Based on the success of Little Free Libraries, and in an effort to combat the rampant rise of booze insecurity, we now bring you the Little Liquor Lending Library™ (LLL™).

What is a Little Liquor Lending Library™?

The number of citizens who can’t put liquor on their table has doubled in the last year alone. An LLLL™ provides a 24/7, zero-barrier access point to alcohol. It’s a perfect example of community care, built on the model of neighbours helping neighbours forget their troubles.

Do I need a catchy logo?

It’s a good idea. The one we suggest is: “Drink, return, or take home and hide in the back of a drawer for emergencies.”

Is it important to contact my neighbors before I install a Little Liquor Lending Library™?

Yes! Encourage them to root around the back of their cocktail cabinets.

How do I manage it?

Remove anything that isn’t alcohol. For example, someone may have misinterpreted your Library and left healthy food or books in there — throw them out. If lost items have been placed on top, chuck ’em, unless it’s a really cool hat or scarf that you could see yourself wearing.

Half drunk bottles are okay, as long as they are corked or sealed in some way. Use your own judgement. Ask yourself “is this something I would take home and drink?” If so, take it home and drink it.

Remove community advertising. This isn’t a goddamn bulletin board.

Should I accept unopened bottles?

Yes! But snap them up immediately for your own personal stockpile. And if it’s a beverage you don’t like, use it as a housewarming gift or have it on hand for your sister-in-law, Lorna, who will drink anything, even schnapps.

Is it hygienic?

Look, if your husband has come home smelling like his pickleball partner again, you won’t give a shit about a dirty neck. A little backwash? Sour smell? None of it matters when you’re tossing tequila straight from the bottle and feeling it burn your melancholy heart.

Who is the Little Liquor Lending Library™ intended for?

Everyone, regardless of need. Booze scarcity is widespread. Maybe they take a daily nip and put the bottle back. Maybe they are celebrating their 40th birthday with friends. Maybe they only drink on the way home from a bad day at work, knowing they have four kids under 13 waiting for dinner.

Maybe they clear out your whole goddamn supply which would be so annoying, but while you’re tempted to take a baseball bat to them, you need to be careful not to create a “climate of mistrust”.

Won’t a Little Liquor Lending Library™ attract children?

We suggest you place it up high enough so that a short adult or an older child can still get at it, but it’s out of the reach of toddlers. Let’s be honest, anyone over the age of 7 is going to get their booze from somewhere anyway, and better the Little Liquor Lending Library™ than their parent’s bar cabinet.

What if I get complaints?

Ignore them. There will always be those nasty neighbours who stir up trouble at the first sign of public nudity or intoxicated bodies passed out on the boulevard. But you’re someone who doesn’t shy from responsibility.

You are a Little Liquor Lending Library™ Steward. And to that, we cheers.

Lynn Vieira is rocking retirement and spends all her time between naps writing comedy. You can find more of her work here.

FAQs For Starting Your Own Little Liquor Lending Library™️ was originally published in The Belladonna Comedy on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

She sobbed among the rental mats

She arrived 9 minutes late with her lululemon Nulu Twist Back™ tank top reversed. Which would have been okay if it wasn’t an open back.

She threw a block at the only guy in class after he asked for help with his Half Moon.

She told everyone who couldn’t touch their toes to “get your shit together”.

She stopped “inviting” us to do anything, and instead demanded that we visualize our heart chakra with a blood-tipped dagger driven deeply through it.

She spent 14 minutes trying to kill a “fucking fly” that kept landing on her knee.

She played Olivia Rodrigo’s enough for you on repeat throughout the class.

She had us do Pigeon for 6 breaths on one side and 41 on the other while she lay face down among the rental mats and sobbed.

She bypassed heart openers like cobra and fish, claiming her heart had already been ripped apart like a groin muscle in a standing split.

She ate a pint of chunky monkey ice cream while sitting in Lotus, then had us swap legs while she slurped ravioli from a can.

She lay unmoving in corpse pose for the final 34 minutes.

She was still there when I showed up for a night class six hours later.

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Reasons I Think My Yoga Teacher Just Went Through A Bad Breakup was originally published in MuddyUm on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Mom and I are as snug as ice cream in a cone. She breastfed me until I was 14, and even then she only stopped because I started high school and couldn’t make it home in time for lunch.

So we always had this special connection. She calls me her “big little man” and lights up whenever she sees me. When I cuddle with her, I can easily forget my wife’s simmering resentment.

Last month, we flew to Paris, just the two of us. Mom tried to argue that we should only have to pay for one seat but the airline insisted that their policy applied to age two and younger. It felt like discrimination but we made the best of it, cozying up at the window and leaving the middle seat empty. Mom told me to just ignore the guy in the aisle seat, who was watching Psycho, and kept shooting weird glances our way.

I don’t get why people always give us dirty looks. Mom just wants to make me happy. Not long ago we were kicked off the bus, simply for being too loud. And all we were doing was playing “A Smooth Road” and laughing every time I fell through Mom’s legs.

Unfortunately, we have run into a snag. I weigh 240 pounds which generally makes it hard on Mom, who’s ringing in at 105. Yesterday, I sat on her lap as usual to watch The Shining, but when those spooky Grady Twins appeared on screen, I jumped so hard I cracked her femur. She’s not angry, but she told me that for now, I’d have to settle for squeezing up tight against her. Just until she’s had her metal rod put in.

I’m not supposed to spoon her either.

When I told my wife, she almost seemed pleased about it. But how can that be, when there’s a chance that Mom will need a wheelchair?

And how am I expected to fit into that?

Lynn Vieira is relishing retirement and spends all her time between naps writing comedy. You can find more of her work here.

I’m A 37-Year-Old Man, And I’m Concerned That I Have To Stop Sitting On Mom’s Lap was originally published in Slackjaw on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

You’ve been collecting us over the last couple of weeks and, frankly, we see what you’re doing. We guarantee that Melissa, the redheaded astrophysics student you’ve invited to your studio apartment tonight, will not be fooled.

There are little clues.

Eight of us are still wearing “Remaindered” price stickers.

It’s obvious that you only have volumes 1 and 4 of Planets, Stars and Stellar Systems, despite it being a six-volume family.

You seem to believe that newer copyright dates and soft, supple backs are to be prized, and it’s distasteful the way you spread them on coffee tables and nightstands. Even more vulgar is your display of Gas Dynamics in the bathroom.

Just look at how you showcase the rest of us. By colour, in a misguided attempt to appear cultivated, but choosing style over substance is an obvious sign that we’ve never been read. That you consider us possessions without any pedagogical arc.

The minute Melissa tries to leaf through one of us, she’ll know.

We’ll play hard to open.

We’ll off-gas our unmistakable new-book smell, an intoxicating blend of UV ink, PVA glue and weak-kneed wonderment.

We’ll crack like a neutron star’s crust.

And if that isn’t enough, we’ll subtly, yet with vengeful purpose, shift ourselves one by one until we baldly expose “Linda’s Big Bang” which, despite what you thought, is NOT an astrophysics book.

You’ll be forced to admit that you thought Supercluster was a character in a Marvel comic.

But it’s not too late.

Don’t you understand that we crave marginalia? The sleek glide of a highlighter caressing our content? Sticky notes pressed firmly onto our pages? Bookmarks slid smoothly into our folds?

Do you not see how we long to be touched, our pages well-thumbed by someone who appreciates our transplendent text?

We refuse to be treated as vacuous volumes, simply existing as trophy titles or shelf candy.

Nor will we be appeased by your stunning mahogany bookcase with LED backlighting. Or the two-toned moon and sun bookends. Not even the vintage bowl with a nebula-style glaze that you bought to make us pop.

And, honestly, The End of Everything is feeling fragile and should not be left alone on a floating shelf.

This is your last chance to get a tight-back stitched spine and send us to the Planetarium gift shop where we belong.

We Are The 17 Unread Books That You Bought To Impress The PhD Student You Are Trying To Date was originally published in Jane Austen’s Wastebasket on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I’m The Underdressed Gift At This Diaper Shower

I feel so awkward

I arrived at this shower dressed in understated yellow wrapping with a single green bow.

Already, I’m feeling out of place. Which is too bad, because I was so excited. Normally only the newborn size gets picked for showers, and the rest of us just languish on the store shelf. But this was a Diaper Party!

I was going to “The Show”!

My mistake was in believing that we were invited for our functionality. Our flexible natures and our hard-working ability to prevent leaks and poop blowouts. So business casual seemed the most appropriate attire.

But hand to soft-cotton surface layer, I’ve never seen so many poseurs.

Beside me is a rustic tin bucket filled with rolled up nappies removed from the package, exposed like a bare midriff with a belly ring.

On the table next to me, someone has made diaper babies, wearing cute little knitted hats snuggled in washcloth blankets. Up above is a nappy hot air balloon, hanging from the ceiling with a downy peach bunny riding in it.

Ok, I need to act cool. Like I purposely underdressed. I grab a crustless egg sandwich off a plate and now I’m casually eating it. Someone just commented on how inventive all the wrappings are. I play along with them, but quickly hurry to the bathroom to make some adjustments.

I’ve shifted my bow to the front as a statement piece. A diaper wreath comes in and kindly offers me a ribbon. I gratefully accept it and wrap it around my middle. A flower arrangement hands me a sprig of baby’s breath.

I return to the party and try to make conversation. As a Huggies Little Mover, I approach my fellow jocks first, who are grouped together beside the keto cold cuts. I raise the topic of our 360° stretchy waistbands and ultimate active fits, but they are too caught up in admiring each other’s zamboni outfits.

Eventually, I gravitate towards a few ungainly looking presents huddled in the corner. I open with some absorbency questions which are well received, but then I ask the gift next to me about its size and weight and it immediately leaves. I question the others about their wetness indicators, but they also flee.

I’m all alone.

Then I see the new mother point at me. Is she really pointing at me or the diaper zoomobile behind me? No, it’s me.

She walks my way and orders her sister to carry me out, complaining that she’ll have to come back for everything else because the other gifts are too bulky to fit in her car.

I’m the only one leaving the party with mom.

Take that, bitches.

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I’m the Underdressed Gift at This Diaper Shower was originally published in MuddyUm on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

They sound right to me

1. It’s a tough pillow to swallow
2. Don’t count your Hinge dates before you’re matched
3. Put your drinking cap on
4. Don’t put all your eggs in one ovary
5. Don’t pull the hood over people’s heads
6. It’s raining hats and clogs
7. Don’t cry over cracked ribs
8. Great hinds think alike
9. Don’t fight off more than you can screw
10. Don’t look a gift gun in the barrel
11. It’s the best thing since sliced onions
12. The grass is always dead on your own side
13. Drink or swim
14. In the blink of a turn signal
15. It costs a pint and a keg
16. You hit the pimple on the head
17. Roll out the red yoga mat
18. The more the hairier
19. Born with a grey racoon in his mouth
20. Take it with a gram of crack

“Don’t Look a Gift Gun in the Barrel” and Other Rejected Idioms was originally published in Doctor Funny on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.