A Little Word Fun

I was reading Mullings, a web site/blog that I often read by Rich Galen, who pointed out this headline from Space.com:

NASA Clears Discovery's Left Wing for Landing, Rest of Shuttle to Follow

HOUSTON - Shuttle managers cleared the Discovery orbiter's left wing for landing Saturday, with the rest of the orbiter expected to follow after a late-night analysis by engineers and flight controllers.

• Apparently, NASA changed its mind and decided to have the left wing land at approximately the same time as the rest of the vehicle.
  

Galen also points out that San Jose State University English Department has announced the winners of the annual "Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest". The contest seeks submissions in which people submit the worst opening paragraph they can concoct.

The contest is named in honor of Edward George Bulwer-Lytton who, in his 1830 book, Paul Clifford made literary history when he wrote: "It was a dark and stormy night …"

Here are a few samples from the winners:

The Klutzy Kitty:

Lisa moved like a cat, not the kind of cat that moves with a slinky grace but more like the kind that always falls off the book shelf when he's washing himself and then gets all mad at you like it's your fault (which it wasn't although it probably was kind of mean to laugh at him like that), although on the bright side, she hardly ever attacked Ricky's toes in his sleep.

Debra Allen
Wichita Falls, TX

"Wordy Harry," (In honor of Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry):

"I know what you're thinking, punk," hissed Wordy Harry to his new editor, "you're thinking, 'Did he use six superfluous adjectives or only five?' - and to tell the truth, I forgot myself in all this excitement; but being as this is English, the most powerful language in the world, whose subtle nuances will blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel loquacious?' - well do you, punk?"

Stuart Vasepuru
Edinburgh, Scotland

Linus' Lament:

It was a day, like any other day, in that Linus got up, faced the sunrise, used his inhaler, applied that special cream between his toes, wrote a quick note and put it in a bottle, and wished he'd been stranded on the island with something other than 40 cases each of inhalers, decorative bottles, and special toe cream.

Chris Harget
Campbell, CA

Rack Him Up!

The king's men breathed heavily under their thick black hoods as they secured the wrists and ankles of prisoner William Tumey of Kent and as the rack's handle began to turn the ropes tightened and William's limbs were slowly stretched in opposite directions until his spine began to pop much like a bag of Redenbachers in a microwave and for something like the time it takes a hummingbird's wings to complete one cycle William smiled and euphorically languished in perfect lumbar alignment.

Daniel Kern
Boise, ID

Yes, I know they're all bad, but that's the point, isn't it! You can read more of these here.