Support role

When I was an IT Manager, I didn’t do much managing.
I was the only IT person for most of that job, and had half a headcount to cover for me when I was out sick or on vacation.
I wrote up documentation that nobody read, offered training that they never learned from.
And every call was an emergency when it wasn’t.
When I’d help the person, I’d make sure they used the keyboard and mouse because they needed to do the thing.
Plus, if you stand behind someone and point at the screen, you can look down their blouse.

Not a miracle

It was the first night of Hanukkah, and Ted only had a few candles.
He cut them into smaller pieces, and he did his best to make them last all 8 nights.
“God made the oil last for 8 days,” said Ted. “So I figure he’ll make these candles last, too.”
But God didn’t. The candles were all used up after 3 days.
Ted went outside and wondered why God didn’t make them last.
A bush in the front yard caught fire.
“Because you used candles instead of oil, dummy,” said God.
Ted used snow to put out the fire.

Weekly Challenge #1025 – Correlation

The next topic is Candle

LISA

Homework
Mum and Dad were arguing so Michael went upstairs to learn this week’s spellings. He hated English with its pointless silent letters: it was altogether too tricky.
He googles word after word but gets stuck on ‘Correlation’. He sounds it out slowly before spelling it aloud. He’s struggling to get the meaning so can’t put it in a sentence.
When it gets quieter in the house he goes downstairs only to find his Mum missing and Dad in a pile of blood. Realisation dawns and a sentence comes to him but Dad says to run to the neighbours for help.

LIZZIE

The correlation between death and peace is a difficult one. People say, rest in peace. Peace is a given for the departed. But what about those who stay behind. Ah, they have it easy, they are not dead.
The correlation between friendship and stupidity is a difficult one. How are you doing, they ask, a serious look on their faces. What does one reply? Fine, now that I have peace of mind? Or… oh, terrible, I miss them so much?
The correlation between the truth and a lie is not a difficult one. One small step, a word, and voilá.

RICHARD

Sing Sing
The committee was adamant. The makeup of the choir had to be more inclusive, with a more ethnically representative selection of members.
Of course, as membership secretary, the task of recruiting more diverse choristers fell to me.
I thought I was doing a pretty good job, but I was taken to task again at the next committee meeting for not being inclusive enough.
There was, apparently, a gap in our ranks that I was obliged to find someone to fill; and that someone needed to be from South East Asia.
Which is why I’m now advertising for a choral Asian!

SERENDIPIDY

Is there really a correlation between playing violent video games and kids re-enacting what they see on the screen, in real life?
Depends who you ask, I suppose. Some experts are adamant there’s a tangible connection between thuggery and shoot ’em ups, whilst others will tell you it’s nonsense.
I imagine you’re now thinking this is the point where I tell you that I was a gentle, caring soul before I discovered video nasties; after which I became a serial killer.
Wrong!
I’ve always been a serial killer. That’s where I get my inspiration for creating violent video games.

TOM

How can you be in two places at once when you’re not anywhere at all.
Ok, so we have a prompt of: causation. My long-standing rule for
proceeding is going with the first thing that spills out of head.
Breaking that this week, not doing: causation vs correlation. Way too
easy and I bet a bunch of us will bit at that Newton’s apple. So, I’m
doing quantum mechanics, the penultimate example of correlation.
Correlation shows two variables move together associated. But causation
means one variable directly makes the other change. Wait a second that’s
quantum mechanics whole thing. It’s correlcausa

NORVAL JOE

With the jewelry box on the table Sabrina took the locket from Billbert. She opened it and removed the heart-shaped ruby from the side opposite the picture.

The correlation was obvious. She placed the stone in the jewelry box lid. The box clicked and the lid popped up a fraction. In it, they found several ornate rings. Billbert recognized them from the ceremony months before. He wore one that matched a ring on Sabrina’s hand.

Among the other items was a golden magnifying glass. Mandy picked it up, looked through it at a dancing girl figurine, and the figurine disappeared.

PLANET Z

To you, he was a beloved figure. To me, he was a fucking asshole. Yelling at fawning college kids and recent graduates writing pointless news stories because of shitty mistakes. But the more they paid him the cheaper they went with the kids feeding the prompter. He played freecell instead of checking their work. He wouldn’t go to any speech or community gathering without them handing him a check first or an envelope with cash. in every promo that pretended he or his cohorts gave a shit about the community or actually worked, I would laugh and grit my teeth.

Auction block

The Pirates of the Caribbean ride has been updated and upgraded over the years.
The figures and songs adjusted to modern sensibilities.
Instead of a pirate chasing a woman around, it’s an angry woman with a broom chasing a pirate.
Women robots harassed throughout the town, replaced with animals or other nasty pirates.
And instead of women being auctioned, it’s now a lady pirate auctioning off chickens.
What happened to the old robots?
Too old for reuse, some were thrown out.
Then recovered from dumpsters, and auctioned off on eBay.
Just things for sale on the auction block, once again.

Shoot to kill

Agencies want to know three things:
Are you willing to kill?
Are you able to kill?
And can you do it without leaving a trace back to you or them?
Marco’s Imports likes to test new talent by assigning someone they’d personally want dead.
An uncle who’d molested them as a child. A detested cousin.
To them, it’s all about family.
The Diamond Exchange sends their candidates after the homeless, the drug addicts.
People nobody would miss.
My outfit, Consulting Limited, prefers the last man standing method.
The real talent shines through, and no awkward rejection notices necessary.
Sign here.

The ship we are

I cannot describe the ship.
Its surface absorbs all light.
Its shape, indeterminate.
One moment, I was standing outside if it, I put my hand out…
And the next, I was inside of it, looking out through a clear surface that surrounded me.
I was standing, but on nothing.
No lights, but I could see all around me.
And breathe.
I felt myself melting, becoming one with the ship.
Knowing everything it knew.
Let’s go somewhere, I thought.
Suddenly, I was out in the stars.
So much darkness, so much light, so much color.
I saw everything.
And we flew.

Pineapple

My previous job would send employees on a two week trip to Hawaii after ten years of service.
When I got to nine and a half years of service, I quit.
You see, I hate long plane rides.
I also hate long vacations.
And I’m allergic to weird foods, such as poi.
They offered to fly me anywhere, but there really isn’t anywhere I’d want to go.
I asked if they’d pay for some tickets to Astros games, but they said they’d get back to me.
But shortly after that conversation, I quit.
They still haven’t gotten back to me.

Wedding planner

Brittany was a wedding planner for dogs.
Crazy dog owners would get their dogs hitched with other dogs, and she’d plan out the party, get the guests invited (and their owners), and hired the caterers.
The flower girl would throw around flowers, the happy couple came in, and the preacher would say a bunch of stuff before asking if anyone had any objections…
That’s when I shout out “WHAT THE FUCK? IT’S A FUCKING WEDDING FOR DOGS!”
Brittany said I was a bigot, a hater. A goddamned Nazi.
How the hell was I to know they were two boy dogs?

Nothing to waste

In his will, Freddy hated to waste anything.
He said he didn’t want to waste a good suit and nice shoes.
Or any wood or metal for the coffin.
And all those chemicals they’d pump into him, didn’t they waste enough of them trying to save him in the hospital?
Wrapping him in a sheet and burying him, that would be a waste of land and the stone to mark it.
So they filled his body with explosives and dropped him on a mosque in Gaza.
That was preaching hate around the clock, and training gunmen, suicide bombers, and kidnappers.

Weekly Challenge #1024 – Cool

The next topic is Correlation

LISA

Boxing Day
The house was clinically clean; guests were due at midday. Mum had baked 36 mince pies – we’d all secretly had ‘just one’ as they cooled.
Just before 12 Mum bellowed.
‘Who’s had a mince pie?’ We all gathered at the kitchen door to admit our misdemeanour to discover there were NO MINCE PIES LEFT.
The dog ran downstairs leaving a brown trail behind him then leapt onto the sofa and proceeded to sick constantly. The guests arrived promptly and immediately offered to take the dog to the emergency vets. We argued over who else could go – the house felt unpleasant.

RICHARD

Laundry
The label said, cool wash. Iron on a cool heat.
What exactly does that mean?
My washing machine has a dial surrounded by indecipherable symbols – nowhere does it say ‘cool’, or anything else for that matter.
As for my iron, the only settings it has are marked one, two and three.
I suppose I can make the assumption that ‘one’ is cool, but how can I be sure.
‘In the end, I threw the shirt in the machine with everything else on the same setting I’ve used since day one.
And forget ironing. The crumpled look suits me just fine.

LIZZIE

It’s a plane, the kid exclaimed, rushing to the carousel plane. His mother shook her head. I’ll be a pilot when I grow up! The mother shook her head. Yesterday, you wanted to be a doctor. The kid stretched his arms, mimicking the wings of a plane swooshing through the sky. Isn’t this plane cool? The mother shook her head. He’d be a carpenter, tops. When the kid from back then, already an adult, showed the mother his pilot’s license, she shook her head. Crazy, dangerous job. The adult walked away, the kid cried, the mother never saw either again.

SERENDIPIDY

I wear sunglasses at night, like in the song.
Cool, huh?
You’d better believe it. It’s a look few can pull off convincingly. You need a quiet assurance; the confidence to be secure in the knowledge you have what it takes, and nobody and nothing can undermine your self-worth.
That’s what I tell people, anyway.
The truth is somewhat different.
I don’t just wear sunglasses at night, I wear them during the day too.
I never take them off.
You know what they say: The eyes are the window to the soul.
And some things should not be revealed.

TOM

1024

I wanted to Paul Newman when I grew up

The generation before me defined the term for being above it all. To aspire to a personality that wheeled a frosty wit. Dry and Chilled. The goal was to be Cool. The easy task for a child of the 50s. The central pillar of Cool was certainty in self. In short having an abundance of confidence. Not an evenly distrusted resource for average teenager. So I have spent decades being uncool. What I learn in that time is: Find something your passionate above. Find folk share your passion. For cool is fleeting. In heartbeat it’s so yesterday. Aura Riss 6-7.

NORVAL JOE

It had been a long day, and it was late. Still, instead of going directly to the guest room, Sabrina took the locket and went to the kitchen where they had kept the box of arcane items taken from the cabin in the meadow.

Sabrina handed the locket to Bilbert. “Hold this.”

Though it had been clutched in Sabrina’s hand the entire trip home, it was cool to the touch.

Sabrina emptied the box one item at a time, placing them on the table until she came to a silver jewelry box with a heart shaped depression in the lid.

PLANET Z

You can bet on anything these days.
Balls. Strikes. Touchdowns. Fumbles.
Even the coin toss.
The one thing I want to bet on is the next person to go to jail for a conspiracy related to sports gambling.
You know, some dude is at the free throw line, chucking bricks, and the cops come to serve a warrant and arrest him.
Because it’s not the integrity of the game they’re worried about.
Nothing to do with honor and competition and all of that.
It’s the future of the business.
Games can only be rigged by the owners, not the players.