I'm a 43 analytical chemist with and MSc and 15 years of lab/instrument experience in food and flavors. I just got laid off. I am kind of at a loss for what to do. I am considering a career change but don't want to go back to school. I am not sure what else I could be hired to do.
My career history is MSc. in Chemistry/protein biochemistry, unemployed 8 months, moved 800 miles for the first job that offered $40k and benefits (food analytical lab), got laid off 9 months later, 3 years as a permatemp, my one good job was 9 years running a small flavors analytical lab, company got bought by a bigger company and 3 years later (After they had me cross train the other chemists) they laid me off.
I have been trying to apply to pharma but get little response to my apps. My only guess is that because pharma is much more regulated they don't want to hire me other than the swarm of contract jobs. There are only so many labs near me.
The old company is paying for outplacement service $2500 though I have no idea how to find a good one.
I generally like what I do. I like working with machines and with my hands in general. I am a DIYer and can fix and build many things on my own. I am proficient with GC/GCMS/LC/LCMS and a ton of wet chem equipment. I am however, rather introverted and shy.
I am very fearful though everyone around me especially my wife says it is no big deal that I will find something better but most of what I am seeing is contract crap jobs which I hate (I got stuck in one for 3 years from 2009-2012 and got to the point I set my diplomas on fire on my birthday).
Fortunately I do have savings as I have been so afraid for the last 12 years of losing my job that I lived a minimalist lifestyle and my wife has good benefits.
Can anyone offer advice?

Thank you to Space paladin for the canvas and u/Acceptable_Egg5560 for proofreading and critique
Content warning; flattery
[Next]
Memory transcript: Maarchal , MESEA Astronomers. Date: [Standard Farsul calendar ] July 13th, 3665
EEECH EEECH EEECH
I turn over on my side, haphazardly reaching for the alarm. My paw crashes into it, knocking it on the ground.
CRASH
“Sigh.” I sit up and rub my eyes open, through my bedroom window I can see the sun just barely creeping over the horizon. Painting the winter sky in a cacophony of reds and purples. It was beautiful, any other day I would appreciate it. But I was too fatigued to enjoy the sight.
The fucking overtime is killing me. Still better than being in this hellhole.
I turn over and dangle my legs over the side of my bed. Looking at the object of my frustration, there vibrating on the ground was my alarm clock, I reached down and picked it up.
Thoo thoo thoo
Great, just great, the fucking whistle was dented. I’m going to have to repair it today or risk waking up late tomorrow. Just my FUCKING LUCK.
“Sigh.” Breath in, breath out, push it down. This anger is pointless, don't feel it.
I get up and head downstairs, alarm in hand. I make my way to the kitchen and take out some plant/meal worm protein kibble. It tastes like shit, but it's cheap and fast to eat. Downing it with a lukewarm glass of sink water I make my way out into my front yard and get into my auto, putting my clock on the passenger seat. I start the hydrocarbon engine and back out of my driveway. The sun was much higher in the sky now, parting the reds and purples for yellow and a blue sky.
I turn and make my way toward main street. What little traffic we had would be dead at this time of day. I turn onto a dirt road and up to the station, a small data processing nodule.
MASEA Sonar and LIDAR telescope survey.
I park and exit my auto, only to turn back and put my alarm in a more hidden place. Right near the pedals. Out of sight of the windows and thus away from any thieves.
Can never be too careful.
I make my way inside. “Hey Maarchal , getting in early again?” Germi asked me.
I nod. ”Hi Germi, can we just please skip the soliloquies today? I had a rough morning.”
“It's still morning, and you never want to talk. I don't think it's healthy but whatever, it's not my Curnts I'm leaving to poachers.”
He turns and punches in my ID code and buzzes me in, simultaneously clocking me in as well. I look down and shuffle my way in. But before I make it all the way in he stops me.
“Oh by the way, they hired a new guy. Said he’d be here around or after lunch. Might want to know so you can make an impression.”
I close my eyes and a growl begins to boil in my throat, before I force it down and turn to the chatty guard.
“I’ll be happier if you mind your own fucking business and do your job. I don't need you to be playing matchmaker again.” He took on a despondent look and shifted in his seat.
“I’m not trying to play matchmaker, I’m playing playdate. I think you need to get a friend, not a boyfriend necessarily. Although I’d be happy if you did. I just don't think you should be married to your job, it's not healthy!!!”
Before I realized it, anger perforated my insides. I growled deeply and launched myself at the wired fence between us. The chubby guard recoiled in his post. “I don't want you trying to interfere with my life!!! I am HAPPY!!! I don't need you or anyone else judging me for how I live!!!”
I turned away and stormed off to my office. Lousy son of a whore, he probably dropped out of high-school. What does he know of happiness? I am at the top of my field and it is not easy like his job.
I calm myself down and walk calmly to my office. There were other farsul in the hallway chatting.
​
Lousy time wasters, get to your office and analyze your data!!! I screamed internally. Knowing what little use it was trying to get them to be productive. As proven when I first started out here and nearly turned my voice ragged from the useless endeavor.
​
I pull up my chair and begin typing. The Light Gathering High orbit Telescope Apparatus or better now as the LiGHTA. Was sending out flashes in the direction of the ice giant Curbosa, the second largest planet in the system. Rich with moons, this had been its project for a number of years. My job was to analyze the data and make a useful model with it to better understand orbital mechanics.
I type in the command to print its data.
Using the white paper with the black spots that represented the light that made its way back to the telescope I began my work. The largest black spot was Curbosa, made up of around five hundred pixels. While the largest moon was around 10. Taking the next printed paper I compared them. Figuring out how each spot moved in comparison to the others.
“Hmm, that's… odd.” One Black spot, barely noticeable, was practically standing still compared to the rest. Even compared to Curbosa as the planet moved. As though it was not orbiting anything at all.
I grabbed the next paper, and the spot was gone. Weird, must have been something bright outside the solar system. A new variable star perhaps? I’ll have to send a request to other observatories to monitor that stretch of sky.
But for now I resumed my work. Calculating, measuring, drawing diagrams. It was all monotonous and time consuming work, but it had to be done by hand. By the time I was finished processing the five second interval of data collection it was almost lunch.
I went to grab my bag of kibble rations I keep in my office, before realizing I could use this time to have my alarm whistle repaired and get takeout as well.
On my way out of the office Germi was giving me a look of abject pity. Fuck that, I’d rather have the avoidance or indifference of everyone else rather then that useless emotion.
I get in my auto and start the engine. I look at the passenger seat and notice my clock is missing, I quickly check around me to no avail. I put my head on the wheel and groan.
“Well, I already started the engine. Might as well get some actual food.” I press down on what I thought would be the brake pedal. Only to feel a surge of pain on my foot. I recoil and look down at the pedals. My clock was there, with a bit of blue on its side.
Oh, that's right… I left it there so it wouldn't be stolen. I lift my foot up and look at the damage, a decently sized cut but nothing worth addressing.
I reach down and grab the offending clock and toss it back into the passenger seat and make my way out of the parking lot. All the while my foot stings from the cut.
​
**\*
Dingaling
I make my way into the old clock shop, the shelves are filled with old and broken clocks and other knickknacks. There's a distinct taste of dust and mildew perforating the old building. Making my way through the maze of dilapidated appliances I find the front desk. A rather young farsul is standing behind it, screwing into the back of an old rust covered whistle alarm clock. I put my clock on the desk and waited for him to respond.
He glances up at me and then back to the object of his attention. Barely giving me any mind. “Excuse me.” I say to get his attention, to no avail. “EXCUSE ME!!!” I yell and slam my hand onto the desk.
“Just a sec, let me finish thiiiisssss and done.” He then takes the back off the old rusted clock and sets it to the side.
“Alrighty, what could I do for you this day Ma'am?”
I pointed to my clock and began. ”The whistle on my clock got dented, I need you to replace or fix it.” He walked over and grabbed my clock, Inspecting all of it in depth except the whistle. Taking on a look of annoyance at the piece of metal and plastic. Shaking his head with his ears held back, he placed it back on the counter.
“I’m afraid I can't repair this, it's mass produced designed to fail shit made of sheet aluminum. Here, I can get you an old brass clock that you could hit with a hammer and the hammer would break before a dent forms.” He was wagging his tail and bent down to presumably grab a said clock.
“I don't want a new clock, I just want you to fix mine. Is there any way you can?” I inquired, becoming more and more annoyed with this guy. He stood up and placed a brass clock on the counter about the same size as mine.
He put his hand behind his head and scratched at his ears. “Well yeah, but it'd probably cost more than just to buy a new one. That's what these are designed to do, break easily but be a pain to repair. I’d have to saw off the whistle and weld a new one on. It would probably cost … fifty eight dollars.”
I was appalled, that was nearly three times how much I paid for it. He then gestures to the brass clock. “But this costs around thirty two dollars, but will probably outlive you.”
Breathing deeply, I reached in my wallet and pulled out the money for the new (old) clock. “Thank you for your business!!!” He said as I turned to leave, I didn't so much as turn to acknowledge him. As I left the store I saw him toss my old clock into a scrap metal bin.
​
**\*
​
“Hello, what would you like to order?” The waiter asked, looking over the menu I contemplated my answer.
“I’d like the mersh meat pie, with a side of fried fleat fruit to go.”
He nodded and went to tell the chef. The restaurant was rather busy, I managed to see some of my colleagues getting lunch together and having a rowdy conversation in the back. With what looked like a centerpiece of a roasted mersh carcass in the center. Haphazardly consumed and cut up between them.
​
DINGALING
​
Looking over to my side I saw someone enter the establishment. He looked around at the crowded venue, seeing almost every seat taken. He then looked over at me. “Excuse me ma'am, might I trouble you to share this table?” I motioned my hand to the empty seat across from me and he took it. He was a rather tall Farsul, with a deep gray coat interrupted by patches of white on his front and sides of his muzzle. He was wearing a deep green cloak and sported leather shoes.
He clearly wasn't a local if he was cold enough for clothing. I sat in silence across from him. He folded his hands together and looked this way and that before settling on me. “So, what's your name?”
“Maarchal ”
“That's a pretty name, what do you do here?”
“I work at the observatory.”
He started to relax his posture. Leaning into his seat “really? That's cool, what do you do there?”
I gave him a distracted look, “that's classified.”
His features softened. “Not much for conversation, yeah?”
I shake my head “conversations are a waste of time. I have more important things to do.”
He smirks and leans back “Right, like sitting in silence waiting for comfort food. C’mon humor me!”
I roll my eyes “fine, tell you what if you can make me laugh i’ll “humor” you.”
He sits up with a stupidly cute smile and wagging tail. “Alright, so there are six pups at a party, and a bag with six freenkern fruit, each one is given one, but the bag still has a freenkern in it. How can that be?”
“Sigh I don't know, how can it be?”
His smile gets bigger somehow. “You just give the bag to the last pup!”
…
…
“Snicker That is ah, that is really dummmhh, heh.”
“AH HA, You laughed!!!” He said while pointing a digit at me and with a big stupid grin on his face.
“No , I chuckled at best, that's not a laugh!”
He wagged his finger at me. “Yes it is, now you have to talk with me!”
I reluctantly threw my paws in the air, ”fine, fine, I’ll try to engage. Just for the wait.”
He pumped his hand and went right at it. “So you're an astronomer, what made you want to be one?”
I turned to give him my full attention, “well, my family has always been big on scholarly type vocations. Both my parents are archeologists, my older brother is a chemist and my younger sister is apprenticeshipping with my parents. I chose the stars as my field of study, as I always loved space stories as a pup.”
He gave me the side eye, “so it's as simple as barky spaceships was your favorite show?”
A smirk threatened to overtake my features. “No, no, I liked to watch documentaries of the stars and read space operas as a teen. Still do, or er did.” I slightly reached into myself from the memories of shame.
He seemed to notice my regret at admitting the bit of info about operas, as he seemed to try to steer me away from the topic. “ What? Documentaries? Those aren't stories!!!”
“Uh, yeah they are! Isn't the history of how the universe formed not the most epic story of all? Every speck of light has a story to tell, every asteroid has secrets to uncover!!!” My voice was beginning to raise, so I began to rain in my outburst.
“Wow, you really like space that much? Such passion is inspiring!!! And a little cute. “ He rested his head on his hand and looked at me with a type of reverence and admiration that made me feel warm inside.
I smiled back, “Yeah, there's just… so much to uncover…” I reached into myself, the shame had been growing with this attention and expelling of my passion in the most unprofessional manner.
He seemed to recognize my turmoil as his face began to match my dour mood. “Uh, hehe, um. Oh those fellows seem to be having a good time. You know them?”
I put my head in my hands, as he just pointed to my “colleagues”. Who had begun to pop off bones of the mersh carcass and cracked them open to suck the marrow out. “Uhh unfortunately, they work with me at the observatory. Bunch of rowdy pups in adult pelts.”
He looked over and seemed confused by my abject contempt for the manner they conducted themselves in.”... Is there a reason you take offense at their mirth?”
“We’re scientists, we should conduct ourselves as absolutely serious as possible. Instead they treat their job as a game.” I flippantly threw my hand in their direction.
He looked at me with confusion. “I don't think they treat it like a game… I just think they like having fun, so what if they don't act all prim and proper a hundred percent of the time?”
I rub my muzzle, “it's just, we do serious work, they need to be serious as well.”
He smiled at me “yeah, whatever you say”.
I rub my arms, he continues to look at me with mirth. His default joy was infectious, as I struggled to keep my tail still.
“Here you go ma’am, that'll be twelve dollars.” The waiter said as he handed me my takeout. I reached into my wallet but found I was short around six dollars.
I shouldn't have let that clock smith up sale me.
“I’m so sorry, I seem to be short. Let me go to my auto to see if I have enough for the meal.
I got out of the building but before I could open my auto the Farsul I was speaking to rushed out with my takeout. “Uh, here, I paid for you.”
I smiled as I took the meal, ”really? All for a gal you spoke with for all of ten minutes?”
He rubs the back of his head and looks at the ground “heh heh yeah, just wanted to repay you for the pleasure of your company.”
I smirk and enter my auto, “well I hope you enjoyed it, as I doubt we’ll meet again soon.” I start the engine and wave goodbye to the Farsul as I leave the parking lot. Who returned the favor.
​
**\*
​
I exit my auto and make my way to the entrance , Germi seemed all too happy to see me again. “Well someone seems to have had a pleasant launch break.” I don't give him the time of day as I wait for him to buzz me in.
I make my way to my office and go about devouring my food. The meat pie was a delectable pastry filled with rich meat and the fried fleat fruit skin was crispy but the fatty flesh inside was all hot and gooey, with a pleasant texture and a hint of a tangy flavor. Much better than my kibble. I ate so fast that it was all gone in a matter of minutes. I relaxed into my seat as the pleasant feeling of a full stomach washes over me.
“You really needed that huh?”
I opened my eyes and turned to my open doorway, the Farsul from the restaurant was standing in it. With his green cloak taken off and draped over his right shoulder.
Embarrassment threatened to swallow me whole. “Wh- what are you doing here?”
​
He shrugs “I'm the new guy. Wanted to get lunch before I came into work.”
I put my head in my hands, unable to reconcile who I acted so unprofessional with.” I-I only humored you because I thought you were just passing through… I have a reputation here!!!”
He smiles and leans on the side of the door frame. “Yeah, I figured after the fellows at the bar mentioned how I survived without getting burned by the “Vermscoorn”. That's you right?”
I nodded. “ I um , I have an anger problem. “
“Coulda fooled me. Anyways, I look forward to working with you. Oh by the way, names Ponthyt.”
He exits my office door frame and I turn and sink my head onto my desk. Annoyed by my tail wagging, displaying a joy that I wished wasn't there.
[Next]

Firstly, i know i might be overreacting but Im mad as hell right now. This is also from South Australia but I will take any advice. <3
I took my car to them for the first time this year and when I got the car back it was making a weird noise.
When I told my dad he said its probably just the new brakes. A week later i was doing 100kmh on the expressway when my car completely shut down.
The timing chain snapped which hit the pistons and caused me to need the whole engine replaced. We had it towed to the mechanic that it was serviced at (with his consent) where he had a look at told us it would be $2.5k to replace the engine. And take 1 week, maybe 2. At the end of week 2 my dad called to see what was happening and they informed him that they were: 1- sent the wrong engine so they had to send it back. 2- Decided to do the suspension without our approval. 3- One of the guys fixing it was out sick for a few days 4- It would only be a few more days.
Moving ahead to the end of week 3 and dad calls again to which they reply "its fixed but we just cant get it to start". Meaning its not fixed, all they had done was put the pieces together.
now week 4 and dad called them again where they informed us that they couldnt get the car to start so now theyve sent the parts back to the manufacturer for them to figure out which could take another week.
I cant get around without my car. They dont offer loan cars (even though it says they do online).
I cant get to work, do food shopping, see the doctor, take my cat to the vet to get his medication, cant go to the chemist to get my own medication. I have to rely on the only two people in my life that can take me to and from work but if they forget or have any issues i cant catch the bus because ill be 2 hours late for work and i cant call an uber because the fee is 1-2 hours pay each way and i only work 4 hour shift.
~ AFTER GETTING THE CAR BACK ~
(Full cost for their work was $2400 - BETTER than we were quoted)
Before even leaving the shop my prtner notices the tow took was still screwed into the front of my car so he takes it out to put it back in the boot where he noticed the bash plate sitting. He asks why thats in the boot and the guy says “ahh shit”. So before my partner can say anything this guy comes and grabs it (literally snatching it) and says “bring it back next week and we’ll get it sorted”. (We do not have intentions on leaving my car with them again).
Pulling out of the driveway i notice the car shakes when i turn (the power steering is empty. So there goes another $50 within the first hour of having it back.)
Next thing im trying to show my dad the jolting and the car WONT START. We threw it into neutral and got a spark. This happened FOURTEEN more times that day. Counting each time we turned the key to start it.
Skip ahead 2 days and my dad decides to take the car when he goes to watch the footy, on the way back he hits the curb because the breaks failed to stop him in time. He was at the end of our road so he pretty much rolled home and into the driveway where he took the wheel off to check the damage (which so far has cost us $200 for parts) and discovered that the bolts were not tight at all as if they had been screwed on by the old guys hand.
~ DASHCAM REVIEW ~
My car is equipped with a dashcam that turns on with the car, and after checking it we have discovered that they pushed my car into something. Dragged my unmovable car using their commodore ute, up the road to the wreckers for parts which can be extremely damaging.
Then while at the wreckers i have a recording of one of the guys saying “just smoke in the car bro, theres literally cigs in the door.” Which 1- were smokes id taken off my manager who was quitting. 2- i dont even allow vapes in my car. 3- even if i did allow smoking in my car, thats a customers car and they didnt know anything about it.
~ CURRENTLY ~
As of right now my car is up on lifts in my shed, wheel is off, first replacement part has been ordered, and they still have my bash plate. We are (for obvious reasons) not taking it back to them, my partner is going to work on it because even though hes not a mechanic and just a car guy, he will at least be honest and communicate issues with us.
I have managed to purchase another car so at the very least i can get to work.
Im angry, im stressed, and its taking a lot for me to not lose my temper.
The name of the mechanic is Dynamic Mechanix in Lonsdale, South Australia. Please, if you or someone you know live around that area, let them know to go anywhere else. These guys might be cheap financially but theyre also cheap emotionally.
But do i have anything i can sue them for or anything like that? I only have the dashcam and the car as evidence and i dont know if any of that is solid enough to give me a fighting chance to take them to court.

Vault Boy MOVESET
Lightweight with 2 jumps and a crawl
GIMMICK
At the beginning of the match 2 shops will appear at the center of the stage, one a restaurant, the other a weapon shop. The more bottle caps you have the better the stuff you get. For the restaurant you will start the match with bubble gum, Then the next stage is funnel cake, then after that is sugar bombs, then food paste, then cold nuka punch, Finally Nuka quantum (note the only thing that changes is how much health you get from consuming non of the additional effects). Then for the weapon store. In melee you will start with combat knife, then steel sword, then rolling pin, then aluminum rolling pin, then finally puncturing powerfist (note this goes for all the weapon types the only thing that changes is damage and end lag nothing else). For ranged start with classic pistol, then eddies peace, then revolver, then prototype gauss, finally the gauss.
Basic Attacks
Jab: Gun Fu (vault boy raises gun before shooting)
2 hit jab. One frame.
Dash: Ninja Blitz (Vault boy runs forward while wearing a ninja costume)
Great damage but poor knockback
Side Tilt: Intimidation (Vault boy yells as he shoots a gun at the ground barly missing his feet)
Depending on your gun level can do mid to major damage causes flinching
Up tilt: Melee bopple (vault boy swings his melee weapon from low to high above him)
Depending on your melee level can do mid to major damage with decent knockback
Down Tilt: V.A.N.S (a toy truck appears in front of him)
small flinching damage but big knockback
Side Smash: Energy Bopple (Vault boy shoots the thirst zapper in front of him)
Does More damage and knockback depending on what consumable level you are and can poison with a higher chance to poison the weapon you have
Up Smash: Rooted (Vault boy roots into the ground and swings his melee over his head)
Does Great to Amazing Damage and Knockback but leaves him vulnerable
Down Smash: Demolition Chemist (Vault Boy Press a TNT container blowing him and any opponent)
Does Great Damage and Knockback But Will also hurt vault boy and a bit of end lag
Aerials
Neutral Air: Adamantium Skeleton(Vault Boy glows green)
Does minor damage but invincible while using it
F Air: Party Person (Vault boy pops a bottle)
Does Minor damage but great knockback. If Level 5 or 6 with consumables the move does double damage
B Air: Science (Vault Boy faces the screen as he shoots a taser)
Does Minor damage but stuns
Up Air: Life Giver(Vault boy grows a beard as he holds his hands above him with a golden arc in between them)
Does Great Damage
Down Air: Concentrated Fire (Vault boy shoots under him)
Does Great to Amazing Damage and Knockback a lot of start lag
Grabs
Grab: Injects opponent with a needle knocking them out
Pummel: stabs opponent with the needle
F Throw: pulls knife from behind there back and throws it at opponent
Throws opponents twice as far if its a women
B Throw: Grows many arms and tosses the foe
Throws opponents twice as far if its a guy
Up Throw: Pulls opponent onto his back before jumping tossing them up
Down Throw: Table with a robot and shot gun appears under opponent before vault boy grabs the shotgun and shoots them
Specials
Neutral Special: Survival
A treasure chest or trash can appears in front of vault boy, which he will then scavenge. Doing this does get you bottle caps. You can hold the button down and the longer you hold the more bottle caps you get but if someone hits while scavenging you will be knocked out of the scavenge. If used in front of a shop you will level up in that shop's skill but lose your bottle caps. And if used in the air you will eat/drink your consumable. You will not stop eating/drinking unless knocked out of it or you finish eating so its not recommend to be used over a blast zone. If you finish the meal/drink you will gain some health back
Side Special: Ghoul
Vault boy will walk forward as a ghoul before returning to normal. However a ghoul will appear where Vault boy was. Now the ghoul will attack everyone including vault boy (though he will take less damage) the ghoul has 20 health but they heal and will not despawn until killed. As many ghouls can be on stage at once though it is unwise to do as vault boy will probably take just as much damage if he can’t reasonably doge them. When one is killed he cannot use side b for 5 seconds.
Up Special: Power Suit
Vault Boy will dawn a power suit and fly up. Does a lot of damage but puts him in free fall.
Down Special: Vault
Will spawn a vault. And walk inside. Vault boy can’t be attacked in a vault. However if vault boy stays in the vault to long it will start to poison him. It is a random amount of time until the vault fails. Vault boy can leave the vault at any time by pressing down b again. When the vault poisons him he can’t leave it for 2 seconds as he takes more and more damage. Afterward vault boy will fix it and stay in the vault where it will take shorter and shorter time until the vault breaks as though vault boy did a sloppy job repairing it. And if the vault breaks and vault boy goes over a hundred he will straight up just lose his stock. So it is unwise to stay in for to long cause unless you have god tier luck you will lose stocks incredibly fast.
Final Smash: Fallout
Vault boy would disappear as a nuke drops onto the stage. If hit directly by the nuke then major damage would rack up and if it goes over a hundred a ko. But even if you dodge the bomb there's the fall out to deal with which deals less damage but still does a lot and if it goes over a hundred would still kill. The smash would end with vault boy going right up to the camera and giving his iconic thumbs up
Cosmetics
Costume
Base with blue and yellow
Brown and Red (Nuka Cola reference)
Blue and purple (Nuka Cola quantum Reference)
All white colors (Synth and Nuka Cola Cide reference)
Completely Black (Nuka Cola Black Reference)
Metallic Grey clothes (Power suit reference)
Green and yellow clothes with a green top hat (Luck Reference)
Alt wearing Baseball uniform
Taunts
He will start flexing
He’ll stand at a podium
Reading a book sitting on a book
Victory Animations
Tons of bobbleheads sit on a shelf before vault boy sits down right beside said shelf
A nuke drops in the background before vault boy panics and enters a vault
Him Giving his iconic thumbs up

Let’s revive Sydney’s Late Nights.
This was inspired me, never making it to the shops, or to do my nails or anything like that due to Graves’ disease exacerbating, my already combined ADHD and ASD. Oh wait, I mean you can combine them, but I have combined type ADHD LOL and I worked in the cross before Gladys ruined everything. Also, I am a big fan girl of Albo, so no Albo Abuse here; Labour as a party, ehh, go for it but not Albo.
See what a sidetrack, but the other inspiration was seeing how long people have having to wait for ASD and ADHD assessments, because of the recent influx of people wanting to get assessed because of TikTok etc. I know a lot of people have come to their diagnoses this way, but it has Creased waiting times for people who really really need these appointments and also medication shortages so this is also going to be a place where you can find clinical psychologist willing to do full comprehensive intakes or assessments or reports for you, possibly psychiatrist telehealths who can do late night telehealth appointments?
Late night pharmacies, of course, and Sydney’s now TWO 24 hour Chemists.
Late night food for late night dates or hangs.
FREE things to do in Sydney After Dark, also completely sobeclean activities and events for those in Alcohol and/or other Drug Recovery Journeys of any kind (we don’t bash maintenance etc) and hopefully we can run some late night NA/AA/GA etc and also Nar-Anon and Al-Anon etc; as we are all aware, a lot of us get trapped into relationships with people who are addicts or abusive because of the faulty firing or wiring or lack of dopamine and whatever else in our brain; that makes most of us extremely empathetic, and that means we feel empathetic for people who are deserve empathy as well. So that’s another thing. I will be teaching on you, I guess or spreading awareness around recovering from abusive relationships and narcissistic abuse.
I would love to run some late night parenting programs over zoom teams that actually get certificates to use in court if need be etc.
Once a week, a domestic violence, survivor group online where we just have a chat.
Grief and loss and trauma.
DBT
Recovery skills and tools for the still using addict and also addicts in early recovery.
Followed by a more advanced one for people who’ve reached 6-9 months and approaching the 1 year mark and then one year onwards 🤍🩶🖤
Anyways I gotta run (don’t we all 😓) but don’t be shy! Post whatever you want. RSD free Zone. No judging and no being mean are basically my only rules!

I plan to Expand my hand to the grands
man your bland and I can’t stand you
what a wack dude spittin wack truths
I’m stoned like a statue settlin a rap feud
you be spittin fast food
come and wine and dine with the finest
heard your on a diet
made you rewind this I’m the guy who rhymes slick
my minds sick like snot up in your sinus
my lines are brightest your bound to get blinded
by my mic spit I’m the wisest
you can call me your highness I’m the flyest like a Pilate
we stay private movin quiet
tip toe in silence when we get violent
i hire hits
big steppa get your ankles tied quick
a nympho ridin im in more booty than a pirate
cuz I kick that fire shit
you desire this all you can do is admire it
I’m rulin like a tyrant
my soul is vibrant spittin out some science
It’s the lyrical chemist ballin like I’m Dennis
eat a chump for breakfast if he thinks he has the best wrist
I’ll be back for seconds when it’s time to replenish
I mastered these rapper schemes
gradually attackin these wack MCs
who can’t compete and have no chance to beat
the savage beast

I tried to post this in a sub specific to my country but the mods removed it, i don't know why. the few people who answered told me not to do this as it would be a waste of creativity. anyway, I'm a 3rd semester computer engineering student. I'm already 33 and went for it because i really enjoyed programming after trying it out almost randomly (i'm an adventure seeker, lol) and figured i had nothing to lose if it didnt work out. College is cheap here. Already own a house. No interest in marriage/kids ever. No previous career only job hopping between low-end café jobs. You know the story...
Anyway, almost my whole family worked/work in the public healthcare system, i was rejected twice and now i got a call from them after waiting for ~8 years. Now, this isn't my dream job at all, i'd Start out as a janitor and could switch later to something else but it wouldnt be anything i like , i don't feel like becoming a nurse or doctor or chemist. Studying and working at the same time is not an option because for the first few years there you have unpredictable schedules. So why would i go for that?

• it's a government job, which means im financially set-up for life . Not gonna be a millionaire but don't want to either way, as long as i have food, Shelter and healthcare i'm cool
• wages are higher than those of the same positions on the prívate sector. Yes, even as a janitor or data entry clerk you can live fairly decently. There's growth opportunities anyway Even if You don't want to get into nursing, they have dozens of Jobs there
• AMAZING work/life balance. This is what really gets me. Everyone gets 2 days off, 1 month of paid vacation just to start (then more days as years pass), shifts are either 6 or 8 hours, meal time included, you can take leave for months up to a year and still keep your job.

Now, i know that programming can get you SO MUCH MONEY in the long term and what not but i don't wanna idealize something im not even familiar with. The few programmers i know are kinda burnt out and they don't even code anymore, they're project managers and just wanna retire and own a farm or something.
As much as i love my major, i don't know what to do. I feel that with a job like that and with all that free time i could have more creative Freedom and work on whatever i want without caring about selling myself and competing in a race i feel behind because i'm way too prone to anxiety. I'm fascinated by technology in general. I also love all the things college would teach me after i'm done with all the math, but i know that even then i could be stuck doing webdev because the job market is brutal. I.like what i do, i don't even want a farm. But i feel that if i don't do programming profesionally i'm never gonna get good enough to create anything actually useful.
as you can imagine and as per my work history i'm a misfit in society and this job would free me from dealing with HR ever again... or kill my dreams once and for all.
Any insight?

​

TLDR: I won't talk about every choice as this is too long, already. You don’t have to read all this, for the love of god you don't. Just know I enjoyed every female character in this game as a partneromantic love interest. Hopefully, I’ll have enough time to do the guys. Sorry for this being fucking SIX PAGES (I have a problem don’t send help)
Scarlett: Oh Scarlett you poor sweet girl. I have never seen a main love interest out matched this badly since Dragon Quest 8; which is a similar situation funny enough. She is not a bad character, though I completely understand why people have issues with her. She's the purest vanilla out there to the point where it almost feels like she knows she is a blonde haired, blue eyed, big breasted, can’t cook well childhood friend princess in a Japanese game. And she has the issue of the character knowing more than the player. Scarlett is Alain's childhood friend. Not ours. He’s used to her antics and only sees her from his perspective. With her pushing herself so hard at Alain it can be frustrating when you don’t know her as well more so when all her rapports are her trying to get into Alain’s pants and the actual character stuff for her is one of the last area before the final boss.
But vanilla isn’t bad. It’s nostalgic. Comforting. Scarlett will never be a bad choice but is the normal choice.
Chole: Holy shit Chole. When I first saw her I thought nothing about her. And then I got spoiled on her ending and found it hilarious that she was one of the only girls to give Alain a kid and not her so called best friend so I went I through her rapport.
And uh, did Chole’s writer have it out for Scarlett? Like it’s utterly baffling how Chole is such a better romantic choice then so called main heroine that it's like that jojo stomping meme. every other girl beating the shit out of Scarlett’s chances and Chole, HER BEST FIREND WHO AGREES TO HELP HER, looks to be minding her own business. And then comes in with steel spiked chair that explodes on impact.
The theme of ‘you can be yourself around me’, the player getting to known Alain better by doing her rapport, dancing in the fucking moonlight. As someone who’s a hardcore romantic; hence why I like this game, I was god smacked at how sweet it all was. And she’s not a trope, well more like she doesn’t have a ‘dere’. The only thing like that about Chole is that she’s just everyone's mom. She has nearly the same mom energy as everyone’s favorite titty owl milf.
And I think that’s the point as the losing heroine trope, or second girl, is becoming more popular in Japan. Characters like Scarlett are actually becoming more rare and harder to come by in manga and light novels. You’re more likely to get a gyaru or a character like Chole as in love interest than your classic blonde, blue eyed, big titty, childhood friend princess tsundere. But that’s getting off topic. Basically, Chole is the main heroine. Sorry Scarlett.
Yunifi: I’ll come back to Yunifi’s fat ass later. (I know Alain is! bum dum tis) but as a character, for me I can sum her up as, Tifa but bottom heavy; she feels like that spunky childhood country bumpkin friend that was not too girly, but girly enough you wouldn’t call her a tomboy. And then you see her again after a few years and you’re already calculating how much a ring will cost. And I shouldn’t have to explain the bottom heavy part :v
She would fit right in with the childhood friend trio, and considering she’s a princess that might have actually happened in some alternative timeline. She’s fun, spunky, cute, not afraid to speak her mind with a sharp tongue, basically, a cat girl, a MONSTER with her bow, and her alter scene with Alain is my favorite.
Alain, poor sweet innocent lad, just thinks ‘Aww she’s talking about making more friends.’ And the girl comes up to him like basically saying ‘No I want you to breed me.’
The look on that poor boy’s face when he realized what he just got into. Like “Oh!....oooohhhh sshhiittt….”
I am reminded of that one meme of female lions biting the balls of their mates when they want sex when the mates are too tired.
Alain better hope he has the stamina of a Unicorn…..
Dinah: Furry memes aside, Dinah shocked me with how cute she is. Like while the Krystal comparison is accurate, it’s also not. Krystal has always been more sexy than cute. Bikini armor, rich accent, tight clothes. Nintendo’s messy handling of her aside, she’s always been mostly sex appeal. Dinah is too, but if you put her character on a normal human, the effects would be the same, but at the sometime it wouldn’t be her as her past makes it hard for her to trust humans. Making her a Berengaria lite; Berengaria has way more rough edges than Dinah who smooths them out rather fast.
It's really nice, if you’re a furry or not, to have an ACTUAL interspecies relationship and not just ‘human but with one extra step and nothing else’ (looking at you Witcher fuck off with that shit). Which is always baffling seeing as a lot of video games have their roots in DND and well you can fuck a dragon in that. And not just the ones on two legs.
But a lot of games just go ‘slightly different human’ when they do theses. Like the other reasons people were upset about the whole Tali face reval years ago was yeah she was a bit too human looking. But biowear isn’t the same company it was during ME3 and now a days…..
Though I wouldn’t mind them going into more detail about their racial differences, there’s some, but wouldn’t call it mass effect level with characters like Tali or Garius.
Still the fact that a furry character that has harsh edges nearly on the same level as Berengaria, is this cute; you can’t tell me you had a little chuckle or go aww when she told Alain she was turn him down, clearly lying with her face so red or asking him to recognize her feelings for him during their last rapport. It makes me wish that she came out around the same time as Krystal so we can get more art of her, because right up, Dinah’s way better than Krystal. (The old furry guard is going to gut me but I’ll die on that hill damn it)
Berengaria: This woman is a bitch (affectionately). Which makes her perfect for our idiot prince.
They both have the issue of taking the weight of the world on their shoulders for the people they care about. But Berengaria is dumber than Alain because he learned to accept help while she pushes others away to keep them safe. And you can’t blame her. She lost an eye. She’s been through some shit. She’s seen how bad and cruel the world can be. And Alain isn’t even her ‘cute little ball of sunshine to light up her life’ dude’s seen that shit too.
But instead of colder view of things, it’s more realistically optimistic. Yeah there is a possibility she’ll stab him in the back but he’ll know there’s a reason for it and try to help her then just let her stab him and be done with it. Aka Alain doesn’t always take her shit and trusts her a lot. Something she isn’t used to and way more than most people have, and even should. Her bitchy standoffish behavior rolls off of him most of the time. He doesn’t even hesitant to nearly drag her into his army. Like it’s only a slight exaggeration that he just picks her up and places her in his army and I don’t even think he’s heard of her save for what Travis has told him; that whole scene had me laughing for a good minute.
It shows the deep trust Alain has for her, even in her ending.
She had a skill called WARRIOR PRINCESS. That woman was not going to sit around with some stuffy ass, slow thinking, face lying, dancing old people taking half a generation just to cut some red tape to help people. Hell she probably scared everyone shit less when she walked in being Alain’s wife with that scar on her face and icy attitude. Of course she was going to fuck off back home to take care of things there. This is a woman who would willingly walk into a trap if it meant keeping people safe. And Alain is all for it. He right up says they’ll face whatever choice they made together and her going back to handle things like the fantasy batman she is while her husband handle the political shit he’s far better at doing than her is a good move. All Alain ask is that she visits the kids because lord knows they had a few :v.
Berengaria is that IRL goth girlfriend that scares people who have been online too long and don’t know how real emo and goth girls can be like.
Amalia: while it’s sad her romantic bits are short it’s understandable with what the team had and even then she’s meant to be picked up last as she’s ten levels away from the max. You aren’t meant to pick her up until late game or after. Lord knows everyone would pay more for just more rapports for everyone they did that good of a job with these characters. And even with Amalia’s short length, she makes good with what she has. She’s a simple woman wanting a strong guy by her side. She reminds of Barghest from fate grand order.
A massive woman who’s insanely strong and is based off a fantasy dog that eats people. But she has dreams of marriage, home cooking for her lover, and wears dresses. While being able to cut a whole mountain at the same time.
While Amalia isn’t on that level it’s clear she has a girly side being embarrassed to explain how much she eats. She’s a nice girl that can take on an army and that’s all she needs to be. And it’s nice to imagine the army being horrified of this wall of a woman training them but gets all soft and cute when her husband who’s nearly at the height of her crotch comes around bringing her a massive table of food for lunch.
Milsanadra: I saw a quote on Twitter that sums her up moderately well. ‘Rise Kujikawa walked so Milsanadra could run’
Everyone was caught off guard by her extreme forwardness and charmed by her thirst for everyone's favorite ‘blue haired fop’ but once you get to know her you know she has ‘perfect woman’ trope; someone who’s great at everything but doesn’t get that much attention. But she still tries hard anyway. Girl is a hard worker and Alain, the bastard, is going to shower her with so many deserved compliments that Baltro's wrinkly ass will die from embarrassment. They have that perfect couple feel. Like you see the two of them and don’t question if they are dating you just know. They bounce off each other well as even Alian is a walking flirt machine only unintentional…half of the time. Dude even mistakenly says ‘she belongs to him’ when they first met; for the love of god muzzle this man….
She reminds me of Metera from Granblue fantasy. A flirty, free spirted woman who is actually a genius in a lot of things. The only difference is that Metera is just too free spirited; good luck getting that woman to do anything if it isn’t fun for her. Under Milsandra’s flirty personality is a hard working, sweet girl that needs all the love she can get.
And I love how she dose a complete 180° at the end. She goes from ‘oh I am good with being the side chick’ to ‘I am not letting any other woman step up to my man.’
Yahna: Those hips did not lie, she really is a great waifu. Yahna having a sense able reason for de-aging herself is what made me like her. It’s very common for the reason to be comical. Like the witch is very vain or it was an mistake with some magic. But Yahna has a good point. The fuck can grandma do in a war? And the guys were looking for an old granny not a sexy young witch with hips to spare. It showed that she was more than just good looks and I love the fact that she is basically just a grandma in younger body; R.I.P Hodrick dude better blind himself because Yahna is young and sexy and she is not going hide that from anyone.
And then the arc with Elheim made me love her. Holy shit as if they needed another nail in Scarlett’s waifu ranking coffin. They really pulled the ‘simi reincarnated lovers not going to fall for the same thing our past selves did’ in front of my poor old heart. Like god damn one of the most romantic tropes in the books, how was I supposed to say no?
I don’t want to say she’s perfect for Alain, because let be real this whole cast nearly is, but fuck me is Yahna dragging me kicking and screaming to say that. That ‘bewitching bride’ of the prince’s has a powerful spell on me and a fair amount of fanbase.
Virginia: The incest is what is holding her back from completely up ending Scarlett’s throne of main heroine. Christ and I thought the chemist with the other girls was powerful this is something else. If they weren’t cousins I would have been so confused why they aren’t already a thing. Like god damn every conversation between was damn delight and a showcase of why they work so damn well together. Virginia’s fiery attitude is what Alain’s needs to sometimes stop thinking and start fucking shit up but Virginia needs to learn to hold back. Hell she even mentions it after getting revenge for the Roses. And there’s that one line in Darkengard that feels a tad sexually charged.
It's the end of a mission that focuses on Leah’s heritage as a Drakengard native. And after Alain wisely suggest she go spoke to the captives instead of Virginia who’s likely to start a war, the woman herself comes back with a ‘Ill show you a war.’
It's short moment, mainly joke, but it perfectly sums up why they are the perfect king and queen like bar none. I can’t even argue with the woman when she just asks for the ring. And knowing vanillaware’s thing for badass powerful sword women this was totally planned. Along with her Schrödinger’s panties.
And yeah this is just like the whole thing with Reha from FE3H but with less odd ‘if you think about too much she’s just fucking her own mother.’
Rosalinde/Eltolinde: Gape moe is a good way to sum up theses girls. Eltolinde is the playful flirty younger sister type at first blush. And then you get to know her. Yes Eltolinde is a flirty palyful girl, but she’s also extremely hardworking, intelligent, tactical and just the other opposite of what you see of her. While her sister Rosalinde, acts the serious wise leader of the elves, but you see her act goofy, get drunk, take the playful ‘he loves me he loves me not’ game very seriously. Like her sister she still is that wise leader, mature leader, but she also acts like a spoiled and spritely little sister.
While I won’t get into the long history of the term gap moe, basically it’s this; when characters have traits of tropes opposite of them. Aka getting lied to by the character. Games like blue archive dose this to an extreme degree, and if anyone has been on the internet and/or glimpse at Japanese pop culture you know that game has fanart up ass because of that. Its not a wonder why those two are the one of the most popular girls with Eltolinde taking the top spot. These girls make a really great argument for harem endings because it feels off just taking one and have having the other.
Liza/Ridiel: I am going to put these two together, because this is getting too long and it’s the same feeling as they both surprised me at how cute and serious they are with their stories. Liza is one of the I want to say two tomboy girls in here, but unlike Berenice who’s more like a bro, Liza is like that spunky little sister that doesn’t want to be called cute but actually enjoys it. And it’s nice seeing Alain pull the poor girl along with his usual charm as well as respecting her wish in taking care of her desert home.
Ridiel’s trouble with her race was treated rather well with Alain not trying to be a dreamer and say something silly like ‘he’ll rid people of those thoughts’ but more understanding as he’ll continue to fight for that equality and her determination to surpass her mom’s skill is insane as it is admirable; thank god for mommy Chole. Also, while it is a great way to end her character arc and embrace her bloodline, it is not funny imagining her mother laughing at her from heaven. Girl goes on for a good minute about not being like her mom and dating humans. And then she falls for the damn PRINCE of all humans. Her mother is cackling in her grave I am sure.
‘Ha! Not so easy when you met a hot guy who treats you great now is it!? I better get a lot damn grandchildren!’ Ridiel’s mother…. Probably.
Selvie: One of the funniest girls in my opinion. She knows her role; she’s nerdy bookworm mage that creeps in dungeons and that can barely throw a punch (but has some thick legs for some brutal kicks). She knows she’s the dweeb and doesn’t expect to be romanced in away way by anyone; even if she does have a body that’ll knock out an elephant.
So Alain needing to nearly beat her over the head at the altar and thinking him falling for her is a joke is so damn good. And she has a cute girly side to her too. Wanting to spend some alone time (at least that’s what I think. These girls do be freaky.) With Alain in some ruins, cherishing her ring. Their relationship really does remind me of the ‘my witch girlfriend and me doing whatever the fuck she wants’ meme. Dude is a good listener and really that’s all she needs. And cuddles.
Lighting round:
Berenice: Actual tomboy girlfriend. Feels more like a bro than a wife. But her shyly admitting that she has a crush on Alain to Mordon is cute.
Griffin girls: Fran is just cute bidding being her Griffin. And as for Celeste; who put a Disney princess with massive tits in my Japanese strategy game? Not mad just asking. I want to thank them.
Hammer girls: Smol hard working girl, Kitra and smol angry girl Nina. Both flavors of a badass small girl with a big fuck off hammer. With Kitra being the standout with being her hammer and taking a swing at Alain.
Who I really agree with because holy shit Alain you absolute asshole shut up. Like, holy crap I am saying this as a guy who enjoys and likes to write this flowery dialogue, you stupid flirting mother fucker. I am blushing over here. It’s not even a major character trait of yours like Sanji from One Piece and you put him to shame. Like my god man, just complement Baltro’s old ass a few times and the fucker will fucking just explode from all the damn complements. Like holy shit, man woman, it does not matter Alain is a fucking menace to society.
I blame Josef. That fucker over corrected and now Corina has the equivalent of Helen of fucking Tory as a king. Mother fucker is going to cause another war with his damn charm alone….love the fucking bastard but jeez I was blushing during some of these rapports and maiden scenes. Like fuck man tone it down will ya???
Certainly my favorite game of the year so far and it's nice seeing a game put romance and partnership at the front. Normally this stuff is secondary or short lived for various reasons. But the writers did a good job of making everyone a believable choice for the prince. No one really feels like a bad romantic partner and/or comrade. Damn good job Vanillaweare
​

Edit: added a few pedals not previously listed and updated pedals that have been claimed.
Here's everything on the trading block currently. I'll be a little picky with the feelers, would like something specific from my list if possible. DM me for pictures
B = Box
F = Feeler

Haves

Pedals

• Black Mass 1312 B,F
• Caline 10-band EQ (Similar to MXR M108) B
• Caroline Parabola B,F (only for another tremolo)
• Danelectro The Breakdown B
• Danelectro Texas Trouble (TS style with bass and treble) B
• Discomfort Devices 1988 (1981 DRV clone)
• DOD FX20B Stereo Phasor
• EHX Soul Food B
• EQD Bit Commander
• Fulltone Mini Deja Vibe MDV-2 (expression version)
• Fulltone OCD V1.1 (I'm the original owner bought brand new around '07) F
• FuzzImp Drat (ProCo Brat clone) F
• Gogo Horizon Tuner (horizontal tuner pedal with big bright display)
• JHS Overdrive Preamp B
• Joyo 6-Band EQ
• Joyo Future Chorus B
• Joyo Sweet Baby B
• Maxon OD808
• Malaise Forever Vicious Bastard B
• Matthews Effects The Chemist F
• Mythos Mime B,F
• Palomar Sound Cholla B
• Pinebox Customs Sirens B,F
• Poison Noises Not For Josh B,F
• Saturnworks custom interface (dual buffered Y split. Input splits to chain/tuner, mono return split to 2 amps with kill switch at the end of your chain)
• T-Rex Tap Tone B
• Valeton Coral MDR B
• Walrus R1 B,F
• ZVEX Instant Lo-Fi Junkie F

DIY pedals

I made these myself all with PedalPCB boards and fully printed enclosures from Tayda

• EHX/JHS Lizard Queen clone
• Ibanez Bottom Boost clone
• Spaceman Titan II clone
• Way Huge Red Llama clone 25th Anniversary edition

Non-pedals

• Fix Pedalboard Riser 23"x5" - Hinged riser version with 3 of each 2.5" and 3.5" risers. See Reverb for more info
• Casiotone MT-240 (no psu, but will run off a 1Spot)
• Nintendo 3DS - Includes Super Smash Bros, Mario Kart 7 and Super Mario 3D as well as a case and a few installed games.
• Gameboy Pocket - Silver. Includes Tetris, Super Mario Land, Donkey Kong & Gex Enter the Gecko

Wants

• Caroline Arigato
• Microkorg
• Midi keyboard controller
• OBNE Excess
• Solid Gold FX NU-33
• Drum stuff (hardware, cymbals, snare drums, acoustic drums, triggers, mics)
• Offers

🪸 This ancient underwater *humanoid species 🪸 is shrouded by mistery, a cataclismic event having them fall from a hi-tek society to a primitive one, and later followed by an arduous climb up the ladder of history, with the unfortunate habit of finding itself (or better, some of its unlucky people) transported to *other dimensions 🌌>! (usually geopol minecraft servers)!<, where they will try their best to carve themselves a little slice of **aztec-inspired home.
Blue skin and dreadlocks, long fins (not a mermaid's tail!), magenta gills, and a colorful assortment of little decorative critters roaming around their hair and clothes, are the hallmarks of this species, able to breathe both in water and air, although preferring the former.
With a fully developed and in-depth biology, culture, language and history, there is always something new to learn about us! 🪬 To join the species, one must pass a brief test (mainly to prove of having browsed the wiki section of the discord and understanding the rules), and after a probationary period to assess if our vibes mesh well, one will be granted the citizen role! But much can be done before that even happens!
A personalized skin and a pair of "fins and gills" (enchanted armor) is provided to all those who pass the test, to get them started in their new underwater life! ⚒️ Many jobs are available in the budding city, from miner to farmer to gatherer to brewer, and more! ⚒️ The server we are currently on, has a ton of secret brewing recipes, which one needs to discover to brew. You might be the first one to discover a drink! 🍹 Foods are also a part of the same plugin, so being a chef *is actually a possibility! 🍰 But also a *chemist, *since... "funny substances" are also discoverable! ⚗️ The many plugins of the server also allow a great degree of specialization in other areas, like defensive engeneering, farm optimizer, strategist.... For those who demonstate aptitude for a certain area, the government offers a *Ministry role, be it of Agriculture (yes, there is agriculture underwater!), Finances, Defense, Foreign affairs, Labour, Infrastructure...🏟️ As the city is still in its infancy, upward movement is within anyone's reach! 🏟️
⛱️ We try to keep to ourselves, ensuring a chill and laid back playstyle away from drama, which settling in the ocean provides.⛱️ 🌊 Come and swim with us! The water is nice! 🌊 Dm me for a link to the discord!

Edit: cleaned up a bit.
Spent too much time writing this up in another thread.
Were cookies banned? How do we know and what do we know about the justification, if any? Level 1 research I spent wayyyyy too much time on and you could probably spend even more if you want to follow up on the Gisha lawsuits and such.
Original thing I'm replying to from u/KeizerDerp (in thread "Lycans claim about isolating sugar from foods/sodas, from a Quality Control Chemist"):

This whole argument is a misdirection anyway because the source that claimed cookies and potato chips were banned, also claimed that sugar itself was permitted. Israel never even claimed they banned these things because of possible use in Qassam rockets. The only reasoning from Israel I could find, came from this 2010 NPR article.

My reply:
Hold up. From the Gisha source:

The following list is approximate and partial, and it changes from time to time. It is based on information from Palestinian traders and businesspersons, international organizations, and the Palestinian Coordination Committee, all of whom "deduce" what is permitted and what is banned based on their experience requesting permission to bring goods into Gaza and the answers they receive from the Israeli authorities (approved or denied). It is not possible to verify this list with the Israeli authorities because they refuse to disclose information regarding the restrictions on transferring goods into Gaza. It should be noted that Israel permits some of the "prohibited" items into Gaza (for example: paper, biscuits, and chocolate), on the condition that they are for the use of international organizations, while requests from private merchants to purchase them are denied.

So it's not even an official list they're referencing and some items are allowed for "international organizations". I'm curious on how expansive or restrictive that is. E.g. can UNRWA import and distribute?
Further, the items on the lists are not impossible, but a little suss in contradiction:
Banned: plastic/glass/metal containers
Not banned: floor cleaning fluid, cooking oil, mineral water, plastic buckets plastic crates for fruits and vegetables, plastic chicken cages, canned meat, canned first, "all canned food except canned fruit"
Ok... maybe the fluids are all shipped in some plastic bags, but it seems some types of plastic containers are allowed. Maybe it's just bare, sealable containers? Maybe it's a fuck up from Israel, maybe they just are arbitrary and unhinged, idk. But I would guess e.g. the mineral water would come in containers, so they could just import and drain those? Or collect empties? Same thing for all the canned food and the empties.
And from the NPR source:

The question is, who has packaged the products and where do they come from? If you import something into Gaza from an uncertain, let's put it mildly, an uncertain producer from a country that has no diplomatic relations with Israel, then the problem is not the product. It is the packaging, it is the origin, the source and so on and so on. This is the nature of the problem.

So maybe they were asking for certain things or from uncertain sources?
Could be Israel was just being unhinged and arbitrary or lazy and didn't care about suffering or wanted suffering .... but also seems like the "list" is not an actual, official static item list. So it could be that there's way more to the story- were merchants trying to import from sketchy sources or sketchy amounts? And the level of validation to get put on Gidra's list is uncertain - were they just asking any merchant if they ever had any problem with importation of any good? Were the goods part of a larger shipment that was blocked for other reasons?
Whole things is kinda weird. I also see several people referencing a "UN report" but if I'm looking at the right thing, the report looks to just be 6 pages of one person's personal retelling (pretty un-neutral and narrativized) and for the talk about the items that are restricted, they make no mention of the methods used for discerning the claims.
It's an easy/quick read, but to show a few excerpts:

The semantics of war usually disguise obvious truths. Consider phrases such as “friendly fire,” “disproportionate response,” “collateral damage;” or what does it mean to be the “victor” in a unilateral massacre; or what happens to the soul of a nation when the majority of its 18 and 19 year olds, both male and female, fulfilling their army obligation, casually carry M16 machine guns in the public malls and streets, learning early in life how to intimidate their neighbors? ....
Even the withdrawal was timed with a cynical disregard for world opinion. Israel, who had begun the assault with the tacit approval of the United States in the dying days of the cooperative Bush administration, brought back their troops the day before President Obama’s inauguration in order not to tarnish his image with a sordid conflict in a volatile region. But there was no escaping the fact that this was a war using American weapons of incredible power and precision guided missiles against the home made rockets, gasoline bombs, and rocks that are the major weapons of long oppressed peoples. ...

On the blockade stuff:

The United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA) and the Palestinian Authority had made funds available for emergency rentals, but there were few apartments available. Reconstruction cannot begin because Israel does not permit the importation of steel, cement or glass, among other building materials. They had also restricted the importation of lentils, pasta, tomato paste and juice by some incomprehensible logic that these items may pose a security threat. In a particularly cruel twist, even batteries for hearing aids used by deaf children cannot be imported, condemning these unfortunates to a world of silence. Despite these Draconian regulations, UNRWA has been able to provide a basic food supply to over a million refugees in the Gaza Strip. I visited a food station where hundreds of displaced persons waited to collect their meager staples of rice, sugar, lentils and cooking oil. While this program may save people from starvation, it is a diet that does not prevent the highest level of anemia in the region, with alarming rates of childhood stunting due to inadequate nutrition.

And on the Wikipedia page:

In January 2010, the Israeli human rights group Gisha took Israeli authorities to court, it attempt to force them to reveal which goods were permitted and which goods weren't. The Israeli State denied it has "a list of permitted goods" for months. However, in its updated response to a petition [19] submitted by Gisha under the Freedom of Information Act "Freedom of Information Act (United States)"), the State recently admitted that it does have a list of permitted goods and other documents relating to the transfer of goods to Gaza,[20] but claimed that revealing them would harm state security and/or Israel's foreign relations. A hearing "Hearing (law)") to determine whether the documents should be revealed will be held in October 2010."[21]

I didn't dig into this, but I think this could also be weird and careful wording. Like I'm sure Israel at least has a list of some known sources it built over time and a list of obvious denials - like grenades or whatever, but it doesn't mean there's this one true list. Also I wonder what happened in and since the 2010 lawsuit.
Anyway I have like 30 tabs open and should probably do other stuff. But holy shit all this stuff can be a rabbit hole and is cancer to get strong answers on some things and lots of citations can imply stronger claims than the sources would be able to. Like did they actually ban any/all "toys" or did one merchant get a denial on a suspicious quantity of a certain toy of suspicious origin? Who the f knows.
tl;dr was at least one private merchant in at least one shipment unable to import some cookies? Probably, unless someone's lying. Were all cookies outright denied to the people of Gaza before 2010? No fucking idea, but it also doesn't seem the sources try to make that big of a claim and from what I've seen, don't have sufficient evidentiary basis to do so, but it's entirely possible.
P.S. Also just realized another DGGer did a similar research expedition 3 months also for Omar Baddar. LOL fuck me. Linking reddit seems blocked here? Anyway the post is "Regarding the banning of chips being shipped to Gaza" H/T DrManhattan16

Hi everyone. I wound up typing out this guide for another thread in here somewhere asking about a good build for melee/unarmed, and it wound up being so freaking long that I figured I could make a whole post out of it and it would be helpful to, potentially, several others.
This will be pretty long, but also comprehensive. Hope you don't mind. I'll attach a TL;DR.
TLDR: 7 STR, 5 PER, 9 END, 1 CHA, 6 INT, 7 AGI, 5 LCK. Skilled, second trait of your choice. Tag unarmed, melee, survival, later get repair, sneak and survival to 90 or more. Get Super Slam, Piercing Strike, Jury Rigging, Better Criticals, Finesse, Purifier, Slayer. The Vikki & Vance has spiked knuckles in a safe you can repair to 100% using the brass knuckles in the Highway Patrol Station early game. Lategame, use Ballistic Fist and Protonic Inversal Axe in VATS, melee weapon of your choice outside of it.
Recommend a bugfix mod to fix things like Ninja not applying properly and automatic weapons like the chainsaw not ignoring armor as they should.
Full breakdown to follow.
BASICS
An ideal melee build has high melee, unarmed, sneak, survival, science and repair, and you'll need at least 6 strength, 6 perception, 7 agility and 6 luck (including implants) by level 26.
Why? Because these get you Super Slam, Slayer and Better Criticals. Through skills, you'll also want Silent Running, Ninja, Piercing Strike, and (obviously) Jury Rigging. Other perks you'll want to pick up are Finesse and Purifier. These are all your bare essentials. You'll do high damage, pierce armour, ragdoll foes so they stop damaging you, attack quickly, sneak up on enemies quickly and do lots of bonus damage when you do, since melee/unarmed sneak attacks do quintuple damage instead of double. Would recommend a patch to make Ninja function.
You'll be powerful because of a high attack rate with armour-piercing, high-damage weapons with a high per-hit chance to knock enemies down and critically hit. But you'll also want healing, hence recommending survival: in addition to letting food give strong healing and giving you access to perks like Old World Gourmet (if you're playing Legionary or some other "clean" character, imagine you're not drinking alcohol, you're disinfecting wounds with it) or Them's Good Eatin' to find healing items absolutely everywhere, it lets you make weapon poisons.
Bleak Venom adds 150 damage to a melee strike over 10 seconds, while Tremble dramatically reduces a human/ghoul enemy's damage output by reducing their weapon skills by 50. If you don't mind being restricted to level 30, Logan's Loophole doubles the duration of all consumables, not just chems, and eliminates the addiction chance.
LIGHT ARMOUR OR HEAVY?
Both light and heavy armour offer advantages enough that there are valid reasons to pick them. Heavy armor is, of course, very protective, and in a build that can potentially take a lot of damage very quickly, that can mean the difference between life and death. But it also slows you down and diminishes your ability to sneak, both of which reduce the time you spent up close, actually effectively fighting your enemy. It's a good choice if you want to "play it safe," sacrificing offensive power and speed for survivability.
Light armour is the glass-cannon route - it can be decently protective, but it really shines in the realm of offence. Light Touch boosts your critical chance by +5% (and reduces your enemies' by 25%,) and Tunnel Runner and Travel Light let you quickly get into range of enemies whether in stealth or out of it. Some light armour like Joshua Graham's Armour or Ulysses' Duster also boost your critical chance, which is a huge DPS increase for a melee/unarmed build due to how many critical hits it can dish out in a short period of time, and how strong those criticals are. But it's definitely *not* a play-it-safe approach - light armour means dying quickly on higher difficulties unless you have the skill (or raw toughness, or healing items) to compensate. Higher risk, much higher reward.
VATS
Where the real magic happens, though, is in VATS, and that makes it a very good idea to get Math Wrath and Nerves of Steel, if you can afford them. Every melee weapon has a VATS-only special attack with special properties, and unarmed weapons all have the same special attacks for the same AP cost no matter what weapon you use.
Because VATS with melee/unarmed is so powerful, perks affecting it are excellent choices. Math Wrath and Nerves of Steel come to mind, as does Grim Reaper's Sprint and Action Boy/Girl. Atomic! Can be excellent, but the penalties from radiation poisoning subtract from your stats and weapon skills, which can make you suddenly much slower with something like a ballistic fist.
Unarmed weapons get "Uppercut" for +15% damage, "Cross" for +10% damage and 2.5x limb damage, and "Stomp" on knocked-down targets, which does +100% damage. Remember that all melee attacks in VATS do double damage in themselves, so an Uppercut actually hits for 230% the damage of a regular attack, and a Stomp hits for 400%. All of these cost 20AP no matter what weapon you use - a ballistic fist strikes as fast as brass knuckles. As such, using Super Slam and Ranger Takedown to ragdoll enemies and then using Stomp attacks with a powerful, slow unarmed weapon like the Ballistic Fist is incredibly powerful.
Melee is more complicated. Some special attacks are almost useless while others are hideously powerful, and some melee weapons are far better in or out of VATS than the alternative. The "back slash" attack (knives, machetes) is usually weak, for example, but the "grand slam" used by baseball bats and nail boards doubles your damage (just like the stomp, this equals 400% damage, since VATS does double by default,) and the Katana's special does *250%.* These also, as far as I know, work for stealth kills - you should be able to sneak up on someone with a katana, enter VATS, and do the special attack to get that +250% damage on top of your existing sneak attack damage. If I'm right, outdamaging the Fat Man isn't just *doable,* it's *easy.*
WEAPONS
The most powerful melee/unarmed weapon in the early game *if you're playing normally* is the pair of spiked knuckles you can find in a safe in the Vikki & Vance (must be stolen,) which you can repair with the perfect-condition brass knuckles in the Nevada Highway Patrol station. These will last you vast swathes of the game. If you don't mind a little venturing outside where the game intends for you to be able to go, you can get Chance's Knife from his grave north of Goodsprings, up a hill south of the Tribal Village. You have to dodge Cazadores and Giant Radscorpions to get to it.
Otherwise, unarmed weapons experience a drought early on - you're best off sticking to melee until you find those knuckles. Once you hit Vegas, your horizons broaden, with the sewers having a fire axe and the Humble Cudgel and various merchants becoming available.
The mountains around Jacobstown are notable for having two absurdly powerful weapons in caves within them: Oh, Baby! the unique super sledge can be found in Charleston Cave (beside a dead Nightkin) as part of the quest to investigate the nightstalkers there, and Pushy the unique displacer glove can be found in the Ruby Hill mine on the body of a dead Jackal.
The weapons with ridiculously powerful special attacks include: the baseball bat, nail board, katana, Old Glory. Proton Axe, Protonic Inversal Axe, and the X-42 Antenna. I've slain fire geckos with the GRA baseball bat, and the protonic inversal axe can theoretically oneshot anything in the game besides the X-42 Giant Roboscorpion with a sneak special attack.
Knock-Knock gets an honorary mention for giving you the most damage per action point spent of any weapon in the game, giving you the most bang for your buck if you spend a whole action bar.
Chainsaws, Thermic Lances, Rippers and the Industrial Hand hold a special spot because they attack many times a second and as such can score critical hits at an astronomical rate, but do little damage immediately. The wiki claims that a 20% critical chance will double the damage listed on the card, where 100% critical chance would theoretically result in seven times the damage listed. VATS attacks with them also do a lot of damage, equivalent to the DAM value times two, just like regular melee weapons.
HEALING
There are various ways to both increase the number of healing items you find, and increase the power of those healing items. High survival and medicine are the obvious choices. Any build will want 55 survival for Them's Good Eatin', letting you find stimpak-tier healing on almost any organic corpse. Old World Gourmet is good for turning alcohol into healing items, but you risk addiction. These two combined let you be swimming in healing items everywhere in the game from beginning to end, from Goodsprings to Dead Money to Hoover Dam.
But there are less conventional ways to do it: perks that increase the duration of "chems" increase the duration of any consumable with a timed effect, such as food. This makes Chemist (Science 70) and Logan's Loophole (which also makes you immune to addiction) incredibly powerful, as they let something like Sunset Sarsaparilla restore 100+ hitpoints apiece over time.
Rad Child deserves a special mention, healing you +2 hitpoints per second for every 200 rads you have, up to +8/sec at 800+ rads. You can go up to 600 rads without losing strength, but at all levels, you're losing points in Unarmed because of the endurance loss. This can make you not meet the requirements for something like the ballistic fist and attack much slower, but it may be worth it for the healing, especially in heavy armour. It also synergizes well with Atomic!, which boosts your AP regeneration the more irradiated you are.
PERKS
Repeating the above, essentials: Super Slam, Piercing Strike, Slayer, Jury Rigging, Purifier, Better Criticals, Finesse. IF USING LIGHT ARMOR: Light Touch, Silent Running, Tunnel Runner.
But there are perks you can get from high science, survival and medicine skills that you'll find handy as well. Not just for healing as detailed above, but for damage. Survival, for example, gives you Entomologist for +50% damage versus insects (cazadores,) and Robotics Expert from Science gives you +25% damage versus robots. Living Anatomy gives you +5% damage versus living targets. These combine to give you high damage bonuses to all of the game's strongest enemies (cazadores, deathclaws, robo-scorpions.)
A high science also lets you improve your VATS performance via Math Wrath. This stacks well with the Beautiful Beatdown perk (kill 42 enemies with unarmed, then do 20,000 damage with unarmed weapons) and Slayer for many VATS unarmed attacks (stomps, stomps, stomps!)

Lycans claim about not being able to isolate sugar from foods/soft drinks is entirely misinformed
Just to preface, I am a quality control chemist for a pharmaceutical company so I'm more use to isolating API's (like ibuprofen) from liquid suspension products then isolating sugar from food products. However, the chemical process and methods to separate compounds from market place FDA regulated products is very comparable.
In analytical chemistry, isolating compounds from various products, is routine. Test methods are regularly developed and validated to isolate compounds (like disaccharide in the form of table sugar). Then techniques such as HPLC as well as FTIR, and NIR, are used by QC Chemists to identify and quantify individual components to report to the FDA. Mass spectrometry techniques can provide detailed structural information about these isolated compounds as well, but usually aren't used in the lab I work at.
It's true that some mixtures are challenging to separate, but from all I've been exposed to I find it extremely hard to believe foods that possess caramelized sugars are above the level of difficulty to separate. If it were true that you couldn't seperate sugar from these products, it would be impossible to assure the quality of food sold on the market place, especially since the FDA requires you to disclose sugar content.

Just started my playthough after following this guide (picking through the mods i wanted and didnt want) but for some reason, my aid items keep getting "punctured" seen here
does anyone know which mod would be doing that?
also, feel free to let me know if something in my Load Order doesn't make sense, cancels something out, or shouldn't be there. I use LOOT so it SHOULD be in the right order atleast lol
thanks in advance.
​
Load Order:
FalloutNV.esm
DeadMoney.esm
HonestHearts.esm
OldWorldBlues.esm
LonesomeRoad.esm
GunRunnersArsenal.esm
ClassicPack.esm
MercenaryPack.esm
TribalPack.esm
CaravanPack.esm
YUP - Base Game + All DLC.esm
Navmesh Fixes and Improvements.esm
Landscape Texture Improvements.esm
Landscape Texture Improvements - YUP Patch.esm
Landscape Disposition Fix.esm
oHUD.esm
HUD Caps.esm
FreesideOpen.esm
Asterra's Many Fixes.esp
Strip Lighting Overhaul.esp
FCOMaster.esm
FCO - The Last Few Edits.esm
NVInteriors_Core.esm
NVInteriors_ComboEdition.esm
TLD_Travelers.esm
Mojave Wildlife (Vanilla-Style).esp
The Frontier.esm
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.esm
ForgeBeyond.esm
The New Bison Steve Hotel.esm
Cyberware.esm
Cave Pack.esm
Mojave Raiders.esm
BR_MeatPrepAnimations.esm
FNVtoFPS.esm
Animated Player Interactions.esm
More Traits.esm
HDTshop.esm
Uncut Bison Steve Trees.esm
WMVM.esm
More Perks.esm
QS3rdPerCamOverhaul.esm
More Perks for Companions.esm
YUP - NPC Fixes (Base Game + All DLC).esp
Unofficial Patch NVSE Plus.esp
AmmoScriptFixes.esp
The Mod Configuration Menu.esp
FalloutNV_lang.esp
The Weapon Mod Menu.esp
Vurt's WFO.esp
NVInteriors Addon.esp
FCO - The Last Few Edits.esp
Uncut Extra Collection.esp
FCO - NPC Changes.esp
CorpsesUseVanillaSkeletons.esp
Logic and Consistency Fixes.esp
FOVSlider.esp
Perks Day Tripper and Chemist Survivalist Style Fix.esp
EVE FNV - ALL DLC.esp
TFHotfixes.esp
FreesideOpenPatch.esp
Uncut Wasteland FSO.esp
WeaponModsExpanded.esp
Less Map Markers.esp
More Perks Update.esp
CNR_Beta.esp
VanillaOutfitTweaks.esp
Car NV.esp
Mojave Raiders.esp
VOT - World Integration.esp
Vendors Containers Respawn Fix - Simple Edition.esp
FO4PowerArmor.esp
Rebreather Tweaked.esp
FCO + YUP.esp
CriticalEffectFixes.esp
MigPerkSorter.esp
Toggleable True Iron Sights.esp
Toggleable Crosshair.esp
SD_Clockwork.esp
MapMarkers.esp
map_icon_overhaul.esp
JIP Improved Recipe Menu.esp
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.Store.esp
FNV Realistic Wasteland Lighting - All DLC.esp
dD - Enhanced Blood Main NV.esp
IMPACT.esp
357retex.esp
singleshot_retex.esp
Animated Workbenches.esp
Equipment Restoration Project.esp
MMDD.esp
lexx_brahmin-variant.esp
TreePositions.esp
CamonPack - Blachnick - Scottmack.esp
CamonPack - Blachnick.esp
Mojave Arsenal.esp
TeslaWeaponsPack.esp
Uncut Cottonwood Cove Shack.esp
PowderGangerImprovement.esp
Northern Passage Cave Entrance.esp
Lucky 38 Lights Redone.esp
populatedcasino-light.esp
Couriers Blunder + Rifle.esp
Rainy Days V2.esp
GS G17.esp
Prospectors.esp
Classic Fallout Weapons Remastered v1.2.esp
NukaColaOverhaul.esp
TheLozza's_Gasmasks_V2.esp
HDTshop.esp
Mossberg590.esp
QwibNewBackpacks.esp
wohbynic.esp
Mojave Raiders - TLD Patch.esp
NukaCola-Ojo.esp
WWP AMR.esp
WWP 22smg.esp
RaestlozFactionArmorEnhancement.esp
YUP-FAUE Patch.esp
VGA - EVE effect forcer script.esp
Book of Steel.esp
Boacombat2glove.esp
majormodder's Junk Food to Barbeque Crisps.esp
HZSmoothLight.esp
Glowing Cazadores - Optional.esp
Mojave Nights.esp
CIB Bighorners - HH.esp
CIB Bighorners Var.esp
TrueBladeOfTheWest.esp
NoDegrade.esp
TrueBladeOfTheEast.esp
ChinaLakeRedux.esp
High Noon Restored.esp
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.Store.LITE.esp
LewisGun.esp
Guitar Hero.esp
ScottmackWeaponPack.esp
RCSS.esp
Fallout Revelation Blues Mega Armor Pack.esp
CasinoHeistPack.esp
VS-Armor-Pack-1.esp
CAGE 1.9.3.2.esp
L85a2.esp
ProjectSledgehammer.esp
The Courier.esp
TFDC - Dodge Challenger.esp
XM4RAW.esp
TacticalLaserRifle.esp
Strip Lights Region Fix - Uncut Wasteland.esp
Enclave Advanced Power Armor.esp
Distributed Necklaces and Chains.esp
Advanced Recon Armor.esp
FCO3-CFWNV.esp
FCO - OHSB NPC Edits.esp
FCO - PathFixing Vanilla.esp
HIIheadgearpack.esp
RB_RaiderPA.esp
MojaveStyles.esp
SkirmisherV1.esp
SkirmisherV1_NoDLC.esp
M1897.esp
psychoelfs char editor.esp
SR556.esp
epock.esp
QwibWasterBackpack.esp
Kaya47GlacierGlasses.esp
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.Cheat.Cabinet.esp
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.Honest.Hearts.Grunt.Patch.esp
Weapons.of.the.New.Millenia.Leveled.Lists.esp
CraftableWeaponMods-WeaponsOfTheNewMillenia.esp
L96_AMR.esp
DEagle.esp
M16A2.esp
MSR556.esp
PKM.esp
FAMAS.esp
SVU.esp
TOZ66.esp
Scout.esp
WA2000.esp
Serbu.esp
CZ805.esp
Galil.esp
BHPM1935.esp
BT87.esp
Pernach.esp
KP31.esp
PhotonLaserWeapons.esp
ScottmackImprovisedPPSh.esp
Karabiner98k.esp
LeeEnfieldMkIII.esp
Stabby.esp
LeeEnfieldNo4.esp
ScottmacksBastardGun.esp
Camon & Scottmack Weapons.esp
CarlZeeWeaponPack.esp
CasinoBankMoney.esp
Kriss.esp
Frontier_-_Enable_Slaves_Harbour.esp
The Frontier - Bonus Cars.esp
R700.esp
MNK-RHINOgaussRevolver.esp
ItemCards.esp
JustAssortedMods.esp
Cyberware OWB.esp
CyberJAM.esp
GS Barrett 95.esp
GS Cynthia.esp
ThrowableFixes.esp
gunrunnersexpanded.esp
Rainier AK.esp
Animated Ingestibles.esp
Immersive Primary Needs.esp
True Wasteland Economy.esp
Alternative Repairing.esp
FCO_TLD_EyeFix.esp
Strip Lights Region Fix - The Living Desert.esp
TLD - FaceGen Tint Fix.esp
TLD LVLI Total Overhaul.esp
Unfound Loot.esp
JIP Fast-Travel Anywhere.esp
Stamina.esp
FPS Dash.esp
360Movement.esp
Falling And Landing Animated.esp
Graves.esp
HelplessFalling.esp
Sit Anywhere.esp
Animated Sleeping.esp
NpcDynamicCombatStyle.esp
Diagonal movement.esp
360Movement - Diagonal movement Patch.esp
FPS Leaning.esp
CloseMenuHotkey.esp
ItemBrowser.esp
More Traits Update.esp
UnlimitedCompanions.esp
pipboy2500_edisleado.esp
More Perks for Companions Update.esp
Stimpak Hotkey.esp
Atmospheric Lighting Tweaks.esp
WMX-ArenovalisTextures.esp

Since Friday evening I've felt stuff stuck in my throat that just won't budge. I've been gargling warm salt water, inhaling steam, taking medicine that is supposed to thin it out. I just don't have the patience with it because I haven't been able to swallow food as it feels like I'm going to choke due to the stuff that keeps pushing up but doesn't come all the way up to cough it out. It's driving me mad it feels like it goes down a bit then just sits in my chest. It's also getting on my vocal cords at times making it difficult to speak (I was going to go to chemist to ask but that's pointless if I'm having trouble talking without going into a huge hacking/coughing fit). I can drink liquid but only in small bits as it feels like I'll choke if I drink too fast.
I haven't been ill at all lately so not quite sure where this came from I just want it gone now. Is there anything I could do to get rid of it instantly?
Edit: Not long after posting this I tried a minestrone cup a soup as I'm finding it hard to swallow food but almost choked and it felt like a bit got stuck in the mucas in my chest which wasn't a nice feeling. I phoned 111 to ask for some advice and they have made a doctors appointment over the phone for tomorrow. They also said to ask at a chemist today if they could advise anything and they can but I need a prescription so I'll see what doctor says tomorrow.
I wouldn't normally be worried about this but because I haven't really eaten anything properly since Friday ( 3 cup a soups yesterday) it's really starting to stress me out. I wish I could see the doctor today instead of waiting for tomorrow.

My harvest hymn — with added Chinese chemicals
By Jeremy Clarkson (The Sunday Times, April 28)
Many of us will remember that Mungo Jerry song featuring the line, “Have a drink, have a drive. Go out and see what you can find.” And of course we all realise you can’t even think that any more. And nor, really, is it considered acceptable to follow up with: “If her daddy’s rich, take her out for a meal. If her daddy’s poor, just do what you feel.” Times have moved on.
Of course lots of lyrics now feel as if they’re from another aeon. "Clair" by Gilbert O’Sullivan especially. But you might think it’s impossible for the lyrics in a harvest festival hymn to become out of date. “We plough the fields and scatter. The good seed on the land. But it is fed and watered by God’s almighty hand.” Absolute timelessness. It was true ten thousand years ago and it’s true now.
No, it isn’t. God doesn’t water the land any more. The coal-fired Chinese power stations do that. And he doesn’t feed it either. That’s handled by CF Industries, which makes all the chemical fertiliser that farmers use on their fields.
We don’t even scatter seeds any more, because that’s wasteful onanism. We drill them into the ground, at precise intervals and at a precise depth using a computer-controlled, £40,000 seed drill. That’s towed behind a £250,000 Case tractor, which was built in the factory where they used to make Tiger tanks. Not much Goddishness going on in any of that.
There isn’t even any ploughing any more. In the olden days farmers would turn the top layer of soil over using a plough so that the weeds were buried. And because they were deprived of sunlight they died. It was a lovely, natural, rosy-cheeked way of creating the perfect seedbed for the following year’s crop.
But then along came Little Miss Thunberg and her merry band of Packhamites, who decided that 1,500 billion tonnes of carbon is stored in the planet’s soil. And that if you turn this soil over with a plough, all of it will be released into the upper atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide. Which is bad. So the lovely, natural method of killing weeds had to stop. And instead farmers had to use chemical sorcery from Monsanto, BASF and the Zhejiang Xinan Chemical Industrial Group.
Farmers didn’t mind, if I’m honest, because ploughing is extremely expensive. You simply would not believe how much diesel is needed to drag a two-tonne land anchor through a muddy field. Using weedkiller instead is much cheaper.
Or rather it was. But weedkiller prices have gone up dramatically in recent years. And from where I’m sitting it doesn’t really seem to work any more. Every year Kaleb goes into the fields like a rural Terminator, hosing down the weeds with his ungodly chemical sorcery and then, a few weeks later, Cheerful Charlie walks me through the same fields, pointing out the brome and the black-grass, which is easy to spot because it’s purple and green and completely immune to anything the world’s chemists can throw at it.
So this year Charlie said we should become medieval and plough the fields instead. Selfish? Well, yes, this will shoot a tonne of CO2 into the troposphere and that’s obviously bad. And I’ll use four times more diesel than I would if I used weedkiller. So that’s not good for the environment either. But here’s the kicker: I wouldn’t be pumping any chemicals into the soil.
So that’s the choice — soil or sky? You have to hurt one of them if you want to eat. I went for the sky and rented a plough.
I settled on an eight-furrow monster for two good reasons. Number one: the bigger the plough, the faster you get the job done. And number two: none of Kaleb’s tractors would be powerful enough to pull it, so we’d have to use my 270bhp Lamborghini. Which would annoy him. Even admitting that it’s better than his tractors gives him a hot flush. Sometimes he vibrates with fury when he goes near it.
The only drawback to this cleverly wrought large plough plan was that, because Kaleb refuses to drive my tractor, I’d have to do the ploughing.
This is something I’ve done before. It was on Top Gear about 200 years ago and I did very well. Partly this was because my competitors in the ploughing competition were James May and Richard Hammond. And partly because one of the two judges was a really good friend of my mum.
In real life, though, things were different. I couldn’t hitch the plough to the tractor without help. I couldn’t do a three-point turn when it was attached. And I couldn’t make the tractor move when the furrows were in the sodden soil. All four wheels just sort of spun. So I had to lift the plough slightly, which meant I wasn’t ploughing. Or wiggle the steering wheel, which made big holes and, when it worked, caused me to set off in a new direction. It began to look as if a drunk, blind man with no arms was doing the ploughing.
All the time I was watching the fuel gauge plummet like the depth gauge in a holed submarine, and wondering if it might be cheaper, easier and kinder to the environment to use chemical weedkiller instead.
This is farming. Only last week I discovered that approximately 18 billion slugs have come to live in the fields where I’ve planted spring barley. If I adopt a live-and-let-live rewilding attitude and do nothing they will eat the lot and, next year, there will be no Hawkstone lager. As that makes no sense, I therefore have to pepper the field with slug pellets, which will kill them. Great. But these pellets will also kill all the worms. So what’s the answer? There isn’t one.
Similarly, I have signed up to the government’s eco-friendly grant scheme and will be planting things that aren’t food in three fields. They’re good for the soil and they’re good for my bank balance. But it means I’m not growing stuff people can eat. I know one chap who has taken 60 per cent of his farm out of food production and he’s not alone. So yippee. All that stored carbon and all of that fixed-in nitrogen.
But what if you want some bread? You’ll have to get a loaf made from wheat that was grown abroad. And how’s that good for global warming? And will it have been grown under the same stringent rules that we have here? Or will it have been fertilised with human faeces? You face a choice then. Do you want net zero in the UK? Or do you want to eat a Mexican’s turd?
Do you want lager or worms? Do you want healthy soil or a healthy sky? Do you want bees or orangutans? These are the questions I’m facing every single day. It’s a multiple-choice world of no right answers.
Which brings us back to another harvest festival hymn.
All things bright and beautiful. All birds that must be plucked. No matter what we choose to do, we’re well and truly.
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Kaleb Cooper: ‘I’ve taught someone triple my age to do a better job’
The Diddly Squat farmers Jeremy Clarkson and Kaleb Cooper are back for a third series. We put our wellies on to meet the odd couple of the Cotswolds
By Ben Dowell (The Times, April 29)
During filming for the forthcoming third series of Clarkson’s Farm, Kaleb Cooper drove into work and saw Jeremy Clarkson vacuuming a blackberry bush. While the spectacle was “something I am never going to forget”, the sandy-haired, cherub-faced youngster was so unimpressed that he didn’t even get out of his car to ask what was happening.
These two have grown into one of television’s best double acts. For the show’s executive producer, Peter Fincham, there is an “element of Jeeves and Wooster” about them, a delicious odd couple relationship that is all the more gratifying because the team didn’t need to cast Cooper. He was already working on Diddly Squat Farm when the show started.
Cooper is a farmer to the tips of his muddy wellies and has taught Clarkson most of the practical business of farming his 1,000-acre establishment near Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire, as well as how hard the job is and the risks farmers take for little financial reward. Cooper may have just completed a sell-out national stage tour building on his popularity and more than two million Instagram followers. He may have been invited to No 10 to meet Rishi Sunak (more on that later), but everyone on the show — the producers, one of Cooper’s “Chippy” friends I spoke to and Clarkson himself — are clear: the 25-year-old hasn’t changed one iota since the show started airing in 2021.
“I think it’s very easy to be grounded if you don’t leave Chipping Norton,” Clarkson says. His girlfriend, Lisa Hogan, who has become another star of the show, agrees. “How Kaleb comes across is exactly how he is. He is very thoughtful and kind and very bright. His use of language is also very easy on the ear. We could have had a monosyllabic tractor driver and that wouldn’t have worked but we were lucky we had Kaleb.”
He has written two books as well: The World According to Kaleb and Britain According to Kaleb, with a third (Life According to Kaleb) on the way. These ruminations are often spoken into a Dictaphone (supplied by his publishers) during the 18 hours he spends each day alone in his happy place, his tractor cab. The books now sit on the shelves that a ten-year-old Cooper and his carpenter father put up in the local bookshop. Though, of course, one of the running jokes in the show is that he has only read one other book in his life apart from his own, and that was one of Clarkson’s.
There is another moment in the new series when Clarkson and Cooper (who are in competition with each other across the eight episodes) are working a field when they spy someone in the distance on another tractor drilling “his” field. He is Andy Cato of the electronic pop duo Groove Armada, and Cooper seems totally nonplussed, not least because he doesn’t know who or what Groove Armada is. The same probably goes for many of his near-neighbours, who include Joe Wicks, Simon Cowell, Natalie Imbruglia, David Beckham and Amanda Holden. When Cooper bumped into David Cameron (now Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton) in a local eaterie, he wasn’t quite sure who he was either. Strangely Cooper is now as famous as at least a few of these people. His appeal extends across the globe — Andy Wilman, Clarkson’s old Top Gear producer who edits the show, tells me that he rarely hears an English accent in the farm shop as tourists flock to see their agricultural idols.
Since Clarkson’s Farm aired, Cooper told his theatre audiences, he has been offered snazzy haircuts from top-level salons, perhaps to stop the constant mickey-taking from Clarkson. But he still goes to the same local hairdresser.
Brilliant moments are not always captured by the cameras and while the team may wake up with plans, farmers and the show’s fans will know that the weather often has other ideas. “Cheerful” Charlie Ireland, the farm’s land agent and adviser, does pop by a couple of times a day, as he does in the series, often to pour cold water on Clarkson’s latest schemes. But many of these moments are not filmed. Is that annoying?
“Sometimes you think, ‘Oh, that would be really good, that’d be funny on TV,’ but actually [the cameras] are not there,” Cooper says. “But you don’t say these things, to make it up for the TV. I may have taken drama in school, but I got a U in it, so actually I’m not an actor.”
Clarkson agrees: “It is [effortless] because I don’t have to pretend to be someone else. With The Grand Tour, Richard Hammond isn’t as stupid as he’s made out. I’m not as bombastic as is made out and James May isn’t quite as boring as he’s made out. And so you’re playing a caricature, you’re playing a role, you’re there to provoke and be stupid. Here, we haven’t got any of that. So we’re just ourselves. You get up and you just have to be yourself, which is incredibly relaxing. And in that regard it is effortless. Farming is not effortless. Make no mistake, the television side of it is a piece of cake because I don’t have to think, ‘Oh I’d better say something idiotic now.’”
“You do that anyway,” Cooper says.
The two bicker in exactly the same way off camera as they do on. At the press conference for the new series they quarrelled with good humour about their dogs. Cooper says Clarkson’s pair of fox-red labradors (named Sansa and Arya after Game of Thrones characters) are “posh man’s dogs” who “never do a thing he says”. Clarkson maintains that Cooper just locks his dog in his tractor cab. They also bicker about the goats Clarkson keeps. Clarkson likes their eyes and thinks they do a good job mowing his grass. Cooper thinks he should breed and slaughter them in the conventional way and sell goat meat in the farm shop.
There is a similar clash of approaches over the pigs. Cooper doesn’t get as emotional as Clarkson and Hogan when things go wrong (and they do go wrong with the pigs this series). When Clarkson holds aloft a newborn piglet, Cooper calls him a “proud parent”, which feels part mickey-take, part genuinely warm compliment — a common theme in their complex relationship.
Clarkson is learning to be more steely and is, Cooper says, actually now a “good pig farmer”. Is the younger man pleased that Clarkson has come on? Or is there a bit of him who would still enjoy showing him the ropes?
“I think there’s a bit of a proudness of teaching someone maybe triple my age … to go out and do a better job … Hopefully I’ve taught him a lot about it. But he’s taught me so much equally about the television industry.” In fact, Cooper says, he has learnt so much that he cannot watch TV now because he knows how it all works behind the scenes.
He is a voice for farmers, showing us how hard the job of people who put food on our table is, and demanding that we respect it. Cooper has arranged two bursaries of £3,000 plus a work placement for young farmers and is keen that more enter a profession where the average age is 59. When he met Sunak last May he was more interested in the PM’s hair than anything, principally because he didn’t expect much from him.
“Let’s put it this way. If someone invited me tomorrow to go to a farm … if I go to that farm and that farmer says to me, ‘Kaleb, you know what, this week I’m gonna plough that field,’ I know for a damn fact that that farmer is going to go out there and plough that field because he said he’s going do it. If the prime minister or anyone from politics goes to me, ‘Kaleb, I’m going to do this next week,’ they’re not going to do it, are they?”
While he doesn’t have much faith in our legislators making life easier for hard-pressed farmers or for supermarkets to pay them more, he must be pleased that people, especially city folk, now know about farming thanks to him, I say.
“Yeah, everyone knows what a tramline is now, right? And let’s face it, I always say this: it doesn’t matter what phone you’ve got, what car you’ve got, what house you’re living in, what matters the very most is what’s coming across your plate for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And therefore that is the most important thing to me.”
Cooper is open to offers of shows such as I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! but thinks he probably won’t have the time with all the work he has to do. Clarkson called him “easily the most entrepreneurial person I have ever met” and he is laser-focused on his ultimate goal of having a farm one day, which will have to be local, despite the “extortionate” price of land in the area.
“I want to farm here,” he says. “I don’t want to move away from my family and everything I know. This is where I was brought up and this is where I’m going to stay.”
But the show will be with us for a while. It is hugely popular — series four is being filmed and while viewing figures aren’t available, it is believed to be Prime’s most popular programme in the UK by, well, a country mile.
Cooper is engaged to his partner, Taya (mother to their three-year-old son and ten-month-old daughter), but doesn’t know when he will have time to walk down the aisle. He knows he will “have a great party”, and isn’t yet sure if Clarkson will be his best man. But one thing’s for sure, Clarkson has already found his.
The new series of Clarkson’s Farm is on Prime Video from May 3.
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No Sun column this week, but the Guardian (!) has published a long interview with Clarkson: "'Dismissing global warming? That was a joke': Jeremy Clarkson on fury, farming and why he’s a changed man". Let me know if you have problems viewing it.
Clarkson's columns are regularly collected as books. You can buy them from his boss or your local bookshop.

Long time reader (of Reddit in general) - first time poster
I am a scientist (Chemist, if that matters) and have quite a few years of experience working in Regulatory Affairs in a few topics that I see that are also worked by law firms. In my job I have interacted quite frequently with lawyers (actually, my boss is a lawyer) and enjoyed quite a lot working with them - quite a few of them came from BigLaw. So now that I am starting to look for a move - going into a law firm could be an option.
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Thanks in advance!