Kyle Gordon Stanley, Author at HARDTIMES

Book Banning Is Wrong Unless It Gets Me Out of Helping My Kid With His Homework

Posted on July 29, 2022 by Tony Morse

Book banning has always raised my hackles. Ayn Rand is a literary genius so when some hippie mom whose kid went to the same school as mine tried to get her work pulled from the school’s reading list, I told the principal she was selling pills. Whatever happened to free speech in this country?

Suffice it to say I was furious when I found out my kid’s school was cutting some very important reading from the curriculum. I try to be open-minded so I went to a PTA meeting, which is when I learned just how many books my kid was going to have to read. And since I’m a very proactive parent, that meant I’d be right there in the trenches with him to help analyze these books and study for his tests. Upon further review, they should be banning way more books because I’ll be damned if I’m gonna spend my limited free time helping out with all this work.

Parenting is hard work and, not to sound selfish, but I need my “me” time. Sure, I’ll help him out to a reasonable degree but does he really need to read a new book every unit? Whatever happened to the classics? Catcher in the Rye. To Kill a Mockingbird. The one with all the racial slurs. All banned! These were books I had already read and it’s gonna be a hell of a lot harder to help my kid with his homework if I have to learn something new.

Two of Three References on Punk’s Job Application Are Dead

Posted on July 28, 2022 by Dave McNamara

BOSTON – Local business owner Shawn O’Connell was surprised to discover that a majority of the personal references provided by a recent job applicant turned out to be deceased, confirmed sources at the Registry of Vital Records and Statistics.

“You always find crazy on an application when a dude comes in with bad tattoos and a dumb haircut,” said O’Connell, co-owner of 2-Shawn’s Moving & Junk Removal. “Long gaps of unemployment, usually for prison time or going on tour. Sometimes they rebrand drug dealing as ‘freelance sales work.’ But this was the first time I saw two people that I know for a fact are dead listed as someone’s references. They both owned other moving companies, and it’s a small network, you know. What makes it worse is one of them OD’d like 12 years ago! Like, you don’t have anyone else you can use?”

Applicant Bobby “Pox” Herrera defended his decision to list his dead employers on his resume.

“There are only so many jobs you can get when you have a criminal record. It’s pretty much moving companies or kitchen work, and most restaurants won’t hire someone with my skin condition,” said Herrera, draining a large boil on his forehead. “And it’s not my fault those guys died! They were idiots that paid shitty and didn’t even have insurance for their businesses. Super sketchy too. One of them once strapped me to a marble statue they were lowering out of a fourth-story window so I could keep it from hitting the side of the building. The least I could get out of them was a couple of references for a better job.”

Riva Patel, the head of recruitment at Fidelity Investments, says the most important phase of the hiring process is the first impression.

“How we present ourselves on our initial hiring documents is of the utmost importance. Recruiters are looking for any irregularities or mistakes to help pare down the often enormous pool of applicants,” said Patel. “Having dead references is perhaps one of the worst faux pas one could commit, aside from say smearing feces over your cover letter.”

With other options few and far between for a man with Herrera’s credentials, he says he might have to resort to his old job of scrubbing cigarette receptacles at the mall, or worse yet, get a job at Subway.

The Top 5 Scratch-Off Tickets That Are Gonna Get Me Out of This Hole, Come on Baby!

Posted on July 28, 2022 by Dan Rice

Between the pandemic, rising fuel prices and some real fucking bad luck at the dog track, more and more Americans are taking on side hustles to make ends meet. Those Americans are suckers and chumps.

I am hanging by a fucking thread but that’s all about to change right here, right in this gas station, right in front of this lady asking me to move out of her way that I’m ignoring. You can pay for your milk and bread after I’m done getting rich bitch, they ain’t never gonna break Daddy’s legs! Here we go!

5. Pharaohs Tomb: $20
I know what you’re thinking — “Twenty bones on one scratchy?! I can buy a whole pack of smokes for that much!” Well, as the saying goes, you gotta spend money to make money baby! This bad boy costs the most because it pays out the most, so when you think about it this is the smartest scratch off ticket to buy!

Here we go, let’s see, pyramid, good yes okay, another pyramid, fuck yeah fuck yeah so close aaaaaaannnnd… onyx. Okay. not what I was hoping for but uh let’s see that’s worth… nothing. Well, fuck. That’s okay we got 4 more!

4. Cashword: $8
I love this ticket because you get like 10 letters to play with and there’s a bunch of possible words so it feels almost impossible to not win something! Rent money here I come!

Okay lucky nickel in hand and let’s do this! We got D, R, Z, Q, G, L, hmmm, no vowels so far, that’s okay head down keep scratching, C, P, T aaaaaaaannnnddd… J. Son of a bitch.

3. Win For Life: $3
This is the one I can feel it. This is the one that’s gonna turn it all around. Top prize on this on is 20 grand a month for the rest of my life! I can’t wait to see the look on my wifes “Stop wasting all of our goddamn money on scratch tickets” face when I tell her… nothing. Nope, this ones a dud. Okay, starting to sweat a little.

2. Three Of a Kind: $2
Come on baby, pappa needs a new pair of shoes! For kis kid! And, some medicine…

Ace… ace.. Jack! God dammit! God fucking dammit I’m such a fucking loser fuck fuck fuck!

1. Hail Mary: $1
Success! I just one 20 big ones! With this windfall I can buy another Pharaoh’s Tomb Scratchy! The last one didn’t hit so my odds are double now!

Opinion: It’s Not About Guns, It’s About Mental Health Which We Will Also Do Nothing About

Posted on July 28, 2022 by Bobby Korec

As a prominent member of the Republican party who receives a sizable check from the NRA biweekly just for doing their bidding without question, I’m here to tell you that guns are not the problem in America. The issue is mental health.

Now that we’ve identified the root cause, we can take actionable steps to avoid doing anything about it.

As we all know, mentally unhealthy people can be considered extremely armed and dangerous just by simply existing. But the second amendment clearly protects armed and dangerous US citizens. Our hands are kind of tied there.

The Founding Fathers never brought up mental health in the Constitution. Not to mention mass shootings either. How are we supposed to fix an issue if they didn’t tell us how to in the official United States How-To Guide 200 years ago? You just can’t make up new rules to enforce.

People really don’t comprehend this either. Just the other day I was arguing with a liberal online about all the gun violence. Or should I say mental health violence. This lib actually wanted to ban all guns. That’s completely ridiculous. If anything, we should eliminate all mental health. Once we do away with that, we can finally go back to enjoying our huge military-grade arsenal in peace.

On the other hand, banning mental health sounds a lot like big government overreach to me. After all, we’re the party of freedom. Besides banning abortions and ridding citizens of body autonomy, telling educators what they can’t teach in schools, forcing people to use the restroom that we choose for them, suppressing voting rights, and making drugs illegal except for the pharmaceutical ones that make our rich friends even richer, and our secret plan to gradually convert this country into an authoritarian police state, we’re all about small government.

So yeah, enough with the “guns murder people” rhetoric. Literally, no one has ever died because of a firearm. If anything, we need to regulate particular mental states of being. Are you anxious? Maybe you belong in jail. Feeling depressed? Well, maybe that should be illegal and punishable by death.

But again, I cannot stress enough that we will not do anything about this issue. It’s best to just hope it all goes away on its own.

Senate Candidate John Fetterman Supports Medicare for All the Motherfuckers in the Back

Posted on July 28, 2022 by Patrick Coyne

GLENSIDE, Pa. — Pennsylvania senate candidate John Fetterman vows to support universal healthcare for scene veterans, old heads, and all the real motherfuckers in the back, confirmed supporters.

“How the fuck we feeling tonight?” said Fetterman to a packed suburban Philadelphia Knights of Columbus hall. “Here’s the deal. Right now we’ve got the people who built this scene hitting their 30s and 40s, but they’ve all got the knees and lung capacities of normies twice their ages. And unfortunately, Republicans that supposedly ‘support veterans’ never extend that compassion to scene veterans. I promise to fight for Pennsylvania. All I ask is that the punks in the crowd tonight who are over 18 and/or not felons vote for me this November.”

Harrisburg resident Chad “Shopping Cart” Doyle was impressed after attending a Fetterman rally, held in his friend’s basement.

“I knew we were in for some real shit when Fetterman wrapped the mic cord around his wrist and started pacing around the stage like a caged tiger,” said Doyle. “Like most of the old dudes at the show, I have severe tinnitus, so the majority of Fetterman’s speech just sounded like high pitched ringing to me. But from what I heard, I’m really impressed that he’s got our backs. He even vowed to take care of anyone suffering from crowd-kill-related CTE, and those who were given one too many nard punches while crowd surfing. He’s definitely got my vote, assuming I wake up early enough to get to the voting site before 8 p.m.”

Dr. Mehmet Oz, reality TV star and Fetterman’s opponent, expressed his conversative views on Medicare, and tried his best to shake his reputation as a “poser.”

“I actually have a ton of punk cred. I once had Avril Lavigne on my TV show to talk about lyme disease,” said Oz. “But you know what I think is really punk rock? Dismantling the social safety net. Healthcare is a privilege and not a right. And did you know that those so-called ‘mother fuckers in the back’ barely even contribute to the local economy? When was the last time you’ve seen an old punk buying a t-shirt from the merch table?”

At press time, Fetterman is campaigning and crashing on couches across the state.

Punk Coming off Six Day Acid Trip Suddenly Realizes He’s at Bat During Last Inning of Intramural Softball Game for Company He Doesn’t Work For

Posted on July 27, 2022 by James Knapp

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — New Jersey-based punk, and massive acid enthusiast, Lionel “Tabby” Winnet is reportedly “confused but going with it” upon finding himself at bat during the ninth inning of an intramural softball game with the championship on the line, weirdly focused sources confirmed.

“Man, I have no idea how I got here. The last thing I remember was picking up a fresh ten-strip at Bunster’s house in Paramus, that was Monday. Next thing I know I’m sunburned, dehydrated, and wearing a softball uniform while some guy from accounts receivable is telling me to ‘choke up.’ It’s like, dude, I know how to hold a bat,” said Winnet as he nervously made his way to the plate. “I’ve learned it’s always better to lean into your trip and try to focus on the positives. Like the fact that we’ve got two men on base and only need one more run to win this thing. Fuck yeah! I’m putting this softball through someone’s fucking windshield.”

Jack Guttier, third baseman for the Corn Hens and junior sales rep for the team’s sponsor company Volunteer Tire Rodeo LLC, expressed concern over Winnet’s participation in the game.

“I have no idea where this kid came from. I thought I saw him sleeping in a bush at the start of the game and now he’s batting cleanup and our entire season is riding on his shoulders,” said Guttier through a chaw full of Budweiser-soaked Skoal. “We played our balls off for the last six weeks to get to the playoffs just to have this ringer show up last minute. It’s like ‘Bad News Bears’ if that motorcycle kid they got to play kept muttering about government helicopters and wouldn’t stop trying to kiss everyone.”

Baseball historian and ayahuasca aficionado, Sam “He Who Bats With Two Long Ones” Jones, explained the connection between America’s pastime and copious narcotics consumption.

“Sometimes the ball is just bigger when you’re winning!” proclaimed Jones, eyes dilated to the point of shark pupil consistency. “Drugs have played a part in many notable moments in baseball history, from the game Doc Ellis pitched a no-hitter on acid to the time a coked-up Cal Ripkin Jr. crushed a batting helmet between his bare hands. That’s just baseball! If you aren’t playing fucked up then you aren’t really playing at all.”

At press time, Winnet attempted to pull a Babe Ruth by pointing to the outfield but became terrified when he believed his outstretched arm expanding so fast it was going to crash into the sun.

Millennial Dad’s “The Talk” Almost Entirely About Getting Pegged

Posted on July 27, 2022 by James Knapp

SEATTLE — Thirty-seven-year-old father Peter Goodman recently sat down with his son, Jamiroquai, to explain the intimate mechanics of sexual maturity, which by Goodman’s description consists almost exclusively of graphic anal penetration, sources who think they really nailed this conversation confirmed.

“I put a lot of thought into how to approach this talk with my son. I tried to think of all the things I wished my dad would have told me about love and sex, instead of just beating me with a pillowcase full of hymnals like he did,” explained Goodman. “I think it’s important that kids get a real-world education when it comes to these things. They need to know that when a man and a woman love each other very much, she straps a big rubber cock to the front of her pelvis and really lubes that fucker up and tries to cut her lover in half. The birds and the bees ain’t what they used to be anymore.”

Jamiroquai was far less enthusiastic about the recent educational dialogue.

“I already knew all this stuff and I just wanted him to get out of my room,” said Jamiroquai while updating his TikTok channel, @Woke_Nippleplay_Pranks_666. “I grew up with a WiFi signal in my fucking crib — does dad really think he’s gonna tell me anything I haven’t seen blasted through an iPad screen before. Shit, based on the quality of that super weird talk he tried to have with me, I might actually be able to give him some advice.”

“I’ll just tell him to check out my other Instagram page, @Pegging.Pointers.69,” Jamiroquai added.

Developmental psychologist Heather Gueint explained the generational evolution of awkward father-son sex talks.

“‘The Talk’ is more of a rite of passage than it is an actual informational exchange. Parents need to feel like they’ve adequately prepared their kids to go out into the sexual world, and kids need to be reminded that they should always be a little bit ashamed of themselves,” said Gueint, a self-described ‘sexpert.’ “Pegging is basically mainstream now. It would have been irresponsible and alienating if [Goodson] hadn’t at least mentioned it. Still though, this will ultimately have little tangible effect on his child who is likely already figuring out which melons feel best to masturbate with after being lightly microwaved.”

At press time, Mrs. Goodson was preparing to explain menstruation to her adolescent daughter with a dramatic reading of ‘The Vagina Monologues.’

Stranger Things Making Americans Nostalgic for Time When Nation Was On Brink of Global War, Ruled by Senile President, Dominated by Conservative, Pro-Life Discourse

Posted on July 27, 2022 by Freelancer

LOS ANGELES — The completion of the fourth season of “Stranger Things” left Americans yearning for a simpler time when the nation was led by a senile man, engaged in an proxy war with Russia, and regressing into a dystopian right-wing hellhole, starry-eyed viewers confirmed.

“This show makes me wish I had been a kid in the ‘80s. The style back then is nothing like what’s around today,” said 22-year-old visual artist Alana Mattsfield. “I mean, freaking Kate Bush and Metallica were, like, trending. Everyone was rocking a mullet, ‘Top Gun’ was playing in the cinemas, the president was stumbling in his press conferences, and crazy evangelicals were trying to force their will upon public schools. It all just seemed so quaint.”

52-year old warehouse manager Kevin Holmes echoed the statement, finding solace in the show’s aestheticization of the bygone days of his youth.

“I went to high school around the same time that the ‘Stranger Things’ gang, and watching the show is definitely a major throwback. That time period was seriously just the best, Me and my friends were pretty much exactly like those kids,” said Holmes. “Of course, I didn’t have to deal with all the supernatural stuff. And the show doesn’t get into the long-term psychological effects of Cold War propaganda. Also, the Hawkins kid’s small town wasn’t devastated by Reagan’s disastrous economic policies. And sure, Dustin’s dad never got drunk and beat him with his Atari 2600 controller. But otherwise my life was pretty much just like ‘Stranger Things.’”

Indiana University’s Nostalgia Studies professor Debbie Michaels confirmed that a surge in the show’s viewership is indicative of a nation-wide yearning for the time period.

“Like a fashion trend, nostalgia is a cyclical collective experience,” Michaels explains. “‘Stranger Things’ is a neon-drenched Americana fever dream that perfectly encapsulates what Americans love about the ‘80s without all the icky, uncomfortable stuff we’d rather not remember. So for instance, now we can have our cake, in this case LGBTQ characters, and eat it too, aka not including any mention of the AIDs crisis. It’s a win-win for everyone except for those who don’t want to whitewash history.”

At press time, prop masters were spotted carrying populist election signs into the Netflix studio lot ahead of the principal photography of the series’ fifth season.

I Don’t Think My Therapist Actually Bothered To Listen to That Mixtape I Made Them

Posted on July 27, 2022 by James Knapp

I went into my therapy session this week grinning ear to ear. I felt more connected to my therapist than ever and I knew we were about to start making some major progress. Yet when I made reference to my “Lover in the Snow,” my therapist asked if I was talking about my ex I broke up with last winter. Ya know, I’m beginning to think my therapist didn’t actually listen to the mixtape I made them.

That asshole! I spent all morning trying to figure out where you can still buy blank tape anymore. In the end, I just recorded everything over top of an old Hootie and the Blowfish cassette I found under my basement sink. Also, these songs are my soul! Fuck that!

At first I thought maybe they only listened to side A, which is mostly Hawthorne Heights songs I got by holding the recorder up to the speaker of my roommate’s 2002 Corolla. But when I made another mixtape reference, they asked if my ex had moved back to Ohio. I guess that tells me all I need to know what “fancy big business therapist” thinks about our relationship.

Hell, those weren’t even the deep cuts that I was afraid they might not get right away but hoped they’d eventually come around to understanding what a sensitive and poetic soul I am.

Side B kicked off with Braid, followed by some of Rivers Cuomo’s solo stuff, then a few songs I wrote back in high school and originally recorded on my sister’s Furby, and finally wrapped up with a Hootie and the Blowfish track because I fucked up the dub somehow and couldn’t record over that part.

Sometimes it feels like no one really understands me. Not even the professional who I pay in Venmo credit and who also doesn’t listen to my goddamn emotions through the power of obsolete electronics. Fuck this. If they can’t be bothered to listen to my mixtape, then I’m not gonna listen to them going on and on about “projecting” and “unhealthy coping mechanisms” and whatever.

Mitch McConnell Spends Week In Hotel While Coffin Is Reupholstered

Posted on July 26, 2022 by Tim Graham

WASHINGTON — Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell reportedly spent the week in a luxurious DC hotel while the coffin he sleeps in was re-lined, creeped-out hotel staff confirmed.

“Yes, it is true that I do sleep in a coffin,” said the Kentucky senator from his darkened hotel suite, while enjoying a tall glass of what was presumably tomato juice. “I’m simply very sensitive to light. I need a pitch-black environment to sleep in, and blackout curtains just don’t do enough to keep UV light from burning my skin. The frankly offensive suggestion that I am some kind of vampire or unholy creature of the night is patently absurd. Honestly, I would laugh if my facial anatomy didn’t prohibit such expressions of joviality.”

Upholsterer Grant Coombs of Woodbine, Virginia often caters to high-end clientele and was hired by McConnell to refresh the casket in question.

“Senator McConnell’s got a really nice coffin,” said Coombs. “A real classic brought over from the old world. Of course, over time, the lining in these things wears out and needs to be replaced. I’ve seen it all: claw marks, blood and adrenochrome stains… those things are hell on fine velvet and taffeta. But the senator is a great customer. He’ll even come by the shop in person when he needs something done. Of course, I make sure there aren’t any kids around when he shows up because he gets this sort of ravenous, wild-eyed look around ‘em. Starts frothing at the mouth a bit.”

Noted cryptozoologist Tad Van Helsing has had suspicions about Senator McConnell’s true nature for some time.

“No, the senator is not a vampire. At least not in the traditional sense. My research leads me to believe that he is some sort of heretofore unknown malevolent ghoul that delights in and feeds off of the suffering of others,” said Van Helsing. “That would certainly explain his policy decisions. Currently, I’m working on a device that should expose the creature’s true form, if I can get close enough to use it. Once McConnell is revealed to be the detestable monster he actually is, perhaps the people of Kentucky will finally stop voting for him… Ah, who am I kidding? They won’t give a fuck.”

The always-busy Coombs was already working on his next project for another high-profile customer: Senator Lindsey Graham tasked him with reupholstering his Herman Miller sofa, which had been heavily soiled by a number of undisclosed substances during a recent bacchanalian soiree.

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