I'll start, and then I really have to go, as I am late for work:

"It was a dark and stormy night, a meteorological event I barely observed, as the weather outside seemed merely a summer shower, a faint echo of the internal storm of emotion that nearly wrought me asunder -- each new onslaught of remembrance experienced as gale force, buffeting winds that drove surging waves of agony within my heart and soul; unnoticed, torrents of tears washed down my face to splash and ultimately render useless, the computer keyboard before me. "

Hah! Beat that for extravagant "florida"!

Good try , Dick, but bzzzt -- it has to be one sentence to qualify. Semi-colons, dashes, parentheses are all acceptable, but no periods allowed.
Try again, please? Personally, in addition to an entry from you personally, I'd like to see one from Senor Eduardo.

It was a dark and stormy night and it being that way rendered me quite unable to see were it not for the intermittent flashes of lightning lighting up the dark corners of the electricity-less house I was forced to share due to reduced circumstances with a total stranger who now seemed quite dead if the body slumped in the plaid upholstered wing-chair by the brick and fire-less fireplace was indeed the rent sharing stranger of whom I knew nothing, really, except that he quite often smelled of vinegar and toothpaste and was prone to talk relentlessly about paranormal phenomena while sipping raspberry cordial from a small crystal stem glass with a gold-leafed fluer-de-lis relief on the stem foot which bespoke of his aristocratic upbringing but said nothing of his current reduced circumstances forcing him to share living quarters with me, a total stranger, and also, too, because he might possibly be quite dead.

Flowerchild:
Your entry may well be a winner! Hilarious. Your passage "...the dark corners of the electricity-less house I was forced to share due to reduced circumstances with a total stranger who now seemed quite dead if the body slumped in the plaid upholstered wing-chair by the brick and fire-less fireplace was indeed the rent sharing stranger of whom I knew nothing, really, except that he quite often smelled of vinegar and toothpaste and was prone to talk relentlessly about paranormal phenomena while sipping raspberry cordial from a small crystal stem glass with a gold-leafed fluer-de-lis relief ..." is a tour de force offering the relief of laughter, as well as a fleur-de-lis.

Ah, Quinn, you think you have a built-in advantage? Perhaps, then, a level-the-playing-field handicap should pertain to your entries. Is there a bookie/Tote in the room?

Oh, I am so happy I did not read his before posting my meager entry. This is WAY too funny!

"Everyone can give up now. ~flowerchild~ has nailed it!"

Really great stuff, and an absolute pleasure to read. Terrific to laugh this hard on a brilliant Sunday morn.

It was a dark and stormy night: the chickens murmured restlessly on their perches, (as the coop was open to the ravages of nature), their beady eyes darting here and there, glittering in the occasional flashes of lightning--which looked like delicate webs of violet to their ultraviolet sphere of vision, causing some to wonder aloud if a giant spider of epic proportions might even now be picking it's way through the atmosphere to their humble abode; as their lord and master the rooster, snoring loudly, slept on oblivious to the unease and worried cluckings of his charges.

Flowers is great, I think it'll be hard to beat, but I hope folks don't give up. Great idea, WW, thanks so much!

=D

Fantastic!

I really appreciate "giant spiders of epic proportions." Illustrative expansion that informs the reader that these are truly GIANT spiders, the kind to be feared much more so than the common giant variety. Love it!

All along, I knew you had it in you, Bwakfat. You not only wrote a good entry, but a really excellent entry as well.

Aw, you left us all hanging, TheraP! What happens next?

It was a dark and stormy night at the Men’s Club in Tuscaloosa; so much had transpired in the gloomy November atmosphere whilst twelve flat screens had relayed the news signaling the end to civilization as the members had known it; the end of a two hundred year old dream of a master race headed by white males constantly served by handmaidens and minority servants all dressed in the finest of cottons; the end of an entirely new oligarchy holding all avenues of power; a new aristocracy created in the image of the English Aristocracy that had created a new monied mercantile class where money dictated all rules and regulations; the end of opportunities sequestered by trusts and estates once guaranteeing that generation after generation of white men would continue in the best of Western European traditions; the end also of a propaganda system that brought models of minority subjugation like Amos & Andy and other black faced satires; the end of women presented only as Lucys and Ethels forced to use device and subterfuge to get their way, the end of Southern Civility and Hospitality that was only really extended to a select few born on the proper side of town; the end of the proper propagation of feigned Christian Values that would ensure the safety of the ruling class and keep the less fortunate in their proper place as less fortunate all the while labeling any descent from the masses to the grand paradigm as treasonist and emanating from communists; and, finally, the end of welfare for the rich and free enterprise for the other 95%.

Sometimes, TheraP, you can be a cold, cold woman!!

It was a dark and stormy night -- the wind howling through tree branches that protested such relentless pressure, first, by flaying the exterior walls of the house, and then, frustrated by their stolid imperturbability, venting (no pun intended) their abuse on the more vulnerable windows, which variously moaned like drama queens, or whistled as if unconcerned, or screeched hysterically, all of which responses were gratifying to the trees, but made me nearly crazed, setting my already jangled nerves on edge as if they were being treated to the torture of relentless squeaky scratches across a blackboard.... which teeth-gritting condition I suddenly ceased to notice when the door blew open and there, apparently lit from within as well as from the background lightning flashes without, stood a formidable creature with tubes that were curiously askew and glowing the dark emanating from its head that were an extravagant, attention-getting display that distracted one's focus away from the more sinister, clicking shuttered lenses that seemed to comprise its eyes; yet, for all its apparent horror, the neon creature radiated a sense of vulnerability (perhaps suggested by its rain-soaked, mud-spattered clothing) as it staggered into the room and, with a courteous nod, introduced itself quite politely by saying: "I am Quinn, struck by ideas 24/7, struck by lightning this night, struck by the notion that I could really use a sandwich --ham and swiss, if I may -- and literally dumbstruck by the idea of this idiotic contest because"....and, at this point the creature lowered its head modestly before asserting, apologetically...."because this exercise is a no-brainer for me."

as the heavens opened and angels sang Hallelujahs and dd desperately tried to memorize the songs to placed into tales of the 6th century, to be written in manuscripts, identified by the Venerable Bede as true evidence of the Savior's existence and care for all of creation, including the heretics and non-believers....

To be continued...

I am dumbstruck! You've outdone us all! :)

But now I am confused, thanks to quinn. Did you turn red like in really red? Or is you talking about some kinda' chicken oriented ultraviolet red that can only be seen by roosters and others looking to perhaps "ruffle your feathers" and such?

And BTW, just what color IS a rhode island red? Us discriminating poultry lovers need to know.

As David Gregory sez, "These are the issues we look at here today on Bleat, the Press."

I knew this was going to be fun. I think I agree with TheraP however, but I think this style is in your genes. Just one point:

I ALWAYS INTEND MY PUNS, EVEN WHEN THEY WERE UNINTENDED.

Glad you enjoyed it. Me and Freud? we're like THAT! (see my fingers crossed as I say that, looking as if they were each possessed of sculpted calves and thighs barring entry to some nether region.)

Well, both.

Maybe...

Excellent. Elegant inclusion of all our delusions, TheraP, but you cannot quit now. Several of us are trained in CPR, and even if those measures were to fail, there are those with faith of one sort or another among us, and outside the igloo, and together our belief can make achieve miracles. Even finding more oxygen.

Oh, this is so much fun....so diverse, from chicken eyeballs to chihuahua's to the arctic circle. More, please!

Only one possible correction: Is it "eyes" or "eye?"

The L&M frequently gets baked AND fried, Mr. Day. Which may explain his snoring through the storm of the century....

=D

Brilliant, Flower. Laughed like hell.

Did someone say "sandwich?"

Yes, please.

Dick: Thanks, er, I think. This style in my genes? As a lover of words, well and selectively chosen, I blush with shame. But as a southerner? Well, you may have a point. So, as an architect I once knew said: "If there's an ugly element that you can't get rid of, paint it red and make a feature of it." Consider me red. Nonetheless, I disqualify myself from contention as a southern gift for extravagant speech would be a serious conflict of interest.
Play on. Where's Senor Eduardo?

I knew you would be good at this. But a beer fest!!!! Good show!!!!

(clink!)

(clink!)

It was a dark and stormy night, the kind Reginald the one-legged horse appreciated more than... Ok. Do over! No one believes in one-legged horses, for starters, so I just gotta say - they exist, they're fine animals, and Reginald is actually a prince in disguise. Got it? Right.

It was a dark and stormy night, the kind Reginald the one-legged horse appreciated more than anything, more even his cart, made by those most trustworthy friends - the beavers - trusted not only for their uni-toothal dental bits, but their origins in the Great White North, a land of which Reginald had often dreamt of, a land where the long-limbed were disadvantaged by nature, a land where sliding on one's belly was a sign of superiority, a land where "4-legs bad, pogo not so much" was carved upon the door of every home (albeit only about 2 feet from the ground, because difficult to reach and all), and also, trucknutz, said often, warding-word of the
Wonkette, trucknutz and good-breeding going hand in hand, though best not to be caught at it, and breeding a difficult process for Reginald, unless one included those unpleasant episodes at boarding school, what with the wart hogs and that bit best not remembered, though the salve... ahhhh, the salve... administered by the school nurse, oh she of gentle countenance and well-clipped nails, ahhhh Gentle Mary, seamstress for the band, anal salvist of his dreams, dreams of a land where the long-limbed were disadvantaged by nature, a land where sliding on one's belly were disadvantaged by... wait a minute...

Damn.

You know what really gets me, Justice. I found out the other day that they actually made Texas a state, and here they have a sissy name for one of their towns. Paris. What a sissy name.

Justice, every time you write something, I am forced or compelled to read it over and over.

Still sorting through the cultural and musical references, nicely done, Q.

I'm still laughing....

You had me worried there for a while, WW. At first, I feared the tubed spectre at your door was the malevolent Creature from Zurpitron7... so his transformation into the friendly (and 100% organic) Swamp Thing was greatly appreciated. ("Swamp Thing" being my absolute top comic book hero, especially as reimagined by Alan Moore.)

Sadly, while the genius of Swamp Thing's brain was that it was wired into every root and branch of the living Earth, my own brain fractured, somewhere back in time, most likely on that, my own dark and stormy night.

Which leads me to... sandwiches? ;-)

No really... it's supposed to be bad writing... I promise!

I think that perhaps some points need to be awarded for the serialization tactic. I mean, for a sentence?!

Brilliant!!

They sat arms akimbo and cross-legged around the blazing, wind-whipped campfire, a grey, mist-like rain cleansing their souls and blood-stained hands, feeling without any trace of remorse, the full and inexorable weight of earthly destiny settle upon their utterly and supremely distended abdomens, having just gorged on the neighboring Papua New Guinea village's, (the one over the jagged, near impossible pass, to the superstition-laden south of their own bucolic home), fearsome, nay, rapacious, witch doctor, (a Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer kinda 'man with the power'),a powerful brujo to be reckoned with, (one could say 'dead-reckoned with, heh, heh...), whose formidable spirit now dwelt inside their roiling, but sated bowels.

It may be derived from an oral tradition of children's stories but methinks Sister Ralph, our aged librarian in my grade school, would surely have put the run on such a tradition about the time we children had wandered into the realm of "good breeding going hand in hand" and "those unpleasant episodes at boarding school."

Brilliant, quinn. And you may have inspired me to take another stab at this while riffing on one of your side topics here. Time will tell...

My favorite so far, W, but I'm still working my way down the page. The competition is fierce here!

With apologies offered beforehand, I will say that you can blame Quinn for being the genesis of this second submission:

It was a dark and stormy night that enveloped the city, but not nearly as repressively as the thoughts that overtook Ignatius as he lay in his bed, the victim of adolescent insecurities that ran the gamut from concerns about the acne blemishes that would not go away to worries about ill-gotten warts to the sinking feeling that he would not ever get laid in this lifetime, yet his deepest concern - that of the fact that he was in fact a bisexual - had been recently lifted from his darkened heart with the newly acquired knowledge that "bisexual" was not merely another word for "ambidextrous" and, in a respite from all the other worries torturing his adolescent soul, Ignatius found relief in finishing his day in performance of the one sure means by which he ever got a grip on himself.

You can perhaps consider this my homage to John Kennedy Toole and his Confederacy of Dunces.

Next?

It was a dark and stormy night as I sat in the dark corner on a dark covered hassock, turned inward, wondering wistfully, yea broodfully wondering when he would return to release me from my shackles that I might saunter forth again to wistfully lay across his big brass bed, you know, lay lady lay, lay across my big brass bed, but I was becoming chafed from the shackles and mostly from the duct tape that taped me to the stupid bed; I was bored with this stupid game and was growing more wistful by the minute, so wistful that I leaned hard into the corner hutch, back and forth, forth and back until I jammed my duct taped shoulder under the lips of the hutch, dislodging the very key with which he taunted me with day by day, day by day, oh dear I leaned to retrieve the key, I was getting the key, when wistfully, the door opened...

I'm new round these parts.

I love the entry. I am hoping the ellipses mean another entry is forthcoming? I hate to leave the poor dear, er, shackled...

Welcome to TPM! It's a lot of fun.

(shuffles feet)

Honest, I was just trying to be helpful.

Also. Buttsects.

And now, a sad one:

It was a dark and stormy night, and Torn Thomas -- so called due to the tear in his old wool coat which he wore not only on nights (and days, for that matter) such as this one but also on the sunniest and warmest and most humid of days (and yes, nights), simply because it was one of three things he owned, his shirt and pants being his only other possessions -- huddled gracefully and gratefully in his temporary home comprised of a large cardboard box and an overturned barrel, the barrel being very handy due to the fact that Thomas had extremely long legs and he was accustomed to having to bend them into improbable and uncomfortable positions most nights, causing him to limp slowly most mornings as the cramps and soreness eventually disappeared during his daily meanderings from garbage dumpster to garbage dumpster in search of edible food.

wwstaebler, totally fab competition. Like, really.

A friend of mine, recently, introduced this game at her party and we have been playing it on email ever since. I've come to associate this game with her and it's a fun game. She introduced me to this singer as well, a year ago. For your listening pleasure, wwstaebler. ;)

It was a a dark and stormy night and in between strikes of lightning, I feverishly wait at my mullioned window of my attic room for a glimpse of my love, the highwayman, my dark and stormy knight, to appear riding up the gravel path and soon I will hear him clip-clopping in on his Star, his face wrapped in his mask, his cape billowing in the wind and he will fling his song at me over the screeching wind calling me by my secret name and I will feel his heat crawling up my leg in his demand that I give myself to him without much ado, which I have every intention of doing as beknownstedly obvious by my packed valise and my note to my Fa on the mantle above the fireplace, awaiting him and my brothers to find in the morning, which then will undoubtedly set them after, riding ventre a terre to preserve my honor but in vain, for I will have given it away freely before they arrive hence confounding them into keening on the moors, rending their clothes as they fall on their knees mourning me as one lost off the Aillte an Mhothair, just because I went so far as to ride-hell-for-leather up to Gretna in the impassioned arms of my Highwayman whom they deemed a neer-do-well, nevertheless, who will keep me in comfort by preying upon the rich and endowed.

LOL. ;)

It was a dark and stormy night, but then they were all dark and stormy nights these days, Global Warming having turned out to mean incessant global storming, and fitful sleep for believers and deniers alike, exhausted as they were from the labors of a thousand small chores that now were done by strength of hand, sweat of brow, or back-breaking work instead of by the now rusting remnants of the fossil-fueled machine age. Only Thundarr slept soundly, as barbarians were wont to do.

Agreed, Bwak. A sentence long enough to serialize is an astonishing feat, even within the context of run-on sentences, redundancies, etc..
Kudos to TheraP, long(winded) may she rein.

I'm happy to be here. Thanks for the welcome and the chance to let you know of my predicament; I'm typing one handed wistfully.

LisB, you lose. Too good.

The rest of you: Let the games continue!

Oh no, I'm disqualified? What a bummer! I'll just have to write a bad one, I guess. LOL.

It was a dark and stormy night, and Willie shuddered as yet another loud crack of thunder pierced the night with a heavy boom and a following flash of lightning strong enough to fell Quinn whilst he was standing out in the storm eating a ham sandwich, said thunder peal causing Willie’s brother Wallace to jump up on the bed next to Willie and curl up in a tiny white and brown and black ball, prompting LisB to get in the bed with them and curl up in a big white ball, dreaming of a highwaymen, yes, yet another bad boy, adding to her list of bad boys she’d already been through and seen there and done that with, and wouldn’t you know it but she just had to get up again and race back to the computer to see how her friend Bwak was faring in the storm, and happily Bwak was faring just peachily, thank you verah much, because she had the other Lis, LisD with her and she and LisD and their five cats and one hyperactive dog were all perched together on their perch, cozy and warm and content in the storm of storms, this storm of the century, er, rather, the century so far, seeing as how it’s still rather young and fresh and brand spanking new and who knows what’s in store in our future, as per Donal and his warnings of warming.

Oh, sorry, my mistake. Of course you were referring back to the Arctic motif, and Shackleford....

as flowerchild disputed the origin of the salvation, giving megwich, and correcting the spelling as it accidentally got set down wrong in the manuscript, and onlookers, who have never yet posted at TPM considered the wisdom of joining the contest, just this once, because they too having accompanied the group to the igloo, gasping in the thin air, and rejoicing in the aforesaid salvation, decided that indeed the dark and stormy, extra long night deserved the stories downthread growing longer and longer;

meanwhile...

That musta been a rather soggy sandwich! Excellent summary, Lis!

It was a dark and stormy night and goddamn it she's gettin loose again and I taped her shut to the bed AND I let her sit down this time, so I'm getting very sick and tired of her games; she's my cousin so it's not so bad if she gets the marks on her skin, she has certainly bitten me many times and I use the peroxide for the bloody ones so don't tell me I put too much tape on her over the shackles, geez, you'd think they'd be enough, but NO, she said to make it hard to get away so I used my mother's tape, the rest of the roll, the hole role almost, and look at her, she's
she's coming at me...
she's singing some song, day by day, jesus, what the hell...

Wonderful writing! Tell us more!

Very creative and poignant!

TheraP,
I'm sick of economics.
I'm trying out my Steven King impersonation.

Quinn's taking a bit of a beating in this competition.

No sooner does he stand up, AGAIN, then down comes the blood lightning, AGAIN, and he's re-re-retoasted AGAIN... along with his bloody sandwiches. AGAIN, DAMMIT!!! I'd like to request just a 5 minute break from being sizzled, and then, I swear, I'll be ready for action.

Or better.... how about we tether Miguelito to that stake, the one top of yonder hill, yea, the one with the toasty toppled once-tall now twice-stricken trees laying aboot, and mayhap we'll all have fried porkie bits come morning?

P.S. And if escapes being re-re-re-toasted, he can wee-wee-wee-all the-way-home, no harm, no fowl. Heh.

And doing a damn fine job of it, Boston!! LOL!!!

It was a dark and stormy night and, as the Abbess lay on the abyss of her bed -- holding on, as if for dear life, to its edge as if it were a raft on storm-tossed waves -- she wondered, still rebellious and decidedly unresigned, what cosmic joke her God had played on "women of a certain age" in arranging the grand scheme of things so that it had come to this: that she "be got" to a nunnery as if it were the only fitting destination at this stage in her life -- when she, and every other woman knew that it was only made fitting as a destination by the never-ending double standard -- in sexual matters as in all others -- that still permitted new starts and stimulations for men of equal age that were denied to their female peers, women who dared not own, much less voice their desires, lest they be mocked and reviled as somehow grotesque, inappropriate, untoward.... when in fact, in actuarial terms, women were younger and healthier in body longer than were their male contemporaries; the Abbess sighed, turned on her bedside light and picked up the book she was reading to wile away the long hours in the night, as the book was a comfort, yes, but not nearly the comfort that a warm male body in her bed, one that was attuned to her physically as well as mentally, would have been .... yet it was important to be grateful for her many blessings, and so she enumerated them to herself, and to the Cosmos....

And preying upon the rich! Extra points for that one!

But. What about the sandwich?

LOL!!

Roiling but sated bowels? Well played, Miguel.

It *was* a dark and stormy night, it really was, I'm not lying this time, and I wasn't lying last time, I was just y'know a bit confused, but I meant every word of it, because I'd never lie to you - not about anything important, just fun stuff, jokes, things that we'll laugh about someday, like kissing Rebecca, she kissed me actually, she meant nothing, and I just wanted to see what would happen but then you found out it hadn't really been dark and stormy, and then it was.

Well done! You can just spin these things off!

Now, here's what I'm wondering ww. Maybe like bundlers of campaign contributions, who get special access to politicians, you could submit this thread as a competitive bundle - warranting special treatment by the committee and perhaps a bundled prize that will keep us warm the next time we all meet at the arctic circle for another go at this!

Now in one chapter I had an abyss as the abbess and I still had to throw in some harpies.

You really got Sunday rockin' Belle

Happy to try that approach, TheraP. Will everyone sign waivers?

Heeeheee! ;-]

Can you win? cuz that was just like, remarkable.

It was a dark and stormy night on board the "Sloop called Seague," and her passengers knew the danger because they had done this before and barely lived to tell the tale of many other dark and stormy nights because the "Sloop called Seague" had a habit of just moving onto the next thing before it was finished with the last; and so the hope of getting into Snug Harbor was looking as remote as a republican Congressman's "Aye" vote for a stimulus package sponsored by the new President, Barack Obama and his band of merry good-guys, who just kept trying to seague into "Bipartisan-Ship," which is a bigger craft than a Sloop and it also has no masts at all, although it does blow steam up several orifices, but never manages to connect with any brain cells at all; which is too bad because our country could use some people who do things because they think it is the right thing to do instead of just wishing for fair weather, which is what all the passengers and crew were hoping for on the "Sloop called Seague," but alas, it was not to be -- this time it was going to be rougher than ever.

It was a dark and stormy night but there were no screams and there were always the screams; screams that ripped through the quiet like lightning, screams that ricocheted off wind chimes and shiny things, screams that rose like a locomotive from the gut of the earth, then crashed out madly and infinitely into the black sky, screams that would shrill so high they could shatter a child but there was nothing, not one tiny sound to quicken my pulse, and I lay awake wondering how long; how long can someone like me last in this silent brew of midnight?

bravo bravo!

meanwhile, the unbearable lightness of being, due to the laughter and good deeds of many was being dragged down by the dark and stormy deeds and stories of others, yet even the S & M, the dark and brooding efforts of men to suppress women, the dangerous dangers of world, global hot, warming, and the wrong wrought rich to suppress poor could not be entirely successful in suppressing the laughter and the hopefulness of people so recently rescued by righteous hedgehogs and errant knights, set down for posterity by the very Venerable Bede, that....

waiver signed.. on a wave!

Hee, this is so much fun.

It was a dark and stormy night and with every jagged flash at the window, eerily lighting the room, I writhe upon my overheated bed, no, must be that pesky imagination, no wait, it's my fevered reality, the world smelling of musk, a world drawn by Poe; nay it must be real because here he is tweaking me, whispering wicked things as he lies next to me, the Night Phantom, and the wind howls and sings outside and the air, like my flesh, quivers with anticipation as I lay on my bed trussed up, sandwiched between him and the wall, bound by silk scarves, unwound cravats, unspent desire while his whispering seemingly increases the ferocity of the wind and the brightness of the lightening, the dormant tree out my window scratches the pane to get in because it too wants to be taken in a similar manner by my devourer who will not let up and is like the intent driven wind, assiduous in his will to fell me and hear me beg.

LOL. Ok. I really have to go now.

Kudos! :)

What I meant to add to that was that he thought me a Wall Street banker, but I'm only a cat. ;) Sorry, the editing took it out. Wordpad. Hate it.

Hah, Dick. Ambisextrous. You are the king of depositions, the art of the rhetorical question. Thanks.

tt you have me laughing. We cannot control the wind, or the rain. I do not know about the weather radio tho

you dont need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

"Silent brew of midnight" shivers one's timbers; ominous, that. Well done.

The perfect TPM entry - literature, eventually devoured by political debate. Extra points!

For some reason, I imagine William F&*#ing Shatner reciting this entry on a spotlit stage somewhere off-off Broadway, Toronto perhaps, in that intense, semi-sweaty style of his that always made me lust after Mr. Spock instead.

tpmgary, me likes!

It was the best of dark and stormy nights; it was the worst of dark and storm nights; it was the winter of our discontent of dark and storm nights...

As long as we´re re-toasting, be it Quinn or porky bits, make mine extra-krispy. Hmmmmm.... Krispy-Quinn... I think there´s franchise potential there. Down home Western province barbecue, the way mama used to make it with Quinn filled donuts for the local constabulary. MMMmmm... goood!

's my fevered reality, the world smelling of musk, a world drawn by Poe

Extra points for the Poe reference!

(clink!)

Fabulous, TheraP, but penalty points -- in the Manny/Fairey sense. When does one work of art cease to exist -- is it when another is born, as the fruit of the former's womb?

Let's just hope things keep leaning a'port! Thanks for the kind words both of yer!

Starboard will do us all in, ya know!

You must be in your early forties just like me!!!!

Don't take TYLENOL! It's bad for you if you drink! It rots out your liver! Other than that, KUDOS!!!!!

(howling with laughter)

I will think of this every time I am behind a er, pair of said devices.

Oh, Senor Eduardo. The pathos, the poignancy of your truths. My beloved Everest would agree. Once he was applauded, photographed, and celebrated for his special talent -- jumping fences. Now he is scolded, berated, jailed in his box stall for days by the overworked stablehands, for -- jumping fences. Life for a talented horse is inherently cruel. So, please, take the stall next to Everest and talk with him, as only you can, about the irony of it all. He has been much depressed lately, wondering, like Bridget Jones, why he is not loved, just as he is, when he once was. And spare a thought for Reginald, too, who has achieved so much, transcended so much. We need to tell you -- you, and Everest, and Reginald, how much you have added to our life experience with your respective talents. Nay (or is it neigh?), we need to reward you, lavishing both attention and affection upon you, as you are so clearly part of God's light in this world. Amen.

Is that why some think that God is dead? Is it all the fault of the birth, not the death, of Jesus?

What a fun post WW and all. Now I´m really leaving to watch that sunset. Cheers!

Hey I have to sleep tonite. And no liquid refreshment for another two weeks. Gees

Thank you Marquis; I believe you will sweep the honors in the No Good Deed Goes Unpunished/Shot in the Face category. Congratulations!

You did your best, Scottie; and it looks like it was

GOOD ENOUGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seague to the next adventure -- beam me up!

Great one, Steve.

My advice to you is to start... drinking... heavily.

Senor Eduardo, existentialist extraordinaire.

Keep him away from those European films, Dick.

1. Quinn.
2. Me.
3. The aforementioned guy.
4. Elvis.
5. Lightning dude.

Of course, Dick. Anything that furthers equine appreciation and communication.

OMG! I already missed the deadline! It is because:

1. The dog ate my homework
2. I was stuck behind a tractor on Garth Road
3. I had to deliver 8 babies - I DO work in an IVF clinic, you know!!!!!!!!!!!!
4. The dark and stormy night blew out my electricity!
5. Well, I'm just settling into my room at the Bates Motel and I'll get back to you after my shower.....

"Vote early, vote often" gets you disqualified in this plebiscite (and for you I do mean plebe). So, sorry, you have ZERO votes, just as I expected.

One contestant has cast his votes, clearly unbiased in his analysis of merit. His acceptance speech, of all honors, perhaps a bit premature -- but maybe it's the power of suggestion -- is it Oscar night?

Clearly, dd, the nothingness of which you were so questioning on that day - or was it a dark and stormy night - when first we met, has been somewhat extended and indeed inherited by dear Edwardo, the horse of course. Bravo! :)

1. Marq

1. WW

1. Quinn

1.PEEGALITO!!!

1. SJ

ack!

It is a dark and stormy voting process, we can say that fer sher.

Oh remember Q when they were the only ones that showed boobies? I swear when we were sixteen we went to the Aster Art Theatre and saw European films. And timmy was so proud that one nite we were actually kicked out of the Aster Art Theatre for drinking beer.

We snuck in the beer in yellow rain coats. Of course when they caught us they were not going to get in worse trouble by calling the cops.

Five years later it was showing Subway Slut and Thigh Noon and forty years later I would not even wish to know what the titles are.

wwstaebler appreciates your vote of confidence, SJ, but cannot participate as she is a relative of the contest sponsor, suffers the effusiveness of a southerner and therefore must be disqualified, on two counts, from consideration. So, your additional vote, please:

Nothing like a stolen election to focus people's attention on the importance of participating in our democratic process.

Let that be a lesson to you.

Ummmm, and I'd like to ESPECIALLY thank the contest creators, sponsors and all the members of the Academy.

(Here's $20, WW. Let's wrap this show up. The stiffs are gettin' grumpy. Especially that clown. Never trusted him.)

That only works if you got the first one right... or are you still interested the revenge of the rejected?

You pushy leaf-blower! Um...what was the lesson?

OK. I guess this vote count is going to go like the Minnesota Senate race. If y'all can't mark an X on a ballot in a timely fashion, then, according to our guidelines, the rules committee will meet and decide: a) if absentee ballots count; b) if everyone was properly registered; c) if any ballots were mislaid; d) how confusing ballots may be interpreted, etc. etc.
Or, if insufficient numbers of votes are received by tomorrow night, then the committee may decide to declare every entrant a winner. As well as a joy to know.

Thanks -- one and all -- for LOL throughout a lovely day.

Is it technically a sentence if he never finished?

You know that feeling of foreboding you had?

;-)

Talk about scent, you're sittin' beneath a clown.

Whew.

Not to be the skunk at the picnic, but has anyone noticed? No trolls! They just don't want to have fun! Something to remember.

Pheww, CVille. Glad to see you made it out of the shower alive.

Jeezly!

Thank gawd for those bars to keep all the crazies out!

Reading the original, I think it is just fine with me, in that one does hear strong steady rain on a noisy roof occasionally interrupted by wind gusts, or at least drowned out. The ridicule stems from the rest of the tale, as well as the apparent redundancy of a doubly dark night.

But in earlier times, without street-lighting, nights can be dark and peaceful. Starlight is enough to see your way, moonlight enough for battles.

Is it too late to play?

It was a dark and stormy night, or at least it seemed that way to me because I was now blind; blinded by some passing stranger with an evil look in his own eyes, which were fine, although one seemed to be a little cocked, but that may just have been the angle from which I was seeing him, before the aforementioned passing stranger blinded me by poking me with his two index fingers, which, even though I was in excruciating pain, made me wonder why he hadn’t used two fingers on the same hand, y’know, like the three stooges do, well Moe mostly, the other guys usually are the ones on the receiving end, but then, I stopped wondering when I heard the thunder, which wasn’t really thunder I now realize, but a cymbal crashing against the side of my head, where my left ear is located, or was, before the cymbal sliced it clean off, or at least I think it was clean off, I can’t really tell now, being blind and all, but it sure felt like that, and of course, that made me lament in a remorseful way, that this had been a decidedly bad day to decide to accept the nomination for Commerce secretary, but then, I also suspect it really isn't raining as I may have just tripped over my neighbor's sprinkler.

I've got my index claw ready to strike you if you win. I got my other eye on you. Watch it Mister.

wwstaebler, I'll give you $50 if I win. Cats are SO much more trustworthy than names like Quinnesque. Really.

Finally, Flowerchild, it is you giving piece a chance.

It was a dark and stormy night in which Gregor heard the rumor of trolls: those fascist connivers of autocracy clothed in the mantle of democracy; the incidious whisperers of rabid racist words, spoken with smiles and laughter to lure the masses into a false sense of joviality, all the while quite serously bent on the dismantlement of the government; these people of no will who demand others allow their rantings to go unchallenged, to stand in the silence and be granted an air of credence, all the while permeating the minds of the weak who wish to be protected by these fearsome and fearful followers of a well-crafted sales pitch; a pitch whose tone was so high, only dogs could hear it's subliminal message, that we will rule if we can crush the liberals, if we can ridicule and minimize them and marginalize them and scoff at their efforts to encourage people to help each other, their only possible help can come from the free market, and it's not coming", but their words could not betray their deeds as right before the eyes of the mesmerized masses these trolls denied doing the things they were in fact doing right before the eyes of everyone, but Gregor would not be silent and his voice was heard above the tumultuous noise as he exclaimed, "Sounds like BS to me!"

Hegemony crickets, eh? Gotta keep an eye out for 'em. But why do they say keep an eye "out"? Better to keep it in, I woulda thunk.

Liked this one. Made my brain burn. Congrats. ;-)

"Hey, Sister! I ain't touching that last line with a ten foot pole!"

- Ignatius J. Reilly

Absolutely wonderful! Handicapped commerce Secretary? Sounds like a natural fit.

This one's gotta' rank toward the top.

It was a dark and stormy night reverberating of juggernaut peals that all souls felt in storm drains of waking - dead canyons of crisply burnt evening readings forgotten - slumber indebted to dreams severed, possible bridges washed away like penguins sliding from bergs under the midnight sun into icy waves of intellection too brittle to think and too restless to stop, parting Left and Right, sacred to the bovinity of self-comfort, innocents eaten up in red raw teeth grating against their true ears until all-imposed white-noise submerged them in stereotype, not silence, and the lightening struck too late, as the storm served up was no natural one, no not at all, for it didn't stop the clock and the time ran out without and within before the scythe set off the shanty's wall spinning with a dreadful tuning of blade: apoca-slipping from the wall cloud of ideology and singing through a republic once, or is it history's dudgeon falling on two pans in a puddle of whole milk unnecessarily soured?

Liked Justice Putnam's entry. Paris is awash and the cedar scent survived the drink.

Glad to SEE? OMG! I left my cam on! Where did I leave my towel? Oh, NO! Sorry guys!

Regrets to Tom Wright, Mr. Smith1, Stratofrog, GregorZap and Mike7Woodson, each of whom wrote a dark and stormy night sentence worthy of the highest honors, had his entry only been posted before the bell. Sorry, Guys, it's a roolz thing. But thank you all for playing.
Preliminary vote counts from the entrants themselves indicate that Flowerchild rules (although it should be said that Bwak rules the roost). But the votes are still being counted. Stay tuned....

Whaddya mean, GET uncomfortable? I can't leave the frickin' house without some TPMer or another urging God to smite me with the frickin' lightning. Again.

And now I gotta worry about yer cuz, too? Well screw that. If cuz wants to follow me around, he better be well-grounded, is all I can say. And not be carrying any metal. Next storm I see, I'm gonna cozy up to kooky-cuz, then duck down about a foot lower. Let HIM take the hit for a change.

P.S. Good luck with the morphine. Have they given you one of those little self-administered do-hickeys? Those things are awwwwwesome. Got one at home here. Works like a charm.

A response:

It was a dark and stormy night, my heart rate pounded, my steps were fast, and my eyes stared straight ahead with my peripheral vision catching the big squares of black space separating the row of houses, my fear expected someone to jump out at me... and why not since I watch TV and every time someone is walking alone at night, not to mention, on a dark and stormy night, someone or something always leaps out, and since I'm older I never like to go out at night, at least not by myself -- and here I am out by myself but that couldn't be helped since it was a nice evening when I walked to my friends house and although I had intentions of being home before it got dark, one thing led to another, ya know what I mean, and time passed quickly -- into a dark and stormy night and.. there I was cold to the bone with my rain-drenched clothes, which I wore a pair of jeans, a tee shirt, and sandals that slid sideways every couple of steps causing me to stumble about like a drunk in my race to reach the warm safety of my home, not to mention, I wanted to get home before he came home and found that I was out all evening, which meant if he wasn't there then he was out all evening -- where was he...with Rebecca, kissing or being kissed?

And stabler than whom? I mean we are all more stable than Bush the Lesser.

Correction: Not The Invisible Man; rather, The Incredible Shrinking Man....scary just to type the title.

Excellent entry Mike. Esp. liked the 'bovinity of self comfort'. Well done.

yes! the chickens mind screamed while she pecked out the answer no, (yes) and glanced mischievously, no at the peegalito, yes.

Me likes, and applauds this late effort. I dunno, perhaps the competition should be open ended...

Whithr a peeg? Bwakman! See you not soo the pfath they pfunded, oura vatars that arred in Staebblerlund, harruad bathar namas, the cheeken, the diday, the nasus-phalanx, the c(k)at(s), two muny tobe sacald when even thurst was athar vetals, mid trefoils slipped the sable rampant, hoof, hoof, hoof, hoof, padapodopudupedding on fattafottafutt. Ere we are! The great fall of the offwall entailed at such short notice the pftjschute of Bwakfat, erse solid woe-man, that the humptyhillhead of hermself prumptly sends an unquiring one well to the west, ("Duse the sin alzo rise in the vest?" unquired Eduardo), in quest of her tumptytumtoes: and their upturnpikepointandplace is at the knock out in the park where peegs have been laid to rust upon the green since dev-linsfirst loved livvy.

er, No?

Ding, ding, ding....but, after the bell Stratofrog. Woe is we.

Ding, ding, ding --well-done, Donal. Although at a price, given Rebecca.

"Boobies'???? Aghh. Never mind. Revealing your repressed Catholic upbringing as never before. It is such a sadness when other words more properly describe.... but, hey, you are an adult now; you can say those words, savor them, without lightning striking you dead. After all, look at Quinn, once stricken, twice wry.

BTW, the second one was from my wife, Angie.

What happened here? Can I delete these repeats since I initiated the blog? Or is that feature only for the blog itself, not comments?