#16 The Completely Bonkers Halloween Episode – with new short stories!

It’s the Completely Bonkers Halloween Episode! Enjoy 3 spooky, mysterious and downright weird stories written by listeners, who’ve all been inspired by Exquisite Corpse game results on this very show!

Are you sitting comfortably?

​Today's show includes:

​“The Deceased Griffin” by Margaret Homersham (inspired by the Exquisite Corpse: “The deceased griffin dug deep into the sackcloth pockets of the great vicar.”)

“A Tale of an Aggressive Centaur and a Gullible Acrobat” by Eryn McConnell (inspired by the Exquisite Corpse: “The aggressive centaur peered through binoculars at the gullible acrobat.”)

Find Eryn’s other fiction and links here: Eryn McConnell | Twitter | Linktree

And:

“The Brazen Maggot” by Joseph Clark (based on “The brazen maggot saved, from the stompers, the pompous dietician.”) Find Joseph Clark on Twitter at @ JOSEPHC36233131

(Warning for younger listeners: stories include one mild swear word and some disturbing ideas - but rest assured, no gore on this show! Most is gentle and bizarre/ humorous.)

Enjoy more surrealist word game mayhem at the end of the show!

For the wildest, most surprising writing prompts you’ll ever try. 

​​Let the show begin!

​SHOW TRANSCRIPTION (does not include Exquisite Corpse game play at the end):

This is episode 16, and it may be the most bonkers we’ve had so far.

Back in episode 14, I invited you, my imaginative, creative listeners, to consider writing a short story with a Halloween theme, based on any Exquisite Corpse game result from the show. I now have 3 short stories to share with you today, from Margaret Homersham, Eryn McConnell and Joseph Clark.

Now before we go any further, please note that if you are looking for a really scary story, you’ve come to the wrong place. These have turned out to be gentle Halloween stories, on the whole – Gentle Halloween is a thing. I’ve heard of it but I had to look it up even so. It’s a thing, I promise you, and these stories fall into that category, with a touch of spookiness and a little bit of menace but also unique, highly imaginative… two of them are at least partly humorous, and frankly, that’s what we need in our lives, isn’t it? I was thinking about what order I should read them in, and I’ve decided to start with the slightly more conventional story, then go for something completely bonkers; and finally, dive into something substantially more bonkers than that. So brace yourselves, people! It’s gonna get weird.

And if you think it can’t get any weirder after that, well, I’ll have some more Exquisite Corpse game play to share at the end of the show, so you’d be wrong.

It is time for Halloween – gentle, a bit spooky and bonkers!
 
Now, I’m going to dive straight in to the stories. I’ll say a little bit more about each author after their story (there’ll also be details in the show notes as well).

First up, we have:

The Deceased Griffin by Margaret Homersham

This was inspired by the Exquisite Corpse, “The deceased griffin dug deep into the sackcloth pockets of the great vicar.”

Are you sitting comfortably?
 
The vicar sighed as he latched the cottage garden gate closed.  The old couple had been delighted to have a visit from their new vicar and generously plied him with tea and cakes.  But he couldn’t help but notice the formality of the atmosphere;  they waited on him as if he were lord of the manor being gratefully received by his lowly serfs.  Why couldn’t he connect with these people?  His predecessor had been on equal terms with his parishioners – sharing a friendly pint in the local pub after the Sunday service.  Well, he wasn’t a pub person himself – especially at the price of a pint these days.
 
After his unsatisfactory visit to the old couple, his footsteps led him automatically to the woods, one of his favourite walks – they reflected his low mood this late October afternoon, with the damp, dripping trees. The leaves gently floated down from the nearly bare, skeletal boughs silhouetted against the darkening sky.  He could think clearly in the muted silence of the wood.  
 
It was probably his style of sermon that put people off him. He rather enjoyed the rituals and traditions of the Church of England and the high church “bells and smells”. Gone was the simple “hymn sandwich” with a short talk in between.  Instead he’d introduced chants and incense and a formality that had impressed but puzzled the rural congregation. His parishioners thought of him as a  “great” man, but this only increased the distance.

“I suppose I don’t really belong in this job – I don’t even connect with God.  I don’t feel love.  It’s the ritual and routine that I really connect with”, he thought.  He felt even more gloomy as he shuffled his way through dead leaves, walking further into the wood. Here the trees huddled together and shifted closer as a sharp breeze began to blow. A finger of light from the sinking sun filtered through the branches and temporarily blinded him.  An owl hooted, a cold wind caught the leaves on the ground and swirled them round.  There was something faintly hostile about this part of the wood.  The darkness had fallen faster than he’d expected. 

He quickened his steps, but then saw a movement in the near distance and heard a low groan.  He made his way cautiously through the trees to a clearing where the sound was coming from.  Amongst the fallen leaves, a large creature lay on its side.  What was it -  a giant bird?  It was struggling to move but wasn’t obviously injured.  The vicar’s heart raced and he turned and fled in panic. Somehow he managed to stumble through the trees, pushing against the branches, which threatened to hold him back. At last he arrived at the edge of the wood.
 
After staggering home, the vicar poured himself a large whiskey and, shaking, sat down to think through what he had seen.  Had he unwittingly entered another world to which the creature belonged?  What was this thing doing in the woods on a cold October day?   What was wrong with it?– It didn’t look badly injured. Was it lying in wait for him, ready to pounce?
 
The vicar went to bed, comforted by the whiskey but deeply troubled – shouldn’t he have done something? After tossing and turning for a while, he fell asleep.
 
In the morning, the watery sun shone through the early mist and he felt more positive.  Yesterday’s incident in the woods seemed unreal, a nightmare.  He would go back to the woods in daylight, when he would have more courage and see if the creature was still there or if it had been
pure imagination, a trick of the half-light and atmosphere of the October wood. He would find something recognisable, like an injured fox.
 
He found his way back through the wood and to his consternation the creature was still lying there large as life but hardly moving.  When it saw him it gave a gasping moan.  The vicar crept closer. The creature stared back at him but didn’t move.  That gave the vicar more confidence to take a closer look. The creature was half bird with big feathered eagle-like wings and soft beige furry hindquarters, rather like a big cat.  Of course!  A Griffin! Half eagle and half lion.  How did it get here? What should he do?  He couldn’t just walk away from this once powerful, impressive, but now pitiful creature that was in obvious distress.
 
Well, what he did was rush home and frantically construct a makeshift sledge from a large, strong cardboard box and some rope, and later, under cover of darkness, he managed to shift the Griffin on to the sledge and drag it back to his garage.  He found some blankets and a hot water bottle and made the Griffin as comfortable as he could. He made a mash of bread and warm milk and tried to get the creature to eat.  Several days passed with the vicar in the garage with the Griffin, talking to it and trying to nurse it back to health.  Should he telephone the vet? But he felt he would be exposing himself to ridicule, and who would believe him? 
 
His parish duties were neglected and the next Sunday he rushed through the church service in record time, without bothering with the usual chants and incense routine. He hardly knew what he preached.  The congregation glanced at each other with raised eyebrows;  they would have an early Sunday lunch that day, leaving for home wondering if their exalted vicar was ill. Something was very amiss.
 
The next morning, the vicar went to the garage only to find that the Griffin had died in the night.  He sat down next to the still creature and tears poured down his cheeks as he sobbed uncontrollably like a child.  Love for the creature had, unbeknown to him, crept into his once stony heart and now he was bereft.  He spent hours stroking the silent Griffin‘s feathers and crying as he had never cried in all his adult life.
 
Eventually, wan and shaky, he stood up and staggered back to the house.  What to do?  He was overwhelmed with the new feeling of loss, but also sickened with guilt that he’d helped make this happen, having left the stricken Griffin in the wood and run away before deciding to help.  He must make amends:  he would keep the Griffin near him, and have him buried in the church yard where he could visit its resting place, amongst the other graves.  He would give the Griffin the best casket he could buy and give it the finest send-off possible, whatever the cost.  He made plans.
 
The undertaker was rather surprised at the Vicar’s request, but thought as the Vicar was known to be a Very Important Person, he was probably an eccentric and should be humoured, pointing out that anything out of the ordinary would be costly.
 
At the next Sunday service the vicar announced to his congregation that there would be a special funeral service on the following Wednesday and that they were all invited.
 
It was a very grand affair; the extra large casket had the very best brass handles. It was placed in a black shiny carriage pulled by four ebony horses with feathery plumes on their heads, accompanied by uniformed attendants. The whole village turned out, but were rather disturbed by it all.  Their vicar seemed somewhat reduced in his grandness of late.  Indeed he looked a little shabby and dishevelled, but there was a new softness about him somehow – he seemed more approachable.  They imagined that he must have lost a very dear friend indeed.
 
Time went by and the funeral ceased to be the general topic of conversation. The village folk gradually lost their awe of their once great vicar.  He was a changed man.  He seemed to really sympathise and feel for their ills and worries, and showed a real empathy which they’d never seen before.
 
One day, the vicar was in the local pub enjoying a pint with a farmer he had made a friend of after his metamorphosis into a kinder, less “great” vicar.
 
“You’ve come to terms with the loss of your friend then?” the farmer asked kindly. 

“To tell you the truth”  the vicar replied “you may not believe me and think that I have an over-active imagination, but the friend I buried with such pomp and expense was in fact a Griffin I had found in the woods.  There, what do you say to that?”
 
“Why bless you”  said the farmer “We do see Griffins from time to time – we think they find their way through a portal that exists in those ancient woods, and they get stuck in this world.  They never last long you know.  It’s the different air here.  It doesn’t agree with them – they can’t tolerate it. After about a week or so, their remains just evaporate and vanish into thin air.”
 
The vicar spluttered into his beer.  All that money spent on burying a body that no longer existed!  But no - since his encounter with the Griffin he had learnt to love and his life had changed for the better.  So he lifted his glass in a salute to his deceased friend the Griffin;  he was no longer the “great” vicar and may be a good deal poorer, but he was an immensely happier man.

(Copyright Margaret Homersham)

Ah. That’s actually a sweet story, but also quite clever. I love that twist at the end – but it wasn’t all for nothing!
Now the author, Margaret Homersham, tells me she hasn’t written a story for years – decades, in fact – and it was just something about the show that prompted her to give it a go, pick up a pencil, and see what happened. And when she sat in front of the blank page, she thought, ‘Nah, I’m not going to come up with anything,’ but when she started, she almost couldn’t stop, and was surprised how much it flowed – and kept flowing.

That’s amazing, that I’ve helped inspire someone to write again – and it’s really well put together.  

And just returning to the Exquisite Corpse that inspired it – because I always think it’s worth just looking at that again after you’ve read a story: “The deceased griffin dug deep into the sackcloth pockets of the great vicar.”

That sentence makes a new sense to us. And the action, “dug deep into the sackcloth pockets” – it’s clever, what Margaret did, because the griffin emptied the vicar’s pockets but passively, by causing him to spend his money (though, how could he do that any other way, because he’s dead)! And sackcloth pockets refers to the fact that he’s either poor or unwilling to spend money. Well, that’s true – until the end.

Next up, we are moving into more bonkers territory, and we have:

“A Tale of an Aggressive Centaur and a Gullible Acrobat” by Eryn McConnell

This story is based on the Exquisite Corpse “The aggressive centaur peered through binoculars at the gullible acrobat.”

He was having a bad day. Again. The birds would not stop chirping in an annoying fashion, and they would not leave him in peace. It was giving him a headache. He looked longingly at his bow and slingshot hanging proudly on the wall of the cabin, and he considered it for just a moment. If he just shot at the loudest one, gave it a bit of a scare, he could get some peace. He gnashed his teeth in frustration. Tonight, the stars were going to be especially clear, if the weather vane was having an accurate day, and he wanted a clear head to view them.
 
He snorted to himself as he ran up towards the roof, harbouring dark thoughts about the noisome troublesome avians. One of these days he would indulge the man part of him and roast a brace of them for his supper. His man stomach rumbled then appreciatively, and he patted it with his huge, gnarled hands. “Not today,” he growled in a deep voice. “Today we’re having horse fodder.”
 
The man-stomach subsided into a quiet grumble and he ignored it. The weather vane was still signalling clear skies, pointing towards the west, and the barometer looked cheerful. This was a good sign. He looked out over the roof of his cabin and surveyed his kingdom. He had built the cabin with the open floor so he could have quiet introspection with the stars but he found it useful in the day too. Today the forest floor was quiet, and still. And then he saw him. That annoying fool, the Acrobat was back.
 
He was dressed in shades of green, lurid, hateful, putrid green, and his head was covered with a ridiculous hat. Shaking his head in amazement, the centaur watched as the Acrobat lolloped, rolled and spun his way across the forest floor. The Acrobat leapt, he spiralled and he threw his body through the air as if he were a joyful dragonfly dancing on the river nearby. “Ridiculous creature,” the centaur snorted, throwing his silken hair back as he tossed his head.
 
Then a mischievous thought entered his mind and he absently tapped his silvered hoof against the floor as he thought. The Acrobat was gullible. He was a fool of epic proportions, in fact, and he could have some fun with this imbecile. The centaur smiled, and nodded thoughtfully, stroking his beard.
 
He turned in haste, his tail swishing in anticipation and he ran down, his legs a flurry of hooves as he descended. It was a scant moment before he found himself outside, his hand having grasped the slingshot as he ran, knotting it around his mighty fist. Today he would have such fun.
 
Eyeing the birds malevolently as he passed, he ran through the trees until he saw the Acrobat, doing his absurd act on the forest floor. He shook his head in amusement, and then he took aim.
 
Thwack!
 
The projectile flew through the air and landed on the back of the Acrobat’s head, just as the idiot was upside down, legs akimbo, in the most ridiculous pose. It pushed his silly hat forward and he landed on his nose. “Oof!” he sounded as he fell, crumpling like a drunk centipede on the way home from his revelries.
 
The centaur snorted, his horse self coming to the fore, and he ran forward, pocketing his slingshot as he trotted out.
 
“My DEAR Acrobat,” he called, arranging his face in a suitably shocked expression, “I saw, I saw that awful man, shooting, shooting at you! What a menace! What is the forest coming to?! My dear Acrobat, are you quite well?”
 
The Acrobat turned, his face red and confused, some mud clinging to his sweaty cheeks. He looked even more ridiculous than normal. The centaur had to work quite hard not to laugh, forcing up his stoic man self but he could hear his horse self guffawing madly inside him.
 
“I, I think I am quite well, thank you, Master Cornelius.” The Acrobat stammered. “I appreciate your helping me! Did you see my assailant? Do you know him?”
 
Cornelius schooled his expression to seriousness, his lips twitching in a frenzy. “I think it was one of those feral dryads, Acrobat. They moved so fast, but they were hellbent on attacking you. To think that this would happen in our forest! I shall protect you. You continue doing… Whatever it is you were doing, and I shall hunt them. Alright?”
 
The foolish, oh so gullible Acrobat beamed, his ridiculous face cracking into lines as if he had been left unfolded in the laundry basket.
 
“Oh, I thank you, Master Cornelius, you are so kind. I shall do just that, knowing that you will keep me safe! Thank you!”
 
The Acrobat reverted to his former position, upside down. The centaur shook his head, both his horse half and his man half in total agreement. The Acrobat was a fool. But Cornelius turned his tail, leaving the clearing and proceeded to gallop frenziedly around and around, shouting to the invisible assailants.
 
“Take that, you useless vermin!”

“There, now you run, dryad cowards!”
 
From time to time he would turn, his face a-gleam with mischief and he would fire off another missile in the direction of the Acrobat, laughing to himself as the fool squawked and leapt to avoid the danger.
 
Cornelius tired of his game at last, returning to the clearing to collect his thanks. The Acrobat was there, hat removed and placed at his side, showing a gleaming bald head with wisps of hair flying about. He looked like a hairy egg. A smiling hairy egg, at that.
 
“Oh Master Cornelius,” the hairy egg beamed. “I am so in your debt. I must say, I have always thought you to be unfriendly and unkind. How wrong have I been! I shall have to tell those pesky birds to stop disturbing you from now on. Because it was I, you know, who set them into a singing tizzy. I must offer my apologies, dear Centaur.”
 
And with that he bowed low, his body folding up in two, his arms sweeping out to either side. The Centaur glared, his horse self and man self both, incandescent with rage. This… … ridiculous Acrobat had been making the birds noisy on purpose? To annoy him?
 
In his mind’s eye his man half became dangerous. Aggressive, even. His horse half joined him. They stood, arms folded, legs stamping, and they hatched a plan.
 
They should murder the gullible scheming Acrobat. They could take him back to the house as his body cooled, and keep him as a captive twisted marionette, doomed to endlessly play Acrobatic Origami with his withered limbs. He smiled as he imagined himself, folding the silly man up, bending him into shapes, dancing with his Acrobat corpse in a daily danse macabre. Oh, the games they could play!
 
He returned to himself, seeing the hapless Acrobat, still breathing, still ridiculous. He huffed. Tomorrow. Tomorrow.
 
“You do that, Acrobat,” he retorted. “I have done you a great favour, and now you can do one in return. Make the birds more respectful of my superiority, my greatness, my epic Centaurness, and we shall not mention this matter again. Does that suit?”
 
The Acrobat bowed low, obsequiously, his head shining in the sun. “Oh, it does, Great Centaur,” he replied. “I shall make sure of it!”
 
The Centaur harrumphed. He turned, majestically, and eyed his cabin some distance away. The barometer had said there would be good weather, and he had an appointment with the stars. And he would make dinner fit for a horse. Oh, today was such a good day.
 
Once the Centaur was out of earshot, the Acrobat murmured to himself, and to the trees – if they were listening. “Good luck tomorrow, dear Cornelius. Those birds aren’t from round here, and aren’t what they seem. Without my dances and weird shapes to confuse them and send them into a chattering daze, they’ll turn back into the death-vultures they really are. On your own, with nothing but your ego and that silly slingshot, they’ll realise soon enough: you’re easy pickings.
 
“Shame you had to make an enemy of your oh-so-gullible neighbour.”
 
He pushed his green hat low onto his head and cartwheeled off into the forest.
 
(Copyright Eryn McConnell.)  Eryn McConnell | Twitter | Linktree

Ooh – a little touch of menace there. It’s weird how the story changes in tone like that, but it feels totally natural, there’s nothing jarring about the change, it just flows on with the same writing style: it’s quite an unusual thing to achieve, putting outlandish humour cheek to cheek with this creeping, lingering menace, that seems to emerge.
 
Great stuff! Thank you, Eryn McConnell for writing this story and sharing it with us! So: Eryn McConnell mainly writes poetry and their debut book is a collection called, Of Swans and Stars. Eryn has another poetry book, Love Lost and Found, due to be released next month, but they’re now focusing on writing a series of Mythology and Folklore poetry collections, based on British myths and folklore. 
 
Eryn writes fiction as well, including Middle-Earth fanfiction, short stories and has 2 novels on the gos, both about dragons. One is dystopian, the other is steampunk portal fantasy.
 
Wow, a really busy person! Lots to discover. I’ve put Eryn’s linktree page on the show notes, as this collates all the relevant links in one place, for books, website and social media.
 
Now it’s time for the next story which is: The Brazen Maggot by Joseph Clark.
 
This is utterly bonkers. Okay? Prepare yourself! A humorous story, and also I think one that works for children and adults. And of course, we are never quite as imaginative as when we open ourselves up to our childhood imaginations. This is surely where the deepest truths are found.
 
Before I give anything away, I’ll stop gabbling and get on with Joseph’s story, which was inspired by the Exquisite Corpse: “The brazen maggot saved, from the stompers, the pompous dietician.”

(Oh my goodness, I’m going to laugh! And that’s just fine, because it’s humour.)

The Brazen Maggot by Joseph Clark

The office is a neat, pristine affair, clinical, white and gleaming, practically anti-septic. As is the dietician, Samantha, delicately poised in her desk chair. A careful fen-shui placement of her book-shelf catches the eye where, on the lower shelf sitting between clinical textbooks sits the novel, “Wyrd Sisters!”, by Terry Pratchett. Samantha observes with surprise a rotten apple sitting in her office trash bin next to her meticulously organised desk- top.

“Five minutes till my longest-standing client arrives yet, I’m starting to feel shaky… and get the damn cleaner in here to remove this disgusting object from my waste bin!”, she exclaims. Trying to calm herself, she trains her eyes on her cross-stitch picture of a galloping horse on the wall; a hobby she’d like to find room in her life to enjoy. Samantha dares another glance into the bin and gasps at what she sees. The world turns around, like a spell being cast upon her. Suddenly, at the sight of food-even rotten food- the Stompers are back again.” You need to face up to reality, Sammy,” the voices say, an echo of her mental health team. “You will never be completely well and may have relapses of your anorexia nervosa!”
 
Suddenly from the direction of the rotten apple, Sammy hears a tiny but potent voice call out to her.

“Hey there what’s wrong? You’re shaking with fear. Tell me what’s up- maybe I can help!”

“Who said that. Who’s there?” she asks with an overwhelming desire to run from her office!

“I’m down here in the apple, oh yum its tasty, nice (burp!). Don’t worry I can’t hurt you! We maggots are about as anti-septic as it gets, and we love food! (MUNCH! MUNCH!)”

“Eeeeewwwww! A horrible, disgusting maggot! How is it possible you are talking to me, and I can hear you?”, yells Sammy in a hysterical voice! (Stomp! Stomp!) comes the Ogre in the forests of her mind! The voices echoing once more. Samantha grips the edge of her desk and keeps her eyes on the maggot as it speaks again. “It’s the spell I’ve cast on you (burp)-you’re in need of help, I can help you, and we maggots aren’t so disgusting when human medicine uses us to help with wound healing! (Munch!) you’re verging on terrified! What’s your name, friend?”

Taken aback by the boldness of the maggot and the politeness of his enquiry Samantha tells him her name while nervously re-arranging  her animal-print pencils and pens in her stationery jar.

“How can you help me? It’s the stompers, they bug me to the point of terror. What could you possibly do about them? You’re just a horrible bug, besides that, even my therapist hasn’t helped a lot, always pushing for reasons and stomping, stomping into my mind, just like the Ogre in my Unicorn Forest!” Sammy clamps her mouth shut, unable to believe how much she’s confessing to this tiny bug in her bin. A revolting bug, at that!

 “(MUNCH, MUNCH, BURP!) Oh, don’t be afraid of me or these Stompers! You might learn there is nothing to fear except fear itself soon! Anyway, what are these stompers you mention, why do they put fear into you so much?”, asks the brazen maggot.

It is a sobering question, but the bizarre nature of the encounter with this unusual creature is starting to grow on her. ,” My therapist says they are the voices of  control and that the roots of them come from my childhood. But how can that be? I’ve spent so long exploring these concepts with my therapist, but I don’t believe any of it, she is always stomping in my mind .”

“Ahhhh! We maggots are in a childhood state till we become flies. Childhood and dreams are usually a doorway into the truth. Tell me, what is your childhood dream?”

But before she can answer, the maggot leaps out of the bin and lands against the clean, white wall just above it. Samantha screams, covering her mouth (what will the receptionist think?). But the maggot is busy. In a flurry of green and slithery squirming, he chews around and around in a spiral. Sammy is dazed until she realises the green glow isn’t just coming from the creature. There’s a hole in the wall as large as her head, revealing a verdant forest glade beyond it.

Forgetting her repulsion, Sammy crouches down and stares through.

“Is this your dream?” asks the maggot.

“Why… yes. I’ve thought of writing stories about this place ever since I was a child. I don’t believe it!”

“But you must believe it, or it wouldn’t be there. I’m just a humble maggot, I can’t make other people’s dreams. All I do is eat away what shouldn’t be there: the waste and dead tissue of this world. The things that need to be set aside and recycled. Like this office for instance…” The maggot sneers at the white, clinical interior.

Sammy can only stare through the hole as a unicorn trots past. The sky beyond the trees glows with a rainbow. It’s unreal – yet it’s her world.

“Go on. Why don’t you climb through and take a look around? It’s time you enjoyed your dreams again.”

Sammy laughs in disbelief. “I think I’ll need a bigger hole than that.”

Just then, the office phone beeps and the receptionist’s voice blurts through. “Mr Brown is here for his four o’clock.”

Sammy jumps. “Oh no! What do I do? There’s a hole in my office wall!”

The maggot looks up. “You could move that.”

“Yes, good idea.” Sammy unhooks her horse cross-stitch picture and places it over the hole. It looks odd, resting on the edge of the bin like that, but it will have to do.

She pauses. “If that’s my dream, what about the voices – the stompers?”

“It’s time you learned to do a bit of waste management yourself,” said the maggot. “If they’re out there, in your world, let them be just echoes on the wind, flutters in the trees. Believe in your dream; munch and poop the rest.”

Sammy stands up, readying herself to face her client and the real world – for now. “Maggot, you’re so wise. How can I ever thank you?”

The maggot answers with a smile on his little face,” yes you could leave an apple in this bin once in a while for me to eat (Burp!) – that wall was quite disgusting!”
 
I hope you’ll agree, that was hilarious!

(Copyright Joseph Clark)

Joseph Clark is primarily a humour a writer who’s into comedy and science fiction, and is a passionate mental health advocate. If you like zany humour, he’s written a joke book called FIZZ BANG WALLOPS EXPERIMENTS WITH FUNNYBONES: WIT AND HUMOUR THROUGH SCHIZOPHRENIA. 

Thinking back over these 3 stories, they’re so different, but one thing that came into my mind as I was reviewing them, and doing a little bit of editing was: they all have – and all had, without need of my editorial – the one thing that a story really needs to have, to function as a story: something that is introduced about the main character in the beginning, and which the story circles back to at the end, with a change. All of the protagonists go through some kind of change: it might not be an internal change – I think that’s true Eryn’s centaur – but certainly, the circumstances for him have taken a very unexpected turn, and that’s really what we need to experience for the stories to work.
 
A massive THANK YOU to all of you – Margaret Homersham, Eryn McConnell and Joseph Clark – and I’m so glad you found inspiration with Exquisite Corpse.
 
ANNOUNCEMENT: Now, before we move into some new games of Exquisite Corpse, I need to let you know that the format of this show is changing a bit from now on. Much as I have LOVED doing the first part of each show where I talk about inspiration, psychology of writing, surrealism – and especially, reading out people’s stories, that is such a treat – from next time, I have to reduce the show – for now – and just focus on the Exquisite Corpse game play. I just have too much on, and sometimes, you have to think, okay, this isn’t workable with the time and energy that I have! But “never say never” – I’m not even going to change the series number or anything like that: I’m leaving the door open for future when I might have more time – and energy – to commit to the… “discursive” part of the show. There are several stories calling my name, but it’s actually not really the writing slots that have been taken up by preparation time for the show, it’s more the daydreaming time. The mindspace. The time when I’m going for a walk or doing the washing up (or cleaning my teeth – that seems to be a good, random time for ideas to pop into my head): I’ve found my stories are needing these mind-spaces which have been taken over a little bit by preparation for the show, because it’s another creative process.
 
And of course, there is no preparation for playing Exquisite Corpse. I cannot prepare for it, other than to make a pot of green tea, and gather together words and phrases that listeners just like have kindly sent me through my Play page at annatizard.com. I gather my socks and dive in!
 
So I hope you’ll continue to tune in and perhaps even join in with the story brainstorming as the show must go on! Exquisite Corpse is just so much fun, and such a great exercise for my imagination – I hope for yours as well – and where else am I going to get my story ideas anyway? I’ll still do little updates at the beginning of each show, I might even tell you what I’m reading, I don’t know! We’ll see. I’m gonna be open about it, but overall, the show will be shorter from now on, mainly focussed on game play.
 
Anyway! It is now that time – to bring forth the Socks of Destiny!

Exquisite Corpse game play is not transposable... Please listen the last section of the show to enter a realm of deep silliness and inspiration!