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Nick Arvin

@nickarvin.bsky.social
1.5K followers 635 following 1.9K posts

Author of MAD BOY from Europa Editions + 3 other books of fiction. Writing in the NYer, NYT, WSJ, Ploughshares. Two times winner of the Colorado Book Award. Also, an engineer! Technical and consulting work in green energy. Colorado based.

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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 15h
The endless discourse around whether AI is conscious or not without anyone on either side bothering to define what they mean by "conscious" is kind of driving me crazy.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 10/10/2026
This graph is terrifying.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
A story about what happens when you cut out the middleman of usefulness... I'm posting a story a week in 2026! #40/52 is "The Wanting Machine."
nickarvin.substack.com
The Wanting Machine
#40 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
A story about what happens when you cut out the middleman of usefulness... I'm posting a story a week in 2026! #40/52 is "The Wanting Machine."
nickarvin.substack.com
The Wanting Machine
#40 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I'm sure the FCC will step in to enforce equal time requirements.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Sounds like a terrific story!
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Lol. I hadn't thought of that, but it did remind me a bit of Howl's Moving Castle.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
🤓 yup... Florence was an oil boom town, and I think this was an oil drilling rig, although there wasn't any signage around. It was just kind of sitting there like someone forgot it.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
This is sitting by the street in Florence, CO. I understand that if you stand in the right spot, it will tie your shoes for you.
This is an antique cable-tool drilling rig, also known as a spudder rig, which were used from the late 1800s through the 1930s for drilling water wells and early oil exploration.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
These are really good stories. Many of them are objectively creepy af.
Cover of the short story collection A Sunny Place for Shady People by Mariana Enríquez and translated by Megan McDowell.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
These are awesome. "You are being monitored" lol.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
So good it's unreal.
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Ryan @rwmaxey.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
How the fuck is Sisyphus happy this sucks
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Reynolds Park yesterday. Beautiful view with stressed and beetle killed trees. 🙁
Mountain views.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
"A really great example of a short story tackling sci-fiesque themes but in such a tender and (ironically) real way" is how one kind commenter described this story, and I love it. I'm posting a story a week in 2026. #38/52 is "There Is No We in IRL."
Image of a woman on a TV screen distorted by blocks of pixels out of place or distorted.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
It's rainbow season here. Vivid double this evening.
Fraction of a double rainbow against gray skies over the top of a tree in the bottom right corner.
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Mitchell Nobis @mitchnobis.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Today is a good day to buy my first poetry collection from @matchfactoryeds.bsky.social. 🤘🏼
matchfactoryeditions.com
The Size of the Horizon, or, I Explained Everything to the Trees by Mitchell Nobis | Books | Match Factory Editions
The Size of the Horizon explores parenting, uncertainty, and injustice, weaving nature, gun violence, and joy into poetry that embraces life’s chaos.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Cool floaty thing in Denver by the train station.
This photo shows “Sun Splash,” a kinetic aerial art installation by Colorado-based artist Patrick Shearn.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
I started this story with two paragraphs about a weird kid, then it didn't go anywhere. I put it away for a while, and when I came back to it, it went in a totally different direction... I'm posting a story a week in 2026: #38 of 52 is "One Good Lie." nickarvin.substack.com/p/one-good-lie
nickarvin.substack.com
One Good Lie
#38 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
This is bipartisan and utterly stupid, a backdoor hit on electric vehicles. Electric vehicle motors generate electromagnetic interference that causes static on AM radio frequencies.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
I found some light and some shadow.
Lines of light and shadow on a brick wall and windows created by a canopy of straight bars.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Spotted in Denver: HAY
Photo of brick wall, aged, with old paint on it that says HAY and a mirror.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Yeah, I was curious about that too. From this article the police position on Axon isn’t clear to me.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Our local city council taking out the Flocks. Interestingly the police were like, sure, go for it.
littletonindependent.net
Englewood City Council unanimously votes to terminate Flock contract
Englewood City Council unanimously voted to terminate the city’s contract with Flock for automatic license plate reader (ALPR) cameras. A proposed similar contract with Axon failed after the vote was
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
I wanted this story to turn on the possibility that the most important friendships in life aren’t the ones that last the longest. Maybe you've had friendships like this too?
nickarvin.substack.com
In Praise of Short Friendships
#37 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
As far as I could figure out, this is a haunted tiny home.
Very small, rundown house, surrounded by encroaching greenery.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found his phone in his bed and resumed scrolling.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Sunset/rainbow combo this evening.
Rainbow over trees against pink clouds.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
This is likely only a coincidence, but knowing that many advice column entries are fiction, and considering that the kind of person who entertains themself by creating fictional advice column submissions also probably wouldn’t hesitate to use some AI assistance, it does make me go hm.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
FWIW, I spent a bunch of time driving around rural Minnesota last week, and I saw zero (0) roadside MAGA signage/flags/etc.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
My story here:
nickarvin.substack.com
Intramarital Dispute Data Tracker.xls
#14 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
This is remarkably similar to a short story I put out in April, titled "Intramarital Dispute Data Tracker.xls."
nytimes.com
My Husband Read My Journal and Now He’s Furious. Was I in the Wrong?
I had kept a log of the fights we had, to help sort through my emotions.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
My latest is a kind of “13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” story, but with men and their hearts. This was fun as hell to write.
nickarvin.substack.com
Men Showing Heart
#36 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 03/09/2026
We're just hurtling toward immense destruction & suffering & the entire US political class has agreed it's better not to talk about it. "Insanity" barely covers it.
nytimes.com
U.N. Says World Will Miss Its 1.5-Degree Climate Target
Carbon removal combined with emissions reduction is the only remaining pathway to avert catastrophic levels of warming, a new report warns.
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Joel Calahan @joelcalahan.com · 01/09/2026
You’re going to want to read today’s story by @nickarvin.bsky.social. So sentimental (complimentary)! It reminds me a little of Calvino, and also somehow of Jack Prelutsky. nickarvin.substack.com/p/men-showin...
nickarvin.substack.com
Men Showing Heart
#36 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Thanks so much, Joel!
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Gorgeous!
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Karen Palmer @karenpalmer.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
It's a match for this morning's sunrise.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
In Willmar, MN, for work, and there isn’t a lot going on, but the sunset is fabulous.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Grim.
nytimes.com
West Point Climate Professor Says He Was Fired for Refusing to ‘Defy Science’
Dr. Adam Kalkstein is suing the U. S. Military Academy, where he was a professor of geography and the only climate scientist, after being fired.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
The plan is to actually, literally build data center capacity that will *double* the amount of electrical power consumed in Texas!
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
🤓
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
Are you reading Night Watch?
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
The entire state of Texas uses ~90 GW!
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
These numbers are deranged. The entire city of Chicago uses an average of 3.5 GW. If you wanted to generate all this data center power with nukes, you would need something like 100 large new nuclear power stations.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Lil jumping spider fella hanging out in our backyard.
Jumping spider. A surprisingly hairy creature with four glossy deep brown eyes.
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Lauren Flans @laurenflans.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Thinking about how the John Henry of AI would just be someone who wrote an email all by himself and then died of exhaustion.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
I love Erin's illustration for this one, which uses a picture of the wings of a cicada that I found awhile ago when I went to grab a door knob on the garage. Startling! You like ghost stories? Here is a lil' ghost story.
substack.com
Ryan, a Rational Man, Didn’t Believe in Ghosts
#33 of 52 Fictions: A Story a Week for 2026
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Sorry, King Soopers, no apostrophe. I don't know what possessed me.
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Nick Arvin @nickarvin.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
The view from the King Sooper's parking lot.
Rainbow over cars.
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