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For serious gossips with a great sense of humor. No bores, no bullies. Come for the gossip, stay for the analysis & community.
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2011.11.29 02:35 CobaltSmith Random Acts Of Gaming

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2009.02.24 13:37 4rugga United States Army on Reddit

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2024.05.21 19:52 Normodox YAF Announces Legal Action Against UCLA for First Amendment Violations

Young America’s Foundation is taking legal action against the University of California, Los Angeles, following the institution’s blatant violation of students’ First Amendment rights. Last week, UCLA forced the last-minute cancellation of a planned event featuring Robert Spencer, founder of Jihad Watch.
The pro-Israel event, which was organized by the school’s Young Americans for Freedom chapter, would have provided a voice of reason amidst the chaos of the pro-Hamas encampments and protests–but apparently, reason and common sense are not allowed at UCLA.
Despite previously granting the event approval, UCLA abruptly reversed its decision on the day of the event, blocking YAF staff out of the reserved venue and citing arbitrary security concerns. This action followed weeks of inconsistent and obstructive behavior by the university, which included initially refusing the event, offering insufficient time to promote it, and ultimately shutting it down on the day-of.
James Kerwin, senior attorney at Mountain States Legal Foundation, remarked in a letter to the administration, “UCLA’s actions represent a gross violation of the First Amendment. The university’s conduct handed an unconstitutional ‘heckler’s veto’ to anti-Israel activists and engaged in blatant viewpoint discrimination against pro-Israel messages.”
The letter reminds administrators of their legal obligations to preserve evidence, noting that YAF is working to prepare the lawsuit and intends to file very soon.
YAF’s forthcoming lawsuit aims to hold UCLA and its administrators accountable for their actions, seeking injunctive and declaratory relief, as well as damages.
Kerwin added, “We warned UCLA that it would be held to account if it did not respect YAF’s constitutional rights. We are deeply disappointed that UCLA did not heed this warning. YAF is committed to vindicating its rights and ensuring that such violations do not occur in the future.”
When UCLA’s sister school, UC-Berkeley, used similar tactics to prevent a successful Ben Shapiro lecture in 2017, Berkeley had to pay a $70,000 settlement and rescind its unconstitutional policies.
UCLA administrators were well aware of the Berkeley case, so it’s a bit surprising that they handled this situation so recklessly.
When YAF reminded administrator Pamela Lewis of the Berkeley situation early on in the event planning process, she said, “Yeah, we didn’t appreciate that.”
“We will win our lawsuit against UCLA, just like we won the case UC-Berkeley,” YAF President Governor Scott Walker said during a recent NewsMax interview about the situation. “But the fact of the matter is we shouldn’t have to go to court. Colleges should be places where free expression, where free speech is embraced and revered–and yet it’s most under attack.”
YAF is dedicated to standing up for our students and will continue to fight against any attempts to suppress their constitutional rights. Further updates on this case will be provided as the legal process unfolds.
YAF Announces Legal Action Against UCLA for First Amendment Violations - Young America's Foundation
submitted by Normodox to BeneiYisraelNews [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:51 Complete-Raspberry16 Handling jobs that require high organization as someone with ADHD?

Long story short - I just came off of my first job out of university where I didn't have much mentorship, and I got fired for "poor work," and all of the details around the "poor work" were ADHD related. How are people with ADHD managing to keep jobs that require excellent organizational skills (and not hate them)?
(I tried posting it on ADHD) but they wouldn't let me for some reason.
Longer story:
I got hired and there was a lot of disruptions shortly afterwards due to my mothers' health (I worked remotely for a bit to help her out). Then, I worked half days for a month while starting new medications that help to regulate mood. After that, I came back to work full time, and that's where things started to get really bad.
My boss (and coworker) would look at me like I was the stupidest person because I didn't remember details from a meeting that happened over a month ago. I seldom got feedback, despite asking for it. I admittedly did miss some details at times, but hardly anything that completely ruined a project. Time management was tough, because I was given a list of things to do, without any context, and quite frankly ambiguous deadlines (there were deadlines, but there were so arbitrary). Then, when I inevitably didn't hit the deadlines, nothing happened. No reprimands, nothing. Until about 4 months later when I was told that by not hitting a deadline the project was unable to move forward. Another point of contention was when I asked for flexible start times (i.e. come in anytime between 8:00-8:30 rather than a firm 8:15 start time) I was told no, the job starts at 8:15 firm (that should have been my first red flag that I'd struggle here). My boss tried to help me a bit with time management by telling me to "time block" my day and stick to the time blocks, but that hardly works for me. Firm times might as well be a death sentence as far as work goes. I do much better by task rather than by time. And projects that took longer than 2-3 weeks were very difficult for me to keep on top of, especially when there was no perceived consequences for not finishing completely (no one told me the effects not finishing it might have). Other things that were an issue were that I was (allegedly) given verbal feedback that I didn't remember, or I lost the notes, etc. (but I did develop systems to keep track of that feedback for the most part, it just took me 7 or so months because I didn't have any guidance). I was also completely unable to balance competing priorities (that once I did not find a suitable solution to, and is a weak spot for me). I even got in trouble because I didn't get a task right after one round of minimal feedback, for a task that I had never done before (and I told my boss that too!).
Anyways, I basically got let go because of poor organization, time management, and attention to detail (all of which had substantial improvements since I started the job, since I was adapting and learning how to keep things organized).
Now I'm honestly scared to even apply for jobs because my first job was such a terrible experience for me (I learned a lot, but also had some of the worst anxiety of my life). My field is in public policy, which seems to lend itsself to a lot of jobs that seem like such a bad fit for someone with ADHD due to ambiguous timelines, the need for high project management skills, high need for organization skills, etc. I feel so deflated from my last job experience where my boss was too busy with her own work (and career advancement) to mentor a new employee.
I'm not particularly tied to this field of work, but I just finished a masters' degree (which was also a terrible experience for me) and I'm not particularly interested in going back to school (it also isn't super financially responsible at the moment).
TL;DR So, my question is, how are people with ADHD managing to keep a job, especially one that requires excellent organizational skills?
submitted by Complete-Raspberry16 to careerguidance [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:50 watch_more_tv40 Mild aspergers?

Hi all,apolgies if i get terminology or my apporitate words wrong. Is there such thing as having mild aspergers?. I am man who was offically diagnosed in my late 20s i am now in my 40s.. I went to an ordinary school,i did suffer from anxiety and depression as a teen . I used to line up my toys when i was kid. I used have bad eye contact. I never had any sensory issues,so i could go to a bar or a concert and not be bothered by sights and sounds. I am terrible at math but have good long term memory apparently.
Now i can make good eye contact which i could not do before and socialize well, i go to concerts and can talk to a random stranger, I love the art of conversation,and are out going, I dont have much routines, i do or did had some niche interests like retro gaming, collecting bottles. My current interest at the moment is true crime. My mental health is quiet good too. Sometimes i wonder if was revaluated would i be diagnosed. Thanks for reading.
submitted by watch_more_tv40 to AutismIreland [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:46 cdubzip MEPS told me I was disqualified from certain jobs due to background

So for context, from 1st-7th grade I was attending school in a district that is known to be in a bad area. The school adopted some extreme measures to deter fighting and other issues one of which was “if you are involved in a fight in any way, you get arrested and get a ticket.” Which is what happened to me on 2 occasions. Both occasions, I was bullied severely and got involved in altercations when standing up for myself (did not start the fight and only fought back when I had no other option, yes I tried to leave and walk away both times but was blocked off), both cases in court I paid no fines and was let off while the others involved were punished legally. Fast forward to MEPS, I was told juvenile records came up on a background check so I assumed they knew about it and I said I don’t have the court docs because they were basically thrown out by the court and it was 12-13 years ago and again, I was a child. They sent me home to get the court docs and I did, much to my recruiter’s annoyance. When choosing a job, basically all of my top jobs I was told I was disqualified for. Are they really that picky? Could it have been my biological father’s background too that came up? I’ve asked family and friends and recruiters and they all said that shouldn’t be why I was disqualified given the circumstances and that the school district screwed me with their no tolerance policy. (Note: MEPS did not tell me why specifically I got disqualified from those jobs, just that it was a background issue.)
There was a note for single drug use (marijuana) which my waiver was approved. I did not tell my recruiter, because it was 8 years ago one time with biological dad that is no longer part of my life he’s basically a ghost. My mother went with me and when I said no drug use (because there was nothing on record and no way it’d come up) my mom said “uh yes you did with you dad” and then I had to fill out the waiver. (Note: my mom did not have bad intention outing me like that, she’s just very honest and she thought if I lied about a single time drug use or anything else it would disqualify me and didn’t think it’d hold me back)
submitted by cdubzip to newtothenavy [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:44 LiseEclaire [Leveling up the World] - Nobility Arc - Chapter 941

Out there - Patreon (for all those curious or wanting to support :))
At the Beginning
Adventure Arc - Arc 2
Wilderness Arc - Arc 3
Academy Arc - Arc 4
Nobility Arc - Arc 5
Previously on Leveling up the World...
The ground kept disintegrating in a five-mile radius. The number of point and line attacks targeting Dallion was so great that even the domain itself had trouble keeping up to protect him. Spikes would injure dozens, occasionally killing one or two in the process, but that would do little to hinder the mass of steel.
The noble with the steel tendrils slashed through the air, sending hundreds of line attacks in one blow. While each was individually weaker than those of a normal person, together they were a serious threat. It didn’t help that they indiscriminately sliced through soldiers on their way. The countess had no value of human life, least of those belonging to her.
Splitting into instances, Dallion combined a vertical line strike with a multi attack.

ATTACK NEGATED
VALORR’s attack has been sliced in two.
Attack has no effect.

Dozens of red rectangles blinked in and out of existence, though even they proved unable to stop everything. The solution was for Dallion to fly higher into the sky, even though that would make him a prime target. At the same time, it also gave him the possibility to perform an area attack of his own.
Taking a deep breath, he did a spiral attack aimed at the archduchess, followed immediately by a magic music attack. It would have been better if he still had rays of destruction remaining, but most of the clay cylinders had already been used up, and Dallion didn’t want to risk venturing into his realm to make more.
As expected, hundreds of soldiers leapt in front of their nobles, performing an array of defensive line attacks. None proved strong enough to stop the spiral attack, but managed to slow it down so that the only thing that reached Priscord were drops of blood.
“I’ve over ten thousand, in case you’re counting,” she said in an amused voice. “And that’s without counting the reserves. But should you somehow manage to deal with them, the emperor has entrusted me with several legions as well.”
The boast made Dallion think. There seemed to be more beneath the spite. While ten thousand awakened was a massive army, it wasn’t the largest, and it definitely wasn’t worth bragging about. With the exception of the archbishop, all conquerors had armies in the millions. Not only that, but while she claimed that the emperor had entrusted her with his legions, there didn’t seem to be any cloud forts in the air.
“Then how about I take them at once?” Dallion whispered.
A wide patch of ground beneath the archduchess and her armies suddenly fell through, creating a deep pit. The armies in full plated armor scattered, in an attempt to escape, yet less than a thousand seemed to do so. The empress, in contrast, didn’t budge. The horse she had mounted remained floating in the air, as if nothing had changed. Not only that, but magic threads had also extended, keeping the two harpsisword nobles in the air as well.
Harp, what’s that? Dallion asked.
It’s not a creature I’ve seen, the nymph replied.
Having Vihrogon here would have been better, although Dallion strongly suspected that the creature had been created, or rather modified, like the crimson furies.
Taking no chances, Dallion quickly closed up the enormous pit. Before he could manage, however, thousands of soldiers flew up, filling the air. A few hundred were squished by the earth, slamming together, though not nearly as many as Dallion had hoped.
“Living armor,” he said. How come he hadn’t noticed that before? Whatever magic there was in the armors, it had to be hidden deep inside. “They’re a bit smaller than I remember them.”
“The original creators had a lot to compensate for,” Priscord replied. “I don’t.”
A new series of attacks filled the air.
In the blink of the eye, the entire space was filled with instances. Even if the common soldiers weren’t able to split into more than twenty, that made close to a quarter million facing three hundred.
A moment of shock went through Dallion, quickly replaced by a new sensation—the thrill of battle and the desire to defeat everything thrown at him.
The archduchess had covered all the angles: echoes to grant her minions strategy, artifacts to give them flight. It was also noticeable that despite their low levels, their speed was quite close to a hundred—another magic artifact or spell that had been cast. Even so, there was one thing that the woman had forgotten: a thousand people with a thousand separate skills couldn’t compare to one who could manage a combination of all, especially within his domain.
“Countess,” Dallion shouted, deliberately aiming to irk her. Red rectangles flashed non-stop as line attacks canceled each other constantly. “You’ve never been to the Academy, have you?”
“No.” The archduchess retained her cool. “I never considered it worth anything much, even when I gained my current title.”
“Let me tell you one thing…”
Of all the remaining buildings, books and scrolls flew out of the shelves. Like swarms of insects, they amassed, flying from all directions straight towards Dallion. It would be several minutes until all of them arrived on the scene, but that wasn’t of consequence, especially for what Dallion had in mind.

DOMAIN AWAKENING

Reality shifted. It didn’t shift just for Dallion. In less than a second, everyone in the real world was transported into the realm of his new domain. In many regards, things were no different than they had been before. Here, just as in the real world, Dallion maintained control over the realm. There were also a number of differences as well. For starters, Dallion’s feet existed here, as did a host of area guardians.
“Goldy, get her,” Dallion ordered.
The golden colossus emerged from the ground, dashing straight for the countess. In contrast to everyone else, its strength and speed were considerably faster, not to mention it was immune to spells.
Not in the least taken aback, Priscord snapped her fingers. All the armors of her soldiers—nobles included—burst, increasing tenfold. Apparently, the living armors were also blooming items as well. Being taken into the awakened realms had boosted their size and abilities to a considerable degree. How considerable, would soon be seen.
“You disappoint me.” Archduchess Priscord yawned. “Did you think that I wouldn’t have a counter for this? You think you’ll impress me by being a domain ruler? I’ve fought in such battles decades before you showed up.”
“That’s not the reason I brought you here.” Dallion attempted to complete a guard sequence, but the attackers didn’t let him, always disrupting it halfway through. “As I was saying, the Academy is probably the one place in the world that has the largest number of physical books.”
At that single moment, a spark of concern emanated from Priscord. She had grasped what Dallion was going for, and by all accounts it was too late to do anything about it.
Scholar skills combined with music, spell craft, and attack, releasing thousands of aether quills from the hundreds of thousands books and scrolls that existed in the realm. Like deadly hail they ascended on Priscord’s army on all sides. The outermost layers of the army tried to block the quills’ advance only to be drilled full of holes, like bullets drilling through a rotten scarecrow. And best of all, Dallion didn’t have to worry about the colossus guardian, since they didn’t affect him in the least.

TERMINAL HIT
Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

TERMINAL HIT
Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

TERMINAL HIT
Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

Red rectangles filled the air like a sea of red. There were so many of them that they covered the entire sky, making it seem like a crimson sunset.
The sudden change in circumstances had forced a large part of the army to shift. Even with their boost, they still had to deal with the colossus, while also protecting Priscord from the aether quills. The momentary chaos created a single opening.
The harpsisword seemed to move on its own, slicing through two soldiers that blocked his way. The spark covered edge went through the massive armor as if it were butter, causing it to blast from the inside.

TERMINAL HIT
Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

TERMINAL HIT
Dealt damage is increased by 1000%

Two red rectangles emerged, after which the soldiers vanished as they were thrust back into the real world, their awakening powers sealed. That wouldn’t get rid of the echoes inside then, but at least made Priscord vulnerable here.
Thrusting his aura sword forward, Dallion cast a series of magic circles. Aether shards began shooting out, while chains targeted the nobles protecting the archduchess. To further cut off her support, Dallion pulled up the ground surrounding her, creating high cliffs. Unlike the other terrain changes in the realm, no one would dare attack these with line attacks out of fear of harming her. At this point, only one unknown remained—the horse.
Three of the nobles flew at Dallion, attacking him with their special weapons. Their armors, too, had blossomed into more elegant versions of living armor.
Bursting into instances, Dallion evaded the tendril sword’s attacks. At the same time, Gem flew in to meet the ax of another attacker head on. A loud cling resonated, pushing the aetherfish back, though by no means diminishing its determination. Meanwhile, Lux transformed the weapon he was inhabiting from a pair of bows to a crossbow, firing bolts of light at the third noble like a machine gun.
“Good work, guys,” Dallion whispered as he flew past, continuing towards his target.
I could take care of them easily, Gleam said, itching for blood.
I need you to keep an eye on Aqui, Dallion insisted.
She’s a great dragon! Even if she’s a cow, killing her won’t be easy.
Keep an eye on Aqui, Dallion said in a firm tone that quickly ended all protests.
A short distance away, the two nobles had combined their music skills, creating a shield around Priscord. Their skills were impressive, though nowhere near anything he’d seen in the former House Elazni. It was a novel use of their powers, though. Dallion made a note to experiment using in the future.
“Move away!” He shouted, using his own music skills, combining it with magic. His own music strands tore through the defensive mesh, striking both of the nobles.

PERMANENT EFFECT - PARALYSIS
IHIJON has been rendered incapable of movement for 20 minutes.
The status continues to be in effect in the real world.

PERMANENT EFFECT - PARALYSIS
AVIRA has been rendered incapable of movement for 20 minutes.
The status continues to be in effect in the real world.

That’s two down, Dallion thought, tightening his grip round the hilt of the harpsisword. Only one left.
Splitting into fifty instances, he unleashed a spiral attack right at the archduchess. His expectation was that the horse would transform into something and block the attack. No such thing happened.
Priscord herself leaped off the creature’s back. A one foot dagger appeared in her hand with which she slashed the air, performing a line attack.

ATTACK NEGATED
Your attack has been sliced in two.
Attack has no effect.

Huh? Dallion instantly performed a series of line attacks.
This was the first time he’d seen a spiral attack be stopped and in such an effortless way. There was no way this could be due to Priscord’s strength. Even if he wasn’t able to see her white rectangle, the woman’s traits were well beneath the hundred. If nothing else, she wasn’t an otherworlder and thus subject to limitations. It had to be some artifact she was wearing.
“Admiring my weapon?” the woman asked, as she kept on negating Dallion’s attacks. “It’s a nice trinket given to me by the emperor. One of several.”
“So, it’s your trinkets versus my trinkets?” Dallion asked, taking the opportunity for a music attack. To his surprise, the harpsiswords held by the paralyzed nobles played on their own, negating it as well.
“Yes.” The dagger glowed purple. “That’s precisely it.”
submitted by LiseEclaire to redditserials [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:44 Calledinthe90s 14: Revenge on my Grade Nine English Teacher

This was originally posted to pettyrevenge, but for some reason got taken down. So here goes:
The revenge I took on my grade nine English teacher was so petty that I hesitate to write about it. But Mrs. Bristle (for that is the name I will give her) was cruel to me every chance she got, and she made my first year in high school a misery. So when a file with her name on it arrived at my office, my first thought was not that I would beat her (for I was certain that I would) but rather, of the revenge I would take along the way.
I was pushing forty when Mrs. Bristle’s file hit my desk, some estate litigation where a mother’s last will and testament left my clients next to nothing, and gave their sister, Mrs. Bristle, pretty well the entire estate. When I saw the defendant’s name it looked familiar, and after a bit of Googling, I confirmed what I suspected: the defendant, Mrs. Bristle, was my former grade nine English teacher.
I remembered Mrs. Bristle very well. She was supposed to be teaching us the wonders of English literature, but what she really taught us were her rules, by which she meant her arbitrary whims, expressed in vague language, backed up by petty punishments for non-compliance. There was an art to getting along with Mrs. Bristle, and while most of the other kids learned it easily enough, somehow I did not. I have trouble learning unwritten rules, and in Mrs. Bristle’s class where unwritten and constantly changing rules were the order of the day, I didn’t stand a chance. Mrs. Bristle admonished me almost daily for ‘not paying attention’. I did detentions, re-wrote assignments, and made visits to the principal’s office, all because I apparently wasn’t listening, wasn’t doing what I was told.
Many was the time when Mrs. Bristle took me to task for missing some obvious but unstated part of an assignment. One time I handed in a sonnet, and received an “F” because the rhyming pattern was Petrarchan, not Shakespearean. But she would be nice to me, Mrs. Bristle would always say when she tossed my work back at me. She would give me another chance to hand the assignment in with the arbitrary changes she required, in the end giving me a good mark, but then heavily downgraded for being late.
Mrs. Bristle's case worked its way through the early stages, and every time I exchanged an email with her (for she was a self-rep, no need for counsel, she claimed) I thought about the unpleasant time I’d spent in her class. I had a rough time in high school, and I always resent anything that makes me dwell on it.
After a few months, the case was ready for the next stage. It was time to examine Mrs. Bristle, to find out why she thought her mother wanted to disinherit most of the family and enrich Mrs. Bristle alone. I showed up at the court reporter’s office early as usual, to get set up.
“What’s that shit eating grin on your face?” Adam asked. He was a lawyer colleague, about my vintage, and we were sitting in the lounge for lawyers only, the room that most court reporter’s offices have, a place for the lawyers to hang out and shoot the shit, no clients allowed.
“I’m going to examine my grade nine English teacher today,” I said, “and it's going to be fun.” I explained how she’d hated me back in the day, and had done her best to make my life hell.
“What’s the case about?” Adam said. Adam had been around the block, same as me, and it took only a few words for me to summarize everything that mattered in the file. “Estate fight, one sibling against four, undue influence, holograph will cutting out most of the siblings, competing with an older will, a formal one, where the shares are equal.”
Adam nodded appreciatively. “Nice fees, if the estate’s got the cash.”
“It does,” I said. We chatted for a bit, and then sat there in silence as we each did the last bit of prep for the cases we had that day, making notes, reading documents and drinking coffee. My alarm dinged just before ten, and I made my way to the examination room, and Mrs. Bristle, the teacher who’d greatly disliked the grade nine version of Calledinthe90s. I was curious to see if she would like the older version any better.
* * *
The examination started, and Mrs. Bristle and I sparred for a while, me tossing vague questions her way, and criticizing her when she did not understand. I kept her on the defensive for close to three hours, until it was getting on to one p.m.
“Aren’t you in a conflict or something?” she said to me just before the lunch break, when she’d finally made the connection, and understood that the lawyer asking her questions was a former student.
“No conflict,” I said, dismissing her concerns with a wave of my hand. “During the lunch break, there’s something I need you to do.”
“I don’t want to answer questions during lunch. I need a break.” The examination had been rough on Mrs. Bristle. She was not used to being asked questions, to being held to account, to being constantly challenged, and even having her grammar corrected now and again.
“You’ll get your lunch break. But while you’re eating a sandwich or whatever, keep this copy of the holograph will next to you.” The will on which Mrs. Bristle’s case relied was a holograph will, meaning that Mrs. Bristle’s mother had written the will entirely in hand from start to finish. The mother, or more likely, Mrs. Bristle herself, had downloaded a holograph will form from the web, and had completed it in accordance with the website’s instructions. Holograph wills are special. You can do a holograph will without a witness, without a lawyer, without anything at all, so long as you did it right. But if you got anything wrong, if you messed up in any way, it was invalid.
“You want me to read the will again over lunch?” Mrs. Bristle said.
“No. Instead, I want you to make a handwritten copy of it.”
“You want me to write it out? Whatever for?”
“There’s an allegation that the will wasn’t written by your mother, and that you wrote it up instead.” An allegation that I’d made up myself, that morning, while I was sitting in the lawyer's lounge, drinking coffee and munching on a muffin. My clients had not challenged the will’s handwriting; it was obviously their mother’s, totally different from Mrs. Bristle’s own writing. But I had decided otherwise.
Mrs. Bristle was appropriately outraged at being unjustly accused of forgery. Said she could prove it wasn’t her handwriting, could absolutely prove it.
“Then let’s settle the forgery issue once and for all,” I said, “write out the will in your own hand, so that our document experts can examine it, compare it with the original, and make a determination.”
“I don’t need the entire lunch break for that,” Mrs. Bristle said, “and I’d rather eat lunch at the restaurant downstairs.” The will was barely a page long, at most three hundred words, that being all it took for the mother to allegedly disinherit most of her children, and inexplicably leave everything to Mrs. Bristle. The mother had written up the will herself, but she’d been ninety at the time, while living in Mrs. Bristle’s house, and very much under her influence.
“I’ve retained five different experts,” I said, “and each of them will need copies.”
Five experts? Why so many experts?”
“Each expert needs ten samples, for comparison purposes. It’s going to take you a while, Mrs. Bristle. I suggest you get started.” I overrode her protests and once she started to write, I left her in the room, and went to the lawyer’s lounge to eat their small sandwiches and drink more of the excellent coffee. After a while I stopped by the examination room to look in on Mrs. Bristle. I wanted to check in on her progress.
Mrs. Bristle asked for more time, complained of writer’s cramp, and asked me again if it was really necessary for her to write out the holograph will fifty times in her own hand, and I assured her that there was nothing for it, that it was absolutely necessary. I returned to the lounge to check my emails, leaving her hard at the homework I’d given her.
After a while my colleague, Adam, popped into the lounge. He asked me how it was going, the examination with the teacher, the teacher who had treated me so badly.
“I’m making her write lines.” Adam laughed, and laughed harder when I explained that I wasn’t kidding, that I really was making Mrs. Bristle write lines, and how I was doing it. His laughter attracted attention, and a few other lawyers asked what was up. “He’s making his teacher witness write lines,” Adam said, and the lawyer’s lounge hooted with laughter when I told everyone what was up.
It was one of the pettiest things I’ve ever done to anyone, making my grade nine teacher write lines. But the writing lines thing was just a warmup. The real revenge had yet to come. I returned to the examination room after a while, to check up on Mrs. Bristle, see how she was doing.
“This is taking forever,” she said, “and I really don’t get why you need it.” She had writer’s cramp, and was shaking her hand to get the kinks out. I picked up the stack of holograph wills she’d created, and flipped through it. She was nowhere near finished.
“On second thought,” I said, “maybe it isn’t necessary. I think you’re right. I don’t need any handwriting samples from you.”
“Why not?” she said.
“The will is invalid,” I explained, adding that because her mother had used a pre-printed form off the web, the law would not recognize the will. “A holograph will has to be entirely in the testator's handwriting,” I explained, “every single word entirely in handwriting from start to finish. This will doesn’t qualify, because your mother used a standard form, a form printed off the web, with instructions and boxes and questions and so on, and when you do that, then the will is no longer a holograph will. It’s a regular will, and regular wills need to be properly witnessed. This one isn’t witnessed, and that means it’s not a will. It’s just a piece of paper.”
“Are you trying to tell me that you only figured that out now? What kind of lawyer are you, anyways?”
“What kind of lawyer am I? I’m a lawyer who makes a witness skip lunch, and sit in a small room all alone, and write lines. Sound familiar, Mrs. Bristle?” She said nothing, and just stared at me. I closed the door on her, leaving her alone once more, and left for the Middle Temple Tavern where the lawyers all hung out. It was time to hoist a Guinness and enjoy my petty triumph.
submitted by Calledinthe90s to Calledinthe90s [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:44 Naughty_Burrito Race Report: 2024 Colfax Marathon - You never forget your first

Race Information

Goals

Goal Description Completed?
A Sub 2:30 No
B Sub 2:35 No
C Finish! Yes

Splits

Mile Time
1 5:37
2 5:36
3 5:37
4 5:41
5 5:45
6 5:45
7 5:52
8 5:45
9 5:35
10 5:39
11 5:38
12 5:42
13 5:38
14 5:35
15 5:44
16 5:34
17 5:26
18 5:26
19 5:23
20 5:26
21 5:42
22 5:41
23 6:17
24 11:11
25 7:30
26 6:28

Background

After years of racing on the track I transitioned to the pavement and ran my first HM at the end of 2022. In the ~1.5 years since then, I’ve trained almost exclusively for the HM running one in May and December of last year.
Since college, I’ve mostly hovered around 50-60 mpw never really drifting higher than 80. I’ve always been hesitant to run more than that due to a stress fracture I got junior year when I was pushing 90+ weeks. But last summer I raced in the Denver iteration of the Tracksmith 5000 twilight meet and realized the main difference in my training compared to everyone faster than me was their higher mileage. Volume is king.
That has been the goal of my training since then – increasing my mileage and getting comfortable with 100 mile weeks. Before the 5k I was averaging about 55 mpw per 12-week cycle, and since then I’ve averaged 78 mpw per cycle with a few 100 mi weeks sprinkled in.
My original plan for 2024 was to keep running HMs, but my friend convinced me to run my first marathon this year. He was entered into Chicago, so I applied and got in via the lottery. I wanted to run an HM this spring, but everyone I talked to said I should get a marathon under my belt, so I could have things really dialed in for Chicago. Enter Denver's Colfax Marathon.

Training

I have had good success following the Pfitz HM plans so I stuck with him and roughly followed his 12/85+ plan. For the most part I felt ok with this plan, but I feel like there wasn't enough quality work. For example, one week is 105 total miles with the only real workout being 7 mi @ LT. Maybe that's just the formula some weeks for marathon training but it felt like too much easy running. I ended up tweaking some weeks and swapping an easy day for an additional threshold workout.
I had a few rough weeks where I had trouble holding MP for even a mile or two. Before you ask, no - I don't think it was from these additional workouts I sprinkled in, but poor nutrition and not eating enough. Once I upped the carb and protein intake for a few weeks my energy levels started to come back.
The last few weeks of training things finally started to click and wrapped up the block with a 10k PR, 32:20 (31:35ish? altitude conversion). Previous PR was a 32:59 split during a HM. I don’t put too much stock into conversions, but it was a big confidence boost and sign I was trending in the right direction. I followed that up a week later with my best workout of the block, a 23-miler with 13.1 mi @ 5:38 avg.
Unfortunately, I caught a stomach bug during the taper and spent 4-days unable to keep any food down. I barely ran, but focused on recovery with a few runs to keep the legs from feeling too stale.

Pre-race

Nothing earth shattering here. 6AM race. Woke up at 3 for two pop tarts and half a bagel and went back to sleep for a bit. Ate half of a Clif bar at 5 AM before a short 1.5 mi warmup and drills at 5:30. It was going to be 60-65 degrees for most of the race so I made an effort to get a lot of fluids down.

Race

The course is conveniently broken down into 5 sections so I'll break down the race by those.
Section 1: 0 - 6.5 mi
The course starts with a long gradual downhill through downtown. The marathon relay starts at the same time so we went out a little hot. I wanted to start the first half of the race running 5:50s, but the front relay runners went out at 5:00 pace and I got pulled into 5:35’s. I scanned the pack for people without batons and found 2 other non-relay runners nearby. They were shooting for ~2:40 so we were all able to slow things down as a pack and settled into 5:45s. Took my first gel at mile 5 going into Mile High.
Section 2: 6.5 - 9.2 mi
Big uphill out of the stadium before lapping Sloan’s Lake. We started to catch back up to some relay teams at this point and it gets nice and flat around the lake. Our little pack picked up the pace and we clicked off a few 5:35s. Second gel a little earlier than I wanted at mile 9, but I wanted to take advantage of the water station shortly after.
Section 3: 9.2 -15.2 mi
My least favorite part of the course. It’s mostly a gradual uphill into a hilly little neighborhood with a lot of turns sprinkled in. Our pack was all alone at this point, in no man's land between the faster relay teams and everyone else. We went through the halfway mark a tad under 1:15 and one of the lead guys (who I later found out was 2:11 marathoner Fernando Cabada) started wondering if we could hit the Colorado state masters marathon record of 2:28. I wanted to slow things down during this hilly section, but hmm maybe? We kept pushing. 3rd gel at mile 15.
Section 4: 15.2 – 19.2 mi
At this point, the 3rd guy dropped so it was just me and Fernando. This section of the course is long, straight, and back down the gradual uphill we made our way up earlier. Again, he asked, “2:28”? Sure, might as well try. I knew we still had a long way left, but I was feeling good and feeling greedy. We took advantage of the downhill and clicked off a few miles at 5:25. Fourth and final gel going back into the stadium at mile 19.
Section 5: 19.2 – 26.2 mi
I knew this section would be tough. It’s a few miles of flat, before a few miles of gradual uphill through downtown and back into the park. There’s a tight hairpin turn from the bike path up into the streets of downtown and it was here that I felt a quick little spasm in my hamstring. I slowed things down a little hoping to stave off anything more, but both hamstrings and quads completely cramped up right before mile 23. I couldn’t take a step without my legs cramping up again so I stood there for a few minutes debating the DNF. Even my toes started cramping!
After a few painful minutes, I was finally able to move my legs so I decided I would at least walk it in and get a finishing time even if I had to crawl across the line. The last 3 miles were at a slow jog to prevent more cramping, but I ran into a few friends spectating so spirits remained somewhat high through the finish.

Post-race

I’m proud of myself for finishing the race even if it wasn’t the outcome I wanted. I can officially call myself a marathoner. I went for it. I failed, but that's running. My legs had been feeling tight since being sick so maybe that played a part, but I definitely should have increased fluid intake throughout the race. A lot of woulda coulda shouldas, but it was a huge learning experience which was the main point of signing up for this race in the first place.
I'm feeling extra motivated and ready to rip at Chicago. Hope to see some of y’all there!
Made with a new race report generator created by u/herumph.
submitted by Naughty_Burrito to AdvancedRunning [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:43 bodynasr Naafiri hasn't even reached one year on the rift and she already became the least picked champion in the game

Naafiri hasn't even reached one year on the rift and she already became the least picked champion in the game
Ziggs mid is less popular but if you combine both Ziggs bot and Ziggs mid, their pickrate is higher than Naafiri
Naafiri is a good case on what Riot should avoid in champion design
1- The end goal was terrible
“A while back, our champion design lead, August Browning, did an analysis of our whole roster and categorized each champ by role, class, and difficulty in order to find some opportunity areas for players,” game designer Glenn “Riot Twin Enso” Anderson reveals. “He ended up finding two major holes: a higher skill tank, which ended up being K’Sante, and a relatively simple and beginner-friendly assassin, which became Naafiri.”” - Naafiri champ insights June 2023
These were a bit of flawed goals, Tank like K'Sante having so much agency forces him to be permanently bound to being highest presence in pro play despite multiple adjustments, nerfs and reworks so he has to remain as 45% WR while an assassin with literally no skill ceiling gets dropped by mid lane players almost immediately and thus have an abysmal pickrate
2-"Monster champions have low pickrate" was used as an excuse to not follow up on Naafiri's post release
Naafiri was in fact just a check box, community kept asking for a monster champions and Riot wanted to fill the gap in their roster so they just checked both boxes, released the filler champ and moved on to the next project.
They didn't stop to think that maybe the brand new easy/intro champion should at the very minimum have same pickrate as other niche assasins as players should find immediate success when they pick her up
Sure, there is truth to it, if Naafiri had a model that looked like the other darkin champions but female, she would have had higher pickrate but there are also tons of monster champions who are faring well in terms of popularity with much older kits and worse looking models.
3-Naafiri should have been allowed to jungle
I can understand why not let her jungle at the first month or two as to push her identity as a mid laner or solo laner but once the dust settled down and mid laners voted with their pickrate that they don't want to play this absolutely boring kit, Riot should have immediately given some jungle ratios and see how she would fare in the jungle
Riot literally buffed Sylas, Olaf, Zyra, Brand, Sett and others to push them to jungle and attract more pickrate for these champions, but the least popular champion in the game isn't looked at?
I don't see any reason why Naafiri shouldn't have been allowed to jungle, Junglers are more receptacle to monster champions. If Naafiri would be problematic and get +30% banrate then sure remove her jungle modifiers but at the very least give it a shot and see if her dwindling playerbase would recover from its death spiral
4- Her kit has an identity issue as she plays like a skirmisher rather than an assassin
-her engage ability [W] is a point and clash dash that has long channel time and can be blocked by other enemies standing in its path so her back line access is pretty shit specially the higher in MMR you go and enemy team has that knowledge. Diana E for example has the same range of Naafiri until Naafiri hits lvl 11 but she has no cast time and other champions can't block it
the cast time of W gives too much counterplay, any champion with an ounce of hard CC can easily interrupt Naafiri mid dash [Hwei EQ, Syndra E, Lux Q, etc] compare that to the instanteous Diana dash's case where the enemy mid laner has to predict that Diana will dash and throw his CC early to stop Diana mid dash
-she has no escape tools but to compensate she gets shields from her R + on her take downs as well
-The bleed in her kit synergizes with Black Cleaver [Bruiser item]
-So is she a good skirmisher? not really, she lacks any form of CC whether slows or hard CC, that greatly diminishes her skirmishing
5- The kit has nothing to master and the narrative is disconnected from the gameplay
shes literally a nothing burger, she has no skill expression and she gets boring after the third game as her gameplay loop gets very repetitive and boring.
her E is the only redeeming ability in her kit as she dishes out damage at start of the dash and then at the end of the dash, she deals even more damage in an explosion but the fun thing about the abilitiy is that it immediately recalls your dogs and heals them up
her R is you get more dogs and bonus AD + shield, the cool part is that the dogs get a small boost in HP so they could survive getting one shot, I like that part
the champion theme is the pack and half her voice lines are all about unity and how the pack makes her strong and that a lone dog is weak, etc. etc.
where is that pack in her gameplay???
why don't her abilities get some twists depending on how many dogs she has? doesn't have to be more or less numbers in her damage but literally anything so maybe when I play Naafiri,
Naafiri has the tools in her kit to protect and heal her pack and but she is punished for protecting her pups as she blows her mana, cooldowns, damage and her cooldown for literally no gain
to reiterate, I don't say Naafiri should have been a high skill floor champion but there are lots of champions that have low skill floor and are newbie friendly but also moderate to high skill ceiling to encourage players to main them and not get bored after a few games.
Closing notes:
its a shame how Naafiri turned out, her in game model is cool and very different from your average league champion, the dogs AI is smart and I love that they can help you CS and they move smoothly around you, her R animation and sound really sells the whole unleash the pack vibe, the animators, riggers, vfx artists all did a wonderful job.
but the gameplay is horrendous and she is doomed to be the lowest pickrate champ in the game unless she's balanced around having 52% WR and her pickrate will still be bottom 20 as you can't bribe players with winrate to play this boring ass champion
No other newly released champion in League's history had their pickrate plummet this quickly and sharply after their release
to understand how bad Naafiri pickrate is, it took Rell ~2 years after her release to get the midscope rework and Rell's pickrate pre midscope was higher than current Naafiri.
submitted by bodynasr to leagueoflegends [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:42 lightorangeish What am I doing wrong?

What am I doing wrong? When I’m suicidal I reach out to the suicide line or Reddit, I’m in trauma therapy, I keep busy every single day either doing errands school chores job applications or helping out but I’m still so close to suicide. It’s like I know I need to die but I’m delaying it even though it’s blatantly obvious to anyone else that I’m not truly ever going to have stable income, healthy relationships, or do anything; it’s like. ‘wow, I’m overstimulated and overwhelmed by regular responsibilities and chores?’ Nice! Well that’s fucking embarrassing and you should stop pretending that you’re so ‘burnt out’ at 23 and focus on pushing through and getting a fucking job. Every day I try to ignore my physical pain and symptoms to get the job done but somehow im not strong or resilient enough to just ‘push through’. I’m such a bad person and I am a genuine, true and deep burden. When I was 18 I thought 23 would be so awesome, that I’d be healed and happy and able to chase the goals I have set out for myself; but no, I’m still stuck, still a bad person, still crazy and emotionally dysregulated. Who the fuck cares I LITERALLY just need to go through with it as opposed to cry every day and panic everyday like. That’s exhausting and embarrassing. It’s obvious I need to kill myself
submitted by lightorangeish to SuicideWatch [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:35 Check-ur-Corners Did I ruin my chances?

So me and my DA ex girlfriend broke up 2 months ago. We had one FaceTime call a couple days later as I had questions, then a couple days after that I asked her to meet up for a coffee to which she enthusiastically agreed. But she then flaked and cancelled a couple days after that and said it was too soon. So I went into no contact for about 6 weeks. I ended up reaching out again to ask if she was ready for that coffee and she said “in the future”. I tried to continue the conversation and reconnect but only had a couple of replies with days in between. I ended up calling her just for a normal chat, but she swayed the conversation towards “us” and asked if we can have “this conversation” another time. So since she swayed it that was I was honest and said I think we can work on things and she said in the future. So I asked if it’s something she’d be open to and she said yes in the “distant future”. After that it kept playing on my mind that I was being strung along or kept as a backup plan, I don’t know if that was just my anxiety making assumptions of her intentions. So a couple days after the call I removed her from social media and left her a text explaining why. I stated I didn’t appreciate being given false hope and that was I was removing her and focusing on moving on and focusing on myself, I also said I would keep her number and if she changed her mind later down the line she could reach out to me and told her I don’t accept friendship. She replied with “okay hun”, and then a couple hours later she sent another text saying I completely misunderstood her and that she only meant we’d catch up in the distant future as friends, she then said she made it clear at the breakup that she didn’t want a relationship now or ever again and said “get the message it’s finished”. Personally I don’t think anything was very clear during the breakup and I don’t think I misunderstood what she meant by distant future as I clearly asked if she’d be open to working on things. She then blocked me on everything along with my brother and everyone she knew through me. I can’t help but feel like there was a chance if I’d just been patient and not assumed her intentions and removed her
submitted by Check-ur-Corners to ExNoContact [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:30 AwkwardSky5152 Audition for School of Rock principal - recommendations?

I am going to audition for School of Rock for the principal or one of the teachers, and am having a terrible time figuring out what to sing. A lot of the part is classical singing - but I'm afraid if I pull out an aria or art song it will be totally against the vibe of the show, plus my voice is realistically not high enough for Queen of the Night, so I'm more likely looking at ensemble. I could do some basic Andrew Lloyd Webber, but something like With One Look is not all that similar to the show's music. I could do something more rock (not sure what it would be), in line with the show overall, but that is not actually what a lot of the part requires.
I've been looking for general songs by uptight women, but those parts are the butt of the joke, and don't get a solo. The principal in Grease does not have a big number.
Any suggestions? What am I forgetting?
submitted by AwkwardSky5152 to MusicalTheatre [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:29 CroweGhost AITA? I pretended to be a girl's friend for an entire year and then wrote a hate letter to her

Alright, so… I (18F) kinda made this reddit account just to get some feedback about this situation, since I’m too ashamed to ask my parents. The girl in question is 16, and is probably one of the most annoying people I’ve ever met…
(TLDR: This girl I was pretending to be friends with in High School obsessively fantasized about murdering someone for an entire semester, is overbearing as a person, interrogates people on a daily basis and is nosy, injects herself into drama that isn’t her own, throws temper tantrums when she doesn’t get her way, constantly touches people and makes unwarranted comments about girl’s bodies, asked me to draw CP for her, and MADE FUN OF HER SUICIDAL BROTHER. And I wrote a hate-letter telling her that all of this stuff is a problem, but now I feel bad about it because I think she might actually have mental issues. It’s a really wild ride and a long story, so if you choose to read it, you should expect to be here for a while. And it’s High School drama, so I’ll try to discard the boring details.)
At the beginning of this year, I ended up in a small Sports Medicine class with literally 8 students total in it. That made things quiet, which gave us some room to start talking and getting to know each other after the teacher was done with the lesson and we had our small hands-on tests and assignments out of the way. (The classes took about 20 minutes every day. Really quick and easy. Laid back. It met curriculum requirements actually, because there wasn’t constant bullshit from other students making the lesson longer.). There’s this girl, who… I’ll call her Storm. You’ll find out why. Storm quickly became the most annoying person in the class. Any time she talked, she didn’t have anything interesting to say, but just kept going on and on and on endlessly. It was annoying, but we just kinda played along to be nice. Well… Around a month into school, Storme started opening up and became comfortable talking about personal topics. She told us this story about how one of her other friends (I’ll call her Katie) “betrayed” her the previous year, and then went on to talk about how much she hated Katie and didn’t care if she lived or died. (Honestly, Katie’s offense was miniscule. At most, she replaced Storm with someone else as her best friend. You know… Regular High School drama that wasn’t that deep. I honestly forgot all of what Katie did because it was just so miniscule.) Then Storme started saying ludicrous stuff like “I hope she falls into a volcano”, or “I hope she gets eaten by sharks falling from the sky. Like Sharknado.”. But like… She kept saying it constantly, out loud in class. She ranted about how she wanted Katie to get kidnapped by the Mafia, be flown up to the moon, and be dropped into a black hole to become “Katie-spaghetti”. It was honestly really funny at first, so me and a few other people in the class joined in a little bit and added our own stupid, childlike scenarios. (Katie has a reputation for being… A slut. That’s why it was funny at first.) But then after this schtick got old, Storm just kept going and going and going… She ranted about Katie until it physically hurt to hear her talk anymore. She was back to being annoying and boring again, but it was worse this time because it was obvious that she was trying to re-kindle our intrigue without realizing that she should move on to something else. Instead of assessing herself, she just kept yapping until everyone rolled their eyes every time she opened her mouth, because we knew she would just keep going on and on about all of the stupid ways she wanted Katie to die. Even the damn teacher told her to stop doing that, but she never listened and the teacher eventually just gave up telling her off (And honestly, I think the teacher started zoning her out.). Katie then gradually started to get more morbid with the things she was saying, to the point where I genuinely considered calling the cops and getting this girl some grippy socks. She talked until she became red-faced, started tweaking, and laughed in a neurotic, nervous angry way while she started wringing out her trembling hands. She genuinely looked and sounded unhinged, and what didn’t help was that she started saying stuff like “There aren’t metal detectors in this school, right?”, and “I wish I wasn’t such a good person, because if I wasn’t, I’d be acting on my impulse to cave her skull in the next time I see her. One of these days I’m going to snap and then just do it..” …Yeah, so I was genuinely considering getting the police involved in this because of those two sentences. Thankfully Katie is safe and sound to this day and Storm never acted on these “impulses”. I’m so glad it worked out that I didn’t have to call the cops, but I was seriously worried for a minute… One of my other friends in that class, (I’ll call him Mark), eventually kinda snapped and called her out for being the annoying piece of crap she is. Quickly, Storm and Mark started getting into arguments just about every day and started throwing things like wads of wrapping-tape at each other, and I was becoming worried that they were going to start actually full-on fighting. It doesn’t sound logical in hindsight, but I ended up taking it upon myself to step in and start acting friendly toward her and listening to her (or pretending to listen to her) just to draw her attention away from him. Pretty soon she started talking mostly to me, and this was intentionally done on my part so that the other people in the class could relax a little bit and start doing whatever on their phones and zone her out instead of having to pretend to listen in agony. Ultimately, it was an exchange that benefited everyone, because after Storme got that angry energy out of her, she shut up for the day. She continued to talk about Katie, but mostly to me. She talked about this topic endlessly, her words getting increasingly violent until Christmas break. Yeah… 5 months. She ranted about the ways she wanted Katie to die for 5 whole months. Months. But then when she was done ranting, she finally shut up. …Oh God, the silence sounded like angels singing. I didn’t even really retain any of the information she spewed onto me, but holy crap, when it was over it was like heaven on Earth. So that’s what I did – I acted like the “lightning rod” for this Storm of a person until it passed (kinda). She wrote a note to Katie explaining “You hurt me really badly, but I’m a Christian so I forgive you and I hope you the best”... As if she didn’t rant about her for 5 months straight. Make it make sense. But enough about that. Here’s where my fuck ups began. I gave Storm my number and we quickly started saying that we were friends, though I didn’t actually like her at all and just wanted to keep the peace. We had a few things in common, but I still didn’t like her whatsoever. She continued to rant to me nonstop about Katie, even over text, and I was burnt out listening after a while. So… To dampen the impact of this girl’s obsessive ramblings, I started sending her pictures of my drawings. (I’m an artist). I had characters that I liked to draw that are ocs of an anime fandom (all of which are underage), and she seemed to calm down a bit and hyper-focus on them. She even has a folder in her phone’s gallery completely dedicated to storing my artwork. That’s great and all, but… One day, the topic of Wattpad came up in one of our conversations. I, myself, was one of those cringy Wattpad 12 year olds who made the most illiterate fanfictions ever to be conceived by a human being (They’ve long since been deleted. Thank God, those were awful.) Then… The topic of “Wattpad smut” came up, because I admitted that I used to read those because of the awful grammar and I thought it was funny. I still do sometimes, actually. The way people on Wattpad can’t write to save their lives is just hilarious. Like the stupid “Shrek x Donald Trump” ones are the ones that make me wheeze. I don’t take them seriously, and I love it when the author doesn’t take it seriously either. It’s hilarious. …But then this asshole said: “I don’t like to read bad grammar, it makes me mad. But I do like to read that type of content… For a different reason”. So uhh… That’s… Weird. But then she asked: “Have you found any… Good ones? Do you have any recommendations? Asking for a friend.” …FUCK NO. No thank you. Nope, I’m done. No jerkoff material for you, ma’am. Nope. You’re done. Seriously, I put down my phone for a little bit and went outside to go stare at some birds at the bird feeder until my sickness went away. I fell nauseous because of that (though in hindsight, that seems like an overreaction). When I came back, I didn’t answer that question and kinda skated past it, and that seemed to be the end of it. …But there is NEVER an end with Storm. She DID forget about the resolution to that conversation, but since we talked about smut to begin with, she started asking me some questions about my art. She asked if I had ever drawn p0rn in my life. Of course, I didn’t really admit to anything. I skated past it too, but then she said: “I think (character 1) and (character 2) are really cute together… Like… Really, really cute together.”. That’s great, she likes my characters… Cool, cool. And then my worst nightmare: “Have you ever drawn p0rn of them?” …Of course I didn’t, because that would be CP… Plus I’ve never thought of those characters as being “sexual”... They’re literally 14 and 15 years old. Then basically, she made an indirect “suggestion” for me to draw them together. I said fuck no. Hell fucking no. She tried to convince me to draw them “aged up”, but again I refused. She eventually dropped it, but since then, she passively talked about things of that nature… Like if she saw a guy she thought was cute, she’d tell me she thought he’s cute or hot or gorgeous or whatever and allude to -other- awkward desires that I didn’t want to know about. She put me off from drawing those characters ever again. I haven’t drawn them since and I don’t take my sketchbook to school anymore because I don’t want her to see my drawings and be reminded of that BS.
But enough about that… Storm is a church-going girl, and so she has a few church-going friends. (This also makes everything I’ve said before all the more ironic.). One day when I was transitioning from my 5th to 6th period, I saw her talking angrily to one of her church friends (I’ll call her Isabelle) outside the school building. Storm was accusing Isabelle of lying about smoking weed/vaping and drinking, and she seemed to be so interested in it that you’d think it had an impact on her personally. Isabelle denied doing that, and they eventually parted ways to go to class. I walked with Storm to 6th period (the Sports Medicine period), and I asked her why she was so damn interested in Isabelle’s habits. Know what she said? Storm said “I just don’t like liars.”... So let me get this straight: She thought she had the right to interrogate someone half to death because she just “doesn’t like liars”? Make that make sense. I’ve heard many stories about how Storm interrogates other people, too. If she sees a guy/girl’s name pop up on the screen of someone she knows, she’ll pester them until they give her one of two answers: either “I’ll tell you later”, or the actual answer. She’s done that to me too, in front of everyone in class. The thing that upsets me about this is that she claims to be “nosy”, but thinks it’s a positive attribute rather than an annoying one. She brags about being “nosy” sometimes.
And the sexual assault… Since we were in a sports medicine class, our projects involved a lot of hands-on things. That didn’t bother me by itself, but with Storm, it was a nightmare. This girl, in the process of strapping an ice bag to my thigh, called my thighs “small”, and said that I have a “beautiful body”. We also did shoulder stretching stuff the next week, and I happened to fall under her care while she stared into my eyes and made weird faces at me, all the while she made sound effects and made the process much more uncomfortable than it needed to be. One week, we ended up as partners again and she ended up wrapping my shoulder. This shoulder-wrap wasn’t an issue for me, but having her as a partner made it an issue. As expected, she made sound effects, but this time she stated the obvious as if it was new information that nobody would have ever suspected: “Wow, this is squishing your boobies huh?”... Emphasis on the word “boobies”. Jesus Fucking Christ, it was already awkward as hell before she even brought that up, why would she say something like that?? I didn’t even realize that until she brought it up. In fear of being subjected to her uncomfortable BS again and feeling violated, I texted her and told her that she’s been making me feel uncomfortable, and to please stop being so…. Weird. I get it’s an awkward thing to wrap up your classmate’s thigh, but that’s a moment to keep comments to yourself. Her response? “I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY-” Just… Stop it. I didn’t introduce the topic as a big deal and told her not to worry about it, but she kept apologizing for it nonstop. Just endlessly, like everything else. Even when I tried to change the subject to something else, she just kept apologizing for it practically until she went to bed. (She has a bedtime at 9:30… At 16 years old.) All of this stuff contributed to my overall hatred toward her. I don’t like her at all, and it’s a wonder I didn’t explode and insult her entire personality and deplorable behavior to her face (Meg Griffin style). Things are just so awkward and awful whenever she opens her mouth, and it just doesn't ever stop. But because of all of this, when it came time for my Senior prom, I decided to secretly invite one of my friends from that class as a plus one, and NOT Storm. I was worried that if I told her that to her face, I would all of a sudden be the new “Katie” in her conversations, because the infraction Katie did was so miniscule that it seemed to be less like a “betrayal” than what I did. (In hindsight, it was probably the other way around.) So… I just kept the whole thing to myself and so did the friend I took to prom (I’ll call her Beyonce. Because… She loves Beyonce.).
If this wasn’t bad enough, strap in because not even three weeks ago, Beyonce was doing her usual schtick of making fun of random things. She once made fun of cool whip and the entire state of Texas at the same time and somehow made it make perfect sense. She should really have a comedy show, I swear. But this time, Beyonce was making fun of the name “Gage”, saying “Why would anyone name their kid after a 12-gage shotgun?” and “People named Gage seem untrustworthy. I wouldn’t want to be near one in a zombie apocalypse, because he’d just feed me to those fuckers.”. Funny stuff. Storm then said “My brother’s name is Gage”, and in order to preserve the flow of the conversation (and also to tick her off a little, I’m ngl), Beyonce asked her: “Is your brother untrustworthy?” And then without a single millisecond wasted, she said, in a Disney Channel comedy fashion: “Welll… We can’t trust him with his own life, sooo…”.. And then she laughed as if it was funny. Like.. Rib-stitches type of laughing. ….So then the others (understandably) went quiet, which left only me and her talking for a moment after her laughter quieted down. She complained about how confused she is that nobody finds her joke funny, and said that her joke had the “perfect timing and everything”... So then my idiot ass decided to say what I was thinking at that moment: “You don’t seem to be taking it seriously. That’s your brother, but you don’t sound sympathetic at all.” She tried to “defend” herself, but Mark interjected into the conversation and changed the course of it entirely, which just left her to sit there in silence, pouting. I felt bad for that statement, so I apologized for it over text when I got home from school. Quickly, we erupted into an argument, (with me holding back), and she ended up saying “What does it matter to you? He’s not your brother. If Beyonce said that about her brother, you’d laugh. But when I do, it’s bad.”. Beyonce’s brother is 8 years old…. So no, that would be even worse. …So then I had to explain to her how human decency works, and how making fun of your s*icidal siblings isn’t funny whatsoever and how that joke could be considered to be in very poor taste, even for people who like dark humor. When me, Beyonce or Mark made “suicide” jokes, it was about OURSELVES and it was usually in a statement like “I don’t want to take a test next period, I’m gonna kms.”... …Storm ended up getting so mad that we weren’t having a conversation anymore; we were just throwing shit around. I told her that if she was being livestreamed at that moment, she’d be bashed on the whole internet for a week or so and be called “evil” for that joke. In hindsight I shouldn’t have said that, but my goal was just to tell her how insensitive others might perceive her comment to be. She said that it wasn’t my business to tell her how to feel about her own brother, but I wasn’t doing that at all, that wasn’t my angle whatsoever – I was just explaining what people find funny. I even said repeatedly that I wasn’t trying to tell her how to feel, and that I know comedy can help lighten situations, but somehow she forgot about that part. And then she went on this whole thing about ending every massive text block with “Not that it’s YOUR business, or anything” to snap at me, despite me being in the room at the time of the joke... So I ended the conversation right then and there because it was pointless to keep going and I really didn’t want to spend any more energy on her. The next day, I apologized to her again. I retracted my statements and told her that I was sorry for talking out of line. She accepted the apology, and things went back to “normal”. She forgot about it, but I didn’t. …So here are the reasons why I feel bad, before I delve into the contents of the “hate letter” I wrote to her. Here’s a list of my crimes: 
I pretended to be her friend for an entire school year. - I hid the fact that I was going to prom with Beyonce from her, and then lied to her face repeatedly whenever she asked if I went to prom or not. - I got into business that wasn’t my own and criticized her. - I wrote a hate-letter to her that I directed her to read at home on the last day of school.
…Here’s why I feel bad: Storm doesn’t seem to be emotionally intelligent and is unable to control her mouth whenever she feels strong emotions. She talks nonstop about her second cousin’s friend’s pet hamster’s wife’s sister’s drama, hoping we’ll find something funny or interesting or impressive, while seeming unable to understand that she needs to change her tune. All she wants is to be listened to and understood, but nobody can and nobody truly wants to. She feigns confidence and goes overboard with compliments in the hopes of catching the attention of people who want to be friends with her. She’s not used to change and is very naive, to the point where (just yesterday) she quit her job at a fast food restaurant after only the first day of working there. For the longest time she didn’t have access to the internet, so she doesn’t really have a means to connect with other people through sharing videos or memes or whatever. …I feel like a bad person because I knowingly, intentionally played into all of this just for the pathetic reason of making her shut up in class. It’s despicable what I did, and I’m beating myself up for it every day. I was just originally going to leave the school, block her and never talk to her ever again in my life, but when she made that joke about her brother, I decided (stupidly) to take it upon myself to be the bearer of bad news. I gave her a letter. Within the “hate letter”, it isn’t actually hate, per se. It’s more like… A report on the behavior she needs to fix, as well as an admission to my lies over the course of this whole year. I told her the awful truth. I told her about everything I mentioned in this post and tried to keep it “professional”, though I did end up going as far as to say “you have all of the attributes of an obnoxious piece of stale bread”........... And what’s worse is… I told her to read it on the last day of school, and my reasoning is pathetic at best. I told her to read it on the last day of school because I didn’t want her to burden the class with her nonstop ranting about me, since she, Mark and Beyonce are sophomores and I’m the only senior in the “friend group”, which means that I left the school an entire week earlier than them. I’ve been intentionally delaying her pain and still talking to her over text acting like things are “normal” so that she doesn’t read it early, knowing damn well that on that last day of school, my words are going to hurt her so badly that she might not be able to recover for a while. In the letter, I told her that by the time she reads it, I would have already blocked her because I don’t want any more conversation with her due to me feeling so bad and having nothing more to say. If the plan goes right, she’ll read it on May 23rd, and on that day I will block her.
I feel awful for all of this. I feel like a monster for this. It’s painful knowing that I’m going to cause her pain and that I planned when it’s going to happen, but at the same time I feel like she deserves it. But at the same time, I know damn well that it wasn’t my place to do that. I should have left everything alone. Nobody I can talk to irl would even hear me out; they’d just stop at the words “hate letter”, which means my only option is to seek advice from people on Reddit. Do my motives for doing things make sense? Am I actually a bad person for this? Am I the asshole? Does she deserve what she’s getting? 
Edit 1: I removed some asterisks (they're annoying).
submitted by CroweGhost to AITA_WIBTA_PUBLIC [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:22 Prescott_Local Goldie Marion “Yellowstone Pete” Robbins - A Local Legend

I'm the same guy that posted that the Independent Order of Odd Fellows cemetery by Acker park was in disrepair and tried finding resources to help turn it around. Here's the link if anyone is interested. I'm still trying.
While walking through the cemetery I came across a gravestone marked "G.M. Robbins - The "End of the Trail" for "Yellowstone Pete" after 25,000 miles by mule train, may he rest in peace" and it got me interested in finding out more about the person. It turns out that Yellowstone Pete holds a place in Americana culture, and really did travel by mule train. There are several pictures linked here that have him, his wife, and mules. I'd love to hear more about him if anyone has more details.
Imgur album of photos I collected. The one that has "OH HOW WE HATE TO WORK" is a postcard that I ordered from Etsy while researching Yellowstone Pete.
There's even a poem about his only daughter.
Yellowstone Pete's Only Daughter was originally published in the book “Rhymes from a Round-up Camp, 1903, and written by Wallace David Coburn in 1894. The book of poetry has been published in 21 different editions. Coburn wrote the preface of the book in Malta, Montana.
Yes, this is the Milk River Valley,
And that's the old ranch that you see,
Where Yellowstone Pete lost his daughter,
The pride of the 7 U. P.
Was she pretty?-Well, stranger, your knowledge
Of these parts is shore incomplete,
When you ask such a comical question
'Bout the daughter of Yellowstone Pete.
Why, man! If the heavens were bluer,
And pansies were deeper in hue ,
They couldn't "size up" with her peepers,
Which shone like the spring poet's dew.
Her teeth were like snowdrops made whiter,
Her hair like the sealskin she wore,
Only softer and silkier and browner,
And she was true blue to the core.
Was old Yellowstone Pete's only daughter,
Whose voice was the envy of birds,
As she warbled at night to the long-horns,
Or when pointing her father's trail herds.
She was happy and good and as loving
As an angel could possibly be,
With always a smile and a greeting,
For tough old cow-punchers like me.
But what I was startin' to narrate,
Before you cut into the game,
Was a love affair she tangled up in,
And the tragical end of the same.
You see, she was borned in this country,
Her mother, a woman of gold,
Kissed her baby and lined out for Heaven,
When Beauty was seven days old.
The boys, you see, nicknamed her "Beauty,"
And each one, he fought for his turn
At feedin' her out of the bottle,
But dress her -- we never could learn.
So Pete he sent off for a nurse girl
And a teacher (not stunning for looks),
To give her the care of a woman,
And learn her the knowledge of books.
Thus Beauty grew up at the home ranch,
And learned how to shore ride and shoot,
Also play and sing on the pianer,
And to tie down a wild steer to boot.
And charming-- why, partner, the sunbeams
They scrapped for the sweets of her face,
And the alkali dust and the zephyrs
They jockeyed to get second place.
So was it a wonder young Dawson,
The son of a neighbor of Pete,
Lost his heart to this rose of the prairie,
And his love for her couldn't be beat?
“Buck"-- that was the handle he went by,
Had pre-empted some learnin' at school,
Was a handsome and big, manly feller,
And in a gun-fight was shore cool.
And there wasn't no man round the country,
Could ride with him down the Red Lane,
He could rope, fork, and ride with clean saddle
Any outlaw that ever wore mane.
They'd been youngsters and brought up together,
And Dawson was shorely dead game,
His father a wealthy old-timer,
All burdened with early-day fame.
Yes, Beauty loved "Buck," that was certain,
But a gal's ways are never foreseen,
And you can't tell what's liable to happen
Be-tween the betwixt and between.
So when a young feller from college
Comes a-romancin' like out this way,
Well, things looked a little promiscuous,
And there was the devil to pay.
Of course, he was welcomed by Beauty,
As the flowers are welcomed in May;
His college pin pleased her, I reckon,
And he had a girl-catchin' way.
But wait till I roll me a smoke, pard,
To filter my bad feelin's down,
Makes me wanter shore squander some powder
When I ponder on that sneakin' houn'.
Well, we was all out on the round-up,
When this college masher, you see,
Ran off with old Yellowstone's daughter,
The pride of the 7 U. P.
Now, old Pete he shore worshipped his daughter,
Loved her better than money or life,
For she was the pride of his old age--
The gift of his beautiful wife.
So he and young Dawson together,
With hearts like the lead in their guns,
Hit the trail of this college-bred villain,
And secured him before many suns.
The gal they found up in Butte City­-
He'd deserted her up there, you know;
But Dawson caught him near the border,
Where numerous cottonwoods grow.
And there, in the depths of the forest,
With the beasts and the birds lookin' on,
They fought to the death with their bowies,
Till the Eastern-bred feller was gone.
And Beauty-- she married "Buck" after,
But never seemed happy or gay,
Like the Beauty we'd worshipped from childhood,­-
She just drooped, shrunk, and withered away.
Yes, she paled like the flowers in summer,
And died with the leaves in the fall ;
And we buried her close to her mother,
While the sunshine went out of us all.
Poor old Pete, his hair white as the snowdrift,
And eyes that stare vacant and old,
Sits and sobs at the foot of two gravestones,
All alone, whether hot days or cold.
All alone? No, for Buck often joins him,
Grim and stern, with his face like a stone;
Never smiling nowdays like he used to,
When he tries he winds up with a moan.
No, the sun don't shine quite as it used to,
And the wind has a lonesomer sound,
As it sings soft and mournful in summer,
And howls when old winter comes round.
Here are the links to original photos:
https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/yellowstone-pete-passes-through-yellowstone-pete-news-photo/161995779
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/rppc-goldie-marion-robbins-aka-1904877006
https://www.phillipscountynews.com/story/2016/09/14/news/yellowstone-petes-only-daughte4302.html
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/52400720/goldie-marion-robbins/photo
submitted by Prescott_Local to Prescott [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:18 TheGoombler Oh hey, I'm not dead, and neither is GME. (A Refresher on COINTELPRO.)

GOOOOOOOOOOD MORNING SUPERSTONKERS! HAHA. It's me again. Yeah, i slipped past the defenses again to drop this off so you can all refresh yourselves on the state of FUD and disinformation in this protracted fight against the legal larcenists doing their best to try and get you to sell. Please spread this amongst the holders, the more people know the less power they have over us holders. We don't sell until we get a call from marge, and that's always been the play.
TLDR: This is a set of tactics used by the Alphabet Boys(CIA, FBI, DEA) to control and manipulate us into drama to collapse our communities and movements. And should be read in full by anyone willing and wanting to learn how these things work.
I've come to notice recently, people keep asking me to repost this for the sake of keeping the new people abreast on what needs to be done to protect the holders of GME. Beneath here will be a detailed account on what you need to be aware of in your online interactions, to avoid being taken for a fool!
_______________________________________________________________________
  1. COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum
  2. Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
  3. Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
  4. How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
  5. Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression
_______________________________________________________________________
COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum..
There are several techniques for the control and manipulation of a internet forum no matter what, or who is on it. We will go over each technique and demonstrate that only a minimal number of operatives can be used to eventually and effectively gain a control of a 'uncontrolled forum.'
Technique #1 - 'FORUM SLIDING'
If a very sensitive posting of a critical nature has been posted on a forum - it can be quickly removed from public view by 'forum sliding.' In this technique a number of unrelated posts are quietly prepositioned on the forum and allowed to 'age.' Each of these misdirectional forum postings can then be called upon at will to trigger a 'forum slide.' The second requirement is that several fake accounts exist, which can be called upon, to ensure that this technique is not exposed to the public. To trigger a 'forum slide' and 'flush' the critical post out of public view it is simply a matter of logging into each account both real and fake and then 'replying' to prepositioned postings with a simple 1 or 2 line comment. This brings the unrelated postings to the top of the forum list, and the critical posting 'slides' down the front page, and quickly out of public view. Although it is difficult or impossible to censor the posting it is now lost in a sea of unrelated and unuseful postings. By this means it becomes effective to keep the readers of the forum reading unrelated and non-issue items.
Technique #2 - 'CONSENSUS CRACKING'
A second highly effective technique (which you can see in operation all the time at www.abovetopsecret.com
) is 'consensus cracking.' To develop a consensus crack, the following technique is used. Under the guise of a fake account a posting is made which looks legitimate and is towards the truth is made - but the critical point is that it has a VERY WEAK PREMISE without substantive proof to back the posting. Once this is done then under alternative fake accounts a very strong position in your favor is slowly introduced over the life of the posting. It is IMPERATIVE that both sides are initially presented, so the uninformed reader cannot determine which side is the truth. As postings and replies are made the stronger 'evidence' or disinformation in your favor is slowly 'seeded in.' Thus the uninformed reader will most like develop the same position as you, and if their position is against you their opposition to your posting will be most likely dropped. However in some cases where the forum members are highly educated and can counter your disinformation with real facts and linked postings, you can then 'abort' the consensus cracking by initiating a 'forum slide.'
Technique #3 - 'TOPIC DILUTION'
Topic dilution is not only effective in forum sliding it is also very useful in keeping the forum readers on unrelated and non-productive issues. This is a critical and useful technique to cause a 'RESOURCE BURN.' By implementing continual and non-related postings that distract and disrupt (trolling ) the forum readers they are more effectively stopped from anything of any real productivity. If the intensity of gradual dilution is intense enough, the readers will effectively stop researching and simply slip into a 'gossip mode.' In this state they can be more easily misdirected away from facts towards uninformed conjecture and opinion. The less informed they are the more effective and easy it becomes to control the entire group in the direction that you would desire the group to go in. It must be stressed that a proper assessment of the psychological capabilities and levels of education is first determined of the group to determine at what level to 'drive in the wedge.' By being too far off topic too quickly it may trigger censorship by a forum moderator.
Technique #4 - 'INFORMATION COLLECTION'
Information collection is also a very effective method to determine the psychological level of the forum members, and to gather intelligence that can be used against them. In this technique in a light and positive environment a 'show you mine so me yours' posting is initiated. From the number of replies and the answers that are provided much statistical information can be gathered. An example is to post your 'favorite weapon' and then encourage other members of the forum to showcase what they have. In this matter it can be determined by reverse proration what percentage of the forum community owns a firearm, and or a illegal weapon. This same method can be used by posing as one of the form members and posting your favorite 'technique of operation.' From the replies various methods that the group utilizes can be studied and effective methods developed to stop them from their activities.
Technique #5 - 'ANGER TROLLING'
Statistically, there is always a percentage of the forum posters who are more inclined to violence. In order to determine who these individuals are, it is a requirement to present a image to the forum to deliberately incite a strong psychological reaction. From this the most violent in the group can be effectively singled out for reverse IP location and possibly local enforcement tracking. To accomplish this only requires posting a link to a video depicting a local police officer massively abusing his power against a very innocent individual. Statistically of the million or so police officers in America there is always one or two being caught abusing there powers and the taping of the activity can be then used for intelligence gathering purposes - without the requirement to 'stage' a fake abuse video. This method is extremely effective, and the more so the more abusive the video can be made to look. Sometimes it is useful to 'lead' the forum by replying to your own posting with your own statement of violent intent, and that you 'do not care what the authorities think!!' inflammation. By doing this and showing no fear it may be more effective in getting the more silent and self-disciplined violent intent members of the forum to slip and post their real intentions. This can be used later in a court of law during prosecution.
Technique #6 - 'GAINING FULL CONTROL'
It is important to also be harvesting and continually maneuvering for a forum moderator position. Once this position is obtained, the forum can then be effectively and quietly controlled by deleting unfavourable postings - and one can eventually steer the forum into complete failure and lack of interest by the general public. This is the 'ultimate victory' as the forum is no longer participated with by the general public and no longer useful in maintaining their freedoms. Depending on the level of control you can obtain, you can deliberately steer a forum into defeat by censoring postings, deleting memberships, flooding, and or accidentally taking the forum offline. By this method the forum can be quickly killed. However it is not always in the interest to kill a forum as it can be converted into a 'honey pot' gathering center to collect and misdirect newcomers and from this point be completely used for your control for your agenda purposes.
CONCLUSION
Remember these techniques are only effective if the forum participants DO NOT KNOW ABOUT THEM. Once they are aware of these techniques the operation can completely fail, and the forum can become uncontrolled. At this point other avenues must be considered such as initiating a false legal precidence to simply have the forum shut down and taken offline. This is not desirable as it then leaves the enforcement agencies unable to track the percentage of those in the population who always resist attempts for control against them. Many other techniques can be utilized and developed by the individual and as you develop further techniques of infiltration and control it is imperative to share then with HQ.
_______________________________________________________________________
Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
Note: The first rule and last five (or six, depending on situation) rules are generally not directly within the ability of the traditional disinfo artist to apply. These rules are generally used more directly by those at the leadership, key players, or planning level of the criminal conspiracy or conspiracy to cover up.
1. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Regardless of what you know, don't discuss it -- especially if you are a public figure, news anchor, etc. If it's not reported, it didn't happen, and you never have to deal with the issues.
2. Become incredulous and indignant. Avoid discussing key issues and instead focus on side issues which can be used show the topic as being critical of some otherwise sacrosanct group or theme. This is also known as the 'How dare you!' gambit.
3. Create rumor mongers. Avoid discussing issues by describing all charges, regardless of venue or evidence, as mere rumors and wild accusations. Other derogatory terms mutually exclusive of truth may work as well. This method which works especially well with a silent press, because the only way the public can learn of the facts are through such 'arguable rumors'. If you can associate the material with the Internet, use this fact to certify it a 'wild rumor' from a 'bunch of kids on the Internet' which can have no basis in fact.
4. Use a straw man. Find or create a seeming element of your opponent's argument which you can easily knock down to make yourself look good and the opponent to look bad. Either make up an issue you may safely imply exists based on your interpretation of the opponent/opponent arguments/situation, or select the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Amplify their significance and destroy them in a way which appears to debunk all the charges, real and fabricated alike, while actually avoiding discussion of the real issues.
5. Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule. This is also known as the primary 'attack the messenger' ploy, though other methods qualify as variants of that approach. Associate opponents with unpopular titles such as 'kooks', 'right-wing', 'liberal', 'left-wing', 'terrorists', 'conspiracy buffs', 'radicals', 'militia', 'racists', 'religious fanatics', 'sexual deviates', and so forth. This makes others shrink from support out of fear of gaining the same label, and you avoid dealing with issues.
6. Hit and Run. In any public forum, make a brief attack of your opponent or the opponent position and then scamper off before an answer can be fielded, or simply ignore any answer. This works extremely well in Internet and letters-to-the-editor environments where a steady stream of new identities can be called upon without having to explain criticism, reasoning -- simply make an accusation or other attack, never discussing issues, and never answering any subsequent response, for that would dignify the opponent's viewpoint.
7. Question motives. Twist or amplify any fact which could be taken to imply that the opponent operates out of a hidden personal agenda or other bias. This avoids discussing issues and forces the accuser on the defensive.
8. Invoke authority. Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough 'jargon' and 'minutia' to illustrate you are 'one who knows', and simply say it isn't so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources.
9. Play Dumb. No matter what evidence or logical argument is offered, avoid discussing issues except with denials they have any credibility, make any sense, provide any proof, contain or make a point, have logic, or support a conclusion. Mix well for maximum effect.
10. Associate opponent charges with old news. A derivative of the straw man -- usually, in any large-scale matter of high visibility, someone will make charges early on which can be or were already easily dealt with - a kind of investment for the future should the matter not be so easily contained.) Where it can be foreseen, have your own side raise a straw man issue and have it dealt with early on as part of the initial contingency plans. Subsequent charges, regardless of validity or new ground uncovered, can usually then be associated with the original charge and dismissed as simply being a rehash without need to address current issues -- so much the better where the opponent is or was involved with the original source.
11. Establish and rely upon fall-back positions. Using a minor matter or element of the facts, take the 'high road' and 'confess' with candor that some innocent mistake, in hindsight, was made -- but that opponents have seized on the opportunity to blow it all out of proportion and imply greater criminalities which, 'just isn't so.' Others can reinforce this on your behalf, later, and even publicly 'call for an end to the nonsense' because you have already 'done the right thing.' Done properly, this can garner sympathy and respect for 'coming clean' and 'owning up' to your mistakes without addressing more serious issues.
12. Enigmas have no solution. Drawing upon the overall umbrella of events surrounding the crime and the multitude of players and events, paint the entire affair as too complex to solve. This causes those otherwise following the matter to begin to lose interest more quickly without having to address the actual issues.
13. Alice in Wonderland Logic. Avoid discussion of the issues by reasoning backwards or with an apparent deductive logic which forbears any actual material fact.
14. Demand complete solutions. Avoid the issues by requiring opponents to solve the crime at hand completely, a ploy which works best with issues qualifying for rule 10.
15. Fit the facts to alternate conclusions. This requires creative thinking unless the crime was planned with contingency conclusions in place.
16. Vanish evidence and witnesses. If it does not exist, it is not fact, and you won't have to address the issue.
17. Change the subject. Usually in connection with one of the other ploys listed here, find a way to side-track the discussion with abrasive or controversial comments in hopes of turning attention to a new, more manageable topic. This works especially well with companions who can 'argue' with you over the new topic and polarize the discussion arena in order to avoid discussing more key issues.
18. Emotionalize, Antagonize, and Goad Opponents. If you can't do anything else, chide and taunt your opponents and draw them into emotional responses which will tend to make them look foolish and overly motivated, and generally render their material somewhat less coherent. Not only will you avoid discussing the issues in the first instance, but even if their emotional response addresses the issue, you can further avoid the issues by then focusing on how 'sensitive they are to criticism.'
19. Ignore proof presented, demand impossible proofs. This is perhaps a variant of the 'play dumb' rule. Regardless of what material may be presented by an opponent in public forums, claim the material irrelevant and demand proof that is impossible for the opponent to come by (it may exist, but not be at his disposal, or it may be something which is known to be safely destroyed or withheld, such as a murder weapon.) In order to completely avoid discussing issues, it may be required that you to categorically deny and be critical of media or books as valid sources, deny that witnesses are acceptable, or even deny that statements made by government or other authorities have any meaning or relevance.
20. False evidence. Whenever possible, introduce new facts or clues designed and manufactured to conflict with opponent presentations -- as useful tools to neutralize sensitive issues or impede resolution. This works best when the crime was designed with contingencies for the purpose, and the facts cannot be easily separated from the fabrications.
21. Call a Grand Jury, Special Prosecutor, or other empowered investigative body. Subvert the (process) to your benefit and effectively neutralize all sensitive issues without open discussion. Once convened, the evidence and testimony are required to be secret when properly handled. For instance, if you own the prosecuting attorney, it can insure a Grand Jury hears no useful evidence and that the evidence is sealed and unavailable to subsequent investigators. Once a favorable verdict is achieved, the matter can be considered officially closed. Usually, this technique is applied to find the guilty innocent, but it can also be used to obtain charges when seeking to frame a victim.
22. Manufacture a new truth. Create your own expert(s), group(s), author(s), leader(s) or influence existing ones willing to forge new ground via scientific, investigative, or social research or testimony which concludes favorably. In this way, if you must actually address issues, you can do so authoritatively.
23. Create bigger distractions. If the above does not seem to be working to distract from sensitive issues, or to prevent unwanted media coverage of unstoppable events such as trials, create bigger news stories (or treat them as such) to distract the multitudes.
24. Silence critics. If the above methods do not prevail, consider removing opponents from circulation by some definitive solution so that the need to address issues is removed entirely. This can be by their death, arrest and detention, blackmail or destruction of their character by release of blackmail information, or merely by destroying them financially, emotionally, or severely damaging their health.
25. Vanish. If you are a key holder of secrets or otherwise overly illuminated and you think the heat is getting too hot, to avoid the issues, vacate the kitchen.
_______________________________________________________________________
Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
1) Avoidance. They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.
2) Selectivity. They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. Should a commentator become argumentative with any success, the focus will shift to include the commentator as well.
3) Coincidental. They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with the reason.
4) Teamwork. They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.
5) Anti-conspiratorial. They almost always have disdain for 'conspiracy theorists' and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a NG focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain. Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.
6) Artificial Emotions. An odd kind of 'artificial' emotionalism and an unusually thick skin -- an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. This likely stems from intelligence community training that, no matter how condemning the evidence, deny everything, and never become emotionally involved or reactive. The net result for a disinfo artist is that emotions can seem artificial.
Most people, if responding in anger, for instance, will express their animosity throughout their rebuttal. But disinfo types usually have trouble maintaining the 'image' and are hot and cold with respect to pretended emotions and their usually more calm or unemotional communications style. It's just a job, and they often seem unable to 'act their role in character' as well in a communications medium as they might be able in a real face-to-face conversation/confrontation. You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later -- an emotional yo-yo.
With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game -- where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.
7) Inconsistent. There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.
I have noted that often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I'm not aware of too many Navy pilots who don't have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.
8) Time Constant. Recently discovered, with respect to News Groups, is the response time factor. There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:
a) ANY NG posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. The government and other empowered players can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. SINCE DISINFO IN A NG ONLY WORKS IF THE READER SEES IT - FAST RESPONSE IS CALLED FOR, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth.
b) When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, DELAY IS CALLED FOR - there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to 'get permission' or instruction from a formal chain of command.
c) In the NG example 1) above, it will often ALSO be seen that bigger guns are drawn and fired after the same 48-72 hours delay - the team approach in play. This is especially true when the targeted truth seeker or their comments are considered more important with respect to potential to reveal truth. Thus, a serious truth sayer will be attacked twice for the same sin.
_______________________________________________________________________
How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
One way to neutralize a potential activist is to get them to be in a group that does all the wrong things. Why?
1) The message doesn't get out.
2) A lot of time is wasted
3) The activist is frustrated and discouraged
4) Nothing good is accomplished.
FBI and Police Informers and Infiltrators will infest any group and they have phoney activist organizations established.
Their purpose is to prevent any real movement for justice or eco-peace from developing in this country.
Agents come in small, medium or large. They can be of any ethnic background. They can be male or female.
The actual size of the group or movement being infiltrated is irrelevant. It is the potential the movement has for becoming large which brings on the spies and saboteurs.
This booklet lists tactics agents use to slow things down, foul things up, destroy the movement and keep tabs on activists.
It is the agent's job to keep the activist from quitting such a group, thus keeping him/her under control.
In some situations, to get control, the agent will tell the activist:
[Here, I have added the psychological reasons as to WHY this maneuver works to control people]
This invites guilty feelings. Many people can be controlled by guilt. The agents begin relationships with activists behind a well-developed mask of "dedication to the cause." Because of their often declared dedication, (and actions designed to prove this), when they criticize the activist, he or she - being truly dedicated to the movement - becomes convinced that somehow, any issues are THEIR fault. This is because a truly dedicated person tends to believe that everyone has a conscience and that nobody would dissimulate and lie like that "on purpose." It's amazing how far agents can go in manipulating an activist because the activist will constantly make excuses for the agent who regularly declares their dedication to the cause. Even if they do, occasionally, suspect the agent, they will pull the wool over their own eyes by rationalizing: "they did that unconsciously... they didn't really mean it... I can help them by being forgiving and accepting " and so on and so forth.
The agent will tell the activist:
This is designed to enhance the activist's self-esteem. His or her narcissistic admiration of his/her own activist/altruistic intentions increase as he or she identifies with and consciously admires the altruistic declarations of the agent which are deliberately set up to mirror those of the activist.
This is "malignant pseudo identification." It is the process by which the agent consciously imitates or simulates a certain behavior to foster the activist's identification with him/her, thus increasing the activist's vulnerability to exploitation. The agent will simulate the more subtle self-concepts of the activist.
Activists and those who have altruistic self-concepts are most vulnerable to malignant pseudo identification especially during work with the agent when the interaction includes matter relating to their competency, autonomy, or knowledge.
The goal of the agent is to increase the activist's general empathy for the agent through pseudo-identification with the activist's self-concepts.
The most common example of this is the agent who will compliment the activist for his competency or knowledge or value to the movement. On a more subtle level, the agent will simulate affects and mannerisms of the activist which promotes identification via mirroring and feelings of "twinship". It is not unheard of for activists, enamored by the perceived helpfulness and competence of a good agent, to find themselves considering ethical violations and perhaps, even illegal behavior, in the service of their agent/handler.
The activist's "felt quality of perfection" [self-concept] is enhanced, and a strong empathic bond is developed with the agent through his/her imitation and simulation of the victim's own narcissistic investments. [self-concepts] That is, if the activist knows, deep inside, their own dedication to the cause, they will project that onto the agent who is "mirroring" them.
The activist will be deluded into thinking that the agent shares this feeling of identification and bonding. In an activist/social movement setting, the adversarial roles that activists naturally play vis a vis the establishment/government, fosters ongoing processes of intrapsychic splitting so that "twinship alliances" between activist and agent may render whole sectors or reality testing unavailable to the activist. They literally "lose touch with reality."
Activists who deny their own narcissistic investments [do not have a good idea of their own self-concepts and that they ARE concepts] and consciously perceive themselves (accurately, as it were) to be "helpers" endowed with a special amount of altruism are exceedingly vulnerable to the affective (emotional) simulation of the accomplished agent.
Empathy is fostered in the activist through the expression of quite visible affects. The presentation of tearfulness, sadness, longing, fear, remorse, and guilt, may induce in the helper-oriented activist a strong sense of compassion, while unconsciously enhancing the activist's narcissistic investment in self as the embodiment of goodness.
The agent's expresssion of such simulated affects may be quite compelling to the observer and difficult to distinguish from deep emotion.
It can usually be identified by two events, however:
First, the activist who has analyzed his/her own narcissistic roots and is aware of his/her own potential for being "emotionally hooked," will be able to remain cool and unaffected by such emotional outpourings by the agent.
As a result of this unaffected, cool, attitude, the Second event will occur: The agent will recompensate much too quickly following such an affective expression leaving the activist with the impression that "the play has ended, the curtain has fallen," and the imposture, for the moment, has finished. The agent will then move quickly to another activist/victim.
The fact is, the movement doesn't need leaders, it needs MOVERS. "Follow the leader" is a waste of time.
A good agent will want to meet as often as possible. He or she will talk a lot and say little. One can expect an onslaught of long, unresolved discussions.
Some agents take on a pushy, arrogant, or defensive manner:
1) To disrupt the agenda
2) To side-track the discussion
3) To interrupt repeatedly
4) To feign ignorance
5) To make an unfounded accusation against a person.
Calling someone a racist, for example. This tactic is used to discredit a person in the eyes of all other group members.
Saboteurs
Some saboteurs pretend to be activists. She or he will ....
1) Write encyclopedic flyers (in the present day, websites)
2) Print flyers in English only.
3) Have demonstrations in places where no one cares.
4) Solicit funding from rich people instead of grass roots support
5) Display banners with too many words that are confusing.
6) Confuse issues.
7) Make the wrong demands.
8) Compromise the goal.
9) Have endless discussions that waste everyone's time. The agent may accompany the endless discussions with drinking, pot smoking or other amusement to slow down the activist's work.
Provocateurs
1) Want to establish "leaders" to set them up for a fall in order to stop the movement.
2) Suggest doing foolish, illegal things to get the activists in trouble.
3) Encourage militancy.
4) Want to taunt the authorities.
5) Attempt to make the activist compromise their values.
6) Attempt to instigate violence. Activism ought to always be non-violent.
7) Attempt to provoke revolt among people who are ill-prepared to deal with the reaction of the authorities to such violence.
Informants
1) Want everyone to sign up and sing in and sign everything.
2) Ask a lot of questions (gathering data).
3) Want to know what events the activist is planning to attend.
4) Attempt to make the activist defend him or herself to identify his or her beliefs, goals, and level of commitment.
Recruiting
Legitimate activists do not subject people to hours of persuasive dialog. Their actions, beliefs, and goals speak for themselves.
Groups that DO recruit are missionaries, military, and fake political parties or movements set up by agents.
Surveillance
ALWAYS assume that you are under surveillance.
At this point, if you are NOT under surveillance, you are not a very good activist!
Scare Tactics
They use them.
Such tactics include slander, defamation, threats, getting close to disaffected or minimally committed fellow activists to persuade them (via psychological tactics described above) to turn against the movement and give false testimony against their former compatriots. They will plant illegal substances on the activist and set up an arrest; they will plant false information and set up "exposure," they will send incriminating letters [emails] in the name of the activist; and more; they will do whatever society will allow.
This booklet in no way covers all the ways agents use to sabotage the lives of sincere an dedicated activists.
If an agent is "exposed," he or she will be transferred or replaced.
COINTELPRO is still in operation today under a different code name. It is no longer placed on paper where it can be discovered through the freedom of information act.
The FBI counterintelligence program's stated purpose: To expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and otherwise neutralize individuals who the FBI categorize as opposed to the National Interests. "National Security" means the FBI's security from the people ever finding out the vicious things it does in violation of people's civil liberties.
_______________________________________________________________________
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression
Strong, credible allegations of high-level criminal activity can bring down a government. When the government lacks an effective, fact-based defense, other techniques must be employed. The success of these techniques depends heavily upon a cooperative, compliant press and a mere token opposition party.
1. Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.
2. Wax indignant. This is also known as the "How dare you?" gambit.
3. Characterize the charges as "rumors" or, better yet, "wild rumors." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumors." (If they tend to believe the "rumors" it must be because they are simply "paranoid" or "hysterical.")
4. Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspects of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumors (or plant false stories) and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.
5. Call the skeptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nutcase," "ranter," "kook," "crackpot," and, of course, "rumor monger." Be sure, too, to use heavily loaded verbs and adjectives when characterizing their charges and defending the "more reasonable" government and its defenders. You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned. For insurance, set up your own "skeptics" to shoot down.
6. Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money (compared to over-compensated adherents to the government line who, presumably, are not).
7. Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.
8. Dismiss the charges as "old news."
9. Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hangout route." This way, you create the impression of candor and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken. With effective damage control, the fall-back position need only be peddled by stooge skeptics to carefully limited markets.
10. Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.
11. Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. E.g. We have a completely free press. If evidence exists that the Vince Foster "suicide" note was forged, they would have reported it. They haven't reported it so there is no such evidence. Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press who would report the leak.
12. Require the skeptics to solve the crime completely. E.g. If Foster was murdered, who did it and why?
13. Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or publicizing distractions.
14. Lightly report incriminating facts, and then make nothing of them. This is sometimes referred to as "bump and run" reporting.
15. Baldly and brazenly lie. A favorite way of doing this is to attribute the "facts" furnished the public to a plausible-sounding, but anonymous, source.
16. Expanding further on numbers 4 and 5, have your own stooges "expose" scandals and champion popular causes. Their job is to pre-empt real opponents and to play 99-yard football. A variation is to pay rich people for the job who will pretend to spend their own money.
17. Flood the Internet with agents. This is the answer to the question, "What could possibly motivate a person to spend hour upon hour on Internet news groups defending the government and/or the press and harassing genuine critics?" Don t the authorities have defenders enough in all the newspapers, magazines, radio, and television? One would think refusing to print critical letters and screening out serious callers or dumping them from radio talk shows would be control enough, but, obviously, it is not.
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2024.05.21 19:17 jdfreeman1990 Petty Librarian Strikes Back

Hello Potato Clan!
Wanted to share another library story that happened literally yesterday.
There is this woman who has started coming in to the library. For a visual, imagine if the girl who was the pretty girl in high school ate a beach ball. All the entitlement, but nothing to back it up with.
I am fairly certain her entire mission in life is to see how many of our minor violations she can break before we throw her out. And I’ll happily throw my back out tossing her to the curb.
Originally, she would fall asleep in the library. Like everywhere. She fell asleep at tables, on the soft seating, in the bathroom I’m pretty sure. Which is a no-no.
Yes, I know other libraries can and do allow patrons to fall asleep in their buildings. However, because of some past incidents of potential to actual overdose, we would rather patrons not fall asleep. We usually ask them to get some fresh air before we eventually have to ask them to leave. Not my rule, but you have to follow it.
Recently, she has started getting snippy with my security staff. They are usually the ones who wake her up. I have woken her up twice myself, one time because I could hear her snoring outside of my office. She has called them stalkers, following her, and harassing her.
Ma’am, you are breaking the rules.
It’s not harassment if you aren’t behaving.
You also will pull your jacket hood over your head and lean down on the table looking as if you are asleep.
Help me, help you.
Yesterday, she came in and dropped her stuff on one of our tables. Sometime later, one of the security guards came up to me and said, “hey, I’m pretty sure that one patron left the building and left her stuff.”
Sure enough, I checked back on the security cameras and she got up, asked another patron to watch her stuff, and left the building. Not only the building, the property. Got on her little scooter and putt putted away.
This is a violation of our rules. You cannot leave your personal property and expect staff or patrons to look after it or have it block access for other patrons. I am surely not keeping an eye on your stuff. Granted, I saw what she left behind. Even the desperate would be like, “I can do better.” But it’s the principle, damn it!
I went over to talk to the guy she spoke with and asked if he knew her and what not. Que the Mariah Carey, “I don’t know her.” This man threw her under several busses in acknowledging how much he did not know who she was. It was actually slightly funny.
She’d been gone for OVER an hour before I finally asked the branch manager if I had permission to put her stuff near the lost and found. He happily agreed. It’s nice when my petty is permitted.
Eventually, almost TWO hours later, this heifer finally strolls in. When she inquires about her stuff, the security guard directs her to me, since I was the manager on duty.
Here. We. Go.
She comes up, annoyed judging by her red face. Or out of breath. Unsure. It was a long walk over to me.
She goes, “why did you move my stuff?”
I replied, in my management tone, “well ma’am, your stuff is over at our circulation desk in our lost and found. We moved your stuff because, as our policy states, you cannot leave personal property unattended. Since you left the property for over an hour, we moved. Now you are more than welcome to leave your stuff if you need to step out to make a phone call or have a smoke break. But you can’t leave the property.”
Her reply, “huh. Well I didn’t think it was an hour.”
Now…the good Lord, when he made me, did not install in my program much patience. He did not think it fit to download the app into me that put up with the audacity.
So, I didn’t.
I replied, still in management tone, “well we have security cameras that keep track of time. So…”
She walked away from me and went to get her stuff, muttering and grumbling all the way.
At some point, word will get out that I am not to be trifled with. But until then, I’m more than happy to knock some entitled patrons down a peg.
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2024.05.21 19:15 watch_more_tv40 Mild Aspergers?

Hi all,apolgies if i get terminology or my apporitate words wrong. Is there such thing as having mild aspergers?. I am man who was offically diagnosed in my late 20s i am now in my 40s.. I went to an ordinary school,i did suffer from anxiety and depression as a teen . I used to line up my toys when i was kid. I used have bad eye contact. I never had any sensory issues,so i could go to a bar or a concert and not be bothered by sights and sounds. I am terrible at math but have good long term memory apparently.
Now i can make good eye contact which i could not do before and socialize well, i go to concerts and can talk to a random stranger, I love the art of conversation,and are out going, I dont have much routines, i do or did had some niche interests like retro gaming, collecting bottles. My current interest at the moment is true crime. My mental health is quiet good too. Sometimes i wonder if was revaluated would i be diagnosed. Thanks for reading.
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2024.05.21 19:12 denastix One Week Post Op

Hey everyone,
It's been one week since surgery and I'm sharing my notes on my daily condition/progress here in case it's helpful to anyone. Feel free to ask questions!
Overview: Here's a link to my first post that includes some details about my injury and pre-op experience. https://www.reddit.com/ACL/s/UOegIkH9i2
Day 0 - Surgery Day Surgeon said everything went well. Surgery itself was about 2.5 hours - ACL reconstruction with patella autograph and repairs of both menisci. MCL and LCL healed on its own and there was no need for the LET. Leg is locked at 0° extension and I'm NWB for at least 8 weeks. I was told to schedule PT after my 2wk follow up and to do ankle pumps and (attempt) leg raises in the meantime.
Pain levels are 5/10 on average, even with the nerve block. I was prescribed Percocet (pain relief), Diclofenac (NSAID), Cephalexin (antibiotic), and regular strength aspirin (DVT prophylaxis); I'm taking them on a strict schedule with alarms so I don't miss a dose.
I also take fiber gummies in the morning (it was already part of my daily routine) and Sennakot dual at night, along with bananas and apples as snacks/meals with my pills throughout. I bought 5mg THC/10mg CBD/15mg CBN edibles for when I'm done with the Percocet. I'm also elevating and icing as much as possible (cold therapy machine + ice packs)
Day 1: Didn't sleep as well, mostly because I'm sleeping on an air mattress in my living room and it usually takes me a night to get comfortable in a new bed/space (I'm in my living room to be closer to the bathroom and so visitors can have easier access to me.)
Nerve block wore off by the evening and pain seemed like it was at it's peak, reaching as high a 9/10 especially when dealing with the blood rush after standing. Had to take two Percocets instead of my one for a dose to get through it, but pain is still manageable.
Day 2: Slept much better than the previous night, even with having to wake up multiple times to take medication.
Pain has subsided back to a 5-6/10 like Day 0, so just sticking with my medicine schedule. My most comfortable position is laying down with my leg elevated on my wedge pillow, followed by sitting upright with my leg at level.
I had my first bowel movements today. Not only is it earlier than I expected (based on other people's stories in these threads), but it's more frequent and came with some sight cramping. I'm hoping we're back to normal after this.
Day 3: Did not sleep as well as the night before. The "heaviness" of my leg is more noticeable and I think I experienced some swelling (leading to increased pain) due to blood rush throughout my leg. Leg felt more comfortable and less swollen by around 3am. Also had to wake up more often than before; my bathroom schedule did not line up with my medication schedule as I hoped it would, so this caused me to wake up at least 5 times a night to do either.
Knee pain when sitting is a 3/10 and a 6-7/10 when initially standing up. It also starts to flare up 30-60 mins before my next Percocet dose, so I'm currently sticking with my timing and dose and will taper off/switch to edibles in the next few days.
A few hours later, I realized that I was having ambiguous and worrisome symptoms from -- I assumed -- the Percocet (chest discomfort, heart palpitations, and increased anxiety), so I decided to pause on the next dose and switch to my edibles + extra strength acetaminophen. I'm starting to feel a 7/10 knee pain.
Day 4: Worst sleep of my life. Not only did I have to pee so often, the knee pain shot up to a 7-9/10 accompanied by what felt like swelling, even with elevation and icing. I think me getting up so often to use the bathroom also aggravated the pain/swelling. Doesn't help that a mosquito made it's way into my living room and harassed me all night. I feel fewer chest symptoms and anxiety, so I'm still deciding if I should officially stop the Percocet and just use the rest of my prescriptions + OTC pain relief to get through or just cut down my dosage.
I feel like shit overall. I'm also sleep deprived, groggy/still high from the edibles, nauseous, sad, and in so much pain. Definitely the worse than Day 2 - I was dealing with pain but was in a fantastic mood on Day 2 lol
I truly didn't realize how much pain the Percocet was blocking until I stopped using it. The pain was so constant and uncomfortable that I decided to get back on it (after toughing it out through three missed doses) and only take a half pill every six hours. My concerning side effects have diminished and I also have pain relief, so I think I found the balance.
Day 5: I slept MUCH better last night, especially compared to the night before. I also had to use the bathroom way less often in the middle of the night, so I was able to get longer hours of sleep and only wake up to take my medications. I coupled the night dose with my THC/CBD/CBN gummies and I feel like this definitely helped with both pain and sleep.
We're back to an avg 3/10 for pain, which is a relief.
Day 6: Looking forward to not having to wake up in the middle of the night to take medications so that I can have a chance at more interrupted sleep.
Pain is at a minimum, but I'm a little worried about the levels when I run out of the Percocet (tomorrow night). I don't intend on getting a refill, so I really hope my pain has actually decreased and can be managed by Tylenol extra strength + my already prescribed NSAID + edibles.
My bigger annoyance is how heavy the brace feels on my leg and how bulky the ace wrap is on my knee. I've been wearing this brace since my injury, but it's never felt heavier, so I assume it feels this way because of my weakening muscles. I think weight of it is also slightly pulling on my incisions, so that's an unpleasant feeling. I have to keep the wrap on until my 2wk follow up, so I'm desperately counting down to that moment.
I'm now trying to keep myself constructively occupied during the times that I'm alone. The medications and pain made focusing on things like reading a tad challenging, so I've mostly been watching TV and scrolling through social media. I'm hoping to do more with my time now that the pain seems more under control.
submitted by denastix to ACL [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:09 zimmer550king Do teachers effectively control your future in German high schools?

I read this comment under a Facebook post and I am posting it here verbatim. I have been here for 1.5 years and just want to get the opinion of Germans. The guy who wrote this comment grew up in Germany as a Muslim of South Asian background. Reading this definitely scared me as it appears that high schools in Germany are racist and teachers can effectively block you from a good future by giving you bad grades intentionally.
the second generation doesn't make it. You can analyse it yourself. Look how successful kids of your friends are. Most of them will be put in real schule or hauptschule. The few who still make it to Gymnasium. They are downgraded back to Realschule after a few years. Only a small portion gets Abitur and a very tiny portion gets the Abitur with good grades.The German culture especially at schools associates less intelligence with colored people. So since the teachers control your life and future. They can give you the grade whatever they want. It doesn't matter what you got in your exams. School is hell. Especially if its a pure gymnasium. To show you how powerful a teacher can be. If you get 100% in a maths exam the teacher has the power to reduce it to 50% and they do it.
I personally struggled a lot at school. Teachers are basically dictators. My sister struggled a lot. E.g in case of my sister she said as a Muslim she doesn't wanna go on Klassenfahrt. The teacher didn't like it and became her enemy and made sure she doesn't get any good grade to go to med school. They made her life hell. Luckily to go to med school you have to get good grades in the TMS. Its a state test it counts 50%. In this test no one knows your name. No one knows if you wear hijab. You are just a number. So she was in top 5% of whole Germany. Which allowed her to go med school. At Unis the life is much better because profs are not racist and they don't have the power to control your future. The school atmosphere is so harsh that most colored kids gets demotivated and just give up. It is one of the reason why yoh don't see many successful 2/3 generation people.
The bulk went to school in Pakistan studied there did master here doesn't speak german got a job as software engineer. The bulk doesn't understand the problems their kids will go through. Most of their kids will not successful. Because they have to go through the school system. Many desi parents still force their kids to get Fachabitur which is low level Abitur and they study history, social sciences or at Fachhochschule to please the parents. In the most of them drop out.
I will be honest, reading that a high school teacher can just slash a student's grade in Germany out of no where is scary. The guy who made this comment is now in the UK after growing up in Germany. He basically wants people of immigrant background to not have kids here as there is widespread racial discrimination in schools as compared to the UK.
How true is the guy's comment? I would especially love to hear from Germans who grew up here and have a migration background.
submitted by zimmer550king to AskAGerman [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:00 Upbeat-Lavishness-23 Hello. I want to share suggestions on how to make Dota better. Maybe the developer can hear me here

Hello. I want to share suggestions on how to make Dota better.
Many heroes buy blink dagger. But not everyone is and is not always ready to pay full price for it.
I suggest adding the BLINK SHARD item. Costs 1000 gold, has a radius slightly larger than that of the for staff. Otherwise it works like a regular blink (maybe a little longer cooldown). I know that this can overly strengthen previous blink hero users. Therefore, the Blink shard should not improve into a blink. Some heroes like Axe, Magnus, Puck will still choose to blink. And other heroes who did not always take it will take a blink shard (venomaser, lich, clowerk). Players will have to choose between blink and blink shard and this will diversify the gameplay.
Many hero picks do not do anything for some heroes who gain an advantage. Many picks cannot do anything to Bristleback, Phantom Assassin, Huskar, etc. Hero abilities can disable passives but not items. The only item against passives is silver. He is not convenient for many heroes; you cannot use an ability under his influence or collect him on a support.
I propose adding a new item that disables passives. Firewater. 4000 cost. Crafted from Wind Lace, Tiara of Selemene, Orb of Corrosion and a recipe. Gives item bonuses and has an active ability: you throw a bottle at a point, pouring the contents of the heroes in the area approximately like the old Omniknight aura, a debuff is hung on the heroes for 4 seconds (the next ability used in this hero will turn off the passive for 4 seconds and will cause periodic damage). Cooldown 25 sec.
The flask's flight speed is the same as the alchemist's ability 2. Used on a point on the ground.
This will ease the balance of some heroes and additionally hit the excessive healing of some picks due to Orb of Corrosion.
Add the ability to accumulate charges for several urns. They are easy to dispel and often you can’t do anything to peaks with a large amount of healing. Other items are often either too expensive or it is not profitable for your hero to buy them.
Add an only mid game mode. As in lol. Only mid with towers and throne 5*5 heroes without forest and sides. This mode will replace turbo and make it easier for new players to enter Dota.
You can also add exploding fruits to the forest on both sides. They work like a sniper's grenade, scattering all heroes when attacking a fruit. Useful for constrictions and escape. Makes the gameplay more spectacular, let him throw the hero in all directions at the radius of a sniper’s grenade.

I think that Ancient Apparition's skills are outdated and do not fit into modern Dota.
Below I will offer a description of the skill rework:
1skill. ICE CUBE.
Envelops himself or an ally in an ice block that blocks 2/3/3 attacks and 100/150/200 magic damage. (falls off after 6 seconds or when attacks or damage are blocked) cooldown 30

2skill. ICE VORTEX
old skill, but can be switched through control (attacks everyone/attacks only heroes {I think that after the rework of the 3rd skill it will be necessary to give the opportunity to vortex zone heroes in the line})
3skill FROST GROUND
Works similar to VOODOO RESTORATION.
creates a field around the hero that deals a little damage every second, slows down the movement of enemies, and reduces their health regeneration by 30% for 4 sec(can be cast on a teammate under the influence of the ICE CUBE, working oll duration cube, stops working 3 seconds after broke the cube)
4 skills
COOLING TOUCH
Increases the range of your next attack. It deals 150/225/300 pure damage and prevents health regeneration for 5 seconds. cannot be dispelled. Cooldown time 25 sec. you can save yourself by clicking BKB or another save item
Aghanim Shard
Grants 2 Ice Cube charges. increases damage block to 4 attacks or 250 magic damage
When you deal 50 magic or 1 attack, cube fragments scatter around, causing a little damage and slowing down opponents
Aghanim like old ultimate
This will make the hero truly situational against a hill. Now it is not always effective even against healing picks.

I propose to remake 1 ability of the Tidehunter.
Replace it with the walrus ability from Aghanim's labyrinth. Like the OGRE SEAL TOTEM, but with the ability to turn a little while sliding. Each bounce deals damage and slows enemies. As you level up, the number of bounces increases and, accordingly, the range and damage. This will make the hero much more interesting in lane and in fights. Don't change Aghanim. (Whoever added the aganim shard is a genius. It greatly improved the hero)

Loosen up Pudge's hook. The hero is picked or banned in every game. It is not normal that a hero can dominate a map using a hook that is not maxed out. Even if you remove the ability to pump up a hook by more than 1, the hero will still be picked.
Or reduce the radius of 1 spell at the initial levels
Or reduce the speed at the first levels.
Or add vision to the hero and a hook for everyone, even in the fog of the battle, provided that the hook is not maxed out.
Make pudge players max hook

And finally. This can be mechanically challenging. Let when the enemy hero goes into the fog of war, you saw him for another 1-2 seconds. Could attack and use abilities. The forest will still be used for an ambush, but it will be a little harder to escape into it. Probably every player lost a fleeing enemy in the forest. This will weaken the Tinker a little because he will be visible if he blinks. Often he blinks point-blank at you and gives you abilities, but you cannot catch him due to the fog of war.

thank you for your attention

submitted by Upbeat-Lavishness-23 to DotA2 [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 19:00 Hot_Evidence_6846 Just cried on a bus and now I’m embarrassed 😅

Long story short, there’s this guy on my block that’s been harassing me for a few weeks because I rejected him and told him I wasn’t interested. (Only 1-2 days a week) and at first I thought it’d be okay but this morning on my way to school he started yelling remarks at me and I yelled back at him and proceeded to wait for my bus. And telling my best friend I was going to call the police on him. While being PISSED OFF.
Once I entered the bus the softie in me couldn’t help but shed a tear. I called my bsf and told her what happened while crying? But I couldn’t hold it in…..but I feel like I was really loud 😵‍💫not really loud but not really quiet either.
Anyways hopefully this isn’t as bad as it seems and can be deemed wholesome in a way considering I was laughing by the end of my bus ride.😊😂
submitted by Hot_Evidence_6846 to rant [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 18:58 ClassWarAndPuppies Hoes mad 🤣

Hoes mad 🤣
Tue 21 May 2024 00.50 EDT
South Korea’s media regulator has banned access to a North Korean propaganda music video that it said idolised and glorified leader Kim Jong-un as a “great leader”.
The catchy tune titled Friendly Father has become an unlikely social media hit around the world, going viral on short-form video app TikTok and other platforms.
South Korea’s national security act blocks access to the North’s government websites and media to restrict exposure to the efforts by Kim’s regime to “praise, incite or propagate” its activities.
The regulator, Korea Communications Standards Commission, said in a statement on Monday: “The video is typical content linked to psychological warfare against South Korea, as it was posted on a channel operated to connect with the outside world and mainly focused on unilaterally idolising and glorifying Kim.”
The decision to ban the video was made after intelligence authorities asked for a review on whether it breached the law.
The song was unveiled last month by North Korea’s state television and shows soldiers and schoolchildren exuberantly belting out lines such as: “Let’s sing, Kim Jong-un the great leader” and “Let’s brag about Kim Jong-un, a friendly father”.
Pyongyang’s state media often displays exaggerated demonstrations of loyalty by citizens toward its leaders to help the latter consolidate power and to craft a personality cult around them.
The South’s regulator blocked access to some North Korean propaganda YouTube channels last year on the spy agency’s request.
The two Koreas are still technically at war since an armistice ended the 1950-1953 Korean war, not a peace treaty.
submitted by ClassWarAndPuppies to MovingToNorthKorea [link] [comments]


2024.05.21 18:48 Procircuitscrub I get the feeling that after 5 years of Flex, I might be getting the boot.

I get the feeling that after 5 years of Flex, I might be getting the boot.
This morning, I rolled up to the local .com warehouse for a $122.50, 3.5 hr block at 6:15 am.
I was stoked. But of course, shenanigans HAD to occur to offset that.
The staff parks everyone in line, yells for everyone to cut off their engines and then to exit vehicles.
Well, everyone (including myself) exits, except for people in 5 vehicles. All of those people wait a couple extra minutes, then get out, and all meet up off to the side, still waiting to approach staff for a cart until they see everyone else has theirs.
The group were all speaking Spanish to each other, and appeared to be friends. One of them I recognized as someone who is CONSTANTLY last in line every morning in order to hopefully not have to work due to being overbooked.
Well, of course, the whole group walks out with 1-2 packages because ofc, they get rewarded and nobody says a word to them. The rest of us get full carts.
One of them walks past me, gestures at his 1 package, laughs, and shrugs, as if to say "Gosh, that's crazy! Only 1 package!"
I approached the staff, asked what's being done about this group waiting in their cars until everyone else has their carts in order to get overbooked, and they told me that they have reported them to Flex, and submitted a ticket.
They held up the rest of us, who ACTUALLY showed up to work by doing this.
The staff went up and spoke with the guy that gestured at me afterwards.
Well, I just missed a call from Amazon, called back, and they have no idea what the call was about. No email, nothing, but was told that they forwarded my request to the management team.
Why do I get the feeling that I just had 5 complaints from 5 Spanish speaking "friends" and I'm about to get hit with an email stating that I've been de-activated? There's no telling what kind of fiction they could have called and told support.
Any advice in the event I see an email/get deactivated? 5 years of this, with zero issues, fantastic standing, etc, and I'm concerned that's all about to go down the drain.
Guess I got a good block this morning though 🤣🤣🤣
submitted by Procircuitscrub to AmazonFlexDrivers [link] [comments]


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