Is your child becoming a hacker?

Celebrating the very worst in bad writing, 2007 edition

At least bad writing can have a purpose: the very "best" of it gets rewarded in the 2007 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest:

Miss Cardinal mused over the singularly decadent manner in which Master Hammond consumed the steak and kidney pie and was reminded of the practices of certain cannibalistic tribes with whom she had lived during her travels in Borneo, not New Guinea, although New Guinea is certainly nice this time of year, despite the fact steak and kidney pie is rarely served there, at least not the kind made from sheep or cows.
Brad R. Frazer
Boise, ID

Agent 53986262.9 was strapped precariously to a giant Chinese firework, the fuse slowly shortening like a noodle getting slurped into someone's pursed lips, and although he knew he was running out of time and still had no plan for escape, all he could think of was the song about the Muffin Man and how the word "polyurethane" made it sound like the material was made out of multiple urethras.
Allison Kelly
Great Falls, VA

Much, much more brain-curdling "goodness" at the link.

QotD: Allergies

It's allergy season — but you knew that, if you have them. Your lovely spring days are spent fighting an Invisible Misery Cloud that makes your head leak. If you don't have allergies, you don't care, and you've already stopped reading, so we can talk about you now that you're gone. Has he gained weight? Maybe it's just those shoes that make him look fat. And that tie! Jeez. Last time I saw something like that, it had been run over on 35W by a semi. Anyway: I don't have allergies, but I live with someone who is allergic to the world every spring, and it's horrible. She uses eyedrops to combat the pollen, and from her expression they're composed of Drano and lemon juice. Then there are the drugs; make you feel like your head is filled with confused bees. It's hard to see her suffer, so I don't spend a lot of time at home in the spring.

James Lileks, "Allergic to Meteors", Star Tribune, 2007-05-01

Fiction reader's life-cycle

The Seven Stages of Falling In Love With an Author. Addicted readers will get this one, immediately.

H/T to Laura Gallagher.