I’m guessing that more than a few Dopers have tried their hands at the Bulwer-Lytton contest. The only downside is that after you create a wonderfully terrible sentence, it disappears forever unless you actually win. So let’s put some entries here, where we can all admire them in their awful glory.
I only entered once - this was my sentence:
A giant of a man, Albert was emotionally outsized as well, for just as his fingers extending from his palm could tenderly caress even an unusually large, wriggly kitten, so could the lines of love extending from his heart like aortas wrap themselves around and give a comforting hug to even an acting-out and off-putting child.
What are some of yours?
(Okay, this is weird. Discourse is telling me my topic is similar to “Mommy, Mommy! Guess what I learned at career day! Big boobies can make you big money!”)
Gerald began–but was interrupted by a piercing whistle which cost him ten percent of his hearing permanently, as it did everyone else in a ten-mile radius of the eruption, not that it mattered much because for them “permanently” meant the next ten minutes or so until buried by searing lava or suffocated by choking ash–to pee.
This reminds me of an event that happened in Raleigh many moons ago. I’m not sure the nature of the event, but Harlan Ellison was putting on a demonstration of writing a story based on a random opening sentence. The article had a picture of one of the officials reading his entry as Harlan sat at a table behind him. The official came up with a rambling Bulwer-Lytton pile-on sentence that elicited groans from the audience. Ellison’s face expressed utter anguish in that photo. He told the official, “This is a career, not a death sentence!”
My (obviously non-winning) entries a few years back:
“Meddling in the past can’t possibly have any effect on the present!” Bob → Josephine → MXliphin3 said as he → she → it entered → left → flew up to his office → her cave → it’s nest."
“This is a moment I will remember for the rest of my life!” he said excitedly, as the Texas-sized meteor quickly approached Earth."
“I shall strike my opponent down with my invincible Space Sword!” said the Space Barbarian, right before the space bullet fired from the space Colt .45 created a space in the middle of his forehead."
More than one of us have won a category, actually. I once won Adventure.
“Leopold looked up at the arrow piercing the skin of the dirigible with a sort of wondrous dismay – the wheezy shriek was just the sort of sound he always imagined a baby moose being beaten with a pair of accordions might make.”