I have never read the Harry Potter series.

I plowed through all sorts books as a kid in the 2000s but never picked them up.

Yeah I think I’m cool with that.

The other day, I cracked open a tote of some high school papers and keepsakes that I haven’t laid eyes on in 15 years. Found a notebook inside where I wrote these yearly journal entries of big takeaways and thoughts I had each NYE starting as a freshman.

What I wrote as a freshman at 14, right down to my exact handwriting, I could have written yesterday. What really hit me was how well I had summarized my entire psyche in wide-ass crayola marker. Like shit, I couldn’t have said it more succinctly myself, self.

Are we indeed the same people we were in those “Stand by Me” years and the added baggage of aging and externally changing has only served to complicate us, to easily confuse ourselves with what we do? Is continually adding to the sum total of our lived experiences even helpful if some of us have already lost ourselves to a heap of internalized hardship?

But who am I now if I am not also what I have lived?

…

Yeah im all good here just another civilian casualty of shock and awe ruminating the night away 👈😎👉

Apologies in advance, for I am kind of dumb, but what does this mean?

What if we work backwards on this?

1. Introduce community boxes at junction points where USPS already delivers, and/or next to a parks so you can say hi to your neighbors and stuff. Ensure any box is within a tolerable walking distance for the average community member served. (Best figure five minutes here folks.)

2. Allow residents with mail being delivered to their physical addresses to opt in to delivery at their associated neighborhood box.

3. Market the boxes as happy medium between visiting a staffed post office at the center of a city and risky doorstep delivery. Locked boxes large enough to accommodate everyday parcels basically nix those pesky pilfering porch pirates.

4. Continue regularly scheduled deliveries to individual addresses because the route will continue to exist at some level of specificity anyway no matter how many or how few community boxes materialize. Carriers essentially keep the same routes but get to drop mad loads of male mail into a bunch of ready and willing local slots near you, driving efficiency up and logistics strategists wild.

5. Promote additional box patronage by offering a slight discount whenever postage/shipping is purchased for a specific physical address utilizing delivery to a community box. Immediate and total coverage of community boxes across America is neither expected nor necessary, but hell, reward those who lighten that load for others.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk!

sincerely, louise dajoy

Edit: got high while writing and it took a turn for the weird

My brother in Christ you have described almost the exact same specs I visualized. The only difference is in the level of resolution of my “scene.” And by that, I mean essentially I did a few more render passes in my head to anchor everything you’ve written within a sort of Impressionistic, highly softened, out-of-focus backdrop. I saw hints of shadowy cabinets, the concept of a darkened kitchen out of sight. The shape and finger placement of my slightly more textured, clothed yet featureless male. The gray-brown feeling of a floor below, a dark white ceiling above, and the faded glow of sunlight through an unseen dining room window grazing one end of that oaken table.

But the basics … They’re the same, and before being asked to recall them. Damn.

Okay, this is fascinating … And makes me wonder how often this–what I will call “academic honorable discharge”–really occurs across institutions, well-known or not.

I haven’t delved into your sources yet, so this is my somewhat educated guess … Environmentally, this type of social breakdown makes sense with the lack of proper oversight, seasoned leadership, and organization appropriate to the study population. But did the low sodium diet itself serve any factor in the violence that occured in this botched study? Like, did kids being dietarily withheld a critical electrolyte affect the speed and intensity with which cracks in the camp structure split open?

Not trying to be too lighthearted here, but my guess in short: The kids went extra bonkers because of altered body and brain chemistry, with a lack of sodium (assuming the diet was initiated on Day 1) being a key aggressor in… making teen aggression more aggressive?

Have you heard any specific reasons for the mail hoarder’s actions at your current workplace, or is it still a fresh case? I’m guessing it was nefarious, since the mail outbox was closer and seemingly more obvious than the secret stashing cabinet. Just wanted to be a dingus to intended mail recipients? I’d also be curious if it was all mail they handled or just select pieces. So many burning questions!!

I am a contractor so I don’t work in a standard office setting right now. I miss the heck out of juicy office gossip, at least about those who deserve such sordid stories! (Karen in accounting is actually really nice, Carl.)

With the rest of the house being normal-to-very clean, it’s almost like the parents were never able to make her clean her room because she was a territorial “devil” child, and they just let it slide for years and years.

Maybe what started as s genuine attempt at hangout ended up with her finally recognizing how embarrassing the situation was, leading to her cooling off during later chats?

Either that or it was all an elaborate ruse to get the wild child a free room cleaning and the parents were somehow in on it and everyone except you in this story is actually nuts!

Quite the spectrum of possibility, really. But honestly, I have a feeling your help might have helped her grow up and out of her family’s (or her own) neglect. It was a kind thing you did, regardless of the weird-ass circumstances!

I love this! Free cat scratchers might not seem like they have much value, but has anyone seen the price of those ready-made things?! They’re pushing $20 for a large-ish flat scratcher at lower volume places like TSC, but Target isn’t much better, still $10 for a 10" x 18" flat cheapy.

Down with bougie cat cardboard!!!

Alright. As I yield to yet another cannabis-laced existential crisis, picking idly, furiously, at my own damn identity and supposed role in whatever this place, space, realm is … Well, this hit me (pun shockingy not intended) and my current mental state so close to home, it’s not even funny. Except it is. In a bittersweet way, I love it.

I love this style of webcomic (bookcomic? lul) and I feel like I’m about to dive headlong into another beautifully depressing, identity-shattering rabbit hole like I did with Elan School.

Edit: I’d never seen this or the full book before, so if you do check out Elan School (which is non-fiction btw, at least in this reality, hahaha), be warned, it’s a lot longer than 22 pages. So worth it though. A wiiiild ride.