At long last! I apologize in the delay in posting this project. It was quite good fun, and I found myself spending a good deal of time thinking about my strange character and letting him grow through the month of December. Below are the submissions received for this project, I hope you enjoy them as much as we enjoyed creating them!
As always, I’m one to encourage slackers, so if you had an idea and never got to it, and you’re inspired to finish it, or if you can’t resist starting one now, you can be sure I will add them to this project post. Project guidelines can be viewed here. Just get in touch and leave a comment below if you intend to do so.
Now to meet our flawed characters and the New Year’s resolutions they came prepared with.
CHARACTER FLAW
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Bunny Middens
Wendy D, Cleveland, Ohio USA
This just came to me fast and I feel like its kinda like a fluffy version of Meat Wad from Aqua Teen Hunger Force, but whatever, it’s what I did…
Bunny Midden (Wendy D, Cleveland, OH)
Hello! My name is Bunny Midden. I live under the bed. I have lots of friends and family who live in the neighborhood. My best friend, Harietta lives in the hall. She really wants to be an actress. She’s always dressing up all kinds of things. One day she dressed up a pair of pants and she looked just like them until she was in the sunlight, then you could tell it was her. I was so amazed and impressed. I wish I could be more like her…
My Aunt Fuzzy lives in the bathroom and my cousins Fluffy and Foffy live on the stairs. Its funny, but they are never satisfied with where they live. They are constantly moving. One minute they live on stair number three, then before you know it, they live on four. I can’t even keep up. If I go visit them I just have to go from stair to stair to find them.
I have a very peculiar aunt that lives in a belly button but we don’t see each other much. She’s kind of uptight and not very accessible.
My boyfriend Dusty is still trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life. He’s a little scattered but I hope some day he can get his act together and really make something of himself. He has a lot of potential.
I would really like to do two things in 2013. First I want to trace my family tree. I have always been told that my family goes back to the Middens that came here on the Mayflower. I could be a Pilgrim or a Daughter of the American Revolution or something!
The other thing I want to do is learn how to knit. I have always wanted to make a sweater. Ideally I would spin my own yarn, but I may have to save that for another year.
So, anyway. That’s a little bit about me…Hope I get to meet you in person some day!
Bunny Midden
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Winnie
Robin, Chagrin Falls, Ohio USA
What is described below occurs at 12:50pm today, seriously. Unfortunately this is not a fictional story….
Winnie and resolution (Robin, Chagrin Falls, OH)
The new year’s resolution has not become apparent yet, except to say that if I get my hands on that cat, there’s going to be trouble.
In Colorado, all Winnie can eat outside is elk, deer and fox poop. Geez. Her 11th birthday is 12/26. Maybe by 12, she will grow out of this nasty habit.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Robin and Winnie
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Jeremiah McBraggart
Mackenzie, Ft. Myers, Florida USA
Jeremiah McBraggart (Mackenzie, Ft. Myers FL)
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Jareld Shirley
Shan, Cleveland, Ohio USA
Jareld Shirley moved slowly and randomly through life. It was in his nature, and he was happy as could be. At age 8, however, his mother burst his idyllic, lackadaisical bubble of content and began to drill into his consciousness the urgent and necessary task of learning how to focus. By high school, as his career in college was drawing near, it was not unusual for neighbors to overhear her bellowing to him “Specialize! Specialize!” “You need to focus your studies on something no one has ever done before. You need to make yourself irreplaceable in this world!” She meant well.
Jareld believed his mother, and did what he was told. He graduated high school with above average grades and embarked on university life. As he filled out his college application, he boldly and without hesitation declared his major as “Entomology, Ph.D., with a second degree in Public Health.” Surely the world would be in great need of someone who could lead the way to the future! Figuring out how to integrate insects into the American food system was precisely the way! he reasoned. He was way ahead of his time, to be sure.
As the years progressed, however, Jareld grew very fond of the little creatures he sought to exploit. By the second year of his doctoral studies, he completely lost the stomach to continue his research. He could no longer fathom that he once viewed his multi-legged friends as culinary ingredients. He wrote home one day:
Dear Mom,
It is after much thought that I have decided to abandon my original career path. My research was not in vain, as it has lead me to find my true calling in life. My studies have instilled a great love for these tiny creatures, and I can no longer bear to be a source of harm to them. It is my desire to now do what I once sought to do for human kind, but now, I will do it instead for insects-oh glorious insects!-I will help them! They are the ones truly in need. I have decided to enter the new and exciting arena (which I am pioneering!) of insect podiatry! In this regard, I will surely be specializing! Graduation will most likely be delayed a few years because of this change of course, but that is of no concern as I feel it is my duty and calling to help them and their multitude of legs and feet—there is no end to legs and feet in the world of insects, believe me—as no other human seems to aspire to this. I will do my best, and I will keep you updated.
Yours,
Jareld
Upon reading this letter his mother disowned him and the college promptly ejected him.
With no contingency plan and nowhere to go, Jareld descended into the depths of the campus to seek shelter. This was 43 years ago. He still lives hidden within the crevaces of the HVAC room in the basement of the Biological Sciences building, though no one has ever actually seen him.
Jareld Shirley, HVAC room (Shan, Cleveland OH)
He has since become a myth and a cult hero to the student population through the decades. Among those who believe in his existence, legend has it that if one were to find his way through the darkness to a specific water tank in the basement of the biology building, and place a scrap of food or an article of clothing behind the tank at the stroke of midnight, Jareld will find it. Of course, he does.
Most recently, a brave student who was leaving a piece of a smoked cheddar cheese sandwich, an apple and a pair of socks on a dare, found a neatly folded slip of paper on the hallway floor leading to the HVAC room. It simply said “2013 New Year’s Goals: Further specialization by developing a line of quality footwear for insects!”
