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. This sample entry from 2005 is by Jim Dehn, Clovis, CA.

Max thought the night-time burglary of the California surfing museum would be a safe caper–maybe not lucrative but certainly safe–but that was before he spotted the security cop riding a bull mastiff, blond hair blowing in the wind, and noticed the blue-and-white sign wired to the cyclone fence, “Guard dude on doggy.”