The results of San Jose State University’s annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest — finding deliberately bad writing — are out. The winner’s entry begins:
“As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire…”
– From Dan Gillmor
Mine: “It was a dark and stormy night. Karl Rove stared out the window at the tall turgid Washington Monument, partly shrouded in dark swirling clouds, and unbuttoned his shirt …”
I don’t need to show it to you all here. Just go to any diary or my comments. You all see it on a daily basis. Thanks for loving me anyway, grammar/spelling/typos warts and all.
when I have completely misunderstood what the writer was trying to convey. Really makes me proud of all my brain cells – all two of them!
Oh Susan, you are TOOOOOO much….:o)…I might add to yours if I may…and the doorbell rang. He knew his heartthrob was about to appear…the sweat appeared on his brow and soon as he turned the knob of the door, there stood Jimmy boy and his pants were already unzipped with intisapation of the fierce night ahead of them both, sweat dripping like a waterfall. As soon as Jimmy boy entered the doorway and over the thresh way, in came the FBI behind him…..
PLEASE ADD! That’ d be fun! Hope more do.
So far we have:
NEXT PERSON?
Roughly shoving Jimmy/Jeff out of the way, they grabbed Karl by the wrists, spun him around, and slammed him into the wall. Karl could hear a slight asthmatic wheeze as the agent hissed in his ear, “These are for you, you slime bag,” and he pulled the fuzzy pink handcuffs out of his belt…
It was a dark and stormy night. Karl Rove stared out the window at the tall turgid Washington Monument, partly shrouded in dark swirling clouds, and unbuttoned his shirt.
The doorbell rang. He knew his heartthrob was about to appear…the sweat appeared on his brow and soon as he turned the knob of the door, there stood Jimmy boy and his pants were already unzipped with intisapation of the fierce night ahead of them both, sweat dripping like a waterfall. As soon as Jimmy boy entered the doorway and over the thresh way, in came the FBI behind him …
Roughly shoving Jimmy/Jeff out of the way, they grabbed Karl by the wrists, spun him around, and slammed him into the wall. Karl could hear a slight asthmatic wheeze as the agent hissed in his ear, “These are for you, you slime bag,” and he pulled the fuzzy pink handcuffs out of his belt…
“KINKY!”, squealed Karl. “Whooooooohooooo. Makes my Texas blood hot!” “And I see,” he said as he squirmed to turn his head and take a look at the tall sandy-haired FBI agent, “that the G in G-man stands for girth!”
“No, Karl!” squeaked Jimmy. “It stands for engorged!”
Karl and the FBI agent smirked at each other. “For god’s sake, Jimmy. Engorged starts with an E. I already GHOST WRITE your blog. Do I have to give you a script in real life too?!”
And I’m still laughing!!
LMAO…OMG, this is way tooo much…can we really keep it going????!!!!!
“Oh My God”, said the agent, once he knew who it was that they had in handcuffs. “We got the wrong address, again”! “Isn’t your name Bolton?” we thought that the lady jail told us this address, they discussed between each other.
Give Preznut dubya our regrets for making the mistake of abusing his brain….showing them all the middle finger as they left. Of course by this time, Karl had lost all his robust for anything Jimmy boy could muster up.
….and as the FBI started to crawl into their car, one said to the other, ” I can’t believe we actually had Turd Blossom in cuffs!” Whew!!!! whata night this has become.
My eyes! They BURN!!!
I’m laughing…
Forgive me. I was 5.
No human bean
Has ever seen
A dinosaur before
And if he had
He would be sad
“Cause then he’d be no more.
Science and poetry all in one. … I have tears in my eyes.
As reviewed in “Poets for Today and Tomorrow: An Examination of Current Trends in Literary Development”:
(a bit of snark, mostly directed at pretentious reviews: actually, I thought it was quite charming and better than many poems by adults)
A real and memorable paragraph from a medical journal manuscript I re-wrote recently (I understand the science behind this, and was so confused myself that I wound up deleting and re-writing much of the paper!):
My head hurts just thinking about it…
… is the best/worst. My all time favorite bad title was a medical article called “A Personal View Forceps.”
I’m not positive, but I’m sure the author also used the word “whither” in a contemplative, questioning way.
Another name for the “Dark Lord”?
Drug name altered to protect the not-so-innocent…. 🙂
Uggh. I have to go wash my brain now.
(I’ll be out for a bit, so feel free to add + post it all as one post … TY!)
It was a dark and stormy night. Karl Rove stared out the window at the tall turgid Washington Monument, partly shrouded in dark swirling clouds, and unbuttoned his shirt.
The doorbell rang. He knew his heartthrob was about to appear…the sweat appeared on his brow and soon as he turned the knob of the door, there stood Jimmy boy and his pants were already unzipped with anticipation of the fierce night ahead of them both, sweat dripping like a waterfall. As soon as Jimmy boy entered the doorway and over the thresh way, in came the FBI behind him …
Roughly shoving Jimmy/Jeff out of the way, they grabbed Karl by the wrists, spun him around, and slammed him into the wall. Karl could hear a slight asthmatic wheeze as the agent hissed in his ear, “These are for you, you slime bag,” and he pulled the fuzzy pink handcuffs out of his belt…
“KINKY!”, squealed Karl. ”Whooooooohooooo. Makes my Texas blood hot!” ”And I see,” he said as he squirmed to turn his head and take a look at the tall sandy-haired FBI agent, “that the G in G-man stands for girth!”
“No, Karl!” squeaked Jimmy. ”It stands for engorged!”
Karl and the FBI agent smirked at each other. “For god’s sake, Jimmy. Engorged starts with an E. I already GHOST WRITE your blog. Do I have to give you a script in real life too?!”
[Meanwhile, in the press office] “Now where is that damn reporter,” asked Scotty, enunciating each word carefully, the way that George Bush wouldn’t. Little did Scotty know, that Jimmy was busy riding his Scooter while the FBI was busy with a Hot Karl.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, Bush contemplated some brush, and his future. Do I conquer Iran, or that yummy Bolton? That moustache would feel wonderful against my…< a rustling sound > “Dickie, is that you?”
The door opened slowly. Bush contemplated some brush and the door. A foot appeared, one slipper clad foot with dainty pink toenails and a bunion the size of Texas. “Oooohhh..mmmm…footie..” was the only thought that came. It sizzled and sputtered through Bush’s brain, as he fell headfirst out of his brown overstuffed leather chair into the bulky mission oak coffee table.
One of my great-aunts had a poem published about ‘How she would not cut her hair,neither to a ‘bob’ nor a ‘do’,that was in the 20’s -I think,in the Saturday Evening Post.
There is also an imitation Hemingway contest, to write a page of really bad Heminway but keeping it good and true and clean, because it is important for people to read it as they cross the river into the trees and bid farewell to arms.
It was started in the late ’90s by PEN, which posts these results for 1999. After 2000, it seems to have come under the corporate wing of a magazine: 2000 ff.
There’s also Faux Faulkner, but I’m not going to go there.
Umm, well there was this diary that I am truly embarassed about now. It is a little over the top on, shall we say, anxiety. Why I’m reviving those feelings now is a mystery to me, but such is the erratic path of my life. The ling to this 1752 wordfest:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2005/5/26/181519/203
Just read one of my diaries..
Same here. I tend to plop stray thoughts into the narrative just wherever the land, as they arrive, so most of my diaries are somewhat murky. Ah well… no Pulitzers this round.
Total and Complete Fiction
A very bad thing happened to me once–I don’t remember where it was or how- but it happened.
There was a full moon,shining upon all of us (who was US?) never mind – the moon was bright, and the legs were long,so long that I could see up their kilts.As they danced and sang I saw the sporrans akilter(so that’s what that means! I said to myself, that explains a lot).
And then,and then, even though I was terribly threatened and afraid of the dreadful sporrans. I just went to sleep.
And awoke in my Mother’s arms, and said ‘Mommy’, what is a sporran?
What did mommy say? 🙂
She said ‘here is this nice substitute food that resembles bananas’ but isnt really bananas
I can do much worse than that- please do not encourage me.
but never mind Uncle Herbert over there…..
Not mine but this is the worse:
Vote for Bush
I still like this winner from 1989:
I’ve had many many non-hours worked when I was a worker, you can be sure about that.
Pax
I once wrote a book, a published book, that was titled, I kid you not, “The Evil Child.”
You can just imagine what fine writing is to be found in these pages. Mr. Bulwer-Lytton would be proud.