Dog Versus Sandwich, July 2008

Dog Versus Sandwich offers three stories for the month of June. Daniel Euphrat serves up a gonzo, offbeat tale in “Jack and the Tiny Kittens.” Life for Jack alternates between sitting in front of the TV at home watching the Bald Fat Man Show with his parrot, Mr. Chirpy, and his job at the office where a tiny man with a necklace made of skulls dances on top of the water cooler and tells him, “I will eat your children.” Back at his desk, Jack finds a million tiny kittens crawling up and down his arms. That evening at Jack’s home, Melissa from the office comes over with her boyfriend, Edward, and Jack asks them to adjourn to his bedroom, where he knocks Edward out with him mind and tries to rape Melissa. But Melissa giggles and then disappears. Later, after his workplace is shut down due to poisoning, Jack returns home to find Edward sprouting a goat’s head, and Jack kills him with a shovel. In the park a little girl plays with a three-headed dog. The next time Jack sees the little girl, she is only three inches tall. Despite the absurdity of this story, I enjoyed it. Though pointless, it holds a certain entertainment value.

“Please, Shahryar” by Michael Hitchcock is a 100-word story about writing a 100-word story. Sound dull? It’s not. Read it!

Lisa A. Koosis’s “The Pastapocalypse” is a flash piece about—what else?—pasta and other high-carb foods taking over the world. Zeb fights his way through rigatoni, fusilli, linguini, fettuccini, and gnocchi. While “Jack and the Tiny Kittens” was pointless yet entertaining, this one’s merely pointless.