I want to give as much information as possible, so if someone I know sees this, know I'm not ashamed of asking Reddit.
My boyfriend (20m) and I (20f) started dating last summer. I had never been so in love, and it was an entirely new world for me. I was used to being distant in relationships, but something about him made me want to grow up. Have a family. Feel excited for the future.
A few months in, I became very anxiously attached, he became avoidant, so it goes... We spent every second together. I'd be anxious if he was anywhere else, I'd start arguments over little things. I once found a sketchbook containing drawings of his past relationships, causing me to feel insecure and like he didn't truly love me. Or that I was dragging him down.
In January, we took a break. We were arguing too much and I had just moved into a new apartment. I was sad and angry and could barely respect the boundaries of a break. After that week, we had a talk. I had started therapy and medication and did a lot of research on healing anxious attachment. He agreed to stay. I began making schedules for us, to ensure that we didn't spend too much time together but we could still have planned dates. He canceled a weekend, and I was frustrated and unable to communicate. He broke up with me. I made a fool of myself and begged for him to stay. He took me to a friends to stay there until I felt more stable. I was so unbelievably wrecked. Angry that he wasn't as affectionate as I'd like. Angry that we didn't go on dates. Angry that I wasn't his muse. Angry that it wasn't a fairytale.
I spouted all of this to friends. While I had a right to be upset about some things, I was ultimately immature in seeking validation from my friends.
Six days later, he asked to talk. He picked me up from my friends apartment and we went to mine. He said he wanted to be in my life, but not in a relationship. From there we began seeing each other exclusively, but making it clear that we weren't "dating". Honestly, not much changed except for the fact that I was still hurt. I believe this led me to wanting to keep a guard up, or have something to fall back on. I spoke ill of him to mutual friends-- both of which went to him and told him. Fast forward to last month, I told one of the friends that I believed an old crush (ultimately just close friend, nothing ever happened) had feelings for me again. I spoke to her about how kind he was compared to my partner, and that he'd probably treat me right. I also told her that an old FWB had texted me telling me to have a good day and enjoy the sunshine-- this is not something I told my partner.
This friend told him all of this. He came to me and we had a short conversation: he was angry and did not want to see me anymore, but he wanted to be friends once he had his space. I coped for the night, pretending I was fine and relieved. The next day, the weight of every emotion in the world dropped down onto me and I checked myself into the psych ward. Three days in, I got my phone to pay my rent when I saw a text from him. He wanted to talk. I had his number memorized so I made a call. He told me he'd been writing me letters and he read one to me. He spoke about how although he was broken, he wanted to rebuild. I got out the next day, and when I got home we had a conversation. I let him read the pages I wrote in the hospital, talking about how I've lived life as a coward and I wanted nothing more than to prove to myself (and him) that I am ready to live a new, courageous life. He apologized for not giving me the affection and energy I deserved in our relationship. We agreed to try. He spent the night. The next morning, he broke down about how hurt he was, and how he doesn't trust me at all. I broke down as well, telling him I am going to be good and I want to lead a completely different life. He said he wants to see the change by knowing I'm keeping up with cleaning (I let my apartment get messy fast and then I get too depressed to do anything about it), and a written apology with no fluff.
I wrote the apology yesterday. I'm going to give it to him today. I deleted my social media and bought a flip phone. I am going to spend a lot of time cleaning today, and mostly decluttering my space.
I feel an immense amount of shame and guilt. I am not going to let it eat me alive, because I know that will stop me from making change. I am going to be honest with him about how ill I spoke of him to friends as well. I still find it hard to grasp why I found it so easy to say hurtful things about him.
I have the integrity to change and rebuild this, and I believe he wants the same. I want to be patient and understanding. What are some steps I can take to ensure that I stay on track with healing? What should I avoid?
I want to do everything in my power to make this right and never hurt him again, which I guess is why I'm asking millions of strangers on Reddit.

(Spoilers for the Side Stories of DDLC+… and the main game!)
Greetings! It’s time to share some postivity~ Well, at least I’m feeling like it, so… Here are some things from each Side Story that I love! Not speaking about big CGs or the story itself, but simply small details~ (Beware, this post is long!)
Trust: First, I love the reference to “Your Reality” when Monika tries to figure out her thoughts, “Join the Literature Club… Write the way into your heart.” Second, I love the references to Sayori’s first poem of the Side Stories “Take my hand”. On line is, “If you can trust me to follow your pace, I’ll trust you to set it. If you can trust me to lend you a smile, I’ll trust you to return it.” Then, at the end of Trust Part 1, it says, “Monika returns Sayori’s smile,” when Sayori tries to offer help to Monika. At the beginning of the second part, when they promise that they’ll be there for each other, it reads, “Unable to help it, Monika return Sayori’s smile”. By the end of the side story, it reads, “The two exchange smiles”. Also, the promise they make and how Monika becomes vulnerable with Sayori first could be a reference to the ‘following your pace’ part of it! And in “Become the flower”, there’s a part that’s also in the main game. When you write the first two poems for Sayori, during the second event, she also performs an almost identical part of that exact poem. There’s also something about when Monika tries writing a poem in the second part. She writes, “This is what I get for seeking perfection. A stain.” You could apply that to the main game as she tries to create her perfect world, but we know how that went…
Understanding: I like how it’s highlighted that Yuri likes fantasy the most. People tend to forget it’s her favorite genre. Even in the main game, she says, “My favorites are usually novels that build deep and complex fantasy worlds. The level of creativity and craftsmanship behind them is amazing to me. And telling a story in such a foreign world is equally impressive.” She only says, “Anyway, I’ve been reading a lot of horror lately…” So I’m glad we got to see more of Yuri’s favorite genre! Also, I liked to hear about the little hobbies she and Sayori have. And the fact that they acknowledged that individuals have different needs, and that they mentioned that people should respect your consent (although, Balance ruined that last part a bit for me…)
Respect: Parfait Girls returned! Another detail I liked is the song that Monika played. Not just the name – My Song, Your Note (each first letter is the first letter of the girls’ names in the order they joined in) – but also WHAT she plays. In the main game, Monika plays the main theme while singing. In this case, she also played an already existent track – the first one we hear, that also isn’t tied to a character as much, meaning it could also be considered the main theme. To add to that, we see short scenes that have happened. I’m not sure if it was intentional or not, but I noticed it anyway: For Sayori and Yuri, we have scenes with Monika standing with them in the hallway, but Natsuki stands only with Sayori in the hallway; and generally, the scenes tend to show Monika happy with the girls, but Natsuki only with Sayori until the last scene. Also, while I noticed it by the second Side Story, this made it very clear to me that this is either another universe, or the girls’ memories were manipulated to give them drama in the main game.
Balance: I guess I liked that we basically have the confirmation that the hanging stick figure of Sayori in the files – and as a special poem in Act 2 – was probably drawn by her, as she apparently likes to draw stick figures. Also, Natsuki likes some more lewd manga too, I see…and we can see the difference between how she explains things versus Yuri in “Understanding”. Sayori also displays the same reaction to being called “mature” by Yuri as when she was called “adult-like” by Natsuki at the beginning of Respect. At the beginning, they also name all the club members in the same order the MC does in the main game on the first day.
Reflection: In the first part, there’s some solid advice. Monika also talks about it in the main game as one of her Act 3 dialogues. In the second part, Yuri says, “Friendship happens when you think about the other person. When you take time to understand them, and respect them, and trust that… that they also want to be a good person.” It once again links to the first three side stories: Trust, Understanding, and Respect. Also, Yuri also mentions in the main game that she used to be talkative, although in Act 2, but it’s brought up here again. She used to be talkative but people didn’t like her for it, so she grew more and more shy. Plus, this Side Story also gives us the insight that Yuri used to like manga, but only in the past - and when she thinks about the past, she thinks about how immature she used to be, leading her to believe that manga is immature, as well. Generally, Natsuki seems to remind her of her past self which seems to impact her perception of her. Also, Yuri initiated a conversation with Monika while they were looking for a free classroom - that development is just so cute to me :')
Self-Love: In part one, they discuss how they feel empathy for fictional characters, connecting over that – and I connected with them over that, too, so... yeah. In the second part, they do a lot of foreshadowing that the side stories are coming to an end, because you can’t keep a story going for forever (although, I kind of want a slice-of-life manga or anime that goes a bit longer than the side stories with them… I don’t know). I’m also glad that the message is that you can be loved even when you struggle with loving yourself, because there are a lot of messages about it not being possible, which I’ve seen to do actual damage to some people. Another line I really loved was, “Yuri turns away to pick up her open book from the dusty floor, which she had hastily set down earlier. She brushes the dust off the cover.” When someone is having a panic attack, it’s normal to put something you're holding away to help that person – but on a metaphorical lever, after Yuri told Natsuki why she loved these books so much, it means a lot. It implies that she finally found someone she connects with on a deeper level than the book characters; someone whose friendship she values more than her friendship with those characters.
Equals: A nice ending, but I want to get into the final song that plays during the credits. It’s called “Friendship and Literature” and has motives or “Dreams of Love and Literature” in it. The second one is from the main game during the poetry mini game. They’re names are parallels, but while “Friendship and Literature” has already achieved it’s goal – that being the beautiful friendships that the girls have developed in the Literature Club – “Dreams of Love and Literature” hasn’t. They’re just dreams, and it reflects in the main game. In the end, nobody can really build a healthy romantic relationship, and everything goes wrong. “Friendship and Literature” is the happier, successful parallel, which could hint at the Side Stories being an alternate universe where they no longer need to dream, as well. Also, instead of trying to write the way into “his” heart (part of Your Reality), Monika is trying to write the way into her own heart, which sounds healthier to do.
There are also one thing I’ve noticed throughout the Side Stories. As many have pointed out, Monika uses the word “like” a lot at the beginning – but this changes as the Side Stories progress! Her language grows more into the one we know from the main game, and she also becomes more confident and grows into becoming a better leader, as well as how she starts being playful with the other characters. By the way, while not as obvious or common as in the Side Stories, Monika tends to use “like” in her sentences more frequently in Act 3, too. However, that makes me wonder why she is at that stage in her life in the normal game if the events of the Side Stories led to such word choice? Perhaps Monika needed to fake more of her confidence since she knew something was wrong with her world and didn’t want to seem like a mess? Maybe.
As a bonus to share some love for the main game! “My Feelings”, “My Confession” and “I still love you” also have the same motive! “My Feelings” has the ukulele or a guitar playin the background while the piano adds a melody; “My Confession” has the piano playing the entire track with a few sounds sprinkled in (the ukulele/guitar motive has also been replaced by the piano), showing Monika’s progress with playing the piano; “I still love you” has neither, but it’s still the same motive - now echoing though the void.
Anyway, that’s all! Sorry for any spelling mistakes. Feel free to share what small details you like in the Side Stories! I hope you have a good day or night~

Originally for superstonk, but I am checks account two fucking weeks shy of showing them how smooth my brain is... Probably should have made an account sometime in the last fucking 9 years I've lurked reddit, but nah 🙃
I'm an XXX ape from the beginning, I took every penny not spent on a house and put it in GME too. Then and said "we don't have that money anymore."
Yesterday my husband asked if I had seen the news about the stream and the stock going down. I had heard about it, but didn't pay it much mind. I'll know when it reaches phone number length, and have a fraction of a share ready to paperhand to get some medical stuff covered, but that's it.
I laughed and said "you know, if we pull out now we would have more money than we've ever had before, and be poorer than we ever have. What is a few thousand dollars now vs a moon ticket? It won't stop us from being PAINFULLY poor, just give us a year or more to ACT like we aren't! It doesn't exist until it changes the world. We loose the house before the trendies, take a loan out for medical if it becomes urgent, but if we sell... We lose everything."
He laughed said "mayo boi get fuk" (the mayo memes are still my favorite, that story about why had me rolling.) and started doing the dishes while I continued writing.
Zen guys, ZEN. the ONLY loss is to sell.
Just thought I would make my first post finally because every time there is a run up and down like this there is FUD and calls of "this is end game!". Hype good and all, but when it's not end game it makes more FUD fuel for later.
Nah dude. The game DOESN'T STOP. IT'S LITERALLY THE NAME OF THE COMPANY WE LOVE!
Buy, hodl, DRS, fuck Robin hood, and CHILL. Everything is going according to plan. Do your part to keep it that way.
We just like the stock 🙃

GPA: 3.166 UW, school has not published rank/weighted yet SAT: 1580 (800 Math, 780 Reading), only took once (March 2024)… taking ACT in Fall
Demographics: white (of Arab origin), female, middle class [Edit] Type of school: large public school (~2500 students), 1 or 2 a year go ivy, I would say majority go to lightly selective in-state colleges.
Course work
-failed first 3 years of honors hs courses (7th-9th grade)
-no academic history for 10th grade
-3.437 UW GPA in 11th grade -> 6 remedial courses, 2 non remedial (all standard); took 6 additional classes online that I did not include in that GPA (2 remedial: Alg 2 honors [A], chem 1 honors [A], and 4 non remedial: Pre-Calculus honors [A], physics honors [A], ASL 1 & 2 [A, A]).
-as for 12th grade, I will be enrolled in AP Bio, AP Calc BC, AP Macro, AP Physics, AP Stat, AP US Gov/Politics, dual enrollment English, dual enrollment (mandatory) “SLS” elective, and possibly a dual enrollment math (College Algebra/liberal arts math), although I might drop that to take an intern class, to assist teachers with intellectually challenged students.
Extracurriculars
-didn’t participate in any ecs for 9th or 10th
-self taught coding, developed learning platform designed to produce personalized learning plans for Florida high school students taking state EOCs, includes data reports for teachers -> will either sell the prototype or participate in congressional app challenge (I have a few weeks of coding left to do, wrote all material for the site myself)
-created a networking hub for students in my city, currently in developmental stages, phase 1 begins in August (I will be using data from this project to write a research paper I’m working on), very elaborate in design; will connect students with others from across the city with similar goals/initiatives to engineer more passion projects, will also aid in college/internship/job applications
-math tutor (paid), working with students of various ages (6th grade-12th grade)
-worked with professor of education at local university to write a research paper on the dwindling condition of the American education system and how to construct an ideal classroom, pending publication
-participating in essay contest, philosophy paper.. pending results
Essays
I’ve already begun writing my common app essay, which will be about a setback I faced that impacted me in a profound way. The essay is extremely personal to me, yet is written in a way that is sure to remain relatable and motivate the reader.
As for letters of recommendation, I will be (hopefully) receiving one from a remedial English teacher of mine (volunteered for class job, wrote extensive essay critiques + improvement plans for 12 students in class, maintained straight As in class, demonstrated determination and respect + excellent communication skills). I will be receiving another from a remedial math teacher who gave me the opportunity to work one-on-one with intellectually challenged students in their class (which changed my life and ultimately set me on the right path, helped me discover my passion for strengthening numeracy skills in high school students). I have a couple other teachers in mind to ask, but I want to see how I connect with my senior year teachers first.
I plan on majoring in mathematics, and later double majoring in either cognitive science or neuroscience (I don’t think I’ll apply anywhere as a double major though). Career-wise, I want to go into curriculum development/academia. I’ve done my research and I believe either Northwestern or UChicago are my best fits. Btw, I live in Florida. I also want to apply to MIT, Boston Univeristy, Boston College, UF, UIUC, UW Madison, UMich, Georgetown, Penn State, UVA, and my local college. So if someone could chance me for those, but also maybe recommend more target schools/schools I may have overlooked as it pertains to my career goals. Thank you.
Questions are welcomed. I don’t want to pay for an admissions advisor, so I’d love to give all you generous people whatever context you need. (Edited for formatting issues. Sorry, not used to posting.)

Hello and welcome to episode 100 in a series inspired by u/kamikazeb0y and CinemaSins, where I'll be sinning each and every episode of Gumball.
Before we start I just want to point out that (not including the Early Reel) we have officially reached Episode ONE HUNDRED of Every Wrong With The Amazing World of Gumball!
It's been an incredibly fun journey so far, and with some very iconic and important episodes still to cover we have a lot to still look forward too! WIth 140 episodes left to cover, I've still got my work cut out for me! But trust me, no matter how long it takes, I will get to the end...hopefully before Season 7 releases and pushes the finish line further away!
Hope you enjoy, and I'll see you for the next one hundred episodes!
Quick Disclaimer: I know this is just a children's cartoon and isn't meant to be taken seriously. This, like the show itself, is not at all meant to be taken seriously or considered an actual critique of the show. It is all in good fun. With that out of the way I present you, Everything Wrong With: The Man!
Granny Jojo: Why are there so many candles? I'm only sixty-three. Anais: Sorry. We didn't know exactly how old you were, so we based it on looks Firstly, I understand the kids not knowing how old she is, but Richard? How does one not know the age of their own mother!? +5
Secondly, BWAHAHAHAHAA! -5
Richard: The alphabet of my mom. "A" is for "Amazing" 'cause that's what you are. "B" is for "Breakfast", one of my twelve favorite mealtimes, and because you're amazing, Mom. "C" is for... [He continues talking] Granny Jojo: Nicole, I just wanted to say that you look really average today. Nicole: Oh, yeah? Well, you look like someone drew an ugly face on a butt with a— wait, what? Did you just say "average"? That's gotta be the least offensive thing you've ever said to me. You need a lie down? Gumball: Yeah, and you gave us real candy instead of your expired fungus medication- Darwin: And your face looks wrong. It's like your mouth is upside down- Anais: It's almost as if you are...smiling. Richard: ...why? Because I like them. And "Z" is for "Zebra", an amazing mythical creature. But not as amazing as you, Mom. Okay, there's no way Richard read through A-Z already. He had to have skipped like half the alphabet to fit it all in that short conversation +1
[Richard slams the door in Louie's face. His outstretched arm sticks out through the letter flap. Granny Jojo reopens the door] Granny Jojo: This is Louie. He's my boyfriend. Okay, what is with episodes and huge lore reveals/changes recently? First Gumball and Penny become a couple, then Carrie's origin and Dad are revealed, and now Granny Jojo is dating Louie. Feels the writers change one thing in The Shell then went wild with power and did a whole bunch more.
I mean, I'm not complaining though. They're pretty cool -1
[Richard finally recovers. He sees Gumball, wobbling in his vision. His voice is distorted and echoing] Gumball: Dad, are you alright? Darwin: What's with the voice? Gumball: [Distorted, but no longer echoing] I don't know. It just felt appropriate. PFFT -1
[Gumball takes a pack of nachos and hands it to Nicole] Nicole: Clear! [She opens it. Immediately, Richard springs up, biting into the nacho bag and chewing on it wildly] I don't know why, but the writers were on point when writing the jokes for this episode and I love it -10
Granny Jojo: To be honest with you, I have no idea what he said. My hearing isn't what it used to be. Louie: Me, neither! I was just laughing and hoping it wasn't a question. [They laugh] Louie: We got so much in common. Granny Jojo: Yeah, we're both falling apart. [They laugh again. Louie kisses Granny Jojo] Awwww -5
Richard: Call me son one more time! I dare you! I DOUBLE-DARE YOU! You MOTHER ROBBER! God damn it actually kinda hurts seeing Richard like this. It's so unlike him to act so aggressively and it makes it really clear how much his Dad leaving him affected him. I demand the entire family give him hugs now! -1
[Richard grunts, and pushes Louie away on his scooter. Afterwards, he storms back inside to confront Granny Jojo] Somehow all of them have, in the span of a few seconds Nicole ahs gone and made a cup of coffee and Gumball and Anais have sat down and started an entire card game. +1
Though, Gumball and Anais just casually hanging out and playing some card game is pretty cute. We never really saw him or Darwin actually hanging out with or chilling with her that often, if ever, so this is nice to see -1
Granny Jojo: Let me explain something— Richard: No, let ME explain something! I don't want you to see that guy anymore! Granny Jojo: Well, I don't think it's for you to decide, young man! Richard: When you're under my roof, you follow my rules, old lady! Gumball: I don't think anyone should follow your twelve-meals-a-day rule. Granny Jojo: Richard, I'm old enough to make my own rules, and I'm seeing Louie TONIGHT! Richard: Go to your room, you're grounded! Granny Jojo: You go to your room, you're grounded! What? But surely Jojo is just visiting for her birthday right? Plus even if she wanted to stay there isn't really any rooms she could stay in except Anais', and it's debatable if said room even exists or not +5
Granny Jojo: Gumball. [Opening an eye, he sees his grandmother beside him, wearing fancy clothes with make-up on. The jump cuts closer to her face] Gumball: [Gasps] Oh wait, this is clearly a nightmare. Nothing could be this ugly in real life. Darwin: We helped Granny Jojo make herself pretty for Louie. What do you think? Gumball: Huh, what do you know? [Screams hysterically] Anais: Yeah, I agree with you. But this is the best we could do short of a face transplant. Okay, I get you think she looks hideous, byt after what happened between her and your Dad earlier I very highly doubt she's in the mood for such insults nor appreciates such comments. You can think it, sure, but you reaaally don't need to say it out loud +5
Granny Jojo: Oh, Gumball, if you could only understand the meaning of true love. The yearning to be at one with another soul. To hold them tightly in your arms- Gumball: Please stop, I'm getting a mental picture. It's really high-def. Granny Jojo: Hear them whisper in your ear: I love you, I love you- Gumball: Fine! Fine! We'll do it, just, please stop talking. Firstly, pretty sure he does know that feeling considering he was crushing over a girl for who knows how long, and is now finally with said girl +1
Secondly...Jojo actually bothered to learn Gumball's name since The Kiss? Neat -1
Nicole: Richard, your mother's never been this happy... or nice. I don't want you to ruin that. Richard: Alright, I'll speak with her. Aww, nice to see Nicole actually helping out Jojo for once...even if it is partially for selfish reasons -1
Gumball: Alright! So the plan is we knock over the DVDs, which sets off the mouse trap, which sends the golf ball up there, which sets off the dominoes, which sets off the toy car, which will switch on the fan, which will send the turtle to the rope, which she bites through, dropping the desk, propelling Granny Jojo through the window and she uses her bloomers to land safely in Louie's arm. Everybody ready? Gumball calls the Evil Turtle "she" here despite the Wattersons not yet knowing that she is a she. Aka, the writers pretty much unintentionally spoiled that twist reveal almost an entire season beforehand +5
Also, Gumball's entire plan here relied on the fact that the Evil Turtle would actually bite the rope upon reaching it. And a plan that relies on someone else out of your control maybe doing something isn't a very good plan +1
Richard: Get away from my mom, get out of our lives! I am the man of this house! So much for talking to him +1
Gumball: Next round: Man washing! [Anais evaluates them washing themselves. Richard washes himself with his clothes on, and Anais is grossed out by his smell. Louie washes himself with a toothbrush. When Anais smells his breath, her head spins around, her ears pop off, and she melts] Ew. No man actually washes like this. At least I'd very much hope not +5
[Louie cooks some meat, and Gumball eats it. He spits it out] Gumball: Ugh, it's rare!Louie: That's how a man eats. No, that's how you kill your grandson +1
[Gumball, Darwin, and out two man-off contestants are sitting around the living room table.] Gumball: And for the final challenge: sharing your emotions! Louie and Richard: What? Gumball: [Evil laugh] Yes! All of this was a trick to make you confront man's deepest, darkest fear: talking about your feelings. Gumball taking Granny Jojo's idea and turning it into a clever plot to trick Richard and Louie into talking things out is actually genius. Which is why It'll never stop annoying me that despite a mountain of evidence proving otherwise the show continues to portray Gumball as stupid. He isn't, and I'm fed up of seeing otherwise -10
Granny Jojo: Oh, Richard, what about your dad? I thought you understood he didn't really go to get milk? [Richard suppresses his emotions. He struggles to keep himself from crying.] Richard: I know… I know. It's just that I really… r-really… Granny Jojo: I know, I know. I liked him too. It's just…he felt otherwise. Come on, just let it all out. [Richard cries hard. Granny Jojo comforts him amidst the shower of tears and mucus.] Granny Jojo: Come on, kid. That's it. Richard: [Stops crying] It's just, I'm worried that you'll like Louie better than me— [Sniffs] And then-and then, I'll lose you too. [Sniffs] Granny Jojo: [Kisses him on cheek] Don't be sillier than you already are. Your brain might stall once and for all. Richard: You know, I want you to be happy too. LOUIE! [Hugs] From now on, I'll call you Daddy! Louie: Um, [Clears throat] A lot of weather we've been having lately. [Richard puts him down, and Louis pats him] Anais: Are you gonna be okay, Dad? Richard: Yes, sweetie. There comes a time when in your life, you have to grow up, and become a man. [Richard hugs his family. Louie and Granny Jojo kiss happily, making him gag one last time] Awww, now this is how you end an episode like this. Wholesome and poignant. -5
Total Sins: -11
Most Sinned Episode So Far: The Hero (1,490,894) Least Sinned Episode: The Shell (-999, 958)
Previous Episode: https://www.reddit.com/gumball/comments/1d9wxta/eww_the_mirro

After 15 months my application was approved. I was put on the Safe Act list without knowing when I was 17-18 after bringing myself voluntarily to the hospital for depression. Here are some tips I wanted to share that I felt helped me:
Keep your composure - anytime I spoke with the NICS office via email or by phone I was always very polite and appreciative of their help. When I got my certificate they did call out they review all communications between you and office when a determination is being made by the review panel
Letters - I had one of my parents, a friend, and my boss write me each a letter of recommendation. Everyone had a different perspective and I felt it made my argument stronger
Don’t withhold info - just because it wasn’t listed on your denial doesn’t mean they don’t know about it (when they asked for my medical records they called out a bunch of stuff I had forgotten about and asked me to collect records for them). When speaking to the office they said that being willing to give them what they are requesting when more info is requested shows you’re working with them and that speaks volumes (which makes more sense now knowing they reviewed all communications)
Psych Evaluation - I hesitantly opted to work with their forensic psychiatrist but it ended up being totally fine. The person works with the OMH/has a private practice. I was very transparent about past struggles, what I did to change my situation, what i do to keep myself busy, how I know when I am not doing well and what I do to combat that, etc. They asked to speak to someone I am close with and asked to call one of my parents. Parents were on vacation when she tried to call and they ended up green lighting me while they were away and told them when they called my parents back.
I truthfully didn’t think this would be overturned and the folks in my life I spoke to about it told me to be patient and things will work out, and they ultimately did.
Hope this helps anyone who is in the situation I was in.

For the hardship secondaries I was considering writing about being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in college and how that gave me perspective on patient experience. I was going to use the example of when I first had to pay out of pocket for insulin because my insurance wouldn’t cover it, and then going on to do a lot of diabetes advocacy work.
I know medical schools dislike when people discuss health issues, but would it be the same for something like type 1?

I originally didn’t want to write about this on reddit as it’s pretty embarrassing. However, after googling the situation over and over it seems like there’s almost nobody out there that has written about going through something like this. For that reason I figured it may be helpful for someone else in the same situation to hear that it does happen to other people and that it’s possible to recover, even though it really hurts. This ended up being a lot longer than I hoped it would be but I wanted to explain everything as much as I could in case anyone finds it to be relatable.
My ex and I broke up a little over a month ago after almost six years of dating. The breakup was definitely my fault. I messed up a lot of things for a long time and when she gave me extra chances I got too caught up in the stress of other parts of my life rather than doing what she was asking me to do. I’m in a stressful and time-consuming grad program and I also haven’t been coping well with a violent incident that happened to me right outside our house a few months ago. I definitely had (and still have) issues with anxiety, depression, and PTSD that I wasn’t getting help for when we were together even though she wanted me to. This caused me to put on weight, become reclusive, and have almost no libido by the end of our relationship. I understood her reasoning and we had an amicable breakup. We both agreed that we’d focus on self improvement and that we wanted to be back together in the future. We both still loved each other and, at her suggestion, concluded that taking a year apart to work on ourselves was a good idea. She also said that she felt that seeing other people during that time could be beneficial for both of us. After all, maybe there are better people for us out there. I suggested that we take a break where we remain exclusive instead, and she was unwilling to try that. This raised the first red flag for me and made me think that this might not be as much about self improvement as she claimed.
Our lease wasn’t over for almost three months after we broke up. I made plans to move into a new apartment with the move-in date being about a month after the breakup. We agreed to share the house for that time and even try to continue as friends.
During the first few days after the breakup we had some good nights and bad ones. She mostly avoided being at home by staying out late. We argued a few times and spent other times peacefully coexisting in the same house and sometimes having pleasant conversations when we ran into each other. I tried to keep our contact friendly and cooked her dinner a couple times as a showing of good will.
Eight days after the breakup we resolved an argument by talking at length about how much we still loved each other and agreed to put more effort into acting respectfully. The real issues started the next day when she was giving me a ride to the gym while my car was being repaired. She handed me her phone and, as I was looking for her maps app, I saw that she had downloaded a dating app on her phone. I was hurt by this as it just felt so soon to be with other people. It hurt because I knew that she must’ve downloaded it right after our conversation about still being in love and just needing to work on ourselves to be together again. I told her that I’d seen the dating app and asked her to take me home because I felt like I just wanted to be alone that night. She dropped me off and didn’t return home until late that night. We went back to arguing during the next few days. I was upset about the dating app and began acting passive aggressively. She claimed that she was upset because she’d already told me that she wanted to be with other people and she said that it was none of my business what she did when we weren’t together. I told her that we still lived together and had to see each other every day, so I couldn’t understand how she could want to be with other people while she still has to be around me when she is home. She repeated that it wasn’t my business and we left the conversation there.
By the end of that week she wasn’t even making eye contact with me and began entirely avoiding me. The thought of her being with other people so soon and while we still lived together bothered me all week. On Friday I got drunk and made the impulsive decision to go through her phone. At the time I thought that if I could find out that she was talking poorly about me or already dating other people then I would hate her and not feel the pain and the jealousy that I was constantly going through. I wouldn’t have to get back with her without knowing that she’d done something that I wouldn’t be able to tolerate if we dated again. I’ve been thinking about those reasons more lately and I think I also wanted to find a way to excuse her behavior. Maybe, even if she’d already been with other people, she had lamented about how they don’t measure up to me or that it was a mistake to do it. I was looking for anything to excuse the behavior I thought she was engaging in and hold onto the prospect of a future together. A few hours later (I think it was around 3 am) I took it while she was sleeping and looked through her dating app and her messages.
I was nauseated by what I saw and began to hyperventilate and shake. It was worse than I ever could have imagined. She’d already been on multiple dates and had sex with multiple men. The first was just nine days after the breakup, two days after the conversation about how we still loved each other, and the day after I found the dating app on her phone. It was in a car that was parked on the road outside of our house while I was in the house. The other was just two days later and she’d left work early to hook up with a guy she’d just started talking to either that day or the day before on the dating app. They had sex in the woods near a local lake. The messages she was sending and receiving were horrifying to me. They were full of sexual desire for these other men, glowing reviews of the sex she had with them, thankful messages for the sex she had with them, and invitations to have more hookups in the future. I felt destroyed when I read those messages. She must’ve complained to them about me and about the intimacy issues that existed at the end of our relationship, as the man she hooked up with in a car told her that he appreciated her telling him how she’d been “unsatisfied” recently. Even worse, she was planning to have one of her hookups over to our house soon while I was out of the state for a while to visit my family and heal from the breakup. She said that she wanted to have a “fuck fest” (her words) with him during that time. There was much more than that but I can’t remember every detail and I honestly don’t want to try.
When I went to put her phone back I didn’t care if she knew that I went through it. I’d never be able to keep that secret anyway. I dropped it right next to her and it woke her up, but I left before she could say anything.
Later that morning I went to talk to her. I was still a little drunk and more upset than I’d ever been, so it probably wasn’t the time for that conversation. She told me that I should never try to go through her phone again, clearly not realizing that I had actually already gone through it before I had woken her up. I told her that she only woke up when I put it back and that I had seen everything. She was enraged. We argued after that and I left for a bit but came back soon after because I wasn’t going to pay for a hotel when I also had to worry about moving costs in the next few weeks. When I came back home we argued again. This argument was just as intense as the last one. I asked how she could possibly have sex with other men so soon, so close to our house, and also plan to have sex in the house we’d shared so much love in and where I still had to live before I moved out. She replied that I violated her privacy and, again, that it was none of my business what she was doing now that she was single.
At one point during the argument she told me she was going to call the police because she felt “threatened” by me. I laughed when she said that. During our relationship I had discussed with her at length how I’d grown up in an abusive home and, because I know what that’s like, I would never lay a hand on her. She has, however, slapped me, punched me, and thrown things at me a few times over the course of our relationship. She has diminished doing those things because they happened when she was very drunk. That was true as she used to have a drinking problem that I made her go to therapy for by threatening to break up with her if she didn’t talk to a professional. She said that I could have made those instances up because she doesn’t remember them. I told her that what she was doing was disgusting and that she was a repulsive person for having done them. We ended the conversation by both saying that we’re never getting back together again and she moved her stuff out later that day.
I texted her a few days later after talking to my therapist about getting closure. I decided to offer to leave a letter for her explaining my feelings and why I’d reacted how I did. I wanted to do that because I still wanted her back. At least part of me did. As a last ditch effort to stop her from ruining the potential of a future relationship I wanted to explain to her why I was so hurt and that she’d be losing me forever if she had sex with other people in our house. She rejected the offer and sent some pretty vicious texts about how it was so wrong for me to have gone through her phone. I kept my responses respectful but she hit a nerve when she mentioned feeling “threatened” by me during our argument again. I fired back. I included in my texts how unbelievably wrong it would be for her to be with someone else in our house as we had shared so much while we lived there together. I explained that every room and everything in it reminded me of her, so it must remind her of me too. To have sex in that place would be such a slap in the face to all the love we’d shared. The argument ended without resolution.
I wish that was where this ended but it wasn’t even the worst part. At that point I was so hurt but I couldn’t fully commit to keeping her out of my life forever. When I was on my trip with my family I remembered that I pay for the wifi at our house and that I can see who’s connected to the router from the wifi app. I checked and saw her leaving late at night and returning at 3 am one day, and leaving around 6 pm another night and returning at 8 the next morning. I was a bit relieved that she at least had a friend (maybe more than a friend) there to watch our cats during at least some of her late night escapades. I figured that she was out on hookups again but really hoped that she hadn’t had sex with anyone in our house, or worse, our bed that I was supposed to sleep in until I moved into my new apartment.
When I came back home she’d left me a note that in which she said that she: hopes my trip went well, was upset at me for not cleaning the house before she moved back in for the week (I left everything where she’d left it when she moved out and cleaned up after myself during my time alone there), was also upset because I’d locked the door to the bedroom and she had a right to sleep in the bed (I didn’t lock the door to stop her from sleeping in the bed and I’m sure she knew that - she’d also been sleeping on the couch when we were sharing the house post-breakup so that was a viable option), wanted us to have mutual respect for our shared space (rich, coming from her given what I’m about to say), had washed the bed sheets before and after sleeping in them (why would she wash the sheets if she only slept in them and we’d slept in the same bed for years?), and that she hopes that I’m ok. I was about to be very not ok.
After reading her note I just knew she’d had sex with someone else or multiple other people in our house. I tore the place apart and eventually found an empty condom wrapper under a couch cushion. I had just vacuumed under those cushions a couple weeks ago and we certainly hadn’t had sex there since. The nausea and shaking returned and I started to freak out. In a haze I went to the outdoor trash cans and brought the trash inside and began to go through it. I found eight used condoms. I was only gone for nine days. The garbage truck came 5 days before I returned. At best that was the total for the week and she hadn’t taken the trash out prior to the garbage truck coming. At worst that was only five days’ worth of the products of things she’d done with other men. At least the things that required condoms. That didn’t include the things she’d done in other locations or that she’d done without protection. If I thought that I was freaking out before then I was on another level when I saw that. I couldn’t breathe or maintain my balance. That house was the last place in the world I wanted to be and I knew it’d be impossible for me to sleep there. I took some of my clothes and left. I have been living in a hotel since then despite the cost.
I ended up addressing it with her when I had to call her a few days later because one of our cats had a medical emergency. I told her that I knew what she was doing in our house while I was gone. She began yelling at me and called the sex “a distraction” from the pain that the breakup (that she initiated) caused her and again reiterated that it was none of my business. I asked her if it was in our bed and she said it was, but that she had used a different blanket and, I can’t remember this clearly but I think that she said that she didn’t allow other men to sleep there. She used this “distraction” excuse despite the fact that it was not only in our house, not only on our couch, not only in our bed, not only that I was expected to sleep in that bed afterward, but also in the room where I was keeping all of my stuff. There’s no way to be distracted from the breakup when you’re surrounded by all of my things.
We haven’t talked about it since. We’ve been communicating more than we did previously because the medical situation with our cat is ongoing. I’ve kept it as respectful as possible, but she ends all of our phone calls by yelling and hanging up on me. For example, during the most recent phone conversation, she said something that I wasn’t sure if I heard correctly so I asked her to repeat it and apologized for not hearing it as I haven’t been sleeping well. She shouted that she’s also struggling and repeated some of her previous criticisms of me before hanging up.
That was last week. I move into my new apartment today. She’s staying elsewhere and watching friends’ pets so I have to return to the house multiple times a day to take care of our cats until she’s done. It’s difficult being here but I love my cats and we haven’t officially decided what we’re doing with them once I move out, so this may be the last time I have with them.
The messed up part is that I still can’t fully convince myself that I don’t want her back. I know that I shouldn’t and I know that I’m better than that, but I still do in some ways. If you’re reading this and feel foolish for wanting your ex back, I hope you can be comforted by knowing that there are people like me out there that are stupid enough to still want their ex after experiencing things like this. People that either have such low self esteem or are so delusional that they’d even consider taking them back exist, so I’m sure you’re not alone if you still want your ex after a messy breakup.
That said - it’s gotten easier. It’s not been that long since all of this happened but over time it begins to hurt less. While I may be delusional or in denial I hope that this is proof that you also will feel better soon. Thanks for reading.

My wife decided in mid-March of this year, at 38, it was do or die to have children. Meanwhile, I (41) was diagnosed with ADHD this February. In a nutshell, I never personally wanted kids, even before I knew that my sensitivity to everything, sense of overwhelm, burnout, lack of follow-through, moodiness, and every other symptom/descriptor were attributed to an actual disability. The thought of having kids is equaling not having time for myself to do what I need to do to make sure I show up. It's the...burden. This seems to be happening either way. I know we need multiple serious conversations to make this work, but I don't know how to navigate that. Like, we have a code for when I get overwhelmed at home and in public. When there's a baby, I can't just tap out. And she, while diagnosed with bipolar disorder herself, wants this parent/child experience. I feel like I'm (once again) trying to meet someone else's needs at the time in which THEY need theirs met, but this is an entirely different ocean. Even if she could just give me a fckin year to process/apply what I'm learning about myself and how to handle my life in various aspects would be a blessing. We've been together for 10 years and married for 5. I finally feel like I'm gaining some traction of sticking to things and going after the career I always wanted. And now, here comes a helpless child that is already affecting our relationship, and it's still just a thought. All the medication in the world isn't going to help me not totally disassociate when my battery, with the lifespan of a phone charge, runs out. Or me have an everlasting attention span. The thought of being on edge (because of said child and implications) every moment for however long is stressful. The more she drives home that you don't have time for anything other than this baby, the more she pushes me away. I said it. This is pushing me away. It feels like my challenges are being disregarded because she all of a sudden made an actual decision about having a child. The anxiety of her having crazy hormonal issues because of both IVF and bipolar, during and after pregnancy, is wild. She is an optimist, and I value the notion of "not putting bad vibes out there." I'm a realist with first-hand experience of taking care of newborns up to preteens, and she thinks we can do things like build a business and manage a newborn simultaneously. Like, what planet are you living on? My therapist and I have A LOT of ground to cover. But I just needed to get this off my chest.
Update 1: I'm a woman- I guess that is another dimension to this, for what it's worth.
Update 2: I told my wife about this rant. Well, I cleaned up the rant and wrote it down as a letter to read to her. That opened up a real-ass conversation that has us both exploring ourselves and this step. She is just as scared as I am.
Update 3: I'm grateful that people took time to share their experiences and didn't hold back.

This is part 2 of our series How to learn French in 60 days.
Note: This post is about "How to learn French in 60 days," and not about how to achieve fluency. It's not a shortcut to achieving fluency and will only work if you put in the work. At the end of the 60 days, you'll probably hit A1 level on paper, but your actual conversational skills will be beginner level.
(If you want a better reading experience with the video embeds, you can find the article here: https://www.getfrenchclasses.com/blog/learn-french-in-60-days )

Month 2: Building upon the basics and learning grammar rules and speech patterns

Congratulations on finishing your first month. If you’ve come this far, it means:

• You can hold a 3 - 5 minutes conversation at a slow pace.
• You can form sentences and know the logic of how native speakers form sentences.
• You can read 1 or 2 syllable words.

For the second month, we’ll learn grammar rules, speech patterns, and complex sentence structure.
Let’s get started.

Week 5: Mastering verbs (Group 1) and simple tenses

• Day 1: Verbs of the 1st group and simple tenses

Watch the video "Les verbes du 1er groupe en français" by Thomas to learn about the verbs of the 1st group in French.
French ER Verbs - Regular French Verbs (Group 1) Les Verbes du 1er Groupe + FUN! (Learn French)
Next, watch the video "Les temps simples en français" by French With Alexa to learn about the simple tenses in French.
French Verbs & Tenses explained in 10 minutes!
Practice conjugating verbs of the 1st group in the simple tenses.
Assignment: Create a table with 10 verbs of the 1st group and conjugate them in the simple tenses (present, past, imperfect, and future). Write 5 sentences using these verbs in different tenses.

• Day 2: Simple present for verbs of the 1st group

Watch the video "Le présent des verbes du 1er groupe en français" by French With Alexa to learn about the simple present for verbs of the 1st group.
Group 1 Regular French Verbs ending in "ER" (Present Tense)
Practice conjugating verbs of the 1st group in the simple present and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Write a short dialogue (10-12 sentences) using verbs of the 1st group in the simple present. Focus on everyday actions and situations.

• Day 3: Simple past (passé composé) and imperfect for verbs of the 1st group

Watch the video "Le passé composé des verbes du 1er groupe en français" by Learn French With Alexa to learn about the simple past for verbs of the 1st group.
Group 1 Regular French Verbs ending in "ER" (Passé Composé - Past Tense)
Next, watch the video "L'imparfait des verbes du 1er groupe en français" by Français avec Pierre to learn about the imperfect for verbs of the 1st group.
Practise your French Imparfait ER Verbs
Practice conjugating verbs of the 1st group in the simple past and imperfect and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Write a short story (120-150 words) about a childhood memory using verbs of the 1st group in the simple past and imperfect. Focus on describing past events and habitual actions.

• Day 4: Simple future for verbs of the 1st group

Watch the video "Le futur simple des verbes du 1er groupe en français" by Learn French With Alexa to learn about the simple future for verbs of the 1st group.
Group 1 Regular French Verbs ending in "ER" (Future Tense)
Practice conjugating verbs of the 1st group in the simple future and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using verbs of the 1st group in the simple future. Focus on expressing future plans, predictions, and hypothetical situations.

• Day 5: Verbs of the 2nd group and simple present

Watch the video “Les verbes du 2ème groupe en français” by French With Elodie to learn about verbs of the 2nd group in French.
2nd group verbs in French -IR (Beginners)
Next, watch the video "Le présent des verbes du 2ème groupe en français" by The Perfect French With Dylane to learn about the simple present for verbs of the 2nd group.
2nd group French Verbs ending in IR (with FREE PDF) - Present Tense - French grammar for beginners
Practice conjugating verbs of the 2nd group in the simple present and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Create a table with 5 verbs of the 2nd group and conjugate them in the simple present. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the simple present.

• Day 6: Imperfect and simple past (passé composé) for verbs of the 2nd group

Watch the video “L’imparfait des verbes du 2ème groupe en français” by French Lesson With Indu to learn about the imperfect verbs of the 2nd group.
IMPARFAIT ! The Imperfect Tense in French and its formation !!
Next, watch the video "Le passé composé des verbes du 2ème groupe en français" by Learn French With Alexa to learn about the simple past for verbs of the 2nd group.
Group 2 Regular French Verbs ending in "IR" (Passé Composé)
Practice conjugating verbs of the 2nd group in the imperfect and simple past and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Write a short paragraph (8-10 sentences) describing a past event using verbs of the 2nd group in the imperfect and simple past. Focus on providing background information and describing completed actions.

• Day 7: Simple future for verbs of the 2nd group

Watch the video “Le futur simple des verbes du 2ème groupe en français” by Français avec Pierre to learn about the simple future for verbs of the 2nd group.
Group 2 Regular French Verbs ending in "IR" (Future Tense)
Assignment: Write 5 sentences using verbs of the 2nd group in the simple future. Focus on expressing future plans and predictions.
Week 6: Mastering verbs (Groups 2 and 3) and simple tenses

• Day 1: Verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre

Watch the video "Les verbes du 3ème groupe en -ir et -dre en français" by Français Immersion to learn about verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre in French.
Irregular French Verbs (Group 3) Les Verbes du 3ème Groupe + FUN! (Learn French with Fun)
Practice identifying and conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre.
Assignment: Create a list of 10 verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre. Write their infinitive form and translate them into English.

• Day 2: Simple present for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre

Watch the video "Le présent des verbes du 3ème groupe en -ir et -dre en français" by Learn French With Alexa to learn about the simple present for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre.
Group 3 Irregular French Verbs (Present Tense)
Practice conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre in the simple present and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Choose 5 verbs from the list you created on Day 1 and conjugate them in the simple present. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the simple present.

• Day 3: Imperfect and simple past (passé composé) for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre

Watch the video "L'imparfait des verbes du 3ème groupe en -ir et -dre en français" by L’ecole CM1 to learn about the imperfect for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9zAUvrNLo8
Next, watch the video "Le passé composé des verbes du 3ème groupe en -ir et -dre en français" by Rita Ouad to learn about the simple past for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre.
Le passé composé du 3e groupe
Practice conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre in the imperfect and simple past and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Choose 5 verbs from the list you created on Day 1 and conjugate them in the imperfect and simple past. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the imperfect and simple past.

• Day 4: Simple future for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre

Watch the video "Le futur simple des verbes du 3ème groupe en -ir et -dre en français" by Maitresse Nadjat to learn about the simple future for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc-nxfRtasI
Practice conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -ir and -dre in the simple future and try using them in sentences.
Assignment: Choose 5 verbs from the list you created on Day 1 and conjugate them in the simple future. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the simple future.

• Day 5: Verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre

"Les verbes du 3ème groupe en -eindre et -soudre en français" by Edunote is a great video to learn about verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre in French.
Leçon 55 Orthographe L'emploi des verbes en eindre et soudre 1
Assignment: Practice identifying and conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre. Create a list of 5 verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre. And write their infinitive form and translate them into English.

• Day 6: Simple present and imperfect for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre

Cours de Soutien Facile’s video "Le présent des verbes du 3ème groupe en -eindre et -soudre en français" offers you a great opportunity about the simple present for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre.
Le présent de L'indicatif des verbes en _indre, en_oindre, et en_soudre
Next, read this blog “L'imparfait des verbes du 3ème groupe en -eindre et -soudre en français" to learn about the imperfect for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre.
Leçon de conjugaison - indicatif imparfait
Now, after all that, practice conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre in the simple present and imperfect and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Conjugate the 5 verbs from the list you created on Day 5 in the simple present and imperfect. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the simple present and imperfect.

• Day 7: Simple past (passé composé) and simple future for 3rd group verbs ending with -eindre and -soudre

“Le passé composé des verbes du 3ème groupe en -eindre et -soudre en français” by Al Ma3ine Channel will help you learn about the simple past for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre.
Le passé composé des verbes du 3 eme groupe : aindre- eindre - oindre
Next, read this blog "Le futur simple des verbes du 3ème groupe en -eindre et -soudre en français" by Merci App to learn about the simple future for verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre.
Le Futur Simple • Règles de conjugaison • MerciApp
Practice conjugating verbs of the 3rd group ending with -eindre and -soudre in the simple past and simple future and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Conjugate the 5 verbs from the list you created on Day 5 in the simple past and simple future. Write 5 sentences using these verbs in the simple past and simple future.

Week 7: Pronouns, adjectives, and common expressions

• Day 1: Personal pronouns

Eveiller Mon Enfant’s video "Les pronoms personnels en français" is a great option for this.
Les pronoms personnels
Practice identifying and using personal pronouns in sentences after watching the video.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using different personal pronouns in French. Focus on using the correct pronoun for each situation.

• Day 2: Possessive pronouns

Tout en Francais offers a great video "Les pronoms possessifs en français" to learn about possessive pronouns in French.
Les pronoms possessifs : le mien le tien le sien...
After watching the video, practice identifying and using possessive pronouns in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using different possessive pronouns in French. Be sure to use the fitting pronoun for each situation and ensure it aligns well with the possessed object.

• Day 3: Object pronouns

"Les pronoms objets en français" by Parlez-vous French is a great video option to learn about object pronouns in French.
Les pronoms compléments d'objet direct et indirect en français (COD et COI)
Practice identifying and using object pronouns in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using different object pronouns in French. Focus on using the correct pronoun for each situation and placing the pronoun in the correct position within the sentence.

• Day 4: Types of adjectives and common adjectives

Watch the video "Les types d'adjectifs en français" by Parlez-vous French? to learn about the different types of adjectives in French.
Comment placer les adjectifs en français + exercice - How to use adjectives in French
Next, watch the video "Les adjectifs courants en français" by Français avec Pierre to learn about common adjectives in French, such as "bon", "mauvais", "grand", "petit", "vrai", and "faux".
Les 100 Adjectifs les Plus Utilisés en Français 💯
Practice identifying and using different types of adjectives and common adjectives in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using different types of adjectives and common adjectives in French. Double check and ensure you have the correct form of the adjective. It should align with the noun it modifies.

• Day 5: Common French phrases and question tags

For common French phrases, we recommend Guillaume Posé’s “Les expressions courantes en français”.
😜 50 expressions françaises que tu dois ABSOLUMENT connaître !
Next, watch Merci Prof’s "Les mots interrogatifs en français”. It’ll help you master question tags in French, such as "qui", "que", "quand", etc.
05 - Les mots interrogatifs
After watching bith videos, you’ll need to try using common French phrases and question tags in sentences.
Assignment: Write a short dialogue (10-12 lines) using common French phrases and question tags. Be sure to use the phrases and tags in the appropriate context.

• Day 6: Expressing destination and origin, and common expressions with "être" and "avoir"

You can learn how to express destination (aller à) and origin (venir de) in French with AB Proffin’s "Exprimer la destination et la provenance en français" video.
Demander et dire la destination et la provenance (Chiedere e dire la destinazione e la provenienza)
Next, watch the videos "Les expressions courantes avec être en français" and "Les expressions courantes avec avoir en français" by Guillaume Posé and Le Prof Elisabeth to learn about common expressions using "être" and "avoir".
10 expressions avec être qui sont SUPER UTILES !!!
10 expressions avec le verbe AVOIR. Première partie. Niveau A1 de FLE. 😍 English subtitles available
Practice using expressions for destination, origin, and common expressions with "être" and “avoir” in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using expressions for destination, origin, and common expressions with "être" and “avoir” in French. Focus on the context and make sure you’re using the correct conjugation of the verbs.

• Day 7: Expressing anger, joy, hunger, and state of mind or being

"Exprimer la colère, la joie, la faim et l'état d'esprit en français" by Français Facile et Claire is a great video to learn how to express anger, joy, hunger, and state of mind or being in French.
la joie, la tristesse, la colère, la peur. Apprendre les émotions en français
Practice using expressions for anger, joy, hunger, and state of mind or being in sentences.
Assignment: Write a short paragraph (8-10 sentences) describing a situation where you experience different emotions and states, such as anger, joy, hunger, and state of mind or being. Use the expressions you learned in the video and focus on conveying the emotions and states effectively.

Week 8: Auxiliaries, storytelling, and miscellaneous topics

• Day 1: French simple tenses and conjugating "être" (to be) and "avoir" (to have) in the simple present

Watch the video "Conjuguer être et avoir au présent simple en français" by Tout en francais tv to learn how to conjugate the verbs "être" and "avoir" in the simple present tense.
Comment conjuguer les verbes ÊTRE et AVOIR au présent en français - FLE A1
Practice conjugating “être” and “avoir” in the simple present tense and use them in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using “être” and “avoir” in the simple present tense.Ensure you’re choosing the right auxiliary verb for each sentence and using the correct conjugation.

• Day 2: Introduction to the two auxiliaries (être and avoir) and their comparison with "to do" in English

We recommend you watch "Les deux auxiliaires en français (être et avoir) et leur comparaison avec 'to do' en anglais" by Quora for this.
Pourquoi dans la langue française y a-t-il deux auxiliaires, 'avoir' et 'être' pour conjuguer les verbes aux temps composés ? Pourquoi pas un seul auxiliaire ? Pourquoi des verbes ont été désignés pour être conjugués avec l'auxiliaire 'être' ? - Quora
After you watch the video, practice using "être" and "avoir" as auxiliary verbs in compound tenses.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using "être" and "avoir" as auxiliary verbs in compound tenses, such as passé composé. Here, you have to make sure you use the right auxiliary verb and the right past participle of the main verb.

• Day 3: Simple future, imperfect, and passé simple of the auxiliaries

We recommend the videos "Le futur simple des auxiliaires en français", "L'imparfait des auxiliaires en français", and "Le passé simple des auxiliaires en français" by Guillaume Posé and Eveiller Mon Enfant for learning about the simple future, imperfect, and passé simple of the auxiliary verbs "être" and "avoir".
Grammaire Le futur simple des verbes irréguliers 👨‍🏫🗣🔊🇨🇵
Conjugaison : les verbes être et avoir à l'indicatif Imparfait
Conjugaison : les verbes être et avoir à l'indicatif Passé simple
Practice conjugating "être" and "avoir" in the simple future, imperfect, and passé simple tenses and using them in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using "être" and "avoir" in the simple future, imperfect, and simple past tenses. Check the conjugation and choose the right tense for each situation.

• Day 4: Introduction to storytelling using different tenses and sentences

Catherine Miron and French Facile’s video "Introduction à la narration en utilisant différents temps et phrases en français" teach you about storytelling using different tenses and sentence structures in French.
Les temps de verbes dans un récit texte narratif
[EN/FR SUB] Slow French Stories Beginner / Intermediate Level
Assignment: Write a short story (120-150 words) using different tenses and sentence structures in French. Make sure the tenses you use convey the timeline of events and create a coherent narrative.

• Day 5: Expressing time (today, yesterday, tomorrow, next, last) and months of the year

Watch the videos "Exprimer le temps en français (aujourd'hui, hier, demain, prochain, dernier)" and "Les mois de l'année en français" by Eveiller mon enfant and Madame à Paname to learn how to express time and talk about the months of the year in French.
Se repérer dans le temps - Hier - Aujourd'hui - Demain
Comment prononcer les mois de l'année en français ?
Practice using expressions for time and the months of the year in sentences.
Assignment: Write 10 sentences using expressions for time and the months of the year in French. Check the prepositions and ensure agreement between the time expressions and the rest of the sentence.

• Day 6: Seasons of the year, weather, and describing food taste

"Les saisons de l'année en français", "Décrire la météo en français", and "Décrire le goût des aliments en français" by Les Mémos de Benito, Éveiller mon enfant and Leçons Françaises are perfect for learning about the seasons of the year, how to describe the weather, and how to describe the taste of food in French.
Les saisons de l'année pour les enfants - Printemps, Été, Automne et Hiver - Que sont les saisons ?
Comment parler du temps en français
les saveurs en français.
Assignment: Write a short paragraph (8-10 sentences) describing your favorite season, the typical weather during that season, and your favorite foods to eat during that time. Use the vocabulary and expressions you learned in the videos.

• Day 7: Hierarchy at work, government structure, and kingdom structure

"La hiérarchie au travail en français", "La structure du gouvernement en français", and "La structure du royaume en français" bacstmg.fr and Voots - Vulgarisation Politique will teach you about hierarchy at work, government structure, and kingdom structure in French.
Thème 3 - Chapitre 1 : La structure de l'entreprise
Qu'est ce que le gouvernement ? #InstancesPolitiques E02
La structure du royaume en français
Assignment: Write a short paragraph (8-10 sentences) describing the hierarchy in your workplace, the structure of your country's government, or the structure of a fictional kingdom. Use the vocabulary and expressions you learned in the videos.

• Recap and Review (Day 7 continued):

We recommend the videos "Autres nuances de lecture et d'écoute en français", "Vidéo récapitulative", and "Récapitulatif et histoire pour la compréhension orale en français" by Français avec Pierre to review the key concepts covered throughout the 8 weeks and practice your listening skills with a story.
HISTOIRE POUR PROGRESSER EN FRANÇAIS : 1. NUIT À LA BELLE ÉTOILE 🌟
Une histoire vraie en français + transcription Compréhension Orale 🎓
Assignment: Create a mind map or summary sheet of the key concepts, vocabulary, and grammar points you learned throughout the 8 weeks. Use this as a reference for future practice and revision.
Assessment 2: Evaluate progress through a comprehensive A1 exam and assignments
At the end of the second month, assess your progress and identify areas that need improvement.
This assessment will help you determine whether you have achieved the A1 level in French and are ready to move on to the next level (A2).

Comprehensive A1 Exam

Take a comprehensive A1 exam that covers all the topics and skills you’ve learned during the first two months. The exam should include the following sections:

1. Listening comprehension
2. Reading comprehension
3. Writing
4. Speaking
5. Grammar and vocabulary

You can find comprehensive A1 exams online or in French learning textbooks. Some recommended resources for A1 exams include:

• DELF A1: Practice Exam 1
• The DELF A1 Exam: What to expect & How to practise with Kwiziq French

Assignments

On top of the exam, complete the following assignments to demonstrate your mastery of A1-level French:

1. Write a 150-word letter to a French-speaking pen pal, introducing yourself and describing your daily routine, hobbies, and interests.
   
2. Record a 6-minute video of yourself speaking in French about a recent trip or vacation you took. Use the passé composé to describe what you did and saw.
   
3. Read this short A1-level French story (150-200 words) and write a summary of the main events and characters in French.
   

Marie est une étudiante de 20 ans qui vit à Lyon, une grande ville dans le sud-est de la France. Elle étudie l'histoire à l'université et rêve de devenir historienne un jour. Tous les matins, Marie se réveille tôt pour aller à l'université. Elle prend le bus et le métro pour y arriver. Les cours commencent à 8h30 et se terminent à 17h. Marie aime beaucoup ses cours d'histoire, mais elle trouve les cours de langues un peu difficiles. Après les cours, Marie retrouve souvent ses amis à la bibliothèque pour étudier ensemble. Ils aiment discuter de leurs cours et de leurs projets d'avenir. Parfois, ils vont au cinéma ou au restaurant pour se détendre. Le week-end, Marie aime faire du sport. Elle joue au tennis avec sa sœur et fait de la natation à la piscine municipale. Quand il pleut, elle préfère rester à la maison et lire un bon livre. Marie est très heureuse de sa vie étudiante à Lyon, mais elle a hâte de voyager et de découvrir de nouveaux endroits. Elle économise de l'argent pour partir en vacances l'été prochain. Questions de compréhension: Qui est Marie ? Où habite-t-elle ? Qu'étudie-t-elle à l'université ? Quel est son rêve ? Comment se rend-elle à l'université ? À quelle heure commencent et se terminent ses cours ? Quels cours trouve-t-elle un peu difficiles ? Que fait-elle souvent après les cours avec ses amis ? Quels sports aime-t-elle pratiquer le week-end ? Que fait-elle quand il pleut ? Pourquoi économise-t-elle de l'argent ? Où aimerait-elle aller l'été prochain ?

1. Listen to this A1-level French podcast or dialogue (2-3 minutes) and answer comprehension questions about the main ideas and specific details.
   
2. Create a presentation (5-7 minutes) in French about your hometown, including information about its location, landmarks, and interesting facts. Use appropriate vocabulary and grammar structures.
   

Evaluation and Reflection

After completing the comprehensive exam and assignments, evaluate your performance and reflect on your progress. Consider the following questions:

1. Did you achieve the A1 level in French based on your exam results and assignment performance?
2. Which areas did you excel in, and which areas still need improvement?
3. How has your French language ability improved since the beginning of your learning journey?
4. What strategies and resources have been most effective in helping you learn French?
5. What are your goals for the next stage of your French learning journey (A2 level)?

Based on your evaluation and reflection, celebrate your achievements and set new goals for the upcoming months.
If you feel that you have not yet reached the A1 level, adjust your learning plan and continue practicing and reviewing the A1 content until you feel confident in your abilities.
(If you want a better reading experience with the video embeds, you can find the article here: https://www.getfrenchclasses.com/blog/learn-french-in-60-days )

I’m applying for a barista job and need a cover letter but have no idea how to write one. Every site on google says something different. What do I do?

Hi, Let me start off by saying that I've never writen here before but need help in what to do. My story starts off with a father who has been my Rock and hero all my life. I was born to a mother and father who never married because my father's mother didn't think my mother was good enough for her son and did everything including threaten to disown him if he didn't marry the woman she wanted him to be with. My mother had to prove paternity thru the friends of the court in getting a DNa test done because she stated the he denied me being his at first and this was due to my fathers mother and his current wife and once paternity was established It was proven that he was indeed my biological father. He never denied me but his name was never put on my birth certificate. I'm 52 so back then if you were not married and getting help from the state the fathers name wasn't put on the birth certificate if the father didn't sign. Let's skip to today where I have a brother who is the only connection to my father and a (so-called stepsister- no relation) someone who my father helped raise but he never adopted her because her father was still alive. My father was going thru a health scare where he needed heart surgery but kept prolonging to get it done. During one of his stays at a rehabilitation center he told me he wanted to give me Power of Attorney. That's when I was told my Brothers son stole my Dad's credit cards and linked them yo a cashapp account and bought a car while stealing alot of money from my father. I was livid. I spoke to Sherry who told me that she had taken Dad to the police station to file a report then to his bank to make a fraud report. I spoke to her and told her my plans and she hurriedly ran down to Probate court and put in for gaurdianship over my father. It was until my father asked me to get him a lawyer I didn't find out until 3months later that she had gotten guardianship. She was very sneaky and slick about it. So I moved in going on a year with my father and took care of him making sure to keep him safe, fed and making sure he took his medicine, going to doctors appointments and just being his daughter who enjoyed spending time with him. I made it clear to my nephew who had stolen from my father the sum of $26,000, if he ever stole anything else from my father again I would make his life a living hell and he said it was all a misunderstanding. I told him there was no misunderstanding stealing from someone I love. The look on my face made him realize I was serious and wasn't dealing with his shit. It was bad enogh my brother had beat up on Dad because Dad wouldn't supply him money for his drug habit. My brother would stand over Dad with weapons and terriorizing him where he could sleep. All he would do is sit up on the side of the bed a sleep sitting up. My Dad was completely traumatized from all that abuse. See this didn't just start with my brother my older sister stayed in the house for 25years and didn't do anything to help but be verbally abusive to him and moving her out of the house was the best thing that he did. Well moving forward in July my father finally got his living will and Revocable Trust done which names me as the executor over his estate and she was listed a a patient advocate and to make sure that all of his bill were paid after he passed. She was not to recieve anything because she was not an heir. My father had children including myself which makes it 3 biological children and 2 step kids which were not adopted but thru marriage he claimed them. One passed away and that left (Let's use Sherry as her name) Well she didn't sign her part to the Living will until September 8th. Moving forward his wallet came up missing and his phone when she came over. Then she'd text me and ask if I'd seen his phone which he had just used talking to her that morning. I had reminded her of needing help because Dad was getting to the point he was using the bathroom on himself more and more. I was continuously cleaning up floors and clothes and bedding but I knew it was something that had to be done. I told her multiple times that I would need help with a caretaker fro 12am-8am she took her time getting someone. She kkept saying she was looking for someone. Now I guess your asking why didn't I get someone? Well she had stated enough times that she was his gaurdian and she would be taking care of anything dealing with him medically. But she continued to do things like trying to get him to sign over power of attorney so she could get inyo his bank account. Thanksgiving came around and Dad wanted to go over to his friends house which was his ex-wife's sisters house when his wallet came up missing gor a second time. He wasn't able to go yo the bank or do anything Little did she know my father was up on her games so he told me that he was signing over the car to me and did but I didn't file the trasfer until the begining of the next year. I had taken care of my father for the whole year with no help except when he fell a cpl of times and had to ask a co-worker to come by and help me get him up. Sherry would only come by maybe once out of each month oe twice if she was begging for money. So December came in thats when everything hit the fan it was late December when she came over to take him to his doctors appt. She told me 3 days before she was going to get her cousin to take him but then she asked me to use the car. I told her no because I had important things that needed to be taken care of and I couldn't not attend. She got upset and thats when the 1st threat in about she would be putting in for me to be put up out of my home. I asked her what made her think she could put me out of my home because of not using the car. I asked her was she sure making threats was what she wanted to do? She said yeh and I don't care how you take it. Then she made an even bigger threat by telling me just cause you have a gun I have one tok and I will use it on you. I said ok I want you to remember that you made these threats. Now picture someone just showing up to your house and all of a sudden your sleep and they've hired someone to come in and clean out a space that my Dad used as his bedroom which was full of valuables,clothes,important papers and things my father treasured. But also your stuff that you've stored in the space. Now this happened on New Years Eve. I called Sherry to find out why my stuff had been thrown out and she said I'll call my cousin and we'll be over on New Years day to get everything back in the house. I knew just from the conversation that wasn't going to happen so I had to hurry home from work to get all my stuff that was thrown out.. I was beyond pissed to say the least. But the next thing to happen was the human society was called on me to get my dog taken away from me. When they arrived they said they recieved a call that the aminal had been living in dangerous and abusive conditions. I laughed and invited them in so the could see the dog. They burst out laughing when they say the dog and said that my dog was spoiled and loved the heck outta me. Then while they were leaving said they'd write in their report that this was a false report. I thanked them. About a couple of days later my Dad ended back in the hospital because he refused to take his medicine and his body started swelling up and retaining water. So during this time Sherry and her crew were showing up knowing that I worked midnites and kept opening up doors and window and it was cold as heck outside also making alot of noise.They were trying to piss me off to say I would move. I just kept my door closed but then it came to a point in February that I had had enough and told the Since Dad wasn't here they didn't need to be here in the house. I had to change the locks also. I realized then just how things were going downhill fast with my Dad. When he did make it home for the last time Sherry had invited church and friends of my father over and decided to tell me that she was upset with me because I got Dad an attorney which he asked for to get his will done. She was yelling so loudly that everyone was stunned but when I asked her what she was really upset about she said that You shouldn't have gotten him a lawyer to do any estate planning cse she should have been the one doing it. I told her that Dad asked for an attorney and he didn't want anyone being a part of what he wanted in his will he gave her a part to play and she wasn't satisfied with that answer she she stated closing in on me into my personal space to yell in my face about her not getting anything. I told her you are not an heir Dad had 3 kids and he had every right to do his Will the way he wanted. Sherry had been calling the estate lawyer trying to get him to transfer everythong into her name. She just kept on harassing him and having Dad call him even though he was in full blown dementia. Dad had told me he didn't want her having access to his bank account and wanted me to follow everything to the letter. Right after having this talk Dad was right back in the hospital 5 days later. So I called Sherry the nite before because she said that there would be someone here to watch Dad so my thieving nephew showed up. I really didn't want him there in the house but I couldn't call off from work so I had to leave Dad in his care. So when I got off work my nephew who had stolen the money from Dad who was watching Dad said Dad was changed and good but hurried out the house. I walked into my Dad's room and my heart broke because my nephrw let him sit in Urine which had travel from the back of hos head down to the calf's of his legs and I mean the smell told me my nephew hadn't done anything he claimed. I just broke down crying and had my co-worker who came home with me to be a witness helped me get Dad cleaned up and helped me tak the bedding off the bed to was. I couldn't kerp it together. I cried my heart out. I was glad to have help that morning. Then Sherry's cousin and daughter came over to help out with Dad the Sherry showed up and while in my room I kept hearing whispers tgen I heard let me know if she comes out. I was on the phone speaking with a friend when I decided to look out my side window when I saw Sherry taking the license plate off my car. I went out to say something but she had jumped into her car and drove off very fast. Then Dad's nurse showed up and quickly told me to call the abulance to get him to the hospital because he wasn't getting better he was getting worse. I hurried up and called an abulance then called Sherry to let her know but she didn't pick up. She did however call back 10 minutes later. I was in the midst of me giving the emt's Dad's medicines Sherry arrived and gave the gaurdianship paperwork to get him to the hospital. After the abulance left I got in the car and went straight to the police station to report my license plate was stolen by Sherry. I walked in one day and Sherry had turned the electricity and heat off in the house. I had them turned back on. Then of course she did the same thing with the water. Dad never made it back home from Rehibiltation or the nursing home. She texted me and lied by saying that she was putting him in 2 different nursing homes the said he was going to the nephews house that had stolen the money but she wouldn't give me the address. I asked her for it and text my nephew both of them wouldn't answer me back. I put in to modify the guardianship but it was adjourned for a week when we got to court finally and the judge listened to her side and I never got a chance to say what has been going on. So Sherry lied so much on me during the zoom court meeting and then stated that I was a danger to my own father. I was so taken aback by this statement. She also said she went and got another will done 1-2 months before Dad passed which was May 1, 2024 the will stated that he wanted me to arrange his funeral. Sherry had obituaries printed with my Dad's name being incorrect and also as a last result to get me to act out at the funeral put in the obituary that I wasn't even his daughter but his God-Daughter. I knew it not to be true so it didn't bother me. Her family and Dad's friends walked up to me and kept apologizing for my lost and also apologizing for the way Sherry had treated me and what she put in the obituary. My Dad had a great send off because of his Lodge brother giving him a sword sulute but I couldn't stay because I knew I would say something. Then after that my oldest son started calling me asking about his aunty. I kept telling him she was no kin to him but because he's stuck on stupid and parked on dumb he believes anybody who will give him money. He called and told me that his kids mother and tge kids needed a place to stay and I told him no because he had stolen from me before and was disrespectful about it and ft nobody should say anything to him. Look when your child tells you after he has stolen from you that your just some B-_+# out in the street and he doesn't care if he stole from you. You tend to learn to separate yourself from tge turmoil of chaos in their life so you don't get caught up. So he thought calling Sherry was going to help his plight. He has been warned several times to not get close to her because she is a narcissist. If she can't get what she wants and control you, she will do and say anything to get you on her side so that you have no one to listen to you. Right now I'm in the process of trying to get the house turned over into my name since Dad said in his will the house goes to me. What would you do to handle someone who doesn't care about anything but money and anything that they can do to throw you in a bad light?

See yourself as someone who uses code to solve business problems? Does working on complex and challenging code for hours feel like minutes to you? And do you have fun figuring out how to make the development experience better — more usable, more scalable, more performant and more future-proof?
We’re looking for a full-time Senior Software Developer to help refine and shape Yuppiechef’s applications and software architecture as we grow and scale.
What does the job entail?

Technical speccing and project planning according to business requirements and objectives Leading the execution of software development projects and contributing to the development cycle Driving our software architecture and maintenance Providing technical leadership and mentoring to more junior team members Collaborating with and working across business units 

What are the requirements?

You’ll typically need to have more than 10 years’ experience as a developer, building web and mobile applications for real customers — either freelance or working for a studio, or in-house in a similar environment A world-class development portfolio spanning across different applications that demonstrates the level of skill and experience required for this role, and the impact your work has had on the businesses you’ve worked for 

You’ll need to show these specific skills and coding languages:

Functional programming languages like Clojure (preferable) or experience with languages like Scala, Go, C#, Ruby or PHP A strong command of MySQL (MariaDB) database A strong command of Message brokers (RabbitMQ / Kafka) and job schedulers A good understanding AWS (Amazon Web Services) cloud infrastructure and services Technical speccing — an ability to write up detailed technical documentation Project management — an ability to lead the technical execution of projects Effective collaboration skills to contribute to projects and team mentorship A tertiary qualification in Computer Science or similar would be beneficial, but not a requirement. You will, however, need to have a Matric (GCSE; A-levels; or equivalent) 

Please note:

While we have a clear idea of the skills and experience required for the role, applicants who have experience in different software technologies, but have the willingness to learn quickly and contribute meaningfully and impactfully within a high-performance team, are encouraged to apply. Every application is evaluated by a real human being 

Preference will be given to candidates from under-represented, designated groups
What technologies will you be working with?
Front end:

Clojurescript Rum Clojure/Clojurescript library React JavaScript Websocket 

Back end:

Clojure Java PHP 

Infrastructure

Nginx / Apache AWS Linux Kafka / RabbitMQ Redis Memcached Cloudflare Datadog and Sentry for monitoring 

What’s the pay, benefits and environment? We pay competitive, market-related salaries based on skills and experience, and profit share based on the company's performance Your salary is based on a “Total Cost To Company” model and includes: Medical Aid (Discovery) contributions Group Life Cover Retirement Annuity Employee Assistance programme 17 Days Paid Annual Leave increasing to 20 days with length of service
We are based in Westlake, Cape Town, and have a hybrid work policy
Who are we? We’re Yuppiechef, and see ourselves as helping people find moments of joy at home. We’re here to offer outstanding and memorable service, while selling things that our customers love using. We’re foodies and home lovers and early adopters, and we’re passionate learners more than we’re experts. We have a loved online store and 20 beautiful physical stores across SA, and we’re a proud member of the dynamic Mr Price Group. Our office in Westlake, Cape Town, has a view of the mountains, a beautiful Rancilio coffee machine, and plenty of books to borrow. It’s filled with people who value excellence, and who like to hang out together and learn from one another. We’re always looking for new people to teach us new ways of doing things and help us make big things happen. We’d love to know if you might be one of them.
Read more / apply: https://ClojureJobboard.com/clojure-job/nr-senior-developer-cape-town-yuppiechef.html

In the wake of digitization and global connectivity, data protection has become an integral agenda for businesses across all sectors. Consequently, maintaining the highest level of security for user and business data has become a paramount necessity. Failing to meet those expectations will result in reputational damage and hefty penalties to regulatory bodies. As a result, several IT Compliance Regulations for Industries have come forward to achieve this goal and prevent potential failures.
Almost 83% of risk-compliance professionals in 2023, said that keeping compliant with all regulations was essential for their company’s sustainability. However, it can be confusing to determine which regulations apply to your business or whether you are eligible for compliance.
Therefore, let’s discuss some of the most crucial IT compliance regulations that will safeguard your business.

Importance of IT Compliance Regulations

In an age where privacy concerns are at the forefront of public discourse, IT compliance regulations ensure that the privacy and confidentiality of user’s personal information are maintained from the business’s side.
For instance, The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) governs the processing and handling of personal data by companies. Likewise, it establishes strict protocols in the following requirements:

• Obtaining Consent from Users for Accessibility of Information
• Implementing Data Protection Measures
• Notifying Individuals in the event of a Data Breach

Undoubtedly, it enhances the transparency and accountability of data processing practices across organizations. In addition, following strict privacy rules, makes the users feel safe to rely on you.
Nonetheless, even without considering the customers, the significance of IT compliance regulations for industries has an impact on revenues too.
For instance, Google was fined 50M Euros for breaches of France’s data privacy regulations under GDPR. Not only does it cost a huge sum of revenue but it also damages the business’s reputation significantly. Furthermore, our studies indicate that 41% of businesses without IT compliance faced serious slowdowns in their sales cycle as well.

Reasons Behind Non-Compliance

Staying compliant with IT regulations might sound simple, but businesses in the current landscape know how tricky it can be. Despite your best efforts to protect your company and customer data, it can lead you to overlook certain critical aspects. Particularly with the emergence of new regulations every few years, this responsibility becomes increasingly difficult over time.
Therefore, after catering to a wide range of industries we identified some of the most significant reasons behind non-compliance. As a result, here are the significant shifts that are making it hard for businesses to stay compliant:

BYOD (Bring Your Own Device)

Letting your employees use their own devices for work could result in significant cost savings. However, without an appropriate BYOD policy, you risk losing the essential supervision needed to remain compliant.

Third-Party Vendor Management

External vendors are crucial for your business operations — It’s not possible to manage everything single-handedly, as they assist in a wide range of tasks like:

• IT Support
• CRM Management
• System Maintenance and Upgrades

However, sharing data with a non-compliant third-party vendor opens up the scope for security breaches. Hence, you must ensure that you are partnering with someone recognized and follows all the IT compliance regularities for industries.

Software Updates

We all know how the technological landscape is advancing rapidly. Due to this, software companies are highly invested in regularly rolling out new updates. But due to time restrictions, businesses often struggle to update their software promptly which hinders the possibility of staying compliant.

IoT (Internet OF Things)

We all know how IoT has been a revolutionary technology for businesses in healthcare to logistics and more. However, the security in IoT networks has yet to make a mark!
As a result, it’s crucial for businesses to regularly check these devices for potential breaches. Besides, you may also consult our IoT experts to assist you in safeguarding your networks and avoid any discrepancies.
Moreover, it is projected that the global IoT Market will reach $1.6 trillion in the coming years. So, businesses that are planning to leverage this must stay compliant with all the regulations to be successful. Thus, you may check out our work on IoT to know how it can benefit your business.
With all of that being said, let’s get started to know all the required IT Compliance Regulations for Industries. By adhering to these, you will ensure that your business stays compliant in the advancing landscape and avoid staying non-compliant.

Industry-Specific Compliance Requirements

Even though each industry has its uniqueness, the requisites for IT compliance regulations for industries remain the same. The ultimate goal is to protect user’s data and business information from any malicious entity.
So, let’s begin:

Healthcare

Compliance with IT regulations is of paramount importance in the healthcare industry. Due to the sensitive nature of patient health information and the potential consequences of data breaches. The healthcare IT compliance regulation is designed to ensure the protection of patient data while facilitating the necessary information processing.
Therefore, here are some of the key compliance requirements that are essential for healthcare businesses to follow:
HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act)
This HIPAA Act regulates the usage and disclosure of health information to uphold patients’ privacy and confidentiality.

• HIPAA Privacy Rule: The Privacy Rule establishes national standards for the protection of patient medical records and other personal health information (PHI). Covered institutions include:
  
• Healthcare Providers
  
• Health Plans
  
• Healthcare Clearinghouses,
  

All of them must adhere to the privacy law of PHI, ensuring that patients have rights over their health information.

• HIPAA Security Rule: A safety rule that sets standards for the security of electronic protected health information (ePHI). Businesses must implement administrative, physical, and technical safeguards to protect against threats and unauthorized access or disclosures.

HITECH Act (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act)
It is implemented to promote the ethical use and adoption of health information across medical devices.

• HITECH Breach Notification Rule: It requires healthcare institutions and their business associates to notify the (Secretary of Health-Human Services), in case of data breaches. The Breach Notification Rule also calls for conducting risk assessments to determine the probability of compromised information.
  
• HITECH Meaningful Use: Encourages the use and meaningful application of electronic health records (EHRs) by offering financial benefits to qualified healthcare providers. The criteria for meaningful use of HITECH involve:
  
• Utilization of certified EHR technology
  
• Enhanced quality, safety, and efficiency of EHRs and
  
• Patient involvement in compliance assessments.
  

All in all, if your business requires you to deal with healthcare records then you are subjected to HIPAA regulations. Also, maintaining and integrating your EHRs must be your first priority to stay compliant. Therefore, you may set up a call with us to learn more about it.

Education

Adherence to IT compliance regulations is very crucial for businesses in order to thrive ethically in the edutech sector. Accordingly, educational institutes have to deal with critical student information like research data, and information from various government bodies.
Therefore, certain important compliance regulations have been set out for businesses in education to follow in terms of staying compliant. Here are they:
FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act)
A federal law of IT governance that emphasizes safeguarding the data and privacy of students’ educational information.

• FERPA Privacy Rights: It establishes privacy rights for students and their parents regarding the access and disclosure of student education records. Educational institutions that receive federal funding, such as schools and universities, must obtain consent before disclosing personally identifiable information (PII).

COPPA (Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act)
It is an established Act to foster a safe and secure online environment for students across the world.
COPPA Compliance: Imposes requirements on websites and online services directed at children under the age of 13 to obtain parental consent for:

• Collecting Identity Information
  
• Using Collected Information for Decision-Making
  
• Disclosing personal information to external parties
  

Hence, educational businesses providing online services or platforms to students must comply with COPPA requirements to stay compliant.
Overall, edutech businesses must leverage maintaining their compliance and promote a safe and supportive learning environment for students.

Logistics

Given the diverse nature of logistics operations, compliance with regulatory requirements is essential to ensure safe global transportation practices. These regulations ensure the protection of sensitive data and uphold the integrity of logistics and supply chain operations.
With that being said, let’s have a look at some of the integral compliance requirements in logistics:
SOX (Sarbanes-Oxley Act)
In context to logistics, its an yearly financial reporting audit that highlights various processes – from human resources to fleet management across supply chains.

• SOX Responsibility: It mandates transparency and accuracy in financial reporting, which can indirectly influence how companies manage their supply chains. Logistics and procurement practices must be accurately reflected in financial statements. Moreover, it will ensure transparency and accuracy in supply chain management (SCM).

SOC (Service Optimization Controls)
It is a set of security guidelines designed to ensure secured data handling and trust-building among B2B stakeholders.
SOC Reports: The report focuses on the following logistics controlling factors including:

• Security of Data
• Availability of Data
• Data Processing Integrity
• Maintaining Confidentiality of Customer Data

These reports are typically relevant for service organizations that handle sensitive information, such as data centers and cloud service providers.
Therefore, logistics businesses must understand that potential data breaches will disrupt their entire supply chain and hence, obey the regulations. Also, it’s best to consult with logistics solution providers to ensure full compliance with IT regularities.

Finance

As the finance sector is the prime target for hackers, it faces more stringent regulatory compliance requirements than others. Notably, these are compliance measures that fintech businesses must follow with strict adherence to ensure sustainability:
AML (Anti-Money Laundering Regulations)
A rule in which fintech firms must comply with regulatory banks to detect and prevent financial discrepancies.

• AML Secrecy: The AML requires financial institutions to establish compliance programs to detect and prevent money laundering and terrorist financing activities. Compliance requirements include customer due diligence, suspicious activity reporting, and currency transaction reporting.

PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard)
It is a combination of security standards that guarantees a safe environment for users’ financial data across diverse fintech units.

• Enhanced Data Security: PCI DSS mandates the implementation of security controls such as firewalls, encryption, and access controls for financial services. This significantly reduces the risk of data breaches and ensures the protection of cardholder data.

Above all, compliance with these regulatory requirements is essential for financial institutions to maintain the trust and confidence of customers. Therefore, it’s a wake-up call for fintech businesses to start implementing robust security measures, while remaining compliant and avoiding penalties.

Additional Compliances

In addition to the IT compliance regulations across industries, which we mentioned above, there are some additional ones too. Let’s explore these as well.

• The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST): It provides a voluntary cybersecurity framework that enables businesses of all sizes to comprehend, manage, and mitigate their cybersecurity risks.
  
• AML-KYC: The Know Your Customer (KYC) process is implemented to authenticate each customer’s identity, preventing illicit activities like fraud within fintech-softwares.
  
• Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG): A collection of various benchmarks and guidelines that determine the accessibility of web-based applications and websites for individuals with disabilities.
  

Up until this stage, we have covered the importance of several IT compliance regulations across industries.

How can TheCodeWork help?

Now before we conclude, we hope that this guide has offered a deep insight into IT compliance regulations for industries. With years of experience across various domains, TheCodeWork can assist your business with all compliance requirements. We have helped businesses to comprehend, apply, and uphold compliance with pertinent IT regulations This includes carrying out compliance evaluations, crafting personalized strategies, putting necessary controls in place, and providing continuous support and monitoring.
Our company keeps businesses up-to-date by constantly tracking changes in IT compliance regulations and delivering timely updates and advice. Additionally, we provide regular compliance audits, training sessions, and consultations to tackle any new challenges.
Furthermore, we assist businesses in identifying and reducing risks through a risk-centric approach, by performing assessments. Also, we place a high priority on data security and confidentiality in our compliance goals, which include:

• Implementing strong access controls
• Encryption methods
• Data protection protocols

In addition, if you want to know how TheCodeWork can help you further, then book a free consultation call today.

F.A.Qs

Now, here’s a list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on IT compliance and regulations for businesses:
Q1. Do small businesses need to comply with IT regulations, or are they mainly for larger corporations?
Regardless of size, all businesses that handle sensitive data are required to comply with relevant IT regulations. However, the specific requirements may vary based on the size and nature of the business.
Q2. How can businesses ensure compliance with international regulations like GDPR?
Businesses can ensure GDPR compliance by obtaining explicit consent for data collection, it can be done in the following ways:

• Implementing data protection measures
• Appointing a Data Protection Officer (DPO)
• Conducting Regular Audits
• Promptly addressing data breaches.

Q3. How often should businesses review and update their IT compliance policies?
IT compliance policies should be reviewed and updated regularly, ideally annually or whenever there are significant changes in regulations or technologies.
Q4. How can businesses stay informed about changes and updates to IT regulations?
Businesses can stay informed by following regular updates on regulation changes via newsletters, or following relevant regulatory agencies.
Notably, you can also subscribe to our LinkedIn newsletters and stay updated with the latest industry insights and reports.

Bottom Line

Summing Up, we have delved into the most prominent IT compliance regulations for industries and witnessed their paramount importance. Especially, in an age where data breaches and regulatory oversight can be fatalistic for business unless it is addressed. Therefore, businesses across a wide range of domains must proactively comprehend and adapt to regulatory changes for their sustainability.
On the other hand, if you are wondering how to get started and get your business compliance-ready. Then, it is advised to partner with an IT solutions provider for better assistance! Eventually, you may set up a free consultation call with us too. TheCodeWork not only assists businesses with IT compliance but also specializes in developing products and services adhering to global standards.

Where Vextruvians like him in aeons past had escaped the dominion of predatory sea life by mingling in the shallows and eventually rising above to conquer the land, some of their brethren had instead shunned the light and sought refuge in the abyssal zones below, and with it came an entirely different way of existence. Gone were the soft and endlessly flexible palpitors for manipulation, replaced by ropes of cartilage rowed by endless, flesh tearing hooks. Gone was the bright blue of the ocean’s surface, meant to camouflage against the waves, and instead silvery translucent scales helped what little light existed in the dark depths pass straight through their bodies and render them all but invisible to their prey. Gone were the dorsal spines flashing their message of warning for friends and family to flee from a diving predator; with a crown of thorns upon its armoured head, it was that predator.
And most of all, gone was the sense of mercy in the creature's ghostly face before their eyes as it dug its barbs painfully into Karron’s throat, gasping for breath.
“YOU!” it howled at Bixley, a vortex of wrathful bubbles seen spinning through the clear tubes snaking around its respirator. “DON’T YOU DARE MOVE! ME, YOUR FRIEND, AND ALL THIS DUST ARE GOING TO TAKE A LONG TRIP DOWNSTAIRS! NOW, YOU CAN CALL THE LIFT UP RIGHT NOW, OR WE CAN WAIT A LITTLE WHILE! EITHER WAY, I’VE GOT TIME! THE QUESTION IS, DOES HE?!”
To punctuate his point, the Alxtruvian tightened his thorny grip, prompting several rivulets of blood to run streakily down Karron’s scales.
Its shrieking demands for him to be still may as well have fallen on deaf ears. So horrifying was the sight before him, every single one of Bixley’s palpitors were stone, and yet simultaneously somehow filled with a deep, internal trembling bordering on physical pain. Even as wails of panic began to rise up from the crowd around them, likewise witnessing the violent scene, he found he could neither bring himself to run away or charge forward as he once imagined he would, come the day to prove he was a hero ever did arrive. Moreso ashamedly, he instead found his eyes once more turning to the human beside him, hoping against hope he might have a way out of this he couldn’t envision.
However, what he saw coming from his friend was not yet another example of human ingenuity or resilience - rather submission… even as the Alxtruvian began slowly dragging its captive painfully backwards.
“Alright, alright”, Sam intoned gently, holding out a hand for restraint, “Just go and no one needs to get hurt…”
“I MEAN IT! TAKE ONE STEP AND HE GETS IT!”
“Believe me - we believe you…”
Out of everyone present, surprisingly it was Max who looked calmest by Bixley’s appraisal. While he himself shook, his subordinates sweated and choked their batons with clenched fists, and Sam glared with a mixture of concentration and fury, the dog merely looked on patiently; crouched and with eyes locked on the assailant with a cool sense of focus. It was as if he, too, was contemplating a solution to their predicament - although what solution that might be, Bixley could fathom it no more than he could read his mind. The simple thing to do would be, of course, to simply just comply. Even if the Alxtruvian escaped via the lift, the only thing waiting for him once he reached the surface would be something akin to a firing squad lined up at the door, ready and waiting to blast whatever came out to smithereens. Unfortunately, given the thirty minutes needed to descend, it was likely in that time the Alx would realise that fact as well - and with that knowledge plus a box stuffed with Dark Matter to numb the fear that came with conceptualising a coming execution, they would all be lucky if the only thing he did was kill Karron out of spite. Bixley felt nauseous to think what the result would be if an overdose of that magnitude went off halfway down the tether.
The notion of his entire station snapping off from the planet and drifting away to crash who knows where out in the black with everyone on board made him all but fall to the floor.
“Tell him you’ll bring the elevator up - if he lets us evacuate everyone here.” He heard Sam murmur, the human’s head not even turning to look down at him.
Desperation suddenly boiled into outrage inside Bixley. After having heard so many stories about Humanity’s resilience in the face of turmoil, to see one - his friend - so cowed and made low in the face of this beast, he simply could not stand for it
“And what, just let him get away?” Bixley hissed back, seething. “That’s my associate he has there! This is my station and everyone on it at risk! I’m supposed to just turn and look away while they die.”
“I have a plan - I just need this place all to ourselves and the lift coming up. That first part needs to happen before the second, so the quicker you do that, the easier this will be.”
Cursing, Bixley threw up his hands in frustration. Taking a deep breath in preparation, he then called out loudly to his brethren of long lost lineage.
“Alright! Alright you win! I’m calling up the lift now - but only if you let everybody else here go!”
“EXCUSE ME?! DO YOU BELIEVE YOU ARE IN ANY POSITION TO MAKE DEMANDS?! YOU CALL THE LIFT NOW, END OF STORY!”
He had anticipated that this might happen. After all, the more hostages one had, the better, right? Luckily, Sam had an answer even to this.
“Look around you, Alx! This is in your best interest, too! If it’s just us, then there’s no vigilantes out there to worry about! We understand not being rash, but you never know how many foolish do-gooders might be hiding around you! Much easier to keep your eyes forward, am I right?”
From their shared evolutionary kinship, albeit distant, Bixley could see the Alxtruvian contemplating his friend’s reasoning. He had to admit, it was convincing - but would their foe share his opinion? Only time would tell.
After what felt like an eternity, at last the ghostly cephalopoid looked up and nodded.
“Fine - just you lot will do!”
Bixley wasted no time. With a sigh of relief he retrieved his data-pad and punched in the command to set the lift foyer into evacuation alert. Immediately the space around them darkened and green lights began to flash across the floor and walls, indicating which direction their occupants should travel to reach safety. At the same time, a calming voice filled the room, announcing the need to egress, with each source voicing the instruction in a different alien language. Slowly, the room began to empty. Some went by gracefully, keeping in orderly lines while others instead jostled about their fellows in a panic to get through. All, however, gave their standoff a wide berth, flowing about it like water around a stone as their two sides stood on silently in opposition, glaring into one-another's' eyes with menace that permeated the air around them.
For how long they stood locked together with one another, listening all the while to nothing but the sounds of Karron struggling to breathe trapped in the Alxtruvian’s grasp, Bixley could not say. By that point, most who’d been present in the room before the violence appeared had managed to trickle out, leaving their confrontation free of bystanders who might get hurt by whatever crossfire might still be there to come. Even so, for what little time it had taken for the area to clear, it was obvious to Bixley that his dark reflection was beginning to grow impatient.
“OK, YOU GOT WHAT YOU WANTED!” the Alxtruvian snarled, “NOW, BRING THAT LIFT HERE SO ME AND THIS DUST CAN SAY GOODBYE TO YOU ALL!”
“Of course, of course, right away!” Bixley replied, relieved that so far things were going to whatever plan Sam had in mind.
Again looking down at the pad, he contemplated what to do. He could bring up the one currently at the bottom of the tether, but that could take too long, not to mention might contain a fully armed security squad who would no doubt shoot first and ask questions later as soon as they arrived. The other option was to reverse the lift going down, but that one he also knew for a fact would already be full of passengers and returning them would be putting innocents in the line of fire. The choice, then, was obvious, and he just had to hope whatever the plan was could be accomplished before anyone got hurt. With a swipe of his tendril, Bixley, with heavy hearts, called the lift and settled in for the agonising wait for it to arrive.
As it would soon transpire, calling it agonising was a gross understatement. With nothing but emptiness and cold silence filling the cathedral-like space overlooking their standoff, it felt like every creak and shudder that faintly echoed in from the vacuum beyond the many windows was magnified a thousand fold. Each time a cable flexed with a deep twang or a micro-meteorite pinged off of a metal plate, it terrified Bixley that it would be the signal to the end of their stalemate and the start of the promised bloodbath. However, no matter how many times the knell tolled, nothing continued to occur, and so his nerves only went on tightening until he was sure they were as tense as the tether connecting them to the surface of Hexolon IV.
It was to Bixley’s surprise, then, that at now of all time their foe began to speak, not with rage or in desperation, but with a tone of reverence.
“It’s beautiful you know, seeing them… all the lights, all the possibilities…
“Huh?” Bixley heard himself utter, the Alx’s sudden words being so unexpected he couldn’t help but let his confusion out.
“The Dust…” the apparition-like creature went on, making Bixley wonder if he was answering his exclamation or simply talking to himself. “All the wondrous worlds it can show you. You, with your rules, try so desperately to stop the truth it wants to show us… but we all know you can’t stop the truth from getting out, only slow it.”
“Truth can be dangerous, you know - something your big blue friend found out the hard way not so long ago”, Sam interjected somewhat venomously.
The Alxtruvian narrowed his eyes at his jab.
“Sooner or later we all dive down too deep. You would too, to see what we’ve all seen. Worlds where mysteries outweigh logic. Worlds where the earth and sky dance out of place. Worlds where the stars speak. Why wouldn’t we all want to get that little bit closer every time we hold our breath and jump? Eventually, you find you can’t stand to come back up for air.”
It was then Bixley realised this wasn’t just some drug peddler they were dealing with, but something far beyond that he could have possibly imagined. Did this guy seriously believe whatever deranged visions his fix of choice gave him was actually real? If so, did that mean he was willing to die for them? Bixley felt his spines give off another azure throb of terror. Perhaps the task the higher ups had forced down on him had been more insurmountable than he’d ever dreamed to guess. How then did Sam expect to get them out of this mess alive?, he wept internally.
Apparently sensing his poetic rhetoric falling upon deaf ears, the atmosphere quickly returned to its original, stifling tension, with all eyes shooting daggers and hearts - singular or otherwise - racing one another towards exhaustion. Feeling like he might collapse from the stress and unable to bear being in the dark much longer, Bixley chanced a communication with Sam.
“So”, he whispered hoarsely, “What are we waiting for? I know you humans are supposed to be something else, but I really don’t see the plan here.”
“We’re waiting for the lift, that’s all”, Sam hissed in return.
“We’ll be caught in the crossfire if we do that! Ground Base has got that thing coming up packed tight with soldiers, no doubt!”
“We’ll handle them. Just sit tight.”
“Huh? Excuse me, we?”
Another strangled gasp from Karron signalled their opponent’s awareness and distaste for their conversation, prompting Bixley to quickly cease his line of questioning. All that was left to do was let the silence drag on second by second, minute by minute, with no way to realise just how many had passed. True, he could easily have checked the lift’s progress up the cable with but a swift scrying of his data pad, but given how such an action might spark another, possibly fatal provocation, a move like that was beyond out of the question. There was also just the fact that knowing just how close they were to their ignition point could cause him to break and doom them all.
It was for that reason, that when the automated announcement for the elevator’s arrival at long last sounded, not only did it come as a surprise, but with no crowd present to soften its proclamation, it was instead loud enough to once more send painful waves coursing through the membranes of his body. More intense than usual, certainly, but after two decades of getting accustomed to the various emergency alerts sonically jostling about the hydraulic fluids within him, day in, day out, all it amounted to was a slight loss of control in some of his more delicate tendrils.
For a first-time Alxtruvian, however, already quite literally out of its element and subsisting on technological support, it was nothing short of debilitating.
ATTENTION, LIFT A WILL NOW BE ARRIVING. PLEASE STEP BACK FROM THE EGRESS POINT.
“AIEEEEEE!!!”, the Alx shrieked, clutching its head with several of its free palpitors as its hydro-breathing mask almost came away from its face from convulsions.
But that scream was nothing compared to the one given out when Max locked jaws around his throat.
Bixley hadn’t even seen Sam release the lead from his collar. In less than a second the perfectly calm and observing dog had been transformed back into that very same monster he’d met back in the baggage terminal, if not filled with an even greater bloodlust now that his master was giving the command. Teeth bit, snarls rang out, and pale clear blood sprayed across fur in arcs in a deadly display of agony and beastly aggression. Desperately, in an attempt to save himself, the Alxtruvian at once gave up on trying to restrain his hostage and instead made to eviscerate his attacker - but whether the mottled coat covering Max was too thick to leave an effect, or if he was merely too enraged to notice the barbs stabbing into him, it would appear to be a fruitless assault. Somewhere in the commotion, Bixley shouted at Karron to get back, then again to his fellow enforcers still standing by. However, it would appear they too were horrifyingly transfixed by the violence going on before them and there was little he could do to help him.
Regretfully abandoning his subordinate to his own rescue, Bixley turned in what felt like slow-motion towards what he knew was about to be the next obstacle inevitably to come, namely the lift itself. Already, through the widening gap between its doors, he could see at least four soldiers clad in their black body armour, all carrying weapons that looked a great deal less than non-lethal. Bixley cursed for what felt like the umpteenth time that day. One side effect he knew of a civil war so fresh in everyone’s memories, especially the military, was that of a shoot first, figure things out later philosophy entrenched in everyone’s consciousness. Mind scrambling, he tried to think of a way to make them stand down. Could he abort the arrival and send them back? No, if the door was already opening, then they would still make it through by the time he pulled the data pad and sent the command. Put his arms up and hope they held fire? No guarantee that they would even acknowledge that before it was too late. Run up and try to meet them halfway to talk it out? Odds were he’d be the one shot first by a trigger happy recruit who wouldn’t take the time to recognise him before answering with a bullet. Faced with the harsh reality now unfolding, he poignantly regretted not having taken the time to think in the minutes leading up to this point.
Before Bixley could collapse against the floor and beat his appendages down on it at his own futility, however, he was startled by what felt like an explosion of movement beside him. Looking up, through bleary eyes, he couldn’t help but gasp to witness Sam no longer at his side, and instead halfway across the room, his footsteps thundering in the direction of the lift. Bixley blinked in disbelief, as if attempting to clear what was supposedly an apparition from his sight. Being the overseer of a planetary transit hub through which literally all walks of life passed through, he’d been made privy to many of the stories that’d come out of the humans’ involvement in the conflict played out mercifully below the reach of his station. How they could take a normally lethal round and keep going. The range at which their sight could track a moving target. How they had the kind of strength that could tear a Vex cleanly in two. Those stories, though, were easily a credit a dozen, and many of them he’d brushed off as simply fantasy brewed up within the fog of war.
But now, seeing the soldier he’d only recently begun to call friend move the way he did now, suddenly lent credence to everything he’d heard about his kind.
He wasn’t as fast as Max had been, tackling the Alx a moment prior. Even as impressive as humans were, Bixley doubted anything could match such a living weapon. But it was close - and the fact that a being possessing as much mass as Sam did could drive itself forward at any sort of comparable speed was astonishing in of itself. At first, shaking off the clouds of wonder in his mind, Bixley thought his companion was simply rushing to the aid of his animal, wishing to remove him from the offender’s thorny grasp. But upon reaching the spot where the two lay, wrestling still, he strode on past them with a fury without so much as a glance downwards. With soaring hearts, Bixley finally understood the full extent of Sam’s plan to save them all.
The soldiers didn’t even get the chance to raise their weapons before what to them was a giant folded them into its arms. If Max had hit the Alxtruvian like a ton of bricks, then Sam colliding with the four troopers was like two tons of steel slamming into their breastplates. Visors cracked, rifles shattered, and Bixley thought he felt the tether blow them sway a tiny degree from the impact. As they crumpled to the lift floor, he sent out a sizable twang of sympathy towards them - but for the most part it was overshadowed by the wave of relief washing over him seeing that at long last it was truly, finally over. There would be inquiries, Coalition meetings, and a fair few medical compensations to hand over, but to him that was all trivial.
“Max, heel”, Sam commanded, stepping out of the lift over the unconscious soldiers in an almost casual fashion. At once, the German Shepherd obeyed, releasing his now likewise unmoving prey to stand at his master’s side.
“Sam!” Bixley cried out, doing his best to force his tendrils to move him forward, “Friend, are you alright?”
“Yes, I’m fine”, he replied, sounding somewhat mournful. “I feel as though I might have been a bit too rough, though. I forgot these guys aren’t quite the frontline troops I used to go up against. Should be fine, all things considered.”
Bixley nodded, the toll of everything that’d occurred having left him much too drained to even attempt to condone or condemn. Instead he turned over to look down at the Alxtruvian and his would-be cargo lying limp on the floor between them.
“And what about him? Will he… make it?”
“Mmm, should do. Max can look pretty vicious when he’s told to be, but he knows to be careful. Still, a trip to the medbay in handcuffs would be one taken better sooner rather than later.”
Bixley shuddered a little to know that, at least to some degree, the display he’d witnessed wasn’t even everything Max was capable of. Nevertheless, with gratitude, he put his palpitor atop the dog’s head in reward for his good efforts.
“Well done, Max. If I had a medal, I’d be pinning it on you now.”
A small, guttural bark that sounded almost like a resolute returning of his own appreciation came from Max’s throat. Evidently, like him, with the atmosphere of tension gone, the remainder of his compatriots were taking control of the situation without his assistance, with calls for medical staff, apprehension measures, and further reinforcements chattering alongside the sounds of hurrying footsteps. Unsure of what to do with himself now, he opted to ask how the human knew his plan would work. To his surprise, Sam looked slightly discomforted by his question.
“Fighting in the field, we quickly found out that… against you guys… sonic grenades were a pretty effective tool. So when you mentioned before how the announcements made you uncomfortable, I figured it’d make more than enough of a distraction with no one but us around to hear it.”
At that, Bixley laughed out loud. To think that had he succeeded in getting the Coalition to get out of their chairs for once in a lifetime they might not be standing there was simply too much irony to be contained.
“Once again you humans astound. I guess now all that’s left is to send you on your way home.”
Having said that, Bixley felt a sudden emotion of sorrow begin to fill him - as well as one of perplexity.
“Still… I can’t help but think nothing’s really changed. We got lucky with you two being here, but this could all happen again tomorrow and we’d have nothing on hand to stop it.”
Sam contemplated his words for a moment, looking downwards in concentration. When he looked back up, to Bixley’s surprise, he was wearing a smile.
“About that… while I can’t make any promises, I think I have an idea.”
Bixley’s hearts lept, somewhat in tune with what Sam was thinking.
“You mean…”
“Yup. Max here certainly ain’t the only good boy planetside on the block for retirement - and odds are pencil pushers won’t be keen to foot the bill for shifting what they think are a bunch of mutts past their use by date all the way home. I’ll try and do some talking, see if they’ll settle for a little orbital adoption drive… Maybe it’s time they weren’t just mankind’s best friends’”
Bixley smiled.
“Well, if they’re anything like Max and you, I think we’ll all be fast friends here.”
Bixley sat at his desk, relaxed and content as he waited for the message he’d been anticipating ever since last cycle’s incident had transpired to arrive. A musical note once again sounded from one of the screens arrayed before him, and immediately Bixley’s two hearts again thudded out of sync. Ravenously, he highlighted the new message that sat glowing within his inbox and eagerly, figuratively began tearing into its content.
“Blah, blah, blah, the Coalition is satisfied with your ongoing regulations, yada, yada, Dark Matter distribution has all but ceased following the introduction of the K9 Initiative - oh, now here’s something - we have agreed to appoint you vice security admiral!”
Bixley smirked, imagining the teeth grinding that must have ensued all around the tribunal room about that decision.
“Still, only Vice admiral?” Bixley scoffed, “It seems you still can’t please everyone!”
All that being said, this was more than he’d imagined from anyone so callous and ivory-towered as those Coalition bigwigs could be. Stretching his arms out with satisfaction at a job well done, he stood up and walked over to the corner of the room, where he crouched down, holding out his hand.
“Isn’t that right, Samson?”
Arf!
“Glad you agree with me”, he laughed as his new friend rolled over, exposing his brown and white belly to be rubbed. “Good boy! Now, do you want to go say hi to the new arrivals?”
ARF, ARF!
If there was just one good thing about bureaucracy, it turned out it was that - when it came to dogs - on the books a German Shepherd and a Corgi were one and the same regarding the new security assets in Terminal Alpha-Seven.
“I’m sure they’ll all love to meet you too! C’mon then, let's go!”

The scene that greeted Bixley and his new enforcers was everything as horribly expected from the moment the call had come in. What was originally an orderly check-in terminal now resembled something straight out of a Nistolla horror holo. Blue and green viscera, steaming and seemingly still twitching with previously contained life, coated just about every possible surface from walls to ceiling, and even now continued to slowly be pulled further, streakily downwards to the floor by the artificial gravity. The viewing window, once displaying the picturesque scene of Hexolon IV’s many moons and the stars behind them was now all but entirely blotted out in gruelish ichor - like a hideous graffiti mockingly overlaid above a masterpiece of art. How it was possible that so much sickly matter had originally been contained within a single being, Bixley had no concept. The only consolation allowed to him was the mercy that this time he hadn’t seen its rapid distribution firsthand.
Not like last time…
Not needing to even ask, nevertheless, for the sake of procedure, Bixley went over to the nearest member of staff present in the room not currently occupied by cleansing slime off the closest surface and asked him about the situation. As anticipated, what he got in return was an incredulous look and a gesture towards everything around him.
“What you see is what you get”, the Elstra told him wearily, scales flushed with spots. “Everything was fine one minute, everyone all waiting nicely in line, bags in hand, next it all turns to hell. Some tweaker Bolgus starts screaming bloody murder in the queue, then before you know it, blows up almost as tall as this room. Then a little while later, POP. You know how the rest goes.”
Bixley sighed. A Bolgus this time, huh? Big, blue, bulbous, and as lovable as a slug - it certainly at least explained the sheer quantity of muck dangling from the velvet ropes guiding the way over to the front desk, as well as why there was absolutely nowhere on the floor that didn’t squelch wherever they walked.
“Right, no need to go over what we already know by now”, Bixley replied, shuddering at the thought of having to review the footage later, “Were there any injuries?”
“That’s about the only silver lining about a Bolgus blowing its lid. Guy was so huge it took an entire three minutes before the goo gave way - more than enough time for everyone to do a runner before the bomb’s countdown hit zero. Probably why he thought he could handle the extra dose as well. Well, he was definitely wrong about that, as you can see.”
“Well, good job with that, at least. No kids around to see it and ending up scared they’re going to randomly explode someday. Guess all that’s left is to do a thorough clean up - and our best to forget what we’ve seen.”
“Sir, if you don’t mind me asking… who are they?”
Surprisingly… and also unsurprisingly, Sam and Max were simply looking at the grisly picture with little more than a stoic expression and a snuffling curiosity, respectively. Just what they’d been through to treat an example of the most horrific occurrences in his life like it was any other weekday, Bixley couldn’t begin to guess.
“Backup - the human military kind”, Bixley said bluntly, much to the Estra’s widening gaze. “They just happened to be around and offer a helping hand.”
Getting over his surprise with startling quickness, the reptilian shrugged and scoffed.
“Guess I don’t mind - as long as it’s you explaining it to the bigwigs.”
Rolling his eyes, Bixley dismissed him with a wave, to which he gladly obliged. The moment he was gone, Bixley found Sam approaching from behind his shoulder.
“So, what’s all this then? People doing the whole spontaneous explosion thing now? It’s usually pretty deliberate in the business I’ve been in.”
Ignoring the human’s crude joke, Bixley clenched his fists, having - in a short period of time - found human hands to be rather good for being expressive.
“Dark Matter. The latest superdrug to sweep the galaxy. It works on some quantum level, so it practically doesn’t exist until it’s in your system and making you see alternate dimensions. This is what happens when you put one quark too many in the nano-applicator - or if it just decides on a whim to collapse its state and unravel you at the fundamental level. A lot of this goop might have been part of some other unfortunate, hopefully better educated Bolgus elsewhere on the timeline. I’ve been at my wits end trying to find a way to stop it getting through.”
“Hmm, it does seem like quite the puzzle.”
At the end of his rope, It was all Bixley could think to do to just begin trudging about the gore-slickened room, hoping maybe this time the detonation had spared some fragment of a clue that would at last give him the key to all this mess. However, as the seconds turned to minutes, with nothing but more stinking azure slop to poke his baton into, it became more and more likely that again all he would receive from it was another round of reprimands and authoritarian edicts arriving in his message box come tomorrow. After all, didn’t he already know it was hopeless? As long as the supply of Dark Matter was intact, somewhere on the shadowed edge of space, those nefarious souls carrying it would continue to slip through the net.
“Huh, whatcha’ got there boy?”
Bixley spun around. Apparently inspired by his own investigation, it would seem Sam, too, was rooting about in the muck - but not to similar lacking success. Wading over, it appeared to him as if the human was busy attempting to pry something from Max's rather stubborn jaws.
“Grr, oof, Max please just give it here!”
“What appears to be the problem, sergeant?” Bixley asked, the barest flicker of excitement accelerating his hearts.
“Not sure just yet! Gimme’ a minute here!”
Stopping his wrestling of the dog, Sam stood up tall and imposing, no longer displaying any hint of humour as he held out his hand expectantly.
“MAX! GIVE!”
Immediately the dog whined. Gently, he put his nose into Sam’s waiting palm and deposited into it something small. Holding it out, Bixley was disappointed to see it was nothing but a small, broken piece of bluish metal. Instantly, his optimism died.
“Sigh, good job, Max. Thanks for trying at least.”
“Not useful?” Sam asked, inspecting it between his fingers.
“I know what it is. It’s a piece of one of the micro containment cubes these guys use to transport Dark Matter. Kind of delicate, so probably got shredded in the ‘explosion’.”
“Dang - that’s too bad.”
“Indeed.”
It was at that moment they were interrupted by the sudden reappearance of the crass Estra Bixley had interrogated before - only this time showing a much more panicked and deferring tone of expression.
“S- Sir! Please, you need to hear this!”
Bixley closed his eyes. Why had he let himself fall into believing his woes were finished for the day. Turning to his colleague, he didn’t even try to hide the resignation on his face.
“No need to sugarcoat it, Karron. Just give it to me straight.”
The one called Karron swallowed nervously.
“Well, you see… I was just speaking with some of the witnesses before the, you know, boom, and they say… well they say they think they saw what might be an accomplice with the Bolgus…”
“WHAT?!!!” Bixley all but screamed, returning with a jolt to full attention.
“U- unfortunately the… explosion wiped out the cameras… meaning there’s no way to tell where he might have gone!”
By now, Bixley felt he could faint. Now there was potentially a second explosive alien running about who knows where in his station, most certainly panicked and, because of that, no doubt headed straight for whichever transport was leaving soonest. Cross referencing the footage they had before the incident would take too long, and by the time they did get a bead on whoever it was they could be halfway to Tau. Bixley had dreaded the day one of these accidents happened onboard a shuttle - and by the way things were going, that day was likely going to be arriving within the hour.
“Why… why…” Bixley despaired, head sinking into his hands.
Before he could fall fully to the floor, however, he abruptly felt a familiar snuffling forcefully work its way beneath his arm. A moment later he found an even more familiar tongue lick his face.
“Max?”
The third familiar sensation was Sam’s hand on his shoulder. Lifting his gaze, he saw the human wearing a sage look of determination.
“Wh-”
“You and Max are pretty good friends now, huh?” he said warmly as Max continued to seemingly work hard to comfort him, “How about I show you one more amazing thing he can do!”
Taking the fragment, Bixley observed in stunned silence as Sam again put it before the German Shepherd’s nose before letting out another militaristic command.
“MAX! FIND!”
At once, Max’s nose went into overdrive, prodding and sniffing at what looked to be nothing but an inscrutable hunk of steel and carbon. In but a moment, however, it looked as if whatever secrets it invisibly held were laid bare by Max’s bestial senses, as within seconds his nose was sweeping back and forth over the blue ooze covering the floor - and, to Bixley’s amazement, not just randomly but with purpose and direction! Quickly, he called over to all but two of the officers in the room to join him.
“All of you, with me!”, he barked as Max’s nose neared the bay doors. “No telling if this guy is going to go quietly!”
Like a bizarre circus troupe, the squad of hardened security enforcers followed the guidance of the beast and its handler. Along hallways, past gift shops, down stairs, and through the food court, the only stops along the way were the occasional moments needed for Max to get reacquainted with the tiny scrap’s telltale smell. And like a circus, eyes, olfactory receptors, antennae, and all manner of other sensory organs followed them throughout - amazed by a spectacle not seen anywhere before throughout the entire galaxy. Bixley, however, was only peripherally aware of his onlookers, as his attention was fixed solely upon which direction Max was inexorably guiding them towards.
At last they arrived at the main lift foyer. By far the largest room on Terminal Alpha-Seven, it was filled by an almost equally vast number of aliens. Standing in line, lounging on benches, or just staring out at the midnight expanse visible through the ring of triangular windows adorning the space’s outer wall, it looked as if just about every species from Vextruvians, to Elstra, to Arthoceras’, it was like looking at a universal zoo. Families held hands, lone travellers irritably checked timepieces, groups of friends played games of one kind or another in various corners; all, however, were there in their chosen places and pastimes for the same purpose - to patiently wait for the next empty elevator to arrive, drop off its passengers, and in turn take them down to the planet below. Visible through the equally transparent and girdered floor beneath their feet, Bixley, as the sight always made him do, felt a surge of vertigo looking at the orbital tether spiral its way down into the clouds of Hexolon IV. With the enormity of the situation bearing down on him, however, he pushed any sensation of dizziness aside and refocused his mind on scanning the assembly arranged before him, trying his best to pick out any particular individual who might show signs of suspicion. His efforts were for naught, unfortunately, as although the area was immense, as a terminal made to ferry a city’s worth of migrants a day should be, even it was near to being packed wall to wall. Bixley cursed silently. In an almost ironic twist, it was the Coalition’s hammering in of practically daily restrictions that was to blame for making zeroing in on the culprit so insurmountable - an ever-worsening bottleneck on operations that made simple ins and outs grind to a crawl and crowds as common as sunrises on Heliocentra. Bixley glanced over towards Sam. It would indeed appear that the human and his amazing companion were everyone’s lone hope now.
“SECURITY! MAKE WAY!”, one of the officers next to him shouted, parting the crowd as best as he was able to allow Max to continue following the trail.
He needn't have bothered. Between the German Shepherd allowing nothing to stand before him in his pursuit of the trail, and the sheer sight of Sam looming virtually double the height of anyone else present around him, it was an understatement to say people were eager to grant passage. It was such an awe-inspiring sight, Bixley worried that, by being so conspicuous, it might make their target wise to their closing in on them and could prompt a reaction not unlike what a cornered Hypogrull could demonstrate. His sole reassurance that this wouldn't turn out true was the confident belief, likely present in their opponent’s mind, of Dark Matter’s supposed impossibility of being detected and that they would think his effort would be destined to turn out fruitless regardless of any assistance or tool they brought to bear. Well, Bixley thought to himself, maybe yesterday that would have been true - but today he had the best kind of help standing beside him!”
An excited bark from Max suddenly made him jump. Tail wagging, the dog’s pace increased abruptly, prompting several gasps from those still struggling to clear their path. Bixley, too, felt his hearts quicken their pace - but for a different reason. Even though he was still no expert on canine behaviour, it was obvious from his excitement that they were closing in. Feeling himself on the verge of a long desired vindication, he likewise increased his stride so as to not be left behind as Max slid his way further and further ahead amongst every manner of arm, wing, and palpitor. Then, as the last row of onlookers parted in front of his baton, Bixley saw it. There, behind a pillar, a small black bag lay leaning, so unassuming as to be conspicuous.
And next to it was his new best friend - sitting down with an air of finality and wearing something akin to a satisfied smile on his doggy face.
“Alright, good job Max!” Sam praised, again ruffling the fur on top of the dog’s head. “If I hadn’t left the treats in my bag, you’d have earned one today!”
Bixley, too, at that moment felt like he wanted to shower Max in gifts, be it bowls of the finest Tsardinian Caviar, or a cut out of his own personal paycheck. For months he’d struggled - thrown every asset and tactic his mind had been able to dredge up to throw at this problem he’d been demanded to solve by so many careless bureaucrats, with nothing but empty, drug devoid cubes tossed mockingly in garbage cans, and gore splattered restrooms to show for it. And while yes it was something of a blow to his pride and sense of professionalism to have a lone human and his animal friend randomly blow through out of nowhere and show him how simple it all could have been, a light at the end of his tunnel, no matter how upstaging, was a beautiful thing to see after so much ugliness. And so, with that in mind, after instructing the rest of his enforcers to set up a perimeter, Bixley decided to join in rewarding his saviour.
“You’re brilliant, Max”, he told the still smiling dog with an equally appreciative scratch behind the ears. “Perhaps I’ll see if I can make that direct shuttle ride first class as well, eh?”
“That sure would be swell”, Sam remarked, beaming pridefully. “I was worried perhaps he might have been a little out of practice by now - but it looks like Max still has it!”
For a brief, sweet moment, all there was in Bixley’s world was triumph. However, for as long as the few seconds it lasted felt, the gravity of what was soon to come next couldn’t be ignored. Letting both of their hands fall away from Max’s head and down to the floor, they each turned their attention to the black bag lying at their feet.
“Do… you want to open it?” Bixley somewhat ashamedly asked, discovering himself frightened by the thought of possibly having still been mistaken somehow, now that the moment had finally arrived.
“With all due respect, this is hardly my jurisdiction - likewise, I don’t want to be held accountable in the event Max really does just have a nose for Bolgus undergarments!”
Regretfully conceding the human was correct in his understanding of policy, given nothing about his involvement was standard operation, let alone Coalition sanctioned, it indeed fell to him to conduct inspection of any suspected cargo. So, with shaking palpitors, Bixley took hold of the container and pulled it towards him, and, after a moment's hesitation to prepare himself, pressed the button holding the bag’s clasp together.
As soon as the dark fabric parted to allow access inside, Bixley immediately had to squint as a bright light all but burst from the parcel’s confines and directly into his retinas. He didn’t need to wait for his pupils to adjust to know they’d hit the jackpot - the telltale, technicolor rainbow of starry sparks drifting about behind the transparent titanium windows of their containment cubes were, to him, by now, unmistakable. Dark Matter, ironically, was quite a rapturous sight to behold, and when it wasn’t ripping druggies in search of multiversal journeys through their minds into dregs, possessed all the allure of a galaxy in a bottle. And right there, staring into a lead-lined pocket universe of galaxies all sitting in long ordered lines, Bixley could almost see why anyone would risk oblivion to join in the cosmic symphony each one promised to show him.
Lost in awe, he didn’t register Sam looking over his shoulder.
“So… I take it that’s the stuff you’ve been looking for?”
Bixley jumped.
“Uh, yeah, that’s it”, he mumbled, shaking off the sickly feeling of temptation the sight inside the bag was giving him. “Again, I have no way to tell you how thankful I truly am.”
“We’re just just glad we could help. Max and I.”
Modding in agreement, Bixley signalled Karron to come over to him and secure the package before rising from the floor. For as monumental a success this moment was, they still hadn’t determined the trafficker themselves - a concern he shared with Sam.
“I wish I could help you there”, he replied sorrowfully, putting the lead back on Max’s collar, “but I’m afraid without something to go off of, he’ll just be sniffing around blind. Would probably just cause a panic by putting his nose in everyone’s faces willy-nilly.”
Bixley had no choice but to agree. With the crowd around them getting over their collective fear and letting curiosity overtake whatever consequences might befall them, the ring of guards allowing them their space was beginning to shrink. Camera footage would at least still point out a potential suspect in time, and if they’d truly managed to escape either via a shuttle boarding or were headed down the elevator right as they spoke, then there was little to be done. And besides, in the end all that would be waiting for them at their destination was a very furious prospective - possibly even murderous - buyer. The possibility that, at any moment, a grisly detonation might occur hadn’t escaped his mind, but to him it stood to reason that without their cargo close to hand - along with the fate of their accomplice fresh in their mind - whoever they were was unlikely to be partaking in any more doses of stardust that day.
“Karron, get this stuff over to forensics”, Bixley barked, handing over the bag. “If this guy is the type to have fingerprints, I want them on record as soon as possible.”
“Yes sir, right away sir!”
Bixley was sapped. Accusing messages or none awaiting him in his office, there was nothing more he wished for than to go back to signing forms and ticking boxes back at his desk - starting most joyously with writing off on a first class shuttle for two passengers direct to the human homeworld.
“Well then, Sam, if there’s really nothing more you or I can do for one another today, then I won’t keep you waiting. Both you and Max have both more than earned a flight home. I will definitely have to see if there are more friends like you two who can help bring things under control like this in the future.”
Sam smiled at his glowing review.
“Thank you, sir. There might be a few ex-soldiers out there I know who’d be interested in a gig like this. Maybe when this tour is over, a life in terminal security wouldn’t be so bad, what with today being so fun.”
“Ha, believe me when I say it isn’t! When there’s not chemical contraband running around left and right, it’s really quite bor-”
“BASTARD! YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT’LL HAPPEN TO ME IF I DON’T DELIVER?! DO YOU?!”
“GRR, WHAT?! LET GO OF ME!”
Bixley spun around. Karron, who’d been making his way through the crowd a moment prior suddenly stood gasping in the clutches of an alien he’d had about as many interactions with as he did with humans.
An Alxtruvian...

Roleplaying games are a fantastic way to tell a story with friends, and Pathfinder is no different! Something that certainly attracted me to the system (way back in the pages of Dungeon magazine, pre-Pathfinder) was Adventure Paths and the immense amount of pre-written content out there for GMs. However, there’s still plenty of room for you and your group to tell the story that fits you best. One of the best resources you have for writing adventures is the GM Core book - especially Chapter 2: Building The Game, which begins on page 63. I’ll be referring to these rules and suggestions (and others) often throughout the post, but think of this as a more focused resource than the Core book.
I’ve been approached by GMs looking to write adventures in the past and I often hear the same thing: “Okay, the group starts out as small town villagers, but then they will go on to defeat one of the risen demigods of death!” Which is to say, I hear about massive, epic stories, but no real plans on how to get there. What I’d like to do with this little exercise is look at how we write an adventure in service to a story, not just one or the other. We’ll approach our games from both a mechanical and storytelling perspective and work to make something like a guide to adventure writing. Hopefully, we can explore a variety of adventure archetypes together, from dungeon crawls to diplomatic missions to planar escapades.
Why Should I Write Adventures? I wouldn’t think of it as “writing an adventure” so much as it is “approaching GMing from a new angle.” If you’re someone (like me) who mostly runs pre-written adventures, you may not see the advantages of peeling back the curtain on both the storytelling and mechanical aspects of the game. And that’s okay! But sometimes those games go off book and it’s a helpful skill to have in your back pocket. It also lets a GM craft more personal encounters for their group to tie them more strongly to the story. It’s also just a fun solo exercise that can be entertaining for GMs with time on their hands.
What A Story Needs - Structure There are numerous ways to tell a story and one could dedicate their life working on perfecting what it means to write a story. Something, of course, to keep in mind is that story writing provides one singular perspective and outcome to how the tale unfolds while an adventure allows for numerous (if not limitless) ways for the story to develop. That said, for this first adventure, let’s keep things simple. We’ll focus mostly on the mechanics of adventure design and just make sure that we have a few storytelling elements before we begin. When I say elements, I mean:

1. Inciting Incident (Adventure Hook): What happens to drag the PCs into the adventure? Seeing a poster in town promising gold for the defeat of some goblins may motivate a group to action, but it’s hardly dynamic. The tower at the edge of town collapses, spurring the group on to investigate. Or perhaps a child is thrust into the care of the PCs with only the name of a close family member to go off of. What about fire that springs up at night suddenly calling out the names of the PCs? These all are interesting ways to involve the PCs directly into the adventure and tease them into the story rather than them existing as outside entities who have no connection to the story.
2. Adversary: An adversary has many meanings and can range from things such as other people, to forces of nature, to one’s own inner struggles. Once more, keeping it simple, let’s keep our adversaries as external, physical opponents; opponents that we can dispatch through encounters. While adventures certainly don’t need combat encounters to succeed, it’s a good place to start in a combat-focused game like Pathfinder 2e.
3. Goal(s): And one of the most important elements that an adventure should have is a goal - the thing that keeps the PCs moving forward on the right track and should, presumably, tie somewhat into resolving the resolving incident and will put them up against the adversary (who may have their own goals in opposition to the party).

Now these are not all you need to write an adventure (and sometimes you can do without them!), but it’s a good place to practice adventure writing. You can quickly come up with some adventures by filling in the blanks. Signposts like these can easily become the seed for a fully-fleshed out adventure and it gives you easily identifiable markers to cleave to when putting together a story.
Adventure Flow - The Five Scene Adventure So while you may have some narrative idea of the direction you’d like the adventure to go, we have to start thinking about how that story comes together at the table. Just as there are countless ways to tell a story, there are numerous ways to construct an adventure. I’d like to take a look at one that you may see crop up in adventures from time to time and is quite easy to execute. If you play a lot of Pathfinder Society, this sort of format should feel a bit familiar. I’ll refer to it as the “Five Scene Adventure”

1. Inciting Incident - The story has to start somewhere, and just like with narrative structure, having a strong opening that establishes the goals of the adventure is key.
2. Investigation - Instead of having the group charge headlong at the goal, they should get a chance to engage with the story and uncover more of what’s going on. This could be through roleplay, encounters, or skill checks, but they should serve to further the players’ understanding of the adventure.
3. Overcoming Challenges - From here, the PCs are armed with some knowledge of what they’re doing and most now overcome challenges on their way to accomplishing their goal. This is often done through a series of encounters, but can actually be handled in many different ways so long as the PCs are challenged.
4. Climax - The major turning point in the adventure where the PCs come face to face with their adversary and accomplish their goal. This is typically the scene where everything comes to a head and is the greatest challenge that the group has faced up until this point.
5. Resolution - An oft-forgotten part of the adventure, but the portion where the PCs return home as heroes and see the fruits of their labor in accomplishing their goal. This is a scene for the heroes to collect their rewards and unwind from a trying adventure.

So now we have a simple flow for how we want our adventure to go. Our group will encounter a problem, learn more about it, work to overcome what lies in their way, solve the problem, and then reap the rewards. On its face, this is a very simple concept, but breaking it down into easy to manage chunks makes adventure writing so much easier.
Now this is specifically setting out to create a low-level adventure, so let’s take a look at how to make those sorts of adventures really play well at the table!
Low-Level Things To Keep In Mind - Tips What follows is a list of tips of things to keep in mind when writing for low-levels. An adventure doesn’t need to cater to every single one of these points, but they’re good guidelines when designing.

• The encounter building guidelines work great across all levels of play in Pathfinder 2e, but I’ll make a small caveat here - if you want to explore more difficult Severe encounters, you should look towards using a larger amount of weaker enemies than a single strong enemy at lower levels. To illustrate, a Severe encounter for a group of level 1 PCs could be a single level 4 opponent. Let’s use an owlbear as an example: with 21 AC, your players will likely only be hitting it around 35% of the time while it’s going to be critting your group about 35% of the time and with damage (7 to 16 on a hit, 14 to 32 on a crit) that’s likely going to be dropping them in one blow. That same Severe encounter budget can instead give us a fight with two ghasts (which, I still don’t love for 1st level parties, but it beats an owlbear), or a healthy trio of mephits. At low-levels, characters don’t have a large breadth of options to help them survive and mitigate damage as well as impact an enemy’s stats. So for low-levels, aim to keep difficult combats against a large quantity of weaker foes as opposed to a singular powerful foe.
• Magic is not ubiquitous. Depending on your group, this could be a real selling point for low-level adventures. Problems are solved through skill checks and investigation and the opposing forces don’t often use magic to foil senses (no invisibility used to escape, no teleportation, no flight, no illusions). It also means that simple problems that get handwaved at higher levels (such as crossing a river, navigating through a forest, or getting food in the wilderness) can become interesting challenges for the PCs to overcome.
• Weaknesses and resistances are felt the most at low-levels. This can give players a real sense of agency over the game when they correctly identify an opponent’s weaknesses and come prepared to exploit it. Likewise, giving PCs enemies with resistances out of nowhere is a bit of an unfair move. If the group was unaware of a ghost lurking in the mine and had no way to discover it, they would feel a little cheated in being unable to overcome its resistances.
• Healing is not assured at the very lowest of levels. Even groups with dedicated healers may fumble that Treat Wounds check or lack the spell slots available to keep everyone topped up. Low-level games should provide groups with opportunities to rest and recover and aren’t served well by throwing encounter after encounter into the PCs.
• Low-level games are some of the best times to play around with non-magical light sources or the lack thereof. A dark room is suddenly much more dangerous when the human fighter has to put away his greatsword to carry a torch because the wizard didn’t prepare light.

Rough Draft - Ideas When writing anything, it’s important that you get all of your ideas out somewhere so you know what direction you’re going in before you start. The first thing you should do before writing an adventure is know the group that you’re writing for (what level, what they’re doing in the story, what the goal of the adventure will be, and the group’s playstyle, to name a few things). When we write our adventure, I’ll be sure to put a few things up top, such as the level the game is intended for, an additional rulesets, how much XP is budgeted for the adventure, and the like.
So let’s start simple. Let’s make an adventure for level 1 characters. Our goal as adventure writers is to provide a fairly straightforward low-level adventure for PCs to get a handle on adventuring. Let’s look at our narrative elements: Inciting incident, adversaries, and goals. I always find it easiest with smaller games to take an adversary and work backwards, as they often provide plenty of good roleplaying opportunities. Let’s take a look at some potential adversaries. This is a list of level -1 to level 1 creatures and gives us a nice range of opponents to consider.
After some searching, I settled on doing something with Tooth Fairies, as there’s a lot of fun stuff to work with. They’re tricky little fey with strange motivations who, like many fey, have a weakness to cold iron. There’s plenty to work with! Perhaps our inciting incident involves an attack by a swarm of tooth fairies who have been pushed to the limit and are attempting to exact revenge for a slight the PCs don’t quite understand yet. Looking through the list of potential adversaries, I see that a number of animals could also fit in nicely. Something to keep in the back pocket. Now we just need a goal - typically one in opposition to the adversary: the tooth fairies. What if the fey creatures stole away something that the PCs want to return. I propose something that could be a bit fun while maintaining the darkness of the fey: a dog. Let’s take a look at what we have narratively so far.

• Inciting Incident: The PCs are attacked by a swarm of tooth fairies while they are at a friend’s home/roadside tavern/storefront. The tooth fairies escape with a dog that potentially has a connection to the PCs
• Adversaries: Tooth fairies, fey creatures, animals
• Goal: Retrieve the dog safely from the tooth fairies.

With our narrative ideas laid out, we can start looking at what we want to do mechanically with our adventure. It’s important to ensure that these scenes actually allow your players to interact with the story. Remember that you’re creating this as an adventure to be played, not read. Let’s try out the “Five Scene Adventure” and rough out some ideas before we fill them in fully.

• Inciting Incident: I’d like to keep this adventure somewhat general while still setting it in a place a bit farther from civilization. It’s also interesting to me if it’s something that you can use to bridge two adventures or start a new campaign! So, while it may be a bit cliche, the PCs are at a roadside inn that is suddenly attacked by a swarm of fey creatures! (To me, cliches get a bit of a pass in low-level games as it sort of builds on something familiar that everyone can easily get into the headspace of).
• Investigation: The PCs discover that the inn’s dog has gone missing! The fey are suspected. During the course of this investigation, the PCs can learn about where the fey are known to be, some of their weaknesses, and perhaps even a cold iron weapon to help deal with weaknesses.
• Overcoming Challenges: We have the trip to the fey home - not sure if we want to do anything here as we want this area to seem relatively safe. The fey could live somewhere interesting, like an abandoned farmhouse, tunnels beneath a tree, or a thicket of unruly briars. From here we could plan out some encounters. We don’t need to think about the exact mechanics of things right now, just general ideas. We don’t have to use all of these, but it gives us a good idea of where we’d like to go with our encounters
  
  • An encounter with wildlife to get the party warmed up
  • An encounter with a Hazard and some sort of guard as a means of protecting the fey base
  • A larger encounter against many fey
  • A plant based encounter (either Hazard or creature)
  • A fey puzzle - perhaps involving teeth?
• Climax: We should have the PCs come face-to-face with a group of tooth fairies, the truly most malicious of this fey group. This could be an encounter with numerous tooth fairy and maybe one elite version, or perhaps a Hazard to keep this interesting. Our dog should be here - maybe locked away (poorly) so that there are alternate ways to approach this encounter (such as simply sneaking in and freeing the dog).
  
• Resolution: The return to the inn should be a triumph, with a reward coming to the PCs for what they’ve done - even small rewards like a free meal and night at the inn and perhaps an item that is special to the owner. This is also a great time to have the group really feel like heroes and perhaps plant the seeds for future adventures.
  

Alright, we have a good outline of an adventure, so now we just need to fill in the details!
The Adventure - The Mechanics Now we get into the actual mechanics of the adventure. You can have all of these ideas ready to go before the game begins, but if you just start throwing out your ideas without any planning, things can get messy real quick! Before I go too much further, I want to put a very important clause here for everyone:
We are not professional game designers and are not getting paid for our work. Don’t pour blood, sweat, and tears into a project and burn out. We’re writing adventures for our friends to play in. Do not let perfect become the enemy of good. An adventure scrawled on the back of a napkin plays just as well as one printed in a Paizo book.
Now, that said, I am putting a little bit more effort into the adventures you see just because I am sharing them with you all and want to provide more clarity in the process than what my typical note-taking would be. Find what works for you!
Now let’s get started! Let’s go through the mechanical bits one-by-one and address how to create them. For our first adventure, I won’t go into too much detail about every choice made since we’ve already covered a lot of material, but rather an explanation of how to accomplish the encounter design. We’ll be focusing more on encounters in this post. While we could talk about designing monsters, hazards, or even subsystems, let’s keep things simple.
First up is the inciting incident in the roadside inn. Now, a tooth fairy swarm at such a low level would be a disastrous first encounter for a group, so we’ll rule that out right away. We’ll be using the guidelines found starting on page 75 of the GM Core Book for this, but I’ll be referencing the AoN pages throughout. The first thing we need to do is decide what our encounter budget is. Given that we want this to be an introduction to the game, let’s make this a Low encounter for our level 1 group. This means we have 60 XP to use to choose our creatures. To find out how much a creature is worth, we compare its level against the party’s level and use this handy chart. Our Tooth Fairies (only level -1) are worth 20 XP to our level 1 party. That means we can use three of them for our encounter. Nothing fancy, but we’ll mix things up as we continue!
Our investigation is going to be a bit more open-ended. We know when combat starts and ends, but the players dictate the flow of the story when they are given the reins of what to do next. And that’s a good thing! But we need to provide them with options that both advance the story and engage them. We have a pretty easy path here - the PCs want to chase after the tooth fairies, but they don’t know where to start. Let’s create a few areas for them to explore. Something like…

• Common Room: Asking patrons, maybe even tending to injuries; success here should put the players on the right track on where to go, and introduce the idea that the fey had a goal in mind during the attack (Using Charisma skills)
• Kitchen: Searching through to find what the fey may have been looking for - a great place to introduce treasure, especially a cold iron weapon (likely a dagger) to give the PCs something to combat the fey (Searching, Perception)
• Overnight Rooms: Here we can put in some more hints about what the group may encounter when they confront the fey; I like the idea of a traveling merchant staying here who offers the PCs a way to deal with a Hazard they could run into later in the adventure
• Backyard: Here we can see that the inn’s dog has been taken, but Investigating PCs can find more clues - like a trail of blood from where the dog fought back. (Nature, Survival, Perception?)
  • Quick note: The game should never hinge on the PCs discovering something. If we want to go this route, we instead introduce a way to “fail forward” like “the PCs can find the fey camp after some wandering, but the sun has already gone down, giving them an hour of dim light before it becomes dark.”

Importantly, when deciding on the DC of these skill checks, we are going to refer to the Level-Based DCs chart (found on page 53 of the GM Core) and keep things around that area, typically adjusting for easy (-2 DC) or hard (+2 DC) while also keeping some wiggle room in between.
And we come now to overcoming challenges, where the meat of our adventure lies. Now, our group should know their enemy and where they’re located, or at least they have a goal in mind. Now it’s our job to put barriers in the way to that goal. Looking back over our rough draft, there are a few ideas for encounters there that seem interesting. I picked out three and want to workshop them a little. We also look through the Bestiary for creatures that fit the theme we’re going for, which is something of a fight against the fey and nature.

• A Low encounter with a Hunting Spider and a number of Hampering Webs
• A Moderate encounter with three Melixies who have swiped some sweets from the inn
• Finally, a Severe encounter with six Tooth Fairies - our finale

However, as I look over the adventure, there isn’t much for the PCs to engage with that isn’t just combat and on top of that, the encounters aren’t terribly exciting. Let’s look at the pain points. The first that I see is that the PCs are encouraged to just move from scene to scene fighting, so what about a way to circumvent the encounter for clever players? On top of that, I want another antagonist to give the fey a bit more character. Finally, the finale encounter is… somewhat dull. Using those three ideas as our tent pole encounters, let’s try something like…

• A Trivial encounter of an elite Sprite who was left to watch the inn. Their role is not to engage the PCs directly, but tail them and strike when they’re preoccupied. Players then have a chance to spot the sprite out and chase him off before he ambushes them in the spider fight.
• The Melixie encounter is changed to have the three fey fighting loudly and distractedly over cake or pie. Clever characters could use the opportunity to slip by or get the jump on them.
  • As a side note, we can also tempt the group with some treasure here, as well as another hazard
• Lastly, let’s keep the Severe encounter, but instead of a boring fight against six Tooth Fairies, we’ll make it three Tooth Fairies and their “pet” Snapping Flytrap who has the weak template since the fey have been feeding it nothing but stolen sweets, coins, and teeth.
  • I’m a little leery of this combat, but if we make the arena large enough, it should be easy for the group to keep away from the plant.

With the mechanics handled, we can write a resolution and give the PCs a big pat on the back for a job well done!
This is also the point in adventure writing where we want to start thinking about Treasure. Now this is hardly enough to get the group the 1000 XP they need to level up - maybe about 1/3rd of that. So we can take a look at the Treasure By Level and roughly sprinkle about a third of that throughout the adventure. Again, I personally like to put in things that will be immediately useful at lower levels.
With all that said and done, let’s take a look at the finished product!
Stepping in with a quick note here, much of this idea was put together during the transition from Legacy PF2 content to Remastered. The following adventure includes some Legacy content, but not in any way that will complicate the experience.
Link to the Low-Level Adventure, “Dognapping!”
As we said earlier, there’s a little more effort put into the presentation of this adventure just to make it easier to parse and for people to use at home if they like. You don’t need to do so much with your own games! If you know the story well enough, just a few notes on a piece of paper and you’re good to go.
Making It Spicy - Alterations Rough drafts are our way of getting ideas down on paper so that we can refine them into a complete thought. However, that’s not to say that we’re always finished after that. Something I enjoy doing is looking at encounters or adventures that I’ve written and adding a little “spice.” What this means is putting in a bit more flavor to either make a scene more memorable, give characters in an encounter more options, or to change how my players look at the game. Adding “spice” does not mean making things harder - it looks to enhance the experience, not bog it down.
While this is certainly not a necessary part of adventure design, I recommend keeping it in the back of your mind. It can even help when running pre-written adventures! So, here are a few “spicy” ideas for this adventure.

• Stitchleaf carries with him a few nets that he happily throws on the PCs when they’re doing battle with the spider before extinguishing his light and slipping away to Hide behind a tree. Likewise, the sprite could even speed ahead to warn the thicket should it look like the PCs will overcome the spider. This removes the possibility of slipping past the melixies and Stitchleaf can join in another encounter, becoming a recurring enemy.
• The thicket itself has enough space within its thorns to allow Tiny creatures like the fey to enter, Take Cover, Sneak, and Hide. When the odds start to turn against them, the melixies use this to great effect.
• The tunnels into the thicket and between the two “rooms” act as choke points for Medium creatures, requiring them to Squeeze (DC 15 Acrobatics) through. On a failure they treat the tunnels as difficult terrain, but take 1d4 piercing damage in the process. This can create a feeling of being “locked in” once a battle has begun.

Wrapping Up - The End And that’s it! Making a low-level adventure is actually quite a straightforward process. We didn’t have to design any new monsters, plan for higher level magic, or create a sweeping, grand story. We came up with a very simple direction and put the pieces together in a way that’s hopefully fun and interesting for the table!
Up next? We’ll take a look at mid-level adventures, when characters start to break the rules a little more!

This is going to be a long post so please bear with me.
A few years ago I had an awful psychotic episode. I was placed in a psychiatric hospital for 40 consecutive days where I was held under close surveillance, was on meds, had to be constantly checked by psychiatrists and the nurses as well as various assistants. I have psychiatric antecedents, I.E. not only did I struggle my entire life with mental issues but there were various attempts that I unwillingly agreed to, which didn’t go well since I refused to communicate and they ended up the shrinks saying stuff like “If he refuses to communicate or cooperate, we can’t help him.”.
Others said stuff like “He’s just weird”. (In all fairness I was 16 or 17 back then and now I’m 28)
But I wasn’t diagnosed as a schizoid until 2021, by a psychiatrist that wasn’t aware of my diagnosis and by the ones and the psychologist in the hospital who’ve had me under the aforementioned surveillance.
There were various “interviews”, or something like that with some of my old high-school teachers, my medic, a few of the shrinks or the old psychiatrists that I had in the past or the medical facilities I had to go to and eventually I was diagnosed as a schizoid.
But only because I suffered the psychotic episode and had no other choice but to “cooperate” or I suppose talk to people”.
My life’s been weird. I didn’t talk to anyone in high-school, at all, with the exception of some teachers, and mainly “communicated” through written notes I’d pass to my class mates. I never had a girlfriend. Had only 4 or 5 friends that I “broke-up” with after a heated argument, but I never liked going outside with them, or hanging out and mainly played video games and Skyped with them.
It’s not my intention to bore you with my long life story, so I’m going to try ending it soon.
Wrote for 10 years fiction in English because I spent too much time in the house and online. Something close to 6-10k pages or 4 million words. But eventually got sick of it and after being placed in the ward, I gave up on writing.
Made digital art for 5 years, gave up on that as well. Tried making music, gave up on that as well. Played video games all my life, gave up on that as well. Notice a pattern yet?
I’m currently trying to make or work on video games. But I don’t know for how long that’s going to last. I’m making this post mainly because I’m scared and I don’t know what to do.
I don’t know if it’s because I’m a schizoid or why, but I don’t have the power of will or the strength to continue making stuff or writing fiction, or making art, or how long this game “gig” is going to last.
Simply put, I feel bad. Because I used to write a lot. Even if it wasn’t good, at least it was something I did and was proud of. Same goes for art, and even games. But I can’t work constantly and I don’t have the power to keep going anymore. And I have no idea what the reason behind it is. Or what’s happening or what’s happened to me.
I don’t want to blame it on being a Schizoid because I don’t know anything about this diagnosis. And I don’t know if I have something else or what’s preventing me from working.
My only real job was working in a supermarket. And I stacked shelves and was too afraid to work as a cashier. It only lasted 2 months before I quit.
I’ve got a lot of questions now.
1. What can I do to start working again on stuff?
I just want to be able to write and read, or to make art, or games again and work as hard as I can and not take breaks and be left alone.
Also, I recently did a stupid thing as well. I get these weird feelings and weird impulses to do stuff, like I don’t think before doing something.
Using my real name for example. I’m publishing my unfinished game on steam using it, as EA. Despite barely working on it every now and then for the past 6 months. Or tying to publish my bad fiction, for free mainly. Both the game and the fiction, that’s another thing. I don’t have a sense of value, when it comes to money.
And I’m mainly using my real name now because I get random thoughts like, “Oh, you’ve been hiding behind a username your whole life”.
But now that I’m actually using my real name I feel awful and bad, and uncomfortable. And If I don’t, well, then I feel worse, because I’m hidWeird and unexplainable feelingsing again.
There was also a game dev event I attended with some of my mates from my master’s. And was an Uber-creep there. Didn’t talk to anyone at all, and was constantly in a state of panic. Met someone famous and almost fucked up because I tried saying hi then basically ran away.
Only took a picture with him because one of my mates called me to be in it. And felt like a tool because I had a T-shirt with my game’s name on it. And I twitted that picture. And was afraid to do it. But I did it anyway.
Before doing it, I checked with someone because my original message was something like “I’m sorry if I was a creep and if I made you uncomfortable”. And one of my mates wrote my message for me.
2. How do I become less, the way I am?
3. How can I hide being a schizoid?
4. What does being a schizoid even mean?
I still don’t understand what it means, like, at all. I really don’t get it at all.
5. Why can I talk to people I know or when I’m alone with only one person, but not when there’s more people? But not always, like if I’m in a group that’s mixed with people I know and some I don’t, I can’t talk. Like, why?
And that’s mainly what I want to know, for now. Thanks for your time.
Stefan.