When it comes to dates, the universe has been a Turkish ice cream man to me. So here I am, looking to finally grab the ice cream.
What am I looking for? A spontaneous date, meeting someone new, really getting to know them and not just scratching the surface, exploring a nice café or maybe attend an event or explore something new in the city. I'm also open to something as simple as having ice cream on the beach. All I want, is someone to talk to. You know, those judgement free conversations where you're simply vibing and relating to everything the other person says? That. And no, before you suggest, I'm not resorting to dating apps for this.
Who am I? I'm just your usual 27 year old who tends to overshare sometimes, but you already know that by now... Not gonna dive to deep in my hobbies and whatnot because I've done that numerous times in other posts. But here's something about me. I like making efforts for the people I like, I'm hardworking, and I don't like leaving things incomplete. My decisions can be emotionally driven sometimes, and I'm not a good liar. That also means, I can be hurtfully honest at times, but I do try my best to make up for it if the person in question is important to me.
That's just a teeny tiny window into my personality. If you're intuitive enough, maybe you can pick up a few more things from my previous posts, but there sure is a lot more to explore. And well, I'm somewhat of an explorer myself too, when it comes to places and people that interest me.
If any of the above made you feel absolutely anything, even a faintest bit of intrigue, you should not shy away from sending a text. As for the evening plans, I'm flexible, and making you feel safe is my top priority. Photo verification is a hard pre requisite before meeting. And it goes without saying, we'll meet at a public place.
When? If you're adventurous enough to plan something today (Wednesday), I'm in. But I do understand if you want to test waters first before making plans. All I ask is, to communicate your intentions clearly and not ghost if you change your mind about meeting. I do realise it's a long post but if you've read this far, you already know we'll hit it off quite well. What are you waiting for then? Hit the chat button and send a text asap. Who knows what the universe has in the bag for us?

Yesterday I opened a store on Reverb to sell a few pedals I don’t want anymore. I went through the verification process uploading my data, the ID card and credit card details. In just a few hours I received 3 replies, but they all looked quite shady to be honest. I would like to use this thread to highlight the kind of environment that Reverb represents for new users. Actually, after less than 24 hours I’m wondering whether I should just close my account and sell my gear elsewhere. I sold stuff on many platforms over the past years. I've occasionally dealt with scammy buyers and sellers at some point, but this is the first time that I receive so many suspicious messages in such a short time and this really makes me wonder - as a new user to the platform - whether Reverb is a good place to be. I’m talking about 3 different users, all mostly trying to look like an automatic message from Reverb that’s asking me to provide all sorts of information (e-mail address, credit card details, etc.) all over again shortly after I published my first listing. One was particularly shady. Actually, they were all kinda shady in different ways. For starters, it’s just odd to receive this kind of “automatic” requests as a reply to my listings instead of receiving an email directly from Reverb. Anyway, here are the messages.
————————
Message 1:
This one was empty and I received it moments after publishing my first listing. The timing was so good that I really thought that it was a system generated message at first. It just contained an official-looking flier (very well put together) with the Reverb logo, some information and a QR code for the verification of my credit card. The name of the user was “Clients Centre” and it had as a picture a confirmation mark similar to the ones that verified users have on certain platforms (I realized only later that this was just the profile picture). This account was now disabled, but it definitely looked the part for a moment
————————
Message 2:

Dear [name of my store edited out], Our system has noticed unusual activity related to the [listing edited out] listing on your "[name of my store edited out]" store. To maintain the integrity and security of our platform, we ask that you verify this listing. Below are steps to help you begin the verification process: Remove all spaces from this link - information-product .shop/36fc84. Paste the modified link into your web browser. Go to the verification start and do not leave the verification page until it is complete, you will be notified by a technical support agent. It is important to note that pasting the modified link into your web browser is an important step to begin the verification process. If verification is not completed within the next 24 hours, we will be forced to temporarily suspend your store until the circumstances are clarified. This verification process helps us confirm your identity and the authenticity of your business. We appreciate your cooperation and understanding in this matter. We appreciate your immediate attention to this matter. Regards Agent Lisa. 

This one looked immediately like a pure scam. The link itself doesn’t even look official and I’ve never seen a platform sending you a link that you have to edit before using it. “Lisa Ag3nt” is also a very odd name and when I clicked on it, it already said “account disabled” so this was a no brainer.
————————
Message 3:

Неllо, this mеssаgе wаs sеnt аutоmаtiсаllу bу Reverb suppоrt bоt. Тhis сustоmеr hаs рurсhаsеd оnе оf уоur рrоduсts. То аvоid frаudulеnt trаnsасtiоns, wе hаvе intrоduсеd а nеw mеthоd оf rесеiving funds. Рlеаsе sеnd уоur e-mаil аddrеss tо this сhаt. Оn it will bе sеnt instruсtiоns fоr furthеr асtiоns. Rеgаrds, Reverb tеаm! 

This could look almost normal at a first glance. The customer had a name and a surname and the message wasn't asking for much. That said, I never received any e-mail confirming the sale and the idea that I have to send my email address in the chat as a reply to the customer who allegedly bought the pedal just to receive further “instructions” is odd at best. It’s just hard to believe that any platform out there would handle the payment like this. Not to mention that at this point I already experienced the warm welcome of the other two swindlers.
————————
So this is it. Now, I know that Reverb will not contact me like this and I do understand that stopping these people preventively isn't an easy task. At the same time, after my first day on Reverb, the scammer to user ratio seems surprisingly high in the worst possible way. Luckily for me, most of them were pretty bad at their job. I'm sure that there are a ton of honest people on the platform. I'm not trying to generalize here. Nevertheless, I pretty much experienced more phishing attempts in a few hours on Reverb than in 10 years of casual sales on eBay, Facebook and a variety of national platforms. I’m genuinely surprised by the amount of shady messages that a new store has to face on Reverb in the first 2-3 hours of activity. I don't do this very often, but I really felt the need to say these things publicly. Anyway, thank you for reading and have a nice day!

The vibrant city of Jaipur holds a lovely diversity in its heart. From a rich history to a rich culture, it has it all. Not to miss, it is a treasure for fashion enthusiasts.
Especially for those looking for timeless elegance like kurtis. And for wholesale kurti manufacturers, Jaipur is a popular hub. They cover a wide and diverse range, from traditional handloom weaves to contemporary designs. They have something for every taste and style out there.

A City Steeped in Textile Tradition

Since ages Jaipur has had a rich heritage in textiles which goes back to centuries. They have Skilled artisans who use age-old techniques to create the masterpiece. They weave magic with threads and craft elegant kurtis known for their quality and artistry.
Hence, they became the best kurti manufacturers in Jaipur. Here, you'll find a kaleidoscope of colors and intricate embroidery. They also possess stunning prints that set Jaipur kurti manufacturer apart.

Finding Your Perfect Wholesale Kurti Partner

Whether you're a boutique owner or a budding entrepreneur, collaboration with the right partner will always flourish your business. For instance, collaborating with a Jaipur kurti manufacturer wholesale can grow your collection.
Here at Harsh Creation, a leading Jaipur kurti wholesale manufacturer, they understand the importance of finding the right partner. They offer a wide range of trendy and timeless kurtis that are meant to serve a wide audience.

Benefits of Partnering with a Jaipur Kurti Wholesaler

Unmatched Selection:

The best part is that you will get to explore a vast collection of Jaipur kurtis. The collection at the Kurtis manufacturer in Jaipur covers diverse styles like anarkali, straight cut, A-line, and many more. You can discover a range of fabrics, from luxurious silks to comfortable cottons. All of these will have top-notch quality, too.

Competitive Prices:

Jaipur kurtis wholesale manufacturers Jaipur rajasthan like Harsh Creation offer competitive rates. This, allowing you to build a profitable business.

Customization Options:

Are you looking for a specific design or a specific color palette? Many manufacturers, like them, provide customization options. This way, you can fulfill your unique needs.

Bulk Quantities:

Wholesale suppliers like Harsh Creation know how to handle large orders. This ensures a steady flow of inventory for your business.

Harsh Creation: Your Trusted Source for Wholesale Kurtis

At Harsh Creation, they take pride in being a well-known branded kurtis manufacturer in Jaipur. They offer a captivating collection of Jaipur kurtis.
Their Kurtis are a perfect combination of tradition and modernity. They are passionate about quality, and customer satisfaction. These features have made them a preferred partner for businesses all across India.

Ready to Explore the World of Jaipur Kurtis?

Harsh creation invites you to explore the vibrant world of Jaipur kurtis. You can even Search online for “ kurti manufacturers near me” or "kurti manufacturers near me Jaipur” to discover a treasure of available options. Look for manufacturers like Harsh Creation who prioritize quality, design, and customer service at top.
So with the right partner by your side, you can unlock the magic of Jaipur kurtis and take your business to new heights.

TLTR: Guys it's time for us to thank all the content creators creating guides, giving away tips, explaining patches and creating a community around them often with their discords that supports new players.
I'll name who I know, so PLS add here in the comments whoever I missed and helped YOU. Also like this post so many people see this. If you ever got helped by one of these guys, you must do it.
————————————————————————————————— THANK YOU FITZBRO ————————————————————————————————— THANK YOU BEASTYQT ————————————————————————————————— THANK YOU AUSSIE_DRONGO —————————————————————————————————
What they do is the foundation of the player base that works or have limited time to spend on the game, also the devs really do a SHITTY job explaing how to play their game. And let's not talk about all the "hidden commands" the game doesn't talk about (alt click, setting a home to the merchants, etc...)
Personal experience: I have 200 h on this game maining byzantine from right from the start, because they are cool. I've started doing the campaigns and vs ia. Normally I'm against meta, but The ia (intermediate) was always killing me so I decided to force to look out for some help. Boy if knew very little of the game. I remember my first thought was "this is a totally different game", looking at casted game. Share your experience if you want to.

DISCLAIMER: Sorry this is a day late. I ended up having to rewrite half of this. Still, I hope you enjoy. After this, I'll be going on my hiatus. So I hope you like this last little bit of Roo-family cuteness. Thank you all and keep on keepin' on!
​
Special thanks to u/SpacePaladin15 for creating the NoP universe.
​
I'd also like to thank u/xskipy10 for their awesome fanart of the main cast as well as their recent Tohba meme and their fanart of Michael baysitting. You're work is a treasure!
​
Thank you as well to u/Accomplished-Golf-59 for his take on Michael, Teylim, and Tohba in his submission for the Banner Art Contest, and u/Spacer_Catgirl4969 for their awesome music video featuring a pixel-art Dohkar in his bar. Be sure to give ALL of these awesome creators your love and support.
​
And let's not forget u/Guywhoexists2812 who has been an awesome source of memes as well as sick pixel art, such as THIS and THIS!!!! And even THIS!!!!!! And how could I forget THIS!!!!!!!!!! Thank you so much!
​
Today, we see all the reasons Teylim has to keep going in the face of adversity. For when all is said and done, love truly does conquer all. LETTUCE...begin...
​
Original Story
​
[Accessing Camera Function…]
​
[Accessing Saved Recordings Function…]
​
[Play Selected Recording?: Y/N…]
​
[Playing Recording!]
​
[The camera opens up on a female Yotul with a satchel over her shoulder. She is walking backwards down a paved walkway while looking up at the person holding the camera…]
​
“Alright! Soooo…here we are in… Michael tell us where we are!”
​
[The person holding the camera gives an audible sigh…]
​
“Do I have to, Tey?”
​
“Yes! Come on, it’ll be fun!”
​
[Another audible sigh is heard before the person begins panning the camera around the surrounding cityscape…]
​
“We are in the beautiful, literally ALWAYS sunny capital of Dayside City!”
​
“And what would you say we’re doing here in Dayside City?”
​
“We were just at the Public Records building getting our paperwork verified.”
​
[The Yotul woman is seen reaching into her satchel and pulling out a leaflet of documents…]
​
“Oh! You mean THIS paperwork? Hmmm… I wonder what these might say… Mind helping me here?”
​
“Seriously?”
​
[The Yotul doesn’t answer, instead shoving the documents directly into the camera. Another, more amused-sounding sigh is heard…]
​
“It says that your name has been officially changed to ‘Teylim Andrews.’”
​
“Mmmmhmmm. And what about this one?”
​
“That one says that Tohba’s name has been officially changed to ‘Tohba Andrews.’”
​
“Aaaand why do you suppose that is?”
​
[A shuffling sound is heard and the camera shifts as the person holding it pulls out their own papers…]
​
“Probably because according to MY paperwork, while we’re still waiting for my Application of Citizenship to go through, I, Michael Ruiz Andrews, am now the full, legal, son of one, Teylim Andrews-”
​
“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHEEHEEHEEHEEHEE!!!!!!”
​
[The Yotul woman darts forward, wrapping the person holding the camera in a hug. The camera is set on the ground and the face of the person is now visible. The two hold their embrace, rocking back and forth…]
​
“I love you so much, my joey…”
​
“Love you too, Ma…”
​
[Recording Ceases…]
​
[Play Next Recording?: Y/N…]
​
[Playing Recording!]
​
[The camera opens on a small kitchen area where two beings are sat eating. On the left, a male Yotul infant in a high chair is munching away at a human food identified as “Cheerios” spread across his tray. On the right, a male human idly stirs at a bowl of cereal while tapping away at a datapad…]
​
[Eventually, after munching down another “Cheerio”, the infant catches a glimpse at the human and stares for approximately one second before his tail begins wagging…]
​
“Mikey?”
​
[The humans attention is broken away from their datapad and immediately focuses on the infant…]
​
“Yeah, Bud?”
​
“I WUV YOOOUUU.”
​
[The infant’s sing-song voice seems to make the human smile before he leans forward, planting a “kiss” on top of the infant’s head…]
​
“MmmMUAH! Te amo, mi hermanito.”
​
“Whaz dat mean?”
​
“It means, ‘I love you, Little Brother’. Want me to teach you?”
​
“Hmmmmm… OKAY!”
​
“Okay.”
​
[The human chuckles slightly before scooting his chair in…]
​
“Okay, so when you want to tell someone you love them, you say, ‘Te amo.’ Okay?”
​
[The infant gives a curious ear flick…]
​
“Teeeh…Mo?”
​
“Close! Here. Repeat after me. Te…”
​
“Teeh…”
​
“Ah…”
​
“Aaahh…”
​
“Mo…”
​
“Moh!”
​
“Te…ah…mo…”
​
“Teeh…aaahh…mo!”
​
“Okay! All together now. Te amo.”
​
“¡TE AMO!”
​
[The human excitedly gets up from his seat and embraces the infant…]
​
“YES!!! You did it! Awesome job, Bud!”
​
“YAAAAYYY!!!! ¡TE AMO, MIKEY!”
​
“MMMUAH!! ¡Te amo, precioso hermanito!”
​
[The camera jitters slightly and a muffled giggling is heard. The human turns to face the camera…]
​
“Ma? What are you- Have you been recording this whole time?”
​
“Just a little!”
​
“Must you record everything?”
​
“As a matter of fact, yes!”
​
“MAMA!!”
​
[The camera zooms in on the excited infant…]
​
“Hello, Precious! Is your big brother teaching you Spanish?”
​
“UH-HUH!! ¡TE AMO, MAMA!”
​
“Ooooh, that is just ADORABLE! Can you teach him to say ‘Mama’ in Spanish, too?”
​
[The camera pans over to the human, who raises an eyebrow. After a moment, the human smirks and gives an exaggerated shrug while shaking his head…]
​
“No tengo que hacerlo. Él ya lo sabe, mamá.”
​
“Pffft! Smart aleck.”
​
[Recording Ceases…]
​
[Play Next Recording?: Y/N…]
​
[Playing Recording!]
​
[The camera opens up facing a pair of beds in a small room. On one bed, a female Yotul is sat with her infant in her lap as a male human walks into frame carrying a brightly wrapped gift box…]
​
“Merry Late Christmas, guys!”
​
“Merry Christmas, Michael!”
​
“Mewwy Kwizmuz, Mikey!”
​
[The human kneels down and hands the infant the gift box…]
​
“Sorry this gift is a bit last minute, but I managed to grab it while I was out with ‘Nel the other day.”
​
“I’m sure it’ll be perfect, Michael.”
​
“I hope so. Go on, Bud. Open it! It’s for you!”
​
“OKAY!!!”
​
[The infant rips away at the brightly-colored paper, and with help from his mother, lifts off the lid. The infant then excitedly starts bouncing up and down and reaches into the box, pulling out a bright-red plush…]
​
“WED TIWFISH!!!!!!”
​
“Oh, Michael! How? When?”
​
“I had to ask around online if anyone else had plushies from the aquarium ship, and I managed to find a guy here in Dayside. There’s…still a lot of things we lost at the house that need to be replaced, but I figured this would be a good start…”
​
“It’s perfect.”
​
[The three embrace and hold it for several seconds before pulling back…]
​
“BUT! I’m not done with gifts just yet.”
​
“What?”
​
“Here. Mind handing me your pad?”
​
“Sure?”
​
[The Yotul hands the human her datapad as he pulls a small drive from his pocket and plugs it in. After a moment, he smiles and sits down on the bed next to the Yotul. She is then seen gasping and covering her mouth with her paws…]
​
“Michael…”
​
“I overheard you on the phone with Aunty Triv, talking about how you wish you had some pictures of me when I was younger…”
​
“How on Liern-”
​
“It’s…a long story. When I was first taken into foster care after getting rescued, I was assigned a social worker to help me adjust. And after I got situated with Dad, he stayed and helped us out from time to time. He basically became like an uncle to me after a while. And since Dad didn’t really have any other family, whenever he wanted to share pictures of me growing up, he’d send a copy to my social worker. I’ve…been back in contact with him for a little while now, and it turns out he kept them.”
​
“Oh, Michael…”
​
[The Yotul and human lean against each other and embrace…]
​
“I love you, Ma.”
​
“I love you too, my joey.
​
[Still leaning against each other, they begin to swipe at the pad, presumably looking through pictures. After a few swipes, The Yotul begins chuckling hysterically…]
​
“Aaaawwweee…”
​
“Crap, I forgot about that one!”
​
“Who’z dat?”
​
“That’s…me, Bud.”
​
[The infant looks at the image for a while, still holding the bright red plush…]
​
“Teeheehee!! Fuzzy Mikey!”
​
“Can we please just swipe to the next one?”
​
“Wait. I’ve seen those kinds of human garments before! Aren’t those for…LITTLE…little joeys?”
​
“Look, I was a very emotionally stunted kid and I just thought they were comfy, alright?”
​
“This is SO going on the desk.”
​
“Please no. Any of them but that one.”
​
“Nope! It’s already decided!”
​
“YAAYYY! FUZZY MIKEY!”
​
“God, ‘Nel’s never gonna let me live this down…”
​
[Recording Ceases…]
​
Memory Transcript Subject: Teylim Andrews, Yotul Accountant And Loving Mother Of Two
​
Date:[Standardized Human Time] February 1, 2137
​
[Warning: REM Sleep Detected: Transcript May Be Fragmented Or Incomplete…]
​
Crrreeeeaak…
​
My eyes slowly squint open as the noise rouses me from sleep. I let out a yawn before looking for the source of the noise. I’m…back in my house… Sitting upright, I see that my door’s been opened, beaming The Dayside’s permanent daylight into my room. I was confused for a moment. The only other person here that would be here is-
​
“Uuuuhhmm… M-Mrs. Teylim?”
​
I looked down, and spotted the culprit.
​
Standing in the doorway was a small human child, cradling my Tohba in his arms. He was silhouetted from the daylight behind him, the light beaming past his adorable onesie pajamas creating a small blue outline around him, matching his eyes.
​
Strange. For some reason, I thought he was taller…
​
“Michael, sweetie? What’s the matter?”
​
Still carrying Tohba, Michael made his way over to the bed.
​
“Uuuhhhmmm… Tohba h-had a n-nightmare…”
​
“Ooohh, is that so?”
​
Something definitely didn’t add up. As he gently handed Tohba over to me, he certainly didn’t seem to be having a nightmare. In fact, even now he was still sleeping peacefully.
​
Michael, on the other paw, was DEFINITELY out of sorts. He was nervous, fidgeting, wrapped up in a self-hug, and even now, refused to even look at me. Whether that was because of his nervousness or if he was still convinced I was afraid of him had yet to be seen.
​
Stupid, ridiculous, Federation dogma…
​
I could tell he wasn’t being honest with me. Ordinarily, I would’ve been upset about him lying, and even more so about him disturbing Tohba, but looking at him now, I knew what he needed now wasn’t a scolding.
​
“Michael, you know you can be honest with me. Was it really Tohba who had the nightmare?”
​
I heard him nervously gulp as he tightened the self-hug around himself. After a moment, he shook his head.
​
“Mm’mm…”
​
I gave a tired, but loving sigh before holding out my free arm.
​
“Come here.”
​
With some hesitation, he stepped closer, allowing me to pull him into a hug. Michael had a lot of issues. From what I learned from his social worker, he’d been terribly abused by his previous mother and he’d lost his father only a few years after moving in with him. And now, with Earth under attack, he simply didn’t have anywhere else to go.
​
It will take a long time before he’s fully comfortable living here, I know that. I’m still not even entirely sure if I’m what he needs. I still wonder if I know what I’m doing when it comes to just raising Tohba. Even so, I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t try. He deserves a home, and a mother who loves him. All children do.
​
“I'm sorry for lying…”
​
“Ssshhh… It’s alright. Do you want to talk about it?”
​
“It was…the one with the scary fire people…”
​
Oh…THAT dream…
​
Exterminators.
​
“I don’t want them to come… I don’t want them to-“
​
“It’s okay, joey. They won’t get you here.”
​
“No! That’s not… That’s not what I’m scared of…”
​
I pulled back slightly, allowing myself to look directly at him. He sniffles and sobbed while trying to wipe away tears.
​
“You’re all so nice to me… \sniff** I…I-I don’t want the fire people to hurt you… I sh-shouldn’t be here…”
​
My heart broke in two. This poor child had already lost so much. It only made sense that he’d be afraid of losing us too.
​
I cupped his face in my paw, wiping away his tears.
​
“Michael Ruiz Andrews, I don’t care what you might have heard, but you have every RIGHT to be here. And if those scary people out there think they can come and take us away from you, they’re wrong. I will never let us be separated. You hear me?”
​
“. . .P-promise?”
​
“With all my heart. You’re MY joey now, and I won’t let anyone take you away from me.”
​
At last, Michael finally unwrapped himself from his self-hug and instead wrapped his arms around me, burying his face in my fur.
​
After a while of holding him, he’d finally calmed down enough to speak again.
​
“C-can I…sleep here tonight?”
​
Your joey needs you.
​
Yes.
​
“Of course.”
​
With some effort, he climbed up onto the bed and curled up next to me. I knew I most likely wouldn’t be getting anymore sleep, but that was fine. Just laying here, holding my boys in my arms. That was enough.
​
One after the other, I gave both my joeys a lick on the forehead.
​
“Goodnight my joeys. I love you.”
​
“Wuv…you…Ma…ma…”
​
“. . .Love you too...Mom…”
​
I love my boys. I love my family. I love…my life…
​
[Transcript Time Progression: 4 hours…]
​
Beebeebeebeep! Beebeebeebeep! Beebeebeebeep!
​
[Warning: Subject Regaining Consciousness…]
​
My entire body protested as I twisted and turned over to tap the alarm on my nightstand. My claw slapped blindly at it until finally, the agitating alarm was silenced. My eyes squinted open, revealing…I was back in our motel room…
​
Well…a girl can dream, can’t she?
​
It was a pleasant dream, I’ll give it that. As I sat up, I let my legs dangle off the side of the bed as I stretched myself out and let out a yawn. Once my eyes had fully opened, and the fog had been blinked away, I was immediately met with a sight that warmed my heart to no end. My still fast asleep, and back to being tall, new son, curled up with his baby brother on the other bed.
​
Precious boys. MY precious boys.
​
I did my best to remember if Michael had anything scheduled with Khornel for this paw, but nothing came to mind. He’d been working so hard lately, helping to keep us above water. Now that he wasn’t a refugee anymore, we were no longer receiving stipends from the program, which meant from here on out, keeping the bills paid was much more difficult. And that’s not even mentioning having to put aside anything we can to be able to eventually have the house rebuilt.
​
I kept trying for a while, I still couldn’t remember anything. For the first time in a decent while, he had a paw off.
​
Good. I’ll leave him be then. He’s earned some rest.
​
I let out one more yawn, before getting up. Unfortunately, while Michael didn’t have to work this paw, I wasn’t so fortunate. Thankfully, my recent injuries allowed me to continue to work from home instead of going out to the physical office. After one last stretch, I let myself slide off the bed.
​
I had to give myself a moment once I was upright. While my previously broken leg had healed for the most part, I still needed to be careful of how much weight I put on it. Once I was ready, I began walking to our small kitchen area. The fridge was nearly empty. I’d need to go to the store soon.
​
Thank goodness we’re staying in Soulroot, where literally EVERYTHING is expensive…
​
After cutting up some leftover fruit and strayu for myself, I went back to my desk. It was impossible to not notice the small stack of colorful books on the ground next to it. They were human kid’s books donated from the embassy here in Soulroot. Tohba would be ready to start going to school in just a few short cycles…
​
Will we be able to get out of here and back into our house before then?
​
Sitting down at my desk and booting up my pad, I found it hard to stay focused. There was still so much to do, so much to worry about. Before, when I was feeling overwhelmed, I’d have Loh, Dohkar, or Trivah there for me. With them around, it always helped things feel more manageable. But now…now I was alone again. Loh was gone. Dohkar and Trivah were stuck on the other side of that damned fence…
​
What are we going to do?
​
My head lowered. I stared blankly at the desk, partly wishing I could look through it at ANYTHING other than my work.
​
But then, there was a glint, just out of the corner of my eye…
​
I looked up, and saw something that I couldn’t help but smile at, something that even when I’m feeling low, reminds me why I have to keep going.
​
I reach out…and grab the two small frames off the corner of my desk and hold them in front of me. In my left paw, wass a framed picture of Tohba, the paw he was born. So small. So precious. So perfect. And in my right, was another picture. It was my new favorite picture.
​
A small, human child…in fuzzy, blue, onesie pajamas that matched his eyes.
​
My Michael. Still so small.
​
These two pictures. My boys. The villains outside could take everything else. So long as I have my boys, I will always have a reason to keep going.
​
I love my boys… I love my family… I love my life…
​
The End

As students, finding a reliable essay writing service is paramount, especially when deadlines are looming and the workload gets overwhelming. Today, I’m focusing on why SpeedyPaper.com is often regarded as a top choice among its peers like EssayMarket.net, WritePaperFor.Me. Let's dive into what makes SpeedyPaper stand out and how it compares briefly with other services.
Why Choose SpeedyPaper?
Pros:

• Efficiency at Its Best: SpeedyPaper lives up to its name, prioritizing quick turnaround without sacrificing quality. For students who are tight on deadlines, this is a critical service feature.
• Exceptional Quality: The papers delivered are not just fast but also meet high academic standards. SpeedyPaper ensures that each assignment is handled by competent writers who are experts in their fields.
• Supportive Customer Service: The backbone of any service-oriented business is its customer support, and SpeedyPaper excels here. They provide 24/7 support, ensuring that all your queries and issues are resolved promptly.
• Comprehensive Services: From essays to complex research papers and even theses, SpeedyPaper covers a wide range of academic writing needs. This makes it a one-stop-shop for students irrespective of their study level.

Cons:

• Cost Factor: Quality and speed come at a price. SpeedyPaper might be a bit pricier compared to others like WritePaperFor.Me, which is known for its affordability.
• Writer Variability: Although generally high, the quality can sometimes depend on the specific writer, which is a common issue in the industry.

How Does SpeedyPaper Compare to Others?

• Versus EssayMarket.net: While EssayMarket provides customized writing and direct communication with writers, SpeedyPaper wins with its quicker turnaround and consistent quality, which is crucial for urgent deadlines.
• Versus WritePaperFor.Me: WritePaperFor.Me offers lower prices, making it suitable for budget-conscious students, but SpeedyPaper’s robust support and quality assurance provide a more reliable option for critical academic needs.

In conclusion, while each service has its merits, SpeedyPaper’s blend of speed, quality, and customer support makes it particularly appealing, especially for those in urgent need of reliable and efficient academic writing assistance. If you’re looking to try a new service or are unsatisfied with your current provider, considering SpeedyPaper might just be the move you need to manage your academic commitments more smoothly.

Hi I am 25f I have depression and anxiety and I was on and off therapy/meds for different periods of my life. at some point my depression had gotten really bad, along with overthinking and insomnia would trigger psychosis episodes that would last up to a week at a time. I was on Lexapro + Abilify for the past four years. When I started Lexapro I experienced psychosis also and my doc prescribed Seroquel for a while which helped me sleep and I did not experience psychosis since then
In January I quit Lexapro and Abilify without tapering off and been struggling a lot the main symptoms are crying spells and suicidality. When I look up the symptom by itself and also considering psychosis experiences in the past I kept running into search results about bipolar disorder and it had me worried what if I have bipolar. I was misdiagnosed with borderline personality in the past and getting the 'wrong treatment' really sucked. but since bipolar and sever depression have similar symptoms it should be fine right? I will see a new psychiatrist soon and I wont mention bipolar at all and see what he thinks? I was just wondering if somebody had major depressive disorder diagnosis before bipolar and what symptoms made the doctor diagnose you with bipolar? How do they tell the depressive v mania episodes are not just a part of the ups and downs of life? And how are the depressive v mania episodes different while youre on meds vs unmedicated? The more I think about it the more I see I might have bipolar disorder. Should I write down or try to identify the episodes to see how long they've lasted, maybe it will help the doctor decide?
Diagnosis and symptoms aside, I was just looking for advice or support. Ive had the psychiatrist number for almost a week and I have to make an appointment soon but I keep postponing it. I feel almost as if I dont wanna get better? its so weird and I feel guilty about it. I just felt like maybe a part of me can survive life without any drug (prescription or recreational). I keep worrying about it- if I get better what is the point because eventually I will fall into this state again and I have a deep believe inside my heart and brain that I will end up dying of suicide eventually in my life. Other than that I also feel kinda lazy, starting a new medication is a nightmare I hate all the side effects and figuring out the dosage and all the bullshit. I wish I was normal or had a healthy brain and it gives me suicidal thoughts when I think about it because is it possible to be content in life without worrying about your health all the time.

2 weeks ago my ex broke up with me, he said he didnt feel the extra, or something was missing. It happen one day after i caught him texting his ex girlfriends and asked him about it. He broke up with me after paying a huge date, comedy show, bar bills, a restaurant and he broke up with me. I simply said "ok i would have work on us, but i will respect your decision" and walked away. Started no contact 20 mins later. Not to get him back. The disrespect was the closure for me.
I can't express how good i feel since right now. I think it was for the best. I dont stay where im not appreciated. I dont feel like i lost anything. I feel relief he is gone. Im the dumpee. So i reached out to my therapist, she knows i myself thought of breaking up often. But i also wanted to be respectful since he was going throught a lot with finances and his sick mom. But he was texting his ex every two days but didnt want to tell her about me. Claiming they were friends but not enough to tell her about his new relationship. She looked at my profil a couple of time, i bet she knew... anyway I was suprised he gave up on us. Things seems fine before he said he chose me... He told me i was his best sex, that he was super attracted to me, that he was enjoying his time with me always but was just not feeling it. It could be true who knows, but i think it has everything to do with me caughting his sms exchange with his ex.
Im very secure with myself and i know my worth. It took me two days to grief and kill my ego. And realize i was not losing anything. He never showed me how special i was. So who lost who? But he was losing a caring, genuine and invested girlfriend, willing to work on us and giving. So i honestly feel fine. I never reached out, for me it's done. I lowkey like breakups because for me i dont stay where im not appreicated. So breakups means a new chapter is starting.
1 week and a half into no contact he texted me to ask how i was. That he was in lost of words, that he wanted to reached out sooner but didn't know what to say. And to tell me i had stuffs at his place. That he really hoped i was okay... To arrange the exchange of personal belongings.
Since he said during the breakup that he didnt value me, i dont feel like investing any energy into this man no more. So i simply answered with "Yeah cool, let me know when" and he never replied to my text. Now im not really in any hurry to get my stuffs back plus my friends could get it for me, since im on my way to Tokyo (some much needed alone time). But why did he act so caring to not respond. His friends are watching my IG stories and i just hope things wont drag. I want all this to be over and pour all my good vibes on me and the loving people of my life.
I dont really think of that on a daily basis, but i'm on the plane and i have 22h for myself. I thought asking for advices here would be helpful. How can i get my stuffs back? Why is he dragging the whole process, he couls have just say when and everything would be done like he wanted. He has to live with the consequences of his actions and that means losing me obviously. You can't say to a woman who respect herself that you didn't value her and probably used me for sex to be in 6 months relationship and admit he didnt see me, to stay in your life.
I won't reached out now, since i already answered and planning my trip sounds more fun. My main focus isnt on this. But will he ever respond so all this is done for both. Like what's up with that?
Ps. English is not my first language. Thank you!

I loved it! Easily one of the best I read this year. Beautifully written and absolutely dreadful, you can feel the horror and hopelessness in every scene, and the depiction of the martians, their weaponry and how the pinnacle of human defense forces can barely tickle them creates a giant pit on your stomach. The reaction of people, some in denial and still clinging to their possessions and comfortable lives, some embracing death and a "new order of things", some seeing going crazy with religious interpretations, was very realistic and pretty much exactly what I believe a black swan event like this would look like.
The ending was my favorite part. Following the protagonist in his journey from desperation in the rubble, to nihilism and conformation to live "as a rat" in the sewers, to hope and resilience at the end of it all was beautiful and honestly made me teary. I'm huge for active optimism and it irritates me that so many stories go for an honestly lazy grimdark "nothing matters and life is horrible" message. Getting to the end and seeing that the creatures were, in fact, not all powerful or all knowing was such a breath of fresh air. The image of the city rebuilding itself, of people getting together and selflessly helping each other and the message of "man neither lives nor dies in vain" will stick with me for a long time.

I'm alone. All my life I've been able to make friends. But I always lose them, in third grade, I lost my two best friends because they switched schools and we just fell out of touch, in fifth grade I lost all my friends except for three, though this was also because of them moving, I made more friends in sixth grade and we remained friends for a good while. Freshman year my best friend from kindergarten and I stopped talking, she texted me one day saying that she didn't actually like me, and she never wanted to talk to me again. That hurt a lot, I got over it in about eight months and eventually was able to stop thinking about her everyday, and seeing her at school didn't bother me as much.
February the next year came, one year since my previous best friend and I stopped talking, maybe it got in my head, and I had been starting to feel suffocated by my current best friend at the time, I loved her, but she kept hurting me by not acknowledging my presence when we were in groups, no matter how hard I tried to contribute to the conversation, she kept leaving me and I just wanted a break from feeling like I was nothing to her. I just wanted some space. But I totally went about it in the wrong way. I picked a fight for no reason and said some awful things that I regret with every fiber of my being. At first, we stopped talking for a couple weeks, and I made two new friends, but soon after my best friend sent me an email telling me everything that was wrong with me, overbearing, pushy, and more I can't remember well, and I agree with her now, I've grown a lot and if she had said those thing recently, I could have come to terms with what she was saying, the things she pointed out were valid points that I should have looked into more, but I got defensive, this was when I thought she didn't want to be friends anymore because it sounded like she hated so many things about me... then what was there to like?
She had texted me a night before and said that she wanted to talk to me, with a specific teacher as a mediator, I refused, I am a very very private person and I do not like to share my feelings with anyone I'm not used to being around, and I wasn't yet familiar with this teacher. I told my friend that if she really didn't want to be friends anymore, that I would respect her decision. I was trying to protect myself, trying to make sure I broke it off before she did, I hate that my brain went there immediately. I wish I had tried to fight for her. She screamed at me while I sat there in a sort of calm daze, which completely gave off the impression that I didn't care... but I cared so much, she told me that I was self-sabotaging and was throwing away something that hadn't gone bad, she was screaming so loud, a teacher came in and told he she was disrupting classes, she was escorted out of the room and I heard her crying, and as soon as she left the room I burst out in tears too.
Our mutual friends, which was only two people, but they were my only other friends, stopped talking to me, and only hung out with her, but we were never on bad terms. I am beginning to resent them though. We stopped talking completely and soon summer vacation came. My cat died, I moved out of my narcissistic mother's house to my Dad's house, and his girlfriend accused me of stealing money, which I didn't, but my father took her side anyway and the entire time I was there they kept trying to blame things on me, and continuously scorned me for being antisocial, so eventually I moved out again when my father and I got in a huge fight, and I haven't talked to him since. I worked 80 hour weeks during the summer at two jobs, trying to keep my mind off my friend, my dad, and stay away from my mom, but it was okay because I had three friends who were from Mongolia, and two friends who were from Turkey working the same exact hours as me. But near the end of the summer, my two Turkish friends and I decided to plan a trip to go to Florida, I asked my mom and after some convincing she finally agreed, we got plane tickets, booked hotels, got car rental stuff, but the night before I left, my mom told me I wasn't allowed to go anymore, she has done this multiple times, but not of this magnitude, I told her that we had already paid for everything, but she told me that if I left, she would call the cops on me.
So I texted my Turkish friends and I told them what happened, but they wouldn't believe me... they blamed me and said "did you tell your mom?" I told them that I did, but they swore that I was lying, they told everyone, including my three Mongolian friends, so in the last month that my foreign friends were in the country, they all hated me, treated me terribly, constantly gave me dirty looks, and were scornful. It broke my heart, especially because they were so kind before, if I can make the kindest person hate me... then what kind of monster am I?
Finally, I came back to school, and it was so much harder than I thought it would be, seeing her everyday, happy with her friends while I sat there, alone and in misery, I had a couple friends, but they weren't in many of my classes. I was able to hold out for so long. One day I just couldn't take it anymore. I just completely gave up, seeing her was too much to bear, she didn't care about me anymore, I didn't have any close friends, just people who wouldn't really care if I lived or died. Everyday was a struggle. I stopped going to school, stopped going to work, and just curled up in my bed and decided that I had enough. I was on a course to graduate that year, a whole year early which got screwed up as well, ruining my chances of doing so.
I skipped work for almost three weeks, but I eventually came back because my boss said she missed me and reassured me that no body was mad. I haven't been to school in about two months, I don't know how I could go back anymore, it would be humiliating... like, what would I say? What if people asked questions? I'd just come off as so pathetic. I've ruined my life, I have little chance of a diploma, and no chance if I don't go back, I've been labeled as "truancy" or whatever. I was also supposed to go to Spain and Italy for a school trip, but I wasn't able to go because of my lack of attendance, so I ended up wasting 4,000 dollars.
My two friends that I made after my last best friend and I broke up called the cops on me because she thought I was going to kill myself, and I was so mad and embarrassed I cried the whole way to the hospital with my mom in the car and was able to go back home after some tests, after I got home, I went off on them, I was so so upset, and I honestly still am, I know they were only doing what they thought best, but I told her that I didn't want to talk to her until she would apologize, because all she kept saying was "I'm sorry you feel that way" so I told her to stop apologizing for how I felt, and apologize for what she did. She didn't, so I told her that I wasn't going to talk to her until she apologized. And the other friend who was in on it too, I texted her angrily and she said "womp womp" I immediately blocked her, I was so mad, words cannot describe my level of fury at that moment. It wasn't funny, that was not the time for jokes.
I have no friends, only my narcissistic mother, I don't even have a father anymore, my oldest sister isn't in contact with him either, for a different reason... I've just been working, and trying not to think. But I can't take it anymore. Have I really screwed everything up? Is my life worth anything anymore? Friendship is dead. Family is overrated, and I have never been able to keep a friend, I do not want the pain of loosing another one, I have people who I enjoy being around, I have coworkers, I have my sisters, and I have two people I hang out with sometimes, but really, none of them are my friends. I never want to make another friend, I refuse, I know they consider me their friends, but if I put a real label on it, it'll hurt too much when they leave and begin to hate me. What do I do? Am I destined for failure? Why do I always end up alone? Not only does everyone hate me, but I'm hating myself more and more by the passing day. I don't know what to do... can somebody, anybody help me? I'm just so lost.

When I was a kid, about like six years old, I had the smallest room in the house. My family had a small house in general. My two older brothers shared a room up to when I was about 10 and my middle sibling got the attic after it was renovated. Because my room was so small, I had a loft bed. Still because it stood against the inner side of the sloping roof it only gave a small room underneath it. But I made the best of it and stored many many boxes of Lego under it. On the foot and head side of the bed were small spaces. Only 20 centimeters wide but wide enough so I could climb up and down my bed with them. Another cool feature of the bed was the desk attached to it. It was facing the window on the opposite side of the door. It was supposed to be a place where I could do my homework, but as if I ever did my homework at that age. You may wonder why I am telling you all of this. Why you need to know how my room looked when I was a small child. But that’s were this one night came. I don´t remember how old I was but I guess I was seven. Far above the age when you can´t distinguish between a dream and reality. Far above the age when you put pieces of Lego up your nose and just in general are just a stupid child. And that’s what makes my experience even more weird.
I always had trouble falling asleep and still have. Back then I would always not close the door entirely, so a bit of light entered the room. I needed that because I was a bit of a squeamish kid. As it is usual when you have older brothers, they exposed me to many things I wasn´t ready for. My first time learning about World War two was when I watched a let’s play of Wolfenstein: The new order with my oldest brothers. When a scene showing the aftermath of human experiments came, he paused and said something along the lines of “Maybe you shouldn’t watch this.” This was after I had already seen BJ gun down countless soldiers and stabbing them to death. He took me down into the kitchen and told me about WW2. The whole time I was thinking about those corpses I had seen on his screen. To sum it up, I saw some shit at a young age and didn´t like falling asleep in total darkness. Now you know everything you need to know to understand this night. Or at least kinda understand it. Not even I fully grasp it.
It was the middle of the night. I woke up feeling the desire to go to the toilette. But something was off. My room was clad in total darkness. Not a single bit of light. The way to the toilette wasn´t long. Just walk down the ladder that was next to the door and walk through the small corridor and open the bathroom door. All in all maybe 7 meters to walk. But for some reason I didn´t took the obvious path. No. I raised my body and climbed down the small opening between bed and wall. My feet touched the ground and I let go off the wooden bedframe. Ahead of me was now a small path. The bed and the desk. Then I would get to the opening and could walk to the door. Of course, I didn´t see anything but with a room so small as mine, I knew every centimeter. I began to set one foot after the other. A second later I left could feel the desk. It touched my chest and was like a barrier I had to go around of. Another few steps and I would be finally able to go to the toilette.
I took those steps, expecting to feel the clearing. But the clearing didn´t came. Instead, the barrier I felt at my chest let me in a turn. “What?”, I asked myself. This wasn´t how I knew my room. My back was still touching the wall when normally I was touch the window. I felt dread creeping through my body. My throat became as dry as a desert. “This can´t be.”, I mumbled. I felt goosebumps on my arms but no matter what, I would reach the toilette. Maybe I just had turned around unknowingly and that was why it felt so weird. I reached out to the barrier and wall and began to walk again. Expecting to soon reach the clearing I upped my pace and walked further. But the clearing didn´t came. Just more wall and more desk. As if the space had been stretched out impossibly.
That’s when the fear broke me. A tear fell down my cheek. I was somewhere other than my room. I thought about just screaming but a small voice in my head told me: “What if you are just stupid? If you scream now, your parents will wake up and be very angry at you. Papa has to work tomorrow.” I felt so hopeless in that moment. Defeated there was just one exit. Try to get back to my bed. I turned around and took three or four steps. Suddenly my hand felt the bedframe. “What?”, I asked my self again. It just made the whole scene so much weirder. But I should be grateful. I reached out my hands and grabbed the upper part of the bedframe before pulling my self up and climbing back under my now cold blanket. Still crying a bit, I somehow fell asleep.
The next morning, I was woken up by my mom. Light filled the room and it looked just normal. So otherworldly stretching. I climbed down the ladder and walked down into the kitchen. Not mentioning the weird events of the night.

May 15, 2024 8:15 AM
TEL AVIV, Israel--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (NYSE and TASE: TEVA) today announced the appointment of Matthew Shields as Executive Vice President of Teva Global Operations (TGO), the Company’s manufacturing and supply division, effective June 3, 2024. Mr. Shields succeeds Eric Drapé, who is leaving after 11 years with the Company, including more than four years as Executive Vice President, Global Operations. Mr. Shields will be a member of Teva’s Executive Leadership Team and report directly to President and CEO Richard Francis. He will be based in Teva’s U.S. headquarters in Parsippany, NJ.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240515380320/en/
Mr. Shields joins Teva with a track record over a 25-plus year career in the global biopharmaceutical and animal health industries. As an engineer by trade, Mr. Shields brings significant experience at every stage of the manufacturing and supply process. Most recently, Mr. Shields served as Senior Vice President for Animal Health Manufacturing for Merck, known as MSD Animal Health outside of the United States and Canada, where he oversaw end-to-end manufacturing, supply chain, procurement, and process development. Prior to Merck, he led Specialty Care Manufacturing, Engineering, and Operational Excellence for Sanofi. Mr. Shields spent much of his early career at Amgen, where held a variety of leadership roles in Operations.
Richard Francis, Teva's President and CEO stated: “I’m thrilled to welcome a transformational leader of Matthew’s caliber to the executive team at Teva. Matthew brings a wealth of experience in health operations that are critical to fulfilling our purpose by enabling Teva to execute on our promises to patients and healthcare systems around the world. Matthew is ideally positioned to lead our TGO organization through the next phase of our Pivot to Growth journey.”
Mr. Francis added: “As we have intensified our efforts to best position Teva for future success through our Pivot to Growth strategy, Eric Drapé has played a key role in strengthening our operations network. During his tenure leading TGO, the organization has made tremendous strides serving patients by standardizing processes, increasing agility, and improving our operating margin. I would like to thank Eric for his many contributions to Teva and wish him all the best as he embarks on a new and exciting phase in his life.”
Mr. Shields stated: “Teva is clearly a company with incredible potential based on the early progress of its Pivot to Growth strategy, and its tremendous heritage in manufacturing important medicines serving the needs of patients around the world. I’m honored to take on this critical role, and eager to begin working with the talented team in Teva Global Operations, and my colleagues across the Company, to deliver on our inspiring purpose.”
Matthew Shields Bio
Mr. Shields is a manufacturing and supply chain leader with more than 25 years of experience in the biopharmaceuticals and animal health industries. He’s held leadership roles at Merck Animal Health, Sanofi, and Amgen.
He joins Teva from Merck Animal Health where he served as Senior Vice President for Manufacturing with responsibility for supporting $5.6 billion in annual sales. During his time at Merck, Mr. Shields also oversaw the Supply Chain, Procurement, and Process Development organizations. His leadership was instrumental in navigating challenging global issues and business integration efforts, while driving improvements in the company’s operations network and delivering significant savings.
Prior to Merck, Mr. Shields was a senior leader at Sanofi, first serving as Head of Engineering and Operational Excellence for the company’s Biologics organization. In that role, he led a lean transformation program resulting in substantial cost savings and operational efficiencies. Later he became Global Head of Sanofi’s Specialty Care Manufacturing organization with a focus on enabling the successful launches of Dupixent® and Praluent®, while also overseeing the commissioning and startup of Sanofi’s first digitally enabled continuous manufacturing facility.
Mr. Shields spent a significant portion of his career with Amgen, holding series of increasingly responsible leadership roles including Head of Global Raw Material Supplier Relationships, Executive Director & Plant Manager in Singapore, and Executive Director of Manufacturing. Notable achievements include overseeing the transition of Amgen’s manufacturing of the future program from R&D to Operations, the start-up of its manufacturing site of the future in Singapore, and leading capacity and throughput improvements of their large-scale biologics manufacturing facility in Rhode Island.
Mr. Shields received his undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering & Materials Science Engineering from the University of Connecticut and an MBA from Bryant University in Rhode Island. He currently serves on the board of the National Association of Manufacturers.
FULL RELEASE: https://ir.tevapharm.com/news-and-events/press-releases/press-release-details/2024/Teva-Announces-Appointment-of-Matthew-Shields-to-Executive-Vice-President-Teva-Global-Operations/default.aspx

I work 12 hour nights so I live in a different world. I'm moody and I like time alone. I am a thinker. Not a talker. I have no idea how to talk to people I don't know and very little desire to meet new people. You might say I'm shy. It takes me a long time to open up with someone and some have thought I was hiding something. Nothing to hide. Just don't dump my baggage onto others. I had the same few friends most of my life and I find it hard to relax around new people. Honestly most people get on my nerves so I prefer to socialize one on one. I am impossible to read. Most people think I'm pissed off all the time. I'm not but I let them think I am so they stay away from me. I can get along with just about anyone and can socialize when I want or need to. Most times I would rather be at home or somewhere the crowd is small. My circle of friends has become non-existent. Lots of tragic stories. I am looking for someone that can understand my need to take things slow. I am more in need of a true friend than a wife. Although finding someone that turns into both would be OUT****INGSTANDING.
I use most of my free time working on home improvement projects. Always coming up with new ideas. I am a jack of all trades, master of none. I have a lot of different interest and the more unusual something is the more I am interested most times. I get board easy there for I'm always looking for new things to do or learn about. I ride a Harley and I have tattoos. I have a strong southern accent, so I've been told and every now and then someone makes the mistake of thinking me dim. That mistake is only made once. I can be quite grumpy at times and I talk to myself. I also talk to my dog, who at this moment is my best friend. I have been told I am OCD. I call it organized. If I start something it is very hard for me to stop until it's done......and done right. In other words, my way. It is highly unlikely I will find anyone that can relate to me on this site. I need someone with self confidence and intelligence. With drive and motivation. I want someone that wants me but does not need me. Someone I can take care of but will also take care of me. Someone who enjoys kissing and knows how. Someone that understands that telling someone you love them is a big deal because love last forever. Okay if you have read this far and by some miracle you understand where I'm coming from you are some kind of nut and we might actually get along. Please send me a message. One last thing, I think we all know that all relationships start with a physical attraction. Sad but true. I know you need it and so do I. Please don't take offense if I don't answer your message. There have been plenty that didn't answer mine.
Personality type INTJ

Hello everyone,
I've been working on and off on an LLM enhanced screen recording tool in order to promote knowledge sharing. I'd be grateful for opinions, tips and tricks. Besides tons of unfinished side projects, I've never had the guts to release something before.
A bit of a backstory before we kick things off: in my day to day job I often drop in short meets to receive answers or ask questions. 99% of my online meetings are knowledge sharing related. I often forget bits and pieces of info so I started recording these type of sessions, and eventually ended up with my desktop cluttered with recordings, totally unorganised and I barely find what I need unless I start watching and scrubbing. My project, Snapclip, is a solution to my problem, scratching my own itch here! ;-)
I've made a recording here: https://app.snapclip.io/share/Y02N0e, it's a basic walkthrough of the app.

• For the recording phase, I use whisperX (https://github.com/m-bain/whisperX) for speech to text. I felt that the result was too large chunks of words, often misaligned with the audio. stable-ts (https://github.com/jianfch/stable-ts) is then used as a stabilizer. Titles and descriptions are generated with gpt-3.5-turbo and a bit of prompt engineering.
• For the assistant phase (a chatbot), it's RAG / gpt-3.5, only the transcript is vectorized, for now. On the front end, embeddings are created by running gte-small (https://huggingface.co/Supabase/gte-small) locally, in a web worker. I'd like to change that and create input embeddings on the server.

I'm pretty new to LLM / AI, my passion has always been video playback, but I'm absolutely having a blast working on this. At some point in the future, I'd like to analyse the actual video side (as it's only audio based at the moment), such as OCR / visual recognition and train the assistant based on that info as well. Chapters and chapter summaries are a nice addition too.
I limited it to 3 recordings of 15 minutes each (but added Stripe integration), and the AI chat is throttled. I've got no clue what the cost impact will be but happy to experiment.
Let me know what you think!
Best,
Mat

Australia Spouse Visa Requirements from India
Wishing to be with your spouse in Australia but worrying about how to deal with the labyrinth of visa requirements can be daunting, especially when it comes to something as significant as moving to a new country to be with your spouse. Understanding the complexities of the Spouse Visa requirements is most important. From proving that you have a genuine relationship of your relationship to meeting financial thresholds, each step demands careful attention.
What are the eligibility criteria for a Spouse Visa?
Mentioned below are some of the requirements that will make your case stronger for Australia Spouse Visa:
1. Genuine Relationship
The main document for obtaining an Australian Spouse Visa is a genuine and long-term relationship. Joint financial obligations, shared housing arrangements, social interactions, and supporting documentation are all necessary forms of proof of the partnership. This is an essential condition for obtaining an Australian spouse visa.
2. Length of Relationship
If you are in a de-facto relationship then it is necessary that you and your partner must have lived together for at least a year. You share a permanent residence with your de facto partner and have evidence to support your claim.
3. Financial
For the length of your stay in Australia, you must show that you can support yourself and any family members you may have listed on your application. Providing proof of income or savings may be necessary for this. It is among the crucial prerequisites for obtaining an Australian spouse visa.
Sponsor must have a minimum 4000 AUD salary to bear all the expenses of their spouse or they can also show their bank statement having 30,000 AUD.
4. Health
The health standards for you and any family members you list on your application must be met. This could entail a medical assessment.
5. Character
Both you and any family members you list on your application need to be of a certain character. This might require a certificate of police clearance.
6. Age
You must be at least 18 years old.
7. Family Planning You and your spouse must hold the best interest of the child and must plan on extending the family in future.
It’s important to keep in mind that the requirements for an Australian spouse visa might be complicated, and specific situations may call for the application of additional requirements. To make sure you meet all of the requirements for an Australian spouse visa, it is advised that you obtain professional assistance on how to apply for a spouse visa from India.
The person Sponsoring his or her spouse:

• Must be over the age of 18.
• The sponsor must not be in another relationship at the same time.
• A sponsor should be financially stable to sponsor his or her spouse.
• Sponsor must either be a Citizen or PR of Australia, or a PR holder or citizen of New Zealand.
• The sponsor needs to provide documents to accommodate the Australia Spouse Visa such as the rent agreement, and utilities.

To get more information regarding the Australia Spouse Visa you can visit https://www.aptechvisa.com/spouse-visa-australia. You can contact our Australia Immigration consultants at 9131059075; 9289289006

Rank and Rent website making $2,000 per month.
This website runs on autopilot.
I didn't touch this website for 3 months and it is making $$$.
Around 30-40 leads per month.
Ranking the main keywords on SERPs and maps.
Here is what we did:

Set up a WordPress website

• We installed the Blocksy theme and Elementor
• Redesigned the website colours to match our logo colours
• Created a high-converting home LP for better conversions
• Created templates for service pages that are similar to the home page but high-converting

Content is the king

• Create a topical map of your services, location pages, and blog posts
• We are using very short parent/child URL slugs, which are easier to understand for G
• Content is in the form of questions and answers and how you can help the customer
• NLP style with entities, don't go crazy with keywords

Set up GMB

• GMB is now a bit tricky, but if you find a good industrial estate near the city or area, it is possible
• Get a local landline from Twilio or from any phone provider
• Get some good business park and set up the GMB there
• Use the local IP address; you can use proxies; or if you are in that location, set your GPS and mobile data on
• Add some photos from stock images, change the contrast, resize, and add your logo watermark
• When G asks you for video verification, just prepare the room or office
• Add some tools for the business in the room, some paperwork, or business cards
• After the verification, spend at least 20 seconds showing your business cards, some paperwork, and tools.
• No need to show the street or outside the building
• When G tells you it is processing the verification, just wait
• Don't touch the GMB at all until it is verified!

GMB-verified

• When you verify your GMB, you can add content, pictures, and optimise
• Fill out everything, set the chat on, more picture, some AI videos, and add services and products

Social media and citations

• Get a Fiverr gig or Legiit gig and get somebody to blast social, web 2.0, and citations with your GMB embed map, content, address, and URL

Iterate the content

• We create around 100 articles for the blog posts with Zimmwriter, upload them to Wordpress, and set up 2-3 blog posts every week
• That's around 8 blog posts per month, so we are covered for the whole year

Internal link building

• We are using Link Whisper and Link Boss to create internal link building every month for new and actual blog posts

PR

• We fired some PRs for $100 just to make the content and company more viral and give some juice of authority
• There are many PR services on the market, or you can use a gig from Legiit

CTR

• Now we are doing CTR a bit on the branded keywords, but only one per day
• Don't go crazy with CTR
• Later, we added CTR to the primary keywords, but again, only one per day

Reviews, Reviews, Reviews

• I still think reviews and stuff keywords in the title are the most important in GMB
• Get some legit reviews from your friends or from customers
• Always use the local IP address and the best with GPS and mobile data.
• Stuck the primary keywords and location in the reviews
• Don't buy reviews from India or Pakistan! They get suspended

(You can save this or ask me any question)
Source

My whole life i have lied about things big and small but ive never had any intentions behind lying, such as to manipulate people or to get attention ect.. (this might be a long read but it’s all important info)
It started of as small things like in elementary school we were watching a video about professional bastekballers, i lied and said one of them was my cousin. I didn’t do it to get attention i just did and i don’t know why. (Obviously no one believed me)
One time in elementary, i was scratched by my dog and sent a picture of it to my friend saying “My dog scratched me” but in those quotes, implying that i SH. (It looked like if u scratch urself w ur fingernail) they obviously got very upset and our friendship ended,,not before me messaging her on PINTEREST apologising. I don’t know why i did that i just did it without any thoughts of “i shouldn’t send this” it was just impulsive/reflex. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Then i started to lie more frequently e.g., if someone asked me a question like “ Have you ever done..{insert topic},or have u ever watched {insert topic}” i would respond w a lie. Those are just examples because i can’t remember every single lie i’ve told especially small ones. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As i’ve gotten older, i’m 19 now. I’ve lied about more extreme things.
I can’t remember much of my childhood, only “core” memories that randomly pop up in my mind; but i don’t have a concept of time w these memories,, idk how old i was when they happened. if i see a picture or if someone in my family mentions a story i can then remember it but only with the detail they provide.
For some background information, i have been verbally abused by my mother and she has suffered with depression and ‘manic??’ episodes my whole life.
When i was younger our relationship was very bad (still is) and we would get into yelling matches almost every day. These were me being yelled at for doing normal things a CHILD would do such as, sleeping in on accident, forgetting to bring something to school ect. And practically any chance she would get to have an argument with me.
She would scream things like “Your worthless, your useless , your a b*tch and ungrateful child, your fucked in the head” ect. She would say things along those lines to me almost every day for several years of my life. I couldn’t give you an age timeline as i can’t remember how old i was when it started happening.
I also have an older brother who’s always have a good relationship w my mum, she only treats me like this (i’m austisic and i’ve been told that’s why we “clash”) My mum was physically abused as a child and homeless around my age. She definitely hasn’t “healed” from it and still doesn’t know how to regulate her emotions and communicate effectively. My dad excuses her behaviour when i try to talk about how it has affected me by saying “it’s the depression, or the way her childhood was and she tries to be better!, she regrets what she says to me and loves me so much” ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Now to probably the worst lie i’ve told. I need to tell some background info tho for it to make sense! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It all happened when i was on 🍃 and at a park with a group of people,, two of my close friends, let’s call them G & B, G’s boyfriend J. 4 guys friends w J including K who G worked with and i was “close with” for 6 months. i will try not to go into lots of detail bcoz if i did this post would be super long.
K was very manipulative towards me, well that is what my two friends G & B would tell me. I could provide screenshots of me and K’s conversations but i won’t, to protect privacy. Me and B hung out with K a few times to sesh and i would talk to K frequently on snap mostly about mental health related things.
He let me vent and explain how i felt and would give me advice as he was older, more experienced and struggled himself. I had a crush on him, he didn’t like me back but we stayed friends.
I discovered i didn’t actually like him and it was just Limerance. We had lots of arguments i can’t remember what about bcoz there was so many. One i remember was he dropped my friend B because she had BPD like him but “didn’t try to manage herself”; not related to that, i started to feel a sense of “hatred” towards B and the way they treated me as a friend in certain situations. I would complain abt them to K often and K would tell me to drop B. i did this while i was still best friends with B.
Me and B’ friendship almost ended because K told them to like get a grip and manage their BPD and treat me better. I liked to B and told them “i’ve never told K anything bad abt them only abt one situation which i’m over and i told u i told K. “ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Summary of it all i’m no longer friends w K and no one ik has been for a good 7-8 months. I will include some “quotes” they said to me in one our last convo (there was another situation after this but if i include it’ll be too long) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “I know that to you, you genuinely think all of the stuff you said was happening is, that's how mental illness works cos i was the same” ; “This is so funny that you think it's somehow my responsibility to control your emotions and attachments”
“You just expect me to cut u off and somehow manage ur attachment for you, you need to manage ur own attachments” ; “You usually accuse me of things unjustly but i've done that to ppl before when i was your age so i understood” ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ After some thought i realise that K might’ve been right about me and my friends were (partially) wrong abt him being manipulative and a bad person. Yes they’ve seen the texts and conversations and the quotes above.
It’s eating at me that i acted this way towards K because it’s embarrassing.
I have to end this story here because it’ll get to long even tho i want to include it all!! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Back to the park. We were all talking abt life events that have happened to us and i told everyone there that i “had a huge secret ive never told anyone”.
“When i was a young child my dad told my mum to get bread out of the freezer to defrost and then make my sandwich for school. When my dad had left my mum complained and started yelling at me because I’m old enough to make my own goddam food. It got heated and she threw the loaf of bread at this glass cabinet i was next to, the glass shattered everywhere and cut my foot. i started to cry and scream, which made her angrier. She picked up a shard and tried to un*live me.” i won’t go into detail of the last bit of the lie i said.
Now this did actually happen apart form the very last bit. When i was telling this lie i didn’t have any intentions behind making it up. It just all came to me and out of my mouth as i was saying it,, kinda like i was read a book and just continuing to read.
I understand that this isn’t something to be lied about. I knew i was lying when i said it/after. I cannot tell people that it is a lie especially because i am still friends with G & B. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Last week i had a conversation with B about it as i mentioned i think i want to start going to therapy.
My reason for wanting to start therapy (this isn’t the only reason why i want to go and not the only time i’ve considered it) was that i got so annoyed by something my mum had done i was thinking everything would be better if she was just 💀. And how i went spiraling wondering if i was a psychopath for thinking/imagining me doing it.
My friend told me that im not a psychopath because i wouldn’t m*rder my mother cold blooded and have no remorse. And something along the lines of she hasn’t done anything to drive me to do that. I brought up the “Incident” (the lie) and B asked me to say what happened again because they forgot.
I told it in the same detail as i did to them before but i said “it’s kinda uncomfortable to type” they said it’s okay i don’t have to ( keep in mind my friend has experienced very traumatic things and wouldn’t get uncomfortable with hearing) and you saying that it’s uncomfortable proves ur not a psychopath.
It wasn’t uncomfortable for me to say, i felt awkward because i knew i was lying again. I know that no one “normal” lies about things like this.
I most of the lies i’ve told especially this one because i have to live with this now for the rest of my life. Telling my friends the truth is not an option, i don’t know how they would react and i would end up with no friends, isolated and excluded from society around me. Maybe that is what i deserve because I’ve lied abt something so horrible and intricately aswell.
I’ve also lied about being SA, i have never falsely accused anyone. I told the lie without saying the “person” who did it because i “didn’t know”. I regret doing this and if i could go back and somehow pause the part of my brain that wires me to lie i would.
I don’t think i’m a psychopath, i have empathy for others,,atleast i think it do?? I tell my friends and family that i love them and display affection towards people. I’ve been in multiple romantic situationships but never a proper relationship.
The idea of cuddling with a partner, talking to them every day and doing lovey dovey couples stuff makes me uncomfortable and i would be awkward doing so.
I’ve always had to question if i actually liked/loved someone as i know the definition of loving someone and how it’s shown but i don’t know if i feel it. I don’t know how to tell if i feel love or how to tell if i like someone romantically.
I do have autism which can be linked with a lack of empathy. Now that i think about it i can’t tell if I’m empathetic. My dad had skin cancer and had to have reconstruction surgery for it, i didn’t feel sad at the possibility of him dying or from seeing him in the hospital bed.
When we visited him my other family members were crying or very emotional. It’s not that i wished he had cancer and died i just didn’t feel any sort of emotion toward it.
My best-friends, i love them dearly? if either of them died i would definitely be sad, but I’m not sure if my “feeling sad” is the “normal” like if they passed away i would miss them giving me advice, conversations, moments and hangouts together and the fact we couldn’t make anymore memories.
I feel a deep connection with animals and love to be in their presence. although when i was very young after seeing my mum always kick, punch or push my pets for their “bad behaviour “ when my cat broke something in my room i attempted to str*ngle it. I regret that deeply and would never do that ever again. Ever. If i had to chose between never doing that and erasing my existence i would.
I guess what i’m asking is if anyone who has similar experience of lying without knowing why or if anyone has any advice on what i should do please help!
I understand a therapist would be good to tell this all too but i am afraid of the consequences/admitting i lied about horrible things. I know that im a horrible person for doing this, i dont think better of myself for lying.
i would do absolutely anything to go back and have never told a lie.
If anyone can help me i would really appreciate it and definitely implement strategies to become a better person and hopefully never lie again.
If anyone has an idea of whats “Wrong with me” please share, be harsh, be honest, be mean if you want to. If there is “something wrong with me” i will definitely try to get professional help when i can or is there a much harder way to resolve “myself” on my own.

I'm alone. All my life I've been able to make friends. But I always lose them, in third grade, I lost my two best friends because they switched schools and we just fell out of touch, in fifth grade I lost all my friends except for three, though this was also because of them moving, I made more friends in sixth grade and we remained friends for a good while. Freshman year my best friend from kindergarten and I stopped talking, she texted me one day saying that she didn't actually like me, and she never wanted to talk to me again. That hurt a lot, I got over it in about eight months and eventually was able to stop thinking about her everyday, and seeing her at school didn't bother me as much.
February the next year came, one year since my previous best friend and I stopped talking, maybe it got in my head, and I had been starting to feel suffocated by my current best friend at the time, I loved her, but she kept hurting me by not acknowledging my presence when we were in groups, no matter how hard I tried to contribute to the conversation, she kept leaving me and I just wanted a break from feeling like I was nothing to her. I just wanted some space. But I totally went about it in the wrong way. I picked a fight for no reason and said some awful things that I regret with every fiber of my being. At first, we stopped talking for a couple weeks, and I made two new friends, but soon after my best friend sent me an email telling me everything that was wrong with me, overbearing, pushy, and more I can't remember well, and I agree with her now, I've grown a lot and if she had said those thing recently, I could have come to terms with what she was saying, the things she pointed out were valid points that I should have looked into more, but I got defensive, this was when I thought she didn't want to be friends anymore because it sounded like she hated so many things about me... then what was there to like?
She had texted me a night before and said that she wanted to talk to me, with a specific teacher as a mediator, I refused, I am a very very private person and I do not like to share my feelings with anyone I'm not used to being around, and I wasn't yet familiar with this teacher. I told my friend that if she really didn't want to be friends anymore, that I would respect her decision. I was trying to protect myself, trying to make sure I broke it off before she did, I hate that my brain went there immediately. I wish I had tried to fight for her. She screamed at me while I sat there in a sort of calm daze, which completely gave off the impression that I didn't care... but I cared so much, she told me that I was self-sabotaging and was throwing away something that hadn't gone bad, she was screaming so loud, a teacher came in and told he she was disrupting classes, she was escorted out of the room and I heard her crying, and as soon as she left the room I burst out in tears too.
Our mutual friends, which was only two people, but they were my only other friends, stopped talking to me, and only hung out with her, but we were never on bad terms. I am beginning to resent them though. We stopped talking completely and soon summer vacation came. My cat died, I moved out of my narcissistic mother's house to my Dad's house, and his girlfriend accused me of stealing money, which I didn't, but my father took her side anyway and the entire time I was there they kept trying to blame things on me, and continuously scorned me for being antisocial, so eventually I moved out again when my father and I got in a huge fight, and I haven't talked to him since. I worked 80 hour weeks during the summer at two jobs, trying to keep my mind off my friend, my dad, and stay away from my mom, but it was okay because I had three friends who were from Mongolia, and two friends who were from Turkey working the same exact hours as me. But near the end of the summer, my two Turkish friends and I decided to plan a trip to go to Florida, I asked my mom and after some convincing she finally agreed, we got plane tickets, booked hotels, got car rental stuff, but the night before I left, my mom told me I wasn't allowed to go anymore, she has done this multiple times, but not of this magnitude, I told her that we had already paid for everything, but she told me that if I left, she would call the cops on me.
So I texted my Turkish friends and I told them what happened, but they wouldn't believe me... they blamed me and said "did you tell your mom?" I told them that I did, but they swore that I was lying, they told everyone, including my three Mongolian friends, so in the last month that my foreign friends were in the country, they all hated me, treated me terribly, constantly gave me dirty looks, and were scornful. It broke my heart, especially because they were so kind before, if I can make the kindest person hate me... then what kind of monster am I?
Finally, I came back to school, and it was so much harder than I thought it would be, seeing her everyday, happy with her friends while I sat there, alone and in misery, I had a couple friends, but they weren't in many of my classes. I was able to hold out for so long. One day I just couldn't take it anymore. I just completely gave up, seeing her was too much to bear, she didn't care about me anymore, I didn't have any close friends, just people who wouldn't really care if I lived or died. Everyday was a struggle. I stopped going to school, stopped going to work, and just curled up in my bed and decided that I had enough. I was on a course to graduate that year, a whole year early which got screwed up as well, ruining my chances of doing so.
I skipped work for almost three weeks, but I eventually came back because my boss said she missed me and reassured me that no body was mad. I haven't been to school in about two months, I don't know how I could go back anymore, it would be humiliating... like, what would I say? What if people asked questions? I'd just come off as so pathetic. I've ruined my life, I have little chance of a diploma, and no chance if I don't go back, I've been labeled as "truancy" or whatever. I was also supposed to go to Spain and Italy for a school trip, but I wasn't able to go because of my lack of attendance, so I ended up wasting 4,000 dollars.
My two friends that I made after my last best friend and I broke up called the cops on me because she thought I was going to kill myself, and I was so mad and embarrassed I cried the whole way to the hospital with my mom in the car and was able to go back home after some tests, after I got home, I went off on them, I was so so upset, and I honestly still am, I know they were only doing what they thought best, but I told her that I didn't want to talk to her until she would apologize, because all she kept saying was "I'm sorry you feel that way" so I told her to stop apologizing for how I felt, and apologize for what she did. She didn't, so I told her that I wasn't going to talk to her until she apologized. And the other friend who was in on it too, I texted her angrily and she said "womp womp" I immediately blocked her, I was so mad, words cannot describe my level of fury at that moment. It wasn't funny, that was not the time for jokes.
I have no friends, only my narcissistic mother, I don't even have a father anymore, my oldest sister isn't in contact with him either, for a different reason... I've just been working, and trying not to think. But I can't take it anymore. Have I really screwed everything up? Is my life worth anything anymore? Friendship is dead. Family is overrated, and I have never been able to keep a friend, I do not want the pain of loosing another one, I have people who I enjoy being around, I have coworkers, I have my sisters, and I have two people I hang out with sometimes, but really, none of them are my friends. I never want to make another friend, I refuse, I know they consider me their friends, but if I put a real label on it, it'll hurt too much when they leave and begin to hate me. What do I do? Am I destined for failure? Why do I always end up alone? Not only does everyone hate me, but I'm hating myself more and more by the passing day. I don't know what to do... can somebody, anybody help me? I'm just so lost.

I'm walking through a bustling underground train station. I push and shove my way through all the other commuters onto the platform. As I look around, there seems to be endless rows of platforms in both directions, stretching well into a dense fog. Further ahead, neat lines of railway tracks extend out from the fog and through the platforms. I instinctually look up at the info screen
Next train in ### minutes
I furrow my brow, squint to try and focus on the numbers but they're heavily pixelated and illegible. I look around at the other commuters, who stream onto the platform completely unaware of the anomaly. Most people are on their phone, or wearing headphones while some are talking to each other. No one seems to notice the malfunction with the screen.
That's when the absurdity of the situation clicks for me. Endless platforms, a wall of fog, unreadable numbers and people that don't care. It's all a dream. I bring my hand up to my face and pinch my nose, trying to breathe through it. An old reality check I remembered from back when I was trying to learn to lucid dream.
My heart rate jumped when I realised, that I couldn't breathe through my nose. Before I could even process this, another problem presented itself. I didn't know why I was here. I didn't know where I was going and I definitely did not know how I even got here. It seems as if reality ceased to exist right before I walked onto this platform. Just like it typically feels in a dream, you spawn in out of nowhere and don't really know what happened prior - except this wasn't a dream.
I knew I was sure of it because deep inside my bones I felt this anxious urgent message. I need to catch this train. It was a primal feeling.
At this point, my head is spinning and I need to sit down somewhere. I choose a silver bench with a middle aged woman sitting on it. She shuffles further to the left as I sit down next to her clutching my head and racking my brain to try and figure out what it is happening. This is what amnesia feels like, I thought to my self as I gnawed at scraps of messy muddled memories. Each image that came into my mind was just a fragment - A school, a library, sickeningly white walls. It hit me that I didn't even know my name. I was starting to hyperventilate but then my body kicked into autopilot. I started to take deep breaths, focusing on my diaphragm and calming myself down. It felt like I was trained to do this. I started to focus on the current situation.
Where was my ticket? Instinctually, I knew I had to have gotten one on my entry to the train station. I reached into my pockets and pulled out a scrap of paper. Scrawled in very familiar cursive:
*In case of memory loss, read the journal in your backpack*
Strange message but I didn't have any choice then to at least give the instructions a try. I removed my backpack and rummaged through it for the journal. I wouldn't really call it a backpack - more a tattered and frayed bundle of cloth that was reminiscent of a backpack. I finally found a series of small thick journals, bundled in cloth with their leather covers on the verge of disintegration. The pages still seemed in good condition though. Each cover was sequentially labelled which I'm guessing corresponded to the chronological order of the writings within.
The lady next to me was weirdly getting agitated. She kept stealing glances, her body shaking and eyes burning with a fierce rage. I slowly got up from the bench and began to step backwards. My backpack bumped into a pillar. The dull thud it made seemed to cause a drastic change to everyone around me though. They all snapped their heads, locking eyes on me and staring through my very soul. I felt exposed.
The rumble of an arriving train stole away their attention and within a split second everyone was ignoring me again, going back to their usual activities. It seriously felt like I had just imagined it and it was becoming more and more clear that I was having some sort of mental breakdown. Nevertheless, as the train slowed to a stop on the platform, I walked into it and found a seat. The train seemed to be old and new at the same time. Typical blue seats with abstract dirty patterns complete with a modern sleek interior of gentle curves clashing with a boxy dull metallic exterior and doors that looked like they belonged on a rusty submarine.
I opened the first of the journals and began to read. I soon realised that the handwriting was mine and within the next few moments I was attacked by a barrage of memories that had remained repressed and buried in the back of my mind.
*
My name is Jacob and I have been stuck here in this place called *The Limbo* for an eternity. When I say 'eternity', I don't mean it lightly. Back when I used to keep track I counted over 500 years through my wristwatch that never seemed to run out of battery. Now I know counting is meaningless. There have been periods like this where my mind falls into a deep trance and I lose my whole identity as I mindlessly wander in this place much like the entities that inhabit it. Occasional periods of lucidity breach this trance and then I find myself lost and confused. It's why I keep the journals with me. I think its some sort of psychological survival mechanism that human brains develop when faced with the infinite vastness of The Limbo.
Speaking of The Limbo, I've come to learn a few things about its nature through my stay here. Some of its been through people that I've come across (Yes others are also stuck here) and some has been through my own experiences. Perhaps the most important is the question of where I get my food and water. The answer is weird. I have never felt hungry or thirsty. The sensation of having cool water slide down my throat remains a memory so distant that it feels like the snippet of a childhood dream.
I guess the next natural topic about this place would be time. Through various experiences of mine (that you'll get to read about) and discussions with others, the leading theory of mine is that The Limbo exists outside of time itself. While I myself have fallen here sometime during 2001, I've met many others from various years like the 80s, 90s and even one recent fellow from 2043.
Most people in The Limbo eventually fall into a trance, withering away until they become one of the entities or become mere tools for them. It's probably naive but I keep going through this place with only two hopes. The first is to somehow get out of here at the right time point and see my son, who I never got to see. The second is to come out of this place and die so that I no longer have to live out the empty agony of eternity (I'll explain how you can't age or die in The Limbo later). Perhaps my hopes will dwindle as the centuries pile and I will become just like those who I look upon in pity now.
I am writing this consolidated diary of my experiences for several reasons. I'd like someone to know of my unending journey in this place. To be aware of the capacity of the human spirit to keep going in the worst of situations. I have never had a long term friend in The Limbo, but know that I consider you the reader a dear friend even if I never get to meet you because you will know my story. I'm also sharing this in hopes that there is more awareness of The Limbo. Perhaps the military and scientists can actually figure out what it is. Perhaps all of us can be brought home. Or maybe this can serve as a survival guide to those who may be unfortunate enough to fall through.
There are small holes in The Limbo. Most of them are barely large enough for a pinkie finger to fit in let alone a person, but sometimes I've come across one large enough for this journal to go through. I'm not sure what time or place these holes lead to, so the safe passage of this book into a person capable of reading it has about the same chances as me ever leaving this place.
The train I'm on supposedly leads to the edge of The Limbo, where the holes are large enough for humans to fit through. It's really more of a legend amongst the poor souls that are trapped here and I've followed trails and clues for a long time to even find this train.
There are only two ways this goes. Both outcomes would lead to you reading this book in your hands. I'll either find my way out of this hell or give up hope and slip this journal through a Hole. You will find my fate at the end.
I should stop rambling now though. It would be best to start at the very beginning.
*
I was rushing out of work in pure ecstasy. My wife had gone into labor while I was at work and been rushed to hospital. I needed to get there fast. People were glancing over at me over their cubicles in confusion as I packed up my work bag and rushed out to the elevators. I couldn't stop thinking about seeing my first son as the elevator made its way down. The elevator doors finally opened and I rushed out.
The ground entrance of the building I worked at, particularly near the lobby, is an intersection of various hallways. I was already walking to close to the wall when someone came rushing around the corner and bumped me right into the wall. I was only able to hear half their apology when I fell *through* the wall like it was just a holographic projection. In hindsight, I find it oddly funny how easy it is for a life to get ruined. Just when you think you've got it all, when everything is going smoothly, a small incident like that is enough to take it all away.
I found myself in a room that resembled a classroom. It looked as if someone who had never stepped inside a classroom was asked to imagine the space. Desks were arranged in messy uneven rows with the chairs facing various directions. The board at the front of the room was a seamless patchy mixture of both chalk and modern whiteboard and mounted way too low on the wall, nearly hugging the floor. A large teachers desk sat in the front of the room. The walls were filled with posters of absolute gibberish along with diagrams and pictures that seemed like they showed something tangible but no matter how close you looked you could never identify anything in the picture.
The initial confusion was replaced by an immense panic. My heart was drumming against my chest as I searched the room for a doorway to exit it. My mind was trying to rationalise the situation. I was trying to convince myself that this was just some old part of the building and I had fallen into a hallway instead of the wall.
I ran through the doorway at the far end of the room and found myself in a large hallway that seemed to extend forever in both directions. The walls were a muted grey and the floors were that typical dirty linoleum. Soon I would find out that the regularly spaced doorways on either side of the hall led to other nonsensical classrooms.
I ran down the hallway screaming for help in pure panic, which was a terrible mistake in hindsight. I stopped running down the hallway when I suddenly heard the distinct scratch of chalk against board. In this large empty space, the sound echoed and boomed. Since I was still refusing to buy in to the reality of the situation, my hopes were momentarily increased by the supposed presence of another person here.
I slowly walked over to the doorway that the sounds were coming from. My stomach filled with an uneasy dread. This deep primal instinct within me urged me to hold back. I peeked carefully in the classroom and saw a woman with their back turned to me drawing something on the chalkboard.
It took me a few moments to notice that it was a very realistic portrait of my face.
She was drawing lines across my throat, her long dark hair swaying as she drew in the details. The drawing was completed with a terrible slash across the throat, blood gurgling out. I was frozen in place, transfixed on the hauntingly beautiful realism of the picture.
She began to turn around slowly while humming a high pitched tune. To this day I can't describe the face I saw. It is still etched into my mind. A face full of so much hatred, so much anger that I don't think its possible for a human to make that face. It expressed an emotion beyond human understanding. No artist in the world could ever render the expression on the paper. No words could describe the pure fear that coursed through my veins as she stared at me and began to approach.
I turned around to run, only to realise that a bunch of school children had gathered around me. They were headless, the bleeding stumps dripping thick blood onto the floor in a rhythmic patter. Somehow they were laughing.
I shoved through the group and ran down the hallway. I wasn't sure where I was going. My whole world had shattered and now I was completely aimless in some nonsense dimension with horrors beyond imagination that wanted me dead.
*
The extract above is from this journal I found at the foot of a large tree on a hiking trail. It's a miracle that I spotted its faded leather cover given that it was almost buried under rotting leaves. I really don't know what to make of what I'm reading, so I'll be slowly transcribing bits of it in separate posts over the next few days.
I know this subreddit is good for this sort of stuff. I'd love if someone else could share anything they know about The Limbo. This whole journal feels like some sort of prank, but the words and memories within feel way too real.
I can't help but feel a connection to this story. My mum doesn't speak much of my Dad, who I know left before I was born. No one ever found out where he went.
I was born in 2001
X