Wednesday, April 25, 2018

A Little Creative Fun

Sometimes I feel less inspired than I would like.  For the last few days, I've had plenty of ideas that I'd love to put on paper, but nothing seems to be coming out right.  Perhaps I'm being too hard on myself.  Isn't that a common problem with writers?  We stress out about the words to the point where they flow like treacle.  It isn't always easy to snap ourselves out of it, either.

When I sat down to write this post, I wasn't feeling any more confident.  I wanted to say something profound about life and writing and the stories that we use to examine our shared humanity.  That sounds like a lot of pressure, so it shouldn't be surprising that doing this to myself did not help my creative output in the slightest.

Then I gave myself permission to have a little bit of fun with this.  Why not?  We all need a little fun and laughter from time to time, and when you're a writer, getting playful with words can also help unblock the pathways responsible for creative output.  Sounds like a win-win scenario, right?

That's why I wrote a little Mad Lib style story to share with you.  It was so much fun to write something silly, and all of you can have a good time filling in the blanks to create something uniquely amusing.  I've always enjoyed writing stories like this, and I'll highly recommend it to anyone who's feeling the creative strain.

Before going on to the story, write a list of these 12 things.  Feel free to be as zany with your responses as you want!

Texture
Beverage
Symptom of illness
Annoying song title
City
Country
Verb
Noun
Emotion
Job title
Color
Shape

Do you have your list ready?  Okay.  Going in order, insert each response into the blanks to create your very own story.  Have fun!



Launch Day

The day of the launch was not going _______.  In fact, an accurate description of events would include a few crude words.  One of the astronauts had too much ______ and was experiencing the fallout from that.  Dealing with ______ on launch day wasn’t exactly ideal.

Then there was the issue with the lead engineer Stan.  Some wires got mixed up, and now the spacecraft’s navigation system played _______ on repeat.  Without a proper navigation system in place, the ship could easily end up in _______ rather than in orbit.

No one had been able to reach Stan, either.  His answering machine said that he’d gone to _______ to _______.  It wouldn’t have been a problem if they had more time.  Delaying a mission was commonplace enough.  Except they had to launch today to save Earth from destruction via _______.

Sarah was determined, however, not to feel ______ about it.  She had a job to do.  She hadn’t been appointed ______ for nothing!  It was only a few wires, right?  How complicated could that be?

She looked up at the enormous _______ ________ of a spacecraft and steeled her nerves.  She had a job to do.  Today she could end up being a hero.  Or she could doom humanity to extinction.  No pressure.

*     *     *

How did your version of the story turn out?  How do you think it ends for our hero, and for humanity as whole?

10 comments:

  1. What a fun idea. Someone should create a book of stories like that, prompting the reader to come up with new words each time.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
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      i am ERIC BRUNT by name. Greetings to every one that is reading this testimony. I have been rejected by my wife after three(3) years of marriage just because another Man had a spell on her and she left me and the kid to suffer. one day when i was reading through the web, i saw a post on how this spell caster on this address AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com have help a woman to get back her husband and i gave him a reply to his address and he told me that a man had a spell on my wife and he told me that he will help me and after 3 days that i will have my wife back. i believed him and today i am glad to let you all know that this spell caster have the power to bring lovers back. because i am now happy with my wife. Thanks for helping me Dr Akhere contact him on email: AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com
      or
      call/whatsapp:+2349057261346

      Delete
  2. This is definitely a great way to get the creativity flowing. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I SO love this! I haven’t done Mad Libs in forever, and I always enjoyed them.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hahah! This looks fun. I am not in the right mood for it, but I am giggling because Mad Libs just do that to me.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Genius, love it, and what fun. It's been ages since I've played this game. Diane is right, a new book?

    ReplyDelete
  6. I am so bad about putting the pressure on my creative self. I'm working on a manuscript right now, and am taking mini-breaks every time I get frustrated and want to splatter whiteout all over the computer screen. (I have to save my computer, you know. The habit was getting expensive.)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hola paso por tu blog a dejar la huella del mio.
    Por si deseas visitar.

    http://anna-historias.blogspot.com/?m=1.
    Gracias.
    Besos

    ReplyDelete
  8. i am ERIC BRUNT by name. Greetings to every one that is reading this testimony. I have been rejected by my wife after three(3) years of marriage just because another Man had a spell on her and she left me and the kid to suffer. one day when i was reading through the web, i saw a post on how this spell caster on this address AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com have help a woman to get back her husband and i gave him a reply to his address and he told me that a man had a spell on my wife and he told me that he will help me and after 3 days that i will have my wife back. i believed him and today i am glad to let you all know that this spell caster have the power to bring lovers back. because i am now happy with my wife. Thanks for helping me Dr Akhere contact him on email: AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com
    or
    call/whatsapp:+2349057261346




    i am ERIC BRUNT by name. Greetings to every one that is reading this testimony. I have been rejected by my wife after three(3) years of marriage just because another Man had a spell on her and she left me and the kid to suffer. one day when i was reading through the web, i saw a post on how this spell caster on this address AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com have help a woman to get back her husband and i gave him a reply to his address and he told me that a man had a spell on my wife and he told me that he will help me and after 3 days that i will have my wife back. i believed him and today i am glad to let you all know that this spell caster have the power to bring lovers back. because i am now happy with my wife. Thanks for helping me Dr Akhere contact him on email: AKHERETEMPLE@gmail.com
    or
    call/whatsapp:+2349057261346

    ReplyDelete

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