Category Archives: story

November 5, 2011 · 4:42 pm

The blathering idiot and the blue tooth’s other byte

The blathering idiot had a blue tooth device for his cell phone. One of those devices that fits in the ear and wirelessly syncs to your cell so you can talk and receive calls while being hands free. The ear piece makes you look important or stupid. Zelda, the blathering idiot’s on-again, off-again girl friend had bought the device for him and he had eventually learned to work it. When he first wore it, she laughed and said he looked like a goofy Borg. It was then he told her she needed to lose a little weight.

There was one problem with the blue tooth. Every now and then, the voice in the blue tooth ear piece would announce in his ear: “There is no active phone.”

He would then move, sometimes not very much, and he would hear the voice say: “Your phone is connected.”

Zelda was away, and besides she was mad at him, so he couldn’t ask her for help.

Instead, he planned to experiment.

First, he laid his cell phone down and walked away from it until the voice in his ear said: “No active phone connected.”

It wasn’t that far, but farther from his hip to his ear.

He next walked around a corner into another room. After a few steps, heard it again: “No active phone connected.” Then “Your phone is connected” when he came back around the corner.

He then decided it must be corners. He would avoid going around corners. If he had to make a turn, he had to make it a 90-degree turn.

He worked to avoid corners, but eventually he would bend his body to avoid a corner, or even make himself sit down to think how he was going to avoid a corner, and he would hear the voice: “No active phone connected.”

Blue tooth's other byte

Beware of the blue tooth's byte

He decided maybe it was his clothes. So he started wearing different types of shirts and pants and even underwear. But that didn’t solve the problem.

Finally, one day he sat down and he turned his head to the left to see where he had placed his candy bar. His phone was on his right side. He heard the voice. He reached down to touch the phone, to make sure it was still there. Instead he accidentally touched his body fat. He pushed it aside and he head: “Your phone is connected.”

He let it go and he heard: “No active phone connected.”

He put down his Snickers bar and went outside for a walk.

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October 7, 2011 · 8:54 pm

The Kibitizer and the Kidd, part 3

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The apothecary was almost done making the cough drops, but the Kibitzer was tired of watching. He ho-hummed to himself, took another bite of some slightly stale popcorn, and decided watching was not always what he had pictured it would be. It was a very unpleasant observation and it did not sit well him or his stomach. The popcorn didn’t help. He belched once in hopes of relief.

It was during the descent of the belch out of his mouth that he heard what sounded like a pop, saw the delivery boy run out of the saloon, and then watched as lightning tripped the light fantastic across the kid’s body.

He then saw another two or three people scurry out of the saloon as if escaping an unpleasantry, like a distant relative’s interminable funeral or a spelling bee where they were next up and the word was interminable.

The Kibitzer forgot all about the cough drops and stepped outside, glancing toward the sky as if somehow he could observe a bolt of lightning before it hit him, and then considered running through the rain to the other side of the street.

That’s when a young lady came up and kneed him in the groin.

The Kibitzer dropped to the wooden sidewalk, balled up, and began rocking back and forth as if it might dissipate the pain.

“My name’s Bonnie,” she said, leaning over him. “No man leaves my apothecary without payin’ for what he ordered.”

“I wasn’t leaving,” the Kibitzer said, his teeth still clenched.

Finally, he rolled over onto all fours.

“Didn’t you see the kid out there? He got struck by lightning?”

Bonnie shrugged. “Happens a lot lately. He’ll be okay. Nobody in this town dies anymore. Been bad for my business, I tell you.”

The Kibitzer was again standing fully erect, if feeling a little tender. The rain had slackened to almost a light drizzle.

“We already lost two undertakers and the saw bones has gone back to yankin’ teeth. If it weren’t for medicinals for that, I’d probably be blowin’ in the wind, too.” She then slipped him the bill for the cough drops.

The Kibitzer looked at it. “What, no discount for the laying on of hands?”

She smiled at him, then raised her hand. In the muddled light of the evening, she still looked quite menacing. “I didn’t finish.”

The Kibitzer paid her and gave her a generous tip.

He then dashed out into the rain, forgetting the cough drops.

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August 28, 2011 · 6:19 pm

The blathering idiot, zombies, and aliens

The blathering idiot stood in her kitchen listening to his sometime girlfriend Zelda debating with Xenia, her daughter, about which would be worse an invasion of aliens or an attack of zombies. Zelda said the invasion of aliens would be worse with their ray guns and flying saucers and killer robot armies. Xenia said it would be zombies because they looked “just like us, but would eat our brains out.”

The debate went on for another ten minutes or so, the blather idiot dozing off as he learned against the counter. Snatches of his head popping off, rotating fast, and zooming away like a flying saucer filled his snoozing, so he kept waking up.

Finally, to end the debate, they turned to him.

Blathering Idiot, Zombies and Aliens

Domestic Dispute on a Cosmic Scale

“Which one?” they asked in unison.

“Which one, what?”

“Aliens?” Zelda asked.

“Or Zombies?” Xenia asked.

Now his head was really spinning. He couldn’t answer. He didn’t really care. It wasn’t even Halloween, so what did it matter?
They stared at him. He felt a rivulet of sweat run down the side of his neck.

It was like asking him to choice between toast with crunchy peanut butter and toast with smooth peanut butter. He liked them both. He also liked other things on his toast. Why did nobody even ask about the toast?

After what seemed like a day, Xenia harrumphed and left the table.

Zelda stood up, shook her head, and said, “Typical.”

She then turned and walked away from him.

That night, while sleeping along, the blathering idiot was visited by an alien ghost that told him he must decide or else. It was hard to understand the alien because of all the high-pitched tones and squeaks.

He woke up lying cross ways over his bed; it squeaked as her pulled himself around into the proper position.

When he went back to sleep, he was visited by a zombie ghost that told him, as best a zombie could, having no brain and all, that he had to use his head and make a decision. He woke up with part of his pillow in his mouth.

After that, he couldn’t sleep. He wondered if there were really aliens out there who might swoop down and invade the Earth, or even just his house. And zombies, well, while he was fairly sure they weren’t real, one could never be 100 percent sure about such things. After all, there were werewolves. He’d seen one at a carnival when he was six.

The blathering idiot went to the bathroom, and while looking in the mirror tried to figure out what was going on. He turned on the small light next to the sink and as it shined up on his face, he stared in the mirror. His pale face looked as if he had died. Pale, blank stare from empty eyes, he reached up and removed a piece of his pillow from his mouth. He then tried to speak, to say something to calm himself, but when he did, only a short squeak came out. It was then that he knew what his answer was.

He couldn’t wait to tell Zelda and Xenia. Neither could be disappointed in him.

When he got to their house, he walked inside and into the kitchen, and made his announcement. “It’s neither aliens nor zombies that I would fear,” he said. “It is alien zombies who would come to Earth, eat the Earth zombies and then starting eating the regular girls and mothers.”

First Xenia and then Zelda looked up at him and smiled. “We’re past that,” they said in unison. “Now we’re trying to figure out who would be a better kisser, an angel or a vampire? What do you think?”

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April 24, 2011 · 9:31 pm

Writing Tip: Drama is conflict

My writing is distinctly middle brow. Just ask anybody who has suffered through it. Still, I like to think that even in my middling way, I can offer some helpful advice when I stumble across it. Therefore, from time to time, I will post some writing advice, but not from me. The advice will come from established sources. I will endeavor not to make it overlong or overreaching, and sometimes it will simply be reminders of what we all probably already know, but it will be some tips I have picked up from reading, from attending writing conferences, or it may even come from you.

Writing with paperclips in ears and nose

Darma is conflict, sometimes even self-inflicted

The first bit of advice comes from a writing course the Knoxville Writers’ Guild sponsored way back in 1993. The teacher was Joseph Gunnels and the cost was $75. It was two-day event, May 15 and 16, and we spent part of a pleasant afternoon sitting on the grass outside the Candy Factory, on The 1982 World’s Fair site. I took over 30 pages of notes, but rather than bore you with details, here is the essence of what I took away from the seminar:

Drama is conflict;
Without conflict no action;
Without action no character;
Without character no story;
Without story, who cares?

In a future entry, I’ll give you a short, crisp definition for conflict that I learned at a more recent one-day writing seminar. It comes from a very highly regarded script doctor in Hollywood, but applies just as well to other forms of fiction writing. Stay turned.

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March 6, 2011 · 1:45 pm

The blathering idiot, taxes, and heaven

The blathering idiot was sitting at the kitchen table doing his taxes, when in a fit of confusion and boredom at the inane complexity of a form, he fell asleep.

When he woke up, he was in heaven. He knew this was the case because the disciple Matthew greeted him. The blathering idiot sat up and looked around. Heaven was not like anything he imaged. The primary thing that struck him about it was how rundown it appeared. The pearly gates looked rusty and slightly out of plumb. They didn’t close tightly. Some things that looked like trash tumbled from heavenly prominence to heavenly prominence, making slight rustling sounds like empty plastic shopping bags. Even the angels’ wings looked sooty and their gowns looked frayed and not quite as dazzling as whitest of whites sound be. One angel was even wearing a frayed t-shirt that read “Angels are people too.” Infrastructure neglect was everywhere.

Matthew had a sad and besmirched look on his face. “We cannot get God to pay attention to heaven. He says he is constantly fighting an endless war with Satan, and sending hurricanes to New Orleans and earthquakes to Haiti and such to punish people for their wicked ways, even if they are already long dead. He says he has no time to keep up heaven. But we have a plan and it involves you.”

The blathering idiot listened to the plan. He wasn’t sure if it would work, but if the blathering idiot succeeded, he could stay in heaven if he wanted.

“And if I don’t succeed?” the blathering idiot asked.

Matthew, the former tax collector, frowned, and then slowly shook his head.

The blathering idiot practiced over and over what he was going to say, and when he was ready, Matthew and some angels, including the one with the t-shirt, dressed him in the most scary costume they could think of, and then they sent him to see God.

The blathering idiot in heaven

"Well, Almighty, our records still show you owe back taxes for several million years."

After a brief introduction, the blathering idiot launched into his script: “Well, Almighty, our records still show you owe back taxes for several million years. And we are about to put a lean on your property.”

Shortly after that, or so it felt like, the blathering idiot woke up, an IRS form stuck to the side of his face.

Once he removed it, he glanced around. The world looked like he was back exactly where he had always been, back where he was before his trip to heaven. The blathering idiot didn’t know if that was good or bad, if that meant he had succeeded or not. He once again read over the form that had been stuck to his cheek, and he continued to wonder.

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February 26, 2011 · 8:36 pm

The blathering idiot launders his own heart

The blathering idiot sat in the coin-operated launder mat watching his clothes dry. It had been a tough time since Valentine’s Day. He had forgotten to get his girl friend anything: no card, no flowers, no gift no matter how inexpensive, and though she was willing to forgive him, she said they needed to talk, and they would do so on the day he brought his laundry over.

The blathering idiot knew what talk meant. It meant that he, the blathering idiot, would need to make amends. He came prepared to offer everything: two-dozen flowers, three cards, an expensive dinner, an entire weekend watching “chick flicks.” Only thing she had to do was tell him what she wanted.

What she wanted from him was something he hadn’t anticipated. She simply said he wasn’t being romantic enough in the relationship and what did he intend to do about it?

The blathering idiot thought about it.

His girl friend waited.

Blathering Idiot at the launder mat

“If I wore my heart on my sleeve, would you launder it?”

The blathering idiot thought some more. He was prepared to give her what she asked for, what she said she deserved, even what she demanded. She only had to say it. He wasn’t, however, prepared to give her an answer.

He stared at his pile of dirty laundry, hoping for inspiration.

Finally, he remembered that she’d often told him that while she wore her heart on her sleeve, he seemed to keep his tucked away somewhere, so he said something he thought was witty, something he thought would break the tension, something that might make her laugh and then they would forget about the question.

He said, “If I wore my heart on my sleeve, would you launder it?”

For the foreseeable future, the blathering idiot was laundering his own heart at a coin-operated place of his choosing.

He found no inspiration as he watched his shirts tumble dry.

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February 20, 2011 · 8:43 pm

The Blathering Idiot and the Box of Everlasting Life

The blathering idiot saw the ad on the Internet, click on it, and was transported to a web site where the promoted product promised to…

Build a new, high-efficiency body:
Say NO to Memory loss
Say NO to Arthritis
Say NO to Pain
Say NO to short lives of 75 years max
Say NO to Ugliness.

Activate your dormant codes for advanced human ability and appearance.
Override the death code based on the carbon grid.
Make dominant your crystalline grid.
Make your DNA perfect again.

“I will show you how to self-heal,” Dr. Ben T. Err said. “My secret product formula, Dunthat, helps you create a new advanced physical form!”

Err then went on to talk about his advanced studies as an, Iridologist, Nutritionist, and Herbologist.

Best If Used By label on bottle

Best If Used By...


“Order today and learn how to upgrade your cellular character by releasing density, carbon congestion, primitive DNA, and by moving to crystalline dominance the natural way.”

The blathering idiot placed an order, which eventually arrived. When he opened the box, it contained a DVD, an instruction booklet, and a series of containers containing a series of products, all very herbal looking. And on the bottom of each container there was a sticker that read: “Best if used by” and a date. They all had the same date and that date had already passed.

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February 6, 2011 · 12:16 pm

The zipper and the preacher

Some things are better left “un-done.”

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January 9, 2011 · 9:48 am

A flightless mind in a myopic world

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/07/books/07huck.html?_r=1&nl=books&emc=booksupdateemb5

January 6, 2011

Light Out, Huck, They Still Want to Sivilize You

By MICHIKO KAKUTANI

“All modern American literature,” Ernest Hemingway once wrote, “comes from one book by MarkTwain called ‘Huckleberry Finn.’ ”

Being an iconic classic, however, hasn’t protected “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” from being banned, bowdlerized and bleeped. It hasn’t protected the novel from being cleaned up, updated and “improved.”

A new effort to sanitize “Huckleberry Finn” comes from Alan Gribben, a professor of English at Auburn University, at Montgomery, Ala., who has produced a new edition of Twain’s novel that replaces the word “nigger” with “slave.” Nigger, which appears in the book more than 200 times, was a common racial epithet in the antebellum South, used by Twain as part of his characters’ vernacular speech and as a reflection of mid-19th-century social attitudes along the Mississippi River.

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December 16, 2010 · 10:26 pm

The presentation

The blathering idiot went to the lingerie store to buy his girlfriend a $50 bra. She had given exact instructions as to what she wanted and where to get it.

The blathering idiot had never been in a lingerie store before. But even before he went, he thought $50 was a little much for a bra. Her physical structures were nice, but not stellar. Neither were his own, and he wouldn’t think of spending $50 to support his.

Still it was his girlfriend and it was the season for presents, so he entered the lingerie store and approached the saleswoman to ask where he could find this “accoutrement.” He had learned that word recently and this was his first chance to use it, and for some reason it seemed to fit.

As she led him to the display, she asked if he might be interested in any of the shop’s specials.
The blathering idiot thought they might be offering some eggnog or Christmas cookies, so he said yes.

She smiled and then explained that their $75 undergarment was on sale for $65 and their $100 undergarment was on sale for $80.

First, she took him to the $50 bra, which looked much like the bras he had glimpsed most of his life, from his mother to his girlfriend, and a few other women in between, especially the one time in high school when his friends had pulled off his underwear, pulled it down over his head, and then shoved him into the girl’s locker room.

“As you can see,” the sales lady said, “there is nothing about this undergarment that stands out from the rest. It is a good one, but for that special woman in your life, I’m sure you want better. A little something that will grab her and your attentions.”

She then winked at him and showed him the $75 bra. It was smaller than the $50 one and had some areas of exposure he had never considered in a bra.

Then, without saying a word, she showed him the $100 bra. They were just two small cups that appeared barely big enough to fit over the tips of his girlfriend’s structures.

When he asked about the loss of material, she said it was all about presentation. “The less material, the more presentation, the more sizzle. Think how proud your girlfriend will be to wear this $100 undergarment, and that pride will show, causing her to walk taller, stand straighter, giving her all the support she will ever need.” She smiled at him. “After all, presentation is everything.”

The blathering idiot was sold. He bought the $100 undergarment on sale for $80, had it wrapped, and couldn’t wait to see his girlfriend’s presentation.

When she unwrapped the undergarment, she didn’t know what to think. Or, rather, she did, but kept her first thoughts to herself. She asked the blathering idiot about it, trying in the nicest way to figure out where he’d screwed up. He talked about sizzle and carriage and presentation, and with that undergarment on, she would walk tall and walk proud.

The blathering idiot’s girlfriend didn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or be angry. All three emotions played across her face.

The blathering idiot took it to be gratitude beyond words.

Shortly thereafter, he walked home with the two small pieces of the undergarment fitted over his eyes. She told him he could only remove them once he got home. Otherwise, he wouldn’t make the right presentation.

He walked proudly into the night.

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