Here is this week’s entry into the weekly challenge brought to us by the lovely Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. She has requested that we extend birthday greetings to Jackie P. and Perry Block, so….
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BOTH OF YOU!
Here are the rules: Use the photo as inspiration, write a hundred(ish) words – and share! Here goes my offering for this week – and I welcome your comments again!
Copyright – Jan Wayne Fields
– The Adventurer –
Murdo McMaster didn’t quite possess the spirit and guts of Great Uncle Hamish.
Hamish had cheated death countless times as he captained his tiny fishing boat, the ‘Nil Desperandum’, in the unforgiving seas off the west coast of Scotland. Murdo’s chosen path as a tourist-season pleasure boat captain was ironic, to say the least.
The only thing that Murdo had ever cheated was the IRS. Now he would be forced to take his two-berth out into the Atlantic, in the hopes of reaching international waters before the tax authorities caught up with him.
—-
Click on the blue froggy below to read others’ offerings!
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Freya Writes... 
Hi Freya,
Inventive, creative story. Maybe Murdo can find a country with no extradition treaty with the U.S. Or maybe hide out in Scotland and check out his roots. Either way, I’d call this a reverse immigration story! Ron
Maybe he could! Yes, reverse immigration indeed!
I like the irony in your story. Maybe he could just offer to host a big party for the IRS and they’d let him off. Free boat rides? 🙂
janet
A mid-Atlantic party sounds fun. Perhaps not filled with the IRS though! 🙂
I like the bit of dark humor in this.
Thank you!
This is a great story. Good use of the prompt.
You wanna know something? My Uncle Hamish has cheated death countless times. He even survived just losing a bit of tackle when he stood on a land mine.
Thank you!
Just losing a bit of tackle sounds like a very close shave indeed!
It was indeed
Good one Freya, I like the idea of cheating death and cheating the tax man, sometimes they can be one and the same.
Thank you. I think the IRS in the US are particularly fierce…
haha great story. you said a lot in 100. reminded me too of Meet Joe Black and how Joe seemed so appalled that people would often use “death and taxes” in the same sentence. ^^
Thank you, kz. I had forgotten about that film – yes, an appalling juxtaposition! 🙂
i actually loved the original black and white version “Death Takes a Holiday” 🙂
And now I need to watch that! 🙂
Fabulous title….
if you’re into old black and white films , it should be great 🙂
ha – he must be trying to get in the the 47% !
🙂
Murdo is going to need the spirit and guts of Great Uncle Hamish to survive the Atlantic in his two-berth–won’t even discuss what he needs to evade the clutches of the IRS.
Indeed! I suspect that he’s been up to rather more than running a tourist boat trip business….
Dear Freya,
I’m still chuckling as I type. Good luck to Hamish. The IRS has its ways of catching up. Good one.
Shalom,
Rochelle
Thank you, Rochelle. A bit of light relief 🙂
Dear Freya,
What an imaginative story. I think, though, that Hamish would advise Murdo that three hots and a cot in a Federal Penitentiary would be far safer than trying to get to safe harbor in his pleasure craft. Ah, well, I wish him fair winds and following seas. Nice job.
Aloha,
Doug
Thank you! I don’t think Murdo listened to any advice, ever, hence the (not so) hot water he is in!
Chortle – ‘three hots and a cot’ – love it! 🙂
A modern pirate story…I wonder if he’ll make it.
It depends what gets him first, huge sea creatures, the IRS or guilt! 🙂
Great take.. and I love a boat name of “nil desperandum” ..says so much … and the irony.. really enjoyable
Thank you, Bjorn. It’s actually the name of a real boat, captained by a real family ancestor – we have photos.
I have a house in a fishing village on the west coast of Sweden – some of the houses have name-boards of old boats.. And there is a “nil desperandum” among those signs…
How fantastic! You never know, it could be from the same boat…. (we can fantasise, can’t we). I know that this little boat travelled far out to sea…
This was probably a sailing cutter that travelled the North Sea at the end of the 19th century
Yes, bring me back down to earth, why don’t you! 🙂 although it has given me a story idea….
He’d better paddle harder, they are relentless!
Indeed, si I’ve heard!
Wonderful take on this photo. I like the glimpse of Hamish we get along with the bumbling plight of Murdo. Great names, fun details… really enjoyed your piece!
Thank you so much! I decided to go overboard on the Scottishness, since it was a comedic piece 🙂
Go Murdo Go! lol
🙂