I won! I won! I won! I wo... shut up, we know it now.

Last week I entered the writing contest John Scalzi was having on his own blog Whatever. The goal was simple: describe the events of the night of 19 August, 1994.

I wrote a little piece of statistics concerning that particular night. To my great delight last monday Scalzi declared the winners and I was the second runner up! <>

It's really amazing to be selected from all the different entries, a lot of entries were really good so I am really honored mine got picked out.

So what did I get? Well I will receive a autographed book by John Scalzi, which is very cool. So now whenever I lend out a book I can lend that one and just casually flip open the first page with the autograph. 'Oh yes, that. I can still remember how I got that one: it was the night of 19 august, 1994 and I was left with two others after a gruelling 72 hour lasting battle royale that started with 300 fame starving writers... "

Ahum, sorry about that.

And of course I also got my fifteen minutes of fame. My little piece got to shine next to the two other winnners, and you should really read those as both are brilliant pieces. Plus people really made nice comments. Reading that people enjoyed my little piece really put a smile on my face. Commenter 26 thanks for rooting for me!

So what will I do now? Well to be honest this contest really uncorked a bit of creativity, so I guess I will keep writing more. Look out for more flash fiction soon to come here.

Gim out.

The night of 19 August, 1994.

John Scalzi is holding a little contest at his blog Whatever; you can win a signed copy of his new book Zoe's Tale. The goal is simple: describe the events on the night of 19 August, 1994.

So I decided to have a go at it and the result is already posted on the comment thread for the contest. But of course I wouldn't want to deprive you guys from my writings, so without further ado:

The night of 19 August, 1994.

4.789.677.003 ideas were born.
80% involved sex.
45% were already forgotten after five seconds.
10,5% were big ideas for a novel, 1 of them eventually got blurbed on Whatever, another was unmasked as fiction on the Oprah Winfrey Show.
5,6% resulted in a divorce.
0,0001% had the solution to world peace, unfortunate it was thought up by a cat who’s owner mistook his message for peace as a cry for food. The cat had a nice diner.

30.887.239.969²³ spermatozoa went on a voyage that night.
99,99% panicked when they discovered they were out in the open air. They died within
five minutes.
0,004% kept bumping against glass. Then the cold came.
0,005% got on the right racing track but were thwarted by another team. The other
team was sponsored by milkman inc.
0,001% Made it to the egg. They were very pleased with the result nine months later.

3.987.452.221 pounds of food was consumed
74,5% consumed by humans. Icecream was a favorite that night.
25% consumed by animals. They loved their grass.
0,5% consumed by mould. Silently plotting their bid for world domination
0,0023% was human consumed by animals. Eight pandas had indigestion afterwards.

256.666 persons claimed to have a supernatural encounter.
68% claimed to be abducted by aliens. They had the sore ass to prove it.
12% said they spoke with God. One actually had.
11% reported they were terrorized by gnomes. The gnomes allied with the mould.
9% encountered a ghost. 20 people had watched a video seven days before.

3.798.333.113 pairs of shoes were used.
77% suffocated due to sweaty feet.
12,5% conducted sabotage against their slave-masters.
6% were thrown away. Enduring afterlife on the seventh tier of Hell: the fiery field of
chew toys for dogs.
4,5% were missed in action. They will be remembered.

23.566.016 acts of kindness were perpetrated.
68% involved candy, flowers and remembering a birthday or anniversary. They had an
assistant with a good memory.
18% was a kind word or two. Being kind only takes a minute sometimes.
12% was helping old ladies across the road. 255 grannies yelled they didn’t need to cross
the road.
2% was extraordinary. You can rent the movies to see it.