i go into old memories and give up inside them
- thursday, december 27th 2012, spenser madsen
sometime during the third week in january
i realize that i have to stop complaining so much
the circus is in town
and i am quietly sulking
in a tub of lukewarm water
drinking vodka and dr. pepper
All I can think as I walk up Kerri’s stairs, is of:
1) my skirt riding up,
2) the sweaty backs of my knees,
3) how the hairs back there might look like soggy vermicelli. Some Playschool project out of PVA or semen, whatever you have at home. Continue reading
As part of the Digital Writers’ Festival for 2015, we hosted an online discussion about confessional memoir – how anonymity and technology play together when it comes to confessional memoir writing. As part of the event, we asked the public to send us secret confessional flash memoir pieces for submission here. These are those pieces – the authors remain anonymous.
Thanks,
The Scum Team
Continue reading
I am sitting on the floor with a glass of wine, wondering where you are; what you might be doing and whom you might be with; fuming with jealousy and anger over imagined scenarios that get worse the longer I spend thinking about them. My glass is empty but I don’t see the point in filling it. Instead I drink straight from the bottle, staring down into its bottom as if it holds the answers to my problems. Really all it does is blend them into one, gigantic mutation of all of the things that cause me pain. I know that I am hurt, but I can no longer pinpoint exactly why. (And the carpet itches me.) Continue reading
Jan 1, 2pm. Brunswick: my living room. Period arrived today. Usually source of relief (? New Year’s resolution: stop forgetting condoms) but is today only source of extreme pain. Am too hungover for this shit. Spent first hours of year vomming kebab. Do not remember eating kebab. Must have eaten kebab? Identified in toilet bowl actual pieces of tomato. Will not eat tomato for long time. Continue reading
In January 2015, Alexander Bennetts acquired an annual pass to the Melbourne Star. Throughout the year, Alex will be sharing this gift with the readers of Scum via this very column. What lessons, if any, can be gleamed from the Victorian skies? Follow his journey to find out. Continue reading
From December 1st until December 24th, Scum writers will be building onto this growing story. Check in every day to watch it unfold! Continue reading
Hey all you Scumbags! Welcome to the beginning to the end of 2014!
So, some news: basically, when we started the ol’ Scum Machine, we didn’t really know…anything…about websites. Like…anything. At all. So, eventually we realised we’d need to one day change providers, and since our hosting is up, that time is now! No big deal, and you shouldn’t experience any severe Lack of Scum, but things might look a little funny for a while around here. Think of it as an adventure! Like Lord of the Rings! If on your travels around the site something looks really wrong to you, shoot us an email and we’ll check it out, but we’re already aware of most of the bugs and we’re in the process of sorting it 
But, hey, to make it up to you all, we’re bringing you the SCUM MAG ADVENTURE CALENDAR EXPERIENCE™ – meaning that we’ve harassed a bunch of our Scum writers and we’re forcing them to write for you/us! Every day of December from now until the 24th, one writer will add to a building story. Where will it take us? Mordor? Who knows!
Oh, and if you’re in Melbourne, we’re having a little Scum Christmas party on Thursday night. Come on over!
xoxo, Peter Jackson (JUST KIDDING IT’S ACTUALLY THE SCUM TEAM)
I brought you flowers but
they were from the supermarket, unlabeled,
and I couldn’t tell you what they were.
My life has not been extraordinary. I have not suffered outside the realms of the normal human experience. I have only been confronted by grief and loss as we all have or will, and I do not carry heartache with me. Instead, I keep it in a box on my bookshelf, and sometimes late at night when the window is open and the world has stopped its noises I open it. In the moonlight it shines. I cry and this is precious. Continue reading