Just Another Apocryphal Mess
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apocryphalmess.bsky.social
Just Another Apocryphal Mess
@apocryphalmess.bsky.social
10 followers 5 following 31 posts
never promised 'em anything less

* formerly of cohost dot org
* so very, very tired
* dog dad of @beanzo.bsky.social
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apocryphalmess.bsky.social
Czesław Miłosz, “This World”
a poem that reads: "It appears that it was all a misunderstanding. / What was only a trial run was taken seriously. / The rivers will return to their beginnings. / The wind will cease in its turning about. / Trees instead of budding will tend to their roots. / Old men will chase a ball, a glance in the mirror- / They are children again. / The dead will wake up, not comprehending. / Till everything that happened has unhappened. / What a relief! Breathe freely, you who suffered much."
January 24, 2026 at 6:35 PM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
“BY YOUR RESPONSE TO DANGER” (Jenny Holzer, 1980 - 1982, red paint and white enamel on metal)

www.pafa.org/museum/colle...
a photo of the art piece "BY YOUR RESPONSE TO DANGER" by Jenny Holzer, which reads, in red all-caps sans serif text on a white background: "BY YOUR RESPONSE TO DANGER IT IS EASY TO TELL HOW YOU HAVE LIVED AND WHAT HAS BEEN DONE TO YOU. YOU SHOW WHETHER YOU WANT TO STAY ALIVE, WHETHER YOU THINK YOU DESERVE TO, AND WHETHER YOU BELIEVE IT'S ANY GOOD TO ACT."
January 23, 2026 at 4:44 PM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
something to keep in mind tonight:
a Tumblr post by "nitewrighter" that reads: "Me: | don't get it. I thought | was doing a lot better than I was a few years ago. I'm like 10 times more on top of things than I used to be. How does everything feel terrible now? -- The Tiny Me in OSHA-approved Hi-Vis Gear Who lives in my brain and pulls all the levers: Boss, it's the fascism. You're completely gunked up with cortisol due to the fact that your entire daily life is now underscored with a haunting awareness of the rapid erosion of your rights, dignity, and any and all social safety nets, and you're also bearing witness to the most vulnerable people immediately being persecuted. This creates a natural stress response that basically means you're going to continue having memory and organizational problems, as well as emotional imbalances. -- Me: BUT I HAVE A BULLET JOURNAL AND I MEDITATE NOW. -- Tiny OSHA Me: BOSS, THE FASCISM."
January 3, 2026 at 9:52 AM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
some months ago I was helping my mother clean up her house, and I found a Playboy from 1984, before my parents split up, on top of a closet shelf

he wasn't into those kind of women, but after browsing it, and looking at the books on my shelf that I inherited from him, i figured out why he had it:
a photo of the cover of a Playboy magazine from September 1984 a photo of the table of contents from the Playboy in the previous photo, with a listing for the short story "Julius Caesar and the Werewolf" by author John Gardner a photo of a page from the Playboy in the first photo, container a block of text that reads: 'John Gardner had just begun to make minor revisions in this story for PLAYBOY when he was killed in a motorcycle accident on September 14, 1982. It is published here exactly as Gardner originally wrote it, and although it stands on its own, one fact that may help readers is that Caesar's "falling sickness was epilepsy, an illness whose symptoms can resemble the convulsions suffered by the werewolf. Gardner dedicated the story "to liz."' a photo of two paperback books, "Grendel" and "The Wreckage of Agathon" by author John Gardner
January 1, 2026 at 3:55 AM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
a series of Mastodon posts by @Richard_Littler@mastodon.social, in response to a screenshot of the infamous "you can read >100 books per day by asking chatgpt to summarize them for you" tweet: Pretty sure all these #AI guys have utterly misconstrued what art is. They think it's just information/data, but it's not: it's a process; it's a manifestation of interwoven conscious & unconscious thoughts that have ripened in a human mind, sometimes for decades. And the result is an interaction with another human mind, a dialogue. 1/3 These AI guys have mistaken a photo of a meal in a restaurant menu for the meal itself. They tell themselves it looks just like the real thing, so it must be the real thing, but in the end they'll starve to death. No protein, no carbs, no vitamins, no nutrients, nothing. 2/3 Imagine there's a once-in-a-lifetime walk that takes you through the greatest, most dramatic scenery in the world. You leave from Point A and walk your way back around to Point A. The ChatGPT guy above might as well say: "Pro tip: You can go on that great walk by never leaving Point A" 3/3
July 7, 2025 at 7:53 PM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
the final paragraphs of _Invisible Cities_, Italo Calvino, 1972

all that gets me through the day sometimes, is the understanding that I am making someone else endure, giving them space, and that they maybe feel the same way about me
A photo of a page from Italo Calvino's novel "Invisible Cities", which reads: He said: "It is all useless, if the last landing place can only be the infernal city, and it is there that, in ever-narrowing circles, the current is drawing us." And Polo said: "The inferno of the living is not something that will be; if there is one, it is what is already here, the inferno where we live every day, that we form by being together. There are two ways to escape suffering it. The first is easy for many: accept the inferno and become such a part of it that you can no longer see it. The second is risky and demands constant vigilance and apprehension: seek and learn to recognize who and what, in the midst of the inferno, are not inferno, then make them endure, give them space."
June 27, 2025 at 3:33 PM
apocryphalmess.bsky.social
back to job hunting

I hope that this company appreciates my bravery and willingness to make salary demands
a screenshot from a LinkedIn job application, where the question "What are your salary expectations?" has been configured as a Yes/No question, currently answered "Yes"
June 25, 2025 at 4:29 PM