She waltzed into the service station with her drunken companions. Neither of the alcoholics had a clue who she was. She was older, and she was easy. That's all that really mattered. The younger men were on each side of her and her arms were flung around their shoulders as if she had trouble walking on her own. Undoubtedly she would've fallen if they had moved. The man on her left held more alcoholic ammunition to supply the night and the man on her right happened to be finishing a can from the last armament. The drunken trio wasapproaching the cashioer when she stopped them. She pointed out the glass front of the store and said "Hey, that's my ex-husband That's my babies' daddy!"
Now the first words she exchanged with him seemed a little odd, but I presume that, since the kid's weren't in the truck with him at the time, she was implying that he was a bad father.
She stumbled over to the man and, in a rather sarcastic double tongue, said "Where's the kids?"
To which the man replied with a cold stare and, in an equally mocking tone, he said "Where's the child support?"
The scene was obvious at this point. I was really ready to pay for my gas and get out of there before some real stuff went down, but her two drunken escorts were in front of me, holding up the works just sitting there watching the scene unfold. In hindsight, I'm glad I stayed around.
The woman's face went red. I'd say with what emotion it turned red but there's really a few different ways it turned red, and I believe that an extra paragraph here would help dispense the knowledge fully, and do the whole ordeal some idealogical justice. Firstly, her face went red with embarrassment because of the scene they were making at the gas station. Secondly, her face turned red with anger at him for bringing it up. Lastly, her face went red because she was completely drunk, and when you're drunk there's just no other suitable color for your face to turn when you're shouting at someone.
She responded, in a slurred shout "If I had a damn penny I'd give it to you right now! I SWEAR I'D GIVE IT TO YOU!"
Now the thing here is... he was buying gas for his car, and she was buying alcohol with two completely inebriated fellows far younger than she was. Who was in the wrong here you know?
I know it wasn't really written in short story fashion, not even in a real prose form, but someone wanted me to update the blog and I came across the memory I have of this scene at a gas station in town. I couldn't really put it into prose that well so here it is in a documentation style story. I will no doubt try to put it into a story at some point, but I just cant seem to get the idea fully wrapped as to how I'll do it.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Exams Approaching... scratch that... Exams Are Here
I rolled over several times this morning pressing the snooze-a-roonie button and enjoyed 'five more minutes' several times over. That is until about 7:54 this morning when the cherry picker painters came back to guild this jail house, as I predicted they would. So off to my bacon biscuit I went. This morning the bacon population in my biscuit-ville wasn't quite as immense as yesterday. -- I bet the swine-flu has something to do with it. As exams approach, so do high levels of stress and irritability. Some of my friends are being extra peculiar. Some of them are not being peculiar enough. I gather that it is simply the fact that exam week is NEXT WEEK!!! Ugh. Why did I start this paragraph "As exams approach"? They're right on top of us as it is. They're done approaching. (Correction -- start paragraph "As exams are sitting right on top of our heads squeezing our tiny little brains out") I passed a french vocabulary quiz this morning. I'm quite proud of that seeing as there are two drop vocabulary grades and I just knocked one of the lower ones off. This Thursday there is one more and I plan to ace it so I can knock another pesky lowball grade off of the tally. Tomorrow and Friday I'll be in the language lab extremely early doing extra credit lab assignments to boost my chances at securing a less than adequate, yet still somewhat okay grade for the class. I should be studying right now in fact. It would be wise if I logged out and gave this blog a rest, but I'm ever devoted to my writing. It is the one thing that does not betray me, nor does it ever let me down. I can always turn to my QWERTY keyboard with peace of mind. Did I seriously just liturgically make love to my computer keypad? That's amazing. I think I'll go study now.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Alarm Clock Cherry Painters
I awoke this morning to the beeping sounds of what seemed to be someone else's alarm clock. It wasn't mine. The blasting beeping sleep-killer came through the brick wall and aroused me from my slumber. Ugh, It was not someone's alarm clock though. I could not go back to my comfortable haven of rest because it was a continuous noise that was not going to stop. The sound was none other than the alarming, and annoying, cry of a cherry picker. The maintenance staff was repainting the side of our dorm's roof today and they started at 8am. Which, to me, is an offensively early hour of the morning.
If that wasn't enough, when I returned to my room several times throughout the day to do work... they were still painting and that danged cherry picker was still beeping away as loud as can be. Why can they not paint on the weekends? Or better yet, why cant they just use ladders like painters used to do. A cherry picker? really?
I guess the worst part of the whole thing is that I can see that they have not finished the painting... and they left the cherry picker here. That could only mean one thing... they will be back tomorrow. Damn cherry painters.
If that wasn't enough, when I returned to my room several times throughout the day to do work... they were still painting and that danged cherry picker was still beeping away as loud as can be. Why can they not paint on the weekends? Or better yet, why cant they just use ladders like painters used to do. A cherry picker? really?
I guess the worst part of the whole thing is that I can see that they have not finished the painting... and they left the cherry picker here. That could only mean one thing... they will be back tomorrow. Damn cherry painters.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
The Bald Frog With A Wig
Well on the random question generator, Blogger.com gave me this question: The children are waiting to hear about the bald frog with a wig.
so I wrote this spiel, which was longer than four hundred characters so i couldnt use it in my bio page. Consequentially, I'm posting it here because I grew fond of it in the twenty or so minutes of my time I wasted on it. Here's the short in it's entirety.
Well you see this frog was sitting near the pond mulling over his failures. He squatted low to the lilypad to see his reflection in the water and needlessly made adjustments to his tupee, which was seemingly constructed of a nasty cat's week-old hairball still held together with flem from the cat's stomach. Sickening I know but frogs aren't known to have good hygiene. Anyway as I was describing his situation, he happened to be meditating on his failures, as one should never do, and he realized he had never amounted up to anything. Sure he'd eaten plenty of flies but all it did was sustain his worthless life. He lived on the largest pad on the pond and still this was just a means to an end. What good had he done? The frog just sat on his pad and pondered if he'd left any sort of mark behind. So the frog put it in his mind that he'd become a vaudevillian and take off to see the world and entertain it. He put a top hat on, grabbed a cane and began singing his own little ditty which went something like, "Hello mah baby, hello mah darlin, hello mah ragtime gahl. send me a kiss by wire. baby my heart's on fire! if you refuse me honey you'll lose me, then you'll be left alone. oh baby telephone and tell me i'm your own!"
Needless to say... he made millions and now, long after his death, his image is forever burned in our memories as the WB frog.
so I wrote this spiel, which was longer than four hundred characters so i couldnt use it in my bio page. Consequentially, I'm posting it here because I grew fond of it in the twenty or so minutes of my time I wasted on it. Here's the short in it's entirety.
Well you see this frog was sitting near the pond mulling over his failures. He squatted low to the lilypad to see his reflection in the water and needlessly made adjustments to his tupee, which was seemingly constructed of a nasty cat's week-old hairball still held together with flem from the cat's stomach. Sickening I know but frogs aren't known to have good hygiene. Anyway as I was describing his situation, he happened to be meditating on his failures, as one should never do, and he realized he had never amounted up to anything. Sure he'd eaten plenty of flies but all it did was sustain his worthless life. He lived on the largest pad on the pond and still this was just a means to an end. What good had he done? The frog just sat on his pad and pondered if he'd left any sort of mark behind. So the frog put it in his mind that he'd become a vaudevillian and take off to see the world and entertain it. He put a top hat on, grabbed a cane and began singing his own little ditty which went something like, "Hello mah baby, hello mah darlin, hello mah ragtime gahl. send me a kiss by wire. baby my heart's on fire! if you refuse me honey you'll lose me, then you'll be left alone. oh baby telephone and tell me i'm your own!"
Needless to say... he made millions and now, long after his death, his image is forever burned in our memories as the WB frog.
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Jon and Lena
Looking over a fancy steak dinner in Rendezvous, Lena held her stomach and to her boyfriend’s puzzled face she responded, “It’s dry.”
“What?” he asked with a most certainly staged face of unintention.
Lena turned to face him and make the address more personal, “My steak is too dry. I can’t eat dry steaks.”
“Well for cryin out loud Lena put some steak sauce on it, or tell the waiter. What am I supposed to do about it?”
“I just thought I’d tell you why I’m not eating, that’s all.”
“Dammit Lena what’s up with you lately?” He said in a most elegant tone. It was almost impossible to think he was being a complete asshole.
Offended she raised her voice with reprise, “What do you mean what’s up with me? I just don’t like the steak here that’s all. Cant a girl have some goddamn preference anymore? Or should I just devour it because you bought it for me?”
“Lena, not here. Don’t breakdown here. If you’re going to argue with me at least let’s go outside.” he said in a persuasive tone instead of the demanding tone it would’ve taken to achieve his motive.
“No, if you’re going to be a complete jerk to me, I at least want everyone to know that I didn’t take it lying down. I’m tired of all the damned circumstance with you. Why can’t I not like my steak? And why can’t I not feel like dancing tonight? Do you think I don’t want to dance? Because dammit Jon, if you asked me to dance and you really, I mean really meant it, then I’d dance with you. But every time you’ve ever asked me to dance it was because of some goddamn stimuli.” Jon sunk into his chair, sliding with much intention under the table as if he were playing limbo and Lena just kept pushing the bar down on his chest.
She broke off again into a mocking tone, “‘There’s music playing so why don’t we dance. It’s a dance party so it’d be rude if we didn’t dance. Other people are dancing so we should dance. It’s a ball so we should tango.’ For CHRISSAKE! Why can’t you just ask me to dance for once without any conditions, without any stimuli telling you that you must dance? Why cant you just want to dance with me instead of wishing to purvey the visual of dancing to an audience of people who aren’t really paying much attention to whether or not we are dancing for pleasure or because you have a fear of being the man with two left feet in a room full of choreographers from American Bandstand. I bet you nobody has ever cared a single bit about our dancing in any place, no matter how fancy.”
“Let’s get out of here.” Jon’s voice protruded from almost completely underneath the table, “please, let’s get out of here now.”
“And you want to leave why?” she started in again, “Because we aren’t up with the Joneses? Because we don’t look happy like the goddamn Brady Bunch? I bet you feel like everyone in the room is staring at you don’t you? Well how vain, because you’re not even worth worrying about Jon. No one in this godforsaken restaurant cared a smidgen about you before and now all eyes are on you and you’re embarrassed. If you really want to leave then get out of here Jon, you don’t need me to give you directions. I’m not your goddamn cartographer. Go get yourself a cab, I’m going to stick around and enjoy looking at my dry steak for a little while. At least the music here’s nice. Maybe I’ll find someone who actually wants to dance with me.”
Jon got up and, with hatred intended he breathed, “You make me a miserable man.” His face was drowning in perspiration from the verbal exhibition of, in his opinion, pure malice. His expression changed from purely embarrassed to absolute infuriation as he walked across the floor, meeting eyes with everyone in the place. Everyone stared at him as he walked up the stairs and onto Escape Alley.
Crying now, Lena poured a whole bottle of Heinz steak sauce all over the place, surprisingly some of it even hit the steak. She almost laughed but it was just a mumbled beginning to her sobs. She sat and cried for a minute or so.
She distanced herself in her chair and tried to remember a better time with Jon. She went back to their first date. She remembered how Jon had come to pick her up in his father’s new coupe. How he’d washed the damn thing even though it had just come from the car lot and there wasn’t a single smudge or crumb anywhere. He took her to this fancy upscale place somewhere in downtown. The name escaped her mind, but she remembered the environment well. The white clothed tables lined the perimeter of the dance floor where most of the patrons were most of the night. Jon and Lena’s table was close to the door and almost seemed to be invisible due to a pillar that came down from the ceiling and blocked their view from half of the room. Of course Jon would pick a table where he couldn’t be seen. He never liked to be seen unless he knew for certain without a doubt that he looked damn good and that nothing embarrassing was going to happen. He ordered for them, a steak dinner if you’ll believe it. A goddamn steak dinner, she thought. The steak there was dry too, but for some reason then she felt the responsibility to at least devour a portion of the steak, so as not to be rude to her date. He even asked her to dance with him. She remembered his ‘proposal’ to dance, “Babe, what do you say we get up and dance like the rest of these folks?” Damn him if he wasn’t always trying to be like everyone else, but she agreed. She danced with him with the greatest pain inside her telling her to walk out on him. She couldn’t stand to bear him any more, but she danced with him. Something about him made her think that he wasn’t all that bad. Maybe he’s worth being so mediocre for.
She slammed her hand on the table to jar her mind from that dream. Then all of the ambient noises in Rendezvous went mute. A few breaths were drawn aback and Lena could hear chairs moving slowly, but absolutely not a word. She felt a presence before her, someone’s shadow overlapping hers. She took her hands away from her face and looked up into the barrel of a gun just before it put her brains against the back wall. Then it retracted and splattered Jon’s brains onto the ceiling but not before he made a final statement, “I’m sorry about this mess.”
“What?” he asked with a most certainly staged face of unintention.
Lena turned to face him and make the address more personal, “My steak is too dry. I can’t eat dry steaks.”
“Well for cryin out loud Lena put some steak sauce on it, or tell the waiter. What am I supposed to do about it?”
“I just thought I’d tell you why I’m not eating, that’s all.”
“Dammit Lena what’s up with you lately?” He said in a most elegant tone. It was almost impossible to think he was being a complete asshole.
Offended she raised her voice with reprise, “What do you mean what’s up with me? I just don’t like the steak here that’s all. Cant a girl have some goddamn preference anymore? Or should I just devour it because you bought it for me?”
“Lena, not here. Don’t breakdown here. If you’re going to argue with me at least let’s go outside.” he said in a persuasive tone instead of the demanding tone it would’ve taken to achieve his motive.
“No, if you’re going to be a complete jerk to me, I at least want everyone to know that I didn’t take it lying down. I’m tired of all the damned circumstance with you. Why can’t I not like my steak? And why can’t I not feel like dancing tonight? Do you think I don’t want to dance? Because dammit Jon, if you asked me to dance and you really, I mean really meant it, then I’d dance with you. But every time you’ve ever asked me to dance it was because of some goddamn stimuli.” Jon sunk into his chair, sliding with much intention under the table as if he were playing limbo and Lena just kept pushing the bar down on his chest.
She broke off again into a mocking tone, “‘There’s music playing so why don’t we dance. It’s a dance party so it’d be rude if we didn’t dance. Other people are dancing so we should dance. It’s a ball so we should tango.’ For CHRISSAKE! Why can’t you just ask me to dance for once without any conditions, without any stimuli telling you that you must dance? Why cant you just want to dance with me instead of wishing to purvey the visual of dancing to an audience of people who aren’t really paying much attention to whether or not we are dancing for pleasure or because you have a fear of being the man with two left feet in a room full of choreographers from American Bandstand. I bet you nobody has ever cared a single bit about our dancing in any place, no matter how fancy.”
“Let’s get out of here.” Jon’s voice protruded from almost completely underneath the table, “please, let’s get out of here now.”
“And you want to leave why?” she started in again, “Because we aren’t up with the Joneses? Because we don’t look happy like the goddamn Brady Bunch? I bet you feel like everyone in the room is staring at you don’t you? Well how vain, because you’re not even worth worrying about Jon. No one in this godforsaken restaurant cared a smidgen about you before and now all eyes are on you and you’re embarrassed. If you really want to leave then get out of here Jon, you don’t need me to give you directions. I’m not your goddamn cartographer. Go get yourself a cab, I’m going to stick around and enjoy looking at my dry steak for a little while. At least the music here’s nice. Maybe I’ll find someone who actually wants to dance with me.”
Jon got up and, with hatred intended he breathed, “You make me a miserable man.” His face was drowning in perspiration from the verbal exhibition of, in his opinion, pure malice. His expression changed from purely embarrassed to absolute infuriation as he walked across the floor, meeting eyes with everyone in the place. Everyone stared at him as he walked up the stairs and onto Escape Alley.
Crying now, Lena poured a whole bottle of Heinz steak sauce all over the place, surprisingly some of it even hit the steak. She almost laughed but it was just a mumbled beginning to her sobs. She sat and cried for a minute or so.
She distanced herself in her chair and tried to remember a better time with Jon. She went back to their first date. She remembered how Jon had come to pick her up in his father’s new coupe. How he’d washed the damn thing even though it had just come from the car lot and there wasn’t a single smudge or crumb anywhere. He took her to this fancy upscale place somewhere in downtown. The name escaped her mind, but she remembered the environment well. The white clothed tables lined the perimeter of the dance floor where most of the patrons were most of the night. Jon and Lena’s table was close to the door and almost seemed to be invisible due to a pillar that came down from the ceiling and blocked their view from half of the room. Of course Jon would pick a table where he couldn’t be seen. He never liked to be seen unless he knew for certain without a doubt that he looked damn good and that nothing embarrassing was going to happen. He ordered for them, a steak dinner if you’ll believe it. A goddamn steak dinner, she thought. The steak there was dry too, but for some reason then she felt the responsibility to at least devour a portion of the steak, so as not to be rude to her date. He even asked her to dance with him. She remembered his ‘proposal’ to dance, “Babe, what do you say we get up and dance like the rest of these folks?” Damn him if he wasn’t always trying to be like everyone else, but she agreed. She danced with him with the greatest pain inside her telling her to walk out on him. She couldn’t stand to bear him any more, but she danced with him. Something about him made her think that he wasn’t all that bad. Maybe he’s worth being so mediocre for.
She slammed her hand on the table to jar her mind from that dream. Then all of the ambient noises in Rendezvous went mute. A few breaths were drawn aback and Lena could hear chairs moving slowly, but absolutely not a word. She felt a presence before her, someone’s shadow overlapping hers. She took her hands away from her face and looked up into the barrel of a gun just before it put her brains against the back wall. Then it retracted and splattered Jon’s brains onto the ceiling but not before he made a final statement, “I’m sorry about this mess.”
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Church Day
I must keep this first blog short by necessity. It is Wednesday and I could possibly be late for church if I spend too much time attempting to delve as deep as I intend to later on in this publication. You see I only have about 9 minutes to put across my intentions.
In this initial post I gather that I should inform my potential readers that this blog will host a number of short stories. The theme will definitely always be tragic, or personal, but never morbid. I write with people in mind. Every character I use is directly related to someone I know in real life. I put them in situations and then I try to calculate how that person, in real life, would react to everything I put in the story.
A few non-fictional, posts will invariably be intertwined within the plots to update my potential readers on anything I feel should be known about myself. I mean, it is a personal blog after all. Isn't it?
My name is Jared Burleson. I'm currently the freshman editor of my community college newspaper and will hopefully be taking full editor duties next year. I write because it makes me happy. I write things that everyone's seen or heard of but never really thought would make a good story. Should you want to make contact with me you may through my email: sjburleson01@iccms.edu. Please title your emails with the name of my blog so that I can easily weave through my school emails first.
It's been a pleasure entertaining you with my initial post. If for some reason I go for a good length without updating and it upsets you, spit me a demanding email.
In this initial post I gather that I should inform my potential readers that this blog will host a number of short stories. The theme will definitely always be tragic, or personal, but never morbid. I write with people in mind. Every character I use is directly related to someone I know in real life. I put them in situations and then I try to calculate how that person, in real life, would react to everything I put in the story.
A few non-fictional, posts will invariably be intertwined within the plots to update my potential readers on anything I feel should be known about myself. I mean, it is a personal blog after all. Isn't it?
My name is Jared Burleson. I'm currently the freshman editor of my community college newspaper and will hopefully be taking full editor duties next year. I write because it makes me happy. I write things that everyone's seen or heard of but never really thought would make a good story. Should you want to make contact with me you may through my email: sjburleson01@iccms.edu. Please title your emails with the name of my blog so that I can easily weave through my school emails first.
It's been a pleasure entertaining you with my initial post. If for some reason I go for a good length without updating and it upsets you, spit me a demanding email.
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