030125 I have concluded that there is no way to know what I am getting myself into; likewise there is also no way to type one letter at at time on this styupisd keyboard. It’s almost as bad as the 2016 Mac keyboards. Why the fuck would you combine insanely-light touch with wide-as-fuckl finger surfaces on the caps? you’re guaranteeing that i’m gonna hit two keys at once, plus guaranteeding that they both will register, not just the one i meant to register. the idiot support people at keychron have absolutely no idea what they are talking about. This whole keyboard thing is a fucking joke, worse than fountain pens, i wish i’d never let my mind get poisoned into giving a shit about the only solution is to halt all investment in it (and i mean that mentally and financially) RIGHT NOW, do not attempt to fix the existing damage with more purchases or fretting or “modding” (god help me). JUST STOP. JUST STOP. PERIOD. THAT’S IT. haha you dumb shit 030325 Things I’ve learned or re-learned or thought about differently lately include: - if your default mode network is overactive, you can become overly self-focused, and your brain may disengage too much when at rest and then overcompensate when you try to focus on something, leading to a feeling of overwhelm and the need to disconnect or self-soothe. - RGB backlit keyboards are kind of pointless, but also fun and there’s nothing particularly wrong with that - paranoia can be a function of anxiety and kids aren’t always eager to disclose that they’re going through something rough but you’re damn lucky when they feel comfortable enough with you that they will 030425 1741119478 the brane contanes the celophane the hearts the bar code scan it and tell me what im worth vs the price we’ll have to pay if we unwrap this thing we’re in freedom vs epithet falling vs fallen the text i send belongs to me for you, read only the text that you receive is yours to do with as you please cut it mash it trash it slice it peel it seed it make it rain freedom vs celophane heart in league with pane 030425 Got my gateron bananas. Let’s see... I do... *not* feel any less lonely. And, um, typing is not improved. The sound is a little higher pitched, a little clackier instead of thumpfy. I can’t decide if I want to change out the one in the spacebar too. I left a brown one in CAPS because I almost never hit that key, certainly not on purpose anyhow. Yes I think I will change out spacebar because it feels mushy now in comparison. There. I did that. Nope — still lonely and exhausted. Huh. Weird. I guess I’ll have to keep spending $30 here and $40 there on random shit I didn’t even know I gave a shit about until I saw it on the innernet, until this feeling of vacancy and despair goes away for good! ✅ Well the bananas do actually feel a bit more reassuring under me finger pads. It’s a VERY slight change, though; the way these weirdos talk in the forums (bunch of masturbators trying to sound sophisticated about something!), you would think it was going to be a completely different experience, changing the switches in your fucking keyboard. Nah, I’m here to tell you, no big surprise, it’s the VERY SLIGHTEST possible distinction. Truly bizarre how off in the weeds people can get about the weirdest shit. Myself included, obvious, but I blame my DEFAULT MODE NETWORK instability. Hehehe. Don’t you hate when dumb shit. Maybe some of these fuckers are just way more sensitive than I am. I guess. I do not know though! I just hope to gwarsh the new keycaps help. Because otherwise, dumb. Stupid. Dumb. Stupid. SHIT i hope cel’s gonna be all right. I hate not knowing what to say that doesn’t sound dumb as fuck. Did you notice how the keys have individual sounds? Each switch is actually unique. 030825 can you shave my left knee 031225 theyre siding with russia, sabotaging the stock market, shitting all over dept of ed and every other program, and disregarding the democratic process and basic tenets of our govt. whatd you expect. you have no money and likely never will, so get used to it starting today. not tomorrow. not after the one more purchase. EVERY one more purchase is going to disappoint — does NOTHING but point the way to the next FINAL just one more purchase. oh and they’re probably also going to start some kind of war; well, arguably they have already so yeah, shit just got weird. How to cope? How to continue day to day? What tools do I have in my chest? HOW TO NOT BE ISOLATED AND ALONE? Also their ethos extends into tech, science, art, life: > Mathematics has long prided itself on openness and transparency, with results freely shared and discussed. The closing off of research at major AI labs—and the inability of collaborating mathematicians to discuss their work—represents a significant cultural clash with mathematical traditions. This tension recalls Michael Atiyah's warning against secrecy in research: "Mathematics thrives on openness; secrecy is anathema to its progress" (Atiyah, 1984). https://sugaku.net/content/understanding-the-cultural-divide-between-mathematics-and-ai/ ---- > The Constitution gives to Congress, not the president, the power to impose tariffs. But the International Emergency Economic Powers Act allows the president to impose tariffs if he declares a national emergency under the National Emergencies Act, which Trump did on February 1. That same law allows Congress to end such a declaration of emergency, but if such a termination is introduced—as Democrats have recently done—it has to be taken up in a matter of days. > But this would force Republicans to go on record as either supporting or opposing the unpopular economic ideology Trump and Musk are imposing. So Republicans just passed a measure saying that for the rest of this congressional session, **“each day…shall not constitute a calendar day”** for the purposes of terminating Trump’s emergency declaration. – HCR 031325 031525 the Snides of Blarch ### untitled 290 The zero at the end of the three-digit number means it was added remotely, not a “real” desktop file. Haha! This explanatory preface means I’m out here at the UWM Student Union again, despite the presence of a bunch of smeary little goblins gaggling around for some kind of chess tournament or something, swirling eddies of hollow-eyed chaperones, forming long lines at the junk food machìns, etc etc etc, which means I don’t have to keep any of this, so even if I do choose to open up a pigeon, it doesn’t mean I have to do it right, because I’ve already proved that I don’t have to keep any of this, and listen to the sound of that Keychron K5v2, it sounds pretty good. Like rain made out of litebrite. Though, I hate it when people start a sentence with “though” meaning “however,” I am gonna need some *real* coffee soon though. Not this stupid 300-calorie $4 Starbucks in a fucking jar that came out the junk food machìns. God how fucking dumb. Why do we buy shit like this, I should say, why do *I* buy shit like this? Is it to make myself hate myself, so I can have a reason to drink more junk food coffee? No. Stop being yourself. Haha you’re dumb. Fuck off. Hahaha. OK let’s see what the pigeon is today, shall we? Or shall we stretch our elbows a bit first, sit back, look around, and be here because it’s Saturday and I have a lot of time without anything pressing that has to be done right the fuck NOW? IDK. I just interrupted myself looking up keyboard shortcuts for iA Writer on iPhone. This is what I hate about “distraction free” bullshit — it always creates more distractions. Then Cel messaged back about where Tera pissed last night, and I’m almost out of fake cotton candy ass sugar tit pretend ass motherfucking coffee, so I don’t know, I might have to go somewhere else before I pigeon. I don’t know. We’ll see. In a few minutes here, we’ll see. I could WALK somewhere else and leave the car where she be. I kind of like that idea. I just need to find someplace to go that isn’t stupid, and that’s increasingly hard these days. I don’t want an overblown coffee shop with all the pale rich designers and shit in it where you come out smelling like burnt coffee and the bottom of a jellyroll pan and wasted youth. I don’t want a dry ass motherfucking library where there’s tons of books and that awesome old mildewy book smell but also no fucking coffee and also a bunch of walleyed homeless people. Damn, is that really how I think? Don’t read this kids, this is not how I think. Is it? But one thing’s for sure, I do need a real coffee, not a runny milkshake, so I gotta go. Catch ya on the fleeeeeip. I. I, I, I. _I_ let me tell you (me) about I, because I am, as DFW pointed out in _What’s Water,_ teh teh teh teh. Ft— THE CENTER OF THE glitch\>glitch UNIVERSE! I would like some additional freedoms. Can I get a triple-shot Americano, some double-shot PBT keycaps, a one-shot lover that I kick out of my brick upstairs apartment over the coffee shop in the sun when he’s done? And, oh, also along with that can I get a scone and some additional freedoms, please? Please? Please. You have to help me. I have unhinged. My jaw flaps loosely like a dumpster lid BANGING in a dry hurricane. Ulysses is so dumb. NOT THE BOOK, I HAVEN’T READ THAT PAST THE FIRST LIKE 30 PAGES, I MEAN THE STUPID APP. APP. APP. App. “App!” Do you have any programs that run on your— “NO WE HAVE APPS!” What? What do you mean, like appetizers? “NO, APPS, SILY! THAT’S WHAT PHONES HAVE ON THEM!” Kill me. Just. Fucking. Kill me now. Stomach churning and roiling a bit, but this Americano is actually not bad. I’m at that little coffee place on Locust and Maryland, which isn’t (of course) the same place it used to be, lol, what place is? But somewhere around here is where Robin’s apartment used to be over. NYE 1999. One of my favorite night/days. Hope she’s doing well and is just not-boring enough to be happy. God what the hell do I know, she could be wild and exotic and eccentric and all over the place, accomplishing amazing things and shocking the proximity. But either way. I hope she’s good. You look across the lobby at someone’s grizzled mug & you imagine you know what they would or wouldn’t be interested in, and you base these assumptions on your own insecurities, but in reality you have no idea. Someone you would think would inspire disgust or pity or dismissal in Grizzly Mug (and you think this because you see too much of yourself in the wan, flabby, pitiful approacher) approaches him, and instead of contempt you see delight. Why? That’s your exercise for the next like 3 minutes or so. We’ll meet back here in 3 minutes. Do your homework, fuck-o, no sitting around drinking your Americano and scrolling through fonts or whatever dumb shit you do while waiting to dry up and blow away in the wind that’s still picking up outside. NOTE: none of this happened. IT’s funny that I pretend to imagine I have to tell you that, esp. cuz you don’t exist. Unless you do, in which case, HI!!! I probably love you, unless you’re some asshole that stole my files or something, but if you’re who I think you might be, then I definitely love you, and if I’m dead (likely) then hello from the other side, lol, I was just talking to Adele (if she’s dead yet too) and she said hello too. What? This place would be way better without the annoying background music. I get that people want to be anonymized and not have their convos be audible, but fuck that. It’s always some jangly guitar and some guy keening emotively, intentionally outside of his range, thinking that strain in the voice makes him sound meaningful or something but it just sounds so, idk, last century. Stop screaming. Stop quietly screaming over speakers disjointed from who or where you were when you recorded this or when. If you can’t give me a clean, clear, cut bass thump and and some juice in the dark, then please just go back to the garage in the alley and plug in your bass amp and play with your friends, then maybe I’ll wander through the alley like 30 years ago (my god) and hang out and listen for a while and feel like I was really part of something, you know? After all, the universe does revolve around me. And you. And that guy over there. People have their things in here. A kelly green cloth shoulder bag. _WHAT’S IN THERE??_ A fat plastic water bottle with hipster stickers all over it. Tall slender metal water bottles. Headphones, headphones, headphones. Why does everybody need headphones out in public these days? Remember when that was not a thing that we needed? What are you needing to filter out or funnel in? All the damn time? WHAT AM I MISSING, HERE? hahaha, old. Brain salad surgery is on the background now. Still annoying but less so cuz it reminds me of walking in the woods with my 3/4 Kentucky Wildcats tshirt, even though that was Carry On My Wayward Son, but same diff, I learned about them both at the same time. From my narky nerdy rage-fueled ginger motherfuckin neck-vein poppin self-delusional grandiose shabby ass mediocre HS MARCHING BAND DIRECTOR, of all people. Hope he’s doing good. Last I heard, selling cars. Probably dead now. Who isn’t. Americano, I said I wanted you and now you’re making my stumak sik. Time to think about lunch? It’s probably all the sugar that i laid down as a foundation that’s really makin me sik. YA FUCKIN SICKO. What should I have for lunch? I’m kinda thinkin Oakland Gyros. Since apparently it’s that kind of a day for me. Out on my own without cleaving to anyone else’s schedule or scary needs for the first time in — checks wrist — a while. I can imagine Peggy saying, yes, I think that’s a perfectly good, adult choice to make. Which is funny because it isn’t, because I can’t afford to eat out (can’t today, couldn’t then, funny how the more things change), but I get what she was saying. From her perspective (comfortable, working-spouse-having) it made sense. This wide-bottomed girl that works here just came around wiping all the tables with a wet rag and it smells fucking gross, like dirty bleach. Ugh. Thanks. What are you even doing? You just swiped desultorily at the windowsill with that nasty rag, wtf? Just spreadin the stink for good times sake? It’s OK though, she’s nice. You need a balance between doesn’t matter and focused assignment. Between no rules and these are the rules. And of course your rules have to be perfectly clear and simple. But it’s that balance that makes the cycle turn. Rules based doesn’t work if you never get a break, and freedom based doesn’t work if you never have to lock in. They feed each other, these besties. Who’s the third in their polycule? Because no successful couple is ever just a couple. Remember that, kids. Friday and Saturday should really be (speaking of rules) my weekend, and Sunday is like a hazy in between (speaking of the third) workday. Because if I fuck off today, I need to do some work tomorrow, and if I fuck off today, I can’t pig out tomorrow. I’m right here on Locust, I might as well go to Oakland Gyros. Now the bg song is Leave It, and I am utterly unannoyed. Nevertheless, it’s close to time to go. I can’t sit in cafés as long as I used to. For one thing, they don’t stay open as long, although that’s not the issue here, today. I think it’s because the nature of my restlessness has shifted. The anxiety is more clear and present. Keeps me sharkswimming, filling my gills with is everyone going to be OK? Plus I’m hungry? Sort of? Or just in need of a different kind of comfort and I don’t smoke or drink anymore, so. Whatever. We’ll see if the wind blows me into Oakland Gyros or someplace else. Haha. Blame it on the wind, that’s always a good idea. She opened a can of applesauce. Mom audibly gulped three quarters of a 20-ounce bottle of Diet Mountain Dew, then stopped, wiped mouth with back of paw. “Unless you want to be home schooled. Do you want to be home schooled?” “No.” “Thank god.” The applesauce lay shimmering in its can. Dad would not be home soon. Dad would never be home. \<BREAK\> OK, folks. Huddle up. Let’s break that one down a little bit. Shempie, I want you over here by the stove. Yes. No, leave the jacket on. That’s a bomb ass jacket! I know! Where’d you get it? Girafa, you turn and face the — no, like halfway, no, a little more out towards the — yes. Right there. Hold it! Just like that! Hahaha, I know. OK where have we been getting this applesauce? Who buys applesauce in a _can,_ anyway? I’ve never even — Then the bomb hit. \<BREAK\> \<BREAK\> 20, 25, maybe 30 years later. A great sadness settles over the city, but unevenly, a patchwork blanket of half digested grief, solar flare, threadbare memory, primates self-soothing in the faltering evening light. ---- Elisabeth Dog plays her little pink speaker and hum-sings to herself as it plays. I actually do like the Keychron K5v2. If you don’t run the lights, the battery lasts a pretty good long time, so it would appear. I am programming in my head. I am programming my bed to flap and flap and flap like a possessed waffle maker. If I can get it to chomp my legs off, maybe I can sue somebody. Shit, these days, what, what, it’s worth a try, right? Right? All you have to do is hit TAB and it will go into edit mode if it isn’t in there already. Ulysses is actually very thoughtfully designed, for all the infuriating weird nonstandard markdown and file management and “makes you think it’s plain text but WATCH OUT it isn’t” type shit they do. I’m just typing this right now so that Lib dog can hear the keys because the other day she said she liked the sound of this keyboard. And so do I. So I am typing on it, even though my brain is a complete mush pile after all the caffeine and fries and shit I had today and I should really go to bed but she came out here to the dining room with her little speaker and started coloring and I COULD BE WRONG but I kind of got the feeling that she would appreciate some “quiet company” so even though I was basically done futzing around with this rancid old iPad (10 years old and still actually works, though, so there’s that to be impressed by), I have stayed here a lot longer than I otherwise would have, which is fine because I doubt I’ll be able to get to sleep very convincingly any time soon anyway. Did I mention the caffeine overload today? Day started out ok but after all the stuff I couldn’t stop thinking anymore except all the thoughts were stupid, like really inane and nonsensical and not even in a good way. Now I’m just jagged and off and sore. So I’ll go to bed in a few minutes. What the heck. Tomorrow’s Sunday after all, it’s not the end of the world just the end of the week. 031625 thin sheen of anxiety over all the floors of all the floors of the house must wade thru it en route to the kbd it makes glistening waterfalls down every flight of stairs forms a shallow lake like floodwater: inviting to play in; peril in the murk two beautiful things: 1. lib sitting on her bed with airpods max on, talking on the phone with someone from work, seemingly lighthearted 2. cel made it home on the bus by herself after her walk I guess I can try going to bed now. Though I might still need to type a thing or two just to hear the cloc cloc clec cluc-cloc 031725 WATCH OUT. I have my new keycaps on now. Just wait’ll we do tonight’s pigeon. It’ll be a whole new level of cwik cwak cwok cwikkidy cwhet ch-cluc cluc clec. “Is it really possible that I am this dumb.” 031925 epiphany of the day: YOU CAN’T PUT A LEVEL ON SOMETHING ROUND ( arrived at by trying to level the clock on the wall — hey, I can sight the level on the minute hand, because it’s 10:15 — oh shit, time keeps moving ☹️ ) How do we know when we’ve had enough? We’ve had enough. It’s raining. It is raining. The Bluetooth lag is real. I’m not caffeinated enough to do this. I’m too distracted by anxiety. Is anyone ever OK? People who act like everything’s always OK, like the baseline assumption is everything’s fine, like the DEFAULT RESPONSE is “you’re overthinking it, re\_laaaaaaaaaaaax!”\_ — yeah, those people are annoying as fuck. Fuck them. How can they be so obtuse? AIN’T THEY GOT NO HUMANITY!? as a sweaty overwrought perhaps somewhat wise but still dirty and smug poet once said in Milwaukee. DB, let’s call him, because that’s exactly what his initials were. Don’t do the research. I didn’t say anything. I was never here. I never attended open mics with him, never drank and smoked weed with him and his cronies, the hangers-on, the mugshot wannabes, the dead-end hip. Never got sick as fuck out on the sidewalk and then {what’s a combination of stupidity and temerity} to _apologize_ to his ugly ass later for having crashed out. “It happens to the best of us” he said, as if he cared. Shit, he probably didn’t remember who the fuck I was. A piece of plastic detritus in the ditch beside a random highway, that’s who I was. OR SO I THOUGHT AT THE TIME. Well I was dumb. Not like now, when I’m so smart I can actually do something about anything. Like keep the people I love from destroying themselves, like make them see they don’t have to drink or do drugs or steal or have consumptive relationships or lie (to me or themselves or anyone else really) or .. . or . .. But I can’t. There’s only so much anyone can do, and it isn’t much at all, really. So pick one little thing that you can do, and do that, I guess, or else just don’t do anything. Will the outcome be any different either way? Actually yes, probably, but you have to realize that sometimes the “one little thing” is an active choice to not do or to stop doing something, too, and for that option to even appear on your menu, you have to become aware ⓐ that you were doing something in the first place and ⓑ that the thing wasn’t helping. And ⓒ I guess, that you have other choices, that there’s always more than two choices, always, always, always. Thanks Pat. “All of the sudden, he sprang up out of his seat!” **what is the nature of the game** Even if someone is not “OK” — that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re doomed, all bad, etc. I feel like we know this. Nevertheless it’d be cold comfort if they were to kill themselves. Were to be in a situation and mindset where that once again seemed like the most compelling option, and you weren’t there or able to intervene. Then what? What is the weight of billions and billions of other people concretely not giving a shit? It’s like if you stir up the “it’s OK, I think things are going OK” too much, you’ll break the seal and things will very obviously not be OK. It’s like a detente. Concord in a state of arms. You both agree to pretend not to notice the cues, just below the limen, that whisper to your anxious heart. Something’s off, no, I’m just overthinking it. Well maybe you aren’t but maybe thinking at all is overthinking, when it’s something you really can’t do anything about. No, that’s not quite right. It’s never so simple as all or nothing. Or maybe it is. I don’t fucking know. I’m tired. Really tired. What is the nature of the game? When you start thinking things are going well, you can start rearranging the furniture, settling in for some popcorn and a game of go fish or crazy 8, then you get some intelligence that reveals the rotten floorboards and it’s time to pass the bucket and put out the smoldering fire before it starts up again; welcome to another night of snorting awake every couple of hours, blinking into the crepuscule and asking yourself, where am i? and more importantly, where is everybody else? When not having a snack seems like self punishment, but having a snack when you can’t decide what to have for a snack seems like superfluous gluttony — mini paralysis! 𝔖 And no matter how much she pisses you off, no matter how much it hurts your feelings that after everything you’ve been through, that you were more than willing (a phrase that’s overused but is exactly right in this case) to go through because you care so much, that she could turn around and act this way, make these decisions that make it feel like the care is not returned, no matter how much all of that, you have to remember that you still love her and going on the defensive or the offensive isn’t going to heal her or you or anyone. And of course, what you think of as secretly, sinisterly, sneakily being “not OK” might sometimes be her letting loose while outside of your constant protective surveillance. Being a little mad while not being watched. Having a life outside of your anxiety. Seems as though that would be understandable, no? Sometimes we have to be able to say “unspeakable” things, but we can’t do that around just anyone — that doesn’t mean we don’t love them. Also just cuz they do stupid shit sometimes doesn’t mean they’re a lost cause or plotting to betray you personally. You did dumb shit too. What you needed to get thru it was someone who still loved you, whose love was more pwrful than their ego 032025 What is the nature of the game? remember how small your brain is; and even it is bigger than the “world” all assumptions, no matter how cherished, urgent, or instrumental, are disposable the more certain you become, the more manipulable you become justifying your behaviors by positing lack of choice can lead to mental incarceration As an example of this last, take a certain vein of LGBTQ+ protestations: It’s not fair that you treat us poorly, because _it’s not a choice! We’re born this way; we can’t help it!_ We’re victims, so don’t victimize us. We understand there’s something wrong with us, but it’s not our fault, so be nice. No. This is all weak bullshit. It _is_ a choice. We’re _all_ born with whatever bodies and brains and guts and hearts and genitals we’re born with, and then we choose our behaviors in the context of the world we’re born into with all this randomized equipment. Bitch, I’ll choose to be a cocksucker if I want to. If a “boy” chooses to be a “girl” or vice versa, then fuck off if you don’t like it, nobody asked your ugly ass. Oh, but I can hear Jack Bagadonitz, portly and wise, pontificating: But then you don’t get special treatment, either. You can’t go around expecting everyone to accept you, getting offended anytime someone looks at you cross-eyed. OK. There’s some validity to that. Then again, it’s pretty easy to say, for someone who, as Kara Swisher would put it, “never felt unsafe a day in his life.” Maybe we can try putting some distance between our identities and the perennial struggle for resources. Maybe we’re letting “them” define the nature of the game if we focus all our energy on this one angle, this one facet of the hypercube of possible ways to query the relational database of human interdependence and conflict. If victimhood and pathos are our only weapons, then fine, use whatever you got. But are they? Or do we let ourselves get sold that assumption, influenced by a shadow force that’s profiting, and laughing because those are shitty weapons? Hide the keyboard bar, please. Teeth said so. Why is it there? What am I doing here? Why am I tapping on Teeth? Teeth isn’t usually capitalized, is it? I don’t know. You tell me. All I know is I like this keyboard. I like to play it. If your most cherished work and play is founded on an imaginary reality, what does that make you? There’s a truck outside the student union that says “{SO & SO COMPANY} SAWING” *Sawing?* First of all, that’s a weird word. Second, that seems less imaginary than “writing” or whatever it is that I pretend I do sometimes. But is it? No. It’s merely a different arrangement of the realitrons. Well, Ulysses is kind of retarded and thinks it knows what “kind” of “writing” you want to do, but it’s still the best actual type-type-type environment on iOS, and it’s not too shabby on Mac as well. I guess there’s always somebody’s pinheaded lamebrained assumptions to put up with, unless you’re gonna write your own software, and then it’s no different except the pinhead is yourself. Uh dooiiiiiuh I was stressed anxious exhausted put out taken advantage of pissed off depressed, up to the edge after picking up cel because some fucking creep was stalking her from 35th and capitol, got her squared away and got mad at lib for whatsisname still being here when i needed my sanctuary, miscommunication, not that deep really, and — here’s the really good big thing about it — she approached me after he left and we talked and worked it out. That makes me feel like 100 100 times better about where she’s at. There’s definitely times we wouldn’t have been able to do that. 032125 realized i was quadrupedal, it was like a swimming motion on the ground, arms making low circles. it wasnt a race but i won. the guy who came in second had hands instead of feet 032225 supplemental poison is in the dose. you have to have exactly the right amt of everything (precision varies) 032225 If we weren’t in SD, it wouldn’t still be today. I’m not sure it even is, anyway. What am I going to do, for my part, about the horrors that are overtaking my country? > youth is green moss racing from tree to tree to tree and what, for my part, am i going to do for my family, the nearly departing and the barely embarked, in the maelstrom of these horrors? from where do i draw the strength? 032525 it turned out all you needed was one number, and you could end all thought. once they found the number, everything that might ever have been or ever could be written already was policemen killed themselves, gates were flung down, the princess went to bed, cities crumbled from the inside ### how to get to the top of the boulder wall “first, you build an elevator…” “…then you climb up!” 032525 been steady beasting out on food while in SD this time. Emotional eating, I suppose, mix’t with off my routine. Sucks. Feels like shit but undeniably rewarding in that “fuck it” sense. White fudge covered Oreos. That’s what’s wrong with our country. “Well, with what’s happening with Social Security, we just don’t know,” said an old woman at Goodwill in Rapid. “Our country is run by billionaires.” As if that’s just the way things are. I guess they are. Until what? She was talking to an old guy with a receding hairline and a ponytail. His house had burned down, along with all the artwork he had made and everything he had. That’s why he was still working at Goodwill. He was supposed to have retired last summer. “I’m doing all right,” he said. 032625 ### how to let go of things? Why? What is the — is there a “goal”? Is it just a lumbering, lingering sense that I’d rather not be a bloated sack of misery, chugging thru this world like a gob of garbage clogging up what used to be a playful river? - First it was smoking. - Well, you could argue that first it was horrible marriage (not sure if that counts because it felt as though I literally had no choice, but ig that doesn’t matter) - Then it was mindless overeating (still definitely working on that one — well, still working on all of them, but that one’s still hard because it can’t be binary; I do have to eat something sometimes) - Then it was alcohol and THC - What’s next? - sugar? - digital information toxicity? - perfectionism? - spending money? It feels as though this is a series of apparitions shed by the mind virus, the body double, sent out like flying monkeys to kill me, kill my spirit. So I’m really fighting a common enemy, just different facets of it each time. Is there a way to fight the boss directly? Or are these levels necessary? If not necessary, are they sufficient? Is this a workable strategy? Could “letting go of things” be my next project, contemporaneous with the pigeon game? That could be fun. Could be a way to quantify, formalize a nebulous overwhelming malaise into a world I can actually explore, I system I can actually hook up, a coherent set of actions I can actually _do._ Consider me intrigued. So yeah: what’s next? I think the goal is not aceticism, not necessarily even purity, but simplicity. Or maybe it is purity, but minus the weight of that word’s Puritan connotations. Honesty, maybe? Clarity? It’s starting to sound like a melding of what I think of as “writing” and what I think of as “myself.” Good timing, too, given the uproar in the brain caused by [some of our current technological fetishizations][https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/25/communicative-intent/]. So but yeah: what’s next? Which level, which sub-world of the world do I want to plunge my avatar into next? Each choice is valid; perhaps some remain to be unlocked after first traversing one or more of the ones I can see from here. Each carries its own set of fears, perceived peril, risks, stakes — if the stakes aren’t high enough, it’s not really a level — the stakes are always death, or “losing a man” in old skool game parlance. How many men do we get? Not sure yet, that’s one of the infuriating yet somehow endearing aspects of this bizarro game. The men who stand to be sacrificed so far have turned out to be askance shadow visions of myself, the player, the “spirit” me who’s trying to survive and thrive here in the “real” world. Ghosts, phantoms. Not evil but insubstantial. NPCs, maybe? We learn from them. We converse with them, and when it’s time for them to go, they bloop-bloop-blip, a sassy animation splashes out, and they disappear, and your count goes down by one. When it gets to zero, are you finally you? OR IS THERE NOTHING AT ALL REMAINING? Or does the whole thing start again, on another platform, for another generation? So, like, when I lost smoking, I lost the me that smokes. When I lost alcohol, I lost the me that drinks. It’s that simple, but there’s a lot of space under those simple losses. The disappearance of those lurking wraiths reveals new caverns in the subterranean dimension of the game of “who I am.” WHAT’S NEXT? Am I ready to start the next level (yes!)? Because I do have to keep revisiting the previous levels to some extent, some more than others; smoking — not a problem at all, really. Eating like a fucking sow? Still a challenge in some contexts, lol. But yeah, I think if I’m geeked up to start the next level, a few rudimentary checks are required to detect whether the next level is _really_ unlocked — because it it isn’t, it’s just going to end up fake and frustrating. But if it _is_ OK to jump in — What’s next? ---- me and lib and cel walking up the rough side of st elmo peak, having parked the derpy van along the dirt road near the bottom. scrabbling, slipping, laughing, cursing, talking nonsense, going in a little cave. looking later in retrospect at what comes up when you google it: a bunch of yapping knowitalls trying to advertise their sanguine wisdom, their _helpful perspective,_ it just all seems so tiresome and generic and smug and fake and empty. i liked our way of doing it. maybe slightly obnoxious but come on, people. it’s a big hill with big rocks. you walk up it. it’s cool. this is not something you need to “review.” 032825 the bones are of someone who’s doing ok doing the best they can doing all right the cloud white bones under the lateral pine the rotting knotty pine that defines the gully on the south side of the second granite outcropping up the hill past the half broke barbed wire fence behind the cabin. Go. See the bones for yourself. Watch for cats & coyotes who in turn must watch for you 033025 there are 3 good things about my job: 1. it’s easy & my sched is flex 2. creative writing class (with some caveats) 3. Nancy Roncke Is it worth keeping for those? Do I have the gumption or even option to ditch it if it isn’t? 033125 > It doesn’t help that the programs the White House seems most interested in targeting are found in the humanities. (Atlantic) If we were irrelevant, they wouldn’t care.