This story begins on a crisp Autumn afternoon, when casually scrolling through Instagram, I get an ad for a sweater. But no, not just any sweater - it was something wonderful, unlike anything I have ever seen before. The colors were rich - indulging even - in a perfect balance of primary and secondary that only the greatest painters could dream of achieving. It was hip and trendy, one might even dare say cool, and the moment I laid eyes on it I had to have it. The culprit looked something like this:

Lost in the thralls of greed, I ventured on to the link, blissfully unaware of the fate that was about to befall me. If I had only known what awaited me on the other side, maybe today I could still click on links without a second thought. But, as they say, some scars never heal...

Off the bat, my reception should have lifted some red flags. I was greeted with banners, promotions, and the type of pop up ads IT guys have nightmares about. After thrashing about in this space for a few minutes, unsuccessful in my endeavor to clear all the garbage from my screen, I put my phone down and starting up my computer, redoubled my efforts.

It's just ads, I thought naively. All websites need some ads, after all, I reassured myself. As I typed in the URL into my search bar, double-checking that my adblocker was in good form, I began to feel a bead of sweat trickle down my neck. Maybe it was a sixth sense, a premonition, or maybe it was just the sketchy Chinese food I had for lunch that day - I'll never know. What I do know is that looking back, I should've jumped ship, and saved face while I still could.

Upon loading up the website, I was met with a lot less resistance. What little resistance was left was futile, for in a few clicks I had cleared the page of any threats. Finally, I was clear to purchase my dear, wonderful find - or so I thought. Looking at the page, I couldn't quite make sense of anything. It was almost as if staring too long at one thing made it disappear, fading like mist and being replaced by a similarly poorly made product. With growing anxiety I sought out the search bar, which was not only behind an internal link labeled "SERCH BAR", but hidden at the bottom of a seemingly blank page. I typed in key words like "RAMEN" and "SWEATER", even going as far as searching for "CHICKEN", but it was no avail. The closest I got was a small chew toy vaguely resembling a deformed chicken which, ironically, was out of stock. Darn.

Any normal person would have quit by now, but not me, no. I would have my Ramen sweatshirt, no matter the cost. I cracked my fingers, wiped my brow, and soldiered on with my search.

Looking back, I should have seen it right away. The Maze Runner, a popular teen fiction book written by James Dashner, was a lot more than I thought it was. All along, it was an allegory for the frustration of navigating a poorly built website, adapted to audiences in a less traumatic way. As I navigated this forsaken website, I felt my sanity quietly slip away, draining from my being and leaving a husk of a man, now filled with anger. Furiously I clicked through page after page of poorly catalogued items, often being redirected to the home site, to different merchandise, and sometimes even to an online tech support page. My efforts were futile.

I would like to say I gave up, that I didn't go on for more than five minutes, but I would be lying. Every minute that passed fueled my anger, replacing my adoration of this divine sweater with outright hate. There came a point in time where I wanted to find it out of spite, to prove to whatever heartless human created the website that I had beat his deranged prank. But, my moment of glory never arrived. Way past my boiling point I finally gave in, incoherently mumbling about UX/UI ignorance, realizing I had been navigating for days straight.