Great funny things to say on someones birthday

I can't stop dwelling on this. I feel like things could have been different if I hadn't done any of this and it's making me have a hard time to move on. Things seemed to be going great with him. After getting food/drinks on our 3rd date and finally having our first kiss with each other, I (25F) invited him (28M) up to my place (I wanted to make out and have a little fun. I was also drunk, I had to go home and throw up in my bathroom but I was coherent). Once we got to my place, I had to stop him in the middle of us doing stuff to tell him I don't have sex until I'm in a relationship and that I'd also need him to get an STD test for oral/blowjobs (and for sex eventually if it gets there).
I don't remember some parts well so I'm going to do my best. He said it didn't make sense to do other things but not sex BUT he was respectful and didn't push for more. We talked about past relationships/exes but there were a couple comments he made in between doing stuff that rubbed me the wrong way. Comments like "You don't think condoms are protective enough? I haven't had sex in a year and a half" (Yeah but you could still have std's..). And then something else along the lines of "what do you think is going to happen after? I'm going to get blue balls but that's okay, right?". He had said earlier that this wasn't casual for him but I didn't like the blue balls comment. Awhile later, I said "you say you don't do casual but you're willing to go all the way with me and you don't even know me yet".
He said we've been chatting 3 weeks (it had only been a week since we were meeting up though) and I was like "What's my favorite food?" (to prove my point) and he responded that he didn't see me casually and hasn't been talking to others, but he was "feeling me". Things felt super awkward and I wanted to explain myself for projecting, so a little bit later, I stopped him from leaving to talk. He was like "What do you need from me? I didn't do anything with you." After he finally sat down, I tried explaining to him that I haven't had the best dating experiences in the past (I didn't want to go in any more detail). He said this wasn't a productive convo and left after.
I reached out the next day to try and clear the air with a lighthearted text and he ended things with me right after. I wonder if things would have gone differently if I just hadn't been drunk and didn't invite him up. I also regret not telling him my boundaries beforehand. I can't let this go and I want to stop dwelling on it

To make this as short as possible, I was a bored teenager on the internet without many friends in real life, so at 16 I started talking to this 30 year old guy. Initially he told me he just wanted to practice his English, because he’s from Eastern Europe, but we started communicating daily. I viewed him as a friend, but after a few months he started to tell me that I was so beautiful, he wanted to be my boyfriend, and so on.
Around ~2 years ago he told me he moved to America, but he still lived pretty far from me, so we never met in person. At this point we only spoke every once in a while. When we did, he’d offer to buy a me plane ticket and hotel room to come visit him, but I always had some excuse as to why I couldn’t.
In the past few months, he’s showed up in my area (with no prior notice) asking if I could meet him. I’d say that I was out of town, or I had a family emergency, or something like that. Recently, he told me he’s coming again next month and he really, really wants to meet. And this time, I have mixed feelings.
I know it’s shallow, but I’m not physically attracted to him. Maybe he’s better in person, but he’s not really that interesting or funny either. There’s also the whole talking to teenage me on the internet thing.
On the other hand, I’ve tried to date before, but was always unsuccessful. I’d get ghosted when I made it clear I didn’t want to have sex yet. In contrast, he’s never mentioned anything sexual, even once. He also made it clear that his physical “type” is for girls who look like me, which isn’t very common.
I’m kind of a failure in life. I’m 23, I live with my parents, I can’t drive, I don’t have any friends, I’ve never had a real job. I had a few retail/food service sort of jobs, but I never lasted long because I got overwhelmed with being around people all day. I did go to college, but I wasn’t very good at what I majored in, and I don’t know what to with my life. I’m honestly not good at anything. In contrast, he has a house, a car, and a job.
He’s talked about me moving in with him, us getting married, having a family, and he’ll take care of everything. I never saw myself living that kind of life, but maybe I’m not suited for anything else. I’m awkward and don’t have any other skills.
Honestly, I think he’s probably the best I’ll ever get. Most people don’t get their perfect 10/10 person, and I should be happy that someone has been this persistent in their interest of me. The only hurdle is finding a way to go meet him when he comes, but I could figure something out. I’m not sure if it’s an ok idea or if I could possibly try to learn to love him? Should I meet him?

You guys know what an alpine coaster is? They are like a small roller coaster you find in the mountains. They are also called summer toboggans or mountain coasters and I think there’s some long German compound word they are called in parts of Europe. They are like a roller coaster, but with much smaller one or two person sleds you just sit on instead of multi-person cars you ride in, and instead of being built with like a scaffolding or a framework the tracks are just on the ground, using the elevation of the mountain. Basically it’s a coaster track on the side of a mountain where you ride a sled down.
They are pretty fun. Or at least I used to think so. They are more “personal” than roller coasters and although you get nowhere near the speed on them that you do on a good traditional roller coaster and they can’t do corkscrews or loops or anything like that the openness and simplicity of the ride gives an impression of a much greater speed. You’re just sitting there with nothing but a little plastic sled and the track between you and the ground as it goes zooming by. It’s like the difference between how fast a go-cart feels compared to how fast a sports car feels. You know the sports car goes faster but the open, simpleness of a go-cart feels a different kind of fast. There’s plenty of POV Youtube videos if you want to get the basic idea of what they are.
I used to love alpine coasters. Used to.
My family used to go to Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge and up and down the Smokey Mountains for vacations when I was a kid and they are common in that area and I’d always rode them every chance I got.
But as with so many things after I grew up and went to college they just became part of my childhood that slipped away. They aren’t exactly common once you get away from the mountains.
Until one cool spring afternoon in 2004. I was in my final year at college and I was driving back to campus in Tennessee after a short visit to my folks in North Carolina. It was only like a 4 or 5 hour drive via the most efficient route and I had no need to be back at campus early so instead of taking the freeway all the way I got off and took part of my trip through the mountains. The scenery was nicer and I admit I liked pushing my Camaro just a little faster than I should through the twisty mountain roads.
Just after lunchtime happened upon one of those little by-the-highway tourist towns deep somewhere in the Smoky Mountains near the Carolina/Tennessee border. Nothing fancy, a gas station/truck stop, a diner, a couple of places selling tourist merch nestled deep in the mountains. I pulled into the gas station. My tank was getting low and I needed to stretch my legs, maybe grab something to eat. It was still early and I only had another couple of hours. I could kill an hour or so and still make it back to campus at a decent hour.
I pulled into the gas station and was filling my tank when I happened to glance across the road and… well I’ll be damned. There it was. “The Blue Ridge Alpine Coaster.” Nestled on the side of the mountain was a building, a mockup of a red barn, where a single railed track that led up into the mountains, where it soon got lost in the greenery. Wooden hand painted standees of cartoon character bears dressed in stereotypical “Hillbilly” getup stood around, some of them holding signs showing the ride hours and ticket costs and other info. I had to admit, as silly as it was, it made me smile.I finished pumping my gas and, well, nostalgia is a helluva thing. I decided then and there I could waste a little time riding an Alpine Coaster again after all these years before getting back on the road.
I parked my car in a corner of the truck stop's parking lot, put my phone in the center console, this being the days before smart phones when people didn’t keep their phones with them 24/7 and I didn’t want my old Nokia brick phone to fall out during the ride, locked my car and walked across the mountain highway to the Alpine Coaster building.
Getting closer, the place was less inviting. The half hearted attempt at a whimsical faux-Americana kitsch was far less effective when it brushed up against the actual decaying, run down wooden building. Hell calling it a building was generous. It was a wood frame holding up a long roof that covered the area where you got on the sleds. The wood boards creaked under my footsteps.
The only real enclosed structure was a shack that held, what I assumed, was a ticket booth. A door on the side had both a single occupancy bathroom with an out of order sign on it. An old Pepsi machine buzzed and glowed next to it.
Still the place looked alive. Ahead of me a bored looking attendant was helping a mother and her young son into one of the sleds while in a bored monotone repeating the safety brief. A few people were waiting in line at the ticket booth. Up in the mountains the playful shouts of people on the ride echoed down. Fond memories of my own childhood rides flooded my mind.10 minutes and 15 dollars later I was settling into the hard plastic seat of a bright red sled sat atop a simple aluminum rail.
I couldn’t help but grin as the sled slowly climbed the track up the mountains, making click-clack ratcheting sounds that hit my nostalgia centers hard. I felt good. The air was cool and crisp and smelled of pine.Higher and higher in the mountains we went. I don’t know if this is my mind trying to make sense of it after the fact but when I remember these moments, the last good moments, I sometimes think I remember a very slight, very subtle pit of fear in my stomach. I honestly don’t know if I felt it at the time or not or it’s just how my mind tries to make sense of it looking back at.
But either way mostly I was enjoying myself. I smiled. I was a kid again. I could hear riders in front of me let out that initial yell of terrified glee you get at the first drop of any good ride.
It peaked. I glanced around. I could see for miles, rolling hills and mountains. I the sled tipped over and zoomed down the mountain and I let out the same happy yell I heard from the other passengers.The ride zoomed down the mountain, catching speed. The mountain forest floor zoomed past, only a few feet under me. Trees zoomed past. I gave out a happy whoop as the ride banked hard around a curve and then looped back under itself.Another dip, another curve. I closed my eyes, enjoying the feel of the G-forces pulling me every which way.
There was no one exact single moment where things started to go “wrong.” The ride kept going. And going. At this point the first creeping thought entered my head.
The ride… was still going.
It just started to hit me… this ride was going on for a really long time. I had taken a dozen rides on various coasters of this type before that day and they topped out at about 5 minutes or so, and that was the long ones. Longer than a traditional roller coaster but not that long. This one had been going on for what felt like 10, maybe even 15 minutes.
I looked back over my shoulder and could only see trees, moving too fast to really get a bearing on where I was at in relation to anything.
I wasn't exactly really worried yet. Okay so I had found a particularly long alpine coaster. At the time I wasn’t 100% wasn't sure they didn’t exist or anything like that. I was a little… unnerved but nothing was happening that was impossible. Yet.
I was trying to talk myself back into just enjoying the ride and stop overthinking it, and halfway succeeded, when out of nowhere I suddenly banked hard, the track jutting out almost over a sheer cliffside. I gripped the sled more tightly as I was whipped around. The ride then dipped hard and picked up speed, barreling down the side of the mountain.
I was pushed back against the seat by the force of the drop. Jesus I didn’t remember them being this rough. I was feeling slightly nauseous. And where had this elevation drop come from I wondered? I was still in the foothills and I didn’t remember seeing anything but gentle rolling hills and light drops from looking at the ride’s route earlier. How the ride had managed such a long, steep drop in this area I didn’t know. . For the first time I hoped that the ride would be over soon. I had no idea then how much I would want that same hope to be true so much more as time went on.
With a whiplash motion I was whipped forward and then back as the ride leveled out on flat ground again, but by this point I was going fast, too fast. My neck hurt from the mild whiplash and I felt sour in my throat and for a moment the contents of my stomach threatened to come back up. For the first, but hardly the last time the ride felt unsafe. Alpine Coasters are tame affairs, much slower and gentler than full on roller coasters but this thing was throwing me around like no thrill ride I had ever been on.
I looked around. I mean I wasn’t that deep into the woods. I should have been able to see a glimpse of something; the highway, the gas station, the tourist shops, the Alpine Coaster office, something, anything. But nothing. Just trees.
I forced back some panic for the first time. I closed my eyes and counted to ten. The ride zoomed along. I counted to 60. I counted to 60 again. And again. Okay this was getting uncomfortably harder and harder to explain.
Suddenly I noticed that up ahead the track seemed to just end, for one brief, terrible moment I thought the track just ended but I was wrong. Almost without warning the track dipped in an almost vertical drop. I almost screamed as I plummeted for 20, maybe 30 seconds before flattening out again.
By this point the voice in my head that was telling me something was wrong was louder and I could no longer tell myself it was wrong. This ride could not have been this long. I tried to make sense of it, wondering if somehow I had gotten diverted onto some kind of maintenance track or, hell for one brief irrational moment even entertaining the idea that I had wound up on an actual train track somehow. But that was absurd. The rail below me was not a train track, it was still just the simple, aluminum rail of an alpine coaster and there had been no diversions or junctions in the track. I was still on the ride, as insane as that was starting to feel. Had the ride somehow looped? Again after having the thought I immediately dismissed it as crazy. There’s no way I could have missed the ride building where I got on. And what kind of ride loops over and over?
The sled zoomed through the forest, oddly never seeming to lose speed despite the relatively flat grade of the track. I cursed myself for leaving my phone in the car and not wearing a watch. I don’t know exactly how long I had been on the ride at that point but it felt like I had been on the ride for a half hour, maybe more. But time is a funny thing when you’re in a situation you’ve never been in. Could have been more, could have been less, at that point.
My pride finally failed me. I started to scream for help. I screamed out that the ride was broken, to stop it, that I needed help. I did that for about ten minutes or so I think. The ride kept going. Mostly flat, level track with occasional mild dips and turns. But the simple length of the ride grew more and more unnerving and unexplainable.
I thought about just bailing out. But the ride, impossibly, was still not slowing down and chunks of mountain rock and thick tree trunks were all around me. Bailing out without risking smashing into a rock or a tree seemed impossible.
The ride kept going.
Up ahead the forest was clearing out some, I could see the forest brightening, more sunlight making it through the canopy.
I wasn’t prepared for what I saw.
The trees stopped and I had just enough time to take in a flat, open area of rock maybe 40, 50 yards at most before another sheer cliff. The tracks twisted and turned and then shot straight down. But that wasn’t the worst of it. For a moment, a very short moment, I had a clear view for miles and the landscape was, to be blunt, totally impossible. Any possibility that I had just stumbled on some incredibly long ride was blasted out of my head. Barren, volcanic looking rock stretched for miles. Jagged, black rocky outcroppings as far as the eye could see. I was in the goddamn Smoky Mountains. They don’t look like that.
I had a few moments for the terror of that view to settle in before the cart plunged into another horrifying drop. I gripped the handles of the cheap plastic sled until my knuckles turned white. The drop felt completely vertical, like I was falling at terminal velocity. I screamed. My stomach dropped and turned. I imagined the sled coming away from the track and me just plummeting screaming to my death on the rocks below. But somehow the ride still functioned. I closed my eyes tightly and just waited for whatever was going to happen. Eventually after several what felt like a full minute of steep plunging the track again leveled out, and I opened my eyes to see myself moving at breakneck speed over that black, rocky landscape.
Now that I was moving on a more or less flat horizontal track again I took a few deep breaths. I looked over the edge of the track. Nothing but that black, jagged rock, almost looking like obsidian, zooming past. I had no idea how fast the sled was moving now. Fast. Faster than a gravity powered sled should be moving. And the track was higher off the ground now. Alpine slides usually stick pretty close to the ground, but I was 20 feet or so in the air, the track suspended in the air, a simple metal tube tower like a power pylon every few yards.
Without any immediate threat and the sled moving fast but steadily and level I was able to think about my situation again, for all the good that did me. Ahead of me the track just continued to the horizon, nothing but the same rocky landscape as far as I could see. I craned my neck to look back over my shoulder and looked back behind me and it looked the same. Even the mountains were but distant specs on the horizon behind me.
This was insane. There’s not a giant seemingly endless field of black jagged rock in the goddamn Smoky Mountains. There’s no cliff faces tall and steep enough for a multi-minute vertical drop. And alpine coasters were small affairs, not major engineering projects that span miles with pylons and vertical tracks. It made no sense.
Sadly it wasn’t going to start making any more sense anytime soon.
The ride kept going.
I was on this rocky landscape for several hours. I feel comfortable saying this because I could actually notice the sun getting lower in the sky. And the sled wasn’t slowing down despite the grade of the track being flat. I was getting cramped from sitting and stretched my legs and twisted my back as best I could. Didn’t do much help. My eyes were starting to get irritated from the constant wind in them. Worst of all it was starting to get chilly. I only had on a light jacket, a windbreaker, just something to keep the breeze off me, no real insulation. I was cold, my joints were stiff, I was hungry and thirsty. My eyes watered and my throat was so dry it was sore.
But none of that was as bad as just how little sense this all made. There’s nothing like this place anywhere near the Smoky Mountains. This was like some volcanic rock landscape. The more I thought about it the less sense it made.
The ride kept going.
My mind didn’t even try to process this. Whatever I was experiencing simply couldn’t be possible. I was crazy. I was dreaming. The CIA had kidnapped me and dosed me with some new version of LSD and I was in a straightjacket in a padded room at Area 51.
The sled kept zooming along as the sky turned to dusk. Soon the bridge disappeared from my view and I continued on along the endless, rocky, featureless landscape.
I sat back against the sled, mentally and physically numb. I was exhausted. I was thirsty. I was cramping up. I was hungry. I had to pee. I held it for as long as I could, then had no choice but just wet myself. I cried until I had no more tears left. Then I just sat there.
The ride kept going.
By the time the sun dipped below the horizon my throat felt like sandpaper. I dug around in my jacket pockets hoping to find a stick of gum or piece of candy. Nothing. I checked again, having nothing else to do. Under a crumpled store receipt in the inner pocket of my jacket was a single old, forgotten cough drop. I unwrapped it from the paper and popped it in my mouth. Saliva flooded back into my mouth and I was overwhelmed by the methanol and medicine taste. It was something at least, although I knew it would be a brief and temporary fix at best.
I felt my eyes get heavy. It was getting colder. That mountain cold. That deep cold the mountains have even into the early spring when the sun goes down. That kind that just pulls the heat right out of you. I shivered. A terrible, horrible certainty came to me. I would ride until I passed out from exhaustion or the hypothermia set in. My body would tumble off the sled to fall and skip across the rocky ground like a stone skipping across a lake, my bones breaking as I tumbled until my body finally came to a stop. If I was lucky I would be killed and not have to lie for days, broken and bruised, on the ground until death took me.
The ride kept going. The ride kept going. The fucking ride kept going.
“Fuck you” I said to the ride, my voice a horse whisper. I pulled my jacket closer around me, for all the good it did. The cold wind was slowly but surely pulling my body heat away. My shivering got worse, crossing the line from a simple normal shiver into those deep, almost violent full body ones.. I wasn’t anything you could call an experienced outdoorsman, but I knew enough to know that wasn’t a good sign.
It was getting dark. There was a full moon at least so I wasn’t totally in the dark.
About then I noticed something. The landscape, what little I could see in the fading light, was changing. It was smoothing out, becoming less rocky and craggy. Up ahead an odd, shimmering light was starting to appear on the ground.
I was over it before I even realized what it was. The tracks were going over a smooth surface.
Water. It was a lake. The odd lights I had seen were the moon, reflected in ripples on the lake.
Within minutes I was out of the view of the land. After the nearly endless rocky landscape and everything else I had seen, it scared me how little I was shocked. I didn’t like how mentally numb I was getting. I leaned over. There was enough moonlight to see the water, 15 or 20 feet below the track. The pylons holding up the track went into the water, the light wasn’t good enough to even make a guess at how far they went down or how deep the water was.I leaned back in the sled. My eyes were red and bloodshot from the constant wind. I closed them. This was a mistake.I jerked awake. I don’t know if I dozed off for a split second or an hour. My weight had shifted and I caught myself as my center of gravity was in danger of sending me off the sled and into the water.
I screamed in anger. A deep primal scream. I hurt so bad. My joints felt like they were full of glass. My limbs were full of pins and needles. I glanced over at the water. For the first time on the very edges of my brain a tiny voice started to speak up, telling me that I could be all over if I just jumped. I shut the voice up, but it scared me still.
I sat there as the ride went on. It felt like hours. Eventually the lake ended in a rocky shore line. The damned ride. There was no safe place to bail out. If the ride slowed down, it was high in the air, if it moved toward the ground it sped up. Sharp rocks, big trees, nothing you could safely bail out into.
I kept having to force myself awake. I kept dozing off. Once I felt myself falling asleep and drove a vicious uppercut into my own nose to stave it off.
I seriously started to think about how much longer I could hang on. The voice came back again. This time I didn’t shut it up. I wasn’t admitting it to myself yet, but I was starting to think about the best way to land that would end it quickly if I needed to.
Something was ahead. The track seemed to dip into the ground. I was too tired, too beaten to even get scared. I was just resigned to whatever happened at this point.
With little warning the track took my sled into a tunnel in the ground. Everything went completely pitch black. After several moments even the dim moonlight was gone.
This was the worst part. The creepy forest, the immense rocky landscape, the eerie lake… those were bad. But this was just nothing. Nothing to look at, nothing to hear, nothing for reference or sense of where I was going. The walls of the tunnel felt like they were inches from me in every direction. The air felt thick, like there wasn’t enough oxygen.
With every moment I was in that tunnel I lost a little more hope. After a long, long time I made a decision. When I got out of this tunnel, I would jump. I didn’t care anymore. Hopefully there would be a spot where I could be certain the fall would instantly kill me. I was done. The ride had beaten me. I sat there, waiting for a chance to end this on my terms. That was all I had left.
Eventually up ahead, a tiny speck of light appeared. I gathered my strength, ready to end it. I sat up, getting my legs under me so I could jump as soon as we were clear. The sled burst out of the tunnel. The dim light of the full moon was enough to be momentarily blinding after the pitch black of the tunnel.. I gave my eyes a moment to adjust.
I was back in a normal looking Appalachian forest. Rolling hills, green trees. The air smelled of pine again. I heard an owl hoot off somewhere.
Slowly I lowered myself back into a setting position, in shock. At first I refused to believe it but the ride was slowing down. I held still, making sure my mind wasn’t playing tricks on me, but no, the cheap plastic sled that had been my world for what felt like an eternity was slowing down.
Up ahead, a structure was visible, peeking out from among the trees in the dim lighting as the sled moved down the track.
It was the Alpine Slide building. The crappy fake red barn where I had boarded this cursed ride so long ago. I blinked and rubbed my eyes, sure it was either my mind or the cursed ride playing tricks with me. But the building stayed there.
It grew closer and closer. The track leveled completely out. The sled slowed down more. Before I had the time to really come to terms with it I arrived back at the building.
The sled slowed to a stop, gently pumping against another sled parked on the track. I sat there for a few moments, gasping in great big gulping fear breaths, trying to assure myself the ride didn’t have one last trick of its sleeve.
I looked around. The place was empty, deserted. The overhead lights were still on and the old Pepsi machine still glowed and buzzed, but the ticket booth was dark and empty, a metal gate pulled down over the ticket window.
Suddenly it hit me that I was free and I practically leapt out of the sled and onto the platform. I immediately collapsed. My legs were jelly and my head was spinning. I tried to stand up again and doubled over, dry heaving. Have you ever been out on a boat for a day and have that weird reverse motion sickness when you’re back on solid land? It was like that times a hundred. My inner ear was literally pounding, all the motion had really done a number on it.
I laid there for a few moments and eventually forced myself to stand up on my two wobbling legs. I looked around, a horrible certainty creeping into my mind that there would be no exit, no way off the platform but to my relief an exit turnstyle, one of those full height ones, was set into the fence that surrounded the ride property.
I went through it and found myself back on the main road. The truckstop was still there, still open but far less busy. My car sat in the same corner of the parking lot I had left it.
I allowed myself one look back, just one quick one. The metal skeleton of the Alpine Slide track sat there, dark and quiet but otherwise normal.
I stumbled-ran back to my car, dug the keys out of my pocket, and collapsed inside. When the door shut I let out a primal scream, the tons of fear and confusion and anger all fusing into a single, raw emotion. I screamed again and again.
After a few moments I felt like I was emotionally at least back to a place where I could act, although I wasn’t sure yet what to do next. Not really knowing what to do I cranked the car. The A/C had been on low when I shut off the car and it came roaring back to life and cold air blowing on me almost sent me back into a full on panic attack. I fumbled with the climate controls until the air stopped blowing directly on me, then calmed down enough to turn the heat on, helping to get the chill out of my bones. There was a half full bottle of water in the center console cup holder and I grabbed it and chugged it. Nothing ever tasted as good before or sense as that few ounces of water.
That was when I noticed the clock on the radio head unit. It was 4:17 in the morning. It had been about one, one thirty or so in the afternoon when I got on the accursed ride.
Over 15 hours. I had been on the goddamn ride for over 15 hours. Over half a day.
I just sat there. Warming up. Calming down. I was exhausted. I was dehydrated. I can’t even describe how my head felt. I probably had at least a minor case of hypothermia. I thought about going into the gas station and asking for help but what would I even say, and more than anything I just wanted to get away from this place. And I just wanted to get away. I wanted to be nowhere near that damn ride.
I put the Camaro in gear and pulled into the street and in panic I immediately slammed on the brakes. I was lucky there was no traffic on the road at that moment. The feeling of accelerating to just normal surface street speeds made me sick to my stomach. I gathered myself and very slowly accelerated the car I usually treated with a very heavy foot up to 30 miles an hour. Every time I tried to accelerate at a pace faster than “Old Lady Going to Church, Uphill” I would have a panic attack. I was okay once I was up to speed, but accelerating freaked me out after being on that ride.
I drove about 30 minutes, putting some arbitrary amount of distance between myself and the coaster. Eventually I made it back to where the twisty mountain road met back up with a major road that would eventually meet back up with the highway. After a few more minutes of driving I saw the onramp for the highway. There was one of those big truckstop travel plazas and pulled in, parking right up at the door. I smelled like pee and I can only imagine how I looked, but I didn’t care.
I kept a couple of emergency 20s in the back of my wallet and spent it on the biggest bottle of water the store had, an overpriced bottle of eye drops, and a huge travel mug of coffee. The clerk looked at me as if he was expecting me to either drop dead or rob him the entire time.
Back in my car I downed the coffee. I put a few eye drops in each of my eyes and sat there as the caffeine took effect until I felt like I could make it back to my apartment. The sun was just coming up when I finally pulled out of the truck stop and got on the freeway. I slowly, very slowly, accelerated up to highway speed, put the Camaro in cruise control, and let the miles start to drift away. I turned on the radio, I needed to hear human voices. Every time my mind went back to what had just happened I turned the radio up louder, eventually drowning it out with painful levels of rock music. I wasn’t ready to think about it yet. Yes looking back I know I was just in denial. I finally made it back to the crappy little apartment I had off campus, a little two story walk up studio. I let myself in and collapsed on the cheap couch. I was asleep before I even had the time to decide whether or not to do anything else. I woke up later that afternoon. I took a shower and ate a meal and didn’t think about the ride. I washed the pee stained filthy clothes I had been wearing and didn’t think about the ride. I went back to class and didn’t think about the ride. Every time I thought about the ride I forced it out of my head. I’m sure this wasn’t the most mentally healthy thing to do but what can you say?
I didn’t forget about it, don’t be silly. This isn’t the kind of thing you forget. One day while looking up something else in the university’s library my curiosity got the better of me and I looked up the Alpine Slide. No website but a few Google Map and Yelp mentions. None of them mentioned anything weird, certainly nothing even remotely like what I experienced. Near as I can tell it closed sometimes in the winter of 2012.
Life went on. I mean, that’s what it does. The next day was a little better. And the day after that a little better. And the day after that a little better still. I met a nice girl. Graduated. Got married. Got a nice house in the suburbs. Got a dog. Had a daughter. Spent a lot of time happy and not thinking about being trapped on an endless alpine coaster.And that was my life for many, many years after that.
Until a few weeks back when as a very different person I found myself driving a boring and safe mid sized family SUV through those same mountains. My wife Carol, 5 months pregnant, sat in the passenger seat, our 6 year old daughter Emily in a booster seat in the back, and Max our mixed breed mutt next to her. It had been a nice pleasant trip, driving back from visiting her folks.
I hadn’t thought about that fucking ride in so long I barely registered that I was in the same general area until it was too late. Suddenly I realized that little mountain tourist trap town was only a few minutes down the road. I swallowed hard and gripped the steering wheel hard. Carol was looking out the window at the scenery and Emily was deep into some kid’s Youtube video on an iPad. I forced myself to keep my breath steady as we rounded the corner.The town was still there, sorta. Time had not been kind to it. The gas station was still there, at some point it had been bought out by Shell. The tourist trap shops were still there. One of them was now a vape shop. The diner was closed, the building looking like it sat unused for a long time.
But of course that’s not what I cared about. A looked over at the site where the Alpine Coaster once stood. It was gone. The kitschy fake barn was gone. The site was just a bare concrete slab with a chainlink fence around it. Faded “no trespassing” and “for sale” signs hung off the fence. A pile of old, decaying lumber that might have once long ago been part of the structure covered part of the old lot. No sign of the track remained outside of some old concrete support posts dotting the side of the mountain.
I exhaled out a breath I hadn’t even realized I had been holding in. Soon the little town disappeared in my rear view mirror.
About a half hour later we stopped for gas. I pulled up to a gas pump across from a massive motorhome. Max stuck his head out the window and started barking at a little white dog, a toy breed of some kind, in the window of the motorhome. Carol and Emily immediately headed into the store to restock on snacks while I fueled up.
I stood there, a half smile on my lips as Max barked and wagged his tail in an attempt to attract the attention of the other dog while I filled up the tank, said dog doing an admirable job of ignoring him.
Right about the time I finished fueling up and cleaning the bugs off the windshield Carol returned from inside the store, Emily in tow, arms filled with two full sized bags of Salt and Vinegar Potato Chips and what looked to be a half dozen individually wrapped pickles.
I raised an eyebrow at the collection of food but knew better than to question a pregnant woman's snack choices.
“Should we take Max for a quick walk?” Carol asked. The travel plaza had a nice little gated dog walking area off to the side.
“Yeah probably not a bad idea, he’s been cooped up in the car for a few hours.” I said. Max, upon hearing his name and the word “walk” , forgot about the other dog and upgraded from wagging his tail to wagging his entire body while making whining sounds and staring right at me.
About this time I became half aware that the big motor home next to us was pulling away. I didn’t think much of it, outside of doing a quick automatic mental check to make sure Emily was well clear of the moving vehicle, but she was safely between me and our SUV, well out of the way.
But that was when Emily looked behind me and cheerfully yelled “Daddy look a roller coaster! Can I ride the coaster?”
It’s cliche as fuck I know but my blood went cold.
I turned around slowly, certain in my knowledge that terrible old decrepit Alpine Coaster would be there, having just popped into existence to trap me again.
That.. is not what I saw. Sure enough there was a coaster there, one I hadn’t noticed earlier because it had mostly been blocked by the motor home, but there it was. It was even an Alpine Coaster.
But it was not the same coaster I had encountered those years ago. That was immediately obvious. It was a small but modern and newish looking setup with neon lights and a bunch of people. There was an actual building where you bought tickets and a little snack stand.
“Daddy! Can we go on the coaster!” Emily asked again.
My mouth made motions but no words came out. I glanced over at Carol, hoping she’d say we didn’t have time but to my horror she smiled and said “You know what? That does sound like fun. Daddy will take you while I take Max for a walk.”
My mind raced, trying to think of a way to get out of it. But Emily was already dragging me across the parking lot to the entrance.
I patted my pocket, making sure my phone was in it. Every fiber of my being was screaming to run away. I slept walked through the line and the ticket booth while Emily bounced happily.
We got into a two seat plastic sled. This one was actually a lot nicer than the one my mind wouldn’t stop thinking about. It had two nice cushioned seats, big grab handles, even a nice rollbar.
The sled started up the track. I fought back the panic. I swerved my head around, keeping the building in my view. I was terrified of losing sight of it. We made it to the top and Emily did a happy squeal as we started down the side of the mountain.
My heart raced. Any second, any second my mind told me we’d lose sight of the building and then the ride would never end. The ride sped down the mountain. My mind tortured me with thoughts of not only going through it again, but seeing Emily go through it. The ride went around a big, banking turn. Emily kept shouting happily. How long before Carol reported us missing I wondered? Could I keep Emily calm? What if it lasted even longer this time? What if this time it never ended?
And then we were back at the start of the ride. The same attendant who had helped us into the sled was helping Emily out. I stepped out. The attendant gave me a brief look but said nothing. I guess I looked a little wild eyed.
I was fine. Emily was fine. It had been a perfectly normal, fun ride.
“That was fun Daddy! Thank you!” Emily said. I forced a smile back. “It was fun.” I responded, hoping like I sounded like I meant it.
I took Emily’s hand and we walked back to the car. Max saw us coming and barked happily. Carol looked up from the pint of Ben and Jerry’s she had somehow acquired and added to her snack collection while we were gone and smiled at us.
“Did you have fun?” she asked.
“It was so fun Mommy!” Emily said.
Carol smiled down at her, but then looked at me and frowned. “Are you okay?” Carol could read my face a lot better than the attendant could. “You’re pale.”
I smiled and this time the smile felt real. “Ya know what. Yeah, I think I am okay.”
Carol looked a little puzzled, but didn’t press it. We loaded Emily back in her booster seat, stopped Max from trying desperately to eat half a discarded gas station hot dog off the ground and got him back in the car. Carol and her small collection of snack food took her place in the passenger seat and I got in the driver's seat.I smiled. I cranked the car. I put it in gear. I pulled out of the gas station and back on the road, this time accelerating just a little faster than I had in years.

I messed up. I messed up bad.
“Never get high on your own supply”. The human who sold me this data told me it was a saying from his world. But I had to be sure it was the real deal. After all, data drugs that worked on people without a brain interface installed? It was unheard of. But here I am [30 hours] later, and I no longer doubt. I feel utterly exhausted despite having barely moved. My every neuron feels fried. All 6 grasping appendages are sore from the repetitive motions, and my eyes are dry and unfocused from the long strain I have put them through. I feel intense pangs of hunger and thirst, as I haven’t eaten or drank since I started this test.
I still want more. But with a great effort of will I force myself away from the screen of my computing terminal and stumble to my pantry so I may attend to my body’s needs. As I gulp down nutrient drinks and chew some dried fruit, I reflect on the trance I’ve somehow barely managed to pull myself out of.
Simulations. A useful tool for engineers, scientists, and military strategists. We had never thought to teach storytellers or artists to use them. Humans had. And what they created was both miraculous and monstrous.
Humans decided to use simulation technology to create art and craft stories. It seemed that there was a human simulation… no, hundreds of human simulations, designed to invoke whatever feeling or emotion you could imagine. And possibly some you couldn’t.
I had started simple. A basic test of spatial reasoning, and later quick thinking, expressed through the medium of stacking colored blocks formed into geometric shapes. While comparable at first to a children's toy, as the speed and challenge increased I became increasingly hypnotized. The feeling of lining up and clearing four rows at once with the all too rare straight piece was intensely satisfying. Making a mistake, leaving a gap caused frustration and incompleteness like I had never felt before, and eventually fixing it gave a feeling of relief, of rightness. As the game sped up, I found myself more and more frantic to try and find places for every piece. The rush of success and agony of failure only increased as I prided and chided myself on my quick decisions.
Eventually, I could keep up no longer, leaving me only with a number. A score.
Could I push that score higher?
[4 hours] went by, and I barely noticed.
I should have stopped. I knew that what I had was genuine. But I wanted to know what else this data was capable of.
I navigated a colorful landscape, defying gravity with every action and finding joy in exploration and collection.
I slaughtered demons with a chaingun, turning the fear of being devoured into a rising sense of conquest and bloodlust.
I failed a single test of dexterity, sending me tumbling down a hole and erasing hours of progress, and I nearly knocked myself out from the shock of frustration.
I defeated a hulking warrior with a team of other adventurers, and the triumph of it was only amplified by the sting of failing several times before.
Freedom and entrapment.
Horror and domination.
Elation and sorrow.
Every new experience was an emotional high of a kind I’d never had before, and my hearts were racing with the myriad of feelings rushing through my mind. My imagination was going wild with the possibilities of all these new worlds of data and programming.
My self-reflection comes to a grinding halt. I need to stop. If I’m not careful I’ll get addicted and end up like one of those mindjackers, burning their brains out on data drugs. Supposedly these simulations can’t do that, but I wouldn’t have put it past the seller to lie about that kind of thing.
Well, one way or another, I’m gonna make a [alien animal that shares many traits with both giant squids and magpies]’s hoard selling these. Time to call my best clients…
[Time skip: approximately 25 solar years]
The Rise of the Galactic Game Industry: Fluke of the Black Market, or Human Marketing Genius? You Decide!
Dr’k-Nam, Head Investigative Critic for the Arts and Culture section of Twin Suns Newsgroup
Simulation games, also known as “video games”, have taken the galaxy by storm ever since their controversial introduction and subsequent series of bannings and legalizations across the galaxy. Simulation technology is nothing new of course, but galactic newcomers from the Sol system, Humans, used it in an extremely novel way: art and entertainment. According to their historical records, a significant amount of their entertainment industry is based around simulation games, and that portion has grown even further with their introduction to the galaxy at large.
At first, however, no one was interested. A simulation with little or no practical application, designed only to entertain? Most people preferred to stick with the entertainment they knew, or seek new experiences outside of sims. So what changed?
Simple: some anonymous human decided to sell them as data drugs instead of simulation games; data drugs usable by simply interacting with a computer program, rather than having to inject the data directly in through a neural interface. With this small, but completely false new branding, video games were ready to start spreading across virtual black markets like spoilers for the latest episode of Ace Flyer Kr’t-Kah on the galnet (side note: please have some courtesy to others and tag your spoilers).
Human governance and society at large had been reportedly as surprised to see a lack of simulation games from other species as they were that humans had them. But they were even more surprised when they started getting accused of pushing the latest data drug. This was an especially confusing accusation because neural interface technology was not widely adopted by humanity at the time, and only a fraction of a percent of their population even knew of the existence of data drugs in the first place. The revelation that most humans had video games of some sort on their PPDDs (personal portable data devices) threatened to cause an uproar in the galaxy, as paranoia around data drugs was at an all time high among many species.
After trying and failing to ignore the problem for long enough for it to go away, human governance, as well as human corporations producing video games, were forced to release statements, acknowledging that:

• Yes, video games were human productions.
• Yes, they could be addictive in the same way that any other pleasure-seeking activity could be addictive.
• Yes, there are games that even humans ban. Adult subject matter is restricted from youths, but additionally, games could be made manipulatively to exploit or develop gambling addictions, which is banned outright. Technically this ban isn’t even for games specifically, but instead falls under the purview of their laws against taking advantage of the mentally unstable.
• No, they did not “hack your brain” to cause neural impulses, unless you’re a a Syns-nah, who only partially exist in our dimension and are not used to any 3-dimensional sensory inputs, to the point where eating an unflavored [grain product resembling a cracker] can cause them vivid hallucinations.
• If other races want to ban them, go ahead, but humans can’t really stop data from spreading (their government has tried, believe me), and they’re not going to stop making or distributing them where it’s legal.

Ironically enough, the controversy made them much more popular, even in places that decided on banning them. The idea of a simulation that could act like a data drug without the risk of frying your mind like the real thing was enticing to many. The lack of side effects and ease with which the games could be distributed only increased both their spread and unregulatability. In short order, races throughout the galaxy were trying out a new pastime, and galnet connected multiplayer games were bridging the gaps between the stars. Now, several other races, including my own, are seeking advice from human developers in starting their own simulation game projects. Only time will tell what kind of games their unique perspectives will produce, but it’s unlikely that humans will lose their position as the most powerful and profitable storytellers through this new medium; they have generations of experience to draw upon, after all.
Rumors that the data drug sales pitch was a deliberate ploy by the human game industry (to drum up intergalactic sales) or by human governance (to spread human culture and influence) are still under investigation, but solid evidence for either has yet to emerge.
Edit: anyone posting untagged Ace Flyer Kr’t-Kah spoilers in the comments section of this article will receive an immediate, no-warning permaban.

I thought I would throw this out there because I thought it was pretty interesting. As background, I live in the United States and I grew up here. About two years ago I stumbled upon POTF on a YouTube channel I frequently watch that reviews music and does reactions. The initial song I heard was My Dark Disquiet. I wasn’t sure what to make of the song but I watched it several times and was intrigued
Fairly quickly I had gone through all of their back catalog (gotta love the world of instant gratification in that department, with Apple Music, Spotify etc). Real fast POTF had become one of my favorite bands and this year with Alan Wake 2 and The Old Gods of Asgard , well I’ve pretty much been down the rabbit hole of relistening to all of the older stuff and OGOA that I missed the first time around and my only wish is that there was more. If I haven’t mentioned this already, I’m constantly blown away by the fact that POTF are Finnish and I’m aware that their following is probably less here in the US as well as overall awareness that they exists (Alan Wake 2 definitely helping change that)
A few weeks ago, my YouTube feed kept showing a song called Hollywood Hills by a band called Sunrise Avenue. I listened to it and liked it and slowly but surely YouTube has been injecting songs by Sunrise Avenue into my daily mixes. I really liked a few I heard so I looked into them on Apple Music and the first thing I see is that they are from Helsinki. What the actual F…I guess the YouTube algorithm is in play here because I doubt I would have believed there’s another great band from Finland out there that I’ve never heard of and who’s music I really enjoy
Anyway - all this to say / ask, is Sunrise Ave a popular band in Europe? They seem to be based on concert attendance on videos I’ve watched. I understand they recently celebrated their 20th year and called it quits in 2023 with a farewell tour
If youve never heard them I urge you to check out songs like Fairytale Gone Bad, Only, Not Again, Forever Yours and I Don’t Dance. Different vibe from POTF but also a unique sound and a voice that doesn’t at all sound to me like it’s from a Finnish band

Obviously, MAJOR spoilers ahead.
Hi all! My group just finished playing through Spelljammer Academy and then straight into Light of Xaryxis, and while it was a great experience overall and my players had a lot of fun, I have some bones to pick with LoX specifically. Disclaimers: I'm not a super experienced DM (I've run a couple one shots and Tomb of Annihilation before this) and I tend to kind of fly by the seat of my pants and lean heavily on the Rule of Cool. Also, I know I'm not the first one to complain about LoX or rewrite portions of it, this is just what worked for me, maybe it will help someone else. Feel free to ask any questions.
So, my group and I decided on a spelljammer campaign- the vibes sounded cool and it was a big tone shift from the campaign we had just finished so I was excited to have some lighthearted fun in space. Fast forward to us getting a third of the way through Light of Xaryxis and me realizing that this adventure makes no fucking sense.
My issues with the story as written and how I fixed them:

1. Too many NPCs. My players couldn't keep them all straight and honestly a lot of them are not necessary to the plot. If they weren't necessary for the story, I just omitted them completely. It's easy enough to just use a couple main NPCs for most roles.
   
2. Most of the chapters end in cliffhangers, which sounds fun in theory, but in practice is just annoying, especially when it turns out to be a fake-out. I let go of the idea of these cliffhangers early on and just let the sessions end whenever felt natural.
   
3. I think this adventure leans a bit too heavily on whatever the writers think will be fun to put the players through, while not considering what players are most likely to actually do. One example of this is in Chapter 3, when players arrive at Aruun. The adventure wants your players to land on the planet and pick up Blastimoff, who is being chased by Artuuks a la Jack Sparrow and the cannibals. However, considering Aruun is a dangerous jungle planet home to rampaging Tarrasques, my players understandably refused to land there. Also, wtf was Blastimoff doing on this moon? "Peaceful entreaty" to the Artuuks? He's been attempting to form a coalition for how long and only just now got around to trying to talk to them?
   
4. The whole second half of the adventure doesn't make any sense. The Xedalli vs Xeleth plot is boring. Why does it matter who gets the crown if the player's world is going to die either way? Why are the only outcomes of this adventure "save your planet and genocide an entire civilization" or "let the Xaryxians live and genocide your own planet"? Like, that sucks. And what the HELL is up with that Zodar battle? I got so annoyed, I just rewrote the entire plot to be as follows:
   

the Xaryxians plant astral seeds on Toril to harvest the planet’s energy in order to feed their own dying star. Up until now, they have only harvested uninhabited planets, but because Xeleth and Xedalli want more power for themselves, they have decided to target a living world.
The prince and princess want more than just a thriving star for their people, they want power for themselves. They create two starlight rings that divert a portion of the harvested energy into themselves, effectively making themselves immortal.
The twins were meant to rule together and share the power, but Xeleth betrays Xedalli. He frames her for treason and she is banished from xaryxispace, so that he may be crowned instead. Xeleth believes that he destroyed Xedalli’s ring, but it was only a clever copy. Xedalli still has her own starlight ring, which Xeleth will eventually realize.
When the characters find Xedalli aboard the Last Breath, she will play the victim and will use the party to get back to Xaryxis and hopefully kill her brother. She claims:

• The Xaryxian empire drew on their own star to supplement their magic, and it eventually started to dim. They harvest other planet’s energy to keep Xaryxis alive. (true)
• Her evil brother Xeleth orchestrated the attack on Toril even though the elves usually harvest uninhabited planets (true, kind of- they were in on it together)
• Xeleth commanded her to be dropped on Toril so that she would be destroyed by the astral blight but the ship was boarded by vampirates and she was captured (true)
• She wants vengeance (true) and will do her best to save toril if the characters help her become empress (false)
• the only way to stop the energy harvest is by destroying the energy harvesting device at the top of the temple of light on the Citadel, which orbits Xaryxis (false- the device is just a decoy at this point, the set of rings belonging to the twins are the real harvesting devices)

This sets up Xedalli as a wolf-in-sheep's-clothing ally to the party, and they agreed to help her, believing that she could set the Xaryxian Empire back on a peaceful path and save their planet. I also think there's nothing more fun than a good final act NPC betrayal, and this worked out pretty well.
This is how it ended up playing out:
characters arrive in doomspace to search for the coalition.
They find Warwyck Blastimoff, who has not been able to form a coalition. the factions in doomspace don’t see the empire as a threat.
Characters seek out Vocath to convince the factions to join together. He wants them to fight in an arena in exchange for an audience with all the factions.
At the end of the fight, three Xaryxian star moths attack and try to kidnap Xedalli. The factions must all fight together to survive and win the battle. Xedalli is not captured. With that, the factions can be convinced that the empire is a threat. Whatever factions can be convinced, will join the coalition and lend their ships to the fleet. Note- I did not have prince Xeleth present for this fight, only a representative of the Empire.
The players plan an attack on the Citadel. NPCs from earlier in the adventure travel out to join the fight if informed. The fleet takes on Xaryxis’ forces while PC’s ship infiltrates their defences using Gargenhale's invisibility spell and reaches the Temple of Light.
Xedalli and PCs battle Xeleth at the Temple of Light and attempt to destroy the harvesting device (which, unbeknownst to anyone, is pretty much inert and breaking it does nothing), while the coalition fleet battles the Xaryxian forces outside. In the temple, a projection of Toril shows the planet dying in real time, crystal vines choking the surface and motes of energy concentrating in a beam toward Xaryxis. The climactic moment: Xeleth lays dying, a final blow is dealt to the device, and… nothing happens. The vines still grow and energy motes still gather. PCs turn to see Xedalli taking the twin Ring of Shooting Stars from Xeleth’s finger, and she performs a fusion spell that turns two rings into one, concentrating the diverted energy into herself, healing herself to full, surrounding herself with motes of Toril’s energy. And then I wrote a whole evil monologue revealing that this was her plan all along.
Phase 2 boss fight with powered-up Xedalli! My players have a crazy ability to blow through 'deadly' combat encounters with ease, so I gave Xedalli some extra powers, including hp replenishing at the start of every turn from her ring. The party can only kill her and save their planet by destroying her fused ring. Once they do, the crystal vines on Toril wither and die.
This leaves the Xaryxian Empire intact but without leadership, and players can convince the priests or whoever else has some authority to go back to their more peaceful methods and never again try to harvest a living planet.
And that's the adventure! I won't pretend that this rewrite is perfect, I'm sure there are plenty of plot holes, but it was still a lot of fun for me and my players.
A note on the segue from Spelljammer Academy to Light of Xaryxis: as written, the adventures don't connect well. What I did was change the villain of Spelljammer Academy to be Hastain the reigar. While hiding behind his noble title on the Rock of Braal, Hastain had been working with the Xaryxian Empire to sabotage the Academy in preparation of the Empire's attack on Toril. I planted clues that led to Hastain being behind it all, and that way my party had someone to focus on chasing down in the first half of LoX. Of course, this did mean that we veered majorly off course and spent more than a couple sessions on Braal, as my party wanted to not only break into his house, but discredit him, embarrass him, and eventually kill him. It was worth it though, it was very funny and gave them a good way to uncover the Xaryxian Empire's plot.

Mischief walks up to the blue crystal clock. She spins the the big hand with her magic and the little hand lands of three. A blue flame is lit. Mischief walks away into the darkness; the light from the blue clock making her look like a silhouette.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuZbmLLv1vM

A bead of sweat falls down Mischief head. Her hair on the ground and her back up august the wall. Mischief had been doing a headstand for the last thirty minutes. In her mind, doing this action once a week was a good way to keep her blood flowing and strength high. Sun walked outside and saw Mischief up august the wall. 

“Are you gonna stand there all day”, Sun asks, holding a peach in his hand.
“You should try it”, Mischief said under the pressure. She uses her feet to push off the rock and picks herself up. “It helps with strength endurance and it help you think.”
“Hard pass”, Sun says, biting the peach. “You know I’m not good with my arms.” Mischief smirks and says, “That’s not what I heard from Ne Zha~” Sun stopped walking and almost chocked on the chunk of peach in his mouth. He looked over at Mischief and said in embarrassment, “Could you not bring Him up?”
“Why? What’s the problem”, Mischief teased. “Oh right, you still like him.” Mischief laughs and then says, “After a millennia and you still haven't told him?” Mischief continues to laugh while Sun burns a bright red and shouts, “Can you shut up?!” Sun starts to hit Mischief head and she still laughs.
“Okay, Okay, I’ll stop”, Mischief says. Sun stops laughing and crosses his arms in annoyance. “Go train Mk. I’ll see you in a bit.” Sun walks out to the training dojo. Mischief smiles but then holds her head in pain with both of her hands. She keeps her eyes shut and feels herself being surrounded by darkness. Even when her eyes where shut, she could see a being covered in a moon themed cloak.
“No…! Why are you here?!” The being looks back; her eyes glowing a light blue. She turns and starts to walk over to Mischief. Mischief raises her hand and cast a spell, but the being covered in the moon cloak faces Mischief.
I am you, as you are me.
We are two become one.
Mischief opens her eyes once the pain subsides and sees that the world around her is normal. She looks around to see if anybody else is there. No one. Mischief looks at her hands and sees then shaking with fear.
“No…. not this night…! Please, not this night….!” Mischief walked back into the house and looked around for a quill and scroll.

Mischief walks back outside to see Mk and Sun training. She sits under a shady area near the entrance to the waterfall. Mk jumps back and lands on the mountains wall. She pushes himself off and charges at Sun from above. Sun smirks and jumps directly up while Mk crashed to the ground. 

“Missed me again”, Sun said. He picks up Mk with his tail and asks, “Now how did I win?”
“Misdirection”, Mk guesses.
“Correct”, Sun says.
“That seams like a shady lesson”, Mischief yells.
“Too soon sis.” Mk chuckles a bit.
“I’m just saying the truth”, Mischief says. She walks over and whispers, “And I bet Ne Zha would say the same thing if he was here.” Sun gets an annoyed look on his face and says, “Whatever. And plus, I was always better at fighting than you.”
“Oh really?”
“Wait a second”, Mk interrupted, “You two have fought before?”
“Yeah. But it was for training purposes”, Sun says.
“Now that you mention it, we haven't trained in a while”, Mischief says. “What do you say, but brother?” Sun smirks and says, “Your on.”

Mischief and Sun get into their fighting positions on each side of the training ground. Mk sits on the stairs in anticipation. 

“Not using your weapon sis?”
“I don’t need it”, Mischief said with a smirk on her face. Sun chuckles under his breath and says, “Your done if I land this.” Sun charges to Mischief at full speed. Mischief closes her eyes and smirks. She moves out of the way and pushes her brother to the wall. Sun blinks a few times in confusion and looks back to sees Mischief untouched.
“I’m waiting.” Sun runs over to Mischief and tried to hit her multiple times but each time, Mischief blocks his attacks over and over. “Wow, brother. Your getting rusty.”
“I’ll show you rusty”, Sun exclaims. He jumps back and starts to attack with his legs.
“Not really effective!” Mischief takes Sun’s leg and pins him down with her foot. “Moon: 1. Sun: 0. I win again.”
“Mischief, let me up”, Sun says. Mischief moved her foot off of Sun’s back and says, “I thought you fought celestial beings bigger than me. You sure your not getting rusty?”
“He’s not”, Mk says. “He beat Demon Bull King, Spider Queen, and More! He’s strong enough to fight the Jade Emperor!” Mischief could hear her thoughts snap in half. She chuckles to herself in annoyance and says under her breath, “Yeah…. Sure…” Mischief then holds her head in pain.
“Mischief, are you okay”, Sun asks. He holds her shoulders.
“I’m fine”, Mischief says. “It’s just a headache. And I don’t think I’ll be able to train Mk tonight.”
“It’s okay”, Mk says. “Plus, I promised Mei I would help her fix her bike”
“Thank you, Mk.”

The full moon shines from above the mountain; its rays passing the peek of the mountain. A being covered in a night themed cloak looks down on the city below. She turns back and jumps backward. She closes her eyes and summoned a portal under her. The portal was covered in shadows and it’s magic was a dark blue. The being fell thought the portal and landed on a roof with grace and elegance. She looks back and sees the lights on in each building from each block ahead. 

“Now… where are you?”

Mk walks down the street of the city. He was walking home from Mei’s bike shop and he was hoping to get some well needed rest. 

“This is the last time I stay out this late”, Mk thinks to himself. He looks up and sees a being silhouetted bu the light of the moon. “Who is that?” Mk squints his eyes and sees the being crying up at the moon. “Are they crying?” Before Mk could call to the person, they jumped to the next roof and vanish into the night. Mk runs to the end of the block but doesn’t see the being.
“That person….. Why where they crying?”

“I’m sorry, say that again?” 

“I saw a person last night”, Mk explains. “It looked like they where crying.” Mischief stopped in her tracks and hides behind the house. She looks to her right and back down to the floor.
“H-How, the, Hell, did he see me”, Mischief thought with worry, panicking in her mind. Her racing thoughts coming to a halt. Mischief touched her broach and thought, “He was with Mei that night. He must have been walking home when he saw me.” Mischief lied the back of her head on the house wall and says, “Damn you, Moon Maiden…!” Mischief sighs and thinks, “There’s no way I can control her at this rate.” Mischief walks back to the front and sees Mk and Sun walking to the top of the mountain.
“Where are you two going?”
“We’re going to train at the top of the mountain”, Sun says. “Wanna come?”
“Sorry, not this time”, Mischief says. “I still have a bit of a headache.”
“Oh… does that mean no training tonight either”, Mk asks.
“I’m sorry, Mk”, Mischief says.
“It’s alright. Take care of yourself. We can train when you feel better.” Mischief smiles. She then remembered how her mentor from years past was so understanding. She saw a lot of them in Mk. “Well see you later.” Mk and Sun walked up the path to the top of the mountain. Mischief looks off to the side is sadness. She hated lying to Mk and her brother, but she had to protect them at all cost. She could risk to lose them like she lost…… her….
Mischief sits on a rock near the edge of the cliff and looks up at the sky. It had almost been a month since she had been away from the celestial realm: her home. She wondered if the cheetah twins had been playing in the celestial forest around this time. She touches her broach and says, “I miss you, mother…..” Pink magic flew around Mischief and a scroll appeared. Mischief catches the scroll and looks at the wax seal. “This is Ne Zha’s crest.” Mischief opens the scroll and a necklace rolls into her lap. She looks at the necklace and then read the scroll as follows:
Mischief,

**It’s good to hear from you again. I heard from your mother that you moved to earth. I hope Sun hasn’t been giving you too much of a headache. I did some research on what you told me about and it lead me to this necklace. And I also found out that the reason your alter ego is coming out on her own is because she hasn’t been bound. One of your ancestors had the same problem and they had a solution. The necklace I set you is called the moon of Apithaea. It has the power to control your alter ego’s rage. It might help you. I hope you get a hendel on your powers.** 

Could you tell sun I said hi?
-Ne Zha
Mischief chuckles and says, “Looks like Ne Zha hasn’t changed one bit. Still the same helpful prince I know.” She smirks. “And his interest in Sun hasn’t left at all.” Mischief looks at the necklace and then placed it around her neck. “Thank you, Lotus.”

Mk and Sun fight along the mountain Plato. However, Mk couldn’t couldn’t really concentrate. He was worried about Mischief, and he was thinking about the person he saw the other night. Mk was so distracted that he didn’t realize that he had left an opening for Sun to hit him. Sun stops his attack midway. 

“You got distracted.” Mk lowers his staff and shudders, “S-Sorry.”
“Are you okay? You seam distracted”, Sun points out.
“I’m worried about Mischief”, Mk says. Sun looked at Mk and the to the side of him, thinking of how to help Mk. she smiles and says, “Kid, follow me. I wanna show you something.”
“What is it?” Sun taps on the ground and a hatch opens. “Now way! How long had this been here?”
“A long time”, Sun says. He jumps and and says, “Come on!” Mk jumps down the hole and lands in a cavern like cave.
“Whoa…. Had this always been down here”, Mk asks.
“Yup”, Sun says. Mk looks ahead and sees a crystal floating above a pedestal; it’s light casting along the floor. Mk walks up to the crystal and asks, “What is this?”
“This is the crystal of the sun”, Sun explains. “This crystal has protected this mountain for a very long time. It was made over three millennia ago.”
“It’s amazing.” Mk takes a closer look at and then gets a vision.
Mischief looks back at someone; her face angry and upset.
She says something but her words are distorted and scrambled.
“She was your mentor!”
Mk blinks a few times and moves his hand away from the crystal. Sun notice Mk’s discomfort and asks, “Are you okay?”
“Huh? Oh, I’m fine”, Mk reassures Sun.
“If you say so.” Sun says.
“Hey, Monkie King? Can I ask you something?”

Mk and Sun walk along the roof of a building. 

“Are you sure the person you saw the other night is gonna be here”, sun asked.
“I’m sure of it”, Mk says. The two look around. Mk looks to the north and sees the same person from the other night. “Hey!” Sun looks over to see Mk running over to the hooded person.
“Mk, wait!”
“Um. Excuse me?” The hooded figure looks back; her eyes covered in shadows. “I noticed you the other night and I wanted to meet you.” The hooded figure looks at Mk for a second.
“MK…..?”
“You know who I am?” Sun takes a closer look at the hooded woman and gains a surprised look on his face.
“Mischief?” The being blinks a few times and then says, “I’m sorry. I don’t know anyone by that name.” She tries to walk away, but Sun holds her by the solder which makes Mischief’s necklace break off. The necklace falls to the ground and Mischief’s head hands low.
“Mischief? Are you okay”, Sun asks. Mischief looks back with her glowing eyes piercing Sun’s soul from within. Sun could feel a chill go up his spine. “Um, Mischief?” Mischief rushes back and attacks Sun. “Sis! Stop! What are you doing?!”
“Anyone who get’s in my way will be destroyed”, She yells. Sun whips around and holds his sister down with all the strength he has within him.
“Mk, get the necklace”, he shouts. Mk looks over and sees the necklace. He runs over and picks it up. Mischief looks over in panic and rage.
“No!” She breaks free from her brothers hold and rushes over to Mk and holds him by his collar. Sun tries to rush over to Mischief, but she puts of a barrier. She looks up at Mk and says, “I will not be locked up like a prisoner!”
“What? I don’t get it. Who are you”, Mk asks, struggling to break free. Mischief chuckles to herself, looks up at Mk and says, “So she didn’t tell you? Your her apprentice. Surely you can tell the difference.”
“What?”
“You don’t know? I am–!” Before she could finish her sentence, A ghostly rendition of Mischief, the real Mischief, Holds back her own body. Mk falls to the ground and looks up to see the scene taking place before him.
“Mischief?”
“Mk, I’m sorry”, Mischief exclaims. “I got you and my brother rapped up in this!” Sun runs over and helps up Mk.
“Mischief, who is this”, Mk asks.
“Moon Maiden”, Mischief answers, struggling to hold her back. “She’s my alter ego. I can’t control her without the necklace! Get it!” Sun and Mk run over to the necklace. “You have gone out of control for the last time! You going back where you belong!” Moon maiden holds Mischief by her neck and says, You really think you can control me?! I am half of you that lingers in your shadow! The dark side of light! You can’t escape me, Mischief Wukong!” Mischief puts her hand on Moon Maiden’s arm and says, “No…”
“What?”
“Your right. You are part of me. But you are nothing but an alter ego! I have been through hell and back! I have lost my way over and over, but I never gave up! I have kept you back for over two damn millennia, and I’m not stopping now”, Mischief shouts, felling herself gaining power. Mischief breaks free and holds Moon Maiden with her magic. “NOW!” Mk and Sun put the necklace on Moon Maiden. Mischief lies up and forces herself back into her body. Mischief looks in the darkness and faces her alter ego. “I know you are part of me, and it’s time to make peace with the past”, Mischief says. She puts out her hand to her alter ego. “And I want you to face it with me. If you allow me to.” Moon Maiden looks down and says, “Then I guess we really are one in the same.” She takes Mischief hand.
“We are two become one. The shadow of the sun.”

Mischief gains breath and she holds herself up. 

“M, are you okay”, Sun asks.
“I’m alright”, Mischief says.

“Alter ego, Huh? That’s a new one”, Sun says. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about her before”, Mischief says. “I though I could control her on my own, but I can’t even do that right.”
“Mischief, you can talk to us”, Mk says. “We’re here for you.” Mischief looks at both Mk and Sun and says, “You know, I think me coming down here was a blessing in disguise. I’m glad you two are here with me.” The trio smiles.

My partner (40M) and I (34F) have been together around a year now. He is a widower and his wife passed 4 years ago. He has 2 kids, one 14F, and 8M.
We had been seeing each other casually for a while and he used to have a wedding ring tattoo that his late wife also had. After I developed feelings for him, I realised that having such a strong reminder of his past love was a deal breaker for me. On the other hand, it would be overstepping if I requested him to get it removed, plus I didn’t want him to do something for me if he wasn’t ready for it.
So I broke up with him. I told him that I’m not ready to seriously date someone like him and that he would be happier with someone who understands and accepts the significant presence of his late wife’s memory in his life. I mean of course I accept that his late wife was important to him once upon a time, but I wouldn’t be comfortable being in a relationship where that past lingers too much for current relationship to bloom.
He came back to me and asked me to be his girlfriend and that he wanted to be with me and would do anything to make me feel emotionally safe in our relationship. So, he chose to get that tattoo removed for me. I was touched by this gesture and fully committed to him.
However, his daughter has been making things difficult for us ever since she discovered this. My partner has also moved photos with pictures of her away from the common areas so that I feel comfortable visiting (again, I never forced him, I just told him we can meet outside/at my place because I didn’t want to look at their photos together as a couple displayed at his house).
We are thinking of moving in together but things with his kids are not looking well. They don’t respect me. When I visit, I sometimes cook for them but they refuse to eat. My stuff that I leave behind would be tampered with.
I’m not going to intervene and make myself look like the bad guy to the kids. I tell my partner he has to have the talk and get his kids in line or I wouldn’t want to move in, permanently. My preference is, we move to a neutral place that’s not the home he shared with his late wife or my own house I cohabitated with my ex. We have to be a united front or it wouldn’t work out.
My partner is upset because he feels that I am leaving it up entirely to him to handle his kids. And says that as a married couple we would be sharing burdens.
He is now throwing it in my face how he removed that tattoo for me and made adjustments to his shared spaces at his house, but I reminded him that, that was his choice and I never made him do anything he didn’t want.
AITA?

Why shouldn’t you trust trees? They seem shady, but you can trust me!
I am a college graduate and work full-time, so at times, my responses may be slow. I will always try to respond as quickly as possible. My job does require long hours but one of my current goals is to achieve a better work-life balance. I usually watch a movie/show/YouTube video every night and if we hit it off after chatting for a bit (Chats preferred over Messages), watching something together sounds really fun. I don't have many forms of social media, so to move the conversation away from Reddit my only other options are WhatsApp and Telegram, or we could just text like the good ole’ days. P.S. I don’t use Snapchat and will not download it.
My hobbies include:

• Sleeping, seriously, I greatly enjoy a good night's sleep. I hope my username checks out :) I try to average about 6-8 hours every night during the work week but I am not always successful. Fun fact, I can basically fall asleep on command.
• I enjoy mostly pop, country, and rock music. If I had to have one favorite band, it would probably be Linkin Park. I usually have music or a movie/show playing throughout the day so it is not too quiet. I enjoy having background noise.
• I enjoy watching tv shows and movies in my free time (I usually try to find something to watch every night to wind down)
  • As far as tv shows go, I usually enjoy drama or romance-related shows. I am currently on the hunt for a new tv show to watch, but unfortunately, nothing has really caught my attention.
  • As for movies, I enjoy horror and romance movies. My favorite is the Conjuring series.
• I enjoy baking and cooking new recipes. I don't have a favorite food or dish to cook but rather it depends on what I am craving at that exact moment. I’m not a picky eater and a firm believer in trying everything at least once.
• Lastly, I also read about a book a week, mostly romance books. Oftentimes, I will read for a bit before bed or when I have a few minutes of downtime.
• Most importantly, I don’t drink or use any drugs and would prefer a night in over a night out.

Now, this part splits into two, the infamous what I am looking for (DISCLAIMER: I believe that relationships start from a great friendship):
Friendship:
I am looking for someone older (preferably between 30-40) as I tend to be able to communicate more effectively with those who are older. I reside in the U.S. and would like to chat with others in the U.S. as well to not have to work around too many different time zones. I would like to have a conversation flowing throughout the day as opposed to one message a day. Also, wouldn't it be great to be able to send and receive funny TikToks throughout the day? (Extra Bonus Points for iPhone users. iMessage and FaceTime are both fantastic) Someone with similar core values as myself. I value honesty and would much rather have a brutally blunt answer than sugarcoat something. I don't believe in lying even if it is just what most consider "a little white lie". I am an extremely motivated and goal-oriented person and would hope that my friends are passionate about whatever it is that they want to pursue. With that being said, to put it bluntly, I am not looking for someone who plays video games and watches anime for hours on end.
Relationship (take everything above + some extra fluff):

• Deal Breakers:
  • Kids (so no single parents please)
  • Open Relationships/Polygamy
  • Tattoos or Piercings
  • Substance Addictions

If you are interested, please send me an introduction about yourself as opposed to “hey” or “hi”. I will not respond to a lacking introduction. A great conversation is a two-way street.
Note 1: Due to the number of creeps on here, please send a picture of yourself, fully clothed, I may add, so I can ensure you’re not an 80-year-old man looking for some adult time. I will also send one in return.
Note 2: Some unpopular Reddit opinions; I am not into video games or anime (old-school Nintendo games and board games can be fun though). Politically, I lean right. I do not believe a person’s political views should be a deal-breaker in friendship but then again, this is Reddit.

I bring this up because I had a video on my FYP come up about this guy sharing that he was an alcoholic and had depressive episodes, that’s fine right just talking about what he experiences. Well he was telling a short story about a girl saying “we love a mentally ill king” after he opened up to her about it and it just honestly makes my blood boil. I hear a song every day at work about like “I’m broken and it’s beautiful” NO IT IS NOT. By all means, share how you feel to a therapist or someone you trust so that you can get the proper help. But disorders aren’t fun, they aren’t cool, they aren’t pretty, THEY SUCK. And I HATE it when people say things like that or like “I want to date a mentally ill person” then whenever they have to actually deal with that person’s mental illness as well, that person is suddenly toxic and gross. ESPECIALLY BPD AND DEPRESSION. BPD is so demonized, it’s insane to me how. And depression is so looked down on because everyone just thinks “Oh you’re sad today :(“ like THATS NOT ALL???? People with depressive episodes sometimes can literally not get out of bed for almost anything. Like how the hell do you go “Lemme get a piece of that 😏” and switch up so fast to “Ew, you haven’t cleaned your room in 6 months??? You aren’t depressed, you’re just a pig..” It’s so INFURIATING. And all this I’ve seen in this sub the last few days about “It’s their disorder so let them display it how they want” is so stupid. This isn’t “insert username disorder” ITS AUTISM. A disorder that is not specific to ONLY ONE PERSON. If people openly infantilize or romanticize a disorder people will start to think that presentation is the disorder as a whole or that that is how they should treat others with the same disorder. By all means, present your disorder(s) however you want while you are alone and NOT on a MASSIVE PUBLIC PLATFORM FOR MILLIONS OF (POSSIBLY) UNDEREDUCATED PEOPLE TO SEE AND MISINTERPRET. PLEASE PEOPLE.. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk, I wish this was all just common sense..

One thing I want to make clear before I start writing is that I love my mother with all my heart and I would give my life for hers, that being said she has always displayed some traits that have always seemed weird to me. She hates and when I say hate I mean HATES anything to do with combat sports. I will give some background round on this as my father was a boxer with a amateur record of 95-5 and Professional of 17-0. But anytime I say something related to combat sports she freaks out and acts like I’m throwing my life away to violence or I’m going to be a fighter myself. She also gets very weird and somewhat creepy with the girls I like. I am into Asian women but my mother gets mad at me for this and she is always asking me what type of women I like and when I say Asian she gets pissed and refuses to talk to me until I apologize. Another thing is I do not feel comfortable discussing my future life with her as she will get pissed at me for not living the life she has pictured for me like being a doctor or lawyer. When I brought this up to her she got mad again. Earlier this year I asked if I could go to a sleepover and she said no because she thinks sleepovers are gay for boys. I also asked her if I could join the wrestling team and she asked if I was gay and wanted another man’s crotch in my face. Another thing she does is sexualize everything, for example I used to have a buddy on Xbox Named Gerbals ( yes that is how it was spelt ) and she asked if he liked to shove gerbils up his rectum as that is something that she heard of in the 70s ( I still have no clue what she was referencing ). This list doesn’t mean I have any Ill will towards my mother as I love her and she loves me but I just wanted to get this off my chest. Thank you for reading this and have a great day.

If my current girlfriend continues to lie about things (5 months in) would you leave someone if they did this too you and why? I know there needs to be trust in a relationship but I feel as if she is destroying it very easily? Some of things she has lied about to me are, her ex (texting her at the start of the relationship) her body count (told me it was 9, admitted to me yesterday it was 13) and told me that she had never been made to orgasm during sex (found out tonight by her telling me herself that in fact she has) basically I know these things can be worked on and people can regain your trust but is it fair to say that with it still being early days is this a major red flag and I should get myself away from her? She does also suffer from Borderline personality disorder and the texts I found from her ex state that she is a compulsive liar and manipulative? I guess I’m starting to see that side of her. Appreciate any advice guys, thank you.

Hello! So this is a bit of an odd issue that could have a dead simple answer but I wanted to come to y’all in case there was less obvious things to know. So I am a brand new Yakuza fan but a long-standing fan of JRPGs. I bought Yakuza: Like a Dragon on a whim since I heard great things about it and read that you can play it without any previous game experience. But upon asking a friend, I decided I’d hold off playing LAD and bought the bundle with Y0 to 6. I started with 0 and have been absolutely loving almost every aspect of it. The silly jokes, the characters, the gameplay, and the worlds. I’ve sunk so many hours into this game trying to max out my characters and do all the games and such, typical stuff. And while I do look forward to playing the other games, I am kinda “scared” that I will experience burnout from the sheer amount of content and stuff to do, and if all the games are like this then it’s a real double-edged sword. And the JRPG fan in me is itching to play LAD but I don’t want to spoil stuff or make my experience of this franchise messed up since it seems like it could be a brand new fav series of mine.
Now ofc the obvious answers are just “don’t try to tackle EVERYTHING” or “give myself breaks in between”, and both are super valid. I am not the type of person to Plat games cuz I find it too time consuming, but if I do pay X amount of money, I want to enjoy everything yk. Plus it’s a game and ain’t that serious. But what do yall think? Should I just go through each game chronologically to get the best Yakuza experience, or if I’m having this itch then would it be better to just scratch it? Any answers or comments would be helpful, thanks y’all, have a great day!
PS: unrelated, but would yall say down the road playing Judgement and Lost Judgement would be worth it? And do they have any connections to the Yakuza franchise?

Hi, I broke up with my partner about a week ago and have felt incredibly sad, depressed, and have now also come to the conclusion after extensive thinking that I did this because of ROCD. And I regret it so much.
For months I have been asking “am I actually happy?” And questioning if I was actually feeling good. I became so fixated trying to figure out if I was secretly unhappy that I became convinced that a happy person cannot be thinking these things. I didn’t want to scare my partner or make them feel like I was not really in love with them, because I didn’t know how I felt, but now i really regret not telling them my fears.
Because then it morphed to the point I became so obsessive and paranoid that I was secretly unhappy - with little proof, besides small moments of emotional triggers or random shit I think I found to try to justify these feelings - that I actually became unhappy. Duh.
I’ve been in therapy for a while and my therapist made a comment like, “if you are trying to heal from anxious attachment and you find yourself in a dynamic thst is triggering you, perhaps it would be better for healing to not be in it.” And then I started spiraling and panicking that i was hurting my partner so horribly by being this upset about this. And my friends all validated the fears and said that if I was really happy I wouldn’t think like this. So I became convinced I had to end it and did.
Now, with the break up clarity of having an answer to “do I actually want to break up” I know the answer was no. I know I was self sabotaging and having a whole private emotional journey and created the distance I was so paranoid was secretly there. And got worried I was “losing myself” because I was so anxious about the relationship. And I feel so fucking sad and I regret it. I think I needed to do it to know this but I feel so sad.
During the break up they were so supportive and even said they were proud of me for doing this because it seems really hard. And I was crying even saying “I don’t want to do this, but I feel like I have to.” We agreed to stay in each other’s lives and first take space. But now I really really regret it. And I want to try to express all of this and also tell them I really reaLly want this to work. There is so much love between us.
Tldr: I was in a happy relationship for years with someone so supportive and patient, and I became anxious I was secretly unhappy and felt like I had to end it because I was the problem and needed to work on my insecurities. But I think I self sabotaged. I want to try to explain ROCD and save our relationship.
Any support or advice …. I would appreciate 💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚

I was just thinking that the popular tradwife influencers are those who display a wonderful lifestyle staying at home with their kids. Of course, many of these women hide the fact that 1) their husband is 1% wealthy (not available for most women!), 2) they are making a ton of income via TikTok etc, and/or 3) they actually pay someone to do the heavy/gross parts of home and child care, which is why they can look immaculate while making fancy food for their families.
I know there’s now some influencers who used to be tradwives and had things go horribly wrong and are now struggling.
But I think there’s a huge market for such content and other women could get in on it. Things I’d like to see:
1) Regular SAHMs (without tradwife ideology nor rich husbands) sharing content showing the nitty gritty, gross, frustrating, exhausting aspects to their work. The never ending cleaning, the difficulties of raising babies and toddlers, the constant running around, the difficulty taking any time for oneself. I know this is more personal, but I’m also curious to see how their relationships with their husbands are going, how the husband feels, etc.
2) Divorced former SAHMs, especially aged 50+, who are struggling to make ends meet. The difficulties of the job search, the lousy job options available to them, the impending end of any alimony (usually it only lasts a few years after divorce). The low-mid five figure lifestyle they eventually settle into and live for the rest of their lives. (My own mom is in this category so I’m quite familiar with it.) Again, not the 1% who divorce from rich husbands- I’m curious about the vast majority of divorced wives who receive half assets and debts and find their resulting net worth to be nowhere near enough to stay afloat without working.
Clearly such content isn’t as visually appealing, but I think women would watch it, given how popular the tradwife discourse has become.
(Note: I’m not saying that divorced breadwinner men are in great situations by any means, on average. I think they financially suffer as well, though their advantage is that they have always had a career and can rebuild their finances after divorce much more solidly than their ex spouse can.)
Any content like this out there? I’d love to see much more of it.

I'm at the point in this (grueling) process where I am turning to the internet for unbiased commentary, guys. Somebody, anybody lol
After 30 years on this planet, many friendships and a few boyfriends, I don't think I've ever just stopped talking to anybody without some kind of a departing conversation. In most situations I think the fair thing to do is amicably go separate ways, both know where the other stands, etc.
Until 2 wks ago when I felt like I was being played and chose to go No Contact with a guy I've been in a 'situationship' with since the Fall. But the way I chose to go about it has me feeling like I did it wrong...and I need advice before I do something too nice like reach back out.
I'm going to spare the full story but just know there were little things that led up to the big thing lol. And if you've been in that stage of seeing someone where you don't know what you guys are, but they're telling you it is going somewhere, this ones for us baby, Cheers.
Let's just say this guy has decently important job, where he's in the process of leveling up in his career (or so I know). He's busy and I've respected that. We make time when it works, which is usually at night and I always accepted that. Our relationship started in the gym, and I'll admit is mainly intimate; we're together at night, talk most of our days thru work, and don't get a lot of time to go out/date. For what it's worth, I'd been committed to him and we agreed we were exclusive (or I would not be involved with what we're doing).
His birthday was coming up. When I asked what he'd like to do, he said it wasn't a big deal this year, that he would be working and he doesn't care to celebrate (go out). That felt odd but I figured since it fell on a weekday it made sense, and that we'd still be together that night after work.
We spoke the morning of his birthday, he said he was working all day and we agreed if he wanted to do anything together later on he'd let me know what's up after work... this man didn't call me til 11PM.
The next day when we spoke, he said he ended up going to the gym and then out to dinner with a co worker very last minute. I was left under the impression he was busy with work!
The day after that he added on to the story that the co worker was a female, I had to ask. A female, married, long time friend and coworker he said I didn't need to worry about. This person met him for dinner at 9PM on a week night on HIS BIRTHDAY without her husband, or me.
I feel like this warranted a reevaluation of what we wanted together convo... both attempts did not go well or get me anywhere. I won't get into how, but just know he basically shut the convo down twice yet still tried to act like everything was fine by continuing to talk to me daily, ask when I was coming over etc. Meanwhile I was stewing, confused, and just trying to process and plan.
Granted, we're not in "a relationship". But I feel so disrespected and it changed my outlook on what I thought we had entirely. All things considered I just know I deserve better than that treatment, and even if this co worker is really just a friend, it's not just that he had his bday dinner with another woman alone. It's that he didn't choose me.
So a week, one last time hooking up (don't judge me please), and some small talk over those few days later, I've just stopped responding to him. I woke up one day and I felt like I deserved way more reassurance than I got and that I just let him slide. The birthday situation just doesn't sit right.
He's called a lot and from multiple numbers. But the few texts he's sent aren't endearing at all. He hasn't apologized, asked what he did, and hasn't professed any love LOL, now he just wants to know if I'm really going to ignore him.
DO I OWE HIM AN EXPLANATION?! Was my timing way off and confusing? Or does he know why?
I don't think he is a bad person. He's just not ready for me.
I went No Contact to protect myself but I also left the line open to see how he acts and what he says. I'm grown enough to know that if the man couldn't live without me I wouldn't be writing to Reddit. So I'll do the math there.....but do I at least owe him a response, or is it better to do what I'm doing?
My empath heart is going to pop help :(

My father and his partner both planned a big two week trip this June to Uganda for some volunteer-tourism thing. During this trip also falls my dad's birthday and fathers day. They've been planning this since Christmas.
My mother raised me. During the pandemic I moved back in with her (after dropping out of college) to help out with some family emergencies and family health issues. Then we got a dog during the pandemic. Recently, the dog got exited when she was taking him out, and he pulled her down. Now her knee is damaged with a torn ACL, MCL, and meniscus damage.
I don't feel confident leaving my dog, and leaving my mom alone to take care of him, for two weeks. But, I also feel terrible having to cancel this trip with my dad.
I'm gonna take a guess, and say I've been the AH for being indecisive up till this point. But, I wanna hear some third party thoughts on what I should do.

I don’t know what I want out of this, probably to just get it off my chest. My husband and I (both 38) have been together since about 16 yrs old, almost 24 years, with 4 kids.
I know I have always loved him more, maybe even slightly obsessed. I think he is fine as hell, smart, successful, witty, and a great dad. All that said, I’m convinced he really dislikes me. He says he’s just jealous, and gets irritated at things I do/dont do.
I feel like I can never do anything right. I have too much anxiety, I don’t make enough money, I don’t clean enough, I drink too much and smoke too much and the list goes on. Some of those things he just insinuates and some thing’s he has said.
I feel like I have done everything in my power to keep him happy, but it’s never enough. For my birthday this year, we did absolutely nothing, not even a card. I still got up with all the kids, did laundry, cooked dinner, ran to sports, and still came home to service him, because I like to. Mother’s Day, I still did all the normal mom things, after he brought the kids to get a card and flowers the day of. I feel like I’m an afterthought, but the minute I do something wrong, I get reminded immediately.
I have always been a rule follower, and he was the opposite. When we were younger he turned it around and has been successful. I make almost $100k less than him, but I also have flexibility that he does not have, I take care of the kids and all the appointments and what not. If I had a corporate job, I wouldn’t be able to do everything I currently do. He doesn’t look at it this way though. I do nothing for myself. At almost 40 I am feeling very lost in life, I don’t have a college degree, I don’t have hobbies, very few friends, I don’t know who I am or want to be. I just want to be happy and successful in the eyes of my husband and kids.
I have spent the last 14 years either pregnant or nursing. I stayed in the house taking care of everything while he went to work, school, or even to his friends to hang out. When he was out having fun, I was taking care of my kids, because this is what I signed up for. I never complain, because I chose this. Now that my kids are a little older, I can finally go out and do things. Every time I do though, I make some mistake. I get too drunk and say stupid things, I recently started smoking after my kids are asleep so I can relax and have me time. He hates it. He has so many stipulations and opinions and I feel like I’m constantly walking on eggshells. He doesn’t see this.
I want to run away. I feel like I will never be the mom or wife I thought I would be. I want to be with my husband, I just want to feel loved and appreciated. I know that if something happened to me, he would finally realize what I actually do for him, our kids, and our house.

Imagine being told the house would take 10-13 months to build. And then imagine being assigned a crappy construction manager named Kevin Thornton and waiting 18+ months for the completion of your home, who seemed to only been hired because his brother Chris Thornton was already a construction manager for the company.
Being told 4 false closing dates. Having to lose a good interest rate because they don’t know how to build a house within a reasonable time. I’ve seen whole apartment complexes built in the time we’ve been waiting.
Having to reach out to said construction manager and the sale consultant Zac Davidson every single month to get an update when you were told you would get an update roughly every two weeks. Being lied to every single month. Trish is also a dishonest unprofessional woman who constantly dodges phone calls and lies about everything.
Finding a crappy job being done in the primary bathroom shower and them having to rip it out and start over again, because part of the shower wall was bowing out into a triangle shape and the small square tiles were not flat and straight with tons of extra grout around them. Having a crappy grading job where 1/3 of the back yard is unusable. And nothing can be done about it, Holiday Builders just loves cheap labor.
Going through a full roll of blue painters tape to point out all the flaws in the construction, where the manager will run out of tape, but luckily we brought some to continue using half the roll. And they still didn’t fix everything the first go around, where we had to call them back multiple times to fix the issues described at the first walkthrough, after closing. You’ll find paint on every single door handle in the house. And paint splatter all over your floors. Different caulking colors used on the countertops right next to each other. You’ll ask them to paint the water access water into the home because it looked like crap the first time and then they’ll make it worse and also paint the grass and gutter runoff as well because they simple don’t give a hoot about anything.
They even had to rip up two parts of the yard to have water and septic lines in place inspected because they forgot and now we’re stuck with even more shitty grading and yard work because of that.
They’ll schedule exterior stuff after laying sod down that end up leaving the yard dug up and not manicured and looking like trash. And then you’ll wait weeks for them to come fix it.
They give you a smart door lock that’s supposed to come with the Rekeying tool, but they won’t give it to you for unspecified reasons, even though you paid for it. You’ll ask if the front door lock is a smart/Wi-Fi compatible one. They’ll say no, but after reading the manual you’ll find out it is. They don’t even know how the products they’re installing works!
Being told a shower door for the primary bathroom isn’t even included after finding out 1 week before closing, seems like their architects failed physics, because water still gets out the shower with a door there if it’s it recessed. Finding out that something as inexpensive as cabinet handles are not included and finding out after the first walkthrough that they’re an “expensive upgrade”, when it was never mentioned during the upgrades selection. Why would I upgrade to 42” upper cabinets and soft close but not op for handles, does that make sense to you. Paying nearly 400k for a house and they can’t even do these simple thing’s correctly or offer these simple things as standard. What if someone had a disability and opening cabinets without handles is extremely difficult for them. Holiday Builders doesn’t give a single hoot about you if that’s the case.
When blinds and a refrigerator and a washer and dryer and a garage door openers are already not included. I would expect the said things above be STANDARD! And a sales consultant that only cares about his paycheck and his ego, than the customer named Zac Davidson, who won’t let you know certain basic things are an upgrade. Zac Davidson is a man that gets his feelings hurt when he gets caught in a lie and starts to be disrespectful when he doesn’t agree with something you’re trying to explain to him.
Holiday builders doesn’t care about the customer. They only care about their wallets. They’ll rush to get the CO before having everything installed. In hopes of you signing before notice they put a hole in your drywall while installing your shelves. Or better yet the construction manager won’t even walkthrough the house prior to have any touch ups or fixes done before the first walk through. We found out our water heater wasn’t even hooked up correctly after closing. Holiday Builders are real comedians.
The trades that they hire can’t even get simple things done like paint and caulking and not painting the floor and door handles, we basically covered the whole house in blue tape and only 50% of it was taken care it. 50% of the trims around the door frames were missing paint and the other 50% looked like a blind man painted the door frames, thick goops of paint and splatter everywhere. They’ll even make sure the caulking where the base boards meet the dry wall has spider web cracking in every single ROOM. Every single one of these trades and construction managers need glasses because I do not honestly understand how you can be proud of your work and let customers find this type of garbage work.
We were so fed up with this process we ended up just fixing all of the issues ourselves. Don’t build with them unless you’re okay with paying for upgrades on basic things that should be standard and you’ll have to ask the construction managers like they’re a 4th grader if they completed their homework. And having to do all the basic touch ups yourselves. It’s extremely frustrating and sad that I can’t be excited about being my first home because of this shitty fucking experience. Also any response to this review will be taken as passive aggressive, if you state that this was taken care of because it wasn’t, everything still looks like shit.
The plumbers and septic company they use suck too. We’re still dealing with sewage smells in our home that they can’t figure out. Constant back ups due to poor plumbing ventilation and workmanship. The plumbers came to investigate and didn’t even have any of the right tools or equipment to do anything and had to borrow my equipment. If you’re wondering which clowns they use. Naber Plumbing and Brain David Septic.
They even under size the AC unit tonnage for the home. Your AC will run for 18 hours a day. I found that they didn’t even seal the area for where the cold air comes out the air handler. It was just blowing all the cold air into the AC room and into the attic. Mechanical One don’t know what they’re doing and Holiday Builder takes shortcuts everywhere they can with undersizing your AC unit and going with the cheapest labor.
Every single builder in the area builds homes faster than these clowns.
Holiday Builders suck. Ever heard the saying lazy people work twice. Everything about their workmanship is trash. The construction managers do not inspect work done by the trades after it is completed. Their scheduling sucks too. They lie about everything, every step of the way. Don’t build with them. We’re still finding issues every single damn day with this house. Don’t make the mistake of building with Holiday Builders. Build with Maronda or anyone else other than this clowns. Zac Davison sucks. Trish sucks. Chris Thornton sucks and his brother Kevin Thornton sucks even more, Steve Pettko sucks. Chris Cubillos Suck.

I am 💯 not telling anyone where to invest. All I'm saying is there is a significant proof that space is the place.
Do you know what you'd experience in orbit around the Earth? The direct cosmic shitstorm barreling ass towards you at the speed of c... You'd roasty-toasty at about 350°f anywhere the sun kisses you. One half of your body 350°f, the other 0°f where the sun don't touch. Baked like a cake. In fact, if you could keep the batter in the pan, direct sunlight in space absolutely could bake a cake. Might vaporize the water instantly so you get a dry ass cake, but y'all are buying your cakes from the supermarket already. Dry ass cake ain't a deal breaker for you.
But that's not all, noooo. We're just getting started in the cavalcade. 350° is enough to cook a steak as well. As one side bakes and the other side starts to freeze, flipping the steak at proper intervals will absolutely produce the perfect medium-rare. Heat creep not getting too far in before it gets flipped and starts rapidly freezing that side. All you're missing is the sear. But you're in space. There's rocket engines. I shouldn't have to figure all of this out for you.
You know what else you can do with that heat differential? Charge your phone. I built an example once for the 6th grade science fair showing how you use a thermoelectric generator to charge a phone. It was so great they said "What are you even doing here?! You don't have any children, you weirdo".
So what else could you possibly want?! Charged phone, a steak, and some cake while chilling in the void. Only thing better would be cell service. Then you could be looking up inappropriate pictures of Bea Arthur while eating your steak and cake on your charged phone...and for that, we got ASTS.
Thanks for coming to my TedTalk. ✌️

I've been mulling over for some days now revisiting conversations nd stuff I realise that so much has changed yet at the same time it feels like I haven't changed much.
I went from my 16yr old who decided to forever keep this secret and be 'straight' to so much comfortable w my sexuality now, tho a long way to go still.
I met some really great people especially online most of whom who are not in my life anymore, Ive never felt more loved and cherished and so ever comfortable than I did w em I don't think I'll ever be able to move on from how they made me feel, they made me feel special and that I really had something unique for them to choose me and us to have so many great memories like I can't believe I was able to meet such great and unique people and have some of the happiest moments w em.
Recently I've realised I might be demiromantic/sexual too, it's just a term that puts into words how I really feel about my crushes and why I rarely have any.
I'm still afraid to come out to some friends irl who I know will be supportive of me it's like a mental block w a bit of internalised shame ig, this is something that has been my lil thing in my head forever and if I tell someone now it'll be out there and I'll never be able to put it back into the box and I won't be able to take it back, things will change forever
Next thing, I'm Really scared life is not going how I planned it to most days I feel really alone and I'm scared that it's not gonna be a very happy ending ~ It's like I'm on a rope jumping between choosing the bad things more over the good things that will be beneficial for me. Idk how to just be okay and not be on the crisp of falling into a pool of sadness every now and then. Idk how people do it really just be okay, I'm jealous of mentally sane people, jealous of people who have healthy relationships with their parents, siblings it's like why can't I have that.
Well this took a dark turn, I just needed to put my thoughts out there notes app wasn't doing much for me. thanks if u read till here <3

Wassup people, I bring Discord tidings once again. If you know base stuff already, slingshot will be at bottom.
No doubt lot of you (kinda obvious from threads lol) have now experienced the shift from no longer doing the endless number monuments with blocks directly, into having 4 buildings surrounding a central block storage pile.
This is called "Base Builder", and is a currently beta feature that has been expanding to eventually come to everyone.
On the left side you have a hot air balloon looking "Logistics", on the right you have "Arsenal" that's kinda like a barracks / factory, bottom in turn is fortress / mini castle looking "Defense" or what was it. And up top you got "Town Hall".
After you set a building up, with the exception of TH (more on that in a sec) what you gotta do is spend blocks from storage to do "jobs" at them. I >think< arsenal also needs you to spend some cards from a card of your choosing? (I dont have BB yet so can't check)
After a job is finished, you'll get a decent small payout (grows with building level), including XP for the building. Once you've filled up the XP gauge, you can level the building up. This'll give you some benefits, mainly 1 skill point to use on any of the 3 skills the buildings have.
Currently only logistics skills are open, we dunno what TH's environments will do, the other 2 are just preview images that you can't unlock.
Pretty self-explanatory. 4x adds a 4x multiplier to the middle of reward gauge, and further points grow the area to make it easier to hit. More looting time is just that. Caps around 2 sec extra or so? Teleport will at random move some of your mobs, sometimes champs, from phase 1 of a map to phase 2 to give you a head start (or phase 3 if you got slingshot)
Currently the level caps for the 3 skill buildings are 100, so you'll get 99 points max to each. It >might< grow later but for now be a little careful what you put points into unless you want to spend some time doing ads to take em back for respending 5 points at a time.
Town Hall differs in the sense that it can't be leveled directly cause it has no jobs, and it only gains XP from leveling up the other 3 buildings. Due to this its always gonna lag behind a bit, and has a level cap of 50. For the most part its just for storage (until environments anyway, whenever that'll be), with the rest coming from your league. (immortal is 10k storage, god tier don't count cause not a league).
Storage full? What about events?
Unfortunately yes, blocks at this time that exceed your storage capacity will be wasted during normal play. Key phrase >normal<, because during Piggy Race and World Clash your entire loot will still count, even if you can't fit a single block more to space. This will change later, more of that in a sec.
BUT ADS-ADS-ADS
Yes, I know =w=;; I'm not all too big on the situation either. Now don't take this as absolute 100% unchangable truth since I'm not a developer, but the main boss man of theirs did tell us in Elite Chat area that their current plan to try if not solve then at least remedy the above excess block wastage and ad galore issue, by later introducing a "time machine" of some sort. This, be it a building or feature or whatever (we dunno what form yet), will take your excess looted blocks, and use them to speed up your ongoing timers. Number subject to possible change, but the value he mentioned so far was 1000 (1k) blocks for 1 minute skipped each. I'd presume its to all ongoing timers at the time, for ease of coding.
So simply said, not best situation, but it >should< hopefully get significantly better soon.
I been waiting, why no BB yet?
Its their by far most massive update to the game so far, so despite going as fast as they can (especially due to unexpected bugs) its been a little slow going. The impatience of players and their displeasure at uneven competitive scene due to this has been made known though, so their current priority above all seems to be trying to get at least basic BB out the door for everyone.
We just now on friday had a significant expansion of the percentage to what I believe is more or less 50% of the entire player base. The next stage >might< be what they were promising before this, an inclusion of everyone who has at least 100 or more bases made on the old form.
I want the purple memento to have a funny number. Wat do?
When you receive the beta, finishing the current base you are on will convert you to the new form, and take that last finished number as your mini monument at top right. So lets say you want it to say 500? Then you need to finish 499 bases, then stay on the blueprint unfinished stage of 500 until you receive beta. After receiving, complete it, and puff it should say 500 on monument.
Okay I know all that, wut dis slingshot thing?
Pretty much self explanatory, a small occasional (seemingly random chance) activity to spice up normal 2 phase maps a little. It'll appear during transition from phase 1 to 2, a gap of some sort (collapsed bridge, energy storm, void, lava, etc), with an enormous giga slingshot like in the moon battle ad of the game against that giant 999 HP tower.
There's a predetermined path you can (dont have to, but why not? more benefit) take for some extra coin, and you'll have anywhere from I believe 2 to 4-5 bubbles rotating around over the gap. Red coin bubbles reduce them, green ones give. Green blocks gives blocks of course, and green skip is 1 skip.
Most seem to quite enjoy it, no bugs that we can see, with a lot of suggestions of wishing the rewards were a little higher. No dev comment on if they'll do that or not yet, but I think it might be in beta phase still so I reckon its not impossible it might be finetuned for full release.