Author: Bret

Categories
advisories

Attention all you hoseclamps

I loved twitter so much you have no idea. Twitter gave us the King's Hand and good dril posts, and, most importantly, it gave us good Jeet Heer dunks and essays about Jack Kirby.

Jeet is still on twitter but I'm hoping he'll type himself into a search engine, and read this, and reconsider. Jeet: hi!

Today I erased my twitter account because having a twitter account is now the lite version of driving a tesla, which is pretty much c'mon you know what it signifies and no you don't need me to spell it out.

Anyway, fuck that guy. In the ear. With a wire brush.

But you: I still love you. Deeply. Let's do posts that add up to more than a hill of beans in this crazy world.

Let's post a mountain of beans, good beans that nourish and have a good snap to the bite.

I love you.

Categories
dialogues

Talking war with T rex

Me: Yo T rex team Russia or team Ukraine.

T rex: You ask a lot of stupid questions but this one, gosh. You aim your ice cream cone for your mouth and hit your eye a lot, don’t you.

Me: Well are you on the side of justice or the side of non justice.

T rex: War is about power not justice. I just hope the monsters lose.

Me: You could personally pass for a monster.

T rex: ...

Me: I invented a new kind of rainbow.

T rex: ...

Me: Wanna see?

T rex: No.

Categories
questions

Why not surrender to the VHS static

If you rewind the tape to this exact fractional frame, to the instant where the door in the upper left corner of the screen begins to open, the flickering yellow line that just rolled from top to bottom does not roll the same way it did on the previous viewing.

The important thing to understand is the static is non deterministic.

The flickering yellow line is non deterministic. This is a VHS tape not software. Software also is non deterministic. Nothing deterministic deserves to be called software.

Watch this tape again and you will see the same big picture. But every dot, every shimmer, every brightening and dimming will be new, unfamiliar, original.

Is it even the same big picture, when every little part of its many little parts is different?

Is the door in the upper left corner even a door anymore?

Is the door closed now?

Have you missed your chance?

Is there even hope?

Categories
dialogues

Talking posts with T rex

Me: Yo T rex how frequently do you post

T rex: On the computer?

Me: No, on the internet

T rex: Nobody likes a pedant

Me: Nobody likes a scold

T rex: Sorry

Me: What if we let go of the past and dance together into the future?

T rex: Yes, my friend. Yes

Me: OK.

T rex: I'm glad we're friends through all this.

Me: Me too, let's dance

T rex: Yeah it's dance time

Me: …

T rex: …

Me: À la main left

T rex: …

Me: …

T rex: hm

Categories
fair dealings plagiarisms

Well the heads

Ian Astbury
Alberto Cabello from Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Well the Texas sun
Makes my back burn
And the words that wrong
Make my back, makes my cat wrong

The sparkle in your eyes
Focus my mind
And the sparkle in your eyes
In fact in my mind, glow ’round the edge of my mind

I’m sure this fur in your mind is
Sanctuary
I’m sure this purr in your mind
Purrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

I’m sure this sparkle will
Stop sparkling
I’m sure this sparkle will
Stop talking

And the world
The sparkle still talking
And the talk
The sparkle talking in
And it talk and it talk and it talk and it talk and it talk and it talk and it talk and i i t a nd it ta l an d it ta l aaal aaala la llll l llll l lllllll

Categories
advisories

The VHS static is leaking out of the VHS

VHS static
Rollcloud, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Today you tried to see brain red without the aid of a bluegreen circle on a computer screen. You simply stared at something that was bluegreen, and you waited for your retinas to tire out. You stared at barbicide.

You stared and you realized what you always realize, when you try to stare.

You re-realized that your powers of concentration are feeble and that your self, your awake awareness, your inner agent that calls itself “I,” is tiny. Your “I” could fit on a camera card from the 90s and this re-proved it. Your “I” couldn’t hold itself centred on the barbicide.

No, your “I” drifted to the edges, was drawn in and trapped by the fringing glittery colours you could not name in the negative space framing the barbicide. In that trap, in the static and the shimmer of something that was not there but which there’s no denying you saw, there were eyes.

They looked back. They met your gaze. Unlike you, they had the strength to stare. Still have.

Categories
dialogues

Talking wordle with T rex

T rex
myfavoritedinosaur.com and LadyofHats, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Me: Yo T rex what’s your start word on wordle.

T rex: BITER.

Me: Wow, basic. That’s like being a lawyer and having plates on your BMW that say ATRNY.

T rex: It has two great vowels and two great consonants and it begins with a leap of faith. It would be a beautiful, wise, artful first word even if I had no teeth and a weak jaw.

Me: Come on that is basic as hell.

T rex: It serves me well. I got KNOLL on my second guess when BITER got zero greenyellows.

Me: It took me five guesses.

T rex: Well knoll was tough.

Me: Still.

T rex: What was your first guess.

Me: ...

T rex: ...

Me: ...

T rex: It was penis wasn’t it.

Me: ...

T rex: I would help you with that, but.

Me: ...

T rex: You know.

Categories
dialogues

Talking VHS static with T rex

T rex
Durbed, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Me: Yo T rex ever noticed that the static in a paused VHS image never pauses?

T rex: Well how could you not. It thrums and flickers unrelentingly. It moves when it shouldn’t.

Me: What makes it move? The tape is stopped.

T rex: It’s stopped spooling and unspooling, true. But the playback head keeps rotating, touching a thin sliver of the tape, picking up both a fraction of a frame and the ambient energy of nearby spirits.

Me: Spirits or demons.

T rex: Depends how good you are at making friends with spirits.

Me: Can you hear them talking to you through the static?

T rex: If you’re asking, that’s a sign you hear them and you want reassurance. I have none. If they speak to you through the VHS static, and if you listen, the choice is yours. Do as they ask or don’t. Perform the rituals they command or don’t. Collect the stones and feathers and fruit and bones they ask you to or don’t. Sharpen the knife they ask you to or don’t. Make the incision they request or don’t.

Me: Thank you for your honesty. Hard truths can be hard to hear.

T rex: Drink the juice of the wound or don’t.

Me: How about we put the movie back on.

T rex: Dab the juice of the wound on your cheeks and chest and belly or don’t.

Me: Movie?

T rex: OK.

Me: Can you push play?

T rex: ...

Me: ...

T rex: Some times I don’t want to be your friend any more.

Categories
advisories

Please p̸u̸s̴h̸ ̷s̴t̵̠̭͇͑̾͌ơ̴̜̠̝̌p̸̒͜͝ ̴̜̋͝o̴̲͒̉͠ń̶̤͎̯̣̼͜͝ ̶̢͎̪̭̣̏͛̑̓̓͗t̵̻͔̩̗̎̎̾h̴̛͖̻̗̙̗͗̐̀͘̕e̶͖͙͕͛̿̾́̊̍̕͜ ̴̛̻̤V̶͉͗H̶͍̟̘̆́͗S̶̛͉̰̼̾͑̈́̅̓

pLease push stop

pleeaSe push stop

Pl̶̛͇̬̩̻͍̗̦̖̻̖̔̀̾͑͆̊̑̒͐͘͝ease push STPO

not even joking there is something terrible coming through the fringes of the static p̴̰̭͒à̷̼u̶͔̕ͅs̴̟͕͗ḛ̶̅̃d̶̦̙̈́͠ image

please pleaee s to o it

ittt

plee e en

Categories
advisories

Demons are not the only ones sending messages in the VHS static

Sometimes the messages in the VHS static are from chemical engineers at BASF who designed their own signatures into the on-tape compounds, and whose message is in every frame. Their message is typically that they are from Austria and like receiving blow jobs.