Do you do jigsaws? I do. I find them incredibly relaxing. Well, mostly I do. Some are so all-green or all-blue, or such cartoon images that you can’t get a flow going – those ones drive me nuts.
I do them while Mr B is watching football, snooker, golf… He’s even discovered Formula E now, motor racing for electric cars. We have an electric car so that’s not quite as random as it sounds. And talking of sounding strange, an e-car race certainly does. None of the usual roaring engines; more frantic buzzing.
I’ll grudgingly admit it’s quite interesting. The drivers need a whole different strategy as e-cars have only a limited range – ie the number of miles you can drive per charge. And that applies to the racing cars, too. So the drivers have to balance putting the foot down to accelerate and overtake, which can use lots of their power, affecting how long they can keep driving, and using their regenerative braking to restore some of that power. And when they go into the pits they have to swop cars while the used-up one is plugged in and recharged. As I said, a whole different strategy and curiously enthralling in its way.
Anyway, back to my jigsaws…
Look what I discovered in one I did recently. Far from a piece being missing – I had a piece left over!
It’s such a story starter, isn’t it? Missing pieces. Spare parts. Gooseberries. Not fitting in. The bigger picture. So many directions this one can go in.
And in the world of odd coincidence, I chose this image for this week not knowing that our new online guru-ess Karlie had found a Valentine card with a verse about jigsaw pieces. The cosmos works in a strange and wonderful way.
I’m particularly looking for 3000-word stories just now, by the way, if you need a pointer.
PS And if you happen to have a similar jigsaw that’s short by one piece, you know where to come!
Shirley Blair Fiction Ed Shirley’s been with the “Friend” since 2007 and calls it her dream job because she gets to read fiction all day every day. Hobbies? Well, that would be reading! She also enjoys writing fiction when she has time, long walks, travel, and watching Scandi thrillers on TV.
