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People Share Their Craziest 'Glitch In The Matrix' Experiences

So that happened...

People Share Their Craziest 'Glitch In The Matrix' Experiences
Image by Ashutosh Goyal from Pixabay

Blue pill or red pill? That is the question. Everyday feels like a computer game gone awry, or like we're all stars in our versions of the Matrix films. Life too often feels unreal and like a virus is corrupting the download. We all have to be our own personal Neo. Déjà Vu or Matrix, the universe can be a tricky mistress.

Redditor u/mailseuuu wanted to discuss the times when life seemed a bit... off... by asking... Was there a moment wherein you thought it was a "glitch in the matrix"? What are your stories?

I've lost track of the amount of times I lost an item only to discover it in a place I KNOW I scoured earlier. Or who hasn't had a television restart once you've turned it off? How about hearing distant voices in the night? Just me? Let's see...

Vanished

Magic Vanish GIF by VPROGiphy

One time when I was like 8, I was rolling a toy plane (I distinctly remember it was an F117 stealth fighter) across my desk.

It rolled off my desk and just disappeared. I didn't lose it. It just disappeared. There was nowhere for it to go and I never found it again.

56Subject

The Shadow

I have a very visually distinctive necklace. Well one day. After I took it off just it disappeared . I looked and looked for it finally giving up and wrote my necklace off as lost forever.

A few weeks later I was dusting the ceiling fan when I noticed a shadow in the light globe. So I undone the globe from off the fan. Thinking the shadow was maybe a bug. No bug. The shadow was my necklace.

Bunnystrawbery

DOOM

I preordered the special edition of Doom 3 and it came with a little pewter figurine of one of the monsters in the game. I accidentally knocked it off my desk and never heard it hit the ground, never saw it again. My room was carpeted so like, there's a chance I might not have heard the sound it made, but I looked freaking everywhere for it and could never find it. I lived in that room for four years after that, constantly rearranging and moving around, never saw it. And there was nothing under the desk it could've fallen into either. So weird.

HealthyWinter69

On Loop

Oh My God Omg GIF by BarryGiphy

Ejected the CD and the music kept going. Four of us in the car were like "we are dead, this is limbo, what is going on".

tobeofuse

They... just... disappear...

I have a desk that glitches all the time. Whenever I eat on it and I spill a piece of my food, the piece just freaking disappears. It happened to me 3 times this week already.

I call it the "quantum table".

The spilled pieces are quite large (meat, or vegetables). They don't fall to the ground (I've checked hundreds of times). They're not beneath it either (it's a simple table, it has nothing underneath like drawers). They... just... disappear. That amount of spilled food should pile up somewhere! But they are just gone. Forever.

ICWiener6666

Damn Cats

When I wear necklaces I have a tendencies to spin the pendant when I'm stressed. I remember one day I was rapidly spinning a necklace on my way to one of my classes and the pendant flew off. I didn't bother to look for it. I had to get to class and luckily it was a relatively cheap piece of jewelry.

A few months later I move about 1.5 hours away to a new town. About a year into being there, I come home and what do I see sitting on my bed? My pendant. My then gf said she found one of the cats playing with it by the stove and figured it had been knocked under there and they dug it out. But... how?

TheRealGongoozler

See now I knew I wasn't alone. We all have moments that seem like their part of either a ghostly experience or we're all characters in a real life "Truman Show." And I'm not sure that's how I want to become famous.

Huntsville Tales

We visited the spaceflight center in Huntsville a few years ago and I got an A-12 (looks like the SR-71) coffee cup. I started drinking coffee in it every day and for more than a year, everything was normal. I wake up, go pour coffee, drink it downstairs, wash it, then go back to work in my office upstairs.

Sometimes, I get a second cup of coffee and bring it up to my office and then bring it down when I'm done to wash and reset for the next day.

On May 1 of last year, I forgot to bring it back downstairs from my office. Next morning, I wake up and go downstairs to have a cup of coffee like usual in my A-12 cup I got from the Space & Rocketry Center in Huntsville, AL. When I'm done, I wash it and put it away and go upstairs to start work...

...and there's the cup from the day before with an inch of cold coffee in it.

I bring it downstairs, trying to figure out what's going on and the one I just used is still sitting in the drying rack.

I now have two A-12 coffee cups. In the months since, they've both picked up a little bit of their own character, but at the time I brought the original and its doppelcupper together, they had the same scuff marks and were in every way I could tell identical.

I don't have an explanation for how this happened. I don't know how this cup somehow duplicated or why or how to do it again, but what I DO have... is two A-12 cups even though I only bought one.

Chairboy

The Drop

bunny rubbing GIFGiphy

My brother got a lucky rabbits foot keychain. I was tossing it in the air and catching it. One time it went up, but didn't come down. 30 years later I was working in the ceiling and found it on the heat duct that was covered by a drop ceiling.

DarrenEdwards

Which One are You?

There was a girl at a place I worked that I flirted with for a couple months. It was weird because she sometimes seemed a LOT more interested than others, like aggressively.

One day I finally got the nerve up to ask her out and she said yes.

So that weekend, I show up at her house to picker her up, and when the front door opens, there are two of them - twins!

Turns out they took turns working the job, and the one I asked out - not aggressive - was just as nervous as I was, so her sister was acting like a wing...girl (?) to encourage things to happen.

We all got a good laugh out of it, and I dated her for about a year. At work it was always funny to try and figure out who was actually working after that, although I did get better after we'd been dating for a bit.

JerkCircleton

Hannah

Season 15 Kiss GIF by The BacheloretteGiphy

I woke up in the morning and saw a trailer for a movie named Hannah. I was then scrolling through my Google calendar and saw it was my friend Hannah's birthday.

Later on in the night I had some friends come over and we were about to go to a bar, I ordered doordash and the delivery girl's name was Hannah. I went out that night and got a girl named Hannah's number who I dated for about 6 months. Nothing else came up the relationship but that was an extremely bizarre coincidence and follow-up circumstance. It made me really consider the matrix theory.

Ok_Process_9611

All the Coins

I had a quantum carpet in my room as a kid. I remember spilling a jar of change on my carpet a mix of all stuff pennies, dimes, quarters etc.

I found like... A handful of the coins and that's it.

Wasn't a shag carpet that could hide the coins, not like 50+ coins all rolled away out of sight or anything.. But they were just gone.

mergedloki

Tossed

I tossed my first cheapo mp3 player at my desk and it never landed. I figured I overshot somehow and it was in my closet. Nope. Not in any of my shoes, not somehow caught in a fold or pocket. Wasn't under the desk or anywhere else. It simply ceased to exist. Never did find it.

mountainmorticia

Roku Away

Mobile App Streaming GIF by RokuGiphy

My roku remote. i was asleep, it was like 7:00 am and i wake up, I don't see the remote. i assume it fell off the side of my bed near the wall, I check under, nope. not there. nothing. It was just gone. Had a hard time convincing my mom.

Nobody_Exciting

Just Roll

I once found a 20 sided dice (that I had lost a few years prior in America) in the middle of a desert in Israel.

It was the exact same dice as well. I remember because it was the same coloring and had the same scratched off number as well.

BW_Bird

I'm going to get my D&D group together to head off to Israel, I guess. We've collectively lost a bunch of dice.

fibericon

Go Fish

Years ago I lost a can of tuna. I took it out of the pantry to make a sandwich, but then decided to just have cereal, and put it back. Before I got the cereal I changed my mind again and took the can back out of the pantry and set it down. I had been craving tuna on toast with extra tomato and had bought it the evening before specifically to make that.

I get the can opener and the can was gone. I looked all over the kitchen and never found it. I even checked the pantry and sure enough I was missing a can. I had bought a certain number like 4 for a dollar or something. This was in the 90's.

FdgPgn

"abracadabra" 

I was maybe around 5 years old. Pretending to be a magician. I put a pen in this big activity book and waved my hands over it and said "abracadabra" to make the pen disappear. The pen literally disappeared. The bulge you would see of a pen being in a book was gone. Looked through the entire book. Look around the floor. Couldn't find it. Never found it. We moved out of that house when I was 11 and never found the pen.

yoyoyodinono

Trash Miracle

miracle GIFGiphy

I dropped a piece of A4 paper at work and it landed stood up on the short edge. It wasn't bent or folded, literally a fresh sheet of paper just standing all by itself.

Whats more, it happened twice whilst I was at that work place. Never seen it happen again.

PangolinMandolin

Fast Pass

I walked by my colleague who was having a conversation. The convo definitely continued after I passed. I walked another 150 meters, went up a staircase, and walked by a room. My colleague was in that room, talking to another person. I was shook. Later in the day I verified that I had indeed passed her.

I asked how she could have gotten past me and she just said "I'm a fast walker." You ain't THAT fast. She would have had to run up a different staircase, outpace me in the same hall but one floor above. I just didn't see how it happened.

UpsetFuture1974

I Awoke...

My bedroom at the time lead into the living room that you could see into the kitchen. We also had a bathroom that was directly off our room, in the corner. You couldn't get to it unless you were in our room.

I woke up one afternoon. I remember sitting up, checking my phone and lighting a cigarette.

I got out of bed, opened the bedroom door, walked into the living room to turn the thermostat up. I saw my ex in the kitchen fiddling around with the coffee pot. Then he started walking towards the back of the house, into the other bedroom. I said "Hey! You're up early." He looked at me, and kept on walking. I went back into our room and sat on the bed.

After a few minutes I called his name, and he opened the bathroom door and said "yeah?"

Apparently he was in the bathroom the whole time. I was very confused and super freaked out because I could have sworn I saw him in the kitchen. There's no way it was him if he was in the bathroom. It shook me up pretty bad.

Kitty_Britches

Dream Repeat

Occasionally I will fall asleep and dream at night and recognize the dream from when I was a very little kid (I'm 31) and basically pick up from where I left off. This has happened with 5 separate dreams now.

As in I'll dream I'm in a particular place doing a particular thing and remember inside the dream that I left off here when I was 6 and this is what happened before I reached this point.

Deswizard

Sometimes the Universe is sending messages we need to hear. And other times it's just playing tricks on us. Start taking notes of strange happenings. the coincidences add up.

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Our ancient ancestors had their own habits; some were strange and bewildering, others were nearly identical to those we practice today. Looking back through history, one might be surprised to find the daily lives of the ancients weren't so unrecognizable. But then again, there are still plenty of ancient habits that leave us scratching our heads.

1. Ground-Breaking Discovery

Recently, archaeologists working in Italy’s Caverna delle Arene Candide found a heap of rocks. Not exactly headline news, but these rocks had been carried up from a nearby beach and broken in a consistent, uniform fashion, and similar-sized pieces had been taken from each one. It appears that Neolithic Italians broke the rocks as a funerary rite—the rocks themselves may have represented lost loved ones, and breaking them symbolized the person dying.

2. Shake On It

person holding hands of another personPhoto by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

The tradition of greeting another person by shaking hands dates at least as far back as the Ancient Greeks. One column at the Acropolis even shows the Greek goddess of marriage, Hera, shaking hands with the Greek goddess of wisdom, Athena.

3. A Little Pick-Me-Up

Nowadays we have Viagra and Cialis, but Pliny the Elder suggested a bevy of ancient Roman aphrodisiacs that reads more like a witch’s shopping list than a doctor’s prescription. To put the pep back in your step, Pliny suggested the yolks of pigeon eggs, in honey, mixed with hog’s lard, or sparrows eggs, or a lizard drowned in one’s own urine. If that didn't work, you could always wear “the right testicle of a cock.” I’ll pause long enough for you to stop giggling.

4. For The Ladies

brown falcon on treePhoto by Photos By Beks on Unsplash

Got it out of your system? Ok, moving on: For ladies with low libido, Pliny advised ingesting a vulture’s tongue, or wearing a patch of wool soaked in bat’s blood on top of the head. It seems so obvious, doesn't it?

5. Just ’Browsing

Nothing made a Greek woman feel more attractive than having a thick, swarthy unibrow. To the Greeks, the unibrow signaled a combination of beauty and brains. Greek women would go to great lengths to get that perfect forehead mustache, lining their brows with kohl or soot, or even using tree resin to affix fake eyebrows made of goats’ hair to their foreheads.

6. Of Corset Was!

white and brown striped textilePhoto by Jamie Coupaud on Unsplash

You probably associate the fitted corset with those breathless Victorian women who, though they maintained their figure, looked constantly on the verge of fainting, but they weren't the first to wear them. The corset goes all the way back to the Ancient Minoan women of Crete, who wore similar restrictive bodices. The Minoan corsets were likely the first fitted garments ever worn.

7. To Be Taken With A Grain Of Salt

Popular superstition states that, if one should spill some salt, one can counteract the bad luck by throwing a pinch of salt over the shoulder. That practice actually goes all the way back to the ancient Assyrians. The superstition was passed on from them to the Egyptians, and then the Greeks, and the Romans, all the way to today.

8. Stairway To Heaven

an egyptian scene with a man offering a bowl to a womanPhoto by British Library on Unsplash

The same is true of walking under ladders—the Egyptians came up with that one. Because a ladder leaning against a wall formed a triangle, representative of the holy trinity of Egyptian gods, to walk through was considered sacrilegious. Naturally, that superstation lent itself perfectly to the early Christians. I always just thought it was because you're likely to get something dropped on you if you walk under a ladder.

9. As It Nappens

Just like the Spaniards with their customary siesta, the Ancient Greeks would insist on taking a quick mid-day nap throughout the summer. One 5th-century medical text advised that a brief nap around noon kept the body from “drying out.”

10. That Sucks!

In ancient Ireland, one showed submission to tribal kings by sucking their nipples. Bog-bodies (ancient remain found well-preserved by the chemicals in a bogs) have been found with slashed nipples, indicating that they had been driven from the throne.

11. Pour One Out

Even if you're completely out of touch, you’ve probably seen a rapper “pouring one out” in a music video. Feel free to pour one out in memory of Pac or Biggie, but you should know the practice actually began with the Ancient Egyptians, who first spilled their drinks as a tribute to their god of death, Osiris.

12. The Good Book

person's hand holding book pagePhoto by Rod Long on Unsplash

The practice of libations was continued by the Greeks. There is even mention of “pouring one out” in the Old Testament: Genesis 35:14 states “Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he had spoken with him [God], even a pillar of stone. He poured out a drink offering on it and poured oil on it.”

13. Beer For Breakfast

While the pharaohs had no shortage of delicacies to choose from—fruit and honey and wine and cured fish and all manner of roasted beasts—the Egyptian working class had a significantly shorter menu. The typical Egyptian breakfast consisted of bread, beer, and onions.

14. Sand Gets Everywhere

a group of people riding horses in a desertPhoto by Veronika Biró on Unsplash

And sand. Lots of sand. Keeping sand out of their food was a huge problem for Egyptians, and coupled with their rough, fibrous diet and the fact that they had no real culture of dental hygiene, it meant that Egyptians of modest means usually suffered severe dental issues.

15. Chickening Out

Roman navies always kept chickens on board their ships, but they never intended to eat the birds. Rather, the chickens were offered cake. If the chickens pecked the cake, the Romans were sure to have luck in their upcoming battle. One Roman admiral, furious that his chicken wouldn’t peck, shunned superstition by throwing his chicken overboard and declared, “If it won’t eat, it can drink instead!”

27. The Stash

green palm tree during sunsetPhoto by Kym MacKinnon on Unsplash

According to Herodotus, certain tribes to the east liked to throw bushels of marijuana on bonfires and enjoy a nice stone. As with a lot of stuff that Herodotus said, historians took this with a grain of salt, but in 2008 archaeologists discovered the tomb of a 2,700-year-old mummy in the Western Chinese province of Xinjiang.

In addition to the mummy—presumably, a shaman of the Yuehzi people—was nearly 800 grams of marijuana, worth about $8,000 to modern consumers. Also found in the tomb, a stack of Bob Marley records and a poster bearing the phrase “Legalize It.”

17. A Different Period

To cope with severe menstrual symptoms, Roman women used tampons soaked in opium, while Egyptian men were allowed—and even encouraged—to take time off work to care for their menstruating wives or daughters.

18. Don’t Sweat It

gray concrete building during daytimePhoto by Federico Di Dio photography on Unsplash

After a big day at the Colosseum, Roman fight-goers liked to celebrate the trip by buying souvenirs. Gladiator sweat was a favorite, as was lard from the animals who had been killed during the show. The sweat was mixed with olive oil and sold as a perfume. It was also considered a powerful aphrodisiac. I'll pass, thanks.

19. Decisions, Decisions

According to Herodotus, the rule of thumb among the Ancient Persians was if something was decided upon while drunk, all people involved must wait until they’ve sobered up, and decide again. Later writers added that, if something were decided while sober, the Persians would again put the decision under scrutiny by getting drunk and seeing if the idea held up. At least they covered all their bases!

20. Puking Party

girl in grey tank top holding purple flowerPhoto by Дмитрий Хрусталев-Григорьев on Unsplash

As everyone knows, the Romans loved to party, but of course one can only party so much. The idea of any Roman feast was to eat and drink as much as physically possible. When a Roman began to feel too full, or too drunk, it was socially acceptable, and even encouraged, to induce vomiting, thereby making room for more.

It should be said, however, that it's a misconception that they had special rooms called "vomitoria" for this purpose. Vomitoria did exist, but they were special passages in theaters or auditoria designed to efficiently allow many people to exit at once. The name comes from the Latin word vomo, which means "to spew forth."

21. No Pants Allowed

The Greeks and Romans had pants, they just didn’t wear them. The Greeks thought they looked silly, and the Romans considered them “for the barbarians,” since they were customarily worn by Germanic peoples to the north.

22. Spitting Image

man spitting waterPhoto by Asael Peña on Unsplash

It wouldn’t be unusual to see a Roman spit on himself; it was something they did any time they encountered a mentally ill person or someone with epilepsy. Not only were these traits undesirable, they were considered contagious as well. By spitting on himself, a Roman was protecting himself from the spread of a disease—an action that had no basis, even in Roman medicine, but remained a widely held superstition.

23. The Cure-All

For everything that spitting couldn’t cure, the Romans swore by "theriac." The compound, invented by Nero’s personal physician, was made of 64 different ingredients, including opium and viper flesh, and was said to cure everything from poisoning to plague. Theriac remained a common item in apothecaries and pharmaceutical shops well into the 19th century, because if nothing works anyway, you might as well eat some snake parts.

24. Ancient Times

grayscale photo of round analog clockPhoto by Timo C. Dinger on Unsplash

Punctual Romans carried around portable sundials, not unlike our more modern pocket watches. Each sundial came with specific instructions on how to use it based on one’s geographical coordinates and the season. But the Romans didn’t rely on a regular 60 minute hour like we do: rather, they followed the Egyptian example of keeping a 45 minute hour through the summer and a 75 minute hour in the winter. How could that not have confused people?

25. Fast Food

The Romans were a busy, on-the-go people, so it’s not surprising that, just like us moderns, they loved fast food. There were restaurants all over the Rome, many of them with windows that opened onto the street so customers could just order their food and go. I wonder if they had drive-thru windows for chariots?

17. Pompeiians Can’t Cook

brown and white concrete buildingPhoto by Yaopey Yong on Unsplash

There were more than 200 take-out restaurants in Pompeii alone. Taking dinner out was so common that many Pompeiian homes didn’t even have kitchens.

16. Vend Diagram

The Romans even had vending machines. Or at least they had the technology—the only known example, built by Roman-Egyptian inventor Hero of Alexander, was coin-operated and dispensed holy water.

28. Cone Heads

brown concrete statue of manPhoto by Tom Podmore on Unsplash

Long before the spray bottle was invented, the Egyptians developed a unique way to apply perfume. They wore tall cones of resin or ox fat on the top of their heads. The cones would be infused with aromatic oils and myrrh. As the balmy night wore on, the cones melted, leaving the Egyptians coated in fragrant oil. It was considered good hospitality to offer these cones to guests at a party.

29. The Best Part Of Waking Up…

Coffee came from Africa, tea from the far east. Neither seemed to have caught on among the Romans. Given the dearth of caffeinated beverages, the Romans began their mornings with a beverage made of goat feces and vinegar. I'll stick to my bean juice, thanks.

30. Just Do It

File:15-07-05-Schloß-Caputh-RalfR-N3S 1528.jpg - Wikimedia Commonscommons.wikimedia.org

According to Pliny the Elder (this guy again...), the goat dung and vinegar beverage was especially popular among chariot racers; it was kind of like an ancient version of Gatorade. The emperor Nero personally endorsed the drink, saying that it gave him extra strength.

31. Urine Luck

The Romans used human urine in industries like leather tanning, and some of these companies even paid a “urine tax” for the privilege. But that’s not all: Urine was used by the Romans as a laundry detergent, a fertilizer, and even as a mouthwash. Because, you know, nothing makes your mouth cleaner than...

32. A Brush With The Egyptians

blue and white plastic bottlePhoto by 莎莉 彭 on Unsplash

In this instance, at least, the Egyptians were centuries ahead of the Romans, and even ahead of pre-20th century Westerners. The Egyptians invented the toothbrush, and used it in conjunction with a toothpaste made of gum arabica, soot, and water that actually would have done an OK job.

33. Mint Condition

In fact, one 4th century Egyptian text offers a complete—though different—recipe for toothpaste: one drachma of rock salt, one drachma of iris flowers, 20 grains of pepper, and, of course, two drachmas of mint for kissably fresh breath. Hey, if it's not human urine, I'll take it!

34. Getting Around To It

man and woman statue under blue sky during daytimePhoto by Sergio García on Unsplash

Let’s talk about bad habits for a minute. Here in the modern world, many of us have trouble getting motivated—we tend to put off starting things, even if they’re important or good for us. But don't feel so bad, even our ancient ancestors struggled with procrastination.

Putting off crucial business was so common in Ancient Greece that the Greeks had a word for it: akrasia, “the state of acting against one’s own interest.”

35. So Stupid, It’s Smart

One Greek statesman discovered a trick to help him defeat akrasia: Demosthenes shaved one side of his head (seriously). Funny, but how does it help? Demosthenes reasoned—rightly, perhaps—that he would be less tempted to go outside if he knew people would make fun of his stupid haircut. Rather than risk the mockery and taunts of his fellow Athenians, he stayed home and studied. Something to remember next time you’ve got a big exam coming up.

36. Moldy Medicine

sliced bread on tablePhoto by Helena Yankovska on Unsplash

The Ancient Egyptians applied moldy bread crusts to burns. This practice has also been found in ancient Greek, Chinese, and Serbian cultures. While none of these ancient cultures had any way to know specifically, they did seem to intuit that the microbes and antibodies active in the mold were good for fighting off infections.

37. An Eyebrow Raising Habit

Eyebrows were important to the Ancient Egyptians, as well. The death of a household cat was a serious tragedy—the Egyptians literally worshipped the furry felines—and families would often demonstrate their grief by shaving their eyebrows off.

38. The Cat’s Pyjamas

Free Images : animal, monument, statue, cat, egypt, sculpture ...pxhere.com

Cats were idolized by the Egyptians because of their skill at killing vermin like rats and snakes, and because they also represented fertility. When a cat died, even the cat of a laborer, it was given a noble burial, mummified, and laid to rest surrounded by pots of milk and mummified mice. We should all be so lucky.

39. Pretty Disrespectful

The practice of mummifying cats was so common that, over the course of the 19th century, British industrialists were able to import nineteen tons of mummified kitties for use as fertilizer.

40. Not Monkeying Around

black monkey sitting on rock during daytimePhoto by Benjamin Ong on Unsplash

Cats weren’t the only pets loved by the Egyptians; they were also known to keep monkeys. Big monkeys. Really big monkeys, like baboons, in fact. Baboons don’t live in Egypt—they had to be imported to Egypt specifically—but their popularity led them to develop a wealth of cultural and religious significance to the Egyptian people, and one was considered lucky indeed to have one of the simians in their home.

41. The Hogs Of War

The Greeks and Romans employed an unlikely ally when they went to war: Because their rivals in the east typically employed elephants, the Greeks and Romans enlisted the help of war pigs, whose squeals terrified the giant beasts.

42. The Romans Treated Their Kids Like Garbage

a statue of a person holding a staffPhoto by Clemens van Lay on Unsplash

Roman families did have adoption practices—even Julius Caesar adopted his great-nephew Octavian, later known as Augustus—but it was mostly a way for the wealthy Roman elite to ensure they had an heir. For poorer families, unwanted children were often just left at the dump.

If those unwanted babies didn’t die, they were usually taken to be raised as slaves.