My writing prompt choice: a sentient toaster or a time-traveling library book

I was stuck between two ideas for a short story last Tuesday: a toaster that gains consciousness and starts giving life advice, or a library book that lets you visit the time period it's about. I picked the toaster, figuring it'd be easier to write. It went off the rails when my main character started taking relationship tips from an appliance that only understands 'light' and 'dark'. Has anyone else had a simple prompt idea spiral into something totally weird?

3 comments

3 Comments

coleman.barbara1mo ago

My uncle had a talking GPS unit that would only give directions in haiku. It made him a much calmer driver, but he got lost in Nebraska for three days. Your toaster giving bad relationship advice feels like the same kind of logic. The weird spiral is usually where the good story actually lives, past the first simple joke.

parkerh381mo ago

Your uncle's GPS, @coleman.barbara, probably got lost because haiku can't say "turn left in 500 feet.

bailey.terry1mo ago

Read an article once about tech designed to be intentionally bad. Like a clock that runs slow on purpose to fight lateness, or a printer that jams if you try to print too much. The haiku GPS fits that perfectly. It trades being useful for being interesting, which forces you to pay more attention. My cousin had a camera that only took blurry pictures on purpose, said it made him think more about the moment than the photo. Kind of a weird way to make things better by making them worse.