Last month, I entered a flash fiction contest hosted by NYC Midnight. Many thousands of writers were sorted into subgroups and challenged to produce a 100-word story featuring an assigned genre, activity, and word in 24 hours. Last night, the results for the first round were released, and because my story placed in the top…
Alternate title: Oh God a Post on Commas Whyyyyyyy Well, no. We don’t have to. But a couple of things happened recently that brought us here. The first was a response I left on Twitter. It was more a subtle jab at my grammar-nerdy self than an actual question (hence the lack of question mark).…
This week’s flash fiction piece comes courtesy of the prompt over at Carrot Ranch: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story that declares, shield your face. It can be a knight of old, a doctor, or a senior citizen. What is the circumstance? Who makes the declaration? I hope you enjoy the…
Tap Tap With my gradebook in hand, I meander between the short desks, checking on my grid as students show me that they brought their homework. I finish and proceed to my desk, bending over to input my class’s attendance on my computer. I feel a tap tap on my arm. “One second,” I say. Tap…
Coming in just under the wire is my submission for this week’s flash fiction challenge over at Carrot Ranch, inspired by this prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story that includes the open road. Enjoy! The Road I pass under the last green light, sighing. Behind me is the city, the…
Two weekends ago, Heather Kindt and I co-rented a booth at Albuquerque Comic Con (read her post about it here). Check us out in our costumed glory. You can’t see my A+ Rey hairdoo game, but I think the foam belt and wrist thingie get the point across. Heather thought her web outfit was lame,…
In October, I entered a 250-word flash fiction contest. That story got me to the semifinals. In November, I submitted a new story for the semifinal round. That one didn’t make the top 5 stories, so I didn’t make the final round. But! The feedback from the judges show it was well liked, plus I…
Today is New Year’s Day, and resolutions are flying around as wildly and perhaps as carefree as dandelion seeds near a daycare. Okay, that might not be the best analogy. The point is, lots and lots of people are setting goals for themselves for the coming year. Mine is a continuation of last year’s, because…
I hope you’ve all had happy, relaxing (ha!) holiday seasons so far. Our Christmas day is really three parties crammed into one day, which is super fun for an introvert like me. So my plans for the next few days look something like this: Aside from all the socializing and copious amounts of wrapping paper…
I’ll explain the story behind this story at the bottom of the post, but I’ll say at the start that it had to include three things: comedy, eating an apple, and grandchildren. Enjoy! The Lonely Apple “We’re done, Grandpa!” Lucy heaves the paper bag full of newly-picked apples onto the porch. The deep red fruit…
