The Serialists of April 23rd
Featured Author: Sheilagh who gets better and better.
This is the hub for The Serialists, a meme for people who post original, serialized fiction on their blogs. If you have one or more posts you would like for us to read, please put the direct link(s) to the post(s) in the linky. Remember to visit one another and comment. We all want to hear from our readers.
Embroidery Project
I just finished an embroidery project. This one I started over the Christmas holiday. It’s not a very big one. I would normally have finished in in a month, maybe two. Instead, I worked on three other projects at the same time and so all of them have slowed down.
Actually, now that I think about it, I’m slower to embroider for other reasons too. I used to take The Girl to music lessons. The lessons were across town and only lasted for half an hour. If I dropped her off and went home, I’d have to go right back as soon as I’d walked in the door. So instead, I’d sit around embroidering for half an hour.
It got so that the music teacher would always ask about what I was working on. She seemed to get a kick out of that and all the other creative things that tend to go in in my household.
I still embroider in other places; and have a rep for it. For instance, my doctor’s lead nurse always looks in on me to see what I’m working on. And of course I still embroider when anyone stops to talk to me. But now that The Boy is officially (if not really) out of the house I have an office to myself instead of a corner of the living room. People don’t stop to talk to me as much.
Still, I have no intention of setting it aside for a couple of decades like I did before. instead, I’ll come up with something even bigger.
Saintly Gift
Tina: Hey, it’s almost Easter. What are you going to give me?
Jack: What are you talking about?
Tina: It’s a holliday, right? As you mother in law I should get a gift? I’m thinking a smart phone would be good. Or maybe a tablet.
Jack: I’ll give you something all right…
Tina: No rotten eggs!
Jack: Rats! Well then forget it. I’m not giving you anything on Easter.
Tina: Well, then when?
Jack: On Saint Never Ever Day.
Previously in Jack and Jill: Fast Asleep
The theme for this week’s Jack and Jill is “On St. Never-ever-day” as suggested by Brian Miller
Want to see what I can do with a word or phrase? Make a suggestion.
Hide and Seek
“The first diving helmets were invented in the ‘20’s by Charles and John Deane. They looked a lot like this one, but this is just a reproduction. Look, you can even open and close the faceplate.” Big brother tried to show his little brother and sister how to work the faceplate.
“Quick! Hide here!” Little brother dived into the cushions, taking little sister with him.
“Squeeeeeee! Giggle, giggle.” Little sister kicked a cushion.
“Hold still! He’ll find us.”
“What can he do?”
“Don’t you know? He’ll lecture us to death!”
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.
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Original photo from the Friday Fictioneers hub. Had been cut in two. Copyright – Douglas M. MacIlroy
13 Characters
I have been writing and posting Suzie’s House episodes on a weekly basis for seven years now. Quite a few characters have been introduced in that time. Here are 13 of them.
1. Suzie Hammaker, aka Mrs. H. – the owner of a great Victorian house in the Willy Street neighborhood of Madison, Wisconsin. She is forced by economics to turn the place into a boarding house. She tends to be a little too nice.
2. Miranda Bailey – Suzie’s best friend and first boarder. She is occasionally a real nut job but means well.
3. Andrew Banks aka Drew – one of the borders. He is in love with Suzie. He was an FBI agent until the bureau sent him to Albuquerque. While working undercover he became addicted to a designer drug and lost everything.
4. Marvin Sutter aka Vin – one of the borders. He is madly in love with Miranda and a long standing friend to Drew. Went through the FBI training, but proved too much of a maverick to fit in at the bureau.
5. Ben Hammaker – Suzie’s son. At the beginning of the series he was in sixth grade. Now he’s in the summer break between middle school and high school. He and his girl friend are both trying to write novels over the break.
6. Lisa Johansen – Ben’s girlfriend. They became friends at the same time as Ben and Gene. For a while it was up in the air who she would go with.
7. Gene Thomas – Became Ben’s friend in middle school. Ran away from home when his father beat him too many times and ended up living in Suzie’s house. Suzie is trying to adopt him, but he has been resisting. Plays lead guitar in a rock band called Malaprop.
8. Tracy Martin – Lisa’s cousin and Gene’s girlfriend. She instigated the formation of Malaprop for which she plays bass guitar. It was named after her way of handling language.
9. Kate Hughes – drummer in Malaprop. Got into the band through an audition. She’s a terrible gossip.
10. Emma Zempel – lead singer in Malaprop and Kate’s friend. She has a number of nervous conditions and is horrendously shy, but changes completely when wearing a mask. She does band practice with a paper bag over her head. Got into the band when she surprised everyone by singing during a practice session.
11. Bruce Benson – keyboard player in Malaprop. He’s a bit of a thug with connections in the local music scene. He makes masks for Emma.
12. Justin Whilks – drummer in Malaprop. Got in through the same audition as Kate. He likes Kate, and Emma likes him.
13. Diane Applegate – neighbor and friend to Suzie. Heroine of Moving In.
Suzie’s House 353 : Impassioned Speech in the Park
This takes place at the same time as the previous episodes.
“I don’t know, Bruce, He looks like a pervert.” Gene hadn’t really wanted to come with Bruce in the first place. Now that he saw the guy they were supposed to buy the stuff from, he was even more sure he didn’t want it.
“What? Because his hair’s all oily?”
“No. Because of the way he keeps looking around all nervous like.” Gene caught himself looking around the park just as nervous like. Luckily, there were only a few kids and a couple of mothers around. The mothers were so busy talking that they hadn’t really noticed the bum sitting at a picnic table on the other end of the park. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” Bruce gave him an annoyed look before taking off across all that green grass.
The Serialists of April 16th
Featured Author:
Someone tried to slip an episode past me. Tsk. 🙂
This is the hub for The Serialists, a meme for people who post original, serialized fiction on their blogs. If you have one or more posts you would like for us to read, please put the direct link(s) to the post(s) in the linky. Remember to visit one another and comment. We all want to hear from our readers.
Where Does the Time Go?
I’ve been moving rather slow the last few days. In January and February I got all kinds of things done. But April is proving a bit of a bust. Luckily I was so effective earlier that I’m not bogged down with taxes this year. Usually I’d be in desperation mode. Maybe that’s why all I feel like doing now is kicking back?
Fast Asleep
Tina: Jack, help me wake Theodor.
Jack: Let him sleep.
Tina: But he’s in the best bed in the house. I want to sleep here.
Jack: Wait until he wakes up.
Tina: That could be days! Ack! Help!
Celebration
Knowing nothing of weddings or birthdays or decorations, the alien crept into the village in the middle of the night with dinner in mind. All was quiet. With no game to consume it did what aliens of its kind had always done. It attached itself to a point well above the ground in a position from which it could drop down on unsuspecting prey and waited. Sure enough, come morning many edible creatures appeared.
“Papa, papa! Look at the pretty decorations!”
“Humph. It looks like a jelly fish to me.”
Photo from the Friday Fictioneers hub. Copyright
DLovering
13 Words
Yep. Straight off the top of my head, because the thing I was trying to post proved too problematic for the hour.
1. Health
2. Wealth
3. Wise
4. Guy
5. Gal
6. Gallon
7. Milk
8. Cook
9. Apron
10. Tye
11. Up
12. Sky
13. Stars
Suzie’s House 352 : Don’t Ever Go Away Again
“Wait. Drew. Where are you going?”
Drew paused with one foot already in the hall and the other still in Suzie’s room. The light from the hall spiked the darkness around him. She hadn’t bothered to turn the light on in the room when she’d gone into the hall to confront Gene, and Drew hadn’t bothered with it when he tucked her in.
He glanced over his shoulder, knowing it was a dangerous thing to do. The slice of light from the hall would make her disheveled look even more waif like. The effort to refrain from seducing her grabbed him in the gut and twisted.
“I’m…” He paused, scrambling for self control. “I’m trying to do what’s right. I know I have to start from scratch with you after the way I messed everything up. I know there is no way around it. So… please don’t make this any harder than it already is.”
He’d been lying on the floor of the den, listening to Trent snore, and trying not to remember a sweet past with Suzie. What would his life be like now if the FBI hadn’t sent him to New Mexico? The sound of Gene sneaking into the house wouldn’t normally have registered, but Drew was too keyed up to miss it. His body still sang with imagined sensation as he went upstairs to break up the building argument between Gene and Suzie.
Forcing his feet to take him even an inch away from Suzie left him listless and moody. He noticed that she didn’t respond to his comment. What had he expected? That Suzie would throw off the covers and launch herself into his arms? Wishful thinking. A horrible man like him didn’t deserve to be loved.
He forced himself into the light in the hallway. A dark, hard floor awaited him in the den. He had to go. Maybe all the way back to Montana.
The rest of this episode is on the newsletter. Warning – NOT work appropriate. May include some nudity and adult themes as well as light swearing. If you have not signed up for the newsletter, you can still access this episode through the yahoo newsgroup by clicking here.
The Serialists of April 9th
Featured Author: Old Egg who very nearly slipped one past me.
This is the hub for The Serialists, a meme for people who post original, serialized fiction on their blogs. If you have one or more posts you would like for us to read, please put the direct link(s) to the post(s) in the linky. Remember to visit one another and comment. We all want to hear from our readers.
