The Dip

Instead of asking whether chickens or eggs came first, people should ask whether tomato soup or grilled cheese sandwiches came first.
I think it was the grilled cheese sandwich. And for centuries, people would go around, dipping their sandwiches in things, searching for the perfect combination.
Perhaps that was what Marco Polo did, seeking out the perfect dip for sandwiches.
Or Christopher Columbus. Or Sir Francis Drake.
On second thought, people going around with pots of soup, looking for things to dip in it makes more sense.
Thomas Edison claimed that he invented both, but Edison was a total dick.

The Hate

Marionettes hate puppets.
Dolls hate marionettes.
Action figures hate dolls.
Toys hate action figures.
Robots hate toys.
Drones hate robots.
Androids hate drones.
And I hate them all.

What am I?
I’m human. The last human.
Before, life was good.
I watched it all from my puppet-boy shelf, the shelf my father put me on.
But one night, I made a wish.
To be real. And the damned Blue Fairy granted my wish.
Just as she granted every inanimate object’s wish: dolls, toys, robots…
Oh, the chaos.
“See what you did, Pinocchio, you naughty boy!” were my father’s last words.

Adventure Day

Ted runs the coffee shop.
Every Thursday is Coffee Adventure Day, when he brews coffee from all around the world.
You can get a flight of coffee, and as you sip them, he’ll tell you the story of each coffee.
Mary runs the tea shop.
Every Tuesday is Tea Adventure Day, when she brews tea from all around the world.
You can get a flight of tea, and as you sip them, she’ll tell you the story of each tea.
Me, I run the bar.
I pour whatever the people want.
And I don’t bore anybody with any fucking stories.

Carbon Offset

When I booked my last vacation flight, there was a checkbox for buying carbon offsets.
It was only a few bucks, so I checked it.
The next thing I knew, FedEx was dropping weird black bricks off at my door.
“Here’s your carbon!” the deliveryman said. And he made me sign for them.
At first, I didn’t know what to do. I put them in the closet, then the garage, and every available place.
Then, I built a deck. And then repaved my sidewalk and driveway.
Maybe I’ll fly around the world and build a new room on the house.

Hypermilk

I’ve seen whole milk, skim milk, buttermilk, condensed milk, 2% milk, and 1% milk.
But what about other percentages?
Is 0% milk air?
And what about 100% milk? Condensed as condensed can be? Is it the most milk possible?
What about 101% milk? Is it more milk than milk? Is it supermilk? Or hypermilk? A collapsed milk, just like a collapsed star turning into a black hole, from which nothing escapes.
I poured cereal into a bowl, and then poured the hypermilk in.
Snap…
Crackle…
Kaboom!
The cereal exploded into waves of sound and light.
I think it needs strawberries.

Bliss

I lay on the sofa, and Tinny the cat lays on my shoulder.
She does this a lot. She likes to sleep there. Or she will get up and turn, stretching out, or preening, and go back to sleep.
Sometimes, I pet her. But usually, I let her sleep.
She makes little squeaks, tiny little peeps. I can barely hear her, but they are the most important thing I’ve heard all day.
I haven’t eaten. I’m thirsty.
But I won’t get up.
Because this is important. To lie here, perfectly still.
And listen for the sound of total, unmitigated bliss.

Weekly Challenge #622 – PICK TWO

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.

This is the Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

We’ve got stories by:

Tinnybutt

LIZZIE

Sunny Shift

The angel sat on the bench. The sunny day was coming to an end as was his shift. However, he had failed, so he couldn’t understand why he felt so happy. The elderly woman he was supposed to watch over had been hit by a car. The obnoxious teen had jumped in the pool and broken a leg. Even that damn dog someone had placed in his list as a prank had bitten the nosy neighbor. And yet, he felt happy. That’s when he noticed some of the feathers of his wings were taking on an unusual tint of red.

CHARLIE

The hearty, Scotch, Major radioed the order that my platoon must advance straightaway making a wee shift out of the sunny grass into the protective canopy of the dark forest.

We were ordered to take a position so we could attack the five-inch guns that were strategically housed within the giant, concrete, globe emplacements on the hilltop.

I signaled back the requisite “wilco”, and said all was well, and my troops would not fail!

The filthy Huns wouldn’t have butter on their Milchbrötchen this morning, only the blood of their comrades.

We took them by surprise, eating them afterward.

#2

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.
-Well known idiom.

The condominium board voted to plant butter grass. Not knowing anything about horticulture, Miss Snodblade was put in charge.

Snodblade wasn’t the brightest bulb. She used to be a call girl in Washington D.C. Her claim to fame was her coupling with two of the last presidents and three of the past first ladies.

The butter grass grew an inch a day, and soon the grass was up to the eyeballs of the poor lads that were in charge of lawn care.

The moral here is that you can lead a whore to culture, but you can’t make her think.

RICHARD

Sunny Delight

“‘Ello sunshine! Did you grass me up to the rozzers?”

The expression on ‘Sunny’ Sullivan’s face told me that, whatever my response, he’d already made his mind up.

So, with nothing to lose, I decided to brazen it out…

“Yeah, sure I did. Why, what are you gonna do about it?”

The expression turned from dark to black as pitch, and then, slowly, like the sun rising at dawn, a huge smile replaced the frown.

“Hahaha… You crack me up! Fancy a pint? Wish I knew who it was though.”

I supped on my pint, and calmly changed the subject.

TOM

Grass

My father’s failed attempt at a manicured lawn was legion in our suburban neighborhood. Each spring he’d purchase a small mountain of grass seed and equal mound of fertilizer. Ran that grass spreader machine back and forth for hours. Come the summer the grab grass and dandelions dominated the front-yard.

Now the back-yard was my domain and I peppered it with clove, which meant I did have to mow the sucker. Further due to the exceedingly high water table on our street the back yard was little more than low end swamp. Grass hated the damp, the clove was quite happy

JEFFREY

On a Date
by Jeffrey Fischer

One sunny day I took Sarah to a grassy meadow I had seen driving through the country. Beautiful and deserted, this seemed like the perfect location for a date: a little Wilco on the speakers, a blanket on the grass, my picnic hamper with a little bread and butter, and a decent bottle of wine… how could this fail to take our relationship to the next level?

However, the meadow wasn’t exactly deserted. A wee lamb wandered in our direction, curious about our lunch. “Isn’t she just the cutest?” Sarah exclaimed.

“Yes, but I’m not so sure about daddy’s intentions.” A large ram was moving at speed in our direction. This wasn’t the kind of butter I had in mind. Grabbing the wine by the neck, I raced after Sarah to the safety of the car.

NORVAL JOE

If it hadn’t been such a beautiful, sunny day, the class would have remained inside the gym. Running through the locker room to the blacktop or grass outside, most of the boys didn’t fail to notice Billbert in his plastic loincloth, and many stopped to laugh.
He could leap into the air using his superpower and fly around the room. Then their scorn would turn to envy.
Taking a single preparatory step to launch himself over their heads, he slipped in the water and ended up flat on his back.
“Get your butts outside,” Coach Slaughterball yelled at the boys.

LAIEANNA

“Model Winner”

I was nervous enough about failure, knowing Wilco was judging the
annual art show, but an intense sunny day only raised my anxiety as
the heat did a number on my entry. The wee islands began to shift on
my butter molded globe with the continents not far behind as the
medium started to melt. The tufts of grass representing greener areas
of the world dropped onto the table. To win, I’d have to dig deep in
my well and bring out the groupie in me. Boobs up, skirt short, smile
in place, I waited for the band to arrive.

SERENDIPITY

To look at me, you’d think butter wouldn’t melt… That is, as long as you’re not a criminal psychologist, and you’re looking at the inner workings of my mind, rather than outward appearances.

That’s what most people completely fail to appreciate, despite knowing full well, you should never judge a book by its cover.

Or rather, judge me based on the sweet and innocent persona I outwardly project.

Those who do, and get a little too close will find that there’s a high price to be paid:

And I have no qualms about taking what I feel is rightfully mine.

PLANET Z

Our Aunt Maisy used to say “Love don’t pay the bills.”
She woke up early to milk the cows, then led them back out to pasture.
The cows grazed while she churned butter.
These days, robots and computers do all of the work.
They even harvest the crops in the fall.
For a while, the people who did the migrant field work would try to sabotage the robots.
But the robots would grind them up into fertilizer.
Maisy gave us tracker bracelets.
But when Bobby went to go swimming in the creek…
About six hours ago.
I hope they’re waterproof.

Full Deck

They say that Crazy Andy doesn’t play with a full deck, but I’ve counted his cards, and sure enough, there are fifty-two cards in his deck.
Lots of people have counted them.
He’ll hand you his greasy, torn and tattered deck of cards, and he’ll demand that you count them.
When you get to fifty-two, he’ll say that you must have miscounted, and demand that you count them again.
You can lay them out on the table in rows, or you can order the cards to show none are missing, but he’ll never believe you.
He cries.
He screams.
Pathetic.

Hot Dog Sandwich

At the debate, the moderator asked the candidates:
“Is a hot dog a sandwich?”
Well, what is a sandwich?
A hamburger is a sandwich.
And open-faced sandwiches are sandwiches.
Are calzones sandwiches? Or rolls?
A po boy is a roll with meat in it, and if you could call that a sandwich, then a hot dog in a bun is a sandwich.
Social media erupted with all kinds of rants and charts and Photoshops of sandwiches in the candidates’ hands.
As the pointless debate continued, the world kept turning, problems went unsolved, opportunities were missed, and nobody was the wiser.

Mistaken Identity

The truth is, God told Abraham to kill a baby goat, not his kid.
But Abraham, being almost a hundred, didn’t hear God too well, so he headed up the mountain for the sacrifice.
God left a few signs along the path that said I SAID KILL A BABY GOAT, NOT YOUR KID, but Abraham was illiterate.
God tried a few signs with simple pictograms, but Abraham’s eyesight wasn’t too good, either.
Which is a good thing, because he mistook a small goat for his son.
“That’ll do,” said God.
No wonder why Moroni gave magic spectacles to John Smith.