Write the start of a novel...

Walking down the lower streets of Marseilles harbor I realized tat I was surrounded by people whom I thought to be of a meretricious caliber. I tried my best to look unfazed, but realized with every glint I saw in their eyes, that I didn't fool anyone. The smells, sounds and all over gory impression that hit my senses made me want to disgorge them all, right there into the water! I wished I had my dear brother's more Harum-Scarum approach to danger. I wished he was there. I wished I was him!!

Trying to hide myself behind the collar I kept walking, clutching the tube holding the secret documents he had sent me by courier. God, whatever was this going to amount to?...

cigarettes
meatloaf
roof
virgin
credit card

Revivifying this thread. It's been somnolent too long.

Herman was down on his luck. He had spent his last $14.50 on a pack of cigarettes, and all he had left was 50 cents, not enough to pay for dinner. How he longed for a juicy meatloaf or maybe a nice lobster! But how would he pay for it? He had maxed out his only credit card. Then he glanced at the roof of a nearby building and saw a sign reading, "Fly Virgin Atlantic." That morning, he remembered, a man on the street had told him that Virgin Atlantic was looking for flight attendants. He could do that kind of work! Why not? Filled with optimism, he set out for the airline office, confident that his 325 pounds would not be an obstacle to landing the job. After all, he had a good personality.

efficient
whirlwind
wrist
polka
dessert

'Starting with dialogue?' asked Professor Crabbe. 'Whatever were you thinking?'

I didn't feel like answering. There was a chocolate dessert with my name on it in a faculty fridge nearby, but Crabbe was in full windbag mode.

'How you can be expected to teach here next term I don't know. Not that I haven't seen worse, of course. It's just you had so much promise. Such fine prose in that last short story of yours. A whirlwind of emotion in 2,000 words. And then your first attempt at a novel opening is that.'

I stared at the two sheets of paper on the staff room table. It wasn't too late to paper cut him to death.

Crabbe sighed. 'Maybe I'm being too harsh on you. After all, your opening was...efficient.' He searched for something else to say and ended up fiddling with his wrist watch. The sound of polka music came from outside the room. Crabbe drew himself to the door, sighed again, and went in search of the culprit.

dance
gnome
foolish
gargled
lightning

The garden gnome throws a bolt of lightning at me. Foolish thing. I dance to the left and leap in the air to spin-kick it in the throat, silencing its gargled cries of possessed rage.

strut
pink
curvy
alert
crane

Kimberly was more than curvy enough to get whistles when she went out to pole dance and strut her stuff, but she always had to be alert to the repulsive slobs who would crane their necks and poke their noses much too close as they slipped dollar bills into her pink shorts.

eject
hillock
disingenuous
egg
Barbie

The skipper was about to eject the stowaways off his experimental ship when they were flying over a cottony hillock. The disingenuous second-in-command saw his chance and pleaded for mercy on behalf of the scared kids. In exchange for their intended free passage, the skipper agreed to accept the stowaway kids’ services provided that they collected the golden egg and the Barbie doll containing the secret microfilm from his rival’s private rooms before the auction as soon as they landed and handed him the coveted items by sunrise.


cauliflower
laser
cleavage
cyborg
clinical

cauliflower
laser
cleavage
cyborg
clinical

"In my clinical opinion," Dr. Dingledrop said, "The patient got that cauliflower ear from interacting with the absurd female cyborg he invented. He was, no doubt, preoccupied with its cleavage. I recommend that he stop interacting with cyborgs and find himself a real woman. Meanwhile, laser treatment may repair some of the damage to the pinna."

bonnet
elastic
dash
impenetrable
judge

"This elastic band on my dashing judge's bonnet is impenetrable to the lies these defendants spew forth!" she giggles as she scribbles the words above the caricature of her honorable self--daydreaming and doodling instead of deliberating.

outsmart
lint
diaper
cocktail
perfume

"What the hell, Roger? You poured perfume on Jenette's diaper? You couldn't outsmart a bag of lint, you moron! I'll take over here, and you just go and fix me a cocktail!"



laptop
orthodontia
fence
fluid
hopscotch

"When you drool like that, the fluid dribbling down your chin is disgusting," Susan said. "You need orthodontia."

"Oh yeah?" said Clyde. "It's just that I fell and broke a tooth playing hopscotch over by the fence. Get your laptop and do some work, unless you want me to give you a broken tooth!"

impostor
dusk
cubbyhole
puberty
raze

Her Grace, the Duchess of Cholmondley-Walton-on-Stoke, glared at the youth standing before her and rang the bell to summon her maid.

"I caught this imposter in my cubbyhole!" she said indignantly, when the maid arrived. "I thought he was the Duke."

"But ma'am, he's barely past puberty. How could you be so easily deceived?"

"It was after dusk and my lamp was turned low. And when I insisted he withdraw, he threatened to raze the castle."

The three of them regarded each other for a moment. Then young Hiram smirked. "Same time again tomorrow, your Grace?"

rodeo
dumpling
pelican
scrabble
socks

It was six thirty and I had nothing to do. I must have gotten up to early, now my 'to do' list was done and it would be hours before bed. I went to a rodeo, then a zoo. It was there where I damn near tripped on a pelican and might have contracted food poisoning from piss poor turkey and dumpling meal I got at the food court. I wish I could call Angie, maybe she would spin by and we could play Scrabble or checkers. I know that won't happen. Maybe I'll get a head start on tomorrow’s laundry. I'm down to my last pair of socks so that might be a good idea. Six thirty and the day and far from over. I have to come up with something to get my mind of Angie. I have to keep busy.

House
Vampire
general
patient
leotard

There is a legend attached to that house that glowers at us from a tangle of broken, dusty elms. Of course it has to do with The Vampire. This general area is rife with vampire lore, as we believers know. This particular legend is unsettling and a little sad, but it carries a grain of humor that is so often missing in run of the mill vampire stories. It begins with a young man in a leotard, a patient of the charming but turbanned Dr. Frisco.

daylilly

Westie

thunderstorm

recluse spider

door

Lola came tripping out the door into her garden. What a beautiful day! Nothing could spoil it. The sun shone bright, and no thunderstorm lurked on the horizon. Orestes, her little Westie, was at her side. She bent to pluck an orange-yellow-and white daylily and held it to her face, inhaling the lovely aroma. Little did she know that a recluse spider lurked in the petals of the pretty flower! The spider sank its fangs into her nose. She staggered and fell...

car wash
nonchalant
pudding
bullfighter
Caravaggio

Lupita de Vallambrosa was on her way to see her lover, Caravaggio, to show him she still cared. Once the greatest bullfighter in all España, poor Gio's career had ended after a devious bull had stuck out a hoof and tripped him in front of an enormous crowd at the arena. Gio had tried to act nonchalant, but the crowd had roared with laughter and Gio's career was over. He'd been reduced to working in a car wash. He tried to hide his shame, even using his chamois like a cape in front of the cars passing through, but nothing could hide his humiliation.Lupita hoped the pudding she was bringing him would remind him that she, at least, still cared for him...somewhat.

agony
whitwash
partridge
suet
molar

Something was terribly wrong. Fifteen of Mrs. Frimble’s tenants had died in agony after she served them partridge fried in suet, and she had collected big insurance payments on all of them. Yet the coroner had ruled all those deaths were natural. Detective Soames suspected that the case had been whitewashed from the start. He was determined to get to the truth, and he would get to it as soon as he saw his dentist. That molar was killing him.

peninsula
conspire
crutch
pot roast
moonbeam

Leaning against the doorframe, I tilt my head as silence smothers the night-sounds of Raker's Peninsula. The shadows conspire, increasing the density of dark, trying to block out the moonbeam's silvery light. The beacon shines brightly though, highlighting a lurking figure in a summons to perform my sworn duty. Sighing heavily, I grab my crutch and my sword, leaving my pot roast simmering while I hobble out to slay a moon-demon.

dice
ribbon
pizza
operation
alligator

dice
ribbon
pizza
operation
alligator

Alligator Pizza was her absolute favourite. Since the operation, though, her body could no longer accept it. The last time she tried, her stomach muscles clenched and she, none too ladylike, upchucked all over the dice. Daddy had to buy a whole new gameboard. He wasn't pleased, she thought. Her mother wasn't pleased either, due to the trailing ribbon of creamy yellow bile winding its way down her best Sunday dress.

Sweeping the thoughts aside, she glanced around. Her hand shot out and snatched up a slice before stuffing it under her cardigan. Already there was a stain, so she got up and took a tumbling run through, into the bedroom to land with a mighty thud upon her wooden stool. Slapping the pizza onto the surface, she noticed too late it landed on her spelling test.

Spelling Test by Anne Grady

1. Goose
2. Polyunsaturated
3. Foxtrot
4. Salivate
5. ingrained

dice
ribbon
pizza
operation
alligator

Operation Neapolitan began on June 5th. General Mac McChrystal, his breast covered in medals and ribbons, had three divisions of pizza-hurling Luigi tanks at his disposal. The Luigi's were rightly feared, they had a distinctive flat disk-shaped gun aperture that could blast medium, large and extra-large pizza's 5 miles into the face of the enemy.

In addition this battle would see the introduction of the prototype Alfonzo X5 battle-tank. Nicknamed the Alligator for its distinctive elongated nose, it featured laser range-finder, global positioning, and fired the 3ft and 6ft long 'Al Metro' pizza that could penetrate concrete if the crust was over-cooked to a charred hardness.

McChrystal gave the signal. His men abandoned their dice and scrambled, ten minutes later they were rolling toward the front line. "Get some, men, get some!" he hollered to his commanders before retreating into his X5.

The Division opened fire...

Melinda knew there was too much fat on the goose, so she must be sure to use polyunsaturated margarine on the muffins. She had announced that dinner was ready. But her inlaws were still in the living room doing the foxtrot. They seemed to have an ingrained affinity for old dance music. Maybe the smell of the goose would make them salivate. She opened the kitchen door to let the goose's aroma fill the living room, but they were dancing more enthusiastically than ever. What should she do?

leather
feather
whether
gather
lather

Light as a feather, tough as old leather, she was a crying, fulsome bird, a sailing silver orb, high of ethereal bosom and in a lather of high vast silver irradiation she set out to gather blue fruit from the heaven tree, pondering whether to sing her silver white, efflugent symbols OR to give Mr. Stephen Daedulus a piece of her mind!

Ooops, here are the words:

Moocow
Humid
Lane
Irradiation
Lemon Platt

The citizens of Lemon Platt were undergoing their yearly irradiation treatments when Humid Finklestein's moocow came rampaging up Lilac Lane.

cinnamon
rake
gambler
comedian
probe

Cinnamon reached out and raked in her chips. On the stage, a comedian was doing a stand-up routine, and no one would notice that she was not a gambler but a shill. She had tipped off management about the crook in the plaid jacket, and they would be down in a minute to grab the guy and start their probe. She hoped it would be a rough one. She hated plaid.

trout
Machiavellian
subsume
cactus garden
cutie pie

After three years of baiting, hooking, and other icky things, I finally caught the guy. He tried to come on to me. A ploy I was falling for, up till he used Machiavellian and cutie pie in the same sentence. I pulled him through the streets like a cat would pull a trout through a cactus garden. He confessed. Then he recanted in the next breath and told me the whole scene was subsumed in a dream. A big dream.

It can't be; I never dream.


shoeless
melody
mirth
quadrant
aftershave