I had just entered the second trimester of a rather stressful pregnancy and was put on modified home bed rest (aka – couch rest). I went from running three miles every morning and spending long days at the office to spending nintety percent of my time in bed or laying on the couch and wearing pajamas and sweats all day. I was in a funk, and rightfully so if I do say so myself. What can you do stuck on the couch? Was I doing anything at all? Was I even participating in life? I made a list of what I already accomplished that day because I have a personality for which lists are therapeutic: 1 - I breathed. Yeah . . . did that. 2 - I put on a t-shirt in place of my long-sleeved pj top (I had pregnant-lady heat stroke). 3 - I watched TV. 4 - I talked (to my spider friend), 5 - texted (my Mum), 6 - checked Facebook (who else is having problems today? Is there a mind-numbing quiz I can do to kill 5 minutes?), drank water, and ate lunch (gotta feed and water the tiny human growing in there) . . . and on and on my list grew. I realized I did actually accomplish things during the day. I participated in life. I existed. My remaining time on the couch ended up not being that bad. And yes, I was on couch rest until the day the tiny human got evicted. Don’t we all have times like this? Days where you’re just in a funk and don’t feel like doing anything? Eventually, though, we all have to join the world again and participate. We all exist even when we don’t feel like it. This list, as well as my lists for 700+ Verbal Emojis and 1000+ Still Useful words, are proof. While a therapeutic tool for me, and certainly valuable as such, 500+ Happenings to Prove Existence is also great tool for roadblocked writers, advertising professionals, or people who have lost their words such as Alzheimer's patients or those on the Autism scale. Whether you're a counselor, an educator, a writer, or just . . . existing . . . I hope you'll find, through this list, the ways in which your patients, your students, your characters, and YOU can participate in this little experimental play on words, as well as this little experiment we call LIFE.

500+ Happenings to Prove Existence: and how to use them in your writing. (An Experimental Play on Words)

Humor & Entertainment

Laberje, Reji

Grebe, Laura

Humor

Reji Laberje Writing and Publishing

Do you remember a while back when Facebook launched its "hover over for additional reactions" feature? People complained that "thumbs up" wasn't adequate for reacting to people's posts. Nobody wanted to "LIKE" the fact that somebody's Grandmother passed away, but - in the same post, they did desire to like the request for prayers. Enter the sad face. So now you can select from a bunch of emojis. There's a heart, laughing face, crying face, shocked face, and an angry face. Now, for Grandmum's passing, we can display a . . . crying face (which I’ve also seen mistaken for a sweating face, by the way). The selection of emojis for texting is also increasing. In fact, just a quick search of the app store gives me 500+ results for emoji apps and add-ons, each boasting their numbers of hundreds and thousands of emojis because it's not enough that you share a sad face, you want a sad face . . . on a cat (this is the internet, after all). All of these emojis just to express how someone is feeling in a single character. What happens when you can't use a character? And is a character really enough, anyway? In overwhelm, we find ourselves back at "how are you?" and "fine." The following is a list of over 700 words and phrases (710, to be exact) to express how someone feels. Consider these your verbal emojis—the long form of those single character emotions. Verbal emojis are great for expressing a character's feelings, state of mind, reaction, or environment. Verbal emojis can be used to further define a character and help a reader empathize with a character. Verbal emojis create deep and complex characters. Verbal emojis are also perfect to use in writing because, well.....they are WORDS! Whoda thunk? Also great for educators and counselors, I hope you'll enjoy this step beyond thumbs up, heart, laughing, crying, and shocked in the experimental play on words, "700+ Verbal Emojis".

700+ Verbal Emojis: and how to use them in your writing (An Experimental Play on Words)

Reference

Words, Language & Grammar

Have you ever struggled to find just the right word, but you don’t seem to have anything suitable in your….mind? No. Suitable in your . . . notebook . . . collection . . . ensemble? No. Anthology? That’s not it either! Something more like skill set . . . skillset . . . two accepted spellings . . . ugh! Have you ever struggled to find just the right word, but you don’t seem to have anything suitable on the tip-of-your-tongue . . . on your lips . . . in your back pocket? Front pocket? Frontal lobe? I digress. Okay. I get it. I've been there. I've been there as a mother going through unspeakable loss and attempting to journal. I've been there as a writer in my professional life as a patent lawyer. I've been there in my creative linguist art. That's where these books came from . . . this collection . . . this series . . . these Experimental Word Plays. Attempts at finding just the right words . . . the write words . . . the words to write to think to feel to experience. Whether you're observing the world around you, taking note of the world for personal reflection, or creating an entirely new world as a writer, word lists like the one shared in "1000+ Still Useful Words" are tools that can connect you, to your language, to your world, to your life. Filled with opportunities for you to play on your own, enjoy these thousand or so phrases . . . letter melds . . . linguistic conglomerations . . . blurts . . . you know - WORDS.

1000+ Still Useful Words: and how to use them in your writing (An Experimental Play on Words)

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Grebe, Laura. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Grebe, Laura