Tell us a story!

[Mr Saturn64 742]

So on Easter, my huge family and I (my grandmother had 7 kids) were sitting around, because people just sit in groups and talk. So we were sitting in the living room watching a documentary on the War of 1812. This conversation follows.

My Uncle: War of 1812? It's Easter, what's that have to do with Easter?

My Cousin: well, there's really nothing good on

Me: yeah, there's some stupid shows. Yesterday we saw an ad for "Hunting Bigfoot".

*my really hairy cousin walks into the room.

My Uncle: There he is!

---

And another pointless conversation between my mom and my brother that occurred today;

My brother: my right thumb is bigger than my left thumb

My mom: because your right handed. Generally if your right handed your right thumb is larger.

Me: mine are the same size

Mom: because your ambidextrous (I really am naturally left handed, I spent preschool learning right handedness)

My brother: actually my left thumb is fatter than my right.

[ROFLyoshi 1,760]

You sound as if you are accident prone. I never use machine tools without a fence or guard.

A little, but in this instance rather what happened is someone reached around to turn off the machine as a joke, so I reached over to switch the machine on. I didn't realise my hand had slipped between the tool guard and the machine.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Once upon a time in a land far, far away there lived a snuflopagus named Bill, who was to go to school on the next day for the very first time. Bill was afraid because he had never been to school and didn't know what it was all about. His mommy told him it would be very good for him, and she have him a book bag with a blank binder in it and a big pencil, sharpened at one end.

 

When Bill's daddy came home from work, Bill told him he was afraid of going to school. Bill's daddy said to him in his big gruff voice, “What? Afraid? Nonsense! Every little snuflopagus who goes to school for the very first time tomorrow will be just as worried about it as you, so you will have lots of company.”

 

Just then Mommy called them to wash up for dinner, and they went and did that.  Then they all went and sat down at the table to eat. Mommy had made one of Bills favourites, koodle-berry stew with umflings. Bill ate his portion happily and asked for seconds and ate the second bowl as well.

 

By then it was time for bed  After brushing his teeth and getting on his jammies, Bill went with Daddy to the bedroom and got in bed. Daddy read some more of the story of the wide world he had been reading to Bill until Bill dropped off to sleep.

 

The next morning, Bill's mommy helped him dress up in his new school uniform, and sent him off to walk down the block to the school with his bag in hand. Bill saw Sam walking along in uniform and with a bag, too. “Do you think it will be awful?” asked Bill.

 

“Naw,” Sam replied. “Everyone our age is going today so we will have a big bunch of others to play with and talk to”.

 

So the two snuflopagus children walked down the block to the school that was on the corner.

 

{Now, if the dish doesn't run away with the spoon, I'll tell you some more tomorrow.}

[airman15 4,113]

I'm feeling the same way going into College. I start on the 26th and i'm a little nervous about what my classes will look like and what my teachers will be like. Going into college will be new to me but at least there are a couple guys I know who are also going.

[AkemiAzula 280]

I barely remember my first day at school back in 96. I don't think I made any friends but I pleased the teachers enough as they wrote about my 'outgoing personality' in my first report. I do remember that my main interest at the time was in the girls at school and I tried to befriend them but many found me weird and creepy lol.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

{Unfortunately, the dish was attacked by the spoon and broken.  More interesting replies?}

[KevinPaul06 57]

My Tarantula won't eat.

 

-The End-

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Requiescat in pacem.

[AkemiAzula 280]

So today we had a barbeque at work and I was cooking the meat. I thought it might rain but it didn't.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

The sun was shining on the sea

Shining with all its might

It did its very best to make

The billows smooth and bright

And this was odd because it was

The middle of the night.

 

It was midnight on the ocean

Not a streetcar was in sight

I opened my umbrella

For it rained all day that night.

A barefoot boy with shoes on

Stood a-sitting in a tree;

And when I put my glasses on

I heard this melody:

 

Be kind to your web-footed friends,

For a duck may be somebody's mother.

Be kind to the denizen of the swamp,

He's a dilly through and through.

You many think that this is the end,

Well it is.

[airman15 4,113]

I have another story from work. This happened to me during my first season on the job. 

 

It was a carpet cleaning job and it was only supposed to be an easy hour cleaning a couple of rooms and a hallway. There was a lady and her son that lived there and the house wasn't very tidy. The son's room had stacks of novels and papers everywhere and the master bedroom had clothes laying all over the floor.

 

As part of our routine, we connected the hoses, got the machinery ready and I started to spray the carpets with a solution that breaks down the grime deep in the carpets, which we like to call pre-spray. Then we would use a wand that extracts the pre-spray and steam cleans the carpets. My dad could hear the lady from the other room; yelling and ranting at her son (who looked to be in either his 20's or 30's).

 

While I was spraying, the lady approached me and asked me if I could move the bed. I wasn't exactly sure what she meant by 'moving the bed'. I told her "We could try to inch the bed away from the wall and get underneath it." She snapped at me by saying "That doesn't answer my question!" So I went to get my dad to talk to her and I was standing next to him. He then explained to her that we don't move beds, only sofas, chairs and some tables. Without hesitation the lady scolded us to get out.

 

And that was it, we just packed up our equipment and left. We never serviced her again. This is also the first and only time we have been kicked out like this. Some people are funny, i'll tell you that.

[Mr Saturn64 742]

My recently retired uncle who was a cop was in his car pulled over around 54th and Chestnut in West Philadelphia when a car came zooming down at around 59 MPH ans the driver throws trash out the window. So naturally, as a cop, he chases the driver. The driver ignores the sirens and continues on their way. Over 10 blocks east at 43rd and Chestnut, the driver stops. The driver was actually a nun, who drove 50 MPH and littered, who went to the former seminary there (it collapsed in 2004 :( :( it was a work of art, now it's in ruins). Just goes to say that there are some people with good intent that do some- ah, never mind.

[airman15 4,113]

I also have an uncle who was a policeman in Fremont. He started as a traffic cop, moved to detective and then went back to his old position before he retired around his 50's. I got to ride along with him when I was about 6 and I sat in the back seat to see what its like. It's a good thing I never had to be in the back seat for anything else.

[Muck308 55]

About 6 weeks ago a friend of mine who is separated by a good distance asked me to join him in a writing exercise. His proposal required the two of us to exchange various works of writing once a week. Short stories, poems, journalistic observations, or pretty much anything showcasing our, admittedly fledgling, practice were agreed upon as acceptable. Our busy lives allowed both of us to become quite lazy with this after only 2 weeks, but I thought I would share one of the works I actually finished. I wrote it quickly. In about 25 minutes at most. I read it before posting it here to be sure there was no profanity, which there was a tad and therefore censored. Still I resisted the urge to rewrite for the sake of displaying a first draft. Please give feedback if you like. I doubt I'll go further with it, so rewrites are unnecessary, but still,please critique if you're so inclined.

 

Remember The Rash

 

    Nickel. No wait. Aluminum? To be honest, the gun could have been made of macaroni.
The fact that it was pointed, no pressed, upon my forehead was a far more prominent thought compared to the physical makeup of the weapon.
Beyond that, the chemical makeup is what reminded me that a mere nanosecond from now the hammer could be released, thus beginning a swift exit of a bullet
from the barrel, only to just as swiftly enter my skull after breaking the skin. Then, more than likely, another exit.
This time more vicious and surely doing more damage to the back of my head than it would by removing itself from the barrel.
I scratched my arm. Dragging my nails up and down my forearm was a welcomed, albeit foolish, action for two reasons.
Firstly, the rash left by coming into contact with the poison ivy one day earlier meant I would only worsen the affliction.
Secondly, because now the man attached to other end of his weapon was actually cocking the hammer. Crap. And here I was hoping he was an idiot.
Or at the very least enough of a fool to have become lost in the moment, forgetting to properly place the hammer.

    No, I am not a spy. I am not a military man. I’m not even one to lead any type of life that would ever be considered exciting, let alone fulfilling.
I’m a man of a certain age that suggests that by that age, I would have done more with my existence. I live alone and have no family now that my parents have passed.
By comparison, my parents lead an exciting and certainly fulfilling life together. Their deaths put me in the position of caretaker for a glorious home that I never
really enjoyed. Contact between my parents and I in their final years had been minimal. The house I now looked after was only inhabited by my parents after their
simultaneous retirements. And even they didn’t inhabit the home all that often. They spent their days, more aptly considering their attitude, travelling and otherwise
squeezing the last delicious bits of life the way I sucked the pulp from a grapefruit half. While they were left with memories, I was left with dirty dishes and sticky
 fingers. While they explored the world I contemplated deep dish or thin crust. Surely I was adopted but my inability to actually be concerned by that possibility
meant it would always remain a mystery. Now I’m being dramatic.

    It had been a few months since my parents’ passing. I had finally gained the motivation needed to get some work done. Not the kind of work that expands
one’s coin purse, but instead the kind that shrinks one’s mind. I had a bit of gardening to do. The west side of the house had become overgrown with weeds to the
point that they were now scaling the exterior walls. Stalks as thick as my thumb gave way to various greens the likes of which were surely not sought after by the
weekend warriors at Home Depot’s garden center. This was a thicket of neglect and I was there to dismantle it.

    I felt far too powerful in this regard. As if to think my decision to destroy the life that so casually took over my parent’s home, the west side of the
home that is, was any type of metaphor for my life was laughable. Ripping these weeds out of the ground, while probably the most significant act I’d practiced in
months, was another reminder of how unfulfilling things had been for me. I found myself extracting a stalk with tiny red roots sprouting from the entire length of it.
Adhering to the siding with a regularity that made me feel inferior. I found out later that evening it was Virginia Creeper, a weed similar to poison ivy.
Being that I had never heard of it before that evening, I just stuck with calling it P.I.

    I slept off and on that night but spent most of the twilight hours irked by the inconvenience of itching on my forearms. When I woke the following afternoon,
 yes you read that correctly, I found that my affliction had spread about my arms much in the same manner that my parents had wandered the Earth.
Again, I felt inferior. I concluded that I should actually leave the house and head to the pharmacy. Surely there was an ointment of some kind I could apply to this
 rash.

    Steel. That’s what the gun was made of. It seems so obvious now. I scratched my other arm. The gunman didn’t care for this act of disobedience any more than
the last one. While I was hoping he’d shoot me in the head I grew impatient and considered taking the gun from him and doing it myself. The impatience was bubbling up
 inside my heart much like the goo was bubbling up under my forearms. The rash was an unmistakable harbinger of caring and acknowledgment that I had never been
accustomed to. I couldn’t ignore the rash any more than I could ignore the man who still wanted to play cops and robbers. I hope no one expected me to fulfill the
role of cop.

    The disobedience of scratching my arm prompted the gunman to remove the barrel from my forehead and use the butt to strike me on the temple. Yet another act
of disobedience was apparently not falling to the ground as he had expected. That resulted in being struck on the other temple. I guess I tip right better than left.
That one took me down. My impatience grew further. I scratched my arms again while ignoring orders from the robber. There were other shoppers in the pharmacy.
An elderly woman who, moments earlier, had been arguing about the change she received after buying Castor Oil. I would think she would rather buy it and leave.
I wondered if she put up the same fuss when she bought adult diapers. A thirty-something mother with a four or five year old boy was in the aisle behind me.
I heard nothing from them. The clerk stood fast behind the counter. I suspect the pungent smell coming from behind that counter was a result of his wetting his pants.
 First timer I guess. I had always assumed that clerks got robbed as often as they renewed their car insurance. Regardless, everyone was now looking at me.
That is until the gunman returned his attention to the clerk. Now I was sure he peed himself because he was doing it again. I could hear it sprinkling on the floor
tiles.

    I scratched my arm again. I had the ointment in my hand. The simple task of purchasing it only so I could apply it to my rash seemed like something even I
 could see through to the end. Being kept from this luxury made my impatience grow further still. I could tolerate a number of failures but today I was easing the
pain of my rash. I was not to be stopped. I don’t know what the active ingredient in the ointment is, but perhaps Pfizer could increase their profits if they also
sold it as a means of self defense. I tapped the gunman on the shoulder and promptly squirted the contents of my medication into his eyes. One shot was fired into
the ceiling as he tumbled to the tile floor, unfortunately, not as pee soaked as the floor on the opposite side of the counter. I disarmed him, contemplated peeing
 myself as well, placed my half-used product on the counter, and walked out into a bright afternoon.

    I scratched my arm from habit but realized then that it bothered me far less than before. The rash would heal and any indication that it was ever there to
 begin with would only be in the form of a memory.  Perhaps making memories, no matter how small, is a better way to spend my time.

[AkemiAzula 280]

...

 

And that was it, we just packed up our equipment and left. We never serviced her again. This is also the first and only time we have been kicked out like this. Some people are funny, i'll tell you that.

Sounds a bit like my mother. She is like that to my grandfather (and me if I am around, I try to keep away from her). 

 

 

 

Well today I cycled to Whitehawk Hill and back. It took six hours. I went along the coast via Worthing to Brighton then through Kemp Town to a track up a hill that circled about to the race course and then to the summit of the hill where there is a tower. I've uploaded pictures at the photo thread. From the hill on a clear day you can see quite a distance but the weather was somewhat misty. Nothing really interesting happened... 

[airman15 4,113]

I will be sure to check out the photos. It's the Show us your Photo thread, correct?

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

In one place we lived, my father decided to grow his own garlic for his famous spaghetti sauce.  He planted a few cloves along the side of the buiding we were living in at the time.  My sister was at the crawl around outside stage at the time, so I guess I was twelve or thirteen.  Anyway, one day my mother picked up my sister from outside to give her a bath and was just about knocked over by her breath.  The garlic had put up fine green stalks, and my sister ate them as fast as she could find them.

[Mr Saturn64 742]

Not to revive he thread, I just wanted to share this,

So my contractor is re-doing a bathroom (1 of 2) are he had his conversation with my brother.

My brother (B) What did i ever do to you!

Contractor © let's see.... I was craving the M&Ms and then I come here and you devour all of them.

B: That was 3 months ago!

C: you're just like the junkman that way.

[The Pennsylvania Turnpike 252]

I spent all day trying to make steam games install into my D drive.

Can you believe computers these days have 150 GB C drives and 780 GB D:drives?

[airman15 4,113]

Earlier this week, I got a bunch of suits from one of my dad's friends. Apparently he is around my size (173 cm, 65 kg) , but as he got older he became too small for his suits so he decided to purge a lot of his wardrobe; and at the same time I've been looking for a wider selection of suits I could use.

 

I tried on some of the jackets and they fit me perfectly. They should last me a while because I haven't grown much in a few years. But now I have a big selection of formal wear to choose from.

[AkemiAzula 280]

I have a jacket of my grandfather and a cheap tesco one. I did have a nice green one i found in a bin but had to leave it when i had to come here

[airman15 4,113]

I've been needing a few suits for a while. I've only had one suit with two shirts and a tie right until the holidays. This is the suit in question, taken at a Moroccan restaurant last week and minus the jacket:

 

My dad also has a lot of vintage coats and shirts that I get to try on for something a little more casual.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

"A stately pleasure dome decree.

"Where Alph, the sacred river ran

"Down to a sunless sea."

Coleridge.

 

Coleridge had just written this and intended to write an epic, but the man from Porlock came by and took him out drinking.  The next morning Coleridge couldn't remember what he was going to write.  Might have been a good story, eh?

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Been a long time since anyone put anything in here.  This is a narrative based on one of my D & D simulation games (Angband), that might interest some people.  It takes place on Level 19 of the dungeon.

 

---

 

The Narrative

 

B'fingol the Tracker stared into the black pool at his feet.  His reflection showed a hale and hearty Dunadan ranger, and while he was known in the town, his lack of refinement made him somewhat unpopular.  He jerked upwards from the pool.  Someone or something had slammed into a door nearby, and while he could see around himself, the passages were murky.  He could see six passages, including the one he had just come from.  The bodies of the black orcs lay around him, quickly rotting to nothingness.  He decided to proceed with caution through the archway to his left.

He entered the passage, lighted only a few feet ahead by Donath, the phial of light.  After a few paces, the passage turned right.  At the end of the passage he found a downwards leading stair, but took the passage off the the right instead.  This passage turned immediately to the left.  This corridor turned left then right again and finally turned to the right for a few paces then left again eventually leading to a hall twice as wide which ended at an impassable wall.  However, there was a corridor leading off to the right somewhat before the end wall.

B'fingol entered the passage only to find the way blocked by a rock lizard.  He dispatched the beast only to discover that it had been the familiar of a dark elven warrior, who fled after a short passage at arms.  He concentrated and cast a levin bolt after the retreating dark elf leaving only a scorched spot on the wall at the end of the passage which turned abruptly right.  This maze passage took him onward to a right turn revealing an upward stair.

He eschewed the stair and proceeded through the archway at the foot of the stair into a strange room guarded by a toxic spotted mushroom patch.  He was able to quietly approach the patch and quickly destroyed it.  He wiped the ichor off his Battle Axe then surveyed the room.  This room contained many niches which were empty except for the passages that led from the room, some very narrow.

Choosing one of the narrow passages, after a few paces he discovered yet another down staircase with an arch at its foot.  This one was guarded by a Stegocentipede, which fled after a couple of axe blows.  He followed it through the arch, unwilling to leave a wounded animal to perish alone.  He dispatched it and proceeded to the archway after the last only to encounter a human zombie.  The monster achieved slight damage before being returned to the pit from which it came.  It dissolved.

On proceeding into the guarded room, B'fingol found four potions of cure serious wounds and potion of speed which he appropriated, adding them to his pack.  Quickly exiting this store room, he proceeded along the adjacent corridor and found that the passage turned again leading him to a door in the left hand wall which was locked.  Calling on his thaumaturgic skills, he cast a spell of door destruction when he was immediately attacked by a dozen giant spiders of the Mirkwood who were protecting the four Gallants.  In the resulting melee all the evil opponents were vanquished though B'fingol was badly bitten by the spiders and poisoned.  Fortunately, an anti-dote from his pack neutralized the venom.  Searching this store room turned up only a regular Scimitar, so it was evident that whatever this force was guarding had escaped.

Emerging from this room and proceeding along the encircling corridor and through another door, a dark room was encountered.  Activating the phial to illuminate the room revealed only a single werewolf, a blue worm mass (frost), and a giant louse.  These were quickly terminated.  An adroit search revealed yet another chamber, well disguised in the wall.  A grey ickky thing was dispatched as it attacked after opening this portal.  There were also a guardian naga and a spotted jelly.  What they were guarding remains a mystery as nothing was found in the room after vanquishing these opponents.  It was necessary to rest and recover after this encounter.