Posts Tagged ‘dreams’

woman with colourful wisps of light

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Cast of Wonders 491: Little Wonders 33 – Dreams & Identity

Cast of Wonders 491: Little Wonders 33 – Dreams & Identity is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 19:56 — 19.6MB)

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Show Notes

“In the Library of Longing” was first published by Daily Science Fiction, February 2021

Sleep Tight

by Mark Joslyn

You were right, you know. When you were a child.

I was hiding under your bed.

You knew it, even though you couldn’t prove it. Even after your mother kissed your cheek, and tucked you in, and told you there was nothing to be afraid of. Even after your father knelt and checked and told you there was nothing hiding down there. Even when you summoned up all your courage and looked for yourself, hanging off the edge of your bed, your trembling flashlight shining on nothing but forgotten socks and lost toys. You still knew, that somehow, someway, I was down there. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 445: The Pop-up Artisan of Drink Me Café (Staff Picks 2020)

Previously published as Cast of Wonders episode 434

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:14 — 25.4MB)

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The Pop-up Artisan of Drink Me Café

by Marie Croke

I came to her coffee shop, but never bought anything–things like that the owner’s bound to notice. Figured my days were numbered as soon as she took note, but my mom ran me off and the cold drove me in and there’s only so many stores one can pretend to be shopping at before people start looking at you all suspicious-like.

Took a coffee cup out of the trash and did the mime thing actors did, pretending to sip while I turned pages in my library book. Whenever the owner came near–wiping down a table, picking up dirty napkins, delivering a latte–I got all stiff, shoulders tense, waiting for her tap on them.

“Excuse me.”

Like I said…

“What are you reading?”

“A book,” I muttered, hugging the book awkwardly with my arm. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 434: The Pop-up Artisan of Drink Me Café

Cast of Wonders 434: The Pop-up Artisan of Drink Me Café is a Cast of Wonders original.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:22 — 25.5MB)

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The Pop-up Artisan of Drink Me Café

by Marie Croke

I came to her coffee shop, but never bought anything–things like that the owner’s bound to notice. Figured my days were numbered as soon as she took note, but my mom ran me off and the cold drove me in and there’s only so many stores one can pretend to be shopping at before people start looking at you all suspicious-like.

Took a coffee cup out of the trash and did the mime thing actors did, pretending to sip while I turned pages in my library book. Whenever the owner came near–wiping down a table, picking up dirty napkins, delivering a latte–I got all stiff, shoulders tense, waiting for her tap on them.

“Excuse me.”

Like I said…

“What are you reading?”

“A book,” I muttered, hugging the book awkwardly with my arm. (Continue Reading…)

Genres: , ,

Cast of Wonders 417: Please, Stop Printing Unicorns

Originally published in The New York Times, in August 2019

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 12:05 — 11.5MB)

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Please, Stop Printing Unicorns

by Fran Wilde

It shouldn’t need to be said that home bioprinters are not toys. And yet, as The New York Times reported last week, Fisher Price Waterhouse will soon offer a line of kid-friendly bioprinters in bright colors.

As a parent, I understand the temptation. There’s so much possibility here for creativity, for immersive learning through technology. But caution is necessary. The moral and environmental consequences of bioprinting extend far beyond the grasp of young minds. This is a moment for modeling moral behavior for tomorrow’s leaders, not a jumping-off point for imaginative hedonism.

Making bioprinting more accessible to the public — especially to children — will be likely to lead to even worse disasters than last Friday’s blockade of the Chicago I-899 skyways off-ramp by a herd of miniature unicorns. Sure, the unicorns (whose origins are unknown) were the size of ducklings, but their appearance caused several accidents and a moral quandary. (Continue Reading…)

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Cast of Wonders 262: My Friend Fishfinger by Daisy, age 7

Originally published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine (Issue #30, August 2007)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:19 — 14.2MB)

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Show Notes

Theme music is “Appeal to Heavens” by Alexye Nov, available from Promo DJ or his Facebook page.

My Friend Fishfinger by Daisy, age 7

by David Tallerman

Fishfinger is my bestest friend in the whole world. And she says I’m her bestest friend too, even though she doesn’t have any other friends, but I’m still the best anyway so that’s okay.

Her name isn’t really Fishfinger, that’s just what everybody at school calls her, because they say she smells like fish and she looks a bit like a fish as well. And she does too but I still like her and anyway they all smell too so there. My mommy says it’s mean and I should call her her proper name but Fishfinger says she doesn’t mind, she does when other kids call her it because they’re mean and they don’t like her but I’m nice she says and I’m her bestest friend so it’s okay. But really her real name is Samantha.

Fishfinger hasn’t lived in my town very long, her and her mom and her dad, who I call them Mr and Mrs Fishfinger but that’s not really their names but I can’t spell their real names, they used to live in another town near the sea and that was called Innsmouth. Fishfinger says it was nice there and no one was mean to her at her old school because she wasn’t different there, and nobody said she smelled like fish, and but then they had to move but she doesn’t know why they did.

(Continue Reading…)