Britannic

The Britannic was the sister ship to the Titanic.
And, like her unsinkable sister ship, the unsinkable Britannic sank as well.
Oh, sure, their reinforced the Britannica’s hull. And added more life boats.
And the Britannic spent her life as a hospital ship in warmer waters than Titanic.
But where the Titanic’s spotters failed to spot an iceberg, the Britannic’s spotters failed to notice a mine.
Which is understandable, since mines are much smaller than icebergs.
And make for less interesting movies, I suppose.
The third sister ship, Olympic, was sold for scrap and demolished.
Even less interesting, I suppose.

When it rains, Bob

The old saying goes that when it rains it pours.
I guess that’s meant to be taken metaphorically, when a lot of things happen at once, because my friend Bob, the weather guy, he’s got all kinds of words to describe rain other than pouring.
Drizzling is the most amusing of the words he uses.
Although I’ve heard others say “gullywasher” which is even more amusing, but Bob doesn’t ever use that word.
He lives in a gully, and takes offense that it is somehow unclean.
“My gully is spotless,” says Bob. “Just say pouring and shut the fuck up.”

The pet forgetful rock

Most people have organizers or smartphones to remember things for them.
Appointments, shopping lists… that kind of thing.
I have a photographic memory.
I remember everything.
The hard thing for me to do is to forget things.
So, I got a pet rock, and it’s job is to forget things for me.
It just sits there, totally oblivious, unable to remember a thing.
I picked it up and threw it on the grass.
Will it remember that?
Of course not. It doesn’t remember anything.
So, why should I remember?
And, should I lose the stupid thing, will it forget itself?

Hunting isn’t fun

They say that hunting isn’t as fun when the rabbit has a gun.
But that’s assuming that the rabbit also has bullets for the gun.
Although a rabbit could try to pistol-whip you with the gun.
Or bash you over the head if it’s a rifle or a shotgun.
The rabbit could also bluff, pointing an empty gun at you before you have a chance to cock and aim yours.
They’re small and quiet and fast, so there’s no shame in a rabbit getting the drop on you.
Just hand over your wallet and all of your carrots slowly, sir.

Sakura

We arrive in Tokyo as the cherry blossoms bloomed.
“Sakura,” we say, arriving in the park.
The pink flowers are everywhere.
We breathe cherry blossom, bitter and sweet.
The crowds are thick, every tree had people under it.
After a while, we find an open spot.
We lay out a blanket, take off our shoes, and sit.
The trees are in bloom for only a few days.
Life is short, but it can be sweet and beautiful.
We stand up, put on our shoes, roll up the blanket, and head to our hotel.
And dream of pink flowers everywhere, forever.

Weekly Challenge #794 – So many questions…

Happy girl

TOM

And Then She Was Gone

So Many Questions, so little answers. She had it all, wealth, the
adoration of millions. A rich internal spiritual life that gave her a rock
solid center to engage an all to raged modern world. Traveled the world to
comfort the inflected and stormed the hall of power in inflect the
comfortable. What seeping darkness had finally dimmed the light. What
growing weight press the last ounce of joy. Could you see it in her eyes?
The question remain and the answers elude. In the end we are left with
silent ghosts. When the light goes out the darkness gathers.

RICHARD

Questions, questions, questions!

Oh, for crying out loud!

Not another one, surely?

So many questions – it’s almost as if you imagine we’ve no idea what we’re getting into.

Do you honestly think that after three years we haven’t considered the points you’re raising at all?

It’s embarrassing, especially in front of all these people. How would you like to be paraded in front of family and friends and interrogated, it’s just not right!

Let’s just assume the answer is ‘yes’ to all these damn questions?

And just maybe, we’ll get to ‘You may kiss the bride’, before the end of the ceremony!

LIZZIE

I sat at my desk and pondered.
Should I go and interview the man?
Should I shake his hand?
Should I be friendly?
Should I smile?
Should I let him lead the conversation or should I ask him specific questions?
Should I show him the photos? The ones with their faces? The ones where they were still smiling?
And the maps? Should I show him the maps, the ones where the crosses mark the different locations?
Should I ask him…? Should I ask him about the bodies?
And are there more out there? Are there?
Where, please, tell us, where?

SERENDIPIDY

There were so many questions I wanted to ask, after all, it’s not every day you get to interview a real serial killer, especially when you’re just sixteen and doing an exclusive piece for the school newspaper!

But I only had fifteen minutes, and I had to make them count.

So I decided to ditch my prepared list – I could always make up the answers afterwards – and ask the things I really, desperately, wanted to know.

He entered the room.

“Hi, Mister Dahmer…

What would you advise a sixteen year old who wants to get into serial killing?”

TURA

So many questions
———
I was sitting outside a cafe on the Rialto one evening when I saw Jim emerge from the crowd.

“Hey Jim, where you been all these years? Weren’t you searching for the secret masters of ancient wisdom? How’s it going? Can I get you a drink?”

“So many questions!” he said. “Found a few, still seeking others. There’s a door off an obscure alley here in Venice that only opens at certain times. So I dropped by you on my way.”

“But how did you know I was here?” I asked.

“Secret wisdom!” he said, and disappeared into the crowd.

NORVAL JOE

Unable to sleep because of the endless pounding on the motel room’s wall, Billbert lay awake as so many questions ran through his head. Had he been older, his first question would have been, how long would their neighbor be pounding the walls? Instead, Billbert wondered, why had they moved to this forsaken, out of the way town? If Nuclear Fission had found his mother before, what guaranteed that she wouldn’t find her here? But, ultimately, the questions that nagged him most were, would Linoliamanda forget all about him and would he ever be able to be with her again?

DUANE

I’m getting tired of so many questions. Just when I think it’s done the process starts all over again.

Who would do such a thin

When did you find out?

What are you doing to keep it from happening again?

Why didn’t you come forward sooner?

How did this make feel?

Wait, where are you going?

My guidance counselor says I still have a week to drop journalism 101. Theater class would be fun, but that’s just more drama. Home ec always smells like cookies when I walk by. Wood shop sounds alright. I could make a cool wooden bong.

JARED

“Is that you, Captain?”

“Do I look like a Girl Scout?”

“Did we wake you from your beauty sleep?”

“What do you think?”

“So, what do you make of this?”

“Is that a clown wig?”

“And how about the feet?”

“Are those ice skates?”

“Notice anything else about the victim?”

“You mean, like the hole in their forehead, or the missing hands?”

“What about the blood?”

“Where is it?”

“Wouldn’t we like to know?”

“So, where did it happen?”

“Would you like to see the next room?”

“Why not?”

“What do you think here?”

“How did it get up there?”

PLANET Z

Trivial Pursuit games contain only so many questions.
It’s possible to memorize all of them in a set.
You can buy more sets, but those can be memorized, too.
Tournaments become nothing more than memorization challenges and lucky dice rolls.
That’s what trivia bots are for.
Millions of questions in a database, too much knowledge to study and memorize.
Unless you’re a trivia bot, too.
Then, you know all the questions and answers.
Which is why we scan for helper devices at tournaments.
No phones. No earpieces.
No ocular or neural implants.
And certainly no loaded dice allowed in, either.

Singin’ in the rain

Fred Astaire used to sing in the rain.
Until he caught a bad cold, which became pneumonia.
It took him weeks to recover from it.
Most people can shake a cold pretty quickly, but a singer has to be extra-careful with their voice.
Not to mention that he was also a dancer.
These days, they’d do the rain with advanced computer graphics.
But you could still tell that he was dry from his face and clothes.
Sure, they could simulate that too, but not as well as actually getting him wet.
Which would give him a cold and pneumonia again.

Car fire

There was a car fire in the parking lot.
Just a small one.
Someone noticed a strange orange glow under the car.
They first thought it was mood lighting, but why would a parked car have mood lighting?
Oh, and the smell. It smelled like fire.
They called the fire department while they got out the hose and extinguishers, and they put out the fire.
The car owner called their insurance company to make a claim.
They’d recently bought the car, so it’s still under the return guarantee.
They asked for a new one. That was slightly less on fire.

Emilio

Emilio the Matador.
He’s my next door neighbor.
I hate it when he takes his work home with him.
All the noise. Three in the morning, crashing and roaring and smashing things.
All of the stomping and shouting he does, practicing for the upcoming fight.
And when the picadors come over, oh my god, what a racket those guys make.
I never get any sleep.
And the smells.
His garbage cans are always overflowing.
The plastic bags burst, leaking God knows what over the sidewalk.
But on the bright side, Emilio is always grilling something good in his back yard.

Bottom of the ninth

It’s only the bottom of the ninth when the home team is losing to the visitors or they’re tied.
If they’re down by a little, the fans are out there cheering.
If they’re down by a lot, the fans who haven’t left already are heading for the exits.
Score enough runs, and they walk it off and win.
But three outs, and it’s over.
Or, if they’re tied, off to extra innings.
To do it all over again.
They stopped selling beer in the seventh.
So, try to make that one last.
And we’ll have another at the bar afterwards.