It's okay to record, post and monetize (as long as you don't put it behind a paywall), just credit me.
Feel free to tweak it, change the roles and pronouns, correct my orthography, just don't change it too much.
Feedback is appreciated.
“hehehe, today is the day”
[pause]
“Finally, after months of frustration and failed attempts”
[pause]
“Today is the day I'll scare him!!!”
[pause]
“I'm sure he is going to say, “oh no a scary ghost, I have to leave this haunted place immediately”, and he will leave my house”
[pause]
“...”
[pause]
“He... is... late today...”
[pause]
“He is never this late”
[pause]
“Could it be that something has happened to him?”
[pause]
“What if he died?”
[pause]
“He better not have died before I had a chance to scare him”
[pause]
(SFX: keys on the door)
“Oh, there he is”
[pause]
“Okay, put you bag down, just like that and now...”
(SFX: door slams)
“ohohoho, I bet that scared him a lot!!!!”
[pause]
“...”
[pause]
“He isn’t even startled...”
[pause]
“Fine, time to get serious”
[pause]
“I’ll turn off the lights as soon as he walks into the kitchen”
[pause]
“One...”
[pause]
“Two...”
[pause]
“Three...”
[pause]
“That should do it”
[pause]
“What?”
[pause]
“No!!!!”
[pause]
“It isn’t your lightbulb, when has it been your lightbulb in the past six weeks?”
[pause]
“it’s me, it’s always been me”
[pause]
“See me!!! Fear me!!!”
[pause]
“What do I have to do, push you down the stairs?”
[pause]
“Actually, scratch that, last time you almost died”
[pause]
“Oh, he is about to sit, maybe I could...”
[pause]
(SFX: chair moves)
[pause]
“The chair moved on its own, surely you at least found that weird, right?”
[pause]
“No!! No!! No!! No!!”
[pause]
“don’t just sit on the chair...”
[pause]
“This wasn’t this difficult in the 80’s”
[pause]
“What is he doing now?”
[pause]
“Instant ramen again?”
[pause]
“He really should stop eating that”
[pause]
“It can’t be good for him”
[pause]
“I wonder what they taste like thought”
[pause]
“Idea, I'll turn on the stove and overboil his noodles”
[pause]
“As soon as he looks away...”
[pause]
“now”
[pause]
“What do you think about that mister I fear nothing”
[pause]
“What is he doing?”
[pause]
“You are just going to leave with the stove turned up like that?”
[pause]
“Well, I'm not turning it down...”
[pause]
“it’s starting to boil...”
[pause]
“And now is boiling...”
[pause]
“And now is spilling!!”
[pause]
“Hey!!! Can't you hear it?”
[pause]
“don’t you care about your soup? your pot? the kitchen? Your safety?”
[pause]
“fine”
[pause]
“I'll turn it off gee”
[pause]
“There you are, the kitchen could have burn you know?”
[pause]
“And you are just going to serve the noodles and move on, because of course you are”
[pause]
“What do I have to do?”
[pause]
“I have tried all the tricks, moving objects, making things disappear, weird noises, turning the lights on and off”
[pause]
“I would appear outside your bedroom wearing a bedsheet at this point”
[pause]
“I would lose my pride as a ghost if I did that”
[pause]
(sight)
“What to do? What to do?”
[pause]
“Hey where did you go?”
[pause]
(SFX: tv turning on)
“Oh, it is that time of the day”
[pause]
“Hey, what are we watching?”
[pause]
“Is it cartoons?”
[pause]
“Ugh, I can’t stand this campy 80’s horror movies, I didn’t like them when they were new, and I don’t like them now”
[pause]
“If you don’t change the channel I will”
[pause]
“Excuse me, did you just flinch?”
[pause]
“Oh no, you are not getting scared watching this garbage?”
[pause]
“You really just screamed?”
[pause]
“Okay, that is it”
[pause]
“What was that trick jerry the poltergeist taught me back in 09?”
[pause]
“haven’t had to do this in a while”
[pause]
(SFX: static noises)
“Hey...”
[pause]
“Hey...”
[pause]
“HEY!!!!!”
[pause]
“Yes, I’m talking to you”
[pause]
“No, this is not part of your movie, your terrible, terrible, stupid movie, I really am talking to you”
[pause]
“what’s the big idea dude?”
[pause]
“For weeks I have been moving chairs and slamming doors, without even getting a single reaction out of you”
[pause]
“Just to see you get scared and literally scream watching a boring 80’s horror movie, that aged like milk”
[pause]
“Point is, not cool”
[pause]
“of course, is only now that you realize I’m here, well about time!!!”
[pause]
“I’m a ghost, I haunt this house”
[pause]
“I'm talking through the tv, it’s a trick I learn from a poltergeist that lived in a radio once”
[pause]
“Yeah, yeah nice to meet you too, whatever moving on”
[pause]
“How can you not notice the house is haunted? Even I literally pushed you down the stairs that one time”
[pause]
“Yeah, sorry, that was me”
[pause]
“I wasn’t trying to kill you or anything, I was just trying to scare you and make you live my house”
[pause]
“Yes, this is my house, I was born here, grew up here and I died here, it’s mine”
[pause]
“I am not sharing it with anyone, I have scared off anyone who has moved here”
[pause]
“First it was the Jeffers in 82, they were a family of five, they were only here for 2 months before they packed up and left”
[pause]
“I took it slow, saw what they were like before starting doing things”
[pause]
“They were nice enough; the kids were a little annoying”
[pause]
“Then in 94, a woman and her daughter, the girl was into spooky stuff, her mom hoped it was just a phase”
[pause]
“After two weeks of things happening, she took a Ouija board and convinced the mom to have a seance, it only took shaking up the table a little and saying get out, for them to pack and leave the next day”
[pause]
“Then 2001, a painter, or was it a writer? Doesn’t matter... he thought he was crazy, and that I was a product of his mind”
[pause]
“Well, he was crazy, but the house was also haunted”
[pause]
“He didn’t run away though, he was hospitalized... it was better for him...”
[pause]
“After that it was a couple of newlyweds, a week of moving objects and they set a bunch cameras allover”
[pause]
“I decided to give them a show, there were out in a week”
[pause]
“What year it was?”
[pause]
“2007, why?”
[pause]
“Anyway, then it was 2012, let’s just say a sorority had to look for a new house, in only three days... that was my proudest moment...”
[pause]
“Which brings us to you”
[pause]
“Six weeks and you didn’t even notice there’s something going on”
[pause]
“Are you that dense?”
[pause]
“What do you mean you knew?”
[pause]
“Well yeah, I don’t want to hurt you, but still, I think you would at least get scared, you live in a seclude house, alone, in the woods”
[pause]
“Why would you willingly live somewhere like this?”
[pause]
“The rent is what?”
[pause]
“That is... so little...”
[pause]
“How dare they rent my house for just that?
[pause]
“My father spent a fortune building it!!!”
[pause]
“It pisses me off”
[pause]
“What valid reasons?”
[pause]
“Yes, I guess the garden could use some work”
[pause]
“And the roof is a little moldy”
[pause]
“Come on, is not as if anyone knows for sure that is haunted”
[pause]
“It was in the contract?”
[pause]
“And you still moved here?”
[pause]
“you’ll really settle for anything, huh?”
[pause]
“...”
[pause]
“Say...”
[pause]
“If I, hypothetically, agreed to share the house”
[pause]
“Under the condition on not putting anymore stupid horror movies”
[pause]
“And let me watch at least an hour of cartoons”
[pause]
“And constantly speaking to me even if you can’t hear me when I'm not in the tv”
[pause]
“Yes, I could move to any other screen”
[pause]
“What? No, I’m not moving to the screen of your phone, i have seen the stuff you look in it”
[pause]
“Your laptop isn’t as bad, but you still haven’t answer me”
[pause]
“Would you do all that?”
[pause]
“Yes?”
[pause]
“Then, will agree to share the place with you”
[pause]
“Because this is the first conversation I had in like a century”
[pause]
“Is rude to ask the age of a lady”
[pause]
“Hmm... what year is this?
[pause]
“a little less than a hundred then”
[pause]
“I don’t speak like an old lady because, I try to keep up with the lingo, why not, I mean, YOLO, you know?”
“Why are you looking at me like that? What did I say?”
[end]

Original Source: https://boringmoney.in/p/brightcom-made-a-profit-by-hiding (my newsletter Boring Money. If you like what you read, do visit the link and subscribe to receive future posts directly in your inbox)

The standard way for a company to make a profit is to produce a thing at some cost, then sell that thing at a higher cost, and pocket the difference. Another, if slightly frowned upon, way of making a profit is to not worry too much about what your company is producing or selling. Instead, at the end of the quarter, you can pick up your financial statements, take a pen, put some nice numbers under “revenue” and erase the numbers under “expenses”. On paper, the company’s making a profit either way.
The risk, apart from running out of money, is that the company might get caught. This month, Brightcom Group, an ad-tech company, got caught. [1] Here’s a SEBI enforcement order describing the stuff Brightcom did, and one of the many things it did was to show profits which didn’t exist.
Some intangible assets are under development
If your company buys, say, a truck, the standard way to account for this expense in your books is by dividing the cost of the truck by the number of years you expect this truck to last, and then adding this number to your expenses every year. This is slightly weird because you do pay cash upfront for the truck. But still, it’s useful to not have to call it an expense just for the first year because it is an asset that lasts many, many years.
If you buy a truck, account for it the standard way I described above, but then the truck meets with an accident and gets trashed the next day? Then that’s it. You have to now account for the full expense of the truck in one go and can’t split it into chunks every year.
In short, as long as an asset is “alive,” you can split its expense into chunks and account for each chunk every year. If it’s “dead,” you have to account for it right away.
Modern accounting is surprisingly thoughtful and there’s a weird in-between “alive” and “dead” that it allows for. Instead of buying an asset, if you’re building it, your asset is in some sense neither dead nor alive. So you can just, umm, add nothing to your expenses until you figure if your asset is actually dead or alive.
Brightcom was spending a lot on salaries, marketing, and stuff, but it didn’t want to show these expenses. So it decided that it wasn’t “spending” but instead “investing” in building an asset. From SEBI’s order, here’s Brightcom’s CFO:

Brightcom was building software and this software would eventually be an intangible asset. But, until Brightcom could figure whether this asset would eventually be dead or alive, it didn’t count any of its expenses as expenses, instead put it under an “intangible assets under development” category. This way, the company could show a nice profit because all its expenses were apparently assets. In all, the company hid ₹863 crore ($100 million) and showed a profit of ₹440 crore ($50 million) in 2020. If its expenses had actually been counted as expenses, Brightcom would’ve shown a loss of ₹428 crore.
https://preview.redd.it/a2xn3xc5bb1d1.jpg?width=762&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8b9bfd5cd84b25807c6025ad9a26980abc57d2da
Asset’s dead but it’s not an expense
One problem with showing your expenses as an “asset under development” is that this asset can’t be under development forever. At some point, depending on if this asset is dead or alive, you have to account for your expenses in some way.
… Or not. If your company makes any money, you put those figures in your profit and loss statement. This is simple and straightforward. But accounting isn’t simple and straightforward. If your company makes money, but it’s not a result of your actual business, then you can’t put it under the P&L. Instead, you have to account for it under a separate subheading called “Other Comprehensive Income”.
The idea behind this new sub-head is that the company's P&L is supposed to reflect its actual ability to make money. If you hold a lot of dollars and the price of the dollar goes up (or down), your company didn’t really do anything to make that profit (or loss) so you’d put it under Other Comprehensive Income and not in your P&L. So stuff like this wouldn’t affect your profit, on paper at least. [2]
Yes, of course, Brightcom recognised the ₹863 crore loss that it had hidden under “intangible assets under development” by categorising it as Other Comprehensive Income. SEBI wasn’t excited about it.
Share this post so that Boring Money can move from “asset under development” to P&L
Sell your stake but keep quiet about it
If a company is doing well, its founders don’t usually sell stock. So if a founder sells some shares, they have to tell everyone about it by regulation, because it could be a sign that things aren’t well.
There are three entities that need to know if a founder sells stock:

1. The company itself, via its registrar and transfer agent (RTA)
2. Depositories that hold stock on behalf of investors
3. Stock exchanges

1 and #2 are important, but they’re obvious. The company has to know if its founders sell stock, and so does the depository that actually moves the stock from one account to another. #3 is how the rest of the rest of the world gets to know. A founder sells some stock, files a disclosure in a stock exchange, the exchange updates its records and screams out that this has happened, and that’s how public investors know.

In March 2014, if you had asked Brightcom’s RTA, a depository, or a stock exchange about how much stake its founders owned, they would’ve all said, “about 40%”. If you asked them again in June 2022, the RTA and the depository would say “about 3.5%”, but the stock exchange would scratch its head and say “18.47%”.
That’s because Brightcom’s founders—primarily CEO Suresh Reddy, his friends and family—sold their stock but didn’t inform the stock exchanges. Here’s what they said when SEBI asked what’s up:

Man, I’m just some dumb guy writing about finance every once in a while, and even I know that if you pledge your shares as collateral to get a loan, you don’t transfer ownership. You just inform your depository and investors about it, and you still own the shares. Reddy & Friends transferred some of their shares to someone else (that is, sold them) and decided not to inform the stock exchanges. Then they used pledging as an excuse and everyone had different answers about how much stock they really owned.
How much money they make tho
When a company’s stock price shoots up in a short period of time, and there’s no concrete reason for it to happen, in all likelihood, it’s a scam. The management of the company may or may not be involved, but it definitely helps if they are.
Last month, I wrote about Sadhna, a company that SEBI charged with running a pump-and-dump. The founders owned a lot of shares, they spread some false news, the share price shot up, then happily sold their stock to naive investors, and made a profit. If you see Brightcom’s share price trajectory without knowing any of the company’s other shenanigans, it might seem a similar story. The stock price was around ₹3 in January 2021. By December, it was at ₹117. 40X in a year is definitely not normal.
In a pump-and-dump, it’s important for those running the fraud to own shares before the price goes up. The fraud that Reddy & Friends are accused of, which I described above, was of selling stock and hiding the fact that they sold it. By early 2021, they had in fact sold 80% of their shares and it’s only later that the share price started going up.
But wait, here’s more from SEBI:

In 2020 and 2021, Brightcom sold a large chunk (almost 15% stake) of shares to a group of investors. [3] Later, Suresh Reddy—who had been selling Brightcom shares all these years—became a partner at these entities that had just bought a large chunk of stock.
It’s all a bit confusing but here’s what I think happened. In late 2020 and early 2021, it had become apparent if you called yourself a tech company, investors would push your price up. The finer details didn’t matter. Brightcom, of course, happened to be an “ad-tech” company. So there was a decent chance that its share price would go up (or it could be made to go up, there are ways). But since Reddy & Friends had already sold nearly all of their shares, they needed to buy more shares so that they could sell them when the price went up. But they couldn’t buy them directly—because how would they justify selling shares so soon?—so they got some proxy investors to do so on their behalf.
As expected, the share price did go up. A lot. Around the same time, SEBI started investigating the company because of all the shady stuff it had done over the years. If the proxy investors were to sell this stock now, SEBI would definitely catch on, it was already investigating them! So instead of selling any shares at crazy high prices, Reddy instead came out with his association with those proxy investors so that the total founder ownership would go back up to the exact amount expected [4] by the public, that is, 18.47%.
It’s possible that Reddy & Friends made some profit but SEBI says it needs more information to be sure about just how much it would be. It would’ve been easier to know had they also run a pump-and-dump for good measure.
Footnotes
[1] Technically, Brightcom got caught earlier when SEBI actually started investigating. But it’s just this month that SEBI put a nice document out with whatever its investigation found.
[2] This “Other Comprehensive Income” should be a small number. If it’s a huge figure more than your actual profit, there’s usually something fishy happening.
[3] Brightcom didn’t directly sell shares to the group of investors. Instead, it issued warrants. What this meant was that the investors had the right, but not the obligation, to buy shares from the company at a fixed price at a later date. This was a good way for these investors (who are now part of the founder group) to not risk too much money buying shares in case the price went down.
[4] Reminder, the reason that the public expected the founder group to own 18.47% was that they hadn’t informed the stock exchanges when they had reduced their stake.
Original Source: https://boringmoney.in/p/brightcom-made-a-profit-by-hiding

I was recruited to do low level systems programming at a well known company in Texas. However the job actually involved doing solutions engineering work and server lab management work.

1. I was too depressed to get anything done over the last whole year because I had this overwhelming feeling that I was cheated.
   
2. I have Tinnitus. Server lab is noisy even with noise cancellation headphones. Ringing became worse Everytime I spent more than an hour in the server lab.
   

After 9 months I was put on a performance improvement plan(PIP). I am 11 months into the plan and I found another job. I want to leave now.
However these people spent a lot of money in relocating me.

1. Relocation bonus: 7K
   
2. Packers/Movers, Temporary storage: 10K?
   
3. Temporary accommodation, flight tickets, transportation: 11K?
   
4. Immigration related expenses: 5K to 10K?
   

My last paycheck would be for around 12K. The total amount I owe them would be 25K? So I would still owe them 13K.
Any tips on how I can negotiate it down. The contract says that they won't pro-rate the relocation payment if I leave early.

Hello and greetings once again my fellow CUEnthusiasts!
This post is going to be different from the usual ones you may be accustomed to because I feel I should have done this first lol.
To some, I just kinda popped up here and started posting these Coaches Corners without providing anything about myself or my back story. Like, who’s this guy?
I feel like a bit of a proper introduction and a brief digital card collecting history may help. Even most of the folks on discord don’t know this lol.
To keep it CUE, I will not name/mention or describe in detail other apps at all, just some general info that helps to understand my history and why I know the stuff I do and am now sharing it with all of you. To be honest, my CUE adventure started, in part, due to these apps :)
I started trading and collecting digital cards in 2016. But don’t worry, like I said I’ll be brief lol. The apps I was on were all individual but also kind of connected, and it’s wasn’t a game, just collecting and trading. I’ll give some insight to what they were like, as it’s kinda relevant but won’t be too detailed or revealing.
The majority of people traded within an individual app, accounts could span all the apps, but cards never transferred across apps. There was a method to trade between apps we called cross trading. I want to note, this was all ok and approved by the apps devs, but we did so at our own risk. Again, I won’t go into detail and this is as specific as I’ll get.
The reason I mention this is because in order to do this well, I had to know values for cards across quite a few apps and be able convert values amongst them. In order to do so effectively and accurately I studied and worked hard and learned all I could because that was the game.
I was selected for and assigned a trade evaluator role on one of their larger discord servers where players could ping us and get a quick evaluation. If needed, I was required to explain as briefly and as detailed as possible, a breakdown of a trade if needed and do so without bias. I did this until about 2021/2022. I was fairly well known and regarded as one of the better traders on each app I was on. But that comes second hand when you learn to play the collecting and trading game fairly and well. And that’s as far as I’ll go with that. Because next comes my CUE story.
It’s was actually a good friend from those previous apps that introduced me to CUE back in 2020, as my cake day indicates lol. However I was pretty casual on cue as my time was invested elsewhere for a number of reasons that I won’t get into.
I got into and went full time with CUE as my main app in around 2021/2022, and it has been my only card app since. I do want to describe my earlier, cue focused days a bit because it lends a bit to my back story and why I’ve been enjoying making these posts.
When I started, like many, I didn’t use any social platform. I had no idea as to the values other than what I knew from my past as a trader and collector. I also didn’t really play the game, so I never grasped the playability aspect of cards until later.
I managed to apply what I knew and successfully complete the app without ever knowing there was a value systems in place and readily available. I was able to figure which cards were hot, in demand and had value, what to pull (I wasn’t spending much back then, I was grinding trades), and when i found out there were hoarders (one card collectors), I had a good idea of to how to trade with them and, for the most part, any level of player. Little by little I was able to eventually piece together the basic trade economy. I can promise, like most players new to a card app, I sent some bad offers, and accepted them too. It happens lol.
All this means is, I write these posts because I’ve experienced what I’ve written about. I’ve learned the trading game, and applied and integrated what I knew successfully. And if I can help some people skip the years it took me, why not?
I’ve been a member on the CUE official discord for maybe a year, maybe a bit more lol it’s a blur. I can say though, it was just like home. Information readily available, a value system in place, trade evals, hoarders(one card collectors), the players who trade heavily. I made it a priority right then and there to learn the value system there in and out. This didn’t require me to be on discord all the time but I made it on as often as I could, and I took it all in and applied it. I knew how important this was going to be, especially when directly working out deals with people live. I had done this before, and was about to again lol.
My years on CUE have been an amazing and incredibly fun experience. And the people I’ve met along the way have become some great friends. Some of my favorite times are on discord talking digital cards and stuff. Makes the game that much more special and enjoyable.
My journey with cue is far from over, although I’m busy with life and that’s my main focus, I feel a deeper connection to that game and a bit of a different appreciation for it. Sorry, it may not make sense to you, but it does to me xD
Doing these segments have been extremely enjoyable and rewarding for me. It’s been a joy to look back and rememberelive times when I was just in my collecting infancy.
I feel like and hope what I’m writing about and passing on is both helpful and useful, as I may have said before. I’ve seen guides and strategies for playing the card game and deck building that go into great depth. I just hope I’m filling, what to me seemed like a gap. And that’s the trading and collecting aspect of the game.
I’ll be posting the next segment of Coaches Corner very shortly, so please, stay tuned :)
As always, Happy Trading and keep it Cue, see you in game!

I was in the backyard one night with my freinds. They were chatting and looking at something on their phones and I heard a twig snap to the right of me. I turned to look and saw a very tall and skinny figure standing in the shadows just behind a tree towards the back of the yard. It was moving back and forth on its feet in a inhuman way and stood at least a foot and a half above the 6 foot fence. I could see it's slender body slightly through the tree and could tell it was in the backyard with us, and it seemed like it was looking right at me even though I couldn't see its face. I panicked and went inside to grab a flashlight, my boyfriend and his friend followed me to see what was wrong, I told them there was something out there but when we went back out we couldn't see any trace of it with the light.
About 2 years after moving to our new home my boyfreind was at his freinds house and would be home in a hour or two. I was getting ready to take a shower and locked myself in the bathroom. I lock the doors behind me becuase it makes me feel safer when I'm alone. So I'm in there getting things ready and I hear a weird sound. It sounded like the doorknob to the bathroom door was turning. I looked over at it kind of confused and sure enough I could see the doorknob moving. I kind of laughed to myself like "wow girl you've really lost it huh" like it was a joke. Well whatever was behind that door heard me and became very aggressive. It started making these aggressive clicking noises and shoving the door. I wasn't laughing anymore and realized that this was happening, something was here and it was trying to get in. My cat started going crazy, I could hear her out in the hallway hissing and growling and I wanted to know what was going on out there but I was so terrified it was like I was paralyzed. Whatever it was went quiet for a few minutes and then I heard what sounded like someone banging their fists on my living room window outside the bathroom then followed by banging on my kitchen counter. I was shaking and I didn't know what to do. I just stayed there, I fully expected whatever was out there to come through the door at any moment but it went silent and the banging stopped. All the doors and windows were locked, there was no way anything could've been in my apartment. Honestly I'd never experienced fear like that before and I didn't move at all the entire time until my boyfreind got home. He could tell something had happened and was concerned about my safety. Even after he had gotten home I was still shaking and couldn't help but feel whatever it was that tried to get in was still there and had never left and was watching us.
There was another time I was walking up the driveway around 1 in the morning and I saw a tall grey crouched outside the bushes next to my bedroom window. It was just staring at me and didn't move or say anything. I made eye contact with it and it freaked the shit out of me. Why was it just waiting there by my window??? Did it want me to see it?? I don't understand but I was scared so I went and sat on the couch and avoided going to my room.
One time when I was a kid I was having a dream about a hooded figure and I woke up to a pain in my lower left side. When I opened my eyes there was a being standing right next to my head about a foot from my face. It was incredibly short, like the size of a child. I looked at it for about 5-10 seconds before it vanished into thin air. Like it activated a cloaking device.
I'm scared honestly, I don't know what they want or if they want to hurt me. I've tried requesting contact or asking for information but absolute silence. I have no clue what's going on and I legit don't know what to think of all this. Anyone here have any perspectives on the matter? I feel like I'm being harrased or they want me to go insane.

Hey reddit bit of a weird/sad one for ya today. Just a throwaway account and I might end up deleting all this within the week.
Sorry if I get ramble-y and all over the place I'm just shooting off my stream of consciousness. Sorry for the trauma/info dump and any grammaspelling errors.
I've been going out with my boyfriend for almost 5 months now and we've just started getting more touchy and intimate over the past month or so.We've talked a bit about intimacy the past few months but I have a few personal issues with it.When I dated my ex of 4 years he was pretty pushy about sexual stuff cause we were in a long distance relationship and he was just a touchy physical guy in general, and I've been a good little church girl all my life with no experience.
We did a lot of stuff I probably wasn't ready for. When we first met in person we just went right to making out and oral but no intercourse. This was consensual but looking back I was probably too shy to say no...I haven't been in the best mind space anyway the past few months I guess and haven't been turned on by anything me and my partner have done. I feel more romantic attraction than sexual, but lately there has been a lack of emotion on my side of things. I don't feel anything when we kiss, i just feel like im there, kissing him. As sad as that is to say. It hurts writing that out because i desperately want to feel something, anything. When I'm alone I have no problem getting myself off, I probably prefer it. I like the fantasy of it more than the physicalness. But I just shut down when I get with a partner.
I have a lot of brain blocks from religion (the classic repressed church girl saving herself for marriage blah) I'm still a virgin. I highly doubt I'm ever going to have sex with him honestly... it's not even a marriage thing, at this point I don't care if I get married or not. I'm not sure if I trust anyone enough with my body to feel good or get over the mental barrier that keep me from enjoying sexual things with a partner.
Which brings me to two questions.
Am I some kind of asexual?
Or just low-key traumatized from past pushy experiences?
Or both? (probably :/ )
Well... I mean I definitely don't feel asexual... I believe I have a fearful avoidant/disorganized attachment style. (Self diagnosed)
Fast forward to now with my current boyfriend, he's very kind, sweet and all around gentlemen. He makes me feel safe and happy. I haven't told him much about my ex cause I just want to leave the past in the past.
But I guess over this past month I've just been like low-key triggered when he asks me to touch him?Which brings me to tonight. We were making out for a while and he asks me to touch him and I just can't get into it. I didn't want to say no to him and ruin the mood, I want him to be happy.
Now that im thinking about it I'm started to repeat some of the behaviour I did with my ex... but im more aware of what im doing now... I am a people pleaser, but it's also just a hand job right? Big whoop. The first time I did it I felt a little grossed out when he finished... and the same thing happened tonight when he finished but I felt disgusted and almost gagged by the feeling and texture of it all... I cant get into it mentally. But hey he thanked me and was satisfied right?
No he hasn't asked to make me feel good or anything, I wouldn't ask that of him because it's too embarrassing and I don't think I could get into it... I don't understand why I would be so disgusted enough to hold back and almost gag.
I don't have a strong gag reflex, I had a dog before and never minded picking up after him or cleaning up my baby cousins vomit.
So am I just doomed and ruined to never enjoy sexual stuff reddit? I want to make my partner happy but it shouldn't come of the cost of me feeling the need to push past what I think and feel and need in that moment.
I said yes to a lot of things in the past with my ex because that's what girlfriends do yadda yadda and I'm gonna have to deal with this real soon and have a talk with my boyfriend about why this is a problem for me...
I uh realize this is probably a good talk to have with a therapist about "sexual trauma" and "repression/suppression" and all that fun stuff but that's not really an option at the moment, so I turn to you reddit experts for advice haha. (Yes I realize yall aren't trained professionals but the only people i can turn to atm)
I probably know the answers to what yall are gonna say but any advice would be cool I guess. I can reply to comments below and might update and edit within the week

So this has all happened within the past few weeks. A girl Im friends with at college is a senior, and I will be a sophomore. I jokingly said that she should help me practice kissing for next semester and she said that if I didn’t kiss at all when I graduated she would kiss me. I then jokingly said that I gotta wait three years and then she said that she’ll do it at her graduation instead which is next year. She is 100% serious. What does this mean? Does she like me? Think Im attractive? Or just wants to do something nice for me because she’s a really good friend? I sorta like her and find her pretty attractive but I already like another girl who just got in a relationship. She has told me she likes another guy but she hasn’t really elaborated much past that. However she knows the guy she likes doesn’t like her back. She wanted to FT me that same night to fall asleep because she’s wasn’t feeling well and having birthday depression because she doesn’t like her birthday. What does this add to the story already talked about?
Then cut to the day after where she went swimming and when she told me I jokingly said to not send swimsuit photos and she then later sent a mirror photo of her smiling, however she was in a tank top and jean shorts and not her swimsuit. Then a couple hours later she sent me another mirror photo in said tank top and jean shorts showing me her sunburn, she was making a sorta laughing smirking face with puffed out cheeks. However she sent a photo to a group chat we are both in but it was a different photo of her. It was definitely taken back to back with each other and the gc photo was more a goofy face/expression. Could that mean anything? Then fast forward to tonight where she asked me if she could send me a photo of her “looking good” (her words). I ofc say yes and she sends another mirror photo in a black tank top and black nike pro shorts, while having a flirty smirk on her face. She said she needed approval before she sent the photo to her mom and when I asked why she need approval to send a picture to her own mother, she responded with she’s scared of sending photos to her mom which I asked why and she replied with “Idk why I’m weird ok.” She then told me that she used to have someone to approve her photos but doesn’t anymore and that she can be herself around me, I told her she can always come to me for approval and she said she appreciated it. Was that photo meant for me or actually for her mom? Is she genuinely just wanting my opinion on photos of her? Or is there something else Im not seeing?
Then yesterday she was out boating and swimming again and she sent me a picture captioned “I hope I stay this tan” and its just a photo of her sitting down and her camera is just showing off her thighs and legs. Is there anything in that or am I just being crazy?

Recently, I got “broken up” with by someone I was talking to, which I was hoping would become a relationship.
At first, I was feeling salty because we had been sexting and sending pictures prior to this, so I felt that I was being vulnerable for no reason, but I just went in my photo album and saw pictures of him and I during FaceTime. Luckily, these photos were live so I can heard my laughter and see his cute smile and cute face. It made me realize how happy we were during those moments and how amazing he was, he barely had red flags, I’d say they were just flaws he could work on.
The best way to explain his flaw is that he’s like rick sanchez(from rick and morty), so damn smart (he loved science and physics) but when it comes to him being wrong or in an emotional situation, he can be stubborn and self-absorbed. We stopped talking because I ss messages of him and I talking about how I felt that he could’ve told me he didn’t want me before I was vulnerable to him for my journal to process more on how I felt. (I didn’t think it was a big deal because I thought we trusted each other) He didn’t like that I did and blocked me, I honestly kept trying to contact him to get him to understand that I wasn’t going to show anyone but he didn’t want to hear it.
It’s been about a week or so, I miss him, I miss hearing him be a nerd, I miss his corny jokes, I miss hearing him complain, but I understand that he doesn’t want to talk so I have nothing to do but to respect that. I truly do appreciate the time of laughter and bonding we had even if it was short-lived.
I really really like him and thank him. <33

Ok so, I'm currently working away from home and staying in a work camp. We have little Tvs in our rooms, so I brought my PS4 for my down time/days off. Problem is, I can't seem to get the HDMI connection to work! I'll break down the details, and include some pictures. (Nevermind it seems I can't add photos)

• The HDMI option is greyed out (unable to select) if the PS4 is off, but can be selected when on, so it seems to be making some sort of connection.

-When HDMI is selected, I get "No Signal" on the screen, but if I disconnect the cable while the PS4 is still on, it changes to "Check Cable"
-There is only one seemingly irrelevant HDMI option in the settings (Black Level), but it is greyed out always.
-I borrowed a coworkers HDMI cable, a higher quality "gaming" cable, to see if my cable was the issue. When using this cable, in the source list there would be a PS4 option (not just "HDMI"), but when selected, it would say "Connecting to Anynet+ device", and I have no idea what that means. After a couple seconds of attempting this, it goes back to "No Signal"
-It is listed in the source list as "HDMI/DVI", but when using the better cable, an option was added, "HDMI-CEC - PlayStation 4".
I'm at a loss as to what could be the issue here. Any help would be greatly appreciated, a day off in camp is a loooong day without it!

I'm the oldest in all my friend groups so a lot of my friends turn 18 much later in the year and I've been having a crisis about my age everyday since my birthday.
It's like I'm suddenly hyper aware of everybody's age and what they've achieved. Almost anybody famous will have some anecdote about how at 15/16 they made or did something cool. All the news articles will be about some 13-16 year old changing the world or achieving the impossible.
Every competition I come across, there's an under 18 category and an over 18 category, I thought about participating in this essay writing competition after I was done with school but got freaked out when I saw I no longer fit in the "13-17" category but instead the "18 and above" category, and so I let the deadline pass. It's like suddenly I'm supposed to be that good, no longer do I have the "oh look at this cool high school kid doing this cool thing to do at their age" cushion.
I read all these reddit posts where everybody says things like "he/she is 18, they're responsible for what they say/do, hence they deserve xyz consequence" and it just always gets me thinking about how I don't feel like a mature person- I'm incredibly impulsive and irresponsible, I feel like I've been the same person since 13, I get jealous and petty and lazy and stupid: how can I possibly be someone who can be held accountable?
I feel like I'm becoming every older kid my parents would talk to me about in disgust, "oh she's in this mediocre college, she didn't do very well in school", "oh he's in some stupid job, he's just wasting his time there", "oh he's been sitting unemployed for months after graduating, all that money they invested in him for his education, all for nothing".
It's like turning 18 takes everything you hate about yourself and anxieties you have about the future- and multiplies it tenfold.

Based on a real conversation I had with myself.

Heart to Heart

After another sleepless night, I was watching the sun come up through the window. His gaze caught mine once again, our eyes locked, and for a moment I forgot who he was. I looked into his eyes for a while and I found myself wondering what he was thinking about as if I didn’t know, but at that moment, I didn’t know. As his gaze followed mine, I about forgot the mirror that separated us, and for the first time, I saw him through different eyes. He was so lost, this man I’ve known all my life yet I have no idea who he is, but I’ve always had the feeling that he wasn’t quite right. I stepped into the balcony with him and sat beside him, to talk to him. He looked into my eyes with such emotion and I felt that he was searching for the right words to say.
“You don’t have to do that”
I didn’t have to, I’ve gotten so used to trying to explain myself to everyone I forgot that he didn’t need the context, he was there to witness my whole life with his own eyes, and for the first time, I realized that I was talking to someone who actually gets it. It was surreal, It was a truly freeing moment.
“Why do you keep doing this?”
“Do you have any idea how awful it makes me feel that you keep searching for someone else when I’m right here?”
My eyes were going back and forth between the reflecting window and the floor.
“I’m here, every fucking day I’m here and you try your hardest to act like you are alone.”
“Do you ever think about how I feel? To have the only person that I trust, try to find my replacement every day?”
“Because you KNOW that I’ll forgive you for it. You KNOW that I’m not fucking going anywhere.”
“I trust in you every day, and every day you avoid me. When were you going to talk to me? In your deathbed?”
“But, I’ll be there too.”
A single tear started running down his tired face.
“Can’t you see that I’m the one you’re yearning for? I listen to your bullshit every day and every day I still give you the best answers I can. I follow your dreams with you. I wait patiently as you go on with your life, never letting you miss a beat, never asking why you were away so long. I do everything for you and I give you my all, what else can I give you besides that? I do every single thing you ask me to do and every single time my work goes thankless. Do you think anyone else will go to those lengths for you? Not even a slave could do that. I’m here every day and you act like I don’t exist ”
“I live in the shadow of some unfound, unknown, unreachable love and I am SICK of waiting for you to see me.”
“That explains a lot actually, now that I think about it.”
“The love that you are so desperate to find, the one that you wait for, ever so patiently, the love that you just won’t give up on? That’s how I feel about you. And it breaks me.”
“But I understand you, I always do, and I will keep waiting as long as you do.”
“But I am sick of you getting into your bed every night, realizing you are alone with me once again, wishing you were alone with somebody else, someone you can trust with your life and most sacred thoughts.”
“I need you to start seeing me as who I am. See me like you want other people to see you.”
“Maybe I’d stop feeling this way if you did. Can’t you just try doing this one thing for me? Just this once? That’s all I ask in return.”
He turned his gaze away from me, and I disappeared once again. I’ll see him again soon though. I just hope he understood it this time, but I’m still not going anywhere if he didn’t.

My (ex)fiancé and I had been together for almost 6.5 years, engaged for almost 2.5. Over the last several months, my (ex)fiancé has sat me down to talk about our relationship about once a month. Before these conversations, he would shut down and barely speak to me for several days even when I would ask what was wrong. Then he would finally tell me he was ready to have a conversation and would express his frustrations with the relationship. By the time of our conversations, I would already be on the defensive from his recent behavior. I also generally do not receive feedback well. When he would try to tell me that he was unhappy in our relationship because I didn't compliment him enough, flirt with him enough, or tell him I loved him enough, I would shut down. I was not able to hear what he was really trying to tell me. Instead, I put up a wall and told him to love me for who I am. I basically asked him "If I'm happy in our relationship despite my frustrations, why can't you be?" I now realize that is not an appropriate or healthy response when your partner is trying to communicate with you.
I did try to hear him. I gifted him some lingerie for the first time and let him take a boudoir photo shoot of me wearing it. I started sending a few more cute messages. I tried to make more time to cuddle with him when he would ask. I tried to give him more hugs. I tried to thank him more for picking up around the house. I wrote him a cute letter and surprised him with a few gifts for Easter. However, about a month ago, we had another one of those conversations. Except this time the first things he brought up were 'wondering what else is out there' and talking about how other girls are always complimenting him. Again came the walls and extra defensiveness. I ended up writing him a letter talking about how I didn't know if I could ever be what he wanted me to be and that maybe he should think about calling things off. This was obviously a defense mechanism to try to beat him to the punch line and talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy. Three weeks later he would sit me down and tell me he wanted to know what else was out there again and that he didn't know if he could go through with marrying me. My efforts did not feel like enough for him and I understand why. I was having a hard time connecting my emotions with my actions which made my actions seem reactionary and not genuine or provoked by love.
I have been through a lot more trauma in my life than I realized. My dad was in the Navy while I was growing up. We had to move every three years. A very pivotal point in my life was when we moved when I was in the 6th grade. I lived right next door to my best friend. I was finding my love for math and theater. I also played soccer and was a Girl Scout. When we moved, I became very depressed, though I didn't understand that's what it was at the time. I stopped all of my extracurricular activities. I stopped getting too close to people because I knew I would have to move or they would have to move eventually. I mostly stayed in my room and kept to myself, even from my family. I also have struggled with anxiety for as long as I can remember. Then, in my senior year of high school, I got my first-ever boyfriend. We were in a relationship for over 4 years. In that relationship, I would always be the one to try to talk about our problems. I would be the one who would always want longer hugs and more cuddles. But it was not a healthy relationship. We broke up and got back together many times. I found several illicit texts to other girls on multiple occasions and he would always gaslight me by saying his younger brother stole his phone or I misinterpreted the messages. I think this caused me not to want to show my emotions because it wasn't reciprocated and resulted in heartache. Then, three years ago my younger brother died in a tragic car accident at the age of 17.
When I realized I could lose the love of my life, I realized that he was right about me not being affectionate enough. I had built up walls to protect myself. I thought I had made progress on my anxiety and depression, but I realized I was wrong. I also realized that I have issues with communication, trust, and vulnerability. I was a great partner in other ways and I did express my love in other ways. I moved across the country, coast to coast, with him to a state where I didn't know anyone so that he could attend his dream school. I take care of the household. I get the majority of the groceries. I do all of the cooking. I do all of the maintenance cleaning. I take care of our 2 cats and 1 dog. I say all of those in the present tense because we currently still live together but are sleeping in separate rooms. I also financially supported him by lending him money and letting him pay less of the rent because I made more money. I accept all of him including that he has terrible time management skills, he can have a hard time controlling his emotions at times, and he is disorganized and messy. I also accepted that I would have to wait for marriage and children because of his school and accepted that he did not have a lot of free time between school, work, and his hobbies. I supported his love for his hobbies by accepting his purchasing of expensive equipment even when he owed me money, traveling to watch several events that were important to him, and traveling to see him win an award from his job. I would write heartfelt cards for every holiday. I also bought him dozens of children's books about love that I wanted us to read to our children one day.
When I realized I could lose him, I felt something change inside me. It was like I could feel a hole being blown in the wall I had built up. I felt all my love for him overwhelm me. I couldn't hug him, kiss him, or tell him I love him enough. I tried to talk to him to apologize for my behavior and how badly I'd hurt him. I tried to explain how I felt like a different person and how I really wanted to work hard on improving myself as a partner to make our relationship work. I tried to prove my words with actions. I wrote a list of things I needed to work on including communication and being more affectionate. I also wrote out a list of ways to work on those things and actually started doing the things on the list. Some of the items I had already begun to do like hug and kiss him more and tell him I love him more. I also tried to ask more questions about his interests/hobbies/day. I was more vulnerable and talked with him about my feelings more. I even initiated intimacy, something I had really only done once in a blue moon when I was intoxicated.
Despite all of my efforts, over the next two weeks, he continued to say he did not know if he could be with me and wanted to know what else was out there. He was very wavering and said multiple times "I don't know what the right decision is." He said he could not trust that my changes would last and that it was probably too late. I begged him to try couples therapy, but he refused and said "Therapy takes too long" and basically said it wasn't worth the time. He finally broke up with me after 2 weeks of going back and forth and I was devastated. He later talked to a mutual friend of ours and changed his mind about therapy. I was so happy to hear that he had changed his mind. However, now I feel like I can't even trust him anymore. He's turning into a person I don't recognize and I don't know what he's capable of anymore. I don't know if the man I love still exists. When he told me he was now agreeable to try therapy he said "We're still broken up, but I won't talk to any other girls." and then promptly said "And it will give me more time to find a place to live if things don't work out." He deleted several Instagram posts that had photos of me after he agreed to try therapy which makes me think he's not actually that open to healing our relationship. He complained to me about how he might have to take out student loans after I told him he needed to pay me for half of the rent while we're broken up and not decreased rate he had been paying me. He also "checked on me" on the night of the 3rd year anniversary of my brother's death when he heard me crying. Then he just sat on the end of the bed scrolling his phone while I cried as if he was checking on me because he felt like he had to and not because he wanted to. When I asked him if he had some sort of deadline in mind for the therapy, because he had previously mentioned that it takes too long, he said July or August and I have a suspicion that is because a girl he likes is leaving for summer break but will be back at the end of August for the next semester.
I just feel like the way he has been acting is not how you act towards someone you were in a relationship with for almost 6.5 years. Especially after saying you still love them and have no negative feelings towards them. That means even though you don't think you are a good relationship match, you should still want to treat them with respect. You should care that they are hurting during this time. You should want to comfort them in their grief of a separate event. You should mean it if you say you want to try therapy.
TL;DR : So should I break up with my ex-fiancé or should I keep fighting to get back the man I love?

TW: CSA, SI
TL;DR: Some bitches simply can't be trusted but some formerly bitch families can maybe make some growth? WUT.
I'd (30sf) lived with my roommate (30sf) for a decade and known her for even longer. I disclosed to her 1.5 yrs ago, after integrating EMDR into a VERY long CPTSD healing process early in the pandemic. She was so, so kind and understanding in the beginning. We'd been best friends for so long, that I genuinely feared calling her family, because family has such negative connotations for me, but lately, I was finally saying it more often.
Since the start of this year, my EMDR has primarily focused on the peak of my suicidal ideation and how it's entangled with my sibling-on-sibling CSA. It has been a rough and exhausting effort, but all things considered, I'm actually "doing" quite well, as much as one can under such conditions. I'd started FMLA leave from work because, SUPRISE, trauma causes lifelong physical ailments and chronic illnesses, and my roommate had reassured me we'd be re-signing the lease that we had less than a month left on, so I would at least not have to worry about housing.
I had one bad night. One bad night of zero sleep, fighting off the nightmares for the thousandth time, begging and pleading to just finally rest, and that's all it took. I called her out the next day over leaving her two-day old dish full of thawed chicken water in the microwave, and finally broke. I know I said a lot of delusion shit (that I immediately-and repeatedly-apologized for for days after, after I'd regained my compusure/grip on reality), but we discussed it for days after and scheduled a therapy session for as soon as we could get one to figure out what went wrong in our communication that night.
She couldn't even wait that long. After a week of the silent treatment (partially because she got mad at me for asking her to mask up while I was on medical leave--while she had active COVID, for the 4th time--and was still going out because she "had plans"), she started a fight with me out of nowhere, broke me down into a fully blown flashback, and then literally ran away from my weeping (which I have done--outside of a therapeutic setting--exactly 3x since my diagnosis). Then she came back the next afternoon (while I was literally in the process of hanging pictures we'd bought ages ago) saying she wouldn't be re-signing the lease. It wasn't even a discussion. She just decided and that was that, no matter how stunned I looked, how much I sobbed and shook, or the fact that I am unpaid right now, see some new specialist t every other day for this shattered brain or broken body, of the fact that we live in HCOL city where, even if I was working, I wouldn't be able to afford somewhere solo.
But the worst part? During her monologue, she tried to claim I had somehow blamed her for my CSA during my trauma tantrum from a couple weeks earlier.. Now I know in general, my shortterm memory has been fucked by the EMDR crossing-the-timelines mindfuckery, but I know myself damn well enough to know I did not and would never place the the blame on her, because why even in the actual hell would I? Folks, this woman used to be a public prosecutor assigned to the children's sexual abuse unit. You can't make this shit up.
And if that weren't all bad enough, in my immediate panic, I had nowehere left to turn, so I had to call my family for help, and because I had to explain why I wasn't working and undergoing all sorts of medical procedures, and after YEARS of So. Much. Fucking. "HEALING." I just gave it all up. Told my parents for the first time. Told my brother, my primary abuser, for the first time. (He'd admitted many times over our adult years that he blacked a lot of his/our childhood out, and I have always believed him, because he was likely abused himself by someone else first.) He apologized. Profusely. And even agreed to start therapy. My parents apologized, in their own way, by promising to help with rent. Of all the things. Of all the fucking things...I wasn't expecting that. While part/a lot of me is cautious to accept any sort of help from them (because obvie), I am genuinely impressed, and grateful, that they are at least pulling through on this one.
It's been a confusing few weeks and people are complex.

Duplex neighbor causing a bunch of problems and just recieved a mildly threatening letter from them.
So, let's start with the basics. I've been living in this place for almost 3 years now. Prior to living here I rented from the same landlord in a nearby duplex in 2014. My neighbor is a man and his wife. They've been living there together for about 6 years with the man living there for nearly 15. We've remained cordial to this point regardless of the issues that have popped up. At least, that was the case up until recently. We share a front porch that has railing around the ledge and splitting the unit down the middle at the living room.
So, the issues(these aren't listed in any particular order).
First, Over the last 2 or so years they've taken in roughly 7 stray cats. They keep the majority of these cats outside at all times. This wasnt an issue initially as I didn't mind the little fluffballs on the porch but as times gone on it has become an inconvenience. The cats will shit on my porch and walkway leading from the porch to the gravel driveway where I park. I have stepped in cat shit no less than 4 times in the past 2 months. When I moved in I had a welcome mat at the door. Well , after the cats shit on it 4 times in one week and I couldn't get the shit off it the last time so I threw it out. I bought a hose and spray nozzle just to spray cat shit off my porch and shoes. I have tried non-toxic sprays to try and coax them away from my walkway and that hasn't worked. I have spoken directly with both the man and his wife on this topic and all I receive is gaslighting. They claim it's not cat shit, it's actually chicken, raccoon, and opossum shit. Also, these cats are not healthy. They do not look healthy, the majority of cat shit I step in is diarrhea, and their fur is in such poor shape.
Second, roaches. When I first moved in there were roaches. I contacted the landlord and he had pest control out. I also placed multiple different traps at the same time and they died down a bit. The kicker here is I asked the neighbor about the roaches and his response was, and I shit you not, "oh the woman in the other duplex(between 500-1000 feet away from current duplex) was dirty and when she moved out the roaches moved over here." that was roughly 1.5 years ago and the roaches come and go now. I place new traps every few months to try and cull the population as much as possible. I just believe that the neighbors are dirty as all hell as their porch is a mess and I wouldn't doubt the inside is just as bad or worse. Oh, and to top that off, they leave their cat food open on the porch. So, roaches, raccoons(which I've seen eating from the cat plate at night), and opossums all get their fill.
Third, and trigger warning in advance, domestic violence. I'll admit going into that I am ashamed of what I'm going to state here. The man beats his wife. I have heard them fighting on so many occasions. There was one day where I had gotten off work and started to chill and unwind preparing to go to sleep on the recliner in the living room. I heard them start fighting as they normally do. Well, this particular time they brought it out onto the porch. All I heard out my window was things breaking and multiple banging noises. Then just absolute screaming. She was screaming as if she were being murdered. Then there was silence and I heard him say " if you ever talk back to me like that again I will kill you." this is where I am ashamed. I should've called the cops. I didn't. The dude owns a gun, is an alcoholic, and is definitely unhinged enough to retaliate if I were to try and help. I am afraid that there would be retaliatory violence and it is an uncomfortable feeling that I should not feel in my own home.
Fourth, my girlfriend refuses to come over to my house anymore due to the sad looking cats/cat shit, the occasional roach that she sees, and her not wanting to be at my home alone at night(I work nights) knowing how unhinged the neighbor is. She has heard him beating his wife. She is afraid because "what am I supposed to do if he gets really drunk while you're at work and tries to come into the house."
There are a couple smaller things but this is the gist of the major issues.
So, about a year ago I messaged the LL about the cats shitting everywhere. About a week or so later there was cat litter alongside my backyard fence. I wasn't seeing cat shit everywhere anymore so I let it go.
We arrive now at last week. Got home from a long night of work, kicked my shoes off, and relaxed. Woke up for work later and started to throw my shoes on just to notice that there was cat shit on them that I had already tracked through to living room.
I was pissed and messaged the landlord "Neighbors let their cats back out again and they are shitting everywhere. Theyve already ruined the mat that was in front of the door when I moved in. There are shit stains all over the porch. I don't want to call animal control cause I doubt they'll do anything but I'm getting tired of having to either clean my shoes or dodge shit everytime I get home from work."
He didn't reply, which I expected as he rarely replies.
A couple days later I get home from work to see a note left in my door. The neighbors wife was pissed. I don't have the note on me right now so I'm going to summarize.
She claimed that the cats do not shit on my side of the house. They shit near their cars "because that's where they are used to shitting" she said that all the shit I'm claiming to be cat shit is chicken, opossum, and raccoon shit. She threatened me with this line "you told the landlord the lie about the cats trying to get us evicted so why shouldn't we tell the landlord that the house smells like weed." yes, my roommate and I smoke. Yes, it's an illegal state. She then goes on to claim "the smoke comes through our oven vent and dryer vent and my clothes reek of weed." I call bullshit because not even my clothes smell like weed. This is legitimately the only complaint I've ever heard them say about my living there. Throughout the letter she claims multiple times that I'm not seeing what I think I'm seeing and I'm just trying to get them evicted.
So, this is where I stand, all I can think of is get photographic evidence of the cats shitting, but I don't really know what it's going to accomplish. The cats definitely need to be taken care of better and them shitting everywhere is not cool either. The other issues I've noted should probably be dealt with as well but domestic violence is a tricky thing to involve myself in. My Gf is mad because I haven't called the cops but I legit don't want to be shot or be evicted/arrested because I smoke weed in my home.
Afterthought: there has been a few instances of the woman being on something, not sure what, and just being a zombie on the porch. I'm playing games and see a figure on the porch. I look out there and there she stands, facing the road, arms and head down, just trying to keep her balance. That was uncomfortable to see to say the least.

I (M25) have been dating my bi boyfriend (m22) for about 6 months and for background in the past he had a female bestfriend who was into him and pressured him into kissing her which he later apologized and confessed to me about. Now flash forward to today, him and my best friend who is a girl (and has a bf she hates) get along well and always make jokes of getting married and things of that sort. I know for a fact he's not her type physically and he himself thinks he may be fully gay, but I know that she is exactly his type and has a history of making poor romantic/sexual choices (especially with her current boyfriend) Right now I'm on vacation and they had a sleepover, which they told me about in advance but didn't really ask if I was okay with it. To be honest I'm 99% sure nothing would ever happen with them especially because of both of their loyalty to me but I'm someone who gets anxious very easily so that 1% is really freaking me out. Would I be justified to tell them I don't feel comfortable with how close they've gotten, which one of them should I tell and how do I say it????

When I was little, my grandma would sing this lullaby to me. She also sang it to my mom and sister. I've looked everywhere and found nothing. I do not have an audio clip or notes, just the lyrics. She says she stumbled across it on a record, if that helps at all.
What a wonderful trip in a rocket ship there are so many places to play
We'll have candy bars on the planet Mars and milk on the Milky Way
What a wonderful trip in a rocket ship there's so many things we can see
If you touch a cloud he will laugh out loud for he's ticklish as he can be
We'll stop for a minute and very soon we'll tie a string all around the Moon
The strings on our finger and off we go using the moon for a yoyo
When the wind starts to blow then it's time to go on our trip back to Earth but then
When we feel like a trip in a rocket ship we'll just sing this song again

Hello, I know people will say your life just started (m approaching mid 20s), but it feels like it might be over for me. There is just no medium for me to meet new people. Whoever’s plan it was to make people in western nations hostile towards each other has won.
I thought going to daily mass would lead to something (maybe even some friends), but it’s just the same 30 people (mostly older and middle aged) who attend everyday. I don’t understand it. People don’t even sign peace to you at daily mass they just stand in the pew like a statue looking straight ahead. Our culture is sick.
Even if a nice gal shows up to mass one of these days I have to perform this near impossible juggling act of figuring out if I would be disturbing her spiritually, finding her in the mess exiting the church, starting/leading the conversation, and all while not making her feel trapped otw to the parking lot (assuming she is single and into me in the first place).
I’m trying to stay hyper-focused on meeting someone right now because soon I will not have the time for all of this. I see so many older people alone at mass and I know that’s going to be me one day. Sometimes I find old posts about events on social media. It appears that there was once a somewhat active YA community in this city, but it just never recovered after COVID. I go to the Newman Center for daily mass sometimes, but no one shows up except school faculty.
It seems as if whenever I try something new I get immediately redirected to something else. Am I going crazy?

Hello! Thanks for stopping by on my post 🙏
I'm a 24M Latino, standing at 5'10, wears glasses and am a total nerd(-: I'm more than happy to share photos (SFW) and hope you are too !
I'm mostly looking for someone that shares some common interests with me, here are some of my biggest hobbies.

• going out and watching movies. I'm obsessed with the movie going experience and always make sure to catch a film whenever I can!
  
• going out to see live music. I listen mostly to post punk, Goth, Dark Wave, Neo-Folk, Industrial and more in that same vein. If you've always wanted to be a part of the goth subculture I could most definitely introduce you to your new favorite goth bands lol
  

-I also really enjoy pc gaming and building. If you're getting started into pc building I could definitely be of help! As I've built tons of pcs over the years (-:
Lastly, I really enjoy weight lifting. Though I've been lacking on doing cardio 💀
I'm not a very picky person at all, I'd love to hear from you regardless of who you are and where you come from, , I'm very attracted to kind and compassionate personalities <3
Hope this post finds you well, and hope to hear from you soon!!

I wouldn't say my parents are unhealthy, and they both understand the importance of eating healthy and they know it's good to be physically active, but they never seem to feel motivated enough to actually adapt these lifestyle changes into their own. They generally eat decently healthy but also often get fast food and takeout, and their fridge is always chock-full of unhealthy snacks. I'm even more concerned about their physical exercise, as they both work from home and rarely go out unless it's a quick drive to the grocery store or something. I suggested getting them a walking pad a few months ago, but my idea was shut down pretty quickly as they thought it would be a waste of money and didn't think they would use it much. And they both refuse to run or do any higher-intensity cardio because they think it'll ruin their joints.
Look, I'm obviously not saying I'm trying to get them to become world-class bodybuilder level or anything, but right now both of them are pretty much complete couch potatoes and it makes me worried and frustrated. My dad is overweight and my mom is toward the higher end of a normal BMI and always complains about the weight she could lose too. They don't have any health problems that could prevent them from living a more physically active lifestyle, they simply choose not to do it even knowing that it's good for them. Besides working, pretty much all they do is just sit inside and watch TV. They have lost touch with most of their friends over the years too, so it's honestly quite depressing that they don't have any forms of social interaction anymore either. It's really, really unhealthy. I know I can't force them to do anything, but I love them and care about their health, and I want them to incorporate more physical activity into their lifestyles, especially as they age - even just something simple like going for a walk every day or something. Sometimes I'm able to get them to go on a walk with me, but I know that as soon as I step away they will stop doing it. Does anyone have advice?

Like many of you my exwbpd put me through the wringer. It only lasted 20 months but that was enough to leave some lasting trauma that I didn't expect. Now that I have started attempting to date again and found someone special I think I am experiencing PTSD.
This guy is absolutely nothing like the type of people I normally attract. I have had a hard time believing he is real. We met on a dating app and hit it off so well over text I started thinking it was my exwbpd catfishing me or her doing something nefarious.
We hadn't talked on the phone yet and set up a date. He ended up cancelling for valid reasons but I got terrified thinking it was for sure her. I had a panic attack and asked him to please send a selfie holding up specific fingers to verify he is real. Thankfully he understands what I am going through and eased my fears or so I thought.
He ended up going silent which hurt because we have been connecting on a deep level. 3 days of no responses led me to think he ghosted me and wasn't as interested as he led on. It felt off like he wouldn't do that, it's just not who he is.
I started panicking again and thought about how much my ex loved AI and used chatgpt to manipulate me in the past. I became convinced my ex was catfishing me. I searched this amazing guys phone number, got his last name, and dove in hoping he's real and not my exwbpd.
He's not only real he's a volunteer with suicide prevention and has many accolades. He's a freaking amazing man. Of course he realized I am damaged and he doesn't want a relationship with me right? Like he did ghost me.
Nope. This guy was in and out of consciousness in the hospital for 3 days. He called me as soon as he was capable and we hadn't heard each others voices until that call. This poor sweet man has a family history of colon cancer. He's 44 and that's close to the age many of his relatives were taken buy the nasty ailment. The doctors can't figure out what is wrong with him and refered him to a specialist.
Now I keep getting this intrusive thought that he's not real and it's my exwbpd. I mean AI is more than capable of meaningful conversation when fed well crafted promts, image generation is a piece of cake, and so is creating a unique voice.
Wth is wrong with my brain? Like I know he's real. I have seen more than enough verifiable information to prove he is infact him yet I can't shake this fear that it's her. I am terrified this is going to persists and transform into me not trusting him and his word. I am scared I am going to ruin something seemingly healthy for me.
I am also terrified he is a great partner and I am opening myself up for heartache if I continue to pursue him and he ends up having colon cancer. I honestly am at a point where I am on my last bit of hope in trying to find a life partner. I can't handle going from so much abuse to someone amazing and him passing away. It will destroy me past recovery and I don't know what to do.
Do I accept that we are a great match and pursue love even though I know if his health takes a turn for the worst it will seal my fate? Or do I accept that I am no able to handle that potential outcome in such near a future? Like I am really into him and it's so healthy I don't think I will ever find this type of connection again. It's not love bombing or trauma bonding. It's genuine and I feel like fate is playing a cruel game with me and I will suffer no matter what I do.

both of us (18F and 19M) are hispanic living in the US and i want to introduce him to my dad soon but i feel as though everything has to be perfect for them to meet. i know how my dad is and if he even says something wrong it might make the wrong impression in a way. i'm not saying i want to change him or anything drastic i just don't want us to feel embarrassed or him get made fun of.
i feel like actually knowing and speaking good Spanish is an important part of our culture. he's almost a no sabo and i'm not... so i'd really appreciate if he was better at it. i had an ex who was reallyyyy a no sabo kid and my mom and sister would always laugh at him or joke at how he said things, mostly behind his back of course. i don't know how he'd react if i asked him to practice his Spanish some more :/ i don't want him to know that i feel kind of embarrassed of his level of Spanish or like that i'm saying he really sucks at it
like the other day he was writing a mother's day card for my mom and drafting what he'd write in his notes app. i had to basically take over for him because of how bad his grammar and everything was. this was a really important card not only because of the holiday but because their relationship wasn't good... so you know it meant a lot to me that he spell everything and come across well to her or i'm not sure how she would've taken it