Cinco Minutos! (I don't know how to do the upside down exclamation point)

(It's like five minutes, but spicy!)

The last green until Easter courses through my bloodstream, so I'm being fancy with the word sprint. And by fancy, I mean multi-lingual.

Vaminos!

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With the gun placed to his head, Toby realized he had no choice but to write.

You know that thing you do when you have writer's block? That whole "What would I write if I had a gun to my head?" Welp, now he knows. Thanks to the worst birthday gift of ever consisting of Sharon hiring a real-life hitman to break into the house, put a loaded .380 to Toby's head, and tell him to start writing, the words flowed from Toby's fingers like they never had before.

They were glorious words, words with meaning, words with passion. They were the best words to ever be written. By Toby, anyway. He was delirious with joy and wonder. "Sonuvabitch," he thought, "it actually worked!"

Toby continued to write as though his life depended upon it, which it quite literally did. An untapped reservoir of ideas and concepts continued to fly upon the page, unbidden. He looked at what he was writing, realizing he had the bare bones foundation of a brilliant story. It would be the Great American Novel. It would be everything Toby ever dreamed he would write.

But Sharon, being a total bitch, couldn't let him have that. After an hour, the gunman made Toby delete everything he had written and then stole the laptop. Fucking Sharon.

Five Minutes of MAYHEM! (and word sprints)

I got five minutes, I'm stoned, and I'm near a keyboard. Giddyup.

---

The man went by the absurd sobriquet of Barracuda Joe, despite being named Fred and never actually having seen a barracuda. Ever. Not even in a book or online. He had no idea it was a fish. Fred—or Joe, I guess—thought it was a bird of some sort and believed it to be resplendent. His word. Seriously. I know, right?

Anyway, Joe arrived at the address in the email at around two in the morning, several hours early. He had been taught from an early age to always respect those who want your company by arriving early, letting them know you literally could not wait until the mutually-agreed upon time. Using this logic, Joe was about to enter the home of a mob boss who was going to give Joe $100 to stand look out for a thing they were doing Thursday morning. The meeting was scheduled for 1 p.m.

Tomorrow.

Joe’s about to get his ass beat.

If You Want Word Sprints, You Got It!

(What's better than a five-minute word sprint?)

An interview I had prepped for is actually in another hour because I don't understand time zones, so I have some time to tear into a five-minute word sprint like a honey badger eating Pop Tarts.

Start that timer.

---

The Penguin stared at the clock, anger making his face even more a caricature than normal. The contact was supposed to be here by now. Oswald Cobblepot was many things. Rich. Successful. Short. But tolerant of tardiness was nowhere on that particular list.

He had discovered a street hood who could finally bring Batman to his armored knees. Armor. Penguin remembered when Batman was just some guy prowling rooftops, beating up muggers. The Gotham cops would use him to solve some cases because he worked for free and they were (are) too stupid to do the jobs themselves.

He took on the wacky costumed criminals that seemed to appear weekly, of which, Cobblepott was more than a little ashamed to say, he was one. The great thing about rising through the ranks of the criminal underworld to its apex is that anyone who remembered him in that ridiculous top hat and tails are either too smart or too dead to mention it in Penguin's presence.

Nowadays, though, Batman was like some armored comic book super hero with any and every device he could think of not only there, but instantly available for use.

---

Decided to go with a comic book motif, as I've been reading a bungload of them lately. There you have it. Five minutes of a Penguin story that didn't exist until now. You're welcome.

Apparently, Five Minutes is a Boy Band As Well as a Writing Sprint

(I got nuthin'.)

The analogy of using my word sprints the way a musicians plays around on their instruments continues to resonate with me. I'm enjoying these little writing bursts. I'm also liking putting them instantly into the world instead of hiding them away. One, it's not THAT brave; only a couple people visit here & I have to beg for those hits, and two, maybe someone sees them and gets something from them. Not necessarily the content itself, but the idea that not every writing sesh has to result in something permanent. Or even good. Even crawling is forward progress.

Start the clock.

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The band was loading their gear into the back of their "vintage" '87 Ford AeroStar when they saw it. It was behind a dumpster, beneath a homeless man who literally smelled like the living personification of a sour egg fart.

Johnny, the guitarist, was the first to recognize what it was. Given his upbringing in the food industry (his mom worked at Hardee's in the 80s), he quickly understood what was happening and moved to coerce Farty McChristthatstinks to move over a couple feet.

Bassists get a bad rap, but Bill sussed out what was happening within seconds of Johnny. He'd seen it and recognized, thanks to his patience and lack of ego, what it could mean for the band's future. Problem was, it apparently belonged to the homeless man.

Which, how exactly do you define ownership? Don't you have to be an actual person? Look, it can't be overstated just how bad this guy smelled. Someone who smells like that can't have a solid grasp on their sanity, much less their humanity and the concept of ownership. Fact is, it belongs where it belongs and we are the best capable to get it there.