In another thread, Brandon says:
This reminded me of a writing technique, used by several well-published writers, where the author created the plot of a book by configuring a plot around several randomly chosen words. The magic, they often said, was in the subconscious. A much more interesting story could be had if you start with such an odd (or random) framework
So, I'm thinking that such a writing technique fits really well with the cobbled intellect of this board. Can we put together a story which integrates three random terms? Let's try.
The terms are:
hog
church
brown-bag lunch
OK troops, do your worst!
It's a story about a girl who grew up on a farm and became a vegetarian when she was traumatized by seeing hogs slaughtered early in her childhood. Every year at the church July 4th hog roast social she brought her own brown-bag lunch and sat by herself, until one day... (Ok - I'm done ?cobbling?).
Papa needs a new pair of shoes...
....sitting off in the distance feeling very much alone, and feeling very self-conscious that she had become labeled as a "brownbagger", she decided to confide her fears to the only relative she ever really trusted, her cousin Murgatroyd. Murgatroyd was studying to be a veterinarian, and would understand her revulsion and withdrawal at the sight of seeing hogs butchered. But she'd also seen her favorite cousin eat pork once or twice, so there was just a flinch of hesitation in her heart...... (and so it continues)
Pork is NOT "The Other White Meat"!!
She decided to take the risk and went up to Murgatroyd relieved to see him standing at a distance just watching the men and women wrestling with the doomed hogs. As she walked up to him, Murgatroyd said, "I am glad to see you. I have been wanting to tell you something." She asked "You want to tell me something?" He said, "Yes. I am not sure how you will take it. It is a secret I have kept from you. My studying to be a veterinarian is just a ruse. Actually I am ..
government agent. My task, should I choose to accept it, and I have, is to infiltrate animal protection organisations to prevent a mass release of hogs saved from being butchered." Our heroine, whose name is being kept secret to protect the guilty, blanched and would have swooned, but remembering the sweven she had had as a young girl she steadied herself and said to the perfidious Murgatroyd, "Murgie, dear, ...
Bingley
Would you believe the govenment told me I would be the only one on this mission?
It was the most exciting day of the year– better than the 4th of July picnic, better than her birthday..
That it happened all at church, well in the field the church owned– not the grave yard across the street from the church– but the big field out back–made it all the better, since church was the best place she knew. All summer it had flowers growing in it for the alter, but now, as the days got shorter, and the nights cooler– the field was mowed, and prepared..
The town had always been poor and rural, and the whole thing started one year, when instead of tithe, one poor farmer had donated the runt piglet of litter. In the fall, the grown hog was butchered – and roast and served up as a church supper.. It was the best fund raising event of the year- and the start of an annual tradition..
Times were better, and one hog wasn't enough– especially since everyone not only ate their fill, but brought along brown bags to fill for the rest of the week.– the price was by the bag size– and reasonable enough that there was a limit on how big a bag you could fill.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Unlike all the vegetarians here-- you put hog and brown bag together, and I am thinking about eating roast pork!
Unlike all the vegetarians here
No, I'm not a vegetarian. I only went along with it because I was too late to affect the main basis of the story.
A worried hog goes to church where he finds the deacon with a brown bag lunch nested suggestively on his lap. "I suppose you'll tell me you haven't seen my wife," says the hog suspiciously. "Oh, would you please calm down," says the deacon, "I was just having her for lunch."
...meanwhile, a most un-vegetarian Murgie, who had just finished up stuffing Our Heroine (who had fainted upon hearing the news that her relative was a double agent which only she knew), under the bushes out back of the church where he had redded up a hidey-hole for her, complete with the brown-bag-lunch he'd taken with him earlier in the day from the salad bar at the local Piggly Wiggly, by-passed the deacon and the suspicious hog to continue on his mission to discover the where abouts of the . . .
(dessert is served; narrator is excused)