Category: My stories

Paranoia Sandwich

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Just as the simultaneous invention of the telephone led to a rivalry between Alexander Graham Bell and some Italian dude, apparently “my” sandwich is being claimed as the development of a shopkeeper in Kazakhstan.
Thieving foreign scum…
Hey, what would you rather eat: a Laurence Simon or an Abu Salam Abdul Khouri Al-Mohammed Jafari?
What’s in it? What’s in my sandwich? Well, there’s… wait a minute. I know what you’re trying to do…
You’re trying to steal my sandwich!
I know who you are… you’re an agent of Jafari. Well, I’m no fool. I won’t tell you a damned thing!

The Kid Talked

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I couldn’t believe my ears! The kid talked! The kid opened his mouth, and instead of sucking on something or barfing, he talked!
The baby is only three or four months old, and he’s reciting Shakespeare.
No, really. Shakespeare. William Shakespeare.
Can’t use the toilet. Can’t walk. Can’t even crawl.
And sure enough, he’s into the third act of Julius Caesar.
I hate Julius Caesar. Give me a copy of As You Like It or a Midsummer’s Night Dream with a nice bottle of red wine to make the evening.
Oh well. We can always try for having another kid.

Vampire Insurance

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Some guy at a garlic processing plant claimed to have been bitten by a vampire and turned into one of them, on his disability claim form.
We suggested that he change to the night shift. You know, because that way he’d stay out of the sun.
Not good enough, he said. Vampires hate garlic at any time of the day, it seems.
So we asked him to prove that he’s a vampire. Turning into a bat or a vapor cloud or something like that. Not giving a reflection would be good enough for us, too.
Claimants can be such bloodsuckers.

Elevator Angst

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I used to be deathly afraid of elevators. I’d look down the gap between the elevator floor and the building floor and worry I’d fall through that crack.
I had nightmares about the bottom of the elevator shaft. I’d wake up in a cold sweat, screaming.
The doctors couldn’t help me. I kept thinking about that dark, bottomless pit.
One day, an elevator supervisor took me to a panel at the bottom of the elevator shaft. He opened it and showed me that the bottom of the shaft was strewn with candy and dimes.
I feel so much better now.

Do You Have Wars?

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Communication between the dimensions via hyperradio has been severely limited despite centuries of development. Brief messages, rotated ninety degrees from reality like passing notes in school.
Which is what it was used for in the end – grade school penpal projects.
After years of “Do you have a dog?” and “I like flowers.” the notes stopped. The last message to arrive was:
“Do you have wars?”
And that was it. Nothing else. Just hyperstatic.
As dull as they were, we will sure miss the daily chatter with those Earthers.
I think I’ll get the class a pet to raise tomorrow.

Heaven 101

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The first few months in Heaven are anything but. It’s an Eternity when you’re in Halo Manners 101, learning the proper brightness, angle, circumference, and elevation of your halo.
Then there’s Flying School. You might think you’ve been flying forever, but they still need to teach you the Rules Of The Sky.
Unless you played a Lyre during your mortal days, not only do you get to learn fingering and strumming technique for a year, but also have to master tuning the darn thing.
Here in Hell, once you have your horns and pitchfork, you’re on your own.
Happy hunting!

Stay up late

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I’m up later than usual, sitting in my leather chair with a blanket over my legs.
Piper is purring under the blanket at my feet. Every now and then she chirps out a musical note and goes back to purring.
Nardo is under the rocking chair, tucked up with his eyes almost completely closed.
Both of them are waiting for me to go to bed. But there are some things I need to finish up before I can shut the computer down and crawl under the covers.
A few more words…
There. Finished.
Record it, post it, and good night.

Hedges

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Every day I wake up, I put on my robe and head for the center of the hedgemaze where servants have placed my medicine.
You’d think I could navigate in my sleep by now, but the hedges are mounted on special tracks of my own design, allowing them to be rearranged into new configurations and challenges.
Lawson the Mazemaster waits in the middle, sipping tea and reading my papers. The sooner I solve his creation, the less of my crosswords he’ll finish.
My butler hands me a sword. “Five minotaurs today,” he says.
Ah, medicine and exercise. My quest begins!

Lemons and Limes

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When I drink my iced tea, I like it with lemon.
I also like it with lime.
So, I keep a bag of lemons and limes handy. When I want tea, I close my eyes and pull something out of the bag. Then I squeeze it into my iced tea.
I’m never unhappy with my selection because I like lemons and limes equally.
One day, I reached in and pulled something out that wasn’t a lemon or a lime
It was an aborted fetus.
It wasn’t good in my tea at all.
But it was great with lemon. Or lime.

Not Dice

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Einstein said that God does not play dice with the universe, and I believe he’s right.
So for the past thirty years, I’ve been trying to determine exactly what game God does play with the universe.
Bouncing quarters in the Holy Grail?
Perhaps.
It wasn’t easy getting the research grants, but when the government doubted and withdrew support, private sources of funding kept the faith.
After all, what casino wouldn’t want to claim to have exclusive rights to the Divine Game. If they’re willing to build volcanoes, replicate cities, and buy holy grilled cheese sandwiches, why not this as well?