TOLEDO, OH — Describing himself as “probably at the top of my game right now,” local internet user Brandon Mills reported Tuesday that his self-esteem has reached unprecedented levels after successfully posting an eggplant emoji followed by a winking face beneath four unrelated news stories concerning prostitution.
Mills, 34, said the breakthrough came shortly after midnight while browsing local news from a desk surrounded by empty energy-drink cans, food wrappers and three computer monitors.
“I saw the first prostitution story and immediately knew what needed to be done,” Mills said. “Eggplant. Wink. Nobody else had gotten there yet.”
The comment received two likes.
Mills said the response provided a level of personal validation he had not experienced since receiving 11 upvotes on a 2023 comment reading “your mom.”
“I realized I still had it,” he said.
Over the next 47 minutes, Mills located three additional articles involving prostitution, escort services or vice enforcement and left the same two emojis beneath each.
He described the fourth posting as “probably my strongest work.”
“At that point it wasn’t even about me anymore,” Mills explained. “I had entered a flow state where all I could see where the laughs I was providing the community.”
Others confirmed Mills has recently appeared more confident.
“He came upstairs from the basement this morning and made eye contact with me,” said his mother, Brenda Mills. “I also noticed several Blue Bajas in the recycling so something definitely happened.”
Mills later updated his social-media biography to describe himself as a “digital creator,” though he acknowledged that his creative output currently consists primarily of eggplants, winking faces, the occasional peach and writing “would” beneath photographs of women he has never met.
Asked whether he worries his humor could someday become repetitive, Mills dismissed the concern.
“You have to understand your audience,” he said. “Everyone is thinking it, I’m just commenting what everyone is already thinking, that has staying power.”
At press time, Mills was coming up with some commentary around a story about Toledo’s favorite desserts. “I could go a lot of ways with it, I’m just deciding the toppings now,” Mills said.
