The Unloved and Unfinished

            Fred entered the local mall to finish his holiday shopping two weeks early.  For the first time in his adult life, Fred wasn’t waiting until Christmas Eve to purchase last minute gifts.  He had completed decorating his tree, hanging the lights on the balcony of his apartment and making cookies and candies to give to his neighbors.  With his shadow cast before him, Fred unbuttoned his woolen trench coat.  Gently shaking his shoulders as he unwrapped the woolen scarf from around his neck, falling snowflakes turned from white to gold in dusk’s final light.             Reaching into his pocket, Fred carefully read the crumbled list.  Only one name remained legible:  Grandma.  He exhaled his fears, breaking into an easy pace, wading into the deep of holiday shoppers.  He smiled an easy smile, warming his round face.  Fred had...

  Tease:  Creative Light Entertainment recorded William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy talking to each other about how their lives changed because of one television show.  The Bronze Shelter talks to Executive Producer, Scott Zakarin, about his Mind Meld project.  The simplest ideas prove to be the best:  Shatner and Nimoy talking.  Better idea?  Record the conversation.  That’s just what Creative Light Entertainment did:  MIND MELD: Secrets Behind the Voyage of a Lifetime .  The two pop culture kingpins kicked back at Nimoy's place to chat about their time on the Star Trek series and how the show affected the rest of their lives.)  Reviewers and fans alike have raved over the eighty minutes of friendly, honest banter that makes this copy a must see for fans and curious alike.  (This graph sounds like the teaser with the next one as the beginning of the article….Okay I take that back.  This graph would be great if the arti...

ENG 394 4:00 - 5:15pm Dr. Fred Svoboda February 2, 1993      Barbie gracefully stepped into the waterfall, the water caressing her hardened, well-formed body.  She felt her form as the liquid ran through every nook and cranny.  Her itsy-bitsy, neon-colored bathing suit soaked up the fluid with ease, cooling off the hot skin beneath.  She pushed the water back from her face, allowing the water to rake her golden wheat strands down her well-defined back.  Her sun-tanned face smiled as the water danced around every beautiful feature:  her small, petite nose;  her full, sensual lips;  her shimmering, blue eyes;  her perfectly straight white teeth.  Her chest heaved with a sigh of happiness, sending ripples through her rounded breasts. She stood at the edge of the mighty white cliffs;  below, the turbulent waters of the sea.  Barbie had become an excellent diver, but this dive could win her the world grand championship....

 Teaser:  Neither sleet, snow nor dead of night will keep this reporter from her appointed tasks:  cosmopolitans and comics.      Big white pillars and that age-old colonialism that comes with white domes that light up in the night sky is the last place I ever pictured to attend a comic book convention.  The Hilton Columbus, nestled in the Yuppieville of the Easton Town Center, end-capped a street lined in a Virgin Megastore, Cheesecake Factory and Barnes & Noble.  On the snowy weekend after Turkey Day, Roger and Jane Price threw the twenty-fourth annual Mid Ohio Con.      Am I name-dropping?  You bet, when the names are this good to drop.      After hitting the box office, the main drag down and around was lined with publishers and guests – I just loved seeing all the independent publishers and retailers right there.  I don’t know about anyone else, one of the most exciting things about going to a comic...

  "Never seen a horse with boobs, before?"   She tromps her hoof a few times as her fists come to rest on her….well, hips?   Not entirely sure what they call that part where horse meets torso on a centaur, but yeah.   This brown haired pinto just gives me a fierce stare as she tries to get off the catwalk.   Yeah, it’s great at the Tavern of Desire – the place is packed with every type of creature known in the Kingdom, all hell bent on getting a lil’tits and ass tonight.             A table of pig-faced, boil-ridden trolls gets a rowdy, pounding on the splintering table top for another round and for another wench.   This is my cue to do some crowd control before Hank has to come down; because if Hank has to come down the stairs, someone’s goin’ home in a casket.   And really, no one wants that – not even a drunken, ugly troll.             “...

     Imagine your on a surfboard, sitting in a shark-free ocean. The sky is that exquisite shade of blue and the breeze keeps the summer sun from completely frying your brain.  The water’s salty and clear – just the perfect day.  And as you look over your shoulder, you spot the perfect wave.  In your gut, you know this is gonna be the ride of a life time and you start your paddle….      That’s Velvet Chain.  Peaked, ready for that perfect wave to just ride them into chart-topping stardom.  And it’s not because they have the “now” sound or do synchronized moves, but because their funky-cool infusion of music has the quality that would keep fans knee deep in their best-selling albums for years to come.  With Erika Amato’s cool blues style fronting to Jeff’s Stacy (composer-producer-bassist) wild mix of rock, funk and jazz, Velvet Chain’s unique sound  has started that paddle for soar.      “That was a big, big...

Title: Stranger and Stranger Word: set Challenger: lj user. budgie_uk Length: 200 words exactly      "Hello."  His chiseled, good looks marked him as a leading man.  As he extended his hand, he made sure to look at her eyes.  "I'm Mark."      "Nancy." She giggled when she shook his hand.  His bathrobe parted below the loosely tied sash.  Her eyes widened.  She tucked her auburn hair behind her ear as she cleared her throat.  "You must be my partner."      "Yeah.  Thanks for filling in at the last minute.  Jennifer's really sick."  Mark stopped twisting the script in his hand and passed her a copy.  When she took it, he studied her ample hips, waspish waist, nice rack and long neck.  "But I guess that's why there are  understudies."      "They really don't have understudies for adult films usually."  Nancy paged through the script as she pretended not to wish ...

     In the late fall rain, they stood in a line.  Their robes clung to their broad shoulders as the one in the purple stepped forward.  He placed the bronze plaque in its spot on the wall; a black wall from times gone past.  The many names upon that wall had meaning once, long ago, when men build skyscrapers and soared through the sky in metal machines.  Now, the overgrown vines and trees had to be cut away for the latest victim.      “Zekaria was a good man,” said the purple robed leader, pressing his weathered, callused hand to the plaque.  “He gave his life for us.  He died for our sins so we can live.”      “Amen,” said the others, bowing their heads.  On leather thongs, holy emblems hued from stone dangled.  Fingers caressed the rough circles dissected by crude, wooden arrows.  Symbols of their crime, their fate, their destiny hung around their necks.      From the woods that c...

     “Bottoms up, bitches!” She declared with a hiccup, raising her glass.       “I don’t think it’s responsible for heroes to get drunk after defeating a villain,” another girl interjected. The first girl continued drinking, raising her middle finger.      It was weird for a Wednesday night.  Normally, during the middle of the week, the patrons were regulars and the drinks were beer on tap.  But that night, the room was filled with flamboyantly dressed women and the drinks were cocktails and white wine spritzers.      I wouldn’t say I worked at a drive bar, but more of a low-end Cheers.  The place didn’t serve food, but there was a pizza delivery joint down the block so food found its way in from time to time.  While the statewide smoking ban prevented a haze from obscuring faces, the old wood paneling and solid wood bar still smelled of well-loved, fully-smoked cigarettes.      ...

     Domstolens Kontorist lived in a very small hut near the Great Wall.  It was an A-frame shaped building with a roof made of wood slats that reached to the ground.  Her hut had but one door and no windows, but it received enough sunlight for an expansive garden.  With a working, stone well nearby, Dom grew beans, turnips, carrots and cabbages.  At the end of the path, from her front door through her garden, she planted a patch of lavender and rosemary.      From the roof beams inside her hut, she dried herbs and fish when she could find it at the market.  One wall was lined with baskets filled with vegetables. On the other hosted her bed, nightstand and chair, which functioned as her sitting room as well.  Though her hearth occupied little space, it could warm her home enough so she slept deep beneath her fur blankets in the winter.      She planted her seeds in the spring.  Come summer, she traded part o...