So (17M), my mom (37F) and dad (42M) broke up because my mom cheated on my dad with a coworker. My mom moved back in with her parents and my dad into a cheaper apartment. They were not married, so there was no divorce or anything like that. Both my little sister (12F) and I decided that we would rather live with our mom than with our dad. We're both way closer to her than to our dad.
Growing up, my mom was the one we spent more time with since my dad works a lot as a manager at the company he works at. She was the one who would take us to the movies, amusement parks, and also the one who went to my soccer games or other school events. She was also way more affectionate, constantly hugging and kissing us and telling us she was proud of us and loved us, while our dad was more reserved and colder. And she was also the one who would take care of us when we where sick .Well I can't remember the last time he hugged me or told me that he loved me.
He’s Hispanic and he just says that's how he was raised by his dad. He also admitted that part of him thinks showing too much affection is, and I quote, “for women and sissies.” I am a guy, so we have been able to bond somewhat over shared interests like sports or classic cars. But he never even attempted to bond with my sister in a similar way. She's a pretty traditional girly girl who likes rom-coms, romance books, Disney princess movies, Taylor Swift, and stuff like that, which my dad has never once even pretended to take an interest in. My sister once told me she feels like she doesn’t even know him.
He was also not that great of a boyfriend/partner either, from what I can tell. He never took my mom on dates or did anything for Mother's Day or her birthday, while my mom would make sure to buy him something for his birthday. So I can't really blame my mom too much for hooking up with someone else. They separated three months ago and since then, we've only seen my dad a couple of times for a few hours over the weekends.
I was talking to a friend about my parents' separation and they told me that it was really messed up that I “sided” with my mom when she is the one who cheated. First of all, I can’t help that I love my mom, I'm not just gonna stop loving her. And also her cheating does not erase the last 17 years of her being a great mom., Also my dad was a pretty shitty dad and boyfriend, so my mom cheating is partially his fault. So AITAH?

I (19F) have been close with my adoptive father (45M), who I call an uncle despite not being biologically related, ever since I was a baby. My biological father was never really in my life for numerous reasons, but chiefly, because he and my mom split before I was born and he only got visitation. Which he rarely made use of. I grew close with my adoptive father, who I'll call Joel (fake name), in the absence of my father and the fact that he stepped up to be in my life. We used to spend all of the time together, and even went on a long trip abroad together. He's also the adoptive father of my little brother, who I'll call Caleb(12M), even though he isn't as relevant to this particular story. Now comes the hangup that's made our relationship complicated:
I'm a transgender woman. I've been out for about two years, and I tend to make no secret of my identity. I thought that Joel would be accepting of it, as before I was transgender, I was openly pansexual and had a boyfriend- which he was okay with. Yet, when I came out to him as transgender, he got really uncomfortable and said 'I don't think I could ever see you as a woman'.
I tried to maintain a relationship with him, but the problem was that he just sort of chose the route of pretending that my transition didn't exist. For a long time, he used my little brother's unawareness (I feel this to be the case, anyways) of the fact that I was transgender and the fact that he didn't want to 'confuse' him (in quotes because those are his words), so that I would just present as male around him. Well, my brother found out through my mother, and ever since I feel that he's made much less effort to speak with me.
I'm, frankly, really hurt by his response. I've tried multiple times to get through to him, but all have failed. I even asked him if he could just use my preferred name, or no name at all, and the pronouns I prefer (or avoid them altogether). Even if he didn't believe that I could ever be a woman, and even if he thought he was lying to me by talking to me as though I were (his words also), I saw it as a matter of respect. I drew it to be similar to how while I call him Joel, that isn't his legal name, and it is instead something else that he doesn't like to be called. He wasn't down for that.
Essentially due to his behavior surrounding this, I am debating whether or not to include him in my birthday celebration, which is still somewhat of a big thing in our family. We tend to make a big deal out of it for longer than others might, but I am not sure what is the norm. On one hand, I want him to be there. I want a relationship with him, because I think the bond that we had is special, and it was very important to me. On the other, I want him to understand that I don't want him to keep treating me this way, because I think that it's unfair to me. It's a really tough situation for me, because he's the closest thing to a father I've ever had and has done so much for me, but his actions recently have wounded me.
So, am I overreacting?

I live in Watertown, NY. The by law for lawns is extremely vague and open to lose interpretation. We have native species plant garden / habitat and foods we can eat to offset the prices at grocery stores, especially with 4 kids. We keep a variety of raised beds, in ground beds, composting, and have a garbage garden barrier which we had been told wasn't a problem at all.
We have a code enforcement officer who is , ,"abusing his power across the city. He has taken the very loose by law, and use it to cite us. The first year we met him, he was friendly and seemed to enjoy learning and walk through. We have brought him on our property three different times and told him about each plant when it flowers, why we have it, where it is, etc.
Last year he talked us into going to criminal Court. He had stated that this would help us get an exemption and then ghosted us with any communication. The case was dismissed. After court, we agreed to show him again. On our property he told us,"you don't belong in this city. You should just move. I don't care or like how this looks."
Fast forward to this year, and he said a notice in the mail that said "you have 5 days to fix this or somebody will come in and cut everything." We were fortunate enough that even though it arrived two days post date to have a weekend. All it was there at the time were violets and some wild flowers we had already had paths through. We had gone through and further exaggerated the paths. Our food crops had started growing in the raised beds as well. The wildflowers are in segmented garden beds. We always keep the easement and just outside of our garden Barier here cut down to dirt, which has been his main standpoint. Everything was well within code.
We went to Syracuse for our son's 10 birthday. Our homeschooled teen stayed home to do work and make stuff for her brother. She ended up calling us, and telling us that people were in our yard , there was no knock at the door, and they were cutting down our garden. My husband immediately started the feed to our security camera, setting the alarms off on it, flashing the lights, and telling them to get off our property through it. I asked her to call so I could speak to the foreman. I asked him for 5 mins to call our public defender from the previous year, he said ok. Then once off the phone with me said, "I'm not fucking waiting, finish the job" to his crew in front of our teen. Our mailman heard him tell the crew to also "get inside The boxes". They destroyed absolutely EVERYTHING we had. To top it off, they broke a rake, took away all of the plants (we have been composting the plants and soils since 2018), and spread a bunch of weeds with their careless destruction.
Then we got a bill from code enforcement for $459. I got a quote to replace one of every plant we had from a local nursery of $560. This did not include the food plants, putting new beds up, the extra signage, getting more soil, the gas to get the soil, the labor in the gardens, the water needed to reestablish, the now food costs we will incur (we have an extremely short growing season in our area), etc for ourselves.
We have since seen both code enforcement and the hired contractor both driving by and eyeing our yard. Our mailman saw him putting a permit across the street, leaving and intentionally driving back by to take photos while driving of our yard.
We are trying first and foremost to work with City council to change the bylaws for protection for what we use our own property for, but I need advice on what we legally can ask for / do with the harassment from This code officer

I know the title is ridiculous, but I'll explain. A week ago my wife "Sara" and I got married. It was a huge wedding, something I didn't love the idea of but stomached for her. She's Catholic so the typical big wedding was all but a requirement for her and her family. That's okay, I genuinely was at peace with it but it put me on edge. Every time I've been to their family events (Christmas, birthdays, football Sundays), I've always got the impression that her father and two uncles didn't like me too much. But a year and a half of dating down, and I proposed because I love Sara and we work on most levels, even if family gatherings can be awkward here and there. This is all to say, I was very nervous to get married in front of a group of about 100-ish people.
Some important context: I struggle with anxiety and, by extension, intrusive thoughts. My favorite movie since I was a kid is Borat - it's admittedly very stupid but it never fails to make me laugh when I'm having a bad day, even now at 30 years old. I know, dumb. But whenever I'm anxious, my intrusive thoughts range from dark to outrageous. You can probably see where this is going.
As the ceremony was approaching the end, I knew the kiss was coming and I was sweating. I'm in front of dozens of people, many of which don't seem to like me to begin with, and I was anxious out of my mind. It was unfortunate because I loved the idea of getting married, just not 'under the microscope'. We kissed, and I felt such a sense of relief to be done (as awful as that sounds). Here's where it gets ugly and god do I wish I was making this up: when we pulled away from the kiss, I was so nervous and relieved that I blurted out a "MY WIFE" in full exaggerated accent and all in front of everyone. Sara explicitly forbade me from doing anything "silly" like smashing her face into cake. I respect that, I get how important this was to her and how much effort went into making her look perfect for our big day. What she didn't expect (and me too, if I'm being honest), was me blurting out a stupid as fuck movie quote in front of everyone.
Now I want to say, the organ had began playing and by that time it wasn't silent in the church. But still, my outburst was fairly loud. Her younger brother audibly laughed at what I had done. She immediately went beet red, and averted her eyes from me. I have never been so mortified in my entire life, and I wanted to cease existing right there on the spot. Luckily only the front row or two seemed to have heard me, and everyone else looked unphased, probably just thinking I was excited. Really, I don't think people thought anything of it save a few people. But that didn't matter. From the moment we left the Church, I could tell I had royally fucked up. Sara wasn't holding eye contact with me, and our chemistry was clearly off all night. She was livid.
To make a long story short, afterwards when we were alone, I immediately tried to explain myself. But here's the thing:
a.) Between the two of us I'm a jokester. I regularly say ridiculous things to make her laugh, and enjoy being silly around her.
b.) She knows I go to therapy and that I struggle with anxiety, but I've never told her about my intrusive thoughts. It's embarrassing have to explain to someone that I have a never-ending tornado of dark thoughts and movie quotes and whatever the hell else swirling around in my head when I'm anxious. It's been this way since I was a teenager.
I told her that it was a nervous reaction, I pleaded with her and told her about my intrusive thoughts (which itself was embarrassing to admit), but she sincerely doesn't believe me because I'm always saying ridiculous shit. She was in tears and fuming, and I started to cry too. She said I had "embarrassed her in front of her parents and grandparents" on the day she's dreamed about her entire life, when she had explicitly asked me to not do anything dumb on this "one day." We talked in circles for an hour, she thinks I'm just making up an excuse and I got so desperate that I begged her to she speak with my therapist. She said she would "think about it" but that if I'm lying that she "doesn't want to be married" to someone that can't respect an important boundary that she set. That night, she slept in the guest room and it's been horrible since. We have time off work for our honeymoon coming up, but every day she leaves the house for most of the day. I'm assuming that she's spending days with her friends.
I don't see my therapist but every two weeks, so I still have about 3 days until my next appointment. I emailed him earlier today, but he hasn't responded yet. I don't even know if a therapist will humor a situation like this. But now I'm worried that I'll never be able to look at her the same way for even threatening to end our relationship like that.
I know this is all so fucking stupid. I sincerely didn't mean for this to happen.
I left out some details because I'm kind of in a haze, but what do I do here? Is this salvageable? Are we just worked up from an emotional day? I really don't want to lose her over something so ridiculous, but I don't even know what to think anymore.

I am not The OOP, OOP is u/ThatLastBiUnicorn
Aita for not giving my bf a threesome
Originally posted to AITAH
Thanks to u/soayherder for suggesting this BoRU
TRIGGER WARNING: verbal abuse, manipulation, poisoning, physical abuse, religious abuse
Original Post May 31, 2024
This is a throwaway because too much identifying info is on my main.
I F29 met my boyfriend "Michael" M35 at a show I performed in (I am a theatre person as a hobby) and he complimented my performance and bought me a drink. We have been together now for a little over a year.
His sister got married last week and I was initially pleased to asked to be a bridesmaid but also a bit surprised as she barely knows me but I thought this was an attempt to have an excuse to also get to know each other better.
Michael and I got into an argument the week before because he said that he wanted to entertain the thought of spicing up our sex life and having a threesome. He said since I was bi, why not? I didn't like the idea too much and said so and it devolved into a petty cold war and he started to ignore my messages after he left my place. He didn't reply to me at all until the day before the wedding asking what time he needed to pick me up since we can't go swperate otherwise "people will gossip" about us. He barely said anything to me the whole time we traveled to the venue. The wedding was fine, but at the reception he got me a plate and leaned in to kiss me but I shied away and he got up to mingle.
I started feeling ill not too long after and 911 wad called. I realized I was having an allergic reaction but had my pen but still had to be carted off by the ambulance and that's when someone eho was looking for Michael said that he had left with some of the other groomsmen to a bar nearby. I called 6 times and texted that it was an emergency as I was getting checked put by the paramedics and again when they strongly suggested I go to the hospital but he never replied.
I was released hy the hospital and called him to ask him to pick me up but he didn't pick up so I woke up my best friend and she took me home and stayed with me overnight to make sure I was okay. The next morning Michael called me but I was still asleep so he left me a lengthy voicemail yelling at me that I ruined his sister's wedding and that I always have to make things about me. He came over to further berate me and told me he should just break up with me at this point as I am dramatic and this is "all too much" so I pointed out that he had gotten my plate, knew full well that I have a alegit allergy to coconut and that his sister had told me afterwards that he knew that the cake he gave me was the coconut cream cake as all the food had signs saying what it was and what the ingredients were as I am not the only person with allergies that attended. He left telling me that he can't talk to me when I am this way.
I was honestly exhausted so I didn't bother going after him. But his father called me to ask how I was doing and after I answered he then told me how I am hurting Michael's heart by blaming him and Michael has been inconsolable since we fought.
I texted Michael to ask if we could talk but the conversation went back around somehow to the threesome and how I don't respect him even in intimate settings or want to hear him out regarding his needs and make things about me.
I am so confused because to me this feels manipulative but I respect his father so much (I go to their church and he is a pastor there) so to have him tell me I am in the wrong threw me. Aitah?
Edit: a lot of comments are suggesting that this was intentional and I have actually never considered he gave me something I am allergic on purpose and certainly not to use against me to leverage in our argument. But I think I may have to come clean and talk to his parents. I know them well so hopefully it won't go too badly.
Small update: Michael texted me this morning to apologize. He said the wedding was stressing him out and he had a lot on his mind so he accidently handed me the plate he meant for himself, not the one for me. He said he didn't know I was in the hospital and feels bad he wasn't there for me but he left the reception with some of the groomsmen to blow of much needed steam. I don't know how I feel about it all so I just replied "okay" he is now asking to come over and talk this out in person.
2nd edit: For any and all of you calling me stupid or implying I am a child and "why am I still with this guy" etc. Just know, you remind me a lot of him in how he used to put me down and bully me ands it's a real wonder of mine if you treat people in your life like he did me. I suspect you do. Glad to be rid of him and indifferent about you.
RELEVANT COMMENTS
OhSheAimsToMisbehave

Op be honest - have you, now that you are looking back, seen red flags like this? This behavior likely didn't just show up. Have you ever gotten ill after a disagreement with him?

OOP

Oddly enough I am sitting with my BFF and she asked me the same question and yes, actually.
Our first real argument that I can remember I was down with a stomach bug for almost a week and he visited me and made soup.
Then the only BIG argument I can recall outside this one, he wanted to use labels really soon onto us going on some dates and I didn't and the next morning, I was sick with chest pains and stomach cramps.
I don't want to sounds dramatic or accusatory but since people have commented he might have purposefully given me something I am allergic to, I just don't know anymore.

~
RiskBig3301

NTA - the two of you are completely incompatible. He wants threesomes…you want to attend wedding receptions without leaving in an ambulance.

OOP

Okay, when I read this I was with bestie and we've been drinking and the scream I scrumpted laughing so hard nearly killed me more effectively than the coconut lmao

Update - I Am No Longer Welcome at Church June 1, 2024
Well many of you were right I should not have met him in person but I did. He took me out to lunch insisting he pay for it all and it was incredibly over the top. He had flowers and a written letter of apology but as some of you messaged me his apologies dodged the point by way of "if I hurt you" or "that you're feeling x or y feeling" etc. He quoted some scriptures and said he has repented as his carelessness caused me harm.
I wasn't much moved by any of it until he said how much his family loves me and how much our church roots for us as a couple and I kinda sat back and realized that one flimsy reason I was even entertaining forgiving him and staying was because of the pressure I dealt with as the GF of a pastors son. It occurred to me that there were so many times I let things slide because he is the heir apparent so he had the power in the social aspect of our community.
Sorry I know I am rambling but I'm emotional and tipsy.
I remembering just staring at him and saying it was incredibly alarming that by now he can't be aware of my oe Ingle allergy and that he didn't bother to tell his own GF he was stepping out with the guys or even that he was stepping out of his own sisters wedding at all. He then said it was really actually kind of stupid of me to eat a cake that had coconut and implied I am an idiot for not realizing what I had was coconut. I realized then he would never accept that he was in the wrong and thus there was no point.
I stood up and and smiled and said "You know what, don't worry about it. Thanks for dinner. Goodnight." To which he replied that if I wasn't going to grow up and accept his apology I am a waste of his time. He uses that a lot whenever we disagree and it usually hurts me deeply but this time it was like a roladex of memories flooded my brain and I really suspect he's been deliberately making me sick whenever we disagree to teach me a lesson. I said I was done and he needn't waste his time with me from this point on and left. I then sent screenshots to his father explaining the situation as best I can without blaming Michael for prior illnesses without proof and I got a text about 20 minutes ago from his father.
His father is "incredibly dissppinted" in my immaturity and hurt that I wouldn't even give it until Sunday at church where we can pray together, talk it our and heal. I felt this way for a while but I was able to say it this time that using religion as a took of guilt is low and I am no longer concerned with his version of God as that version is a judgemental, cruel, and heartless jerk while the one I always thought of was loving, compassionate, and kind, and I am done. I was told by him and by further emails rolling in that I am no longer welcome at my church until I reconcile with my "true husband" and learn compassion and respect for my leaders.
So I guess that's it. I will enjoy sleeping in tomorrow and eating coconut free food, while lazing about my home rather than going to three sperate church services starting at 8am and then figure it all out from there.
I don't know how to sign off but I do watch a concerning amount of Charlotte Dobre videos and she usually ends things with practical shit like "do your laundry" or something so I will just say - live for yourself, feed your soul, and know you are enough. I certainly am going to put in the work to get there and I hope we all make it to the other side contented, and filled with love and joy.
And by the way, F you Michael. I know you are reading this. I know you know it's me. And I hope your socks are always just a little soggy. 🫶
OOP Added in the comments
Here
I forgot to add to my post but I didn't want to bring the threesome requests into it...
...well I sent his daddy screenshots of some texts. If you'd like some drama here are the top two:
1) it was a night I sent him home after he tried and failed to pressure into sex. He sent me that I was missing out and should be grateful since "your body makes me sick, but my love for you is stronger. Would it kill you to be grateful enough to just do a HJ?"
And
2) on his birthday, I had just been in the hospital after passing out from exhaustion and dehydration and went straight to his party. I stayed at his until everyone left and I left soon after helping clean all but the kitchen and he sent "You could have cleaned the kitchen." Then "or stayed over [for sex]." Then "you're a waste of time if I don't even get birthday sex. Thanks a lot."
And after both be suggested adding a 3rd. His dad hasn't responded.
RELEVANT COMMENTS
Still_Actuator_8316

Holy crap. And you stayed with him. You poor girl. No one deserves someone like that in there life.
But you didn't say if you told his dad about him sending you to the hospital and potentially killing you. Becuase we both know and the rest of reddit knows that he did that intentionally.
And if there was proof of him giving you that cake. You could probley send his happy ass to jail.

OOP

I didn't and don't have the best self esteem. And here as the only black woman in the town that I've known of, I've always known that I am considered less desirable- not saying that's right - but just knowing where I live. Been here since my preteen years. When Michael asked me out it was like a parade. Everyone acted like it was a Cinderella story and I won a lottery or something. I have a friend who I ha e been texting today and she is letting me know how dumb I've been (I never told her of our issues) and is about ready to commit crimes lol
I think I lost myself for a bit but I wanted to leave the church low-key for a while because of my treatment so that helps a bit

THIS IS A REPOST SUB - I AM NOT THE OOP
DO NOT CONTACT THE OOP's OR COMMENT ON LINKED POSTS, REMEMBER - RULE 7

AITAH for going through my bfs phone? For some back story. Sorry this will be long.
I 38F and my bf 38M have been together for nearly 3 months. The first month was great, to the point we spent every day either talking on the phone or with each other. my birthday was coming up, a day after a holiday and my boyfriend (I’ll call him Pat for the story). Promised me a weekend I would never forget for my birthday. As we both have come from lots of failed relationships and being cheated on, we both haven’t had the greatest experiences. As the weekend approaches of my birthday, I begin to notice that Pat is being very private with his phone and i saw lots of “interesting” notifications from Snapchat and apps I didn’t know. Which again we’re still new into the relationship, I understand privacy. But he would tell me stories about all his friends and coworkers and what not but when I asked who messaged him or who he’s texting, he would just say a friend and give no information or even a name. So when I had the opportunity I went through Pat’s phone and I understand that is a betrayal of trust. But what I found in there I feel was worse. He had an app called whisper not sure if that’s even a dating app, but between that app, Snapchat, Facebook messenger and others, Pat had been sending sexual messages to multiple women and saving lots of their dirty pictures and sending his own. Granted like none of the women responded, but still. There was also a message on messenger to a friend of his that he has had for years we’ll call her skank and he admitted to having feelings for her at the beginning, but nothing ever came of it. One of the last things he messaged her was, “ I may be shallow, but I think I can get a better looking girl” and he was talking about me. I didn’t know how to feel after seeing all that. I felt lied to, betrayed, ugly, just about every hurt feeling you could. We had a blowout, he cried and begged me not to leave and said he was stupid and he obviously has a problem but he will fix it and it will never happen again. Fast-forward two weeks. I am trying to move past it, but I still have a pit in my stomach, he would show me his phone when I asked, but not actually let me go through it, just scroll fast so my eyes could barely even see what I was looking at. So I decided to check again as proof that he is keeping his word. I was pleasantly surprised that there were no apps, no dirty messages to anyone in Snapchat. No new messages on messenger besides again to Skank. And again Pat’s last message to her again just two days before I looked, and I quote, “I’m sorry, but those are special. And I will only delete them if you ask me to if she can’t deal with some ‘random’ woman’s lingerie pictures. As a man she’s controlling as f***. Why does my best friend have to be so damn gorgeous” I again lost all sense of my thoughts, feeling completely unappreciated and unpretty, and just someone he settling for, because obviously I’m the only one who will give him attention. We spoke again as I cried and freaked out on why he needs to keep her lingerie pictures and why they are so special?!? He said they were a birthday gift. We were not together for his birthday but Skank was and still is in a relationship when she sent them (hence why the name fits). I told him this was unacceptable and if he had just forgotten about the pictures, I probably wouldn’t have cared. But he was actively acknowledging that they were there and it made me so upset that he told her he was keeping them regardless if I found them. After we spoke and cried he blocked her and again promised me he never would do anything again, and how stupid he was and those pictures meant nothing and she means nothing to him. It was just very hurtful. Fast forward to today, about a week again after the second incident. I go through his phone one more time, this time I truly find nothing. Except for one message at about three in the morning to a woman in Israel, where he said hello gorgeous I questioned him about it and supposedly she is just a friend as well as a lesbian, and I didn’t know and jumped to conclusions. Which I feel I have a right to. But he is upset that I continue to go through his phone, I just feel that I need to for a little while more until I feel comfortable enough to trust him again. So AITH for going through my boyfriend’s phone?

AITAH for telling my daughter my husband won't watch her kids when she had a medical "emergency"
My daughter (29 F) had her third baby a couple months ago, and everything seemed fine. But a couple weeks ago she called me(54f) and she was crying, I asked her what was wrong and she said she had to go back to the hospital she gave birth at because she was having 9/10 pain in her uterus. I asked if it could be her birth control and she said she wasn't sure but that she called her OB and they wanted her to be seen at the hospital. She asked if my husband (53M) was available to watch the kids so her husband could take her since my husband is currently unemployed. I told her I didn't know what her dad was up to but that there was no way he was taking 3 kids, it just wasn't happening. She went quiet for a bit and I suggested they take all the kids(4M,2M, newbornm) and she just go in and they wait for her in the car while she gets checked. She then said "never mind I'll just figure it out" and hung up i tried calling back but she ignored my call.
Apparently she found a neighbor to watch her older two sons and they took the baby with them, they checked her out and turns out she had 3 cysts on her ovaries, one on her left and two on her right and that's what was causing her pain. I told her I was glad she found out what was wrong and she just gave a short "yeah me too" and hasn't really been talking to us much since. I think she's upset I told her no on my husband's behalf but watching 3 kids is too much on him and I don't feel she's entitled for us to watch all 3 of her kids on such short notice. So AITAH?
Tw: minimizing medical issues, possible golden child/scapegoat dynamics.
Copied verbatim from oop's comments:
Why couldn't you watch the kids?

I had just pulled up to work when she called.

INFO: just why your husband couldn't take the 2 oldest?

I didn't know what his plans for the day were and he gets tired watching the kids by himself.

"I didn't know what her dad was up to but that there was no way he was taking 3 kids"
Could you offer information on why it was a problem for you to have checked with your husband, and why you feel there simply was no way he could have kept an eye on them for a few hours?
Edit: Based on the additional information you presented, I would say in this case it would have been best to have checked with your husband, especially since it was a medical situation. Presumably there is some unpleasant history with the daughter which needs to be addressed else you will be the distant grandparents.

He gets tired watching the two oldest, there's no way he would take all three. I did text him to let him know his daughter might call and ask him to take all the kids and just said OK but I guess she never called or texted him about it.

Is your husband her father ?
If so, YTA. She needed help urgently, her dad had the time to give help, and didn’t because he can’t watch his own grand children for one day?
Of course you have no obligation to help your daughter in any way, she’s a grown woman, but if I were your daughter I would also stop bothering with my parents if they couldn’t bother watching their own grand children when I need to go to the hospital and they literally have no other plans.

She and her father have had a rocky relationship last couple years. He has given her a few lectures that I think didn't sit well with her. And that's why she called me first instead

Lectures about what?

Her brother got an injury at work and had to have surgery on it, my husband told her she should take him because she's a stay at home mom, she didn't exactly agree but told my son she couldn't because she had plans and my husband ended up needing to take him and apparently sent her a long lecture about how messed up it was and how family needs to be there for each other and help when needed. I guess he made a comment about her being a bad sister and how he feels he failed as a parent and it didn't sit right with her.

I don’t think you’re going to find many people that agree with you. She didn’t ask you to help so she could go out and party, she was in extreme pain. Ovarian cysts are very painful and that soon after birth, she had to have been so afraid. There are so many things that can go wrong after giving birth. I’m happy she’s ok. YTA

I'm glad she's OK I wasn't there for this ones birth but apparently it was complicated.

Didn’t you say that he was unemployed? Why couldn’t he take him?

This was before my husband was let go

Why didn’t she ask you to watch the kids? Something smells fishy.

I was at work when she called

I doubt you even knew when they were born.

I knew, we watched her older two while she had him

This has to be a rage bait. "Apparently it was complicated." Are you really her mother or what?? How are you so callous and insensitive about your own child's pain? I hope she goes NC with you forever.

She had a circumvallate placenta and they told me when I went to visit after that baby's heart rate dipped into the 80s and had to be brought back up a couple times. I guess after he was born they had to clip the placenta from the uterus she couldn't pass it normally

Ah golden child baby boy.
You and your husband are angry that she didn't help your golden child.
That's what all this is about.
You're so evil. Really.
I hope she leaves the both of you to rot.

That lecture happened way before this incident. My husband ended up taking our son he was just upset he had to call off work on Halloween.

Is this like a step dad that they don’t get along situation? Because in one sentence you said her dad, which I find odd that she wouldn’t just call her own dad. Also, I can’t imagine my husband telling our daughter no I can’t keep my grandkids while my daughter goes to the hospital. That seems odd

He is her biological dad, she feels uncomfortable asking him for help sometimes, he has said things like "don't ask us for help ever again!" A few times when she was a teenager. I think that's why.

YTA your daughter could have been dying for all you know.

She wasn't dying, she exaggerates a lot.

Are some of the kids special needs

No none of them are special needs.

YTA. Girl, I would do this for a literal STRANGER. When other human beings are experiencing a medical crisis, those of us with the good sense god gave to grape jelly rally round to make sure the crisis doesn’t snowball into, for example, losing your kids to CPS because you left a newborn in the care of a 4 year old in an unattended vehicle in a location where nearly every passerby is a mandated reporter. This is like Australopithecus level emotional intelligence. People living before the invention of stone tools got this stuff, what are you even doing?

I suggested her husband stay in the car with the kids and she go in by herself

Why did you put quotes around "emergency"?

Because the cysts found on her ovaries turned out to be small and should go away on their own.

Info: you call your husband "dad" when talking to your daughter, he is her actual father or stepfather? Does he have a disability or is he just not very involved?
She did have a medical emergency. She was having severe pain after having a baby. A lot of post birth complications can happen that result in maternal death. She was right to be concerned.
It's not entitled to ask for help in a time of need. It's short notice because she was having an actual medical emergency. Those aren't planned.
Did you and your husband have plans? Honestly, if a neighbor can find it in their hearts to watch her children during an emergency, but you cannot, you're worse than an acquaintance.
YTA

Yes my husband is her biological father. She knows the neighbor and I believe they are friends. My daughter has watched her 3 kids at times so I wasn't surprised when she offered to watch my daughters sons.

I'd have taken off work to help watch the kiddos for my daughter and daughter in law. No way I'd say- sorry you're sick but you're on your own

I've already taken off work to watch her kids so she can go to a couple concerts with her husband for their anniversary and her husband's birthday. I also had to request to work from home while she was in the hospital to have the baby.

YTA. Was this what you were like when she was growing up too? Poor thing having shit parents.

She has always exaggerated her period pain since she was 9, I wasn't sure if this was just another one of her exaggerations since she got cleared at her 6 week checkup

Ovarian cysts are common and not an emergency typically. Many women get them every menstrual cycle. Which is likely what the OP is thinking when she put “emergency” .
Does the daughter have a history of excessive ER visits ?

Not for periods or anything like that. Her last emergency was an emergency surgery to remove her gallbladder.

Yeah, YTA. Are you kidding? You wanted her to leave her kids alone in the car while she was being checked out at the doctor? At best, that's negligent, at worst dangerous and illegal in some places. Why were you unable to help her during an actual time of need.

I didn't word that part very well, my apologies. Her husband was home and I suggested the kids wait in the car with her husband not alone.

Addition by u/Fit-Humor-5022: she just commented this gem

She's my "oopsie baby" I wanted to stop at one but I forgot to refill my birth control and well.. she happened. I do love my daughter but she's always been a handful.

We've made to day four. I'm happy I'm getting this out in the morning this time, as that was my original intention when doing this. Despite having it out later than I wanted to yesterday I appreciate the comments and up votes truly and dearly. We are only three days away from Worm's birthday and continue forward with Worm Week.
Honorable mentions list:
Arc 20 Chrysalis
Arc 12 Plague
Arc 19 Scourge
The Top 7 Arcs in Worm according to my opinion:

1. Arc 16 Monarch
   
2. Arc 24 Crushed
   
3. Arc 30 Speck
   

Today's Honorable Mention: Arc 11 Infestation This one goes out to all my Smugbug shippers, just a fun Taylor and Lisa adventure going to a merchant's party looking for for a boy named Bryce and much hijinks ensues. From saving old classmates who were complicit in bullying, to Cauldron vials and Faultline's Crew. That part on its own is great and fun but the Slaughterhouse Nine introduction interludes are on a whole nother level. This is where this Arc really shines. All of them are engaging and sets up the Nine masterfully, we see Bitch's backstory as she runs into the terrifying Siberian, the Theo and Jack scene has a perfect opening with Theo talking about how he's memorized the TV screen and he's too scared to move, Colin dealing with a sussy Mannequin as he comes through the vents and takes a piece of Colin telling him that he will become just like him, Dinah as she watches Crawler come for his nominee in Noelle is severely underrated and I do not see it get talked about enough. I love just going back and listening to these. But on to the list itself
4. Arc 31 Teneral: I'm not entirely sure if it's right to include the epilogue, but it's my list so it's going on here. To me it only slightly beats out Speck here purely for that conversation Taylor has with her mom. But starting from the beginning as always, anytime Jessica Yamada is doing anything in the book, it's always such a fun read. Doing this from Glaistig Uaine's perspective was such an interesting choice that I would not have made but it works so well, especially when she's threatening Yamada and to her it just feels like she's not selling it but we know as readers from Yamada's interlude that she's absolutely terrified but she just knows how to keep a good poker face. I love their conversation. For me I was more terrified that at any point Uaine would just say fuck it we ball and kill Yamada but she doesn't and sticks with it. Yamada breaking down Uaine piece by piece, from calling her by her civilian name or talking about her relationship with Scion, it's so good and entertaining.
From there into e.2, Imp's chapter. This one is my favorite of the five. Imp carries during the second half of the story, she is endlessly funny and endlessly entertaining. I love her character so much, and this chapter pins the point home for her. Taking down a warlord who's acting incredibly similarly to another old warlord. She effortlessly takes him and chains him up threatening to let go of the chain to let him down on a bed of makeshift spikes. Another great conversation, between her, Nero, and the debuting Heartbroken. Imp using her power to making everyone forget after she realizes that she make been calling Nero Nemo the entire time still makes me smile just thinking about it. Then she gives him a Regent doll to take care of and make sure it's most pristine along with making him follow certain rules and if he doesn't follow those rules he'll burst into full song and dance to the tune of the tea cup song.

“It’s about legacies,” Imp said. “Kind of important. She’s gone, so it’s up to us to protect her legacy. Now here’s another. Desk drawer, bottom right.”

Imp also deals with Shadow Stalker. The dialogue in this Arc is the best in the book. Her conversation with Shadow Stalker about Taylor and how she'll always be remembered and how someone like Shadow Stalker will be forgotten is what makes this chapter my favorite of the five.

“In the rest of your years, even if you try, which you won’t, you won’t make a fraction of the difference she made. You’re going to keep living this solitary little hunter-stalker existence, picking off a few bad guys, getting your jollies, and people are never going to wear a badge on their sleeves for you.”
“That badge is not for Hebert.”
“Maybe not for everyone,” Imp said. “It means different things for different people. A planet they lost, an ordeal they survived, I dunno. But it’s a reminder of Taylor to me, and it’s a reminder for you, too. Every time you see it, now, it’s going to make you think of her, remind you that she did something big.”

Those two paragraphs that I quoted for this to me ends Imp's character arc in Worm. This girl whose power makes people forget she exists makes these lasting connections with people and once they're gone from her life, she chooses to do everything she can to make sure people know who they were and to remember them. It's so beautiful to me.
Dragon's chapter with Defiant is such a graceful chapter. Defiant doing everything he can to try and fix Dragon who he loves so much and is neglecting his own health for her. Dragon talking about kids and what their future could look like together is so cute and sweet. All this just to set up Defiant uploading Pandora just so Dragon can be free even if it means he won't get to love her anymore, absolutely heartbreaking. But Dragon fights off Pandora successfully and then at the end Dragon and Defiant embrace and it's such a sweet ending to their story.
Rachel and her crew going to the city together and this chapter puts an end to Rachel's character arc. First with reinforcing that she doesn't understand people, such as Biter believing that the peak of civilization when you have french fries at a fast food place. I think in the moment where they think there's a cape fight going on and Rachel takes a moment to think about what to do next, and as she's thinking she thinks about Taylor, it's in that moment I personally believe she almost fully comes around to the idea of trusting people and giving them a chance. Then she comes face to face with Miss Milita

“We going to have a problem?” Rachel called out.
“No. No problem,” Miss Militia said. “I’m coming closer, okay? We’re good. There’s an amnesty.”
“Don’t know what that means.”
“There’s a deal. Everyone gets a second chance. We don’t have a problem with anyone, until they do something wrong.”
“I’m not a villain anymore?”
“Not unless you want to do something villainous.”

I know being objective for a second that the amnesty is purely because there's too much chaos going on and too many villainous capes out of the bird cage to do anything about it so amnesty was the best option. But I enjoy second chances/redemption in fiction especially done right. This amnesty is such a perfect parallel to Rachel giving people a second chance. People make mistakes and that's okay, you don't always owe them forgiveness but sometimes it doesn't hurt to let them try, especially when people have been willing to do it for you.
I'm not really a big fan of the next chapter with Teacher, it feels really unnecessary, I guess it sets up some stuff for Ward which is fine but even Wildbow himself has said that he would scrap this chapter in a rewrite so I'm just going to skip it.
Then comes the true ending of Worm, Interlude:End. Taylor sits on a bus and talks with a elderly woman, they have a really interesting conversation, a conversation about reflection of all that has happened but by the end of it all you can do is learn from it and choose where you go from there. At least that was my interpretation of it.

“When you reach the end of your life, you have a chance to take stock. You sum it up, and you decide if you want to spend your remaining years, months or days in regret or satisfaction. My late husband told me that.”

Then it switches and we are with the Undersiders. As Tattletale, Imp, Bitch, Foil, Parian, Cozen, Forrest, Charlotte, Sierra, Aidan, and Dinah make a toast to the three Undersiders that had died, Brian, Alec, and Taylor. It's a touching tribute.

Tattletale gave Imp the evil eye as she continued, “In honor of everything and everyone we fought for and saved. In remembrance of everything we couldn’t save.”

We then switch back to Taylor's perspective as she has the conversation with her mom, her mom from another Earth that didn't die. I don't think I can give an analysis of this conversation rightfully so I'm just going to encourage you to go read it again yourself. I will say however that in the beginning after I finished when I finished Worm I believe Taylor was alive and Cauldron put her on another Earth. But the more I thought about it the more I realized I was just thinking that because I wanted Taylor to be alive and it made more sense for her to be in a coma, the first shot by Contessa was to deactivate her power, the second was to put her in the coma itself. Why must you play with my heart Wildbow?
With that concludes day four. This one I had the most fun writing out. Feel free to leave a comment, I would love to respond to what you say, and as always I appreciate you reading this and I'll see you tomorrow for day five.

I know this is a pretty common experience and nothing really that new but i am 21 F and was invited to a birthday party of some very good friends (four 20 year old engineering students) I have known since school. We used to live in the same housing complex and my parents have met them as well. The party wasn't going to be much, just go to my friend's house, eat cake and play some video games while my friend's parents were there too. The problem is that they're all guys and I'm the only woman there. And my parents flat out refused that I go. They trusted me with going to pondicherry on vacation with my two female friends for a week but draw the line at this.
I didnt argue with my parents to let me go since both me and to an extent my friends are also aware of the risks of me being alone with a group of men in my friend's house (even if I know them) but it still feels so bad that I have to be cautious around every man just because of the heinous acts of some of them towards women, I can't trust men, even those i consider my friends but i cannot deny that the risk is also just as real. It's bad enough that I feel like and am treated like prey owing to the fact of me being a woman in a country like India. I generally avoid being friends with men if there's an option of other women around as it's a whole lot less stressful for me as the dynamics of gender never come into play ("dont talk with him on the phone for so long, quit walking around and chatting with them till late evening, its not a good look.") but it's not like I can cut these guys off after a decade of being friends either. I quoted my mom telling my friends "Im sorry i don't think I can come. My parents don't think it's safe for me to be alone with a bunch of guys" and my parents scolded me that it's not something I should say out loud to them as theyll feel bad since why would they want to be friends with someone who doesnt even trust them? It was a mistake on my end saying that out loud as these particular men are nice people and even my parents agree on that, theyve never acted weirdly with me but my parents are scared about the "what if they werent trustworthy all along" and that is justified.
I just wish my gender didn't bring so many restrictions on me and who I can visit, where I can go, what I can wear, etc. It would be so much better and simpler if I was male instead, not because I hate women or being a women but because of how we are treated in society. I'm sick and tired of the mind games on how not to hurt people's feelings over very justified threats. I just hate it. I wish I had the freedom males are allowed to have.
Edit: Not exactly relevant but I talked to my friends about this and they understood my point. We all decided to meet up at a public space near my house and had a lot of fun. But my thoughts remain unchanged on this matter.

This interview has so much tea even on Hrithik and Kangana.
Tell me about how it all started
In 2008 while shooting for the O Jaana song for Raaz 2, we started getting close. We used to go for drives and dinners.
One day I took her for dinner at The Taj. I was immature as any 20-year-old and we got into an argument about our exes (hers was Aditya Pancholi) when she got angry and created a scene.
She said she was going to the restroom. I waited for an hour then I called her. She told me she was at home. I didn’t understand at that time that there was something eccentric about her behaviour. I was like chalo theek hai…
The next morning when I went to her Lokhandwala home to say “sorry’ with flowers, she didn’t let me in.
She told me, “F*** off! It’s over.” Dad called her and she said, “I won’t let him in, Sir. Please tell him to go.” She made me beg for a very long time. I waited for five hours on her steps. I was doing things I never thought I would do.
She got me to shave my hair off while attending the Filmfare awards. I didn’t question it. My hair never looked uglier but she felt I needed a new style. And then on the stage she thanked everyone for the award. The camera was on me for a very long time but she didn’t mention me. She was walking ahead and I was walking behind her like her bodyguard. It was humiliating.
Did anybody caution you about dating her?
Haal-E-Dil was releasing and she had come for the premiere. I remember Aditya Pancholi was standing at the exit and Kangana was just walking out.
He stopped me, looked into my eyes and said, “Welcome to the circus my friend and all the best!” I didn’t understand at that time. Kangana clarified saying that Aditya did that to intimidate people with her.
I told her I am not scared because we are not doing anything wrong. At the time we were getting to know each other, but we hadn’t made it public.
When did it become public?
A month into our relationship. We were shooting a song in South Africa, when I got a call from a journalist asking me if I was dating Kangana. I denied it saying she was just a friend, however clichéd it sounded.
The journalist told me he had found out that I went to her room at night. I told him that it was wrong to talk about a woman like that. I hung up and she began screaming that, You are trying to hide the fact that you are seeing me! “You think I am just your f* buddy?”**
What followed?
She made me call back the journalist and tell him how much I loved her etc. I hung up and told her that I’d given him a quote from my side, what about a quote from her? I said tell him that you love me also because otherwise it will sound one-sided.
She didn’t do that and I wasn’t able to figure out why. I came back to Mumbai and saw the story splashed across all the papers about how I was besotted by her. I said to her this isn’t how it is. It was mutual. My father was furious. He felt the story should not have been one-sided.
There were many stories about how devoted you were to her…
Yes. I was with her in Bangkok when my father saw the first cut of Jashn on December 31, 2008 and he called me at night and got emotional. He said that he was very proud of my performance. He said when I came back I would have a surprise waiting for me on my birthday — January 13.
On my birthday eve, at my home, dad called me down and gave me the keys to my dream car — a BMW 7Series. I was thrilled and touched when my dad gifted it to me! It wasn’t about a father spoiling his son, but a father who had seen the work of his son and was proud of him. I cried and hugged him.
Kangana had left earlier as she didn’t want to face the media. I wanted to share my happiness with her and called her to tell her about my dad’s gift.
She said coldly, “Achcha? Really? They gifted you a one crore car? Aisa kya ukhada tumne life mein?” This was when she had won a National Award for Best Supporting Actress for Fashion and had no work.
I remember her frustration of not getting any work for four-five months. In less than a week’s time, she went to Hyderabad and called me to say, she’d signed the Telugu film Ek Niranjan with Prabhas.
She came back and booked the same car dad had gifted me! She had no money so she went all the way to Hyderabad to sign the film and buy the car.
Kangana couldn’t take it that I had a car, she couldn’t afford. There were stories in newspapers about how she had bought the same car as me, etc. This was two months before our break-up. Later, I sold off my car because of the pressure of failure.
Were you guys fighting a lot before the break-up? Yes. I’d always see her eccentric behaviour as a woman’s emotions.But it started getting worse. One day when I was at her house, time, Bhattsaab called me after seeing the rushes of Raaz 2 and told me he loved my work and he would direct me.
He quit directing by then, so I was like ‘Wow, that’s amazing!’ I was talking on speakerphone and she was hearing everything. She told me, “Behen** mujhe koi kyun nahi phone kar rahe yaar?”**
That was the first time I heard her abuse. I was made to feel guilty and like shit for no reason. I realised that she wasn’t happy that the Bhatts had started giving me so much attention. +I made sure that Mukeshji and Bhattsaab called her told her how good she was too*
What was the first shock that you got?
It was during the shooting of Kites. She got friendly with Hrithik and his wife. There were occasional dinners with them and I went for a few.
Hrithik had invited Kangana for his birthday and he called me also. I brought flowers and an expensive champagne
We were sitting and talking when Hrithik walked in. She cut me abruptly, picked up my flowers and champagne and handed it to him saying, “Happy birthday! This is from me for you.”
She didn’t even introduce me. She started networking and I was left alone with a drink in my hand.
I was feeling really upset and left and I got a little high. One moment she made me feel loved and then in the next, it was like I was a nobody in her life! I was standing at the bar alone when Kangana walked up to me said some actor at the party was trying to grab her a**.
I felt protective towards her but I was at someone’s house and creating a scene would be rude so I told her, ‘Let’s go.’ She went back to doing her thing. Later she came and told me let’s go right now.
I was walking down the stairs with her, when she turned around and slapped me! She said, “Mother Fu, behen! Bhsd*ke! You are f*** jealous of my success!” The intensity of the slap was so hard I was almost crying. That was the first time she got violent**
What did you do?
My only thought was: The entire media was outside. How am I going to get out and go? I was tearing up like a child and shivering at the violently abusive language.
She told me to drop her home, and then in the car, she started hitting me. Eventually, I asked my driver to stop the car. I decided to take a rickshaw home. I was in the middle of the road crying and shouting at her, “You are crazy! F***** up!” And she was abusing me MC/BC gaalis.
My family driver of 20 years came crying to me and said, mere liye thoda sa bhi pyar hai toh ghar chalo. I will never forget that night. I dropped her home and she picked up her stiletto and threw it at me!
I picked up my phone and smashed it against the wall. I didn’t know how to vent my anger. That was the start of her physical violence with me.
What happened next?
The next day we had a press meet for Raaz 2 at my building. Kangana said she wouldn’t come. Our PR started panicking but then she turned up. I took held her hand and said, “Baby I am so sorry. I love you.” She slapped me hard, again. I was just zapped! I was crying like a kid… and then the entire rant and MC/BC gaalis began. I realised then that she’d made up the whole thing about the actor trying to grab her a. She said that just to f*** my mind with these mind games**
To the waiting media, even though I felt like a complete a**hole I gave an interview saying, ‘She was one of the most beautiful actresses that we have in the country today and a huge star.’
In her interview she mocked me and said I was the most spoiled brat that she knew who didn’t come to sets on time etc. I just laughed it off like a joke, I had no other option.
I had just come out after being physically abused and emotionally tortured I had to praise her and hear things about how I didn’t want to work etc. It was traumatising.
On her birthday in March 2008 at The Leela, she had invited everybody that she had worked with. She said “Let’s do cocaine in the night.” I had smoked hash with her a couple of times before and didn’t like it so I said no. I remember getting into the biggest argument that night because I said no to cocaine.
Why did you take all this abuse?
Kangana had this amazing knack of manipulating my emotions and drawing me back. She took me to this tarot reader Sunita Menon who said we were meant to be together and that gave me confidence and strength to work at the relationship, even though I was going through shit.
I hadn’t told my parents about this. If my father ever knew that she hit me, I can’t imagine his reaction. I stopped going home, and started living with her.
I started drinking and smoking a lot. My relationship with my parents changed. I became defiant. The visit to Sunita happened right after we broke up. Kangana called me to her house and started crying. She said, “I cook for you and wash your clothes and how will I live without you?” That made me very emotional and we got back together.
Then it got worse?
Yes. On January 13, 2009, at my birthday party at home, after most people left, Mohit Suri, Kangana, Kunal Deshmukh, my parents and dad’s few close friends were talking about how actors sometimes tend to sell our souls for commercial films.
Kangana started to get offended and said, ‘We don’t sell our souls’. Dad said he was giving a generic example but she took it personally and she called my father a b****** in front of everyone.
My father was furious. She left screaming started screaming abuses at him in Hindi. One thing I can’t still forgive myself for — I was a bad son to my parents during that time.
This one moment changed my life forever— the way she spoke to my father. But at the time, she had manipulated my mind so beautifully that rather than breaking up with her that night, I screamed at my father. I smashed things because I was losing my mind.
You defended her when she abused your father?
The way I spoke to my father that night is something I can never forget and forgive myself for. It makes me cry even today. I was starting to become someone else.
I went to Kangana’s house that night and apologised for my dad’s behaviour and ended up spending the night with her. I didn’t go home for two days. Then dad started getting calls from the film fraternity Aditya Pancholi called my dad and said, “Shekharji kya ho raha hai? She’s crazy, a psycho and this has been her behaviour pattern.
He was right as that was exactly her behaviour pattern with me. Aditya told my father that if he wanted he would speak to me but he should get me out of Kangana’s clutches as she would ruin me and by the time I realised it it would be too late for me..
She also tried to jeopardise your career?
People magazine wanted us on the cover. I learnt that she called the magazine editor and said she didn’t want to shoot with me, but with Imran Khan whose film Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na was a hit. I lost out on a couple of covers because of her. Rather than people talking about my successful film, media would write stories about me being besotted with her. My career suffered because of that.
What followed next?
Kangana took me to another astrologer called Pallavi who always gave positive news to Kangana and negative ones to me.
She said my time wasn’t right and if I did certain pujas I would be fine. I didn’t believe in all this but Kangana insisted I listen to her.
One day, Kangana called me at home in the night to do some puja. I reached at 11.30 pm as the puja was to start at 12.
She had a small guest room in her apartment and she had covered it in black, including black curtains. There were some random statues of God, fire all around, some scary things (kept) puja. She asked me to chant some mantras, and locked me in. I was terrified. I didn’t do it and I came out and told her that I had
Then she started taking me to Pallavi frequently. One day, Pallavi said go to the graveyard at 12 am and throw these certain things. I was chilled to the bone! I didn’t go.
Are you talking about black magic?
Yes. Being a metropolitan kid studying in London and New York, I was always away from things like astrology and black magic. I remember going to my Tarot reader after she started making me doing pujas. She told me she sensed a woman from pahadi region doing black magic on me.
I knew only one person back then, my girlfriend Kangana, who used to go to Himachal for certain pujas there.
My Tarot reader said she saw something really bad happening and warned me to get out of the relationship. She told me, “You feel you want to come out of it and every time you make a decision of wanting to come out, you fail and are back at it again.”
My career stopped completely. I had a successful film Raaz 2 behind me but nobody wanted to talk about me. I started seeing this decline. My films were shutting down while she was achieving more success. Even talking about it scares me now....
What happened after this?
My mother was very worried and she called the family’s Panditji to come home and meet me. The first thing he asked me was: “Khana banati hai tumhare liye?”
When I said yes, he said, “Apna impure blood milati hai khaane mein black magic ke liye.” I didn’t want to accept anything against her. I would tell people who said anything negative about her to f*** off.
The physical violence had become so frequent in my relationship with her that any other guy would have hit her back. But I couldn’t. Every time I was hit, I wanted to retaliate but my hands would just stop. I was scared as hell. I would cry to my PR every single night. I would drive down Marine Drive with a bottle of scotch on my lap, drunk.
I got into a phase where I could not accept reality and thought it was better to be perpetually drunk all the time. I had reached a stage where I would have either died because of an overdose of alcohol or gone mental.
My mom prayed a lot for me. The same Pandit later on came on Salman’s Dus Ka Dum also and he looked at Kangana in the middle of the show and said “Aap Pisachini (demoness) hai.” She treated it as if it was a joke. It’s there on national TV.
Please go on
In one of his interviews, my father was asked a question on Kangana and he said “She was a senior actress” but not in a derogatory way.
We were headed to an event when she started abusing my father in filthy language. That day something snapped in me.
Hearing her abuse my father and still being by her side every night was something that shamed me. After we split, it took me five years to get over that guilt.
I was a bad kid to my parents and that’s something I can’t forgive myself for. Everything else was a learning experience.
I remember Kangana physically abusing me in the car again. When we reached the hotel, in front of the media she was so normal. It was like interacting with a split personality. On one hand it was MC/BC and on the other it was ‘Baby I love you so much.’
It was around this time you learned about her texts to Hrithik?
She gave me her phone’s old chip to transfer to her new phone. While doing that I saw her inbox was all empty — which was okay as it was a new phone — but there were 50-70 messages to Hrithik Roshan.
I knew she was eyeing him from back then, from the time she went to Las Vegas for Kites. Hrithik had hurt his arm and she had gone to see him. I knew her desperation to get to know him well.
I asked her about these messages. She said that he was her co-star and she had to talk to him like that. She made me believe that all those texts to him were casual. And I could believe that because whenever I met Hrithik and her together, he always maintained his distance.
As a guy you can see it when there’s something brewing between two people especially when they are drinking and the masks come off.
I never saw any feelings from his side. So, these stories about Kangana’s obsession with him had begun back then of her wanting to get him.
Those messages made me realise that I had to get out of this relationship and fast. Every time she had to put her point across she would get physically abusive.
She dominated me to a level where I couldn’t make a decision for myself. My parents would feel very embarrassed and yet my mom, seeing my mental state, would go and beg Kangana asking her to patch up with me after every fight. I have realised our parents are the most important people in our lives. They would do anything for you. Their selfless love has made me come back to what I was.
So when did you finally break up?
My father was getting into politics. She started imagining that dad wanted her to campaign for him. I said to her, ‘Are you out of your mind?’
Then she started abusing my dad. She said “Tumhara pura khandaan mere stardom ko use karna chahta hai?”
She was talking about a man whose been in this industry for 25 years, seen so much stardom of his own and has so much love, support and goodwill in the industry.
Why would he need her? I came back to my house and she messaged me something again about my father. That was it. I messaged her back “Now you can f*** off. It’s over between us.”
She felt it was one of those break-ups where we’d get back together. Exactly one year after we started dating, we finally broke up.
I told her never to call or message me again. I made sure I never crossed paths with her again. I haven’t seen her for seven years, not been in same room, at an event or anywhere.
The last conversation we had was when she called to tell me I had left some clothes behind. I told her to give it to charity. It took me five years to get over the whole thing.
I lost five years of my precious time, I lost out on relationships as people hated me because I was with her. They felt I wasn’t the same person anymore.
Only my friend Sonu understood the space I was in and supported me all through this hell. I took off to NYC after that. I would pass my time staring at the ceiling, eating food, because of which I put on 25 kgs, and crying.
Why didn’t you talk about your break-up then?
I couldn’t. I was depressed. She was telling people how I suddenly broke up one day and was getting the sympathy.
I didn’t have the energy. I was too weak to defend myself and thought no one will want to believe me.
The entire feeling of being called a loser, and people calling me “Kangana’s boyfriend”, had taken its toll and robbed me of my confidence.
Then it became all about how I had used her. But people called me and said, “Dude it was a very simple plan. She wanted respectability as she came out of an extra-marital affair and she wanted to get hooked to someone from a respectable Bollywood family. And the moment she got success she would be out from your life in a jiffy.”
That’s exactly what happened. She wasn’t even a star when I met and we started dating. It was me who came from a star background so who used who?
At the time when this was published, no one believed Adhyayan. He seems to have gone through a lot. He was brilliant in Heeramandi and hope he gets good work in his second innings.

4th: Shane Powers (Panama - 5th)

i have an issue with my penis, im so sorry. the linsanity run ends here!
u/SMC0629:
Shane is a character who I don't think you can replicate. His focus on humor is something people can find overbearing, but most of it is just a joy to watch. He has some of the funniest moments the show has seen, whether intentional or unintentional. However, the main reason I love Shane is his moral and emotional stuff. From his nicotine withdrawls, to his relationship with Aras, to most imporantly, his bond with his son. It makes for to this day, the best family visit the show has ever seen. Shane is incredible, very deserving of endgame.
~
u/DryBonesKing:
So of all the people in this Endgame who are in my Personal Top 100, Shane ranks the lowest. I’ve actually lowered on him a little bit since this thing started and if I had no deals attached at all, I’d probably have him cut around the same time I tried to cut Lex. One of my 10/10s with minor criticism. But before I get into that, let’s talk up why Shane’s great: because he’s literally batshit.
I cannot fathom how he passed the psyche test to get on the cast, because there’s so much going on with him to the point of it being overwhelming. Shane going cold turkey with his nicotine withdrawal is an amazing case study that doesn’t feel ethical, but goddammit was it entertaining! Shane slots perfectly into Casaya and his dynamic with literally everyone on that godforsaken tribe (but especially his relationship with Courtney) is perfect. Hell, he’s also got an underrated dynamic with Terry as well and I think gives the guy some very interesting characterization in the endgame. Shane’s batshit energy and “bad vibes” however does get offset by his relationship with his son, which I think is probably one of my favorite loved one visits of all time. Boston helps humanize him in a way that you normally don’t get to see for these “crazy” type of characters and their whole dynamic and the build-up to the loved one visit is probably one of the biggest reasons why Shane not only works, but works perfectly.
The only criticism I think I can give Shane is that sometimes, his bullshit does come across a bit too much. Like, moments where he loses his shit on Courtney and threatens to kill her in her shitty apartment? Feels believable in terms of his loss of sanity. Him losing his shit about “his sitting spot”? Pushing it, but I kinda buy it. But that whole blackberry scene? Honestly, a bit too much, makes the whole character feel a little fake. Like I know he’s doing a bit, but he says it such crazed energy and the edit takes him serious enough that it just rubs me the wrong way. It’s admittedly only a single scene so it doesn’t irk me enough to bring him down from a 10/10, but like Lex and his relationship with Big Tom, it’s just a minor nitpick I have with this otherwise flawless character.
Overall Rank – 87/821
~
u/Zanthosus:
Shane rides the line of being incredibly chaotic without it ever becoming concerning or worrisome. That’s not to say it never rides that line incredibly close, because there’s definitely points where he can bring a level of discomfort to the season that makes me hesitant to consider him truly great. Even despite that, though, he makes for incredible TV nine times out of ten, so I’m still glad he’s made it to endgame again.
~
u/Tommyroxs45:
Shane is the soul of Casaya, all of the incredible moments quoted to this day basically all come from Shane. He works so well with the rest of the tribe and how he and the rest of them are somehow able to control the game is baffling but also comedic gold.
~
u/Regnisyak1:
You better believe I am getting him to endgame in Survivor Rankdown: All-Stars to do his damn writeup
Personal Rank: 4/821. 10/10.
~~~~~
u/ninjedi1:
When I was a kid, my bedtime was 8pm. However, because I was a little shit I would usually get out of bed usually about 30 to 50 minutes later and see what my Mom was watching on TV. This would be my first way I would experience Survivor for a while. My first experience were these two guys sitting at this set and one of the guys looked really cool with his beard and funky rainbow shirt. The next key Survivor memory I have is a challenge where they had to swim out and then down to get rings, but one guy drops him to the ocean floor, but then another guy goes down and goes “It was so deep…and I got it!” and that was really cool. I finally got a chance to see more than a couple minutes of an episode where I got to see most of this one episode where one team only had two people left on it, and I thought that they must stink at the game, and I was right cause they lost both challenges. Then my Mom started letting me watch the first half of the episodes about the jury phase of Guatemala, where I was rooting for Rafe cause I thought his name was cool. But finally, I got to experience my first real season right from the start, Survivor Panama Exile Island. Naturally, I needed to pick my favorite to root for in the season, and when I saw this one guy right at the start with hair that I thought looked cool and saw his name, I decided “Him. He’s my favorite”.
Shane Powers (5th Place, Panama)
Shane powers is my favorite survivor player of all time ever since I first saw him as a kid. I was worried on rewatch that I only liked him because I had nostalgia goggles on, but on rewatches I love him even more. The first episode actually greatly sets up who Shane is and what his story is going to be, which is actually pretty incredible considering all screen time is split between 4 teams, and La Mina wins immunity so they aren’t nearly as important for the focus of the first episode. He complains about how all his tribe wants to do is work and wants to call people out for being moronic. He also talks about how he just stopped smoking the day before coming out to the island, so he can’t lash out at anyone while he’s on this detox.
The next episode is when Shane hits a low point in the game. The shelter La Mina has isn’t finished when a huge rainstorm comes in, so they’re soaked, and wonders why he’s even out here cause he doesn’t need the money and misses his son. We also get two iconic lines back to back from him. Most remember the “No more torrential downpours sir god, no more of those!” line, but my favorite as a kid was “I do not like you flea!”. Luckily though, a swap happens and Shane gets first as “the cool guy with the Boston tattoo” to be on the new Casaya tribe and chooses Courtney to be on it. He then immediately starts trashing the season theme by complaining about how didn’t belong in the older men tribe because he was 34 going on 12 and prefers this new tribe as he doesn’t feel like wanting to leave at all. He even gets himself in a great spot strategically as Shane instantly forms an alliance with Aras, Courtney, and Danielle, swearing in his son to stay true and tells everyone that if they screw him he’ll kill them and tells them he’s serious when they laugh. However, that grace period ends quickly after they lose immunity, saying that Casaya is in dire straits and were wrecked physically, and now he was once again done with the game and wants to be voted out, which annoys everyone including the alliance he just made. However, he gets convinced by Aras to stick it out and he just needs water, so he decides to stay and immediately tells Cirie and Melinda to their face that they’re going home. Such a huge emotional roller coaster with Shane, and it's only the second episode.
The next couple episodes do set up a rhythm of how Shane’s experience on Casaya goes. For starters, he starts developing a big hatred for his two biggest allies, Danielle and Courtney. With Danielle, he feels like she doesn’t do nearly as much work as him or Aras, and argues with her about her aversion to working. He also gets annoyed with Courtney simply by the fact that she annoys him, and they end up bickering over everything. Another big part of Shane’s character is his big outbursts, the big one from episode three is when he gets a big rock to sit on and calls it his thinking seat, tells everyone that no one can sit on it, and when everyone laughs he starts yelling about how he just wants to sit on this rock.
These emotions boil over in episode 5 when Casaya loses immunity again, and originally he wants to vote out Bobby, but gets convinced by Aras to vote Bruce. So Shane makes a deal with Bobby, swearing on his son that he would keep Bobby around until final 6. But uh oh, the women of the tribe want to vote out Bobby now, which greatly annoys Shane cause he just promised Bobby that he would get Bobby to F6 and starts yelling at Courtney about it for some reason. He would throw his vote and Bobby went home, but he was so livid he yelled about how they made a bad decision due to Danielle’s emotions while everyone was trying to sleep. He basically wants out of the alliance but can’t because he swore on his son’s name. Luckily for him, all the women on the tribe want him out next, so when asked if he could take back his son’s name, they say yes immediately, and then he tells them that he can’t work with people who make their decisions emotionally and then tells them that they do nothing. At that point, even Aras was ready to vote Shane out. Luckily, they win immunity and go on a reward to a panamanian village. That’s where Shane manages to bum a cigarette off a local and gets an insane rush from it that somehow gives him the ability to make up everything with Danielle, allowing all to be forgiven.
Then the merge hits, and Shane ends up in a really good spot! Since Casaya are up in numbers when the merge hits, 6-4, and he quickly rallies all of Casaya to stick together, giving Shane an easy ride to final 7. That means we get a lot of great Shane moments! We get him asking Jeff to bring out a temptation during an immunity challenge, and when Jeff reveals he doesn’t have any, he just drops out. He complains about the people talking about the reward they won, saying “That’s a problem, I couldn’t finish my bacon cause there was too much”. We get Shane chowing Cirie his penis to check on a rash he’s getting and then him stuffing his face full of cheeseburger instead of doing the immunity challenge, and then says he overperformed at the immunity challenge cause he almost ate two cheeseburgers both in the same episode!
The biggest episode for Shane though was the touchy subjects episode. We do get the funny Shane moments at that challenge where he gets voted as “person who thinks they’re in control of the game” and “most moodiest person”, which he then proves by complaining about Courtney cutting him twice, saying that her life in the game is changing, specifically her enjoyment around camp. He also gets on his hands and knees begging Cirie to take him on reward, which she doesn’t. We also get the iconic Bruce medevac scene, where Shane helps carry Bruce out on a stretcher buck naked. But in the morning, Shane begins strategizing with Courtney, seeing her as a dream person to take to the F2 to beat. They solidify a plan to work together in the game, and then Shane proceeds to threaten to kill her in her shitty apartment if she betrayed him, much to Cortney’s annoyance because her apartment isn’t shitty! This would lead into Shane’s strategic downfall, as Cirie figures out how useful Courtney would be to take to the end while Shane is too busy using a piece of wood as a blackberry to allow him to communicate to people not on the island, and she organizes a Courtney vote, leaving Shane out of it. This shocks Shane when it happens, but gets assured that he is still good for F4 by Aras. This calms Shane down and makes him confident that he’s safe, when in reality he would be next to go if Terry won immunity again. And sure enough, Terry won immunity again and Shane gets blindsided at the vote, and instead of a huge meltdown which everyone was probably expecting, Shane brags about how he’s going to have a chocolate ice cream bar in one minute (extra emphasis on the one minute) before finally getting his torch snuffed.
So all of the above is great. Shane is clearly a goofy crazy character with a lot of funny moments and outbursts, and that makes him a great character, but that isn’t what makes him number one for me. What makes Shane the best for me and elevates him from a great character to a perfect character, is the love he has for his son. We see Shane himself explain how much Boston means to him, as when watching a part of his video from home, he begins to tear up and cry when seeing his son, calling him his son, his brother, his other half.It really resonates with me how much Shane clearly loves and cares for his son Boston out there, especially when you consider the status quo at the time was for men to keep their emotions under wraps. It's especially unique with Shane since usually people who are about their family play the game to win it for him, but for Shane it is what makes him want to leave. The first time he thinks about quitting is when he realizes how much he misses his son and questions why he’s even out there. He cares so much that when he uses his son’s name for promises, it ways on him deeply, like when he hated the people in his alliance but he was stuck with them due to using his son’s name and asking them to let him take it back instead of just outright betraying them, or being annoyed when the vote switches to Bobby cause he just promised on his son name to keep Bobby until F6. We were honestly robbed with that extra scene where Shane thinks he shouldn’t be there cause he’s missing his son’s birthday, so Courtney suggests the whole tribe sing happy birthday for him, and the whole tribe sits at the beach singing happy birthday while Shane just stares off into the night sky is just emotionally powerful. This all leads into the F5 reward challenge, where we learn that the reward for the challenge was the loved ones visit, where Boston shows up. But Terry already won, so it's up to him who gets love. It's generally tense because we know how much Shane hurts and misses his son, so when Terry lets Shane take Boston to the resort with him, it's just so emotionally powerful. In a way, after everything Shane had gone through, getting to finally see the son he missed the whole time he was there was probably better than winning the million dollars. That’s what makes Shane the perfect character to me, as even though he was crazy due to nicotine withdrawal and was high strung, at the end of the day, he was just a father who really missed his son, and I will always love that about him.
SMC0629: 15
DryBonesKing: 17
Zanthosus: 12
Tommyroxs45: 11
Regnisyak1: 4
DavidW1208: 1
ninjedi1: 1
Average Placement: 8.714
Total Points: 61
Standard Deviation: 6.651 (9th Highest)

I am not The OOP, OOP is u/brotherconflict
WIBTA if I skipped my sister's wedding?
Originally posted to AmItheAsshole & OOP's own page
Previous BoRU
TRIGGER WARNING: emotional abuse and manipulation, verbal abuse, neglect, harassment, controlling behavior, golden child syndrome
Original Post May 31, 2023
Throwaway account + fake names.
​
I (23m) am one of seven kids. There's Lydia (31f), Josh (28m), Leo (25m), me, then Erin (21f), Nadia (18f), and the surprise child Lexie (4f). With that many siblings, it's easy to get lost in the crowd. Some of us have our 'positions,' so to speak. Lydia's the oldest, Lexie's the baby, I have a kid (yes, that's my descriptor. OP: gave us a grandchild). Erin is the golden child. She was the last planned child, the one supposed to tie up our family. She was born premature so I understand that my parents coddled her to an extent, but it's more than that now.
​
Erin's getting married and recently told us that she's brought the date forward due to a cancellation. No big deal, it just means they're getting married sooner. But the new date lands on the date of Nadia's HS graduation. Erin was sympathetic, but said she's already committed to the date, they've printed the invitations. My parents normally go overboard on our HS grads, but they said that they'd just have to miss Nadia's. We were all sympathetic, but it wasn't intentional.
​
Or so I thought. But Nadia later told me and Leo that she was there when Erin got the call about the cancellation and told Erin that she was graduating that day, but Erin just laughed and accepted the date anyway. This, as much as I hate to admit it, sounds like a very Erin thing to do. She booked her engagement part for the night of Nadia's 18th birthday (luckily, she wasn't celebrating until the weekend). She announced her engagement at my oldest sister's wedding anniversary. Everything is about her.
​
I confronted Erin about this, and she said that Nadia's HS graduation didn't matter. She wanted to get married to the love of her life sooner—and our family had been to plenty of HS graduations at this point, anyway. She said something like, "we still have Lexie." But here's what gets me the most: Nadia's been looking forward to this for so long. She's watched all of us graduate and have these huge celebrations thrown by our parents. I asked Nadia what she wanted, and she said she wanted to have her day.
​
So, I told my family that me and Nadia won't be attending the wedding. Leo has also dropped out. Everyone's angry. Erin's furious, and I didn't make it better by telling her that I could watch our other siblings get married, since it's all the same in her eyes. Mom's trying to convince me to come to the wedding because 'graduation isn't as important' but I feel like if I don't do this then it sets a precedent in Nadia's life that she's always going to mean less than Erin. I've had messages calling me an asshole, an idiot, etc. They're telling me to step up and be a good brother, but that's what I'm doing. My son is supposed to be ring bearer but with how my family is reacting, I'm considering pulling him out of the wedding, too. My dad's told Nadia he'll take her to dinner after the wedding. Nadia's currently staying with me because mom won't stop cornering her.
​
AITA?
VERDICT: NOT THE ASSHOLE
Update 1 June 11, 2023
It's two days after D-Day and I finally come bearing an update! I've had to condense it quite a bit because a lot has happened. Before I start, Nadia wanted me to thank everyone who congratulated her on her graduation. She was overwhelmed by the support you all gave her, especially after she faced such opposition from our family.
So, let's start. Last Friday, Leo and I went to speak to our parents and Erin. I wanted to tell them that I'd be pulling my son from the wedding. Our older siblings ended up turning up as well, so it was us four standing up for Nadia. Leo had spoken to them the night before, and helped them see things more clearly from Nadia's eyes. Apparently, it didn't sink in with them that Erin chose the date intentionally.
There was a lot of yelling. Erin accused me of trying to sabotage her wedding, our parents tried to convince me to let them take my son to the wedding, but I stood my ground. I felt a lot stronger with my older siblings with me. There's only two years between me and Erin after all, I'm not much of an older brother.
Luckily, Lydia was there. Her words carry more weight as the eldest and she didn't give Erin or my parents room to argue as she told them that Erin chose the date intentionally, admitted as much in front of me and Leo, and that this was normal behaviour for her. Lydia told them that if they continued to favor Erin so blatantly, the rest of us would go no-contact—and Lexie would likely follow in the future.
Our dad started yelling. Not at us, but at Erin, surprisingly. I've never seen him so angry before, and to see it directed at Erin was... shocking. Our mom asked us to leave. We didn't hear from anyone on that side until Monday when Erin's fiancé George asked to meet us at our parents'. He apologised to Nadia. He didn't know that the wedding and graduation overlapped, nor did he know that it was something Erin did on purpose. Our dad was the one to tell him.
What followed was a long talk between us, during which we all aired our grievances. I told our parents that we all felt that they valued Erin more. That none of us mattered to them compared to her. Her artwork always went up on the fridge, ours always went in the drawer. I told them that, as a parent, I could never imagine treating my child like that.
Erin tried to argue. She tried to tell us that we were trying to turn her into a bad guy, trying to turn our parents against her, trying to sabtoage her wedding. Our mom told her to be quiet, that it was our time to talk. George stepped in to tell us that he didn't expect us to attend the wedding, but we were welcome to attend the reception. He went so far as to say that he wished he could have cancelled the wedding altogether, but it'd only cost him more money that he'd spent by bringing it forward.
Mom's willingness to hear us out lasted less than 24 hours. By Tuesday, she was begging us to reconsider. Apparently our feelings meant nothing in the face of Erin's dire stress and the fact that people would be questioning our absence on the big day. I haven't spoken to my mom since, but I did ask my dad to bring my some of Nadia's things because she is going to be staying with me full-time.
We have officially gone no-contact with our mother.
Dad took Nadia out for an early-graduation celebration on Wednesday. They had a daddy-daughter date that I think she really needed. He apologised for a lot of things and told her he wanted to do the same with the rest of us. But Wednesday was about her. I'm happy she got that one-on-one time with him. She was happy coming home to me. In our sibling group chat, she said that she really thinks dad is going to try to mend bridges with us, even if mom won't.
Dad also turned up early yesterday morning (I'm talking... 6.30 a.m.) to give Nadia flowers. He told her that he was proud of her. George even called while he was getting ready for his big day to congratulate Nadia, which I really appreciated.
We didn't hear from mom or Erin. Our paternal grandma ended up coming to the graduation with us.
It was a great day. Like, a really great day. We didn't think about the wedding, didn't think about Erin. We just had fun together. My son got to wear his aunt's cap and gown and nearly drowned in the fabric. Our grandma tried on the cap, too. We took photos and sent them to our dad, who posted them in a Facebook post he wrote to congratulate both Erin on her wedding and Nadia on her graduation and we laughed about how it must have pissed off our newly wedded sister. We went out for dinner and we, as siblings, gifted Nadia money for a week away with her best friend, which somebody suggested in a comment on the initial post.
I texted George my congratulations. Despite everything, I do hope he and Erin are happy together. While she might not love us, I don't doubt that Erin loves him. Yes, she wants her spotlight and her moment, but I don't think she's marrying him just for that. Bringing the wedding forward? Sure, that's a hugely malicious tactic to bring herself more attention. Marrying him for the sake of having a wedding? She isn't that type of narcissist.
As of right now, I plan on staying no-contact with my mom unless she makes some big changes. This is a sentiment shared not only by the majority of my siblings, but is also encouraged by our dad and grandma. She's tried reaching out to me and my partner, mostly berating us for not attending the wedding and accusing us of planning to keep her grandchild away from her.
At the moment, our summer looks busy! We're planning on filling it with as many family outings as possible before Nadia leaves for college. We've also got Josh's 29th birthday to plan! Our dad's even joining in! This might cause a bigger rift between him and mom, but for now, at least, it looks like we're his priority. Lydia's threat really did something to him.
Thanks everyone who left comments on the original post! I know they really cheered Nadia up when she was worrying about whether or not she was doing the right thing by choosing herself. Part of me wishes we could've taken this stand earlier, but it took us a while to find our voices. Looking into the future, I do see two empty spaces at my own wedding, but I also see five siblings cheering my on. I'm happy with that.
Update 2 Oct 31, 2023
It's been about 5 months since I've last posted, and I've had some requests for an update, so I figured I'd sit down and write one up. Bare in mind, a lot can happen in 5 months, and that's definitely true for this!
​
Let me start off with July. Erin and George went on their Honeymoon, and their absence sent our Mom into a frenzy. She wasn't used to having no one around; someone was always visiting. Mostly Erin, but the rest of us would visit out of obligation and to see Nadia and Lexie. With Erin on her Honeymoon and the rest of us NC, Mom had no visitors and she really didn't like that. Literally the DAY after Erin left, we started getting bombarded with phone calls. She tried convincing Nadia first, which Lydia thought was a strategic move because Nadia is the more timid of all of us and, thus, more likely to be persuaded. When Nadia turned her down, she turned her sights on the rest of us. We all got identical phone calls with her trying to persuade us to go visit her, to understand her, to see things from Erin's perspective. She even brought up the circumstances of Erin's premature birth and how it was a miracle that she was even here. Josh told her to 'do better with Lexie.' Lydia blocked her number.
​
When the phone calls didn't work, she started turning up at our homes. She continued spewing much of the same shit she had over the phone and before the wedding. She didn't understand what she'd done so wrong, why we were treating her like this. She called me ungrateful and disrespectful. She accused us of harbouring 'unnecessary jealousy' towards Erin and that she loved us all equally. I didn't respond to these comments. I was just trying to prevent her from going inside and saying the same things to Nadia, who was with my partner and son in the living room. Her comments didn't deserve a response, and when she was done I asked her to leave as calmly as I could, but truthfully, I felt a little like crying. But who wouldn't feel shitty with their mom yelling in their face like that, trying to downplay years of pain and calling it 'unnecessary jealousy?'
​
My siblings and I have been let down time and time again by her and our dad ever since Erin was born. They missed out on so many things over the years, both big and small. But we had one thing. One thing. One thing that they never missed and we were happy with just that one thing, and that was our HS Graduations, but they couldn't give that to Nadia. All we had were our HS Graduations. They missed Josh's college graduation because Erin broke her leg. It was an accident, I get that, but they never made it up to him. They never celebrated this huge achievement afterwards, and he just had to grin and bear it. Our Mom didn't turn up to my partner's babysitter after making such a huge fuss about it because Erin didn't want to go and wanted them to get their nails done together instead.
​
But our jealousy is unnecessary?
​
Sorry.
​
I don't know how I managed to stay calm when she was yelling at me, but I did. Asking her to leave made her switch tactics though, and she started calling out for my son, trying to coax him to go to her and telling me that she had a right to see her grandson. My partner stepped in then, because she was seething, and took my place at the door. Mom yelled some more but she left when my partner threatened to call the cops.
​
Mom repeated this song and dance with my older siblings but similarly got nowhere with them.
​
Then came the Facebook posts. Indirect rants about ungrateful people and how shocking it is that 'some kids' could turn against their parents so easily. Erin somehow got involved while on her honeymoon and called Lydia to scold her for being mean to our mom. But as I've said before, Lydia is angry and she's had enough. Whatever she said to Erin prevented her from calling the rest of us.
​
There was then a Facebook post about how much it hurt to be kept from a grandchild. Now, there were no names mentioned, but there is only one grandchild and that is my son. My mom's sister called me. There was yelling. I blocked the number.
​
I know Dad was trying to convince our Mom to just... leave us alone. He kept apologizing because she just wasn't listening to him.
​
Erin came home after two weeks. She tried reaching out to Lydia again, asking for us all to talk because, and this is a quote from Lydia, 'clearly you (we) all have some issues to work out.' We did not turn up. Erin was very angry at that because she's not used to us turning up for her.
​
July wasn't all bad though. While our Mom was on a rampage, our Dad was still trying to do better by us. And he's improved a lot! In July, he and I went out for a meal together, just the two of us, and grabbed a drink, and he apologized. It wasn't a generic apology that he could've repeated to all of us, about how he's sorry that he hurt us and neglecting us, but he brought up specific instances that he wanted to apologize for. He thought back on all those years and picked out moments that he wanted to apologize to me for. I know he did the same for the others, but having him apologize for things like cancelling a fishing trip because Erin 'needed him' was something I wasn't expecting.
​
And I never really cared for fishing, but I wanted to go on that trip because I always saw it on TV, you know? I'd always see a dad and son fishing together and I wanted to have that. I wanted dad to prove that I was a priority to him somewhere deep down. It didn't happen, and I never asked again.
​
But we went fishing in July. What started as a trip between the two of us soon grew into a family day out when my siblings expressed an interest in going fishing, too. My brothers first, then Nadia, and even Lydia who hates the smell of fish. Dad brought Lexie and I brought my son, and it was great. It was one of the best days of my life. I suck at fishing, but I'm pretty great at collecting seashells. It was brilliant.
​
Our parents did end up arguing when Dad went home. I wasn't there, so I don't know every little detail, but from what Dad told me, the argument was mostly because Mom didn't understand why we were still in contact with him and not her. She found it insulting that we were repairing our relationship with him. She was angry that Dad wasn't pushing us to forgive her, or why he wasn't stopping us from 'acting out.' She was angry that he didn't extend an invitation to her and Erin for the fishing trip, and she was even angrier when he explained that their presence would make us uncomfortable.
​
Josh turned 29 and the end of July. We booked an escape room for the five of us siblings, then we met our dad and partners for dinner that evening. Josh introduced us to his new partner for the first time. All of our attention was on Josh, the day was completely about him, which was a first for our family. Then there was a party thrown for him by his friends which I came out of with a massive hangover.
​
Mom started giving us the silent treatment in the middle of August. Dad moved out in September. While we were getting the silent treatment, Dad was baring the brunt of her anger and it really took it out of him. He was trying to do better by us and she was trying to villainise us, and he ultimately told her that if she didn't take accountability for her actions soon, then he'd be contacting a lawyer. Mom didn't take him seriously. He's been staying in Lydia's guest room since. Mom doubled down and said that he was blind for not seeing how we were manipulating him. Unlike the rest of us, Dad obviously still has regular contact with Erin—and according to him, she's even told Mom to reconsider. Unsurprisingly, Erin's involvement is what got Mom to relent. I'm not sure if she's thinking about how she's treated us, or if she's silently stewing. I know she asked Dad if he's going to move back home but he said that it was better for them to have space right now. Personally, I'm struggling to see an outcome where our Mom sincerely admits that she was in the wrong. I think she'll say it just to get Dad back home and the rest of us talking to her again. I don't think she'll ever hold us to the same level as Erin.
​
In brighter news, there's officially less than a year left until my own wedding. Currently, there is no place for my mom or Erin. My partner Jade and I are having our fathers wear ties that match me and my groomsmen, something I originally didn't plan to do, but I'm happy with the change. Nadia's settled in at college. She's made some new friends with kids in her classes, and she's enjoying. She's happy. Even though we have an active group chat, she facetimes me every few days just to talk. Most of what she says I've already read in the gc, but I'm always willing to listen to her stories again. Nadia never used to talk this much. She looks a lot happier now than she did five months ago.
​
I think that's everything. I'm sorry for the novel, but like I said, a lot can happen in five months.

NEW UPDATE

Update 3 June 1, 2024
Original
Previous Update
So, it's been about 7 months since my last update and I thought one was well overdue! I actually intended on sitting down and writing one out a few months ago, but life got in the way. A lot has happened, most of it good, some of it not. I'm sure you can guess what or who the reason for the not good moments were.
Mom was silent through Lydia's birthday in October, but made a huge song and dance for Erin's in November. None of us make it a habit to check her social media accounts, and honestly we'd have blocked her if it weren't for Lexie, but Leo sent a screenshot in the group chat about a post she'd made. The post essentially painted Erin as the perfect child, her precious angel, and said how she'd always be proud of her. She didn't even mention Lydia on her page at all during her birthday, but I can't say I'm surprised.
Thanksgiving was different, but fun. We all drove out to our paternal grandparents' place a few hours away to spend it with them. Technically, it was supposed to be an in-law year, since Jade and I tend to switch who we spend it with so that neither one of our families were being left out, but she suggested we switch it up this year so that I could be with my siblings on the first big holiday since the fallout. My in-laws are great people and have been really supportive throughout all of this, and I'm really grateful for them, too. Mom didn't reach out to us on the day, but I could tell she was fuming. It didn't help that she was being asked questions after Lydia posted a Thanksgiving day photo that didn't include her or Erin.
In December, she started a group chat with all of us and Dad essentially telling us it was time to stop this 'petty drama' and focus on family. But none of us are stupid. We all know she wanted to show off her picture perfect family over Christmas, and how could she do that when all but two of her children can't stand to be near her? Erin was in the group, but didn't speak up, which was odd for her, but none of us really thought much of it at the time. Dad said he'd swing by to see Lexie, but he had no interest in spending Christmas with her until she was ready to admit to the pain they'd caused us. A week later, my birthday also went ignored by her, but that was fine. It only proved that she had no intention of admitting she was the bad guy.
She got more desperate as Christmas drew closer. The messages and phone calls started up again, but I could ignore those for the most part. What I couldn't ignore was coming home from work to find her on my doorstep. She told me she'd been waiting for ages, like I was expecting her visit and had done it intentionally... which, honestly, I probably would have given the state of our relationship. I'm just grateful my family wasn't home—Jade was on her way back from work herself, and our son with her parents. I didn't want to invite her inside, but honestly given how desperate she looked, I also didn't want to deal with her where my neighbors could see.
This woman told me that Christmas was about family and forgiveness. She told me I was taking it too far by keeping her grandson away from her, and how confused he must be without her. She said it like I was using my son to punish her. I told her it was better this way, because we all knew what'd happen if Erin had a child someday. My son would be pushed to the side like the rest of us were, and I didn't want that for him. She said I was being ridiculous and once again used that line, I love you all equally.
I asked her to leave, because nothing was changing my stance, and I wasn't going to be spending Christmas with her. She got angry. She started yelling, and while I want to say I kept my composure, I didn't. I started yelling too. The more I yelled, the more worked up I got, to the point that I started shedding tears. Reddit, this was years of hurt rushing to the surface. I don't think I will ever understand how she can claim to love us all equally but tell her crying son to stop being so dramatic. She left only when Jade came back and saw the state I was in. Jade's little but fierce and would do anything for me and my son, and I swear my mom left terrified of her that day.
The social media posts picked up again. She played victim, shared posts about children not respecting the sacrifices mothers make for them and stuff like that. She posted how we didn't appreciate all that she'd done for us, but we all ignored it. We did our own Christmas. Jade, our son, and I visited the in-laws on Christmas morning, watched our son and nieces open their presents there, and then went over to Lydia's house. She offered to host us all this year. Dad took his place in the kitchen, joined by his assistant chefs Josh and Lydia's husband.
We didn't see our Mom or Erin until January. Lexie turned 5, so there was a party, and we weren't about to punish our sister for the actions of the Demon that birthed us. So we went. There were some questions, but people didn't push when it was obvious that none of us wanted to get into it. Mom acted like everything was fine, but Erin stayed away from us. At the end of the party, as we were helping clean up, Mom said it was good that we were finally putting things behind us. Lydia told her the only thing we were putting behind us was her. That started her off again, but she quickly realized she was outnumbered and headed inside. That was when Erin approached us with her husband. Honestly, I was expecting her to tell us to go easy on our mom or something, but instead she apologized. She said she'd been doing a lot of thinking since all of this started, and she realized that treated us badly her whole life, and part of that was influenced by the way our parents treated her. She told us she didn't expect us to forgive her, but that she just wanted to tell us that she was sorry. We left a little while later.
There was silence at the end of January and in February for Leo and Nadia's birthdays, but we were expecting that. Our days never did matter to her, after all.
I got married in April without my mom present. It was hands down one of the best days of my life, second only to the birth of my son. Jade and I were surrounded by the people we cared about most and who cared about us in return. I had both of my brothers as my best men, Nadia and Lydia were bridesmaids, too. It was better than anything I could've imagined. Honestly, I'm still blown away by the fact I now get to call Jade my wife. It's been amazing. But, I'm sure you're all wondering how my mother handled this, and I can tell you plainly that she did not handle it well.
Truthfully, when we sent out invitations, part of me hoped that the news just... wouldn't get back to her? I hoped it'd go smoothly enough that I wouldn't actually have to talk to her about this decision, but of course that'd be too easy. She showed up a few days later banging on my door, demanding I talk to her. I went out. I didn't let her in, despite knowing that the neighbors could see us, and that was solely because I didn't want her inside my home where my son was. I didn't want her scaring him like she was undoubtedly doing. She demanded to know what I was playing at, how I could be so cruel, how I could exclude her from such a special day. I told her plainly that my wedding was a day for me to celebrate with my close loved ones, and she wasn't someone I considered close or a loved one anymore. She'd made her bed, she had to lie in it.
Part of me worried that she'd turn up at my wedding. She came by the house a few more times, but stopped when I threatened to call the cops. I didn't do it sooner because I guess I'm soft at heart and didn't want to see my mom in any trouble, but every time she showed up to spew some bullshit about me being a terrible son for doing this to her, it drained me. There were social media posts, of course. I had relatives reaching out to me to tell me I should invite her, what kind of son am I, etc., but they stopped when I told them I'd take back their invites, too. No one mentioned her at the wedding, and she didn't try showing up. She did, however, try to prevent Lexie from being a flower girl, like I promised, but Dad quickly nipped that in the bud.
Which takes me to the next point, my parents are officially over. Dad sent her divorce papers sometime in February, and I don't think he's looking back at all. This is something that also shocks me, because this time last year, he was much the same as she was. He was someone who cared more about Erin than any of us, someone who brushed off our achievements if they somehow interfered with hers, and now he was an advocate for us. Every time Mom posted something on social media belittling us, he responded with a post uplifting us.
I never imagined having such a good relationship with my dad, but here we are. We helped him move into his own place back in March. He's a new man, honestly. He's worked out a 50/50 custody agreement for Lexie, because as much as he'd be happy to have full custody, he wants to believe that she can change like he did. He has said, however, that if he catches even the slightest hint of Lexie being mistreated like we were, he'd be filing for it.
In the case of my siblings, life has been going good for them, too. Leo got a raise at work and has adopted a dog that my son is obsessed with—to the point that I think we may need to get a dog ourselves, haha. Josh and his partner are going strong. He fits right into our family, and I couldn't be happier for Josh. He's found someone that really cares about him, and I can tell he's in love. Maybe there will be wedding bells there soon? Lexie... well, Lexie's 5 so there's not really much going on in her life. I think she recently made my dad join her tea party.
QUICK EDIT TO ADD: Lexie is obviously aware that things have changed. She's naturally confused about it all. Things changed so much in the space of a year, and I can't imagine what it was like for her living with our parents when Mom was angry all of the time. We've let her know that we'll always be there for her and that we're safe spaces if she needs to talk about her feelings or if she has any questions to ask. We don't want this affecting her more than it already has. Josh is the one who's made headway on that. He works in childcare and has experience in things like this. Dad is thinking about setting up therapy for her.
But I'm sure you're all wondering about Nadia and Erin. Nadia's great. She's honestly thriving. I think being away from our mom, Erin, and the pressures at home has really helped her find herself as a person. She's made new friends, excelling in class, and she's just... an overall happier person, which is all I care about. She's happy, I'm happy. She's been invited to move in with my dad, now that he has his own place and enough room for her and Lexie, but she hasn't decided on an answer yet. She's more than welcome to stay here if she wants, but I know that she also wants to be closer with our dad. I'll support her no matter what, and I've told her that she can try it with dad if she wants, and she can come back if it's too weird for her.
Erin is another story. We are no longer NC with her, but we are LC. After her apology at Lexie's party, Leo reached out to see if it was genuine. All of us were pretty stuck on what to do, to be honest. Erin was never someone to bow her head and apologize, but how could we know if it was genuine and not a ploy to get us to forgive our mom or something? Erin asked to speak with us in person when Leo reached out to her, and we agreed because we were curious to see how it'd go. We also agreed that if she tried anything, we would be leaving immediately and would block her again.
The meeting happened in mid-January, between Lexie and Leo's birthdays. We met at her place. Erin looked like a nervous wreck, like she hadn't slept all night, and honestly it was really weird because she's normally so put together? Like even when she was throwing tantrums, she looked better than this. We sat down and she started off by apologizing to us again, she said that she was needlessly cruel and unfair to us, especially Nadia, and even apologized for trying to ruin her graduation. She said when we all backed out of our wedding, she was confused and hurt because none of us had said no to her before. She thought we were closer than that, but realized now that it was one-sided. She thought we were close and we just wanted to be as far away from her as possible.
We asked our questions and she answered every one. 'Why did you think we were close?' Because she'd been acting this way since childhood, partially encouraged by our parents' treatment of us vs her, and assumed that since none of us said anything about it, we were fine with it. 'Did you ever feel sorry?' She didn't, before this whole fiasco. It was normal for her to be the center of attention. Everything was always about her, and she was trying to unlearn that. 'Why now?' It came down to her husband. He'd tried talking to her a few times about her treamtent of us, but she never saw an issue with it since, well, we never made it an issue before. He didn't like that response, but he loved her and she was a lot kinder outside of our family unit, so he hoped that if he kept talking to her about it, she'd eventually stop. They fought when she announced their engagement on Lydia's anniversary and they fought again when she booked their party on Nadia's birthday. He couldn't understand how she could be so cruel to her family, and she told him that he didn't understand our family dynamic, and that we were cool with it. The stuff with Nadia's graduation damn near ruined their relationship, and I don't know how she convinced him to stay with her, because George admitted he was very close to walking out the door.
She said she was on our mom's side for a while because she really did think we were just acting out. We'd never been like this before, so why were we like this now? She didn't get why we were ignoring her, why we'd suddenly cut her off, and admittedly had a break down over it. George told her we'd likely been carrying that hurt and bitterness with us for years. She said that she knew she was a brat, but didn't realize how bad she really was until George and our dad laid it all out for her. That's why she told mom to leave us be, so that we could have peace from it all, and it turns out Dad wasn't the only one bearing the brunt of Mom's anger. She was constantly blasting Erin's phone, turning up at her place, dragging our names through the mud. It got worse when Dad moved out, and suddenly Erin was all she had in the world. Mom called us awful names that Erin (thankfully) didn't repeat. Mom told Erin that she was 'all she had' now.
George vouched for how bad our Mom was, said he'd come home from work often to find Erin staring at a ringing phone. She didn't want to answer but knew if she didn't eventually then Mom would turn up at her house. I know Erin was... awful to us ever since she was born, but it really hurt seeing her like this. I think she herself was a victim of our mom's behaviour, albeit in a drastically different way. She said she wanted to reach out to us sooner, but knew we probably didn't want to speak to her. She just couldn't help herself when she saw us at Lexie's party and needed to apologize.
We parted ways conflicted. One on hand, Erin had always been selfish. She'd been manipulative and downright mean, she always found a way to overshadow us at every turn, at every achievement. Nadia's graduation was proof of that. On the other hand, she looked tired. She looked worn and she looked guilty and I didn't want to believe that was an act put on for the sake of getting us to forgive her and then our mother. None of us were sure how to proceed, but then Jade suggested that we invite her to the wedding. Or, rather, we invite her to the reception, after everyone's eaten. We had a few friends coming at that time, too, who couldn't attend the wedding itself due to inescapable enagements. That way, if Erin did try to bring our mom, security would catch it and we'd know for certain whether or not Erin had turned a new leaf.
Reddit, Erin attended the reception. She didn't bring our mom, didn't even mention her. She and George arrived, and Erin cried as she congratulated me. She told Jade she looked beautiful, and hugged my son. At some point, she took Nadia aside, and when they came back, they were both a litle teary eyed. Nadia later told me that Erin wanted to apologize to her properly, one to one, and didn't know if she'd get another opportunity to do so. George thanked me for giving Erin a chance. He told me that she really could be a warm, kind-hearted person. I told him I hoped to meet that version of her some day. And I mean it. If Erin is truly as warm and kind and wonderful as George believes her to be, then I want nothing more than to meet that version of my sister.
Now, you may be wondering, OP, you forgot to mention Lydia when talking about your siblings! That was on purpose. You see, it's a good thing Dad moved out of her spare room. She's going to need that space in a few months, and she's not the only one. I knew Lydia was pregnant because she sat both me and Jade down to tell us she was pregnant and worried about her bridesmaid dress, even offered to step down if it was a problem. We, of course, told her not to be ridiculous and that we'd cover the cost of any alterations needed.
In the lead up to the wedding, Jade told me that she planned on having Lydia make an announcement during the speeches. I foolishly assumed that Lydia was going to announce her pregnancy to our extended family, and while I was a little hesitant, I agreed since Jade wanted this—and well, at least she'd gotten permission, unlike someone would have. Reddit, Lydia made a speech about pregnancy, and how she couldn't wait to be a mom, and how she was grateful to be sharing at least part of her pregnancy journey with Jade.
Reddit, this was how I found out my wife was expecting our second child. Again, I wish I could say I maintained my composure, but I didn't. I cried. I was so overwhelmed with happiness that I couldn't help myself, and I'm sure my friends will forever make fun of me for it. It felt like all the shit we'd been through this past year was worth it all for that moment. To have my family rally around me in an event that I'm sure would somehow have been made about Erin and her wedding if my Mom had been present.
I haven't spoken much about how this past year has made me feel. Truthfully, I have felt like shit for most of it. I felt like curling up and disappearing. I felt rotten and useless simply because my mother told me I was. I felt sometimes like I couldn't show how I was feeling, because Nadia was here and I didn't want her to blame herself anymore than she did. I'm in therapy now, and I'm not the only one, and I'm healing. Right now, I'm happy. I'm so unfathomably happy that I can barely understand it. I'm happier than I've ever been and I know my siblings will say the same.
While our Mom will probably say that our family has fallen apart, that's not true. Hers has. The family that she made has fallen apart, but ours has grown stronger. It has grown so unbelievably strong. We were a united front before, but it's like now we've upgraded our defences. We're coming out of this with stronger relationships with each other, a real relationship with our dad, and two new family members on the way. This is what our Mom is missing out on and it's all her own fault.
Maybe I'll update you again in the future. I'm not sure if our mom knows yet about Lydia and Jade's pregnancies, but the announcement is out there. We do have her blocked on social media though, so maybe no one's told her the good news. Erin hasn't, at least. So if anything happens on that front, I'll let you know, but for now, I'm happy with where my life is. Thank you all for your support, again, and I hope you have an amazing day.
THIS IS A REPOST SUB - I AM NOT THE OOP
DO NOT CONTACT THE OOP's OR COMMENT ON LINKED POSTS, REMEMBER - RULE 7

So first off, this is a rant post, I'm posting this specifically to rant and rave about him.
Secondly, I'm not posting this to any subreddit, which means you've clicked on my account, and may read the saga of my life. So have fun I guess?
Anyways, I want to rand about my dad/father, or rather lack of one.
This may be jumpy in terms of timelines, I don't know, again, just a rant post only intended for myself to vent.
So my dad has had a rough life, I'll give him that, he has bounced around a lot here and there, but has always come back to our spot here in Ontario. Long story short, he became an alcoholic. For a long time, decades of drinking near constantly, until he cleaned up his act, he found my mum, they had my older brother, yada yada yada, then I was born
The day that I was born was the day my dad picked up his first drink in years. He didn't drink it cause he was celebrating, nothing like that, or at least that's what I was told by my mum a long time later, was that he drank because of me, and not because he was happy.
So he starts drinking again, and he slowly gets worse, and worse, and he kept drinking till one day he left, I was 3 years old, and I still have vague memories of not knowing what was happening. I remember watching my dad walk out the door, I didn't see him for a few years after.
Then comes to the reason why I put dad/father in the title, from the ages 5-6 ish, I would see my dad every other week on weekends, me and my 2 brothers (one older, one younger), would stay overnight, I mainly have good memories of it.
He was still drinking, but he would try to hide it from us, he also used to smoke a lot, and had a scruffy beard, I remember when he used to hug me, he would always give us the biggest hugs, and I could always feel his gritty beard, and the smell of cigarettes lingering on his clothing, even now its still very present in my mind, and very nostalgic
That year-ish was some of the best in my life, I had a dad, we did fun things, played board games, went outside, he had us help him make a table for my granny, things like that. Until one day we were supposed to stay over, and we didn't
His door was left ajar, lights on, but he wasn't there, there were beet cans, and bottles, and stuff everywhere, so we went back home with my mom
I didn't hear from him for years
There were a few spurts here and there when I saw him briefly, but he always made a point to call on my birthday, on my 17th birthday, he called my older brother, talked to him, and then hung up before I could talk to him. My 18th birthday he didn't call at all.
The last time I saw him, he had this really messy haircut, with a bunch of different lengths in all different directions, like he tried to cut it in the mirror while drunk, or high or both, I was Parked in a parking lot across from his apartment, he smelt of cigarettes, which made me tear up because of the nostalgia, and the main thing I remember, this was almost 2 years ago now, he had used my car as a wind buffer, so he could light his pipe for weed
I'm fine with weed, but it's the fact that who he was when I saw him last, and who he was when I was a kid are 2 different people in my mind, there's my dad, then there is my father
There's a quote that I live by, and it helps me get a grasp of people better, everybody has a father, but not everyone has a dad (obviously there are variations, but the sentimentis the same)
Anyways, my dad isn't who I remember him being, he has the same mannerisms, same eyes, that scruffy beard, but at times I didn't recognize him, it was like talking to a stranger when I used to see him
Anyways, this is my rant for today, it's utterly and completely useless, just a way for me to vent
I might talk about my older brother next, or maybe my mom and stepmom kicking me out (stepmom and mom are fiancé's), I don't know, there's a lot to rant about
Hope you like the saga of your local loonie

This years Nebulas are being awarded tomorrow night, so I thought I’d give my rankings of the Hugo and Nebula nominees. The Hugos are awarded on August 11th. Obligatory mention of how the Hugos appear to have been fixed last year, but that has been thoroughly discussed elsewhere, so I don’t really want to rehash it. And this year appears to be completely transparent, and I’m guessing and hoping will include efforts to prevent any similar corruption again.
For those who don’t like the Nebulas or Hugos, or don’t find them useful ways to find things you like to read, that’s certainly understandable. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any nominees you did read, or on works from 2023 that you enjoyed and feel are award worthy!
Notable things from this year: Martha Wells declined Murderbot nominations, a classy move for an already well awarded series. Lot’s of our usual nominees, while the only notable absence I caught was Seanan Mcguire’s Wayward Children novella, which is a bit of a shame as #8 is easily the best of the series, and it functions as a stand alone like all of the even numbered ones. But also, once you’re 8 books in, it does seem past due to start nominating other things. I’ll be curious to see if it was the Chinese works that edged it out.
A couple last things. Fantasy is doing their Hugo read, and it has some great commentary. u/brent_323 put out his rankings and comments on the Nebula novel nominees, and they differ from my somewhat if you want a different perspective. Lstly, I’ve added Goodreads ratings (out of 5 stars) for novels and novellas to give some context on how generally liked and how widely read each book is.

Best Novel

9: (Nebula Nominee) Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, Wole Talabi (DAW, Gollancz)
Stars: 3.70
Number of ratings: 633
Thematically, Shigidi is pretty similar to American Gods but with an emphasis on the Yoruba religion. My apologies in advance for any potential inaccuracies, my knowledge of Yoruba is based on this book, and some cursory Wikipedia reading. Different creators or gods have their own corporate structure, with minor sub-deities as employees. Olorun is the creator in Yoruba, with Orisha’s being lower level gods. One of these, Shigidi (a nightmare god in the book, although Wikipedia lists him as Guardian of Home and Environment), is trying to split from the Yoruba corporation and be an independent entity, along with his lover, the succubus Nneoma (based on Naamah, a demon from Jewish mysticism). To pay off his debt to the company, Shigidi has one last job.
It’s an interesting world, but despite the thematic American Gods comparisons, it feels nothing like that and has little else in common, and its structure ultimately makes it a much less successful book. Approximately a third of the book is the present day story, but most of that is in the second half of the book. The first half is brief tastes of the present in between longer chapters of background events. Those events are telling a single secondary story, just filling in the info you need to understand how we got to the present situation. Everytime we finally had some momentum, that thread would be done and I’d have to ‘get into’ the book all over again. If it wasn’t so broken up, I think I would have really enjoyed it, but as it is I was pretty done with the book by the time I got to where the bulk of the present day heist story was, and ended up skimming the last 50 to 100 pages.
8: (Nebula Nominee) The Terraformers, Annalee Newitz (Tor; Orbit UK)
Stars: 3.38
Number of ratings: 5,213
I loved The Future of Another Timeline, and on that alone will read any future Newitz novels, but so far nothing else of hers has come close to the same heights. The Terraformers is a set of 3 novellas set around 500 years apart, watching the terraforming of a planet over time through the eyes of the workers owned by the corporation terraforming the planet. Most of the plot is focused on terraforming, the corporation’s shenanigans, civil engineering, and civil rights, as the populace works to win the freedom to enjoy their home.
Very interesting, but it definitely drags at times. I loved the themes explored, although the civil engineering could be a bit much at times (said as a Kim Stanley Robinson fan). I did love the sentient buses, naked mole rats, and the cat reporter! Ultimately, more interesting than it was enjoyable.
7: (Hugo Nominee) Starter Villain by John Scalzi (Tor, Tor UK)
Stars: 4.18
Number of ratings: 43,367
I really enjoyed Starter Villain! There was some criticism of The Kaiju Preservation Society for being ‘light’, and that seems somewhat fair, although I likewise enjoyed it. People have leveled similar criticism at Starter Villain, but that seems less true. It’s quippy, a bit light hearted, but so are the other Scalzi books I’ve read (Redshirts, The Android’s Dream) it’s not exactly dealing with light topics despite that. It’s a critique of capitalism, and how wealth can become entrenched to both oppose what’s good for society, and oppose innovation. That said, I found the ‘villain’ idea pretty silly, as it’s essentially being used as a shorthand for disruptive technology, not for anything actually villainous or bad. I probably wouldn’t vote for it for a major award, but it was a fun and thoughtful novel.
6: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Witch King by Martha Wells (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.71
Number of ratings: 16,432
While Martha Wells declined nominations for Murderbot, she did accept them for Witch King! It’s really imaginative and interesting world, and I’m hoping we get more of it (I hear she’s working on another book in the setting, so I trust we will). It has two narrative threads, the present day, where the main character Kai has been held prisoner during a pivotal political moment. The story focuses on his escape and the efforts to figure out what’s going on. The second thread tells the backstory of Kai’s life, and how the world came to the current situation.
I loved the world, and really enjoyed the book! It seems like quite a few of the people who didn’t disliked it because they thought the back story was a lot more interesting than the present day story, which I have to agree with, honestly. I wish they were told as two separate books, or in a way where splitting them contributed to the story. For example, a historian character that wheedled Kai about what has actually happened in the past could have been a vehicle for exploring the past events. Regardless of these qualms, I still enjoyed the book and look forward to more.
5: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Translation State by Ann Leckie (Orbit US, Orbit UK)
Stars: 4.11
Number of ratings: 9,848
Translation State is yet another book set in Leckie’s Raadchai universe. It’s not necessary to read the Ancillary books first, although I think it would help (and they’re awesome). Not sure how much Provenance relates, as I didn’t enjoy it and DNFed. Translation State is really good though, looking at the life and society of the Presger translators (as you might imagine), and giving some glimpses of what’s going on in the broader setting. I have enjoyed the books giving hints of that bigger picture, but would love one like Ancillary Justice where that’s more of a primary focus. I’d say this book is award worthy (as are all the ones I ranked higher), but I also feel like it’s linked enough to the setting that it’s fair to treat it more like a sequel, and I’m less inclined to award sequels major awards.
4: (Nebula Nominee) The Water Outlaws, S.L. Huang (Tordotcom; Solaris UK)
Stars: 3.82
Number of ratings: 2,326
The Water Outlaws is a queer, gender bent retelling of the Chinese classic Water Margin. And by classic, I mean in the sense that Don Quixote or Middlemarch is classic. It’s (probably) a 14th century novel, set around 1120 and following the rebellion of the outlaws at Mount Liang against the Northern Song dynasty. It is one of the 6 classics of pre-modern Chinese literature. At least, that’s what Wikipedia says, and it sounds like retellings and adaptations are pretty common.
I really enjoyed The Water Outlaws, and it’s the first that I would actually be happy to see win. It was fast paced and fun, but also had quite a bit of interesting insight into gender. It was also interesting to see how more Eastern values played into the story. I’m not necessarily very attuned to that, although it sounds like other readers can attest that it felt both like a Western and an Eastern novel. But I definitely noticed that the outlaws weren’t rebelling against the Emperor or the Empire really, just the corrupt people just under the top who were managing it. To me at least, it seemed to reflect the Eastern collectivism over Western individualism. S. L. Huang also has a great AMA on Fantasy from a month ago that’s worth checking out. This and the following novels are the ones I’m really hoping win.
3: (Hugo Nominee) The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty (Harper Voyager, Harper Voyager UK)
Stars: 4.28
Number of ratings: 44,645
A 12th century century Muslim lady pirate comes out of retirement for one last job. It’s fantastic! It’s also apparently set in the same world as Chakraborty’s Daevabad Trilogy, albeit some centuries earlier. I appreciated the obvious effort that went into research and world building, and writing that made it a lot of fun even when it was dealing with heavy subjects. And I loved when things finally got on the weird side, and supernatural entities took over the story. I also thought that it was pretty interesting to see how Chakraborty was able to incorporate quite a lot of diversity and modern ideals in a way that genuinely felt authentic and believable. Related, but perhaps a bit different, it was interesting to see Amina as a devout Muslim, despite not always being a great person (she is a pirate after all). So often, religion is portrayed in pretty uncompelling ways, either as bad or dumb (sometimes in ways that feel accurate and sometimes in ways that feel like caricatures), or in ways that are very pro-religion such that some big bias is showing. In Amina, it was a significant part of her life, but didn’t feel in your face. It felt lived in, if that makes sense, but well balanced with the other aspects of her life.
I’m very much looking forward to the next two books!
2: (Hugo Nominee) Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh (Tordotcom, Orbit UK)
Stars: 4.06
Number of ratings: 7,957
This book appears to be pretty well regarded, but also a bit divisive. The main character, Kyr, lives on Gaia Station, the last outpost of (real) humanity in the fight with the broader galactic society of aliens and their reality warping AI, the Wisdom. Despite losing the war and most other humans moving on and integrating with galactic society, Gaia Station is still fighting. The book is ultimately an exploration of indoctrination, how your upbringing and surroundings shape your worldview, and what can later shake you into new perspectives. It reminds me of a scene from the book, Touching Spirit Bear, where a counselor demonstrates that people change from slow, steady pressure that pushes them off the course they’re on, or by a single big push that jolts them out of their path. Some Desperate Glory is several of those large pushes. In some ways, that does make it feel a little less authentic, as we don’t see Kyr really change over time, just have some pretty abrupt shifts (the first of which very much was unexpected, although the second not so much), but it also makes those changes much more accessible, since that time could be pretty hard to show. Despite that, it’s a really interesting look at indoctrination and deprogramming. As someone who grew up in and subsequently left what could be called a ‘high demand religion’, albeit one that is much, much milder than Gaia in the book or Jonestown in real life on the cult-o-meter, there’s a lot of resonance.
It seems like the main reason people didn’t like the book is that Kyr is a pretty unlikeable character. To be honest, that isn’t a thing that normally affects me, at least not for main characters. I tend to be in their headspace, as that’s what’s presented, so I’m usually not seeing them as unlikeable. Some obvious exceptions if they’re really annoying, and of course it became pretty clear over time that Kyr wasn’t exactly a considerate or kind person, but Kyr’s growth throughout the book is pretty specifically the point, so that wouldn’t really bother me either, honestly. The other issue is a scene towards the end where Kyr is touching (with consent) an alien’s feathers as a show of acceptance that he’s a person too, but some people have felt it comes off racially coded and offensive. I feel like that is pretty clearly not the author’s intent, and it’s a bit overblown, but I’m also not from a group where that would be triggering. Someone on the publishing team definitely should have seen that this would come off wrong, and changed it to something else that got the idea across in a way that wouldn’t be offensive.
I do hope that we get more of the world. It’s an interesting setting, and I would love a book exploring how the Gaians integrate into society. And also looking at Kyr’s dynamics with her group now that she has a broader perspective, and isn’t always a well meaning asshole, as we didn’t get a whole lot of that once she had grown out of it.
1: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.71
Number of ratings: 2,056
My wife bought this for me as a birthday present, thinking I’d like it based on the description. And I did! He is now on my must read list, and I’m pretty excited for Rakesfall, which comes out this month. I had never heard of The Saint of Bright Doors, or Chandrasekera, but I absolutely loved it. Then I was surprised to see people periodically mentioning it on reddit, and then I was thrilled when it was nominated for both the Hugo and Nebula. This is easily the most daring and innovative book on this list, mostly because it’s pretty atypical. Honestly, the closest thing I can think of to it is Some Desperate Glory due to reality warping, but they’re mostly nothing alike. The Saint of Bright Doors follows Fetter, with a brief bit of his childhood, and then a jump to his 20’s or so. Fetter appears to be based on Rāhula, the son of Siddhārtha Gautama (the Buddha), with Rāhula meaning fetter, as he was a fetter on Gautama’s path to enlightenment. The book also appears to engage quite a bit with Sri Lankan politics, particularly surrounding Buddhism. I’m not super familiar with any of that, although some Wikipedia reading gives some clear parallels. Even without that added depth, the story was fascinating. The world is complicated and at times pretty opaque, and it has a tendency to shift and change as the story progresses. There’s a pretty deep sense of mystery with the bright doors, but they ultimately end up becoming just another part of the world for most people in the setting. Fetter ends up being part of a support group for ‘Unchosen Ones’ from different religions that, for whatever reason, were meant to be ‘Chosen’ but ultimately weren’t. Interestingly, each of the religions appears to be true. We don’t get nearly as much of the other members of the group as I would have liked, but maybe some day we’ll hear about their stories. I hope so.
The primary complaint I see is that the story meanders a lot and is quite aimless, and that’s mostly because Fetter doesn’t really act. He has little agency, and instead things just happen to him. When he does make choices, it’s pretty unclear why. That’s a pretty fair assessment, but again, not something that bothered me at all. I loved how I never knew where the book was going. I’d get comfortable with where it was at and what was happening, and then it’d shift pretty quickly. I can see why that could bother some, but it worked for me in this book, and kept me interested. The other aspect of that is how the story is told. There’s a big reveal towards the end that I won’t spoil here. We get a few hints of it along the way, some that if you catch it you definitely know something is going on, even though you don’t know what. But it goes a long way towards explaining why the story has jumps in time, why we don’t get much view into Fetter’s mind and decisions, and just how the story is told. The one downside is that the story ends a bit abruptly, and while it makes sense in context, it’s also less satisfying. But it makes me think about what I want from a story, and the place the storyteller has in it. Sometimes things being unsatisfying can stir more thought, and maybe that’s worth it. Should a storyteller always give us everything? It makes me think of a song from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, The End of the Movie (some spoilers for that show). It captures some of the ambiguities in Bright Doors, but that ends up just adding to why I like it, whereas for some it definitely seemed to detract.

Best Novella

9. (Hugo Nominee) Rose/House by Arkady Martine (Subterranean)
Stars: 3.76
Number of ratings: 1,850
I really didn’t care for this story. I admittedly listened to it as an audiobook, rather than read it, and that isn’t usually as good an experience for close readings for me. Plus the only place I could find it was Hoopla, my least preferred app for audiobooks, because it’s pretty glitchy on the audio. My library has it on order, so I’ll give it another shot when I can do so in print, but all of that speaks to the larger issue that this novella was really hard to get a hold of, which is maybe not ideal if people are going to vote for it.
Anyways, on the story itself, it seemed a bit ambiguous. I couldn’t always tell what was going on, and on looking at reviews, that wasn’t just my listening experience, that was other people’s experiences as well. I didn’t feel like it added much to the AI discussion, although I did enjoy the house being convinced that a police detective was not in fact a person, but rather a police precinct. The story wasn’t all that interesting. All around, not a great read, with the above caveat on the listening experience, which is a shame since I loved the Teixcalaan books.
8. (Hugo Nominee) “Life Does Not Allow Us to Meet”, He Xi / 人生不相见, 何夕, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 2010)
This was a bit of a frustrating story. Some of the setting was interesting, but the insistence on both modifying humans to adapt them to other worlds, and that those modifications can’t be too much not human, because then they’re aliens, and humans can’t cultivate alien intelligences because they may at some point turn on us. The story is a bit more complicated than that, but it has quite a few things that just don’t make a lot of sense.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher (Tor, Titan UK)
Stars: 4.01
Number of ratings: 25,644
I loved What Moves the Dead and Nettle and Bone! As did many others, given the nominations they received. It’s starting to look like Kingfisher might join the ranks of the usually nominated at this point. And I definitely look forward to more of her work, with What Feasts at Night one of my next several reads. That said, Thornhedge was not my favorite. I loved Toadling, pretty much everything about her and her life, and the twist on Sleeping Beauty was interesting, but the story just doesn’t shine the way the others of hers that I’ve read do.
6. (Nebula Nominee) “Linghun,” Ai Jiang (Linghun)
Stars: 4.00
Number of ratings: 1,594
A thoughtful meditation on grief, and what it looks like if we could be haunted by those we’ve lost. In some ways it feels a little unrealistic, as people are more or less fighting to the death to get access to the houses where said hauntings can actually happen, but I can see how society might not have the will to ban such obviously harmful things if they also offered the chance to see your loved one again. The one and only reason this isn’t one of my top picks is because it falls apart in the last third. There’s a second story element that is introduced early on, but doesn’t take on much prominence until towards the end, and it doesn’t really fit. It’s another character whose story is relevant, and does add nuance to the themes, but it just feels like an insertion that distracts from the rest of what’s going on in the story. Linghun would ultimately work better if that character was stripped out.
5. (Nebula Nominee) The Crane Husband, Kelly Barnhill (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.89
Number of ratings: 6,326
This is an odd book, to say the least. It's a retelling/subversion of the Japanese folktale, The Crane Wife. The main character is a 15 year old girl telling us the story years later. The setting is a pretty normal, slightly dystopian near future, with elements of magical realism when the girl's mother brings home a crane to be her new husband, and horror as that relationship turns (more) bizarre and abusive. It’s a symbolic exploration of both abuse and generational trauma, and it’s pretty interesting, but I’m still not sure how I feel about it. It definitely feels like the most ‘out there’ of the novella nominees, but this is the first I’d be happy to see win.
4. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.64
Number of ratings: 5,689
I rather liked this story, and I'm pretty excited for when I get around to reading the sequel! While I've seen complaints about the language and style, that's a large part of what I like. More than almost any book I've read, besides ones by Gene Wolfe, every word Older uses feels specifically considered and used intentionally. And unlike in academic texts, the other main place that writing feels like this, this doesn't makes the meaning confusing or hard to sort through. Older uses complex, nuanced sentences with quite a bit of clauses and qualifiers, but it illuminates rather than obscures. It feels like the way I think (or at least the way I think I think), so I appreciate that. There's also a story and characters and such, and those are pretty nifty. One of the things I love on that front is how deftly words are used; without explicitly telling us things, the setting, characters, and world really come clear. While there is a story, the driving force really is the interactions between the two main characters, particularly as the viewpoint character deduces that thoughts and intents of the other main character through subtle signs. Anyways, more than any other element, the writing for this story really worked for me!
3. (Nebula Nominee) Untethered Sky, Fonda Lee (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.90
Number of ratings: 8,153
Another book about birds, where the main character is a ruhker, someone who trains with rocs so they can be used to fight manticores. The book feels quiet, with the primary relationship being two humans who are both quiet introverts, and their birds who of course don’t talk. There’s action and violence and terror , but on the whole, it feels like a quiet meditation. This book is one of the reasons I’ve grown to love novellas. It could easily be a novel, but instead it just tells its story and is done. There’s a power in limiting your scope like that, a purity, and I feel like this book has that more so than any other novella on this list.
2. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Mammoths at the Gates by Nghi Vo (Tordotcom)
Stars: 4.25
Number of ratings: 4,478
My comment from the Fantasy Hugo discussion of Mammoths at the Gates:
Each of the 4 books to date have Chih take on a greater role in the story.
In the 1st, they mostly seem like the context of the frame narrative, and not really a main character.
In the 2nd, the framing has its own story with the tigers that's as significant as the story being told by Chih and the tigers.
In the 3rd, the story told merges with the framing story, and they become one at the end.
In the 4th (Mammoths at the Gate), the framing story is the story, dealing with the grief of Cleric Thien passing, with the other smaller stories about him within adding or illuminating but never really being separate from the framing.
It seems that over time, it's shifting from Chih and Almost Brilliant being a means of telling different stories to Chih and Almost Brilliant being the story. It makes me curious what book 5 and beyond will be, because I can only imagine one more book of following that trend before I'm out of ideas on how they could be more of the story.
At the same time, it shifts the focus from what a story is and how we tell it, how we know what the 'right' version is, and makes it more and more personal. Book 1, the historical figures had different understandings of what was happening, to the detriment of the overthrown kingdom. Book 2, Chih and the tigers had different understandings, and together told a fuller story by sharing that. Book 3, the story becomes much more complicated when you actually meet the characters. Book 4, a person you know becomes more complicated and nuanced when you learn from others their experience with the person. There's more to the story of who a person is than your personal experience of them.
All that's super interesting to me. Each of the books really does function fine as a stand alone, and I'm not sure that there's a clear overarching storyline outside of Almost Brilliant's having a kid, but there's a thematic evolution that seems to be following a specific path. I'm pretty curious to see where it's headed. (In the Fantasy Hugo read along, u/tarvolon confirmed that book 5 is thoroughly The Adventures of Chih, so I guess that trend is accurate, and u/Nineteen_Adze thought that perhaps later books could have Chih hear stories where he featured as a main character, an idea I really like).
1. (Hugo Nominee) “Seeds of Mercury”, Wang Jinkang / 水星播种, 王晋康, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 2002)
This was ultimately my favorite of the stories. It’s about secretly seeding life on Mercury. Sometimes the language is clumsy, and I’m not sure if that’s the original writing or the translation, but ultimately it’s not too much of an issue. I loved the look at the alien life and their society!

Best Novelette

10. (Nebula Nominee) “Imagine: Purple-Haired Girl Shooting Down The Moon,” Angela Liu (Clarkesworld 6/23)
This is a weird story, and one I really didn’t care for. It deals with memory and how that shapes who we are, and quite a bit with people being used. Oh, and purpose haired girls. But if it was trying to say something in particular, I missed it.
9. (Nebula Nominee) “A Short Biography of a Conscious Chair,” Renan Bernardo (Samovar 2/23)
The story of a chair, as you might guess from the title, but just as much it’s the story of the family that owns the chair. It has an interesting family secret that’s eventually revealed and which hinges on the chair, but ultimately, this was a more interesting idea than story.
8. (Nebula Nominee) “Saturday’s Song,” Wole Talabi (Lightspeed 5/23)
This is the sequel to Wednesday’s Story. Like Talabi’s novel nominee this year, Saturday's Song features Shigidi as a nightmare god again, but also Hausa spirits. Both stories feature a frame narrative, with a story within a story similar to Vo’s Singing Hills noellas. I enjoyed it, and Saturday’s Song does tell you what you need to know from Wednesday’s Story, but it works better if you read them in order, as it functions more as a resolution than anything.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) I AM AI by Ai Jiang (Shortwave)
This is a decent story, looking at capitalistic dystopias. Specifically, the pressure to be better while competing against AI, to the point where the main character is slowly morphing into a machine to catch up but in doing so loses what makes them unique and human. I don’t know that it adds a lot to the conversation exactly, but it makes some good points and summarizes some common concerns pretty well. I would have likely ranked it higher, but there were quite a bit of plausibility issues in the setting that I couldn’t really get past, and which made it much more dystopian than it would otherwise be.
6. (Hugo Nominee) “Ivy, Angelica, Bay” by C.L. Polk (Tor.com 8 December 2023)
This is a sequel to St. Valentine, St. Abigail, St. Brigid. And it was pretty good! I wouldn’t say there’s anything super special about it, but I enjoyed it. The lead of the previous story has grown up and taken on her role keeping her area of the city safe through small magics, but trouble is stirring. This story onwards are ones I’d feel comfortable voting for.
5. (Hugo Nominee) “One Man’s Treasure” by Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2023)
Our only Pinsker nominee this year! And while it’s pretty good, it doesn’t seem like a top contender to me. It reminds me of Wiswell's DIY from last year, thematically. It’s about several garbage collectors who remove magical items once a month, and the rich people who don’t particularly care about basic safety. Like DIY, it focuses on finding common person solutions since the rich don't care, something I can sympathize with. It’s a well told and interesting story, but that’s hardly a surprise from Pinsker.
4. (Nebula Nominee) “Six Versions of My Brother Found Under the Bridge,” Eugenia Triantafyllou (Uncanny 9-10/23)
This is a story about the bargains and sacrifices we make for grief, and how they can further harm and traumatize us. Also, it’s about how the devil exploits our grief and trauma to mess with us. It turns out when you go under the Devil’s bridge, you really ought not to make deals. This story and the following are the ones that I actually hope win.
3. (Hugo Nominee) “On the Fox Roads” by Nghi Vo (Tor.com 31 October 2023)
This story was pretty light on magical or sf elements, at least until the end, much like Vo’s other early to mid 1900s books (The Chosen and Beautiful, Siren Queen). This one is about finding yourself, and how relationships with others can help you do it. Even when those others start as complete strangers. Oh, and it’s about heists. I really enjoyed this one, and the ambiance Vo summons with her more real world settings.
2. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “The Year Without Sunshine” by Naomi Kritzer (Uncanny Magazine, November-December 2023)
On the Fox Roads was pretty light on the magical elements, but they were there, and they were integral to the story. The Year Without Sunshine could pass as non-genre fiction just as well as it could as SF. The only element is an unspecified calamity that temporarily put a bunch of ash in to the air. THe story itself focuses on community working together when social safety nets are only semi functional, and resources become pretty scarce. I really enjoyed the the characters and how people worked together. It felt genuine and realistic, if optimistic, and seems much more helpful for real world disasters where things start to break down but aren’t post-apocalyptic. I would say it’s a very inspiring story.
1. (Hugo Nominee) “Introduction to 2181 Overture, Second Edition”, Gu Shi /〈2181序曲〉再版导言, 顾适 translated by Emily Jin (Clarkesworld, February 2023)(Originally published in 2020)
This is science fiction is the most classic sense, and done well, in that it looks at a technology (cryosleep) and extrapolates what kind of impact it would have on society. The closest comparison I can think of to it would be Stephen Baxter and Arthur C. Clarke’s The Light of Other Days. But of course, this is completely different in that it’s written as an introduction to a fictional nonfiction book, which gives Gu Shi a lot of freedom to tell the story in a unique way, with fictional quotes with commentary from fictional people who are important to the history of cryosleep. Towards the end, it gets into the personal story behind that history, the creator of the book, and the person writing the introduction, and that allows the technical and sociology exploration to add a really touching emotional component. While I don’t agree with all of the extrapolations (hardly a surprise for a story like this), this is easily the best of the translated nominees this year, and one of my absolute favorites overall from this year.

Best Short Story:

(Hugo Nominee) 美食三品 (“Tasting the Future Delicacy Three Times”), 宝树 / Baoshu (银河边缘013：黑域密室 / Galaxy’s Edge Vol. 13: Secret Room in the Black Domain)
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to read this story. It appears to have only been translated into English for the Hugo voter packet. Since I’m not actually a member of the Hugos (maybe one day, if I can attend the actual convention), I don’t have the packet.
9. (Hugo Nominee) “Answerless Journey”, Han Song / 没有答案的航程, 韩松, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 1995)
Easily the worst of the translated fiction this year, or really just the worst nominee. The writing is stiff and clumsy, and it’s not just the translator as we have 2 other nominees to compare it with that were also translated by Alex Woodend. Minimal plot. The main character, who is human, is called ‘Creature’, presumably because amnesia has made him forget his name. It just doesn’t make a ton of sense all around.
8. (Hugo Nominee) “The Mausoleum’s Children” by Aliette de Bodard (Uncanny Magazine, May-June 2023)
This feels like an interesting story, except I can’t really tell what's going on. The setting isn't particularly clear, despite seeming pretty interesting. The story was ok outside of that, but not amazing, and it’s hard to come back from not really getting what’s happening.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “The Sound of Children Screaming” by Rachael K. Jones (Nightmare Magazine, October 2023)
This piece has some insightful comments on gun violence, but those make up approximately 2 or 3 paragraphs. It goes from a somewhat generalized description of a shooting to a specific one to a portal fantasy to a world with evil mice. Interesting, but it doesn't make a ton of sense and doesn't really all fit together.
6. (Nebula Nominee) “Bad Doors,” John Wiswell (Uncanny 1-2/23)
I didn’t care much for Wiswell on first reading him, with The House on Haunted Hill. I mean, I liked that and thought it was a cute story, but it wasn’t something I’d vote for. But his writing has grown on me, with each year getting better and better. Bad Doors breaks that trend though. It’s not a bad story, it just wasn’t that interesting to me. Not much happens besides a family falling out over political drama, and honestly that is a bit too much like real life to be worth reading unless it’s going to give some good insight or be really good.
5. (Nebula Nominee) “Window Boy,” Thomas Ha (Clarkesworld 8/23)
A strange story about the anxieties around the other, set mostly in post apocalyptic underground bunkers. It looks a lot at the relationship between the haves and the have nots, and the imbalance around friendships in that context. Are have nots always only friends to take advantage of the haves? Is that actually unreasonable if it is the case? But also maybe they have nots are actually weird 20 foot grackle bird things. The reality filters on the cameras to see outside the bunkers make it hard to tell.
4. (Hugo Nominee) “How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub” by P. Djèlí Clark (Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2023)
This is where I’d really start voting for the nominees. How to Raise a Kraken is a funny story about an ambitious idiot who gets a newspaper ad kraken, one that is actually real, and the fall out from doing so. It addresses colonialism and hubris in a pretty amusing and satisfying way.
3. (Nebula Nominee) “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont,” P.A. Cornell (Fantasy 10/23)
This is a thoughtful story about time. It’s set in an apartment building with tenants from different points in time going about their normal lives. Because of that, there are lots of rules to prevent info being transmitted to the past and to stop any harm from foreknowledge. The story centers on a lady from the present in a relationship with a man from the 1940's. It’s one of the more interesting ways of playing with time that I’ve seen.
2. (Nebula Nominee) “Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200,” R.S.A Garcia (Uncanny 7-8/23)
This is set in Tobago, with the local vernacular, and tells of a robotic farmhand trying to take care of an old lady's goat, and gaining further intelligence in the process. It’s a powerful, moving story. It’s occasionally a little unconvincing, in that the old lady used emojis in her youth but seems unfamiliar with what would be basic tech from her childhood, but also old people do frequently tend to struggle with technological things, so perhaps that’s unfair of me. It does a really good job looking at the social isolation of the elderly though. Tantie Merle and the following story are both the ones that I’d really hope win.
1. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “Better Living Through Algorithms” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023)
The second Naomi Kritzer story, this one is about an AI app that directs people on what to do to make them happy. It’s a nifty idea, well executed, and something I could actually see lots of people being interested in in real life if it worked as described. It also has well written, interesting, and relatable characters. I’ve only read the CatNet books by Kritzer, and while I liked them, it didn’t have me searching her out. After Better Living and The Year Without Sunshine though, I’ll have to check out the rest of her work.

This years Nebulas are being awarded tomorrow night, so I thought I’d give my rankings of the Hugo and Nebula nominees. The Hugos are awarded on August 11th. Obligatory mention of how the Hugos appear to have been fixed last year, but that has been thoroughly discussed elsewhere, so I don’t really want to rehash it. And this year appears to be completely transparent, and I’m guessing and hoping will include efforts to prevent any similar corruption again.
For those who don’t like the Nebulas or Hugos, or don’t find them useful ways to find things you like to read, that’s certainly understandable. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any nominees you did read, or on works from 2023 that you enjoyed and feel are award worthy!
Notable things from this year: Martha Wells declined Murderbot nominations, a classy move for an already well awarded series. Lot’s of our usual nominees, while the only notable absence I caught was Seanan Mcguire’s Wayward Children novella, which is a bit of a shame as #8 is easily the best of the series, and it functions as a stand alone like all of the even numbered ones. But also, once you’re 8 books in, it does seem past due to start nominating other things. I’ll be curious to see if it was the Chinese works that edged it out.
A couple last things. Fantasy is doing their Hugo read, and it has some great commentary. u/brent_323 put out his rankings and comments on the Nebula novel nominees, and they differ from my somewhat if you want a different perspective. Lstly, I’ve added Goodreads ratings (out of 5 stars) for novels and novellas to give some context on how generally liked and how widely read each book is.

Best Novel

9: (Nebula Nominee) Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, Wole Talabi (DAW, Gollancz)
Stars: 3.70
Number of ratings: 633
Thematically, Shigidi is pretty similar to American Gods but with an emphasis on the Yoruba religion. My apologies in advance for any potential inaccuracies, my knowledge of Yoruba is based on this book, and some cursory Wikipedia reading. Different creators or gods have their own corporate structure, with minor sub-deities as employees. Olorun is the creator in Yoruba, with Orisha’s being lower level gods. One of these, Shigidi (a nightmare god in the book, although Wikipedia lists him as Guardian of Home and Environment), is trying to split from the Yoruba corporation and be an independent entity, along with his lover, the succubus Nneoma (based on Naamah, a demon from Jewish mysticism). To pay off his debt to the company, Shigidi has one last job.
It’s an interesting world, but despite the thematic American Gods comparisons, it feels nothing like that and has little else in common, and its structure ultimately makes it a much less successful book. Approximately a third of the book is the present day story, but most of that is in the second half of the book. The first half is brief tastes of the present in between longer chapters of background events. Those events are telling a single secondary story, just filling in the info you need to understand how we got to the present situation. Everytime we finally had some momentum, that thread would be done and I’d have to ‘get into’ the book all over again. If it wasn’t so broken up, I think I would have really enjoyed it, but as it is I was pretty done with the book by the time I got to where the bulk of the present day heist story was, and ended up skimming the last 50 to 100 pages.
8: (Nebula Nominee) The Terraformers, Annalee Newitz (Tor; Orbit UK)
Stars: 3.38
Number of ratings: 5,213
I loved The Future of Another Timeline, and on that alone will read any future Newitz novels, but so far nothing else of hers has come close to the same heights. The Terraformers is a set of 3 novellas set around 500 years apart, watching the terraforming of a planet over time through the eyes of the workers owned by the corporation terraforming the planet. Most of the plot is focused on terraforming, the corporation’s shenanigans, civil engineering, and civil rights, as the populace works to win the freedom to enjoy their home.
Very interesting, but it definitely drags at times. I loved the themes explored, although the civil engineering could be a bit much at times (said as a Kim Stanley Robinson fan). I did love the sentient buses, naked mole rats, and the cat reporter! Ultimately, more interesting than it was enjoyable.
7: (Hugo Nominee) Starter Villain by John Scalzi (Tor, Tor UK)
Stars: 4.18
Number of ratings: 43,367
I really enjoyed Starter Villain! There was some criticism of The Kaiju Preservation Society for being ‘light’, and that seems somewhat fair, although I likewise enjoyed it. People have leveled similar criticism at Starter Villain, but that seems less true. It’s quippy, a bit light hearted, but so are the other Scalzi books I’ve read (Redshirts, The Android’s Dream) it’s not exactly dealing with light topics despite that. It’s a critique of capitalism, and how wealth can become entrenched to both oppose what’s good for society, and oppose innovation. That said, I found the ‘villain’ idea pretty silly, as it’s essentially being used as a shorthand for disruptive technology, not for anything actually villainous or bad. I probably wouldn’t vote for it for a major award, but it was a fun and thoughtful novel.
6: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Witch King by Martha Wells (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.71
Number of ratings: 16,432
While Martha Wells declined nominations for Murderbot, she did accept them for Witch King! It’s really imaginative and interesting world, and I’m hoping we get more of it (I hear she’s working on another book in the setting, so I trust we will). It has two narrative threads, the present day, where the main character Kai has been held prisoner during a pivotal political moment. The story focuses on his escape and the efforts to figure out what’s going on. The second thread tells the backstory of Kai’s life, and how the world came to the current situation.
I loved the world, and really enjoyed the book! It seems like quite a few of the people who didn’t disliked it because they thought the back story was a lot more interesting than the present day story, which I have to agree with, honestly. I wish they were told as two separate books, or in a way where splitting them contributed to the story. For example, a historian character that wheedled Kai about what has actually happened in the past could have been a vehicle for exploring the past events. Regardless of these qualms, I still enjoyed the book and look forward to more.
5: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Translation State by Ann Leckie (Orbit US, Orbit UK)
Stars: 4.11
Number of ratings: 9,848
Translation State is yet another book set in Leckie’s Raadchai universe. It’s not necessary to read the Ancillary books first, although I think it would help (and they’re awesome). Not sure how much Provenance relates, as I didn’t enjoy it and DNFed. Translation State is really good though, looking at the life and society of the Presger translators (as you might imagine), and giving some glimpses of what’s going on in the broader setting. I have enjoyed the books giving hints of that bigger picture, but would love one like Ancillary Justice where that’s more of a primary focus. I’d say this book is award worthy (as are all the ones I ranked higher), but I also feel like it’s linked enough to the setting that it’s fair to treat it more like a sequel, and I’m less inclined to award sequels major awards.
4: (Nebula Nominee) The Water Outlaws, S.L. Huang (Tordotcom; Solaris UK)
Stars: 3.82
Number of ratings: 2,326
The Water Outlaws is a queer, gender bent retelling of the Chinese classic Water Margin. And by classic, I mean in the sense that Don Quixote or Middlemarch is classic. It’s (probably) a 14th century novel, set around 1120 and following the rebellion of the outlaws at Mount Liang against the Northern Song dynasty. It is one of the 6 classics of pre-modern Chinese literature. At least, that’s what Wikipedia says, and it sounds like retellings and adaptations are pretty common.
I really enjoyed The Water Outlaws, and it’s the first that I would actually be happy to see win. It was fast paced and fun, but also had quite a bit of interesting insight into gender. It was also interesting to see how more Eastern values played into the story. I’m not necessarily very attuned to that, although it sounds like other readers can attest that it felt both like a Western and an Eastern novel. But I definitely noticed that the outlaws weren’t rebelling against the Emperor or the Empire really, just the corrupt people just under the top who were managing it. To me at least, it seemed to reflect the Eastern collectivism over Western individualism. S. L. Huang also has a great AMA on Fantasy from a month ago that’s worth checking out. This and the following novels are the ones I’m really hoping win.
3: (Hugo Nominee) The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty (Harper Voyager, Harper Voyager UK)
Stars: 4.28
Number of ratings: 44,645
A 12th century century Muslim lady pirate comes out of retirement for one last job. It’s fantastic! It’s also apparently set in the same world as Chakraborty’s Daevabad Trilogy, albeit some centuries earlier. I appreciated the obvious effort that went into research and world building, and writing that made it a lot of fun even when it was dealing with heavy subjects. And I loved when things finally got on the weird side, and supernatural entities took over the story. I also thought that it was pretty interesting to see how Chakraborty was able to incorporate quite a lot of diversity and modern ideals in a way that genuinely felt authentic and believable. Related, but perhaps a bit different, it was interesting to see Amina as a devout Muslim, despite not always being a great person (she is a pirate after all). So often, religion is portrayed in pretty uncompelling ways, either as bad or dumb (sometimes in ways that feel accurate and sometimes in ways that feel like caricatures), or in ways that are very pro-religion such that some big bias is showing. In Amina, it was a significant part of her life, but didn’t feel in your face. It felt lived in, if that makes sense, but well balanced with the other aspects of her life.
I’m very much looking forward to the next two books!
2: (Hugo Nominee) Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh (Tordotcom, Orbit UK)
Stars: 4.06
Number of ratings: 7,957
This book appears to be pretty well regarded, but also a bit divisive. The main character, Kyr, lives on Gaia Station, the last outpost of (real) humanity in the fight with the broader galactic society of aliens and their reality warping AI, the Wisdom. Despite losing the war and most other humans moving on and integrating with galactic society, Gaia Station is still fighting. The book is ultimately an exploration of indoctrination, how your upbringing and surroundings shape your worldview, and what can later shake you into new perspectives. It reminds me of a scene from the book, Touching Spirit Bear, where a counselor demonstrates that people change from slow, steady pressure that pushes them off the course they’re on, or by a single big push that jolts them out of their path. Some Desperate Glory is several of those large pushes. In some ways, that does make it feel a little less authentic, as we don’t see Kyr really change over time, just have some pretty abrupt shifts (the first of which very much was unexpected, although the second not so much), but it also makes those changes much more accessible, since that time could be pretty hard to show. Despite that, it’s a really interesting look at indoctrination and deprogramming. As someone who grew up in and subsequently left what could be called a ‘high demand religion’, albeit one that is much, much milder than Gaia in the book or Jonestown in real life on the cult-o-meter, there’s a lot of resonance.
It seems like the main reason people didn’t like the book is that Kyr is a pretty unlikeable character. To be honest, that isn’t a thing that normally affects me, at least not for main characters. I tend to be in their headspace, as that’s what’s presented, so I’m usually not seeing them as unlikeable. Some obvious exceptions if they’re really annoying, and of course it became pretty clear over time that Kyr wasn’t exactly a considerate or kind person, but Kyr’s growth throughout the book is pretty specifically the point, so that wouldn’t really bother me either, honestly. The other issue is a scene towards the end where Kyr is touching (with consent) an alien’s feathers as a show of acceptance that he’s a person too, but some people have felt it comes off racially coded and offensive. I feel like that is pretty clearly not the author’s intent, and it’s a bit overblown, but I’m also not from a group where that would be triggering. Someone on the publishing team definitely should have seen that this would come off wrong, and changed it to something else that got the idea across in a way that wouldn’t be offensive.
I do hope that we get more of the world. It’s an interesting setting, and I would love a book exploring how the Gaians integrate into society. And also looking at Kyr’s dynamics with her group now that she has a broader perspective, and isn’t always a well meaning asshole, as we didn’t get a whole lot of that once she had grown out of it.
1: (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.71
Number of ratings: 2,056
My wife bought this for me as a birthday present, thinking I’d like it based on the description. And I did! He is now on my must read list, and I’m pretty excited for Rakesfall, which comes out this month. I had never heard of The Saint of Bright Doors, or Chandrasekera, but I absolutely loved it. Then I was surprised to see people periodically mentioning it on reddit, and then I was thrilled when it was nominated for both the Hugo and Nebula. This is easily the most daring and innovative book on this list, mostly because it’s pretty atypical. Honestly, the closest thing I can think of to it is Some Desperate Glory due to reality warping, but they’re mostly nothing alike. The Saint of Bright Doors follows Fetter, with a brief bit of his childhood, and then a jump to his 20’s or so. Fetter appears to be based on Rāhula, the son of Siddhārtha Gautama (the Buddha), with Rāhula meaning fetter, as he was a fetter on Gautama’s path to enlightenment. The book also appears to engage quite a bit with Sri Lankan politics, particularly surrounding Buddhism. I’m not super familiar with any of that, although some Wikipedia reading gives some clear parallels. Even without that added depth, the story was fascinating. The world is complicated and at times pretty opaque, and it has a tendency to shift and change as the story progresses. There’s a pretty deep sense of mystery with the bright doors, but they ultimately end up becoming just another part of the world for most people in the setting. Fetter ends up being part of a support group for ‘Unchosen Ones’ from different religions that, for whatever reason, were meant to be ‘Chosen’ but ultimately weren’t. Interestingly, each of the religions appears to be true. We don’t get nearly as much of the other members of the group as I would have liked, but maybe some day we’ll hear about their stories. I hope so.
The primary complaint I see is that the story meanders a lot and is quite aimless, and that’s mostly because Fetter doesn’t really act. He has little agency, and instead things just happen to him. When he does make choices, it’s pretty unclear why. That’s a pretty fair assessment, but again, not something that bothered me at all. I loved how I never knew where the book was going. I’d get comfortable with where it was at and what was happening, and then it’d shift pretty quickly. I can see why that could bother some, but it worked for me in this book, and kept me interested. The other aspect of that is how the story is told. There’s a big reveal towards the end that I won’t spoil here. We get a few hints of it along the way, some that if you catch it you definitely know something is going on, even though you don’t know what. But it goes a long way towards explaining why the story has jumps in time, why we don’t get much view into Fetter’s mind and decisions, and just how the story is told. The one downside is that the story ends a bit abruptly, and while it makes sense in context, it’s also less satisfying. But it makes me think about what I want from a story, and the place the storyteller has in it. Sometimes things being unsatisfying can stir more thought, and maybe that’s worth it. Should a storyteller always give us everything? It makes me think of a song from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, The End of the Movie (some spoilers for that show). It captures some of the ambiguities in Bright Doors, but that ends up just adding to why I like it, whereas for some it definitely seemed to detract.

Best Novella

9. (Hugo Nominee) Rose/House by Arkady Martine (Subterranean)
Stars: 3.76
Number of ratings: 1,850
I really didn’t care for this story. I admittedly listened to it as an audiobook, rather than read it, and that isn’t usually as good an experience for close readings for me. Plus the only place I could find it was Hoopla, my least preferred app for audiobooks, because it’s pretty glitchy on the audio. My library has it on order, so I’ll give it another shot when I can do so in print, but all of that speaks to the larger issue that this novella was really hard to get a hold of, which is maybe not ideal if people are going to vote for it.
Anyways, on the story itself, it seemed a bit ambiguous. I couldn’t always tell what was going on, and on looking at reviews, that wasn’t just my listening experience, that was other people’s experiences as well. I didn’t feel like it added much to the AI discussion, although I did enjoy the house being convinced that a police detective was not in fact a person, but rather a police precinct. The story wasn’t all that interesting. All around, not a great read, with the above caveat on the listening experience, which is a shame since I loved the Teixcalaan books.
8. (Hugo Nominee) “Life Does Not Allow Us to Meet”, He Xi / 人生不相见, 何夕, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 2010)
This was a bit of a frustrating story. Some of the setting was interesting, but the insistence on both modifying humans to adapt them to other worlds, and that those modifications can’t be too much not human, because then they’re aliens, and humans can’t cultivate alien intelligences because they may at some point turn on us. The story is a bit more complicated than that, but it has quite a few things that just don’t make a lot of sense.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher (Tor, Titan UK)
Stars: 4.01
Number of ratings: 25,644
I loved What Moves the Dead and Nettle and Bone! As did many others, given the nominations they received. It’s starting to look like Kingfisher might join the ranks of the usually nominated at this point. And I definitely look forward to more of her work, with What Feasts at Night one of my next several reads. That said, Thornhedge was not my favorite. I loved Toadling, pretty much everything about her and her life, and the twist on Sleeping Beauty was interesting, but the story just doesn’t shine the way the others of hers that I’ve read do.
6. (Nebula Nominee) “Linghun,” Ai Jiang (Linghun)
Stars: 4.00
Number of ratings: 1,594
A thoughtful meditation on grief, and what it looks like if we could be haunted by those we’ve lost. In some ways it feels a little unrealistic, as people are more or less fighting to the death to get access to the houses where said hauntings can actually happen, but I can see how society might not have the will to ban such obviously harmful things if they also offered the chance to see your loved one again. The one and only reason this isn’t one of my top picks is because it falls apart in the last third. There’s a second story element that is introduced early on, but doesn’t take on much prominence until towards the end, and it doesn’t really fit. It’s another character whose story is relevant, and does add nuance to the themes, but it just feels like an insertion that distracts from the rest of what’s going on in the story. Linghun would ultimately work better if that character was stripped out.
5. (Nebula Nominee) The Crane Husband, Kelly Barnhill (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.89
Number of ratings: 6,326
This is an odd book, to say the least. It's a retelling/subversion of the Japanese folktale, The Crane Wife. The main character is a 15 year old girl telling us the story years later. The setting is a pretty normal, slightly dystopian near future, with elements of magical realism when the girl's mother brings home a crane to be her new husband, and horror as that relationship turns (more) bizarre and abusive. It’s a symbolic exploration of both abuse and generational trauma, and it’s pretty interesting, but I’m still not sure how I feel about it. It definitely feels like the most ‘out there’ of the novella nominees, but this is the first I’d be happy to see win.
4. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.64
Number of ratings: 5,689
I rather liked this story, and I'm pretty excited for when I get around to reading the sequel! While I've seen complaints about the language and style, that's a large part of what I like. More than almost any book I've read, besides ones by Gene Wolfe, every word Older uses feels specifically considered and used intentionally. And unlike in academic texts, the other main place that writing feels like this, this doesn't makes the meaning confusing or hard to sort through. Older uses complex, nuanced sentences with quite a bit of clauses and qualifiers, but it illuminates rather than obscures. It feels like the way I think (or at least the way I think I think), so I appreciate that. There's also a story and characters and such, and those are pretty nifty. One of the things I love on that front is how deftly words are used; without explicitly telling us things, the setting, characters, and world really come clear. While there is a story, the driving force really is the interactions between the two main characters, particularly as the viewpoint character deduces that thoughts and intents of the other main character through subtle signs. Anyways, more than any other element, the writing for this story really worked for me!
3. (Nebula Nominee) Untethered Sky, Fonda Lee (Tordotcom)
Stars: 3.90
Number of ratings: 8,153
Another book about birds, where the main character is a ruhker, someone who trains with rocs so they can be used to fight manticores. The book feels quiet, with the primary relationship being two humans who are both quiet introverts, and their birds who of course don’t talk. There’s action and violence and terror , but on the whole, it feels like a quiet meditation. This book is one of the reasons I’ve grown to love novellas. It could easily be a novel, but instead it just tells its story and is done. There’s a power in limiting your scope like that, a purity, and I feel like this book has that more so than any other novella on this list.
2. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) Mammoths at the Gates by Nghi Vo (Tordotcom)
Stars: 4.25
Number of ratings: 4,478
My comment from the Fantasy Hugo discussion of Mammoths at the Gates:
Each of the 4 books to date have Chih take on a greater role in the story.
In the 1st, they mostly seem like the context of the frame narrative, and not really a main character.
In the 2nd, the framing has its own story with the tigers that's as significant as the story being told by Chih and the tigers.
In the 3rd, the story told merges with the framing story, and they become one at the end.
In the 4th (Mammoths at the Gate), the framing story is the story, dealing with the grief of Cleric Thien passing, with the other smaller stories about him within adding or illuminating but never really being separate from the framing.
It seems that over time, it's shifting from Chih and Almost Brilliant being a means of telling different stories to Chih and Almost Brilliant being the story. It makes me curious what book 5 and beyond will be, because I can only imagine one more book of following that trend before I'm out of ideas on how they could be more of the story.
At the same time, it shifts the focus from what a story is and how we tell it, how we know what the 'right' version is, and makes it more and more personal. Book 1, the historical figures had different understandings of what was happening, to the detriment of the overthrown kingdom. Book 2, Chih and the tigers had different understandings, and together told a fuller story by sharing that. Book 3, the story becomes much more complicated when you actually meet the characters. Book 4, a person you know becomes more complicated and nuanced when you learn from others their experience with the person. There's more to the story of who a person is than your personal experience of them.
All that's super interesting to me. Each of the books really does function fine as a stand alone, and I'm not sure that there's a clear overarching storyline outside of Almost Brilliant's having a kid, but there's a thematic evolution that seems to be following a specific path. I'm pretty curious to see where it's headed. (In the Fantasy Hugo read along, u/tarvolon confirmed that book 5 is thoroughly The Adventures of Chih, so I guess that trend is accurate, and u/Nineteen_Adze thought that perhaps later books could have Chih hear stories where he featured as a main character, an idea I really like).
1. (Hugo Nominee) “Seeds of Mercury”, Wang Jinkang / 水星播种, 王晋康, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 2002)
This was ultimately my favorite of the stories. It’s about secretly seeding life on Mercury. Sometimes the language is clumsy, and I’m not sure if that’s the original writing or the translation, but ultimately it’s not too much of an issue. I loved the look at the alien life and their society!

Best Novelette

10. (Nebula Nominee) “Imagine: Purple-Haired Girl Shooting Down The Moon,” Angela Liu (Clarkesworld 6/23)
This is a weird story, and one I really didn’t care for. It deals with memory and how that shapes who we are, and quite a bit with people being used. Oh, and purpose haired girls. But if it was trying to say something in particular, I missed it.
9. (Nebula Nominee) “A Short Biography of a Conscious Chair,” Renan Bernardo (Samovar 2/23)
The story of a chair, as you might guess from the title, but just as much it’s the story of the family that owns the chair. It has an interesting family secret that’s eventually revealed and which hinges on the chair, but ultimately, this was a more interesting idea than story.
8. (Nebula Nominee) “Saturday’s Song,” Wole Talabi (Lightspeed 5/23)
This is the sequel to Wednesday’s Story. Like Talabi’s novel nominee this year, Saturday's Song features Shigidi as a nightmare god again, but also Hausa spirits. Both stories feature a frame narrative, with a story within a story similar to Vo’s Singing Hills noellas. I enjoyed it, and Saturday’s Song does tell you what you need to know from Wednesday’s Story, but it works better if you read them in order, as it functions more as a resolution than anything.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) I AM AI by Ai Jiang (Shortwave)
This is a decent story, looking at capitalistic dystopias. Specifically, the pressure to be better while competing against AI, to the point where the main character is slowly morphing into a machine to catch up but in doing so loses what makes them unique and human. I don’t know that it adds a lot to the conversation exactly, but it makes some good points and summarizes some common concerns pretty well. I would have likely ranked it higher, but there were quite a bit of plausibility issues in the setting that I couldn’t really get past, and which made it much more dystopian than it would otherwise be.
6. (Hugo Nominee) “Ivy, Angelica, Bay” by C.L. Polk (Tor.com 8 December 2023)
This is a sequel to St. Valentine, St. Abigail, St. Brigid. And it was pretty good! I wouldn’t say there’s anything super special about it, but I enjoyed it. The lead of the previous story has grown up and taken on her role keeping her area of the city safe through small magics, but trouble is stirring. This story onwards are ones I’d feel comfortable voting for.
5. (Hugo Nominee) “One Man’s Treasure” by Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2023)
Our only Pinsker nominee this year! And while it’s pretty good, it doesn’t seem like a top contender to me. It reminds me of Wiswell's DIY from last year, thematically. It’s about several garbage collectors who remove magical items once a month, and the rich people who don’t particularly care about basic safety. Like DIY, it focuses on finding common person solutions since the rich don't care, something I can sympathize with. It’s a well told and interesting story, but that’s hardly a surprise from Pinsker.
4. (Nebula Nominee) “Six Versions of My Brother Found Under the Bridge,” Eugenia Triantafyllou (Uncanny 9-10/23)
This is a story about the bargains and sacrifices we make for grief, and how they can further harm and traumatize us. Also, it’s about how the devil exploits our grief and trauma to mess with us. It turns out when you go under the Devil’s bridge, you really ought not to make deals. This story and the following are the ones that I actually hope win.
3. (Hugo Nominee) “On the Fox Roads” by Nghi Vo (Tor.com 31 October 2023)
This story was pretty light on magical or sf elements, at least until the end, much like Vo’s other early to mid 1900s books (The Chosen and Beautiful, Siren Queen). This one is about finding yourself, and how relationships with others can help you do it. Even when those others start as complete strangers. Oh, and it’s about heists. I really enjoyed this one, and the ambiance Vo summons with her more real world settings.
2. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “The Year Without Sunshine” by Naomi Kritzer (Uncanny Magazine, November-December 2023)
On the Fox Roads was pretty light on the magical elements, but they were there, and they were integral to the story. The Year Without Sunshine could pass as non-genre fiction just as well as it could as SF. The only element is an unspecified calamity that temporarily put a bunch of ash in to the air. THe story itself focuses on community working together when social safety nets are only semi functional, and resources become pretty scarce. I really enjoyed the the characters and how people worked together. It felt genuine and realistic, if optimistic, and seems much more helpful for real world disasters where things start to break down but aren’t post-apocalyptic. I would say it’s a very inspiring story.
1. (Hugo Nominee) “Introduction to 2181 Overture, Second Edition”, Gu Shi /〈2181序曲〉再版导言, 顾适 translated by Emily Jin (Clarkesworld, February 2023)(Originally published in 2020)
This is science fiction is the most classic sense, and done well, in that it looks at a technology (cryosleep) and extrapolates what kind of impact it would have on society. The closest comparison I can think of to it would be Stephen Baxter and Arthur C. Clarke’s The Light of Other Days. But of course, this is completely different in that it’s written as an introduction to a fictional nonfiction book, which gives Gu Shi a lot of freedom to tell the story in a unique way, with fictional quotes with commentary from fictional people who are important to the history of cryosleep. Towards the end, it gets into the personal story behind that history, the creator of the book, and the person writing the introduction, and that allows the technical and sociology exploration to add a really touching emotional component. While I don’t agree with all of the extrapolations (hardly a surprise for a story like this), this is easily the best of the translated nominees this year, and one of my absolute favorites overall from this year.

Best Short Story:

(Hugo Nominee) 美食三品 (“Tasting the Future Delicacy Three Times”), 宝树 / Baoshu (银河边缘013：黑域密室 / Galaxy’s Edge Vol. 13: Secret Room in the Black Domain)
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to read this story. It appears to have only been translated into English for the Hugo voter packet. Since I’m not actually a member of the Hugos (maybe one day, if I can attend the actual convention), I don’t have the packet.
9. (Hugo Nominee) “Answerless Journey”, Han Song / 没有答案的航程, 韩松, translated by Alex Woodend (Adventures in Space: New Short stories by Chinese & English Science Fiction Writers)(Originally published in 1995)
Easily the worst of the translated fiction this year, or really just the worst nominee. The writing is stiff and clumsy, and it’s not just the translator as we have 2 other nominees to compare it with that were also translated by Alex Woodend. Minimal plot. The main character, who is human, is called ‘Creature’, presumably because amnesia has made him forget his name. It just doesn’t make a ton of sense all around.
8. (Hugo Nominee) “The Mausoleum’s Children” by Aliette de Bodard (Uncanny Magazine, May-June 2023)
This feels like an interesting story, except I can’t really tell what's going on. The setting isn't particularly clear, despite seeming pretty interesting. The story was ok outside of that, but not amazing, and it’s hard to come back from not really getting what’s happening.
7. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “The Sound of Children Screaming” by Rachael K. Jones (Nightmare Magazine, October 2023)
This piece has some insightful comments on gun violence, but those make up approximately 2 or 3 paragraphs. It goes from a somewhat generalized description of a shooting to a specific one to a portal fantasy to a world with evil mice. Interesting, but it doesn't make a ton of sense and doesn't really all fit together.
6. (Nebula Nominee) “Bad Doors,” John Wiswell (Uncanny 1-2/23)
I didn’t care much for Wiswell on first reading him, with The House on Haunted Hill. I mean, I liked that and thought it was a cute story, but it wasn’t something I’d vote for. But his writing has grown on me, with each year getting better and better. Bad Doors breaks that trend though. It’s not a bad story, it just wasn’t that interesting to me. Not much happens besides a family falling out over political drama, and honestly that is a bit too much like real life to be worth reading unless it’s going to give some good insight or be really good.
5. (Nebula Nominee) “Window Boy,” Thomas Ha (Clarkesworld 8/23)
A strange story about the anxieties around the other, set mostly in post apocalyptic underground bunkers. It looks a lot at the relationship between the haves and the have nots, and the imbalance around friendships in that context. Are have nots always only friends to take advantage of the haves? Is that actually unreasonable if it is the case? But also maybe they have nots are actually weird 20 foot grackle bird things. The reality filters on the cameras to see outside the bunkers make it hard to tell.
4. (Hugo Nominee) “How to Raise a Kraken in Your Bathtub” by P. Djèlí Clark (Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2023)
This is where I’d really start voting for the nominees. How to Raise a Kraken is a funny story about an ambitious idiot who gets a newspaper ad kraken, one that is actually real, and the fall out from doing so. It addresses colonialism and hubris in a pretty amusing and satisfying way.
3. (Nebula Nominee) “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont,” P.A. Cornell (Fantasy 10/23)
This is a thoughtful story about time. It’s set in an apartment building with tenants from different points in time going about their normal lives. Because of that, there are lots of rules to prevent info being transmitted to the past and to stop any harm from foreknowledge. The story centers on a lady from the present in a relationship with a man from the 1940's. It’s one of the more interesting ways of playing with time that I’ve seen.
2. (Nebula Nominee) “Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200,” R.S.A Garcia (Uncanny 7-8/23)
This is set in Tobago, with the local vernacular, and tells of a robotic farmhand trying to take care of an old lady's goat, and gaining further intelligence in the process. It’s a powerful, moving story. It’s occasionally a little unconvincing, in that the old lady used emojis in her youth but seems unfamiliar with what would be basic tech from her childhood, but also old people do frequently tend to struggle with technological things, so perhaps that’s unfair of me. It does a really good job looking at the social isolation of the elderly though. Tantie Merle and the following story are both the ones that I’d really hope win.
1. (Hugo & Nebula Nominee) “Better Living Through Algorithms” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld May 2023)
The second Naomi Kritzer story, this one is about an AI app that directs people on what to do to make them happy. It’s a nifty idea, well executed, and something I could actually see lots of people being interested in in real life if it worked as described. It also has well written, interesting, and relatable characters. I’ve only read the CatNet books by Kritzer, and while I liked them, it didn’t have me searching her out. After Better Living and The Year Without Sunshine though, I’ll have to check out the rest of her work.

Date: 06/07/2024

Reading time: 13 minutes, 2629 words

🪖 Military

Armenia, Germany reached agreements on military-technical and military-technological cooperation

Delegation to participate in ‘ILA Berlin 2024’ exhibition, held in Berlin from June 5 to 9. Several agreements were reached, and various documents were signed, the defence ministry said.

Armenpress, Armenia and Germany sign documents on military-technical cooperation

The NA committee approved the agreement on the expansion of Armenian-Greek military-technical cooperation

Armenia and Greece signed an agreement on military-technical cooperation. The agreement was signed on December 14, 2023 in Athens. The directions will be the transfer of technologies and technical support for the production of weapons and munitions.

CivilNet, Parliamentary committee approves ratification of Armenia-Greece defense cooperation agreement

Macron to supply Ukraine with Mirage 2000-5 warplanes and train pilots and troops in France

France to train and equip 4,500 Ukrainian soldiers in France. France to send pilots to Ukraine for five-six months. Move is part of new military cooperation.

Armenpress

🏛️ Politics & Government

Signing of Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty nullifies OSCE Minsk Group's relevance, believes Alen Simonyan

President of the Armenian National Assembly Alen Simonyan said Yerevan is taking steps aimed at concluding a peace treaty with Azerbaijan. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev suggested that both Baku and Yereva jointly propose to the OSCE the abolition of the Minsk Group. The Speaker of the National Assembly said the Constitution of Armenia is a matter of internal affairs.

Armenpress, According to Simonyan, the dissolution of the Minsk Group should be addressed after the peace treaty is signed, The Foreign Ministry assesses Baku's attempts to change the constitution as "gross interference" in the internal affairs of the country, According to Aliyev, if the constitution of Armenia is not changed, a peace treaty will not be signed, Baku's attempts to interfere in ArmenianConstitution issues is a gross interference in Armenia's internal affairs - Foreign Ministry, Aliyev: No peace treaty unless Armenia changes constitution

“Geghard” SAF welcomes the announcement by Lemkin Institute to withdraw support for Azerbaijan's hosting of COP29

The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention called on the UN to withdraw support for Azerbaijan's hosting of the COP29 climate conference. The “Geghard’ Scientific and Analytical Foundation welcomes the Lemkin’s statement.

Armenpress

Protesters at COP 29 accuse Azerbaijan of greenwashing genocide as host of COP29, call for release of Armenian prisoners

A group of activists reiterated the call for the Azerbaijani government to release the 23 political prisoners it is illegally detaining in Baku, including entrepreneur and philanthropist Ruben Vardanyan. At a protest on Friday, 7 June, protestors appealed to delegates at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC SB60) to oppose Azerbaijan’s hosting of COP29.

ArmRadio

Azerbaijan proposes Armenia to jointly seek cancelation of Minak Group

The Azerbaijani President maintained that the move will show “how sincere Armenia is.”

PanArmenian

Armenia elected as Member of UN Economic and Social Council for 2025-2027

Armenia elected as a Member of the UN Economic and Social Council for 2025-2027. Armenia received 148 votes in the voting held at the UN headquarters in New York. Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Armenia committed to contributing to international cooperation.

Armenpress

Armenian Foreign Minister meets SCO Secretary-General

Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan had a meeting with Secretary-General of Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Zhang Ming. The parties expressed hope that the discussions during the visit would contribute to expanding opportunities for cooperation between Armenia and the SCO.

Armenpress, Nikol Pashinyan Receives Zhang Ming and Delegation, SCO interested in expanding mutually beneficial relations with Armenia - Secretary General, The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is interested in expanding mutually beneficial relations with Armenia. General Secretary, Shanghai Cooperation Organization interested in expanding relations with Armenia

Armenian Parliament Speaker deems information regarding Pashinyan's visit to Azerbaijan absurd

President of the Armenian National Assembly Alen Simonyan says information suggesting that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan is planning to visit Azerbaijan in November is absurd. Earlier, PM's Press Secretary Nazeli Baghdasaryan denied the post made by a political scientist.

Armenpress

Prime Minister receives the representatives of the Central Board of Armenian Democratic Liberal Party-Ramgavar

Nikol Pashinyan received the representatives of the Central Board of the Armenian Democratic Liberal Party-Ramgavar. The PM emphasized that the government's goal is to strengthen the sovereignty and ensure the permanence of statehood in Armenia.

Armenpress

No delegation from Armenia visits Ukraine, affirms Armenian Parliament Speaker

Alen Simonyan says no delegation from Armenia went to Ukraine, noting that he is not commenting on Maria Zakharova's statements. The Russian representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry called for the handover of the list of those killed in Bucha.

Armenpress, Zakharova referred to the Armenian delegation's visit to Bucha

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan chairs regular session of the Investment Committee

The sixth session of the Investment Committee was held under the leadership of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. The committee discussed the Yerevan Metro Modernization Project. The main goal of the project is the creation of a pre-clinical center for pre-scientific research.

Armenpress

European Commission recommends start of accession talks with Ukraine, Moldova

The European Commission has recommended that European Union members start accession talks with Ukraine and Moldova, the commission’s Spokesperson Ana Pisonero said at a press conference in Brussels. At a Brussels meeting on December 14-15, 2023, EU leaders decided to start negotiations with the two countries on joining the union.

Armenpress, Brussels says Ukraine and Moldova ready for membership talks as Hungary mounts opposition

Mirzoyan congratulates Greece on election to UN Security Council

Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan congratulated his Greek counterpart George Gerapetritis on Greece's election as a member of the United Nations Security Council. The message reads as follows: "I extend warmest congratulations" given commitment and shared vision for more secure environment in our region.

Armenpress, Armenian FM congratulates Greece and Denmark on their election to UN Security Council

The EU will provide budgetary support to Armenia

The financing agreement "EU support for education in Armenia" was signed between Armenia and the European Commission. The European Commission transferred 5 million euros to the Government in December 2023, and 1.5 million euros in May 2024. It is also planned to build 13 educational complexes in Syunik region, 7 of them in Kapan, and 6 in Goris.

Armenpress, EC allocates about 7 million euros to Armenia for education development, EU to provide budgetary support to Armenia

Pashinyan and Modi emphasized the importance of the development of Armenian-Indian cooperation

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan had a telephone conversation with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Pashinian congratulated the National Democratic Alliance led by Narendra Modi on the occasion of its victory in the parliamentary elections. Nikol and Narendra Modi emphasized the importance of further development of cooperation between the two countries, the PM's office says.

CivilNet

Armenia’s parliamentary speaker: OSCE Minsk Group dissolution can be discussed after Yerevan, Baku sign peace treaty

Azerbaijan’s leader Ilham Aliyev said on Thursday that Yerevan and Baku should address the OSCE to initiate the dissolution of the Minsk Group. President of Armenia's National Assembly Alen Simonyan also said that Armenia puts its efforts towards the peace treaty.

ArkaAm

Armenia to oblige banks, pharmacies and large retail outlets to install surveillance cameras

Armenian Parliament approves draft law obliging large economic entities and companies to install outdoor surveillance cameras. Deputy Interior Minister Arpine Sargsyan noted that the bill applies to banks, credit organisations, pawnshops, pharmacies and pharmacies. The changes will affect retail facilities with an area of more than 100 square metres, gas stations and catering outlets.

ArkaAm

Police Guard to be established in Armenia

Armenian parliamentary committee on defence and security issues on Friday approved a bill calling for establishment of a police guard. The bill was presented by the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Arpine Sargsyan. Guards will not take direct part in military actions, as was the case with the police troops.

ArkaAm

Russian Deputy Prime Minister expects Iran-EEU FTA to becomeoperational in 2025

Russia expects the free trade area (FTA) agreement between Iran and the Eurasian Economic Union to become operational in 2025. Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk noted that Iran’s accession to the FTA will enlarge the EEU market by 80 million people to a total 400 million people. The EEU countries signed a full-fledged free trade agreement with Iran on December 25, 2023.

ArkaAm

Armenia willing to complete and sign peace deal with Azerbaijan within the next month – MFA

The Republic of Armenia does not have any territorial claims on any of its neighbors, including Azerbaijan, the Armenian Foreign Ministry said in response to Azerbaijani Presidents claims. ‘Such rhetoric torpedoes the peace process and casts doubts on the sincerity of the leadership of Azerbaijan to achieve peace’

ArmRadio, Aliyev: No peace treaty unless Armenia changes constitution

Sunak admits it was a 'mistake' to leave D-Day commemorations early

British PM Rishi Sunak has apologised for leaving D-Day commemorations in Normandy early, admitting it was a "mistake" Sunak: "The last thing I want is for the commemorations to be overshadowed by politics" Labour has called it a "dereliction of duty"

Armenpress

Gevorg Papoyan received Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Saha Sinha

The Armenian government is planning to build a partnership with India to help develop the country's economy. The government is also planning to develop a partnership in India-Argentine partnership with the country.

Armenpress, Armenia might construct copper smelter using leading Indian tech, Armenia is considering the option of building a copper smelter using advanced technologies from India

Illegally built and non-compliant gas stations can not be in Yerevan - Avinyan

During 2023, we have dismantled 25 gas stations located near residential buildings in the city of Yerevan, wrote on his Facebook page. The process will be implemented this year as well and will continue consistently.

Armenpress

Israel's Netanyahu to address U.S. Congress on July 24

Benjamin Netanyahu will speak to joint session of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Netanyahu's visit comes amid tensions between him and U.S. President Joe Biden. Netanyahu has also issued a statement on his upcoming visit.

Armenpress, Netanyahu to address US Congress on 24 July

7 injured in massive blast at gas station outside Yerevan

A liquified gas tank exploded in the town of Abovyan along the highway to Lake Sevan. At least seven people were injured, two seriously, in a blast late Thursday evening. Authorities moved in February to shut down the gas station, which was operating without a license, local media reports.

CivilNet, Seven citizens were injured by the explosion on the Yerevan-Sevan road, two are in the intensive care unit, Gas supply to subscribers in Abovyan stopped since night due to explosion on Sevan highway, The gas supply to the city of Abovyan was stopped overnight due to an explosion on the Sevan highway, Seven injured in massive gas station explosion in Armenia

‘Stop threatening us’: Alen Simonyan responds to Galuzin's allegations

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said earlier that 'ill-conceived steps' could make it impossible to return to joint work on creating a common defence space with Russia and other CSTO countries. Simonyan said that Armenia is not negotiating with any country, nor is it discussing deployment of a foreign military base or joining any strategic alliance.

ArkaAm

Russia works on bringing Mir cards back to Armenia

Russia working on resuming operation of its Mir bank cards in Armenia and Kyrgyzstan, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Pankin said on Friday. Russian banks, except for the Russian-owned VTB bank, stopped accepting Mir cards on 30 March 2024 due to the payment system being sanctioned by the Western countries. The Russian payment system was introduced in 2015.

ArkaAm

Armenia has made significant strides in improving food safety, FAO and WHO say

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) jointly with key partners in Armenia observes the World Food Safety Day. This year’s theme emphasizes the importance of readiness for unforeseen food safety incidents, ranging from minor local events to major international crises.

ArmRadio

💵 Economy

Exports of products of Armenian origin recorded 14 per cent decline in the first quarter - Finance Ministry

Exports of products of Armenian origin in the first three months of 2024, compared to the same period of 2023, recorded a 14.3 per cent decline. At the same time, imports grew 75.8 per cent in January-March 2024 compared to 2023. Armenia's foreign trade turnover increased 2.1 times to $9.2 billion.

ArkaAm, Finance Ministry: Armenia’s tourist influx drops by 2% in Q1 2024 YoY

Insurance premiums in Armenia totalled AMD 23bn in the first quarter of 2024.

The volume of insurance premiums collected by 8 insurance companies in Armenia in the first quarter of 2024 made more than AMD 23 billion. In 2023, AMD 73.3 billion were collected as personal insurance premiums.

ArkaAm

🎭 Culture

Aram Khachatryan, Saroyan and Yerevan Metro

On June 6, passengers in the Yerevan metro were listening to Aram Khachatryan's music. It was the great composer's birthday, and the metro management decided to remind the passengers about the day. Both the "Dance with Swords&quat; and the.quatry. waltz melody of the &qot;Masquerade. ballet was playing in another station, the. &quatyyan's most famous and world-wide works.

CivilNet

⚽ Sport

Yerevan to host open boxing championship

The Yerevan Open Boxing Championship will be held in the Armenian capital on 10-15 June. Around 150 boxers from Bulgaria, Iran, Latvia, Hungary, Moldova, Russia, Georgia and Armenia registered for the tournament.

ArkaAm

Armenia beat Kazakhstan 2:1 in a friendly

Armenian national beat Kazakhstan in a friendly at Republican Stadium after Vazgen Sargsyan in Yerevan. Nair Tiknizyan opened the score in the 4th minute of the match. Vahan Bichakhchyan doubled the advantage in the 58th minute.

ArmRadio, Armenia hosts Kazakhstan in a friendly tonight

Donations to Armenia:

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Armenian Wounded Heroes
ArmeniaFund

I sincerely hope your wounds heal soon enough. I, for one, really enjoyed our live stream!
You proved beyond doubt that it is indeed really you behind the posts on X and Reddit. Those who questioned the apparent reality have been silenced, and I think that was the game plan. Is it REALLY him?
Yes, yes it is.
I'd like to think DFV finished the stream, logged into his etrade account (made sure it still existed...) and sat for a moment contemplating the excise button.
Maybe he doesn't press it today. Maybe he waits a few days. He has a couple of weeks left, eh. Regardless, it was wonderful to see his battered and bruised existence.
It's not some influencer or hacker or game player. It's the one. The only. The man. The myth. The legend.
Happy fucking birthday you total regard. My nipples have never been more erect!
And just to make sure I am within the character requirements, I leave you with this quote from the new Planet of the Kingdom of the Apes movie:
"Are you familiar with the concept of evolution? In their time, humans were capable of many great things. They could fly, like eagles fly. They could speak across oceans. But now, it is our time... and it is my kingdom. We will learn. Apes will learn. I will learn. And I... will conquer."See you soon

This story took place between 2022-23. It is long but there is a backstory that is pertinent to the information. All names are fake.
So I (27 F) was friends with Amy (29F) for six years. We met when we worked at the same place. We had been through a lot together as friends in that six years including breakups, deaths, divorce and significant friend group changes. Amy was married when we first met but ended up getting divorced. We live in Town A which is almost dead center between two other towns, Town B 45 minutes south and Town C being about and hour north. This is important for later on.
When Amy and her now ex-husband separated with the divorce pending she started dating that same summer (2021) they were not officially divorced until early 2022. In July of 2021 Amy met Xander (34M), and they started dating that month. Xander and I got to know each other more as their relationship progressed and I really liked him. In Fall of 2021 I found out that I was pregnant which was exciting as I had had a miscarriage not long before. Amy and Xander were both very happy for us. I was due in summer of 2022 just a few day after my own birthday. Fast forward to May of 2022 (I am now about 6.5 months pregnant). Xander contacts me privately and says he his planning on proposing to Amy on their one year anniversary and asked me for help with the ring. I was excited for the two of them and immediately said yes I was happy to help! He asked if I could come with him to go ring shopping as I knew what she liked/wanted and had access to her Pinterest. We set up a day and I waddled around three different jewelry stores with him helping him pick out the ring. Prior to his and my appointment I took my friend out and had her casually walk around and look at rings and had the salesperson get me pictures as covertly as they could. We ended up picking out a gorgeous ring and I kept it hidden at my house until he was ready to propose.
My baby shower was set for July the day BEFORE their one year anniversary and when he was planning on proposing . Now I did NOT pick this date. Amy and my mother did as they planned the entire thing. I wasn't even told the theme until I saw the invitations. I wanted it this way as I had a rough pregnancy and was tired and sick a lot of the time. Amy asked me for a guest list with contact information for these people and that was the extent of my contributions. The week of my baby shower I kept trying to get Amy to come with me to get her nails done and she would just refuse so without spoiling the surprise I let it go. I show up to my baby shower to see MAYBE 8 people. I was hurt but figured it was summer and a lot of people may have already had vacations planned so while I was sad I was grateful for who came and got us gifts. I found out later that this was not the case.
The proposal happens the next day and she says yes and the planning begins immediately. About 2 weeks later I am about a month away from my due date and Amy lets me know that her and Xander have picked a date. May of 2023, barely ten months later. I was a little shocked because that isn't a lot of time to plan a wedding and I was about to have a baby. I let her know that I will do what I can to help her plan and be there for her but that wasn't a lot of time to plan (or pay!) for all the things and I will need her to be gracious with me as I learn how to be a new mom. She said she totally understood and would also do what she could to support me and baby. She asked me to be her MOH and I accepted with the conditions that she understand that a lot of the maid of honor things I may not be able to do simply because of how quickly she was getting married and the baby's imminent arrival. Again, she said she totally understood and just wanted me to be a part of the wedding as much as I was able to be. She also said she totally expects baby to be at the wedding and is already thinking of how to accommodate for baby's presence there. That made me feel good and confident that this would all work out.
I ended up having my baby almost a month to the day later however it was an emergency c-section. It was not the beautiful happy moment that most people imagine as I almost died. I don't even remember holding my baby for the first time. The most prevalent memory I have is fighting to open my eyes and stay conscious (Everyone came out on the other side alive and healthy, thank goodness!). Amy and Xander came to visit us in the hospital after the birth and at this point had not been given full details of everything. When they showed up my husband let Amy hold the baby and gave them the run down of what had happened. All I got was a "Oh my gosh!" and then Amy went straight into talking about wedding plans... I should have said something then but was honestly just too tired.
Things begin to happen a little faster now. Baby and I had a rough time and had to go back into the hospital after being born. We only had to stay one night but when she was informed all we got in return was a "Oh no. I'm sorry." Now I didn't expect her to do something spectacular but it honestly felt like it just didn't matter to her. A few months go by and wedding planning is still happening. They selected their venue which was just past Town B. I called and made her a dress appointment the following January/February as well as started looking around for makeup artists for her as she doesn't typically wear makeup ever and I wear it regularly. There is a wedding dress shop that was right up her alley style wise located in Town B where Amy worked. I had a Saturday appointment set for her and I to go and take a look around. That week (like Monday or Tuesday) I found out that she goes to the shop ALONE and ends up finding her wedding dress. I was again shocked but told her, from the pictures she sent after she had already bought it. That the dress looked amazing. I expressed that I was upset that she went alone but glad she got such a good deal on it (think $2k dress on sale for $800).
She asked me last minute to go to floral shops with her on day and thankfully my husband was home that day and able to watch the baby. I agreed and we ended up driving to every single florist in town only to be turned away by all but one because she didn't make an appointment and the person she needed to talk with for wedding arrangements was unavailable at the time. By the end of that adventure she told me how upset she was that she had only been able to get one quote. I was blunt with her and said that she should have made an appointment or at least called ahead to see if anyone was available. She said that typically the MOH (i.e. me) sets up those appointment. I was annoyed and had a little heart to heart with her and said "I understand that but the last appointment I made for you, you ignored. I also am having a really hard time right now. If you need to pick someone else to take on the MOH duties I totally understand and there will be no hard feelings. I will even still give a speech if you would like me to." She said it was fine and she wanted me to be MOH still. We also had planned on going to a bridal expo the following weekend and I reminded her that most of those people would be there as well as others. She was placated by this it seemed and we ended up going to the bridal expo with her two other bridesmaids.
Now I had met these two other women ONCE. They were friends with her fiancé and she had only met them 3-6 months prior. While they were not mean or rude to me they certainly weren't welcoming. I kept getting comments like "well you are the one with a kid" or "I'm glad you didn't have to bring the baby". It rubbed me the wrong way but again I didn't say anything because it isn't about me right now. Amy ended up booking no one at the expo but did sign up to have a jewelry party. I ended up being unable to attend because I was having a really rough time and my kid was still not sleeping through the night at the time and my husband and I were having a really bad argument. I do admit I should have told her about what was going on and I can see how it hurt her that I didn't tell her but I was in the thick of it, sleep deprived and struggling with post partum depression. I did end up apologizing to her.
The next issue was the makeup trial. I told her specifically beforehand that she will more than likely have to try a few different artists because each has their own unique style and since she doesn't ever wear makeup they will all probably feel strange to her. I did have her look over the photos of the makeup artists that I think she would like and have her put in order the ones she wanted to try. After the appointment she told me that she felt like she looked like "a tranny" and hated the artist I picked. Again I was annoyed and told her that I was doing the best I could and this was difficult because she does not wear make up and there isn't much else I can do other than look online and message some people.
Now the bach trip became the next problem. A group chat was made to include myself and the other two bridesmaids. Amy is not one to go out and drink (she doesn't even drink at home) so I explained to the bridesmaids that I think a fancy dinner would be perfect. We could find other things to add to it like a theater show or something like that. We selected a theater show and a really fancy restaurant that I know Amy would love dates hadn't been decided yet because we had to nail down some details still. They agreed but when it came down to the actual planning things got really quite and I never got a reply. I didn't want to tell Amy either because she was already upset with me over the makeup artist trial I had set up for her.
At this point I am getting burnt out between her, the baby, and all the other issues going on that she was FULLY aware of (I had been fired from my job the day before Christmas Eve so now finances had become difficult). I told her again that I was struggling with everything and would understand if she wanted someone else to act as MOH as I was still just doing the best I could but it didn't seem like it was enough. Again she told me she understood.
The next big issue was the bridesmaid dresses. A couple days before the appointment both me and my kid ended up getting sick. I let her know that we would be unable to go. She asked me if I was sure and that other people would be there to help me with the baby included her soon to be SIL and one of her bridesmaids moms... I told her "I am not driving my sick baby to a different town to have absolute strangers hold him just to try on dresses. Especially during flu season." She said "Okay well I guess I will send you some pictures of what we pick." I told her fine and that was it. I should note that the bridal shop she selected was in Town B so I would have to take my baby all the way down there. I didn't get pictures till the next day. The dresses had been selected and all I had to do was get a dress that was the color assigned to me. I selected several that I liked that were within my budget and sent them to her. She nitpicks all of them and says my tattoo will be visible in all of them. Again, color me shocked. Up until this point she had NEVER mentioned my tattoo (on on left side of my chest and partially on my shoulder) being an issue. I vented to my husband and he helped me calm down and said while he thinks it is strange that she is suddenly against my tattoo when hers are visible in her wedding dress I should at least try to see if there were some styles of dress that I liked that met her criteria.
I ended up buying one of those multiway dresses that you can change the style of the top so that we could find out that worked for us both. It was in this god awful lilac tone that looked awful on my skin tone but not my wedding not my choice. She came over that weekend after it arrived to look at it. I hadn't even shown it to her when the subject of me being MOH comes up again and I told her the same thing as before, that I was struggling but doing my best and it wouldn't hurt my feelings if she felt like she needed to pick someone else to do the things she was expecting of me. Girl RAN out of my house crying when I said this. I looked at my husband like "WFT just happened?" as, again not the first time we have had this conversation. We didn't talk for almost a week (not normal for us) until i asked her to come over and talk so we could figure out what was going on. She shows up and starts going in on me saying how everyone else who is engaged is getting all of these trips and gifts and she isn't. How this should be so much more fun for her and it isn't. How she isn't happy that I am not doing all the MOH stuff that I should and she understands that I have a baby but she just isn't happy. She said that since the baby showed up everything is different and I never have time for her. She said "I had to get my wedding dress all alone! Yippee for me!" and now I am ANGRY.
I snapped and told reminder her that SHE chose to go in on her own after work and try things on. That we had an appointment set up and she just ignored it. I also reminded her that I asked for grace while I figured out how to be a new mom as she was the one who decided to get married within less than a year. That she was the one who went around to placed WITHOUT appointments and expected everyone to drop things for her. I also warned her to watch her mouth when it came to my baby because I had gotten pregnant before she was engaged and let her know before the baby was here that things would be different since I was now responsible for a whole as human. We had a heated argument but eventually came to an agreement that I would still be MOH just without the duties (i.e. I would be giving a speech and walking down the aisle as MOH and on the website as MOH but nothing outside of that now). I told her that I was planning on getting just her and I appointments to get out nails done before the wedding as a present for her and some much needed one on one time for us. She said that sounds amazing and she would love to do that. I gave her the tentative date I was thinking and she agreed. I thought things were, while a little tense, on the mend.
Fast forward and I see photos of her and the bridesmaids, her future SIL and some other woman at her bachelorette party. I had apparently been uninvited and not told. I was EXTREMELY hurt by this. The following weekend I see MORE pictures of her at a DIFFERENT Bach party that her coworker threw for her. I ended up checking her website (as I did periodically) and what do you know? I had been removed ENTIRELY. Now, while I understand that I had signed off on giving up my MOH duties, my understanding was that I was still MOH. I see her future SIL is now listed as MOH. I show my husband and he is also confused as he was home when her and I had our heart to heart. I message her the next day and asked if we could go get coffee and talk. She took awhile to respond but eventually did.
Since this story is so long I will try to summarize as best I can. It started with me gently confronting her about how I saw the website and I thought it was a bit rude that she didn't just tell me that she was replacing me in all aspects and not the ones we had talked about. She said she understood and should have told me before doing anything. I told her that in all honesty I didn't believe her because she had repeatedly told me that she understood things but her actions showed otherwise. I then brought up the bach party and how I wasn't even told anything and she said NOTHING. I explained how it made me feel and asked how she didn't notice I wasn't there and why she hadn't reached out to see where I was? So it was either she didn't care that I wasn't there OR she was made aware that I wasn't there which meant her new "friends" had lied to her OR she had asked them not to invite me. Again she said NOTHING. When she did respond it was a string of "I'm sorry" and "I wanted you there". We talked about it some more but honestly I felt like shit and just didn't care anymore. I told her that we would need to work on things because this was ridiculous and I was seeing a pattern now (including before her wedding/engagement). She said that she agrees and wants to work on things.
We left it at that and a week later I messaged her to ask her what type of manicure she wanted so I could let the salon know. She then informs me that she already had an appointment with the other bridesmaids for the SAME DAY that her and I had agreed on... I snapped. I responded with "Okay" and ignored her for the rest of the week. The day before the wedding she sent me a message asking if I was still coming. I did not respond. I understand that I should have said something and how my silence probably hurt her but I was just so done. So AITA for not going to her wedding?
**Edit: I forgot to include the baby shower guest list! She kept asking me if anyone had RSVP'd yet which I thought was weird since it was HER number on the invites (from what I could see of the sample invite my mother showed me). I later found out that she had been in charge of the invites and apparently didn't send most of them out or follow up with people. The 8 people who were there were the people who my mother invited personally.

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LAST CARD'S PICKS: 7-5

LAST CARD'S HAMMER LOCK: CASHED - 2 WEEK STREAK

PRELIMS
SW Bout: Puja Tomar v. Rayanne Amanda
Records: 8-4 v. 14-7
Last 5 Fights: WWWWL v. LWWWL

• Rayanne will be fighting on her birthday and I’m sure that’s a +EV handicap right there
• Puja has a very big problem with being finished and especially with being finished on the ground
• Puja was in ONE CHAMPIONSHIP so she has some fights that matter on her record - however, she went 1-3 there with all 3 losses coming inside the distance, and her one win coming by split decision with a debatable robbery at play
• Puja has only seen the judges twice in her 12 fight career - she reminds me a lot of Liang Na in the way she goes for broke to find a finish, and if she can’t get one, then she gets finishes shortly thereafter
• There is an obvious glaring hole in Puja’s game and it’s her takedown defense as well as her ground game as a whole - she has 3 submission losses with 2 armbars and 1 triangle choke
• Although she’s on a 4 fight winning streak, she amassed those wins on a different regional scene and against bottom of the barrel competition
• This is WMMA so anything is possible, but all signs point to Rayanne being able to sneak a win out of this one
• In Rayanne’s only 2 step ups in competition (1 DWCS fight and 1 UFC fight), she has lost but decision both times
• However, I don’t think Puja is really a points fighter so if this were to hit scorecards I lean Rayanne to amass more control time on the mat and potentially land some nice ground and pound
• I am getting heavy Liang Na vibes from Puja so I think the bet here is going to be Rayanne inside the distance, but the pick is going to play off of Puja’s weakness and Rayanne’s strength - I am further predicting an armbar finish since Rayanne 7 of those on her record

PICK: Rayanne Amanda by RD1 Submission
BW Bout: Cody Stamann v. Taylor Lapilus
Records: 21-6-1 v. 19-4
Last 5 Fights: LWWLL v. LWWWW

• Wrestler v. Striker match up here
• Stamann is sitting at a nine inch reach disadvantage against a guy who is the more well rounded striker
• Stamann is a known wrestler but he has landed only 7 takedowns in his last 5 fights combined - he was able to land 5 against Song Yadong but that was 2019 and that was the most he’s ever landed in a fight since and all time
• Stamann is also coming off of a year layoff compared to Lapilus who has fought twice in that timespan
• Lapilus has fought back to back wrestlers in the UFC and is now fighting a third - Caolon shot for 11 takedowns and secured only 2 - Farid shot for 16 and secured only 5
• Lapilus does have good subs and kos on his record - makes sense why his opponents are seemingly scared to strike with him and only resort to wrestling
• I think Stamann is about the same level as Caolan so he’s going to try to utilize a similar strategy with wrestling
• The over is juiced here so vegas really thinks this is hitting the scorecards
• I will take the guy with the elite TD defense, the way better striking, the way longer reach, and the sneaky submission skills to take the victory here

PICK: Taylor Lapilus by Unanimous Decision
SW Bout: Eduarda Moura v. Denise Gomes
Records: 10-0 v. 8-3
Last 5 Fights: WWWWW v. LWWLW

• Classic tale of striker v grappler
• There are a lot of question marks for Eduarda considering we don’t know what her cardio is like in later rounds and how will she hold up if she can’t get the takedowns going
• However, I think the green flags outweigh the red flags on this one
• Gomes definitely has a chance to bonk moura, but that’s about it
• If this fight hits the ground in any capacity, it will be in moura’s domain and it will stay there
• Moura trains with Jailton almeida and fights just like him tbh - very grapple heavy style with great elbows from the top
• She may not be tested truly at a UFC level, but I think this is going to be her coming out party (pause)
• Gomes struggled with takedowns against Angela hill because she kept overextending on strikes and hill would duck and secure a takedown
• This is even worse for Gomes in this matchup because moura is HUGE with a big reach and height advantage
• If moura makes weight, she should win this IMO - I think the pros outweigh the cons enough to make a straight bet

PICK: Eduarda Moura by RD2 Submission
BW Bout: Daniel Marcos v. John Castaneda
Records: 15-0 v. 21-6
Last 5 Fights: DWWWW v. WWLWW

• Marcos gives me huge Marlon Vera vibes
• Both Marcos and Vera look for the killshot the entire fight instead of trying to accumulate points and damage, but for Marcos this has worked well so far considering he is undefeated with 15 wins and 8 KO victories
• Marcos has decent takedown defense - we have seen him tested slightly thus far in the UFC like against Oliveira
• Castaneda’s main path to victory here is to outvolume Marcos and try to mix in wrestling, but I don’t think that will be enough to edge out rounds if Marcos is landing big shots like he usually does
• Don’t get me wrong - I am not saying Marcos is world class or anything of the sort, but he definitely has high level striking and has been a problem for anyone he has faced thus far
• I watched back Nathaniel Wood v Castaneda and I think a similar fight is going to go down here - Castaneda might be able to land more shots with his flurries to the inside but I think Marcos will fend off the takedowns well and come back with the even bigger shots
• Marcos also does a good job at managing distance and pressuring his opponents against the cage - finding a finish for both sides might be tough, but if there is one, my educated guess would be that Marcos found it
• There is a world where Marcos stays timid for 3 rounds and loses a split decision, surely, but if he goes out there like we’ve seen him before, I believe he will land enough damage on Castaneda to squeak out the decision
• For betting purposes, I like Marcos as a straight pick, but the o2.5 RDs might be a safer play

PICK: Daniel Marcos by Split Decision
FlyW W Bout: Andrea Lee v. Montana De La Rosa
Records: 13-9 v. 12-9-1
Last 5 Fights: LLLLW v. LLLWD

• Both fighters here on 4 fight losing streaks, so the loser is most likely being cut from the UFC, so just an extra piece of handicapping there
• These two actually fought in 2019 and honestly I see this one playing out very similarly
• Andrea Lee pieced up Montana for 3 rounds whilst Montana desperately shot for failed takedown after failed takedown
• Montana did secure a couple but even when she did, she did not maintain much control and even got swept and put into bad spots by Andrea
• Andrea Lee fought Miranda Maverick in her last bout and she put up a great fight against someone who has the same skillset as Montana but just better
• Lee was able to reverse some of Miranda’s positions and throw up some sub attempts - I lowkey think she could’ve snuck a split decision victory
• Long story short, this should be free for Lee unless the judges decide that Montana’s clinch work and 4 second takedowns will be enough to win the bout
• For betting purposes, I really want to pull the trigger on Lee but I can’t because of how the judges are - and I highly think this is hitting the judges so maybe a parlay with the 02.5 RDs might be a play
• Sneaky play might be betting Lee by split decision in the hopes the judges really fugg this up

PICK: Andrea Lee By Unanimous Decision
BW Bout: Brad Katona v. Jesse Butler
Records: 13-3 v. 12-5
Last 5 Fights: LWWWW v. LWWWW

• Let’s state a few facts before giving the pick for this one
• Fact: Brad Katona has never been finished inside of the octagon
• Fact: Jesse Butler has 1 KO win in 17 professional fights, and that win came 2 fights ago
• Fact: Jesse Butler has fought at lightweight and featherweight and is now for the first time in his career making a weight cut to 135 (bantamweight)
• Fact: Brad Katona has 1 KO victory in his 16 fight career, and it came in his very first fight
• Fact: Jesse Butler has never been submitted, and Katona also has 3 submission wins on his resume
• Fact: Jesse Butler has a 4 inch height advantage as well as a 8.5 inch reach advantage
• There are so many ways this can go wrong for Katona - granted, we have seen him in wars and in dog fights that he was able to come out on top of, but we haven’t seen him... necessarily HURT someone
• Butler may have gotten KO’d in his last bout by Jim Miller in RD1, but that was also a weight class higher than he is accustomed to and it was on short notice
• Butler’s main path to victory is to try to submit Katona since he has 8 wins by submission, varying from RNCs to armbars to triangles
• I think there is better than a +600 chance that Butler wins here - he is legit way bigger and actually finishes his fights
• Katona has a way of making fights close regardless of opponent and this is the perfect fight for that
• For betting purposes, I really like Jesse Butler sub prop, but overall I have to fade this because the line makes absolutely no sense considering Katona is not a KO artist like Vegas might be thinking

PICK: Brad Katona (lol i know i just glazed Butler but i mean c’mon) by Unanimous Decision
WW Bout: Charles Radtke v. Carlos Prates
Records: 9-3 v. 18-6
Last 5 Fights: WWWWW v. WWWWW

• It’s pride month and we get a Charles Radtke fight - it’s almost like divine intervention
• Radtke is an interesting fighter - he doesn’t excel in any one part of MMA but his IQ IMO is very high
• Radtke may not out strike or out grapple you but he will do what he needs to do to win
• Against blood diamond he basicslly held him against the cage for the entire fight - some people may think that’s a bad look for radtke but it honestly showed me he’ll do what he needs to to win
• Radtke is a BJJ specialist but you wouldn’t think it the way he’s been fighting recently
• Last word on radtke, we saw his KO power last bout as a decent sized underdog as well
• Now prates - not a big fan of this guy although on paper it appears I should be
• Prates is a finisher and has a sniper left hand
• The issue becomes when he can’t land the left hand OR when he takes too long to start up
• Against Trevin Giles he was on his way to a clear decision loss before finding the button
• I don’t like the volume of Prates and I fear if he doesn’t get going in his flow state early, he will simply lose from being outvolumed
• I think Radtke has more grappling and clinch upside whereas prates has the up close elbows and knees (muay thai edge) and the power advantage altogether
• Ultimately, I think Radtke will be able to utilize a gameplan to outwork Prates and potentially even find a submission - he has been training grappling a lot recently due to his regional grappling performance and he is a high black belt so don’t be surprised to see him whip it out

PICK: Charles Radtke by RD2 Submission
WW Bout: Thiago Moises v. Ludovit Klein
Records: 18-7 v. 21-4-1
Last 5 Fights: WLWWL v. WWDWW

• This is going to be an interesting one
• Moises is a slow starter who throws lots of leg kicks but keep in mind these are HEAVY leg kicks
• As fights go on, Moises does better with his striking and he mixes in all of his striking techniques nicely
• Moises has also fought a lot of high level lightweights like Islam and Joel Alvarez to name 2 - he definitely has the experience advantage
• The issue with Moises is his proclivity to be taken down by high level wrestlers and his proclivity to being outpowered and outmuscled
• He may have good BJJ but his wrestling is nonexistent for the most part
• Even if he were to wrestle, I expect Klein to be able to easily fend off the takedowns and perhaps even reverse them into his advantageous position
• I watched every UFC fight of Klein and I noticed a few things
• The Mason jones fight was crazy considering he was +340 and nearly knocked him out multiple times and had the wrestling advantage
• The jai Herbert draw was weird but he got outvolumed, outworked on the ground even though he was on top, out worked in the clinch, but he did pull off round 3 with his wrestling
• Don’t get me wrong though- Klein is super aggressive early and hunts for early KOs
• I suspect this will go as Klein fights usually go except better - Klein will land some vicious blows early, get Moises to be timid and throw only leg kicks, clinch him up, secure takedowns, and get a decision victory
• The glaring issue for this is that Moises is a high degree black belt and Klein has showed a lot in his fights to put himself in dangerous sub positions, so a hedge on Moises sub prop might not be bad if you were to bet Klein

PICK: Ludovit Klein by Split Decision
MAIN CARD
WW Bout: Punahele Soriano v. Miguel Baeza
Records: 9-4 v. 10-3
Last 5 Fights: LLWLL v. LLLWW

• Punahele is an interesting fighter - he has a wrestling background but has decided he likes to stand and bang more
• Punahele has wicked power for the weight class and rocks nearly every opponent put in front of him - if he wins the fight is a different story
• He certainly rocked Stoltzfus before succumbing to a sub in round 2, and he even rocked kopylov a couple times on the entry before getting jabbed to d*ath
• The problem with Punahele is he is very untrustworthy - he may have gotten a finish against Lungiambulla but he debatably lost RD1
• Punahele has struggled against better wrestlers and rangier fighters, and I debate that Baeza is both of those things
• Baeza was once a touted prospect (honestly both these guy were, kinda), but then he went on a 3 fight losing streak with the cherry on top being a KO loss to Andre Fialho in his last UFC bout
• I saw a lot of similarities between Fialho and Punahele in that fight - I think Punahele can utilize a similar strategy
• Baeza does well when he’s leading the dance but suffers when he gets flurried at, which Punahele loves to do
• Considering Baeza may even be chinny now, I don’t see how you can trust him in this one as a -200 favorite
• Baeza has been grappling regionally in his 2 years off - I think he wants to come out there, avoid the power shots, and try to get this to the ground as fast as possible for a sub
• Baeza sub is an interesting prop, but I think Punahele is going to be too strong too early for Baeza here and he has the ring rust advantage considering his last fight was only 6 months ago compared to Baeza’s 2 years
• A huge question mark as well is Punahele is going down to WW but I’d argue this is a more natural weight class for him since he’s always been an undersized MW
• For betting purposes, you can take the dog shot on Punahele but I think the FTNGTD is a good parlay piece

PICK: Punahele Soriano by RD1 KO
MW Bout: Julian Marquez v. Zach Reese
Records: 9-4 v. 6-1
Last 5 Fights: LLWWL v. LWWWW

• Not sure how you can trust either guy in this spot
• Both guys are finishers and have rarely seen the judges scorecards - Julian has gone to decision twice, both losses, and Reese has never seen a 2nd round in 7 professional fights
• Marquez has good striking and is willing to stand and bang, but he leaves way too many openings for my liking, and he has gassed badly in nearly all of his UFC performances, even in the wins, too
• Reese has good striking as well - he has a couple knockdowns and 4 KO wins on his record, although his main department of expertise is the ground game
• I can see Reese rocking Julian, and I can see Julian rocking Reese here
• My worry is if Reese gets rocked, how will Julian proceed... will he follow him to the ground? If so, Reese can snatch up a sub since he has a very active guard and has done so before (like on DWCS)
• My 2nd worry is if Reese does snatch up something, will he avoid being slammed again? Lol I mean you have to have some ring IQ to know to let go of a triangle once you get lifted off of the ground
• I don’t TRUST Reese but I do like his chances of winning here over Marquez - Marquez has taken a considerable amount of damage over his career
• Just because Reese got slam KO’d last fight does not mean he is chinny either
• I don’t particularly like Reese’s stance - he stands very tall with his chin wide open and I think Marquez can find success finding the chin, but I just don’t think Marquez is going to be able to finish this guy
• Overall, though, I do think Reese can catch a W by throwing hard shots, avoiding the power from Marquez, and potentially even working in some clinch takedowns
• Method of victory is hard - Reese is a KO artist but if Marquez doesn’t get flatlined I can see Reese following him to the ground and latching up a sub - the only thing though is Marquez has never been submitted and I don’t see that starting Saturday
• For betting purposes, you can throw on Reese if you’re a degen but I ultimately like the alternate under 2.5 rds OR for the fight to NOT start RD3 if you want to really lay on the juice

PICK: Zach Reese by RD1 KO
MW Bout: Bruno Ferreira v. Dustin Stoltzfus
Records: 11-1 v. 15-5
Last 5 Fights: WLWWW v. WLWLL

• Unfortunately for Stoltzfus, I don’t think this fight will play out well for him
• Ferreira is a vicious puncher for the MW division - he has 11 wins all inside the distance with 8 coming by way of KO
• Ferreira has a good ground game as well with 3 submissions, and he fended off Gregory Rodrigues quite well when he was threatening to take his back early in their fight
• Stoltzfus is very hittable and gets rocked in nearly every fight - a quote you may remember from earlier in the writeup
• Ferreira has good takedown defense as well and I think that’s Stoltzfus’ main path to victory - secure takedowns and try for a choke - but I don’t think he will have much success
• The height and reach advantages both go to Dustin here, but Diego is used to being the smaller fighter since he is a small guy for MW, but he packs a tremendous punch
• He did get KO’d by Ruziboev but I am going to chalk that up to a lazy leg kick that got Bruno off balance which led to vicious ground and pound
• I think Bruno is the more aggressive fighter as well and I simply think his pressure is going to be too much for Dustin to handle
• Out of respect for Dustin, I will go ahead and say he can survive at least 1 round with Bruno
• For betting purposes, you can use Ferreira as a parlay stuffer or you can parlay the fight to NGTD

PICK: Bruno Ferreira by RD2 KO
BW Bout: Raul Rosas Jr. v. Ricky Turcios
Records: 8-1 v. 12-3
Last 5 Fights: WLWWW v. WLWWL

• I would say this is striker v. grappler but I honestly can’t even say that
• Turcios is very, very, very... mid
• Turcios doesn’t excel in any one major department of MMA - his best attribute is that he throws with high volume eclipsing 5 significant strikes per minute
• His DWCS loss debatably should have gone in his favor, and it’s funny that he did DWCS considering he ended up winning TUF shortly thereafter
• We also found out shortly after fighting Ricky that Bostom Salmon had no chin, getting knocked out in RD1 in his two subsequent UFC bouts - yet Ricky wasn’t able to do sh*t against him
• It is glaring to see Turcios’s takedown defense sit at 45% - he got taken down multiple times at will by Brady Hiestand and Kevin Natividad - Brady was 22 at that time BTW (foreshadowing)
• Ricky may be able to get a sneaky split decision if Raul doesn’t get his takedowns going like he usually does, but that’s about his only path to victory here
• Rosas has already been put through the fire in the UFC even though he’s only 19 years old - he has 4 fights in the promotion including DWCS and fought Cristian Rodriguez in his 3rd fight - he had success in RD1 but gasses badly - but I think that fight was a tremendous learning experience for him
• I think Raul goes out there, gets takedowns at will, lands a couple nice powerful blows, and cruises to a victory
• I think KO is out of the question since Ricky hasn’t been dusted like that yet - although Mana Martinez did KO him on the regional scene...
• This is either going to be an easy finish for Raul or a grueling decision, and I am leaning grueling decision
• If there’s one thing Ricky is good at in the octagon, it is surviving as he has gone to decision in the 4 fights he’s had in the promotion
• For betting purposes, Raul moneyline is a good parlay stuffer but you can get a slightly better price if you do Raul to win by sub/points

PICK: Raul Rosas Jr by Unanimous Decision
LHW Bout: Dominick Reyes v. Dustin Jacoby
Records: 12-4 v. 19-8-1
Last 5 Fights: LLLLW v. LWLLW

• What a sad fight to predict
• Dominick Reyes debatably beat Jon Jones, and then proceeded to lose 3 straight fights in more and more devastating fashions
• Reyes got body kicked to de*th by Blachowicz, got sent to the shadow realm with a spinning elbow by Jiri, and got sent to the Nether by Ryan Spann with a power jab
• In the Spann fight I was awfully concerned because every shot Reyes took looked like it was wobbling him - I am afraid he just can’t take punches in general anymore
• Reyes is good on the feet and has some wrestling in his backpocket, but it’s hard to put a lot of stock into those attributes considering his chin might be completely shot
• Keep in mind I thought the same thing about OSP and Niko Price and they did just fine, going 3 hard rounds!!!! Reyes fans there’s a chance!!!!
• Reyes has also not fought since the end of 2022 - does taking time off recover your chin? That I do not know but I do not think so...
• The slightly good news for Reyes is Dustin Jacoby isn’t some murderous power puncher - he is a kickboxer at heart but he is more of a points guy than a power guy
• I say this, but Jacoby’s last 2 UFC wins have been by RD1 KO, so that is a bit concerning...
• In fights that he loses though, he is usually outvoluming his opponent, but not with much power, and then eventually gets clipped himself and loses the round by being outpowered in one small exchange
• Reyes definitely has that power to do that but I am afraid he may be timid to throw that kind of shot considering every time he has previously, he gets starched directly after
• I’m sorry, but I have to go with Jacoby, and I have to go with Jacoby by brutal finish - I did not like what I saw out of Reyes AT ALL in the Spann fight - I hope he does turn it around but I don’t think it will happen
• For betting purposes, I am staying far away - sure, Jacoby KO might be FREE but my heart can’t do it

PICK: Dustin Jacoby... by ... RD2 KO :(
MW Bout: Jared Cannonier v. Nassourdine Imavov
Records: 17-6 v. 193-4
Last 5 Fights: WWLWW v. WDLWW

• This is a tailor made matchup for Cannonier to win a decision lol
• Losing a majority decision to Phil Hawes is bad regardless of how deep into your UFC tenure you are - and Imavov did just that
• Granted, Imavov is very technically sound, has decent wrestling, and has decent power
• The issues with Imavov are his gas tank and his volume - he slows down horrifically as fights progress and a prime example is his 5 round fight against Dolidze - Dolidze was bad in that one, too, but both guys were basically d*ad in the 4th and 5th rounds
• Dolidze landed approximately FIVE strikes per round and Imavov was still unable to finish him - just a note
• If there’s a finish in this one, I think it’s coming on the Cannonier side - he has the power advantage for sure considering he has actually KO’d high level guys and Imavov only KO win was a crucifix ground and pound against Edmen Shahbazyan
• Cannonier has the cardio upside as well - he used to be timid but lately he is throwing more than 100 strikes per fight and set the MW sig strike record against Marvin Vettori in his last bout with 241 landed
• There are some question marks of course with Cannonier which is why he’s the dog - he has gotten rocked early in fights (almost got put out by Vettori on the first exchange), and he is coming off a year layoff where he had major knee/ACL surgery as well, AND he is significantly older in this matchup coming in as the 40 year old against a 28 year old
• All those factors baked in, I still think Cannonier is going to show Imavov levels and win a decision cleanly here
• I do see Imavov potentially winning round 1 and maybe even round 2, but the longer this fight progresses, the more I see it going in Cannonier’s favor
• For betting purposes, I like Cannonier as a straight pick but you could bet the o4.5 RDs if you want a real sweat

PICK: Jared Cannonier by Unanimous Decision

AITA for kicking my mom out of Our wedding??? Side note* not great with grammar so forgive me on my writing.
Storytime: I 24 female is getting ready to be married in 9 days from now to my lovely fiance male 27. We are currently running into issues with my mom his mother in law and family. I met my lovely fiance back in college and he was just everything I wanted and more. I note here that before and while I'm in college my parents (specifically my mother) didn't want me or my sisters dating anyone without her permission. They were strict,but me not having it want to pursue dating since I was ready to be with someone my age or within my age group. At the time I was 17 and just met let's call him Al in a US government class. We be came friends after sometime and then a month later started dating. Overtime of dating one another Al told his parents about me but I chose not to tell mine about him. Your probably wondering "why?" Well for me like I said they were strict about their not dating anyone. We would message one another back and forth over messages and then switch to talking on the phone. My extended family started noticing that I would say I love you to someone that not my parents but didn't bother to tell anyone. Well they tried but failed.
Fast forward to 2 year and I still haven't told my parents about him and she just found from my aunt about it. I understand some of us tell our parents about "the one" but I just didn't want hear one the same lectures she gives about guys just wanting one thing. She was upset then about but it really to turn out to be she didn't like him at all but I just brushed it off. Over time everything Al tried to do for me or with me my mom never seem to like it she just hate or just not care at all and say I couldn't do things with Al.
Fast forward again 2 more it's the summer and my birthday just passed he want to do something for my birthday since it had passed and my mom wasn't having. She said no to home leave and going anywhere and told him to give me the where she proceeded to tell me to get rid of him now. For squeeze: at the time I was still living with my parents and if I want to go somewhere he would have to call and ask her if I could leave to go or I would have to, need I remind you I was 22 at the time. But this sadden me so that he decided to sit and talk with me. I had to stop him in the middle of talking and go inside to grab something only to come back out and found him on the ground with a ring in a box asking me to marry him. Over joyed I said yes with no though or hesitation. Then he got a call from his mom to come home and he left happy and excited and overjoyed about the proposal of course. Now ran back inside to share the news with my sisters and they where happy too. Well that happiness didn't last long because as soon as my parents got home and I told them the news. Oh how the mood change my mom start fussing and saying how I ruined my life and I was fucking thinking straight and that I just said yes to being a housewife with no future. This hurt my feelings and I was pissed her my father did nothing and just sat there and kept agreeing with her. Then she grab my phone and proceeded to call Al. Al thought it was me who call to say how excited I was about the engagement but only to hear my mother calling him a less of man. And that he could have just came to my parents and ask for their permission to Marry me. Al said no I don't due the lack of respect shown and given towards him. More details to why objected to that; overtime he would hear the conversation my mother would have with me about him and how he's manipulating me, cheating one (which he was because he's not like that), and that I was just a girl he was stringing along like a dog. Now my mom was upset that he refused and hung in his face after call him a useless sht ni*a. To futher more explain she even call the mom out and cussed her by calling her a B and said I make my daughter decisions for her. My mom basically came for his entire family Al's father and brother included.
Again fast forward 2 years and I came to turns that she is just not a great person to be living under and I moved out after graduating last year and I start my wedding planning last year and started to get the ball rolling on getting things done. But a wedding to me means having your family right?!, by your side as you plan, well I tried again with my parents(mom) and told her about going dress shopping with me, this woman chose to go to a family gathering then be with me. Strike one I said ok then I invited to go venue looking with me and Al and Al's mom but she looked at me and said I don't want even be apart around that B that took my baby away from me. And said if she at the wedding I'm not coming. Strike Two. Now I meant to you that I have sisters and she refused for them to be in my wedding and said that I'm not paying for their bridesmaids dress and that would have to if I want to. Now me and Al are short on money but make the best we can to have the wedding the way we want but while on a budget, that meant our bridesmaids and groomsmen have to buy their dress. Now I have two beautiful niece who just got adopted to the family and I want them to be apart of it but my mom said no at first, then change her mind and demanded that I paid for the dress and not my older sister whom I call Bre. Bre did like Al and Al didn't like her and Al asked me Why would include someone like that who doesn't want help nor contribute to my wedding which by the way his mom Al and I and stuck paying for because oh yeah my parent said and I Quote "we to broke to afford a wedding, and he should be the one paying for it!" "If he loves you like he say he does he will pay for the entire wedding and your dress!" But back what Al asked I told well I want my family to be apart of the wedding best way I wanted to be.
Fast forward it's December and my mom decided to tell my family whom I work with and others family members that she lied to me and she not coming to the wedding she said she not gonna show. My dad said the said the same thing and said he not walking me either. This hurt worse and so I just decided after all the stress and planing now we are days out that I'm let my mother in law ask besides she was really my backbone who was helping run things smoothly. She call her in May and asked her hey are you coming to the wedding your daughter wants you there and she told her yeah I would be there I wouldn't leave my baby alone on her big day for I want to be there to support her. But a few weeks later I tolded everyone my wedding was going to be kid free since that what me and Al wanted. And everyone just went to blowing up my mom phone they were complaining because my side of the family had kids and Al side didn't have kids. They told her I was not right for not want to have kids at our wedding and she agree because after all the only two kids I wanted was my two niece who where only gonna be there for the ceremony and not the reception. My mom called me later saying that it was a dissing move to make that decision and that me and al should have thought about have a place for kids at our wedding and she is pulling the girls out. Now here I spent 50 dollars a peice on their dress and 20 on the accessory for their hair and shoes for the big day. So when I asked her she need to pay me her or Bre can pay me back she hung up in my face and texted me you can forget about it. Strike Three. So after dealing with her about our wedding and her talking negatively nonsense about it I decided to kick her out of the wedding as whole for all the problems she was causing. So I as am I the A-hole for kicking her out of our wedding?