Category: My stories

Most kids in kindergarten get their art taped to the refrigerator. Alonzo had his art framed and hung in the museum. His parents were curators in. They take down a Picasso or a Cezanne and put up an Alonzo. And art historians and critics and the public would come by and stare at it. Students would write up many doctoral thesis about Alonzo. His rudimentary and Puritan styles were all the rage. Other artists became jealous of Alonso, which only served to keep him in the spotlight. Nothing enhances, an artist like a scandal. He died young from ingesting paste.

When I go for my walks, it’s always amusing to see lawn sprinkler systems and irrigation running when it’s raining. I know it wastes water and its ecologically unsound, but it’s still amusing. I mean it used to be you had to run hoses and sprinklers around and turn them on manually at times. Then there were buried pipes and sprinkler heads that would pop up. And now you have systems that detect if it’s raining or talk to a weather bureau for forecast. As I approach my house, I see my sprinklers are on in the rain. Stupid Internet.

A tornado wiped Hamilton off of the map. The handful of survivors thanked God for sparing them. Little did they know it had been God that had killed their community. The mayor of the adjoining town Bowden regularly conducted animal and human sacrifices to convince God to spare his city. And God would send his wrath to Hamilton. However, the humans and animals the mayor would sacrifice had come from Hamilton, and as the survivors abandoned the runs, another storm was brewing. Nobody wanted to volunteer for a ritual sacrifice. By the time they drew lots, the tornadoes were coming.

Agent 12 accidentally tripped an alarm. The office he was in was surrounded and there was no exit. He didn’t have anything useful in the office that could be use as a weapon to fight his way out. His orders were blunt? Do not be captured alive. He took out a pill from my pocket and looked at it. Then he put it in his mouth and put down on it. He’d heard that the poison would taste like almonds, but it taste like watermelon. Then he wondered. And felt bad for the kid he’d given some candy to.

Insurance auditor checked the statistics of Highway 10 and noticed a dramatic increase in the number of accident claims. He drove down to Highway 10 and didn’t notice anything unusual. No construction, no dangerous on ramps or off ramps. So he turned around and was coming home when he noticed a billboard with one of those codes you scan with your phone on it so he did and promptly got into an accident. When he came to in the emergency room, he picked up his phone. Through the cracked screen, saw the code was for his insurance company’s website.

50 years ago, Hamilton Gotha appeared as Blitzkrieg on the German version of the American gladiators television series. Just like his American counterpart, when he wasn’t on camera, he was soaking in ice baths and shooting up with steroids and painkillers. He knocked out a lot of contestants, and put several in the hospital. When he killed a contestant on the Thunderball game, the series was suspended and Hamilton was arrested. The charges were reduced to unintentional manslaughter. He was released and put on probation. These days, he runs a bar in Berlin and cuts off, overly intoxicated customers quickly.

There’s this movie that’s out from a famous director that’s supposed to be really epic and powerful and amazing on giant screens. And there is a big screen in the resort town across the bridge. However, they say that the sound mixing is bad and muddy and my hearing isn’t so great. And there’s some really goofy casting that are politically motivated. However, reviewers on both sides of the political spectrum say it is a spectacle. One that you have to see on the big screen. But it’s three hours long, and I’d have to go to the bathroom twice.

When I work for a company, sometimes they send out marketing swag. Little worthless trinkets that have the company logo on them. When I leave a company, I tend to throw these away. Unless they’re really useful, like an Eddie Bauer travel cooler that was really nice, but it had the company name on the side. I don’t want to be reminded of this company every time I use it.. I tried to cover up the logo, but in the end, I gave the cooler away to a friend.. let them associate the cooler with me so it’s good memories

You know who lives at 10 Downing Street, but do you know who lives at 11 Downing Street?
It’s Nigel Smith. He’s lived across the way from the Prime Minister for thirty years.
And he hates it.
Every morning, some reporter or security guard steals his newspaper or a bottle of milk from his delivery.
It’s so hard to get to his car with the crowds of press.
And the noise at all hours from protestors shouting and throwing things.
Why doesn’t he move somewhere quieter?
“I was here first!” he growls. “Make that pompous arsehole and his gang move!”

My cousin Maynard was a creepy kid. In kindergarten, other kids drew hopscotch on the playground. He do scary chalk outlines and would smuggle ketchup in his lunch bag to accessorize the outline. When the teacher and principal banned all chalk from the playground and searched Maynard’s lunch bag, he pondered finding a way to keep doing his art. That’s when they found the body in the playground. The police took photos drone outline, took the body away for an autopsy. The official cause was cirrhosis of the liver, but somehow they blamed Maynard. I never saw that kid again.