Tag: humour

The Crucible (NOT the play about the Salem witch trials)

Here’s another piece I did in my creative writing course last year. We had to write a conversation where one character was explaining something to another character without it turning into a boring monologue. I decided to show off and combine it with what we learned about plots the previous week.

The Crucible

“Right, so, every story at some point needs a crucible.”

“Hang on. What’s a crucible? I thought this was a writing class, not religion.”

“Crucible, not crucifix. Technically, it’s a clay container in which you mix chemicals and then heat them up so they’ll react with each other –“

“Now you’re talking about chemistry. Do you really know about writing?”

“Keep your pants on! In writing, a crucible is a situation in which two characters are in conflict –“

“So, not a clay pot?”

“…No.”

“Okay.”

“May I continue now?”

“Sure.”

“As I was saying, two characters are in conflict, but it’s a situation they can’t escape, like, being stuck in an elevator, say.”

“Oh! Just like the chemicals in the clay pot. I see. It’s one of them metaphor-thingies.”

“Yes. One of them metaphor-thingies. Anyway, then you add something to make the situation worse.”

“Like the building being on fire?”

“Exactly. So, they have to get out of the stuck elevator before the building burns down with them in it, but they have to sort out their crap first, otherwise they can’t work together to get out, see?”

“Erm.”

“Yes?”

“Why’s the building on fire?”

“Why’s the..? Forget it! I give up!”

“Hey, wait! Where are you going? Come back!”

On stuff people say

The wife’s been feeling poorly since last week, with an initial infection leading to full-blown bronchitis and the doc almost sending her to hospital on Monday out of fear that it will develop into pneumonia. But, as he told her, the hospital’s full of sick people (I couldn’t believe this tidbit) and she might end up worse than if she just stays at home (that’s what you call irony). Continue reading “On stuff people say” →

Song Title Challenge #3: If I Ever Get Around to Living – John Mayer

It’s time for this week’s Song Title Challenge.

Write a short piece of fiction, around 300 words, using the song title as your story title but don’t listen to the song. Remember to link back to this post so I can find yours.

If you would like to suggest a song title for a future post, you can do so from the challenge page. You can also leave a suggestion on the Facebook page.

This week’s song is If I Ever Get Around to Living by John Mayer. Thanks to Emma at A Wordless Blogger for suggesting it. I had lots of fun writing it. Hope you do too.

If I ever get around to living

Continue reading “Song Title Challenge #3: If I Ever Get Around to Living – John Mayer” →

The Blogger Who Spam-“Liked” Me

As a rule I don’t reblog others’ posts, never mind two in one day, but this is such an excellent response to my post of this morning. Do yourself a favour and check out this blog.

sairyou.me

Inspired by “On a Different Type of Spam” by Herman Kok (kokkieh).
—

[8:03 AM]

Look! I have just posted a photo on my blog, of Lord Chubbington dancing on a string. Isn’t he adorable?

OK, it’s time to engage in some meaningful blog marketing and get people—a lot of people—to see Lord Chubbington. You see, the best way to do this is on the WordPress Reader, which is perhaps the most ingenious invention in the history of blogging, like, ever. I simply have to type the topic—“humor,” in my case, but feel free to type anything you feel like “reading”—in the search box, hit enter, and voìla!

See that “Like” button underneath every post? That’s my secret weapon. Although, if you’re reading this, I guess it’s no secret anymore.

First post. Click. Second post. Click. Third post. Click. Clickety-click-click.

Phew. Fifty-seven posts…

View original post 690 more words

Boredom

This is a piece I wrote for a creative writing course I did last year. The assignment was to write a scene showing a character experiencing boredom, but it should not be boring. I have since expanded it a little.

The following is based on real events, with some embellishment.

Boredom

David rounded the front desk for the umpteenth time. He’d lost count of how many kilometres he’d walked up and down the aisles. He stopped at attention and turned around like a soldier on parade, completely quietly, of course. The only sound in the hall was the scritching of pens on paper and the occasional cough from one of the students. Scritching. Is that even a word? It sounds right. David decided to look it up later. No dictionaries allowed in the exam room. Right now he’d even read a dictionary.

He rounded the front desk for the second time since he’d lost count. By now he had inventoried everything in the hall: floor tiles, window latches, light bulbs, bricks…He decided to add them together; without a calculator. The mental arithmetic took him all of forty-seven seconds – he had timed himself by the clock on the wall. Maybe something more challenging: square roots. Yeah! He hadn’t tried those in a while.

David rounded the front desk for the third time in four minutes. He glanced at the clock and about-faced. Excellent! Only two more hours to go. David started back down the row with a spring in his step. It’s the little things that make life worthwhile, you know?

He managed to keep that up for two circuits and seventy-eight seconds. He started humming in his head a tune from a video he saw earlier that morning on the net: Dumb ways to die, so many dumb ways to die, dump-di-dump-di-dum-dum…He stopped. Why were all the students looking at him? O crap! He was singing out loud again, wasn’t he? He stared at them crossly . They continued writing.

David rounded the front desk for the…Dammit. He’d lost count again. He looked at the clock. Only one hour, fifty-six minutes to go…

As a bonus, here’s the song (got to wonder what type of mind comes up with something like this):