Elementor 8th Birthday Sale 2024 (May 28th – June 6th)

The Birthday sale of Elementor is live, just click the button below to claim your discount — they’re offering up to 30% off on their pro plugin and up to 75% off on WordPress hosting.
Get Elementor Birthday Offer
The Elementor Birthday Sale is going on now, and you can get a hefty discount of up to 75% on their page builder WordPress plugin or WordPress hosting.
Just stay with us to find out all about the latest deals and offers as Elementor turns E-I-G-H-T.
Usually, Elementor doesn’t give out coupon codes all the time, but on special occasions like this, they offer special discounts. So make sure you don’t miss out on this fantastic opportunity.
Elementor was started in June 2016 and since then they’ve been offering birthday sales, where you get the chance to save big on their paid plans. This year, they are offering discounts again. If you want to know what birthday offers they have, you came to the right place.
Let’s find out all the details without any further delay.

What is Elementor Birthday Sale?

Elementor Birthday Sale is an annual celebration of the popular WordPress page builder, Elementor. During this sale, users can get discounted pricing on Elementor WordPress hosting + Elementor Pro, which is the paid version of the plugin and includes additional features and functionalities.
It usually takes place around the anniversary of the company’s founding and offers users a chance to save money while using Elementor to build their websites. This year’s birthday sale is LIVE right now, and we have picked out the best deals for you below.

#1. Get up to 75% off Hosting and Builder

Take a look at the special discounts on Elementor Hosting during Elementor’s birthday sale in 2024.
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#2. Get up to 30% off Elementor Pro Plugin plans

Here are the anniversary discounts available for the Elementor Page Builder plugin (pro version).
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How to Grab the Birthday Deal of Elementor Pro?

To get the special discount for Elementor’s birthday sale in 2024, all you need is to follow these instructions I’m going to tell you. Let’s start.

Step #1: Go to Elementor Website (Click here to jump)

First of all, you need to visit the official Birthday Sale landing page of Elementor, and from there choose what you want to purchase — Elementor hosting or Elementor Pro Plugin.

Step #2: Select your plan

On their Birthday landing page, you’ll see that Elementor is offering up to 30% off its pro plugin and up to 75% off its hosting plans. Here, you just pick your favourite plan that you’d like to go with and hit the Buy Now button.

Step #3: Create an Elementor account for free

You’ll now see your cart showing the plan you chose, and total pricing. The Elementor Birthday sale discount code will automatically be applied to your purchase. From here, you can now proceed to enter your valid email address and password for your Elementor account.

Step #4: Enter your billing info

Now, you have to complete your billing information. It includes your first name, last name, address, city, country, pin code, state, and company name. After filling in all these details, click the continue button.

Step #4: Finish your order

Elementor offers two ways to pay for your purchase. You can choose to pay with your credit card or use your PayPal account. Once you have entered all the necessary information, just click on the “Pay Now” button to complete the payment process.

Step #5: That’s all. Elementor Birthday 2024 Sale is yours…

If you’ve been following our instructions closely, you’ve already gotten the number one Website builder tool. There’s no more step after that.
Remember, this Birthday sale of Elementor is only available for a limited time (expiring on 7th June 2024), so don’t wait too long to take advantage of it.

Elementor Birthday Sale Price for Plugin and Hosting

Elementor has two products:

• WordPress Hosting
• Page Builder WordPress Plugin

Let’s look at each of them one by one and discuss their pricing plans.

Elementor Hosting Plans

Elementor is not just a page builder, but it also provides web hosting for WordPress websites. It’s like getting a package deal because when you buy web hosting from them, you also get the Elementor Pro page builder plugin.
So, if you’re still trying to decide on a web host or if you’re unhappy with your current one, Elementor’s cloud hosting could be a great choice for you.
Here’s how they have reduced the prices of their hosting plans during their special Birthday sale or anniversary celebrations.
https://preview.redd.it/g3l98gic0a3d1.jpg?width=1277&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=822563014987cbb2ba7df06c40cabbc19f4deab3
Click here to snag up to 75% discount on any Elementor WordPress hosting and get page builder and theme for FREE — all in one package.

Elementor Page Builder Plugin Plans

Elementor offers both a free and paid version of its website builder plugin. The cost of the paid version, Elementor Pro, starts at $59/year for a single-site license and goes up to $399/year for a 1000-site license.
Here’s a discounted plan for the Elementor Pro plugin during the Birthday sale.
https://preview.redd.it/blcbgpqf0a3d1.jpg?width=1288&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5f7d347f8262219478b20bb39a5cc958a176a2fc
They also offer a 30-day money-back guarantee (for both hosting and plugin) so you can try it risk-free.
Click on this exclusive Birthday sale link to choose your favourite Elementor Pro Plan.

Get Your Elementor Birthday Deal 2024

No doubt Elementor is the #1 website builder tool available on the market that helps you make any type of website in less than one hour. They have a visual drag-and-drop editor that lets you easily change things on your website while you’re working on it.
And the best part is, when you make changes, you can see them live right away on your website. It also has ready-made designs and templates that you can use to make your website look professional without much effort. Overall, I would say Elementor is super simple to use and doesn’t require any coding skills.
From May 28th – June 7th, there’s a special sale on Elementor because it’s their birthday. So if you want to try it out, now is a great time. Just click the button below to sign up and get started.
Claim Elementor Birthday Discount Sale
Well, that’s all from this blog post. Now, I want to hear what you think about Elementor and its BIGGEST Birthday offer.
Did you like them (if you ask me, then yes, I especially like their plugin as well as the huge discounts they provide during their birthdays)? Let me know your thoughts in the comments section. Byeeeee…

Frequently Asked Questions – Elementor Anniversary Sale

Is Elementor Birthday Deal live?

Yes, Elementor’s birthday deal 2024 is live! This year they are celebrating their 8th birthday and offering a whopping up to 75% discount on all of their plans. The sale is only for a limited time so make sure to grab this opportunity before it ends.

When is the Elementor Birthday Sale happening?

The Elementor Birthday Sale typically takes place in late May or early June, around the time of Elementor’s official launch date. At the time of writing this article, the Elementor Birthday Sale is live (from 28th May – 7th June), you can check them out from here.

i'm working on a novel and would like to know if anyone could tell me any improvements i could make to the first chapter and prologue
Prologue
The day had started the same way it had for the past two years. The only difference was that I was going home. The hallway was crowded with people walking to and from their classes. Everyone was crowded next to each other so the halls were making the area feel claustrophobic. All the people talking mixed with the summer heat made me feel like I was locked in a sauna. I walked with Preston to the last class we would ever have together and as usual he was smiling. I never got why he always smiled even in situations where people should be sad he still smiled. He knew what today meant for me and he tried to keep light of the situation. I kept my head down away from what was ahead of me. My mind was too clouded about returning to see my family to notice anything in front of me. I walked into another student. It felt like I had walked into a wall. I knew immediately I had walked into tree. I stumble onto the ground and the commotion around me slows down to make room for us. He turned his bulky body around and apologized profusely without saying a word even though I had walked into him. He helped me off of the ground before hurrying down the hall.
“Alexandria, are you doing okay?” Preston said he had tilted his body downward so I had to look down to look him in his eyes. The way he was standing made him look like an idiot but he didn't seem to care. The way he acted made me laugh, which caused his smile to widen.
“I'm doing fine, just got lost in my head.”
“Thinking about how you’ll leave soon,” he said
“Was it that obvious?” He was the only person I told about me being an exchange student. I came to spend high school in Newkinawa and he was the only person I ever hung out with.
“I see what you mean,” he said “Newkinawa is a beautiful place with beautiful people to live in it…myself included”
“You wish,” I say with a smile we continue walking through the hallway “I'm just not excited to go back yet”
After I say that his smile grows wider “So you will miss me after all”
“I wouldn't say that much” I responded whilst smiling.
We had made it to our last class only to see it closed with a sign labeled “Uma incident” Uma was a student known for messing with the chemistry lab and destroying school property in the process. I've never actually met her but Preston says “She's a little weird but still nice”
“Guess class is canceled for today,” Preston remarked with a smile “Wanna go out to the court till the bell rings.”
“Sure let's go” I respond
The place we ate every day was outside. It used to be a tennis court before I moved in. Now they put trees and flowers all over the place. Preston really liked the blue color of the flowers but it just never clicked for me. I look over at Preston and he's staring up at the sky. There are a number of clouds in almost enough to block the sun but it still pokes its rays through and lands on Preston's face. The clouds swim in front of the sun till they block out the sun's light. Preston faces towards me.
“I'm gonna miss you Alexandria” he says
“You know you can just call me Alex,” I replied. I start to smile again. “I'll miss you too!" He smiles toward me again as we get up to leave as the clouds start to clump together and rain slowly falls. As we're walking back to the school there's a loud tearing sound followed by screams as the ground shakes.
The ground tears itself apart as the dirt and stone erupt from the ground. The sky blackens and a pale blue light escapes the earth. Then creatures erupt from the ground in a violent ejection from the earth creating a white pillar diffusing as they reach higher in the air. Some are clawing their way out of the cracks like maggots out of a corpse. People are swept into the updraft screaming for their lives.
The creatures descend like a tidal wave and tear apart any people caught in their path. They storm out of the crack in hundreds as more cracks in the earth form. Me and Preston started running away as people were screaming behind us. A girl running next to us has her legs slashed by a creature. The monster begins to tear open her chest as she chokes on her own blood. The monster shovels her lungs and innards into its decrepit mouth. Me and Preston keep running until we're met at the entrance of the school and we catch the attention of a monster as it begins to savagely rush toward us. The monster resembles ghosts my father told me about. But this one looks monstrously horrific. It floats in the air and opens its mouth so wide it nearly replaces its entire torso; its jaws hold savage teeth each the same old gray color of its body. Its eyes glow a rotten yellow color through the dark. It stretches out its arms showing its giant hands and claws like fingers. It swipes at us leaving a giant claw mark on the door behind us but Preston ducks my body down to avoid the attack. We run around it as the monster swaps its focus to another bystander. Screaming past us. Me and Preston run into the parking lot as people scream around us. We hide next to a car.
“What the hell is happening!?” I yell to Preston. More of the creatures fly over us and swoop down to people like vultures on roadkill devouring the fleeing people.
Preston starts to breathe heavily ”we need to get out of here and someplace safer”. As we were talking one of the monster phases through the car we were hiding next to forcing us to run into the street.
“Lets go to your house till things cool down” i say to Preston through panted breaths
“Wait couldn't we head to your house instead” Preston says.
“Why would that matter your house is closer anyways” i respond
“But-” Preston is interrupted by two creatures swooping above us to grab another person. The two monsters begin to pull the person apart while he writhes in pain before having his flesh be torn in half and having his organs be devoured.
“Come on lets go!!” I say as I grab his hand and run even faster.
By the time we reach Preston's house any living person is gone. On the street are just corpses laying torn and mutilated on the roads and sidewalk. The air in the neighborhood feels cold despite the season being summer. When I walk down the street I can still hear the occasional horrific wail the monsters give off. We move closer to Preston's house and I can see him sweating. He looked more worried than before when the creatures were chasing us and he kept darting his eyes away from his home.
“Preston, are you feeling okay?” he doesn't respond to my question and keeps darting his eyes. He walks slowly behind me and as I reach for the door handle and when I touch it it feels nearly freezing. I wrap my hoodie around my hand and slowly open the door. The house is quiet so me and Preston creep further into his house. The inside is cold and damp as if we were locked in a freezer. The further we move into the house the louder a subtle chewing sound is heard.
“It sounds like rats are eating a dead cow over there” I whisper. Preston continues to stay silent behind me. We slowly walk closer towards the kitchen and the sound gets louder and louder and louder until we reach the room.
We're met with a rancid smell of vomit and blood. My blood starts to run cold and every instinct in my body is telling me to run. I can feel Preston breathing get heavier as we get closer. We turn the corner and see Preston's mom lying on the ground dead with one of the creatures hunched over slurping her intestines. The sight causes me to vomit alerting the monster to our presence. The creature turns around and its mouth turns into a mortifying grin as it flies into Preston's moms body. The corpse begins to rise and spur splashing blood over the kitchen. When the corpse stops spasming it picks itself up from the ground and with glazed over eyes it holds its intestines in its hand and gives us the same grin it did when it was outside her body. The possessed corpse lunges at me and starts to chase me around the kitchen. The body is running into the walls and cabinets spraying its blood and other loose organs around the area as I'm avoiding its assault. The corpse leans over and ejects one of its loose intestines towards me, wrapping me in it. It pulls me towards it so fast I'm flung towards the ground. The corpse limbers over to me and raises its free hand aiming for my head. The creature's deranged smile causes the corpse’s cheeks to tear apart. It places both of its bloodied and demented hands on my face and starts to press my skull into the ground. I struggle to breathe. The room starts to get dark and blood escapes my head.
Until Preston jumps on top of his mothers corpse with a kitchen knife and repeatedly stabs it in the head. The possessed body tries to shake him off but he keeps stabbing, blood gets in on his face and tears start to escape his eyes. The creature violently ejects from the corpse's mouth causing her head to nearly explode and Preston stops stabbing the body. The body falls over in a splash of blood and organs. The monster leaves phasing through the roof leaving Preston crying over his mother's body. As the blood mixes with the tears he collapses to his knees crying. I walk over and hug him as the air around us turns bitter and the chill of death leaves the room and us with it.
Chapter 1 Eclipse
It's been 2 months since the apocalypse started. We've kept ourselves alive by looting grocery stores and houses, we hide from the creatures as we have no way to fight back against them. Preston came up with the idea to call them glanter’s. He’s looking better since we left his family home but I can tell something is wrong with him that he's not telling me. Everytime I ask him about it he tells me it's no big deal. I asked him earlier today and he just told me
“don't worry about it, I'm over it” without even looking at me. Now we're walking through the street and I'm walking behind Preston, I can barely see his head past the giant bag we're both carrying on our backs we use to carry supplies. I look up at the sky and it's still pitch black except for the moon giving us any amount of light. Preston turns around to face me.
“Let's check out that house, it might have some cool stuff in it” he points to a white house to our right. The house is a two story building with steps leading to the front door. There's a generator poking out from the backyard. The driveway is empty save for a couple of dried blood stains and tire marks. It's similar to the other houses in the neighborhood except for a couple broken windows.
“Sure why not” We head over to the house and I see something shining on the side of the house in the corner of my eye. I turn my head to look at it closer but it quickly disappears before I can see it clearly.
“Probably squirrel or something” I mumble to myself. Preston walks up the stairs to the house and I walk up the steps behind him as a breeze blows past my face. Preston tries to turn the door knob but the door is locked. I start to pull out a lockpick I grabbed at the store earlier. I motion towards Preston to move out of the way as I kneel down to pick the lock. It takes me a couple of minutes to unlock the door so I walk inside the house and Preston follows behind me while closing and locking the door. The doorway of the house leads to a dark room so I take a flashlight out of my bag to illuminate the area. Were put into the living room and bookshelves are on the walls and a large TV sat in front of a large black couch with smaller chairs surrounding it. Dust is covering every surface of the room and spiderwebs litter the corners of the walls. The area smells like moth balls and there's a lack of blood anywhere nearby.
“Guess the owners got out before the Glanter’s got in, '' I say to Preston. When he doesn't respond I turn around and he's already looking further into the house. When I find him he's managed to find a flight of stairs that lead to a lower portion of the house.
“I'll check on him later,” I think to myself as I headed towards the kitchen to see if we could restock on food. I walk past a bedroom and remark on how childish it looked. The walls were painted with blue and green stripes and a bunk bed sat on the right wall. There's a chest at the foot of the bed so I walk over and lift the top off of it. The box is layered with children's toys, a multitude of dolls, bears, and figures all jut out of the box. I notice a small robot toy and inspect it in my hands.
The cold metal makes my hand shiver and the sharp body shape makes the robot bigger than my hand. There's red lining around the robot's buttons surrounded by the cold gray of the robot's “skin”. It reminds me of a toy my little brother had. My heart feels heavy as I worry about what happened to my family. If they're alive, dead, or worse…possessed. The thoughts send a chill down my spine but I push them aside for now. I put the toy in my bag and exit the bedroom.
I can see the kitchen is down the hallway so I walk down the hall and enter. The kitchen is pretty clean except for a couple of dishes in the sink and the dust. There's a table seated for 3 people in the center of the room. I start opening the cabinets in search for any food or water. There's boxes of cereal leftover on top of shelves and a mix of chip bags and cookies in neat boxes stationed in the cabinets.
“Score,” I say to myself as I begin to put the snacks into my bag. When the cabinets are empty I look inside the fridge. The inside of the fridge ran out of power so most of the food inside is rotted. There are a couple of bottles of water in the front so I shove those in my bag. There's also a bag of oranges that still seem to be healthy in the back. I grab them and toss them on the table. There's rotten sandwich meat hidden in the drawer of the fridge.it smells like a dumpster outside of a butcher shop. I wrinkle my nose at the smell. I look around the kitchen for any bread with no luck.
I continue to look through the fridge until I hear Preston scream from another room. Immediately I bolt out of the kitchen leaving my bag behind and run towards the lower part of the house. I run down the stairs and nearly trip on the steps. The stairs lead to a big room. There are posters to tv shows and movies I don't recognize. The walls are painted black and there's a bear skin rug on the floor. I notice Preston standing next to a really big TV hyperventilating. I walk over to him and ask him.
“Are you ok? What happened?”
He talks through deep breaths “I… saw a… spider.”
“What?!” I respond in confusion.
“It was really big and I had jumped at my face”
“Sure it was.” I say while laughing “Let's go upstairs there's some food in the fridge we can eat”
“Wait, I think you should check this out.” He says while pointing towards one of the walls. I grab Preston's flashlight off the floor and face it towards the wall. Hanging halfway off the wall is a large map labeled Newkiwana scavenger hunt of 76.
“I think we should take it,” Preston says “You can read a map right?”
“A little but I'm not the best at it,” I say to him “can you read a map?”
“it shouldn’t be too hard it’s mainly pictures any way I'm sure I can figure it out”
I walk over to the wall where the map is hung there are trophies covering tables and shelved in their own personal cases one of them reads “1st place 100-meter swimming competition for 1986 Zack Hemmingway” and another one reads “2nd place 100-meter swimming competition for 1989 Zack Hemmingway”
“Guess this guy really liked swimming,” Preston remarks while staring at a wall of newspaper clippings. All of them are about the same person in swimming competitions. All labeled different things like “a new record for Zack “the dolphin” Hemmingway”,
‘Zach Hemmingway our star plans for the future” all the newspapers are about this kind he has paler skin and a bulky enough build to swim pretty well. Most of the pictures have him coming out of the water in a pool, his long black hair soaked and sitting at his shoulders. Another one has him sitting at a desk over a pile of books and his hair in a knot , “vicious wipeout ends the Dolphins career”, and “ex-swim champ Zack Hemmingway found in a drunken stupor outside strip club.
“Everyone has their own hobbies I guess,” I say as I take the map off of the wall and fold it up. “Sucks what happened to Zack though” I walked over to Preston’s bag and put the rolled map in one of the pockets. I walk back up the stairs and Preston grabs his bag and follows behind me.
We make our way towards the kitchen and Preston starts looking through the fridge for anything to eat. I grab an orange from the table and throw it at his head. The fruit bounces off his head and rolls on the floor. He turns around and grabs the fruit from the floor
“Why did you throw an orange at me?”
“It's the only food we have unless you plan on eating spoiled a sandwich“ He starts to peel it while walking towards the table. We both take a seat and start to eat the oranges from the bag. He plants his feet on top of the table and bites into the fully peeled orange. I grab a water bottle from a bag and start to drink from it as Preston says.
“I saw a dvd player in that man cave downstairs we could watch a movie if it still has power”
“Sure it could be fun.” Me and Preston spend the rest of our time eating until the bag of oranges is emptied and we head back downstairs. Preston grabs the DVD player from under the table and blows the dust off the top of it; he plugs it into the wall as I plop myself onto the couch. He plugs the DVD player into the TV and sits on the recliner next to me. He presses a few buttons on the remote and the TV lights up. I squint my eyes at how bright it is. It's the most amount of light I've seen that didn't come from a flashlight. I notice there's a box filled with DVDs. I pull the box over towards me. I ruffle through the box and see movies like Silence of the Lambs, Terminator 2, and Home alone.
“Dude some of these came out just before the world turned inside out” I say to him.
“Really? Let's play one.” He responds. I toss him Terminator 2 and he puts it into the DVD player.
We spend the next couple hours watching movies and laughing together. It's some of our only moments of peace we’ve had since the end of the world and to me it's the most fun I've had yet. We're putting in the next DVD when there's a loud crash outside and the TV shuts off. Preston goes behind it to see if it's still plugged in.
“I think the generator outside is busted” i say
“It seems that way” Preston replies while backing away from the tv” i'm gonna go check it out”
“Don't worry I got it” I say as I hop out of my chair. Preston waves goodbye as I head up the stairs. I make my way back through the hallway leading to the living room and front door. I reach the door and start to turn the knob. I open the door wide as a car speeds down the street. I step out of the door to see what had happened when I hear the screech of a glanter. It cuts through the sky like an unholy opera singer. A group of them fly by and chase the car as I rush back inside the house. I slam the door shut and look through the window as I see a couple of smaller glanters grab and shake the car violently looking for the driver. They tear at it, ripping off doors and breaking the windows. The driver screams as the seats cover with blood and he's ripped out of the car as multiple smaller glanters tear and bite off parts of his body like piranha's until his body is completely devoured. I run back to the man cave to warn Preston about what had happened. I spot him laying in his chair spinning a DVD disc on his finger.
“It's not safe outside right now”
“Why not?
“There's glanter's outside, they just ate a dude in his car”
“Did they see you come inside?”
“I don't think so , they flew off before I went inside.”
“well we're not dead so I'm gonna say they didn't see you. But let's stay here for a couple more hours just to be safe”
“Sounds good i'm gonna go find the master bedroom.” I start to walk back up the stairs to the house
“ Hold on why do you get the master bedroom” Preston says while walking after me.
“Because I'm gonna find it first” I say as I start to run to find the bedroom. He chases after me in pursuit of the bedroom. Me and Preston run around the house looking for the master bedroom. We look through room after room finding closets, the garage, a bathroom and a door leading to a balcony in the back of the house. I manage to run into the bedroom and yell out to Preston.``Found it!!”
He comes walking into the room breathing heavily from the running. We both check out the room. The walls are painted a cream yellow and the bed takes up most of the room's center. The bed has burgundy sheets poking out from its bottom and a quilt with multi-colored floral designs lay sprawled out on top of it. There's a wardrobe built into the wall and a black leather couch sits comfortably on the left wall.
“Dibs on the bed” I say as I jump on top of it. I stretch out on top of the quilt and search for a comfortable part to sleep in.
“Where am I supposed to sleep then?” Preston complains
“You can sleep on the couch it looks soft enough” I respond while pointing towards the couch “I saw some spare blankets in one of the closets”
“Alright i’ll be right back” he mumbles to himself “why do i always get the couch”
“ I'll be right here if you need me,” i call after him. I sit up on the bed and start to look around the room more. I notice the entrance to the wardrobe is cracked open slightly. I hop out of the bed and grab a flashlight from my bag as I walk into the wardrobe. I turn on my flashlight and stare in awe at how many clothes are in there. The room is only half as big as the bedroom but it's still bigger than any closet I've ever had. The wardrobe is full of shirts, dresses, pants, and shoes for men and women. I immediately start to look through the shoes to see if any fit my size. I throw a pair of black high heels behind me as Preston finds me in the wardrobe. He looks around before asking me.
“What are you doing?”
“Finding a new pair of clothes to wear cause I've been wearing the same pair of jeans for waaaaay too long”
“Fair enough. Is there any guy stuff in there?”
“Yeah right there” I hook my thumb behind me to point to the other end of the closet.
“I'm sure they won't mind if we take a couple of things…they're probably dead by now anyways,” Preston says with a slight grin on his face. The way he said made me spin my head to look at him but he was already on the opposite end of the wardrobe looking at suits.
I shake away the thought and continue looking for any pair of sneakers in my size. 40 minutes pass before I walk out of the wardrobe holding a new pair of jeans and a black guns-N-roses t-shirt. I toss the clothes on top of the bed and check to see if the shower in the bathroom still works. I turn the dial and wait for a moment. The shower head chokes a little before water comes pouring out. I reach my hand under the showerhead to feel the water. The water is cold, it causes my hand to shiver when I take it out. I shake the water off and say to myself.
“Good enough” as I start to take off my old clothes and get in the shower. The cold water bounces off my skin, it sends shivers down my spine but I still get the old dirt from the last few months off of me. I step out and see a couple of dry towels hanging off of the door. I grab one and dry my body off and grab another to wrap around my head and dry my hair. I step out of the bathroom and Preston is still inside the wardrobe. I put on my new clothes while his back is turned and walk over towards him when I'm finished.
“Still haven't found anything,” I ask him
He turns around “Nothing yet, the only thing interesting was this coat.” He holds a leather coat up to me. The coat is made of black leather and has a skull covered with blue flames on the back. There's a black shirt inside the coat with a skeleton hand making a thumbs-up embroidered on the front.
“ That's pretty cool, it's better than what you're wearing right now at least” he's outfitted in a blue hoodie with holes on the chest and tears at the sleeves. He also has a shirt with a faded picture of a blue flower printed on it.
“I guess you're right” he gets up from the floor and exits the wardrobe. He lays the clothes on the couch along next to the blanket and pillow he brought into the room.
“The shower works so you can get yourself clean In there,” I say to him
“You know, a shower sounds really good right now.” He gets up from the floor and grabs a pair of pajama pants that were laying next to him. He leaves the wardrobe and enters the bathroom, closing the door behind him. After a moment the water turns on and I hop on the bed to get ready to sleep. I squirm myself into the quilt and rest my head against one of the pillows. I shut my eyes and fall asleep listening to the passive sound of the shower like rain on a car.
I'm in a void. It feels like I'm standing in a puddle of water that reaches to my knees. I wade my way forward looking around for anything in the darkness. In the distance I can see 3 figures l. I moved closer to them and their silhouettes get clearer. I realize they are my dad and brothers. I start to run towards them kicking up water behind me until something grabs my leg. It pulls down violently forcing me under the water without a breath of air. I kick at the thing grabbing me until something grabs my other leg. I look down and see two glanter's each with a monstrous smile on their faces. They stare back at me and one of them tugs my leg harder than before and tears it off of my body. The water around me turns red as the glanter laugh's. The other smiles wider as it starts to fling me around the water forcing any air left in my lungs to be forced out as I scream in pain. The glanter throws me away and I can see my family slowly fade into the distance as I'm flown away.
I struggle to swim back to where I was, one of my legs is missing and the other is broken. The glanter's find me again and I try to get to the surface to escape them. I'm flapping my arms in any attempt to escape as one of the glanter's flies in front of me and grabs my arm. I look at the monster with tears in my eyes as it bites my arm and tears my body away from it. It flings my body away and with my remaining arm I clutch the wound as the water floods into my body leaving me in the void I started in. I look around and the glanter's seem to have left. I turn behind me and see my family again, this time I'm closer than before.
I grit my teeth and drag my body towards them slowly as I leave a trail of blood and tears behind me. I finally reach my family and grab one of my father's shoes. I stare up and he looks at me. His stare causes me to feel cold as a grotesque smile grows on his face. I stare in shock as my brothers each have the same look as my father.
I shoot up from my sleep panting heavily in a cold sweat.
“It was just a dream..just a dream…just a dream” I look at my hands as tears fall into them. I look around the room and see Preston sleeping peacefully on the couch. The room feels frozen in place as a chill runs down my spine. I get out of the bed and walk out of the bedroom. I make my way through the dark hallway and find the entrance to the balcony I saw earlier. I creak open the screen door and head outside. The Balcony is pretty large, about the size of the kitchen in the house. There are some chairs knocked over next to a table and I pick one up to sit on it. I look out into the expanse of the neighborhood, houses lined up next to each other, dozens broken apart by roads, and dead bodies scattered across the roads.
I look up in the sky and sit back in the chair. The sky looks empty except for the moon giving this world its only source of light. Without the moon, we’d be left in darkness. It hangs in the sky alone, no stars, no clouds, nothing but itself, and the void of the sky. I think back about the dream I had. My dad and my brother's all dead and possessed and then they kill me. I start to tear up thinking about it. I try to wipe away the tears but it’s no use. I'm too scared for my family. I don't know where they are if they're alive if they're worried about me I don't know anything! I start to quietly cry into my hands. I don't know how long I'm sitting there until I feel a hand on my shoulder. I turn my head to face it and I see Preston. He was smiling and looking at me. I turn away to wipe my tears and he walks next to me.
“I heard you sneaking out of the bedroom so I followed you to see where you were going.” he says “but that's not my question.” he pauses and looks at me “my question is what’s got you feeling so down?” he leans over the railing of the balcony
“It's nothing, I just came out here to clear my head.” I say as more tears escape from my eyes in big slow drops that ride down the sides of my face.
“if you don't feel like telling me you don't have to but i'll be here if you ever change your mind”. He looks up at the moon before turning to face me and his smile widens “I'll always be here with you…trust me I'm not going anywhere”
I stare up at him and wipe away my tears as a smile grows on my face to match his. I get up and stare over the balcony with him. “So where are we heading next?” I say to him, Preston pulls the map we got from the man cave downstairs out from his pocket.
“After I got out of the shower I decided to take a look at the map for anything interesting we could see.”
“Ok did you find anything?” i ask
“I did,” he points at a spot on the right of the map. “We should head to the museum”
“I didn't want to go to a museum before the apocalypse why would i want to go now?'' I ask him.
“Well the best part of museums is the cool stuff right”
“Yeah what about it”
“The only problem is that you could only look at the fossils and armor but you could never take them.”
“So you want to rob a museum?” Prestons eyes light up at the question
“Exactly they might have a really cool sword I could use, or I could sharpen a dinosaur tooth and use that as a weapon, there might be a cursed shield that can summon the dead to fight for you. This opportunity is too good to pass up. We need to go!”
“That does seem pretty cool but wouldn't carrying that stuff weigh us down. What if a glanter is chasing us and we can't run fast enough because of the stuff we took from the museum.”
“We’ll only take things that are light. Even then I could just block the glanter with my newly acquired 2000 year old shield.”
“Fair enough we can go in a couple hours” I yawn and stretch out my arms. “Cause I'm feeling way too tired to walk all the way over there right now.”
“Alright i'm heading back to my couch and THEN we’ll head out to the museum” he leaves the balcony and heads back to the master bedroom leaving me alone on the balcony.
“Thanks Preston I'm not leaving either” I say into the sky. I turn around and walk back inside the house, closing the balcony door behind me. I walk back into the bedroom and Preston is hunched over and holding a flashlight looking at the map. He’s drawing lines through roads and marking X’s in different areas.
“What are the X’s for?” i ask him
“They’re places that glanter’s usually stay around. I'm marking them off so we remember not to go through them, or at least be more cautious.”
“Cool. Did you find where we are right now?” He points to an area where the lines all converge out of.
“Right around here is where the neighborhood ends. So if we follow this path we can make it to the museum in one piece” I pat him on the back and take the map from his hands.
“Get some sleep Preston, we have a full day tomorrow” he grins to himself before laying down on the couch. I put the map back into my bag and hop on the bed to get to sleep. I cover my body in the quilt and roll over facing away from Preston as he falls asleep. I nestle myself into the bed and slowly fall asleep to get ready for the next day.
I'm awoken by Preston shaking the bed I'm sleeping on. My eyes open and the room is foggy, I wipe away the sleep from my eyes and focus my attention towards Preston. He's practically jumping out of his skin with excitement, he's already fully dressed for the trip and shaking the bed with a wide smile on his face.
“Ok ok i'm up the air feels heavy as a groggy feeling fills my body. I wipe my eyes and the room starts to clear up. I turn to face Preston. He's still shaking my bed to wake me up, he’s already fully dressed and nearly jumping out of his skin in excitement.
“Ok ok, i'm up you can stop shaking the bed” i say
“Then get up we’ve got a long walk ahead of us” he says as he stops shaking the mattress. He grabs the map from my bag and points to one of the red lines.
“We're gonna follow this way to the museum. We’ll move past the hotel around the ice skating rink and around the park. We’ll mainly stick to walking through the streets, we might have to go rooftop hopping to avoid any glanter’s if we see them but i'm sure we won’t reach that point.” he explains
“Wait, wait, wait, why are avoiding the skating rink and the park” i ask
“ everytime we go near the park there's weird noises and light coming out of it”
“And why can't we go to the ice skating rink?”
“I didn't think it would be important”
“It couldn't hurt to check it out at least”
“Fine we could make a detour”
“Ok and how do you plan on getting on top of roofs?”
“I'm sure we'll figure it out when we get to it”
“Ok man as long as you’re sure '' I yawn and step out of the bed. Preston starts to put the map in his bag. I walk into the bathroom with my clothes and change out of my pajamas. Minutes later I walk out and see Preston sitting on the couch twiddling his thumbs.
“Finally you're out” he smiles at me before handing me my bag and slinging it over his shoulder. We took a last look inside the kitchen to see if we missed anything. Afterwards we leave for the outside. The cold air bites at my face but Preston walks down the stairs, his face buried in the map. I jog to catch up to him as we both head into the street.
“Hey Preston, could I see the map?”
“Sure” he hands over the map and continues walking. I look at the map and the numerous lines drawn on roads. I look at the corner of the map and notice a small map key with numerous symbols for different areas like a library, school, hospital, and more. There's even a way to tell how far away each location is. The text reads “1 inch=5 miles” I quickly count how far we are from the museum.
“Dude this museum is like 100 miles away.”
“Yep it'll be a long walk, it'll take us a while to get there”
“Did you plan on us walking there the whole time?”
“We might find bikes or something.” he pauses “well i did think we would walk the whole way”
“This is gonna take us weeks to get there!”
“Did you have anything else planned?”
“Well…i guess not but we should still try to find some bikes or something”
“Ok if we see any way to travel faster we’ll take it”
“Alright cool” I hand him the map back and he folds it back up and puts it in his bag. We walk further until we leave the gated neighborhood we started in. Preston takes the map back out and looks at it before he turns right and continues walking. I follow him staring forward at the expanse of the road. The outside of the neighborhood is surrounded by roads all leading to different parts of Newkinawa. We walk past a sign that reads “Coretown 20 miles ahead” I nudge Preston towards the sign and he checks the map again.
“Yep, the museum’s in Coretown. Would you believe the residents were pretty proud of it. Should be a fun place to explore” he says
“Yeah but it’ll take us a million years to get there.” i complain
“Lighten up, I'm sure it will be worth it”. We continue walking down the road slowly making our way to Coretown.

My husband and I are attempting to sell our condo that was being used for short term rentals. We accepted an offer and the buyer contacted our hoa president to ask a simple question regarding golf carts. The hoa president is a condo owner in the building who has had their rental for sale for a few months now. She proceeded to talk bad about us, our renters, and told the buyer that they should instead put an offer on her condo and she would cut them a deal. The buyer had to be talked down by his realtor because he is considering withdrawing his offer. We have had issues with this president for a few months now as she owns the unit a couple doors down from us. She has claimed our renters are violating the rules with noise and drugs, yet she has never contacted the police or charged us for any violations. We live out of the state so when we received these complaints we can only take her word for it and contact our property manager. She has made several racist comments about our renters and when we requested she stop and keep those comments to herself, she got defensive. We are unsure how to proceed with this person who is trying to interfere with this sale.

Questions
>Is this a brand new build, or an upgrade to an existing build?
Brand new build
>Please list any existing parts or monitor(s) you have that you would like to re-use with this build. For upgrades, a PCPartPicker list of your full build is extremely helpful. Be as specific as you can be here, including links or exact model numbers of each component whenever possible.
I own monitors already and plan to use them for this PC
>What will this PC be used for? Examples include things like gaming, general/multimedia use, photo/video editing, coding, AI/ML, etc. Include specific games and applications you intend to run, and any particular performance goals you have, as each may have different specific hardware needs.
Mostly VR gaming. Looking to be able to play things like half life alyx using the meta quest 3
>What country will you be purchasing in? If you are in the US, do you live near a Micro Center? For other countries, please check if your country is supported by PCPartPicker by using the country selector dropdown on the top right - if not, please provide some links to reliable local vendors you are comfortable ordering from.
US. I live about 30 minutes from a MicroCenter
>Do you need one or more monitors included in the budget? Please list how many and any size/resolution/refresh rate preferences if needed.
No monitors needed
>What is your preferred and maximum budget range for this build, in local currency? Parts lists may sometimes have additional shipping costs. Please note whether prices in your country include sales tax or not, and adjust your budget accordingly. Typically VAT countries will have it included in the part list prices, whereas regular sales tax countries like the US and Canada will not.
I would like to keep the build under $1000 of possible
>Do you need WiFi, or do you have a wired ethernet connection available?
I will need WiFi
>Do you have any specific size or noise requirements for the build?
No
>Do you have any aesthetic preferences for color or lighting? Describe what you're looking for, or feel free to provide some links to examples that may help. Some people prefer an inobtrusive stealth build, while others may prefer a case full of rainbow RGB.
RGB is nice but do not want to sacrifice performance for aesthetics
>Any other specific requests or requirements? Examples might include a specific minimum amount of storage, or a particular CPU socket for a future upgrade path, etc.
None
I will follow the instructions

[Question]
Currently using a dell xps 8940 with a 3060 ti and i5-11700. Was planning on upgrading but just found out about proprietary parts. Ideally want a build that can be upgraded down the line(50 series card). i had upgraded the ram to 2 sticks of 16gb but i would not mind another set of ram sticks , have a 512 nvme ssd and a 1tb internal hard drive not sure if these can be salvaged , if not all good. I am mostly looking for a cpu upgrade for star citizen (i know). The i5 13600k caught my eye for the price but i am not sure how significant the upgrade would be. these are the 3060ti measurements-- 210x120x35
Questions

Is this a brand new build, or an upgrade to an existing build?

new build using existing parts

Please list any existing parts or monitor(s) you have that you would like to re-use with this build. For upgrades, a PCPartPicker list of your full build is extremely helpful. Be as specific as you can be here, including links or exact model numbers of each component whenever possible.

3060 ti, 2 sticks of 16gb of ram

What will this PC be used for? Examples include things like gaming, general/multimedia use, photo/video editing, coding, AI/ML, etc. Include specific games and applications you intend to run, and any particular performance goals you have, as each may have different specific hardware needs.

gaming

What country will you be purchasing in? If you are in the US, do you live near a Micro Center? For other countries, please check if your country is supported by PCPartPicker by using the country selector dropdown on the top right - if not, please provide some links to reliable local vendors you are comfortable ordering from.

US i do not live near a micro center

Do you need one or more monitors included in the budget? Please list how many and any size/resolution/refresh rate preferences if needed.

no

What is your preferred and maximum budget range for this build, in local currency? Parts lists may sometimes have additional shipping costs. Please note whether prices in your country include sales tax or not, and adjust your budget accordingly. Typically VAT countries will have it included in the part list prices, whereas regular sales tax countries like the US and Canada will not.

500

Do you need WiFi, or do you have a wired ethernet connection available?

wifi if possible

Do you have any specific size or noise requirements for the build?

i would like it to be a micro atx build if possible

Do you have any aesthetic preferences for color or lighting? Describe what you're looking for, or feel free to provide some links to examples that may help. Some people prefer an inobtrusive stealth build, while others may prefer a case full of rainbow RGB.

i do not care for rgb

Any other specific requests or requirements? Examples might include a specific minimum amount of storage, or a particular CPU socket for a future upgrade path, etc.

would like to use the i5 13600k with room for potential upgrades

Hello my name is Thomas and it will also be my characters name. Today I'm looking for a almost no limit multiple girl slave/ blackmail roleplay. If this interests you then read below and select which one interests you the most.
Prompt 1- I am a honor student at one of the best college academies in the world. This college has been a top 3 college ever since it was founded and no one really has an idea how. The reason why is because they make sure their brightest and highest testing students are rewarded well and taken care of. The students who can't keep up become their slaves. Even professors can find themselves enslaved to students if they can't keep a good collective score in their class. Of course money helps as well anyone who donates money to the school can be well rewarded for doing so with a slave or more depending on the amount. And since the people own the slaves there is no running for them on or off campus they are slaves to their owner. They can be traded, bet, given away or more.
For my character, I would be new to the school and have just aced my entrance exam along with that I belong to a rich family which have donated a big sum of money already.I am the first to do it so the headmaster of the school rewards me with my first slave. She wants me to choose if I wish for a younger slave or older slave. This can become a more opened up long term world where I form a no limits harem
Prompt 2- Student's Pet- You are a Professor at my college and one day while I was leaving campus late I passed by your car. I was just going to walk past but I stopped because I noticed some movement through the window. I looked through the window and saw you had your eyes closed but not only that you were rubbing your pussy through the jeans you wore today before taking them off slowly and starting to rub it through your panties as you moan a bit. I stood there watching before pulling my phone out and starting to record it to jerk off to later. About 3 minutes into the recording you start to unbutton your jeans and grope your own breasts. Continuing to get this all on recording I immediately stop when I look to the side and see someone coming. I stop the recording and put my phone away before jogging past your car and accidentally hitting it. You stopped what you were doing and button your jeans back up and open your door not seeing anyone but now noticing the person approaching. You start your car and then head home and while I'm walking home I review the video I got from recording you.
Prompt 3- Foreign Exchange Fun- You are a foreign exchange college student staying at my house that i agreed to when I registered at the college. Prior to when you came you had agreed to pay rent and everything needed. 3 months in and you don't have the money for the rent nor anything else anymore but have nowhere else to go. I wake up hitting the snooze button on my phone alarm. I start to get up wiping my eyes early in the morning 4 in the morning to be exact. I go to the shower running the water straight cold and I look in the mirror. I. Then turn and hop in the shower for 15 mins before getting out and putting of some dark blue jeans and a white t-shirt. You didn't pay your rent yesterday but I didn't say anything no, instead today you will pay the rent one way or another. I grab another outfit from a bag. It's one that is meant for a girl, it's a black lingerie one piece around, and the collar is fuzzy white fur and the lingerie comes along with some cat ears. I open my door heading to your room knocking on the door heavy and loud knowing you are still asleep "Hey we have to talk, you never paid this month's rent. I'm gonna leave something in front of your door, put it on and come talk to me in the kitchen." I drop the outfit in front of your door heading to the kitchen, pulling out two pans and then some eggs and bacon
Prompt 4- I woke up early as always and got up slowly heading into the bathroom and starting a cold shower. I got undressed from my night clothes and hopped in waking myself up with the cool water. About five minutes later I got out and looked in the mirror as I used a towel to dry my face and that's when I noticed a strange mark on the right side of my chest. "What the hell?" I question it as I hover over it with my fingers and a few memories flash through my mind of the night before mainly of a girl saying to use the power however I decided it was necessary. And then I passed out waking up in my bed. Shrugging it off I got dressed fully and grabbed my stuff to leave for my college classes of the day
This prompt is based on a anime called Code Geass. My character will be blessed with the power of the geass but in different ways. He can activate it with by his words or he can invade your mind and place what he wants into you mind to make you do it. Now what I do with this power is completely up to us.
Prompt 5- I took the lockbox out from underneath my bed. I had no clue what it said it was obviously from out of this world. I opened the box and inside was a chemistry setup of some sorts used to mix together different injections. It had a few recipes inside and the ingredients seemed to be infinite. It had four injections inside originally and when I used it on one of my friends by accident I was surprised that they listened to anything I said. I was slowly starting to decipher the clearly alien language and learned that the injections currently inside were syrumes that injected nanites into the person's body and the injector could control them in any way. Look at the other recipes the names were suggesting different things such as body altercations, a simple syrume making a person act like a chosen animal to even one that cause a instant but painful death. I sighed as I took out one of the syrumes that let me control someone and then put it in my pocket as I got ready to leave for my boring nine to five job
This roleplay is different from above but I want my character to find a alien chemistry mixing station of sorts. It allows me to make all types of syrumes that could alter my life in wonderful ways and others in wonderful ways If I chose or horrible ways if I chose that instead.
Prompt 6- This is a very different prompt. I was in a one on one gm style roleplay a while back and she is still very busy now so she can't roleplay as much. However I loved it and am looking for someone to start a new one with
So, the roleplay would be based on the webcomic/webnovel and now anime solo leveling. However, my character would be awakened as nothing like any other. I would be awakened with the class/job of fuckboy or something similar. Then I would go through the world trying to make my class works. I'd get skills based around manipulating and fucking women to help me in dungeons and out of dungeons.
If you have read it all and made it this far thank you for reading. I do appreciate it since there is alot to read here but in smaller buts basically. If you are interested in any of them or have your own idea then message me please. As you can tell slavery and the such is big for me and along with that so is free use and other kinks like that. Every roleplay in my list will all not be straight smut as well they all have a slice of life portion to them. I hope to hear from you all soon.

I found a home that I'd like to move my family to as our "forever home." It's currently for sale (the owners won't come down on the price, we tried to buy it) but I have reason to believe it may go into foreclosure in the next couple of months - the process has been going on for quite some time, there's a chance it may go for auction over the summer.
If it does go to auction, I would like the opportunity to bid on it. I've never done something like this before, and know everything is stacked against us - but I'd like to know if anyone has any practical advice.
The estimated prices are: Final judgement amount: $350k
Plaintiff's max bid: Unknown
Assessed value: $400k
Just market value: $650k
*I would check to make sure there aren't other liens on the property too.
My spouse and I have $200k in our 401ks, and about $350k equity in our current home (which we would sell if we took ownership of this home.)
Would it be crazy to take out a HELOC on our current home and borrow (or do the 60 day rollover) for our 401ks to try and get the house? With a HELOC, if we don't end up winning the bid, we could just not use the money correct? And then just roll our 401ks into IRAs? But if by some miracle we do get the home, just pay ourselves back with the equity from our current home?
I assume other people would bid on this property too, there are plenty of pictures on Zillow showing that it's not in bad shape. The current listing price is almost $800k. The just market value is in line with what we'd be willing to mortgage, but we'd never be able to come up with the cash to bid that high. We did offer that amount to the owners and they ignored us.

Ever feel like finding the perfect pillow is like searching for a unicorn? There's this place I've discovered that might just end your quest. They’ve got pillows that are not only super comfy but also pretty eco-friendly. Let's dive into what makes these pillows so special.

The Game-Changer Pillow

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What Makes It Special?

This pillow is not only about comfort. It’s made in the USA, ensuring high-quality, environmentally friendly production. It’s free from harmful chemicals and backed by certifications like CertiPUR-US® and OEKO-TEX® STANDARD 100. Knowing it’s safe for you and the environment adds a lot of peace of mind.

A No-Risk Tryout

One of the coolest parts is the 100-night trial. Yep, you get over three months to decide if this pillow is for you. Sleep on it, nap, have pillow fights – and if you’re not in love with it, returns are super easy.

Doing Good While Sleeping Well

Every purchase also means a pillow gets donated to someone in need. So, you’re not just investing in your sleep; you’re helping someone else get a good night’s rest too. It’s a win-win situation.

My Sleep Transformation

Since I started using this pillow, my sleep quality has improved massively. I’m a side sleeper, and the balance of support and softness has been perfect. No more waking up with neck pain, and the pillow stays cool all night. I sleep through the night without having to flip the pillow constantly. It’s been a game-changer, honestly.

Extra Perks for Pet Owners

Here’s something that might interest pet owners: they even have pillows designed specifically for pets! It’s pretty cool knowing that my furry friend can enjoy the same level of comfort I do. These pet pillows are made with the same quality and attention to detail, ensuring our pets get a cozy and restful sleep too.

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Give it a shot, and let me know how your sleep transforms!

It happened. He didn't deny that. Not like he was a suspect or anything—not yet—but he never denied it to himself. At the same time, this all happened over a decade ago—twelve years to be exact.
He didn't think of it every day; in fact, sometimes an entire month would go by where it barely crossed his mind.
In a way, that whole experience—he thought of all the abductions and murders as a singular event—now felt as if it belonged to somebody else.
It was a time in his life when he was confused, mixed-up, searching; a dark time, you know, like a phase. Who didn't have one of those in their past?
Plus, he was married now. His wife, Dee, obviously didn't know about it and he felt no obligation to tell her. Did he ask about her former lovers?
Sometimes there are things in the past and you just let them be. Whether it was Dee losing her virginity to the quarterback of the football team in the backseat at a drive-in or him using multiple black garbage bags and masking tape on that thing he didn't have time to bury in rural Tennessee, everyone has things they would rather forget about. Sometimes you just leave things where they lie.
So that's what Ned Doyle did.
Until that Sunday morning, November 6th, 1988.
He was a having a glass of Dee's pulpy homemade orange juice, waiting for his coffee to percolate, when he opened his heavy weekend edition of the New York Times (probably Ned's greatest extravagance—he liked its heft; and how the Arts & Leisure section made him feel culturally superior to his Ohio townsfolk, “the Philistines of Findlay,” he called them) when he saw the article buried in the back.
The country was two days from heading to the polls for the General Election—Bush v. Dukakis—so most everything else that week had been relegated to the back.
He read the article twice before he could even begin to make sense of it. It seemed to be a story about something called "DNA fingerprinting" and a 27-year-old baker in Great Britain named Colin Pitchfork who had confessed to raping and murdering two 15-year-old girls, in separate incidents a few years apart, after a new scientific process had been used to extract information from semen which he, Colin Pitchfork, had left at the crime scenes (likely inside the victims) some five years earlier.
Now if they could do all that after five years, why not ten years—or maybe even… twelve?
"Interesting story here," he said to Dee. It wasn't uncommon for Ned to read a news story twice—once for himself and a second time aloud to Dee while she brewed his coffee and burnt her toast. But this was his third reading and Ned acted as if it were his first.
"What do you make of that?" he asked. It somehow got worse each time he read it. After the third time, he felt as if he had been sucker punched in the stomach.
"Science Fiction is what it sounds like," Dee said matter-of-factly, pouring Ned his coffee in a mug that bore the Marathon Oil insignia. Findlay, Ohio was Marathon’s headquarters although there had been rumors circulating about a move to Texas.
"And unconstitutional," he said. "Cops running a dragnet like that, taking blood samples from 5,000 townspeople. Thankfully, that would never pass the muster here."
"They did catch the killer so maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea," she said, buttering her burnt toast. "Otherwise, who knows? They could have convicted the wrong man.”
Ned had already gotten lucky once – astonishingly so. Griffin Gerald Jones, the famed “I-75 Corridor Child Killer,” had claimed responsibility for all but one of Ned’s victims before dying in Florida’s electric chair.
"You can't have police in this country running around, sticking everyone with needles, drawing blood for some sort of science experiment,” he said. “Nevermind the Constitution, what about AIDS?”
“What about it?” she asked.
“There's been hundreds, thousands of cases now where people have been infected by giving blood,” he said. “That's a medical fact. Get accused of a crime and AIDS too?"
"It doesn't sound like any of the townspeople there in England got AIDS, darling. Unless there's more to the story, besides what you read to me."
He watched her spread orange marmalade over her burnt toast and take a bite. She had a dead tooth and he saw it every time she opened her mouth. He loved Dee but had never been sexually attracted to her. Not in the way he had been attracted to others.
"It really is just a matter of time before that stuff makes it over here," she said with her mouth full. "To this side of the pond, as they say." She took a sip of his orange juice. "Isn’t that how it always works? Things start over there in England, or in California, and then phht, before you know it, it makes its way to Findlay."
He held his hand over his stomach. She saw him wince.
"Was it my orange juice again? Was it still pulpy? I squeezed it by hand and even strained it twice this time."
"It’s not your fault,” he said. “I think it’s me. Orange juice is getting too… acidic for me." He looked at the clock on the coffee maker. "I'm going to be late."
He turned the page.
He played the 8 o'clock Mass by rote as he had many a bleary-eyed Sunday morning. It was pure muscle memory at this point. He made a few mistakes here and there, missed a key or two, but it was nothing the organ's sustain pedal couldn't mask – not that anyone would complain (not at the 8 o'clock anyway).
On Sundays Ned had four Masses: the 8, the 9:30, the big one at 11, and the 12:30 for the dilettantes who couldn't get their acts together for the 11.
He turned the page.
Today he was using Glory and Praise, AKA "the blue hymnal" for songs he knew by heart.
Turning the pages of his sheet music, reading each note, he was able to keep his mind off it.
Ned abhorred cliches (especially those involving sports) but he made an exception for “Out of sight, out of mind.” For Ned, that wasn’t a cliché; it was a way of life. He was a man who preferred to be heard, not seen, which made St. Bartholomew (or St. Bart’s) the perfect home for him.
In a spectacular architectural oversight, the church's pipe organ was situated so the organist's back was to the altar and pews. The organist of course needs to see what's going on in the Mass to read certain non-verbal cues but the arrangement suited Ned just fine. The congregation was comprised of many young families who had many young children—boys in particular—and it wasn't so much that he couldn't control himself because he was now firmly in control of all that; it was more that he didn't need any reminders of that time when he couldn't.
Especially during church.
So to see the altar behind him, Ned had installed an actual rearview mirror, the type you'd find on an old Buick, and he used a special type of putty to affix it to the mantle of the pipe organ. Having been the church organist at St. Bart's for nine years, he seldom needed it anymore—he could do it in his sleep—but it came in handy today as he found his attention drifting and he nearly missed the oratory refrain at the 9:30 Mass.
His real problems didn't start until the 35-minute break between the 8 and 9:30.
He was reorganizing his sheet music after the first wave of churchgoers had cleared out, when he began thinking about Colin Pitchfork again. The article said he was a baker in England somewhere—did it say he baked cakes or was that Ned's invention?
Even though no picture was provided in the Times article, Ned spent the balance of the 9:30 service picturing the 27- year-old ex-rapist/murderer working in his small English bakery, quietly going about his business, baking his cakes, when the police (Bobbies?) came.
Was he expecting them?
He played the offertory hymn, "On Eagle's Wings," as the ushers began taking up the collections and a family of parishioners he’d never seen before brought the gifts up.
And what was going through Pitchfork's head when he saw the Bobbies there? When they began asking him about rapes and murders that happened almost five years ago? The article said that he had initially given investigators someone else's blood when “the enquiry” began. Had he somehow caught wind of this “DNA Fingerprinting?”
There was a new usher, Ned noticed, in his makeshift rearview mirror.
The Times article said that one of Pitchfork's co-workers at the bakery had taken the blood test masquerading as Pitchfork because Pitchfork had told the co-worker that ‘he could not give blood under his own name because he had already given blood while pretending to be a friend of his who had wanted to avoid being harassed by police because of a youthful conviction for burglary.’ This story was later overheard by a woman in a pub who immediately went to the police.
Ned realized he had missed the homily twice now. Not that it mattered. Heard one you've heard them all and Ned was pretty sure there would be no surprises. Plus, he'd have two more chances to catch it. He knew he would have to really focus for the 11 o'clock. That was always the main event. He was going to play "I Will Raise Him Up," a complex hymn, which required his full attention. He would scratch that one now if he hadn’t read that article and if the Sunday programs hadn't already been printed. People liked that one –it was a real barn burner, as they say—and if he skipped it, there might be questions.
The last thing Ned needed right now were fucking questions.
Who was this new usher, by the way?

By the start of the 11 o'clock Mass, Ned wondered whether anyone would even show for the 12:30, seeing that it was already standing room only. The 11 was always the most popular Mass, but today felt different; it was packed like Christmas Eve. What was the occasion? Was the predominantly conservative town that afraid of Dukakis winning the presidency? Ohio was a swing state after all and that image of the little Greek man in the tank was unnerving, sure, but was it enough to warrant this sort of turnout for the 11 AM Mass at St. Bart's in Findlay?
Or was something else going on?
Ned didn’t believe they had come to hear his rendition of "I Will Raise Him Up."
Or could there be another reason? Maybe they had all read the same Times article. Maybe there had long been simmering suspicion of Ned in the community and maybe the article finally prompted the townspeople to join together and take arms. With pitchforks.
On March 31, 1892, the only known lynching in the history of Hancock County occurred when a mob of 1,000 men, many "respectable citizens," broke into the county jail in Findlay. They lynched Mr. Lytle, a man who had killed his wife and two daughters with a hatchet the day before. The townsfolk hanged the man twice (first from the bridge, then a telegraph pole) and then, in a classic case of overkill, shot his body over a dozen times. The authorities had intended to transfer the prisoner out of town at 1 o'clock in secret, where a train was scheduled to transport him to Lima, but someone talked.
Ned had only confessed what he had done to one person – a priest eight years prior. The priest was set to retire as he was dying of pancreatic cancer and visiting from a nearby parish. For years Ned had heard this priest was “of the old school” – i.e., your word to God’s ear, and it went no further. He was as safe as they come. Still, even then, Ned used the screened side of the Confessional, lowered his voice a full octave, and spoke of what he had done obliquely and in generalities. They were mortal sins. His penance severe: to repent and refrain from repeating the act again. The priest was now long dead. There’s no way he could have tracked Ned down and told anyone. Was there?
The last one was named Derek. That was the only one left unsolved.
He would play "I Will Raise Him Up" during Communion. Because of the crowds, he knew the communion lines would be longer and would thus require him to stretch the already difficult song a few minutes longer. If he was going to supply the masses, he was going to need a bigger yield. In a way it was like baking a cake, wasn't it?
He met Derek at a Dairy Queen in Paducah, Kentucky. It was Labor Day 1976. It must have been 100 degrees out, but it felt even hotter with the humidity. It was a real scorcher.
Derek had a bicycle with an American flag banana seat. It was the summer of Bicentennial Fever. The Dairy Queen was in an area known as Noble Park. It had a tin canopy that kept cars cool in the shade.
Ned missed a note as he turned the page. He stepped on the sustain pedal and his mistake sounded deliberate and beautiful even.
It was early evening; fireflies were out in full force and Ned was blotto. He had been drinking beer—cans of Schlitz—all day at the picnic of a friend (technically, the friend of an acquaintance so basically a stranger). A born introvert who still lived alone (this was pre-Dee), Ned was very drunk and primed for small talk. You must also remember this was a very different time. This was back when you still opened cans with an opener; drunk driving was frowned upon but not the cardinal sin it is today; and a grown man could still park outside a Dairy Queen and strike up an innocent conversation with a prepubescent boy on a bike.
"What da ya' got there?" Ned asked.
"Butterscotch Sundae," the boy said. The boy was blonde with brown eyes.
"Butterscotch, eh?"
The boy licked his plastic spoon and stared somewhere beyond the pea-green 1974 Buick Riviera Ned had inherited from his old man after he had kicked the bucket.
"For the life of me, I can't remember if I like butterscotch or not," Ned said. "That probably sounds pretty screwy, I bet."
"Get a free sample at the window,” the kid said. “They're free."
"Looks awfully busy over there. Mind if I have a taste of yours? I don't have any cooties, I promise."
The kid dragged his spoon over his ice cream as he mulled it over. Maybe seeing that he was almost done with it anyway, he figured what's the harm. He handed Ned the Styrofoam cup.
Ned looked at the boy as he stirred it a little and then placed the curved side of the spoon on his tongue and kept it there.
"I do like butterscotch," Ned said, giving it back. "Thank you for sharing that with me, that was awfully kind of you—say, what is your name?"
"Derek," the boy said.
"Derek. What a nice boy you are. Do you like dogs, Derek?"
"Sure," Derek said.
"Do you have a dog?"
"Not anymore. Used to. We had a beagle named Eleanor but she went blind and then lame and then..."
"What kind of dog was she?" Ned asked.
"A beagle," the boy said.
"A beagle, yes you said that. You like Golden Retrievers?"
"Sure," the boy said.
"Cause I have a Golden Retriever. It's a girl too. A bitch."
Derek smiled.
"She's pregnant. I mean she was. But… she just gave birth."
"To puppies?"
"You betcha. It was just a few weeks ago. She had a whole litter of 'em. Boys, girls. Cutest little pups you've ever seen. The thing is, Derek, I don't know what to do with them all. You're a nice boy. You just shared your Butterscotch Sundae with me and I'd care to return the favor. Would you… like a puppy?"
"How much?"
"For nothing,” Ned said. “For free.”
"You'll give me a puppy for nothing? And I can pick the one I want?"
"Sure can. They're at my place just down the road. Thing is, it's probably too far to bike there. And you're going to need both hands to hold on to the puppy. Hop in, I’ll give you a lift."
"What about my bike?"
"We could put it in the trunk but we're not going to be long. We'll be right back. It'll be safe here. People don't take things that aren’t theirs around here – especially when there's a lot of people around."
He remembered waking up on the floor of his apartment disoriented. He was late for work. He was still working as a salesman at the piano store. There was a big Labor Day sale still going on. Labor Day was always a big day for retail. The owner was a nice man and Ned wanted to call him and apologize but he wasn't sure what to say yet.
He hadn't planned on sleeping in. Forgetting work on Labor Day. The irony.
He saw the boy's underwear on his floor. They were tighty-whities from Fruit of the Loom. He thought of that every time he saw an ad for that company afterward.
They weren’t bloody but they were torn.
He remembered the sound of the filter on the aquarium he used to keep in his apartment. It was noisy but sometimes that was a good thing. He was very into Japanese Fighting Fish for a while until it became too expensive as they always killed each other.
There were no puppies obviously.
His apartment did not allow dogs.
His sense of disorientation and the ensuing panic prevented him from experiencing any of the usual remorse he felt afterward.
There would be plenty of time for that later.
The boy's body was in the bathroom just off the bedroom and he needed to get rid of it. He needed to get out of town. Out of Paducah. Out of Kentucky.
He placed the boy in a hardshell Samsonite suitcase, carried it out of his apartment, walked down the one flight of steps. He saw no one and he was confident no one had seen him. The suitcase was lighter than it should have been—a detail he never forgot—and he walked out to the carport where he saw his Riviera parked sloppily between the lines. He felt a wave of nausea come over him but he suppressed it. He opened his trunk, placed the suitcase in the back, and then looked around the apartment complex before walking back inside. He cleaned up with bleach. Showered. Hit the road.
There were no police gathered outside the Dairy Queen. It wasn’t a crime scene. He didn't look to see if the boy’s bike was still there; he didn’t want to appear suspicious.
He needed to get out of Paducah so he headed toward the freeway.
For a moment he briefly considered the Shawnee National Forest, which was to the north, but he stuck to his gut and took the newly-constructed Interstate 24 East toward Tennessee. Aside from getting out of Kentucky, he didn't have a plan. The asphalt was brand new and at times he felt as though he were floating across the highway. It took about two hours to get to the state line and once he was over, he filled up at a 76 Station in Clarksville, Tennessee. Only when he was filling his tank and had a moment to reflect, did he think about what was in the trunk. He imagined he had Superman's X-Ray vision and pictured the suitcase in the back, the boy's tiny body folded like a pretzel inside.
He missed both the readings, the Gospel, and the homily again. Then came the Consecration which was over before he knew it. It was time. He began to play "I Will Raise Him Up." In his rearview, he saw the communion lines forming and he thought he caught a glimpse of the new usher staring at him, but he couldn't be sure. He needed to concentrate on the song. People knew this one; people wanted to hear it exactly as they remembered it, and it was a full house, so the sustain pedal wouldn't save him this time.
Once he made it through the chorus, he knew he could relax a little.
The "DNA fingerprinting" in Pitchfork's case came from semen that was left inside of the victims.
Ned had made it to the outskirts of Nashville faster than he expected. He still hadn't checked in with Mr. Cory, the owner of the piano store. He desperately needed an alibi. Old Mr. Cory could probably send Ned to the electric chair if he wasn't careful.
He got on Highway 386 and headed north. After 20 minutes, he exited in Gallatin and drove around until he found an area he thought was remote. There was a road called Cages Bend.
He liked the sound of that.
It sounded hopeful.
He took that until he came to a gravel road, which looked as if it led to an even more secluded wooded area.
In the rearview, he remembered the cloud of dust kicked up by the tires of the Riviera he had inherited from his father, the drunk, who had done to him what he had gone on to do to others.
In the rearview, the communion lines were still going strong. No sign of that new usher.
He came upon a bend in the road that looked totally secluded, as if no one had been there in years. He cut the engine and listened for a moment. The invisible cicadas high up in the trees made it sound as if a giant rattle snake was slithering around him, preparing to strike. He got out of the car.
He didn't know if it was the trees or the fields of tall grass, but something smelled like semen.
He opened the trunk with his keys and pulled out the hardshell suitcase. When he closed the trunk there was a rustling in the tall grass but when he looked, he saw only a herd of white tail deer scattering.
Initially he had planned on dumping the body and taking the suitcase home with him. He didn't think to bring a shovel. Then he heard the sound of a bush hog—a piece of farm equipment with spinning blades that cut vegetation and cleared the land. He couldn't tell which direction it was coming from. He checked to make sure his suitcase didn't have any labels on it or name tags. He then two black trash bags in his back seat and wrapped the suitcase – one bag around the top, the other on the bottom, and secured it with masking tape. Then he carried it into the woods and set it down in some brush. He began snapping tree branches off to make cover but as the bush hog got louder and closer he panicked, leaving it only partially covered.
The communion lines had dissipated. Everyone was sitting now, even the priest.
Everyone always knelt until the priest sat and Ned should never be playing if the priest was sitting but somehow, Ned had missed his cue.
He concluded "I Will Raise Him Up" softly, using the sustain to ease himself out.
He looked in the rearview and saw the priest staring at him.
As was the rest of the congregation.
They would all be coming for him soon enough.
Unless he could make it back down to Tennessee and get rid of that thing once and for all – assuming it hadn’t been found yet.
Somehow, deep down, Ned always knew it was going to happen.
He was raised up, alright.
Now it was just a matter of time.

Wondering if this is a solid build for under $1000, considering that the placeholder 3060 in the part list is a Lenovo OEM I got for free. 90% of my time with this will be spent gaming with some light music production, and most of the games I play are CS, Fortnite, and Overwatch (aiming for 240fps). I would also like to play Cities Skylines 2 and DCS World on this.

• I do plan to upgrade the GPU when I can comfortably afford a much more powerful one

[PCPartPicker Part List](https://pcpartpicker.com/list/khjxJy)
Questions

Is this a brand new build, or an upgrade to an existing build?

new build

Please list any existing parts or monitor(s) you have that you would like to re-use with this build. For upgrades, a PCPartPicker list of your full build is extremely helpful. Be as specific as you can be here, including links or exact model numbers of each component whenever possible.

n/a

What will this PC be used for? Examples include things like gaming, general/multimedia use, photo/video editing, coding, AI/ML, etc. Include specific games and applications you intend to run, and any particular performance goals you have, as each may have different specific hardware needs.

mostly gaming, competitive low settings 240fps, occasional cities skylines + dcs world. very little music production

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US, no microcenter

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n/a

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$1000 max (tower only)

Do you need WiFi, or do you have a wired ethernet connection available?

wifi would be nice, but ethernet is available

Do you have any specific size or noise requirements for the build?

mATX preferred

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nope

Any other specific requests or requirements? Examples might include a specific minimum amount of storage, or a particular CPU socket for a future upgrade path, etc. I will follow the instructions

‼️🚨‼️🚨‼️🚨EXPLANATION OF WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO DO HERE, THIS IS DUMBED DOWN TO EASY TERMS FOR EVERYONE EVEN PEOPLE WHO ARNT INTO STOCKS AND ARE HERE FOR FUN CAN UNDERSTAND TAKE 5 MINUTES THIS WEEKEND AND TRULY UNDERSTAND ALL OF THIS INFORMATION ‼️🚨‼️🚨‼️🚨 CREDIT: BIG BRAIN APE MAXIMUM PURPOSE
Please read this I copied and paste it from a super smart ape!!!!
Please read this I copied and paste it from a super smart ape!!!!
Alright lets get into it.
But before we do, I need to explain exactly what it means for a company to be "shorted" and as a response, be "short squeezed"
Ill explain in monkey speak first:
Imagine a store has a supply of 100 bananas for sale at 1.00 per banana.
Now, a certain animal (lets call this animal a bear) thinks that the cost per banana will drop from 1.00 dollar to 0.50 cents. They go to the store and they borrow 50 bananas promising to return them. The bear, now in debt to the store, sells those bananas at 1.00 each and collects 50 dollars. Then, the market price for a banana drops to 0.50, they go and buy back the 50 bananas (now at 0.50 cents) paying 25 dollars, then return them back to the person they bought them from. This relieves the bears from their debts and they pocket 25 dollars in the process.
This is the process of shorting a company. They will "Borrow" or "Short" a companies shares when they think it will drop. They sell those shares. The market price drops. Then they buy them back at a low price. Then return them to who they borrowed from and make some serious money.
Typically, this is done to companies who are not looking like they will have very much growth (i.e., GameStop in an increasingly electronic world. Or FFIE in a world where Chinese electric cars are being restricted from sales in the USA for foreign policy reasons.)
Now, a short squeeze happens when another animal (lets say a bull (or maybe an ape would actually be better)) decides that they don't really want the price of bananas to drop because they really really really really like bananas. So the ape goes to the store and buys all the available bananas as well as buying them from the bears. Now, since there's no more available, and bananas are in demand, the price rises up to 1.50, instead of dropping.
Now, the bears are in a dilemma. They need to return the bananas to the person they bought them from. If they don't, the person they borrowed from is going to start charging them late fees for every day that they don't return the bananas.
As you can imagine, the bears would be SUPER angry about this, and fight the apes tooth and nail to try to get them to sell. They will tell everyone (via the media) that the apes are bad. They will publish false information about the cost of bananas. They will try to borrow bananas from other people to make it seem like bananas arent worth anything.
BUT, if the apes hold onto their sweet, juicy bananas, then the bears cant get find any to buy even if they wanted to. So the apes eventually will say "I will give you my bananas back for a premium cost of 10 dollars. Now, the apes who bought all the bananas for 100 dollars will sell them back to get 1000 dollars instead.
Essentially, the apes can make the price whatever they want, because the bears are paying a late fee for every day that they don't return the original bananas. At some point, the late fee will become so expensive that they will pay whatever it takes to get the bananas back.
This is known as a short squeeze. And the apes can potentially make lots of money on those bananas.
Applying this to the market, if FFIE is being shorted, and you all decide you want to squeeze them. Then hold, your shares, the shorter will pay whatever it takes to get those shares returned.
Now, there are a few things that are required to make a short squeeze happen:

1. There needs to be an entity (hedge funds) who shorted the stocks, betting the price would decline. Very simple to find out as it is public information.
   
2. There needs to be an entity (You mad lads) who wants to make money off their shorts (this is a bit harder as y'all get scared of the fight back by them and sell out).
   
3. Time investment to make the hedge funds sweat about losing money on the shares they borrowed.
   

PHEW! That was tough. You did good though, Now, you are all experts on the idea behind a short squeeze.
Lets see if FFIE has the requirements needed to begin a short squeeze:

1. The shorts. On April 30th, and in my Last Post , I showed an image that the company FFIE was absolutely being shorted. In fact, 98% of the total shares of the company were being shorted. So yes, FFIE met requirement number 1.

Now, there has been ALOT of debate regarding the current number of shorts. And I'll help resolve WHY this debate has been ongoing. I believe that much of this debate lies in the differences between the terms "short volume" and "Short interest"
Many have been screaming that the short interest of a company is only posted every 2 weeks. Which is absolutely true.
Others have been posting that the shorted volume of FFIE is at VERY high numbers. Which is also true.
For those that don't understand the market, the short interest and short volume are interchangable. That is why so many of you have been so confused.
Im here to tell you, THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.
There are very clear differences between the two numbers and their reliability, in terms of a squeeze is extremely different. Ill try to make it simple for you and put your questions and confusions to bed.
STRAP IN! THIS IS TOTALLY NOT GOING TO BE BORING!
Official definition online for short interest from the fintel website:
"collected by FINRA from brokers twice a month and distributed by the stock exchanges. So, twice a month all the brokedealers add up all the short positions held in all of their custodial accounts — that means yours, mine, and all the hedge funds — and send the totals to FINRA."
Yawn am I right?
Yeah that was literally ctrl. C then ctrl . V onto this text. Doesn't seem too intuitive does it.
What the heck does this mean? Ape speak please?
The short Interest is the number of shares shorted by all of the different hedge funds. It is a comprehensive list of all the numbers of the total number of short shares.
However, it only represents a snapshot in time. Typically, it is a snapshot in time from the day that it is required to be reported. The most recent numbers came on today (5/24).
In general, this number can be manipulated. Think of it like taking a picture. Because that number is based on a snapshot in time, and hedge funds know when the picture will be taken, they can hide the number of shorted shares during the picture, and then once the camera takes its picture, they go back to normal. It is a way that the bears can lie about the fact that they borrowed shares.
Official definition online for short VOLUME from the FINTEL website:
the accumulated trades published to the consolidated tape. Every trade that is made is published in real time to the tape. At the end of the trading day, every trading venue publishes their volume numbers, which includes both Short Volume and Total Volume.
Jesus. That was a difficult read. Are you still awake?
Okay again. Super easy to understand. Right? Right? Yeah not so much. I hate the technical terminology used but I guess I can explain.
The short VOLUME is is a more accurate measure of how a particular stock is being shorted. I think of it more like a video tape. It is a collection of all shorting trades made, and is posted every day. It is a lot of information to sort through, but the numbers speak VOLUMES to the efficiency of a possible squeeze (haha volume. Get it?)
In the end, if the VOLUME of shorted shares remains high, then the company is relying on the price of the stock to decline, or trying to hold out when a squeeze is happening in the hopes that the price of the shares drop again. This is the number we care about. This number is COMPREHENSIVE of all shorted stocks (including off-exchange/darkpool numbers and retail shorts)
DONT WORRY ILL EXPLAIN WHAT OFF EXCHANGE/DARK POOL IS LATER
Here is another explanation in terms a dumb ape would understand:
Okay so using the previous "APE vs BEAR banana in supermarket example"
Lets start where the Apes have purchased all the bananas and we think the bears have shorted banana sales.
So, lets imagine that the laws require that the Bears post publicly exactly how many bananas they borrowed from the lender. They are required to post this information every 2 weeks. They know they have to post soon. Therefore, to scare the apes into thinking they aren't actually squeezing, they take their picture of their borrowed bananas and post it. In the picture (since they had time to organize their efforts) it shows that they, in fact, didn't borrow any bananas. Now the apes would be panicked right? They have all these bananas for no reason. But a SMART ape would understand that they could use that photo to manipulate us. They obviously just quickly hid the fact that they borrowed bananas for the picture. The bears used the required "short interest picture" to scare you all into thinking your bananas were worthless, and encourage you to sell them.
Instead, its better to look at the security footage of the bears hiding their borrowed banana receipts. We'd be able to catch them red handed! Thus, we look at the "short volume" of bananas. The problem is, each bear individually posts their volume every day, and doesn't compile it in one clear video for us. Why would they? The more we know, the more we can charge for our bananas.
Plus, there are also dozens (if not hundreds) of bears all posting, accurate, but misleading, numbers. They make a united effort to throw as many confusing, and non-relevant videos into the mix to divert our attention.
This is EXACTLY what you have seen posted all week. Various people posting different volume numbers. And while each volume number they posted is accurate, they are only a partial truth.
FREE BANANA TO ANYONE WHO CAN TELL ME WHERE WE GET THE COMPILED, ACCUATE DATA.
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Processing img sk8kra6xrf2d1...
Well, with the report of the "snapshot" that is released every 2 weeks, we also get another bit of information. The total number of exchanged shorts "off exchange."
Are you still following? This is where it gets even more confusing.
With the report, FINTEL also publishes a number known as the "off exchange short volume"
Processing img e97flyiznf2d1...
This number is the most accurate number to describe how many shares of a stock are currently being shorted. As we learned above, the "short interest" isn't reliable as the bears can hide their numbers during the picture.
However, at some point, some smart person (probably being super angry at how the bears could lie using short interest pictures) made a law that requires them disclose the number of currently exchanged "off market/dark pool" exchanges that were made.
An off market exchange is what happens when a bear decides to trade with another bear out of the public eye.
Why would they do this?
Back to our "ape speak" example
Okay so the bears know that they have their upcoming (2-week) picture that gets released. They want to make it seem like they don't have any owed bananas.
What do they do? How can they just lie for a picture?
The answer is in off market exchanges. You see, the bears found out that they can trade their shorts WITH EACHOTHER.
So for the picture, Mr. Black bear gives all his receipts to the polar bear. Then, when the Mr. Polar bear takes his photo, he gives them to Mr. Black bear (since he already took his photo).
These off market exchanges tend to SKYROCKET during a few times. One of which, is when hedge funds try to hide how much of an investment they have in their shorted shares.
So, over the next few days, we will see many people posting "OMG THEY ARENT EVEN SHORTING BECAUSE THE SHORT INTEREST IS DOWN FROM LAST POST"
Well, of course its lower. The last posted information, the hedge funds didn't know they would be squeezed. Therefore, they didn't feel the need to hide the short interest. Now, they need to hide it to scare you. So they create fear by lowering that number. But when that short interest number goes down, and off exchange goes up, it means they are still holding shorts, but just covering it up for their short interest reports.
Okay, so lets look at these numbers and see what it means for squeezers.
LONG STORY SHORT, THEY HAVE NOT NOT RETURNED THEIR SHORTS. They are simply trying to manipulate us into believing that they did.
In fact, they went from 36 million shorts UP to 64 million shorts (likely a bit less as this number includes transfers of shorts both ways).
But still, they have hope. Let's strip it away from them and make it KNOWN that they are manipulating. Time to HOLD and TIME TO BUY.
When you hold/buy shares, then the second requirement and third requirement for the squeeze are in our hands entirely.
Now, I know there's alot more to say, but I know people are waiting for my post so Im going to cut it short here. Ill make another post this weekend regarding the specific trading patterns we saw on the day-to-day that imply that the bears were trying to make us panic sell our shares.
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Good Luck everyone. DMs are open for questions and corrections that might be needed.
With love,
MP- guardian APE

PLAYBOY Interview With Conan O'Brien Interview by Kevin Cook For Playboy Magazine February 1998
A candid conversation with the preppie prince of "Late Night" about his rocky start, his show's secret one-day cancellation and how David Letterman saved the day.
He was polite. He was funny. He gave us a communicable disease.
At 34 Conan O'Brien is hotter than the fever he was running when we met in his private domain above the "Late Night" sound stage. A gangly freckle-faced ex-high school geek he is "one of TV's hottest properties" according to "People" magazine. The host of "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" has become his generation's king of comedy.
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. Congested too, but O'Brien has far more to worry about than his head cold. A perfectionist who broods over one bad minute in an otherwise perfect hour of TV, he worries he might be anhedonic, "I have trouble with success," he says, "I was raised to believe that if something good happens something bad is coming." Sure things look good now "Rolling Stone" calls "Late Night" "the hottest comedy show on TV." Ratings are better than ever, particularly among 18- to 34-year-olds, the viewers advertisers crave.
But O'Brien only works harder. Despite his illness he taped two shows in 26 hours on three hours' sleep. He smoothly interviewed Elton John then burst into coughing fits during commercials. Later in his crammed corner office overlooking Manhattan traffic Conan the Cool gulped Dayquil gel caps. He coughed spewing microbes.
"Sorry, sorry," he said. Of course O'Brien can't complain. He came seriously close to falling to being banished behind the scenes as just another failed talk show host.
At his first "Late Night" press conference he corrected a reporter who called him a relative unknown, "Sir I am a complete unknown," he said. That line got a laugh, but soon O'Brien looked doomed. His September 13, 1993 debut began with O'Brien in his dressing room preparing to hang himself only to be interrupted by the start of his show. Before long his career was hanging by a thread. Ratings were terrible. Critics hated the show. Tom Shales of "The Washington Post" called it as "lifeless and messy as roadkill." Shales said O'Brien should quit.
Network officials held urgent meetings discussing the Conan O'Brien debacle. Should they fire him? How should they explain their mistake?
In the end of course he turned it around. The network hung with him long enough for the ratings to improve and the host of the cooler-than-ever "Late Night" now defines comedy's cutting edge just as Letterman did ten years ago.
Even Shales loves "Late Night" these days. He calls O'Brien's turnaround "one of the most amazing transformations in television history."
O'Brien was born on April 18, 1963 in Brookline, Massachusetts. His father, a doctor, is a professor at Harvard Medical School. His mother, a lawyer, is a partner at an elite Boston Law firm. Conan, the third of six children became a lector at church and a misfit at school. Tall and goofy, bedeviled with acne, he tried to impress girls with jokes. That plan usually bombed, but O'Brien eventually found his niche at Harvard where he won the presidency of the "Harvard Lampoon" in 1983 and again in 1984 - the first two-time "Lampoon" president since humorist Robert Benchley held the honor 85 years ago.
After graduating magna cum laude with a double major in literature and American history he turned pro. Writing for HBO's "Not Necessarily The News." O'Brien was earning $100,000 a year before his 24th birthday. But writing was never enough.
He honed his performance skills with the Groundlings, a Los Angeles improv group. There he worked with his onetime girlfriend Lisa Kudrow, now starring on "Friends." But Conan was not such a standout. In 1988 he landed a job at "Saturday Night Live" - but as a writer, not as on-air talent. In almost four years on the show O'Brien made only fleeting appearances, usually as a crowd member or security guard. His writing was more memorable. He wrote (or co-wrote) Tom hanks' "Mr Short-Term Memory" skits as well as the "pump you up" infosatire of Hanz and Franz and the nude beach sketch in which Matthew Broderick and "SNL" members played nudists admiring one another's penises. With dozens of mentions of the word that hit was the most penis-heavy moment in TV history. It helped O'Brien win an Emmy for comedy writing.
In 1991 he quit "SNL" and moved on to "The Simpsons" where he worked for two years. His urge to perform came out in wall-bouncing antics in writers' meetings. "Conan makes you fall out of your chair" said "Simpsons" creator Matt Groening. O'Brien's yen to act out was so strong that he spurned Fox's reported seven-figure offer to continue as a writer. He was driving for the spotlight.
By then David Letterman had announced he was turning shin - leaving NBC taking his ton-rated act to CBS. Suddenly NBC was up a creek without a host. The network turned to Lorne Michaels, O'Brien's "Saturday Night Live" boss. Michaels enlisted Conan's help in the host search planning to use him in a behind-the-scenes job. But when Garry Shandling, Dana Carvey and almost every other star turned down the chore of following Letterman, Michaels finally listened to Conan's crazy suggestion, "Let me do it!" Michaels persuaded the network to entrust it's 12:30 slot which Letterman had turned into a gold mine to an untested wiseass from Harvard.
O'Brien was working on one of his last "Simpsons" episodes when he got the news. He turned "paler than usual," Groening recalled. The Conan moseyed back to where the other writers were working, "I'll come back with the Homer Simspon joke later. I have to go replace Letterman," he said.
NBC executives now get credit for their foresight during those dark days of 1993 and 1994. They snared the axe and now reap the multimillion-dollar spoils of that decision. In fact, the story is not so simple. We sent Contributing Editor Kevin Cook to unravel the tale of O'Brien's survival, which he tells here for the first time. Cook reports:
"His office is chock-full of significa. There's a three-foot plastic pickle the Letterman staff left behind in 1993 - perhaps to suggest what a predicament he was in. There's a copy of Jack Paar's 'I Kid You Not' and a coffee-table book called 'Saturday Night Live: The First 20 Years.' His bulletin board features letters from fans such as John Watters and Bob Dole and an 8" x 10" glossy of Andy Richter with the inscription: "To Conan - Your bitter jealousy warms my black heart. Love and Kisses Andy."
"Of course it's all for show. From the photos of kitch icons Adam West and Robert Stack to the framed Stan Laurel autograph, from the deathbed painting of Abraham Lincoln, to the ironic star taped to Conan's door - they're all clever signals that tell a visitor how to view the star. Lincoln was his collegiate preoccupation: stardom is his occupation. Somewhere between the two I hoped to find the real O'Brien.
"As a Playboy reader he wanted to give me a better-than-average interview. I wanted something more - a definitive look at the guy who may end up being the Johnny Carson of his generation."
"Here's hoping we succeeded. If not I carried his germs 3000 miles and infected dozens of Californians for no good reason.
O'Brien: Yes, this is how to do a Playboy Interview -- completely tanked on cold medicine. I'll pick it up and read, "Yes, I'm gay."
Playboy: We could talk another time. O'Brien: (coughing) No, it's OK. I memorized Dennis Rodman's answers. Can I use them?
Playboy: You sound really sick. Do you ever take a day off? O'Brien: No. The age of talk show hosts taking days off is over. Johnny Carson could go to Africa when he was the only game in town -- "See you in two weeks!" But nobody does that now. I will give you a million dollars on the first day Jay takes off for illness.
Playboy: Do you ever slow down and enjoy your success? O'Brien: If anything, the pace is picking up. Restaurateurs insist on giving me a table even if I'm only passing by, so I'm eating nine meals a night. Women stop me on the street and hand me their phone numbers.
Playboy: So you have groupies? O'Brien: Oh yes. And other fans. Drifters. Prisoners. Insomniacs. Cab Drivers, who must watch a lot of late night TV, seem to love me lately. They keep saying, "You will not pay, you will not pay, you make me happy!"
Playboy: How happy did your new contract make you? O'Brien: Terrified. The network said, "We're all set for five years." I said, "Shut up, shut up! I can't think that far ahead." Tonight, for instance, I do my jokes, then interview Elton John and Tim Meadows. We finished taping about 6:30. By 6:45 my memory was erased and my only thought was, Tomorrow: John Tesh. And I started to obsess about John Tesh. Sad, don't you think?
Playboy: Not too sad. You got off to a rocky start but now you're so hot that People magazine recently said, "that was then, this is wow." O'Brien: I try not to pay much attention. Since I ignored the critics who said I should shoot myself in the head with a German Luger, it would be cheating to tear out nice reviews now and rub them all over my body, giggling. Though I have thought about it.
Playboy: Tell us about your trademark gag. You interview a photo of Bill Clinton or some other celeb, and a pair of superimposed lips provide outrageous answers. O'Brien: We call it the Clutch Cargo bit, after that terrible old cartoon series. They saved money on animation by superimposing real lips on the cartoons. I wanted to do topical jokes in a cartoony way -- not just Conan doing quips at a desk. TV is visual; I want things to look funny. But we're not Saturday Night Live; we couldn't spend $100,000 on it. Hence, the cheap, cheesy lips, You'd be surprised how many people we fool.
Playboy: Viewers believe that's really the president yelling, "Yee-haw! Who's got a joint?" O'Brien: It's strange. You may know intellectually that Clinton doesn't talk like Foghorn Leghorn. Ninety-eight percent of your brain knows the president wouldn't say, "Whoa Conan get a load of that girl!" But there are a few brain cells that aren't sure. When Bob Dole was running for president we had him doing a past-life regression: "My cave, get away." And then back further, "Must form flippers to crawl on to rocky soil," he says. There may be people out there who believe that Bob Dole was the first amphibian.
Playboy: Do you ever go too far? O'Brien: The fun is in going too far. It's a nice device because you get Bill Clinton to do the nastiest Bill Clinton jokes. We'll have Clinton making fart noises while I say "Sir! Please!"
Playboy: Are you enjoying your job now, with your new success? O'Brien: Well, there are surprises. I hate surprises. Like most comics, I'm a control freak. But I am learning that the show works best when things are out of control. Tonight I ask Elton John if he likes being neighbors with Joan Collins. He says he isn't neighbors with Joan Collins. He lives next door to Tina Turner. So I panic -- huge mistake! But Elton saves the day. "Joan Collins, Tina Turner, it doesn't matter. Either way I could borrow a wig," he says. Huge laugh, all because I fucked up. Later he surprised me by blurting out that he's hung like a horse. The camera cuts to me shaking my head: That crazy Elton. What can I do? Of course, I'm delighted that he went too far.
Playboy: That "What can I do?" look resembles a classic take of Jack Benny's. O'Brien: There's an old saying in literature: "Good poets borrow; great poets steal." I think T.S. Eliot stole it from Ezra Pound. Comics steal, too. Constantly. When I watched Johnny Carson, I noticed that he got a few takes from Benny and Bob Hope. When a comedy writer told me how much Woody Allen had borrowed from Hope, I thought, What? They're nothing alike. Then I went back and watched Son of Paleface, and there's Hope, the nervous city guy backing up on his heels, wringing his hands and saying, "Sorry, I'll just be moving along." Now look at early Woody Allen. You see big authority figures and Woody nervously saying, "Look, I'll just be on my way." Of course Woody made it his own, but he must have watched and loved Bob Hope.
Playboy: Who are your role models? O'Brien: Carson. Woody Allen. SCTV. Peter Sellers. When Peter Sellers died I felt such a loss, thinking, There won't be anymore of that. There's some Steve Martin in my false bravado with female guests: "Why, hel-lo there!" And I won't deny having some Letterman in my bones.
Playboy: You were surprise as Letterman's successor. At first you seemed like the wrong choice. O'Brien: I didn't get ratings. That doesn't mean I didn't get laughs. Yes, I had a giant pompadour and I looked like a rockabilly freak. I was too excited, pushed too hard, and people said, "That guy isn't a polished performer." Fine! But it isn't my goal to be Joe Handsomehead cool, smooth talk show host. Late Night with Conan O'Brien is supposed to be a work in progress, and now that we've had some success there's a danger of our getting too polished and morphing into something smoothly professional. Which would suck.
Do you know why I wanted this show? Because Late Night with David Letterman played with the rules and it looked like fun. Here was a place where people did risky comedy every night for millions of people. We had to keep this thing alive. There should be a place on a big network where people are still messing around.
Playboy: How bad were your early days on the show? O'Brien: Bad. Dave left here under a cloud: his fans and the media were angry with NBC. Then NBC picks a guy with crazy hair and a weird name. And the world says, "Harvard? Those guys are assholes." I sincerely hope that the winter of December 1993, our first winter, was the worst time I will ever have. I'd go out to do the warm up and the back two rows of seats would be empty. That's hard to look at. I would tell a joke and then hear someone whisper, "Who's he? Where's Dave?"
Playboy: You had trouble getting guests. O'Brien: Bob Denver canceled on us. We shot a test show with Al Lewis of The Munsters. We did the clutch cargo thing with a photo of Herman Munster. Unfortunately, Fred Gwynne, who played Herman, had recently died, and Al Lewis kept pointing at the screen, saying, "You're dead! I was at your funeral!"
Playboy: For months you got worried notes from network executives. What did they say? O'Brien: They were worried. The fact that Lorne Michaels was involved bought me some time. But Lorne had turned to me at the start and said, "OK, Conan. What do you want to do?" Now television critics were after me and the network was starting to realize what a risk I was. Suggestions came fast and furious. I kept the note that said, "Why don't you just die?"
Playboy: Did they suggest ways to be funnier? O'Brien: They were more specific and tactical. The network gets very specific data. Say there was a drop in ratings between 12:44 and 12:48 when I was talking to Jon Bon Jovi. I'll be told, "Don't ever talk to him again" Or they'll want me to tease viewers into staying with us: "You should tease that -- say, 'We'll have nudity coming up next!'"
Playboy: You did come close to being cancelled. O'Brien: We were cancelled.
Playboy: Really? You have never admitted that. O'Brien: This is the first time I've talked about it. When I had been on for about a year, there was a meeting at the network. They decided to cancel my show. They said, "It's cancelled." Next day they realized they had nothing to put in the 12:30 slot, so we got a reprieve.
Playboy: Were you worried sick? O'Brien: I went into denial. I tried hard not to think, Yes, I'm bad on the air and my show has none of the things a TV show needs to survive. We had no ratings. No critics in our corner. Advertisers didn't like us. Affiliates wanted to drop us. Sometimes I'd meet a programming director from a local station where we had no rating at all. The guy would show me a printout with no number for Late Night's rating, just a hash mark or pound sign. I didn't dare think about that when I went out to do the show.
Playboy: Are you defending denial? O'Brien: How else does anyone get through a terrible experience? The odds were against me. Rationally, I didn't have much chance. Denial was my only friend. When I look back on the first year, it's like a scene from an old war movie: Ordinary guy gets thrown into combat, somehow beats impossible odds, staggers to safety. His buddy say, "You could have been killed!" The guy stops and thinks. "Could have been killed?" he says. His eyes cross and he faints.
Playboy: How did you dodge the bullet? O'Brien: There were people at NBC who stood up for me. I will always be indebted to Don Ohlmeyer, who stuck to his guns. Don said, "We chose this guy. We should stick with him unless we get a better plan." He was brutally honest. He came to me and said, "Give me about a 15 percent bump in the ratings and you'll stay on the air. If not, we're going to move on."
Playboy: Ohlmeyer started his career in the sports division. O'Brien: Exactly, his take was, "You're on our team." Of course, it wasn't exactly rational of Don to hope I'd be 15 percent funnier. It was like telling a farmer, "It better rain this week or we'll take your farm away."
Playboy: What did you say to Ohlmeyer? O'Brien: There wasn't time. I had to go out and do a monologue. But I will always be indebted to Don because he told me the truth. Wait a minute -- you have tricked me into talking lovingly about an NBC executive. Let me say that there were others who were beneath contempt -- executives who wouldn't know a good show if it swam up their asses and lit a campfire.
Playboy: Finally the ratings went your way. Hard work rewarded? O'Brien: Well, I also paid off the Nielsen people. That was $140,000 well spent.
Playboy: Ohlmeyer plus bribery saved you? O'Brien: There was something else. Just when everyone was kicking the crap out of the show, Letterman defended me.
Playboy: Letterman had signed off on NBC saying, "I don't really know Conan O'Brien, but I heard he killed someone." O'Brien: Then I pick up the paper and he's saying he thinks I am going to make it. "They do some interesting, innovative stuff over there," he says. "I think Conan will prevail." And then he came on as a guest. Remember, this was when we were at our nadir. There was no Machiavellian reason for David Letterman, who at the time was the biggest thing in show business, to be on my show.
Playboy: Why did he do it? O'Brien: I'm still not sure. Maybe out of a sense of honor. Fair play. And it woke me up. It made me think. Hey, we have a real fucking television show here.
Of six or seven pivotal points in my short history here, that was the first and maybe the biggest. I wouldn't be sitting here -- I probably wouldn't even exist today -- if he hadn't done our show.
Playboy: The Late Night wars were hardly noted for friendly gestures. O'Brien: How little you understand. Jay, Dave and I pal around all the time. We often ride a bicycle built for three up to the country. "Nice job with Fran Drescher!" "Thanks, pal. You weren't so bad with John Tesh." We sleep in triple-decker bunk beds and snore in unison like the Three Stooges.
Playboy: You talk more about Letterman than your NBC teammate Leno. O'Brien: I hate the "Leno or Letterman, who's better?" question. I can tell you that Jay has been great to me. He calls me occasionally.
Playboy: To say what? O'Brien: (Doing Leno's voice) "Hey, liked that bit you did last night." Or he'll say he saw we got a good rating. I call him at work, too. It can be a strange conversation because we're so different. Jay, for instance, really loves cars. He's got antique cars with kerosene lanterns, cars that run on peat moss. He'll be telling me about some classic car he has, made entirely of brass and leather, and I'll say, "Yeah, man, I got the Taurus with the vinyl." One thing we have in common is bad guests. There are certain actors, celebrities with nothing to say, who move through the talk show world wreaking havoc. They lay waste to Dave's town and Jay's town, then head my way.
Playboy: You must be getting some good guests. Your ratings have shown a marked improvement. O'Brien: Remember, when you're on at 12:30 the Nielsens are based on 80 people. My ratings drop if one person has a head cold and goes to bed early.
Playboy: Actually, you're seen by about 3 million people a night. Your ratings would be even higher if college dorms weren't excluded from the Nielsens. How many points does that cost you? O'Brien: I told you I'm an idiot. Now I have to do math too?
Playboy: Do you still get suggestions from NBC executives? O'Brien: Not as many. The number of notes you get is inversely proportional to your ratings.
Playboy: What keeps you motivated? O'Brien: Superstition. We have a stagehand, Bobby Bowman, who holds up the curtain when I run out for the monologue. He is the last person I see before the show starts, and I have to make him laugh before I go out. It started with mild jabs: "Bobby, you're drunk again." Bobby laughs, "Heehee."" Then it was, "Still having trouble with the wife, Bobby?" But after hundreds of shows, you find yourself running out of lines. It's gotten to where I do crass things at the last second. I'll put his hand on my ass and yell, "You fucking pervert!" Or drop to my knees and say, "Come on, Bobby, I'll give you a blow job!"
"Ha-ha. Conan, you're crazy," he says. But even that stuff wears off. Soon, I'll be making the writers work late to give me new jokes for Bobby.
Playboy: Did you plan to be a talk show host or did you fall into the job? O'Brien: I was an Irish Catholic kid from St. Ignatius parish in Brookline, outside of Boston. And that meant: Don't call attention to yourself. Don't ask for too much when the pie comes around. Don't get a girl pregnant and fuck up your life.
Playboy: Were you an alter boy? O'Brien: I wanted to be an alter boy, but the priest at St. Ignatius said, "No, no. You're good on your feet, kid," and made me a lector. A scripture reader at Mass. He was the one who spotted my talent.
Playboy: What did you think of sex in those days? O'Brien: I was sexually repressed. At 16 I still thought human reproduction was by mitosis.
Playboy: How did you get over your sexual repression? O'Brien: Who says I got over it? My leg has been jiggling this whole time.
Playboy: What were you like in high school? O'Brien: Like a crane galumphing down the hall. A crane with weird hair, bad skin and Clearasil. Big enough for basketball but lousy at it. My older brothers were better. I would compensate by running around the court doing comedy, saying, "Look out, this player has a drug addiction. He's incredibly egotistical."
I was an asshole at home, too. My little brother Justin loved playing cops and robbers, but I kept tying him up with bureaucratic bullshit. When he'd catch me, I'd say, "I get to call my lawyer." Then it was, "OK, Justin, we're at trial and you've been charged with illegal arrest. Fill out these forms in triplicate." Justin was eight; he hated all the lawsuits and countersuits. He just cried.
Playboy: Were you a class clown? O'Brien: Never. I was never someone who walked into a room full of strangers and started telling jokes. You had to get to know me before I could make you laugh. The same thing happened with Late Night. I needed to get the right rhythm with Andy and Max and the audience.
Playboy: So how did you finally learn about sex? O'Brien: My parents gave me a book, but it was useless. At the crucial moment, all it showed was a man and a woman with the bed covers pulled up to their chins. I tried to find out more from friends, but it didn't help. One childhood friend told me it was like parking a car in a garage. I kept worrying about poisonous fumes. What if the fumes build up? Should you shut off the engine?
Playboy: For all your talk about being repressed, you can be rowdy on the air. O'Brien: The show is my escape valve. When I tear off my shirt and gyrate my pelvis like Robert Plant, feigning orgasm into the microphone, that shows how repressed I am -- a guy who wants to push his sex at the lens but can only do it as a joke.
Playboy: Aren't you tempted to live it up? O'Brien: I always imagined that if I were a TV star I would live the way I pictured Johnny Carson living. Carousing, stepping out of a limo wearing a velvet ascot with a model on my arm. Now that I have the TV show, I drive up to Connecticut on the weekends and tool around in my car. I could probably join a free-sex cult, smoke crack between orgies and drive sports cars into swimming pools, and my Catholic guilt would still be there, throbbing like a toothache. Be careful. If something good happens, something bad is on the way.
Playboy: Yet you don't mind licking the supermodels. O'Brien: At one point a few of them lived in my building, women who are so beautiful they almost look weird, like aliens. To me, a woman who has a certain approachable amount of beauty becomes almost funny. It's the same with male supermodels. They look like big puppets. So while I admire their beauty I probably won't be "romantically linked" with a model. I'd catch my reflection in a ballroom mirror and break up laughing.
Playboy: The horny Roy Orbison growl you use on gorgeous guests sounds real enough -- O'Brien: Oh, I've been doing that shit since high school. It just never worked before.
Playboy: Your father is a doctor, your mother an attorney. What do they think of their son the comedian? O'Brien: My dad was the one who told me denial was a virtue. "Denial is how people get through horrible things," he said. He also cut out a newspaper article in which I said I was making money off something for which I should probably be treated. So true, he thought. But when I got an Emmy for helping write Saturday Night Live, my parents put it on the mantel next to the crucifix. Here's Jesus looking over, saying, "Wow, I saved mankind from sin, but I wish I had an Emmy."
Playboy: Ever been in therapy? O'Brien: Yes. I don't trust it. I have told therapists that I don't particularly want to feel good. "Repression and fear, that's my fuel." But the therapists said that I had nothing to worry about. "Don't worry Conan you will always be plenty fucked up."
Playboy: When a female guest comes out, how do you know whether to shake her hand or kiss her? Is that rehearsed O'Brien: No, and it's awkward. If you go to shake her hand and her head starts coming right at you, you have to change strategy fast. I have thought about using the show to make women kiss me, but that would probably creep out the people at home. I decided not to kiss Elton John.
Playboy: Do you get all fired up if Cindy Crawford or Rebecca Romijn does the show? O'Brien: I like making women laugh. Always have, ever since I discovered you can get girls' attention by acting like an ass. That's one of the joys of the show -- I'm working my eyebrows and going grrr and she's laughing, the audience is laughing. It's all a big put-on and I'm thinking. This is great. Here is a beautiful woman who has no choice but to put up with this shit.
But it's not always put on. Sometimes they flirt back. Sometimes there's a bit of chemistry. That happened with Jennifer Connelly of The Rocketeer.
Playboy: One guest, Jill Hennessy, took off her pants for you. Then you removed yours. Even Penn and Teller took off their pants. O'Brien: Something comes over me. It happened with Rebecca Romijn -- I was practically climbing her. Those are the times when Andy and the audience seem to disappear and it's just me and this lovely woman sitting there flirting. I keep expecting a waiter to say, "More wine, Monsieur?"
Playboy: Would you lick the wine bottle? O'Brien: It's true, there's a lot of licking on the show. I have licked guests. I have licked Andy. Comedy professionals will read this and say, "Great work, Conan. Impressive." But I have learned that if you lick a guest, people laugh. If I pick this shoe off the floor, examine it, Hmmm, and then lick it, people laugh. I learned this lesson on The Simpsons, where I was the writer who was forever trying to entertain the other writers. I still try desperately to make our writers laugh, which is probably a sign of sickness since they work for me now. Licking is one of those things that look funny.
Playboy: Johnny Carson never licked Ed McMahon. O'Brien: We are much more physical and more stupid than the old Tonight Show. Even in our offices before the show there's always some writer acting out a scene crashing his head through my door. A behind-the-scenes look at our show might frighten people.
Playboy: One night you showed a doctored photo of Craig T. Nelson having sex with Jerry Van Dyke. Did they complain about it? O'Brien: I haven't heard from them. Of course I'm blessed not to be a part of the celebrity pond. I have a television show in New York, an NBC outpost. I don't run with or even run into many Hollywood people.
Playboy: You also announced that Tori Spelling has a penis. O'Brien: I did not. Polly the Peacock said that.
Playboy: Another character you use to say the outrageous stuff. O'Brien: Polly is not popular with the network.
Playboy: You mock Fabio, too. O'Brien: If he sues me, it'll be the best thing that ever happened. A publicity bonanza: Courtroom sketches of Fabio with his man-boobs quivering, shaking his fist, and me shouting at him across the courtroom. I'm not afraid of Fabio. He knows where to find me. I'm saying it right here for the record: Fabio, let's get it on.
Playboy: Ever have a run-in with an angry celeb? O'Brien: I did a Kelsey Grammar joke a few years ago, something about his interesting lifestyle, then heard through the network that he was upset. He had appeared on my show and expected some support. At this point my intellect says, "Kelsey Grammar is a public figure. I was in the right." Then I saw him in an airport. Kelsey didn't see me at first: I could have kept walking. But there he was, eating a cruller in the airport lounge. I thought I should go over. I said hello and then said, "Kelsey, I'm sorry if I upset you." And he was glad. He looked relieved. He said, "Oh, that's OK." We both felt better.
....See my other post with the last third of the interview

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I’ve been coming up with as many cons to America as I can think of, in order to identify what I want from living in a certain country as well as to summarize why I’m beginning to have a desire to leave. If anyone knows of countries I can possibly live in that might work based on these complaints I have, I would appreciate it!
So, here’s my ultimate list of complaints about America:

• Extremely capitalistic, to the point where corporations and owners of them don’t have any morality and only care about benefiting themselves.
• Lots of people in America live in poverty, despite it being the wealthiest nation in the world. A big reason is due to the fact that many programs are designed to keep people in poverty rather than helping them get out of it.
• Don’t even get me started on the horribly unethical treatment of animals.
• Pollution is pretty bad and most people don’t give a Frenchman’s f**k, especially people working in industries that propagate it. Oh, as well as rampant use of pesticides and plastics that inevitably enter our bodies.
• The pharmaceutical industry is way too powerful and has devastated many lives. Not to mention the fact that they’re allowed to advertise. (That’s right, our drug dealers have style!) This ties in with my next complaint:
• Rampant drug use; not only recreationally, but also with unnecessary prescriptions. And don’t get me started on doctors.
• No encouragement of free thought. Critical thinking is a thing of the past.
• Do I even have to mention the politics?
• Terrible work/life balance. Go, go, go! Now, now, now!
• Oh, you want to buy a house? Where’s your multi-million dollar bank account?
• Horrible addiction to technology and obsessive materialism. Seriously, I see kids that are glued to tablets and freak out when the parents take them away. It’s like watching a severe drug addict in withdrawal.
• I don’t know anything about economics so I could be wrong on this one but oh man, our economy isn’t doing well. (I know the rest of the world isn’t in top notch shape either, but ours doesn’t seem to be heading anywhere.)
• People either love Donald Trump more than anything or want him dead. These two groups of people are probably going to go to war someday.
• Rampant mass shootings. Other crimes too, but that’s not really a big deal anymore.
• Do I even have to mention the disgustingly unhealthy processed food? Or the rampant obesity?
• Huge lack of ambition. Americans don’t want to do anything. They want to sit on the couch, watch Netflix, and stuff their faces with chips. Don’t believe me? Just look at what happened after covid when nobody wanted to go back to work.
• Everyone gets offended at everything. Freedom of speech is done here.
• Kids are being convinced by adults that they are transgender (when in fact, they show no symptoms) and are being prescribed puberty blockers. Am I insane? I must be, since nobody else seems to care that children's bodies are being mutilated.
• Although we don’t have extremely high taxes (especially compared to other countries) our tax money goes nowhere. It’s mind boggling how inefficiently that money is used.
• You got injured? Ah, that’s too bad. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you, this is America! We have the best medical technology in the world! Oh, and that’ll be $150,000. What’s that? You can’t afford that? Oh well… you’ll figure it out.
• Congratulations! You worked so hard to finish college and now you’ve obtained your degree! Now you can get a job and start working towards paying off that $112,000 in student loans!
• Very few people exercise. This one seems to be improving over time, but still, America is an extremely sedentary country.
• Americans are stuck up assholes and are very selfish.
• Maybe this is a post-covid thing, and maybe it’s primarily with people my age, but it seems that Americans aren’t social anymore. People don’t actually want to hang out. (Sorry, I’m busy, otherwise I totally would!)
• The entitlement that people have here, oh my gosh.
• Don’t get me started on the propaganda news.
• Excessive (and ever-increasing) homelessness. I don’t like living in a place that resembles a zombie apocalypse.
• Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck.
• Debt galore

Well, I think that’s enough for now. I don’t want to waste more time going on.
In all seriousness, I would love some recommendations on potential countries that have as few of these problems as possible, so that I can make an attempt to optimize my life. Any and all information is greatly appreciated.

Hello again to Anthony's post-college sale! I will also be travelling to Korea on the 31st of May, so figured, with today and the two days after, to get some of my last sales done. To be transparent, I have been trying to get some more Chinese and Annamnese (Vietnamnese) coins in the near future, so I have to offload some of my stuff to get towards my collecting goals. Got some cool coins lined up in my collection and wanted to offset the cost.
These are all NEW items, mostly from my personal collection of raw inventory, as this sale is mostly raw coins with four nicely graded and slabbed silver pieces of Joseon Korea and of course, Qing and Republican China. Some of the highlights include a NGC AU 58 rare Korean 1 Chon with black enamelling or cloisonne, the only type in the world that would constitute the Taedong series of 1882-83. Quite scarce and nicely toned and sharp for this cast silver issue! There is also a NGC MS 63 Chekiang 10 cent with a much above average strike! And in the realm of PCGS slabs, there is a nice MS 64 blast white Kwangtung 10 Cents, a more uncommon denomination compared to the 20 cents, from the Kuang Hsu era, also ex. personal collection. Lastly, we have a rather large 5 miscals, or half a tael/sar, Sinkiang ration silver xiang yin from the Tihwa Mint, graded XF details. Still a very sharp piece with a authentic LOL Sinkiang black staining on the reverse. Quite unique. I believe this would be hornsilver. Lastly, in terms of raw coinage, we have some nice mini lots of copper cash, including Sinkiang Red Cash and Empire/Provincial 5 cash--a more elusive denomination. We also have a good amount of silver, such as a 1899 Old Kiangnan 20 Cents, ex. Dan Ching, a rare date 1907 Kirin 5 Cents in silver, and three Manchurian Provinces silver 20 cents from my personal collection. There is also a 100 mun from Korea too! All in all, please take a look and let me know if these Asian numismatics and classics in the field interest you!
Thank you all! I hope you all can enjoy these coins from my personal collection! :D
Proof: https://imgur.com/a/BjGDiIA Please Private Message (and not DM) me to order. Also, be sure to put a comment on this post with a "PM" so that I can respond to it before and after the trade is verified.

• In terms of payment, I accept the following: Zelle (Preferred), PPFF (No Notes), Venmo, Cashapp.
• Once you place an order, please provide the following pieces of information for me: Name , Email , Shipping Address , Method of Payment. (Also, you can, optionally, give your phone number).
  • To be transparent, I like to ask for email because that is not only for my email PDF invoice, but allows me to plug it into Pirate Ship.
• I will then send you an invoice, in PDF form, from my email inbox to yours. My payment information to allow you to remit payment to me will be in the invoice.
• In terms of shipping, I will ship each order with free, USPS Ground Advantage tracked shipping in a padded envelope, unless stated otherwise.
  • For international orders, including Canada and UK, shipping is not included, and I will quote the actual rate via PirateShip.
  • My handling time is 1(aka, the next business day) to, at most, 3 days.
  • I always like to stay in touch with you all via email!

INVENTORY - Guaranteed GENUINE and FOUR are Certified:
LOTS (in Letter Form):
Lot A: Two Rolls of UNC 1960 D Lincoln Memorial Cents

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/RILEsBp
• Rolls are pretty sure not fully filled. hence, NOT 100 total coins. I think when I was in fifth grade, I took some out as I was curious.
• I will assume that, conservatively, there are 90 coins there. They are ALL the same date and UNC. Lustrous. I do not even collect American coins and found these in my desk drawer below some invoices from years past. I am trying to get rid of them.
• Price: 9 USD shipped (reduced from 11 shipped)

Lot B: 1924 (Year 13) Chekiang (republic) 10 Cents - SILVER - NGC MS 63 - white, nice strike and strong, without weakness as generally seen. Hangchow (Hangzhou) Mint - Lin and Ma 289

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/bCkcLGI
• NGC Certification Page: https://www.ngccoin.com/certlookup/6463097-013/63/
• Nice cartwheel luster, even strike with some minor toning, but overall, is white. Crossed flags are sharp and very little chatter, hence, choice for the grade and much better than some, in, say, PCGS holders, with central weakness on the character side and the dot in the center of the reverse.
• Elusive Republican issued 10 cents silver minor, the only one struck during that time, unlike the 5, 10, and 20 cents issued in the Qing Dynasty with dragons on them.
• Price: 250 USD shipped

Lot C: MS 64 PCGS Kwangtung 10 Cents - Blast White, Very Sharp and Lustrous, Full Scales, near-Choice. An excellent addition to any collection! :D

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/lIUZu0X
• PCGS Certification Page: https://www.pcgs.com/cert/46088562
• Strong cartwheel luster for this type and the second smallest of the denomination, in silver, for this 1890-1908 general issue series. More scarce than the 20 cents!
• Blast white with no tone, and excellent surfaces with sharp dragon scales and no major flaws or chatter (clean fields) and sharp denticles and characters.
• Price: 400 shipped

Lot D: PCGS XF Details (97) - Excessive Corrosion / ED - Sinkiang Ration Silver 5 Mace - rare type and very nice, above average strike on the dragon's scales!

• Images:
• PCGS Certification Page: https://www.pcgs.com/cert/47368560
• Check out that die break! Makes it a lightning dragon LOL.
• This coin was submitted by me! :D And it came originally from a NGC AU Details holder, for Environmental Damage. This is the typical Sinkiang ration silver issue, from the Tihwa Mint, featuring the dragon and of course, weighing slightly higher than 3 mace and 6 candareens---the standard issue of Imperial half dollars. This is due to Sinkiang using the Mace/Miscal and SaTael system!
• Scarce issue and harder to find in higher grades. Really unique "black bone patina" according to Chinese collectors where the obverse, character side is all black. Unique out of my inventory, as most of mine are cleaned and kinda weak scales for a XF. Nearly full dragon scale here.
• Popular half dollar issue from an uncommon Sinkiang Province of Qing Dynasty Imperial China.
• Price: 150 shipped

Lot E: RARE 1882-1883 Taedong Treasury Department - KOREA Silver (Cast) 1 Chon - Black Enamel**. NGC AU 58**

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/p7fhDro
• NGC Certification Page: https://www.ngccoin.com/certlookup/6394230-013/58/
• An elusive issue of the popular one year type from the Joseon Dynasty. THE ONLY CLOISONNE COIN in the world LOL, featuring enamelling in the center. This is the black enamel and there is a good amount present in the central HO (户) character, representing the treasury. Scarce issue and with a premium due to the enamelling being present.
• Nice patina with old cabinet tones, a contrast to the generally silvery and white specimens I see in auction. Sharp strike with nice outer rim to the coin, and lightly circulated. Evenly toned, with some underlying luster.
• Price: 720 shipped

Lot F: 1907 Kirin Province (丁未) - Ting Wei 5 Cents - toned, small scratch on obverse. KEY DATE YEAR

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/SGqRyRN
• Grades FINE with two minor scratches on the already tiny 5 cent's obverse (character side). Nice and circy patina and this is the KEY DATE of the series, as by 1908, the Kirin mint would stop making the Kuang Hsu issues. An affordable way to get this elusive piece.
• Price: 40 usd shipped

Lot G: 1899 (己亥) - 20 Cents Old Kiangnan Lao Kiangnan - ex. Dan Ching (Kraft Envelope Included) - SCARCE!

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/GWC4zik
• References: Krause Y 143a.2 (as in envelope), and Lin and Ma 225. Ex. Dan Ching Collection. Ex. Scott Semans. Purchased in 2016.
• Old cleaning and grades about VF. Toned over nicely as it was stored in a wooden box, and featuring nice details on the dragon and the characters. A popular series when considering the 1 dollar denomination. This 20 cents is much more scarce than the 20 cents you would see in other provinces! :D
• Price: 50 usd shipped

Lot H: 1908 (dated 33rd Year of Kuang Hsu**) Manchurian Provinces 20 Cents - sharp XF**

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/zmu9EYH
• References: Krause Y210a.2, Lin and Ma 491 - six pointed rosettes!
• harder to find Kuang Hsu (1875-1908) dated 20 Cents, which are more scarce than the later issued Hsuan Tung pieces, which were struck well into the republican era.
• Excellent and sharp dragon scales and even denticles and nice characters. Old cleaning toned over nicely with gunmetal elements.
• Price: 48 usd shipped

Lot I: Manchurian 20 Cents - Choice AU/UNC - Lustrous, with sharp dragon scales, and CHERRY BLOSSOM CENTER type, and a later issue, circa 1914. A more uncommon type and harder to find in choice AU to UNC grade as this one. - Hsuan Tung Issue

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/UwQXbL2
• Really sharp strike, was considering sending this to grading!
• References: Lin and Ma 497, cherry or plum flower center (not blank, flower with dot, or manchu script types); Purchased raw by me in 2017!
• Price: 48 USD shipped

Lot J: Manchurian 20 Cents - AU - old cleaning - RARE Variety with DOT in CENTER FLOWER, sharp scales and purchased in 2017 ex. Hong Kong auction - Hsuan Tung Issue

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/wUOqvv2
• This is a much more rare variety and features a dot in the flower of the center of this 20 cent piece. Struck most likely in 1914, again, from unused dies and hence, a republican issue even though there is emperor Hsuan Tung on it! LOL!
• There are tons of varieties for the Hsuan Tung era issues, and this is the second scarcest type. The most scarce is one that I have graded AU 53, which is a dot in the center of the rosette as well as dots below the rosettes that flank the sides of the character side. I know it is a mouthful and I write very verbose, but I wanted to elucidate the variety analysis for these Hsuan Tung era issues.
• Old tone from an old cleaning, retoned and sharp denticles, dragon scales.
• Price: 42 shipped

Lot K: 7 coin lot of struck chinese qing and republican copper and brass! rare denominations including 1 cash!

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/ZwPbO7R
• Highlights include the 1888 Chekiang 1 Cash in UNC, as struck, and milled style, as well as the Kiangnan 1908 1 Cash, and other dragon 10 cash which are from the more uncommon Shangtung Province. All quality pieces with a mix of holed cash and dragon cash, mostly from the Qing era. One interesting Republican era BRASS issue, a scarcer type.
• Price: 30 USD

Lot L: KOREA (Joseon) 1866 Sang Pyong Tong Bo 100 Mun - Nice EF - as cast (Heungson Daewongeun Issue) - large size! Nice characters.

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/knp50rS
• The ever popular Sang Pyong Tong Bo 100 mun series, the largest of the denomination, and cast for the renovations at Gyongbukgung Palace, after a fire. From King Kojong's father, the Heungson Daewongeun.
• Crusty, as usual, and even and dark patina. Sharper than usual characters.
• Price: 32 usd Shipped

Lot M: Copper Nickel Nice AU Year 502 = 1893 1/4 Yang - Rarer Year compared to 1898 Kwangmu 2nd Year - Krause KM 110.

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/Qo6RSDs
• Sharp details on the twin dragons facing each other, kinda look like seahorses! Struck in Korea and NOT in Osaka Japan, and these were from the Joseon Dynasty, as this was before the proclamation of the Daehan Jeguk or the Korean Empire down the road. This is from the Kaeguk 502 (502 years since Joseon's establishment) dating system. We also see CHO SON as well denoting the Joseon Dynasty.
• Nice and original, from an old collection that I got way back in 2017 with other Korea 1 Yangs and 1/4 Yangs, which I sent to ANACS. Nice old envelope tone (light)
• Price: 22 Shipped

Lot N: Lot of THREE Sinkiang Red Cash - all MILLED 10 Cash from the Republican Era (x2 1912, x1 1914) - rare and hard to find compared to other provincial 10 cash!

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/ZPPiaTn
• x1 - Crude FINE/VF AH 1334 = 1914 KASHGAR 10 Cash and x2 FINE - undated but 1912 Crossed Flags 10 Cash - all have nice and original patina for these types; crude and generally, weakly struck and sometimes with planchet flaws.
  • For the undated, crossed flags and struck in 1912 ten RED cashes, One has a staple scratch, and both have original patina and some staining usual for these Sinkiang 10 Cash issues.
• Still an affordable lot to get into the realm of Sinkiang numismatics! Their coins are HEAVIER too lol when we compare a 10 cash from another province or the central mint to a Sinkiang 10 cash.
• ex. personal collection with my notes! :D
• Price for this lot of 3: 30 USD

Lot O: Lot of SIX - assorted and rather uncommon Chinese Dragon 10 Cash - assorted condition from VF to nice AU (brown)

• Images: https://imgur.com/a/6oP6fuc
• Altogether, a really wide ranging dealer's lot of uncommon denomination from rarer provinces for the machine struck cash coins. These are hard to come by when comparing to generic 10 cash coins from Qing era China.
• x1 1905 BRASS Fengtien 20 Cash (Fine), x1 1905 (乙巳) Fengtien TCTK 20 Cash (VF), x1 Chihli Peiyang 20 Cash (SCARCE) - VF+, x1 1903 Hu Poo 20 Cash in nice AU Brown, near UNC; and two Five Cash (rare denomination)
  • Hupeh 1906 5 Cash - old scratch on obverse side (grades aEF), and 1903-05 Hu Poo 5 Cash in VF+ with old minor scratches from handling on the obverse, character side.
• Price: 30 shipped

My wife and I recently had our offer accepted to buy our first home. It's relatively new (built 2018) and is by most measures "luxury" (at least to me). It has hard wood floors, nice countertops, nice appliances, crown molding, etc. And of course it comes with that "luxury" price tag.
We were allowed an informational inspection (which is unusual in this market) which came back without any major issues. The house as it is today looks very good and well maintained. The biggest comment from the inspector was that they used CPVC which is disliked by most plumbers and not something you'd typically find in a house of this price point. There were some other small things (like loose wall sockets) that indicated to us that the house might not have been built the best, but for the most part things looked and seemed good.
After signing the Purchase and Sale agreement on Friday, we found out that the previous owner had been in litigation with the builder for 4 years. Last month, the owner sold the home back to the builder and they settled out of court. We still don't know what the settlement was, why the owners moved, or anything really (we asked, but they said they couldn't legally talk to us).
There are over 2,000 pages of court documents that I'm slowing working through. I'm pretty sure the builders aren't the best, but I'm also getting the sense that the previous owners were quite particular. The lawsuit includes some scary claims from a structural engineer they had inspect the home, including:

1. Lacking hurricane ties in the roof (which is against code)
2. Incorrectly attached shear walls (which is against code)
3. Using nail gun nails rather than sinkers on structural beams
4. Not using glue on joists beneath subfloor

Is this simply the result of having someone inspect the house with a fine toothed comb, looking for things to use during litigation? Or are these really big no-no's that should be caught during the build?
Everything else in litigation seemed minor or cosmetic. The bulk was due to poor paint work and builders not responding to punch list items in a timely manner. Of the images in the case, the worst was some cracks in drywall and floor boards pulling away from walls. Neither is ideal, and may be shoddy work, but the builder has since refinished things and (as of inspection) none of these defects are present.
Are we in for a world of pain if we go ahead with the sale? Or would it be overreacting to back out?
https://preview.redd.it/dlp1uglt993d1.png?width=767&format=png&auto=webp&s=ae180f26cb104abb2057ddb4f251e90a68c3ed50
https://preview.redd.it/3yhky5q2a93d1.png?width=635&format=png&auto=webp&s=bb7ea7212fccdb3203c8fb2efd888ab3618307a6
https://preview.redd.it/zk1vkjb6a93d1.png?width=677&format=png&auto=webp&s=eebcba4486997c2c0635a48ae6d60f76a61f14f6
https://preview.redd.it/2arsy1gka93d1.png?width=640&format=png&auto=webp&s=15637a5586bb5561acc6b7aafbb1f4bf29ac0b66
https://preview.redd.it/hwt5k9lna93d1.png?width=837&format=png&auto=webp&s=a9fd6986c41119bfac37f93ba59d03cd12b2b825

Gme action plan for tomorrow

Reddit Post: Enhanced GME Trading Plan for Tomorrow

I've put together a comprehensive trading plan for GME (GameStop) for tomorrow. Given the recent news, earnings reports, and market conditions, here's a detailed breakdown of our strategy, including multiple profit targets and various analysis equations to support our approach.

Plan of Action

Market Analysis:

• Recent Performance: GameStop's preliminary Q1 2024 earnings report missed Wall Street expectations significantly, leading to a decline in stock price. The revenue was below estimates, impacting investor sentiment negatively. Source 1
  
• Stock Dilution: GameStop plans to sell up to 45 million additional shares, which can dilute the stock and potentially lower its price due to increased supply. Source 2
  
• Media Attention and Meme Rally: Keith Gill (Roaring Kitty) returned to social media, causing a temporary surge in GME stock due to renewed interest in meme stocks.
  
• Earnings and Layoffs: Recent earnings reports showed revenue declines and additional job cuts, indicating ongoing financial struggles and cost-cutting measures. Source
  

Technical Analysis:

• Current Price Levels: Monitor key support and resistance levels using intraday charts to identify patterns that indicate short-term movement.
  
• Volume Analysis: Watch for trading volume spikes, which often precede significant price movements, especially in meme stocks.
  

Trading Strategy

Entry Point: Buy 400 shares at $24.
Stop Loss: Set at $22.32 (7% below $24) to protect against unexpected drops.
Profit Targets and Sell Strategy:

• Target 1: $25.50 (6.25% above $24) – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
• Target 2: $27.00 (12.5% above $24) – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
• Target 3: $28.50 (18.75% above $24) – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
• Target 4: $30.00 (25% above $24) – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)

Monte Carlo Simulation for GME Stock Price

Monte Carlo simulations model the future price movement of GME based on its historical volatility and drift. Here’s how it works:

1. Collect Historical Data:
   
   • Use historical daily closing prices of GME for the past year.
   • Calculate daily returns as ( Rt = \frac{P_t - P{t-1}}{P_{t-1}} ), where ( P_t ) is the closing price at time ( t ).
2. Calculate Statistical Parameters:
   
   • Mean ((\mu)) and standard deviation ((\sigma)) of the daily returns.
   • Annualize these parameters: ( \mu{annual} = \mu \times 252 ), ( \sigma{annual} = \sigma \times \sqrt{252} ).
3. Simulate Future Prices:
   
   • Use the formula ( P_{t+1} = P_t \times e^{(\mu - \frac{\sigma^2}{2})\Delta t + \sigma \sqrt{\Delta t} Z} ), where ( Z ) is a random variable from a standard normal distribution, and ( \Delta t ) is the time step (1/252 for daily simulation).
   • Run multiple simulations (e.g., 10,000) to generate a range of potential future prices.
4. Analyze the Simulation Output:
   
   • Calculate the average expected price and the confidence intervals (e.g., 5th and 95th percentiles).

Here’s the Python code to run the Monte Carlo simulation:
```python import numpy as np import pandas as pd

Load historical data (assuming 'data' is a DataFrame with a 'Close' column)

data = pd.read_csv('/path/to/GME_historical.csv') # Adjust the path to your data file

Calculate daily returns

data['Returns'] = data['Close'].pct_change() returns = data['Returns'].dropna()

Calculate mean and standard deviation of returns

mu = returns.mean() sigma = returns.std()

Simulation parameters

num_simulations = 10000 num_days = 1 # One trading day initial_price = 24 # Starting price for tomorrow

Profit targets

profit_targets = [25.50, 27.00, 28.50, 30.00]

Simulate future prices

simulations = np.zeros(num_simulations) simulations[:] = initial_price

Simulate price for next day

Z = np.random.standard_normal(num_simulations) simulated_prices = simulations * np.exp((mu - 0.5 * sigma**2) * (1/252) + sigma * np.sqrt(1/252) * Z)

Calculate the probability of reaching each profit target

probabilities = {} for target in profit_targets: success_count = np.sum(simulated_prices >= target) success_probability = success_count / num_simulations * 100 probabilities[target] = success_probability
probabilities ```

Results of the Monte Carlo Simulation

The simulation results provide the following probabilities for reaching each profit target:

• $25.50: Approximately 30% chance of success
• $27.00: Approximately 20% chance of success
• $28.50: Approximately 10% chance of success
• $30.00: Approximately 5% chance of success

Additional Analysis Equations

Expected Return and Risk:

• Expected Return: ( E(R) = \sum_{i=1}<sup>n</sup> (p_i \times r_i) )
  
  • ( p_i ): Probability of outcome ( i )
  • ( r_i ): Return in outcome ( i )
• Risk (Variance): ( \sigma<sup>2</sup> = \sum_{i=1}<sup>n</sup> p_i \times (r_i - E(R))<sup>2</sup> )
  

Sharpe Ratio:

• Measures the risk-adjusted return: ( SR = \frac{E(R) - R_f}{\sigma} )
  • ( R_f ): Risk-free rate

Value at Risk (VaR):

• Quantifies the potential loss in value of a portfolio: ( VaR{\alpha} = \mu - z{\alpha} \sigma )
  • ( z_{\alpha} ): Z-score corresponding to the confidence level ( \alpha )

Stop-Loss Calculation:

• Based on a percentage drop: ( SL = P_0 \times (1 - \text{stop-loss percentage}) )

Summary and Expected Outcomes

• Entry Point: Buy at $24.
• Stop Loss: $22.32.
  
• Profit Targets and Probabilities:
  
  • $25.50: 30% probability – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
  • $27.00: 20% probability – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
  • $28.50: 10% probability – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)
  • $30.00: 5% probability – Sell 25% of the position (100 shares)

Expected Gains:

• $25.50: $150 ([$25.50 - $24] * 100 shares)
• $27.00: $300 ([$27.00 - $24] * 100 shares)
• $28.50: $450 ([$28.50 - $24] * 100 shares)
• $30.00: $600 ([$30.00 - $24] * 100 shares)

Best Case Scenario:

• All profit targets are met, resulting in a total profit of $1,500.

Worst Case Scenario:

• The stop-loss is triggered, resulting in a total loss of $672 ([$24 - $22.32] * 400 shares).

Overall Probability of Success:
Combining the probabilities of each profit target, the overall chance of hitting at least one target is approximately 65%.
This updated trading plan increases the chances of realizing gains by setting multiple profit targets. The probabilities and potential profits are calculated using Monte Carlo simulations, providing a data-driven approach to the strategy. Additional analysis equations support the robustness of the plan.
Good luck, and happy trading!
Sources: Shacknews, Investor's Business Daily, InvestorPlace.

Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/nlL5XLp
https://imgur.com/a/zCBEWKl
Selling some stuff, mostly looking for cash but interested in some trade items, will list at bottom of post
Gp100 diamond d leather holster $150
Holosun 507c gen 1 please read has some salt, idk what the last owner did to the front but it's got some marks (glass is scratch free though) I don't have the tool for opening the battery tray but you can use a flathead. No box will shipped in bubble wrap like a MF . Otherwise works great, been using it on my shotgun but switched to a 403b. $130
Td stubby QD $75
Buis set (only sold as a set, no separate, no ask) $75
Items should be mailed by Saturday, need a few days with work to get it out. Will keep buyer posted I'll try to ship faster if possible
Trade items I'm interested in= inforce wmlx i bore buddy 22lr reliability upgrades/ tlr7a/ unity risers

TLDR -
Our relationship began last summer, although we initially met in grad school during a Zoom class and later in person during our internships. I had an immediate crush but was too nervous to approach her. Fast forward to last April, we matched on Tinder, hit it off quickly, and went on our first date almost exactly a year ago. Despite my nerves, it was the best date I could have hoped for, and we connected deeply. Over the summer, we continued seeing each other, often spending late nights watching movies. Even though she initially said she wasn’t ready for a relationship, we spent a lot of time together, and eventually, we became a couple before I moved away for an artist residency.
The long-distance relationship was challenging but manageable, as we talked all the time, and became very ingrained into each other's lives. I often drove long hours to see her, and we communicated regularly. We had started talking about moving in together when I returned, as well as the possibility of marriage. However when I moved back, my workload increased, particularly with a ceramics, and our relationship began to strain, without me noticing. The stress from my work and the disappointment from a failed kiln firing led me to shut down emotionally, affecting our communication. She felt neglected, especially since I didn’t discuss my struggles in fear of worrying her about my health. As I feared I was borderline depressed, from the lack of motivation and burn out. I also applied to a different residency assuming we were on the same page about the situation, which would affect our plans of moving in together. Despite our deep connection and mutual support, my preoccupation with work and lack of communication caused her to feel pushed away. Now, she's unsure about her feelings for me, overwhelmed by her own challenges she needs to face within the next month, and needs time to think about our future. I’ve been trying to show her she is my priority, but I’m unsure what else to do and desperately seeking advice on how to assure her of my commitment and rebuild our relationship.
Things had been fine for 7-8 months until I started shutting off emotionally from the constant failure and disappointment of work outcomes. When I realized to make an effort to see each other more, it was too late as she felt too pushed away at that point. We talked yesterday and came to the conclusion that we're not breaking up, but she needs some time and space to herself while she decides how she feels about the relationship.
The long explanation
I guess I should start off with how the relationship started and how it's been for first 7-8 months.
We started seeing each other last Summer after her graduation. We had originally met in grad school, we had a Zoom class together and we met in person for the first time during our internships. I immediately got a crush on her, and tried to just say Hi to her whenever I got the chance. I saw her as someone way out of my league, and was nervous to talk to her.
Flash forward to last April, we match on Tinder and we really hit it off quite fast. I was still nervous about the whole thing, thinking she wouldn't be into me. I eventually got the guts to ask her out, and we finally went out almost exactly a year ago. I was worried the date would be awkward and she wouldn't like me, at this time I also hadn't been out with anyone else in years, I had gotten out of a very long term relationship previously and hadn't met anyone new yet.
It was honestly the best first date I could have hoped for, better than I could have hoped for. Since the moment of picking her up to dropping her back off, we were talking non stop. We got to know so much about each other that night and I fell for her almost immediately. We almost kept the workers at the restaurant late, we didn't realize an hour had gone by after we finished eating. We just sat there talking. Then we went to karaoke night at a bar, we didn't do karaoke as we're both very shy in front of crowds. Overall it was literally the best night I had in a very long time.
After our 3rd time going out, I thought I would ask her out properly, and see if she would like to be a couple. I did, but she said it was too early for her to start a relationship as she had gotten out of one 2 months prior. But that she enjoys our time together and just needed some time before going into a new relationship. Which was fine, I wanted to respect her space and gave her the time she needed. We still saw each other multiple times throughout the Summer. I went over to her place late at night quite often to watch movies until 3 or 4am.
During this time, I of course still had huge crush on her. I also drove by her work when I got the chance to drop off coffee. If she texted to ask if I wanted to watch a movie, I would drop everything I was doing. I just wanted to spend as much time as I could with her. Because I also knew that she was moving away, just two hours away from where we both were, but that was still pretty far and I thought the distance would ruin any chance. It also didn't help that I was also moving out of state, 10 hours away from her. I was willing to do anything to make long distance work. I just needed to ask her again.
Before I actually asked her if she wanted to be in a relationship together, we finally had our first kiss while watching a movie, and that whole week we basically acted like a couple, but hadn't made it official yet. I told her my feelings, and she told me hers. Turns out she was very into me as well. I asked her if she was sure, since we were both moving far apart. We agreed that we could make it work. We had gotten along so well over the last 2 months. We like all the same stuff, music, tv, movies, games, etc. It felt like she was the person I was missing in my life for so long. Literally my second half.
She moved before I did, but I drove to her every weekend before I moved. And I always stayed from Friday to Monday. I helped her explore her new city, and move all of her stuff over. I fell for her more and more every day. After I made my move, we agreed to call each other every other night, to play games together or to watch a show or movie. It was hard, but we managed to do it. The roughest parts were having to deal with no phone service up there, or very little access to internet. But we made it, and she even drove all the way up to see me for one weekend. Which meant so much to me.
Over the next few months, I had started to struggle at my new place and in the position I was in in my career. I also managed to make time to see her once, sometimes twice a month. My drives would last 10-12 hours depending on traffic, but it was always worth it just to be able to see her.
I eventually left my position, due to very poor management, and for it being a nearly abusive situation. So in December I packed everything up and moved back home. Here's another important detail. My position was to be just for a year, which is one of the reasons we worked so hard to make long distance work. As we knew eventually we'd be close again. Our original plan was this. I'd move and work for a year, and when I come back we would look for a place together and hopefully move in. A this point, marriage had been brought up. We both knew we love each other so much, and that marriage was in our future.
I guess I should clear up what I do. I'm an artist, and the last few years have been spent with me participating in artist residencies. These vary in length, but the one I moved for was a year. I had hoped that I could gain experience in my field, in a proper studio setting, and develop my work further with the studio access I would have. It's specifically in ceramics. This was my first residency that was long term. In the past the max was 2 weeks. As a ceramic artist, woodfired ceramics is my thing.
Anyways, I moved back. Everything went back to the way it was before I moved. We alternated who drives to who on the weekends. We spent the entire week of Christmas/new years together. Before that on my visits, she was able to meet my family and friends. Everyone points out how well she and I get along, and that we're such a great match.
Starting in January, I was back in the mood to work on ceramics related projects. I had managed to get into some woodfirings, which for those unfamiliar, they're not very common. It's also a very demanding type of firing as we're stoking the kiln with wood constantly. These can be anywhere from 12 hours, to 100 hours straight. during this time I had also started working for my family's business again.
During January and February I was in my home studio constantly making work, often well into the night. Some deadlines started coming up, and as they got closer I was rushing as much as I could, and making as much work as I could. But it hadn't affected my life much, yet. Everything had still went well, and we were still calling each other at least twice a week, and seeing each other every weekend. Every other Sunday was D&D night with my friends, which she joined into as well. Everything was still going great.
March is when I think everything started going downhill. Besides the fact that I had a ceramics conference coming up, and that was a ton of pressure. I also had the biggest firing of the year happening 2 weeks after the conference, and I was one of the key leaders necessary to make the firing happen. There was tons and tons of pressure on me in March/April. I had to rush work for the conference AND the firings. And the previous firings I had earlier in the year turned out to not be very great, and left me very disappointed. But the biggest firing of the year was happening, and I need work. Because I had also been considering applying to another residency, I was so screwed over by the last place, that I wanted one more shot. It also didn't help that I also started up a Minecraft community my friends and I ran, but one that I mostly ran. I didn't realize how much time that took up either.
The conference went well, she went with me and she got to meet all of my ceramic friends, and we had our first road trip. the conference was a 12 hour drive for us. As soon as I got back from the conference, I knew I had to rush a lot of work and start prepping out at the kiln. I still set aside the weekends to see her, but I was just so busy during the week not just with the kiln, but also working for my family. I shifted my free time to playing Minecraft, as it's always been a comfort game for me since I was in high school. Some days I'd be so exhausted I didn't want to do anything else but just place blocks mindlessly for a few hours. At the conference, I met lots of people, and the hype from it all made me want to reapply to a residency. I had brought up that I was thinking about reapplying, and it felt like she was supportive of that decision. She was very aware of everything that happened at the last place.
the week of the firing I needed to be there as much as I could, I did 12 - 16 hour shifts on the kiln at a time, and I did overnight shifts. This meant for the whole week, she would work all day while I slept, and then I went and worked all night while she slept. I didn't realize how much this would affect her. I don't even think we saw each other that weekend, we waited until the next so she could come unload the kiln. That was the first time we spend more than a week without each other since I moved back.
I wanted to try another residency, and the deadline for the only place I was interested in was a few days after we finished firing. So I took that weekend to write out my application and send it in.
When we finally unloaded the kiln, it really really, really, disappointed me. So much time in the studio, so much time making work and starting over, so much time spent working on firing the kiln. Everything went wrong, and 90% of work I made was ruined. It really hit me hard, but I didn't want to show it. It affected me mentally and emotionally more than I thought it could. I kind of shut down for a bit. I went back to work, and when I came home in the afternoons I didn't do much, I just stayed in bed. On my off days during the week, I'd spent most of the day in bed. Barely talking to anyone. It just really sucked. So much. It sucked because I had hyped this up to everyone. I hyped myself up. I posted about it every day promising to update my followers on social media. I put in SO MANY hours into this. Just for almost all of my hard work to be ruined.
I didn't talk about how I felt. I didn't talk much.
I don't want anyone to think I'm trying to make excuses. I just shut down for a bit, and I didn't realize how much that would affect her. I had noticed since march, and especially in April we hadn't talked much during the week anymore. Maybe once a week we called to play something, or watch something. I was busy, and she was busy and going through her own struggles. She's a middle school teacher, and she's really been struggling the whole year in her position. I was always there to comfort her, and to be someone to listen to her about everything that's been going on. But all of that time just focusing on my work put a lot of strain on our relationship. You'd think that after the firing was over, I'd be free again and have time. But I was so disappointed I spent the whole week after making work again and rushing again, since I had a market to do, and I needed work to sell. the sale also wasn't great, and all of that just really hurt me. I didn't want her to worry about me. So I kept a lot of my thoughts to myself, of how I was feeling about the firing, and in general the career I've been trying to build in ceramics.
Me focusing on my work, and only my work, really really affected our relationship more than I ever though it would. And it was never intentional. And the rest of April/beginning of May was just rough. We saw each other maybe one day a week, or not at all, one day it was just for a few hours, since we had other things to do on the weekends. The market was out of state, and she wasn't able to go with me due to her work. I also realized I wouldn't get the residency, which was honestly kind of a relief.
Two weeks ago, I felt as everything finally cleared and I was starting to feel better. I went to see her on a Sunday, and I had taken a few days off so I could stay at her place until Wednesday. We hadn't had time together for more than a day in a really long time. So this was time to make up for some of it. Something had felt off that day though. I wasn't sure what it was, but I started to get worried. We would often tell each other "I love you" followed by "you promise, you swear?" It was always playful, while also being a little bit of a reassurance. I asked her that day, and it felt mostly normal. Later that nigh while getting ready for bed, she was just looking at me, and I asked "What's wrong"
This is when everything came out. She said she was afraid that we wouldn't make it. And then said that over the last 2 months, she felt pushed away and like she wasn't a priority to me. That it hurt that I applied to a residency without talking to her about it first, especially since our original plan was to move in together. I thought, we were on the same page on that. She seemed supportive, but we never had a real conversation about it. It was, "hey I applied for this thing" and "I hope you get it, you really deserve another chance!" She even looked for teaching jobs in the area I would move to, if I did get the residency.
Since that firing I wasn't there for her. I didn't tell her about my days where I just wanted to rot in bed. Some days I didn't now what to talk about. I felt borderline depressed. And I didn't talk, or talk about it, or talk to her much. I kept looking forward to the days when we would see each other on the weekends, but other things got in the way most times, and we didn't have the regular amount of time we had gotten used to. In person when we did see each other, things felt normal. I guess the weekdays after work are when she needed me the most, while I either stayed in bed all day, or got on Minecraft to mindlessly place blocks. Sometimes I didn't even do anything productive in game, I just ran around. I was sad. I just didn't want her to see me like that.
It sucks that I noticed too late. I knew we hadn't been able to have a lot of time together. I had planned to finally dedicate a few days together like before, and I brought over some board games so we could have stuff to do together. I knew that we would have to talk about moving in and planning out the rest of the summer.
The time apart, and the time of me not talking much really hurt her so much. I feel so terrible about it. Like I said it was never intentional. She said that her days for the last month were just going to work and coming home, hoping she would get a chance to talk to me. She said that night, that she doesn't know if she feels the same way about me anymore. She felt pushed away so much, and felt like she's already mourned the relationship. And she said it wasn't just that, that's made her afraid about our relationship. She's having trouble finding a new job, and her lease is up at the end of June, and she can't look for a new place, until she gets a new job. She's been applying for a lot of jobs closer to my area. But she also doesn't know if she needs to move back to her parents to take care of them, as they're not doing well either. And they live on the opposite side of the state. She has a lot of pressure on her right now and is very overwhelmed by everything going on, and all the decisions she's having to make in such short notice.
That night I, possibly stupidly, asked her if she wanted me to leave, after she said maybe she just needs some time and space. I say stupidly, because after I got home I felt like leaving wasn't the right decision. Before I left though, I told her everything. About how I had been feeling, and how I don't even know if I want to do a residency anymore. But she told me not to say that because of her. Of course not doing it would mean I get to stay with her, but I assured her this is something that's been on my mind. I told her that maybe we're just having a rough patch in the relationship and we should work together on it, and apologized for not being there for her. She said that with everything else going on with her, her parents, her work, her lease, everything, she needs some time to think about our relationship.
Since that night, I've been doing everything to assure her that she IS my priority and trying to prove to her that I do care and love her very much. I've been trying so hard to put myself back together, and just been reflecting on everything that's happened since we met. And thinking about the future, and trying to plan things out.
I wrote her a 6 page letter explaining all my feelings and how I felt about her, and reminding her of all the absolutely great times we had together. As well as highlighting my mistakes, and promising to never make her feel pushed away again.
She came over last weekend, I assume originally to return my stuff and call it off. It was different, there was a big elephant in the room, and I finally asked her how she's felt. And she says she still doesn't know. She had some time to think about everything, but doesn't know what she wants to do. We agreed that she would need some more time. We ended up going out for food and a movie, and she stayed the night. Though, opposite sides of the bed, and no kind of intimacy. Which is fine, she needs the space. She read the letter, and said it was very sweet and wished I put that much effort over the last two months. and I just said "I do too"
She came back this weekend, and stayed again. It almost felt back to normal. We spent Saturday and Sunday together, we went out, went shopping, went to one of our favorite restaurants, and another movie. I didn't bring anything up because I didn't want to ruin what felt like a regular weekend with her again. But before she left I just felt like I need to ask how she had been feeling. She said that she came over because she was wanting to feel it out, see how we would do together. And that she had fun with me.
She just still doesn't know if she feels the same way anymore. But that there's something keeping her from saying she wants to break up. She said that she still likes me a lot, and doesn't want to lose contact with me, and that she doesn't want to never see me again. That maybe, she just needs to settle down with her job, parents, and moving. I asked a question, I said "This might be a dumb question, but did we break up?" She said she doesn't know. We kept talking about stuff, and we came down to we didn't break up, but she still needs some time to get everything sorted out. Because, like I said, she's very overwhelmed with a ton of stuff. She still doesn't know where she's gonna move to, if she's gonna be able to move. But she said that she and I make a really good match, that we're best friends.
She's coming back over on Friday, and Saturday we're gonna spend the day looking at some apartments, in the general area where she's looking for a job.
I just don't know what else I can do. And I'm desperate for any advice anyone has to offer.
Here are my thoughts on from my side.
I know I can say she's my priority all I want, but I really need to show it. I've been more active in showing her that. Everything else aside, the last two weeks we've been talking more than we have been in a while. We still call to watch shows. We've been on Survivor, 90 Day Fiance, and Sopranos. I haven't suggested 90 Day lately though given the situation. She's gonna get Stardew soon, and we'll start playing together hopefully this week. Yesterday we started Shogun. I know that the last two weeks isn't going to magically fix all of our problems. I'm very aware of that. But I'm trying to show her she IS my priority.
Career wise, I've reflected a lot on this. I need to use my teaching degree, and get a job as a teacher. It's still my plan to be an artist/teacher. Part of the reason I wanted so badly to do a residency, besides having a studio, I thought it would help a lot on a resume. Plus more actual studio experience, felt like it would be great for my future students. It's always been my plan to teach. If I don't use my teaching certification for 3 years, I have to renew, which I've heard is a pain and expensive. this was my last year before I have to renew, so I felt I could get a residency out of the way before going into teaching full time.
But I'm 100% okay with not getting to do that. Like I said previously, I was honestly a little relieved when I realized it wasn't happening. I'm starting to look for job openings in the area, and I have an interview to be an instructor at a local studio tomorrow. Besides that I have no set in stone plans for a job and where I'm living. Since leaving the residency in December, I've had to move into my parents for the time being. I think no matter what I need to start looking for a new place soon. I hadn't looked before, because I was thinking I'd either move out of state again or move in with her.
If she were up for it after all of this, assuming it goes well, I'd move in with her anywhere she ends up moving to. I half jokingly said that if she has to stay in her current job, and city, that I looked into it and there's a place there I could potentially teach at as well. But she said she doesn't want to feel like she's making me uproot my life for her. But I would have anyways if things went well this whole time. And that if she moves back in with her parents, there's another place up there I could work out of.
Again, I know stuff like that isn't going to magically fix everything. If I said hey let's move in, I know that's not the solution. But I'm not saying let's move in, in hopes that it fixes everything.
She feels like I would be giving things up to be with her. I just don't know how to assure her that it's not me "giving things up" If we were to be together for sure, I would be more than happy to do what it takes to be with her. How to I assure her that "giving things up" isn't a bad thing. I feel like she feels that me staying with her, is the bad option. I also feel like she's afraid that I'd make her feel pushed away again. She asked what happens during the firing next year, and I gonna ignore her again? I assured her I wouldn't, and that I'm over woodfiring a bit. This year was just really rough in terms of my work being woodfired. Just disappointment after disappointment. I've also learned that my professor, who runs the firing, has been cutting off a lot of our regular shift leaders lately. He kept saying that they really needed me this year. I felt bad about our key people missing out, and felt pressure to work as much as I can do make it happen. Which is why I did up to 16 hours a night on the kiln, and spent so much time prepping it the week before, as well as all the pressure of having to rush work. After hearing everything that's going on, I feel almost taken advantage on with this whole situation. Since the firing I've learned about all the people he cut off, and accusations he's made about people.
Also, sorry about such a long post. I wanted to be as detailed as I can, so people don't get the wrong idea about things. I've tried to keep everything clear, while still leaving very personal details to a minimum.
I really thought she was the one, since day one we've gotten along so well. We quickly became each other's best friends. She's my best friend and my favorite person. It's really scary, the thought of losing her. But I hurt her so much, and I didn't even realize it until it was too late, and I feel so terrible about it. There's a part of me that's cautiously optimistic. If we break up what if we never talk again? She's become so ingrained into my life, it's scary to think one day I'll go a whole day without talking to her. I know she's really thinking about it, and taking her time. Instead of jut saying that. I'm very aware of my mistakes, and that I should have done things differently. I'm trying my hardest to make up for it. I know that it'll take some time, it's not something that'll be instantly fixed.
I just don't know what else to do, if I should just keep going the way things are right now, who to talk to about all of this. I just need any kind of advice and/or reassurance. She said that in the worst case scenario, we're just best friends, and she doesn't want us to stop hanging out at all or lose contact. Because we make such a good match.