Weekly challenge #1049 – PICK TWO Buffering, Update, An old postcard, offensive, Roll

The next topic is Tokyo

LIZZIE

Dear You,
Here’s an unrequested update that will cause a sudden flare-up of indigestion, I know.
He took everything. The jewels, the money, even the hand-painted dishes no one liked.
He did leave a rather offensive note behind that I’ll refrain from copying here.
Now, how do you want to roll? Shall we hunt him down or simply ignore him?
Crazy question, I know. I can hear your swearing from the future. I know your answer.
I’ve gathered a team. I know where he hangs out.
Meet you at the usual place. Tomorrow, midnight.
Bring the meat grinder.
Yours truly.

RICHARD

Wish you were here
I was clearing out the loft. The usual rubbish collected over the years, most of it useless; some bound for charity shops, one or two items worth salvaging and the rest destined for the tip.
Amongst some old newspapers, I rediscovered the relics of a childhood family holiday, including an old postcard.
It was the typical British seaside affair, a cartoon of a busty babe in a bikini, buying an ice-cream.
“I’d like a large one, please. I do like a good long licking!”
Harmless fun, back in the day.
But, I’ve no doubt, hugely offensive to modern sensibilities.

TOM

From the Lost Room

For many years I have been on a great scavenger’s hunt. It was connected to the tv show “The Lost Room”. One of the items of the collection was a painting of an old oak tree. In the fore-ground of the painting was on odd shape stone. After much searching, I learned the oak in question had been on the U of C campus in Berkley. Figured the paint might have some source image. So, I found an old postcard from 1915 which pretty much matched the painting. Written on the card was an update about a trip to Oakland.

SERENDIPIDY

I was struggling with the latest Windows update.
For an hour I’d watched the spinning wheel on the screen: buffering constantly, without a care in the world.
I was in a hurry. I had work to do, I was up against a deadline… But the technology didn’t care and it was taking its own good time to mess me about.
With each circle of the wheel I could feel my stress levels growing.
This was exactly what the shrink had warned me about.
I glanced at the semi-automatic at my side.
Anger, or the update; which would it be?

NORVAL JOE

Old Doris Grindlebomb was 92 when her family took her keys away. No, they weren’t the keys to her Cadillac convertible. There was no way in hell they were gonna take those away from her no matter how blind she was. Or, blind drunk. It was the keys to piano that they took away. For 70 years, she had been the music teacher at the local elementary school, and they would’ve retired her long ago if anyone else had wanted the job. She switched to the saxophone. She was so bad at it, they gave her the piano keys back.

PLANET Z

Old Doris Grindlebomb was 92 when her family took her keys away. No, they weren’t the keys to her Cadillac convertible. There was no way in hell they were gonna take those away from her no matter how blind she was. Or, blind drunk. It was the keys to piano that they took away. For 70 years, she had been the music teacher at the local elementary school, and they would’ve retired her long ago if anyone else had wanted the job. She switched to the saxophone. She was so bad at it, they gave her the piano keys back.

George and the cure

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate. The rare times his captain gave him a mission, he’d fail it miserably. But when the entire crew came down with a plague and George was the only man spared, the captain begrudgingly sent George out to obtain a rare flower to brew a tea to cure the malady. George set out that day in the longboat, landing on a tropical island. He found a clearing with many flowers, and he brought them back to the ship… too late. He made wreaths of the flowers and held many funerals.

One light town

The mayor never liked it when people called Centerville, a one traffic light town. So he had the traffic light removed and replaced with a four-way stop. And the accident rate didn’t change that much, considering that there were never any accidents in the town. You thought about putting in a traffic circle. Things that he read on the Internet said that traffic circles were safer, but it was a small intersection already and didn’t need all the ruckus to build up the traffic circle. Although putting some flowers or a flag pole in the round would’ve looked nice.

Leg

When Lucy lost her first tooth, she kind of freaked out. She thought she was gonna completely fall apart. I told her now it’s just teeth, although every now and then a fingernail might come loose and hair and eyelashes will fall out. The tooth fairy gave her a dollar that night. However, when my friend Bill came over, who had lost a leg to cancer, Lucy completely freaked out. By the time Bill and I calmed her down, she asked how much money the leg fairy gave Bill. Bill laughed, and said nothing. But it cost him a lot.

Saint wally

Sometimes I like to look down the list of saints to see who is the patron saint of something that was invented centuries after the saint had died. I mean, Saint Wally was hung upside down and burned at the stake in the 13th century, yet he’s the patron saint of magnetic residence imaging. I’m not sure why, you’d have to ask a Catholic MRI technician or something. I mean, back, then they had farming and sculpting and simple stuff, but unless someone was made a saint just recently, I don’t think a patron saint to the Internet is valid.

Grenade oops

Private Joseph Mongo would’ve earned himself a Medal of Honor for falling on a grenade to keep it from killing his platoon mates, but the problem was the way he landed on it. It not only exploded out fragments, but also propelled his 17 silver fillings from his teeth throughout the company. So by throwing himself on the grenade caused even more carnage than if he had run for cover like everybody else was trying to. The fact that he was the idiot who pulled the pin and fumbled the grenade only adds to the consternation of the command structure.

Raids

I remember doing a report in eighth grade history on the Doolittle raids over Japan. I went to the local college library and pulled every source I could find on it. And I looked through newspaper accounts of the attacks. My report was quite lame and copy paste from the limited sources. Just now, I finished watching a video with excruciating detail of the Japanese patrol boat spotting them early, the crew man hit by a propeller on the deck, and all sorts of other amazing details I never learned about. Middle schoolers are such lazy, ineffective researchers, I guess.

Weekly challenge #1048 – Give Up

The next topic is PICK TWO
Buffering
Update
An old postcard
offensive
Roll

LIZZIE

Give up. Give up. Give up. And he tossed and turned on the bunk bed. Nightmares turning into night sweats. His ears beating to the drum of his heart. Tomorrow. It’ll be another day. Tomorrow. But it never was another day. It was the same day, over and over again. The same intelligence gathering. The same raids. The same ambushes. The same killings. The same deaths. A never-ending string of horrors. Give up… He wished closing his eyes would make everything disappear. The noise, the nightmares, his heartbeat. Give up… That nagging voice hammered on. Tomorrow. Tomorrow, I’ll give up.

RICHARD

Marathon
Ask any marathon runner and they will tell you about ‘hitting the wall’. That’s the moment when the fatigue completely overwhelms your body and there’s nothing in the world you want more than to quit.
In technical terms, it’s the point at which your cells run out of glycogen – the fuel that powers your body.
And, right now, I was hitting the wall, big time!
“Keep going!” Somebody in the crowd shouted, “Don’t give up!”
Easy for them to say.
I gave up.
Fell to the ground, exhausted.
And laboriously crawled back the long hundred yards to the start line.

TOM

Full Measure.

O’Brian gave the Lt. Daley the small square of paper. On it were written two words. He raised his eyes to meet the faces of the last of the defenders. It was very quiet, so in a whisper the Lt gave the only order he could give the circumstances. It was a one word, matching the one note of the trumpet. When the fog of war settled the tribe took the field. Second Si-At Paylax stood before Daley’s body. He carefully removed the crumple square of paper. “Why didn’t they give up?” he mused put the paper in his pocket.

NORVAL JOE

“Mrs. Weinerheimer, I appreciate you bringing Sabrina back,” Ms. Pinkerton of Child Protective Services said. “We’ll take care of her from here.”

Joan Weinerheimer was suddenly filled with fury and stepped forward. “I’m not going to give up on Sabrina. You had us turn her in before and where did she end up? Locked in a basement by a group of cultists.”

Pinkerton tried to mask her surprise and said, “That’s a serious charge. I hope you have more than just this girl to back up your accusations.”

Sabrina said, “Let’s go to the Yaan’s house. You can see yourself.”

SERENDIPIDY

You really should give up now. In the long run, it’s for the best; you’re just delaying the inevitable, so why not give up and accept your fate?
You can run, you can hide, you can even fight back if you think that will make a difference.
It won’t.
The outcome is a forgone conclusion. I will hunt you down, and when I have you in my grasp, I will kill you. Slowly. Painfully, and without the slightest remorse.
If you must, then try to escape me, but it really is pointless.
Just give up now.
Because, I never do.

LEWIE

Title: Santa’s Little OSHA Violation

A jolly “Ho-ho-ho” came from behind, followed by “Hidey ho, neighbor!”

“Hello, Santa,” little Timmy replied.

“Why the long face?” Santa asked.

Timmy showed him a block of wood. “I’m building a pinewood derby car, but I have no tools.”

Santa put his hands on his waist and made grunting sounds, followed by the order: “Never give up. Never surrender!”

Santa went into his bag and grabbed a few presents, handing them over. Timmy quickly ripped open the packages, finding a chainsaw, angle grinder, nail gun, industrial CNC router, plasma cutter, and a flame thrower, while Santa shouted, “More power!”

PLANET Z

You’ve heard about the Christmas Truce in World War One, but have you heard of The Big Surrender of The Second Punic War?
Lines of Carthagagenians and Romans facing off, throwing spears and charging, and all of the sudden, silence.
Everybody threw down their swords and spears and shields and held up their hands in surrender.
From the lowest stable slave to the highest general, they all surrendered.
Nobody knew what to do at that point.
They all looked around, trying to figure out what happened.
Or what to do next.
Many just sat down and stared for a while.

Deaf safe words

What do deaf people use as safe words?
I’m asking for a friend. Who I have tied up in the basement.
So he can’t sign out HELP. And he’s never quite learned how to talk right.
How the hell am I supposed to tell one grunt from another?
And he’s got a ballgag, so rolling his tongue won’t work either.
Never learned Morse code, so all that blinking isn’t working.
Now, when it’s the other way around, yeah, that’s even worse.
I can shout MUENSTER CHEESE! all day long, and he’ll keep swatting me with the cat-o-nine-tails.
So, any ideas?

Old general

The old general had gone senile years ago. He kept calling his caretaker, his chief of staff, and he would ask about reports from the field. The nurse would print out the same report every day, just with the weather and date changed. The general would nod, dictate orders, and the nurse would pretend to take notes so that she could give them to the brigade. This carried on for several years, and when the general would ask to inspect the troops, the nurse would say they’re being assembled and would be ready for inspection by six, past his bedtime.