Where does Victor get his ideas from?
He gets his ideas from the well in the woods.
Armed with a sword, he goes there every morning with a bucket.
Along the way, he dumps out any bad ideas left in the bucket.
Then, when he gets to the well, he sends the bucket down and pulls it back up with fresh ideas.
The problem is, those bad ideas find root in the darkness of the woods.
And they grow… and grow…
One day, a bad idea whispered in Victor’s ear…
“You don’t need that sword.”
We haven’t seen Victor since.
Author: R.
Sodastream
I bought a sodastream a few years ago for the office.
A coworker and I made Italian sodas every few days.
Then, the coworker left, and the pandemic hit.
And I didn’t pick up the sodastream until I left that job two years later.
The bottles were missing. The canister was out of gas.
So, I swapped the canister for a fresh one, got some flavorings, and picked up replacement bottles.
The bottles didn’t fit in the machine.
They were shaped for a newer version.
I had to order the old style bottles.
All this to save money on sodas.
Pillowcase
There are so many different pillows on the market.
Feather pillows, cotton pillows, foam pillows, and so on.
Some are hypoallergenic. Others draw heat and moisture.
They’re stuffed to varying degrees of firmness, too.
The same variation goes for pillowcases.
Cotton, silk, special fabrics.
They all serve their purposes.
And each has their special laundering instructions.
Would you combine a memory foam pillow with a silk pillowcase?
Hell no.
So, forgive me, warden, if I continue to complain about the pillow and pillowcase quality here.
And the laundry.
But this kind of shit got me here in the first place.
She sat alone
She’d been alone for years.
She thought she’d never find someone special.
And then, he showed up.
He was perfect.
Handsome, strong, patient, understanding.
Too bad he wasn’t real.
She’d dreamed him up.
And even though she could see him, hear him, feel him…
He wasn’t real.
But it didn’t matter.
She went to dinner with him.
She went to the movies with him.
She did everything with him.
And when she introduced him to her parents, and he got down on one knee, she said yes.
Two days later, he sat by her hospital bed, holding her hand, smiling.
Summoning marks
I don’t think of them as Registered Trademarks or Copyright Symbols anymore.
I think of them as demonic R’s and C’s that some angry intellectual property lawyer’s wizard summoned from Hell.
Thankfully, they used the proper magic circles to bind those monsters and prevent them from running amok.
The problem is when they summon a regular Trademark Symbol from Hell.
That TM shows up without any protective circle.
Sometimes, they use protective parentheses, but that leaves the TM two avenues of escape.
I don’t feel so bad about a intellectual property lawyer getting slaughtered, but the wizard didn’t deserve it.
Clubbing
Shelby loved to go clubbing.
The more exclusive the club, the better.
A bodyguard at the door.
Checking a list. On a clipboard.
Or some app on a tablet, a finger to an earpiece.
That was a good sign.
Then a roped-off section with another bodyguard.
Down a flight of stairs, or up a glass elevator.
Up a mountainside, or a cavern only reachable with scuba gear.
Blindfolded and shoved in the trunk of a limousine.
And then, the greatest of all clubs.
Nobody knew its name. The city. Or the country.
Shelby searched for years, but never found it.
Weekly Challenge #857: Crash
LISA
The Smell of Onions
There was an air of excitement around the table. Don’t get me wrong, we were still quiet but hopeful and very hungry. We’d sat a while listening to the crash of pans escaping from the crack in the kitchen door, daring each other to ask Mum when it would be ready.
As the eldest it was left up to me and I didn’t know how to tell them it was another project. There was nothing cooking, she was boiling fabric with onion skins to dye it. I grabbed a packet of crackers, cheese and apples. Another Christmas we’d never forget.
RICHARD
Time Dilation
There’s a popular belief that time slows down in the moments before a crash.
You see events unfolding in slow motion, your whole life flashes before your eyes, and somehow you find time to wish you’d put on a decent pair of underpants that morning. All before you go crashing into the wall, or vehicle coming head-on towards you.
Such was the inspiration for Uncle Frank’s great invention: A device that maximised that slowing effect, giving you enough time to escape the inevitable, unscathed.
That worked perfectly.
It was the huge crash back to normal speed that killed you.
LIZZIE
The bikes were new. He sneered. He didn’t know about the upcoming crash. He didn’t know she’d made a decision. Which one should he ride first? Yes, this one. She had told him not to, but he wanted to ride those bikes. He didn’t care about her. In fact, her words sounded like a warning, the bitch. He never cared about anyone else. He always did what he wanted. When the time came for her to say a few words at the funeral, she sneered and said “Hope you had fun being who you were. Your ride is now over.”
SERENDIPIDY
As if from a distance, I heard the urgent shouts, “Code Blue. We need a crash cart in here!”
Then, people running, frantic activity, and -at the end of it all- the long, unwavering tone of the flatline, a piercing finality, bringing proceedings to their close.
“Time of death, Twelve forty two.”
Smiling, I smoothed my nurse’s uniform, discreetly exited the room and briskly walked down the corridor.
Another doorway beckons, another room, another patient.
I draw the syringe from my pocket and plunge it into their neck.
Then, I step back, hit the alarm, and wait for the action!
NORVAL JOE
Sabrina rolled her eyes impatiently. “Sure. I could cure your eyesight. But there are legal ramifications. Such as, if you got into a car crash after we cast a corrective spell, you could attempt to sue based on an expectation of wellness.”
Linoliamanda nodded thoughtfully but Billbert shook his head. “Are you serious?”
Sabrina shrugged. “No and yes. We don’t expect to be sued. We just say that to keep from helping people we don’t like.”
“Right,” Billbert said. “You just met Linoliamanda. How can you say you don’t like her?”
Sabrina sniffed. “She just rubs me the wrong way.”
PLANET Z
Humans are destroying the planet’s rainforests at an alarming pace.
Barely half the rainforests from twenty years ago are still standing.
Farmers and developers are cutting down the trees and plowing up the land.
The Rainforest Cafe exploied the crisis by letting people buy overpriced trinkets and food in Chuck-e-cheesey animatronic environments.
But the theme restaurant is waning, and barely half of them are still standing.
So, I’ve ripped off my Save the Rainforests bumpersticker, and replaced it with Save the Rainforest Cafes.
I smile as I fill the tank at the gas station, spilling a bit on the pavement.
Madden
John Madden had three rules for his team:
Be on time, pay attention, and play like hell.
And his players were on time, paid attention, and they sure played like hell.
One of the Madden rules wasn’t “Wear a suit and tie on the plane.”
He said that kind of crap never won a damn game, so he didn’t care what they wore as long as they wore their pads and jerseys on the field.
As long as they were on time for the flight.
I wonder if Madden’s Raiders still alive will wear suits and ties for his funeral.
School supplies
I started with a simple 8 crayon box.
I saw other kids with 16 crayon boxes and felt jealous.
So, I got one.
The next day, all the other kids had 24 crayon boxes.
When I got mine, they all had 32 crayon boxes.
The next day, they had 64 crayon boxes.
With built-in sharpeners, no less.
The 72 box came in a neat case.
The 120 box was made out of rich Corinthian leather.
And 152 box had a combination lock and alarm system.
We all still drew like fucking idiots.
And the crayon company got richer and richer.
Nap from home
It’s been over a year since I was last at the office.
I hated it when people would corner me in my office and ask for help for something they could just fucking Google or look up themselves.
And they wouldn’t take “I don’t know” for an answer.
Some would figure it out and say I figured it out, are you proud of me?
Others would say “I figured it out, no thanks to you.”
I’d snap back “Well, look it up yourself next time!”
Now, I just tell them I’ll get back to them.
And nap in my bathroom.