I think this is my fourth last-warm-Friday-of-the-summer cold brew so far this year.
Enjoy what you've read? Want to receive updates and publishing news in your inbox? Sign up to the bradism mailing list. You'll also receive an ebook, free!
Yet another work day, another moment with the wardrobe to decide which shirt I would wear to the office.
The white one. Only worn once before, still crisp in colour and shape. It matched the pants I was already wearing. I calculated the hazards as I slipped it on. Smoothie for breakfast, curry for lunch. Two coffees. A juicy apple for morning tea. Rain. All might bring a stain of shame. Without care, anything could leave a mark on the cotton-ivory wasteland of my chest. I wouldn't be back in front of the wardrobe for ten hours.
I chose white. I chose risk. If you never take chances in life, are you truly living? I wanted to be my best me. My best me wore bright, white polos and brown slacks. My best me ate healthy breakfasts, and posted good journal entries.
I microwaved the frozen berries a few seconds longer than usual. The weather outside looked gloomy and I was aiming to make a smoothie that wouldn't freeze my fresh optimism for the day. I removed the berries from the microwave and a raspberry fell from the bowl and struck me between the tits, literally one minute and ten seconds since I put on the shirt.
Maybe I should have been upset, frustrated, angry. I laughed. I chortled a good minute before picking out a blue shirt which I wore the rest of the day without a fleck or smudge getting near it.
I thought about it, and I think this is how I'll react to my own death too. Every day I leave the house, presuming she'll be right. All it could take is one slip up, one mistake, and I'll be dying. And I'll laugh, thinking my final thoughts about goddamn journal jinxes and goddamn raspberries.
They say if you love something, set it free. If it comes back it’s yours. If not, it was never meant to be.
I guess summer loves me.
I wonder if my dog would come back...
I finished a box of tic-tacs today. I don't remember when I bought them. March sometime, maybe before Marion Bay.
I was like, damn, it took me four weeks to eat a box of tic-tacs. In high school I'd do the same size box in four hours. How quickly things change over eighteen years.
Like my words? Want to buy one of my books? I think you'll like this one:
If you met yourself from the future, what would you ask your future self?
What if they wont tell you anything?
Chase: A Tomorrow Technologies Novella. Available Now for Less than a dollar!
It's been a week since I posted anything, so I decided to write this much, then let auto-correct take the weight off your spine and a ranch house was both old and a ranch house.
What do Steve Smith, Barnaby Joyce, Harvey Weinstein and Martha Stewart all have in common?
Like so many other celebrities, politicians, business-people and app developers, they don't think the rules should apply to them.
The farcical level of disrepute the Australian cricket team brought to their sport today was yet another example of arrogant humans in a position of power or superiority choosing to believe they are above the law.
In this absurd case, only the laws of cricket, but it simply highlights the recurring theme that human beings will always try to find ways to cheat to benefit themselves.
Whether it be trying to win a game, trying to make money, trying to get sex, trying to take power, nothing changes. We establish rules for ourselves, then we break them.
It's not only those in power. You probably break rules too. Pirating software, using a phone while driving, printing personal documents on the office printer, self-scanning expensive produce for lower prices, overestimating work-related expenses on your tax return.
Not everyone, of course, but enough for a pattern to emerge.
Human beings are cheaters, it's biological. We wouldn't be where we are without pushing the boundaries. The first fish to walk on land was breaking the rules. How did mammoths feel when we cheated and used stone tools? How many steps forward has our species taken by trying to gain an unfair advantage?
It doesn't excuse the modern day cheats, they should know better. We all should, but the justifications they made would be like the ones in everyone else's head when we break the rules. Psychological camouflage for what's really happening under the hood. The only thing between you and what you want is an abstract concept and a perceptible risk.
So should we just cheat? Everyone drop the act, step back to survival of the fittest?
It depends how much longer we want to survive on this planet. The evolutions of our technology has outpaced our own. We wield power beyond what our meaty brains can holistically understand.
Funnily enough, we're actually heading in the right direction. Every time corruption or deception generates public attention, it indicates we're coming closer to self-governance. It might seem slow, or overwhelming, but it's happening.
Of course, the better we govern ourselves, the more innovative cheaters will become. We've seen that this week too, regarding revelations about Cambridge Analytica, and the evidence of flaws in our social media platforms.
My preference would be for a global AI to take charge, but I don't think we've progressed to that stage yet. It would probably turn on us, or never get out of beta while project costs spiral higher. More likely, it will be hit with security flaws, or someone will find loopholes.
Sadly, that's what we do.
Older Entries | No Newer Entries