arnold toynbee

by nick nelson

illustrated by palomine studios

bobby blue and rita red woke up one morning in a big white bed outside the grass was growing green and a yellow sun lit up the scene rita shook her tresses loose and poured a glass of orange juice and bobby with his brain so gray put on his clothes to face the day bobby worked for mister brown the biggest employer in the town his immediate supervisor was miss pink who had been known to take a drink rita was a spirit free who flaunted her prodigality she had been raised by a purple aunt whose favorite words were “don’t” and “can’t” rita dreamed of rosy fame when everybody knew her name and she had her pick and choice of guys under clear cerulean skies bobby and rita were only two people in a world no longer new people whose overflowing dreams sped through the cosmos in widening streams the world was blue five billion years ago and then turned brown so very very slow red people with green eyes woke up to find they were prisoners of universal mind universal mind was a mauve baboon who could not leave behind too soon the curious magenta concoction he had dreamed where nothing violet was what chartreuse seemed in a drugstore in paris tennessee rita bought a ticket in the lottery and since she had already come so far she also bought a hershey bar

three guys

by nick nelson

illustrated by palomine studios

ted, joe, and stan were three guys. ted got a job in a pizza store, on a little street just beside the entrance to the interstate. he did not think he would keep the job for very long, but he ended up staying there for twenty-three years. ted felt that he had found something in the pizza place, though he did not know exactly what. every day he would look out the window and see joe, standing at the entrance to the interstate. not hitchhiking, just standing there. like he was waiting for something. around ten o’clock every morning, stan would run by. he was always dressed like an ordinary guy, just out running for exercise. but if you looked closer, he had a look in his eyes like he was running from something. what had ted found? what was joe waiting for? what was stan running from? maybe what ted had found, joe was waiting for, and stan was running from were all the same thing.

the conversation

by nick nelson

illustrated by palomine studios

rob and lois bradley were boring people, and they didn’t have any friends. one morning lois was in the local bake shop buying some blueberry muffins when she overheard carol porter, a member of the school committee, laughingly refer to herself and rob as “ those ————“. lois could not make the word out but she knew it was not complimentary. from that moment her life assumed a new purpose. she formed a plan, and that night she outlined it to rob. her plan was for them to have an entry in the guinness book of world records. that would show carol porter and all those other stuckup people who thought she and rob were so boring! lois had the idea that she and rob would have the exact same conversation every night - word for word - for a record number of days. 5,000 days? 10,000? lois settled on 6,667 as a compromise - that would be a little over 18 years. the conversation went like this: it’s a lovely evening, isn’t it? yes, but it will soon be over. and tomorrow will be another day. that is true. it is strange, isn’t it, that one day is so much like another. it might seem strange to some people. you are right. others might find it not so strange. even comforting. the city had not fixed the sidewalk yet. no, they have not. what a worthless lot they are. bureaucrats, that is all they are. with no imagination. how people put up with it, year after year, is beyond me. it seems that the population of dogs has been increasing, worldwide. really? yes, it is now approximately one-tenth that of humans. i would have thought it was much higher than that. the figure has been verified by the most conscientious observers. chimpanzees, on the other hand, have seen their numbers dwindle appallingly to where they are now an endangered species. but baboons have, somewhat surprisingly, maintained their numbers quite well. yes, the baboon is a resilient creature. we should all be so resilient. that is an interesting thought. but it does not seem that humans are as adaptable as they might be. i agree. rob and lois engaged in this conversation for the targeted 6,667 nights, and submitted the requisite paperwork to the guinness book of world records. however, their application was declined, and they continued to live in obscurity.

go

by nick nelson

illustrations by roy dismas