So back in January a spring in my garage broke. I contacted a company that had top reviews in the area (omaha nebraska) set up an appointment in which they were late for. I called the time of the appointment was told they where 30 mins behind. Called 45 mins later was told they where in the area. called an hour later was told they were 5 mins away. Called again an hour later and they answered as they were pulling up. They give me an estimate of $600 dollars I felt this was high but was informed they have a call fee which I did know about prior to them arriving. Decided I was in a hurry and just wanted it done. It took about 15 mins the guy even said that it was about a record for him. I paid, he left. I look up online later that for the area the repair is more commonly $300-$400. Decided I would write a review that they were late and that the business uses a call fee to make you feel trapped into over paying and gave a 1 star review. About a week later I got a call from the company about my review and they said they would offer $100 if I made it a 5 star review and took down my negative remarks. I turned down the offer, they called a couple more times about it and I continued to say no. Each time they would say " you were informed of the service fees, you agreed to pay, all our phone calls are recorded and you agreed over the phone." I admit I knew about the service fee. But I was never given an estimate over the phone. Now today I received a letter from an attorney that represents the company stating they intend to sue for slander if the negative review is not taken down, if I don't make a positive review, and I don't write an apology letter to the business owner. I checked my review which seems to have already been removed off Google,not by me, and my account doesn't have it saved either. I see no reason to write a positive review or an apology. My fear now is if I don't do anything it will just go to a default judgement with me owing court and lawyer fees and damages they feel they can quantify. How ridiculous is this and what should I honestly do at this point?

First, congrats to all of the people that got into Penn today. Genuinely happy for all you strangers as some of you have helped me cope with the stress of admission decisions by answering my questions.
I never in my life even pictured myself having the opportunity of applying to T25 schools, especially after I enrolled in community college. I feel extremely lucky and grateful that I at least got into one of the 12 schools I applied to. I read cases were very talented applicants got rejected and I don't even understand why or how.
I have to admit that the idea of going to an ivy league school was very appealing but it only became a priority or my objective in my last semester. Before that, I either didn't know what I wanted to study or how to even get there. I figured community college would be a great way to gain time, figure things out and save money.
I didn't really have any expectations to get into an Ivy college cause I knew it's extremely difficult, but while I was writing my essays I realized how great it would be attending Columbia in undergrad. I guess I was delusional thinking there is a possibility.
Now I feel like I have a better sense of what Harvard, Brown or Cornell are looking for in their applicants and before I opened my UPenn decision today I already knew I was not accepted cause I read the stats of several students who got into Upenn and that was not me. I'm lacking stronger ECs mainly and grades extremely close to 4.0 so the reason why I got rejected is not cause of gpa ( I think)
I guess I'm just venting before Columbia's decisions come out this Friday. Getting rejected from Upenn didn't really hurt but I'm afraid I will get rejected by Columbia and that one was my " dream school".
On the upside I have an idea of what I should be working on to improve to hopefully gain admission in te future but into medical school.
Congrats again to all of you who got into their dream school or a T25. Wish you all the best. And for the ones that didn't get in this time, keep grinding and improving every day to become the best version of yourself and good things will come to you

Now Hiring: Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer: Join our Sustainable Mission!
Attention Full-Stack Developers!
Are you passionate about using your coding skills to drive positive change? Our boutique management consulting firm, specializing in clean energy and green finance, is on the lookout for a talented Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer to join our team. Work from anywhere while contributing to innovative solutions that promote sustainability and environmental stewardship.
Responsibilities:

• Web Development: Lead the development of web-based applications and platforms, from concept to deployment, using your full-stack expertise.
• Technical Solutions: Collaborate with our team to identify technical requirements and develop scalable solutions that meet the needs of our clients and projects.
• UI/UX Design: Ensure an intuitive and visually appealing user experience by integrating best practices in UI/UX design into your development work.
• Troubleshooting & Maintenance: Provide ongoing support, troubleshooting, and maintenance for existing web applications, ensuring optimal performance and reliability.

Requirements:

• Full-Stack Proficiency: Strong proficiency in both front-end and back-end development technologies, including but not limited to HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Node.js, and relational databases (e.g., MySQL, PostgreSQL).
• Problem-Solving Skills: Demonstrated ability to analyze complex problems and develop innovative technical solutions to address them.
• Collaborative Spirit: Excellent communication and teamwork skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams in a remote work environment.
• Passion for Sustainability: A genuine interest in sustainability and a desire to contribute to projects that promote environmental conservation and green finance.

Perks & Benefits:

• Remote Work: Enjoy the flexibility of remote work, with the freedom to work from anywhere that inspires you.
• Meaningful Projects: Be part of a team that's making a real difference in the world, developing solutions that contribute to a more sustainable future.
• Professional Growth: Access opportunities for ongoing learning and skill development, with the chance to expand your expertise in clean energy and green finance.
• Competitive Compensation: Receive competitive compensation for your valuable contributions to our team.

How to Apply:
Excited to be part of our sustainable mission?

• Send CV or GDrive link via PM with code: ApplyForFullStackDeveloper
  
• Include certifications or evidence of expertise
  
• State salary expectations
  
• Shortlisted candidates will be asked to submit a brief self-taken video introducing themselves and answering a prompt to gauge communication skills.
  
• Also, you may send your resume along with a brief cover letter outlining your relevant experience and why you're the perfect fit for this role to mjbgcopc@gmail.com.
  

Join us in leveraging technology to drive positive change and create a more sustainable world for future generations. Apply now and be a part of something meaningful!

I (19M) was always lonely throughout my life. I never had friends in school and never took part in any co-curricular activities. I would be jealous of my classmates with them hanging out with friends and being able to talk to girls, so I decided that after my high school I will try to make friends in college.
In college I met a group of people who I thought could be my friends. We would talk and have fun together. We would joke about each other. Even there were 2 girls in our group and with their friendly nature made me comfortable to talk to girls. Even there was a guy in the group who I would hangout with a lot. We would sit together and go to eat food together in the canteen or outside college.
I even started talking to a girl. She was really sweet and cute to talk to and we would bitch about our professors and at once shared playlists with each other. She was the one who asked me for my Insta ID. She would look and smile at me and wave at me. It was amazing. I thought my college life is going to be way better than my school life.
But it all came crashing down. In October me and my friends bunked our classes and went to the sports arena to play games. We were playing darts. One of the 2 girls, let's call her S, jokingly told one of the guys in our group that she would hit him on his head with a dart. So I jokingly told her that I would hit her with the dart but I accidentally pointed at her breast. I was looking at her face so I didn't realize it.
She got offended. She took the other girl, let's call her Z, and told her everything about this. Z confronted me and started shouting at me in the sports arena attracting everybody's attention. The Sports Officer came running towards us. He heard the entire story and took my ID card and told them to write a letter against me to the Dean.
After the letter was written he took me and the girls to the Dean who thought of this as a minor incident and told us we are legally adults and coming to him with these petty complaints. Then they told the Dean about me taking photographs of them and leaking them.
The day before I clicked S's photos of her eating a banana in the presence of our friend group. All of us saw it as a double meaning joke so we were laughing at the photos. She took it very sportingly as a joke and I uploaded them to our personal Whatsapp Group. Everyone of us including her were laughing and giggling. But she and Z told that I took them without permission. They even told that I was never a friend and I was an outsider.
Dean got me suspended for 15 days because the next day our vacation would start so throughout November I was in my home. My mother uses this incident as a weapon to scold me evey now and then when we have arguments. And the worst was my crush.
During the days of my suspension I was in contact with my crush. She would even send notes of the classes of that day everyday throughout the suspension, but she didn't know I got suspended. Then when I rejoined college and started attending classes I sat far to my former friend group and behind my crush and she ignored me. Completely.
Throughout the whole day she would ignore me. That broke my heart. I was very upset and regretful for my actions. I think that my crush stopped taking to me because she got to know about this incident and misunderstood me. I have been hating myself for doing not respecting boundaries. Now I am all alone seeing my classmates enjoying their friendships and relationships. I think I deserve this.
I posted the same on confession and healthygamergg. But there were commens that either this is fake or GEN Z is too woke and it is all because of feminism. See I am a feminist. So for me as a feminist insulting a girl has been a very shameful and embarrassing act. It has nothing to do with wokeness or GENZ. I really want to know if I did something wrong or not. Especially from women as i insulted and crossed the boundaries of one of them.
Please don't be aggressive or antagonistic to me regarding this. I got a couple of crappy comments from those two subs. If I did anything wrong or need to fix something about it please tell me I would keep it check. Also I am not autistic or manipulative.

I am seeking someone with whom I can engage in deep conversations, exchanging thoughts on how we live our lives, our perspectives, and what we make of existence as we await our inevitable demise. I am looking for someone whose outlook on life aligns with mine, with whom we can collectively find the best way to live out our allotted time. Together, we will share our plans and goals, discussing our understanding of various matters.
I would be delighted if you, upon deciding to write to me, could explain why you chose to do so and share a bit about yourself, to streamline our initial conversations.
Some of my reflections and views on life: - I've come to realize that happiness for me won't come from having a big house, an expensive car, or even a family. Happiness, for me, lies in improving people's lives. Eventually, I'll die (like everyone else), and if I only live for myself, it would be meaningless—everything will go with me to the grave. But if I create something that improves people's lives, something that remains even after I'm gone, it gives meaning to my own life and brings me hope and happiness. I'm willing to dedicate my life to this, to improving the lives of others. - I'm interested in philosophy not just as a hobby, but as a necessity for determining the direction of life and how to approach it, understanding what to do in this life. - I often ponder the meaning of life in the face of inevitable death (because what comes after death greatly influences what to do with life). - I'm interested in what to do in life and how to spend it. The typical scenario of finding a job with good pay, buying a house, starting a family, retiring, and dying doesn't appeal to me (but I don't have anything against it). If you resonate with these sentiments, I eagerly await your response.

Now Hiring: Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer: Join our Sustainable Mission!
Attention Full-Stack Developers!
Are you passionate about using your coding skills to drive positive change? Our boutique management consulting firm, specializing in clean energy and green finance, is on the lookout for a talented Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer to join our team. Work from anywhere while contributing to innovative solutions that promote sustainability and environmental stewardship.
Responsibilities:

• Web Development: Lead the development of web-based applications and platforms, from concept to deployment, using your full-stack expertise.
• Technical Solutions: Collaborate with our team to identify technical requirements and develop scalable solutions that meet the needs of our clients and projects.
• UI/UX Design: Ensure an intuitive and visually appealing user experience by integrating best practices in UI/UX design into your development work.
• Troubleshooting & Maintenance: Provide ongoing support, troubleshooting, and maintenance for existing web applications, ensuring optimal performance and reliability.

Requirements:

• Full-Stack Proficiency: Strong proficiency in both front-end and back-end development technologies, including but not limited to HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Node.js, and relational databases (e.g., MySQL, PostgreSQL).
• Problem-Solving Skills: Demonstrated ability to analyze complex problems and develop innovative technical solutions to address them.
• Collaborative Spirit: Excellent communication and teamwork skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams in a remote work environment.
• Passion for Sustainability: A genuine interest in sustainability and a desire to contribute to projects that promote environmental conservation and green finance.

Perks & Benefits:

• Remote Work: Enjoy the flexibility of remote work, with the freedom to work from anywhere that inspires you.
• Meaningful Projects: Be part of a team that's making a real difference in the world, developing solutions that contribute to a more sustainable future.
• Professional Growth: Access opportunities for ongoing learning and skill development, with the chance to expand your expertise in clean energy and green finance.
• Competitive Compensation: Receive competitive compensation for your valuable contributions to our team.

How to Apply:
Excited to be part of our sustainable mission?

• Send CV or GDrive link via PM with code: ApplyForFullStackDeveloper
  
• Include certifications or evidence of expertise
  
• State salary expectations
  
• Shortlisted candidates will be asked to submit a brief self-taken video introducing themselves and answering a prompt to gauge communication skills.
  
• Also, you may send your resume along with a brief cover letter outlining your relevant experience and why you're the perfect fit for this role to mjbgcopc@gmail.com.
  

Join us in leveraging technology to drive positive change and create a more sustainable world for future generations. Apply now and be a part of something meaningful!

Now Hiring: Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer: Join our Sustainable Mission!
Attention Full-Stack Developers!
Are you passionate about using your coding skills to drive positive change? Our boutique management consulting firm, specializing in clean energy and green finance, is on the lookout for a talented Part-time Remote Full-Stack Developer to join our team. Work from anywhere while contributing to innovative solutions that promote sustainability and environmental stewardship.
Responsibilities:

• Web Development: Lead the development of web-based applications and platforms, from concept to deployment, using your full-stack expertise.
• Technical Solutions: Collaborate with our team to identify technical requirements and develop scalable solutions that meet the needs of our clients and projects.
• UI/UX Design: Ensure an intuitive and visually appealing user experience by integrating best practices in UI/UX design into your development work.
• Troubleshooting & Maintenance: Provide ongoing support, troubleshooting, and maintenance for existing web applications, ensuring optimal performance and reliability.

Requirements:

• Full-Stack Proficiency: Strong proficiency in both front-end and back-end development technologies, including but not limited to HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Node.js, and relational databases (e.g., MySQL, PostgreSQL).
• Problem-Solving Skills: Demonstrated ability to analyze complex problems and develop innovative technical solutions to address them.
• Collaborative Spirit: Excellent communication and teamwork skills, with the ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams in a remote work environment.
• Passion for Sustainability: A genuine interest in sustainability and a desire to contribute to projects that promote environmental conservation and green finance.

Perks & Benefits:

• Remote Work: Enjoy the flexibility of remote work, with the freedom to work from anywhere that inspires you.
• Meaningful Projects: Be part of a team that's making a real difference in the world, developing solutions that contribute to a more sustainable future.
• Professional Growth: Access opportunities for ongoing learning and skill development, with the chance to expand your expertise in clean energy and green finance.
• Competitive Compensation: Receive competitive compensation for your valuable contributions to our team.

How to Apply:
Excited to be part of our sustainable mission?

• Send CV or GDrive link via PM with code: ApplyForFullStackDeveloper
  
• Include certifications or evidence of expertise
  
• State salary expectations
  
• Shortlisted candidates will be asked to submit a brief self-taken video introducing themselves and answering a prompt to gauge communication skills.
  
• Also, you may send your resume along with a brief cover letter outlining your relevant experience and why you're the perfect fit for this role to mjbgcopc@gmail.com.
  

Join us in leveraging technology to drive positive change and create a more sustainable world for future generations. Apply now and be a part of something meaningful!

It's considered somewhat common knowledge to those familiar with To Kill a Mockingbird that Atticus taught Jean Louise to read by allowing her to sit with him every night when he went over his evening newspaper. But it turns out that isn't the entire story. As modern a father as Atticus was, it was someone else who actually got into the nitty gritty of teaching Scout how to read.
Credit actually goes to Calpurnia.
From Harper Lee's, To Kill a Mockingbird:

Miss Caroline caught me writing and told me to tell my father to stop teaching me. “Besides,” she said. “We don’t write in the first grade, we print. You won’t learn to write until you’re in the third grade.”
Calpurnia was to blame for this. It kept me from driving her crazy on rainy days, I guess. She would set me a writing task by scrawling the alphabet firmly across the top of a tablet, then copying out a chapter of the Bible beneath. If I reproduced her penmanship satisfactorily, she rewarded me with an open-faced sandwich of bread and butter and sugar. In Calpurnia’s teaching, there was no sentimentality: I seldom pleased her and she seldom rewarded me.

Good old Calpurnia, who was as much a mother to Scout and Jem as she was a housekeeper.
Atticus certainly contributed greatly to the cause, since Scout did read with Atticus at night, and he even mentions that she can continue to do so, even after Miss Caroline discouraged it, but Calpurnia put the early effort into teaching Jean Louise her letters.

So originally this was a question from a redditor, u/Madmax0622, about why Gepirone hasn't been on the market yet despite being approved in September, 2023 and doing some research into has led to a rabbit hole of murder, intrigue, and one very disappointed boy having his father arrested at his 7th birthday party. Okay, not really, but the story is interesting and there is some important points to make about how drugs become approved and how data is represented. So i thought I would mkae it a full post (and comments have a smaller character limit).

What the hell is Gepirone?

Gepirone (Exxua) is a novel azapirone drug that is thought to work as a partial agonist at the Serotonin-1a (5HT-1a) receptor. This is a fancy way of saying that Geprione is a drug that is structurally similar to other serotonin receptor agonists. In the United States we only have Buspirone (Buspar, approved 1986) as our 5HT-1a agonist but internationally there are several others such as Perospirone (Lullan, Japan), Tandospirone (Sediel, Japan), and Binospirone (China). All in all, these drugs share very similar structures and only really differ in their pharmacokinetic properties such as half life, bioavailability, and first pass metabolism.
Where Gepirone differs from these other 5HT-1a agonists is that it is a partial agonist which means that when administered into the body, it creates a partial response to the receptor rather than a full response. While Gepirone is novel because it is the first drug who's primary mechanism of action (MOA) is this partial agonism at 5HT-1a, it is not an unknown one. Several common medications also have this mechanism, such as some newer antidepressants (Trazodone, Vilazodone, Nefazaodone), old and new antipsychotics (Haloperidol, Olanzapine, Clozapine, Ziprasidone), and some other known anti-anxiety chemicals (cannabidiol, LSD, and gingko biloba).
So if Gepirone wasn't the first drug to work on 5HT-1a, why did it get delayed?

What did the data say?

Well I should say first that Gepirone did show benefit. In a double blind trial of two different doses of Gepirone in treating depression, patients received either a high dose, low dose, or placebo and were found to have lower depression scores (HAM-D) at the end of 6 weeks. Based on these results (among other trials, it takes years and millions to submit a drug for approval--im paraphrasing here), Gepirone's pharma company Organanon submitted their data to the FDA. Their package of data contained one positive phase 3 trial--a randomized trial of over 200 participants with drepssion who either received Gepirone and had a reduction in depression score of 9.05 points (17% reduction in depression score) vs those who received placebo and had a 6.75 reduction in depression score (13% reduction) after 8 weeks of treatment.

• Their big bad trial of only ~200 people is not really robust so the FDA rejected their 2001 application and told Organanon in 2002 that they needed two large trials with positive results. Okay....Organanon submitted the two trials in 2003 and even added in data on relapsing depression when Gepirone was stopped vs continued. What they found was that people who stuck with Gepirone ER (at this point they reformulated the drug to be extended release) had a relapse rate of 23% vs people who stopped the drug had a relapse rate of 35%. The FDA looked at this data and said, "yeah that's not positive enough" and walked out of the room.

Feeling dejected, Organanon was sitting on the marble steps outside the main FDA office when little Fabre-Kramer came walking by.

"Hey Organanon, did the FDA deny your reapplication?" Fabre-Kramer asked. "Yeah, they said my drug failed to show explicit benefit. That in the analysis of the main endpoints, submitting 25 studies and only have 2 be positive against placebo and the rest be negative or fail when challenge other established drugs doesn't show positive results." "Man that really sucks. How much did you spend on developing this drug?" "About $1.3 billion." "Well that's not too bad, you just got NuvaRing (2001, still makes up 22% of their revenue) approved and are making a killing off of it. Likewise you are still making boatloads off of Mirtazapine (1997)." "Well don't tell anyone but we are actually in a major scandal with Medicaid in Massachusetts and Texas where we were defrauding state government," Organanon lamented. "Yikes, that sucks," Fabre-Kramer said, "Hey, why don't I take Gepirone off yours hands. Afterall I originally got it from Bristol-Myers Squibb in 1993 before I sold it to you in 1998." "Aight, bet."

And so Gepirone was handed off to Fabre-Kramer in 2005 so Organanon could write off this whole venture to their shareholders.
Fabre-Kramer started by conducting an additional randomized trial of 238 adult participants who received Gepirone ER for 8 weeks. Results were....the same as before--people who received Gepirone showed a 10 point reduction while the placebo group showed an 8 point reduction. In 2007 this third trial was included and sent over to the FDA for approval (for the 3rd time) and the FDA looked at it and said, "yeah no thanks kid." They said that the positive results from the most recent phase 3 trials was good but the 23 other small trials that showed negative results was troubling.
Fabre-Kramer then pushed up their glasses and pulled up their suspenders a bit and said, "I'd like to appeal that decision" and in 2012 the decision was send to the FDA's Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee (PDAC) in Dec 2015. In a 9-4 ruling, the committee voted that Fabre-Kramer smelled funny and they were dummy and that their drug was not good enough. They said they could resubmit another drug application again when they had more data.
Eventually Fabre-Kramer did submit another application in 2022 and Gepirone ER was approved by the FDA for the treatment of Depression in 2023.

If Gepirone was denied so many times, does that mean its a bad drug?

It would be easy to look at Gepirone's story and say that the drug is just not good enough and the pharma companies had to complete multiple trials (and thus generate more data) to prove its efficacy. Truthfully, its a mixed bag and I am going to try to shoot down the middle hear so you can make an informed decision on your own if you want to try Gepirone ER.
The Good

• Its always good to have additional drugs that focus on mechanisms that we know work. Remember that Gepirone works very similarly to Buspirone, as they both affect 5HT-1a, but importantly it has a longer half life. Unlike Buspirone, Gepirone is offered as an extended release form so instead of 3-4 doses a day you'd potentially only have 1 or 2.
• Now Gepirone is a partial agonist while Buspirone is a full agonist, which does have some important pharmacodynamic factors but based on the impact of other partial 5HT-1a agonists as discussed above, we can say that Gepirone is likely to work the way we want it. So you can attack the receptor that Olanzapine affects without all of Olanzapine's other effects.
• Likewise, the side effect profile is similar to or better than Buspirone. Again, this is most likely due to the improved half life or extended release.
• Gepirone also respresents another option for a non-traditional antidepressant that 1) does not cause weiight gain and 2) does not cause sexual dysfunction--two of the biggest reasons why people stop their depression treatment.

The Bad

• The data is very meh. Look at the differences in scores in these studies of reduction in depression score when given Gepirone vs Placebo: -9.04 vs -6.75; -10.2 vs -8.0; -9.0 vs -6.6; -10.1 vs -7.8. These differences are extremely close--a difference of 3 points (12.5%) in someone's depression? Would you take a drug knowing it would only lead to a potential 12.5% reduction in your depression after 8 weeks? Now its important to note that some people did have massive benefit, and im glad they did. But on average, 12.5%. Not great.
  • Now, don't get me wrong, Buspirone also doesn't have great data. In the trial that got Buspirone approved it showed that 7.5mg 3x daily of Buspirone had a HAM-D score reduction of 10.45 points vs the placebo of 7.92. So only a 10% reduction in depression score. But, then again Buspirone was primarily approved for anxiety, not depression like Gepirone, and Buspirone shows a 30-42% reduction in anxiety score at 8 weeks. Maybe Gepirone will show better results in Depression-Anxiety copresentation.

Alright, this is where my brain is wanting to stop for now. If I think of additional things to add I will throw them in. Cheers!

Serious question (US based)
How do I become upper class?
CONTEXT: My family grew up middle class in an upper middle class neighborhood. I remember feeling ashamed because my friends would vacation to Europe every summer or other exotic destinations while I spent my summers working, and my only "vacation" was to go to the local public pool.
I've been out of college for a year now and have been able to take some short vacations within the US, which has been nice. However I still work in retail making a very low salary and my parents have given me a deadline to move out soon. I'm well aware that what I make is NOT a liveable salary, at least in the part of the country where I live.
I've been applying to jobs for almost two years and have gotten the occasional interview or phone screen but have not landed a single offer. I majored in a liberal arts degree but changed my mind on my ideal career path at a point where I was already stuck in my degree. I'd love to work in business but have already been rejected from all the firms in my area, not just the top ones (all without even getting an interview). I've been applying to jobs daily but I know I need a way to earn more money if I need to start supporting myself soon. I've even signed up for a side gig just to supplement my current job but am still waiting to get approved.
I've thought about becoming a gold digger (I am female) or starting an OnlyFans, although I can't quite overcome my conscience to do the latter, and I am too fat to be the former (I have PCOS and have struggled with my weight my whole life). I am currently learning to watch my diet and calories and working on losing weight, but I am currently well over my ideal weight and am only losing weight at a very slow rate which means it will be several years before I am down to a healthy weight.
Now for the good news.
For one, because I grew up surrounded by the upper middle class, I am familiar to some extent of the aesthetic of that class (although it is very different from my own personal style). I don't know some of the really boujee etiquette things like the different types of forks and what not (tbh being so concerned that someone's using a salad fork to eat steak or whatever is stupid. A fork is a fork.)
Because I went to an affordable public college, I graduated debt free, which is huge. I also graduated with a very good GPA and scored fairly highly on both undergraduate and graduate school standardized exams.
I also have a few different credit cards that I use responsibly and don't spend beyond my means (for the most part). I always pay my cards off in full every month and have a FICO credit score of about 770.
I try to diversify my portfolio, and of my savings I've accumulated so far, just under 10% is in a mutual fund, about 25% is in my 401k with company match, and the rest is in a high yield traditional savings account. With every paycheck, I contribute 10% to my 401k and an additional 10-25% into my savings account (I aim for 25% since I still live at home and have fewer expenses right now, but some months it's less).
It's hard because I've tried looking online for advice as far as how to become wealthy and I feel like I'm doing everything right - I went to college, I got good grades, I save a lot, I have no debt, I don't spend beyond my means, I've even tried going above and beyond to show my dedication in my job search by cold emailing recruiters at companies I'd be interested in (especially those who were alumni of my school), writing personalized cover letters, etc. and yet here I am stuck in my barely-above-minimum-wage soul-sucking retail job with a clock ticking over my head that I don't have much time to somehow find something that provides a liveable wage / move up in class so I can move out of my parents house. In addition, I don't really have the money to immerse myself into affluent circles by joining expensive country clubs, etc. (and even if I did, I feel like I would be judged and dismissed because I'm a fat woman), so that severely limits any opportunities to network or rub shoulders with the rich.
I know this is a very long post so thank you if you made it all the way to the end. I would really appreciate any sincere advice on how to move up in socioeconomic status, find a better paying job, etc. thank you ♥️

Some background, like the title says 27M and have been in relationship with my girlfriend with suspected BPD for a little over 2 years. We moved in together fast about 4 months in, I know don’t come at me, but she seemed solid. Had a job and owns the house we live in. She’s slightly older than me, 28. She had a really rough childhood, trauma, moving all the time, a lot of poverty and abuse (she doesn’t say much what happened to her but talks about her siblings and it’s implied that things were so bad they are unspeakable and she’s very damaged from it). Her biological father is in prison but she didn’t have any contact with him growing up yet she is still very affected by this fact. She has received large sums of money from him prior to his prison sentence. She is, I feel, intentionally vague about the details of all of that (except for when she’s angry and venting where the details change to serve her victim narrative).
I’m exhausted by how different my relationship is from the healthy relationships of my friends. My friends who can go to a concert with their friends and without their girlfriends obsessively checking up on them, or guilting them for going in the first place. My friends who can have lunch with their girlfriends without an abrupt cessation of eating because she’s suddenly triggered and is going to go throw up her food (or covertly threaten to). My friends whose girlfriends can show up to a hangout without having 5 layers of video-game-girl makeup and a wig styled to “perfection”. I’m tired of playing dad, therapist, boyfriend, and bestie to an adult woman with such a weak core sense of who she is that she bends and warps her body and her mind into what she *thinks* I want when what I *actually want* is to be with someone who can simply exist in her own skin and see the world as it really is. See past her own insecurity to actually see me and not whatever projection her trauma is informing her worldview with at the moment.
She can’t be alone. She is insufferable if I do something for myself, without her. She believes she needs to supervise me and make her presence known so that other girls (threats) don’t come onto me. She “knows” that I think other women are cute or beautiful and that I’m “only with her because I know her”. As if this pathologically insecure personality of hers is her winning asset. She’s plenty pretty, and the sex is amazing as you all already know, but even that appeal is lessening due to her intense neediness. She takes my not being in the mood as rejection. She wants sex because she feels bad about herself and needs to feel wanted, regardless of what I want or need. It’s all a reflection of HER. HER needs. HER insecurities. I’m suffocating like there’s no room for me to exist in this relationship. She sucks up all the air in any given room.
She’s obsessed with “thinspo,” body modification, and plastic surgery. I have tattoos myself and do find them attractive on a woman, but I believe she is using tattoos and piercings as self-harm. I hate to say it but I’m starting to question the legitimacy of her eating disorder as she is the attention-seeking type. The attention seeking didn’t used to bother me and I used to be ok with caring for hesoothing her, but she’s just getting worse over time and needing more.
Her spending is out of control and she can’t keep a job. She got herself fired from her job this year because she couldn’t keep her head down enough to keep a paycheck. At a job she was lucky to have (not technically qualified for) and exaggerated to the point of lying on her resume to get into. She now has her own business, which despite my own job is “our” gig in an attempt to future-fake and keep me stuck with her. I can’t say much about the business without giving away too much indentifying information. But there is a lot of frustration here. I am expected to do so much for this business and while I support her, I don’t want this for myself and I do have my own work. She spends so much money she doesn’t have on “the business”. She asks me for money for “business things” which also happen to be expensive hobby gear or the newest iphone, making a case for needing it for social media promotion or whatever else excuse. She can’t tolerate due to her childhood poverty being “without” anything she wants. She has thousands in debt which she finds a way to blame on her parents too (she is estranged from them).
I believed the lies and exaggerations that she was better off than this and more capable than this. But she’s coming apart and I’m not enough to hold her – or us – together. If I stay, I’ll continue to be miserable. If I leave, I’ll be just another asshole who abandons her. And that’s how every story ever ends, she says. Everyone always abandons her. She doesn’t get that she’s the reason. She really believes in her victimhood. She lost a significant friendship last year and I was fully on her side, convinced she was wronged. Now that I’m feeling the weight of knowing her long-term, I honestly kind of get it.
There’s so much more I wanted to write but I’m exhausted. I’m angry. I’m thinking about my future, and I don’t think I want one with her. This has been fun (well it was...) and I care about her, I really do, but I don’t think I can keep doing this.

In 1945, the United States underwent Operation Paperclip which gave over 1,600 German scientists, engineers and technicians sanctuary and absolution of their crimes in exchange for the continuation of their research.
In 1953 those same individuals came up with and executed MK Ultra, an illegal human experiment that used its citizens (targeting schools, hospitals and prisons) as test subjects.
In 1954 the Plum Island was turned into a research center for diseases.
In 1975 the first documented case of Lyme disease occurred. Rumored to have escaped Plum Island.
In 2005 the DHS announced that all the work done at Plum Island would be continued in Kansas. Not just the center of the continental United States, but also home to crops seen in grocery stores all over the country.
The following is a true story.
Getting into work, one of the first things I do is check my mail. I’ve been a reporter for years and have amassed fans who like to write in and give me leads. Most of the time these leads don't amount to much (Sometimes I wonder if people send me things because of my apophenia and they are trying to get me off their scent), but every once in a while I strike gold.
I had been working at Whisper Alley Echos for a few months by the time I got my first lead. The package I got was small and when I opened it I saw a DVD that had the words “play me” written in black marker on it. Not knowing what was on it, I waited until I got home to put it on. Not just because I didnt know what was on it, but I was also busy working on a different project about how everyone in a nearby town just went missing. The official story is that they all went on vacation or went to visit a relative and decided to stay. I dont know about you, but I found that suspicious.
After getting home and shifting gears to get into the movie mood (popcorn, blinds pulled, etc…) I popped the DVD in and began watching.
There were dozens of different videos to pick from, some ranging from a minute to half an hour. Instead of picking one at random, I just played them in order. After all, all their titles were dates and times and I didnt want to miss anything that might make sense later.
The first video featured a tardigrade, at the time I didnt know what it was, but the scientist doing the voice over described it as being a microscopic animal as well as being extremely resilient. This went on for several minutes and for a moment it felt as though I was watching a nature documentary instead of something given to me by a government whistleblower.
The next few videos featured footage of the tardigrades being given something called “BB-F828” and the changes it caused.
The voiceover talked about how a tardigrade (this time he called them water bears and the two terms were interchangeable from this point on) was showing signs of several thousand generations of evolution in only a few days. Even though I know nothing about science, I could see that the thing on the television was not the same animal that was shown in the first video.
While they were never “cute”, at least they never looked like predators, but after a few videos I saw that the tardigrades were covered in what appeared to be padding. In a later video this padding would change into being chitin-like armor.
The last video was filmed two months after the water bears were given BB-F828 and in it the scientists could see them even without a microscope.
The next morning I went into work and started writing on my computer, copying notes from my small notebook. However by the time I started the second draft, Andrea, the office secretary, dropped a letter off at my desk.
It was the first time I got a letter about an “inside scoop” two days in a row.
The letter said that they were the ones who sent the DVD and if I wanted to know more I would have to go to The Rats Skeleton (a bar that used to be a speakeasy during prohibition. Because of this the place feels as though its a front for a comic book villain. The owners have leaned into this and did everything they could to reinforce this feeling with sparse lighting and everything that isn't red velvet on the walls being painted black) at a specific time.
Usually I wouldn't go meet strangers after getting an anonymous letter that tells me to come alone, but its a small town and I didn't have much going on that particular Thursday.
Parking behind the Merc (short for mercantile, where most of the grocery and general shopping is done in town), I descended the stairs and made my way to the back of the bar. There I found a woman that didnt look like she slept in days. Since no one else was in that back area I figured she must have been the person I was there to see.
“Hey, I’m Daniel West. Am I—”
“Sit” the woman said, motioning across from her. I sat down and asked her for her name but she didn’t want to answer me and when i asked for it a second time she claimed it was Jane, but there is no doubt that was not her real name.
“What made you reach out, Jane?”
“You saw the video?”
I nodded. “Yup.”
“And?”
“I have a lot of questions” I answered.
“Figured you would” Jane said. “Ask.”
“Well, first” I said, my journalistic inexperience showing as I went through my pocket notebook. “Who are you and why do you know all this?”
“Name isnt important” Jane answered. “Let me start from the beginning. We thought we were working on human survivability” Jane answered. “I thought that I was working for some company that had a government contract. That might be true, it might not be. Either way lots of money and resources have been put into this.”
“I saw the video” I answered. “What exactly was it that I was watching?”
Janes eyes were frantic as she looked at the stairs behind me. When I turned around to see what she was looking at I saw a local descending the steps and approach the bar. She only answered my question when she was convinced that the man wasn't eavesdropping, still, she spoke in whispers.
“We were working on human survivability.”
“You said that. What does that mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. Consider we civilize mars and the long term effects from the static radiation there. Or another planet that demands thicker bones because of increased gravity? Evolution might give us those things eventually but what if we need it now? In this generation?”
“So you made super humans?”
Jane was annoyed and slapped the table. No one was around to hear or see her but I still looked around anyways.
“We didn’t work on humans. We piggybacked off of some other countries' genetic research and made some breakthroughs of our own. When—-“
“Other countries?” I interrupted instead of letting her talk.
“Yeah” Jane said with a shrug. “Some countries aren’t tied down by the same code of ethics as ours.”
“That’s why you got a hold of me? To tell—-“
“We were working on small parts. At first individual genes, building from that success we went on to more complex organisms. Eventually, hopefully, test on humans.”
“But you never made it that far?”
“No” Jane said, taking a sip from her glass. “We tested BB-F828 on other things, building up towards human testing.”
“Okay, like what?”
Jane inhaled through her nose and looked at me as though she wasnt sure if I could be trusted. Then she sighed when she realized it was too late not to trust me, she had already went too far to turn back. “What do you think has the best chance of not only surviving a planet wide disaster, but also thrive in it?”
“Cockroaches” I answered.
Jane nodded. “Sure. Lots of people would agree with you, however that wouldn't be the best pick.”
“Oh? Then what would be?”
“Rats.”
I laughed.
“They are tough and can thrive anywhere. Even before BB-F828 they are smarter than roaches, plus rats have a complicated social hierarchy, similar to humans. Remember, I didn't just say survive. I said thrive.”
“So you tested all this on rats?”
Jane nodded. “We did.”
I waited for Jane to continue, but thanks to her staring off into space due to lack of sleep, she waited longer.
“What happened?”
Janes eyes drifted back at me, she was running on fumes. “Huh? Oh, yeah. Rats, right?” she asked while pulling a folder out from the seat next to her. She set it on the table and slid it over to me. “Here, take a peek.”
I opened it, expecting redacted pages of ‘evidence’ and while I got some of that, it was the photos that drew my attention the most. At first the photos were individual rats and a designated number they received instead of a name.
“How many rats did you experiment—” I started, but my voice trailed off when I came across a photo of the one rat with unique markings on its back now appearing to be bred for a war on pleasant dreams. Its eyes were pearly gray, teeth became tusks, its whiskers were thick and barbed. According to the scale it was on when the second photo was taken it weighed twenty nine point four kilos.
“A few hundred?” Jane answered, though it was obvious that it was just a guess. “They were paired off and put in different environments to see how they adapt.”
“Why would you pair them off?”
“I think it was to see if some would branch out and become their own species” Jane answered as she checked her watch. Seeing the time she sped up. “See, when something with BB-F828 finds itself in a desert, it might adapt to the point that it grows a hump like a camel. Or grow gills if they are in the ocean. The original purpose was for human survivability on other planets. We thought if we could discover how the adaptations work, and it could be repeated exactly the same over and over again, we could do something for humans. After all you wouldn't want anything unexpected to happen when you're in the middle of growing another set of arms or a dorsal fin, right?”Jane said. “But to do this we needed lots of subjects and all in their own environments. Each one had their own surprises, after all, evolution is random. Favors some things over others. One species can branch out to be dozens or hundreds. Thousands with enough time and environmental factors. When the tardigrades started displaying more predatory behavior we thought it was due to the change in diet and the increase in protein, but now we think its due to the rapid change. It drives them insane. All of this was surprising, but none as surprising as the ‘dirt rats’.”
“Wait. They are all insane? Also, dirt rats?” I asked, flipping the photo over to show the next one. This one revealed what I thought was a bear, but when I was about to flip it over to look at the next one I noticed its teeth. Thats when I noticed that it was a huge, muscular rat.
“Six breeding pairs, all kept in an empty pool full of dirt. They weren't given enough room to get out of the dirt, so they had to adapt to living in it. Anyways, because they are in the dirt its harder to keep track of what they are doing. Because of that, by the time we discovered that they had burrowed their way out of the facility it was too late. They were gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean?”
“Escaped,” Jane whispered. “And they are growing.”
“Growing?”
“Last I heard, they were nearly sixty feet but we honestly don't know. It's not like we can compare them to anything else.”
“Sixty feet?” I laughed. “Someone would have saw them by—”
“Underground” Jane said with a shake of her head. “They are underground. I know it's hard to believe, but how else can you explain those earthquakes in Chicago? New York?”
“Are you saying there are giant rats under those cities?”
“I am saying they aren't rats anymore. They are something else entirely. I am saying six breeding pairs might not sound like a lot, but rats reproduce so quickly it's terrifying. I am saying that they are so big and there are so many of them that they are causing those earthquakes. I am saying that due to their size they burn off lots of calories and some have evolved to hibernating.”
“Why hibernation?”
“No idea, but when they wake up they are going to be very hungry. Ravenous.”
“Any idea when that might be?” I asked.
Jane shrugged. “Some already have. We just covered it up.”
It might have been my apophenia talking, but with that statement I started seeing the bigger picture and asked Jane about the town that went missing (The story I was working on before her DVD reached me). Jane gave me the politician's answer, saying something without actually saying something, and that was enough to confirm that I was indeed on the right track.
Unfortunately Jane and I did not speak for much longer, she got a call that freaked her out and she took off. Before she left she took the folder and the pictures I was still going through. I haven't seen or heard from her since and have dropped the story about the disappearances that have secretly been plaguing our country.
WAE

In 1945, the United States underwent Operation Paperclip which gave over 1,600 German scientists, engineers and technicians sanctuary and absolution of their crimes in exchange for the continuation of their research.
In 1953 those same individuals came up with and executed MK Ultra, an illegal human experiment that used its citizens (targeting schools, hospitals and prisons) as test subjects.
In 1954 the Plum Island was turned into a research center for diseases.
In 1975 the first documented case of Lyme disease occurred. Rumored to have escaped Plum Island.
In 2005 the DHS announced that all the work done at Plum Island would be continued in Kansas. Not just the center of the continental United States, but also home to crops seen in grocery stores all over the country.
The following is a true story.
Getting into work, one of the first things I do is check my mail. I’ve been a reporter for years and have amassed fans who like to write in and give me leads. Most of the time these leads don't amount to much (Sometimes I wonder if people send me things because of my apophenia and they are trying to get me off their scent), but every once in a while I strike gold.
I had been working at Whisper Alley Echos for a few months by the time I got my first lead. The package I got was small and when I opened it I saw a DVD that had the words “play me” written in black marker on it. Not knowing what was on it, I waited until I got home to put it on. Not just because I didnt know what was on it, but I was also busy working on a different project about how everyone in a nearby town just went missing. The official story is that they all went on vacation or went to visit a relative and decided to stay. I dont know about you, but I found that suspicious.
After getting home and shifting gears to get into the movie mood (popcorn, blinds pulled, etc…) I popped the DVD in and began watching.
There were dozens of different videos to pick from, some ranging from a minute to half an hour. Instead of picking one at random, I just played them in order. After all, all their titles were dates and times and I didnt want to miss anything that might make sense later.
The first video featured a tardigrade, at the time I didnt know what it was, but the scientist doing the voice over described it as being a microscopic animal as well as being extremely resilient. This went on for several minutes and for a moment it felt as though I was watching a nature documentary instead of something given to me by a government whistleblower.
The next few videos featured footage of the tardigrades being given something called “BB-F828” and the changes it caused.
The voiceover talked about how a tardigrade (this time he called them water bears and the two terms were interchangeable from this point on) was showing signs of several thousand generations of evolution in only a few days. Even though I know nothing about science, I could see that the thing on the television was not the same animal that was shown in the first video.
While they were never “cute”, at least they never looked like predators, but after a few videos I saw that the tardigrades were covered in what appeared to be padding. In a later video this padding would change into being chitin-like armor.
The last video was filmed two months after the water bears were given BB-F828 and in it the scientists could see them even without a microscope.
The next morning I went into work and started writing on my computer, copying notes from my small notebook. However by the time I started the second draft, Andrea, the office secretary, dropped a letter off at my desk.
It was the first time I got a letter about an “inside scoop” two days in a row.
The letter said that they were the ones who sent the DVD and if I wanted to know more I would have to go to The Rats Skeleton (a bar that used to be a speakeasy during prohibition. Because of this the place feels as though its a front for a comic book villain. The owners have leaned into this and did everything they could to reinforce this feeling with sparse lighting and everything that isn't red velvet on the walls being painted black) at a specific time.
Usually I wouldn't go meet strangers after getting an anonymous letter that tells me to come alone, but its a small town and I didn't have much going on that particular Thursday.
Parking behind the Merc (short for mercantile, where most of the grocery and general shopping is done in town), I descended the stairs and made my way to the back of the bar. There I found a woman that didnt look like she slept in days. Since no one else was in that back area I figured she must have been the person I was there to see.
“Hey, I’m Daniel West. Am I—”
“Sit” the woman said, motioning across from her. I sat down and asked her for her name but she didn’t want to answer me and when i asked for it a second time she claimed it was Jane, but there is no doubt that was not her real name.
“What made you reach out, Jane?”
“You saw the video?”
I nodded. “Yup.”
“And?”
“I have a lot of questions” I answered.
“Figured you would” Jane said. “Ask.”
“Well, first” I said, my journalistic inexperience showing as I went through my pocket notebook. “Who are you and why do you know all this?”
“Name isnt important” Jane answered. “Let me start from the beginning. We thought we were working on human survivability” Jane answered. “I thought that I was working for some company that had a government contract. That might be true, it might not be. Either way lots of money and resources have been put into this.”
“I saw the video” I answered. “What exactly was it that I was watching?”
Janes eyes were frantic as she looked at the stairs behind me. When I turned around to see what she was looking at I saw a local descending the steps and approach the bar. She only answered my question when she was convinced that the man wasn't eavesdropping, still, she spoke in whispers.
“We were working on human survivability.”
“You said that. What does that mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. Consider we civilize mars and the long term effects from the static radiation there. Or another planet that demands thicker bones because of increased gravity? Evolution might give us those things eventually but what if we need it now? In this generation?”
“So you made super humans?”
Jane was annoyed and slapped the table. No one was around to hear or see her but I still looked around anyways.
“We didn’t work on humans. We piggybacked off of some other countries' genetic research and made some breakthroughs of our own. When—-“
“Other countries?” I interrupted instead of letting her talk.
“Yeah” Jane said with a shrug. “Some countries aren’t tied down by the same code of ethics as ours.”
“That’s why you got a hold of me? To tell—-“
“We were working on small parts. At first individual genes, building from that success we went on to more complex organisms. Eventually, hopefully, test on humans.”
“But you never made it that far?”
“No” Jane said, taking a sip from her glass. “We tested BB-F828 on other things, building up towards human testing.”
“Okay, like what?”
Jane inhaled through her nose and looked at me as though she wasnt sure if I could be trusted. Then she sighed when she realized it was too late not to trust me, she had already went too far to turn back. “What do you think has the best chance of not only surviving a planet wide disaster, but also thrive in it?”
“Cockroaches” I answered.
Jane nodded. “Sure. Lots of people would agree with you, however that wouldn't be the best pick.”
“Oh? Then what would be?”
“Rats.”
I laughed.
“They are tough and can thrive anywhere. Even before BB-F828 they are smarter than roaches, plus rats have a complicated social hierarchy, similar to humans. Remember, I didn't just say survive. I said thrive.”
“So you tested all this on rats?”
Jane nodded. “We did.”
I waited for Jane to continue, but thanks to her staring off into space due to lack of sleep, she waited longer.
“What happened?”
Janes eyes drifted back at me, she was running on fumes. “Huh? Oh, yeah. Rats, right?” she asked while pulling a folder out from the seat next to her. She set it on the table and slid it over to me. “Here, take a peek.”
I opened it, expecting redacted pages of ‘evidence’ and while I got some of that, it was the photos that drew my attention the most. At first the photos were individual rats and a designated number they received instead of a name.
“How many rats did you experiment—” I started, but my voice trailed off when I came across a photo of the one rat with unique markings on its back now appearing to be bred for a war on pleasant dreams. Its eyes were pearly gray, teeth became tusks, its whiskers were thick and barbed. According to the scale it was on when the second photo was taken it weighed twenty nine point four kilos.
“A few hundred?” Jane answered, though it was obvious that it was just a guess. “They were paired off and put in different environments to see how they adapt.”
“Why would you pair them off?”
“I think it was to see if some would branch out and become their own species” Jane answered as she checked her watch. Seeing the time she sped up. “See, when something with BB-F828 finds itself in a desert, it might adapt to the point that it grows a hump like a camel. Or grow gills if they are in the ocean. The original purpose was for human survivability on other planets. We thought if we could discover how the adaptations work, and it could be repeated exactly the same over and over again, we could do something for humans. After all you wouldn't want anything unexpected to happen when you're in the middle of growing another set of arms or a dorsal fin, right?”Jane said. “But to do this we needed lots of subjects and all in their own environments. Each one had their own surprises, after all, evolution is random. Favors some things over others. One species can branch out to be dozens or hundreds. Thousands with enough time and environmental factors. When the tardigrades started displaying more predatory behavior we thought it was due to the change in diet and the increase in protein, but now we think its due to the rapid change. It drives them insane. All of this was surprising, but none as surprising as the ‘dirt rats’.”
“Wait. They are all insane? Also, dirt rats?” I asked, flipping the photo over to show the next one. This one revealed what I thought was a bear, but when I was about to flip it over to look at the next one I noticed its teeth. Thats when I noticed that it was a huge, muscular rat.
“Six breeding pairs, all kept in an empty pool full of dirt. They weren't given enough room to get out of the dirt, so they had to adapt to living in it. Anyways, because they are in the dirt its harder to keep track of what they are doing. Because of that, by the time we discovered that they had burrowed their way out of the facility it was too late. They were gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean?”
“Escaped,” Jane whispered. “And they are growing.”
“Growing?”
“Last I heard, they were nearly sixty feet but we honestly don't know. It's not like we can compare them to anything else.”
“Sixty feet?” I laughed. “Someone would have saw them by—”
“Underground” Jane said with a shake of her head. “They are underground. I know it's hard to believe, but how else can you explain those earthquakes in Chicago? New York?”
“Are you saying there are giant rats under those cities?”
“I am saying they aren't rats anymore. They are something else entirely. I am saying six breeding pairs might not sound like a lot, but rats reproduce so quickly it's terrifying. I am saying that they are so big and there are so many of them that they are causing those earthquakes. I am saying that due to their size they burn off lots of calories and some have evolved to hibernating.”
“Why hibernation?”
“No idea, but when they wake up they are going to be very hungry. Ravenous.”
“Any idea when that might be?” I asked.
Jane shrugged. “Some already have. We just covered it up.”
It might have been my apophenia talking, but with that statement I started seeing the bigger picture and asked Jane about the town that went missing (The story I was working on before her DVD reached me). Jane gave me the politician's answer, saying something without actually saying something, and that was enough to confirm that I was indeed on the right track.
Unfortunately Jane and I did not speak for much longer, she got a call that freaked her out and she took off. Before she left she took the folder and the pictures I was still going through. I haven't seen or heard from her since and have dropped the story about the disappearances that have secretly been plaguing our country.
WAE

So yeah... this is a post where I review all 5 Cage The Elephant albums. Pretty simple. These are all reviews that I originally wrote on an app/website called "Musicboard" over the past couple weeks, but I've copy-pasted them here for your reading convenience. Hope you enjoy & I hope to to talk about these albums with you!
____________________________________________

Self Titled

Probably their weakest album to date, but still a pretty solid debut overall.
I hate to be so predictable, but the best song here is still “Ain’t No Rest for The Wicked”, and it ain’t even close. It’s extremely fun & catchy, it’s the album’s most sonically distinct piece BY FAR, and it’s storytelling/pacing are both absolutely flawless. A track that absolutely deserves it’s iconic status.
Even though the record’s best isn’t up for debate, there are some other pretty good highlights as well. “In One Ear” is a very solid opener for the project, “Judas” gives us consistently excellent lyricism, and “Tiny Little Robots” has an uncharacteristically super atmospheric bridge which makes it stand out quite a bit. It also transitions super smoothly into the following “Lotus” who’s engaging pacing, beautiful chorus, & satisfying climax make it another easy favourite for me.
But then beyond the lovably visceral energy of it’s closer, “Free Love”, Cage The Elephant’s self-titled debut really doesn’t give me a whole lot more to talk about. It’s got consistently great musicianship, a decent number of highlights, and some bizarrely excellent song transitions, but the album has a really bad case of being FAR too samey. Everything outside of the tracks I’ve already mentioned blend together in my mind almost completely. None of them are bad, but none of them are particularly memorable either.
This album is still pretty good at the end of the day, some solid garage rock fun, but Cage’s later projects would all feel a whole lot more distinct & purposeful.
Best Songs: Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked, Lotus, & Free Love.
Weakest Songs: Drones in the Valley, Soil to the Sun, & Back Stabbin' Betty.
This album gets a strong 7/10 from me.
____________________________________________

Thank You, Happy Birthday

It may be a little all over the place, but it’s still a pretty big improvement over their debut.
For one, the sound of this album is FAR more lush & vibrant than that of their debut. The guitars here are especially brimming with so much more life & colour than they were on their self-titled record. Another big improvement is that record is how much more variety this album has. It’s an incredibly stylistically varied project, and while that does lead to it feeling a little messy every so often, it’s all still held together very well by excellent & super aesthetically consistent production.
The album starts out quite strong with “Always Something”. The ominous guitars, raw vocals, & slight electronic elements all combine to make for a rather gripping opener. Other highlights include “Shake Me Down” which I love for it’s percussive acoustic guitars & personal childhood nostalgia, “Aberdeen” which I love for it’s super catchy melodies & powerfully mixed guitars, as well as “Right Before My Eyes” which has a similarly excellent sound & a surprisingly moving chorus.
This record also contains a lot of the most loudly abrasive material that Cage have ever released... to very mixed results. You have tracks like “Sell Yourself” & “Doctor Help Me” which are just sorta forgettable, a song like “Indy Kidz” which has a fantastic instrumental alongside an unfortunately & obnoxiously tryhard vocal performance, but then you have “Sabertooth Tiger” which is actually one of my TOP favourites here. The chaotic viscerality of this one feels so much more natural than those other tracks, as well as SO MUCH more invigorating. I really wasn't expecting to love it so much upon revisiting it today, but it very much surprised me.
On the other side of the coin, we also have a couple distinctly lowkey moments that I’d like to talk about. “Rubber Ball” is a very pleasant track with a slightly jaunty charm to it, but even more pleasant than that is “Flow”. My favourite song on the whole album. It’s not a particularly sad song, nor is it like STUNNINGLY beautiful, and yet… I often find myself close to tears when listening to it. If I had to put the feeling into words, I’d say that the atmosphere of this song is so perfectly tender & existentially content that it’s… genuinely overwhelming. I yearn to forever exist within the powerful sense of peace that this song provides, but I can only do so for 3 minutes at a time & that makes me wanna cry.
Overall, “Thank You Happy Birthday” is just a WAY more consistently enjoyable project than their debut. It has cleaner production, a far more memorable aesthetic, a greater sense of sonic exploration, better vocals for the most part, MUCH higher highs, and far fewer lows as well. Other than those “forgettably abrasive” songs which I talked about 2 paragraphs ago, the only significant lowlight for me would be the underwhelming closer that is “Carry Me In”. The record honestly should’ve just ended with “Flow” cuz these final 2 tracks which come right after just aren’t very interesting.
But yeah, other than having a significantly weaker closer, this album is an improvement over their first in every single way.
Best Songs: Flow, Sabertooth Tiger, & Aberdeen
Weakest Songs: Doctor Help Me, Carry Me In, & Sell Yourself.
This album gets a light to decent 8/10 from me.
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Melophobia

Don’t you love it when an overall “pretty good” discography randomly contains one genuine masterpiece?
I absolutely ADORE this record, and I don’t even consider Cage The Elephant to be one of my all time favourite bands. They probably wouldn’t make my Top 25, but “Melophobia” specifically is easily one of the best albums I’ve ever heard, and (now that I no longer listen to Arcade Fire) my personal favourite release of 2013. At the very least, it’s a stiff competition between this & Daft Punk’s “Random Access Memories”. I’ve gotta go track by track with this one in order to effectively convey my love for it so buckle in!
“Spiderhead” is a genuinely perfect opener for the record. It conveys to us ALL of the project’s best qualities while never feeling like it’s spoiled the album for you. The best is still very much yet to come. We’ve got scuzzy guitars that feel both authentically raw & immaculately produced, super catchy melodies delivered through a very precise yet slightly wild vocal performance, and also this really cool “glitched tempo change” at the end which gives this specific song a very unique flare.
“Come A Little Closer” is probably the most popular song here, and while it’s not my personal #1, it is still absolutely deserving of that status. The verses ease us in with a super slick bassline, some incredibly atmospheric guitars/synths, as well as a grippingly moody vocal performance. All of which come to a head on the track's spectacularly explosive choruses which still manage to fit the song’s moody tone flawlessly. The bridge here is also excellent with an extremely effective build to the song’s final & most explosive chorus. LOVE this track. Iconic shit.
“Telescope” is even more iconic though. It’s the best thing that Matt Schultz has ever written & it’s not even a contest honestly. We open with some tenderly playful synths which eventually give way to an equally playful yet distinctly melancholic vocal performance & lyrical story. This leads to the song’s incredible chorus which only becomes more emotionally powerful each & every time it’s repeated, but it’s the bridge here that really elevates the track into something truly spectacular. It’s so instrumentally frantic & vocally raw while still miraculously fitting into the song’s overall tenderly melancholic atmosphere. Such an evocative masterpiece. Unquestionably one of my favourite songs of all time.
“It’s Just Forever” is frequently maligned as the album’s one & only dud, but other than some admittedly awkward tonal whiplash between it & the last song, I still think it’s a fantastic addition to the record. We’ve got some wonderfully visceral guitars, a delightfully wild guest vocal performance courtesy of Alison Mosshart, and an outro that predicted the “Untitled Goose Game” OST six years in advance. What’s not to love?
“Take It Or Leave It” has a super chillaxed atmosphere all throughout, but never in a way that becomes boring. The chorus is super catchy, I enjoy the slight country-isms of the track, and the guitars sound amazing… but that’s definitely starting to become a moot point in this review. SUCH a vibe of a song.
“Halo” is probably the least uniquely remarkable song here. I don’t really have anything specific to say about it, but don’t think for a second that I mean to imply it’s even remotely weak. It’s still a banger.
“Black Widow” is an absolute BLAST of a song. The gritty rock’n’roll instrumentation along with those seductive vocals are obviously fantastic, but the star of the show here is undoubtedly the brass elements. The blaring horns on this track, whichever ones they are exactly, are sheer musical euphoria. That brief moment during the bridge where they completely overpower the rest of the mix is especially stunning. This is another one of those songs that I often hear people proclaiming as one of the album’s worst, but I think those people are weak. This song is nothing short of SPECTACULAR. Such a wonderful rush of visceral energy.
“Hypocrite” serves as a very nice change of pace for the record. The incredibly unique drum rhythms & overall slow pacing really make it stand out here. We’ve got a decently moving chorus, some nice brass elements yet again, and while said brass elements aren’t nearly as impressive as last time, these horns still fill out the mix very nicely & aid the song in having an even more unique energy than the aforementioned odd drumming was already giving it.
“Teeth” is the most perfectly unhinged thing that Cage The Elephant has ever released. In my review for their previous album, I talked about how certain tracks there often struggled to nail the balance of “controlled chaos”. Songs from that record which attempted this mostly just felt messy instead of compellingly scatterbrained. “Teeth”, on the other hand, achieves that balance effortlessly. Everything about this track is marvelous madness. The frantically abrasive guitars, evocatively strange lyrics, rivetingly unrefined vocals, and OH MY WORD that outro. After being a badass rock song for about 3 minutes, this shit randomly decides to basically become spoken word jazz at the end, and it works miraculously well. The lethargic bassline, the dour brass elements, the lyrics rich with meaning that’s hard to fully grasp. The whole thing is genuinely quite unnerving, but in a way that’s always still very enjoyable to listen to.
“Cigarette Daydreams” is a very interesting closer for this album. The acoustics & pianos are both incredibly pretty, the vocals & melodies are both really moving, and the whole experience is extremely immersive with it’s atmosphere. It’s a truly beautiful song on it’s own as well as an extremely anticlimactic ending for the record. But to explain why I actually mean that as a positive, I need to talk about “Teeth” again. Keep in mind that everything I’m about to say here has absolutely NOTHING to do with the lyrics of these songs. It’s simply my mind creating a story by interpreting the emotional atmospheres of both tracks.
“Teeth” is like witnessing or being involved in some sort of traumatic event. It’s a chaotic mess that leaves you deeply unsettled. Horrified even. Like being the bystander to a uniquely bad car crash. The kind where gorey death is very clearly visible. “Cigarette Daydreams” contrasts “Teeth” by being easily the most tender & simplistic song on the album. It’s very comforting with it’s musicality, but what I love here is that it’s not quite “cathartic”. It’s not a release of tension or an eradication of negative emotion. It’s like being frozen with shock after witnessing this crash before someone else eventually arrives to comfort you. This comfort feels nice & brings you back to your senses, but you’re still not ok. You still witnessed something horrible & a quick bit of comfort isn’t going to immediately fix that.
That’s the story I read from the tonal dichotomy between these 2 songs. A story of horror followed by incomplete comfort. It’s not a satisfying ending for me, but it’s such a specific & evocative kind of dissatisfaction that I can’t help but be fascinated by it. A super cathartic track full of positive emotion & grandiose beauty wouldn’t have worked here at all. Something quietly comforting that’s lacking in huge catharsis is the only way this could have gone. It’s the only ending that makes sense directly after a track as wild a “Teeth”. Again, NONE of this has anything to do with the lyrics. Just sheer emotion.
In conclusion though, I really fucking love “Melophobia”. It’s got perfect pacing, perfect production, tons of variety, so many excellent highlights, and one of the most memorable album endings I’ve ever experienced. The band’s whole discography is undoubtedly quite good, but this record is still LEAGUES above anything else that came before it, and so far, anything that has come after. Y’all better listen to it if you haven’t already.
Best Songs: Telescope, Black Widow, & Come A Little Closer.
Weakest Songs: haha no.
10/10. Masterpiece.
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Tell Me I'm Pretty

It’s a HUGE downgrade from the last album, but still a decent enough listen.
It’s a stiff competition between this & their self-titled when we’re deciding which Cage The Elephant album is the weakest. They both exist on pretty much equal levels of “unremarkably decent”, but I think I’d probably give “Tell Me I’m Pretty” an ever so slight edge over their debut. Even though I’m ultimately gonna give them the same rating, I think this record has a few more significantly notable qualities.
“Cry Baby” is a very solid opener & “Mess Around” is a delightfully nostalgic single in spite of literally just being a Black Keys song, but it’s only on tracks 4-7 where this album really hits it’s stride. “Too Late To Say Goodbye” is very methodically emotive, “Cold Cold Cold” has some super fun percussion & an engagingly dazed sense of atmosphere, and “How Are You True” is one of the prettiest songs in the band’s whole catalog. The choppy vocal effects are extremely immersive, and the lowkey energy of it all is wonderfully hypnotic.
It also transitions very naturally out of the song right before it. That song being “Trouble”. The strongest piece of this album by a pretty wide margin. The backing vocals are beautiful, the chorus is really impactful, the acoustic elements are particularly well utilized, and the whole thing truly feels “Melophobia quality” while still being sonically distinct from that project. After this 4-7 stretch however, the album’s final 3 tracks don’t give me a whole lot to talk about.
I enjoy the spaghetti western vibes of “That’s Right” decently enough, but “Punchin’s Bag” is one of the most forgettable songs that CTE have ever made, and even though it’s a decently fun track on it’s own, “Portuguese Knife Fight” has almost no real impact as a CLOSER. Which is particularly disappointing coming right off the heels of a record with one of the most impactful endings I’ve ever heard.
So yeah… “Tell Me I’m Pretty” definitely isn’t bad, but it definitely ain’t special either. It’s unenergetic in a way that mostly feels ill fitting of the band, Dan Auerbach’s production is solid but also extremely homogeneous, and lots of Matt’s vocals here feel way more “performative” than they do natural and/or “from the heart”. I do still enjoy this record for it’s excellent musicianship, generally solid song writing, and handful of wonderful highlights, but something definitely feels a little off about it all.
They just weren’t in peak form here. Which, again, is not a very pretty look right up against one of the most PEAK albums of the 2010’s.
Best Songs: Trouble, Cold Cold Cold, & How Are You True.
Weakest Songs: Punchin’ Bag, Sweetie Little Jean, & Portuguese Knife Fight.
This album gets a strong 7/10 to me.
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Social Cues

Not without it’s problems, but undoubtedly some of their strongest material to date.
This is pretty easily their 2nd best album if you ask me. It’s nowhere NEAR as good as 2013’s “Melophobia”, but it’s not like I ever expected them to reach those heights again. Cage The Elephant are an overall “pretty good” band with one exceptional masterpiece that came out of nowhere. But in terms of the rest of their “pretty good” discography, this is a very enjoyable album… even if it is VERY front loaded. Tracks 1-7 are all fantastic with only one exception, but then tracks 8-13 are all super forgettable outside of a couple key exceptions.
Let’s talk about that excellent first half though. “Broken Boy” is an immediately gripping BANGER of an opener with viscerally crisp production, The Title Track has a wonderfully psychedelic soundscape to it & one of the band’s catchiest choruses ever, and “Night Running” is a song that’s always gotten way too much hate in my opinion. I can KINDA understand the aversion to how sheerly radio friendly it is, but the vibes are again delightfully psychedelic, the Beck feature suits the track flawlessly, and there’s this extremely appealing sense of… idk “fuzziness” to the production on the chorus. Super sonically satisfying stuff.
Other great moments from this first half include “Ready to Let Go’ which was a perfect lead single for the record, as well as “Skin And Bones” which has a really moving chorus & some beautifully implemented strings, but easily the HARDEST banger of the whole project comes to us in the direct middle. “House of Glass”. This is one of the spectacularly wild things they’ve ever put out & it’s an absolute BLAST to listen to. The sly vocals, viciously vigorous guitars, and perfectly chaotic production all come together to create one of their best songs to date. LOVE IT.
Now for that relatively lackluster 2nd half. “The War Is Over” actually grew on me quite a bit this time around which I wasn’t expecting, but we still have songs like “Dance Dance” which feel distinctly lacking in creativity, “Tokyo Smoke” which frankly just feels kinda aimless to me, as well as “What I’m Becoming” which, in an attempt to sound soft & lowkey, just comes across as rather drab. These songs are all still “decent” at the end of the day, but they absolutely do not live up to the consistently high quality of that first half. Where this 2nd half DOES shine however are in it’s softer moment’s that aren’t “What I’m Becoming”.
“Love’s the Only Way” is SUCH a lovely track. The light guitars, the ethereal string sections, the tender vocal performance, the vividly “late night” atmosphere of it all! It’s easily one of the most beautiful glimpses into their softer side that the band have ever given us, but even more beautiful than that is the album’s closer & best song BY FAR, “Goodbye”. The lyrics are absolutely heartbreaking, the pianos are extremely moving in spite of being so very simple, and the bridge here is beyond fascinating to me.
There’s this part of it’s instrumental that’s either a muted piano or the pitched down plucks of an orchestral stringed instrument. Whatever the hell it is, it gives me chills damn near every time I hear it. There aren’t even lyrics during this part, but it still manages to be one of the most evocative depictions of sadness that I’ve ever borne witness to. Undeniable proof that sound alone can often speak SO MUCH louder than words. This has been my go to “depression song” for YEARS now & I don’t see that changing any time soon.
So that’s “Social Cues”! It’s definitely got some issues, but I still like it quite a bit. It’s got a really fun new sound for the band, a decent amount of variety, consistently excellent lyrics that are largely about Matt’s, at the time, recent divorce, and some of the highest highs in their entire discography. It’s undoubtedly frontloaded, but still a very satisfying album experience overall. I mean it’s kind of impossible NOT to be satisfied with a closer this stellar.
Best Songs: Goodbye, House of Glass, & Social Cues.
Weakest Songs: What I’m Becoming, Black Madonna, & Tokyo Smoke.
This album gets a decent 8/10 from me.
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Well that's the post! Hope you enjoyed reading it & I'd love to discuss any & all of my takes in the comments!

I'd like to send an apology letter to my ex (2 months breakup and NC). I admit there was some emotional abuse (emotional withdrawing, lies, over defensiveness) from my side during the worst moments of the relationship. I also cared and loved this person very deeply and perhaps it was my avoidant attachment that was a factor in not expressing myself as clearly as I felt. I wrote a letter in an attempt to articulate that I am sorry for my wrongful behaviors and how she was affected by them. I'm not wanting anything from her. I'm trying to be careful in keeping the focus on the apology only and not have excuses or be manipulative. If you take the time to read it, can you please let me know your thoughts?
__________________________
"I’m writing this only to take proper accountability and validate every single point of hurt that you endured because of me. Just maybe, some of these words might offer some measure of healing that you may need. I subjected you to the indignities of dishonesty, betrayal, and disrespect on several levels - all which I have a great amount of remorse for having been the source of. You were right the many times you asked me to show you more empathy for your hurt feelings caused by my selfish lies. You told me on numerous occasions how you felt unsafe based on our conversations and I failed to show you the proper treatment to correct that. I’m so sorry for not approaching those moments with more compassion when it was my responsibility to help you heal through each one, especially during the times you were understandably triggered. No loving partner should ever treat their equal in a way that makes them feel minimized, undervalued, and invalidated. I wish that I would have gotten my shit together much earlier to at least have spared you from the weight of heartache and pain from my abusive behaviors. That was never okay and I’m deeply remorseful for allowing all of it to happen.
It was my responsibility to repair the broken trust created by my stupid lies. I neglected the full effort in helping carry the emotional labor that was needed from me and it was never fair to leave you holding the large majority of that burden. Despite my intentions, I did not show up for you repeatedly and I know that it wore you down over time. I can’t imagine how incredibly hurt and betrayed all of it made you feel and I’m terribly sorry for bringing that to you. It was never right for me to try to justify any of these behaviors using past traumas. They were just fucking wrong, period. Every part of you is beautiful and worthy of tender love and curiosity. You deserved committed support and respect in all aspects of your life. I’m not asking for your forgiveness or absolution. I say all of this to validate your experience and that I am profoundly sorry for the hurt that I inflicted on you. Your feelings mattered and should have always been a priority. I did care about everything more than you may know. I sincerely hope you live in all the peace and happiness you deserve."

ADVICE/QUESTIONS/CRITISM WANTED AND ENCOURAGED
I apologize for the bad writing and spelling errors in advance. I'm trying to write this quickly. Even if I have come to terms with it, I don't want to think about it for too long.
I, 22F, was not the best person in high school. In my sophomore and freshman year, I had a more refined 'sub-group' of friends. They were never my first choice, but I was their first choice. I didn't feel bad, however I now do. I would constantly choose my 'better' group of friends over them. However, I was still well-liked in the group. Spending time with them was fun, and I was relatively nice. Except to this one girl, who I will call 'Emma'.
Emma wasn't exactly conventionally attractive. She had decent features, but it didn't come together well at all. Her hair looked bad, and her style wasn't the prettiest. So, she was subject to getting made fun of. We all made fun of each other in the group, but even I could admit we were a bit ruthless when it came to Emma. Here is a list of some of the things we did:
Dump out her backpack when she did homework
Make fun of her love life
Poke her in the stomach
Take really bad pictures of her and post them online
Pretend the ground was shaking when she would walk by
Laugh at her when she ate
Push her when she was walking next to one of us (so another one of us could sit there)
Take her things (snacks, pens, homework assignments)
I know, it is bad. We did other things, but not things I am particularly proud of or want to share. Now, she would generally laugh along. However, towards late freshman and early sophmore year, she didn't laugh as much at our jokes. She would chuckle, but not like she laughed earlier. One friend in the group noticed she stopped bringing food to school, which could also be because of us. However, this didn't make us stop. If anything, it made it worse. Once, I had made the decision to host a hang-out at the skating rink. However, I decided not to invite Emma. I don't really even have a reason. But, sometime before the event, she found out. She said she didn't care, and that she didn't have any roller skates anyways. Looking back, she most likely did care.
In the last semester of sophomore year, Emma stopped doing almost anything. She wouldn't eat, barely drank, stopped doing schoolwork, stopped talking, and eventually stopped going to class. When we asked her about it, she just told us she was tired with the newfound stress the year gave her. We bought it. I remember exactly what I did after. It feels like I will never forget it, because it set off a spiral. About ten minutes after our conversation, the topic turned to Emma again. She had her head down, but started listening a few minutes after we started talking about her. I got up (we were sitting in the library, so we were all on the ground) and walked over to her. She smiled and started to say something, and before she could finish her sentence I bent down, lifted up her shirt slightly, and jiggled her stomach in front of everyone. We weren't the only ones in the room, mind you. Somewhere near ten or twenty people laughed. I dropped her shirt and pinched her cheeks. I told her something about eating a salad, and she shot me one of the most dejected glances I have ever seen. She muttered something about actually really liking salads, and I made yet another joke about how that couldn't possibly be true. I then told her, word for word, 'Next time you think about eating another chocolate bar, maybe try chewing some gum.' I remember being a bit upset that not as many people laughed, only a few people in our friend group. Emma nodded and went back to whatever she was doing.
Everything I described earlier, the not eating, drinking, etc., got much worse after that. She would go days without saying a word unless prompted, and yet we continued to make fun of her. No one was nearly as bad as me, though. A few weeks after this continuous behavior, we were once again in the library. We were passing a bag of chips along the library and had skipped over her. One person, 'Jess', the person who was probably the nicest to her, offered her some, but she said no. She closed her book and told us something about closing her eyes. She had been dozing on and off recently, so no one really minded. However, after an hour (and the bell had rung), Jess went to wake her up.
We were all waiting with our stuff for Jess to come back, but it took much longer than usual. After about five minutes, I decided to go check. My mind was already turning with jokes. (Was she sleeping a huge meal off? Was she hibernating?) But when I went over, Jess was just bent over examining her. I came over and shook her, but she did nothing. Jess told me she had already tried that, and that she wouldn't wake up no matter what she did. I shook Emma harder and poured some water on her (I'm not exactly sure which came first.) She still wouldn't wake up. After a few minutes of us both trying things (And other people who had came over from the group), we decided to give up and take her to the nurse, and she could deal with her. We were already late to our next class. One of the girls in our group and I picked her up, and she was honestly much lighter than I expected. Jess went ahead to the nurse to tell her we were coming since we would be a bit behind. We dropped her off and went back to our respective classes, and Jess stayed with Emma. From what Jess had told me, she had passed out from lack of food of some sorts. This is the action where I felt the worst (not even the stomach part): I continued to make jokes and make fun of her. (Of course SHE of all people passed out from hunger. Finally she's not eating for once. How can she be hungry, look at her!)
She wasn't even overweight. She was probably only a few pounds more than me, at least before she started practically starving herself. After she had come back to school (probably 2-4 weeks after the nurse thing), she couldn't even look at us. Any time someone talked to her, she would start to tear up (except for Jess, of course). I mostly ignored it until the end of the year. Of course, I felt bad, but I didn't think there was any point in trying to talk to her. And most of the group followed in my shoes. At the end of the year, Emma handed me a folded up sheet of paper. I made another stupid joke, once again (What, is this your McDonalds order? Or a confession letter?) She dodged the joke and told me to read it whenever I could, as long as it was after school, and to spread the message. I laughed and called it cliche, and then continued on with my day. But the letter was painful to read, and I didn't even accept it or really comprehend it until later on. This is a slightly paraphrased version, as it is in my room at my parents' house:
"Hey, Mia (me). I just want to talk to you about what happened this year. I don't blame you that much, but I don't want what you did to be repeated. Ever since last year you've been incredibly rude. I get that it was jokes, but I felt completely targetted. I was the only one in the group to be made fun of my physical appearance. I get it, I didn't look the best, so it kind of makes sense. But did it have to be a daily (if not hourly) thing? Sometime last year, it really got to me. I tried to ignore it, to joke along. But it really hit me hard. I'm made fun of a bit at home already, and I really liked school up until these years. It felt like a safe space, and it was ruined a bit by your constant bullying. I tried everything. I dieted, I worked out, I did it all. Eventually (and by your suggestion) I just slowly stopped eating. You probably noticed since you took my food all the time. I've been working on my self-confidence recently, and I noticed something. I'm average. I have average weight, average looks, an average life. Why should I be made fun of for that? The highest I've weighed is 130 pounds, early this year. I get it. It was a lot. But as I lost weight, why was I still made fun of? Left out? Honestly, my biggest hope is that you just don't ever repeat this. I don't want anyone else to go through this. I don't expect an apology either, because I won't be coming back to the school next year. Just please, don't do this again.
Your 'best friend',
Emma."
That letter changed my life. I changed everything. I changed who I hung out with, what I said and did, and apologized to the people in that friend group. I never showed them that letter, mostly because I was embarrassed. Me, the cause of all of it, was embarrassed. I want to talk to her and fully apologize, but I don't have any contact with her. I am planning on contacting Jess soon, probably this weekend. I feel as though I have fully come to sense with my actions. And I think Jess would be proud to hear that. Personally, I hope Emma is glad to hear that I've gained weight since then. I want her to feel some sort of relief, even if she didn't directly cause it.
Edit: You can ask questions if you want. I am willing to answer anything. However, I wanted to clarify: I know it was mentioned a few times she wasn't as chubby as we made her out to be. So why make fun of her for her weight? She wasn't exactly blessed in the facial fat and stomach fat department, and we saw that as some sort of reason to laugh at her.

I have worked in many healthcare settings from a can on a med surgical floor, a GI in a GI lab, to a pharmacy tech, and now an optometric tech. I have asked a nurse that was a charge nurse now a NP to write me a letter of recommendation and she said yes and I can ask my university for a committee letter. Should I ask the optometrists that I work with, should I ask the nurses that I worked with, should I ask the pharmacists I worked with? I just don’t know how valuable their opinion is. All the people I have stated have known me very well and could write awesome letters.

Throw away since I know this former employee is on Reddit.
This is in regards to a small, privately owned retail business in an at-will state.
Usually oral agreement issues are employees being shafted by owners/managers/etc. that the latter may have orally agreed to about X, Y, or Z to an employee. It has actually been difficult to find online search results that are reversed, which is the case I am experiencing with a former employee (let's call them Alex, in a gender-neutral manner to reduce revealing private info about them) - Alex is claiming that they were promised a large portion of ownership of the business as well as equity related to recent, large product investments.
We had to fire Alex because of prolonged, catalogued/tracked service quality and professionalism issues, as well as strong suspicion (and eventual solid evidence discovered post termination) of theft. The service quality and professionalism issues were discussed with Alex numerous times, and naturally known to other employees working alongside them. Eventually, after numerous continued issues and verbal warnings, Alex was formally written up and we had them sign the notes covered in the meeting. After a couple more months of still declining service quality, and odd, suspicious behavior that strongly indicated theft as mentioned, we were forced to terminate employment. We provided Alex with a fairly standard release form which essentially said "we won't sue you and you won't sue us, and if you sign you get 4 weeks of severance pay." Alex did not sign the form. Alex found new employment about 4 weeks after termination and to my knowledge has not filed for unemployment for the few weeks between jobs.
As mentioned, we later confirmed not only theft, but Alex was selling the stolen goods online while undercutting our prices and then even using the store's financial accounts to purchase shipping labels for their online customers to ship the stolen goods to them. We have screenshots of their Ebay account, along with pictures they took showing of the goods where their hand is visible with recognizable jewelry seen by all the staff before Alex was terminated (so we can confirm it's Alex in the pictures they posted). There is strong evidence of other theft but it is more difficult to prove.
Re: the oral agreement - it should be noted that I did in fact make an oral agreement with Alex, but of which is very different than the one they are claiming was made. Because Alex was our first employee and worked with us for over 5 years, I agreed that if the business was to ever grow to say another storefront, I would allow Alex to buy in for an undetermined percent of the business (probably around 10% at most). That is it. I've maintained that this was the agreement to Alex, my wife, and employees for a number of years, never changing the details of the arrangement. Unfortunately Alex made these poor service quality and theft decisions and was terminated before the business was able to grow into an additional store (still not a possibility at the moment and probably for another couple of years), thus the agreement is now null and void. This agreement was NOT written down or signed by either party (and thus no witnesses either).
Alex is claiming that they were promised to be given (yes, given, not just allowed to buy in) ownership up to 50% of the current business and 20%-30% or so of the value of recent product investments, of which would likely be in excess of $100,000 together. Alex's claim is absolutely not true. There is no paperwork, signatures, witnesses, etc. that would be able to confirm this unless they are going to forge something or have people lie for them. However, I am concerned about this because I otherwise do not have proof that this was not the agreement...
Our two current employees, aware of this situation, and aware of (and witness to) the poor and odd behavior of the former employee that led to their termination (including the theft), are more than willing to testify that Alex's claim is not the case. Alex even spoke to them about thinking about drafting a letter to me about a 7% ownership stake, which they never did. If they were orally promised such a great deal of ownership why would they need to draft a letter for only 7%? Unfortunately Alex has recruited the wrath of their parents (who they lived with for 6 years straight and just moved into an apartment, Alex is in their 30s.) who are going to bankroll them a lawyer. I would imagine that Alex has been telling their parents for some time now (like years) that there was some sort of oral agreement about ownership more in the line of their false claims (to the specifics I am not sure) and they have been able to convince them that their child is telling the truth. So Alex's parents could very well feel like they're telling the truth when they say their child told them about this crazy 50% stake and equity when in fact it was a lie. But how do I prove that? Do I need to prove that?
Here's where it gets a little more complicated - Alex's father (who I miss, he was a good guy) is handy and built a majority of the counters, drawers, storage, display tables, etc. in the storefront for free (he refused payment for the labor, but I paid for all the materials of which I have receipts for). Alex is claiming that because their father built all this furniture, it is "proof" that they were promised part ownership and equity (because why else would their father be so generous?...). But that is not the case, their father just wanted to help and participate in any way he could as he is nearing retirement and wanting to take on new activities. The employee may have been cultivating this false assumption that such construction is proof of promised partnership with their fathefamily from the start, although their father never mentioned anything like that to me.
The personal and professional betrayal aside, I'm concerned about Alex levying such accusations of ridiculous grand promises via oral agreement since it is so hard to confirm either way, and given this person's proclivity of lying (and stealing) I have little trust they will act in good faith if any legal proceedings unfold. I would love any advice on how to possibly handle this issue. Wouldn't the onus be on Alex to prove these grand promises? Given the little I have listed above, what "evidence" might be in their favor? How concerning is it that their parents are fully convinced their child has been wronged (I also know that Alex is telling friends and new coworkers the reason they were fired was because of me not wanting to "give" them part of the business)? It seems ridiculous a parent's perspective would hold much weight in actual legal environments since they would be so biased. Should I be concerned there is no written agreement about any of these promises (including the legitimate one about eventual opportunity to buy in)? Anything about their father volunteering their labor? Is it a good thing that our current employees are willing to testify (on their own volition, I didn't even ask them) about their own first hand experiences and conversations with Alex that contradicts many of Alex's statements? Anything else potentially troublesome I should be aware of?
Yes, lots of lessons learned here - get things in writing for my own protection against such claims. Unfortunately that is not the case here, so advice geared around the fact that no party has much to support their claims (well, I'm only claiming their claim is false) would be most helpful. Please let me know if you have any clarifying questions or need more information for better input. I really appreciate your time and consideration!

Just to preface this, we're long distance and started dating almost 8 months ago. We've had several visits and we've been together in person for around a total of 2 months so far, with 4 more months of visits planned this year.
Recently I read through some of our older messages, I guess because I was missing her. And it started to dawn on me just how much it feels like things have changed. For the first bit of our relationship, she'd write me poems, send me letters, tell me how in love with me she is. I'd wake up to paragraphs of messages, with her telling me how much she missed me while I was asleep, telling me how much she loves me and how she needs me, how she can't bear to be away from me. Her replies would be so quick, and she'd seem so eager to talk to me. I'd send her selfies and she'd get so excited, complimenting me and saying she loves me. We'd video call all the time, watch shows together, play video games together. When I left after our first ever visit together, she was sobbing and we couldn't let each other go, and she sent me tons of messages saying how much she loves me, asking when I think we can live together, how upset she was and how much she misses me.
But a couple months ago, I started to feel like things were seeming less enthusiastic on her end. I brought it up to her and she got very upset, and she told me how terrible she felt about it, saying she'd be better for me (I felt really bad about this because I didn't want to upset her at all, I just wanted to let her know because I didn't want to worry her). And that was that.
But more recently things feel like they've gotten even worse. Her replies will be incredibly slow sometimes (relative to how they used to be), sometimes taking up to an hour to reply to me because she gets distracted with TikTok or games, which makes me feel like she'd rather be doing that than talk to me. The late night messages when I'm asleep, the letters and the poems stopped months ago. I've done similar things since the start of the relationship, and still continue to do so. I don't feel like this is just a love language or the way she communicates love thing, because she's always been incredibly full of love, it just feels like her heart isn't really in it anymore. We haven't video called in a long time, and any time I've suggested it her camera just ends up facing the ceiling. Playing games together is a thing of the past too.
The last two visits we had, she didn't shed a single tear or even seem all that sad when I/she left. I cried several times leading up to me leaving every time, and was extremely upset. I mentioned this kind of, saying something about how she handled it so much better than I did, and her reasoning was she was trying to be strong and be there for me.
I feel like I'm partly to blame for this, as I get very anxious sometimes and get upset by things that are kinda stupid. I've never taken it out on her or gotten mad or yelled or anything, and we've always talked about it, and she's always said that its okay and she understands that I get anxious. But my theory is that she's just starting to get tired of me. I guess maybe I'm not the person she fell in love with? I don't know.
I'm just scared. I love this girl with everything I have. I see my entire life, my entire future with her. And she says she feels the same, but I'm starting to worry that its no longer the case. I don't know what to do. I know I should bring it up, but I don't know how and I don't want to upset or worry her. What can I do to deal with this?
TLDR: Worried that my long distance girlfriend isn't in love with me anymore. She doesn't seem as invested or enthusiastic about us anymore, and I'm scared and don't know what to do about it.

Below is the US travel history:
In 2015, I obtained B1/B2 visa with my Chinese passport (my only nationality at that time), travelled from Canada to the US for the first time, no issues with entry or exit. I was a student in a Canadian university. After this trip, my passport along with the visa was lost.
In 2017, I got a new B1/B2 visa with my new Chinese passport. Travelled from Canada to the US in March 2018 for business. I was working as a researcher for an agricultural company. My status in Canada was temporary residence with post graduate work permit, was in the process of getting a PR. My B1/B2 visa was cancelled by the US consulate in April 2018 after I came back from the business trip. Reason was that new information became available after the visa was issued.
In 2018 May, I applied for a visa for business travel again, it was refused. The refusal came after the in-person interview. There's no detail/reason why it's refused.
I became a Canadian citizen and cancelled my Chinese citizenship in 2023. Between 2018 and 2024, I also changed jobs but still with the same company.
In 2024, I went to the US border with my Canadian passport and was denied entry. CBP couldn't tell me more details but said that I was on the inadmissible list. I will have to apply for a new visa or a security letter for future entry into the US.
I've consulted with immigration attorneys, they told me that I could write to the US consulate asking for details but may never get a response. Without knowing the reasons, I'm not sure how to prepare for future visa applications.

The whole scene is nothing but characters acting stupid for the sake of plot and nonsensically out of character. The whole problem with the scene stems entirely from 4 points: 1) Adam shouldn't be there. 2) charlie being ill prepared. 3) Sera being stupid. 4) exterminations being a secret.
1) Adam shouldn't be there: Everyone knows Adam is an idiot and a loud mouth, that's his main character traits, so why would Sera, the immortal angel who has been in an important position of power in heaven for millennia, ever think it's a good idea to trust him with anything that requires the most minimal amount of intelligence and subtlety? She shouldn't do that because Sera isn't supposed to be braindead, braindead people don't stay in positions of power for long, if Sera was half as smart as her position requires her to be she wouldn't have put Adam on the trial because he would obviously fuck up, i know he was going to fuck it up, you knew he was going to fuck it up, how did Sera not?
That blunder was so unbelievably stupid i feel it deserves it's own section.
2) "Charlie being ill prepared*: Charlie already begins the trial wrong by bringing in a bunch of definitions, which not only doesn't prove that souls can be redeemed, but is also offensive to the people she is pitching the hotel to because it's a tad belittling. Also not only are those papers with definitions and drawings her opening statement, that's all that she has, which is weird because she was more prepared when she met Adam, in fact she was doing well with Adam, she was explaining what the hotel, what it does, and why they should accept it and even appealing to his clear laziness, the only reason she failed was because Adam doesn't do the exterminations just because they are his job, he does for fun too. If Charlie actually put in the same amout of work and competency she would have brought with her and showed Serpentious to give his own statements about the hotel and his stay there, he made remarkable progress despite being in the hotel for 5 months at best. But instead Charlie is ill prepared and she ends up relying entirely on luck, imagine how much more different the trial would have happened if Angel Dust had been just sleeping, or in the salon cutting his hair, or wanking, or doing literally ANYTHING else.
3) Sera being stupid: Literally every mistake Sera could make, she did.
3.1) she is against the hotel: from the get go Sera is needlessly against the idea of the hotel and sees it as a danger for quite literally no reason, if anything the hotel is a good thing to heaven because the main reason hell is a threat is due to their numbers, the hotel redeeming sinners evens that plain field.
3.2) she interrupts Charlie's opening statement: as i explained before, the definitions were lame and a bad first impression to the council, since Sera doesn't want the hotel she shouldn't have sustained the objection, that would have made her pass for a nice person giving Charlie a fair shot while following the basic principle of "Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.".
3.3) "why isn't he here then?": When that question was asked relating to Angel the answer was obvious, in the words of a much more competent character with divine stuff around him "one good action doesn't erase all the bad, and one bad action doesn't erase all the good", i through of this answer as i was watching the scene, how did Sara, the immortal angel who rules a section of heaven didn't?
3.4) "You didn't know": throughout the whole song Sera does literally NOTHING, she just runs like a headless chicken while going "you don't know" a thousand times over, but if she actually had the competency necessary for holding the position she holds she would have put her cock on the table and said "No! We don't know exactly what gets someone into heaven, that's for god/the sector that makes that judgement to know, what we do know is that it's our position to ensure that your people, the murderers and rapists won't come up here to murder and rape. You, Charlie, have shown yourself to be a petuland and emotional child so this trial is over!".
4) Extermination being a secret: Extermination is a very simple thing, in order to ensure that hell can't grow strong enough to invade heaven and rape everything in sight Adam and his gang of goons go there to kill some sinners, it's a secret in two fronts: to sinners it's said that the exterminatons happen due to over population. To heaven it's kept hidden. Both of these are stupid.
4.1) telling hell the exterminatons are due to over population: if you want to ensure hell won't rise up then telling them "look here, bitch, look at how easily i can clip out your strength with a small platoon, try anything and you are ALL dead" would be a good use of fear factor.
4.2) Not telling heaven the exterminatons happen: what do you gain by keeping the exterminaton a secret? Nothing! You just give whoever reveals it first control over the narrative, it's super easy to paint the exterminators as true heroes who every year venture to the land of the depraved to ensure those of good will and morals in heaven stay safe, so why go through all the trouble of keeping it a secret?
Literally every single action taken in this scene is stupidity after stupidity that doesn't makes sense for the characters, Adam and Lute are cocky dumbasses, it makes sense for them to make the mistakes they did, the mistakes from Charlie and Sera don't make sense.
tl dr: the Trial Scene is a complete failure from a writing stand point, nothing makes sense, characters act stupidly out of character.

Hi Reddit,
I'm in need of some opinions regarding a complicated situation at work that involves potential retaliation and unfair treatment. I'd appreciate any insights or similar experiences you might have to help me navigate this.
Background: I've been working at my company for a couple of years. Recently, I became more active in union activities, specifically inquiring about changes to our overtime policy. Shortly after my involvement in these activities, I was suspended and then terminated, which seemed very sudden and suspicious to me.
Union Activities: - Inquiry About Overtime Policy: On November 20, 2023, the General Manager sent an email stating that due to the union, we were no longer permitted to earn overtime. - Pre-shift Meeting: On November 26, 2023, during a pre-shift meeting, a coworker and I asked management to clarify the new overtime policy. After the meeting, I sent an email to HR and our Union Representative to discuss the issue further and requested a copy of the contract. - Union Office Visit: On November 27, 2023, a coworker and I went to the union office to clarify the overtime policy. The union representatives confirmed that the no-overtime rule was not part of the union agreement but a company policy. - Confirmation from HR: On November 29, 2023, I received an email from HR confirming that the no-overtime rule was a company policy and that there was no finalized collective bargaining agreement.
Key Events Leading to Termination: 1. Drinking Incident: On November 29, 2023, after my shift, I made myself a drink. This is the incident cited by the company for my termination. 2. Meeting Request: On December 2, 2023, I sent an email requesting a meeting with HR to discuss the overtime policy further. 3. HR Response: On December 5, 2023, HR agreed to meet with me on December 9, 2023. 4. Suspension Meeting: On December 9, 2023, just before my scheduled meeting with HR, my supervisor informed me of an investigation into the drinking incident from November 29. I was suspended pending the outcome of the investigation. 5. Termination Meeting: On December 14, 2023, I was called into a meeting with my supervisor and a union representative, where I was informed that I was being terminated due to the drinking incident. The supervisor stated that they had found evidence of the incident, but did not provide this evidence to me or the union.

Key Evidence and How It Supports My Claim:

1. Recorded Statement:
   
   • Timeline: The recording captures a conversation with my supervisor on December 9, 2023, shortly before my suspension.
   • Support: In the recording, the supervisor stated they only recently became aware of my alleged policy violation. This directly contradicts the company's claim that they knew about the incident much earlier, suggesting inconsistencies in their account and indicating possible retaliation.
2. Employer’s Documentation (Equifax Report):
   
   • Timeline: The document, dated February 21, 2024, details my termination and the reasons for it.
   • Support: The report confirms the official reason for my termination and the timeline of events leading up to it. However, it does not specify when the employer became aware of the alleged misconduct, aligning with my claim that the timing is suspect and possibly retaliatory. This supports the inconsistency highlighted by the recorded statement.
3. Text Messages and Emails:
   
   • Timeline: These communications span the period before and after the alleged incident.
   • Support: The messages show that other employees, including managers, engaged in similar conduct without being disciplined. They also include instructions to lie about the contents of the drinks, indicating selective enforcement and unfair treatment. This evidence supports my claim of inconsistency and possible targeting due to my union activities.
4. Union Activities Timeline:
   
   • November 20, 2023: Inquiry about overtime policy begins with the General Manager’s email.
   • November 26, 2023: Pre-shift meeting where I and a coworker questioned the overtime policy.
   • November 27, 2023: Visit to the union office to clarify the policy.
   • November 29, 2023: Confirmation from HR that the overtime rule is a company policy, followed by the drinking incident after my shift.
   • December 2, 2023: Email requesting a meeting with HR.
   • December 5, 2023: HR agrees to meet with me on December 9, 2023.
   • December 9, 2023: Suspended pending investigation just before the HR meeting.
   • December 14, 2023: Termination meeting citing the drinking incident.
5. Unemployment Appeal:
   
   • Timeline: After I filed my NLRB claim, the company appealed my unemployment benefits.
   • Support: The timing of this appeal, especially since similar actions were not taken for other employees terminated for similar reasons, suggests a retaliatory motive aimed at discouraging my union activities. This further supports my claim of retaliation and selective enforcement.

Current Situation:

• I filed a case with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) alleging retaliation and unfair treatment.
• During a grievance meeting, the company offered to reinstate me if I completed an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) program, but this offer does not address my core issues of retaliation and selective enforcement.

What I'm Looking For:

I'm seeking opinions on how to proceed. Specifically, I'm interested in: - How to strengthen my case and what additional evidence might be useful. - Insights into how others have handled similar situations and what outcomes they experienced. - Any legal nuances or strategies that could help in presenting my case effectively.
Thanks in advance for your help!
Feel free to share your thoughts or similar experiences. I could really use some guidance on the best steps forward.