George’s parking space

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
His priorities were completely out of whack.
“No, George, you can’t have your own parking space,” said the captain. “We’re pirates. We’re always out at sea, plundering. You’ll never need a parking space.”
During the next raid, George somehow managed to plunder a Buick dealership.
“Oh, great,” grumbled George. “Now where will I park this car?”
He tried to park in the captain’s space, but the captain had George’s car towed.
George gave the Buick back to the dealership.
He filled the tank, but he didn’t have it washed.

George and his pony

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
After he heard Lyle Lovett’s “If I Had A Boat” he bought himself a pony.
Together, they sailed out on the ocean, and George rode the pony on his boat.
It’s not easy riding a pony on a boat.
I could understand doing it on a big cruise ship.
When George ran into rough seas, and he and the pony fell overboard.
He had to let the pony sink to save himself.
For the rest of the voyage, George missed the pony.
He could have used the horse meat.

George the privateer

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
During the American Revolutionary War, he obtained letters of marque from both the colonists and the British Empire, and he stole from pretty much everyone.
When he raided ships leaving England for the Americas, they had a lot of soldiers, weapons, and ammunition.
Those raids didn’t end well.
So, he preferred to raid ships leaving the Americas for England. The soldiers tended to be tired or wounded, and easier to defeat.
Their cargo was worthless: barrels with the preserved bodies of the dead, heading home for a proper burial.

George vs Procedure

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
He wasn’t very good at following procedures.
He’d be stacking cannonballs or swabbing the deck, and he’d be told “You’re doing it wrong, stupid. The captain announced a change last week, don’t you remember?”
It happened a lot, and one day. George snapped, screaming “Why doesn’t anybody write this shit down?”
“Because half of the crew can’t read,” growled the captain. “Besides, I’m busy doing other things than meaningless paperwork. You should write them down.”
So, George did. With a permanent marker on the captain’s face while he slept.

George and the piper

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
The people of Hamlin were desperate, so they called on George to rescue their children from The Pied Piper.
George came back the next day with crates full of rats, and he released them.
“No, you idiot,” said the mayor. “The Pied Piper led those away first. When we refused to pay, he led away our children.”
“Ah, ok,” said George. “Sorry.”
The next day, George came back with The Pied Piper.
“My rate has doubled,” said The Piper. “Oh, and I prefer Bitcoin.”
George took a 10% commission.

Weekly Challenge #989 – Server

The next topic is Place

LISA

The Server
Pete, a medical student, was working part time as a waiter. It’d been a difficult shift a packed restaurant with one particularly rude customer mostly insulting him and questioning his intelligence. He didn’t contradict her.
It was a placement week and the same awful customer had been in a nasty car crash. Her shoulder had come out of its socket; He quickly and efficiently popped it back in. As he left the cubicle she asked if she knew him.
“I was your thicko waiter, the other night.” Pete smiled, “I’ll be back to stitch your facial injuries in a moment.”

RICHARD

— 404 —
It was me.
I was the one who opened the email that brought my laptop down.
And it was my laptop that went on to crash the network and bring the server down.
The same server that went on to trash the data centre, which screwed the web and brought down the internet completely.
Yes, you can blame me for it all.
I’m the one who single-handedly broke the information super highway.
And apparently, it’s not going to be fixed any time soon, so they tell me.
But why not look on the bright side?
No more dodgy emails!

LIZZIE

“Arsenic? We apologize. The server is offline.”
The questions continued until the server was back online.
Everyone resumed clicking their buttons frantically.
Some even chanted “the server is online, the server is online”.
What were the little tables for?
“Roleplay,” was the answer.
She didn’t know where the menu was, but the waiter whispered “no worries”. He’d explain everything.
The needle. What? No.
But but… “the server is back online”.
Now she understood the little joke. “Here, Happy Birthday, have fun”.
She was a widow, a black widow. Go to the RP café and have some arsenic on our tab.

THOMAS

Server

Mr. Liu moved like a shadow through Jade Lantern, his age hidden beneath a crisp blue jacket and knowing smile. He delivered plates of thousand-year eggs and drunken shrimp with eerie precision, never writing orders down, never making a mistake.

One night, a new customer hesitated over a plate of braised eel. Mr. Liu leaned in. “Eat,” he whispered. “It’s watching.”

The man laughed nervously, but Mr. Liu did not. He simply walked away, humming an old tune.

Later, when the plate was empty, the man swore he saw Liu give the eel’s discarded bones a small, approving nod.

IAN

The Server

“Soup’s cold!”

“Well, I didn’t make it!” thinks Larry, apologizing.

“The guy on table 5 says this soup’s cold,” Larry tells the chef.

“Christ, don’t shoot the messenger,” Larry thinks seeing Fat Steve’s violent glare.

Swearing, Fat Steve vindictively overheats it, and Larry takes it back.

“I’m never coming here again!” says the table five guy.

“Good, fuck off!” thinks Larry, heroically maintaining his composure, squeezed in the vice of customer and chef.

Later he reads the feedback on the restaurant app.

Terrible food, worse service.

In bed, he receives his manager’s text message.

See me before your shift tomorrow.

SERENDIPIDY

Whether you’ve enjoyed your meal, or not, please don’t forget to tip the server.
Make it a decent tip too, none of your measly ten or twenty percent. Better still, go the whole hog, the food is cheap enough for you to double-up, a hundred percent seems a reasonable ask to me.
Your server works hard, particularly with what they have to deal with behind the scenes in the kitchen.
So, please consider being generous.
If not, don’t blame me when they wait outside for you with a cleaver.
And you’ll end up as tomorrow’s dish of the day!

TOM

Rabbit Holes

The path of the geek is long and deep. Being in Silicon Valley in the late 70s if you had a cursor interest in Networks you were easily swept up in the techno-Gyr. Spent major time working with Sun, then Red Hat then SUSE. I had a 1200 baud Hayse before it was released to the public. Built a mess of servers. Ran Sendmail. Ran IRC. Ran Apanche. Try my hand at Microsoft’s servers, but frankly, there stuff sucked. Taught Unix class, now I’m just happy to wander around Discord. If your now current everything is above your pay grade.

NORVAL JOE

When Sabrina came back downstairs, she kept her eyes on the floor, not looking at anyone. “There are still a few things I couldn’t fit in my backpack.”

Billbert hugged her. “I’ll bring them to school.”

“Okay. Thanks,” she mumbled and followed Ms. Callabassa out.

Once the door was closed, Billbert asked, “Can’t you follow them, with a satellite through work, or something?”

His mother paused, then with determination, said, “Yes. I think we can.”

They sat at the computer and his mother entered her password to log into the office network.

A message appeared, “Unable to connect to server.”

PLANET Z

The asylum application process was simple.
Get a cell phone from a border agent, download an app, and apply for asylum.
A judge napped in an office while a room full of clerks rubber-stamped applications, and you could print out a certificate, or just show the certificate on your phone to any law enforcement bothering you.
And then the law changed.
The asylum app was shut down, the borders were closed, and the servers were handed over to a new team of clerks.
They gathered up the names and addresses, handed them over to immigration officers, and the raids began.

George on a cruise ship

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
Any time he led a raid on another ship, things didn’t end well.
Unless you count that time George led a raid on that Filipino cruise ship.
They were going to rob the casino, but people mistook them for actors playing pirates.
“This is better than the shows in Vegas!” said the cruise ship’s captain. “Can you do this for every one of our cruise ships?”
George’s captain signed the contract, and they made more money playing pirate roles than actually being pirates.
George kept busy stitching up costumes.

George and the swear jar

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
Most sailors speak in ways that are saltier than the seas, but George did his best to avoid swearing.
He had a swear jar by his bunk, and every time he swore, he’d put a piece of eight in it.
His shipmates would steal from the jar, and George would shout “WHERE THE FUCK IS MY MONEY?”
And he’d drop another piece of eight in the jar. Which his shipmates would also steal.
His shipmates eventually stole enough money to throw themselves a party.
No, they didn’t invite George.

George the… whirling dervish?

George was a dervish, but he wasn’t a very good dervish.
He tried to whirl, but he’d get dizzy quickly, and he’d trip over his own feet.
So, he tried to whirl the other way, and he’d trip over his feet even more quickly.
That’s when George decided to give up whirling, and he’d stand perfectly still.
“What good is a dervish who does not whirl?” growled his dance master.
“Does not the earth turn?” said George. “And orbit the sun? Which orbits the galaxy?”
The dance master pondered this, and then slapped George on the back of the head.

George eats local

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
He sailed the world, adventuring with his shipmates.
But unlike them, he would take in local culture and cuisine.
He’d be sipping coffee at a sidewalk cafe or enjoying some delicacy in a hole-in-the-wall while they’d be lining up at the McDonalds for a Big Mac and fries.
And then they’d plunder and loot the place, burning it to the ground.
George didn’t try to convince his crewmates that going local was better than franchise food.
Because he didn’t want them plundering, looting, and burning his favorite places, too.