Harold Roberts arrives last at the board meeting with a stranger in tow. The board members and legal counsel stop chatting and look expectant, waiting for an introduction. 

He takes his place at the head of the table as chairman and CEO of Wide World Amusement Parks, while his administrative assistant places a chair next to him for his guest. A solicitous gesture directs the guest to sit, and Harold turns to the board with a smile. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he begins, “we have a special treat in store today.”

Harold pauses while the others in the room react to the hum of machinery closing the window blinds.

“Allow me to present,” Harold announces with a broad sweep of his arm towards a screen descending from the ceiling, “the world's most terrifying amusement ride.”
A projector bulb burns to life and the title slide appears on the screen revealing the logotype “Carousel” as Harold pronounces the word simultaneously.

Silence ensues.

Here a nervous cough, there stifled giggles.

“Carousel?” an anonymous member of the audience echoes incredulously.

“Carousel!” Harold thunders.

The invasion began where the land met the sea and spread throughout the continents forever changing them. The warring sides fought with every ounce of strength. Survival was the prize.

Those that had occupied the land from time immemorial held fast so long as the interlopers were contained on the beaches cut off from the fertile fields further inland. The sand and scree that lined the water's edge offered little that the invaders could rely on for a firm grip. However, they had an advantage. They were more modern, better evolved than their predecessors, and their victory was a foregone conclusion. Looking back from a more civilized age, some could argue that their advantage was unfair. Others would argue that it was simply a reality.

It little mattered for, in time, the vanquished vanished and the victors thrived until a new invader arrived on those shores and the story was repeated. However, there was a difference. This interloper had different needs than the established population which ceded territory begrudgingly but thrived on what remained uncontested by the new comers. Thus the new and old subsisted side-by-side. 

Jerry kept his chin pressed firmly into his chest to hide the smirk that commanded his expression. He had the solution that his party had been agonizing over ever since the last election when the Republicans not only maintained their majorities in both chambers of Congress, but also increased them and won the Presidency. 

The other party members in the room rehashed the same litany of woes that Jerry had heard countless times. How could they reverse the electoral tide that set against them? The economy was improving since they lost control of the government. Businesses, freed from countless regulations, were once again growing and creating new jobs. Hell, they had almost replaced all that had been lost during the previous eight years in just one year of the new Administration. Obamacare had been replaced with new reforms and healthcare facilities were reopening. Medical professionals who had fled the United States were returning and the AMA was again encouraging students to train to become doctors. Premium rates had dropped lower than they had been prior to passage of the Affordable Health Care Act. Even the terrorists seem to be conspiring against the party. They were so busy burrowing out of sight that attacks were becoming ever scarcer.

DEBRA MURPHY HAD A VERY MESSY DIVORCE. She caught her husband cheating with her best friend, three neighbors, her tax preparer, her hair dresser, her bridge partner, her gynecologist, her employer, and two of their husbands. She severed all ties with them and negotiated a healthy settlement, alimony, and child support for their two children. Inasmuch as her ex-spouse had children with three other women, Debra didn't have much trouble with custody and visitation. He didn't want any. 

So Debra returned to the life she had before she married the “cheating bastard” – her words – except that she retained the house. She even resumed life as she had entered it as the daughter of Howard and Elizabeth Takken. She took back her maiden name. She also had the children's names changed and the "scum-sucking low life" – her words again – didn't contest the action.

Her friends and neighbors adapted easily to the new identities, all except Gordon Horvath, the elderly gentleman who lived next door. He continued to greet her as Mrs. Murphy no matter how many times Debra corrected him. “I'm Ms. Takken.”

Gordon would shake his head with his eyes foggy in bewilderment. “About what?”

NED WAS DISCOMBOBULATED  when Bob left the room. He had taken the only flashlight with him leaving Ned alone in the dark.

“Bob?”

Ned's shout elicited no response, at least none that Ned could hear.

“Bob?”

Shouting louder didn't help. 

The floor began to tip. What the hell? 

“Bob!”

The door opened a crack and the beam of the flashlight sliced through the Stygian murk but didn't illuminate Ned or the floor around him.

“What?”

“Did you feel that?”

“What?”

“The floor.”

The flashlight inspected the floor near the door.

“I'm 'enry the Eighth, I am,
 'enery the Eighth, I am, I am.
 I got married to the widow next door,
 She's been married seven times before.
 And, every one's been a 'enery...”

I CAN'T GET THAT DAMN SONG OUT OF MY HEAD ever since they announced this week's topic – Henry VIII – on the Writer's Collection. I'm a student of history. My head should be full of historical images. But no, I'm stuck in the land of doggerel. You know where this is going to end up, don't you?

No? Maybe you don't, not unless you lived through the 50s. Those of us of advanced years complain bitterly about today's music, especially rap. However, you haven't heard anything until you get an earful of the novelty songs of my youth, doggerel set to music.

They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha Haaa – Monster Mash – The Purple People Eater. These are not the titles of serious art. Disco Duck – Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport – Beep Beep. Dear God, I still remember many of the lyrics. At the very least I could sing along without hesitation. In fact, I typed the lyrics to Henry the Eighth without looking them up and am absolutely certain that they are correct, although I cannot remember what I ate for dinner last night.

JOSH STOOD ROOTED in front of the jukebox at the Oakland Army Terminal Officers Club, unaware of its unique feature. A film of Lili St Cyr was playing on the small screen above the music selection buttons that he was pretending to study. The truth was that it was his first visit to an Officers Club anywhere or to any bar anytime. He was only nineteen and a newly commissioned lieutenant from the Infantry Officer Candidate School at Fort Benning, Georgia.

A wizened captain sat at a table nearby smiling to himself as he watched Josh. “She’s as old as my grandmother,” he mentioned in Josh’s direction, “and still looks better than most college girls.”

Josh glanced around, wondering who the captain was speaking to. He saw that they were alone at that end of the club. Only a couple of others, senior officers, were seated across the room at the bar sipping on their drinks and staring at nothing. “Who?” Josh asked, perplexed by the captain’s comment.

“Lili,” the captain responded extending one finger from the hand that held his drink to point in the direction of the jukebox.

I COULDN'T REALLY SEE VERY MUCH from my seat in the bottom of the boat, so I stood up just to peek over the front and saw the backside of combers washing up on the beach ahead of us. They appeared dimly in the morning mist, against a backdrop of cliffs descending gently to an escarpment a few miles further south. A quick look behind revealed sea gulls circling over our wake looking for morsels that might have been stirred up by our propeller wash. 

We were in a race to the shore with hundreds of other boats. We weren't winning, but we weren't losing either. I guessed that we were somewhere in the middle of the pack the next time I peeked over the sides and focused on the sights to our right and left. Funny, no one actually seemed to want to take the lead.

I sat back down before anyone yelled at me for standing. Most everyone else had already taken their own look and there wasn't any need to discuss what we had seen. 

THE COLLABORATING AUTHORS of The Writers Collection sat around their virtual conference table. Some were sipping coffee or tea. A couple had snacks handy and at least one was pouring liberal doses of something suspiciously hard over ice cubes he had extracted from an insulated bucket that he kept off screen. He reached forward towards the screen with a grease pencil in hand and did something the others couldn't see. Most had never seen a grease pencil before. All wondered what he was doing with it.

At least two were scowling at Tony's portion of the mosaic that presented all the writers within individual tiles. He was the one who had provided this week's topic.

“Brotherswater!” Jack exclaimed. “What the hell is that?”

“Google it,” Tony replied patiently.

“I did,” Jack replied.

“We all did,” Nancy chimed in.

“So, then you know its a small lake in Cumbria,” Tony said.

Phillip Catshill nodded in agreement. He too was a Brit.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jack interrupted, “and two brothers drowned there.”

“So, what's your problem?” Tony asked and sighed his exasperation.

“Okay,” Jack challenged, “you write about one and Phillip'll write about the other. What's everybody else going to write about?”

ONCE UPON A TIME there was a place with no name. It was populated by people with names made up of grunts, whistles, and snorts. It was a really long time ago.

One man – let's call him Cedric, his actual name can't be written using ABCs – Cedric was full of ideas, but no one paid attention. They were too busy competing for the place's limited supply of food and water. Cedric was a small man with a very large head, easily brushed aside.

So, Cedric went to the largest, dumbest man in that place – let's call him Bruno, same reason – and began taking food and water to gain Bruno's favor. 

Bruno protected Cedric from the other people, and Cedric made Bruno a hat. It wasn't any ordinary hat. Of course, no one else wore a hat in that time and place. They might drape a leaf or an animal skin over their head, but few did as it made them look silly and others laughed at them. Cedric decorated Bruno's hat with fancy baubles, mostly colorful rocks and leaves that he had gathered. No one laughed at Bruno.