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Saturday, January 15, 2011

The lottery ticket - Mrs. Jenny Matlock's Saturday Centus Week 37

Saturday Centus - Hey! Wake up! It's another Shake-up!

Jenny Matlock

Welcome to week thirty-seven of Saturday Centus.
To read Mrs. Jenny's instructions, please scroll down past my SC-text!


Here is my text:

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After the avalanche, we spotted something red in the snow. Seeing that it was held in a hand, we dug him out quickly. The lottery ticket saved him.*
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Word count by hand count:25

*Some background information:
I'm not being very original today. This short-short fictional 25+3-word-text is based upon a true story, that a friend told me. It happened in Sweden in the 1930's or 40's.
A man who had been grouse-shooting in the mountains, got buried under the snow during a storm or snowslide. He was buried so deeply that he could not move enough to get himself up out of the snow.
Finding a red movie ticket-stub in his pocket he reached with his hand as far as he could in the direction that he believed to be up to the surface, before blacking out.
He was found alive and rescued, but the injuries - both physical and psychological - that he suffered because of this terrible experience, drove him into a depression that lead to him taking his own life some years later.
This is such a sad story. It took a long time for the ski-patrol to find him, not having helicopters or special heat-cameras that would have sped things up. The little red cinema-ticket-stub was all he had to show his postion in the white masses of snow.
I like to think that my little 28-word-story about a lottery ticket instead of a movie ticket-stub has a happier ending.
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Best wishes,
Anna

First Commenter:
Lin of
Duck and Wheel with String




Here are Mrs. Jenny's instructions:

I think we all need to continue to shake things up a little bit for the New Year so this week we'll continue doing that. I'll tell you more in a moment, but go ahead and curse me now!

This week, we're going to go further with a shake up and do a micro-fiction Saturday Centus. Shakespeare writes, 'brevity is the soul of wit' and with that in mind, here are this weeks instructions.

Your SC can be a story of your choosing - fact, fiction, or poetry but this week you will only have twenty-five words (plus the three words for the prompt) for your story.

Twenty. Five.

Yes. I said it. I stick by it. I figure you don't know where I live so you can't come and beat me up. 2. 5.

And now...for this weeks prompt...

"The lottery ticket..."

You have the entire week to link your work to the meme and you can link more than one story if you like. Please try mightily to visit all the other weeks. There are some great writers participating in this meme AND it will be a zippy quick read this week for sure!

Please display link button or just a hyper-link back to Saturday Centus. Be careful to link your SC URL to the Linky and not just link to your main blog.

Please e-mail me directly with ???'s or ask your question in a comment and I will do my best to get back to you as soon as possible.

Link anytime between now and next Saturday morning.


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