Weekly Short Stories Contest and Company! discussion
Brainstormin' Help
>
Get to Know Your Character(Popcorn Served)
M wrote: "Mouse #6: (In the shade, near the mouse hole by the stairs to the afterdeck.) Hey, there, Herbert! How did it go?Mouse #9: (Wiping his brow.) Narvis and I managed to get that stuff out of the medi..."
(gasp) M!!! The despicable evil!!!!!! How could you???
LOL, I'm kidding. This conversation never happened. Otherwise, it'll be hard to justify knowing that you ruined our honeycomb and still stealing it.
I never thought I’d wind up writing about mice. The strangest things happen to people who join the W.S.S.
Let's call it the Steinbeck effect: of Mice and M! LoL.
Next, I suppose, it will be cockroaches. Guy, do you remember Don Marquis’s “Archy and Mehitabel”?
It's tickling the smallest of my small memory cells. I'll give it a sec to percolate before Googling it.[pause to perc.]
Nope, nothing bubbled up, so Google here I come. Ah! Thank you Wikipedians! I cannot be sure, but I think my dim awareness of them comes from the animated film based on the characters, called Shinbone Alley. I would have seen that when I was a very young - probably 12 or 13. But the title of the film clicks with the burbling memories of the character's names.
The wiki article has got me intrigued, and so will now need to do a bit more research.
I watched the first part of the 1971 movie, and yup, this is now very clearly ringing the memory bells.
Guy wrote: "Let's call it the Steinbeck effect: of Mice and M! LoL."I'm glad I'm alone in this room; I just had a silent fit that must've looked like a seizure.
I came across Archy and Mehitabel in a tattered, high-school textbook of American Literature I had bought at a library sale when I was at Baylor. Sometime around the 1920’s, a journalist name Don Marquis (pronounced “Markwiss”) used to pound out a column about a cockroach named Archy, who, in a previous life, had been a vers libre poet. Archy’s best friend is Mehitabel, an alley cat. At night, when the newspaper office has closed, Archy goes in there and types his daily adventures by diving onto the keys.Anybody who has done much typing on a manual typewriter knows that even a large cockroach doesn’t weigh enough to push one of the keys. None of the readers seemed to mind that, however.
The column reprinted in the textbook I bought was called “Freddy the Rat Perishes.” It’s all delightful dialogue, and in it the rat reveals that he has been unfortunate enough to have eaten something poison. He tells Archy, “I’m as full of death as a drugstore.” I just love that kind of writing.
A couple of years later, when I was teaching English in high school, someone gave me an old copy of all Marquis’s Archy and Mehitabel columns. Unaccountably, I no longer have it. I remember, though, an interview Archy has with the Egyptian mummy recently arrived in the city as part of a museum exhibit. The mummy can think of nothing other than having something to drink. He craves a beer. Archy asks him how dry he is, and the mummy replies, “I’m as dry as the heart of a dust storm at high noon in hell.”
The real trick to metaphors isn't coming up with them, but making them sound poigant (spelling?) instead of corny.Hm, I'm going to build a manual typewriter. Sounds like a good forerunner to other projects I want to work on.
Like a motion-picture projector or a wind-up phonograph, a manual typewriter (one of the old ones, when that was what businesses used) is a marvel of mechanical ingenuity.
Guy wrote: “Let’s call it the Steinbeck effect: of Mice and M! LoL.”The phrase “of mice and men” originated with Robert Burns, who, in “To a Mouse,” writes, “The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft a-gley . ..” (1785). One of my favorite poems, “Tam o’ Shanter,” was written by Burns.
That explains the name of the book.Oh, hey, now I'm depressed just thinking of it.
Guy wrote: "Me: Sophia, what did you say to the Professor?Sophia: [Tries unsuccessfully to not laugh.]
Me: [Waits.] Well?
Sophia: What? [Says this more as a statement than a question. Chuckles.]
Me: [Doesn't..."
That's great. Hilarious.
Well, hello, Cheyenne! Did you bring some margaritas back from the island?
Hey M, I make margaritas! And a killer mojito.Al, nice to see you back on board, home away from home.
Hi, Cheyenne. I am glad you enjoyed my little play on words and you too Edward. It is a curious thing, to be a closet comic writing, hoping to be funny, but never quite sure if the words are working.
M, when I did my research on Archy and Mehitabel I became fascinated by the history. The Shinbone animation wasn't really that good - I think the script was mostly bad and badly voiced. But the concept seems intriguing, so I'll be reading some of the original works.
And thanks for the etymology of Mice and Men. I love learning how words and phrases came to have meaningfulness and how they connect to things.
Guy wrote: "Me: Sophia, what did you say to the Professor?Sophia: [Tries unsuccessfully to not laugh.]
Me: [Waits.] Well?
Sophia: What? [Says this more as a statement than a question. Chuckles.]
Me: [Doesn't..."
LOL!!!!! You guys are too funny.
Hello Kyra. Great to see you laughing. Brings a huge smile to my face.
Why, thank you. That really was hilarious, though. Sophia sounds like a brilliant muse.Sara: We are, too.
Me: Sure you are. If you're a muse, then go inspire me. I'm stuck on your book.
I have no idea why I stayed up so late. I had been mowing earlier and was really tired.
I couldn't have helped.By the way, my abrupt departure last night was due to a storm knocking over some power lines, M.
I went to sleep right about that time. Fortunately, the power doesn’t go out here very often. In the summer, it’s nearly impossible to sleep at night without airconditioning. Yesterday afternoon, when I was hauling limbs to the burn pile, a neighbor told me it was 104 degrees.
Yeah, the heat that set in made it a little difficult to get comfortable, but once I fell asleep there were no tiny LED lights or humming electronics to disturb me. Just wind singing me through my dreams.Fun fact: The smallest amount of light at night messes up with melatonin levels, which (apart from distorting sleep cycles) can also ruin your ability to grow properly.
(Ralph the cat is concealed among the leaves of a tree in an apple orchard. Below is high grass. Nearby is a dilapidated building. The scene is bathed in mellow, autumnal light. Almost out of earshot, Alex is talking to someone.)Ralph: (Muttering to himself, watching a bee buzzing around.) How did I ever get into this?
(In one direction, beyond the high walls that surround the orchard, are dark hills. In another direction, the light slants across grassland and marshes. Ralph looks behind him. In the distance are mountains, one of them high and snow capped.)
Ralph: (Turning his attention back to the people in the grass.) And how am I ever going to get out of here?
Hi, Al. By your quiet it sounds like the power is out. Our local news spent quite a bit of its broadcast time talking about the weather damage in the states, but I don't remember them mentioning South Carolina.Here's more popcorn.
Neve: I don't understand why Ralph seems concerned about his situation.
Professor: I don't understand.
Neve: I know.
Professor: Huh?
Neve: Yup, a rather strange cat, that cat Ralph. Not a cool cat at all.
Professor: Huh?
Neve: I understand that his having regurgitated a living mouse could be unsettling — given that he is a cat. I mean, it is not hard to see that such an upchuck could give a cat an existential cataclysm. [Starts to laugh.] And, of course, there is the fear of what that mouse was up to in his stomach before he was expelled. [Continues laughing.]
Professor: What are you laughing at?
Neve: [Pauses her laughter to look at him. Then laughs even harder.]
Professor: What? [Pause to stare at her while she laughs.] What?!
Neve: [When she stops laughing.] Have we met?
Professor: Of course we have!
Neve: Are you sure? I don't remember…
Professor: [His face turns red in embarrassment.] We had a long talk in one of Guy's plays.
Neve: [She looks at him blankly. Shakes her head slowly, but not definitively. Then shrugs.] I guess it wasn't that good for me, then. Glad it was good for you, though.
Professor: I wasn't a professor then. You were there with eight or ten other expert liars I'd pulled together for my conference 'Why are you False?'
Neve: [Her face opens in shock and pleasant surprise.] YES! I remember.
Professor: You don't know this, but because of you I wasted the better part of a year of my life trying to understand Nietzsche. [Neve laughs.] It wasn't funny. I couldn't make hide nor hair out of his so-called philosophy. But I understand perfectly why he committed suicide: not even he could live with his jumbled zeitgeist.
Neve: That was so long ago, now. It's passed. We're here, now, watching a cat with an existential crisis, creeping in the shadows and afraid of his own. He tried to eat a mouse and tried to commit suicide. Don't you see, there is something deeply philosophical about that! That's exciting.
Professor: No, it isn't. Just because M gave his stupid cat a name doesn't mean that he — it , I mean it is anything more than a small-brained mammal with little more intelligence than the rodents it hunts and plays with. A cat cannot be used allegorically for ... well, for anything I guess. I cat is just a cat, and when it's dead it ain't coming back.
Neve: [Pauses. Looks him very slowly up and down. He begins to get a little uncomfortable.] I don't remember that about you, that you had an existential streak. And you're smaller than I remember. [Pauses.] Or is that existentialism of yours confined to the 'lesser' creatures only, and doesn't apply to we the so-called 'supermen'?
Professor: [After a pause.] So? And I don't. And even if I did — which I don't — who cares? It's irrelevant. And what does my size have to do with anything?!
Neve: Nothing.
Professor: Exactly!
Neve: Right.
Professor: That's correct.
Neve: Yup.
Professor: What is it with you b*tching bloody females with those stupid one-liners! Can't you put two words together into a coherent thought?!
Neve: [Starts laughing.]
Professor: Not again! [Neve starts laughing very hard.] I might just as well give up! I'll bet that the real reason Nietzsche killed himself was because he was surrounded by hysterical women who broke out in laughter at the cat in the hat — I mean drop of the hat!
Neve: [Struggles to control her laughter. Eventually is able to just speak.] Quiet! I want to see what Ralph is up to. If you keep making me laugh I might scare him away.
LOL!!!! Fab work, Guy. I just fell out of my chair laughing.
Hope you're OK, Kyra! Chair falls can be hurtful. LoL. Thank you.
I agree with Kyra! That was a blast to read. I notice Neve doesn’t give the Professor the credit he’s due for even attempting Nietzsche.
Mouse #1: Ray, what in the world are you doing, way down here in the hold?Mouse #10: (Atop a trunk.) I want to be a writer.
Mouse #1: (Points to the old typewriter.) Where did you get that thing?
Mouse #10: It was over there, under some junk.
Mouse #1: (In astonishment.) How in the world did you move it?
Mouse #10: It took twenty of us to do it. Wilfred sprained his back.
Mouse #1: (Sizing up the machine.) Where did you get the paper?
Mouse #10: Among those boxes and suitcases is a satchel full of it.
Mouse #1: (Scampers up to the top of the typewriter and reads what’s been typed.) “So it was that Earl and Clyde and Herbert and Phil arranged for Ralph the cat to follow the Mistress of the Realm to a place called Orchard Bay, to determine the nature of her mission there.” Pretty impressive, Ray!
Mouse #10: Thanks, Phil. It took me forty-five minutes to type that.
Mouse #1: That’s dedication. (Wiping his brow.) I don’t see how you stand the heat down here.
Mouse #10: (Modestly.) A writer scarcely notices things like that. I just wish I had . . .
Mouse #1: What?
Mouse #10: A bottle of whiskey.
Mouse #1: Ray, I’ve never known a mouse who liked whiskey.
Mouse #1: (Clearly baffled.) As soon as I got to typing, smelled the ink on the ribbon, the old oil on the mechanism, I thought, “I could sure use a shot of bourbon.”
Mouse #10: (Glancing up at the paper, seeing his name in the narrative.) You just keep typing, Ray. I’ll round up a few of the guys and bring you all the whiskey you want.
Mouse #1: (Turning back to the keys, a faraway look coming into his eyes.) Thanks, Phil.
Thank you, Alex! I’m curious to see what happens next at the lodge at Lost Lake.
Thanks, Al. Sigh, if only I were. Of course, it is also a nice pick-up when an anima figure notices you and give you a kiss on the cheek. Thank you for that!And I too am looking forward to the new instalment.
M! I was wondering how you'd incorporate the Archy idea. Love it! It's okay if I play off this a bit?
Back at you! Have fun with the girls! 'Night.
Have at it, Guy! I hoped you would find it amusing.
I now have two bruises on my leg from falling out of the chair. Thanks a lot, Guy and M. XD LOL, you two are hilarious.
I hadn’t realized how far past my bedtime it is. Goodnight, pirates! If you think you see mice creeping around in the shadows, just remind yourselves that they’re just a figment of your imagination.
Psst. If they talk to you, does that still mean I should ignore them? Cuz right now, there's one on my shoulder yelling in my ear about rum and typewriters rather insistently. It's quite annoying.
When mice have too much to drink, they start talking about things they intended to keep secret.
Ah. So I give him a chance to sober up, then?
No. Give him a chance to tell you about the honeycombs.
Sara: They're probably stuffed in her bra or something.Nikara: If they are, forget about stealing them. We'll hafta settle for her espresso beans.
Kyra: We don't know for certain they're on her person. Nicky, let's review the tapes and see if we can catch her hiding them.
Nikara: No can do. The cameras went out yesterday. I have no idea why.
Sara: Well, that doesn't sound good.
I’m can’t say just why, but I have a feeling you might not want to eat much of one of those honeycombs. I think you should be generous and share them with the crew--except for me, of course, and maybe Guy. I think he’s allergic to them.
Sara: (innocently) Kyra? Have you checked message 1275?Me: Shut up. We're not supposed to know about that.
Sara: Well, yeah, but now that we do...
Me: Oh, for crying out loud!!! Let's just have Nicky brainwash us.
Sara: (nervously) She can do that?
I’m going to go mow the sea of high grass that’s my back yard. I hope you pirates have a pleasant afternoon!
Have fun with that, M. We shall await your return.Poor Al!!! And I was looking so forward to seeing your writing.
(after the brainwashing)Kyra: Great. Let's just start out with getting into her cabin and locating the honeycomb.
Sara: Sounds like it'll be kinda difficult to find, though. At least, Al's convinced we won't be able to get it.
Nicky: (snort) And since when has Al ever stood in our way of stealing her honeycomb? It'll be a piece of cake.
Sara: You are hopelessly optimistic.
Me: Guys. Stop fighting and help me break into the Cap'n's quarters. Deal?
Sara: Deal. But I call dibs on the honeycomb stash if we find it. It's my turn, anyways.
Mouse #6: What?!Mouse #2: That’s right, Malcolm.
Mouse #8: I had to taste the stuff, and I like to have died of the flux. (Shaking his head.) I can’t believe he leaked it.
Mouse #9: What’s happened, Narvis?
Mouse #8: Ray got drunk down there in the hold, then he wandered up to some girl’s quarters. (He gestures.) Wanda was headed back by way of the corridor behind the paneling and happened to hear Ray going on, so she peeked out through a crack. (He rolls his eyes.) She said Ray was reciting poetry and telling some girl of all his adventures.
Mouse #2: Apparently, he related an adventure he shouldn’t have.
Mouse #9: (Perplexed.) What adventure was that?
Mouse #6: (Heaves a big sigh.) Now the crew knows about the honeycombs.
(For a few moments, the mice stand around in silence.)
Mouse #8: I feel kind of sorry for Ray. This morning he had a terrible hangover.
Mouse #2: I heard that when everybody found out, Kirby and Holcomb and a couple of other guys held him down and Wilfred’s wife Rita gave him a dram of that stuff in the bottle.
Mouse #9: (Horrified.) Where is the poor fellow?
Mouse #8: He’s on the stern. One minute he’s hanging his nose over the side. The next minute he turns around and hangs his tail over.
Kyra: It's in Al's laundry pile. Wrapped in her trendy little pink coat.Sara: THAT was what she thought would trick us???
Kyra: Apparently she set up a deal with Guy. He'd haul her laundry away before we had a chance to raid her cabin again. Then hide it behind the detergent.
Nikara: That's actually pretty clever. We were only monitoring Al's movements thus far, so even if we did see her laundry exit the cabin, we'd never assume the honeycomb would be leaving with it.
Sara: You got all that from a mouse???
Kyra: Yup. A talking drunk mouse.
Nikara: (shaking head) The things we see on this ship.
Sophia: [Tries unsuccessfully to not laugh.]
Me: [Waits.] Well?
Sophia: What? [Says this more as a statement than a question. Chuckles.]
Me: [Doesn't say anything.]
Sophia: 'What'!
Me: [Becomes a little impatient.] I said, 'W-h-a-t d-i-d y -o-u s-a-y t-o h-i-m?'
Sophia: Hey! I'm not deaf. I said what to him. I was trying to be funny. I thought that that was funny.
Me: [Smiles and shakes his head.] But you know that the Professor has a tiny mouse-sized sense of humour.
Sophia: [Laughs loudly.] Oh my god, you are so funny! Why can't the professor be more like you? [Laughs until the tears flow.]
Me: I don't get it. I wasn't trying to be funny. [But gets infected by the power of her laughter, and begins to smile and evetually laugh too, although not exactly sure why. Eventually both stop laughing.] Why do you tease him?
Sophia: He's such an easy target, puffing around like a know-it-all. I keep hoping that he'll loosen up. How can someone who thinks he's so smart not understand that his $hit stinks just like everyone else's?
Me: Hey! That's rude!
Sophia: But it is true.
Me: That's not the point.
Sophia: Are you saying that truth is not the point?
Me: Of course not, it's just that … well, where's the tenderness with your honesty?
Sophia: You haven't heard of the efficacy of tough love, I take it? [Before he can answer.] Now that I think about it, does mouse scat even stink? [Smiles.]
Me: Stop it! [And starts laughing despite himself.]
Sophia: [Laughing now, too.] Hey! How much scat could the fat cats scat if the fat cats could scat scat?