Flatline, I hope to offend as many people as possible with this story. Options

[Jess]

Warning: Mature Themes

Chapter 1:Woodrow

Woodrow yelped as Daddy's extra-sharp steak knife pierced her side. Blood dripped out of the wounds and off of the meat cutter slowly, seductively, sublimely, ultimately falling and seeping into the cracked surface of the backyard. The dog had ceased its futile struggle against man's superior intellect and tools. The occasional whimper was all that remained of the proud dog's powerful bark. The white-gray fur around the husky's wounds was stained red, her mouth hung open, her eyes were struggling to stay open. A gust of wind kicked up dust in the back of the house. One more stab, for good measure. Clearly, the dirt had molested the dog, as her stillness gave way to slight squirming as more and more blood seeped out of him. I rubbed my eyes. That's why I hate Lester. So much dust and dirt in the air. Going outside on some days is torturous. The dog might have been better off dead than living in our yard day in, day out, but that didn't really matter by that time.

In life, Woodrow was my brother's dog, named after some president or some shit like that. History's for people who look to the past because they have nothing to do in the here and now. James, or Jimmy, as we called him back then, loved that dog more than anything else in the world. I still remember the day we got the Bit**. Yeah, a female dog named Woodrow. Stupid, I know. Don't blame me; I didn't name it. My brother always was kind of weird, if you know what I mean. Yeah, Jimmy was real excited about having the mutt around the house, didn't even mind cleaning up after it. Mom never even had to tell him to do it. Never seen the brat more dutiful about nothing. He's a bit of a ne'er-do-well, if you know what I mean. Never ever got a grade higher than a C, never good at any sports. Ain't never had much hope for him, myself. But that dog, he loved her. I guess they were about equal in terms of brains. The dog wasn't much more than a pain in the ass for me, though. Always barking or chewin' on something, pissing in my bedroom or howling at who knows what till the peak hours of the morning. Don't have to worry about that no more, though. Sure was annoying though, that animal.

I rubbed the dust out my eyes one more time and watched the dog breathe its last. The beast's heart stopped and that was it. I kinda stared at it for a while. The wounds still hadn't stopped gushing out blood, but the knife wasn't dripping by that time. Once the dog was done leaving his last stein in or near the vicinity of our house, I took a seat in one of the lawn chairs my mom had set out a couple of weeks earlier. Woodrow was dead, alright. Dead as I ever saw something. I could hear Daddy's truck pull in. So I stood up, closed and locked the back door, and walked into the kitchen, and cleaned off the knife. I figured it probably wasn't quite clean, so I threw it into the dishwasher and escaped upstairs to my bathroom. Daddy made pretty good money and, for a family in Lester, our house was pretty nice. No escaping that dust, but the house was nice.

Around five minutes later, I heard Jimmy scream. I was in the shower, getting any blood off of me. By the time I got out and put on some jeans and a T-shirt, I could hear Daddy trying to cheer Jimmy up. There wasn't any chance. That Bit** was Jimmy's life, and now she was dead. I smirked a little, but Jimmy was too busy weeping and Daddy was too busy trying to stop Jimmy from dehydrating himself via tears.
"What happened?"I asked, rather innocently, "What's wrong, Jimmy?"

"They killed Woodrow! You were here! Why didn't you stop em?!" Jimmy screamed in his shrill, high pitched, pre-pubescent voice, still clearly crying.

"It looks like somebody tried to break in, but good ol Woodrow gave em a run for his money. She died protecting the house, Jimmy." Now, I had a story ready, but I didn't even have to tell it. Daddy's attempts at cheering Jimmy up made something completely fabricated a fact around our house. I acted surprised, but soon retreated to my room so I wouldn't have to deal with my slobbering brother.


Notes: The first chapter in my next short story. Inspired by my Goth/kill them all phase. If you find this first chapter disturbing(as a bad thing, of course), you may not want to read on.

This post has been edited by Jess: Aug 10 2007, 04:58 PM

[Caspis Sinclair]

I believe that you will succeed in your goal, Jess.

It's quite a bit different than the idea that you were considering a while ago... I wasn't expecting a story about brotherly struggles.

You certainly got my attention with the first chapter, though. The main character is impressively cold-blooded (will he remain unnamed?) and I had to laugh a little when he simply tossed the knife into the dish washer. He has sort of a "Well, thats that... I wonder whats on tv?" kind of attitude about killing.

Clearly, the dirt had molested the dog, as his stillness gave way to slight squirming as more and more blood seeped out of him.

Ooops... you done called the Bit** a boy.

(I still don't understand why HMFarm censors "Bit**" and not "shit")



Well, I'll looking forward to seeing if Jimmy finds the knife or not...

[Jess]

I believe that you will succeed in your goal, Jess.

It's quite a bit different than the idea that you were considering a while ago... I wasn't expecting a story about brotherly struggles.

You certainly got my attention with the first chapter, though. The main character is impressively cold-blooded (will he remain unnamed?) and I had to laugh a little when he simply tossed the knife into the dish washer. He has sort of a "Well, thats that... I wonder whats on tv?" kind of attitude about killing.
Ooops... you done called the Bit** a boy.

(I still don't understand why HMFarm censors "Bit**" and not "shit")
Well, I'll looking forward to seeing if Jimmy finds the knife or not...

Ha, that isn't surprising. The choice to make the dog a girl was spur of the moment. It was rather immature, but I wanted the opportunity to characterize Jimmy and give the main character something to poke fun at. Well, the story isn't really about brotherly struggles, but I think I'll leave the true direction of the plot a mystery for now.

Edit: the main character will ultimately get a name, not sure when I'll choose to reveal it, though.

This post has been edited by Jess: Aug 9 2007, 06:23 PM

[kitten]

Well, Jess.... I have to say, Bravo. For a first chapter, it's definitely not bad at all. There are some minor things that I would fix though. The unnamed guy's dialect, if it's supposed to be distinctive, could use some tweaking to make it more interesting and defining - for example, he says chewin', but also barking, in the same sentence, which makes his manner of speech kinda confusing.
I really like how the characters' ... well, characters are so well-defined. You can definitely get an idea of how they think, feel, and act, simply based on this chapter, which is really impressive writing skills, if you ask me. I can't wait 'til the next chapter comes out! Maybe that guy will move up from killing animals to killing people... I've heard that's how serial killers start out.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention this, but I also like how the story's in first person - in the first chapter, anyway. You don't see too many "killing" stories written that way, or at least not that I've read.

[Jess]

Chapter 2: Dinner and a Burial

That night, Jimmy insisted that we give Woodrow a proper burial. Daddy quickly agreed, but he sent Jimmy upstairs, saying something about not wanting to give him nightmares. I had the pleasure of watching the 'burial,' even though it wasn't much in reality. Daddy moved around some dirt in the backyard while Woodrow, who by that time had entered rigor mortis, lay there motionless. Afterward, he put on some old gloves to handle the corpse, which he proceeded to put in a store-brand extra large trash bag. Having a dead dog buried in the back wouldn't have been mom's cup of tea. He loaded the bag into his truck, but it ripped, exposing the dead dog's muzzle. I supposed that was one of the reasons people should buy GLADâ„¢ bags instead. I offered to come along, an offer he accepted without thinking much. Daddy didn't like to think much outside of work. He always said he used his brain enough at work without having to use it at home. We drove without much talking, some country rock band was playing on the radio. The car stopped as a terrible smell entered through the windows. Garbage. Lots of garbage. Daddy was going to drop the dead dog in the landfill. A fitting end, I thought, to be sure.
We got home at around eight pm, Jimmy'd calmed down a little and Mom was making dinner. I don't remember particularly what she was cookin', but I remember it smelled like bacon. Maybe it was French fries. She sat us down for dinner after another half an hour. Daddy was kinda quiet that night, but Mom and Jimmy were having some kinda conversation about schoolwork.
"You gotta work harder if you ever want to be successful in the world, Jimmy," Mom lectured," Don't you wanna make good money someday like your daddy?" Daddy looked up and nodded, but he clearly didn't care too much about the conversation. Unlike Mom, Daddy was a good judge of smarts. As long as Jimmy didn't flunk out, he was alright with whatever happened.
"I am tryin', Ma. The work's just too tough, that's all," Jimmy explained," School's differ'nt these days, you know. Ms. Billy's some kinda Nazi, I'm telling ya." Now, Ms. Billy was the nicest ol' lady you'd ever meet. Never married, but each one of her students was like one of her own.
"Ms. Billy," I began in the politest tone I could," never gave anybody I know any trouble, Jimmy." Dad gave me a look that seemed to mean he was angry. Whenever anybody hinted they might just be better than Jimmy, he fumed. I knew right then it was time to shut up.
Everything went quiet for a while. Jimmy was trying to convince himself he wasn't dumb as a bag of bricks, Mom was eating and pretending not to notice that nobody was sayin' a word, and Daddy was shoveling down his food, bein' sure to give me the occasional glare to make sure I felt good and sorry about what I said, even if it was true. It kinda went on like that till I was finished eating. Right when I was about to excuse myself, Mom spoke up again.
"We're goin' to Aunt Maybelle's tomorrow for the weekend, so make sure you plan ahead, alright?" I nodded went to bed right after.

Notes: Nothing of much consequence happens in this chapter, but it does set up for the next one.

Kitten: The dialect is actually very important, but I haven't quite managed to come to terms with it yet. It is, however, supposed to be confusing, even if there were some oversights on it in the first chapter.

This post has been edited by Jess: Aug 9 2007, 08:17 PM

[bananner]

=o Yeahh. Jess. That was beautiful. I was going to post after the first chapter, but I wanted to see if the the next chapter would be as good. I like the first person perspective of the story. Not many stories that Ive read using that perpective turn out goood. But yours was greatt. Ill be looking forward to the third chapter.

[Jess]

Chapter 3-Maybelle and Mr. Winkle

Morning came too quick. As soon as I hit that pillow, the sun seemed to rise up to spite me. I was the last one up, as usual. Jimmy was bouncing off the walls, prolly excited about getting some free stuff from Aunt Maybelle. Aunt Maybelle loved giving us free stuff. She was either the most generous person to ever walk this earth or she wanted to get on our good side for one reason or another. Maybe it was a mutual thing and Mom gave her kids stuff whenever they came over without me and Jimmy knowin' about it. It beats me. Really, it does. But anyway, I woke up, took off my PJs, and took a cold shower. Some people don't like cold showers, but I like 'em. Warm showers just make me fall asleep again. I get real tired if there isn't somethin' to keep me awake. I guess I'm ramblin' now, though. I got outta the shower and put on something that'd be livable in the heat. I figure it must've been around ninety five around Aunt Maybelle's, so I dressed pretty light: a white sundress and a straw hat mom got me for Christmas the year before. I tied my hair in a ponytail and I was ready to go. I never really bothered dressing up for Maybelle. You know, she's not really my aunt. I'm not really a big fan of her's, neither, so no point in prettying myself up for the old hag. Jimmy loved the woman, though, so he always dressed up as good as he could. He wore a dress shirt, slacks, a tie, everything. I couldn't get a clue why, but there it was.

On the car ride over, I saw Mr. Winkle. He was my 1st grade teacher. He loved me, but he was a total bastard, everybody secretly thought so. Whatever, though. He lived a couple blocks down and was always taking walks down to our neighborhood and stopping by. I'd always have to come down and greet him, sometimes he'd stay for over an hour. Royal pain in the ass, trust me. I'm sure you'd hate him too. He was the only teacher that ever gave Jimmy a good grade on anything, and even Jimmy hated him. The old man waved as we passed by. Mom forced me and Jimmy to return it, but we didn't want to. Mom's word was law most've the time, unless Daddy stepped in to give his piece. That old man's smile. It was nasty. Everything about him was painful to look at: his overly short shorts, his Hawaiian shirts, down to his stupid comb over. It felt like an eternity just to get by Winkle's house.

The ride was pretty quick after that, though. Daddy was drivin', so we held a good seventy miles an hour once we got to the freeway. Hour or so later, we finally got there. Maybelle's house was pretty ugly. It was big, but it was painted the most awful shade of turquoise you ever saw. And, living in Lester, I saw some pretty bad turquoise houses. There must have been a goddamn ugly-ass turquoise house club I didn't know about at the time, I swear. Me, Mom, Daddy, and Jimmy got out of the car to Aunt Maybelle's twisted welcome wagon of Uncle Bobby(he wasn't our uncle, if you couldn't guess) and cousin(same, obviously) Jane. Uncle Bobby was alright, I guess, but Maybelle had him wrapped around her finger, if you know what I mean. He was a really fat man, prolly because eating had taken the place of his manhood. Jane was an alright sort of girl, real pretty, long blonde hair. Like Maybelle might've looked when she was younger. That gal was a painfully obvious lesbian though, at least to me. I might be the only one who knows to this day, other than you, now and her, but I guess that'd go without sayin'. She was always touchin' me when I came over and one time when I was fallin' asleep, I could swear she was undressing me as I fell into unconsciousness, just to sneak a peak. That last part could've been a dream, I guess, but I never saw that girl with any boy. I don't want you to get the wrong idea, though. I got nothin' against lesbians. I just like my privacy, is all. Damnit, you keep letting me drift off. Next time I start blathering, lemme know, would ya?
Well, Maybelle let us in and things went pretty normal, had dinner, Jane got a thrill out of my presence, Jimmy got some legos, I forget what the old hag gave me. Useless, though. As usual, everything got really boring really fast. Me and Jane talked for a while about boys. That was funny as hell.
"So, you got a boyfriend, Jane?" I asked, knowing for sure what the answer'd be.

"Na," she replied, " got a crush though." Her tone was pretty defensive. How she fooled anybody was beyond me. I told her to describe him to me, so she described a Ken doll for me," He's tall, blonde, strong, and really handsome."

"You got a yearbook, Jane?" I asked, setting up to call 'er bluff. She nodded yes and I smiled, knowin' she was trapped. "Why don't you show him to me then?" She hesitated for a sec, then said it wasn't worth findin'. She knew I knew, you know. That dirty little secret. Someday she'll come home with a short haircut and a girlfriend, I'm tellin' you. After our little talk, we all went to bed. I slept next to Jane, of course, just to tempt her. If she ever got up the courage to do something like that again, I woulda screamed bloody murder till everyone in the house knew.

Believe it or not, that was one of the better trips to old Maybelle's. Next day, we had breakfast and headed out. Same old thing in reverse. Freeway for a while, in town, Mr. Winkle waves, we got home.

Notes: Not much to say here. Getting around to the action.

Bananner: Thanks. I appreciate the post. I appreciate them all, really. It's a helluva lot easier to write when I know someone is reading.

Editz: Fixed some typos. I think that's all of them.

This post has been edited by Jess: Aug 10 2007, 01:32 PM

[White Mage]

Oooo it's a girl? Wasn't expecting that. Nice Jess.

Did you ever finish that other story? I don't remember ever seeing the ending.

[Jess]

Oooo it's a girl? Wasn't expecting that. Nice Jess.

Did you ever finish that other story? I don't remember ever seeing the ending.

That's actually an interesting story. Oh, wait...no it isn't. I just got stuck. I didn't plan well enough on that one. I did some crazy shyt and actually outlined this one.

[kitten]

o__________O I wasn't expecting it to be a girl either. Now I feel like an idiot. Man, I didn't realize animal-killing people were stereotyped so much... If someone told me a person killed somebody, I'd automatically assume it was a guy.
Chapters two and three were good, too... Only one thing. (Sorry for criticizing so much. ^^") The part where it says "rapped around her finger" - it's supposed to be "wrapped", I think. Okay, I'm done. :D
Can't wait for chapter four!

[Caspis Sinclair]

I wonder if anyone is NOT going to be surprised that the main character turned out to be a girl.

Don't get me wrong. I was surprised.


But then again they can be a cold, heartless gender at times...



You have such an odd way of adding humor into otherwise serious situations.

I love it. Really. From the somewhat silly reference to "Glad Bags" to the MC's (main character) tempting of Jane just for her own personal amusement... besides your sense of humor you really have a gift for building up a character's personality in a short time.

Your MC is the type of girl that would endlessly fascinate me, but despite my best efforts at the end of the story I would end up with a knife in my gut.




Don't just read Flatline, let Jess know what you think about it! We need more stories of this caliber.


(please try to space out your paragraphs a little better in the future though, Jess.. it wasn't difficult to read but it could have been a little easier )

This post has been edited by Caspis Sinclair: Aug 10 2007, 01:48 AM

[midori]

The first chapter was disturbing, yes.
But somehow, I always thought it was a girl. Maybe because of the way she called her father 'Daddy'. . . .
Anyway, nicely written. A lot better than I could do, especially on a gritty story like this.

[bananner]

o_____O Wow. That was a big twist. =O


But still very good. I have to agree totally with Emily. The whole non uncle thing confused me =/ xD But yes, it is gonna be a really good story. Cant wait for Chapter 4

[griffenhawk]

I actually thought the main character was a girl, when everyone said the main character was a guy I was like 'o_O' wah? Maybe I'm different but I could just tell the main character was a girl, also her dad was protective over Jimmy who was a guy so... you know, if they were both boys I think the dad would be protective over the older guy and not the younger. Then again, I thought the character was a girl in the first chapter.

Anyways, this story is really good, I never liked 1st person writing but this is really good.

[Jess]

Chapter 4- Bruiser

The night after we got home from Aunt Maybelle’s, Mr. Winkle took a walk over to our house again. I couldn’t make out what anybody was sayin’, but I knew it was him. that voice, I could recognize it from thirty miles. Anybody could. When he saw me, he gave me that creepy-ass smile he always did when our eyes met. We didn’t say nothin’, but Mom decided to ask ‘em to stay for dinner this time. That wasn’t too normal for her, but I guess bein’ overly polite was something from Maybelle that might’ve rubbed off over the last couple days. Since it was around five and we always ate around seven, I took my backpack, along with a hammer and a nail and some gloves, and hopped on my old bike. The tires were a little deflated, but they ended up workin’ fine for a few blocks.

When I got to Mr. Winkle’s house, I parked my bike near the fence so his neighbors wouldn’t see nothin’ and I hopped the fence into his backyard. It was one’a those real easy to climb fences, about five feet tall and no good for keepin’ anything out but possums. Old Bruiser was in the back. He was an orange cat, fat as hell, but I couldn’t tell you the breed. Never been much of a cat person. Not really an animal person, to tell the truth. Am fond of horses, though. Anyway, there was Bruiser, lickin’ his paws. The old cat knew I was there, but he either didn’t care much or knew he had no chance of runnin’ away. You’ve seen turtles that run faster.

I took the hammer out of the backpack. I pet the old cat a few times, to make him feel comfortable. I raised the hammer slowly, methodically, skillfully, so that Bruiser wouldn’t notice. Then, still petting him, I pressed down upon the feline with greater force to prevent escape and I thrust the ball-peen down upon his skull, first once, then twice, then a third time, to make sure he was dead. There wasn’t much hissing or noise from the animal, which surprised me slightly. Woodrow had whined constantly. The head was obviously misshapen after the blunt-force trauma.. Part of the bone from his skull had pierced his right eye, which had deflated instead of popping like I’d assumed eyes would do when pierced. The left eye, however, was intact. The rest of the body was in as good condition as the fat cat ever kept it. Daddy’s hammer was slightly bloody, but my hands and clothes were still in immaculate condition. Once any movement from the dying feline had ceased, I donned the gloves from my backpack and, the nail and hammer in one hand, the cat in the other, I walked out of the gate, sure to close it behind me with my foot.

I held the cat up by its skin, right on Mr. Winkle’s front door. In a difficult maneuver, I managed to place the nail in that same hand and align it with the wood of the door. Taking the hammer, I nailed Bruiser to the door. It took three strikes, making six total uses of the hammer. Two things surprised me while I completed my action. One, there was very little blood. Piercing the cat’s skin with a sharp object would presumably yield large amounts of the red liquid, but not much came out. Two, I was amazed the corpulent beast’s skin could support it. This made up for the lack of blood, at least. I nodded at my job well done and escaped as quickly as possible on my bike. No one saw me that night; no lights even came on.

When I got back home, I found out that nobody even knew I was gone. I left the bloody hammer in my backpack. There was nowhere else to put it. It was about time to sit down to dinner, so I hurried to the table to see a pleased Mr. Winkle along with Jimmy, Mom, and Daddy.


Notes: Thanks for the comments, everyone. This chapter is a little bloody, but not too bad. The worst is yet to come, I assure you. Any critique is appreciated and noted. As I’ve said before, I’m not one for proofreading, so things sometimes escape me.

[Caspis Sinclair]

You were really detailed in your description of the cat's injuries. It's almost as if you had experi-


...Nawww.



That girl is twisted. She might be a normal enough person under ideal circumstances but its not like the old man actually DID anything to her, besides being a bit of a creep. Lock up your pets, boys and girls... there's a seriously unbalanced girl on the loose!

[Jess]

Chapter 5- Dinner with Mr. Winkle

By the time I walked into the room, everybody was already sittin’ down. Was kinda awkward to be the last one there, Mom’d probably already called for me earlier. Things got less serious after a few minutes though. We were havin’ fried chicken and mashed potatoes. I think both of ‘em were store-bought, but I couldn’t tell you for sure. I don’t even know how fried chicken’s made, to be honest. Cookin’s never been my thing. I was still a little shaken up from earlier, so I wasn’t too hungry. It must’ve been pretty darn good, though, since Jimmy said barely a word. Mr. Winkle, as expected, started the conversation.

“So, Melissa,” he started out,” How is school going? Well, I assume?” I hate it when people use my full name. It’s too long for it to roll of the tongue good. Mr. Winkle never just called me Mel like everybody else. He was always doin’ that. Stuff like that, I mean. He didn’t talk like nobody else. Old man had to use perfect grammar, big words, things like that. Annoyed the hell outta his students.

“It’s alrigh’,” I answered,” Got all A’s last semester.” I always did pretty good in school, you know.

“Why, that’s splendid.” Mr. Winkle was big on splendid. Good, great, it was like it killed him to have a sentence without a word completely outside the vernacular. Hell, if it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t even know the goddamn word vernacular. “And how is tennis?”

“Still playing. You know how it is, Mr. Winkle.” I used to be a pretty good tennis player, too. I like tennis. You can get by on smarts and skill if you don’t have the brawn the bigger gals got.

“Wonderful. You always were talented.”

“So, Gerald,” Mom cut in. I dunno why she couldn’t have joined in the conversation and bragged about whatever I’d accomplished that week, but I was happy she didn’t. “How is your job at the college goin’?”

“Well, I haven’t been bless with any students like Melissa, here” he laughed that fake laugh of his like it was a joke, but started talkin’ again with a more serious look on his face, ”It’s tough. Children today don’t seem to have as much drive.” I dunno what the old man was expectin’. Lester Community College was where the losers all went. If you wanted to be somebody, you got out of the damn town. “Still, I’m making progress.”

Progress. Winkle loved making progress. I guess that was his excuse for not gettin’ anything done. Speakin’ of not getting’ anything done, the talkin’ eventually shifted to Jimmy.

“How are your endeavors going, Jimmy?” Winkle looked over and halted his eating. He couldn’t think and eat at the same time, I guess. Jimmy, who couldn’t even walk and chew gum at the same time, looked up real fast. Either he’d been waitin’ for a chance to talk about himself or he’d been dreadin’ it. I was surprised he was so damn chipper, though. It’d only been a few days since ol’ Woodrow kicked the bucket, but it looked like he was completely over it.

“I’m doin’ pretty good,” he answered as Winkle nodded. The old man knew full well that pretty good for Jimmy was dire straits for everybody else.”I got most improved player on my lil’ league team this year.” Jimmy got most improved every year on his baseball team. I‘d figured that if he improved so damn much every year, he’d eventually be pretty good, but I guess not. Winkle blathered on for a while and eventually excused himself.
“Well, I must be leaving. I wouldn’t want to overstay my welcome.” He had. “Thank you for your hospitality, Hope.” With that, he left .After everythin’ that happened, I was a little tired myself, so I went to bed not too long after.

Notes: Not much to say here. I’m just glad Caspis posted so I could avoid the dreaded double post.

[Caspis Sinclair]

Even though Mel is still seriously disturbed at least she wasn't completely numb to what she had just done (not having much of an appetite). She's good at *pretending* to be a normal, if rather quiet person though.

Sorry that I'm not offering any helpful critisism or suggestions... I just can't really find anything in particular that bothers me about the story so far.

[bananner]

I must agree with Caspis. Very good, and not much to critisiize on. But- i fyou want a suggestion....

With that, he left .After everythin’ that happened, I was a little tired myself, so I went to bed not too long after.

OMG JESS! WHERE IS THE SPACE!? You shall pay for that Jess. I swear.

[Jess]

I don't know how many of you read that, but I took it down. It just doesn't match the quality of what I'd like to put up here. After re-working(and possibly rewriting) it, chapter six will come up again.

This post has been edited by Jess: Aug 12 2007, 11:27 AM