THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-TWO WEEKS OF FUCK YOU FRIDAYS
SIR KUPSLOCK KUSS THE POMFURY IS NEVER GOING TO LET A DISCONNTION STOP HIM (but sitting on the wires sometimes disconnects the rest of us)
SEEMS LIKE WE STILL GOT SOME WAVES OF DDOS GOING ON HERE AND THERE, WHILE WE'RE TRYING TO GET OUR MOGTOMES OR ALL THE MGP IN THE WORLD (LIKELY THROUGH ENDLESS LEAPS OF FAITH)
LITTLE SCRIPT KIDDIES THINKING THEY ARE REAL GOOD ABOUT TAKING DOWN ONE OF THE MOST POPULAR ONLINE GAMES, NO DOUBT. TROLLS, THE LOT OF THEM.
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON… OH RIGHT, THERE WAS A LIVE LETTER YESTERDAY. ANYTHING TO BE ANGRY ABOUT?
DISCONNECTING RULES :

• UPPERCASE IS NOT ENFORCED, BUT ENCOURAGED : RAGE LIKE THE TANK GETS DISCONNECTED JUST BEFORE THE TANK BUSTER
  
• EVERY REPLY SHOULD BE EQUALLY ENCOURAGED TO CAPITALIZE WHEN NEED BE
  
• OPTIONAL : TL;DR IN THE FIRST SENTENCE OF YOUR POST, WRITTEN IN 4 WORDS (EG : NEED ALL THE MOGTOMES), OR IN HAIKU IF YOU WANT
  
• READ EVERYTHING IN THE VOICE OF BUSY EVENT MOOGLES
  
• UNTAGGED SPOILERS WILL GET PAPERCUTS
  
• SUBREDDIT RULES STILL APPLY, LIKE NAME DROPPING AND WITCH HUNTS.
  
• WHEN IN DOUBT REFER TO THE FLOWCHART OF RAGE
  

HALL OF RAGE

• LAST WEEK'S TOP VOTED THAT IS NOT BUBBLE WRAP : NO WANNA NO DDOS
• LAST WEEK'S PERSONAL FAVORITE : KITTY

THE MEGA LIST OF MISSPELLED WORDS
IT'S BACK AND BETTER THAN EVER. READ THROUGH IT FOR LAUGH, OR SUBMIT YOUR OWN AWFUL MISSPELLINGS THAT EITHER MADE YOU LAUGH OR YOU'RE TIRED OF SEEING (LIKE TOMBSTONES AND SCRIPTS).
THE SALTWORKS DISCORD
JOIN THE SALTWORKS DISCORD FOR OUT-OF-THREAD RAGE AND VENTING. WE GOT A DEDICATED ALL-CAPS CHANNEL, BUT ALSO GENERAL AND COMIC RELATED CHANNELS.

Hey everyone, it’s Andrei, from Inspo Stories!
I love to do deep researches and interviews with successful founders and their businesses on how they got started
Today, I have a super inspiring study on Typefully Bootstrapped Saas: From $0 to $113K MRR

How was the idea born?

Typefully exists now because Fabrizio (co-founder) wanted a tool to write twitter Threads. So he started build one 4+ years ago

How the cofounders met?

They met through Twitter in 2011. They were part of the same bubble of Italian teenagers interested in tech (specifically Apple at the time). They had tons of micro-interactions throughout the years via Twitter and were both passioned about apps and great UX.
Fabrizio reach out to Francesco about building a camera app for iOS. He took the offer but, after a short collab, they dropped the project. Nothing came out of it in the end
After that, they kept following and interacting with each other for months.
At some point in 2015, Fabrizio tweeted about a concept of a Mac app wrapping Inbox by Gmail and Francesco DM’d him a prototype after a few hours.
That project was Bboxysuite, their first successful project together. They sold it with a good exit🎉 After that, they kept working together on bigger and bigger projects.

Getting first 1000 users in one day

Launch day: 16k page visits, 1,432 Signups, $155 Revenue
The traffic breakdown reveals what happened:

• Hacker News: 6.3k
• Twitter: 2.1k
• ProductHunt: 1.9k

And they also managed to hit the Hacker News frontpage.
The perfect formula was:

• interesting product
• no-bullshit title
• sparking a controversial discussion in the comments.

When it comes to Twitter, we have been building a following there for some time, so it was a matter of publishing the right tweet, at the right time, and getting the right people to retweet it
For Product Hunt, we partnered with our friend Chris. His followers got a notification when he hunted us, but we also did our part and emailed our lists. That helped to get fast on the front page and to kickstart the discussion

How got to the HackerNews front page three times in a row

What's the point, though? Those articles took me 1-2 hours to write and resulted in 40k+ visits to this blog, hundreds of signups for Typefully and Mailbrew, and many Twitter followers

1. "Select a topic. HN is a community of entrepreneurial hackers, naturally curious about company building, startups, programming, technical topics, and understanding the world. Writing about those topics will help but is not required. In fact, you can write about anything as long as your writing is intellectually honest, in-depth, and does not try to sell something."
2. "Pick the right title. The title should describe exactly what the post is about. No marketing is allowed. Think of the title more as a commit message than a headline."
3. "Don't try to outsmart HN readers. You can safely assume that the average HN reader is smarter than you. They have a radar for bullshit. You are either telling a story, describing a problem, showing something you built, or not getting to the front page. This should influence your title and style of writing. Not trying to teach anything."
4. "Be responsive in the comments. Engaging with people in the comments is the funniest part of the front-page experience. I usually write in a void and getting the diverse feedback that HN delivers is a ton of fun. I believe starting a discussion is also key in getting people to click and upvote your post. I don't take comments too seriously or personally. While the average HN reader may be smarter than me, there is a lot of variance."
5. "Dance like nobody's watching. I write for myself, and when I get a good feeling about a post, I submit it, trying not to overthink it."

Read the full Story here
We put a 4 hours into this research and it’s covering mostly all aspects:

• Free to Paid conversions improvement hack
• 30 days challenge, Black Friday & Twitter Growth Strategies
• 100k MRR SaaS Tech stack Detailed, $3K/m costs
• Hiring
• Twitter is the ultimate opportunity finder

This story is personally inspiring me, I love growth and building profitable businesses, so I hope you will feel the same energy from it!

I am ready for a new challenge. After now approx. 16 years of porn addiciton, with good and bad phases, success in life (have a good job) and in love life (I am married and soon to be father) and being more knowledgeable by now about myself and what leads me to relapse, as well as my deep desires and wishes which lead me to seek out porn, I have now a clear picture of everything. Also I have a clear picture of the bad effects porn has on me: I had some erection problems, was not good at sex, but now I have pills for the emergency if it doesn’t work. I am still not good at sex, but at least it is possible with me (nowdays even without the pills).
And I have found self-confidence. I know what I need for self-confidence.
Today, when I relapse, I am not filled with guilt. Because I forgive myself, at the same time knowing that it is weird to watch other people perform acts of sexuality instead of performing them myself. It is clear to me that in the heart of my hearts, I don’t want to watch porn. I want to have good sex and sexual pleasures, and need to find different ways of dealing with it when I am frustrated sexually.
And it is also clear to me that if I relapse repeatedly within a short time, it will lead me to too much loss of energy and also affect my self-confidence in a way I cannot put into words: I don’t feel self-conscious, but I feel inhibited, and less alive, less bold, less radiant. Also it can lead to thinking about sex more than is natural.
I also want to stop having unrealistic goals. Fapping should always remain a guilty pleasure, but fapping without porn after I have gone for 7 days without any other release should not be a source of guilt. And to be honest: There is no reason I should not be able to do this now.
So here I set out my new goal: Fapping only allowed without porn, and only when the last release was at least 7 days ago.
May this be my last goal and my last attempt. Wish me success for the rest of my life.
Now, I will go to the gym, because I would rather be somewhat muscular and attractive than start growing fatter and getting health problems.
And may I find the courage, when I am ready, to delete my other reddit account (once and for all, never creating a new one) with which I have been visiting subreddits filled, though not with images, with people focussing a bit too much on sex and masturbation than is healthy for me.

Hey everyone,
this question may be worded strangely but I was seriously looking for help from other blue collar women who have been there done that I recently started a trade program and have this one teacher who is so mind-numbingly disrespectful that I am not really sure what to do. I've finished my education all the way up to my Masters and never really had problems with my teachers before with the exception of a select few who would go out of their way to make me feel like shit for succeeding. Frankly I was always considered more of the "teachers pet" growing up.
I have no idea if I come as insubordinate to him or if it us because I am the only obviously non-white female in the course, but it's like he doesn't want me to be in "his space" and will be obnoxious just to establish his own dominance. Or he will always make these weird side comments of how I or my skills are inferior even though I'm the farthest along in the program out of the group and ace every aptitude test he tries to give me.
Some examples: was fixing a piece of wood to match into a slot. He said he didn't approve because it wasn't the way he would do it (even though he didn't instruct me on that to begin with). I started doing it his way so he would get off my back and it made everything worse. He came around to tell me some gifted students get the technique from the first try whereas others just don't have it in them and he guesses I was one.
He never really assisted me with anything while he was being very hands on with the other students and basically would only come up to me to tell me how everything I was doing was wrong to him.
I came up to grab a pencil from my desk and all of them were gone. His response? He didn't like the way I sharpened my pencils and did them himself, while actually giving me an individual lecture while everyone else got to work, on why his method of sharpening pencils was superior.
I ask if there are ways outside of school to practise what I do in class since there are certain things I wish to fine tune. He says no and that he can't slow down for me so I need to get with the program and cope since he has other people relying on him...like stakeholders
Every time I do something and it is right (which tends to be the case), he says I got lucky or he gave me a good piece of wood on purpose. Everytime I do something and it's wrong, it's just my inferiority showing :/
So far I just try to ignore him and do not speak back, but I really do not know how to handle this as this was never my reality. He said he wanted to discuss my background and understanding how I'm in the program later but I'm trying to figure out why the man is trying to have me do everything but what I came to this course to do, which is not deal with his foolishness and build my projects.
Additional Info:
I ask to speak privately after he made another disrespectful comment and had a lecture where he made a point to engage with everyone but me, and tell him I don't really understand what the conflict is and why we are having so many issues. I also ask if there are ways outside of school to practise what I do in class since there are certain things I wish to fine tune. He says no and that he can't slow down for me (even though I'm ahead???) so I need to get with the program and cope since he has other people relying on him...like stakeholders. He also inserts a bit about how he was only in my program for 2 months yet has made a 20 years career out of it because he was actually up for it whereas I just miss the mark? He also says he never assists me because I seem like I don't need help/like I'm doing fine. I ask him how that can be the case if every time he comes to speak to me it's to tell me that I miss the mark and I/what I'm doing are not good enough, like he had just said a good 45 seconds ago, and he gets even more hostile?

This is gonna be long so bear with me pls. I (f21) used to hook up with this guy (m22), I started liking him a lot, he said he wasn’t interested in a relationship. I didn’t take it personally plus I was transferring to another school abroad at the end of the year and then I’d probably never see him again.
About 3 months after i moved (so march 2023) he spontaneously booked a flight and came to visit me during spring break, he stayed with me and we were together basically the whole time, we hooked up but it was kind of an fwb situation? but throughout he kept dropping hints which I decided to ignore since I knew he wasn’t interested in being more than friends.
I do want to mention that I come from a rather well to do family and i might be a little spoilt in the sense that my family pays my tuition so I don’t have student loans and I get my rent money and some pocket money from home because my family doesn’t want me to work yet so I can focus on school more, but since I moved I have been working 2 jobs (without my family knowing) to save money because I like to live comfortably, go shopping, travel, and I’m trying to save up for my masters so I’m pretty comfortable financially, which he saw on his visit since I paid for p much everything. (Now that I think about it, I took a leave from work and didn’t have school that week so he didn’t actually see how hard I work, to him i was just chilling all day and living rich).
When he went back after his visit he kept talking ab how he has such a good time with me and how he really likes me and we started talking a lot more and I was kinda into him again. After like a month he started telling me that he wants to stop seeing other people and he dsnt want me to see other people either, still no mention of a relationship but he wanted to be exclusive. I had been on a couple dates since I moved but I wasn’t really interested in anyone so I agreed. Within a month of that (so june 2023) he started saying he loves me and for the longest time I hesitated to say it back but eventually i did. He kept saying he wants to visit me again etc but he cnt afford it. I agreed to pay bec i wanted to see him too but I thought that since I didn’t have school all month we could go on a little vacation instead of just him coming over, since I could afford it. We planned an trip for July and decided everything but before I paid for anything I asked him if he sees this ever turning into a relationship and he told me no at first but after i said if it’s not going anywhere (I was going to pay for his flights, all the stay and we would split the money we spend there) I don’t want to invest financially in it like time is one thing but i work really hard for the money, he said he just doesn’t feel like he’s ready for a relationship now but gave me hope saying that might change as we spend time together. I was naive enough to fall for that and we went on our little vacation.
Towards the end of the vacation like 2 days before we were supposed to go back, we were at a club and I was sitting down with my drink while he was on the floor and I saw him make a snapchat call and he was on it for a while and in the middle of it his screen lit up and a girl’s (let’s call her K) bitmoji was on it, so i went up to him to ask who he was talking to, he straight up lied and told me it was one of his guy friends and i just went and sat back down. After he finished the call he came and sat next to me and held his phone in a way that he obviously wanted me to look at the screen bec he had called his guy friend now the bitmoji was on the screen, which was such a failure because his guy friend didn’t even answer the phone he just showed me the “ringing” screen. I didn’t say anything tho because we both were pretty drunk and I didn’t want to start a fight in that condition. The next was our last night there and it went well but on the way back to our hotel at the end of the night i forgot my phone in the uber and used his phone to call the uber driver to ask if there was any way i could get it back. He was almost passed put by the time the uber driver came back around to bring my phone so i asked him if i could take his phone outside while i go to bring my phone just in case I need to contact the driver, he agreed and unlocked his phone and gave it to me. When i was going, K called him and i just rejected the call but then she sent him like a million texts and my suspicion got the best of me and I opened the chat. I barely had to scroll up before I saw several explicit msgs and photos (all very recent) and it made me sick to my stomach. I got my phone back and went back to the room to find him passed out I threw his phone at him and he woke up and we talked about it basically all night, I was crying like the whole time and in the end he promised me he wouldn’t do it again and he only wants to be with me and all this other emo (and in hindsight, toxic) crap that I fell for at the time and the next day we flew back.
Things were okay for like 2 months after that. On Halloween we were both on facetime, getting ready to go to halloween parties (in our respective countries lol) and I was telling him how to do his makeup (he really likes my style and often asks me for advice on clothes, makeup, hair etc) we talked for a while it was all great and after we got ready we ended the call and I went to the party (it was like 10min from my place) and as soon as I got there I tried to send him a snap but couldn’t find him on my snapchat friend list, so i tried to text him on Instagram only to find he had blocked me, on everything.
I DID NOT handle that well. After he had been nc for a week, he called me. Of course, I couldn’t resist and answered. He asked for help with a school project (I would often help him with things like that, even tho he was in a much complex course i would learn his stuff and then help him with homework and stuff). Even tho I was not in good condition physically bec of the withdrawals and even tho he hadn’t even addressed the fact that he had blocked me on everything out of nowhere I decided to help him again because I was just so desperate to talk to him and I basically made the whole thing for him and he got a good grade, he thanked me and stuff and when i asked him why he blocked me he just said “idk i was just upset idk why” he just always refused to talk about it. But i mean social media is so accessible, i did see that he had been commenting on K’s old Instagram posts (he commented on ALL her posts actually) throughout the week, so i’m sure it had something to do with her, but I didn’t ask because he seemed irritable whenever i would bring it up.
We started talking like before again, he graduated (i’m still in school) and we planned for another vacation for new years eve. Big surprise, even tho he was the one who proposed the trip, now he was unemployed so he couldn’t afford it, again. And another big surprise, I agreed to pay for it again. It was all good except I brought about $1000 in cash to spend on the trip and every time I took money out of it he would comment about how it was such a “fat stack” which sussed me out a little but whatever. About halfway through the trip I got really drunk and passed out and when I woke up the next morning all my cash was gone and I asked him if he kept it with him and he refused and got mad at me for losing such a big amount of money (as if I wasn’t stressed enough) and how he was going to have to pay now (hotels and flights were already paid for, he’d be paying for drinks and food basically). I still don’t think he would steal from me bec if he wanted money he could just ask and I would have just given him and not even asked for it back but there’s nowhere it could’ve gone because I never took the whole cash out of the hotel room and it was just us two there. I didn’t want to accuse him of anything so i let that go and never mentioned it. But that was the first time I got sus ab him with the money.
Fast forward to two months ago, we planned another trip (to my home country this time) which was supposed to be two weeks long but while we were there we were having so much fun that we kept extending it and it ended up being a month long. I saved up hella for this trip because I knew exactly what hotels I wanted to stay at, what places i wanted to go etc and i knew it was gonna be kinda expensive but even then because we stayed much longer it also costed way more than expected. At this point he didn’t even have to tell me he couldn’t afford it, it was just understood that i would be paying since he was still unemployed. But this time he had this new credit card and wanted to increase his credit score so he asked if i could use his cards to book everything and pay HIM back instead, i was like sure whatever. So i booked both our flights on my card and hotels and stuff on his. We had the best time on this trip, felt closer to him than ever so I didn’t mind paying. We decided that I would give him a certain amount in cash (to avoid international transfer fee) and transfer the rest (because countries have a limit on how much cash u can bring without having to report to customs). Once again towards the end of the trip I saw he was still talking to that girl, and it wasn’t just sexual, he called her the same nicknames he called me, he sent her the same reels and stuff on Instagram that he sent me it was like reading his chats with me. I didn’t say anything then, but a couple hours later I asked him if we should see other people too, like keep seeing each other but also see other people (i even said “we both” so he dsnt feel the need to get defensive) and he said no he dsnt want to and he dsnt even want me to. Him lying again when i gave him a chance to end his lie really broke my heart completely (bec at this point he was just lying for the sake of it) but it was just 3 days before we were gonna leave so i decided not to ruin the rest of the trip and end things with him after I paid him back for the credit card (I’d already given him more than half the amount in cash as soon as we met). When we were booking flights to go back he insisted that be take pne with a layover in a third completely put of the way country because it was cheaper and i was like sure, but then he also said because it’s two really long flights he wants to stay in this third country for a couple days bec he wouldn’t be too exhausted and wanted me to pay for the airbnb, I already wasn’t a fan of paying for a whole solo trip for him where I wasn’t going (it was one of my bucket list countries too) so i tried to tell him to just suck it up and take a couple hour layover instead but he wouldn’t listen. AND to make it worse, i saw his phone again (I didn’t even checking his phone or anything even once on this trip, he had the conversation open while he was sitting next to me and i could see) and he was talking to this girl who was around that country and asked her if she would travel there for a couple days to meet him and she agreed at first but once he sent her an airbnb and asked what she thought about it, she left him on seen and never responded even after he offered to pay (im guessing bec initially she just thought he meant they would hang out and when he brought up staying together even she got creeped out). THIS MAN WANTED ME TO PAY FOR HIS INTERNATIONAL TRIP TO MEET ANOTHER GIRL WHO HE TOLD HE WAS PAYING FOR EVERYTHING.
That was my last straw i got so mad and we had a big conversation , highlights: (Note: this is all in a very calm tone, i was holding back tears but no one was being aggressive)
Him: she’s just a friend and I haven’t even ever slept with her or anything PLUS that’s not even happening i’m not going to see her Me: because SHE left you on seen, u were clearly trying in fact ur the one who asked her to begin with Him: sighs & shrugs
Me: what about the girl in (hometown)? Him:
Me: why did u block me after halloween Him: i cnt tell u that Me: is it because u were also lying to K, telling her u were not seeing other people n she found out u were talking to me and to keep her from leaving u blocked me till she calmed down? Him: sighs, leans back and looks away
Me: why is one girl not enough Him: bec I’m not 40 Me: so why do u lie instead of just being honest and saying ur also seeing other people Him: bec i dnt wanna hurt feelings Me: i never asked u for anything u were the one who insisted on being exclusive, u were the one who said u loved me first while u knew the whole time u were lying, u really had no reason to lie? Him: u wouldn’t treat me the same if u knew i was seeing other people Me: i was treating u the exact same before u said all that? When u came to visit me i still paid for everything, u really didn’t have reason to lie Him: sighs
Me: what do u expect me to do now? Him: idk i guess u can see other people too(?)
Me: i didn’t mind paying for u if u were seeing other people n honest about it but dnt want to pay for someone who goes out of their way to lie to me for no reason (i p much never get pissed ab anything as long as it’s honest so there’s really no reason to lie which is why i cnt stand when people lie to me) Him: i understand
Me: did u at least use protection with other people (he told me he was clean and wasn’t seeing other people so i agreed to not using protection since i was on birth control anyway) Him: yes u can get tested if u want (i did and turns out he was lying i came home with a nasty std, I haven’t slept with anyone else in about a year)
After the long conversation we went to sleep and he noticed i was still crying so he hugged me and said “i dnt want u to cry talk to me” so i started saying how idk how to feel or what to do it’s just too much to process that he would do this bec i trusted him so much even when I didn’t want to but he rolled his eyes in the middle of my sentence which ticked me off so i turned away and was like “no dont turn away” to which I said “when im not talking u have an issue, when im talking u have an issue, what do u want?” This was the first time i dropped my calm in from of him and picked up an actually annoyed tone, which seemed to set something off in his head and he just blew up at me like YELLING about how im the one making a big deal out of everything and im the one who keeps turning away and refusing to talk to him etc and then he got up from the bed and punched the wall REALLY hard so i grabbed both his hands and sat him down on the bed and told him to shut up and calm down bec he was gonna get hurt if he keeps punching shit. He already hurt his hand p bad and he just held his hand to his chest and i could tell he was trying to hold in screams bec he was so much in pain. I called room service to bring ice and went downstairs to get him a painkiller. He finally calmed down and fell asleep. The next day he didn’t talk to me for 8 hours, didn’t go out or anything, we just sat there in the hotel room in silence, whenever i tried to bring up anything he just shrugged and continued to not say a word, Finally we both got hungry and went to get dinner after which we got drinks, once we got a little buzzed he started talking to me again and told me he got triggered bec i yelled at him (I didn’t yell but i did get annoyed so i got what he meant) and i apologised.
We were fine for the rest of the day and the next day and the night after that we finally flew back home.
He asked me to transfer him the money for his credit card and i asked him how much it was. The number he gave me was ridiculously higher than the number i had on my spreadsheet (since i made the bookings i even had the receipts) so i showed him saying these were the numbers that I had and he said “no but this is what my card got charged” and he sent me his own spreadsheet that me made (v poorly made no dates or anything, there were even some amounts without descriptions) so i said ok this isn’t helpful, just send me the credit card statement and i’ll see what went wrong in my calculations and he has been making dumb excuses for the last 2 weeks every time i ask him to send the statement like “there’s other payments too on the statement so u might get confused” (as if idk how to read??) or “oh i’ll send it when i open the credit card website next” but he keeps asking me to send him the money like constantly. Another thing that’s weird to me is that he completely disregarded the part where I told him I would only be paying for my half of the trip bec of him lying to me, which I already gave him more than half in cash in the beginning of the trip. Thirdly, not only does he want me to pay full he is also disregarding the money i gave him in cash bec he “spent it on the trip so it didn’t go towards the credit card payment” which I never agreed to give him spending money, that’s supposed to be on him, I brought my own spending money separately so it wasn’t even like he had to pay for both of us.
So basically, he wants me to pay for the whole credit card bill (which he won’t send me the statement for) on top of what i gave him in cash which was more than half of the number HE is giving me (and close to 80% of the number I have) ALL AFTER he lied to me, tried to make me pay for him going to meet another girl in a different country, yelled at me, punched a wall and made ME apologise.
The amount he’s asking for is big and I know he’s unemployed and if that’s the actual number, he definitely can’t pay it. While i can afford it (just barely after everything I already paid for including previous trips, flights for this trip and the money i gave him in cash) i did already tell him I would only be paying for my half (which i already did) and he agreed at the time, and i’m still extremely hurt and angry about all the lies and the drama. If he sent me the credit card statement I would still help him a little bit but he even refuses to do that. He hasn’t talked about anything else except asking me to send him the money for the past few days. I was going to cut him off after I paid him but he’s being kind of not cool about it and it’s not like i just have the money lying around. So would I be the asshole if I just ghosted him with his credit card debt that i know he can’t pay?
Also want to add: i keep mentioning his unemployment bec until February i was helping him improve his resume, prepare for interviews etc (I’m studying HR and recruitment) but after this trip he told me he is not even looking for a job bec if he got a job he “wouldn’t be able to travel as much” which pissed me off more bec im working my ass off to afford all this.

In 2010, I was facing felony charges for distribution of drugs. I was a drug addict. Hook line and sinker. But never admitted that to myself. My drug of choice? Anything I could get my hands on. Cocaine, ecstasy, weed, Xanax, Oxycontin, ciggys, alcohol, ativan, seroquil, spice, mushrooms.. You name it.
Desperately wanting to avoid prison time, I did whatever I could to turn my life around. The potential pain in carrying on was too great to tolerate. This was my rock bottom.
I enrolled in college, started working out every day, got rid of any "friends" that wanted to continue that lifestyle.
And quitting my daily drug use?
It wasn't a factor. I was too scared. I was willing to do anything to escape my prison sentence so I dropped them all without looking back. I was lucky. Lucky I had hit rock bottom. Lucky that everything collapsed around me. I needed a push and this was it.
Apparently the judge saw that I was making real change and I was able to avoid prison. I was slapped with a couple of felonies, fines, and drug and rehab classes.
Having felonies on my record was hard. I couldn't get a decent job. Even Walmart was excited to hire me, but then rejected me because of my record. I knew that I had turned a new leaf. I just needed someone to see that I was changed now.
Luckily, I found a family that needed help with their special needs kid.
I worked for them for long enough to get my felonies reduced and expunged off my record.
When hard drugs turn into soft drugs.
I thought I was "drug free" because I had stopped all illegal drugs. But soon I found myself consuming copious amounts of caffeine in order to lose weight and get "Jacked". You see, I found a passion for natural bodybuilding and Jiu-Jitsu around 2011.
I consumed endless content on how to lose body fat so I could finally get a six pack. A lot of YouTubers at the time were promoting pre-workouts like Jack3d. Which also had another stimulant called 1,3 dimethylamylamine - or DMAA. Which was banned after it had become known to be problematic.
So there I was, taking Jack3d, working out, and trying to figure out how to get a six pack. I hired the same coaches that my favorite YouTuber Matt Ogus had. 3DMuscleJourney. I got very serious with Diet and training.
When I started with 3DMuscleJourney in 2012, I had been working out for a solid year. I had gotten down to 195lbs from 215. Not a huge difference. And I had put on a good amount of Muscle in that time.
3DMuscleJourney taught me and guided me on how to train effectively while dieting and how to diet efficiently by tracking macros. But my preworkout and caffeine use had spiked up 1,500mg a day. I used caffeine as a substitute for food. After 12 weeks, I was down to 160lbs.
I was fit by any person's definition. My new found glory would soon collapse as my caffeine and DMAA use caught up to me. I started having bad shoulder pain, my joints were achy and cracky, popping every time I moved. I started stretching and doing mobility exercises but the pain in my body only got worse. I was unable to sleep. I would have fits of rage followed by lows of doubt and depression.
Then, I broke. I was no longer able to exercise because of the pain. I started eating more to see if it would help my joints. I quickly gained 30lbs. Probably within only a few weeks. I ended my coaching and started to slip back towards the abyss
That's when I figured out that caffeine and DMAA were both a huge problem.
I had been consuming caffeine my whole life. But never thought twice about it. It was a legal substance that a kid could go buy in a vending machine. How bad could it be? Broken, I decided to quit.
I was quickly able to cut out DMAA. But every attempt at quitting caffeine left me in so much pain that I would quickly rationalize going back to it. I never made it past two weeks.
Why was this harder than quitting all of those harder drugs?
I guess decades of using a softer drug still carves out some pretty steep ravines in your reward pathway. Caffeine was my last vice. Or so I thought..
I read the book "Caffeine Blues". This book explained that caffeine is not healthy in any way. It is a stimulant that causes your body to break down over time just like any drug. The book outlined some of the negatives associated with caffeine.

• Poor sleep, even if you didn't consume caffeine close to bedtime
• Joint pain from increased muscle tension.
• Poor vitamin and mineral absorption.
• Energy crashes and mood swings.
• Irritability.
• Psychosis.
• Masking negatives of caffeine with drugs and alcohol.

The list goes on. This was crazy. The book recommended tapering off of caffeine. While I was able to wean down to 300-600 most days. I couldn't get myself to fully commit. I started to look for some help.
Maybe I needed something to give me energy and focus while I quit?
I started to look at "Nootropics" to help me focus. I tried a large variety of them.

• Noopept
• Modafinil
• Piracetam
• Aniracetam
• L-Theanine
• Phenibu
• Kratom
• Nicotine
• A large variety of other supplements.

Non of this helped me quit caffeine. I soon realized that these legal "Performance enhancers" were just drugs. With their own highs and lows. And negative effects over time. I ended up quitting all of this after a year.
It was back to the drawing board.
Around the end of 2015, I ended up doing a 3 month or so long caffeine taper. Using caffeine powder and a mg scale I bought off Amazon. The plan was slow and steady. 1-2mg per day. I didn't want to notice my caffeine levels were dropping. After about a month under 25mg, I started feeling great.
My joints felt great, Arizona heat was more comfortable, I craved healthy food and exercise, I slept like a baby, the list goes on. I had raised my testosterone levels from 320ng/dL to 575ng/dL.
But then, just as I finally let go of caffeine. There was a surprise. A curve ball that would change my life forever.
The boy who lived...
My first child was to be born. The 24 hours in the hospital was an introduction to the lack of sleep I would face over the next few years. I caved..
One or two cups of coffee later, my son was born, and a new cycle of baby wake me up > being tired > caffeine to get me through the day > poor quality sleep > baby wake me up had begun.
I got got even more dependent on caffeine. I could no longer just take a nap whenever I wanted. I was a mess. Feeling like shit, with high stress, I also started drinking alcohol and smoking weed again. My testosterone levels plummeted down to 275ng/dL.
Great move dad..
I wanted to get healthy again. I started reading books about health, nutrition, meditation, etc. I wanted to attack this problem from multiple angles. I started eating a plant-based diet, meditating, exercising, taking ice baths, etc. I quit alcohol and weed again. Tapering my caffeine down below 100mg again.
I was starting to feel better. Even got my testosterone levels all the way up to 575ng/D
The girl who lived..
Sorry about the Harry Potter references...
Just when I thought it was over, another curve ball to my health goals. Something that would start the lack of sleep cycle all over again.
You guessed it.. another child! This time, there was a baby girl in my house. This new baby came with new challenges. Our daughter was born with cataracts. She had to have surgery at around 3 months old to get them removed. So not only did we have to deal with the lack of sleep stress again, and boy did she excel in that area, we had to deal with putting contacts in a baby...
Imagine a grown man squeezing their fist closed. And you have to delicately open up their fist, and place a sticky note on their palm without bending the paper. And the grown man is also having a seizure at the same time. Also, you haven't slept a quality night of sleep for weeks.
Needless to say, but I'm going to say it, our stress levels shot through the roof. We had new worries and fears about our daughter's condition and the caffeine cycle ramped back up again. All while trying to focus on my new career in IT and raising our other child.
Testosterone Replacement Therapy
I think sometime early 2023, a friend told me he was on Testosterone replacement therapy (TRT). I knew my low test levels were due to stress, caffeine use, lack of sleep, belly fat, poor eating habits, etc. But I was desperate for some edge that would help me finally quit caffeine and get healthy again.
I thought, if I can use Testosterone to help me get healthy, then I can get off of it later and not suffer any consequences.
Boy was I wrong
TRT did give me more drive and gusto to get stuff done. It also made me work harder than my body wanted. I started getting more back pain from harder weightlifting session, I actually started doing more caffeine, and even weed again. I was like 6 years clean from weed at this point.
This made me over confident. Like I could handle anything, which led to poor decisions. I felt like a horny teenager and it made it hard to focus. I started masturbating furiously..
After 4 months stabbing myself in the ass, and draining my life essence, I decided to quit TRT cold turkey. I knew this wasn't what I needed.
Withdrawals from TRT were bearable. I had waves of depression, lack of energy, etc. But I got through it. I'll probably get my levels tested again soon. As I write this, I have been off of TRT for 12 months now.
I leaned more heavily on caffeine while I was coming off of TRT. My current levels are around 400mg per day. But tapering off is my primary focus. Or maybe I should try cold turkey again? Not sure how I can afford to be a useless zombie for weeks while I have a full time job and 2 kids to look after.
"Semen retention" and NoFap
For years, I had made half ass attempts at doing No Fap and quitting porn. The benefits claimed by people who have tried it are:

• Increased energy
• Vigor
• Willpower
• Can function on less sleep
• Increased confidenc
• Better focus and concentration
• Muscle growth
• Increased Libido

I started to read some books about the topic. This big two were "Your Brain on Porn" and "Cupid's Poisoned Arrow". These books took a more Science-based approach. There were also a couple books that were a little off tilt such as "Bliss of the Celibate" and "Why You Should Never Masturbate". These books included a lot of hokey about chakras and religion.
I never made it passed two weeks.
After TRT, I decided to give it a real go. NoFap/ Semen retention felt like my final try at getting an "edge". I lasted over a month. Just around the 3 week mark, I had felt the same benefits of TRT without all of the negatives. I also learned, that you have to be all in.
Any sexual thoughts had to be banished. Just think of something else. If you entertain lust at all, you will fail. Stay off social media where you may run into soft porn, which can start the spiral that leads you to porn, etc.
I was able to control my caffeine intake finally, my sleep was better, my wife was more attracted to me, I was more patient with the kids. I finally found the answer.
But then, I relapsed. And lost sight of the benefits. I had forgotten.
Slowly everything started slipping again. With small nofap stints here and there never lasting more than two weeks.
As I write this, I am realizing that caffeine was never my problem. It was a symptom of something else. I am currently on day 6 of retention and have made it my number one priority again. I need to remember this. I need my edge back.
The journey continues..
Life is full of ups and downs. And decisions you make (good or bad) compound over time. I know all of the positive effort, and commitment to personal development has paid off over time. Even though it may have been slower than I had hoped.
This story leaves out a lot. But I'd love to have a conversation with anyone who has had similar struggles. I have been going at this alone. I can only imagine how much more growth there can be surrounding yourself with like-minded individual
Ta Ta for Now.

EOS = End of season/playoff exit
Is that they actually built a really good game, competed very well against the Rangers. They were attrocious on the special teams to start the series and this killed them. But what really really really irks me? Is that they actually brought me to believing they were going to AT THE VERY F@#!#@! lease force a game 7.... EVEN.... EVEN building a good game with a TWO goal lead going into the third... and EVEN had many chances to increase the lead, counter the Rangers comeback... but BLEW IT. How can you work so hard.... then just throw it away in one f'n period like that?
I'm really lost for words this one guys and gals. How can we have been so good but come out like freaking turtles and reverse mojo'ed special teams?
Is there any way to actually make logic of this one? We HAD very good odds... in my 'books'. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr

Big fan of Atlantis here, it's a comfort serie for me. Never watched SG1 that much, I still remember few episodes that I watched with my dad when I was a kid.
But oh my... SG1 is so far better than Atlantis. If really feels more real/human.
I'm currently at the end of S3 and all the episodes were amazing, the plot, the characters, dialogues are breathtaking. Even when you know where the episodes is going it's nowhere near to being boring. I get so many emotions watching this serie. Really the best SF TV show ever created, and I chose my words carefully !
The dynamics of all the members of SG1 is lovely even with G.Hamond (RIP, what a great actor).
Well this post was just about saying to take your time and appreciate all the tiny details the show has to offer. We really can see how much they all loved what they were doing and it makes it spectacular, especially when you know it all started some 30 years ago

Is this a good balanced plot?
So some friends and me want to write a book. we wrote some ideas for plots but mine is the one I'm asking about in this post. In all our ideas, it would be a young adult Fantasy/ Horror book with LGBTQIA+ themes. If you don't support please just read a different post. I don't want any of that kind of hate. The plot is 1007 words, is that okay? I accidentally posted it in the wrong place before.
Possible Trigger Warning for mentions of gore, death, cults, and mentions of torture.
Numbered characters don't have names yet.
The Eight Divines
A widely known cult called the Creed of the Eight Divines survives a deadly plague while the rest of the world is suffering. The Creed the Eight Divines tells its followers that the plague is brought on by sin. Outsiders are killed on spot because they will bring their sins with them. The real reason is that they know the truth about the plague.
It starts with an execution. A body with a sac over its head is being hung. It writhes for a bit before becoming still, swaying in the cold winter air. A child's stuffed toy falls from its cold greying hand. The Leaders remind the Children of the Creed that outsiders are sinners who carry the plague.
There is a yearly sacrifice and two young Children of the Creed, Niko and Talis, get chosen. Niko thinks it's bullshit because they found out the truth about the plague. The truth being that The Creed of the Eight Divines made the plague, that the plague is not just a disease but a being that they believe is their Lord. That takes over people’s bodies. Inhabiting hundreds of people at once until they die in a span of a day to a week depending on how hungry it is, then moving on to find new hosts.
The cult leaders believe that the plague was their duty to spread, to wipe out the non-believers. A few immune people outside of the cult survive and grow as different communities. Niko finds all this out and thinks it's wrong. Niko also finds out that the other people who are sacrificed all had found out about the truth. They don’t get a chance to tell Talis.
Talis is honoured to serve their Lord by their death, as they are brainwashed and believe everything the cult leader says. Unknown to even themself, Talis is an experiment of the church. Created to turn into a monster. The two have been best friends for a long time. But they are completely loyal to the cult.
Niko believes that they can change Talis’s mind by telling them about an escape plan and try to tell them what they found out. Talis doesn’t believe Niko, and betrays them by telling the Children of the Creed about the plan. Before they can be captured, Niko makes a desperate escape attempt and gets out but Talis is sent to hunt them down with a few other loyal “Children of the Creed”. After escaping, Niko meets a community of new people and decides to live with them, while Talis is struggling because something strange and horrifying is happening to them.
Something snaps inside Talis and they turn on the Children of the Creed with them. Brutally murdering them. They get back in control of themself and realise what they did. They run off and soon getting lost. Niko finds Talis almost passed out while on a patrol with some other people but it's not what is expected. There is no big fight. Niko convinces Talis that they aren’t mad at them and it's not their fault, but Talis falls unconscious at their feet. Niko is scared for Talis because even though they betrayed them, they were only being loyal to the only thing they knew, and Niko genuinely has faith that Talis can change.
They live for a few months in peace, away from the cult, and Talis meets someone new named Finn. Talis struggles with their feelings towards Finn and discovering who they are and want to be. They were raised believing homosexuality and being transgender is a horrible sin. Finn helps Talis and becomes good friends with them.
Both Niko and Talis plan with a small group of people how to end the cult and free all the people. Niko doesn’t want Talis to come on the plan because they are getting sicker. Talis wants to go and they both get into an argument, with people from the group choosing sides. Talis loses control and attacks Niko, but gets knocked out while the fight is being stopped.
In this moment of arguments and anger, the Children of the Creed that had discovered the location of the camp, raids the community and a fight ensues, in which Talis is captured along with some of the other people living outside who didn’t escape. Among the people who escaped are Niko, Greyson, #5, #6, #7, #8, and #9. The captured people are all brought back to the cult. The secret about Talis is uncovered, leaving them shocked and horrified. Talis is tortured and made to watch as the cult executes the people they had been living with and getting to know for so long, including Finn.
Niko’s plan changes from ‘end the cult’ to ‘rescue Talis and anyone else still alive’. Over a few days as Niko prepares to raid the cult, Talis is slowly changing into the monster they were created to be. When the raid is finally made, all hell breaks loose when Talis, now turned monster, breaks out of their cell and starts rage killing the cult followers and leaders in revenge for Finn and all the torturing and trauma they had dealt with over many years.
While that is happening, the plague breaks into the cult, killing everyone it can infect as it is hungry for new hosts. #8 dies in the fighting. The people in the group from the community that are immune rescue all the people they can, while Niko goes to find Talis. Niko first sees Talis when they are about to kill the remaining cult leaders. They manage to calm Talis down when they are about to kill the leader who tells them about a cure for both the plague and Talis's monster, in a desperate plan to save himself. They kill him and leave with all those alive, uninfected, and willing, along with Greyson, Shiga, #5, #6, and #9.
In the epilog, a funeral is held for Finn, #8, and all those who lost or gave their lives.
If we write and finish it, we could write a book based on finding a cure for Talis and the plague.
Thoughts??

Apologies for this one being so late; Been sick for the last week or so, and the friday i was meant to post this, I think from memory I was busy :/ But I'm starting to get back into the swing of things, and the Glossary Addendum has also had a bit of an overhaul :D I'll be applying that tonight as well, to each of the currently released chapters.
[First] [Glossary Addendum] [Previous]
[From the Abyss Artisanry, Wolfreach Commercial District, Halsion Reach Region, Haldios IV, 12th of Emheraldis, 5011 TE]
[Boltz] The door chimed, though it sounded... Off today, and I sighed. I'd have to replace the old beeper with something else now that it had broken. As I walked towards the counter, I heard Chit's voice from around the corner as she said,
"I'll be right with you!" I frowned, noticing the strain in her voice. I stepped around the counter and poked my head around the corner, and then immediately rushed to help. She was trying to move a Draekkan mace, and causing gouges in the floor as she dragged the heavy weapon.
"Seriously? Leave Draekkan weapons to me, beloved." I said, and Chit nodded as I lifted the massive, spiked club-like weapon. Made of Luunic steel, the metal was cool against my hand as I cautiously hefted it, a dark blue color akin to the Lunwatch sky on a clear night with few stars. I slowly walked over to the storage racks, and hung the mace on a pair of large hooks. Then I turned back to my lover, and looked her up and down for injuries.
Finding none, I shook my head with another sigh. "Well at least you didn't hurt yourself on it." I said, stepping up to her and wrapping my arms around her lower back. I pulled her cool body towards mine, and she happily melted into my embrace. Chuckling, I planted a kiss on her hair, and gently ran a finger down one of her drit'onthke. Her entire body shivered and she giggled, before wrapping her arms around me and giving me a tight hug.
"So what's on the list for today?" I asked, resting my cheek on her head.
"Just a few armour sets which need some minor repairs, thankfully." Chit replied. I nodded, and then the beeper went off, indicating a customer.
"Solahra's Light, what an awful noise to greet a customer with!" A deep, male-sounding canine voice rumbled from out in the customer area. We reluctantly pulled apart and both went out to see what he needed.

As Chit rounded the corner, she automatically greeted the customer by saying,
"Welcome to From the Abyss Artisanry, how can we help today?" But as I stepped around after her, I froze. The canine man was holding a box filled with shattered pieces of art, it looked like. I stepped closer and realised that they weren't shattered pieces of art, at least not in the traditional sense. Rather, they were the parts of what was formerly a weapon. I felt my eyes widen as I realised what it was. I looked at the canine man, and realised he was a Labardon. I looked back at the pieces of plasma caster, which appeared to, on closer inspection, actually have catastrophically failed at a structural level upon attempting to fire a shot.
"I went to the Lunhaekin blacksmith over in Aellandendil, cos they said that fishing my ancestral plasma caster would be an exceedingly simple affair. Instead, the next time I went to fire it, the blasted thing fell apart in my hands!" The man growled, and then asked,
"How bad is it... Is... Is there any way to restore it?" His eyes went wide as if to wordlessly plead with me, and I gestured for him to give me the box of parts. He hesitantly handed the box over and I gently placed it on the counter before pulling out one of the furcloth rolls underneath and unravelling it. Then, one by one, I pulled out each of the pieces, and with each new item, my heart sank.

This would not be a simple fix of just re-assembling the pieces. I let out a heavy sigh, and, leaning on the counter, covered my mouth with the side of my hand while looking at the arrayed parts.
"This is... At this point you might as well just buy a new plasma caster." I said finally, still looking at the parts. I looked up at the man and said,
"If I reconstruct this, because that's what it will take, a full reconstruction, it WILL cost more than buying a new caster." I looked down at the parts again, and swore under my breath.
"The focusing plate has been shattered, and those things are near indestructible when carved right, the prism chamber is cracked, so that's no good any more, and the magnetic acceleration rings..." I trailed off, and swallowed before looking up at the man.
"They're not rings any more..." I whispered, and the man's face seemed to break.
"Is there anything we can salvage of the original parts?" He asked, his voice shaky. I looked down at the parts, and realised that there was just one piece that was fully intact. With a mirthless chuckle, I picked it up.
"The plasma compression chamber. That's it." I laid the small metallic chamber down again, and sighed.
"The rest is just... Junk. Scrap even." I shook my head, running the numbers in my head. When I finished, I swore again, and dropped the bombshell.
"You're looking at around fifty thousand in parts alone." I said, and the canine's shoulders slumped.
"If that's the price it takes..." He said.
"I will try and recover as much material as I can though; I might be able to melt down the mag rings for example and re-energise them."

[A Cycle Later...]
[Chit'eiwu]
The Labardon stepped into the store, a simple digital bell sounding, and he sighed, his tail wagging a little as he did so.
"Much better than last time!" He joked, and Jakob walked around the corner holding a box, grinning from ear to ear.
"Just in time, good sir!" He exclaimed. He set down the box, and the Labardon's gaze instantly honed in on it. Jakob laid a hand on the lid, and said,
"Behold, your restored heritage!" And with that, he lifted the lid like he was proposing to the customer, and the canine's eyes lit up, his tail suddenly zipping back and forth as though it were some kind of demented metronome. As he lifted the ancient weapon, my own eyes widened; It was truly a thing of beauty.

[Boltz]
I smiled as the Labardon man admired my handiwork, and in a voice that sounded like it was half pure air, he whispered,
"It's as beautiful as the day my sire first showed it to me..." My smile widened, and I said,
"I was able to salvage more than I thought, in the end. I managed to keep the primary focus cone; I simply had to melt and recast it due to a crack in it, the laser projector's crystal matrix casing also was salvageable, though I did have to replace the crystal matrix. So it now has a Kaurine crystal for providing the first round of focusing." The man froze, and his gaze flicked to me. His hands still raise, he asked,
"A Kaurine crystal? Genuine?" I nodded.
"Cut the crystal free from the rock myself." I replied. The man laid the plasma caster on the counter gently, though it rattled slightly from his shaking paws as he ceased to support it.
"My sire said that it originally had a Shell crystal as its matrix..." He said, voice trembling as much as his paws.
"They are great crystals for energy conduction as well as for energy focusing. It took a bit to set the frequency for the right channels though." He nodded, and shakily handed over his Orionpay card. I handed it to Chit'eiwu, right as he asked,
"So how much was it all up?" I grinned and replied,
"An even fifty five thousand." He blinked, and asked,
"But... the crystal... Surely that alone would be a few hundred thousand!" I shook my head, and replied,
"It's not a Blade. And it doesn't need to be anywhere near as big. Only came to around three thousand." He nodded, and Chit'eiwu input the numbers and scanned the card. The system registered a successful transaction, and she handed the man back his card.
"Thank you for choosing From the Abyss Artisanry!" I said, and he nodded, his eyes turning shiny with unshed tears.
"No, thank you. All of my friends will be hearing about this, and you will be my first stop for anything artisanal." I nodded to him, and he left, carefully cradling the restored plasma caster in its box. Looking over to the clock, I noticed that it was indicating less than an hour before Lunrise. I jerked my head towards Chit'eiwu and asked,
"Think we should close up the shop early, or wait until Soldown before we stop operating?" She looked up at the clock as well, then back to me, and shook her head.
"No, I think we can afford to close early this evening." I nodded, and pressed the button to activate the end of Watch sign system, and a moment later, a holosign in the window came to life and began a 10 minute countdown.

We always did the countdown so that prospective customers knew how long they had to enter to the store before we stopped taking new customers prior to closing down for the Lunwatch. As usually happened however, the sign completed its countdown and flicked to the "Closed" display, and I pressed a second button to lock the door remotely, and arm the security system. As I did so, Chit'eiwu walked into the apartment, and soon after, I heard the sound of her cooking. I smiled, knowing that she was bound to make an incredible dinner as per usual, and let out a contented sigh as the system went through the arming process. Life with her was... Good. Not necessarily great by any stretch of the imagination; Most of our days were spent working after all. But it was at least a good life. A life I was more than happy to lead.

When the system indicated full armed status some minutes later, I followed my aquatic lover into our home behind and above the shop, and arrived just in time for her to serve up dinner. As I sat down, a stupid grin spread across my face as I beheld what she had cooked up. On the plate was a kind of "nest" made of purple coloured strands of pasta, and topped off with a green-sauced mince of some kind. I looked up at my lover, who was watching me expectantly. My grin refusing to go away, I obliged her apparent intent, and used a fork to collect some mince with sauce, and some of the pasta.

As the food reached my mouth, it was like an explosion of flavours; An earthy, slightly spicy flavour issued forth from the sauce, and the mince tasted somewhat like yuron, a kind of cattle animal from Zehllukarn Prime, and it was followed up by a surprisingly sweet flavour from the pasta as it rotated around in my mouth as I chewed. Swallowing, I said,
"This is incredible! I can't even properly describe it; it's... It's like an explosion of all different flavours coming together in my mouth!" Chit's face turned a fierce azure, and my grin widened. The grin morphing into a smirk, I added,
"You're definitely getting rewarded this Lunwatch, beloved."

[A Few Hours Later...]

[Boltz]

As Chit'eiwu walked into the bedroom we shared upstairs, I put the dishes from our dinner into the automatic dishwasher, and followed her up. As I reached the laundry room, I stripped off my clothes from the Solwatch, and tossed them expertly into the laundry, each garment hitting the wall and bouncing off slightly to fall into the clothes basket waiting below, before walking into the bedroom entirely unclad. Chit'eiwu was laying in the bed, the blanket covering her amethyst body from view, and in such a way that I knew that she too had put her clothes in the laundry. I walked around the bed, and pulled down the blanket to get in beside her, and after that, things turn rather hazy for a little while.

[A Week Later...]

[Chit'Eiwu]
Jakob and I stepped off of the transport, hand-in-grasper, him looking absolutely divine in a glacial blue suit with silver trimmings, seeming to be a walking ice sculpture. Complimenting him, I opted for a taste of my birthplace; Trimmed with onyx hems, I was wearing a deep, abyssal purple dress, showing off my relatively lighter purple skin, becoming a shadow of the Abyss to act as the dark counterpart to my Warrior of the Overwaves. I looked towards him as we stepped inside the Fortress of Kaur'Ainda together for the first time since I was Ascended by both him and Cewa together.
He looked back at me, smiled and squeezed my hand reassuringly, before saying over our rarely-used connection,
There's no need to be nervous; It's just a Greenmarch Feast, my Siren. As I did every time he called me that, I giggled; At first I had been confused by him calling me an alarm sound, until he showed me one of the few surviving Terran records from... Wherever it was that they came from. Terran, or at the time, Human, women of extraordinary beauty, totally uncovered, and singing some kind of song that lured male sailors to their deaths.
Then he had sent me an image of how he viewed me; My plain purple skin instead appeared almost... Luminous, and my average green eyes were glittering emerald gems. My hair, an equally unremarkable azure, was a brilliant blue that resembled the Azuresheet high above even the Overwaves, and in his mind's eye, my cheeks were flushed slightly blue. I had never considered myself to be attractive by any means; In the Abyss I would have struggled to find a mate...
But here in the Overwaves? I had been chosen by a Terran, that enigmatic, smooth-skinned, near-prey-like biped species who were renowned for absurd feats of strength and endurance. I was not as fragile as I seemed, even before my Ascension...
But Jakob seemed to realise that early on; The first time we lay together, an eye-rolling, mind-erasing experience, he showed such gentleness that it was hard to believe the stories... Until the very next day when I had struggled to move a shipment of materials that had come in, even barely raising it, and he had simply come in and told me to let it go, before seeming to effortlessly pick up the heavy box and carry it into the Forge, before placing it down and rapidly sorting the material inside for me. I had asked him about it, and his response was a mere shrug, and to say, It wasn't that heavy for me; Absolutely awkward, but not anything that will break my back.

In the present, we stepped into the Great Hall, and froze. It had been totally transformed, becoming a verdant green forest canopy under which wooden tables seemingly made from the trunks of trees, with seats formed from sections of log from great tree branches. Seiranha saw us enter, and rushed over to greet us.
"Boltz! Chit!" She exclaimed, and hugged us both in turn. It felt... Odd, to be given a hug by a Vampyris, but this particular one was a friend, and so I happily returned the hug, albeit reluctantly letting go of Jakob's hand to do so. We held the hug for a few eternal moments, before she let go and did the same to Jakob, who greeted her warmly.
"You look great!" Jakob said to the Vampyris warrior, and she blushed a deep golden color on her pale cream skin. It looked almost like golden Skyblaze rays were touching her cheeks as she giggled. But Jakob was right; She was garbed in a flowing set of obviously ceremonial armour which appeared to have been made by first weaving a suit of leaves, and then attaching segments of bark to the resulting garment. And combined with her silver-in-crimson eyes...
"You look sort of like a vengeful forest spirit in this armour, Master Seiranha!" I said, and the woman grinned.
"That's sort of the idea. Not many people remember that the spirits of the forests of all our worlds yet live... And for those who do not respect the forest's inhabitants, only death can be anticipated, or worse."

Over the course of what remained of the Solwatch, we enjoyed the Greenmarch Feast, and soon enough, it was time to scatter to our homes once again, to rest away the overindulgences of the Feast.

[Boltz]
As the transport landed at the Wolfreach starport, Chit and I walked down the ramp, though she was somewhat unsteady on her legs. Chuckling, I asked her,
"Would you like me to carry you home?" She looked at me, her face blazing sapphire, but through our connection, she, apparently not realising she was 'speaking', replied, I thought you'd never ask... My mighty Skybright, carrying me like an Inkle in his powerful arms... As the thought travelled over our connection the azure spread, and I shook my head with a grin. I really was the luckiest guy in the Reach to have landed such an exotic life partner. She happily stepped in closer to me, and I swept her off her feet, much to her almost drunken delight, and she let out a whoop of surprise.
However, as her intoxicated brain realised what had happened, she melted into my embrace, burbling away in my ear as though she had been returned to her youngest of Watches. I was all too happy to carry my lover home of course; The sound of her tripled heartbeat like a three-beat rhythm pulsed against my own heart, and her emerald gaze was transfixed on my face, the look in those beautiful green orbs one of utter and complete adoration.

After around 10 minutes, we reached the shop, and I swiped my wristcomm over the new sensor, first up-down, then right-left. The two-part verification proved my identity, and the door swung open automatically, a recent addition I had also made. As we cleared the door, I swept my foot around and behind me to close the door again, and carried Chit to the bedroom in our apartment, before laying her gently down on the bed, and saying,
"Unfortunately, I've gotta take that incredible dress off you or it will be ruined in your sleep." Chit vaguely nodded, and I helped her stand back up. Having done this routine together before, she laid her arms on my shoulders for added balancing support, and I bent down to grab the bottom of the dress, before slowly pulling it up to her chest. Feeling the garment fully above her hips, Chit carefully sat down on the bed, and I carefully pulled the dress up and over her head, then down her arms.

Turning around, I draped the dress across a nearby dresser, smoothing out any wrinkles in it, and then returned my attention to my lover, who was now completely undressed. Once again taking up the role of caregiver, I wrapped an arm around her and scooped her up once more before laying her on the bed sideways, where she let out a small gasp as the cold fabric touched her bare skin. I gave her a reassuring smile and said,
"I'll have you nice and warm soon enough, Heartstreasure." And with that, I stripped off my own suit, carefully draping it over a chair, and then pulled off the underwear I had worn for the Feast, and climbed under the covers beside Chit. Upon feeling me enter the bed, she shifted over, hissing a bit as she moved off the warmed area, and melted her body against my own. As she settled into a comfortable position, one of her legs across mine, she said through repeated yawns,
"May... May you swim... With the... Blessing of... Of Drynedaea... My.... Sky-Warrior..." Chuckling as I wrapped an arm around her back, I kissed her gently on the forehead and over our connection, replied,
"May Luunah Guard your Dreams, Heartstreasure of the Depths." And with that, as if it were a cue, Chit's breathing shifted to become deep and regular, and the sound along with the rising and falling of her amethyst chest against my skin sung its own siren song, dragging me down into...
[Next: To Tread the Shaded Path]

There’s many officers that want to make it to that sweet 20 years and gtfo of the shit show that can be active duty. But they can’t because they fail to make the LtCol list. And because of that, they are shown the door with almost nothing to show for it, except some stuff to pad their LinkedIn, yet no way to suck the teet of the American taxpayer for the rest of their days (or starting at 60 for Nasty Girls/Reservists)
How much minimum (or optimal enough to where you can comfortably not have to constantly worry about getting the top block on your OER to promote into your 20) time should you do enlisted before you want to get that Gold and Silver on your chest?
Wasn’t able to post this in army cause of the bot :(

As always, thank you to u/SpacePaladin15 for the wonderful universe that is NoP! Thank you to u/cruisingNW for proof reading and helping me make this chapter as good as it can be, you're the man! Honestly LoM wouldn't have gone very far without him! If you haven't you should absolutely go read Foundations of Humanity! It's very good AND it just updated!
A big thanks to u/Saint-Andros for helping with proofreading! He writes Out of Our Elements which is a very good one! If you like a good fic in the wilderness and a pair of cute 'friends' ;) you'll love OOE!
Also thank you to u/brotanics! For this wonderful fanart of Taisa. And this one! She's so cute I'm gonna die
And thank you to u/Jimdandy117! For this adorable fanart of Chris and Renkel! Dear god help he's adorable I love him so much
Thank you u/SlimyRage, or AsciiSquid on Discord, for makin' Vengineer Taisa Gamin'. She's absolutely adorable, I love her lil' workers apron. She looks so excited to get to work!
Thank you u/Braquen! For this astounding Pixel Art of Taisa after a few range day dates with Chris! Her little hat and gunbelt are absolutely astounding!
Thank you u/VeryUnluckyDice! For this Artwork of Taisa and Chris as characters from One Piece! I've never seen or read it before but it's incredibly cute!
Thank you to u/creditmission for their wonderful work of several LoM fanfics!
First Prev. Next
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Memory Transcription Subject: Taisa, Venlil Starship Engineer, Crystal Star Shipping Co-Owner
Date [Standardized Human Time]: October 16th, 2136
Stars… doom or not, that moon is beautiful.
Earth’s own spotlight still hung in the sky, creeping ever higher backlight more and more of the fleet waiting in anticipation. The moon’s pure white light scattered aimlessly across the mountains, shimmering like liquid silver on the surface of the river flowing through the valley far below us. Slinking dark forms of ships that slipped beyond her light made their presence known through the trailing wisps their ion thrusters jetted out behind them; painting the soil-black sky with twisting, swirling hues of blue amongst the shimmering stars.
A warm and weighty hand pulled me close as the cool night air of the mountains flowed through my wool, coaxing a contended purr to build and blossom in my chest as I pressed into Chris’ side, stretching up to nuzzle into his neck before leaning forward and snatching another ‘hummus’ covered carrot from the tray to pop it into my mouth. The delicious, savory smoothness of the hummus accompanied the sweet harshness of the carrot perfectly, sending a trill of pleasure through my chest before I continued my story.
“Anyhow, Quilleth and I, despite her continuous protests, get assigned to the same design herd for one of our final projects. We had an old Triconn Drive Systems TC-547 Jump drive and one of their ‘standard’ fusion cores to go with it, one of the worst pairs of speh-stacks ever built if you ask me, that we needed to rebuild and get working again, and she wanted no part of having to ‘deal’ with me for any extended period of time. Tavareth, my jump-drive maintenance and design professor, was adamant that,” I stopped, pulling in a breath and puffing out my chest, doing my best to mimic the old, gray trunked Mazic. “Ahem, ‘In a work environment you’ll have to work past your differences to make the herd stronger.’ and all kinds of other speh that amounted to ‘I need to fill out this herd the rest of the way and you two are who’s left.’”
“They both sound so pleasant.” Chris rumbled, a chuckle in his voice as he grinned, handing me another of his ‘cracker sandwiches’ before turning his eyes back to the stars high above.
“That’s a word for it.” I agreed, giving a jovial whistle past the crumbling cracker and deliciously smooth nut-spread. “But she dropped that tune real fast the second we came up to a real problem in the project trying to source a new, or at least rebuildable, primary magnetic accelerator. I called Parnel and had a brand new one, that was well past any spec we were expected to meet, in our workshop and installed within the paw. After that I checked the drive’s Tritium levels, rerouted every coolant line, field flow point and magnetic induction coil so they actually worked right, stars forbid those wool brains at Triconn ever design something right the first time, to get everything I could out of the new accelerator assembly.”
“Now why does that sound familiar?” Chris mused, a sly smile on his face as scooped a fistful of crunchy chips into his mouth.
“You can shush Captain ‘try his damnedest to burn out every subsystem he can find’, half the re-routing I have to do now is your fault!” I replied with an amused whistle, paffing the back of his head with my tail-tuft before continuing. “Now, after I’d… dove into the ove-”
“As you often do.” Chris cut in, a smile on his face as he prodded my side with a burbling laugh in his voice.
“Shush!” I bleated in return, the warmth of a spreading bloom driving the sneaking cold of the mountain air from my wool. “As I was saying, after I dove into the drive, Quilleth and our other partners, mostly Quilleth, had taken it on themselves to handle the core’s overhaul and refueling. Leave it to most herds to take the easy route and not learn something if they can get away with it, you can damn well bet they made sure to document that I was the one who worked on the drive and that the, far easier, core was all them. The work on the drive took a while by myself but I still managed to get everything done and put together before we had to spin it up for the test-paw.”
“How do you test a drive and a core if it's not on a ship? Feels like a fast way to make a problem for yourself.” Chris asked, his eyes focused on me, interest plain on his face as his hand wrapped around my side to pull me close.
“Well the drives physically can’t engage if they’re in a sufficient gravity well, and VP is well beyond that threshold, so we just spin them up, take readings to ‘prove’ that they’d work in a real application. I argued we should have had a few shuttles with remote diagnostics and control systems, like we used during your flight training, to do the tests to show they actually did work since correct readings in a gravity well and correct readings in applied use can be different and you wouldn’t know until you were in orbit and getting ready to jump. Tavareth said he’d have ‘loved to give us the chance but the university didn’t have the funds to allocate’ or some other excuse the faculty always used to avoid doing things the right way.” I replied, waving my paws in frustration at the amount of projects that were only given a curled tail of thought before being dumped on us to complete, real world applications or not.
“Sounds a lot like Trepassy’s parent company, unless it was a ‘mission critical component’ as they put it, then they didn’t much care to fix it if it didn’t keep her stuck in port. Always made the excuse that the repairs weren’t in the budget while posting ten plus percent margins. Didn’t matter how much me and the cap’ called and bitched them out for busted Air-con or the rec-room being entirely bare they always said the same damned thing. Bunch of assholes.”
My tail set to wagging at the idea of Chris and his captain shouting into a phone at some other Human half the world away about something that felt all too familiar. “Anyways, we get everything set up on the testing field outside of Dayside, get the systems mounted into their cooling and fuel channels before we start spooling the core up and putting power to the drive. Before too long Tavareth announces that everything looks stable and we can begin putting load onto the system, everything climbs their scales well. The warp field levels off with the expected fluctuations of a drive being operated way too far into a gravity well to maintain any real stability and the core temperature looks good. Everything’s holding steady, Tavareth looks pleased, the rest of my project-herd is congratulating each other on a project completed.”
“Then the core temp starts climbing, blooming well beyond any ‘acceptable’ overheating limiter Quilleth, Uderek or Ofent could have seen fit to set. I looked over and found all three of them watching the core start to melt down in disbelief as Tavereth slams down every single E-stop he can find on the command console. Suddenly everything stops, the room goes quiet as the distant, now glowing white core is dumped straight into an abort tank to expend its… energy somewhere a bit safer. ”
“Tavereth whipped around faster than I’d ever seen that big old Mazic move and oh stars was he furious!” I bleated, tossing my paws in the air at the memory of him studying each of us in turn before launching into an angry tirade. “That core was as bright as the stars themselves but it had nothing on the bloom positively glowing beneath Quilleth’s coat! He laid into all of us for a solid five minutes, calling out everything that could have gone wrong under Sollaglick’s light and I didn’t say a thing until she tried to blame me for forgetting to install the limiters!”
I saw the corner of Chris’ mouth curl in a tight smile, he knew what was coming but it still felt so good to be able to revel in it with my own herd, pack or whatever we should have been called. “Then I threw her own write up right back at her! Pointed out every note that explicitly called out that I only worked on the drive and that the core was all them, more specifically that SHE was supposed to have installed the limiters almost a herd before according to their schedule!”
“Uderek, Ofent and I all got a stern warning about why you should always check your herd-mates’ work and I got a gruff ‘good work’ for the drive before Tavereth positively berated Quilleth for the next quarter claw! Those two were good to me for the tail end of the semester, I’d hoped they’d try to keep in touch after we went our separate ways but… well they really didn’t.” I sighed with a shrug, the sun falling from my field at the memory of the last time I’d seen the chipper Gojid and our Tilfish friend.
“Well, hopefully things are going good for them, sometimes folks get busy… maybe they figure they don’t wanna bother you! ‘Specially now that you got your own ship and whatnot!” Chris comforted, his hands tracing wonderfully comforting circles through my wool.
Could always try to get in contact again if we make it through this.
>Agreed.< “Maybe I should, would be nice to have even more paws onto look at any of the problems Darno and I can’t… Stars above what is that?!”
My breath hitched in my throat as I looked to the stars, watching as the fleets high above began to exchange zipping tails of blue and green. A horrid, deadly light show filled the void high above earth, ships on both sides taking and serving hits with the fervor only people fighting for their lives, and the lives of everyone they’d ever known, could truly muster. The blazing trails of plasma slammed into the distant motes, scattering their vibrant colors in globs across the tapestry of the stars before some of them were joined by the flash of critical reactors and munition blowouts.
But amongst it all that wasn’t even the most of it.
For a brief moment I had thought the U.N. had decided to throw their entire moon at the fleet, another break-tail juke to smash as much of the fleet as they could; but the vectors were all wrong. They weren’t propelling here, they were taking off from her. The light of the moon was ablaze, obscured with towering pillars of smoke and fire, cacophonous trails of burnt oxygen and hydrogen traced a stampede directly to the extermination fleet. No, what they had actually chosen to do was far worse.
They’d stowed what looked like a never ending salvo of gargantuan missiles waiting for the exact moment to drop everything they had on the extermination fleet. A thought crossed my mind, a display from some stars-forsaken exhibit in the capital’s museum called ‘true evil’, its content was positively laughable now, about how many atomics humanity had made before they’d ’annihilated’ themselves. I think the curator had harvested the numbers a shear or two short. The sky lit up like a battery of strobes, the constant cracking light of splitting atoms nearly turning night to day as they spread like a blight through the assaulting fleet.
I couldn’t help but pull my lips back in a smile as my tail thumped rapidly against the stone beneath me. That mote of hope in my chest grew, watching the burning hulks full of people who wanted nothing more than to destroy everything about this world I’d come to love break apart, venting atmosphere as they sat, hanging in the void. Some tried to turn tail and limp away, some slipped into Earth’s gravity, their battered hull sections turning to voracious fireballs as they plummeted toward the hard, unforgiving dirt below.
Should’ve stayed home.
The thunk and twang of Chris’ instrument slipping from its case harvested my attention, my eyes sliding from the battle high above to the glowing white instrument resting in his hands. His own eyes turned to the sky, hovering for a moment as he plucked a few discordant notes from the instrument before looking back down and over to me, meeting my gaze.
“‘Suppose now’s as good a time as any.” He shrugged, giving me a small smile as I nodded, wrapping my tail around his wrist before gently nuzzling into his neck and turning my eyes back to the battle.
The sharp, plucky, barking twang of the banjo called out across the mountain tops, echoing back to us like a distant friend as Chris’ voice filled the air, joining the banjo in its reprise. The slow, wavering song danced between us just as the violence for the stars above, weaving amongs the whispering chorus of the trees and the chattering, throaty backing of evening insects.
“But I want to be where all the stupid shit I say Sounds so romantic and true.
Cause I'd rot in hell with you,
If you'd just ask me to.
I love the shitty things we do together,
Live with me in this sin forever.”
Memories flooded my mind with the words and hanging notes that echoed across the valley before us. The panic of our first solo flight as Chris pushed Shamrock for everything she’d had to give us, trying desperately to keep her in one piece as he blew past every limiter to get Maeve to the hospital as fast as we could. Concern roiling in my chest as I helped him to the truck after he’d dove into the river after, soaked to the bone, shivering and frozen but still so proud. The frustration of the two of us hard at work on Polani the paw after we’d gotten her, tail, and elbow, deep in carbon, grease and oil as we cursed everything under the stars. The fear of the cradle as the thunder of shells slamming into Polani’s hull filled her halls, the horror as one stalked me within my home…
“Cause home is the last place that I'd stand to be with anyone but you.
I'd rot in hell with you, If you'd just ask me to.
I love the shitty things we do together, Live with me in this sin forever.
Hell and you, I know you want it too.
I hope you take the shot, see this chance.
Feel the fire, and let me have this dance with you.”
I pressed into his side with a contented sigh, listening to the last echoing twangs of the Banjo and his voice as they called back across the great expanse before us. A long, cool breath filled my lungs before I leaned up to give his cheek a small, loving lick as a purr rolled through my chest. “I love everything we do together too, Love. Almost as much as I love just having you in my life at all.”
His mouth split into that broad, goofy grin as his hand pulled me just a little closer, his heavy voice rolling through me, just as comforting as always. “I love you too, Darlin’.”
“So…” I whistled, my tail twitching back and forth with amusement as I spoke into his neck. “About that dan-”
The words faltered in my mouth as a building light caught my eye, harvesting my attention skyward.
There, seemingly hanging in the sky, a pair of ships were tangled, no speared together. Both of them were burning fuel as munitions explosions wracked their hulls and trailing plumes of wispy atmosphere vented from their hulls as they plummeted to earth together, locked in their own deadly dance. The fires of re-entry blazed across both of their hulls as parts, pods and melted trails of slag broke away from both of them. The rammer’s guns opened up, sending round after round out after the escape pods that had bailed from the other ship, turning scores of them into little more than puffs of smoke that never had a chance.
As the pair grew closer I could finally make out what they were, or at least who the aggressor was. A Federation light cruiser was speared dead in her midship by the unmistakable, sleek curves of a Venlil Destroyer ending in a hextet of thrusters that still belched plumes of burning hydrogen fuel into the sky as she drove her opponent towards the certain death of the mountains below them with everything they had. The screaming roar of the ship reached my ears, their cacophonous echos casting across the mountain range like the angered, belligerent wails of someone defending everything they held dear.
That ship doesn’t have U.N. markings… Stars above that ship… those are Venlil.
“Damn…”
“Stars above…”
Chris and I watched what amounted to a grand, defiant headbutt as it traced its path down from the stars above. The pair of dancing ships continued their descent, pirouetting to the mountains below them like experienced partners just as their arms and thrusters screamed at each other like enemies with a centuries old grudge to settle.
“Shit… they’re comin’ down on Salt Pond.” Chris whispered, his eyes tracking the pair as they plummeted.
Mountains rose into sight beneath them, the distant mountain’s peak rose into the sky like it was anticipation, just hoping for the chance to dash the interloper across its face.
“H-How far is that?”
“‘Bout twenty miles as the crow flies. ‘Least no one lives on that one I think, ‘sides maybe the rangers.”
The fleets far above them were still locked in a furious fight, the monstrous flanks of the federation ships pushed on, crashing through the defenders like a harvester through wool-grass. Ships of both sides fell from their formations, ablaze like the stars around them, only growing brighter before flaring into catastrophic explosions that cast them into incalculable pieces that fell to the ground below like a meteor shower.
“Think they’ll manage?” I whispered, a sprout of fear and doubt managing to push past the stone of hope I’d done my best to embed in my heart.
“I hope so, Darlin’. I ho-“
The cacophonous screech and cavernous boom of metal crashing into stone, trees and dirt filled the air, drowning his voice out and sending birds scattering from the trees around us as the ground beneath us shuddered from the impact.
Then everything went whi-
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ERROR: REMAINDER OF LOADED TRANSCRIPT CORRUPTED.
ERROR CODE: 47846-MD-EF-RI. MEMORY DAMAGED BY ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS: RADIOLOGICAL INFLUENCE.
SOLUTION: ATTEMPT RECOVERY? Y/N
Y
ATTEMPTING…
ATTEMPTING…
ATTEMPT FAILED.
SOLUTION: LOAD NEXT TRANSCRIPT IN QUEUE FOR ‘THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE BLACKSBURG BURNER AND THE SKALGAN SHOWSTOPPER’? Y/N
Y
SOLUTION ACCEPTED. LOADING NEXT TRANSCRIPT.
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First Prev. Next

Hey all!
Okay, so I discovered ASMR about three/four months ago and... wow! So much content and it has been quite a nice thing for me to get into when life gets a bit tricky. After reading/listening to a lot of people's work, I decided to write a script. I do not intend to record this myself - nobody needs to hear my voice lol!!
I'm not expecting anyone to read, or comment - I wrote this for fun and curious to see what people think! However, if you do, thankyou!! Please feel free to leave a comment, and constructive feedback. Still learning the ropes, so to speak.
I'm definitely not expecting any voice artists to want to pick this up, but again, if you do, thankyou so much!! Feel free to post on Youtube, Patreon etc and I'm fine with monetization. Just please provide full credit to me and a link to the script :)
Also, I know I include a lot of directions on background noise, but I leave that entirely up to the artist! It's mainly to break up big blocks of exposition, but from the stuff I've listened to, I do prefer background noises. I just find it much more immersive.
As put in the title, I've deliberately kept both Yandere and listener gender neutral. Both Yandere and listener can be any gender! I wrote this for everyone! My personal preference would be Yandere girl, listener boy, but again, I'm not fussed if that's not your thing!
Finally, and I hope she doesn't mind me doing this, but I wanted to do a little plug to HuskyWolfGirl's YT channel. She was one of the first ASMR channels I found and really helped influence me in seeking out other content, both on Reddit and YouTube, and wanting to write my own stuff. Her work is really good and she deserves a much bigger following. Link here https://www.youtube.com/@huskywolfgirlasmr
So, the premise is you've been dating someone for a couple of weeks and you're starting to really like them. You've even been thinking that things could get pretty serious. That said, they are a bit odd, only ever meeting up with you at night, not eating a huge amount, and always being cold. One night, you finally get intimate with each other and something happens. They change into a strange creature right in front of you, with wings, big fangs and red eyes. The last thing you see is them coming at you, and everything goes dark...
Muffled noises. Fire crackling in a grate. Maybe some distant wind through the window.
A chair creaking. The sound of straining rope, which starts soft and then increases in volume. Someone has been restrained and is trying to free themselves.
Footsteps, loud and clunky as someone approaches.

Yandere
Thank God! You’re awake. Finally! You’ve been asleep ages.

More staining rope noises, increasing in intensity.

Yandere
(sounding worried)
Please don’t struggle. You’re only going to hurt yourself. I’ve been around a while. I know my way around a knot. Please. I said STOP.

The word ‘stop’ is echoey. It has power in it. The noises stop.

Yandere
Okay. Thankyou.

Noise of a chair being pulled across the room.

Yandere
Look, I’m sorry, okay. This was not the plan. I just want you to know that. I’m not going to hurt you, or do anything bad. I mean yeah, okay, tying you up isn’t great, I admit. But I just want to sit and talk with you for a little bit. If that’s okay.

Sound of Yandere sitting down. A slight rope strain.


Yandere
Ah, you don’t think it’s okay. I get that. Honest, I’m sorry for having to restrain you like this. I tried not to make it too tight. Are you in pain? You are? Damn. I’ll try to keep this quick. I really am not going to hurt you. I promise.
(sighs)
I only had to tie you up because I need you to listen to me. And after what happened last night, I figured you’d only run if you saw me again. I wouldn’t blame you. But if you did try to get away before we’ve spoken, and I had to stop you, I could hurt you. Not intentionally or anything, but… ah, now you look even more confused.
(sighs again)
You want to say something to me. I’ll take the gag out in a minute, I promise. I know you probably hate me right now. This is all just typical me. Diving in head first, not thinking things through! And now we’re…I… I’m in trouble.
Don’t look at me like that!

The rope straining sounds start again. The listener really wants to get free.

Yandere
Trust me when I say you’re not going anywhere. I’m hundreds of years old and you’re not the first person I’ve had to tie up in my time. Oh Jesus, that sounds so wrong.

At that, the straining stops. The listener is probably trying to get their head around what was just said.

Yandere
Ahh yeah, urm, so that was a slip. I guess I just better get to it. Fact is, I know we’ve only been on a few dates, but things have been so good so far. You’re just so cool to hang out with. I really loved spending time with you, and I think you felt the same.
(beat, Yandere is studying the listener for an answer, but they are keeping still for now)
Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like you before. You make me feel something I haven’t felt in years. Decades. I’ve been alone a while, you know? I was kind of happy to be, until I saw you. I remember seeing you with your friends in the restaurant. Remember, the one I work at? You looked so happy, so full of life. You remember the first night we met? How you spilt a drink on me? Well, that wasn’t actually your fault. I just wanted an excuse to talk to you, so I tripped up near you. I’m pretty clumsy at the best of times, but I didn’t exactly put on an Oscar winning performance.
(yandere chuckles)
I kinda got the impression you figured that out to be honest. But you didn’t seem to care. I don’t think anyone has ever looked at me the way you did. I felt like the most special person in the room. In the whole universe. Are you cold? I’ll put more wood on the fire.

Sound of wood being added to the fire, and flames. Yandere sits down, hissing.

Yandere
Shit, burned my hand! Typical. Is that better though? Don’t worry. I heal quickly, trust me. See? Ah damn, you look so pale. Please believe me. I won’t do anything to you. You’re everything to me. I know it’s fast. I know it’s odd! But you’re wonderful, and amazing, and beautiful and… I’m in love with you.
Remember what you kept saying to me? That you wanted to wait before we spent a night together until it was the right time? That we should get to know each other properly first? Well last night was just… wow. Being with you made it feel like my heart was beating again. It’s probably why… well, what happened last night happened.
What you saw was my true form. It happens sometimes when we lose control of our emotions. I’m usually so good at keeping myself in check. Lots of practice, you know? But I couldn’t help it. And once things got, urm, good last night…
(beat)
I’m such an idiot. I shouldn’t have let it happen. But I was just enjoying it so much.
Oh my, you’re crying. Please stop.
(echoey)
Stop!
Thankyou. Oh, now you look confused. When I want to, I can compel people to do things. Well, kind of. It doesn’t always work. Never really something I mastered, you know? I don’t like doing it anyway. I just don’t want you to be scared. I need you calm. I can hear your heart beating and it’s… distracting.
(beat)
I can see you really want that gag out. I suppose I can do. Just don’t scream. Nobody is going to hear you.

Sounds of material as the gag is removed.

Yandere
There we go. Oh, no, honey, please don’t… I said there’s no point screaming. Oh, go on then. May as well get it out your system, I guess.

Sounds of strained rope, a creaking chair and footsteps as the listener struggles and Yandere walks to the other end of the room. We hear water being poured into a glass and more footsteps as Yandere comes back.

Yandere
Would you like some water? I can hold it up to… there you go. Not too fast! You’ve spilt it all down yourself now! I know it’s kind of cold in here for you. I can’t really feel it, you know? The cold, I mean. Well, my body is always cold. Kind of comes with the territory of… What? Let you go? I promise, I will do, okay? But there’s just a few things I need to discuss with you first.
(beat)
I won’t hurt you! I would never… why don’t you believe… okay, yeah, I know it looks bad I tied you up like this.
(beat)
Okay, no need to be rude. I know you’re upset and…
(echoey)
That’s enough!
(beat)
Now, I took your gag out because you asked me to, but you will listen to me. Neither of us have a choice in that now. I was gonna wait to tell you this, you know? I mean, I don’t even know when I was gonna tell you. I hadn’t made my mind up. It’s kind of a hard thing to bring up, believe me. Like when do you do it? Third date? Just before I meet your parents? Wedding night? Honeymoon? Kinda hard to jump on a plane to the sunny Amalfi Coast if you run the risk of bursting into flame. But…
Ah, I’m rambling. Okay, I’m just gonna say it. Thing is, well the truth is, I… I’m a Vampire.
(beat)
Okay, so now you think I’m crazy, wonderful. What? That ship had already… okay, you’re being rude again.

Sound of strained ropes again.

Yandere
If you keep struggling like that you’re going to start bleeding. Not a very good idea, you think, given what I’ve just told you? Oh, there’s no such thing huh? Well then. Ask yourself if you can explain what you saw last night. My wings, my hair… my fangs. Like my entire body changed in front of you. I know you saw it.
(beat)
Wait… no, you weren’t drunk.
(beat)
And I certainly did not put anything in your drink! I mean, I did have to knock you out but that was just a small bump on the head! I didn’t plan this, you know! This isn’t some Baby Reindeer rip-off.
(beat)
What? You hated that show? Me too, to be honest. Kind of creeped me out. I mean, how pathetic is that? I’m a 700 year old Vampire who kidnaps and ties up the person I’m in love with, and a crazy Scottish gal is too much for me. I mean, what the actual hell. You probably think I’m the worst Vampire ever.
(beat)
I’m not lying to you. I promise. I wouldn’t lie to you about something like this. Here, feel my skin! It’s room temp, it’s always room temp! You always used to comment on how cold I was. Didn’t you ever wonder why we only ever met up at night? Why I never really ate that much when we went out to dinner? What, you think I live for Caesar Salad without dressing? Why do you think my face is always white?
(beat)
Yeah, I knew you thought it was weird. But I knew you never wanted to say anything. I think I loved you for that even more. Despite everything, you still wanted to know me. Do you know how rare it is to find someone you really click with? Someone who sparkles for you like the brightest star, and the way they look at you means they might, just might, feel the same way? I mean, I thought you did.
(hopeful)
Do you?
(beat)
If you say yes, will I let you go? I don’t want you to say yes because you’re scared of me!
(beat)
If I loved you, I’d untie your hands? Are they hurting? I… look, okay, I’ll untie you if it’ll make you feel better. But please don’t try anything. Please don’t. Thing is, the main thing I need to tell you is that you’re in danger. We both are, now you know what I am. Stay still.

Sound of rope being untangled.

Yandere
Okay, there you go. Oh, your wrists look sore. I told you not to struggle too much! I can give you something for that. Okay, sorry, I know you’re still a bit nervous. I won’t try to touch you again unless I have to, so please stay in the chair. The ropes can go back on if they need to.
(beat)
Why are we in danger? Well, it’s a bit complicated. Trying to condense two thousand years of Vampire lore into one conversation is a little hard, you know? I mean, there’s so much crap out there about Vampires. Half the stuff paints us as some sort of wild animal, whilst the other half… I swear I wanted to bite Stephanie Myer. But through all the literal shit they do get some things right. We exist. We live in secret in the human world. We used to be human, until another of our kind turned us, and we became what we are. We drink blood to survive.
(beat)
Okay, I’ll ignore your sarcastic tone. How many are there of us? I’m really not sure, you know? Less than there was when I was first turned, I think. We spend a lot of time in hiding. We really don’t want the human world knowing about us. That part is true as well.
(beat)
Because we are better off! When I was first turned, humans did know about us, and they hunted us. We Vampires, we are stronger than the average human. We also have faster instincts, and we’re very good at hiding. I don’t know for sure, but I think we kind of evolved to be really good at hunting, well… humans. No, please don’t move! I don’t do that anymore! I haven’t fed… I mean, I don’t drink human blood. That’s not what this is about! No…

Sound of running, and a whooshing sound like material flying through the air. Then creaks as the listener is sat in the chair, followed by the sound of rope.

Yandere
I told you not to try anything! I’m going to have to tie you up again now! How am I so fast? Have you not been listening? What? You think I want to keep you tied up? You promise you won’t try that again? Fine, I won't put the ropes back on, but please don’t.
(beat)
I know this sounds crazy, but trust me, it’s real. I’m real. Vampires are real! I’m standing right in front of you! Can you not see me?
(beat)
Where are we all? Well that’s the thing. Most of us tend to keep to ourselves. A while back now, I’m not sure when exactly, a decision was kind of made that we would avoid contact with humans. For every human we hunted, ten would spring up to hunt us back and it looked like it was to be all out war. So, we hid. Got the blood we need from animals. Only some of the bad ones still feed on humans, and even then they do it stealthily. They’re very smart. They use human laws and influence to hide themselves. It’s easy to get very rich when you’ve been around for hundreds of years. They’re the really bad ones.
(beat)
Yeah, quite a few famous people are Vampires. But not all of us are like that. I don’t want to hurt anyone. Most of us try to live with humans. We get our blood from butchers, or hunting wild animals, and we just get by.
(beat)
No. I haven’t seen any of my kind for a long time. Not directly anyway. I’m alone.
(beat)
That’s a very long story. I will tell you, but I first need you to decide something. The thing is, the decision to keep away from humans and to hide, well, it was more than a decision. It was a general order. The accepted nature of a Vampire is that we do not reveal ourselves to humans unless… well unless we plan to make them one of us.
(beat)
Please don’t move. I need to explain… don’t even think about it.
(echoey)
STOP!
(beat)
Don’t you understand? I can’t let you go because you know about us now! And you shouldn’t do. Sit down, please, or I will have to make you.

A chair creaks as the listener sits back down.

Yandere
If we come into contact with humans, we take a lot of steps to avoid revealing who we really are. What we are. Most of us don’t risk getting close to anyone in case they figure it out. We can blend in, but the closer someone gets, the more they see us. Like you were starting to. And in moments of heightened emotion… well, you saw what happened.
(beat)
Why am I telling you now? Because you saw me. You may not have known what I was, but you saw enough. And if you told someone, and they told someone… before you know it someone hears who we don’t want to hear. And then, they’d come for you. They’d come for both of us.
(beat)
Remember I mentioned there are some powerful famous ones amongst us? Well, they like their lives. Exposing Vampires to the world could jeopardize that. And that is something that they won’t… believe me, you don’t want to piss them off.
(beat)
I’m sorry, it’s not that I didn’t trust you, but I couldn’t take that chance. As long as you knew about me, you’d be in danger. Anyone you told would be in danger. Anyone who you might have told. Leaving you free, knowing about me… I just couldn’t do it. It’s why I had to kidnap you. I didn’t really have a lot of time to think.
(emotionally, like Yandere is holding back tears)
And now we’re done, aren’t we? I can see it in the way you’re looking at me. Please believe me. I would never have done this to you. I had no choice. I really didn’t. I swear. Being with you has been the best time in my life. And I’ve lived forever. It’s a long time to be alone.
(beat)
Please say something.
(beat)
What happens now? Well, this is where it gets a bit, urm, complicated.
(beat)
I get it, you won’t tell anyone. And I believe you, I do. But it goes beyond that now. You know about us, and that knowledge is a curse. I know you, I know how conscientious you are. You’ll see Vampires in everything now. What if someone goes missing and you think a Vampire did it? What if you tell the wrong person? You’ll be dooming yourself, and you wouldn’t even know it.
(beat)
Yeah, I said I’ll let you go, and I will do. Well, that’s kind of up to you. You’ve seen that I have the power of compulsion. Vampires can use this to alter memories. It’s hard, and we avoid doing it unless we absolutely have to, but we can. If you want to leave, right now, then you can. But I would need to remove from your mind any memory of me. All the times we spent together would need to go.
(beat)
I could just try to remove what happened last night, yeah. But if I just disappear, you’ll look for me. Better you never met me. Better that I never existed for you.
(Yandere sniffs)
That is the price for your freedom, and for your safety. I will let you go, but you will go forever. We will never see each other again.
(beat)
The process won’t harm you! I have done it before. You would simply go to sleep, and wake up at home. You could get on with your life.
(beat)
Yes, I did mention you have a choice. The other option is that you don’t leave. You stay here with me.
(beat)
No, not as my prisoner. Haven’t I told you I don’t want to hurt you? I have no interest in holding you against your will. If you were to stay, it would be your own choice. But the only way to guarantee your safety would be, well, the thing is, I would need to… you would need to become like me. A Vampire.
(beat)
I’m afraid there isn’t another way. If you were to become a Vampire, you would be safe. Nobody would come after you. It would be in your best interests to not tell others about us. About what you were. But it’s more than that.
When I first entered into a relationship with you, I knew that if we were going to get serious, I would need to have this conversation eventually. I hoped we would be much further along than this, but there we go. It’s a lot to put on you, especially from someone you’ve not known that long.
If you were to become a Vampire, you could stay with me. Forever if you wanted. We could share eternity. Watch as this world grows and changes. There’s a lot of bad in it, but a lot of good as well. I could show it to you. We could see it together. For hundreds and hundreds of years.
There’s props to being a Vampire too. As I said, you have increased strength, and agility. You never get sick. Your body never changes, or ages. As long as you consume the blood you need, you don’t need any other form of sustenance. We don’t even need toilets! If nobody harms you, you can go on forever.
(beat)
Yes. I’m serious. I’m offering you the world, if you want to take it.
(Yandere’s voice quivers. This next bit is hard for them to say)
Of course, you wouldn’t have to stay with me forever. Once fully turned, if you wanted to, you could leave. Make your own way in the world. But this couldn’t happen straight away. Becoming a Vampire is an intense experience that I can’t even begin to describe to you. Everything is turned up like 1,000 percent. It’s a lot, and it can be very hard to get used to. If I were to change you, you would need to stay with me and learn how to control this power. And it could take a while. You would not be able to even think about returning to your old life for months, possibly years. If you went back too soon, you would run the risk of hurting those you loved.
(beat)
Yes. You would need to disappear. You would not be able to speak to your family, your friends, or anyone, for a long time.
(beat)
Yeah, I already said you can stay with me. I would help you, and bring you anything you needed. In time, there’s no reason why you could not reconnect with your old life. But you would have to be so careful. No matter how well you manage to integrate, or how well you hide who you really are, you would be a Vampire. Always.

The fire crackles in the grate as the listener takes all of this in.

Yandere
I know this is a lot, so I have one more thing I want to offer you. Stay with me, here in my home. Let me show you my world over the next few days. What it really means to be like me. You would not be allowed to leave here without me, and if you tried I would need to tie you up again, but if you promised me not to, then you can stay as long as you like. Or at least, until you make your final decision. Become a Vampire and accept a whole new life, or let me take your memories and return home. You can decide whenever you like, but just know that once you do, whenever that is, there is no going back.
(beat)
So. My love. What would you like to do?

And that's it! I leave the ending open really. Either it can end here, or I write more!
If you made it this far, thanks for reading, and have a good day!!

It seems like Dr Jaishankar has been tasked with endlessly attacking Pandit Nehru. For a while now, he has shifted the blame for all the failures of this government to him. He regularly distorts his words, conveniently doesn't mention the context, and acts as if Pandit Nehru should have been omniscient and omnipotent while his government is not responsible for anything terrible. Here is a list of his statements:
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/china-making-model-village-on-land-ceded-by-nehru-says-s-jaishankar-101715938344351.html
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/pojk-slipped-away-due-to-someones-weakness-jaishankars-veiled-jibe-at-nehru-congress/articleshow/110178197.cms
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/congress-is-holding-pm-modi-responsible-for-nehrus-mistakes-jaishankar-on-china-issue/article68170882.ece
https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/jawaharlal-nehru-foreign-policy-s-jaishankar-india-china-pakistan-occupied-kashmir-2522494-2024-04-03
https://m.economictimes.com/news/india/pm-jawaharlal-nehru-saw-katchatheevu-island-as-a-nuisance-s-jaishankaarticleshow/108932055.cms
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/in-s-jaishankars-china-view-nehrus-romanticism-vs-modi-patels-realism-101704177524054.html
https://www.livemint.com/news/india/s-jaishankar-on-indias-historical-foreign-policy-patel-warned-nehru-against-china-it-was-a-bubble-11710920082125.html
I made a post regarding what he said on Sardar Patel, China, and Pandit Nehru. Those interested can find it in my profile. He deftly fails to mention facts like the truth that China is building the so-called model villages in multiple areas close to the Indian border (including near Uttarakhand).
https://m.thewire.in/article/security/china-constructing-model-villages-along-lac
With respect to Katchatheevu, he did not point out that the island was never truly ours to begin with and that India also received the Wadge bank when the agreement to settle the dispute was signed between India and Sri Lanka.
What is particularly sad is how Dr Jaishankar relentlessly finds fault with Pandit Nehru's actions even as he continues to follow his philosophy of non-alignment. India has chosen non-alignment with respect to the war in the Middle East as well as the war between Russia and Ukraine. Sure, one could argue that India is more active now, but that's quite obvious since we are talking about the world's most populous nation that has the world's 5th-largest economy. This India is nothing like the newly-independent India in which most people did not even live until the age of 50 and the economy had been sucked dry by a brutal colonial power.
I haven't seen any other major country that spends as much time trying to bring down its own founders as we do. It's strange considering that many of the people who are doing this will also simultaneously spend hours talking about how we shouldn't forget the positives of our past and that we should appreciate our heritage.

Tiny mentioned on stream the other day that we need to start cooking up some strategies for tearing apart common talking points we might run into. Figured I'd kick it off with this thread - dont care about I/P or anti lefty stuff so going to focus on election rhetoric
Talking Points for the Election

1. What has Biden done?

We cant use this much at home but if someone whips this out in a talk with Destiny this is probably one of the biggest slam dunks he can get. A professional political commentator openly admitting they haven't kept up with the latest legislation is damning, and it gets a followup - "If you actually followed what was happening you might've known that the policy you said you loved so much with Trump was actually put into practice by Biden" (China tariffs are a huge win for Joe)

1. Senility

The first response to this is always to call it theater. If they push, you pivot this into "If he's senile then why is everything going right?". This is a big point for destiny - you *have* to stop pivoting away from "do you even like biden?" to "wait but trump is worse." Biden has genuine positives you should be leaning on, and at this point people are good at people picking up on that particular pivot so it often ends up looking very political and potentially dishonest. Its especially important to bring up the wins that are bipartisan or that have appealed to any of the versions of the republican party over the last 20 years

1. Immigration

I notice Destiny generally avoids asking questions in arguments because he thinks it can lose for rhetorical reasons, but this is a spot I think it works really well - you lead in with "What issue do you have with Biden's immigration policy?" and when they follow up with one of their halfbaked answers you cut them off with "no no no, whats your issue with *Biden*'s immigration policy?". The point is you want to direct the conversation to the bill thats currently on the floor of congress and either A) fuck them for not knowing about the bill or B) win the back and forth on what you like or dont like about the bill

1. Wokeness

Tiny's been doing great on this topic lately, downplaying the role of college students and throwing a few zingers to show how stupid it is to base political discourse off some suped up 18 year old. The broader followup to make here is you want to make it clear to the audience that you think the democratic party is moving away from immigration and woke. Having this observation aired is so insanely strong among neutral / conservative audiences its almost criminal not slip it in somehow. Destiny's already has it is in arsenal to mention how the far left hasn't seemed to infiltrate the actual democratic party very far, however I think he can be much stronger on this point and you can use the recent immigration bill to group that in here as well

1. "Trump came up with it first!"

Yea but you need an adult to put it into practice. Easy shot. Using rhetoric to consistently frame trump as juvenile or incompetent is super important, and it works x10 if you slip it in on a separate point (because they cant respond to both your point and your insinuation)

1. "But people clearly like the guy!"

The most piers morgan take you can get, takes some tact but you should be able to turn this into your favor by slipping in a "well people like a lot of dumb shit" and then go into a longer point either about celebrity worship or about how the dont focus on policy. Potential TMZ zinger here? Also, when you do this dont say republicans, say "The trump movement" or something similar. Simple word change to make it appeal to tradcons

1. You're just saying that to be a contrarian!

This goes for any point where they try to come up with a background reason for what you're saying. I remember this specifically happening in the candace debate, but it comes up all the time. This is an opportunity because it actually gives you a chance to frame your position in your own words. I'll get into this more in the optics section but pivoting this into "No, I believe this because I've always believed in [good thing]" or "No I believe it because I've read [relevant document] and I found the evidence compelling / hard to deny".

1. Ukraine - Isolationism / The libertarian position

"Just ignore the world until its on your doorstep". Easy zingers here
Content / "Optics" Analysis for Mr. Tiny

1. Clips & Breakdowns

We just had a post this week asking for Destiny to do video essays - that shit's stupid, but its the right energy and a good litmus test for what people are looking for. The way Destiny makes this work is by taking the explanations he already does on stream - you know, when someone asks him a good question in chat and he does the little drawings - and [aieifndc] that into a machine. First step is to approach it correctly - dont wait for the good question to be asked. Come in to the stream ready to launch into an explanation on immigration, I/P, trump lawsuits, vaccine conspiracies, etc. When you find what you want, clip it and edit it either into 8 minutes for youtube or 15s for tiktok and let the algo gods do their thing. You make high quality content because you're generally knowledgeable on the topics at hand - lean on that, the higher quality your explanation the more likely someone's going to share it to their friends

1. Topic Selection

We have a number of opinions we believe, which of those opinions do we lean on to serve me best in this conversation? This is the main game you play if you're ever trying to be smart *and& honest about talking politics. For Destiny this means - younger audiences you lean on anti-conspiracies and avoid I/P, for boomers you focus on bipartisan issues and interest rates, for rightwingers and libertarians mention the guns you have and talk about how much you love america.

1. Positive Optics - Research Streams and dunking on Conspiracy Theorists

Tuning into a destiny stream to see that he brought two lawyers on to read through the latest trump case earned an unbelievable amount of respect for him in my head, I bring it up every time he comes and people are rightfully impressed - this is positive optics. Many aspects of Destiny's day to day work are incredibly impressive and a breath of fresh air to the average joe learning about his work, nearly every American is going to have respect for the guy who actually reads the bills and court cases he's talking about. So yeah, mention that shit more.
Destiny completely underestimates how crucial his takes on conspiracies are right now. When my uncle brings up voting machines or bats in China, I have no idea what to say - Destiny does. You see that big write up I did for talking points about the election? *Nobody* has the anti-conspiracy version of that talking point list - except Destiny. Voters under 26 dont give a fuck about the economy or healthcare, give them ammo to fire at the nutjob on the other end of the dinner table and they'll be willing to look past whatever stupid slur crusade you're on this week.

1. Chummy Buddies :)

"I dont see any possible argument for trump so Im really curious what Ben comes up with here" is possibly the only time I've seen Destiny tip into the most powerful rhetorical tactic of all time - camaraderie. When you kick off with some mildmannered joshing around, you give the impression you're just a couple of reasonable guys who happen to disagree on key topics. Americans splurge at even the idea of that scenario. The Trump supporter guy on the piers morgan appearances tries this approach a lot, and he's a good example of it - often makes concessions to Destiny's points in an effort to seem palatable & visibly laughs at a lot of oneliners from Destiny and Piers. It also throws the opponents off sometimes, because they feel like they cant get as combative when you're being friendly. Its also a good tactic in 2v2 debates, if it looks like you're super friendly with one of the two the other one comes off poorly

1. Hedging on I/P

"Hey listen I know its a contentious topic, I understand why people feel the way they do but from digging more into the topic its just really a lot more complicated from how it looks on the surface"

1. The Next Research

Pretty clear to me that Tiny was a bit disappointed by how shallow the immigration topic was, but this was the wrong perspective on it. Turns out, most of the crucial election topics are this simple. The only hard ones (I/P and the lawsuits) have already been covered. So if you make a big lineup of election topics there's good odds you're done with it by August - Economy, geopolitics, climate change, CHIPS act. I've noticed economics is something especially Destiny tries to toe around, interest rate stuff really isnt that complicated but hey maybe worth bringing Noah Smith on Bridges to help out (he's literally just written a piece on the economic arguments for Biden)

1. Bridges

Milking guests for followup guests. Sometimes you can just directly ask them who'd be a good fit, but its also just a generally good question to ask "Who are the prominent figures in the field right now?" "What books should be people be reading up on if they want to dive deeper?" (And then contact the author). For science and art features its always good to ask about recent work - "Is there any cool research you've seen in the past year or so that the public should be excited about?"

1. Commit to a position! State it clearly!

David Pakman's really good about this - he has a firm stance and he'll keep reiterating it throughout a conversation. Destiny OTOH tends to continuously circle around a conversation by adding evidence and making points - this is important, but if you dont state your point as well then it looks like you're avoiding giving an answer and people become confused on what your position is. The other thing is if people dont have a clear answer on what you believe, they'll start inferring it from the rest of the conversation - they have to guess, and that guess will never be favorable to you. A lot of conservative commentators *have* to circle the point because they dont have a position to stick to, there's no reason for Destiny to be doing it (and should be nailing the conservatives who rely on this tactic)
Thats all I got for now. Sorry in advance if there's any typos

I loathe the fact that I am unsightly. I am no chocolate box beauty, or a scenery you’d love to savor at first sight. I am that nobody, nobody ever turns to for rest. No hearts ever skipped a beat when I pass by; an exotic species you’d need to put your soul into to grow to love.
In other words, I need to try hard to get your eyes to look at me. I don’t look like a turd, yet I look a lot less significant than those classmates who has a lot of people swooning over them. Perhaps, I would like the attention, the beauty, the grandeur that it would give me, yet it’s more than that. It is the pain of being compared, overlooked, being laughed at, and ignored, because you don’t possess the beauty the society requires you to hold.
When I was a kid, I was often bullied. Although the reason of such bullying is not directly because of being ugly, (I know that I am not) I am aware that they do not hesitate because they don’t find me anywhere near attractive. They can sweep my soul on the floor like a rag, they can stomp on me like you do on mud. Who cares right?
There was also one time, I overheard my classmates saying that the teacher often put the beautiful people to sit in front, and others at the back. Guess what, in the beginning of the classes, he put me in the last row along with the others.
I will always have instances when guys I like will like my friends more than me, or relatives will compliment the more beautiful cousin or relative. Thus, I often compensate through my academic studies, I need to be good at something at least, so I don’t get overlooked.
For years, I tried to heal- I tried to be more understanding of aesthetics. I am aware that beauty is different everywhere. What may be beautiful for you is not for me and so there is no need to take everything personally. I thought I was better, I thought I had accepted the sublimation of the beauty I so ever have. I thought I knew I was beautiful. Turns out I am not and I know nothing.
I have a best friend who I know loves me very much. She tries to be there for me, accommodate to my needs, and I would too. She’s one of the best things that ever happened to me. She is the most beautiful genuine friend I ever had. No words can describe our bond.
One day, I saw her in a blue pretty dress. Her hair waved like the actual Belle she was playing for as an act for a school requirement. I attended to watch her perform although we come from different colleges. I gatecrashed and admired her from a distance. She was so graceful, and she moved so fluidly and beautifully. I was stunned.
After her performance, we went to eat. She couldn’t eat well because of the post-nervousness she felt as she performed. I was hungry. I didn’t have the chance to eat because I was hurrying to see her play. However, there was already something eerie inside of me that I was feeling when I was looking at her pretty face. I couldn’t grasp what it was but I shook it off and we went back for the announcement of winners.
The professor was happy of the performances but she singled out my best friend for being the best. She performed well and she really looked stunning in her role. I know that it is not only her role but her beauty. She did not have any make up on and only was wearing a blue casual dress to go with the theme. On the other hand, in every academic occasion I would often dress up in exaggeration to cover my plainness. She doesn’t even have to try. But god if she wasn’t so gorgeous. She took everyone’s breath away, including me, from that lonely dark shadow. Suddenly, I heard someone saying “Belle” so I turned around, (my name has a Belle on it) only to know that he was calling her. He looked at her with fondness and stopped smiling as he looked my way, and continued to go on the other way. I felt like something squeezed my chest and dark clots formed in my vision. That moment, I didn’t understand what was going on and suddenly became irate. I asked permission from her to leave as soon as possible and went to walk away with tears in my eyes.
I cut off contacts with her today as I realized how toxic I am and will be as a friend to her. I have a lot of issues that I thought were already fixed. It’s not her fault that I am nothing but a trying hard plain little crap. She deserves more than a jealous friend. I know that I am loyal, and I would fight for her till the end, but it’s not it.
She never knew the reason, and you can call me an asshole for not telling her anything and just plainly ghosting her. It’s just that I know she will try her best to change herself so she can stoop down my level-and I can’t let her do that. She is amazing at that top.

(Originally posted to selfhosted)
Over the past few months, I've tested several self-hosted reverse proxy solutions for my local network and I decided to share my experience for anyone else in the market. Full disclosure: I'm not an advanced user, nor am I an authority on this subject whatsoever. I mainly use reverse proxies for accessing simple local services with SSL behind memorable URLs and haven't dipped my toes into anything more complex than integrating Authentik for SSO. I prefer file-based configuration, avoid complexity, and don't need advanced features; so this list certainly won't be valuable for everyone. Feel free to share your opinions; I'd love to hear what everyone else is using.
Here's my opinionated review of the reverse proxy solutions I've tried, ranked from most likely to recommend to newcomers to least likely:

1. Caddy: By far the most painless reverse proxy I've used. Extremely lightweight, performant, and modular with plenty of extensions. Great documentation and descriptive error messages. I currently have most of my services behind a single instance of Caddy running on a Debian LXC on Proxmox and I love it. Combined with the ACME Cloudflare DNS provider addon and VS Code Server for easy configuration from a web browser, I couldn't recommend a more painless solution for beginners who just want to access their local services behind a TLD without browser warnings. Having my entire home network's reverse proxy solution contained within a single, elegantly formatted Caddyfile is a godsend. Though, if your setup is complex enough to require using the JSON config or you rely heavily on Docker, you might also consider Traefik.
2. Traefik: Probably the most powerful and versatile option I've tried, with the necessary complexity and learning curve that entails. The Docker label configuration is fantastic, and I still use it on systems I haven't migrated away from Docker. I find the multiple approaches to configuration and the corresponding documentation hard to wrap my head around sometimes, but it always seems to pay off.
3. Zoraxy: Despite being relatively new, it's the best GUI-based reverse proxy solution I'm familiar with. I grew out of it quickly as it was missing very basic features like SSL via DNS challenges when I last tried it, but I'm still placing it high on the list solely for providing the only viable option for people with a phobia of config files that I currently know of. It also has a really sleek interface, although looks can be deceiving. YMMV.
4. NGINX: Old reliable. It's only this far down the list because I prefer Traefik over vanilla NGINX for more complex use cases these days and haven't used it for proxy purposes in recent memory. I have absolutely nothing bad to say about NGINX (besides finding the configuration a bit ugly) and I use it for public-facing services all the time. If you're already using NGINX, you probably have a good reason to, and this list will have zero value to you.
5. NGINX Proxy Manager: Unreliable. It's this far down the list because I'd prefer anything over NPM. Don't let its shiny user-friendly frontend fool you, as underneath lies a trove of bugs that will inevitably lead you down a rabbit hole of stale issues and nonexistent documentation. "I've been using NPM for months and have never had an issue with it." WRONG. By the time you've read this, half of your proxy hosts are offline, and the frontend login has inexplicably stopped accepting your admin account credentials. Hyperbole aside, I've never self-hosted anything as fragile and prone to sporadically breaking as NPM in its current state, which is especially unappealing for something you might be putting all of your self-hosted services behind. From what I can tell, development is primarily focused on a major overhaul (v3) rather than fixing current issues in v2. I'd recommend anything else until then, including nothing at all. Just my experience though.

Honorable mentions:

• SWAG: Haven't used this one since I moved away from Docker, but I've seen it recommended a ton and it seems the linuxserver.io guys are held in pretty high regard. It's definitely worth a look if you use Docker or want an alternative Traefik.
• HAProxy: I didn't include it in the list because I was using the OPNsense addon and nearly went insane in the process. It might have just been the GUI, but it's the only reverse proxy solution I've used that made me actively feel like a moron. Definitely has its purpose, but I personally had no reason to keep putting myself through that.

If you're buying an NVIDIA card, test it first or ensure you can return it.
Since discussing technical problems isn't allowed on this subreddit, I describe in detail what I've checked and how the problem occurs here: Nvidia - mouse stuttering nightmare geforce experience – please help! : techsupport (reddit.com)
Check if you encounter the same issue that I and hundreds of other users have faced. The card is unplayable, regardless of whether it's a 2070 or a 4090. This problem affects all of it because it's a driver issue, W10 and W11, even on a freshly installed system. When I switch to a radeon card, the problem disappears. I had a radeon, and problems began immediately after installing the NVIDIA, making it impossible to play any games.
NVIDIA doesn't acknowledge the issue, acting as if it doesn't exist.
So, be cautious when buying an NVIDIA card, as you might experience the same nightmare I did, along with hundreds of other users dealing with the same mouse stuttering issue.
Search "mouse stuttering + NVIDIA" on Google, and you'll find numerous posts on various forums without a solution. Some solutions are as absurd as plugging and unplugging the HDMI cable. Some users claim the problem was resolved, but I've tried all the suggested solutions without success. In 5 days, I'll be returning the card because it's unusable for gaming or working due to the stuttering mouse.
NVIDIA has known about this issue and their response from two years ago was to disable the overlay, but disabling it doesn't work.
Yesterday, I started a thread about this issue, and within 5 minutes, someone confirmed they had the same problem. UncleMac69•10h ago
I can confirm this isn’t the mouse, I have the same issue for 4 months now since upgrading from a 2070 to a 3060 ti. I’m about to replace my PSU as the final effort, if it fails I’m not only selling my rig but I’m joining AMD. DONE with Nvidia not having a resolution. My mice: Razer tournament edition Razer basilisk v2 Logitech g502 They ALL stutter but when I go back to my GTX 1080 no problem. RTX + just causes lag.
But the orginal thread was removed by a moderator. nvidia-ModTeamMOD•6h ago•
Hey, Tiger-Trick. Thank you for your submission! Unfortunately, your submission has been removed for breaching the following rule:

• Rule 1 - Tech Support & Issues: Tech Support posts are not allowed. Please use the tech support megathread. Latest thread is linked in the sidebar or pinned on the front page. You can also use TechSupport community.
• Most driver related problems can be resolved by using DDU. Please visit DDU Guide here

u/moderator, as I mentioned, I used DDU right away, and it didn't work. Additionally, the problem occurred even on clean Windows.
So, we can't discuss technical problems here? What are we supposed to talk about on nVIdia subreddit, the weather? politics? money? I don't understand, but rules are rules. This post is about purchase advice, and nVidia support, so it's not technical.
I've included links where you can see a detailed technical description of this issue and attempted solutions. Since discussing technical problems isn't allowed on this subreddit, here are some external resources: I describe in detail what I've checked and how the problem occurs. Nvidia - mouse stuttering nightmare geforce experience – please help! : techsupport (reddit.com)
Here are some threads I've already checked, where hundreds of people describe the same issue.

• Mouse Cursor Unresponsive When Bringing Up In-Game NVIDIA GeForce Forums
• Mouse Cursor Unresponsive When Invoking GeForce Experience In-Game Overlay In Certain Games NVIDIA (custhelp.com)
• Mouse cursor stuck in the middle of the screen when opening Nvidia overlay : apexlegends (reddit.com)
• Mouse stutter caused by Nvidia drive NVIDIA GeForce Forums
• Mouse Lag/Stutter NVIDIA GeForce Forums
• I found the REAL deal fix for mouse NVIDIA GeForce Forums
• Mouse stutter caused by Nvidia drive NVIDIA GeForce Forums

In conclusion, I spent six days trying to resolve this issue. When you buy a product and pay good money, it should work. Known issues affecting many users should be addressed by the company selling the product. The NVIDIA technical team should provide detailed solutions, not just a simple "disable overlay" suggestion. A large company selling products worth over a thousand dollars should handle this better.
Has anyone else experienced issues with how NVIDIA addresses known problems like this? Please share your similar issues here Nvidia - mouse stuttering nightmare geforce experience – please help! : techsupport (reddit.com) since we can't discuss technical matters on this subreddit.
How do you think nVidia should handle these situations better?