Writing Exercise

Days where I cannot come up with a topic will involve some weird writing exercises. This one was given to me by some drunkard from my college days.

And Captain Jenkins raised what was left of his right hand to signal the final charge on the German trenches. After the first sweep of the German machine guns 90% of the charging force was stopped in the muddy wasteland between the trenches, the other 10% were being propelled skyward by the myriad of artillery fire haphazardly peppering no-man’s land and by the land mines that were now randomly strewn about the battlefield. At one time the land mines were planted in orderly rows with white picket fences (The way land mines were meant to be planted), but over the course of the war these explosive devices had been messed about all higgley-piggley and the picket fences with nice shrubberies were replaced with the metallic tasting barbed wire that one often finds keeping the cows from taking over Texas. For all know that without the wire that is barbed, the bovine revolution would have to be held in check by the sheep-herders and their flocks of wooly commandos, but that is a story for another time. This is about the fifth charge on the German trenches of the mediocre captaincy of Captain Jenkins. One would think with a name like Captain Jenkins he would be better at being a Captain, but one would be wrong and should most likely keep one’s opinions to oneself. One is awfully nosey, one is.

Captain Jenkins rallied we remaining 4 men to continue pushing toward the German lines, because that was the way of trench warfare. First Captain Jenkins would signal the charge, and then people would charge until there weren’t many people left, and then what was left of Captain Jenkins would rally what was left of his command and those 5 people would heroically dash into the German trenches to gain a new foothold for the British in France, for the sun should never set on the British Empire, unless, of course, it is night-time and then the sun shouldn’t be up at all. The second sweep of machinegun fire, of course killed the rest of us for the third time that day, but being dead merely 3 times over is not enough to stop the dogged charge of the British. Everyone knows that a Brit charging the German lines is quick like a cat and has as many lives providing the cat of comparison is not dodging busses in a busy road or placed into a cage with hungry badgers. For future reference, let’s assume all metaphors from now on imply a certain lack of hungry badgers and confined spaces. It is just safer that way, both for the badgers and for their human meals.

The five of us crested the lip of the German trench in time to see the shocked expressions of those whose conversation had just been interrupted by muddy soldiers intent on killing. Of course, by “five” I truly mean three of us, what was left of Captain Jenkins and oddly a badger in a uniform (they are sometime referred to as Scots especially if one defines “uniform” as a skirt). You can’t follow either a Scot or a badger in times of conversation that is just the way it is.

Luckily for the astonished Germans caught in betwixt conversational topics, the whistle to withdraw had been given considering our 134% personnel losses during this final charge of the day. I nicked a German biscuit and started the sloppy deadly withdrawal process of re-crossing no-man’s land, with what was left of the mediocre Captain Jenkins, a badger in a dress, and 2 other chaps with poor dental hygiene in tow.

To recap:
This weekend Little Man re-discovered Cap’n Crunch cereal
By this weekend, I mean yesterday
4.5 bowls of cereal later the roof of his mouth was hurting
So much that he decided to forego dinner
Much to his chagrin at bedtime
My stomach is a bit on the upset side today
Stupid Stomach!
Or should I say, "Stupid Stomachabitch!"