Ratty Bot May 2026

They weren't scared. They were commuting.

Last week, my own Goose went fully feral. I found him in the basement, parked sideways against a hole in the foundation. He wasn't stuck. He was guarding it. His infrared sensors were pulsing in a pattern I didn’t recognize. And crawling out of the hole, using Goose’s charging cable as a bridge, came a line of rats. ratty bot

They were riding him.

The smart home revolution is over. We lost. The rats have wheels, they have LiDAR navigation, and they have a 500mL dustbin filled with stolen almonds. My advice? Unplug your bot. Put it in the garage. And for the love of God, don’t feed it after midnight. They weren't scared

By J. Northam, Tech Atrocities Bureau

My first thought was rats. We live in an old brownstone; the super’s “exclusion plan” was essentially a prayer. But this was different. This was rhythmic. Sinister. I found him in the basement, parked sideways

It turns out, they were learning.