The army has its humor. When George Rank and Henry File enlisted, the leadership saw an opportunity. So, they were promoted quickly. And despite their incompetence, they breezed through Officer Shool with a wink and a nod from the teachers and evaluators. 20 years later, Rank and File had stars on their shoulders. The joint chief of staff probably announced that the army was now in the hands of the rank-and-file. And due to their incompetence, the actual rank-and-file were decimated. And the country lost every war and battle it fought. Thank God for the Air Force bombing the enemy.
The sound of freedom
Living near an Air Force Base, occasionally you’ll hear a jet going by. And even though they’re not supposed to go sonic overland, but you still feel the occasional shudder or window rattle. That’s the sound of freedom, said the head librarian. Smiling. I nodded, handed over my card and she slid the book back to me. Then I heard aloud crash and the whole building shook. One of the fighters accidentally dropped a bomb and the shockwave took down City Hall. The aquarium in the kids section and shattered and books had fallen off of all of the shelves.
Kinda Like Tilda
Charlie’s favorite pickup line was is heaven missing an angel because I’m seeing one right in front of me. When Michael the archangel went down to earth for a drink, the world had the misfortune of him going to the bar that Charlie frequented. Charlie was pretty well hammered at that point, and we all know how angels can be a bit Tilda Swinton in looks. Michael took offense, but Charlie was drunk and doubled down on his lechery. By the time God recalled Michael to heaven, half of Nebraska had been lain waste. Not that anyone could really tell.
Weekly Challenge #1062 – PICK TWO Borderline Stairwell Hood Challenge accepted Porn star
- Richard
- Lizzie
- Tom
- Serendipidy
- Norval Joe
- Planet Z
RICHARD
Ice-Breaker
It was one of those awful management development courses. You know the sort: A day stuck with a bunch of strangers, none of whom want to be there, spending the time in meaningless discussion and sticking Post-it notes to flipcharts.
We started with the inevitable, predictable, ice-breaker. ‘Tell the person next to you something surprising about yourself’.
Well, challenge accepted!
Nobody said it had to be true, right?
I told the stunning blonde at my side I was a porn star.
Her response was equally surprising…
‘I’m starting a new job next week. At your company. As your boss!’
LIZZIE
He was a porn star. Was. You can’t do anything else, someone said. Challenge accepted. He looked around for acting roles. Failed. He worked as a delivery man. Why aren’t you in acting? Failed. More acting roles. Failed. Performing had never been an issue before, he thought. The local hotel had a job. Yes. During the break, sitting in front of the hotel’s fireplace one day, he overheard someone say uh, it’s that guy. At least someone remembered him. It’s that guy who dropped my dinner, and apologized in a very unusual way. Where’s a camera when we need one?
TOM
Neo-Classic
Borderline Stairwell is the most misunderstood novel of the early 2000s. It’s florid shifting of time-frame. The binary language of the people of the grass. A hero will no redeeming qualities. The laughable use of flip-book art at the bottom of each page. And its length, 2017 pages. The only novel to get -5 stars from the village voice. So why it so popular nearly 25 years after publication. Why are whole passage quoted by Alpha units. My best guess is: it pisses off all four generation before them. Such embraced derision is a badge of honor. Point, Game, Match.
SERENDIPIDY
Borderline psychopathic: That was the diagnosis at age twelve, when I threw my sister down a stairwell at school.
I thought they were over-reacting. I simply wanted to see if she bounced. I was just having fun and exploring my boundaries.
Isn’t that what kids do?
Isn’t that what school is for?
Judging by the reaction, I guess not.
I’m all better now.
I’ve been taking my tablets and following the rules, and now I’m a perfectly well-adjusted, fully-functioning, productive member of society.
I can tell you don’t believe me.
Which is probably a good thing, right?
NORVAL JOE
Driving back to Billbert’s house, Sabrina said, “All my stuff is still at Patrick’s. How are we going to get it?”
Mrs. Weinerheimer considered for a moment. “We can check if they left a door open. If not, we’ll have to find another way.”
“Challenge accepted,” Billbert said, rubbing his hands together. “They probably left an upstairs window unlocked.”
Billbert’s mother, Sabrina, and Mandi waited on the front porch while Billbert flew up to a back bedroom window, then flew down the stairwell to unlock the door.
It felt evil inside the dark and empty house.
Sabrina began to cry.
PLANET Z
Gary didn’t have a basement or a storm cellar. When he heard the tornado siren, he calmly walked to the central bath, got in the tub, and waited. He set his phone to play the local weather alerts, sitting in the tub and waiting for the big storm to pass. The rain pounded on the roof, and the winds shook the trees in the yard. Sometimes, the neighbors’ patio furniture slammed hard against the wall. When the storm died down, the all clear was given, Gary turned off the weather alert station and got out of the tub, and yawned
Night person
Daisy loved watching the sunset over the water. So when her parents said they were moving from the Oregon coast to the Shores of North Carolina, she wept. But you’ll see sunrises over the ocean her parents said. You’ve never seen this before and I think you’ll like them. Try as she might, Daisy was a night person and could never get up early enough to watch the sunrise. So she tried another strategy, she drank coffee and tried to stay up late enough. Sure enough, she saw the sunrise. And it sucked. She cut her wrists on the beach.
Accidental perfection
100 years ago, launches were a huge spectacle. Crowds gathering in grandstands. People camping out for days outside the facility. Television and radio and newspapers covering every moment. Press conferences with the crew and the mission control staff. Nowadays, antigravity propulsion made things so much smoother. No more packing explosive gas in liquid form into leaky tanks. It was all contained in a superconducting module with years of flawless operation. And now that all the orbital space junk has been cleared out, there was no risk of another nasty collision with debris. All for tourists to weekend at the lunar base
Big mart
Even when the big mart opened in Smallville, people still went to Earl’s pharmacy to get their prescriptions filled. Sure, he had to change, distributors and insurance plans changed over to the big Mart as a preferred provider, people still wanted to go to Earl. He never made mistakes, he worked things out with people who couldn’t afford their medicine, and he knew alternative ways to stay healthy that people actually used. He encouraged them during his walks or at the gym or the grocery store. The big Mart tried to buy Earl out. Then they burned his store down.
Teacher teacher
Smith was a beloved teacher at the high school, which made his dismissal all the more shocking. Rumors about him went around the town. He was taking care of his mother, so he didn’t leave town, and he showed up at the grocery or the pharmacy. But he never went anywhere else, especially the high school. The first year after his dismissal, when he went to the school to vote, the sheriff went with him. And didn’t talk to any of the teachers or students. After that, they say he voted absentee. But once again, just a rumor about him.
Teachers Pet
It was an annual prank at my high school for the students to hand the biology teacher a snake on the first day of class. If the teacher panicked or freaked out, they knew that they were bullshit. But if the teacher handled and petted the snake, they knew the teacher knew their shit. Usually, the snake was a garter snake or some docile non-poisonous species. But one year, they had found a cottonmouth. As for the teacher’s reaction to the snake, well, they never got the chance. The snake bit one of the students and killed the dumbass.
Winton
Winton got a basketball scholarship to a really good state college. They expected him to be a basketball. The staff wizard in the physical education department spiked Winton‘s Gatorade with a transfiguration potion. By the next morning, Winton was a basketball. He spent four years in the equipment locker, occasionally pulled out for practices. Once, he was a game ball. But it wasn’t a special game. Or the team all would’ve signed him and put them in the trophy case. After four years, they changed them back. Oddly enough, he was the only member of the basketball squad to graduate.