I recently got a new passport.
Work wanted me to travel to Europe for a conference.
So, I got my photo, filled out the forms, and expedited the process.
Six weeks and two hundred bucks later, I have a nice new passport.
And nowhere to use it. The conference was cancelled because of the pandemic.
Using a passport as a photo ID is always fun.
Feels kinda hoity-toity compared to a mere driver’s license.
Especially when it’s a new passport book, no stamps, and the clerk asks where I’ve been.
I say “To the DMV to replace my driver’s license.”
Coffee for the family
My family’s always asking me to go to Starbucks to pick up coffee.
We started with a coffee maker with a coffee pot, but that wasn’t good enough.
Then there was the one I got with the pods.
Variety packs with every pod they made.
Not good enough.
The espresso machine? Too complicated.
You need a college degree to run it.
A degree in sociology or psychology, mind you.
Starbucks is full of baristas with those worthless degrees.
And the espresso machine that ran on pods wasn’t good enough.
I sold them all on eBay.
Except for the coffee pot.
Doris the drummer
Bob Whitehouse played the drums.
He was really good at it, but he couldn’t fit his name on his bass drum.
His agent suggested he shorten his last name to White. Or House.
But Bob wrote BOB on the drum.
It was shorter than either WHITE or HOUSE.
Bob installed his bass drum upside down, and it still kinda looked like BOB.
It was such a hassle carting the drum kit around, and he hated using house drums.
So, Bob switched to clarinet. And he changed his name to Doris Franklin.
Because it said DORIS FRANKLIN on the case already.
Martin’s Strain
Martin never liked going into the office.
All the people and noise confused him.
Having to pretend to pay attention during boring meetings.
It was easier to deal with everything through the filter of a screen.
So, when the pandemic came, and everyone worked from home, he was ecstatic.
His productivity went way up, he was happy.
He got a promotion and a raise, and lots of bonuses.
All that wasted commute time was now spent in his home gym.
And his chemistry lab, working on mutations of the virus.
So he’d never have to go to the office again.
Weekly Challenge #863 – PICK TWO Quit, Mouse trap, Base, Facts, Martian, Stamp
LISA
Last Wishes
We’re all sat around a cracked Formica table playing MouseTrap while the rain relentlessly shoots at the caravan roof.
“Oooh it’s good to be back at Base!” Dad motions to outside. He tries to stretch out to show how relaxed he is but can’t, there’s no room. The three sleeping bags from the tent drip water into a little puddle that slides towards the open door and escapes.
Mum’s having the time of her life though. And that’s what this is about – our last holiday together. We snuggle in tighter and not just because of the lack of space.
RICHARD
Mouse Trap
Every Christmas at family get-togethers it’s the same old routine.
Out comes the box, and we all spend an hour or so putting together the various board game pieces, for Mouse trap.
There are, of course, always pieces missing, and we can never get that ridiculous plastic basket to stay put where it’s meant to go. Half the mice have been substituted over the years for Monopoly pieces, which makes the whole thing a bit nonsensical.
And the game is always a crushing disappointment.
I wish you could just quit.
But it’s not in the rules. I double-checked!
LIZZIE
“Quit whining. The mouse trap has been set. The facts are the facts. What about the martian base? I don’t care about the martian base. Let them take care of their own base. We take care of our stuff. No! No way, you’re doing that. The order has been signed and stamped. What do you mean? Yes, with the stamp thing they always use. Not that one. The other one. The mouse trap? You know. No, I’m not saying the martians are mice. What?! We’re not going to stamp the martians! That’s not what I said! Oh, forget about it.”
SERENDIPIDY
Will I ever quit?
I doubt it.
I know it’s a disgusting habit. Antisocial, bad for my health and for the health of those around me, and nowhere near as acceptable as it once was, but I suppose I’m addicted, and I’ve no inclination to stop.
So, you can keep spouting all the facts at me until you’re blue in the face. Tell me it makes my clothes and surroundings reek as much as you like.
Because, I simply don’t care.
I enjoy it, and it relaxes me.
And although killing people may be morally wrong, I love doing it!
TURA
Mousetrap; stamp
———
I found a mouse in the trap today. It was still alive, its hindquarters crushed under the spring. I was taking the trap out to the garden when the mouse spoke to me.
“this world is broken and made of pain” it said in its tiny voice.
“all flesh hungers for obliteration” it said.
“if you knew you would beg to avoid reincarnation”
“pain is all that was and is and shall be”
“choose death”
I pulled open the spring and dropped the body on the garden path, then stamped it under my heel.
Why should I believe a mouse?
NORVAL JOE
Sabrina stamped her foot. “Quit wasting time.” She waved her hand. The rain stopped and the clouds slowly dissipated. “You have to face the facts, Billbert’s life is in danger. You can either help me protect him, or you can get out of my life.”
Linoliamanda looked stunned. “That was harsh.”
The bell rang to start their next class. Before Billbert could step that direction, two very large boys blocked him.
One poked him in the chest with a very hard finger and said, “You look like you want to fight. Meet me after school behind the baseball diamond backstop.”
PLANET Z
Freddy liked to tailgate.
But he didn’t tailgate football or baseball.
He tailgated executions.
He’d load up the truck with coolers and a grill and food and water and beer.
And he’d get a stack of sticks and signboards and a staplegun with staples.
And markers.
He’d sell stuff to the protestors, people from either side, whatever.
And made a lot of money from it.
Until someone tried to steal his cashbox, and he killed the guy.
Freddy was arrested, charged, tried, and convicted.
Death, of course.
And on the night of the execution, protestors showed up, waving blank signs.
Climb the mountain
“Climb the mountain,” says the wise man.
So, we climb.
It gets colder, and the air gets thinner.
The sky is so beautiful, here above the clouds.
The blue and white, swirling around the mountain range.
I can barely feel my body.
I can barely hear anything, except for… wind.
And the old man, grabbing my arms, shouting in my face.
KEEP CLIMBING! KEEP CLIMBING!
So, we climb.
The air is colder, thinner, darker.
We’re above the sky, looking down on the world.
The old man standing over me.
I close my eyes, and the cold and dark surround me.
Find my
I really like Apple’s Find My feature.
I rarely misplace my laptop, phone, and watch.
But when I do, it’s nice to be able to run Find My and ping the missing device.
Usually it’s in my apartment. Or in the trunk of my car.
Once I lost my phone while on a hiking trip, and the phone reported itself at the bottom of a deep canyon I’d been hiking through.
If only Apple had a drone service to go fetch your device.
As long as the drone doesn’t fail and get lost, and you have to locate it, too.
Markham County
All roads in Markham County lead to the landfill.
Trucks arrive at dawn, lining up at the gate.
The supervisor weighs each truck, takes their cash, and sends them along the last mile.
Up to the rim, and back down into the pit.
Opening their back gates, and laying out their trash.
The bulldozers shove the trash into a pile, and cover it with dirt.
The trucks leave the pit, drive down the rim, and back out through the gate.
Every day, the pile gets bigger, and the pit gets smaller.
At the end of the roads of Markham County.
Exit through the gift shop
It’s a cliche to finish a thrilling experience by exiting through the gift shop.
But what happens when the thrilling experience is a gift shop?
The greatest gift shop in the world is a very thrilling place.
And you exit it through a gift shop for the gift shop.
Over time, that gift shop for the gift shop has become so thrilling, it needed a gift shop to exit through.
Pretty soon, there were an endless series of gift shops.
And nobody could exit.
Because you couldn’t exit through a gift shop, they all winked out of existence at once.
Myrtle
Aunt Myrtle always said that everything is in the last place you look.
So when Aunt Myrtle lost her glasses, she fumbled around everywhere.
The sofa, the table, the countertop.
She checked the bathroom counter.
And she looked in her purse at least a hundred times.
“Did you steal them?” she yelled at her cats.
And she checked her purse again.
Her heart couldn’t take the panic, and she fell to the floor.
No, her glasses weren’t on the floor.
They were up on her hair.
She might have seen them in the bathroom mirror.
If she’d had them on.