I sat down and came up with 176 new story ideas this morning. Some of them were pretty bad, but 62 of them were worth thinking more about!

Even the most creative person can use some sparks once in a while. One of the ways I deal with that is a little “thing” I created awhile back in my world in Second Life. Yeah, I’m still there, and still finding SL to be of value. Like the little gadget I created a few years ago and used again this morning. It’s a simple little script that takes words I put in it, shuffles them all around a bit, and then randomly pulls them back out in a “story” idea for me. Push the button…get an idea. Pretty sweet!

Not all of the ideas are keepers. Sometimes the button gives me something like, “A colleague impersonates a train”, which I’m not sure what to do with. But other times, it gives me, “A survivalist blows-up a boat”, or “A nation impersonates water”. That second one looked like a throw-away at first, but then I started wondering…just HOW would someone “impersonate” water? The more I thought about it, the more interesting it became. What if…what if…what we thought we were drinking as “water” was something else instead? Yeah, that one turned out to be a keeper as well.

A few others that made my “keeper” list:

  • A religious burns a city.
  • A business person hacks a boat.
  • A spy hacks a bank.

Sorry, but I’m keeping some of the REALLY good ones to myself…for now. You’ll see them one of these days…

If you want to try the Story Generator in Second Life, here is the SLURL to get there. If you don’t have a free SL account, you can create one. In my opinion, it’s still well worth the experience.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/imagiLEARNING/72/190/32/

If you want to try the Story Generator idea without SL, here’s what you can do…

  • Create three lists: one with characters, one with actions, and one with locations. My first set had 17 items in each list.
  • Get a die from a game you have around the place. I’m using a 20 sided one.
  • Roll the die three times, once for each of your lists, and pick the word that matches the number.
  • Put the words together in a sentence…and putz it around a bit.

It’s not fancy, but hey, it works!

Keep writing!