Escape Artists
PseudoPod => Episode Comments => Topic started by: Bdoomed on November 22, 2007, 06:03:14 PM
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Flash: Why I Hate Cake (http://pseudopod.org/2007/11/22/flash-why-i-hate-cake/)
By Paul Mannering (http://brokensea.com/blog/category/shows/)
Read by Alasdair Stuart (http://www.tangentonline.com/index.php?option=com_contact&task=view&contact_id=44&Itemid=98)
We ate things on dares too. A particular favorite was the larvae of a winged beetle called the Huhu Bug. These grubs grow to about the size of your thumb and they eat dead wood so they taste almost exactly like peanut butter doesn’t.
I always liked to fry mine first, having seen a friend run around screaming with one of these blind maggots attached to his lip with its wood munching mandibles when he tried to eat one raw.
(http://escapepod.org/wp-images/podcast-mini4.gif)
Listen to this Pseudopod Flash. (http://pseudopod.org/podpress_trac/web/93/0/PseudoFlash011_WhyIHateCake.mp3)
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THE CAKE IS A LIE!!!
Yeah, I don'r really buy that he mistook baby mice for marzipan. Not that I've tried marzipan, but I imagine it tastes very different from sweet, yummy baby mice ;-)
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THE CAKE IS A LIE!!!
Portal? :) i just beat that game.
the cake wasnt a lie! :O
poor mice.
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Yeah, I know Australians aren't exactly well known for culinary sophistication, but either this kid's mom's a really bad cook or his tastebuds are woefully underdeveloped. This whole thing read like an unconvincing urban legend.
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I didn't think that he mistook baby mice for marzipan, but rather that he picked up chunks of marzipan with baby mice in it. Presumably, the mice taste would be covered by the stronger flavors of the cake.
That said, the story still doesn't make sense because if this was the case, he would have eaten the entire mice. In order to leave half-eaten baby mice behind, he would have had to pick up half-mice to begin with.
On the other other hand (side note - I refuse to say gripping hand, as I utterly hated that novel), my initial reaction to the story was amused disgust, and it was only a while later that I started to second-guess the premise. Yeah, this isn't the strongest tale ever, but as far as horror flash goes, I'd much, much rather than more stories like this than incomprehesible semi-surrealist mishmashes of imagery like "Hunan Fare".
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i hope that, if i'm ever in that situation, i'd be able to taste the difference before i went back multiple times.
Yeah, I know Australians aren't exactly well known for culinary sophistication, but either this kid's mom's a really bad cook or his tastebuds are woefully underdeveloped. This whole thing read like an unconvincing urban legend.
interesting that you assume the narrator is australian.
perhaps your ability to place accents isn't particularly sophisticated either...
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Yeah, I know Australians aren't exactly well known for culinary sophistication,
Ouch.
Last time I checked a) we're not attached to Sydney via the harbour bridge b) had electricity for as long as the rest of civilization c) had stopped eating tourists who didn't know anything about our culture or where we are on the map.
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Yeah, I know Australians aren't exactly well known for culinary sophistication,
Ouch.
Last time I checked a) we're not attached to Sydney via the harbour bridge b) had electricity for as long as the rest of civilization c) had stopped eating tourists who didn't know anything about our culture or where we are on the map.
Wait, I'm confused. From the recent EP episode, I learnt that you are a Kiwi. So is this story supposed to be taking place in New Zealand? Regardless, I still don't understand what you meant by (a) - are you implying that only people who are attached to Sydeny via the Harbour bridge (which is either the entire continent of Australia or none of it, since the Harbour bridge just connects two sides of a bay you can otherwise go around, and thus technically speaking isn't used to attach anything) lack culinary sophistication? And (b) seems like a rather random non-sequiter.
(c), however, might have been a bad decision on behalf of the Aussies/Kiwis and may need to be reconsidered.
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Kiwi and Aussie accents are similar, therefore can be confused. As I understand it, this was written by a New Zealand writer.
The Harbour Bridge thing is an old joke - some people have thought in the past that New Zealand was so close to Australia geographically, one could just walk across the harbour bridge to it.
Regarding b), the inference was that "a lack of culinary sophistication" meant we'd (as in we New Zealanders, and I'll take umbrage for Australians too to help out the argument) only moved into decent western society within the last few years.
Yeah, I might have to reconsider cannibalism, or at least going back to eating mice, because my diet isn't sophisticated enough.
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Ah. Part of my confusion stems from the fact that I couldn't find any information as to the author's nationality (though I admit I didn't try too hard), and the narrator is British, so his accent isn't particularly relevant.
I wish one *could* get to New Zealand by crossing the harbour bridge... I've always wanted to go there and never had the time to take the trip, whether I was in Austrlia or elsewhere.
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The narrator is from New Zealand as that is the setting specifically set up within the story (and the narrator is the kid from whose perspective the story is written); the reader is obviously Alisdair and therefore neither Kiwi nor Aussie.
This was just bizarre. I was waiting and waiting and waiting for the horror part to kick in...I was sort of expecting that the kid would reach for something horrible in the dark pantry--perhaps his mother has some odd culinary habits he knows not of, man-eating plant, etc. But nothing horrible happened so I was confused, and then it turned out I was right after all.
I, too, don't understand how there came to be half-eaten mouse carcasses if the kid gorged himself on marzipan and cake. I don't put back bits of stolen cake I've already started eating... Also, I know mouse bones are tiny, but wouldn't you think you would notice them?
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That's so funny. I kind of liked this one. I thought it was extremely well-written and perfect for audio (Alasdair nailed the reading) because I felt like the character really was talking to me about something that had happened in his own life. Actually, for a minute, I thought Alasdair was doing an intro, because it all felt and sounded so natural. Then I remembered it was a flash piece and there was no intro. At the same time, I was wondering where the horror was. And then it came at the end. More of a gross-out than horror, maybe, but it still worked for me.
Different strokes, I guess :)
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That's so funny. I kind of liked this one. I thought it was extremely well-written and perfect for audio (Alasdair nailed the reading) because I felt like the character really was talking to me about something that had happened in his own life. Actually, for a minute, I thought Alasdair was doing an intro, because it all felt and sounded so natural. Then I remembered it was a flash piece and there was no intro. At the same time, I was wondering where the horror was. And then it came at the end. More of a gross-out than horror, maybe, but it still worked for me.
Different strokes, I guess :)
Definitely. It worked while I was listening (and is it terrible that this is the kind of personal story we could expect Alisdair to share?), I just started over-thinking it afterwards and poking holes in it. I enjoyed it overall.
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I really enjoyed this one. I specifically remember squirming and covering my mouth in disgust as the ending was being described. The commuters next to me no doubt wondered what I was listening to. I think reactions like that show the story and reading worked well. I don't think I would call it horror, but then again eating baby mice is pretty horrible.
I think the half eaten baby mice were a plot tool to show he had eaten them. And I think they were supposed to be dried fruits, not marzipan. I think the texture would be something like a prune or date.
Okay, I'm grossing myself out again...
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I think the half eaten baby mice were a plot tool to show he had eaten them.
Certainly. And while I was listening to the story, it worked pretty well. But later I realized it actually is inconsistent with the description of what happened.
(One thing that suddenly occured to me is that it would be pretty amusing, in a horribly cheesy way, if the "real" story was that the cake was alive and it was feeding on the mice. It was an evil cake! Evil, I tell you! EVIL! EVIIIIIIILLLLL! - *ahem*, sorry)
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Most of what I thought of the story and NZ have been covered. Although I must say I was disappointed about the cannibalism thing and am canceling my vacation I had planned. The one thing I want to bring up is the title. I spent the whole story wondering what the cake might be and some of the things I thought of were far more disgusting or shocking than some baby mice. The baby mice are more believable (sort of) than the zombie flesh I was envisioning, but after everything I cooked up they were a let down.
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I think the half eaten baby mice were a plot tool to show he had eaten them.
Certainly. And while I was listening to the story, it worked pretty well. But later I realized it actually is inconsistent with the description of what happened.
(One thing that suddenly occured to me is that it would be pretty amusing, in a horribly cheesy way, if the "real" story was that the cake was alive and it was feeding on the mice. It was an evil cake! Evil, I tell you! EVIL! EVIIIIIIILLLLL! - *ahem*, sorry)
watch out, the government might censor your ... insane ramblings... yea thats all they are...
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PROTECT THE TRUTH!
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I feel compelled to add my two cents. Whatever shortcomings the story may or may not have had, I think the entire thing was worth the phrase "they taste almost exactly like peanut butter doesn’t."
I laughed out loud. Luckily, I was listening to it in the car and not, say, in a restaurant or at work.
As for the consistency of baby mice: I think the bones would be less "crunchy" because of the age. Aren't newborn mammal skeletons still cartilage in large part? And I got the impression it was fruitcake, so the chewy/crunchy bits wouldn't have been as noticeable. The only cake I have ever had that was covered in marzipan was a (perfectly awful) fruitcake, so maybe that's where I got the idea of fruitcake.
Anyway, I liked it. :)
(The story, not the cake. The cake was perfectly awful.)
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I feel compelled to add my two cents. Whatever shortcomings the story may or may not have had, I think the entire thing was worth the phrase "they taste almost exactly like peanut butter doesn’t."
I laughed out loud. Luckily, I was listening to it in the car and not, say, in a restaurant or at work.
Anyway, I liked it. :)
(The story, not the cake. The cake was perfectly awful.)
this made me squirm like the weak vegetarian i am. laughing like a madwoman while being completely horrified is a not entirely unpleasant sensation. kudos.
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This was, by far, my favorite flash piece.
The accent of our dear editor meshed so well with the writing that I really thought "Wow, Alasdair sure is rambling on in this intro." for the first couple minutes. After that I was just waiting for the twist, expecting something huge like a hole to another dimension, or a homicidal half-vampire were-mom, that the baby mice were totally unexpected.
I came up to a stop light just in time for the prestige and was sitting there slack-jawed for about a minute just shocked that the author really went there. He really ate baby mice. I was even thinking "that doesn't make sense, baby mice don't taste anything like Marzipan!" and still held strong by the story's ending.
Great fine, nice reading. Thanks Ben and Alasdair!
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THE CAKE IS A LIE!!!
Yeah, I don'r really buy that he mistook baby mice for marzipan. Not that I've tried marzipan, but I imagine it tastes very different from sweet, yummy baby mice ;-)
Marzipan is a type of icing. It has an entirely different texture to baby mice. I suggest you listen to it again. It was the dried fruit and other contents that the mice were confused with.
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Yeah, I know Australians aren't exactly well known for culinary sophistication, but either this kid's mom's a really bad cook or his tastebuds are woefully underdeveloped. This whole thing read like an unconvincing urban legend.
I don't think Alasdair (the reader) was Australian.
I'm actually a New Zealander. Which makes me about as Australian as your average Texan. :-)
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I feel compelled to add my two cents. Whatever shortcomings the story may or may not have had, I think the entire thing was worth the phrase "they taste almost exactly like peanut butter doesn’t."
It's true.
http://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/research/biosystematics/invertebrates/invertid/bug_details.asp?Bu_Id=200 (http://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/research/biosystematics/invertebrates/invertid/bug_details.asp?Bu_Id=200) (are a wood devouring grub, and they have an odd woody flavour like peanut butter... but not.
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I'm actually a New Zealander. Which makes me about as Australian as your average Texan. :-)
How different can you be? I mean, you're just over the bridge from Australia, right?
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The accent of our dear editor meshed so well with the writing that I really thought "Wow, Alasdair sure is rambling on in this intro." for the first couple minutes.
My initial reaction, too. Nice little twist.
Thanks pseudopod!
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Thanks for the comments all. Feedback and hole poking is essential for making sure as a writer I learn stuff.
I've submitted a new story for Pseudopod's consideration so hopefully it suits their tastes as well.
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My God, when the realization came, I expereinced the closest thing to a jump scare while reading a story. :o
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The best part of this story for me was I forgot it was a flash piece, and I thought this was Alisdair's anecdotal intro... :-[
Not until it ended without an actual PP episode following it did I remember it was a flash piece.
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Choke. Retch.
I may never stop gagging.
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The effect of this was lost on me simply because I couldn't believe a person confusing the taste of baby mice for the taste of cake. I mean, the movement, and crunchy bones, and spurting blood didn't tip the kid off? And as others pointed out, it didn't make sense to have half-mice in the pantry, as that would imply the mice had been halved before he reached in there.
I did like the phrase "they taste almost exactly like peanut butter doesn’t". It rather reminded me of the food replicator in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy which, no matter what you asked it for, would produce a substance which was "almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea."
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Hahahaha! G R O S S ! ! !