Please find below the anonymous entries for the latest round. HJ will be asked to judge and the result posted here.
Apologies for the delay in posting - my computer broke !
Edited by Pugugly on 29/11/2009 at 22:50
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Entry Number 1.
5) In a parallel world to our own everything was identical except for
oil and coal deposits which have not formed, other than in small traces.
Despite this you are a motorist in 2009.
Describe your motoring trip on a day out to the coast - in detail.
It was an interesting theory anyway he thought, putting down the glossy
supplement. Crumbs, with the size of Sunday papers these days it was
amazing he even stirred after his usual Saturday night ?spectacular?;
He scolded himself, ?James, you must do something useful or at least
healthy today?. Get some fresh air maybe, see the sea; yes, he?d check
out the catastrophe that befell Brighthlemstone?s West Pier after the
humungous autumnal gales of the past few days. He pushed the remains of
the papers, already starting their decomposition cycle, into the evaco
on his way out; barely get a chance to finish them since they decreased
the biodegrade time last year.. ah well, we need the energy I suppose.
The story in the paper kept popping back into his mind as he drove ?
just 2 degrees difference & the world could have looked so different.
Maybe we could have had ?trees? in the countryside instead of just in
those special ?tree retreats? that are so popular...and expensive ? too
expensive for the likes of him. The traffic ahead slowed & bunched-up
sharply ? oh no ? why do they do these re-gens on a Sunday.. he?d
be stuck in the M23 tunnel for another 40 miles now, with nothing to
look at except the luminous green-grey sludge moving around outside the
gigantic polytunnel that enclosed him.
The reports weren?t exaggerated ? wow ? nearly half the pier was no
more, the old Charlesian theatre at the end of West Pier completely
gone, only glimpsed now & then beneath the green-grey soupy swell.
James turned on his heels, eager now for respite from the ear ache
inducing wind & keen for an appointment with steamy frappacino & a
sticky chocolate confection. As he drained the last gulp of gritty
grounds (always a mistake he thought ..should really leave the last
eighth) he replayed the different world imagined in the ?bad science?
column he read that morning.
If it had been just 2 degrees warmer it said, all those millions of
years ago, those vegetative deposits would have decomposed thoroughly &
made vast quantities of energy rich deposits that could have powered
the world for centuries. Imagine that - you could have the luxury of
open fields & banks of trees to wander about in instead the vast
continent covering bio-gens & decomp-lakes next to the sea; yeah, in a
another universe maybe. But still, we?ve got to have energy & thanks to
our little green-sludgy algae friends, we do. He was looking forward
to his next algatrol ration next month; driving was about his only
unobserved pleasure these days ? might try Kernwall then. Apparently
still nearly 7 miles of decomp-lake-free coastline there.
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Entry Number two
The Beeb in his Glory
I don?t know where the Beeb got the Mini-Cooper. Perhaps from one of the slum landlords or West End hoods he was hanging out with at the time. He didn?t have it for long, but it coincided with a surge in the braggartry and insolence he used to pole himself rapidly up- and downstream and across the whirpools of early sixties London.
A poet and hustler, working with some success at becoming a gigolo, he was now apparently a racing driver too. On the rear shelf of that Mini, dirty green with double white stripe and chequered roof, sat an iconically placed racing helmet. Before the door was closed it was wheelspinning off into the traffic and zigzgging down the middle of Gloucester Road like a scalded cat.
Pedestrians scattered as it described a tyre-squealing rightward arc into Cromwell Road, but a big bearded man just stood there and the Mini stopped at his feet. He stepped round to the offside and launched a hard punch through the sliding window at the Beeb?s head as the car bolted forward. The Beeb redlined it in second and whacked it into third with an embarrassed snigger. A bell rang and a black police Wolseley undertook, flagging the Mini down. Both cars stopped in the outside lane.
The Beeb selected one of his driving licences and put the others away. ?My name?s Philip Gill,? he instructed tersely, jumping out and advancing on the fuzz with a welcoming smile. Presently he demonstrated the bearded man?s punch through the window of their Wolseley. By then they were laughing uproariously. Soon the Beeb returned in triumph and the Mini was heading, more gently now, for Earl?s Court. He always knew how to talk to the Old Bill. His father was a policeman and he?d done some youth porridge for theft. Just as well because I?d forgotten his alias.
That was in his early glory days, before their plutocratic apogee, before his driving, its essential lack of seriousness, cut the glory short and brought his chickens home to a long unglamorous boring provincial roost. Effrontery and fast reactions can stretch the law of the land but not the laws of physics. Worth bearing in mind, that.
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Entry Number three
Let us go back to the early 70?s, imagine a struggling village garage, two petrol pumps and a small workshop at the rear. Petrol was around 47pence a gallon, and the staff filled the car up for you. They checked the air pressure in your tyres, topped up the radiator and checked the oil, not only that, you were called Sir, and served with a smile.
You filled up most days and took great delight in telling the forecourt staff to check oil, water and tyre pressures every day, regardless of whether it needed or not. No canopies in those days. Not even a thank you for the free service provided, that after all, is what staff are there for, to bide your every whim.
Then the disaster struck, but luckily, just as you was pulling into the forecourt.
A strange grinding noise when you braked. Smug at how conveniently this had appeared, you parked the car, went straight round to the workshop and demanded a diagnosis immediately.
?Brake pads, Sir. I?m afraid you can?t drive it like that.?
?Well, it has to be repaired now, I need the car.?
?Sorry Sir, we are fully booked until Friday.?
A long impatient sigh from you, eyes rolling to the sky and the ultimatum ?If you want to keep my custom you will do it now?
?Well, maybe there is a way Sir, just go into the office and wait, we?ll see what we can do.?
Sometime later, you look out of the window and see a young girl, in a boiler suit with both front wheels off your car and with a box of disc pads in her hand. It?s the same girl who you are normally so rude to.
You storm out of the office and tell her to stop immediately, demand to see the owner and remonstrate with him.
?If you want your car today this is the only way, she is more than capable and I will personally check her work when she has finished.?
You know there is no option, but worse was to come.
?Right, now would you please go and apologise and ask her to carry on if you want the wheels putting back together.?
And he did!
Edited by Pugugly on 29/11/2009 at 22:48
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HJ has judged entry number 2 to be the winner. The entrant will be notified and if they provide me with an address - a small, exclusive gift has been made available !
I will notify all concerned by e-mail and at the winner's discretion post their forum identity
Rob
Edited by Pugugly on 30/11/2009 at 21:12
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