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Drabbleclassics 31 – Boojum

In this Drabbleclassics episode, author and Drabblefan Weirdo Abbie Hilton breaks down the hit Drabblecast story Boojum, by Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette.

The ship had no name of her own, so her human crew called her the Lavinia Whateley. As far as anyone could tell, she didn’t mind. At least, her long grasping vanes curled—affectionately? — when the chief engineers patted her bulkheads and called her “Vinnie,” and she ceremoniously tracked the footsteps of each crew member with her internal bioluminescence, giving them light to walk and work and live by…

Drabblecast Director’s Cut: Jelly Park

Cover for Drabblecast Director's Cut of Aliya Whitely's Jelly Park by Rodolfo Arredondo

“It’s about getting on the bus…” Norm and author Aliya Whiteley talk double decker busses, double decker tacos, embracing weirdness for what it is and reinventing yourself. They also get into the in’s and out’s of the first ever Drabblecast People’s Choice Award Winner for “Best Story” back in 2007, for this “Director’s Cut: Jelly Park.”

We go over little ditty’s like this:

Keep your sponge cake, fling your flan
Stick your donuts, cream and jam
Leave your custard in its can
Give us all some jelly

In a trifle, from a mold
Rabbit shaped or ice cream coned
Nothing better, so I’m told
Then a lovely Jelly…

But we digress.

Story Excerpt:

“I’m not sure I belong here.”
“Then where do you belong?”
The others stopped chewing and looked at me expectantly.
What am I?…

Co-narrator, Dermot Glennon, also contributed to Episode #29, “Code Brown.”

Enjoy!

Drabblecast Director’s Cut: Jelly Park

Drabbleclassics 14 – Jelly Park (43)

Cover for Drabblecast episode 43, Jelly Park, by Rodolfo Arredondo“I’m not sure I belong here.”
“Then where do you belong?”
The others stopped chewing and looked at me expectantly.
What am I?…

As Norm detailed his Christmas plans, the common theme of this episode became apparent:  that “Home” is not a place, but rather a choice. Before getting there, though, the Drabble News tracked through a pile of extremely rare rhinoceros dung…  or rather, four piles, collected by conservationists and auctioned on E-bay to raise money for preservation of the species. Norm speculates on the market timing of such a gift. Next, Norm reflects on the meaning of the holidays, from the point of view of various people, animals, and legendary monsters. The week’s Drabble, “Choosing Home” by noteworthy community member Josh Hugo, offers a story of love conquering danger. The feature story, “Jelly Park,” (consistently voted among listener favorites), is a deliciously absurd tale of a down-on-her-luck, unemployed secretary who discovers a strange welcome from the easily overlooked community of double-decker bus drivers. The episode’s author, published twice by McMillan Press, helped sing the charminly twisted story’s celebrations. Co-narrator, Dermot Glennon, also contributed Episode #29, “Code Brown.” Feedback for Episode #37, “Luna Springs,” is bittersweet and poignant. Norm and the staff close with a rousing rendition of the Jelly Park Celebration Song, showing off multiple voices and characters, ranging from scat-singing to lunatic opera.

Cover for Drabblecast episode 248, Cockroach Hat, by Greg Cravens

Drabblecast 248 – The Cockroach Hat

Cover for Drabblecast episode 248, Cockroach Hat, by Greg Cravens“What I don’t like about it,” said Cliffe, “is that is it’s just a metaphor instead of something real.”

“What if it was real?” I (Sam) asked. “What if it was me and I actually turned into a cockroach someday?”

This episode of the Drabblecast is all about crazy relationships. In the drabble, it’s apparent that finding Mr. Right is difficult no matter who (or what) you are. In the feature, Sam wakes up one day to discover he has been transformed into a giant cockroach. He spends the rest of his day on a surreal quest, not only to return to his normal self, but also to save his girlfriend from threats both mundane and extraordinary, with the hope a new start together.

Cover for Drabblecast episode 238, The Lost Diary of TreeFrog7, by Caroline Parkinson

Drabblecast 238 – From the Lost Diary of TreeFrog7

Cover for Drabblecast episode 238, The Lost Diary of TreeFrog7, by Caroline ParkinsonTranslating… Appendix 820 of The Forbidden Greeny Jungle Field Guide. This series of audio files was created by TreeFrog7. It has been automatically translated into text

In this episode of the Drabblecast, heavily pregnant jungle explorer TreeFrog7 keeps a recorded diary of data she and her husband are collecting for the Forbidden Greeny Jungle Field Guide. As they close in on a legendary mature CPU plant (MCPU), a wild version of cultivated CPU plants used as personal computers, they encounter numerous jungle creatures including an enormous flightless moth protecting the plant. Despite its attacks, the explorers do not want to kill the moth in case the MCPU needs it to survive. While treed by the moth in the MCPU, TreeFrog7 gives birth to their daughter while her husband downloads the MCPU’s data. Close enough to see the MCPU’s monitor, they watch a rapidly shifting display of locations and symbols. TreeFrog7 realizes the images are getting closer to their own location and represent another explorer’s collected data. Finally, the scene fades and the monitor shows only two eyes. The diary ends with an entry by an unknown voice that implies the explorers have themselves been collected. In the drabble, a teenage boy fails to convince an uninterested, gum-snapping girl that he understands her feelings of otherness and isolation.

Drabblecast 220 – Trifecta XVIII

Cover for Drabblecast episode 220, Trifecta XVIII, by Liz PenniesAnother of the Drabblecast’s vaunted Trifecta series. Three short stories, each with a unique twist. The episode begins with an interview of author J.R. Hamantaschen, Norm runs fingers through his troubled mind, learning of the seeds from which his horrors spring. The theme of this Trifecta: getting the boot – stories of rejection and alienation. First up, Richard Weems’s Bad Habit, in which a nun and a naked pervert do battle (no, really). Next, author Andrew Gudgel (featured on fellow podcasts such as Escapepod) appears with Tags, as read by Kimi Alexander, a story of teenage dares in a technologically submerged world. Lastly, A Happy Family, by author, novelist Nathaniel Tower, read by Abner Senires, in which a family receives a very unexpected bundle of joy (and puzzlement).

Episode Sponsor: You Shall Never Know Security by J.R. Hamantaschen.

Drabblecast 215 – Dread Unlocks

Cover for Drabblecast episode 215, Dread Unlocks, by Bo KaierOkay, no one expects eldritch horror in LA. Not that I know what eldritch horror really is. My old boyfriend (about fifteen boyfriends back) called anything that inspired dread “eldritch horror.” I guess that would describe my entire job, really…

Another story from Lovecraft month – elder horror in LA. Dread Unlocks is on the job!

Cover for Drabblecast episode 202, Boojum pt. 1, by Caroline Parkinson

Drabblecast 202 – Boojum: Part I

Cover for Drabblecast episode 202, Boojum pt. 1, by Caroline ParkinsonThe ship had no name of her own, so her human crew called her the Lavinia Whateley. As far as anyone could tell, she didn’t mind. At least, her long grasping vanes curled—affectionately? — when the chief engineers patted her bulkheads and called her “Vinnie,” and she ceremoniously tracked the footsteps of each crew member with her internal bioluminescence, giving them light to walk and work and live by…

Cover for Drabblecast episode 201, Trifecta XV, by Alyssa Suzumura

Drabblecast 201 – Trifecta XV

Cover for Drabblecast episode 201, Trifecta XV, by Alyssa Suzumura“Are these fiddlebacks ferns mommy?” Cindy asked. Fiddlehead honey. Margery said absently. “Fiddlebacks are nasty spiders.” It was only later that she would realize Cindy, for once in her vacuous, Barbie obsessed life, was right.”

The first episode of Women and Alien’s month 2011 featuring three stories, each exploring nasty, insectile alien menaces. Fiddleback Ferns, a space infestation sends a mother to her breaking point. Killipedes, a dark, humorous tale where a doctor breaks down a patient’s nasty parasitical infection. In The Difficulties of Evolution, a mournful parent contemplates her child’s anthropomorphic metamorphosis.

Cover for Drabblecast episode 198, Love in the Pneumatic Tube Era, by Matt Wasiela

Drabblecast 198 – Love in the Pneumatic Tube Era

Cover for Drabblecast episode 198, Love in the Pneumatic Tube Era, by Matt WasielaWe discover old scrolls that we wrote to each other in high school, back in the Early Pneumatic Tube Era. That was back when a PT message took five minutes to get across the city.

We shake our heads. Now you can send a living butterfly to Dubai in ten seconds…

This Valentine’s Day episode of the Drabblecast’s theme is centered on odd love. Norm rattles off a staggering set of fart/love puns, and waxes on about the travails of staying together in the digital age. In the drabble, we experience love through a fighter’s eyes. In the feature story, two soul mates seperated by great distance negotiate an alternate, steampunk (tube punk?) future. In addittion the Drabblecast 2010 People’s Choice nominations are announced.

Cover for Drabblecast episode 180, Something Borrowed Something Blue, by Bo Kaier

Drabblecast 180 – Something Borrowed, Something Doomed

Cover for Drabblecast episode 180, Something Borrowed Something Blue, by Bo KaierWhile the rest a’ the country had turned away from the biorevolution, we Best Virginians had become magicians. We had learned how to use the tiniest creatures to change the world in the biggest, most beautiful ways…

Cover for Drabblecast episode 179, The Red Bride, by Skeet Scienski

Drabblecast 179 – The Red Bride

Cover for Drabblecast episode 179, The Red Bride, by Skeet ScienskiYou are to imagine, Twigling, the Red Bride to be a human, such as yourself, although she is in truth a creature of the Var...

Cover for Drabblecast episode 163, Once a Month on a Sunday, by Caroline Parkinson

Drabblecast 163 – Once a Month on a Sunday

Cover for Drabblecast episode 163, Once a Month on a Sunday, by Caroline ParkinsonOnce a month, on a Sunday, Mum and me and my little brother Zubby would dress up in our best clothes, Mum would put ribbons in my hair, and we’d all walk into town to go to church…

Cover for Drabblecast episode 154, Family Values, by Chelsea Ragan

Drabblecast 154 – Family Values

Cover for Drabblecast episode 154, Family Values, by Chelsea RaganAlthough she was tired, Wu was careful not to show it. Her pregnancies were progressing nicely. The eldest foetus, Hoo, was about to be born, and she was getting too big for parties, but the Senate elections were only months away and her visible pregnancy gave her an advantage she could not afford to waste…

All the Single Rotifers

Cover for Drabblecast episode 147, Cassie, by Phil Pomphrey

Drabblecast 147 – Cassie

Cover for Drabblecast episode 147, Cassie, by Phil PomphreyThe other gamblers ignored her. They were a mixed bunch– middle aged men in ties and shiny suits, women in evening gowns, young men with gleaming teeth and haunted expressions. Roulette was a sucker’s game. Unless you were Cassie…

Cover for Drabblecast episode 144, by Sean Azzapardi

Drabblecast 144 – joanierules.bloggermax.com

Cover for Drabblecast episode 144, by Sean AzzapardiThis sounds ridiculous, I know. It’s like watching an old movie where everyone has a British accent, even if they’re supposed to be in ancient Rome or something. God is just impossible to translate…

Magpie Yarns

Cover for Drabblecast episode 111, Frequent Flyer Miles, by Josh Hugo

Drabblecast 111 – Frequent Flier Miles

Cover for Drabblecast episode 111, Frequent Flyer Miles, by Josh HugoHe folds his barely eaten burrito away in its paper wrapper and regards me seriously with his warm, friendly eyes. “I have a *lot* of frequent flier miles. I’d be more than happy to share them.”
I understand that we’re not talking about the kind of miles the airlines give you. This has nothing to do with credit card rewards…

The ex-husband of the feature story’s titular frequent flier once told her that the key to not being found is to keep moving. It’s been years since her ex kidnapped their daughter, and our protagonist is determined to stay on the move, from one airport to the next. She meets a curious fellow searcher who refers to himself as the wandering Jew.

Also included is a Bbardle, Radioactive Runaways, written by Norm Sherman for Eric Peters’ birthday, a gift made possible by the donation of his wife Janette.

Cover of Drabblecast episode 110, Trifecta 6, by Tom Morganti

Drabblecast 110 – Trifecta VII

Cover of Drabblecast episode 110, Trifecta 6, by Tom MorgantiThe village of Kriegerwald on the shores of Lake Teufel high in the Swiss Alps couldonly be reached by foot or ski lift, which suited the villagers. Each villager possessed broadforeheads and flat noses with strange guttural accents even the people in the valley below barelyunderstood. They also had a singular tourist attraction, popular enough to fund villagemaintenance but not to flood them or stir a desire for greater accessibility.

This trifecta episode of the Drabblecast features three stories, each exploring humanity’s reaction to strange and threatening situations. In the first story, The Frozen People, Swiss villagers sustain their existence by selling views of their 7000 year old perfectly preserved frozen warrior. When lightening strikes, everyone’s life changes. In Sheltered, a fast approaching asteroid threatens to wipe out all of mankind. This sends many burrowing deep into the ground, while a few brave individuals stay above to revel in the cataclysm. Interactions between the groups take on an ironic twist. In Order to Conserve speaks to governments and people as they are threatened by the loss of the most precious of all natural resources…. and it’s not oil or water.

Of note: this episode marks the debut of Twit-Fic/Twabbles.

Cover for Drabblecast 097, Daydream Nation, by Bo Kaier

Drabblecast 97 – Daydream Nation

Cover for Drabblecast 097, Daydream Nation, by Bo KaierFrom a small, dusty box similar to a contact-lens case, she took a fresh iDreams bindi, a self-adhesive circlet displaying the iDreams logo: a stylized human head wreathed in fluffy clouds and displaying a Third Eye…

This episode of the Drabblecast explores the relationship between technology and romance. In the Drabble, cryotechnology brings new dimensions to love, loss, and grieving. The feature, Daydream Nation, is a post-modern fairy tale exploring how the development of an iDreams caster, a device allowing users to broadcast crafted or purchased iDreams to one another, might affect courtship and relationships. After the story, Norm waxes poetic about the effect of our instant message society on “good old fashioned cheesy flirting.”

Cover for Drabblecast 49, Heart to Heart, by Bo Kaier

Drabblecast 49 – Heart to Heart

Cover for Drabblecast 49, Heart to Heart, by Bo KaierHere’s the thing Sheila- you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.  You’re also funny, intelligent, sex is fantastic and you certainly have an interesting career but…I just don’t think I can date you anymore..

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