wife beater

 

please quit calling my shirt
a wife beater
i don’t beat my wife
although you wouldn’t know that
and please quit trying to pull it off
or i’m gonna have to slug you

 

Photo: Google
For Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie

devotion

The lake is beautiful and so is your cabin, but watch out for that stray dog coming there.

Aw, that’s just old Shep. He’s ours.

I though he lived down at your house.

Yeah, we leave him there but he always runs the twenty miles up here anyway.

Jeez, that’s devotion.

 

For Five Lines or Less

dim

“You’re dim.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means you’re stupid.”

“I’m not stupid.”

“Stupid people don’t know they’re stupid.”

“I hear people say they’re stupid all the time.”

“Those are the smart ones, say that.”

“That don’t make any sense.”

“To you it don’t, because you’re stupid.”

“Ok… I’m stupid.”

“Now you’re wising up.”

 

 

For Daily Post

burn

day to day
animals eat each other
carnage
dinner
a rough way to run the world but
nature would have it that way
while perversely burning
fields and forests
to roast not just
prey but
predators too
who might enjoy
a nice cooked meal


For dVerse

my woods

 

I grew up on the edge of woods. It was extensive and I spent a lot of time in it. When I headed off to college, my parents left their empty nest and moved to the city. I didn’t revisit my beloved woods for years.

Out of school, I went to work. I had ideas. I made a lot of money. Three-hundred billion dollars, in fact, which is… a lot of money.

When I finally returned to my woods, I found a subdivision. Average price of the midwestern homes in it, three-hundred thousand dollars. That is, one thousand homes per billion dollars.

Over a decade, I bought thirty-billion worth, thirty thousand homes. I built a twelve-foot wall around them. Removed the homes and built one for myself.

With the tracts for about forty-four homes per acre, the wall enclosed about one hundred and fifty thousand acres, or two hundred and twenty square miles. In the portions of the wall facing still-existing woods, I added portals that could be opened from sunset to sunrise, for the wildlife.

I had a new forest planted, and added a plank path that ran through it.

Now, in my dotage, I ride a golf cart out into my domain every morning.

 

Photo: Mike Vor
For Sunday Photo Fiction

Blue Serpent

It’s difficult to train a snake but it can be done. I’ve spent years at the task. My efforts eventually brought me to the final round of the Snake Olympics.

My prize competitor, my greatest training accomplishment, and if I may say so, my friend, Blue Serpent, versus the great Russian speedster, черный гигант (Chernyy Gigant, or Black Giant).

Of course, Blue was a massive underdog, or undersnake, to the multiple-race winner. How is a humble Coluber constrictor to beat a Dendroaspis polylepis, fastest snake on the planet?

Training is key. Your snake has to know what’s at stake. Your snake has to want it and want it bad.

The training involves accustoming your animal to the ways of race tracks and ensuring that he or she is sufficiently hungry. You must also know just which prey will be most attractive to your charge, which prey, waiting there at the finish line. Note: Training a snake that prefers other snakes for dinner is never a good idea, as they race side-by-side.

Blue has a taste for mice of a certain size and color.

To keep the competitor on a straight line, light electric shocks are employed during training.

Blue Serpent learned quickly. Off the track, he was adorable. Snuggly. On race days, hungry, he grew still, composing his mind.

Did I mention that Blue is a blue racer. Sure, mambas are supposedly the world’s fastest snake, but with money on the line (no mouse for Blue if he loses), not all ophidians have the heart to triumph, especially after competing in multiple heats to reach that final challenge.

Black Giant had the heart, the will to win, of course. Blue and Black knew each other well. Black 0wned Blue when Blue first came up. That was before I took over Blue’s training. Now Black was confident, proud, perhaps a little hubristic.

The start was clean. At the other end of the course, Blue’s mouse and Black’s yellow-spotted rock hyrax waited in fear. The black viper sprang out to a quick lead. Most snakes can use lateral undulation, rectilinear movement, concertina movement, and  sidewinding, sometimes two-at-a-time in different parts of the body. Competitors must learn which mode(s) of locomotion are most effective in their particular race.

Blue maintained contact through the first half of the race, then began to move up. At the crucial moment in the final stretch, Black’s trainer shouted from the pit the traditional “STOP! STOP!” at Blue. This is allowed, as the snakes must ignore crowd noise. I then shouted “стоп! стоп!” and because I had been practicing the commanding tone of Putin ordering his minions around, (a famous soundbite in Russia), Black hesitated for a fraction of a second, just enough time for Blue to grab the lead and, soon thereafter, the mouse.

The glow of the victory has endured, even now, after Blue has been put out to stud.

 

For Flash Fiction Challenge

astral

“Welcome to Morvis High School, Freshman Class. Per adua ad astra. Through hard work to the stars. Ok? Per aspera ad astra. Hardships. Difficulties. You aren’t kids anymore. Per audacia ad astra. Be bold. Quam celerrime ad astra. You won’t be here forever. You’re only young once. Apply yourselves. Sic itur ad astra. That’s how you succeed. Ignore the wiseguy sophomores who tell you Ad astra per alas porci and our highly religious students who tell you Ad astra per alas fideles. Non lucror, exposita scientia, ad astra, knowledge for knowledge’s sake…”

“Jeez, he does go on.”

“Yeah and I couldn’t care less. Forget the stars. Tell me how to get to the astral plane.”

 

For Daily Post

conversation

Could you converse with an ant?

Talk to her about going to work? That’s what she does and you do too.

Off she marches, same old same old. What about you?

The ants in the next nest? She’ll ignore them or fight them, but never cooperate with them. If she goes over there, they all look alike to her.

You could talk about how your social life is the pits. Couple of girls get all the guys, because they’re to die for.

Or you could talk about how you sometimes get antsy, while she gets peopley.

I’d rather converse with my aunt.

 

For the Daily Post

Kicks

My boyfriend  gave me these kicks.

They cost a lot.

So I have him some kicks.

 

 

For 3LineTales

Cosell’s Constant

One of the universal constants of our world is Cosell’s Constant, which is due to change quite soon.

When it increases from .05854 to .05855, a number of differences will be noticeable in our everyday life.

On the plus side:

• We’ll be able to eat a little more
• We’ll be a little taller
• People will like you better, until they get to know you
• Insects will make better pets than they do now
• Drive-in movies will return
• The separation of Church and State will become the separation of Church, State, and Justin Bieber

On the minus side:

• In scientific calculations, quite a few pluses will become minuses
• Grass will talk in a loud voice, especially in your front lawn
• As for the crabgrass, don’t ask
• Whoever the current US president is, or, no, whomever, will become the permanent king of the world and come to live with you.
• Big pickles will no longer look as appetizing as they do now
• The aging process will reverse, but only for the reviled

 

For Daily Post