Grading Plagiarism

I saw a hilarious picture online a few years back. If I was a teacher, I would definitely want this stamp for grading work.

The Silhouette in the Hall

One day, my friend was in the bathroom getting ready to go somewhere. She was Face-Timing with her mother, and thought she was alone in the house.

Just then, she saw a tall, looming silhouette of a man in the hall. She screamed bloody murder, staring in wide-eyed horror. In her panic, she didn't realize the man was actually their roommate. Startled by this reaction and not knowing why she was screaming, he cowered in a ball against the wall. He was terrified to look behind him, thinking there was someone behind him that prompted this shriek.

Finally, her brain registered that it was their roommate, and not a random stranger who broke into the house to kill her. She then started laughing at the situation. Their roommate couldn't figure out what was funny, but she was laughing too hard to explain. In confusion, he began looking through the house for the serial killer he still feared might be in the house.

The neighbors, who heard the deafening screams, hurried over to the house to investigate. My friend tried to tell them everything was fine, but they were unconvinced, and insisted on going through the house themselves to make sure that she was telling the truth.

Meanwhile, her mother, who had been forgotten in the chaos, was freaking out. All she knew was that her daughter suddenly screamed, then vanished. She called every family member she could, telling them that something was going on. My friend's uncle, who didn't have a car, somehow managed to secure a vehicle shortly after hearing about this, and hurried to the house.

Upon discovering the panic she had created in her mother, my friend called her mother, and spent about an hour trying to calm her down and assure her that it was just a false alarm. "I've never heard you scream like that." her mother said. "I never want to hear anything like that again!" 

When my friend's father heard about the string of events her ear-splitting scream caused, he told her, "Well, at least we know if anything actually happens to you, it won't go unnoticed."

Late Night Scares

A group of girls were at a sleepover, and they were all telling scary stories in the dark .After a while, they were all thoroughly creeped out, to the point where no one wanted to walk down the dark, spooky hallway to the bathroom alone.

So one girl escorted the other through the hall. As they approached, the second girl thought, Hey, wouldn't it be funny if I pretended to be pulled into the bathroom by something? Upon reaching the door, she acted like something was dragging her in. Her horrified escort shrieked and ran for her life down the hall.

Good to know you have a brave protector if something happens, right?

Guide Cats

While taking the online DMV practice test, I saw an interesting question.

The primary traveling aids for a blind person include:

One of the multiple-choice answers is "a red cane and a trained guide cat". Now, how many people have seen a trained guide cat? I sure haven't. In fact, I haven't seen many people walking their cat at all, save for on television. And even less of those cats were actually walking on the leash. But seriously, people, don't drag your poor cat across the ground. Unless you want to be a scratching post later, or find cat poop in your shoe.

Of course, some people have actually got their feline to walk with them on a leash. Now you can parade around town, showing off your beautiful tabby, or Siamese, or whatever the case might be.

Placeholder Names

Let's face it, as writers, we want the perfect names for everything. We're perfectionists in every way, always striving for perfection in spelling, grammar, plot, character development, etc. And did I mention we want everything to be perfect?

However, there are times when we have to mention something in our story, though we haven't decided yet what it's going to be called. That's what placeholder names are for. Just a temporary blob of letters until you decide the name of that character, or town, or landmass, or fictional man-eating plant species. Come to think of it, sometimes placeholder names can have some amusing results. Let's explore some examples, shall we?