Author: R.

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.

This is the Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

We’ve got stories by:

• Charlie Lacrosse
• Tom
• Lizzie
• Richard
• Tura
• Jon
• Serendipity
• Danny
• Norval Joe
• Planet Z

CHARLIE

As I child, I was lucky enough to have the pizza bones any time we ordered a pizza. We had the pizza on a Saturday night, as we gathered in the den in front of the television. Mom would trim the crispy end pieces for me. She would grate some additional Mozzarella, and pop the pieces into the oven until the cheese melted and joined the circle of bones together into a large circle of crispy, cheesy, chewiness.

Dad and I sometimes shared the Bone Ring as we named it, but he usually was happy with eating the regular slices.

TOM

The First Glorious Thing I Ever Ate.

Many years ago challenge topics were chosen by the winner of a weekly poll. The first time I had a majority of listens votes I chose the topic: Pizza. This choice totally drove Andrew Ian Dodge crazy. He said it was the stupidest topic he had ever seen and end a run of 22 stories in a row. He refused to write a story. I feel confident in the decade that has follow pizza has not been the worst topic. Further I think it’s fair to say all 630 topics have been it their way inspiring, as was Mr. Dodge.

LIZZIE

“This looks awful. Are you sure they have pizza here?”
“Yeah.”
“How did you find this place? There’s no one else here.”
“I got an email. They sent me an 80%-off coupon.”
“80%?? Let’s go. Now.”
“Why?!”
“Haven’t you heard of the 80% club? They’ll shrink your brain by 80%.”
“What?”
It was too late. The doors closed.
The next morning, they were found barely alive.
The number of these cases had been growing lately. No one knew how it was done, but everyone knew the consequences.
Discount coupons can be hazardous.

RICHARD

Food of the gods

That sublime combination of tomato, cheese and a light, doughy base, suffused with an infinite variety of flavours and textures. Mushroom, chicken, sausage, onion, fresh herbs and olive oil… I could talk forever of its merits.

Food of the gods indeed, but there’s a downside to this culinary marvel – I can’t eat more than a slice without suffering the most appalling heartburn.

Might explain why the gods always seem to be hurling lightning bolts and in such a bad mood.

TURA

Pizza
———
Pizzas are not popular in China, and imported Western pizza chains have met with indifferent success. This is despite the fact that pizza was invented there, more than two thousand years ago, during the Qin dynasty, and had many regional forms. But one day, at a great state banquet, one of the guests suddenly picked up his pizza and flung it, frisbee style, at the Emperor. The circular blade concealed inside by a treasonous cook decapitated him.

Pizzas were henceforth banned throughout the Middle Kingdom, pizza ovens and recipes were destroyed, and the very word was expunged from the language.
———

JON

Wrapped in Wool To Keep It Warm

By

Jon DeCles

The first pizza is speculated to be that of the Ancient Romans, who baked it on the hot bricks of the hearth after raking back the coals. The dough was made simply with water and chestnut flour. Chestnuts were plentiful, and easier to process than wheat or barley. Pine nuts rather than anchovies provided a contrasting flavor, and a sprinkling of fresh rosemary was covered with a drizzle of olive oil before baking. It was a very rich desert.

Flavius the attractive slave delivered it from the baker, and was subject to the same advances as his attractive contemporary counterpart.

SERENDIPITY

Hotter than the surface of the sun!

That first bite of a fresh pizza that sears the roof of your mouth, instantly flaying the skin in peeling layers from your palate; bubbling blisters erupting from the corners of your lips.

It’s excruciating.

Yet you’re compelled to continue through to the bitter end.

Bite after bite.

Slice after slice.

One piece after another; until, bleeding, torn and blistered, tongue swollen and useless, you collapse, whimpering and broken.

Would you like another slice?

DANNY

Weekly Challenge 630: Pizza
Posted on May 14, 2018 by dannydwyer
Vito tried to calm a customer outraged at his brother slapping the dough on his bare chest to make pizza by saying, “you think that’s bad, you should see how he makes the doughnuts.” The customer stormed out in a rage. Over the next week, Vito and Tony were shocked at the sudden decline in business. They had NO customers at all.

They agreed to be on “Gordon Ramsay’s 24 Hours to Hell & Back,’ to figure out what was going wrong. Gordon screamed after walking in on Tony making the doughnuts, “Start by taking your dick out of the food, dumb-ass!”

NORVAL JOE

Billbert leaned over, held his stomach, and stared at the ground, waiting for the pain and the students to go away.
When the nausea passed he looked up to find a single student standing there.
She smiled. Neon blue cat ear headphones perched on her blond head matched her blue eyes.
“I’m Linoliamanda. I’m sorry he hit you.”
Billbert gathered up the shreds of plastic. “Yeah. Me too.”
“Do you want to come to my birthday party on Friday? We’re having pizza.”
Billbert shoved the remains of the plastic bag in his pocket and said, “Yeah. That sounds like fun.”

PLANET Z

I like to watch the How It’s Made television series.
The episode on Frozen Pizzas is fascinating, showing how much automation there in is the process.
The machines they use are fascinatingly complex.
If I had become an engineer, I’d have liked to have designed machines like that.
But what I find most fascinating is that instead of having to watch The Discovery Channel when they air this show, I can watch any episode by searching for it on YouTube.
On Demand is so fascinatingly complex.
If I had been a software engineer, I’d have liked to design that too.

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.

This is the Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

We’ve got stories by:

• Richard
• Charlie Lacrosse
• Lizzie
• Serendipity
• Tom
• Jon
• Norval Joe
• Danny
• Paul Camp
• Planet Z



RICHARD

Mavis

Mavis plays the pipe organ in church every Sunday.

She’s not particularly good, but the vicar won’t let anyone else try their hand, despite having a few candidates who could play equally well, if not better.

There’s Albert, who was a music teacher; Henry, who plays keyboard on a Friday night at The Smokehouse Blues Bar; and Jake, who’s young, but can play better than most twice his age.

We reckoned the vicar just didn’t want to hurt her feelings.

Until we discovered the vicar’s own ‘pipe organ’ was also getting the Mavis treatment in the vestry before every service!

CHARLIE

When I went to South Africa to shop for my organ, I brought Bessie with me. I trusted her enough to help me pick out the organ I would have the rest of my life.

She was not a stuffy, snooty type. She would pick one out that was simple, not ornate in any way, and she would tend to pick something that was practical and easy to maintain.

We arrived at the showroom and the director took us into the private display salon.

There were about a dozen on display. A couple of them had mirrors reflecting several views.

#2

If you have an aging organ, you have several options: 1) rebuild the existing organ; 2) replace the organ with a suitable electronic substitute; 3) purchase an entirely new organ; or 4) make do with a compromised tool.

Trading in an existing organ for an electronic substitute can be much like tossing out an heirloom gold watch bequeathed by your grandfather and replacing it with a Walmart 6 dollar watch. Most organs, even those neglected and in greatest need of repair, have parts of considerable value to someone.

The pipes, casework, console shell, and many other components never wear out.

LIZZIE

When we arrived for dinner at the neighbors, a man was playing a song on an old pipe organ. One of the notes was off-key, but he played on. When the host invited us to go outside, I was happy to escape that torture. The problems started when she explained that they needed meat and that they took some of his organs . I was shocked, and was about to ask how he could even play when I felt a sharp blow to the back of my neck. Officer, do you think this scar is what I suspect it is?

SERENDIPITY

I’m all in favour of organ donation, but I do think that it’s a shame so many die because the demand for organs so frequently outstrips the supply.

So I thought I should do my bit to solve the problem. I’ve been working on growing human tissues in the lab, with some very encouraging successes to date, I’ve even managed to create a functioning human kidney!

You see, I’m not all bad.

I bet you thought this was going to be a story about harvesting organs from unwilling victims, didn’t you?

That’s just a hobby I pursue on the side!

TOM

Even Educated Fleas Do-s It

Birds got this organ that lets them know exactly where there are in space. You’ve seen Humming Birds target a space that was once a red feeder and hoover there in surprise. Well modern science has discovered a logic organ in male humans. It seems a matrix of Y-chromosomes somewhere north of Mr. Happy and bit south of the hippocampus is responsible for mid-level discord processes. Researchers at the Mayo Clinic have dubbed this new structure the Y-organ. The triggering mechanism is the sound of the female voice. The response is a long string of the word: WHY WHY WHY.

JON

Bach’s Royal Instrument

By

Jon DeCles

The organ is the biggest, most powerful instrument ever built. Pipes from teeny tiny to pipes 28 feet long. In San Francisco there is an art gallery that is one gigantic organ, the pipes inside the walls. Churches tremble as if in earthquake when the mighty organ sounds its orgasmic chords under fingers and pedals. People who have only heard the organ recorded are like those who have read pornography but never had sex. Properly played, the organ can make you tremble right down to your core.

That’s the very kind of big-piped, powerful, orgasm-inducing, mind-shattering organ that I want.

NORVAL JOE

A dozen students, including Billbert, gathered around Roderick as he put his feet through the holes in the grocery bag and pulled it up.

“Watch this.” He put his arms out like superman, jumped forward, and belly flopped in the dirt.

The kids wouldn’t have laughed harder if an organ grinder with a dancing monkey had suddenly appeared.

Fuming, Roderick got to his feet, tore off the grocery bag, and threw the shreds of plastic on the ground. He walked to Billbert and slugged him in the stomach.

“I think he ruptured my spleen,” Billbert said, watching Roderick stomp away.

DANNY

Jezebel was a musician, who liked to make instruments out of human organs and body parts. There were the Bagpipes made of lungs, piano keys made from bones, piano wire made from hair and muscle, and his favorite, a harmonica made from a larynx. Jezebel would bring his grizzly musical instruments to the town square every Saturday, where the crowd favorite was his portable Organ made solely out of organs. It would make disturbing squishy sounds with every key he hit. “What on earth does that sound like?” most would ask. I don’t know, but it sure does sound expensive.

PAUL CAMP

Time For the Game

“Daddy, why do they call it the Organ Trail?” The game is about to start. I mute the car radio.
“The Organ Trail?”
“You know, with the covered wagons.”
“Oh, sweetheart, you mean the Oregon Trail. Oregon is a place.”
“No, Daddy! Mrs. Lindholm says it’s the ‘Organ Trail.’
Who am I to contradict her first grade teacher?
“It’s because the Indians would cut out everyone’s hearts and livers. You know, their organs.”
A look in the mirror of horrified silence. We can straighten this out later. I turn up the radio. This is going to be a great game.

PLANET Z

People settled Red Creek about two hundred years ago.
They built houses, a school, and a church.
More people arrived. And they built more.
They raised money for a pipe organ for the church.
Wells Fargo wagons brought the pipes and machinery out to Red Creek.
But the assembly instructions somehow got lost.
Instead of waiting for a new copy to arrive, the town blacksmith did his best to put the thing together.
At the celebration party, the pipe organ exploded, killing everyone in town.
Wells Fargo paid the newspapers to cover it up and call it a meteor strike