Monday Morning Mark • 74

How Getting Beat By A Tortoise Made Me A Better Hare • Bird Regrets • Taking Matters Into Their Own Hands

Jan 24

Bunny Blog

How Getting Beat By A Tortoise Made Me A Better Hare

I was ashamed. Getting beat by a tortoise was humiliating. I should have easily won the race. But looking back on it now, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. It caused me to re-evaluate my “life in the fast lane” lifestyle. I decided to make some changes.

I’ve gone vegan. Alright, I already was a vegan. But I quit binge eating carrots before a big race. And I get lots of sleep now so I don’t feel the need to nap during a competition.

I learned a valuable lesson losing that race. I came to realize that failure is part of succeeding in life. So this year I am going to allow the tortoise to learn the valuable lesson of failure when I leave him in my dust.

Tweet Fiction

Bird Regrets

Charles knew winter was coming.

All of his friends had flown south weeks ago.

But the berries were SO tasty. He ate and ate and ate.

The snow came, and he was ready to go, but Charles was too heavy to fly.

Sorry, Charlie.

Tweet Fiction is my term for stories short enough to fit on Twitter. It applies to stories about birds also.

Story

Taking Matters Into Their Own Hands

The Secret Meeting

Protagonist: Thank you for meeting with me tonight. I want to discuss an important issue with everyone since we all have a mutual interest in this endeavor.

Villain: Like how long is this thing going to take? He has to be the least disciplined writer ever. I have been on this same page for weeks now.

Secondary Character: At least you’re safe. He’s going to kill me off. I can feel it. It’s just a matter of what chapter.

Love Interest: You don’t know that.

Secondary Character: Someone’s going to die. They always do. And I’m not necessary to the plot.

Protagonist’s Companion: What I want to know is, when did this become a romance? I didn’t sign up for this. I was supposed to be the number two guy in a fantasy story. Now all he wants to do is chase after her.

Love Interest: Like I had anything to do with it. I am playing hard to get, remember?

Villain: He does love his clichés.

Protagonist: Listen up, people. I hacked into his Scrivener file. His outline is incomplete. He doesn’t have an ending.

Protagonist’s Companion: What?

Villain: You’ve got to be kidding.

Love Interest: I can type.

Villain: So?

Love Interest: So, let’s finish this book ourselves. How hard can it be?

Protagonist: Excellent idea.

Secondary Character: I don’t want to die. Don’t make me die.

Villain: Quit whining or I’ll kill you off before the chapter ends.

Protagonist: Calm down. No one is dying. This is serious. If we don’t start working together we might never make it to the second book in the series.

Secondary Character: Wait! I never thought of that. What if this isn’t a series? What if this book is it? And we never appear in another story?

Villain: Dude, you have serious issues.

Love Interest: Don’t worry, all we have to do is write an awesome story and leave it unfinished. Then there will have to be a sequel. Which we will also write and leave unfinished. Then we’ll make people wait ten years for the final book. In the meantime, the first two books will be picked up by HBO or Netflix and we will all become movie or TV stars. Then people will start writing fan fiction about us. We will never end.

Protagonist: No wonder I love you.

Love Interest: Cool it, Romeo. We have work to do. All right, who has an idea for the next chapter?