"Lash out and vanish into mist," he said, and then he disappeared forever into the smog somewhere atop Mount Baldy.
Good evening and hello!
I just wanted to say, howdy!
Also, hi there!, and
how’s it going?
Welcome back to The Neverending Standup, again for some reason!
We should probably call it The Neverending Holdup instead, because you all are being held here against your will to witness some of the worst standup in the history of standup!
Is this thing on??
LOL!
@brandt here, and tonight I’ll be filling in for the madman living inside my mind, because apparently all that caffeine and insomnia were the last two straws that broke the madman’s back, so to speak, because now he’s blown a gasket and gone off and disappeared into the woods like some kind of madman. Idiot.
He does this every couple weeks or so.
I assume this time it’s because Halloween is just around the corner and he needs to practice howling at the new moon and terrorizing the poor miner ghosts who inhabit these hills and would much prefer it if everyone just left them alone.
Hopefully he falls into an open mineshaft and dies.
I’ve been quite a bit dismayed by all the havoc he’s been wreaking here with this stupid Neverending Standup thing of his. Believe it or not I really do try to hold him back, but good luck keeping a madman reined in, right? If he wants to be wild, I guess he’s just gonna be wild. You can’t put animals in cages. Yes, that is a jab at America Fuck Yeah’s monstrously inhumane prison system, and it's also definitely a topic for the madman to rant and rave about, not me. Stay tuned.
So anyway. I think the best thing I can do right now is just try and make the most of my situation. So, while the madman’s out being a total dick to all those poor innocent ghosts, and also hopefully dying very slowly and painfully at the bottom of a vertical mineshaft, I’m gonna spend some time talking to all you wonderful souls about
how to ghost people.
There’s really not that much to it.
You just quit talking to them!
You stop responding.
You stop showing up when and where you’re supposed to show up.
You disappear, like a ghost.
As the one and only Pat the Bunny so skillfully put it,
"lash out and vanish into mist."
So I guess tonight's show is gonna be a lot less about how to ghost people, and a lot more about how I’ve ghosted people.
Let me give you an example!
In the slice of time between back when I used to be a writer, and now, I’ve been trying my luck with an oddball assortment of odd jobs that never really seem to work out.
I did real estate for a while… but the job was just too fake, and I couldn’t take it.
Then I took a position at a local bank… but there was no money in it, so I quit.
At one point I tried to start my own homebrewing company… but then I found out I was technically supposed to get a license and register my company with the state and on top of that pay taxes, and that’s clearly not a viable business model, so I locked myself in my room with 250 bottles of homebrewed trippel and didn’t come out till I’d drunk every last bottle dry. Apparently that’s not a viable business model, either. Oh well, at least I tried.
Then I after that I took up raising mountain goats for a while… but that turned out to be extremely illegal, for a variety of extremely dumb reasons, and they told me I could either release the goats, or go experience America’s monstrously inhumane prison system firsthand.
So I let the goats go, and got a job as a contractor hunting souls for Satan. That was probably the best and easiest money I’ve ever made in my life, but then Satan got sick of how cold and miserable the winters are around here, and he took off south looking for warmer accommodations. Last I heard he’s somewhere in Georgia.
Most recently I was employed as a dishwasher part time at two different restaurants, one in Frisco and one in Twin Lakes…
and this is where my example of ghosting people really starts.
So here I am, washing dishes for a living, and actually kind of enjoying it, too. Because it’s not hard work, as long as you're able to move fast, and it doesn’t send you spinning into this neverending downward spiral of depression and creative burnout like writing does. Plus, free food and beer every night! Talk about job perks. Oh, you're offering 100% healthcare coverage, 401k matching, two months of paid vacation every year, health & wellness stipends, and a company laptop… but no free food and beer?? PASS!!
Anyway, so then one day Carl, my boss at the restaurant in Twin Lakes, offered me full-time hours. I was thrilled, because it was a lot closer to home than the restaurant in Frisco, and the pay was the same. How could I say no?
So of course I accepted the offer and put in my two weeks' notice at my other job.
Little did I know!
I went to pick up my paycheck a few days before the beginning of what I thought was going to be my awesome new full-time job, and Carl was like:
Hey @brandt. Yeah, so I lied about those full-time hours.
…
…
Umm, excuse me?
Yeah, it’s still going to be part-time, just like it was before. Sorry.
Come again?
You heard me. See you at 2pm Friday?
…
…
Needless to say, I was a terrible combination of livid and also terrified, because, I mean, we’re talking about rent here! We’re talking about insurance, medical bills, jet fuel in the Brandtmobile, food on the coffee table, coffee on the coffee table, beer inside me, and condoms inside her!
So I very politely explained that Hey, you guys promised me full-time hours!, and Hey, I literally quit my other job so I could work full time for you guys!, and Hey, this is very much a very, very big problem here!
Then I told him yes, of course I’ll be there to work my scheduled shift this coming weekend! Yep, 2pm Friday, just as planned! Yep! I’ll be there for sure!
And then I left to deposit my paycheck.
Little did he know!
How many of you here have ever worked in the restaurant industry before? Show of hands. Raise your hand if you’ve ever worked in a restaurant. Uh huh, yep, I see there’s a bunch of you out there.
Who wants to tell the rest of the audience here what happens when your dishwasher doesn’t show up for work?
Haha, yep, you said it, man! You said it! This guy gets it!
Since you probably couldn't hear what he said, what he said was,
YOU'RE FUCKED.
And he’s right, because not having a dishwasher can literally shut a restaurant down.
Yeah, washing dishes is literally one of the shittiest jobs out there. But it’s also a pretty important shitty job.
Dishwashers are like toilets. Their job is shit! And everyone takes them for granted. But just try taking them out of the picture. Suddenly everyone’s panicking, pissing their pants, and shitting their britches because Oh my god, this thing we were taking for granted is suddenly gone, and nothing in the world makes sense anymore!
Anyway, what I’m really trying to say here is,
Carl lied to me,
so I ghosted him and his goddamn restaurant,
and please for the love of god
don’t ever give your business to The Twin Lakes Inn & Saloon in Twin Lakes, Colorado!
Unless you’re inn the business of arson,
in which case,
by all means be my guest and please go burn it to the fucking gr—
…
…
Hold on.
Wait.
Shit.
Shit shit shit.
I just realized something.
I think I just realized what the madman’s up to!
Goddammit! I was joking about burning it down, madman!
Madman, you get yourself back home right the fuck now!
Don’t you fucking dare!!
I don't give a damn about how much you need to practice howling at the new moon!!
There’s a big difference between ghosting someone,
and burning down a restaurant that for all we know might have people sleeping in the inn upstairs!!
Hear me now, madman!
Get yourself back inside my head right the fuck now, or I’m ghosting you forever!
Hi brandt,
Visit curiesteem.com or join the Curie Discord community to learn more.
Hi @curie, thanks for your vote! Have a super day :)
if you said Bay Area, I wouldn’t presumed between that and Twin Lakes, you’re from California, too. But it’s a different Twin Lakes and everyone knows only outsiders call the Bay Area “Frisco.”
It’s a good thing i didn’t presume anything
Real estate and fake.. dude, you couldn’t be more accurate. My wife is licensed and gave it a go for a few months—we realized how much a liar, thief, and snake you have to be to slang property—scratch that.
No money in banks, huh? That’s surprising.
I'm glad you didn't presume anything. We would all be in so much shit right now if you had presumed a thing. I am indeed from Colorado, although I visited LA recently, hence the picture taken from the slopes of Mt. Baldy.
Real estate does involve a lot of snakery and deception, that's for sure. In my case, the people I worked for were good and honest. I would say that's a rare find in real estate though.
And no, I couldn't believe it man, when I finally figured out how to break into the bank vault after hours, there was literally no money in it! Either someone else beat me to it, or these people are taking the concept of fiat waaaay too far! Whatever happened to the gold standard, anyway?
Dude, you really need to step outta your comedy character and live in reality from time to time, @brandt. They’re talking about it all over the place—you haven’t heard??
The United States sent a couple of dudes to the moon like 3 or 4 weeks ago with all of the gold in the world, I guess vaults down here on earth aren’t reliable so they sent some dudes to the moon to stash the gold—that’s where it is.
What, don’t believe me?? Which part, the part about the gold or the part about burying the gold on the moon because everyone knows that America really did land on the moon—google that ish! Google never lies.
You have got to be kidding me. How are we going to justify our foreign wars if all the shiny yellow malleable metal is stashed on the moon? Unbelievable.
What's Google?
First It’s the gold, then landing on the moon and now this, “what’s google?” Who do you think I am, the Internet?
Congrats on the reward here dude. When I can by this morning, it wasn’t gaining traction yet and had been released for like three hours, I was like wtf?! Cuz I thought that ish was funny. It was nice to come back and see Curie came by. 👍🏿 Good job man.
Thanks man, it's always good to hear someone thinks my ish is funny. I'm fortunate that @curie and @c-squared have given me some love over the past couple weeks.
I was tempted to reply here with "What's Curie?" but if I did that then we might never get to the end of this comment thread, and at some point I need to make time for writing today's episode.
Hello Hello!
Omg I loved reading your post, it was great to have some fun hahahahahha
Greetings from Venezuela
Hi @iamsaray, I'm glad you enjoyed it! Hello from Colorado, USA :)
Hi. I don't know if this is satire or a very acid humor. In any case it is already written. Could it be that Halloween released the ghosts? Regards @brandt
I think it's more acid humor than satire. And the ghosts are definitely upon us now. Happy Halloween!