100 Word Challenge - Fingerprints

There are so many passages in life that we encounter.
Learning. Friendship. Love. Loss.
The hardest of all to bear is loss.
When you love someone so much that losing them feels like your heart has been ripped out.
That happened with us.
It happened slowly; you said "Some time apart, new and old friends to be with".
We called, we talked but we didn't talk much about the future.
You said I was not losing you, that something or someone else was causing the pain.
But I know it was you - they found your fingerprints on my discarded heart.

100 Word Weekly Challenge - Coffee

I interviewed for a job with a software company yesterday.
I think I did well on my part of the interview.
At least well enough for Joe, my prospective boss, to start selling me on the company.
He explained the well designed benefits package and gave me a tour of the offices,
At the end of the tour I had one question, "Where are the coffee machines? I did not see one during our tour".
Joe took me back to the cubicles and pointed, "See?"
Yup, coffee. Delivered via IV tubing to every cubicle.
I'm going to like it here.

100 Word Weekly Challenge - 'Mirror'

I loved the amazing work Hayley Mills did in "The Parent Trap", especially the scene where she and her 'twin sister' pretended they were posing in front of a mirror. Many weekend afternoons were spent with my sisters trying to emulate that act, matching poses and facial expressions. Although it works better when you are twins of the same gender, it was still fun and a fond memory.

50 years later I have decided to try it again. But I want to do it right. I need someone as my identical twin, a "Hayley".

Unfortunately, Haley Barbour is not available.

100 Word Stories - Week 279 #2 - Shrink

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so we designed our application to use pictures.

Every action requires the user to click on a picture.

Want to open something? Click on the picture of the closed door.

Want to close something? Click on the picture of the open door.

Want to edit something? Click on the picture of grizzled editor from the Times.

It was a great application. It was adopted quickly by users. The test users said it was a very effective paradigm.

Then they said the application was too big, shrink it. So we used thumbnails.

100 Word Story Challenge #279 - Shrink

My weekly therapy sessions had not been going well.

The couch doctor seemed to concentrate on my problems but could not condense her thoughts to something I could understand.

"Listen Doc, we have a contract. I come here to drop off and decrease my problems. I leave feeling deflated, diminished, weakened. You aren't helping!"

She said "I understand. You feel constricted, smaller, wasted away".

"Doc, aren't you listening? I feel that way after I leave; shriveled, dwindled. Reduce your verbiage, narrow your focus. Help me!".

"I'm afraid I need to shorten our time today. See you next week".

Damn shrink.

(see http://thesaurus.com/browse/shrink)

100 Word Stories - Week 277 #1

I've promised to do one story a day this week - expect more

This week's theme is 'Radio'.

============
I was listening to the radio this morning and heard an intriguing song.

The lyrics told the story of a man whose wife had turned her focus inward.

He started exploring and fell in love with someone else.

He left his wife.

His wife refocused on him and started stalking him.

This presented a conundrum for him - return to the renewed focus of his wife or stay with the focus of his new lover.

I never heard the outcome.

It was a country song and, in my mind, I kept hearing a tune about roadkill, so I turned it off.


============

100 Word Stories - Week 276 #2

We have a new activity here at the nursing home, my new employer.
Joe has been retained to help reduce the recent increase in resident injuries.
His firm, Safety First, is considered the premier injury reduction firm in the area.
The class is called 'Falling, Gracefully', which teaches how to fall without injury, using many techniques taught to those studying judo.
The residents seem to enjoy the class but there does not seem to be a reduction in injuries.
One day they will find the correlation between my hire date, the rise in injuries and my joy in tripping people.

100 Word Story Challenge #276 - Falling

She purred "I love you".

Without thinking I replied "I adore you, I love you, I cherish you and I am slowly falling in love with you".

She laughed, "I don't think you are the type to 'fall in love'".
 
I thought a second.

"I think you are right - I don't fall in love but I have been in love and I am slowly becoming in love".

She asked "What's the difference between falling and becoming?"

"Falling happens quickly - becoming happens slowly".
 
A lightbulb appeared.

"Maybe it should be 'I am slowly realizing that I am in love with you'".

100 Word Stories - Week 275

This morning we chatted and planned our evening together.

"Let's make it a romantic evening tonight. We'll start with a nice dinner.
I found a recipe that should be fun. Could you stop by the market and get some armadillo?"

She agreed and we started our day.

She was late.

"Sorry, it took me awhile to find what you asked for", she said.

I didn't see any shopping bags with her.

"Where's the meat?", I said.

"What meat? You only asked for this", she said, as she reached into her purse and pulled out her favorite vibrator.

Wrapped in Kevlar.

100 Word Stories - Week 274 #2

we fly
in the heavens
swooping
wingtip to wingtip
seeking fantasies
together
exploring
the visceral
the erotic
the mundane
clouds of joy
joined by our dreams

we glide
relishing
our shared collection
building the
clouds higher
stronger
glorious
pampering our love

we soar
the moist coolness
of the clouds
envelops us
making it real

then

the caged guinea pigs
of our minds
spin their wheels
furiously
spreading away
the wisps of cloud

we fall
reaching out
grasping in vain
passing our creations
quickly disappearing
clouds of love

we land
safely
two feet on solid ground
our dreams
a faint memory

100 Word Stories - Week 274

I have a unique ability - I can predict when changes will occur in my life.

Normally I do not remember my dreams but there are times when I will have a series of vivid, unrelated dreams that stay with me. After six months or so, when the dreams have been long forgotten, events will happen in my life that bring the dreams back to life. The dreams become real. Like déjà vu.

That déjà vu is always followed by a momentous change in my life.
Like the time three months ago when I dreamt I was a writer.
Oh. Shit.

100 Word Stories - Week 273

Starting this week I am stretching myself - time to see if I can inspire others through my words as others have inspired me. First task in the process - write! I will be trying to diligently participate in Laurence Simon's (aka R Crap Mariner in Second Life) weekly 100 Word Stories Challenge (http://podcasting.isfullofcrap.com/the-weekly-challenge/).

The following is my entry for this, my first, week.

Double Barrel Failure (a true story)

Christmas was always the same. She delivered a list of gifts she wanted. I acquired, wrapped and presented them.

One Christmas I decided to innovate; my gift ideas, my own theme.

So proud, I presented the peripherals I knew (knew!) she could use with her new laptop.
 

Failure.
 

Nonplussed, the next day I retrieved her list, acquired, wrapped and placed the gifts under the tree.

Santa even left a note telling her what a bad boy I had been.
 

I waited. And waited. And waited.
 

Abject Failure!
 

Until three weeks later, while taking down the tree, she found the gifts.