This week Kirst Writes is hosting the Six Word Story Challenge. This week’s prompt word is Superstition. Remember to head to Kirst’s blog on Thursday to vote for your favorite. Here is my little story…
“It was true. Everyone believed it.”
~kat
Category Archives: Flash Fiction
Twittering Tales #106 – 16 October 2018
About the challenge: Each Tuesday I will provide a photo prompt. Your mission, if you choose to accept the challenge, is to tell a story in 280 characters or less. When you write your tale, be sure to let me know in the comments with a link to your tale.
A final note: if you need help tracking the number of characters in your story, there is a nifty online tool that will count for you at charactercountonline.com.
I will do a roundup each Tuesday, along with providing a new prompt. And if for some reason I missed your entry in the Roundup, as I have occasionally done, please let me know. I want to be sure to include your tale.
Finally, have fun!
And REMEMBER…you have 280 characters (spaces and punctuation included), to tell your tale…and a week to do it. I can’t wait to see what you create this week.
Twittering Tales #105 – The Roundup
Photo by Matt Artz at Unsplash
Starting us off…
“I’m a moron,” Brad groaned.
“It’s all the rage!” she said. “You have a chance to get in on the ground floor.”
He’d spent his savings on the very first plein air writing kiosk. It became a favorite spot for texters and gamers.
“Cool sculpture,” they’d say, smart phones in hand.
~kat
278 Characters
By Martin at Martin Cororan:
You Maniacs
After years of churning out gibberish the apes finally typed the complete works of Shakespeare.
The boffins in their lab coats seemed very pleased with themselves.
Many moons later Charlton Heston rode along the beach and encountered a semi-submerged Statue of Liberty…
Bloody boffins!
By Hayley at The Story Files:
Working Air
It was a crazy idea, an office set up outside wouldn’t work! Mr.Cooper believed his team would be more productive without the ‘shackled desk’ atmosphere. It did improve things for awhile but then it rained and nobody wanted to work outside anymore.
By Reena at ReInventions:
Alas
Tickety-Tac ….. the fingers din’t stop rattling the keyboard, and dropping white sheets stained with stories on the sand.
But what were the stories?
The great drama unfolding on the horizon, of the meek winning battles….
Then?
They did not live long enough to witness it on Earth.
(276 characters)
By Willow at WillowDot21:
Nightmare
It was the same nightmare that he’d had for years. He’d arrive at work and not only had the office and carpark gone. In their place, among the weeds were five desks and five typewriters. He pinched himself on the arm as Dr Capaldy had suggested. But this time he didn’t wake up.
(280 Characters)
By The Dark Netizen:
TYPEWRITERS
A madman once read that monkeys typing on typewriters are bound to produce a novel. And so, he made monkeys type. Everyone mocked him. But, they were all proven wrong. The monkeys produced a masterpiece!
The madman stood triumphant, the typewriters stood as relics of his victory.
Character Count: 280
By Michael at Morpethroad:
In the house of lost story the keyboards sit idle, awaiting energetic fingers to restore them to life.
Each machine is overflowing with tales gallant and brave.
They sit idle ready to pour forth the next best seller.
A word escapes flops momentarily but gasps a lack of inspiration.
(279 characters)
By Deepa at Sync With Deep:
Eye Love You
for hours
we sat in silence
me and my typewriter
my heart was
his typewriter
and he typed
his love
through my eyes
By Ramya at And Miles to Go Before I Sleep:
Unwritten Fate
News headline read –
Want to change your fate? Then excellent opportunity for you!!!
Be the writer of your own destiny.
Write your own fairytale.*
Write the unwritten.
*Conditions apply – Fate once written cannot be changed back.
Character Count – 223
By Deb at Twenty Four:
With care Lola sprinkled the last grains of sand and then, finally satisfied, took a step back, it looked perfect.
“What is it for though? Old beat up typewriters in the desert?”
She scowled, tourists, they just didn’t comprehend artistic vision.
(247 characters)
By Anurag at Jagahdilmein:
The Writers Shall Inherit the Earth
“Are you sure these were the last of them?” I asked my General.
“Yes Sir,” he replied.
I sighed in relief. We’d managed to extract the last group of writers too.
Now we could safely go ahead with the invasion & annihilation of Planet Earth as per our plans.
258 characters.
By Peter at Peter’s Pondering:
The Sand Fly Typing Pool
The experiment had been tried before with monkeys.
Now, working with sand flies, it was thought that, eventually, their landing on the row of keyboards must lead to a work worthy of Shakespeare.
What a pity Charlie, the office junior, had forgotten to load the platens with paper!
(279 characters)
By Jan at Strange Goings on in the Shed:
Ancestral Burial Grounds
The ancestral burial grounds were a place of pilgrimage
And reflection.
An echo of great literary undertaking
And beauty.
And now,
The ancestors lay shrouded in memories and silence,
For the age of typewriters was all but gone,
A distant memory in the minds of the ones that came after.
(280 characters
By the Universal Unionist:
You already know about the SAS but the existence of an even more secret elite force that fought in WWII has now been revealed by a blogger known only as “agent Kat”. The STS or Special Typewriter Service played a crucial role in undermining and interfering in NAZI signal traffic, I could tell you more but agent Kat has restricted me in revea…..
By the Indie She:
The keys on the typewriters rusty as no one touched them.
Relics of history,they were consigned to the arid plains of oblivion.
Epitome of grander times,when you ruled the keyboard.
Time has turned.
The travesty of our times that keys rule us ,more smaller and smarter.
(267 characters)
A late entry from week #103 by Soul Connection:
Prediction
Ur View On Dis?
May Be Ancestors Prediction On Future.
Mean?
Dey Wr More Intlgnt Den V R 2day.Till Date Almst Evry Prdctn Is True.May B Dis Is Smthng Imprtnt Dey Predicted Abt Future Tht Need Attention n Thts Y Its Dfclt To Decode As U Can C It Includes Almst Evrythng Frm D Univrse.
Well done everyone! I was surprised by all the monkeys (and sand fleas) that made their way into this week’s tales. I guess I’m a bit out of touch. But they were great. Very entertaining, some nostalgic, some that made me think.
This week’s odd photo is by Buzz Anderson at Unsplash. I hope you have fun with it. In 280 characters or less of course, and I’ll see you and next week’s roundup! Have a great week!
Twittering Tales #106 – 16 October 2018
Photo by Buzz Anderson at Unsplash.com
The Great Christmas War
“This is the Christmas War exhibit,” droned the tour guide.
“What’s a Christmas?” asked a wide-eyed boy.
“Well,” the tour guide winked, “50 years ago, Christmas was banned because it drove people nuts! Filled ‘em with greed, hate, envy, rage!”
“Sounds scary!”
“It was buddy. It was.”
~kat
280 Characters
Twittering Tales #105 – 9 October 2018
About the challenge: Each Tuesday I will provide a photo prompt. Your mission, if you choose to accept the challenge, is to tell a story in 280 characters or less. When you write your tale, be sure to let me know in the comments with a link to your tale.
A final note: if you need help tracking the number of characters in your story, there is a nifty online tool that will count for you at charactercountonline.com.
I will do a roundup each Tuesday, along with providing a new prompt. And if for some reason I missed your entry in the Roundup, as I have occasionally done, please let me know. I want to be sure to include your tale.
Finally, have fun!
And REMEMBER…you have 280 characters (spaces and punctuation included), to tell your tale…and a week to do it. I can’t wait to see what you create this week.
Twittering Tales #104 – The Roundup
Before we move on I want to give a shout out to newcomer, Hrida who forgot to link her tale for the Shoe Tree Prompt. Visit her site for an interesting lesson on “shoefitis”.
Tired of painting on various canvases, walls and other inanimate things, I wanted something raw, something alive. Came across a dying tree and decided that it’d be my canvas this time. I randomly tossed shoes upon it, and named the art – Shoefiti.
~247 characters
Starting us off…
Dr. Willis’ decades-long quest for the mdju netjer, “words of the gods” had been rewarded with an amazing find. As he read the tablet’s message, he realized no one must know. Suddenly, a wind whipped up the sand burying him in a matter of minutes. He was right. No one would know.
280 Characters
By Martin at Martin Cororan:
Pyramid Scheme
Rameses had promised his favourite concubines that he wouldn’t bury them alive upon his demise, but apparently that had been a catacomb-sized lie.
‘Well that’s just great,’ wailed Hehet over his mummified corpse. ‘What now?’
Ngozi began to angrily carve at the stone walls. ‘Now we make shit up and screw with future historians.’
By The Dark Netizen:
Hieroglyphs
There it was, the hieroglyphs I had searched my entire life for.
I placed the torches down, and fished out my translation book, notepad, and a pencil from my bag. began noting the translation of the first line. I jumped up in joy. This was indeed it.
Here lies the recipe for beer!
Character Count: 280
By Fandango at This, That, and the Other:
At the Zoo
“What does it say?” the boy asked.
“It’s about how the ancient Egyptians built a zoo using crude tools,” the man said. “And all of the birds, animals, and snakes they kept at the zoo.”
“Wow,” the boy said, “really?”
“I don’t know, kid,” the man grinned. “I can’t read hieroglyphics.”
(280 characters)
By Willow at WillowDot21:
The Stone
Moses stormed out of Peter’s office. He was so angry! “I spent week’s writing those commandments. And now they are gone!”
Down on earth Azriel was happily playing in the sand waiting for the tide to turn? Satan had promised him a paddle if buried the stone. For Mr Carter to find.
(279 Characters)
By Kristian at Tales from the Mind of Kristian:
The Overlords
When it was translated, the stone caused uproar.
It said “We, the Overlords, leave you now to govern yourselves as you see fit. We will return in five thousand years. From the heavens we will come.”
This stone was dated to the time of the first dynasty, Five thousand years ago.
[276 characters]
By Reena at ReInventions:
Scripted
“From inky thumb impressions of the illiterate to biometrics … the world is round. This script may be old, but the images will convey what alphabets cannot. We can use this in digital devices for the unlettered.”
“Sure, I have already figured out how to dupe them of their money.”
(279 characters)
By Deepa at Sync with Deep:
Pastime
a few years before: “don’t scribble the wall. ”
now: Stop flooding my wall with your memes and jokes
writing on the wall has been my favorite pastime since long.
By Peter at Peter’s Pondering:
Those new contraceptive tablets were great.
The instructions were really clear.
I just had to make a sheath out of the intestine of a goat and stretch it over my organ, before ravishing all the handmaidens I desired.
I didn’t have an organ, or a piano, so I stretched it over my lyre!
(280 characters)
By Hélène at Willow Poetry:
Short Reign
It is said that the son of God will rise in the West. He will be given the name, Trump. He will be recognized by his distinguished orange hair. At the end of his reign, he will be remembered for his Pinocchio nose. His famous nose could stretch all the way to Rocket Man’s Land.
278 Characters
By Ramya at Miles to Go Before I Sleep:
Missing Link
Examining the tablet, the researcher concluded that the tablet depicts an actual event.
A good piece to the puzzle.
Could this be an elaborate hoax or the Missing link?
Character Count : 167
By Deb at Twenty Four:
She frowned as she studied the hieroglyphics. This was getting beyond a joke, they couldn’t be serious but as she studied it, she knew that they were and she almost groaned aloud.
Write an essay praising our glorious and virtuous leader, Cleopatra.
As if.
(254 characters)
By Anurag at Jagahdilmein:
Apocalypse Now
Amidst falling debris, I quickly started the translation software on my computer.
The screen said- WHEN YOU LIFT THE TABLET, AN EARTHQUAKE SHALL DESTROY YOU UNLESS
I kept staring in despair at the frozen screen, which now said-MICROSOFT WINDOWS IS NOT RESPONDING. PLEASE WAIT.
276 characters.
By TheIndieShe:
The murals told the tales of distant past long gone .Men then fought and killed each other. All glory laid to dust.
The myriad figures stand alone.
But the story has not changed.
Men still keep on fighting and killing each other.
And the stony walls blood washed shine anew.
(272 characters)
By at Hrida at Inked Beliefs:
Cryptic Glyphs
Cooper had finally reached the end of the cave. Translating etchings, he realised that it was a doorway to something special. The glyphs of fishes, birds, men toiling and stars only meant a treasure deep under the river which would open, upon discovering only under the moonlight.
~ 280 characters
Thank you to everyone who participated this week.
Now on to this week’s fun photo by Matt Artz at Unsplash. You know I like to find interesting photos to challenge you. I hope you’ll have fun with this one! In 280 characters or less of course, and I’ll see you and next week’s roundup!
Twittering Tales #105 – 9 October 2018
Photo by Matt Artz at Unsplash
“I’m a moron,” Brad groaned.
“It’s all the rage!” she said. “You have a chance to get in on the ground floor.”
He’d spent his savings on the very first plein air writing kiosk. It became a favorite spot for texters and gamers.
“Cool sculpture,” they’d say, smart phones in hand.
~kat
278 Characters
Princess – A Six Word Story
She was a bitch. Daddy’s princess.
~kat
This week’s prompt word, princess, comes from Wonderwall. Check out the others in the comments HERE. And be sure to vote for your favorites on Thursday! 😊
Twittering Tales #104 – 2 October 2018
About the challenge: Each Tuesday I will provide a photo prompt. Your mission, if you choose to accept the challenge, is to tell a story in 280 characters or less. When you write your tale, be sure to let me know in the comments with a link to your tale.
A final note: if you need help tracking the number of characters in your story, there is a nifty online tool that will count for you at charactercountonline.com.
I will do a roundup each Tuesday, along with providing a new prompt. And if for some reason I missed your entry in the Roundup, as I have occasionally done, please let me know. I want to be sure to include your tale.
Finally, have fun!
And REMEMBER…you have 280 characters (spaces and punctuation included), to tell your tale…and a week to do it. I can’t wait to see what you create this week.
Twittering Tales #103 – The Roundup
Photo by PDPhotos at Pixabay.com
As promised, the story behind this photo from the Union Tribune:
Winds, weight of soggy namesakes do it in
By Tony Manolatos, UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
January 9, 2008BALBOA PARK – It was called the shoe tree, and it was one of San Diego’s strangest landmarks.
Hundreds of pairs of shoes – sneakers, high heels, Rollerblades, you name it – hung from its branches. For some reason, people tossed their shoes onto the massive tree, which graced hole No. 2 at Morley Field Disc Golf Course for about three decades.
Tourists – yes, tourists – would drive to Morley Field to get a peek.
Until Sunday.
Wicked winds knocked the old tree to the ground. It had died years ago, but it was never cut down because of its popularity.
Still, not everyone knew about the tree, one of 10 or so throughout Balboa Park lost to the winds.
Richard Amero, an unofficial park historian, said he’d never heard of the shoe tree. Others are mourning the loss.
“Oh yeah, it’s missed,” said Mitch Zunich, who works at the disc golf pro shop. “Everybody is pretty bummed out.”
Zunich and other park employees suspect all of the rain-soaked shoes did the tree in. They said that when the high winds swooped in, the wet shoes served as anchors, pulling the tree to the ground.Yesterday morning, three workers used a chain saw to slice the tree into pieces. The shoes were loaded into two tractor beds – each about the size of a twin bed – and hauled to a nearby Dumpster. It took five trips to get rid of all the shoes.Legend has it that the shoe tree started with a bet. The loser of the disc golf game had to toss his shoes into the branches.By yesterday afternoon, all that was left of the shoe tree was a single branch and a 6-foot stump. It looked as if the stump had been pushed over; the base was still attached to its roots.All of the shoes were gone, but there were two pairs of laces – one turquoise, the other white – strung around the branch. And what looked like a black handkerchief was actually a pair of Victoria Secret panties.“Somehow that’s appropriate,” a nearby golfer remarked.At some point last year, shoes started showing up on another tree. This one is on hole No. 11.Now in Morley Field, disc golfers are waiting for the other shoe tree to drop.
Now on to our recap:
Starting us off:
The Shoe Tree
She lost her greening when lightning singed her, tip to root. But life still flickered in her core where tiny creatures nested and cicadas laid their eggs.
One day someone tossed his shoes over her bare limbs. More followed. She was useful again. Life has a way of surprising us. ~kat
279 Characters
By Reena at ReInventions:
Rituals
It is a ritual for budding sportsmen to tie a shoe on this tree. They believe it gives success.
What started as a way of documenting my son’s journey from childhood to youth has become a beacon of hope to so many. He became a legend for early success, before leaving us forever.
By The Dark Netizen:
Shoes
There it is, another pair up on you, my dear tree.
Please continue carrying the burden of my shoes for a little while longer. I promise it won’t be long now. These torn shoes are proof of my training and serve to remind me of the pains I have taken.
I will be a gold medalist soon!
Character Count: 280
By Michael at Morpethroad:
Money didn’t grow on trees but the old tree at the end of the road grew shoes.
Old one’s mum said as she pushed the pram past it each day.
“As if I’ve time to waste on getting up there for a pair of size nines,” she’d say telling us we only had one pair and to be grateful for that.
280 Characters
By Deepa at SyncWithDeep:
The First…
I am going to get you new shoes, dad said.
Running and toiling behind the entire family for 30 years, mom was all ready to set her foot for the first marathon run.
(163 characters)
By Fandango at This, That, and the Other:
Taken Too Literally…
“What is that?” Franklin asked his son when he saw that the small tree in their backyard was covered with shoes draped over its bare branches.
“I made a present for you, Pop,” the boy said. “I heard you tell Mom the other day that you needed a new shoe tree. Well, there it is!”
(277 characters)
By Hayley at The Story Files:
Lost Shoes
It began as a simple thing after the ship wreak, one of the rescuers put the dead boy’s shoes in a tree. More followed and it became a way to keep count of the deaths. The tree was overburdened and it started to wither. It became a memorial; a memory for those lost.
By Willow at WillowDot21:
The Gift.
”What in my name is this.” The big man turned to St Peter who shrugged. “It’s quite a piece of art.” As they were admiring the tree Azriel, his arms full of trainers came into view!
Satan smiled,make him a shoe tree he had told Ariel. Azriel’s naivety, a gift that kept on giving.
(279 Characters)
By Kristian at Tales from the Mind of Kristian:
The Blood Price
The tree was a monument to a lost generation.
Each shoe represented a child who’d been shot dead at school.
The killings had to end but the tree would remain until Congress passed laws restricting access to guns.
It would likely remain a while until the blood price was paid.
[275 Characters]
By Peter at Peter’s Pondering:
The tree had become quite a tourist attraction.
57 pairs of shoes in the branches.
114 uppers, 114 laces, 114 throats, 114 tongues, and 114 heels.
Beneath the tree there were only half that number of tongues, all belonging to the 57 bodies buried there!
Please pray for their souls!
(279 characters)
By Deepika at DeepikasRamblings:
A crowd gathered at the dilapidated hut in the village. Worried, they were all busy discussing about the otherwise barren tree which had grown “shoes”.
The villagers decided to offer one of their shoe to the “shoe tree” as an oblation, lest some tragedy befell on them..
269 characters
By Amritha at Igniting Hope:
POI (Point of Interest)
“People paid 20$ just to take pictures of an unusual sight – a shoe tree. Graduate students would hang their shoes in that tree in celebration on their final day. The truth though remains a mystery”, our guide remarked.
“Whoever started this custom, he is clever!”, I pondered.
(277 characters)
By Deb at Twenty Four:
In Australia the shoe tree was a common sight so their friends were confused that they kept returning to this one, to take photos and comment on the additions but the smile they shared suggested there was a secret.
No one knew they had thrown up the first pair on their honeymoon.
(279 characters)
By The IndieShe:
The Wishing Tree was once lush and green.
Tiny birds crooned and ambled on its wavy branches.
Their nests hung in myriad shapes.
A microcosm of life!
But man made the world his own and life a travesty!
The leaves withered and birds left.
Now costly shoes hung on the dried branches.
By Jan at Strange Goings on in the Shed:
Long John Silver’s Revenge
See that tree. Every shoe’s been pinched from his shop. He can see it from his window, but can’t do anything about it. The damned cur!
The homicidal cobbler finally met his nemesis. He took my leg, and I took his business, down, down, into the Abyss.
John! Time for your medication.
(280 characters)
By Anurag at Jagahdilmein:
Shoes that Touch the Sky (Three Stories for the Price of One)
Story 1
“How the hell did THAT happen?”
“Well, Coach, the athletes said that we basketball players are no more than overgrown monkeys, so we broke into their locker room last night, and used their shoes instead of a ball for practice…on a tree. That’s where monkeys live, right?”
272 characters.
Story 2
My father taught me that we should always use the enemy’s weapon against him.
So when those runners threw a shoe at us, they should have known better than to dry their newly-washed shoes in the open.
NOW let’s see who’s the monkey?
231 characters.
Story 3
“Mom, I swear ’tis not my fault. I did watcha told me to do.”
“Then how come this tree is laden with shoes ‘stead of fruit, Jack?”
“I did throw away those beans, but how was I ‘sposed to know that they would fall on the terrace where those athletes were drying their shoes?”
272 characters.
By Radhika at Radhika’s Reflection:
Toss for a Cause
Thanks to the social media, what started as a local event, gained momentum to become one of the most sought after annual philanthropic meet, christened “Walk with dignity”. The new pair of shoes and the money raised, was donated to the needy, of the remote interior villages.
Letter count : 279
By Lorraine at Lorraine’s Frilly Freudian Slip:
Shoe Tree Nation
Shoe Tree was the trending store and internet influencer.
Life-sized reproductions dangled the designer wares from limb-like “branches”; customers tree-climbed to find their own style and size.
Footwear concierges available to provide a leg up.
Viral video moments guaranteed.
(character count: 264)
By Soul Connection:
Creativity
“So its easy to tackle cmptitve world wd creativity.Here are shoes,Shw ur creatvty”
He tk few shoes,mobile stair wd him n gne ot,tied shoes in pairs n hangd on tree
Owner ws watchng,Publc too ws curious
He-“Loved?Select here n buy thr”
Pointing 2wrds Showrm
Ownr-“Congrats,U R Selcted”
By D. Avery at ShiftNShake:
Those shoes up there?
I thought you knew.
Unshod they took to the air
bare footed, brave things-
spread their wings
took off and flew!
(127 characters)
By Universal Unionist:
Arbor calceus; grows in abundance on the Russian Steppes. Notable variations of the species developed in Holland, Abor clogus nederlandia, and in China, the often much-criticised miniature or dwarf variation, Abor parva pedess.
By Indhu at Always:
Partner in Crime
“Tree of shoes” takes another life! read the headline of the local daily. This is the 36thmysterious murder and the victim’s shoes were on the tree.
The corner news read that the crimes in the town has gone down recently.
He stood in front of her and thanked his partner in crime.
<279 characters>
Well done everyone! This week we have an ancient etching, photo by fotoerich at Pixabay.com. Tell me the story of this ancient artifact…how it came to be, where it ended up, or, have a bit of fun with it, and translate a line or two based on the glyphs depicted. You have 280 characters to tell your tale. I’ll see you at next week’s roundup!
Twittering Tales #104 – 2 October 2018
Photo by fotoerich at Pixabay.com
Dr. Willis’ decades-long quest for the mdju netjer, “words of the gods” had been rewarded with an amazing find. As he read the tablet’s message, he realized no one must know. Suddenly, a wind whipped up the sand burying him in a matter of minutes. He was right. No one would know.
~kat
Most Inspirational Blogger Nominee
like mercury colliding... 