Respect all, fear nun - part five
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Respect all, fear nun - part five It was the terce prayer hour. We were all three of us in the gym; the off springs were outside playing with their dogs. I was lying on my back, doing reps with 500, when I noticed a crack in the ceiling that looked like a jagged bolt of stylized lightning. When I finished my set, I showed it to Nora and Mandy. My eyes followed the crack, and the wall was also cracked. "That looks bad," said Mandy. "Is the building falling down?" asked Nora. "I think we should treat the building a lot more gently until further notice," I suggested. "So no more dropping the weights to the floor; lower them gently." "And we should pray," said Nora. "Of course," I said, "but we should also get a good surveyor, to tell us whether this is nothing, or very bad. Roger stood, transfixed. He'd never seen a nun doing bench presses before, he's never seen a woman with 26 inch biceps before and he'd never seen a St Hilda's nun except me, and I was covered head to toe in my habit. He just stood there, paralysed with a mixture of respect and fear. He was imagining what Nora could do to a man once he was helpless in those huge arms. And I thought, Gotcha! I prophesy a discount.

The Black Burqa part four
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The patriarchy become afraid of the Black Burqa movement, which is spreading rapidly. There's a media campaign, orchestrated by the Ministry of Truth. trying to discredit them. So the Black Burdas raid the Ministry of Truth and help the Minister to understand the true meaning of the Quran. Ayesha breaks one of his ribs, then squeezes him so hard that he can't breathe, and his bladder voids. They crushed the gates of the compound into a tangle of useless steel piled in a heap, and they left a black burqa there to show what had happened.

Respect all, fear nun - part four
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Respect all, fear nun - part four We learn about nuns and candles, and the part they play in the life of a nun. Fiona dreams about Satan, and does a deal with the devil; the off springs of the orphanage will all get Xboxes in return for Fiona's soul. Fiona now thinks she's infested by Satan, so Sam does an exorcism for her, which involves some very heavy sex. But the Xboxes have already started to appear in the hands of the off spring. Where could they have come from? Then Fiona realizes. If it was all just a dream, then it didn't matter. And if it wasn't a dream, Satan was lying to her; it's what he does.

The Black Burqa part three
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I was just burning some toast to go with the soggy beans for Raafid's supper, when Sfiyah turned up, and she had someone with her. Who? I don't know, she was dressed head to toe in a black burqa. "Hey," Sfiyah said. "Hey hey," I replied, "what's the timing for toast again?" She looked at what was pretty much charcoal. "About ten minutes ago," she answered, "this is Asma. She wants to be a Black Burqa." I blinked. A what? Apparently, my appearance at the masjid had led to some confusion, mostly because Sfiyah also wore a black burqa when she went there to douse the lights. So people already thought there were two of us, and if two, why not three? The great thing about a burqa, is that no-one could actually see me. It was like a disguise, only better. So no-one, except me and Sfiyah, knew the secret identity of the Black Burqa. I suppose Raafid might have guessed, but he was too intimidated by me to tell anyone. It must be terrible to live with someone who, at any time, might inflict painful violence on you. I know this, because that's how I had lived for years and years. "Who was that mysterious woman?" people were asking each other, and the guesses were all over the place. Every woman around here was wearing a niqab with a face veil; a burqa was only a small step further. Who was that masked woman? Asma spoke. "I've been through eight years of beatings. And each time he didn't kill me, he made me stronger. And now I want to be like you, a Black Burqa. I want to help all the women who are being trodden on and treated unjustly. We women are supposed to be treated like queens; too many of us get treated like serfs."

Respect all, fear nun - part three
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By Diana the Valkyrie The Westingfield Baptist Church I thought that things were going well. We'd avoided the possible defunding, we'd avoided being closed down on hygiene grounds, and the future looked rosy. Hah! We'd even managed to get an increase in funding, on account of Oakfield Developments repenting of their sins, and the world looked golden. Hah! The off springs at the orphanage were happy, we three nuns were happy (they even named a brand of tobacco after us), and the dogs, as ever, were happy. Happiness bloomed all over. And, for the third time, hah! Satan had not finished throwing his tribulations at us. The first sign that something was going wrong, was when I heard chanting coming from the road outside the orphanage. I listened hard. It sounded like "Stop the nonsense". I had to google that, and what I found was totally shocking. I called a staff meeting; me, Mandy and Nora. And I explained to them what nonsense is, and they were as shocked as I was. "I have to ask," I said, "but are either of you ...?" "Certainly not!" and "No way!" were the answers, followed by "I'm surprised you even thought you needed to ask!" "Well, I said. "Nuns have been known to ..." "To what," said Nora. I looked hard at Mandy. "What?" she said. "Candles," I said. She blushed.

Octavia part one
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I'm six feet tall in my bare feet, and two hundred pounds of hard muscle; I can bench three times my weight. And I don't hide my light under a bushel. Everything is on display, and a lot of guys like that. My impressive body drives men crazy, and crazy men do crazy things. And I encourage the crazy. My hobby is to find men who are nutty as fruitcake, or if they aren't, I push them that way. And when they're one squawk short of a cuckoo, I take a trophy and dump them. Would you like to hear about some of the absurd things I've done; or rather, the crazy things that men do with a bit of encouragement from a woman with massive muscles?

The Black Burqa part two
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Sfiyah visited just now, and she was quite excited. "Ayesha, I have a task for you." Uh-oh, I thought, she wants me to bake a cake, and I'm a really rotten cook. But that wasn't it. "You know Jawaria?" "You mean the one married to Dawud?" "That's right," said Sfiyah. "Well I was with her yesterday, and she has a big bruise on her cheek." "How did that happen?" "She said she bent over and hit it on a tap, but I don't believe that's true." "Why would she lie?" "To avoid the shame of admitting that her husband beats her. You remember, you didn't tell anyone when Raafid was beating you." "So why is it your problem?" I asked. "It's a problem for all of us," she replied. "We are all sisters, and so we must care for each other." "Maybe he had a good reason to beat her?" I wondered. Sfiyah gave me a withering look. "Like Raafid had a good reason to beat you?" "Good point," I admitted. "So what do you want me to do about it?" "I think you should Raafid him. Do what you did to Raafid." "But that was different. He was going to marry off Maryam when she was only thirteen, and I just lost my cool at him." Sfiyah shook her head. "That was the trigger. But the real reason was all the abuse you took over so many years. Well, now Jawaria needs your help." "Why me?"

Respect all, fear nun - part two
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Respect all, fear nun - part two An inspector calls The letter confirming that the defunding had been rescinded, duly arrived. No surprise - Justin Graham had sworn on a bible that this would be done, and that's binding. But our celebrations were short-lived. That letter was swiftly followed by another, telling us that we were going to be inspected. If that sounded ominous, it's because it was. Not because we were doing anything wrong, but because today's America is a place where officials like the mayor make use of official systems to get what they personally want. Yes, that is corruption, but this is how it is now. We were in his way. He wanted the orphans to be in his privately run, for-profit, orphan machine - and the sisters of St Hilda wanted the orphans to have the best experiences growing up, that we could give them. I told Nancy, the Mother Superior. "Deal with it," she said, not unkindly. "I have great confidence in you, Fiona, and I'll pray for you." Prayer is good, of course, but I wanted more. "Could I borrow one of the novices?" I asked. "What for?" asked the Mother Superior. "When the inspectors call, I want to shadow them, to make sure they don't make up stuff about us. So I need the extra pair of hands. Could I borrow Daisy?" "You mean, Sister Vache?" "Yes." "OK, that's fine, you can have her for two weeks." She was called Sister Vache for a reason. And her nickname was Daisy for the same reason - a cow's udders can hold six gallons of milk, and a cow's teats are about two inches long. Daisy wasn't anywhere near that big - but nicknames don't have to be accurate.

The Black Burqa part one
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My name is Ayesha. I am a pious Muslima, married to Raafid, my four off springs are Maryam, Gamali, Nasif and baby Kaadiha. I wear the veil, because I am a modest woman. I'm not smart like my friend Sfiyah. She seems to know everything. I read my Quran, and I'm still rather ignorant, unskilled and often I don't understand what people are saying. But I'm happy. At least, I was happy, until Raafid decided that he didn't like my cooking. To be honest, I don't blame him - cooking is one of the many skills I've never mastered. My food comes in two varieties, soggy or burned. So for the last two years, we've been at loggerheads. First, he spoke to me and told me to improve my cooking. I asked "How?" but he didn't have an answer. Then he tried to punish me by not joining me in bed. That's supposed to be a punishment? And when neither of those worked, he started beating me. They say that what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. That seemed to be true for me - I noticed that I was thickening in the places where the blows landed. And it was hard muscle, protecting my body from Raafid's rod. He kept it hanging on a hook on the wall, and I knew that when he took it down, I was in for another beating. 15 minutes.

Respect all, fear nun - part one
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I run an orphanage, but it's very different from the usual orphanages. I'm Fiona, a nun on loan from St Hilda. You'll remember St Hilda's, the convent with the motto "Nil bonum sine passione", which means "No pain, no gain" and denotes the way we use Septadecaherbis and heavy iron to build massive muscles. The ingredients for the seventeen herbs and spices of Septadecaherbis are, of course, a secret. For a St Hilda's nun, I'm less than the average size - my arms are only 21 inches. My best friend Mandy is 24, Nora is 26. But 21 is usually enough. Mandy says that "biceps aren't everything", and proves it by showing her enormous thighs. I don't have huge thighs, but I do have a useful brain. Anyway, back to the orphanage. Apart from the fact that it's run by nuns seconded from St Hilda, we're very focused towards the off springs. It's bad enough that they're orphans, and don't know the love that only parents can give. We do our best for them, but there's a limit to how much love three nuns can give to 24 off springs. It's not that we lack love. It's that there simply isn't enough time in each day to give them what they'd get from a family, from parents. But here's my clever idea. Dogs. As well as 24 off springs, we have 24 dogs. Dogs will give unlimited love, unconditional love, and will be constantly available playmates. Plus, each off spring has to care for his or her dog, so they learn how to give as well as take. (18 minutes)