Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.
This is 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
Remember Remember
By Christopher Munroe
Remember when that one Guy tried to blow up parliament with a cartload of gunpowder?
Oh come on, you remember. Guy pulls up, gunpowder in tow, he’s intercepted, nothing explodes but he’s ALL OVER the news, people screaming for his execution? It was a whole huge thing, #GunpowderTreason was trending on Twitter and everything, EVERYONE was sharing stories .
No?
Are you sure?
Huh.
Oh, nothing, I was just wondering how that whole thing turned out. After the initial outrage I kind of lost interest.
I guess these sorts of stories get covered differently in the age of social media…
JEFFREY
One Thing to Agree On
by Jeffrey Fischer
Peter asked his dad for forty dollars to fill the car. He really wanted to get away from the boring family reunion. His dad replied, “I remember when gasoline was two bucks a gallon and you could buy a nice house for a hundred thousand.”
Peter’s granddad replied, “That’s nothing. I remember when gasoline was 75 cents and you could buy a nice house for $75,000.”
Peter’s great-grandad wasn’t too mobile any longer, but he still had his memory. “In my time, gasoline was a quarter, and a polite young man pumped it and checked your oil. Oh, and a nice house was $20,000.”
Peter said, “Every generation thinks younger people have it easier.I bet you can’t agree on one thing.”
In unison, all three elders said, “Today’s music sucks. It’s all noise.”
Common Sense
by Jeffrey Fischer
Bryan’s parents often fought. If that wasn’t bad enough, they tended to use Bryan as an intermediary in their battles. Even though both were in the same room, each would direct remarks to Bryan.
“I remember when your mother used to have a hot meal ready when I came home from work.”
“I remember when your father had a good job and could provide for us.”
“I remember when your mother was attractive.” There was a long pause after that comment. Bryan thought his father might have gone too far that time.
“Well, I remember when your father had the good sense to keep his mouth shut.”
CHARLIE
I remember when it was Thursday for the full day. I remember it came right before Friday and a little before my favorite day, Saturday. I think I was two or three months old. My dad was home on Saturdays, and it was the day he threw me up in the air a half dozen times in the surf, and caught me right before I touched the cold Atlantic. The day my parents decided I should learn to swim was the day that dad threw me far into the air, and let me fall into the water. Since I had swum around inside my mother’s womb for nine months already, I took to swimming in the ocean, immediately.
RICHARD
#1 – Back
I remember when I was a kid, addicted to Star Trek, Arthur C Clarke and Asimov… The future was going to be amazing.
Unfortunately, it isn’t: Moon holidays, flying cars, teleporters and intelligent robots are still science fiction; we still have to work for a living, iron our clothes and the same inconveniences we thought would one day become things of the past.
The future has badly let me down.
However, I have a cunning plan – I’m waiting for Marty Mcfly and Doc Brown to turn up, and when they do, I’m grabbing a lift… back, to their future.
#2 – Grandpa
Back in the day, grandpa would often take me out into the garden and stand, smoking his pipe and reminiscing about the good old days.
“I remember when this was pasture and farmland, as far as you could see”, he’d say, with an expansive gesture; “Now look at it”
Factories, roads, houses filled the view as far as the horizon.
That was before the asteroid struck.
Now, in the bleak days of eternal winter, I find myself standing in the same spot with my young son…
“I remember when this was all civilisation, as far as the eye could see…”
SERENDIPITY
I remember when I was in school, you used to tease me; you’d steal my homework and bully me in the playground.
Do you also remember?
I think not. You’ve almost certainly forgotten me – an inconsequential, unimportant name from the distant past.
A nobody.
And that suits me just fine – the lack of recognition in your eyes, that blank look you gave me when I introduced myself, work entirely in my favour. Will you remember Nurse Haven when you wake up? I don’t think you will.
But you’ll certainly remember what it was like to once possess legs!
LIZZIE
“I remember when saving a man’s life meant exactly that. People would be praised on TV for stopping someone from jumping off a bridge or for saving them from a train approaching at high speed. They were true heroes.
Nowadays, saving a man’s life means nothing of the sort. Anyone can jump off a bridge with little consequences, no one really cares, and there aren’t any trains anymore.
These days, people are hailed as heroes for saving a dead man’s life. Well, they’re half dead… Honey, where’s the gun? The beasts are at the door again and they are hungry.”
ZACKMANN
Grandpa started saying “I remember when…”
“You couldn’t wait to love me?” interrupted Joe.
“No, that is not what I was saying and have no plans to love you late at night.”
Joe said “Yes, Wen was nose guard for our high school football team junior year.”
“I wasn’t talking about the Wen kid just saying that I remember when earworms weren’t as cool as Stephanie Mabey’s Zombie Love Song but not as sucky as Baby by that Canadian kid with the funny hair.”
Joe replied. “Doesn’t have funny hair, anymore and the worst ear worms were inflicted by Khan.”
TURA
1.
“I remember when it was nowt but fields around here,” said Young Tom.
He was called Young, because he was only eighty years old.
“I remember when it were wild forests, and you could get eaten by boars!” rejoined Old Tom, Young Tom’s father.
“Youngsters!” said Great-Great Grandma. Nobody knew how old she was. “I remember when it were ice year round, a mile thick!”
“Tell us about the ape-men!” said Little Tom.
Great-Great Grandma shot him an evil look. “Any Neanderthal was twice the man you’ll ever be. I remember when…”
I sighed. There was no stopping her now.
2.
I remember when the world was young
The knife-sharp air, the mile-high trees, the tides
Reciprocating like a giant’s breath
So strong one feared the day that he might wake.
The empty skies, yet pure of any life
The swamps where giant sloths boomed, mate to mate
Primaeval oceans, wherein ichthyosaurs swam
And trilobe-teeming mud condensed to rock.
When deep convection drove tectonic plates
Which, jostling, raised the Himalayan peaks
When asteroids combining made this globe
When nuclear fusion first began our Sun.
But tell that to the young folk of today,
And they will not believe, whate’er you say.
TOM
Nostalgia
I remember when a small carton of milk was three cents at my high school cafeteria. Of course this was the 70s when the dairy industry got major subs. In fact the whole lunch program was pretty much one big subsidy. I guess they wanted to produce a generation of reasonably well fed children. My parents wouldn’t spring for a paid lunch, so I had to work in the school book store. I recall eating an inordinate amount of cookies. And a lot of tater tots. What you could get for a buck then would costs you seven dollars today.
MARSHA
(Story was over 200 words when I ran it through Wordcounter. Sorry.)
NORVAL JOE
I remember when the backyard was filled with the happy sound of excited puppies.
I remember when we used to get dressed up and head out in the dead of night to leave puppies on the porches of unsuspecting new owners.
I remember driving in the micro-van with our ears and noses alert for the presence of danger, for criminals and the evil they would perpetrate.
I remember when the pack leader stopped believing in himself, when his plastic card wouldn’t buy us food, and our home was taken away.
I wish we could go live with the Bambi woman.
PLANET Z
I remember when Dan and I took a day off of work and he took a foul ball to the head.
Dan doesn’t remember it, though. In fact, Dan doesn’t remember much of anything.
He just sits there and stares.
I could swear, he’s almost smiling.
You could set his hair on fire and he wouldn’t do anything about it.
I still take him to baseball games.
Maybe he’ll take another foul ball to the head and wake his ass up.
That way, he can tell me the combination to the safe.
Or die, and I can collect the insurance.
