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: FORK
We’ve got stories by:
- John
- Jeffrey
- Richard
- Tom
- Serendipity
- Spate
- Munsi
- Chelsea
- Tura Brezoianu
- Zackmann
- Dionysis Clowes
- Norval Joe
- Danny
- Lizzie
- Julie
- Planet Z
The next 100 word stories weekly challenge is on the topic of VICE…
JOHN
Unseen Forks in the Road.
by John Musico
At the helm, I gazed ahead, fixed on my planned destination. To verify that I was indeed holding a straight steady course; I turned to inspect the whitewash behind the boat. Incredibly, my path had been instead serpentine; weaving to and fro! An epiphany drenched me like a bucket of cold water. We look ahead at the next small step, feeling that we are the captains of our destiny. However, if we look back, way back; all evidence is to the contrary. So, when things don’t go as you “planned”; remember- they never actually did; so don’t beat yourself up.
JEFFREY
Two Paths Diverged
by Jeffrey Fischer
Neil Young once opined that if you don’t know where you’re going, it doesn’t matter which road you travel. One day, while hiking in the woods, I decided to put that view to the test: when I came upon a fork in the path, I flipped a coin to decide which to take. Heads, I went left; tails, right.
One time I got heads six times in a row and found myself back at the same intersection, two hours after I left it. Usually, though, I got an assortment of lefts and rights, leading me to interesting vistas and less well-trodden paths.
Of course, a good thing can still go to unfortunate extremes. Enough random choices and one forgets where one started – or where one is currently located, relative to one’s car. All of which is to say: if you find this note, please send help. I’m lost!
Medium Rare
by Jeffrey Fischer
Freddy Boulier was an intrepid explorer. His latest interest was the Zampani tribe, a fiercely private group in the Amazonian jungle. Freddy heard they practiced cannibalism, though he was skeptical. Accompanied by a native translator, Freddy made the trek into the jungle to visit the tribe.
In a jungle clearing, the Zampini danced around a simmering pot of water. “Welcome!” said the chief, through the aid of the translator. “We heard a brave explorer had come to visit us.” Four burly tribesmen picked him up and placed him in the pot of water. Freddy started to babble, trying to avoid becoming that night’s entrée. When he finally stopped, the chief asked the translator if Freddy had finished speaking. The translator, eagerly awaiting fresh meat for dinner, replied, “Stick a fork in him. He’s done.”
Sadly, the joke didn’t translate well, and the tribe ate twice as well that evening.
RICHARD
#1 – George’s Story – Part 69: Indirection
The fact remained that George still had no idea where exactly this particular god-forsaken place was. None of the street signs he saw were particularly helpful and he found himself driving aimlessly around in the hope of discovering a road that would lead him out.
Arriving at a fork in the road, he debated whether to go right or left – finally opting for left, since up until now he’d seldom been right!
Something about his surroundings seemed familiar… he felt the stirrings of memory: he knew this place, he was sure of it.
Turning a corner, he stopped dead…
#2 – Cutlery Creation
Grandpa Jack emerged from his workshop, beaming with pride.
“I did it!”, he exclaimed, “The first sentient robot, and created entirely from washing machine parts and cutlery!”
Sure enough, his unique creation was a wonder to behold, although I was more than a little concerned that grandpa had chosen to use steak knives for the robots fingers.
“Are you sure it’s safe?”, I asked, nodding towards the twitching knives.
“Of course I’m safe!”, replied the robot.
“Wow, it speaks!”, I blurted.
“Indeed it does”, said grandpa, “but I wouldn’t believe a word it says… I gave it a fork tongue!”
#3 – Buffet
I hate buffets.
I hate the food: pastry-laden morsels of heartburn, served at a bacteria-loving room temperature, prodded and poked by the sweaty fingers of those in the queue in front.
And the queue! The endless, mindless, shuffling, irritation of it all!
Then, with laden, soggy paper plate, you juggle with wine, canapes and conversation, all the while praying desperately not to drop the whole lot.
Rotten food, warm wine, useless plates and dreadful conversation, could it possibly get any worse?
Oh yes… because no-one has ever mastered the breakable, bendable, utterly uncommendable horrors of the puny, pathetic, plastic fork!
TOM
Well Defined Relationship Part 66
“Listen here, Duke God.”
“Call me Marion.”
“Yes … Marion I’m not going to allow my son …”
“Could you please hold these?”
“What?”
“They’re spaceships.”
“s-p-a-c-e-s-h-i-p-s”
“Don’t drop them there are people inside.”
Mother continued, “ to be put in that level of danger.”
“Correct Mrs. Parsons which is why I’m here. You have arrived at the fork in the road. One of my Divinical Duties to my five million followers”
Both Banister and Smith let out a low whistle.
“is to insure the Profit safely fulfills his density and to that end I will be joining your company.”
A Post-Modern Culinary Report III
After evaluating both the American and Japanese Sporks I can safely say what’s wrong with their design structure. In both cases the spork is not fork enough. In the case of the American Spork the curved tines impede piercing and the gaps allow fluid leakage. In the case of the Nippon Spork the tines rest under the spoon area allowing parallel protrusion, sadly without careful maneuvering during the slurping action one is likely to jab a lip or the gum line. So the most elegant alteration would be retractable tines, a reverse vampire tap forking Spork. Humbly submitted Lendus Lacksmore.
SERENDIPITY
A fork of lightning flickered on the horizon – a storm was coming, and it was going to be a big one.
She shivered, pulling the bedclothes over her head, waiting for the fury to come.
Her big brother used to mock her fear of thunderstorms – “Don’t be such a sissy”, he’d laugh – until the night the storm took him, screaming, to his death.
Father, mother, all her family – all were taken, one by one; storm by storm.
And now, the storm was coming for her too.
Distant thunder rumbled, as she burrowed deeper under the sheets.
SPATE
Eye Candy
When he was but a wee baby, Mama decided it was time he learned to feed
himself, so she set a bowl of macaroni and cheese in front of him and placed
a fork in his hand.
With innocent delight he proceeded to thrust that fork directly into Mama’s
eye.
One Eyed Mama (as she’s now known) swore an oath that this child would never
be given a fork again.
And so it is, to this day, he eats without a fork. or a knife for that
matter…just a spoon.
After all, spoons make tidy work of extracting eyeballs.
(Music: “Funeral March For A Marionette” by Ergo Phizmiz
[http://www.ergophizmiz.net]
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England)
MUNSI
The Chef
By Christopher Munroe
His massive eyebrows furrow as he throws himself, body and soul, into his work.
Chef’s hat set low upon his brow, moustache twitching in concentration as he slaves in his kitchen, so devoted to what he does that it has become all that he is.
Did he once have a name? Bjorn? Benny? It’s lost to him now, in the haze of food and creation.
But it’s all worthwhile, in the end. He’s the best there is at what he does. And such delicacies he creates…
But what utensil to use to sup upon his grand creations?
Fork fork fork!
CHELSEA
Fork
She sat there on her rock looking at the forks before her.
To her left was her home, a place she was not keen to see again, ever.
To her right was the dark forest, full of adventure, mystery and danger. She had explored it many times in her youth.
Ahead of her the path was new. This fork had not been there when last she passed this way.
The path was completely obscured by a strange mist, enticing her with only the first few steps.
‘Here we go!’ She said, jumping off the rock and disappearing into the mist.
TURA
The preacher said, “There are no forks in the road, only different paths to the same destination.”
One replied, “Tell us of this destination.”
He answered, “The end of all paths, the cessation of suffering, the reward obtained by the holy men of all ages.”
Another sneered, “I know this riddle, the answer is death!”
The priest’s acolytes drew machine-guns and mowed down the congregation.
“They were a miserly lot,” said the priest, as they rifled the bodies for jewellery and fat wallets. “Mining them out is a shorter branch of this fork than waiting on a trickle of donations.”
ZACKMANN
I fight with rice. The food not the football player. I remember attempting to eat rice in a Japanese restaurant with chopsticks. Being alone that day, I was more nervous and self conscious than I usually am. I did poorly. A waitress walked up to me, smiled then commanded “You will use a fork.” A friend assured me that like him if I practiced I could get good enough to get every last grain of rice on the plate. Now after living with a Pinoy I can’t eat rice with a fork anymore or with chopsticks only with a spoon.
DIO
A Childhood Memory
I remember the first time I ever used a fork.
As soon as ma and gaga left, the babysitter called her boyfriend. I grumbled a bit from the playpen.
Before long he showed up with beer and bud. They were decidedly interested in the contents of each other’s pants but not mine. Nothing could deter them from the inevitable, even as I watched through my screams.
Their lust sated, they fell on the contents of our refrigerator. At last they thought of me.
The little dude is hungry! said the boyfriend. What does he eat?
Nothing with a fork, I thought, as I jabbed it through his eye.
NORVAL JOE
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
Boy, was I surprised.
I figured, somebody went this way, or there wouldn’t be a trail. A couple miles along, I ran into this guy who wasn’t at all happy to see me. I thought maybe he was a hiker, or a hippie, or democrat. When I got close, I saw he had a gun and a pitbull. He said I’d be smarter to go the other way, I might live longer.
He said he was a farmer. I thought farmers were frendlier than that.
DANNY
EeSaw is an elderly blind man who lives in a small remote cabin on the edge of a majestic lake in the Northwestern Territories of Canada. Every morning Eesaw grabs his walking stick and heads to the fork in the road in front of his cabin, choosing a different direction to walk each day. Regardless which direction EeSaw takes, he always winds up back at the same fork in the road by his cabin, because the road simply winds around the lake. Life gives you the illusion of choice, when in reality, we all end up in the same place.
LIZZIE
The man stormed out of the restaurant, screaming. He ran around aimlessly before collapsing onto a pile of snow. Upon closer inspection, the police officer realized that the man had a fork stuck in his eye. Some said it was an accident, others a bet. When the officer got closer, the man lifted his face from the snow and smiled. “What a ride!” The officer was baffled. Suddenly, the man stood up and took off running. The ambulance eventually caught up with him in a field, digging for money, he said. “Oh yeah, it was a bet,” concluded the officer.
JULIE
Stick a fork in me.
When I am done cooking—
I will stop
Paying attention.
Wait. no–
That’s my Irish bravado,
kicking in.
I care, immensely.
But it did not hurt.
Wait, yes—it did.
The bleeding stopped,
A few months ago—
It is now a slow clot
A blot,
On my permanent record.
I am going to be just fine,
Thank you.
Tossing shreds of you
Out the window
Shiny metal forks back at you
I am strong, strong
Kicking these last two years
To the curb
you are gone, gone gone.
PLANET Z
Amir came to our school as an exchange student, and he was pretty good with the language, but some idioms threw him off.
The phrase “Stick a fork in it, it’s done” threw him off for a while. He was always sticking forks into things. Thank goodness that he never stabbed a cheerleader or an electrical outlet.
Some guys on the football team tried to convince him that he should use the phrase “That’s the bomb!” But even Amir knew that was pretty fucking stupid to say.
Besides, the authorities determined that the locker room fire was a gas leak.
