Tag Archives: DDoA

TBM-2512.04 – Dog Days of Advent: Snowglobe

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DDOA-04

Description:

Welcome to the Dog Days of Advent. I made a list of prompts, and wrote a bite-sized story for each one. They don’t live in the same universe, but they’re all a little off-kilter from what you might expect from holiday fare. And if you pay attention, you’ll notice that the last line of each story becomes the first line of the next. Today’s prompt is Snowglobe.

Excerpt:

The lights above them pulse, soft as breathing. She remembers that first storm — the fear of the power failing, the scramble to secure the greenhouse domes, the way they’d worked side by side in the cold until dawn. That was when it began, really: not the flirtation or the laughter, but the quiet respect that came from surviving something together.

Episode Cast:

Melissa A. Bartell

Links and References

Credits:

  • The Bathtub Mermaid: Tales from the Tub is written and produced by Melissa A. Bartell, and is recorded and produced using Audacity.
  • Bathtub Mermaid blog header art was created by Rebecca Moran of Moran Media
  • Sound Effects and Music are from Freesound and UppBeat

Contact:

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:12 — 6.8MB)

TBM-2512.03 – Dog Days of Advent: Orbit

by

DDOA-03

Description:

Welcome to the Dog Days of Advent. I made a list of prompts, and wrote a bite-sized story for each one. They don’t live in the same universe, but they’re all a little off-kilter from what you might expect from holiday fare. And if you pay attention, you’ll notice that the last line of each story becomes the first line of the next. Today’s prompt is orbit.

Excerpt:

Below her, ribbons of green and violet curl across the poles, shimmering like breath against the night. It’s not the first aurora she’s seen from orbit, but this one feels different — brighter, alive. She thinks of the Christmas lights her father used to hang along the eaves of their house, blinking patterns that never quite synced. He’d laugh every year and say, “Perfection’s overrated, sweetheart. Just make it shine.”

Episode Cast:

Melissa A. Bartell

Links and References

Credits:

  • The Bathtub Mermaid: Tales from the Tub is written and produced by Melissa A. Bartell, and is recorded and produced using Audacity.
  • Bathtub Mermaid blog header art was created by Rebecca Moran of Moran Media
  • Sound Effects and Music are from Freesound and UppBeat

Contact:

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:14 — 6.2MB)

TBM-2512.02 – Dog Days of Advent: Hearth

by

DDOA-02

Description:

Welcome to the Dog Days of Advent. I made a list of prompts, and wrote a bite-sized story for each one. They don’t live in the same universe, but they’re all a little off-kilter from what you might expect from holiday fare. And if you pay attention, you’ll notice that the last line of each story becomes the first line of the next. Today’s prompt is hearth.

Excerpt:

Outside, the church bells strike midnight — exactly on time.

Inside the café, the world softens around the edges. The espresso machine has gone quiet, its metal belly releasing one last sigh of steam. She wipes down the counter in slow, practiced circles. When she finishes, she pours herself a small mug from what remains in the pot — lukewarm, but still comforting — and brings it with her as she turns.

Episode Cast:

Melissa A. Bartell

Links and References

Credits:

  • The Bathtub Mermaid: Tales from the Tub is written and produced by Melissa A. Bartell, and is recorded and produced using Audacity.
  • Bathtub Mermaid blog header art was created by Rebecca Moran of Moran Media
  • Sound Effects and Music are from Freesound and UppBeat

Contact:

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 6:08 — 7.5MB)

TBM-2512.01 – Dog Days of Advent: Clock

by

DDOA-01

Description:

Welcome to the Dog Days of Advent. I made a list of prompts, and wrote a bite-sized story for each one. They don’t live in the same universe, but they’re all a little off-kilter from what you might expect from holiday fare. And if you pay attention, you’ll notice that the last line of each story becomes the first line of the next. Today’s prompt is “clock.”

Excerpt:

Time, for her, is elastic. Sometimes it stretches, gossamer-thin, like taffy pulled too far, and she can walk its length to touch the moment when her mother bent to kiss her scraped knee, or the instant she first realized she’d fallen in love. Other times it snaps tight and whips her forward, years ahead, where she sees a conversation that hasn’t happened yet, the face of a friend she hasn’t met.

Episode Cast:

Melissa A. Bartell

Links and References

Transcript: Clock 

Credits:

  • The Bathtub Mermaid: Tales from the Tub is written and produced by Melissa A. Bartell, and is recorded and produced using Audacity.
  • Bathtub Mermaid blog header art was created by Rebecca Moran of Moran Media
  • Sound Effects are from Freesound and UppBeat

Contact:

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:34 — 7.3MB)

TBM-1812.02 – DDOA-001: Breathing

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anunay-mahajan-545899-unsplash

Description:

#Audio. #Essay. The Bathtub Mermaid muses about breathing and how it relates to reading, writing, and creativity.

Excerpt:

And breathing… breathing isn’t all the same. There’s meditative breathing, and contemplative sighing. There’s the sharp intake of breath when something surprises you (for good or ill) and the abrupt outflow of air when you express yourself with a hearty “Huh.” There’s the way we choke on breath when we experience sudden cold – that knife to the chest feeling – and the way overheated air makes us feel like there is no air to take in.

Links and References

Credits:

  • The Bathtub Mermaid: Tales from the Tub is written and produced by Melissa A. Bartell, and is recorded and produced using the BossJock iPad app and Audacity.
  • Bathtub Mermaid album art was created by Rebecca Moran of Moran Media
  • Music used for the opening and closing is a mix of Chris Zabriskie’s “The Oceans Continue to Rise” from the Free Music Archive and Kevoy’s clip of whales off the coast of French Polynesia from Freesound.
  • Chris Zabriskie’s song is also used under some readings.

Contact:

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:50 — 10.5MB)