Friday, April 28, 2006

Another BC Second

Cally gets a joint second place in a small writers comp!


alex

Aricle & Prompts

My 38th Article on Writing is up at The Internet Writing Journal

http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/apr06/keegan38.htm






TODAY's PROMPTS

Incidentally, someone once said that prompts and flashes "Are a waste of time". Well my two first places this year were from daily prompts. My Lichfield win was for a story that combined ALL the prompts.


Set your mind free and make the unconscious surprise you!






Bank Holiday Weekend

Painting a Door

The Secret Laptop

Telly and Cheesy

Checking Distances

Partners

A Truly Good Man

A Goodly True Man

Ping!

My Life as a Penguin

How High's the Water, Mama? Two Feet High and Rising

Here We Go, Here We Go!

Blackbird, Blackbird

The Efficacy of Yoghurt

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

And More

Today's Morning Prompts


Trouble at 'Mill

The Common, Five A.M.

Bridge For Fascists

Saxophone

Bliss and Custard

Last Minute Penalty

The Gunpowder Plot

Dr Johnson's Cure

Pepys on various

Coyotes Interrupt Us

Madwoman in the Attic, Nutter in the Basement

Professor Pea.

Is That Asparagus? No Mate, Fink Issa HouseMartin

1492

What Lies Beneath

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

More Prompts

The Echo, The Echo

Away in Spain

Dropped From Diamomd to Club

Running in the Morning

Severe Darkness Predicted Tonight

Plaster, Plaster

A Truly Good Man, Aurelius

White Socks, White Socks, White Socks

James and the Giant Pea

The True Story of Jack and the Beanstalk

Chocolate Sandwiches

How Long it Takes, How Long

Born to the Purple

PIN

Now I Am Back From Mars

Ghost Town, Formerly Known as BC

Monday, April 24, 2006

Another Monday, Flash

Today's Morning Prompts

Leader Board

Swimming to America

In the Long Run

Harry's Hamstrings

Harp

When in Rome

Bird Flew

Iceberg, Iceberg

Mrs Murray's Mentor Michael Moon

I Need a...

Cambrensis

Road Kill Recipes

Bingo!

Sunday, April 23, 2006

Rainy Sunday Morning

TODAY's POMPTS


View From My Office Window

A Tad Confusing

Why Seattle?

Sleeping With a Dead Fish

An Hour in the Rain

Six-a-Side

Dead Donors

Father, I Have Sinned

BOIL

The Accidental Flame-Thrower

How To Develop a Black Heart in 13 Easy Lessons

Bitch! Scum! Yes, Dear.

Mad BirdCow Flu Global Warming Aids Syndrome

Chicken!

Saturday, April 22, 2006

One More

Another BC Hit (closing on 100 for the year now), this time for TomC



And Spurs wil finish 5th.







alx

Finally!

Completed on the Chapel Friday Afternoon





Now just the small matter of a refurbishment!



Here are the BC Prompts for Saturday



Hangover

Trivial Pursuits

A Misunderstanding

Credit

Worms, Cake

Hugh Rynal's Funny Smell

Meeting the Hamptons

When the Light Comes Through Clouds

Reflections in a Dark State

Issues at Work

Pyramid, Square, Circle, Cheese

To Amsterdam, ASAP


Friday, April 21, 2006

Friday Morning Prompts

Clean Weekend in Scarborough

Swallow

The Devil's Bridge

The Duel

Running With Dee

A Sheep With One Arm

The Horror! The Horror!

Marlon Brando Wears Pink

Dinner in Dachau

Syrup Dippity

The Chapel, Finally

McMillan and His Music

Chronicles of Nanna

Soap





alx

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Limping On

Still very quiet in Boot Camp but TomC picks up a 4th place in a small comp and DaveP has an acceptance for print magazine Aesthetica, taking us to 33 Prizes, 93 Hits.

On the publications front, Alsop Review feature four of my prize-winning stories, two winners, two seconds, one from the Bridport Prize.

And after six barren weeks, I've managed a couple of flashes!



alex

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Why Not Drop In?

We are posting a set of prompts for 7PM (UK Time) tonight at Boot Camp, folks have up to three hours to write a flash or a full story and post it via Alex. alex.keegan(at sign)btconnect.com if you prefer the story to be anonymously commented on, or as a post in the public area of Boot Camp if you don't care.

We then meet up again (same place) at ten PM and begin discussing the stories.


Feel free to join in, but email AK so he knows you are "in".


Here are this morning's prompts




Tea, Run, Story, School, 9AM

Gin House Blues

Sky

The Last Match

The Blacksmith's Arm

Thomas the Tank Engine

Billy and the Shoes

Nuts & Raisins

Reasons to Be Cheerful One-Two-Three

La ci darem la mano

Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know

Sane, Good and Fucking Boring

Cheese

Hills, Rivers, Grey





Alex

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

After the Holiday

Well, I had a day of Bridge. (It would have been hard to play much worse than we did) and I ran every day. Boot Camp was like Grimsby on a Wet Tuesday Night.


Dead






Here are Tuesday's Morning Prompts


85, 85, 85

Well Done Manchester United!

My Name is Bond, Premium Bond

C Flight, Second

Ravine

Early Morning Run, Lapwings

Rumble

The Importance of Ernie

Badly Shaken

Diary of a Failed Suicide Bomber







Alx

Sunday, April 16, 2006

A Recommend, Sunday Prompts

I'd like to recommend a book, Mark Steel's "Vive la Revolution!"




Here are Suday's Prompts


Black Rain

Bunkers, Runway, Long Slow Jog

It May Be Her Period

The Beauty of Dying

Creakin' Back Into Action

Peep!

The Child, The Pomegranate Waiting

Tom Paine

I Tried Your Mobile

Shakespeare the Builder

Lane, Canal, Helicopter

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Easter Bunny?

Saturday Morning's BC Prompts


Lazy Sunday Afternoon

How Many Chickens?

If Rifles Were Art and Poetry Killed

Another Run, Another Knee-cap

The Pain of an Easy Finish

The Early History of Rome

China, White, China White

May Blossom, Repeat May

A story beginning, "Stop Reading!"

The Chick I Picked up in the Colosseum

Friday, April 14, 2006

Good! Friday...




Here's this morning's Boot Camp Flash Prompts


Napoleon Jones

A Bridge Too Far

All Greeks & Romans

Odeon

Bacon & Egg: The Chicken is Involved, the Pig is Committed

Metamorphoses

Flowers For Thomas

Bright and Brighter But Not Brightest

Two Men Dig a Hole

Vive La Revolution!

The Honourable Gentleman is Mistaken

Roses, Chips

Thursday, April 13, 2006

Wot No Hits?




No Hits (yet) today and BC is still quiet but congrats to almost new-member Julie on the birth of her first child, and welcome to a new member "Gab" currently bsed in Mexico.


Here are a few photos and Thursday Morning's Prompts.





The geometric thing is PJ's building experiment using dry spaghetti and marshmallows. It would have been bigger but we ran out of floor space.


Thursday Prompts (you could use the photos, too!)

Seven Feet Under

The Estuary

The Early History of Rome

Stirring Custard on Mars

Spam

When Madness is Attractive

Your VT Payment is...

Buffalo's Bill

Unfitted Kitchen

The Chronicles of Nanna

Builder's Bottom Tea, Six Sugars, Ooooh

The Calamities of Jane

The Arrangement

Daisy, Daisies, Buttercups, A Day to Die

The Terror



And a new shot of the chapel at Llyngwrryl






Alex

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Two Day Binge, Another First Prize!

I lost web access for 36 hours but came back on line to eight more Boot Camp Hits, another First Prize ($250) in The Lichfield, and ColinU with a nice hit at Pulp.net who pay £100


April is looking better now with 19 Hits, two first prizes


We also had two ex-BCer's HRd (congratulations Laurie!)
in the same comps (but we don't count these in our stats).

APRIL HITS

71 Nightwriter Flash to EarlyWorkPress
72 TomC "The Elephant in the Corner" to The Big Jewel
73 Cally has THREE stories shortlisted at Slingink Comp
74 Colu (and Colin has two shortlisted, also)
75 Cally FIRST PLACE Bank Street Writers SS Comp
76 Alex, (to be announced)
77 TomC HR'd in Bank Street SS Comp
78 Alex "The Long & the Short of It" ISJ
79 Alex "More on Napalm" ISJ
80 Alex "Not Enough Hints For Mrs GoLightly" ISJ
81 Alex "Well a Novel It Isn't" ISJ
82 Nightwriter Article at Bewildering Stories
83 Nightwriter SS at Bewildering Stories
84 Colin U gets £100 story at Pulp.net
85 R Jones FIRST PLACE Lichfield Prize $250
86 Alex Miguel Who Cuts Down Trees, Alsop Review
87 Alex Obelisk, Alsop Review
88 Alex Bastard William Williams, Alsop Review
89 Dee, a Dancer, Alsop Review




So that's 89 for the year now, $3,540



Alex

Monday, April 10, 2006

While the Cat's Away...

Just spent a week away sorting out the Chapel in Wales



Came back to a flurry of April Hits, one for myself and another Boot Camp First Prize



71 Nightwriter Flash to EarlyWorkPress
72 TomC "The Elephant in the Corner" to The Big Jewel
73 Cally has THREE stories shortlisted at Slingink Comp
74 ColU (and Colin has two shortlisted at Slingink, also)
75 Cally FIRST PLACE Bank Street Writers SS Comp
76 Alex


My shortlisting and publication is not formally announced yet




That makes 76 Hits for the year,
TEN First prizes,
30 Prizes and Places Total


Total Prize Money $3,090

Saturday, April 01, 2006

One HUNDRED First Prizes!

Recently, comments were made on this blog suggesting our numbers did not add up.

It turns out that the anonymous commenter was right.

We have checked our list of Boot Camp First Prizes and discovered that (a) two were not listed, and (b) 97 was in fact 98.

This means that BC's £500 Cotswold Winner (a BCer also won Cotswold last year) was, in fact, our 100th First Place.

I'd like to congratulate all the BC Members past and present, for this magnificent achievement.

To see a full list of these First Places, go to alexkeegan.com - click on "All About Boot Camp" and then "Boot Camp Firsts"



alx


Saturday BC Prompts


Stand Up History

Only 2,500 Dead

Return to the Forbidden Planet

The Knife Man

The Art of Faction

Caerphilly, Rising

Google Earth

John Brown's Body Lies

Where Ajax Lived

Rushing For the Train