What is a hangover?

It's beginner's luck.

It's giving up.

It's simply the lack of effort soo much so one would rather withdraw and suffer than to go and pet the dog and pocket one of the loose hairs it shed.

Hangovers make you want to change your ways, when changing of one's ways is what what caused this whole headache in the first place.

Big toe

Gotta keep it jagged and ready to burst

Early on in life grind it down from the top layer without actually cutting it, builds character

Sure it may seem something odd to have to purple puss toes with their own horns

that,hould they need to be used in combat will no doubt filet anything born of this world

But then are riddled useless since it's really more of a kamikaze type of situation when deal with these types of podiatrinsic warfare

they say how you spend the first day of the year is how you’ll spend the rest of it. personally, i never believed in such notions, but a recent time-travelling experience got me thinking and challenging my beliefs. so, i came up with a perfect plan for the 1st of january. since it was my first attempt, i had to get it right—there could be no room for missing anything productive or disrespecting the phenomenon of time by wondering, questioning, wishing, dreaming, or regretting.

to start a good day, i needed proper sleep.

at 11 pm, i sipped a strong valerian root tea—mild never works for me, except when it’s alcohol.

i decided to wake up whenever my eyes naturally opened.

i spent some time in bed organising my thoughts. there’s so much to do, and it feels like a curse that i get hungry and tired like everyone else.

you can either smoke weed or have a strong cup of green tea potent enough to make you puke. if you don’t, the level of concentration you can achieve—especially with a basic noise-cancelling plug—is unimaginable. but even then, you can’t ignore the events beyond your control.

i should have listened to my instincts and put my phone on aeroplane mode.

one distraction led to another.

i must work out.

tiredness brings calm. have you ever wondered about those who don’t need music while working out? it’s because an entire orchestra is playing in their minds.

i must organise it all.

when there’s a mountain of tasks, organising only helps if you have the will to execute them.

for today, i had only three goals.

a workout that wasn’t too intense—lest i become tired—or too light, which would leave me dissatisfied.

every second counts.

it’s 8:11 am.

let’s see how it goes from here.

i did some chores, like making breakfast and eating it. yes, at this point, even these minor activities felt like chores. it helps to get your head ready before declaring it a productive day. i need tangible results by the day’s end.

listening to music or watching short videos could be distracting, so i’m saving them for when i’m absolutely drained.

one thing i’ve noticed for a long time: when you’re focused, everything aligns to its purpose—except time. it speeds up. i just know it.

writing and editing have been part of my daily life for as long as i can remember. it had to be done today too.

half the day had gone by, and so far, i had no issues with it.

then, i doubted whether it would all work out.

i sensed fear.

and in fear, i did the only thing i know that works.

it’s a parallel thing, something beyond explanation or understanding. it’s like nature—it just is.

then, i finished the rest of my chores, evaluating everything.

there was no room for argument, only acceptance.

i did it.

maybe not entirely.

but i’d wish for it in some mystical way—with just a minor input from my side—when i could finally be happy.

mtw: business hours.

tfs: fantasy hours.

s: milestone review.

after finishing this shitty writing, i got a handle on typing.

i then switched to the second phase of the plan.

yes, we’re open for business now.

what.!?

that's it. is this all that fuss was about. what about the nighttime.

saving the final hours for the best chase in the history of all time.

stream of consciousness.

so what do you think? how did i do so far?

if i search for more, i think i can locate the lost kid living somewhere in my conscience.

do you hate me now.!? nope. you cannot, that's the beauty of the game.

Now your average fellow might panic, throw something and perhaps call the cops. You might ask a question like “who are you?” “what are you doing here?”. Taiki and I stood there, Shrek stood there, we stared at him, him at us and with no time to think a woman stormed onto the set cutting through the air, her voice sharp, screaming at her boyfriend right into the car. The screams migrated with her. The mushrooms were hitting hard, there really isn't much time to think in a situation like this, you just observe because Shrek is a man of peace and onions. A hero celebrated among generations, if anything we were safe in his presence. We might have to worry about the paparazzi though, once they find out the husband of the princess is my backyard. I’d probably have to move, change my address. Would my mailbox overflow with fan mail? Love letters? Hate mail? The screaming continued and the affluent movie star was actually enjoying the argument it seemed, like he was tired of entertaining. His posture, subtle but relieved, like the chaos isn't pointed at him for once, it was out of his manage. Shrek was off duty. For now, he is a person, and under that mask? A hero, a story of love. He looked at me. And at that moment I couldn’t help but wonder if this Shrek, the Shrek in my backyard, wearing the face of a hero, was tired of being the hero. This Shrek seemed dulled from too many wars. The look he gave me, the look of defeat, like he was the one getting yelled at, it drapes over my spine. Shrek, an empath, soaking in the sadness of the world around him, and I felt as if that night, I were to open my phone and read “Shrek Dead” on instagram, a nation at unrest. Out of nowhere, after a secret signal the hero removes his mask deliberately exposing his identity. And there he was: a boy. No older than 25. Curly hair, glasses, a plaid shirt that looked a size too big for him. I can’t really describe the face, but he was average. Completely ordinary. Shrek? This is shrek? A curly haired man in glasses and a plaid shirt, has this always been Shrek? We stood there, frozen. I wanted to say something to taiki, to myself, to shrek. What was there to say? The green mask lay limp in his hand, staring at me. Mocking me, this was not the Shrek I grew up with, the unmasked stranger probably worked at the grocery store around the corner. This in fact was a boy who put on a Shrek mask and walked into my backyard.

cuz mine aging rickety

foundering ship of state

(fleshy bonafide skeletal skiff) bellows ahoy,

where silent movies of mein kampf

initially project yours truly as a little boy,

who exuded evident joie de vivre spark,

which got plugged, gummed,

and blocked up with strong emotions

upon advent when

prepubescent self of mine

engendered, kindled, and wracked,

exhibited predominant characteristic

of being exceptionally coy

withdrawing into bedroom

coping method I learned to deploy

within familiar four walls

supposed solitude I did enjoy

pretending to play

with - imagine dragons as friends

tamed courtesy by Little Lord Fauntleroy

green with envy

by his doppelganger Gilderoy,

whose shock of dark hair

similar to that of Donald Hoy.

Thus I provide an attempt to describe the mental health crisis (ease) that waylaid this wordsmith, which may appear as utter gibberish and subsequently incurring absolute zero sympathy, which goads me to switch places with the devil.

Age of precocious innocence recounted yours truly (me) mirthfully exhibiting tomfoolery with Shari (ye), whose near identical physique ofttimes confounded family and friends mistaking us for Bobbsey twins. At some juncture, I succumbed to severe dislocation of psyche, yet (try like the dickens) impossible mission to retrieve exact turmoil that cleft my being asunder and consequently severed our sibling syzygy.

Nevertheless, the total incapacity to function found all mine systems stopped up generating the equivalent organic human breakdown (me) similar to that infamous disc operating message "Abort, Retry, Fail?" (or "Abort, Retry, Ignore?") an error message found in DOS operating systems, which prompts the end-user for a course of action to ... DOES NOT COMPUTE!!! the essential bottom line.

No genuine heartfelt attempt from father, mother, nor reaching out from either sister found yours truly ambitious to broker family relations, rather the absence of presenting emotional accessibility videre licet by barricading myself secluded within bedroom, or remaining deaf and mute to any desperate overtures prevailed giving the impression that I happened to be a bajillion miles away stranded within the outer limits of the twilight zone, where dark shadows signaled the edge of night over formerly sunny disposition.

Unlike yourself or Amelie, I never shared minor or major issues that festered within me noggin, nor inquired about the welfare of Harris cohabitants housed at 324 Level Road giving the distinct (understandable) impression that nary a whit of concern existed towards kith and kin, especially at onset of protracted or sudden unexpected psychological crisis invariably affecting me such as when our papa got laid off from General Electric (despite being a stalwart employee for most of his working life) while us kids happened to be attending either middle, junior or senior high school at Methacton, which name considered a Native American word that refers to a hilly area in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. The area extends from Eagleville in Lower Providence Township to Fairview Village in Worcester Township. The name is believed to mean "windy hill".

After being duped into one dubious fly by night venture after another courtesy selling a slick ruse (for gobs of money) and netting a poor sucker hook, line and sinker, I do not remember myself reacting in any supportive way, nor boosting morale of dad during that stint where we worked at Collegeville Historical Society helping to refurbish said structure during the bicentennial summer (and giving him our earnings - yours truly grudgingly concurred), whereat I donned a makeshift hat to prevent plaster falling into my hair.

Does the husband and wife team (name Frank and Barbara??? Nancy??? Eld), the proud parents of a two year old daughter ring a figurative bell?

No matter, a substantial chunk of the nest egg dad squirreled away (after he served a storied career as an aerospace engineer envisioning himself subsequently working about two more decades then at age sixty taking early retirement, when during those so called golden years, he meant to live a promising long life where financial security for himself and mom a vouchsafed moot point) until his accrued savings got wiped out (bilked) cause predacious thieving yahoos zeroed in on vulnerable souls like papa being easily vulnerable and analogously lured toward one after another cheap trick, which super tramps of skulduggery drew the attention of (correct me if mistaken) one news investigative correspondent employed by NBC 10 News named Bill Baldini able, eager, ready and willing hit the ground running Monday through Friday up to his retirement in December of 2006. He joined WCAU in 1964, and is the longest working television reporter in the city of Philadelphia yes? Do you recall?

One final marked event (before emailing this mishmash) included ectopic pregnancy experienced by mom and luckily expelled, albeit naturally aborted, which came by way of surprise to their solitudinarian son, who happened to be approximately eighteen years old, and dad made an off hand comment inquiring (prematurely ejaculating) my potential newfound role as surrogate father to baby brother.

Many future ruptures awaited Matthew Scott Harris as he plodded along the boulevard of broken dreams, a song title on American Idiot album, which thanks go to Billie Joe Armstrong - lead singer of the punk band named Green Day.

This virtual paper is my void and I shall speak being into it, for all good stories start off, "In the beginning there was nothing." This blank white nothing is my void and so I shall scream into it!

I will shout shout let it all out because these are the things I can do without! I will scream for every abused, molested, and forgotten child and malnourished animal. I will scream at the piss ants who decry the action of the Nazi Party only to don their glittering, tinfoil chapeaus and blame the Jews for every conspiracy real and imagined just like the Nazis did.

I will scream at the abusive, alcoholic husband, and the contemptuous shrew wives. I will scream at every Pastor that's eloquently fleeced his flock as he served himself rather than God. A great cry shall go up from my throat that I am more sinner than Saint.

I will scream at every hypocrite and charlatan, every evil bastard that drains life from others. I look towards the chasm created by the circus we call politics and scream something I know will fall on deaf ears: An eagle needs both wings to fly!

I will always scream at Adam, Eve, and their malcontent vagabond of a son Cane for wrecking Earth to start with. I scream at my own body for feeling like a ran own prison I can't ever escape from.

And I will scream because of the five years I spent languishing in a purgatory caught between a bickering married couple that I once called Mom and Dad. Scream that I felt trapped and that no one not even God Himself gave to craps and that I almost extinguished the life I felt added up to a less tha Zero sum. I will scream at the baggage that long five years left me with.

I've screamed until my spiritual throat is raw, it's blood splashed upon this digital paper. Now I conclude my act not with a shout but a minute whisper....

So I was taking the bus home from school today. There was a homeless man on the bus, seated across from where I was standing. He was pale and had brown hair and a beard. He was 31, according to what he said. The bus had maybe forty people in it. Not crowded but not empty either.

This homeless man, he was speaking out loud. Not to anyone in particular. He was just speaking out loud, in a volume that was just a little bit loud, so that a decent amount of people could hear but no one would be bothered.

He talked about how the federal government was not doing enough to combat climate change and protect the environment. He talked about how climate change was getting worse and the government wasn’t doing enough to stop it because they cared about the fossil fuel industry more than peoples’ lives. He mentioned how scary it was that there still wasn’t snow in November.

He also voiced that public transit (buses, LRT, etc) should be free. Because that would help the environment and because it would give homeless people a space to stay out of the cold. Also because it would help poor people get to where they needed to go without becoming broke. He expressed that it gets really cold in the winter. And especially recently, since climate change is causing the Arctic vortex to get looser so all the cold winds from the Arctic are coming into the south. And if homeless people had somewhere warmer to go in the winter, like a bus for example, that would really help a lot of people.

He discussed how most homeless people don’t act rowdy or unruly on the bus, and how a lot of middle class people do act rowdy and unruly on the bus. Which tracks well with what I’ve seen, the only rowdy people I’ve seen have all been middle class, and I’ve ridden the bus a whole lot. And he discussed how homeless people have a human right to be somewhere warm.

He talked about anti homeless architecture on the buses. The new seats on the buses, the plastic seats, they make it harder for people to lie down and sleep. (There are three places on each bus that each have three seats in a row together and one place that has five seats.) He explained how if there are enough seats for everyone, which there often is, then homeless people sleeping on the bus aren’t bothering or hurting anyone.

He also explained that homeless people deserve to be able to sleep on the bus, because they deserve somewhere to sleep that isn’t cold. See the thing is, and most people in my city don’t know this, the homeless shelters are overflowing and they don’t have enough space for everyone. Anyways, as the homeless man was explaining, a lot of homeless people have no choice but to sleep outside. And when you sleep outside on a day or night when it’s really cold (which is happening more frequently due to the polar vortex becoming looser and coming south due to climate change), you may not wake up at all. Or you will wake up with frost bite and lose body parts. This really disturbed me, the reality of people going to sleep in the horrific cold and not waking up at all.

He discussed the inflation that is happening recently due to corporate price gouging. How food is more expensive, and homeless people can’t afford to buy the food they need. He discussed how it’s hard for homeless people to buy food to begin with since they can’t cook anything due to not having kitchens.

And he expressed how so many of the people he met on the streets were the kindest people ever. How they had so much kindness for him. How they gave up what little they had in order to help him out. How they were so generous, how they helped him and each other even at great personal sacrifice. He talked about how someone even gave him their shoes once.

I told him that I was listening to what he was saying, that I agreed and that I was glad he was saying this. He shook my hand, and then we sat down to talk together. He told me that he wasn’t lazy, that he had to walk around all day. I told him that that must be exhausting. And truly it is very exhausting having to walk around all day, I know that from personal experience. And homeless people do have to do that because if they stay in one place then the cops come to beat them and steal their possessions. He talked about how he made sure to properly put out his cigarettes so that he didn’t cause fires, and about how he didn’t litter.

I told him that I wished I had something I could give him. (At the time I didn’t have any money or food on me and I didn’t even have a hat on me.) He said it was okay since he had some raw chicken hot dogs and some wonder bread and some cheap ketchup. I had to get off the bus at that point because it was my stop. But I believe that it’s very important that his story is told and shared.

My previous post, Questions, was inspired by the posts of a rising star on this site—a star whose literary "creations" are being celebrated as par excellence. Their posts are also, almost certainly, all or mostly generated by AI. Many of their comments and replies to comments are also from AI.

Questions was generated by ChatGPT and posted unedited, except for the title, which I added. I'll let you all discover the rising star for yourselves, assuming you're interested. Just look for posts that have a similar structure and style as Questions: enchanting, magical, verbose, and a little too sweet. Other telltale signs include liberal use of the word 'whisper' and overly optimistic endings. Think of Questions as your benchmark.

Some of you have been gushing over this rising star's posts so much I thought I was gonna barf on my laptop. I couldn't fucking take any more. Don't get me wrong; I think AI is great. I've worked with it as a developer and in real life. And FWIW, I get that y'all want to be artists and not think about AI. Don't be left behind. AI holds many benefits to you if you learn to use it. But don't be duped by some shithead's AI-generated posts.

10/24/2024

It’s been suggested that you can improve the quality of your life by cultivating compassion. Compassion has been described as 1) a feeling of deep sympathy for another person, 2) to suffer together, or 3) concern for the misfortune of others.

Not only is compassion praised as a desired human quality, studies suggest that engaging compassion can increase the hormone DHEA and reduce cortisol, the hormone responsible for managing stress. It’s also been suggested that people who live with a high degree of compassion tend to be happier and be actively engaged in service and volunteer work.

When people live a compassionate life they tend to be admired by friends and family. This sense of compassion tends to spill over into their relationships.

I’d like to suggest five ways to engage compassion:

>Follow-through with service work. Volunteering is helpful as you are engaged in an activity that’s not about you. Oftentimes when we have a desire to use or drink we’re focused on us, our situation, or a problem that has to do with us. Volunteering creates emotional space to give you a chance to make better decisions.

>Random acts of kindness. Doing something for someone without any expectation of something in return.

>One of the most powerful tools for developing compassion is loving kindness meditation. This involves the practice of deliberately engaging kindness by focusing on internal images of different people and directing compassion towards those individuals. This also involves sending loving thoughts to people you care about.

>Develop a ritual which includes meditation time in the morning or before you retire for the night. Focus on statements that allow you to engage ways that allow you to engage loving kindness towards others.

>Practice Commonalities. One favorite exercise comes from a great article from Ode Magazine — it’s a five-step exercise to try when you meet friends and strangers. Do it discreetly and try to do all the steps with the same person. With your attention geared to the other person, tell yourself:

Step 1: “Just like me, this person is seeking happiness in his/her life.”

Step 2: “Just like me, this person is trying to avoid suffering in his/her life.”

Step 3: “Just like me, this person has known sadness, loneliness and despair.”

Step 4: “Just like me, this person is seeking to fulfill his/her needs.”

Step 5: “Just like me, this person is learning about life.”

Good luck on your path.

Reading is a compelling passion for a portion of the globe. When you flip open a novel and peer at the small feeble font sprawled across the pages in preceise positions, your life pauses. Your background blurs. It mutes any noise from your surroundings and allows you to focus on the intricate characters, exquisite vocabulary, and carefully placed details.

The Google definition defines reading as “a cognitive process that involves decoding symbols to arrive at meaning and receiving information.” While that is their interpretation of the favored verb, I would define it much differently. I would comment that reading is like jumping into another individual's life and going through their life beside them. You experience the same emotions as the characters in the delicate tale.

When a reader scans the thin smooth pages and notices the lovely aroma of the novel, they can instantly appreciate the time and dedication it took for the author to construct such a favored masterpiece. The author attempts to display every sentence in a certain way to impact any readers.

George RR. Martin accurately produces a wonderful quote about this fascinating verb: “A man who reads lives a thousand lives, but a man who never reads only lives one.”