Tag Archives: fun

Reform, it’s not what you think

It was a cold day and the wind was blowing. The Blathering Idiot and his friend, Gary, were walking to take place in a protest against some change they knew little about but felt had to be protest because somebody on the radio had told them so.

The Blathering Idiot turned to his friend and said, “You know, Gary, the biggest problem with reform is that it requires you to think.”

Gary paused for a minute, then said, “I hadn’t thought about that.”

BlatheringIdiot_Reform

"You know, Gary, the biggest problem with reform is that it requries you to think."

They stopped and looked at each other. First one minute passed. Then another, and another, each looking at the other.

“I think we’ve discovered something profound,” Gary said.

Finally, they decided to turn around and go back home, where at least they could think in a warm place.

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So, you want to be a writer? Watch and learn

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The Job Application

A new year had begun, and the blathering idiot resolved to find a job.

Help Wanted sign

The blathering idiot applies for a job

He saw a Help Wanted sign in the window of a building and went inside to apply.

He sat at the table with the form and did his best to fill it out. The first line said: Name.

He wrote: I have one.

Sex.

He wrote: Yes

Place of birth.

He wrote: A hospital, though I don’t remember the exact event. This is what I have been told.

Put your hometown here:

It won’t fit.

References:

Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, Gregg’s Reference Manual, Chicago Manual of Style.

What attracted you to this position?

The sign in the window.

Salary expectations:

To get paid regularly.

What sort of challenges are you looking for?

I am not looking for challenges. I am looking for a job.

When he was finished, the blathering idiot looked over the questionnaire one last time. There was one question he had skipped, and he still did not have an answer for it. He looked at it again, first staring at it and then looking away. He felt he should write something, but what?

The blathering idiot was about to give up and return the form incomplete, when it struck him what he should write. He had seen this exact wording on similar pages in other documents. He had never fully understood what it meant until now.

The question was: Use the blank side of this form to provide any additional information.

To which the blathering idiot wrote: This side intentionally left blank.

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Oh, Santa Baby…

A little holiday cheer in a tough economic year.

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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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Get a grip

The blathering idiot stood in front of the full-length hallway mirror. He looked down at his left hand. Then he looked down at his right hand. He brought his right hand up toward the mirror and turned, open-palm outward so he could see its reflection in the mirror. He did the same thing with the left hand. He then turned the left hand toward the right one and bent the fingers and thumb to make a beak.

“Hello, right hand,” he said as he flapped the beak open and closed.

The right hand remained palm outward toward the mirror.

The left hand waited a minute, then tried again. “Hello, right hand. I’m the left hand and would like to get to know you so that I know what you’re up to.”

The right hand turned slightly toward the left, curled into a fist, but then wiggled its thumb like a lower-lip: “Harrumph.”

It then fled to the safety of the front pants’ pocket.

The left hand turned toward the blathering idiot. “How do you intend to handle this?”

The blathering idiot shrugged. “Maybe the right hand doesn’t want to know what the left hand is doing.”

The left hand smacked him. “Get a grip.”

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The blathering idiot

Once upon a time in a street not so far away, a piece of history came floating by. It rode on a clown of expectation, juggled just high enough for everybody to see, if you were looking. I looked, but in the end could not figure out what was going on. Then a frog hopped up to me and said, “Your tie’s on backwards.” But I wasn’t wearing a tie, and least I wasn’t until I felt up around my neck to be sure and realized that somebody had slipped a noose around my shoulders when I wasn’t looking. The other end was dangling over a tree limb in my front yard. A rake was dangling from another tree limb. I had been raking until I saw the piece of history floating by. Then I had stopped and stepped to the street to see what it was all about. And now there was a noose around my neck. Some days it just doesn’t pay to watch the parade of history go by.

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The pitches

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Below are two of my pitches. I used the The Painted Beast pitch on all the agents and editors I talked with at Killer Nashville. I was able to use The Small Resurrection pitch once or twice.

Two pieces of advice, one I have said before: Practice the pitch and make it as natural as you can. Two: Think of a pitch as a spoken version of the back-cover blurb you read on many paperback books.

The Painted Beast

Ex-cop Stephen York was once a hero. Decorated and lionized from uncovering corruption in the police department and bringing down a criminal enterprise, he now works two or three menial jobs in order to hold body and soul together, not only for himself but also his thirteen-year-old step-daughter and eight-year-old daughter. One night his ex-wife, who has escaped from prison, returns home and terrorizes him. He escapes from her and she from him, but shortly thereafter she kidnaps their daughters. In order to save them, Stephen has to kill her, which puts him under suspicion for murder and under the thumb of a police detective who has personal as well as professional reasons for wanting to grind Stephen down further. In addition, his step-daughter’s biological father steps forward to kidnap her with the intention of leading her into a life of child pornography and prostitution in order to get money to help re-establish the criminal empire that Stephen had helped take down. This time, in order to save his step-daughter, Stephen, who has not been a particularly good father, has to offer his life in order to save his step-daughter’s. In so doing, he learns another definition of hero. At its core this novel’s theme asks and answers the question: Can a fallen hero be a hero again?

Limerick version:
There once was an ex-cop who did poorly
At being a father and what’s more he
Killed his ex-wife,
Then offered up his life
To save his daughter from a life in pornography.

***

A Small Resurrection

Is believing in what you see the same thing as seeing what you believe in?

Knoxville, Tennessee, is the last place T. Xavier Gabriel wants to be. But the director of the 8th highest grossing film in Hollywood has come to town to ask his ex-wife for forbearance in paying the large alimony and possibly also for a loan to help restart his fallen career. She, however, has other plans. She wants him to

Pitching your novel

Use conversational voice when talking about your novel

rescue their 22-year-old daughter from the undue influences of a 24-year-old evangelical preacher. Gabriel wants nothing to do with that, having already admitted to be a failure once as a father, he doesn’t want a second bite of the apple. But when he finds his daughter keeping company with a resurrected Rod Serling, he sees a chance to use this Serling look-alike to resurrect his own career. But getting Serling away from his daughter puts her in jeopardy, and Gabriel must decide if he is going to save her or save his career. To save her, he must enlist the aid of Serling, who is not quite sure who he is or why he has been resurrected, and in saving her he puts an end ever resurrecting his career.

Limerick version:
There once was a director named Gabriel
Whose life was a broken down fable
Then along came Rod Serling
And an offer so sterling
That it could save Gabe if he was able.

Two final notes:
1) The limerick versions were not something I pitched, though I thought about it. It was my way of have a pitch that could be done in 15 seconds or less.

2) Some pitch advice says you need to have antecedents as part of your pitch. Antecedents are novels that are like yours. Something similar to your novel. This is supposed to show that you know about your novel’s market and where it might fit. While I had that prepared for The Painted Beast, it did not seem to be something those I pitched to at Killer Nashville were interested in. That could have been a mistake on my part. But I had the feeling that these agents wanted to be the ones to decide where it belongs.

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And out will waltz a little girl to Strauss

But at night in that big ol’ house,
When everybody’s in bed, even a mouse,
The portmanteau will open,
As if magic words were spoken,
And out will waltz a little girl to Strauss.

#The End#

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To guess at what happened or posit

Now the portmanteau sits in a closet
Like a gift awaiting a deposit.
The once-Lady from Kent
Won’t even relent
To guess at what happened or posit.

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