Two Couples on a Bench

Retarius' first story
new, from the secret company of evil creative minds who flood the market with large styrofoam fingers, huge chess pieces for lawn chess, and ludicrously sized hamburgers, comes "teenage double date," incredibly large, lifelike bookends. these whimsicle bookends conjure up images of awkard college doubledating, including hours trying to figure out what to wear, feinging interest and false smiles, and loads of hair product. incredibly oversized books not included.

Retarius' second story
when they were young, brothers chad and chet made a pact that they would only date girls who wear scarves. once they got into college, they met rose and marie, sisters who were both adopted from different parents and decided to only date boys who wore pants with lines going up the sides. as a foursome they were always together and decided it was fate they met. they also decided each girl would marry both guys, and all four would live in one house, and start thier own commune, freely sharing each other and each other's clothes. unfortunately, they broke up one month after this picture because each person found a totally different person who was far more interesting and attractive.

Mushroom's story
Jenna and Barbara always thought it would be cool to date vampires. They were always concerned about finding real ones, rather than those Goth pretenders in facial powder and eye shadow who only wanted to get drunk and screw to The Bauhaus. Josh and Jeremy were just the men for them, because they didn't advertise and they didn't dress differently than other people. The girls felt special, like they had some prize other people only dreamed of. They were gentlemen and kind of fun to be with. Never completely taking leave of their senses, no matter how far they'd go with the boys they always protected their necks -- some folks thought they were hiding hickies, but it was quite the contrary: they were hiding from getting hickies.

Abby Taylor's story
The odds of being chosen were phenomenally low, so when the kids got the letter they couldn't believe their good fortune! Only six months in the queue before being chosen by Vladimir, the world renown writer whose secretive nature only added to his own popularity and to the popularity he was able to bring to his randomly selected short story subjects.

Indeed, others chosen by The Vlad, as he was called in private, had gone on to fame and fortune beyond their wildest imaginations. The legends of former story-subjects were well known... many landing supporting roles on popular sitcoms, later spin-offs to their own prime time shows. Still others became famous spokesmodels for popular products such as the Genie automatic garage door opener and the Princess cruise lines. Of course, there was also the case of the now defunct Little Boy in the Balloon Body Wash, but no one liked to dwell on the negatives.

Saturday, February 12, 2005 was THEIR DAY... their moment to shine, and the start of all things good for the four kids from the small town in the heartland! All the expected calls were made to family, friends, agents, and the local news media. They couldn't wait to see what The Vlad had in store for them.

At 12:01 AM on the designated day they, along with the entire population of their hometown, logged into the famous website to have their date with destiny. But as they read their excitement turned into horror.

Out of town for the weekend? Substitute writers?!?! It just couldn't be! This had to be some kind of joke!

After the initial period of shock, Gary and Elaine erupted into an argument of volcanic proportions. Apparently Gary had never really believed in Elaine's dream of becoming the next Suzanne Somers, but he had to admit she did have great thighs so he stuck it out. But now he was publicly humiliated, and he blamed Elaine.

Vivian tried to take the news with her usual cheery demeanor, but deep down she knew that she was now destined to wait tables all her life at the 24 hour diner. Stephen truly loved Vivian, and he promised to be with her until the end.

Which, as fate would have it, occurred at 3:08 PM on Valentine's Day, Monday, February 14, 2005, when Vivian, always the drama queen, took three fistfuls of pills and drank a quart of vodka. A hastily scrawled note found by her bed read, "Substitute writers, my ass."

M.P.'s story
"Their gathering had been set like some secret mission. Each of them had received an invitation-card for a mysterious party at a place named Blogger and their host was Indeterminacy.

Although this Blogger place had no real precise geographical situation, they found it with no apparent difficulty due to their common professional formation - computing.

Once there it wasn't difficult to spot where the party would happen: as the invitation-card informed, the party would be in the laptop shapped building right in Blooger city-centre and there was no other builidng like that over there.
They really enjoyed every party little detail. Everything had been carefully planned and thought over. However they found it strange there were no other people to join them and the fact the host hadn't yet arrived at that late hour (it was already dawn!).

They thought they'd better wait outside to wait for their incognito host to turn up. And so they did!...After a while they saw somebody at the garden gate! They just couldn't believe their eyes... It was him!

He came closer holding a digital camera and snapped them.
He took them again into the lapetop shaped building and arrested them forever in his blog!"

Livinia's story
Much line
Curve of hip
Boys and girls
One Armenian
Close, close, closer
Click

My story
Bill, Bob, Yvonne and Yvette were out for a Valentine's day walk. They happened to be sitting on the bench when the Cupids arrived. First, one Cupid came strolling by, then there were several and soon the park path was flowing with an entire phalanx of Cupids, all marching towards the make-out point located at the end of the strategic lane. It was to be a surprise attack, which was why they weren't flying. Bill, Bob, Yvonne and Yvette were obvious targets for the impish little love soldiers overanxious to shoot off their arrows of amorosity, tips anesthetized so as to postpone the pain of love. With so many thousands of arrows there were bound to be mistakes made, especially with Yvonne and Yvette sitting so close to one another. The two girls sat now fully charged and would show someone the time of his life that night, as soon as they could work out who to leave with.

Mushroom's sequel
There was some debate on the way back to Yvonne's apartment about how things should be parsed. The legion of cherubim couldn't have been wrong to want to get these people together, that much they knew, but in the confusion it was unclear how to couple up. With a little bit of discussion and a few failed games of rock/paper/scissors, they decided that they should vote. They each got a piece of paper and a writing utensil, wrote down their name and who they wanted, and hoped that there would be a meshing. The end result was as such, and it became evident that the girls had indeed been sitting too close when the attack occured:
• Bill - Yvette
• Bob - Yvonne
• Yvonne - Yvette
• Yvette - Yvonne
At first the girls' eyes widened because that wasn't how they were paired in the park. But then they decided that since since there was only one couple that mutually voted the same way, the two girls, that would be how things went. The guys had no problem with this as long as they got to watch.