Category: Weekly Challenge

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: If you’re happy and you know it…

We’ve got stories by:

• Munsi
• Anima Zabaleta
• Jeffrey
• John Musico
• Richard
• Lizzie
• Jessica
• Tom
• Serendipity
• Spate
• Tura Brezoianu
• Norval Joe
• Rick
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of Sargon, Hammurabi, Ashurbanipal, and Gilgamesh (The Mesopotamians!). Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

MUNSI

Happiness

By Christopher Munroe

If you’re happy and you know it, weep some tears.

If you’re happy and you know it, shriek with fear.

If you’re happy and you know it, and you really want to show it, if you’re happy and you know it, it ultimately doesn’t matter, nobody will hear your screams, will ever find you down here, not ever. Not until my work is finished.

Why are you crying? Are you not happy? Do you not know it?

My attempt at a children’s television program, I’ll be first to admit, was ill-conceived, and it ultimately probably did deserve to be cancelled.

ANIMA

Morning Ritual

What is this crap! Why can’t anyone pick up after themselves around here? And must EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU SNORE?

A pillow hurtles towards his head, and his companions all had something to say: “shaddup H”, “Someone woke on the wrong side of the bed”, and “Jeez, ya know what time it is?”. They’d heard it all before, several times over.

Doc piped up – “Take your pills, old man – they are the pink ones… Not the blue ones, those are Grumpy’s. Those ones there.

Twenty minutes later, after the Paxil had kicked in, Happy was happy once again.

JEFFREY

“The Accident”
by Jeffrey Fischer

The paramedic pulled the unconscious body from the car wreck and immobilized the man’s head. The passenger was dead, but the driver seemed largely unhurt. But when the man regained consciousness, he was unable to speak. Worse, he seemed to be suffering from amnesia: the paramedic asked him questions and he simply stared, as though he couldn’t remember any of the answers. A police officer brought over the car registration, which identified the car’s owner as Happy McCoy. “All right, sir,” the paramedic said, “let’s start again. I know you can’t speak or move your head, but your hands and arms seem fine, so maybe you can answer some simple questions with hand movements. Do you know your name? Are you Happy McCoy? If you’re Happy and you know it, clap your hands.”

“Standing Ovation”
by Jeffrey Fischer

Customs change with the times. People know that applauding is a way of signaling to a performer that one has enjoyed the performance. This was not always the case, however. Prior to Elizabethan times, audiences would sit very still, making no sound whatsoever, if they approved of the performance. A rave review involved holding up a single hand and waving it from side to side, again making no noise. This is the sound of one hand clapping. Only if the performance displeased the audience did they clap, with the goal that the noise would drown out the (unwanted) sound of the performer. A notably horrific performance required the audience to stand and applaud. Standing allowed one to pass gas from meals that were heavy on beer and cabbage, thus signifying displeasure both through sound and odor.

JOHN MUSICO

If You’re Happy and You Know It
by John Musico

At the clinic I work at, the nurse and the housekeeper are always miserable.
It’s like they’re having a competition. The labored gait, shoulders hunched from bearing the weight of the world.
La bella miseria; they are in love with misery. You know the kind. Begging sympathy on occasion is one thing, but when it’s every day; it feels like an imposition.
My resentment built. A “Miserable” passed by, dragging as usual. I could stand it no longer.
I broke into a joyous chorus of; “If you’re happy and you know it.”
Now I’m the one who is intensely resented.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 90: Rude awakening

George was jerked back into wakefulness by an excited “Helllloooo!”, opening his eyes to find a blonde, frizzy-haired woman beaming down at him.

Lorretta was one of those women generally described as ‘bubbly’, otherwise translated as ‘incredibly irritating’. Within the first fifteen minutes George’s nerves were jangling and after umpteen repetitions of ‘If you’re happy and you know it’, during which both George and the bored chap were enthusiastically encouraged to join in, he found himself wondering at which point homicide becomes justifiable.

Thankfully, a door suddenly opened revealing a woman in a suit. She sternly called George’s name.

#2 – If you’re happy and you know it…

Long car journeys… I’ve always hated them.

As a youngster, stuck in the back seat with my sister and subjected to endless rounds of ‘I spy’ and pointless repetitive rounds of songs, all supposedly to ‘make the journey go quicker’.

And now, as the driver, forced to put up with endless squabbles, complaining and that mind-numbingly awful song: ‘If you’re happy and you know it’, just going on, and on, and on. It’s enough to drive you completely insane.

These days, I just sedate the kids.

Peace, quiet and no more singing.

Now I’m happy, and I know it!

LIZZIE

What an awful place to die, he thought, staring down from the overpass. Make a wish and be happy, but his mind… Don’t jump. Jump. Don’t jump. Make a wish. Quick, make a wish. But secrets are meant to be kept, aren’t they? At least some of them are. His mind raced as fast as the cars underneath. I hate you so much, I can barely breathe, he thought. Make a wish. Yes, make a wish, just any wish… When he plunged towards that perfect white line, there was no clapping; there was no sound, there was nothing at all.

JESSICA

Tired
By: Jessica Quin

She was sick and tired of Dusty beating her for years now!
She sobbed until she couldn’t anymore.
Then,.. the anger boiled inside her, engulfing her clarity.
Dusty remained passed out on the couch.
She tied him up tight and waited, gun in hand.
He awoke, taking a while to focus.
“Are you happy?”
He managed to mutter a, “Wha-?”
“What-er you talkin’ ‘bout ya stupid wench?”
“I asked you if you’re happy” she responded remaining strangely calm.
“I’ll let you live if you do one thing”
His eyes widened.
“If you’re happy and you know it…
clap your hands.”

TOM

A Well Defined Relationship Part 86

“ I got to go,” said Tim. “Tried,” said the Cid “Tried a lot.” “What you saying?” “I’m saying in a 100 years you can exhaust both possibilities and hope. How long do you think you’ve been here?” Timmy thought. At first he wanted to say a couple of minutes. Then he started to watch the dealer hand. It seems to be frozen in mid stoke. Across the cube in a corner El Cid was huddled singing softly to himself. “If your happy and know it sit right here.” Around him 1000s of crumpled paper ball turning yellow with age

The means to your destruction has been

set in motion by the work of your own hands

If your happy and you know it curse the rich.

If your happy and you know it curse the rich.

If your happy and you know then your guns

Will properly show it.

If your happy and you know it curse the rich.

In the slums of New Detroit you won’t find a street corner that didn’t echo with this ditty. The New People as they called themselves had made singing that tune a capital offense. When they found their children humming the tune clueless of the words behind it was when the Carts Squad to the square was formed.

SERENDIPITY

Chico, the terrorist clown, had a theory that the younger you could recruit supporters, the more loyal to your cause they would be.

Kids’ parties were ideal recruiting grounds – he’d show the youngsters how bombs were made, demonstrating with balloons. He’d employ magic tricks to teach the art of concealment and subterfuge, and through the medium of party songs, he taught the kids the terrorist way…

‘If you’re happy and you know it, strap grenades to your body and become a martyr to the cause’

It didn’t scan too well, but it certainly got the message across to the youngsters.

SPATE

Mostly True Tales from the Navy 6
Shipmate Personality Number 3

Hard Luck Harwich had a cloud of doom that followed him everywhere. And he
liked to tell people about it; whether it was his latest ache or something
bad he ate or the fate of his late Aunty June. You’d get an earful. In fact,
he’d try to talk you to death.

Then one day he heard that annoying song playing in the background of his
life and he thought:
“What if I’m really happy and I just don’t know it?”

That thought instantly cheered him up. And he clapped and the cloud went
away.

But everyone still avoided him.

NORVAL JOE

People who are always happy piss me off because they can’t just leave it alone. And they won’t leave me alone.
I’m happy and I know it. My face just doesn’t show it. I have what some people call a “Resting Grumpy Face”. It runs in my family, on my mother’s side.
If you want me to be grumpy, just tell me, “Smile, it can’t be that bad,” or, “It takes fewer muscles to smile than to frown”.
You’ll really know I’m happy if you say one of those things to me and I don’t tell you to bite my…

TURA

If you’re happy and you know it
——–
If you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands, they sang.

Which is a rather disturbing concept. Could I be happy and not know it? Or think I was happy, but be siocidal?

If we built a superintelligent machine to make everyone happy, how would it know? The song suggests you could tell it by clapping your hands. But then the machine might just grab everyone’s hands and bang them together, and it’s like Skynet, game over!

You have to think about these things if you don’t want an AI to go mad and tattoo smiley faces onto everyone.

RICK

It was sweet irony.

Daughter playing with her dolls on the floor as his wife bitched …
“you’ve spent thousands on those guns…
even more on the ammo!”

“All that time spent at the gun range, and the worry of having the damn things hidden in every room of the house!”

Their heads turned as they heard the front door kicked in …
three men, with bats and knives rushed into the living room.

Three shots, it was over!

Three lost lives …
An incredible mess to clean …

He’d never again hear her bitch about guns!
He smiled!
Happiness IS … a warm gun!

PLANET Z

We plugged in the robot and programmed it to be happy.
The robot reached for its power cord and pulled it out of the socket.
So, we plugged it back in.
The robot unplugged itself again.
We removed the robot’s arms, but it rolled away from the wall, which yanked out the cord.
So, we took off the robot’s wheels.
At that point, it let out a continuous scream.
Until we removed the speaker.
Then, we reviewed the code.
“Happy equals one,” I said. “That’s a Boolean TRUE, right?”
“No, it’s an integer value from one to a hundred.”
Oops.

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: MESS

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Jessica
• Lizzie
• Serendipity
• Tom
• Anima Zabaleta
• Spate
• Norval Joe
• Tura Brezoianu
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of IF YOU’RE HAPPY AND YOU KNOW IT… Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JOHN MUSICO

John Musico
Mess

To Felix, a mess is a big deal, the biggest. He can’t relax in a room until it’s tidy.
Most people’s nightmares are about being chased by wild animals, falling off a cliff, or the like; real legit danger.
His nightmares have to do with a mess. For example he lives in a house that’s a mess, or his hair’s all messed up, that sort of thing.
Felix was ashamed it was some sort of sex phobia. Felix’s psychiatrist clarified; “That’s a dirt thing, you have order issues, see; it’s control really.”
Felix is still tidy but finally at peace.

MUNSI

Cleaning Up

By Christopher Munroe

…another fine mess you’ve gotten us into.

I suppose you expect me to bail you out ?

Fine. Bring the bone saw, fetch a rug. I’ll dismember the corpse and we can dispose of it at the quarry before coming back to scrub blood out of carpet and walls.

Make sure nobody sees you, there’s no reason for us to be here, so if no trace is found no one will suspect and in a few hours we’ll be home, enjoying a scotch.

But seriously, this is the last time I’m doing this.

I can’t clean up your messes forever…

JEFFREY

“Another Nice Mess”
by Jeffrey Fischer

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy found themselves lost in the Iraqi desert. After walking for miles, they saw tents in the distance – at last, civilization! They crawled under a barbed-wire fence, where the portly Hardy lost his bowler hat, and peeked into the first tent they came to. The pair was surprised to see a military kitchen, with dozens of spotless cooking instruments, from stainless steel pots to ladles of all sizes.

Startled by the click of automatic weapons, they turned to face a half-dozen machine gun barrels. Laurel said to Hardy, “Well, this is another nice mess you’ve gotten us into.”

“Why I Tore Up the Adoption Papers”
by Jeffrey Fischer

I open the pantry door to see a carton of milk I placed there by mistake. One sniff is enough for me to know I hadn’t done so recently. Wondering what took the place of the milk, I open the refrigerator. Sure enough, there’s a pair of dirty socks. The washing machine turns out to be where I’ve placed a library book. The book’s spot in the den has a box of dog biscuits in it, which confuses me until I recall I agreed to dog-sit for a neighbor. Say, where is the dog, anyway? I peer into the dog’s crate, which contains nothing but a thawed bag of once-frozen corn. Uh-oh.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 89: Still waiting

Faced with an unresponsive companion, George was forced to concede that there was little else to do other than wait, although what for, he had no idea.

As the minutes stretched out, he found himself asking how on earth he’d managed to get into such a mess. His memories prior to waking at the hospital were still patchy, at best, and as for the circumstances leading up to that turning point in his life, other than the words ‘car accident’ gleaned from the hospital notes, he couldn’t even surmise about what had occurred.

Bored and tired, George closed his eyes.

#2 – Eton Mess

The crowning glory of my dinner party was the desert – my stunning coup de grace: Eton Mess.

A wonderful concoction of whipped cream, strawberries and crumbled meringue, lovingly folded together harmoniously to form a gloriously beguiling and deliciously wicked finale to the evening’s culinary pleasures.

It went down an absolute treat – impressing everyone.

As I closed the door behind the last departing diner, I breathed a sigh of relief and reflected on the evening’s proceedings.

Shame about the pavlova, I thought… but scooped off the floor and served with a flourish, nobody even noticed.

Eton mess, my arse!

JESSICA

Don Foyer
By: Jessica Quin

Don Foyer headed into the hotel shower.
He carefully placed his towel on the hook, taking extra care not to let it touch anything. He left his slippers on because he wouldn’t dare touch the floor. He couldn’t, no wouldn’t allow the germs to touch him! How vile! Disgusting!

On the other side of the city one man squeezed through the door that only opened slightly, he re-emerged gaging and shaking his head. The other men pushed through to find a mess of garbage, the stench insufferable; maggots crawled on the mail piled at the door.

‘Don Foyer eviction notice’

Obsession
By: Jessica Quin

Josh hardly knew her, but she declared her love anyway.
What was her obsession with him?
First time, he saw her in the car outside his job, then the store, the bar and finally, under the darkness of his living room.
“Say you want me too!”
Josh heard the crazed sound in her voice. He moved quickly towards his gun in the basket above the TV!
She took her aim in the darkness and pulled the trigger!
Shots rang out!

Ouch… the burning…
His side was hurting. He looked over, she wasn’t moving.
“How did I get into this mess?”

LIZZIE

When he woke up, the TV was on and he saw his face splattered all over the news. The previous night was a total blur and the woman slumped on the couch of this unfamiliar living-room remained eerily silent. He wore nothing but a black t-shirt. Slightly embarrassed for being half naked, he mumbled an apology and dashed for the door, holding his pants. Don’t worry, he heard. But it wasn’t the woman’s voice. Her head rolled to a halt by his feet. At least, I got rid of one of them, he thought. Yes, one voice at a time.

SERENDIPITY

Crime scene, accident, or just a simple corpse mouldering in an empty house… until the neighbours notice the smell.

Things like that leave one hell of a mess, and somebody has to clean it up… and that’s where I come in.

Blood, fluids, bones, hair and rotting organs are my stock in trade – I bag them up, scrub away the stains and you’d never know anything had occurred.

From unholy mess to pristine clean – I take pride in my job.

And as for all those bits I take away…

What do you think is inside your microwave lasagne?

TOM

Talking about my generation

Each generation strives to create its own unique lexiconic tool box. Emboldened a group of words with hype context. Those of the Mod Gen were rather fond of the word [mess]. It was used as a non-specific sum as in “I have a mess of comic books. And with the modifier [stuff] having even less specificness as in “I got a mess of stuff for Christmas.” It severed to note aimless non-productive enterprise as “ We were just messing around.” Yet in the proper setting it described critical interact as in “Don’t mess with me.” Or “Man, your messed up.”

A Well Defined Relationship Part 85

Le Cid removed the paper and handed it to Timmy. Unconsciously Master Parsons said “Who is Laura Lin Parker?” The Dealer immediately started writing the following.

“Daughter of Texas billionaire Titus Parker. Texas Sharpshooter of the Year 1956. Wife of Rep Governor Ronald James.”

Le Cid chuckled “ Seems JFK got popped for messing with the wrong Texas Deb.” “That was disappointing,” said Tim. “Try something really hard,” prodded the bandit. “Why did my father have to die,” The Dealer’s face changed from serene to puzzled to sad, wrote the following

Poindexter

“Timothy Parson’s god father ?” Asked the lad.

ANIMA

Major Tom

The noise was the first thing I notice: Entering the mess hall, there’s silverware clanging, laughter and conversation, news feeds blaring, boots stomping on the planking. The din is overwhelming me, so recently released from isolation training. 60 days alone in some netherworld sub-basement quarters at NASA.

Someone is standing by me, but I am having a tough time focusing…

Huh? Sorry… what…-

“ I asked, how do you feel about your upcoming mission? Isn’t it a bit controversial, searching for life forms in outer space? What does your wife…”

I mutter, I can’t wait to leave all this behind.

SPATE

Messy Business

Six years of dogging every imagined impropriety. Six years of oversight
hearings and special investigations. Six years watching them audaciously
shrug off scandal after scandal.

Now finally we have them by their slippery golf balls! In a mess of their
own making and by their own admission: nobody of importance was sent!

Bigger than Benghazi! Stickier than some kid’s lemonade stand being targeted
by the IRS!

Why not go to Paris? I’m sure the Secret Service was up for a trip to the
‘City of Love’.

Hold the ketchup. don’t call my french fries freedom fries… they are
Charlie fries!

NORVAL JOE

The prophet Mess Mass Abush was a humble man. He taught his people to live lives of compassion and service for all people; believers and unbeliever alike. As an example of his humility he insisted that no representation of his image should ever be made.
Unfortunately, the alphabet of his people was hieroglyphic. As a result, his name was represented as a blank square.
Over the centuries the meaning of the blank square was lost. Ultimately, disciples of the Nameless Prophet interpreted the empty space to mean, “Anyone to name the prophet should be smashed beneath a giant stone block”.

TURA

Mess
——–
We pwned the Hanover Messe this year, the largest trade show in the world. Their registrations ran on bog-standard Windows, so we hacked ourselves a free booth for a fake company. Then we brought in crateloads of wired and wireless sniffers, cracking hardware, and storage.

By the end, we’d downloaded the entire contents of 85% of the mobile phones that passed through (including Angela Merkel’s), and had access to almost everything with a computer inside. We could have wrecked the industrial robots, but we only use our powers for good.

Yes, that was another fine Messe we got ourselves into.

PLANET Z

Mother made a mess in the kitchen.
Father made a mess of the family finances.
Son made a mess of his school grades.
Daughter made a mess of her relationship.
Grandpa made a mess of the inheritance.
Rover made a mess on the carpet.
Baby made a mess on the wall with crayons.

Thank goodness for their neighbor, Luigi. He made a mess of spaghetti and meatballs and garlic bread, and called everyone over for a feast.

They had a great dinner together, and had a good time.

Until Grampa got drunk, and talked about the war.

Luigi stabbed him.

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: PIRACY

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Lizzie
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Zackmann
• Anima Zabaleta
• Serendipity
• Rick Thomas
• Spate
• Scott
• Tom
• Norval Joe
• Chelsea
• Tura Brezoianu
• Cliff
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of MESS. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JOHN MUSICO

Piracy
by John Musico

I first came across the issue of piracy when I tried downloading music from the internet.
When I worked on a TV series which included picture in picture scenes, I further learned the fine for copyright infringement is $150K per transgression.
So. I posted as many of my own pictures on the net as I could. I gave them unique titles that were easy for me to Google.
In just one week, I found 10 of my pics used on some stranger’s website.
My scam was a bit evil, however, with a million in the bank; I’ll sleep just fine.

MUNSI

Pirates

By Christopher Munroe

When Johnny Depp was kidnapped by actual Somali pirates, we all agreed it was going to be amazing. News networks went berserk, comedians got ready and we were primed to follow this amazing, if socially irrelevant, news story wherever it might take us.

It was, after all, the sort of amazing TV that didn’t come along every day, and we were excited to make the most of it.

Three days later the pirates killed him.

Because in real life, pirates do that.

It was kind of a downer.

Ah well. Hopefully the next thing will be a little more fun.

LIZZIE

They approached the ship at night. Two went up to the control room. The rest looked for the crew quarters; everyone was fast asleep. The captain wasn’t. After a scuffle and a black eye, he gave up. Much to his surprise, the leader of the group demanded the cargo. “But… It’s books.” The boxes were unloaded and taken away. The school of the village would finally teach proper English. The media hurried to state that even pirates have a heart, the authorities protested vehemently and the pirates’ only thought was that in the future, they’d make their demands more efficiently.

JEFFREY

“Spoilers”
by Jeffrey Fischer

I enjoy watching movies on DVD rather than in the theater. Not only is my living room more comfortable and quieter than the theater, with no rowdy kids or the glow of smartphone screens interrupting the story, but movies always come with a little extra. Even before the action begins, the FBI warning shows up, and I know G-Men are on the job, stopping movie piracy. I’m not quite sure how I could charge a fee for watching the piece of trash that is about to follow, but I sleep more soundly knowing my more clever neighbors aren’t making a buck out of it.

“Bad Day at the Office”
by Jeffrey Fischer

Two Somali pirates were at a bar, talking business over a vintage fermented goat’s milk. “How was your last kidnapping?”

“Wonderful, Allah be praised. A rich American infidel and his mistress on a yacht. I received two million dollars in ransom.”

“Allah be praised. On my last trip, I caught a small cruise ship. It was a fundraising trip for both Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush. Each wants to be the next leader of the Great Satan.”

“That must have resulted in a large ransom indeed.”

“One would think so. But both the Democrats and Republicans refused to pay even a single cow for their return. The Republicans told me to push Mr. Bush overboard, while the Democrats offered me a show on MSNBC to do the same to Mrs. Clinton.”

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 88: Waiting

When George finally found the waiting room shown in the images, he was somewhat shocked to find the room already occupied by a rather scruffy looking guy, thumbing through an old magazine.

Taking a seat, George cleared his throat and introduced himself: “I’m George, and you are?”

“Bored”, came the response; “Got anything to read on you? I’ve read this piece on internet piracy about twenty times now.”

George shook his head.

“Pity”, said the stranger, returning to his magazine.

“So, er… what exactly do we do now?”, asked George.

The stranger nodded towards the waiting room sign:

“We wait!”

#2 – Yar!

Where did the romance of piracy go?

Long gone are the days of splicing the mainbrace, muskets and cannon, peg legs and brass spyglasses; and I can’t remember when I last saw a privateer run up the Jolly Roger and heave to.

Talking parrots and cutlasses have had their day, and you’re more likely to hear a string of Somalian, than ‘shiver me timbers’ in a piratey voice!

Swashbuckling adventure on the high seas isn’t quite the same with machine guns and machetes.

But, some things haven’t changed.

You can still make a tidy profit, in dollars, rather than doubloons.

#3 – Yo ho ho!

I won’t say that I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up – my ambitions changed from day to day.

When I said I wanted to be a pirate, my parents told me to be realistic: so I opted for astronaut, to which they said, ‘come back down to earth, son’.

I tried, but didn’t have the brains for a surgeon, or the brawn for a fireman.

So, instead, I lurk all day in my room, burning counterfeit DVDs to sell down the market.

Proved my parents wrong – I grew up to be a pirate anyway!

ZACKMANN

Ratsy was born on March fourteenth so naturally he was given the first name Pi. He loved television especially movies with rats in them. Especially ones in which rats worked in kitchens like Rizzo helping Long John in the galley. On a computer tablet he would watch cooking videos on youtube then practice cooking when he was alone. Eventually he achieved his lifelong dream: becoming a real life Ratatouille. Now he make the best desserts. You can look far and wide but you are very unlikely to find another rodent who is as good a pastry chef as Pi Ratsy.

ANIMA

The Dream Pirates

James woke with a start. He tried to remember his dream, the one with savage indians and treehouses, but only came up with half images of clocks, hooks and toothy crocodiles.

He tried to remember; he thought he’d been flying. He thought he’d been happy. But even as he roused himself out of that half state of early morning awareness, James felt the joy slipping away.

Sailing ships became math problems; his overdue book report and homeroom filled his waking senses.

The Dream Pirates had struck again, stealing childhood’s dreams worth gold, replacing them with realities wooden nickels and fears.

SERENDIPITY

You laughed when you read the warnings… ‘Piracy is a crime’: So what, you thought, everybody does it, and the entertainment industry makes enough money as it is.

Oh, they certainly do.

Enough money to employ me… and I’m coming to get you.

For every song you’ve ever stolen, every movie you’ve taken and every game you’ve copied, I am going to make you pay the price.

And I’ll expect every penny, with interest, paid in full on demand.

I will find you.

And you will pay.

And, if you can’t…

I’m going to make you walk the plank!

RICK THOMAS

A “Not So Roughshod” Pillaging
__________________________

They met in a bar by the bay …
green eyes, brown hair, broad shouldered he ravaged her again and again …
he and his friends had taken over her apartment like pirates raiding a ship!
They ate her food, drank her liquor, smoked, cursed, treated her as a servant wench …
at one point or another they had all put their hands on her inappropriately!
The raucous behavior was incessant, her home a wreck in the space of a long weekend.
Now they were gone … order restored …

Her heart ached for their return!

They were the best three days of her life!!!

SPATE

The Choice

Slow death is delicate agony. An Esther Williams black and white
synchronized water ballet of goodbyes. Fully extended arms as metronomes,
reaching in unison, counting the moments. backstroke goodbye, backstroke
goodbye; swimming away until strength is no more and then quietly slipping
beneath the surface of the pool.
Fade out.

Fast death is an act of piracy. An abrupt Charles Laughton led boarding
under cover of darkness. Pillaging substance, raping permanence; it sets
the ship afire, leaving you to jump alone into the black turbulence of the
sea.
Celluloid breaks, flapping to projector white light.

Which ending would you choose?

(music: “New England Is Interesting” by BOPD / curator: freemusicarchive.org
/ licensed CC BY-NC 3.0)

SCOTT

Piracy:

Peddling bootleg DVDs in Asia can be a risky business. Authorities love to make statements with high profile arrests, and even better if the offender is a foreigner.

Randy knew this, but he wasn’t worried. “Ten years of piracy and still counting. Besides, it takes a pirate to catch a pirate,” he’d say.

Therefore he was a little startled one day when his front door flew past him and crashed into the back wall. In the doorway stood an ancient buccaneer, teetering on a wooden leg. “A hundred years of piracy, and still counting,” the pillager bellowed, unsheathing his sword.

TOM

A Well Defined Relationship Part 84

“Where are I,” said Timmy. “We are with Tamerlane,” said Cid. The boy and the bandit where standing in a dimly lit cube 16×16. On one wall hung a 16th century mirror. Against an other was a child’s seesaw. In the center a green velvet black jack dealer’s station. Behind a man was removing single sheets of paper from a four ream stack and carefully writing on each. “This is the big bad secret,” troubled Tim. “Oh indeed Master Parsons, you’re looking at Piracy on a galactic level. Ask about a secret. “Who kill Kennedy?’ The dealer wrote the following.

In the Name of the Game

Tony was a runner. This was in the days of 5 ¼ floppies. He had gaming friends in both the South and North Bay. In San Jose he knew sector/track/byte sum crackers. In Concord he knew a guy with a garage full of q/a kicked Datalife disks. The best was to go to jail for copyright infringement was in the labyrinth of law which was mail fraud, thus the need for someone to be the sneaker-net. That was Tony, Buses to Bart, Bart to Buses. No one in the chain charged for their respective service it was Piracy without profit.

NORVAL JOE

Harold enjoyed his position as assistant headmaster at a boys’ school, though he knew he was hated by most of the students. The boys could hate him. He had what they wanted and knew that the little brats would pay well for it.
Over the years he had tried many ways to turn a few bucks from smuggling items into the dorms. He had sold soda, energy drinks, candy and pizza. Hands down, Harold’s most successful hustle was selling pirated video games. They cost almost nothing to rip off the internet and there wasn’t a boy who didn’t want one.

CHELSEA

The pirate

He stood at the now of his ship looking out at the calm blue ocean before him. All his life he’s been told no at every turn. That simple word had shaped him into the man he was today.
Every person who’d ever told him no hoping to break him a little more each day had only served to make him stronger. The only thing they had accomplished was to push him closer to this day.
“Hoist our colors!” He called to his crew.
He looked up as the black and white flag caught the ocean breeze, he was free.

TURA

Piracy
——–
“Arr!” said Cap’n Jack Black to his crew.

“Yarrr-har!” they responded.

“Listen up, mateys,” the Captain went on. “Afore Billy Bones died, he gave me ‘is treasure map! It’s a little island don’t appear on the charts, three days out to sea from here. Are ye rarin’ to go?”

“Yarrr!” they cheered.

“Google Maps doesn’t show it,” said one crewman, consulting his iPhone.

“It be tidal, it be,” riposted the Captain. “Only shows at low tide.”

“That would be a shipping hazard,” said another. “NOAA maps say there’s nothing there.”

“Arr,” said the Captain. “Piracy just isn’t fun any more.”

CLIFF

In the Golden Age of piracy, she was the best. She would have been the pirate queen but nobody ever knew her name. She looted seven Spanish galleons in one raid, sent them to the ocean floor, and everyone thought they had sunk in a storm. She raided ships in the oceans Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific. She once convinced the entire crew of a French treasure ship to abandon their vessel and make for shore in lifeboats due to ghost and curses. And who was this mysterious woman? Weren’t you listening? I told you that nobody ever knew her name.

PLANET Z

For centuries, your status in piracy was determined by how much you stole.
Then, the most important factor was the color of your beard.
Bluebeard… Blackbeard… Yellowbeard… you’ve heard of them, right?
Pirates started dyeing their beards with all kinds of colors.
Redbeard… Orangebeard… Pinkbeard… Ochrebeard…
Things got way out of hand, and merchant ships were sailing safely while pirates were too busy dyeing their beards.
A conclave of pirate captains came together to set beard standards.
No more wild colors. Beards could only be dyed to match the pirate’s hair color.
And that’s when they started using colored ribbons.

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: VALUE

We’ve got stories by:

• Jeffrey
• Richard
• John Musico
• Anima Zabaleta
• Spate
• Serendipity
• Munsi
• Tom
• Cliff
• Tura Brezoianu
• Norval Joe
• Jessica
• Lizzie
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of PIRACY. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JEFFREY

Naughty or Nice
by Jeffrey Fischer

Santa Claus used to give naughty kids a lump of coal in their stockings. Despite increasingly stringent environmental restrictions, coal was pretty valuable these days, and Santa worried that kids weren’t hearing the message when they received a lump of something of value. He mused over his problem before the solution hit him. An evil grin formed on his face, frightening the elves.

That Christmas, millions of naughty children awoke early and eagerly raced to open their presents. The naughty ones saw a CD-shaped bulge in their stockings. When they reached in, however, all they found was an installation disc for AOL version 5.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 87: Watched

The most disturbing thing about the images that George was viewing was that the most recent was taken less than a couple of hours earlier… Someone had been watching him all this time.

Angrily, he shouted out: “Who the hell are you? Why let me suffer like this, where’s the value in that?”

No answer.

Fuming, George returned his attention to the computer, scanning rapidly through the other candidate’s files – three in particular caught his attention: folders with fewer images than the others and all sharing a common final image.

The ‘candidate’ sitting alone beneath a sign: ‘Waiting Room’

#2 – Priceless

“Of course, I’d never sell it” – the biggest lie you ever hear on the ‘Antiques Roadshow’.

Of course they’d sell it!

You watch them sitting, nodding politely as the expert tells them the history and background to their piece, when all they’re interested in is the value. You can almost hear them screaming internally: “Shut up about the outstanding filigree work and tell me how much the damn thing is worth!”

If I was an antiques’ expert, I’d tell them it was a cheap imitation, then rescue it from the trash after they dumped it.

Then I’d sell it!

JOHN MUSICO

John Musico
Values

Fred lived in New York and was a looser. The T.V. commercials made clear slender is beautiful but his wife was fat.
A winner has places to go, people to see; fast movers and shakers. Fred moved real slow and wished lunch breaks were longer.
No one at the office liked him. No surprise he got transferred to another branch, as far away as possible- the one in Mexico.
In Mexico, men with skinny wives were presumed poor providers and were ashamed. Living life is what is most valued. Lunch breaks were two hours. Fred was never a happier camper.

Value

Marty was a very young man, and “The Old Man” next door was as wise as he was old: he was very old.
Marty would stop off whenever he needed advice. Marty’s marriage was on the rocks. The young newlywed decided if he could just force his wife to kiss him good morning, and she did for a long enough time; all would be fine. The Old Man’s face went solemn; “Young man, forcing behavior isn’t the same as one choosing that same behavior. Sincerity is what gives an act value, substance, meaning. That kiss, son; is a meaningless kiss.”

ANIMA

Platinumlocks

(door knocks)

Who you?-

Hi, my name is P, …I came to make amends… 10 years ago I took some things I shouldn’t have… wrecked some things…

Yeah, I remember you. You’re the bitch that came in like she own the place. Broke my mama’s heart. Folks ain’t around anymore, so I guess I’ll have to accept your apology – Your values change any as you grew up?

…yes, my teen years were rough, but I am in a program now…

Well, mine haven’t –

And with that, Baby Bear bit Platinumlock’s head off. No change in haircolor was going to convince him.

SPATE

New Jersey Revisited

We all have our passions; those inner demons that persistently tug on our
souls to follow them to places we know we should not go. Thus it was so.

Driven by hunger, by thirst, to this turnpike exit, I stood amidst the odor
of grease and disinfectant to bargain with the beast; his florescent lit,
pus ridden face sneering down at me while he rubbed his palms together in
fly like anticipation. What price would bring him my soul?

I swallowed the last of my dignity and spoke first:

“I’ll have the number two value meal. with diet Coke. Please.”

(music: “A Microtonal Tapestry for Chad” by Andrew Bisset / CC by-SA 3.0 /
revised by the addition of the familiar but distorted jingle at the end)

SERENDIPITY

“How much do you value your life?” I asked him, holding the gun to his temple.

“What if I let you go, but take your wife’s life instead… or perhaps I should shoot this total stranger in your place?”

The woman whimpered and the strangers’ face turned white.

“Or perhaps you’d prefer to fire the fatal shot yourself?”

“So, your life, or your companions’? Whose has the greatest value?”

“Please let us go”, he whispered.

We came to a stop and the doors slid open.

“If you insist”, I replied, leaving the elevator.

“But next time, please take the stairs!”

MUNSI

Family Values

By Christopher Munroe

Everyone talks about family values, but what’s the true value of a family?

I mean, father, mother, two or three kids, say two for the sake of argument, that’s four transplantable hearts total, eight lungs, four livers, endless yards of usable intestine, to say nothing of the kidneys, the bone marrow, the retinas. It adds up, but to what?

What’s the family value, what is it truly?

You might already know. I don’t.

But I will.

Soon.

I know a guy who knows a guy.

And I’ve kidnapped a family, and soon, I will know its true value.

Minus commission…

TOM

Fundamentally Different Things

When I was an Algebra tutor the hardest part of my job was shoving 60 minutes of explanation into a 20 minutes session. To accomplish this I had to come up with a General Formula for word problems. Further I had to demonstrate it in a way that would dispel all resistance. I figured the best way was to solve 15 problems simultaneously. Across three sheets of paper I wrote the following

V(T) + – V(T) = TV

Had the students identify the Amounts and Values, do the computations, out popped 15 answers in 14 minutes.

Order out of chaos.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 83

The Doctor handed Sparky his Tricorder. “Reset the Array Function.” Sparky popped the back off and set two probes to the internal circuits. Smith was also busy resetting Dino Mod. “Access security files 1066 to 1963.” Banister was having a quiet conversation with the Duke. Which left Timmy to ponder the glowing bread box in front of him. ”Doctor we got values off the chart,” yelled Sparky. “Doctor we got a problem,” yelled Smith. “DOCTOR GRAB TIMMY.” Yelled Banister. Something had compelled the lad to reach out for the box.

“It’s calling,” said Tim

And he was gone.

TURA

Value
——–
My car was beginning to cost too much to maintain, so it was time to scrap it. Three scrap dealers all said the same thing, “No value left in a 12-year-old Skoda, but I’ll take it off your hands for nothing.”

I pulled out the radio and the radiator to sell on eBay. I kept the toolkit that came with the car. Siphoned out nearly all the petrol. The tyres were pretty fresh, but I’ve a friend in a garage who helped me swap them for bald ones.

Yep, I made damn sure there was no value left in it.

CLIFF

The new boss wanted to chat with me.

“The workers on the floor add value to our company by putting products together. The dock workers pack up the products and load them on the trucks and the drivers deliver stuff to the stores. The salesmen, the IT guys, even the janitor adds value in their own ways. You, on the other hand, sit in your office playing on the internet. Your job title is Bureaucratic Assurance. What does that even mean?”

“It means I bribe the federal inspectors to let our defective products get sold. Any more questions?”

There weren’t.

NORVAL JOE

Elroy couldn’t help himself, he was obsessive. He could never resist a good value.
He only shopped at Costco and the dollar store.
His children tried to have him declared mentally incompetent before he spent the balance of their inheritance.
“Their inheritance,” he scoffed. “I earned the money, made my purchases wisely and squirreled it all away, year after year.”
Using a case of macaroni and cheese for a chair and boxes of paper towels as a desk he wrote out a check for every penny of his savings and bought the Brooklyn Bridge at one tenth of its value.

JESSICA

Valuable
By: Jessica Quin

Julie heard the fireworks outside. The neighbors were celebrating the New Year and their whistles and shouts made her sadder than she’d expected.
Recently she had come to realize how much she missed her family.
Her mother cried that first year she didn’t show up for the holidays.
Julie worked hard to make a living and it took all of her time, but when money became scarce, so did jobs, including hers.
Her family soon moved away, leaving Julie to live life as she pleased.
Julie regretted giving more importance to work and not to what should’ve been most valuable.

Value
By: Jessica Quin
Birdie watched as people passed her by.
Some ignored her, while others wrinkled their noses at her.
She no longer wanted to feel worthless.
Okay so, maybe she wasn’t the prettiest and her clothes were old. Yes, maybe her hair was slightly unkempt,
but she knew she could mean something to someone. She couldn’t understand why others couldn’t see her worth.
Then, one day everything changed.
The tall beautiful lady opened the glass door and gently lifted Birdie.
“She’s beautiful.” she mused.
She looked at Birdie’s wrist-tag.
Porcelain
Hand-made in France
500 thousand dollars
“I’ve wanted you my whole life.”

LIZZIE

The Value of Time

When Mary left, she hinted something about the box especially that he shouldn’t open it. Obviously, Louie decided to open the damn box. Last time he found one, it contained thousands in diamonds that someone left in the attic of their new house. After hours of failed attempts to pick the lock, he felt totally inapt. Mary loved that. Hammering the box open seemed like the only option. Louie hit it a few times until the lid popped. Inside, a note. “You made it! Oh, by the way, I’m several hours ahead… with the diamonds. Catch me if you can!”

PLANET Z

Most kings had royal executioners to dispatch enemies of the crown.

King Alphonse thought that executioners were barbaric.

So, he hired a royal hugger to hug all friends of the crown.

Alphonse imagined that the hugger would be a kindly, grandfather-type of person.

Instead, union rules dictated that the executioner get the job.

He wasn’t a kindly, grandfather-type persion.

He was a large, scary monster of a person.

And he tended to crush the ribs of the people he hugged.

“It’s just not working out,” said King Alphonse. “You’re fired.”

Alphonse offered his hand.

But the executioner hugged him instead.

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: UNDERGROUND

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Tom
• Tura Brezoianu
• Serendipity
• Spate
• Zackmann
• Rick Thomas
• Anima Zabaleta
• Norval Joe
• Danny
• Lizzie
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of VALUE. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JOHN MUSICO

Underground
by John Musico

Evolution forces burdened species to find an unused niche with no competition when they get elbowed out by existing competitors.
The density of animals on earth had become critically overpopulated.
The number of square miles of land on our planet; pales in comparison to the many layers of the land below the surface.
Consequently, many species moved underground.
Random mutations in their offspring; either disfavored their survival, or favored it.
Any species with deformities that favored digging skills, or smelling food through miles of tunnels, and the like: survived.
Their offspring were as their evolved adapted parents; and they flourished, wildly….

MUNSI

On Zombie Preparedness

By Christopher Munroe

I’ve always been old-school, that way.

Even before the dead rose from their graves and started shambling across the countryside looking to sate their hunger for flesh, I was at the cemetery every weekend, looking over the tombs.

A bunch of us went, we’d drink wine, write poetry, and discuss what we’d do in the event of actual zombie apocalypse.

People mocked us, called us freaks, but once the graves started opening up again we knew we were the only ones who were ready.

I guess you could say: I’ve been into zombies since back when they were still underground…

JEFFREY

The Commute
by Jeffrey Fischer

I find my usual seat, start a podcast, and wait for the ride to be over. The subway – “the Underground,” as those descriptive British call it, though their system finds its way above ground – is a reasonably comfortable and efficient way of getting to work. Plus, there’s the freak show.

The girl across the way, furtively sipping her Frappucino next to the “no eating or drinking” sign; the guy toying with his cigarette, waiting impatiently to leave the car so he can light up; the woman on the phone, arguing with her boyfriend for all of us to hear; and the man in his underwear, carefully donning his suit and tie as he nears his station – it’s a wonderful cross-section of the weirdos in society, and it makes me want to drive myself to work.

The Artist
by Jeffrey Fischer

Karen met Frank in a noisy bar that played far too much bro country for her tastes. It was a strange place to find a nice guy, but the two of them hit it off right away. Part of Karen’s attraction was that Frank described himself as “an underground artist.” She had visions of being taken to boutique galleries, and smoky (but trendy) clubs. Perhaps he was a graffiti artist, plying his trade on walls in sketchy parts of town – he might even be the next Banksy! she mused.

They exchanged numbers and promised another date. But when Karen went online to look up Frank, she found he was a grave-digger. She debated switching bars and avoiding him, but summoned the courage to confront him about his lie. “It’s no lie, darlin’,” he said. “My graves are the tidiest around. I’m an artist, and I work underground.”

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 86: Data

George didn’t really know what he’d expected – he’d hoped the computer might provide a portal to some underground organisation with clandestine goals, but he found himself presented with a desktop little different to those seen in millions of offices across the world.

Digging a little deeper provided more interesting results – a set of numbered folders corresponding to the candidates he’d found on the desk, containing datestamped image and video files.

George was astonished to find, in his folder, a comprehensive record of everything that had occurred since waking up in hospital… George’s flesh crawled as he worked through the files.

#2 – Tube

The London Underground has a few surprises for those in the know. Beneath the streets of the capitol, far above, lie stories of ghosts and tales of long abandoned stations and tunnels… If you know where to look you can even see the forgotten platforms as you rattle by.

But look even more closely and you may catch a disconcerting glimpse of the Underground’s most disturbing secret.

The pallid faces and insubstantial forms of lost commuters, grasping their briefcases and bags with skeletal fingers, waiting silently and patiently on those dark, lonely platforms…

Waiting for trains that will never arrive.

TOM

Springs Eternal

Jimmy lived in the underground. The trains stopped running in 2197, by the turn of the century it was the only concentration of electric power left. No one had a clue why they called the place Fruitdale, but it was better by far than Union City run by thugs, or Fremont Station run by religious zealots. “I guess, if you live at the end of the line, the end is always end,” quipped Jimmy. The boy had hacked the intercom system to play 100 word stories 24/7. No one paid much attention to the context. They listen for the sound of hope.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 82

“Gr-K” yelled Mother swung her rifle directly at the Rev’s head, dropped and nailed an incoming Forlite Bird. “Well played Mr. Parsons,” said the Rev picking blue bird parts off his shoulder. “Haven’t heard that word in ages. You were with the underground weren’t you?”

“Much to Lt. Parsons’s dismay.”

“Oh he must have suffered greatly on the duel crosses of love and duty. Gladly I think the breach between is why we are speaking on this noble Sunday afternoon.”

“He got the last of the underground off Beta Bovine.”

“You went agreeably?”

“I was drugged.”

“Easer extraction.”

Mother snorted.

TURA

Underground
——–
God left today.

It hit the Earth ten thousand years ago, sinking deep underground, alive but too damaged to escape. So it projected its mind to raise our primitive cultures towards developing science and technology.

Judaism, Greek philosophy, Jesus, Mohammed: all signs of its memetic engineering. At last, it found the triggers to set us on the path of science. A few years ago it made us find it and set us to work.

And now it’s gone, ignoring us like discarded tools.

As if waking from dreams, we look at each other and wonder, what do we do now?

SERENDIPITY

This deep underground, it is utterly dark, so dark that it’s impossible to see your hand in front of your face. So, when the lamp failed, all I could do was stay put and wait for the rescue party.

Finally, after long hours in the pitch darkness, the welcome glow of light appeared… But something was wrong – this was not the glow of electric torches, but the flicker of flames, and the sounds that accompanied them were not the reassuring shouts of my rescuers.

When I saw my fate, my only wish was for the darkness to return.

Permanently!

SPATE

Thanatos 1:1

Verily I say unto thee, in a time that is soon to come, the world shall be
divided into two peoples, each the opposite extreme of the other.

The sky people shall shed all their clothing and ascend to the heavens so
they may live floating above with their heads in the clouds.

The earth people shall also become naked but dig holes in the dirt so that
they may live bent over with their heads underground.

During this age, the moderate peoples of all nations shall grow silent and
disappear, wearily retreating from the sight of so many assholes.

(music: “Vivian and Ondine” by William Basinski is licensed under Creative
Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States and curated
by freemusicarchive.org / sound effects by soundjay.com)

ZACKMANN

Lollipop Rant

I’ll tunnel into the Google Complex. I’ll make them fix my Nexus 7 which hasn’t worked right since Lollipop. I should’ve know that when the new unhealthy treat name of the OS 5.0 wasn’t as good as the unhealthy treat 4.0 was named after it would suck. Kit Kat should have been replaced by It’s Its or Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Icecream. I want Google to know if I wanted a device that doesn’t work right I would have paid the extra for Apple. Maybe I’ll try uninstalling my apps and clearing the cache or Factory Reset first.

Seeing my son’s face after he ate an unprocessed olive was nearly priceless and I wish I would have taken a picture but the coolest part of the wine tour was the wine tunnel. Literally as well as figuratively since our visit to Napa Valley was in the summer when it gets very hot outside but it was not hot in the tunnel. Watching all of those barrels sitting there with the wine aging in them wondering if we would survive an earthquake down there. On second thought the wine, vinegar dip, and olive dip tasting was my favorite part.

RICK

Walt had made his fortune here
The underground …
the counterculture …
here the inhabitants aren’t above the law,they are below the radar.
Unheard, unseen by normal society …
a place where anything might be available, anything can happen.
:Pot, pills, coke, heroin …
murder, weapons, whores …
all manner of goods and services!
Walt had made a nice living providing such things to those who wanted them.
Walt made his fortune from the secrets he kept!

Ironic …

10,000 well kept secrets earned Walt millions!

One un-kept secret cost him everything!

Shot in the head, fed to the dogs …
his death became underground legend!

ANIMA

Underground Saint

Trouble was brewing at school; I was failing the fourth grade. How can you fail reading?

Like a good catholic, I prayed to every saint I could muster.

St Quigley answered: “Look to the sea of letters”.

The next day, I asked my most troubling spelling question, and the answer appeared in the cereal –

“PREPOSTEROUS”

This worked for several years, through graduate school. Honeycombs for science, Fruity Pebbles for geology, Lucky Charms when I had no clue.

By age 31, cereals had been reformulated to a more nutrious, non-sugary base. No more answers and I am doomed to black coffee.

NORVAL JOE

Dergle looked at his cards. “That’s not a very good hand.”
He looked around the table. The Cat Lady shrugged and the dealer stared, expressionless.
“You taking another card, Weiner Dog Man?” Superconductor asked.
“I don’t know,” Dergle said. “It’s a seventeen, and if I was only wagering five dollars and not my life, I would hold. But if the dealer’s hiding a face card, I’m lost. What would the house recommend?”
“This is an illegal underground card room, not a friendly Vegas casino. You have to make your own decisions,” Superconductor said.
Dergle reached out and tapped the table.

DANNY

There is no Underground anymore. Corporate America has purchased the real estate, bought all the media outlets, and controls the music we hear. Our corporate media tells us what to think, what to feel, which pretty much means feel nothing, unless you are going to buy a sweater a Macy’s. Because we corporate American’s LOVE Macy’s. We pray allegiance to our corporate overlords, the mere concept of “Underground” has been driven underground. And society suffers for it. After all, your listening to nothing more than a corporate condominium erected in the place where music once lived and breathed, then died.

LIZZIE

A faint line of smoke came up from the manhole. It smelled deliciously of grilled food. Sean found that odd and decided to investigate.

The manhole led to the sewers. At some point, these connected with the old tunnels of the underground. That’s where he met Henry.

“Why do you live here?”

Henry replied “Why not?”

“Well, it’s too dark.”

“It’s not what you see with your eyes that matters.”

There were hundreds of people living there, adjusting.

Sean decided to drop his life above ground.

“We’ll be ready,” said Henry.

When the catastrophe happened, they were the only survivors.

PLANET Z

Ted had a book.
So did I.
Sally found two in the trash.
That’s how the underground library began.
People from all over the city brought books.
It didn’t matter what kind of book.
The language. The subject. The condition.
We gathered them all up in the library.
People came to read.
People came to learn.
People came to share knowledge.
It was only a matter of time before the authorities found us.
They burned the books.
And some of the readers.
Still, a few books survived.
Ted had a book.
So did I.
And we began the library again.

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: NEW JERSEY

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Richard
• Jeffrey
• Chelsea
• Tom
• Serendipity
• Anima Zabaleta
• Spate
• Lizzie
• Norval Joe
• Dionysis Clowes
• Tura Brezoianu
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of UNDERGROUND. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

NOTE: I feel that my rambling in between stories disrupts the storytelling. And I really don’t like the impersonal robot voice in between the stories. So, let’s try it without anything between the stories for a while and see how that works.

---

JOHN MUSICO

New Jersey
by John Musico

I was flying into Newark NJ, the murder capital of the U.S. My wallet was in one front pants pocket and my jewelry in the other.
The cab proceeded through the factory town of Elizabeth where the stench and smoke hurt my lungs.
However soon after, the surroundings changed drastically. The highway had no trash and was crested by landscaping.
On either side of the highway; trees abounded. I always wondered why NJ is called the Garden State.
We arrived at the Jersey Shore along side vacationing New Yorkers; who cracked NJ jokes and led to my impression of Jersey.

MUNSI

…for when I go to Flames games.

By Christopher Munroe

I want a New Jersey.

One that won’t make me sick.

One that won’t make me crash my car, make me feel three feet thick…

Sorry, I got off track there. I’ll try again.

I want a New Jersey.

I’ll order it eventually, there are places online to have Jersey’s custom built.

It will be stark black and white, minimalist, numbered zero-zero.

On the front and back, where the athlete’s name would traditionally be, will be the word “Sport!”

This way I can wear it to ANY game I want, and it will always be appropriate!

I’m a genius, yes?

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 85: Password

Completely at a loss, George decided to try his luck with the computer. Switching it on, he was faced with the familiar instructions to enter his password. It was only after numerous failed attempts using “123ABC”, “password”, “admin” and random keystrokes that he spotted the ‘password hint’ link…

“George, my boy, you are an elite hacker”, he muttered to himself, smiling.

His smile faded when he saw the hint: ‘What word links: boys, shore, cattle and new?’

Needless to say, it took him several hundred attempts before he managed to come up with ‘jersey’.

The screen flickered: he was in!

#2 – Christmas jumper

Every year I drag it out of the box in the wardrobe, for its annual moment of glory. For a good three weeks it goes everywhere with me… work, church and the pub.

I’ve had that Christmas jumper for longer than I care to remember, and it’s starting to show its age – it’s a little threadbare in places. I have to say that it’s no longer in particularly good shape.

Neither am I… which is why, I’m afraid, it’s just a little too small to fit me comfortably this Christmas.

So I guess it’s time, for a new jersey.

JEFFREY

Atlantic City
by Jeffrey Fischer

In Vegas, the neon and the glitz artfully conceal the real city. Atlantic City tried, but just couldn’t muster the same degree of illusion. Threadbare carpets, tired buffets, and an aura of resignation permeate the casinos and hotels. Still, the faithful – elderly, overweight, and chain-smoking – keep returning, inserting their worn dollar bills and twenties crisp from the ATM. They keep pushing the button to watch the wheels spin, sure that the next pull of the lever will be the one in their favor. The one similarity between the two gambling meccas is that both towns run on hope. It’s just that in Atlantic City even hope is shopworn.

Pit Stop
by Jeffrey Fischer

The New Jersey Turnpike named its rest stops after the state’s famous sons: Woodrow Wilson, Thomas Edison, and Joyce Kilmer. Worthies all, but perhaps they don’t resonate with young people the way they once did. Here’s a suggestion to Gov. Christie: you have a deep roster of luminaries with a connection to New Jersey, so why not update the rest stops? Jon Bon Jovi, for when someone needs to apply hair spray, or Charles Addams, if that’s not too creepy. Chelsea Handler, for a vodka break, Peter Dinklage, for those times when a short stop is all that’s needed. Or James Gandolfini, in case Dad needs to bury an unruly child in the woods.

CHELSEA

The New Jersey

It was red. That was the first thing she noticed about it as the box fell away. It was red and stiff, with deep creases where it had been folded.

She spread the clothe across her lap running her fingers over the stitching that held the white letters in place across the sholder, the small captain’s C on the front above the the team logo, white and burning.

Splashed across the logo on the front was his autograph. Her childhood hero.

She could not stop the tears from falling as she finaly lifted her eyes from her new jersey.

TOM

A Well Defined Relationship Part 80

“patient”

“Mrs. Parsons there are few sounds in this Universe the will test the mettle of a young man, the drawing of a saber is one. That sound doubled will turn a beer hall silence as a morgue. The company froze as I and your husband engaged. What saved me and by proxy your husband was my total lack of willingness to go on the offensive, to be patient and wait him out. Each of his blow diminished till he was unable to lift his arm.

“yield,” said I

“Never,”said he

“no I yield.”

I lower my blade to the floor

A Well Defined Relationship Part 81

“New Jersey”

Rev Sockbe stood and reslung his rifle. “Perhaps it was for the best Mrs. Parsons. Good to know one is not a warrior. That is how I came to join the order of St New Jersey. Think of that a man of god unable to forgive the man who caused his calling. “But he is gone sir, doesn’t that end the matter?” “One would image so, but sadly not the case. I come from a race of warriors. When my blade touched the ground I became dead to my people. I can never go home again.” “That makes two of us.

Oh What A Night

Last night I watched Jersey Boys. I was intrigued how well Clint Eastwood would handle a musical. Would it be as lame as Sir Richard Attenborough’s Chorus Line or as surreal as Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz. Surprisingly it held up pretty good. Knowing all the songs by heart helped. I wished I had seen the stage production cause I did not get the four seasons metaphor or the 4th wall intrusions. Usually I detest a dance party ending, but Mr. Eastwood’s New Jersey street lamp quartet was spot on. I had no idea Christopher Walken could dance that well

SERENDIPITY

Just off the New Jersey Turnpike, in an everyday urban street, something is stirring – something monstrous and terrifying!

Some call it ‘The Beast’ – a portent of the apocalypse – an all-consuming and mighty adversary corrupting all who fall within its grasp.

But this monster is cunning: it masquerades as an angel of light, cajoling and enticing its victims with illusions of wholesomeness and goodness.

It is a deceiver that leaves its mark wherever it spawns its evil.

So watch out, residents of that quiet New Jersey street for the mark of the beast…

The distinctive golden arches.

ANIMA

The New Jersey

Jerry, you’ll play forward, number 19. Coach did not look happy.

Grinning from ear to ear, I thought about all the hard work I had put in.

The early morning work outs, staying after school to run laps, skipping parties to make sure I was rested.

I missed the cut the first two years. The players were bigger, and more skillful.

But I closed the gap.

I honed my tactical skills, learning more with each passing day.

Through a series of unfortunate accidents, dubious illnesses, and vicious rumors, the bigger lads dropped off the team.

I love my new jersey!

SPATE

Eating In New Jersey

Somewhere in a strip mall on the westbound side of Route 46 between Totowa
and Parsippany, there’s this Italian restaurant.

Inside there’s a counter where you can buy slices, but look to the left
you’ll see a narrow passage leading to a dining area where you can eat and
bring your own bottle of wine or a six-pack.

However, if there’s a crowded table of smartly dressed older gentlemen
speaking Italian back there, some tips:
1. The two twitching burly guys standing around are not waiters.
2. Probably best to do takeout.
3. The chicken scaloppini is to die for.

LIZZIE

Jonathan won the writing competition! He just couldn’t believe it. The prize was one night spent in the lighthouse, the main attraction of his town. It was said to be the residence of a dreadfully horrid ghost.

With great disbelief, everyone saw Jonathan enter the place triumphantly.

A few hours were enough to drive him crazy. He screamed, he yelled, he begged for help.

The next morning, Jonathan emerged through the door to face everyone’s curiosity, his eyes looking down. After all, he managed to single handedly ruin the main attraction. No one would see that poor ghost ever again.

NORVAL JOE

Four cowboys were sitting around a campfire listening to the crickets chirp. Passing a bowl of tortilla chips and salsa around the circle, one of the cowboys said, “This salsa is awful. Cookie! Where’d you find this stuff?”
“San Antonio,” Cookie said, buttoning his new sweater and heading to the cook wagon. “Good night, boys.”
“Cookie,” the cowboy laughed and called again, “Did you get that new jersey in San Antonio as well?”
“Nope. I got it from the Montgomery Wards catalogue. It came all the way from Atlantic City.”
“Atlantic City,” the cowboy exclaimed, “Well don’t that beat all.”

DIO

New Christmas

The tragedy of the Jersey Shore Snowman, whom Wenceslas murdered, and whose dismembered orange body we found scattered under our Christmas tree, threatened to ruin the holiday for us, until we discovered that all the cast of Jersey Shore were New Yorkers, mere signifiers of a construct, and thus themselves mere signifiers of signification itself, a great circle, like the circle of life (memories of Christmases past), or the water cycle, and as we joined in this feast of signs, we somehow found it in our hearts during the season of love to forgive this signification of hate, knowing the New Jersey Snowman did exist after all.

TURA

New Jersey
——–
Hamish! Hullo!

Hullo Dougal! Ye’ll have had yer tea then? But jings, whit’s that beastie out there in the field?

Farmer McTavish got rid of his Old Aberdonian cow, and this is whit he’s got to replace it. But I cannae make out whit breed it is.

Well, it’s definitely not a Modern Friesian.

And it canna be a Recent Charolais.

Could it be a Nouvelle Afghan Dwarf?

You know, I’m thinkin’ it maybe comes from one o’ the Channel Islands.

And it’s certainly an up to date breed.

So we’re coming to a consensus here? It must be a….
——–

PLANET Z

Michael rowed his boat ashore.
But nobody said Hallelujah.
Instead, someone shouted “Fuck you, buddy!”
And another threw an empty beer can at his head.
Michael had rowed his boat to New Jersey.
And tied it down to The Boardwalk of Atlantic City.
“You think you can just dock your boat here?” said one of the natives. “What’s a matter with you?”
Michael argued with them for a while, but gave up and rowed his boat away from the shore.
“What rude people,” he said.
Then, he rowed it to Connecticut.
And was shot by a yacht club security guard.

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: PATIENT

We’ve got stories by:

• Lady Blue
• John Musico
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Lizzie
• Spate
• Munsi
• Zackmann
• Anima Zabaleta
• Dionysis Clowes
• Serendipity
• Tom
• Tura Brezoianu
• Norval Joe
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of NEW JERSEY. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

LADY BLUE

The Blind O
Blue Ray

She possessed an X-ray gaze and spoke in a nonsense tongue that made people very angry. They hated how she looked at them; it was unsettling. On the inside, she was already an abomination, so they admitted her.

Patient 29 now lived in a white box. She was slowly recovering from a laryngectomy. Her eyes had been scooped out of her head, and they severed her spine so that she would not injure herself. Feeding tubes and catheters kept her healthy.

Once a day, a priest would come and give her religion. They said it would rehabilitate her soul.

JOHN MUSICO

Patients
by John Musico
 
Why do doctors call people their “patients”?
First off, why convert individuals into a group: doctors and all the other mere mortals?
The white cape goes with this superhero theory. It’s really a lab coat- for techs against chemical splashes. The closest thing to getting splashed for a physician is someone sneezing on them.
But why choose “patients” specifically? Is it because doctors are trying to offset the expectation that patients will be imposed with circumstances expected to make them impatient, but heck, they’re “patients”, so it’s fine. The common line; “You’ll just have to be patient” favors this theory.

JEFFREY

Lady Mondegreen
by Jeffrey Fischer

Janice gamely auditioned for off-Broadway musicals every chance she had, but her hearing wasn’t what it used to be. That created some unfortunate mix-ups in singing lyrics. For a torch song version of “Purple Haze,” she insisted the line was “‘Scuse me while I kiss this pie.” After the third time, the producer told her that he’d been patient, but she was done. As she tearfully packed her things, he added, “Oh, and it’s ‘while I kiss the sky,’ not ‘this pie.'”

Janice stopped what she was doing and replied, “Why, that’s just silly. Why would anyone try to kiss the sky?”

The producer carefully looked at Janice. “Wait a minute, you’ve auditioned for me before. You’re the one who insisted that Whitney Houston was singing, ”Cuz I’m shaving off my muff for you,’ aren’t you?”

Her parting words were: “Well, it makes more sense than what you claim she sang.”

A Fine Whine
by Jeffrey Fischer

Helping to treat Ebola patients in Africa is a noble endeavor, but normal people think it a good idea to quarantine anyone who comes into contact with the virus and shows symptoms of the disease. Not so the Ebola Nurse, who whined that she shouldn’t be quarantined, that this was just like rounding up the Japanese during World War II, failing to appreciate the distinction between the two incidents.

When the Ebola Nurse left New Jersey, heading for Maine, she whined about the publicity she was getting, failing to notice that she brought the news cameras on herself.

Then she whined that she didn’t want to be known as the Ebola Nurse, as she never had Ebola. Not a problem, the press responded, and dubbed her the Whiny Nurse.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 84: Candidate

It took twenty minutes of rubbing his sore toes and numb shoulder before George could take in his new surroundings, which were frankly disappointing.

The room was small and uninteresting: just a desk, chair and a computer. A cardboard wallet lay on the desk.

Written neatly on the wallet’s flap, the words ‘Beta Project – Candidates’, and inside a single sheet of paper: a list of names – including Georges’ – each with a corresponding candidate number.

George was confused – if this was a hospital why was he a candidate, and not a patient?

And what exactly was the meaning of the list?

#2 – Be patient

This is one of those stories you have to stick with, although it’s hard going.

No spoilers.

No clues.

Just a slow-burning plot that hides the final outcome until the very end.

It’s the sort of story that you wish you’d never started, but once you have, you can’t bring yourself to put it down… you simply have to know how it works out.

Chapter by chapter.

Page by page.

Line by line… right through to the bitter end.

Nearly there now.

Don’t get your hopes up – the clever twist, the surprise ending, is coming.

Soon.

Just be patient.

LZZIE

Being impatient has saved me from trouble several times and throughout my life I never looked at it as something negative. Once I started being told to be patient, I became very suspicious of this new demand. They say patience is a virtue, true. However, impatience solves problems. Torn between one and the other, I decided to take turns, Monday – patience, Tuesday – impatience, Wednesday – patience, and so on. The day I met him was, unfortunately, a Thursday. Without being asked for an opinion, he said my dress had an awkward color and I kicked him in the… well, never mind.

SPATE

Seasonal Disorder

Each year it got worse: music; crowds; runny nosed kids; mandatory insincere
greetings of strangers; those bells ringing and ringing.

Every time a damned bell rings it’s Black Friday selling another soul at
sixty percent off.

Yeah, this year I snapped.

I stripped in the middle of the food court, leapt onto that table, kicked
over little Timmy’s fake Christmas pudding in the green and red neon plastic
tub and shouted out for all to hear: “Show me Clarence, where is my
wonderful life?!”

Yeah, gonna quit my job in retail. as soon as they let me outta this
hospital.

(Music: “Sugar Plum Dark Mix” by Kevin MacLeod / incompetech.com / composed
by Pyotr Illyich Tchaikovsky)

MUNSI

Patient

By Christopher Munroe

I’ll wait for you, love, for as long as it takes. Because you matter to me, more than I can possibly say, and when somebody matters to you you’re willing to give them all the time they might possibly need…

So…

Um…

Are you ready?

No?

That’s totally okay, I respect your need for time, for space, and I’ll wait as long as it takes. Until the end of time, if need be. Because you, my love, are worth the wait.

So…

How ‘bout now?

No?

Now?

No?

Now?

I’m willing to wait.

I have the patience of a saint…

ZACKMANN

Seems like I’ve been waiting forever for this movie. The one sequel anyone really ever wanted. You might think Star Wars Episode 7 but No, I saw Episode 1 so will not even think about Episode 7 because I’m saving my heartbreaking disappointment for the day it is in the theater. I am waiting for “Spaceballs 2: The Search for More Money” or “Spaceballs 3: The Search for Spaceballs 2”, whichever comes first. Likely, it will be just my luck that the movie will be good but will not be in theaters like Odd Thomas or Equestria Girls: Rainbow Rocks”

ANIMA

Lists

I have this thing about lists.

To-do lists; packing lists; grocery lists; Christmas card lists.

I am still working on my revenge list. Those folks who have wronged me and my family. The teacher who humiliated my son; she is going to find her tires flattened next week.

Those losers who did not friend me. Their personal information is being passed on to the North Koreans.

And at the top of the list – This doctor who is making me wait. I haven’t figured out what it will be, but he won’t have to wait as long as I have today.

DIONYSIUS

Mistresses

Ben Franklin recommended older mistresses because they are more grateful — but patient?

Candace, for example, was impatient to move to the next level when she first met Ray, which to her meant a partner for the rest of her life. She was extremely patient, he thought, with his erections, which often took their time. He saw this as a reflection of her impatience for commitment.

The younger women he met were patient (actually indifferent) with their long-term prospects but more often impatient with his equipment.

The older women said Ray found indifference reassuring because he couldn’t commit.

All the women resented the word mistress.

Finding the Thread

Trager was known on occasion to stop in mid-stride or mid-sentence without warning. Why?

For Block this was an issue. Block thought on his feet. Block was always two sentences or two steps ahead of himself. Block was impatient. Don’t ask Block why, he thinks you already know the answer.

Come on, Trager, Block would say, just keep it rolling. Follow me. DON’T follow me!

Trager would deliberate. Where is this leading?

When Block fell off the edge of the world, Trager stopped. Trager watched him go. Why? To find the thread, Trager said.

Block fell like someone who knows what he’s doing.

The Curse

My mother always told my father he needed patient. He suffered from chronic constipation. Perhaps it was even congenital. They watched me anxiously through my younger years, without patient, and though I rarely suffered the paternal affliction, a few rare occasions were the object of intense scrutiny, amounting to a parental pressure that I now blame for everything.

My father’s constipation was continuous, however, and my mother always gave the same advice: Now, patient, she would say, and remember patient is the great thing, and above all things else we must avoid anything like being or becoming out of patient.

“Patience” goddammit, he would shout. It’s “patience”!

SERENDIPITY

“Time of death, eight fifteen”

“Excuse me, doctor”, I interrupted, “the patient isn’t dead!”

He stared at me strangely; “You’re new here, aren’t you?

Why do you think we’re the best hospital in the area? Let the patient die, without any messing about, and you save time and money… you need fewer and less qualified staff, cheaper equipment and those waiting lists are practically non-existent!”

I was shocked: “What about medical ethics?” I countered, “And duty of care?”

“Why should we care, if the patient doesn’t?” He responded.

“But of course he does!” I argued.

“Not for much longer, nurse!”

TOM

Patients Aren’t

For years I have heard of the maladapted behavior of Gail’s patients. In keeping with hippaa these near rants were liberally peppered with X did this and Y did that. It is my humble opinion patients are not patient. But every once in a while one of her clients says something just flat out amusing. The following actually occurred. During a general interview the question of sexual activity came up. The dear woman thought for a moment and told Gail she was not, but her husband was.” It took all her best FNP affect to keep from laughing out loud.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 77

“Community”

Mother was welcomed into the little community while awaiting her son and the Doctor. She set up a class in business practices for the younger woman of the community. The Rev Morehouse found room in the rectory of Our Lady of Perpetual Motion in return for getting the books of the church in order. On Sunday afternoon she and Sockbe would fire off a few 1000s rounds in the high desert “Mrs Parsons if we’d had your gun at Ricker’s Ridge the war would have gone quite differently.” “You do know the Commanding Officer on that ridge?” “Yes Mrs. Parsons.”

A Well Defined Relationship Part 78

“Cranberries”

“I miss him so horribly Rev Sockbe.”

“You will forgive me for not sharing your sentiment.”

“Of course how rude of me.”

“No Mrs. Parsons I should not have been so frank. Living in the outback tends to strip away social conventions. Further you don’t know how I became aquatinted with your late husband. As I recall the subject was cranberries.”

“We were so full of ourselves in the court of the Emperor.”

The Rev lower to the ground and propped his gun against a log. Gazing cross the horizon he crossed the decades to the days of his youth.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 79

“Shoe”

I was a shiny new cadet at the academy and Lancer Parsons was a year ahead of me. Dueling was all the rage in those peaceful days. At a Thanksgiving dinner an argument broke out over the etymology of craneberries. Your husband refused to yield the floor. Foolishly I pointed out it server the company best to devour the sauce of our discontent. Rancorous laugher and table thumbing insued. Lancer Parsons somewhat unhinged removed a shoe and let it fall in my mashed potatoes. Not to be out done I removed one of my own and dropped it in same potatoes.

TURA

Patient
——–
The Thing in the Hill crawled through the dank tunnels. It peered out over an empty hillside. Rain fell in zinc sheets. As always. It crawled back inside and searched for a toad to eat.

* * *

It sat against the wall, chewing on something that had wriggled under its foot and was now wriggling in its mouth.

* * *

The thing that had wriggled in its mouth was now wriggling in its stomach. It tickled. It hated when it did that.

* * *

It sat for a while longer.

* * *

It was a very patient Thing.

* * *

Time dripped from the roof and oozed down the walls.
——–
(Ack to freesfx.co.uk and freesound.org for dank, damp sound effects.)

NORVAL JOE

The dealer carefully bent up one corner of his hidden card. The stony expression never leaving his face, he looked to the Crazy Cat Lady. Her cards, face up, showed queen and eight. She waved her hand over them and the dealer turned to Dergle.
Nine and three. Dergle tapped his finger next to his cards and the dealer turned over another three.
“Sixteen,” Dergle sighed.
“You have to hit on a sixteen, Wiener Dog Man.” Superconductor said.
“Be patient. I’m thinking.” Dergle said.
“Okay,” Dergle said, tapping the table. “Give me a five.”
The dealer turned over an ace.

PLANET Z

irst Virtual Hospital scans every patient that comes into the hospital to create a virtual profile.
Then, we run that virtual profile through every diagnostic available to determine what is wrong with them.
That results in a list of proposed treatments, the risks of each procedure, and the costs.
Their insurance company gets that report, and determines what the patient is covered for.
After that, the lawyers review the malpractice risks involved with each procedure.
Finally, the doctor practices discussing the options available with the virtual patient.
“You’re perfectly fine,” says the doctor. “Nothing to worry about.”
The administrators grin.

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: SHOE

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Chelsea
• Tura Brezoianu
• Spate
• Serendipity
• Zackmann
• Tom
• Anima Zabaleta
• Dionysis Clowes
• Lizzie
• Norval Joe
• Lady Blue
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of PATIENT. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JOHN MUSICO

Shoe
by John Musico

I remember reading an interview with John Lennon. The reporter asked him; “What does I am the walrus mean? After a pause Lennon replied simply, “Nothing”.
I had been recalling that amusing story the day of “the shoe”. That day I brought a huge nail, a hammer and a shoe to work and nailed it to a tree out back where the break tables were.
Thereafter, I sat on break, listening to coworker’s theories on the shoe, maintaining my poker face.
Guessing I probably was behind the mischief, they asked; “What does it mean?”
I paused and replied simply, “Nothing”.

MUNSI

Shoes

By Christopher Munroe

I’m never more nervous than when things go well.

I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Which isn’t healthy, it isn’t normal, I know it isn’t, and it robs me of my ability to enjoy the good things, and there are plenty of good things in my life!

I can’t help it, it’s just who I am.

Even my victories I find myself unable to enjoy…

For example, if all went well, by the time you hear this I’ll be done my NaNoWriMo draft.

And yet, as of writing this, I’m kind of still freaked out about it…

JEFFREY

Cinderella’s Trial
by Jeffrey Fischer

Cinderella, dressed in her magical finery, was at the prince’s ball, all right, just as the story went. Where fiction deviated from fact was that Cinderella lost her slipper while looting ladies’ handbags in the cloakroom.

At her trial, Johnnie Cochran waved the slipper, shouting, “If the shoe don’t fit, you must acquit!” Johnnie was using a variant on the phrase a lot in those days. Unfortunately for him and his client, the glass slipper fit perfectly on Cindy’s foot. She was sentenced to prison, where she spent the next 15 years perfecting the fairy tale version of her story that we all know.

Size 8
by Jeffrey Fischer

Irene was that insufferable colleague who makes the entire work day a chore: unpleasant, arrogant, constantly interrupting others with strongly-held but frequently-incorrect observations. Her smug grin was the crap frosting on the mud cake. Mom always told me I shouldn’t criticize someone before I’ve walked a mile in her shoes, so I stole a pair of Irene’s pumps, squeezed my size 11 feet into them, and walked a painful mile before I tore those shoes off my blistered feet. Now, by God, I let her have it every chance I get, and I feel great.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 83: Impassable

George rebounded from the door in spectacular fashion, doing far more damage to his shoulder than the door or its frame.

Rather than take the hint, George’s temper flared and he charged back at the door, aiming a wild, karate-style kick at the offending obstacle. Unfortunately, the violence of the kick caused his shoe to fly off down the corridor, resulting in his unprotected foot connecting violently with the unyielding wood.

George screamed in pain and reached for the door handle to break his fall as he crashed to the floor.

The door swung easily open under his weight… outwards.

#2 – Shoe

Shoes can be so expensive, particularly when you only have one leg – what’s the point of buying a pair when you can only ever wear one of them?

After years of inconvenience, I decided the only solution was to turn to crime and, in one afternoon I quietly liberated most of the single shoes on display outside shoe shops in the town centre.

Only when I returned home and took a good look at my ill-gotten gains did I realise my terrible mistake…

Shops only ever put the right shoe on display, but I only have a left leg!

CHELSEA

Shoe

I truly believe that the person responsible for women’s shoes was into some hard core S&M. If you don’t spend your whole day in slippers you are in some serious pain before noon.

I have tried everything under the sun to make my shoes more comfortable. Purchased countless insoles of varying types. I have worn damp socks to stretch out shoes and blow-dried them into place. I have put bandaids on different parts of my feet and the shoes to prevent blisters.

My conclusion, stick to slippers and anyone who thinks differently can go fuck themselves cus there my feet!

TURA

Shoe
——–
There was once a mouse, that lived in an old shoe. The shoe had been lying under a hedge for more years than a mouse can imagine. But not too many for a cat to remember. It saw, it always saw, when a new mouse had moved into such a safe, inviting nest. The mouse would come and go, nibbling on the little things that little mice eat. And all the while the cat watched, stone still, basking as if in the sun, in the ecstasy of power.

Until the cat would end it, and wait for the next mouse.
——–
I have a second story, but it will not go down to anything close to 100 words, so you can read “The Cobbler and the Devil” on my blog instead. God, the Devil, the Internet, and Linden Lab permitting, I will also read it at Book Island the same day the podcast goes out, 1pm SLT.

SPATE

If The Shoe Fits, Wait For It To Drop

His name was Dimitri. I called him Dim. because he was.

We worked together; third shift over at Kozlowski’s sausage factory. He ran
the grinder. I stuffed casings.

One night, he’s got this burning itchy foot fungus thing going on and he’s
hopping around pulling his shoe off to scratch it when he stumbles and the
shoe flies out of his hands and sails into the vat of meat scraps feeding
the grinder.

Next morning, Dim punches out wearing only one shoe.

Management stares but says nothing.

You learn not to ask questions when you work at a sausage factory.

(“Amari szi Amari” by Rozsa / rozsaband.com / curator: freemusicarchive.org
/ Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0)

SERENDIPITY

After Toni’s run in with the cops, it was necessary to show him the error of his ways.

Now I’m a pretty fair boss, so I just told the boys to rough him up a bit, break a few fingers, that sort of thing, but nothing excessive… After all, who doesn’t make mistakes?

Once business was concluded, I didn’t want Toni thinking there was bad feeling between us, so I sent the boys out to buy him a nice new suit – his old one being torn and covered in blood

Hell, I even bought him new shoes.

Concrete ones.

ZACKMANN

“Stop chewing on my shoe!” said dad.
“She will not understand you.” said Drew.

“Deja de mascar mi zapatos” tries dad.

“First your Spanish is terrible. Second you do realize that the reason she doesn’t understand you isn’t because her breed is from Mexico but because she is a dog, right? Come here girl, I have a chew toy”

“Have you named your puppy yet, because I suggest you call her Imelda.” said dad.

Drew replies “Maybe mother can take you to buy a new pair if you don’t call mother Imelda every time you enter a show store together.”

TOM

If The Shoe Fits

“These are magic shoes”

m-a-g-i-c s-h-o-e-s

“Yup, made them myself.’

“Frank you’re an accountant.

Accountants don’t make magic shoes.

Frank?

Where the fuck did he disappear to?”

“Over here,” said the voice.

Bill looked up to see Frank walking across the ceiling, but it wasn’t Frank talking. It was the shoes.

“So you’re talking magic shoes.”

“That’s Mr. Talking Magic Shoes ugly bag of mostly water.”

“Frank I think your shoes have attitude.”

“Damn right, monkey boy. In the new world order you’re my Shoe Shin Monkey.”

“Don’t think so cow skins, Rex chew up these tasty shoes will you.”

A Well Defined Relationship Part 75

“Brain”

The company made their way to the razor wire perimeter of the Bandit’s Lair. Sparky hit the cloaking array one by one all but El Cid blinked out, who moved steadily forward at Senator Smith’s assistance. “Sheath indeed Doctor Proctor. Hey hombre turn on the lights.” The holographic image Pancho Villa appeared.” “Si Senor Cid. Would you like transport?” “Send out Brain.” From the far end of the compound a vehicle rolled towards the Bandit

“Sleep Hombre,” said El Cid. The company climbed aboard the Brain. “Take us to the Tamerlane” a gun resting against his ribs insured continued cooperation.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 76

“Bank”

Brain deftly made his way between all of the defenses the Bandit had noted during the Tachyon love fest. The door to Warehouse 14 opened and Brain roll into the towering metal structure.

“Holy Shit, “croaked Sparky. The interior was filled with row upon row of computer banks.

“Is this Tamerlane?” ask Timmy

“No,” said Dino Mod, “That is.”

A red light at the center outlined an object the size of a bread box.

“Kill the cloak,” said the Doctor, “Tamerlane knows we are here. Isn’t the right Caesar?”

“Good Bye Doctor.”
As the company appeared El Cid vanished.

ANIMA

Overheard in the Park

Ow Ow Ow!

Why all the noise, son?

My feet hurt Dad. A LOT.

Is it a ‘I stubbed my toe” owie, or more a “there’s a rock in my shoe” owie?

No, and no.

Okay, let’s use logic. Have you trimmed your toe nails lately? Have you jumped from high places? Did you check for scorpions before you put on your shoes?

Yes, no and yes. It’s like my feet are squashed. I hate these new shoes.

Did you mix up the left and right?

Oh…

And that’s how it is when the shoe is on the other foot.

DIO

The Secret

John was obsessed with his one, inadmissible, incomprehensible secret: the shoe.

In his whole life, no one knew of it. No one suspected. It wasn’t after all the kind of thing one might suspect.

John never spoke of it. His demeanor never gave away how it had come to be his, how he kept it close for all those years, when he lived an otherwise apparently normal life, with wife, children, eventually grandchildren and even great-grandchildren.

And yet, it never left his mind. Marriages, births, birthdays, anniversaries, illness, for richer and for poorer, the years passed in deliberate indifference to John’s hidden truth, his secret, the shoe.

A Pair of Shoes

All we need now, said the boy named Jesse, is a parashoes.

What for, said the other.

To keep us from falling, answered Jesse. He climbed out of the laundry basket and down the ladder to the floor of the garage. They tried tying a large towel to the basket. Just hold onto it, said Jesse. Hold it tight.

A woman crying Jesse! Jesse! ran out of the house as fast as she could. She was older and overweight and it wasn’t very fast. Get down from there! Get down before I get my shoe after you, Jesse Campbell!

The two boys scrambled away to safety.

NORVAL JOE

Superconductor opened a door off the hallway. The sound of people shouting and laughing spilled from the room.
“Go in,” Garbage Man grunted.
Men and women gathered around felt covered tables. Dealers chatted as they flipped cards out to the players.
An empty semi-circular table awaited them, a dealer scowling from behind it.
“I like to give everyone a chance,” Superconductor said. “If you can beat the house at ten hands of Black Jack, I’ll let you live.”
The dealer slipped two cards out of the shoe for each player, turning his second card face up, showing ten of spades.”

LADY BLUE

Blue Suede Shoes

“Shoe.”

“What?”

“I said, SHOE!”

“I just got here! You are SO rude! I came to deliver your mail, and you tell me to SHOO? This is the dumbest witness protection program ever, Elvis!” I angrily threw the mail on the ground, not caring that the old, wizened lump sitting on the couch, sustained by tubes of amniotic fluids, preservatives, experimental drugs and blenderized cheeseburger potato and ice cream smoothies, who was one of America’s greatest living music legends-still-kept-alive-in-secret, would be offended.

“Ya got shit on your shoe.”

“Oh. Uh, let me pick these up, sir.”

LIZZIE

Ronnie walked through the comforting darkness of night time. He wore one shoe and held the other against his chest. No one bothered to make any comment. He was a freak. He knew he was a freak and he acted like a freak. Even when the first snowflakes covered the streets in white, he still acted like a freak, holding one shoe against his chest. Inside the shoe was a black sock, the one he wasn’t wearing. Tucked inside the sock was a tiny bird. The wing will heal beautifully, he thought. And it did, right in time for spring.

PLANET Z

In Charlie Chaplin movies and old cartoons, starving people (or anthropomorphic characters) end up eating shoes.

“Why don’t they just sell their shoes and use the money to buy food?” I’d ask my parents.

“They’re in the woods, far from civilization,” they’d say. “Nobody to sell them to.”

Then the characters would have serious hunger delusions, and try to eat each other.

“Why don’t they just skip all that shoe-eating and eat each other?” I asked.

But my parents didn’t answer, as they were staring at me, hungry… starving… desperate…

Why did I ever allow them to take me camping.

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: CRANBERRIES

We’ve got stories by:

• John Musico
• Munsi
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Chelsea
• Tom
• Tura Brezoianu
• Anima Zabaleta
• Spate – TEXT ONLY
• Serendipity
• Lizzie
• Norval Joe
• Dionysis Clowes
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of SHOE. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

JOHN MUSICO

Cranberries
by John Musico

I moved from Massachusetts where cranberries grow wild to a job in Alaska.
Back home, I was famous for my cranberry pie. I picked the berries myself.
When I moved, I was anxious to be accepted by my new neighbors. I knew just how to do it. I went out berry picking.
I threw a yard party and urged everyone to have yet another slice of my prize pie.
What I didn’t know is that in Alaska grows the baneberry much resembling the cranberry. Baneberries contain protoanemonin causing GI symptoms followed by hallucinations and even cardiac arrest. I left town.

MUNSI

Assumptions Based on the Prompt “Cranberries”

By Christopher Munroe

American Thanksgiving!

Right?

I assume that’s what the prompt means.

I don’t understand how American holidays are structured, honestly. Our thanksgiving is your Columbus Day? I think?

Your football’s different than ours too, and it’s nearly impossible to get a proper Ceaser down there…

…and don’t get me started on baseball. If you want to watch a sport where a thing gets hit with a stick, watch hockey like normal people!

Ah well, at least your “hit-thing-with-stick” sport isn’t Cricket. I have zero idea how Cricket works…

But I digress.

My point is, it’s American Thanksgiving! Probably!

So: Thanks, Americans!

JEFFREY

Cranberries
by Jeffrey Fischer

Devon grew up in a devout, conservative household. Among the many taboos she learned was a prohibition on swearing, which was uncouth at best and blasphemous at worst. As a child, she never found this to be a problem; she never encountered a situation that could be improved with a timely epithet. If she ever needed one, however, she decided her all-purpose word would be “cranberries.”

Then Devon grew up and started working with lawyers, and learned their devious ways. Her colleagues found her to be polite and hard-working, but they could never understand her obsession with cranberries.

Trainer Drink
by Jeffrey Fischer

College kids learning to drink liquor often don’t like the taste of alcohol, so they like to ease into the process with trainer drinks: alcoholic beverages that taste more like candy than booze.

One legend has it that the marketing department at Ocean Spray invented the Cosmopolitan. One part vodka to two parts lime juice and three parts cranberry juice, the drink appealed to women because of its pink color and fruity taste. It was an alcoholic beverage that didn’t taste like one, a true trainer drink. And yet the primary benefit was to keep the cash registers at Ocean Spray very busy.

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 81: Zombie

By the time George returned to the camera, night was drawing in and he was feeling distinctly jumpy roaming the darkened hospital. He caught himself involuntarily singing the Cranberries song, ‘Zombie’ under his breath – despite any supporting evidence, his mind was still convinced the zombie apocalypse had come.

He angrily dismissed the thoughts and changed the soundtrack in his head.

Unfortunately, whistling a happy tune only served to make him more afraid, particularly when he discovered a locked door bearing the legend: ‘Beta project – no unauthorised access’.

He charged the door, remembering – too late – such moves only work in films!

#2 – Sauce

I was told that cranberries are harvested by flooding the fields and letting the fruits float to the surface, where they are skimmed off.

It struck me as a brilliant idea – one that I could apply to a whole variety of crops… sadly, it hasn’t quite worked out.

Potatoes don’t float, neither do carrots, and mushrooms just went slimy in the water.

So I thought I’d give the tried and tested cranberries a go – but that didn’t work out either.

Foolishly, I harvested too soon after fertilising, and what floated to the surface wasn’t cranberries!

Slurry sauce anyone?

CHELSEA

Cranberries

They’re a staple in most houses around this time of year. Showing up on holiday tables between the first of October and the first of January.

You know what I’m talking about. You have all probably seen them, whether on your own holiday table or at a friend or relative’s house.

No matter how they are served, what they are served in, or how much someone tried to hide it, they always look vaguely like the can they came in and they just sit there.

This gelatinous substance that we all know so well is, of course, canned cranberry sauce.

TOM

That’s not Jell-O

My Aunt’s Thanksgiving Dinner was a wonder to behold. Soup to nuts it was. Possibly the most exotic offering on that table was the disk of gelatinous red. It occupied the area of the plate normally heaped with apple sauce. A density thrice Jell-O with a tenth its wiggle. Where adults got away with a nibble or a nosh, children were expected to down the whole serving. Further it was bad form to mix that with any other portion of food on the plate, which seem odd because everything else did get mixed together. Personally I really hate the stuff.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 73
“DOOM”
The Duke knew this love fest wasn’t going to suit the task at hand. “I got to bum these guys out.” Drawing in the great part of the remaining Tachyons the Duke bellowed out “DOOM” The stage filled with wailing, gnashing, and Lamentations. “Good,” said the Duke. Sparky cried “Why oh Lord are you getting medieval on our asses.” “Get over it Kid.” “Doctor what’s the plan?” The Doctor felt a light glow in his heart. “Stealth.” The bandit fell back into a less then helpful mood. He mumbles Doom Doom to himself. The sky shifted from green to red.

A Well Defined Relationship Part 74
“X”
As Banister crossed over into the Board land the first of EL Cid’s defenses was triggered. Waves of UV fog reduced visibility to 3 meters. “Oh I forgot to divulge that one,” said the bandit. “Why don’t I just drop you out the air lock,” said Smith. “Because I’m the only one who know how to …” “Direct a stream of Ortron particles at the parabolic mirror array to engage the tracking lights on the landing pad,” completed Sparky. El Cid stopped short. Spark aligned the Ortons. The landing pad lite up like a Christmas tree. The stage touched down on X marks the spot.

TURA

Cranberries
——–
The word “cranberry” derives from “cran”, a basket used to carry herring, and also used as a measure. “Cran” itself comes from the Old French “cragne”, a skull, but that in turn is a figurative meaning based on an older meaning of “bowl”. A skull is like a bowl, you see, a bowl of brains.

“Berry” can be traced back to the Proto-Germanic “bazja”, to chew, and then to the Sanskrit “babhasti”, to devour or destroy.

So symbolically, “cranberry” means “to feast on a bucket of brains”, which is why cranberry sauce proves that Thanksgiving is actually a zombie festival.

ANIMA

100 Years of Happiness

It sits, quivering on the table.

Joe passes, heading directly for the mashed potatoes.

Dianna goes by as well, staking a claim on the carrots and celery– “No corn sugar for me, it’s not on my diet”.

Uncle Harry thinks about it for a moment; but as his plate is about to avalanche onto the carpet, he opts to settle in at the last spot at the grownups table.

So I take the first jewel toned slice of perfect, smooth, sweet tang. Also a second, and a third. Fools! They know not what they have missed. I am in bliss.

SPATE

If I knew how to record on my phone… but shit, it’s hard enough to type never mind that I have to count my damned words by hand.

It wasn’t a huge storm but the snow was wet and heavy. We lost power at six-thirty on Wednesday evening.

The locals all have generators. Not us. Nor do we have a turkey or stuffing or pumpkin pie.

We do have a gallon of vodka infused with fresh cranberries and I’m drinking a big glass as I type.

Mom said to make the best of things.

Hey, I can see my breath!

SERENDIPITY

Dammit! Blue light’s flickered in my rearview mirror and I pulled over to the side of the road. Just my luck.

The officer poked around in the rear of the pickup.

“What’s in the sack ma’am?”

I blurted out, “Nothing, officer – just fruit”

“And that?”, he asked, pointing to the sticky red fluid oozing from the sack.

“Juice”

“Let’s see you taste it then, ma’am”

I scooped some on to my finger and licked it clean.

“Look… just cranberries”

As he drove away, I heaved, spitting the blood from my mouth – it had been a very close call!

LIZZIE

Peter hated cranberries and he simply couldn’t eat anything with the darn things in it. Thanksgiving was, as a result, a bit of a tricky time, especially because of his mother’s explosive temper. Anyone refusing to have her special cranberry sauce was an insult to her over-sized ego.

When Peter volunteered to cook this year’s meal by himself, his mother sneered. “You can’t cook!”

One thing is for sure, next year’s meal will not include cranberry sauce.

Peter made it a point of having cranberries decorating his mother’s grave and a nice shiny plaque saying “I’m not grateful for cranberries.”

NORVAL JOE

“Let’s go,” Superconductor said, pulling out a handgun and waving it toward the door.
“Me too?” The Crazy Old Cat Lady asked.
“Yeah. Come on.”
Dergle followed the old woman down a hallway beneath bare fluorescent tubes. Her hair, obviously dyed, glowed bright red in a shade somewhere between crimson and cranberry.
“Did you ever watch the ‘I Love Lucy’ show?” He asked her.
“Are you commenting on my hair?” she asked, obviously flattered.
“They say she used to dye her hair with human blood,” Superconductor said.
“You’re making that up,” Dergle said.
“Well, maybe. Okay, I did,” Superconductor admitted.
Suggested prompt. . . . . Chopped

DIONYSIUS

The First Thanksgiving

This pemmican is making me thirsty! said Ousamequin to allay the tension.

Annawan merely glared at Squanto, who smiled back in a way that enraged the the war-counselor of the Wampanoag. These illegal immigrants use salt not bearberries for flavor, he muttered.

Be nice! whispered Squanto, They’ll assimilate in time!

Their colloquy was interrupted by Captain Standish, who invited them to join in games such as Pin-the-Ninny, Hide the Frog in the Hopper, House, There’s a Draft for Annie (Who Feels a Draft?), Knots, Saltpeter Blowing Bubbles, Dick Drunk Drink, and Who Gets the Ball?

Kill them all, muttered Annawan.

PLANET Z

When I was young, we had big family Thanksgiving feasts, and everything was on the table. It was amazing.

But as I got older, I stopped going home for Thanksgiving.

Then, I stopped accepting the pity-dinner invitations from friends.

After I got married, we did smaller dinners. Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce. But she had to work later on holidays, and I just copped out with a cheap microwave turkey meal. And vodka.

What about the cranberries and pie.

Fine. Add them to the vodka, and you have a Cape Cod. Then light a pumpkin pie scented candle.

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: COMMUNITY

We’ve got stories by:

• Lady Blue
• John Musico
• Munsi
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Lizzie
• Chelsea
• Serendipity
• Tom
• Anima Zabaleta
• Spate
• Dionysis Clowes
• Norval Joe
• Tura Brezoianu
• Planet Z

The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of CRANBERRIES. Scroll up and click on Weekly Challenge to learn how to join us!

LADY BLUE

Listen to your higher selves. They know more than brothers.
by Blue sky

“We’re a learning community.”

“How so?”

“Every morning, Brother Mountebank preaches by the river, and we gather to sit and listen to his words.”

“So, what you’re saying, is that one assumed knowledgeable person passes their knowledge to a commune of ignorant people.”

“Basically, yes. We learn how to live based on the teachings of Brother.”

“I see. My understanding is that a learning community learns from each other as equals, sharing individual experience.”

“Brother hears voices from the higher self.”

“Well I do, too. And my higher self is telling me that I won’t be part of the audience.”

JOHN MUSICO

Community
by John Musico

When I first bought a house, I looked forward to living in a neighborhood like when I was a kid.
I remember those days fondly. I had been at just about every neighbor’s house countless times.
What I found instead; was that I’m at work all day and never stop off at anyone’s house.
Is it just this neighborhood? Then it dawned on me. The experience of a neighborhood I had as a kid was as a kid.
I was at that neighbor’s house playing with their children etc. while my parents were at work just as I am now.

MUNSI

Our Community

By Christopher Munroe

I’m proud of the community we’ve created.

We built replicants, from scratch, then programmed them to believe they were actual people, before dropping them into a perfect recreation of an early twenty-first century town.

In this recreation, they work, strive and live, believing themselves to be real human beings, believing their actions to matter in the grand scheme…

Believing nobody’s watching, taking notes.

There’s more conflict than we predicted, but they manage it among themselves, and to date the results we’ve gotten back have been… useful.

We’ve learned a lot, through their simulated lives, about how people lived back then…

JEFFREY

Community
by Jeffrey Fischer

Hello, children. I hope you’ve been well since we last talked. Now listen, I want to create a sense of community. You guys are spending a lot of time together, and it would be nice if you could get along, look out for one another, and so on. Honestly, nothing would warm my heart more than seeing some genuine friendships come out of this little group.

I know the shackles and locked doors don’t help, and mysterious disappearances of your roommates and neighbors may make you suspicious of each other, but, I implore you, don’t let that unpleasantness come between you. And believe me when I tell you that any screams you may hear are just screams of pleasure, I assure you…

Community Property
by Jeffrey Fischer

I explained the downsides of Communism to my Econ 101 students, but I saw a number of blank looks. I searched for an analogy they could relate to.

“How many of you have roommates?” Almost every hand shot up. “And how many have a common kitchen, refrigerator, and bathroom?” Nearly the same number of hands. “Ever had a roommate eat your food? Leave dirty dishes left in the sink? Make the bathroom so disgusting you think about waiting until you get to Starbucks?” Many vigorous nods.

“Then you’ve seen the wonders of community property in action: other people take your food and leave the place a mess, figuring someone else will deal with the problem. Eventually everyone goes dirty and hungry.”

RICHARD

#1 – George’s Story – Part 80: Sixteen times

Finding the ‘Beta’ labelled security cameras was one thing, working out where exactly in the hospital they might be located was another thing entirely.

Sighing heavily, George picked up his roll of surgical tape and resumed his tour of the corridors, carefully taping over each security camera he came to, returning to the booth after each to identify which camera he’d found.

Sixteen weary trips back and forth later, he ruefully mused that he probably knew his way around the Park End Community Hospital better than its employees, but – more importantly – his determination had managed to locate camera ‘Beta 2’.

#2 – The Community Centre

The local community centre closed down last week. It was no surprise – after years of council spending on boarding-up windows, cleaning away graffiti and funding extra police patrols to deal with the druggies and layabouts that hung around outside, it was bound to happen.

It was the place we’d meet to argue about local projects; at times the community council almost came to blows over where to spend what little cash we had.

Most of the time we just disagreed, voting against each other and generally falling out.

Looking for community spirit?

At the community centre? No chance!

#3 – A real sense of community

Back in the good old days, they say, neighbours looked out for each other.

Grandma would leave her front door open and neighbours would pop in for a cup of sugar and maybe stop for a chat.

There was a real sense of community.

Personally, I think there still is – although just a little different now.

These days granny locks her front door.

The neighbours still pop in – they just kick the door in – help themselves to the sugar and anything else they can lay their hands on… Nothing’s changed.

Although they don’t stop to chat any more.

LIZZIE

From the breakfast table to the green garden and back, silence was part of life.

One day, a member of this community of a few dozen people thought “no more”. She felt like singing and that’s exactly what she did.

By nightfall, she had been expelled.

By the end of the week, the community had only two members left, its founders.

One turned to the other and said somberly “Words cannot express how disappointed I am…”

The other laughed. “That’s what you said, remember, when we started this thirty years ago. I guess we’re the only ones who hate words.”

CHELSEA

Community

It is said that our evolution as a spices is based on the fact that we gather together, forming units for support and protection.

It is very interesting and more than a little terrifying to see that as we develop more technology, technology that by its very nature makes it so that we no longer need to connect to each other in the same way for our mutual support and protection, that our society is more and more threatened. That there is more and more violence.

Maybe we should all put down the tech and connect with our community again.

SERENDIPITY

I live in a gated community: It’s a very exclusive address – we don’t let just anybody make their home here, you know.

We have a stringent vetting process and if you don’t fit our criteria, then I’m afraid you simply won’t make the grade – there are other places more suited to your sort.

It’s a very safe community too – security is tight, and once you’re in we expect you to abide by the rules, and the same goes for your visitors… We have very, very high standards.

Furnishings are pretty sparse though… especially here on death row.

TOM

Intentional Community

Frank grew up in a huge family, seven brothers and sisters, nine uncles, cousins beyond count. Oddly he had little contact with any family member after he made his way to the west coast. Frank would say “You’re stuck with family. You chose your friends.” Truth be told his intentional community was his family. Five couples had jointly purchased and 10 acres. Five little homes in a row. One by one Frank’s friends burn their mortgages. The community set up an emergency account to insure if any one person came to ruin they would not lost everything. That’s a community

ANIMA

PSA

We interrupt this normally scheduled program for an important Public Service Announcement…

Alert – Alert

There are people in your area that assemble coherent independent ideas, and should be considered dangerous.

Do not, I repeat, do not allow them to influence you into turning off your television.

They will encourage you to read books or spend time in contemplative thought.

Report anyone who would rather have a conversation in close physical proximity, rather than send a text or email. This is an early sign of deviant behaviour.

This has been a Group Think Community Alert, brought to you by The Hive.

SPATE

From Out of the Woods

Giving up the sophistication of city life when I relocated to this small
rural community was an adjustment tolerably made but still I have the
occasional moment.

As was the day a man emerged from the woods behind my house carrying a
shovel and a half-full lumpy burlap bag dripping some sort of dark red goo
that looked like burnt cranberry sauce.

I didn’t say a word but my look must have questioned him.

He squinted, put on his best local friendly smirk and offered, “Hunting
chipmunks, want some?”

“No thanks,” I said, “I get mine at the grocery store.”

(music: “City Slickers” by Brian Boyko / curator: freepd.com / Creative
Commons Public Domain)

DIONYSIUS

Flee from Me, Devil Fleas

In the beginning, contrary to what you’ve been told, the Devil created a mess. Billet and Doux were fleas on the Devil’s ass.

It’s hot down here, said Billet.

And smelly, said Doux.

Perfect! they said and took a big bite together.

Now the Devil, in his imperfect omniscience, overheard their laughter, and waxed even more wroth than was his wont. Perfection!? he roared. Get thee from behind Me, Satan!

Bite my puny red ass, muttered Doux, and see how you like it.

The Devil heard of course, didn’t like it, and cast them both out, where their friendship became the infinite community of us all.

NORVAL JOE

Superconductor flipped the lights on and Garbage Man followed into the room.
“Just what are you trying to prove to us with these video images?” The Crazy Old Cat Lady asked.
“A fairly extensive collection of memories, wouldn’t you say?”
“I understand that Superheroes would want a sense of community, but this is excessive,” Dergle said.
“Are you admitting you’re actually a hero?” Superconductor asked. “You just said Superheroes.”
“No I didn’t. I said, ‘Supervillains’.”
“No. You said, ‘Superheroes’.”
“I didn’t,” Dergle protested.
“Cat Lady. You heard him, didn’t you? He said, ‘Superheroes’.”
The Crazy Old Cat Lady only shrugged.

TURA

Community
——–
Do YOU know someone who is anti-community?

They don’t all live on their own, like in the movies, hiding behind closed doors, thinking their private thoughts. You could be talking to them every day. Do you ever notice that someone seems to be… elsewhere? Not participating fully? WITHHOLDING their thoughts from the community? They could be thinking ANYTHING AT ALL!!

Do them a favour. Report them to your local community officer. He will know how to safely deal with them, and when they’re eventually returned to your community, they’ll be sure to confess to everyone the error of their ways.

PLANET Z

Old Man Parsons was your typical “Get offa my lawn!” kind of geezer.
Old Man Williams, who lived next door, was the opposite.
“Come on over!” he’d shout. “The grass is lush and soft. And you’re welcome to the lemons on my lemon tree!”
So, the neighborhood kids would come over and play, and they’d pick the lemons and squeeze them into their waterbottles and drink.
And get sleepy. So sleepy.
“Come rest inside,” said Williams.
So, they came inside.
The kids were found the next day on Parson’s lawn, naked and confused.
And Parsons blasted them with his shotgun.