Their boos grew as Gloria Gaynor’s defiant voice escaped out of the speakers, Fabi swaying to the tune. A big reason the gimmick worked as well as it did was because of his willingness to go the extra mile.
—-Hector Acosta, Besos
Lucadores, Oak Cliff, Dallas, Texas
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from Mystery Tribune
Luchadores, Oak Cliff, Dallas, Texas
One of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. One of the Colosseum in Rome. One of a unnamed boulevard in New York City.
—-Fandango, Always Smile
Travelers
Deborah Masters
Audubon Park, New Orleans
(click to enlarge)
When you look back there are very few things you regret doing – especially compared to the universe of things you regret not doing.
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I could do anything with this hat on, she told herself. I am invincible.
—-Millie Thom, The Hat
Bowler Hat Sculpture in the Cedars, Dallas, Texas
A hat in a field of flowers on a beautiful sunny day. But danger and, dare I say it?, evil lurks everywhere and at any time.
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from Millie Thom
There IS and it’s all gooey and bubbly and covered in eyes!
—-Robin Stevenson, Shoggoth Under The Bed
Mural on Construction Fence
Farmer’s Market
Dallas, Texas
Chris Hoover
Years and years ago -I was in the Garland, Texas library perusing the fiction aisles. The fiction, of course, was arranged by author. At the end of each row was the start and end of the author’s names… such as Smith-Thompson, or Adams-Baker. In the C section it had Clark-Cthulhu. That caught me off guard. I didn’t know that Cthulhu had written any popular fiction. I checked the stacks and there was a collection of short stories set in the Cthulhu Mythos written by a variety of authors and the person that cataloged the book mistakenly thought that Cthulhu himself, the great evil one, born on the planet Vhoorl in the 23rd nebula from Nug and Yeb had actually penned the tome himself.
I really wanted that little plastic sign and considered prying it off when nobody was looking. Unfortunately, I am too honest for that. When I moved to Richardson I stopped going to the Garland library on a regular basis and the last time I visited the fiction section had been reorganized and the sign was long gone.
So you have to take my word for it. Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.
Nothing better than flash fiction written in the Cthulhu mythos… even if it is only a monster under a bed.
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from Sweet Pandemonium
Chelsea longed to run out and meet the postman, but she’d been warned the last time she’d done so. They threatened to stop bringing the post to her. She’d have to make an appointment to go and get it.
—-GM Potter, The Winner
This is from an ad drawn by Charles Barsotti for National Lampoon from almost fifty years ago. I had it tacked up on my dorm room in college along with a couple of other examples of odd humor. It served as a sort of gatekeeper – to keep people with (or without) certain ways of looking at the world from entering my domain. Sort of a symbolic “Abandon all hope ye who enter here.”
Today’s story reminded me of this old cartoon.
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from GM Potter Writes
Orchids are erotic. You have to consider the honest look of them: the labial petals ballet-slipper pink and eggshell white splayed delicately open, the blood-brown leopard spots on ridged tongues; you’re always compelled to stroke them with your finger. When the children ask why orchids, their mother says, “Because they’re handsome,” as if she is describing a square-faced Irish washerwoman, and when they press her further she says, “Because growing things is good for people.”
—- Jen Julian, I Have Entered My Garden, My Sweetheart, My Bride
Sunflower
Though I would have liked to been one… I haven’t been much of a gardener – it’s tough when you come home from work exhausted every day. Now, though, I’m working on a shade garden in front of my house. The problem is, shade plants grow slowly and it won’t really look good for years. I might not live that long. To compensate I look up places I lived decades ago on Google Street View and see if the plants and trees I did plant back then are still there. It’s surprising how many are. Some have grown to immense size.
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from wig.leaf
And I said that when I said I want to keep things light I meant not-heavy, not not-dark. I don’t want not-dark but I also don’t want dark, I tell her. I want an intense grey.
—- Jennifer Wortman, A Person’s Essence Feels the Smallest
Transcendence, on the first night.
There’s overthinking and there’s overtalking and there are people that don’t know what is in front of them. Born in the USA was great, but I think it was also the tipping point where Springsteen began to believe his own hype. By the way, I thought Darkness on the Edge of Town was brilliant the first time I heard it. I remember buying a copy of the vinyl album in a KMart in Kansas when it first dropped. I guess none of those things have quite stood up to the test of time, but what does, really?
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from wig.leaf
Mom taught me Earth with a buttermilk pancake. “We’re about right here,” she said, pointing just off-center of the middle. Dad taught me birds with a helium balloon. “It’s filled with flying gas.”
—- Michelle Ross, How I Learned About Evolution
My bicycle locked up to the TRex in Exposition Park, Dallas, Texas
We didn’t home school our kids. One reason (among many, I admit) is that we always thought that the public schools – especially in our ‘hood – needed our kids.
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from Okay Donkey
To Monte, it looked good enough to eat, so he ate it. Come to find out that The Guy had had other plans for that hunk of meat. The fact that he’d left him the bone (albeit scored with tooth marks) didn’t seem to make much difference.
—- The Abject Muse, Monte
Isaak in the pond at NorthBark Park, Dallas, Texas
I always wonder what my dog is thinking as I take him for a walk. He acts like he really likes to play fetch, though (and he is very good at it).
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from The Abject Muse (Susan Marie Shuman)
Jude stared at himself in the full-length mirror with disgust. In his 18 years of being alive, he had gotten out of wearing a suit with an almost 100-percent success rate.
—-Rachel Poli, Suit
Main Street Park
Dallas, Texas
We all remember being young – most remember going to prom. Even if it wasn’t the same everywhere and anytime, it was always a time of embarrassment and shame. Preparation for the rest of your life.
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from Rachael Poli
Bill Chance 