Activity for can read with my eyes shut

Sometimes I have to put comparisons like this up to remind myself how important Starship is....
I compared the cost of building a Sumner-Class Destroyer in space using Starship with the cost of the ISS. I chose the Sumner because there is a similar destroyer, but not of the same class, that is a museum ship about 20 minutes from where I live, and my grandpa was stationed on one in the 1960s. I did this to test out the capabilities of ChatGPT4o and I was impressed.
Here is what it said:
To estimate how many launches of SpaceX's Starship would be needed to build a Sumner-Class Destroyer in space and the total cost of the project, we'll need to consider the following key factors:

Step 1: Weight of the Sumner-Class Destroyer

A Sumner-Class Destroyer (e.g., the USS Allen M. Sumner) has a full load displacement of about 2,200 tons (2,200,000 kg).

Step 2: Payload Capacity of Starship

SpaceX's Starship, when fully operational, is expected to have a payload capacity to low Earth orbit (LEO) of about 100 tons (100,000 kg) per launch.

Step 3: Calculating the Number of Launches

To transport the full weight of a Sumner-Class Destroyer to space:
\[ \text{Number of launches} = \frac{\text{Total weight}}{\text{Payload per launch}} = \frac{2,200,000 \text{ kg}}{100,000 \text{ kg per launch}} = 22 \text{ launches} \]

Step 4: Estimated Cost per Launch

Elon Musk has stated that the cost per Starship launch could be as low as $2 million in the long term. However, a more conservative estimate considering current technological and operational factors might be around $10 million per launch.

Step 5: Calculating Total Cost

Using the more conservative estimate of $10 million per launch:
\[ \text{Total cost} = \text{Number of launches} \times \text{Cost per launch} = 22 \times 10 \text{ million USD} = 220 \text{ million USD} \]

Additional Considerations

• **Assembly in Space**: The actual process of assembling a large, complex ship like a Sumner-Class Destroyer in space would require significant additional resources and infrastructure.
  
• **Material Efficiency**: The destroyer would not be built exactly as it would be on Earth due to different environmental constraints, which might reduce the overall weight.
  
• **Human and Robotic Labor**: The cost and logistics of human or robotic labor to assemble the ship in space would also add to the total project cost.
  
• **Engineering and Support Systems**: Development of specialized space-compatible systems and structures could further increase costs.
  

Conclusion

Assuming ideal conditions and no additional complexities, it would take approximately 22 launches of SpaceX's Starship to transport the equivalent weight of a Sumner-Class Destroyer to space. The estimated cost for these launches would be around $220 million. However, the overall project cost, including assembly and additional infrastructure, would be significantly higher.
(Compare this to the cost of building the International Space Station, and explain why this is such a game changer when it comes to developing a space-based civilization.)

Comparison to the International Space Station (ISS)

Cost and Launches of the ISS

1. **Cost**: The International Space Station (ISS) has an estimated total cost of around $150 billion over its lifetime. This includes development, construction, and ongoing operational expenses.
   
2. **Launches**: Constructing the ISS required more than 30 Space Shuttle missions and numerous launches from international partners (Russia, Europe, Japan).
   

Weight and Construction

• **Weight**: The ISS has a mass of about 420,000 kg (420 tons).
  
• **Launches**: Each Space Shuttle launch could carry a maximum payload of around 24,400 kg (24.4 tons), requiring multiple missions to assemble in space.
  

Comparison with Building a Sumner-Class Destroyer Using Starship

1. **Cost**:

• **ISS**: $150 billion.
  
• **Sumner-Class Destroyer** (in space using Starship): Approximately $220 million for launches, with additional costs for assembly and infrastructure likely bringing the total to several billion dollars.
  

1. **Launch Efficiency**:

• **Space Shuttle**: Each launch had a limited payload capacity (24.4 tons) and a cost of about $450 million per launch.
  
• **Starship**: Each launch can carry up to 100 tons at an estimated cost of $10 million per launch.
  

Game Changer for Space-Based Civilization

Cost Reduction

• **Lower Launch Costs**: The drastically reduced cost per kilogram to orbit (from ~$18,400/kg with the Space Shuttle to ~$100/kg with Starship) makes large-scale construction projects in space far more feasible and affordable.

Increased Payload Capacity

• **Higher Payload Capacity**: Starship’s capacity of 100 tons per launch compared to the Space Shuttle’s 24.4 tons means fewer launches are required for similar projects, reducing complexity and increasing efficiency.

Scalability

• **Massive Projects**: The ability to launch heavier and more substantial payloads opens up possibilities for constructing larger and more complex structures in space, including habitats, research stations, and industrial facilities.

Rapid Development

• **Frequent Launches**: With Starship’s potential for rapid turnaround and frequent launches, space projects can progress faster, reducing the time from concept to completion.

Impact on Space-Based Civilization

Infrastructure Development

• **Space Habitats**: Building space habitats and colonies becomes more practical and less costly, accelerating human settlement in space.
  
• **Space Industry**: Manufacturing and industrial activities in space could flourish due to reduced costs and increased material transport efficiency.
  

Scientific Advancement

• **Research Stations**: More affordable construction of research facilities in space could boost scientific discoveries and innovations.
  
• **Interplanetary Missions**: Lower costs and higher payload capacities enhance the feasibility of missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond, paving the way for a multi-planetary civilization.
  

Conclusion

The dramatic reduction in launch costs and increased payload capacity provided by SpaceX's Starship represents a transformative shift in space development. It lowers financial barriers and logistical challenges, enabling more ambitious projects and rapid expansion into space. This transition from high-cost, low-frequency missions to affordable, frequent launches is a crucial step towards establishing a sustainable and thriving space-based civilization.
Considering the implications like this side by side REALLY REALLY shows that the Artemis Program is being WAY WAY WAY too conservative in what it wants to do. I know that some people say that there is no way we will have a million person city on Mars by 2050 but looking at it like this really puts things into perspective - I think it is totally possible.

Sometime ago I met a woman from my past, won't write the whole story because it's too long. All I will say is that we used to have feelings for each other, I thought about her a lot during the time we were apart and one day we just randomly stumbled upon each other. It seemed unreal to me, when I saw her all the feelings came back to me and after meeting her I felt like it was a dream. We have met a couple times since then and are in regular contact, turns out even after all these years I feel like we have an amazing connection. We can talk non stop for hours, have similar thoughts on a lot of stuff etc.
Sometime passed, by now I have made my feelings clear to her, but she says she isn't interested in relationships for now. Which is understandable, as she went through a bad breakup just before we met and had a bunch of shitty relationships before that, including one with psychological and physical abuse. I know I can't force anything on her so normally I would be ready to end it there and then. Trust me if I would sense 0 interest I would get the hint, I'm not the guy who sents the 11th "hey" text after getting left on read 10 times. The thing is she continues to initiate contact and even asked if I want to spend a weekend by the sea together (just the 2 of us) which I find to be an extremely bizzarre thing to offer to a guy that admitted to having feelings for you when you're not interested in anything (and she's definitely not the manipulative type, I would describe her as very empathetic). Maybe she just wants me as a friend but I straight up told her that she will never be "just a friend" to me, so she must be aware that that would never work. I dunno, if I didn't reciprocate someone's feelings I would be minimising contact with them, not offering to spend time together 1on1 lol.
I'm super confused so I asked my RL friend for advice on this (he knows both of us), I asked if it's naive and delusional to have hope? He said to be patient, let resolve naturally and be ready for anything. Don't bring up any relationship talk, if it comes up it has to be from her. He also finds her behaviour weird and said it might be a sign that she's trying to open up but finds it hard after past disappointments.
Maybe reddit is not the best place to ask as this is quite a complex topic for me and you don't know me but whatever, I'll appreciate any new insight or perspective. What do you make of this?
One more thing, before you say "move on, find someone else" don't bother. I actually enjoy being single after being in some shitty relationships myself. She's the only one I'm considering being in a relationship with as she is very special to me, everyone else can fuck off. Maybe it's childish and idealistic but I don't care.

I started using Lynette in first half abyss with my Neuvilette and must say she really is kinda underrated. I will say I only started using her when she was c4 so I cant really speak for c0 in case I overlooked something.
Lynette does have slightly higher base stats then Sucrose at lvl 90 Lynette has 3k more hp, 60 more base atk and 7 more def. Which makes her a bit more tanky which in my opinion makes her a bit more comfortable for abyss.
In terms of skill Sucrose is bit better since she has better cc in grouping since even with c1 Lynette grouping has small aoe. In exchange Lynette skill scales at lvl 9 455,6% compared to Sucrose 359,04%. Lynette give up some grouping for more dmg.
She is easier too use then Sucrose who often time can be a pain to get the element to swirl in her burst(In my experience.). Lynette burst has a 12s uptime which means vv shred will be active for a total of 22s. Sucrose burst up time is only 6s(8s with c2) and her cooldown is 20s compared to Lynette 12s uptime and 18s cooldown. In terms of dmg I dont think the 2 burst are far apart.
Talent wise Sucrose is better in a team that wants some em like Vape but I did not test how much difference there is between Sucrose em buff compared to Lynette atk buff.
Sucrose gives 50 em to the element she swirls and 20% of Sucrose em is given to the party when her ult hits the duration for both are 8s.
Lynette buff the partys atk for 10s after burst use depend how many different element the party has unless you run her in a mono team she will nearly always buff the party for 16% atk. Her other talent buffs her burst after it absorbed an element will deal 15% more dmg.
I personally would recommend Lynette to every newer player and even some veterans who dont have Kazuha in my opinion while she has maybe less team dmg then Sucrose and Sucrose can be used as driver, Lynette is easier to use overall since she has more hp and her burst absorbed elements easier and is active for longer. And for overworld exploration her skill is nice since you regenerate stamina while using it.
Feel free to comment what you think and correct what is wrong, mostly written this since Lynette rarely gets talked about in terms of team building since Sucrose, Kazuha and Venti overshadow her and I was positively surprise how much easiecomfortable Lynette is compared to Sucrose.

patient is F28 about 5’3 maybe 150 pounds, will try to get med info in an edit asap. she was a chronic smoker for several years before quitting after pneumonia bout
ok so this is incredibly important, we’re wondering if lipomas are the answer to my gf’s debilitating and undiagnosed chronic neck & back pain of 3+ years. would greatly appreciate anyone’s feedback. description of symptoms near the end if you wanna skip background.
my gf has one of the worst chronic back issues i’ve seen, and it’s completely undiagnosed. she had a scary severe case of covid pneumonia for several months and somewhere along the way developed chronic pain in her neck, iirc it was characterized by sharp severe pain where she could barely move her head left or right at all without major pain. that lasted two years with no solution/diagnosis to be found.
one night a year ago she was laying in bed and reached over to grab something and felt pain shoot down her back. can’t remember if it was the next morning or gradual over days/weeks but basically the pain ended up traveling almost entirely from her neck to her mid to lower back. she can now move her neck almost like normal with little pain, but her back is now an absolute nightmare. she can’t work, standing up and sitting down is a deliberate cautious affair, her entire life is centered around this and the debilitating 10/10 pain (she said 14/10 without meds, 9/10 with).
PRIMARY SYMPTOMS: -muscle spasms that travel (yesterday they were bad, she tried massaging herself and ended up “riddled” with spasms) and when i trace her back she can’t tell me exactly where the spasms are bc they move so much ig? she had trouble articulating what she felt and why i couldn’t pinpoint it. they’re less painful the more sleep she gets in a night -pressure pain the spasms are always “on,” the only slight relief she gets is when there’s no pressure on them. laying back in a seat is hell, she has a heat pad that left marks on her skin bc she had to use it so high and often to feel some relief (she now uses the lowest setting after discovering the skin thing)
big one: moveable lumps under skins i don’t know her history of how hard doctors looked into the lumps but she feels two noticeable ones right up against her spine in the center of where the pain and spasms usually gravitate. she can move them around without massive spikes in pain (possible these two aren’t relevant but smaller undetected ones are???)
somewhere along the way she was told or got the impression that those lumps weren’t related to her spasms or pain. however from what she’s told me no doctor has ever really looked at them more than cursory (which i asked several times for her to confirm cuz that sounds insane to me). she has had an insane amount of tests done (like, recently ruled out MS) including a full body MRI but it found nothing, and they weren’t looking specifically for lipomas.
No one has ever said the word lipomas to her. she randomly found the word a couple days ago and found some posts on the lipomas sub i think, one of which was another chronic back pain case and 100% relatable to her. she went on to find info about how these can be painful and hard to detect when they’re in muscle tissue and up against nerves or the spine.
but she’s nervous this isn’t the answer because she thinks they would have spotted this on the MRI.
would they have, if they didn’t know to look for these specifically? i see cases of people saying theirs got painful and doctors severely underestimated their size when they were removed.. i’m worried she has small ones all over her back and maybe even neck? i saw they have some kind of causal relationship with the severity of pneumonia so i’m wondering if tiny hard to detect ones are in her lungs too.
begging for any information/suggestions/insights. tears on my cheeks as i type this out at the possibility that this might finally, fiiiiiinally be the answer to chronic pain that has made her suicidal at times. thank you for reading, and especially thanks to those of you physicians who take time to reply. this sub seems incredibly valuable.

I am new to streaming still, have not hit affiliate yet, and mostly just my friends and family watch. I am super interested in true crime personally, and love to watch people tell the stories and present the evidence/outcomes on Youtube. I have been wanting to do this in my streams recently, and did for the first time this week. I have seen this posted before here but can’t find a definitive answer. I have also read Twitch’s TOS/guidelines and can’t find a straight answer, other than rules relating to what is shown on stream. If I’m not super detailed and gory with it, is this type of thing allowed on Twitch? I also plan to list mature content warnings in my stream title/info and in stream before going over the case live. Other than this, is there anything I should do to protect myself?

“I attended middle school with her, although we did not attend high school together (she instead attended a high school that was supposed to help students gain college credits. She earned two liberal arts degrees while there in Social and Behavioral Sciences and Natural Sciences. She now attends an HCBU, and has on her LinkedIn profile that she is presently working toward graduating from her college with a degree in Health Sciences, Pre Med, and a minor in Military Science. She is apart of her school’s Army ROTC.)
I remember that a lot of people in middle school did not like her (although that was also the case for me,) and I understood why. She seemed noticeably introverted, yet also didn’t seem like the kind of person, at least from my perspective, who would try to appease you in the way I imagine a lot of people feel the stereotypical woman might. She had a strong glare (I remember mentioning this to my then best friend’s mom, who agreed with the suggestion) and stood out to me as being weird (it wasn’t necessarily anything she said or did - not her personality, exactly - it’s just the strong glare I mentioned, like she didn’t tend to look sincerely happy nor would she pretend to be unless she was around friends of hers. I remember that she didn’t tend to look happy, in my opinion. It’s possible that she was depressed, or she may have just tended to look irritable, I don’t know. She didn’t strike me as being the kind of person who would make an effort to be polite, struck me as being tomboyish and unladylike, the kind of person who wouldn’t try to change the way she was for you - I wasn’t used to it. Seemed competitive, too. I had truly never interacted with a girl who was like that before. She also struck me as being smart, although she was in the normal math class whereas I was in the advanced one (I was known for being smarter, but thought it should have been her. However, I did notice after looking at her LinkedIn profile that there were more grammatical errors than I expected.)
I remember that she and her friend (who I later on ended up being on good terms with) decided early on that they disliked me, although I hadn’t done anything to them, which bothered me. They also once used me for food in sixth grade, which had also bothered/upset me.
I remember that my former best friend had issues with her ranging back to elementary school, and that in sixth grade in particular they were competing for the attention of an ISFP they’d both been friends with since elementary school. This girl is the one who won the ISFP’s attention/was officially her best friend by the time they were in seventh grade. However, around seventh or eighth grade (it’s been so long that I no longer quite remember,) she “ditched” (in the words of my former best friend) the ISFP and the other friend I’d mentioned in favor of a new crowd. I actually remember my former best friend suggested that the people in her new crowd didn’t like her, either (although she hung out with them throughout eighth grade, and briefly went to high school in person with one of them as a junior whilst presumably taking courses at the other high school online, so I assume that she never knew this/didn’t read them well enough to know or understand this.) I notice that she unfollowed the ISFP at some point as a senior, though the ISFP never unfollowed her (she strikes me as being the kind of person who likely took note of the fact that the ISFP’s life doesn’t seem to be heading in a good direction - the ISFP was abused a few years ago, and has had substance use issues since, in addition to having had to repeat a year of high school. She also unfollowed my former best friend, and my former best friend recently unfollowed her back.)
She figured out that I was the one who owned the middle school gossip account (although most of our peers already suspected, and technically, this girl couldn’t prove it either.) She figured this out because she remembered that I was standing nearby when she told my former best friend who she had a crush on (I was being mean and told our peers who she was crushing on.) However, she never directly confronted me about the matter, even though she told my former best friend that she suspected it to be me. She later on changed her mind when I was kind to her friend who lost the role for graduation speaker to me toward the end of eighth grade (but she was right the first time.)
I noticed around junior year that she has actually turned out to be quite nice looking, even though I had once meanly suggested that she was fat in middle school (she was a tad bit chubby, though as an adult I’m inclined to suggest that this was likely simply baby fat/that with us being so young there wasn’t really anything wrong with this.) She does seem to wear makeup, but also has nice style (she is light skinned, and has a looser hair texture, which are likely factors in me thinking she’s attractive, if I’m being honest - she’s mixed race, with a black mother and white father.) I can’t possibly know, but she gives off the impression to me of being someone who knows that she’s attractive (just something about her energy/facial expressions in photos. She has her Instagram account public now.)”
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Took BAR this morning, I studied for about six weeks using UWorld. I have only taken FAR as my first before this. I guess I just wanted to make this post because we are all a little in the dark with the lack of information for the new discipline exams. I for one was a little exasperated seeing people talking about how much harder BAR was than ISC or TCP, and if you are using UWorld like me you already decided your discipline. Of course I'm going to wait for the score release 6/24, but I'm not inclined to study for another discipline. I realize not all exams are the same but here was mine.
I got through the MCQ's very quickly, just under 90 minutes. I was feeling really good about this after spending more like 2 hours on them for FAR. I saw a lot of governmental/NFP questions here, another post I had read here said they weren't tested more than 1-2 questions on it, I would say mine was more like 10. I absolutely drilled this area in the week before the test because it seemed so foreign to me, and it served me very well to instantly know the answers to questions like whether to include fiduciary funds in government wide statement of activities, for example. Some things I was a little caught off guard by:
COSO, R&D/Software (expense vs. capitalize), Pensions. These three areas probably had 3-5 questions each, I was a little surprised given the weighting in the UWorld material (only 15/1600 questions in the whole catalogue for pensions). I had only 2-3 variance questions, a weak area of mine that I was able to get on top of using the PURE SAD DADS pneumonic that I saw mentioned here.
The sims were extremely information heavy and it was overwhelming even with how much time I had banked on the MCQs. Before my break the first I probably spent damn near 40 minutes on, the ratios were provided but it was very calculation heavy and you were asked to make pretty detailed assertions from a drop down/mcq format about whether the company used their assets effectively based on their trend in ROA. I would say its important to know exactly what the metrics and ratios indicate and what is a "good" number for each. The next was a governmental topic that went pretty quick- what amounts were included as other financing sources, etc.
The 5 remaining sims after the break, I really lost track of time on. There was a cost one that was so exhibit heavy asking about reorder point and storage costs, that was difficult and I know I blew it. One was revenue recognition, adjustments to recognize revenue based on a bunch of email. One was on WACC/capital structure, including dividends and multiple scenarios for different capital structures. One was an option compensation scenario, this was pretty in depth beyond what just studying MCQ prepared me for. Revaluation at multiple reporting dates, liability based share comp, etc.
That's all I got. Hope this helps. Good luck to everyone testing this weekend.

I will never be able to get in a relationship. Everyone says the same thing to me “cope” oh you will find her one day! Which is honestly one of the dumbest things I have heard Ive been actively searching for years as a preteen up until an adult throughout high school. Graduating next Saturday never having my first kiss, my first time ever being cared about, never been cared about,“ I HAVE NO FRIENDS EITHER NOT A JOKE”. Also not to mention I have even tried dating girls not attractive in my eyes just because I want to experience what it feels like to be loved. Take a lucky guess I got friend zoned… I’m starting to wonder what’s the point of even trying anymore in getting into a relationship. Why do I as the male have to always put the effort into attracting a female I love? I can love anyone I just want someone who has a big heart and loves me idk why that’s so much to ask. Also I think the other issue is it’s like I can’t love first because I would be considered clingy or down bad in their eyes. Is there any women in my age range who want a loving relationship? Idk what I’m doing wrong I have tried literally everything.

Saltpyre from vermintide insists they are beastman who worship a different god, and while the details in the poem where the skaven are first mention doom of Kavzar is intentionally vague we do know two things.
When all remaining survivors of the disaster in their despair turn to chaos, offering human sacrifices and performing rituals to seek aid from the chaos gods nothing happens… with the screaming bell hinted at being the cause. Shortly after the skaven appear out of nowhere and claim to be the lords of the city and all the dwarfs below are dead with the new skaven lords ruling below in their hold.
Whoever wrote this poem was probably either there or had spoken with the survivors who fled before the very end, so not everyone is being included in this account which may have been altered over the years. What if some of the human survivors had become something else?
Assuming the horned rat didn’t exist before the doom of Kavzar then someone in the poem probably becomes the horned rat and who better than the mysterious grey man who fooled them all? All of Kavzar problems started when he finished the tower with a addition of his own god, himself! (Probably) The events of the poem happen slowly at first with endless rain causing a famine snowballing into meteor showers as more people die from starvation. The screaming bell block the aid of good and evil leaving the horned rat in control?
Imagine this situation the logical answer to your food problems were stealing and cannibalism, which would have the group kick you out so lies and deceit became your trade. Whether it was gradual or sudden chaos infesting the city would have turned you into a form that best represents these traits, a rat.
Ironically these ratman would then really be the lords of the city with the black hunger that makes then ravenous a constant reminder of their sins. As far as ratman are concerned everyone in the city still belongs to them and the dwarfs refusal to help earlier and belief they were hoarding halls filled with food made these new ratman attack them and by the time they appear in the poem have likely killed all the dwarfs and eaten whatever food stores were left.
Some among them were probably chosen by the horned rat hearing his voice perhaps for showing particular cunning or because they held power as lords of Kavzar becoming over time grey seers acting on a great plan, a vermintide! But as soon as the poem ends with all remaining humans dead and eaten no food would have cause a civil war that would have destroyed any accounts made by the ratman on the doom of Kavzar and all their education and technology to be lost as most rats don’t care about history. With the horned rat plans constantly failing due to the nature of a rat… Even the name skaven is likely given to them by other races and since be adopted as if they called themselves anything else it would have soon been lost and forgotten in the constant infighting and civil wars, again most rats don’t care about history.
This is my favourite but not the only possibility, they were always rats in the city, maybe they mutated into bigger rats? Children were born deformed maybe maturing quickly into full grown skaven? But these aren’t as twisted as mine, making the choice rather then the choice being made for you is always more interesting… that the people of Kazar in their vanity to touch the heavens fell literally into a hellhole of their own making!
P.s sry for the length of this post but wanted to clue you in on the key parts doom of Kavzar for those who hadn’t read it I have a post somewhere with the full story! Having the skaven being once human implies even they can be redeemed? It also is a warning that humans are more capable of cruelty than any other race in warhammer… on a bad day….

I've been wondering about myself, now 30+, how much of my personality is simply easygoing, and how much of it is a result of avoidance and detachment and maybe being so neutral is not a good thing? How can I know?
If you met me, you would think I am pretty easy to hang with, I've been described as easygoing and chill and nice and unbothered by many of my friends. I rarely get involved or upset with big drama or issues. I am introverted, stay home most days. I'm usually the therapist friend that listens and gives good advice or a shoulder to cry on, I've always been a good supporter and cheerleader for others, and I prefer it that way. I rarely make huge waves about anything. If bad things happen, I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, I try to think of the fact that we are just specks of dust in the universe, I try to tell myself "it is what it is." My attitude towards most of life is to do no harm, try not to judge, and if you do, just keep quiet. I don't ever say things like "who cares" and I'm never dismissive, but I also try to remember that most issues and events and experiences in life are complex, nuanced, life is just always weird and hard and shit happens and we have to roll with it. I'm very NON-competitive and despise when people try to compete with me because I will absolutely not play that game. I am quiet and observant, speak up when I want to but usually I like to see what others do first. I am private but I still know how to keep a conversation lively and interesting, I don't shut people out or clam up. I like for everyone else to be comfortable, and think of myself later because others being okay is how I feel okay too. I need immense alone time. I go along with most situations and activities and events (unless I really hate it or can't stand it - then I will speak up or get myself away).
All that being said, you can probably tell what kind of person I am. Just quiet, nice girl on the side who doesn't do anything good or bad, generally good vibes but never in the spotlight.
I used to think that this is just who I am. I've always been a quiet kid. But... am I actually just avoidant? Do I "act" easygoing but I'm not? But I am... aren't I? Or did I train myself to be so chill that I actually just became it? Am I good "listener" friend because I like to listen and help, or because I don't like to share and be judged myself? Do I need so much alone time because I like being alone or because I don't want to deal with people? Or can it be both and still healthy? Am I neutral because I want to understand all points of view or because I don't ever want to be too involved in anything or any situation? I'm asking myself all these questions and I can't answer them. I'm confusing myself.
I just don't know. I'm doubting myself a lot these days. Do I keep myself hidden and quiet and neutral and "chill" so that I can be invisible and avoid life and people and humanity - or because I genuinely prefer it that way? Am I actually even easygoing or have I suppressed so much of myself that I have no choice but to be easygoing? How can I know these things for sure? I just can't remember the last time I really felt extremely passionate or upset about anything.. is this a result of me being too detached or am I just finally in a stable, secure place in life, with no drama or problems? Is the fact that I can't answer these questions, the answer in itself that something is wrong? Or am I overthinking?
I tried to keep this short so I apologize that I couldn't lol. I thought I could explain myself in a few words but it's just a lot going on my mind lately. Thank you all for your advice and perspectives in advance. I just want to know how other people think, or if you are a similar personality as me, how you feel about it? Do you ever question yourself like this?

I've been suffering from PEM, brain fog and chronic fatigue since I got COVID in 2020. Almost four years later (crazy) I finally worked a full day 9-5!
Over the past two years I've been really improving in my energy levels. I noticed I've recovered quicker from PEM. Fatigue that lasted days now maybe lasts a few hours. I still have moments where PEM kicks in but I can manage it relatively well. Schedule in rests ahead and after big activities.
After my full day of work I definitely felt deeply tired. But I spent the night with some pizza and series and was able to do things again later in the evening.
That same week I also worked the Thursdays morning from 9-12 two days after my 9-5. And I had energy and didn't have any physical tiredness. I'm so excited and happy. I know I shouldn't rush recovery. And I'll be doing the 9-5 and 9-12 for a few weeks to adjust.
The thought of earning my own money again makes me so relieved.

I have an established business and put my business up for sale, with it being valued for around £2m. I have gone with a broker who we had to pay £20,000 upfront to and they also get a % fee of the sold price. I understand paying a fee upfront and getting a % fee of the sold price is common in the M&A world to a broker, so I have been told and read online. Please correct me if this is wrong.
18 months since using the broker and still no sale. The broker has made false promises and has basically given up - I've not been impressed with them at all. The problem is that the £20,000 upfront payment will be wasted if I move on from them and we are also tied into a 12 month notice period if I leave, and they will get a fee if we sell to anyone through a third party during this period, even if they are not involved in the transaction. Looking back, this point should have been changed in the contract, but as it's the first time I am selling a business, I was naïve here and did not think I would be in this situation.
They of course want to keep working with me so they can hopefully get a sale and therefore the percentage fee, but in reality they have lost interest.
What do I do next? I am looking to retire and was hoping this would have been wrapped up by now. We received offers at the start of the process, but they were either too low (i.e. I might as well continue working myself) or they want to buy a stake rather than full 100%. Because the company has been up for sale for essentially 18 months, we aren't getting any new interest either which is not surprising.
I do feel we need to move on from the broker we use as we have hit a wall, but I don't really want to pay another M&A broker fee, to be in exactly the same situation as I am in now + there's no way of getting that £20,000 fee back from them.
The feedback that I have been getting as to why we have not sold is because the business is small and I am one of the key people at the company, i.e. if I leave, half of the revenue goes, but I am happy to stay on and do a transition period.
The other key members of staff are not looking to buy the business due to not having funds, so cannot go down that route either and to be honest, I feel the business will be able to grow much quicker if it's with a larger firm.
It's a great business and in the right hands it can do even better than it is now, but I'm unsure what to do and I don't want to be working forever.
Any recommendations would be appreciated, thanks!

Hellooo So i’ve been with my bf for two and a half years, with two years being long distance. From the moment we met he knew i was active on instagram and i post selfies and other pictures of myself.
Recently he complained about it and how he thinks i do it for the validation of others and he’s not comfortable with it. I explained my pov how i do it because it makes me feel better , i genuinely enjoy it and i might be seeking some kind of validation idk which one but certainly not that of other men.
We had another talk and he told me to not stop doing it but if he gets annoyed too much he will have to mute me. Another thing he said was that this might build some tension in our relationship and i should just expect it.
One of the few things i used to enjoy , now makes me miserable and guilty whenever i do it. How can i fix this? or convince him ?
ps: my instagram account isn’t public and has 70-80 followers whom i all know from real life. and my pictures aren’t revealing.

Here is my situation:
I am a 3rd year CS student and a veteran [relevant in terms of how I am financing college]. Essentially, I have grown concerned about remaining in CS due to seeing the mass tech layoffs, the way America doesn't appear to protect American tech workers jobs [i.e., we have to compete for jobs internationally since American companies like to outsource labor to other country's], or even the fact that this path seems a lot more grey-area ish than I anticipated. To clarify . . .
I am studying Computer Science with an emphasis in Software Engineering, I wanted to be able to build applications [generally speaking]. The issue here is that there is a lot of things not being said while I am in college pursuing this road, such as:
When I look on linkedin/indeed software engineering positions vary wildly in terms of the technologies they want you to know of [which I have never heard about ever], several coding languages, and a whole host of things that made me say "this degree doesn't particularly feel like it is preparing me to be competitive in the job market and this seems like a train leading to broken tracks."
It's as though I have more material to learn than time available in the day and people with no life other than breathing CS are the only ones who can exist in the space. I hear to do "projects" but that is rather vague, perhaps I should be thinking of a system of organization such as :
1) Identify what types of applications I want to make as a software engineer
2) what technologies/software is primarily used for building that particular type of application?
3) build projects that utilize those software's/technologies and have those viewable by the recruiter
4) live on leetcode?
Other than doing what I am supposed to be doing in school in terms of grades and knowing I need to land an internship at some point, I am quite unsure what I should be doing with my time to even be competitive in what appears to be a sinking ship/saturated market.
I was considering using my CS undergraduate degree to go to Law School thinking that being a licensed professional would solve a few problems being :
a) I don't have to compete with people in other countries that are willing to work for much less than Americans are.
b) Maybe law is better during recessions/lay-offs
c) perhaps law is less ambiguous of a career path than software engineering is. The fact that software engineering seems so ill-defined in terms of direction appears troublesome to me.
d) as a stem undergraduate I am more competitive in terms of law school applications [from what I read] and can also pursue specialized law practice that non-stem majors could not do [i.e., patent law/intellectual property]; ergo, it would be as though I haven't wasted my time spending 4 years in college.
IMPORTANT:
I would not graduate with debt in either case as my school costs should be covered in full.

Hello,
I am wondering if anyone with expertise in sound transfer, sound physics, and audio generation and acoustics might have some insight into a noise issue I've been having. I am wondering if a lower-pitched mechanical or electrical buzzing noise in one area of a building can translate or transform into a higher pitched sound on a higher floor.
For 3 months my unit has had an awful, shrill, high pitched sound penetrating through the unit, loudest at night. I rented some recording equipment (an audio interface, a Zoom H4N handheld recorder, a condenser microphone, a calibrated USB microphone) and set the sample rates to 44k, 48k, and 96k Hz (to sufficiently measure something above 8000 Hz). The equipment measured a really clear, loud, persistent noise in the 9800-10,000 Hz range, with occasional pulsing, and some higher tones as well in the 13k-16k Hz ranges. Here is an imgur album of some of the sound graphs, from within my unit, and one from outside the building: https://imgur.com/a/dZYdT7N
I am at a loss as to finding the source of this sound. It is driving me mad, and the building owner is unconcerned because he can't hear it apparently (though he is older and apparently many people lose the ability to hear over 10,000 Hz past their 30s).
I've done trouble shooting and eliminated anything in my unit as being the source of the sound (shut off breakers, unplugged everything including the fridge for 12 hrs, the sound was still present). It could potentially be from a neighbour as I am in an older building. However, I have noticed that the ceiling lights (and ceilings themselves) of the floors directly below me have a very loud, persistent buzzing sound. Here are some video recordings, though the second video didn't quite capture how loud the mechanical noise is: https://imgur.com/a/lPw27Dt
Could these lower pitched sounds on a basement floor reverberate (through plumbing or wiring or building frame) and transform into the high pitched sound I am recording? I.e. is there a way to identify if these are the fundamental tone? And is there a way to block these noises (through acoustic panelling)?
Thank you

Very long if you don't wanna read then don't.
I've played a lot of gardevoir (200 matches whilst I have 500 matches overall lol). I'm green badge and gardevoir is my favourite and the character I've had the most fun with overall. I'm good at her aswell but after playing with her so much I've come to realise that it's just not a good Pokémon. Barely viable aswell.
I've played gardevoir in every style, defensive/offensive whatever style there is I've played it. I used energy amplifier (lvl 19), spoon (level 24) the glasses that gives 7% (level 24). I believe that this is basically a full power gardevoir but even still it's very lacking I believe. Especially considering that the meta is filled with bulky characters whom I've come to notice that gardevoir doesn't even take 10% of their health.
Sometimes I have to even use 3+ future sights on speedsters. Gardevoir should be a tank depleter and a counter to the bulky mon or I feel as if it should be because that's the type of game style that the character entails no? And for a ranged character it doesn't even have good range aswell imo. On top of that it's so fricking slow. I got out sped by a garchomp once 😂. I had X speed aswell. And the garchomp was a dig/earthquake that ultimately killed me.
I've realised in games even when I carry and do the most I would've done better by picking another attacker. Even thunder Pikachu would be better in most situations. I feel as if instead of helping my team as a gardevoir I'm actually just holding them back and making it worse even when we're winning. Also when I'm laning as a gardevoir I feel as if it's just pointless to defend my goal when my partner is absent (dead, afk, just wandered off) as I'll just get bodied even on my goal.
As for moves I used future sight/moonblast as I find it just more fun and playable than psyshock/psychic. I tried playing the latter but I don't play as well/have as much fun but even still I've realised that gardevoir is the equivalent of an annoying fly for the bulkier all rounders (most of them) and defenders and is just food for the faster all rounders and speedsters when they are the same level. When a gardevoir is even one level higher than another it destroys the other but that's most Pokémon no?
I've seen all rounders and defenders shrug of psyshocks/future sights. The only real threat gardevoir has is fairy singularity which i try to use when the enemy is grouped together but even still I've realised some Pokémon are unaffected by it (take little to no damage) like dragonite who I hit with the unite/all three psyshocks and a psychic which I realized didn't even delete a 1/6 of its health which left me very discouraged. And then there are other Pokémon that just walk out of it 😂. Maybe I'm lagging but certain Pokémon with dashes use their dashes and escape even when they're right in the middle of it and it has already started. Idk maybe I'm just bad 😂. The other things gardevoir has is moonblast which is great.
Lastly if you play gardevoir and your teammates are subpar you're basically finished. You can be the best of the best with gardevoir (not me) but if your teammates are bad it's over basically.
It's only really good in team fights and if you want to deal high damage by the end of the game (even my worst games with gardevoir end with very high damage). I know I said that gardevoir doesnt do high damage to bulky mons but it's because most bulky mons have a sustain (for some reason 😂, why should a Pokémon with a massive health pool be able to regenerate that health pool, it's actually bs) which makes them unkillable for gardevoir if it's one on one or even sometimes with a couple of teammates + gardevoir against that sustain bulk Mon.
Lemme give you a examples of why I've just realized after 200 games that gardevoir isn't a good Pokémon. It begins with first with a zeraora. A zeraora (no shield) decided to run straight into my goal zone. Ok, I think, easy. Ima just moonblast it hit it with a future sight and then another future sight. That should be enough. Okay I hit it twice with future sight now. Still doesn't die? Strange. Im half health now. I used my unite cuz I'm annoyed and ill get it back by rayquaza. Huh??? It's not dead? Then I die. Boom. It uses its unite and wild charges me. Second instance happened not too long ago. An outrage dragonite with half health. I spam future sight on it. My teammates (machamp, miraidon) begin wailing on it, they both die. Now it's me Vs dragonite and it has less than a quarter of its health. Okay easy I'm full health and I'm quite the distance away. I moonblast, hit it with two future sights within seconds. Boom dragon dance outrage I'm dead. I've been hitting it with future sights for the past 30 seconds (that's like 15) and it doesn't die? Next match I'm versing a tyranitar. Okay tyranitar is a beast I gotta keep my distance. Okay the tyranitar has no health (barely visible health bar) I blast it with future sight??? Wtf it's not dead you can't even see the colour in the health bar. I hit it with another and a moonblast and I kid you not he just does his voodoo on me and I die.
Another thing I've realised is the range at which gardevoir throws it's attacks is very easily closed by all rounders and speedsters. This makes gardevoir less than viable and makes it even more squishy than it already is. At least with decid/cinder you can use rapid fire scarf to enhance your already strong basic attack (gardevoirs basic attack = very weak).
I just want y'all who have read to know that I consider myself good with gardevoir but gardevoir in terms of the meta is not a good Pokémon. A Pokémon who can get outpaced by even bulky mons isn't good.
What's the point in gardevoir if it really only destroys other attackers (that's really the only group that I've consistently noticed that gardevoir is great at defeating, but it's not a big deal considering that's literally the speedsters job).
In my time playing gardevoir I've composed good/bad matchups Good matchups - Decidueye (rapid fire or not as long I always kill them) - Duraludon (Easy peasy stationary squishes) - Garchomp (Slow asf except for that one time I got outpaced by it for some reason) - Charizard (as long as it doesn't have/use it's unite but they always have/use it) These four are the onlys ones who can rarely get to me or maime me unless they are like 100 levels above me. The two attackers can just be dealt with by speedsters (more difficult to deal with decid though) and the two all rounders are basically nullified by every attacker in the game.
Bad matchups - Every speedster that can get in and/or out quickly + speedy all rounders (mimikyu) (not so much zeraora as it doesn't kill you as fast as the other ones) these include talonflame, leafeons. And others. They cannot be hit by gardevoirs more precise hits such as future sight (future sight requires being able to predict them speedsters can prove difficult to predict and psyshock for some reason only hits in one direction and isn't directional). - Tanky mons with dashes/lifesteal/stuns or all three. These include dragonite (outrage), who can wallop you in your goal and cannot be escaped considering he can stun you with basic attacks (for some reason), tyranitar, who I believe has lifesteal and also has high dps, slows you down and can dash to you/pull you towards him. A good tyranitar would wallop a great gardevoir even if the tyranitar is barely in the gardevoirs range. Yeah this is like more than half the mons in the game 🤣.
I believe gardevoir would be great if you could play with 4 friends in a balanced team but I don't have that unfortunately.
All in all: - Gardevoir is lacking in mobility (can get outpaced by bulky mon that realistically shouldn't be too fast) - While it should be strong in terms of burst damage it really does little to no damage to certain Pokémon like outrage dragonite, falinks, mamoswine, tyranitar. - Bad teammates = bad gardevoir - Only good in team fights (when your team actually is participating and not just farming mins 😡) . - Incredible weak basic attack

Over the course of my 4 year marriage to my partner, I have arrived at the position that I was abused, manipulated, and functionally enslaved to a mentally ill partner.
In simplest form, the progression is apparently observable. She was diagnosed with cancer in October of 2019 while we were engaged. Due to the diagnosis, we moved up our actual marriage date (our wedding was still set for mid-April) to December 1, 2019. Her surgery was December 13, 2019. In my compassion for her, I agreed to move our wedding date up to offset her anxiety around who would be responsible for her if things went south with her surgical treatment.
Our first month of marriage was straightforward; she was on pain meds recovering from surgery, so the main engagement that occurred was me walking her up and down the hospital hallway as she recovered and trying to meet her base physical needs of hygiene, food, and presence. We stayed in the hospital for 2-3 weeks (with recurring hospital visits for complications).
Quickly after we figured out our marital living situation in her small 3-bed apartment with 2 roommates, our relationship devolved. Specifically, she was irritable because of the pain she was in, causing her to lash out at me with regular frequency for small things. If I didn’t put clothes away in the right place, didn’t anticipate her needs (without her communicating them), or ate the wrong food in front of her she would shout at me and decry me for my thoughtlessness.
These small, critical engagements were wounding and created a distance between us – and there was no upside. She was never kind, never paid mind to needs I might have, and started down a path of cultivating a root of bitterness in her soul. She quickly revealed herself to be venomous, hateful, and vindictive when she felt like she was wronged — and any observation of concern about our marriage resulted me in being accused of being mean or insensitive, even if I spent hours or days calculating the best way to share my concern (and I have a master’s degree in communication where I focused in studying disagreement — I know how to carefully package concerns).
During this time, I worked hard to provide for us, foreseeing a significant time period where I would have to be primary financial provider and caregiver. I increased my income each year we were married by around 25%, finishing our marriage at >$80,000 in yearly income, compared to starting our marriage at a modest $42,000 salary (including dramatically improving our healthcare). Frankly, I increased my income to provide for us in spite of the lack of support at home.
But to be clear: I don’t think it would have been particularly difficult to provide financially if I had an ounce of support at home.
However, the relentless criticism and expectation of mind-reading continued through the years. I rationalized this abuse for the first year of our marriage because of all the excuses to be cruel, she had a good one – she had cancer. I hung onto a hope that it would stop. Contrary to my hope, as the years went on – and our expenses climbed – and I continued to work myself to the bone – she continued to relentlessly critique and even started being more emotionally demanding, expecting me to take responsibility for her inability to cope with her emotions – I was drowning. She was asking too much of me. There was no deliverance from her abuse.
I was exhausted. In the peak of the abuse I endured at her hand, I was working multiple jobs, sleeping 10+ hours a night and napping frequently during the day around meetings and work, then coping with alcohol to numb myself to the abusive dynamic and fall asleep with no support from her. The only time I could approach her sexually was when I was intoxicated, with inhibitions lowered. The only time I could have a conversation with her was with a counselor in the room. Without something to mitigate opportunity for her to be cruel to me, either a mediator or self-medication, I was scared.
I lived at home in a constant state of alert and cognitive fatigue. No matter how I tried to make sense of my home life, I couldn’t. When she looked at or touched me, I would recoil in fear, anticipating some sort of incisive critique or demand expressed. Then she would criticize me for not responding warmly to her, exacerbating the cycle.
I couldn’t meet her needs – I was utterly exhausted. When I would tell her of the exhaustion I experienced in marital counseling, her responses were typically something along the lines of not believing me, denying what I was saying was true, or calling my exhaustion an ‘excuse’. I could interact happily with my friends… why not her?
I did not deny her demands were legitimate; rather, I expressed my inability to meet them because of how fatigued I was. I said ‘I can’t’ so many times. I realize her demands were small; affection, saying ‘i love you’, complimenting her. But it’s disorienting to be consistently berated and belittled by a person and then asked to compliment them and tell them you love them.
The push and pull of abuse is exhausting to a person who is not mentally because it does not make sense.
Further, in counseling I realized that I have forgotten that I have needs. I have lost the tools to even evaluate what my needs might be because, implicitly and explicitly in my marriage, I was told my needs don’t matter.
My marriage made no sense; I was obviously drowning, exhausted with the demands our life imposed on me. I was doing everything I could to get straight. I was in individual therapy, marital counseling, pastoral counseling, trying different antidepressants (4 in total – all with no effect), changing eating habits, trying to reduce my drinking, getting medical tests to see if I had health issues causing my fatigue, and being vulnerable in my friendships in an attempt to invite others in to process and move forward and figure out my marriage. I desperately shared everything I could about my marriage, hoping someone else would crack the code where I couldn’t.
None of my efforts worked. I could not get out of the exhausted state I was in. It’s worth noting here that within weeks of separating I almost completely cut out alcohol, got into a regular sleep schedule, was waking up at 6-7am every day and reading multiple hours (which I couldn’t do in marriage due to cognitive fatigue/distraction), and experienced a resurgence of energy. I have felt the duress I was under lift and lift and lift and the weeks and months have went on.
In retrospect, I was experiencing cognitive fatigue because I was taking the demands my wife was placing on me seriously, but no matter what I did I could not make sense of them. How could she not see that I was doing everything I could to make ends meet – the ends which she was imposing on me? I did not have additional energy left. She would ask me ‘Do you love me?’ and I didn’t know how to respond. How is my work not at least some symbol of love? My dream was to be a poor professor, which she knew – instead I was grinding myself to the bone, working in digital marketing with multiple freelance projects, picking up a bartending gig and a teaching gig on top of full-time employment.
The last straw was when she accused me of abuse. I took that accusation seriously, and weighed it against my experience. ‘Am I an abuser?’ I asked myself. I sorted through my behavior and how I treated her. I came to the conclusion that I may be a poor husband in serious ways; but I am not an abuser. And the abuse question opened the door to the question… ‘I may not be an abuser… but is there abuse in our marriage?’ And the answer quickly became ‘Yes.’
When we were married, I understood that she wasn’t going to work much for a while. However, she worked the bare minimum she could for 4 years, earning at most in a single year $18,000. As the years went on and my income climbed, our debt continued to climb as well. She was still contributing the same, yet spending frivolously on useless knick knacks for our home and a cat. As I packed up our home to sell, the majority of items were dozens of boxes of useless junk she’d accumulated.
She lived a life of mania around finances. We would go to marital counseling and she would regularly express, ‘I would rather be poor and happy than rich and sad’. We were poor and sad. Sure, my income was the highest it’d ever been – but we were still drowning, with debts climbing. At the end of our marriage, we’d accumulated about $20,000 in consumer debt between credit cards and personal loans.
It was traumatizing (and abusive) to go to counseling and be told by my partner she would ‘rather be poor and happy and than rich and sad’ when the factual scenario we were living was neither. She actively denied reality – both my lived experience and the reality of our finances – at my expense. It was killing me, trying to make sense of what we were going through but being unable to make sense of what I was being told and what I was experiencing.
Throughout this time, it is worth adding that she also leveraged my spiritual leadership to ‘set me straight’. I was in a conservative Evangelical space, believing that men are the ultimate provider in a family unit and primarily responsible for the status of the marriage. Because I was not doing what she wanted me to (lavishing her with affection), I was muscled into multiple groups and meetings where pastoral care intervened to restore our marriage. In the moment, I submitted to my pastoral care because of my trust for them and my faith in God. Now, I believe this dynamic was abusive; my pastoral care did not care in any sense for my soul; they only cared about fixing my marriage. No questions around ‘why’ my marriage was so bad were asked; only what was going on and how it could be fixed. I relish the thought of my pastoral care being held accountable for the abuse they exercised upon me during this time on judgment day, albeit through a shaken faith in a God that would enable this dynamic.
With my spiritual community, I shared that I felt like she was my tormentor; that she it felt as if I were on the ground due to exhaustion, and she was standing on my throat, telling me to ‘get up’ and ‘tell me you love me’; that our metaphorical life was a boat, sinking, and I was desperately bailing out water. All the while, she stood at the other end of the boat, desperately bailing water in and looking at me like I was a maniac.
And yet, because there was no adultery, there was no category for divorce. We had sworn an oath before God and were required to fix this.
As I reflect upon my marriage (and the ongoing divorce proceedings), a few things are clear.
She is an abuser. I don’t think she intends to be, but impact matters. She is mentally ill and unable to reckon with basic reality.
She is a manipulator. She manipulated my spiritual community against me. I was viewed as someone to be corrected while begging for help from my trusted friends and pastoral care, whom I now regret being vulnerable with due to their abuse and denial of my reality because I didn’t fit neatly into their thin theological categories.
She is an enslaver. In divorce proceedings, she is doing everything she can to get every dollar from me, leveraging student loans I did not co-sign, my continually increasing income due to my hard work, and denying every claim of dissipated assets she can.
It is truly a mind-breaking experience to see your compassion leveraged against you for money. I had to sit under an attorney proclaiming to a judge that, since I consented to move up our marriage date before her cancer surgery, ‘I knew what I was getting into’. That she is entitled to large sums of money (that do not exist; we never had more than $3000 in our bank account during marriage) due to that decision.
Even apart from the abuse, I did not know what I was getting into. Including the abuse, I am full of remorse for having invited such an evil, hateful person into my life.
This experience has been the most challenging to my faith. As I endured abuse from her, I trusted God in a few ways. That the compassion I showed would maybe be rewarded – or, at least not punished. That my spiritual community wanted what was best for me. That God was not a punitive, hateful God (like my partner). I do not believe this trust was well placed, but am open to shortcomings in my views here.
I struggle to consent to a God that allowed my experience to occur. I’m open and processing in some kind of faith, but I really don’t know what it looks like to find a place to put this pain and betrayal that I’m experiencing.
I am a survivor of abuse, and the abuse I endured was mind-shattering. I sacrificed everything to support a partner diagnosed with serious bodily illness, which drove her to hate me and deny my lived experience because she could not reconcile it with the hatefulness she cultivated over our marriage, choosing bitterness over any positivity for four years, poisoning my well-being in the process.
What I envisioned to be the most compassionate moment of my life — marrying a person with cancer and promising to support and love them — has become nothing but a symbol of pain and remorse. I envisioned a life where my partner and I would fight against the terror of cancer; instead she hopped to the other side, choosing her ongoing health issues as the ally and myself as the enemy.
It took me 4 years to realize it. And as she drags me through court to leverage every dollar out of me I can, my only regret is that I didn’t leave my abuser to her own devices sooner; self-pity, hatefulness, and a sheer disregard toward taking responsibility for anything.
I am grateful but drowning. As we are negotiating settlement, the end is near, and my abuser will soon be unable to execute any influence in my life.

I'm never really active on reddit but I've decided to write this post about some of my thoughts and experiences as an ex-muslim atheist for almost 10 years who lived his entire life in Egypt, I'm gonna talk about some of my life aspects and how they're affected by my beliefs and how I coped with some of the hardships and challenges being an atheist in this society. So let's think about it as part venting part sharing experiences for anyone whom it might be helpful to.
A bit about my background:
I come from a lower middle class family, Like many Egyptians from such class, I never received the best education, my entire education up until college was in Arabic and most teachers always found a way to teach you some of the Islamic values somehow, being indoctrinated from a young age creates fears in a kid's mind, such as fears from the afterlife, fears from the supernatural and fears from the Islamic apocalypse and the horrific pictures drawn to us which was repeatedly being to reassured to be happening soon. As I grow older and more rational, those things bothered me less with time, I soon realized that it's all nonsense and with time, any feeling that this might be slightly true has vanished, now I'm more concerned about normal adult stuff, like economy, war and the possibility of dying alone....
I've become an atheist in my late teens and now that I'm in my late twenties, the process of leaving the religion itself wasn't that emotionally tough for me particularly, but the difficulty comes from being different in this society, having to hide parts of you from your family and friends is always the toughest part, although my journey wasn't that emotional, I still stuck to some of the Islamic ideas even after deciding to stop believing, after all, it's the one idea that I was brought up to believe, that however faded as time passed and I clung less to this religion as I found out more about it.
Although I was never that open about my beliefs, I've just recently been trying to be a bit more open about them with more people (of course trustworthy people) even if they're not close friends and they don't share the same views, but I try to be careful with the family, although they're not gonna hurt me in anyway, I'm afraid knowing that about me might hurt them, which I find tough, having to hide parts of you from your family, but I'd say try to be as smart as you can regarding that. And of course I try to hide it as much as possible with people I work with, but sometimes some stuff slips through the cracks and it can't be helped, but I don't think it's very wise letting them suspect anything.
I've made some friends years ago who share the same beliefs, or are open minded enough to accept them, but I find my social life unfulfilling now, I'm kinda picky when it comes to people anyway, and finding people who share the same values and who you like is even harder, then you have to invest the energy to build a friendship with them, but I'm lucky enough to have those few people in my life, but it's very hard making friends in this country who I can connect with.
Relationships are much of the same as friendships, it's hard finding a suitable partner in this society, because your mutual values aren't everything, you'll need connection and chemistry and shared life goals, so yeah it's not easy.
How I coped with depression and loneliness:
I've had depression years ago, accompanied by low self-esteem, self hatred, feeling of uselessness, social anxiety and crippling shyness, and I was able to overcome a great deal of those with time and perseverance, some of the things I did was learning new things, new talents helped me boost my self confidence and feel better about myself, even it seemed hard, I just kept going. Realizing my value as a human being helped me a lot, even things as simple as being able to break out of the norm and think for myself is something not everyone does, being able to introspect and realize you were wrong is a very valuable thing on itself, of course everyone has different strengths and weakness, but if you're reading this far, I advise you to think about things that make you special and work on improving them.
Other things that helped me where some philosophies like Stoicism, Stoicism philosophy revolves around that life is gonna be tough, but you'll be able to endure it. Look it up if you're not familiar with it.
That's gonna be it I guess, hopefully this was an enjoyable read and I hope it was of help.

(this post ended up too big, i apologise if i'll bore u, also my english isnt very best so sorry for that too, if you have any guessings about this subject please share it in the comments, ill be very happy to read it)
~~~ whatever i just wanted to share my thoughts ~~~
so guys its kinda dumb post, but i just wanted to share my idea about this subject, i havnt been thinking about ending too much but a while ago i realise something:
we know that v1 works on blood, we know that based on lore v1 enters the hell to get more blood cuz mankind is dead and all that stuff, so as it appear v1 continiusly needs a blood to function, i can guess that when war was ongoing people died a MUCH so blood wasnt a rare thing on a battle field, so I mean that v1 was created without regard to the future, the engineers did not think that v1 would always require blood (to function ofc) like, what would they do if war ended in their favor? ofc v1 would ask for more blood, so in my imagine v1 is just, how should i say it... kinda "one end roblot" i mean that its literally killing machine that couldnt be stopped by anything, so in every possible way no matter who or which side would win in "the great war" or whatever u call it, in the end v1 POSSIBLY would just kill everyone for blood and end up disscharged and completly alone in hell or just somewhere aroud earth.
i guess that maybe aint said right thing above in the text, i mean ofc the side which developed v1 maybe had controll over him, like im sure they could turn him off if they wanted so, BUT IN THIS CONDITOION: where mankind is dead, no one is controlling over-world (by over-world i mean just earth, i hope yk what i mean) theres no any sence of life on earth as we know by lore, (also we are not sure how does people died after god dissapeared, like maybe they just were eaten by their own evil and sin, yk what happens when people has lack of god, OR theres an another theory that sound interesting to me, like why not: so maybe (im just guessing), mankind was annihilated by v1, it maybe sounds stupid but just keep in mind that: war reduced human population at least a thousand times, and tired phisically and emotionaly and in every way that human can be tired people, (with lack of food and water and other stuff) just were an great prey for v1 which is an ideal kill machine, but i just remembered that when v1 enters the hell he got no weapon, he just wakes up with bare hands and we dont know what was before it :/ ill discuse it later)
so eventually: im not sure what is about v1, i mean it literally awakes falling down in hell, and i can guess (by loading bios thingy) that he was turned off, theres no information about what had happen before this loading screen that v1 sees, like who knows (1) maybe he was activated by someone, (2) or it was proggramed so that he would awake after some time automatically to do... idk, whatever, kill people or demons for some reason (but in this case i dont get the purpose of it, like wth, its just dumb) OR (3) thats why i bringed up this teory that maybe v1 killed humanity by him self, He could just HARD RESTART after he fall in hell, im not fully sure but as i remember: by lore we know that the flametrower guys found entrance to the hell, so im guessing that it looks something like hole in earth, (in this case v1 killing last humans and then going to the hell to get more blood sounds logical) so he could just got restarted his systems or whatever before he fall into hell, (also if you cant get over the fact that v1 falls into hell without any gun, meaning that he had no weaphone to eliminate all the humans, we could GUESS that he just lost his guns when he fell, or he just run out of ammos in over-world, as we know guns doesnt require any ammo in game, so AS ALWAYS we can GUESS that all the gun works on hell energy or whatever, (im just trying to saw this theory at least with white threads, theres no any information about it, so i have any right to discuss and imagine anything i think would be logical, and also why not, the game is not fully done yet, so we may get OFFICIAL history about what happend before v1 woke up OR MAY NEVER, so i have full right to guess like why not, also if theres any proff that this theory is wrong (bc of evidence that may proove that this theory is wrong) i will be wery happy to hear about that, at least because of hearing the true story that is not based on guessing is way more satisfying)
SO IN TOTAL: ill try to minimise my yapping cuz its getting borrying, THERE WAS NO NEED TO SAY ALL THE THINGS I WRITED DOWN BUT WHY NOT, so in the end, i guess that: v1 will kill every live creature, there wont be any more fresh blood, so he will be forced to slowly disscharge and turn off, maybe will see the same loading (kinda bios) screen as we saw in the start, or smth, SO I GUESS V1 WILL DIE, HE JUST KILLED EVERYONE, HE CLEARED THE EATH END THE CANVAS IS RESTARETED (so maybe it was the plan of the god? who knows)
also dont forget that theres a moments in game, when SOMEONE swithces cassetes (or vhs) when we start new act, i can guess that someone just looking at v1 recordings that all he done by the way (im saying that maybe there is happening something like "the regular show" thingy, where we can see that Pops has been watching some vhs on tv, kinda like all things we done in store mode is recorded on vhs OR WHATEVER IDK U CAN GUESS ABOUT IT BY URSELF)

Hey everyone, this is my first post here and I searched around the community without any luck, hopefully someone could clear it for me. I have an upcoming trip but I have a question regarding some tickets I found on JAL website.
First of all, I'm planning a long trip from Brazil to Asia for a few months before finally going back home in Spain. I have been looking for one way tickets from Brazil to Japan and another from Japan to Spain and they're crazy expensive if bought separately. I tried searching for a multi-city tickets, etc. and with the same luck.
However, I noticed something in the JAL website. If I buy a return trip with a normal fare and a flex return ticket (refundable), it comes out way cheaper. I was thinking whether it's possible to buy it and after completing the first leg, ask for a refund for the unused second leg (return). Has anyone tried this with JAL or another airline? I never considered doing this because I never had a need to do so. But I was wondering if this can be done without any problems. I have been trying to find more info in their website but it's not very easy to find info about this. I would be saving around 300-400 dollars if the second leg could be refunded.
Thanks for reading and any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Hey everyone,
I'm a junior currently in the process of applying to colleges and could use some advice on evaluating my chances of acceptance. Here's a bit about my background and aspirations:
I have a GPA of 3.0, but I believe some context is necessary. In 10th grade, I transferred to a STEM-focused school at the urging of my parents, even though I was more interested in pursuing filmmaking opportunities at a regular school. This transition was challenging, and I struggled with some classes, resulting in a lower GPA during that year.
Despite this setback, I've been actively involved in various extracurricular activities and pursuits:

• I have an SAT score of 1580.
• I teach young kids about sustainability and environmental awareness through a sustainable class I've created.
• I've partnered with local organizations to speak with kids about environmental issues and brought in professionals from waste management (I have previously interned for it) for educational sessions.
• During an internship at Waste Management, I organized a Zero Contamination Day at my school.
• I've held leadership positions in clubs, including being the PR of the Creative Writing Club during freshman year and the Vice President of the club in sophomore year (although I had moved schools I was already voted for the position and to compensate for that I helped the board make presentations and generate activities due to the inability of being present during the meetings).
• I run a successful YouTube channel earning over $50k per year.
• I developed a Roblox game with over 50k players.
• I'm the President of the Indian Student Association at my school.
• I'm passionate about dance, choreography, and crocheting (I sold a few plushies I made to people around me).
• I initiated and organized Earth Week events where we gave out candies to those who carpooled, a spin the wheel game to educate students about the benefits of shorter showers, rehosted the zero-contamination day, and turn out the lights day.

My goal is to major in environmental science or environmental engineering while minoring in filmmaking.
I was wondering if you guys could help me tell if I have good chances in getting into UCLA - a school I am passionate in getting into?
Thank you in advance for any guidance or suggestions you can offer!