Parker

This links to a travel site, but the article is about the new center for fantasy at Glasgow University.  There is a short video, too, and it has sub titles for those who have trouble with spoken Scottish English.
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/articles/glasgow-university-center-for-fantasy?utm_campaign=&utm_source=sfmc&utm_medium=email&stuid=5fefc05b9ef1778fb073bfe265032989&utm_content=168837&utm_term=

It's been a while since this site had an 'event'.  Why don't you post your story idea and let anyone who wants to take a crack at it?  Not a contest, just a way to get more stories posted.  If you keep your outline short enough and vague enough you should get some very different results.

I think the numbers (page views) you put on the story chapters are great. I know, people say you write for yourself, but I don't, maybe I'm too vain, but I write for people to read it... and, yes, because I enjoy it. It can be a very isolated and lonely business without comments or feedback, those numbers are a lifeline. They tell me there are readers, even if I never hear from them or they never come on the forum. 
I can't help thinking it's a little selfish to take a book for free and read it without bothering to give a word to the author. A good story isn't written in a couple of days, it often involves a long process and other people, like editors, so you get a nicely finished book. Still, you read it, consume it, presumably enjoy it, I don't know. I'm not psychic, I hope you're out there somewhere, but only the numbers tell me that, like driving along an empty road watching the miles tick by.

Dear Zeph,  A good place to store books or stories is in a library. On the home page are four white words at the very top of the page. One of those is LIBRARY. One click on that word opens a whole list of categories for you to click on, including Stories By Author. One click on that line and a list of all authors alphabetically arranged arranged will open. One click on a name reveals all stories posted by that author.  If you do not know an author's name you have the ability to search by what type or genre of story it is. Quite frankly this is one of the most all inclusive search menus on a story site I have come across. I hope you take the time to explore the site, it really is a well set up site. Art

In the summer of ’69 I was between my junior and senior year in high school and working in a tourist town. Young, dumb, and full of … hormones, I had better things to do than watch the news (except the moon landing), so if the riots were reported at all in my conservative area, I missed it.

I can tell you about what it was like living there at that time as a gay boy. It was a time of great fear for me. I was always gay and had crushes on other boys from the time I was six. At the same time, I learned what the word Queer meant. I was never a brave boy and when other boys tossed out that taunt at each other I knew that I had better keep my head down. My older brother used to tell me about going to the nearby city with his football teammates to roll queers. They lurked in the parking lot of the only little gay bar and waited to catch a man walking alone. Then they would beat and rob him. There was never any consequence for them.

Homosexuality wasn’t talked about except with scorn and hatred. Mostly the local news never reported anything about us, except for when someone was arrested for sex. Then the papers would print their names and addresses for everyone to see. I stayed in the closet all through college and suffered all of the angst and discomfort of having to date girls in order to keep up the pretense of being straight. I hated it.

Finally, I picked up an Advocate newspaper and saw that I wasn’t one of hundreds of gays. I was part of millions of other boys like me, so I moved to Atlanta and got into all sorts of wonderful trouble. I spent the following decades trying to continue the work that the Stonewall folk started. I am so grateful for their bravery that opened the door for me. I think I would have committed suicide if I had been forced to live like that for much longer.

The thing is, I never got over that childhood of intense fear and loneliness. Parts of that little boy still hides in me today.


 
 

in my defense, the only thing I have that is labeled 'in progress' is my Noah Osgood series. This is a collection of 9stories, each complete in itself, that may be increased by one or two more episodes. There is probably a better label for them than 'In Progress'.

Parker Mountains of Memories' status has been changed to "On Hold"

No minimum.  However the scoring will include how well the characters were developed.  

No Minimum. And the suggested max is just that. A suggestion.
Does that help?

The story continues in the Library: Terra Apokalypsis
It just dropped today.

The Harper Household, 6:30 pm EDT
"Holy shit!" Jimmy had just turned the TV on and watched a few minutes of news about the upcoming solar event. "Thomas, get down here NOW. We got to go to the store! Bad stuff's happenin!"
Thom came down from the upper half floor where the bedrooms were. "What's going on?" Jimmy let him know about the Sun and how this event could hurt millions of people. "This must be why Mom and Dad can't come home right now. I don't know what they're going to do against frick'n solar flares, though! Anyways, we gotta go get some water and food that don't need to be kept cold. Stores might not be open for a long time, and we gotta get there before they close."
Fortunately the Publix grocery store was only two blocks away. And Thomas still had his wagon in the garage. He probably hadn't had it out in over two years. "I feel kinda dumb pulling this old red wagon. You know I'm nine, right?" Jimmy replied, "You like to have water to drink?  Food? We gotta get any survival stuff we can get! This is really bad, Thom, and being a little embarrassed don't even count as a problem right now."
The store was crowded, but not crazy-panicked crowded. Yet. All the regular bottled water was gone, but they still had lots of gallon-size distilled-water cartons. They also picked up bags of beef jerkey, Twinkies (... if anything is going to survive an apocolypse ...) bandages, anything that looked like it might be useful and they could fit in the wagon.
No one was at the checkouts. Jimmy saw the manager, Mr. Pearson, just sort of in a daze. "Hi kids. Just take it. It doesn't matter, just take it. I have a really bad feeling that money won't be much good tomorrow. In fact, all the employees are going home in half an hour to be with their families. We are moving everything out from the back room so folks can easily get what they want. We're leaving the door open when we leave. It would just get busted open anyways."
"Geez, Mr. Peason, I hope you and your family are going to be okay.. Leaving the door open makes a lot of sense!"
As Jimmy and Thomas were walking home, thick clouds had begun to form in the sky. Florida weather is often unpredictable, but these clouds had come from nowhere. They were thick and getting thicker. "Spooky. Really spooky. Jimmy, I'm scared." Jimmy gave his bro a quick hug. "So am I. Let's get home and hope Mom and Dad make it home before hell gets here."
"That's strange," Jimmy thought, "I never used religious emojis before."

CBS Breaking News - 6:25 pm EDT:
Officials at CBS News have now learned that the President and his cabinet have been taken to undisclosed secure locations in preparation of tonight’s worldwide event.
CBS now believes that this action validates the leaked NASA document that has called this solar event a Near Extinction Level Event.
We turn now to our Chief Science Reporter, Mr Michael Andreason, to explain what is about to happen and how you may prepare for this earth shattering event....

ABC Breaking News Alert - 6:20 pm EDT:
An unconfirmed NASA report that has been leaked to the national news media is saying that the Coronal Mass Ejection that was reported earlier today, was mistakenly classed as a low-level event. This new information, if true, asserts that the CME, as they call it, will strike the Earth at approximately 8:20 pm tonight. That's 8:20 pm Eastern time.
According to the report, this event will cause major electrical malfunctions and may damage many electronics.
Our research staff suggests that everyone unplug all electrical devices in your houses and offices to avoid the possibility of electrical fires. Our staff feels that this event will pass quickly.
Meanwhile, we at ABC will attempt to verify the document and will keep you all informed of any other things you might need to know before the event happens.
Stay tuned to this station for further updates.

The Harper Household, Cocoa Beach, FLorida, 4:07 pm EDT
When Jimmy Harper's Mom called, he was surprised to learn that neither of his parents would be home this evening.  They both work at NASA and have worked regular hours for many years running. She was not sure when they would be home, but it might not even be tonight. He was asked to make something for dinner for he and his little brother, Thomas. Being 13, he had never been "in charge" of the house for any extended time before. He wished he had remembered to ask what was going on, but the situation was just too unusual to fully comprehend. Plus she seemed to be in a hurry.  For some reason, she closed by asking him to go buy a lot of bottled water, as much as he and Thomas could carry.
He thought, "I hope everything is okay." Then he shouted, "Thomas, what do you feel like for dinner? Mom and Dad are going to be late, and I gotta cook something." Thom shouted back that anything would be fine. Deciding he had time, Jimmy did what any young teen would do, pulled back out his smartphone, opened Twitter, and sent:
 

Oval Office, White House, 1:30 pm EDT:
"Mr. President. The latest information is that the Earth is now in the direct path of the CME. It has been determined that it will strike our planet at approx. midnight, GMT - about five and a half hours from now.
"It's going to be a mean one, Mr. President. They are saying that it is 30% more energetic than the 1859 Carrington Event or that near miss, back in 2012."
"Simplify that for me, General."
"Yes sir. In a nutshell, the entire world's electric grid is about to be destroyed. Include in that, every piece of electronics is going to fry."
"What are we doing to mitigate the damage?"
"Not much we can do. We've sent out instructions to every electrical generating plant in the US to power down and disconnect their generators from the grid. We don't know if they have the manpower or the time to accomplish this. All nuclear facilities have been instructed to scram their reactors. All Navel surface vessels have been ordered to head for the deepest water they can get to in the next 4 hours and eject their cores. Our Submarines have been ordered to dive to a depth of 150 ft, at a minimum... The electrical and EMP effects will not reach that depth.
"We've also instructed the FAA to immediately ground all flights.
"Right now, Mr. President, we are instituting the Continuity of Government Protocols. It is expected that this event will last 5 to 7 days."
"All right gentlemen, we don't have enough time to warn the public. At this stage it will only create mass chaos and death. There will be plenty of that, after the event. All national guard are now federalized. Get as many of them as we can, mobilized. Martial Law now exists. After the event, all NG Commanders are to restore as much order as they can. Looters should be shot on sight, etc."
"You mean Operation Deathstarkiller, Mr. President?" His National Security Adviser asks.
 

CBS Noon Report - 12:00 pm EDT:
We have an update to that Solar Flare we reported earlier this morning. Scientists from NASA are now saying that the flare was accompanied by a large Coronal Mass Ejection: A portion of the sun's atmosphere was ejected from the surface. They assure us that the CME, as they call it, posses no danger to the earth, as it will mostly miss our planet by a few million miles.
Scientists are telling us that we will see an increase in the northern lights, possibly as far south as New Jersey, Ohio and Oregon. Best time to view this will be in the early hours, an hour before dawn, tomorrow.

CBS Morning News - 6:30 am EDT:
If you were out and about at 3:10 am this morning, you would have been witness to a solar event, as your eastern sky would have suddenly brightened to almost full daylight intensity, that lasted almost 5 seconds.
NASA says a large solar flare occurred at that time. Since the flare was "aimed" at the earth, for a very short time it made the sun appear to be much brighter than it normally is.
Solar scientists are telling us not to worry, however. Solar flares happen all the time, but are rarely in a direct path to the Earth. Because this flare was directly in our path, it just seemed to make the sun brighter.

I had heard this anecdote before, but I remember it from Designing Women, when Mary Jo talked about being at a posh cocktail party in New York. She said, "I didn't know anyone there so I tried to start a conversation with the woman beside me. I asked her, 'Where are y'all from?'
She said, 'I'm from a place where we don't end our sentences with a preposition.' 
'I looked at her and said, So, where are y'all from... bitch?'"  

I had heard this anecdote before, but I remember it from Designing Women, when Mary Jo talked about being at a posh cocktail party in New York. She said, "I didn't know anyone there so I tried to start a conversation with the woman beside me. I asked her, 'Where are y'all from?'
She said, 'I'm from a place where we don't end our sentences with a preposition.' 
'I looked at her and said, So, where are y'all from... bitch?'"  

Masturbation

No counterpoints. These are alarming times. Fascism has reared its ugly head and it has a bad comb over and orange skin. I feel deeply affected by the idiocy and cruelty of this administration because my brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews are all Trump supporters. I asked my sister if she was still proud of Trump and she seemed surprised that I would ask. She said, "Of course."
I can understand a bit of a backlash after the legalization of gay marriages and the Black Lives Matter movement, but it seems that half the country is filled with hate and anger. Where did all of that hate come from? It's shocking and I wonder now how we will ever get back on track. I know that people will get used to these new freedoms eventually if we have the time, but it is essential that we win back the White House and Congress. We have to undo some of the damage that Trump, McConnell and Ryan have created. Let's all vote.
Truck Fump
 

No counterpoints. These are alarming times. Fascism has reared its ugly head and it has a bad comb over and orange skin. I feel deeply affected by the idiocy and cruelty of this administration because my brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews are all Trump supporters. I asked my sister if she was still proud of Trump and she seemed surprised that I would ask. She said, "Of course."
I can understand a bit of a backlash after the legalization of gay marriages and the Black Lives Matter movement, but it seems that half the country is filled with hate and anger. Where did all of that hate come from? It's shocking and I wonder now how we will ever get back on track. I know that people will get used to these new freedoms eventually if we have the time, but it is essential that we win back the White House and Congress. We have to undo some of the damage that Trump, McConnell and Ryan have created. Let's all vote.
Truck Fump
 

I'm just about to light one up right now. Of course, I am at home and do not plan on going anywhere. I'm going to space out with my recordings of the "Into the Badlands" TV series. If pot were legalized then maybe the price would come down. I wish I could grow my own, because I can never be certain that my stuff has not been treated in some way to make it more potent. I once had some that was laced with PCP. That was terrible, so maybe government oversight of pot production would be a good thing.
The one thing I worry about is the increase of stoned drivers on the road, but I suppose that there are plenty out there right now. Alcohol seems to be the main cause of traffic accidents.

I'm just about to light one up right now. Of course, I am at home and do not plan on going anywhere. I'm going to space out with my recordings of the "Into the Badlands" TV series. If pot were legalized then maybe the price would come down. I wish I could grow my own, because I can never be certain that my stuff has not been treated in some way to make it more potent. I once had some that was laced with PCP. That was terrible, so maybe government oversight of pot production would be a good thing.
The one thing I worry about is the increase of stoned drivers on the road, but I suppose that there are plenty out there right now. Alcohol seems to be the main cause of traffic accidents.

Driver, I think what I like best about your stories is the psychological insight you provide to each character. Their motivations seem natural and reasonable. I also wish that I could have had friends like that when I was growing up. These are fun stories and I look forward to each new chapter and finding out more about the boys. Thanks for writing these stories.
Parker