Greg "The Horror of Existence" Machlin
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gregmachlin.bsky.social
Greg "The Horror of Existence" Machlin
@gregmachlin.bsky.social
850 followers 1.1K following 1K posts
I write with VivaciousVandal. Won an Inevitable Fellowship for writers with disabilities. AFF Semifinalist 2025. Welcome to Bsky, or "Good Twitter," as I call it!
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gregmachlin.bsky.social
First you get down on your knees,
Fiddle with your rosaries,
Bow your head with great respect and
Genuflect, genuflect, genuflect
The pope speaks into a microphone. A frows of cardinals and media figures, all in black, bustle behind him.
November 23, 2025 at 7:22 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
1/2 WAYSIDE SCHOOL IS FALLING DOWN, by Louis Sachar. The meta-narrative games he plays blew my 10-year-old mind.

(In the first book, SIDEWAYS STORIES FROM WAYSIDE SCHOOL, Chapter 19 reads, in full: "There is no 19th story. There is no Miss Zarves. Sorry.")
The cover of the children's book WAYSIDE SCHOOL IS FALLING DOWN. A part of a brick building tilts at a forty-five degree angle. Through a large window, we can see three children floating and looking alarmed, along with a globe.
November 13, 2025 at 1:24 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
@vivaciousvandal.bsky.social has arrived at #AFF2025. Panels have been great so far! We have new *ideas* on how to pitch our current projects.
A white woman with short bleached hair wearing a neon sweater holds up two fingers, trying to do bunny ears on a white man with a skeptical smile in glasses.
October 23, 2025 at 10:58 PM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
A black cat with wide, bulging eyes is lounging on an orange couch, quite possibly insisting that everything it is saying is off the record.
October 21, 2025 at 7:11 PM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Photos from today’s LAUSD No Kings protest and march!
A white man in pink Godzilla shirt and baseball cap stands on a sidewalk and holds a cardboard sign that reads “Hey Donald, everyone’s laughing at you and no one likes you!” A black man at a protest smiles and wears a union army civil war uniform and holds a sign with the confederate flag on it and Donald trumps faced superimposed on the flag and the words “Benedict Donald.” A man holds a sign that reads “not a paid protester I hate Trump for free.”
October 19, 2025 at 3:19 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Currently it’s this big dumb shiny fellow. Garbodor!
Screenshot of a turquoise and gray blob with dumb adorable eyes from the mobile game Pokemon Go.
October 12, 2025 at 6:08 PM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Post a RANDOM PICTURE or else everything will go bad in September

but if you post the picture things will go GOOD in September
An old woman with glasses and a red cardigan sits on a couch in a seated position, asleep, in her living room. At least three frogs in lily pads float in front of her. The frog in the foreground holds a remote control and looks pleased. This image is from a picture book named Tuesday that won the Caldecott. The book has no words. The frogs are everywhere.
August 29, 2025 at 7:37 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Troll alert:

A more-clever-than-usual troll going by the name of "Myles Penfeld" is using a stolen photo of an upstate NY dentist. Block & report.
July 27, 2025 at 7:14 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
@myles-penfield.bsky.social

Is there a reason you're using a stolen photo of a dentist as your avatar? That's really weird.

Also, your name does not appear to have pub credits anywhere, let alone in the Times or the Atlantic.

Weirdness all around!
July 27, 2025 at 7:12 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
This book sounds fantastic, Charlie!

To paraphrase The Simpsons, "why is it when I heard the word "gayest" and the word "witch" I immediately thought of the word @vivaciousvandal.bsky.social?"
Still image of a Simpsons cartoon. Chalmers, a yellow-colored man in a blue suit, has an annoyed look on his face, standing on the roof of a school. Text on the image reads "why is it when I heard the word School and the word Exploded I immediately thought of the word Skinner!"
June 2, 2025 at 2:34 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Look, I know that these are all real band and musician names, but they *sound* made-up when you list them off in a commercial…

Portugal the Man! Peggy Gou! KHRUANGBIN!

(it's pronounced CRUNG-ga-bin.)
The words "Portugal. The Man" in large white text against a backdrop of a photo of a stage. The words "Peggy Gou" in large white text against a backdrop of a photo of a crowd. The words "Anderson Paak & the Free Nationals" in large white text against a backdrop of a photo of a crowd The word "Khruaungbin" whichis actually pronounced "CRUNG-guh-bin." In large blue text against a backdrop of a photo of a concert.
May 14, 2025 at 6:45 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
This was Aoife’s answer to the prompt in the very fun game “Ransom Note,” where you use magnetic poetry to create your answers. highly recommended!
A card reading “Summarize Greek mythology.” Below it, a magnetic board with four magnet words on it: “Man adventure. Avoid wife.”
March 17, 2025 at 5:35 PM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Aoife did me so I felt obligated to do them: Aoife-coded characters!
A woman with brown hair and a brown jacket points a large gun from a sniper position diagonally across the screen; this is Shaw from CBS's Person of Interest. Still image from animation of Marcelene from "Adventure Time." A young woman with long black hair plays guitar while a tree appears about to devour her. The young woman is a vampire. A young blonde girl wears a light aqua hoodie with a unicorn horn and a striped shirt. This is Angelica from the TV series Daybreak. A redheaded woman in a green sweater looks anxiously past the camera, outdoors. Behind her, in soft focus, is a pre-teen girl against a backdrop of large rocks. Aya Cash in the Apple series Wolf Like Me.
February 18, 2025 at 2:20 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Congrats to @cjhoke.bsky.social for co-writing SHRINKING season 2 episode 7!!

Literally my only issue with the ep is that there were no talking squirrels like there were in play she wrote.

I'M KIDDING it's a fantastic ep of a fantastic show.
December 4, 2024 at 2:29 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
That canceled TV show you'll never stop thinking about
Upbeat image of white man in green jacket and colllared shirt and tie next to Hispanic woman in the same outfit. Both are holding futuristic guns. The image is from the TV show The Middleman.
November 16, 2024 at 4:30 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
I've never seen DESPICABLE ME before and I'm already impressed. DAMN, movie! You go *hard*!
Sign reading "Bank of Evil" in large letters with smaller letters below, saying "formerly Lehman Brothers." From Despicable Me.
November 14, 2024 at 8:35 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
One Perfect Shot:

CONCLAVE (2024)
An animated Pope from Rick and Morty levitates and glows with energy in front of a diagonal arch.
September 20, 2024 at 7:28 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
I am #428,717. The first 10%!

i'm not the earliest of adopters, so sue me.
September 16, 2024 at 11:33 PM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
Why no, my writing partner is NOT a Miyazaki creature, they are a perfectly normal human--

EVERYONE ELSE: They're a Miyazaki creature.

ME: (sigh): They're a Miyazaki creature.
A female feature hunched over a laptop in a tent. Her large black floppy hat hides her face. Her body is covered by an aqua towel except for her hands.
September 16, 2024 at 4:07 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
I may have watched a little bit too much Interview with the Vampire because I just wrote this.
Half of a screenplay page: Greg's Apartment - Night. Greg looks out the window. Thoughtfully. Moodily. He's talking to an Interviewer. Greg (affected accent): I begged her to come back, of course. And she did. How could she not? We were writing partners. Interviewer: And then? Greg: Fights. Screaming. Scratching out each other's pages with venomous pens. We would hurl our laptops at each other. Also venomous. Interviewer: Really?! Greg turns away from window and drops the accent. Greg: Of course not! We were chill all the time! But Jesus Christ, if you want this to outsell Anne Rice, I gotta make it interesting somehow. Smash cut to black. Title Card: Interview with the Vamp-Writer.
September 9, 2024 at 5:21 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
I don't know if I mentioned this but Aoife (@vivaciousvandal.bsky.social) is very funny when they're high.
Text from Aoife: "I'm too dumb right now." Greg: "Yay high Aoife!" Aoife: "I like a baby who thinks it's night under a blanket." Aoife: "That's parrots." Aoife: "Never mind." Aoife: "Babies don't know what night is yet."
September 2, 2024 at 6:51 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
For anyone curious, the full context… doesn't make me look any better! 😅
Text exchange: "Right know [sic] they got off too easy. And you are very good at torture!" "ugh you are gonna make me hurt my babies again!" "But u love when I make u hurt the babies because I am not as good at hurting the babies." "That's going on bluesky you sicko."
August 28, 2024 at 6:35 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
6/ and a conclusion of the very lengthy list.
Obama raised taxes on the wealthy and cut them on the poor and middle class by expanding the earned-income tax credit and the child tax credit, causing a major and lasting effect on income inequality. It would consume too much space to list the smaller Obama achievements, but an abbreviated list includes nationalizing the student-loan industry, allowing gay people to serve openly in the military, expanding eligibility for overtime pay, cracking down on for-profit colleges, banning hidden credit-card fees, and the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act banning sex-based wage discrimination.
August 10, 2024 at 12:42 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
5/ Obama accomplishments, more:
With the Dodd-Frank law, Obama implemented sweeping reforms to ensure another financial crisis wouldn’t occur, creating higher capital requirements on systemically important firms, requiring investment firms to do what’s best for their customers, and founding a new agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, to protect people from scams, among other measures. And there was so much more. The administration enacted the largest green-energy-subsidy program in American history ($90 billion of the stimulus), bolstering a fledgling domestic wind sector and creating a solar industry virtually from scratch. Greenhouse-gas emissions declined, and the administration made landmark climate deals with China, slingshotting those agreements into the first global climate treaty. Obama raised taxes on the wealthy...
August 10, 2024 at 12:38 AM
gregmachlin.bsky.social
4/ Why doesn't Bsky have the ability to thread??
Obama accomplishments, the saving-the-auto-industry-part and the don't-falsely-blame-him for the Bush bailout part.
What people most remember about Obama’s record, other than Obamacare, is that he bailed out Wall Street. Except he didn’t. They’re remembering the bailout that occurred in October 2008 under the Bush administration. The “Obama bailout” has been repeated so often it has become canon in the public memory — for example, Semafor’s recent claim that “Barack Obama and his Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner bailed out the bottom lines of banks and financial institutions.” In truth, Obama’s main contribution to the Bush-era Wall Street bailout was to use the leftover funds to rescue the auto industry. The move not only saved the industry, its suppliers, and quite likely the entire upper Midwest from economic collapse, it also saved the U.S. government $100 billion in pension bailouts and health subsidies it would have had to shell out had it let Detroit go bankrupt.
August 10, 2024 at 12:37 AM