George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
“It’s because you’re a white, straight, cisgendered male,” said the ship’s Chief Diversity Officer. “You’re a privileged member of The Patriocracy.”
“When the shit did we get a Chief Diversity Officer?” muttered George.
“Diversity is our strength!” shouted the officer, who shoved George overboard. “Go hate elsewhere!”
While George swam for shore, the crew demanded living wages, unlimited vacation days, remote work, and a foosball table.
Anyone given an assignment would accuse their superior of racism, sexism, and homophobia.
As the ship headed for the rocks surrounding the harbor.
Author: R.
George and rainbows
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
After watching The Muppet Movie, he tried to think about songs about rainbows.
But the only one he could think of was the one that Kermit the Frog sang.
So, he tried to write a sea shanty about rainbows.
It didn’t come out so well.
It sounded like three cats fighting in an oil drum.
George tried different musicians, but it always came out badly.
He leaned on the ship’s railing, watched a rainbow over the ocean, and hummed a happy tune.
If only he’d written that song down.
George decorates for Halloween
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
Still, he tried his best, such as the time when he wanted to decorate the ship for Halloween.
“We’ll carve creepy pumpkins!” he said.
The problem was, they didn’t have any pumpkins.
So, George painted the cannonballs orange and drew scary faces on them.
And he cut up the sails into ghost costumes.
“See?” George said. “We’re ghosts! Ghostly pirates! Scary!”
“Without our sails, we’re dead in the water,” growled the captain.
“That’s the spirit!” said a ghostly George. “Booooooo! Boooooo!”
The captain brained George with an orange cannonball.
Weekly Challenge #1010 – PICK TWO Dictionary, Game, Orchestra, Appreciated, Charge
- Richard
- Lizzie
- Tom
- Lisa
- Serendipidy
- Norval Joe
- Planet Z
THOMAS
The old dictionary sat open on the table, pages fluttering as if alive. Clara turned it into a game, pointing at random words and weaving them into stories for her little brother. Tonight, she landed on orchestra. She closed her eyes and described violins tuning, drums thundering, a conductor ready to give the charge. Her brother listened wide-eyed, as though he truly heard the music filling their small kitchen. When she finished, he clapped, the applause soft but sincere. Clara smiled, feeling deeply appreciated. Sometimes, the grandest performances happened not on stage, but in the quiet corners of home.
LIZZIE
Twist my words, he said, play the game. Come on, do it. She replied she had the orchestra waiting. He laughed and said you can’t do it. You’re not strong enough. She remained silent. He continued to laugh and twist her words. She felt like saying, come on, do it, but she didn’t want to miss the right moment. He turned away to face the closed window. No one heard anything. No one saw anything. So, yes, she thought, she was strong enough to play the game. She dumped the weapon in the lake and the silencer in someone’s trash.
LISA
Holiday
We’d forgotten what rain was like; then we went on holiday and endured an endless drum on the caravan roof. A storm had knocked the electrics off and my phone was dead.
Everything felt too far away to leave our dry little sanctuary.
The windows steamed up and I wanted to sleep but the table we sat at was also my bed. They felt like desperate times we’d found a dictionary and tried to make up a word game.
The power returning felt like a miracle.
Then the sun returned too just as we loaded the car to go home.
TOM
Dictionary Games
When I was growing up YA was a gentler read. Tom Swift, Nancy Dew, Harder Boys. Now reflexive of the times we live dystopian death match 2000 is in vogue. Lots of dead youth. So not one to miss out on trends in emerging American fiction I have chosen a tale I’m calling The Dictionary Games. Dozen seniors locked in a library. Their only weapon a 1909 Webster’s Dictionary. The shelves are layered with deadly traps and the librarian is packing a Smith and Wesson. The sole survivor gets a free ride to Harvard and seat of the supreme court.
NORVAL JOE
They sat down on a musty threadbare couch. The filthy walls were bare except for a single curling photo of a girl and her older brother.
“That picture is you and your brother.” Mandi pointed. “Why’s he smiling, and you look unhappy?”
Bobbie blushed. “That was years ago. Patrick was playing his game with me and was proud of himself.”
“What game?” Mandi asked.
Bobbi blushed and shook her head. “He knows I’m in charge now and he can’t mess with me anymore. That’s why he likes the Black Knights. They’re all about persecuting and dominating other people of power.”
SERENDIPIDY
I really should charge for my services, but then again, didn’t someone once say if you truly love your job, you’ll never work a day of your life? And it seems somehow wrong to charge for something I’m happy to do for free.
My clients are happy too. They tell me I give a five star service.
It’s nice to be appreciated.
But, nothing in life is ever really free. There’s always a price to be paid on the day of reckoning.
You make a deal with this devil, and some day you are going to pay with your soul.
RICHARD
— Scrabble —
“How about a game of Scrabble?” suggested Harry.
Everybody groaned inwardly.
Harry always wanted to play Scrabble, and Harry always won.
This time would be no different.
“Juxplunk!” Harry proclaimed triumphantly; “And on two triple word scores too!” He quickly totted up the score… “I make that a hundred and sixty eight points!”
“That’s not a real word Harry.”
He sighed and thumbed through the dictionary.
“Juxplunk: The sound of a pebble falling down a well.”
He snapped the dictionary shut and stuffed it down the side of his chair.
We knew he was lying, but it was his dictionary.
PLANET Z
I had an handheld Electronic Football game growing up.
Well, my brother and I were forced to share it.
We were forced to share a lot.
My brother would take his turn and run down the battery.
Then he handed it to me.
I wanted to replace the battery, but my parents were cheap.
So, I left the game on the counter.
My brother would wait until night and swap the battery with one in a smoke detector.
And it would give its low battery beep.
My dad would get out a step ladder and replace the battery,
A lot.
George has talent
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
He didn’t have much of skills or talent.
At the first annual Pirate Talent Show, he arranged flowers.
Well, weeds. He didn’t have any flowers to arrange.
And instead of a vase, he had a helmet.
Pathetic, really.
At the second one, he did bird calls. No birds showed up.
“Why don’t you do something more pirate-like,” said his captain. “You know, swords or cannons or knot-tying.”
So, for the third show, George stuffed swords into a cannon and tied a knot around it.
And arranged flowers around it.
George gets his hair cut
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
You’re not supposed to clip your nails or cut your hair on a ship.
It’s seen as an offering to the goddess Persephone.
But Neptune is a jealous asshole, and hates it when you make offerings to other gods.
So when George opened a manicure stand and barber shop below decks, the captain had George marooned.
George set up a manicure stand and barber shop on the island.
And the crew came ashore to have their nails and hair done.
“Just a little off the top,” said the captain.
George gets on the right foot
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
There’s a superstition about boarding boats with your right foot.
Because the left foot is unlucky.
The captain put a sign at the gangplank that said DO NOT STEP ON BOARD WITH YOUR LEFT FOOT.
George, of course, kept boarding the boat with his left foot.
“Oops,” said George. “Sorry. My bad.”
And bad things kept happening.
The captain handed the cabin boy an axe and peg leg to shake at George when he boarded.
“Either use your right foot, or this will be your left.”
George complied quickly.
George and the wrens
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
So he made up for it with luck charms and superstitious rituals.
They say that if you get a feather from a wren on New Year’s Day and wear it, you’ll be safe from shipwrecks for the whole year.
If one feather was lucky, why not the whole bird?
George stuck seventeen wrens in his hair and beard.
But, being a merciful soul, George couldn’t bring himself to kill the birds.
The constant flapping and pecking was a big distraction, and they eventually caused George to wreck the ship.
George keeps his distance
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
And he didn’t get any better at it with the pandemic.
The CDC told people not to rub their faces and eyes, which is you have a hook for a hand, already makes sense.
But when the CDC ordered people to social distance, he would yell at his swashbuckling opponents to keep six feet away.
“But my sword is only two feet long,” said his opponent.
“I guess we can’t swashbuckle then,” said George. “Parley then?”
His opponent put his sword away while George drew his pistol and fired.
George and the Northwest Passage
George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
His sextant wasn’t as much a navigation tool as it was a nutcracker.
He’d sweep the shells off of the maps and charts and shout “Oh, let’s go that way!”
One day, the ship was in the North Atlantic. The next day, he was in the North Pacific.
“Did we just discover the Northwest Passage?” asked the captain.
George looked over the maps and charts, turning them over and over in his hands.
“Hell if I know,” he said. “But can we stop somewhere to pick up more walnuts?”