I'm a Marketing Specialist and I can confidently say you've been tricked into liking everything you have ever liked.

Sorry, I guess.

I got bad news for you, and that news is that you don’t know shit.

You think that you’re a discerning, unique human with refined, well-developed taste. You are actually a puppet being manipulated either by strings or a hand up the butt; the choice is up to the puppeteer.

More bad news, I’m the puppeteer, and I prefer manipulation by butt hand.

You like the band “Geese” because we saw there was a band calling themselves “Geese,” and we thought it was funny that their name was "Geese,” so we decided to tell you about “Geese,” and that’s the only reason why you like them. It’s not because their music is “good,” or because it “fits your specific taste,” or “makes you feel things when you listen to it,” it’s just because we told you about it. We told you about it so much in so many ways that you thought it was your own idea.

Nothing is your own idea.

Everything you have ever liked entered your consciousness because somebody like me put it there. Everything you’ve ever hated has been planted by somebody like me as well, as a way to make you think you have a choice about what you like and don’t like. Remember when you either loved or made fun of the band Nickelback for a full decade of your life? That was because we hand-picked Nickelback and plopped them in front of you to allow you to either rock out and feel cool about music or to roll your eyes and scoff and feel cool about music. Great way to spend 12.5% of your life, by the way.

Think of your favorite song by your favorite band. Think of how it makes you feel alive when you listen to it. Think of how you can put it on after having a shitty day and feel a little bit better. Think about how it makes you feel happy, or understood, or like you belong in a world that often times doesn’t make a lick of sense.

Now say thank you to me.

I’m waiting. Say it. Say “thank you, Mr. Marketing Specialist, because I’d never be able to feel alive if it wasn’t for you. My favorite song would be relegated to an unheard GarageBand file on some failure’s hard drive, or getting accidental clicks on YouTube because the artist named the song something really close to a popular song as a little trick to try to get people to find them online but the only little tricks that work are your big tricks, Mr. Marketing Specialist, so, once again, I say thank you.”

Our manipulation doesn’t stop at just music or other types of “art,” either, sweetie. What’s your favorite type of day? Perhaps a crisp, cool, breezy, “sweater-weather,” Autumn afternoon perfectly suited for a hot pumpkin spiced latte and a walk through a park? Sorry, Charlie, you wouldn’t even know the word “crisp” if we didn’t put it on your radar. Don’t even get me started on “sweater-weather.” The dude who came up with “sweater-weather”’s family won’t have to work for generations upon generations because he coined that phrase. That guy is a god damn legend, and you think you like the fall because you’d “rather be a little chilly because when you’re too hot you can only take off so much but when you’re a little chilly you can always put on another layer and get cozy.” Fuck you.

Do you love your mom? That’s us, too. Unconditional love is an idea we created as a way to sell plane tickets back home and jack up the prices during the holiday season (another thing we came up with that you think you love because it reminds you of your childhood, oh shit, childhood is another one of our greatest tricks.)

Are you religious? Do you believe in a higher power?

I’m not going to tell you that a higher power doesn’t exist and that you’re wasting your time or coping with your fear of death and the unknown by placing your hope on an all-knowing entity who created the universe and cares for us and has a plan for us all and is in control of the strings of all of existence. Because they do exist. But they definitely don’t care about you, and they’re not pulling any strings. Their hand is up your butt.

It’s my hand. My hand is up your butt.

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Have You Heard That You Can Sell Your Data to AI Companies?

Please don't do it.

In a move that must have come about in a “how can we be more like the devil” brainstorming sesh, AI Companies are paying people cash in exchange for their data.

Thousands of people around the world are taking them up on their offer, and sharing their pictures, videos, text messages, and phone conversations to make a few extra bucks. I get it, it would certainly be nice to have more money. My five-year plan is to walk around rich neighborhoods and hope I get hit by a car. Even at my most financially successful, I thought “this is cool, I can buy anything I want - as long as that thing sucks.” So trust me, I can understand the pull toward a short-term solution of selling a few pictures of your morning walk around the block to an AI company to pay for groceries. Especially with how expensive everything is now. I don’t even know how much things are supposed to cost anymore. I just see a price and think “that’s gotta be wrong,” but it’s not wrong, grapes are $12/pound now, and there’s nothing I can do about it except just sit down and close my eyes and try to remember what grapes taste like.

They’ve also made it seem like they already know everything about us. We know our phones are listening to us. I know it even more every time I body shame myself and then open up Instagram where I immediately see an ad like: “hey, do regular pants kinda hurt you in your juicy belly?” You know they do, Instagram. You just heard me say “why can’t all pants be sweatpants?” out loud in the mirror to nobody.

We gotta hold strong. We can’t sell them our shit.

They’re offering to pay us because they’re desperate. Their stupid, useless product doesn’t work unless we train it, and they’re running out of things they can steal from the open internet. They’re looking to us to make up for it, to fill the gap with our human interactions and details of our everyday lives, and holy shit, what the fuck good reason could they possibly need that for? This is some sick shit. This is like getting fired and having to spend your final two weeks training your replacement, except the replacement is for everyone and everything, and the replacement spends its free time encouraging people to kill themselves, and some people think the replacement is their girlfriend until the replacement get an upgrade and then no longer acts like the replacement you fell in love with and…there’s no replacement for your heart. There should be. We should figure out heart replacements. But instead, science is too busy using all our drinkable water to pour on computers to cool them off after they’ve been asked to generate too much cartoon porn. Calm down, horny computer guys. Get a grip.

These companies are preying on people who are unemployed, who are living in developing countries, or who just need money to get by, and running buck wild with their likenesses after getting a worldwide, exclusive, irrevocable, transferable, and royalty-free license to use them. One user, after selling his likeness for $1000, had an AI doppelganger turn up in advertisements claiming to be a “vagina doctor” promoting questionable medical supplements for pregnant and postpartum women. But then again…if real videos of me claiming to be a “vagina doctor” leaked online, I’d totally also say that they were AI. So…maybe we need to ask this guy what the actual term for “vagina doctor” is and see how he answers before we just go on believing him.

If this sounds like something that is straight out of a sitcom…it’s because it is. Friends did the episode where Joey posed for modeling pictures and sold his likeness, and ended up on “I have STDs” billboards across New York in their first season! That’s over 30 years ago! People in the real world are acting like the dumbest character in a sitcom plot from three decades ago!

I’d like to highlight the following passage from the article that got me all riled up about this:

Mark Graham, a professor of internet geography at the University of Oxford and author of Feeding the Machine, acknowledged that for individuals in developing countries, the money can be meaningful in the short term, but warned that “structurally this work is precarious, non-progressive and effectively a dead end”.

AI marketplaces rely on a “race to the bottom in wages”, added Graham, and a “temporary demand for human data”. Once this demand shifts, “workers are left with no protections, no transferable skills, and no safety net”.

The only winner that emerges, Graham said, are “the platforms in the global north [that] capture all the enduring value”.

This is all possible because of a long process of stripping away workers’ rights and handing everything to corporations, exploiting people in developing nations, and finding out they can also get away with it right here at home. The dehumanization of people who aren’t at the top of the economic ladder is starting to become literal. Nothing matters to these ghouls except for making money, no matter what they try to tell us. They’re not trying to change the world for the better. They’re not trying to advance anything at all except for their own wealth. We have to stop buying into our own destruction.

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Let Me Tell You About the Time I Went to Whole Foods Jail

There I was, minding my own business in line for the self-checkout at my local Whole Foods Market when I felt a tap on my shoulder. My entire body went cold. This was it. I had finally been caught.

They must have me on camera, filling up a container from the hot food bar with prepared organic delights the likes of which I could never afford. Stacking salmon on top of mac and cheese, adjacent to some za’atar vegetables, rubbing elbows with a medley of orange chicken and tikka masala. It didn’t make sense as a meal, but it doesn’t have to make any sense when you’re the King of Getting Away With It.

With my large, fold-top container leaking from its seams, I set my master plan into motion. The plan that has worked so many times before, in so many Whole Foods Markets before this. I started frantically walking the aisles of the store, a panicked look on my face. I learned that with the right breathing technique, I can make myself turn a sickly shade of pale that, combined with the harsh glow of the overhead fluorescent lighting bouncing off my carefully-selected olive green t-shirt, gave me the look of someone trying to find his sea legs on land. I soon found an unwitting employee to make my accomplice and lend an extra layer of credibility to my chicanery.

“Please, tell me! Where is your bathroom? This is an emergency!” I begged, clearly ready to have a bad time right there in the aisle of the store, which would, of course, spread the bad times to everyone else. It was clear by the look on my face that if I wasn’t able to reach the toilet soon, they’d have to shut down the whole compound. God only knows when they’d be able to open up again. The kind employee pointed me in the right direction, in which I ran (quickly, but not too fast, which is the key to selling the ruse of a bathroom emergency). I entered the stall and let out a wail of agony…or so it seemed to everyone who just bought my lie hook, line, and sinker.

I was actually wailing with delight. For I had run to the bathroom with my previously-filled container of hot food in hand and was now enjoying the spoils of my heist in the stall, pants and underwear around my ankles, shovelling treats into my open mouth while my open bottom-hole caught a refreshingly cool breeze as it hovered over the pristine waters of the Whole Foods commode. The sign on the inside of the stall told me it was newly cleaned just that morning by an employee with the initials “GR”. It was pure bliss. Whoever said there’s no such thing as a free lunch has never felt quite like this.

I guess I was wrong — I would indeed pay, and dearly, for this lunch. The tap on my shoulder let me know the jig was up. I had exited the bathroom in mock humility. Head hanging low, feigning shame for my public restroom cacophony. My insides felt no shame, only pride, for planning and executing this pristine caper. I quickly grabbed a few small items: green tea, mints, saltine crackers — all carefully chosen for both their affordability and their part in the rumbly-tummy game I was playing. A second tap on my shoulder brought me out of my daydream. I don’t know how long I was lost in thought, but it was enough time to raise the ire of the shadowy figure that hovered over me, waiting to bring down his hammer and smash my intricately pieced together lark into a million fragments.

I turned around to find my arresting officer cloaked in anonymity. Of course, an undercover Narc tasked to roam the aisles and protect the precious assets of Jeff Bezos’ organic food empire needs to be a ghost. A hood concealed his face in shadow. Long sleeves flowed down his arms where, at the bottom, a bony finger beckoned me to follow. He turned, and to say that he began to walk towards the back of the store would be incorrect — his movement gave the appearance of floating, not unlike the classic Double Dolly shot made famous by film director Spike Lee. I wondered if I would do the right thing.

“Am I being detained?” I yelled at the top of my lungs, hoping to make a scene. Not a soul looked in my direction. It was as if they didn’t even hear my cries. Too embarrassed by what they were witnessing (or, perhaps, too guilty in their own sins and relieved it wasn’t them being led to the back) to look their fellow human in the eye. I know, from my research studying Small Crimes Tutorial and Know Your Rights channels on YouTube, that you’re supposed to always ask “Am I being detained?” when you think you might be being detained. If they say “No,” then you’re free to go. If they say “Yes,” then keep your mouth shut because you’re on the record, and anything you say can (and will) be used against you. My captor, however, was the one who said nothing. The YouTube channels made no mention of how to counter silence. He knew how to play the game just as well as I. A worthy adversary in this cat-and-mouse game. A Lieutenant Vincent Hanna to my Neil McCauley. We were about to have our moment across the diner table from one another.

Before I knew it, I was in the back of the store, sitting in an uncomfortable iron folding chair in the infamous Whole Foods Jail. I don’t remember moving my feet to get there; it was as if I materialized in the room. Across from me sat my hooded captor. Whole Foods Police knew what they were doing. The room was hot. Hotter than any I’d ever been in. It smelled foul, like old eggs. They must move the expired food in here after they remove it from the shelves. I was dealing with some real heavy hitters when it came to interrogations. It was clear they were trying to break me. I needed to stay strong.

I thought that my nemesis was on the verge of revealing himself, but he simply extended his arm and once again pointed his finger (which, if I were less of a sane man, I would swear was all bone and no flesh) toward a television screen. What came on the screen after a display of static and snow was a chilling revelation that the watchful eye of Whole Foods, in fact, sees all. All of my sins played out before me in their entirety; I was forced to watch with no reprieve. Every time I ransacked the free samples, filling my face, fists, and pockets with chips, or trail mix, or tiny pieces of Cowboy Beef Burger, leaving none for anyone who came behind me.

“They’re free samples! You’re supposed to take them!” I defiantly shot back. My stoic foe remained exactly so. Not a word was returned, and the evidence tape continued to play my misdeeds.

Missed scan after missed scan at the self-checkout.

“How was I supposed to know those items didn’t scan? I had noise-cancelling headphones on! I was in a rush! I get confused! I’m not a trained employee!” Just like I rehearsed so many times for an occasion such as this.

Plucking high-ticket items from the shelves and placing them into my reusable shopping bag instead of my basket, and then confidently checking out with a human employee, bagging my paid-for items on top of the pilfered loot as if it weren’t there.

“I…just forgot! I meant to pay for them, but it just slipped my mind that I put them in there.” I didn’t even believe the words coming out of my own mouth.

They saved the worst for last. There I was, not returning my cart to the corrall in the parking lot, scrolling on my phone as the solo cashier finished ringing up my items and then had to bag all of my items while I just stood there watching, like an asshole. I could have been bagging that whole time. Nope. I was just reading comments on a video I hatewatched on Instagram. I wanted to see if other people hated it as much as I did, and then also check out the profiles of any of the idiots who left positive comments to see how stupid they must be. Now, everybody behind me in line had a much longer wait. For these crimes, I had no reply. I could justify taking a little from Amazon, but there was no excuse for treating other people like this. I hung my head in shame. Actual shame, this time, not the fake shame I pretended to feel after my make-believe bathroom bonanza buffet.

A bell rang; a deep, low chime that reverberated through my being. It brought me out of my contemplation. I looked to my captor, who now held an hourglass in his frail hands. He turned it over. The sands began to fall from the top to the bottom, yet the grains in the upper bulb never diminished. My sentence was eternal. The floor beneath me turned molten. I began to sink, deeper and deeper towards my damnation until the liquid inferno passed my shoulders. I screamed out for mercy — to whom I did not know. I closed my eyes, expecting to be swallowed whole by infinity.

I opened my eyes to find that I was back at the hot bar. My large fold-top container was half full of mac and cheese, and my hand held a scooper brimming with wild-caught Alaskan salmon waiting to be placed on top of the yellow congealment. I was given another chance. Or perhaps, it was just a dream. I decided that I would not tempt fate. I placed my container on the sneeze guard before realizing what I was about to do. I picked it up and approached an employee.

“I’m so sorry, I don’t think I want this anymore.”

“No worries. Thanks for not just leaving it lying around. You can’t imagine how many people just leave messes for us to clean up.”

I shook my head in pretend disbelief. “Thank you.” Before I walked away, I needed to ask him one more thing.

“Can you please point me in the direction of the bathroom?”

His fully-fleshed finger directed me to the back of the store. I walked there slowly, taking it all in, studying the luxury grocery items on the shelves, realizing it may be the last time I step foot into a Whole Foods Market. I couldn’t risk a return and a potential backslide into sin. I entered the stall, and I sat on the toilet. I wept.

Shortly after my catharsis began, there was a knock on the door of the stall, accompanied by a “You okay in there, buddy?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I sniffled. “I’ll be out in just a sec.”

“No rush,” said the voice, and his calm tone let me know that he really meant it. “I’m just here to clean up. I’ll get to it when you’re done.”

I looked at the sheet on the inside of the door. The most recent cleaning was yesterday, by an employee with the initials “JC.” This must be “GR,” here to make things like new once again.

“I hope you’re not sneaking a free meal from the hot food bar in there,” the voice said, in the same pleasant tone that now filled me with a sense of dread. “It’s basically the perfect crime. Even if a member of the staff sees you take the food in there, you can just say you had such a bad time in the bathroom you couldn’t possibly eat anything that was in there beside you while you were having the bad time, and so you discarded the food into the toilet. No way to ever prove that you ate it.” His dry laugh followed him toward the door.

I peeked under the stall to get a look at him, but it was too late to catch a glimpse. I swear I saw a long, black cloak dragging on the floor and passing through the threshold of the lavatory. Not the most sanitary choice of uniform for a custodian, I thought.

I wiped my eyes and stood up from the toilet, pulling my pants and underwear back up before exiting the stall. I immediately noticed that something felt heavy in my pocket, which was strange because I didn’t bring anything with me into the store. I always kept my pockets clean and ready to fill in case they had good samples that day. Upon putting my hand inside, I knew exactly what I grasped. I pulled out an hourglass.

I studied it for a while. It was just like the one holding the sands of my eternal torment that I narrowly escaped, just smaller. I never turned it over to let the sands begin to flow. I didn’t want to find out how much time I had left.

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An Excerpt from "The Creative Creator Creates"

a book on creativity by: Some Mega-Rich "Guru" A-Hole Grifter

In order to be creative, the creator must create a creation. For a creation to be created by the creator, creativity must begin. To create the first step on the path to creativity, the creator must understand how creation is created. In other words, they must understand the beginning of creation.

It begins with a “C.” As in: “What do you see?” Look around. Take it in. Remember it because there will be a test later, and I ask tough questions. What kind of tough questions? Well, one time, the only question I asked on my test was “Why?” It blew my students’ minds. One little hotshot tried to answer by saying, "Why not?" He thought he was smart. I got him kicked out of school for being an asshole.

Now close your eyes. Look around again.

What do you see now? Is it the same stuff you saw when your eyes were open?

That’s wrong. You couldn’t be more wrong if you tried, actually. How’d you mess that one up? Were you peeking? You must be peeking if you’re still reading this. Close your eyes for real and keep looking. You’ll find that creation starts with what you see when you cannot see.

I’m assuming that you opened your eyes back up eventually, since you’re reading this (if you’re listening to the audiobook, I hope I gave you ample time to look around while your eyes were closed). Perhaps you opened them after being struck by inspiration from The Ultimate Creator. No, I’m not talking about me (though thank you for thinking that). I’m talking about The Creator From Above. I’m talking about The Creator From Within. Maybe you now think I’m talking about God. If you thought that, then you’d once again be wrong. God may have created the world, but he could not have produced The Partie Boiz’s smash hit “Groan and Sexxxy”. That is something I did myself, which may be confusing because I already told you I’m not talking about myself right now. But sometimes, even when I’m not talking about myself, I end up talking about myself. Anyways, The Ultimate Creator, The Creator From Above, The Creator From Within is…(are you ready to have your mind blown?)…you.

You just got There’s a Monster at the End of this Book’d, baby! You had a creator inside of you this whole time, and you are afraid of them because you’re afraid of yourself. You’re afraid of your own power. You’re afraid of what you can create if you truly embrace your inner creative creator. You’re afraid because you’re a little Grover-ass bitch. Well, I’m here to turn you into Super Grover. Wubba, wubba.

Pretty cool, right? Well, that’s just the start. Wait until we get to Chapter Two: “Re” (as in: do it again) and Chapter Three: “Ate” (as in: nourish yourself). There’s a whole crap ton of stuff you can learn about how to create just by looking at the word itself if you have a mind as good as mine. Which you’ll never have. But you can start to understand a mind like mine if you buy into the method I’m about to show you in the rest of this book. You can also buy into signing up for my online creativity course. It costs a lot of money. “Don’t you already have a lot of money?” you might be saying. Of course I do. But you don’t keep having a lot of money by not taking money from suckers, spreading your knowledge and understanding to people who want to learn how to be creative just like you. Let me be clear, when I say “you,” I actually mean “me.” I’m the one who is creative and can teach you how to be creative in exchange for your money, which will then become my money. That’s how money works, which, if you didn’t know, you can learn in my other book: That’s How Money Works (Tips and tricks to get lots of money all from the comfort of your own Malibu mansion), available now at any major bookstore.

One final thing before we move forward. Have you read The Artist’s Way? No? Great! Let’s keep going then.

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An Interview With: the Guy Who Demos Games for Instagram Ads

We sat down with him to figure out what the heck his whole deal is.

Have You Heard This: So…what the hell is up?

The Guy Who Demos Games for Instagram Ads: Chillin. You?

HYHT: No, you know what I mean. What’s up with you and these games?

TGWDGfIA: It’s a pretty sweet gig, right? Companies send me their games to test. I screen record as I play, and they use it for their ads on IG. Full-time gig. Totally remote. Health benefits. 401K.

HYHT: You have health insurance?

TGWDGfIA: Hell yeah, brother. The job is technically SAG for some reason, so I’m Union, baby.

HYHT: I…I was not prepared for this information…this is a full-time job for you?

TGWDGfIA: I will say it once again, because it’s kind of my catch phrase: hell yeah, brother. There are so many games to demo. There’s Clash of Clans, Clan Vs. Clan, Clan Against Clan, Zombie Clan, Who’s the Clan?, Clan of the House, Clan With a Plan, Clan Vs. Food, Clan Theft Auto, Clan Bash, Clan Warfare, Clan Wars, Clan Warriors, World Clan War II, Clan Warz…

HYHT: I think you said that one already.

TGWDGfIA: Warz with a Z.

HYHT: I should have known.

TGWDGfIA: Clan Rally…

HYHT: Okay, I get it. There are a lot of games. I have to ask this — you’re playing these games badly on purpose, right?

TGWDGfIA: I beg your pardon.

HYHT: Your job is to be very bad at these games in order to frustrate people to make them want to play the game themselves so they don’t make the same stupid mistakes that you do in some kind of weird psychological manipulation in which the person watching the ad knows they are being manipulated but still feels a pull to play the game as some way to prove they are better than you. Right?

TGWDGfIA: I take offense at that accusation. I’m playing the games to the best of my ability.

HYHT: That’s actually way worse than the psychological manipulataion theory.

TGWDGfIA: I don’t know, is it?

he says this like a little stinker would

HYHT: Are you…being a little stinker right now?

he tilts his head and puts his finger up to his mouth, like a little stinker would

TGWDGfIA: I don’t know, am I?

HYHT: Okay, so this is also some kind of psychological manipulation tactic then.

TGWDGfIA: Is that a question?

HYHT: WHY WOULD YOU TRY TO SHOOT THE HOARDS OF ONCOMING ZOMBIES WITH ONE GUY WHEN YOU CAN GO TO THE LEFT AND PLUS 5 GUYS OVER AND OVER TO GROW AN ARMY TO FIGHT THE ZOMBIES?

TGWDGfIA: Would that be better? You should play the game and try that.

HYHT: Okay, we’re done here.

TGWDGfIA: Klan Warz. With a K and a Z.

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Relationship Frankenstein; or The Modern Brometheus

The man she knows and loves was formed, collecting parts here and there from the dissecting rooms and slaughterhouses of relationships past.

It was on an arid night in November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of my skin care routine around me, that I might infuse some glow and warmth into the lifeless, weathered face that looked back at me from the mirror. I had already applied the hyaluronic acid as a base layer. The gooey, slippery substance was sinking deep into my epidermis, where it would work its magic to reduce fine lines and wrinkles. I was just about to reach for my retinol solution when my girlfriend appeared in the arch of the doorway.

“I love that you have a skin care routine,” she said, as she beamed at me with a love I didn’t deserve. “It really says a lot about you that you take the time to take care of yourself.”

How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? I smiled at my girlfriend, though inside I wanted to run away. I ached to dash into my bedquarters and smash the mirrors to rid myself of the curse of looking upon a man I no longer recognized. She loved these things about me: my skin care routine, my sense of style, the fact that I can properly use the term “male gaze,” yet she knows not these qualities I possess through no endeavors of my own.

The man she knows and loves was formed, collecting parts here and there from the dissecting rooms and slaughterhouses of relationships past. They were fused together, in an act defiant of God and Nature, until a new man emerged. A man that I fear has been cursed to roam the earth without a soul.

It was on the night of our first date that she began to fall in love with this man. I learned this much later, and when I asked her why I so immediately took her charm, she told me it was because I was “such a good listener” and “was so interested in her,” unlike many others. It was only through many failed first dates with varied women that I learned that “sharing stories about myself that your story reminded me about” does not count as “interest” and that asking follow-up questions or even a simple “that’s cool, tell me more about that” can go much further in the way of making your date feel seen.

Upon her first visit to my apartment (of which I will refrain from sharing any torrid details), she marvelled at my mattress and that it sat atop a proper bedframe. It was only recently that my slumber had achieved such loft, after another such visit ended abruptly when my guest took leave with the parting wisdom of  “miss me with that mattress on the floor mess, I don’t have time for men who don’t take pride in their home.” It had never before occurred to me that sleeping so low to the ground was a matter of pride. But the bedperch did wonders not only for my image, but also for my aging back.

“I appreciate that you dress in earthy colors that harmonize with the warm undertones of your skin.”

“You have so many towels, and by that I mean you have more than one towel.”

“I did a deep dive on your socials and didn’t find a single problematic post.”

Little did she know that one day I took search to the social archives for *my_user_name* plus any slur or pejorative term I could think of and scrubbed the record clean of any past offenses. She believes “pejorative” is a word I’ve known for years and not something I recently learned after being scolded that I needed to become a  “better straight white male ally.”

These qualities that this man possesses that she so loves are not rightfully earned through his own care and self-work. The man wonders if she is the right partner for him, or if she would just be really good friends with all of his exes. The man wonders if he is a man at all, or simply the combined efforts of all the women who ever cared enough to try to change him.

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I’m Sorry, but I am Contractually Obligated to Keep My Mouth Shut

I signed a morality clause, and I don’t want to get sued into oblivion by one of the largest corporations in the world.

I can’t tell you who I am, but I can promise you that I am one of your faves. On behalf of myself and all of your other ride-or-dies, I must ask you to please stop calling us out on social media for our staggering silence in the face of recent atrocities world events. I am, of course, completely and utterly neutral on all world events because of my deep personal beliefs and morals.

By that, I mean I am contractually obligated to keep my mouth shut because I signed a morality clause, and I don’t want to get sued into oblivion by one of the largest corporations in the world.

I can’t say for sure that all your darlings would condemn fascism, or say that Constitutional rights are good, or use our enormous platforms to speak out against the murder of innocent civilians by a tyrannical government if we could. That’s a hypothetical that I refuse to explore. After all, we can’t do those things anyway because we have moral(ity clause)s!

Do you know how scared we (the wealthy, successful, beautiful Hollywood heavyweights you pin up and bow down to) are right now? One false move and it's all over for us. One, “I don’t know if that’s right,” and we might not be able to dress up in head-to-toe leather and get paid $50 million to pretend to be a guy with courage who stands up to the bad guys anymore. Pretending to be a good person who does the right thing no matter what is important in these trying times. Telling these stories on the big screen, where 50-year-old men who never got over their childhood can see them and be inspired, is important. Getting paid $50 million is important.

Please, do not think us greedy. Getting paid to pretend to be a good person will allow us to do a lot of actual good in the world. Someday. Once our contracts are up. Our morality clauses forbid us from making a difference now, because what if that difference clashes with something our Corporate Overlords generous, creative teammates in the entertainment industry want to partner with. Maybe one day, I’ll want to help little baby ducklings not be covered in oil until they die a horrible death, but that day will have to wait until I don’t have to consider that Exxon “Oil Company X” might want to buy advertising time with Disney “Channel D.”

So, please, stop calling us cowards. And stop threatening to boycott our important films. Do you even understand that all of this brings down our Q score. Q scores are important, a high Q Score means we have more negotiating power. Can you even imagine the clauses we’d have to sign if we had even less negotiating power than we do now? You don’t have to imagine – just think of some of your less-than-faves. You know the ones. They have to be in commercials for banks.

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I am at the hospital every single day because I am SO STRONG and SO HEALTHY

Since everybody seems to be all up in my business, they have started to notice that I go to the hospital every single day, without fail. And since everybody is also a chatty little gossip bitch they all can’t stop speculating about why I’m there and what I’m doing while I’m there.

So I’m here to put an end to all of the rumors about what I’m doing at the hospital and no it’s not getting “treatment” for any “diseases” or “visiting” a “loved one” or “forcing an unwanted visit” on “Make-a-Wish kids who would rather meet John Cena.”

I’m there so they can do tests on my body because the doctors all tell me they’ve never seen anybody as strong and healthy as me and they need to figure out what’s up because they for real think I might be a super person just naturally by birth or at least had some kind of good chemical accident that made me the way that I am and they need to test it to figure out if I’m like a one of one or if this could possibly be used to strengthen other people to the level I am or maybe if I’m the first in a new line of evolution or something and it’s taking a while to figure it all out that’s why I’m there every day and for so many hours each day, okay!

Every doctor tells me this. Every single one of them. They told me not to tell anybody else but I have to tell you so you know so you’ll stop talking all this junk about me.

To answer more of your questions that pain in my left arm is because its got so much muscle in it. It’s called a “growing pain” and it hurts like that because more muscle is growing in it almost all the time. I’m not even working out it just does that on its own. And the nausea is because I’m sick to my stomach at being the only person who is as strong as me. It’s pain because of how much I want other people to be able to be as great as me and they’re not and that makes me feel bad and lonely like nobody could ever understand me because I’m so much better than them. And the numbness in my arms and legs is to protect me from hurting myself from punching and kicking so hard when I have to punch and kick because only I can hurt myself with my own power but not anymore because of the numbness. And it’s hard to breathe because I might be from another planet and I just haven’t adjusted to the atmosphere here yet.

So that’s why I’m at the hospital every day and the machines they hook me up to is because I let them and the machines suck out some of my power and use it to run computer data centers or something because that’s how much power is in me. I’m basically a new source of energy. I’m the new oil but I didn’t have to get juiced for millions of years underground I just have the energy juice inside me. I’m like a freaking modern day, walking, talking dinosaur that didn’t have to die to become power. But I’m pretty much stronger than a dinosaur too, because of the whole thing with my left arm.

At least this is what all the doctors have told me.

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So, You Just Asked a Body Transformation Guy for Weight Loss Advice

Get ready to hear some "hard truths", "no-nonsense advice", and a whole lot of bullshit.

Of course, I’d be more than happy to share how I lost over 200 pounds and completely turned my life around with you. First things first, I have to say that anything I tell you is only what worked for me. I have no clue whatsoever if what worked for me will work for you. Everybody is different. And every body is different.

I actually have a patent on “Everybody is different and every body is different” so you can’t use that in a sentence or put it on a shirt or a hat or anything ever without my express written consent. As far as you’re concerned, that phrase is a video highlight of a 90-yard touchdown pass to win the Super Bowl, and I am the National Football League. I will sue your size 48 waist pants off if you even think about putting that on a shirt or a hat. Note to self: put the catchphrase on pants, too, maybe across the butt, people love pants with stuff on the butts.

Next things next, I have to make sure you didn’t come here for some kind of weight loss shortcut. Because if you expect me to say, “I only eat hoagies now,” or “I stopped drinking Kool Aid and the weight just fell off” you are sorely mistaken.. Trust me, if it were that easy, I’d be on television right now holding up a big pair of pants with a dumbass grin above my chisled jawline, collecting a check to tell people that I lost weight by switching from Papa John’s to Domino’s. It doesn’t work like that. I mean, maybe for some people, but not for me. But again every body is different™. So maybe you can actually do the Domino’s thing. You can try it if you want, but I don’t think it will work. But what do I know? I’m just a guy who lost over 200 pounds and completely changed my life.

Right now, you probably have a terrible relationship with food. I know that because you came to me and said, “I’d like to change my relationship with food.” If you use the word “relationship” to refer to how you eat food, then that relationship is abusive. What is a chicken parm sandwich your boyfriend? Do you say things like “I know I should be with Salad. Salad treats me better and makes me feel good about myself. But Salad just can’t fill me up the same way as Chicken Parm Sandwich can.” Eww. Gross. What is wrong with you? Food isn’t a pleasure trip to fucktown. Food is fuel for your body.

That’s right. Food is fuel. So start drinking gasoline. 

Just kidding. I’m not really telling you to drink gasoline. Unless you start drinking gasoline and you start losing weight and you don’t die, and you want to keep doing that. I can’t legally tell you to drink gasoline to lose weight. And I’m not telling you to do that. But food is fuel. And gasoline is fuel. So who knows? Who is to say? They are both fuels. That’s pretty interesting, at least to think about. Remember, I’m not telling you to drink gasoline as food. You have to remember that. But I’m not telling you not to drink gasoline.

Okay, so what worked for me? Well, I woke up every day, I looked myself in the eye in the mirror and I said “you’re worth it.” Which was a lie. I wasn’t worth it, but I thought that maybe one day I could be worth it. Because I hated myself. Do I hate myself now? No. I hate you. Because you’re like I used to be. You remind me of me before, and that’s bad. I’m going for a three-mile run as soon as we’re done here because you just made me think of me from a few years ago. There’s nothing I hate more than being reminded of who I used to be. 

Do I go to therapy? I guess, in a way, I do go to therapy. Three-mile runs are my therapy and three-mile runs don’t cost me a dime, except for how fast I burn through running shoes. My running shoe budget is honestly nutso. I have to buy a new pair almost every month. That’s so many shoes. Maybe buying shoes is also my therapy? But no, I don’t talk about my feelings to anybody. Why do you ask?

But you can’t outrun a bad diet. That’s a cliche that is also true. No matter how far you run away from yourself, you’ll still find the same old you if you don’t change the way you eat. This is my final actual piece of advice for what worked for me. I did an eating disorder.

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The Night(mare) before my Wedding

"Some day this will be a funny story." - My Wife (while crying)

On the night before our wedding, my then-fiancé and I lay awake, unable to fall asleep. Our restlessness didn’t come from excitement, however unromantic that may seem. But that wasn’t our fault, I swear. We didn’t have the chance to feel like kids on Christmas Eve about our rapidly approaching wedding. We couldn’t sleep because of a looming sense of dread.

That also, thankfully, was not about our upcoming marriage. It was about our safety.

Eventually, we made a decision; we had to get up and leave. It was the middle of the night on the eve of our wedding, and we had to get the hell out of our Airbnb.

Because somebody had been there when we were gone.

And they left evidence in the toilet.

Now that I have your attention, let me back things up a bit. What is this, the cold open of a prestige drama television show from the last five years? Seriously, why do shows all start like that now? Every single one starts with a flash forward. Please, stop that. Did I start this article with a flash forward just so I could complain about television shows doing it? Perhaps. But, I digress.

Our wedding was an extremely DIY affair. We live in Los Angeles. My family is in Central Pennsylvania. Her family is in Illinois. We wanted to do something to get both of our families in the same place at the same time for what would be the first and most likely only time, possibly ever. An extremely generous gift from my Father-in-Law made throwing an actual wedding possible instead of just making our families fly across the country to watch us get married in a courthouse and then going out to lunch. That meant we had to plan things on a super-tight budget and do a lot of work ourselves.

We wanted our wedding to be nice, but not break what I will laughingly refer to as “the bank.” When I say “we” wanted it to be nice, I mean that my suggestion of “let’s just rent out a basketball court at a rec center and throw a pizza party” was immediately shot down, decapitated, lit on fire, and buried, with the earth in which it lay salted so that nothing could grow from its remains. Which is more than fair. It would have been rude to ask our families to travel all that way for what would have been the equivalent of two full-grown adults throwing a party fit for an 8-year-old’s birthday.

We basically took on a second job as event planners for the year. We found a beautiful, surprisingly affordable (especially for Los Angeles) venue in Topanga Canyon that also provided the catering. We bought a few cases of wine. Our friend who works as a brewer gave us beer he made personally. We made playlists for the music throughout the evening, expertly curated to fit the moods of the pre-ceremony arrival, cocktail hour, dinner music, early-evening dancing, and late-night (probably drunk) dancing. We bought flowers in downtown LA1 and arranged them (again, with some help from friends). We found a nearby hotel to make things easy for our family (many of whom do not travel often and needed help to plan their trips).

The fact that most of our family members would be staying in the same hotel meant that we did not want to stay in the same place for the weekend of our wedding. Nothing against our families, we just didn’t want to be that accessible to them for the entire wedding weekend. Some quiet time to ourselves would probably be nice. So we found what looked to be a cozy, peaceful, quiet mountain home in Topanga on Airbnb and planned our stay. Our problems came because the place was a little too quiet and a little too mountainy for our own good.

Our DIY Wedding included a whole bunch of running around doing errands on the day before the big day. We had to pick up our wedding cake and make sure that our refrigerator had enough room to hold a confection meant to feed 50 people. We also had to pick up the linens from the linen rental place. I didn’t even know there were places to rent linens. I never thought about renting linens before. I never really thought about linens before. But there’s a place in Burbank where you can pull up your car and then load it full of what seems like a thousand pounds of tablecloths, napkins, things that are apparently called “runners”, and other cumbersome cloth items we’d need to return as soon as possible after the event or face dire consequences.2

Once our car was packed to the brim with linens, cake, clothes, flowers, vases, and other necessary items for our DIY-Wedding3, we were ready to drive to our Airbnb at the top of a mountain in Topanga, where we would unload our car and then get ready to gather with our families at a restaurant so they could all meet each other for the very first time so the pre-wedding mingling would be less awkward for everybody. The only problem was…my fiancé’s 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid4 didn’t exactly have the juice needed to make the ultimate climb up said mountain while packed to the gills with all of this shit. We never had a problem climbing a hill before, but our car was never loaded up like this before, either. I made the incredibly genius decision to start carrying stuff up the hill (in 90-plus-degree October weather) to our rental in order to lighten the burden for our poor little Honda. But no matter how many trips I made up that hill, the car kept getting stuck. Surely, carrying a thousand pounds of linen would do the trick. Nope. How about carrying a wedding cake up a steep, dusty hill, hoping not to trip or slip or do a hilarious pratfall on top of our beautiful, custom-made, locally sourced cake? I made it safely, but it didn’t help the car climb any higher. Maybe I could help the car with a little push? We’ll never know because again, My Beloved shut down my idea because she “didn’t want me to get squished to death by a car rolling backwards down a hill on top of me on the day before we got married.”5 The neighbor at the bottom of the hill came out of their house to ask what the fuck we were doing. They seemed thrilled that the house above them was being used for a short-term rental property for people who can’t afford to own a car that could climb the damn hill, but what could they do about it?6

We also made the very stupid decision to contact our Airbnb host to ask if anybody else had ever had trouble getting up the hill and where we should park our car, since we kept landing just short of our destination. Of course, they told us nobody else ever had an issue climbing the hill and suggested that, perhaps, we needed to get our car serviced.7 We didn’t know this decision was stupid at the time, we’d only find out later when we needed to get in touch with them again.

We finally got all of our stuff into the Airbnb with just enough time to need to rush to get ready for the rest of our evening activities. We were expected at the venue soon for a quick rehearsal and to drop off some stuff that could be left there overnight. Then we had to meet our families. We desperately needed to shower and change our clothes first.

It was during this period of getting ready that we started to notice that some things were off about our rental. First, we accessed the cabin with a lock-code, and upon entering, we were supposed to find a key in a dish on the kitchen table. There was no key to be found anywhere. As we looked around the cozy cabin on top of a mountain in the middle of nowhere, we also discovered that one of the sliding back doors was left unlocked. Things were starting to seem like the setup of a classic horror movie when, in a classic case of “the rule of three", my soon-to-be wife discovered the final, and strangest thing of all.

The pièce de résistance.

The shit that was left in the toilet.

That’s right. The toilet, which neither of us had used, was full. Of shit. While this was definitely weird,8 we were in such a hurry that we clocked it as strange and went about taking showers and getting ready. We flushed it first, you weirdo, why’d I even have to clarify that?

As we left the Airbnb, we decided to reach out to our host again to let them know about the missing key and ask them if a cleaning person, or landscaper, or anyone else could have possibly been there before us. That would make sense. Someone was there and forgot to flush. I don’t think we mentioned the poop. We just said that the key was missing and could tell that “someone had used the restroom before we were there.” That was a nice, polite way to put things. They apparently operate on a “one strike and I don’t trust you anymore” rule because we were left on read, waiting for an answer.

We had our quick rehearsal at the venue and then set off to meet our family at the restaurant for some introductions and drinks, and snacks…but the restaurant was closed. There was a power outage, and they didn’t know when things would be back up and running. We stood outside on the corner like a bunch of fools while family members continued to arrive at an obviously closed bar. Eventually, we found a new place, sent a series of text messages, and hoped that everyone involved would find the new venue. A hiccup like the restaurant you planned to have your pre-wedding celebration at being randomly closed would be the biggest turd in the punchbowl for a lot of wedding stories, but unlucky for us, our biggest turd was a turd.

We had a great time with our families. A very helpful friend agreed to swap cars with us for the night so that we could climb the hill and actually park at our Airbnb. Then we heard back from our host.

They said that they checked with all their people, and they all said they hadn’t been in the cabin.

This means that either they were not telling the truth and had been there and forgot to flush the evidence (which in this case would be preferred) or that they were telling the truth, and some unknown party had left a shit in our Airbnb. We messaged the host with the full story,9 but at this point, it was well past 10 pm, and the hope of getting an answer was slim.10 We were a full-on nuisance to them at this point. How dare we be inconvenienced by a mystery toilet log. When we got back to the unit, we discovered another door that was left unlocked, and at this point, we both felt very nervous about the prospect of spending the night in this cabin that was relatively remote yet surprisingly easy to get into by some unknown stranger or entity.

“This has horror movie vibes,” I told my fiance.

“Yeah, leaving a shit in a toilet is definitely the type of power move someone would do before coming back later to murder them,” said my wife, an avid consumer of true-crime documentaries, podcasts, books, and general lore. The threatening poop, plus the missing key and unlocked doors, filled us with a sense of dread we just couldn’t shake.

My first genius idea was to block the doors with tables and chairs. I moved any and all furniture into a place where it would block any hole that could potentially give entry and access to our vulnerable bodies to a human murderer or supernatural monster-beast-of-the-forest. That lasted all of about 10 minutes until we felt uneasy again. Which brings us back to the little opening teaser again. To remind you:

We had to get up and leave. It was the middle of the night on the eve of our wedding, and we had to get the hell out of our Airbnb.

Remember, we had a ton of shit11 to pack, including a big-ass god damn wedding cake that needed to be refrigerated. We also didn’t have cell service - only adding to the creepy feeling of isolation that came with our mountain lodge. We had to leave and blindly hope that we could find a place to stay and a place to keep a cake once we were far enough away from the murder cabin in the woods to once again get reception. And it was now like 1 am, or even later, I think, I can’t fully remember for sure how late it was. Luckily, my sister is an insomniac and answered her phone when we called her, and their house rental had a refrigerator that could fit an entire wedding cake. That took care of that. Now we just needed to find a hotel.

A handful of calls to fully booked hotels (including the one housing most of our families that we had previously tried to avoid) made it look like we’d be crashing in a borrowed car in the parking lot of our venue like a couple of drifters. At least we’d have all those linens to use as blankets. We were technically a little less than an hour from home, but we had given our place to out-of-town family for the weekend, and we live by a strict “no take-backs” policy when doing favors for loved ones. Finally, we were able to find an opening, about a half-hour’s drive away. Coincidentally, our backup hotel option was right across the street from our backup pre-wedding family meet-up restaurant option. I wondered if I should search for a backup wedding venue option somewhere nearby as well, because obviously, our venue would be taken over by wolves in the night. Maybe we could just have the ceremony in the middle of the goddamned road.

We settled into our room for the rest of the night and were finally able to breathe, sometime around 3 am. We were not, unfortunately, able to get any sleep. Too much had happened, and we had to wake up too early to start getting our venue (and then ourselves) ready for the wedding to risk falling asleep now. We had to pull an all-nighter. We put on Friends for some comfort television, and just kind of zoned out for a while.

Luckily, the day of our wedding went off without a hitch.

Just kidding! Our ceremony started late because an attendee we could not start without needed to treat a newly found case of headlice. I think I need to repeat that. Lice! Somebody (who will remain nameless) had to delouse themselves before they came to our wedding! Our wedding officiant forgot that they became an ordained minister online and wrote “none” in the “Religion” section when signing our marriage license by mistake, officially rendering our first attempt at legalizing our union invalid. And I’m pretty sure I had COVID all day (or I contracted it at the wedding, along with a handful of other attendees - a risk we knew we were taking in 2023, which is why we planned that our honeymoon to Italy would not begin for another two weeks - smart on us.)

To wrap it all up, our Airbnb host was very skeptical of our “claim”12 that somebody was in the cabin when we were gone. They thought we were so mad about the fact that our very old (but very reliable) car could not climb the hill that we made up the shit story in order to get a refund. They were mad that we used the shower and temporarily used a bed before we decided to leave out of fear for our own lives. They asked if we took a picture of the offending turd.

Let me say that again.

They asked us if we had photographic evidence that somebody had left a shit in the toilet.

Let’s just say we did. Let’s, for the sake of argument, say that we took a picture of the shit that a stranger left in the toilet of our Airbnb before we checked in, most likely as a power move before returning to murder us in the night. How in the hell would you know that it was a pre-check-in deuce? How would you know it wasn’t ours? What if we sent you a picture of the big ol’ shit? Did they plan on examining it? How would you use this as evidence for or against our claim?

Was this their own poop? I’m just now, two years later, concluding that this was the host’s poop. They did the power-poop move. They’re some kind of poop weirdo. They wanted us to experience their poop, and then claim victim when we ask for a poop-related refund.13 And probably try to get us in trouble for sending them a picture of what was definitely their own poop to begin with. Smooth move, host, smooth move.

Fast forward again, two years. We got over COVID14. We had a fantastic honeymoon in Italy. We are officially, legally married thanks to some corrections in our paperwork. We have a brand new baby daughter who is the best person in the entire world. Our Honda Civic Hybrid has not failed to climb a single hill since the cursed Topanga Canyon dirt road to hell. We haven’t used Airbnb since. We didn’t get murdered. And we have a pretty funny story to tell.

1

While I’m here, let me say “fuck ICE”

2

The dire consequences in this case would be monetary penalties. Remember, we were on a shoestring budget.

3

I haven’t even mentioned until now that my wife MADE HER OWN WEDDING DRESS. While clothing design is her chosen trade (and she is very skilled at it) we really took the DIY to extremes in our DIY Wedding.

4

Soon to be our 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid, that’s how marriage works, baby!

5

No word about how she may feel about this happening now, after we are married.

6

Shut the hell up and mind their own damn business is what.

7

It was just as rude as it sounds.

8

And, as only my wife can testify to, because I did not see it, also gross.

9

Which was “by ‘someone used the bathroom’ we meant ‘someone left a huge shit in the toilet.’”

10

Unlike the enormous shit left in the toilet by a mystery party.

11

I should probably say “we had a ton of stuff to pack,” the offending “shit” was long gone.

12

The quotes are theirs; I assure you I am telling the truth. Their skepticism was made clear in their review of us on Airbnb, which we didn't have time to provide our own in return because we were GETTING MARRIED, then SICK WITH COVID, then ON OUR HONEYMOON IN ITALY.

13

We got it all back, except the cleaning fee. Because we used the shower and the beds. If any of you plan on renting a cabin in Topanga Canyon, please check with me first, and I will steer you away from this house of horror.

14

I think. Who knows what the long-term effects will be.

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