24 November 2008

Egregiously bad writing

I found these sentences posted somewhere long ago, supposedly as examples of poor writing by "high school students." It's not that. Most or all of them are a bit too clever to be simple mistakes. They could be entries in the annual Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest. Whatever. They're still fun to read...

Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a ThighMaster.

The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.

His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.

Her eyes were shining like two marbles that someone dropped in mucus and then held up to catch the light.

She was as unhappy as when someone puts your cake out in the rain, and all the sweet green icing flows down and then you lose the recipe.

The sunset displayed rich, spectacular hues like a JPEG file at 10 percent cyan, 10 percent magenta, 60 percent yellow and 10 percent black.

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