Short Phone-out

Oh no, the horror!
No texting and no phoning
For a couple hours.

Long Term Lose

If our rating falls
It’s not likely to come back
For a good, long time.

Lollipops’ Pacifying Effect

The bars just closed down
And the drunks are getting mean;
Give them some lollys.

sucker

I heard about this on Wait Wait and it cracked me up.

The Color of Sound

I heard a story about Ida Maria on NPR.   She has synesthesia, and sees colors associated with words and sounds.  I’ve always kind of wondered if this would be distracting.  But, thinking about it a little, I think the worst part about it would probably be that other people wouldn’t perceive things the way you did, and so communicating with others could be rather difficult.  But, it sounds like she’s figured out how to deal with that, and knows how to perform with other musicians.

Never #1

US students test
Poorly in history, in
1943.

chronic problem

I know I’ve heard several of these in my lifetime,  and I’m glad somebody finally pointed this out.  I know I’ve wondered how our ranking has changed over time, but I never really expected someone to actually report on it.

3 Minute 6, my attempt

I could say I sent an entry at the last minute, but that’s not exactly true.  I’d almost forgotten about it, but this afternoon I remembered and checked to see when the deadline was.  Even though I hadn’t written anything until this afternoon, I’d had an idea ruminating in the back of my mind.  And, even though I hadn’t consciously thought about it, I was able to come up with a suitable ending.  Or, at least, I should say, one that I was fairly happy with.  I doubt I’ll win, especially considering the last minute nature of it, but I’m still glad I wrote a story for it.

3 Minute 6

That’s right, 3 minute fiction is back.  This time around, the special condition is to have one character laugh and one character cry within the telling of the story.  It can be the same character at different points in the story, but both have to happen within the telling of the short story.  I have a couple of ideas, but I’m not sure if any of them will pan out.  I’m beginning to hate the one entry per person thing.  But, at least I can write several different attempts and submit the one I like the best.

3 Minute 5

Well, I submitted an entry.  Yay!  I had several ideas that I tried to write and entered the one I thought was the most creative (least likely to have entries similar to it), but I still don’t know if it was that good.  Still, I’m happy that I had to pare it down.  I tend toward brevity, so having to rewrite to shorten is somewhat refreshing.

The fun thing with this entry was deciding if the house was actually haunted.  The answer could be yes, no, or maybe.  And maybe was my personal favorite.  Having events happen that could be a haunting but weren’t definitively so, makes for an interesting story.  I ran into some trouble with how to end with ‘nothing was ever the same again after that’.  I didn’t know if it was allowed to add things to the beginning of the sentence.  But, luckily, I didn’t feel the need to test that with the story I entered.  All in all, it was a fun writing process, and I’m glad I decided to write through several ideas until I found one that I thought worked best.

Haunted House … Everything Changed

There is a new round of 3-minute fiction:  the story must begin with the line, “Some people swore that the house was haunted”; it must end with, “Nothing was ever the same again after that.”  I’ve written a couple of attempts; the first one was too long, the second one too short (if it can be too short considering they don’t seem to have a minimum). I have a few other ideas, but I might just rework the second one; I like it better as a storyline, but it’s harder to write in some ways.  My personal experiences diverge more from it.

B.K. Doe

A missing persons,
Who’s lost his identity;
He can’t remember.