Greetings Earthlings!

There was a lunar eclipse tonight. Did you notice? Neither did I – I was hanging out at a seedy little cabana tucked away in the Orion Nebula trying to psych myself up to call my mom. I only came back because the roaming charges were exorbitant. Plus, they ran out of Arcturan Mega-gin, and the bottom shelf stuff just doesn’t make a good pangalactic gargleblaster. The hangover is killing me. How about a little hair of the dog?

Answer the ultimate question in exactly 42 words: what would your mother say?

Notice what we did here. We’re not asking what your mother did say, or what she will say. Or what you said to your mother. We’re asking, what would she say… if? You fill in the if.

A couple more things: Proofread! Do you have typos? Spelling mistakes? Grammatical errors? Are you sure that word means what you think it means, in that context? You’ve only got 42 of them. Get one wrong and it’s a whole lot easier to spot in a gargleblaster than in a longer piece. Need a second set of eyes? Find yourself a writing partner over in the yeah write coffeehouse.

Don’t restate the question in your answer, but do make sure the answer makes sense without knowing the question. Please, for the love of Marvin, don’t use the question as your title, or anywhere else in your piece. And remember, any words surrounding your gargleblaster — explanations, references, etc. — will be counted against your 42-word limit.

The top 42 entries will be open for voting on Thursday

You can enter only one micro-story, but the grid itself will be unlimited as the entries are being submitted. We will open the top 42 entries to a popular vote on Thursday. The voting grid, however, will be limited to the top 42. So many changes, so much new stuff to understand. Email us or head over to our pages on Facebook and Twitter with any questions.

Winners will be announced on Friday

Look for Friday’s combined winners’ post to see the crowd favorites and editors’ picks from across all of our challenge grids.

Fall writing contest

In two weeks we’re throwing open the doors to a four-week writing contest on each of the competitive grids: non-fiction, fiction|poetry and micro. The winner of the challenge can win $100 cash. If you invite a friend to the challenge and your friend wins instead of you? You each get the $100 cash: your friend for winning and you for referring the winner to yeah write.

We’ve got a bunch of other things we think you’ll like, so stay tuned!

What else is happening around here?

We’ve got the non-fiction grid opening on Mondays, the speakeasy for fiction and poetry on Tuesdays, the gargleblaster micro challenge on Wednesdays, and the come-one, come-all moonshine grid for the weekends. We’ve got a great hangout space over at the coffeehouse, and coming up, we’ve got a writing contest! Don’t want to miss out? Make sure you sign up for our weekly e-mail blast. And pop back in here whenever you can.

What would your mother say?

The yeah write #182 weekly writing challenge is open is open for micro-stories: fiction, non-fiction, haiku, whatever. Answer the question in exactly 42 words by clicking the link below.