Writing, (mostly) not my own

I'm going on vacation in a couple of weeks and was hoping to blog a lot before I leave to help get all of my dear readers through the tragic, and all too quickly approaching, week when I will be doing more interesting things than blogging. Then again, I'll actually be traveling with one of my most loyal commenters, and I'm sure the rest of you can get along without my words of wisdom for a time.

At any rate, my efforts to post frequently this week have been thwarted by an unfortunate case of writer's block. I have a lot of ideas, but no good ones. However, last night when I was looking through my "files" (a fairly loose designation for the plastic tub containing everything from my birth certificate to the lease to an apartment I lived in almost a year ago, all my tin whistle sheet music, and every birthday card I've ever received) and found some books written by the kids I work with at 826. 826 NYC is a charity devoted to tutoring children and encouraging creativity and writing. They also provide superhero supplies to the people of Brooklyn. For more information (and a very unflattering picture of me) you can check out this blog: http://www.changesbrooklyn.com/2009/05/08/profile-826nyc/.

Anyway, I got to reading some of the kid's stories. I realized I probably should have started blogging when I was 8 because there is no greater cure for writer's block than having the unbridled creativity of a child. However, I'm still stuck. So instead of writing anything real, I'm going to give you a couple of quotes from my favorite stories. Trust me, these kids are good.

"The place was an abandoned apartment. Her name was Rosy. She was tall, lean , gorgeous, blond--probably had tons of boyfriends. She was wearing a white sweater, short skirt. Probably a cheerleader, you could tell. She had on the local school colors and dirt under her fingernails, plus her voice was a little hoarse."
-Justin, Age 10

"One day, at 12:00 am, when Billy Bob was getting honey from his bee cage, like he usually did four times a day, his arm jerked, because he's not that strong, and the honey fell all over his face and he fell into the closet, straight into the cages, and his shirt unlocked the cages for the python and the lion. The bees escaped. The python escaped. The lion escaped. Everything escaped."
-Tyler, Age 9

"Every morning when he wakes up, he runs over to check his safe of money. He then puts a big red check on his pajamas and throws them into the garbage (he wears different pajamas every day). He is 57, good-looking, nice, and cool and smart."
-Greg, Age 10

And my personal favorite (in honor of my home state and one of the places I'll be vacationing soon):

"In Texas, everyone helped one another. There were no worms, and families loved each other."
-Sebastian, Age 13