Everyone used to talk about the things that Santa brought them.
Except for me. Because I was Jewish.
“Why doesn’t Santa visit us and bring us things?” I asked my father.
“Because Santa is a stupid anti-Semite, and he hates Jews!” my father growled. “Now do your homework!”
Dad said similar things about the Easter Bunny, too.
When he got mad, he called a lot of people anti-Semites.
So many, in fact, they passed around the hat and bought him a trip to Israel.
One-way.
He calls every morning to tell me to do my homework.
He thinks it’s evening.
Author: R.
a bad day
you could say
that jesus
had a bad day
a really
bad day
betrayed
whipped
beaten
crucified
and stabbed
but it could have been
worse
so much worse
what if
mary magdeline
had a baby?
his son?
what if
he had
overdue library books?
what if
nobody volunteered
to feed his cat
or water his plants
while he was gone?
or even worse
what if
one of the apostles
was a
necrophiliac?
no wonder why
he was grateful
for just
getting crucified
and stabbed
and thrown
behind a rock
to rot
wouldn’t you?
even if
he missed
the whole weekend.
Poor angels
The girl in “It’s A Wonderful Life” didn’t quite get it right.
Every time a bell rings, an angel grows another pair of wings.
Nowadays, angels are covered with wings, all over their thrashing and writhing bodies.
And they’re always sprouting more wings, faster than they can rip them off.
Bloody, screaming angels, tearing wings off of their backs, their arms, their legs, their faces…
Heaven is like a David Cronenberg horror film, with bright puffy clouds.
No wonder why angels don’t interfere in human affairs anymore.
Devils just have to deal with hellfire.
They have it so much better.
The Tractor
Three days after the big ice storm, Old Man Thompson didn’t come in to Dot’s Diner for his usual Thursday Special.
The sheriff found him sitting on his tractor, hands frozen to the wheel. Why he was on it when it was too early to plant, nobody knows.
“Can he still be Santa for the kids?” asked Miss Blake, the kindergarten teacher. “Just dress and pose him for a little bit?”
She wasn’t very bright.
The sheriff took Old Man Thompson’s place. A kid asked to see his gun, it went off, and the town had two funerals for Christmas.
Elf On The Shelf Life
As the holidays approach, some parents use an Elf On The Shelf doll to convince their gullible, naughty kids to behave themselves.
Christmas comes and goes, the kids unwrap their presents, and the elf goes back in his box until the holidays come around again.
During this time, who watches the elf? What keeps the elf from misbehaving and causing trouble?
Chicken wire and duct tape usually do the trick.
I know one family that sticks the elf in a Tupperware, fills it with water, and freezes him. Just to be safe.
They don’t get invited to many parties.
Holiday Horror House
Edna loved to bake gingerbread men every year.
But one year, she rolled out the dough, cut out the gingerbread men, and decided that she’d rather make a fancy winter scene.
So, she mashed all but one of the men back into a dough ball, rolled it out, and sliced out some walls, a roof, and a chimney.
She baked all the pieces, built a house, glues it together with frosting, decorated it with gumdrops and candy canes, and set the gingerbread man in front.
The gingerbread man trembled with fear, haunted by the tormented souls of his unborn brothers.
Weekly Challenge #554 – Moment
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:
MUNSI
Moments
By Christopher Munroe
This has been a moment in 100-word story…
Our moment.
Shimmering and lovely and sad,
Leave the moment, just be glad,
For the story that we had,
Every moment is a moment,
When you’re in a 100-word story!
This is ridiculous, what am I doing here, I’m in the wrong story!
Wait, no, this is my story.
I wrote this story. Nobody wrote it but me, and as such nobody but me will pull it together and make it all make sense.
Because otherwise, it’s all going to slip away from me, and be forgotten.
Moments are fleeting that way…
CHARLIE
He declared it only took a moment. The posture he was forced to take was both uncomfortable and awkward. He was speaking of his morning routine of the cursory, steam cleansing and the application of unguents to his aging and parched spheroids.
He told his breakfast club that it might be the reason he was late, in addition to the traffic in downtown Seattle.
An eccentric, but scholarly man, Mr. LaCrosse spoke freely and without a hint of restraint. Like his new, modern, hero, Donald Trump, he relied on his wealth, education, and position in the community to speak candidly.
JEFFREY
Living in the Moment
by Jeffrey Fischer
Grant was depressed about the future. His shrink told him he shouldn’t obsess about things to come, but to live in the moment and enjoy himself.
Grant started with several shots of bourbon. He felt he needed some stimulation, so he snorted several lines of coke. He swallowed a random handful of pills to see what would happen. What happened was that he felt lust for his next-door neighbor, so they had sex.
When the police examined his body the next morning, they assumed the combination of drugs killed him. And they would have – but Grant’s wife worked faster, stabbing the cheating bastard. Her shrink also told her to live in the moment.
RICHARD
#1 – Horses
I’ve never liked horses, and they don’t particularly like me either: they’ll roll their eyes, do that thing with their upper lip, and – given half a chance – get a swift bite in if they can.
The one and only time I went horse riding was a complete disaster.
They gave me the smallest, most docile animal they had, and I still ended up upside down, underneath its belly, then brutally thrown into a stream when it suddenly decided to bolt.
I still have a reminder of that occasion having on my wall…
It’s the spur of the moment!
#2 – Caught out
“What you thinking?”, said my girlfriend, catching me in the middle of a reverie.
“Erm, nothing much,” I replied, “I was just having a moment”.
“Go on,” she teased, “what’s going on in that head of yours?”
I’d been well and truly caught out. There was no way I could tell her I was imagining what it might be like to bed the hot girl from across the street!
Quickly I countered: “You tell me what you’re thinking first!”
She looked embarrassed; “Umm… Actually, I was imagining a threesome with that hot girl across the street!”
She’s definitely a keeper!
TOM
By Leaf and Bow
Merry and Pippin were in a quite jolly mood having finished the better part of second breakfast. They were engaged in a lively conversation with the youngest of the Ents, a 1000 year old, named Top Heavy. In short order talk wandered off to favorite dish made by their mothers. Top Heavy spoke of a spice moss pudding then turned to the west and fell silent. “I can hardly remember her branches …” “If we return …” “When we return,” corrected Pippin, “we will join the search for the Ent wives.” “Blessing be on you who seek my Mom Ent.”
LIZZIE
The lights by the pink boxes took her back.
It was a rainy day.
She complained that she needed sun, that she absolutely abhorred winter.
He smiled. It wasn’t even winter yet but he knew her well.
He grabbed one of the boxes and said there was something special in it. She played along.
Inside the box, a string of white lights was neatly stored away.
When he plugged them, they flickered happily.
Here’s the sun for you, he said.
The lights stayed on since that day. And the sun was his smile offering her a string of white lights.
SERENDIPITY
They say in that moment before you die, your whole life flashes before your eyes. The problem is, it’s generally over too quickly to savour.
So, consider what I’m about to do, my parting gift to you – no matter what people say, I’m not as callous as they make out.
Yes, you’re about to die, and yes, it will be extraordinarily painful; but, out of the kindness of my heart and the compassion in my soul, I’ll do everything I can to help you enjoy your final moment of recall.
I’m going to kill you… Very, very slowly indeed!
LISA
WATCH
It was always the last thing he did before sleep. Always had been, from boarding school to today at Elms View Retirement Home.
It was usually done in bed, teetering on his left hip (new in 1992)
Watch wound before lights out. Funny how things from youth return to us later. He found comfort ending the day with those five swift twists.
Except tonight.
Arthur’d felt a bit queer and had gone to bed early. Had even missed pudding. (Jam roly poly with custard.)
He thought about the watch, but then lay back on his bed.
Just for a moment.
NORVAL JOE
For a moment Mickey thought it was over.
But as the form of a man, a big man with a pistol in his hand, passed in front of the head lights, he found Ferret had more guts to her than he had given her credit. She gunned the engine and raced passed the gunman.
Three bullets splashed through the side window. Three more shots fired and Mickey hoped they hadn’t hit anyone, or anything important in the van.
“Is anyone hurt?” he asked.
“I’m okay.”
“Me, too,” Cherry said.
Mickey peeked over the bench seat to watch for approaching headlights.
TURA
Moment
———
A man’s pipe-rack is the measure of his character. Established in his private study, this product of solitude springs wholly from his inmost soul.
For every moment, there is the perfect pipe, and for every pipe, the perfect moment to be smoked. Each new thing in one’s life, if lasting, may prompt a new pipe. Thus should a man accumulate a pipe-rack, as he accumulates substance.
On a certain distinguished Lord’s death, his executor, on entering his study, was struck dumb for a space of full three hours in wonderment at the transcendent character revealed by his row of pipes.
PLANET Z
“Do you have a moment?” is how the human resources representative gets you.
It’s never anything good.
“Hey, I baked these cookies, and I know you like peanut butter.”
See? You’d never hear anything like that.
It’s always something bad.
Someone talking shit, or you talking shit and someone reporting you for it.
So, I say “No, I don’t have a moment.” and walk away.
That’s when the emails begin. Followed by chat requests and calendar updates.
“Nope. Sorry. Too busy.”
Then, they show up at my door.
“We need to talk.”
At least now they’re being honest about it.
Revenge For Christmas
For Christmas, my daughter says that all she wants is justice.
The man that raped her.
The cops who didn’t believe her story.
The lab technicians who contaminated her rape kit.
Her lawyer, who botched the case. And the prosecutor who called her a whore.
The jury… the whole jury.
And the judge who let this circus happen under his watch.
The reporters, damned vultures. The silent witnesses.
“Will revenge do?” I ask her, as I press the button.
A flash of light. The searing wind. The tell-tale mushroom cloud.
Never fuck with the daughter of a nuclear weapons technician.
Church theme
Every week, the church tries a different theme.
One week, it was a pirate theme. Everyone came to church on Sunday dressed as a pirate.
Or a parrot. Or a bar wench.
The church did a space theme. A medieval theme.
The sermons strayed from the religious to the secular.
And then, music. A deejay spinning tunes.
From week to week, the church turned into nothing more than a costume party.
Two drink minimum, the weddings rocked, the funerals rocked.
And then, one day, it was gone.
Vanished without a trace.
Now, on Sunday, I watch football, or sleep late.
Plus One
The holiday season brings holiday parties, which brings holiday party invites.
You can’t say “bring your husband or wife” because that assumes a marital relationship.
You can’t say “bring your significant other” because who is to decide who is significant or not?
You can’t say “plus one” because you may have more than one in your life that you consider a plus, and it’s unfair to have to decide who among them is the plusiest.
After the community activist consulting fees and legal costs, all that’s left in the budget for the party is…
Fuck it. Here’s a fruit cake.