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Hit 500 words on a short story idea from a random chat at a diner last week
I was sitting at a booth in this old diner off Route 9, just waiting for my order, and I overheard this waitress talking to a regular about a stray cat that keeps showing up behind the dumpster. Something about the way she said "he knows when I'm having a bad day" just stuck with me. I pulled out my phone and jotted down a rough idea, and by the time my eggs came I had like 300 words of a story about a diner worker and a cat that might be something more. By the end of the night I pushed through to 500 words, which is a big deal for me since I usually quit after a paragraph. Has anyone else gotten a weird spark from just eavesdropping on strangers? Feels like cheating but I'll take it.
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charles_kim4mo ago
Huh. @patricia_chen67 I once wrote a whole scene from a guy's sneeze in a laundromat.
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patricia_chen674mo ago
That waitress, did you base the main character on her or just steal the cat idea?
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