InterNutter

Indie writer seeks audience with an audience. Paying customers welcome. [pronouns: ze/hir] Daily free stories happen because it is an excellent counter to Writers' Block.

Burpengary East http://www.cmweller.com 12601 posts

Challenge #02383-F193: No More Pencils...

Can we hear more about the changes in intergalactic schools? (And can two of them be the removal of perfect attendance "awards" and school lunches that even the most well behaved child can't choke down?) -- Anon Guest

The Cogniscent Rights Committee had a lot to say about Terran Standard Schooling, especially that of the pre-shattering era, relics of which can still be found in Terran colonies. Nothing it had to say about the school system was polite. They tried, but there comes a time when such efforts are not only counter-productive, but sickening to attempt.

For those familiar with class sizes maxing out at ten, and tutorial groups of no more than four... allow us to walk you through the process of standardized Terran education. The evolution of a uniquely uneducational system that nevertheless persisted because the unscrupulous could make money out of it.

It began - as these things always did - with a need. In this case, it was the need of industry moguls to possess a large number of employees who could process the forms and bookkeeping procedures in an era before electronic calculating machines. The current system was run by a charitable few and attended randomly by whomever decided to show up that day. As such, the crowds of barely literate, barely numerate workers were below the standards necessary, and those who could afford such an education didn't want to work in the kind of employ that had one filling out paperwork all day. Industry and charity merged into mandatory, industrialised education.

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Shenanigans!

Today, thanks to my numerous errands and trials, we will not be wasting half of today getting matts and tools.

Nope.

TODAY will be halfway wasted by making a tool out of the matts I fetched. Yay!

At least I'll be learning how to weld. Woot.

So this morning is going to be devoted to those episodes of Inter-Mission that I'm lagging on. By the way, you may have noticed that the link to my podcast has changed sites. That's because Soundcloud

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Challenge #02382-F192: It's Just a Hobby

Captain: "You have nothing to worry about. Our only human crewmember is one of the nicest, sweetest humans you will ever meet."

Human: "I found my knives! Now, WHO THE HEY HID THEM FROM ME IN THE FIRST PLACE!?!?" -- Anon Guest

Rule Eleven: Never go anywhere without a knife. -- Leeroy Jethro Gibbs, historical Terran hero.

Civilisation in general holds certain truths to be self-evident. Such as the ability to make and safely use sharp things as one of the stages

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I Run Around... From Town to Town...

So. Yesterday, I had to get a whole bunch of stuff so we can bend the metal mesh and thereby make the walkways. Metal-bending tools exist but the CO$T is more than we can bear. Besides, you can make your own for like $300.

I only forgot one thing - C-clamps :P

So today:

  • Clean the house
  • Write the instant
  • Get the C-clamps
  • Also acquire cream and sour cream
  • The Brat Run

So yeah. I'm a busy li'l bumblebee today. I

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Challenge #02381-F191: Viva La Revolution

The peppy one with beautiful blond hair is always in black and the one with dyed-black spiky hair is always in soft pastels. -- Anon Guest

She wore braids. Neat, tidy braids she wound into a knot of a bun in the back of her head. The only thing that changed about that 'do was the length and volume of the hair, and that was progress that was annually cut back. The rest of her choices were pretty much anything she liked

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OK now what?

I did my 3K words this week, leaving me today and tomorrow to fart around with building the kitty kondo(tm).

Thing is, we need stuff to do the thing. Bending that much metal needs a metal-bending press, which needs materials to make. Unfortunately, the design is in Beloved's head. So about all I can do is gather the mats and hope the crafting doesn't take long when Beloved returns to actually make the thing.

As I understand bending tools, you need

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Challenge #02380-F190: Tasty Trade

Alien witnesses true fear in the eyes of a band of country roughneck mercs in the form of a single raised eyebrow of the group's diminutive elderly "grandmother" figure. Grown warriors, men and women, who have charged into the maw of insanity cowed by a 98lbs octogenarian.

Pretty pretty please. -- Yup

In all the known universe, there is little that is as unlikely to be terrifying as the words, "What the diddly gosh-darn heck're you kids got goin' on in here?

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Another Imp's Ass

Kitty shelter skin: Complete(ish) with the caveat of needing to be tol to take care of the last of it.

Skillz for the next bit: nonexistent.

I know vaguely what we're doing next, but not how we're doing it next. I suspect that learning to weld will be on my itinerary at some point.

I want to do something to finish this project, but I either don't have the stuff or I don't have the skill. It's infuriating.

Fingers crossed that

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Challenge #02379-F189: For a Thousand Years

"I believe there's something good in him."

"That's childish."

"So? Children can be right too." -- Anon Guest

"We're talking about a man who has rounded up millions of people, put them into life-endangering camps when he and his cohort couldn't outright kill them, denied them basic human rights, denied them humanity, cowed the populace with both his super-loyal adherents and threats of physical and legal violence, and is one hundred percent in favour of eliminating anyone who isn't a member of

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GDI it's cold

There's something wrong about it being the coldest days of the year after the winter equinox. I can't put my finger on it, precisely, but it strikes me as the height of illogic that all the cold happens after the shortest day of the year.

I'm still journeying out in this noise to add staples and screws to the Kitty Kondo(tm) frame. My weak noodly writer muscles weren't enough to hold the staplegun above my shoulders, so Beloved kindly stapled the

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Challenge #02378-F188: Anything You Can Do...

An idea for the humans/earth is space Australia. These aliens fight with their voice. But our songs are stronger. Opera singers? They can't even fathom, they just faint. Thought you'd have fun with it! Thank you -- Anon Guest

The Karolai had thought they were masters of tactics and the ultimate weapon. None had dared oppose them for a thousand years of glory. Their empire spanned most of a galactic arm, and they kept tight control of it with sonic weaponry.

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Week 2

Four weeks to go in the agent hunt. I'm hoping for good results. If not, I have four more attempts at trawling #MSWL on Twitter to sell Adapting.

The goal this week is 12K in Kingdom of Sand: Border of Bones. I also aim to have the Kitty Kondo finished by the end of this coming weekend.

I should be using the early hours at my current disposal to record some audio for Inter-Mission, but my throat is demanding a day of

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Challenge #02377-F187: Almost a Nightmare

Imagine you meet your doppelganger of a different species. They look nothing like you, but your personalities are as close to identical as possible! -- Anon Guest

The universe is a fractal, as above, so below. Galaxies spiral into a supergalaxy. Stars spiral into galaxies, clouds of debris spiral into both stars and planets. Atmosphere spirals into weather... liquid drains into a spiral form. Around and around it goes... Is it no wonder, then, that there are patterns of personas?

They do

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Another day of shenanigans ahead

This time, we're finishing up the paint job and maybe attaching the roof. I'm getting used to the idea that we're going to just... spend half of Saturdays just getting stuff, now.

So yeah, we now own a new paint sprayer and this one might suffer the slings and arrows of being stored for extended periods and not develop leaks like the old one.
The old one did more resemble a Super Soaker than anything industrial.

The new one looks a bit

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Challenge #02376-F186: So Walks a Spider

Imagine if the Old Pagan gods still walked among us. But the stories from their point of view were slightly different.. and they were only made into gods because of storytellers...

I.E.

Odin: "I started my existence as an ordinary man, and lived a fairly uneventful first life. Then my wife passed and I became lonely so I started to look after all the local lost and orphaned children. The bards started to sing of my generosity far and wide until

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