Sentence builder worksheets

University of Victoria

2010.06.13 20:45 joelfriesen University of Victoria

The University of Victoria is a major research university located in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. The university traces its roots to Victoria College, the first post-secondary institution established in British Columbia in 1903, it was then reorganized in 1963 into its present form. The University of Victoria is a non-denominational multi-disciplinary institution.
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2021.02.26 11:44 blizzard2875 Pokémon Brilliant Diamond And Shining Pearl

A place to discuss anything related to Nintendo's Diamond and Pearl remakes, Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl.
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2012.05.31 02:54 Lunch_B0x A community for the game Starforge

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2024.05.14 23:19 FabuliciousFruitLoop One year in

I would like to add an encouragement post. I am at my 1-year anniversary this week.
As far as I can figure out I have POTS, MCAS, CFS. My recent gut screen was actually pretty good except for a couple of aspects that need correcting.
I was bed/ chairbound for about 3 months. I couldn’t cope with any noisy sensory stimulation; no TV, radio, music. I literally just sat like a potato for weeks. In that time I had unintentional extended fasting where I just couldn’t stand to eat or drink for 2 or 3 days at a time. If I tried to use the stairs at home, there was crawling and resting involved, so I avoided trying to do that. I couldn’t really maintain my personal hygiene very well. My cognitive function was badly affected. Short term memory loss, on one occasion I didn’t recognise my own sister. Unable to read anything more than a couple of sentences or follow a conversation. Unable to interact with more than one person at a time.
After 6 months I was improved enough to try returning to work. I restarted at 4 hours per week. I could not drive at this point. At first I thought I was going to have to drop from a management role to a data entry clerk because my skills were significantly altered.
It is now 6 months later. I work 26-30 hours per week. I crash about 2 or 3 days per month; I’m still learning pacing but in the past month have got much, much better at this. My symptoms for everything except POTS are very significantly reduced. I still score “significantly impacted” on the different scales I am being monitored on, but compared to where I was, in material terms I am much more able. I can now drive for 30 minutes several times per week. I am holding about 50% of my previous work duties at this point. My cognitive function is dramatically better. I can lead a group meeting without crashing, for example.
Today, I had a joyous moment. I took my dog to a park I have not visited for a year. I have not been there because of an incline involved. I did a short walk with her. It was OK.
Every month I get slightly better. I have done a bunch of things to try and aid this. Thank goodness for this subreddit; it has given me the keys, signposted every single thing I’ve tried out, some of which I’m convinced are pivotal for me. I’m not writing a list because I can’t really say for sure - what has done what? Nobody is monitoring me except me. Maybe none of it worked and it was just time. Maybe I’m right, some things were crucial.
I know there are people early on in their journey looking for hope here. I would like to speak up and say I’m very much better. I am starting to contemplate the next forward steps. To all the people still profoundly debilitated: I think of you a lot. I speak about you in my paid work as a community builder. I’m so sorry that this gradual improvement I am describing has not happened for you. It sucks.
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2024.05.13 01:26 IQ_Throwaway4 IQ Subtest Variance Questions with background info

IQ Subtest Variance Questions with background info
I have a 7 year old child who recently took an IQ test and I have questions about the results (pictured). We are going to discuss with the tester (a school psychologist), but I wanted to get some outside opinions as well so that I'm well equipped for the conversation. This is long, so TIA for reading and commenting.
My concern revolves around the fact that the child’s subtest scores were up to 2+ standard deviations apart from one another (see below). I’m not sure if this is “normal” or if some kind of intervention needs to take place.
Some testing and personal background:
-The child started talking in full sentences at 15 months old and reading and writing before kindergarten (with no push from us).
-They are highly sociable and seem to have an above-average social awareness (doesn’t seem to be on the autistic spectrum).
-They seem to have very high executive functioning, even reminding us of day to day scheduling that might otherwise slip through the cracks (doesn’t seem to have ADHD?).
-The child is prone to anxiety and has previously suffered from severe separation anxiety and a coughing tic. The separation anxiety seems to be innate and the coughing tic appeared during the pandemic. Our family has also dealt with a lot of chronic and emergency health issues in the past 5 years (so since the child was 2 years old).
-The test was given on a Friday early afternoon with no forewarning (pretty much worst-case scenario in my mind). And the child’s other parent was out of town for work that whole week (possible separation anxiety again).
-An anecdote about schoolwork: Two weeks ago the child brought home a worksheet with 16 math problems on it. The first 8 were perfect. The next 8 answers were such gibberish that I assumed the child was just messing around and I asked them about it (non-judgmentally, I don’t really care). The child seemed offended by such a statement and claimed to have not realized. The next week the child brought home a bunch of worksheets with about 100 math problems and they were all correct, save two where the child had subtracted instead of added.
-My partner and I, as well as the child's 9 year old sibling are all classified as “moderately gifted” according to testing.
-The child and sibling have a very close relationship and play together all day long. It’s possible that some of the child’s problem-solving skills have been dampened by reliance on the older sibling. Or that any issues with said skills were masked by the older sibling’s help.
So, what should we make of these test scores? What questions or concerns (if anything) should we bring up with the psychologist?
https://preview.redd.it/lx1agdlky20d1.jpg?width=780&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=65a64e854fe968f3cb846a7966f6856f7c231aaf
submitted by IQ_Throwaway4 to cognitiveTesting [link] [comments]


2024.05.12 23:23 miss5533 What are 7 year olds learning in school, english wise?

My aunt has given me the responsibility (or honor?) of her 7 year old this summer about once or twice a week. Not full time or anything, so remove if this isn't allowed, but I have been tasked with teaching the kid some English while school's out for the summer. I don't know any 7 year olds so I can't ask them what they're learning in school. From some online research I've come up with worksheets about adjectives, nouns, sentence structure including action words, present and past tense...
parents: What approaches work best for kids? Do you have book suggestions I can buy online?
I'm not really that close with my aunt, but at this point I don't even know what I'm supposed to ask her to get more information.
Thank you!
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2024.05.12 21:32 vlviprealestate Conservatory Group - Richmond Green experience

Conservatory Group - Richmond Green experience
I am embarassed to share my story but hope it will be useful to others navigating the market.
I got swept up in the peak back in Jan 2022. This unit was at the time being sold by the builder, as I believe is the case with the subsequent listing.
I had agreed to purchase this exact unit. The agent I was working with had confirmed the price (much higher than this listing) and sent an agreement that I had to return in 24 hours - this is normal.
STRANGELY, the agreement did not require the builder to return a signature to me within 24 hours, if I recall correctly they had 7 days to mull it over. I noticed this when reviewing the agreement, but did not worry as my experience was that builders typically sign back right away as the agreement contains all terms that are favourable to them and are non-negotiable.
I was surprised that upon receiving the signed agreement, I was sent a NEW purchase and sale agreement that had a NEW purchase price at $50,000 higher. This was problematic, as it wasn’t a clear counteroffer so it could be viewed that the original PSA could still be accepted by them for 7 days which sucks if something you want comes on the market in that time.
Of course my agent had my best interests at heart and told me to sign back. 🤣 I did NOT sign back and was advised by my lawyer to send a message back builder indicating that this was counter offer and the original agreement was void. Of course I was reprimanded by the agent for asking to have written confirmation of this for my records to cover my ass - someone who I had gone to to school and worked with and known for 10+ years at the time. Funny thing is she said she would buy the unit off me if they honored the original price as I would be able to easily flip the property, but the above listing was terminated despite being listed at a lower price.
Anyway just wanted to share the red flags above so others can avoid a similar negative experience.
Sharing this now as I feel like I dodged a bullet and it seems like the market may have picked up as this desperate agent is again sending me pre-con listings to share with friends and family. Tactics like “limited units”, “fill worksheet asap if interested” —> if these things were selling, there would be no need to do this.
There is a happy ending, found my forever home and enjoying it everyday.
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2024.05.12 20:31 approachenglish English Grammar Class 6 Topics Syllabus CBSE ICSE (2025)

English Grammar Class 6 Topics Syllabus CBSE ICSE (2025)
English Grammar Class 6 Topics Syllabus CBSE ICSE (2025)
In the academic year 2025, Class 6 students across various educational boards will delve into the intricacies of English Grammar. Understanding the syllabus is crucial for students to excel in language proficiency and academic performance.

Importance of Understanding English Grammar at an Early Age

Grasping English Grammar concepts at a young age lays a strong foundation for effective communication and academic success. Early exposure to grammar aids students in writing coherent essays, improving comprehension skills, and achieving higher grades in exams.

Topics Covered in Class 6 English Grammar CBSE, ICSE, Other State Boards (2025)

In Class 6 English Grammar syllabi for 2025, CBSE, ICSE, and other State Boards cover the following grammar topics:
1: The Sentences
2: Subject and Predicate
3: Nouns
4: Singular Plural Nouns
5: Gender
6: Nominative Accusative Possessive Case
7: Pronouns
8: Verbs
9: Modal Auxiliaries
10: Adjectives
11: Degrees of Comparison
12: Adverbs
13: The Simple Tense
14: The Continuous Tense
15: The Perfect Tense
16: Phrases and Clauses
17: Prepositions
18: Conjunctions
19: Articles
20: Subject Verb Agreement
21: Active and Passive Voice
22: Direct and Indirect Speech
23: Punctuation Marks and Capital Letters

Overview of CBSE and ICSE Syllabus for Class 6 English Grammar

Comparing the syllabi provided by CBSE and ICSE reveals similarities and differences in the focus and structure of English Grammar education. While both boards emphasize language skills development, CBSE tends to have a broader approach, covering reading, writing, and grammar, whereas ICSE places more emphasis on language proficiency and composition.

Detailed Breakdown of CBSE Syllabus

CBSE's syllabus for Class 6 English Grammar includes comprehensive coverage of reading skills, writing skills, and grammar concepts. Students engage in activities such as comprehension passages, essay writing, and grammar exercises to enhance their language proficiency.

Detailed Breakdown of ICSE Syllabus

In contrast, ICSE's syllabus focuses on language proficiency and composition, with an emphasis on literary analysis and creative writing. Students explore various literary genres, practice writing different types of compositions, and delve into advanced grammar concepts.

Key Topics Covered in Class 6 English Grammar

Key topics covered in Class 6 English Grammar include parts of speech, sentence structure, tenses, punctuation, and comprehension skills. Mastering these topics is essential for effective communication and academic success.

Tips for Effective Learning of English Grammar

Students can enhance their grammar skills through regular practice, active reading, writing exercises, and seeking feedback from teachers or peers. Utilizing online resources, grammar apps, and participating in grammar games can also facilitate learning.

Resources for Further Practice

Additional resources such as websites like approachenglish.com, grammar books like "Wren & Martin," and online platforms like Grammarly provide students with opportunities for further practice and consolidation of English Grammar skills.

Conclusion

In conclusion, understanding the English Grammar Class 6 Topics Syllabus CBSE ICSE (2025) is paramount for students' language development and academic success. By mastering grammar concepts, students can communicate effectively, excel in exams, and prepare for future opportunities.

Get the Class 6 English Grammar Book

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2024.05.12 19:01 lambchopsuey Deconstructing the "discussion meeting" performance - "the staged character of discussion meetings" - illuminates why SGI is failing and how far it has deteriorated

This analysis comes from Cults and Nonconventional Religious Groups: A Collection of Outstanding Dissertations and Monographs, "Shakubuku: A Study of the Nichiren Shoshu Buddhist Movement in America, 1960-1975", David A. Snow, 1993, pp. 171-179.
I'll try to shave it down, because it's a long section, but he masterfully dissects the manipulation and artifice involved in the "discussion meetings" of then-NSA (now SGI-USA). You'll recognize the fakery he identifies - this is the nature of the Dead-Ikeda-cult SGI, a completely dishonest and exploitative cult.
It is at these discussion meetings, then, that NSA gets on with the real work of promoting and securing nominal conversion, of attempting to get recruits to take the first major step toward conversion by agreeing to receive a Gohonzon and to give chanting a try.
In those days, the nohonzon was issued up front (for a fee, of course - cash on the barrelhead).
And since gaining converts is, in large part, what this movement is all about, "nothing is more basic to the activities of NSA," as noted in the Winter edition of the 1975 NSA Quarterly, "than the discussion meeting." Or, as one district leader emphasized when discussing the importance of these meetings: "Discussion meetings are indispensable to the spread of the practice and the attainment of Kosen-rufu."
If you've ever felt confused at how sitting around someone's living room with the same bunch of losers month after month is doing anything toward the SGI's supposed goals of "world peace" or anything at all, actually, besides wasting the participants' time, I think what's described here will make it clearer what the original intent and purpose of these "discussion meetings" was, AND how far from that the current SGI "activities" have fallen.
The Character and Organization of These Meetings from a Sociological Standpoint
Given the purpose and importance of these discussion meetings, the question arises as to how they are organized and brought off in a strategic manner. In other words, what is the underlying strategy guiding this work of securing nominal conversion, and what are the kinds of tactical adjustments made at the line of scrimmage when the plan of attack does not appear to be advancing the group toward its goal of getting guests to agree to give chanting a try.
It's not enough that the "guests" say they'll try it; by the end of this ordeal, they'll say absolutely anything to get themselves to the other side of that door! What they really want is enough interest and desire on the part of those "guests" that they'll come back - and ideally become regularly attending members (as described in this indoctrinational creative writing fiction where a career Catholic priest is so entranced with the fictional (non)discussion meetings that he JOINS the SGI!! You'll notice that there is never any room within SGI to even mention one of THEIR SGI leaders who joins a Baptist church, for example, much less to celebrate such a stepping-out-of-line. But it's always FINE for other religions' leaders to see the obvious superiority of the SGI, knowmsayin?
In order to answer these question [sic] in a sociological manner, let us step out of the shoes of a guest and into those of a sociological [sic] with insiders' knowledge.
The Strategy of Theatrical Persuasion. Although members and the movement's literature like to characterize these meetings as being forums for free and open discussion and the spontaneous expression and flow of happiness and excitement, they are a far cry from gatherings characterized by spontaneity and unstructured discussion and interaction. Rather, they are meticulously planned and highly orchestrated meetings that can be best conceptualized, from a dramaturgical perspective, as theatrical-like presentations staged and conducted by a set of individuals (NSA members) who not only work together as a team but whose intimate cooperation is expected and required in order to foster and sustain a convincing impression or definition of the situation in the eyes of the audience (the recruits or guests).
Although the staged character of these meetings is seldom readily discernible to the unsuspecting guest, the appropriateness of conceptualizing these meetings in this way is suggested by the following considerations. First, the purpose of the meeting, as already indicated, is to sell guests on the idea of chanting, to so impress them that they feel compelled to give this practice call [sic] chanting a try.
Secondly, there is a division of labor such that all members have one or more roles to play. These various roles include the leadership role, the role of emcee, a general, overarching supportive role, and several more specific supportive roles, such as the role of giving an explanation of what NSA is all about, the role of a song leader, and the role of giving testimony. And even more significantly, members are provided with fairly detailed instructions, or, in the language of the theater, with scripts indicating what each role involves and how best to perform or play it.
There's a list of these roles. At the discussion meeting planning meeting, the attendees go down the list and simply plug different members' names into the worksheet.
The main leadership role, assumed by the district chief or, in his absence, the assistant district chief, includes, for example, the tasks of leading the chanting in a vigorous manner, conducting the question-and-answer session, meeting with each of the guests, and providing an inspirational role model for the other members. In performing these tasks, the leader is reminded that rather than putting on the air of a great sage, he should make a point of displaying great vitality, warmth, and compassion. Furthermore, he is expected "to be able to give clear explanations of the philosophy and practice," and is instructed to "always tailor his answers and encouragement to the audience."
Answers should always be tailored to the audience. If the guests are young, then the answers should include examples they can relate to. If the questions are too mystical or one-sided, the leader must have the wisdom to change the subject or break off the question-and-answer period diplomatically.
Blanche described how in her first district, the WD District leader instructed everyone that, if someone in the meeting was going on too long or rambling or whatever, that they should just start clapping wildly and shouting, "Congratulations!!" and then the MC would just move on to the next topic on the agenda. Reeeeal "spontaneous" there...
The emcee role is also regarded as particularly important, so much so that "the success of the meeting" is said to be contingent on how well it is performed. In fact, "so much depends on the emcee" that the discussion meeting is described for him as "a battleground in which he must struggle to bring victory to the members."
Barf. How far SGI has fallen! Now the goal is to see if there's some young teen in an SGI member's family who can be press-ganged to show up and read the agenda - their youth in and of itself is supposed to "encourage" everyone! Forget about all that "struggle" nonsense - they aren't gonna. This illustrates the SGI's current "form over function" approach, in which they just identify someone and pressure that person to do it, rather than the ideal candidate volunteering from a spirit of...oh, whatever - see above paragraph 🙄 Ideally, there would be SEVERAL young people positively brimming with passion and youthful energy who would be vying to be chosen: "Me! Let ME do it this time!" "No! ME!" "Choose ME!!" Instead, now it's just some tired old fart who agrees to do it, just to get this over with and there's no one else.
Specific responsibilities include setting "the gears fo the meeting in motion" and keeping the meeting going in a rhythmical and orderly manner.
You have to wonder just how crazy they envision these (non)discussion meetings might go - will a spontaneous rave break out if it isn't carefully controlled? An unpermitted parade? A frenzy of liturgical dance?? WHAT might happen??? Enquiring minds want to know!!
The emcee must develop the ability to keep the rhythm of the meeting going by making sure that there are no pauses or interruptions. If someone is causing a disorder, he should quiet the person in a polite manner. If a baby starts crying, he should see to it that either the mother or one of the young women at the meeting takes the child to another room to calm it down.
Gendered. Misogynist.
The emcee is also charged with being "the eyes and ears of the person leading the meeting."
Before and during the meeting, he should watch guests, be on the lookout for disruptions, and in general, be aware of everything that's happening. He should inform the person leading the meeting how many guests are present and whether they are young or old, so the leader can set the rhythm of the meeting accordingly.
Yeah. NO 😄 WOW but it's been a LONG TIME since any SGI sales pitch-based recruiting session - I mean discussion meeting - had any characteristics that would fit the above instructions. Just no way. Not now. Now, it's the same old handful of longhaulers dragging themselves in to go through the motions - as usual. By rote.
In addition, the emcee is expected to talk, act, and appear in a manner that displays or exudes strength, confidence, vitality and neatness.
The emcee must speak in a vigorous, strong and clear voice, but not screaming. The way he sits, stands up and moves the table must display confidence.
This was when a small table would be moved in in front of the person who led gongyo, who would turn around to face the group. This is of course a Japanese norm, completely foreign to Westerners. How many people outside of Japan even have a low table like that, designed for someone who's sitting on the floor??
In fact, he should stand up smartly whenever he is talking. As for appearance, he should reflect the image of NSA - clean and neat clothes and personal grooming.
It has been a LOOOOOOOONG time since ANY SGI district could insist on these requirements! Now they're just lucky if they can get anyone younger than retirement age to read the agenda off, and the agenda is often handed to them right there at the meeting itself - fuhgeddabout all this "advance preparation" nonsense. Nothing happens at the SGI discussion meetings, so nobody's going to go to this much trouble just because.
And finally, the emcee is instructed to have the details of the meeting worked out and the setting in order before the meeting begins.
...as opposed to showing up and being handed a printed agenda to read off as SGI does it now.
The emcee must have a plan for the meeting. He should write up a schedule showing who will give the explanation, what songs will be sung, who will give experiences and so on, and present it to the leader at least two days prior to the meeting. The emcee must prepare for the meeting. He should check to see if the meeting place is clean and neat, that all lights work and there is an appropriate meeting table. Most of all, he should do Shakubuku for the success of the meeting.
Oh, like any of that's gonna happen! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Yes, things were VERY different back in the late 1960s-early 1970s, when the SGI organization in the US was still growing. As you can see, all this has been tossed right out the window.
A couple of items:
In fact, you can see a newly promoted leader doing exactly that, "chanting for the success of the meeting", here, from this same time period (early 1970s).
It's been a LONG time since any of this was happening, and you can clearly see in today's (non)discussion meetings how far things have deteriorated - and that's JUST the MC part! There's a bit about the demands on the members of the group - I'll skip to just this part:
As one district chief explained during a planning meeting for senior and junior leaders within the district and which I was invited to by one of my key informants:
Make sure to tell your members to chant in rhythm with the leaders. There shouldn't be any more than one rhythm. Everyone should be together so that there is unity. And remember to have them support the leader in whatever he says; the guests won't know whether he is right or wrong. So even if you don't agree with what is being said, act as if you do. this [sic] way there is unity at the meeting and the guests will be more impressed.
Wow, huh? It's completely dishonest and oriented entirely at flimflamming and bamboozling the "guests"!
Next there's a big section on "experiences", but I'm going to give that its own post because it's a WHOLE topic on its own. Hopefully today! But Ima skip ahead a bit, to p. 177:
A fourth indication of the staged character of discussion meetings is provided by the fact that planning meetings are held at both the district and chapter level for the purpose of discussing how to improve discussion meetings and make them more successful. Although rank-and-file members (those who have not attained that status of a junior or senior leader) are not normally invited to these planning meetings, I was able to attend several of them at the invitation of both my district chief and a junior leader who was one of my key informants.
SKULLDUGGERY!! 💀
It was during these planning meetings that I became deeply sensitized to the highly orchestrated and dramaturgical character of not only the discussion meetings but of NSA's overall operation.
At this point it's important to remember that "dramaturgical" means "relating to the art or the theory of writing and putting on plays, especially for the theater" - it's all putting on a show to manipulate the unwitting guests in order to trick them into transforming into new recruits. It's ALL fake - just a façade to fool the uninformed.
A fifth consideration suggesting that staged character of discussion meetings is the fact that much of what members do and say, both verbally and nonverbally, during the course of a meeting is to appear natural and spontaneous rather than artificial and contrived.
They try. Unconvincingly.
In other words, these meetings are not to appear as staged performances or as the product of dramaturgical cooperation. This concern is evidenced by the emphasis placed on exuding sincerity and responding to calls from the emcee and to what the leader says and does with alacrity and enthusiasm. It is also suggested by some of the rituals engaged in by the emcee, as when he scans the gathering after he has called for an experience so as to foster the impression that whom he calls is a spontaneous decision rather than one that has been pre-arranged, as indicated by the fact that those called on are already listed on his meeting agenda and by the fact that members frequently know beforehand whether they will be giving an experience.
This fakery apparently was dropped decades ago; in current SGI (non)discussion meetings, not only is the person acknowledged by name as delivering/"sharing" an "experience", but the person often has it written out on a piece of paper they semi-read off.

But none of this is evident to the guest.

Rather, what transpires - who gives the explanation, who gives testimonies, and so on - is staged in such a way that it all appears as if it is spontaneous and independent of prior planning, negotiation, and decision-making among the members. As a consequence, it seems reasonable to suggest that NSA in general and the district members in particular have something of the character of a secret society.
Only without any special perks or sexiness.
This is not particularly surprising, however, when considering the nature of theatrical-like teamwork. As Erving Goffman noted in his seminal discussion of this kind of work:
... if a performance is to be effective it will be likely that the extent of cooperation that makes this possible will be concealed and kept secret... The audience may appreciate, of course, that all members of the team are held together by a bond that no member of the audience shares ... But (the members of the team) form a secret society ... insofar as a secret is kept as to how they are cooperating together to maintain a particular definition of the situation.
This will all be very familiar to the people trying to recruit new suckers into MLM schemes/scams, too.
The sixth and final consideration suggesting the appropriateness of viewing these meetings from a dramaturgical perspective is the fact that they do not "go on" unless there is an audience, that is unless guests are in attendance.
Before Ikeda was excommunicated by Nichiren Shoshu and transformed the SGI into his own personal worship society, there was a certain "rhythm" to the year. February and August were "Shakubuku Months", and there was an "introductory meeting" scheduled every week. If it came to meeting start time and there was no "guest", the meeting was halted and everybody was sent out to try and find something with a pulse to drag in, at which point the meeting would proceed:
When I first discovered this I was somewhat startled, for I had assumed that these meetings were conducted in their entirety regardless of the presence or absence of a new face. But as I learned one evening, this is not the case. Following the chanting session on this particular evening, the leader emphasized that since these meetings were for guests and none were present, we would have to go out and round up one or two. So the members in attendance were divided into Shakubuku teams and sent out in search of prospects. Although three of the four teams returned empty-handed, one had managed to corral a single guest. But one is all that is needed; and so the formal meeting began as usual.
For "formal meeting" read "sales pitch". By the late-1980s, perhaps earlier, instead of being every discussion meeting, this format was restricted to the "introductory meetings" during the Shakubuku Months. However, he's describing something that happened every single time. No meeting unless a "guest" was present.
During my tenure as a member I saw this particular scenario re-enacted on four different occasions, and on one occasion we were sent back into the streets three times in succession. Around 8:30 p.m., after the third try and with one guest in hand, the show finally got on the road.
The author describes himself as "an active participant observer for nearly a year and a half".
Perhaps even more illustrative of the theatrical character of these meetings and the fact that they are staged for guests is the following course of events that transpired one evening during a meeting I attended:
Although no guests were present when the chanting began, a young couple came in toward the end of the chanting session and situated themselves on the floor at the back of the room. But apparently the emcee didn't notice them; for upon completion of the chanting session he didn't jump up and yell out: 'Welcome to a vigorous and happy meeting of the [name here] District of NSA!' But the district leader, who had apparently seen this couple come in, punched the emcee in the ribs and whispered that some guests were present. And so this member immediately assumed his role of the emcee and proceeded as usual by springing to his feet, putting on a big smile, and blurting out, 'Welcome to a vigorous and happy meeting of the [name here] District of NSA!'
"Vigorous and happy" 🤣
In light of the foregoing considerations and observations, there seems to be little question about the appropriateness of conceptualizing NSA discussion meetings as "shows" or presentations staged by the members, who constitute a performance team, before an audience composed of recruits or "guests".
This was what was going on BEFORE Dickeda swanned into the US in 1990 and "changed our direction" - because of what Sensei did, the bottom fell out of the discussion meetings. Instead of weekly meetings, Dickeata dictated that these meetings would only happen monthly from now on - and of COURSE Die-Sucky Scamsei's word is LAW in his own cult of personality, where the membership follows a PERSON instead of any "law". Post-excommunication, at the (non)discussion meetings I attended, there was at least one guest every single time, but they never came back. The ONLY person I saw join post-excommunication was a formerly homeless woman with two small children who had moved in with an SGI member (who had unethically selected her at the abused-women's shelter she was living at, where he volunteered computer classes for the residents). She was able to see it didn't work; she ended up quitting.
Now what SGI-USA is left with is an ever-shrinking membership of mostly Baby-Boom generation and older individuals who mostly joined during the time period described in this study. SGI has completely lost what vitality it once had; now it's simply waiting around for the grave - and oblivion.
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2024.05.12 18:49 vmtz2001 Whether to take or not to take meds

A good friend asked me this and this was my response.
(Btw I know what a run-on sentence is, so spare me. I was a journalist. I am writing informally)
“Always consult with a professional. Don’t ever play around with dosages!!! Absolutely talk to your doctor to see if you can be taking your med as needed or if you need to follow a consistent regimen, but If you haven’t been taking it regularly in a while WITH YOUR DOCTOR’S BLESSING and you have been fine before this latest episode, it would be best not to fall back into any kind of avoidance behavior if you can pull it off. Otherwise, you trigger that old unconscious habit of giving it validity in your mind as a threat or concern and you will undo the recovery you’ve accomplished. Whenever you can’t pull off dismissing it …and sometime you just can’t….that latest experience where you felt you had to take a preventive measure is like a recording in your brain that will play back the same feelings and sensations the next time you are in a similar situation . The act of avoidance creates a trigger, in other words. I don’t need to remind you that the trick when you get symptoms is to dismiss them to the best of your ability and leave them in the background, fully expecting you will soon recover. Meds can be very useful toward that end if you do this with the idea that the problem is more with your own thinking and that your body is acting accordingly, rather than this being a legitimate medical condition” [this doesn’t apply to everyone, I know, I know].
“They say to stay in the present. In my experience, that only applies to not projecting into the future what you fear might go wrong, but it worked for me if I projected into the future an expected a positive outcome….just as long as I didn’t overthink it and quickly put it aside . You needed those few victories as confidence builders and you have them to fall back on. You are saying ‘I’m familiar with this uncomfortable sensation, I don’t like it, but I can tolerate it. I know how it all turns out and that I will be okay’. You are saying ‘yes this bugs me, but I have this other program in my brain, this previous positive outcome, to counteract this trigger. I’m going to dismiss this even though my brain keeps snapping back to it and creating symptoms”
. But if you are in really dire circumstances where you will need to function, or your body has become used to it, what else can you do but take the pill ? Maybe take it for now until your doctor tells you to taper it off with the idea that you will take a different approach later. Just know that it’s going to take a while to get back to normal once you fall back into that old pattern. Expect and accept the symptoms. It’s your general attitude that matters most, and not so much how you reacted when it happened. Be kind and patient with yourself. You are good at this. You’ve done it before.”
submitted by vmtz2001 to Anxiety [link] [comments]


2024.05.12 03:06 StuckinLoserville Daughter-in-Law or Mistress?

While opposites attract each other, they say, like captivates like, and the sprawling messy lives of Ayonna and Jamahl are like a streaming overflowing creek bed with water bouncing off, regrouping, changing course and flowing over the stony landscapes of their lives filled with haphazard children, arrests and family members who've seen and heard so much by now they can now only mutely stand by and nod to each other. Is it genetic? Ayonna's brother, Jaleel, did 4 years himself, and as he drives her to meet her-mother-in-law to be she hopes, Christine, and her daughters, one day before her sentencing, there is already a knotty history with how they first met. "They're about to put the steak on the grill," laughs Ayonna nervously to Jamahl on the phone, but he erases any nerves by mentioning that he really wants to wait 2 years before getting married. News to Ayonna who doesn't have much time to answer as they approach the park and, Christine, a poor man's Whoopie Goldberg, smiles revealing checkerboard teeth that have shamelessly adopted the stand-your-ground defense. Christine and her daughters know their Jamahl who suffers from a major case of the Herschel Squirts having fathered 6 children with 4 different mothers with whom he presumably co-parents. His first marriage, like Ayonna's arrest, wasn't his fault; it was Islam's fault that not only made him get married - for only 6 months, but forbid him to date, and this is all too piddlingly insignificant to mention even though he's "an open book." "You have nothing to worry about; don't be tripping," he soothes placatingly - like The Killer who promises his Victim he will let her go and when he aims, she cries, "You lied! You promised me mercy." "And you shall have it," he responds as he shoots her in the head quickly ending it - for him that is mercy.
Rick is that kind of guy who attends his high school reunions. All of them. But this 40th, this time, he will be sober and act responsibly and even remember it. Still, Samantha is concerned that Rick isn't a human walking billboard advertising their engagement so these lonely single women and di​vor​cées who always show up drinking too much and talking too loud looking for a second and third chance for love won't bedazzle him away from her. She likes marriage so much she's tried it a couple of times and she'd be happy to try it again even before she's released. He, on the other hand, doesn't want to upstage the event with any announcement, but she wants to plant her flag like Cook or Peary discovering the North Pole. Well, Rick is no professional hitman like John Cusack in "Grosse Point Blank, but he is grappling with a mid-life crisis, slightly torn between his present and past as Sandy, a forward-looking blonde, and Carol, "C.D.," a younger version of "90 Day Fiancé's" Claire, Sophie's hyperbolic mother, who fondly remembers a past hookup in the Westwood parking lot, swarm over him like bees to honey. C.D. has loved Rick since 7th grade and has completely missed the irony that his recent sobriety has tempered his phone calls to her. Of course, Sammy, who "don't trust them bitches" calls Rick while her high school buddy, Sandy, is standing nearby, and who has enough aplomb to not bat an eyelash and offer her congratulations as she then flits like a butterfly to disperse the news to the other attendees. Rick who loves Sammy, a multiple DUI and possible resisting/obstructing an officer and disorderly conduct offender, and his confidence builder, is contemplating his set pension and the fluid amount of cash required to move out-of-state to meet Sammy's non-negotiable demand to be with her children where he will default serve as a live-in stepfather and grandfather. And that's only the beginning.
It's 3 weeks until True's release and Shonta receives all her filtered photos (looking at you Mo'nique) back from prison. The explanation the prison spokesperson gives her is that explicit photos/nudity or contraband will be rejected as well as when the prisoner is in solitary confinement. She unsurprisingly takes her daughter, Monae, into her confidence and Monae is unsurprised at her mother's desperate attempts to find love and to give her all without getting anything back. True acts clueless as to why the pictures were rejected and blames the eponymously named Two Braids - whose "females bad and they dimes" relaying his photos to True for just checking them out. Shonta believes him as much as Drake loves Lamar and Trump will stop being openly contemptuous of court, and as much as we believe that even though True prefers white females, he's physically attracted to Shonta. He says this crouched over a table, thumb moving ploddingly towards his mouth as a reassuring pacifier, eyeballs straining to heaven as he cannot say this lie full fronal and arms crossed defensively. And still she'll give him another chance.
Candice is rightfully behind bars for burglary because she is stealing Andrew's money as this poor schlub is driving to Vegas to furnish a decent apartment with the help of her friend and mothementor figure, Denise, who looks a little "Misery's" Annie Wilkes, with a seemingly innocent smile hiding a terrifying switch between fanatical devotion and violent aggression. She could out her friend, but she stays mum as Andrew enumerates his expenses: $1360 rent per month, 36 hours driving and a minimum of $1600 gas, 15K spent on eight 2-hour contact visits, unspecified amounts for furniture, whether bought or rented, and the incalculable countless hours of lonely nights which will propel him to propose immediately. It's there or a well-care center that might go unoccupied and gather dust and rental monies until the prison decides on a parole address. MC Hammer is sort of a case in point. At the peak of his success he earned a reported $33 million in 1991, but over-the-top spending on luxury cars, a record company, airplanes and a $30 million home that he built from the ground up, which eventually sold for less than $7 million, ate into his fortune, so he filed for bankruptcy continuing to owe the IRS thousands in back taxes for the next 20 years. Andrew isn't exactly a one-hit wonder nor has he earned any serious bank, but he is about to lose it all because as soon as Candice is released, she will grab what she can and then announce, “U Can’t Touch This.”
submitted by StuckinLoserville to loveafterlockup [link] [comments]


2024.05.11 17:29 Lifetime88888 How to compare if both sentences have the same words using CountIf formula

I'm trying to create an excel worksheet for quality purposes. The idea is to ensure that the words are within the standard statement. However, I'm having a trouble with broken lines.
For example: Standard statement is "The greater good"
CountIf formula =CountIf(C3, "the greater good")
Problem encountered: Sometimes there's a broken line. Example
The (entered) Greater good
Since it is not in the same sentence, the countif would appear as 0. However, I'm trying to have it resulted to 1 since all of the words exists.
What can I improve?
edited refer to picture in the comment box
Edited edited** already sorted by the suggestion regarding the break line. Thank you everyone for your suggestions and recommendations! I appreciate you all ❤️
submitted by Lifetime88888 to excel [link] [comments]


2024.05.11 17:17 SensitiveBugGirl Why do some teachers not use the curriculum?

Hi, I've been thinking about this question and would like some outside opinions because I feel like I have to be missing something. I also don't want to ask a bunch of coworkers and come off as dissing the teacher.
I'm a teacher aide in two second grade classrooms in a Choice private school. I did go to school to be a teacher. I completed everything except one 10 week student teaching (but I made up the credits and graduated). I've worked at those school for about 3.5 years. 1.5 were spent with K4. This is my second year in 2nd grade.
Backstory: My one teacher is chronically absent. She is being forced to retire after this school year. Her back and legs are causing hee so much pain she can't come to school and work. I've been the only constant presence for these kids these last 6 months. My teacher has only been a full time teacher her for about 7 years. She subbed for a lot of her life. I end up teaching a lot, although it's been awesome having subs on most days as of late. I take care of most of the stuff in the classroom and come in early and stay late to try to make sure everything is as it should be.
She basically doesn't use the school's science or English curriculum. We have a new math curriculum (we used to use Saxon until we couldn't get any more physical books. Now we have Math Expressions), but she doesn't teach it as intended. She doesn't use a lot of the materials that came with it.
For English, our school uses Shirely which is what I grew up with. The student books are still in storage. The student workbook are in their desks, unused. They have only used the sentence books, but she doesn't teach it the Shirely way. These kids will go on to 3rd grade... behind. She thinks they have to master each part of speech before doing sentences. It never occurred to her that we could go through them... as a class. I never even knew where the TE book was until like a week ago. I'm not even convinced she knows how to do it. She uses tons of superteacher worksheets and random ones she finds online. Sometimes the answer key isn't right. Some of the stuff is confusing. Instead of using the Shirely songs and videos, she picks random stuff from on YouTube.
For science, she doesn't use the book. She prints off all these black and white packets that the kids frequently lose. Lots of repetitive questions. Everything is writing stuff out that frankly feels like wastes of time sometimes because by the time everyone has the answers down, a chunk of the kids are now talking, making noises, and distracting each other. Sometimes I don't even know what the question is asking either. Sometimes the answer isn't actually in the text (and it's not an opinion or inference question).
I've talked a little with one of subs (who taught in the upper grades for many years at the school), and she clearly thinks that not using the English curriculm is wrong. On the days she's there, it's like she makes it her mission to teach how they should be taught.
Math is now being taught by the other 2nd grade teacher. We are units behind with only a couple weeks left and won't be able to finish the book. There were too many days spent not doing lessons or using materials not from the curriculum (which they didn't master. They are still very much struggling).
I just don't understand. How do you not know where you NEED to be if at all possible? If you are picking random topics for science, how do you know you are meeting standards? All of this goes against everything I was taught in college. If the kids were thriving, I wouldn't be worried. They aren't though.
And FWIW, the other teacher doesn't use the curriculum for social studies either, and I can't say I understand. That retired teacher sub doesn't even agree with some of the stuff in these worksheets (like money being an example of scarcity).
I very much try to give people the benefit of the doubt. I naturally believe they know better than me, so I hate saying anything. Am I missing something or is/was my teacher just not great at teaching? She feels like the kind of teachers I grew up with in the 90s and early 00s, although my teachers were better I think. I understand supplementing with materials every once in a while... or if the book is missing a lot of stuff. But never using the curriculum and it's worksheets? Or using it only a quarter of the way so that it appears to confuse the kids so it must not work? To be clear, I've never heard them talk about the curriculum being awful or old or anything.
I'll say this because I feel like someone may ask, we don't have anyone in charge of curriculum or looking over lesson plans. They submit their block plans to the drive I think, but I'm pretty sure they aren't looked at.
submitted by SensitiveBugGirl to Teachers [link] [comments]


2024.05.11 15:20 poopshoes53 Just screw everything, honestly. Daughter rejected for tutoring because of anxiety diagnosis.

I hope this isn't a dumb question - I am the parent of a fourth grade girl who was diagnosed with dyslexia recently and this is all pretty new to me. I hope I'm missing something, actually, because I'm confused and pissed and sad.
This ended up being longer than my single question - I guess I am actually really pissed off and sad about the last nine months in general, and I am completely open to any feedback, advice, or ideas about what to do now and how to help my kid. This is the first time I wrote all of this down and the irony of writing a novel on a dyslexia subreddit is not lost on me.
I'm leaving it lol.
Cora has always been brilliant and weird and loud, but over the last few years, it became apparent that she was having a harder time....stopping. Stopping talking, stopping moving, stopping yelling - it was just endless and exhausting for everyone around her. (Except at school. She is and was perfectly behaved at school - she has literally never gotten so much as a note home about goofing off in class.) Cora hit a wall in third grade - the hyperactivity was finally wearing her out, too, and annoying her friends. She finally asked for some help slowing down.
She was tested for ADHD and the general host of common mental health conditions last fall, and to no one's surprise, was diagnosed with ADHD-combined type, as well as anxiety symptoms that the psychologist described as significant enough to warrant a GAD diagnosis…but that she strongly suspected were a perfectly rational reaction to the very real problems Cora’s impulsiveness caused in her life.
This was exactly my experience as someone diagnosed with ADHD as an adult. It turns out that the consequences of constantly losing my car keys, forgetting appointments, and impulsively spending money I didn’t have were making me anxious and stressed, not the other way around. I had expected similar results for Cora and I was glad this was happening now - she could skip the years of totally ineffective treatment and misdiagnoses that I went through before being diagnosed and successfully treated.
What we were not expecting at all was the additional diagnosis of "specific learning disorder with reading impairment" noted in the report. I had no idea what this meant. The psychologist did not use the word "dyslexia" in her written evaluation, a decision which resulted in another 8 months of confusion and (probably unnecessary) testing detailed below. She explained to us that Cora could have dyslexia, but that her testing wasn't granular enough to be sure - that there was a chance it was "something else" and the SLD diagnosis was an umbrella term that covered both dyslexia and conditions unknown. (I have no idea what she was referring to and the general weirdness about using the word dyslexia was something I noticed with the school, too. I am still confused by this and other interactions where I get the distinct feeling people aren’t telling me something important.)
It was almost September, so the psychologist recommended pursuing testing with the school; this seemed to be a reasonable next step. They would test Cora and determine exactly what was going on, if anything. This whole part of the report was very much characterized as an incidental finding - something to follow up on, but nothing alarming given Cora’s history of good grades.
"Maybe she was just tired after a long day of testing,” the doctor explained. “But it also seemed like she wasn't hearing certain letters correctly." Years of speech therapy had helped Cora correct all but a few minor issues - but combined with this potential reading issue, maybe an audiologist should test her again. Get her hearing tested, start medication for ADHD, and see what the school says about her reading - that was the plan, no big deal.
I wasn't worried, but I figured it couldn't hurt to see what other help was available. I learned that we have a branch of a big tutoring nonprofit in our city that offers Orton-Gillingham instruction at no charge - something I soon realized would cost hundreds of dollars per month at other centers. Free is good! I submitted Cora's application and the report from the psychologist (with the ADHD/GAD/SLD all clearly noted)….and we got a rejection letter a week later in the mail. Cora didn't qualify because the tutoring was specific to dyslexia, and the SLD with reading impairment was not the same as a formal dyslexia diagnosis. Fair enough, I thought - I figured we'd get the testing done through her school and could reapply if the result was a dyslexia diagnosis.
That....was naïve, lol. But the psychologist made it sound like a total non-issue, something schools did all the time. I sent the school psychologist and teachers the report before school even started, since surely they would want to schedule all of this right away! I didn’t hear anything for a few weeks – the start of the school year must be such a busy time, after all – but raised it again, report in hand, at a meeting with Cora’s teacher in late September.
“You….really want to try to avoid putting a label on things too quickly,” she told me, in a tone that implied there was much more that she was not saying. “She seems to be doing quite well in class. Let’s see how she does on the standardized tests we’re finishing this week and go from there.” I was definitely aware that I was missing something, but it seemed reasonable to wait for Cora’s test results if they would help inform next steps. Cora scored well above average, as usual; shortly after receiving these scores, the school psychologist emailed me to let me know that no further testing was warranted.
I still felt like I was missing something – spoiler alert, I was – but there didn’t seem to be anything else left to do. They're the experts and were totally unconcerned – only positive news - and Cora’s new ADHD meds seemed to be really helping. After that, everything did seem to be okay at school for a while. Cora liked her teachers and was doing well.
Everything was copacetic…except for the fact that Cora’s anxiety seemed to be getting worse without any tangible explanation. She complained about fourth grade being a lot harder, but again – her grades were fine, she was perfectly behaved, she liked her teachers….it was difficult to identify any problem that needed solving. Soon, Cora started getting home and isolating herself in her room for over an hour every day. She seemed stressed. Worn out. This went on for months.
And then she had her first panic attack on a Sunday night, seemingly out of nowhere. She wanted a mental health day Monday and was back in school Tuesday, seemingly her normal self.
The next Sunday, she had another panic attack, and this one was much, much worse. She lost control of her bladder. I was close to taking her to the ER. It was scary. That's when it all came out. She was DREADING school - her two hours of ELA in the mornings had become “torture.” She was white-knuckling it through the reading, writing, and spelling work, totally clueless as to why it seemed so much harder for her than for other kids, but so determined to get good grades that she had just burned. the. fuck. OUT.
She was home for days after this. The school tried to dismiss my concerns at first - it couldn't have been that bad, I was told. To be fair, my concerns were vague because I still didn’t understand the real issues or how to help Cora, either. Cora was clearly unwell and adamantly refused to return to school. I started putting everything in formal, written letters emailed to all of her teachers, the school psychologist, and everyone else who seemed potentially relevant. I told them I wasn't sending her back until they did something to try to figure out what was going on in ELA.
That was mid-February. We had a meeting before I would agree to send Cora back, where they talked about putting together the "interdisciplinary team" to conduct "extensive classroom observation.” They insisted that this process would take at least 60 days to complete. Cora reports that there have been three days where someone has essentially come to her ELA class and stared at her while she works.
We weren’t just waiting for the school, though. After the psych eval last summer, we had been slowly working through additional evaluations and appointments related to Cora’s hearing, speech, and language abilities. Basically, we were working our way from Cora's ears into different regions of her brain, trying to catch problems along the path that sound waves traveled - entering Cora's head as vibrations in her ear canals, winding into her brain as phenomes, assembling into a stream of recognizable words, converting into meaning in entirely different areas of her brain, and eventually emerging again via her speech. I had no idea so many tiny things could go wrong in that process, but they can - and we can get pretty damn granular in order to figure that shit out when there’s a potential problem. Cora had some weird results here and there - we now know that overlapping speech is basically her Kryptonite, which explains a lot of meltdowns at family gatherings over the years. But on the whole, her ears and her brain are doing fine, and she doesn't have autism, either.
We had been lucky to get hooked up with the best child development team in the area - they were wonderful, and the process of more testing and visits seemed to reassure Cora (and us, honestly) that there was more help on the horizon, more answers soon. She started low-dose Zoloft for the anxiety and seemed a little happier; her anxiety about school was starting to morph into resignation and frustration, which actually seemed healthier in a way. "It takes time," they tell us. Her breakdown was in February. They wanted to see the report from the most recent evaluations. Fair enough; although it is not lost on me that I am paying an outside team to do the school's job, at least it's getting done.
Two weeks ago, we finally got the team's report - and the written words, "developmental dyslexia." The lead psychologist is going to meet with the 504 team at her school - he is wonderful and immediately understood so many of Cora's concerns and needs. I'm not exactly optimistic, but it's at least possible that this may result in accommodations/extra help in school. Cora thinks he walks on water and is so excited that he's going to "stand up for" her.
The report is detailed and confirmed a lot of what we suspected. She's a really bright kid - IQ around 120 with sky high mathematics and nonverbal problem-solving scores. She apparently discussed "conundrums that are complex and abstract in nature" during her sessions, with a "recognition that there is not necessarily a solution" to these mysterious issues. (LMAO....this is my weird and wonderful kid.) The report describes Cora as "delightful" - funny, self aware, and highly motivated to learn.
Her reading comprehension score was in the 90th percentile, essay composition in the 70th - spelling scores came in at the 25th percentile, which was no surprise. Pseudoword decoding was poor - she's in the 14th percentile - and it got worse from there. Cora has an oral reading fluency in the 9th percentile, a basic reading score in the 7th percentile, and a word reading score in the 4th percentile.
In fact, the essay composition score was the only "average" score among dozens of measures of her reading, writing, and language abilities - comprehension was universally excellent and decoding was universally abysmal. It was hard to read. It felt like a gut punch - looking at the single-digit scores, I finally realized the insane degree of effort it must have taken to finish her work and look happy doing it.
The developmental psychologist leading the team told us that it was unusual to see that stark of a difference - that the severity of her impairments are usually associated with average comprehension scores at best. I have tried to wade through research about these instruments, but decided to take his word for it. Typically, the deficits in her basic reading skills would set off a chain reaction of lower scores down the line - but Cora had brought her grades and tests scores up from an already high start at the beginning of the year.
"It's no wonder her anxiety symptoms are increasing - she's completely exhausted," he said. "Imagine what she could achieve with the right kind of help."
I realized then why Cora's high scores and good grades, so impressive to everyone else, were such a source of consternation for her. That chain reaction was still happening, getting in the way of what she was actually capable of achieving. She knew it, even if the rest of us didn't - she could do better with the right kind of help.
I honestly feel sick thinking about it. She never told anyone she was struggling, never asked for help - not from us, not from anyone at school, heck not from her former-literacy-teacher grandma. No one had any idea. My husband and I had actually encouraged her to slow down a little in the weeks before her panic attacks, just out of a general sense that something was brewing despite her repeated insistence she was doing fine. Turn in the worksheet a day late, three sentences is plenty, relax. Unthinkable, Cora insisted, she was fine.
So she's back at school, nothing has changed other than the glacially slow 504 process of "observation" occurring in the background sometimes, but she seems to be a bit less stressed. I can't tell if getting pissed off about the situation is helping her deal with it, if the Zoloft is taking the edge off, or if she's just masking harder now. Maybe all three. 18 more days of school and Cora is counting. them. down. Her teachers and support staff seem generally bewildered by the idea she is or was ever struggling. They were caught totally off guard when I abruptly pulled her out of school until we at least got them to commit to the 504 process – but we had been blindsided too. They saw a happy kid who was thriving academically until her parents pulled her out of school and started a process that no one seems particularly committed to finishing. Sometimes I think they don't believe us at all. Maybe I would feel the same way in their shoes, I don’t know. I think they’ll listen to the doctor.
The entire point of this post, though, was to ask about Cora’s second rejection from the local tutoring program. With summer approaching and the diagnosis of dyslexia (versus maybe-dyslexia, maybe-whatever-else-could-be-included-under-the-SLD-“umbrella”, which I am still unsure is even a thing), I've been looking into all sorts of options for tutoring. Summer is a good opportunity to try to start getting Cora some meaningful help without adding yet another thing to her plate. She's excited. We can build some tools before next year - if we know what works for her, we can be better advocates from Day 1.
So I resubmitted Cora's application - I still had my original email and I just attached the shiny new report to that, explaining where to find the magic D word that I fully expected would finally open a door where Cora could get the right kind of help. This new report was more granular with reading testing, but the dyslexia diagnosis was the one really substantive change. It included Cora's ADHD and anxiety diagnoses, as did the report I submitted with our initial application, but with new information about medication and treatment for these issues - progress!
(I would like to point out at this point that ADHD and anxiety are firmly established as two of the most common comorbid diagnoses for kids with dyslexia, and that anxiety symptoms in particular can occur because of the challenges caused by dyslexia. My daughter had full-blown panic attacks at 10 years old largely because she struggles to FUCKING READ and no one was helping her. I know I am preaching to what little choir is likely left at this point in my novel. But especially as someone who was medicated/treated for depression and anxiety for 20 years before anyone agreed to test for, diagnose, and treat the ADHD symptoms that were causing me to regularly fuck up my life in really depressing and stressful ways…..this chicken and egg shit really hits a nerve.)
Anyhoo, it had taken 8 months and a lot of work, but I had finally done this one cool thing for her - Cora was going to get the right kind of help. The school year is almost over, but at least we had this one success. The obstacle that I’m still not sure was warranted in the first place – the lack of the word dyslexia in the initial evaluation – had been checked off what was now a giant list of obstacles in Cora's path.
And thanks to the generosity of people who had probably heard and experienced a lot of similar, frustrating stories, our family could focus on paying off the bills accumulated in the process of getting to this point instead of adding more to the pile. Free is always good, but sometimes free is a godsend.
Twelve hours later, Cora was denied again, this time via a brief email simply noting the GAD diagnosis in both reports. "Our tutors are not trained to work with children who are diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorders" and they "cannot meet her needs."
That was it. No further explanation. Just…fuck your anxious baby girl who is trying so hard and fuck you for trying. NEXT!
Oh, and P.S., fuck the really significant percentage of kids with dyslexia with comorbid anxiety diagnoses who are incredibly well researched and described in just…all of the fucking literature. Just all of it, honestly, for decades. Fuck those kids too.
People seem to treat the word "dyslexia" like it's the only thing that matters sometimes but also not something that should be ever said in other contexts, AND I'm pretty fucking sure that "SLD with reading impairment" is essentially equivalent to the word dyslexia because no one can explain what else might be under that "umbrella," and apparently it's nigh impossible to get meaningful help for my daughter through the public school systems anywhere in America, and giant nonprofits care about kids with dyslexia so much, but not the anxious ones, better lock the doors before those crybabies get their needs all over our tutoring center!
We will figure out how to pay for help for Cora, that’s a given.
But honest to fucking god, have you guys just been putting up with this shit the whole time? I'm so sorry.
submitted by poopshoes53 to Dyslexia [link] [comments]


2024.05.11 01:04 Equivalent_Bar2267 TTMIK - Level 4 Summary

I just finished Level 4 of the TTMIK paid course and have been reflecting. The first half of level 4 was the most difficult yet. I was beginning to feel like perhaps the curriculum was rushed, but then about half-way through, things fell into place and I experienced a bit of a turning point and the grammar rules started to really make sense. I can't really put it into words other than sentences just began to sound "correct". I really appreciate the word builder lessons. You know how when you learn a new word, you suddenly start hearing it everywhere? Well, with the world builder lessons, you suddenly start hearing many words and while you might not know exactly what they mean, you have some context that is really helpful in deciphering what you hear. I also had subscribed to TTMIK stories prior to level 4 and it was a slog. I started over a few days ago and now it is at the right level. While your mileage may vary, for me, level 4 is a good place to begin this additional piece. I also incorporated Glossika into my studies during level 4. I think this was a good time to add in Glossika too, because I was already familiar with basic vocabulary and sentence structure. Glossika is really helping with reading as well, which is an unforeseen benefit. One other helpful material at this level has been the Billy Go conversation series (highly recommend). I also just ordered the Yosei Korean level 1-1 textbook and I'm going to start working on that as I launch into level 5. Just keep swimming!
submitted by Equivalent_Bar2267 to Korean [link] [comments]


2024.05.10 17:43 ou812_420 When do you start seeing losses?

I'm definitely not a great Magic player or deck builder, but I feel like I'm getting better at both. However, despite this, I'm still losing a LOT. In fact, I don't feel like I'm making any win progress. I can get through bronze rank okay, but when I hit silver, I feel like I'm at a 20% or worse.
The weird thing is my earlier decks seemed like they were getting me more wins even though my latest ones have so much more synergy.
To make things even stranger, when I go back to my old decks, they lose just as bad.
Is this an MMR issue? I don't feel like I get any easy opponents, but I get worked over fairly routinely.
The few wins I do get are hard won...
Anyone else feel the same? Are you guys winning a lot in the lower ranks? If so, when does your win rate start dropping?
Edit: Posted main decks
Format: Alchemy ranked
Deck 1: 3 Chrome Host Seedshark (MOM) 51. 3 Scoured Barrens (NEO) 274. 1 Assimilate Essence (MOM) 47. 3 Eyes of Gitaxias (MOM) 57. 1 Corruption of Towashi (MOM) 53. 2 Phyrexian Awakening (MOM) 30. 4 Dismal Backwater (MOM) 269. 1 Essence of Orthodoxy (MOM) 323. 4 Norn's Inquisitor (MOM) 29. 1 Infected Defector (MOM) 18. 1 Progenitor Exarch (MOM) 32. 2 Sculpted Perfection (MOM) 253. 4 Ichor Drinker (MOM) 111. 2 Ichor Synthesizer (ONE) 55. 1 Mercurial Spelldancer (ONE) 61. 1 Attentive Skywarden (MOM) 7. 2 Dramatic Accusation (MKM) 53. 1 Fortified Beachhead (BRO) 262. 4 Idyllic Beachfront (DMU) 249. 4 Forlorn Flats (OTJ) 258. 4 Loch Larent (Y24) 30. 4 Tranquil Cove (MOM) 275. 1 Sunlit Marsh (DMU) 257. 1 Undercity Sewers (MKM) 270. 2 Contaminated Aquifer (DMU) 245. 1 Banish from Edoras (LTR) 1. 1 Citizen's Arrest (DMU) 11. 1 Bloated Processor (MOM) 93.
Deck 2: 1 Lush Portico (MKM) 263. 4 Blossoming Sands (MOM) 268. 3 Radiant Grove (DMU) 253. 4 Jungle Hollow (MOM) 270. 2 Phyrexian Awakening (MOM) 30. 2 Bilious Skulldweller (ONE) 83. 1 Essence of Orthodoxy (MOM) 323. 2 Norn's Inquisitor (MOM) 29. 1 Infected Defector (MOM) 18. 1 Progenitor Exarch (MOM) 32. 2 Sculpted Perfection (MOM) 253. 2 Ichor Drinker (MOM) 111. 1 Attentive Skywarden (MOM) 7. 4 Scoured Barrens (NEO) 274. 4 Forlorn Flats (OTJ) 258. 4 Festering Gulch (OTJ) 257. 1 Basilica Shepherd (ONE) 4. 2 Blightbelly Rat (ONE) 85. 4 Blighted Burgeoning (MOM) 177. 1 Banish from Edoras (LTR) 1. 1 Citizen's Arrest (DMU) 11. 1 March Toward Perfection (Y23) 9. 2 Phyrexian Missionary (DMU) 27. 1 Grafted Butcher (MOM) 109. 1 Seedpod Caretaker (MOM) 325. 2 Bloated Processor (MOM) 93. 1 Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor (BRO) 95. 1 Deadly Derision (MOM) 99. 1 Pile On (MOM) 122. 1 Alabaster Host Intercessor (MOM) 3. 2 Haunted Mire (DMU) 248.
Deck 3: 3 Warden of Evos Isle (ANB) 38. 2 Meldweb Curator (ONE) 59. 1 Dramatic Accusation (MKM) 53. 1 Waterknot (ANB) 40. 2 Academy Wall (DMU) 41. 1 Chrome Host Seedshark (MOM) 51. 2 Patchplate Resolute (Y23) 28. 1 Neva, Stalked by Nightmares (WOE) 209. 1 Wrench (MKM) 37. 1 Windreader Sphinx (ANB) 41. 1 Vivisurgeon's Insight (ONE) 77. 2 Wall of Runes (ANB) 37. 1 Pacifism (ANB) 16. 3 Island (MKM) 280. 1 Loch Larent (Y24) 30. 1 Fortified Beachhead (BRO) 262. 4 Idyllic Beachfront (DMU) 249. 4 Tranquil Cove (MOM) 275. 4 Scoured Barrens (M21) 250. 1 Porcine Portent (Y24) 23. 2 Banish from Edoras (LTR) 1. 2 Phyrexian Missionary (DMU) 27. 1 Tactical Advantage (ANB) 22. 3 Plains (MKM) 278. 1 Coastal Bulwark (BRO) 76. 1 Weakstone's Subjugation (BRO) 72. 4 Dismal Backwater (MOM) 269. 3 Planar Disruption (ONE) 28. 1 Auspicious Arrival (MKM) 5. 1 Not on My Watch (MKM) 28. 1 Reprieve (LTR) 26. 1 Prison Sentence (BRO) 21. 1 No Witnesses (MKM) 27. 1 Slimy Dualleech (MKM) 104. 1 Sculpted Perfection (MOM) 253.
submitted by ou812_420 to MagicArena [link] [comments]


2024.05.10 16:24 cosmogoblin [F] How being an influencer turned into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse

This story was originally written July 2023.
You might have heard of me. I was a social media influencer for two years.
I know kids have “influencer” as one of their top professions these days, but for me it was all an accident, really. I uploaded a few YouTube videos back in 2019, in the summer I finished school. All I did was rant about movies. I had a few notes, not a full script, and just spouted off to my laptop camera about inaccurate science, bad casting choices, real nitpicky stuff. In about six months I’d got 200 subscribers.
I was at university then, and I mentioned my videos to some of my uni friends. They subbed and told their friends, and I got up to 1,000 sub by January 2020. My videos were only about ten minutes long, and I had nowhere near the views to monetise. I was making one a week, but not on any sort of schedule. It was just something I did when I was bored.
Then the pandemic hit. A lot of students here in England basically got locked into their halls of residence (that’s dorms for any Americans reading), but I was lucky enough to get back to my parents’ before then. So I was doing what my uni laughably called “remote learning”, which basically meant a couple of video lectures a week, some worksheets, and lots and lots of my own research. I won’t bore you with the topic of my course; it’s not relevant.
I’m not exactly stereotypically pretty. I’ve come to accept that. My hair is stringy, my nose is too big, my face is profoundly asymmetrical, my complexion is strange and acned, my teeth are crooked … You get the idea. You can only do so much with makeup and hair that covers your face. I probably have fewer friends than I would if I looked like other people, and it actually took a lot of courage to make that first video - and even more courage to upload it.
I can only assume that’s the reason I went viral. It certainly wasn’t the high production values, or the tightly-written scripts, or the quality of my research. On the 9th of April I had 1,322 subscribers. On the 10th it was over 8,000. By the end of April it was up to 300,000, and I had actually monetised my channel.
The comments were … well, they were varied. Lots of hate because of my looks, but lots of love from people who just appreciated what I put out there, calling out others for their negative comments. I know many social media stars struggle with unkind comments, but I’d got used to it. Let’s be honest, they weren’t nice, but neither were they untrue. And comments under your video are easier to ignore than comments in the street. I was making decent money after all. If you were one of those commenters, you know which side you were on, and I love you either way. Thanks for the engagement - it’s not easy to gain financially from your unusual appearance!
The trouble with going viral is that it doesn’t last. Competing in the fast-paced world of internet stardom takes a lot of effort. I started experimenting with other things - YouTube shorts, TikTok, Instagram, pretty much anything going. The format that turned out to work best was actually TikTok. I’d bought some skimpy outfits and did ridiculous little dances. I quickly reached over a thousand views per video, and while I wasn’t up to their creator tier, it still worked. A well-known cosmetics company asked to sponsor my videos.
Cosmetics! Me! I guess they were going for woke points or something. I didn’t care, they offered me more money than I knew what to do with, as long as my views stayed high. So I started making 2-minute videos. A dance without make-up, then I applied the make-up - being sure to show the brand name clear and up-close - and then the same dance with make-up. If this is ringing any bells with you, then yes - that was me. And no, stupid - that’s not my real name.
I’d got used to undesired attention of course. Along with the unpleasant comments, I got my fair share of unwelcome male approaches. For a few hours after any upload, about half of my DMs were from men, and some women (or men with female account names), asking to see more of me. I wasn’t a camgirl, though I suppose I wasn’t a million miles away from one; but I could have been. I did seriously consider it a few times, but never actually followed through.
And half of the rest of my DMs, and a good portion of the public comments, were from angry women. What made me think I had the right to show off like that? How could I bring their favourite cosmetics brand into disrepute? But I’ve got pretty thick skin (hey, I can make that joke, you can’t), and mostly laughed the comments off and ignored them.
That was, in hindsight, a mistake.
By September my uni was reopening for in-person teaching. I was working six or seven hours a day just to keep up with everything, and had a couple more brands sponsoring me. Being an influencer isn’t just about filming for ten minutes a day and watching the money come in!
So I was going to tutorials an hour a day, watching video lectures at 2x speed, and ignoring my assignments in favour of making videos and replying to messages. It’s not like my pointless degree was helping with my real job.
Okay fine. It was geology. Rocks and stuff. You happy now? I bet you can’t tell the difference between sylvite and carnallite just by licking it, can you?
Anyway, the point is I came close to being chucked out. Actually I had to repeat the second year. At least I could afford it.
So anyway, I somehow got through to the end of my second year, the end of my second year again, and part way through my third year. I was passing my exams - just - and through several reinventions I had managed to maintain my social influencer role. Last Autumn I was getting some good views, and cash, back on YouTube. I was getting pretty good at make-up (I had an exclusive deal with one company on TikTok, and another deal with a different cosmetics company on YouTube). The videos that did well then were me with experimental hairstyles and not much in the way of clothes, putting on makeup for a few minutes, then reading out-of-copyright fiction in my patented “YouTube voice”. If you can imagine a cross between Shania Twain and Marge Simpson then… well, then you’re weird, but you’ve pretty much got it.
Then, last December, a week or so before the Christmas holidays, I went out with my friends. I had made a decent number, both girls and guys, by then. I could never quite tell whether it was my personality (which I assure you is fantastic), my influencer status, or the cash I was liberal with (it always seemed to be my round, and I didn’t mind). There were even a couple of boys who were keen on me, though I hadn’t done anything about it yet. Eight of us went out together to celebrate a birthday. It wasn’t actually anybody’s birthday that day, but Shireen had a Christmas Day birthday, and she wanted a proper party.
Now I look quite different in real life than I do online. I think the technical term is “frumpy” - jeans, trainers, fluffy jumper and a hat, or maybe a hoodie. The birthday girl had somehow convinced me to put a bit more effort in, and had helped me pick out some heels and a knee-length silver dress. Make-up was easy for me of course, and so I got dressed up and off we went to the Black Swan.
The Black Swan has several great qualities about it. One: it’s cheap. Two: it does good food. Three: it’s a couple of hundred metres from The Bar. We had a decent meal, a few drinks, and around 9 we walked to The Bar.
To be more precise, they walked. I wobbled. If you’ve watched my videos you might have seen me in heels, but did you ever see me walk in them? Didn’t think so.
The Bar is open til 3 in the morning. It looks respectable enough from the outside, especially in the afternoon; but after about 11, when most pubs close, it fills up with students drinking expensive-looking drinks. And almost every night, somebody jumps up onto a table, and then everybody’s up there dancing. In The Bar, either you hold your drink tightly, or you lose it.
I’d done this before, and I can handle my alcohol. I’ve stayed at The Bar till chuckout more than a few times, and I’ve been wobbly on the way home, but I’ve never thrown up or passed out. And so I was surprised when I woke up. The last thing I remembered was Stu saying he was tired, and Shireen replying that it wasn’t even midnight yet. Now I was lying on the hard wooden floor of my living room.
My head pounded. Daylight streamed through the window, and I blinked a few times and rubbed my eyes. My hands were wet and sticky.
I looked at them. They were covered in blood.
I looked down. My heels were across the room, but I was still wearing my dress. It, also, was covered in blood, a huge stain across the chest.
Panic set in. What happened to me last night? I checked myself out and could find no injuries. Where did the blood come from?
Standing up, I realised it was worse than that. Red pools stained the wooden floor. I don’t know much medicine, but if somebody had lost this much blood, I couldn’t see how they could have survived.
I stood up, unsure whether my shaking was from the shock or the alcohol. This was when I saw a shirt on the floor behind me. White, with a subtle pattern. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that it wasn’t my shirt. I lived alone, and rarely invited people back to my flat. I looked around some more. A pair of men’s black leather shoes by the door. And then I saw it.
I suppose, rather, I should say him. He was naked except for a pair of dark blue jeans, slumped in the open doorway to the kitchen, covered in blood, and very, very, dead.
I panicked then. I’m calmer now, so let’s take a moment to describe my conclusions that morning. I had got very drunk. I had met a guy. We’d come back to my flat. We’d been getting naked (the shoes and shirt weren’t bloodied). Then, for some reason, we’d had an argument or a fight. The body had stab wounds in the chest, and a pool of blood had congealed onto the wooden floor of the living room and the linoleum of the kitchen where the man collapsed. How did those stab wounds get there? I didn’t know for sure, but a quick glance at my kitchen counter showed that my sharp carving knife was missing. It was all coming together. I didn’t know if he had picked up the knife, or if I had; I didn’t know why either of us would do that. I didn’t even know his name, and later when I checked his pockets, I couldn’t find any ID.
There was a lot I didn’t know. But I’m smart. So once I was done crying on the floor (I think it was about two hours), I came up with a plan. This man was dead, and I couldn’t do anything about that. But what would the consequences be? There’s no need for my life to be ruined as well. I decided not to call the police. People go missing mysteriously all the time, he can just be another statistic and I’ll get on with my life.
The blood on Dave was mostly dry by now. (Sure, I didn’t know his name, but every bloke’s called Dave, right?) So I put a badly-fitting vest on him to soak up the remaining blood, and his shirt over the top, along with his shoes. His jeans were bloody, but they were dark, so hopefully it wouldn’t show up in low light. I couldn’t find his coat, which was odd given how cold it was, but this would have to do. I put my dress and heels in a plastic bag, and grabbed a spade that I never used. Had I missed anything?
The knife. The fucking knife. I searched all over for it, but by the time it got dark I still hadn’t found it. I knew I couldn’t delay for long, so I figured it was best to deal with Dave now, and find the knife later.
Eight o’clock in the evening came. I’m lucky I have parking right outside my house, no street cameras, and a ground-floor flat. I put the bag in the boot of my car and came back for the body.
Have you ever tried to move a dead person? It’s not easy, and I’m not exactly strong. I put my arm around his waist and eventually managed to heave him almost upright. “Come on Dave, that’s it. We’re gonna get you home. Maybe calm down on the tequila next time right? Try to keep it in, and don’t you dare vomit in my car, you sexy bastard.”
Oh come on, what do you want from me? I’m an influencer, not a stand-up comedian. And anyway, I don’t think anybody saw me during the several minutes it took to drag Dave to the passenger seat. I really wish I’d got round to buying a bigger car than the Fiat Punto I’d had since I was 18, but it was too late for that now.
There’s a place about an hour’s drive from me called Epping Forest. The Heritage Trust reckon it’s most famous for its huge tracts of unspoiled wildlife, thousands of trees, and Iron Age settlements. But around here it’s best known as the place where murderers and gang members bury bodies. So off I trundled in my 1.2 litre pensioner-mobile. I arrived around 9:30, checked Google Maps, and drove offroad into the woods.
Do you know how long it takes to dig a grave? The answer is: a long time! By dawn I’d only managed a hole about two feet. Oh, and it was my third try, because the first two times I found too much rock. Well, it would have to do. In went Dave, and I shovelled the ground back over him. I thought I could put my clothes in with him, but it was a shallow grave, and when the inevitable dog-walker finds it I didn’t want them linked back to me. I mean, there’s my DNA in there for sure, but let’s not make it too easy for them, right? So I chucked the spade in a river, and the clothes went back home with me, including the vest I’d lent him.
Now in England we have a thing called ANPR everywhere. The police can just type in a car registration and see exactly where it’s been from traffic cameras. I needed an alibi. Why had I gone to Epping Forest? For a hike of course! So I walked around for a few hours, got breakfast at a pub, and told the staff about all the wacky adventures I’d had that night. And while I was there, for the first time in a good long time, I checked my phone.
Hundreds of messages, of course. But only one sent a shiver down my spine.
Jolly_Gal_56234
I KNOW WHAT YOU DID
My heart thumped. My ears started ringing. I felt dizzy, nearly passed out. How could anybody know?
Of course nobody knew. I actually got messages like this fairly often. Just some idiot trying to wind people up. They’d probably sent a dozen messages just like it, to random people, and I just blocked her. Still it rattled me. I finished my breakfast, paid up, walked back to my car, and drove home.
My flat was just as I left it. Dave was gone, but his blood was still there. I scrubbed the floor for hours, and it helped a bit, but you could still see the stains. Exhausted, I showered and went to bed.
The next morning I woke up. I hadn’t posted anything for a day and a half, so I needed to do something about that. Scrolling through my messages, one stood out like a police light.
Jolly_Gal_28473
YOU’VE BEEN A BAD GIRL 🔪
Shit. SHIT! What the fuck is going on? I stared at my phone, paralysed with indecision. When I finally snapped out of it I made sure the door was locked, and tried to come up with a plan.
I had no idea who was sending these. Maybe they didn’t really know anything. You send stupid messages like that to hundreds of people, you’re gonna come across one who’s actually done something bad, right? I poured myself a big glass of gin, decided that nobody could know anything, and made a video.
Remember that one where I didn’t speak at all, just danced for three minutes dressed like 90s Britney to 70s disco music, titled “HANGOVER DANCE”? Yeah, that’s the one. I didn’t trust myself to speak without breaking, but I could dance about as well as I ever could.
The rest of the day I answered messages, emailed my sponsors, and considered getting an agent. It’s still just me doing everything, and that Sunday afternoon, I really didn’t want to. I also spent a few hours scrubbing the wooden floor with baking soda and vinegar, and looking for the knife.
I kept getting messages from Jolly_Gal. It didn’t matter how much I blocked her, she just popped up again the next day with different numbers at the end of her username. Always all-caps, just a single sentence.
YOU DON’T DESERVE IT
YOU’LL GET WHAT’S COMING TO YOU
OWN UP
DELETE YOUR ACCOUNT
Exactly one message a day, but always at different times. I decided it was a bot, and it was just coincidence that it started when it did. Until Christmas Day.
I’d been back at my parents’ for a few days, and endured the usual conversations about what I was going to do for a “proper job” after uni. They’re great, and really supportive. They’ve just never understood what an “influencer” really is, and that “playing on my phone” for six hours a day counts as work. My brother Rich gets it, but the rest of my family is honestly baffled.
Anyway, Christmas morning comes. All four of us were in the house together (my brother’s 17 so he still lives there), and we gathered together in the living room opening presents. It was a couple of weeks since the incident, and I still had nightmares every night, and those sudden panic attacks - you know, when you’re sure you’re going to be found out - but I was getting used to it. It had happened, I couldn’t change it, and I’d have to keep it secret for the rest of my life; but it was becoming a sort of background hum. I don’t know if that’s too quick, but I suppose I’ve learned to handle difficulty in my life.
Until we finished opening presents and I checked my phone.
Jolly_Gal_814385
HAPPY CHRISTMAS
And underneath, a photo of my kitchen knife, stained with blood.
I ran out of the house in tears.
Rich found me, sitting on the wooden bridge down the road from the house, my legs dangling over the river. I came here a lot when I was a teenager, so it was the first place he looked. I’d left my phone on the living room floor, and the three of them had seen the message, so he knew what triggered me. He just didn’t know the full story.
Well, I told him. I mean, not everything, obviously. But I told him how this person had been harassing me for weeks. He listened sympathetically, like he’s always done, and asked if there was anything he could do to help. I didn’t say anything; I just turned around, hugged him, and cried into his Christmas sweater.
After about half an hour we went back to the house. Rich explained things to my parents, thank goodness. I don’t think I could have handled it.
The rest of the holiday was … okay, I guess. More messages from Jolly_Gal, but only text. I made videos most days, and met all two of my old schoolfriends for drinks, movies and shopping. They’re big fans of my channels. I even took Rich out for drinks one evening, though it took us four pubs to find somewhere that wouldn’t ID him. He’s a bit of a babyface.
I did all I could not to think about Dave. I put him to the back of my mind, letting him live in the shed at the bottom of the garden of my psyche where he couldn’t disturb me. I guess that’s why it came as a shock to me, when I packed my stuff into the boot of my car to head back to uni.
There was one suitcase I’d packed but hadn’t got round to taking into the house. And peeking around the edge was that plastic bag. I’d forgotten to get rid of it!
Dad was helping me load the car, so I couldn’t do anything about it. I tucked it out of sight, finished loading up, said goodbye, and drove back to uni. It was dark when I got back, so I unpacked everything else, triple-bagged my bloody clothes, left my phone at home (no tracking me!), and walked two miles to drop them into somebody else’s wheelie bin.
The next morning I checked my messages.
Jolly_Gal_12592
WELCOME HOME
And a photo of me dumping the bag the night before.
You know what? This didn’t bother me. I mean, it did bother me, but not as much as I guess Jolly_Gal hoped. I’ve been bullied and harassed most of my life, and I’ve got pretty good at ignoring it. Sure, it was an escalation - she was actually following me - but it was just one of almost thirty messages. Jolly_Gal was hoping to destroy me. Instead, she hardened my resolve.
Clearly she had enough evidence to go to the police, but she hadn’t. And obviously she lived nearby. Now I’m no hacker, but you don’t do a job like mine without learning your way around technology. So I started sleuthing. I hadn’t bothered blocking her after the third or fourth message, so I made a list of all the messages, including timecodes. I’ve got a geology degree (almost), and we have techniques to analyse rock strata. Finally I had a genuine use for all that studying I sort of did!
Jolly_Gal was not as clever as she thought. She’d got sloppy. About half of her messages were sent at strange hours, on the hour. These were presumably posted by her bot. But the other messages were all sent between 7 and 8 am, or between 6 and 10 pm. So I guessed that she has a normal 9-5 day job, or maybe she’s a student.
Next I searched all the social media sites I could think of for Jolly_Gal or JollyGal usernames. There are a few, so please don’t go harassing people with that username! I don’t want innocent people to get hurt. After a few hours I had profiles of all Jolly_Gals. Pictures, locations, partial travel history, even birthdays for some of them. I discounted those who clearly weren’t in England, but I still had too many to narrow it down. The photos had no EXIF data so I couldn’t tell the type of phone or camera they used.
So my days became something like this: Five hours doing uni stuff, five hours working on my socials, and an hour or two learning digital sleuthing. I still went out with my friends sometimes, but made sure not to drink too much. I know how to have a good time without being drunk!
The breakthrough came by total chance. I rarely read the local papers, and just got lucky one afternoon in March. I was waiting for a friend in the pub after lectures, and there was a copy of the Post somebody had left on a table. So I flicked through it. The local council was rubbish at doing traffic. Some group of OAPS was organising a May Day celebration. And a woman had been convicted of body-snatching.
I recognised her! There was a photo of a woman in her early twenties. She’d been arrested when a corpse went missing back in December, and they’d seen her take it on the morgue’s CCTV. She’d been released on bail. “Prevention of the lawful and decent burial of a dead body” is a rare crime these days, so she hadn’t been sentenced yet; instead she was released until her sentencing, expected to be in August. Her name was Jenny Smith, which is so common as to be almost useless - that is, if you don’t have a profile of her on your laptop at home!
The report also gave her address. So I started hatching a plan. I texted my friend that I wouldn’t make it, and went home.
Jolly_Gal, or rather, Jenny, lived near me, and actually went to the same university. She had accounts on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Twitter, and a few others. Of course you can’t get Jolly_Gal by itself these days, but my profile gave all her precise usernames. I spent my evening watching her videos and reading her tweets. And then I found the smoking gun.
Jenny had posted a video on TikTok last June bitching about me. She’s way prettier than me, and yet I’d got all the subs and follows. She deserved all those sponsorship deals. It wasn’t fair that I had hundreds of thousands of subs and she only had a few thousand. She even said I was ugly and deserved to die.
Well, she got one out of two right, I guess. You can decide which one.
It all started to slot into place. Jenny was absurdly jealous of me, so she’d hatched a plan to destroy me. She must have roofied me in The Bar, got me and Dave back to my place, stabbed him, poured blood everywhere, and taken the knife home. I mean, I don’t know anything about forensic science, and I was drugged and panicked when I woke up that morning. I’d have no way of knowing that Dave had died days before he ended up in my flat!
I’d never managed to get all the blood out of the wooden flooring, and ended up putting a really misplaced rug over it. I chiselled off a sample and gave it to one of my friends who was doing a PhD in biology. It took a bit of persuading, but he ran an analysis on it.
It was pig’s blood.
Fuck Jenny. She’s not Jenny, or Jolly_Gal, she’s fucking Carrie!
She planned to destroy me. She ruined my mental health, she framed me for murder. All because I was more popular on TikTok than she was. Well, two can play at that game. I didn’t deserve what Jenny did to me. She did.
I thought about this all night, coming up with plan after plan, weighing them in my head. I wanted two things: to destroy Jenny, and to feel good about it for myself. Finally I had a course of action I’m actually rather proud of.
I decided to start slow. I did something anybody could have done - I mocked up a poster. At the top was “Jenny Smith - body snatcher!”. Underneath were two pictures, her Insta profile pic and the courthouse photo from the paper, and between them: “From This … To This!” And all her various social media handles to top it off. I printed hundreds of these, and pinned them all around the university and her street.
I’ve never thought of myself as an unkind person - God knows I’ve suffered enough myself to be sympathetic to others. But I’m willing to admit I felt a lot of satisfaction seeing her comments fill up with accusations and links to the online article. Jenny carried on making videos, but I could tell she was suffering. Good!
That was stage one. I had to up the ante for stage two. Jenny had covered me and my flat with pig’s blood, so I think we all know what’s coming next.
I pondered for a long time whether I should do it in the day or the night. But you know what they say - go big or go home. I scoped out her house for a while, and found out that she leaves her kitchen window, at the back of the house, open. Now I’m not the most athletic girl in the world, but I can be pretty determined when I want to be. So one night around 2 am I walked to her house - it’s only about half a mile - and climbed through the window.
I almost gave myself a heart attack when I knocked a glass over on the kitchen sink! Luckily it didn’t smash. I hid in a corner and waited for a full half hour before I decided Jenny hadn’t heard me. Then I snuck upstairs, slow as anything, and crept into her room.
Actually, the first room wasn’t hers. She shared with a couple of other students. Thank fuck I checked first! The second room was the right one. She was asleep, alone, in a double bed. I was so quiet that the only thing I could hear was my heart pounding in my chest as I opened my canvas bag, gently deposited its contents onto the pillow next to her, and took a photo. It didn’t come out that well - I couldn’t use the flash - but hey, I have a souvenir!
I really wish I’d seen her face when she woke up the next morning, staring at a pig’s head. She didn’t post on her socials for a week after that, and for two days she even forgot to send me a threatening message.
I’m sorry? You think I’m done? Oh, my sweet summer child. I’ve barely begun.
Jenny had a boyfriend, Abdul. I made sure he wasn’t around when I broke in, but stage three involved him in a big way.
Abdul was also at our university, a year younger than me, a year older than Jenny. He wasn’t very active on social media, but he did tend to broadcast his activity on Twitter. And what do you know? He’s also a fan of The Bar. So I spent the next month planning my move. I bought a new clubbing dress and heels - hey, I kinda missed that outfit! - and asked around for the other thing I needed. Some things you can’t just buy in Next, or a local butcher’s, but eventually I managed it.
I got my chance one Friday in May. Abdul had loudly announced on Twitter that he was excited for his boys’ night out in The Bar, and Jenny had been gushing about a girls’ night on the whole other side of town. Perfect. I spent hours on my makeup, and got to The Bar around ten. Abdul and his mates were having a drinking contest, and leching up at the girls dancing on the tables.
I figured I had a good long while before he would be ready, so I had a couple of drinks - not too much, but like I said I can handle myself, and I knew Jenny wasn’t around - and got up on the tables myself for a bit. Then about midnight Abdul’s friend got another round in, while Abdul was in the loo. This was my chance. I walked up to their table - which had no dancing feet on it, but a heck of a lot of spilled beer - and started talking to them, saying I thought their friend was hot.
“Uh, what the fuck?” “Not a chance in hell.” “Get lost, freak!”
Lovely chaps. But they were too far gone to notice me dropping something into Abdul’s double-whiskey-and-coke. For all I know, it’s the exact same thing Jenny used on me all those months ago.
Abdul came back and downed his whiskey in one gulp. I was worried he was going to vomit it up, but he held it in and blamed his difficulty on the coke fizz. Yeah mate, sure, sure.
Not too long after, he started to fade. His friends were really taking the piss out of him for being such a lightweight. Well, when I came over, the pisstaking just got worse. I introduced myself (with a fake name, duh) and told him he was hot. Believe it or not, it was only about twenty seconds before he put his tongue down my throat. Wow, I’m not sure I even needed to bother with the roofie!
His friends, who had been so intent on being mean to me, now turned their attention to him. I suggested we ditch them and go back to his place (I’d checked, it was only five minutes’ walk sober) - and off we went.
That was the first time I had sex. I’m sure I don’t need to go into details, but we did a lot of stuff, and I enjoyed it. I’m not sure if that’s because it was good, or because he was good, or because I knew what it was all for. I was impressed that he managed to keep going as long as he did in his state, but I do feel a bit sorry for him; from his Twitter he seems like a decent guy.
When he finally fell asleep I left. I’d got what I came for - pictures. And the next day I made a new account and sent a DM to Jenny.
At first I blurred my face, or chose shots that didn’t include it. A bit of editing and I could have been anybody. I watched their messy breakup on Twitter, Jenny hurling accusations, Abdul protesting his innocence. I know this is the age of social media, but I never understood why people play these things out in public.
And then, after posting a picture a day for a few weeks (I’d taken a lot of pictures), I sent one that showed my face clearly.
Jenny had managed to restrain herself from replying before, but now she knew who I was. She was furious! The very idea that her boyfriend had cheated on her with ME, of all people, was unbelievable. And this was exactly the outcome I’d been going for.
Jolly_Gal was broken. She’d ruined her reputation. She’d lost her boyfriend. She had nightmares about pigs (okay, so I don’t know that for certain, but in my imagination she woke up screaming every night). She was possibly going to prison. And now she knew that not only was I more successful than her as an influencer, but I was the one to steal her lover. She still sent messages, at first angry, but they soon degenerated into pleading. “Please stop.” “I’m sorry.” “We can work this out.” Jolly_Gal without CAPS LOCK, it was glorious to see.
In fact it was almost perfect. Three stages of my plan were complete, and only one remained. Jenny’s sentencing was in three weeks, so I had to move quickly.
She had two flatmates, so I needed to work around them. They weren’t particularly active on Twitter, but Jenny was. I knew from her tweets that while her flatmates had gone home, she was staying on a couple of weeks after the end of term. She didn’t say why publicly, but it was for her trial. No flatmates, no boyfriend. Now was the time.
And that brings us up to date. I’ve typed this up over the last few days, and saved as a draft. The final chapter, hopefully, comes tonight.
*******
I’m at Jenny’s house, and I’ve just called the police.
I turned up at Jenny’s door just after seven. Luck was with me - she’d tweeted that she was expecting a Deliveroo takeout. And I got there first.
The idiot actually kept the knife. I’d seen it when I was in her room. When she answered the doorbell, expecting food, and saw me - ah, the look on her face was priceless.
“I’m so sorry! Please, let’s just talk. I didn’t mean it to get this -”
I stalked towards her, anger in my face. Jenny fled upstairs. Perfect! She went into her room and shut the door, but I was like the furies of Greek legend. I smashed the door in, and looked on as Jenny cowered on her bed.
In full daylight, I saw the knife took pride of place in what looked like a shrine. She had photos of me printed out, and she’d written on them “BITCH”, “WHORE”, “FREAK” and all sorts of other hateful words.
Jenny had tried to make me into a murderer, so I gave her what she wanted. I grabbed the knife and stood over her. The coward shrank into the bed, begging for forgiveness, pleading for her life. Unfortunately for her I was not inclined to oblige. I plunged the knife into her chest, just as she had done to Dave all those many months ago. Jenny whimpered like a whipped dog, and after the ninth stab (yes, I counted), she stopped.
The police are on their way. I’m definitely going to jail after this. But Jenny got what was coming to her. We could both have lived happily, but Jenny chose otherwise.
And me? I passed my degree. I have friends. And jail or not, I have a life.
Burn in hell, Jolly_Gal.
submitted by cosmogoblin to story [link] [comments]


2024.05.09 20:24 Significant-Donut555 Relationship anxiety

Hello all! This post may sound a little out there, as I have been struggling with some pretty bad postpartum anxiety about literally everything that I've been trying to work on! So forgive me for how this is about to sound. My best friend and I have been friends for 15 years, and her boyfriend and my boyfriend met and we're also great friends so we were all in a friend group. She got bored in her relationship and ended up cheating on him with his best friend and several other guys, including her good friends boyfriend too. A year later I got a random prank call from a kid singing cheating songs, of course I was paranoid about it so I told her about it and she was asking details of it. Mind you she's a body builder and was going to the gym at the time I told her. She said a few minutes later this exact sentence "My heart is pounding😂" I then asked her why, and she said it was because she drank a monster and hit a vape on the way to the gym (I don't actually know if she was on her way there but assuming she was as she works out everyday ) and then proceeded to call me to talk about the phone call I got. This may sound stupid but I got very anxious when she said that because I thought " is she nervous because something happened between her and my boyfriend?" (Mind you my boyfriend is a great guy and don't think he would ever do that. We've been together 4 years but still get anxiety over this situation.) then my thoughts were, well if something DID happen between them why would she say her heart was pounding to give herself away? Thinking that's not something she'd admit if it did happen. There was another time she sent me a video of her shaking because she drank so much caffeine. So I was assuming it probably was from the caffeine she drank but was an innocent coincidence she said that after I got the phone call. Without judgment, what is your alls opinions/thoughts on if this is sketchy or if it was innocent ? So I can get some closure to soothe my anxiety. Thank you for reading !
submitted by Significant-Donut555 to Anxietyhelp [link] [comments]


2024.05.09 20:04 xlxjack7xlx My GoT anthology series idea… The Real North

My GoT anthology series idea… The Real North
So I tried to post this earlier but I must’ve skipped a step but if it’s a duplicate please delete it. It I had this idea a while back and never really shared it:
I think a great idea for a spin off would be to have it revolve around the Night’s Watch, Wildlings and in general the greater stories involved with the real North.
The show could skip around each episode at different timelines and obviously the cast would change depending on the timeline and story being told from episode to episode. You could of course have episodes with recurring timelines and characters, but this keeps the show from having to have a ton of full-time actors on the books.
For instance… the following would be great ideas for single episodes:
-Jon having a dream sequence where he reunites with Ygritte in post GoT timeline…
-Hardhome tales at various timelines…
-Jorah selling poachers leading to the Old Bear joining…
-The adventures of Uncle Benjen…
-Raymar Royce’s decision and journey to the Wall…
-Three Eyed Raven visions…
-Moletown…
-What’s going on at the other strongholds and castles on the wall at different timelines…
-The formation of the Night’s Watch…
-Bran the Builder…
-Mance Rayder as a watchman and his defection…
-Skagos…
-Night King origin…
-Children of the Forest
-Tales of men committing crimes that get them sentenced to the wall
-Watchmen ranging and having run ins with Wildlings, Direwolves, Giant Spiders, Snarks and Grumpkins…
-Craster’s Keep…
-New recruits arriving…
-The travels of Yoren…
-Post GoT timeline visits by Tyrion so he can piss of the edge of the world sometimes…
-Sixskins…
-Tormund raises a family…
-Wall reconstruction…
-Arya visits Jon at Hardhome or Eastwatch in her travels…
You guys get the idea… yay or nay? If you like the idea, what other story lines would you add? There’s kind of an infinite amount of possibilities…
submitted by xlxjack7xlx to gameofthrones [link] [comments]


2024.05.09 09:51 supersnorkel Optimization tips for my custom Find and Replace macro

I created a custom Find and Replace macro where a user configures a list of words and keywords. When running the macro an userform pops up granting the user the option to. (many more options but this is the gist of it)
The macro works fine except it is a bit slow on bigger selections and I was wondering if there are some improvements I can make.
Private Function PerformFindAndReplace(cleanRange As Range, findValues() As Variant, replaceValues() As Variant, partialMatch As Boolean, selected_find_option As String) Dim SelectedArray As Variant SelectedArray = cleanRange cleanRange.ClearComments 'If selection is only one cell, make it an array with a temp value so the for loop works If Not IsArray(SelectedArray) Then Dim TempArray As Variant ReDim TempArray(1 To 1, 1 To 1) TempArray(1, 1) = SelectedArray SelectedArray = TempArray End If Dim i As Long, j As Long, k As Long For i = 1 To UBound(SelectedArray, 1) For j = 1 To UBound(SelectedArray, 2) For k = 1 To UBound(findValues, 1) ' loop keywords to find in string Select Case selected_find_option Case "Replace" SelectedArray(i, j) = ReplaceWordInString(CStr(SelectedArray(i, j)), CStr(findValues(k, 1)), CStr(replaceValues(k, 1)), partialMatch) Case "Remove" SelectedArray(i, j) = RemoveWordInString(CStr(SelectedArray(i, j)), CStr(findValues(k, 1)), partialMatch) End Select Next k SelectedArray(i, j) = Trim(SelectedArray(i, j)) ' trim the array to remove access spacing SelectedArray(i, j) = Application.WorksheetFunction.Trim(Replace(SelectedArray(i, j), " ", " ")) 'remove double or more spaces in text Next j Next i 'Paste the array back on the user selection cleanRange.value = SelectedArray End Function 
The ReplaceWordInString function:
Public Function ReplaceWordInString(sentence As String, keyword As String, replacement As String, Partial As Boolean) As String If Partial Then If InStr(1, sentence, keyword, vbTextCompare) > 0 Then ReplaceWordInString = Replace(sentence, keyword, replacement) Else ReplaceWordInString = sentence End If Else Dim word As Variant, result As String For Each word In Split(sentence, " ") If LCase(word) = LCase(keyword) Then result = result & replacement & " " ' If the word matches, replace it Else result = result & word & " " ' If the word doesn't match, add it to the result End If Next word ReplaceWordInString = result End If End Function 
submitted by supersnorkel to vba [link] [comments]


2024.05.08 14:39 ietms1000d The Top 6 Methods to Boost Your English Language Proficiency

English proficiency is increasingly important in India for various purposes, and Google searches for English grammar and vocabulary terms are common. However, these searches are insufficient, and understanding and remembering these terms is crucial for proper communication.
The Digital Teacher English Language Lab provides a comprehensive glossary of common terminology, aiding in vocabulary enhancement and improving fluency in the language. Its use can enhance communication, even in simple conversations, making it a valuable tool for language learning.
This article discusses the challenges and opportunities of enhancing English language skills, offering quick and easy methods to enhance grammar and vocabulary.

How Can You Become a Better English Speaker?

The six tips provided can enhance your English language learning experience, making it faster, more efficient, and cost-effective. This platform is the ideal resource for enhancing your English grammar and vocabulary skills.
  1. Work on these exercises pertaining to grammar.
    • The regular practice of grammar exercises can significantly enhance the quality of writing.
    • The correct use of grammar and verb tenses improves comprehension, word flow, and overall comprehension.
    • Studying grammar can be as enjoyable as answering questions and providing answers.
    • Observing language patterns is a beneficial method for enhancing grammar.
    • This exercise can be performed frequently.
    • This aids in comprehending the diverse meanings and structures of language.
  2. Acquire Vocabulary Through These ExercisesThe speaker emphasizes the importance of expanding vocabulary and familiarity with English terms, stating that understanding how words are used and expressed is more crucial than just memorizing them. They suggest proper use of basic language and communication to expand vocabulary.English Language Lab's software offers experienced teachers practice in listening, speaking, reading, and writing, enhancing their English language learning experience.Listening Skills, English language lab – Digital Teacher
    1. Regular reading with vocabulary-building tasks
    2. Making a note
    3. Make reading aloud a habit.
    4. Taking in audiobooks
    5. These methods might significantly improve your English language learning by:
    6. Focusing on new terms
    7. Improving learning and remembering
    8. When everything is looked at, they greatly help students in their learning of the English language.
  3. Regularly Work on Your Basic English Listening SkillsActive listening is crucial for effective communication, especially when learning a new language. Focus on speaking English, asking for details, and providing comments.
    • Enhance your English listening skills by listening to short dialogues and answering questions.
    • Daily study and regular listening to English-language knowledge enhance one's speaking abilities.
    • The goal is to enhance awareness by mastering English vocabulary and taking notes throughout the course.
    • Worksheets and lyric-rich music are effective tools for enhancing listening skills.
    • Utilizing diverse resources such as movies, infographics, and Quora can significantly aid in learning English.
    • These activities aim to enhance your overall English language learning process.
  4. Read and Practice (Reading Comprehension in English)Reading proficiency is crucial for language learners to enhance communication skills, and can be achieved through various methods such as audiobooks, note-taking, learning new words, ear-reading, and continuous training.
    1. Engage in vocabulary-building exercises to enhance your comprehension of words.
    2. Choose novels that you enjoy reading, not just those that are popular.
    3. The act of mouthing words or reading aloud can enhance concentration and recall.
    4. Taking notes while reading improves memory and comprehension of the content by highlighting new words.
    5. Reading clubs are an excellent method to enhance language skills through participation in reading groups.
    6. The study plans should incorporate these techniques for effective English language learning development to significantly enhance skills.
  5. Begin to Speak English as a First LanguageEngaging with native English speakers can enhance your vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and conversational skills, providing insight into the language's daily usage.Digital English activities provide teachers with a focus on speaking practice and individual instruction, enabling them to plan exercises that naturally improve English skills.
    • Practice speaking, conversing with native speakers, and receiving immediate feedback can make it easier.
    • The skill of effective English communication necessitates continuous practice.
    • Utilize common language and phrases in various everyday situations.
    • Enhance your conversational skills by learning new words and engaging in real-life discussions.
    • Engage in dialogues to enhance your self-assurance.
    • Learning to speak and pronounce requires slow and clear speech.
    • Asking for comments facilitates the identification of issues and improves speaking skills.
    • The regular study and usage of English are promoted by incorporating it into daily activities.
  6. Develop Your Writing Ability in EnglishDaily writing practice is crucial for comprehending language strengths and weaknesses, enhancing sentence structure, and cultivating a distinctive writing style.
    1. To enhance the readability and quality of official writing, it is recommended to avoid using symbols.
    2. Use strong verbs to describe specific and detailed tasks, resulting in stronger phrases.
    3. The text suggests that straightforward statements should be preferred over expressions like "there is" and "there are".
    4. To enhance reading comprehension, it is recommended to eliminate unnecessary words such as "very," "really," and "a lot.“
    5. To enhance your writing skills, it is essential to practice regularly and enjoy the process.

Frequent Reading Has a Number of Advantages:

Consistent Writing Encourages:

English Language Lab Software Digital Teacher
English Language Lab is an offline language learning platform that helps students improve their skills in areas like grammar, speaking, reading, writing, listening, phonetics, vocabulary, soft skills, and life skills, offering lessons from school, home, or anywhere.
submitted by ietms1000d to languagelab [link] [comments]


2024.05.08 14:37 twiddledee31 A Look at BetterLegal - Are their LLC services any good?

Okay, my first attempt at writing a bit of an appraisal of one of the LLC services I have used in the past, (about a year ago now, but I am pretty sure everything still stands).
I'll break this down with my thoughts at the top, followed by some details of BetterLegal and where they are based, etc, and then a larger overview of what they offer.
If you like what you read, and think BetterLegal might be a good choice for you, check out the website here.
Let's get straight into what I think are the good and bad points of the service...
The Good
The Bad
The Ugly
In a nutshell, I really liked BetterLegal because of the fast formation times. For other services I have used, I have had to pay a lot more for expedited filing, with BL its there in the standard package.
But then the standard package is a similar price to the medium packages you get elsewhere.
Furthermore, this single package option does require additional services to get everything you will need to be a fully blown LLC.
For instance, while Bizee provides a complimentary one-year registered agent service, BetterLegal charges $90 annually for this service, which is not integrated into its formation package.
Anyway, I am getting ahead of myself... a little about the company.

Who is BetterLegal?

Established in 2016 in Austin, Texas, positions itself as an online business formation company emphasizing speed and transparency.
One thing to mention about them, BetterLegal is far smaller than most LLC formation services. As far as I know, it's just a small team of people working out of one office.
It hasn't expanded like so many of the other online formation services. For all I know, you could even walk into the office for face-to-face service, if you live in the area... if you have done this as a customer, or you work at BetterLegal I'd love to see a comment below.
Small can mean good though. While other BetterLegal reviews I have read state that the customer service options are limited, (I wouldn't call online chat and email support limited)... it is apparent that some customers have experienced delays trying to get a representative on the phone.
I much prefer online chat and I never found that a problem.

Prices of BetterLegal LLC Formation

The core formation package, priced at $299 plus state filing fees, covers essential services such as LLC filing, Employer Identification Number (EIN) acquisition, Operating Agreement Draft, and Banking Resolution, along with additional complimentary services like insurance, business website builder, business checking, and business tax analysis. (Phew, what a sentence)
That's what I paid, and I have just checked and it remains the same.
As I said earlier, BetterLegal does not provide registered agent services within its package, so please consider this.
Add-on services are available for those needing extra assistance, including the Registered Agent Service at $10 per month or $90 per year, State Annual Compliance Services at the same rate, Permit & License Search Service at a fixed fee of $125, and Amendment & Document Research, which is complimentary with the core formation package.
This is turning into a lot longer review than I thought.
Okay, I'll now break down where BetterLegal might be a good choice for you.
When to Consider BetterLegal
BetterLegal is great for those seeking lightning-fast formation services. With claims of document filing within minutes, the company appeals to businesses eager to expedite the formation process.
You also need to know that it is not the cheapest option out there, but the service is very reliable. (I put it down to the small team where people can be held accountable).
I personally think it is suitable for small and mid-sized enterprises that want a more bespoke service.
When to Look Elsewhere
If you are on a complete budget and really need to keep things as low cost as possible, there is no denying that other services may be a better choice.
I guess I just really liked that fast turnaround time and the fact everything went very smoothly indeed.
Anyway, you can check out BetterLegal here to see what they offer.
submitted by twiddledee31 to LLChat [link] [comments]


2024.05.07 02:36 AnastasiousRS Do commas need to function parenthetically here, or is this usage correct?

"Attentive readers of the story, however, might notice that the builders begin, not with a plan to build a city, but with the discovery of a new construction technique."
If "not with a plan to build a city" is parenthetical, the sentence reads: "begin ... but with the discovery," which doesn't make sense. So do they need to function parenthetically here? (One alternative: ... begin, not with a plan to build a city but, with the discovery ...; but this looks odd to me. Alternatively, maybe the comma before not can be removed?)
(I originally had this for grammar, but I can't seem to post there at the moment; not sure what's going on)
submitted by AnastasiousRS to ENGLISH [link] [comments]


2024.05.07 01:42 shaneka69 DEPRESSION: A NUMEROLOGY DECODE

Let's Decode What Depression Is And More

Today I will be going in depth about depression and decoding the word and reasoning with Numerology. We can already see that depression has a lot of repeated letters which shows there is too much of a focus on one thing and too much of something can usually hinder it or cause imbalance.
Let's break down the word DEPRESSION:
The word has E 2 times, S 2 times
D=4
E=5
P=7(16)
R=9(18)
E=5
S=1(19)
S=1(19)
I=9
O=6(15)
N=5(14)
Let's first focus on the obvious! This word has karmic debt numbers for the letters N, P, and S. Let's grab some context from a site that I will link below that explain what these karmic debt numbers mean in detail.
"The 14 Karmic Debt arises from previous actions where human freedom has been abused. Those with a 14 Karmic Debt are forced to adapt to ever-changing circumstances and unexpected occurrences. There is an acute danger of falling victim to drug abuse, alcohol, or overindulgence in sensual pleasures, such as food and sex. Moderation in all affairs is crucial to overcome this Karmic Debt." - credit goes to Karmic Debt Numbers in Numerology World Numerology
"The 16 Karmic Debt – in any area it appears in a chart - means destruction of the old and birth of the new. It is about the fall of the ego and all it has built for itself. It is a watershed, a cleansing. Things the ego has constructed to separate a person from the source of life, are destroyed.
Through the 16, reunion with higher consciousness may be achieved. This can be a painful process because it usually comes after much ego inflation, resulting in a struggle between the ego and higher ideals. Life will present challenges to your grand plans which you may resent and struggle against. It is a losing battle… and you will likely feel humbled in the face of the collapse that follows. However, humility is the key to later success, as you learn to follow the intimations of a deeper reality."
"A person with the 19 Karmic Debt will learn independence and the proper use of power. You will be placed in situations where you are forced to stand up for yourself (and often be left standing alone). One of the central lessons for people with the 19 Karmic Debt revolves around stubbornly resisting help from others. Much of your independence is self-imposed - you simply want to do it your own way.The 19 Karmic Debt can become a self-imposed prison if you don’t recognize the need for interdependence and the mutual need for love.Although you seek to stand on your own feet, you are inextricably connected to others and in need of the support and understanding that all people need - this is the most important lesson for the 19 Karmic Debt." And being personally connected to a lot of 19 energy, this is very true! There is one 19 person I watch on Youtube and he is using this energy pretty well.

DECODING DEPRESSION

Let's take a look at the word. You see it starts with the letter D which is ruled by the number 4 as the 4th letter in the alphabet. 4 energy is connected to privacy, home, family, discontent, restriction, and nonchalant energy. There is many more terms, but you can see where this is going. If you call certain companies toll free, listen to what they say you need to press number 4 for.
What just hit me as I looked at the word is the rest of the word after DE...PRESSION. Maybe there is something needing to be expressed(expression!) that isn't being expressed. All depression is, is suppression of something. D/4 can be suppression and withholding. That's why some jobs want you to fill out the W4 which is a withholding form! Depression comes when someone is choosing to withhold expression of emotions and genuine communication that can help. Taking caution to a whole new level and it ends up being destructive. 4 can point to dissipation which makes sense for destruction to mean what it means.
The word starts with the energy of 4 which is about withholding and suppression and end with the energy of 5 which can be conflicting.
All those letters and we only get to the number 5?!. This word is embedded with the energy of 1 and 9 which means that people who claim or feel depression CAN utilize their personal power to get themselves out of said depression. You have the right to process your emotions and once you do, you can start using your strength and power to overcome. Sometimes it starts with the mind.
Now, based on the letters and numbers with the word, let's see what numbers are missing!
We are missing 2,3,and 8! 2 gives a person a natural comfort within self. It can also make them loveable or easily cooperative with others. The energy of 3 gives a person natural optimism and majestic mental capacity. 8 gives a person a steadfast embedded powerful strength. This 8 energy gives a person unstoppable capability.
Getting over depression is about rising above a situation and having the capability of strengthening your perspective. Your confidence levels are something you have to personally master. Notice how depression ends with O and N which is 6 and 5. That's a backtrack. We're counting forwards, not backwards. 6 is about overcoming problems while 5 is the problems or insecurities. Depression ending with the energy of 5 is a thinkpiece. 5 deals with the uniqueness of a situation or action. You will have to do something different or new to wake up out of whatever this depression was about and understand that everyone's depression won't be the same!
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submitted by shaneka69 to NumerologyPage [link] [comments]


2024.05.06 00:13 kalathe How to create a custom post type thing to make a giant page easier in the backend?

Hi, I'm trying to figure out how to do something that I know is possible. It's a situation I've encountered a bunch of times now on different WordPress sites.
Here's an example:
Right now I'm working on a site where they have a page that has a ton of resources divided into about 10 categories.
Each resource has a square picture, a name, a sentence or so of text and a button with a link.
There's a few hundred resources on this page, it's built using a page builder and making updates to the page with that is starting to become a problem due to the size of the page.
So my question is what do I need to learn how to use to create some kind of custom post type in the backend where I just have to hit New, put the picture, the title, the text and a link, select a category, hit post and then it shows up in the correct part of the page?
Is this what that Advanced Custom Fields plugin is for and is it possible to do this without having to add any code to the WordPress theme or anything like that?
Thanks in advance.
submitted by kalathe to Wordpress [link] [comments]


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