The Annual Bulwer-Lytton writing contest is based upon the much stolen beginning line by Snoopy, “It was a dark and stormy night…” The contest is run each year by the Department of English at San Jose State University. The award is given to the worst lead-in to a wretched story.

“Just look, ya bloomin’ idiot,” Eleanor Rugglesby-Bobsyeruncle, the world-famous cockney art collector, screamed at her assistant, Ivan Ivanovich, illegitimate son of the Secret Czar, Ivanovichi, “ya packed me priceless Don Quixote paintin’ in with a sack of bloody Spam, it was the darn cans tore me knight!”