Stadiums and arenas sit unused.
The churches are empty.
So are the schools.
Banks, malls, coffee shops.
Restaurants just fill orders for pickup and delivery.
The grocery stores will close themselves off to shoppers soon.
Weddings, funerals… what of those?
We make plans for after it’s safe, but will it ever be safe again?
Was it ever safe to begin with? Was it really?
One cough, one sneeze… one careless touch of your face after taking back your credit card or handing over the delivery bag.
That’s all it takes.
To live in fear is not to live at all.
Revenge best served
Revenge may be a dish best served cold, but some people actually prefer it heated back up.
Kind of like people who like their beer served warm.
You know, Guinness drinkers.
What’s the best way to heat your revenge back up?
Well, I reheat my revenge in the microwave.
The potato setting for 5 minutes will even out the revenge.
Don’t use the high setting, you’ll just make it all dried-out.
Be sure to put it on a microwave-safe plate and cover it with a paper towel.
To keep the revenge from splattering all over the inside of the microwave.
Brown Bagging It
Mom usually left lunch money on the counter, but today she handed me a five dollar bill and a bloody paper bag.
“Get rid of the bag,” she said. “Don’t look in it, and don’t show it to anyone.”
So, I put the five bucks in my pocket. walked to the woods, and tossed the bag into the tall grass.
For three weeks, we did this.
Until, one morning, I looked in the bag.
Inside was a hand.
The next day, I asked for ten bucks.
After that, there were no more bags.
And I locked my door at night.
Weekly Challenge #800 – If I had a nickel
- Lizzie
- Richard
- Tom
- Tura
- Serendipidy
- Norval Joe
- Planet Z
LIZZIE
If I had a nickel for every time I back-paddled, I’d be rich, he thought. He was the kind of man who never had a clear opinion. He often used the word “potentially”. It sounded grand, but he wanted to be left alone, that’s all. The problem was that he never wished to be a CEO. He just wanted to get the money, which was very good, and paddle his boat around the lake at his mountain cottage. Work was such a waste of time. He sneered and tossed a nickel into the deep dark waters, making a wish… again.
RICHARD
Nickel
Every day it’s the same, running the gauntlet of all the hobo’s as I make my way to work.
“Can you spare a nickel, sir?”
No, absolutely not!
If I had a nickel for every time somebody asked me if I could spare a nickel… Well, I could probably afford to spare it.
But then what?
I’d be all out of spare nickels, and the next down and out would end up doing without!
So, I’m going to save up my nickels, and if ever I happen to fall on hard times myself, I’ll have plenty going spare for myself.
TOM
Cite Your Source
If I had a nickel for every time someone misquoted H. L. Mencken I’d be
able to buy that Tesla I have been lusting after. The quote go like this:
No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have searched the records for
years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by
underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.
I know he was sort of dick in real life. Did much care for chiropractors:
quackery flourishing lushly; he wrote nearly a hundred years ago.He wrote
when a newspaper cost a nickle.
TURA
If I had a nickel for every time
———
I’ve heard all the excuses.
“Sorry I didn’t hand in my homework, the dog chewed it up.”
“…I had to go to China for my grandmother’s funeral.”
“…the computer crashed.”
“…the exercises are impossible, it’s not fair.”
“…I really tried, isn’t that worth something?”
“…a virus ate it.”
“…I was feeling a bit under the weather.”
“…I don’t want to hand in anything less than my best.”
“…I’m triggered by any sort of demand.”
“…I’m problematising the pass/fail binary”
I just tell them, “Hey, if I had a nickel for every time that’s really happened, I’d be flat broke.”
SERENDIPIDY
If I had a nickel for every time I tell my kids not to pull faces, I could afford to pay for a child minder.
Unfortunately, I’m stuck with minding them myself, and it sucks!
And now they’re at it again, pulling faces behind my back.
“Don’t do that!” I say, “if the wind changes, you’ll stay that way!”
And they did.
Although it wasn’t exactly wind.
And their faces didn’t exactly stay the same.
It was an industrial hot air paint stripper, wielded by a mother who’d completely lost her sanity.
But they didn’t pull faces again.
They couldn’t!
NORVAL JOE
Billbert grabbed the back of Sabrina’s puffy coat. “Wait. Are you saying you really are a witch?”
She shot daggers from her eyes. “I told you about that witch word. If I had a nickel for every time someone called me that…” She shook her head ruefully. “Well. I’d have a whole sack full of nickels.”
“So, it happens a lot?” Billbert asked stupidly.
She folded her arms. “Do you think it’s weird that I’m talking to you? Someone who doesn’t know me at all? It’s because everyone else, everyone who knows me, only talks to me behind my back.”
PLANET Z
I won’t bend down to pick up a penny.
I will bend down to pick up a dime.
But a nickel? Maybe.
Depends on how filthy it is.
A nickel saves you from having to carry five pennies.
And it’s good to scratch a lottery ticket.
But on its own, it’s not really worth much.
Now, if you have a lot of nickels, it’s still not worth much.
So, you can fill a thick sock with them or put them in a plastic roll.
And knock someone out.
Then, take their wallet full of tens and twenties and credit cards.
Meet the Jetsons
I never understood why there were Flintstones vitamin pills.
Shouldn’t they be Jetsons vitamin pills?
After all, the Jetsons were living in the future where Vitamin pills exist.
The Flintstones were prehistoric cave-dwelling suburbanite analogs who shouldn’t have things like vitamins or medicine.
But then, the Flintstones had various retro-technological devices like garbage disposals, foot-powered cars, and dinosaur construction equipment.
Why not vitamins, I guess.
And if the show’s popular and all about branding, then I guess it’s okay to have Flintstones vitamin pills.
Still, it would have been fun to bite the head off of that annoying kid Elroy.
Hoarders
It didn’t take long after the announcement of a pandemic that people freaked out and cleaned stores out of hand sanitizer, toilet paper, soup, bread, milk, and other essential goods.
Fights broke out in stores, and people were wrestling, kicking, and punching each other.
Shoved into the back of squad cars.
Plenty of hand sanitizer to go around at the police station after having their fingerprints taken by officers wearing latex gloves.
Dumped in a holding cell to cool off and think things over.
A hacking, wheezing bag lady, sitting on a bench in the corner.
And so it spreads.
Twix straw
Of all the things I saw today, the most important thing has been that you can use Twix as a straw.
The colder the drink, the better.
So, I got out a glass of milk, bit the ends off of a Twix bar, and stuck it in the milk.
And I sucked the milk up the Twix.
And it was great. I liked it. Just a hint of Twix flavor added to the milk.
Then I tried it with the other Twix bar from the pack on a cup of coffee.
It melted too quickly.
But still good for dunking.
Socialism and Communism
The government store ran out of bread.
The government store ran out of meat.
The government store ran out of potatoes.
The government store ran out of fish.
The government store ran out of toilet paper.
The government store ran out of soup.
The government store ran out of lettuce.
The government store ran out of carrots.
The government store ran out of baby food.
The government store ran out of wine.
The government store ran out of everything.
Except for forms. Lots of forms to fill out.
They’re only good for wrapping fish.
Which the store is out of.
The black line
When you drop something on your foot and cause a bleed under your toenail, or jam your foot against something in the dark, it’s interesting to document the months it takes for the line of black to grow out from the root.
Clipping a little off every few days, taking a snapshot with your phone, the line eventually comes to the edge, and you file off the last of it. And you’re back to normal.
And swear to always wear socks and shoes everywhere.
Until you head off for bed, trip over something, and jam your toe against something else.
Buffet of death
A lot of tech companies offer subsidized cafeterias or free delivery lunches.
Ours offers credits for snack vending machines and a daily lunch buffet.
However, with the coronavirus fears, shared buffets like that could lead to some dangerous situations.
And coming to the office may become a hazard in and of itself.
Especially when there’s one or two troglodytes who don’t wash their hands after using the bathroom.
Truly disgusting.
So, they’re having people work from home and they’re offering an allowance for meals to be delivered.
Which works out fine… until the people at the delivery services get sick.