iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

We’re up in a flash. The liftman reports that we’ve reached level three, then opens the lift gate. I don’t see her, and my stomach rumbles. It’s in knots. I lean out to look down the walkway.

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He closes the gate as I pour water from my waterskin over the flower and wand, trying to wash some of the gunk off. They come pretty clean.

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The liftman asks me which level. I usually tell him to shut up and pull the lever myself. He acts insulted and tut-tuts me. I remind him that illusions don’t have feelings. He “begs to differ,” but I know their emotions are phantoms. This time I say, “Third, please.”

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I look down at the flower. My welding wand is lying next to it, snuffed out ‘cause my concentration is blown. I look back up at her, and she gives me a thumbs up as she heads towards the lift. I look down at the flower again. It’s almost quittin’ time anyhow.

It’s as if she knows I’m restricted to three down, but she’s a Sixie; there’s no way she knows me.

She’s on the walkover six levels up and shouting something down at me. I can’t hear her over the din. I throw up my hands and shout, “Whadaya want!” She can’t hear me either, so she points to the lift and waves three fingers at me. She wants me to meet her on the third level, I guess.

I usually don’t look up when somethin’ drops on me–unless I hear them laughing. If they’re laughing, then I look and try to memorize their face just in case I bump into them someday. They won’t be laughing then. Still, it’s dangerous to look up, but I risk it.

It’s a single long-stemmed yellow flower tied to a coinpurse-sized sandbag with a strap of red twine. The whole thing’s covered in the filth now. What a waste of life.

Abe Goldfarb @abegoldfarb.bsky.social · 30/11/2025

Somethin’ heavy hits the steel rim of my hat, pushing it down over my eyes, then plops down into the sludge between my boots. I knudge my hat back in place with the knuckles of my heavy gloves to see what it is and if it’s worth pickin’ up. It’s not.

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when someone tells me not to use em dashes because AI uses em dashes

Scene from OFFICE SPACE with Michael Bolton replying to Samir Nagheenanajar:

“No way. Why should I change?
He's the one who sucks.”

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Gene B. @gene-b.bsky.social · 15/11/2025

Through the false premise that childhood ends at puberty.

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one dozen bats at a keyboard @panasonicdx4500.bsky.social · 12/11/2025

QANON CULTIST IN 2017: "In this 1,879 page thread I will unravel the byzantine system of codewords and phrases the global elite use to mask their pedophile cabal." JEFFREY EPSTEIN WRITING AN EMAIL AT THE SAME TIME: "helo its me jeff had fun cmmitting sex crimes wit u lst weeknd"

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Deborah Pearlstein @debpearlstein.bsky.social · 05/11/2025

For the remarkable number of folks in excellent law firms, corporate suites, non-legal academia who still aren't really sure "where we are" country-wise, I'm just not sure how much clearer he can be. Countries in which opponents of the government can "never obtain power" are not democracies.

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Gene B. @gene-b.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

This is a beautifully written reflection. I have been thinking about some of these things A LOT lately.

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Grace Blakeley @graceblakeley.substack.com · 25/10/2025

Bonuses on Wall Street are expected to break records this year as big bank profits soar. Bubbles are everywhere - from tech stocks, to corporate bonds - and the banks are profiting. But they won't be the ones to pay when the crash finally comes. graceblakeley.substack.com/p/what-i-rea...

graceblakeley.substack.com

What I Read this Week

Booming bank profits, the race for critical minerals, and how climate breakdown is driving inflation.

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Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla.bsky.social · 13/10/2025

My colleagues & I have taken a huge gamble to set up @thenerve.news We’re trying to build a new independent publication from the ground up. Social media is our only distribution for now. Sharing this article in your networks would make a huge difference. Thank you! 🙏🙏🙏

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Gareth L. Powell / G.L. Powell @garethlpowell.bsky.social · 21/07/2025

Does anyone else find it crazy that you can walk into a bookshop and be charged £9.99 for a paperback novel that took the author a year to complete, but £17.99 for a completely blank notebook?

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Allison Gill @muellershewrote.com · 21/07/2025

Why did Kash Patel and Pam Bondi want the Epstein Victim names? My latest: open.substack.com/pub/muellers...

open.substack.com

The Epstein Cover-Up at the FBI

Inside the chaotic review process of the Epstein and Maxwell files at the Bureau

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Reposted by Gene B.

David M. Perry @lollardfish.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

WASHINGTON—With the United States facing a daunting array of problems, leading historians reminded the nation that when making tough choices, it never hurts to stop, take a look at similar situations from the past, and then think about whether the decisions people made back then were good or bad.

theonion.com

Historians Politely Remind Nation To Check What's Happened In Past Before Making Any Big Decisions

WASHINGTON—With the United States facing a daunting array of problems at home and abroad, leading historians courteously reminded the nation Thursday that when making tough choices, it never hurts to ...

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Kathryn Anne Edwards @kedseconomist.com · 19/06/2025

Time for some tax bill graphletics!!! One Big Beautiful Bill Act is policy design at its worst. In this thread, I show through some charts just how much MORE expensive it is to give a tax break to rich people than it is to provide services to poor ones. 1/

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Gene B. @gene-b.bsky.social · 21/05/2025

Persuasion via Vicious Mockery. Brilliant! Thomas will fail his Wisdom Save (obviously), but the DC to persuade him is 32.

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Maia @maiamindel.bsky.social · 02/05/2025

New Substack post: Donald Trump’s tariffs have been called a threat to the US’s role as the “world banker”. How real is this? What, exactly could happen? And is it as bad as 2008 - or 1929? open.substack.com/pub/someunpl...

open.substack.com

Check Your Exorbitant Privilege!

The MAGA embrace of Thelma and Louise Economics

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Andrea @andreakremer.bsky.social · 28/04/2025

...“a tremendous amount of the verboten conversations can now shift back into public view,” Andreessen told Fridman. “It’s much healthier to live in a society in which people are literally not scared of what they’re saying.” Secret group chats with some of the worst people, plus Marc Cuban.

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Brevity / Dinty W. Moore @dintywmoore.bsky.social · 18/04/2025

"A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people." ~Thomas Mann

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Adam Gurri @adamgurri.liberalcurrents.com · 09/04/2025

Why settle for inaccurate history when you can just settle for made up stuff

ancient constitutionalism, example The Spirit of Laws by Montesquieu
<stern looking wojak> "Fuck off I don't believe in that made up nonsense"
Big grin wojak looking at Social Contract Theory, example Two Treatises of Government by Locke: "So true!!!"

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The apex predators of the system have risen to power by taking advantage of the economic fears and the uncertainty of whom to trust because the political class has consistently betrayed us. Keep victim blaming, though, and see if that helps win elections.

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While the other discreetly siphons away the wealth, disingenuously puts the blame on the marginalized other-of-the-day, and actively and openly wages war on the other side and all social policies that might mitigate the harm caused by the scheme.

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Every decade or so, the bubble bursts, and one side rebuilds the machine while tossing crumbs and platitudes to placate the other side and the masses.

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