By the end of the 1980s, my dad's Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme was starting to show signs of aging. As a kid, I knew nothing of the mechanical problems plaguing The Great Silver Beast, but something must have been wrong if we were borrowing my grandmother's car
I recently finished another revision pass on House of Nepenthe, a process that felt like trying to get a long sofa up a spiral staircase, and I didn't even have anyone screaming pivot at me the whole time to keep me motivated. For context, Vise Manor came out
After a brief and underwhelming sabbatical from the Church of Bezos, I’ve returned—head bowed, tail tucked, and ready to once again sell my wares in the temple. You know, the one Jeebus flipped tables over because it had become a marketplace? That one. Except this temple is digital,
In retrospect, turning 45 was a mistake. Ever since that fateful day in March, bad things have been happening to me—things even Cool Daniel or Even Steven Daniel can't seem to reconcile. There was the you have angry old man shoulder just deal with it diagnosis from
It only took twenty years, a few formatting meltdowns, and one deeply philosophical debate over the plural of "bone yard"—but Bartering Nola is finally here. Originally written back in the early 2000s, this novella has spent the better part of two decades loitering in the weird space
Author's Note: This selection is from an attempt at a longer version of Bartering Nola that never quite materialized. In addition to molding it into a full-length novel, I also tried to tie it back into the larger Vinestead Universe. Obrego, for example, has an Ayudante biochip, which
Strapped into a go-kart, heart pounding, helmet damp with someone else’s sweat, all I can think is: please, not again. I'm in Group 2, tail end of the lineup, listening to a teenage attendant deliver the safety speech with the enthusiasm of a bro-skibidi-rizz TED talk. He&
My content calendar insists today is for a personal update, so here we are, broadcasting another Weekly Uplink straight from the Verastiqui neural stack. Let’s get into it before the system times out. Going W̶i̶d̶e̶ Right Back to Amazon I still don’t know what to
How convenience, compromise, and capitalism are breaking the indie dream. Enter the Behemoth I'm pretty sure the phrase "love-hate relationship" was invented in anticipation of how I would feel about Amazon in 2025. I remember–decades ago now–being at the library on base in Misawa,
May 2, 2025 – Austin, TX The sky in Austin today couldn't make up its mind. Half of it looked like a dingy bedsheet, bleached and stretched, and the other a bruised knuckle, blue to almost black. Rain was coming. The kind of rain that makes you reach for
Essays
On friendship, fate, and existential nihilism Every time I drive somewhere in Austin, it feels a little like visiting a childhood home and finding it now serves poke bowls and bespoke dog treats. The city is growing, the roads are getting wider, and what used to be sleepy two-lane drags
Flashes From the Verse
Date of Notification: April 25, 2025 Dear VNet Account Holder, Thank you for choosing Vinestead International’s Virtual Reality Network (“VNet”) as your platform for immersive digital experiences. We are committed to safeguarding your personal information and are writing to inform you of a recent security incident that may have
For My Fellow Patriots
Perfect protest. No notes. Preserving for posterity. As seen on Reddit.
Essays
Let it not be said that I have a problem with the English. I don’t. They’re a lovely people—clever, polite, and adorned with delightful accents that sound like they were born in velvet robes and Oxford libraries. I find those accents hilarious, not in a mocking way,
Coding
At my last job, I built a web app called Central, and I loved it like a firstborn. It was a sleek, efficient, under-documented monstrosity that pulled customer data from disparate sources and unified it into a single, moderately coherent interface. Sales could use it to figure out why people
Writing
For the longest time, Amazon was all a self-published author really needed. Upload your book, let them assign you an ISBN, and boom—you're published. Simple. Easy. Almost too easy. But now that I'm stepping outside the walled garden and going wide, I'm running
Black & White Stories
For My Tech Nerds
If you're in the market for a nice soundbar to shove beneath your monitor to keep things nice and tidy, may I recommend you stay the hell away from the Razer Leviathan. Yes, it sounds fine. Yes, it has pretty colors that dance along to the music. But
Newsletters
Issue #98-01 | January 1998 | For Internal Distribution Only Hello Team, Welcome to another edition of the Vinestead International Employee Bulletin, your official source for updates, reminders, and a few friendly words to help guide us through Q2 of FY98. As always, we remain committed to transparency, efficiency, and the continued
Flashes From the Verse
by Frank Gattis, Junior Aggregator, Banks Media Productions The more things change, the faster they change. At no time in our history was that more true than in the years between 2018 and 2026, when America and most of the civilized world were almost brought to a technological standstill by
Flashes From the Verse
Pattrn itself is not the problem. It’s social media as a whole that needs to go. Every network that has come and gone in the last two decades has promised to revolutionize the way we connect with people. Instead, they’ve degraded an instinct that is vital to our survival as a species.
Flashes From the Verse
by Frank Gattis, Junior Aggregator, Banks Media Productions Living in America means taking things for granted. We assume there will always be water to drink, food to eat, and electricity to keep the lights burning. We expect roads to be in good repair, buildings to remain standing, and VNet to