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Message: <blockquote data-quote="alsih2o" data-source="post: 2039808" data-attributes="member: 4790">Maddman75 Vs. Sigurd Piratecat- Maddman75 vs Sigurd (who never posted a story)Okay, a little editorializing here. I hate it when people drop outpartway through a competition. Sometimes there are extenuating circumstances(such as in CarpeDavid’s case), and we understand those; we also appreciateit when a competitor apologizes for having to withdraw. Saying “Okay, readyto roll!” and then not showing up again isn’t fair or kind to yourcompetitors.Moral of story: please don’t sign up to compete unless you’re willing tomake time to write, and if you sign up do everything you canto write a story -- even if it’s one you aren’t happy with. That’s thenature of the beast.That being said, let’s discuss Maddman’s story.-- o --This is a funny piece. I like how it’s told, as if over a beer in a darkbar. The style is informal, the tone humorous.  There’s a few typos (“butbut”), but not a lot of them. The biggest strength of this story is thatMaddman does a good job of describing and expanding on the absurd. That’s astyle I really like. Unfortunately, this also ties into the piece’sweakness.I think the story weaves a lot of photo-inspired disparate threads that thennever entirely connect. The result is surreal. I think it may have been bestas a bad day that gets slowly more and more surreal, but the inclusion ofthe robot girlfriend (!) right away strains credibility a little too soonfor my liking. With the bulldog, we had a funny and believable scene; therobot girlfriend made me pull back and say “huh?”Likewise with the re-enactors and the elephants. The description andinteraction with these were funny, playing to one of Maddman’s strengths asa writer. They didn’t connect very well to the rest of the story, though,and that makes the whole thing less likely to hang together.  Interestingly,I think the explicit moral of the story weakens it. I kind of liked theending with Brutus rolling in the elephant poop; bringing it back around tothe dog is a step in the right direction.All in all a fun story. I’m looking forward to seeing Maddman’s entry inround 2. Alsih20- What strikes me right up front here is the strong picture use. Everything is tied together, each picture becomes a major point in the story. But it seems to be ALL about the pictures.  I think there is a good basis here but I think it could be stronger by wrapping the story together as tightly as the pics are used. If you have a robo-girl I want to see something else in the setting that gives me a tech-frame or time-frame. I am encouraged to see your next round story based on this one. Maddman advances.</blockquote>

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