Pearl by Josh Malerman (Bird Box).

It’s about a pig on a small farm that can seep into your mind and make you do and see terrible things. I picked it up after reading Bird Box and a few other books of his, which I enjoyed. I expected to give up on it based on the silly 80s horror movie premise, but the book is truly demented and creepy and I felt existentially weird after reading it

I am in a much better environment! This was about 10 years ago, and that particular store closed. I also ghosted that job. They had been harassing my trans coworker friend so we just stopped showing up. They did NOT try to call me :)

I worked with someone who did this. It was the HR person. She just didn’t show up one day, didn’t answer her phone or door. For a solid week. After a wellness check by the police, it was revealed that she was fine, just couldn’t go back in to work because she hated her job so much.

I was young, and it was a shitty grocery chain filled with shitty management and shitty customers. I 100% thought she had killed herself, or skipped town for some other awful reason. It was a relief to hear she was OK. Fuck that store.

Thank you, kind stranger!

Divorce her immediately.

The lyrics support this.

Well, the party was nice, the party was pumpin’ Heya, yippie yi yo And everybody havin’ a ball Huh, huh, yippie yi yo I tell the fellas start the name callin’ Yippie yi yo And the girls respond to the call I heard a woman shout out Who let the dogs out? Who, who, who, who, who?

Nah, that’s

dudududadudadu dun dun dun, dudududadada dunu duna duna duna / dududadududadu dun dun dun, dudududadada duna duna duna duna duna duna / bubuDA bubudA bubudA bubudA budaaaaaaaaaa

Oooooooh this one is fun, as I just solved the riddle today! I kept getting Korn’s Falling Away From Me stuck in my head, which would morph into other Korn songs, etc. I couldn’t figure out why the fuck it was in my head so much. Today in the shower I had Nookie in my head which is a song I only recently remembered existed in the first place. For whatever reason, nookie morphed into In the End. And then. THEN it turned into Falling Away From Me because of the similarities of the piano ending of In the End reminding me of the guitar intro to Falling Away.

I have been going through this for days. It drives me nuts. Why on earth would Nookie be in my head? I’m 37, and I did my time with Limp Bizkit and Korn… cut to today when my phone alarm went off before work.

I have an alarm set to play The Head That Controls Both Right and Left Sides Eats Meats and Slobbers Even Today, because the beginning is a Japanese woman absolutely shredding vocally. It is a good wakeup.

So. Today, and all last week, I’ve had a rapid earworm race from The Head–>Nookie–>End–>Falling Away. All the way to work in the morning.

After that it’s just whatever is playing around me.

Might change my alarm.

I don’t wanna talk to you no more!