David V. Matthews

Flash Fiction (a Hundred Words or Fewer) #66: The Paul Lynde Show (1972-73)

From TV Guide, September 9, 1972, p. 53. Running across this image on my Facebook feed this morning inspired me to bring you yet another Flasher.–DVM, January 6, 2020, 11:33 AM EST

I may have watched some snippets of this lame sitcom as an eight-year-old in 1972. As with so many other kids back then, I’d watch anything on TV—good, bad, it didn’t matter, as long as it numbed my mind. Anyway, I remember nothing about this show except hearing the, uh, flamboyant Lynde say “Eeeeugh” after his supergenius son-in-law has once again done something idiotic, though perhaps I’ve made up this memory. Perhaps my status back then as a closeted gay boy in a gay-unfriendly environment has compelled me toward imagining myself as precociously hip.

Flash Fiction (a Hundred Words or Fewer) #65: Chaff

I know I had a three-month relationship between marriages, twenty years ago, but I can barely recall the guy in question. He wore blue three-piece suits, and had a mole on I think his right cheek. Otherwise, nothing. I can’t even remember his name—Dan? Stan? We must have had sex at least once, at least I have the feeling we did, which makes my haziness regarding him a bit surprising, since I never forget a sexual partner, even the lame ones. Perhaps as I’ve grown older, my brain has started sorting out the chaff; everyone wants a chaffless life.

Flash Fiction (a Hundred Words or Fewer) #64: Dicks with Chicks

Yo, incels: I know why the worst Chads nab the hottest Stacys. Years ago, those Chads started feigning Chaddishness. They pretended they’d lost their virginity during grade school; they pretended their sexual conquests totaled in the quadruple-digits; they pretended they didn’t have crushing student-loan debt. And eventually, the fake Chads turned into real ones. Stacys drool over male confidence, real or not, the best way to distract themselves from worrying about climate catastrophe (or about Black Lives Matter, depending upon the Stacys’ politics).

Sex can both enlighten and pacify you; thus, dicks with chicks epitomize purple haze: a red-pill/blue-pill combo.