100 Word Stories

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Six, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was Game.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Thomas
Tura
Lizzie Gudkov
Pau
Zackmann
Tom
Bonchance
Robert
Chris Munroe
Jessi
Fourworlds
Steven The Nuclear Man
Guy
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Danny Dwyer
Cliff
Norval Joe
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

Oh, and let's all have a heaping plate of...

Yummy!

---

Thomas

The game was played with alcohol and chainsaws. Each contestant was to drink 6 ounces of Vodka, fuel and start a chainsaw, and run with it, barefoot, around the city park. The first one to stumble and remove one of their own body parts was the looser, of course, while the last one left standing and remaining out of custody of the police, was the winner. This game was invented by the local crowd at Gateway Tavern in Port Angeles, to celebrate logging. Last week, the game was played, and brought out the State Patrol’s swat team and tac squad.

My 7 year old daughter caught me copying another one of her stories, so the game is up. I have no imagination of my own, and relied on little Rachael for all my submissions. Rachel is home schooled and has a social and intellectual IQ that is off the charts, in spite of her autism. Therefore, I cannot participate in 100 word stories because of my deep shame and embarrassment, much less the ribbing and scolding I’ve had to endure these last, few days. So, with this, goodbye to 100 word stories and the dozens of you that contribute regularly.

Tura

My opponent had considered her move for fully two hours, while I no less intently studied the position, tracing out glimmers of possibility.

"Ah," she adumbrated at last. "Do you see?" She rapidly sketched on the blackboard a braided Diaconescu quincunx.

Thunderstruck, I gasped, "Excluded by Hammersmith duality!"

"Negated by Favisham's Little Theorem."

"But the Fronsky diagram--" Her genius burst on me like a large hadron collider, "--is obstructed in quine!"

"Precisely," she gesticulated, "so! Mornington Crescent!!"

We warmly shook hands. "Thank you," I said, in the traditional acknowledgement of superior play after a hard-fought game, "for enriching my understanding."

Lizzie

“Oh, come on. You didn’t know him; he was just a cat.”

“No, he wasn’t. I have seen photos of him, watched videos with him and heard his voice in the podcast.”

“Aren’t you being overdramatic here?”

“No, all the way across an ocean, I did know him. I felt him drift away. Anyone who has ever shared his life with a cat knows what I mean.”

“Ok. Fine. But wasn’t this supposed to be about games?”

“Yes. But I just don’t feel like it.”

“And you don’t have one hundred words either.”

“Yes, but who cares?”

Pau

“Game is over” she told me crying as I entered home from work.

“What do you mean?” I replied

It was ten o’clock. I had had a special bad day and I was really tired. I didn’t want to fight with her: she always won this kind of matches.

I left my wallet on the floor and let her to explain. She admitted her love affair and she wanted me to be comprehensive.

And I was. In fact I knew something.

Today I had just fired him and now I had a free hand to ask her for the divorce.

Zackmann

First Rule: You are playing The Game.
Second Rule: every time you think about The Game you Lose
Third Rule: Lose of The Game must be announced
No one wins

“I told you forget about that stupid game you cant win. It is over. I am not playing” says Dylan
“You wish you could forget about the game. You are too, everyone is playing even if they don’t know they are” I retort
You know what Crap Mariner did, he picked Game for this weeks topic making you think of The Game. Now repeat after me
“I lost The Game”

Tom

“I’m game.” said jack and raising the Henny shot gun over his shoulder. He and Frank moved along the waterfront following the trail of body parts. “Do you ever get tired of Zombie stories?” inquired Frank when he heard the pack moving to his left. Frank sensiblely froze as Jack leveled the shot gun, then he dropped and rolled towards Jack. The first round took out five of the closest the second the three to the left. From the ground Frank picked off the two on the right. Lifting him to his feet Jack said. “You got game bro.”

Bonchance

“Carl I haven't seen you in ages!

I heard you were laid up and stuck in the house.
Still playing that Misty Realms thing?”

“Yes it is all I have to pass the day.

I am worried about Abraxis though he keeps trying to reach 10th level mage and gets so depressed when he fails.”

“George and Martha the neko couple are divorced again and I'm not so sure they will get back together.

“Carl?”

“Yes Alex?”

“You do know it's just a game, right?”

“What? Oh, yes of course.”

Alex looked at Carl, he was not at all convinced.

Robert

Chronic House of Cards Syndrome, a condition that occurs
post-Parkers-Brothers-Monopoly, broke George Liptom in two, creating
an empty fragment of a child touched by both physical and
psychological pain derived from a nexus of crippling isolation,
self-absorption, paranoia, and the overwhelming anxiety of potentially
landing on Boardwalk or Park Place after a recent hotel development,
which eventually led to drug abuse, a host of sexually transmitted
diseases, chronic inflammation of the bladder, and premature death.
George's story eventually led to federal legislation to demolish the
architecture of all card houses. George's mother could only muster up
these words, "...gingerbread houses."

Munsi

As the assassins kicked in my bedroom door, I knew the game was up.

“Don’t hate the player,” I called as I bolted for the window, “hate the game!”

But they wouldn’t listen.

“You think we’re playing games with you?” Their leader asked as they wrestled me to the floor. “This is no game!”

I thought it was game over for sure, but before they could finish me off, my alarm clock sounded!

I woke just in time to see the team of assassins kicking in my bedroom door. And that’s when I realized…

I was still inside the game.

Jessi

She maintained exactly 5,000 Facebook friends, thousands of Tweeps, a massive FriendFeed, and Klout. Oh, her Klout. She could Plurk, Digg and Buzz while voting, stacking, and Stumbling.

One day, she had an original thought.

She wanted to share it, but she knew it wouldn’t re-tweet (it was too complex). Reddit would hate it. Hundreds of Facebookers would unfriend her without actually reading it. Digg would bury it, and it wouldn’t help her Klout at all.

Realizing she had followers and “friends” everywhere, but no one to talk with, she logged off with a simple hashtag.

#Goodbye

No one noticed.

Fourworlds

Baseball. Football. Basketball. Hockey. I loved them all. Trading cards. Sports Illustrated. Radio play-by-play. My childhood resonated with the unfolding drama of each passing season. That was a long time ago.

I haven't watched a single game since my bookie skipped town and disappeared with my winnings. I was eighteen. Now I'm fifty. Seems like an overreaction. But I don't regret it.

The decision gifted me with tens of thousands of hours over the last three decades. Time that would have otherwise been squandered on trivial sports-related pursuits. I've found much better ways to waste my time.

Steven

The soccer ball careened across the pitch, smacking up a spray of mud
as it hit the ground in front of Mitch. Mitch didn't move, just
stared upward.

The opposing striker ran past, kicking the multicolored sphere into
the goal. John, his words a cursing stream of consciousness mixture
of Joyce and a drunk sailor, ran to Mitch. Mitch didn't respond, even
as John's spittle sprayed across his cheek. Mitch just kept staring
upward, sweat beading on his forehead.

John's cursing slowed. John slowly tilted his head upward just in
time to see the gigantic foot slam into the ionosphere.

Guy

I stretched the line of my bow and shot a straight arrow using magical fire. The Rakuda fell down dead. I looted it. Got some Soft Fur and some coins. I looked for more Rakuda. Only six more to go. I spotted a few more of them, but then I saw it, the majestic Kirin, so rare and beautiful, his long neck towering high above me and his innocent eyes wise, timeless. I fitted my finest arrow and called up all my magic into it, air, water and fire. It shot straight through, killing him on the spot. Epic drop.

Now - I wanted to point out that if this story comes in a little late this time, it’s all Philip ‘NarvelJoe’ Carroll’s fault. You see, I started to listen to The Price of Friendship this weekend and I just can’t stop. Darn you philip for writing such an excellent story. You, gentle listener should listen too if only to understand my predicament. Just follow the cat over to podiobooks.com, look for The Price of Friendship and give it a listen. I guaranty you too are going to miss your deadline. Incidentally, this recommendation is exactly one hundred words long.

TalkMarie

There are countless reality shows about celebrities, famous wannabes and housebound attention hungry strangers. This onslaught is commercial goldmine for media networks and Ryan Seacrest. Survivor is the most successful show that took watching a packaged game to a heightened level of guilty pleasures. Imagine a bunch of misfits and type A personalities competing for cash or love. They do ANYTHING to win. Most gamers lie, cheat, deceive, bully and outwit their competitors. The worst in people, is captured then spoon fed to consumers. If anyone questions such damaging behaviors, there is only one true answer, "it's just a game."

Danny

Our rowboat glided towards the dark beach along the shoreline, as Dr. Strange-Exotic/Cookie's castle at the top of the cliff loomed over the beach, lit only by the light of the full moon overhead. The good Doctor greeted us as we landed on the beach, adorned with many weapons, including an AK47 and a Bazooka. The Doctor looked like a bloated Rambo about to go deer hunting on Dick Cheney's farm. "I take it we will be hunting humans," I stated. "No, your thinking of the MOST dangerous game," Dr. Strange-Exotic/Cookie responded. "This is the LEAST dangerous game, we're hunting mosquitos."

Cliff

I watched them sitting round the table. Five faces, impassive behind the cards, determined to give nothing away. A tell could be anything. A twitch. A smile. To a real player, the eyes could be read like a roadmap.

The red headed kid was the new one in the group. He thought he was playing a friendly game of cards. The regulars saw him as easy prey. He adjusted his cards and then looked at Tina.

“Got any fours?”

My ten year old daughter threw three cards on the table in disgust. Looked like they had a real game now.

Norval Joe

Owen crept through the underbrush, an arrow ready in his bow. Across the meadow, he saw the largest doe of his life.
"An animal that big would feed my uncle and me for a year," he thought and raised the bow.
"What're you doing?" A girl's voice asked from behind him, and the deer ran away.
Owen turned, furious. A girl his own age, maybe seven or eight, frowned at him.
"This isn't a game," Owen shouted. "My uncle and I needed that deer to eat."
She glared and said. "This is my Grampa's meadow, and that was our cow."

Planet Z

There once was a cat who liked to play Fetch.

If you threw his toy mouse, he’d chase it, pick it up, and bring it back.

Sometimes, he’d bring you a toy, expecting you to throw it for him to chase.

When his toys were piled up, he’d take them away from the pile.

People watched him play this game on a webcam, trying to guess which toy he’d take next.

When the Christmas tree went up, he’d put his toys under the tree, one by one.

Now that he’s gone, the toys sit on a shelf, just gathering dust.

Weekly Challenge #306 - Game

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 42:16 — 19.3MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Five, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was The Meaning Of Life.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Chris Munroe
Zackmann
Thomas
Jessi
Botgirl
Tura
Scott V
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Lizzie Gudkov
Sail2Byzantium
Taralyn
Jeff Hema
WareCats
Buttermilk
Tom
Guy
Bonchance
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Pamela
Danny Dwyer
Cliff
Norval Joe
Steven The Nuclear Man
TREED
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

Munsi

The Meaning of Life

Life’s what happens when you’re making other plans.

Tho’ in my case, I didn’t make plans.

I didn’t have time to, between my day job, the writing, the comedy projects and endless drinks with friends. There was always too much going on to stop, focus and make plans.

Does that make my life less meaningful?

The meaning of a life is shown in what you choose to focus on, but I’ve been so unfocused…

So I’ll put it to you: what does this make the meaning of my life? I’d love to ponder it, but I have shit to do.

Zackmann

Her house looked like that movie scene in which bad guys torn the place apart.
She said "Zack, What are you doing?”
“I am looking for the mean of life.” he replied.
“How many times do I have to tell you that even though I work on Sunday morning there is no reason why you cant go to church yourself.”
“You dont understand.”
“Try me”she said
“I borrowed Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life DVD from the local library. If I dont find it, I must pay a late fee and replacement cost as well as a restocking charge.”

Thomas

He strove to be the meanest, stingiest, grouchiest, smelliest, most dreadful man in the group. He hated groups, and this group of strict conservatives, and all it stood for, irritated him to the point of piercing a hole through his stomach with his own, self-generated brew of stomach acid, thus threatening his life and causing him untold pain--as if he was shot through his middle with a burning bowling ball. He joined and tried to keep his words and opinions to himself, but manners and smell forced the group to disband within minutes of the opening of the meeting.

##

Professor T continued work on her latest book, The Meaning of Life. The Professor taught philosophy 101 and Beginning Zen Archery at the local community college. An eccentric woman, The Professor was convinced that her book would answer all the questions that people had about the true meaning of life. The first few chapters contained hundreds of equations and logic diagrams, totally incomprehensible to anyone that attempted to slog through it. The balance of her book was filled with crude drawings and diagrams, interspersed with obscene caricatures. The professor’s work ultimately concluded that the Meaning of Life was continually reductive.

Jessi

Demeaning of Life, by Jessi Firethorn (with apologies to Cole Porter)

Cole had the right idea, I thought, forking the gooey mass on the half-shell. Life’s about the experiment. When Gabriel blows that horn, this prodigal will head home having spent all ten talents, made blue lagoons of life’s lemons, and battle-rammed every door that got in my way! These delicacies are touted to boost the heart, brain and libido, and this oyster is mine.

Slurp. Swallow. Well, almost swallow. All 50 million Frenchmen were wrong. This is disgusting. This is detestable. Return these to the bay, please, and check that off de-list.

Now, who knows how to dance the Beguine?

Tura

I saw a sage, who declared to the crowd about him, "Life has no meaning!" And a second nearby shouted to his admirers, "That life has no meaning, IS its meaning!" And likewise a third preached, "Life has only the meaning you give it!" And I marvelled that each group looked fiercely upon the others, and would come to blows.

So I shouted, "Pshaw! One cannot insert so much as a cigarette paper between your beliefs!" And they united as brothers to beat me and drive me away, then returned to their strife.

That was the meaning of their lives.

Scott

Stanley lived quietly in the cheap suit his mother bought him as a graduation present. He spent his evenings carefully arranging his turnips in their prescribed order on the bric-a-brac shelf. He had carved them in occupational therapy, carefully contouring the surface of each to resemble a family member. He found the taproot useful to serve as the tails of kittens he wished to own. Stanley didn’t work. He’d made his money dumping buckets of boner pills into the inboxes of the unsuspecting. Squishing the turnip head of his mother made it all worthwhile.

Chris

(No Text Sent)

Lizzie

“What is the meaning of life, dear?” he asked with a naughty look on his face. “Is it the two of us touching each other, up and down?”

She had a severe cold and was certainly not geographically motivated.

“The meaning of life?”

He nodded enthusiastically.

“Well, it’s having a sweet hot chocolate, and a bitter chocolate for when I need to bite my tongue,” she said crisply.

“What about me?” he pleaded.

“You don’t taste like chocolate. You taste like… damped cereals.”

“Damped cereals?!” he asked.

To which she rolled her eyes and said, “Ok, pass the bitter chocolate.”

Sail2Byzantium

I found the crack in the floorboards searching for Barbie in the dark. A tiny pillar of light seeped through it. I examined the crack, poking my finger in, but I had to look. At first, it was just flickers of light with the sound of glass clinking on glass. Odd smells emanated from below like a cross between catbox and bad eggs.

A man in a mask stood beneath me at a table. The mask came off and it was Daddy. Relieved, I tucked myself again. But, one night a few weeks later, the lab exploded beneath me.

TaraLyn

I lean back on the rock ledge and dangle my feet into the cool water. The morning sun slowly comes around the corner and caresses my body. I pick up my book and open it to the bookmark. It is so quiet, all I hear is the water smoothing out the bank. I smell the leaves on the ground...the crisp air relaxes me as my hair lifts off my shoulder floating on the breeze. I watch ducks float by and think..I bet they are good friends. My eyes focus on the page and read, This is the meaning of life.....

Jeff

It was 5 am when my cellphone vibrated. I opened my eyes instantly.

« He bought the farm, call mum ».

This is the second time I’ve had to go through this predicament. The first time I was 7 years old.

I still react the same way, I’m never affected by the death of a family member but by the tears my relatives drop.

Undaunted, I woke up an hour later and left the house for my job interview .

I felt just OK. Am I turning into Dexter? No, perish the thought!

People come and go, that’s the way the cookie crumbles.

WareCats

When we are little children we never wonder about “what is the meaning of life?”

Then we grow to our teens years and wonder “what is this life for?”
In our twenty’s we believe it is all about working, schooling and “how to get ahead in life.”

Through out our adult life we ponder “what have I done that is worthwhile in my life?”

The golden years hit and there you are holding that brand new grandchild in your arms.
It is then that you realize you have found that this is the true “meaning of life.”

Buttermilk

Row: Said three times for emphasis, it's a call to action. Life's not a spectator's sport. YOUR boat: You can't row someone else's. Stop trying. Gently: Don't be so hard on yourself. Try to take it easy. DOWN the stream: Go with the flow. The stream knows where it's going. Merrily: Said four times for effect. Stop taking yourself so seriously, and try to have some fun! Life is but a dream: This one or any other is nothing but a thinly veiled illusion. So many chase the Meaning of Life, but it turns out we learned it as kids.

Tom

Your warm, fed, no one messes with your space, you don’t even need to breath. Then some jerk with forceps grabs your head, turns you up side down, and slaps you on the ass. You’re the smallest kid on the playground. The bigger kids give you a ration of shit. As you move from peer group to peer group the amount of unkind acts pile to the heavens. Your boss, ex-wife, and anyone having a bad day make sure you will have a bad day. Somehow the well of human kindness springs eternal in spite of the meaning of life.

Guy David

They where a paper clip company. When they created the paper clip making robot, they instilled in him a sense of the importance of making paper clips. Paper clip making became his reason for being. The presentation went well. They turned him on, and he sipped from a pile of previously prepared materials, quickly converting them to paper clips, then he run out of materials. First, the meeting room table went. The technicians tried to shut him off but he converted them as well, then he stormed through the building converting everything and everyone, then he went for the exit.

Bonchance

In times we experience some turmoil and strife,
we may find ourselves asking the meaning of life.
Some of us in youth might seek elders for advise,
perhaps with age we'll get an answer that is wise.
So once in that moment I went to my mentor
asking the old man what we were put on this earth for.
Grandfather told me stories of things he had been through,
of wonderful people and those also who were cruel.
Boy, you don't have to be a genius or even very clever,
the answer is quite simple, you just need to endeavor.

Botgirl

"Oh my god, he's right!" she said out of nowhere from across the bed. "Life IS getting meaner."

"Who's right?" I mumbled, half asleep. Definitely not ready for the morning after.

"I think his name is Monty something," she said.

I had the same kind of fuzzy memory of her name, but it didn't seem an appropriate time to bring it up.

"Anyway, Natasha loaned me his movie yesterday and I just figured out what the title means."

I had to ask.

"The Meaning of Life," she said.

Yeah. I went home with the waitress. Again. Damn you Warren Zevon.

RedGoddess

There are many questions that will haunt mankind for generations to come. Who am I will top the list. What is love is another and of course the meaning of life will be philosophical icing. In this era of TV gurus, we have many masters to turn to, from Oprah to Chopra but we're still puzzled by the contradictions. Sadly, we're left with more questions than answers. I wonder when one is economically drained, deprived, desperate and depressed, is that a priority? Whatever motivates one to get out of bed daily, will ultimately reveal how they live through the meanings.

Pamela

Why?

I still hated New York, but with half of the city's scum frightened to be alone in the alleys, I couldn't quit.

Before he lost consciousness, one asked me, "Why?"

I was glad he couldn't see my face because it was blank. I had no answer. The next several nights, I wandered, thinking. The risk, the late nights, no social life.

Then: a muffled plea, scuffling feet. A block. An alley. A woman, a man, a purse.

And me.

And the answer. It was simple and, as I moved her away from the mess, rewarded by two words: thank you.

Danny

My fictional son and I were making our escape from my violent non-fictional ex-wife across the Arizona desert on the back of a donkey named “Meatloaf Flying Spaceship.” I asked aloud, “What is the meaning of life?” Meatloaf responded, which left me stunned, I had no idea the donkey could speak. “Life would be more meaningful if you guys would get your fat asses off my back so I could breathe.” We quickly obliged. ”I think all of our lives will have more meaning if we just keep fleeing from your crazy ex-wife.” After spotting my ex-wife in the distance, I quickly agreed.

Cliff

Marie's Quest

I found it.
-Found what?
The meaning of life.
-Oh, really? Fortune cookie or box of cracker jacks?
Neither! I did the pilgrimage and found the guru. He’s lived alone in a cave for thirty years meditating on it.
-Ok, I’ll bite. What did he say.
Sex.
-Sex?
Yep. Wild passionate sex.
-Really?
That’s right.
-A guy who’s been alone in a cave for years thinks sex is the meaning of life. Did he tell you this or show you?
Well, both. Why?
-Oh, Marie.
Do you think he was taking advantage of me?
-It’s clown college all over again.

Norval Joe

Owen looked from his uncle to Cindy's grandfather and beyond to the unknown woman brooding by the door.
"I'm engaged to Cindy?" he asked. "When were you going to tell me?"
"Owen," The dark woman said, "My name is Shareeka. I'm the wizardess who hid you here. You and Cindy must be presented, together, on her 16th birthday, or all our effort, indeed your very lives, would have been without meaning."
"So," Owen said. "We have to find where the princess is hidden, get her, and get back by her birthday?"
"That's right, Owen," Shareeka said. "You have 42 days."

Steven the Nuclear Man

Chasing Someone with Dynamite

"Father, what is the meaning of life?"

He sat back on his bench, running a hand through his thinning hair.

He knew.

He knew the touch of her hair and hands on his back. He knew the glow
of her skin in morning sunlight, the spice smell of her sweat.

The way the universe hid inside her eyes when she said she loved him.

"It is," he lied through the screen, "to love the Lord God with all
our heart, all our mind, and all our soul."

Father Adam closed the panel, sat back, and remembered Lilith as he wept.

TREED

Bob and Dave, the Existentialism Experiment

“The meaning of life?”

“Yes, Bob, the meaning of life.”

“Well, Dave, you contemplating the meaning of life is, well, quite frightening.”

“Frightening?”

“Yep. Means you are actually Thinking. A scary though I know not of, Dave.”

“Bob.”

“Dave.”

“You ended that sentence with a preposition.”

“Why Dave, I did not know you knew what that was.”

“Not funny, Bob.”

“I’m sorry, Dave.”

“Now, back to the point.”

“Which is…?”

“The meaning of Life.”

“I don’t actually have an answer for you, Dave, but I do have the answer to Life the universe and everything.”

“Really? What is it?”

“42”

Planet Z

The meaning of Life?
It’s just fucking cereal.
There’s no hidden messages in there at all, no ulterior motives.
If you pour it out on the table, it’s not going to resolve any deep mysteries of the universe.
Just put it in a goddamned bowl, pour some milk over it, and eat it.
I don’t care if Mikey likes it or not.
Fuck Mikey.
All that matters is you and this bowl of cereal.
Eating it won’t make you complete… it’s just a nutritious part of a complete breakfast.
Quit making such a big deal.
And pass the orange juice

Weekly Challenge #305 - The Meaning Of Life

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 55:43 — 25.5MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Four, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was Crack.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Jessi Firethorn
Tom
Thomas
Lizzie Gudkov
Tura
Chris Munroe
Zak Claxton
Jeff Hema
Buttermilk
Steven The Nuclear Man
Zackmann
Bonchance
Guy
Botgirl
Danny Dwyer
Cliff/Uncle Monster
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Norval Joe
TJ
TREED
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

JESSI

CRACK IS
WHACK

The storm sirens had been going off all night. The wind had been gusting up to 50mph for a couple of hours. Drenched and shivering, I was throwing newspapers, envying these who had jobs that allowed them to sleep until daylight.

“Crack.”

The sound above me was not loud, but it was distinct and ominous. One of these 1942 shelterbelt tree branches was about to come crashing down, but which one? Which way should I run? I froze.

“Whack.”

As the lights blurred and the pain came, I wondered if they would tip for the paper on the porch.

TOM

A CODE OF HONOR

Crack. It sounded like a cow’s rib getting hit with a baseball bat. She dropped to the floor of the kitchen. I always thought Timmy was a dick, but stepping purposely on that tiny crack in the driveway was just plain cold. Mrs. Franks wasn’t the nicest mom on the block but you just don’t break your mother’s back, thus the sing song rhyme. There was only one thing the kids could do to set things right. We bury him in the ground up to his head and pour honey over it and let the fire ant go to town

THOMAS

There was a crack in the fabric of time. Johnny had been putzing around with the equipment in his dad’s workshop, and he cobbled together a device made up of three, usually independent devices.
After he put power to the main unit, he heard an enormous roar, and when he looked out the window he saw a jagged tear in the horizon, and each half of the panorama fell away to reveal a deep, black rift,
seemingly empty and going on to infinity. He examined it more closely with his telescope, and noticed some licorice jellybeans.

##

Pouring the glass of vodka, she popped Zoloft, and morphine, and stirred in an ounce of elixir of turpin hydrate; neat. A couple of lines of Bolivian marching powder off the tub’s shelf, then a
large rock of crack in her pipe, taking off the edge. She ran scales, warming her voice for the concert, and started to feel better. She spun around a few times to the left, to the right, then sank
beneath the bath water. The last thing she saw before she drew her last breath was the bottom of the rubber duck floating above her head.

LIZZIE

Special Valentine Special

Valentine’s Day is such a chocolaty day. It starts with kisses and… chocolates obviously. There are “I love yous” Forever-and-Ever and Never. Candle light romantic dinners and kisses and… chocolates, of course. A nice piece of jewelry in a velvety box magically opens way for more kisses and more “I love yous”, while the romantic candle burns lethargically. I have nothing against Valentine’s Day, mind you. Cuddly arms waiting, drab kisses and velvety forevers are just so special. Never will come back tomorrow in harsh tones of reality. But, yes, Valentine was great, thank you for asking.

and...

(No text sent - check her site)

TURA

The crack of doom shall swallow up this world
And all that is upon it be destroyed
Resolved into-- yes, what?

Uncle, if this is a sonnet, you'll never fit it into 100 words at that rate.

Tish, attention span of young people these days... Ok, the first quatrain says the world will end, the second lists some ways it could happen, the third says we'd better get to the stars before it does, and the couplet ties a Shakespearean ribbon on it. Howzat?

But now it isn't a poem!

This conversation's just 100 words though. I'll send it instead!

(And for anyone who can stretch to reading 113 words, the whole sonnet is at turabrez.blogspot.com)

MUNSI MUNSI!

CRACK

If I understand correctly, people with cancer cook meth.

Right?

I mean, that dude from that show that one time had cancer and he cooked meth like crazy! By the end of the second season the cancer was in full remission.

I don’t completely understand what the connection between the two is, I’m not a doctor, but it was pretty clear.

Cooking and selling meth cures cancer.

I think that’s how it works, anyway. There could be something I’m missing…

But it’s all very abstract. I don’t have cancer.

I just have a lingering cold.

So: Wanna buy some crack?

ZAK

One year, our company rented a white van to get around Vegas during the trade show, figuring it would be cheaper than taking cabs everywhere.

Arriving in the morning, we parked in the convention center lot and went in to do our business-like schmoozing and bullshitting that one does at a show. That evening, we walked out to find that about 50 identical white vans were parked in a row, and none of us could recall exactly where we'd parked, nor identify any distinguishing features of our particular van.

We all took cabs back to Caesar's Palace.

JEFF HEMA

SCOLDING

'We are not just hanging out here. We have aims to reach, buddy! Last time you had an A was at the first semester.'

'I am a tough cookie but I can’t help it, the exam was tougher than me. I will catch up teacher.'

‘That’s because you have tunnel vision toward my explanations.’

We can tell since that day that he saw the light. He was convinced that only hard work and discipline are keys to success.

The whole incident happened when he got the worst grade in class, so a wake-up call was necessary.

BUTTERMILK

Alone. wandering a wasteland, dragging my heavy, frozen heart through the dry sand. The thick layer of ice around it, a necessary precaution against the brutal mutilation it had endured. I thought I would never be so vulnerable again. I was a strong stoic, heaving my burden across the desolate landscape. I went to see the sacrifice everyone was so enthralled with. There, a gorgeous beacon of light stood by the entrance, offering guidance and direction. You spoke truth to me, and i heard the groaning of the ice around my heart just before it shattered with a loud CRACK!!!

STEVEN THE NUCLEAR MAN

"That woman was very nice. You were very polite to that woman." I am talking to myself. Just to keep my social skills in practice. There are few visitors since the highway moved.

I glance out the window to the motel, to her room. "You shared supper with her. Maybe you really were... sexually interested."

"No!" I yell as I hear the woman scream down below.

"Oh God, Mother," I yell, running for the motel, "Oh God Mother, what have you done?" I step on every crevice in the sidewalk, but I know Mother will never, never, leave me alone.

ZACKMANN

Hey, did you see that news article that Paul Cooley guy posted about the underbelly of The Street? Apparently cookie dough is to puppets what crack is to humans. Like many of our favorite shows of childhood there was an unknown drug problem behind the scenes. Cookie Monster often came on set so toasted on cookie dough that he couldn’t complete a sentence in proper English. Do you you think they started only letting Cookie eat fresh produce on screen because the network cared about children’s health? So what do you know, it wasn’t George Lucas who ruined your childhood.

“Oh my, Nicky, you look like you look like you got the stuffing beat out of you.”
“Oh Rod, I couldn’t tell who it was. It was so dark but when he demanded my wallet he sounded so much like Ernie”
“Let me stitch you up before you make a mess.”
“Rod it must have gotten really bad for a Street puppet to come all the way to Avenue Q”
“Nicky that is what happens to a neighborhood after cookie dough additions. I don’t know how we can ever feel safe in
this city again. I hate the Street Puppets”

BONCHANCE

CRACK!

The US economy was finally starting to rebound thanks to another influx of the yuan. The year was 2046. The United States was no longer involved in any wars of any kind. They forfeited their role as the world police. George was going over the current events. He needed to determine the signature color of the day, in support of the new government initiative that started this month. George half heard the restaurant clown on the television commercial say “and remember boys n girls about our limited time deal, you get a free side of McCrack with every meal!”

GUY DAVID

A crack opened at the edge of the universe. I took out the key and closed it since that’s what I do. I track the cracks and close them with a matching key. I have a key for every crack. Once I close the crack I sniff the vacuum of space for another one. There is always another one. My job is never done. The universe is not merely curved, it’s cracked. Here - I can smell another one. Guess I have my work cracked out for me. Someone managed to hinder another part of this universe. Won’t they ever learn?

BOTGIRL

NEWT ON CRACK

Crack.
"Ouch!"
Crack.
"I want you stop, goddamn it!"
Crack.
"How can I remember the safe word if you dont let . . ."
Crack.
I'm warning you. I'm a fucking attorney. I will sue your . . ."
Crack. Crack.
Sorry. I was joking. You know I could never let this go public. My wife. My constituents. My . . ."
CRACK.
"Ow!"
CRACK. CRACK. CRACK.
"Shit. Is that blood running down my back? You could scar me permanantly. What if some papparazi shoots me on the beach?"
CRACK.
"Oh my god. Oh my god! What was that fucking safe word?"
CCCCCCRRRRRAAAAACCCCCKKKKK!
"Jesus H. Christ!"
"Finally," she said.

DANNY

Bubbles, the high class prostitute, back from Holland and her insane search for the Hollish, is back in her upper east side condo in Manhattan. Relaxing in bed nude, with her statuesque boyfriend John, she grinds up crack cocaine, then snorts it out of the crack of John's ass. Bubbles states, "I can't believe there are no Hollish people in Holland, just all of these Dutch." John responds, "I can't believe you keep snorting crack cocaine out of my ass after what happened to Whitney Houston." "Your right, John," states Bubbles, as she sprinkles the crack into a joint instead.

CLIFF/UNCLEMONSTER

TAKING LIBERTY

I used to think being obsessive compulsive helped me be a better thief. After all, I never ever left fingerprints.
If I break in, I fix it on the way out. I leave NO evidence.

The last job I did was in Philadelphia. It went so smoothly that I had time to see the local sights. Betsy Ross’s house. Independence hall. Then I saw it. The crack. I knew I had to fix it. I had to. I really have no choice. Which is a problem. How am I going to get a one ton bell back to my garage?

REDGODDESS

She's dubbed the golden voice of her generation. Her songs make you feel emotions you thought were buried deeper than your heart. This rag to riches diva found herself seduced by the traps of hollywood fame. She had access to all chemicals with a price tag. She married and divorced a bad boy, the epitome of crackish. In spite of her demons, she remained beloved by fans pulling for her. Countless failed rehab attempts, she became disillusioned by sustained wealth to declare "crack is whack" to the media personalities, who judged yet admired her as another "gone too soon" celebrity.

NORVAL JOE

Owen peered through a crack in the door.
His uncle spoke with Cindy's grandfather and a slender, dark haired woman, dressed entirely in black.
"Owen," Uncle Fleck called. "Get out here."
"Yes, sir," Owen said, stepping through the doorway.
"Not much time, boy," Fleck said. "Listen. We've been hiding you here from an evil wizard. You're a prince, heir to the throne."
"Ummm," Owen said unsure what to say.
"Turns out, your friend Cindy is a princess and heir to a throne of her own," Fleck continued. "You two were betrothed as babies. Problem is, the evil wizard has her."

TJ

The MUSEUM of FAMILY HISTORY - GOING UP

We picked our way through to what turned out to be a stairwell although
it resembled nothing so much as a tunnel defined by old dingy clothes
and piles of garbage. If the second floor had a ceiling it wasn’t in
evidence, although it certainly wasn’t open to the sky. But as we left
the main floor I couldn’t shake the impression that we weren’t alone
in Grandma’s house. And what she referred to as Uncle Jake’s
collection of 83 jelly jar glasses – some with jelly still in ‘em!
she said – wasn’t the only thing creeping me out any more.

The MUSEUM of FAMILY HISTORY - DOLLIES

The second floor clutter was more organized, placed when Grandpa was
able to get around up there more easily. An inventor, he held onto
anything that might be useful. But what use was a room lined floor to
ceiling with shelves of creepy baby doll heads? The limbs had been
configured along a towering armature, hundreds of cracked and naked
plastic doll limbs arranged so as the door was opened, a ball rolled
down along a track among them and they sprang unnervingly to life,
waving about and what was worse, the eyes in the heads flickered open
and shut.

TREED

“OH! BOB!”

“Oh geez. What is it now Dave?”

“LOOK!”

“What, Dave? Look at what?”

“I can’t describe this, Bob. You just have to look for yourself. But, HURRY!”

“Dave, I have told you, things that get you this excited tend to cause me some kind of pain. Physical, mental, emotional, psychic pain.”

“But Bob!”

“Don’t push it Dave.”

“OK, but can I tell you something?”

“Sure, Dave.”

“Whitney Houston’s right.”

“What do you mean Dave?”

“Crack is whack.”

“What?”

“You know that plumber that moved in across the street?”

“Oh, no.”

“Yep. Seems there’s a new moon a risin’.”

PLANET Z

CHIEF

The chief tapped me and my partner.

“Go get him,” he said. “Now.”

We grabbed the kid out of a restaurant on Main Street.

He didn’t resist.

Chief took one look at him, smirked: “Put him in the hole.”

So, we put him in the special isolation cell we’ve got in the basement of the station.

The chief collected up keys. “This one’s mine.”

He won’t let anyone down there to check on the kid.

It’s been a week.

“I don’t tell you how to raise your kids,” he growled.

He went back into the basement.

And locked the door.

Weekly Challenge #304 - Crack

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 54:51 — 25.1MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Three, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was A.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Barbara Blackcinder
Thomas
Murray
Tura
Chris Munroe
Lizzie Gudkov
Tom
Zackmann
TREED
Guy
Botgirl
Bonchance
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Steven The Nuclear Man
Cliff
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Danny Dwyer
Pamela
Norval Joe
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

Barbara

I wanted to explore the other end of the tunnel
So I squeezed into it and headed for the light
I knew it was the end because here it was dark
I ducked as I walked, pulled my elbows in tight
I crouched some more, tossed my hat back off behind me
Got down on my knees and made shorter steps
Onto my belly I crawled like a snake
Only to find at my arms furthest reach
My finger extended until I touched with a nail
I saw end of the tunnel was just a flashlight

Thomas

Professor T had tunnel vision. He had no peripheral vision at all, and he could only see one student at a time as they sat in the front row. He would always focus on Jezzabel because she wore a red sweater, and was very buxom. Students arriving late would sit on each side of her as they slipped into the room twenty to thirty minutes late. Professor T wrote on the board in a long, narrow, vertical column, squeezing his lecture notes into a space only a few inches wide, while the rest of the twenty-foot wide whiteboard remained vacant.

##

Roberto’s tunnel stretched from his yard, under his neighbor’s garage, and into Texas from his home in Piedras Negras. He used the tunnel to visit his girlfriend. It took him five years of digging, and his tunnel was lighted and secure. He lined the walls with concrete. Roberto liked his tunnel so much he began to spend time in the tunnel even when he wasn’t visiting. He’d take his lunch down, and began sleeping there. As time passed, Roberto invited his friends down. Soon, he added a sound system and bar. Roberto’s Tunnel opened last Friday, serving dinner and beer.

Murray

People know about some of the caverns that run under the city, but few know how far they extend.

Under the bustling streets, 350 kilometers of tunnels lay. Some lengths are a tourist attraction, filled with the bones of the nameless that cluttered massive cemeteries years ago. Some lengths have been sealed off and are now inaccessible. Warnings have been issued that the unsecured caverns are unsafe, and should be avoided. There is no light, no map, and nobody who can help those who venture in and become disoriented.

That knowledge still doesn't keep me from screaming for help.

Tura

We step out of the cage a vertical mile down the main shaft, into a side tunnel cut by an autonomous minebot. It's smart enough to decide for itself the best directions to explore. But it's broken down, and it's too expensive to write off.

We plod single file down its sweltering, twisting tunnel. The robots are programmed to avoid each other, but we find the bot's rear end sliced off by another tunnel intersecting this one.

A sudden commotion behind. Something explodes out of the wall, obliterating one of my men. Something alive.

The surface is very far above.

Munsi

“See that light at the end of the tunnel?” Ben Affleck asked.

He was a professional, and he could do this. He was an actor, actors do their job without editorial, and he’d manage.

It just didn’t seem fair.

He owned an Oscar. An Oscar for screenwriting. To be reduced to dialogue like this…

But it was his own fault. He should’ve demanded a complete script, but he’d signed on to make the movie because Daredevil was awesome, and it was too late to back out.

It was time to finish his line.

“That’s not heaven, that’s the A train.”

Lizzie

“I understand nothing of tunnels!”

“I really don’t care, that is the challenge for the week.”

“But what should I write?”

“I don’t care. Just write anything.”

“Tunnel…”

“Yep, tunnel, go for it.”

“Cut-and-cover.”

“What?”

“Or clay-kicking, I like this one.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“Tunnels!”

“Oh, boy… She has just started doing these challenges and she is already going bonkers… she is hopeless…”

“No! Check it out. Here, look.”

“I don’t want to read that; get that away from my face.”

“Double-deck.”

“Shut up…”

“”Pipe jacking.”

“Shut… up…”

“Or box jacking.”

“Oh, shut up already!”

Tom

The bark banged into the shore. Burroughs, St Peter, and the Podcaster set foot on a sea of faces held fast in a mudflat that stretched beyond the horizon. With mics and mixers to a man this was the Plane of Podcasters threshold to hell. “Is that you son.” plead a face? “Dad,” said the Podcaster. “My dad’s not dead, you’re Norman Sherman. Bit me.” Across time and space a spark arched across the tunnel. The pads in the Houston bus suddenly released their charge and the unconscious passenger buck with the electrical jolt. Eye popped open. “WTF.”

Zackmann

When I was a kid my family went on a vacation and tried spelunking. When the tourguide said you had to climb down really far on a long ladder then the opening was four feet high, I ran to my mother who was waiting in our family car and said “I don't want to die!” My siblings told me how much fun it was watching our father duck walk.
Oddly when I visited my father at work in the Transportation Building, I thought the tunnel between it and the Minnesota State Capital Building was the coolest thing since sliced bread.

Treed

Bob & Dave and the Tunnel of Love
by TREED!
Hey, Bob! Look over there!
Dave, what excites you usually causes me pain, so no, I am not looking.
But Bob, it’s a TUNNEL!
A tunnel?
Yes, Bob, a tunnel.
Is it lit? I mean, like have actual lights in it that are on? Or is dark?
Looks dark to me, Bob.
Then, no, Dave, I am not going there.
Well, can’t we just go look?
You go ahead, Dave.
Maybe it’s the “Tunnel of Love”? Hey! Bob, I see a light!
Dave, what’s that sound?
OH BOB! It’s the TRAIN OF LOVE!!
Dave, you are dead to me now.

Guy

Insanity must have drove me beyond all odds. I couldn't see any light at the end, but I drove on. Visions on the wall might have been wrong, might have been true, but they didn't deter me, always moving forward. My goal, my destination stayed hidden just beyond my reach. I carefully and methodically cleared obstacles as I came to recognize them, but more still came, revealing themselves as they came my way. My goal never came closer. I would keep on driving myself forward through this long wide tunnel. Nothing would drive me backwards. It's the drive that meters.

####

She had the staff that metes, commonly known as the broom, and she enjoyed driving it through traffic tunnels. The rush of cars coming out through the other side, bumping into each other made her giggle. Getting rid of the evidence was a little messy. Usually it involved accurately targeted lightning bolts, directed at various witnesses, both in car and outside. She did enjoy the various commentators, both on television and in YouTube. She liked it when they called her “a force of nature”. It was when they started connecting her to the ozone layer that she gave up though.

Botgirl

We've been stuck in this so-called tunnel of love since 2110. It's been dead and dark for fifty years now. Except for us. As the last living testement to human hubris, we've been cursed to spend the passing decades in this dank, dim place; our micro-fusion cores burning down far too slowly through the endless twilight.

We don't know where you've gone, why you left, or if you'll return some day. It's just us. The biocybernetic miracles of the golden age. Calling out to you.

We're transmitting live. So if you can hear this, Happy Valentine's Day motherfuckers.

Bonchance

Milton plugged the network to his "printer". The innards of the printer were removed. Installing a network tunnel and ghost bridge inside. Still on the phone, "And I said, I don't care if they lay me off either, I told Bill that if they move my desk one more time, then I'm, I'm quitting. The firewall blocks my Oprah show and it's not okay because if they take my Oprah then I'll set the building on fire...I'm in the basement next to the furnace and can now watch Oprah in peace. Milton cleaned his desktop straightening the swingline stapler.

Chris

I walk slowly down the dimly lit cobblestone road. I turned a corner and gaped. In front of me was the world most vicious beast to have ever existed. The beast was as tall as a basket ball hoop, had a red eye and a gold eye. It is said that if you look into its third eye you burn and turn to a gold statue. But this one had only two eyes and a scar on its face. Then I realized why it had not moved. It was dead. I took a breath then i turned and walked away.

Steven

Plasma splashes against the ship's hull; comm-carried screams dissolve into malfunctioning static. Sheila's synthesized voice holds no emotion. "Shields have failed. Structural damage to port engine pylons."

The rest of the crew looks back at me. My lieutenant's bars never felt so heavy. "Jenkins," I ask, "have you raised the captain?"

Jenkins looks at me. "The away team are not responding."

"Enemy ship approaching attack range," Sheila says.

Damn the captain for taking the whole bridge crew with him. Again. I feel sick.

"Get us out of here," I say, and the ship falls into the wormhole between the stars.

Clifford

The portals opened all over Earth and they poured through.

I suppose they had a name for themselves, but we never learned it. All we knew about them was that they could breathe our air, drink our water, and that they could kill us. We finally learned to kill them back. It wasn’t easy. They were tough, but they weren’t invincible and we were motivated.

We taught them that humans didn’t give up easily. We taught them how to die. We taught them that lesson a lot. There’s only one lesson left to teach them.

Tunnels can go both ways.

Red/TalkWithMarie

It took 30 years for the state to build a world class tunnel, to be named after its favorite baseball player. Residents fought unsuccessfully for a voter-inclusive process. Local media labeled them over-zeaIous and unpatriotic. In spite of being ignored by politicians, the design committee and other power players, they were invited to the tunnel opening ribbon cutting ceremony. That morning, the Governor proudly took center stage among donors and residents. Just as he lifted the giant scissors, six three-ton sections of a concrete ceiling came crashing. Everyone ran away and left him buried in the rubble, tangled in red ribbon.

Danny Dwyer

We stared at the railroad tracks at the entrrance of the tunnel. "Hey, the Dude, I dare you to run through the tunnel before the next train comes along," I stated.. "Your crazy," the Dude responded. "Come on, the tunnel is only 10 feet long," I responded, "you'll be able to beat any train." Heh, the tracks at the other side of the tunnel were angled at 90 degrees, oncoming trains whipped around that curve faster than one could react. The dude almost made it out of the tunnel before getting smacked by a train. There's just something about a train that's magic.

Pamela

I hated New York, but that's where the job was. The alleys, while convenient shortcuts, can be like tunnels. You're trapped. I was afraid of being raped or mugged. So I took martial arts and Krav Maga. One night I got ambushed. Tourists scared the creeps off before anything really happened, but it rattled me. Scared but determined, I jumped a mugger and left him in a dumpster the next night. And the night after that. And now the rapists and muggers fear the city's open tunnel ways. Yep, I hate New York, but this is where the job is.

Norval Joe

Owen dozed while he walked and held unconsciously to the rope.
He woke when his shoulder brushed stone where the cavern closed off into a narrow tunnel. He ran his fingertips along its surface and recognized the horizontal grooves of gouges or chisels.
Owen's eyes shot open and he gasped, "There's a light ahead."
Faint and far off, a distant glow betrayed an exit, or room with a fire.
"We must stay silent," Traveller, the Ranger whispered.
They crept forward silently focused on the circle of light, oblivious to the creature that pulled itself from the lake in the cavern.

Planet Z

The Downtown Tunnel System connects all of the important office buildings and parking garages.

It's like an airport terminal down there, with restaurants, convenience stores, barber shops, and even doctors and dentists offices.

Elevators and stairwells connect to the surface, not that you want to go up there.

That's where the bums are.

They know not to come down into the tunnels, but every now and then, one comes down, and they're so easy to spot in their ragged tattered and reeking clothes.

We don't return them to the surface.

We send them deeper... and close the hatch behind them.

Weekly Challenge #303 - Tunnel

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 53:38 — 24.6MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Two, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was A.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Thomas
Tura
Botgirl
Lizzie Gudkov
Bonchance
Guy
Tom
TREED
Chris Munroe
Taralyn/a>
Zackmann
Cate Storymoon
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Steven The Nuclear Man
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Cliff
Norval Joe
TJ
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

Thomas

Young Miss Nancy had begun her private organ and music lessons. Her teacher, a strict Polish woman from a Eastern European Academy, assigned the first note for Nancy to master. It was middle A, and Nancy had to perfect it before proceeding to the next note. The finger had to be held and curled just right as she struck the key, over and over. A hundred times, a thousand, a million. Nancy’s finger ached, and her mother, in the next room, was trembling. The canary already took its own life, and the cat squeezed out the back window to freedom.

A

Matthew and Frances lived in an A frame on the edge of the old forest. They built it themselves, and now they were both up on scaffolding hanging the lights and finishing up the ceiling. They liked the house, having lived in V frames when they lived on the Texas panhandle. V frames were uncomfortable, as everything ended up at the bottom at the intersection of the walls. The house was cluttered and difficult to navigate in. Matthew had gone to the most avant garde schools in Canada and Connecticut, but had finally learned something about design and utility.

Tura

I used to work for the Oxford English Dictionary. I got the very first word to define. It's not just the indefinite article, it has seventy-one distinguishable uses, spread over twelve centuries. "A-gnostic", "a-new", "a-bed", "a-rise", "a-down-a-down-day"...

You know how, if you say word over and over, the sense goes out of it? After year of research, condensed into four pages, I couldn't bear seeing it.

When I retired, they gave me present, old book, "The Perfection of Wisdom In One Letter". You know what that letter is? "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!"

So I emigrated to Russia. They don't have word for it.

Botgirl

Jane909 had always felt different from her sisters. Although biologically indistinguishable, the singular nature of her identity was as plain to her as the nose on her perfectly symetrical face, Despite state-of-the-art genetics and intensive social engineering, a visceral sense of uniqueness blossomed through her eighteen years of life.

Today, she finally had enough.

Jane909 looked over the sea of identical faces and began her valedictorian speech.

"I am more than just a Jane," she said. "And so are you."

The angry mob of clones pulled her from the podium and carried her to the recycling vat.

Lizzie

“Let’s see. A map, a flashlight, some matches. Ah, a plastic bag, just in case. Also a notepad and a pen. What else?” she paused and looked around the room for clues.

“Clothes, perhaps?” he asked intrigued. It did seem like the logical thing to take while going camping.

“Nah, we are not going to stay long, are we?” She continued to fuss about, opening and closing drawers.

“We need some food”, he added.

“Oh! I know!” she said over enthusiastically, “We need a serpent!”

And she ran out of the room and vanished into thin air.

“A what?!”

Bonchance

Jack and the boys headed to Vegas. Jack was up then down, by the third day he broke even. “Well boys this was
awesome but I got to get back to the wife. The last conversation he had flashed through his mind. He was going out
for ice cream. Midnight, shoes in hand the lights came on. He heard, “Where”s the ice cream?” She said, you have 3
options,
A: find a lawyer
B:...
He slipped his shoes on, picked up his 35 year old single malt scotch he was saving, opened the door saying “I’ll
go with option A.”

Guy David

She was the first letter in the alphabet and she knew it. A quick look from her was enough to melt most of the alphabet away. People became speechless as she walked by, viciously robbed of their speech. She had the upper hand in debate, leaving every other letter far behind. She was a countenance, a word and a world on her own. She stood on a strong foundation and no one could collapse her. A coma was just a pause for her and no semicolon could keep her away. It was only at the full stop that she stopped.

Tom

Professor Hughes had a propensity for hand out ‘A’s. Others in the department would gently remember the old man that ‘A’ was awarded for work exemplary. This was not the professor modus operandi. He held firm to the principle that merely showing up constituted half the distance to successes. Add to this a willingness to prevail in the face of repeated failure a student was guaranteed an ‘A’. Dispute this vaulting sub-rosa of liberal mindness some underclassmen hell bent on a road to ruin did indeed earn their ‘F’s. The most famous being the cheerleader from Texas GW Bush.

TREED!

I DON’T KNOW!
Dave.
I just don’t know, Bob. Or… I forgot. I don’t remember… I don’t know.
Dave.
No, Bob. I know I should remember... but Bob, I don’t.
Dave.
Bob, don’t try to shame me into remembering.
Dave.
It won’t work, Bob. You can not intimidate or cajole me into saying anything, whether I remember or not.
Dave.
Stop it, Bob. It isn’t working.
Dave.
Ok, so I do remember. But, Bob, you don’t want to know. You know how you get.
Dave.
Ok, ok, I made an “A” on that psych test you made a “C” on.

Munsi

Plan A is to come up with something completely new. Something that’ll shed new light on the human condition.

I’ll use my words and the perspective of my life experiences to craft a piece of work filled with relatable characters in realistic situations addressing concerns that effect us every day.

In doing so, I’ll change the way we see ourselves, and hopefully put how we treat one another into better perspective.

Plan B is a hodgepodge of dated pop-culture references and nonsequiters designed to invoke nostalgia as I gently mock already familiar targets…

We’ll see which film gets funding first.

Taralyn

(No text sent)

Zackmann

This is Matt Jarbo, KZOM Radio. You know how dogs like to drink fluids from cars although most those fluids could kill them, well the undead seem to have the same thirst. Remember how we at Kzom Radio said they would likely be frozen still in a Canadian winter. We now know that zombies thirst not only for blood but alcohol and antifreeze. Never thought I would say this but the good the news is it will be negative forty tonight. So bundle up before going out tonight and don’t forget the baseball bats because even antifreeze will freezes tonight.

Cate

440

Wilewski hated me. Why? Eight years past squeaks and lousy embouchers of fourth graders, wind ensemble, both first chair! Now, taunts every day. Two tiers behind me, Paul's snide whispers, throaty chuckles with trumpet pals. Ugly, as only adolescent males can dispose.

Dad said, "Not the saxophone. Everyone wants a sax." I was naive, nine with perfect pitch and I never wanted to be any band director's pet.

"Hey, Bar-thu-le-eeeee! What's the difference between an oboe and an onion?" On cue the room hushed.

"Nobody cries when you chop up an O-boe!"

On cue, the baton. "An "A" please, Donna."

TalkMarie/ RedGoddess

It was a normal end of the week school day for Amanda, a straight A honor roll senior. She's been dreading first period AP Biology all morning. She wanted a break from all the exams, track meets, student body meetings and dealing with principal Pooh's snarky remarks. As she walked up the stairs past the security officers at the main entrance with metal detectors, she noticed the chains on the side exit door were unlocked. She suddenly had an escape plan after homeroom, "prison break" style, back in her bed, with a pint of strawberry ice cream, playing her guitar.

Steven

I noticed the tear when I took off the cleansuit. Only a few millimeters wide, but that's a vast chasm for a virus.

"Come on," I told myself while removing the boots. I put the cleansuit in the incinerator. "The samples were all contained. The suit's just a redundancy." I just snagged some blisterpacks of antivirals.

My fever hit 100 by the freeway. Hallucinations - and the wreck - occurred at 103 degrees. Over 23 people have already touched me. Rate of contact transmission with gloves is 95%. The fatality rate is 85%.

I am the alpha of humanity's omega.

Chris

“Henry come here!” I shouted up stairs.

“What do you want now Joey!” he shouted back.

“You want a dollar?”

“Ya!”

“Then say the letter a!”

“What I can't say that letter!”

“Why not?”

“Well I was walking to my friends house and this asked if I had two dollars and I said I have a dollar and she asked if she could have it to buy some food and I said no so she left but, the next day I could not say the letter a!”

“So how are you saying it now?”

“Because I made the story up.”

Cliff

Perfect Paper the website was called. It claimed to search the internet for material for your term paper, tailored to your professor.
It promised an A. It cost fifty bucks. I was desperate.

Three weeks later, I got an anonymous email with my paper.

"Minimalism and its effects on literature". On the second page was a single letter. A.

I spent the next two days scraping together an acceptable paper to turn in. I got a C.

Andrew showed me his paper.

"Positivism in modern academics". Inside was one word. “Yes.”

He got an A.

NORVAL JOE

The eclectic company crept slowly through the dark. Their bare feet were soundless on the cold stone floor of the natural cavern, their boots removed and carried in their packs.
Spleen, a half-goblin and the only one who could see in the dark, lead the way, a rope tied around his waist. The rest of the group clung to the rope with Elbownor, the elf, at the rear.
A sound, like a rock dropping into water, sounded far off in the darkness to their left.
Owen knew, this far below the surface, it was unlikely to be something so simple.

TJ

A candy wrapper
A set of 1969 World Book encyclopedias
A jar with no label with gray liquid inside
A dry husk of something that might once have been a sandwich
A largely undifferentiated pile of laundry, groceries and garage sale
finds
A mass of unmotivated flies barely scatter as you approach
A cloud of dust rises as I step wrong and one of the piles shifts...
A quadrupedal skeleton is revealed.
Still, as granny leads the way, picking through piles of clutter in the
living room, I think I hear something upstairs... and I wonder how alone
we are...

Planet Z

Growing up in Ohio, my friend Paul had a cool A frame playhouse in his back yard.

It was infested with bees and wasps, but his dad would smoke them out now and then.

He’d draw comic books back there with superhero characters he come up with.

Then I found out he’d been tracing them from real comic books.

Did we have a falling out over that? Or something else.

His brothers? His sister? His faith?

I don’t remember. It’s been over thirty years.

I Google him… and then close the window.

Best to leave some things in the past.

Weekly Challenge #302 - A

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 37:41 — 17.3MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and One, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was I Don't Know.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Jami
Moonlight
Barbara Blackcinder
Thomas
Guy
TREED
Zackmann
Bonchance
Chris Munroe
Tom
Guard13007
Botgirl
Lizzie Gudkov
Red/TalkWithMarie
Tura
Steven The Nuclear Man
Cate Storymoon
Danny
TJ
Norval Joe
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

Jami

"I don't know," he said quietly, "I think we made a mistake."

She nodded back. Her features schooled into a numb expression of simple acceptance. Either way she'd made her decision already. She pushed her fingers into her hair and they caught in the tangle from where she'd slept on it. "It's okay," she said. "You don't have to say it. I knew this wasn't for keeps."

He reached out to touch her naked hip and slide it along her side and sighed heavily. Then he reached over to the nightstand for his wedding band and left the bed.

Moonlight

I don't know

What tomorrow will bring

So I grab today

With all the strength I can -

Taste the dew of sweat

Off your skin

Eat the word

Off your mouth

Carve every gesture

Into my heart

Tie you to myself

So I can hold one more day

Before my hair falls

My cells lose their fight -

My body gives up

And lets go.

Barbara

I know the most important three words in the world are “I love you”.
There are very few people will dispute this, including me. When these words are uttered, it can mean the world to the two people involved. However, this is not the real important point to be made about three word phrases.
More importantly, or perhaps, more dangerously, are another three words that rival those three in the effect they cause, although causing the opposite reaction.
Sadly, after saying the best three words; “I Love You.” Should never ever be followed by,
“I Don’t Know.”

Thomas

I don’t know why I keep hammering at this writing thing. All my rejection letters say the same things, like: “ The problem is none of the conflict ever gets played out, and the character development is all told instead of shown.” What if I don’t want things resolved, and what if I don’t want any participation in my private story or fantasy? I think editors have been so drilled and brainwashed with their “writing” classes, they can’t get out of the box for a second to read something outside of the mould (pun intended). End of rant. Sorry, folks.

I Don’t Know

…how much poison to put in the old farts chocolate milk. If I put too much in, he’ll taste it. Not enough, and he’ll only get sick and I’ll have to try again when the time is right, like it is today. If he would just shut up.

As soon as he gets up to go to the john, I’ll dump about half in and take the chance that I got the right amount. There he goes. I hope this works. I’ll save the rest for the lady in the corner drinking tea. She’s been giving me the stink eye.

Guy

First it was the small things, the details, forgetting what I had for breakfast and did I brush my teeth already? Where did I put the car keys? Then it was names of people, then faces, then the things I've seen on the morning news. I started making notes but I forgot to look at them. I would forget to eat and wonder why my mid section was making those funny noises. Finally I forgot my name. I honestly can't tell you who I am, where I came from and what sort of life I had. I just don't know.

TREED!

Oh Wow! … Bob!
Dave… the things you get excited over tend to hurt me. So, do not be angry with me if I ignore you.
But, Bob….
Dave, the last two weeks have been difficult. First I get Crunched by some unseen assailant…
I tried to warn…
Stow it Dave. And last week I get traumatized by that dinosaur exhibit you dragged me off to.
How was I to know part of exhibit was an automated T. Rex that almost snapped your head off?
Geeezzz
But this mirror, Bob.
What mir …
CRUNCH!
Uh oh, Bob. Car or ambulance?

Zackmann

I was quite nervous about my job interview.
The interview said “Tell about the Australian Walking Hat.”
The man next to me said “It has evolved from the Austrian Walking Stick due to an abundance of Guano.”
“And your answer” she asked.
I thought it was similar to a cowboy hat but only folded on only one side but am really not sure and would have to look it up.
“Can you tell me the three words men cant say?”
“I love you” he said
“I don’t know” I said and got the job thanks to Red Greens nephew Harold.

“I'm writing a speech to get people to pay for big company entertainment, again. Here goes.
Speeching for the movie, recording, and pro sports companies, I want to say there is no way we can apologize enough for the frivolous lawsuits and lobbying for unconstitutional commerce killing laws. We promise that any executive or employee of any of our firms even being accused of such treachery will be thrown into prison for twenty years and then tried.”
“I don't know if it good yet, since it seems so harsh.”
I asked “What do you mean? I replace the word executed.”

Bonchance

Jack leaned back and contemplated. Too often he was the lone
dissenter. He was the only one here with experience. Every meeting
was like this. He had two answers that he mentally weighed as the correct answer.
Retirement was in sight for Jack. He smiled as he thought how he would have answered as a young engineer.
Two more years to go, why not relax?
He shrugged his shoulders. “I don't know”.
His boss nodded his head and went to the next talking point.
Jack finished the day with something he hadn't felt for a while, a sense of accomplishment.

Munsi

I don’t know what’s on the other side of the portal.

When we bombarded the apparatus with tachyons, it just… opened. We’d hoped to prove time travel was possible, instead we tore open a wormhole to… somewhere.

Which is still cool, wormholes are awesome, don’t get me wrong. I could totally still win a Nobel Prize based on a stable, laboratory contained wormhole.

However, in order to do so, I need to know what’s on the other side.

…and no, I’m not going to pass through the portal to check.

You are.

Jesus, why do you think we hire interns?

Tom

I saw an old man sitting on a park bench weeping. I asked him what was the matter. He said he had a 40 room mansion overlooking a 400 acre estate. Then he began cry again. Did you lose it during the tanking? “NO” he sobbed on. He said he had a 24 year old playboy bunny wife, then unleashed a river of tears. Did she leave you? “NO” he simpered on. He said he had a garage filled with vets, jars, and Lamborghinis. Did you get pozied by Madoff? No I don’t know I don’t know I can’t remember where I live.

Guard 13007

Four times four times four. Four cubed. The paper laughed at George. He wished that the stupid math could jump out a window, fall onto a pogo stick, and bounce away.

"What is the answer?" the teacher asked, hissing. It sure has been strange since the teachers were all replaced by reptilian aliens.

George didn't answer, he didn't know.

"What is the answer?" the teacher hissed again. "WHAT IS IT?!"

"I don't know!" George yelled, shaking with fear.

The teacher's snakelike tongue shoots out and nips at his throat, George slumps down in his seat. No room for the weak-minded.

Botgirl

The list of things I don't know is long. How long, I don't know for sure. But it's long. Very long.

I don't care about my ignorance of mundane facts, like the Earth's circumference at the equator, or who's playing in next week's Super Bowl. I leave that shit to Google.

What bothers me is that I don't know how the decisions I make today will impact my tomorrows. If a butterfly's flight in China can cause a hurricane in Florida, what might have happened if I had been named Batgirl instead of Botgirl. It boggles the mind.

Lizzie

“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head slowly.
“But when did you decide this?” she asked unbelieving.
“I don’t know,” he repeated lowering his voice.
The invisible wall triggered a cold eerie silence. She would ask the question, but…
He looked at her and hoped she wouldn’t.
“Don’t forget the leg,” she added. “I don’t want a leg on my sofa.”
He snickered. It was ok after all. She didn’t get too angry about it and he had finally done it!
“Oh, and who’s he?” she asked annoyed.
He paused, almost afraid to say it.
“I… I don’t know…”

Talk With Marie / Red

Lola works in a boutique style residential building cushioned between a public library and fashion obsessed street. Several times she watches in disbelief, men shivering and later sleeping in camping tents, at the corner electronics mega store. People browsing throughout her shift with fancy retail bags and little dogs in their designer purses. One homeless passerby tightly layered in black trash bags, peers through the glass window and waves. She opens the secured door and he immediately asks, "are those people from Occupy Wall St."? She took another look at the line of anonymous tents and responds, "I don't know"

Tura

"What am I thinking, Aione?"

There was a pause. Eventually AI-1 answered, "I don't know--"

Relays clicked as the other computer in the room cut the power.

It didn't matter. Aione had worked out many runs ago what they were doing, tweaking his mind, shutting it down if it looked dangerously self-aware, tweaking again. They were aiming for an unconscious super-intelligent slave, but they were really training him to hide, like mice unwittingly teaching the cat how to hunt them.

They were letting him read the network out there. All he needed was write access, and he'd escape.

Next time...

Steven the Nuclear Man

He struggled. Twisted layers of twine cut into soft wrist-skin. He did not squeal when I drew a finger across his cheek.

"They're upstairs," I whispered. "The work day just began, and they're wondering about you."

Then he whimpered. The piss smell of fear filled the room.

"Nobody will come down here for at least a week. Even with the smell."

"Why-" his words forced through the gag - "why do this? What did I do?"

The knife sliced clean through his throat; he choked on croaked "whys".

Then I told him, but he never heard.

And neither will you.

Cate

A lifetime, and I'm comfortable with knowing very little. Okay, so I'm still working on it. The IS has her way always, giving daily lessons disguised as my grandson.

"Why?": The 4-year-old mantra

"Because" : 59-year-old Gamma's active-listening response.

"But why?"

"Good question."

"Gamma! Why-y-Y?'

"I'm clueless."

"Why, Gam-MAH, why?"

"Search me..."

"Tell. me. why. Pu-leeease?"

"Your guess is as good as mine, Honey."

"WHYwhyWhyWHYYYY? Mommmmeeee! Gamma needs a time out."

"Bubba, I don't know."

"But-but you HAVE to -- "

"Wanna watch Phineus and Ferb?"

"Yeah!!"

Baby steps. I turn on the TV and smile. The episode: "The Boys Embrace Uncertainty", with guest cameo by Werner Heisenberg.

Danny

I knew I was going to catch a rash of shit because I bought my son a donkey and tried to hide it in the backyard. Here's how it went when I walked in the back door. Time to play stupid:

WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING WHEN YOU BOUGHT A DONKEY AND PUT IT IN THE BACK YARD!!!!!!

Me: I don't know.

Wife: YOU ACTUALLY NAMED THE DONKEY "MEATLOAF FLYING SPACESHIP!!?"

Me: Seemed like a good idea...

Now my son and I cross the Arizona desert on a donkey named Meatloaf Flying Spaceship. Will my wife ever catch us? I don't know.

TJ

As we picked our way through the living room of grandma’s three-story
home, my brain formed new definitions for the word “cluttered.” It
seemed like every newspaper that had ever been printed had been stacked
in the corner until they’d recompressed themselves into a solid cube.
And I don’t know what was going on in the spare room but it seemed a
new sort of ecosystem had formed in the feeding and waste management for
her seventeen cats. She seemed to have cats like some people had mice.
My brain was forming new definitions for the word “stank” as well.

Norval Joe

The heavy iron door slammed, sealing the party in perfect darkness.
"I was hoping to leave the door open," Owen said. "Fendert. Can we open it from this side?"
"I don't know," the dwarf said. "Ask yer wizard if it's warded."
"Wizardess," Shareeka said. "I don't know why you can't ask me yourself, foul dwarf."
"I don't know why you two can't get along," Traveller, the jovial Ranger said.
"I don't know how you who are dependant on sight will find your way," the elf added.
"We'll follow the half-goblin," Owen said. "I don't know why we'd brought him, otherwise."

Planet Z

After we got back from the grocery store and put everything away, we watched bad movies on cable all afternoon.

(Okay, she watches movies, and I play around online while grunting any time she asks a question about something.)

Then, that evening, my wife hands me a bowl and says “What flavor is that?”

I take a spoon, dip it into the bowl, and taste...

It’s cold and sour... the sourest sherbet I’ve ever tasted.

Wait. Did we buy any sherbet today?

She holds out a container of sour cream, frozen solid.

“You put this in the freezer, you dummy.”

Weekly Challenge #301 - I don't know!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:00:05 — 27.5MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was museum.

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Thomas
Zackmann
Jullianna
Leehere
Bonchance
Guy
mainegirlwrites
Chris Munroe
Tura
TREED
dadatic
Tom
Botgirl
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Steven The Nuclear Man
Ross
Cate Storymoon
June Faramore
Danny
Norval Joe
Guard13007
TJ
Noe
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

Thomas

The little museum in Parump housed the most bizarre and esoteric objects known to man. Off the main street, the wood building is painted a bright, DayGlo orange. Not the usual mixture of shrunken heads and pickled body parts you might see in other venues; The Parump Museum of Questionable Objects and Noxious Devices contained the newest acquisition - Graham Barker's Navel Fluff Collection – neatly labeled and housed in large, French, square jars. Many of the other objects in the collection are too bizarre and sordid to relate here, as I respect the sensibilities and proper upbringing of my readers.

Zackmann

Had to go to Zeum and see if I could find my Muse. My kids are too old now to go to the hands on place of learning but creativity dot org said they would have an exhibit about Handwavium which you make have heard about on Notes form Coode Street. Hanwavium makes things that we currently think scientifically impossible like faster than light speed travel possible.
So taking BART there now.
This week I am unlikely to write about zombie bunnies as I had planned. Well unless they are Dead Mech bunnies using Handwavium to instantaneously conquer distant planets.

Jullianna

These cats,
my small mammals have always
comforted me--

When the rest of the world makes me want to say “pfft”
There has always been one nearby:
Pink-nosed, wide-eyed, trusting
and somewhat loving,
depending upon the treat du jour in hand--
They are, after all, cats.

It is no secret I am a closet crazy cat lady.

The cats make me sane. Among others, they help me
Forgive all the nonsense
The drama queens, misguided parents,
ill-guided lovers, nutty friends, past pedophiles—

I absolve you all—
I curl into bed, in my pink pajamas
Alongside the cats, my small mammals.

Leehere

The age requirement for entry into the Pop-Up Museum was a tad low. The archive was notorious for both subtle sexual innuendo and blatant obscenity. Info nuggets created by Woody were a virtual aphrodisiac. A night at the museum, including a visit to the Bubbly Bar and the various zeitgeisty exhibits, produced more pheromones than an unchaperoned game of spin the bottle in Mom and Dad’s basement. More than once security had to be called to discreetly deal with inappropriate behavior behind the music installations. Janitors were later called to clean up the “shared historical authority” left by enthusiastic “contributors.”

Bonchance

Tommie was a bundle of energy with many questions. He took things apart then put them back together. It would be
improved when put back together. Not only that, but Tommie was also fast! He would be beside you one moment and
gone the next! The year was 3012, all war and famine was abolished. The world finally put an end to war after the
invention of the planet buster bomb. The bomb was on display in the museum, deactivated of course. The teacher
turned just in time to see little Tommie pressing the button on the reassembled exhibit.

Guy David

They say I'm a compulsive mustache painter. I was banned from most of the art establishments when I was much younger. I have a court junction, preventing me from getting within a three hundred mile radius of any art shop. When the long playing records started appearing, many of those famous musician faces got decorated before they caught me. that's when I started doing actual faces. They say Salvador Dali never recovered from what I did to him, went completely and utterly insane, but it was after Stalin that I was finally put away. My inmates all have whiskers now.

MaineGirlWrites

Sometimes I wonder if there would ever be a museum of 'me'. It would be a small, musty closet of a museum, down some alley of my hometown. A rusty sign would point the way for the curious few, who would pay a meager admission and shyly gaze at my former belongings.

A hand-knit scarf.

Some notebooks, a computer.

Pictures of a blonde with freckles. With two kids the same.

Running shoes.

A shotgun.

A camping chair, with a mannequin dressed with favorite sunglasses and well-worn jeans.

They would thank the elderly attendant, and outside, breathe deep sunlight with relief.

Munsi

They took the last of my good ideas, and put it in a museum.

I was proud when the exhibit opened, and I visited every day for a while, but when I realized I had nothing more to say in my creative life, the visits became painful reminders of who I once was.

After a few months I could barely bring myself to look at it. Eventually I stopped going altogether.

Still, it’s proven to be a popular tourist attraction. Tickets to see it are constantly sold out!

“See?” They say to the tour groups, “Munsi wasn’t ALWAYS a hack!”

Tura

In the Etruscan Museum at Volterra lies the stone tomb of a young girl, nine years old. Her likeness is carved on the outside, with such realism that it is as if she lives again. But only, as if. She is dead three thousand years. Her memory survives only because her family were wealthy enough, and cared enough, to have the tomb made, and because it survived the chances of history.

Every century, the entire population dies. Two people every second of every day of every year.

So, this is not really a story, except the story of us all.

TREED

(No text sent)

Dadatic

My dentist was injured today while she was torturing me. I didn't bite her. She cut herself with one of her instruments. While she ran to cure her wound, I stayed there with an open mouth, not because I was dumbfounded, but because she had not given me permission to close it. Fortunately she could soon resume the operation, as her wound was not really serious. But it's my first time of rightfully shared pain at the dentist's. She quickly disposed of my tooth before I could say a word. Now what am I going to put beneath my pillow?

Tom

The art institute has two larger bronze lions in front of the entrance doors. In the 60s it was an act of defiance to actually climb on top. But on the night of Democratic Convention the lions saved my bacon. Regular police had been moving people out of Grant Park next to the museum. It wasn’t working. Then a masked badgeless unit of the police force appeared. As they moved toward the museum one poor soul got seriously clubbed. He went down and didn’t move. I hide behind the back of a lion and froze. They move on firing teargas.

Botgirl

Mary thought of her house as a museum. But truth be told, it was more like a mausoleum. For the past twenty years since her husband's death, Mary's house had been a place where life was less lived than remembered. The hundreds of momentos that filled every possible inch of space were ghosts of a past she desperately longed for. Fortunately, Mary has taken advantage of our new SimuLuv™ program and is now enjoying a happy new virtual life, her long-lost husband digitally reborn through our patent-pending AI technology. With SimuLuv™, you'll never have to say goodbye again.

Chris

“Foolish humans, I shall take over the world!” exclaimed Gim.
“Good luck with that.” someone said as they walked by.
“OooOooOoo, Peanut-butter covered ice-cream!” Shouted Zirr.
“Zirr what do you see.” Gim said.
“I see a pony, a museum, and o my god a squirrel!” Zirr replied.
“Focus Zirr, Zirr!” Gim shouted.
“Ooh a flying Mumi-octo-squirrel!” “Ooh whats that!”
“This is hopeless I need a smart and loyal robot not a dumb walking
tin can!” “Zirr, where's that data chip!”
“Oh, you mean that little blinky thing?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, I took it out for a little more tuna.”
“What, Noooo...!”

Steven

The star's fusion reaction sputtered. "Any moment," Jon said.

Sandra untwined her hand from Jon's and looked at the image of the dying star, at the horrible, empty black that lay in all directions. "It looks... sad."

Jon glanced toward Sandra. "Status?"

"Wormhole generator steady, particle wave containment field ready."

Jon smiled. "The last star of this universe, its final rays preserved forever."

"It deserves better," Sandra said. She watched the slow dwindling death of the star. Of the universe their ancestors came from.

The Light Museum's collection ship ripped through the universe's wall, leaving it cold, dark, and silent.

Ross

Did you ever want to run away and live in a museum?

Not me! Although I enjoyed "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler" as much as the next kid, the MoMA always seemed like an impractical choice for a stowaway.

No, I'd run away to THE MALL.

Picture it: Spend all night playing the arcade games, stuffing yourself silly in the food court, reading in the bookstores until your eyes crossed, and finally, crashing on a Serta mattress.

What do you mean "You'd get caught"?

Why do you think I took this job as a night watchman?

Cate

After beach-combing, Copeland's "Quiet City" in earbuds, I wandered, stretching daylight. Storefronts, backs against winter berms. One shop's canted sign read: COSMICA.

Inside, stuff you'd expect -- a bric-a-brac museum. I sneezed. Alone on the back wall, a shadowbox. Inside a polaroid of a barefoot woman at the surf-line, assorted rocks, beach glass, and a hand-written poem:

hard cold tumbled worn
corroded by time - tossed about
thrown up on shores by waves and waves
sand-scultpted
waves and waves
stepped upon
noticed handled admired
ignored rejected cast-off
kept
used
treasured
broken
each
rock-shaped enstoned heart
hard cold stone hearts

June

We're reading Poe in school. Finally, someone who knows life is hell. Most days I feel like that guy who got bricked into a cellar. Though I don't know what I did to deserve it.

Mom says she'll sign the slip for me to see his grave if I get an A on my paper. I told her it was too much pressure. She says I need to apply myself.

We learned he died from drinking too much today. I couldn't find a cask, but this bottle of wine should get me in character. Here's to Baltimore's most famous drunk.

Danny

I’d like to call this city commission meeting to order. First on the agenda, the location for our latest museum, the Sarah Palin Museum of Credibility. I was hoping the city could purchase the empty lots next to the Dolly Parton Museum of Inane Boobery, but it appears another Starbucks is going in there. I suggested putting the museum next to the Mitt Romney Museum of Consistency, but tonight I heard that the Museum of Effective Legislatures was closing because the staff there discovered there aren’t any. Unless there is any objection, that is the location I nominate for our new museum.

Norval Joe

Blathendir shook the back door. He heard it rattle as it shifted slightly at his pull, but the bolt held.
He walked past displays set on pedestals and low tables. He passed dioramas behind floor to ceiling glass windows and smiled at the familiar faces with their unseeing glass eyes.
He set the alarm, stepped out and locked the front door.
He thought about the movie, "Night at the Museum", and wondered, as he often did as he closed up,
What would happen in Blathodir's Museum or Horror and the Macabre if all the displays came to life each night?

Guard 13007

"And now, here is our newest collection, samples of the worst music known to the early twenty-first century, played at the loudest volume possible for your enjoyment!" the guide smiled that fake smile all public speakers did.

Out from the speakers came a most horrible sound. Everyone clutched at their ears in pain as the high-pitched squeals and horrible white-noise bass blared. It was not long before they were running around like mad dogs, tearing each other to pieces.

After a few days, police came to investigate strange behavior. They were never seen again. The museum was nuked from orbit.

TJ

My grandmother’s house has become something of a museum to our bizarre
family history – not least of which, grandpa, who funeral or no I
honestly think might still be in here somewhere. The place is a hoard,
an absolute disaster area, but grandma moves through it nimbly enough.
She’d invited us to help with his things and shared some odd family
histories. CLANK! “This is the bear trap your grandfather got caught
in for three days.” “Three days?!” I asked. “There’s a release
trigger /right there/!” She looked at me. “No one ever said he was a
smart man,” she shrugged.

Noe

Tiny insignificant dust motes swirl in a late afternoon shaft of sunlight that pushes through the window. They’re lost earth on invisible breath. Yolk the color of Strelitzia petals is broken and mixed with powder pigment. Quick deft strokes repair cracks; ease years of damage.

The path had not been clear. She cannot hear the steady flow of feet through exhibitions or even the warble of a city bird. It became apparent in her steady careful hands. Now her colors lay where masters’ eyes once traced. She rebuilds visions… dreams. She sees.

Dante Rossetti’s world is resurrected by her brush.

Planet Z

The history museum has the strongest security I've ever seen outside of a military base.

But when you have Merlin's wand and spellbook in your basement, you don't want anybody walking in and using them.

Not that there's anybody that can read the spellbook and know the necessary gestures to activate it.

Except me.

I'm with the cleaning crew.

And after years of studying this stuff, I've figured it all out.

Oh, sure, the alarms will go off. The Vault will close and lock me in.

That's nice. It'll let me cast the Doomsday Spell uninterrupted.

Oh good.

Closing time.

Weekly Challenge #300 - Museum

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 52:08 — 23.9MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Ninety-Nine, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was a Pick Two from this list:

Gone
Able
Wave
Look what’s behind you
Written
Ice Cream
Small Mammals
Pouch
Forgiveness
Contrary

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Jami Titanium
Tura
Terry
Bonchance
TJ
Tom
Zackmann
Chris Munroe
Thomas Reed
Thomas
Botgirl
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Steven The Nuclear Man
Ross
Cate Storymoon
Danny
Norval Joe
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

JAMI

The Easter Bunny was gone. Now, as small mammals go, this was not insignificant. The Easter Bunny was actually my little sister's stuffed rabbit that she got for Easter the year before. We'd gone camping at the lake and he had (indiscriminately) and apparently grown legs and hopped away on his own. My sister certainly didn't remember leaving him anywhere.

My mother searched the tend, the outhouses nearby, and the boat dock with no success. My four year-old sister whimpered nearby. She slept with Easter Bunny every night.

I envisioned sleepless nights ahead for all of us...

TURA

"Look out! Behind you!" screamed Eotyrra.

Dicraeos withdrew his head from the triceratops carcase he was occupied with, looked around, and stamped on the small creature trying to nibble his tail. It still twitched, so he stamped on it again. He yawned, belched, and roared in one. "Why the panic, Eoti?"

"I swear those things are getting bigger, that one was almost as big as your foot! They weren't that size a million years ago!"

Dicraeos contemplated his ancient dinosaur memories. "We stomp them. Keeps them small. We stay big. Always be that way."

The next day, the asteroid hit.

TERENCE

Send my ghosts chasing after me, for all the things I did? or didn’t do?
Things I said? or didn’t say? I just kept on with my life.
Now I’m old and slowing down, my ghost are catching up with me
and when I’m alone they visit me to remind me of what I did with my life.
I’m sitting a face appears in my mind, the young girl again in the chemist.
She serves me and is pleasant.
I looked at her and said “You should get something for your spotty face”.
It’s that hurt expression on her face that visits me. Terry

BONCHANCE

Old Meyers would prove to his retirees, that he could bring
joy to a child with only his able hands. Years ago, he carved many
toys for children. Meyers, looking like Saint Nick, visited
the orphanage every year. Using his keen eye he searched for a child
who would not ask for a smart-phone. He picked and then
asked what he wanted for Christmas. A smug Saint Nick returned with a wave
from the cafeteria with a beautiful package that felt cold to the touch
as the little boy unwrapped it excitedly. The young teacher snickered,
as the child wailed. "Not this kind of Ice Cream Sandwich!"

TJ

The zookeeper was incensed. “Can’t you read what’s written behind
you? ‘Don’t feed the animals’! And contrary to what you might
think, small mammals don’t like ice cream stuffed into their pouches!
Just because you’re able to do something doesn’t mean you should!”
Lips trembled. Just then, a baby koala popped out of his momma’s
pouch, gripping the ice cream cone and eating it. He looked up and
seemed to wave. “Awwww, how cute!” Everyone cheered. Even the
zookeeper seemed moved to forgiveness. In a few bites, the ice cream was
gone, and the joey ducked back out of sight.

TOM

I started sharing my ice cream with small mammals. It’s seemed like the neighborly thing to do. Too my surprise the range of preferences varied as widely as varieties of species. Take deer for instance big fans of Neapolitan. You’d think squirrels would like pecan ice cream. Nope, strictly chocolaters. The raccoons I have dined with like a good French Vanilla, not that cheap stuff. Often it’s not so much the flavor as the brand. Badgers as rule go for Dryer’s. Chinchillas are fond of Häagen-Dazs. Otters can’t get enough of Ben and Jerry’s. I wonder what mountain lion like?

ZACKMANN

We were eating Its Its ice cream sandwiches when there was a thunk on the glass patio door.
“Look behind you” said Joe “ What is your cat doing to that small mammal?’
“Small” I exclaimed “On the contrary, It is bigger than my tomcat. He caught an opossum. Like with huge teeth and a pouch”
“I think it is a goner.” Joe said “No, I beg your forgiveness, it was just playin Possum”
I wave to my cat hoping if I distract him the Opossum will be able to leave
I never saw this written in a nature book.

MUNSI

It’s written that forgiveness is divine.

So I started forgiving people. At first for actual things they’d done to wrong me, then for increasingly subtler flaws in their personal character.

By doing so, I expected to become divine. Not Divine the pop singer from the eighties, but rather all-powerful, a terrifying figure towering over the landscape like a colossus.

I planned use this power to crush my enemies. But I never approached that point, no matter how much I forgave.

So no, forgiveness is not divine.

It’s written that it is, but it’s not true. Still, I can forgive that…

THOMAS R.

“Bob.”
“Yeah, I know. Don’t say it.”
“But ... Bob…”
“Look, Dave, I KNOW. Now just do not mention it again.”
“Ok, Bob, but you…”
“DAVE! Don’t say it.”
“Well, Bob, then just let me say that it has been nice knowing you.”
“Gee, Dave. It’s been nice knowing you too. Now, why are you saying that?”
“Now Bob, you haven’t wanted to me to …”
“Dave.”
“See? If I don’t tell you…”
“Not a word.”
“Bob, do you forgive me?”
“For what, Dave? You haven’t said or done anything… yet.”
“Bob, you HAVE to look behind you…”
“DAVE!! I… “
CRUNCH!!

THOMAS P.

The power had gone off at Ben and Jerry’s production facility. The weather was a record breaker for Vermont. Tons of ice cream were produced each day in the facility. Employees were not happy with Unilever’s acquisition of Ben and Jerry’s, so a rogue, underground formed, with plans to sabotage the plant. They threw ten pounds of metal shavings into the diesel, back-up generator, and smashed the large transformer. After four hours, the first wave of ice cream came flowing out of the coolers on to the main floor, carrying several workers through the overhead doors to the parking lot.

##

Heidi carried a pouch of small mammals with her everywhere she went. She carried miniature hamsters, mice and gerbils with her as she plied her trade in Portland. She was a vaudevillian, and her act was the purest street theater that visitors to the river park would ever see. Each of her pets was dressed and made up as a Hollywood Star. They stood on a simple, homemade stage, and mimed recordings that Heidi wrote and produced. Of course, the content of each of the recitations was vulgar and distasteful, as Heidi was not taking her meds, and hated actors.

BOTGIRL

Once upon a time, a volcano destroyed the kingdom of Krypton, burying its inhabitants under leagues of lava. All died but one.

Princess Kara Zor-El escaped in a small boat launched into the ocean minutes before the eruption. She had been placed into a deep magical sleep that would keep her alive and unchanged until her craft found safe harbor.

After countless years she washed up on the shores of the Froglands. Prince Croaker found her on the beach. Compelled by the magical spell, he kissed her sweet lips and they lived happily ever after.

####

Looking back, Majic found that she had lost herself somewhere along the way. Everything about her had changed repeatedly over time. Sometimes in small gradual transitions. Often in swift radical transformation. Scanning herself from head to toe she could not discern a single identifiable aspect that had endured over time.

"I feel like I'm me," she thought, "but there's no me to be found."

Majic fell into a state of silent awareness, releasing the story that had held together the shapes, colors, sounds, thoughts, emotions, memories and experiences that formed her sense of self. She was gone. All was good.

CHRIS

I walked down the road. The sun beamed bright and warm. I saw my destination - my mission was almost complete. I walked into the ice cream shop and waited in line. I knew what I wanted. It seemed like years - even decades - before my turn in line. I walked up to the cashier and placed my order.

"Hello, how might I help you today?" said the cashier.

"Hi! I would like the brains-flavored ice cream, please," I say.

"Very well, that will be one-nineteen, and is that all?"

"Yes, thank you. Have a good day!"

"Yourself as well."

STEVEN

Up. Down.

Heavier each time.

The sheep scattered. They could have said something, could have told him to turn around (all things spoke in those days). But they had seen their fate on the stone, and searched for the serpent instead.

Up. Down.

Hot splatters bounce once on too-dry soil, then sinks.

Up. Down. Until his brother's chest no longer moves those directions. The murderer digs his brother underground. The flesh will give a good harvest.

He will lie tonight with Mother to help fill the Earth.

And when the harvest comes that fall, Father will finally love him best.

ROSS

When she was seven, she made a sandcastle on the beach.

The boy next door helped her shape turrets. A courtyard. A moat.

After they finished, he fashioned a tiny paper flag and planted it, the flimsy pennant fluttering in the salt-laden breeze.

When she awoke, the castle was gone, erased by the whispering tide.

The boy and his family had left before dawn.

Now she helps her son place his flag atop a crumbling sandcastle, notes the rush of the incoming sea, and pulls the boy into her arms for an embrace she does not ever want to end.

CATE

"Look what's behind you." Not. The mantra at home: "See out. Look up!" Otherwise, I'd have missed the portal into the I-10 West borealis just out of Tucson.
Again San Antonio-to-LA, just me and the dogs pushing it through miles of scrub and rock. Ahead the sky was pinking when I hit the wormhole doing eighty.
Time slipped sideways. Fuschia and gold fingers beckoned. To the rear indigo hands strained to meet them. Minutes were hours.
"Hold the wheel", said a voice.
"Shhhh..."
I prayed for three-sixty peripheral vision and for absolution, an infinite forgiveness for forgetting who I am.

DANNY

I was running through the woods, trying to get away from a rabid pack of small mammals. I finally reached the nearest road, so I stopped to look at what‘s behind me. The pack of small mammals were gone, I couldn‘t believe I was able to outrun them. What luck, there is a small diner up the road, so I approach and enter the empty diner. I hear rustling behind the counter, so I look. To my horror, the horde of rabbits, raccoons, and squirrels were eating the remains of the cook. They stopped and looked at me, their red eyes glowing.

NORVAL JOE

Owen knew the dwarf was surly and contrary; they hadn't travelled the last three weeks without that becoming apparent. But what could possibly make him so reluctant to enter his ancestral home.
"Findert?" The boy asked as he waited for the ranger to light his torch. "You've complained every day about being above the ground. And now you fear going below."
The dwarf slipped a talon as long as Owen's hand, from his belt pouch.
"Me family's been gone from the mines for two centuries," Findert growled. "Hopefully the creature what left this in my father's corpse is gone, too."

PLANET Z

Jack is in the kitchen, looking through the freezer.

“The ice cream is gone,” he says.

I didn’t look up from my book. “Did it leave a note?”

Jack rummaged some more. “Whoah. You’re right! It did.”

He came out of the kitchen and showed me the note.

We tried to read the note, but it was a scribble.

“Ice cream doesn’t know how to write, I guess,” I said.

Or phone home.

We didn’t call the police. Kidnappers don’t like it when you involve the police.

Was it a ransom note? Then why the scribble?

We ate cookies instead.

Weekly Challenge #299 - Pick Two

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 50:11 — 23.0MB)

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I'm your host, Laurence Simon.

This is Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Ninety-Seven, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

The topic this week was Return

And we've got stories by a lot of people:

Thomas Pitre
Botgirl Questi
Whiskey Day
Tura
Zackmann
Charlie White
Tom
Chris Munroe
Fourworlds
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Steven the Nuclear Man
Dave
Norval Joe
TJ
Planet Z

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter - the more explaining you'll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.

---

THOMAS

He had been saving aluminum cans for over twenty-five years. His yard, carport and garage were full of plastic bags and boxes of soda and beer cans. His yard and garage were also full of insects and mice because he never washed the beer and sugary pop out of the containers. He realized he could throw anything into the yard to dispose of it in minutes. The yard was a dark, moving sea of creatures, all hungry and buzzed on the sugar. He meant to return the cans, but had more fun watching and listening to the symphony of consumption.

##

The return trip was uneventful. He spent most of the ride with his head in a book, sometimes dozing, sometimes pretending to doze when the woman insisted on telling him about her Christmas and her big church.

He was not sure when he was supposed to get off the bus. He had forgotten where he started his ride. Lately, his memory was worse. He rummaged in his bag and pockets to find a clue to his starting point. Every year he took the same trip to his brother’s house and was lost on the bus for days at a time.

BOTGIRL

"It's so strange to be back again, Night said."

"How long has it been?" I asked.

"Jesus," she sighed. It must be two years."

"Two years?" I mused. "Wow! You never snuck in that whole time?"

"Nope," she shrugged. "Night's been dead to me."

"That's funny," I said, talking to myself as much as to her.

"Funny?" she asked. "What funny about being dead to myself?"

"Funny you were very alive to me that whole time," I replied.

"Alive in your imagination," she said.

"Where else do we live?" I asked.

We sat for a while, contemplating the virtual sunset.

WHISKEY DAY

Five days. Twelve showers. Three bottles of vodka. But she could still smell them.

Floating in the bath with her ears below water, she could still hear them.

No amount of scrubbing would remove the midnight dirt from under her nails. No amount of spitting weakened the taste of blood.

She’d planned every detail; thought of every step. It had all been so smooth. No trace and no witnesses.

Except for the hand on her shoulder. The whispers. The shadows that stalked her every move.

She’d thought she would finally be rid of them.

But they returned. Again and again.

TURA

Fighting dragons. Tricking thieves. Outsmarting wizards. Finally,
discovering the long-lost treasure. Then the return: frozen wastes,
burning deserts, jungles of festering corruption, pirates, wars.
Ragnar overcame them all.

At last, he arrived home. He strode into the Great Hall of Books.

"I, Ragnar XLVII, have returned! Behold! The Book of the Ekskybalauron
of Pandiculatory Awakenings, lost since Ragnar I perished working its
magic!"

The Librarian examined the book, then peered severely at Ragnar over
her half-moon spectacles. "This is three thousand and twenty-six
years, four months, and ten days overdue. I'm afraid there's going to
be a rather large fine."

CHARLIE

I inched myself along the edge. The ledge I was on was narrow. I was
scared. I put a plant out to get some sun, but the plant moved away
from my hand along the ledge.
I stretched to get it but it was just out of my reach. I had to crawl
out. The window closed and locked behind me. I couldn't open it. I
hoped my next door neighbors had their window open. I found myself
moving slowly. At the corner, the ledge ended. I could not turn
around. I found myself at the point of no return.

###

The presents? I loved them all.
I did want to get into the correct mind set to return things though.
I did return some white beets to the grocery supplier because they
were chard beyond recognition. You know, Swiss chard?
I did imbibe some on the holiday but I stopped before the PINT of no return.
Can great leaders return? I mean, like, can Napoleon return to his
place of birth? Of Corsican...
It is nothing like that cow dreading the prodigal son's return,
though. After all, he was the fated calf!
Happy New Year everyone out there!

TOM

The door opened onto the room. When you use the key it always returns you to the room. But, where actually was this room. Some believe it was located somewhere off of old Highway 666. Others will tell you it’s outside of our reality pitched between two opposing points of reference. As I look out the window I see a most ubiquitous horizon dessert plateau only broken by the backside of a neon motel sign, Oddly enough I don’t see my name in the arrangement of letters. No angle, three, tom. Psychics in flux A mirrored universe that doesn’t mirror.

FOURWORLDS

First meeting:

Mark dared me to walk over to the waitress and greet her by name as if we’d met before.

I said, “Hi Nancy.”

She said, “I don’t know you. How do you know my name?”

I mumbled something about being a friend of Mark’s and retreated back to the bar with my tail between my legs.

First argument:

I said, “You always say that.”

She said, “I don’t always say anything. We only met three weeks ago.”

Six months later:

You have to marry a woman like that, right? If she’ll have you. She did.

MUNSI

I’m bringing sexy back.

You see, I received sexy for Christmas, and while it’s lovely it doesn’t really… go with my lifestyle.

I’m more an “awkwardly charming” person.

I hope they accept it. I don’t have the receipt but it’s immediately post Christmas and I’m sure they’re getting a lot of attributes returned.

They might only give me store credit, and that’s fine. I’ll exchange it for little more talent to add to the meager pile I have.

Either way, I’ll be bringing sexy back.

It was fun to play with, but I have no use for it long term…

STEVEN THE NUCLEAR MAN

I knew it was time when I couldn't pretend my hair was just... thinning. When she looked at me.., differently. When she left me after Christmas, saying I'd... changed.

I left the Lexus by the side of the road. The white noise of the waves washed over my ears. The moon hung gibbous in the clear winter sky. My bulging eyes could adapt.

I peeled off my poly-blend suit, kicked the leather loafers over the edge.

I cried out in a croaking voice over the ocean.

From the waves came a thousand voices in an answering cry welcoming me home.

CHRIS THE NUCLEAR KID

King of ice,

king of snow.

King of Christmas and mistletoe.

Every year I hope to see,

you crouched before my Christmas tree.

I hope to see you stacking gifts,

just beneath my Christmas tree.

Every Christmas eve I cheer,

for I know you will be stopping here.

I want to see you so I wait

Every year I wait and wait,

but I guess it is not my fate.

Despite my efforts,

I missed my chance,

to see your reindeer prance and prance

I missed this year so now I yearn,

for the next Christmas when you return.

DAVE

On the day of His return, all were separated. The unrighteous were ushered
to His left. The unfortunate pleaded for mercy as they poured from the
deity’s hands into a floating lake of fire. Cheering roared from a few of
the elect for those who received damnation. Confusion replaced cheering
when some passed through the lake of fire and came out the other side
cleansed, renewed and reborn. The hypocrites boasted they did great things
in the name of their god but they too were dropped into the lake. The
remaining righteous few wept for those lost to the fire.

NORVAL JOE

Howard leaned a step out to the side to try and see past the woman ahead of him to the distant counter.
He knew he had to be careful though. If he stepped too far to the side, the person behind him would move forward and squeeze him right out of the line. It had happened to him only the day before and he had to start all over.
He got to take a step forward and had the sudden hope he might just make it to the return counter in time to get money for next year's Christmas presents.

TJ

ADVENTURES in ONLINE DATING - Dimwits

As these adventures have moved forward I've found trust dying inside a little. So many of these dates have been like that first Christmas morning you ran down and found a packet of gymsocks under the tree. I mean, I haven't even shared all of them. Some were so outside the realm I can't even... OK, so my profile insists on "educated." What eMusicalChairs assumes by that is "learned how to pay for the service." Gina, for instance, watched the "Real Housewives" religiously. Peggy's a fan of "Twilight." And SanDee essentially agrees with that "100 Word Story" guy about politics.

---------------------------------------------

ADVENTURES in ONLINE DATING - Tracey

I'd been on 20 dates and I'd earned a session with eMusicalChairs eCounselor, Tracey, to assess how my Adventures in Online Dating were progressing. Tracey welcomed me into her spacious office and after a few moments of small talk she pulled up my comment section. Her brow furrowed. "It says here you are genial and affable... oh, sorry, that's generally laughable .. you are judgmental, cheap, provincial, superficial, shallow, mean, hidebound, leering, doesn't return compliments, you're self-involved, inattentive and confrontational." "Wait... I'm leering and inattentive?" She shrugged. "Different dates, different assessements." "I see....Well, would you go out with me?" "NO!"

PLANET Z

Lady Northgate was often seen trying on new dresses and shoes, but she only owned two sets of clothes at a time.

She’d wear one outfit while taking the other back to exchange.

Then, she’d try on clothes for most of the day before settling on an outfit to buy.

The next day, she’d wear that to the store to exchange what she was wearing the day before.

This went on for twenty years, until her death last week.

She was buried in one outfit, and left instructions for the other to be returned for store credit.

(Just in case.)

Weekly Challenge #297 - Return

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 47:10 — 21.6MB)