Oh, Winter

I find myself writing about the weather once more.  This was written in the midst of an unexpected winter blizzard.  Here’s hoping the weather’s a bit more springlike by the time this post comes out!

 

My goodness, Winter

You said you’d never come back

After our last fight

After that last flight

You ran away that night

 

Yet here you are, Winter

Hurling daggers from the clouds

At my smug smiling face

At this maddening pace

A swirl of white, icy lace

 

Oh, Winter…

 

Please learn to share, Winter

With your seasonal sisters

Fall’s mournful cinders

Springtime’s hush

Fair, beautiful Summer’s blush

 

I’m glad you’re back, Winter

In honesty, I enjoy your company

But time’s passed along

I’m afraid I’ve moved on

Find someplace else to snow upon

 

Death by Peanut Butter – a short story (finally!!!)

I wrote this short story for school, based on the writings of Canadian humorist Stephen Leacock.  Leacock wrote a hilarious piece outlining the essential cliches of 19th-20th century serialized detective fiction.  It’s available online under the name “The Great Detective.”  (An even funnier version of the discourse exists under the name “Frenzied Fiction,” which I found in my grandpa’s well-worn copy of Leacock’s Laugh Parade.)  The punchline of my story is that, once again, the butler has “done it.”  This time, however, he has done it is to himself.

On the subject of Canada, I’d also like to thank my aunt for bringing three huge jars of Canadian peanut butter when she visited the week I received this assignment, as they served as my inspiration to write this. 😀

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The Great Detective and I were sitting down to a hearty breakfast when we heard the frenetic pattering of footsteps in the stairwell.

“A visitor, I presume,” my ingenious flatmate remarked as he spread a generous amount of peanut butter on his crumpet.  “It must be – and surely, he must be distressed, for the way he mounts our staircase is uneven and heavy.  Either that, or he is a drunken lout who has read too many of your stories, seeking my autograph.”

“Perhaps,” said I, fondly recalling the last case I’d dutifully chronicled for The Brand.  (You ought to read it after this one!)

The stuff behind my desk

The things that are behind my desk

I heard them fall and clatter

Yet too engrossed in work was I

To notice if they matter

 

From all the things behind my desk

A fortress has been formed

To fend off tiny Uruk-Hai

From a foot-tall Helm’s Deep

Or the bitsy spiders crawling by

 

With all this stuff behind my desk

It’s two inches from the wall

One of these days I’ll clean it up

Before it spreads into the hall!

“Jenny” – a Flash Fiction

Happy New Year, everyone!  (As usual, I’m a bit late in wishing people things.)  Let me tell you, I’ve always wanted to write a Doctor Who fanfiction about Jenny (the Doctor’s daughter) and a certain hit song by Tommy Tutone.  Well, here’s a little something I wrote in literally three minutes.  (This one’s for the Figgies in the TARDIS. 😉 )

 “I don’t know, you guys,” said Grace uncertainly as Cece and Emii reached for the TARDIS’ telephone.

 “Oh, come on, Grace,” Emii chided.  “Haven’t you ever wanted to know who’s at that number?”

 Cece and Emii sang out the numbers as they dialed, which only made Grace roll her eyes.  “Eight-six-seven-five-three-oh-niiiine!”

 The two mischief-makers waited anxiously for the call to complete as dialed.  Finally, somebody picked up.

 “Hello, Dad!”  a cheery voice that sounded like a cross between Peter Davison and Sandra Dickinson sang out from the other side.  “I thought I recognized your number on the caller ID!  What a pleasant surprise.  I thought you’d never call!”

 Cece nearly dropped the phone.  Emmi caught it and pressed the receiver to her ear.

 “Hello?”  the cheery voice persisted.  “Anybody there?  Oh, I know, you must be breathless from all the running you do with that Donna woman.  I’ll just wait for you, ‘kay?”

 Cece cleared her throat.  “Er, sorry … wrong number,” she stammered hurriedly.  Then, she hung up.

 Grace eyed the two younger girls curiously.  “Well, that was odd.”

A Hyman Kaplan Fanfic Excerpt and One Lengthy Introduction

One of the books I inherited from my grandmother’s personal library was The Return of Hyman Kaplan by Leo Rosten.  It is the sequel to the infamous Education of Hyman Kaplan, which Rosten penned under the sagely-sounding pseudonym, Leonard Q. Ross.  I read them both, out of order, and enjoyed them immensely.  The Hyman Kaplan duology chronicles the misadventures of an olden day night school teacher whose job is to ensure that his culturally diverse class of immigrants to the United States will have a firm grasp on our strange, native language.

Now, this would be a fairly simple process if not for the presence of a student named Hyman Kaplan, an eccentric fellow and a deep thinker who possesses a highly unique understanding of how English works – or should work.  He’s not stupid, you see; his reasoning is surprisingly (almost aggravatingly) philosophical, even if it comes out sounding incredibly silly.  Sometimes, his analysis technically makes sense, but when applied to the English language, it simply cannot work.  Other times, it simply doesn’t.  Either way, the end results are simply hilarious on so many levels.

To top it all off, he writes his name in the most unusual way.  With crayons.  In multiple colors.  And with little stars between each letter.  The minimally formatted text of this post simply cannot do it justice.

I was pretty young I read Hyman Kaplan for the first time.  Even if I didn’t quite get some of the references to the first book, at my young age, I understood enough of the humor, chuckled at the odd ways Mr. Kaplan philosophically butchers the English language, and understood most of the writing.  (“‘Scuse me, Grandma, what does ‘pedagogical’ mean?”)

The books really aren’t bad as books written for adults go, content-wise.  Its humor is intellectual and remains that way throughout the book.  If you love the English language in all of its idiosyncrasy, you’ll put these books back on the shelf with at least one fond memory to laugh about.

I recently looked through some of my old writings, and my eye fell on this story.  I picked it up.

Apparently, at some point, I had attempted to write a fanfiction of Hyman Kaplan, entitled The Employment of Hyman Kaplan.  If my memory serves me correctly, it was to detail the lives of Kaplan, his teacher, and his former classmates after they either graduated, quit, or (most likely in Kaplan’s case–) expelled from the American Night Preparatory School for Adults.

“Mr. Parkhill and the T*R*U*C*K D*R*I*V*E*R”

by Allison Q. Rose

 

It was a dark and stormy … well … evening, as Miss Olga Tarnova – an alumna – would have romantically described it.  (Even if it was snowing, or if it was just plain sunny, the Russian-born ballet dancer would have found some sort of dramatic method of categorizing the day.)

The American Night Preparatory School for Adults had just closed down for the night.  Adults of varying age and ethnicity clamored through the large glass double-doors, pouring out onto the street in clusters, conversing among themselves in their respective languages.  Whether they could actually understand each other remained a mystery.

Mr. Parkhill, a teacher at the school, eyed them all absent-mindedly from the open doorway.

This school (for those who do not already know) was a school for foreigners, new immigrants to the United States of America.  Here, they would learn to master the basics of the English language and its culture, by reading, writing and, most importantly, speaking English.  Being a rather small organization, the ANPSA held three classes: one being for beginners, the next for those who had mastered – and survived – the beginners’ grade, and another for the valedictorian candidates, who were usually the only students who could make it that far.  To most of the ANPSA’s students, the highest grade level seemed as unreachable and elusive as a distant star.

However, the faculty tried to encourage their ambitious charges to work to the best of their potentials, for one day, a rocket ship bearing good grades may one day take these students as far as that distant star.  Mr. Parkhill could only reassure himself in futility that this method of transportation was still in commission.

Greetings from Camp NaNoWriMo + Short Story

Hello Mother, hello Father….  (If anyone knows what I’m referencing and you’re under fifty, you’re officially cool in my book.)

I’m a camper at the idyllic, online retreat writers know to be Camp NaNoWriMo (not Granada), where people who can’t make the November event or just want an additional similar challenge over the summer can write and have fun!

My project is to write 10,000 words’ worth of short stories over the month of July.  My goal is to write about a thousand words per day, give or take, and since this isn’t for a school project, I’m sure the words will flow like endless rain into a paper cup.  (If John Lennon wrote books, I can only imagine what other artful, odd metaphors he might use.)

Plus, the handy-dandy word count recorder thingie on the Camp NaNo site predicts that I’ll need to write a minimum of 250 words per day to meet my ultimate writing goal, so my personal per-day goal cuts me plenty of slack.  I can take generous breaks if I need, but let’s hope that won’t happen too often.

Today, I finished one of the short stories I was writing for my project.  I don’t have a title for it, but it’s basically a discombobulated prequel to the first Figgies in the TARDIS story.  It presents some odd theories as to where the FITT cast comes from, some awkward moments between Time Lord and companion, and some vague references to a certain time-traveling uncle.

That said, enjoy my on-the-fly handiwork!  (Seriously, my other writings go through minimal editing before I share them with anyone; this is an exception.)

 

 The Doctor lounged on an inflatable … well … lounge chair in the middle of the TARDIS’ swimming pool, engrossed in his favorite Agatha Christie novel, a facsimile edition from the far, far future, long after Jack Harkness, ideally, should have died, of Death in the Clouds.  There were benefits, as it were, to having a swimming pool in the library.

Figgies Take the TARDIS

An unfinished work featuring the Figgies, the Third Doctor, the Brigadier, and Sarah Jane.

(by Allison Rose)

Chapter One

“Where’s the Doctor?”  Cece Ryder asked incredulously, looking around the TARDIS control room uncertainly.  That tweed-wearing, flippy-haired, bowtie-adoring Time Lord whom she’d been accompanying for the last few months was nowhere to be seen.

“I don’t know,” Emii Wells replied.  “He hadn’t mentioned anything about going anywhere yesterday.”

Skye Falconer eyed the dashboard mischievously.  “Do you suppose he’s hiding in there?”  She was dying to crack it open and see what was hiding inside.

“Yeah!”  Tyler Jonesmith agreed, reading her thoughts almost exactly.  “I’m dying to crack it open and see what’s hiding inside!”

Emii, and Cece shook their heads vehemently.  The last time someone had tried to do that, the results had been disastrous.  Or so the Doctor in question claimed.

“Look,” Hannah suggested diplomatically, “I’m pretty sure he just went out shopping with the rest of the gang.”

It did seem plausible; Grace, Scarlett, Emory, Hailey, Athena, and Claire had all gone out to the mall to hang out, buy nail polish and do other girly things (although Scarlett had probably gone to the hardware store instead).  Jack was meeting some friends of his, too.  Rhiannon, his daughter, was visiting Gwen Cooper and her family in Wales.  And the Doctor, as noted, wasn’t around for whatever reason, so, in conclusion, they were all alone in the TARDIS.