you remind me of me. you should check out the artworks of Paul Laffoley.

i honestly think we won’t have to try. the musk bubble will pop someday. when it does, it’ll deflate rather quickly.

i grew up in a BIG mormon family.

a decade or so ago, a group of 20-ish cousins and i were sitting round the campfire at the reunion. they all discussed among themselves and decided that i am the original black-sheep of the family and they thanked me for being a strong role model for their own journey out of the truly awful mormon religion.

i am very proud of that.

i just wanted to say that what you wrote here is beautiful and it helps me clarify my thoughts. ♥️

i think it is incredibly unfair that the process of ending your own life is, in this culture, a necessarily lonely and grim affair.

according to the theory of complete bodily autonomy the option must be available, simple, painless, and ideally a joyful shared experience. but the moment you make such a desire known to others, they will try to “help” you. and i can assure you that their idea of “help” will not be pleasant for you.

so, sadly, you must tread this path alone.

philosophically, i think it offends people because it forces them to acknowledge that their own life is probably not worth preserving. we force each other to suffer through it all because no one wants to openly admit that this shit just plain-old-sucks.

it puts the lotion on its skin

i noticed this shot during this week’s episode and thought to myself, “well that was tricky”.

who is that cute man, please?

that’s what i was thinkin… surely single-cell eukaryote (fungi) is earlier than complex eukaryote (shark)?

calculus made easy?

i (longtime ex-mo) am fifth generation from Parley P Pratt who personally helped brother Joseph develop his insipid theology.

our ancestors stood together at ensign peak. such a proud history

hello. that was really lovely to read.

i share a lot of similarities with your story. although honestly you seem to be faring much better than i have into my middle age.

there definitely was a successful future for me to be had. but i fell off that path hard a decade ago and now i have very little hope nor desire to find success in any standard measure.

it has been an interesting experience to discover exactly how and why i made the choices that have landed me in my current situation. i am well beyond regret or blame (per se), and am simply grateful for some tiny piece of reality to call my own.

honesty is important.

good luck.

i have recently become very aware of and disgusted by the the amount of plastic waste i make.

every single goddammed thing is covered in it. it’s obscene and i am ashamed.

i second this request. please

when i encounter a dog turd on the sidewalk, i usually imagine force-feeding it to the nasty owner who left it there. it makes me super angry.

i spend a lot of time alone and so my mind wandering out unattended can be a real problem. years ago (45 now), i finally traced back to the single moments in my life that caused my demise and since then my brain LOVES to torture me repeatedly with the pain and betrayal and shame and anger of those moments.

1.5 years ago i found something that helps. i made “elevator music” for my mind.

i have always had a bit of a problem getting songs stuck in my head. so i found one that i like but not love (not a favorite song) that i have known for forever, and put the chorus and bridge on permanent replay.

the tune and lyrics are available as a reflex, last for about a minute before the loopback, it is calming and centering and allows me to manually wrest control away from thought processes that are harming me but seem to be happening automatically.

it may be that this is too specific of a solution, but it aids my sanity. good luck to you.

(the song is: “Spinning the Wheel” by George Michael)

the turn tables

Watching their partner have sex with someone else sometimes sparked what they called “classic little jealousy issues,” which Adams said they resolved with “more communication, more growing up.” The money was just too good. And over time, they adopted a self-affirming ideology that framed everything as just business.

i swear this is the exact plot of “Boogie Nights”. i wish these young entrepreneurs all the best, but the movie didn’t exactly have a happy ending.

so it’s NOT a pyramid scheme?

or it IS a pyramid scheme, and that’s why we should get on board?

i got to spend 30 minutes in the doctors waiting room last week and they had a pop playlist running. i rarely listen to (any) music these days and spend my time in public with earplugs jammed in my ears.

the music coming from those speakers was ungodly distracting, aggressive, poorly constructed and LOUD. i brought it up to my family and they told me i sound like an old man (45).

i don’t think it’s just my age.

loudness wars