New Phone

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I bought a new phone.
It has a lot of features, but instead of sitting down and reading the manual, I’m going to power it up and then complain about how hard it is to use.
Yes, I’m that much of an impatient dick. Instead of spending a little time now to save a lot of time later, I just like to hear the sound of my own angry, bitching voice.
The box says it’s supposed to have all sorts of stuff. Including a stun gun.
But I don’t have time to read about it… hey, my first call!
YEOW!

The Right Religion

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After thousands of years of praying, sacrificing, killing, maiming, and suffering through gospel music, mankind had finally determined which of all religions was the right one.
The Global Address System, normally reserved for planetwide emergencies, was turned on as the researchers revealed their findings.
“We have determined that the Supreme Being is the 2917k5b Asteroid,” they said. “This mighty rock may not be the creator of our universe, but it will certainly be our destruction.”
Riots and chaos spread across the globe, and billions of people died.
“Nice joke there, Dr. Walters,” said a scientist. “Solved that pesky population problem.”

Weekly Challenge #202 – Bats

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Two, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was… was…. um…
It’s Bats!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this year?
Zachmann
Vince T
Jeffrey
Steven
TJ
JRadimus
Justin
Norval Joe
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


Zachmann

Son said You should checkout @ASAHiCon. Ate(atA) as in sister? No, @ as in twitter. You can link to the website. We want Anime Society of Antioch High Convention on March 20th 2010 in Antioch California to be a success. I asked if anyone planned to come dress as the Joker or Bats. No, but people wearing video game and Anime costumes are likely. I will go because Son worked really hard last year. I rarely see him do that a home. Think Son will hit someone with a bat if talked into wearing that dress again this year.

Vince T

Gramps always had a way with words.
Kids would be playing ball on his lawn and he’d walk out onto his porch and yell.
“Hey you slackers, why don’t you go and play on the highway where you belong.”
The kids would leave and yell back: “You crazy old man, do you have bats in your head? The highways aren’t safe.”
Later that day, Gramps had to run to the store to pick up his glasses.
As he backed out of his driveway, he hit a kid!
“You see! Now that wouldn’t have happened if you played on the highway!”

Jeffrey

“Bats.”
“What?”
“You asked what I was afraid of, bats.”
“Brad, that was four months ago.”
“Yeah.”
“It took four months to determine what you’re afraid of?”
“Well I was busy, you know I had other things on my mind.”
“What other things. I mean the computer runs the ship, we have less to do than Dave and Frank, and I asked you four months ago, what were you thinking about?”
“I’m not really afraid of much, and I was cleaning my toe nails, I don’t want to effect a new world with that.”
“Yeah, you know bats, not scary”

Steven

The church looked down at the ranch home in the next lot. “Excuse you.”
The house blushed, the sounds of copulating echoing from inside.
“Human infestation,” it said. “It happens.”
“Balderdash!” said the church, raising its voice above the moans from
next door. “They are sent by God to afflict the wicked!”
“You’re nuts!” said the house. The church scoffed, its humans raising
their voices in praise and song.
When night came, a black cloud came close – bats flying back to their
church steeple home. The house giggled to itself.
“I knew you had bats in your belfry,” it said.

TJ

“Bats!”
“You’ve got bats … in the belfry!” said McBatt. “You’re bonkers!”
“Not the belfry! The baffroom!” said Betsy McBatt.
“What, off the boudoir?”
“No! Back of the balcony!”
“We haven’t got a balcony. You’ve gone birdy.”
“Oh, that big whatyoucallit, then, behind the balustrade!”
“Oh off the landing, in the guest baffroom?”
“Yes! They’re driving me batty!”
“Short trip. I’d better be after them. Where’s the bat?”
“Bertie? You’re not sending my cat after them!”
“Not Bertie. My bat!”
“Check behind the Barcalounger.”
“Right-o.”
And with that, McBatt did wield his bat and banish those bats from the baffroom.

JRadimus

Every spring, I relive my greatest shame. When I was 9, I heard there would be try-outs at Yankee Stadium for “Batboys”. I couldn’t believe it: my lifelong dream of the past 6 years had come true. Amidst daydreams of patrolling our fair city by moonlight alongside our own caped-crusader (one I didn’t even know we had), I prepared my home-made costume for the auditions. It had to be perfect, naturally. I was so excited I could barely eat. I arrived an hour early; upon seeing the other kids, I refused to get out of the car. I hate baseball.

Justin

I wound up and pitched. She batted her eye right back at me. I dodged it, she made it to first base.
Making the giant zombie spider hitters use one of their own eyes as a ball lowers their sight advantage, but only a little bit.
You might think using an eye is cruel, but the zombie flesh regenerates when it is replaced.
We’ve got to win this game. Another loss means we have to feed more people to the spiders. It’s the only way to keep them from just overrunning us all. Who knew spiders loved baseball so much?

Norval Joe

“It would be so cool to be a bat,” she thought. “I could fly around and no one would see me.”
She climbed onto the back of the couch, hooked her legs and tried to hang over, upside down. She immediately dropped on her back. Before she could control it, a yelp escaped her lips.
“What was that?” Rebekah mumbled from where she sat across the room.
“If I was a bat, I could have a really cool name,” Fluffy thought to herself as she crawled from behind the couch, sat, licked her paw and acted like nothing had happened.

Planet Z

Moonlight Graham.
One plate appearance in the majors, then the season was over.
He went back home, got married, and became a doctor.
For fifty years, every cold, broken bone, and baby born. That was his work.
When he died, they found a closet full of blue hats he never got around to giving his wife.
They also found closets full of gloves, bats, and baseball memorabilia, broken and defaced in nightly fits of rage.
Then, in the crawlspace, all the children who’d gone missing over the years.
They quietly buried the baseball junk and bodies.
And the ugly truth.

The Dying Killers

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We smuggle the temple priests, women, and children out of the village under cover of darkness.
The jihad strikes at dawn, mercilessly killing everyone.
The children and women are told not to cry, lest we be spotted.
They cry silently, never sleeping.
The next day, we wait and watch the jihad march South.
Then, one by one, the killers drop dead in the sand.
Returning to the village, we see the destruction… blood everywhere, animals slaughtered, men cut in half, and buildings burned.
And the false granary, full of poisoned seed, empty.
The priests bless the dead, and we rebuild.

Fungusville

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There’s nothing unusual about Fungusville.
It’s a typical small town just a half mile or so off the freeway.
There’s houses, schools, businesses, and even a Main Street.
City Hall has a square with a cannon, a fountain, and a statue as part of a war memorial.
They have two churches, and they have a softball game on the Fourth of July every year.
No matter how many people I ask, nobody knows where the name Fungusville came from, or why someone would name a town after fungus.
Rubes!
I shrug and hop on the bus back to Hemorrhoid Falls.

Colin Cares

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Does Colin care?
You can’t tell by looking at Colin’s face. He’s always got the same confused expression on his face.
Colin is easily confused.
Snap your fingers, and he’ll turn his head to see what’s the racket.
Set fire to his shoes, and he’ll just watch them, trying to figure out why they’re burning.
“Don’t you care that your shoes are on fire, Colin?” I shout.
Colin just stands there, watching.
I pour a bucket of water on his feet, putting out the flames.
“They’re not my shoes,” mutters Colin. “They’re my roommate’s.”
And he goes back to staring.

Oatmeal and Raisins

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We shut down the particle accelerator, turn off the lights and call it a day.
Back in the break room, a food fight breaks out. We’re throwing cookies at each other.
Smashed cookies litter the floor.
And then, upon closer inspection…
“Wait,” says Dr. Thompson. “These are plain oatmeal cookies, right?”
“Right,” says his assistant.
“Then where did all these raisins come from?”
He picks one up, and begins to theorize on cookie particles in other dimensions, crossing over with energy transformation.
Then he tastes it.
And makes a horrible face.
I shrug and call the exterminator.
“We’ve got rats.”

Counting Sheep

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I’ve been having trouble sleeping.
I’ve tried counting sheep, but I’ve only got one sheep.
His name is Fred.
“One,” I say, looking at Fred.
“Baaaaaaaa,” says Fred.
“Jump over the fence again, Fred,” I say.
“Baaaaaaaa,” says Fred, and he grazes a bit.
So, I brained Fred with a baseball bat, carved him up, and cooked him.
Fred was absolutely delicious!
I woke up the next day, rested and feeling full.
The next night, Fred was back, standing by the fence.
And he was just as delicious when I ate him.
Sure, it’s the same sheep, but who’s counting?

The Orange Hair

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While I’m at work, the cat sleeps on my pillow all day.
I know this, because his long orange hair is all over the pillow when I get home.
I brush it off, roll up the clumps, and put them in the trash.
I go through this every day, going to work and coming back to find that my pillow had been shed on.
Beats having cat piss or cat shit on the pillow, right?
So I called an exorcist.
You see, the cat died three years ago, and as much as I miss him, I want this to stop.

Weekly Challenge #201 – What have I got in my pockets?

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and One, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was… was…. um…
It’s What have I got in my pockets?!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this year?
Zachmann
Steven
Justin
TJ
Anima
JRadimus
Norval Joe
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


Zachmann

What do you mean this time you don’t want another disaster and this time want to know what have I got in my pockets? Yes, I will put everything on the table and from the clothes I wore yesterday too. Keys, cell phone, Yu-Gi-oh cards, gum, some coins, a rock, crayons, a coloring book, a cat toy, a kitten, candy wrappers, a Sansa player, a Disk World book, bicycle inner tube with tire patch kit, Beef jerky, portable television , a Bionicles set, Legos, a sonic screwdriver, and an autographed photo of Harpo Marx. Dad, you know I hate laundry day.

Steven

Uncle Al smelled of vaporub as he poked at me. “How’s my little girl?”
My young voice squeaked angrily at him. “I. Am. A. Boy.”
Al ran his finger through his thick black hair. “Okay, little girl.” He reached out, and I felt a brief tug. “Gotcher nose!”
“I’m a boy! And that’s your finger, not my nose.”
I smiled. “I’ve got one too, Uncle.” I reached towards his scalp, then put my hand in my pocket. “Guess what I’ve got, Uncle.”
He shrieked, feeling the air cold against his suddenly bald scalp.
“Oh,” I said. “You figured it out.”

Justin

In my pocket are keys to other worlds. I keep them in a small notebook. I put them there whenever I find them. Sometimes I find them at work, and other times when I’m waiting in line at the grocery store. I even find them at church.
I’ve found a door. I check my notebook for the key that fits. I take out one of the keys and put it in the lock. The door opens and before me is my imagination. It flows out of the door and through me onto the pages. I hope you enjoy the stories!

TJ

Alanis always skated on past that hand she had in her pocket. The other one was the one out giving high fives or playing a piano or hailing a taxicab. The hand she kept hidden was the attitude of a generation. Think about the look – jaded ’90s hippie chick can’t be bothered to engage 100 percent in anything. The one hand in her pocket was flipping a bird in solidarity with a Reality Bites, slacker, coffee-fueled Seattle-centric vibe. Things make no sense, but what it all comes down to my good friends is that everything is just fine, fine, fine.

Anima

When I bought the jacket, I was looking for something more practical than my technical fleece. The ancient sherpani wanted a hundred fifty rupee, but settled for a hundred and the tube of chapstick, everything I had in my pockets. That night I noticed the value of the coat when my guidebook disappeared into its chasmic folds, followed by a 2 liter bottle of water. And a live chicken. I’ve lived in Katmandu 10 years now, carrying loads for trekkers – I make them pay extra for conversations about sports and politics. Wherever you are hajurama, I owe you 50 rupee…

JRadimus

“What have I got in my pockets?” The stranger casually fingered through his clothes, pretending to look for money he knew wasn’t there. Zara waited patiently, her fiddle dangling casually from her fingers.
Her offer seemed implausibly generous to him: a song for the largest bill in his pockets, sight-unseen. He wondered how she made a living; like most people, he didn’t carry cash anymore. During this distraction, Zara waggled her fingers surreptitiously. A now-familiar shock came over his face as he pulled a twenty from otherwise-empty pockets. She hid a smirk, pocketed her fee and played him his song.

Norval Joe

It was a bad area of town in a town already bad enough.
An old man sat, everyday, on the corner of Fourth and T. His name was Art King. He was old and wrinkled but sat on his soap box with such regal presence, everyone called him King Arthur.
A stranger pulled a knife on him and said, “Gimmee all you got.”
“Well, let me see what I got here in my pocket.”
He pulled out an old harmonica and said, “You can have it, and every other disease I have.”
He laughed, coughed, spat, and played a song.

Z

Stare at your target, synchronize alpha waves, and make connection.
I can’t explain MindJumping any better than that.
Neither can the Psychic Academy, but without their training, I’d be a drooling husk, rejected by strong host personalities.
Instead, I can leap, store my body in a Coma Hotel, and walk you around while searching your memories like pockets.
Jumping back stuns the host temporarily. By then, I’m long gone, with your secrets and money.
Not this time. Back at the Coma Hotel, someone’s buried a knife in my chest.
Not good.
Sorry, chump, but your ass is literally mine now.