{"id":22691,"date":"2020-05-13T10:52:04","date_gmt":"2020-05-13T14:52:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=22691"},"modified":"2025-01-11T11:03:50","modified_gmt":"2025-01-11T16:03:50","slug":"microfiction-post-practice-obsession-random-story-ideas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2020\/05\/microfiction-post-practice-obsession-random-story-ideas\/","title":{"rendered":"Microfiction Post-Practice Obsession: Random Story Ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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[Image: screen shot of my little form for generating random story ideas from a database of over 46 million possibilities]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This past Friday night, at midnight, I got my first-round assignment in the 2020 NYC Midnight 100-Word Microfiction Challenge: a romance (aaaiiieeee…!<\/em>), featuring roller skating in some way, and including some form of the word forget<\/em>… to be written and submitted electronically by midnight Saturday. I did that, and so now the wait begins: Round 1 results will not be announced until the last week of June.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While this seems like a long wait to hear back about such a short bit of writing, the reason is obvious: they received over seven thousand six hundred entries. I don’t know the back-room details of the round’s judging; I do know they’ve probably got dozens of judges. Each judge will be assigned to assess the stories in one or more groups (a\/k\/a “heats”: entries sharing the same genre, action, and required word). I don’t yet know how many groups there might be, but I can tell you I’m in Group 66…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this point in the cascade of numbers, the mindset of the former database guy kicks in and I start to wonder about all the data. Here’s what I can tell you so far, based on the list of first-round assignments:<\/p>\n\n\n\n