kyleisme14

[kyleisme14]

Picking it up again

Hey everybody. all my gosh darn readers here. I’m sorry it’s been so long since I’ve written to you all. I’m feeling a little lonely, so I wanted to come say hi.

I forgot that you guys always listen so well. And I hate to admit it, but I’m feeling a little glum and without direction. Well, I mean I have a direction, but who knows if I can get there. After all, I’m pretty pathetic. I’m really hoping that things will work out for me, but can we ever be sure? Is there a way to know I’m going to figure it out. Ugh. Now is the time isn’t it? If I don’t put something together then what?

Is life all about turning passion into action? Or is it about making a buck? Can we have one without the other? I really want to make shit loads of mullah, but what if I don’t? Am I a shmuck? Probably. Undeserving of time or attention, hmm.

Well, here’s the thing, if I don’t get this to work, my life that is. Well, guess what. I’m going to go do something cool. I’m gonna go walk across the country. I’m going to walk away from everything. If I turn 30 without succeeding in something. Well, I’m just going to walk to alaska. Become a part time fire-fighter, full time recluse. I’ll sire children and grow my own food. Make weird paint projects and renounce my name and voice.

It’ll be cool. No matter what I do. It’ll be cool.

[kyleisme14]

Remembering that sometimes when I’m lazy it’s perceived as strong editing skills.

Or maybe I should just be confident in what I can do without trying to hard.

I’m a brilliant editor and story teller.

Even if nobody reads my book, it’s amazing that I’ve written it.

[kyleisme14]

Going viral

It’s so funny to me how everybody creating any kind of content on the internet wants to ‘go viral.’ And don’t get me wrong, I want my stuff to get spread far and wide really fast. But we are nearing the end of year one of the covid epidemic and the infectious disease homophone is awkward. 

It’s crazy that blowing up on an algorithmic social media platform is the number one way most people think they will succeed and receive notoriety. And that people are now basing all of what they make on the potentiality that it will get huge. Creators are designing things to be shared with mass appeal, which is a skill that previous creators only had to half heartedly learn. 

Novels, poetry, movies, tv shows and fine art from back in the day, all you had to do was convince a handful of tastemakers that your stuff was good and then they’d put it on shelves or in print or on the wall. Today we rely on both the incredibly democratic and decentralized upvote/like and the quasi dystopian algorithm to promote and decide upon content that lots of people will like. 

There’s all sorts of incentives but it’s always been about sales and attention. What’s good or not is totally subjective until it’s not...

My theory is to make lots of high quality content that only I can produce and then slowly attract people into watching my brand. And what is my brand? Idk check back next week

[kyleisme14]

Rhythm

I have a very hard time getting into a pattern that rewards me. I want to be consistent and get all the shit done that I need. And I find that once I begin the pattern I have an easier time staying in it. But that getting in part... damn. Why it gotta be so tough?

So right now I’m back on the pomodoro method, and I have a morning routine app. And I have ella who reminds me to do things. But yknow, it’s pretty tough. But I’m not complaining. If it wasn’t hard then everybody would be doing it and they’d all be way more successful that I could ever be. I am bolstered by the fact that nobody seems to have that easy of a time.

My theorem is that if I can get into a system where I make stuff and get stuff done, and I can move my life forward an inch every day, then that’s like a couple feet a year, and after ten years, you’ve gone like a whole mile and maybe things speed up or at least you get to the top of the mountain.

When I think of rhythm I think of patterns, and the drums, and grooving. What is the beat of everyday? Is it heartbeats, is it the movement of atoms? Is it sun up and sun down. What teaches us the motion of time? Right now it feels like the beat of my dog squeaking her toy. She really loves it and it’s her favorite downtime activity. 

I believe that if I can create rituals and habits that I can maintain, then I will be able to develop the lifestyle that will take me to my dreams. So right now I am writing because the bell went off and that means I need to write. So hi. These are words that are coming straight from my brain into yours. Magic.

[kyleisme14]

Me and my dog

Me and my dog were sitting on the couch after rolling air of bed this morning. She had a little itch between her shoulder blades that made me worried she might have fleas. But if didn’t seem to bother her too much.

When you have a little puppy you worry about them, not like a human child, because those are way more fragile and can grow up to have trauma that they perpetuate into the world and that’s all your fault. And they can get fleas too.

I wonder if I’ll ever have enough friends. The kind that can be there in a moment of desperate, creaming floor need. Or those whose sole objective is to offer some support on the way towards success. Like, the - hey I heard of a job you’d be great at - or the - let me lend you some money’s.

I’ve got insurance does the dog, but not sure if I have anything to cover me if I get fleas. Do I have a friend who would spot me for flea meds? Would my dog be embarrassed if she transmitted her insect problem to me?

Probably not. I have the things I need in life here and around me. I have friends in the past and future who I love. I thank all the people who are biding their time and waiting to be a friendly person in my life. I’ll need you soon.

Love. K

[kyleisme14]

Blogging for an audience

I never ever ever do it. I should be though. It's something important that I know I need to be doing in order to market myself better.

Here's the thing, everybody has always told me to blog. My brother once told me he had a blog with hundreds of thousands of readers and I believe him.

I always like reading blogs when I'm in the mood to get an intimate article about a persons experience in a specific area.

How to write a blog entry:

1. you come up with a topic

2. you write a few paragraphs about the topic

3. publish the thing on a blog

4. boom you have created a blog

What is there even to blog about anymore? Hasn't it all been written about, or is human understanding a infinitely large thing? Like is me writing this silly little post worthwhile in the grand scheme?

Who cares, if you read this youre a beautiful person that I'd love to make love to in any way that the state allows. Thanks for reading, this has been my first Blog for an audience 2.0. I started this blog with the intention of writing towards an audeince. Since it's on the web and on a site that people know and use, I figued that there's a chance one or two people I know find it organically, and likely only like three people will read each thing. But that's ok, because untill now it's just given me a framework by which I can talk to an audience. Write in my own words. Tell a story about human experience without really attempting to communicate a single clear thing. Ya feel me?

Have you ever tried something new that didn't feel too bad, then you remember you used to do it as a little kid?

[kyleisme14]

The sexy skeleton

Do you ever feel that tightness or tingle just below the skin? You try to stretch or scratch it but the feeling doesn’t go away.

On Friday at lunch, Amalia couldn’t stop feeling weirdly separate from her body. She’s been feeling good like she deserved fast food after she got all her work projects done. But now in her hand she could feel the layers of skin rub against muscle and it was ruining her meal.

She ate her French fries and could feel each one drop down her esophagus, landing with noticable thuds in her guts.

That night she was home and staring the bathroom mirror. She appeared as she always did to herself, a bit thicker than she’d like, still fine. But now, looking into her own eyes she felt like they belonged to somebody else. She touched them, poking a fingernail to the white sphere and felt nothing. No blinking or queesiness. “What the fuck,” she said. It was overwhelmingly eerie.

And like always in these odd situations she called her mother. “Amalia, I wouldn’t stress. Stop touching your eyes.” Her mom was always telling her not to stress. That’s why she called.

“My whole body feels so weird. Like my mind and body are detached.”

“Babygirl, you probably just had a stressful week. Relax and get some sleep!”

“But mom, this week has been easy!”

In bed later, Amalia’s body continued to feel strange. The sheets on her twin bed were resting on someone else’s body. Her arms and legs all felt deeply asleep. Numb and unfeeling. As if they belonged to a stranger.

Across the room the clock said 12:00 and that’s when Amalia heard an awful screech coming from between her ears all over body. The sensation of itchy tightness overwhelmed her. She wanted to leap out of bed but couldn’t move. She thrashed. Trapped. Her bones jangled inside her. She tried screaming but breath only soaked out her pores.

Her eyes, rolling in their sockets, saw that her hands were clenching uncontrollably. Then with sudden clarity she knew how to relieve this awful feeling. Without being able to stop, she grabbed a cuticle on her pinky and ripped until she’d peeled her finger like a ripe banana, letting the skin fall off. She continued degloving one hand then went onto the other.

She scraped at herself until her forearm flesh laid on the bed and she had lovely skeletal arms. Then as easy as unzipping herself from a well worn hoodie, Amalia stood up from bed leaving her meat behind.

In the mirror she saw herself, a skeleton with eyes. She plunged her bony fingers into her sockets, yanking the gooey orbs out.

“All better.”

And with that Amalia walked out into the night. The weird feeling was gone. All feeling was gone.

So just remember, if you ever feel weird in your body... it’s just your skeleton trying to get out.

[kyleisme14]

Ambition

I believe that ambition is the desire to do something with your life. It’s one of those really tricky feelings that can only be talked around. What do you want to do today, this week, this year, this lifetime? I try to break down my time frames and set various goals to accomplish while maintaining an overall trajectory.

There’s nothing wrong with having no ambition, and sometimes I wish I had less. I want a lot. I want my name in lights or in print or at least on somebody’s tongue saying, wow did you read kyle’s blog post about ambition? No? Well, you are right now... 

I have man ambitions, some for the week and some for forever. What’s the difference between wanting to get something done like paying your taxes or watching a movie, versus earning a fortune or making a movie? I suppose it’s the scope and range of the ambition. Like right now I’m really just trying to create habits that will reward me in my desire to achieve certain things. So I think that having ambitions is really just a roadmap for the direction in which you should lead your life.

Is it ambitious to want to be a good person, a moral individual, who also accomplishes fabulous things? I want to pick up litter and leave the world with some more trees planted than I left it. I want to make people smile and laugh and feel comfortable and a sense of connection. But I also have a sense of urgency on the less simplistic ambitions. I have a book that I want to publish, and I feel the need to do that NOW. I have all these stories that I want to write and get into people’s hands and I have the desire to do that NOW. It puts a strain on me and my happiness because I feel that when I am not pushing myself forward and towards these goals I am slacking, which is a relatively new feeling in the life of this slacker. If anything it will probably appear to follks like i’ve slacked my way to success. God willing.... 

No mini essay about ambition is complete without mentioning Macbeth. That homie had ambition to be king, which then bit him in the ass because he was haunted by all these ghosts. And maybe we are all haunted by ghosts, and all we can determine is whether they hold us back or drive us forward. Also like yeah, ok, macbeth wanted to be king and so he killed the king, who was a good guy and a friend... but then shakespeare wrote a play that we still talk about today and I don’t think hurt anyone in the process. So maybe the lesson is make sure that your ambitions are not destructive and add beauty and fun to the world. But idk. You do you.

[kyleisme14]

Feeling abundant vs empty.

A lot of the time I feel worthless and like a blemish on the earth. But then I try and remember that Im plenty useful. I’m great at converting oxygen into co2, which like I guess is kinda not useful in our carbon abundant world, but whatever.

It’s important to remind oneself that we are enough just as we are. That thinking we are unfulfilled or meaningless are just thoughts! If we remember that nothing matters, then life is what you make of it. Those nagging and redundant thoughts telling you “you suck” are just whispers in your head. They aren’t real.

Lately I’ve been really trying to feel abundant like a wellspring of creativity and positivity that I can let pour out onto the world like a mountain stream flowing into the ocean. Or maybe like a single molecule of water which across the eons has moved through every space available on earth from sea to sky and back.

I’m just a little drip of water but when we turn the faucets of our life we realize that the water is abundant. We aren’t going to run out of ourselves. We are abundant. Of course this metaphor breaks down when we think about water conservation and pollution and the like.

My only real point is there is no reason to say we are worthless or less than. We all have so much going on and so much to offer. Even if we are feeling low, and I feel low a lot, and feel like we have nothing to offer the world, we just need to remember that our mere existence is a blessing for ourselves and those around us.

So good luck and open the faucet from your heart unto the rivers and lakes of the world.

[kyleisme14]

LA is like a nut to crack

I think it’s a matter of time before I figure out how to crack in. I think the universe puts things in front of us to desire. And some things are achievable.

You can stand at the foot of a mountain, rock impenetrable and looming. You might know that there is gold in them thar hills. But with your hands you can only dig so deep. But maybe if you figure out where the streams cut into the hills deepest or else just work your fingernails off you can find a nugget.

Well I know I’m going to find my nugget. I’m driving right now in the back of an uber through my city, Los Angeles. It’s a cool town and I’ve already done cool stuff here. I’ve already had small validations and I can’t forget about them. I also can’t compare myself to others.

Does jealousy fuel ambition or vice versa? If I work my ass off can I achieve my wildest dreams? With a bit of luck probably. I see other folks find their nuggets and I’ve learned to only be proud and take it to know that this mountain does have mineral glory.

I can keep digging especially when I’ve found such a nice hillside to set up my little hovel. And I’d rather be the one who stays on his faraway mountain dying with a pickaxe in his hand than going back down from the Yukon to say, I tried and gave up.

No I’ll find my nugget, and it’s going to yield a vein. And I’ll work that vein for all it’s worth and then bend back down to find another one.

[kyleisme14]

They got together and chose a new one

All the folks got together to choose a new one. It was the time of the cycle where they did that and every last one got up and laced up their sneakers tight. And walked out to decide on a new guy.

All the folks had agreed that there should only be one guy who was theee guy. The guy would then get to decide. Get to decide all the things that folks used to bother with. Nothing wrong with bothering with things, except we all decided we didn’t want to anymore.

Now once a cycle we pick a new guy. It’s a tough job. Deciding on everything. But he’s got the resources to do it. The one the folks decide on gets all the money, army and a big house. when it comes down to it you need to make some tough decisions. And sure after you’re done being the guy you get thrown into an active volcano. But that’s part of the job, right.

Now I have my guy and folks think he’s great, and there’s another guy who’s awful and the folks who like him are fools. If I met this guy I’d probably kill him. But! If he gets decided on to be the guy I am ok with him making all of the decisions. That’s the way things go. That guy gets to decide everything and then after we throw them into a volcano.

It’s the throwing them into a volcano part that makes the system us folks created so perfect. Because whomever we folks pick, we’ll throw em in the volcano wether we love them or hate them. And I can put up with some bad decisions if they know the consequences for getting to make them is having your last moments being the slowroasted of your carnal body parts and evaporating soul.

[kyleisme14]

On being sick

I have got my tea and I’m all bundled up and ready for bed. And I’m as sick as a dog.

I think about biological warfare every time I get ill. Like if I were sneezing all over the good people at my improv class and that caused them to be incapacitated for our final class on Wednesday, then would that have been an attack? I can’t really help that I’m sick and need to be somewhere and there are other breathing humans. Like yeah, obviously I’d like to be home in bed, and I was for most of the day. But I had to be there along with the infection I’m carrying. I hope it’s not catching.

Growing up I seemed to always be sick. Sleep apnea and sinusitis are what I call it now, along with dairy and refined sugar intolerance (pretty sure I carry a mucus that just loves certain things) but then I was just sick. Then I got Lyme disease, and then I was depressed, and around the same time I had some sinus surgery. It added up to a lot of days where I wanted to stay home.

It was always a battle with my mom to go to school. At a certain point it didn’t matter how crummy I felt, she was the person responsible for my education. And then once I was at school there was no guarantee I wasn’t going to beg the school nurse to send me home. Geez do most kids spend so much time in the nurses office? Probably.

Sick days can feel awful, but can also be kind of fun. Like stay in and play video games and eat soup. I remember once I watched an entire season of America’s next top model. I didn’t have any sense that I was wasting a day. I long sometimes for that feeling that time isn’t pacing away.

These days I’m better at taking care of myself. I eat right and exercise. But still a man gets sick. Such is life and that’s fine. I drink lots of tea. I work on my breathing. I basically always am neti potting, so that’s covered. And right now I’m going to try and get plenty of sleep!

[kyleisme14]

Under the Sea ~ a poem

I realize now that

i was kind of getting snookered

it stinks on the inside

like a chemical

used to clean

the shower

grime

she’d been treating me the one way, well

so that she could

treat me the other way, 

but even this struggle is appropriate in some way

doesn’t it

make me grow

or is it like when you find a sea cucumber

you pull it up from the depths

and shake it

rubbing so it would release

defensive strands

looks like the cucumber is a dick

and its ejaculating

maybe

the sea creature

enjoys it

[kyleisme14]

On being a disappointment

People have all sorts of expectations of us. Most of them we can’t meet. Probably this is because people’s expectations don’t directly mirror reality and also because even if they did they are in reference to a personal reality. What is true for me is different for others.

Ok like for instance the fact that I don’t have a job disappoints my girlfriend. She doesn’t see me as being productive, nor of doing anything of merit. She sees all of my bad habits and negative traits in full bloom. She sees me as unreliable, unambiguous, lazy and misguided. She doesn’t seem to think I’m being serious and can’t understand why I haven’t succeeded already.

Meanwhile I feel as if I’ve never been more productive, never written as well and never felt better. So while I am living well in my reality, she is disappointed.

Another way to say disappointed is let down by. Like oh shoot you really let me down. I expected you to be here. I expected you to get that thing. I expected you to know better. I hate when people are upset that you let them down. Like yes ok if your expectations are clear and achievable then fine that’s great. I will do everything I can to achieve those goals.

But wtf there are so many expectations surrounding how people behave and what one does with their life. Maybe have patience for others and their journey above all else.

I try to be patient and kind with myself because the alternative of getting antsy and hating myself is a bad waste of time. I have incredible, borderline foolhardy optimism and I never want to escape that.

As long as I am not disappointing myself I am ok. My ultimate and only goal is to make myself proud and I am on my path to achieve that. Wish me luck.

[kyleisme14]

What is Area 51?

I could never believe people weren't following the biggest BREAKING news of our lives. But for those out of the loop, Area 51 is an infamous hotspot for UFO lovers. It has a rich history in alien folklore. But here is the factual history: Nevada is almost all federal land. and it was used back in the day for nuclear testing. an original tourist attraction to Las Vegas was watching nuclear testing in the distance...

Some airforce commanders were flying around dropping bombs when they spied a dried lakebed next to a mountain, Groom Lake. They landed on it and found it to be a perfectly flat natural runway. Excellent for testing expiremental aircraft. The facility became known as  Area 51. And was where the airforce and Lockheed Corp developed the U-2 stealth bomber. 

They brought the best and brightest scientists and engineers to develop new aeronautics and weaponry for the US military. At the height of the Cold War, any foreign technology that was aquired would be brought to Area 51 to be tested and backwards-engineered. You can imagine Chinese reactors and Russian jets being taken apart and used by the best tinkerer's and best test pilots. People at the highest levels of classified access. Because if you are one of the folks who are handling stolen foreign items, you are so classified that your spouse isn't supposed to know what you do all day. Yes honey, I was testing out the Ruskies new fighter plane! They don't even know we have it! 

These were experts in aeronautics and weapons science who could decipher technology even if the instructions were in another language... so perhaps if the US government were to encounter any other 'foreign technology' of an unknown origin, maybe they'd  send it to Area 51 to be backwards engineered? 

That's the set up, those are the facts, the rest is conjecture and tinfoil hats stuff. Like unexplained phenomena,  military released sightings that definitely aren't weather baloons and general mysticism. Do you believe in aliens or not?

[kyleisme14]

My trip to Area 51 - unedited

On Facebook, a kid from Bakersfield created an event. He uses his page, perfectly named, shitposting because my life is in shambles and makes 'storm area 51, they can't stop us all' and seemingly overnight a million people said that they would be attending. I did attend. Shitposting because my life is in shambles is inadvertent the most zeitgeist worthy name for this page. Shitposting is when you share terrible content that you know is bad just to get a reaction. You are sharing a low effort joke for the sense of connection from others.  Because my life is in shambles, this anonymous statement of personal vulnerability, I shall try and make a low effort attempt at connection. This is what our age is all about. We are doomed to be as connected and as isolated as possible. This had a chance of being a real life meme where we'd be isolated no longer.

The page became an immediate stronghold for memes. It adopted other internet jokes like Karens asking to see managers, Kyle's drinking monster energy drink for invincibility, and Naruto runners being faster than bullets, as ways of infiltrating the base. And also generated new ones about what people would find inside Area 51 like the 10th doctor to recommend a toothpaste or where my girlfriend wants to go for dinner or how we'd sneak in with a minivan but escape with a space ship. The killer meme was how once we 'free them aliens' we'd keep them as lovers and bang them so hard that we 'clapped them cheeks'. This was the low effort comedy that this meme page generated.

Was it a joke or would people actually go? At first I did not know why I needed to go to area 51, and everybody seemed to ask me. I failed to recruit any friends to join me on the quest, 7 hours driving to the infamous base. Most thought I was crazy for going. My brother told me to be safe. My sister thought I was joking, and called to counter my bluff. Whenever somebody said they couldn't go, I pittied them because I was sure they were going to miss something incredible and life affirming. I was excited because I had no idea what was going to go down, and nobody in the whole world did. I stopped at the army surplus. I thought we'd either see a humanitarian crisis like fyre fest or a government crackdown. Don't forget, 2 million people clicked GOING online, so even if 1% came that'd be 10,000 people to a town with a population of  1000. The airforce released a warning about 'raiding' active military bases being a bad idea and the use of deadly force being a possibility. Lincoln County, one of nevadas sleepiest, had to call in enough police to potentially break up a neo-woodstock.

I always wanted to go to area 51 since I first learned about aliens as a kid. When I asked the big question of are we alone in the universe? If there was an answer, if somebody had the evidence, if it was anywhere, it was stored at area 51.  UFO's and little green men were hiding somewhere in Nevada... at least according to pop mythology. In grade school I would check out the same book over and over from the library, about aliens and the search for exterterestrial life and the scientists who were looking at the stars. There was a spooky section about times aliens might have visited early humans based on cave paintings and statues. And then the next page was all about area 51, where the government did secret expirements on alien artifacts and maybe had a specimen. So I've been captivated since at least then. Area 51 represents a big secret. A mystery! And somebody powerful, a general or established congress person, knows and is keeping the answers from us. So as an anti-establishment, meme and alien lover, I was fascinated with this 'movement,' that would of 'raid the base'. I wanted to go and find out how many people like me were out there! Turns out I wasn't completely alone! But... for the ignorant... What is Area 51? I could never believe people weren't following the biggest BREAKING news of our lives. But for those out of the loop, Area 51 is an infamous hotspot for UFO lovers. It has a rich history in alien folklore. But here is the factual history: Nevada is almost all federal land. and it was used back in the day for nuclear testing. an original tourist attraction to Las Vegas was watching nuclear testing in the distance...

Some airforce commanders were flying around dropping bombs when they spied a dried lakebed next to a mountain, Groom Lake. They landed on it and found it to be a perfectly flat natural runway. Excellent for testing expiremental aircraft. The facility became known as  Area 51. And was where the airforce and Lockheed Corp developed the U-2 stealth bomber. They brought the best and brightest scientists and engineers to develop new aeronautics and weaponry for the US military. At the height of the Cold War, any foreign technology that was aquired would be brought to Area 51 to be tested and backwards-engineered. You can imagine Chinese reactors and Russian jets being taken apart and used by the best tinkerer's and best test pilots. People at the highest levels of classified access. Because if you are one of the folks who are handling stolen foreign items, you are so classified that your spouse isn't supposed to know what you do all day. Yes honey, I was testing out the Ruskies new fighter plane! They don't even know we have it! These were experts in aeronautics and weapons science who could decipher technology even if the instructions were in another language... so perhaps if the US government were to encounter any other 'foreign technology' of an unknown origin, maybe they'd  send it to Area 51 to be backwards engineered? That's the set up, those are the facts, the rest is conjecture and tinfoil hats stuff. Like unexplained phenomena,  military released sightings that definitely aren't weather baloons and general mysticism. Do you believe in aliens or not?

If you believe that it's more likely that our government would keep aliens a secret than releasing that information to the public... welcome to the club! If not, do some reading. As I drove across the desert, down lonesome roads and through one horse towns, I realized what I was doing. I was driving into the middle of nowhere, likely to stand around doing nothing... and boy was I excited. My plan was to go and maybe film something and if that didn't work out I'd put on an alien costume and hold a sign. I figured that there'd be a bunch of cameras and I could use it to collectively protest all sorts of wrongs in the world. One of the initial reacitons to the playful event was, 'hey there are more imporant places to raid! why not raid the border detention centers, why not congress, why not the oil companies?' To which I say, hell yes... but that's not shitposting. That's being earnest and noble. This was about being ironic and part of a joke. This was about chasing an internet meme into the ground and disecting it until all that was left was the human connection. I had a sign and costume and figured that even if nobody showed up at least news organizations would be covering it.  The sign I held said, Peace on earth ain't coming from outer space, and I really believe that. We shouldn't expect peace to come from somewhere else in the universe, it has to start right here at home, inside each of us. I wanted to get that message out. The day of the event, due to classic internet decentralization, people debated whether the raid meet up (located at the Area 51 gate) should be at 3am on friday morning or 3am on saturday morning. Most people kind of agreed to just gather sporadically between those two times. I monitored a live stream late on thursday to confirm that millions of people weren't gathering to make American History. Instead, about 30 people gathered for that 3am moment. I only missed a photo-op. I awoke on friday morning and drove towards my destiny. There were two events scheduled. One hosted by the facebook Shitposting kid who decided to use his 15 minutes of fame to organize a rave in the desert at the local Little Ale'inn, a motel close to the gate. The other was set up by a filmmaker who made a movie about Area 51 at the Alien Research Center. Both locales are alien themed tchotchke paradises designed to sell the eager UFO tourist any manner of t-shirt, shot glass or Alien doll. These spots have a fun feel and would be desert trinket spots selling only desert sage and gems if not for the boon of being next to an infamous mystery base.

The dueling events were both hoping to capitalize on the rush of people to the desert for the raid. Alienstock, as shitpost called it, was going to be a kumbaya style gathering. But everybody thought it was an alibi for shitpost incase anybody got in actual trouble at the gate and roped him in. Shitpost from bakersfield ended up not even going to his own event out of fear. Also the county sued him for the cost of preparing for a potential fiasco. The Alien Research Center event was going to have famous Alien Community folks speak and some high end music performances. But as I drove down the dusty route 375, known as Exterterestrial Highway, I saw very few people on the roads. Lots and lots of cops. It became obvious that the whole county and the organizers of these events had been preparingor at least 30,000 people. They had nearly 200 port-a-potties. Which makes  sense, if 1% of the people who claimed they were coming online came! The reality was that maybe only 1% of 1% showed up to these sleepy nevada towns on the edge of a fabled military base. The imediate reality of the events was that they were extremely underattended, but that was also a blessing. it made everything a little bit more intimate and accessible. I pulled into the dusty parking lot of the Little Ale'inn to find a rag tag DIY music festival set up. People were essentially tailgating on the side of the road. It was a scene and it was dusty. All sorts of folks were jovially milling about, some in alien themed costume, many with cameras. Many folks with booze, despite the morning. I pulled out a camera and tried interviewing people, but found that everybody I talked to had the exact same talking points. Do you believe in aliens? Duh. Why are you here? Free them Aliens. Do you really think they are in the base? Yes, but maybe now they've been moved. What did you think would happen if we charged? We'd all get killed or arrested. Nobody seemed to have really believed in the facebook post's idea of 'they can't stop us all.' Most people were sure that, especially with the meager turn out, the military and police could stop us all. Everybody just wanted to see what would happen, expecting anywhere from fyre festival 2.0 to a bloodbath to nothing. Everybody had listened to the same Joe Rogan podcast, where he'd interviewed Bob Lazar who claims to have worked at the base. That podcast was the bible of this gathering and  was what had inspired Shitpost to shitpost.

It was special that everybody was a believer. That's rare that strangers are all on the same wavelength. Nobody seemed to have any doubts that the government knew about aliens and weren't telling the public. And it was agreed that UFO's had been tested and stored at the base. Everybody I ended up meeting seemed pretty prepared. They had plenty of water and booze and camping supplies, so the idea that a humanitarian crisis was going to occur dissapated completely and reminded me of a group outting to the desert. Most important was that everybody at the event seemed to be in on the joke. They might believe in aliens but had no plans of raiding the base in actuality. Aliens might exist but the might of the US government is way more certain. The police presence alone was insane, but they merely hinted at the military might behind the base's perimeter. The police actually became quite friendly once they realized it wasn't going to be a boodbath. But the silent and hooded guards behind the gate remained terrifying with big guns and big dogs. There was definitely the threat of violence if you crossed. But we all joked that maybe if a million more people showed up we'd actually start Naruto running passed the guards.

After a while of milling around quasi-interviewing people I decided there were enough people with cameras that I should just put on my alien costume and go to the gate and get in front of the camera. I was taken to the gate by some friends I'd made while trying to get interviews. Evan and Kevin were two dudes I became super weirdly close on the day of the Raid. Each of us had come by ourselves from far away, San Francisco, Boston and Los Angeles, with a vague intention of documenting it in some way. I had a vision of either a mini doc or article, Evan was a photographer and who took some insanely beautiful photos (featured here).

Kevin was a video creation guru who just wanted to make as much instagram content as possible. Kevin was by far the most successful, he's got that showman's knack to always get on camera with insanely high energy. There were a lot of cameras and each one he'd run up to and start lecturing about how the governemnt needed to release the secret documents! It was a great bit especially with his Boston Townie accent turned all the way up.

Evan explained how he was drawn to the site by a mysterious desire to see what would happen.  He expressed it best as, 'this is like a reddit safe post.' People will find safes while remodeling or cleaning a house and say, 'hey reddit, look i found a safe, i'm going to open it and see what's inside!' Then people get excited trying to guess what marvelous jackpot could be in that old dusty safe. They wait desperately for the original poster to share an update. More often than not the poster never returns and people are left waiting for nothing.

Once and a while there will be an updated post to show what was found inside and sometime's it's a haul of trinkets and dubloons and rare items that were saved throughout time to be found by some noble internet user. but then most of the time it's like, wow a roll of coins from 1953! "so yeah i felt obligated to go and find out what was in the safe and share it with reddit even if there actually was nothing inside. reddit deserves to know.' evan said. Because sometimes those posts are just as important, the safe find coming back to say, 'hey we cracked the safe, but turns out there was nothing in it! here's a picture of an empty safe."

So I was beginning to realize that I was standing inside an empty safe. But wow, all of these people had also come to be here and that was something special. It's not often that we get to organically be around likeminded strangers that all have such clear and imediate shared experience. Here we all were, because of a a meme, just to see what would happen. The gathering had a magical quality because we were an internet joke that had left the cyber space and entered the meat space. It was a silly idea that was reaching a physical end point.

I stood around the gate for a good while, we chatted with everybody, shook hands with the police guarding the gate, exchanged instagram handles and shared jokes we'd heard on the internet. You could tell people were really cutting loose. Most people spent most of their time on their computers it seemed. Hey, me too. We shouted 'clap them cheeks' and 'let them out.' We were all in on the joke. There were still mainly cameras and I got interviewed and photographed by dozens including history channels ancient aliens and the nytimes and countless youtubers and instagramers. It all kind of culminated when Kevin and Evan were getting cold and saying we should leave, I heard a distant 'clap them cheeks' chant and booty shuffling down the lonesome road to the infamous Area 51 gate was Riley Reid! Pornhub's number 1 star. She's somebody I have searched for all my life, on google. She did a strip tease and pretended to rush the gate. She was an internet hero in the flesh, and she was in on the joke too! A perfect metaphor, eh?

The next morning, hungover from the excitement and extrovertism of the day before I was sitting in a diner scouring news websites for mentions of the raid and looking for photos of myself. Behind me I heard some locals discussing, a gravelly voice said, "usually this town has 1 car every 10 minutes. this weekend we've got like 1 car every minute!" The townsfolk seemed to have had the wildest weekend of their lives. Me too. I managed to get into a few articles in my green alien suit.  A USA Today affiliate newspaper even printed a whole write up about me and my sign. On the way back, realizing I expected nothing, and found little more than nothing, I was completely satisfied. I had held my sign for peace and found a version of it, internet strangers, weirdos from all over had gathered peacefully to celebrate an idea. A silly and anti authoritarian conspiracy idea, but an idea none the less. I decided the reason I was drove all this way through beautiful american desert land, was because it's something I would have thought was cool as an 11 year old. A mission to see aliens and the people who wanted to meet them. Radical.

[kyleisme14]

Improv rules for me in Basic

My main things that I have to do in improv is commit, connect and have an attitude. This is what I got from my one on one with my improv teacher this week. I am taking Basic Improv from the Groundlings and my buddy Tom is teaching a great class. I think most of the people in it are pretty high caliber, and really there for the love of learning and advancing themselves.

I’m not the best improvisor, but I am good at lying to people’s faces. And there is a kind of overlap. My main goal creatively is finding my voice, finding what I do that is entertaining to others and really leaning into it. I’m pretty broad right now but really want to refine into something really good, but I’m playing the field until my best position proves itself. So who knows, maybe I am destined to be really great at improvisational comedy. That’d be cool. 

I worry all the time about whether I’m ‘funny’ or not. Like do I make people laugh in conversation, sure. Have people liked things I wrote and laughed at them on screen, sure. Do I try to share all instances of humor that I encounter with the world, yes that too. So maybe I am ‘funny’ but I want to be so funny that it’s a commercial viability for me. And I know that feels incredibly unlikely or immodest or grandiose or idk, hopeful? But maybe taking improv classes will help. Who knows, there’s other people who have matriculated from groundlings onto big time funny success.  Improv is healthy regardless.

So anyway, I been in this basic class a few weeks and it’s been mighty fun and the exercises are doing their job, etc. And the thing I keep realizing is that if I just relax and remember the basic premise of the exercise, I feel like I do pretty well. Like just remember to say the simplest thing and work with your partner, it’s all a fun game.

For me I’ve been told that instead of just relaxing, I should think of it as committing, come on and sink into the persona of the scene. Commit to being whatever attitude I have organically or match my scene pardner. Connecting to the other person is just as crucial because they are just as important to creating the scene you are in and understanding who you are and what relationship you have is the whole bag. Super fun.

Just got to remember to have an attitude, commit to it and connect with my scene partners. If I can do that, the rest is trusting that I can be pretty darn funny if I just don’t stress.