Joe Rybicki

@joerybicki.com

460 Followers 162 Following

He/him. Writer, video game consultant, virtual tourist. Former Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. Other credits: higround.net/#bylines

A screenshot of a response to a post seemingly presented as a standalone post
A Google search for “your mouth my chicken chaucer” (having already been corrected from Google’s assumption that “chaucer” means “chausser”) returns the following “AI Summary”: “It sounds like you are referencing the clever rooster Chauntecleer tricking the fox in The Nun's Priest's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer! In the poem, the fox opens his mouth to boast just as Chauntecleer cleverly flies away. If you are instead looking to make a delicious, mouth-watering Chicken Chasseur (the classic French hunter's stew) for your own mouth, here are the core ingredients you'll need: & Nicky's Kitchen Sanctuary • Chicken: 4-6 bone-in, skin-on thighs or drumsticks • Veggies: Sliced mushrooms, chopped shallots or onion, minced garlic…” For the record, “Your mouth, my chicken!” is a *direct quote* from *The Miller’s Tale* in *Chaucer’s* Canterbury Tales
A flyer for a punk rock show in 1995. It is printed on green paper and features the following words, printed in all caps, times new Roman, on a shitty inkjet printer, and pasted over a map of Ohio: WHATEVER… THE REAL CD/LP RELEASE SHOW FRIDAY, AUGUST 11th PEABODY'S DOWNUNDER WITH DREYFUS AND OTHERS? SHOW STARTS AT 9:00pm $3.00 PLUS THAT 21 AND UNDER CHARGE NO MAN, WOMEN OR CHILD SHOULD MISS THIS ONE!! ROCK AND ROLL LIVES
Principal Skinner says “Am I so out of touch? …No, it’s the voters who are wrong”
A Bluesky post from Aaron Rupar, @atrupar.com, shows a video from CSPAN of Representative Tom Emmer, R, an old white man in a tan blazer and blue tie. The post quotes him as follows: "Minnesotans are so afraid that you're gonna call us a racist, you're gonna call us an Islamophobe. You know what? I'm done being even the least bit careful. Somalis don't assimilate. And if they don't assimilate, then they should go the hell back to where they came from." Brandon Friedman, @brandonfriedman.bsky.social, quote-posts the above and says “21st century America is a multiracial democracy whose commerce, culture and cuisine reflect the influence of immigrants from every country on earth. The only people seemingly unable to assimilate into this society are white Republicans.”
Principal Skinner says “Am I so out of touch? …No, it’s the voters who are wrong.”
Three otters pop out of a water chute. Above it reads “hello from the”
Mustachioed man with a drumstick flute says “Bitch”
A screenshot of a segment from the linked article. The relevant passage reads "’Gen Z, despite being more familiar with Al, is the most pessimistic about jobs, with 81% saying that Al will decrease job opportunities,’ said Chetan Jaiswal, an associate professor of computer science and associate chair of the Department of Computing at Quinnipiac who also worked on the poll.” The word “despite” is highlighted.
Two black cats and a tuxedo cat sit in front of a sliding screen door. The middle one is gazing up raptly at something flying by. Not pictured: the cutest little chest blaze and white tail-tip of the foreground feline
In a dense stand of leafy trees, in dappled afternoon light, a barred owl stares straight at the camera and yells “WHO COOKS FOR YOU, MOTHERFUCKER”
2080 (the number of hours in a year of work at 40 hours a week) Divided by 8 (the number of hours in a standard work day) Equals 260 (the number of days most people who work full-time work) *to be clear a lot of folks get 10 to 30 days of paid time off, so for the sake of completeness: 260-30 = 230. And for further completeness: 230 - 140 = 90. And just to close the circle: 90 days of work is 4.14 months at 40 hours a week.
Dwight Schultz (“Reginald Barclay”) as Howlin’ Mad Murdock on The A-Team, a slightly crazed-looking white man wearing a black baseball cap, the then-ubiquitous headphones with the orange foam earpieces, and a battered leather bomber jacket, Hawaiian shirt, khakis and worn black hi-top Chucks, sits on a car hood with his fingers pressed together as though molding something out of clay. Or, more likely, C4.
A screenshot of a Kotaku headline reading “Sony Set Pay [sic] $7.8 Million To PlayStation Users After Jude [sic] Approves Preliminary Settlement In PSN Digital Games Class Action Lawsuit”
Irving from Severance, a graying man with a mustache and a sharp blue suit, says “Let’s burn this place to the ground”
Seymour Skinner ponders whether he may be wrong about Catholic doctrine, then concludes that no, it is the FUCKING POPE who is wrong.
A cartoon of a That Fuckin Guy popping out of a well to say “I am very intelligent”
Integrity, Houston: have you flushed your DNS cache Integrity, Houston: Try turning it upside down? Integrity, Houston: Can you confirm you have full connectivity vis a vis Satphone and electrical outlet? Integrity, Houston: How much rice do you have onboard?
Boost Blue - Headlines and subheds in link cards are truncated in the main feed. They're slightly less truncated in post view but they still don't wrap gracefully. - If you tap on the start of a thread, you'll only see the first 7 posts, with no indication that the seventh post isn't the final one in the thread. If you do tap on the seventh and there are more, Boost will load only another 7, and so on. (Tapping late in a thread will allow the user to scroll all the way up to the beginning though.) - Tapping on the Home icon from the main feed scrolls all the way up-which is not totally unexpected! —but it also clears the read position, which makes it possible for the user to accidentally screw themselves out of one of Boost's marquee features with a single tap. I'd suggest changing this behavior so that tapping on the Home icon either does nothing when in the main feed, or scrolls to the top but keeps the Read badge up so that tapping on that gets you back to where you were. (In other words, don't treat a scroll to the top as "reading" all the posts it scrolls by.) - When replying, post being replied to is truncated after a few lines, and you can't scroll down to see the whole message. Also can't scroll up to view earlier posts in a thread you're replying to. - Can't zoom in on image when writing alt text - Random stuff triggers the link card. This seems to have calmed down a bit but it still happens occasionally. Main culprit at the moment is two periods. - Spellcheck weirdly random: Misspelled words are rarely (it ever?) underlined, and seem to not be autocorrected either. Tapping on them will bring up suggestions for corrections though. - Exiting full screen image or video is unreliable. The target for the X seems weirdly small, and flicking the media away seems to work unpredictably (this may have improved? Or maybe I just got used to it) - A hash in a link adds a phantom second instance at the end (see the link in my profile for example)
A view of Earth taken by NASA astronaut and Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman from of the Orion spacecraft's window after completing the translunar injection burn on April 2, 2026. The image features two auroras (top right and bottom left) and zodiacal light (upper left) is visible as the Earth eclipses the Sun.
Three Peeps—one pink, one white, and one baby blue—stand next to each other. Two hold trans pride flags. The text reads “I suooort our trans peeps” Happy Trans Day of Visibility. I see you and I love you.
This exact skeet, except the word “immediately” is blocked by a large button that reads “Anyone can reply”
A screenshot of this exact skeet being composed, except a large button that reads “Anyone can reply” blocks most of the single sentence
The cover of the November 2004 issue of The Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. It features an angled stream of exclamation marks in the style of those seen above guards’ heads when they detect Snake in the Metal Gear Solid series. The main text on the cover reads “Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater”
We fucking killed it. Picture shows a plate with red braised pork belly on a bed of noodles, accompanied by steamed broccolini in an almost otherworldly green. And y’all? It tasted better than it looked.
The cover of the version of Thexder I bought with my own damn money from Radio Shack for our Tandy 1000. It depicts a robot and a massively late-‘80s vibe.
John Turturro’s character Irving on Severance saying “let’s burn this place to the ground”
A man and a woman stare into the middle distance in front of a wall of ivy. They are dressed as though they time traveled from the late eighties. They both resemble people I’ve seen in tv but can’t place.
On a game show (I think Password?) the irreplaceable Betty White holds up a card that says “BOOZE”
The cast of Battle of the Planets, an animated show which when I was in grade school was called “G-Force”
R/C Pro Am saves our oil
A soldier, hegseth, JD Vance, and Trump walking on a tarmac. Pete Hesgeth is wearing clown shoes, just big ol' floppy clown shoes like a clown would wear. They are circled in red.
An email from my work address to expertoptout@superhuman.com Subject: If for some reason anything l've published has put me on your "expert" roster, no it hasn't Body: The fuck is wrong with you people? Sincerely, -- Joe Rybicki, Writing From a Mobile Device High Ground Media, LLC
A soldier, hegseth, JD Vance, and Trump walking on a tarmac. Pete Hesgeth is wearing clown shoes, just big ol’ floppy clown shoes like a clown would wear. They are circled in red.
The character Dandelion from The Witcher 3. Yes, it’s a crap joke. I regret nothing.
Sal Frelick of the Milwaukee Brewers walks away from the outfield wall with an amused and confused expression, mouthing “what the fuck just happened”?
Jodie Foster in the film Contact stares in awe at the above post, saying “They should have sent a poet.” I have never seen this gorgeous red machine before and I WANT
A man in dark sunglasses sings into a microphone in a dark room, bopping side to side before doing a little comic shuffle/march thingy back and forth behind the microphone. Video saved from the account of @yourpal_austin on TikTok before the site went to shit.
A black and white drawing of a figure standing in a field of giant spikes under a dark sky. Overlaid are the words: THIS PLACE IS A MESSAGE. THIS PLACE IS NOT A PLACE OF HONOR. THE DANGER IS STILL PRESENT WHAT WAS HERE IS DANGEROUS AND REPULSIVE TO US. IN YOUR TIME, AS IT WAS IN OURS THIS PLACE IS BEST SHUNNED AND LEFT UNINHABITED. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture
The reader art section of the letters section of the October 1999 issue of The Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine. It features a ton of shockingly good art, including a slick R4 piece from Mike “Gabriel” Krahulik. The full text of the section reads: Reader Art, Baby, YEAH! Every month we'll be picking one exceptional piece as our Reader Art of the Month. The creator of the winning work will have his/her piece published and will receive a new game or game-related item in the mail-so include your mailing address with all submissions. Runners-up (as many as we want, 'cause it's our magazine) are printed as well. Good luck! Check out this month's artists! Clockwise from above: our winner Meredith Dillman, [redacted]@plaidworld.com; Mike "Gabriel," krahulik@[redacted].net; Tuan Nguyen, Santa Ana, CA; Jonathan Robinson, Baltimore, MD; and Matt Komel, Eagle River, AK. Good job, folks!
A closeup of a smiley-face pin on a jean jacket worn by a young Wil Wheaton, at an angle one might call conveniently oblique if one were looking for evidence that said wearer were in fact the Walkin’ Dude
A four-panel comic depicts two anthropomorphic bald eagles on armchairs. The dialogue reads: “DO YOU THINK THE OWL IS A PREDATOR?” “OF COURSE NOT. HE'S NEVER BOTHERED ME.” “EXACTLY.” There is a frame where they are depicted in silent domesticity. “…NO IDEA WHAT MR. MOUSE WAS GOING ON ABOUT.”
Film poster for the movie C.H.U.D.
Four pinkish ice cream bars are spread out on a festive tray. They read: H A PP Y VA LEN TIN ES D A Y ♥️ Below is a sketch of a…porg, maybe? holding the third of the four bars and crying. By itself the bar reads: PP TIN Y
D'Marcus Williums T.J. Juckson T'varisuness King Tyroil Smoochie-Wallace D'Squarius Green, Jr. Ibrahim Moizoos Jackmerius Tacktheritrix D'Isiah T. Billings-Clyde D'Jasper Probincrux III Leoz Maxwell Jilliumz Javaris Jamar Javarison-Lamar Davoin Shower-Handel Hingle McCringleberry L'Carpetron Dookmarriot J'Dinkalage Morgoone Xmus Jaxon Flaxon-Waxon
A map that shows cities that fall under CBP’s jurisdiction, which extends 100 miles from every border. It includes most of New England, including almost all of the state of New York, plus other cities one might assume to be “interior” such as Sacramento, Chicago, and Portland. (Cleveland is in there too, though I don’t know how much of a surprise that might be to anyone who doesn’t live here; Canada is like 45 miles away by boat.)
A screenshot of two posts adjacent to each other in my Bluesky timeline. Both feature similar visual formatting that makes it clear the resemblance is intentional. The top is from @theonion.com, and depicts an old man in historical garb. The caption reads: “Medieval Scribe Keeps Forgetting 'Whence/Whither' Rule” The bottom is from @hard-drive.net and depicts two people in front of a pair of computer screens, one of which appears to depict the game Minecraft. A woman is seated in front of the keyboard and a man leans on her desk, uncomfortably close. The caption reads: “Game Developer Puts Layoffs on Seasonal Roadmap” Only the upper image shows an alt-text tag.
Screenshot of a post from a medical website which reads: Physical signs of high testosterone Men with high testosterone levels may experience several changes in their physical appearance. Many men welcome these changes, which often include increased muscle mass, a deeper voice, and more pronounced facial and body hair. However, negative changes can also occur. Here are some of the physical signs linked to high testosterone levels: • Increased muscle mass: Men with excessive testosterone might have larger and more defined muscles. • Body hair growth: High testosterone often leads to more body hair, especially on the chest, arms, and legs. In some cases, excessive body hair growth can occur and appear in unusual areas. • Facial hair: Men with high testosterone may experience thicker, faster-growing facial hair. • Acne: High testosterone levels may lead to increased oil production in the skin, causing more frequent d or severe acne. • Shrinking of the testes: In some cases, abnormally high levels of testosterone can lead to the shrinking of the testes. • High blood pressure: High testosterone can sometimes cause increased blood pressure, which may increase the risk of heart attack and stroke.
The final verse of Phil Ochs’ “Ringing of Revolution” (a cinematic song!), which reads: Down on our knees we're begging you please We're sorry for the way you were driven There's no need to taunt, just take what you want And we'll make amends, if we're living But away from the grounds the flames told the town That only the dead are forgiven As they vanished inside the ringing of revolution
“MAY YOUR NEW YEAR BE FERTILIZED BY THE BONES OF THOSE WHO WOULD WISH YOU HARM”
FOCUS PULLER - TONY STRACHAN CLAPPER LOADER - JOHN FLETCHER FOCUS LOADER - JACK WILLIAMS CLAPPER PULLER - TOM BROWN PULLER CLAPPER - JOE TAYLOR CLAPPER CLAPPER - EDWARD DAVIS FLIPPER FLAPPER - JANE THOMAS HABERDASHER - HELEN ROBERTS SET DECORATOR - CRISPIER SALLIS