Stories Short and Strange

17 short stories for general audiences ranging from the unusual to the unbelievable to the just plain strange.

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With a Little Help From My Friend

Jim Jenkins is an ace detective who solves the most difficult crimes. Yet he always works alone. Or does he?

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Canine Champions

“He followed me home, Mom, can I keep him?” Why do we each seem to know what the other is thinking? ... Anyone wishing for an adult PAW Patrol will love this!

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Could You Report an Earthquake?

News flash — If you have an Android phone, you can actually detect earthquakes. Google has created an Android Earthquake Alerts system by using smartphone accelerometers. Between 2021 and 2024, the system has detected over 11,000 earthquakes and issued more than 1200 alerts in 98 countries. The results have been as effective as seismometers and,

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Did You Enjoy Your Shorter Days?

Something you may have missed (and I’m a bit late in mentioning) is that timewise three recent days were shorter. Wait, what? Yes, it seems July 9, July 22 and August 5 were unusually short. We like to think our days are 24 hours, but the real world is never that simple. Earth’s rotation is actually

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How We Got Potatoes

The ability to analyze genomes has given us great insight into the evolution of many animal species, including us. But have you ever wondered how plants evolved? Recently, scientists have discovered how one of our favorite food plants came to be. By using advanced genomic tools that are now available, researchers have deduced that random

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The Real Tooth Fairy

If you are looking for a feel-good story, The New York Times recently found one. It seems the tooth fairy is real. Her name is Dr. Purva Merchant and she’s a pediatric dentist in Seattle, Washington. Which brings up the question, how did she get the job? It started with her boyfriend-now-husband who in 2004

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Is Anyone Worried About Doomsday?

When I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, nuclear war was considered a real possibility. Every home-improvement show I remember attending had at least one contractor selling fallout shelters. But with the end of the Cold War, we don’t have to worry about that any more, do we? Actually, there is one organization

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Which Animals Can Do Math?

On a visit to SeaWorld (the one in Aurora, Ohio before it merged with Six Flags Ohio in 2000), I remember a concession which sold fish to feed dolphins. For a reasonable fee (I think $5), you purchased three small, sorry-looking fish in a cone-shaped paper cup at a stand next to a large pool

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How to Flirt in the Victorian Age

Social mores sure do change. Introducing yourself to the opposite sex has always been challenging (at least for me), but we can take some solace in knowing that this has been a problem throughout history. This is especially true during times when many women needed a chaperone to be seen in public. So it’s interesting

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