and I will always be that way
One of the things I like to do with this journal is post stories or papers I have written for school, even though I assume no one reads them. After these many years of school, I find the only thing that remains academically entertaining to me is writing.
Keep in mind that I just finished writing this about 5 minutes ago, so there's probably plenty of editing and revising needed to be done.
The assignment for this story was to take a classic children's story (in this case, The Three Little Pigs) and mold it into your own, while using the diction and style of Twain (indiginous dialect), Hemingway (drama), and Hawthorne (excessively descriptive) throughout. When I sat down to write this, I began remembering when my dad would tell me such stories when I was young. For some reason (perhaps the overbearing presence of Star Wars in my recent life), the next thing I thought about was either an alien telling the story of the great war with Earth to a child who had inquired as to the nature of the conflict, or the same story as told by a human parent. The way I ended up writing it reveals itself more like the human version than the martian version. I tried to be very entertaining through this piece, and perhaps tried a bit too hard. Nevertheless, I still find some parts I chuckle at, which is kind of an odd feeling knowing that I'm the one who wrote it.
Oh well...this is what came of it...straight from my brain to this journal that nobody reads. If you do happen to be bored enough to read it, I would greatly appreciate comments on how you liked it.
Once upon a time there were three young, aspiring engineers who were all brothers. They had just graduated from college, and were very near to setting out on their own to begin designing their designs and earning their fortunes. The week before they were to leave, they all had one last meal with their mother as a sendoff for them. At the beginning of the evening their mother said she had something very important to tell them. During the course of the celebration however, their mother had become rather…tipsy…and when they asked her what she was to tell them, all she could muster was ranting and babbling concerning her second marriage.
So the three young engineers set off, each in his own direction. The first, a short, stocky man, balding at the age of 26, was hired at NASA to design the next space station. He arrived to work on his first day and shortly began to grow bored. He began staring at the clock on his desk. Its hands, ebony with a hint of chestnut, drew him into a dreary and dull trance. His eyes, bearing a resemblance to the slot machine to which he had lost forty thousand dollars as a freshman at Las Vegas University, drooped upward into his skull, leaving only the glazed, pearly sclera visible to the crowd of onlookers that had gathered around his workstation. The watched with a sort of awe as the drool fell from his primary orifice to the pool forming on his pressed blue oxford shirt which featured an ironic tie depicting Garfield the Cat amidst many a snoozing ‘z’. This continued for twenty some-odd years until (in the obligatory spirit of story book magic) the space station was completed.
Well almost as soon as the station was complete, a lone martian, a Zattarain of Mars to be specific, began to feel hungry on his long voyage to Mercury, and saw the space station as sort of a fast food stop where he would have to do little scaring, killing, commandeering to receive a hearty meal. He flew his ship right up to the air-lock window and through the intercom and said, “Puny human, surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied for the remainder of my long journey to Planet Hollywood, or as you earthlings call it, ‘Mercury’.”
“Never!” he replied. “Not by the hairs on my chinny-chin-chin!”
What a ridiculous thing to say thought the martian. “Then I’ll turn and I’ll burn and I’ll blow your station away!” he said.
Knowing that the space station was built from balsa wood which had recently been found to be one of the strongest materials on earth (contrary to belief throughout world history), the engineer sneered back, “I’d like to see you try!” He then proceeded to engage in physical taunting which was surprisingly more distasteful than the taunting and celebration found in the modern day NFL.
So with one beam from his Zattarainian blaster, the space station was little more than a splintered heap. To the martian’s surprise however, only two men where floating in space. He now noticed that this station seemed like it was not fully developed and was rushed into active status, bearing a striking resemblance to the now ancient Windows Millennium Edition. Still feeling hungry, the martian chose to delay his trip to Planet Hollywood and continue his orbit of Earth, perhaps finding a more occupied space station to dine upon.
. And find one he did. Oddly enough, it was the brother of the previous engineer who was operating this station. Almost as if he were the subject of a humorous anecdote, the second brother had developed a low-class British accent due to the enormous amount of time spent working jointly with the United Kingdom on the project.
“Puny human! Surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied on my long voyage through the galaxy!”
“Ey no way ma’n!” the second engineer shouted back in his irksome accent.
“Yoo theen am gonna jes lei yoo wowtz in ‘ere aw ‘igh ‘n mi-ey ‘n eet me ‘n aw me werk? Blimey, yoo go-a be awf yor rock-a!”
Not understanding anything the human with horrible teeth had said, the martian decided to forego the obvious storybook dialogue and with a single blast from his Zattarainian blaster, destroyed the station and in the blink of an eye and had devoured all of its occupants, the number of which totaled in four.
Now the martian was growing ever so impatient and decided he was going to find one last space station to attack in hopes he would hit the jackpot with over ten occupants inside. He proceeded in his orbit at battle stations for what seemed an eternity until at last he came upon the grandest Earth space station he had seen yet. In all its human glory, the station looked vile, disgusting and obsolete to the extra-terrestrial creature. It reminded him of martian school and his history class when they were learning of the beginnings of Zattarainia. He finally knew the answer to the whining question, “Well when are we ever going to use this?” To his bewilderment, the martian found that the engineer in charge of this space station was the other brother of the first engineer. This brother, in addition to being an excellent gardener, was an amateur actor in his spare time.
“Puny human!” the martian bellowed, “Surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied on my long journey through the galaxy!”
“Oh what distress has been thrust upon me!” the third engineer said as he slapped his hand to his forehead in an all too Shakespearean manner. “I know not what cruel fate awaits, but know ye this, foul beast: I have heard the news spread ‘round the land of my brothers’ death and it destroys my heart such that lamentations cannot explain its feeling. ‘Fear not,’ I tell my young ones, ‘for father will be whisked away to a world more great than this.’
The carnivorous beast was moved. His one giant eye had began to tear up and his multi-colored lip had began to shake. “What a touching performance,” he said. “I am sorry for your loss…I will be on my way to Hollywood now.
The martian began to turn his ship around, and stood down from battle stations. But as soon as he did, he heard a great cry.
“EAT BLAZER LAZER YOU MARTIAN SCUM!!!”
Then all at once, the stations lazers deployed and within four huge blasts from the cannon, the beast’s ship was no more than a child’s plaything. Huzzah for Humanity!
Unfortunately due to the course of events that happened on this day, Mars declared war on Earth, and thus ensued an incredible struggle for survival, the same that rages today still. The End.
There it is...tell me what you think...please...
§
Keep in mind that I just finished writing this about 5 minutes ago, so there's probably plenty of editing and revising needed to be done.
The assignment for this story was to take a classic children's story (in this case, The Three Little Pigs) and mold it into your own, while using the diction and style of Twain (indiginous dialect), Hemingway (drama), and Hawthorne (excessively descriptive) throughout. When I sat down to write this, I began remembering when my dad would tell me such stories when I was young. For some reason (perhaps the overbearing presence of Star Wars in my recent life), the next thing I thought about was either an alien telling the story of the great war with Earth to a child who had inquired as to the nature of the conflict, or the same story as told by a human parent. The way I ended up writing it reveals itself more like the human version than the martian version. I tried to be very entertaining through this piece, and perhaps tried a bit too hard. Nevertheless, I still find some parts I chuckle at, which is kind of an odd feeling knowing that I'm the one who wrote it.
Oh well...this is what came of it...straight from my brain to this journal that nobody reads. If you do happen to be bored enough to read it, I would greatly appreciate comments on how you liked it.
Once upon a time there were three young, aspiring engineers who were all brothers. They had just graduated from college, and were very near to setting out on their own to begin designing their designs and earning their fortunes. The week before they were to leave, they all had one last meal with their mother as a sendoff for them. At the beginning of the evening their mother said she had something very important to tell them. During the course of the celebration however, their mother had become rather…tipsy…and when they asked her what she was to tell them, all she could muster was ranting and babbling concerning her second marriage.
So the three young engineers set off, each in his own direction. The first, a short, stocky man, balding at the age of 26, was hired at NASA to design the next space station. He arrived to work on his first day and shortly began to grow bored. He began staring at the clock on his desk. Its hands, ebony with a hint of chestnut, drew him into a dreary and dull trance. His eyes, bearing a resemblance to the slot machine to which he had lost forty thousand dollars as a freshman at Las Vegas University, drooped upward into his skull, leaving only the glazed, pearly sclera visible to the crowd of onlookers that had gathered around his workstation. The watched with a sort of awe as the drool fell from his primary orifice to the pool forming on his pressed blue oxford shirt which featured an ironic tie depicting Garfield the Cat amidst many a snoozing ‘z’. This continued for twenty some-odd years until (in the obligatory spirit of story book magic) the space station was completed.
Well almost as soon as the station was complete, a lone martian, a Zattarain of Mars to be specific, began to feel hungry on his long voyage to Mercury, and saw the space station as sort of a fast food stop where he would have to do little scaring, killing, commandeering to receive a hearty meal. He flew his ship right up to the air-lock window and through the intercom and said, “Puny human, surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied for the remainder of my long journey to Planet Hollywood, or as you earthlings call it, ‘Mercury’.”
“Never!” he replied. “Not by the hairs on my chinny-chin-chin!”
What a ridiculous thing to say thought the martian. “Then I’ll turn and I’ll burn and I’ll blow your station away!” he said.
Knowing that the space station was built from balsa wood which had recently been found to be one of the strongest materials on earth (contrary to belief throughout world history), the engineer sneered back, “I’d like to see you try!” He then proceeded to engage in physical taunting which was surprisingly more distasteful than the taunting and celebration found in the modern day NFL.
So with one beam from his Zattarainian blaster, the space station was little more than a splintered heap. To the martian’s surprise however, only two men where floating in space. He now noticed that this station seemed like it was not fully developed and was rushed into active status, bearing a striking resemblance to the now ancient Windows Millennium Edition. Still feeling hungry, the martian chose to delay his trip to Planet Hollywood and continue his orbit of Earth, perhaps finding a more occupied space station to dine upon.
. And find one he did. Oddly enough, it was the brother of the previous engineer who was operating this station. Almost as if he were the subject of a humorous anecdote, the second brother had developed a low-class British accent due to the enormous amount of time spent working jointly with the United Kingdom on the project.
“Puny human! Surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied on my long voyage through the galaxy!”
“Ey no way ma’n!” the second engineer shouted back in his irksome accent.
“Yoo theen am gonna jes lei yoo wowtz in ‘ere aw ‘igh ‘n mi-ey ‘n eet me ‘n aw me werk? Blimey, yoo go-a be awf yor rock-a!”
Not understanding anything the human with horrible teeth had said, the martian decided to forego the obvious storybook dialogue and with a single blast from his Zattarainian blaster, destroyed the station and in the blink of an eye and had devoured all of its occupants, the number of which totaled in four.
Now the martian was growing ever so impatient and decided he was going to find one last space station to attack in hopes he would hit the jackpot with over ten occupants inside. He proceeded in his orbit at battle stations for what seemed an eternity until at last he came upon the grandest Earth space station he had seen yet. In all its human glory, the station looked vile, disgusting and obsolete to the extra-terrestrial creature. It reminded him of martian school and his history class when they were learning of the beginnings of Zattarainia. He finally knew the answer to the whining question, “Well when are we ever going to use this?” To his bewilderment, the martian found that the engineer in charge of this space station was the other brother of the first engineer. This brother, in addition to being an excellent gardener, was an amateur actor in his spare time.
“Puny human!” the martian bellowed, “Surrender your nutrients to me so that I may be satisfied on my long journey through the galaxy!”
“Oh what distress has been thrust upon me!” the third engineer said as he slapped his hand to his forehead in an all too Shakespearean manner. “I know not what cruel fate awaits, but know ye this, foul beast: I have heard the news spread ‘round the land of my brothers’ death and it destroys my heart such that lamentations cannot explain its feeling. ‘Fear not,’ I tell my young ones, ‘for father will be whisked away to a world more great than this.’
The carnivorous beast was moved. His one giant eye had began to tear up and his multi-colored lip had began to shake. “What a touching performance,” he said. “I am sorry for your loss…I will be on my way to Hollywood now.
The martian began to turn his ship around, and stood down from battle stations. But as soon as he did, he heard a great cry.
“EAT BLAZER LAZER YOU MARTIAN SCUM!!!”
Then all at once, the stations lazers deployed and within four huge blasts from the cannon, the beast’s ship was no more than a child’s plaything. Huzzah for Humanity!
Unfortunately due to the course of events that happened on this day, Mars declared war on Earth, and thus ensued an incredible struggle for survival, the same that rages today still. The End.
There it is...tell me what you think...please...
§