This challenge is produced by GirlieOnTheEdge with the following simple rules:
Write 6 Sentences. No more. No less.
Use the current week’s prompt word – BLANKET
Click here to hear the author read his words:
The Herald
The Herald is not usually my newspaper of choice, just another establishment propaganda sheet spouting the same old phoney statistics and bare-faced lies about everything and anything of interest.
Okay, it is nominally a Scottish broadsheet, but of course it has a parent company in London which has a parent company in New York which is a subsidiary of a gazillion dollar financial investment conglomerate.
Still, it’s a bit more local in its reporting than the London rags that put ‘Scottish’ in front of their real title and hope that it fools at least some of the hard-of-thinking – the Scottish Sun, with pictures of scantily-clad girls, the Scottish Express, still bemoaning the death of Diana, and the totally risible, utterly wretched, and oh-so-middle-England Scottish Daily Mail.
Furthermore, there is a minimal amount of actual news in any of them, just the blanket coverage of the topic du moment, viz. three years of Brexit, comprising May’s whinges and Johnson’s lies, followed by 18 months of Covid, comprising much obfuscation and Johnson’s lies, allowing everything else (such as Johnson’s other lies) to be hidden in a couple of paragraphs on page 7.
Strangely enough, given the above diatribe, the content of the analogue media is far from my main concern right now.
In fact, given that it’s mid-November in Glasgow, I would be grateful even for a copy of the despicable Murdoch’s London Times for a blanket as I huddle overnight in this freezing doorway.
Sound Bite Fiction 
Surprising ending but really a thought-provoking story.
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Indeed, a twist/surprise of an ending, CE. Well done, sir.
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Paper products have provided a barrier to keep the cold away for many of the homeless, and as many have discovered when remodeling an old home have been used as insulation before the newer products made specifically for that purpose were invented. Nice twist in the story at the end, following your summation of newspapers available these days.
I learned a new word too. 👏
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I enjoyed every utterly justifiable drop of vitriol expended on the dismal drivel found between the pages of those putrid publications! They spread their turbid tentacles far and wide: the ‘African edition’ of the Daily Express is one of the worst rags I have ever had the misfortune to encounter.
An satisfying and surprising ending too!
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Excellent twist-ending*. I still hold on to the wood pulp analogies Town Crier because it gives my eyes something to do during my morning hypo-caffiene therapy.
* imo, a proper twist ending doubles the enjoyment of a story, as the invisible sub-text appears without warning.
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Great surprise ending. Political statements all through and a surprise one at the end. Grand.
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Spot on about the right wing media in the UK. The titles you mention are particularly loathsome in their tactics. Good ending, CE.
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Hard of thinking 👏👏👏👏👏👏 and the ending 👏👏👏👏👏
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Smartly written, with a great twist.
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Vintage rant, ceayr. And of course as long as newspapers survive, they will always serve a purpose as a personal hygiene product. 😉
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Let me guess: You’re not the head of the Boris Fan Club?
Nice twist at the end. One can see why the narrator is not a fan…at all!
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I like the description of fooling “some of the hard-of-thinking”. Another good description: “much obfuscation and Johnson’s lies, allowing everything else (such as Johnson’s other lies)”. Good point: these papers are at least useful as bedding.
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Well, I wasn’t expecting that ending!
I was completely indignant about the sorry state of the print media and about Johnson’s lies, and then…
A suprise ending… which itself knocks on the head the stereotype of the kind of person who ends up sleeping in doorways.
A great, thought-provoking story.
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