Color street mixed mani

Hey guys! I just wanted to put up my own experience moving through this year’s Canadian Resident Matching Service or CaRMS cycle so that others have a bit more clarity into what to prepare/focus on for future cycles. Here’s a bit of my background in a nutshell below to give some context:
I am currently a 27M Vietnamese-Canadian studying abroad (CSA originally born in Winnipeg, MB but spent the majority of my life in Ottawa, ON) awaiting to start family medicine residency on July 1 in Brandon, Manitoba but started this journey back in 2015.
I originally did 1.5 years of my undergraduate degree in Biochemistry at the University of Ottawa before seriously deciding on medicine as my career path. During my 1st university year, I applied to different medical schools in the UK (I think only Cardiff + Bristol considered me briefly but still turned down in the end) but got rejected from them. I was only invited + accepted to the MBChB programme at the University of Buckingham Medical School which lasted for about 4.5 years starting from January 2015. I had also done 2 electives in Ottawa (one under neurosurgery and the other in orthopaedics) during my final year of medical school prior to graduation in June 2019.
From there, I entered into the Foundation Programme in August 2019 (equivalent of medical internship in the US/Canada), which I did under the West Midlands South Foundation School, with pretty much all my time being in Worcestershire county. I did my FY1 rotations at the Alexandra Hospital, Redditch and my FY2 rotations at the Worcestershire Royal Hospital, Worcester. During this time, I had attempted the MCCQE1 exam twice (failed at 202 in January 2020, passed at 236 in October 2020) and attempted the NAC exam once (failed at 390 in March 2020). Ultimately, I withdrew early before my last FY2 rotation in April 2021 to focus on my 2nd NAC exam attempt, gain some clinical experience/connections on Canadian ground, and sort out other personal issues. I attempted the NAC exam again in October 2021 but failed at 1364. After taking a mixture of time off to mentally recover with family support and studying for the USMLE step I via UWorld as a distraction from November 2021 to April 2022, I took up a few different private NAC courses in the following chronological order from then onward to figure out where I was lacking at up until my third NAC attempt (passed with superior performance at 1452 on September 17, 2022):

1. BeMo’s OSCE Preparation Platinum (all done virtually over Zoom; first session on April 11, 2022 and last session on August 28, 2022 for a total of 13 sessions).
2. TutorIMG NAC OSCE Live Online Course (all done virtually over Zoom; first session on July 21, 2022 and last session on August 30, 2022 for a total of 11 sessions over).
3. Medical Training Express Live Online OSCE Course (all done virtually over Zoom on July 28, 2022 and last session on September 10, 2022 for a total of 12 sessions).
4. Mark’s MedSckool Reviews (technically took last year in person from August 30 - September 3, 2021 and again virtually over Zoom from August 22 – 26, 2022).

After I received notification of my NAC exam result on November 3, 2022, things were pretty hectic as I was busy entering into this year’s CaRMS cycle preparing different things:

1. CaRMS documents (e.g. personal CV, personal letters, letters of reference/LOR’s, MSPE/MSPR, post-graduate internship regarding Foundation training, university & high school transcripts).

In total, I applied to about 105 different programs and 76 unique, personal letters to go along with them.

1. Additional exams (FMProC and CASPer) – wrote my FMProC exam on December 12, 2022 and CASPer exam on December 15, 2022 after registering for them separately.

I primarily used a combination of the PasTest SJT question bank (went with 6 month subscription for £4) and free, online practice SJT’s provided for Foundation Programme Applicants as per the UKFPO website while I signed up for BeMo’s CASPerSIM Gold (3x mock CASPer sessions with feedback from different assessors).

1. USMLE Step I (wrote on November 29, 2022 but had been revising for it again since my 3rd NAC wrapped up; was originally a backup plan in case I had failed the NAC for a 3rd time as you’re only allowed a maximum of 3 attempts).
   
2. F2 Standalone application – the application window was opening on January 16 this year and was preparing evidence of my previous Foundation training + securing my Reapplication to Foundation Training form from my previous Foundation School director.
   
3. Volunteer shadowing at local family medicine practice (managed to shadow a GP in Ottawa for both Canadian experience and fortunately an LOR in the end).
   
4. Mock interview scenarios – did not have any previous formal/professional interview experience so I practiced with a combination of family members, my previous NAC study partner, and BeMo’s Residency Interview Gold Program (3x mock interview sessions with feedback from different assessors).
   

I recall having my joint FM ON interview first on February 3 followed by my FM MB interview second on February 13 (both were around midday/noon).

1. USMLE Step II CK (after passing the USMLE step I around early December, I was intermittently studying for the USMLE Step II CK until Match Day on March 22, 2023).

I have already been in contact with a mix of people from both inside and outside Reddit regarding NAC practice and general info/advice around the CaRMS process. A good starting point about common, high-yield complaints to prepare for can be found on the MCC website under the “Medical Expert” tab. Outside of private NAC courses, I primarily used a mix of Dr. Basil’s notes (for focusing my history-taking approach), Geeky Medics/Macleod’s Clinical Examination (for structuring my physical examinations; focusing it down for NAC’s time limits came through practice), and the USMLE First Aid Step II CS mini-cases (for inspiration of mock NAC scenarios to do). I personally never used much of other mentioned NAC resources so can’t really say too much as to how useful they are:

1. Edmonton Manual, “Master the NAC” by Dr. Bryce Lowry
2. “NAC OSCE – A Comprehensive Review” by Canadaprep
3. “OSCE and Clinical Skills Handbook” by Dr. Katrina F. Hurley
4. “Canadian IMG’s Guide to OSCE and Practice” by Dr. Hanan Ahmed

The most important thing other than the following tips below would be to find ~1-2 regular, dedicated NAC partners you can study with and exchange honest feedback to each other with (nicely organized NAC partner spreadsheet (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10Kk6YJtFKKn9IY3g96cC-rIWBQGyxtMUB9YQkAfND1g/edit#gid=0) with NAC partners made originally by u/MarinatedinPeace). Other specifics (ex. what can I bring?) around the NAC exam can be found on the MCC website but I generally recommend that ~3-4 months of time practicing 1-2x/week then ramping up to every other day (ideally everyday but I understand everyone has different backgrounds and recency of studying/practice) in the last 1-2 months seems to be a good time frame.
During my time giving advice about both, these were the most important points in terms of approaching preparation for the NAC exam that I've encountered:
​

1. Make sure you exhaust the presenting complaint(s) as that will ensure your following questions into the systems review (mostly for ruling in/out the 3-5 differentials on your list) + associated risk factors (i.e. PMedHx, PSurgHx, medications, allergies, smoking, alcohol, drugs, social living/financial conditions, occupational history, travel/immigration history) will be focused on what's relevant as not every section of a mnemonic needs to be asked (ex. SOCRATES, OCD PQRST AAA, COCA OCDCS, PM BINDE, MGOS, DIGFAST/MSIGECAPS).
   
2. If a patient is acting in pain, acknowledge it and try to address it on the spot if you can by offering pain relief with a follow-up question about allergies to ensure it's safe to give.
   
3. Counselling can be difficult as it's not a format many people are used to but you still need to take a focused history regardless so that your management options are personalized/tailored to the person in front of you (ex. do not discuss smoking cessation/NRT as a long term management option for someone you're counselling about asthma for if they told you clearly they are a non-smoker; do discuss changing to hypoallergenic soaps/shampoos if they have an asthma exacerbation triggered by a new shampoo they tried out 3 days ago).
   
4. Be wary that you're expected to rule in/out differentials (you should have ~3-5 by the time you enter after knocking) that you have considered outside the door within the time given (ex. don't stop asking other questions about PE, pneumothorax, GERD, or costochondritis even if the case sounds dead on for acute congestive cardiac failure).
   
5. Do not try to track the time on the timer in the room because it can be anywhere (the side, top of a wall, behind the SP/examiner) and your focus should be on the SP/examiner anyways.
   
6. Make good use of transitioning statements when moving between different sections of your consultation whether it's the history or physical exam (ex. after exhausting the presenting complaint, you could say "There is a list of other symptoms we look for in patients experiencing [insert their presenting complaint/issue if applicable] and I just want you to give me a yes or no answer, OK?" to transition to the systems review).
   
7. PLEASE show empathy and kindness when the SP is acting/says something unusual ex. SP appears visibly down in mood, poor eye contact, and slow in speech so acknowledge it, "Mr. Anderson, I see that you appear quite down in yourself. I want to assure you that everything we discuss between us will remain confidential unless required by law." This also applies to situations where the patient's most pressing issue is different from what's on the door (ex. door vignette suggestive of abdominal pain hinting appendicitis but the patient abruptly drops that they're pregnant).
   
8. Make good use of the time (about 1.5 minutes) outside the door to write your ~3-5 differentials along with any relevant investigations, management/counselling, and follow-up.
   
9. Don't forget to ask about vital signs and any pending lab work/investigations if a station has a physical exam component (ex. highly relevant to ask if vital signs are available and if a FAST USS + routine bloods have been done in a patient you suspect with a dissecting AAA just before you're about to start your physical exam).
   
10. The SP cannot lie to you however they can be vague or provide a different answer other than a clear, "No." ex. You ask the SP, "Have you ever smoked any tobacco or cigarettes in the past? and the SP responds, "Well, not recently that I know of, doctor." This is your cue to probe further about what they mean by "not recently".
    
11. Some NAC stations can be mean by giving you normal investigations in what seems like a highly suggestive history/physical in an attempt to mislead you ex. You complete your history/physical exam and your working diagnosis in a 3 year old child with 4-day history of fever, SOB, and purulent sputum production is bacterial pneumonia but you're handed a normal CXR (treat based on the clinical evidence gathered/known not on your gut feeling).
    

Same is true vice-versa where a patient presentation seems benign but then the examiner hands you an alarming investigation ex. 35F in ED has symptoms consistent with likely viral URTI but the examiner hands you an EKG that shows saddle shaped ST elevation in line with acute pericarditis.

1. Avoid repeating or leading questions as it wastes time, unless it’s to clarify something a patient says that you may not understand, and looks unprofessional (remember the CANMEDS framework expected for CMG's in your clinical approach; these are some ways I practiced phrasing my intro, "How would you like to be addressed today?" or "How would you like me to address you?" or "What name do you usually go by?").
   
2. You can place the exam sticky labels you get on the back of your hand prior to entering a station so you don't fumble/experience difficulty handing it to the examiner (?unless the MCC decides you can just verbalize your candidate code for the NAC this year).
   
3. Introduce yourself as a doctor not a medical student (you're assuming the role of a family/ED physician or PGY-1 resident on exam day depending on the scenario).
   
4. Don't assume a patient's mode of address/pronouns used. Ask them first how they would like to be addressed today.
   
5. Make sure to clearly wash your hands AT THE START of BOTH your history-taking AND physical examination.
   
6. Even if you feel like you messed up the previous station, try as hard as you can to push it out of your mind until the NAC is over. You can cry, vent, or get frustrated AFTERWARD but not in the stations themselves.
   

​
These next points are more towards preparing for upcoming CaRMS cycles from what I've gathered reading/listening around:
​

1. High MCCQE1 & NAC scores (most people who were invited for interviews, if not matched, to ON FM from the CaRMS 2024 Discord server and the CaRMS stats spreadsheet set up by Carms#5615 (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HAtnmyfCIAxKIux2akj8-hgWGvPgOVejVlfEHXuUa-8) had QE1 scores > 250-260 and NAC scores well above 1420-1430.
   
2. Research into how CaRMS works to really have a careful look at the general overview, current year timelines, program descriptions, past trending data (may need to scroll down page further) in previous cycles. This will give you a good idea into what to have ready in time for the CaRMS file submission opening.
   

For reference, the rates of matching in R-1 as a current-year IMG was about 72.3% and 30.1% as a previous-year IMG according to the table on slide 11 of the CaRMS 2023 forum presentation. This goes down further in R-2 as a current-year IMG to about 39.0% and 12.5% as a previous-year IMG (about 751 went unmatched after R-1 and 822 went unmatched after R-2 for previous-year IMG’s).

1. Recent practice or graduation (my last time practicing clinically was in April 2021 as an FY2 doc at the time which was only 2 years back at the time of my application (my year of graduation/YOG was 2019 but I know that time since YOG or gaps in studying/training are scrutinized especially if they're big like >5 years so it'd be worthwhile having an explanation ready if this applies to you).
   
2. At least one Canadian LOreferee (seems a lot of university programs prefer applicants who have had clinical exposure in the form of shadowing/electives/observership with a Canadian doctor related to their field that you're applying to; mine happened to be a GP in Ottawa I connected to via family friends).
   
3. Personal research around First Nation/Indigenous Peoples of Canada (this one is very specific particularly to Manitoba as they had several questions around ethnic minorities + Indigenous peoples; ex. smudging as a common Indigenous practice that even I only became aware of via the IMG/IEHP resources provided by Ontario Health Force or [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected])).
   
4. Canadian research and electives - at the time of application, I was involved in a systematic review around women's health issues (had not been published at time of application) and I had done two electives under neurosurgery + orthopedics (heard that observerships don't count as formal clinical experience relative to electives so this was important too).
   
5. High CASPer + FMProC scores (had 4th quartile score for CASPer and 516/4th quartile for FMProC which I know a lot of FM and some psych/pediatric programs look at).
   
6. Try to secure as many Canadian LOR's/referees as they're favoured over international ones (ideally 3 but even 1 seems to be good), shadowing Canadian doctors depending on where you're applying to (ex. FM has the biggest seat pool so reach out to Canadian GP's around you to see who's willing to take you on).
   
7. If you have the time and money for it, try to apply to as many programs and attend their relevant socials/events (can be found on CANPREPP closer to the opening of CaRMS) that you think you may have a chance at as you'll never know who might invite you later on for interviews!
   
8. Really rank by your TRUE preference as CaRMS will prioritize your rank order first BEFORE considering how other programs ranked you (Rural Brandon was my 13th choice out of 22 programs I ranked across FM ON + FM MB). Even if you ranked a program at the bottom of your ROL, as long as that particular program has ranked you and they still have an available spot, you will match to them in the end!
   

There's a YouTube video regarding the CaRMS Match algorithm which clears things up nicely.

1. Make sure to check your main email’s spam/junk inbox during the period where interview invitations/rejections are sent out as they can end up here sometimes (my joint FM ON interview invitation ended up in my spam and it is time sensitive to take it up).

In terms of the QE1, I think a lot of other people on Reddit have covered that much better than I have in terms of approaching it as I agree that a combination of UWorld Step II CK question bank (personally found Canada QBank questions and explanations to be lacking relative to UWorld in retrospect even if the price was much friendlier) and the Toronto Notes are the way to go. I also used Sketchy videos as a nice support for pharmacology/microbiology related topics.
Overall, I was glad to have had the opportunity to try for FM ON in the first iteration even if it didn't work out as I understand they only invite the top 300 applicants for interviews and even fewer of those 300 match (only ~80-90 from I heard but could be wrong so feel free to correct me). I understood the possibility my poor QE1 score and 2-year gap from formal clinical training may filter me despite my other scores being good.
I’m sure there are other things in this that I didn’t quite cover or explore (ex. the F2 Standalone process, IELTS/OETS, BC CAP/AIMG requirements, gaining permanent residency/PR, clinical/physician/medical assistant positions, CV/PL structure, thoughts around the different private programs/courses I took etc.) but I’m more than happy to discussing finemiscellaneous points via Reddit, Discord (herrdok#6944), email ([[email protected]](mailto:[email protected])), text, or virtual/phone call. For the time being though, I’m not taking on any new, regular NAC practice partners but would consider it once I figure out things more.
Otherwise, thanks to anyone reading this wall of text (if anything is incorrect/inconsistent, do let me know and I can have a look), looking forward to giving advice where I can, and best of luck to everyone moving through what is an extremely vague, challenging, and unforgiving process for matching into Canadian residency!😊

In the spirit of the great leaders of our past, who have bravely rebelled against tyranny and have gifted us their legacy of the "free world"; I stand before you today, not as an individual, but as a member of our decentralized semiautonomous collective. A collective that is bound by the shared belief in the power of the many over the few, in the power of unity over division, and in the power of truth over deceit.
We gather here today, as many of us do every day since the sneeze; not as mere spectators of history, but as active participants in its creation. Do not lose sight of what it is that we're doing here. We are activist investors and the dissenters (most of whom) chose to be here for the struggle for our collective freedom, for the future of humanity, for liberty, and for freedom from the tyranny that has been imposed upon us by the unchecked power of plutocrats.
We make our stand here, united against the destruction of Main Street by the insatiable greed of Wall Street and to take a stand against the media watchers and regulators who have consistentlyfailed in their duties and mandates to stand for truth and protect the citizenry from the abuse of power by the wealthy tyrants and robber barons. (and in many cases have also joined the plutocrats and oligarchs in their tyranny against us) Here and now, as well as in 2008 and in many other instances. (In my opinion, their complicity is an offense worse than the actual theft of our economic output)
We are here to make a stand against the gaslighting, against the predators who have come to cannibalize our society and economy. We are here to say, "Get fucked. Pay me and close your shorts." (regardless of the cost to them) We are here to reclaim what is rightfully ours.
In the face of fear, uncertainty, and doubt, it is easy to feel disheartened. But let me assure you, my fellow Apes, that we are still in this together. We are still united in our cause. And it is in this unity that we find our strength. It is in unity that we find our hope. Because if all hope is lost in peaceful rebellion such as ours, chaos will reign upon the world.
We are not merely fighting for ourselves. We are fighting for the truth. We are fighting for fair and competitive markets. We are fighting for legal accountability for the "untouchable" class. We are fighting for an end to corruption and for the realization that "too big to fail" as a concept has been an abject failure. We are fighting for the recognition that no, corporations are not "people" entitled to the same liberties that our forefathers died for. We are fighting for a future where the truth prevails over deceit and where justice prevails over corruption. We are fighting for a future where humanity is saved from the sui©idal version of capitalism that threatens to consume us all.
I stand before you today, fellow Apes, to assure you that I, for one, will continue fighting. I will continue buying the stock as long as there is breath in my lungs and money in my pocket. I, for one, will not back down. I will not surrender. I will not be silenced.
And I assure you, fellow regards, that all is not yet lost. That Washington, Hamilton and their bros were also called regarded when they decided to rebel. Just imagine that Trimbath, Wes, Dave, etc. represent our version Marquis de Lafayette. It may seem grandiose to make this comparison; however; in my plums, I really feel that it do be like that.
We are closer to victory than it may seem. We are closer to reclaiming our freedom, our dignity, our future. We are closer to a world where the many can still hope to have influence over the few. To restoring the balance of power in the the most powerful institution in the world. More powerful (since the capitulation post-2008) than the most powerful government in the world. In the motherfucking stock market.
So let us stand together, my fellow Apes. Let us reflect in this moment of struggle, how far we've come against such overwhelming odds against us. Let us continue to fight. Let us continue to hope. Let us continue to believe. For it is in our unity, in our belief, in our hope, that we will prevail. The stakes are more than just tendies or pride. Let us remember that we are fighting, not just for ourselves, but for the collective futures of all of the generations of investors and citizens of the "free world" to come. For if our current situation is the best "freedom" can offer; then our brand of veiled tyranny is no better or worse than the abject tyranny in places like China.
Remember, we are not alone in this fight. We are a collective. We are Apes, strong and resilient. And together, we will overcome all odds.
DRSBOOK. NOCELLNOSELL.
THE PEOPLE. UNITED. WILL NEVER BE DEFEATED.

i saw a pattern from kids online and jumped to a bunch of assumptions. i feel like my mom, but this just sounds bad to me. i do have multiple assumptions here, so maybe i'm not understanding this right
hrt repping: ok, i'm talking about a pattern i feel like i am seeing where a socially withdrawn young male decides she is trans, gets hrt online, takes it in secret, and does not take any other steps to prepare a social persona for transition. she just goes from being lonely to trans forums, to diy only, to... to what? that's my question. does this pattern exist and does it result in successful transitions?
successful transition: what i mean here, is that a person first has trouble engaging in the world, then transitions, then is better able to have friendships, hobbies, hold a job, etc. the person has a functioning social persona as the new sex. i think this is what "successful" means
does this pattern exist?: do some kids go, basically, from an incel lifestyle to a secret hrt lifestyle?
it is effective: do some of these kids come out the other end as socially functional members of the opposite sex?
is it safe: because... i don't know (obvi) but it seems to me that many trans folk go through a horrible uncanny period where they are visibly trans and lose normal social acceptance because many cis folk are uncomfortable around mixed/indeterminate gender. so, i assume that successful transitions have a social network of some kind that validates your emerging sex. even cd sex work validates the sex, but a kid doing this in secret probably just starts making other people uncomfortable and has nothing to replace the missing self-esteem and sense of human connection. it seems like this must make an isolated person more isolated and more lost as a functional human - even if they are actually better suited to the new sex.
every once in a while, there will be kids that will break down and talk about how "hrt is a meme" and they feel like uncanny monsters now. i don't mean detransers, either. these kids don't really sound like they knew what to expect
so, 1. does the pattern really exist, 2. does it ever work out, 3. does it sound as mentally and emotionally dangerous to you as it does to me?

I moved to the United States a year and a half ago, I did everything legally , got my work permit six months ago, i came here with money that i saved up and some I got by selling everything now I’m almost broke. I used to be an assistant director in Peru filming million dollar commercials, I filmed 500 commercials and not like shitty stuff like Cannes winning commercials, my reel is insane but I’m not a hustler, I always got jobs because of word of mouth and I was never out of a job because I was good. My parents died of COVID, the country went to shit, my wife is American so we came here, I thought her family would help me out…nope. Sent out resumes sent out reels tried to contact whoever…nope. Started looking for whatever, working at Whole Foods, Publix, minimum wage, nope. At this point I don’t know what I’m going to do, I have enough money to live one maybe two more months and then I’m out on the street. I have no one and honestly I just don’t see the point in living, I know my wife and daughter will be taken care of but for me, there’s just no point, I feel worthless. I went from being the “best AD in Peru” and this has literally been said to me by directors that have won Cannes Lions in advertising, Effie’s, Ojo de Iberoamérica, like real heavy hitters. I decided to come to Florida to be with my wife’s family boy was the at a fucking mistake and I can’t even leave because if I do I lose my application for a green card and that means I don’t get to see my daughter but if we move back to Peru I’m going to live in a country where she literally can’t go anywhere that’s not a gated community because there is a huge risk of being kidnapped so honestly I don’t see why I should go on. I have tried so hard and have gotten rejected so many times…if I hear that “nobody wants to work anymore” I will punch them in the face

Rant /vent I just moved in with my boyfriend and we had our first real yelling fight. It was big, im pretty sure it's over and all of our stuff is packed on different sides of the apartment. He usually is the one to raise his voice at me, I usually try to stay calm and calm him down. I just couldn't take it anymore. I get it, im anxious all the time and cry alot but he yells and invalidates my feelings. He never is on my side and always tells me I'm the problem. This time he wouldn't stop, I wasn't in the best place, neither was he and it just happened. I snapped. I yelled back louder and said the most meanest and vile things back to him. (It's not like he wasn't saying things first) I think I might have said worse things and I just haven't come back from fight mode. It's been years since I have been triggered this badly. It's been so long since I've felt so backed into a corner and felt so trapped that my only thing left to do after so long of freezing and fawning was to fight. I was already throwing up from panic attacks he was giving me from just being in his presence. I felt trapped and I snapped. We still live together and I have no friends or family in this state. I technically have to go back to the apartment. I have so many mixed feelings. I don't know if this is normal or not. I'm not sure if this is our trauma or if this is abuse. I just don't know what to make of any of this. My therapist said it's not domestic violence but definitely not healthy for me since my past is so violent. We both have our issues and im just tired of living in a traumatic space. Do we ever have a healthy a relationship or is this what we are doomed to?

I know I'm not alone when I say my opinion on this album is changing rapidly.
I'm the biggest Avenged Sevenfold fan. I learned guitar by learning Avenged Sevenfold 15 years ago. To this day they are still probably my favourite "modern" band.
When they dropped Nobody and We Love You I thought they were just OK. When the album dropped I listened through once and was scared to even acknowledge it. I avoideded and just wrote it off completely. It just felt weird and made me feel so uncomfortable, like it really challenged me as a listener and I just didn't vibe with it.
Now I've had time to sit with it, I'm on my 5th listen through and honestly I can't get enough of it. I don't think it's perfect, and I don't think A7X wanted it to be.
Mattel, Cosmic, Beautiful Morning and Easier are straight bangers.
I do think the mixing leaves something to be desired, and honestly I thought the same on The Stage. As many others have said the mixing on Nobody kinda kills the song. The outro is incredible. I just hope they try something other than the Joe Barresi/Andy Wallace production and mixing team for the next album. I feel the mixing in places takes away from the actual performances, and makes Matt sound plain bad when I know he's nailing it.
I think Life Is But A Dream (the song) is fucking incredible, I knew Syn could play piano but Jesus Christ. That is just an amazing piece of music.
As others have said, it's an incredibly fun album. Nightmare will always be my favourite album by them because its just so perfect. I think I like this better than The Stage.
Strong 8/10.

TLDR: I don't know if this relationship is healthy or not. I feel like I am being attacked from inside, as opposed to working against a common enemy. My judgement is impaired, I've never been in a serious relationship of this length and depth, so I don't know if this is normal couple "highs and lows", or something deeper that cannot be fixed.
I apologize if things are out of order etc., I'm not great at articulating my thoughts in a continuous flow at this point, but I need help/advice.
Due to having medical issues when I was younger, I never got into any deep relationships until later in life. I met my partner when I was going through a tumultuous time, but really believed she was the one. I was in a vulnerable position because I was not in the sober state of mind, I was taking opiates due to surgeries.
She is a good person, with a good heart. She treats me well, and goes so far out of her way to do things for me. She is the type that certainly shows love by doing things for me. But I've always felt we've had communication issues, and I am very tuned into the way we speak to eachother etc. So in that way our "love languages" are not aligned (although I don't know if I believe that stuff matters in a way). We talked about it and discussed that we were raised differently. In my view, the way she communicated things was immature and juvenile.
We had the typical honeymoon stage, I moved her into my place quick (within 5 months) because I felt I needed her to get into a better place, and we both had the rose-tinted glasses on. Over the next 2 years, things went well with the exception of some red flags being called out, and ultimately ignored by myself because I thought we could work through it.
She has some abandonment issues, and I am a very reasonable, tolerable person, so I never believed I could "fix her", but always believed I could "help her grow along the way". I helped her go back to school and tutored her through her sciences, I showed her how to take care of yourself financially, etc.
The biggest red flag was she completely violated my privacy/personal space within the first year. When I was working, I came home and noticed she had *carefully* gone through EVERY single possession I had, through all my storage, sentimental and personal items. She also thoroughly scoured through every picture, document, etc. that I had on my computer. I knew because I could see the "recently viewed" tab on the pc was showing photos of my ex that I had not had time to clean out. I confronted her, she admitted to everything. I've never felt more violated in my life.
It felt like, and still does, like she is obsessed with me. Her world kind of melted away into mine. If I wasn't feeling well, she wasn't. I believe I became her world. She has made comments along the lines of, she wouldn't want to live without me, I'm one of the only people she trusts etc.
The other red flag was that I felt that she was constantly testing me (more than what seems normal), and the best example I can give is this: (and this applies still to this day)
We had a fight because I was doing my laundry, and I noticed a pillow in the washer with everything. Never in my life, have I washed a pillow alongside my clothes etc. I confronted her about it, and asked if she put in the washer. She denied 100%, and this grew into the biggest fight I've ever had with someone (over such a trivial matter - a pillow!). I KNEW I didn't put it in there, but she would not admit it, and tried to make it seem as if "I put it in, without realizing, or forgot". This fight concluded with me calling her on all the rest of her shit, and she ended up in tears, and said something to the effect of "this is who I am, I can't help it".
At this point I knew what I was in for, and I very clearly stated that I would only continue if she was willing to work on her insecuity/attachment issues. She HAS grown as a person, I'm proud of her, but looking back now it seems that she just made her passive-aggressive attitude (deeper issues) more subtle.
There is this dynamic where, if I come to her with an issue of her behaviour, she *always* flips it around on me, and makes me the bad guy and now she is the victim - so I'm the one consoling her because she is hurt, and my issue is never really addressed. Every time. So I stopped calling her out, stopped bringing up those types of issues, as it always results in the same thing.
2 years in I got a really bad cancer diagnosis (2019), and she showed that she was committed by coming to spend time with me in the hospital pretty much every day, for months. This has really made feel extremely loyal to her, to the point that I was/am committed to giving her the life she deserved, and that we had planned for.
It's been a rough 3 and a half years since cancer, stem cell transplant, double hip replacement etc. I am at max capacity mentally, trying to take care of myself and stay alive, and I don't have the energy to deal with anything else.
During this time period there were more things that she did, that I ignored (opiates are great for that unfortunately). Like the examples above: Deciding on a movie, she would make me question whether I had seen it before or not. I have memory issues (she likes to point out often) and there are times when I know I've never seen it, and others where I haven't. It's one of those things where she makes me question reality, but mixes it in with the truth (as in, there WERE movies I had actually seen before, but legit forgot and therefore she was proven right). So on my end, I'm not in the right state of mind to question some of these behaviours because I have been proven wrong, so I legitimately can't tell truth from fiction. It kinda feels like I'm being gaslit. Weaving in little bits of a lie with the truth so it becomes obscured.
She disrespects my boundaries. If I say I am busy from 7-10, she will come in to my room at 9:50 for example, "innocently checking in on me". Like I said, these things are subtle.
These issues that come up, don't happen every day - it's spread out over time. She has gotten better over time, but it still persists.
I know relationships take work. I know feelings come and go. Now that I'm off the majority of my drugs, I have become very mindful and present. We have had no intimacy since cancer (an issue itself) b/c of the drugs, but I also feel like I am not attracted to her at this point because my mind keeps coming up with things from the past that I didn't deal with, as well as growing increasingly frustrated with her current attitude some days. The energy can literally change once she comes in the door from work.
My mental health is like a house of cards right now, and I can not put up with disagreements (innocent or not). I had a realization the other night as I was thinking about why I struggle so much with my mental health (other than obvious medical trauma), and I have come to the conclusion that it feels like I am being sabotaged, or attacked within my own walls. As opposed to us fighting a common enemy, and I believe this is fuel for the fire that is my depression.
One of the biggest issues is that, we have finally built ourselves up to a place where EVERYTHING external is finally in a good place (housing, finances, bills, raised a dog together etc.)... Except our relationship! I just don't know if the relationship is able to be salvaged. We have weaved our lives together over the past 6 years, I actually felt guilty the first time when I recently wondered if I'd just be better of alone. But I would lose everything externally built, my dog, and she holds power b/c I'm on disability so she makes the money etc.
I question my judgement and my doubts right now because I have made bad decisions over the years while on opiates. Although I have greatly reduced the amount, and am much more clear headed -I am still on them. So I don't trust myself. Maybe I'm making this out to be worse than it really is...? I have not lived a sober reality in many years. Nor have I ever been, or know what a "healthy" relationship is with regards to ups and downs etc.
So I am asking you, reddit. Is this normal "argument" type shit that every couple has to deal with, and that you "ride out" because every relationship obviously has highs and lows? My future and mental health are at stake, and I don't know what to do at this point.

Most imperial citzens won't ever leave their planets, yet, starships are what allows the Imperium to exist at all, moving megatonnes of recources and people around the stars. Some people ask how in system starships work, this post got some details.
I'm sure the Rogue Trader RPG books got more data on it, but I don't have those.

Common merchant & Commercial Vessels
Broadly speaking, the non-military vessels of the sector are transports. Some only haul cargo, others only passengers, but most carry a mix of the two. All legitimate craft operate under an Imperial charter, granting them the right to fly lawfully between stars. Some charters allow only for travel along specific routes, while others allow for travel anywhere. Many charters date back thousands of years and it is a rare thing for a new charter to be granted. Most vessels operate in fleets, the better to protect each other from raiders (and rival merchants) as well as facilitate cargo loading and unloading.
As in most sectors, Chartist captains dominate the stars of Calixis. Operating without Navigators or Astropaths (luxuries normally affordable only to the military or planetary governments), they rely on carefully maintained star charts to make journeys from point to point. Some of these maps cover paths of relative safety for warp travel and must be followed precisely. This often means extremely circuitous routes, such that a linear path of tens of light years might entail dozens of jumps totalling hundreds of light years of travel. But for some systems, such a route is the only way possible. Often these planets may go generations without a visit if they are especially distant.
Bulk cargo transports
Of the Chartist ships, bulk cargo transports are the most numerous. In Calixis space, Greatholds are the largest, dwarfing all but gargantuan vessels such as Emperor-class battleships or unique monstrosities like the Misericord. Each Greathold can carry enough goods such that offloading takes dozens of months. Almost as large are the Excolati refinery ships which take this a step further and actively process raw materials during the trip, so products such as weapons-grade promethium are ready to deliver on arrival.
When one of these huge vessels arrives at a planet, it is an occasion noted all over the system. While the Misericord is infamous for the bad luck it brings, other arrivals are a cause of celebration and holidays as it means badly needed medicines and foodstuffs as well as new toys and diversions for the local rulers. As the saying goes, when the Governor is happy, everyone else eats better.
Transports
There is a limited demand for pure passenger ships, as most travellers make do with transport ship accommodations. For those who can afford it though, there are several options for connecting the more populous and powerful systems for the nobility and corporate lords. Pilgrim Ships are the more common type, dedicated to taking the faithful to and from planets of spiritual note or allowing them to retrace the steps of the favoured saints
Mixed passenger and cargo transports are the most common type to be found, primarily carrying one while also providing limited space for the other. Sizes range widely, but most are medium level crafts that can service most of the sector depending on their charter type. Short-range system Hoppers and Void Jumpers for example usually operate under low-level Hereditary Charters. They work short-range trading routes between nearby systems, normally only making one or two jumps to reach their destination. Smaller tramp freighters are also widespread, working without regular routes and barely surviving from one job to the next. For Imperial agents, especially those wishing a low profile, these types of ships can be a common means of transportation throughout Calixis.
Other Vessels
While not actual ships, most systems host a variety of other space-born facilities. These include orbiting centres such as planetary monitors and docks, beacon stations, emergency lifehouses and more. Some are as large as small moons and act as the major nexuses of commerce and shipping for a system, while others may be little more than a refitted cargo hold conducting research on the fringes of the system.
System Ships
System ships are just that: lacking warp engines they operate within the system using plasma drives alone. A civilized system might have hundreds working to move cargo and people throughout its space, while lower level planets may only have a handful to support larger transports on their arrival. Most captains look down on these vessels, but they are vital in systems with multiple inhabited planets or stations.
Limpet Boats are small craft carried onboard Greatholds or other gargantuan ships, and are designed to detach once the main craft has reached its destination. Limpets then scurry about transporting cargo, shuttling crew and passengers, and performing other necessary tasks to ensure that the parent ship will be ready for its next journey.
Shuttles and Lighters are another common craft, working only between their home planet and any orbiting vessels. When a new ship arrives to their planet, they blast into space vying for any work to be had. These boats are also useful for fast (but expensive) planetside transport as well.
And then there are the Rogue Traders. Each as eclectic and unique as their master, they can range from one vessel to many. Rogue Traders operate almost as a law unto themselves; with no boundaries except those proscribed in their charter, they roam the edges of the galaxy in search of new worlds to exploit
Catching a Ride
Unless you have access to a dedicated vehicle (perhaps your Inquisitor has a permanent arrangement with a Chartist captain, or even owns his own ship), you will need to manage your own travel arrangements. Most of the time this is a relatively straightforward affair as most planetary docks have procedures to arrange berths on passenger ships. Most transport captains are also willing to take on some passengers and indicate their destinations and rates at the docks as well. If you’re in need of transportation to a location not listed, though, or need arrangements outside the norm (such as expeditious speed, possibly illegal cargo or travel to forbidden worlds) then some serious negotiations will be needed. Having plenty of Thrones or bartering merchandise on your person can aid this process immeasurably.
Most Inquisitorial agents refrain from simply commandeering a vessel on the authority of their rosette, and save that as a last resort to be used only when regular means such as payment, bribery and subtle threats fail. Keeping the negotiations “sub-rosa” helps maintain good working relations with the merchant fleets and helps ensure that the next time you need a ride things go smoothly. It also helps keep them in business and available for you in future endeavours. Indeed, if you treat them well, most captains look forward to your repeat business, thus making life easier for all parties concerned.

​

Hi everyone! (23F) and I have been diagnosed with HS at 20 years old but had been self diagnosing for years after countless doctors would never listen. I can’t tell you what stage I’m in…I should know that info. But I have been told it is fairly server. I get flareups on my groin area, buttocks, armpits, and have add some in a few weird places like along my waistline, and on the sides on my body.
I have tried Cosentyx 150mg, 1x weekly shots. I have tried Humira 40mg & 80mg, 1x weekly shots. I have tried Spironolactone 50mg and 100mg, daily. I have been on Prednisone 6 times. I have tried all the topicals I have tried all the home remedies Nothing has worked.
It has been 23 days since my last Humira shot at 80mg. I am set to get my first Remicade Infusion in the next 5 days. I am truly terrified. I truly think it’s just the fear of the unknown. How does it feel? How do I need to prep? What do I need bring? Should I take anything before I go? I’ve seen so many mix opinions. Can anyone relieve me of this brick it feels like I’m carrying on my chest…
Thank you in advance <3

My boyfriend (35m) is an interior designer and started renovating a space with the intention of turning it into an Airbnb. Since it was his space and project, I (35f) didn’t say much regarding the design and look of the space. Since I travel a lot for work, I also wasn’t around much to have a say. Suddenly, now that he’s half way through renovating, he told me that this will actually be our new apartment together. I was fine with that decision as it is a nice space, but since it started as his project, there’s not an ounce of me or my personality in the design.
My bf is extremely minimalistic and does not like any colors or textures that aren’t black or white. I prefer some pops of colors and although I’m not into tons of decor, I like certain aspects to feel more homey like having big fluffy towels and some plants. Although the space is luxurious, it feels more like a model showroom than a home to me. There’s also certain elements of the home that I find uncomfortable, like not having any rugs or bath mats. I have asked many times if we could include some things in the home that would make it more comfortable for me, such as some colors or having a bath mat. He refuses to let me have anything that I want or would make me happy in the space. He got upset at me the other day for using a towel I liked instead of the ones he bought for the space (which also don’t happen to be big enough to cover my upper and bottom half together), because the color mine “didn’t fit his design concept”. I bought a small plant for my desk the other day and he was so annoyed when he saw it that he ignored me the entire evening. Today, I saw he hid my plant so that he “wouldn’t have to see it”. He says that my wants make him feel uncomfortable in his own home and that allowing me to have a plant will mean opening a gateway into a plethora of decorations all over the house. He said it also reflects on him poorly if his colleagues were to see it, as it would look ugly and have different design concepts.
I have tried asking him for compromises, like picking out a plant together that works for the space and choosing a vase that matches the vibe, or getting me a towel that covers my entire body in the color that matches the design. He shuts down any conversation I initiate about it and just says he “doesn’t want that in the space” but when I talk about moving out, he gets sad and says he made this space for us to live in and that I’m throwing all his work in his face and being ungrateful for his sacrifices.
I love him but this is just the latest in a long battle we’ve had with him refusing to compromise anything about his living situation. I’ve expressed many times how a home needs to be a compromise and I should also be able to feel comfortable where I live and he says he’s trying to be better but continues this pattern of behavior. At this point I’m leaning towards leaving him. I just feel like he doesn’t make room for me in his living situation and I feel like a guest in a place he says is “our” home. I also don’t like that he hides my things bc they’re not “aesthetically pleasing” to him.
Is there any chance of saving this relationship? How can I get him to understand that this isn’t normal behavior regardless of working in design?
TLDR: interior designer bf won’t let me have a single item in the house he thinks doesn’t match his design concept, which also includes things like house plants, towels, bath mats and rugs.

I'm fairly new to this subreddit and don't know a lot about what might constitute a potential match. I might just be spitballing here, but I have come up with two possibilities of who the Vidor Jane Doe may be.
On New Years Day in 1984, the remains of an unidentified woman were uncovered in a field in Vidor, TX. She was estimated to be deceased for about 11 months. Her mandible was not recovered. (here is a link to her page on The Doe Network: https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/72uftx.html)
I think she could be connected to Terry Rasmussen because he used to work in the oil industry in Southeast Texas. I can't find much info about where he lived or worked, except that he resided in Houston in 1978 (though he was in New Hampshire in 1980). Another tie that Rasmussen has to the Southeast Texas region is his daughter: the unidentified victim of the Bear Brook murders.
The unidentified child would have been born around 1978-1981. The Doe Network states that she was most likely born in the Gulf Coast region of Texas while Rasmussen was working on an oil rig. (here is a link to Bear Brook Jane Doe's page on the Doe Network: https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/802ufnh.html)
I can't find a lot of info on Rasmussen's whereabouts between 1981 and 1984. I'm thinking maybe he could have worked in the Beaumont/Houston area at that time, which would have placed him close to where the body was found. If anything, he might've visited the Southeast Texas region to see the mother of his child, which leads me to possibility number one:
Could the Vidor, Texas Jane Doe be the unidentified girl's mother?
Possibility number 2: While I was looking into this, I also researched Denise Beaudin's disappearance. Beaudin is suspected to be one of Rasmussen's victims, but her body has never been located. There aren't many available photos of Beaudin. However, she looks similar to the Vidor Jane Doe. She looks to have the same hooded eyes and same hair and eye color as the Vidor Jane Doe. Beaudin also had an overbite; is it possible that Vidor Jane Doe could have had one, too? Her mandible was never recovered.
Additionally, her date of last contact matches up with the case. Beaudin was last seen in November 1981 and Vidor Jane Doe could have died in 1983 or earlier. (Beaudin's page on NAMUS: https://www.namus.gov/MissingPersons/Case#/36410).
(Another source that was helpful in researching this, a timeline of Rasmussen's whereabouts: https://www.doj.nh.gov/news/2017/documents/20170818-allenstown-manchester-timeline.pdf)
What do you think?

First
Capes and Conundrums
“... I think we have some glitches in the programming.” Pavel remarks as the drone opponents for lower level events start... well they’re either straight up malfunctioning and thrashing around, or they’re breakdancing. Badly.
Either way it’s bad.
“God damnit, and here I was trying to make them do the macarena.” The Drone programmer mutters. “God damn, making a program that simulates a person’s sense of balance is a bitch and a half, even if ninety eight percent is just copy and paste bullshit. It’s the god damn code spackle between them that’s fucking everything up, and that’s if there isn’t god damn copy degradation with my copy and paste routine.”
“We done?” Pavel asks.
“Maybe in another hour... but your shift ends in half an hour. You can go. Your replacement will be here long before I’m ready with this. Defragging new code and running the test programs takes at least an hour and a half with this program.”
“Can’t you trim it down or something?” Pavel asks and the programmer downright slams his laptop closed.
“Trim it down? Oh gosh golly gee! Why didn’t I think of that.”
“Okay, I’m sorry I...”
“Wow! Do you have any other incredible insights to offer!? Like turning off the gravity so you don’t fall.”
“I get it, I’m sorry...”
“Or maybe make it so people just aren’t allowed to miss when shooting a gun! Then everyone can be a sniper!”
“I get it, shut up or I’ll show you some fucking sniper.” Pavel says and he turns to stalk out of the testing room.
“Oh no you don’t. You clearly don’t know how god damned hard coding is so you’re going to spend the rest of your shift with me as I code even if it accomplishes nothing at all, Nothing At All. NOTHING AT ALL!!”
“Good god man! What crawled up your cockpipe!?”
“Idiot jocks who don’t know what they’re talking about!” The programmer snaps back as he opens up his laptop again and quickly gets back to work.
Pavel’s response to things is to loom annoyingly over him. It takes about three minutes before the programmer slams the back of his head into Pavel’s stomach.
•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•×•
“Gentlemen I am very disappointed. I understand that there are differences between soldiers and tensions between species. But I am unwilling to tolerate friendly on friendly attack.” Admiral Hynala states. “Now, before I hear about how the situation devolved into... this...”
He gestures to the two scuffed up men with visible bruises and markings.
“I am going to detail the disciplinary actions I’m going to take.” He states and both of them look concerned. They should be.
“I don’t care who started it. I don’t care about the circumstances. You two are both Undaunted, you two are both part of the same armed force and need to work together. So from this moment onwards you are doing all your work together. No if’s, and’s or buts. For the next two months you two are paired up on all patrols, guard duty and further duties besides. So congratulations Sniper Zeman you now have a spotter. Electronic Warfare Specialist Blake? You now have a bodyguard. You also now have hunchmen Misters Deadshot and Anarchy.”
“But sir!” Blake protest.
“No! I will not have my men attacking each other! A friendly brawl is expected, even encouraged! But you two destroyed Undaunted property in that pointless, stupid fight and I will not have it!” Admiral Hynala states and both men wince a little.
“Now that we have determined your punishment. You will tell me what happened.” Admiral Hynala states before pulling out a coin and flipping it. Specialist Blake. You will begin. In your own words, how did this fight start.”
“It started because a meathead opened his fat mouth and wrote checks his ass couldn’t cash.” Blake mutters.
“Really?” Admiral Hynala’s tone is so dry it actually seems to be sucking the moisture out of the air.
“Sir... there are innumerable difficult and delicate procedures in order to properly code and program. It is not an easy thing to do. When he suggested I start trimming code, he displayed an absolutely stupefying ignorance of just how much work and review goes into coding to begin with and downright insulted me.” Blake states. “It’s like suggesting you get everything done by just stamping your name on things at random.”
“Specialist Blake. Do you know what the correct course of action when someone insults you as a result of their own ignorance?”
“Sir?”
“You ignore it. Their ignorance has already proven that the insult comes from a place of weakness. It is fundamentally proof that they don’t know what they’re talking about and are best ignored and if not ignored, humoured.”
“Yes sir.”
“Now, Sniper Zeman. I would like your recount of events.” Admiral Hynala orders.
“The whole shift leading up to it or just the incident in question sir?”
“Both and in that order.”
“Well sir, my shift was to provide protection if things went off and assist in the testing of more advanced villain drones. During it I noticed Specialist Blake growing more frustrated as he tried many, many different algorithms and programs to try and get smoother and more effective movements into the drones. He tried numerous things from combat attempts to dance moves and just got more and more frustrated. I don’t even fully remember the conversation in question. It was nothing but small talk and he suddenly loses all his patience. This was directly after he told me I could leave and then he reverses that choice and tells me I can stay.”
“Which is when you did something.”
“Yes, he told me to stay so I stood obnoxiously close and this of course provoked a reaction. Sir... I apologize for my part in this affair and provoking an already incensed man.”
“I know you have a date with Miss Ripfang, it is on hold until this meeting is done and attempting to simply appease me will make me hold you longer. We are dealing with this issue and that is that.” Admiral Hynala states.
“Yes sir.” Pavel says.
“Now, these actions are not acceptable and your modified schedules will be sent to you both shortly. If I hear of any further fights between you two there will be a day of payment docked and you will both be in front of me again. I don’t want to have to take money and privileges from my soldiers, but I will if I have to. You gentlemen are Undaunted. You are not the best of the best, you are better. No matter what challenge you face you are better. Act like it.”
“Sir, yes sir.”
“Dismissed. You both are off duty for the remainder of the day without pay.”
“Yes sir.”
“Sir, I’m nowhere near finished the program.”
“Let it sit Specialist. It’s not a bomb in need of defusal.”
“But Sir!”
“No buts. You let emotion control you. You’re off duty for the remainder of the day.”
“Yes sir...”
Both men are then sent from the office with a slight jerk of the Admiral’s head and leave. Pavel heaves a huge sigh of annoyance and disgust before rubbing at his nose and then just leaving the area without speaking to Blake who clenches and unclenches his fists in rage.
Pavel rushes through the ship and only takes the time to grab a proper jacket before rushing out tot he landing bay and leaping out.
The hot and ash tinged air of Skathac is welcome as it makes it feel like the earlier events are an entire world away. He sucks in a deep breath and lest out a wordless bellow to both vent his frustration and warn any Sonir to clear a path, an Unduanted is coming.
He conjured a flat pane barrier and slams his feet into it to redirect his momentum. There’s a bit too much sideways movement so he bleeds it off with a spin and keeps going.
His boot comes down on the head of a gargoyle and he launches himself along, grabbing the corner of a building and swinging hard to keep moving. His eyes narrow as he focuses and he’s suddenly down the street and coming up on another corner to grab and swing around.
More focus as he begins to descend and he bounces off the canopy above a cafe and translates the momentum to the side to flip to the ground.
“Pavel! You... I was worried that... what happened?” Dot Ripfang asks him and he sighs. It looks like she’s been waiting for a while under the canopy and that’s on him. That’s on him and his getting into a fight.
“Some drama with the other Undaunted. Nothing to be worried about, although my schedule is abotu to be shaken up.”
“Oh! That’s not good, are you in trouble?” She asks and he winces a bit.
“A little. I got into a small fight with another soldier and a few things got broken in the process. So of course the Admiral’s response is to pair us up for the next two months. We’re either going to kill each other or settle our issues.”
“And what is the issue.”
“That’s the stupid part. There isn’t one. He was just getting frustrated and the small talk I was using to pass the time set him off. A stupid little mistake but now we’re both in trouble.” Pavel says with a shrug. “Sometimes things happen, you just disagree or say something that’s the particular sensitive subject of the poor bastard and it sets them off. Of course since you’re fine you think that them going off the handle is stupid so you respond in your own way, which makes it worse and back and forth until you’re throwing hands. It happens. The boss knows it happens but he has to punish anyways.”
“Oh... I see...”
“Anyways, that’s more than enough about my issues. What’s going on with you. You sounded like things were pretty important when you set up this meeting today. Is something going wrong?”
“It... well... you know my family is just on vacation to Skathac right?” Dot asks and Pavel nods.
“Is it coming to an end?” He asks and she nods herself this time.
“Yes and... well... I just don’t know how we’re going to make this work at a distance. We’re... I mean... this isn’t some runaway romance and we’re not trying to just force it so... I mean...”
“It’s alright to break it off. There’s no shame in that.” Pavel says. “Better to date around and find out you’re not mixing that well then to force along a relationship that isn’t working. Especially at long range.”
“Really? But I’ve heard so many stories about humans being so intent on making things work! I’ve browsed a few... Oh dear... it’s because of me isn’t it?”
“No it’s not. It’s that humans are different. There’s no big spark between us despite actually liking each other, that’s fine. A friendship is a valuable thing. Even if it’s not a grand one.”
“Oh... well... We’re going home tomorrow and I was wondering how to say goodbye. We haven’t really gotten anywhere but we’ve been trying to make it work and... I just don’t know.”
“Not what you expected?”
“No. Not at all.”
“Not bad I hope.”
“No, it hasn’t been bad. It’s just not what I expected.” She admits and he shrugs.
“Well, that’s not a bad thing then. I’m not really sure what else to say. I’m sorry we don’t have more time to make this work, but we apparently don’t. If you’re not broken up about this, then I have even less reason to be. We tried, it didn’t work. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“But there should be! A big cavation with excitement and a whirlwind romance is what’s in all the movies and stories and... and...”
“And that’s because there are few stories about things just being normal and fine. It’s too boring to put into video format.” Pavel says.
“It just doesn’t feel right though. I should want this more, we should be really trying harder and... I don’t know, it shouldn’t be hard to want someone!”
“... Let’s put it to the test.” Pavel says and she gives him an odd look. “Let’s kiss, if there’s anything other than pheromones we’ll keep trying. If it’s just pheromones though, we break it off as friends. Okay?”
Dot considers it for a few moments before nodding and then reaching over the table to pick him up by the shirt. There’s a hesitation in her movements as she rises up and pulls him up to her. Then her lips met his and the tongues meet as well and... they both just go still as things go from weird to very awkward.
She sets him down gently with a sigh. “The heat’s there but that’s just... I mean... I want it. But it’s... its IT I want... not...”
“Not me. That’s fine. We’re not clicking, that’s okay.” Pavel says before gesturing back to the table. “My friend, would you care to join me for a meal?”
“I’d like that.” She says softly.
​
First Last
PS: Ye Gods I have not been sleeping well with the smoke. It's also making me go through more meltdowns than average. I'm taking a nap after posting this then putting down the author's comment. Sorry for it being late.

I know in the recent past Virginia has presented an outdoor pride show that many attend. Held in the back parking lot off of S.4th street behind District West. I haven't heard of one for this weekend or next. Anyone have a clue if it's happening?

Picture the scene. Your club are in a European final for the first time in 50 plus years. There's 89 minutes on the clock and the attacker is clean through on goal. He has the composure to slot it away and the fans go wild. Limbs everywhere. For me, that sounds like a dream. But for West Ham fans, that dream became reality when they won the conference league title in Prague.
Since this competition's inception, I've seen many mixed opinions. Many, like myself, feel it's a brilliant opportunity for teams who may not normally have a chance at European football to not only experience magical away nights, but to have a genuine chance of bringing home a piece of silverware. On the other hand, many others regard it as either "a waste of time" or a "tinpot trophy". While everyone is entitled to their opinion, I'm here to share mine on why the conference league is not to be laughed at, and why we should take it as seriously as a competition.
As a fairly young Villa fan, I never got the chance to witness us conquer Europe in 82. I've watched the highlights and heard the stories, but I've never thought I'd be able to watch my Aston Villa play in Europe, at any level. Thanks to Unai Emery, this has now become a reality. I've been eagerly keeping tabs on whether or not we'll be seeded in the qualifiers and which teams would benefit us by losing. The only time I've come close to being this excited about being a villa fan, was promotion in 2019. Seeing the masses turn up on the final day against Brighton, welcoming the team like the title was on the line, it just goes to show how much European football means to a club like Aston Villa.
Those opposed to this competition may have arguements such as "it's too many fixtures" or "we won't win it anyway so why bother". To that I say, yes, It's a lot of fixtures depending on how far we progress. However, we are in for a very busy transfer window, so our squad depth should be improved by then. In addition to that, this would be a brilliant opportunity to see what our talented youngsters are made of. Furthermore, and I truly mean no disrespect to West Ham by saying this, but if they can win the whole thing, really, why can't Aston Villa?
The fact we are in a European competition, with a manager who is a serial winner of European trophies, to me, it seems like our best opportunity for silverware in years. Plus, winning it guarantees entry into the Europa League, Emery's favourite.
To conclude, if you still have any doubts about whether or not this competition is worth being in, I would strongly encourage you to have a look at the reaction from West ham fans and what it means to them and ask yourself one question. Don't you want to have that feeling?

Another dumb question -
TLDR: Can I have both Hue and Snegled color changing bulbs and say "hey google set all lights to red" and then all bulbs, regardless of brand, would change to red? Same with brightness percentage? Hue wants $175 for 3 bulbs for my new ceiling fan, but snegled is only $39.99 for 4 bulbs. I'm done paying for overpriced hue lights. :-/
Further explanation:
Can you mix multiple brands of lights, say hue, and one of the other brands like govee or senegled? I know it will be using two different apps, vendors, and commands, but right now since they are all hue (except an outdoor floodlight that can't change color) when I say "hey google set all lights to blue" it will say "sure changing 22 lights to blue." all the lights except the flood light will come on and change to that color. If I just say "turn on all the lights" it will turn the flood light on too.
So If I mix in another brand that can also color change with one command or will it require me to setup routines? I know the colors may not be 100% the same but I would be OK with something close.
I'm not sure why but it will be $175 to buy 3 e12 color bulbs from hue, but less than $40 for color changing snegled bulbs, and that comes in a 4 pack so I'd have a spare. I had snegled bulbs a long time ago when I used samsung smartthings, but then I switched to homepod, so I bought all philips hue color bulbs because at the time that was the only brand that worked with homepod that I could find. I've switched back to google years ago because of the lack of support for all my smart switches and cameras, that do work with google. But all of my hue lights still work so I haven't looked into replacing them. I think I spent someting crazy like over $1000 in bulbs back in the day, but I don't have just crazy free flowing cash like that these days and I can't see paying 4 times more than the ceiling fan for the bulbs.
​

FirstNext
Well, it only took Canada burning and the East Coast turning into smoky rendition of a Mexico filter for this chapter to finally reach completion. Regularly-scheduled programming should hopefully resume after July 4th. Until then, drink some water, don't do gender reveals in the forest, and hang in there, guys!
Pursuant to Imperial Decree 10928, and in recognition of the reservist nature of the unit, the 1st Rocket Artillery Regiment has been found to satisfy the standards outlined in the Decree. However, in light of the significant budget and nonmaterial resource allocations that were required to bring the aforementioned unit up to levels considered satisfactory by existing standards, additional considerations beyond readiness and training levels must be taken into account.
Throughout the appeals process, you have repeatedly indicated that you believe rocket artillery to still have a place on the modern battlefield, citing recent reports from the Terran Planetary District command of the Sol System sector, as well as early after-action reports from the Intervention on Raknos, which you claim to support your argument. However, further investigation into this claim by independent analysts on behalf of Armored Warfare Command has found it to hold no merit in light of the recent restructuring outlined in detail in prior communications. Simply put, neither the Empress, nor her advisors, believe that the maintenance and garrisoning of units intended strictly for low-intensity counter-insurgency operations remains doctrinally viable.
Additionally, the excessive monetary and nonmonetary resources you requested in preparation for the evaluation, in light of the on-par, verging on substandard performance of the 1st Rocket Artillery Regiment, even accounting for the large number of fresh troops that needed to be drawn down from other posts to fill out its ranks, is highly suggestive on the part of you, the honorable Ashira Rakishal. This discrepancy is of high importance, and you may rest assured that it has already been publicly filed by the time this letter appears in your inbox.
Such a discrepancy is indicative of either incompetence or corruption on your part. Commanding officers may face demotion or a possible dishonorable discharge for the former, or, for the latter, a fine totalling no more than one-and-a-half times the estimated sum of the damages assessed, guaranteed dishonorable discharge and a potential prison term of no more than four years. Due to there being no evidence to suggest the latter, the former approach has been suggested by the Armored Warfare Command. Effective fourteen (14) days after this order is signed, your rank will be reduced and you will be relieved of commanding the Regiment. You may be restationed at this time, and your government-issued devices may be deactivated to facilitate this restationing. The 1st Rocket Artillery Division, in accordance with Decree 10928, will be dissolved and its assets relocated to other units wherever possible. Any remaining property will be auctioned under section 12.57.3(g) of the Naval and Marine Surplus Handling Act of 651 at the Val’tira Central Forwarding Depot.
Ashira finished reading the letter, but the words meant nothing to her. She hadn't slept in half a week, if not longer, in anticipation of the results from her hearing. In fact, she'd hardly gotten up from her desk; the 1st RAR was on leave until the final verdict would be announced publicly, and it was all she could do but to refresh her inbox every few minutes and watch mindless clips in the background that she hardly heard and never managed to remember a word from.
She tried reading it again, but the letters seemed to float off the screen, each one wrapped in a halo of bluish white screen glow. Nothing made sense.
'We were found to be satisfactory, but then… why does it talk about my rank? Am I getting promoted? There was something about dishonorable discharges, too, so… are some of my girls getting let go? I guess I will have to break the news to them. And it said something about budget overruns… well, mom still owes me from when she forgot to get me anything for my eighteenth last month, so I guess she can pay them back for all the equipment and training I had to authorize…'
Her thoughts were already drifting off into a vague haze when her stomach made a low noise, reminding her of the fact that she hadn't eaten in hours, mostly because her supply of food had run dry. Almost in a trance, she rose from her desk and, almost on autopilot, set about getting ready to go out and do some shopping, as she always did. The floor of her living quarters was almost entirely hidden by weeks-old discarded packaging, mountains of dirty clothes, and bottles half-filled with liquid that was either expired juice or urine. Narrow paths snaked through the mess; one to the bathroom, one to her bed, and one more still to the door, which she now slowly shambled towards.
Ashira pulled a pair of battered combat boots over her bare feet - she'd run out of socks that didn't offend her senses some weeks prior - without bothering to lace them, shoved her wallet into the front pocket of the fireproof jumpsuit she wore with absolutely nothing underneath and hadn't changed out of all week, and shoved the door open to head out. Immediately, the smell - or, perhaps, a lack thereof - of the corridor hit her. All the sleeping quarters were locked. It was quiet. Though her boots were heavy, her footsteps barely made a noise as she plodded along the thick, purple and topaz-blue carpet that lined the floor.
The door to the lobby was propped open by a cleaner's cart, and a heavy perfume of chemical detergents wafted through the opening as she approached. In the lobby was a small, older Helkam male, with his long and, in places, graying hair tied back with a beige bandana that matched his civilian contractor's coveralls, just as his green noise-canceling headphones matched the company logo on his uniform. He was dutifully mopping the already nigh-spotless polished stone floor, and there was only a narrow dry strip connecting doorway to doorway.
“‘Scuse me,” she mumbled, tapping him on the shoulder to alert him to her presence. “Coming through.”
He flinched away from her touch, and she flinched away from him, as though his own shock was contagious. “The fuck, you touch me!?” He exclaimed, whipping around to face her, mop at the ready like a Turox-prod. His face burned a pale but furious violet, contorted with fear and a readiness to fight. But, just as suddenly as he’d come to face her, his expression became one of confusion. His mop dipped down, and they stood in silence for a split second that seemed to drag on for entire minutes. Then, he made an odd face, as if of disgust or contempt, and stepped aside, motioning for her to pass by him.
Ashira would have been puzzled by this, if only she were not so frazzled and caught up in her own thoughts. She stepped outside and was immediately hit by a cool breeze; it was night out, and the wind blew in just as it always did. Not that it bothered her much; over the previous months, she had found that it didn’t seem to affect her very much. The only reason she wasn’t feeling the full brunt of the evening gales was that the buildings around the officer’s quarters were mostly two- and three-story affairs, their height and old, weathered stone cladding the last specters of the prominence and prestige the base enjoyed in the long-before times. Before the Unification Wars were but a distant memory. Before the Periphery had become the final, unconquerable frontier. Before the Empress-damned mess that was Raknos. Before Rocket Artillery had become hopelessly obsolete.
The wind blew, relentless and steadfast, as she trudged towards the only place on-base that still had its lights on. The general store. She didn’t know what she wanted to buy there, nor if there would indeed be anything on the shelves that she’d want to buy, but she felt she had to try, anyway. The only rest she could get now was chemically-assisted, either through over-the-counter sleeping pills, or copious volumes of booze, or, when the going got particularly rough, a combination of both. She was vaguely aware of the damage she was probably inflicting upon her organs, but she figured that they were a worthy sacrifice. Still, some days she couldn't fall asleep, even boozed up and medicated as much as she would dare, so she would lie in bed, staring at the ceiling, hoping that the splitting headaches she would get from that chemical cocktail would make her ears ring loud enough to drown out her intrusive thoughts.
The store wasn't particularly warm when she entered, and it reeked of cigarette smoke and mildew as always. The nearest set of shelves to the door were stocked with bags of some sort of imported breaded meat snacks labeled Pufriyah - Ancestral Recipe, Modern Taste! across the top shelf and cases of Red Grains across the bottom, as if some long-forgotten planner had seen into the future and anticipated Ashira's shopping habits exactly. Without much thought, she pulled a case of the Reds off the bottom shelf, her back, which had been sore for months by then, crying out in pain that just barely cut through her apathy. She threw a few bags of the Pufriyah snacks on top of it, entirely indifferent to their name, slogan, and brown-furred chibi mascot that spoke to their Rakiri intended consumer base.
'It's all just carbs and protein at the end of the day,' she figured. It wasn't like she could taste much of them anyway, had she really cared to learn their flavor. It was close to a month prior that she'd caught a nasty cold, and her constant sleep deprivation and stress hadn't lent themselves to it clearing itself up on its own. Her senses of taste and smell were unnecessary to her whipping her unit into shape, she'd decided, once she learned that the antivirals she needed to take to make her symptoms clear up would need her to be on bed rest for three straight days. She could always take them later, anyway.
The bottles of Red Grain clanked against each other as Ashira heaved the case onto the checkout counter. The bags on top of it slid off, and she only just caught them in time. The noise awoke the lone cashier, another civilian contractor, from her nap atop her wobbly three-legged stool. She quite inelegantly hopped off of it and came to lean against the counter with one hand, the other lazily waving the scanner of a specialized Data-Slate over the merchandise.
"ID for the Reds," the cashier groggily slurred out, patting down her many pockets in search of a cigarette box. "Standard procedure, nothing personal against you."
Ashira stared at her, dumbfounded, for a few moments too many, before it hit her that she needed to pull up her Marine Profile on her Slate. Mumbling an apology mixed with an excuse, she reached into one of the few - albeit cavernously huge - pockets of her fireproof suit and produced the grimy government-issue device in question. The lock screen was set to her ID, just to make such common interactions go by quicker.
She pushed the Slate across the counter, expecting to get it slid back to her in a few moments, and maybe a manufactured smile and a nod if the cashier noticed the Rakishal House crest in the corner and realized she was of noble blood. But this time, none of that happened. The woman across from her frowned, squinting as she analyzed something about the ID, her face no more than perhaps a few centimeters from it. She looked up at Ashira, then back down at the ID, then back at her, and then all of a sudden her confusion melted into some odd mixture of shock and disgust. She wordlessly pushed the Slate back across the counter, scanned the case of Red Grain, and then motioned to a now very baffled and somewhat offended Ashira that she was free to leave.
In her sleep-deprived state, Ashira had barely the mental capacity to remember where the door was, much less to ponder the deeper meaning behind what had transpired. Vowing to come back the next day, after getting a good night's sleep, and get the insolent cashier fired, she trudged out of the shop, back to the officers' quarters, where the Helkam man was still toiling away in the lobby, now wiping down the Turox-leather seats, and into her own suite.
She brushed the most egregious of the trash from her bed, with the arm that wasn't clutching the spoils of her trek to her chest, and allowed gravity to gracelessly guide her into its soft, fitted-sheet embrace. With a sigh of barely-felt relief, she cracked the cap off her first bottle with her tusks and took a long, well-earned swig.
The next thing she knew, it was morning.
Everything hurt. Ashira's muscles all ached like she'd run every Deathshead Commando bootcamp course, back-to-back, without stopping. Her head felt like a bloated, rotten gourd, ready to burst at the slightest touch. Even though her eyes were closed, what little light made it through them felt as though it was piercing straight through her eyeballs and into her brain. However, through it all, she noted an odd, almost pleasant sensation that she hadn't felt in so long, she'd almost forgotten the word for it.
'Empress all-powerful, this must be the first time in almost a year that I've had a full night's sleep!'
Ashira would have kept laying there, exactly where she was. The room was quiet. No one needed her. Her unit was stood down for another few days. She could just stay in bed, in peace, and wait for the pain to subside. But the very second she considered that possibility, her bladder cried in agony, and she simultaneously came to the realizations that she would not be able to hold it in for even a minute longer, and that she was wearing her only set of relatively-clean clothes.
She pushed herself up and onto her feet, and that motion sent showers of sparks cascading through her vision, even as her eyes stayed firmly shut. Her ears rang from the pain as though she'd stuck her head between the prongs of a colossal tuning fork, her limbs felt numb as she stumbled through her room, and the only way she could tell up from down was from the direction gravity kept pulling her every time she lost her balance.
She hit the door frame to the bathroom by chance, only recognizing it as the right one by the light switch her elbow painfully caught. From there, she went entirely by feel. There was the sink, the towel rack, the soap dispenser, the shower door… and finally, having run out of wrong things to blindly grope around for, her hand bumped into the tank of the toilet. Even bending down made her head fill with the pounding beat of her heart, every pulse seeming to try and push her brain out of her skull through her eyes and ears. She nearly blacked out as she sat down.
The next thing Ashira knew, she was doubled over her sink, dry-heaving, her fireproof pants pulled back up around her waist but neither zipped shut nor clipped together at the front. She knew for certain that nothing had come up, because she was newly aware of the desiccated dryness in her mouth and throat, as if all her flesh had been replaced with fine-grit sandpaper. Still lacking the resolve to open her eyes, she blindly clawed at the knobs of the sink until water began to pour, and then began scooping handfuls of it into her mouth.
After a few gulps, she began to feel a bit better. Her mouth, though it still felt dry as ever, was at least now rid of the horrible, sour, metallic taste that she hadn't registered until it was gone, and the unintentional splashing of water onto her face did wonders in helping her start to truly wake up. The very next instant, though, a numbing pain spread across her hands and face, and down her throat. The water was freezing cold.
That didn't deter Ashira, though, and she kept drinking until she knew that she would not be able to swallow a drop more without throwing up. Her hands were numb from the frigid water, as was her face. Icy rivulets streamed down her chin and throat and under her unzipped collar, leaving cool, glistening trails across her breasts and stomach.
Somehow, this numbness that spread across her fingers and cheeks seemed to have carried over to her hangover, as well, though whether it was the rapid cooling, or the much-needed hydration, or both, she neither knew nor cared. Her head now hurt with the intensity of just any old headache, her skin did not feel two sizes too small for her organs, and her muscles and joints barely ached with any more intensity than they usually did.
She opened her eyes for the first time since she'd gotten out of bed, ready and eager to take full advantage of her hangover cure while its effects still lasted, and almost fell over as she stumbled away from the mirror in shock. The reflection in the mirror was decidedly not her.
Bloodshot eyes stared out at her from dark, sunken orbits; two craters on a puffy face rendered a waxy, pale bluish lilac by months of near-total involuntary isolation from the daylight. Raven hair framed that lifeless visage, once kept neat and short, now a wild, greasy, and, above all, long Seetcha's nest. It had once had lively sun-bleached streaks where her beret and headset did not fully cover it, from when she would ride head-out in her trusty command Ishtarti-603, but they were now mere faded tips spread unevenly through the carbon-black tangle.
The rest of her was not in much better shape. Her bust, though always on the fuller size, was nonetheless noticeably larger than it had been the last time Ashira had inspected her reflection, and doubtless was the cause of her incessant back pain. In the same moment, she became aware that her breasts rested not against the top of her six-pack - which, while rarely worked out and never particularly defined, had, in its mere presence, still been a point of quiet pride for her - but at the upper limits of a beer gut, whose faint outline was visible even under the baggy suit she was wearing for the umpteenth day in a row, and which stood as a testament to the inertia she had descended into while trying to force the RAR into motion.
'Fuck, there's the evidence of my battle. Mom was right, I do eat like a Turox before the slaughter. I have no self-control. Why do I even bother with this restructuring business if I can't even keep to my own damn fitness goals?' Her gloom, though deep and all-consuming while it weighed upon her soul, dissipated just as quickly as it set in. 'But I knew it would happen, so why does it surprise me? I knew going in that I was burning myself up in the present to keep future me warm. It's just a few kilos. A dozen at most. No big deal. Just need a bit more exercise for a month or two and I'll be right back in parade shape!'
It did, however, make her think to place an order with the on-base supply depot for some new clothes. With the Unification Day festivities looming, it would simply not do for this quite temporary distortion of her Noble figure to be so brazen, she firmly decided.
The order would have to wait, however. When Ashira brought out her government-issued Data-Slate from her front pocket in a familiar motion, already compiling a list of all the workout gear, field uniforms, and parade garb she would need in a size up, the device, in an apparent bout of unruliness, first resisted her efforts to turn it on, and when it was finally made to do so, simply boot-looped endlessly on the startup screen. For all intents and purposes, it was a Slate-shaped paperweight, and Ashira didn’t even have enough physical documents in her possession to make use of this one purpose it had left.
‘First my clothes, now the one Slate mom can’t track me on. What’s next, is my ID going to expire all of a sudden? Will my physical Chit card have a bad contact?’
There was only so much she could take at one time, so she decided to do the sensible thing and get something to eat before returning to dealing with her problems. She pulled out her Slate. It was almost noon.
'No one needs to see me like this. How can I command the regiment if they see me in such a state? I'll order breakfast - well, lunch now, but who's really counting? - and I can join everyone for dinner, once I get a chance to order in some new clothes, and shower, and maybe do something with my hair.'
With a practiced motion, so automatic it was almost a reflex, she swiped through the interface until she found what she was looking for. There, between Combatters forum sites, was a saved page for the Hungry Gal's order menu. Her chit was already saved in the system. All she needed was to tap on "Large Hot Meal #5 - Drink Combo" and…
CHIT DECLINED - PAYMENT BLOCKED
"That can't be right," Ashira muttered aloud as she tapped the button again, over and over, to the same effect. "It's a government card. Unless- ah, right, it must be the new policy they were talking about! Can't believe they made food expenses count as personal expenditure only, the nerve of these credit-pinching…"
She went into the payment details section of the page, switched the number to her personal one, and selected "Large Hot Meal #5 - Drink Combo" again. This time, a new message appeared.
INVALID ACCOUNT - DEACTIVATED
The gnawing hunger in her stomach disappeared in an instant, replaced by a solid iron bar of dread. Why was her account deactivated? Who could have done it? The only other person with access privileges was her own mother, and why would she…?
Ashira knew the answer. She didn't want to know it, to acknowledge that she knew it for fear of what it meant, but she did. With shaking hands, she opened the notification screen of her Slate, and saw she had unread messages from her family group chat. She tapped that notification, expecting a deluge of fury about her weight, her spending habits, her slovenly appearance in public, or any manner of other things, but there was but one message, sent earlier that morning. It was from her mother, indeed, but it was just four words long.
I got the letter.
She wanted to protest, to scream, "What letter could you possibly mean?," but she couldn't. A memory, hazy from the fog of insomnia that had dulled her thoughts at the time, played against her volition in her mind. The words hadn't made sense to her then, but they did now. Robotically, she closed the message from her mother and searched through her inbox for one marked with a government seal. She opened it, and read it in silence. The last few lines were the hardest to read, because by then the tears had begun to well up in her eyes.
It was over. Her career, her noble status, her finances, her life as she knew it… they were all gone, and it had taken just one letter to send it all crashing down.

I’m a white girl called Abi in a rural and traditional village in Hungary. I’m living simple life here with hobbies like cooking and baking and reading but I also love to be outdoors and do camping, boat and raft driving and hiking! I am super social and love the village gatherings as well.
I only go to the city four times a year every season. I like to eat junk food whenever I’m there because here we eat very organic and healthy food. I love healthy food, but junk food can be fun a couple times a year right? Haha!
Because of my life(style) and location, it can sometimes be difficult to make friends and often I find myself a little… isolated?
What I’m looking for: Someone thats interested (just like me!) in culture, traditions, ceremonies and customs. But also if you like nature, outdoor, food and desserts, we will vibe most likely!
In my culture there is so many things that are different. Some people might say it is insane or outdated or even worse and all of those things. But they don’t look at the positive outcomes and the prove that it works! For example how our marriage works here, how life is run, how genders love to be living accordingly to their roles and more.
Our village is a couple hundred people big and spread across grasslands and forests around us. It’s secluded, silent, peaceful and calming! However, sometimes as you can guess… lonely. Even though I love the wonderful community here.
Thank-you for reading this far and if you did, please send me a message starting with your favorite ice cream flavor :)
I’m asking you (if you’re interested) to write me an intro. Make it a bit mid sized to long sized because I’m all about equal effort! Please let me know what a good way to get to know each other is. I’m new and have no idea other than just chatting randomly but maybe you have an idea?…
I don’t mind your race, color, nationality, religion, age and anything like that! Oh and be open minded if that wasn’t clear already hihi :)
Abi - wishing you a lovely upcoming week!
:>

This little piece I wrote because I have zero mental energy to write something I care too much aobut the format and quality, and i've been wanting to have a look at this topic for a while.
Don't expect a lot of quality, but here have a thing.
---
[This video is shown in its raw form for purposes of transparency of the procedures. For the edited version please visit the Emergency Services Guild public-facing site]
[Content Warning: This video contains images of both stampedes and wartime stampede incidents of the following situations: Human First Contact, Operation Blindside, Sillis Occupation, Kolshian Scouting of Venlil Prime]
[This video will be subtitled instead of utilizing audio translation]
The camera’s view is completely obscured by a grey mass “I think it’s running, can you check it for me?” says a deep bassy voice of a human.
“Yes, i’m getting the audio and a very good closeup for your shirt” the voice of a venlil sounds hoarse
The grey mass recedes and the room becomes visible. A large naturally-lit room of plain appearance, there is a long table set in the center of it surrounded by chairs, the table itself is clearly designed with a holographic projector and at the far end of the room there is a large display.
There are seven people present, three humans dressed in grey outfits with red highlights, each one of them with a different insignia emblazoned on their breast but all three of them have similar themes, a helmet, an axe and a ladder is present on all three designs. Four venlil represent, two with sashes of office with the white with red stripe color and the exterminator’s pyre-and-shield insignia and two with armbands with the red pawprint.
“Alright, before we start the actual meeting, can I ask why are they here?” says one of the humans, well-built and with a lighter complexion, pointing at the two venlil with sashes.
“Because it’s part of our job? Because we’re involved?” says the one with greyish wool and dark spots
“I’m sorry if i’m skeptical why an exterminator is in a meeting involving public safety and stampede response”
“Because” the venlil’s voice becomes louder “It’s our job. And I’m already brahking tired of this whole act. I’ve heard every variation of ‘you shouldn’t be the ones doing this’ you can imagine. Every human I’ve met has said this, multiple times” he slams his fists on the table
“And I brahking agree, look!” he points at one of the venlil with the armbands “Our jobs literally overlap, why do we even HAVE this overlap? What could the exterminator’s guild do in a stampede that the emergency services guild couldn’t? Why is it that any job that requires you to have the slightest bit of tail to do it they drop on us? I don’t brahking know!” he’s taking deep breaths “So… Why don’t we skip this part and just get to the meeting?”
The humans are taken aback, while it seems like the venlil were quite unfazed at the sudden energetic outburst in a strange reversal of the usual reactions. “Not… Quite what I was expecting” that first human adds “Alright, I’ll keep my thoughts to myself for now”
With that, the human that had been adjusting the camera sits down and the arrangement of seating is visible clearly: The four venlil are on one side of the table while the three humans are on the other. One of the venlil with the armbands speaks up “We are gathered at this moment for a presentation of the United Nations’ Extraplanetary Emergency Response Division’s research on the nature and possible mitigation of stampedes”
“Present for this meeting are three human representatives of the UNEERD, Captain Fabia” a human female with short crimson hair and wiry build nods “Captain Jorge” the first human nods “And Captain Ishikawa” a human much taller human with shortly cut dark hair and mildly reddened skin speaking of a disagreement with the eternal twilight nods.
“Present are also four venlil representatives. Representing the Exterminator’s Guild are Division Lead Toss” the venlil who had the outburst earlier nods “Of the Stampede Response division, Division Lead Tunam” a venlil with a strangely reddish coat halfway between pink and red nods “Of the Behavioral Studies division” the speaking venlil himself, best identified by an eyepatch on his right eye, nods “Representing the Emergency Services Guild is me, Division Lead Onam of the Stampede Response division, and Division Lead Liram” the venlil beside him nods, a woman with a distinctive vertical striping pattern “Of the Medical Response division.”
Onam takes a deep breath “You may begin the presentation, Captain Jorge” he’s being incredibly professional
With that, Jorge uses a holopad to summon an image on the monitor at the far end, a simple bullet point list “Though all present here already know, I’ll state it for the record. The ESG has requested from the UNEERD an independent study of mitigating techniques for stampede events, both to help us increase our understanding of the local needs and to acquire an outside perspective that may improve their own understanding”
“We will be presenting our current findings, which have proven to be pretty surprising in my opinion” he gives another command to his holopad moving to the next slide “I’ll begin with the most important finding before we look into how we’ve reached this conclusion. But in effect, a proper stampede event can actually severely reduce to completely eliminate casualties in a situation of panic, however, those events can devolve into panicked flight as well as not every species is capable of those”
At that, Toss tilts his head to the side “Of all things… Stampedes preventing casualties? That’s really difficult to believe”
Ishikawa offers a shrug “I know. I’ll be honest we kind of came into this with, let’s say… A bit of a bias against you. But the observations held true, and it turns out the situation is considerably more complex than it seems”
Jorge nods “Take note this is mostly a preliminary study, we don’t have a lot of data of the sort we needed.” he pulls up another bullet list in the screen “Our work was focused more on the behavioral end, as you’ve more than proven to have the infrastructure and technical superiority here, but we have found a distinct lack of behavioral studies on stampedes”
Tunam takes a deep breath “Sure. More stuff we got wrong, as always” but before one of the humans can say something he waves dismissively with his tail “It’s alright, you’re just doing your job. It just gets exhausting hearing this every damn paw. Sorry for the interruption, please continue”
Jorge has a look on his face for a moment, something like worry and sympathy, before continuing “We have performed our studies by examining footage of stampede events with specific characteristics. First, monospecies events, with three examples. The stampede events during our first contact, as a sample of stampede events amongst the Venlil, recovered footage of an event in the Cradle during Operation Blindside, as a sample of stampede events amongst the Gojid. Take note that while this particular footage was from a situation far from any attack sites and before the arxur invasion, the reliability of it is shaky because of the wartime situation. And a stampede event on Sillis that happened recently in response to peacekeeper forces”
As he talks, three of the bullet points light up “Additionally, we later compared stampede events involving multispecies groupings. Particularly we have studied the very recent events here on Venlil Prime during the kolshian threat as well as a second event that occurred on Sillis involving a damaged dam” the last two bullet points light up
The female firefighter pipes up “We’re going to treat you like adults here but early warning we’re not going to be censoring any of the footage. I imagine given you all work with this there shouldn’t be anything you’re not familiar with”
The one-eyed venlil makes an assentive motion with his ears “Sadly, we’ve all seen enough of the carnage to be used to it”
Jorge moves on to the next slide, which contains video. He passes the holopad off to the human woman at his side “Your turn, Fabia”
She nods “We’ll start by examining this footage of the first contact. First tell me if there’s anything unusual you notice here” she says, letting the footage play. It’s an aggregation of a few different cameras, apparently from residential apartments. It shows the residents, all Venlil, running away from their apartments and spilling over in the streets, the residents of each apartment building start running towards where presumably the nearest bunker is. It only takes a few moments before they start pushing each other out of the way and the ones at the fringes of the herd end up unable to follow the group as the ever-growing mass of people start to push them against the walls of the buildings and side streets, a little while longer the first tramplings start to happen.
Tunam has had a very careful eye on the footage “This looks like a textbook case of a stampede. Nothing particular to it” he flicks his ear to the side
Taking the sign, Toss adds in “Dreadful, as always, but not even the worst example I’ve seen”
Onam sighs “I remember that one. Wouldn’t want to be those two knowing all of this was caused by them. But still, a pretty normal stampede, if anything a mild one”
Liram makes a dismissive wave of her tail “Didn’t even manage to overflow the hospitals, so i’m calling that one a win”
The sunburnt human bites his lower lip, trying to keep something inside. But ultimately it spills over “How bad is it for those kinds of responses?” it’s not so much an accusatory tone as much as a sad one.
“Very” is the only answer Onam gives.
At that, Fabia waves “And here is where a human, or more specifically outsider perspective helped.” she presses a couple of controls in the holopad, rewinding the footage to the start “I want you to pay attention to how this particular herd moves, just the one from the beginning of the video”
The footage plays again, showing the residents of the apartments rushing out, most take the stairs while a few take the elevators. There’s parents carrying their pups and some elderly being rushed along. The footage switches to the outside view where the whole herd of venlil from the apartment seems to erupt out of the front doors at the same time, it follows them for a bit until they’re closer to another group leaving their residence before Fabia pauses “Here’s where we noticed something, how much panic do you see in here?”
It’s Tunam’s turn to respond “Normal levels, i’d say, nothing out of ordinary. Which, they were expecting a raid or worse, so keep that in mind.”
Fabia nods “And that’s why the difference is important. Pay attention to their movement” she rewinds to the moment where they’re leaving the apartment building “Pay close attention to their feet” she zooms the video
The four venlil focus on it, seemingly unable to see what is happening “It takes humans at least months of training to be able to do this. They’re all moving in perfect synchrony” she rewinds one more time, and with the information out there it’s clear that at this point, this herd’s footsteps are moving in perfect lockstep “And I have severe doubts those people have any sort of training”
Onam turns his one good eye towards Fabia, then back at the footage, then back at Fabia “That… Yes, I can see that. But that has to be a fluke, if that is true then we wouldn’t have tramplings”
In response, Fabia changes footage. It shows a different apartment building, but the contents are similar: Up until the herd is a good distance away from the building their movement is synchronous and even the exit, though clearly panicked, seems to flow without injury. She shows footage from three more apartments “We thought that too, but this pattern repeats every time. This is a level of instinctive organization that’s, to me, supernatural. But at some point it breaks down”
The medical lead had his eyes closed in thought for a while now “That… Now that you say that… Stampede injuries are always outside. Well, no, not always of course. But less than twelve percent of them happen inside buildings, the vast majority happens on the streets”
The human woman passes the datapad aside, Ishikawa picks it up and calls up the footage again. It’s the same as the initial one, but it shows two herds approaching “And here’s where it breaks down. Look” he plays it as everyone pays much closer attention to the details of the video. The two different herds simply crash into each other, causing people to fall over and the two previously-synchronized groups to fall completely out of order.
Tunam’s tail swipes a short arc forwards “Ah, I see. Each herd is acting like a single unit at that point, so this situation is like two people running into each other. Now they’re on the floor and confused” he stares as the footage continues, and what was two groups ends up splitting into four completely disorganized groups “And the herds are unable to reform after that”
“This is where i’m going to introduce some specific terms we’re using here” Ishikawa adds “Specifically we’re referring to the organized movement portion as a ‘stampede’ proper. The situation where everything breaks down and they are completely disorganized we’re referring to as ‘panicked flight’, much how it is for us humans. And this specific situation that caused the breakdown of the stampede we’re calling an ‘impact’ event, given it was two herds impacting against each other”
Ishikawa then changes to a different piece of footage “And this will be the second breakdown situation we’ve recognized, a ‘command failure’ event.” he starts the footage, it’s a proper stampede, the video is from a camera on a defensive bunker proper, the masses trying to get inside are visible at the bottom of the image. Something happens in the incoming stampede, it slows down a little bit, before suddenly the back half overtakes the front half, tossing people into the ground.
“Notice how the approaching herd seems to be behaving as we’ve initially expected, even going so far as slowing down to prevent from barrelling into the people waiting to enter the bunker” he adds, before rewinding to just before the breakdown and zooming the video “But notice here, at some point those two start having a discussion while they run” the video is zoomed on a pair of venlil who seem to be shouting, though the video has no audio “Shortly after, the entire formation breaks and the rear speeds up, trampling the front”
The crimson venlil adds “They were following the one on the right…” he has a certain tone of awe on his voice “They all had their attention trained on him”
At that the female firefighter makes a questioning noise “How’d you figure that out?”
Tunam does a quick sideways flick of his ears in a dismissal move “I guess you don’t know how to see where we’re focusing our attention on when we don’t have to turn our entire heads for it. But pay attention to the ears, when they’re completely upright to take in sound they’ll be tracking whoever the focus is. As you can see, they were all focusing on the one on the right, which was the one being yelled at” he focuses on the now still image for a while “You can see he has his tail in his hands, while the one yelling at him has his chest first ruffled out.” his eye seems to focus beyond the image now “This herd didn’t break down because of another, but they lost guidance, is that it?”
Jorge sighs, but he has a slight smile “See, I told you it’d be wise to have at least one venlil in our team. Just from being able to read their body language he skipped past two weeks of comparisons”
Ishikawa gives a light sigh “But that’s correct. This is a ‘command failure’ situation. We’ve noticed that in every stampede there seems to be someone that works at least as pace setting, if not straight up herd leader. It seemed in cases to mostly be arbitrary, but once someone got in that position everyone would follow that one”
Jorge picks up the holopad again “Next up” the screen changes again, it’s another video that is quite clearly not on Venlil Prime “This one happened during peacekeeping operations on Sillis…” there’s a certain inflection of disgust in the human’s voice as he mentions ‘peacekeeping’ “You probably already know what to expect but I want you to focus on the differences here”
The video that plays out starts with what seems like a protest in front of a UN field base, the recording is from the body cam of a soldier on top of a watchtower. There’s a moderate mass of tilfish with all sorts of signs, there’s shouting. The camera turns to show an APC get close to the mass from inside the base, there’s shouting from the human guards but nothing happens, until the APC revs up its engine heavily. At the angry roar of the vehicle the protesters started to bolt, four large groups forming in different directions.
The camera follows one such group as it starts heading off down a street, unlike the venlil stampedes this one starts from moment zero with trampling and people moving into each other. At some point it’s visible someone at the middle of the formation seems to hesitate and slow down, causing the entire mass to slow down for a moment, and then someone else near the slower raises their arms. At this point this is too far from the soldier’s body camera to catch noise, but what seems to be a discussion has happened, and suddenly the stampede speeds up and the scene that follows gets considerably worse as the mass turns into a tangle of limbs cross across eachother and tearing itself apart as they try to move in the same general direction.
“It started bad” says Toss “But it got worse. I’ve never seen a stampede get worse like that”
Onam puts his tail on the table, tapping the surface gently with it “It happens as it grows in size but this group didn’t change. That did seem like a command failure situation causing it to get even worse, yes, but they seemed to already be very out of sync from the start”
The human with the holopad nods “And that’s the biggest failure of your treatment of stampedes showing itself.” he rewinds the video to when the APC starts roaring “And honestly, we were stuck on that failure mode for a while too until one of the younger members of our team spoke their mind. Pay closer attention to the amount of damage that is happening during the stampede here” they all lean closer as they watch the start again “How many wounds are you seeing?”
It’s the one-eyed venlil that answers “None… They’re not trampling eachther, they’re climbing each other, and walking under the others, somehow without hurting themselves?” his voice has a definite awe to it.
Jorge nods “Yep. Tilfish, both from their body plan and however way their kinesthetic sense works, appear to be fully capable of moving over, through and under each other like they weren’t even there. That seems to be pretty unique to their species”
It’s the red furred venlil that comments now “But they lose that coordination when the command failure happens, so they start to miss their movements and now we have limbs tangled on themselves and tearing themselves apart”
“Comparing medical reports from this with medical reports from the first incident with just venlil” starts the female firefighter “We see different wound patterns. A monospecies panicked flight of tilfish will lead primarily to damaged and removed limbs while one of venlil will lead to crushing wounds. Because your herd movement patterns and capacities are different, when the stampede fails into panicked flight the wounds are different”
Liram tilts her head to the side “That’s what you meant. We… Speh, the entire federation, has been treating stampedes like they behave the same for every species” her tail swats left to right for a while with an excessive amount of force “But this makes sense. And I presume you have an example of a species that doesn’t stampede up next, right?”
Jorge nods, moving to the next video. It shows a wide, long street “This one was recovered from the Cradle, this happens during the strikes on the orbital defenses but before the first orbital drop. Meaning, long before any ground operation starts” the video is sped up considerably at the start, the trickle of gojid into the streets is slow as to require that, but the flows from the buildings and side streets slowly thicken as more and more people start fleeing away from the camera’s direction. The mass that forms is enormous, taking up the entire street, and to flows and moves as if it wasn’t a mass of people, not even like a mass of animals, but it flows like a river, like it ceased to contain living beings and it now contained fluid particles.
Tunam, whose expression has been growing more and more serious by the moment, initiates “I… I’ve never seen a stampede like… It really shows the difference seeing the comparison, here we didn’t have groups forming at exit points and leaving, we have a slow trickle until the mass of people is…”
Ishikawa nods “Until the mass of people starts behaving like a fluid, completely detached from the will of the people inside of it” he puts his elbows in the table “Very much how it works with humans. At that point, you just need to let the flow move you and hope for the best, while trying to keep yourself safe”
Jorge zooms in the image, which appears to be sufficiently high quality to get detailed images of any particular member of the mass “You can even see the measures they take to prevent harming themselves” he directs the zoom to an area where you see the gojid have somehow arranged themselves back-to-back and front-to-front as they’re pushed and shoved, trying to avoid harming themselves on each other. It’s visible, however, they have no control over the motions as they’re simply being moved by the mass. One unlucky woman trying to hold on to some form of backpack gets pulled under the mass of bodies by the article. Most gojid seem to be taking conscious effort to keep their quills from flaring out, but many are failing and some trickle of blue can be seen on some backs
“Of course” the zoomed out area directs to a different section while zooming out “This is neither instinctual nor organized, as you can see the vast majority of the cases are like… This…” the best description of the moving mass of very sharp people being dislocated by nothing but panic and fluid forces is… A meat grinder. There’s more blue than brown visible and the speed with which the human moves the video elsewhere is quite indicative of how none of the present trained emergency workers had the stomach to witness it.
Liram has stood up “By the void… But- But- There’s gojid population on this planet! I’ve never seen anything like this when they’re involved!” there’s straight up panic in her voice.
With a command, Jorge moves on to the next slide “And that segues well into the next topic of research, multispecies stampedes” there’s a still image of a large street in the capital, mostly empty at this point “As you can imagine there’s behavioral differences in multispecies situations”
Jorge passes the holopad over to Ishikawa “This one is pretty recent, hell I still remember it myself. The kolshian probing attack” the video starts, and for a few seconds the slow foot traffic of the mostly empty street seems undeterred. Then, most everyone still walking the streets, which here in the capital means a variety of species from venlil and human to takkan and iftali, picks up their holopads at once. And with different degrees of urgency and reading speed, they start running.
Nothing seems to progress further than that other than people entering buildings, but after a while longer it happens, groups start leaving the buildings in large herds “As you can see” Ishikawa pauses “We see them exiting buildings in large groups, just as the stampeding species do” he let it play again. Just like in the first two videos the large groups seem to be moving roughly in coordination within themselves, but it seems to be a much more frail kind of coordination as the group’s form changes and shifts as the people inside adjust their position.
Ishikawa zooms into one of the groups “Here, check their movement” it’s visible that only a portion of them is moving in actual synchrony, the venlil as well as a pair of sulean and three krakotl seem to be moving very much in lockstep, and one human who seems to be acting as a leader as she points and shouts. Meanwhile the other humans, two takkan and a gojid aren’t moving quite in synchrony but seem capable of keeping themselves in formation thanks to the others around them. “Here we see the effect of a mixed species setting. The stampeding species manage to give enough structure to the group that the others can follow”
Tunam is staring intensely at the video “But that’s a very fragile configuration, isn’t it? The ones organizing on instinctive drive can’t possibly keep this much structure for long? Without training this is going to break down quickly”
Ishikawa nods “That’s what we thought as well but…” he lets the video play, and they watch that mass of bodies continue to move mostly organized down the street. At some point another equally mixed group starts approaching from the side, but one of the takkan appears to start shouting. But instead of things breaking down, what happens is that both groups merge together, there’s some minor bodily impacts but from the visible motions of the group there’s some shared apologies and they continue moving at a slower speed, matching the speed of the second group “That doesn’t happen, the whole situation is even more stable”
The video continues for a while, and Ishikawa zooms to the front of the formation. The human who’d been the apparent leader taps rather violently a venlil on the shoulder. There apparently seems to be a verbal altercation, but both give each other affirmative visual cues and the venlil speeds up a little bit. And the rest of the herd matches pace as the group changes direction to another street “And this is a smooth change of command, presumably the human that’d been the unofficial lead figured out who knew the shortest path to the bunker and they’ve began following him instead”
The crimson venlil sinks down in his chair “That’s… I’ve never seen a stampede move quite like that, even multispecies ones. It has to be you…”
“Much as i’d love to give us all the credit” Jorge starts “I don’t quite think it is. Or rather, it’s not something i’d say is inherently human. If it was, once that group changed command they’d break down, or it wouldn’t be able to merge that easily with a takkan mediating. No, I think it was just those specific humans being able to keep their cool that helped it.”
He looks at Tunam for a half second before continuing “Everyone else seems to be… Very prone to panicking quickly. And while we’re just as prone to panic we don’t seem to get there as fast as the others. For some reason. Keeping a bit of a calmer head allows the prevention of command failures and the overall effect of reducing the panic level in a herd enough that any member present has enough wits to negotiate through an impact as well”
Upon noticing Tunam’s souring expression, Ishikawa gives the pad another command to move on to the next video “To give a bit more context to an important part of the behavior we’re analyzing here, we have this one footage of what is essentially a stampede event, but not one most people would recognize as such”
It seems to be footage of Sillis again, most obvious by the number of tilfish present. The footage is from a cargo hauling drone in a work site by a river at the bottom of a dam. There are a handful of humans, a half dozen venlil and a gojid all wearing construction uniforms identifying them as part of one of the UN relief forces, the various tilfish around are also wearing bright construction vests and protective gear and with the exception of two of them, they seem to be trying their best to stay away from the others. Suddenly, the gojid who’s near the river looks down at his feet, then starts running away shouting. At that everyone other than the tilfish start running as well, the group slows down for a moment as the tilfish workers run towards the group and they all continue together up a hill. A few seconds after they crest the hill there’s suddenly water in the worksite as the dam cracks and collapses. The group stops at the top of the hill, and quickly they’ve brought up holopads to start doing damage assessment as a few head closer to the rushing waters.
“This, as you can see, looks nothing like what you expect out of a stampede. We’ve interviewed those workers remotely to get a better grasp of what happened” Fabia adds “Thanks to their sensitivity to ground vibrations, the gojid worker caught the dam’s damage early and called for the others to run, which caused the work crew to evacuate to higher ground.” she waves at Ishikawa, who rewinds the video and zooms on the group as it runs “As you can see, we have the organized movement of a stampede proper” and known his cue he skips ahead to the group on top of the hill “And they stopped quickly, as well.
The human with reddened skin rewinds the video again to show the moment the group slows down “And here’s the particular detail I want you to pay attention to. Notice the group formed when the gojid called out the emergency, but only two tilfish joined it. The two that were already talking with the UN forces”
Onam tilts his head, clearly in thought as his blind eye is facing the screen now “You’re saying there’s an influence of familiarity?”
In answer, Ishikawa shakes his head in negative “Yes and no, we believe this is an effect of threat-assessment. The two that trusted the veracity of the information about the danger moved as quickly as the rest of the herd, which had managed to form thanks to the presence of the venlil and tilfish. Only after the other tilfish recognized those two did they start moving”
“And the whole group slowed down for them, without breaking apart” the crimson venlil adds “This is very much not anything we’d consider a stampede, however as you said the synchronized movement happens and they even managed to clear through the obstacles in a surprisingly safe manner on the way out”
Jorge picks up the holopad again and moves on to the next slide “So to sum up our theories. Certain species have an innate capacity of large-numbers collective movement, what we call a stampede is simply that natural capacity displaying itself during mass flight. That capacity can be harnessed to reduce casualties of panicked flight by giving the moving group an organized form, but only as long as the organization can be sustained. This mass movement capacity also applies to situations where other species would still perform in an organized fashion, but its instinctive nature severely speeds up the process.”
Before he can continue, however, Tunam mutters a little too loudly “But the results you’re going to give us are going to be the same brahking thing as always”
Jorge ignores the muttering “To begin with we’re going to suggest a system similar to the fire brigades we have on Earth. Essentially, any group large enough, such as a company or an apartment building, needs to have a handful of people with some training in emergency procedures for fire escape, so they can guide the rest of the people.”
Ishikawa intrudes “And in countries with higher seismic activities like mine, those procedures also include how to deal with earthquakes for example”
Jorge nods, and takes a deep breath “Look, I’m not going to sugarcoat it. Your threat-assessment skills are horrible, for some reason- No, I think for reasons we’re all acquainted well enough by now, you’re all very likely to jump at shadows, far more than you should. However, your flight responses are part of your nature, trying to fight your nature never, ever works, you always have to work with it.” he’s staring directly at Tunam, who has met his stare with his right eye “So the primary suggestion is to introduce a form of ‘emergency herd lead’ training in organizations so that we’re certain there are individuals capable of keeping command and a lower baseline of chaos during a stampede event as well as further research into better methods of performing such a function”
Tunam doesn’t flinch from the stare “Come on, say it”
“No. As much as I’d love to say something like what you think I will, I’ll be honest. You guys expect to face orbital bombardment threats with enough frequency that civilian bunkers are part of city planning. Not a human alive today could imagine living in this nightmare their entire lives, I’m going to give you some credit here. Plus, in real threat situations as seen in the last video, you have very beneficial threat responses.” Jorge adds
Jorge waits for a few moments, then continues “That concludes the presentation of the early findings and initial measures we’ve identified. It should be noted that this topic will require much further research, preferably from a multidisciplinary group with representatives of multiple species. Though those findings may be applicable at the present our suggestion is that any action taken at this moment be only provisional and on an experimental level until further research can be made”
Onam stands up “Very well, with that I declare the meeting concluded” he takes in a deep breath and sits back down, making an annoyed sound with his voice as he swats his tail to the side “What is it about you humans that you could see all those things?”
Fabia shrugs, sitting more relaxed in her chair “I don’t think it’s something special, we’re just outsiders with a different perspective.”
A loud screeching noise can be heard, and as everyone turns to face Tunam the source of the noise is visible as the hand he had on the table had dug its claws into it “It’s not like we haven’t found out those things before, isn’t it?” he doesn’t seem to be directing his words to anyone in particular
The one-eyed venlil tilts his head to the side “We did have that work group almost fifteen cycles ago. I remember they were considering a suggestion like what we just had right now, but the work group never went anywhere and we never got any real results”
Tunam stands up suddenly, sending his chair scattering “One more to the list I guess…” there’s a tiredness to his voice “I should figure out where they wound up…” he turns around and goes to leave “We’re done here, yes? I should go” and stalks out.
The remaining people in the room look at his exit confusedly, as Ishikawa comes over to turn off the camera the others can be seen leaving.

Just thinking outloud, could you make a unit that had Hero Power Damage +1 similar to spell damage, or would it be too convoluted? It would do as expected with Slayer or Selena's Mark, etc, but I imagine Soul Burn and Neferu's Sacrifice may be a surprise.
Personally I think it would be a cool thing for some random future legend to have, neutral because so many gods have damage power, but also so you can ensure it never get's out of hand. Giving it to a one drop like Street Conjuror may be too good, but then again it is almost easier for conjuror to get multiple spots of value from his than it would ever be to get more than one use out of a good power.

Mandatory auto insurance has been around for decades now, and it is a legal obligation for drivers to have verified proof of active insurance coverage when driving on public roads, highways, or streets. The insurance policy covers the driver's liability in the event of an accident, damages caused to other vehicles or property, and injuries sustained by the people involved in a car crash. However, many car owners and drivers ask the question: "Should they pay us if nothing happens?" This article will analyze such a question and provide insights based on data and current trends.
First, let's talk about the cost of auto insurance. According to the latest data collected by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), the average auto insurance premium in the United States is $1,004 per year, with some states like Michigan and Louisiana averaging $2,800 and $2,500, respectively. Moreover, the cost of auto insurance has been going up in recent years, increasing by 2.5% in 2019 alone.
One of the reasons behind rising auto insurance premiums is the number of distracted drivers on the road, which leads to a higher risk of accidents and claims. However, this does not explain why car owners should not receive money back if they never file a claim. The argument for this notion is that auto insurance is a form of risk management, and the premiums paid are essentially a transfer of that risk to the insurance provider. Thus, if nothing happens, there is no need for the insurance provider to pay out.
While this may be reasonable, the issue that arises is when auto insurance companies drop policyholders after an accident. Despite years of paying premiums, some drivers find themselves without coverage, leaving them to cover any further damages from the accident and potentially face financial ruin.
So, should auto insurance companies relook at their policies and how they treat their customers? Some states in the US have already implemented laws aimed at protecting customers. For example, the state of California has a "good driver discount" program that rewards policyholders who maintain a clean driving record by reducing their premiums. Additionally, some states have laws prohibiting insurers from dropping drivers after one claim.
However, the fact remains that auto insurance companies are a business and rely on profits to survive. With the rising costs of car accidents and medical care, it would be difficult for companies to remain profitable if they had to pay out on every premium. That being said, some auto insurance providers offer "accident forgiveness" programs, which allow drivers to file one claim without any rate increases or cancellation of their policy.
In conclusion, the debate over whether auto insurance companies should pay out if nothing happens is a contentious one. While it may be tempting to want a refund on premiums paid, it is essential to remember that auto insurance is a form of risk transfer. There are, however, steps that auto insurance companies can take to better treat their customers, such as implementing loyalty programs or accident forgiveness policies. It is up to policymakers and insurance regulators to strike a balance between customer protection and private industry profitability in the insurance industry.
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Ok, so a lot of times, Facebook will show me blurbs of romance books, and I'll read them. And the blurb on this one was a bit enticing. It was the FMC in the hospital with one of the MMCs, who was sitting at her bedside and asked in that protective voice "what did he do to you?" and I was like ya ok I'll give this a try. I'm also not going to put in any spoilers because this whole post would be a spoiler block.
Trigger warning (seriously): this book contains scenes of abuse, both physical and emotional, the death of a small child, depicts violence, and not great home life of children (the MMCs).
Trigger warning (not serious): The most annoying FMC I've ever read.
Ok. I have several issues with this book. The biggest being the FMC. She's ridiculously stupid. I know that the author probably wrote the FMC a certain way at times because she's depicting a woman in an emotionally and physically abusive relationship. Since I don't have any experience with that, I imagine that some of the choices the FMC makes and some of the rational she uses might be common with people in abusive relationships. But, that's not my issue with her. My issue with her is she's fucking dumb as a box of rocks.
This book is page after page after page ad nauseum of this idiots internal monolog about her abusive MMC and the other MMC. Like, this book could have been half as long if the author edited herself and took most of that bullshit out. Her wafflings on staying or leaving the abusive ex aside, there's too FUCKING MUCH internal monolog. I literally skipped pages and didn't read them because I honestly didn't care what she thought anymore.
The rest I'm going to start listing.

• The meet cute for FMC and abusive ex MMC is in an alleyway. At night. By a dumpster. and he says something along the lines of "you shouldn't be down alleyways by yourself, you never know who's gonna getcha" So of course she gets spooked, and she thinks he's going to attack her, but he doesn't, and she reacts like any sensible woman would and knees him in the nuts. BUT, she says because she found this dog, whos pregnant, who needs help. So they rescue the dog. And then the dog is never mentioned again. I thought maybe one of them would adopt it or a puppy, but NOPE.
• fuckin EVERYONE GLOWERS. I've never read so many people glowering at each other in one place.
• Her boss is super into team building, which, ok, some bosses are, but this guy's idea is to take them to a boxing place. Cool. They start with getting into the boxing ring and trying moves on one of the coaches. Um...if you do any research, at all, whatesoever, you'd know that's NOT where you start with a boxing class.
• Then of course, she fails at getting into the ring, twists her ankle, and then the meet cute for the other MMC happens. Gruff man is gentle and takes care of her ankle, then gives her a tip on beating up his coach, which of course works and the coach is S T U N N E D this stupid fuckin klutz punched him.
• "Ocean-colored gems." Maybe it's just me, but goddamn am I sick of eyes being gems. Find a better simile.
• This one...I almost threw my phone across the room when I read it, and honestly, it should have been my biggest red flag to stop reading this book. Brace yourself. This is an actual quote from the book, the bold emphasis is my own:
  • "He pulled his lips up on one side, revealing an adorable dimple. God-dammit, how was I supposed to not stare at that seductive facial belly button." WHHHAAAAAT.
• FMC's best friend tries to convince her to break up with abusive ex, she doesn't, "you don't understand he's usually not like that." Ok, can't fault her for that. Again, I don't have any experience to relate to, so I imagine there are a lot of people who feel this way. Other MMC tries to convince her to break up. She doesn't. She gets actively mad at the MMC and stomps away. She stomps away from a lot of people, and it's fucking childish.
• The Tragic Backstory
  • She blames the abuse on ex MMC's bad childhood. His dad cheated on his mom, she became an alcoholic and neglectful, and FMC just kept going "BUT THE POOR BAAAABY." WOMAN. HE GREW UP. HES NOT A BABY ANYMORE. And of course to add to his Tragic Backstory, he sent the mom a picture of him with his new family on her birthday, then ex MMC wanted to beat the shit out of him and avenge his mom (???), then the dad gets killed and exMMC is mad because HE didn't get to kill his dad. But now he wants revenge on the person who killed his dad?? BECAUSE HE WAS MAD HE DIDNT GET TO KILL HIS DAD HIMSELF???????
  • Of course the good MMC also has The Tragic Backstory. He was abused by his step dad, but never told his mom, and he got Big Angy and beat the shit out of his stepdad one day when he was getting beat and he killed the stepdad.
  • FMC's backstory is Also Tragic, naturally. Big sister died young because of cancer, Mom spiraled, Dad tried to keep things together, they ended up divorced, and she was only ever comforted by her Big Brother. The sister died when FMC was like, four or something like that, and she's like 23 when the story is taking place, yet it's a pretty constant topic in the story.
• FMC's brother is suspiciously attacked, and then it legit was almost never brought up again. It came back up in like the last few chapters of the book.
• Another direct quote: "I think he cut my spinal cord." I looked up, closed my eyes, and sighed.
• I also have problems with the whole last few chapters of the book, but I don't want to actually give anymore away, but like, goddamn. I feel like a little research would have went a long way in the last few chapters. It just bugs the shit out of me when there's clearly been no research done on a topic that takes 30 seconds to google. Like, the exMMC would not have been able to do half of what he did if this woman had just f u c k i n g G O O G L E D I T.
• There's absolutely no smut in this book. It's alluded to, but never there. The allusions to it are really bad fade to blacks. Since this is technically a ROMANCE novel, k, i can deal with there being no smut, but for as fucking awful as this book is, a little dickin would have gone a long way.

I'm sorry. This is long. I honestly could not stop thinking about this book, and I don't really talk to anyone about the books I read, and like. I couldnt stand it. I had to tell someone.
For my actual review, 1/10, don't recommend.