Wednesday December 24th, 2014

The exercise:

Write about: the man in red.

Since you'll all be reading this on the 25th anyway, I shall wish you a very, very merry Christmas and hope that you're spending it with family and/or good friends.

I'm not sure what time we'll be up at Kat's parents place tomorrow to open presents, but if this morning was any indication it'll be shortly after Max wakes up. He got me out of bed around 7 and we were up there by 8. And that was just because he was excited to see his cousin.

Most mornings I'm doing well just to have breakfast in him by that time. Who knows what it'll be like tomorrow with the added motivation of presents.

I should get to sleep.

Mine:

The man in red
Is on his sled
And moving rather fast.

He has to be
Because, you see,
This darkness will not last.

If he is seen
All will have been
Quite utterly for naught,

For in the light
We all just might
See his presents were bought.

2 comments:

Greg said...

I'm expecting Max to try and wake you up at around 5am, but you to resist manfully until 5:10 :-D But part of Christmas is really seeing the excitement on the faces of the children as the day unfolds, so it's something to treasure really.
Heh, I like the way you convey speed and urgency with the short, staccato lines of your poem; it quite gets the task ahead of poor old Santa across in no uncertain terms!

The man in red
Miss Febrile, the Film Studies teacher, selected another .mpeg file from the uploads directory and checked her list. This was from Lionel and Suzie, two children who were normally in Miss Snippet's class. She paused, her mouse hovering over the filename, wondering if she really wanted to see this, and then she got up and poured herself a Christmas brandy. She found herself checking the mantlepiece for dust next, and then making sure that there were satsumas in the stockings hanging there, and then she needed to refill her glass; finally she accepted that she was delaying the inevitable and sat down again. She double-clicked on the filename: The man in red

The film started with Suzie sitting in what looked like a portacabin, leaning over what might have been blueprints for a multi-story car-park. There was a large-buttoned beige calculator to her right, and a notepad with pencilled figures to her left. She appeared to be muttering under her breath.
"It puts the lotion in the basket," came a breathy, sticky voice from somewhere behind her. Miss Febrile felt her skin crawl, and she forced herself to wonder if "the man in red" was a Hitchcock reference. "It puts the flenser in the basket...."
"Yes, Santa," said Suzie, not looking up. "And why do we put lotion and flensers in the basket?"
"Because Santa is collecting payment for the presents this year."
"Exactly," said Suzie. She moved, the camera panning with her, and looked at a spreadsheet on a laptop. There were some very large numbers visible there. "And what are acceptable payments?"
"Money or skin." The voice sounded wet, as though the speaker had too much saliva and couldn't swallow it all before speaking.
"Skin because...?"
"Because Santa wants his own back."
The camera pulled back, revealing what had to be Lionel, but it looked like someone had skinned Santa. A head with wet, red muscle showing over gleams of white bone looked into the camera, dark eyes glistening. A chest; more muscle, but now dotted with yellowish-white patches of fat, and then a red Santa coat was being drawn over it.
"Ho. Ho. Ho." coughed Santa, each sound like a water balloon splattering on the pavement below.
A hand fell on Miss Febrile's shoulder, and she screamed.

Marc said...

Greg - yeah, Christmas has become exciting again with the kids around. All my favorite memories from this Christmas certainly involve them!

What a delightfully horrific Christmas story you've given us here. Only you, my friend. Only you :)