I don't know what to do or know why I won't just leave. I have a car, a good job/finances, and alternative housing immediately available.
I know I'm in a toxic relationship. I hate admitting it, but it is definitely abusive too. I am not sure if it is mutually abusive or if I am just a victim.
I started dating this person a year ago. It's been a rollercoaster from the beginning. We both have extensive childhood trauma. I have done over a decade of therapy for mine. When we met, they had been in therapy for a year. I have been very aware of how my actions in relationships were unhealthy and abusive. I know I have complex PTSD but I never used that as an excuse for my behavior. I know things I've said to past partners were absolutely uncalled for and traumatizing. It's been over 5 years since I have lashed out at someone in an emotionally/psychologically abusive way. I have never spoken to or lashed out at my current partner in the ways I have in the past. What I have done is be paranoid but not in an accusing way. I have not accused my partner of cheating or talking to others; but I have asked them about it. I have never told my partner they couldn't talk to or see anyone. I have been curious about their life and, depending on the situation, have asked whether they were interested in someone as more than friends. They consider my questions as paranoia and controlling.
Background: when we started dating they made it clear that they were going to want to fuck other people eventually. They lied to me by omission about sleeping with someone and then slept with me the same day (which really pissed me off). After that incident, I realized I would have to ask very specific and direct questions. At this point, they have told me multiple times that they don't want to fuck around and they only want me but it's been hard for me to truly believe them.
Other background info: This person is really sick, physically. They have a chronic debilitating condition that is preventing them from working right now. Their parents take care of them financially. A couple of months after we started dating they contracted HSV1 from me (which I was open about having the whole time) and because of their underlying health condition, the HSV almost killed them. It was incredibly traumatizing. They were home-bound for over a month and I was their caregiver. They continue to have problems with it but not nearly as horrible as then.
Their behavior: They have always had difficulty letting me leave when I wanted to go home. It was endearing at first. I liked that they wanted to keep me around so much. I liked the attention and extra love they gave me when they were asking me to stay. The extra attention turned into them becoming upset if I persisted in trying to leave. They would get very pouty, say "no" and bump into me in a way I now consider a push/shove. Other things they did/do that caught my attention but brushed off are teasing me a lot and even though I've complained, they continue to say "it was just a joke, lighten up", and get mad at me for not being cheerful around their friends all the time. They also grab me hard around the arms and neck to pull me in certain directions. If I'm upset and being loud/talking fast they cover my mouth. They insist I be around them all the time when we are together, including when they are showering. If i'm showering they are free to do whatever they want, but if they are they continually ask me to be in the bathroom with them and get upset if I attempt not to be. They ask me specific questions about my conversations with my friends/what i've talked about in therapy; basically, they want a lot of details about my life but if I ask about theirs they might accuse me of being paranoid and controlling. Also, they blow up my phone if I am not responding to them when we are in conflict and away from each other and they have come to my house when i didn't respond.
Their behavior has become increasingly violent. I stopped excusing it and started pointing it out to them. They always denied it at first, which just led to us arguing about it. When we are in conflict I just want to get away. I do have a hard time saying something like "I'm leaving, i'll be back at X time" and instead I am frantically packing my things and just trying to leave, which they say triggers their behavior. They refuse to let me leave though. They physically stop me, they have taken my keys, they have thrown my stuff around many times, and the pushing has gotten a lot worse.
Where we are now: I have begun fighting back and it is a lot worse now. I have lost it. A month ago, they chased me down in a parking lot and shoved me against a store wall demanding I fix things immediately (this conflict started because I didn't support them enough when they were upset at another driver). When we got back to their place, they pushed me against the corner of a closet and I got a huge bruise on my ass. This bruise is what finally opened my eyes to how bad things are getting. They have thrown me on the bed by my neck, which they still deny. Out of anger at being denied so much (after the second incident of this) I showed them what they did to me by doing the same thing and now if I ever bring it up they say, "yeah, well you did the same thing to me". In the past month they have moved to another apartment. Now they live alone. We have not been able to go a week without a physical altercation. After the incident that resulted in a bruised ass, I confided in a friend about some of their behavior. I also recorded some of the moments they were yelling at me.
This past weekend we really fought. There was a fight earlier in the week, which included them refusing to let me leave, throwing my stuff on the ground and backing me into the fridge. I fell to the ground as well and was crawling away. They grabbed my shirt, pulling me back (choking me) and wrapped their arm around my neck to pull me off the ground. I got a scratch on my neck from this and some other bruises/scratches on my arm. Some days later we fought again and I don't remember what happened but I ended up telling them that I told my friend they have been pushing me around. This really upset them and they started saying I couldn't hang out with her the following day or go to her birthday party since now they couldn't go. I explained to them how hurtful and telling it was that they were more concerned about my friend knowing than how their actual behavior is affecting me (the person they say they love more than anyone). The next day they were super sweet and apologetic (they always are afterward, which I'm wondering if i'm addicted to this part), and wrote me a letter apologizing for lots of things. I read the letter Friday night. Saturday morning I woke up and snuggled them in bed for an hour before waking them up. I had my party to go to but was still trying to spend time with them by getting breakfast together. I had to wake them up for the timing to work out. Shortly after waking up they made a joke about how they didn't invite this one person out last night when they were with their friends (this is in reference to a previous conflict we had because at one point I wasn't allowed to hang out with their friends because I'm moody and I found out this other girl met up with them and they had been messaging through disappearing messages, so of course I had feelings about this). My response was, "well I hope you didn't secretly invite anyone else out" and they turned over and got pouty and all of a sudden I was the bad person and I was in a bad mood upon waking up. They ended up taking a shower and having a mental breakdown, screaming and what not. I was confused and angry. Really angry that they accused me of being in a bad mood when I had just been cuddling them for an hour trying to gently wake them. So I was unavailable to ease their emotional distress. At some point, they got out of the shower and I am over everything. I shoved them out of my way and they fell pretty hard and from there it's "look at what you did". They start acting completely different, talking in a small voice and saying things like "i'll do whatever you want, it's going to be okay." It was a trauma response. Seemed like they age regressed. And while I have sympathy and remorse, It made me angry that they were responding to me like this since I have been putting up with them shoving me and more for the past year. I am not sure what happened next but we kept fighting and then trying to de-escalate over and over again. At one point I made the remark, "yeah well I have plenty of recordings of you" and this is where things became very scary. They lost it and we fought fought over my phone. They were fighting me and trying to prevent me from leaving the room. They kept saying, "what kind of person would record another person" and forcing me to give them my phone passcode. At some point I bit them because they had their hands around me and they bit me back so hard I have a massive bruise because of it. They pulled out chunks of my hair. We both body slammed each other onto the bed/ground multiple times. I had my arm pressed against their neck at some point too when they were wrestling me. They choked me with their hands wrapped around my neck to the point I couldn't breathe. At some point they pinned me down and sat on me and refused to get up until they could access my phone again (it got locked because they were trying to get in it). I was defeated. After they erased all the evidence I had of them I decided I was going to look at their phone. They flipped their shit on me again and we started fighting more. At this point I was certain they were hiding something because of how violent they were being and not allowing me access their phone. They ended up slapping me after throwing me down onto the bathroom floor. Turns out they didn't want me to access their phone cuz they recorded me arguing with them after I shoved them that morning - literally the worst fight of my life began by them demanding i give them my phone and them making me feel like I was the worst for recording them when they did the same exact thing. They then went on to self-harm, and I insisted they go to the party with me becuase I was scared of what they would do to themselves.
I can count over 10 bruises/scratches from the past couple weeks of fighting. My partner has one bruise from when I shoved them Saturday morning. I do not want to minimize my violence towards them. I am just incredibly upset about how they are reacting about the bruise I gave them. When I bring up the marks they left on my body they usually respond with a sorry, but also with an "you bruise like a banana. And I'm not like one of those people who beats the shit out of their wives.", which i feel like dismisses my experience and pain.
OMG this was long, and it still doesn't convey everything. I am at work now and in shock. Been having panic attacks all day. I don't know what to do, and I am really confused about why I am staying in this relationship.

Amazing race. Here's a bit of a recap from training to post-race:
Training: I started preparing in earnest in February for this May race. Although I planned to do more, I maintained 50-70 miles per week for several weeks. My longest prep run was 40 miles going sub-9-minutes per mile. I'm in NYC, so in anticipation of the heat, I spent some time in the sauna, for 15-minute stints. No alcohol Feb and March, so dropped some weight. The FB page is great, with the race officials and runners posting useful info. The RD Bob Becker and Mark Cudak are fonts of knowledge. Got a Garmin Enduro 2 a week before the race because I was concerned about battery life ($750 on eBay). Happy with that purchase.
Day before race: Smooth packet pick-up and great experts panel. Great pasta primavera at Mrs. Macs Kitchen II.
Race day: I was pretty panicky on a couple of occasions before race day, which was unusual, but I am glad it happened because I was afforded the ability to work through the anxiety. Also, this is a tough fucking race and the trepidation was recognition of the seriousness of this endeavor.
In the morning, I taped my toes and heels with kinesiology tape, which allowed me to deal with blisters. Injinji toe socks did me good. Started the race with HOKA Carbon X 2.
It was crucial in the morning to bank easy miles before things got hot. Switched from a baseball-style cap to Sunday Afternoons Unisex Ultra-Adventure Hat when the sun rose. The latter hat was great because it covered my neck, and the drawstring closure held it in place. Also, when things got hot, I was happy to be wearing XOSKIN compression shorts, because I could jam ice in them.
Midway through the race, I changed into Nike Vaporfly NEXT% 2, but I would probably change into another pair of Hoka road shoes if I could do it again.
I was able to finish this race because I remained hydrated. I went through 7 Gatorlytes and a lot of Tailwind. The heat made eating uncomfortable, but I knocked back some gels and gummies. Because every runner must have a crew, and there are some stints where runners and crews can't meet, I wish I had a Salomon Soft Reservoir in my vest.
I liberally applied and re-applied sunblock. The few places I forgot to reapply sunblock, such as the backs of my knees, got pretty burned.
The final 20-30 miles were kind of lonely. Runners really spread out. My AirPods ran out of juice, and I could have used some music for motivation to run a bit quicker. Finished under 24 hours.
Post race: Fairfield Inn overbooked us, so we were sent to another hotel, which was kind of a pain in the ass. But breakfast at IHOP the next day was awesome.
This was my third 100-miler. Being from Miami, I'm very happy I did this. Great bonding experience for my family. You'll never look at the bridges the same way again. Highly recommend.

Over the last 2 or so days, me and a friend got our base set up and got stacked to the brim with guns we found from care packages and whatnot. It was going great. We were in a secluded area and rarely found players. Then all of a sudden some guy who lives near us hired one of those 5 man clans who were stacked to the brim with Thompsons, hasmats, and infinite ammo to come wreck our shit.
They came out of fucking nowhere and killed us instantly. Then when I followed them back to their base, the millisecond the heard me, they went naked with a water pipe and started lobbing grenades over their high wooden walls like pussies. Genuinely don’t understand why anybody likes this game. I feel like it’s only fun when you play with 7 man zergs.
It quite literally does not matter how much progress you make solo or in small groups because you’ll just get all of it stolen by 5+ man zergs who got to where you’re at in under 24 hours.

Hi! I’m Erin Smith, a journalist at POLITICO. A few months ago I asked you all to consider sharing your story about wage increases over the last couple of years.
I wanted to thank everyone in this sub who reached out to help. We ended up highlighting the story of a worker who found us through this sub, so I wanted to share the resulting story.
Econ reporter Victoria Guida analyzed data from the U.S. Labor Department, spoke to economists and chatted with workers about their experiences. She found that: * Government policies to boost the economy during the pandemic also helped boost wages for low-income workers. * People making an average of $12.50 per hour nationally saw their pay grow nearly 6% from 2020 to 2022 — even after factoring in inflation. * At the same time, price spikes have eaten away raises for the highest-earning employees, dropping their inflation-adjusted income by roughly 5% over the past couple of years. * But even for the lower-wage workers who have seen the biggest gains, inflation is denying them the full benefit of raises, with many of them going into debt to cover basic expenses. * The Federal Reserve is now trying to slow inflation. But some progressive lawmakers and economists are questioning whether it will hurt the progress made by low-wage workers.
You can read the full story here. Let me know if you have any questions, comments or ideas for other data we should be digging into – and thanks again!

I just picked up a D-50 for cheap, and I can't decide if I want to keep it. I know it does breathy, swooshy pads and chiffy percussion real well, but I don't like...pretty much any of those sounds, since they make me think of being dragged around the mall by my mom in 1993.
Is the D-50 more versatile than that? Are the patch demos on YouTube are all cheesy throwback stuff because that's what people want? I ask because we all have an image in mind of what the DX7 sounds like, but I've heard some modern patches (madFame's Voyager Pad in particular) that sound NOTHING like a Hall & Oates song. There's clearly an element of most folks not wanting anything but the canned cheese in that instance, rather than the instrument only sounding like the Testarossa just dropped, and I'm hoping the same applies to the D-50.

Sometimes when you look into the mirror, the mirror looks back.
William Bailey's forehead shattered the mirror like a sledgehammer. The last thing he remembered before he blacked out was the feeling that he was falling through the mirror. Sub-cranial hematoma, a concussion, maybe even a cracked skull--that had to be the reason for the strange feeling. The mirror was mounted on the wall just to the right of the bar, four feet tall by about three feet wide. As consciousness slipped away, common sense and his strong belief in the rational world told him that he couldn't fall through the mirror. He must have bounced his head off the wall and be falling toward the floor.
It seemed like just a second or two before William's eyes popped open. He lay on his back, on the hard wood floor of Fausto's, with Johnny Davis towering over him. Big Johnny probably wanted to finish him off, maybe kill him, and finally end their twenty-year-old feud. Either Big Johnny Davis and the ceiling lights above him were spinning, or William's head was spinning, but either way something wasn't right.
He raised his head and looked to his left, toward the bar. Except the bar wasn't there. Instead, he was staring at the bathrooms. That didn't make sense. It must be his brain that had gotten spun around. William turned his head and peered over his size-ten wingtips at the busted mirror. The wooden frame and most of the glass still clung to the wall, the rest sat broken on the ground. The bar had to be on his left. He looked again, and still saw the bathrooms. A brain bruise, maybe some fluid pressure building up might be the cause of it.
"Get up!" Big Johnny Davis said.
William looked up at him. Johnny stood behind him, just beyond his shoulders. Perfect place for him to stomp my head into the plank floor. Except Johnny Davis was holding out his hand.
"Come on, we've got to get out of here."
Davis looked scared. It was the first time William Bailey could ever remember Johnny Davis looking scared. William had always been scared of Big Johnny, but Big Johnny wasn't scared of anything or anyone.
Police sirens wailed in the distance.
Johnny glanced over his shoulder. William craned his neck to look where Johnny was looking, saw he was staring at the front door like a man terrified something bad was going to come through it. Big Johnny looked down at him again and pumped his hand. "Come on, get up. They'll be here any second."
"Who?" William asked. "Who'll be--" But before he finished, Big Johnny Davis reached down, grabbed him by both arms, and jerked him to his feet.
As he was dragged toward the door by the only man in town who truly hated him, William glanced up and saw the rusted metal sign nailed above the door. He had to have a concussion, probably severe; that had to be it, because the letters on the sign were backward. It said TUO.
As Johnny Davis pulled him out the door, William heard tires skid on the pavement.
"Where's your car?" Johnny asked.
William twisted away from the big man's grip, then turned to his left. "In the alley." He started to run, still not sure exactly what he was running from.
Behind him, Big John shouted, "The alley's over here."
William kept running but turned his head back toward Johnny. "I know where the alley--"
Something hit him across the midsection and toppled him to the ground. He got his hands up just in time to break his fall and managed to keep his head from slamming into the sidewalk. When he looked up he saw a shopping cart tumbled onto its side.
Once again, William found himself lying flat on his back, this time amid the spilled contents of the cart. It had been filled with junk: paper bags full of dirty clothes, canned food, bags of potato chips, a diamond shaped, orange road sign, and other trash that looked like it had been collected from back alley garbage bins.
The homeless man who'd been pushing the cart was scrawny, and wafer thin. His skin was the color of old shoe leather, and he wore a long gray beard, tangled and matted with food and bits of filth. He was sprawled on the ground next to his cart, half sitting up, staring at William with his bright blue eyes.
Car doors slammed, men shouted.
"You better get going," the homeless man said, as he cocked his head. "The police after you?"
Police!
Before William could assure the old man that the police weren't after him--he was a respected businessman and family man--someone behind him grabbed him under both arms and pulled him to his feet. William turned and found himself staring into the face of Johnny Davis. "The alley's that way," Johnny said, pointing to the other side of Fausto's. With one hand gripping William's jacket, Johnny dashed across the front of the bar toward the alley. The alley--right there, plain as day--on the other side of Fausto's, right where it shouldn't be, where it couldn't be. William had been here a thousand times. As you stepped out of the bar, the alley was on the left, Brockton's Ace Hardware on the right. Now everything was mixed up and in the wrong place.
Johnny Davis turned down the alley, dragging William behind him. After just a few steps, a spotlight flashed in front of them.
"Stop!" a voice commanded. "Get on the ground."
William couldn't see because Johnny was in his way. "Who's that yelling?" he asked.
Big Johnny stopped and William plowed into his back.
"Get on the ground," the voice boomed again.
William poked his head out from behind Johnny Davis's back. The blinding white light was in his face. He couldn't see a thing.
POP! POP! POP!
Gunshots.
Big Johnny sagged, then crashed to his knees. Instinctively, William bent forward and grabbed hold of Johnny. "What's the matter?"
More pops.
Johnny's big hand reached out and shoved William back toward the street. "Back door," he wheezed, then plunged forward onto his face.
William stood alone. Behind the white spotlight he saw blue police lights flashing. He was totally exposed.
POP! POP!
He saw flashes--little yellow spurts of flame--as something tugged at his jacket.
William had said "back door." What back door? Fausto's had a back door, but it didn't lead anywhere except to the open space behind the building used for trash and deliveries. Twenty feet of asphalt between the bar and the back of the building on the next block. William had parked his car at the end of the alley, but the police cars--or whatever they were--had the alley blocked off. The building behind Fausto's also had an alley that ran alongside it, but the owner had closed it off to keep the bums out. He'd put up a gate, padlocked it, and topped it with razor wire. It was a dead end.
Two more pops. Dead end or not it was better than standing here and getting shot. William turned and ran. He burst through the front door of Fausto's, dashed through the bar, past the shattered mirror, hit the back door at a dead run, and was outside behind the bar within seconds.
He could see the tail end of his car sticking out from the corner of the building, but with the cops blocking the alley, his car was useless to him. William glanced across the open space to the alley that ran next to the other building. The gate, the padlock, the razor wire--all still in place. To his right an overflowing garbage dumpster sat beside the back of Fausto's, jammed against the fire ladder.
The fire ladder.
An iron ladder bolted to the cinderblock wall.
William looked up. The top of the ladder was lost in shadow, but he knew it went up two stories to the roof. Last summer, when the toilet had stopped up, he'd come out back to take a leak and had stood behind the dumpster, peeing against the wall like a kid, one hand draped over the bottom rung of the ladder.
He slipped behind the dumpster. The smell made him gag. The bottom of the ladder was four feet from the ground. William reached up as high as he could, grabbed hold of the third rung, then hauled himself up.
Through the partially open back door came the sounds of heavy feet pounding on the hard wood floor of the bar.
Halfway up the ladder, he was exhausted--and scared. Shaking, he white-knuckled the ladder. Being more than ten feet off the ground terrified him. He needed a break, just a second or two to catch his breath. There was enough moonlight so he could see into one of the second story windows. Inside, junk was piled everywhere. Old barstools, a busted jukebox, furniture stacked almost to the ceiling. Years ago, old man Fausto lived on the second floor, but Jake, who'd bought the place from the old man and had decided to keep the name, used it for storage.
Below him, William heard the back door thrown open so hard it banged against the wall. He scrambled up until he reached the top of the ladder, then hoisted himself over the edge of the roof. Down on the ground a voice shouted, "There he is, up there."
Another gunshot. What the hell was going on?
The unmistakable sound of feet--fast feet, in shape feet, boot shod feet--scurrying up the ladder. Standing on the tar and pebble roof, William glanced around for something he could use as a weapon, shocked he was even thinking of such a thing. A five gallon plastic bucket was all there was. It stood upright, filled with rainwater. He picked it up and peered over the edge. A uniformed policeman was three quarters of the way up the ladder. Two more cops were right behind him.
William looked at the heavy bucket in his hands, thought about just dumping the water onto them but knew it wouldn't stop them. There was only one way to stop them, and that was to knock them off the ladder. He thought about warning them, maybe trying to scare them away. But they were cops. You couldn't scare them away.
So why had they shot Johnny Davis, and why were they shooting at him?
The first officer looked up and saw William staring down at him with the bucket in his hands. Their eyes locked for just a second and the cop stopped. In those eyes that stared back at him, William saw an almost maniacal determination that sent a shiver down his spine. The officer held his grip on the ladder with his right hand while his left dropped to the pistol resting in his gleaming leather holster. In one smooth motion he drew his gun and raised it toward William.
William Bailey tossed the bucket down the ladder. A shot rang out an instant before the heavy bucket thudded into the cop's head. Like a gruesome traffic accident happening before his eyes, William couldn't help but watch as the policeman fell, taking his two partners down with him. The last thing William saw before he turned away was a jumbled heap of black uniforms resting on the concrete below the ladder.
* * *
Hiding in the shadow of a telephone booth, thinking. Home. He had to get home. Had to get back to Marge and the kids. Maybe somehow he could explain what had happened. Vincent, his attorney, he would know what to do--maybe--but he was a civil lawyer not a criminal attorney. He wrote contracts and did personal injury on the side; he didn't get people out of jail who'd killed a cop by dropping a bucket of water on his head and knocking him and his buddies off the side of a building.
As the cab he'd been waiting for pulled up, William stepped out from the dark and climbed into the back seat.
The driver turned around. "Where to?"
William pulled the door shut. "Uptown. 1721 Audubon Court."
"Fare's gonna be about fifteen dollars. After dark, I gotta have the money up front."
"What?"
"Company policy." The cabbie shrugged. "A lot of drivers been getting stiffed."
William opened his wallet, pulled out a twenty and handed it across the seat. The driver took it and almost slipped it into his cash box, then took a second look at the bill. His face tightened. "What the hell is this?"
"Huh?"
With the bill stretched between his hands, the cabbie stared at it for a second then looked up at William. "You're either the dumbest counterfeiter who ever lived or you've been had."
"What you are talking about?"
The driver faced the bill toward William but didn't hand it back to him. "It's printed backwards."
William looked at the twenty-dollar bill in the man's hand. It looked like--it was--an almost brand new bill, nothing wrong with it as far as he could tell.
"Get out of my cab," the driver said.
William didn't know what the man was talking about but knew he didn't want to get out. This cab was his only way home. He reached for the twenty. "If you don't like that one I've got another--"
The driver pulled his hands away. "I ain't giving this back. I got to turn it in to the police." He dropped one hand behind his seat back, then came up clutching a pistol, an old German Luger by the looks of it, the muzzle aimed straight at William's face. "In fact, I bet they give me a reward if I bring you in with it."
William jerked the door handle and rolled out into the street. He sprang to his feet and ran, the driver's yells just background noise. Has everyone gone crazy or is it just me?
Home. He had to get home.
* * *
Rain. Driving, relentless rain. William was just two blocks from Fausto's. In two hours, that's as far as he'd gotten--one block an hour. Police cars prowled the neighborhood, shinning spotlights into every nook and cranny, lighting up every shadow. Everyone in Fausto's knew his name. He'd been going there three or four nights a week after work for years. The cabbie had his address. William had given it to him when he told the hack driver where to drop him.
Ten o'clock at night, with nowhere to go and no way to get there, William sat behind the closed Goodwill store, under an overhang that barely kept the rain off of him.
Huddled in the dark, head sunk between his knees, he hadn't heard anyone approach.
"You don't look so good."
Startled, William looked up, prepared to run again. It was the homeless man he'd knocked over outside the bar. The one with the shopping cart and the leathery skin. William relaxed a little. "Excuse me?"
The man pushed his cart closer. "You're not supposed to be here."
William looked around. "Why not?"
The old man grinned, half his teeth gone.
William found it nearly impossible to tell his age. The guy could be forty and maybe had lived a hard life, or perhaps he was a well-preserved seventy, pickled by a lifetime of booze. William waved him off, expecting a plea for money. "I can't help you."
The old man stopped just a few feet away. "Everything's out of place isn't it?" He had a strange lilting voice. Almost like an accent.
And he was right. Everything was out of place--from Johnny Davis to the cab driver--everything was wrong.
Strapped to the back of the old man's shopping cart was a plastic sign about the size of a loaf of bread. William recognized the sign, the words, the colors, the logo of a local supermarket chain, all were familiar to him, but the letters were backward, unreadable.
Rainwater ran down William's face. He pointed to the sign. "Why's it written like that?"
The old man looked at the sign then back at William. "Like what?" he said, then shuffled away behind his basket.
* * *
The rain came down even harder. William slouched in a darkened doorway across the street from Fausto's. Nothing made sense. Everything was messed up, backward, out of whack. Almost like this wasn't his home, like he was a stranger seeing it for the first time.
But that was crazy. He'd grown up here, gone to Brother Martin High School, dated Jenny Underhill who went to Cabrini, lost her to Johnny Davis, then got her back only to lose her again the first year of college to some kid who drove a Mustang. Two years later William married Marge at Saint Luke's. They had two kids.
This town was his home. He recognized it. He knew the people here, Big Johnny and Zeke, the bartender at Fausto's. But things were different, little things. John Davis for one. In trying to help him, the big man had gotten himself killed. That wasn't John Davis--at least not the one William Bailey had known since seventh grade. Everything looked the same but wasn't. Nothing was quite right.
But they knew him--or someone like him.
A strange sensation crept over him that made the hair on the back of his neck rise. Maybe he didn't belong here. Maybe everything wasn't as it appeared. Maybe this wasn't his home. But if that were true, then whose home was it? Another thought, even scarier seeped through his brain. If he was here, who was there--at his home?
Crazy.
William dropped his head into his hands. Just considering such nonsense was a waste of time. Yet, here he was scanning the street, thinking of going back inside Fausto's, back to that mirror.
Not much time to think about it. The bar closed at three AM and it was already two-thirty. When he'd left--run for his life with Big Johnny--most of the mirror was still in the frame hanging on the wall.
Something about that damned mirror.
But Fausto's was dangerous, so a couple of hours ago William had found another mirror. In the men's room of a twenty-four hour gas station. The Chevron on North Rampart.
He had approached it cautiously, afraid he was going mad. As he peered over the sink into the mirror, he saw what he always saw, his own reflection. Holding up his left hand, he looked at the image in the mirror, at the watch strapped to his wrist. He noticed that the man in the mirror wore his watch on his right hand. Just the opposite.
William stood in the gas station bathroom for twenty minutes before he worked up his nerve. Finally, he took a deep breath, leaned back, then slammed his forehead into the dirt-streaked mirror. The glass shattered and cut his head. Blood dribbled off the tip of his nose into the sink. His reflection stared out at him from the other side of the mirror, blood running down his face, too.
I have gone crazy!
So the gas station hadn't worked out. Ducking police cruisers, William had wandered the streets, his head reeling. What was he doing?
On the sidewalk, he found a sopping wet magazine that the wind had blown up against the side of a newspaper machine. The cover caught his eye. He picked it up. It was printed backwards, the letters reversed, words running right to left. The spine was on the right. As he flipped through the pages, he couldn't read a thing. Then William had an idea.
In the bathroom of an all night restaurant he held the wet magazine up to the mirror. Perfect. The reflected image was normal, spine on the left, words running left to right, all the letters printed correctly. He could read it clearly. But what did it mean?
Then he drove his head into that mirror. The glass cracked. Someone walked in, a skinny waiter wearing an apron. He stood gawking as William leaned over the sink with tears of pain filling his eyes.
The waiter looked at the broken mirror, then jabbed a finger at William's bloody forehead. "What the hell are you doing?"
"An accident," he mumbled, pressing his fingers against the fresh cut.
The waiter turned. "I'm calling the cops."
William Bailey ran.
Now he was huddled in the rain staring at Fausto's across the street. Because he had nowhere else to go.
He stood and walked toward Fausto's. When he was halfway across the street, a police car glided around the corner, headlights reflecting off the wet pavement. The cops in no hurry, just cruising. William forced himself to keep walking, not to run. One foot in front of the other. In the downpour, odds were that the cops wouldn't even recognize him.
But they did recognize him.
The police car slid to a stop as its high beams clicked on and its blue strobe lights started popping. Both front doors flew open.
Like a sinner seeking the sanctuary of a church, William ran straight for Fausto's door. As he burst inside, Zeke looked up from behind the bar. "William! What the hell are you doing here?"
He ignored the bartender, running right past him, eyes focused on the broken mirror and its busted frame hanging on the wall.
Zeke again, "The cops been looking all over for you. Say you killed two officers and--"
Behind him the front door banged against the wall. "Police!" a voice behind him commanded. "Stop."
But William didn't stop. He kept running--running straight for the mirror. Reflected in its fragmented pieces he saw two uniformed police officers behind him, heard their boots pounding on the wooden floor. Just ten feet separated him from the mirror. At full speed he took two strides then dove. He stretched his arms out overhead and tucked his chin into his chest as his feet left the floor.
He felt one hand hit wall and the other strike broken glass. Then his head hit. More glass cracked, more skin split.
Darkness.
* * *
William's eyes popped open. He was staring at the ceiling. Rough voices, even rougher hands. They rolled him over onto his stomach and jerked his arms behind his back. He felt cold steel on his wrists and heard the metallic ratcheting as the handcuffs tightened and bit into his skin.
He tilted his head up and rested his chin against the floor. Blood poured down the side of his face; he watched it pool on the floor then seep between the wooden planks. By rolling his eyes up he could just see the empty spot on the wall where the mirror had hung. Lying on the floor, three feet from his head, was the broken frame and the rest of the glass.
The two cops grabbed his arms and yanked him to his feet, sending waves of pain through his shoulders and wrists. As they spun him toward the door, one of the officers said, "You're under arrest."
"Why?" William asked.
The officer pressed his face into William's. "Murdering your family for starters."
"My...my family." William felt his stomach cinch and his bowels turn to ice. A thought he'd had earlier in the night echoed inside his head. If he was here, who was there--at his home.
As the cops dragged him across the floor, William glanced up and saw the rusted metal sign nailed above the door.
OUT.
He was home.

I've been drawing for over 7 years now and I still have bad art days every now and then (you know, the type of day where everything you draw looks like many levels under your usual quality). I have learned to deal with the negative emotions on days like that by just accepting that this is how it goes and also acknowledging that they are getting significantly rarer recently (it used to be 50/50 years ago and nowadays it only happens once or twice a week), however there is a little something that has been eating at me for a while now...
As the title suggests, I'm talking about pros/famous artists (especially the ones on youtube and the other social networks). I notice that they are always able to draw and consistently pump out amazing work that's up to their usual standard all year round. And it's not like there's only a couple of them - there's probably hundreds that I know and follow, some even younger than me (but that's a whole different can of worms) - all of them seemingly flawless with their consistency.
It honestly kind of makes me want to throw in the towel every now and then and give up on having art as anything other than occasional hobby. I haven't done it yet (thanks to a mix of my love for drawing + sunk cost fallacy), but the older I get the more urgency I feel to either reach their level or give up on trying. I do often ask myself if I'm just not meant to have art as a career, considering how incapable I am of consistently delivering.
I wonder if professionals struggle with this kind of thing too or if they've passed some sort of mystical checkpoint in skill level from where onwards you just always enjoy yourself due to everything being so consistently easy to reproduce.
​
PS: This post kind of ended up just being a bunch of venting by me it seems, sorry about that. I guess I am trying to find some outside perspective on this particular issue - god knows I haven't been able to figure it out by myself these past 7 years.

Here's one that got their SGIsplainin' ass BANNED last week - from Why does SGI hate the Shoshu priesthood so much?, from THREE YEARS AGO - first, the OP they're replying to:

Over at the SGIUSA sub, they are discussing how members should just take what they want and leave what they don't about practicing Nichiren Buddhism under SGI.
Someone shared a Gosho quote basically saying that if someone has the same belief as you in NMRK, you should never fight with or even criticize that person.

https://archive.ph/BYmyg

The commenters take this to mean that SGI is accepting of its members being interfaith and practicing multiple religions.
But I've also read quotes by Nichiren that basically show he wanted to DESTROY all other sects of Buddhism!!! (These quotes have been linked many times, sorry not to link them again).
It seems that Nichiren was only protecting the followers of the Lotus Sutra and not other religions, though . So in our modern-day, we might say that Nichiren would have protected both the Shoshu priesthood and the SGI members.
But we all know how hard SGI has fought to keep the separation of the Shoshu and their own members. SGI is constantly belittling and criticizing the Shoshu. It seems pretty hypocritical, especially considering Nichiren wants protection of all Lotus Sutra practitioners, doesn't it? Source

So far so good? That post was from October 24, 2019 - over 3 1/2 years ago. Now here's from a mere FIVE DAYS AGO, from u/Mobile_Taro1969 (sounds like a BOOMER to me):

From what I have researched, SGI members grew the organization and were encouraged to make pilgrimages to Japan if possible.

No. Virtually ALL the money and members have always been IN JAPAN. All of the SGI properties are owned by the Soka Gakkai in Japan (via one or more of their many shell corporations distributed throughout the various countries of the world).
The SGI is NOT "growing"; it is collapsing. The SGI membership is aging and dying, just as the Soka Gakkai membership is in Japan. The Ikeda organization stopped growing everywhere in the mid-1970s.

Over time, their generous donations added up to billions - far exceeding most churches, including the Vatican.

Really? Show us the money, then! We all KNOW the Soka Gakkai hasn't given the lion's share of the money they have to Nichiren Shoshu (or anyone), and the Soka Gakkai has been very careful to NEVER disclose how much it is worth. So let's see your sources! I can't WAIT to see the details!! 😃

Seems the temple high priests felt it 'acceptable' to use the hard-earned donated funds for their frequent drinking parties with the opposite sex and other irresponsible actions.

Oh, really? I'm guessing you're going off those photoshopped pictures the Soka Gakkai mocked up and then got spanked for in court. You really need to do better research!
Whatever happened to Ikeda's 1990 supposedly "eternal" "clear mirror guidance", in which everyone is instructed to assume FULL PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY for everything that bothers them within their environment?? Hmmmm....? Since when has the SGI encouraged COMPLAINING about others?? You really should stop your complaining - Ikeda SENSEI says so!

Frequent requests to stop by the lay organization were ignored.

No, no - this was a power struggle in which Daisaku Ikeda thought he'd be able to take over Nichiren Shoshu and run it however HE wanted. THAT is the ENTIRE problem.

Also, prior to the burning of the Shohondo which was paid for by SGI members

You apparently don't realize that the Sho-Hondo was made of ferroconcrete - concrete reinforced with steel.
Do you really think that concrete and steel are flammable??? Have you ever tried to burn concrete or steel??? Here are images from the DEMOLITION. Enjoy.
[No "burning" was involved, moron. And it was the right thing to do.

the priests had instructed that the cremated ashes of members left in safeguard at the Shohondo, be dumped into rice bags like trash. I was in total disbelief to hear and read of such disrespectful actions - like watching a movie unfold.

Let's see the evidence. SGI members are notorious for making shit up and expecting everybody to just believe them.

Priests like that are not fit to be advisers and examples for others - they are no better than wild animals. The Japanese govt verbally reprimanded the temple priests for their lack of respect and compassion for the deceased and their loved ones. Unfit for their role as head priests, these money-hungry animals showed no remorse as their pockets were already filled they make me sick to my stomach!

Oh boo hoo hoo. EVIDENCE PLEASE

Not true. To set the record straight, their belief is that other faiths are outdated and there is only one true religion. Also, they do not teach to destroy other faiths - a ridiculous statement. (Not a member but I researched enough to know what are false statements.)

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
SURE you're not, SkinBitchy! You're dripping with "I Will Become Shin'ichi Yamamoto!" energy!
Considering that most, if not ALL, the content you posted has been shown to be WRONG, your "research" obviously needs some work. Idiot.
"All religions except Nichiren Shoshu are evil and poisonous to society and must be destroyed." - All Three Soka Gakkai Presidents
Here are Jōsei Toda and Daisaku Ikeda (ever heard of them?) stating plainly that other faiths must be DESTROYED:
Toda:

Intolerance
It should be noted that in the immediate postwar era Sōka Gakkai’s extreme intolerance of other religious faiths did not change in the least. For example, on October 31, 1954, Toda Jōsei mounted a white horse (previously the exclusive prerogative of the emperor) on the Taisekiji parade grounds and addressed assembled members of the Young Men’s and Young Women’s divisions as follows:
In our attempt at kosen rufu [converting the entire world] we are without an ally. We must consider all religions our enemies, and we must destroy them. Ladies and gentlemen, it is obvious that the road ahead is full of obstacles. Therefore, you must worship the gohonzon (sacred scroll), take the Sōka Gakkai spirit to heart, and cultivate the strength of youth. I expect you to rise to the occasion to meet the many challenges that lie ahead. Source

The Soka Gakkai:

"All of orders and religions except Nichiren-sho-shu are heretical religion, and they poison society." - "Shakubuku-Kyoten," p286, edited by Soka-Gakkai teaching section and supervised by Ikeda Daisaku. Source
At the time of Toda's death Soka Gakkai numbered nearly a million followers. Under the leadership of the movement's third president, Daisaku Ikeda, Soka Gakkai's influence increased rapidly. He committed himself to continue Toda's policy 'to destroy other religions'. Source

Daisaku Ikeda:

My two hundred thousand comrades in the entire Kansai district, I hereby desire you to open a general attack under the command of Mr. Shiraki, the chief of the General Chapter[,] on the Tenrikyo, the stronghold of all heresy in the Kansai area. - Ikeda
I desire, therefore, that you, under the leadership of the Youth Division Chief open a general attack, starting this very day, on the Rissho Koseikai, which leads people to hell by delusory doctrines. - Ikeda

There it is. DOCUMENTED.

they do not teach to destroy other faiths - a ridiculous statement.

Here ya go:

Like his mentor, Toda was not speaking metaphorically when he urged the destruction of all other religions. Nevertheless, Sōka Gakkai representatives now claim things have changed. Source

They sure do. It is you and your beliefs that are ridiculous, and you should be ashamed of your LYING.
I am hereby inviting u/Mobile_Taro1969, who is banned from SGIWhistleblowers, to send me a private message with any response or comments, which I will post in its unedited entirety here in the comments, with a screenshot to show it is complete.
If anyone finds any more such necrotrolling, please bring it to the attention of one of the mods so that we can deal with it.

Arcanemigration ch4 Room to grow
As I sit at the edge of a stream near the entrance of my cave i Cast my gaze upon the tranquil scenery, I realize that it holds a newfound significance for me. It has provided me with sustenance, a source of water, and now a temporary respite from the stress of constant work. The fish continue their rhythmic dance in the water.
I reach for my fishing spear, determined to catch a meal to replenish my strength. As I prepare to strike, I hear a faint rustling from the nearby bushes. Instinctively, I grip the spear tighter and scan the surroundings. The eyes of the goblins still haunt my thoughts, reminding me that danger lurks even in the most peaceful moments.
Instead of a goblin that emerges from the brush. It is a creature unlike any I have encountered before—a majestic white pearlescent stag with antlers that seem to reach towards the heavens. Its eyes are filled swirling waves of a blue wisdom and a green of serenity that I have rarely witnessed.
The stag approaches the stream, its graceful movements leaving me in awe. It drinks from the water with a glowing reflection shimmering in the gentle ripples. I watch in silence, a mix of reverence and curiosity stirring within me. Could this be a sign? A guiding presence in this harsh world?
The stag lifts its head, its gaze meeting mine. For a brief moment, time stands still. And then, as if acknowledging my presence, it takes a step closer, its hooves barely making a sound on the soft earth.
In that moment, a realization dawns upon me. The goblins, the battles, the struggle to survive—they are but a small part of a much greater tapestry of the journey to come. There are forces at play beyond my comprehension, and while they may not have taken notice of my deeds, they have sent me a message through this ethereal encounter.
I lower my spear, a newfound sense of purpose coursing through my veins. I will not only defend this sanctuary against the goblin hordes but also strive to understand the mysteries that surround me. I will seek knowledge, forge alliances, and uncover the truths that lie hidden within this world.
With renewed determination, I set my sights on fortifying the cave, transforming it into a stronghold that not only protects me but also serves as a beacon of resilience and defiance. The goblins may still pose a threat, but I am no longer just a survivor—I am a warrior with a purpose.
The stag watches me closely and thoughtfully As I prepare to embark on this new chapter, I offer my silent gratitude to the creature before it gracefully disappears into the depths of the forest.
The journey ahead will be arduous, and the trials I face will test my strength, both physical and spiritual. I may be alone but With the spirit of the stag guiding me, and the scars of my past battles etched into my flesh, I step forward, ready to face whatever challenges lie ahead.
I am the defender of this sanctuary, the seeker of truths, and the embodiment of resilience. And as I move forward, I carry with me the wisdom of the stag and the unwavering determination to protect what is mine.
Inside the cave, I take stock of my resources. Though limited, they are enough to begin the task at hand. And get to work smoothing down the hard stone again until it is the right shape. Then heat up the rock in my fore and then drip cold water along the edge to shatter bits off to make a sharp edge. Then I find the largest bone in the bone pile seemingly a femur and with some work and supplies I bind them together. Lastly I char the bone to seal it.
{Crude woodcutting axe} Wood-damage : +50% Range:3 Bone: +1 durability Char: +1 longevity
Using this makeshift tool, I venture into the surrounding forest, seeking sturdy trees suitable for reinforcement. With each swing of the axe, I feel a sense of empowerment. It is not just the physical act of cutting wood but also the symbol of taking control over my environment. I am no longer at the mercy of nature; I am the one shaping my destiny.
The axe bites into the wood, and with each felled tree, I feel like it's getting easier. Then chopping the tree into logs and branches. I gather logs and branches, forming a stockpile near the cave entrance. I return multiple times, driven by a relentless determination to create a formidable barrier against any future onslaught. I also collect large rocks from the nearby riverbed, utilizing them to strengthen the cave's entrance.
Hours turn into days as I toil, the sweat mingling with the dirt on my brow. With each passing moment, the cave transforms into a sanctuary that reflects my resilience. The once-vulnerable entrance is now fortified with thick logs and sturdy rocks, creating a formidable barrier that would give even the most determined goblin pause.
As I stand back to survey my handiwork, a sense of accomplishment washes over me. The cave, once a mere shelter, has evolved into a stronghold—a testament to my will to survive and protect what is mine. The scars on my body are mirrored in the scars on the land, each a reminder of the battles fought and won.
With the physical defenses in place, I turn my attention to the interior of the cave. I make a simple stone chisel with a replaceable head and useing the same sharp stone, I shape smaller logs into makeshift furniture—a crude bed, a rough-hewn table, and even a shelf to store my meager belongings. I carve niches into the walls to hold torches, their flickering light banishing the shadows that once haunted this place.
As I sit on my newly crafted bed, a flicker of the white stag's presence dances in my mind. I realize that my soul has been blessed with a simple yet useful ability—a keen intuition that guides me in times of danger. It is as if the spirit of the white stag has bestowed upon me a heightened sense of awareness, allowing me to anticipate danger before it strikes.
(Blessing of the stag) Soul trait The user knows when immediate death is near.
With the cave fortified and made livable, I find a moment of respite. I lay on my rough bed, the scars on my body throbbing with both pain and pride. The journey has been grueling, and the battles have taken their toll, but I am ready to face whatever lies ahead. In that moment I notice some notifications I may have ignored or didn't see before.
{Shelter -> Home} Sufficient upgrades have been made do you accept the ownership of this new Home. YES : NO
It doesn't take long but I say yes after I do other pop-ups make themselves know.
HOME This designation partains to places meant for long term living not just survival and can have major improvements and is meant for months to years of living. Many improvements can be made, few expansions can be made tho and only minor differences can be erected. If major improvements are made until there are none left to make and all minor traps are established then it will automatically move into the [BASE] designation. This designation can trigger only minor events.
There now seems to be a few tabs available to me including (defenses),(furniture),(waist room),(pool room),(the pit),(main room)
[You have now made the first step to living in this world and have gained one new skill and 1 level]
Learned skill [ wood working] Rarity: uncommon The user can efficiently cut trees down and work them into anything from small art pieces and furniture to walls and defenses.
And I guess I need to now see what leveling up is like. It can't be that hard I'll also need to go through my windows and learn everything I can about this system.
STATS LV:6 CLASS:NONE NAME: WILLIAM RACE:HUMAN [WHITE] AGE: 23YEARS OLD WEIGHT: 250LB HEALTH :(LV6 * CON14)= 84 ARCANA :(LV6 * INT33) 198 -198=0 PHYSICAL : (LV6 *DEX10)= 60
STRENGTH : 15 DEXTERITY :10 CONSTITUTION :14 INTELLIGENCE :33 WISDOM :27 CHARISMA :-2 LUCK :10
STAT POINTS :5
I close my eyes, allowing the exhaustion to wash over me, knowing that tomorrow will bring new challenges. But with the wisdom of the stag etched into my soul and the strength of my defenses surrounding me, I find solace in the knowledge that I am prepared. And with 5 stat points I should be able to see a difference after using them.
The goblins may regroup and seek revenge, or another threat can raise it's ugly head but they will find a changed man awaiting them—a warrior with a fortified sanctuary, a soul.

My wife calls all lunch meats "ham" and all deli-style sandwiches "ham sandwiches" as if deli meats fall under some kind of "ham" umbrella. I caught onto this a few years ago while we were grocery shopping. She had written "ham" on the list, which I was reaching for when she said "how about some of this ham?" while pointing to a package of sliced roast beef. I was confused.
"What do you mean? Ham's on the list. Here's some good honey ham," I said."But that ham is getting boring. I like other hams, too. Like these -" and she gestured towards all the other kinds of deli meats like sliced turkey, roast beef, and pastrami on the aisle.
Folks, she nearly broke my brain. She wasn't joking or trying to pull some kind of weird psychological prank on me. She explained to me that she legitimately understands "ham" to be a broad-spectrum category. In my mind, and to anyone else who I've asked, ham is a specific type of meat - it's cured, usually sweet, smoked or baked, leg meat from a pig. To her, ham is the category and all other sliced sandwich meats are subsets.
She says her and her immediate family always regarded cold cuts this way, but doesn't know why. Is this a normal thing for some people? Is it a regional thing like calling sodas "pop" or "Coke"?
​
A couple of clarifying points: she's a native English speaker and her sister shares this quirk.

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It's no less numbing to find material meant for children retconned for adults—and, in the process, for most of the naïve delight to be leached out, and for any serious concerns to be shoehorned in and then waved away with dazzle and noise. Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine” offers a moral realm that draws no lines, a personal one of simplistic stakes, a political one that suggests any interpretation, an audiovisual one that rehashes long-familiar tropes and repackages overused devices for a commercial experiment that might as well wear its import as its title. When I was in Paris in 1983, Jerry Lewis—yes, they really did love him there—had a new movie in theaters. You're Crazy, Jerry."Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine " could be retitled 'You're a Superhero, Dwayne'—it's the marketing team's PowerPoint presentation extended to feature length.
In addition to being Johnson's DC Universe debut, “Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine” is also notable for marking the return of Henry Cavill's Superman. The cameo is likely to set up future showdowns between the two characters, but Hodge was completely unaware of it until he saw the film.
“They kept that all the way under wraps, and I didn't know until maybe a day or two before the premiere,” he recently said Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine FULLMOVIE ONLINE
Is Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine Available On Hulu?Viewers are saying that they want to view the new TV show Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine on Hulu. Unfortunately, this is not possible since Hulu currently does not offer any of the free ****odes of this series streaming at this time. the MTV channel, which you get by subscribing to cable or satellite TV services. You will not be able to watch it on Hulu or any other free streaming service.
Is Filmmakers for the The Machine Fullmovie Online For Free on Disney Plus?
Unfortunately, Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine is not currently available to stream on Disney Plus and it's not expected that the film will release on Disney Plus until late December at the absolute earliest.
While Disney eventually releases its various studios' films on Disney Plus for subscribers to watch via its streaming platform, most major releases don't arrive on Disney Plus until at least 45-60 days after the film's theatrical release.
Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine has finally ended the box office blues. It will be a close call, but based on the estimates, the year's biggest opener remains Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness with its $187 million start. Nonetheless, Wakanda Forever's $180 million opening is a huge one, being the biggest ever for the month of November (beating the $158 million of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire), the second biggest of the year, and the 13th biggest of all time (though it could go up or down a few slots once the actuals come out). It led an overall weekend box office of $208 million, which is the fourth biggest of the year and the biggest by a long shot of the past four months, with no other weekend since July 8 -10 even going above $133 million.
This isn't the $202 million opening that we saw from Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine in February 2018, nor should we expect the amazing legs that were able to get that film to an astonishing $700 million. With that said, expect it to perform strong throughout the holiday season, likely repeating the five-weekend number-one streak that the first film had, and it shouldn't have any trouble becoming the second highest grossing film of the year so far, beating the $411 million cume of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. The audience response is strong, with the A CinemaScore falling below the first film's A+ but bouncing back from the B+'s earned by Doctor Strange 2 and Thor: Love and Thunder, which ranked among the worst for the MCU. improvement over the recent franchise installations,with the aforementioned films coming in at 74% and 64% respectively on Rotten Tomatoes, both at the lower end for Marvel films, while Wakanda Forever's 84% ​​​is closer to franchise norms, though not meeting the high bar set by the first Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine's 96%.
The sequel opened to $150 million internationally, which Disney reports is 4% ahead of the first film when comparing like for likes at current exchange rates. Overall, the global cume comes to $330 million. Can it become the year's third film to make it past $1 billion worldwide despite China and Russia, which made up around $124 million of the first film's $682 million international box office, being out of play? It may be tough, but it's not impossible. Legging out past $500 million is plausible on the domestic front (that would be a multiplier of at least 2.7), and another $500 million abroad would be a drop of around $58 million from the original after excluding the two MIA markets. It'd be another story if audiences didn't love the film,but the positive reception suggests that Wakanda Forever will outperform the legs on this year's earlier MCU titles (Multiverse of Madness and Love and Thunder had multipliers of 2.2 and 2.3 respectively).
As for the rest of the box office, there's little to get excited about, with nothing else grossing above $10 million as Hollywood shied away from releasing anything significant not just this weekend but also over the previous two weekends. When Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine opened in 2018, there was no counterprogramming that opened the same weekend, but Peter Rabbit and Fifty Shades Freed were in their second weekends and took second and third with $17.5 million and $17.3 million respectively. That weekend had an overall cume of $287 million compared to $208 million this weekend Take away the $22 million gap between the two Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine films and there's still a $57 million gap between the two weekends. The difference may not feel that large when a mega blockbuster is propping up the grosses,but the contrast is harsher when the mid-level films are the entire box office as we saw in recent months.
Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine, which is the biggest grosser of the rough post-summer, pre-Wakanda Forever season, came in second with just $8.6 million. Despite the blockbuster competition that arrived in its fourth weekend, the numbers didn't totally collapse, dropping 53 % for a cume of $151 million. Worldwide it is at $352 million, which isn't a great cume as the grosses start to wind down considering its $200 million budget. Still, it's the biggest of any film since Thor: Love and Thunder, though Wakanda Forever will overtake it any day now.
Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine came in third place in its fourth weekend, down 29% with $6.1 million, emerging as one of the season's most durable grossers and one of the year's few bright spots when it comes to films for adults. The domestic cume is $56.5 million Fourth place went to Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile, which had a negligible drop of 5% for a $3.2 million sixth weekend and $40.8 million cume., in fact )
, which isn't surprising considering it's the only family film on the market, and it's close to grossing four times its $11.4 million opening. Still, the $72.6 million worldwide cume is soft given the $50 million budget , though a number of international markets have yet to open.
Finishing up the top five is Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine, which had its biggest weekend drop yet, falling 42% for a $2.3 million seventh weekend. Of course, that's no reason to frown for the horror film, which has a domestic cume of $103 million and global cume of $ 210 million from a budget of just $20 million.
The one new specialty title of note comes from a filmmaker we don't typically associate with the specialty box office: Steven Spielberg. The Beard's semi-autobiographical family drama Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine opened in four theaters in New York and Los Angeles to $160k, a $40k average. The film expands to 600 theaters the day before Thanksgiving, and it has the potential to break out in a way that none of the other of the season's awards contenders have. We're also seeing very solid numbers from Watch ‘Filmmakers for the The Machine, which grossed $1.7 million this weekend for a seventh place finish, bringing its cume to $5.8

Welcome to this non-real time meeting of codependency_12steps
Hi, I’m u/newsolution4life. I’m a recovered codependent and your leader for this meeting. Will those who wish, please join me in the Serenity Prayer: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference. Thy will, not mine, be done.
Strong sponsorship is necessary to live a recovered life. Sponsors are recovered codependents committed to living the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions to the best of their ability. Sponsors share their program up to the level of their experience and strengthen their recovery through this service to others. To find a sponsor, look for someone who has what you want and ask how he or she is achieving it. Will all sponsors please identify themselves in their post?
Suggested guidelines for sharing: As you share your experience and strength, please also share your hope. Please confine your sharing to your experience with the illness of codependency, the solution offered by the twelve steps and your own recovery from codependency, rather than just the events of the day or week. When responding to other member’s posts, please focus on your personal experience rather than advice giving. If you are having difficulties, share how you use the program to deal with them. If you need to talk more about your difficulties and seek solutions, we suggest you speak to your sponsor and other members after the meeting.
Share on how this paragraph relates to the illness of codependency and the solution offered by the Twelve Steps. Today we are studying the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, Page 50:
"Here are thousands of men and women, worldly indeed. They flatly declare that since they have come to believe in a Power greater than themselves, to take a certain attitude toward that Power, and to do certain simple things, there has been a revolutionary change in their way of living and thinking. In the face of collapse and despair, in the face of the total failure of their human resources, they found that a new power, peace, happiness, and sense of direction flowed into them. This happened soon after they wholeheartedly met a few simple requirements. Once confused and baffled by the seeming futility of existence, they show the underlying reasons why they were making heavy going of life. Leaving aside the drink question, they tell why living was so unsatisfactory. They show how the change came over them. When many hundreds of people are able to say that the consciousness of the Presence of God is today the most important fact of their lives, they present a powerful reason why one should have faith."
Alcoholics Anonymous, Fourth Edition (p. 50). Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.
Closing: Freedom from codependency is possible by living a Twelve Step way of life. The *Big Book of Alcoholic Anonymous and a recovered sponsor are all you need to get started. Feel free to reach out by private message to newcomers, returning members, and each other. From the Big Book page 164: "Abandon yourself to God as you understand God. Admit your faults to Him and to your fellows. Clear away the wreckage of your past. Give freely of what you find and join us. We shall be with you in the Fellowship of the Spirit, and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the Road of Happy Destiny. May God bless you and keep you- until then."
*Why the Big Book? Time and experience have proven it to be the most successful approach to the Steps no matter what the addictive problem may be (this includes codependency). We also know it to be the purest 12 Step document in existence. It worked for the founders of Twelve Step and it works for us today. If you don't have a copy of the Big Book you can access one for free: https://www.aa.org/the-big-book

Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/o1UJuMM
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Hi Would like some advice please. I’ve created a throwaway account for safety and anxiety reasons.
I had been taken on for some summer work with a small company for numerous weekend dates over the next few months and worked for the company for the first event of these dates last month. I replied to a job advert online about temporary summer work and spoke with the employer on WhatsApp, video calls and phone calls where we negotiated the role and most importantly the hourly wage I was being accepted on. This was over WhatsApp message which I still have. There was no actual contract I signed. I’ve been informed that I will be reduced my wage by nearly 50% hourly, for reasons such as “not performed as expected/didn’t meet set standards” which I contest highly. My pay has gone in at the reduced rate and have been messaged saying they do not want to offer me any more employment and goodbye.
I’ve asked for an invoice which hasn’t been received yet.
I’ve been paid gross. No tax or NI taken off. Bank transferred.
What options do I have?
Thanks for any replies

First shot at a recap so let’s see how we do!
Race Info
What – IM 70.3: Chattanooga
Where – Chattanooga, TN USA
When - Sunday, May 21st, 2023
Overall Goals
- PR - Yes (previous PR was a 5:30:12 at Ohio 70.3 in 2022)
- Sub 5:00 - Heck no
- Not blow up on run - Sorta?
TL;DR and Results
This was my 3rd 70.3 and my first with my coach who has been training me since the start of the fall 2022
Swim – 35:07
T1 – 5:03
Bike – 2:49:55
T2 – 3:13
Run – 1:51:57
Total time – 5:25:14
58th in AG (M27), 579 overall
Background
Was a college soccer player (GK) and after college had a foray into BJJ and MMA with a couple fights. Realized that was dumb for longevity and switched to triathlon
Training
Swimming
2-3 sessions a week of 2.4K to 3.6K yards per session. Some workouts are speed focused, some are technique focused, so on and so forth. I have seen a good improvement on CSS these last few month from 1:40 to 1:33. I did swim team as a kid so I have been trying to recapture some of that swim experience. I also felt some recent breakthrough with decreasing my stroke rate and using fewer more powerful strokes. Have been very happy with my improvement these last months. I still remain a terrible to nonexistent kicker
Goal split - 35 Minutes
Biking
typically rides a week. Longer weekend ride and 2 during the week (on zwift trainer) with focus on cadence or power or VO2. I have a big problem with low cadence, recently been trying to get up into the 80s for when I am normally riding. However when I start putting power down I start reverting to the low 70s cadence of riding. As far as FTP I had worked my FTP up to 257 leading up to the start of the season. However I have felt pretty weak these last 2 month leading up to this actual race. It has been harder for me to put the power down. However on the outdoor longer rides I have felt very strong and very comfortable riding for longer periods. Outdoors I ride without power so will probably need to make that investment soon.
Goal Split - 2:30:00
Running
Running has steadily improved with increased mileage and more speedwork. Recent 5K test had improved me to 6:33 for my fastest 5K. Additionally in the most recent half marathon race I had I finished 1:30:12 with a 6:57 avg. biggest issues I have been dealing with are some pain in my left Achilles at the very start of runs that typically disappears after a mile or 2. Typically 3-4 runs a week (1 tempo short, longer run on the weekend, Z2 10k).
Goal Split - 1:40:00
Race Morning
Woke up at 4 AM to get the body rolling. Had my usual prerace breakfast of 2 English muffins with peanut butter and honey as well as a power armour with caffeine and a cup of coffee. Transition setup right at 4:40 to give me plenty of time for the most important part of the morning, THE BM. Went back to my hotel and was able to get showered and dressed up for the race. Headed over to the busses for drop-off to the swim and get to the swim start 20-30 mins before the race start
Swim – seeded myself in the 30-35 minute group and set off! for those that fear swimming Chatty is a great race. It is a with the current swim so it felt like we were flying down the river. Dealt with a slight leak in my left goggle the entire swim which was pretty annoying but it was far from terrible. Also I forgot that in Chatty the swim is actually 1.4 miles instead of 1.2, so as I swam over 2100 yards I was thinking WTF why are we still swimming? This was the first time I seeded myself in the 30-35 min so I did deal with less of the slower swimmers who seed incorrectly. However I did still find quite a few in front of me who should not have been where they were. Mini Rant here, but seriously people why are you doing this? IDK this is just a huge pet peeve of mine when I have to swim all the way around a person (small problems I know...) rant over. But got through it without any real major contact with anyone
35:07 @ 1:23/100 yards - 7:48 PR!
T1 – Never had a wetsuit stripper before! that was fun. But this transition is long as crap. My watch clocked my total transition distance as almost half a mile which was crazy to me. Also I was a little slow getting my socks on today which was unusual. all and all a odd transition where I just felt slow and unfocused on what I was doing.
5:03
Bike – Set off on what had previously been my nemesis for my first 70.3 but felt like I would have an area of great improvement for today! with my goal of 2:30 I knew my goal average speed was around 22MPH, and for the first bit we were well on track! If I look at my average speed through the first 26 miles I was averaging 21.6 MPH. And this is a course with rolling hills most of the way. Goals of the bike were to try and really spin to get through the hill and not stuck grinding it out as this would destroy my legs. Also wanted to keep on my nutrition as I felt this really caused me to blow up on my runs in Galveston and Ohio. Fueling per hour was 1 x 55g carb Gatorade mix bottle and a maurten gel to get to 80 g carb per hours. Would then rinse down the body and sip water through the aid stations. after I burned through my 2 bottles I sipped on the Gatorade endurance bottle taken from the aide stations. In total took 160 g carb + some of the Gatorade endurance for nutrition. So all was going ok until after the "big" climb halfway. Not sure if it was fueling or the headwind that started. But my average speed just tanked. I felt like I had no power. When I tried to flex and stretch my legs I could just feel the damage in them. Not good. Then with the slower speed my mental game fell apart. mile 40-50 I was in a really bad mental spot and had decided at several points to just quit when I got back into transition as there was no way in hell I would break 5 hours. I felt like a failure and a loser. why had I been training 9-12 hours every week to just suck? Talk about a tale of 2 half's. Managed to get back to transition. Mini rant #2 - draft packs... screw you. A literal peloton of 8-10 people 2 abreast 5 deep flew by me at mile 45 and let me tell you I was big mad. Rant over. Also saw a guy lose control at 30 MPH and hit the deck pretty hard, hope he's ok. That was a nice bike to wreck on :( Also another guy almost started peeing on me (I was behind him) near the end and definitely did not use enough water to wash himself down after LOL.
2:49:55 - 20.07 MPH - 11ish minutes slower than PR :(
T2 – Made it into T2 and said alright lets just run the first 5k and see how we are doing then we can DNF if you really are that miserable. So got everything racked and ditched the 10 maurtens I had somehow acquired on the bike. but threw on my trusty Saucony Endorphin Pro 2s and set off
3:13
Run – That first hill out of transition took my already bad mental state and threw it into the fire. So I have never come closer to quitting than that moment. I did not somehow. And then the run flattened out. So after 1.5 miles I actually started to feel good mentally and that's when I knew I was going to finish. I also saw how my pace was going and I knew I would at least PR on the day if I just held the pacing I was doing. after the 1st aid station I decided I wouldn't push too hard on the run and simply walk through the aid stations. avg pace as 7:40-8:00 while running then would walk through the aid stations. in the aid stations I would douse with water and take Gatorade in. Also was putting ice in the suit. I think in total I had 2-3 gels throughout the run? and I stopped at every single aide station for drink and splashing myself with water. Besides the aid stations the only section I had to walk was an incredibly steep little hill right before the first bridge crossing to the other side of the river. That hill is a real ball buster. In terms of improvements I think if I really want to chop some time I have some free time if I don't walk through aid stations. I need to get better at doing that on the run to enable me to get that free time. Also I really didn't push at all my heartrate was pretty much in high Z2 for me the whole run. Also I was dealing with side stitches off and on the whole run so not sure how I can prevent that in the future but if I could eliminate that I would be a much happier camper. Also lap 2 on the run was SO CROWDED mind you there were 3k athletes but man that was a busy run course for the second lap. Saw the shoot and had the tear well up a little. Got over the line and had a quick little 30 second sob so that was that.
1:51:57 - 8:31 AVG - 11 min PR
Final Thoughts
Chatty has me feeling some really mixed emotions. I really was sure I was in for massive PR., chopping 30 minutes off my last PR. Instead I got a measly 5. Maybe I am being to hard on myself or am being greedy with the amount of time I feel I should be dropping? However when I think about it practically it is a much harder course with 2.3K feet in climbing over the bike and 600 or so feet in climbing on the run. So to PR on a harder course is good right? Just a confusing weekend for me about how to feel about it. I think nutrition is still and issue as I am left thinking why did I feel so weak on the bike? I have read some literature that 90-100g carb may be even better now so I think I will implement this into training. Also could I have been tougher and gone harder on that run? If you saw me out there I was in an blue and orange suit with a white helmet riding and old black and blue trek equinox 7 or black running hat. Next race is in July with the Happy Valley 70.3 so I have even more climbing to look forward to there. Will I be able to further PR? Let me know what y'all think of this write up or your thoughts on all this!

Hello everyone. I recently platinummed the PSVITA version of Sly Cooper 4: Thieves in Time as my 28th platinum. It only took me 10 years, 4 weeks, 22 hours to do it. Did you know this game hides its true ending behind the platinum?
Anyway, I'd like to talk about the experience.
Sly 4 was a bit confusing and inconsistent to platinum. I get the feeling the game wants you to platinum it given how on every loading screen it shows you how much you've completed the trophies and collectibles for the game. And that there no missable trophies. But there are some decisions that don't help with that.
So I'd say there are around 3 groups of Trophies in this game.
The first group are the mandatory story trophies. Not much to say about these. There's nothing missable here and the names are quite cool. I do like looking at the percent completion to see how many players completed the PS VITA version of the game. Did you know that around 73% of players booted this game up and completed the prologue? And only around 25% of players even beat the game. The biggest drop happened around the start of Episode 2 since the completion dropped from around 60%to 48% for some reason.
The second group are the trophies for the collectibles and arcades. I'll talk about these later.
The third and final group of trophies are for miscellaneous challenges. I'll start with these first and highlight some of the notable ones that I missed on my first playthrough.
"Crazed Climber - Scale the dragon lair in under 90 seconds". This was one I missed during my original playthrough of the game. This requires you to climb a giant tower filled with traps in the mission "Mechanical Menace". And this one was really fun even though it took me like 3 attempts. Sly 4's movement and platforming is quite fun so having a mini speedrun challenge using Sir Galleth's moveset was a treat. The one criticism I have here is that the game drops a checkpoint as soon as you get to the top. If you haven't gotten the trophy by then and need to retry, you need to quit to the main menu/hideout and reselect the mission, skip through all the cutscenes and get back there which gets annoying. At least the tower is near the start of the mission.
"Ancient Warfare 3 - Crackshot 10 enemies within 65 seconds. Sly's ancestor, Tennessee "Kid" Cooper" has an ability similar to "Dead Eye" from Red Dead Redemption where he can slow down time, mark enemies and objects and then instantly shoot them dead called "Crackshot". I never got this trophy when I first played the game because there wasn't much opportunity to. There aren't large groups of enemies wandering around that you can casually get 10+ of them line up for you to shoot them. Plus, I was already good at shooting them normally. I tried running around in the open world trying to lure enemies but found it wasn't working. There's a mission in the game called "Blind Date" that throws lots of rabbit enemies that chuck TNT at you that worked better for me.
"Hubba Hubba - Don't miss a beat in the Carmelita dance game." This trophy is, without a doubt, the main reason to platinum this game on VITA instead of the PS3. So nobody can see you play this dumb minigame and call you a Furry. This trophy requires you to complete the minigame where Carmilita needs to disguise herself as a belly dancer and dance to distract guards while the Cooper gang try and open a door. You just need to hit the button prompts perfectly. So you can ignore the times the minigame asks you to shake the VITA from side to side like a champagne bottle to make Carmilita shake her ass (seriously, why does this game sexualize Carmilita so much? None of the past Sly games did it).
"Get To the Chopper - Don't take any damage during Up In Smoke." This one was actually fun. In the mission "Up in Smoke", you have to control an RC Helicopter and drop bombs on turrents while drones and mines chase you down. It was fun dodging and weaving through them. There are 3 phases to this mission and you have a checkpoint in between every phase. So if you mess up, you can just restart the checkpoint to the last phase. You don't need to avoid taking damage the whole way through which is nice.
"Unexpected Package - Place 60 bombs in enemy pockets with Bentley." When I first saw this trophy, I groaned. This would be a massive grind. And I had actually made it harder on myself. You see, normally, when you sneak up behind an enemy as Bentley and hold triangle, Bentley will try to put a bomb in the enemy's pocket. Larger enemies won't notice this but smaller enemies will. But the main issue is that I had previously unlocked the Heat Seeking upgrade for Bentley. Meaning sometimes, the bombs would "miss" and stick to an enemy guard's arms or legs instead. So it was annoying going around the hub world and planting bombs on guards.....until I remembered that I had purchased the upgrade for sleep bombs. My plan now was just to find a lone guard on a rooftop, try and place one sleep bomb into his back pocket and detonate it. He'd then fall asleep. Then I'd go to his sleeping body and try placing 5 sleeping bombs in his pocket and back away (the max you can place at any one time). When he wakes him, I'd detonate all 5 which set him to sleep and then repeat. Even if I'd "miss" a few bombs that would stick to their legs instead, I generally 3 or 4 bombs work perfectly. So it didn't take long to get all 60.
"Apollo Wins - Have the perfect workout during the Training Montage." During the mission "Getting Stronger", you have to do a training montage with Bob where you alternate through 6 minigames as you complete them with the minigames getting harder as you complete them. The trophy requires you to complete 10 randomly selected minigames without making a single mistake. If you mess up, you can restart the checkpoint to the beginning of the montage and have to play through a new set of 10 randomly selected minigames. The Minigames are "Slippery Slope" where you balance an egg on a beam using motion controls while penguins jump around on the floating iceberg you are standing on. "Penguin Popper" where Penguins are diving in front of you and you have to play baseball using them. "Sumo Slap" where you have to perform QTEs to push a giant penguin out of a Sumo Ring. "Duck and Cover" where penguins get launched at you from 4 different directions and you have to move the left stick to dodge them. "Super Sling" which requires you to use a catapult to launch a penguin at a flying pterodactyl. And "Whack a chump" which is Whack a Mole but with penguins. Some of which are fake and you should avoid.
Penguin Popper was easy. Once you get the timing down it's easy to get into a rhythm and hit the penguins since they don't vary when they dive. Whenever this popped into the rotation, I considered it a freebie. Sumo Slap was extremly easy. The button mashing was extremely generous. This was another freebie. Duck and Cover requires a bit more focus because of the timing and inconsistent patterns. It's not too challenging. Interestingly, I noticed that the VITA's speakers would reflect if the penguin was coming from the right or left but not above or below you. I guess headphones would make this easier but I had no need for it. I was generally glad when this popped up in the rotation. Whack a Chump was a bit harder than Penguin Popper because there is no set pattern and the additional challenge of not hitting the fake penguins. But it wasn't too bad. I was glad when this popped up in the rotation.
Super Sling and Slippery Slope were the 2 I dreaded and the ones I messed up the most on. Super Sling doesn't give you much indication of where your sling will go. The Pterodactyls have varied speeds so you can't rely on pattern recolonization and reactions. And there's time pressure as taking too long counts as a miss. And it kept popping up in the rotations for some reason!
Slippery Slope was stressful because of the motion controls and how wild later versions of it were.
"The Cooper Open - Have a 20 hit rally with Bentley in each hideout." There are 6 hideouts in the game. In each hideout there is a table tennis table where you as Sly can play a round of table tennis with Bentley. I question the inclusion of it but I suppose it can be a nice distraction. This trophy requires you get a sequences where both you and Bentley hit the ball back and forth 10 times each (or 20 times overall) without missing. And repeat for each of the 6 tables. I found Bentley kept messing up so I had to intentionally hold back and avoid making good shots and try and hit the ball towards him. The main issue is the fact you have to repeat it 6 times. I feel it would be better off just once and as nothing is really added by doing it 6 times. If anything, it's more annoying given the long load times to switch hideouts and Bentley's random AI.
"Hassan Would Be Proud - Pickpocket a full collection of every item in the game." Each of the 6 or so locations have around 3-4 items that can be pickpocketted from guards. The main issue with this trophy is that it doesn't keep track of which items you have already pickpocketed in any way. The game already tracks how many treasures and masks you've found per general area but not pickpocketted items.
I only got this trophy by planning on systematically going through every location in the game and pickpocketting every enemy item and noting down which ones I found.....only to get it in the first level when I used Murray's shake move on some rat enemies. Enemies that you never encounter or have a reason or opportunity to naturally pickpocket. I guess 2013 me had already gotten 99% of these items previously.
"Navigate Like Drake - Take a look at every map in every episode". I found this trophy really annoying. The way it works is that every location in the game, including linear interiors that are exclusive to missions and even the hideouts, have a map you can look at by pressing SELECT. The game doesn't keep track of which locations you've seen the map of. So I had to systamatically play the game from the first mission and press SELECT whenever I entered a new interior. Then quit out and play the next mission and repeat. It popped for me in Episode 4 so somehow, 2013 me had looked at all the maps in Episode 5 without realizing it.
I don't like this trophy. It doesn't really add anything. The player would already be looking at the maps in the hub worlds where they would be at their most useful since those are open world sections. They have no real reason to use the map in linear interiors. And even less useful in hideouts as these aren't even explorable. They are basically just menus that happen to have a 3D background. I'd be more forgiving of this trophy if the map showed collectibles at least. That way, players have more of a reason to use this feature.
Shout out to the Lazy Trunk Spa & Lounge. A secret area in the game that contains a mask collectible and counts for the trophy with a unique map. No mission ever goes here. So even if you were to play diligently and open the map for every area you encounter, you'd still miss this. I only knew this existed because the trophy guide I looked at told me about it so I decided to tag this area while doing the "Get to the Chopper" trophy.
"Hero Tech - Battle with a secret weapon" Once you collect 50 Sly masks. You unlock Ratchet's wrench from Ratchet and Clank. This weapon even turns the coins you collect into bolts. Collecting 60 Masks unlocks Cole's Amp from inFAMOUS. This can electrocute the enemies you hit. I chose to use Cole's Amp to get the trophy as a tribute to inFAMOUS. Killed by Ghost of Tsumia 😭. May it rest in peace. Gone too soon.
That covers all the miscellaneous trophies. Now for the collectibles and arcades.
Sly 4 has a bunch of different collectibles scattered in each of its 6 episodes.
Bottles: Each hub world contains 30 bottles. Collecting all of them gives you access to unlock a safe hidden somewhere in the hub world. Unlocking that safe rewards you a special treasure. Bottles make a "clinking" sound when you're near them so if you're having a hard time finding them, try going into the game's settings and turning down the music and voice sounds. If you find the safe in Episode 3, the special treasure it gives you will highlight bottles and safes in every other episode on your map which is quite nice. I wish the game did this more often. If it hides collectibles from the player, at least give the player an endgame ability to highlight them. It makes it more feasible and fun to complete these tasks instead of combing every last inch (or looking up a guide).
Treasures: Each hub world has around 11 treasures scattered all around. The gimmick here is that in order to collect them, you first need to find where they are in the hub world. Then once you pick them, you need to race back to your hideout under a certain time limit and without taking any damage. If you mess up, you need to repeat the process. The treasures generally require you to have all of Sly's costumes. And a couple require you to be playing as Sir Galleth because England has increased gravity for some reason. Some of these treasures are really well hidden. Requiring you to go to these holes in the middle of nowhere which then require you to switch between some of Sly's costumes. Like, if you open the map when picking some of these up, you'll find Sly is located beyond the borders of the area.
I found it way more fun to race back to the hideout than actually finding them. It was tedious to find many of them because of how well hidden they are. There is no tool or item in the game that can help mark them on your map. Well, I say that. Supposedly, if you have both the PS3 and VITA versions of the game and play them at the same time, you can use the VITA like a scannebinoculars to locate these treasures. And then use the Cross Save feature to nab them in both versions. I only have the VITA version so no luck for me. Again, I'd argue it would be better if there was an endgame upgrade or tool you could get that would mark the treasures like how the game does it for bottles. There isn't even a "clinking sound" or any help for these.
Anyway, collecting all the treasures for an episode unlocks the arcade machine minigame for that episode.
Also sidenote, but this game has the worst map screen that still somehow can be useful. The map gives a top down view of the area but with a blue filter. This makes it harder and more annoying to navigate and use landmarks for reference. Especially on the VITA with its smaller screen. There are also no icons on the map (aside from bottles, safes and objectives) or the ability to make your own markers. The VITA version makes it worse as you can't even use the buttons to navigate the map. You have to use the touchscreen even though that's not how it is in the PS3 version. But you can still use it to know where you are and where collectibles can be from guides. It's technically readable and useful but just barely. I've never seen a map in a game so perfectly walk the line between useful and annoying.
The next collectible are Sly Masks. There are 60 total and around 11 per Episode. Collecting them unlocks skins and some goodies. But the catch with them is that they can be anywhere. There can be a couple in the hub world. But also couple during select missions and even some in the arcade minigames. There's no way to know where any of them are. They generally tend to be really well hidden even if you are trying to scour every area.
Again, I wish there was a way to highlight them. The game's long load times make it a chore to switch episodes or missions so it's tedious to try searching for them manually.
Now it's time to talk about the arcades. Sly 4 has 3 arcade minigames that are used in both the main missions and have a harder version in the arcades in hideouts. The arcade versions of these minigames are harder, go on for much longer and can have secret paths that lead to portals that reward you with points and some of them even have Sly masks. You need to beat the high scores to get the trophies
The first minigame is "Alter Ego". This has you play this 2D auto scrolling twin stick shooter minigame where you must avoid enemies and collect these "ionic bits". Collecting 5 yellow bits levels you up so your weapons get more powerful. At level 10 you have shoot crazy fast, can launch missiles and have floating drones that can damage enemies around you. But whenever you take damage, you drop an entire level. And you get left behind as the level autoscrolls, you respawn at level 0. You can also collect blue bits which can give you a grenade explosion around you.
Personally, I don't really like this minigame. It's fine when playing casually as a change of pace but grinding the high score isn't great. Since it is an autoscroller it is entirely possible you don't have enough points to match the high score and you won't know until its too late, wasting your time. I also found the hitboxes a bit too small. Making items more annoying to pickup.
The key to success is finding the right balance between collecting yellow bits as they give points and level you up (and how high your level is acts as a multiplier for your score) and killing enemies since they give more points. As well as avoiding taking damage and maintaining level 10 as much as possible and knowing where the secret paths are so you can get more points as well as level up if you have messed up.
The second minigame is "System Cracker". Here, you guide a little space ship looking thing through 2D levels in top down twin stick shooting sections. This isn't an autoscroller. You need to explore levels looking for keys and shooting enemies. There are 3 ships you can switch between by going onto specific coloured pads and each ship has its pros and cons. The green ship you start with does decent damage and has decent health and can carry keys. So it's a jack of all trades master of none kinda ship. The pink ship literally resembles a tank. It fires slower and at a shorter range but does more damage and has more health. It's also necessary for destroying pink crystals to progress. The blue ship has floatier handling and faster speeds. Its shots also bounce off walls and it can draw a line which can activate switches and damage enemies. It is weaker than the green ship though.
I actually really enjoyed this minigame and was happy whenever it comes up. It even feels the most fleshed out of the 3. Like, I feel it could even be released as a small standalone game with some tweaking and expansion. I'd probably play a mobile version of this in my free time.
I like how varied the levels can be. You can have a lot of different threats and mini-puzzles and even scenarios where you have to keep switching between ships on the fly to damage enemies. Like, there's this one enemy that's made up of orange, blue and pink hexagons that require you to switch between all 3 ships and use their abilities to damage it. It's quite fun. Damage one ship takes is "saved" on that ship. So if you take 50% damage with the green ship and switch to the pink one, the pink one will have 100% health. But whenever you switch back to the green one, you will be back at 50% health. So mistakes have consequences requiring you to make decisions accounting for them without being too overbearing.
Beating the high scores for the associated arcades is very easy. For one, there is no time limit or pressure so you’re free to take your time and play carefully. On top of that, the mode is very generous with points. Whereas Alter Ego only gives you points for killing enemies and picking up bits (and you need to get and maintain a multiplier for decent times), System Cracker gives you points even for shooting obstacles and barricades in your way. In Alter Ego, I was scraping for points until the very end. In System Cracker, I had more than enough points by the halfway mark.
I suppose the game could have balanced this by increasing the points threshold and rewarding extra points for taking less time to complete sections but I’m not complaining.
The third and worst minigame is “Spark Chaser”. Here you must guide a little electric ball across these maze like areas with gaps that end your attempt if you fall down them and these pinball like bounce pads that bounce you really far. There’s also a time pressure. You have around 20 seconds to get as far as possible with more time added as you pick up these purple clock icons.
The biggest issue is that it’s entirely controlled by motion controls. And this makes me experience worse on VITA. Seriously, I very nearly quit playing. This post was almost titled “I gave up trying to Platinum Sly 4”.
With the PS3 version, at least titling the remote doesn’t also affect your view of the screen. You can look at the game and play it the same as you normally would. But in the VITA version, the “neutral” position where no input is registered by the system is placing the VITA flat with its screen facing up. The standard “screen facing you” position registers as down.
The end result is a frustrating experience. This minigame requires really fine precision given how easy it is to fall off and the time pressure requires you both be fast and more precise to collect time pickups. On top of that, your view is constantly being messed with due to how much you need to tilt the system from odd angles. Especially how tilting “up” really makes it hard to see. Oh, and the dialogue from Bentley as you bounce gets really annoying and repetitive.
It’s barely tolerable in regular missions since those don’t require as much precision or speed. And even then, the usage there in 2013 was suspect to begin with. I only completed this because there’s a cheese where if you can get enough time early on, you can then keep bouncing on certain pads which give around 20 points per bounce. When I played “normally”, I’d get around 300 points with the high score being 1000 points. Using the cheese, I averaged around 990 points and managed to get lucky to win with 1010 points.
Tangent Time:
I’ve said it before. Motion controls work best when they complement existing controls in an optional way or in more restrained ways. I love it when games have gyro aiming since that can help compensate when aiming with sticks with small fine corrections. It works here because the sticks do most of the work and the gyro sensors work where they are best suited.
Or in many mobile racing games, steering is often done by tilting your phone. I enjoy this because there is only one axis you need to tilt your phone, the screen often rotates in conjunction so your view is preserved and it’s more intuitive to feel the “range” of rotation and how it corresponds to steering.
Hell, even ignoring these approaches, motion can still be used in worthwhile ways. Such as by mapping an extra action that is infrequent if all other buttons are occupied. The Mario games on Wii map a “spin” when you jump and shake the remotes giving Mario a bit of grace allowing him to make slightly further jumps or correct a bad jump. Call of Duty MW1 on Wii allowed you to assign certain commands to custom motions of the controller and nunchuck. So you could map stuff like jumping, moving and shooting to buttons but map reloading to smacking the nunchuck to the Wii Mote or plunge the Wii Mote forward to do a melee attack or tilting the Wii Mote to bring out a grenade or alt fire.
Even Resistance 1: Fall of Man had a neat idea. You could quickly tilt the controller left to bring up the Scoreboard screen without needing to take your thumbs off the sticks or stop moving. The Soulsbourne games allow you to quickly do emotes without needing a menu by holding the interact button and quickly tilting the controller in certain directions.
I bring all this up to highlight how Sly 4’s use of motion controls are a failure on every level. They’re mostly used in place of minigames as the sole method of control. So all the issues of motion controls (such as the lack of broad control and feedback) are front and centre. The only place where the motion controls are understandable is when firing arrows as you can then control the arrow after it’s fired using both the sticks and gyro aiming. But even then, the lack of any ability to tune the gyro sensitivity or even invert the controls hampers any use it could have had.
I don’t mind the idea of Sly 4 having decent motion controls. There are places where I can see it being beneficial. In addition to shooting and guiding arrows, I can see it being useful when you have to use the binoculars. Especially as Bentley as you need to shoot darts precisely.
Or, here’s a gimmicky one: you can bind certain costumes or tools to also be selected by quickly tilting the system. Even though using the D-pad for a quick select would be faster, it would still be a better use of motion controls for Sly 4 than most of what’s currently there.
End Tangent.
Back to getting all the trophies, the final arcade machine, unlocked only when you’ve gotten all the treasures in every other episode, is very easy. It has “3 rooms”, one featuring every minigame thus far. But the high score requirements are really low and rooms aren’t as tough as prior versions. You can easily get the high score in the first area which is the Alter Ego one. Even if you miss it there, the second area is Spark Runner but you can keep reloading the checkpoint to preserve your score. So you can get some time clocks, reload a checkpoint when you’re close to running out of time or about to fall off and repeat until you get the high score.
You do need to get past the Spark Runner section to the 3rd and final section that uses System Cracker's gameplay in order to get a hidden Sly Mask, but it's far easier than the dedicated Spark Runner arcade minigame as the section is shorter, is more generous with Time Pickups, has easier level design and lets you reload a checkpoint if you're about to fail which doesn't end the run.
So yeah, Sly 4 Thieves in Time was....inconsistent game to platinum. I enjoyed the base gameplay, System Cracker, the various challenge trophies and the mini speedruns for collecting treasures. I didn't enjoy finding the collectibles and doing some of the other minigames. I hated Spark Runner.
If the game had more ways of tracking collectibles, fewer minigames and better load times, I'd gladly recommend it as a fun game to platinum.
As for the base game itself, I am mixed on it. The gameplay is arguably the best in the series. Sly's movement and costumes are so fun to play around with. Murray, Bentely and Sly's ancestors are also fun changes of pace during missions.
The story is lacking. My main issue is that it doesn't feel like it realizes its following up Sly 3. The story so casually undoes the ending of Sly 3 to get Sly 4's story going. I get it, that's what a sequel has to do. But the way it does it really undermines Sly 3. It's also much more lighthearted and doesn't have as much of a theme or focal point as its predecessors. Sly 1-3 explored the theme of legacy and the consequences of adhering to it so tightly. A major aspect of Sly 3 was Sly realizing the Cooper Vault wasn't worth dying for. It's what prompts him to fake his amnesia and retire with Carmilita in the end. So for Sly 4 to then have Sly have an itch to steal just for the fun of it, it's sending mixed messages here.
In addition, Sly is really casual about the fact Carmilita now knows about his betrayal and has broken up with him. Seems like that should have been a bigger deal. In fact, that kind of "casual-ness" persists throughout the story. Sly doesn't really have much of an arc or any real heartfelt moments with his ancestors. Nor do they seem to really care their decedent from the future is here with them.
If I could have tweaked the story to address these points, here's what I would have done:
I'd have the story open with Sly, Bentley and Murray enjoying their "retirement" and have no plans of thieving. I'd go so far as to have Sly even scoff at the idea of him ever wanting to be a thief. Then when the pages of the Thievus Racconus are dissapearing, Sly, Bentley and Murray have to reluctantly unretire to try stopping them. There would be dialogue during the opening mission of Sly being worried if they get caught as it would undo their happy ending. And then when Carmilita catches Sly, Sly at first is flustered and tries to explain the situation to Carmilita who isn't having any of Sly's BS. Sly is forcibly extracted by the gang and then they time travel. As they are time travelling. Sly is upset that, in order to go literally defend the Cooper Legacy, he has to give up his happy relationship and can't be repaired now. That even if they fix the problem, they'll be on the run forever now. Murray had to give up his professional career as well.
Already, I feel this introduction has a few things going for it. It respects the ending of Sly 3 and keeps the characters in more character, as well as putting more heat on Le Paradox. Sly 4 had to rip away the happy ending that was Sly 3. The characters know that and aren't happy about it. There is immediate consequences. And that heat can be directed at Le Paradox when he comes later.
I'd also like if all of the ancestors Sly met had different reactions to both him and the Cooper legacy and how it affects Sly's arc.
For example, lets say when he meets Riochi Cooper, Ricohi is initially disappointed in Sly as the future Cooper decendent as Sly doesn't act honourably or respect the legacy or something like this. Something that makes Sly start to question if it's even worth defending the Cooper Legacy. Bentely is the voice of reason here and mediator that gets the gang to work as well as they can.
Then when Sly meets Tennessee Cooper, Sly is initially expecting another traditionalist ancestor that cares a lot about the Cooper Legacy. But Tennessee is kinda the opposite of Riochi in that Tennasee doesn't care about the legacy in the same way. He adds his own spin and contributions but also uses the knowledge from it to do his own thing. Perhaps Tennessee is this Robin-Hood esque figure who uses his heisting skills to steal from the corrupt ruling class and give to the lower class. The point being that through Tennessee, Sly considers another aspect of the Cooper Legacy on how he's not that beholden to it and can potentially make it his own.
Then when Sly meets Bob, part of Bob's training is also from Sly as Sly teaches him some of the Cooper moves he knows. Since Bob is the first Cooper ancestor, he has no bias towards the legacy or any knowledge. So he's far more grateful and begins to use his new skills in helpful ways. Causing Sly to wonder if he could use the Cooper Legacy in more ways.
It's a similar situation for Sir Galleth. And for Selim, perhaps by that point, Sly has a newfound outlook and appreciation for the Cooper Legacy and ways on how he can improve it or make it his own that he encourages Selim not to retire or to retire in such a way where he could help people or something like that.
So yeah, there's this theme now of "Don't let the past define you now. You can make it your own and grow past its flaws". Which I feel would give Sly 4 more of a punch. I am basically copying Metal Gear Solid 4 and Assassin's Creed though.
I also feel it would be better if Penelope wasn't the villain of episode 4. It seems to contradict her character from past games and the explanation given for her heel turn doesn't really hold water. I feel the story would be better if Penelope had the role Dmitri has where she's their help in the present and the Knight was a new character. But if you need to have Penelope as the antagonist, have her be under mind control or something. That way the team has the conflict of how will they stop the plan without hurting their friend. But if you really insist on Penelope being a full on antagonist now by her own choice, perhaps flesh out her motivations more? Maybe something like "she sees how Bentley will never reach his full potential as the Bill Gates of the world because of his criminal past that requires him to lay low and not take public credit for his inventions. So she's trying to erase the Coopers so Bentley will have never met Sly". That would at least be more than "I want money".
Everything else, I feel works more or less.
I will note that the cliffhanger ending was a weird choice given that this game wasn't projected to sell well and kinda pigenholes any story Sly 5 would be going for. Plus, it being locked behind the platinum trophy means only a small portion of the few players that played Sly 4 would even know about it.
So yeah, that's my take on platinumming Sly 4: Thieves in Time. What do y'all think?
Next up for me is platinumming every Spider-Man game on PS VITA. See you then.

I (15F) almost became a step mum at 15 for a guy I had met online. He, a trans male, and I had been talking for a while when he then confessed his feelings for me. He then tells me a day later how he'd possibly be pregnant. No shame of course, it's a natural thing whether they be transgender or not. It may seem weird and believe me it feels it. There's nothing more strange than being told that someone is pregnant especially when they in a way would like to involved you. It seems strange now because they aren't even sure they are pregnant. They're only 85% sure. I may seem like an asshole in this sense but, what would you do in that position because, l'm clueless and advice would be useful. I also feel as this may affect me as well as the person carrying the child because if things were to kept long term, how would it affect us? They're in another part of the world whereas I'm in England. I seem horrible when I say this but I don't want to have to become a step mum at 15 because it's a scary thing. I have two nieces under 5 and if I end up being a step mum now, would they mean I'd have to leave my nieces out? I'd feel horrible if I had to prioritise a baby that isn't even mind so why should I have to care for it? It sounds like an asshole move but I'm nowhere near ready. Am I the asshole?

I have a few days to decide if I should transfer. Currently, I am attend a commuter school in a city that is not particularly competitive or highly ranked. Frankly, I don't like this college and only went because it was cheap and I could commute from home. The food is subpar, my major is mediocre and there is virtually no social scene, and the campus is constantly under construction. Since I commute and don't have friends, I primarily stack my classes and hardly spend any time on campus. Additionally, people tend to be reserved and keep to themselves, resulting in an isolating and lonely experience. People really just go to class, work and then sleep. Though I do want to add that I have really tried my best to make friends and am in a club that I actively participate in (I just seem to have a lot of acquaintances
Recently, I received an acceptance letter from a large state school located approximately two hours away. It has a higher ranking and is known for its vibrant social and party scene. While it may seem like an obvious choice to transfer, there are some things to consider. Firstly, I am currently a rising junior, which means that if I transfer, I would only spend two years at the new school. Moreover, the college in the city I currently attend is the likely place for me to secure a job after graduation, as I genuinely like the city. Furthermore, transferring would require me to adjust to living away from home and living on campus which would obviously be a huge change.
Although, I was a very outgoing person in hs, and still am, I think I would have a good chance of making friends there but part of me is worried I wouldn't. Solely because I'm not sure if people would have established friend groups by jr year. Given these factors, I am torn between continuing at my current college for another two years, despite not liking it, or transferring. It is worth noting that all my credits would transfer seamlessly. I apologize for the long post, but I am genuinely conflicted and unsure about which decision would be the best for me. Any advice from people who were in/ are in similar situations/or just any outside point of view would be immensely appreciated.
-add: Also just want to add that I would definitely be paying more at the other school as I would live on campus/need a meal plan, but not a crazy amount since it’s a state school)
short summary: rising junior who doesn’t like there current commuter college and is considering transferring to another college to live on campus. Debating whether or not transferring is worth it at this point, as I only have two years left and it would be a huge transition.

Hi all,
I just want to begin by saying for those that experience this all the time/frequently I am so sorry. I will admit for a long time I was a person that just said "oh it's just a bad dream, you're fine" and for that I am regretful for my ignorant thinking for all those years. I had a short but horrifying experience for the first time in my life and it feels like it's still kinda affecting me, even days later. I'm not one that has bad dreams, or dreams in general very frequently but this is one that will probably stay with me for the rest of my life.
Me and my hubby were on vacation at his childhood home for Memorial Day weekend. We had family and friends over, a cookout, yard games, and just an overall great weekend. Once everyone left and we got the house/yard (somewhat) picked up me, hubby, and in-laws went inside to wind down and get ready for bed. I hopped in the shower last so I could take the longest as I needed to wash my hair and hubby and in-laws watched some TV and scrolled on their phones. When I was waiting to hop in my FIL had on something about the Coca Cola 600 that got delayed that day and I was really just scrolling on tik tok and snapchat to see what all my friends did over the weekend while I was away. I showered and when I was done, I joined them in the living room and watched TV with them for about 15-20 mins till my eyes were getting heavy and I knew I needed to go to sleep as we were leaving at around 4 am to head back home (10ish hr drive). I will say when I got back they were watching some of the "spooky" shows of "real ghosts/spirits" caught on camera but that's something hubby enjoys so it's nothing out of the ordinary for us to watch right before bed and the stories we watched weren't anywhere near as scary as what we have seen before.
It was around 10-10:30 when we went and laid down and probably closer to 11-11:15 when we finally fell asleep. Both me and hubby are light sleepers and we toss and turn quite a lot, along with being in a queen bed when we're used to a king we don't get optimal sleep when visiting his parents but it has never been an issue before. We woke up around 2 am, him adjusting the fan to point more towards him and I had to go pee. When I checked my phone right before I fell asleep again to make sure the alarm was set it was 2:07 and I fell back asleep pretty fast. This is where the paralysis kicked in. I had a dream that we were back outside during the cookout and I started to feel a bit woozy and light headed, I walked inside with my MIL and she told me to sit down while she grabs me a water bottle from the garage. I did as she said but when she came back I was on the floor being picked up by what I thought was my husband. I tried to look behind my shoulder to him but I couldn't, and I go super nervous and could only look forward to my MIL standing in front of the couch looking down at me saying "it's okay, you just had a bit too much to drink, you'll feel better soon. (Note: I did not have too much to drink that day/night. I had maybe 3 highnoons all day and never once even got tipsy, I'm not a heavy drinker by any means but I do drink occasionally and can hold my liquor fine and I know that has nothing to do with it.) I kept trying to look back but couldn't but the arms were getting tighter and tighter around me. While at first I thought it was my husband picking me up I quickly realized it was not him at all. Whatever had me didn't even feel human. I was being dragged into the bed room and when I would take a deep breath to scream NOTHING would come out, I tried multiple times and the last time I did my eyes shot open and I realized it was just a dream. I laid there for a minute just staring at the wall to calm down and my mouth was wide open and super dry so I tried to grab my water bottle off of the nightstand to take a sip but I couldn't make myself move. I kinda fought with myself for a bit to force myself to grab the bottle but stopped when I felt the arms slide around me again. I tried to move, even just clench my fist together, I could maybe flinch my fingers in the slightest movement, just enough to know my limbs were still attached but they were completely useless. I heard my husbands voice for a split second, I couldn't make out what was actually said but it sounded like him and then it just didn't. I was like a crescendo of whispers, on top of more whispers, all saying something clear as day but getting muffled out but the others. I couldn't make out anything but I felt surrounded by the noise and it just got louder and louder. I could feel myself getting scared again and wanting to scream but the same thing. I would take a deep breath, go scream but nothing would come out. I realized then that I was having sleep paralysis and just thought "it's okay, you're okay, this isn't real, it's just a dream, it'll be over soon." I kept repeating that to myself in my head over and over again for what seemed like forever while the arms around me seemed to pull me in closer and tighter and then the whispers suddenly stopped all together. Silence. Like an eerily, sudden silence that almost hurt it happened so close to the loud whispers. I hear a distorted version of "my husband's" voice say "oh, is it? are you? are you sure?"
Then I finally came to for real this time. My eyes were wide open and all I could make myself do was move them around for the first few seconds, looking around the room making sure it was real this time. My breathing was super short and fast, heart rate felt like I had just sprinted a full mile. Under my pillow I moved my fingers to touch my thumb, again making sure I was really awake this time. Like in my dream, my mouth was wide open and dry as the Saraha Desert, I drank that entire bottle in about 3 seconds and just laid there till my alarm went off. I was a bit in shock just because it felt so real, I had to lay there and make sure what really happened vs. what I dreamed. My alarm started beeping shortly after and once my hubby was awake and moving I asked if I made any weird noises or anything like that while I was sleeping and he didn't remember anything but said he didn't sleep good so he didn't pay much attention to me.
I was still creeped out pretty much the entire trip back. I didn't want to dwell on it and freak myself out even more but it was also just something that kept popping into my mind. I kept apologizing to my husband for talking about it so much, especially since it was just the same thoughts on it over and over again. He assured me it was okay, and I can talk about it as much or as little as I need. Once we got home I took a quick cat nap and thankfully didn't have any dreams or anything but I started house/dog sitting last night and I will say it took a bit of courage to finally let myself fall asleep, especially away from my husband, and in a house and bed that's familiar, but isn't mine. I don't want to develop anxiety towards sleeping but I feel a bit uneasy about it. It was the first time I ever had an experience like that and nothing out of the ordinary happened to cause it. It was one of the most terrifying moments of my life, and I hope the only time it ever happens.

I put in some low-voltage LEDs last year. It's cheap Chinese stuff. I've actually had good success with it. It's a 120-amp transformer and currently powers seven in-ground 3-amp LEDs, four 5-amp step lights and a "top hat" style downlight light that I think pulls 7 amps. The line runs through a flowerbed, under the deck steps onto the patio, goes around the perimeter of the patio and along one side of the pool, maybe 80 total feet. This has been very reliable and no issues at all.
I want to add some more pathway lights adjacent to the deck, need to add lights to another staircase on the backside of the deck and maybe run power down to a spotlight under a tree. The additional load would probably be another 50 amps.
What would be the best way to do this?

• Should I get another transformer and plug into a separate 110 outlet?
• Can I splice into the existing line where it runs under the deck steps?
• Can I run a second line out of the transformer for the new lights?
• Should I replace the current Chinese transformer with something like this https://www.voltlighting.com/150w-slim-line-led-transformer and run two lines off of it?
• Something else?

Thanks.