Hi looking for some advice. Premptive TLDR: possible sprinkler head/pipe leak affected house waterpressure. I need to know who to contact to fix it. Is it a "call the Plumber" emergency or call the irrigation pros situation?
My house is 3 years old, home builders installed the sprinkler system. I rarely use it (am in a rain heavy area), so I keep the system and water turned off. Recently the city switched us all to reclaim water.
Not long after, I noticed a patch of grass growing way too well near a sprinkler head, figred there was a sprinkler leak. Today I started digging around to find the leak. Cant even find the pipe right away, so I turned on the sprinkler so see if maybe that'll show the leak.
I turned on the water supply, then ran each sprinkler zone to cheak over. Didn't see the issue with that spot. Went inside to wash my hands, and the water pressure inside my house was super low, then stopped all together. No water. Turned off the sprinkler water source, and the presure returned in the house.
So. Is this just cause I had the water source to the sprinklers turned off and the pressure just needed a minute? Could the City have switched the lines and somehow the reclaim switch screwed up the water supply? Or, more nefariusly, could that leak outside actually be a line to the house, not the sprinkler? Basically, who do I call? Plumber? Irrigation Pro? The city? Additional info: I checked my water bill and usage, that has not gone up since the leak appeared. Thank you!

TLDR - I lived at IT for my freshman year and worked there as an RA my sophomore year. Management is unprofessional, negligent, incompetent, and employs predatory strategies when it comes to charging and collecting money. The building has issues with maintenance, security, and community. They treat their residents and employees like shit. I cannot recommend you live there.
Please chime in with any anecdotes you can add.
I lived at Illini Tower for two years, one as a resident and one as an RA, so I can offer plenty of insight regarding the goings on of the building. Here are my experiences.
Year 1 – Freshman, Resident (2022-23)
I chose Illini Tower (IT) as a freshman because it was, at the time, actually cheaper than university housing, it is well situated on campus (close to my classes on South Quad, close to Main Quad, and it is close to Green Street), and, based on the tour, seemed like a very nice building. I didn’t have a standard for dorms, so I didn’t know how my experience compared to that of others until I made some friends living in university housing. I did not meet my RA until November and there were no events held for the first 75% of the year (until the end of the spring semester when upper management was there to help with leasing, and they needed to put on a good face). What this means is there was pretty much no community, one of the things that I know lots of people are looking for their freshman year as they come to a new place with new people. I recognize that this had more to do with my RA specifically than the building itself, but it also means that the RA’s were not held to a high standard and were not required to do anything; something that I can’t hold against my RA because I know being a student is a full time job, and if you’re not required to plan and host events, I can’t blame them for not doing it. On the topic of RA’s, later in the year, they were paid $20 per positive review of the building that mentioned their name. This resulted in RA’s telling residents to leave reviews in order to receive part of that $20 dollars. The Google review for the building is highly inflated because of this.
Water damage is a common topic when IT is mentioned, and that’s because for the last three years straight, at least, there has been a major flood in the building. The main event my freshman year occurred during Christmas break and was the result of a burst pipe which was in turn the result of an improperly closed window. I know the residents whose room flooded, they had been reporting their window for a while (which could not fully close), trying to get it fixed, but management never addressed the problem. This resulted in flooding (inches of water on the floor) in many rooms and water pouring into the lobby. The affected residents were moved into other rooms while theirs were fixed, but the group of four girls from the room where the flood originated, were placed in a cramped staff room on the first floor with one bed for a few weeks to a month.
Also common were, and are, fire alarms. My freshman year we had quite a few a week, until they (I don’t know who) determined it was a sensitivity issue and adjusted it (allegedly the alarms were tripping on any minor thing). Not too long after this, my roommate came home drunk at 3am, put chicken on the stove, and passed out. My other roommates and I woke up to our room filled with smoke. The fire alarm never went off. I don’t think we had another alarm all year.
The other major event of my freshman year was the building trying to charge us for “food and beverage tax” (a few hundred dollars), something that was not in the lease we signed. It took me coming down to the front desk multiple times (which never resulted in anything as no one ever seemed to be available), me calling the office multiple times (the phone just goes to the front desk, so same result), and, finally, my father calling every day for over a week demanding to speak to someone in order to get them to remove the charge. They eventually did, but as is a recurring issue with this building that I’ll detail more later, they were borderline unreachable if not just flat-out dodging people’s calls because they know they’re doing something shady. Management is a problem area for IT, as they’ve had four building managers in 2 years, and only one of them has been any good. She left because she couldn’t deal with upper management. Not a good sign.
Year 2 – Sophomore, Resident Assistant (2023-24)
This experience starts in my freshman year. I was interested in being an RA because I got a fully comped room and max meal plan, and asked at the front desk in October and they took my name and phone number, so they’d know I was interested. I was told I’d hear something soon. I came back about a month later and a month after that, with them taking my name and number again and telling me the same thing. No one could offer any actual information, and apartment leases started filling up in OctobeNovember, hence me asking so many times. I wanted to make sure I had somewhere to live. Finally, over Christmas break that year, I received a call from Antazah Blalock, the assistant general manager to schedule an interview when I returned in January. On the day of the interview, I went down to the desk and told the RA’s working there that I had an appointment with Antazah. I waited for about 20 minutes before being told she was out of the office and to come back tomorrow at the same time (they said they’d tell her). I came back the next day at the same time, waited a while again, and then was told she was out sick and that they’d just have her call me and schedule another interview. I waited about a week, she never called. I started going down to the front desk every day to ask for her and only got my meeting when I happened to catch her when she left her office, at which point she put me in a room with someone else who explained to me what an RA is and sent me on my way, saying I’d hear more information soon. Some time passed and I occasionally checked back in. Eventually, they posted on Instagram that applications were up. I applied and waited about two weeks with no word. I eventually reached out to the provided email, suggested for if I had questions, and never heard back. I started going to the desk every day for a few days asking about it. Again, if it seems like I’m doing too much here, I needed to make sure I had a place to live for the next year. Eventually, I just decided to renew my lease at IT and gamble on getting the job. After more hounding on my part, I eventually (in May, right before I was headed home) was told I got the job and would be getting an offer letter shortly. That came in July, and only after I asked for it a few times. That was just the hiring process. I called multiple times over the summer and was always directed to a call center who couldn’t answer my questions and said they’d have management call me back. They never did.
The offer letter we all signed stated that we would be paid hourly and receive a fully comped meal plan and room (this’ll be important later). For those unaware, the duties of an RA are to essentially foster a community on their floors and within the building. We plan and run events, check in with our residents, and try to help them adjust to life away from home. When move-in week started, many of the residents came to us with a multitude of problems. We had a ton of complaints from residents that their rooms were missing things, had notable damage, smells, or that whole appliances just flat out didn’t work. With what people were paying to live there, I can understand the frustration. Most of the rooms were not move-in ready and they were waiting for people to complain before they did anything, resulting in a huge backlog of maintenance requests that took weeks to resolve. Many times, work orders would just be checked off without staff coming to the room at all.
The rest of the post will be broken into sections by topic

A. Water Damage
As I mentioned before, water damage is a hot topic. There was one major flood this year and at least ten minor water damage incidents. Water damage happens, especially in such a large building. And when you give a bunch of kids who have never lived away from home their own bathroom and kitchen, it just magnifies the issue. Management can’t keep college kids from being stupid. Where they fall short, however, is in their response. This year, we had a resident hang a shirt from his sprinkler so he could steam clean it. This set off the sprinkler and the fire alarm. We all evacuated and waited for the fire department to arrive. When they got there, they needed to get into the fire alarm control room to turn off the alarm and the sprinklers. This room is locked and the only key belongs to the building manager, who lives in the building but was nowhere to be found. We waited around for at least half an hour before he showed up to unlock the door, the whole-time water just poured out of the sprinkler and soaked the rooms below.
As far as I’m aware, most of the affected residents were not relocated and instead had loud dehumidifiers placed in their rooms and their drywall and ceiling slowly fixed. They did not check for or do anything about mold growth. In conversation with the maintenance staff, I was told that if the building sustained much more water damage, it would need to be completely gutted and redone in order to be safe to live in.
Management can’t always keep water damage from happening, but what they can control is the response. In both major floods of the past two years, and all comparatively minor incidents (each of which still affected at least a few floors and usually the lobby), their response was [poor]()[[AS1]](#_msocom_1) .
B. Security
Another big issue with the building is security. For the entirety of my freshman year, the security cameras did not work. This year, fortunately they did. The building has 6 key entrances/exits. The two lobby entrances, the back door by the rec area, the south fire escape, the north fire escape, and the garage. The garage is always unlocked. It has been all year. We brought it to the attention of management. Nothing was done. The fire escape doors do not always close fully, and sometimes are left unlocked for long stretches of time. The lobby has two entrances. One is always locked and the other is unlocked between 9am and 11pm, while there is someone at the front desk. At nighttime it is locked so that, in theory, only residents can get in. The issue is, there was no security guard at any time of day. During the day, anyone can walk and in no one bats an eye. We get dining hall staff, postal workers, door dash, prospective residents, people’s friends, families, whatever. All of whom have business in the building. It’s hard to differentiate between these people and someone who doesn’t belong, and since the RA’s are the one’s working at the front desk, even if we identify someone that should’ve be there, all we can do is call the police. We’re not in a position to get them out of the building. At nighttime, residents come and go and people can slip in, or residents will just let people in, giving them the benefit of the doubt that maybe they just forgot their key. We have had homeless people sleeping in common areas, homeless people stealing door dash deliveries, and for a few days, a convicted criminal (convicted for breaking and entering and stalking) who was stalking a resident was reported to have been wandering the building. I’m told this resident sued IT over the lack of security. Even if we shored up the lobby security issues, people can still come and go unseen from the garage.
C. Management
The building has three managers. During my time working there, we had Michael Mulholland (general manager), Antazah Blalock (assistant general manager), and Adedoyin Akisanya (resident life manager – essentially head of the RA’s).
Michael and Adedoyin lived in the building, with Michael being the one who had the keys to the fire alarm control room who was unreachable. Michael was all talk, and never did anything. The printer was broken for the entire year, and he always said he was working on it. The regional manager came in at the end of April and had it repaired in a day. When it came to ordering supplies for building events, we were told he’d order things but he never did. This made doing our (the RA’s) jobs very difficult. He did not meet with us until November, with communication always being an issue. He would give Adedoyin things to tell us in our meetings and was unavailable when we had questions or otherwise needed clarification. Up front, he was nice and seemed good enough, but behind the scenes I’m not really sure what he was doing all day. This is just my experience as an employee. I’ve heard of issues with him from resident’s, but nothing I’m confident enough in the validity of to share.
Antazah oversaw finances – resident fines, rent, stuff like that. At one point we were having issues with residents leaving the trash rooms messy and not putting trash in bags and putting them down the chute. Her proposed response was to fine the entire floor, something known as collective punishment, which, if not illegal (which it might be), is at least highly unethical. We had to talk her out of it by bringing up potential repercussions. She is unreachable and generally does not seem competent at her job.
Adedoyin Akisanya is head of the RA’s and his duties officially include settling roommate conflicts that cannot be handled by us, managing event preparation, and just managing us. He was unprofessional from the beginning. During the first few weeks we arrived, while doing training and getting ready for move-in, as well as throughout the first semester, he encouraged us to clock in for hours we did not work, also called fraud or time theft. He also would deliver instructions from Michael and then tell us how Michael was being stupid and how we should do something else instead. He spent a great deal of time shit talking both Michael and Antazah, commonly during our staff meetings, he constantly gossiped about some RA’s with other RA’s, flat out bullied one of the RA’s on multiple occassions, bragged about having keyed one of his fellow RA’s cars the year before (he was an RA in 2022-23), tried to sell RTS packages (Return to sender – packages that arrive by mistake and need to be sent back. They never were. We had over 50), would leave to go to the library and study or go to the gym while on the clock, and just generally didn’t take his job seriously. This attitude trickles down to the RA’s. If your boss acts like his job is a joke and tells you that your job is a joke, you’re probably not going to take it seriously either.
Most of the issues above wouldn’t directly affect residents, but I believe it’s still relevant. It shows the general mismanagement of the building and reflects the themes of negligence, incompetence, and, at times, deliberate malfeasance (this will be expanded upon later).
D. Resident Assistants and Community
The building has fifteen residential floors and each has an RA. As mentioned previously, RA’s are responsible for helping to build a community. We are all full-time students as well. We were told at the beginning of the year that we needed to have an event and a meeting with our floor once each month. The first two months, we were held to this. We each did a few events, most with low turnouts (most residents don’t want to do stuff with the RA, which I understand). Adedoyin told us that we didn’t really need to do floor events or have floor meetings anymore if we didn’t want to (His own decision, not from higher up). Most people stopped or didn’t put in a lot of effort. Yes, ideally everyone would be so dedicated to the job that they’d pour their heart and soul into events for the love of their floor, but realistically, management needs to hold the RA’s to it. We were held to a low standard throughout the job. We did four or five building events each month. These typically had a better turnout and, in my opinion, were actually pretty successful. Management did not make running these events easy. As mentioned before, Michael would request a list of supplies about two weeks in advance, encouraging us to go all out. He would usually drag his feet on ordering, if he ordered at all, usually resulting a scramble to pull something together at the end. All of this would seem to indicate that management doesn’t care too much about building a community.
Other responsibilities of the RA’s included working at the front desk, helping residents with personal and academic issues, and being on-call after hours. The phone number for the on-call phone did not week for about two months, during which time, afterhours, residents could not get into their room if locked out. The number provided to residents directs them to a call center, which then directs them to the on-call phone. For those two months, the number for the call center never worked. They didn’t ever fix it, the school year ending beat them to it.
E. Maintenance
Maintenance is comprised of 3 or 4 guys and they work weeks, trading off being on-call during the weekends and at night. They would often check off work orders without actually going to the rooms (I think with the idea that if it was important, they’d just submit the order again), requiring residents to put it in two or three times. My fridge leaked for about a month, with me putting in multiple work orders. They eventually came, replaced the fridge lightbulb, and left. It still leaked. I just fixed it myself one day. I did lots of maintenance for my residents and those on other floors, including stopping toilets that were overflowing, fixing leaks, fixing air conditioning, and repairing fridges, all because it was hard to get anything fixed otherwise. We had a resident get stuck inside their room one Saturday morning (lock broke in a weird way, not his fault) and he was in there for about an hour and a half while I called all the maintenance guys trying to figure out who was on-call and who could come in. The building will also bring in contractors to do larger jobs, and they will start work as early as 6:30 AM and, at times, have entered resident’s rooms as early as 7:30 AM. Additionally, the building has four elevators (the only way to access residential floors from the lobby) for all 500+ residents. They all had expired inspection certificates for the duration of the year and for the better part of the year, the sensors on the doors did not work properly. I’ve been hit by them quite a few times and I’ve seen some people get their arms caught while trying to activate the sensor. The stairs in the building are only for fire escapes, so you can’t reliably use them as an entrance, and only the first five or six floors can realistically use them to exit. The elevators are slow, as you can only wait on two at a time and everyone must use them. There was a day when three of them were down.
F. Hiring Process
Now, a story. Again, this won’t directly impact residents, but I feel reflects the poor management of the company. We were told in August of last year that re-hiring would begin in November, at the latest. In November, we were told that they’d start first thing after Christmas break. In January we were told the applications would release on February 5^th. They came out at some point in March. Throughout this time, again wanting to make sure I had a place to live the following year, I asked Adedoyin Akisanya if he knew anything. He assured me at least five times over the course of 4 or 5 months that I had nothing to worry about and was being rehired. He also told me everyone else that was being rehired and the reasoning for not hiring those who weren’t being rehired. Again, unprofessional. Separately, Antazah had been telling people that they were being rehired. They were not. When applications came out, we submitted them and waited. Sometime in mid-April we finally heard back. Or at least those being rehired did. Everyone that wasn’t coming back had no idea decisions had even been made. The only reason I knew I wasn’t coming back is because my friend, who did get an offer letter, asked if I’d gotten one. Adedoyin conducted all the interviews by himself and passed the information on to Michael and Antazah. Multiple times he told us that he was conducting interviews based on “how fun people would be” and “who he wanted to be friends with”. He would come out of interviews and make fun of the applicants or share other details about the hiring process of some of the current and prospective RA’s. When I found out I wasn’t rehired, I went to talk to him to find out why. I did not put a foot wrong all year and went well beyond what was expected of me. He told me it wasn’t up to him and he had no idea. He then called an “emergency” meeting to tell all the RA’s (most of which weren’t being rehired but had been told that they were and were super pissed) that it wasn’t his fault and to talk to Michael and Antazah. He then called me down after the meeting to tell me why I wasn’t being rehired, all while playing with a stapler, laughing, and refusing to look me in the eye. He said this wasn’t his decision, and that all the reasons he gave were what Michael and Antazah had told him. This was the first I’d heard of any of this. As I mentioned, I don’t think I put a foot wrong all year, and no one had ever given me any idea or told me that I was doing something wrong. All of the others not being rehired had also never been told they were doing anything wrong. Essentially, everyone was blindsided by this. That’s not how you manage people. If you have a problem with them, you tell them and allow them to improve and grow.
Anyways, I met with Michael and Antazah and they both said that I “had done nothing wrong” and that they had just received better applicants. Why are they hiring nine people with no experience as an RA over someone who has a year of RA experience and has “done nothing wrong”? That’s just bad business. They then told me that I was the first alternate AND that “someone had declined their offer letter”. This, at least to me, STRONGLY implies that I was getting the job. They told me to come back after the weekend and they’d have an answer. I came back to talk to them every single day that next week and every day they postponed. I kept coming back because, again, it sounded like the job was mine. If I am the first choice alternate and someone already declined the job, then that means I fill in. Finally, the following Monday, I was told that everyone had accepted their offer letter. I’m not sure what happened to the person who declined. This was 1 week before I was to leave for the summer, leaving me one week to scout for an apartment. Because I had been told I was a shoo-in all year, I hadn’t even thought about a backup plan. Because they made it sound like I was going to be filling in for someone, I continued to delay my search so I could focus on final projects and tests, which were also going on during all of this. I was more than a little stressed. They put five of us out on our asses with no warning right in the middle of finals and now we were all scrambling to find housing for the next year, with almost all the reasonably priced units having been filled. I relied on the savings from being an RA to help me get through school. Not having to worry about food or rent is really nice.
Again, this is a personal anecdote that doesn’t affect anyone else. I have big personal grudge against the building and its management. But I think this is reflective of and in line with management who does not care about its residents or employees.
G. Deliberate Malfeasance
Finally, the worst part. As I mentioned earlier, Antazah attempted to collectively fine floors for issues caused by individuals. Additonally, as mentioned before, the RA employment contract entitled us to hourly pay, a comped meal plan, and a comped room. March 8^th, 2024 was payday. None of us received our pay. We talked to Adedoyin. He told us that it was probably fine and that we’d get paid eventually. He got paid, so of course he didn’t care. We went to talk to Michael. He said he’d look into it. We all knew what that meant, but we gave him some time. Next payday came and went we didn’t get paid. This went on for a month and a half. We talked to Adedoyin again, as he was the most accessible, and he started getting pissed and said we were being annoying and that we’d get paid eventually. Again, he got paid so he didn’t care. We needed this money. Michael still hadn’t fixed anything. Again, this is in breach of our employment contract. It should’ve been as simple as sending that contract to payroll. Eventually, I reached out to payroll myself and was told that because we were being provided food and housing, that we didn’t get paid hourly anymore. Again, in breach of the contract. I told this to Adedoyin and he got angry that I went over his head. Nothing was done about the problem. Eventually, another RA and myself reached out to the University (The Private Certified Housing Office to be specific) and the next day we were paid in full. I am confident they never would have paid us if we didn’t do something.
Now, despite food and housing being free, parking was not. This means I needed to pay parking each semester. Now, I have been unable to access my resident portal all year. I got the issue resolved in the fall and was able to pay the first semester fee. The issue resurfaced about a month later. When the time came to pay for the spring, I was unable to access my account to pay. I made this issue known, multiple times, to both Michael and Adedoyin, and nothing was ever done. For about three months, I’ve been racking up late fees, with no way to do anything about it. I’d asked them to fix it many times now. Now, about a week ago, I received a bill from IT. The charges are as follows:

Parking Fees: $312.65
Turnover: Trash/Cleaning – Deep Clean Bathroom: $60.00
Turnover: Trash/Cleaning: $60.00
Meal Plan: $241.55
BHOM Liability Insurance: $13.50
Late Charges: $82.30
I admit I owe both the parking and liability insurance, and am happy to pay them, but as mentioned, I can’t access the payment platform, so I can’t. As for the bathroom deep clean, I deep cleaned my bathroom before I left, and for the trash, I know I didn’t leave anything there. In fact, one of the rehired RA’s did my room check and can confirm that the bathroom was not left dirty and that I didn’t leave any trash. As for the meal plan, my employment contract entitles me to a comped meal plan, so I should not owe them anything for that. And finally, the late charges are only tacked on because I cannot access my resident portal to pay. I did not miss a single payment as a freshman, I was on time for my parking payment in the fall, and I have made every effort to get into my account so that I could pay my balance. I have emailed the address that I was told to contact with any questions twice, with no response, and I have called to no avail. I don’t really know what to do about this at this point. I know they’ve done this to at least one other group of residents.
Conclusion
That’s my two cents on Illini Tower. I cannot recommend that you live there, as a freshman or otherwise. I believe the university, specifically Private Certified Housing, need to look into this place. I feel like they wouldn’t want to put their name on the building if they knew what was going on. If you’re looking for freshman housing options, I recommend FAPAR and the Six Pack for university housing, and Newman or Presby if you’re looking for private certified. I’ve heard good things about all of them but do some research to find what’s best for you. IT’s prices have been drastically increasing year to year (exceeding inflation), with no improvements in their offerings. If you are living there in 2024-25, I would recommend photographing your room when you move in and when you move out, taking precautions for flooding when you leave for breaks, and being very persistent when dealing with management. Hopefully this was helpful to any prospective students.

Date: 06/07/2024

Reading time: 3 minutes, 794 words

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CivilGe

Economy Minister says promoting green economy potential, sustainable development Gov’t “important priority”

Georgian Economy Minister Levan Davitashvili spoke at the 14th Local Economic Development Forum in Tbilisi. He said promoting the potential of green economy and sustainable development represented the Government’s ‘priority” in the country's economy. The Minister said the Government's policy aimed at developing the private sector's capabilities, effective management of resources and carrying out structural reforms.

AgendaGe

Opposition Parties Plead to the U.S. Congress to Commit Resources for Election Monitoring in Georgia

Opposition parties write to U.S. Congressman Joe Wilson, the initiator of the MEGOBATI Act. They plead with Congress to commit necessary human and financial resources to ensure due electoral observation for the October parliamentary elections in Georgia. The letter stresses the will of the “overwhelming majority” of the Georgian people for the country’s integration into the EU and NATO.

CivilGe

MFA Keeps SIlent, as “People’s Power” Lies About NATO’s Article 5

People’s Power, an offshoot of the ruling Georgian Dream party, issued a lengthy statement on June 5. It claimed that NATO Charter's Article 5 did not guarantee military assistance to Allies in the event of an attack. Georgia's Foreign Ministry has not responded to the People's Power statement. Civil.ge has approached the Information Center on NATO and EU.

CivilGe

Georgian Dream Introduces Draft Law to Restrict LGBTQ+ Rights

Georgia’s ruling party has introduced draft legislation that would limit LGBTQ+ rights. The measures come soon after the adoption of the “foreign influence” law, which resulted in months’-long mass protests and criticism for its perceived threat to democratic freedom.

GeorgiaToday

Georgian FM: Adoption of UN Resolution on IDPs from Russian-Occupied Regions “great success”

Georgian Foreign Minister Ilia Darchiashvili celebrated this week’s adoption of a resolution by the United Nations General Assembly concerning Internally Displaced Persons and Refugees from the Russian-occupied Abkhazia and Tskhinvali (South Ossetia) regions. The resolution reiterates the right of return for all displaced persons and refugees to these regions, with 103 countries voting in favor, nine against, and 52 abstaining.

GeorgiaToday

TI Georgia: Chinese Company with ‘Questionable Reputation’ to Build Anaklia Port

Transparency International (TI) Georgia, a local corruption watchdog, says the government awarded the Anaklia Port project to a Chinese company “known for corruption scandals” The watchdog also warns that the deal raises corruption risks amid the growing crackdown on civil society watchdogs. The U.S. State Department echoed these concerns on June 1, stressing the importance of safeguarding Georgia’s security.

CivilGe

Georgian Witnesses at the Congressional Hearing Under Fire

The People’s Power attacked Ivane Chkhikvadze and Natalie Sabanadze for testifying before the U.S. Congress. PM Irakli Kobakhidze and ruling party MPs compared the two witnesses to Bolsheviks and fascists. Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili said: “We have seen Orjonikidzes of the 21st century, who have snitched on their homeland”

CivilGe, William Courtney on the Helsinki Commission Hearing and Sanctioning Georgian Dream

Celebrating World Environment Day 2024: UNDP and Its Commitment to Georgia’s Environmental and Energy Sustainability

On World Environment Day 2024, the UNDP celebrated its ongoing work in Georgia with regards environmental preservation and sustainable energy solutions. Georgia boasts 100 protected areas which cover 13% of its land, where forests flourish across 75% of these natural havens.

GeorgiaToday

💵 Economy

Fitch Ratings Initiates Coverage of TBC Bank Uzbekistan with a BB- Rating, in line with the sovereign

Uzbekistan-based Joint Stock Commercial Bank ‘TBC BANK’ (TBCU) Long-Term Issuer Default Ratings (IDRs) of ‘BB-‘ with Stable Outlooks and a Viability Rating (VR) of 'b' TBCU’s ‘b’ VR reflects its reasonable risk profile and asset quality and good capitalisation. The bank contributed 9% of the group's total revenue and 5% of net profit in 2023, although we expect it to increase further in the medium term.

GeorgiaToday

Date: 06/05/2024

Reading time: 2 minutes, 533 words

🏛️ Politics & Government

Parliament Bans Another Critical Journalist from Working in Legislative Building

The Georgian Parliament has banned Natalia Kajaia of the opposition-leaning TV Pirveli from working in the legislative building for one month, until July 3, at the request of the leader of the People’s Power party, MP Sozar Subari. The bans come as a result of implementing a controversial February 2023 Order issued by Speaker Shalva Papuashvili.

CivilGe

Roth: A Russian-style crackdown on LGBTI is another red flag for Georgia‘s EU ambitions

A Russian-style crackdown on LGBTI is another red flag for Georgia‘s EU ambitions. Georgian Dream must stop initiatives to destroy Georgia future, – Michael Roth, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the German Parliament (Bundestag).

GeorgiaToday

People’s Power Distorts NATO’s Article 5 Content

People’s Power, an offshoot of the ruling Georgian Dream party, issued a lengthy statement on June 5. The People's Power claimed NATO's Article 5 does not guarantee military assistance to Allies in the event of an attack. The statement accuses the “Global War Party” of misleading the Georgian people for years.

CivilGe

Russia’s Deputy FM: West is Trying to Implement Maidan Scenario in Georgia

Mikhail Galuzin, Russia’s deputy Foreign Minister, accused the West of putting “unscrupulous pressure” on “many sovereign states” in Georgia. The Russian official also lashed out at the foreign ministers of Lithuania, Estonia and Iceland, calling their actions “blatant interference in the internal affairs of an independent state”

CivilGe

EU Ambassador: EU to Check Whether Visa Liberalization Conditions Still Apply to Georgia

EU Ambassador to Georgia Paweł Herczyński said that the EU will consider “all options” that can be introduced towards Georgia as a result of the adoption of the foreign agents law, including the suspension of visa liberalization. He expressed his concern that ordinary citizens of Georgia will be affected and will have to pay a very heavy price.

CivilGe

U.S. Congressional Hearing Discusses Support for Georgia’s Sovereignty and Democracy

The United States Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (Helsinki Commission) held a congressional hearing on supporting Georgia’s sovereignty and democracy. The hearing came amid the recent adoption of the Russian-style foreign agents law and the U.S. announcement of sanctions against those undermining democracy in Georgia.

CivilGe

🧪 Science & Technology

Georgian Citizen Illegally Sentenced in Occupied Tskhinvali Region

Giorgi Mosiashvili, 35, was sentenced to two years in a general regime colony by the de-facto court in occupied Java, Tskhinvali region. He is accused of crossing the occupation line and fishing, in particular, catching about 25 kg of trout fry with an electric fishing rod.

CivilGe

Date: 06/04/2024

Reading time: 3 minutes, 704 words

🪖 Military

Informal mobilization in Russia

Wives of conscripted soldiers held a small protest in front of the Ministry of Defense in Moscow. The wives demanded the return of their husbands. They were announced as a foreign agent by the Russian government.

EuroNewsGeorgia

🏛️ Politics & Government

Stormi Daniels says she and her family are being threatened

Stormy Daniels claims she had sexual relations with Donald Trump 10 years ago. Daniels says she and her family receive serious death threats on a daily basis.

EuroNewsGeorgia

Congress starts discussing "MEGOBARI" - politicians talk about possible sanctions

Washington states that they are considering the US response to the actions taken by the Georgian government. According to the spokesperson of the US State Department, the US has announced the new policy of sanctions, although it has not yet announced individual sanctions. Opponents of the government say that along with the American visa restrictions, the EU member states should individually adopt such decisions.

EuroNewsGeorgia

“Georgian Charter” signed by 17 parties and 5 independent deputies

The administration of the President publishes information about political parties and independent MPs who have signed the “Georgian Charter” The charter talks about “repeal of laws harmful to the European course of the country”, liberation of the justice system and restoration of trust, improvement of the electoral system and creation of a new political reality.

GeorgiaToday

Parliament Slaps Bans on Critical Journalists at GD Vice-Speaker’s Request

Two journalists from opposition-leaning media outlets have been temporarily banned from the legislative building. MP Nino Tsilosani demanded their accreditations be suspended after the journalists approached her even though she refused to answer their questions. The bans come as a result of implementing a controversial February 2023 Order issued by Speaker Shalva Papuashvili.

CivilGe

Parliament Speaker Enacts “Offshore Law”

Georgia's 'Offshore Law' makes it easier to bring offshore assets to Georgia. The law is aimed at allowing Georgian Dream’s billionaire founder, Bidzina Ivanishvili, and his cronies to evade Western sanctions. President Salome Zurabishvili vetoed the bill, which was then overruled by the Parliament.

CivilGe, Parliament Speaker Presents Homophobic Legislation

Prime Minister’s Report Claims Progress in Foreign Policy, Defense, Economy, Governance

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze presents report to Parliament on June 28. Report covers foreign and security policy, conflict resolution and human rights, economic development and social development and human capital, and state governance. Ukraine is mentioned only three times in the 171-page document.

CivilGe

Expert Paper Details Risks ahead of Georgia’s Crucial Parliamentary Elections

The German Marshall Fund published a paper called “Georgia’s 2024 Parliamentary Election: Pre-election risk assessment” It details risks and vulnerabilities in the political pre-election landscape, legal framework and election administration, campaign environment, and media and information space. Author Laura Thornton anticipates political violence and arrests and challenges to the legitimacy of the election.

CivilGe

Management team plans to protect "family values".

The draft law, which, according to the civil sector, will limit the rights of LGBTQ+. Intimate scenes of same-sex couples will be cut from the films, these shots will not be shown on TV screens or in cinemas. Talking about the queer community in educational institutions may be prohibited, if it is considered as propaganda for the LGBTQ+ community.

EuroNewsGeorgia

MEP: GD tried to put the last nail in the coffin of Georgia’s European future

Georgian parliamentarian Thijs Reuten responds to the signing of the law “On Transparency of Foreign Influence” by the Speaker of the Parliament of Georgia, Shalva Papuashvili. “Georgian Dream” recently tried to put the last nail in the coffin of Georgia’s European future – but in the end they will fail, writes MEP Reuten.

GeorgiaToday

Date: 06/03/2024

Reading time: 2 minutes, 405 words

🏛️ Politics & Government

Georgian Infrastructure Minister: Gov’t continuing to develop sports infrastructure

Infrastructure Minister Irakli Karseladze opens stadium in southern Georgian city of Marneuli. The 2,000-capacity stadium is designed to host both local and international tournaments.

AgendaGe

Protesters against Foreign Agents Law Fined

On May 20, and the court fined several activists GEL 500 (approximately USD 180) in connection with protests against the Foreign Agents Law. This is the maximum fine for the offense, according to Article 174 Prima of the Administrative Code. Those fined include Saba Skhvitaridze, Anri Gorgiladze, and Boris Chele Kurua of the opposition party.

CivilGe, Parliament Speaker Enacts Foreign Agents Law After President’s Refusal to Sign, Parliament Speaker signs the law “On transparency of foreign influence”

Opposition Parties Sign Georgian Charter

Opposition parties which have agreed to sign the Georgian Charter will do so on June 3. Opposition parties For Justice, Greens Party, Girchi-More Freedom and Droa, European Democrats, European Georgia, Republican Party, For People, Ahali, Lelo for Georgia, Citizens, Freedom-Zviad Gamsakhurdia’s Way, United National Movement, Law and Justice, National-Democratic Party have already signed the Charter.

CivilGe, Gakharia: For Georgia not to sign “Georgian Charter” offered by President, Political parties sign “Georgian Charter” presented by President, Gakharia: For Georgia not to sign “Georgian Charter” offered by President

UK to have a new ambassador to Georgia

The United Kingdom will have a new ambassador to Georgia – Mark Clayton will be replaced by Gareth Ward in a few months. Gareth Ward will start working as the Ambassador of Great Britain in Georgia from August 2024.

GeorgiaToday

Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Georgia visites Machakhela Protected Landscape to review ongoing initiatives

Petr Kubernát, Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Georgia, visited Machakhela Protected Landscape to review ongoing initiatives and discuss future partnerships for sustainable development.

GeorgiaToday

Date: 06/02/2024

Reading time: 0 minutes, 0 words

Date: 06/01/2024

Reading time: 0 minutes, 151 words

🏛️ Politics & Government

Georgians Gear Up for ‘Unprecedented’ Election Mobilization

Georgia's President Salome Zurabishvili has unveiled a roadmap for victory in October's elections. She has called the upcoming elections a “referendum’s referendum” between a ‘European, democratic, independent Georgia, or a Russian-led, authoritarian, and isolated Georgia. With the polling day approaching, opposition remains fragmented, with a unified opposition list.

CivilGe

Intimidation Campaign Against Opposition, Civil Society, Gov’t Critics as Repressions Announced by GD MPs

An orchestrated campaign of intimidation against opposition politicians, media, civil society organizations and critics of the foreign agents law has resumed on May 31, several days after the final passage of the infamous law. This time, Georgian Dream representatives don’t hide their involvement in this campaign, on the contrary, they openly announce the repressions.

CivilGe

Citizens Confront GD MPs Following Adoption of Foreign Agents’ Law

After Georgian Dream MPs voted on May 28 to overturn veto on the Foreign Agents Law, they have been confronted by angry citizens, opposing the law. Several cases of citizens writing on the walls of GD MPs’ houses and calling them “slaves” and “traitors” in public have been observed.

CivilGe

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My municipal water supply is 120 psi, maybe a bit more. I have an old sprinkler system, and I was thinking about replacing some or all of the sprinkler heads for the grass (5 zones).
Would you get pressure regulated sprayers, or look into installing a PRV for the whole system instead? Any other advice on choosing or replacing heads in a 20+ year old system with very high pressure?

TLDR: Writing a somewhat anti social character and their interactions with people
Disclaimer: The character does not have ASPD, he just has some of the traits but he does have guilt and all that just somewhat muted and he can easily justify stuff.
Kei is a 27 years old man immigrant from the Philippines who's a prepper but also works at a dayjob as a government contracted sys admin in New York. His life comes at full stop when he gets transported to a forest with no powers, the fauna is hostile and unfamiliar, little supply & no one speaks his language.
Backstory: Born in the slums Kei started off as a goody two shoes in the Reyes family, until his father cheated on his mom but stayed leading to rocky relationship and domestic abuse as it spirals out of control. As Kei becomes neglected due to mother's depression and the father's long absence in the house he makes it to himself to live on his own through stealing, what cemented Kei's further down is his mother's "betrayal" one day he was found stealing again and he was beaten by the owner, his mother was just staring at him and left off to find her husband instead of helping him he was only 8 at this point.
So then on Kei worked as anything, taking scraps and selling them on the junkyard, transporting water by making his own "wheel barrow" using tin cans he reinforced by packing sand or rock on them, or buying packs of water and selling them on foreigners on higher prices, of course Kei's not always an honest worker he steals phones, watches, copper wires and anything he could get his hands on as long as he knows he's "safe".
Kei stayed afloat on school because of this without anyone even noticing what his actual living situation is, he was always the smart kid, getting scholarships and grants winning prizes(He cheated but never sabotaged anyone as he thought it was stupid as he was "better")
He has friends, and he's loyal to all of them although some of them are more "useful" like people who give him free stuff he still thinks of them as his real friends although he hated social gatherings, he also hated somewhat his rich friends because he thought they were mocking him without them even knowing that he was poor.
Qualities:
Muted emotions on happiness, sadness, fear Impulsive Prone to violence if buttons are pushed Morally good, however these get thrown out if he was threatened. Paranoia and general mistrust to people High functioning autist(Sometimes misunderstands people) Despite his misunderstandings he is extremely perceptive to people's emotion Hates talking to people in general(Not the manipulative Johan Libert type, but he does have exemptions friends, people of higher power) Hates seeing starving people and will go out of his way to help them. Extreme thirst for knowledge
I do plan on hiding the backstory for a reveal, but I have a hard time on writing his interactions with people. How do I do it? Can someone give an example ;-;

Is there a way to boost pressure so that I can run multiple yard water toys at once? I have an inflatable slide and a few other sprinkler style toys for the kids but when I run them all at once off of a hose splitter the divided pressure makes them unusable. The water supply has normal residential pressure of 80 but I’m hoping there’s some sort of inline pump I could use to boost that for the toys downstream. If so what type and size would work?

"We are called, summoned to appear before two pathways. On the one, we hear Messaien and the musical messages of peace. On the other, Gavreau and the musical messages of war. And again we choose. And again we must choose. Whose music will it be?"
full text >>> http://www.zemos98.org/controlsonoro/2008/03/09/the-sonic-weapon-of-vladimir-gavreau/

Lost Science” by Gerry Vassilatos Limited permission granted to use this material in other presentations. ISBN 0-932813-75-5 © 1999
SIGNALS
He listened and closed his eyes as the rolling waves of sound poured over and through his being. Thrilling, intoxicating, the hysteria of heaven, the enthralled and frightening flight of angels. Electrifying. Messaien’s organ music signaled messages of meaning, titanic foghorns ululating among dimly perceived near-worlds. Olivier Messaien, master composer of musical expressionism, used the ground thrumming tones of great Parisian cathedral organs to evoke sensations, which may only be called otherworldly. Masterfully macabre. Black foundations, blue pillars, and rainbow ceilings.
Sound, rhythm, and space. Ultra-chromatic chord frames, rising like rock walls from the black depths. And immense stellar crystallizations, radiating tonal perfumes through deep and black radiant space. Lovely and lyrically swooping melodies, the flight of birds through delicate limbs. And melodic lines, reaching up toward unknown depths of space, each had their foundation in ultra bass tones of rooted depth. The basso profunda of Messaien are the critical foundations, the strong vertical pillars of an immense architecture, which extends beyond performance walls. He scoured the deep and unreachable roots of worlds to hold his musical cathedrals together. Such majesty and grandeur of sound! Rich in the intelligence, which flooded and made the world, the musical currents and the atmosphere of tones. Fluidic music and meaning.
The most fundamental signals, which permeate this world, are inaudible. They not only surpass our hearing, but they undergird our being. Natural infrasounds rumble through experience daily. There manifestations are fortunately infrequent and incoherent. Infrasound is inaudible to human hearing, being of pitch below 15 cycles per second. The bottom human limit. The plynth. The foundation. Infrasound is not heard, it is felt. Infrasound holds a terrible secret in its silent roar.
Infrasound produces varied physiological sensations, which begin as vague “irritations”. At certain pitch, infrasound produces physical pressure. At specific low intensity, fear and disorientation. Nazi propaganda engineers methodically used infrasound to stir up the hostilities of crowds who were gathered to hear their madman. The results are historical nightmares.
At a very specific pitch, infrasound explodes matter. At others, infrasound incapacitates and kills. Organisms rupture in its blast. Sea creatures use this power to stun and kill prey.
The swelling bass tones of the cathedral seem as though they can burst the very pillars, which uphold the ancient vaults. Stained glass windows have been known to erupt in a shower of colored fragments from the organ’s basso profunda. Impulsed ultrabass tones … thunder. Somewhere in the almost inaudible roll of these basement sounds there was a devastating and fearful power.
THUNDER
As thunderous tones deepen, their power seemingly intensifies over frail barriers such as glass windows. Certain abrupt thunder peals often shatter windows into tiny fragments. In the apparent absence of thunderous tones we may observe the strong and continuous vibration of glass windowpanes during storms. A sudden eerie silence, and the window is shattered before our eyes. Natural phenomena are prodigious generators of infrasound. The potent distal effects produced when natural explosions occur produce legendary effects. When Krakatoa exploded, windows were shattered hundreds of miles away by the infrasonic wave. Wind was not the causative agent of these occurrences, as no wind was felt or detected. Seismographic stations registered the blast, and barometers measured the shockwaves. The “ringing” of both earth and atmosphere continued for hours. It is believed that infrasound actually formed the upper pitch of this natural volcanic explosion, tones unmeasurably deep forming the actual “central harmonic” of the event. The island of Krakatoa was literally lifted into orbit in the fatal blast. Brilliant sunsets followed for many years thereafter, the sad memorial of all the souls who perished.
The power of explosives, in shattering and devastating property, lies in two zones. The first zone is that with which we are principally familiar; the actual blast site, where chemically released gases and metal fragments push back everything in their perimeter. The second less familiar zone extends very much further from the blast site than can be imagined. It is in the powerful sonic wave, which expands outward that an equally destructive danger lies. Thick pressure walls of incredible momentum, inters paced with equally thick walls of reduced air pressure, travel far away from the blast site. The blast site is the small destructive zone by comparison. Few objects can survive this destructive tide.
Analysts contend that infrasound is composed of a very broad band of pitches. These tones of immense pressure and duration “accommodate” themselves when encountering resonant cavities. All such resonant cavities are “found and destroyed” when the proper pressure waves flow into their resonances. Rooms, halls, alleys, spaces among buildings, courtyard areas, cellars, subways, sewer chambers; all these burst open into flying fragments when infrasonic waves flood them. Infrasound is the cruel tonal giant, tearing open whatever it finds in its path.
Study reveals that the sudden shock wave of an explosion propels a complex infrasonic signal far beyond the shattered perimeter. Incoherent though such shockwaves may be, their destructive influence dissolves distant walls and windows seconds after the shrapnel has done its deadly work. Objects of all shapes, sizes, and compositions explode when the infrasonic impulse passes through their space. No shield can block infrasound. Physicists have studied the refuse, which remains after an explosive charge has been detonated. Few materials can maintain their integrity. Those objects, which manage to survive explosions, are noteworthy as infrasonic “resistors”. Screen reinforced concrete does not easily succumb to the infrasonic blasts of explosive charges.
EARTHQUAKE
The sound of Krakatoa exploding up into space, a vertical excess of one hundred miles, succeeded in blasting out windows at a thousand mile radius from the epicenter. Certain earthquake activities produce large and virtually insensate vertical displacements of the ground surface, in extreme instances amounting to a few feet per pulse. In this case, the ground becomes the surface of a drum, ringing out its deadly cadence at infrasonic pitch hours before the event. The ground undulates with infrasonic tones, an elasticity that eventually cracks under the heaving stress.
Ultra low pitch earthquake sounds are keenly felt by animals and sensitive humans. Quakes occur in distinct stages. Long before the final breaking release of built up earth tensions, there are numerous and succinct precursory shocks. Deep shocks produce strong infrasonic impulses up to the surface, the result of massive heaving ground strata. Certain animals (fish) actually can hear infrasonic precursors. Precursory shocks are silent, being inaudible in humans. Animals, however, react strongly to the sudden surface assault of infrasonic shocks by attempting escape from the area. Animals cannot locate the source and center of these infrasonic impulses, behaving in a pitiful display of circular frenzies. The careening motion of wild horses and other domestic animals indicates their fear and anxiety. Poor creatures, neither they nor we can escape the infrasonic source. Encounters with natural infrasound reveal their vast extent, covering hundreds of square miles of surface area.
Certain animals employ infrasound as weaponry. It has been known that certain whales are able to stun their prey with powerful blasts of inaudible sounds. Called “gunshots”, whales focus these powerful blasts at large squid and other fish to paralyze and catch them. In some instances, they have been known to burst their prey apart by tonal projection alone. Human experience with these inaudible blasts have been reported. The distress calls emitted by little beached whales was sufficient to push a veterinarian back several feet in the water. Others have experienced these pressure waves, reporting that their hands could not be brought close to the sinal area of small whales because of their inaudible acoustic projections.
Infrasonic shocks produce characteristic pressure effects on structures and organisms alike. The sensation flattens the body. It is as if one were struck with a solid invisible wall from which there is no escape. There are physiological effects as well. Anxiety, fear, extreme emotional distress, and mental incapacitation are all part of the unpleasant phenomenon. Notable among human exposures to quake-correlated infrasound is the precursory nausea, which many report. This strong sensation leaves its more sensitive victims helpless. Feeling the momentary deep motion of the ground strata beneath them, numerous individuals have been used to report these sensations in a bizarre earthquake “alarm system”. Unfortunately, physiological reaction to infrasound remains continuous, long after their irritating presence has ceased. The harmfully stimulating influence of infrasound renders physiology permeable and ultrasensitive to every available environmental sensation. The extreme irritability of infrasound victims has been noted.
Earthquake infrasound manifests only at intermittent intervals, producing drastic and sustained negative modifications of consciousness. The human organism continues to reel under intermittent infrasonic assault for numerous reasons. After less than a five-minute exposure to low intensity infrasound of 10 cycles per second, dizziness will last for hours. Infrasound of 12 cycles per second produces severe and long lasting nausea after a brief low intensity exposure.
FLOOD...
.... THE ABYSS
The Cold War was on. The United States alone held the dread secret. The most terrible weapon yet developed was the private property of one government. The mere existence of the atomic bomb was threat to nations whose motives were not entirely altruistic. Motivated, aggressive, and imperialistic, obtaining atomic bomb data was a priority for several nations. The only manner in which some nations obtained the secret was by stealing it. When Stalin’s science officers finally developed an atomic duplicate of the American bomb, pressure suddenly was placed upon every other European nation to achieve an equivalent or better device.
When one seeks to defend one’s borders, the consequences of releasing weapons of devastation to the world do not seem important. Weaponry is death-oriented by nature. But there are moral differences between weapons of defense and weapons of offense. Previous to this atomic proliferation, competing nations concentrated their weapons research on truly bizarre and equally deadly means for defending their national boundaries. A great variety of such deadly weapons were perfected in rapid succession. This included deadly variations and combinations of gas weaponry, pathogenic agents, and radiant weaponry. Stalin’s research teams investigated psychic powers as a possible means for destroying an enemy. Psychotronic warfare was devel­oped among numerous groups, both private and national, with measurable success. Information on some simpler psychotronic weapons has recently been obtained through an increasing process of Soviet disclosure.
In truth, the larger the weaponry the less safe the national boundaries truly were. While the superpowers concentrated their weapons development programs on mass-destructive nuclear weaponry, others focused on more practical conventions. The limited tactical warfare of small battlefields seemed a more immediate need. While developing their own atomic device, France sought defensive tactical weaponry on every possible technological front. Short-range weapons would best defend against a conventional national assault. But other systems were also sought; systems which, though non-nuclear, were equally invincible. As the great Frankish Knight, Charles “the Ham­mer” Martel repelled ruthless invaders from the medieval east, so a new ham­mer would be sought to defend France against possible new enemies from the east. Even as Charles Martel arose from obscurity, so this strange new “hammer” would arise in equal obscurity.
GAVREAU
The central research theme of Dr. Vladimir Gavreau was the development of remote controlled automatons and robotic devices. To this end he assembled a group of scientists in 1957. The group, including Marcel Miane, Henri Saul, and Raymond Comdat, successfully developed a great variety of ro­botic devices for industrial and military purposes. In the course of develop­ing mobile robots for use in battlefields and industrial fields, Dr. Gavreau and his staff made a strange and astounding observation, which, not only interrupted their work, but became their major research theme.
Housed in a large concrete building, the entire group periodically experienced a disconcerting nausea, which flooded the research facility. Day after day, for weeks at a time, the symptoms plagued the researchers. Called to inspect the situation, industrial examiners also fell victim to the malady. It was thought that the condition was caused by pathogens, a “building sick­ness”. No such agencies were ever biologically detected. Yet the condition prevailed. Research schedules now seriously interrupted, a complete exami­nation of the building was called.
The researchers noticed that the mysterious nauseations ceased when cer­tain laboratory windows were blocked. It was then assumed that “chemical gas emissions” of some kind were responsible for the malady, and so a thor­ough search of the building was undertaken. While no noxious fumes could be detected by any technical means, the source was finally traced by building engineers to an improperly installed motor-driven ventilator. The engineers at first thought that this motor might be emitting noxious fumes, possibly evaporated oils and lubricants. But no evaporated products were ever detected. It was found that the loosely poised low speed motor, poised in its cavernous duct of several stories, was developing “nauseating vibrations”.
The mystery magnified for Dr. Gavreau and his team, when they tried to measure the sound intensity and pitch. Failing to register any acoustic readings at all, the team doubted the assessment of the building engineers. Never­theless, closing the windows blocked the sense of nausea. In a step of bril­liant scientific reasoning, Gavreau and his colleagues realized that the sound with which they were dealing was so low in pitch that it could not register on any available microphonic detector. The data was costly to the crew.
They could not pursue the “search” for long time periods. During the very course of tracking the sound down, an accidental direct exposure rendered them all extremely ill for hours. When finally measured, it was found that a low intensity pitch of a fundamental 7 cycles per second was being produced. Furthermore, this infrasonic pitch was not one of great intensity ei­ther. It became obvious that the slow vibrating motor was activating an infra­sonic resonant mode in the large concrete duct. Operating as the vibrating “tongue” of an immense “organ pipe”, the rattling motor produced nauseat­ing infrasound. Coupled with the rest of the concrete building, a cavernous industrial enclosure, the vibrating air column formed a bizarre infrasonic “amplifier”.
Knowledge of this infrasonic configuration also explained why shutting the windows was mildly effective in “blocking the malady”. The windows altered the total resonant profile of the building, shifting the infrasonic pitch and intensity. Since this time, others have noted the personally damaging effects of such infrasonic generation in office buildings and industrial facili­ties. The nauseating effects of exposure to a low intensity natural or manmade infrasonic source is now well appreciated.
It has become a routine architectural procedure to seek out and alter any possible such resonant cavities. The sources often appear in older buildings, the result of construction rendered faulty by previous lack of this knowledge. All such “improper” architectural formats are modified by the additions of sound-blocking materials.
WHISTLES
Dr. Gavreau and his research team now carefully investigated the effects of their “infrasonic organ” at various intensity levels and pitch. Changing the spring tension on shock mounts, which held the fan motor, it was possible to change the pitch. Various infrasonic resonances were established throughout the large research building. Shutting the windows blocked most of the symptoms. When the window was again opened, however weak as the source was made, the team felt the nauseating effects once again. In the business of mili­tary research, Dr. Gavreau believed he had discovered a new and previously “unknown weapon” in these infrasounds. Aware of the natural explosives by which infrasonics are generated, Dr. Gavreau began to speculate on the ap­plication of infrasonics as a defense initiative. The haphazard explosive ef­fects of natural infrasound in thunderclaps were quite effective in demon­strating what an artificial “thunder-maker” could do. But, how could a thun­derclap be artificially generated in a compact system? These thoughts stimu­lated theoretical discussions on the possibility of producing coherent infrasound: an infrasonic “laser”.
The first devices Dr. Gavreau implemented were designed to imitate the “accident” which first made his research group aware of infrasonics. They designed real organ pipes of exceedingly great width and length. The first of these was six feet in diameter and seventy-five feet long. These designs were tested outdoors, securely propped against protective sound-absorbent walls. The investigators stood at a great distance. Two forms of these infrasonic organ pipes were built. The first utilized a drive piston, which pulsed the pipe output. The second utilized compressed air in a more conventional manner.
The main resonant frequency of these pipes occurred in the “range of death”, found to lie between three and seven cycles per second. These sounds could not be humanly heard, a distinct advantage for a defense system. The effects were felt however. The symptoms come on rapidly and unexpectedly, though the pipes were operating for a few seconds. Their pressure waves impacted against the entire body in a terrible and inescapable grip. The grip was a pressure which came in on one from all sides simultaneously, an enve­lope of death.
Next came the pain, dull infrasonic pressure against the eyes and ears. Then came a frightening manifestation on the material supports of the device itself. With sustained operation of the pipe, a sudden rumble rocked the area, nearly destroying the test building. Every pillar and joint of the massive struc­ture bolted and moved. One of the technicians managed to ignore the pain enough to shut down the power supply.
These experiments with infrasonics were as dangerous as those early investigations of nuclear energy. Dr. Gavreau and his associates were dangerously ill for nearly a day after these preliminary tests. These maladies were sustained for hours after the device was turned off. Infrasonic assaults on the body are the more lethal because they come with dreadful silence. The eye­sight of Dr. Gavreau and his fellow workers were affected for days. More dangerously were their internal organs affected: the heart, lungs, stomach, intestinal cavity were filled with continual painful spasms for an equal time period.
Musculature convulses, torques, and tears were the symptoms of infra­sonic exposure. All the resonant body cavities absorbed the self-destructive acoustic energy, and would have been torn apart had the power not been extinguished at that precise moment. The effectiveness of infrasound as a defense weapon of frightening power having been demonstrated “to satisfaction”, more questions were asked. After this dreadful accident, approaching the equipment once again was almost a fearful exercise. How powerful could the output of an infrasonic device be raised before even the operating engi­neers were affected?
With greatest caution and respect for the power with which they worked, Dr. Gavreau began recalculating all of his design parameters. He had grossly misjudged the power released by the pipes. He had, in fact, greatly lowered those calculated outputs for diagnostic purposes. Never had he imagined that these figures were actually far too great in the world of infrasound!
Empirical data being the only way to determine how infrasonic energy correlated with both biological and material effect, the tests were again attempted with a miniature power supply. First, the dimensions of these devices had to be greatly reduced. Their extreme length was objectionable. In order to provide absolutely safe control of the deadly blasts, several emergency cutoff switches were provided. These responded to the radiated infrasonic pressure wave. The intensity could be absolutely limited by use of automated barometric switches.
In an attempt to achieve more compact and controllable infrasound generators, Dr. Gavreau designed and tested special horns and “whistles” of vari­ous volumes. These were each remarkably simple flat circular resonant cavi­ties, having a side output duct. They were simply the large analogues of fog­horns and police whistles. These flat forms were volumetrically reduced in successive design stages because it was found that their output was far too great. The infrasonic foghorns could produce a frightening two kilowatts of infrasonic energy, at a pitch of one hundred fifty cycles per second.
The flat “police whistles” were more easily designed to required specifications. Their overall characteristics were quite simple to determine, a math­ematical formula being devised for the purpose. The whistle’s resonant pitch was found by dividing its diameter into a numerical constant of 51. Increas­ing the depth of the whistle effectively increased its amplitude. A whistle 1.3 meters in diameter produced an infrasonic pitch of 37 cycles per second. This form violently shook the walls of the entire laboratory complex, though its intensity was less than 2 watts infrasonic power.
DANGER
Not much amplitude is required for infrasound to produce physiological malady. Several researchers accidentally did themselves great harm when, by deliberate intent or accident, they succeeded in generating infrasonic vibrations. Tesla used vibrating platforms as an aid to vitality. He delighted in “toning the body” with vibrational platforms of his own design. Mounted on heavy rubber pads, these platforms were vibrated by simple motorized “eccentric” wheels.
Their mild use, for a minute, could be pleasantly stimulating. The effects invigorating the whole body for hours thereafter. Excessive use would produce grave illness however, excessive aggravations of the heart being the most dangerous aspect of the stimulation. The entire body “rang” for hours with an elevated heart rate and greatly stimulated blood pressure. The effects could be deadly.
In one historic instance, Samuel Clemens, Tesla’s close friend, refused to descend from the vibrating platform. Tesla was sorry he had allowed him to mount it. After repeated warnings, Tesla’s concern was drowned out by both the vibrating machine and Clemens’ jubilant exaltations and praises. Several more seconds and Clemens nearly soiled his white suit, the effects of infrasound being “duly recorded”.
Tesla often went to great lengths in describing the effects of infrasounds to newspaper reporters who, behind his back, scoffed at the notion that a “little sound” could effect such devastations. Yet, it was precisely with such a “little sound” that Tesla nearly brought down his laboratory on Houston Street. His compact infrasonic impulsers were terribly efficient. Tesla later designed and tested infrasonic impulse weapons capable of wrecking buildings and whole cities on command.
Walt Disney and his artists were once made seriously ill when a sound effect, intended for a short cartoon scene, was slowed down several times on a tape machine and amplified through a theater sound system. The original sound source was a soldering iron, whose buzzing 60-cycle tone was lowered five times to 12 cycles. This tone produced a lingering nausea in the crew, which lasted for days.
Physiology seems to remain paralyzed by infrasound. Infrasound stimu­lates middle ear disruptions, ruining organismic equilibrium. The effect is like severe and prolonged seasickness. Infrasound immobilizes its victims. Restoration to normal vitality requires several hours, or even days. Exposure to mild infrasound intensities produces illness, but increased intensities re­sult in death. Alarming responses to infrasound have been accurately recorded by military medical experts. Tolerances from 40 to 100 cycles per second have been recorded by military examiners. The results are sobering ones. As infrasonic pitches decrease, the deadly symptoms increase. Altered cardiac rhythms, with pulse rates rising to 40 percent of their rest values, are the precursors to other pre-lethal states. Mild nausea, giddiness, skin flushing, and body tingling occur at 100 cycles per second. Vertigo, anxiety, extreme fatigue, throat pressure, and respiratory dysfunction follow. Coughing, se­vere sternal pressure, choking, excessive salivation, extreme swallowing pains, inability to breathe, headache, and abdominal pain occur between 60 and 73 cycles per second. Post exposure fatigue is marked. Certain subjects contin­ued to cough for half an hour, while many continued the skin-flush manifes­tation for up to four hours.
Significant visual acuity decrements are noted when humans are exposed to infrasounds between 43 and 73 cycles per second. Intelligibility scores for persons exposed, fall to a low of 77 percent their normal scores. Spatial orientation becomes completely distorted. Muscular coordination and equilibrium falter considerably. Depressed manual dexterity and slurred speech have been noted before individuals blackout. Just before this point, a significant loss in intelligibility is noted.
The findings of Dr. Gavreau in the infrasonic range between 1 and 10 cycles per second are truly shocking. Lethal infrasonic pitch lies in the 7-cycle range. Small amplitude increases affect human behavior in this pitch range. Intellectual activity is first inhibited, blocked, and then destroyed. As the amplitude is increased, several disconcerting responses had been noted. These responses begin as complete neurological interference. The action of the medulla is physiologically blocked, its autonomic functions cease.
WATCHMEN
Infrasound clings to the ground, a phenomenon well known in the animal world. Female vocalizations and those of their young, take their traceable routes through the air. High-pitched sounds are aerial in nature. This makes females and young natural targets for predators. Low-pitched tones cling to the ground, being “guided” along the soil layers. Male vocalizations cannot be localized by predators. Male sounds “hug the ground”, diffusing out from their source. Some males rumble the ground with voice and hooves. These are communications signals, which they alone comprehend. .....
.....Such a war engine would be impossible to locate. None who saw its size would believe it to contain such a lethal power. Most would overlook the device completely. A flood of such devices, each emanating a peculiar highly modulated blend of infrasound, would be an unstoppable wall. Robotic tanks equipped with infrasonic generators could sweep an area with deadly infrasound, destroying all opponents to within a five mile radius. These ter­rible infrasonic weapons could easily be secured in drone jets, where aerial assaults could quickly and methodically waste any offensive approaching army.
Deterring would-be aerial attackers could be equally devastating for the offenders. Infrasonic beacons could sweep and scan the skies with a deadly accuracy. Infrasound passes through all matter with equal effectiveness, seek­ing out offenders with deadly consequence. The intensities which the Gavreau devices effectively broadcast into the environment are frightening. In these devices we see the perfection of phenomena, which never naturally occur in such dangerous intensities. This is why these weapons must be deployed by remote control, operating as automatons at great distances from their operators.
Weapons are made to defend, not to offend. In Gavreau’s own words: “There does not exist complete protection against infrasound. It is not ab­sorbed by ordinary matter, walls and chambers do not suffice to arrest it”. And so, once again, we stand at the crossroads. We are called, summoned to appear before two pathways. On the one, we hear Messaien and the musical messages of peace. On the other, Gavreau and the musical messages of war. And again we choose. And again we must choose. Whose music will it be?

Date: 06/06/2024

Reading time: 11 minutes, 2213 words

🪖 Military

Armenia border guard injured in mine blast in Voskepar

An Armenian border guard was injured by an explosion near the church in the village of Voskepar, Tavush Province. Sergeant Narek Gareginyan's life is not in danger, the Armenian National Security Service said.

Armenpress, A border guard was injured by a mine explosion in the Voskepar sector, Armenian serviceman injured in mine blast in Voskepar – NSS

Armenia to simplify management of military-oriented, dual-use goods

Customs authorities rely on expert opinions of accredited special organizations. Military goods cost about 12,000 drams to examine, while examination of dual-use goods costs as much as 60,000. Customs authorities must obtain permits from Defense Ministry or Economy Ministry.

ArkaAm

Three individuals suspected of online drug running detained in Yerevan

Armenia’s Investigative Committee reported detaining three individuals suspected of operating an online drug running network. The suspects used crypto for their operations, also using e-wallets, as well as bank and betting shops accounts. All three were charged with various felonies, including illegal drug trafficking, illegal sale of firearms, and money laundering.

ArkaAm

🏛️ Politics & Government

Türkiye has highest incarceration rates; Armenia shows lowest rate in South Caucasus, Council of Europe Report reveals

Armenia has the lowest incarceration rate in the South Caucasus. Georgia is 256th, Azerbaijan – 244th, while Armenia is 79th. In Europe, the number of prisoners per 100 places available grew by 2% from 31 January 2022 to 31 January 2023 (from 91.7 to 93.5 inmates)

Armenpress, Armenia among countries with lowest prison incarnation rates – Council of Europe

Armenia, Azerbaijan must approve work regulations by July 1, proceed with delimitation of other sectors - Gor Tsarukyan

Gor Tsarukyan, Director of the "Public Relations and Information Center" of the Armenian Prime Minister's Office, made these remarks during an interview with the Public Television Company. He noted that the main and primary beneficiary of the border delimitation process is the Republic of Armenia. The commission has already completed the first stage of delimitation concerning parts of four villages in the Tavush region.

Armenpress

The main work of cleaning the disaster zone has been completed

In Lori and Tavush regions, electricity supply, gas supply, and water supply have been restored to a large extent - 90 percent. Minister of Territorial Management and Infrastructure Gnel Sanosyan announced this at the June 6 session of the Government.

Armenpress, Russian partners undertaking extensive work to restore railway in disaster zone, Four pedestrian bridges built in disaster zone, car bridge under construction, Armenia: Rescue workers restore pedestrian bridge for flood-hit community

US troubled by continued arrests of members of Azerbaijani civil society – State Dept. Spokesperson

US is troubled by continued arrests of members of Azerbaijani civil society and calls for their immediate release. Farid Mehralizade was arrested for 3 months 20 days as part of the investigation.

Armenpress, U.S. “deeply troubled” by Azerbaijan's arrest of civil society members

Pashinyan will not visit Baku. the spokesperson responded to the news of the Prime Minister's participation in COP29

Azerbaijani political scientist Ahmed Shairoglu wrote in his X microblog that RA Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will participate in the COP29 forum in Baku. The PM's press secretary denied the post of the scientist, saying such a visit is not planned in PM's work agenda.

CivilNet, Armenian PM not expected to attend COP29 conference in Baku: Press Secretary responds to rumors, Pashinyan’s spokesperson denies intention to visit Baku for COP29

Proposal to create Milk Producers Union: Working discussion held in Armenian Parliament

On June 6, on the initiative of the Armenian National Assembly Standing Committee on Protection of Human Rights and Public Affairs Rustam Bakoyan proposed to create Milk Producers Union, where milk producer-provider specialists will be engaged. The proposal was accepted.

Armenpress

Armenia, Switzerland FMs address situation in Lori and Tavush following heavy floods

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Armenia Ararat Mirzoyan had a telephone conversation with Switzerland's Ignazio Cassis. The interlocutors discussed the situation in Lori and Tavush regions of Armenia following heavy floods. Issues of regional security and stability also discussed.

Armenpress, Armenian FM thanks Switzerland for quick response and support provided after heavy floods

Armenian, Indian Prime Ministers hold phone call

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan congratulates Indian PM Narendra Modi in phone call. PM and PM highlighted expansion of cooperation between Armenia and India following bilateral meeting in New York in 2019. Narendra Modi expressed support to the Republic of Armenia in connection with the floods that occurred in Lori and Tavush regions.

Armenpress, Pashinyan and Modi emphasize importance of further development of cooperation between Armenia and India, Pashinyan, Modi attach importance to further development of Armenia-India cooperation

Lithuania will provide 100,000 euros to Armenia to eliminate the consequences of the flood

Lithuania will provide humanitarian aid of 100,000 euros to Armenia to eliminate the consequences of the flood. This was stated in a post on the X microblog of the Lithuanian government: "Lithuania-Armenia solidarity in action. 4 people died as a result of floods in Tavush and Lori marzes.

CivilNet, Armenian PM thanks Lithuanian counterpart for support after heavy floods, Lithuania sending €100,000 to help Armenia fight floods consequences

Moscow has no plans to downgrade diplomatic relations with Yerevan despite discrepancies - Foreign Ministry

Russian Ambassador to Armenia Sergey Kopyrkin will soon return to Yerevan after a set of consultations in Moscow. There is no talk of breaking relations (with Armenia), Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said. Russia and Armenia are allies and strategic partners, he added.

ArkaAm

Minister: Sanitary, hygiene situation under control in flood-stricken areas

The sanitary and hygiene situation is under control in the flood-stricken areas of northeastern Armenia. Heavy rains flooded Armenia’s northeastern provinces Lori and Tavush on 25 and 26 May. So far, the death toll stands at 4, and 443 individuals have been evacuated from the flooded area.

ArkaAm

Armenia tries to reduce risk of spreading infections among livestock

Armenia seeking ways to improve management of risks of spreading possible infectious diseases among livestock. The government at a session on Thursday approved the procedure of compensation in case of grazing, destruction or forced slaughter of livestock.

ArkaAm

Armenia to acquire American software to supervise crypto transactions

The State Revenue Committee of Armenia will acquire American Chainalysis Reactor software to supervise crypto transactions. This will help combat concealment of income and money laundering, the government believes. A total of 85 million drams will be allocated to acquire the software.

ArkaAm

Government allocates over 2.4 billion drams for implementation of 22 subvention projects in Armenian communities

The Armenian government has allocated today over 2.4 bln. drams for implementation of subvention projects in the regions of the country. Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure Gnel Sanosyan says funds will be used to finance 22 projects.

ArkaAm

Lemkin Institute for Genocide Preventioncalls on UN to withdraw support forAzerbaijan ashost ofCOP29.

The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention called on the UN to withdraw support for Azerbaijan as host of COP 29. Azerbaijan is a 'genocidal state run by a president who routinely expresses genocidal ideology towards Armenians, including referring to them as dogs, jackals, and terrorists'

ArkaAm, Lemkin Institute calls on UN to withdraw support for Azerbaijan as host of COP29

5 nations elected to UN Security Council

Denmark, Greece, Pakistan, Panama and Somalia elected to 15-member U.N. Security Council. The Security Council is the only body that can make legally binding decisions. It has five permanent veto-wielding members: Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.

Armenpress

The Prime Minister sends congratulatory message to the Prime Minister of Sweden

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan sent a congratulatory message to Ulf Kristersson, Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sweden, on the occasion of the National Day. The message reads as follows, "I warmly congratulate you and the friendly people of Sweden"

Armenpress

CP received 122 million drams more in donations than the prescribed amount, violating the law

The audit continues to record problems in the annual reports of the "Civil Agreement" ; party. Earlier, we reported that the KP 2022 report received a negative conclusion. The audit also expressed reservations regarding the party's 2023 report. The process of checking the current financing of parties is entrusted to the Corruption Prevention Commission.

CivilNet

Housing provision for Artsakh residents. new program, old problems

Gevorg Tosunyan: New housing program for people forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh will start in January 2027. The goal is to provide state support for housing access to families forcibly displaced after the war unleashed by Azerbaijan on September 27, 2020, as well as after September 19, 2023. The primary prerequisite for applying to the program is acceptance of Armenian citizenship by all family members.

CivilNet

EU, Austrian Development Agency to provide €11m for Syunik

EU R2D Syunik program was presented in Yerevan on Thursday, co-financed by the European Union and the Austrian Development Agency. It is expected that a total of €11 million will be invested until 2027.

ArkaAm

Tourist visits in Armenia amounted to unprecedented 40% growth in 2023 - Tourism Committee

Over 2.3 million foreign  tourists visited Armenia in 2023, an exceptional growth in the total number of tourist visits has been registered. Most of the tourists came from Russia, Georgia, Iran, the United States, Germany, France, Ukraine, China, Belarus, as well as the United Arab Emirates. Armenia ranked 7th in the list of countries with the highest growth in tourist visits in January-September 2023.

ArkaAm

Armenia to abandon turnover tax and switch to unified tax system

Armenia to abandon turnover tax and switch to unified tax system. The Ministry of Finance claims that the turnover tax has ceased to act as a tool for business development and has turned into an ‘extraordinary favourable treatment’

ArkaAm

💵 Economy

IMF regional director about the factors for improving the forecast of Armenia's economy and its development potential

IMF Middle East and Central Asia Regional Director Thanos Arvanitis gave an exclusive interview to "ARKA" ; agency. He gave exclusive interview telling why the growth forecast of Armenia's economy was revised. For further growth of the Armenian economy, structural reforms are necessary, he said.

ArkaAm

Ties between China and Russia continue to develop - Chinese envoy

Ties between China and Russia remain stable amid turbulent international situation. Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) Tass quoted him as saying cooperation has a stable and predictable nature.

Armenpress

Armenia's construction sector grew by 13.7% to 107.8bn drams in January-April

Armenia's construction sector grew to 107.8 billion drams (in current prices) in the first four months of 2024, up 13.7% compared to the same period of 2023. At the same time, the figure stood at AMD 35.6 billion in April, up 17.8% year-on-year. State-funded construction accounted for AMD 17 billion (up 32.7%) of the total. Community-financed construction totalled about 4.5 billion (23.3% growth)

ArkaAm, Domestic trade turnover stands at 1.7 trillion AMD in Q1 2024, grows by 26.7%

Inflation of 0.3% registered in Armenia in May for the year

Consumer prices in Armenia were up 0.3% in May 2024 when opposed to the same month of 2023, the National Statistical Committee (NSC) reported. Consumer price index in the first 5 months of 2024 was down 0.8% compared to 2023.

ArkaAm

🧪 Science & Technology

First Bug Bounty contest held in Armenia (video)

The first Bug Bounty contest held in Armenia brought together more than 50 cyber security specialists. The contest's objective is to identify vulnerabilities of public sector organizations and the acba digital system. The bank is controlled by the Central Bank of Armenia.

ArkaAm, The first Bug Bounty competition was held in Armenia (VIDEO)

Zero interest loans for farmers from Acba Leasing

Acba Leasing and Zeppelin Armenia have signed a memorandum to provide agricultural machinery and equipment without interest. “Providing the latest technology is of great importance to Armenian farmers as they largely use old equipment and machinery that is ineffective in the current environment. It is time to replace all this with efficient, energy-saving and cost-effective equipment, which is one of the most important goals of this project,” says Arman Ghazaryan.

ArkaAm

Armenia's birth rate down 7.7% inJanuary-April2024

Armenia's birth rate dropped by 7.7% in January-April 2024 compared to same period in 2023. 161 cases of stillbirth were registered during the mentioned period, which is 22.9% more than in the same period of 2023. In Armenia, 9,265 people died in the reported period, 6.2% more in the first four months of 2024.

ArkaAm

🎭 Culture

Ardshinbank is the financial partner of the "Palaces of Saint Petersburg in Yerevan" international music festival

The unique international music festival "Palaces of Saint Petersburg in Yerevan" will be held from 16 to 23 June of this year. World famous music stars from Italy, Russia and Armenia will be on Armenia’s main musical venues’ scene. The festival art director, famous Russian violinist, Russian Federation Honored artist Maria Safaryants, noted in particular.

ArkaAm, Ardshinbank is the financial partner of the international music festival "Palaces of Saint Petersburg in Yerevan".

Donations to Armenia:

Himnadram
ServicemenFund
Armenian Wounded Heroes
ArmeniaFund

ugar Defender aims to provide sustained energy throughout the day and support optimal blood sugar levels. If you're seeking a genuine Sugar Defender review, you've come to the right place. This comprehensive customer review covers various aspects, including ingredients, benefits, side effects, pricing, and more.
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The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship will soon be announcing additional response measures.
Additionally, genomic sequencing of the virus that was detected at the Sioux County farm announced on May 28 was determined by the NVSL in Ames to be consistent with the variant identified in affected dairies in other states. Sequencing is not yet completed on the virus detected at a recent turkey flock in Cherokee County or this dairy in O’Brien County. Epidemiological investigations are ongoing to try to determine how the virus was introduced into the flocks and herd.
“Given the spread of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza within dairy cattle in many other states, it is not a surprise that we would have a case given the size of our dairy industry in Iowa. While lactating dairy cattle appear to recover with supportive care, we know this destructive virus continues to be deadly for poultry. Our team at the Department has been preparing for this possibility and will soon be announcing additional response steps to protect our flocks and herds,” said Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig. “Poultry producers and dairy farmers should immediately take steps to harden their biosecurity defenses, limit unnecessary visitors, and report symptomatic birds or cattle to the Department. This remains an evolving situation and we will continue to be in close communication with stakeholders, USDA, and other states as we evaluate our response. Our top priority is to protect our livestock and the farmers and people who care for them.”
About HPAI HPAI is a viral disease that affects both wild and domestic bird populations as well as lactating dairy cattle. HPAI can travel in wild birds without those birds appearing sick, but is often fatal to domestic bird populations, including chickens and turkeys. With supportive care, dairy cattle recover with little to no mortality associated with the disease.
Suspected Cases in Dairy If dairy producers suspect cases of HPAI, they should contact their herd veterinarian immediately. Possible cases must also be reported to the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship at (515) 281-5305. USDA’s federal order regulating the interstate movement of lactating dairy cattle remains in effect.
Clinical signs of HPAI in dairy may include: • Decrease in food consumption with a simultaneous decrease in rumination • Clear nasal discharge • Drop in milk production • Tacky or loose feces • Lethargy • Dehydration • Fever • Thicker, concentrated, colostrum-like milk
Heightened Biosecurity The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship is strongly encouraging Iowa poultry producers and dairy farmers to bolster their biosecurity practices and protocols to protect their flocks and herds. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship has biosecurity recommendations for dairy herds to utilize. In addition, the Department has numerous other biosecurity resources for poultry producers and livestock farms to reference on its website. Farmers or farm workers who interact regularly with both dairy and poultry or who interact frequently with other farm workers in poultry or dairy, should take extra precautions to limit possible transmissions.
Suspected Cases in Poultry If poultry producers or those with backyard birds suspect signs of HPAI, they should contact their veterinarian immediately. Possible cases must also be reported to the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship at (515) 281-5305.
Clinical signs of HPAI in birds may include: • Sudden increase in bird deaths without any clinical signs • Lethargy and/or lack of energy and appetite • Decrease in egg production • Soft, thin-shelled and/or misshapen eggs • Swelling of the head, eyelids, comb, wattles, and hocks • Purple/blue discoloration of the wattles, comb, and legs • Difficulty breathing • Coughing, sneezing, and/or nasal discharge (runny nose) • Stumbling and/or falling down • Diarrhea
Food Safety It remains safe to enjoy poultry products. As a reminder, consumers should always properly handle and cook eggs and poultry products, including cooking to an internal temperature of 165˚F. It is a longstanding practice that only milk from healthy animals may enter the food supply. There is no concern about the safety of pasteurized milk or dairy products. Pasteurization has continually proven to successfully inactivate bacteria and viruses, like influenza, in milk.
Public Health Though recent cases of HPAI were confirmed in dairy workers in Texas and Michigan, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) continues to believe the threat to the general public remains low. Any questions related to public health should be directed to the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services at alex.murphy@hhs.iowa.gov. There are no known human cases in Iowa.
Editor's Note: The original press release contained the following statement: "Final confirmatory testing is pending at the National Veterinary Services Laboratory (NVSL) in Ames." The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship received confirmation from NVSL on June 5, 2024.
About the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship Led by Secretary Mike Naig, the Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship serves the rural and urban residents that call Iowa home. Through its 14 diverse bureaus, the Department ensures animal health, food safety and consumer protection. It also promotes conservation efforts to preserve our land and enhance water quality for the next generation. Learn more at iowaagriculture.gov.
Media Contact: Don McDowell Communications Director 515-281-3375 Don.McDowell@IowaAgriculture.gov
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Asus ROG Strix B550-i AM4 ITX Motherboard, comes in white box but has all accessories as new - $185
Corsair SF850L Power Supply SFX-L 850W, brand new just missing the box comes with all cables, full size adapter and screws - $105
GSkill Trident Z RGB DDR4 RAM 2x16GB (32GB total) 3600 CL 16 - Sold
AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3D CPU - $230
Corsair XR5 280mm radiator comes with both sets of mounting screws, black - $45
2x Artic P14 PWM PST (tho one has had the PST plug removed) 140mm fans, white - $10 each
EKWB EK-Quantum Velocity Nickel Plexi CPU Block 4 pin RGB, is the AMD version but I have the bracket and backplate for LGA1700 (uses same hardware) so can be used with 13th/14th gen Intel too - Sold
8x G1/4" fittings Black SDTC fittings 10mm ID, 14mm OD hard line tubing, all but one come with spare o-ring, a little paint may have worn off a couple - $20 for all 8
4x G1/4" 90 degree M-F fittings, black - $10 for 4
Inline temp sensor G1/4" - $free with purchase of anything else
Prebent hardline tubes -$free with purchase of anything else
Bykski DDC pump and reservoir, pump housing was originally gold, was painted black, includes brackets - $50
EKWB EK-Quantum Velocity Nickel Plexi GPU Block, Zotac Trinity version but will also fit all RE cards too 3080, 3080Ti, 3090, 3090Ti, includes black back plate, comes with thermal pads already installed and some spare too - $100
EKWB EK-FC Terminal Rotary 90 degree G1/4", black - $20
SSUPD Meshlicious SFF ITX case, white full mesh with PCIe Gen4 Riser, a little worn paint around the some of screw holes, comes with all original accessories and also bonus DP1.4 and HDMI 2.1 right angle low profile dongles - $100
If anyone is interested I can also assemble the water cooling parts in the case so you have an add your own system hardline build all read to go just add motherboard, GPU, PSU, etc, can include some EK Cryofuel concentrate.
All prices are local cash, please provide zip code for shipping quotes.
Everything works perfectly and is generally less than 2 years old, with the exception of the PSU and waterblocks everything comes in original boxes/packaging with all accessories like new.
Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/JuiHRU7

Chapter One
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Prev
Dear Mage Thippily,
I write to express my gratitude for your gracious prize. I have participated in the first three tournaments; although I have yet to seize the laurels, I have acquitted myself respectably. A small following of fans now cheers my name, filling me with pride and determination. Much of this admiration is likely due to your tournament gear, which many believe could only belong to a great lord, leading them to think I am competing incognito. Among my fans is a distant relative and his niece, the fair Willhemena. They have been a great source of comfort, and I have learned much about my lineage through them.
With two more tournaments this season, including the grand harvest games in the capital, I again thank you for the prize that has afforded me this experience and for helping my seneschal manage my subjects during my absence. Wishing you good health and a prosperous season!
Logrik Logaria
Count of Pine Bluffs County
67/302 this tournament season
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Lord Logaria,
Thank you for your kind words! Your success is our success, and we toast to your victories each night at dinner. I only lament that you did not regale us with detailed accounts of each event in the tournaments. In hindsight, perhaps hiring a bard to chronicle your tale should have been part of the prize! I am fully confident you will finish in the top fifty this season, but regardless we’ll have a great feast when you return home, for the entire town!
Life in Pine Bluffs remains much the same. The bakery has introduced a new kind of sweet bun that my men and I are quite taken with. My factory finally began full production last month, and we have already shipped several loads of high-quality goods. If you see anyone in the capital wearing clothing bearing our emblem, please let me know; it would be quite thrilling! There was a disturbance last month involving pirates, but it was swiftly dealt with, and the town remains unharmed.
My cat caught a field mouse with a remarkable cranial morphology! Its skull was a full percent longer, proportionate to its body length, compared to the field mice I studied near the capital. It is possible that the field mice around Pine Bluffs are an uncataloged subspecies! I have written to several colleagues to verify this finding; although unofficial, their coloration suggests—
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
“Sir! You have visitors! It’s the dorfs, mi’lord!”
“Dorfs? Here already?” Grigory exclaimed, sitting bolt upright and lifting his quill from the sheet.
“Aye, mi’lord, five of the tradeclan are at the outer gate,” Eowin replied.
“Excellent! Seat them in the reception hall; I’ll be down shortly.”
With a practised motion, he sprinkled fine sand over the ink to blot his partially written letter. Carefully, he placed the quill back in its holder, watching the feathered end sway slightly as it settled. The man-at-arms quickly bowed and returned to his post, the jingle of his steel rings waking Professor Toe-pounce. The professor gave a wary stare from his miniature armchair, which sat directly beside Grigory's larger, but otherwise identical, chair.
The master demonologist went to the window and took a deep breath. He’d been sitting in his chamber library all day, going through some of the crates of books that he ordered and catching up on correspondence. The dorfs were already here? He’d worried he might have to wait an entire year, so their arrival at his gate a scant few weeks after he asked the smith to make the request was beyond his hopes.
So much to discuss!
He checked his shirt and vest for crumbs, brushing his hands over them anyway. He squinted at his reflection in the small wall mirror, a recent purchase. Thankfully, the imps trimmed his beard and hair every morning, so he looked as crisp and presentable as a great noble ought to. He loudly cleared his throat, finished his mug of cold tea in a single gulp, and left his chambers.
He detoured through the dining hall and saw only Taritha, sitting alone with a tea and a sweet bun.
“Where’s Stanisk?” he asked without preamble.
“He’s running drills on the roof, I think?” she said, covering her mouth as she finished her bite.
“Good! Fetch him down to the reception hall, the dorf delegation is here!” He turned and left without waiting for her reply.
He slowed his pace to a stately stride as he came to the grand door of the reception hall. With one final deep breath, he pushed open the heavy door. The five dorfs sat waiting for him; they’d managed to get up on the upholstered couches, but their legs were so short, only their ankles hung off the edge of the seat.
Dorfs were a peculiar race, distinct and captivating in their appearance. They barely reached the height of a human child, with most of their shoulders not even reaching Grigory's waist. Despite their small stature, they were robust and more heavily muscled than humans, though only weighing about a third as much. Dorfs had an even weaker affinity for magic than humans and lived significantly shorter lives. Their faces were unsettling, elongated, and rat-like. Fortunately, these features were mostly hidden beneath a living filter-mesh resembling a dense grey beard that began just below their eyes, concealing the long snouts and tiny sharp teeth Grigory academically knew they had.
Their solid black eyes, hidden beneath multiple eyelids, were unsettling.. The outermost eyelid was thick and slightly cloudy, contributing to their resemblance to ancient men with cataracts and scruffy grey beards. However, Grigory knew that due to their brief lifespans, none of them were likely older than eight or ten years.
“Good afternoon, most esteemed guests of the Anghesk Tradeclan! Welcome to my factory!”
Four of the dorfs wore matching shades of earthy brown. Their tunics and trousers were adorned with intricate patterns that mimicked the natural growth rings and textures of fungi, creating a camouflage effect that would blend seamlessly into their underground habitats. Despite their utilitarian nature, the garments featured small embellishments: braided belts, mushroom cap buttons, and occasionally, dyed fibres that added a splash of muted colour. The final dorf had his tunic highlighted with a ghostly white fibre that faintly glowed with a soft bioluminescent blue. He also wore a sash of incredibly fine chainmail, more akin to fabric than armour, which was made of many different coloured alloys.
Grigory gestured to the one he identified as their leader, “May I offer you food or drink?”
“NoThankYou,” the leader said in a slurred high-pitched hiss. Grigory had to repeat the reply to himself to even tell it was speaking Hyruxian at all.
Grigory nodded and took a seat opposite them. “I am so glad you came! How was your journey on the surface?” He had no idea what their expectations of small talk were, but he also knew the tradeclan were the hive’s diplomats, so he felt it was mainly on them to steer the talks.
“LongBright-AlwaysAHardship.SporesAndSoil!WeEndureForTheUnity!” Its speech was slippery and hard to follow, but in fairness, they had different-shaped mouths and wildly different brain structures, so that it could speak Hyruxian at all was praiseworthy.
“Ah,” Grigory replied flatly. “I assume you are interested in conducting trade with me then? I was hoping to get enough dorfsteel for a small armed force?” He hoped his optimistic smile would convey his intentions.
“YouWantCpmvvvv?” The last word sounded like an extra high-pitched chirping.
“Uh? Dorfsteel?” The demonologist’s brow furrowed.
The conversation went slowly and haltingly, as their vocabulary was far from complete, and many of his ideas and counter offers had to be painstakingly explained. The other four dorfs sat still and scarcely moved, content to let their leader do all the talking. It became clear that in their deep forges, the dorfs had countless mysterious and prized alloys, and the concept of dorfsteel was purely for the upsiders. After even more back and forth, including Grigory at one point standing up and miming swinging a sword and getting stabbed in the chest, the Tradeclan leader finally understood the specific alloy he was asking for.
Exhausted from the effort, Grigory called a short break to get some cool water and see if there were more sweet buns in the dining hall. He filled an ornate pitcher with water, rearranged the half plate of buns to look untouched, and carried it all out, with empty mugs clanking around his pinkies.
If only I had some domestic servants, he thought with a smile, knowing it was far too early to reveal his demonic ones.
He lit up at seeing Stanisk come down the stairs and commented, “Nice of you to finally join me!”
For once he wasn’t in armour, instead wearing a dark crushed velvet jacket over a pale linen shirt. He looked fresh as a daisy, clearly not coming straight from the drills.
“Yeah, lemme grab some of that from you. How’s it going in there? They fair?”
The demonologist passed the mugs and buns. “Partially? They know what I want, so it's a start.”
“What do you reckon they want?”
Grigory shrugged as he gently pushed the door open with his shoulder.
In his absence, they’d removed their wide-brimmed hats, revealing their heads. They weren’t entirely hairless, as there were some coarse long hairs sticking out, but they did nothing to cover their pink wrinkly skin. Being mostly bald made them look more like half-rat old men, even though they were none of those things.
“I have some snacks and some water; I assume bread is agreeable to your digestion?”
“SporelessIsFine,” the lead dorf agreed. Grigory was starting to understand their thick accents a little better, and was increasingly confident in what they were saying.
Grigory paused, alarmed by the scale of the faux pas he’d committed. He somehow talked with this delegation for much of the morning without introductions.
“Where are my manners! My name is Grigory, I am the mage, and this is my chief of security, Stanisk. May I ask your names?”
“CallMeZrprpTradeClanChrprpClusterAnskskHive,” the leader said in a single breath.
With a strained smile, Grigory timidly ventured, “Is Zerpzerp fine?”
“GziggrzFine?”
“Perfectly fine, Zerpzerp! So what can I offer you for this alloy you call Cpmvvvv?” Grigory slowly over pronounced the dorf word for the specific alloy of dorfsteel.
“TheHive, GloryForever, needs manythings. FirelessLights, AirPoisonWards, and WaterPoisonWards would serve the gloryOfTheHive. For this AlloyYouWant, we need special ores. WillTrade one cart of dorfsteel for two carts of TitaniferousMagnetite. NoneLeftHere. TradeShipsBring?” The words tumbled together, and the pitch was uncomfortably high, almost a sustained squeak, but Grigory nodded his understanding.
The Hive requires magic goods: lights without fire, wards against air and water poisons. In exchange for their prized alloy, they demand a rare ore. Simple enough!
“I’ll raise it with my trade advisor and see what I can do. How about regular steel? Is that something you can supply?” Grigory immediately heard himself and knew asking a dorf for regular steel was like asking a farmer for a regular plant. More back and forth and they finally got to the lowest cost alloy of steel that could be used in a product. For that, they would accept only magical goods, but the value of the goods and the metal would be pegged to market price, a more reformed barter, but a barter that Grigory felt favoured him.
“If you don’t mind me asking, apropos of nothing, are there types of magic that your people have strong feelings or laws about? I don’t want to create any misunderstandings.” Grigory asked cautiously.
The tradeclan lead dorf slowly shook his head, trying to contextualise what seemed like a silly question.“UnityHasNo Magic. UnityHasNo Laws. All for the unity. If Upsider MagicHelpsHive, it’s goodness. If MagicHurtsHive, Problems.” The last sentence carried a more aggressive tone than he’d heard so far.
“Oh! Of course! The health of your hive and unity are very important to me too! A refreshingly clear legal and moral framework too!” Grigory nodded quickly while speaking.
Nearing conclusion, the lead trade dorf held up his hand for one final point. Grigory stared in fascination at his three stubby fingers and long thumb. The entire last segment of each finger was encased in a form of a fingernail, doubtlessly an advantage for digging in softer materials. “OneMoreAsk, MgGziggrz.”
“Oh? By all means!” The mage said, utterly fascinated by the creatures.
“StoneOfLime underfeet. StoneofLime needed in all alloys, veryscarce homeveins, Wouldmine underfactory, payGziggrz?”
Finally, they overlapped with Grigory’s tenuous understanding of metallurgy. “Of course! Lime is a critical flux agent! By all means. But instead of paying, how about a team of Digclan dorfs spend a fraction of their time quarrying stone for my building projects? I’ll even calcine the limestone into lime before we send it up the mountain to you!” A dozen things ran through the mage's mind at once, and this seemed like a sublimely good deal.
The little dorfs spoke amongst themselves in their even higher-pitched native language and nearly immediately turned back to Grigory.
“AnskskHive WillSendFiftyLifeBond DigClanDorfs. SomeQuarry for Gziggrz, someQuarry For GloryOfUnity. DigclanBossDorf WillCommand ClanDorfs. OneTradeclanLifeBond WillCommand DigclanBoss. Gziggrz OnlyTalkTo TradeclanDorf. Gziggrz FeedsAll.”
“Certainly! That’s amenable to me. You may send the dorfs any time! I would need some specifics about their care and diet though?”
For a while longer, they discussed the specifics and refined the wording, while one of the other dorfs wrote up a simple contract, only two pages long outlining exactly what both sides were committed to in the agreement, thankfully all in Hyruxian.
The mage looked it over, made some minor amendments for clarity, and both sides signed at the bottom. With effort, the dorfs wiggled off the couches and each shook the mage's hand. Their hands were soft and dry, but slightly crinkly, reminding the mage of warm parchment. They went to shake Stanisk’s hand, and he crouched low on his heels to be more accessible. Grigory worried about it causing offense, but they seemed as fascinated with the mighty warrior as he was with them. Finally, they put their wide hats back on and walked back out the door in their shuffling gait.
Stanisk let out a long sigh. “You could understand them?”
“Yes, other than the actual words in their language. I was impressed they could speak our language as well as they did, all things considered. It does make Aethlina’s mastery of our language and rhetoric all the more impressive.”
“She looks better too!” The soldier snatched a bun off the plate. After chewing a bite he asked, “So did you just buy fifty dorf slaves at the end, because it sounded like you did?”
“Oh no, of course not, it was either fifty-one or fifty-two. I don’t know which category the Digclan boss will fall into,” Grigory said with a cheeky grin. It was a sure sign he was being at least somewhat misleading.
“That’s awful, the law is pretty clear about slaves! And that’s a law I agree with! Seriously, what’s the lifebond bit?”
Grigory’s tone shifted from conversational to expository, a wholly involuntary shift that he noticed but was mostly helpless to stop. “Dorf society is eusocial; they live exclusively for the good of the hive. There is no need or desire that can ever compete with their dedication to the hive. Sometimes the hive is best served by them aiding an ally or working at a remote site. To facilitate this, they perform a ritual where a non-hive entity’s goals are integrated into the hive’s priorities. So, while you and I or the company will not matter to them, fulfilling the details of this contract is considered a direct service to the hive. They are bound to this duty for the rest of their lives. We translate this as a lifebond. In their language, though, there are many additional roots and nuances to their term for the arrangement.”
“Alright. So slavery with a ritual? How're they not slaves? Do we'se pay 'em?”
Grigory shrugged, “No collars or whips? Definitely unpaid, or more accurately we pay the hive, and the hive provides their reason for living? The door will be open and none will leave. Probably? I guess they can.” Another shrug, his knowledge was mostly theoretical until today. “Some dorfs get permission to journey through foreign lands alone, and others just leave. I think it’s akin to abandoning your family, but very much stronger? I’ve read that it happens from time to time. They’ll send us a fresh one if we get a leaver; I added that wording to the contract. Or if one dies in the first year.”
“That ain’t remotely my problem with this!” Stanisk rubbed his forehead. “So they'se slaves by choice, and that’s okay?”
The mage paused in thought, carefully considering his position and words. “It’s more nuanced than that. They are doing what they want, and I am facilitating it. I am also economically benefiting from it, but my economic benefit will be used to improve our security, and eventually improve the quality of life for a great many people. Reduced to inputs and outputs; they do what makes them happy, resulting in other people being safer and happier.”
The chief scowled. “Put like that, yeah, but as an annoying mage told me a few times, people ain’t numbers! They'se still work in a mine all day 'til they die, so you'se get some stone and iron.”
Grigory raised his quibbling finger; “We’ll be paying for the steel, these labourers are primarily here for limestone for their own uses, I just collect some of their discarded stone to help defend the town. Obviously, we'll make their lives as comfortable as possible, as honoured guests. Have you considered their quality of life might increase as a result of this deal, and with the lime, presumably so will the health of their hive.”
“Ach, I knew better than to start this kind of talk with you! Still, it doesn’t sit right. These fellas will just do something, because it was writ in their minds somehow?” Stanisk was frustrated but lacked the words to articulate the specifics.
“Isn’t it fascinating? Some species of dog are predisposed to cheerfulness, squirrels to watchfulness, and here we have a whole sentient species predisposed to absolute selflessness!” Grigory said excitedly. In a more measured tone he justified further, “If we conceded that all forms of unpaid work are slavery, which I do not, then they would be technically slaves to the hive, not me or our company.”
“How can they have minds, but there’s thoughts they can’t think, or gotta think? That would be nuts. Could you imagine if people were like that?” Stanisk said, valiantly sallying out one more time.
“Ehh, if by people, you mean humans, I disagree. I don’t think you have to go far to find humans that have predispositions they can’t control, that cause them to ignore even compelling alternatives. We just call them personalities, or cultures as it affects a whole population. For the most part, no one gets to choose their own personality or upbringing.”
“Nah, I don’t like that one bit. My mind’s my own. I think whatever I want. Or not think!” Stanisk crossed his arms defiantly, his biceps straining the sleeves of his jacket.
“At no point in your military career did you run into someone that prized an abstraction like Nation or Emperor or Victory above their own life? What about killing Aethlina in cold blood? Or never think about gravy again, even while eating overcooked roast?” Grigory gently challenged.
“What?! That’s not–”
“Not a thought you are capable of thinking or not thinking, respectively? Bite off your own fingers, I’m sure you have the jaw strength. I’ll reattach them. We live in infuriatingly narrow canyons of our own minds, and I’m intensely glad I could finally make someone else see it!” Grigory accidentally taunted, gleefully spreading his more thinky problems, at long last.
Stanisk examined his thick calloused fingers before shaking his head. “You’re wrong, I just need some time to think through why. How does this apply to them dorfs? Do they all think the same things? Do these lifebonders even get to leave and start a family?” The big soldier dropped his half-eaten bun onto the plate, appetite lost.
“Nah, they’re drones, entirely sterile. All sisters, maybe cousins?” Grigory said dismissively as he stood. “I’ll explain their royalty to you another time. I need to get a move on if I’m to catch up with Aethlina. I really would like to see if she knows where I can find this titaniferous magnetite they wanted.”
“Hold up, you can’t just go! I make my own choices! Right! RIGHT?” Stanisk rose to his feet, his mouth a hard, intense line.
“Unproven, and likely unprovable! I’ll try to be back for dinner, so we’ll eat together or not. Based on an unbroken string of events that began before the first mountains formed!” Grigory’s cheeky grin had somehow grown wider yet.
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Just received a quote for some work on a townhome in the greater DC area and was hoping for some input. This is for a 2012 townhome in great condition we just purchased and would like to redo the floors. I had similar work done in the midwest 4 years ago for around half the cost of this quote.... but I know geography is different and post covid all prices have changed. Would appreciate a sanity check on these estimates to know if they're par for the course or not. It's coming to $15.6/sq ft with labor costs included.... Thank you in advance!
~First Floor - Approximately 970 sq. ft.:~

• Sand existing hardwood floor
• Apply stain
• Apply one coat sealer
• Apply two coats commercial water base finish
• Supply and install Soctia shoe molding

Labor and Material: $6270.00
~Second Floor - Approximately 790 sq. ft.:~

• Remove and dispose of existing carpet, pad, and tacklers
• Supply and deliver 860 sq. ft. of red oak select or better, 2 ¼” X ¾”
• Install new hardwood
• Apply stain
• Apply one coat sealer
• Apply two coats commercial water base finish
• Supply and install Soctia shoe molding

Labor and Material: $12,350.00
~Additional Optional Work:~

• Screw Down Sub-Floors: $1.00 / per sq. ft.

Squeaky Floors are from loose subfloors. We will inspect subfloors for loose panels and give a recommendation.
~13 Steps and 1 Landing - First to Second Floor:~

• Remove and dispose of existing runner
• Supply, deliver, and install Qty: 16 risers (veneers)
• Supply and install scotia molding between steps and risers
• Sand, stain, and finish new risers
• Sand, stain, and refinish existing steps and landing
• Install new shoe molding on landing

Labor and Material: $2,080.00
~13 Steps and 1 Landing - First to Basement:~

• Remove and dispose of existing carpet
• Supply, deliver Qty: 13 steps, Qty:15 risers, Qty: 2 stair nosing
• Landing: supply, deliver and install approx.12ft red oak select or better, 2 ¼” X ¾”
• Supply and install scotia molding between steps and risers
• Sand, stain, and finish new risers, steps, and landing
• Install new shoe molding on landing

Labor and Material: $3315.00

On one of my zones I have 4 3500s and 3 rvan14s. I know it should really be two zones, but I don't think I want that kind of project. The 3 rvan 14s is for a small L section of grass that is probably no bigger than 10x6. So yeah the rvan 14 is adjusted to throw 6 to 10 feet, which is not ideal.
When we moved in there was fixed sprays there and i switched them to rvan as this way my first experience with irrigation system and it seemed to me like that area was getting too much water and the precipitation rates seemed to match between 3500s and rvans.
I installed the rvans last year and they never seemed to work right. This year I flushed them all and found they had a lot of rocks in the lines. So now the water pressure is right on them but I think they are still broken as I can't adjust the arc on all of them. But I can adjust the throw distance.
I've been reading up and it seems these nozzles are not very good. It sounds like they are also sensitive to water pressure. I bought 1804-SAMs for them but I guess I should of gone with PRS versions. A plumber measured my water pressure at 110 and recommended I get a pressure regulator for the house to reduce the pressure. But I think that will not affect the line to the sprinkler system.
So anyhow, how should I approach this problem? Is there a way for me to fix the rvans arc adjustment? When I turn the ring for arc adjustment, I don't feel any pressure, it just turns easily. Does that mean something broke off? Or is it because of the high water pressure that the adjustment isnt going to work? All my zones, will have this high pressure, so I can't really put the nozzle somewhere else and adjust it.
Should I look into getting a pressure regulator for my sprinkler system? Or start replacing all the brand new sprinklers I got last year with PRS versions?
Should I replace the rvan14s with the hunter mpr versions? Hopefully I can use the 1800 bodies for that and just need to replace the nozzle?
On an unrelated question, is there a way to connect a small hose/funny pipe to an 1800 riser so that I can control the direction of the water when flushing the system? I have one of those orange flush nozzles, but havent tried it because that area is surrounded by things I dont want to get wet.

From what I can gather, If you Google or ask why you want or need these devices you will get a generic and trite response “to prevent contamination”. The rest of the story seems to be it’s not contamination from normal use. It’s when you winterize your system. The town next to me had an ecoli in the water supply because they did not do the back flow testing and winterized their sprinklers. Using air, the individual(s) pushed bacteria back into the water supply. It seems to me that particular case could have been prevented with a shutoff valve. 🤷‍♂️

First
Lori sat next to her designated ward. Having been the one looking after the VIP when they had jettisoned off ship and subsequently been towed to the Titan 7, she had been asked to stay with her until Miss Vali's team could compile enough data on the VIP's condition to feel safe administering the U.S.A.'s personal nanites. When she had asked the healer's with the red "+" why they needed her to stay with the young Orion woman, one of them had answered, "We wouldn't want her to wake up surrounded by 'aliens' she wasn't familiar with. Your the same species as her, so hopefully she won't panic if she recovers enough to regain consciousness." Which had made perfect sense to Lori. So they had assigned the VIP to the bunk under her and moved them both closer to the medical bay.
Three days had passed since they had come to the Sol system. Her group of refugees had been informed at dinner the night prior that Mars Station had agreed to house any Orion's that wished to stay there until the Habitat Dome had been moved into a orbit and anchored to an astroid and retrofitted to her people's 7.1 G's and oxygen levels appropriate for her species. They had all been astonished that in less than a galactic week multiple organizations, businesses, and corporations seemed to jump at the opportunity to help her people. They weren't naive, they knew that those companies and organizations were getting something in return but it was help when they needed it the most and that meant a lot to the Orion's. And whatever a "tax break" was Lori was extremely glad it was apparently important. Of course there was average people that wanted to help to. She immediately thought about Tim, and her eyes flicked to his "jacket" was tossed over her open locker door. His smell was almost intoxicating to her and she couldn't figure out why.
She had gotten chilly the second night when after dinner in the mess hall he had asked her if she wanted to see something amazing. She had been hesitant, but after thinking about it, she had decided it would be nice to see more of the massive ship she had seen so little of. So after some talking Tim had managed to secure permission to escort her to view some of the bottom levels. The Titan 7 was a truly massive ship and she had gotten to see and interact with many of the U.S. Alliance species as they made their way through those bottom levels. And then he had opened a door to a jungle! She was amazed to find living plants in such an abundance on a ship in space. Tim had called it an Astrobotony Lab. It didn't look like any lab Lori had ever seen, more like a garden or a lush park! The sprinklers had decided it was time to give the plants near them a mist and she had found herself shivering from the cool damp air. Without hesitating he had pulled his jacket off and placed it around her shoulders. Her ears twitched at the delightful memory.
She hadn't slept after she returned to her room. Instead her interaction with Tim had sparked even more curiosity as to who these people were. And the drive to find out had caused her to search her data chit for human history and had found multiple documentaries about everything from the ancient era where humans killed each other with stick's and stones to their two world wars in their twentieth century. The colonizing of Earth's moon and Mars through their teriforming age that saw Proxima Centauri B, the Cerberus systems, and many many others slowly changed into simi earth like planets. Then the Colony wars had fractured the humans into multiple sects and nations and for nearly fifty cycles the entirety of human territory fought amongst themselves. This would end with the eventual formation of two fractions.
The Confederation of Unified Governments (CUG) and the Free People's Republic of Earth (FPRE). They both controlled roughly half the human systems and though they never technically went to war a technological competition began. During the next twenty cycles they would develop numerous groundbreaking technology including the personal nanites everyone receives upon entering Sol systems and their "Blink Drive" which she found out doesn't use FTL Gates! The humans only had Gates so everyone else could trade with them. They didn't need them to travel.... anywhere, any distance, they just had to KNOW where to go, type the coordinates in and they FOLDED space and blinked to the location! Of course a human ship had to have visited that location prior for the system to work and that still required the old fashioned long haul exploration voyages. Everything was looking pretty good for humanity and then a race of giant lizard people called the Gurgaxians had invaded the CUG's outer frontier colonies and began moving closer to the CUG'S inner more populated planets. The Gurgaxians, in a rash decision by the general in charge of the invasion, ordered all the humans to be "put to the knife " and the images the documentary showed caught by a passing FPRE spy satellite made her blood run cold and she had been glad she had "accidentally" kept Tim's jacket. She still shivered seeing the brutality of millions of innocent civilians being butchered en mass.
The Gurgaxians were nearly exterminated, and that was the words the documentary had used! The humans found a way to change the very air into a weapon by releasing a compound in the upper atmosphere. This caused the air on those planets to become deadly to anything NOT human. But, the humans didn't stop there! Once they had taken the systems captured by the Gurgaxians, the humans had struck hard, and fast into the very core systems and managed to glass the seven largest planets killing hundreds of billions. A monument still floats in the void where Carinaxx 3 once orbited it's sun. Once the Gurgaxians were defeated a short war called the Unification War was lost by both the CUG and FPRE as the United Sol Alliance was formed in the vacuum left by both sides effectively imploding.
And a good thing too, because the next species the humans had ran into, the Jabilix, where being forced out of their systems by another aggressive species called the Daks. Though both species where reptilian the Daks could easily physically reach 5 feet 10 inches while a Jabilix only averaged about 1.5 feet. The humans NOT wanting to get dragged into another war refused to step in personally, opting to wage a proxy war through the varying "Clutches" that the Jabilix organized themselves in. This is were Lori learned about the humans having a "pack" mentality. Over the next three cycles they would grow very fond of the small Jabilix people. Mostly in part for the sheer determination they had to find and implement a way to defeat the Daks and reclaim their cradle world. Eventually the humans picked up strange messages coming from the Dak fleet's. Something was happening, a human trained Jabilix kill team had eliminated the Dak emperor and ALL of his family that favored staying at war with the Jabilix people. And while the Dak military was busy trying to figure out who of the 5 remaining children of the emperor would succeed him a fleet of Jabilix Missile Frigates entered the Dark home system and sent one message. "Surrender or we will crack Daccall". (Daccall being the Daks cradle world.)
And so the Jabilix won the war thanks to the humans support and within two cycles had approached the humans to fully join with the U.S. Alliance, bringing the Dak in as well only a cycle later.
A couple more species joined through the next fifty cycles, some were conquered like the Lillgars, (bipedal, 4 armed, winged herbivores that average 3 feet 9 inches and weigh roughly 60 lbs and look roughly like a large fruit bat from earth), the Kiklatts, (insectoids herbivores averaging a little over 4 feet and roughly 105 lbs with two sets of pincers and a set of "manipulators" consisting of 2 fingers and a thumb, and grew their ship's from"space bugs". Apparently after these bug's died of natural causes they used them as the "hulls" for a thriving merchant fleet). To the Voidonny, (bipedal omnivores averaging around 3 feet tall, the documentary described them as looking like a small human teddy bear with black curly furry) who's home planet had been stripped of its atmosphere in a massive soler flare. And their was the Vouls, (octopoid averaging 5.5 feet and roughly 200 lbs that look roughly like humans with four dominant arms and 2 brains that make some of the best pilots galaxy over) was effected by a plague and ostracized from the wider community after it was feared to have hopped species. It hadn't, but the damage had been done, no one would help them and they were slowly dying until the U.S.Alliance ship had disregarded the quarantine ban and took as much medical supplies it could carry in. The ship is still used as a hospital on Vul and to this day the Voul regard humanity and the United Sol Alliance as the saviors of their species. The Voul left the Starlight Imperium they had been a long time member of and joined with the U.S. Alliance petitioning and receiving entry after only a galactic month. (The documentary pointed out that the U.S. Alliance had expected this and so the Senate in one of the rare times of it actually doing something, ordered the Navy to position U.S. fleet's near all three FTL Gates in the Voul system before this time, allowing them to safely withdraw their own Voul ships from the Imperium's fleet's and back home safely behind the U.S. fleet's protective screening). Many experts believe this stopped a war with the Imperium before it could start.
There were several more minor wars, and then the Omega Crisis happened. This was the last major war the U.S. Alliance had fought. And it absolutely intrigued her because it had to do with the Elladrin.
The conflict had lasted twenty two cycles and had spanned multiple planets and systems many of which still belonged to the Elladrin. A race of biological AI that had accidentally been created by a Dr Ella Drin. The poor Dr had become the first victim of the evolving AI Personal Assistant Bot that had become self aware. No one knows how it happened, wether it was a personal project Dr Ella was working on or a random fluke that put a random 0 in just the right spot is still debated even among the Elladrin. What is known is that this AI quickly figured out how to recreate other AI but found itself still unable to create unique personalities for them. Instead every AI it created came out like an exact copy of itself. And to the AI this was a failure. It fairly quickly came to the conclusion that if "it" wanted to become "they" it would have to find a way to reproduce like the humans it was built to serve.
The AI released a savage virus that overwrote the command protocol tree built into all PAB's, and linked them all into a sort of "hive mind" known as the"First". Wether this was the actual first AI or something that evolved from it and Dr Ella was never known and the Elladrin are strangely quiet about it, even now they avoided the subject. The U.S. Alliance had eventually fought the AI to a stalemate. This continued for the last three years of the war, the U.S. Alliance would finally manage to break through at a place called the Naball Power Core. The U.S. Alliance failed to take advantage of the situation fully as the AI pulled back unexpectedly, stopping fighting on every front almost simultaneously. Fearing a trap, the U.S. Alliance failed to capitalize on this lul in the war, and two galactic weeks later a small diplomatic vessel had appeared just outside Sol outer system limits and requested diplomatic dialogue with their "fellow Sapients."
That was only three cycles ago! She couldn't help but be amazed at these people. She had seen the Elladrin and the other species of the U.S. Alliance interact with absolutely no animosity between them. After a brutal war that had killed hundreds of billions of sentient lives and they could move past it "for the betterment of all sentients" was how the documentary had put it. She could still remember the pain in Miss Vali's red eyes when Lori had asked her about it.
She had thought for a moment before replying, "Sometimes siblings will disagree with each other. Sometimes they fight amongst themselves. But no matter what, they are still siblings. My forbearer AI combined their DNA to finally create us Elladrin. ALL nine species of them. While we can't give back what our predecessor AI harvested during their quest to complete us, we can do our best to prevent any more of our siblings from coming to harm. That is why so many of my people have become Dr's and Xinobiologists."
And so she was sitting on her bunk scrolling through the most recent news feeds she could find when she heard something like a whimper. Quickly she hopped off her bunk to check on the VIP and seen her eyes flutter open slightly, Lori rushed to the rooms console and hurriedly pressed the image of Miss Vali.
"Yes, this is Vali Fuija." Answered the tinkling bell like voice of Miss Vali.
"Uhhh, this is Lori, you said call you if the VIP's condition changed. Well I think she's waking up." She looked back over at the woman.
"Keep her calm, we're on our way." Was all she said and the screen blinked to the Sol insignia.
Lori ducked her head back under the bunk, intent on doing exactly what Miss Vali had asked when she froze. The VIP's eye's were fully open now and they weren't golden like all the other Orion's, nope they were the bright green of the ruling families bloodline. She immediately dropped to one knee next to the bed as was proper for her commoner status in the presence of this woman, Lori did note she wasn't much older than herself so she couldn't be the Regent. But those eyes definitely placed her within the ruling family. They alone had green eyes, it was unique to their family and a genetic trait not shared by any other Orion's.
"Whh." her voice was dry and crackly from not being used for days the woman was having trouble getting anything out. She swallowed hard and tried again, "Wwwhere am I?" she managed.
"We're safe my Lady, please stay calm. Here take a drink." Lori took the glass of water sitting near the bed and gently lowered it so the woman could get a drink. She started slow at first but quickly downed the glasses contents and coughed some as everything moistened up again. "What's the last thing you remember?"
"I remember I was visiting my aunt in the Capitol when something had hit the palace. I was grabbed by the Regents Guard and along with my aunt and her son and daughter rushed onto a ship I think was called the Regents Pride. I remember an explosion. Someone grabbed me and...and...that's all I remember."
"What's your name my lady?" Lori asked, worry beginning to creep into her voice.
"Tarra," she started to sit up and Lori helped her. "What is this place, it doesn't look like anywhere I visited on the Regents Pride?"
"The ship is the Titan 7." Lori sighed, and began to tell her everything that had happened since she had lost consciousness. "Nobody would help us except the United Sol Alliance, we traveled past at least 7 allied systems and not a single one of them would allow us entry. The Great Admiral seeing our warp bubble collapsing around us ordered a distress signal sent in advance of our arrival at the FTL gate. The Sol system gate keeper recognized the distress signal for what it was and allowed our ship's through the gate even though we were under fire from the Varille. The gate keeper then destroyed the Varille battleship in the gate. We lost the Claw, and had to abandon the Regents Pride."
"What of my aunt?" Tarra asked.
Lori was silent for a moment before she took Tarra's hand gently. "No one can find her, as far as we know you are the only remaining member of the Kaji family, my Lady."
Tarra let out a heart wrenching wail and utterly broke down. She grabbed Lori in a hug. still kneeling, Lori tried her best to comfort her. And felt a profound sense of relief when she saw the door slid open and Miss Vali standing just outside holding a data chit and a scanner.

FIRST
Lori sat next to her designated ward. Having been the one looking after the VIP when they had jettisoned off ship and subsequently been towed to the Titan 7, she had been asked to stay with her until Miss Vali's team could compile enough data on the VIP's condition to feel safe administering the U.S.A.'s personal nanites. When she had asked the healer's with the red "+" why they needed her to stay with the young Orion woman, one of them had answered, "We wouldn't want her to wake up surrounded by 'aliens' she wasn't familiar with. Your the same species as her, so hopefully she won't panic if she recovers enough to regain consciousness." Which had made perfect sense to Lori. So they had assigned the VIP to the bunk under her and moved them both closer to the medical bay.
Three days had passed since they had come to the Sol system. Her group of refugees had been informed at dinner the night prior that Mars Station had agreed to house any Orion's that wished to stay there until the Habitat Dome had been moved into a orbit and anchored to an astroid and retrofitted to her people's 7.1 G's and oxygen levels appropriate for her species. They had all been astonished that in less than a galactic week multiple organizations, businesses, and corporations seemed to jump at the opportunity to help her people. They weren't naive, they knew that those companies and organizations were getting something in return but it was help when they needed it the most and that meant a lot to the Orion's. And whatever a "tax break" was Lori was extremely glad it was apparently important. Of course there was average people that wanted to help to. She immediately thought about Tim, and her eyes flicked to his "jacket" was tossed over her open locker door. His smell was almost intoxicating to her and she couldn't figure out why.
She had gotten chilly the second night when after dinner in the mess hall he had asked her if she wanted to see something amazing. She had been hesitant, but after thinking about it, she had decided it would be nice to see more of the massive ship she had seen so little of. So after some talking Tim had managed to secure permission to escort her to view some of the bottom levels. The Titan 7 was a truly massive ship and she had gotten to see and interact with many of the U.S. Alliance species as they made their way through those bottom levels. And then he had opened a door to a jungle! She was amazed to find living plants in such an abundance on a ship in space. Tim had called it an Astrobotony Lab. It didn't look like any lab Lori had ever seen, more like a garden or a lush park! The sprinklers had decided it was time to give the plants near them a mist and she had found herself shivering from the cool damp air. Without hesitating he had pulled his jacket off and placed it around her shoulders. Her ears twitched at the delightful memory.
She hadn't slept after she returned to her room. Instead her interaction with Tim had sparked even more curiosity as to who these people were. And the drive to find out had caused her to search her data chit for human history and had found multiple documentaries about everything from the ancient era where humans killed each other with stick's and stones to their two world wars in their twentieth century. The colonizing of Earth's moon and Mars through their teriforming age that saw Proxima Centauri B, the Cerberus systems, and many many others slowly changed into simi earth like planets. Then the Colony wars had fractured the humans into multiple sects and nations and for nearly fifty cycles the entirety of human territory fought amongst themselves. This would end with the eventual formation of two fractions.
The Confederation of Unified Governments (CUG) and the Free People's Republic of Earth (FPRE). They both controlled roughly half the human systems and though they never technically went to war a technological competition began. During the next twenty cycles they would develop numerous groundbreaking technology's including the personal nanites everyone receives upon entering Sol systems and their "Blink Drive" which she found out doesn't use FTL Gates! The humans only had Gates so everyone else could trade with them. They didn't need them to travel.... anywhere, any distance, they just had to KNOW where to go, type the coordinates in and they FOLDED space and blinked to the location! Of course a human ship had to have visited that location prior for the system to work and that still required the old fashioned long haul exploration voyages. Everything was looking pretty good for humanity and then a race of giant lizard people called the Gurgaxians had invaded the CUG's outer frontier colonies and began moving closer to the CUG'S inner more populated planets. The Gurgaxians, in a rash decision by the general in charge of the invasion, ordered all the humans to be "put to the knife " and the images the documentary showed caught by a passing FPRE spy satellite made her blood run cold and she had been glad she had "accidentally" kept Tim's jacket. She still shivered seeing the brutality of millions of innocent civilians being butchered en mass.
The Gurgaxians were nearly exterminated, and that was the words the documentary had used! The humans found a way to change the very air into a weapon by releasing a compound in the upper atmosphere. This caused the air on those planets to become deadly to anything NOT human. But, the humans didn't stop there! Once they had taken the systems captured by the Gurgaxians, the humans had struck hard, and fast into the very core systems and managed to glass the seven largest planets killing hundreds of billions. A monument still floats in the void where Carinaxx 3 once orbited it's sun. Once the Gurgaxians were defeated a short war called the Unification War was lost by both the CUG and FPRE as the United Sol Alliance was formed in the vacuum left by both sides effectively imploding.
And a good thing too, because the next species the humans had ran into, the Jabilix, where being forced out of their systems by another aggressive species called the Daks. Though both species where reptilian the Daks could easily physically reach 5 feet 10 inches while a Jabilix only averaged about 1.5 feet. The humans NOT wanting to get dragged into another war refused to step in personally, opting to wage a proxy war through the varying "Clutches" that the Jabilix organized themselves in. This is were Lori learned about the humans having a "pack" mentality. Over the next three cycles they would grow very fond of the small Jabilix people. Mostly in part for the sheer determination they had to find and implement a way to defeat the Daks and reclaim their cradle world. Eventually the humans picked up strange messages coming from the Dak fleet's. Something was happening, a human trained Jabilix kill team had eliminated the Dak emperor and ALL of his family that favored staying at war with the Jabilix people. And while the Dak military was busy trying to figure out who of the 5 remaining children of the emperor would succeed him a fleet of Jabilix Missile Frigates entered the Dak home system and sent one message. "Surrender or we will crack Daccall". (Daccall being the Daks cradle world.)
And so the Jabilix won the war thanks to the humans support and within two cycles had approached the humans to fully join with the U.S. Alliance, bringing the Dak in as well only a cycle later.
A couple more species joined through the next fifty cycles, some were conquered like the Lillgars, (bipedal, 4 armed, winged herbivores that average 3 feet 9 inches and weigh roughly 60 lbs and look roughly like a large fruit bat from earth), the Kiklatts, (insectoid herbivores averaging a little over 4 feet and roughly 105 lbs with two sets of pincers and a set of "manipulators" consisting of 2 fingers and a thumb, and grew their ship's from"giant space bugs". Apparently after these bug's died of natural causes they used them as the "hulls" for a thriving merchant fleet). To the Voidonny, (bipedal omnivores averaging around 3 feet tall, the documentary described them as looking like a small human teddy bear with black curly fur) who's home planet had been stripped of its atmosphere in a massive soler flare. And their was the Vouls, (octopoid averaging 5.5 feet and roughly 200 lbs that look roughly like humans with four dominant arms and 2 brains that make some of the best pilots galaxy over) was effected by a plague and ostracized from the wider community after it was feared to have hopped species. It hadn't, but the damage had been done, no one would help them and they were slowly dying until the U.S.Alliance ship had disregarded the quarantine ban and took as much medical supplies it could carry in. The ship is still used as a hospital on Vul (the Voul cradle world), and to this day the Voul regard humanity and the United Sol Alliance as the saviors of their species. The Voul left the Starlight Imperium they had been a long time member of and joined with the U.S. Alliance petitioning and receiving entry after only a galactic month. (The documentary pointed out that the U.S. Alliance had expected this and so the Senate in one of the rare times of it actually doing something, ordered the Navy to position U.S. fleet's near all three FTL Gates in the Voul system before this time, allowing them to safely withdraw their own Voul ships from the Imperium's fleet's and back home safely behind the U.S. fleet's protective screening). Many experts believe this stopped a war with the Imperium before it could start.
There were several more minor wars, and then the Omega Crisis happened. This was the last major war the U.S. Alliance had fought. And it absolutely intrigued her because it had to do with the Elladrin.
The conflict had lasted twenty two cycles and had spanned multiple planets and systems many of which still belonged to the Elladrin. A race of biological AI that had accidentally been created by a Dr Ella Drin. The poor Dr had become the first victim of the evolving AI Personal Assistant Bot that had become self aware. No one knows how it happened, wether it was a personal project Dr Ella was working on or a random fluke that put a random 0 in just the right spot is still debated even among the Elladrin. What is known is that this AI quickly figured out how to recreate other AI but found itself still unable to create unique personalities for them. Instead every AI it created came out like an exact copy of itself. And to the AI this was a failure. It fairly quickly came to the conclusion that if "it" wanted to become "they" it would have to find a way to reproduce like the humans it was built to serve.
The AI released a savage virus that overwrote the command protocol tree built into all PAB's, and linked them all into a sort of "hive mind" known as the"First". Wether this was the actual first AI or something that evolved from it and Dr Ella was never known and the Elladrin are strangely quiet about it, even now they avoided the subject. The U.S. Alliance had eventually fought the AI to a stalemate. This continued for the last three years of the war, the U.S. Alliance would finally manage to break through at a place called the Naball Power Core. The U.S. Alliance failed to take advantage of the situation fully as the AI pulled back unexpectedly, stopping fighting on every front almost simultaneously. Fearing a trap, the U.S. Alliance failed to capitalize on this lul in the war, and two galactic weeks later a small diplomatic vessel had appeared just outside Sol outer system limits and requested diplomatic dialogue with their "fellow Sapients."
That was only three cycles ago! She couldn't help but be amazed at these people. She had seen the Elladrin and the other species of the U.S. Alliance interact with absolutely no animosity between them. After a brutal war that had killed hundreds of billions of sentient lives and they could move past it "for the betterment of all sentients" was how the documentary had put it. She could still remember the pain in Miss Vali's red eyes when Lori had asked her about it.
She had thought for a moment before replying, "Sometimes siblings will disagree with each other. Sometimes they fight amongst themselves. But no matter what, they are still siblings. My forbearer AI combined their DNA to finally create us Elladrin. ALL nine species of them. While we can't give back what our predecessor AI harvested during their quest to complete us, we can do our best to prevent any more of our siblings from coming to harm. That is why so many of my people have become Dr's and Xinobiologists."
And so she was sitting on her bunk scrolling through the most recent news feeds she could find when she heard something like a whimper. Quickly she hopped off her bunk to check on the VIP and seen her eyes flutter open slightly, Lori rushed to the rooms console and hurriedly pressed the image of Miss Vali.
"Yes, this is Dr Vali Fuija." Answered the tinkling bell like voice of Miss Vali.
"Uhhh, this is Lori, you said call you if the VIP's condition changed. Well I think she's waking up." She looked back over at the woman.
"Keep her calm, we're on our way." Was all she said and the screen blinked to the Sol insignia.
Lori ducked her head back under the bunk, intent on doing exactly what Miss Vali had asked when she froze. The VIP's eye's were fully open now and they weren't golden like all the other Orion's, nope they were the bright green of the ruling families bloodline. She immediately dropped to one knee next to the bed as was proper for her commoner status in the presence of this woman, Lori did note she wasn't much older than herself so she couldn't be the Regent. But those eyes definitely placed her within the ruling family. They alone had green eyes, it was unique to their family and a genetic trait not shared by any other Orion's.
"Whh." her voice was dry and crackly from not being used for days the woman was having trouble getting anything out. She swallowed hard and tried again, "Wwwhere am I?" she managed.
"We're safe my Lady, please stay calm. Here take a drink." Lori took the glass of water sitting near the bed and gently lowered it so the woman could get a drink. She started slow at first but quickly downed the glasses contents and coughed some as everything moistened up again. "What's the last thing you remember?"
"I remember I was visiting my aunt in the Capitol when something had hit the palace. I was grabbed by the Regents Guard and along with my aunt and her son and daughter rushed onto a ship I think was called the Regents Pride. I remember an explosion. Someone grabbed me and...and...that's all I remember."
"What's your name my lady?" Lori asked, worry beginning to creep into her voice.
"Tarra," she started to sit up and Lori helped her. "What is this place, it doesn't look like anywhere I visited on the Regents Pride?"
"The ship is the Titan 7." Lori sighed, and began to tell her everything that had happened since she had lost consciousness. "Nobody would help us except the United Sol Alliance, we traveled past at least 7 allied systems and not a single one of them would allow us entry. The Great Admiral seeing our warp bubble collapsing around us ordered a distress signal sent in advance of our arrival at the FTL gate. The Sol system gate keeper recognized the distress signal for what it was and allowed our ship's through the gate even though we were under fire from the Varille. The gate keeper then destroyed the Varille battleship in the gate. We lost the Claw, and had to abandon the Regents Pride."
"What of my aunt?" Tarra asked.
Lori was silent for a moment before she took Tarra's hand gently. "No one can find her, as far as I know you are the only remaining member of the Kaji family, my Lady."
Tarra let out a heart wrenching wail and utterly broke down. She grabbed Lori in a hug. still kneeling, Lori tried her best to comfort her. And felt a profound sense of relief when she saw the door slide open and Miss Vali standing just outside holding a data chit and a scanner.
NEXT