All right, gather round, everyone’s come to watch
The biggest event in Yehonatan County.
The Triannual Contest for Best Butternut Squash!
Let’s head on down and check out this year’s bounty.

This one here’s certainly ripe for the finals
It comes from the reigning champion, Ms. Ren.
It’s a plump specimen but still nicely rounded.
We’ll see if she squashes the competition again.

Mr. M has his own way of growing his squash.
We can here see the fruits of his three years of labor.
See how the grooves in the side are quite smooth
The judges might consider that…

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The Lyttle Lytton is a contest to come up with the worst possible opening line for a (serious) novel, using 30 words or less. The contest runner’s example, which stands alone in its sheer awkward awfulness, is as follows:

• Jennifer stood there, quietly ovulating. –Adam Cadre

For more hilarious examples of horrible first lines, click through to the contest site.

• A laptop wasn’t much like a banana slug, but that was the least of Jerry’s problems right now.
• A commanding officer in both sense of the word “commanding”, Wedge sighed.

From JoMoWriPoShoSto.

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Inspired by @VeryShortStory, the rule is officially that it’s supposed to fit in a Tweet, i.e. 140 characters. Unofficially, it’s just a very compact story…not a plot summary, but a piece that evokes/encompasses a whole story in a sentence or three. There’s a bit of a community with the #vss tag, but they honestly aren’t as good.

My three favorites in bold.

• “Too late!” Matt gasped. He reached the bridge just in time to see the splash
• Wife off fighting time-traveling demons. Relationship status: It’s Complicated
• His shoes went squik squik along the kitchen floor. “Tony, what has…

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