This song has become a well loved track for me. DYWTYLM is a track that sounds the most poppie compared to the rest of their catalog. One of the reasons that I love this song is because it really gives that main character euphoria. I live in a major US City and rely on public transit. That means I walk A LOT. The walk-ability of this song is top tier. The way the beat goes is always right in time with my foot meeting the pavement as I walk through the big city. Aside from the feel of the song the lyrics, as per usual, are a treat to dissect.
Within the Lore of Sleep Token I choose rest my head on an acquired understanding that Sleep is just a personification of Mental/Emotional states of being/the Self and Death. Thus is the framework of which I consume this musical offerings. The songs structure (from out understanding) as encounters with Vessel and Sleep, making the lyrics very conversational even if only one sided at times. In this song ,however, it seems almost more to be breaking that third wall in addition to its tie to the sleep lore. The more I listen to this track the more I feel like I am getting a little peak into a more pointed aspect of the mental continuum of the man behind the mask; a insecurity perhaps? Behold my theory fellow worshipers...

1. Energy is shared and never ending. Everything that makes up the stars in the sky also makes up us. Many spiritualists adopt the understanding that we are simply the universe experiencing itself over and over in different incarnations. We are each other. I am it and it is me, a philosophy I think it is safe to say that Sleep Token shares. In 2017 the band even released a single line response on social media in res posting to an article that within its headline asked (possibly paraphrasing) "What and Who the Hell are Sleep Token?" To which the band responded "We are YOU" All this to say that any relationship or battle or communication with sleep is, to me, often just directed towards the darker facets of the artist himself. Additionally it is about creating a community that can dine in darkness together.
2. So why would I suspect that a fourth wall is broken? The perspective that I am viewing this song in lends itself to that suspension though the song still works regardless of POV. Either this song is reference towards a specific person or conversation or its directed at fans or both. DYWTYLM has come off of the most recent album Take Me Back To Eden. At this point the band has gained some following though it seems it didn't really explode until around the time of the albums release when the summoning blew up on social media. Regardless, when you have the talent that Sleep Token has, a large fan base is inevitable. I can imagine going from being relatively unknown to having strangers shout that they love you can be a heavy experience especially if one already struggles with self Image. To me, this song comes from the headspace of someone being interested in you in some way and wanting to build some sort of relationship with you, wanting to invest themselves in you. Despite this person saying how much they want you in their life, you feel like you should come with a warning label. I feel that's whats happening here. the question DYWTYLM is a interesting one because the inflection of that question is what can easily change the perspective. I view that question with a tone of disbelief and sense of "..but why?"

"Do you roll with the waves? or do you duck into deep blue safety? Is is always the same? DYWTYLM? Do you pull out the chains? or Do you push into constant aching each and every day? DYWTYLM?"
To me its as if someone has told him that they love him and that they want him to have a bigger role in their life in whatever regards the relationship is to. Friend, Lover whomever. He is trying to deter this person from getting to close. essentially it is say "My responses to negative stimulus is either on one side of the spectrum or the complete other side of the spectrum." Perhaps he is saying "I may be a bueden to you." As if to warn "I am too broken for you." If you look at the entirety of this song like this, you can see it easily. All of the questions seem posed as if/then, this or that. When he says DYWTYLM, is he really saying"You may wish that you loved me but behold, here is all the lists of the reasons we wont work out cause I am too complicated and mentaly ill. So, after all that, do you still want me? Do You Wish That You Loved me?"
Another reason I suspect that this song could be directed at fans is because of the in between parts toward the end of the song. During a interview style version of one of vessels messages he had said (again, paraphrasing)"I only see them smiling...I want them to smile" and during the end of the song you hear him sing "smile back.....at me..."
The band has always wanted it to be about the music. These are smart lads though, I am sure they expected and bit of a following from ....Hungry Eyes...if you will.... Perhaps this song gently address "hey, you think im desirable? If you really knew me..if you knew the man behind the mask..,maybe you would change your mind."
During the course of the song he also addresses "my reflecion wont smile back at me like I know it should and I would turn into a stranger in a minute if I could. There is something eating me alive I dont know what it is...."
He doesnt seem to like himself very much in the first place. Introspectively, The artist understands that sometimes there is a blind spot to see greatness within ones self. When he says he wished he could be a stranger it could be that he wishes he were able to look at himself more objectivly and not be weighed down by any preconceived notions or lies he has told himself. To say he doesn't know what is eating him alive it sounds like he is struggling with depression or some other mental/emotional health concern.
He goes on to say "I cannot hope to give you what I cannot give myself" This is powerful because its like he has been offered a way out of his lonleyness, out of some of the darkness but has refused it because he wont do it at the expense of anyone else. He is compassionate.
In summary I feel that the track DYWTYLM is about questioning what someone sees in you, and/or wanting to protect somone from yourself. I get a sense that this narrative is something that is perhaps a less metaphorical aspect and more a confession of something real that the lead singer has dealth with before.
So what do you think? Have you had similar thoughts? How do you feel it relates to the Sleep lore? There are probably as many variations of interpretation as there are Sleep Token Worshipers. Aside from whatever is truley cannon in Vessles mind, there is no right or wrong answers or interpretations. If something resonated with you then you explore that path and if it didnt thats okay too.
-Byte

Especially if they met someone else? There’s a lot of confusion on my end because my boyfriend of a year broke up with me for circumstances that aren’t new. He’s got a lot going on such as taking over full custody of one of his kids, finalizing a divorce, and taking full ownership of his business that he shared with his ex. But these were circumstances that we’ve been navigating for a year. It’s getting closer to the court date, but other than that, nothing has changed. One minute he’s calling and texting everyday, and then he didn’t talk to me for a week and then ended things between us. His reasons for wanting to break up don’t make sense to me so I think he met someone else. Which is totally fine, if he found someone that offers more to him than I can. I would just like to know honestly why the sudden decision to break up.
So I’m just wondering if men that meet someone else while in a relationship, do you would you tell the other person the truth?

Hello! My name is Andrea Ramirez, and I am conducting a research study to fulfill the requirements for a Psy.D in Clinical Psychology at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology.
The purpose of this study (IRB-FY23-260) is to measure anxiety, depression, and trauma symptomatology among a sample of adult gay men and compare results between two age-based cohorts.
You may participate in this study if:

• Must be between 18-99 years old.
• Must identify as a gay man.
• Must currently live in the United States.
• Must have lived in the United States during the AIDS epidemic and/or the 2022 mpox outbreak.

During this study, you will be asked to complete a 20-30 minute survey about your experiences with anxiety, depression, trauma, and experiences with mpox and discrimination. You will be asked to complete this study on Qualtrics.com.
If you are interested and/or have any questions, please contact me or my dissertation chair as noted below:
Andrea Ramirez, M.A (they/them/theirs): [aramirez4@ego.thechicagoschool.edu](mailto:aramirez4@ego.thechicagoschool.edu)
Beatriz Lopez, Ph.D. (she/hehers): [blopez4@thechicagoschool.edu](mailto:blopez4@thechicagoschool.edu)
Please feel free to share this post with anyone who may be interested in participating. I am currently looking to reach a wider age range (especially folx who were adults in the 80s). Thank you for reading.
Survey Link: https://qualtricsxmxqkf55frn.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9HuZAYJxSq6eSIm

So my girlfriend and I want to go to build a bear but the only close one is at a GWL. The other one is a solid 6 hour drive. According to 100’s of people you can buy the empty bear skin, and take it to a bab and have it filled for free. my question is if I can do this at the lodge.
Yes I did call my local GWL and I spent 25 minutes trying to speak to a real person and not their terrible virtual assistant.

So the past 6 months have been the wildest rollercoaster ride of my life. More like a horror movie. Back in November 2023, a woman I used to see (but recently broke up with) pretended she was pregnant, lying to me first and then to my family. She was convincing and had pics of the positive test (belonging to one of her sisters-in-law, as I later found out), and thought she wouldn't lie about it because I never knew her to lie before and thought she would be crazy to lie about such a huge thing in our conservative culture & religious community. Well it turns out that's exactly what she was.
I was pressured/threatened to marry her, and felt it as my responsibility, because that's how you patch it up in our community.
But I found out she wasn't pregnant, from her messages with her best friend on her phone and then a lot of questioning. There were many more manipulations to follow over the months, one of the biggest ones being her previous marital history and her age - she pretended she was 28 but according to her passport she's 40! She later claimed she's actually 28, or 29, or 31 (different dates in different conversations). So with that and everything else from the very beginning, I don't know what to believe anymore. Oh, and the fact that I didn't even want the marriage in the first place.
I tried to divorce her many times, but she constantly threatened me with either her family/brothers or with suicide.
Long story short, and skipping over many details, I tried to make things work between us a few times but it kept on breaking down. Eventually one crazy night where she was round my & my family's place, she hounded me for almost the whole night about me not having sex with her (at this point I had just stopped) and my father had to even get involved and calm her down, warning he would call the police because of her harassment.
She wasn't allowed back in our house and we basically ignored her calls for a couple of days until things calmed down. But then the unexpected happened: she reported ME to the police alleging that I had raped her multiple times (ironic considering she was pressuring me for sex), when I had never dome anything non-consensual with anyone in my entire life. I was arrested and detained for a day while being interrogated and examined before let out on bail.
It turns out she then dropped the case, furiously shouting at the police for arresting me and apparently now launching legal action against them. Bizarre, what did she think would happen when reporting rape?
She has since begged for my forgiveness and for me to take her back, but I don't have the slightest desire to do so. I don't seek revenge and I can even forgive her, but I just want peace of mind and for her to get out of my life.
She's claimed numerous times since then that she would accept my decision even to divorce, but then when I brought it up yet again recently (with an intermediate mutual friend present - I ain't meeting her alone) she denied it and insists on staying with me.
My dilemma is this: I suspect she likely has borderline personality disorder (BPD) based on a lot of symptoms, and her mental state has apparently deteriorated. If I divorce her, I fear she might kill or harm herself, and that would be on my head. Alternatively she could even reopen the rape allegations case and I could get rearrested. Or she could at the very least set her family on me or get some type of revenge (for what I don't know).
Either way it could get messy. If anyone has any advice on the next steps, feel free. Otherwise it's been great finally venting

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Hey everyone,
I'm M 34 Software professional relatively new around Christchurch and I'm looking to meet some new people and make friends. I've posted here twice before, but not much luck. Life has been a bit hectic settling down and travelling back and forth , but now that I'm finally settled, I'm excited to get out there and connect with others.
I'm really into sports like tennis, football, and hiking. With winter here, I think it's the perfect time to get into some indoor activities—badminton sounds like a lot of fun! This winter, I'm also aiming to learn skiing, so if anyone's up for some winter sports, let's connect!
If you're also new to the city, or just looking to expand your social circle, feel free to reach out. Whether it's for a game of badminton, a hike, or just grabbing a coffee/Beer, I'm open to it all. Let's keep our social lives active and make the most of what Christchurch has to offer.
Looking forward to meeting some awesome people!
Cheers!

In a health insurance setting, would it be considered fraud if all the claims processors at a company knew, for years and years, which claims would be pulled for quality audits?
This info was apparently passed from the auditing dept, to the trainers, to supervisors, etc. All of which then passed it to the processors, who have used that info to make their quality ratings for years. LOTS of those people have used their good ratings to move into better positions, and some are now supervisors or managers themselves.
So is this fraud of some sort? As far as I know, none of the senior management was aware. But I've been told by many, many people that their supervisors would remind them in weekly meetings, I was told by a company trainer in a training class which ones to watch for. (When the auditing system in question was set up, one of their reps told me it was supposed to be a randomized sample. It is not.)
It is my understanding that basically the entirety of the claims staff knows about this, and at the least the supervisors absolutely do.

When it comes to shipping in Bleach, many fans of the anime will make really good ships, and also not so good ones. Take the UraYoru (Urahara x Yoruichi) ship for example (which is the main focus for this reddit post). I think it's really good. And I'll explain that right now.
We know that Urahara and Yoruichi are childhood friends. They grew up together. Although we don't know much, we could possibly get some flash back scenes to their childhood in the upcoming TYBW anime adaptation, as Kubo has been working with Studio Pierrot to include anime exclusive scenes. So there's a chance we'll definitely get flash backs of Yoruichi and Urahara's childhood together, which would also make their ship seem more agreeable.
Looking at their personalities, they are very similar in nature. Both characters often have teasing attitudes, and both Kisuke and Yoruichi like to mess around when in a battle or are apart of some type of training as well. For example, Yoruichi in the TYBW arc when she was fighting Askin. She was flirting with him at the beginning of their fight. Kisuke also was a bit teasing towards Ichigo in a playful voice when he was helping Ichigo regain his shinigami powers after Rukia was taken by Byakuya and Renji back to the Soul Society.
But both characters do get serious when it is necessary, like when both Urahara and Yoruichi fought against Aizen alongside Isshin. Even without Isshin, they are both a great duo overall. For example, when they saved Ichigo, Orihime, and Chad from Ulquiorra and Yammy. They were very well in sync, easily dominating Yammy on the battlefield.
Moving on, their appearance and clothing are also similar, in the sense that they have complementary colours. Kisuke's hair is blonde (a type of yellow). Yoruichi's hair is purple. Kisuke's eyes are grey. Yoruichi's eyes are gold. Kisuke's clothing is green. Yoruichi's clothing is typically orange. See where I'm going with this?
But like I mentioned in my last post (which was unfortunately removed from the Bleach reddit community), many Bleach fans who ship Yoruichi with Soi-Fon say that after TYBW, Yoruichi isn't talking to kisuke, after he forced her to enter the Shunryū Kokubyō Senki form in their fight against Askin. Again... its not true, because in the Can't Fear Your Own World light novels, Yoruichi meets up with Kisuke un her cat form, at the end of the 3'rd volume, where, after they talk about if Hisagi should know the truth about the Soul King, Kisuke mentioned how he's no better than Mayuri Kurotsuchi. Yoruichi then said afterwards that she would always be their for Kisuke, and if he were to ever go rouge and rebel against the soul society, she'd kill him herself. That's just a summary of what they said.
And let's also not forget... IF Kubo decides to continue the manga and start the Hell arc, there's no way Yoruichi wouldn't be talking to Kisuke, because the one-shot hell chapter we got is set 12 years after the TYBW arc. So that would be more than enough time for them to reconnect and strengthen their bond.
Now, I'm not saying that Yoruichi and Kisuke are gonna be a definite couple in the future. But with all the points I've just mentioned, it's clear that Yoruichi wouldn't end up with Soi-Fon. As I clearly stated in my last post, Yoruichi doesn't have feelings for Soi-Fon, even if Soi-Fon has feelings for her. Yoruichi isn't a lesbian either, because she wouldn't have teased Ichigo, not would she have flirted with Askin. Yoruichi literally threw away her royalty and status to save Kisuke from being convicted of Aizen's crimes. Soi-Fon eventually hated Yoruichi for over 100 years, when she left Soi-Fon behind. And finally... Soi-Fon was a literal CHILD when she first met yoruichi, making the YoruSoi ship very weird (like I mentioned last time). So in conclusion, Yoruichi is a better fit for Kisuke.
Let me know if I had missed anything out that could further support the UraYoru ship. And if anyone disagrees with what I say, feel free to comment.

I (24f) am married, mentally ill (ADHD, Bipolar, Anxiety), super introverted, and work as an RBT (registered behavior technician) to give therapy to kids with autism. I was homeschooled and don’t really have friends from there, the 6 months I went to public school my sophomore year I had no friends (but ended up reconnecting with a classmate who is now my husband). Then for the rest of high school I was sent to different RTCs (residential treatment centers) in different states. So I have no friends from school. My parents were super religious and I am not. The kids I went to church with I wasn’t really close with or want to be. The people at my old jobs do drugs or party and I’m sober. How do I make new friends if not through work? I don’t really interact with other RBTs. I did get a promotion where I’ll be helping behavior technicians become registered. They might see me as a supervisor and that could be an inappropriate work relationship. Also I don’t want my husband’s friends through his work and high school, I want my own. I’m temporarily staying at my parents until SeptembeOctober, but when I lived in an apartment complex, I had no friends who were neighbors. When I go back to an apartment complex, I might make new friends (doubt it) but I’d have to wait a couple months. I don’t really like going out but my interests includes: crocheting, animals, sports, arcades, sci-fi/fantasy/action/gore movies, metal music, outdoors, and working out (not in that order). I used to go to a ton of concerts but never made any deep friends. I don’t have a lot of money to spend and I spend my free time indoors or outside if it’s not too hot. I would like friends and have no idea how to meet them. I don’t want a lot, I want like 3 close friends. It doesn’t help that I’m super picky and can flake unless we’re close.
Edit: I’m mentally ill but I’m very stable and have been for over a year. I can’t be around drugs or alcohol.

So the past 6 months have been the wildest rollercoaster ride of my life. More like a horror movie. Back in November 2023, a woman I used to see (but recently broke up with) pretended she was pregnant, lying to me first and then to my family. She was convincing and had pics of the positive test (belonging to one of her sisters-in-law, as I later found out), and thought she wouldn't lie about it because I never knew her to lie before and thought she would be crazy to lie about such a huge thing in our conservative culture & religious community. Well it turns out that's exactly what she was.
I was pressured/threatened to marry her, and felt it as my responsibility, because that's how you patch it up in our community.
But I found out she wasn't pregnant, from her messages with her best friend on her phone and then a lot of questioning. There were many more manipulations to follow over the months, one of the biggest ones being her previous marital history and her age - she pretended she was 28 but according to her passport she's 40! She later claimed she's actually 28, or 29, or 31 (different dates in different conversations). So with that and everything else from the very beginning, I don't know what to believe anymore. Oh, and the fact that I didn't even want the marriage in the first place.
I tried to divorce her many times, but she constantly threatened me with either her family/brothers or with suicide.
Long story short, and skipping over many details, I tried to make things work between us a few times but it kept on breaking down. Eventually one crazy night where she was round my & my family's place, she hounded me for almost the whole night about me not having sex with her (at this point I had just stopped) and my father had to even get involved and calm her down, warning he would call the police because of her harassment.
She wasn't allowed back in our house and we basically ignored her calls for a couple of days until things calmed down. But then the unexpected happened: she reported ME to the police alleging that I had raped her multiple times (ironic considering she was pressuring me for sex), when I had never dome anything non-consensual with anyone in my entire life. I was arrested and detained for a day while being interrogated and examined before let out on bail.
It turns out she then dropped the case, furiously shouting at the police for arresting me and apparently now launching legal action against them. Bizarre, what did she think would happen when reporting rape?
She has since begged for my forgiveness and for me to take her back, but I don't have the slightest desire to do so. I don't seek revenge and I can even forgive her, but I just want peace of mind and for her to get out of my life.
She's claimed numerous times since then that she would accept my decision even to divorce, but then when I brought it up yet again recently (with an intermediate mutual friend present - I ain't meeting her alone) she denied it and insists on staying with me.
My dilemma is this: I suspect she likely has borderline personality disorder (BPD) based on a lot of symptoms, and her mental state has apparently deteriorated. If I divorce her, I fear she might kill or harm herself, and that would be on my head. Alternatively she could even reopen the rape allegations case and I could get rearrested. Or she could at the very least set her family on me or get some type of revenge (for what I don't know).
Either way it could get messy. If anyone has any advice on the next steps, feel free. Otherwise it's been great finally venting

I went to guruvaoor may 15 because it was maasapiravi I'm visiting there after many years. And for the people who visited there at that date will knows about the crowd at that day there
I started standing in the queue on 6:45 am and was able to pray at 11:30. So we all know mobile phones are not allowed in temple, so I had to stand there for that much hours counting every minutes. So as like every boys I was also checking on the collection and i layed my eyes on a girl standing 10 - 15 people ahead of me in the Q And after few minutes later the noticed me that I was looking her. After few minutes first eye contact happened
It continued for a long period. I was looking at her not creeply on every zig zag turns. And she was checking me if I'm really looking her. Time passed by at a certain moment I felt like 'asthikyu pidichu mone'
There will a moment at the temple we will be gathered in front of the temple not as a Q She was infornt of me but I was still incapable of starting a communication. But her facial expressions was made me clear that she knows that I fell for her. And the time goes on we entered the temple, then she was bit close to me. Still the crowd and pushing made it impossible to speak.
And the last option was to pray that to please make another opportunity to meet her along with the wishes to help me clear my n supplies.
Never saw her after that
Searched for her a bit ( I was with my parents)
In my 22 years of life never experienced a crush like that I done my part of reaserch by checking ig story on location tag and that was a dead end.
Enthayalum krishnande oro kalikale Also I even thought that if it was a njane kandollu njan maathram kandollu moment.
And if she's reading this ( 0.00001% probability) I was the guy wearing turquoise coloured shirt.

To start this story off, I suppose it's best to talk a little bit about myself and my experience in the TTRPG space. I've been an avid TTRPG enthusiast for almost two decades now. Yes, I'm a bit of an old hat/old fogey. I started my enjoyment of the hobby with Pathfinder 1st edition, eventually transferring over to DnD 5e when it first arrived on the scene, mostly because it was the new hotness, but I ultimately found that it was better suited for the type of games that I enjoy running at my table. While I very adamantly enjoy the structure that a game's mechanical rules bring to the table, 5e provided a rules system that wasn't invasive, and so me and my friends were able to focus on the things about the game that we enjoyed the most - the roleplaying, the storytelling, and (most importantly) the fun.
Many years would go by, as well as a couple of what I would consider to be successful campaigns - basically anything that managed to survive longer than 3 months. Scheduling, right? I digress. Eventually, I arrived at a point where my current circle of friends and I were itching to play a new campaign, and for the shits and giggles of it we decided we would livestream it on Twitch. At the time, we had managed to get affiliated on Twitch, and one or two of us would occasionally have a couple of viewers pop in when we were streaming whatever video game we were playing, and we figured it would be fun to do the same thing with our next campaign. So we did. As you might expect, nothing really ever came out of it. We were just doing it for fun. The campaign only lasted about 3 months or so, and we never set out with the expectation that what we were releasing into the world was anything amazing - we were just four normal dudes having fun playing a game we enjoyed, and if you happened to find yourself on our Twitch channel to see it, awesome! If not, cool. We weren't doing it for you.
So, yeah, that campaign eventually fell off, and we would eventually return to just streaming whatever video game excited us. One of friends got married, and had a kid, and was too busy for DnD. Another friend got a new job, and his schedule just didn't give him the time. Hell, even I managed to land a pretty decent job at the time, and I struggled to make time for our weekly video game nights, but I managed. But ever since that streamed campaign had ended, I had an itch in the back of my mind that I really wanted to scratch. I thoroughly enjoyed everything about livestreaming our campaign. Sure, it was nothing to write home about, but I fell in love with the showmanship of it all. Maybe it was because of the thought of the potential for someone to eventually watch it, but whenever we would stream, I would get in the zone and pretend I was putting on a show for thousands (even though we may have only ever had three or four viewers at max). Basically, I had fallen in love with the idea of putting on a show for others, and I knew I would jump at the chance to do it again in the future. Enter Wayne.
A little over a year ago (at the time of this posting), I was perusing through the /LFG subreddit and not looking for anything in particular, when I stumbled across a post that checked off all the boxes.
I don't like to admit that I'm picky, but that fact that this sub exists should give credence to that fact that one should, at the very least, have a criteria when looking for games to invest yourself in when looking at advertisements. And if my little backstory above should inform you, there were a number of things on my checklist that this post had. For starters, it was longer than a few sentences. Clearly, the person who posted this was meticulous about what they wanted and what they didn't want (I would learn, much later on, that Wayne was not the one who wrote the post, but one of his players). Secondly, the post was very adamant about what was of paramount importance at the table - rich and compelling narratives, deep exploration of characters, and a passion for roleplay. And thirdly, the plan was to turn this into a "production". The post even included a promo video of respectable quality. Clearly, the people involved with this had a plan, much more of a plan than my friends and I had when we streamed. And, I considered myself a pretty decent roleplayer, so I applied. They were only looking for 1 applicant, but I figured I had a decent shot, with my previous livestreaming experience, and the fact that I already owned a (what some would call excessive) microphone and camera. So I shot my shot. If I didn't get picked, no biggie, life goes on. But when I received a discord invite and told that I had made it to the second round of the application process, I was ecstatic.
It is around here that I should introduce you to our cast of characters (names have been changed, of course:

• There is, of course, me, Dave - a guy who fundamentally believes that fun and safety at a table supersedes everything else, who happens to really enjoy hamming it up in character, and telling exciting stories.
  
• Ava - an already confirmed player at the table, with a past experience of playing with Wayne. I would come to find out that Ava was the one who had written the LFG post. Ava was also in charge of Discord moderation, and the second round interview process. She has her own story, which I will allude to here, but is ultimately hers to share.
  
• Jelly - Wayne's significant other. Jelly was supposedly not involved with the upcoming campaign at all, but had a presence on the Discord, and have previously played in Wayne's campaigns.
  Seth - another already confirmed player at the table. Admittedly, Seth plays a minor role in the story, but his inclusion is necessary.
  
  • and Wayne - the lead character of our story. The DM of the upcoming campaign. The visionary. The guy who plans to have the next big thing in the TTRPG actual play space.

There are at least a half dozen other individuals involved in this story, but ultimately play very minor roles. If at some point while I am writing this one of them pop up, I will update the list above to include them.
Back to the story. I was ecstatic to find out I had been selected for an Discord interview and scheduled it at my earliest convenience. This is where I first meet Ava. To be honest, I don't recall much about the interview, but I remember it being pretty standard and what I was expecting an interview to be. Mostly it was just going into detail about some of the stuff I had included in my primary application and talking about expectations and goals. I was told that after the Discord interview, the next step would be a participation in a practice one shot, to get a feel for how I would play at the table. After the interview was over, Wayne hopped into the voice channel, and this would be when I would meet the man, the legend.
I pride myself on being very good at reading people. I can usually pick up on when someone is trying to sell me something, pretty quickly. I tend to over analyze words and expression looking for intent. I have been gaslit and manipulated several times in my past by people very close to me, and so I have developed this defense when meeting people for the first time. Very rarely do I take someone at their word, or completely buy what they are selling when I hardly know them, and even less so to a complete stranger. In this case, when meeting Wayne for the first time, my defenses failed me.
Perhaps it was because it had been over a year since I last ran a campaign. Perhaps it was because it had been even longer than that that I actually got to be a player in a campaign. Perhaps it was because of that itch of wanting to perform again for an audience. Or, perhaps, it was because Wayne was very good at pitching his plans. Whatever the reason, my first impression of Wayne was that this was a guy who had a plan, and had the means to enact that plan, and I wanted to be a part of it in any way that I could.
Wayne, you see, had two big passions in life. The first was DnD. The second, as he would admit, was being an entrepreneur. He owned his own business in New York City. One of several ventures he had pursued, and it afforded him a premium NYC apartment and the time and luxury to spend on his second passion - playing DnD. And so, he thought, why not marry these two passions together? He had a great head for business. And according to him, the last campaign he had run was fantastic. So fantastic, he thought, that surely other people would enjoy listening to it. And so he hatched a plan - he would use his business knowledge and savvy to launch a Youtube channel that would be home to his next great campaign. But he had the foresight, at least, to know of just how saturated the DnD actual play space has become in recent years. If he wanted to be successful at this venture, he would have to stand out from the rest. And he had a solution to that. He wasn't going to put out just any old DnD actual play. He was going to create "DnD Cinema".
To do that, he said, he needed the right people that share in the same core philosophies that he had. Namely, a "pretentious level of hyperfixation on roleplaying and narrative storytelling". Most other actual plays, to him, were playing "beer and pretzels" DnD. You know, the type of game were you sit around with your friends having a good time and a laugh, where you might spend five minutes on an out of character joke, etc. Shit like that wasn't going to fly in this campaign. When you came to the table, you were going to be in character from start to finish. And recording sessions were going to be seven hours long. Could I handle that?
And I admit that I told him I could. Like I said, he had a way with words. He was clearly passionate about it. And he talked a good talk. And he was friendly enough. So he said he would be in touch. And the wait began.
Over the course of the next month or so, I would come to become friends with Ava and Wayne. We would hop into Discord and play games, talk about the upcoming campaign, etc. It was going to be several months before the campaign actually began recording, and so Wayne was still conducting the interview process while also working on worldbuilding for the campaign. He was also spending over $3000 dollars commissioning an animated table for the youtube video. This was clearly something he was very proud of, as he took every and all opportunity to talk about how amazing and innovative it was going to be.
You see, in Wayne's vision of "DnD cinema", the videos that would be put up on youtube would not include the faces of the players. Or battlemaps. Instead, it would be animated table that he could manipulate in editing at various cue points. It would feature portraits of the characters that would light up when they speak. It was the next big thing in the TTRPG space - a (frankly) audio only experience that was accentuated with the occasional fancy animation that cost thousands of dollars. No one else was doing it, he would say, and that would help him stand out even more.
It was also during these more innocent days that I would come to understand Wayne's obsession with Brennan Lee Mulligan. He idolized the guy. In fact, he would brag on multiple occasions that his significant other's job had her 3 or 4 degrees removed from Brennan - basically, she worked for someone who worked for someone who was involved with the Dungeons and Drag Queens season of Dimension 20, and he would often mention how he was hoping to use that connection to someday have a sit down and meet and greet with BLeeM himself. As time would go on, I would eventually find out that Wayne actually considered Brennan Lee Mulligan as his competition.
About a month would past before I would hear anything about my application. I never brought it up during our gaming sessions, as another core tenet of mine is that I don't want my friendship or acquaintance with someone to give me an edge over other candidates. I want my experience and what I bring to the table to stand on its own merit. This will come up later in our story. Eventually, I would get a message from Wayne asking me if I would be interested in participating in a try out one shot for the campaign. Apparently, he had completely forgotten that I had applied, and wanted to schedule in a last minute try out for me. My fellow players during the one shot would be Ava, some other member of the discord community, and Jelly.
I'll be honest, the one shot was nothing to write home about. And even Wayne would admit it was something he threw together last minute so that he could say I had my chance. I immediately found Ava to be a fantastic scene partner, and even for a one shot, put the time and effort into her character and actions. Jelly, on the other hand, was not that good. To be fair to Jelly, my criteria for grading her performance was strictly on the curve that Wayne himself said he was grading people on. I found her to be a very selfish player, who failed to pick up on narrative cues, and was solely focused on her time in the spotlight. But it was a trial one shot that didn't mean anything. My biggest take away from Jelly was that she was a player that I would not enjoy playing with in the future, and that I wouldn't seek out as a player at a table that I was DMing for. Not horror story bad (yet), but not good. Average.
When the application process was done, it would eventually come down to two choices. I was one. Wayne loved my southern twang, and thought it would sound good in a production. And we had become friends. The other was someone with a theater and acting background, who had been to Julliard. I was not selected. And I was okay with that. The decision did not impact my friendship with either Ava or Wayne, and we continued to hang out and play games together. I then learned of Wayne's new plan.
In the original posting ad for the campaign, it had been mentioned that a possibility for guest character appearing in the campaign could happen. The original idea was that, as members of the Discord community would play in one shots, Wayne would then be able to invite stand out performance to appear in an episode or two of the new campaign, as a gift to the community and to give those players a chance to play in a campaign with other players of similar caliber. This all changed as the months got closer to release date. The idea for guests at the table changed completely. Instead, Wayne's plan was to use the guest spots at the table as a networking opportunity. Don't forget - Wayne is an entrepreneur. This was a business venture for him, and successful businesses need to show growth. And he wanted to achieve growth at an accelerated pace. The plan was simple - as the channel grew, Wayne would scour the internet for similar channels with slightly higher subscriber count than his. Well, I say Wayne would do this. Wayne would actually pawn this off on to someone else. A tangent that I will perhaps need to touch on later in this story - Wayne was very good at finding ways of pawning off work on to others, and then taking the credit. He very much believe himself to be a manager, and other members of the Discord that showed any interest in the success of this venture as his employees. He would then engage in communications with these other channels in the hopes of achieving some Quid Pro Quo. You send someone to be a guest on our channel for a few episodes, and we'll shout you out. In return, he would send someone from his channel to theirs, and get a shout out in return. Something to note here - all of this was done without ever including his players in the discussion. He was offering them up to strangers without even asking if they even wanted to do that.
Time passes, and eventually recording for the campaign begins. It would be about two months into recording when Wayne approached me about being the first guest character. (At this point, I had been an active member of the Discord community for over six months now). He wanted me to be the first guest character for two reasons. The first was because I was familiar, and he wanted to test out the format before bringing in strangers. The second was because of my prior livestreaming experience. I was a part of an affiliated Twitch channel that met the criteria of having a slightly higher subscriber count than his. But for the most part, our old Twitch channel was dead. Sure, we still streamed games into the void, but there was practically no engagement. And I told him so when he asked me if I wanted to be introduced as someone from that Twitch channel. I was more involved in his community as that point, anyway. And so, I finally got what I was wanting - to sit down and play quality DnD with like minded individuals for the purposes of entertaining others.
At this point, only a handful of episodes had aired. The recording schedule had them a grace period of a month or so before release, and I admittedly hadn't watched them. Honestly, I wasn't that interested. I don't know if that's bad or not. There are a lot of actual plays out there of varying quality. And each one requires a lot of time commitment to watch. Already I was regularly watching Critical Roll, and I was having a hard time to find time to watch some of the other really good shows I was enjoying, like Dimension 20 and The Glass Cannon. On top of that, it was an game that I wasn't a part of, so yeah, I admit I hadn't watch any of it. But even if I had, it wouldn't have prepared me for what playing at the table was actually like. The released episodes were highly edited, with sound effects and music. It wasn't until I became actually involved at the table that I would find out just how manufactured the game actually was. And I use the word "game" very generously.
For starters, once recording began, all out of character talk and banter was immediately and explicitly forbidden. We were to remain in character at all times. Secondly, I would find out that Wayne had developed a "formula for success" in regards to time spent recording. No scene would ever last longer than ten minutes. If players spent too much time having their characters engaging with each other and the time elapsed, we were moving on the next scene, regardless of if it was a natural conclusion or not. Speaking of the characters, I would come to learn that the characters that the player brought to this campaign were secondary to the story that Wayne wanted to tell. "This campaign isn't character focused, it's story focused" he would say. The campaign simply did not have time for that. I don't like to toss out the word "railroaded" very often, but it quickly became apparent that there was a good bit of railroading being done here. The only character decisions or choices or conversations that would ever make it to the final cut were ones that provided what he thought would be the most interesting while pushing his narrative forward. And for a DnD game, there wasn't a whole lot of game being done here. Sure, the players had character sheets, and classes, but it was all superficial. Combat was a rarity on the level of a shiny Pokemon. I think mostly because Wayne didn't find combat narratively compelling. But in that case, I have to ask, why use DnD as your game system? If all you want to do is roll clicky dice and improv, there are much better systems out there. And speaking of the dice - I'm sad to say that in most cases they were superfluous, as well. The only real purpose the dice served to Wayne was when they could be used to clip epic moments of success or failure. A natural 20 or a natural 1 was gold for him, because then he could clip it into a Youtube or Tiktok Short and grow those subscriber numbers. For a game in which "every decision hung on the roll of a dice", there weren't a lot of dice rolls, there weren't a lot of decisions, and when there were decisions, most of the time, the outcome was predetermined by Wayne. Everything Wayne did in regards to this game was in service to growing his Youtube channel. And the sad part? It worked.
In a shockingly short amount of time, Wayne was able to grow his Youtube channel from just over a 100 subscribers to over a 1000. This was mostly done by his excessive push of Youtube and Tiktok shorts. For a short period of time, I was deemed trustworthy enough to have access to the Youtube channel's admin, and I could view the statistics. The turnover rate for shorts into actual video views was miniscule. Only a tiny fraction were tuning in for the actual show. At this point, he had just become a Youtube Shorts creator.
And I want to mention at this point - I understand and respect the hustle. The world of Youtube is a dog eat dog world, and you have to have to play the game to stay in the game - I get it. I don't have any issue with being proud of what you've created, and pushing it out to people. I really don't. My issue was with how deceptive Wayne was being with it. And how deceptive he was, in general, as I would come to find out.
You see, before the inaugural campaign had even launched, Wayne approached me one day to see if I would be interested in running a campaign on his channel, as I had experience before in it, and had expressed an interest in doing it again. And I will admit, I was excited about the prospect. But before my words of "Yeah, I'd love to talk about" even had a chance to dissipate into the ether, Jelly would hop into the channel, in the middle of the discussion to say, "You know who should run a campaign? Seth." And then immediately log off.
I don't have a lot to say about Seth. I think he is an amazing, caring, friendly guy. He also happens to be an incredible roleplayer and storyteller, and his character is Wayne's campaign is truly phenomenal. I envy how easy it is for Seth to get into and portray the wide arrange of emotions of a character. He also happens to be a great GM. I understand why Jelly would suggest him to run a campaign. What I didn't understand, at the time, were her motives. Wayne, Ava, Jelly, and Seth had all played in a previous campaign together, and Wayne and Jelly had become enamored by just how good Seth was. And even prior to that, Ava and Seth had a past campaign together. Jelly wanted to be a player in a Seth run campaign. And if Wayne was going to have a second campaign on the channel, she wanted it to be Seth's, and she wanted to be a player in it.
And so, immediately, any and all discussion about me running a campaign was ceased, and the legwork was put forth for Seth to run a campaign. Wayne would approach him about it, and he was interested. Seth would already have in mind the players that he wanted for it - two friends of his from outside the server, Ava, and another player from the Wayne campaign. Noticeably missing from that list - Jelly.
Strangely, Wayne would then tell Seth that if he was going to run a campaign on the channel, he would have to have an application process for the players, and open it up so that anyone could apply. After Seth had already stated he already had players in mind - players who already said yes. I don't know about you, but as a DM, I would never let someone dictate to me who I could have at my table. If I have players in mind already, it's because I have a reason. But Wayne demanded an application process be followed, and a second LFG post would appear in LFG for the Seth run campaign - that was noticeably advertising for 4 players. After Seth had chosen his players. The advertisement came with another well edited and narrated youtube promo that was, and still is, the highest viewed video on the channel. And all of it was a sham. Which I knew it was. And I confronted Wayne about it. It was then that I learned some unsavory backstory involving Ava and Jelly and the prior campaign. That is not my story to tell. I have shared my accounts of events with Ava, and she is considering posting an account from her perspective following this. The most I am willing to say on this is that involves situations that should never be okay at a DnD table, and that Wayne would gloss over and sugarcoat these situations as no big deal. It would lead to Ava not being comfortable with being at a table with Jelly which both I, and Seth, would understand.
Wayne, however, found this to be unfair and manipulative on Ava's part. Those past incidents should have had no bearing on Jelly's consideration for the Seth run campaign. Which is why he would demand an application process. He would then confide to me when I questioned the duplicity of the LFG advertisement that it wasn't completely misleading. There would still be someone chosen from the list of applicants - because he was going to make sure that Ava wasn't part of the campaign. After Seth had already told both Wayne and her that she was. After the players for that game had already come together for a session zero. He claimed that Ava had prior incidents of being difficult to work with, and that because he wasn't involved in the campaign, he couldn't be there to handle any situations that might arise of conflicts between players at the table. At the time I thought that was an odd statement to make - if you are trusting enough of another person, like Seth, to run a campaign on your channel shouldn't you be trusting enough in their ability to handle problems between players? Looking back now, I can only assume he made that statement because he was certain that Jelly would be a player at the table, and that problems might arise between Jelly and Ava. He asked that I keep the conversation between us. But that was something I could not do. None of that situation felt right to me. Wayne, Ava, and I had been friends playing games together for nearly a year now. I never saw any inclination of Ava being a "problem player" - she was great at the table, and a great person to hang out with. And I found it weird that Wayne would say those things about her, and not approach her about it. So of course I talked to her. For weeks she had been sharing her excitement of the new campaign with me, often with Wayne in the voice channel with us. Ava would then share with me her past experiences with Wayne and Jelly. Again, it is not my story to tell, but I am a good judge of character. I believed Ava's account of events. It made sense to me, with how Wayne and Jelly acted.
I wish I could say this story had a happy and/or satisfying conclusion. I'm not even really sure if there is a point to it, or even if it will be a good read. It has been clear for some time now that Wayne has been entirely obsessed with the growing of his Youtube channel, damn any and all bridges burned, and walking back some of his initial promises of what he claimed the campaign and the Youtube channel would be. It's also very clear to me that Wayne is someone who absolutely has to have control over everything, especially the narrative (fictional and real life).
There are so many minor grievances to air about Wayne that I haven't already touched on, and I feel like I've already taken up too much of your time already. Here's just a brief overview, I'd be more than happy to go into more details if you want them:

• Multiple players from the Wayne campaign confided in me about some of the problems they had with Wayne and how the game was being run. When Wayne found out, he blew his lid, and said that he was both Manager and HR, and no one should be complaining to anyone outside of the table. If they were going to complain to anyone, it should be him.
  
  • It turns out, Wayne has a prior history of being an asshole. Long before the Youtube channel, and the campaign, even before the previous campaign, he told his then group that they were playing the game wrong. He then found a new group, sang their praises to the old group, and then even brought both groups together to show the old group "the right way to play"
  • In addition to Wayne, he has two editors working for him. One of which he pays. The other one has had no compensation. The one not getting paid is doing the same work as both Wayne and the paid editor combined.
  • I mentioned way early on in the story that Ava was the Discord Administrator for the Discord server. After the Seth campaign incident, Wayne unceremoniously removed Ava as Administrator, told her it was "by mistake", and never put it back. As far as I can tell, there was nothing to warrant this other than control. I suspect it was because there were certain Seth campaign related channels or other channels he didn't want Ava to see.
  • The unceremonious removal of myself and Ava from the Youtube channel admin. Admittedly, we contributed very little to it, but it was removed without a word mentioned.
  • Recently making a post requiring his "talent" to purchase a minimum $5 dollar Patreon subscription. He has admitted to me the reasoning for this was to inflate Patreon subscriber numbers to entice new subscribers. He has since walked that back after much outcry from the "talent"
  • Asking Seth if it wouldn't be too much to convert his envisioned DnD campaign into a Daggerheart campaign, because Daggerheart is the new hotness, and will attract more viewers.

Ultimately, I suppose I feel disheartened and deceived. Deceived because I originally signed up for what I thought was going to be a bunch of friends sitting around and recording themselves playing quality DnD, and it has shifted so far from that original purpose. Wayne is obsessed over subscriber numbers and views, it's all he ever talks about. He claims that his goal is to reach a level of success to which all 10+ people involved will be able to achieve financial freedom (which he claims is roughly $2000 a month). I'm sure you've done the math, just like I have. Even if you believe $2k a month is financial freedom (I certainly don't), that comes out to $240,000 a year. That's an insane level of success to promise your players. Oh, I'm sorry, your "talent".
I feel disheartened because....there's actually good work being done here. Some of the players are some of the best I've ever played with. Wayne can actually be a good storyteller, when he's not pushing for likes or clicks. The editors do a really fantastic job. I have seen and listened to the work being done on the Seth campaign (luckily Wayne is only tangentially involved), and Seth's campaign is turning out to be something really special. There is something good being done here, but it seems so tainted by Wayne and his obsession for Youtube and Tiktok success. So, maybe this is an RPG Horror Story, maybe it's a cautionary tale. I dunno. I have committed to finishing out my run in the campaign, (I was brought back to the table multiple times because the players enjoy playing with me, and also I suspect I was involved in one of his highest viewed shorts), but my hearts not in it. I've told Wayne I've no interest in any of his future projects, and I wish him well on his Youtube journey. But in the pursuit of clicks, and likes, and subscribers, I feel like he has fundamentally lost what attracts people to actually watch and invest in TTRPG actual plays - authenticity.

I've always been bad at describing myself, don't mind :)
I live in Central Europe and would like to meet new friends. It's a bit strange to look for friends online, but obviously those times have come.
I am quite an extroverted person and I can talk to anyone about various topics. Feel free to start a topic and don't hesitate. I also like opposite opinions and attitudes from my own. I always learn something new from it and also reconsider my views.
The topics we can talk about are: politics, economics, esotericism, spiritualism, philosophy... But I am open to other topics, of course.
I train swimming and wrestling. I also often go for long walks along the river. I love espresso. Music is my passion, especially electro.
This is me:
https://i.imgur.com/ayg5BBY

Hey guys. So I'm pretty confident that I'm reading rule 17E in the flsa excludes helpdesk / repair techs from being OT exempt. But here I am. I didn't know about this before taking the job, and realistically it's not that much OT to pursue legal action, but long story short the ship has sailed on moving up in this company, I didn't get my promised career advancement framework, and other folks with less experience are getting hired in at higher rates even while raises are "temporarily suspended". I know job hopping right now is hard given the state of the industry, so I'm looking to cut back to a hard 40 limit, and protect myself from retribution, somehow, without telling them I know my rights, until I can find something better.
Basically the problem is this: they schedule us required to be on site from 8-5 with an hour lunch. This lunch break is not protected to be duty free - we have to keep all communications turned on, and are strongly discouraged from leaving our areas to take lunch. What this results in obviously is people walking in during our lunch needing something, and the expectation being to help them in emergency or submit a ticket for them. The workload is not so high that in any given week I cannot accomplish the job within SLA within 40 hours, even if they have an after-hours need. So when there's an after-hours meeting or event, I have to stay over, in unpaid OT, as well as still arriving at my 8am start, for the sake of availability. I feel that they can't have the employer benefit of not paying OT if they get to micromanage our hours just for availability, even if there are no pending tasks. Like if my SLA is 2 hours first response, and I had to stay 2 hours late so come in 2 hours late next day and immediately respond, I'm still within bounds of my metrics. Am I actually needing to go full throttle working for 40 hours a week? No. But I am definitely at minimum "engaged to wait" for this full 40+. Again this is not a super regular occurrence, just when you add it up over the course of a year it adds up to a non-negligible amount. Like I'd be very upset if I were robbed for this amount in any other way. Management has been known to check badge swipe timing and camera footage to make sure we're on time, and has written folks up for it (again even when there was no task scheduled).
One of the general conditions of being salary is flexible hours within business reason, but my scheduled hours are to start before everyone else, leave after everyone else, so there is time to +- 30 minutes without risking any business impact. It's literally just so they can have me available at the helpdesk just in case. "Just in case" scheduling doesn't sound like a very exempt type of workload. Of course if there's a big high prio issue like the network is down, I would get my ass out of bed and be there asap, as well as being on the horn with the other techs to consult. But... fires like that are so uncommon to pop up at random first thing in the morning without already having 50 reporting emails in my inbox that I'd already have seen. I don't have a problem telling them that I'm comping the time just so they know, but having to ask them, rely upon receiving a response (which is maybe 50% likely), and then told no a high amount of the time, or to provide proof that I worked over during the hours I was asked to, seems..... questionable.
What can I do besides play hardball and leaving at 40 at this point? I've never had a salary exempt job before this and just don't know how to navigate the politics of putting my foot down, as a powerless, low paid tech worker in a shitty job market, with managers like this? Best I can really do without anyone noticing is taking long periods of doing no backlog/project work. But that's not really the same as being home, on my own time.

While I can go on and on about this situation, I will try to limit myself to the pertinent details as to not make this a novel.
I (23F) have been dating my partner (25M) for 5 years since we met in college. I am very much in love with him, and our relationship is pretty good. We communicate, support one another, and try to be very open with our feelings. He is the first person for me to date that I actually see myself having a future with.
The issue is our mothers. Neither one is more of a problem than the other. My mother does not like his mom, and she seemingly doesn’t like her either. Mind you, in our 5 years of dating they have only actually met for 15 minutes at most (at graduation, and his mom ended up leaving bc she was sick and ended up having covid).
I recently found out that apparently my mother left a bad taste in her mouth due to a comment along the lines of “oh are you excited to finally sit down and gossip/kiki about these two (meaning my partner and I).” Now, knowing my mom, she was making a light-hearted comment and trying to be personable. But apparently his mom took this as “catty and mean girlish.”
His mother has also tried to force him to break up with me numerous times, most notably on Christmas two years ago, to which I called him out for blindly listening to mommy. He admitted it’s not what he wanted, and his mom was just in his ear. She’s always in his ear about how “she’s worried that because we met so young that he hasn’t experienced other people and what he wants in relationships.”
Theres always some iteration of this sort of behavior from her. She’s truly a snake, and I’ve known that from the minute I met her. His family is very wealthy (think pedigree status) and my family just is not, which I think is another layer to all of this. She clearly doesn’t like me or think I’m good enough for her son, but it’s laughable because I am an admittedly conventionally beautiful woman with a MS in science who got her alcoholic son into AA (now 2.5 years sober), which ALSO resulted in getting her sober herself, since he refused to have a relationship with her once he was sober (since she was still a drunk).
And now I’m not saying it’s all on his mom. My mom is just as bad. In my ear trying to pit me against his mom and family, pulling emotional and mental manipulation to get me to live closer, etc.
This never was really a big thing to me; but when I found out her “bad taste” from my mom’s comment at the graduation, I kinda just lost my shit. Especially since I’m supposed to be moving to his family’s summer house to work for the summer and I’ll be around her all the time. I’m realizing that as much as I love this man, our future (and any potential marriage) also includes that insufferable woman, and the strange and controlling dynamics of his whole family. Not to mention having to deal with my mother and the dynamics there.
It’s just gotten me thinking whether this relationship is doomed from the get-go, and whether it might serve us both better to end it? There’s a part of me that thinks it’s so stupid to end the relationship because of parents and bullshit outside of the relationship, but I also know it’s stupid to think that those sort of things don’t have significant impacts on relationships.
I don’t know, this might just be rambling, but if it’s somewhere coherent, any advice is much appreciated.
TLDR: both my partner and I’s moms are emotionally and mentally manipulative people that hate each other (despite never meeting) and are making me think my 5-year relationship is actually doomed.

Hello!
My name is Taaha Adamji, and I am a third-year medical student at the University of Arizona College of Medicine - Phoenix. I am conducting a research study on the correlation between sensory deprivation tank usage and various psychological and physiological variables, including health, stress, and mindfulness.
If you have ever used a sensory deprivation tank, I would greatly appreciate your participation in my survey. This study is approved by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at the University of Arizona, ensuring that all ethical standards are met.
Here are a few important details about the study:
Purpose: To explore the effects of sensory deprivation tank usage on health, stress, and mindfulness. Participation: Open to anyone who has used a sensory deprivation tank, regardless of frequency. Duration: The survey takes approximately 7 minutes to complete. Anonymity: Your responses are anonymous, and no personally identifying information will be collected. This ensures that your participation is confidential. The survey includes a variety of questions about your experiences with sensory deprivation tanks, your health, and your mindfulness practices. Your insights will help broaden our understanding of the benefits and potential applications of sensory deprivation in health and wellness.
Why Participate?
Contribute to Research: Your participation will help us gather valuable data that can inform future studies and therapeutic practices. Unique Perspective: As a member of the floatation community, your experiences are particularly valuable to our research, which aims to include diverse perspectives. Important Information:
Participation is voluntary, and you can stop at any time. Since the survey is anonymous, it will not be possible to withdraw your responses once submitted. To participate in the survey, please click the following link: https://uarizona.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_7VYRXm26OR7kHFc?Q_CHL=qr
If you have any questions about the study, please feel free to email me at tadamji2@arizona.edu
TL;DR: Participate in a 7-minute research survey about your floatation experiences. Your insights will help advance scientific understanding of sensory deprivation tanks.
Thank you for your time and contribution to this important research!

Crossposted in waterwelldrilling
I hired a well company to install a new well. His communication and planning were not good. He subcontracted the drilling to another well company without telling me (huge surprise when company X showed up top drill when I hired company Y), showed up to finish the install and realized he had forgotten to hire an excavator crew so there was another delay. Also, there were issues on site the day he ran the water lines.
Well was finally installed, check written to the guy and county health guy came by today to inspect the well and take samples to test and sign off.
Nobody plugged the old well. I didn't know it was required. County won't sign off until that's done and when I called the well guy, he tells me his subcontracted company has to do that and hangs up. The subcontractor's receptionist had no idea about it and the owner hasn't returned my calls. And here's no mention of plugging the old well in the quote or receipt.
I appreciate that contractors shouldn't have to do extra work outside the quote for free, but I hired a licensed well driller, and I don't think it's unreasonable to presume that a quote would include all work required to install a well that meets county and state health requirements. This isn't like he had to drill deeper than expected. It's work that he had to have known was required. And I can't help but feel like he's trying to push this off as company Xs problem when it probably isn't.
If it comes to it, am I out of line for demanding the well plugging be included in the original quoted price?