Category: Weekly Challenge

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Forty-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 It seemed like a good idea at the time…!

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

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

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Craig

What these “nut bin” clowns don’t know, is that I am close to befriending a telekinetic embodiment of Christ, in the ward and very near my escape. Tranny-psychopath left an archipelago of revolting milky stains on my bed during recreation group. Endure this…refocus on laundry cart.

Psychiatric meds are inflicting torpidity in all of us inmates; even the geniuses sleep. Spattered feces in the halls…. Holy shit; perverted apes must be getting ready to prey on me. I’m scared… no security on shift except nurses.

Concealed, in the laundry cart ­­­– I deserted Jesus and escaped!

“Medication time… doctor? Doctor Yoon…?

Danny

Summer 1987, time for our annual college rafting trip. I’m introduced to a cute girl, I just had to impress her. Grabbing the rope of a homemade swing along the river’s edge, I jump from the height of a 3 story building. With a drought causing the river to be unusually low that year, I miss the water, instead smashing into the rocks of the river bank. My right leg, cleanly broken, all ligaments of my ankle, completely torn. All to impress a woman who married someone else less than 6 months later. Hey, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

AM Earley

“Listen,” Don said defensively, “We all know this marriage isn’t going to last six months.”

Kelly’s response was to grab the scruff of her cousin’s neck and forced him out of the hotel.

Wil looked at the other woman who was barring his and Don’s way. “Don’t bother calling the cops,” Darla stated. “They are already inside.” Wil looked in the ball room and confirmed five important members of the law inside.

As he picked up Don off the side walk, Wil didn’t question offering his services in divorce proceedings at a rehearsal dinner. He did wonder if he should have given his business card to the two mothers of the couple.

Jeffrey

After all what is wrong with a little D and D game. I mean we
all love it, and who wouldn’t, the roll of the dice, the hit
counts, the nine grown men all with duct-tape on some part of
their attire. It was a great time until the screaming
started, and the midwife sent the rest of them home. How was
I to know that she was a level 11 dungeon master. Now the
guys say they don’t want to play at our house any more. But
the midwife invited us to her place, so it all worked out.

Tom

When I was young I heard tell of a cowboy who took off all his clothes ran head long into a cactus patch. Upon extraction he was asked why on earth he did it. His replied “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” Last summer my oldest friend from high school was diagnose with a critical heart condition. His resolution to this was a walk down the railroad tracks and waited for an on coming freight. At the wake the family wonder why. I said “It must have seemed like a good idea at the time” Silence ensued.

Steven

I stop typing when Bob’s fetid breath flows into my cubicle. “Write
the good idea episode.”

“Huh?”

“Write where his companion says it seemed like a good idea to
gallavant across time and space in a telephone booth – but they miss
their regular boring day job and regular boring life.”

“Already?”

Bob nods. “There’s discontent. People are starting to want more from
their lives. Time for their hero to say that regular boring lives
are… important.”

“Time for him to lie again.”

“Exactly. Allonz-y!”

“On whose authority?”

A pepperpot’s shadow slides past my door.

“The highest authority. The highest.”

Zackmann

We thought cashing in on the Snowman Offsets was a good way too get rich. Hiring farmers
in winter to make snowman when they couldn’t work in the fields, Great Idea. At least until
someone discovered Snowmancromancy and used the snowmen to take over the world. Okay
just the northern states and Canada. One day the snowmen became self aware and stopped
taking orders. Snowmen put us in this igloo prison. We are hoping escape will be aided by an
early spring. After escaping, we could go inside Leavenworth for our crimes but at least we
would be warm.

TJ 1

On the plus side, it had quieted them down immensely.

Four fussy kids packed up on a cross-country car trip quickly got on
their dad’s nerves, and by day three his nerves were clinically
jangled.

So it’s easy to see the logic of dropping them in a safe place while
he and his wife stepped across the way for a quiet, sophisicated meal in
an upscale restaurant.

By and by, that silence became deafening. They hurried across to
discover that, as it turns out, four kids playing hide-and-seek can hide
themselves pretty darn well in the Museum of Natural History.

TJ 2

Bread in the ficus. Nearly a week’s worth of damp newspaper, and a few
half-filled spray bottles and water pistols. Rice crunching everywhere.
Noisemakers scattered among discarded clothing and — perhaps most
disturbingly — a black corset dangling from the chandelier.

Fortescue regretted their staging a local production of “Rocky Horror
Picture Show” as a fundraiser for the opera house — not to mention,
volunteering the Opera House. “Think of the fun! Think of the irony!”
he’d said.

Now all he could think of was the gallons of Febreeze, and the priest
he’d probably have to call in to exorcize it.

DJ

His toes gripped the smooth vine as he squeezed through the tunnel into the Temple. The priest waited at the entrance to the Alter; they bobbed to each other, dewlaps inflating in mutual respect.

He entered the impenetrable darkness.

There was a flash.

He found himself on a bony claw. Glancing back, he saw a black-hooded skull and froze in panic — but it only nodded and gently flicked its hand. He spread his wings to steady himself.

He had wings! Death forgotten, he launched into the air. He laughed, and a gout of flame burst from his mouth….

Norval Joe

The wind was cool and comforting as it blew across his sweaty forehead and through his golden curls.
Everyone had said as he grew, his chubby red cheeks made his face cherubic. Wings would be handy, right then, as he clung to the steeple at the top of the skyscraper.
People milled about, hundreds of yards below, on the street, unaware the masked crime fighter spied from above.
A gang of criminals broke the window of a jewelry store, grabbed as many diamond necklaces as they could hold and ran off.
Too high above help, Flypaper man could only watch.

Planet Z

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

A new fuel source that was rich in energy, cheap to produce, and portable.

What could possibly go wrong?

The world quickly adopted it, and technology advanced by leaps and bounds.

But after a while, what was marketed as a perfect solution turned out to be dangerous to the environment and increasingly expensive to produce.

Still, in the face of cleaner and renewable alternatives, humans refused to give up their oil economies.

War, famine, and death spread across the globe, and the few hardy survivors cursed their greedy and shortsighted ancestors.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Forty, 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 Holiday!

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

And if you want to spam your social networks with this episode, use the Share buttons at the end of the post.

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Zackmann

The hog looked scared. He had a that horrified and appalled look in his eyes like a person
reading a sick horror novel gets. I think he knows what the presidential pardon meant for him.
No one would pardon him and he was innocent of everything. You think that politicians would
have more respect for his kind but no they always want to cut their pork or put lipstick on them.
The hog knew when the president pardoned those stupid useless turkey, it was his hammy ass
on the line.
What do you think they where going to serve, eggplant?

My least favorite holiday is a celebration of treating people like cattle in a line to the slaughter
mixed with some bait and switch. It celibates commercialism at its worst.
It starts with the decorative paper mailed out to the unsuspecting public with the lies of cheap
electronic devices that conveniently won’t be in the stores, then tricking otherwise intelligent
people to stand in line for what seems like forever and finally the merchants chanting their
condolences of “Sorry, we have none in the back”. It happens every year with few wise enough
to stay home on Black Friday.

AM Earley

General stores with Christmas starting in July – bad. Specialty stores for holiday décor all year round – good. With this in mind we present to you:

Happy Everything.

In addition to the regular one holiday each décor, we provide cross décor. This is especially great when you don’t have time to change décor each month. We have shamrock valentines, Easter bunnies carrying jack-o-lanterns, and fireworks for every cultures’ New Years and nations’ Independence Days. Our spinning trees have fours sides of decor so you can have a different side facing the window each season. And our resin “Happy Everything” statue can stay outside all year long and represent everything.

Come on in we’ll show you.

Tom

My first truly adult job was during the holiday season of 1970. They needed extra check out clerks at the locale E. J. Korvetts. The garden/ hardware department had three cash registers stations. The last station was literally the last station in the department chain. It spent all but 2 weeks under a gray velt cover thus it was shinny and new but more important it ran smoothly and didn’t jab up. Night Floor mangers hated this station. It had the only cash draw with a three key lock. That meant three mangers had to be present at closing time.

Katwood

I love spending the holidays with my family. We all gather at my house, needing a few tables lined up end to end to fit everyone. The friendly fights over food, the good natured teasing and tormenting and then the after dinner activities. (Snowball fights if it’s cold enough, paintball wars if it’s not) The real fun, however, is preparing the food. We all work in concert to get it done on time, making sure everything is at its best. We do always have to make sure that we get all of the bullet fragments out of the meat, though.

Danny

The Holidays. Time for the only prodigal son to return home to his elderly parents, married for 62 years, something you often don’t see in this day and age. Time to reflect. Despite the failed business, the pending foreclosure, the persistent health problems, the uncertainty of my future, what do I have to be grateful for? To be able to sit down and have dinner with my parents over the holidays, to share great times together, along with my Maltese, Danny, the real Dwyer, life isn’t so bad. It carries on, despite the hardships, I’m damn lucky to be alive.

Steven

“How do you decide which direction to pray?”

Abdul shrugged, floating in the starship cabin. “Towards Earth.
Close enough, I guess.” He rolled up his mat and looked at Joseph.
“How do you decide when it’s the Sabbath? Do you use Greenwich Mean
Time?”

Joseph laughed at his station. “Of course not. You use Jerusalem time.”

Mary looked over her shoulder. “Both of you hush. It’s Christmas today.”

The men glanced at each other, then her. “Relativistic time
distortion,” they said together.

The ship dropped out of FTL. Earth shone before them.

“You’re all wrong,” Sarah said. “It’s Homecoming Day.”

TJ

The six bowls of chocolate pudding sat covered on the windowsill. The
children dusted the Highest Places They Could Reach while the ceremonial
chicken chow mein was prepared and ladled over rice. As they ate, they
recounted their favorite memories of the past year, which mom would
include in the Christmas letter. Then the pudding was eaten during the
traditional watching of “The Princess Bride,” after which dad headed
out and fired up the snow blower.

Yes, the First Blizzard of the Year was irritating in other ways, but
Sarah’s family had found a way to make it a holiday.

Norval Joe

My grand mum from England lived with our family when I was growing up. She had a lot of unusual expression she liked to use. Some were embarassing, like the one, “Keep your pecker up” that somehow actually ment “Keep smiling.”
She used one expression when she would rearange the furniture, which seemed to happen way too often. She would say “A change is as good as a holiday.”
She didn’t mean a holiday like Christmas. She called a vacation, like visiting second cousins in Bakersfield, a holiday.
Best Holiday we ever had was when she moved back to England.

Planet Z

The Museum hired me to collect concert and theater footage.

They send me back in time to record the greats before they were great, or who came before recording was possible.

Lilian Russell on Broadway.
Mozart in Vienna.
Shakespeare at The Globe.

I’ve seen them all.

And, so have you.

Every now and then, I get to pick my assignments.

Jesus and Caesar are still beyond our reach for the moment, but Henry Clay’s orations are not to be missed.

And then, an evening in the Cabaret with Billie Holiday.

Lady sings the blues, and I ride the chronostream again.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Nine, 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 Day Job!

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

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Tony

My eyes have become bloodshot staring at this living puzzle. Shift a room a couple of inches and the user’s psychological state shifts too. Enclose a space too much and the boss gets offended. Open it up and there’s a looming Orwellian/Hawthorne effect. Jesus, this office is too small to be driving me this crazy!

At least I don’t design homes. If a closet were too deep, the bathroom might not have a bath. Expand the size of the bathroom, and you’d shrink the living room. Or kitchen. Or bedroom!

I’d be too nervous to make changes. Way too nervous

Tom

My day job is playing Dr. Frank-N-Furter in a Furbee bar in mythic Connecticut. A happy tree friends version of Rocky Horror Picture Show. It’s really hot, not sexual, its damn toasty wearing a corset over a chimmunck suit. I truly believe the two greatest words in the English language are “Musical Theater” It’s a bit of a drag that the pay doesn’t quite meet the bills. Thank god for my night job in The City. Senior Account for Goldman Sack lets me channel that wild and untamed thing. Don’t feel it be it. Just be it and steel it

Zackmann

Say that employment office you sent me to isn’t a job office anymore. It has been massage
parlor for over two weeks now. When the clerk asked me why I was there she wasn’t really
listening. I said I was looking for a day job since I am a writer and everyone who reads my work
tells me to keep my day job. Yes, it was one of those massage parlors. Of course I enjoyed it
but I would have really liked to have had a massage. She said “Hey, Writer Guy come back for
the Happy Ending”.

AM Earley

Claire really liked her day job. Oh sure she had to make her deliveries between midnight and eight o’clock, but she saw more morning hours than office workers.

She was liked so much, that one of her clients requested that only she delivered to them. Even over the guys who have been there for decades. She finally asked the scientist who always received that cargo why they preferred her.

“The live specimens always arrived calm when it is you driving.”

“Well,” Claire thought, “if they are calm enough that I’ve never known they were alive, I’m going to continue singing every song in my I-pod.”

Steven the Nuclear Man

I guess it sounds easy. Maybe even fun. But it’s not. I can’t do
the simplest chores – fill out your check BEFORE the cashier’s done,
you douchebag!

I’m always busy. Hey – you! You park like a douche!

And I have to explain my job – no, ma’am, it’s not sexist because
douching was developed by our patriarchal culture. Douches aren’t
healthy for women.

Some days, I wish I could just make widgets all day.

“Quit bitching about your job! You’re a douche!”

You’re a douche!

At least I have job security.

TJ

Frank made a donut. Jen grabbed it on her way to the office, where she
designed a luggage rack on a 4×4. Mark dropped some mail off at her
workstation and turned up his headphones. He was listening to Wendy
argue with Bill on the radio, powered by a wind turbine designed by
Annie and built by Warren, which Rachel had negotiated the easement for
on Harold’s farm. Harold reworked his wheat field to accommodate it
and Jake took his harvest into town. Jane milled his flour and bagged up
some of it for Frank, who made … another donut.

Norval Joe

The masked crime fighter crouched atop the bank in the moonless dark.
He watched the bank robbers back thier unmarked van up to the glass doors of the entrance.
By day, he was an unassuming Pest Control Agent.
As the would be criminals gathered and placed the explosive charge on the door, he dropped lightly onto one of them and clung tightly. One by one, the remaining three tried to pull Flypaper Man from their accomplice and joined him in his sticky fate.
Eventually a policeman arrested the clump of men and carefully peeled each criminal from the super hero.

Katwood

Most people were relieved when the governments crawled out of their bunkers and reclaimed the world. Not me. While the governments planned and strategized, I grew up in a world where fighting zombies was a given. Now, there are “too many” zombie hunters. All the agencies say they can only have “mentally stable” people in their employment. Stability doesn’t matter, killing zombies matters. I can kill more zombies in a day than those buffoons could in a week. Yet I’m stuck taking out the trash as a day job, only being able to kill zombies in my off hours. Idiots.

Planet Z

My day job was to keep the world from blowing up.

I managed the antimatter flow at New Edison Power.

The plasma ducts vibrated in unusual harmonies, and I recorded them.

My night job is with the radio station.

You’ve heard of The Doctor Power Hour?

I’m Doctor Power.

I mix my recordings, weaving the whistles of release valves and other generator sounds into trance music.

The audience grew quickly, and I started doing weekend concerts to hundreds… thousands…

Instead of keeping it safe, I tuned the Generator for music.

It exploded.

Oh well. I still have my night gig.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Eight, 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 Potato Peels!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	Steven
	Tom
	Zackmann
	Katwood
	Danny
	TJ
	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):

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Steven

“We will find a way out of this. I promise.”
She slapped my hand away from her face. “How stupid do you think I
am? There’s only a hundred words in this story. Then we’re gone.
Forever.”
I looked around the sparsely-described kitchen, desperate for a way
out. My gaze landed on the bucket of potato peels Ma had left.
“That’s it!” I kissed Sally.
“What are you doing?”
“Remember when Ma had you peel potatoes? The thin peels would fill up
twice as many baskets, right?” I held the sharp peeler up to the
words. “Let’s get started.”

Tom

I uses to operate the missile systems on a X1 tank Could drop one of those puppies through a NBA hoop no net. So why you might ask am I sitting next to a mountain of potato peels of my own making? In a word: Willie. General Jack Rippers prize Jack Russell Well it use to be his prize Jack Russell. Who’ve guessed that a X1 heat seeking missile could’ve profiled a dog and Frisbee as a Russian with antitank rocket. When I pointed out the we needed an anti-dog over ride is the moment I got my new job.

Zackmann

Peelings, nothing more that peelings
trying to forget those peelings of spuds
Memories of French fries, scallops, and hash browns
she cooked but never shared with me
potatoes cooked by my love.
woe woe woe peelings
in the mulch pile becoming nutrition for the garden I love.
woe woe Peelings like my galley duty never ended
Peeling those spuds
Teardrops like I was cutting onions
because I cut my finger peeling those spuds
feeling like you never cook for me
feeling like I wish you never put me and a low card diet
but made me keep peeling those spuds.

Katwood

I’ve been peeling potatoes for months, years, I don’t know. I lost track long ago. It’s hard to remember a time when I wasn’t peeling. They’re everywhere, the peels. I can’t stand them. I once had a bin for them, but that’s buried somewhere in this mess of peelings. I peel and peel and peel, but there are never any less potatoes, only a growing sea of peels. Am I supposed to drown in them? I don’t know. I do know that I need to get out. The potatoes have to come from somewhere. I just have to find it.

Danny

Potato peels, the best part of the potato. Most full of nutrients, the peel is the only part of the potato that interacts with the soil, absorbing all the nutrients as the potato grows, making it the best tasting part of the potato. Fried, baked, or roasted, the peel is the most discarded part of the potato. A total waste. Ever notice the best mashed potato’s have the peels within it? Please, cherish your potato peals, spare them from the landfills whose space we need for our discarded alkaline batteries.

TJ

When you see potato peelings in the Great Pyramid, you don’t
immediately think, “It worked!” and that the great king Cheops
sprang to life and began peeling potatoes for his feast of the
afterlife. You assume a shepherd sheltered from the heat and grabbed
himself a snack. And in very nearly every other instance you’d be
right. However, when the guide, Denali, encountered a fortunate rat
nibbling on a fresh rind, his attention was drawn away from the bandaged
figure looming behind him … long enough for him to extend a bony
finger and drain him of his life force.

Norval Joe

“We have ways of making you talk,” the criminal mastermind said.
The agent silently sneered back at his captor, and shook his head.
The bald man laughed, “You’re all so brave when we start, but we’ve broken all of your predecessors before you.
“Agent X we soaked in olive oil until the truth slipped out of him. Agent M we buried in potato peels until he begged for mercy. I don’t think you will be so strong,” he said and turned on the TV.
“We have “The Wiggles” on an endless video loop. Call me when you’re ready to talk.”

Planet Z

Thanksgiving is right around the corner, so it’s time to grocery shop.
We both like turkey, gravy, stuffing, and cranberry sauce.
But when it comes to the mashed potatoes, we have our disagreements.
I like to leave the potato peels on when boiling the potatoes.
She doesn’t like the peels.
I like to add rosemary and roasted garlic. Adds a little aroma to the meal.
She doesn’t like them. Just adds butter and milk before blending everything up into the white gloppy mush.
So, instead of arguing, we make two batches of mashed potatoes.
Sadly, both gave us food poisoning.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Seven, 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 Penguins!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	Tom
	AM Earley
	Steven
	Katwood
	Zackmann
	Danny
	Ted
	Mrs. Abe
	TJ
	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):

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Tom

His black coat glisten in the sun. Black pear eyes glared at the Anaheim studio. As he dropped the violin case it rotated and he flipped the clasps. Out popped the min Uzi “Say hello to my little friend” yell the penguin. A hail of bullets dropped a dozen Disney execs. They crumple like autumn leaves in a Osterizer. From under a desk someone cried “Why?”
“You stole my life story so dance bastard” He peppered the floor will bullets. Up popped the CEO in the middle of a buck and wing the penguin dropped him
Happy feet my ass

AM Earley

My home has become a black, white, and pink warzone. I’m outnumbered six to one, even the dogs are females. If I am not going to loose my home when puberty comes around I need to make allies – quick.
Fortunately, my three daughters are obsessed with only penguins and princesses. Movies, Plushies, toys, everything.
So I gave my oldest all my old Batman comics, starting with the ones featuring Penguin.
I made my middle one is a sports nut. Guess which hockey team is her favorite?
The last one is the challenge. How do I connect with a toddler convinced penguins are perfect ballerinas?
Earley Midnight Production & Design
Life is our Art
Searching for a Medium

Steven

?She doesn’t know what to make of me. “You’re a long way from home.”
I waddle closer. The male with her frowns. “Don’t polar bears eat
them things?”
She leans over and smiles at me. “They live by the South Pole.
Didn’t you pay any attention to the movie?”
He grunts and tries to kick me. I waddle to the side and peck her
ankle. She screams as I dive into the bushes.
Next month, in the full moon’s light, I will meet my werepenguin
bride. We will hunt the man.
And he will feed our chicks all winter long.

Katwood

There comes a time in every young penguin’s life when they must venture out from the colony and see the world. For Pengy, this time had come. After packing his things and saying good bye to his friends and family, he left for his travels. During his adventures, he encounters numerous strange and interesting creatures, many of which become his lifelong friends and allies, and…
“No,” the boss said, “Why bother even trying to write for a kids’ game? Go get the license to something that’s currently popular and use one of the templates instead. Those brats’ll still buy it.”

Zackmann

Isn’t it weird how those animal rights activists “rescued” us from that horrible place that we had
trained the people to feed us?
Although I enjoyed being waited on hand and foot by those zoo keepers, all safe from hunters
and predators, this adventure has been fun. I have never been on a ship before since I was
born in the zoo.
Does it snow in the Galapagos Islands where the zoo keepers said we came form? All this cold
and snow I don’t think we can survive here. Some penguins don’t belong near the South Pole.

Danny

After the loud explosion, the two Penguins spent what seemed like months stuck in the same cage. Luckily, the food and water was plentiful, no need to eat each other. Fortunately one day, without warning, the door to the cage opened, and the penguins emerged from their prison, breathing the fresh air of freedom for the first time. The air smelled strange, like death. The buildings were destroyed, the streets were in decay. Humanity had finally destroyed itself. Then, one penquin turned to the other, and asked, “What’s the point of this?”

Ted

It’s our fault Antarctica University closed down.
Some of us kappas got drunk and decided to eat a giant penguin.
A terrible scandal ensued. The President apologized to the U.N., called us barbarians.
The papers asked how it tasted. We told them the truth: the outside was tough, fibrous, hard to cut through, but inside, my God, the flesh was so tender and succulent, though the meat and organs were surprisingly small for such a large animal.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Brian added, “we don’t even have any sports teams! What was Dean Wilson doing in a mascot costume?”

Mrs. Abe

The penguins huddle together, soaked with sweat and urine, smothered under the dark musty blanket.
Suddenly they are seized, plunged into freezing water, and beaten savagely over and over again. Red liquid fills the chamber.
Eventually the beating stops, but they are soon shoved into the hotbox. Scorching blasts of air singe them as they tumble against each other, groggy from the heat and queasy from the motion.
Finally, barbarically, they are turned inside out and left to hang outside–wet and swaying gently in the winter breeze.
Yep, it ain’t easy being penguins on a kid’s red flannel pajamas.

TJ

When zoos invented warm-water penguins so people in the rest of the
world could enjoy them, they flourished in the temperate climates and
lack of natural enemies. They quickly became too numerous and the zoos
made them available for pets. This was awesome. I got one of the first
penguins. I named her Penny. She waddles around and floops into the tub
when she needs a swim. She can get into the tub just fine on the ramp I
made her but she’s sort of … penguin-shaped, so she needs, like, a
boost to get out again. Penguins are AWESOME!

Norval Joe

“How can someone be claustrophobic and aggorophobic at the same time,” Oswaldo asked.
“I don’t know,” Bertram said, “but just look at him. He’s a quivering mass of black and white feathers. One moment he’s hot and bothered because everyone’s standing too close around him. So we all move away to give him space and he’s flapping about and squaking like he’s about to lay an egg.”
“Do you think that’s how he stays so slim?” Oswaldo asked, “all that nervous energy?”
“No,” Bertram fluffed his feathers and said, “he just doesn’t eat much. They says he’s hydrophobic as well.”

Planet Z

The phone won’t stop ringing.
I don’t want to answer it.
I can’t answer it.
I don’t have caller ID, but I know who it is.
Or… what it is.
It’s that damned penguin.
I was at the zoo, I was watching the penguins swim around in the tank.
I was using my cell phone to record a movie of them.
That’s when someone bumped me from behind.
And I dropped my cell phone into the tank.
They must have dried it out or something.
What? It’s someone from the zoo calling?
No. It’s those penguins.
I’m sure of it.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Six, 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 Halloween!

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Remember to post Rossotron as a separate story
ANONYMOUS
Always the same, black and orange. Always that nasty color combination
for Halloween. I presume it is a mixture of the traditional vampire
colors of black and red and the fall color of orange pumpkins. The
witches so often portrayed are black magic witches, so I guess that
makes sense; and black cats wouldn’t be the same as ginger
tabbies. But why must everything else be black and orange? When does
violet get its turn? What about all this ‘go green’ we
hear about? Wouldn’t purple witches and green pumpkins be
grand? Or is that just the Irish in me?
NORVAL JOE
Groups of kids rushed up the walkway to the door and hurried off to
the next house as two costumned boys lurched from the street to the
porch. “Trickertreet,” the taller of the two said as a woman opened
the door. “My,” the woman exclaimed cheerfully, “Who do we have here?”
The taller spoke again as he held out a plastic pumpkin, “I’m Igor,
Dr. Frankenstein’s assistant. My brother is Super Man, but he can’t
talk. He has cerebral palsy.” He helped his brother hold his bag out
to the woman. “Thank you,” he said as the two lurched away.
STEVEN
Sit down. I don’t care if you have fangs, or claws, or fur where you
shouldn’t. Sit down. Have some milk. I imagine this isn’t the response
you expected. Cookie? Sorry, I don’t have any raw childflesh. Would it
make you feel better if I screamed? I’m not going to. You don’t scare
me, Mister Monster-Man. There’s this girl, Sally. I like her, but
she’s way cooler than me. So I sent her a card saying how I feel. I
got a letter back. I haven’t opened it. I’m more scared of what’s
inside than I am of you.
TOM
Lenny what do you want to be for Halloween?” asked Mother. “A ghost,”
smiled Lenny. Mom got out her pinking shears and carefully cut two eye
sized holes in a old pillow case and gently dropped the costume over
Lenny’s head. “Time to go,” said Georgia. “Trick or Treat,”
cried Lenny. Mrs. Specter put a candy bunny in his plastic pumpkin. He
trotted back to show her. Lenny had been a ghost since he was six, saw
no need in changing now. Mom had saved each pillow case in the attic.
There were 57. “Tell me about the rabbits mom.”
KATWOOD
The zombie invasion started on Halloween, but nobody noticed for a
week. Everyone just thought it was a well co-ordinated prank,
especially the news. However, anyone who ran into these
�pranksters� quickly learned otherwise. It wasn�t
until the 4th that people realized that there were too many
�pranksters� for this to be a joke. I�m a little
paranoid, and so was wary of all this from the start. That�s
why I�m still alive. But this virus is too perfect, too
consistently fatal and too quick to appear to be natural. So, who
knows? Maybe it was a prank after all.
ZACKMANN
Yes grandma, I did have to bring the children in their costumes. After
what the wife and I sent on the materials for those they will wear
them all day and to a local Con. No grandma Anime cartoon convention.
I stopped buying anything from Guido years ago. No grandma the this
cake is not a lie and glad you are enjoying the Xbox. My wife thought
you would never use it. Happy Halloween. Happy birthday. I know you
never liked the coincidence but at least the children will remember
your birthday. It could be worse it could be Christmas.
EARLEY
Little Mario skipped past the Haunted Mansion, Hall of Presidents, and
the Liberty Bell. At the boat dock is a barrel of candy and a cast
member with a smile. After the candy is in his bag, she ask Mario,
�Where are your parents?� The three year old plumber
spins around and begins sobbing in the cast member�s colonial
dress. Thankfully she can see above the crowds. Princess Peach sighs,
adjusting Yoshi on her hip. Luigi makes eye contact with the cast
member and presses a finger to his lips. What is Halloween without a
�little� scare? Maybe Mario won�t leave
Luigi�s side again.
TED
They conquered Earth three years ago. The aliens demand revenge, but
how could we have known? The first December, they somehow learned
about Christmas. They made us stand in their living rooms for days on
end; presents at our feet for their conical green children. Those who
collapsed were executed. Last March they glued our hands to their
windows while they held a parade and drank green beer from cups held
in their clover-shaped appendages. Most of us survived. But now
we�re terrified. It�s early October and we see them
huddling their orange, pumpkin-shaped heads together and sharpening
their knives.
MRS. ABE
They boiled him. They sliced him. They chopped him into little pieces.
They grated his skin and rubbed salt into his wounds: pickling him in
his own juices. They kept his head in the freezer. They locked him in
the cellar and ate him piece by piece. They stir-fried him. They baked
him. They roasted him. And when they were done, the monsters threw his
decomposing corpse in the garbage like common trash. But one day a
year, just one, at the end of October, when he saw what happened to
the pumpkins, Sylvester was happy to be a cabbage.
ROSSOTRON
George loathed Halloween. He planned to lay low while the neighborhood
kids made their rounds, begging treats from strange adults. “WAAAAH!”
he screamed, spying the man in the corner. Floating. Above the ground.
“Friendly neighborhood poltergeist here,” the apparition moaned. “I’m
supposed to give you a heads’ up about the new Participation Law. Any
folks that don’t hand out candy get haunted until next Halloween.” As
George shuffled down the candy aisle, a young man caught his eye.
“It’s gotta be a trick, right?” George shrugged, and sighed. He was
NOT looking forward to the Easter Bunny’s visit next spring.
TJ
There�s a reason we don�t hold Election Day on
Halloween. We could send the candidates around trick or treating and
the ones with the most candy could be declared the winner. But the
fact that they could cheat and sneak entire bags of Mounds bars into
their treat bags suggests we ought to maintain the current system
� you know, terrifying political ads, mobs of angry voters,
mysterious ballot boxes that disappear into the night, letting the
dead come back to life to vote, the scary candidates themselves
� come to think of it, maybe we should hold elections on
Halloween.
PLANET Z
It’s Halloween, sitting with a bowl of candy on my doorstep. I
remember when I was a kid, dressed up, begging for candy. What
happened? When did childhood end? When I first got laid? When I got
out of school? When I got a job? No. None of those. My parole officer
said: You ain’t an adult until you go to trial as one. I cross my
legs, try to hide the ankle monitor. More kids walk by, see the sign
on the window, and keep walking. Oh well. More candy for me. And the
three kids in my basement.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Five, 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 Cabbage!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	Steven
	AM Earley
	Anonymous
	Katwood
	TJ
	Tom
	Zackmann
	Ted
	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):

---

Steven

The cabbages gained sentience on a Thursday.
They conquered the Earth by Saturday.
Some humans simply went mad, unable to deal with the vegetable voices
in their supermarkets, in their stomachs. Other humans required more
emphatic persuasion to submit.
A cabbage moving at high speed suffers little damage when impacting a
human skull.
The skull is not so lucky.
That Sunday, mass funerals were held for the victims of coleslaw
violence outside of every KFC. All countries, led by cabbage rulers,
declared peace.
At least the world was finally in harmony.
Until the next Thursday, when the rutabagas started talking.

AM Earley

Cabbage, beer and bratwurst combine to make my dad’s favorite meal. He ate it almost everyday. Oh sure, it tasted good, mom added carrots, onions and garlic. However I learned early on that I never wanted to sit in the same room with him for the rest of the night.
I found staying in my room was my best option, better when I stuffed a towel under my door. So I was stuck with doing my homework, or reading the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Maybe that’s how I ended up before all you nice people as Valedictorian of Elmwood High.

Anonymous

I know everyone poops, and every creature God created poops, but why don’t people clean up after their dogs? Before work today I had to roll the garbage can to the back of the house, around two other townhouses. I was dressed for work, and…guess what? Yup, I stepped in it. It was fresh and stinky and I guess hiding in a pile of leaves, cuz I didn’t see it. Since doggies don’t have opposable thumbs, their owners need to shovel up after them. Maybe I’ll go scrape my shoes on their front steps. Think they would get the hint?

Katwood

It’s a little known fact that dragons love cabbage, which was the root cause of the first dragon attack. The survivors told everyone that they were attacked for no reason by bloodthirsty monsters. That makes a much better story than “we were attacked because we wouldn’t hold up our end of a cabbage trade agreement or return the payment that we took”. This, of course, lead to an all-out war. Now, the few remaining humans hide as well as they can, to avoid being dragged off to grow cabbage. We would do it ourselves, but dragons are notoriously bad farmers.

TJ

Charles Babbage hated cabbage. He built up a machine
A Differential Engine to analyze cuisine
>From all the world over, Hungarian and Russian,
French, Greek and Korean, Rumanian and Prussian
Fed he into one end, machinery would clatter,
Analysis commenced on texture, chemistry and matter
If cabbage found he none, the meal would ensue
Even tho the end result resembled that of goo.
If cabbage was detected, the machine let out a blast
That thus avoiding, Charles did not pass along as gas
Cabbage free, his home took on a positiver air
Tranquil domesticity is all shall find you there.

Tom

A little know fact about the Irish potato famine was the effect of the baby zombies an army of cabbage patch children. Not the ugly toys from the 80s. but truly ugly little walking dead. At night you could hear their mournful cannibalistic cries. “Spuds Spuds” Damn near eat everything in Erie.
Some enterprising souls took to capturing Gabbages for their pots of lead. All that leaded crystal made the those who survived quite well todo. In remembrance of their deliverance Irish boil the cabbage and if they could get their hand on Elizabeth Windsor they’d boil her too.

Zackmann

I hated to move because I really miss my friend named Kim Chi. Every week I would have
supper with her and she loved to cook.She made what she called ham burgers with canned
ham patties and eggs served on an English Muffin. I thought it more of a breakfast but
sometimes we had lunch at night and our breakfast for supper. She always had rice and very
spicy vegetables. My favorite thing she made was a sort or pickled salad with Napa cabbage,
Daikon radishes, and lots of spice but I can’t remember what it’s called.

Please,come with me and take that basket because the Monroes gave me permission to pick
some produce from their garden. They are also a friend of Mr Howe’s who my wife promised
to make some fresh lumpia. Watch out for holes and don’t pick any white vegetables that
shouldn’t be white. Did I mention the Monroes have a vegetarian vampyre rabbit. No, he is
totally harmless and sleeps inside the house until dusk. Bunnicla only eats or rather only drinks
vegetables . Those white cabbages do look pretty creepy after Bunnicula sucks the life out of
them.

Ted

“Roll The Cabbage! Roll The Cabbage!”
It had been an annual tradition as Henry could remember and was one he truly hated.
Every summer the children hunted out The Cabbage hiding in the back of some closet and carried The Cabbage to the hill.
They rolled The Cabbage down the slope, sometimes hitting The Cabbage with sticks and tumbling after The Cabbage. Someone always got hurt, usually Henry.
“Jesus, I hate those bastards,” thought Henry just before vomiting and blacking out at the bottom of the hill. “It’s such a stupid nickname too; why can’t they just call me ‘Fatso’?”
This is my serious entry, the one that will win the Nobel prize. I don’t care how you do the narration, the father should be friendly but a pit paternalistic, “young Helen” can sound like a little girl. Peter’s father (“Corinthian stuffed cabbage!”) should sound like a proud Mediterranean older man, you can do the Greek accent for Peter as well if you want, I trust your judgment, Mr. Midget.

Her father was an art historian too. “Name the three Greek architectural styles,” he challenged.
Young Helen racked her brain: “the plain columns are Doric, the scroll Ionic, the leaves, um….”
“Corinthian. C for cabbage. Cabbage, Corinthian, OK?”
He died after she defended her dissertation on Roman temple carvings.
She met Peter while in Greece for her first sabbatical.
Dinner with his family. “Mom does most of the cooking but Papa is very proud of his regional specialties.”
The plate comes out: steaming leaves overflowing with meat and rice.
“Corinthian stuffed cabbage!”
They smell fantastic, and she begins to cry.

Norval Joe

I grew up down south around Bakersfield. My family was so poor we all lived in the same cardboard box. It was good we lived in Bakersfield, cause it don’t get really cold there or rain very much.
My cousin lived with us, too. He had a big old head that looked like a cabbage, so we just called him cabbage, his hair was green. Maybe he didn’t being called that cause he up and disappeared one day.
Times got really hard and we didn’t have much food. Funny, for a long time all we ever ate was cabbage soup.

Planet Z

Sure they were cute when they were young, but Cabbage Patch Kids don’t stay kids forever.
They grew up and became the Cabbage Patch Teens, and soon after, the lost and confused Generation Cabbage.
Imagine, trying to get a driver’s license, and all you have as documentation is a fake birth certificate from some toy company.
You can’t get Social Security cards with that, either, so you can’t get a real job.
Day laborers, prostitutes, drug addicts.
Now when you see them, by the side of the road, begging for food.
Once, you loved them.
But, you grew up too.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Four, 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 Cotton Mouth!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	A.M. Earley
	Tom
	Dave
	Stephen
	Katwood
	Ted
	Kathleen
	Norval Joe
	TJ
	Planet Z
Free polls from Pollhost.com

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

---

A.M Earley

“My mouth fells like cotton.”
“Well alcohol, mosh-pits and screaming at the top. . .”
Sheila didn’t get to finish her rant. Her brother Steven passed out on her. The concert-goers around them ignored his plight.
“He is thirty pounds heavier than me, but no one else gives a . . .” Sheila thought of mothers picking up cars, bent her knees and put Steven in a fireman carry. It was forty feet to the door and security.
Steven better be fine by the time the main act took the stage. She loved Steven, but damnit, this is rock-and roll.

Tom

As he took the podium all moisture vanished from his mouth.
A silver thread of doubt ribbonen through his puritan logic.
At first he thought it might be the absence of god.
Am I not called to duty directly by divine will.
After inspection his resolve returned.
A righteous gaze bore into the slumped head of Mistress Brown.
Ada was bound but not broken, met his gaze with defiance.
“Show her the instruments of the question.” Squeaked the preacher.
His mind may have been drenched in grace, but his palate was still parched.
Imagine that Cotton Mather a Cotton Mouther

Dave

It was the darkest, creepiest, building in the neighborhood.
Davey promises he will return tonight with his trick-or-treat bag. This will be the year he owns up for what he’s done to them in the past.
He fills his bag so much he can’t close it. Davey decides it is time to face his fears and make his last stop.
He rings the door bell, his nerves give out, he can’t talk, he has cotton mouth.
He dodges behind the bushes
as the door to Faith’s Embrace Foster Home opens.
A group of small children drag inside their annual gift.

Zackmann

Hello Hugh, I am calling about Charles, your dimension’s company representative. In our world
there are intelligent peoples who look like muppets so we are totally okay with people you
call plushophiles. Getting to the point he is in quarantine. Due to a case of what doctors here
call Cotton Mouth therefore he will stay an additional week and hopefully next time he will meet
someone from a good family and not go home with the first blue plush person he meets in a bar.
At least he knows what foreplay is. Cotton Balls takes much longer to cure.

Steven

Angie arranged the dolls around the table. “Teatime!” she yelled.
Ellie held his denim trunk still as Angie poured imaginary tea.
Bunny’s plush ears did not twitch. R.A. (Esquire) flopped his stuffed
head to the side, red yarn hair draping his shoulder.
“Raggedy.” Angie stared at R.A. “Have some tea.”
R.A. picked up the faded teacup. He glanced at Ann’s severed head in
the corner. She’d guessed wrong. He took a drink of pretend tea.
“Oolong,” he guessed, mouth dry.
Angie smiled. “Yes!”
R.A. sighed in relief.
“From what country?” Angie asked.
R.A. swore Ann’s button eyes winked in anticipation.

Katwood

Dear Sophia,
I am sorry I was unable make it to your wedding, but I was sick. I had to go to the hospital and everything. That alone should tell you how sick I was. It would have been fine, but I had a bad reaction to one of the medications they gave me. Sometime people just don’t listen, especially people who think they know everything. I’ll probably be out and back to work within in the next couple of days. I really did intend to go this time, too. But that damn cottonmouth bit me again.
From,
Your Friend

Ted

I love Thanksgiving: the parade, the sales, but most of all, the stuffing.
My first taste was Mom’s stuffed bird. True, it was pretty dry, but I was hooked.
I’d eat anything with stuffing: chicken, duck, even frog or cat, I reckon.
Midnight last Thanksgiving-Eve, the craving struck. I ate all the stuffing in the house. Every piece.
That morning was horrible. My wife was screaming, the children were crying. I left the house in shame.
I wanted to make it up to them, but how? I had been banned from every store that sold stuffed animals or upholstered furniture.

Kathleen

Thirst
What can I get you to drink?
Can’t decide
Try the water moccasin–house specialty.
Never heard of it.
It’s a girly drink, someone piped in.
What’s that you’re drinking Earl?
You know what I’m drinking.
Isn’t that a water moccasin
The one and only
So it’s a girly drink? I questioned
I’m Earl
So you own this place?
It’s a long story
This was Eve’s and Earl’s; now it’s only Earl’s
But the water moccasin?
It was Eve’s concoction.
Earl showed me his tattoo
Here’s my real baby– a cotton mouth. Isn’t she beautiful.
I’ll try that house specialty.

Norval Joe

“We’re going to make all those new toys pay,” the filthy, faded beagle barked and nervously tucked the seam together where his tail used to be.
“That’s right, No Tail,” the legless, one-eyed giraffe whined. “This will be a night the toy box will never forget. What do you think, Cotton Mouth?”
The teddy bear shoved a ball of loose padding back through his torn mouth and down his throat.
“Yes, they will all suffer, the same as us,” he said and pulled a butcher knife from beneath the bed. “Now if we could just get the stupid box open.”

TJ

Cotton-Mouth Jim didn’t get a song written about him. His brother,
Cotton-Eyed Joe, was kind of a slut. After that girl broke up with her
whiny songwriter boyfriend to be with him, he was regaled the world
over. Of course, everyone always asks about Joe, where did he come from,
where did he go, these eternal questions, but no one’s heard of the
songwriter. Cotton-Mouth Jim, he hasn’t been famous for anything since
he was 9 and he shoved two giant cotton candies in his mouth at the
county fair. That’s the kind of front-page photo that haunts a man.

Planet Z

I smoke way too much pot.
Way… way too much.
My mouth is so dry. When I drag my tongue around, little crusty bits come loose.
I spit them out. What awful colors they are.
It starts to hurt, so…
I smoke some more.
And it gets worse.
Everything stinks. I never clean in here.
Nobody wants to visit because it’s so awful here.
So, I smoke some more.
I can’t tell if it’s day or night.
The cable’s out. Phone’s out. I assume I got fired from my job.
What was my job?
Who cares?
I smoke some more.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-Three, 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 Ten!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	Chibi
	Steven
	Lynda
	Zackmann
	Katwood
	Norval Joe
	TJ
	A.M. Earley
	Ted
	Planet Z
Free polls from Pollhost.com

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

---

Chibi

Ten fingers and ten toes. That’s all she cared about when each one was born. But as time wore on, and each grew older, she began to wonder if the sense of independence she instilled in them would be a cause for future pain. One by one, they took off. Each child beaming at the possibilities, free from the confines of parental control. Each with their own dream of a life other than what she thought was to be. She anticipated the day would come when they all flew the coop. That time just came too soon.

Steven

The aliens told us to comply within ten hours, or face destruction.
We had to give them all our men. Forever. As bull studs.
Some men showed up. The female aliens weren’t ugly, after all. But a
surprising percentage of men preferred life with their families, their
lovers, their jobs.
We thought we had time to prepare.
The countdown clock had two hours left when we noticed the translation
was not ten hours, but “two hands of hours”.
The aliens looked a lot like us.
They had four digits on each hand.
We heard lasers, held our spouses, and prayed.

Lynda

When time travel became commercially available, it was used purely for entertainment. Hunting dinosaurs is cheaper than averting wars, evidently.
Then came the hyped and protested day when ten of history’s greatest warriors were gathered to fight a supreme death match.
The small man with the big voice stood in the center of the arena, introducing each fighter to a cheering crowd. His tuxedo and blinding white teeth were as out of place as his warning, “Keep it clean, kids are watching!”
The kids loved having their pictures taken with the referree’s charred, impaled head before all hell broke loose.

Zackmann

Ten little zombies all in a row. Out comes the twelve gauge where did they go.
Nine zombies. Cast iron pan hits one on the hat.
Eight little zombies really being where it’s at,at least until the baseball bat.
Seven little zombies. One shot by M-16 until again dead.
Six little zombies. More gunfire and where is the head.
Five little zombies one meets a chainsaw in a bathroom stall.
Four little zombies one has a nasty fall.
Three little zombies standing in a row seeing a hand grenade.
Should have used that sooner. Don’t yah know.

Since ten, ten, ten is binary for forty-two, like many others I am thinking of Douglas Adams. I
would like to tell you how by carrying ones in binary this is possible but there are Adam’s fans
smarter than I who have blog posts explaining that.
Every since a friend in high school introduced me to The Hitchhikers Guide, I started wondering
about Adams and his fiction universes.
My biggest question is about Gusty Winds from Salmon of the Soul. Why would a woman
whose pet poops in a different dimension want the rear end of her pet back.

I am Sirius Cybernetics Corporation’s GPP (Genuine People Personalities)
ebook reader. It makes me happy to serve you. Please read a book from me or
let me read a book to you. Ford told me Dale M. Courtney’s Moon People is you
favorite. Well after Twilight. I could gladly download you a brand new ebook for
an even higher costs than buying the hardcover or if you insist I could get you a
book in Public Domain free. When you are done reading or hearing me read, you
may put me back in that cold dark desk drawer.

Does my insurance cover acts of gods? What you mean if there was an act of thee God like
a tornado I would be covered but when Thor transports a military aircraft into my living room
there is nothing you can do? Just how do you think I am playing some kind of joke? I sent you
photographs. You sent an adjuster because you thought my pictures were photo shopped. This
is the tenth time I called you this week and I want my living room back. No, I don’t think the
military will let me keep the plane.

“Do you think if Douglas Adams would have lived longer there would have been ten books in a
trilogy instead of only five?” asked Zack.
“Maybe” replied the high priest “I believe there are currently thirty-five books in the Xanth
trilogy.”
“Should Doug Adams be considered the grandfather of podiobooks since his radio show proved
people will buy books even if they had heard the audio free?” said Zack
“No sir, Scott Sigler invented podcasting and the very Internet”
Zack wished he had not gone to an alternate universe in which Siglerism was taken seriously
and became the predominant religion.
by zackmann

Katwood

Ten minutes. Then everything will be in place and I can slip in. I’ve been observing for weeks, since the day when I first laid eyes on that golden cobra, with its graceful wings and minute details. It will, it must, be mine. Security will not be as much of a problem as in a major museum. I’ve studied this place, looking for a weakness, and I found one. I’ve been waiting in this unnoticeable spot for hours, waiting for the moment that it’s unguarded. The electricity and little explosive go off. I move and it is mine. Now, escape.

Norval Joe

One wiener dog sought revenge against evolution’s ridiculous design flaw.
Two bricks fell in love, eternally separated across the chimney.
Three flounders swim in circles and make silly, bug-eyed faces
Four Studebaker Larks discussed the weather and slowly rust away.
Five small mountains entered official negotiations to form a range.
Six sub-atomic particles are still way too small to see
Seven eleven has Slurpees for sale in four different flavors.
Eight planets mourn the loss of one of their members.
Nine monsters under the bed wrestle for the best spot.
Ten bowling pins futilely brace themselves for the inevitable assault.

TJ

Ten tents attested to the intensity of the intent of ten Terwilligers to test their testosterone up the Grand Tetons. Tempestuous winds tore across the timberline as timberwolves took shelter in the trees. The Terwilligers trekked tenaciously toward the top but stopped for the night without attaining it. They?d trapped rabbit and stewed it with tomatoes, tarragon and thyme which made for a tasty repast. The trip would?ve been ten times better had they attained the summit. Tragically, Tommy Terwilliger took sick and his temperature topped 100, so they packed up the transport and returned to town tout-suite. Too bad.

AM Earley

“Ninety-four years is a long time to be alive. But I feel ten years old.” I looked at Granddad and instantly got the reference. He was diagnosed with breast cancer ten years ago, remission for seven. I figure I will wait a few days until I tell him the results of my test. I’m not going to do the chemo like he did. I do have a few days before I decide what to do. Today I watch Granddad blow out his pink ribbon birthday candle. In ten years I will celebrate with a candle but definitely not pink.

Ted

Everything should come in tens: commandments, fingers. hotdogs, armadillos. You name it, it should come in tens.
Sometimes I’m the only one who cares. Once I lost my job at the theater for drawing in the missing dwarves.
But the fans loved me: “Ten Inning Charlie,” they called me.
Until the accident, of course. When our jet went down in the Rockies, only the pilot and shortstop died on impact. The rest of us were unharmed.
“Pitcher Sole Survivor,” the papers said.
Sometimes at night I can still hear their screams, the copilot’s especially.
But everything should come in tens.

I won the lottery today. After ten years playing the scratch-off I finally beat that sucker! Who’s laughing now, Gamblers Anonymous?
Now I’m gettin’ me the royal treatment on a first-class trip to Vegas. Yes sir, I feel like Elvis: presidential suite; five course lobster breakfast; Olympic-sized Jacuzzi with a wetbar and a waterproof (I hope) flatscreen HDTV; four escort girls; and a mountain of cocaine.
All comped of course. Casinos don’t ask questions when they know you have a gambling problem and a winning lotto ticket.
But they should. A $10 scratch-off payout don’t buy too many of chips.

Planet Z

The gymnast chalks her hands, takes a deep breath, looks to her coach for the signal, and begins her run.
She remembers her training, years of pain and repetition.
The Party bosses watching her in approval, implied threats to her and her family.
“Only gold,” they said. “Only tens.”
Once she entered competition, that’s all she earned.
Now, at the Olympics, this was her big chance.
Still running, she turned at the pommel horse, made a beeline for the American judge, and shouted “I DEMAND AMNESTY!”
The crowd erupted in cheers, and she earned something more precious than gold.
Freedom.

Laurence Simon

Many years ago, my family took a trip to Washington, and we toured the Air and Space Museum.
Off in a corner, the Charles and Ray Eames film “Powers Of Ten” played in a loop.
I watched it zoom out from the man on the blanket out into the universe, and then shrink down to quantum mysteries 3 times before my family wondered where I was.
Would I be a scientist?
Would I be an astronomer?
No, I am neither of those. I never did follow those dreams.
Instead, I came away with something more valuable: a sense of perspective.

Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number Two Hundred and Thirty-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 Banned!
VOTING

Which were the best stories this week?
	Katwood92
	Ross
	Dave A.
	Tom
	Zackmann
	Justin
	Terence
	TJ
	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):

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Katwood

It was a happy day when the politicians were banned from Earth. Not just some of them, all of them. Now they live on some moon somewhere. Around Jupiter, I think. No one’s quite sure who started this process, or how. Regardless, they deserve a Nobel Prize. Governments around the world are much more effective now that the people in charge are there because they truly want to help, not for their own gain. In five years, we’ve managed to get things done that politicians only talked about. Now we just have to get something done about those pesky lobbyists.

Ross

First books were banned, then schools, then education in general.
Soon followed prohibitions concerning consumption of green vegetables, bathing, newspapers (and news reporting in general), public displays of affection, and regimented exercise. People were at a loss with what to do with all their free time when employment was banned.
But the final straw, which incited rebellion and the eventual downfall of the empire, was the proclamation banning “girls and their cooties”.
Years later, looking back, the historians all agreed that it had been a monumentally bad idea to allow the child-emperor to dictate law according to his 8-year-old whims.

Dave

“Can we play at Shagnasty’s?”
Taylor, the drummer, explained their situation, “No, Nigel, we’re banned
there too. That was the night your leather pants split and you were
arrested for indecent exposure.”
“Just because a man drops his pants is no reason to stop a concert. Can we
play at Tommy’s?”
“You drove the van through their front window. Banned”
“The Green Olive?”
“You set fire to the pool tables. Banned”
“Can we practice in your parents’ garage?”
“If you come near my mom, my Dad, will kill you, and the band voted, we
think it’s best if you leave.”

Tom

I was 11 years ago when the gulf of Tokin resolution occurred. Seven years later the damn war was still raging. I had gone from child to young adult and the war from remote to perilously close. The year before my lottery call a book began to appear around my high school. It had the dubious pedigree of actually being self-banned by its author and publisher in the interest of nation security. Its hero was a solider who had lost are his limbs eyes ears and mouth. I failed to heed its message, so I’m send this one in Morse code.

Zackmann

Are you coming to the book club meeting tonight? We are choosing a banned book to read.
Would you like to read Twilight?
Do they ban books for being dull.
No it was for religious views or necrophiliac pedophilia.
We were really thinking maybe Fahrenheit 451 or Brave New World.
Maybe a banned book with murder, war, incest, and genocide.
The Bible?
Exactly
Is Dave coming?
No, the meeting is at the Pork House and Dave doesn’t want to come since the owner’s wife
banned bacon stuffed bacon wrapped in bacon cooked in bacon grease from the menu.

Justin

I went Wal-Mart dressed up as a ninja, complete with all black attire and mask.
I walked in and I knew people were staring at me, but I didn’t look at anyone, just kept to my mission; buy a banana.
I went to the produce section, grabbed a banana, and headed, coins in hand, to the registers.
I skipped the nearest one because it was an older lady who looking like she’d faint, so I went to the next one, a guy who saw my banana, said ‘never mind’ into the phone and hung up.
I probably could’ve been banned.

Terrence

The TSA agent looked me in the eye, not even a hint of a smile on his face.
“This is getting a little ridiculous.” I said placing my socks into the bag. The agent nodded for me to continue. I reached for the electric shaver. “Really?”
“Could braid your hair to make strangling cords.”
“I am thinking about that myself right now.”
That apparently was the wrong thing to say. Now, I’m sitting in a small room with a metal table and two chairs bolted to the ground. Looks like I’m going to be the next thing banned from flying.

TJ

Banned?! You want these materials banned from the library?! They are a
classic! I cannot STAND when books are banned. Children have a right to
be exposed to a wide variety of differing views. How silent would be the
forest if only the best birds could sing? You don’t know! A book like
Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” could spark a movement against
injustice! It’s an outrage! I protest! Information wants to be free!
Sir, while I don’t disagree with you on any particular point, donating
your old Playboys to a middle-school library is simply asking for
trouble.
Heh heh heh.

Norval Joe

There is a small European nation wedged between Germany and Austria that has been so totally forgotten that no one outside its borders even remember its name, or where exactly it is on the map.
That’s fine for the residents of that country. Their goal as a nation is to remain unchanged from their traditional ways.
The last change there was after World War II when the United States forced them to abandon their royalty for democracy.
Offended by the interference they banned anything to do with the US, except for Walmart, since everything there is made in China.

Planet Z

There’s a party on the base, and my orders are to find it.
I check my weapon and step out of the jeep, walking into the restricted warehouse.
Everything that had ever been banned was in there: books, guns, drugs.
You name it: if it’s banned, it’s in there.
I walked up to the security desk and was waved through the gate.
“Follow the music, you’ll find the party,” said the guard.
“Do I need to I leave my sidearm?” I ask.
“Nah,” said the guard. “There could be dueling.”
Good, I say, and burn my invitation with a lighter.