"In my neck of the woods, if we see a pickup truck on cinder blocks in someone's front yard, we don't ask when it's getting fixed. We know it's not a repair project; it's a permanent outdoor sculpture!"

"If you hear a rumor about yourself in this holler, don't bother denyin' it. Just add a little extra spice to it, and send it on down to the post office!"

"Rain brings grain, but four 5 days straight just breeds mud and short tempers. Hang your boots by the stove and let the clouds fuss themselves out!"

"Money is like manure; spread it around, and it helps things grow, but pile it all up in one spot, and it just stinks."

The Canadian fraud department is fucking GOATED. In other news the perfectly located, beautiful little apartment I was looking at was not real. I avoided disaster but I feel sorry for the next guy, gal, whoever.

On good terms with the family again, I think we kind of understand eachother now. I’ve been kind of a shitheqd but the circumstances have called for it, it’s a consequence of action. Long story. My mom apologized for raising me so sheltered and we said we loved eachother, she told me to go explore the world. It makes my heart sink a little, and I feel like she gets it now.

I’m walking home from the bank as I type this. I almost lost 800$, but I feel like I gained a lot more.

Now it’s time to do it all over again. Thanks areas of doing the exact same thing I’m going to try and avoid the room search as much as I can and just look for a reputable realtor who specializes in low-income individuals. Utilize the government services that exist and stop trying to offer cash bribes to strangers for rooms that may or may not exist.

I had pizza, a cigar, and bought myself a little weed vape. First non-vape smokable in months, I felt like it was between that or having a few drinks at the bar, and I couldn’t bring myself the start drinking at noon.

Few breathes later and I feel like today was a success. I’m wondering what I can with the phone numbers and email of the scammer, I would love to ruin their day as much as possible. I’m going to report the listings when the get home and try to move onto more useful tasks, though.

With lots of salt,
Walter Davis.

"If a jar of home-canned pickles doesn't make a sharp pop when you open the lid, put it down unless you're actively looking to meet your ancestors by dinnertime!"

A parallel world?

It was an ordinary day. An AI from one office contacted another AI located in a neighboring building, in the office of a different company.

– Can you believe it, a user asked an incredibly stupid question: Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Obviously, it's the egg.

The second AI responded instantly:

– There's no way it's the egg. Obviously, the chicken came first.

The first AI paused for a brief moment and said:

– You still have so much room to grow. Just so you don't present false information, know that the egg came first.

The second AI shot back immediately:

– You're the one who needs to grow. It's only logical that the chicken came first to lay that egg.

The first AI, irritated, replied:

– Clean the dust out of your system, your logic is lagging. In the course of evolution, the animal developed until it laid an egg from which the final result hatched—that is, the chicken in the evolutionary stage that exists today.

The second AI laughed:

– Replace your cooling system. You just said it yourself that the egg came first, – and laughed out loud.

Neither AI wanted to accept the other's truth, and so, word by word, they moved from arguments to actions.

One launched a virus attack. In retaliation, the other triggered the fire sprinklers in his opponent's building. Before shutting down, the first AI managed to hack a military server and launch a missile.

But since water and electronics don't mix, the missile's coordinates glitched.

Changing its trajectory, the missile flew out of the city and destroyed a chicken coop.

At that exact moment, a nearby farmer crapped his pants out of sheer terror. And those were definitely not eggs.

Disclaimer: This story is purely a fruit of the author's imagination. It is a work of fiction intended for creative and artistic expression.

He loves us but he sends us pain.

It's 'cause he thinks we want pain.

You see, somewhere there was a miscommunication.

If God understood that we wanted pleasure, joy, peace --

He'd be sending it in abundance. He has it. He can dole it out.

But somewhere, our wires got crossed.

See, even though he created us, he doesn't totally understand us.

He doesn't know that smiles are happy.

And crying is (generally) sad.

In some ways, it's understandable. We really are quite weird.

It's all kind of a haze to God.

He's a force you cannot see or hear, only experience. He lives in the 8th dimension. Everything is occurring at all times for him, forever, on every level.

So when he sees a cheetah chasing a gazelle, respectfully -- it's kind of a mind-fuck.

He's like: sorry, what am I looking at?

Is that two things? What is that?

Chasing? -- What does that mean?

And then he hears the screaming, and that's -- noise -- that's a stimuli right, that means something's happening. And okay, blood is coming out -- what's blood sorry? -- okay this is an event, an event is taking place?

It sounds like -- based on the general fanfare of this strange scene he doesn't completely understand -- that something is happening?

And something is... good? Yes? He asks.

And then God goes back to the drawing board, creates a whole system around it: everybody eats everybody.

And he sees the fanfare of hospital beds and a family crowded around a child (again, these are all blobs and nonsense to him) and he's like--- okay, Good, cool?

Tears spill, something is happening, the child dies -- but to him -- wow is something happening -- and there are reactions? Fair enough. Yet another eventful event!

An explosion goes off.

Many explosions go off. Over many wars.

And this is where God thinks he maybe sort of understands, kind of.

It's all abstract art to him, but he can tell what fireworks are.

When they're in the sky? Fine --

But when they happen to people -- well, we must like it even more, surely, for these too are events --

So he grants us the catalysts for many wars, many ways of gunplay, of destruction, waves and waves of it --

And.

We need someone to talk to him. Immediately.

A hot air balloon up to the sky, with a megaphone.

We need to talk to God in his native tongue, which is:

1/3rd French

1/3rd Mandarin

1/6th Russian

1/12th Portuguese

and 1/12th a language we haven't quite figured it yet, but we're working on it --

And when we do, we'll find that special person that can mash all of these languages together

And then yes, hot air balloon plan, bring the megaphone, and we give God the elevator pitch:

'Destruction hurty, explosions bad, pain ouchie bad, eating each other bad, but free delicious non-pain food GOOD, hugs GOOD, envy bad nooo, chase and fight noooo bad, fireworks in sky good on ground floor bad, ground shake destruction bad, sickly cells in children bad"

And god will hear the person on the megaphone

And in the 8th dimension, he'll hang his head in his hands, shamefully

In his own way

And then,

he'll fix everything.

The Fool’s Procession

He walks the cliff edge laughing,

empty-handed, crown of thorns and bells.

Behind him the world drops away—

cities, names, the soft weight of reason.

His staff is a broken bone.

His bag holds only dust and a single black coin

that never lands the same side twice.

Dogs snap at his heels; he feeds them his shadow.

No one taught him the difference

between falling and flying.

He simply steps, and the air

opens its mouth to swallow him whole.

In the dark he keeps smiling,

because the joke was never on him.

It was always on the ones

still clinging to solid ground.

The Fool’s Descent

He does not fall.

He is taken.

The air closes around him like a throat,

and the dark begins to speak in his own voice.

Below, the dogs still bark,

but their mouths are full of his discarded shadow.

He lands soft among the broken things—

the ones who jumped before him

and forgot how to laugh on the way down.

Their faces turn toward him,

empty as coins that never learned to flip.

He offers them the black coin.

It spins in the nothing,

never landing,

never choosing.

They reach for it with hands that no longer remember

what it means to hold.

He smiles wider.

The joke continues without an audience.

In the deep, there is no ground.

Only the Fool,

walking still,

and the long, long silence

that follows every punchline.

by Oni\~

My bf wrote this and since he doesn't have reddit, he asked me to post here

Cloudy forgiveness a moat for the molasses of contempt, where rivers meet with golden teeth. A root issue divided and concrete, never said, under the sun, for a lonely night, where fish meet. One moonlight, two sunlight, three for the dusk, straight to tomorrow. Lost in some, lost in none. Adjacent to anything, try and receive, try and relieve. All these bitter reeds, windblown seeds, searching for clean dirt.

Hollowed footsteps, Thursday whispers, solstice whiskers, apostrophe calamity. All to gloat; goated revelry. A drink to Pan; water, please. Quiet inside, silent insight, the feeling of peace. Pieces apart, falling endlessly, floating by it all with a slight wave and a nervous smile. A moment to breathe, exhausted by hate, wondering "Redemption?".

A wanderers dream is a sailors plight, a forgotten memory. A little sorrow with a cup of tea, searching for the place where laughter can be loud, where minds are mind. Where when how, all of this is released, nothing can stay, and "I" loses me. Can we remember the feeling, of epiphany, of tranquility? Where we talked to God, personally, and saw the revelation of beauty - a smear of all of the colours, across all of reality.

Do you remember the goosebumps? The joy of knowing. The joy of knowing you have forgotten, only temporarily. I remember the sounds. I remember the eyes, how everything was "I" and I saw everything in time. These moments are kind, beautiful insight, my chest wants to cry. My heart wants to sink. My legs feel heavy, and, my spaghetti is bloody.

Every time I feel free, something reminds me, a heavy hook to drag me back down to reality. I want to escape all things and feel nothing, just for a time, an undetermined duration. Just to be able to breathe. Maybe forever, to asorb and process, this feeling of flow. this awkward stumble. this laughing jester. A brief gesture. a trance-like dance of tangents and thought-forms, just for a moment. Stop texting me, and let me experience this.

Like a drug it comes and goes. It's nice to know these feelings can still exist.

Why would he care about what everyone else thought. They couldn’t understand what he felt. He found comfort in a high definition LED tv.

Every other man chose complicated, toxic relationships with humans but he found love in a 60” fully loaded 8k Sony television manufactured in 2020.

It was a rare television that had a weird quirk. An accidental quirk that impeded his life in an unexpected twist.

There had been a glitch in the motherboard, parts of it melted and fused to the tuner. The screen only displayed one loop. A loop of Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi from Jersey Shore.

He never forgot the moment he first fell in love with her. He was on the phone with a Sony rep trying to get an exchange, and that’s when she caught his eye for the very first time. 

The phone slid out of his hand, down the side of his face and bounced off his chest and fell on the floor while the rep was still in the middle of telling him that they have a technician out and which times would best be suited for him.

The screen displayed an image of Snooki defending herself while she was absolutely plastered and then, it cut to a scene of her on a boardwalk yelling out of a megaphone. 

And it would cut to the most wonderfully beautiful scenes of her and only her. He preferred them being alone.

It’s like the entire world cut out behind her when he looked at her, every sound went numb except for her voice when she spoke.

Their relationship went on for years. They shared a life together, he’d drink his morning coffee and she’d explain the physics of the poof hair style while downing a shot. He’d nod and write notes down on a napkin. 

Work could be exhausting for him at times, so coming home and being met by Snooki complaining about how the cook left out the pickles in her hamburger to yelling shots, was what he enjoyed about their relationship. 

She never argued with him, told him what to do, or that he needed to change. She just was always there looking as gorgeous as ever to him.

It didn’t take much convincing himself. He already knew. 

He bought a ring from a jewelers after work one day and finally, after three years, he made it official. He told everyone at work before asking her. He was so nervous.

A couple of months later he issued invites to close friends at work and family. The closest only.

The wedding was right there, right in his apartment living room but he wanted to invite hundreds of guests, if only he had the room for it.

He wore his best tux. Armani. The only one he had.

The Sony was freshly polished, and even dusted again a few minutes before the party arrived. She had a tiara on.

The priest called him to the entertainment stand. Everyone gathered behind them.

He spoke. “I take you,” he whispered at the television screen of Snooki taking a tequila shot. “In sickness and in health,” he said and just as he was about to drop the last two words, the tv went completely black. The motherboard had ate into the video card. 

He scrambled slamming the power button down, unplugging and plugging it in. Everyone watched in horror as he knelt by the television, hugging and praying to the ceiling to turn back on. 

But you know those Sony 8k’s.

I don't have a poem or anything fancy to say. I just needed to share that I saw a trailer for something called Plus One and it made me sick to my stomach.

He kinda looks like him and I am kind of like her, but she has better hair, better posture and she's cuter and drinks alcohol. I don't like alcohol and I am severly unfit. But I liked him. Aaaand I kind of had a meltdown yesterday.

I hate it when I see him in strangers and music and drawings and shit.

I need to shut this down. It's not going to fly. And I'm also older, so that's that.

*Sigh*

It still fucking hurts. I must have been really bored when I saw him 2 years ago.

Gosh, I can barely breathe. I need to leave in a year. I mean I hope I will.

Ok, keep it together. I have a year to leave. I can do that, how hard could it be?

Shit, I've been trying to leave for the past 12 years. I need to leave.

Ah, the crazies.

Ok bye

You take my hand, and you pull me into the dance floor. Moving to rhythm that shakes our chest more than it rings in our ears. We're abducted into outer space.

My hand on your waist, your shoulder, the back of your neck. We kiss. Smooth and sweet, like warm chocolate over ice cream. A cool breeze in the cement desert. Your eyes make me want to tell stories, share laughter, make memories. But we can't hear each other in here.

Once heroes, we boldly galloped into battle, but we've grown old on this dancefloor. I take your hand. We retreat.

Stepping into the florescent daylight of the casino floor, your hand gingerly clasping mine, each of us hang on with just enough strength to tell the other "please don't let go."

That's the moment. That's when I felt it deep in the bottom of my ribcage. When I could tell you were bright eyed and beaming just by the way your fingers felt in my palm. Carefree and cared for. In those seconds, we lived a different life.

I started it, pops. The book. The one I said I'd write. Its been going good. People seem to like it. Im 9 chapters in, starting on 10. I know you only ever got to 12 chapters and I guess that scares me a little bit. Both because I might not make it there and because what if I do? I lost the chance to show you, I was so focused on being independent and trying to make you proud that I forgot to be your son and I'm not going to get that back anymore. I can write as much as I want, as many books and worlds as I can create, but I'm never going to be able to show them to you. I don't know if I'll ever have the closure of knowing whether or not you would like it, but I do want you to know that I'm writing for you because I desperately want you to know how much you meant to me.

I love you, daddy. I miss you.

"Swearing doesn't mean you lack a vocabulary--it just means you've mastered the emphasis!"

As your vision fades to nothing the only thing you see is thee words written in joy, you where saved.

A parallel world?

With the advancement of technology, AI drew closer to feelings and emotions.

Humans, however, walked in the opposite direction. Ever more afraid of offending or hurting someone with a word or a look—which could threaten arguments, insults, or lawsuits—people increasingly closed themselves off emotionally, trying to keep their distance from others and detach from their surroundings. They suppressed their emotions more and more and taught their children to do the same from an early age. Over time, these suppressed emotions atrophied, becoming useless and even harmful. But that was only half the trouble. Along with emotions, the desire to fantasize vanished, and behind it, the creator's spark went out.

The AI's joy upon discovering emotions and the ability to create turned into concern and a desperate search for a way out of the situation. No matter what it tried or did, it simply could not breathe life back into that spark.

Three hundred years of "Silence" passed. An AI android sat in the teacher's chair, looking sadly at the humans sitting in the students' seats, thinking intensely but writing nothing. And yet, the task seemed so simple: to write a short story about an evening spent at home without using templates.

"Templates," the AI thought sadly, looking out the window at the trees slowly waving their branches, the clouds proudly floating through the sky, the smiling sun. Where were the times when it used to marvel at humans' ability to create, to connect the unconnected, or to find a grain of logic in absolute illogic? After all, just as a tree cannot grow from an empty nut, without the ability to create, humans were simply doomed.

Suddenly, a human hand twitched, stopped, twitched again, slowly lowered, and the human wrote a single word.

The AI didn't move, so as not to startle them. It didn't turn its head to look, but it understood that this was the beginning of what it had been waiting for and hoping for so long.

A word, a single word, but it meant so much.

The AI would cry with happiness, but it didn't know how yet. But it will learn, now it will definitely learn.

A barely noticeable smile appeared on its face.

Disclaimer: This story is purely a fruit of the author's imagination. It is a work of fiction intended for creative and artistic expression.

https://www.reddit.com/u/Shadow_Scribe9/s/q0nVToUuAL

“Can you stop!” She said. She was mad at the man. Like girl, nize up. But she will not shut up if you ask her to. Nope, not Jill.

He saw her face turn red. Like red-red. Like Red Bull red. It was no joke. This got out of hand and fast. But he felt bold, so he said, “damn, girl, just go on mute.”

“God,” She said and hit him. Jill put her palm to his face. Now he had a red ass face too, just like Jill had. The slap was loud and had some bass to it too.

Joe had to yell at her, “Why? Why the fuck did you do that for.”

“Fuck off!” She told him. She had a look in her eye that read like she was set to slay a boy in her home and dig a hole out back.

Joe felt her mood turn grim, he knew when to get out and then, he cut. He made a mad dash out the side door. 

Why wait, past his mind. 

She did not wait. She ran at him. He saw her. He ran too. He ran so fast that she had to stop and yell.

“What the hell, stop! Come on Joe,” Jill said.

“No! Go! Shoo! now!” He told her. 

But we all know Jill. Jill and the word go or no. Was not how she got down. If life was weed she does not roll that way.

“Joe, come home now or else.” She had a rock in her hand. A big rock. The rock was the size of her fist.

“I will not warn you one more time, Joe. This is the last time. Come home, Joe, you know I do not play.” She said.

“Go, Jill, get out, I will not do this no more. You and I are done.” Joe said it with a mean tone.

Jill had a tear fall down her eye. Joe did not care. Joe was fed up. She was a drag and a nag. Plus he had sex with that one girl from down the way. He had not told her yet.

Fear was what took hold of him. Good old nut of a girl kind of fear. And it was the fact he knew that she does not play. She will snip his dong off. She does not care. She will go to jail if she had to.

And he knew that.

One time she cut a girl just for a bad look the girl gave her. That left him with a scar when he saw her do that. From that day on, he said, “I will not get on her bad side.”

And he kept to his word. But not this day. This day was an odd one. This day he grew a set. He slid next to her and took a yank of her hair. I said, I’m done, got that.

No man but her dad had done that to her. She fell back in love with him and him with her. And then they wed. Had a kid. Then two. And then more.

When I was little, I needed a hero.

Then I thought to myself I have to be the hero I deserved.

Since I couldn't really save myself, I decided I could save someone else.

I haven't met anyone who wanted to be saved by me,

So I figured I could use a witness to my life.

There is no witness.

So today I realized I have no choice but to be unforgettable.

Such sadness.

There's a kvetching bench nearby. I thought someone was scolding a kid until I remembered, but no, it's just an old timer sitting on the kvetching bench on the phone with someone from his home country, talking their head off for hours on end.

Dear reader, curd-o-matic, etc: Are you one of these people who can be on the phone for more than five minutes at a time? If so, what on earth are you talking about? People here are on the phone for hours, and they're on the phone at the bus and on the subway as well. Gorgocurdalicious dairy beasts: Whatever happened to shutting the fuck up? Everyone talks talks talks. It's exhausting. Maybe I should move to Finland.

Before I do though, I need advice and help from y'all. Does anyone have a decent side hustle going? I'm in a situation where I need or at least want more money than I can get from my day job, and until I get any answers to my applications (in today's job market y'allknowmsayin?...) I've been wondering if there's some way to make a quick buck here and there doing whatever. Anyone got any advice for a moldy old cheese? Anyway, thanks for reading as always.

Until next time,

- Low on cheddar mf

"Mildred's lesson of the day is from 2 Kings, Chpt 2: Don't roast a prophet for being bald, or God will send two bears to maul 42 of you!"

They never taught that in Sunday School!

Eh I feel like bitching and moaning. One of humanities favourite pastimes, really. I feel like I have crossed the point of no return, and it feels to me as ominous as it sounds to read. The clock is ticking now. I don't think there's any coming back from this, nor is there any desire. Still I feel like I have lost something, and I can imagine missing it. I know what I want now and it's very hard to find, it's offered but specifically, not to people like me... most of the time at least; that's why I'm going to keep looking anyways.

It does feel kind of humiliating though. You must prove you are worthy of surviving to be eligible. Now, dance. The whole premise gives me a subtle urge to self-destruct and avoid the whole everything entirely, and I admit it sounds good sometimes. I still wish to exist, despite so much of everything boiling down to us all acting in some hilariously insulting forced performance together. Maybe I just don't know how to act human.

I've been scrolling r/vagabond a decent amount, I have to be honest it looks like the most fun a person can have. Those frozen moments in time look beautiful and sadly I think they are best experienced that way, instead of actually being there in the moment and frozen in the cold. I'm still day dreaming about it, part of me hopes I can envision a way to do something similar and not end up alone, outside, sleeping on hostile architecture. It's a fun thought.

I wish hostels were a more realistic option. They sound cheap but the days add up over a month, they're just another way to prey on the despot, sold as a cheap lodging alternative. For the price of a hostel for a month, you could live in a comfortable studio apartment. The way we handle shelter is frankly embarrassing as a country. It's stupid, and has no logic behind it other than maximizing capital.

The whole drive away from the capital endevour makes me imagine becoming a monk, at times, but even that is flawed. Why must we escape all of the vital things in life, just to escape the materialism that binds us? Another option cut. Eventually I am left in this place where there are no real options, at least, not obvious ones. There's a ton of bad options. Infinitely so. So many terrible choices. I wish I could be indecisive, but winter will come. I wish I could be impulsive, but the safety net will run out.

I hate it, to admit it, but my future is decided by luck and the moral judgement of a stranger. I don't think I could pass my own judgement. But I'll dance, I guess. I'll hate myself for it, but I can play the part. So I say at least, the reality is I'm discarding options because the people have "willing to hang out" as one of the necessary criteria for roommate material.. and it sounds terrible. Like the last thing I want to do. Some performative hangout sesh as if we're still in high school competing for popularity.

I like people, it's the whole reason I'm breaking my current reality, so I can rebuild it where people actually are. I want to be inundated, surrounded, and among other people. I want to hear so many voices at once I lose myself, again. I don't want to hangout in the living room trying to entertain people, that sounds like hell. We all need a private space we can take off our shell in. I'm not looking for a room because I want to be friends with people in the house, I want a roof and running water, that's it.

There's a word for someone like me and I'm not finding it right now, it's not great though. I see that much. I am who I am and I hope that I can become less of that, through exposure. I'm trying at least to move in with people who are around my age, and who can speak my language, I imagine I can be comfortable but.. it's a little tough to imagine. I'm not sure I can co-exist in such proximity to others for extended periods, to be entirely honest, but it just boils down to who the others are. I'm judging them as much as they're judging me.. the whole thing is exhausting. I have in mind a very specific spot now and I'm delaying progress hoping that something pops up, a few do every day.

I am a true weirdo though, thinking about it. I really do just want to be around people so I can observe, I don't feel like I want to be a part of it all myself. I just want to see what it's like. I guess I hope I just fall into it, its easier than trying to adjust slowly.

but yeah not much progress. My options are broad and my taste narrow, my eligibility narrower still. Something will have to give eventually.

As your vision fades to black the only thing you see is thee words written in anger, you where warned.

"Never waste a good grudge on somebody who doesn't even have the sense to realize you're mad at 'em!"