The Wall

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Just a black angle in the ground, etched marble with so many names.
You could jog past it in less than a minute, nothing but a blur.
The flags at the base of each piece, the flowers.
Boots and candles. Cigarettes and flasks.
It’s the people that make you slow down and stop.
Less and less each year, parents too old to make the trip. Or gone themselves.
Children all grown up. They have children of their own. Easier to just let them learn about it in school.
The wall’s still there.
What was it for? What did we learn?

The Wacky Adventures of Abraham Lincoln #91

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Mary Todd was going crazy, but the analyst was curious as to the source of her husband’s misery.
Abe shrugged off all offers to get him on the couch and work out his issues.
“Perhaps it is something in your childhood?” said the doctor.
Abe laughed. “It is a great piece of folly to attempt to make anything out of my early life,” he said.
When the doctor left, Abe took out his flask of Zook’s “Crazy No More” Tonic.
*glug* *glug*
“This is the only doctor I need,” he said, patting the flask and heading back to his office.

Weekly Challenge #133 – Omission

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number One Hundred And Thirty-Three 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 Omission.
The excellent theme music is by Guy David
VOTING

Which were the best stories in Weekly Challenge #133?
Steven from http://ideatrash.blogspot.com
Mary from http://randomness-of-me-blog.blogspot.com/
Justin from http://www.thebeandom.com/spaceturtle
Guy from http://www.guydavid.com
Almo
Tom from http://midi.libsyn.com
Eva Moon from http://evamoon.net
Norval Joe
Planet X from http://planetxpodcast.com/
Ashley
Anima from http://zabbadabba.com/
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com


Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


STEVEN

“Cindy, this is Jason from work and his wife Megan.” Dan ushered the
two into the kitchen, away from the noises of the party.
“Cindy,” Megan said, “I saw your daughter today. She’s so adorable!”
“Yes, Dan,” Jason said, “She looked wonderful in that dress. Did you
say you had a son, too? Where’s he?”
Dan and Cindy glanced at each other, at the basement door, then to their guests.
“He’s visiting his grandparents,” Cindy said quickly. “Let’s go join
the others back in the den.”
Neither Dan nor Cindy glanced at the door for the rest of the evening.

MARY

Overwhelmed by her own bliss, she barely noticed him dressing to leave. As he softly caressed her face to kiss her goodbye, she was startled by the cool chill of metal on her cheek.
Her eyes widened in shock as she stared at his wedding band.
How could this have happened? Their whirlwind romance seemed so perfect.
Never before had she become intimate with someone so quickly, but they were in love.
He turned and walked away without waiting for her to form a question. “You never asked.”
Rather than love, their relationship was based on a lie of omission.

JUSTIN

Ollie ordered an ostrich omelet but asked they omit the onions. Oliver the waiter gave the order to Otto the chef. Ollie ogled at the opulent onyx ornaments adorning Lady Olivia’s ornate outfit. From outside entered an overly obese officer of the order. It seemed that Lady Olivia obviously overstepped her bounds in not obeying the parking lot ordinance. She objected to the order to off-load her over-sized and orange Oldsmobile out of the compact zone. After an occasion, she obliged the officer, offended. Ollie obtained his order. It was out of line! Onion loving Otto made Ollie olive loaf!

GUY

As bob crawled through underground tunnels, he thought about his omissions. He giggled as he remembered how he omitted Harriet, the apple falling from her head after he blew it up. He smiled as he remembered how he curved Dave The Hacker into omission, starting with his ass, using his army knife. Now it was time to omit those Chirapa into oblivion. He could hear them in the distance. They where singing. Those fuckers where singing Chirapa songs. Then he could see them. He charged, spraying them with bullets from his automatic, and the song of The Chirapa was silenced.

ALMO

Robert snatched the envelope from the FedEx man. It was bulky, solid, the way realized dreams are supposed to feel.
Robert had spent three months assembling his proposal for the city architectural contest. It was edgy but not so much that it would horrify the council. It would create a three-word landmark for the city, like Seattle Space Needle or Sydney Opera House. He had a source who said the judges were absolutely wowed.
He pulled the rip strip. Stamped in on the first page Robert read: “Rejected for omission:” and the line checked below said “Missing applicant signature.”

TOM

M called in 008. It had been a busy week at MI5. 006 had been dispatch on M mission, 007 on N mission and 008 on the most pressing of the three O mission was now reporting. At one point in the debriefing M raise on eyebrow at one salient point of contention. As 008 smiled confidently M raise her Walther PPK clocked 008 in the forehead. “actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea” she quietly quoted Sir Edward Coke. In British intelligence many sins are overlooked, but the sin of omission, never. 008 prove to be a Chalabi mole.

EVAMOON

Alma shifted her weight on the soft surface and tried not to look at the figure before her. The wait seemed eternal as he perused her record and she found her attention wandering. It really did look just like she’d always imagined it. The imposing gates, the light.
“Ahem”
Her attention was immediately drawn back to the judge.
“Overall, the balance ought to be in your favor.”
She held her breath.
“Except for one glaring sin. One of omission. You didn’t send in your 100 word story this week. That’s gonna cost you.”
Saint Peter picked up the red phone.

NORVAL JOE

What had he misunderstood from the enticing advertisement?
He read the beautifully illustrated pamphlet again.
“All expenses paid
Two weeks in Hawaii
Ocean front condo on Maui
First class seating from any mainland airport
All at no cost. All we require is you.*”
The asterisk on the word ‘you’. There was always an asterisk and you could never find it at the bottom of the page. He searched the advertisement again, realizing with horror that the bottom third of the advertisement had been torn away.
The omission of “*your soul” was what left him standing at the gates of hell.

PLANET X

Dr Odd plugged in the final connection of his latest robot creation and its head slowly rotated, scanning and logging each item it saw into its memory.
Coming to the Doctor’s monkey writing staff, the robot stopped and moved toward Guy and Laieanna,
The robot spoke, “What is your designation and purpose?”
Guy just gestured rudely at the robot, while Laieanna offered a ripe banana to it.
“I would like you” the robot said to Guy.
It was then that the Doctor silently thought, “I made an omission of not telling them that the robot ran on meat and blood”

ASHLEY

John looked across the living room into his wife’s weary eyes and said, “I think the adoption agency may have omitted something.”
Jessica simply stared and continued to chew on her gnawed finger nails.
Suddenly, a gout of flame shot upward from the crib in the next room.
“I think it’s time to feed the baby,” said Jessica.
Both husband and wife sat in silence.
Inside the crib, little Johnny purred as he slowly clawed the eyes out of his new doll.

ANIMA

Are you the next of kin?
Yea… William Tipton. I called when Dad collapsed.
You his son?
Adopted. Kitty should be here… Bill’s gone, huh?
Yes son, gone.
Bill was famous in the day… played piano in jazz clubs all over … You should see the pictures… Always dressed sharp, always with pretty girls…
Later, he and mom hooked up, settled down…
Jeez I loved him… treated me and my brothers like blood.
We tried everything we could, son; I feel for your loss; Look, there’s something you should know… I don’t think your father was the person you think…

PLANET Z

The previous administration’s omission of a Cabinet-level science policy advisor led to a decline in the country’s standing in the fields of science and technology.
As his victory celebration wound to a close, the president-elect was assembling his final choices to lead the country with him.
But the selection of a well-known science advisor was downright difficult.
Just then, a bald, scarfaced pudgy man in a grey suit appeared on the Jumbotron, demanding one billion dollars or he’d destroy the world.
The new president smiled.
“Hello, Doctor Evil,” he said. “You’re just the man I’m looking for.”

Chipmunk

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I mourned your death, O Furry Little Creature – so small and cute you were.
Day after day.
Year after year.
Century after century.
This ritual never changes.
I hold out the little peanut, you see it and stand up, sniffing the air.
I shake it. You creep closer, slowly, wary.
Almost close enough now. One paw reaches. I toss the peanut behind you.
You start to flee, but you stop. Sniff.
You grab it and scurry away.
To the road. The highway. A truck is coming, but you do not see it!
Splat!
I will miss you, my furry friend.

Hack Writerland

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Sixty-five million years from now, an amber block containing a mosquito will be drained of “author” Michael Chricton’s blood.
Through the miracle of junk science, his DNA will be patched to a chimpanzee’s and grown into a theme park attraction.
From all over, they will pay to see herds of hack writers roam the hillsides, devouring fringe research and vomiting up novel after novel, screenplay after screenplay.
“Mommy! Look at the box office on that one!”
Until a theme park rival tries to steal the DNA and causes deadly violent mayhem!
But that’s a tale for another hack to tell.

Cinder block

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As I hug this cinder block, I ponder our long relationship together.
We’ve been through a lot.
I made a bookshelf out of cinder blocks and slats in college.
The only thing that kept me from being blown away by the hurricane last year was hugging this cinder block.
I take it with me everywhere now as a good luck charm: the movies, the bank, grocery shopping.
I guess bringing it skydiving was a bad idea. I’ll just let it go and meet it on the ground when I land.
That playground down there doesn’t look too full, does it?

America

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Here lies America, and all of America’s lies.
All the lies we told the world and all the lies we told ourselves.
In the home of the brave, we move the fences in and jog the bases to thunderous applause.
In the land of the free, we doubled the price so we could buy one and get one free.
A thumb in every balance pan, a fox in every henhouse.
Eat chicken for dinner too many times and you will discover there are no eggs for breakfast.
Don’t scream at the fox to lay eggs. He has eaten and left.

Miss November

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In the old days, you ran out of film.
Now, with these digital cameras, your battery is always dying.
Miss November passes out, her nose bleeding from snorting enough lines of cocaine to line Ebbets Field.
They got enough pictures to last her shelf life, every angle, every expression.
Everything uploaded, scanned, rendered, and ready with a single click of the mouse.
Backdrops and shadows are her passport, just lay her over, matte, and print.
“What were her dislikes?” asks the publisher, lighting his pipe.
The coroner suggests hard linoleum, shaking his head at the corpse on the bathroom floor.

The Wacky Adventures of Abraham Lincoln #90

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Cows, everywhere cows!
Lincoln couldn’t believe the sheer number of cows roaming through the streets of Washington.
Going forth like swarms of Egyptian locusts, devouring every blade of grass and other green thing.
“Where did all these cows come from?” he asked, but nobody had an answer.
As always, Abe came up with a solution. He commanded the city to hold a carnival and a massive barbecue.
Under his direction, the cows were caught, slaughtered, butchered into steaks, and cooked in the remnants of the public parks.
A good time was had by all.
Except for the cows, of course.

Weekly Challenge #132 – Clowns vs. Ninja

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number One Hundred And Thirty-Twowhere 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 Clowns vs. Ninja.
The excellent theme music is by Guy David
VOTING

Which were the best stories of Weekly Challenge #132?
Almo Schumann
Laieanna from http://hodgepodgepoint.libsyn.com/
Jeff from http://GreatHites.blogspot.com
Ashley
Justin from http://www.thebeandom.com/spaceturtle
Tom from http://midi.libdyn.com
Steven from http://ideatrash.blogspot.com
Philip
Anima from http://zabbadabba,com
Planet Xray from http://planetxpodcast.com
Terry Tee from http://www.terrytee.com/
Guy David from http://guydavid.com
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


ALMO

The couple sat on opposite sides of mahogany table. She with her lawyer, he with his.
She glared at him. He studied his nails.
He thought, “I should have known this marriage would never work. We were always so different. But there was a burning passion there.”
He sighed.
She sat perfectly still. She looked good in black although you could only see her eyes. They made her leave her sword at the court entrance.
He felt suddenly sad and blew his bulbous red nose, dabbed at his painted-on tear.
“Divorce proceedings can begin,” said the judge. “Clown vs. Ninja.”

LAIEANNA

Korzo the psychotic clown barreled into the fight between clowns and ninjas.
His rage rang out in a deep yell and constant squeaking of his bicycle horn.
Hariku the feather ninja, so light on his feet no one believed he truly
touched the ground, somersaulted before the clown, his sword drawn, edge
out. Korzo stopped just five feet short of bursting through the ninjas gut.
The front of his near empty shoes still jiggled from the speed of his
run. Hariku
bowed, eyes remaining on the clown, and whispered, “Prepare to Fight.”
This is awful. I’m going back nanowrimo. Bye!

JEFF

“Are you the clown or the Ninja?” The director said looking at his clip board.
“You can’t tell man?” I answered.
“Well, you have the black on so I could assume you are the ninja, but what is with the big floppy shoes?” He stifled a yawn.
“Come on man, I am a ninja clown.” I couched in my most menacing ninja stance, then worked the squirt flower.
“A what?”
“A ninja-clown, maybe I should go with clown-ninja, I don’t know what do you think?” I asked.
“Personally I think you need to find a new line of work. Next!”

ASHLEY

To one side he stands slightly hunched and a spectacle for all to see. He wears his bulbous shoes, puffy stripped gloves and a perfectly round bright red nose with pride. In his hands, he wields a seltzer bottle cocked and ready.
Opposite from him she stands, resplendent in her matte black attire. Weapons bristling from every unseen pouch and strapped gaudily across her back. Proudly wearing the black mask of the assassin she stands erect, proud and full of potential lethality.
Soon the war will begin in earnest.
Afterwards, the only winner will be the divorce court lawyer avatars.

JUSTIN

“OK kids, who wants a balloon hat!”
“This clown is lame and scary!”
“How about you Timmy, it is your birthday after all!”
The clown twisted together some balloons. Little did the children know that the balloons would be twisted into an evil shape that would eat the mind of Timmy, feeding the clown.
The clown raised the diabolical balloon hat to Timmy’s head. Two bright glints of metal flew through the air, slicing through the balloons, popping them, then burying into the clowns chest.
The clown toppled over, dead.
The children cheered.
“This is the best party ever, Timmy!”

TOM

The Clown acknowledged the ninja’s indiscretion and so Pie Kata was chosen as the means to maintain honor. Through analysis of thousands of recorded piefights, the Clowns have determined that the geometric distribution of antagonists in any pie battle is a statistically-predictable element. The pie Kata treats the pie as a total weapon, each fluid position representing a maximum kill zone, inflicting maximum damage on the maximum number of opponents, while keeping the defender clear of the statistically-traditional trajectories of return pies. In 20 seconds a 12in pie tin was complete drive down the ninja’s throat. Clown vs Ninja. Ha!

STEVEN

The antiseptic hospital stink makes it through the red rubber nose.
He shuffles faster, seeing her outside his son’s room. His ex-wife’s
distinctive braid swings over a black clad shoulder, a katana across
her back.
He yells over the flapping of his oversize shoes. “A ninja? In a hospital?”
“He likes ninjas!”
“That was a year ago! Clowns make everyone happy!”
He realized that wasn’t true as she hit him.
Later, the police handcuffed them outside the room. Bobby beamed out,
cancer forgotten at the spectacle of clowns fighting ninjas.
His real smile was far bigger than the painted one.

PHILIP

Black. The assassin struck in the darkest hour of the night.
Red. The mark lay in a pool of his own blood.
Black. His clothes, to match the night, shrouded the assassin’s entire body in black, except for his eyes.
Red. His hair, soaked in the blood where it pooled around his head, blood red.
Black. Yellow lights reflected in the assassins black eyes.
Red. Shiny, patent leather boots, not black, but red, below red and white striped stockings, on the lifeless feet.
Black. The black blade, invisible in the night, took down the mark. Ronald didn’t stand a chance.

ANIMA

The Clown: A fuschia ’72 Volkswagen, fueled on 95% personality, 5% luck. Push starts were the norm, and there was always room in the back for more kids and dogs. The Clown had the last laugh, leaving me stranded in Atlanta.
The Ninja: A 280Z in stealth black, with red interior. I was fast, but the Ninja was faster. We would race serpentine mountain roads. It took them 4 hours to free me, the night she tried out Kung Fu moves on the switchbacks.
And now I have Mom. My handicap converted Caravan chaperone… At least I still drive, right?

PLANET XRAY

The promoters were calling it Clown versus Ninja, the match that would set the standard of wrestling for years.
The Clown, Leonard Crapalotski, had just finished an unsuccessful low budget movie and was in the need of a job. Standing at 6′ 3″, and only weighing 125 pounds dripping wet, Leonard was the perfect Clown.
The Ninja, Lo Hung Wang, had just arrived in the country to continue his occupation of loan enforcement. Weighing 200 pounds with quick reflexes, Mr. Wang was the perfect Ninja.
Now, what the promoters really needed was writers and a great script for the match.

TERRY TEE

Only a few days left until the elections, and in the last couple of weeks my home phone has been ringing off the hook with messages from both parties.
They ask questions like; what is more important to you? Health Care? The Economy?
What they really should be asking is, do you think that people are dumb enough to believe the crap that each of the parties is saying about the other?
When it comes down to it, they are politicians after all, and for my money, it’s the Clown versus Ninja, what I ask is which one is which?

GUY DAVID

The plane was crowded with people in Halloween costumes. Chaketo Chirapa stayed hidden under his cloaking device and watched in horror as a man dressed in a clown costume assaulted a woman dressed up as a ninja. He couldn’t hear what they where arguing about from his hiding place, but when the man pulled out a gun he was sure he wouldn’t make it back. Thankfully, the clown was nailed down and arrested by a mean looking stewardess before the actual takeoff. As the plane took off, Chaketo Chirapa wondered what his Chirapa where doing back at their underground alcove.

PLANET Z

They were identical only in appearance. The twins were like night and day for everything else.
Especially when it came to birthdays.
Billy wanted a clown, but Bobby wanted a ninja.
“What that?” their mother asked.
“He’s quiet and deadly and all dressed in black,” said Bobby.
“We’ll have to ask your father,” said mom.
Bobby’s heart sank as he watched the clown make balloon animals for Billy.
All the kids were laughing and cheering.
Until… a flash of steel from the shadows.
The clown’s head fell from his shoulders.
“Happy birthday,” whispered a fluttering blur, and it was gone.