Yesterday I told you things were going to get mixed up around here – well I hope you spent yesterday taking deep breaths, finding your chi and taking a lot of vitamin C, because this whole week here at The Byronic Man is going to be Choose Your Own Adventure Week! Yes!
Remember how you’d “turn to page 43” and it’d only be a paragraph, which almost always means you die, so you’d flip back real quick because “I didn’t start reading, so it doesn’t count!”? Good times.
Remember Choose Your Own Adventure books? Weren’t they great?? Well, this is not in any way affiliated with those, but it will hopefully be the same kind of fun. Each day this week I will be posting a section of a story. At the end, YOU get to vote what happens next (Do you go through the door? Get back in the jeep? Jump out the window? Pretend to fall asleep? etc.) AND vote on various items you’d like to see show up in the next installment (A bouncing ball, a dragon, a cloud shaped like a dolphin, etc.).
In addition to the story, it should also be exciting to find out if this is a terrible idea! Will it be more work than it’s worth? Will the story suck? Will no one read or vote? Who knows??!! Ha ha! It could be a disaster! Ha! Ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha!
Please read my story.
Anyway, for today, let me hear ideas: in the comments section, give me settings, characters, lines of dialogue you’d like to see, objects, pretty much anything you’d like to see in a story. I won’t work it all in, of course, but I’ll reach from the comments as much as possible. I’m very excited to see what you’ve got – and where this story goes. I hope you’ll join me this week!
The Byronic Man 
August 19, 2012 at 5:02 am
A standup comic finds his way onto the alter during a funeral.
August 19, 2012 at 5:22 am
I loved those books! I would always cheat and flip back if the ending didn’t look good. 😉 This should be fun. It’s too early for me to think of any ideas but I’m sure you’ll get plenty. Good luck. 😉
August 19, 2012 at 5:33 am
An intelligent penguin acquires a laser rifle and becomes a diabolical supervillain; only the dolphins can stop him.
August 19, 2012 at 6:18 am
::applause::
August 19, 2012 at 5:49 am
“Put down the curling iron and nobody gets hurt”
“You call that a dumpling?”
“Manatees aren’t native to these parts”
“I think I just threw up in my mouth – a little”
August 19, 2012 at 6:16 am
Unicorn signs into drug rehab tired of being everyones’ delusion. “I’m real dam it”
August 19, 2012 at 6:51 am
I missed out on the “make your adventure” craze! Sheesh!
Character list
The bully – Big Ben Bullwhacker
The crush – Tiffany van Keepyureysupheer
The nerd – Dickie Zittlecoffer
Add to the list Byronic readers!
August 19, 2012 at 7:03 am
*happy dance* Okay I am having a blast already. These comments are aMAzing. I don’t really care if you use any of my ideas as long as there’s an epic ‘stache in there somewhere.
Kidding. Kind of. I am SO tempted to pull from my search engine terms. But I won’t.
“Wow. I’ve never seen someone ACTUALLY tip a cow.”
“Yeah. Especially when they don’t even tip the waitress.”
(Note: This conversation does not have to occur between two people. I am picturing a bear and a bee…)
August 19, 2012 at 7:34 am
When I was 10, those were amazing.
August 19, 2012 at 7:39 am
Jay Edgar Hoover
The interior of a volcano
A very large linen closet
“We shall end this forthwith!”
Wine that looks like beer that tastes like vodka
August 19, 2012 at 7:40 am
Can there be stuff about BDSM? Because I don’t think enough attention has been given to that topic lately.
August 19, 2012 at 10:51 am
You are a hoot! Yes, throw that it in. Can you manage that?
August 19, 2012 at 4:43 pm
Maybe everyone in America knows this, but I just recently found out that 50 Shades started out as Twilight fan-fiction. I thought I couldn’t think any less of the series… I thought I couldn’t think the world was more unfair…
August 19, 2012 at 6:06 pm
I would rather read Fifty Shades of Earl Grey.
August 19, 2012 at 7:38 pm
I know. How did you not know that? It’s like writing about Stars Wars characters in a different setting. Or something. But I don’t know how the droids would exactly work. But yeah. Unfair.
August 19, 2012 at 9:54 pm
It always secretly pleases me when I don’t know that stuff. A few months ago (maybe a year?) someone mentioned Casey Anthony and I didn’t know who that was, and when they explained it I wanted to buy myself a drink for not knowing.
August 19, 2012 at 7:50 am
This is going to be a blast! I think you should work in a bit of pop culture into the story.
“Here’s my number, so call me maybe.”
August 19, 2012 at 8:40 am
Excuse me sir, do you happen to have the thyme?
One part sassy, one part assy.
Is that a torpedo in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
Hand over the cinnamon and nobody gets hurt.
August 19, 2012 at 9:55 am
Fun! I’m so excited to see what you come up with – and vote! Here is my contribution:
Bethany reached up toward the manhole cover, praying that this one would give. She was done. Her mascara was running, her prom dress was ruined, and she’d never wear a pair of strappy heals again in her life.
August 19, 2012 at 6:07 pm
I want to see where this one goes.
If my vote counts at all.
August 20, 2012 at 3:49 pm
Your vote counts with me! 🙂
August 19, 2012 at 10:08 am
Hey, this reminds me of the Choose Your Own Adventure I did on my blog. I let people vote by clicking on the direction they wanted. Shazam.
August 19, 2012 at 3:55 pm
http://wp.me/p1CLmE-7A Granite Countertop, Private Eye in Hall of Madness: A Choose Your Own Blog Adventure!
August 19, 2012 at 12:32 pm
“HOLLY SWEET WHALE CARCASS!!”
That’s all.
August 19, 2012 at 2:40 pm
A convent.
The mosh pit at a Red Hot Chili Peppers concert.
A haunted house.
Lunch ladies working at a junior high cafeteria.
“Maybe you should check again to see if it’s really dead.”
“Let’s see if this turkey can fly!”
“Oh, one more thing–if you drop it, it explodes.”
“Don’t eat the guacamole.”
August 19, 2012 at 3:36 pm
A sentient bottle of Jack Daniels sobers up and attempts to attend a local A.A. meeting.
August 19, 2012 at 3:51 pm
“Shazam”??? lol O, definitely work that in!
August 19, 2012 at 4:43 pm
Rosie the Riveter.
August 19, 2012 at 5:40 pm
Can one of the characters be that woman who tans so much her face looks like a tootsie roll?
August 19, 2012 at 6:13 pm
Man walks into a bar…
It was deja vu. He’d been here before, but he thought it was in a dream. Then the angel in his dream asked, “would you like a lap dance?”
“I don’t think it’s supposed to smell like that.”
“He wasn’t hugged enough as a child.”
Apparently this shit was just floating around aimlessly in my head.
August 19, 2012 at 6:26 pm
It was deja vu all over again.
a penguin
a pink wand
magic
a girl who does not know her powers
a boy who knows the girl’s powers
a psychadelic pizza (only spelled correctly)
Mario and Luigi
He walked into the door.
August 20, 2012 at 3:32 am
Yes, yes…
“Hey, baby, what’s *your* super power?”
August 20, 2012 at 6:22 am
Invisibility
August 19, 2012 at 9:53 pm
please let atleast one of the characters burst up in flames or burn down a huge something or weird rabbits…oh so excited
August 19, 2012 at 10:11 pm
You just made me think of R.L. Stine’s Give Yourself Goosebumps series, and I just regained a piece of my childhood. And yes, I totally cheated by turning back if it looked like it was gonna be a bad choice, because if you didn’t read it, it doesn’t count!
So in the spirit of that, you should include slime, goosebumps, and zombies in there somewhere…
August 20, 2012 at 1:57 am
It sounds like you need sleep.
But I’ll throw in an idea: The serial killer was the cat, Mr. Buttons, all along.
August 20, 2012 at 3:49 am
Seriously mate, I love your blog, you’re the dog’s bollocks funny, you really are and I will read the up coming entries and vote, but I’ve got my own crappy stories to write, let alone doing ‘jigsaw’ narratives for you. I’ll sit this one out coach, if that’s alright?
August 20, 2012 at 2:04 pm
Intentional or otherwise, the dog’s bollocks is THE BEST SUGGESTION so far.
August 20, 2012 at 4:46 am
I’m looking forward to this. It will be my first “pick your own adventure”.
Let’s get started!
August 20, 2012 at 7:00 am
Pie? Can there be… pie?
August 20, 2012 at 8:44 am
There should be a large pit. You can fall into it, you can look into it, but pits are hours of fun for the whole family. Also, just because I can; The Macarena. Yeah, you heard me.
August 20, 2012 at 8:51 am
“Please don’t squeeze the Charmin.”
Elmer Fudd
Dawn on the Serengeti Plain and the wildebeests were beginning to stir.
August 20, 2012 at 9:45 am
As it was our wedding anniversary yesterday and we are wedding musos, I’d like to see a wedding music mishap worked in somewhere…. 🙂
August 20, 2012 at 10:16 am
A man with two glass eyes
August 20, 2012 at 12:58 pm
Dragons!
August 21, 2012 at 7:14 am
Well obviously one of your main characters has to be a shark…or with shark-like characteristics. Or the story involves a death-by-shark.
And there must be a kitten. What kind of kitten? A LIVE kitten. 😉
August 25, 2012 at 12:54 am
I know who did it! Kublai Khan, in the drawwwering room, with a can of mace.