Author: R.

• Richard
• Lisa
• Tura
• Lizzie
• Tom
• Serendipidy
• Norval Joe
• Planet Z

The next topic is Assistive technology

RICHARD

Unstuck
My son developed an interest in model-making and, like so many of his hobbies, I ended up funding the majority of it, but I reckoned it was educational and keeping him off the streets, so I never complained.
I’d be tasked with finding model kits, tools and supplies, paint – the standard fare for such activities.
Then, one day, he asked for horse glue.
It took me ages to find, and a very unpleasant trip to the local abattoir.
“What’s this?” He asked suspiciously.
“Glue made from horses, like you wanted.”
“No… Stuff for gluing horses. For my model farm!”

LISA

Him
As first dates go it was OK. We met. We ate. He invited me back to his. He made me pay my half of the cab fare. His flat was immaculate. Clinically clean. But, an overwhelming smell of what I can only describe as horse glue.
How many red flags did I ignore?
Reader, I married him. The first time I questioned his behaviour was in the dock years later, prompted by the barrister. You’d know him – his crimes had been front page news for so long he was a household name.
That smell? I could still almost taste it.

TURA

Horse glue; evolution
———
For violin-making, marquetry, and carpentry, there’s nothing like horse glue. But ever since petrol displaced horses it has been scarce and expensive. So we’ve bypassed evolution and genetically engineered the glue horse, Equus glutinosus. It produces so much glue that it accumulates in a reservoir under the skin of its belly. An implanted spigot allows it to be drained at regular intervals, a gallon at a time.

When the horse must be retired, the whole body can be rendered for glue. Scarcely anything will be left of it afterwards.

The flesh of Equus glutinosus is toxic and should be avoided.

LIZZIE

She waited for the bus. A bus drove by and she waited. Another bus drove by and she waited. Is the fare too much for you, dear, asked an old lady, trying to help. She shook her head. And waited. The bus stop had a small bench. She sat down, her legs so heavy. I’m so tired, she thought, so tired. Why are people screaming, their panic seeping through her haziness. Perhaps it was time, yes. But she had already done it. The bus stop was taken by the flames. It burns, it burns!, was the last thing she heard.

TOM

Skibidi Tree Friends

The evolution of American English has taken a shape right hand turn. Due to algo gatekeeping Gen Alpha has had to speed up creating terms to stay one step ahead of the media wasteland. It is no longer about value-added content for kids to claim their voices; it is life blood of their cultural center. As a boomer it would be easy to discount the humor of the Alpha-s as pure nonsense. But that’s the point, the powers that-be are quite mad, so truly why spend the time to sift out deeper meaning. I say skibidi this. 6 – 7

SERENDIPIDY

I take my job as senior product developer for the Spanish Inquisition very seriously.
It’s not only the evolution of new and novel methods of cruel and inhuman torture techniques, but I focus on the quality of the torture we dispense too.
So, I’ve set up a focus group of ‘customers’ to gain helpful feedback.
For example, it’s not enough to simply scream ‘It burns!” I want to know how badly? Is it a pain that lingers and grows worse over time? Can you give it a rating on a scale of one to ten?
Torture: Continuously improving since 1478.

NORVAL JOE

Patrick held up a phone with a Facetime video of the wave building up to crash down on the Five Sisters Coven. As it approached the shore it had grown to fifteen feet in height. “Thanks for your help, Billy,” Patrick said. “That’s some real value added to Sabrina’s power.”

“Don’t get too excited, Patty,” Billbert said with his hands still on Sabrina’s bare neck. “Sabrina is still the one in control.”

The tidal wave stopped, ten feet from shore, like a stationary water-wall. The women ran for higher ground.

“Looks like you failed,” Billbert said. “It burns, doesn’t it?”

PLANET Z

It’s an easy scam, really.
Get a bunch of rookies hooked on poker or blackjack or some other game.
Rig the games so they’re deep in debt.
To pay off the debt, they ease up on their game or fake an injury for a bit.
Maybe pass along things the public doesn’t know, like a teammate spending too much time in the training room.
What sport is this? What league?
All of them.
Because gladiators are stupid, and suddenly rich gladiators are stupider.
Don’t let that year or two in college fool you.
They didn’t learn a thing in there.

My grandfather ran a chain of drycleaning stores.
Buttons would fall off of the clothes, and we’d get boxes of shiny buttons of so many colors and shapes and sizes.
We’d also get maids who’d “retired” from the drycleaning stores.
All were old and sick, and none lasted longer than a month or two.
My grandfather eventually lost all the drycleaners.
He’d been sued into ruin because his workers were all dying from carbon tetrachloride poisoning.
And he was too, leaving my grandmother destitute and reputation ruined.
I remember sorting those buttons.
Now, I wonder if they were poisoned too.

• Richard
• Lisa
• Lizzie
• Tom
• Serendipidy
• Norval Joe
• Planet Z

The next topic is PICK TWO
It burns!
Fare
Value-added
Horse glue
Evolution

NORVAL JOE

The Five Star Sister’s coven sat around a campfire in the sand. Waves crashed on the shore a dozen yards away as they toasted marshmallows and assembled smores.

After an hour of enjoying the tasty trifecta of graham cracker, marshmallow, and melted chocolate bar, one of the women said, “Do you hear that sound?”

“I can’t hear a thing, Marsha,” another replied.

“That’s just it.” Marsha said, stood and looked at the ocean.

Where waves had been crashing on the shore was only wet sand and seaweed. The ocean had withdrawn a hundred yards out to sea.

“Uh oh,” Marsha said.

TOM

The dwarf, the elf, the man, and the Wizard noted the swinging sign over
the ramshackle tavern. The elf asked: “Safe?!” The wizard replied: “Seem
so.” Upon entering the drinking establishment the man inquired about the
lore concerning the name outside the door. A world-weary barkeep said:
“We have an agreement with the arch-mage of the School of Magic
Confections to serve their student magus.” Just then a misspoke chant
rose from a table. The room was engulfed in Sugar Fire. All within were
completely covered in brown goo. Aye Melting Chocolate Bar. Licking a
finger the dwarf said: “sweet”

SERENDIPIDY

By the time I was done, his face resembled a melted chocolate bar.
That is, if you like your chocolate burned, bloody and full of broken bone fragments.
Coming to think of it, maybe a melted chocolate bar was a poor analogy. Think instead of that end scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark, when those Nazis had their faces blasted away when the ark was opened.
Either way, you get the general idea, right?
Did he have it coming? Probably not; he just happened to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time.
Right time for me though!

LIZZIE

With a melted chocolate bar, he said. The barista turned around. Melted? Yes, his teeth, he mumbled. I don’t want to be judgmental, she said, but perhaps chocolate isn’t a good option. He shrugged. With milk, please. She grabbed a chocolate bar from the counter and dropped it in the cup with hot milk. Anything else? No, he said. Are you OK? He smiled the saddest smile she had ever seen. Go sit down, now, I’ll come over and chat. I’ll even make a melted chocolate bar cup of milk for me! And this is why he’s still alive today.

LISA

The Joy of New Jeans.
I’ve been shopping. I got new jeans. White! I know… who even am I? Anyway, I’m feeling great. I think it’s changed the way I’m walking or my expression or something because it feels like everyone’s staring as I walk for the bus.
I’m sure I heard them whispering about me when I got off the bus too. I think I must be imagining it. I mean, it’s just a pair of jeans. Right?
When I get home I realise people have been talking: a melted chocolate bar has somehow spread it’s delight all over the back of the jeans.

RICHARD

— Melted —
I’ve never understood people who keep their chocolate in the fridge, and I can’t abide it.
For me, chocolate should be served at room temperature, better still, slightly above -soft and creamy- just on the point of melting.
And let’s not stop there. The ultimate indulgence for me is to pop a piece in my mouth, and let it slowly melt over my tongue.
Sometimes, I’ll stuff a bar in my pocket, just to bring it up to the perfect temperature for eating.
But, often I forget it’s there.
And end up with a melted chocolate bar.
Best thing ever!

PLANET Z

Some people credit Perry Spencer for inventing the microwave oven.
He was a Raytheon employee who noticed that microwaves from a radar set he was working on melted a candy bar he had in his pocket.
Later, he tested the effect on popcorn, and then on an egg.
Other engineers performed experiments and confirmed Perry’s findings.
They worked up a proposal and brought it to management.
Who rejected it.
“What fool wants to be cooking food in their pockets?”
It’s when they put the food in a bowl and inside a box with the microwaves that the management were convinced.