Friday, December 12, 2008
Dwarfs, buses, boxes -- a story meme!
TAGGED: TECH, Trixie, DrLoboJo:
Here's the story so far:
The bus was more crowded than usual. It was bitterly cold outside, and I hadn't prepared for it. I noticed that a fair number of the riders were dressed curiously. As I glanced around, I stretched my feet and kicked up against a large, heavy cardboard box laying under the seat in front of me. (Splotchy)
I couldn't believe my eyes. Surreptitiously, I tried to establish, without giving it away, if anyone else had seen what I had. For ten years I had been looking for that box. What looked like an ordinary cardboard box to most contained something most precious. Only by the small golden "P" was I able to identify what I was looking at. (Freida Bee)
How the box got here, or how I happened to be on this bus with it now--these questions were immaterial. I just had to get that box. The bus slowed to a stop, so I steadied myself. Just as I was about to make a grab for the box, however, it moved. Someone else was picking it up to take it away! I had to stop her! (Dguzman)
What? This couldn't be happening--to get this close and watch some quick-footed little dwarf just up and snatch it away from me...no! I got up and just as I did the sweaty hillbilly in front of me stood up and stepped into the aisle. Moving like a bad mime imitating a man in a box he extended his arms and stretched, looking up at the ceiling as he did so. The dwarf with the box--I couldn't be sure if it was a man or a woman, but something about her seemed feminine--slipped out the front door and off the bus. I took a deep breath and slumped back down into my seat.(Bubs)
"F---. F---, f---, f---, f---, f---!" I mumbled under my breath. I leaned my head against the cold window and watched the dwarf threading her way through the crowd. She held the box tightly to her chest as she leaned into the wind and rushed forward. The small gold P on the box flashed teasingly between the coats and legs of the passersby. I bit my lower lip, trying not to cry. I had a brief flashback to the last time I'd seen that box. Agnes and I had just enjoyed a concert at Crew Hall. We ducked into her father's book shop for some tea. As we shrugged off our wraps, we heard her father arguing animatedly in French with someone in the back room. Agnes laughed and waved her hand dismissively at me when I looked at her questioningly. "Eetz nussing!" she whispered. "Eetz, mon pere and mon oncle! Zay are deescussing an order." Just then Agnes's father jerked open the door to the back room and hurried out. His face was ruddy with anger and he was carrying the box with the small. gold P. A second later, Agnes's uncle followed. He opened his mouth to say something, but seeing Agnes and me staring at him, closed it again with a snap. His large mustache quivered. The bus pulled away from the curb, jerking me out of my reverie. I shook my head to clear my thoughts and searched the crowd on the sidewalk for the dwarf. There she was! Keeping my eyes glued to her, I stood again and yanked the bell cord. I'd get off at the next stop and see if I could catch up to her. The bus pulled up to the curb a couple of blocks away. I could still see the dwarf as she hurried in and out of the crowd. I lurched to the front of the bus and ran down the steps, still not taking my eyes off the dwarf and the gold P on the box. (DCup)
The hillbilly stretched again once his feet hit the pavement, his arms blocking my view of the dwarf and the box. Overwhelmed by the odor of a three-day drunk, I skittered around him as fast as I could. There she was! She seemed to be moving toward a store front? No! An alley! She ducked down the alley, the box clasped to her small frame. I hurried past couples holding hands, individuals talking to thin air, and turned down the alley, only to be confronted by two daunting challenges. A man vomiting, and a whole series of doors, any of which could have been the escape route of the little lady with the box.(Geoffrey)
But then I found myself stumbling, shaking my head. I was dizzy -- and there was barf down my shirt! That was no man vomiting! It was a discarded full-length bath mirror, leaned against the alley wall amid some overflowing trash cans and piles of garbage. The alley backs a block of small eateries. I was standing in piss and thrown-away shrimp tails and oyster shells, about to hurl again. Between the hard run, the smell of the hillbilly and the smell of the alley, I'd puked and almost passed out! And that series of doors? There was just one. I'd been seeing double-double. One door. It was open! (Erudite Redneck)
Tahhed: TECH, Trixie, DrLoboJo!
--ER
Here's the story so far:
The bus was more crowded than usual. It was bitterly cold outside, and I hadn't prepared for it. I noticed that a fair number of the riders were dressed curiously. As I glanced around, I stretched my feet and kicked up against a large, heavy cardboard box laying under the seat in front of me. (Splotchy)
I couldn't believe my eyes. Surreptitiously, I tried to establish, without giving it away, if anyone else had seen what I had. For ten years I had been looking for that box. What looked like an ordinary cardboard box to most contained something most precious. Only by the small golden "P" was I able to identify what I was looking at. (Freida Bee)
How the box got here, or how I happened to be on this bus with it now--these questions were immaterial. I just had to get that box. The bus slowed to a stop, so I steadied myself. Just as I was about to make a grab for the box, however, it moved. Someone else was picking it up to take it away! I had to stop her! (Dguzman)
What? This couldn't be happening--to get this close and watch some quick-footed little dwarf just up and snatch it away from me...no! I got up and just as I did the sweaty hillbilly in front of me stood up and stepped into the aisle. Moving like a bad mime imitating a man in a box he extended his arms and stretched, looking up at the ceiling as he did so. The dwarf with the box--I couldn't be sure if it was a man or a woman, but something about her seemed feminine--slipped out the front door and off the bus. I took a deep breath and slumped back down into my seat.(Bubs)
"F---. F---, f---, f---, f---, f---!" I mumbled under my breath. I leaned my head against the cold window and watched the dwarf threading her way through the crowd. She held the box tightly to her chest as she leaned into the wind and rushed forward. The small gold P on the box flashed teasingly between the coats and legs of the passersby. I bit my lower lip, trying not to cry. I had a brief flashback to the last time I'd seen that box. Agnes and I had just enjoyed a concert at Crew Hall. We ducked into her father's book shop for some tea. As we shrugged off our wraps, we heard her father arguing animatedly in French with someone in the back room. Agnes laughed and waved her hand dismissively at me when I looked at her questioningly. "Eetz nussing!" she whispered. "Eetz, mon pere and mon oncle! Zay are deescussing an order." Just then Agnes's father jerked open the door to the back room and hurried out. His face was ruddy with anger and he was carrying the box with the small. gold P. A second later, Agnes's uncle followed. He opened his mouth to say something, but seeing Agnes and me staring at him, closed it again with a snap. His large mustache quivered. The bus pulled away from the curb, jerking me out of my reverie. I shook my head to clear my thoughts and searched the crowd on the sidewalk for the dwarf. There she was! Keeping my eyes glued to her, I stood again and yanked the bell cord. I'd get off at the next stop and see if I could catch up to her. The bus pulled up to the curb a couple of blocks away. I could still see the dwarf as she hurried in and out of the crowd. I lurched to the front of the bus and ran down the steps, still not taking my eyes off the dwarf and the gold P on the box. (DCup)
The hillbilly stretched again once his feet hit the pavement, his arms blocking my view of the dwarf and the box. Overwhelmed by the odor of a three-day drunk, I skittered around him as fast as I could. There she was! She seemed to be moving toward a store front? No! An alley! She ducked down the alley, the box clasped to her small frame. I hurried past couples holding hands, individuals talking to thin air, and turned down the alley, only to be confronted by two daunting challenges. A man vomiting, and a whole series of doors, any of which could have been the escape route of the little lady with the box.(Geoffrey)
But then I found myself stumbling, shaking my head. I was dizzy -- and there was barf down my shirt! That was no man vomiting! It was a discarded full-length bath mirror, leaned against the alley wall amid some overflowing trash cans and piles of garbage. The alley backs a block of small eateries. I was standing in piss and thrown-away shrimp tails and oyster shells, about to hurl again. Between the hard run, the smell of the hillbilly and the smell of the alley, I'd puked and almost passed out! And that series of doors? There was just one. I'd been seeing double-double. One door. It was open! (Erudite Redneck)
Tahhed: TECH, Trixie, DrLoboJo!
--ER
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Through the door I could see the dwarf handing the package to a very petite Chinese woman. Then what looked like a sumo wrestler took the dwarf, lifted her above his head and bent her in half ( I heard her spine crack and a small whine from her lips) and stuffed her into a twelve inch pipe seven feet above the floor and then put a lid on it. Having been distracted at the murderous act of the wrestler I had not notice that the Chinese woman had slipped away. I immediately entered and began to search a rabbit's warren of passages for the woman. As I searched I became aware that an overpowering smell pervaded the rooms and hallways. It was...opium. I was in an opium den. Having just puked out my guts anyway I was in a weakened condition and the opium was beginning to have an effect on me. At the end of the last hall way I saw a room in which, yes it was, the hillbilly who was now dressed in black robes and sitting on a golden throne was being presented with the box (the P was glowing like fire) by the small woman. (drlobojo)
With dried tobacco spit stiffening his beard hair, the hillbilly flags a taxi. He mutters to the sterotypical middle eastern driver 'jus' go'. His long, dirty fingers probe the front pocket of his bib overalls searching for hidden treasure. He thrusts a sliver of sinewed cured meat into his nearly toothless mouth...the salt & red pepper create a painful thirst that must be quenched. In a life laden with disappointment & ridicule, he finds a brief respite in the half-full 'RED BULL' can on the taxi's floorboard. Throwing all caution to the wind, he wraps his cracked lips around the opening of this bacteria cornucopia and tilts his head back. The mercy mirage evaporates as he realizes some club hopper or hurried shift worker had made use of his cylindrical oasis the night before. The taste of urine causes the lava of discontent boiling inside him to erupt in a glorious shower of vulgarity, beef jerky and cold stranger piss. His head presses hard against the plexiglass barrier as Abdul slams on the brakes. Profanity need not be spoken in one's native tongue to be understood. Skin from his chin paints the sidewalk as he is thrown violently from the cab. As he lay there in a putrid heap, businessmen in pressed suits walk around or step over him, teens in ass-revealing baggy jeans gleefully kick him, and the street evangelists shove tracts in his pocket that ask "Where would you go if you died?". But the thought that hauntingly reverberates in his hollow soul..."why does the hillbilly in the story have to be smelly? it aint like we dont never take a bath...that's jus' hillbilly profilin"
In a not related topic...Dr. Loney's point to ponder for the day:
"its alright if you wanna go catfishin with dynamite...heck, we all do it...but if yous in somebody else's pond, a cane pole and chicken livers a'do"
"its alright if you wanna go catfishin with dynamite...heck, we all do it...but if yous in somebody else's pond, a cane pole and chicken livers a'do"
I know yall is spinnin on each others yarns, but honest to god, I wuz woke up this mornin by crowin, squawkin, & screechin...they wuz a red gamecock, a blue n green peacock & a speckled guinea on my front porch. Im figurin that either a neighbor has got some new pets from the co-op, or in wild celery smokin induced fog I went & signed a contrack to be in a bad, talkin'-poultry disney movie... whatever one, theys been an upgrade in afterchurch eatin t-mowr...'bout noonish, if any of yous in the Loney Mountain locality...BYOB...bring your own bbqsauce.
Dr. Bill, you'm me must be kin. I just went and donated $115 to the local PetsMart for vittles, beddin' and other acooterments for our domestic livestock, and I hasd flashbacks to trips to the co-op in Fort Smith for feed'n all for large-animal stock way back when -- and I'm thinkin' the percentile of people who casually use the term "co-op" in that sense, which is the sense you just used it, is shrinkin' ever day.
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