Publisher: 100 Word Stories
Weekly Challenge: 197
Topic: Whatever you choose…
Submitted: January 29, 2010
Published: January 31, 2010
Participants: 10 total
Recommended Topic: Sick Puppet
A pile of coins were poured out of a small brown bag down on the table. Johnny looked at them and was silent.
“Well? Are you going to take any?”
Johnny looked up with a confused look on his face. “Which ones can I have?”
The man gave a chuckle. “Whatever you choose…”
Johnny started to reach out for the largest coin.
“but not that one!”
Johnny pulled his hand back and started to reach for another large coin.
“Not that one either!”
Johnny sat silently and then threw a dagger into the pirate’s forehead. “I will take them all.”
About the 100 Word Stories Weekly Challenge
About the 100 Word Stories Weekly Challenge
100 Word Stories
…And, as always, keep it brief!
The 100 Word Stories Weekly Challenge was (and still is) hosted by Laurence Simon—better known in Second Life as Crap Mariner—who built a wonderfully strange, tight-knit community around storytelling discipline.
Originally, he started a daily random theme on ScriberOptics via 100words on May 13, 2005, based on a photo, using a combination of everyone’s submitted words rather than posting a single topic. He would write short 100-word stories featuring recurring characters, such as Abraham Lincoln and the Mustard Man.
In June 2005, he then spun the stories into their own subdomain from his personal blog at podcasting.isfullofcrap.com, featuring multiple authors and guest entries. Rather than daily challenges, he settled for weekly challenges, which were due on April 21, 2006, for the topic “Bunnies!” It was published on April 22, 2006. He continued each week posting a topic and invited people to write a story of 100 or [sic]Less Nessman 2.0 words long. Most participants went for exactly 100. It was a form of microfiction—a subset of flash fiction—where the limitation wasn’t restrictive but creatively freeing. Within those 100 words, stories could be funny, heartfelt, surreal, absurd, reflective, or unexpectedly powerful.
Laurence encouraged contributors not just to write but to perform. He always invited people to record themselves reading their stories and send in the audio so their voices could be part of the experience. If someone didn’t—or couldn’t—he gladly read their story for them. Sometimes he even used software to alter his voice, adding character variety, humor, or dramatic flair, so every episode felt like a small production rather than just a reading.
The project chose to respond to the creative emptiness of podcasts at the time not with cynicism, but with creativity. Laurence filled the internet with humor, storytelling, discipline, and imagination. Eventually, the project continued under his broader creative umbrella, “One A Day Until I Die,” where he continues to celebrate the joy of storytelling in all its weird and wonderful forms.
Episodes usually feature everyone’s submissions together in one podcast, and listeners vote on their favorites. The weekly winner not only gets bragging rights but also the honor of choosing the next topic—meaning the community itself shaped what came next. Many participants came from overlapping creative spaces: writers, musicians, podcasters, and especially people in Second Life, where the challenge became something of a shared cultural experience. It wasn’t just a writing exercise; it was friendship, collaboration, creative play, and a small but meaningful part of internet history.
I even had the chance to meet Laurence once at the Second Life Community Convention, where he was handing out refrigerator magnets promoting the podcast — including one I still have today on my fridge. It’s a little artifact from a wonderfully weird, wonderfully human creative era.
This project mattered. It still does.
Paper/Wood Floor Theme from an old version of 100 Word Stories Circa 2009
Reflection
This story was written for 100 Word Stories Weekly Challenge #197, where the prompt was simply: Whatever you choose…
Most people would take that as permission to write about anything. I, along with a few others, took it literally instead — making the phrase itself part of the story.
What came out feels like something between a fairy tale, a pirate scene, and a moral lesson about limits disguised as generosity. I liked the tension of permission with restrictions, and the satisfaction of the character rejecting the game entirely.
I sent the story in relatively late on January 29, 2010, at 2:40 AM. The story was published on January 31, 2010.
Audio Submission
For all challenges, participants are encouraged to record themselves reading their stories so listeners can hear them in Laurence Simon’s weekly podcast before voting. I hadn’t recorded one in quite a while, so my intro was a little awkward, self-aware, and funny in hindsight. But that human nervousness is part of the charm of those old recordings.
Here’s the intro to the audio I submitted:
Hello, everybody. This is Lewie/Dedric Mauriac… uh… somebody. I don’t know who I am anymore. I haven’t done one of these in a long while, so I’ll… try and… do one… now, at the last minute.. or second… ok.
[Story begins]
