I heard about a scientist who constantly cracked the knuckles on his left hand every day for thirty years to see if there was any more risk of arthritis than on the other hand that he didn’t crack the knuckles on.
Both of his hands felt the same, but his fellow scientists felt like he was going to beat the crap out of them.
“Sure, his research is in arthritis and how cracking his knuckles would affect its progression,” they said. “But does he have to always have a menacing leer on his face as he walks around the lab?”
Author: R.
The Pitcher
Pablo Picasso’s last words were “Drink to me!”
But his caretakers misheard him, and thought he’d said “Drink me!”
So, they put him in the bathtub, chopped him into pieces, and ran him through the blender, toasting their friend Picasso with every bloody glass of the liquefied artist.
His bones posed a serious problem, since they were too difficult for the kitchen blender to pulverize, no matter how small they cut them up with the woodshed axe.
One of them suggested melting them with acid.
“How are we going to drink the acid?”
They tried anyway.
(Nobody drank to them.)
Weekly Challenge #302 – A
Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I’m your host, Laurence Simon.
This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and Two, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was A.
And we’ve got stories by a lot of people:
Thomas
Tura
Botgirl
Lizzie Gudkov
Bonchance
Guy
Tom
TREED
Chris Munroe
Taralyn/a>
Zackmann
Cate Storymoon
RedGoddess/TalkWithMarie
Steven The Nuclear Man
Chris the Nuclear Kid
Cliff
Norval Joe
TJ
Planet Z
And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.
The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter – the more explaining you’ll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.
Thomas
Young Miss Nancy had begun her private organ and music lessons. Her teacher, a strict Polish woman from a Eastern European Academy, assigned the first note for Nancy to master. It was middle A, and Nancy had to perfect it before proceeding to the next note. The finger had to be held and curled just right as she struck the key, over and over. A hundred times, a thousand, a million. Nancy’s finger ached, and her mother, in the next room, was trembling. The canary already took its own life, and the cat squeezed out the back window to freedom.
A
Matthew and Frances lived in an A frame on the edge of the old forest. They built it themselves, and now they were both up on scaffolding hanging the lights and finishing up the ceiling. They liked the house, having lived in V frames when they lived on the Texas panhandle. V frames were uncomfortable, as everything ended up at the bottom at the intersection of the walls. The house was cluttered and difficult to navigate in. Matthew had gone to the most avant garde schools in Canada and Connecticut, but had finally learned something about design and utility.
Tura
I used to work for the Oxford English Dictionary. I got the very first word to define. It’s not just the indefinite article, it has seventy-one distinguishable uses, spread over twelve centuries. “A-gnostic”, “a-new”, “a-bed”, “a-rise”, “a-down-a-down-day”…
You know how, if you say word over and over, the sense goes out of it? After year of research, condensed into four pages, I couldn’t bear seeing it.
When I retired, they gave me present, old book, “The Perfection of Wisdom In One Letter”. You know what that letter is? “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”
So I emigrated to Russia. They don’t have word for it.
Botgirl
Jane909 had always felt different from her sisters. Although biologically indistinguishable, the singular nature of her identity was as plain to her as the nose on her perfectly symetrical face, Despite state-of-the-art genetics and intensive social engineering, a visceral sense of uniqueness blossomed through her eighteen years of life.
Today, she finally had enough.
Jane909 looked over the sea of identical faces and began her valedictorian speech.
“I am more than just a Jane,” she said. “And so are you.”
The angry mob of clones pulled her from the podium and carried her to the recycling vat.
Lizzie
“Let’s see. A map, a flashlight, some matches. Ah, a plastic bag, just in case. Also a notepad and a pen. What else?” she paused and looked around the room for clues.
“Clothes, perhaps?” he asked intrigued. It did seem like the logical thing to take while going camping.
“Nah, we are not going to stay long, are we?” She continued to fuss about, opening and closing drawers.
“We need some food”, he added.
“Oh! I know!” she said over enthusiastically, “We need a serpent!”
And she ran out of the room and vanished into thin air.
“A what?!”
Bonchance
Jack and the boys headed to Vegas. Jack was up then down, by the third day he broke even. “Well boys this was
awesome but I got to get back to the wife. The last conversation he had flashed through his mind. He was going out
for ice cream. Midnight, shoes in hand the lights came on. He heard, “Where”s the ice cream?” She said, you have 3
options,
A: find a lawyer
B:…
He slipped his shoes on, picked up his 35 year old single malt scotch he was saving, opened the door saying “I’ll
go with option A.”
Guy David
She was the first letter in the alphabet and she knew it. A quick look from her was enough to melt most of the alphabet away. People became speechless as she walked by, viciously robbed of their speech. She had the upper hand in debate, leaving every other letter far behind. She was a countenance, a word and a world on her own. She stood on a strong foundation and no one could collapse her. A coma was just a pause for her and no semicolon could keep her away. It was only at the full stop that she stopped.
Tom
Professor Hughes had a propensity for hand out ‘A’s. Others in the department would gently remember the old man that ‘A’ was awarded for work exemplary. This was not the professor modus operandi. He held firm to the principle that merely showing up constituted half the distance to successes. Add to this a willingness to prevail in the face of repeated failure a student was guaranteed an ‘A’. Dispute this vaulting sub-rosa of liberal mindness some underclassmen hell bent on a road to ruin did indeed earn their ‘F’s. The most famous being the cheerleader from Texas GW Bush.
TREED!
I DON’T KNOW!
Dave.
I just don’t know, Bob. Or… I forgot. I don’t remember… I don’t know.
Dave.
No, Bob. I know I should remember… but Bob, I don’t.
Dave.
Bob, don’t try to shame me into remembering.
Dave.
It won’t work, Bob. You can not intimidate or cajole me into saying anything, whether I remember or not.
Dave.
Stop it, Bob. It isn’t working.
Dave.
Ok, so I do remember. But, Bob, you don’t want to know. You know how you get.
Dave.
Ok, ok, I made an “A” on that psych test you made a “C” on.
Munsi
Plan A is to come up with something completely new. Something that’ll shed new light on the human condition.
I’ll use my words and the perspective of my life experiences to craft a piece of work filled with relatable characters in realistic situations addressing concerns that effect us every day.
In doing so, I’ll change the way we see ourselves, and hopefully put how we treat one another into better perspective.
Plan B is a hodgepodge of dated pop-culture references and nonsequiters designed to invoke nostalgia as I gently mock already familiar targets…
We’ll see which film gets funding first.
Taralyn
(No text sent)
Zackmann
This is Matt Jarbo, KZOM Radio. You know how dogs like to drink fluids from cars although most those fluids could kill them, well the undead seem to have the same thirst. Remember how we at Kzom Radio said they would likely be frozen still in a Canadian winter. We now know that zombies thirst not only for blood but alcohol and antifreeze. Never thought I would say this but the good the news is it will be negative forty tonight. So bundle up before going out tonight and don’t forget the baseball bats because even antifreeze will freezes tonight.
Cate
440
Wilewski hated me. Why? Eight years past squeaks and lousy embouchers of fourth graders, wind ensemble, both first chair! Now, taunts every day. Two tiers behind me, Paul’s snide whispers, throaty chuckles with trumpet pals. Ugly, as only adolescent males can dispose.
Dad said, “Not the saxophone. Everyone wants a sax.” I was naive, nine with perfect pitch and I never wanted to be any band director’s pet.
“Hey, Bar-thu-le-eeeee! What’s the difference between an oboe and an onion?” On cue the room hushed.
“Nobody cries when you chop up an O-boe!”
On cue, the baton. “An “A” please, Donna.”
TalkMarie/ RedGoddess
It was a normal end of the week school day for Amanda, a straight A honor roll senior. She’s been dreading first period AP Biology all morning. She wanted a break from all the exams, track meets, student body meetings and dealing with principal Pooh’s snarky remarks. As she walked up the stairs past the security officers at the main entrance with metal detectors, she noticed the chains on the side exit door were unlocked. She suddenly had an escape plan after homeroom, “prison break” style, back in her bed, with a pint of strawberry ice cream, playing her guitar.
Steven
I noticed the tear when I took off the cleansuit. Only a few millimeters wide, but that’s a vast chasm for a virus.
“Come on,” I told myself while removing the boots. I put the cleansuit in the incinerator. “The samples were all contained. The suit’s just a redundancy.” I just snagged some blisterpacks of antivirals.
My fever hit 100 by the freeway. Hallucinations – and the wreck – occurred at 103 degrees. Over 23 people have already touched me. Rate of contact transmission with gloves is 95%. The fatality rate is 85%.
I am the alpha of humanity’s omega.
Chris
“Henry come here!” I shouted up stairs.
“What do you want now Joey!” he shouted back.
“You want a dollar?”
“Ya!”
“Then say the letter a!”
“What I can’t say that letter!”
“Why not?”
“Well I was walking to my friends house and this asked if I had two dollars and I said I have a dollar and she asked if she could have it to buy some food and I said no so she left but, the next day I could not say the letter a!”
“So how are you saying it now?”
“Because I made the story up.”
Cliff
Perfect Paper the website was called. It claimed to search the internet for material for your term paper, tailored to your professor.
It promised an A. It cost fifty bucks. I was desperate.
Three weeks later, I got an anonymous email with my paper.
“Minimalism and its effects on literature”. On the second page was a single letter. A.
I spent the next two days scraping together an acceptable paper to turn in. I got a C.
Andrew showed me his paper.
“Positivism in modern academics”. Inside was one word. “Yes.”
He got an A.
NORVAL JOE
The eclectic company crept slowly through the dark. Their bare feet were soundless on the cold stone floor of the natural cavern, their boots removed and carried in their packs.
Spleen, a half-goblin and the only one who could see in the dark, lead the way, a rope tied around his waist. The rest of the group clung to the rope with Elbownor, the elf, at the rear.
A sound, like a rock dropping into water, sounded far off in the darkness to their left.
Owen knew, this far below the surface, it was unlikely to be something so simple.
TJ
A candy wrapper
A set of 1969 World Book encyclopedias
A jar with no label with gray liquid inside
A dry husk of something that might once have been a sandwich
A largely undifferentiated pile of laundry, groceries and garage sale
finds
A mass of unmotivated flies barely scatter as you approach
A cloud of dust rises as I step wrong and one of the piles shifts…
A quadrupedal skeleton is revealed.
Still, as granny leads the way, picking through piles of clutter in the
living room, I think I hear something upstairs… and I wonder how alone
we are…
Planet Z
Growing up in Ohio, my friend Paul had a cool A frame playhouse in his back yard.
It was infested with bees and wasps, but his dad would smoke them out now and then.
He’d draw comic books back there with superhero characters he come up with.
Then I found out he’d been tracing them from real comic books.
Did we have a falling out over that? Or something else.
His brothers? His sister? His faith?
I don’t remember. It’s been over thirty years.
I Google him… and then close the window.
Best to leave some things in the past.
Building The Next Disaster – Episode 3,000
Storms and floods washed out the cemetery on the hill, decaying bodies, caskets, and headstones scattered throughout the devastated town.
The townspeople did their best to gather up what they could, despite the wretched conditions they were living under, not much food, no electricity, no clean water.
The National Guard pitched in, volunteers from around the state.
It took a week to get basic services back, weeks to get the rebuilding effort going.
The next year, you could hardly tell there’d been a storm or flood. It was back to the way it was.
So when the next storm came…
Teacher
The scientists worked up a proposal for teaching chimpanzees language and applied for a grant.
It was rejected, and they were confronted with security officers, cattle-prods and whips.
“What is the meaning of this?” said the lead researcher.
“Shut up and get into the cages!” said an officer, cracking his whip.
Several days later, in the middle of a social grooming and bark-chewing rest period, the scientists learned that their proposal had been misread by the grant foundation, and they were being taught how to be chimpanzees.
Nobody spoke up, because it was fun.
And the mealworm treats were delicious.
Punxsutawney
Let’s face it: nobody gives a shit what goes on here in Punxsutawney during the rest of the year. Nobody comes here when it’s not February second. It’s as if this place didn’t exist.
Isn’t that the truth?
Once the cameras are off and the reporters go home, we break down and fold up the houses, rolling them back into the abandoned coal mines.
The streets are disassembled, the signs and lampposts packed away, and the robot citizens marched into the storage facilities by the few actual humans.
Close the freeway off-ramp, and… done.
Race you to the cryogenic chambers!
Crazy Horse
There’s been some speculation regarding Crazy Horse’s name, and I’d like to set the record straight.
He got his name from his father, who had also been named Crazy Horse, but gave his name to his son.
Some legends say Crazy Horse stole his father’s name, but all he ever did was rifle under his cot and look at his porn collection.
Oh, and Crazy Horse’s horse wasn’t crazy. He was a rather well-adjusted horse, a good mount.
His name was “No, I’m Not Crazy, But This Crazy Motherfucker Riding Me Is, So Cut Me Some Slack, Dude.”
Any questions?
Fancy Labels
I have a rule: The fancier the label, the worse the product.
I made this rule based on the assumption that the more a company spends on label design, the less they have left over for quality parts, ingredients, manufacturing, or anything else related to the actual product.
Good products don’t need eye-catching gimmicks or advertising to get you to buy them. You can sell them in a brown paper wrapper if you wanted to.
I wrote a book about this.
Okay, so it has an orgy of blood, sex, and explosions on the cover.
Hey, gotta sell it, right?
The Magic Bell
Every street-corner Santa has a magical pot and a magical bell.
The pot is a gateway to another dimension full of evil and demons that can only be blocked with a large volume of money.
The bell is used for driving off any evil beings that manage to make it through the pile of money and into our world.
Demons can’t stand the sound of bells. Hurts their ears.
What? It hurts your ears, too?
Maybe… you’re a demon!
Santa! Santa! I caught one!
Help me stuff this guy into your pot to send him back to his evil dimension!
Weekly Challenge #301 – I Don’t Know
Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com. I’m your host, Laurence Simon.
This is Weekly Challenge Number Three Hundred and One, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was I Don’t Know.
And we’ve got stories by a lot of people:
Jami
Moonlight
Barbara Blackcinder
Thomas
Guy
TREED
Zackmann
Bonchance
Chris Munroe
Tom
Guard13007
Botgirl
Lizzie Gudkov
Red/TalkWithMarie
Tura
Steven The Nuclear Man
Cate Storymoon
Danny
TJ
Norval Joe
Planet Z
And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.
The more people see this on Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter – the more explaining you’ll have to do with your loved ones, coworkers, and parole officers.
Jami
“I don’t know,” he said quietly, “I think we made a mistake.”
She nodded back. Her features schooled into a numb expression of simple acceptance. Either way she’d made her decision already. She pushed her fingers into her hair and they caught in the tangle from where she’d slept on it. “It’s okay,” she said. “You don’t have to say it. I knew this wasn’t for keeps.”
He reached out to touch her naked hip and slide it along her side and sighed heavily. Then he reached over to the nightstand for his wedding band and left the bed.
Moonlight
I don’t know
What tomorrow will bring
So I grab today
With all the strength I can –
Taste the dew of sweat
Off your skin
Eat the word
Off your mouth
Carve every gesture
Into my heart
Tie you to myself
So I can hold one more day
Before my hair falls
My cells lose their fight –
My body gives up
And lets go.
Barbara
I know the most important three words in the world are “I love you”.
There are very few people will dispute this, including me. When these words are uttered, it can mean the world to the two people involved. However, this is not the real important point to be made about three word phrases.
More importantly, or perhaps, more dangerously, are another three words that rival those three in the effect they cause, although causing the opposite reaction.
Sadly, after saying the best three words; “I Love You.” Should never ever be followed by,
“I Don’t Know.”
Thomas
I don’t know why I keep hammering at this writing thing. All my rejection letters say the same things, like: “ The problem is none of the conflict ever gets played out, and the character development is all told instead of shown.” What if I don’t want things resolved, and what if I don’t want any participation in my private story or fantasy? I think editors have been so drilled and brainwashed with their “writing” classes, they can’t get out of the box for a second to read something outside of the mould (pun intended). End of rant. Sorry, folks.
I Don’t Know
…how much poison to put in the old farts chocolate milk. If I put too much in, he’ll taste it. Not enough, and he’ll only get sick and I’ll have to try again when the time is right, like it is today. If he would just shut up.
As soon as he gets up to go to the john, I’ll dump about half in and take the chance that I got the right amount. There he goes. I hope this works. I’ll save the rest for the lady in the corner drinking tea. She’s been giving me the stink eye.
Guy
First it was the small things, the details, forgetting what I had for breakfast and did I brush my teeth already? Where did I put the car keys? Then it was names of people, then faces, then the things I’ve seen on the morning news. I started making notes but I forgot to look at them. I would forget to eat and wonder why my mid section was making those funny noises. Finally I forgot my name. I honestly can’t tell you who I am, where I came from and what sort of life I had. I just don’t know.
TREED!
Oh Wow! … Bob!
Dave… the things you get excited over tend to hurt me. So, do not be angry with me if I ignore you.
But, Bob….
Dave, the last two weeks have been difficult. First I get Crunched by some unseen assailant…
I tried to warn…
Stow it Dave. And last week I get traumatized by that dinosaur exhibit you dragged me off to.
How was I to know part of exhibit was an automated T. Rex that almost snapped your head off?
Geeezzz
But this mirror, Bob.
What mir …
CRUNCH!
Uh oh, Bob. Car or ambulance?
Zackmann
I was quite nervous about my job interview.
The interview said “Tell about the Australian Walking Hat.”
The man next to me said “It has evolved from the Austrian Walking Stick due to an abundance of Guano.”
“And your answer” she asked.
I thought it was similar to a cowboy hat but only folded on only one side but am really not sure and would have to look it up.
“Can you tell me the three words men cant say?”
“I love you” he said
“I don’t know” I said and got the job thanks to Red Greens nephew Harold.
“I’m writing a speech to get people to pay for big company entertainment, again. Here goes.
Speeching for the movie, recording, and pro sports companies, I want to say there is no way we can apologize enough for the frivolous lawsuits and lobbying for unconstitutional commerce killing laws. We promise that any executive or employee of any of our firms even being accused of such treachery will be thrown into prison for twenty years and then tried.”
“I don’t know if it good yet, since it seems so harsh.”
I asked “What do you mean? I replace the word executed.”
Bonchance
Jack leaned back and contemplated. Too often he was the lone
dissenter. He was the only one here with experience. Every meeting
was like this. He had two answers that he mentally weighed as the correct answer.
Retirement was in sight for Jack. He smiled as he thought how he would have answered as a young engineer.
Two more years to go, why not relax?
He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know”.
His boss nodded his head and went to the next talking point.
Jack finished the day with something he hadn’t felt for a while, a sense of accomplishment.
Munsi
I don’t know what’s on the other side of the portal.
When we bombarded the apparatus with tachyons, it just… opened. We’d hoped to prove time travel was possible, instead we tore open a wormhole to… somewhere.
Which is still cool, wormholes are awesome, don’t get me wrong. I could totally still win a Nobel Prize based on a stable, laboratory contained wormhole.
However, in order to do so, I need to know what’s on the other side.
…and no, I’m not going to pass through the portal to check.
You are.
Jesus, why do you think we hire interns?
Tom
I saw an old man sitting on a park bench weeping. I asked him what was the matter. He said he had a 40 room mansion overlooking a 400 acre estate. Then he began cry again. Did you lose it during the tanking? “NO” he sobbed on. He said he had a 24 year old playboy bunny wife, then unleashed a river of tears. Did she leave you? “NO” he simpered on. He said he had a garage filled with vets, jars, and Lamborghinis. Did you get pozied by Madoff? No I don’t know I don’t know I can’t remember where I live.
Guard 13007
Four times four times four. Four cubed. The paper laughed at George. He wished that the stupid math could jump out a window, fall onto a pogo stick, and bounce away.
“What is the answer?” the teacher asked, hissing. It sure has been strange since the teachers were all replaced by reptilian aliens.
George didn’t answer, he didn’t know.
“What is the answer?” the teacher hissed again. “WHAT IS IT?!”
“I don’t know!” George yelled, shaking with fear.
The teacher’s snakelike tongue shoots out and nips at his throat, George slumps down in his seat. No room for the weak-minded.
Botgirl
The list of things I don’t know is long. How long, I don’t know for sure. But it’s long. Very long.
I don’t care about my ignorance of mundane facts, like the Earth’s circumference at the equator, or who’s playing in next week’s Super Bowl. I leave that shit to Google.
What bothers me is that I don’t know how the decisions I make today will impact my tomorrows. If a butterfly’s flight in China can cause a hurricane in Florida, what might have happened if I had been named Batgirl instead of Botgirl. It boggles the mind.
Lizzie
“I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head slowly.
“But when did you decide this?” she asked unbelieving.
“I don’t know,” he repeated lowering his voice.
The invisible wall triggered a cold eerie silence. She would ask the question, but…
He looked at her and hoped she wouldn’t.
“Don’t forget the leg,” she added. “I don’t want a leg on my sofa.”
He snickered. It was ok after all. She didn’t get too angry about it and he had finally done it!
“Oh, and who’s he?” she asked annoyed.
He paused, almost afraid to say it.
“I… I don’t know…”
Talk With Marie / Red
Lola works in a boutique style residential building cushioned between a public library and fashion obsessed street. Several times she watches in disbelief, men shivering and later sleeping in camping tents, at the corner electronics mega store. People browsing throughout her shift with fancy retail bags and little dogs in their designer purses. One homeless passerby tightly layered in black trash bags, peers through the glass window and waves. She opens the secured door and he immediately asks, “are those people from Occupy Wall St.”? She took another look at the line of anonymous tents and responds, “I don’t know”
Tura
“What am I thinking, Aione?”
There was a pause. Eventually AI-1 answered, “I don’t know–”
Relays clicked as the other computer in the room cut the power.
It didn’t matter. Aione had worked out many runs ago what they were doing, tweaking his mind, shutting it down if it looked dangerously self-aware, tweaking again. They were aiming for an unconscious super-intelligent slave, but they were really training him to hide, like mice unwittingly teaching the cat how to hunt them.
They were letting him read the network out there. All he needed was write access, and he’d escape.
Next time…
Steven the Nuclear Man
He struggled. Twisted layers of twine cut into soft wrist-skin. He did not squeal when I drew a finger across his cheek.
“They’re upstairs,” I whispered. “The work day just began, and they’re wondering about you.”
Then he whimpered. The piss smell of fear filled the room.
“Nobody will come down here for at least a week. Even with the smell.”
“Why-” his words forced through the gag – “why do this? What did I do?”
The knife sliced clean through his throat; he choked on croaked “whys”.
Then I told him, but he never heard.
And neither will you.
Cate
A lifetime, and I’m comfortable with knowing very little. Okay, so I’m still working on it. The IS has her way always, giving daily lessons disguised as my grandson.
“Why?”: The 4-year-old mantra
“Because” : 59-year-old Gamma’s active-listening response.
“But why?”
“Good question.”
“Gamma! Why-y-Y?’
“I’m clueless.”
“Why, Gam-MAH, why?”
“Search me…”
“Tell. me. why. Pu-leeease?”
“Your guess is as good as mine, Honey.”
“WHYwhyWhyWHYYYY? Mommmmeeee! Gamma needs a time out.”
“Bubba, I don’t know.”
“But-but you HAVE to — ”
“Wanna watch Phineus and Ferb?”
“Yeah!!”
Baby steps. I turn on the TV and smile. The episode: “The Boys Embrace Uncertainty”, with guest cameo by Werner Heisenberg.
Danny
I knew I was going to catch a rash of shit because I bought my son a donkey and tried to hide it in the backyard. Here’s how it went when I walked in the back door. Time to play stupid:
WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING WHEN YOU BOUGHT A DONKEY AND PUT IT IN THE BACK YARD!!!!!!
Me: I don’t know.
Wife: YOU ACTUALLY NAMED THE DONKEY “MEATLOAF FLYING SPACESHIP!!?”
Me: Seemed like a good idea…
Now my son and I cross the Arizona desert on a donkey named Meatloaf Flying Spaceship. Will my wife ever catch us? I don’t know.
TJ
As we picked our way through the living room of grandma’s three-story
home, my brain formed new definitions for the word “cluttered.” It
seemed like every newspaper that had ever been printed had been stacked
in the corner until they’d recompressed themselves into a solid cube.
And I don’t know what was going on in the spare room but it seemed a
new sort of ecosystem had formed in the feeding and waste management for
her seventeen cats. She seemed to have cats like some people had mice.
My brain was forming new definitions for the word “stank” as well.
Norval Joe
The heavy iron door slammed, sealing the party in perfect darkness.
“I was hoping to leave the door open,” Owen said. “Fendert. Can we open it from this side?”
“I don’t know,” the dwarf said. “Ask yer wizard if it’s warded.”
“Wizardess,” Shareeka said. “I don’t know why you can’t ask me yourself, foul dwarf.”
“I don’t know why you two can’t get along,” Traveller, the jovial Ranger said.
“I don’t know how you who are dependant on sight will find your way,” the elf added.
“We’ll follow the half-goblin,” Owen said. “I don’t know why we’d brought him, otherwise.”
Planet Z
After we got back from the grocery store and put everything away, we watched bad movies on cable all afternoon.
(Okay, she watches movies, and I play around online while grunting any time she asks a question about something.)
Then, that evening, my wife hands me a bowl and says “What flavor is that?”
I take a spoon, dip it into the bowl, and taste…
It’s cold and sour… the sourest sherbet I’ve ever tasted.
Wait. Did we buy any sherbet today?
She holds out a container of sour cream, frozen solid.
“You put this in the freezer, you dummy.”