We take bribes, you take bribes. We admit it, you don’t. Who’s more honest?

We take bribes, you take bribes. The difference? We don’t waste time hiding it, compadre. It’s all out in the open, like the sun burning through a desert sky. Why bother pretending? This world runs on greased palms, quiet deals in the shadows—you know it, I know it. It’s what keeps this whole chingado mess from collapsing. We face reality. You? Vives en un sueño, playing like everything’s clean.

So tell me, ¿quién es más honesto? The guy who admits the system is a labyrinth of lies, or the one who swears up and down it’s built on justice? Ándale, cuate, you sit in your air-conditioned office, looking at your papers like they mean something. But behind every law, every speech, there’s a man waiting for his cut. You know it. Just like every guy who sweats for his next meal knows it.

We don’t hide behind fancy words or pretend we’re saints. We know the world is built on the backs of people who have to bend, have to hustle just to survive. And you? You act like you’re better, like you’re clean. Pero no eres diferente, güey. You just have nicer curtains to cover it up, while the rest of us are out here, working the grind, playing the game.

At the end of the day, la verdad es muy sencilla. We see the machine for what it is, una chingadera of betrayal and barter, where every man has a price. You think you can escape it? You think you’re above it? Por favor, you’re just another cog in the same rusty wheel, pretending it’s all good while the whole thing keeps turning.

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You know what I do? I compartmentalize. Yeah, that’s right. I don’t get bogged down in all the mess. I keep it neat, keep it separated. You want to stay standing in this world, you better learn to put things in their place. One drawer for the dirt, one for the clean. One for the deals nobody talks about, another for the good ol’ boy smiles. That’s how you survive. You think I got this far by lettin’ it all mix together? Hell no. I compartmentalize.

Pretty soon you end up with a thousand drawers, each one for a different mess. But that’s okay, that’s the way it’s gotta be. You got one for the bribes, one for the lies, one for the promises you ain’t never gonna keep. And when it all gets too heavy, well, you got a bottle sittin’ in the bottom drawer. Take a swig, clear your head, and get back to it. That’s how you keep it together. Booze helps grease the gears when the drawers start stickin’.

Compartmentalize? Hell yeah, that’s the only way to keep your head on straight in a world like this. You gotta divide things up—keep the dirt in one corner, the clean hands in another. Bribes, favors, deals? You toss ’em in a drawer, lock it tight, and put on your best damn suit. Smile for the cameras, shake hands with the folks. That’s just how it’s done. You can’t let one thing spill over into the other, or you’re finished. That ain’t weakness, amigo, that’s survival.

Now, I get it—you think it sounds crooked, like I’m spittin’ lies. But listen, if you don’t compartmentalize, the whole damn thing falls apart. You can’t run a ranch, a business, or a country without splittin’ the necessities from all that idealistic nonsense. You reckon you can live without bending a little? That’s a fine way to end up broke, dead, or forgotten. You take the bribe, make the compromise, but you don’t let it touch who you really are. It’s just part of the game, same as anything else.

You folks talk about integrity like it’s carved in stone, but that ain’t how life works. Integrity ain’t a rock; it’s more like water. It flows, it shifts, it adapts. You don’t, you sink. Now, you call that lyin’ to myself? Fine, call it what you want. I call it doin’ what needs doin’ to keep moving ahead. The grime of one day ain’t gotta stick to the next. You keep your compartments clean, or at least clean enough to make it through.

The world’s a mess, sure, but it ain’t a simple one. You wanna make it through? Better learn to keep those compartments in check, pardner.

Tech Cycles

I have always been curious about what a tech cycle looks like from up close, the mechanics of it, the raw gears grinding beneath the polished veneer. As this last one scrapes the bottom of the barrel and sputters to its inevitable end, it’s worth noting that innovations like the first iPod or the latest LLMs are, in their essence, affect machines. They could rewire entire systems of perception if used properly. But tech people, with their near-religious devotion to speed, to the thrill of the next release, to the relentless pursuit of dopamine, are too caught up in the rush to truly savor affects.

They’re the speed freaks, the ones whose minds race at a thousand miles an hour, always two steps ahead, but never quite present. They can’t afford to slow down, to feel the ripples of emotion and sensation that affect brings. In their world, everything is reduced to a hit, a spike in the data, a momentary high before the next fix is needed. The machinery of tech hums along, fueled by this insatiable hunger for speed, for progress that’s always just out of reach.

Meanwhile, those outside this digital cyclone—artists, thinkers, those who dwell in the messy, unpredictable world of affect—are tripping through the kaleidoscope, inhabiting a different temporality altogether. They follow the slow, undulating rhythms of feeling, of experience, their minds tuned to the subtle shifts in light and shadow, in mood and tone. They navigate the spaces between, where tech’s binary rigidity falters, where the infinite complexity of human emotion unfolds.

Remember the Hawkwind quote: “the band was built on one bunch of guys taking acid and another bunch of guys taking speed, and they never got along because they were inhabiting different temporalities.” Tech is the speed, always hurtling forward, barely aware of the ground beneath. Art is the acid, dissolving boundaries, blurring lines, steeping in the affective present. The collision of these temporalities creates a dissonance, a disconnect that neither side can fully reconcile.

And so, the tech cycle spins on, driven by speed, by the relentless pursuit of the next hit of dopamine, while the affects remain in the periphery, sensed but not fully grasped, felt but never truly integrated. It’s a loop, a circuit that never quite completes, always racing ahead but never arriving, always seeking but never finding the depth, the richness that lies just outside the frantic beat of the digital age.

No medium lasts forever, but affects mostly do. The critical distinction lies in how they evolve over time. Dopamine, the quick fix, the rush of the new, inevitably turns to cortisol—the stress of keeping up, the anxiety of the chase. What once thrilled now grates, what once sparked joy now triggers fatigue. The cycle of dopamine-fueled tech and innovation is unsustainable, leading to burnout as the novelty wears off and the demands increase.

Affects, on the other hand, have a way of self-renovating. They aren’t just a fleeting chemical response but a deeper, more enduring resonance within us. Affects grow, shift, and adapt—they transform with us, renewing themselves through new contexts, new interpretations, new emotional landscapes. While the medium through which they’re delivered may fade, the affects continue to evolve, sustaining their relevance and power long after the original source is gone.

In this way, affects hold a kind of timeless vitality that dopamine-driven experiences lack. They renew themselves, reflecting the ever-changing nature of human experience, while the mediums we rely on to trigger that dopamine rush eventually falter, leaving only stress and dissatisfaction in their wake.

Fear and Loathing: Political Conventions 2024

Red Flood pulsing, Vegas lights refracted through a cracked windshield. Faces flicker on the motel TV, a kaleidoscope of rictus grins and disembodied teeth. The Republican National Convention – a Roach Motel for the American Dream.

Cut-up slogans flicker across the screen: “STRONG BORDERS, STRONG DRUGS!” – cut to a montage of emaciated faces, hollow eyes glinting with a desperate need for that next fix. A booming voice, an oily televangelist on a bender, thumps about “God, Guns & Gridlock” – the holy trinity of the paranoid crank.

Red convention floor throbbed, a pulsating meat-market under flickering fluorescent hell. Faces contorted into grotesque rictus grins, eyes gleaming with a manic amphetamine jit. Delegates, wired on speed cocktails and paranoia, bounced in their seats like hyperactive toddlers hopped up on Pixy Stix.

Reptoid eyes glint under the garish lights, pupils dilated on a cocktail of amphetamines – Bennies dancing with Ritalin, a Dexedrine tango fueling a manic energy that borders on psychosis. Televangelists, voices hoarse from years of hollering damnation, whip the crowd into a frothing mass of paranoia and grievance. Conspiracy theories morph and mutate, spilling from chattering mouths like a viral download.

Floorwalkers in powder-blue suits, their smiles stretched thin like taffy, hustle delegates with glazed eyes and trembling hands. Briefcases bulge not with policy papers, but with Tuinal cocktails and vials of crystal amphetamine. A shadow falls across the room – a gaunt figure with bloodshot eyes, a trench coat bulging suspiciously. Is that Dick Cheney, risen from the grave and fueled by pure political bile? Or just some strung-out lobbyist peddling influence by the ounce?

Outside, on the neon-drenched streets, a different kind of frenzy unfolds. Militias with haunted eyes clutch AR-15s like security blankets. Conspiracy theorists rant about lizard people and stolen elections, their voices hoarse from years of screaming into the void. The air crackles with a jittery paranoia, the collective buzz of a nation wired on fear and cheap stimulants.

Meanwhile, back in the roach motel, the floor show continues. A chorus line of cheerleaders in star-spangled bikinis shimmies across the stage, their smiles brighter, their eyes emptier with each pulsating beat. The air hangs thick with the stench of desperation and stale ambition. This isn’t a convention, it’s a collective nervous breakdown fueled by bathtub pharmaceuticals and a shared delusion of national decline.

Speed freaks in ill-fitting suits, shadows beneath their Stetsons, scurry around the edges, eyes darting, deals whispered in code. Delegates wired on uppers tap their feet impatiently, the promised culture war a shot in the arm they desperately crave. The air crackles with a raw, desperate energy, a million voices screaming into the void, a cacophony of fear and loathing amplified by cheap pharmaceuticals. It’s a grotesque parody of revolution, a bug-eyed twitch towards oblivion fueled by paranoia pills and discount speed.

This wasn’t politics, it was a Bugs Bunny cartoon on a bender. Weaving through the crowd, a greasy-haired huckster hawked vials of “Wakey Wakey, Eggs & Bakey” – a dubious concoction promising “ultimate MAGA focus.” Above it all, a disembodied voice crackled from the loudspeakers – a voice warped beyond recognition, spewing venomous pronouncements about socialist cabals and stolen borders.

Will this manufactured frenzy translate into victory? Or will they all come crashing down in a jittery heap, come November? Only time, and the next shipment of speed, will tell.

A stark contrast to the Dem’s Zoloft-induced stupor. Here, reality fractured like a windshield hit by a rogue bowling ball. Truth dissolved in a vat of hyperbole, logic replaced by a desperate chase for the next adrenaline rush. It was a nightmare fuelled by pills, a chaotic ballet of manufactured outrage, a desperate bid to paper over the cracks with a mountain of stimulants.

Democrat Convention

The Democrats’ convention last week? A lukewarm bath of psychotropic sludge. Sertraline smiles and fluoxetine frowns, the whole damn assembly wading through a treacle-thick vat of apathy. Prozac glazed eyes stared out at a future sculpted entirely by in-committee compromise. Citalopram sighs hung heavy in the air, punctuated by the occasional, feeble bleat about “unity” and “reaching across the aisle.”

A sickly green fog hangs over the Dem convention, the air thick with Zoloft and Xanax fumes. Pale delegates shuffle, eyes glazed over, their fight-or-flight response chemically lobotomized. Campaign slogans drone on, a mantra of pre-fabricated optimism failing to pierce the miasma of creeping dread. But

Sertraline smiles stretched thin across their faces, like the plastic on a pack of cheap bologna. Conversations were punctuated by long, melancholic silences, pregnant with the unspoken fear of a future teetering on the precipice of absurdity. Fluoxetine fog clouded their once-sharp political barbs, leaving only a disarming vulnerability, a whimper instead of a roar.

Citalopram commiseration hung heavy in the air. Party leaders droned on about unity and hope, their voices a monotonous white noise washing over the assembly. But beneath the surface, a cold dread pulsed – a gnawing awareness that the political landscape had fractured beyond repair.

This is a Dantean procession shuffling through a beige purgatory. Prozac pallor hung over the convention floor, punctuated by outbursts of nervous laughter that echoed hollowly in the vast convention center. Delegates clutched lukewarm mugs of herbal tea, their eyes glazed with a quiet, existential dread.

It was a beige-toned nightmare, a Hieronymus Bosch landscape rendered in the bland hues of discount office furniture. Delegates shuffled about like sleepwalkers, their faces doughy with the enervating effects of too many goddamn focus groups and polls. Slogans, pre-digested by marketing consultants, dribbled from their lips – a monotonous drone about “fairness” and “equality” that sent shivers down the spine for its utter lack of conviction.

It was a beige-toned nightmare, a Hieronymus Bosch landscape rendered in the bland hues of discount office furniture. Delegates shuffled about like sleepwalkers, their faces doughy with the enervating effects of too many goddamn focus groups and polls. Slogans, pre-digested by marketing consultants, dribbled from their lips – a monotonous drone about “fairness” and “equality” that sent shivers down the spine for its utter lack of conviction.

No fiery speeches, no electric rallies, just a collective sigh escaping a million weary souls. The air crackled not with excitement but with a low-grade anxiety, the kind that manifests in fidgeting hands and mumbled conversations about climate change and the rising cost of quinoa.

The only spark came from the Bernie Sanders holdouts, a sprinkling of rumpled suits jabbing their fists in the air, their voices hoarse from years of shouting into the void. But even their righteous anger seemed muted, dampened by the pervasive aura of milquetoast moderation. It was a convention designed by focus groups, a carefully curated display of inoffensive nothingness.

Meanwhile, out in the real world, the gears of capitalist oppression churned on, oblivious to the sedative spectacle playing out on cable news. The rich got richer, the poor got poorer, and the middle class continued their slow descent into Xanax-fueled oblivion. The promises whispered from the stage – a better tomorrow, a more just society – tasted like stale cookies and lukewarm decaf.

One couldn’t help but wonder: was this the new opiate of the masses? A carefully crafted political display, engineered to lull the citizenry into a complacent stupor? Or perhaps it was merely the calm before the storm, a prelude to a rejection of this bland, medicated charade. Only time, and the next election cycle, would tell.

It was a scene ripped from a dystopian novel by a depressed accountant. A political convention where passion had been replaced by a yearning for a nap and a comforting bowl of oatmeal. Is this the new face of the Democratic party? A legion of the mildly discontent, medicated into manageable apathy? Or perhaps, it was just a temporary lull, a Xanax-induced intermission before the next act of the political play – a drama promising to be as unpredictable and terrifying as a bad acid trip.

One couldn’t help but wonder: was this the future of American politics? A land divided by pill-popping factions, perpetually high on their own self-righteousness? Or perhaps, just perhaps, this was merely the opening act, a prelude to something even more bizarre, even more terrifyingly nonsensical. Only time, and the next shipment of pharmaceuticals, would tell.

Constructive Ambiguity is Xanax Talking

Constructive ambiguity ain’t your doctor in a white coat, shushing anxieties with a pill. It’s Xanax talking alright, but Xanax laced with broken glass and mescaline. It’s the serpent in the garden, whispering riddles instead of offering forbidden fruit.

The air hangs thick, a smog of cotton in your skull. You peer through it, vision smeared like a watercolor left out in the rain. Words, once crisp and clear, now bleed into one another, forming a formless soup of meaning. Is that the refrigerator humming or the dull thrum of your own anxiety? It doesn’t much matter.

A voice, distant yet insistent, snakes through the haze. It’s Xanax, your personal demon disguised as a concerned pharmacist. “Maybe,” it croons, voice like syrup drizzled over gravel, “that presentation isn’t a looming threat but an…opportunity for creative exploration.”

The deadline? A gentle nudge towards productivity. The disapproving stare of your boss? Merely a challenge to unlock your hidden charisma. Everything, Xanax assures you in its dulcet tones, is a swirling vortex of possibility.

But beneath the surface, a Burroughs-esque paranoia writhes. This ambiguity, is it a twisted trick, a way for Xanax to lull you into a blissful haze while the world burns around you? Is that smile on your coworker’s face genuine, or a shark’s grin hidden just beneath the surface?

The world becomes a labyrinth of shifting signs, and Xanax your unreliable guide. The only certainty is the sweet, seductive oblivion it offers. But somewhere, deep in the fog, a primal question claws its way up: is this freedom or a gilded cage? The answer, like everything else, dissolves in the hazy laughter of Xanax.

The Roach Motel of Semantics

They call it “constructive ambiguity,” these squares in their starched suits. But down here, in the roach motel of semantics, it’s the skittering whisper of Xanax, the dull ache in your lobotomized afternoon. Words dissolve like roach legs under a greasy thumb, meaning melts into a shapeless ooze.

Is it hope or hopelessness that bleeds from the sentence? Does that smile hold triumph or veiled threat? It’s all a magnificent, maddening blur. Questions dangle like flies caught in flypaper, forever unanswered, buzzing in the stagnant air.

The sharp edges of reality soften, replaced by a hazy, lukewarm bath of maybe. Maybe this means that, maybe it means this other thing, or maybe it’s all a big beautiful nothingburger. The world becomes a Jackson Pollock painting splattered with indecision, a swirling vortex of “could be” and “might perhaps.”

This is the kingdom of Xanax, the land of the shrug. Don’t take a stand, don’t rock the boat, just sink into the blissful ambiguity, the mushy center of existence. No need to choose, no need to fight, because everything and nothing means the same in the end.

But wait, a skittering in the shadows. Is that a roach, or a repressed thought trying to scuttle free? Maybe it’s just the dull roar of existential dread muffled by the cotton wool blanket of Xanax. Don’t worry about it. Another pill, another hazy day in the roach motel.

The words slither and writhe, but they convey nothing. This is constructive ambiguity, alright, a construction site where nothing gets built, only demolished by the wrecking crew of sedation. Just another day in the land of the permanently shrugged shoulders.

This ambiguity, it slithers through life, a greased word weasel. One minute it’s promising freedom, the next it’s vanishing down a hole in perception, leaving you clutching nonsensical possibilities. It’s a word that fractures meaning, splintering reality into a kaleidoscope of maybe’s and what-ifs.

Politicians mainline this ambiguity, spewing words that morph and twist under scrutiny. Advertisers mainline it too, their messages shimmering mirages, beckoning with the promise of a better self, a more fulfilling life, but always just out of reach.

But here’s the rub, man: This ambiguity, it can be a ticket to the carnival of the mind. It can crack open perception, letting you see the world through a fractured lens, where everything is a kaleidoscope of potential. It’s the buzz you get from staring at a flickering neon sign too long, words bleeding into colors, reality dissolving at the edges.

Just remember, this ain’t Disneyland. This ambiguity, it can be a harsh mistress. You can get lost in the labyrinth of your own mind, chasing phantoms of meaning. The world can turn into a hall of mirrors, reflecting back distorted versions of yourself.

So tread carefully. This constructive ambiguity, it’s a potent brew. One sip might set you free, another might leave you babbling to the cockroaches. You gotta learn to play the game, man. Learn to dance with the ambiguity, to use its slipperiness to your advantage.

That’s the way. Not taking the easy pill, but staring into the abyss and laughing, because who knows, maybe the abyss stares back and winks.