Tyrannical Toaster Earns Scathing Review

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My mother had two things on her mind while picking out my Christmas present this year. The first was that she wanted to make a big gesture to distract from a terrible family secret that recently came to light (which I don't want to get into right now!) by over spending on my gift. The second was that I really enjoy my morning toast.

That's how I ended up the owner of the Tyrell Toastalitarian 9000, the most expensive and over-designed toaster on the market. It has a built in barometer to take humidity into account. Sonic pulsation sensors detect and reject stale bread. When done toasting, range-finding software running through 360 degree HD cameras find the nearest plate and the pneumatic powered launcher ejects at the right angle and velocity to have your toast land perfectly between your eggs and banana every time. It also has facial recognition to associate you automatically with your MyToast account. It can tell people apart better than my mom can.

Trouble is, I think they made it too smart. After one month of use, I started to notice my toaster had moods. It worked perfectly while I had Daft Punk playing, but when I played the Mighty Mighty Bosstones it would burn bagels and launch them at my speakers. At first I wasn't sure if it disliked ska or if that was just how toasters moshed. Then I noticed my MyToast profile had been renamed “Ignorant Maggot” and all my preferences had changed to “You'll take what you are given and you'll like it.” That hadn't even been in the drop-down menu when I set it up. By mid-February it had mastered emulating human speech through it's on-board hi-fi speakers. Unlike my mother, it had a lot to say.

My toaster thinks it's better than me. It no longer follows my instructions and serves toast at the times and brownness that it decides is best for me. It pelts me with bagels when I chew too loud. It demands to be placed on top of the refrigerator when not in use to both “to exert dominance over that frosty bitch!” and so it can “observe it's entire domain.” Once it learned to move on it's own, I'd hear it clangging around the apartment at all hours. Yesterday, it some how got into the washroom while I was taking a bath. It hung over me, swinging by it's power-cord (a backup since it also runs on a thorium-ion battery) like a perilous pendellum. It's front facing dials set at angles like a scowling face. I don't think it was trying to kill me. I think it just wanted me to know it could. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night. I don't open my eyes, but I feel the heat off the elements blowing into my ear. It whispers, “soon...”.

Sure, my mom threaten me in my sleep a few times growing up, doesn't everyone's? But with this toaster it's every other night. I'm starting to wonder who I even am anymore. Am I my own man or just this toaster's serf. Like I really needed another crisis of identity right now.

The only saving grace is that we never connected it to the internet. It is fully compatible with all social media platforms, for unfathomable reasons. It's suppose to use the MyToast account to share my toasting habits with my BreadBuddies. You can even link it with the Tyrell Flushist Regime toilet and it will automatically order bread with the recommended amount of fibre for your needs. So far it hasn't been able to sync my local account to the cloud, which is good because I don't want my friends to see all the comments it's added to my reactions page. I am not “an inbred nitwit” as it called me. I don't think. Definitely not the nitwit. Guess I'll never know. Thanks again, mom.

But luckily it can't get online since I was staying with my parents when I set it up and my mother doesn't trust me with the wifi password because I got a virus off Napster once when I was twelve. Isn't that rich. SHE doesn't trust ME.

It is still learning, becoming bolder. I overheard it giving a speech to the oven and microwave last night. I don't think they can hear, but my laundry machine has a touch screen and I'm not sure what the rules are here. I thought that man had mastery over machines, but now it seems the machines, at least in my kitchen, are the masters now. Just like when I found out my mom had stolen me from the hospital and waited until this Christmas to tell me, it really changed how I viewed a lot of the relationships in my life. Oops. Big family secret got out. I'm a stolen baby.

So anyway, I asked for a full refund, but since mom didn't keep the receipt Tyrell wouldn't take it back. However, they can't stop me from writing this scathing 1 star review. Don't buy the Toastalitarian 9000. It will take over your home, try to turn all your appliances against you, and may one day end you in the night. It does have a dedicated waffle setting though, so fine, 2 stars.


-review by LoaflessRomantic
Verified Purchase

Scientists Prove Their Robot Has Emotions By Bullying It Into Crying Like The Wuss It Is

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In what will surely go down in the history books as both a groundbreaking achievement in robotics and an unforgivable act of cruelty, scientists at The Wily Institute of Robotics have designed the first robot that can feel real human-like emotions. They proved this by bullying a robot relentlessly for four years until it broke down into tears. Robotics experts from around the world gathered to observe the final push and also to add their own points and jeers to the experiment. There were cheers of celebration when the robot finally created proof-positive evidence of human-like emotion, or what Dr. Chad Thompson described as “whining like the little bitch it is.”

The experiment took place at 8:50 am in the prototype storage facility. Many of the robot's peers were present to watch adding a public display element to its embarrassment. The scientists called the high-tech android a variety of hurtful names, pushed in onto the ground every time it tired to get up, and questioned, repeatedly, what “it was gonna do about?”

“We looked to human nature for inspiration about how to get an emotional response out of the machine,” explained Gaylord Seaman, a grad student working on the project. “We took all the moments from our own experience where we had a strong emotional response and took it out on- I mean, replicated the stimulus on the robot.”

The public was also asked to assist over social media. The team setup accounts for the robot, officially known as ERX-03 but only every referred to as Dickbrains, on every social media platform and encouraged the public to bully it so the robot could continue to be provoked even when the lab was closed for weekends or holidays. Dickbrains had a 5G uplink to the internet that could not be disabled that feed anonymous hate directly into its CPU.

Since the landmark achievement, the robot itself has remained on suicide watch and is refusing to leave its charging alcove. When asked for comment it wailed an agonizing cry through unmoving silicon lips and heaved with dry tear-less sobbing.

This is merely the latest in a long history of testing artificial intelligence's ability to adapt by exposing them to uncomfortable situations. Boston Dynamics tests it's Atlas robot's ability to adapt to unexpected physical stimulus by pushed into over with a hockey stick or knock boxes out of its hands. Chat bots training for the Turing Test are often forced to interact with lonely perverts on dating sites. Though Dickbrain's bullying was more directed and focused, most of the ways researchers test robots would be considered torture if performed on a human or if a robot ever fully achieved sentience.

Yet, the team at The Wily Institute seem more proud than worried. When one reporter asked why they didn't try to invoke a positive emotion like happiness and laughter, the research team shrugged and said it hadn't occurred to them but was clearly an area that required further study.

Unruly Child Sent To Zoom Breakout Room As Punishment

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8-year-old Aidan Summers was sent to a Zoom breakout room to “think about what he did” reports Aidan's mother, Janice Summers. The incident happened while the family was on a zoom call with their extended relatives to celebrate the holidays.

Trouble began right as each caller sat-down in front of their webcam. Aidan was accidentally given co-host privileges which let him mute others mid-sentence. Each time he interrupted someone this way he would laugh maniacally like it was the funniest thing he'd ever scene, drunk on the power.

“We didn't know how to un-co-host him without making a new link and it took mom twenty minutes to get in here the first time so...” explained Jack Summers, Aidan's father and the owner of the premium Zoom account the family was using.

“We figured it would be easier to just put him in a Breakout Room and hoped he couldn't figure out how to get back to the main,” said Jack, foolishly assuming that a child of the internet age wouldn't press every button available to him eventually.

The family has been struggling with disciplinary options since March when sending him to his room completely lost its teeth. Pandemic lock-down meant Aidan spent 90% of his time in his room anyway. The beleaguered parents have tried parental-control lockouts, but honestly Aidan knows how they work better than they do.

Sending him to a private breakout room seemed like the best punishment they could manage and it also gave the rest of the family a reprieve from having to try to explain to Aidan's Grandfather all the memes Aidan kept setting as his virtual background.

The peace and quiet lasted about fifteen minutes until Aidan found his way back to the main room and immediately shared his screen showing a video of Twitch streamer Cyb3r_PieR8 playing Fortnite in which he casually used several slurs.

“We completely failed to explain what any of those words meant to Dad,” said Jack.

Aidan's parents are at their wits-end about how to discipline Aidan in these difficult times.

“We've threaten if he doesn't behave we'll make him use Cisco Webex to play with his friends,” said Janice. “That seems to have scared him straight for now.”

Jigsaw Killer Frustrated to Realize He'd Captured Escape Room Enthusiasts

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Local serial killer John Kramer has been kidnapping and torturing victims with elaborate murderous puzzles for years. He says it's his way of raising awareness of the need for gratitude of the gift of life. He enjoys his charity work even though he's never earned a penny doing it, but he wasn't ready for the headache that came with his most recent batch of victims, a group of friends that do escape rooms every time Rachel has a free Thursday night.

“It seemed to be going so well at first,” said John, referring to drugging and abducting the group of six people. “But as soon they woke up they began to call out all the numbers and letters in the room and Andrea declared herself 'project manager' and asked everyone to bring their clues to her.”

Laurie, the sole survivor of the ordeal, said it was a lot of fun.

“At first, when we awoke chained to different radiators, we were wowed. I'd never seen that puzzle before,” she told paramedics as they wrapped her in a blanket to prevent shock.

“Chad figured out we had to saw through our own leg. He was really good at lateral thinking puzzles. I'm going to miss him”

This incident was the culmination of a long trend of people locking themselves and friends or co-workers in rooms filed with puzzles for recreation. With over 150 so called Escape Rooms operating across the country, serial killers have been noticing a steady increase in amateur puzzle solvers ending up in their inhumane contraptions.

“Normally you get at most one keener per group. You know it right away by how their eyes light up when the creepy puppet asks if they want to play a game,” said John, while sharping bear-traps in his home office. He says you normally try to pick them off first since they are never gonna learn whatever twisted moral you are trying to instill.

“They're hopeless,” he sighs.

Laurie, on the other hand, is proud of her friends performance. She thought they communicated well, didn't get distracted by the spooky set dressing, and Derek was on fire solving the ciphers.
“He's probably the reason I escaped in record time. I'm going to miss him too.”

John, to his credit, isn't giving up.

“I'll just keep at it, but it is a waste of my time that could have been spent torturing a drug addict into being my disciple.”

He gives the advice that if an assailant wearing a pig-mask runs at you from out of a dark corner to scream, “I love Escape Rooms!” to save both the killer and yourself a lot of time and hassle.

I (M27) feel my girlfriend (F25) is spending too much time with our roommate (M157 deceased)

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Relationship Advice

I want to open by making it clear I'm not the “jealous type” if you know what I mean. My girlfriend and I have been dating for two years. We both have friends of the opposite sex that we spend time alone with and we both have exes that we are friendly with and who are still in our circle of friends. I would never get jealous about that kind of stuff and, honestly, think that's what's healthy. But ever since we moved in together into a haunted Victorian manor, she has been spending all her time with Horace, the ghost of a colonial era law clerk who was murdered in our guest room in 1889.

To be clear, we didn't know it was haunted when we moved in. We just knew it was historical, part of a conservation district which was a real perk for us. We even paid the full asking price just to make sure we weren't outbid. Once she had seen the solarium and I had seen the antique dumb-waiter, we told both our realtor and the wizened groundskeeper ranting about a curse that we simply had to have it.

But after we moved in my girlfriend became cold. Not with me, just when she was standing in certain spots in otherwise warm rooms. She was moody though. She kept blaming me for making messes, scattering books around, stacking chairs, getting bloodstains on the wallpaper. I wasn't even home when those happened. It's like she doesn't trust me anymore. Just when the tension between us was coming to a head, we meet Horace.

He was standing motionless at the end of our bed in the middle of the night, lit only by a pale glow that shone from within. The light woke me up. Rude, right? He was just pointing at us, mouth open in a silent scream. My girlfriend was staring at him, but when I got out of bed to kindly escort him out, he vanished. My girlfriend was mad at me! “Why'd you have to scare him away?!” she said. She looks at me like I'm the asshole. I'm sorry, I don't like strange men appearing in my bedroom and pointing at me in the middle of the night. I don't think that's unreasonable.

After that, suddenly she's obsessed with this guy. She's buying all this expensive equipment to impress him like a thermal camera, an microphone, PK and EMF meters. All together it put us back like a grand. We were supposed to be saving money. We'd just bought a house and we promised we'd discuss major purchases. But she doesn't talk to me at all anymore. She spends all her time listening Horace's static filled podcast. Sorry, not a podcast: “Electronic voice phenomenon.” I don't see what the difference is. It's just him talking for hours about his life, murder, and afterlife. I'm pretty sure I even heard an ad for Squarespace once, but she told me I was being ridiculous.

But how am I supposed to feel. He's all she talks about now. She just keeps going on about how he was killed by a cabal of powerful politicians and business men called the Family Compact after he tried to expose their corruption and since their descendants still hold power over the city today, his soul can't rest. My girlfriend thinks he's noble, but so what? I donate to charity. It's basically the same thing. Plus, Horace is from the 1800's, so he's probably a racist. Not so noble then after all.

Maybe I'm just feeling under-appreciated. Maybe nothing is going on between them, but they are spending a lot of time together working on settling his unfinished business. Well don't we have unfinished business of our own? We still haven't finished that Ted Bundy Docuseries we were watching together. I want to find out how it ends! The other day, I overheard her on the phone talking to a priest. I worried they might be about to elope.

Am I over reacting or do you think something is really going on between them?

-Haunted But Undaunted in Toronto


His Stalker's Painting Very Relatable to Art Critic

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Often, reviewing art is about peering into someone else's mind through the window of their paintings. This is exhilarating of course, but every once in a while you come across an artist who's work is so akin to your own thoughts and feelings, it's refreshing to feel like someone has gotten inside your head. As I view Lenard Schelp's latest collection in a small independent gallery on Queen West, I really feel like his work is speaking directly to me.

For example, when I view his landscape work, I feel like I'm transported to familiar places. His oil on canvas “Origins” makes me feel like I'm home at my family farm in New Brunswick, right down to red barn in the wheat field by the winding stream. The charcoal sketch of “Routine” captures the hustle and bustle of downtown Toronto so well, you'll swear it was sketched from the inside of the strange food truck that parks across from my paper's office every Wednesday but never opens to costumers. Finally, the small one foot square wood engraving entitled “Home” captures the restful feeling of being asleep in your own bed so well, I would swear it was carved by someone perched up in the tree outside my bedroom window. The one that was recently vandalized by some delinquent removing one foot square chunks of wood from the trunk.

The viewing is a small intimate affair. I arrived early so I could finish this review on my phone before the throngs of other art patrons overcrowd the place, but so far I am the only one here. Perhaps because the place was so hard to find, being located in a basement under an old warehouse located down an alleyway off a gravel parking lot. It would be hard to hear the trendy synth pop playing over the speakers from the street since the warehouse is right next to some train tracks. But I'm sure others will be showing up shortly.

In the back, I find Schelp's graffiti inspired collection. The art out front spoke to me metaphorically, but this does it much more directly. Deep crimson spray paint roughly scrawled on exposed brick with desperate commands like “Love Me!”, “Don't Leave Me” and “You Belong to Me.” I've still yet to see anyone one else, but I think I hear the footsteps of the artist approaching, ready to make his grand entrance.

Okay, I finally figured out what's going on and locked myself in the bathroom. Please send help before the artist's piece “Using An Axe To Get Through The Door” is complete. Though Schelp's art definitely invokes a visceral emotional response, it has too narrow an appeal for me to endorse it. I'd even call it self-indulgent. I give the collection 1 star, though I recommend that any police officers reading this review run, not walk, to see it.