"You have not yet begun your story." The Ghostly Author's countenance fell, and the air was filled with the acrid stench of unfinished tales. "Yet chance and favor may yet be yours."
"Now, Emma!" Scrooge scoffed. “I've got all the time in the world. I can't even post an entry until New Year's Day, and Valentine's day is weeks away!"
“It’s Sunday,” the Ghostly Author replied. “Do you know where your muse is?”
“Ah. Well. Errr. About that,” Scrooge temporized.
The spectral scrivener regarded Scrooge for a long moment before declaring, "You will be haunted, and perhaps inspired, by three stories that are disqualified from the contest."
This time, it was Scrooge's countenance that fell. "Is that the chance and favor that you mentioned, Emma?" he demanded in a faltering voice.
"It is."
"I—I think I'd rather not," said Scrooge.
"Expect the first tomorrow, when the bell tolls one."
"Would that be Greenwich Mean Time, or something else?" Scrooge inquired.
“Do I put a ‘u’ in color?”
“What?”
The Ghostly Author tried again. “Do I sound English?”
Scrooge shook his head wordlessly.
“Scottish? Irish? Welsh? Pakistani?”
“Uhhhh . . . .”
Raising her hands to heaven, the Ghostly Author made the strange howling noise that had unnerved Scrooge earlier.
"Couldn't I take 'em all at once, and have it over, Emma?" hinted Scrooge.
"Expect the second, four days hence. The third a week after that. But don't be too literal, Ebenezer. The third lives on the other side of the International Date Line."
International dating had never occurred to Scrooge, and he was intrigued despite himself. "Really?"
The wraithlike writer smiled cryptically and faded from view, but the sound of her mechanical keyboard lingered. Clicketty-clack, clicketty-clack, clicketty-clicketty-clack!
Two Days Later
Scrooge rubbed his eyes and checked the monitor again. It couldn’t be. Could it?
He checked. Yes, it was. In a wavering voice, he called out, “Spirit?”
The sound of a mechanical keyboard once again heralded the arrival of the Ghostly Author.
“Spirit, can it be? The third story has already arrived — even before the second!”
“I told you not to be too literal.”
“Well, sure, but . . . .”
“Did I not warn of temporal anomalies when the International Date Line is crossed?”
“I meant to ask you about international dating,” Scrooge said, diverted from his prior inquiry.
The Ghostly Author smiled as she once more faded away. “You should try it, Ebenezer. Enjoy!”
Comments
Date line
must pass through the Mediterranean since cultivation mostly is south of that sea.
Dates are a traditional crop throughout the Middle East and north Africa. Dates (especially Medjool and Deglet Nour) are also cultivated in the southwestern United States, and in Sonora and Baja California in Mexico.
Date line
Good one!
I for one look forward to seeing what those amazing authors will come up when erm pitted against each other!
Colosseum!
The new venue for the contest!
Pitted dates are also referred to as stoned dates. From wikipedia
Might be interesting to see them slug it out., regardless of if we are talking about the contest or if someone asked two separete individuals for a date at the same time.
(1 slug= 1 lbf x s(squared) / ft)
Bru!!!
You know stoned dates are still illegal in many jurisdictions! Think of the children!
— Emma
Stoned dates
*groan*
John 8:7
.
Oh dear.
To clarify, that kind of stoned date is illegal in every jurisdiction!
— Emma
Stoned?
A bag of gravel and four flat ones, please. No, this isn't a false beard.
Emma and Joanne Are So Generous
When Emma told us we were going to do A Christmas Carol, I begged them to let me be Bob Marley.
At first, the two of them just laughed but I convinced them that I know all his songs.
After I whined, Emma said, "Don't worry, be happy." and then the two of them giggled and said I could be whoever I wanted.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
But!
Just to keep things all balanced, I want to be Jacob Cratchit!
SammyC is going to scold me, too. She’ll probably let me be Jacob Cratchit — she’s open-minded about names, after all — but she’d be so disappointed that I thought “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” was a Bob Marley song!
— Emma
Stevie Wonder Song
. . .best performed by Rebecca on Ted Lasso.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Always be yourself. Unless
Always be yourself. Unless you can be Buddha. Then be Buddha. :-)
Buddha Marley
Hmmm. Sure! It could work in the story! Let’s see . . . .
“Marley! Why have you come?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure. For all will transpire as it will, and the balance of the universe will remain.”
“Ummm, great,” Ebenezer replied, sounding uncertain. “So, I’m good?”
“In the grand scheme of things? Yes, of course.” His former partner’s voice was serene.
“Why doesn’t that comfort me?” Scrooge asked warily.
Buddha shrugged. “A miser in this life, a banana slug in the next. Who is to say, really, which is superior?”
— Emma
Neither is superior, because
Neither is superior, because in the end, neither can exist without the other. (Did I just write this by whisky induced dizziness or did whisky write this by means of my dizzy mind? :-))
Don't mind me
thank you very much!
thank you very much!
that's nicest gentle incentive I've received today
As challenged as I am I still do give a d****
Just a matter of figuring out an effective way
And even though my laptop's pushing fourteen
And my hands hurt from all sorts of stupid stuff
I'm resolved to write a story
with resolution in all its glory
Soooooo
Thank you very, very, very much!
Thank you very, very, very much!
PS: Shameless self-promotion of previous New Year's stories -
https://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/fiction/71946/arrangement
https://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/fiction/72280/resolution/
Love, Andrea Lena
I just know Yule get it!
Mere laptop lapses and digital ailments will not stop YOU, ‘Drea!
Loved the gender-bender stories, too — thanks for re-sharing!!!
— Emma
I Think
You're Fagin it!
Mwahhhh haahhhhhhahhhaaaaaa the Bell Tolls One.
I am the ghost of stories future, and I come to show you February 15th 2024. Take my hand Scrooge.
You pass through time, you writing, christmas, hew year, the long cold january, more time reading and at your keyboard, all ghostly before you, and then finally you settle before a gravestone.
Engraved at the top is; Unsubnitted and Unfinished Stories, by Scrooge.
The list is long and seemingly endless until at the bottom, the contest story....
Oh gh9sf you say, is this my fixed future, or can it be changed?
The ghost shrugs and points at their watch and rewinds you to now.
They slowly, fade, laughing the laugh of one whose story is already written......
__
Estarriol
I used to be normal, but I found the cure....
That's where I went to find my story.
It's much the same as I did when I got involved with the "One Dozen Roses" anthology.
With a deadline, I didn't trust myself to start from scratch. I went to the bone yard and found one of those "Unsubnitted and Unfinished Stories," added in the New Year's Resolution and tweaked the time setting, shortened the scope and it wrote it's self. So much so, I had to rein in my muse to keep from running over the 5000 word limit.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin ein femininer Mann
No Confusion Now, Please!
2024, It Was A Very Good Year.....for authorial girls (and boys and gender fluids). Let's follow in Sinatra's footsteps, well, Patrick's actually, and "Make It So!"
And let's have no prune faces lamenting that they didn't enter. Go and mix those metaphors.
Slow but steady
My story is slowly putting on weight. It a struggle as my muse wants me to focus on other things, I'm giving her cookies and milk to help me get this story in motion. Currently the world count stands at around 1,200 words in the raw. I'm at the first of three check points I want to meet. Going to retype what I've written tomorrow. Writing is a few hundred words at a time because right now I'm dealing with a double dosage of Flu and Strep throat. I humble ask that the three ghost of Christmas grant mercy on this poor writer. I mean I can totally see Emma being the ghost of Christmas past, totally see Joanne being the ghost of Christmas Present. And Ms. Jill being the ghost of Christmas yet to come?
The Christmas Virgin
That's so me!
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
I suspect that that's
a Hail Mary pass.
I've got my International Dates lined up at the checkout/till
Also ...
### ###
Buddha: Be Here Now /
Four Truths, Eight Paths, Five Precepts. /
Now. Here. Be Buddha.
### ###
"Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.”
― Robert Heinlein
And when the warm water has washed out your Keyboard Kramps - then click Submit.
###
So, we get to writing.
We don't wanna be Scrooged at the deadline.
What comes after four truths?
I’m going to go with three French hens. But really . . . I was told there would be no math. ;-)
No getting Scrooged!
— Emma
Not going to bother
Well, I wasn't. Then I got nagged---nagged, I tell you!--by Jo. As already mentioned, story is written. Came out at around 4,300 words, so I do believe it is in the approved length range..
It is a local story, for local people! Are you local?
I've made fishcakes.
[Sorry; wrong Christmas story. But you're still my wife now, Daaaaaaaave]
She’s persuasive!
Good work, Joanne!
— Emma
Well....
The first Christmas story I wrote here involved Cthulhu, Yog-Sothoth and Shub-Niggurath...
Well, you know what they say:
“Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn."
Ia!
Nag! Nag! Nag!
It works!
I have a Dapple Mare
for a Muse. When I nag her she just remarks
NEIGH! NEIGH! NEIGH!
Love, Andrea Lena