You’ll never be President, Robert, the brainworm whispered. You’re 70. You’re too old.
“Shut up, just shut up. I killed you, I got rid of you!” Robert yelled.
You’ll never be rid of me, Robert. All the Ivermectin in all the Rural Kings in the world can’t kill me.
“Are you OK, Bobby?” Cheryl mumbled, half-awake.
Old. You couldn’t even seal the deal with that reporter.
Robert threw off the sheets and got out of bed, stalking into the bathroom and shutting himself in, eco-friendly fluorescents struggling to come on’
Light can’t kill me, Robert.
“Shut up, shut up , shut up.”
She sent you a picture of her butthole. Pathetic. You could have had her in every hole.
He pawed through a cabinet for his bottle of pills.
Oh, you love Big Pharma now, huh?
Robert fumbled at the bottle, trying to get it open.
Take them all, it won’t matter.
The pill bottle burst open and they sprayed into the air, little pink triangles of momentary quiet.
Maybe a vaccine would get rid of me…
Robert took one off the floor and swallowed it. And then another and another.
How do you think that little bear cub felt?
“Shut up!” he said, beating the sides of his head.
You could have killed that little reporter, Robert. Your entire family loves killing women. Mary Jo. Would you have drowned the reporter?
Cheryl knocked on the door, “Honey?”
Or a gold club, like Martha? Bitches love getting beat to death with a golf club.
“I’m fine,” he gasped.
You could kill Cheryl right now. Chainsaw her head off, that like that poor whale.
“You’re not real,” he growled to himself. “You can’t be real.”
I am the Earth, Robert. And I am very disappointed in you.
Tell me about your mother.
As Freud said, “If it’s not one thing, it’s your mother.”
“eco-friendly fluorescents struggling to come on’”
/giggle
I was on vacation when the new broke. I have not followed any of the details.
But I don’t need to now. SF had enlightened me.
He’s probably not completely innocent, but it does sound like surprisingly the young reporter wanted some of that dying man voice.
LOL
*Closes laptop, sits silently*
local journalists want a bite of your Toblerone. Check your spam folder.
*hands Swiss a pink triangle pill*
That reporter was an intelligence agency honeypot. Trying to get blackmail material on RFK.
I just want to know if butt pics were actually sent.
Which intelligence service has the best honeypots? I’m going Chinese, even if I’m hungry again in two hours.
I imagine Gal Gadot didn’t make the cut for (((them))).
This isn’t going to end well.
whoooooooa
Well.
The worm turns in the black, pulsating as it secretes what used to be brain matter. (an interesting idea for a short story.)
Purely as speculation, from a readers point of view, I don’t know which I find more horrifying: the idea of a brain worm actually living in the brain talking to the host, or the worm being a product of madness.
Has flavors of both Poe and Lovecraft. I mean that as a compliment. Is this a one off, or is RFK jr and his head worm going to appear again?
My headcanon has it start something like this, and it may end the same way.
God is in… his holy TEM-PLE.
Alrighty. That was perfectly gross. Loved it.
Never seen Poltergeist II. I’m going to have to watch it now.
I would like to point out that once again an idea that I thought would make a good story has already been done decades before. Where’s my shocked face, I seem to have misplaced it.
At least I didn’t get the piss taken out of me by Stephen King. That dratted guy has already put too many of my ‘ideas’ to page already.
Or something like this…https://youtu.be/d3D9O9vrDjw?si=qYUJ7qln8K2LqJUX&t=52
Comment *Stephen King
Aloysious:
Poltergeist 2 is not the best, but I have a soft spot for it. They had to write off the older sister (because the actress was killed after the first movie), and at least two of the cast died shortly after the movie was released. The worm part was just an entry point for the big bad.
I can’t in good conscience recommend Poltergeist 3. The remake wasn’t bad, and had some neat little changes.
Dang it. Slither. That’s the movie that has been tickling my memory. Worms using people as meat puppets.
Oh well, easy come, easy go.
If you haven’t seen it, please do. Stars Nathan Fillion.
LCD: thanks. From Beyond added to the list of movies to watch. And that Family Guy clip made me face palm.
Brain Damage is also excellent. I posted it during Lumpmania in ’22.
https://tubitv.com/movies/505047/brain-damage
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073705/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_6_tt_7_nm_1_in_0_q_Shiver
Have I ever mentioned how much I love David Cronenberg’s work?
Shiver….isnt that one playing out right now in real life with the foreign invader debacle?
Mom, a brother, and I saw that in the theater – bless our hearts.
Never saw III.
This Book is a Full of Spiders, Seriously, Dude, Don’t Touch It by David Wong
Sequel to John Dies at the End also has fun mind controlling parasites.
@cowboy
I Loved those short stories.
Neal Asher’s Polity Universe novels feature a parasite that makes the infected nearly superhuman to make them durable enough to keep spreading it. One of the two living science fiction authors worth reading, for my taste.
I may have asked this here before, but…if one wanted to give Neal Asher another go (after being unable to finish Gridlinked in several attempts), what book should one start with?
Also “The Puppet Masters”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Puppet_Masters
Thanks, SF and Sensei. Will check out.
ES – try The Technician and the trilogy that follows it (Dark Intelligence, War Factory, Infinity Engine). Or the Owner trilogy, The Departure, Zero Point, The Jupiter War.
I was hoping for a mention about the bear cub. I was not disappointed.
Same with the whale head.
Just fantastic. You top yourself every week. Bravo.
Sugarfree is his own bottom!
I sincerely hope the worm is around for 4 years.
*puts ear plugs in nose and ears*
Matt Bracken and Steve Murray on Coffee and a Mike. In case you thought you had enough ammo.
https://rumble.com/v5g8xxp-coffee-and-a-mike-matt-bracken-and-steve-murray-israelis-approved-mail-bomb.html
If fire bombing entire cities is approved, I can’t see squawking about mail bombs.
Genius
The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board compared Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to Sen. Bernie Sanders following Trump’s announcement that if he were reelected, he would instate a temporary 10 percent cap on credit card interest rates.
The former president made the surprise pledge, which would require congressional approval, during a rally last week.
In Trump’s effort to “microtarget working-class voters,” the board wrote in their Sunday piece, he is “bidding himself into policy and political dead ends.” A 10 percent cap is “a price control on credit” that would cut off people with poor credit scores, they continued.
Ten percent is even lower than the rate that “America’s two leading socialists” — referring to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sanders (I-Vt.) — proposed in 2019, which was 15 percent, the board wrote.
Who the fuck has he been listening to now?
Doesn’t matter who.
He wins in a landslide because unions are abandoning Harris. Or the dems steal another election.
Nothing else matters at this point.
Always been Bernie Sanders-lite really.
That was meant to go in a different spot but whatever.
I’m having trouble getting spun up about cutting off access to consumer credit for people who are poor credit risks. Maybe I should jump back on TwiX for a while.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-credit-card-interest-cap-10-percent-new-york-rally-4f0dd47b?st=EhnpVx&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
They’ve also taken him to task for his tariffs will fix everything especially holding out John Deere as an example. In many ways he is no different from the socialist populist he is running against. It is why its hard for me to work up much enthusiasm for him.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-tariffs-john-deere-mexico-79daf213?st=d8EmHS&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
His first term was a mix of good and bad policies.
Still, it was way better that Biden’s term or any future term from Harris.
They certainly display similar levels of economic illiteracy.
He does apparently listen to Rand Paul.
I just want to continue abusing the cc reward system.
Carbon Copies for EVERYBODY!
No rewards for using that Commie metric system!
bcc?
thicc
Trump isn’t a Libertarian. News at 11.
In all honesty folks, we are solidly back in an era of command economies. If we wanted to help change that, we had a chance at Trumps ear, but, alas…
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/sep/20/trump-tweets-false-label-credibility-supporters
Labelling Trump’s lies as ‘disputed’ on X makes supporters believe them more, study finds
Study says tagging posts with false claims on election fraud may make Trump voters more likely to think they’re true
good news perhaps
Are we talking community notes here or something else? I refuse to read the article.
Labelling tweets featuring false claims about election fraud as “disputed” does little to nothing to change Trump voters’ pre-existing beliefs, and it may make them more likely to believe the lies, according to a new study.
The study, authored by John Blanchar, an assistant professor from the University of Minnesota, Duluth, and Catherine Norris, an associate professor from Swarthmore College, looked at data from a sampling of 1,072 Americans surveyed in December of 2020. The researchers published a peer-reviewed paper on their findings this month in the Harvard Kennedy School’s Misinformation Review.
“These ‘disputed’ tags are meant to alert a reader to false/misinformation, so it’s shocking to find that they may have the opposite effect,” Norris said.
I never even noticed “disputed” tags on there.
Shocking. Compulsive liars say something is true, people dont believe it. Compulsive liars say something is not true people instantly know it likely is true.
“We dont listen to Pravda to find out what happened, we listen to Pravda to find out what did not happen.” – Soviet Citizens
They’d have you think Trump is the only politician in history who’s lied.
*cackle*
She only
liedmisspoke once during the debate. Weren’t you listening to the live fact checks?If the people who constantly publish palpable, bleedingly obvious lies claim somebody else is lying, I’m willing to give the somebody else benefit of the doubt.
You mean, when compulsive liars say something, people tend to believe its a lie?
“BOB-BBY!”
/Cheryl’s loud grating Curb Your Enthusiasm voice
I’m having trouble getting spun up about cutting off access to consumer credit for people who are poor credit risks.
Do you want loan sharks? because this is how you get loan sharks.
More seriously, I agree with you. We shouldn’t be making it easier for dumb people to dig themselves into a hole. Not that people won’t find a way to spend more than they earn, one way or another. Which is why I find those “it’s your money. You earned it, and you should get it NOW” ads so infuriating. Take an advance for an impulse buy now, and worry about the big drop in your paycheck next week.
The whole fucking country and economy is addicted to cheap money. The Fed’s modest rate hike had wailing and gnashing across the board.
Everyone seems to expect internet rates to drop to abnormal historic lows permanently.
The average person has no idea what money is, much less what to do with it.
A lot of adults excuse their bad behavior with undiagnosed childhood trauma (IOW, bullshit). A brainworm should buy you some excuses.
Everyone seems to expect internet rates to drop to abnormal historic lows permanently.
We actually made it back to the low end of historically normal rates, and you’d think we actually were being skinned by usurers.
I celebrate my 2.5% mortgage rate every month.
One of my coworkers purchased a new home on a 5. something VA rate, and needs rates to drop to pencil in their long term financial planning. Also planning to retire in a year or two.
I’m happy with my 3.75% rate. I’ve had no interest in refinancing.
I am happy with my lack of ongoing payments.
I am happy with one of two houses paid off. (Second one is at 4.25, side eyes wife, remembers her income, goes back to reading.)
I was happy to refi back in the early 2010’s and see my monthly payment stay essentially the same with a 15 year instead of a 30 year. That allowed me to payoff the house that much faster.
We have to go back though. The US can’t refinance $35 trillion at 5%.
Step 1: ” Will just take a little bit and put it back tomorrow.”
Step 2: ” I will just take a little bit, keep it on a tab and pay it all back later”
Step 2: ” No one noticed, no one has said anything. I will take a bit more, what the hell” (continues on a regular basis)
Step 4: ” Awww, fuck it, I will just take it all and disappear”
The progressive rationalization of the embezzler/thief.
It seems the country as a whole, both the govt and its citizens, have reached stage 4.
35 squillion dollars? It’s too late to try to fix it we may as well let out all of the stops.
the Harvard Kennedy School’s Misinformation Review
I read that as “Harvard Kennedy School of Misinformation” for some reason.
Wow.
So what are the pills?
Give me a call, I know a guy.
Upstream Color is a movie about a criminal that uses a parasite to control the minds of unsuspecting victims. He then forces them to clean out their bank accounts, investments, etc. They then eat food then regain control. The people affected by this parasite are then drawn to each other and…………… lets’s just say it gets very weird. If you like challenging movies this is for you. The writer, star, and director is Shane Carruth who made the most complex and interesting time travel movie I’ve seen even with the very small budget.
https://youtu.be/Hjf7OPqTK3E
Define “challenging movie”?
Hungarian art film with subtitles in Swahili
Check out the timeline for Primer.
Little dialog, clear explanations or motivations other than what you see and feel, and using music and color to relay moods and feelings. After I saw it I had unanswered questions, but I certainly felt everything going on.
Primer is amazingly good. And it’s one of the rare time travel movies that WORKS.
I’ll recommend both those flicks too. Primer is excellent. Upstream Color is very “interesting”. Sophomore project a decade the first one.
Primer was incredible, it looked like shit, but somehow it helped with the story. It’s own lack of budget and sound engineering made the movie look like found footage. It took me a few goes through to get the subtleties of the timelines, but I got the main points after the first go around.
For both of you (and anyone else who replied in the meantime), if you like Primer, I’d give hearty recommendation to Moon (~$5 million) and Ex Machina (~$15 million) as low budget good sci-fi movies.
EX Machina was that low budget? I didn’t know that. Good movie. I’ll try to check out Moon.
Haven’t seen either but luckily Amazon has both on one blu-ray.
Fourthed. Primer was outstanding.
Maybe not as cerebral as ex machina or primer, but Upgrade is a good movie and it’s budget was only 3 million. It also fits in our current theme of mind control and AI!
Upgrade is good. Dark, but good.
We have to go back though. The US can’t refinance $35 trillion at 5%.
Exactly.
See. Both you and CPA get it.
The US can’t refinance $35TT, period. Refinancing means selling new bonds. At the rates the government might want to, nobody will buy. At the rates people will buy, the government can’t afford it.
Meh, just force everyone to convert their 401Ks into the new government bonds. Problem solved.
I am the Earth, Robert. And I am very disappointed in you.
This is a brilliant end to a brilliant story.
Our “friends” at Mozilla are at again.
Firefox tracks you with “privacy preserving” feature
https://noyb.eu/en/firefox-tracks-you-privacy-preserving-feature
They are better than Hooli’s Chrome Browser, but that’s not exactly saying a lot.
Why doesn’t the article indicate how to disable it?
Well, I found the info, at the moment, it’s still a visible configuration option under settings.
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/privacy-preserving-attribution
Who knows when it will become an invisible option that is on by default.
Clutch Earthworm:
https://youtu.be/qdWp35KV7zA
Now all will be sanctified
And now all will be purified
And now all will be rectified
And now all will be rectified
And now you will be purified
So you writhe in the deep fry
Squirm like the Earthworm
In that mud called love
That you justified
That will be purified
Whether you like it or not
So you leap from the dung heap
Squirm like the Earthworm
In that mud called love
That you justified
That will be purified
Whether you like it or not
Saving the planet by creating mostly useless images and information.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/09/openai-asked-us-to-approve-energy-guzzling-5gw-data-centers-report-says/
If you haven’t also read – Microsoft wants to reopen the Three Mile Island nuclear plant for its exclusive use.
If unions were smart about it, they would insist that AI data centers be run exclusively on solar and wind power.
There would never be a threat to a union member’s job again.
Not a libertarian idea, but if I were a governor I’d say fine, build your own plant, but 10% of the power generated goes into the grid.
I was joking. By going solar AI would not have enough energy to power a riveting bot.
I’m all for more nuclear, but this is a giant corporation building its own power plant to make money off AI, while our government is all in on wind and solar. I envision a future where Microsoft’s buildings full of servers are lit up while the rest of us burn dung to keep warm.
Don’t be so negative. We likely won’t live long enough to see that day, particularly if the retards get us into two simultaneous hot wars in the next few months.
That’s the spirit!
I am actually all for it, I think the success of this will pull nuclear forward and “raise all boats.”
We need somebody to cut through all the stupid waste of solar and wind.
I agree with you 100 percent. This is great news.
But the grid absolutely needs to be a priority.
Tundra/RJ:
I would think if MS is paying for reopening the power plant, it is (at least in a small way) helping the grid. Instead of pushing up the price of power for anyone else in the area, they’re paying to bring more capacity to the area. I would think that MS would be smart enough to sell any extra power they’re generating on the grid instead of letting it go to waste.
Now if MS is lobbying for the government to pay to reopen the power plant for their exclusive use, that should be smacked down.
The lobbying has already been done:
Constellation said it plans to spend $1.6 billion revitalizing the plant, including inspections and replacements for the reactor’s turbines and cooling systems. Tax credits and other federal subsidies from the Inflation Reduction Act would also help fund the re-opening.
Tundra with the white pills.
Fantastic, SF!
Am I the only one who immediately thought of Irving Welsh’s “Filth”?
Okay, SugarFree did the links, but there appear to be squirrel-related issues. I’m diving in with the old plunger and snake to see if I can get things moving.
The damn squirrels are at my house. They are in the attic. Squirrel killer is here to do them in.