Caterwaul
I'd love to make it home but my instruments just went black. All readings gone - engine failure imminent. I was dead in the water, but still breathing.
I kicked the main console and swore to the heavens. Jack was going to have my hide for this; if I ever made it back alive.
I glanced at my watch. Old analog - a gift from my father before he died - at least one thing was still working. But it was 5:53pm and counting. Sunset was closing in, and once it went dark there'd be no hope of a rescue until dawn. No one goes out on the sea after dark. No one was willing to risk it. But I'd been stupid, thought I could make it in time. Hell of a time to be wrong.
Hurrying to the emergency supply box, I threw the lid off and riffled through bandages and flares, and first aid gear, to find the dated radio at the bottom. It weighed at least a kilo. I mentally crossed everything that the damn thing would work.
Static, then a few clicks, before dying out with a bang. Something white and hot began to ooze out of the back compartment. Disgusted, I dropped the radio and wiped my hands on my shorts. I checked the time - 5:59pm. Sunset was due at 6:01pm, and it was never late.
The silence was deafening, pressing in on my ears as I strained to hear the first signs that they were coming. I could hear my own panicked heartbeat pounding against my rib-cage, ready to burst. My breath was anxious and impatient.
Then I heard it, so sudden, and closer than I had been expecting. Not more than 100 meters away at the most. That spine chilling caterwaul. Dread seeped into every crevice of my body. The fear that gripped me made me feel sick to the stomach. I felt dizzy, sweaty and weak at the knees. I wasn't ready to die.
There it was again. The moan of the dead. The souls of all sailors lost at sea. I knew they would come. It was only a matter of time. Come for me like they'd come for the others. To take me back to the sea. I checked the time.
A sudden thud against to side of my craft knocked me off balance, and I let out a small scream.
They were here.
Royals
I’d love to be a princess, but my allergy to tiaras just ruins it every time.
I’m sure I’m not the only one afflicted by this malady, but for some reason people don’t, or can’t talk about it. I understand that – I do. It took me 37 years, hundreds of attacks, and 10 years as a card carrying member of Tiara Allergies Anonymous to build up enough courage to speak out.
I realize now that princes my age are few and far between. I owe it to every young lady out there waiting on her knight in shining armor to let her know. Not finding a prince might not be her fault (because, let’s face it, none of us ever want to admit there might be something challenging about us when it comes to finding true love.)
It always worked like this. There would be a prince. He didn’t have to propose, ask me on a date, or even recognize I was in the same room with him.
Of course, he always found out rather quickly because as soon as it would come to my attention there was a prince in the room, fantasy hormones kicked into overdrive. Before he completed his official room scan to determine if there were any eligible or likely princesses to be courted, my imagination had us betrothed.
Things would have been fine if my imagination stopped there. But it didn’t.
Within seconds of betrothal we would be standing before whoever marries royalty (that part was always a bit fuzzy for me), decked in full-fledged raiment of prince and princess (tiara included) poised to exchange “I do’s”.
That was when my troubles always began.
Some people sneeze or get itchy and runny eyes when they have an allergy. Some break out in rash or worse, develop hives. If only I had been so lucky.
No, when my tiara allergy kicked in, the transformation from eager princess wanna-be to cutthroat vixen cougar birthed a side of me that would make a sailor blush. Before that unsuspecting prince could say ‘jack-rabbit’, I was ON him, right up in his business, ready to be making babies.
You can see why this created problems, given royal protocols and all. Sigh.
I’ve been told there is no cure, but writing about it is sure good therapy.
Wow. I don’t even know where this came from. Hopefully it brings a grin. Full disclosure: to the best of my knowledge there is no such thing as a tiara allergy and I’ve never been within a thousand yards of what the world deems royalty. But when it comes to princes – I met mine in HS and we’ll be celebrating 37 years of married bliss next month, so I guess things worked OK.
Girl Scout Cookies
I'd love to buy some of your girl scout cookies, but my doctor told me that if I eat any more of them, even just one, then I would explode and launch chunks of my flesh and organs onto everyone around me! The combination of the sugar and other life shortening ingredients found in your cookies would build up large amounts of gas that my body just wouldn't be able to handle, thus resulting in my gory death. The bloody stains and guts that my body would leave on the surfaces of my explosive death would result in the area being marked off, as no other human being would ever want to come into contact with anything my blown up body came into contact with.
The smell would attract beings from hell, who would drag helpless victims who came too close to the scene and rip their skin from their body. The demons would place the skins of their victims on the walls of the area to display their demonic passion to all who came by. Once they gather enough victims, they would commence a demonic ceremony to summon their demon master who would rain death upon the earth.
Humanity would be at a great risk of extinction as the demons from hell slaughtered any living being they could find. The amount of death and destruction would throw the world into an apocalyptic melt down before ultimately causing the earth itself to explode. Ending all life on earth as we know it.
The amount of lost souls from earth would cause a black hole, the size of which the observable universe has never beard witness too. All things that have ever been would be sucked up into this black hole, which after sucking up everything in existence, would implode on itself eliminating all existence and cause an end to everything...
Also, I don't have cash...
