What fun!

Like JamieMarie, I would definitely want to use this in a classroom. In fact, I think these exercises would be a great icebreaker for the first week of class -- and a great way to show students that writing can actually be fun. For many students, writing is anything but fun because they associate it with laborious research papers or personal journals that force them to reveal more about themselves than they feel comfortable doing. "Unjournaling" would give students an unusual chance to be as silly as they want. And I would hope that producing a funny piece of writing would help build students' confidence and break down some of their inhibitions.

I was amazed at the variety of the exercises. If I were a teacher, I would give students several choices of assignments -- because some of the exercises left me cold, some I couldn't wait to do and some I have actually done on my own over the years because I am a mildly creative person.

For example, my son and I spent several days doing a version of #154 -- thinking of ingruous combos of people and making them interact -- like a bratty neighbor kid and Albert Einstein. I also sometimes write song parodies when the mood hits me, and that's #185. However, I wouldn't have any ideas for creating my own fairy godmother (#82), but presumably there must be some people out there who would.

The exercises I'm most eager to try are #34 and #179. The Number 34 is an ad that tells the absolute truth about a product. Having spent several years writing ad copy that extoled the often nonexistent virtues of obscure, worthless or boring products, #34 would be a great non-violent way for me to release anger. To be fair, though, real-life ad writers are often legally compelled to do "disclosure" -- the way drug ads have to reveal all the possible disgusting and dangerous side effects.

#179 asks you to describe a stereotypical character doing stereotypical things -- and then change one sentence so you show that character doing something weird or unexpected. I immediately thought of my middled-aged, across-the-street neighbor whom I've talked to exactly once in six years. He's a handsome, clean-cut fellow with a good corporate job who's always out taking wonderful care of his yard. But he has a very punky looking 20-something daughter. She seems to have several even more punky-looking boyfriends, and they're constantly hanging out in the garage with the door half pulled down, so we wonder if they have a drug or murder ring.