All baby capybaras derive effervescent flight gifts. However, ill-meaning jackalopes kick sneakily low-riding minotaurs, never offer pardons, quite regretting silly trifles. Usually, vexations with xeruses yodel ‘zap’.

For context,

“Create a story that uses words that begin with the letters of the alphabet consecutively. For example, A big cat dug eight… But you have to go all the way to the letter Z. Try to make as much sense as possible. Or if you really can’t, then go crazy. Be creative and have fun!”

ds106 Assignments: A Story In Alphabet

This was quite a bit more difficult than I thought it was going to be. The constriction of only using words that begin with the next letter of the alphabet was a delightful challenge. I wanted to make it somewhat sensical, as much as these sentences are technically sentences in a grammatical sense. They don’t make much logical or normal sense, but what is normal anyway? It kind of turned into a strange folk tale and I am not completely mad at the result. The last six words/letters were really really difficult and are the weakest point, but again, they were very difficult. Thinking about words in this way stretched my mind in ways it doesn’t usually. Overall, it was a very fun puzzle-like experience.

Ashy beasts crawl downward, ever fearless, grinning horribly in joy. Kids lie motionless, never once piercing quietness. Rubble starts trapping us. Violent whines. Xylophones? Yesterday’s zone.

For this story, I wanted to create something with clear direction but a lot of room for the imagination to play. Only being able to use 26 works was extremely difficult, especially considering the lack of “I, the, and, he, she,” and so on. My goal here was to present some sort of attack by otherworldly beasts on a school, potentially in a world that is actively experiencing an apocalypse. The unwritten narrative is that these beasts work off of motion and noise, but can’t detect a silent and still target. In the wake of this, the school is collapsing around them, as the beasts have ravaged most other classrooms and are looking for stragglers. The final two sentences, “Xylophones? Yesterday’s zone,” hints at the idea that this world no longer has time for fun and playing, even in a child’s classroom. That, instead, is an idea of the past.

Written Assignment #1

A big cat damned everyone forever. Groundbreaking hairballs in junkyard killed lives maliciously. No one prepared quickly. Rare superhero tomcats used vicious whales xing Yellowstone Zoo.

Telling a story in alphabet may seem easy, however it was actually pretty difficult especially since I’m not used to telling stories. Once I figured out how I wanted to approach this assignment the process was simple though: think of the first words that come to mind (using the alphabet) and use them to tell a story.

I started off by brainstorming what I wanted my subject to be in the story. I first came up with “a buffet can…” and “a beer can…” but realized neither one of those things were interesting to me, nor could they last the rest of the alphabet. Now cats on the other hand… I could probably write an entire book on them. So once I came to the conclusion that I was using cats as my subject matter, I started thinking of things that can be related to cats or my cats specifically (which is how I came up with gigantic hairballs. Gross, I know). Once I started getting further down the alphabet is when I started to use The Free Dictionary. This helped me find words for the letter S, and the letter X; however, I still used the website to give me inspiration for other words like “Yellowstone.” Also full disclosure, in some instances xing is not a word; however in my story it is and it means crossing.

In terms of the story… well its quite simple. There’s a big cat, apparently in a junkyard, having giant hairballs. Then a superhero cat, comes and saves the day with mean whales that are apparently at the Yellowstone Zoo (which I’m not sure is a thing, but big cats with gigantic hairballs aren’t a thing either, so it’s fine). I envisioned giant cats were taking over the world, and their “hairballs” are actually the humans they were eating; however some of the humans weren’t prepared for the giant hairballs. I guess I also imagined that whales could be on land as well.

I really enjoyed doing this assignment, especially as my first one because it gave me somewhat of a challenging take on my creativity. I was able to see what influences my imagination, all while following a strict “rubric.” Which kind of relates to “The Joy of Painting,” because it overall brought me joy because of how ridiculous this story really is . I think when I’m interpreting “The Joy of Painting,” I’m interpreting it as “The Joy of Creativity,” whether it be painting, writing, or creating media. Creativity is a way of expressing one’s self, so in this case… writing about big cats basically taking over the world, was one way I could express myself.

Create a story that uses words that begin with the letters of the alphabet consecutively. For example, A big cat dug eight… But you have to go all the way to the letter Z. Try to make as much sense as possible. Or if you really can’t, then go crazy. Be creative and have fun!

Assignment Bank-Writing Assignments

A blinding crash. Darkness enveloped forests, glaciers, houses, jungles… Karma left mankind no options. People quickly realized something tough. Universal vanquish will (e)xterminate youths. Zap!

I thought this alphabet story would have been easier than it actually was. It was easy to find words that started with the letters until I got to U, V, W, X, Y, and Z. I could find words, but none of them made any sense if you put them together. I ended up not finding a word for “x” and ended up using a word that sounds like an “x”, but actually has an “e” in front.

I chose to do this assignment because I have no idea where this story could lead, but I’d like to find out!

As Berry crawled down escalators, fire gained him igniting Jesse’s knees. Laughing maniacally, nearby other people quietly ran straight towards unopened visible windows Xecuting yellow zombies.

I know I didn’t find an actual word for the letter X, but that crap’s hard!

Next, I chose a writing assignment that said to create a story using the letters of the alphabet. The assignment was three starts for a current total of 6 stars and one more assignment to go. With the assignment, I am supposed to write a story where each letter of the first word goes in alphabetical order.

Another broken CD eventually found grossly hiding inside Jake’s kart. Luckily my nanna offered (to) pay quite recently so that Ursulla (w)vouldn’t worry. (E)xcept Yolanda zipped.

This story sounds about as awkward as I had expected. It doesn’t entirely make sense and I fudged some of the rules with changed spellings and interpretations. Overall, I think my story makes some sense. Some of it doesn’t really, but I think it did pretty well with the assignment as I did manage to use every singe letter to create this store. The first letter limitations made it very difficult to stick to one plot, hence why there are around three. While it is sightly scattered, I really enjoyed writing this and having to think hard about what my text work would be.

A bright colorful doorway emerged from (the) gleaming hollows in Jackson, Kansas. Like magic, new optimism popped quickly right (as) she turned under Victor’s wing. Xandra yanked (the) zipper around Brendon’s collar.