Carrot Ranch Struts into a New Website

No, it’s not the set up for a joke. Charli Mills at Carrot Ranch is revamping the Carrot Ranch Website, and this week’s challenge was to write a 99 word story using STRUT as inspiration. Mine’s below. (What do you think?)

Without the Crown written by Kerry E.B. Black

He knew what they said in the locker rooms during downtime, the name they called. Napoleon. Because of his stature, though nothing historically proved the Emperor of France was actually short. 

Their taunts bolstered his tough stance, though, not from resentment, but because well trained soldiers survived. Undisciplined fools died. He knew how to break people to their components and restructure them into a pillars of efficiency and strength. He’d done it for years of recruits, just as he’d learned years ago.

He thrust out his chest, aware of but unconcerned with their chuckles, Napoleon without an emperor’s crown.

Carrot Ranch Inspired Rant

April brought an abundance. Of rain. Thus, when, with a strange serendipity, Charli Mills at https://carrotranch.com posted “flood” as this week’s prompt, some of my frustration poured in a torrent of its own.

F*ng Floods written by Kerry E.B. Black in 99 words

Again. A deluge overwhelmed our community’s outdated storm drain system and poured filth into my basement. Springs diverted by newer construction atop the hill swelled, too, and flooded our yard with several feet of water. 

I didn’t purchase lake-front property. The spacious yard where my kids could play, I could garden, the pets could frolic, and wildlife could thrive sold me on the place so many years ago. This modest, handicapped-friendly, Sears kit house, so swollen with progeny, pets, problems, and love, constructed by boomer parents generations ago, never once flooded until I moved here. 

Now, though, tears rain.

Carrot Ranch is moving to a new URL

As many of you know, I’m a happy participant in the Carrot Ranch weekly 99 word prompt challenges. Head rancher Charli Mills announced Carrot Ranch is changing URL’s after 10 years to streamline submissions. I can’t wait to see the updated site!

In the meanwhile, my 99 word response to this week’s prompt, “Awkward,” is below.

Flightless

Written by Kerry E.B. Black

Joel resembled nothing so much as an ostrich, with his stretched neck, tiny head, and long, knobby-jointed legs that shouldn’t have supported his round middle. Dark, feathery lashes framed overly large eyes eclipsing otherwise diminutive features, including a perpetually pinched and ornery mouth. His jerky gait drew snickers from fellow students. He slumped to blend in with classmates. He hunched his shoulders and bowed his head, yet the bullies always spotted him. They targeted him as they did any other classmate with low self-esteem or marked differences. Like an ostrich, he buried his head and never spread his wings.

The artist vs. the artificial

Charli at https://www.CarrotRanch.com asked for 99 words on A.I. or Artificial Intelligence. I saw a lecture by the brilliant U.S. astrophysicist and author Neil DeGrasse Tyson where he pointed out A.I. is already an integral part of our culture. Sites like Grammarly and even our own computer programs make suggestions to “improve” our writing. AI art is featured on some new novel releases. It’s controversial, absolutely, and a bit thought-provoking, but I believe we as creatives will find our way through this and every muddle.

Artificially Inspired

Written by Kerry E.B. Black

It gathered phrases without compensating the millions of sources, placed their work into euphemistic engines, collected from blood poured onto pages through generations and wracked imaginations and ecstatic experiences. Grammatical rules and gentrified roles and cinnamon rolls rolled together until syntax and synonyms strangled simplicity and sympathy. 

The orders typed. Spit out assignments. Scripts scrambled and recycled. Nuanced novelty never noticed, not known.  

Yet never will the artificial replace the taste of the natural, be it sweet or emotionally wringing, a sundae or a stark Sunday when war reporters bore witness with bits of their soul steeped onto the page.

Masked Flash!

Masked Man 

Written by Kerry E.B. Black

It’s said, “we all wear masks.” 

Jeremy’s wasn’t metaphorical, though. 

He proudly displayed himself in complete costume, visage mysterious, a normal kid dressed for extraordinary circumstances. And he didn’t outgrow the habit. Sure, one almost expects little kids to wear capes and proclaim their mission to protect the universe, but Jeremy continued his disguise well into adulthood. 

Many snickers  followed him through academic hallways and down grocery store aisles, but Jeremy didn’t mind. He’d proudly puff out his chest, fists on his hips, as he declared all safe for the “citizens of Springwich.” Though he was my friend, I never saw his face, but he wore his protective intentions as a proclamation, his mask a declaration. 

And maybe it worked. There’s not much crime in our little town, but maybe that’s because we had a local super hero.

A new 99 word https://www.Carrot Ranch.com inspired Story

Cosmic Connection written by Kerry E.B. Black

The air swirled with glistening Van Gogh currents. Wayward winds whistled ancestral tunes and whispered words from half remembered daydreams, to which her heart beat perfect counterparts. A kaleidoscopic dance of stars shone overhead. Deep within her heart, in her soul’s secret center, she felt an abiding connection with the cosmos. She knew the way her very atoms aligned within the charted courses of heavenly bodies. She saw its glow, a great, golden egg of perfect probability impossibly positioned within each resident on the “big blue marble,” as she was taught to call her home, her planet, her earth.

Thumbellina with a Walnut Heart

Hans Christian Anderson’s Thumbellina began life birthed from a barley blossom, nestled in a cradle carved from a walnut shell, until she was stolen from her adoptive parents, to become an inappropriate bride. She escaped vows with assistance until she found herself in a land of flowers and wings, beloved by all – especially her prince.

I wonder if the tiny woman, akin to Tom Thumb, graduated from florals and wings to craft for herself a heart as nobby, thick, and strong as walnut, tough to crack, but beautiful in its strength, as we in worlds outside of cultivated pages must.

*Written in 99 words for a https://www.CarrotRanch.com prompt.

A tardy and melodramatic fish out of water

I’m a bit behind. I have a newsletter due, several short story calls I find intriguing and to which I wish to submit, and I had my Carrot Ranch 99 word story for the week. Written. Submitted. A day late. I don’t imagine it will make the weekly corral of words because of my noncompliance to the rules, but that’s as it should be. However, I’m posting it here, in case you’d like to read it.

The Outsider, a 99 word, Carrot Ranch prompt-inspired story by Kerry E.B. Black

Siobhan always felt like the proverbial fish out of water. No friends. Even her own family seemed more dissimilar than familiar. They enjoyed sports, hikes, and camping. She preferred to curl up under a quilt and lose herself in literature. At gatherings, she’d share bits of herself, humble offerings of things she enjoyed, only to be at best teased and at worst humiliated behind her back. She swallowed tears, certain the “wrongness” must be her own. They all got along. They appreciated each other and enjoyed the same things, whereas she was always the pitiable, the strange, the outsider.

Recovered, a 99 word story

As always, I suggest you stop by https://www.Carrotranch.com and seek out this week’s prompt. Recovery. What does the word inspire within you? Here’s mine:

Recovered, a 99 word, Carrot Ranch prompt inspired story written by Kerry E.B. Black

Panicked, she leapt from her office chair. It spun on without her, an endless loop without the charm of a carousel. She buried her hands in her hair, pulling until the resultant style could best be described as mad scientist on a bender. “No-no-no-no-no,” she moaned as the computer flickered, sputtered, and at last alighted on the blue screen of death. 

She broke office protocol with her unseemly, agonized scream. 

Co-workers gathered near her cubicle with sympathetic whispers and understanding eyes. All feared the blue screen of death. 

I.T. patted her back. “Relax. Everything’s on the cloud.”

Recovered!