The lady in the moon lazily lifted her eyes. Her alarm clock screeched like a meteor skating on atmosphere. There was to be a full moon that night, meaning she would have to shine her very best. But she did not feel like showing herself at all. Her makeup had run out, and the solar tides had put her in such a state of exhaustion she couldn't even orbit her eyes, let alone her whole body. She sent out lunar waves of mayday to the clouds. "Cover me up," she begged them, "for I am too tired to glow."

"No," the clouds told her, "it has been an entire month since we've seen you in all your splendor, and we will not be denied this feast of light."

"If only someone would eclipse me," she cried, tears beginning to stream down the dark side of her face.

But none of the heavenly hosts volunteered to eclipse her. They were waiting, all of them, to see her this one special hour when no one of her curves was veiled. The lady of nighttime rolled over and went back to sleep. Once in a blue moon she shone only for the lovers in her own dreams.

Story #194

Magister Mecanus worked in the Destiny Department predestining love. He selected a pendant from the girl pile and one from the boy pile, placed them next to each other, and examined them closely with his magnifying lense. The match was aesthetically pleasing to him even in the minutest of details. His highly trained fingers felt the flat metal likenesses for affinity static and dangled them millimeters apart, one in each hand, to test the magnetism. Finally he reached for the abacus on the corner of his desk and computed the time the boy and girl would share. His computation worked out to just over eighty years. The rest of their lives, in fact. This made Magister Mecanus very happy. It was always sad when the pendants came back to him so soon to be melted down again.

Story #193

Note: Thanks to all who contributed stories this weekend. They may be viewed all in one place at indeterminacies.blogspot.com.

The pool party had long since ended, the music had stopped, the wet bodies had dried themselves and drifted away, but Brenda's reflection lingered at the pool's edge, hoping for her own private plunge into that liquid element of life. But she found it impossible to venture in alone without her body of substance to draw her in after it. She was doomed to roam hither and forth along the concrete edge of watery pleasure, passionately yearning but never able to dip into the coolness. Brenda herself was in the arms of a boy she met while swimming. He had admired her in her dripping bikini, lay now in her arms looking into her eyes. But she seemed vacant to him, hardly responding to his touch or glance. She had left an important aspect of herself at the pool, but never suspected. And so she would remain. The reflection of Brenda could not run away to find her mistress, as reflections may only exist where they have been cast.

Story #192

Eugene loved Katy so much he locked her in a closet. "I love you, Katy," he would tell her upon leaving for his confrontations with the world outside.

"If you love me, let me out," her muffled voice invariably called to him as he moved out of the room, out of earshot.

He would come back from time to time to feed her, and give her clothes. In a generous moment he even gave her a flashlight and a mirror so she could see what she looked like when she tried on the clothes. But he never let her out of the closet.

"I love you, Katy," he always called to her as he left.

Weeks, months and precious years watched over a ritual become reflex. It came to pass that Eugene could no longer speak with the vigor he once knew. As he tried to utter his declaration of love he could only cough helplessly. Before leaving the room to lay on his deathbed he etched his epitaph in the accumulated dust of their time together: "I love Katy."

Story #191

She is the spirit of water, or Neera, as dying men in the desert call her name, pressed by an archetypal instinct of primal language and a desire for one of her teardrops. Neera is a sad spirit, but when she cries it gives life, though she mourns the teardrops she gives forth for others, making her even sadder, for each droplet, no matter how small, is a part of her. When exhaustion subdues her she drifts the Earth in search of any remains of the waters she gave forth. What she finds she absorbs again into her flesh, but knows that she is doomed to perpetually part with it again. Neera swam in the pools of the Garden of Eden. Those days she was happiest. But that was so long ago, a memory nearly washed away by the tide that is her heartbeat. She caressed the throat of every great and every minor person who ever lived, and caresses the throat of everyone alive. She refuses no one. Despite her promiscuity, her purity is eternal.

Story #190

Reporter: I'm here with Professor Ernest Grimm, the world famous archeologist who has made what is perhaps the most significant discovery of our 50th century. Professor, would you please explain what you found.

Professor Grimm: I'd be glad to. Here you see a petrified specimen of the race that once inhabited this land during the Google dynasty. Now, we were sure that some kind of catastrophic event ended their civilization. A solar flare melting all the credit cards or a fatal disease like hiccups. We just didn't know.

Reporter: But you've solved it.

Professor Grimm: Yes I have. You see, this specimen here was coming out of a server room with a backup of the Internet in his hands. Luckily, the Outdoor Computer Museum in Antarctica is in possession of a working Windows PC, the only one in existence, reconstructed from pieces dug up where the Pacific Ocean used to be. The point is, we could read the backup.

Reporter: Were there problems translating it?

Professor Grimm: Actually not. The backup was in English, one of the simpler languages of that era, spoken universally by all primates. It doesn't present a problem to us. But I digress. You see, you have to understand about this race. They thrived on humor. It was their nourishment. It kept them alive. Gave them hope, something to laugh for, as one of their ancient sayings goes.

Reporter: And this backup proves that the humor ran out?

Professor Grimm: Yes it does. As we know, the ancient God of Comedy was Retarius, who channeled his humor to the masses by use of a blog. But one day he closed the blog and that was the end. With all the humor gone, everyone instantaneously turned to stone.

Story #189

Note: retarius.blogspot.com is one of my favorite blogs, because it's brilliant and it makes me laugh. Every time. On March 31st Retarius announced that he would stop blogging. It wasn't an April Fool's joke. This story was written as part of the tribute organized by Deryke of deryke.blogspot.com. Fortunately Retarius has reconsidered his decision, thereby averting a catastrophe of proportions we can only begin to imagine.

Kathy was a girl who consorted with plants. She had given up men long ago. During a few careful conversations with her vegan friend Susan, she ascertained an unspoken willingness to experiment, though outwardly her friend still upheld a semblance of resistance to such exotic interactions. That night Kathy invited Susan over to her house and softened her fears with a tasty wine made from plums just before their first stage of ripeness. It was very sweet and resulted easily in the desired clouding of Susan's inhibitions.

"It's so lovely," Kathy mused, "lying on the bed, the vine wrapping itself around you, sliding across the most sensitive parts of your body."

"But I couldn't kiss it," Susan stated anxiously, fighting off the desires confounding her determination.

"You'll learn to love that," Kathy countered in a sisterly voice full of encouragement. "Look, I'll show you." Without turning around, she lifted her forearm. The ivy awoke from its slumber in the pot, slowly extended itself, slinking down to her shoulder and into her hand, inching unambiguously towards her waiting mouth. Her tongue met the quivering leaves.

"Lesson one," stated Kathy with a mouth full of ivy, "stroke the leaves with your tongue - from bottom to top - as many as you can. When they begin to twitch in all different directions - they're yours to devour."

"No!" cried Susan, panicking, "I can't do that! I can't eat them without a dressing!"

Story 188

- Are you sure this is going to work?
- Oh, yeah, it's an ancient thing, you know. Tried and tested.
- Won't he put a curse on us or something?
- Nah, that only happens long after the embalmment, if someone starts to mess with him.
- But he's not embalmed yet.
- Duh. That's because he's still breathing.
- You mean, this might kill him?
- Well, he wanted us to make him into a mummy. You can't bake a cake without breaking a few eggs.
- OK, if you say so. But if he puts a curse on me, I'll tell your mom what you did to her linens.
- Will you just shut up and seal his nostrils!

Story #187

Lynn is her name. I spied her there several times, on days I bowled, or tried to bowl. When she wasn't watching me my eyes followed her pleasant curves and the straight lines she walked. In my imagination I equated her dimensions with the perfect shape of a bowling pin. She never bowled, yet she was always there, bee lining back and forth in a patient, ambling gait, eyeing the bowlers, but never smiling at them. There was something odd about her presence there.

One day I was ready to bowl my first strike. My form was perfect. My grip immaculate. I concentrated like a Buddha at the gate of Nirvana. I threw. Ten feet later the ball rolled into the gutter, just as I had wanted to roll onto Lynn. That's when she smiled at me. Girls make me nervous when they smile, especially when it's at me. I didn't hit a pin that entire evening. And the strange thing is, the worse I bowled, the more she glowed with lips upturning and eyes welling with love, as if to tell me, "It doesn't matter. I believe in you. You'll get your strike." But the more she warmed to me, the worse I bowled.

We've been together now for several years. Sure, she told me about her past, but I didn't mind. And it did serve to explain the attraction she felt towards me that night. For years she had been the lead pin in her lane, bearing the blunt blows of those horrid orbs bringing her down dozens of times a night, knocking her comrades against her. One day she willed herself not to fall. As the ball concussed a magic spark electrified her, transforming her into real flesh. She haunted the venue as a live girl until discovering my mercy for the pins.

Story #186

"Come over here to the railing," the beautiful girl said.

Jeff was stunned. He thought he had heard talking out on the balcony, but it couldn't be Bo. She broke up with him weeks ago, stating in her knifey, no-nonsense way, that he would not see her again.

"Why did you come back?" he asked her, suspicious of her intentions.

"I changed my mind. I want you. Come over here and want me."

Jeff wanted to believe, but he also knew it was April Fool's day. The contradiction of Bo-ex and and Bo-his collided to the sound of sirens as his desire nudged him forward. A dim thought arose. What if she intended to hurl him from the balcony at the end of the kiss he would snatch from her lips? She knew judo and was extremely hard to pin into positions she did not want to be in. He hesitated.

"You're going to come and hold me, aren't you?" she cooed at him with a tempting smile to back it up.

That smile was one of those addictions he could never resist. He lunged forward towards the promise of carnality. As he bent closer to lick the soft parts of her body his head bumped with a loud bong against the railing. He looked up and she was gone.

"April fool!" laughed the burly male baritone in his head, a sadistic voice that had taunted him since the day Bo left. He would have to do something about those voices he was hearing. It was beginning to annoy him.

Story #185

With all those bodies breezing about out there it was destined to happen. Doug and Marsha got together. Warm skin against warm skin caused blood flowing parallel to tepid blood to sizzle in the veins. A mile-high feeling of dizzying ecstasy charged through them. With each pelvic thrust they shot into unfolding realms of altitude, hotly defying the futile "no's" of gravity. The carnal splendor saw them swirling through boundless tangents, an intertwining one with the stratosphere.

Subsequent to an extremely bumpy ride George inspected his jet car, wiping clouds from the chassis. It never ceased to astonish him how the random formations invariably culminated in some kind of meaningful gestalt.

Story #184

The reader stories have all been reposted at indeterminacies.blogspot.com.

Instructor: He's dead.
Trainee 1: Oh God, what'd you do to him.
Instructor: Only what was necessary. I have it down to a science.
Trainee 2: It's evil.
Instructor: It's lateral thinking: acupuncture, Kama Sutra and massage technique, a little of each. They give us a g-point. Guys have a d-circuit. But it's not easy to complete.
Trainee 1: Wish I'd been better in math.
Instructor: See, guys can't have multiple orgasms like we do. There's this protective mechanism, because the male heart can only stand so much. But nature gave us an override.
Trainee 2: How does it work?
Instructor: First of all bring him to the brink, and dangle him there.
Trainee 1: And then?
Instructor: Then there are these two nerves: one ends in his big toe, the other ends at the base of the skull. Read your acupuncture. So you're on him like a figure eight, if you get my drift. Usually it's pretty quick, and completely non-violent.
Trainee 1: Yeah, there's something humane about it, but it leaves such a mess afterwards.
Trainee 2: If they had black belts in love, they'd surely give you one.
Instructor: All right. Enough digressing. Put out your cigarettes and let the taxidermy lesson begin!

Story #183

The two cave girls sat at the monitor, staring into the webcam they had found. They were highly adaptive creatures. They didn't even need stones to knock out the scientist who had reached back in time via laser verberations to grab them into the present. They were subtler. They slyly let their rocks scatter onto the transfer platform where they had materialized. As the scientist stepped into the circle to clear the rubble away they rushed to the panel and pressed all the buttons they had seen him press. Now, at the control PC, they watched him back in their era playing with their pet mastadon. But it didn't like him very much. It was trying to step on him. Finally it chased him out of camera range and the screams that subsequently filtered through showed that he had stumbled upon their house cat, the one with the scythe-like teeth. The two ingenious specimens of the stone age quickly set up shop in the 21st century, downloaded some mp3's, camouflaged the time platform as a hip hop disco, and turned their attention towards boys. Hunting was so much easier on the Internet, and with their bare shoulders and coquettish smiles they could easily lure over and send back all the boys their pet cat could eat.

Story #182

Note from Indeterminacy: This is part one of a two part set. Part two is here.

Special thanks to Becca for contributing the photo!

This would be an all-nighter. Programmer Frank and engineer Barnes were struggling to get the system working.

"This is the second brunette it's generated," stated Barnes in an irritated growl, "What's wrong with the friggin' thing?"
"Let me try a new parameter matrix with split radix primes," Frank replied, grasping at straws.
"That's how I got the broad with the dog on her lap," issued from Barnes' exasperated expression.

The Blondex 3200 was a complex and temperamental piece of equipment for the generation of easy-going, easy-to-handle, and most of all just plain easy blondes for modern mating purposes. But something had gone wrong. Now the girls it generated were complex and temperamental.

"Can't we just try something with these girls?" Frank interrupted Barnes who was typing desperately at the console.
"You try. They won't let anyone touch them. That girl with the long hair slapped me."
"What about the other one? I mean her dog has sort of blondish hair. Maybe she's gentler."
"She sicced the dog on me!"

Barnes clattered some more on the console, manipulated the system parameters then clicked the generation button. Both men waited expectantly. There was a zapping sound.

"We've lost the motherboard," Barnes said in a giving up tone of voice.
"Look, Barnes, this is going nowhere. But I have an idea."
"What?"
"How about we say some nice things to the girls. Take them out to dinner, dancing, conversation. You know, the way it used to be. And if they don't come around, well, maybe they're clever enough to help us get the Blondex working again."

Story #181

Thanks to Irma "Audra" Vep for the photo!

Before leaving her abode for the "Who's Real" contest her thoughts spiraled into self-doubt. Soon she would pit her make believe existence against two living human contestants. On live national television! She'd done everything to conceal her artificiality. She'd put on make-up. She'd memorized the refrain of a top ten love song, practiced relating her aspiration: "I've always wanted to write a poem." She even planned the effect of a tear rolling down her cheek. But what if they saw beneath the surface? Saw the fiberglass weavings under her fragile, skin-colored veneer? It meant so much to her to win. Once they had certified her as real, she could do what real people did: share intense, one-time conversations with chance acquaintances, go shopping at Wal-Mart, use a cell phone and all the other mysterious and wonderful rituals accessible only to people with hearts and souls. At the studio she lost her way and wandered onto the set of a soap opera. Something about her, some searching look in her eye, struck the director. She was immediately given a role, returned each day to live out her new life with her new friends. And it was a sensation. The soap opera's ratings shot into double digits. Sacks bursting with fan mail arrived for the new character. Men basked in fantasies about her. Women all over the world saw her and wanted to be just like her.

Story #180

Mr. Peavey didn't mind taking his wife to the mall. Sure her tryings-on of every article of female covering with a three-digit price were about as fun to watch as a filibuster, but Peavey knew a secret. On the other side of the mall there was always some hot entertainment going on: scantily clad females whirling through the kind of motions that never failed to intrigue males. Peavey made his usual excuse. He would inquire at the travel agency about all the wonderful places he could take his dear partner-for-life on their next anniversary. As soon as she vanished inside the changing booth Mr. Peavey fairly galloped to the show and watched entranced, face glowing like a little boy at Christmas who found not one but two bicycles under the tree. He daydreamed as his eyes followed the gyrating bodies and his mind whirled on the nuances of the tropical dance. He would have to suggest an island cruise to Mrs. Peavey, and this time he would gladly come along with her. Unfortunately Mr. Peavey did not notice his wife sneaking up behind him. He also did not notice the mall wastebasket crashing down on his head. The dancing girls noticed, but didn't allow it to break their concentration. They were used to this sort of thing.

Story #179

Only three had come to share in the farewell. And soon it would be officially over. The camera and other equipment were destined for a film museum, the seats were too old to interest anyone anymore. Everything else had been promised away to the usual caring scavengers catching wind of a cache of history. The beam of light through celluloid streamed from the projector across the span of the theater, spreading out into moving images on the screen. Victor, who sat towards the back, nodded off, lulled by the sound of the organ music accompanying the antique visuals of a silent movie. His dream became a spark of light mingling with the light of the diva flowing through the air. It gave her life and form flavored by his modern imagination. He awoke as the film ended, the dream but a vague memory. He left with the others, but in one hidden corner of the soon to be abandoned theater slumbered the diva he had created, waiting to be imagined again.

Story #178

Once again, I'm overwhelmed by all the story versions you dear people contributed! Thank you very much. It's fascinating how each person saw this photo in a different way. The stories will be posted at indeterminacies.blogspot.com tomorrow morning.

Karla had just been kissed. And it caused a minor sensation. Except in Karla, where the sensation was decidedly major. Her shoulders hunched up and she staggered for a moment. But even then she could not open her eyes, as all her fantasies focused on the lingering residue of erogenous feeling. Everyone saw the affects of the kiss, but no one actually saw who it had been. One moment she was dancing alone and the next her lips glistened with a coating of fresh saliva. Perhaps it was magic, but Karla knew she had to have that boy. She opened her eyes and issued the demand that all boys present line up to recreate what had just occurred. The one whose kiss she recognized would be the recipient of..., well, of her. Just as the boys began assembling for their moment of tenderness something odd happened. They began slipping, bumping into each other, and running into trees. In the midst of all this chaos an invisible force grabbed her by the hand, jerking her forward on unsure steps, whisking her behind a rock. That's when her guardian angel introduced himself to her and apologized. Watching over her day and night, protecting her from harm, was nice to do. But her lips, her desirable lips had tempted him too long. He had to allow himself this one little slip.

Story #177

Vance and Vera invited an inflatable man to their house. When he arrived they sat him down on the sofa and ran through their act of hospitality. Refreshments were served, cake and coca cola. A half an hour went by gilded with small talk banalities. They conversed on the subject of helium-filled balloons. They asked him where he got his air. They inquired if he would like some fresh air at their window, a baldly audacious gesture, as the nearby highway billowed smog at tragic levels, and of course they knew that. The inflatable man had already noticed the bad air but concealed his perception, for fear of insulting his hosts. But his hosts were perceptive enough, especially now, and well aware that he had held his breath upon arriving, not that that concerned them. Nevertheless the inflatable man was becoming sluggish. He felt giddy and unable to move. The nitrous oxide Vance had carbonated into the coke and the aromatic glue solvents Vera stirred into the cake mix had done their job well. Before long he was defenseless. At sunset, heralded by the chimes of the wall clock, Vance and Vera fell upon their guest and sucked all the air out of his paralyzed form.

Story #176

Harvey became the first soul in theological history to demand expulsion from heaven. He was a masochist who couldn't come to terms with the paradisiacal pleasures heaven had to offer. They tossed him from the cloud to a harp fanfare and waves of good riddance. A short time later he toppled into hell, which Satan had just made over into an icy wasteland. Satan wanted a change and the frostbite burns of absolute zero were just as delightful to him as the seared flesh of brimstone. Harvey landed naked and shivering before a horde of demonettes poised to pelt his unprotected body with snowballs. But this was, after all, hell. Masochist or not, Harvey had to suffer. Despite his pitiful begging, the demonic mistresses never let fly their sensual pellets of coldness, but followed him around, feinting imaginary blows. As for pain, if Harvey wanted pain, he could have pain. Satan, ever the opportunist, put him to work shoveling snow.

Story #175

Note from Indeterminacy:
This is part two of a three part set. Part one is here. The prequel is here.

Harvey awoke to the sound of harp strings strummed by unseen hands. It made him nervous. He saw beatific angels all around him in cute little heaven costumes. They approached him smiling, anticipating desire unfulfilled in the new arrival. Harvey was too stunned to even say a prayer.

"We brought you something to drink"
"Would you like a massage after your exhausting death?"
"Shall we give you a kiss bath?"
"Oh it's sooo warm up here. Won't you help us out of these clothes?"
"Don't let our angelic appearance fool you. We're used to more than missionaries."

Harvey began to tremble. The heavenly servents came nearer.

"Don't be afraid, we're your personal angels."
"We're going to share you among ourselves for the rest of eternity."
"And teach you the meaning of divine pleasure..."
"On our own private little cloud..."
"We call it Cloud Sixty-Nine."
"You'll have no more pain, forever and ever and ever..."

Harvey was having trouble holding up under the barrage of well-meant seduction. He broke down whimpering on the cloud.

"We know this is a bit much all at once."
"Please don't cry."
"Take a nap if you like, and we'll play with your sleeping body."

"No!" his primal scream echoed through the ethereal setting. "Send me to hell," he cried between sobs, his pounding fists caught up tenderly in the soft cumulus carpet, "I'm a masochist."

Story #174

Note from Indeterminacy:
This is part one of a two part set. Part two is here. The prequel is here.

As Vincent jammed on his guitar spirits of the great guitarists intermingled with the sound vibrating throughout the room. Charlie Christian was there hovering in one corner. Wes Montgomery and John Fahey were in another. Jimi Hendrix and Robert Johnson arrived together, met Danny Gatton floating in through the open window. Duane Allman with his Southern rock aura danced on the ceiling. George Harrison met the Slavic soul of Krzysztof Klenczon and they duelled together on air guitars, variations on Vincent's themes. More and more spirits converged, filling the room with inspiration. The longer Vincent jammed, the more spontaneous his music became. The combined creativity in the air seeped into his unconscious, guiding his fingers, while his musical feeling flowed into the room, affecting the dancing specters of genius. A wonderful symbiosis had arisen. It was heaven for all. It was holy.

Story #173

It began the first night of the new month. The head appeared and followed him everywhere he went, eyes trained firmly upon him. His attempts to turn away from it saw it intrude again swiftly into his line of vision. The head caught the light and shadows such that he could never tell with certainty whether it was disembodied or not. And those unblinking eyes continued to stare. That was the worst of it, that the eyes never blinked. It made the head seem unnatural and threatening. Try watching TV under those circumstances! At each new eruption of disquiet inside him the head seemed to increase the mad boldness of its demeanor. It was always just out of reach, intensely focused eyes staring into him with a resolve that could smash stone to rubble. Even in his sleep he could not escape the ghastliness of it. It watched near his bed - the eerie illumination forced its way through his eyelids and entered his dreams at will - and looked at him. By the third day he cracked. He went directly to the collection agency and payed his overdue installment on his new state-of-the-art high definition widescreen television, upon which they called off their patented Neversleep Reminder Head™.

Story #172

Thanks for all the brilliant stories you posted in the comments section! More are welcome!

Original post: It's your turn again! I hope this photo will inspire everyone to pen their own story. Please post them to the comments section. Sunday evening I hope to post my own version.

Also, I'd like to say once in this central location: Thanks to everyone for the encouragement, the lovely comments, the links, and more basically, for reading my stories. I feel as if I've done something right, but I'm not sure what, and my only fear is that I might begin to disappoint your high expectations. I read your blogs and you're all so brilliant.

Another announcement: I will only be able to post stories until March 11th. After that I'll be on a two and a half week vacation stateside, my first time back since 1999. Regular posts will resume in April.

Martin proudly presented his photo of the Loch Ness monster to the world. He became an immediate sensation, an honored guest on talk shows, even garnered a cameo appearance on a Baywatch reunion episode in which the entire incident was recreated. His animated accounts of the legendary water creature charmed and engrossed audiences. He related how it had popped its head out of the water, turned towards him, given a sly wink, then waved its disproportionately small arms in his direction before vanishing again into the depths. It had to be true. People just didn't imagine things like that, not in so much detail. Fortunately Martin had had his camera and enough wits about him to capture the moment for all eternity, as proof of what he had seen. The photograph was later borrowed and scrutinized by marine biologists using computer enhancements combined with other state of the art methods, and finally discredited as an insidiously cheap hoax. It wasn't Nessie at all whose image Martin presented them with. It was an alien being flitting across a corn field. No one ever believed Martin again.

Story #171

Backseat-Dog: What's going on with our road trip?
Frontseat-Dog: Yeah, why'd you pull off the freeway?
Driver-Dog: It was frightening out there. Didn't you see it?
Frontseat-Dog: Woof. I mean, see what?
Driver-Dog: That Jaguar bearing down on us. That cat nearly ran us off the road!
Frontseat-Dog: I missed that. I was counting cows.
Backseat-Dog: I missed that, too. I was playing that alphabet game, looking for all the letters.
Driver-Dog: Don't be so intellectual! Dogs can't read.
Backseat-Dog: Sure they can. You know they make dog food out of cows?
Frontseat-Dog: Oh, really?
Driver-Dog: No they don't.
Backseat-Dog: Yes they do. I read it on the package.
Driver-Dog: Anything to munch back there? All this talk about dog food is making my stomache growl.
Frontseat-Dog: Me, too. How about we go get something to eat?
Backseat-Dog: Yeah, but go to a drive-thru. Most inside places have this "no pets" rule.
Driver-Dog: OK. Just a second.
Frontseat-Dog: What's wrong with now?
Driving-Dog: I'm waiting for the right moment to pull out.
Frontseat-Dog: The right moment?
Driver-Dog: I'm not going out there again unless I can drive behind a Greyhound bus.

Story #170

Karen had just graduated from cool school. They gave her a cool diploma saying she was cool and a pair of sunglasses, also cool. She had mastered written coolness: cool, kewl, and kool, knew how to emphasize as in keeeeewl, kewwwwl, and especially keeewwwlll. She'd picked up an idiom: "It's cool." She recognized the opposite: uncool. Her music professors taught her the coolio beats of rap, hiphop and blues. Her tutors agreed she had a cool body. After the ceremony her brother and sister, class of last year, came to pick her up and take her to the coolest club in town where Karen was hit on by a hot looking guy who taught her all about rad.

Story #169

Soon everyone would be thinking of Sharon. The package had just arrived. She had won. She had been accepted. It was as simple as that. The competition had been especially fierce and glass shattering, but Sharon had this knack for screams, screams that could turn blood into buttermilk. It was just this basic mood of hers. Her scream hit a nerve, a razor sharp balance between modern existential alienation and Nina Hagen on amphetamines. That's why her friends urged her to submit an application to the committee. The Council of Archetypes was broadening the collective unconscious to afford better representation to women. The special-delivery postman handed her the award certificate naming her the female counterpart of Edvard Munch's Skrik, the anguish archetype. Soon everyone would be thinking of Sharon...

Story #168

Note from Indeterminacy: In observance of "Free Mojtaba and Arash Day" (February 22, 2005), this blog stands for the right of freedom of speech and expression for bloggers everywhere.

Dihala was the Goddess of the Universe. Occasionally it was in her fancy to create a new planet with an intricate balance of living creatures forming together a harmony of themes to please her eyes and ears. While she was so occupied it was vital that Dihalus stand back discreetly and allow her to do her work. Creating planets was not simple. One interruption from him and the creation might be less than perfect. The creatures living on the planet might not function properly and begin to destroy the planet or each other. Dihalus was extremely careful. His conscience was still trying to live with the consequences of what happened as Dihala created Earth, and he grabbed her from behind to kiss her.

Story #167

Clara's relationship with the wall could not quite be understood. She was never seen in the company of boys. Warm summer days found her embracing the flat gray mortar in the garden. They tried everything. The spatula they used broke when they tried to slip it in between the warm flesh and cold stone. "Get away from that wall," they told her. Not even that worked. As the moon appeared through the trees the sounds of her song drifted in through the open windows, a love song she hummed, accompanied by a summer night's breeze. The mystery was solved when Clara's aunt, an avid hang glider, landed in the back yard one August afternoon and related what she had just seen from above. On the other side of the wall, at exactly the position Clara clung to, was a boy, weeping because he had no ladder.

Story #166

Kevin was in distress, so he issued a loud call to anyone in earshot. The three supergirls were up sunbathing on a cloud high above the skyscrapers when their supersonic ears perked to the cry of Kevin's voice calling "Help, I'm lonely!" The superheroines slipped into their tight tops and dived down immediately afterwards to where Kevin stood on the pavement of the smothering metropolis he walked. The red, yellow and blue colors darted around him, pulling him, tugging him, drawing him with them, making him feel wanted, less lonely. They sat him down at a cafe, brought him a coffee, and showered him with sweet smiles while he sipped the liquid caffeine. The three took turns whispering secrets into his ears. For one small moment, he felt confident and in control. After the coffee, they returned him to where they had first met him, did a brief dance for his benefit on the metal gate, then soared back to their cloud for some more topless sunbathing. All this didn't really happen. It was an urban mirage. Those who had seen Kevin noticed only a typical city dweller, walking along swiftly, mumbling incoherently to himself.

Story #165

Marc and Tammy had just built a snowman, laughing and giggling the entire time. Somehow it brought them closer together. When the final feature of the snowman's face was in place, a stubby little carrot nose which Tammy pushed in herself, Marc and Tammy kissed their first kiss. They went for a walk, holding hands under the falling snow, sharing conversation that brought them even closer. As they reached the bench, which Marc decided was a good place to kiss Tammy again, they perceived a sliding, slushing sound behind them. It was the snowman, come to life, tears of ice streaming down its face. "Please, Tammy, please," it cried. "Tell me it's me you love, and not him!"

Story #164

Minerva was possessed by a demon. She roamed around growling and clawing at whatever came her way. Objects of lust were basely consumed, in a spiritual sense, sometimes physically, as well. One day Minerva was attracted to Maria. Maria was a pious creature, in whose body an angel lived. She prayed for life. She prayed for love. She prayed for death. But she never prayed for lust. The angel inside her dozed momentarily, enabling the feelings of life, love and death to fuse into a lust that flowed into Maria's blood and pulsed with the beat of her heart. She sprang from the wall and embraced the flesh-covered demoness. In the consummation of intense intimacy the two natures accidentally interchanged. Minerva returned to Maria's place on the wall, assumed the lotus position, and began a prayer. Maria began to growl with a hunger for lust.

Story #163

In the beginning there was the Universe. And it was vast and empty. And the boredom that filled it constricted God who watched over it all. "Let there be light," He told it. And there was light. It filled the vastness from one infinite end to the other. But the boredom would not be vanquished. It became merely an illumined boredom with light that burned dullness into the eyes. God created shadows to contrast the light, so that now the light shared its endless space with its opposite. But the shadows were dead and unmoving. And the light was dead and unmoving. Yet God yearned for life and movement. Then He created the dancer, to charm shadows and strew light with her whims of spontaneous motion. And He saw that it was good. God now had all that He could ever desire.

Story #162

Note from Indeterminacy: This story is dedicated to Patrick of Aquarius Books, a great source of light in Cincinnati, on the occasion of his birthday.

Heather pretended to read but she was actually in the book, wandering around the paragraphs through various scenes in search of the pizza delivery boy mentioned briefly on page 37. Something was not right. The boy was just a little too polite, too much of a cliché. He'd dropped off his pizza, then vanished from the story altogether, but something about his stock nature was a cry for help. She felt that and had to find him! Heather slipped onto page 38 and cornered Sherrie Baxter, the lead character, a strong-willed twenty-something with long, auburn hair and an icy demeanor, and demanded information on his whereabouts. In a droll, emotionless voice Sherrie claimed ignorance. Heather knocked the pizza from Sherrie's hands and it would have turned violent, except Sherrie had no idea how to react, being firmly anchored in another plotline. She froze. The pizza fell cheese-side-down on the carpet, revealing a message on the flip side scrawled in charcoal: "Save us - Basement." Heather rushed through the house until she located the cellar door, stormed through, switched on the light and saw scores of characters huddled together at the base of the stairs. The delivery boy was there, too. When they realized she was a reader they cheered at having finally been freed. The author had plagiarized them from other books and kept them in hiding, waiting for an opportunity to pull them out and introduce them as his own.

Story #161

"Pssst," whispered Paul as he sat down next to the mermaid, "How'd you like to be our Valentine tonight?" The mermaid hesitated. Before she could answer Pauline pressed in on the other side. "It'd be a cozy little Valentine's day party. Just the three of us," she said. "We have a hot tub," Paul went on, timing the syllables to make it sound tempting. "I'll share my bikini with you," Pauline chimed in, smiling at the mermaid with big, sultry eyes. "You take the top and I'll wear the bottom," she elaborated. The mermaid was becoming intrigued. Thoughts of salty desire swam in her plaster head. "So what do you say?" Paul broke in on the thoughts. The mermaid considered, but did not yet answer. "We'll put you back in the ocean afterwards," Pauline added in response to the sea creature's apparent indecision. As a matter of fact it all sounded extremely tempting to the mermaid. The two were like pleasant summer waves gently splashing in on each side of her. But she just couldn't answer. That was the drawback to being inanimate.

Story #160

Note from Indeterminacy: Happy Valentine's Day to all!! (Mermaids included)

Bill, Bob, Yvonne and Yvette were out for a Valentine's day walk. They happened to be sitting on the bench when the Cupids arrived. First, one Cupid came strolling by, then there were several and soon the park path was flowing with an entire phalanx of Cupids, all marching towards the make-out point located at the end of the strategic lane. It was to be a surprise attack, which was why they weren't flying. Bill, Bob, Yvonne and Yvette were obvious targets for the impish little love soldiers overanxious to shoot off their arrows of amorosity, tips anesthetized so as to postpone the pain of love. With so many thousands of arrows there were bound to be mistakes made, especially with Yvonne and Yvette sitting so close to one another. The two girls sat now fully charged and would show someone the time of his life that night, as soon as they could work out who to leave with.

Story #159

Note from Indeterminacy: Thanks to everyone who posted their own take on this photograph!

************************ The pre-story post ************************

Today's post is something of a departure. Since I'm going away for the weekend and won't be able to post anyway, I thought I would leave the blog in the capable hands of my visitors. Here's the photo I found (above). I invite my visitors to write the one minute short story this time. The story can be anything you want and if you have trouble starting just write the first thing that comes to mind. Free associate, even if you think it's stupid. You can always go back and make it brilliant afterwards. The thing that used to intimidate me most about writing was getting started. I used to think to write you had to have a completely worked out scenario, a particular moral you wanted to convey, etc. Some writers may be comfortable with that, but it certainly intimidated me. I tried to select a photo that would fit with Valentine's day, which is Monday. But that doesn't mean this has to be a love story. And it doesn't have to be spectacular. Just write! I look forward to Sunday night, when I'll log back on and check the comments. Until then, have a great weekend!

Thanks to Robyn for this idea!

Every time she looked into the bottle a feeling of déjà vu overcame her. Why was this so familiar? What did it mean? She'd glance over to her girlfriends sitting near her, search for some reaction, but they were silent, avoided her eyes. They always seemed to notice what was on her mind, passing uneasy looks between them. They could have said something. She was sure of it. But they didn't.

This time she confronted them: "You know something, don't you?"

"Uh, well, I don't know," one of her friends declared evasively.

"About me and this bottle. Tell me."

Nervous pause. A cough.

"Look, I'll get off this bus and never hang out with you again," she said, and meant it, though it wouldn't be easy, as she had known her friends as far back as she could remember. Everyone called them "The Inseparables."

Her friends' eyes darted about tentatively. Their silence was masked by the motor of the bus revving as it turned down a new street. This time they couldn't back down. An imploring glance, a nod, then one of her friends spoke.

"Well, we didn't know if we should say anything. It's just that you-" her friend couldn't finish.

"You're a genie," another blurted out. "We found you in the bottle. You gave us a wish, and we wished for you. We wished you to be our best friend for all time."

"Yeah," another friend went on, "you've been places, seen the world, we thought it'd be really cool to hang out with you."

They took turns explaining now:
"But then you lost your powers and your memory."
"We thought it'd be kind of traumatic, if we reminded you."
"So we avoided it."
"But you're still fun to hang out with."

The former genie smiled and peered dreamily into the bottle: "So that's where I come from..."

Story #158

Note from Indeterminacy: This story is for Cori.

Stacey had a shrunken boy in a blue balloon. All the cool girls had one these days. It was a new voodoo spell that spread through the high schools and girl cliques like a combination of wildfire and flash flood, burning some, washing away others. Fun things could be done with the boys. You could inflate or deflate their personal space, tie the balloon to a string, bounce it around, or even pop it. That was not good for the boy, as his atoms would then scatter in the wind. Many girls tied the balloon to the foot of their bed and drove the boy crazy with the eyeful he might have had, if he could see clearly through the translucent rubber. Others teased the boy by blowing up the balloon to the maximum tension, then stopping. Miriam and Stephanie saw the fun that Stacey had and would probably get themselves a boy in a balloon soon, after finding the right boy. Beth looked up in the air, wondering what had become of her boy when the balloon accidentally slipped from her fingers and jetted out through the skylight.

Story #157

Snow White had been around for a while. She'd pricked her finger on more than a few spindles, gone out nights while no one was watching, to press lips and wrap tongues with frogs, and lost more slippers in palace bedrooms than she cared to admit. By now the princes had lost interest. They didn't want a beautiful woman going on 30, in orange dress. They preferred a fresh young maiden in white, old enough to be the woman's daughter. Even the mirror qualified its praise with "...in your age class." Snow White returned to live with the dwarves, awaiting resolution of her lawsuit against the Grimm estate for reneging on the "happily ever after" clause in her fairy tale contract.

Story #156

In the course of his travels Professor Zahlschmidt of mathematics encountered a two-headed girl with four arms. Fascinated by the sheer numerics of it, he invited her home with him, pondering her categorization the entire time. For example, was she a two-headed girl with four arms, or a four-armed girl with two heads? He couldn't decide. He counted sixteen fingers, four thumbs, ten toes, and two wonderful breasts with geometric proportions he had never even dared fantasize about. Wild mathematical dreams overwhelmed the protective boundaries guarding his sleep. He multiplied two times four on a calculator and it kept coming up "LOVE", which confused him because it wasn't really a number. Then the enjoined females came storming after him, juggling perfectly formed orbs in perfectly formed circles. One afternoon while the professor was taking a nap the girls snuck away to the train station, to leave on the next train. They hoped to meet someone with whom they could share their primal passion: hugging.

Story #155

Dick and Jane wandered around the labyrynth, hoping to work out a storyline for their next primer. "See Dick run" just didn't work with today's youth. Why were Dick and Jane running? What was their motivation? There was no passion to the plot. Kids wanted action, suspense, drama. Dick and Jane had to be running in mad panic, trapped in an M.C. Escheresque setting, one step ahead of a pyschopathic killer tracking them with his pet dog, Spot, a ravenous hellhound with three heads. They tested the maze, developing various scenarios. But did it have to be so horrific? The idea for a sexual education manual was fun to work out in all its detail, and they did, several times, but deep down they knew it would never make it past the education committees.

Story #154

This would be a night the girls would never forget. Stripper Ken would see to that. His decadent dance would cause a crescendo of feminine heartbeats to pound in rhythm with the blaring disco beat. One by one the scraps of clothing would come off, each movement and each baring of skin driving the women higher, until the one thing they came to see was revealed. The club owner was a sadist, which is why he had hired this particular male dancer, a failed clone experiment from the 1980's named after the Ken dolls of Barbie fame, by virtue of his endowment. When the moment came there would be shocked gasps from the women, some would faint, and the remainder would wander the streets for hours afterwards in a distressed daze.

Story #153

Michael put on his boots and his safari hat and went out into the back yard to hunt for girls. Many would have admired his grit and determination, throwing himself into situations so dangerously imbalanced to his detriment. He didn't carry a firearm or knife, not even a whip. A lasso, his lone defense, hung from his belt, but he knew how to use it. He surveyed the yard, checked behind trees, saw out of the corner of his eye movements in the tall grass. That's where they were hiding, he told himself. A sudden giggle, interrupted as quickly as it began, confirmed his subliminal impression. Like the free-spirited coyotes of the Great Plains he cornered them before they could reconceal themselves or dash away...
"Alright babes, I've got you surrounded. Come out!"
They giggled again.
"Come out here and kiss me or I'll tie you up!" he called to them resolutely, in a voice that threw down a gauntlet, daring them not to obey. They peered out from the grass at him.
"Shall we kiss him?" the one said to the other.
"It might be educational..." she answered
"Hmm, yes, it might be..." her friend went on, playfulness in her eyes.
Michael stood, stone-faced, not flinching a moment as they approached him. It was great being ten years old, he thought to himself. He hoped it would be as easy with girls when he was sixteen.

Story #152

A beautiful model was found standing in the parking lot. People walked up to her, peered at her from all sides, then asked her what she was doing there, but she chose to remain a mystery. They only got that enigmatic model's smile from her lips, the kind that aroused covetous emotions in men to possess the model and in women to possess the clothes. A few helpful individuals scouted the area for anyone looking like a professional photographer or camera crew, but none were found, though a few curious onlookers made the odd snapshot to take with them as a souvenir, while the model posed, smiled and blinked. They called diverse model agencies to see if any were missing a model, for soon it would be evening, and much too cold for what she was wearing. Finally a quick-witted passerby had a brilliant idea: "Is that a Dior?" he asked, looking inside her dress, at the back, to see what was on the label. They telephoned the designer who drove by a half hour later in a mannequin truck and took her away.

Story #151

The ghost was out looking at new apartments. His old haunt had gone drastically downhill. Inner city. Condemned buildings. Crime. The usual. He looked rather silly rattling chains in front of gang members doing the same. His own efforts notwithstanding, the neighborhood had become quite frightening, so he drifted out to the suburbs to see what life was like there. This particular attic room endeared itself to him immediately with its sensitive aura of Kafkaesque paranoia, the kind where it seems like the walls are perpetually closing in on you but leave the final contraction to the imagination. The view with the shadows was nice, too. He took it. Hopefully the neighbors wouldn't be too loud.

Story #150

The two forest sprites hovered near the campfire, beaconing to the men to join them in the forest. One of the campers, intrigued by the seductive possibilities and ribbed on by his friends, went with them. The lovely sprites escorted him out of view of the flickering firelight, deep into the woods where night shadows reigned. Whatever it was they did, it was over before the remaining campers could sing even three songs. Then the nymph-like creatures returned to lure the next man along with them. Halfway between midnight and dawn all but one of the men had left with the two sprites. That final man remained resolute, telling himself he would never go with them, regardless of what they might try. They planted wild forest pleasures in his imagination but still he resisted. They implored his manhood with voices tasting like sugar. But he did not surrender. Something told him they might lead him to an empty spot in the heart of the forest and turn him into a tree. All at once the sweet voices ceased. Only the sounds of the crackling campfire flames were heard as the two creatures retreated irretrievably into their forest realm. At daybreak, the lone survivor ran through the rows of trees, feet falling on sunlight strewn here and there on fallen leaves. He found his friends, broken men, all of them. Broken financially. The sprites had sold them worthless lots of quicksand deep in the woodland swamp, for all the money they had.

Story #149

Mona's mouth went on vacation. Although she didn't really need to, she signed up for the No Nibbles diet to make herself slimmer and more attractive to men. After losing about two pounds in the first week, nothing else happened. It was just like all the other diets. Her skin somehow drew fat out of the air. Not only that, her dates with guys weren't going well anymore. Without a mouth to talk to them, smile at them and other things that girls' mouths did, she found the guys were avoiding her for even heavier girls who were able to put their money where their mouth was. She sent a registered letter to the No Nibbles company asking them to return her oral appendage but they refused. They had a verbal agreement, and the orifice was theirs now, to do with as they pleased, at least for the next year. If only she had thought twice before opening her mouth. After the initial shock she started hanging out at the art museum, in the Dali section, where she didn't feel so conspicuous. She finally met a nice student who was into surrealism. He took her just as she was, though she was still sensitive about the bump on her face when she unthinkingly tried to stick out her tongue.

Story #148

Big Bob applauded more than any of them. After all, the evening's entertainment with the magician had been his own idea, and even he had to admit the magic seemed real. But it couldn't be. Could it? First the Amazing Presto made a little bonfire of George's hairpiece on the flambeaux tray, adding the personal papers from everyone's wallet as tinder. Minutes later a Fed-Ex package arrived with the toupet freshly cleaned and looking realistic, plus all the burnt scraps wrapped safely in a bundle. The trick with the cards made everyone laugh. No matter which card they picked, the face always turned blank when they showed it to Presto. Presto's mock annoyance at having to go through the entire deck to figure out the missing card was sublimely funny. The coup de grâce came when Presto made Big Bob's wife disappear. She stood up in front of the small audience. Presto, in one quick move yanked the tablecloth out from under their meal, tossed it over the wife, and that was that. The tablecloth fluttered to the floor and when they looked under it, they found a farewell letter in her handwriting saying she was running off to Rio with Presto. Big Bob had written that, and it was good enough to fool their friends. Yes, the Amazing Presto had done beautifully, just as Big Bob had payed him to. Although it had cost a small fortune, it was still less than a divorce. So now Bob was free to do as he pleased. Interestingly enough, the letter, though not written by Bob's wife, had been true. Presto made her reappear that night in his hotel room, with all the money out of her joint bank account with Bob, just as she and Presto had planned. The money from Bob alone was enough for a nice honeymoon.

Story #147

Two luscious ladies appeared on Phil's bed. "Touch us," they said to him. Phil thought he was hallucinating. Then he thought he was seeing double.
- "You are not seeing double. There really are two of us in your bed."
- "And we're waiting for you to touch us. But only one of us!"
- "And you dare not touch the wrong one!"
- "Something shocking will happen if you do."
- "One of us will disappear."
- "Yes, there will be disappearances."
Phil did not want either of them to disappear. He trusted his youthful virility to endure both of the erotic apparitions. Consequences never made Phil hesitate to take a chance so he reached for the girl who was more nearly undressed, taking her hand in his to pull her close to him. The other vision of beauty faded immediately and was gone, as if she had never been there. The feminine fantasy he had chosen assumed full, fleshy substance. She smiled at him and said, "My name is Dolores and I am a woman...", trailing off as if waiting for the affect her words would have. Phil lost himself for a moment looking into her eyes. His features softened. Then he felt the tightness of his erection constricting into itself, surrendering stiffness for an intense feeling of erogenous flesh drawn into flesh, forming a mysterious crevice where phallus had once been. At the same time female breasts budded and expanded on his torso, filling his shirt, the fabric brushing him in a way that aroused him further. Emotions of ecstasy overwhelmed him. In what felt like an orgasm, Phil had become a woman, but the lust for Dolores lingered strongly. Phyllis embraced her and began a kiss that would last well into the night.

Story #146

Princess Azizama of Persia would go to great lengths to kiss a boy. She had willed herself to another millennium where she found herself on a beach. She enjoyed the light costume that snugly embraced the body she was just discovering, enjoyed the eyes of boys that gazed upon her in ways not possible when she was a princess in her time, protected by guards who would kill the bearer of eyes clandestinely viewing her. But here it was different - there were so many boys. How to choose one? If she could, she would choose them all, but wouldn't the first one she kissed become possessive of her? She despised possessiveness in boys. In response to that thought she danced freely on the shore, a dance of contentment. She would enter the waters of the sea, and let the waves lap against her blossoming form. For now the boys could look and she would dream.

Story #145