The lamp wouldn't turn on. Off, yes. around, yes. But on, absolutely not. No matter how many times he flipped the switch, no matter how many times he prodded it, shook it, swung it over his head, he could not get it to turn on. He decided to coax it. First he offered it things that humans like: chocolate, love and affection, sex. The lamp did not budge. Then he offered it things that his cat liked: mackerel, catnip, a laser. Nothing. He tried reasoning with it, but the lamp was dead to his entreaties. Look, he explained, you staying...
The ceremony was fine, stuffy and long but fine. The party had been alright, except that her father had booked a stuffy classical six piece when they really wanted to get a soul band.
But the father-in-law was paying so you could only say so much, and she never ever stood up to him anyway. So he had to spend five hours in a restrictive tuxedo, stealing glances at her as she danced with her father, with the best man, nodding and smiling as old ladies pulled at his arms so they could kiss his cheeks and congratulate him, telling...
They had only met a through days ago through the happy coincidence that they were staying at the same hotel on the same island at the same time. They had met at a bar, neither their friends back home would be surprised by that fact, and had become fast friends.
Gloria was twenty-one, a full time secretary who was travelling alone, just needing to escape the soap opera of a life she had back home.
Mallory was a second year student, on holiday with her mother, step-father and three much younger half-siblings. She had been relieved to find a kindred...
They were the best of friends, but the worst of enemies. My husband and his brother would become like tigers fighting for turf or for female companionship. And they would never stop. I liked it when we first met because, of course, my husband, then my roommate's friend, fought for the right to sit beside me at the dinner table, to talk to me, and would find all sorts of ways to stop his brother from any contact.
He didn't have to do that. I didn't like his brother much. They looked exactly alike, although there were 10 months between...
…and at some moment you realize how wrong you were all that time. You don't need this anymore. Absurd. So annoying. You hear same phrases, stories, noises. And you cant do anything about it. You try to explain but what can you do when you are not used to explaining yourself. You have that stoned look on your face and not a thing can disturb you now. Because all you can hear are your thoughts. All you can feel is…and you make your first shot...
Same silence, the only difference is that you can actually hear that ear-breaking noise. Three...
i could be someone else,
a beauty queen,
a famous singer,
I could be an artist,
painting mountains and seasides,
making millions.
i could be a tv producer,
sitting in a beach chair and yelling at cast and crew.
But i choose to just be me.
I'm not a beauty queen,
an artistic genius,
or a tv producer.
but i'm unique.
there's no one else who can see through my eyes,
No one has walked two moons in my sneakers,
and that's the way i like it.
my mind is uncharted territory, my soul has never been explored. i'm a...
Bombs were the last thing on his mind. The first thing on his mind was an egg salad sandwich. Then bombs. He had exactly two things on his mind.
He was a very simple fellow, a bomb enthusiast who ate nothing but egg salad sandwiches. He didn't even have a proper name. Just He. Sometimes He answered to His or Him, depending on the tense.
There was a bomb in the bedroom and, being a bomb enthusiast, he was enthused by this. The only way to defuse the bomb was to eat the fuse. The fuse was not an egg...
You can count me out. In teaspoons if you wish, but it might take a while. I prefer metric, none of that standard or imperial nonsense, it's just not scientific.
You can count me out, I'm certainly in the process of it. Measuring it all, repurposing the materials to a better purpose. 3.7 litres of potable water, the rest bound up in organs or areas that I have not processed yet. 2.5 grams of iron, perhaps that will go to the electromagnet I am constructing, perhaps to the dynamo. But what am I saying? It will have to go to...
Wet asphalt sparkling under the white sky. There is a yawn of blue. Sometimes fall is brighter than summer, more alive with moisture and energy. Some things are dying, but many things end like fireworks.
We can be categorized in many ways. Let's divide us into the standing, the sitting and the reclining for the time being. Then let us separate into summer minds, winter minds, spring minds, fall minds.
You're going to yawn. You're going to stretch your eyes.
Prison is for mossy bricks, reinforced iron bars, decrepid toilets and savage guards beating on the door every morning. How can it be anything else?
And yet, within the confines of this framework, there is a nook as tangible as any cell; the walls are closing in on me, invisible monsters lurking in the dark, only — these are worse than any monster imaginable, for they do not breathe, do not reason. You can't reason with walls.
The post seemed like a good idea at the time, for who doesn't dream of directing such a large, historic enterprise if given...