for alan. attempt number one.

My dear friend Alan challenged me an age and a half ago to come up with a plot idea in 5 seconds and write a story out of it. I know I had some good ideas, back when the challenge was set, but they've (unsurprisingly) fled since he presented the concept, and I'm attempting, for the first time since then (sorry sorry sorry!!!) to redeem myself. We shall see how the first try goes.

"walking along, minding my business, through the woods."

so, i was walking along, minding my business, through the woods, when a tiny bird came and smacked me in the face. i could hear strange rustling sounds throughout the forest, and, as an apology for so rudely colliding with my best feature, the bird informed me that all the animals of the wood were fleeing from the impending nuclear holocaust (apparently, this is not only predictable, but out-runnable). i asked the bird if i should be fleeing, too, and he promptly replied, "no, dr. manhattan, you're the whole problem."

[disclamer: i was just watching "watchmen"]

...okay. that was lame. really really. not even clever. so...let's try again. 1...2...3...4...5...

...

what happens when a sphere travels through flatland? it appears as a flat circle steadily growing larger and smaller, right? so, by an extension of logic, a four-dimensional object moving through three-dimensional space would appear as a three-dimensional object in an abnormal state of fluxuation, right? (assuming, obviously, that the fourth dimension has to do with space, and not time.) i'm pretty sure, then, that every single rat i've ever had the pleasure of owning was actually a four-dimensional object, or possibly spy, cleverly disguised as a three-dimensional innocent.

...lost my train of thought on that one. and that wasn't even really a story. mebbe you should just skip this post altogether. it's coming out to be a bit of a "trial run."

okay. let's do some brainstorming.

5 second plots:

man murdered by sister-in-law as revenge for sister sleeping with sister-in-law's husband. s-i-l belatedly realizes that sister was sleeping with the right guy, and she just killed her husband, her brother-in-law's twin. (sort of csi meets comedy of errors. blegh.)

ah HAH! art imitating a possibility of life - father drops dead from aneurysm over worrying about child getting into a good college, wasting time, etc. child does fine in life. (sorry dad. this one is dumb.)

like the geico stack-o-money, professional photographer's camera comes to life and begins berating him for his photographic subject choices.

...i think my brain is on shutdown already. i'm having trouble being very creative. right now, i'm just derivative.

OH i should do something about the xkcd characters coming to life...think, nerd-sniper meets playing chess on rollercoasters-er. or something. but gods know i'm not nearly as clever as that guy.

more later. i'm working on it, i promise!