Humdrum Places - BlogFlock

Time Has No Memory - foofaraw

2026-09-24T16:00:30.000Z

The Late Cretaceous is hotter than the other periods I’ve visited. My dossier says it’s because of all the volcanic activity. I can’t see any volcanoes from my campsite, which is on the shore of the prehistoric Pacific Ocean, but the air is thick, like a bad smog day in Los Angeles.

I’m queasy from the jump. Time travel is like being shoved through a kaleidoscope made of light, sound, and terror. I’m told it’s so painful because it’s not just time travel. It’s also something like time fracturing. Whenever they send one of us back, it creates a new timeline, a new universe, separate and parallel to our own. I have no reason not to take the techs at their word. All I know is that I end up puking my guts out after each jump. Not exactly the best way to arrive in a world full of monsters.

I ended up in a nice spot, beach-front property in what will be Fresno, California in sixty-six million years. The beach wasn’t empty when I arrived. I share it with a flock of giant birds that look like a cross between a duck and a heron, only they’re the size of harbor seals and sport beaks filled with teeth as long as my finger. My field guide tells me they’re called Hesperornis rossicus, and they should be harmless. I wonder if they taste like chicken.

I set my camp a hundred yards from the water⁠—the Cretaceous oceans are filled with horrors, and placing a football field between me and them seems a sensible precaution. I don’t have much with me, just the essentials: food, weapons, tent, water purification tablets, a compact first aid and surgery kit, a compass, and a small but powerful gas-powered bone saw that will run for hours on a half-liter of ethanol. All that fits neatly into a moderately sized backpack, and not one of these items runs on batteries or includes electronics of any kind. That’s the real motherfucker of time travel⁠—it completely fries anything with electronics. No datapads, no thermal imagers, not even a goddamn flashlight. Finally, I have my mission dossier, which, among other things, tells me all about the prehistoric beast I’m here to hunt and kill.

I’m exhausted, and my mouth still tastes like vomit, so I’ll end here. I hear the Hesperornis on the beach, squawking and hissing. I’ll put my pistol beneath my pillow, just in case they’re wondering if I taste like chicken.

I watched the sun come up over the ocean this morning. Beautiful. I’m not the kind of guy who is particularly moved by sunrises, but, hey, I’ve never been the only human being to witness one.

Of course, the morning wasn’t all sunshine and poetry. While I was choking down a breakfast of instant coffee and an MRE (something the package claimed was scrambled eggs), I was reminded how dangerous the ancient past can be. All was serene until a mosasaur⁠—a forty-foot monster that looks like a cross between a whale and crocodile⁠—burst out of the surf and dragged a Hesperornis to a bloody, watery death while its compatriots scattered, squawking in terror. Reminded me of killer whales doing the same thing to seals in my own time. Nature has been playing from the same deck for a long time.

I guess now is a good time to tell you why I’m writing in the blank spaces of my mission dossier with a stubby golf pencil I smuggled in⁠—RevChem forbids any recording of our little jaunts. I wonder if that’s the real reason we can’t take anything electronic or why we go alone. If what they’re doing got out, especially in something like a live-capture vid, they’d be royally fucked. But I’m jumping ahead. Let me start with this. What am I doing here sixty-six million years in the past?

Money is the simplest answer. RevChem Pharmaceuticals has been mining the past for its riches. Those riches are the organs of long-extinct animals, some of which harbor miracle medical treatments. The brain from a Tyrannosaurus Rex, for example, produces a protein that halts and even reverses the advancement of Alzheimer’s. You can imagine how profitable that is. Thing is, no one is supposed to have time-travel equipment. It’s illegal, and RevChem is covering their asses with a truckload of bogus science. That Alzheimer’s cure? They say it comes from the brains of Andean condors. From what I’ve learned, there are enough similarities to fool some people in the medical community, and, well, the others are turning a blind eye because we’re talking billions of dollars here.

Speaking of money. RevChem pays folks like me⁠—former military special forces and other hard-edged assholes⁠—a absurd sums of money because no one else is stupid or tough enough to survive hunting prehistoric monsters for their precious organs. They pay us a lot because it’s dangerous, and they pay us a lot so we keep our mouths shut. I thought I could do that. I thought the seven-figure paydays would curb any guilt I felt going along with RevChem’s secret operation. Unfortunately, I’ve developed a conscience. It’s all because of my mom. Yeah, even hard-edged assholes like me have a mom, and mine was a goddamn superhero.

My dad bailed on us pretty early on. Well, we sort of bailed on him first, I guess. Mom finally got tired of him smacking the shit out of her, and thought he might turn his fists on me. She got the jump on him with my little-league baseball bat, and put his ass in the hospital. We skipped town before he could sufficiently recover and come looking for payback. It was just me and her from then on. She worked two or three jobs to make sure we had enough to eat, that I had clothes for school, and a life that included things like joy and love. When I joined the Army, I tried to return the favor and send money home, so she wouldn’t have to work so much anymore.

Mom started having problems in her early fifties. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s two days after her fifty-third birthday. Things got worse with each passing year, and eventually I had to come home, accept a private security job, and take care of her. I watched her slowly fade over the next three years, losing more and more of herself to the disease, until, at the end, there was nothing left of the woman who’d been the absolute foundation of my life.

After that, I kind of drifted from one dangerous, likely-to-get-you-killed job to the next. I did a lot of mercenary work all over the world, including Africa, where I worked for the Kenyan government, hunting poachers on the Masai Mara wildlife reserve. That’s where RevChem recruited me.

I didn’t know what I’d be doing at first⁠—RevChem was obviously tight-lipped about it. When I found out, I should have told them to go fuck themselves. Instead, I saw a chance to experience something few people could even dream of. I also thought what better place to hide from the horrors of my past than millions of years before they even happened. The money didn’t hurt either.

Unfortunately, guilt is a powerful force, and it can reach back through time and space and grab hold of you. My guilt was clothed in memories of my mom, and it eventually pushed me to reach out to NewsNow, one of the few unbiased news agencies, and bear my soul. I told them how RevChem was using illegal time travel equipment to pillage the past. I related that one T-Rex brain provides enough genetic material to treat a thousand Alzheimer’s patients, but RevChem offers the treatment to a fraction of that number to drive up the price.

NewsNow is running their article in a few days. I’ll be back before the dam breaks, time enough to collect the money RevChem is paying for this job. I suppose that makes me a hypocrite, but I’m gonna tell myself it’s okay because this journal is the start to a book that’ll blow the cover off everything. I’m gonna tell myself it’ll lead to people like my mom getting treated.

I even sort of believe it.

Spent all day hunting. No dice.

My target is a healthy adult Tyrannosaurus Rex (apparently the brains of juveniles don’t carry that magic protein). An adult T-Rex is a forty-foot-long killing machine with dagger-sized teeth and a bite force registering north of six tons. You’d think an animal that big would be easy to find. You’d be wrong. One thing I learned in Kenya was that predators are adept at remaining unseen, even giant ones like T-Rexes.

If you know anything about hunting predators, you also know hunting them directly rarely pays off. The best tactic is to post up near their favorite food and wait for the lions and tigers and bears to get hungry. This morning, I followed my compass west and trekked inland through pine forests that make the Redwoods look like someone’s backyard. I was searching for T-Rex’s favorite prey. That just happens to be an animal only slightly less terrifying than Rexy himself. Triceratops horridus is thirty feet long, weighs about eight tons, and its head features a bony crest that is both bullet-proof (trust me on this one) and Rex-proof. That monstrous head also sports three massive horns. The two above its eyes are a yard long and anything on the wrong end of them, be it T-Rex or a hapless time-traveler, is shish kebab.

I found a herd of Triceratops, about twenty of them, in a big clearing five clicks from my campsite. They’re dangerous, but, like most herbivores, they’ll leave you alone unless you get too close or mess with their young. I made myself a hunting blind near the tree line, and watched and waited. People often think hunting is some grand adventurous escapade. It’s mostly sitting in the boonies with your thumb up your ass hoping whatever you’re hunting actually shows up. Today, I spent nine hours watching Triceratops eat and shit and then eat some more. It held all the majesty of watching a herd of giant, well-armed cows.

When I was certain that T-Rex wasn’t going to show, I climbed into a nearby tree, and slung my hammock. My dossier says T-Rex doesn’t hunt at night, but I’d rather not sleep on the ground and test the theory. As I lay here with my rifle across my lap and writing in the last rays of the Cretaceous sun, I’m thinking about Mom. Thinking about her last year and how the treatments we could afford did next to nothing. How, at the end, she didn’t even know who I was.

The more I think about Mom, the more I think about all the people RevChem is not helping, and the more I hate myself for getting involved in their shit show to begin with. You take the devil’s money, and you do the devil’s bidding, and, in the end, the devil gets your soul. Well, he’s gonna pay through the fucking nose for mine.

Last note. Night has fallen, but I’m watching the most epic meteor shower. Hundreds of them, lighting up the night like flares. Hell of a show.

Success!

I bagged a T-Rex. Happened first thing this morning. I woke to the Triceratops herd making an ungodly racket. Imagine the honking of a goose mixed with an air-raid siren, and you’ll have some approximation of a Triceratops alarm bleat. A pair of Rexes had cornered one of the Triceratops juveniles, a little ten-footer with no chance of fighting off the monsters who’d come to eat it.

It’s weird; you grow up with pictures of dinosaurs. Artist interpretations, you know?. They show these scaly, lumbering brutes, but the truth is radically different. A T-Rex has a thick, almost barrel-shaped body, and they’ve got feathers and scales. The feathers are drab green and run along their backs, while their legs and bellies are covered in brown, pebble-like scales. Despite their size, they move like birds⁠—fast and fluid⁠—like ostriches bred with dragons. They’re borderline ridiculous, until you get to that massive head and teeth. Nothing ridiculous about those.

The adult Triceratops managed to drive off one of the Rexes, but not before the second one went in for the kill. That’s when I took my shot. Like I said, no high-tech gear, but even though I can’t pack the latest gauss carbine, I’m not exactly sporting Davy Crockett’s bear rifle. My Simpson M105 fires .50 caliber, explosive-tipped rounds that can put soccer-ball sized holes in two feet of concrete. I shot my Rex just as he opened those jaws of death to turn the juvenile Triceratops into dino-chow. I hit him just behind his two dinky arms, obliterating heart and lungs in a spray of blood. The Rex staggered to the side, eyes wide and goggling, then keeled over. The gunshot scattered the herd of Triceratops, and in a few minutes the glade was empty and quiet.

I left my hunting blind, made my way across the clearing to the T-Rex corpse, and fired up my bone saw. It’s messy cutting through skin, meat, and a half-inch of bone, but there’s no other way to do it. T-Rex’s brain is located in the back of its skull, and it’s surprisingly small for such a big animal, about half the size of a human brain. Once I cut it out, I put the brain in a special vacuum sealed bag and started hoofing it back to my camp.

That’s really the most dangerous part of this whole thing. Stinking like carrion and trekking back through five miles of monster-infested forest. I had to sling my rifle to carry the brain, and, yeah, sure, I could probably get to my pistol if another T-Rex showed up, but that’d be like shooting a mountain with a slingshot.

I made it back to camp, burned my blood-soaked fatigues, and changed into a fresh pair. Luckily, the vacuum seal around the specimen blocks any odor, so I shouldn’t attract any unwanted attention tonight.

I’m supposed to snap back to the present at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow. That’s how it works. You’re on a timer. The techs give you a certain number of days to do the job, and when that time expires, the machinery yanks you back. It’s worse than the journey to get here. Like being squeezed through a hole a little too small for you to fit.

There was another meteor shower tonight. Even brighter than last night. Scared the shit out of the Hesperornis, and they all flocked into the sea, leaving me alone on my little stretch of beach. Fine by me. Tomorrow I go home, get paid, and this will be the last time I visit the past. That’s a little bittersweet, to be honest. I mean, how many people get to see the things I’ve seen? The consolation prize is RevChem will be exposed, and I’ll have done something approaching worthwhile with my life. Still feels like I got a lot more to answer for, but it’s a start.

It’s 10:00 a.m. as I write this, and I’m still in the Cretaceous. The techs have been a little off before, but only by a few minutes. An hour is definitely out of the ordinary. Of course, it could be just a technical malfunction. I mean, we’re talking about time travel, right?

It’s noon and technical difficulties seem a lot less likely. I’m a cynical bastard, and I’m starting to think RevChem got wind of my little story at NewsNow and figured it would be a lot worse if I came back to corroborate all that ooey-gooey evidence. No need to hire a hitman to remove someone if you can arrange for them to slowly die sixty-six million years in the past, right?

I wonder how long I can survive. I have a finite amount of ammunition, and I don’t fancy hunting dinosaurs with sharp sticks. Seems pointless to even try, but there’s a part of me that can’t go quietly. I’ll stick it out for as long as I can.

Seems silly to keep writing this down, but I like doing it. It’s calming. Cathartic.

It’s midnight, and I am struck by a line I wrote in a previous entry. I’m definitely gonna get to see some shit no one has ever seen before. For starters, I was treated to the biggest meteor shower of all time. Thousands of shooting stars, some so big they made it all the way to the surface. I heard impacts from multiple directions, and I can already smell the fires to the east.

Then the big one came. The K-T asteroid passed overhead, and it was like someone hurled that sun at me. The light from the thing was like noon on a summer day.

That was twenty minutes ago. I felt the impact, even thousands of miles away, and a fiery glow bloomed on the horizon. The shockwave will hit soon.

RevChem couldn’t just leave me to die in the past. They needed to make a statement. It’s a little over the top, but I gotta hand it to them. The calculations they had to pull off to put me right here, right now must have cost millions. I’m honestly flattered they went to all this trouble.

I’m sorry as hell I won’t be able to help more folks like my mom. If there’s something beyond all this, maybe I’ve done enough to see her again. That’s a nice thought, and I’m going to hold it close, sit on the beach, and wait for the world to end.

Aeryn Rudel is a writer from Tacoma, Washington. He is the author of the baseball horror novella Effectively Wild, the Iron Kingdoms Acts of War novels, and the flash fiction collection Night Walk & Other Dark Paths. His short stories have appeared in Abyss & Apex. Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and Pseudopod, among others. Learn more about Aeryn's work at www.rejectomancy.com or on Bluesky @aerynrudel.bsky.social.

The Source Behind The Ban - The Independent Variable

2026-09-23T21:48:09.000Z

The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance, Status has learned. On Monday, Vance himself also defended the White House’s decision to ban POLITICO. “They can still report on the Trump White House,” he told reporters. “They can still get the public reports. They can still, of course, talk to people in the administration and outside the administration.” He then added: “If you actually look at the objective analysis … POLITICO is as anti-Trump as Breitbart was anti-Obama or anti-Biden.”

The call was coming from inside the house, you say??? What a bunch of morons—the audacity!

Tyler Lee - foofaraw

2026-09-23T17:32:50.000Z

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Read Dinosaurs Are Too Big now!

So what do you have against heavy-duty, industrial sized dinos like the Triceratops? What did they ever do to you?!

You know what, this is a valid point, it really isn’t fair to the dinos to put this all on them. In real-life I have an intense amount of anxiety around motor vehicles. I don’t drive myself (never have, never will) and I prefer to get things done on foot or by bicycle whenever possible, but that’s not really realistic in a place like Saskatchewan. My fiance grew up out in the country and has been driving since she was young because that’s really the only way to get anywhere out there. She never really “got” my car-anxiety at first. One time she asked me to try and describe it, and the best analogy I could come up with was to say that being in a car/in traffic makes me feel like I’m on the back of a dinosaur, surrounded by other dinosaurs, and I have to just trust them not to do dinosaur things. That conversation stayed stuck in the back of my mind for a few months, and then you announced that foofaraw was running a dino-themed issue and I thought “maybe there’s a piece in there somewhere?”

How do you have such a vast knowledge of dinosaurs??

I was a kid in the '90s, and I feel like that was a very dino-heavy era: Jurassic Park, Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, all that stuff. I had a pretty heavy dino-phase when I was young, where I would consume anything dino-related like crazy, from cartoons to those big hardcover books from the Scholastic fair with all the infographics and everything. I ate that stuff up. When I was seven or so, we went on a long family road trip, and one of the stops was at the Royall Tyrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta, which is an absolutely incredible dinosaur museum, and it absolutely blew my mind. I made it back to Drumheller in late-2024 while I was on tour, and got to spend another afternoon there, and it was just as magical as an adult. Dinosaurs rule.

Do you have a favorite dinosaur? What dinosaur would you be driving to work?

I always thought the ankylosaurus was very cool. It’s much smaller than the classic dinos like the t-rex, it doesn’t look fast like a velociraptor, he’s kind of just a little guy, but he’s plated in armour and he has this big club tail (which I guess would be almost impossible to aim with any accuracy because it’s behind the head anyway) – I don’t know but there’s something simultaneously so cool and so impractical about the ankylosaurus that has always tickled my brain.

Assuming this is an Editor’s Chisel for some sort of publication… what would the publication be called?

I actually brainstormed a few different ideas for this when I was drafting, and they were all basically “(some kind of rock-based pun for an existing city) + (some kind of ancient writing medium)” but by the end I felt like maybe the piece worked better if the silly puns didn’t really start rolling until the body of the story. The last publication title I had settled on before I finally decided to just pull it was “The Sedmenton Daily Cuneiform”

How would the publication get delivered? Are their paper boys and girls? What do they ride???

I like to think that even in this crazy world, children aren’t expected to be responsible for dinosaurs on their own. Instead, they probably have like a sled that gets dragged behind a team of sabretooth tigers (much safer) from door to door.

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

None. I wrote this one specifically with this call in mind.

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

I know I’m about forty years late to the party on this one, but I’ve only recently become aware of the work of Lorrie Moore, and I’m absolutely flabbergasted at just how incredible her stories are. I’m a sucker for second-person POV, and sad people being beautiful in their brokenness. Moore is a master of both things. “How To Be An Other Woman” seems to be her most well-known story, and it’s absolutely worthy of all the praise that’s been heaped upon it over the decades, but nearly every story in her Self Help collection is brilliant IMO.

What book are you reading right now?

I’m nearly finished Paul Auster’s In The Country of Last Things. I’m a huge fan of Auster, and while this one doesn’t work quite as well for me as my favourites from him, I’m enjoying it quite a lot. The dystopia depicted in the novel is interesting in so far as it feels (to me) simultaneously both very alien and very mundane. The political structure and “mechanics” (for lack of a better word) of the society are constantly in flux, and completely hidden from the characters (and the readers) but the people adapt to these changes in a way that almost makes them seem normal. That realization is especially chilling for the reader (or at least it is for me) in the current political environment, where it feels like the President of the United States, tech billionaires, and other global power brokers are conjuring up “new normals” on a near-monthly basis, and getting scary amounts of buy-in from the public on them.

If you like way-too-wordy underground hip-hop, you can find my music under the name Skizza on most streaming platforms. I have stories recently-ish published in Radon Journal, Grain Magazine, Temz Review, Neon & Smoke, spring, and of course foofaraw, and I have stuff coming out in the TBD-but-near-ish future with The New Quarterly, and Tome & Space. I’m on Instagram/Threads @skizzafromsask.

Make Art. Drink Water. Read Books. Lift Weights. Love People.

Thanks to Tyler for talking dinos and the safer alternative, saber tooth tigers!

Raised by Dinosaurs - foofaraw

2026-09-23T16:00:55.000Z

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Zack Rhodes is a cartoonist based in Sonoma County. Find him on Instagram @solditfor50

Dinosaurs Are Too Big - foofaraw

2026-09-23T15:01:41.000Z

From the Editor’s Chisel:

The dust has finally settled on Tuesday’s tragic three stegosaurus pile-up. Five people are dead, another seven seriously injured. Our city is at rock bottom, scraping to find some answers. Folks, trust me when I say I’m not one of those hippie-dippie, free-the-lizards activists, who expects everyone to get around on their own two hairy feet, like they did back in the Triassic. I’m a modern, Cretaceous man, with modern, Cretaceous values; some of my best childhood memories are those summer holidays when Dad would hitch the camper up to the family Parasaurolophus and burn gravel, with nothing but a map and a half-tank of leaves to guide us. I get it⁠—there’s something intoxicating about hitting the open-road with four powerful legs beneath you, all four chambers of that dino-heart roaring with five-hundred pounds of pure, unbridled lizardpower. But in light of the recent catastrophes, even this commentator is forced to acknowledge an uncomfortable fact: dinosaurs have simply gotten too big.

I recognize I run the risk of sounding out-of-touch. This might come across as the stereotypical “old man yelling at the ghosts in the sky that rain their dreams into our heads” here. But if you’re of a certain age, you remember a time when Sedmenton was a quiet, safe place to raise your children. When kids could walk or slateboard to school, and every driveway housed a practical, family-friendly dino, like an Austoraptor or an Ankylosaurus. But nowadays, the mantra is bigger is better. That’s great for the luxury reptile dealers, and the leaf stations, but what about the rest of us? My next door neighbour rides a Triceratops to work. Yes, a TRICERATOPS⁠—with all three horns, and a giant armour plate on the head, which must be a nightmare for blindspots. My neighbour doesn’t scavenge mammoth carcasses from the ice-wilds for a living, nor does he have to haul sheets of rock around town to do construction work. My neighbour works as a tabletkeeper at the bank. By all accounts, a good one, but a tabletkeeper nonetheless. When even white-tunic workers feel like they need heavy-duty, industrial-sized dinos for their daily commutes, I can’t help but feel we’ve lost our way.

It was only last year that The Cave Matthews Band’s driver fell asleep at the reigns, and crashed their Tour Rex into a crowded promenade, killing nearly a dozen people, and wounding countless others. How many more tragedies like this must we endure before we do something about it?

Tyler Lee is a writer, poet, and hip-hop artist. His work has been published in Grain Magazine, Radon Journal, and Neon & Smoke. Tyler lives in Saskatoon, Canada, where he owns a completely normal amount of sneakers, and definitely isn't on a first-name basis with the staff of his neighbourhood burrito spot.

Ed Sheeran Delivers Pointless Statement Then Cries During Latest Concert - The Independent Variable

2026-09-22T23:23:59.000Z

Sheeran delivered everything you'd expect from a person in his position: equivocating, meaningless bullshit that was most likely written by someone else.

More reasons not to ever pay attention to Ed Sheeran—not that I've ever intentionally listened to any of his music. There are just so many choices he could have made to handle this differently, but he just went with the most basic, toothless, and cowardly approach. I definitely don't think every individual has to have an opinion on every political matter in the world, but being against genocide seems like a pretty simple one so enabling the silence of someone who has spoken up to support the Palestinian people seems like a pretty idiotic thing to do. Just be human for gods sake.

Robert Eggers to Direct ‘Romeo and Juliet’ for Focus Features — Will Be His Next Film - The Independent Variable

2026-09-22T23:20:20.000Z

No surprise, sources say the actors will be speaking the original Shakespearean language. Of course they will. This is the guy who made Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson talk in 19th-century maritime dialect, and who researched Viking-era speech for “The Northman.” Nobody should expect otherwise from Eggers.

I really wish people would stop it with the Shakespearean English. Robert Eggers doing Romeo and Juliet actually sounds like a fun pairing, but I'm so tired of all the Shakespeare language—I get that it's lyrical and I'm probably supposed to think it's elegant, but I hate it so much.

Caleb Williams Suffers Awful Injury At Awful Time In Awful Game - The Independent Variable

2026-09-22T23:14:10.000Z

It’s a horribly sad turn of events for a team that, after decades of futility, finally seemed on the verge of a real breakthrough.

This was a heartbreaking game to watch—devastatingly terrible football, followed by this injury. Luckily, it sounds like a minor hamstring injury. If that's the case, I bet they sit him for the next two games to make sure he's 110% and hopefully he makes a return without issue.

‘We Hacked the FBI:’ Hackers Say They Have Data on All FBI Employees - The Independent Variable

2026-09-22T23:12:11.000Z

When asked if ShinyHunters was going to attempt to extort the FBI, the representative said, “what we plan to do is not something I’d call extortion, maybe coercion.” “This is not financially motivated,” they added.

This is absolutely bonkers. Obviously, ShinyHunters aren't great people given they likely make a living via hacking and extortion, but... I am interested to see what "coercion" means in this instance against the current administration.

FPF statement on ‘editorial independence board’ for CBS and CNN - The Independent Variable

2026-09-22T05:33:12.000Z

The fish rots from the head, and this particular fish is headed by a compromised oligarch with a history of throwing journalists under the bus to advance his business interests

‘Nuff said. I mean, I get the hesitation, they’re scared. But in a situation like this, you have to use every lever you have, and that means fighting until the end. I still think Paramount would’ve regretted moving to Tennessee more than California would have.

We Must Create the Shit Machine - The Independent Variable

2026-09-19T18:36:32.000Z

Could the Shit Machine END WORLD HUNGER? It’s NOT IMPOSSIBLE in the most LITERAL SENSE, which is all the justification we need to invest an AMOUNT OF MONEY that would OTHERWISE BY ITSELF END ACTUAL WORLD HUNGER.

I’m not sure I’ll quote a better line than this all year.

On the sincerity of AI bosses - The Independent Variable

2026-09-19T00:21:24.000Z

Conservative political victories are always followed by economic misery for the conservative base, because the senior partners in the conservative coalition are the bosses who get richer by making workers poorer. Conservative rulers try to offset this with spectacular acts of cruelty against disfavored minorities, but this tactic only carries so far. Eventually, the electorate notices that despite terrorizing migrants and trans people, diesel is now $10/gallon and the guy responsible is now $1.4b richer than he was before the election.

Not sure you could summarize the past/present/future of politics and elections any better than that. I think there are three major factors that contribute to the cycle: 1) greed (obviously); 2) human beings like to follow. I mean, look at all these “alpha males” who, by definition, are betas as they keep looking to others for how to be “alpha;” and 3) selfishness, which sounds obvious, but it contributes to a lot more than just “Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie.” When we let our selfish ego take over, it’s easy to look at things as a zero-sum game—if someone else is winning, you must be losing. This leads to “othering” and then demonizing other groups of people to ensure you and yours don’t fall behind. I have more to say about how pacifism and rising tides are principles to follow to prevent you from falling into the trap of those instincts, but I’m still at a loss for how to bring folks on the dark side into the light.

Russian Businessman Paid for Donald Trump Jr.’s Lavish Wedding After-Party - The Independent Variable

2026-09-18T02:11:54.000Z

Mr. Kremlev also has direct ties to President Vladimir V. Putin. In April, Mr. Putin honored Mr. Kremlev with a high-level state award, the Order of Friendship. And just days before Mr. Trump’s wedding in May, Mr. Putin and Mr. Kremlev were seen together in China.

Nothing to see here, I'm sure. Just another Russia hoax, I'm sure.

STOP OMARCHY /// Boycott Tech - The Independent Variable

2026-09-18T02:08:46.000Z

Protest against the Omarchy/Omacom Foundation and the tech companies and executives funding far-right open source.

A bit behind on this, but jeez, the amount of money flowing to an open-source project run by a white nationalist millionaire is beyond wild.

Areal /// a typeface - The Independent Variable

2026-09-18T02:07:04.000Z

Areal, a “revival” of Arial, is based on the first version of Arial that was used on the internet (v2.82). It’s entirely redrawn and rebuilt from the ground up. Most revivals draw on analog artefacts like antique books, record covers, posters, etc. But Arial has always been a digital typeface, born in the computer age, which means its earliest traces existed only as a software running on hardware that barely exists anymore.

I've long been a fan of Dinamo Type and a long time user of Are.na so when they first announced Areal awhile back, I thought it was a wonderful project and something I wanted to get my hands on immediately. Well, a few months later, here we are and it's free for all! And in tons of varieties including variable fonts.

Meagan Fisher - foofaraw

2026-09-17T16:58:35.000Z

Read When To? now!

Do you have any “Tim’s” in your life who maybe get hyperfixated on something, ignoring the things that need to get done around them?

Myself. I’ve had to set aside a day each week for laundry, dishes, and other household chores and then hold myself accountable to following through. Fictional worlds are just so much more interesting!

If you ended up in a situation like this, who in your life would you most trust to get you home?

I would most trust my closest friend and roommate who has been there for me through a difficult home life when I was younger, then later a divorce, every time my car has broken down or my OCD has become too much to handle on my own. Plus, they’re probably the most knowledgeable person I know when it comes to both dinosaurs and survival. If there is anyone I would trust to get me home, or at least keep me safe in a situation like this, it’s them!

I’m not sure I was familiar with the hesperonychus… why that over something like a raptor or even a T-Rex?

While a raptor or a t-rex might have been a more recognizable and cinematic choice, I felt like hesperonychus was the correct choice for this specific story for a couple reasons. For one, I wanted to give Tim a chance to show off his knowledge without slowing down the story. While most might be able to recognize the big, well-known dinos, Tim might have recognized just about any dinosaur which might have shown its teeth. Additionally, I wanted a small, somewhat close to bird-sized dinosaur which would have realistically been found in what is now the United States, and hesperonychus fit the bill. Also, I just think these little dudes are cool and deserve a bit of a spotlight.

How long do you think Tim gets the silent treatment from Carla after that disaster of a trip?

Carla will not be speaking to Tim for a very long time. While, yes, his time machine did work – and that’s a win for him! – it came at the cost of his wife’s own wants and needs, and she won’t forget that quickly.

When do you think Tim gives it another spin? And does Carla ever set foot in the box again?

Oh, absolutely! Most likely as soon as he drops Carla back home, assuming they return home as easily as she hopes. As soon as she’s back in the present, though, Carla most certainly vows to never again set foot in a time machine. She is happy in the here-and-now, thank you very much. Tim, however, has just gotten a taste of something wonderful; he’s going back for more.

Does Tim ever fix the table?

He does, eventually. Probably once he finally realizes that Carla isn’t going to speak to him until he does. He might now be the most thoughtful or considerate, but he does love his wife.

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

This story was rejected twice by other magazines, which let me know this story didn’t quite fit what they were currently looking for. I tend to only send out my short stories to a few markets at a time, to keep things more focused and tailored for each individual story’s needs. I’m very grateful foofaraw offered When To? a home!

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

I’ve been taking a dive into the short stories of Ray Bradbury and just recently read The Veldt. It’s a very timely story for having been written seventy-six years ago, and it will certainly be sticking in my mind for a while.

What book are you reading right now?

I’ve been reading A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers. The low stakes and hopeful world Chambers has created here has been a lovely breath of fresh air!

Thanks to Meagan for chatting hyperfixations and dinosaurs!

When To? - foofaraw

2026-09-17T16:00:34.000Z

Carla couldn’t say she was surprised when her husband dragged her out to the barn to show her the sheets of metal he fused together into a large box. Nor was she surprised when he told her this box was, in fact, a time machine.

When he urged her to climb in through the small opening on the side; she obliged. After all, what harm could come from it? She’d play along, nothing would happen, then she’d get him to finally fix the loose leg on the kitchen table. For months, he pushed it off, telling her he’d do it just as soon as he was finished with his “top secret project.” This “time machine,” she presumed.

A pair of metal folding chairs sat in the center of the box; wires hung from the ceiling and across the floor. There were no windows and no door other than the small opening which her husband sealed behind them.

“Now, see these dials here on the wall?” He motioned toward a series of notched dials with a lever beside them sticking out of the metal wall. “These correspond to day, month, year. When do you want to go?”

“Tim,” she began.

He held up a hand. “No, wait, I’ve got it!”

He twisted the dials, muttering to himself, then pulled the lever. He waited a moment, then spun around to face his wife; a grin plastered across his face.

“Are you ready for this?” he asked.

“Ready for what? Nothing happened.” She crossed her arms, dropping into one of the chairs. “Look, you’ve had your fun. You learned time travel isn’t possible. Now will you please fix the table? Chrissy and the boys are coming over for lunch tomorrow, and I’d really like to have a place we can all sit and eat.”

“What do you mean it didn’t work? You haven’t even looked outside,” Tim said.

“I don’t need to. We didn’t move. Where did you think we’d go, anyway?” Carla asked.

He wagged his finger. “Not where, when. Remember? Time machine.” He marched proudly to the small door and opened it. “Welcome to the future.”

Carla couldn’t see much through the small door from her seat, but something smelled… different. She didn’t quite know how to describe it. It smelled kind of like that time her grandpa took her to the zoo when she was a little girl. It ended up raining all day, and they were stuck in the reptile house the whole time. Nothing like the tangy sweet smell of the barn she was used to.

She stood slowly. “Tim, what’s outside?”

“I just told you. It’s the future.” He gestured dramatically toward the door.

As she ducked through the small opening, Carla found herself in the middle of what seemed to be a rainforest. She didn’t recognize any of the plants around her. She might as well have been standing on an alien planet. One thing was for sure; they weren’t in their barn anymore.

“What… How… Are we…?” She couldn’t seem to form a complete sentence.

Tim stoked his chin thoughtfully. “The future’s way more nature-y than I expected. I thought there’d be flying cars. Where are all the robots?”

“How is… Is this… But we didn’t…”

“Although,” he continued, “the plant life seems to be very evolved. I’ll have to take some samples. I don’t think we have anything like this in our time.”

A rustling in the leaves of a nearby bush caught Carla’s attention. She watched as a strange, small creature emerged. It looked a bit like a duck or a loon or something else she might see on the lake, but it had an exceptionally long tail and oddly short wings. Its feet weren’t webbed, but bore large claws instead.

“Tim.” Her voice was shaky. She tried again. “Tim.”

“Not now, Carla, I’m trying to determine if this tree might be some future relative of the aspen in our backyard.”

The creature chirped, tapping one of its claws rhythmically against the ground.

“Oh my god, what is it doing?” Carla backed away from the creature, inching slowly toward the time machine.

Unwilling to tear her eyes away from the strange little thing, she collided with her husband, who spun angrily around, ready to yell at her. Instead, he let out a soft gasp.

“Sweetheart, get in the time machine,” he whispered.

Carla’s voice squeaked as she replied, “Yeah, that’s what I’m trying to do.”

“That’s a hesperonychus.” Awe filled his voice. “I’ve read about these.”

“I don’t care what it is. Something about it scares me.” She felt behind her for the metal box but only found air.

“That’s good. Evolution taught you that. This thing’s a killer,” Tim said.

The creature lowered its head, approaching them slowly, hissing.

“Oh, great. Killer little creatures. Just what the future needs.” She was starting to panic. Where was that stupid box‽

Her husband chuckled nervously. “Actually, I think something may have gone wrong.”

“Oh, you think‽” She spun around to see where she was. She had been backing diagonally away from the box this entire time. “Why can’t you just be normal for once? I didn’t ask to be swept away to the future. You did this all on your own. Remember that.”

The creature leapt toward her. So did Tim. He tackled her out of the way just in time. The creature crashed into the brush where she had just stood. It spun toward them, hissing even louder now.

“This isn’t the future.” Tim stood and helped her to her feet. “If I’m remembering correctly, I think this little guy’s from the Cretaceous Period.”

Carla didn’t have time to reply. The creature was running toward them.

“Quick,” Tim said, “machine.”

They both ducked through the small opening, and Tim slammed it closed. The creature ran into the door with a loud CLINK.

Laughing, Tim pulled Carla in for a hug. “We made it! Oh, that was exhilarating. Can you imagine what else could be out there? When to next?”

She pushed him away. “Home,” she hissed. “I want my table fixed.”

Meagan Fisher is a speculative fiction author from Upstate South Carolina who enjoys writing as a way to explore the human condition through the lens of fantastical or other-worldly settings. In her free time, she's an avid cosplayer and an amateur arachnologist. Her spiders, Frodo and Éowyn, wave hello from their hammocks!

Julia Rajagopalan - foofaraw

2026-09-16T19:24:56.000Z

Read The Bones of Doubt now!

So are dinosaur bones a complete sham?

Just for the record, I do not believe the Earth is 6,000 years old. Some of the people I grew up with do. They believe Satan put dinosaur bones on the Earth to tempt us into believing in things like evolution and science.

While I like to respect everyone’s belief system, I have a hard time with this one. I think we can say with some scientific confidence that dinosaur bones are legit. But I’m not a paleontologist, just a humble writer, so I’ll leave all the science to the people with the fancy degrees and big shovels.

Do you have a favorite dinosaur?

Yes! My favorite dinosaur is the Ankylosaurus, which looks kind of like if a tank had a baby with an armadillo. They say it’s the last of the non-avian dinosaurs, and they still haven’t found an entire skeleton. I’ve always liked it because I think it is the dinosaur that looks least likely to bite my face off. Then again, I’m not a paleontologist.

If there were a living species of animal that was the creation of the devil, which species do you think it would it be?

Monkeys. I’ve been chased by monkeys in so many different parts of the world I can’t even list them here. Apparently you’re not supposed to make eye contact with them, which reminds me a lot of middle school. Come to think of it, maybe that’s why I got bullied so much. Though I’m pretty sure being a bisexual atheist in a small town didn’t help.

How do you know Stolas isn’t already using social media? ;)

How, if at all, has your Masters of Science in Information effected your writing and storytelling?

My Master’s degree has dramatically impacted my writing and really my entire view on life. My specialty is in Archives, which makes me a librarian of historical documents. (I mean it would’ve if I hadn’t sold out and gone corporate.)

The study of archives has made me understand that history and stories have always been political, biased, and always will be. From the documents we deem ‘worthy’ to be kept in an archive, to the people we decide are ‘interesting’ enough to interview, all of what is studied is based on our choices. These decisions are extremely powerful in how we tell the stories about who we are and what we’re doing here.

I don’t think there’s such a thing as the Truth in relation to any of this. I think right and wrong are unfortunately subjective. That said, what I love about History and Writing is that we can poke along the edges of what we believe and explore the corners of who we are. Every story is powerful and worth listening to and reveals a little more about us as a collective whole.

Also, I think that these things can help us learn empathy and get curious about the people around us, and I think when we meet each other with empathy and curiosity, we will automatically start treating each other better and in turn make the world a better place.

How do you think Aym would feel knowing Stolas’ plan was a success and people believe dinosaurs were real today?

To be honest, I’m not sure he would have cared all that much about the dinosaur bones. I think he would love climate change, though, and all of these forest fires. Aym is a pyro of a demon.

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

I wrote this story specifically for this submission call. Though the idea has been floating around in my brain for decades.

When I heard as a kid, this idea that Satan put dinosaur bones on earth to trick us, I wondered how he could’ve pulled off this prehistoric treasure hunt. I assume he would’ve had to have gotten a lot of help.

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

I just read the story “Teddy Bear Pancake” by Chris Scott in Weird Lit Magazine that blew my mind. It’s about the end of death on Earth. HUGE premise, right, but he tells the story with these two little characters in a diner eating pancakes. I love the idea of attacking these enormous ideas with just small, normal people.

What book are you reading right now?

One book? That’s cute. I’m reading about eight books right now and usually am.

Craft: Verb Your Enthusiasm

Short stories: Fifty Beasts to Break Your Heart

Novel: The Hero of Ages AND Taken by the Alien Next Door

Nonfiction: Humans: A Monstrous History

Graphic Novel: Bowling With Corpses

I’m looking for an agent for my debut novel, A Sign of Murder, which is a modern fantasy mystery with romantic elements.

So if anyone knows an agent who likes dark humor and too much sarcasm, send them my way. The book’s pretty funny too.

Thanks to Julia for discussing dinos and their bones with us!

The Bones of Doubt - foofaraw

2026-09-16T18:23:24.000Z

A Study in the Demonic Digging Habits of Early Strigiformes

Stolas scratches at the dusty red dirt with his filthy talons. When his claw strikes a buried rock, he squawks, then pecks at it with his hooked beak. The sweltering Earthean sun beats relentlessly down on his feathered head. Still, it’s much cooler here than in hell.

As he digs, the ground shakes behind him in powerful rhythmic steps. With a twist, he swivels his head to see the demon Aym climbing the mild incline toward him. Stolas steps in front of his project, blocking it with his wings. The last thing he needs is Aym stealing his idea.

“What are you doing?” Aym’s feline head looks at Stolas, while the human head inspects the poorly hidden pile of bones. The reptilian head stares off at the clouds, but that head rarely pays attention to anything.

“Nothing. A craft project.” Stolas scuffs dust behind him, trying to obscure the bones. It is ineffective, serving only to draw Aym’s infernal interest.

“A craft project for Satan?”

“Everything we do is for the Dark Lord,” Stolas says, glancing around. You never know who could be listening.

“Yes, yes, of course, all hail Satan, our Lord and master. What is this?” Aym points at the pile with his fiery torch. He drags the torch everywhere, which Stolas feels is a bitlittle redundant, particularly in Hell. Then again, everyone has their eccentricities.

“As I said, a craft project.”

“It looks like a pile of too-big bird bones.”

“Well, it is a pile of avian bones,” Stolas admits. “But they are terrifying bird bones, just look at the claws. I made some giant ones too, but I put those somewhere else.” He gestures to the rock formation behind them.

“So, how does this aid our Dark Lord’s plan? How does it tempt the humans?” Aym’s cat head wrinkles its furry nose.

“I’m going to plant them in the Earth, and then the humans will dig them up, and they will be tempted to believe the Earth is much older than it is.” Not that Stolas is precisely sure how old the Earth is, but he’s heard from someone, who heard from someone, that it is a particular point of contention. If it is, his bones will be an exceptionally creative form of temptation. So subtle, soand cerebral. He refrains from puffing out his feathered chest. Aym will latch onto any pride and burn it out of him.

“Why would humans dig up a bunch of old bones?”

“Because they’re curious. Remember the tree?”

“I know about the tree. But isn’t it a lot of work? For them and you?”

“Nothing is too much work for our Lord,” Stolas says, though Aym is correct. The project is a tremendous amount of effort. He’s already tired of digging, and he’s only gotten through a single continent. How many more will he need to inter before they buy it?

“Why do the bones look like birds?”

“Because birds are elegantly designed and fearsome.”

“Is it because you look like an owl?”

“Owls look like me.” Stolas is done with this conversation. “I’d better get back to it.” He turns back to his hole, trying to get the other demon to take a hint. Aym does not.

“Let me get this straight. The humans are supposed to dig up these things up and then think that giant birds ran around the Earth a million years ago? Based on some random bones?”

“Hundreds of millions of years, actually.”

“Who would believe that?”

“Well, what’s your big idea?” Stolas is ready to peck out Aym’s irksome human eyes. Who does this witless monster think he is?

“I was just going to light things on fire.” Aym waves the torch. Its eternal flame flickers but remains staunchly lit.

“I am continuously mesmerized by your creativity.” Stolas waves his wings in a sarcastic flutter. “I can’t believe no one’s thought of that one.”

“You don’t have to be such a jerk about it.” Aym crosses his arms, and the cat’s head hisses. Stolas squawks back at it.

“Do you think you could add some lizards?” Aym’s lizard head speaks, its forked tongue slipping out from between sharp fangs.

Stolas pauses but then shrugs his wings. “I don’t see why not.”

“I still think it’s convoluted.” Aym turns and retreats, his flame trailing across a dry shrub brush. The leaves crackle and then burst into flame.

Stolas scrambles over and stomps out the fire. With a sigh, he returns to his pile of bones. The lizard head is right. Reptilian features might be just the thing. Why didn’t he think of that? He resumes digging in the stony ground.

As he works, a startled gecko darts out from beneath a dislodged rock. Stolas snatches it off the ground mid-run and tosses the thing into his open mouth, crunching its little bones between his beak. Lizard features will be perfect. Not that bird bones wouldn’t be entirely worthy, of course.

Stolas tosses a few bones into the hole, tilts his head, then adds a few more. Finally satisfied, he packs his travel sack, saving a remaining tibia and a particularly well-rendered epoccipital frill. No doubt it will be an arduous flight to the next continent, especially since he’ll have to take the long way around. He can’t risk falling off the edge of the Earth after all. With a flap of his colossal wings, Stolas launches his feathery frame to the sky, dodging the black plumed smoke of Aym’s infernal arson as he soars away.

Julia Rajagopalan is an award-winning writer of speculative and literary fiction who lives just outside of Detroit, Michigan, with her husband and their very grumpy dog. She has published pieces in *Club Chicxulub, The Lorelei Signal,* *Flame Tree Press,* and more. She has a Master of Science in Information from the University of Michigan. For a list of her publications, check out her website: http://juliarajagopalan.com/.

Dino Therapy - foofaraw

2026-09-16T16:00:15.000Z

—John Garvey

Humdrum Places - BlogFlock

Time Has No Memory - foofaraw

The Source Behind The Ban - The Independent Variable

Tyler Lee - foofaraw

So what do you have against heavy-duty, industrial sized dinos like the Triceratops? What did they ever do to you?!

How do you have such a vast knowledge of dinosaurs??

Do you have a favorite dinosaur? What dinosaur would you be driving to work?

Assuming this is an Editor’s Chisel for some sort of publication… what would the publication be called?

How would the publication get delivered? Are their paper boys and girls? What do they ride???

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

What book are you reading right now?

Do you have anything else you’d like to share?

Thanks to Tyler for talking dinos and the safer alternative, saber tooth tigers!

Raised by Dinosaurs - foofaraw

Dinosaurs Are Too Big - foofaraw

From the Editor’s Chisel:

Ed Sheeran Delivers Pointless Statement Then Cries During Latest Concert - The Independent Variable

Robert Eggers to Direct ‘Romeo and Juliet’ for Focus Features — Will Be His Next Film - The Independent Variable

Caleb Williams Suffers Awful Injury At Awful Time In Awful Game - The Independent Variable

‘We Hacked the FBI:’ Hackers Say They Have Data on All FBI Employees - The Independent Variable

FPF statement on ‘editorial independence board’ for CBS and CNN - The Independent Variable

We Must Create the Shit Machine - The Independent Variable

On the sincerity of AI bosses - The Independent Variable

Russian Businessman Paid for Donald Trump Jr.’s Lavish Wedding After-Party - The Independent Variable

STOP OMARCHY /// Boycott Tech - The Independent Variable

Areal /// a typeface - The Independent Variable

Meagan Fisher - foofaraw

Do you have any “Tim’s” in your life who maybe get hyperfixated on something, ignoring the things that need to get done around them?

If you ended up in a situation like this, who in your life would you most trust to get you home?

I’m not sure I was familiar with the hesperonychus… why that over something like a raptor or even a T-Rex?

How long do you think Tim gets the silent treatment from Carla after that disaster of a trip?

When do you think Tim gives it another spin? And does Carla ever set foot in the box again?

Does Tim ever fix the table?

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

What book are you reading right now?

Thanks to Meagan for chatting hyperfixations and dinosaurs!

When To? - foofaraw

Julia Rajagopalan - foofaraw

So are dinosaur bones a complete sham?

Do you have a favorite dinosaur?

If there were a living species of animal that was the creation of the devil, which species do you think it would it be?

If Stolas were around today, now do you think they’d use social media to perpetuate this dinosaur bone theory?

How, if at all, has your Masters of Science in Information effected your writing and storytelling?

How do you think Aym would feel knowing Stolas’ plan was a success and people believe dinosaurs were real today?

How many times has this story been rejected by other markets?

What’s a great short story you’ve read recently?

What book are you reading right now?

Do you have anything else you’d like to share?

Thanks to Julia for discussing dinos and their bones with us!

The Bones of Doubt - foofaraw

A Study in the Demonic Digging Habits of Early Strigiformes

Dino Therapy - foofaraw