A very merry hood christmas vimeo

Hi all, I hope you're doing well.
So I have a tenancy agreement which lasts 12 months and ends July 1st this year. However, throughout the entirety of the tenancy the noise from the upstairs flat has been unbearable with stomping + running around at all hours of the night etc. and had been waking us up almost every night since last year, speaking with the upstairs flat didn't help.
We finally had enough and decided to move out and we were looking to use a clause in the contract which allows us to pay 1 months rent + find replacement tenants, and we would be free. I spoke with the agency and they told me it was a quick process, I found nice tenants that were desperate for a place until July and would put up with the noise, they were also willing to pay all of the remaning rent upfront (4 months were left at this point, now 3 months are left on the contract), so I figured there's nothing that could go wrong and we got accepted by a new landlord.
We have now moved into the new property but a few days before we expected the replacement tenants to be accepted and move in, we got an email stating the landlord has rejected them with no further reasoning. I've requested several times for clarification on why they were rejected and at most they told me it's related to their payslips, I do understand that they have minimum wage jobs but have enough savings to pay all of our remaining rent (they also just paid 12 months rent upfront for a different property!). I kept requesting clarification since it seems like the landlord will just keep declining replacement tenants no matter who we find. But no response.
I have conducted MANY viewings for the property and the noise is an issue for all of them, so I simply cannot find replacement tenants (neither can the agency find tenants to take over from July, and it's a student area so most of the properties are gone just after Christmas). Therefore, contractually I am supposed to pay the rent for two properties up until July but this is becoming quite the financial struggle.
Now, here's what I have found out so far: The building was built within the last 2 years which means that it should follow Resistance to sound: Approved Document E regarding the sound/impact sound proofing of newer built properties. I have spoken with the flats below us, and tested out the sound proofing/sound impact proofing and indeed their flats are properly sound proofed, whereas ours has essentially none whatsoever. Because of this, every other flat has stayed for more than their initial tenancy, and we have recently found out that the tenants prior to us also moved out due to the lack of sound proofing. Furthermore, for the first 1 year it was rented out to tenants before us, it had no valid EPC, only after my questioning did they get one before my tenancy started (but after I signed the contract). We were also not provided with any electrical installation certificate. I have requested evidence of compliance of both approved document E and the EIC, but have had no response for over 2 weeks.
Now it's coming up to April and we're expected to once again pay rent, with effectively no communication from either the landlord or the agency.
What would you guys do in this situation? Legally I should just pay the remaining rent and consider it an expensive lesson, but morally I don't want to be screwed over by dodgy landlords/letting agents. If I were to just refuse to pay the remaning rent (totalling £3150), what are the chances they would come after me legally given the facts above? Alternatively, if they don't have compliance with approved document E or an EIC, and I did pay the remaning rent, do you think I could go to small claims court and win it back?
Also note that I have left the flat in excellent condition, very clean with no damage.
Thanks for any advice!

"Well, Mrs. Lee, this treatment is experimental, but we feel it will improve your condition. All you need to do is sign on the dotted line, and we can schedule you for the first of the week."
The Doctor tapped the form like a used car salesman trying to sell a sports car with no engine.
The kind of salesman who thinks you're too stupid to look under the hood and too desperate to believe the deal is anything but genuine.
That was the beginning of the end of my life.
My name is Pandora Lee, and this is my story.
Two years ago, I was diagnosed with a debilitating bone disease. The kind that causes your bones to be very weak. My doctor sent me to a specialist, and after running some tests and running up a small fortune in bills, he wanted to try an experimental treatment to harden my bones.
I was hesitant; who wouldn't be, but could I really afford to be in my condition?
The following week I arrived for my first treatment. The waiting room was the same bland area I'd seen a thousand times. The sort of forgetable facade that hides the work that goes on behind that unassuming blue door between the show floor and the butcher's shop. Children moved beads along a wire maze as parents and patients looked through magazines that had been current ten years ago. The smiling face of President Obama looked up from a small table as I sat there, he and Martha Stewart sharing space with Better Homes and Gardens and Highlights magazine.
The magazines were only slightly more interesting than the paperwork on the clipboard I was muddling through, but I tried my best to ignore them.
"Mrs. Lee? We're ready for you. "
A young blonde-haired woman in scrubs called to me, smiling brightly as she led me through that oddly dark blue door and into a hallway of the same color. Despite the buzzing overhead lights, the paint scheme made the whole space look shadowy, and I shuddered as she led me to a little room farther down. She showed me to a small sterile room with only a Gurnee and an IV stand to break up the emptiness. The room was blessedly brighter, a kind of eggshell white that verged on eye-watering, and I stepped inside and handed her my clipboard.
"Please take a seat and get comfortable, Mrs. Lee. The Doctor will be with you shortly."
As I lay there waiting, the clean white paper crinkling under me, I had a gut feeling that this was a bad idea. I chalked it up to nerves, though. It was just another exam, just another series of tests, just another meeting that would end predictably.
I should have listened to my gut.
As the doctor walked in, he smiled his best crest kids grin, and I imagined I could see the spit stains on his teeth. I wish I could tell you that he was an ugly little man, some goblin who scared me or made me wish a nurse had stayed to observe our interaction, but he was actually very plain looking. Thinking back now, I can't tell you anything about him other than his big grin and neat little mustache. It might have been easier if he were a monster, but I guess life is rarely easy.
"Well, Mrs. Lee, as you know, this is still experimental. It's in the early trial phase, you'd honestly be one of our first human trials for the treatment, but we feel you are the perfect candidate."
I stare at him blankly, unsure whether he expects me to be flattered or break into applause.
He looked uncomfortable, clearly not getting the response he was expecting. Calling the pretty blond nurse from earlier, he asked her to strap me down so they could begin, and told me to just relax. The straps were scratchy, the clasps sitting cold against my arm, and I found it hard not to squirm as she slid the IV in. The Doctor reached into the hall and wheeled in a large metal canister. It looked like a fire extinguisher, the old kind that you had to crank, except for the face mask on the end that was undoubtedly going over my face.
He must have noticed my apprehension because the too-big teeth made a return appearance.
"Don't worry, Mrs. Lee. It's all very safe."
He placed the mask over my face, the smell of cleaner mixing with something sickly sweet and acidic.
"Breath deep," he prompted, and as I took my first breath, his voice already sounded as if it were coming to me from the lip of a deep hole, "you will wake up in no time."
Then it all went black, my last memory being that the stuff I breathed in tasted like the smell of the cleaner my mother used when I was young.
Then, I didn't think about anything for a while.
I was floating for a while, my body as light as a feather, and I could have gladly floated in that void forever.
When I dropped back into my body, however, it was worse than any falling dream I'd ever had. I opened my eyes and looked around frantically, my body still splayed across the Gurnee as the canister pumped whatever was in the tank into my lungs. I felt a surge of pain rip through my whole body and jerked fitfully against the restraints. A scream ripped up my lungs, the gas clouding my mouth as I choked on my anguish. The nurse ran in, trying to calm me to no avail.
"Calm down, Mrs. Lee. We don't want you to damage your bones while the treatment is doing its job! The pain is only temporary. The doctor will be in to give you something for it and explain everything."
Her words did nothing for the pain that drilled into my bones, and after what seemed hours, the doctor finally came in. He had a needle in his hand, and the tip slid easily into the IV he filled the saline bag with something. It was cold, the liquid flowing in like ice, but the relief was immediate. I lay back gasping, the sudden lack of pain almost as jarring as the pain had been, and the big smile hovered over me like a specter.
"The first treatment is always the most painful, but it seems to be a success so far! You might have some joint stiffness for a few days, but that is to be expected as the treatment hardens your bones."
As the gas hissed and the ice brought sweet relief to my inflamed bones, I lay there drinking in grateful lungfuls of air. The lack of pain was hard to quantify, but I became aware, over time, that it wasn't just the sudden burning that had gone away. The everyday pain I had gotten used to, the enflamed joints and deep ache of weakened bones, was also gone. It was like someone had flipped a switch in me, and suddenly I was exactly like I had been before. This may seem like a small thing, but when you've lived with the pain, made it a day-to-day part of your life, its absence is like a physical loss. I was like a kid who's had his tooth pulled, my tongue probing at the vacancy where something solid had been before.
When he spoke, I had to shake myself back to reality and ask him to repeat himself.
"We will see you in two weeks for your next treatment. The nurse will give you a prescription when you leave. Take it twice a day in order to keep your body from rejecting the treatment. Understand?"
I nodded, still a little dazed, and agreed to take the pills. I made another appointment with a similarly pretty brunette and took the nondescript little bag she handed me. She smiled, saying they would see me in two weeks, and I headed home.
As I drove home, I expected the pain to rear its head again with every press of the pedal or turn of the wheel. The pain had become like a swarm of gnats, ever-present and buzzing. You never got used to it, but you became accustomed to it. It's never comfortable, but you look forward to the times when it isn't there. Now it was just gone. I was driving with nary a pain or wince, something I hadn't done in years.
I should have been happy, but I kept waiting for it to disappear.
Maybe that makes me a pessimist, but I don't care.
When you live like this long enough, you constantly wait for the other shoe to drop.
I walked into the house, my bones still feeling like nothing so much as normal bones, and took the pills out of the bag. Reading over the label for side effects or warnings, I found nothing but instructions on the outside. No name, no ingredients, no warnings, just eight words in bold font.
Take one pill with food twice a day.
I opened the bottle and let a few of the pills roll out onto my palm. They were white a blue gel capsules, the contents looking like the stuff on top of the Snowcaps my husband always ate at the movies. As they sat in my hand, I noticed that they were oddly cold to the touch, and the feeling reminded me of the way the liquid had felt as it entered my IV. When they didn't immediately appear dangerous or try to bite me, I let them tumble back into the bottle and closed the lid. I set a reminder on my phone for seven am and started fixing dinner. When I went to bed that night, I had already forgotten about them, but as I pulled the blanket around myself, I felt a sudden chill arrow through me.
It should have raised some sort of red flag, but I was still riding the high of moving about my home without any of the pain I'd had earlier that day.
A few hours later, I was woken up by an icy chill going through my body, followed by an intense ache in my joints. As I tried to get up, I felt every bone in my body tighten. It was almost impossible to walk, but after a few minutes, it eased up, and I was able to make it to the bathroom. I figured this was just a side effect of the stiffness the doctor was talking about, and after a warm bath, some of the pain had abated. With some of my mobility returned, I shuffled back to bed, hoping to sleep off the pain until it was time for my first dose of the medication.
The next day, the pain of the night before was just a fleeting memory, and I took my first pill and started getting ready for my day. It usually took me several hours to get my legs to cooperate enough to make breakfast, but today I moved about my kitchen in a way I hadn't in years. My joints felt fluid, my bones were as forgettable as they should be, and when I woke my husband for work around ten, he looked at me a little shocked to find breakfast already on the table and the kitchen dishes cleaned and put away.
"Wow, those treatments really did the trick." he said, taking my hands in his big calloused one, intending to kiss them.
He dropped them in surprise as a shudder ran through him. “Jeez, babe. Your hands are so cold!"
There was worry on his face, but I waved his worries away and told him it was nothing.
"It's just a side effect of the treatment. I'll be fine, sweetie."
Deep down, though, I was worried. I should have called the doctor's office right then and there and told them about my side effects. After the weirdness that had happened the night before, I should have been more concerned, but it all comes back to one thing. Despite the stiffness, despite the cold hands, despite the next two weeks where I sometimes woke up in the middle of the night and hobbled into a warm bath, the intense pain in my bones was all but a distant memory. I would have given anything to be done with pain like that, and it turns out the cost was more than I could have known.
Two weeks later, I arrived at my next appointment. I was curious to see if it hurt the same way it had the time before, but my reasons for going were also twofold. I had taken the last of my pills that morning, and I knew I would need more if I wanted to maintain this lack of joint pain. So, I smiled at the nurse, let them strap me down again, let them slide the needle into my arm, and breathed in the gas like the good doctor told me to.
The treatment was performed the same as the first, but I gritted my teeth through the pain as I waited for him to inject my IV with the sweet icy liquid as the gas did its work. As the straps slid off, I nodded through the closing instructions and shuffled up to the desk to make my appointment and get my pills. I moved as if in a dream, my body feeling strangely heavy as I climbed in my car and drove home.
I jerked awake in my driveway, unsure how I'd arrived home. I had never fallen asleep at the wheel, much less sleep drove home, and the thought made me shiver. I grabbed my prescription as I headed inside, wanting to get as far from the vehicle as possible at that moment. I thought about starting dinner as I trudged in but decided to have a nap instead. It was early still, only mid-afternoon, but I was suddenly exhausted. I could barely keep my eyes open, and as I slid into bed with the same clothes I'd left the house in, I thought I was settling in for nothing but a couple of hours of rest.
Ten hours later, I shuddered awake into total darkness as an arctic chill shot through my nerve endings. It was worse than any of the ones before it, and as I tried to climb out of bed, my legs froze up and sent me spilling to the floor. I lay there, unable to bend my legs or arms, only able to pull them towards me like palsied claws.
I was overjoyed when I heard my husband's soft snores from the bed beside me. He would help me, he could get me to the hospital, he could get me into a warm bath, and I opened my mouth to scream his name. My lips trembled as I prepared to cry out for him, but no sound escaped my chilly maw. I gasped weakly, his name lost amongst the short barks of sound while he slept peacefully feet away. I lay there with tears of fear dripping down my face, certain he would wake up the next morning to find me dead. I almost expected to see them freeze against my cheeks, but they did little more than pool beneath my head and wet the side of my face.
I spent that night drifting in and out of my new painful existence. It felt like I lay there for weeks, listening to the contented snores of my spouse as my body was racked with freezing chills. I thought I would die again and again, and as the sun began to rise, I almost wished for it. The colder I became, the less the shivers seemed to blow through me. I still felt them, but my body had stopped responding. I was powerless to move, incapable of doing much besides watching the day begin.
I must have fallen asleep at some point because when my husband yelled my name, my eyes were startled open.
"What...what the hell is," but he seemed to lose his words as he stood over me.
I mouthed at him, asking him to help me, but he looked unsure.
"I don't...I don't know how."
I wanted to ask him what he meant, but instead, he turned to my vanity and fetched a small hand mirror.
I looked back at myself, not sure it was me for a moment. I was looking at a perfect china doll as she lay curled up on the floor. Her skin was a perfect alabaster, broken only by the slight spider cracks that ran through it. As I watched, another chill coursed through me, and I saw the cracks lengthen as my fragile form tried to shiver. I wanted to cry, but I had no tears left.
Instead, I told him to put my phone on text to speak and lay it next to my head.
I wanted him to understand, wanted to explain how this had happened while I could still explain anything.
He did as I asked, saying he would get help, but I don't think help will get here in time.
It took a surprisingly short time to lay all this out, but I can feel the change beginning to affect my face now. My blinks are coming slower and slower, and my throat is beginning to tighten as it stiffens like my skin. My lips have started to flake as I speak, the cracks in my arms likely running through the lips my husband loved to kiss. I'll be nothing but a beautiful statue soon, a curiosity piece for people to speculate over, but with the time I have left, I want people to understand how I came to this point.
I don't know if it was the treatment or the pills, maybe it was even both, but it doesn't appear to be as ready for human trials as they believed.
If they ask you to sign your life away as I did, make sure you know what you're agreeing to.
The short respite from pain isn't worth the hell I find myself in now.
It's getting hard to breathe now. My lungs are laboring to pull in breath, and I can feel the same shivers running through them with each gasping pull. My eyes are fixed forward, my fingers forever locked together, and I fear that every word may be my last. If you make it home, Jason, know I love you, and I'm sorry that this is where we must part.

Hello, I work as a CAE engineer, so I sit in front of my computer almost all day. Of course I talk to colleagues about work but not for very long. I also eat lunch alone because I eat faster than others and don't want to wait for other colleagues to finish lunch. I don't even go for drinks after work or to the Christmas party because I feel very awkward when I go out for drinks with other colleagues. I'm afraid it could be reason for layout. Only hope is it took almost 9-10 months to hire someone (me) because the company could not find a suitable candidate after the ex-colleague left this job.

It was way back in the day when it all went down.
Going to my friend’s secluded cottage up north seemed like a good idea until the car wrapped around a tree in the middle of a raging fucking blizzard, twenty miles away from any civilization. I kept trying to convince my friends to stop at a hotel, but the driver and the owner of the car, my old college roommate Pat, kept brushing my concerns off as if the approaching snowstorm wasn’t even coming.
I bet he wished he had listened after the car crashed.
“Shit,” Homie said, pulling me out. “Anything broken?”
“No,” I answered.
The only other friend who was crazy enough to come with us, nicknamed Homie, a big ol' country boy, stood in front of the hood, inspecting the damage as best he could. Based on how smoke and sparks was coming out of the engine, we wouldn’t be able to turn it back on without assistance.
“Are the phones okay? We might be able to call for help.”
Pat showed us his phone, which had broken during the crash, and said, “Like hell, we can. We can’t stay in the car, and if we don’t want to freeze to death, we need to go somewhere to stay.”
He was right. The bumper in the front of the car was compressed from the impact, and after we had all gotten out, a very heavy tree branch had fallen on the roof of the car, crushing the metal into crumpled tinfoil. No way we were going to fit in that car. We were on a dirt road with woods surrounding us on both sides, and the closest town was two miles away.
The snow was heavily blowing down, and as unusual as it sounded, there was a heavy fog obscuring our vision.
“Well let’s at least get moving,” I said. “A crackhead or someone might live along the road.”
They didn’t argue. We put on our jackets, packed all the food and water we could carry, and we prepared to set off down the road, into a snowy abyss.
When Pat pulled out two guns from the trunk, I got confused.
“Why are you bringing the guns?”
I shouldn’t have even asked. When Pat went anywhere near the countryside, he carried at least two high-powered guns, because of an incident that happened a year ago. Pat closed the trunk and walked away, his shotgun in his arms with his revolver strapped to his side.
“There’s… creatures in these woods. I’ve seen them before. You can never be too safe.”
I knew better to question Pat. He was always a cautious, but extremely care-free and reckless dude who always paid attention to all the details around him.
“Alright. Looks like the fucking storm is blowing in hard.” I said.
And with that last comment, we began to walk down the road, searching for anything, anything that would indicate that a single person was out here. As luck would have it, the immense snowstorm was keeping everyone inside, if there were even people living all the way out here. To say that the cold was terrible was a vast understatement. We were only wearing light jackets and two layers of pants, and even that wasn’t enough to keep us warm, given that there was a very plausible chance of catching hypothermia.
“Shit, man. How far did we walk?” Homie asked, once our car was well out of sight.
“We’re not even close,” I said. “Just shut up and wait till we get there.”
“Guys.” It was Pat. His face looked pale as if he was retelling the horrible incident he had gone through a year ago.
So about a year ago, Pat had gone on a camping trip, alone in the woods behind his cottage. It was at the peak of the night when he heard something moving around outside his tent. Something big. When he looked outside, he saw something just beyond the treeline, and he could just make out that something’s silhouette. According to Pat, who almost never told lies or made-up stories, a thing was watching him. He remembered it very vividly. '
It was humanoid, but it wasn’t human. It was eight feet tall, extremely skinny, hairless, and it had antlers with an open head with several glowing orbs in the center. And after all this time, after everything, after all the nightmares, we were seeing the exact thing Pat had seen that night. Expect it was dead.
But it wasn’t just dead, it was mutilated.
Mangled.
The dead creature lay on its back on the side of the road, unmoving. The creature’s entire body was skinny and pale, and its head… was identical to a deer skull, complete with an impressive array of antlers, that were snapped and completely shattered.
One of the creature’s legs was ripped off, and it looked like something enormous had taken a bite out of its shoulder and stomach. The creature was eaten. Killed, by a horror we couldn’t even begin to fathom. And worst of all, the creature looked to be killed recently, with a blood trail heading into the woods. And based on how heavy the snow was falling, the creature would have had to be killed at least ten minutes ago, for the blood trail to not be covered by snow already.
“Holy shit, man,” Homie exclaimed. “Isn’t that the thing Pat saw last year?”
Pat sighed and gritted his teeth. “Yeah. It fucking is.”
I stared at the dead creature, and despite not wanting to know the truth of what really happened, I already knew. Something bigger had killed this thing.
“But something killed it. This thing is already huge, so what killed it must be… enormous...”
Pat looked away from the creature.
“It’s dead, we know. But something killed it, and it’s probably nearby. So I'm going to fuck it up.
I looked at the blood trail heading deep into the woods. Then as Pat walked alongside us, loading shells into his shotgun, we turned, and continued down the dark road.
CONNECTED MYTHOS
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MORE STORIES AND SERIES

Greetings,
​
I have a 2020 Subaru Impreza Sedan base model - base everything all the way down to steelies LOL (with the exception of the hard floor mats - great investment for New England.)
Anyway, it's a special car - picked it up during the pandemic right before new cars became impossible to get for a while - grandmother helped me get it right before the virus got her.
It's been through a lot of nonsense - car doors bumping it, random shit flying off of trucks on the highway to dent the hood, whacked by an errant shopping cart at the grocery parking lot ... you know - normal cosmetic wear and tear
So I've been thinking of making it look nicer - I plan to respray it matte black later on. In the meantime, I wanted to debadge it and wanted to seek some advice on the best way to do this - the trunk has an oval indentation for the badge, so I'm thinking of overlaying that one since there's nothing I can do about it and it would look ugly without SOMETHING there.
But basically the front grille has the oval shape for the badge as well, and I am wondering if there are badgeless grilles out there compatible with my car? Searches on google -> ebay yield a ton of results for badgeless grilles for the WRX, but very little custom/nonstandard parts I have been able to find for the '20 impreza sedan - guess it's a rare model? (in a bad way - hatchbacks seem to have taken over!)
​
So, to summarize: my two questions for more knowledgeables on this forum:

1. Recommendations for best badge custom overlay supplier
2. How interchangeable are grilles between WTX and Impreza models from 2020 (or rather-18-21 as they tend to be grouped by OEM sellers)

Many thanks in advance for your advice!

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What was wrought here should be allowed to slip into slumber and sleep a dreamless sleep until entropy sips it away. - Former Grand Most High Sma'akamo'o, from I Have Ridden the Hasslehoff
Nice little mitochondria you got there, Biology.
Be a shame if something happened to it… - Terran Descent Humanity
The Dairy Queen is one of the Hamburger King's brides. A gift of tribute from The Mapleland Empire to the bloody tyrant of the Hamburger Kingdom. Her heart was cold but sweet and the Hamburger King put her in charge of the blizzards and winter storms of the Hamburger Kingdom.
The Dairy Queen is adored by Terrans everywhere, celebrated in song and dance, even through the worst winter storms. She is often depicted by carving ice into her likeness. She is shown smiling, dressed in finery made of frost and snow, and is known for her singing voice. She is often seen moving through storms and blizzards, her voice uplifted in song despite the chill.
The cold never bothered her anyway. - The Myths & Legends of Terra
We do not know who they were, only that they were here. They left behind great works, impossible machinery that once labored for unknowable purpose.
We know these Forerunners only as The Builders. - Kretark Press, 3285 Current Era
You don't get to judge the Devil and the War in Hell from the comfort of Heaven. - Doctor Jachike Pascel, Sailor Moon Sisterhood Project Decommissioning Commander AKA The Grave Watcher, 38 PG
The stellar system was repeated all over the universe. An energetic young star, a few gas giants, a debris ring, and barren rocky planets in various orbits. The number of planets and gas giants didn't matter, they were all virtually the same.
This one was in the middle of the Cygnus-Orion Galactic Arm Spur.
In the middle of what was known to the species capable of space travel as "The Long Dark." A band across the entire section of the spur that was barren of all life, with many of the stellar systems reduced to nothing but scattered gravel where planets once were, smears of gases from where gas giants had once been, and a single stellar mass.
This stellar system had not been reduced to gravel and wisps of gasses, but rather still had the few rocky planets and the trio of gas giants. The star was young, highly energetic, burning away merrily in a stellar signal that it existed. It was not alone, it had a brother, that it danced around in a slow twisting pattern, and they both burned with merry fire.
It had been like that for millions of years.
At one time there had been life. Not much, just a few simple algae and fungus, a few multicelled organisms. Not much, but the beginning of life.
But unliving things destroyed that life, leaving behind long life radiation, siphoning away water and atmosphere both.
The binary stars felt a slight bit of sadness at that, in the strange way inanimate balls of burning gasses could feel sadness.
Something new had arrived.
It was strange, and different.
The stars were dimly curious, watching the newcomers.
There were ten figures within a two light seconds of the binary stars, positioned in such a way that the polar stellar winds of both stars merged and washed over them. Several of them were terribly scarred, their faces and bodies mutely proclaiming that they had been severely injured, almost maimed, in the past. Despite their disfigurement and scarring they, like the unmarred, were inhuman in their perfection.
They were dressed strangely. Short skirts, leggings, short sleeve tops with bows on the front. They all held wands and blades, they all had long flowing hair. Behind them extended gauzy fields of whitish that reached out thousands of kilometers but did not block or cover any of the others. They looked vaguely wing-like, pearlescent energy that gathered in the stellar winds.
Resting in space, they were in the fetal position, their eyes closed, their hands tight around their weapons and wands.
They stayed that way for long days, asleep in a deep dreamless sleep.
They had sent out the call, and now waited on the one they had summoned.
A puff of purple particles, almost smoke-like, appeared above polar-north between the two binary stars. When it cleared a single figure stood in space as if it was standing on a flat surface. Ebony of skin, with long flowing white hair. Her face was haughty and cruel. She was dressed in scant wires of esoteric spooky particle metals that emulated the look of spiderwebs that only covered enough of her to hide her genitals and the nipples on the prominent mammaries.
She surveyed the worlds and gas giants slowly, her eyes full of a cold silver light.
She looked beyond the now into what had been.
Her lip curled in disgust at one point and she reached out her hand. Chronotrons and other esoteric particles flowed into her hand, slowly taking the shape of a bright red apple.
It crunched, despite there being no sound in space, when she took a large bite from it. She chewed the bite, looking over the planets.
When she was done with the apple, she streaked into motion, moving an appreciable fraction of the speed of light, until she was in front of the sleeping girls.
One, her bangs forming a heart on the pale skin of her forehead, woke slowly, stretching and yawning as she did so.
The onyx woman merely waited.
She was old, but the child was even older.
She was feared, but the child was legend made flesh.
She was fearsome in her power, but the child was terrible in her joy.
They were sisters. Two sides of the same dark and bloody coin.
The child smiled at the onyx woman, who merely nodded dispassionately. The child waved at the system with one hand, the wand she tightly grasped leaving behind a trail of glitter.
In the glitter could be seen living planets. Some with hellish atmospheres where burning carbon ash rained from the sky, others with life giving oceans, and still others with iron oxide sands that teamed with microbial life.
The onyx woman looked back over the system slowly, then turned and looked at the two stellar masses with more than just her eyes. After a moment she turned to the young girl and nodded.
At an unseen signal the other young girls slowly woke. They gave the impression of happiness and joy even as they held tight to terrible weapons.
The onyx woman kept looking at the planets. At what would need to be done. Which zone each planet occupied.
To merely cover them with life would not do. That was for a Genysys Device or a G.E.C.K, which were simple toys compared to her obsidian majesty.
She held out her arms at a 45 degree angle to her body, threw her head back, and vocalized a single note that resonated in the coronas of the two stars.
Behind her appeared a dozen females of her species, none as beautiful or well endowed as she was, clad in more clothing, all reclining on furniture made of pale white energy. She snapped her fingers and two dozen males appeared, all dressed in black leather, pants and vests, with heavy boots, all carrying swords made of a dark purple metal that glittered in the light of the stars.
Another snap and an orchestra appeared, all of black onyx and obsidian that breathed in the stellar vacuum of space.
The band began to play, and the males began to dance with wild abandon.
She joined them, her voice upraised, as the girls all watched and added their power to hers.
Reaching out, she lifted mass from the stars, a process known as star lifting, optimizing and extending the binary stars's energy output and lifespan.
To the two stars it tickled and their giggles rippled the stellar winds.
As she danced, runes and glimmers of light streamed from her fingers, speeding out to wrap around the planets.
The planets were swallowed by golden energy.
Still she danced and sang in the darkness.
On the planets, new bedrock was laid, planetary cores were repaired and spun up to restore the magnetic field. Atmosphere was laid, then oceans. Fossil records and geological records of asteroid impacts were applied. The rude organisms that had been wiped out were extrapolated and laid into the bedrock as fossils.
Sixty-five million years of history was laid into the bedrock.
The tiny multi-celled organisms were extrapolated into more complex forms. The skeletons and evidence of those life forms were embedded into the fossil record. Weather formed and erosion was built into the mountains that suddenly thrust there way from the planetary crust.
Higher organisms were laid in. A fossil record, a record of tool use, migration patterns, all were laid down.
The energy cleared, to reveal a single planet bearing life. The other two had failed, existing inside the amber zone.
But they left behind fossil records and scant fungus and microbial life.
The creatures on the single life bearing planet began to move around, began to live lives programmed into their very genetic code. Crude housing and primitive culture was laid down.
And then it was done.
The male dancers slowed their wild dance, bowed once to the watching girls, and vanished.
The band rippled and vanished.
The reclining beings of onyx and silver vanished.
Only the onyx woman remained, her skin glittering with sweat.
She bowed to the girls.
And vanished.
The girls looked over the stellar system and nodded to one another.
It had been restored.
They held still a moment, contemplating, before moving.
They sped forward and vanished in bright silver streaks.
The binary stars agreed that they had witnessed something interesting.
Then they returned to their dance with one another.
On the planet, a species that had been extinguished before it even had a chance to exist began to go about its business as if there had never been an interruption marked by the scream of "ALL BELONGS TO THE HIVE!"
-----
Space was empty with the exception of a small bit of dark matter the size of a coin.
It wasn't dark matter as many races knew it, it was transparent to most scanning systems. A tiny bit of proto-matter that the universe used to heal up tears and scrapes that were just part of the growing pains of a youthful universe.
There was a sudden flash and ten young Terran girls appeared. The leader lifted her voice in song within the vacuum of space.
A single note answered.
They waited, patiently.
The tiny bit of dark matter began to spread out as more and more dark matter began to gush from the tiny bit. Soon, there was a patch of dark matter nearly two kilometers wide, even if it was only a few molecules thick.
A massive black warship slid from inside the dark matter. The thick warsteel armor was covered with beads of the dark matter, like a cold can on a hot humid day. The weapons were cold and dark, offline and silent. The engines burned with a purple light
Code streamed from the massive black warship, bathing the ten figures.
Their eyes closed and their bodies relaxed. They slowly curled into the fetal position.
From the warship came small craft. Ten of them. One by one, each of the figures were gathered up by the small craft, pulled inside. The craft then remained motionless until the last was gathered up and a period of stillness followed.
Code packets were exchanged between the gathering ships and the massive warship.
The little ships swept back to the warship.
The dark matter shivered and rippled and a vast door rose up out of the dark matter, the proto-matter streaming off the face of the doors like water. The sheer size and mass of the doors hinted at something large, something ominous, something terrible deeper in the dark matter.
The doors opened and the warship vanished inside.
-----
The Obelisk AKA Black Box 536169-6c6f72-204d6f6f6e.
Inside were machines of ancient and strange purpose, built to continue working for millions of years. Bulky robots carried out maintenance tasks to ensure the life of The Obelisk.
Through the dark halls moved The Grave Watcher. Heavy of muscle and bone, ancient and crude cybernetics attached to flesh that neither aged nor mortified.
He served the Digital Omnimessian and all of humanity through his works.
At long last he came to a simple chamber.
A cryo-tube sat in the middle of the far wall, covered in frost. Beside it, extended from the wall, were drawers where strange implements sat in custom fitted cushioned slots.
The Grave Walker moved up and rubbed the frost from the capsule.
Inside was a teenage Terran Descent Humanity immature female who was beautiful even in sleep. Her large blue eyes were closed, the long lashes touching her cheeks. Her blonde hair was pulled into a tight braid and wound under a cryosleep cap, but the gap in the middle of the cap showed how her bangs looked like a heart. Her flawless arms and legs were longer than normal, somehow making her aesthetically pleasing instead of freakish. She had a button nose and a cupid's bow mouth, a flawless complexion, and even in sleep she looked as if she was full of joy.
She was inhuman in her perfection.
The Grave Watcher ran through the context menus then, satisfied with the readouts, turned away.
The extended drawer was covered with a clear armaglass panel that showed what was beyond, held in a black warsteel frame. Jewelry, clothing, shoes. He checked the inventory list that scrolled by with cold amber light to the contents, examining phasic and energy levels.
Satisfied, he turned away, moving to the doorway. He reached out and pressed a heavy button.
The cryo-pod hissed and pulled up into the wall. The drawers pulled into the wall. The floor of the room vanished as mist rose to knee height.
He turned away, moving through the door, locking it once it closed after him. A blast door lowered and he ensured that one was locked with a molecular bonding system.
The Grave Watcher made his way to the central control room.
Inside stood a Terran woman of indeterminate age. She wore a black suit, her black hair was in a short cut, and her face was cold and hard, her gun-metal gray eyes unreadable.
The Grave Watcher moved to the pedestal in the middle of the room.
He placed his hand on the top of the pedestal. Data streamed by beneath his hand. Finally, only two words remained.
He stepped back and motioned to the Terran female.
She stepped up and looked down.
DEACTIVATE PROJECT?
She pressed a single icon.
YES
The Grave Watcher escorted her from The Obelisk. Boarding his own grim ship as she boarded hers.
He watched as her ship slipped through the narrowing gap of the slowly receding proto-matter pool in realspace.
Once she was gone, he sat down on a command chair that was more a throne than a chair.
The atmosphere pumped out of the bridge, leaving him sitting in cold vacuum.
He stared at the small pinpoint of dark matter with frost covered eyes.
And waited.
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I see vented lids to help with condensation. Are these ideal for home grows? I'm wondering if vents let in contaminants whole they are being cultured? I do parafilm right now and wouldn't that cover the vents essentially? or would you wait to parafilm till they are done venting? I move very quickly with my agar plate making and try to get them sealed asap so no contams. But I do have a clean room and a flow hood and store petris in their own bin. I noticed cultures grow faster in dark on plates actually. So I'm just checking on everyones preference for petris type. I use 100mm x 15 usually. Also suppliers of petris you like?

It was way back in the day when it all went down.
Going to my friend’s secluded cottage up north seemed like a good idea until the car wrapped around a tree in the middle of a raging fucking blizzard, twenty miles away from any civilization. I kept trying to convince my friends to stop at a hotel, but the driver and the owner of the car, my old college roommate Pat, kept brushing my concerns off as if the approaching snowstorm wasn’t even coming.
I bet he wished he had listened after the car crashed.
“Shit,” Homie said, pulling me out. “Anything broken?”
“No,” I answered.
The only other friend who was crazy enough to come with us, nicknamed Homie, a big ol' country boy, stood in front of the hood, inspecting the damage as best he could. Based on how smoke and sparks was coming out of the engine, we wouldn’t be able to turn it back on without assistance.
“Are the phones okay? We might be able to call for help.”
Pat showed us his phone, which had broken during the crash, and said, “Like hell, we can. We can’t stay in the car, and if we don’t want to freeze to death, we need to go somewhere to stay.”
He was right. The bumper in the front of the car was compressed from the impact, and after we had all gotten out, a very heavy tree branch had fallen on the roof of the car, crushing the metal into crumpled tinfoil. No way we were going to fit in that car. We were on a dirt road with woods surrounding us on both sides, and the closest town was two miles away.
The snow was heavily blowing down, and as unusual as it sounded, there was a heavy fog obscuring our vision.
“Well let’s at least get moving,” I said. “A crackhead or someone might live along the road.”
They didn’t argue. We put on our jackets, packed all the food and water we could carry, and we prepared to set off down the road, into a snowy abyss.
When Pat pulled out two guns from the trunk, I got confused.
“Why are you bringing the guns?”
I shouldn’t have even asked. When Pat went anywhere near the countryside, he carried at least two high-powered guns, because of an incident that happened a year ago. Pat closed the trunk and walked away, his shotgun in his arms with his revolver strapped to his side.
“There’s… creatures in these woods. I’ve seen them before. You can never be too safe.”
I knew better to question Pat. He was always a cautious, but extremely care-free and reckless dude who always paid attention to all the details around him.
“Alright. Looks like the fucking storm is blowing in hard.” I said.
And with that last comment, we began to walk down the road, searching for anything, anything that would indicate that a single person was out here. As luck would have it, the immense snowstorm was keeping everyone inside, if there were even people living all the way out here. To say that the cold was terrible was a vast understatement. We were only wearing light jackets and two layers of pants, and even that wasn’t enough to keep us warm, given that there was a very plausible chance of catching hypothermia.
“Shit, man. How far did we walk?” Homie asked, once our car was well out of sight.
“We’re not even close,” I said. “Just shut up and wait till we get there.”
“Guys.” It was Pat. His face looked pale as if he was retelling the horrible incident he had gone through a year ago.
So about a year ago, Pat had gone on a camping trip, alone in the woods behind his cottage. It was at the peak of the night when he heard something moving around outside his tent. Something big. When he looked outside, he saw something just beyond the treeline, and he could just make out that something’s silhouette. According to Pat, who almost never told lies or made-up stories, a thing was watching him. He remembered it very vividly. '
It was humanoid, but it wasn’t human. It was eight feet tall, extremely skinny, hairless, and it had antlers with an open head with several glowing orbs in the center. And after all this time, after everything, after all the nightmares, we were seeing the exact thing Pat had seen that night. Expect it was dead.
But it wasn’t just dead, it was mutilated.
Mangled.
The dead creature lay on its back on the side of the road, unmoving. The creature’s entire body was skinny and pale, and its head… was identical to a deer skull, complete with an impressive array of antlers, that were snapped and completely shattered.
One of the creature’s legs was ripped off, and it looked like something enormous had taken a bite out of its shoulder and stomach. The creature was eaten. Killed, by a horror we couldn’t even begin to fathom. And worst of all, the creature looked to be killed recently, with a blood trail heading into the woods. And based on how heavy the snow was falling, the creature would have had to be killed at least ten minutes ago, for the blood trail to not be covered by snow already.
“Holy shit, man,” Homie exclaimed. “Isn’t that the thing Pat saw last year?”
Pat sighed and gritted his teeth. “Yeah. It fucking is.”
I stared at the dead creature, and despite not wanting to know the truth of what really happened, I already knew. Something bigger had killed this thing.
“But something killed it. This thing is already huge, so what killed it must be… enormous...”
Pat looked away from the creature.
“It’s dead, we know. But something killed it, and it’s probably nearby. So I'm going to fuck it up.
I looked at the blood trail heading deep into the woods. Then as Pat walked alongside us, loading shells into his shotgun, we turned, and continued down the dark road.

I have a unique situation: I worked for City Government in a role typically deemed "as needed" and 0.5 FTE and 1,040 hours over 1 Year (20 hours per week) - however, I worked under the direction of a contractor (a school within a probation department). I moved to the area for the job, so as a condition of accepting the role, I said I'd need to work full-time until hours ran out (aiming for 40 hours per week). They have no payroll records, unfortunately, stating records are not accessible (from 2011-2012). Because of this, the HR rep for the dept. filled out the PSLF form as 20 hours and part-time, which makes the period ineligible. However, I may have a case to "prove" to her that I was full-time majority of that period (working 30+ hours per week).
Remember that since I was the "Aide" for a School, I often couldn't work when the school was closed (Thanksgiving week, Christmas week) - although I tried to come in and tutor probationers that were there even if the school was closed for breaks at times (when the Probation Dept. was open). I have retrieved the school calendars, but I don't know how this helps bc I was technically employed by the city government (although supervised by the charter school).
I have W2 + Transparent California records to prove how much I made in each year, and the only record the city could give me was the number of hours worked and the dates. From my own calculations, from 8/2011 - 12/2011 I worked an average of 30.7 hours per week & from 01/2012 - 5/2012 I worked an average of 24 hours per week.
The problem is I recall working as much as I could until I was very low on hours toward the very end - at that point I would just come in and work a few hours here and there dragging it out as I worked other restaurant jobs - however, I have no way to prove this. I believe I truly worked at least 5-6 months 30+ hours.
I know this is a lot of detail, but if anyone has any advice I would very much appreciate it and it would save me thousands of dollars since this would complete my PSLF. It's disappointing because I loved this job and the only reason I tried to drag it out a little in the end was because the school needed me to. Do I try to collect the 4 months in 2011 because I know its over 30 hours? I'm so lost and I wish I just retained my paystubs or could track them down.
THANK YOU SO MUCH!

I don’t see my parents and when I avoid them I find my nervous system slows down. I find pockets of peace and calm.
I’m quite agoraphobic. I don’t like being out much and the longer I go without being out the harder it is when I go out.
I see pretty girls in nice outfits and realise I don’t make the effort anymore. I see old friends who are happy and I feel so ashamed of myself for being single and lonely.
The pace of life is too much for me and I retreat back home where I can control my environment and avoid triggers.
Today I think I saw my mum in the car and it made me suddenly feel overwhelmed with all these emotions. I can’t even understand what they are.
It’s like I want to scream at her for everything wrong in my life, I want to run away, I want her to understand me and help me but know she can’t do that because she’s too affected by her own feelings. I feel unable to ground myself and the world feels unfamiliar and strange and I don’t know who I am.
I know it’s a trauma response. I know it’s the fight and flight mode. I know that when I avoid my issues they get bigger when I’m forced to confront them. I know all of this but I still am stuck going about life in a dysfunctional way.
The way I feel is I want to give up. Collapse. The world to end. I want that nuke to be land on my house. I want to pain to stop.
My mum and dad are too emotionally immature. A good example is that they went travelling last year and left me with no other family support for months. They did it at Christmas time too.
So after that I felt very hurt and decided I had to survive on my own. And I’ve thrived doing that. No doubt if they asked why I don’t want to be close with them and I used the example that I will continue to be left alone without any family so I don’t want to get used to having that only for it to end when it suits them.
A typical response would be “we’re allowed to travel. We’re not doing anything wrong”. Which is true, so that’s why I choose to keep my distance and be independent of them so it doesn’t affect me the way it did.
But the response they should have is “I understand how you would feel alone and lonely without anyone here and that’s your coping mechanism. I don’t want to make you feel worse by leaving you. “

TL;DR I am not financially dependent on my parents, I want to drop out of university and move out, but I do not want my parents to write me off as a failure and never talk to me again because of it.
So essentially I have been an "academic powerhouse" my entire life. I never took anything below an honors class all throughout middle and high school, and in high school I was in several extracurriculars including National English Honors Society, NHS, Beta Club President, student class vice president, etc. I also enrolled in and completed 9 AP classes for credits throughout high school. I never made anything below a 95 in any class, ever.
All that being said, I AM BURNED TF OUT! I thought college would be enough of an environmental change to reengage me in school and give me the motivation to push through, but after only 1 1/2 semesters I am completely ready to take a gap year-- or maybe a few years -- to settle, save some money, and just enjoy being young without the added stress of school.
As it is, I already have 3 jobs, however I cannot just quit working and just focus on school as my parents do not give me money for food, clothing, books, or just other mundane necessities like laundry detergent and body wash. I live in a 4 bedroom apartment that my academic scholarships have paid for, but that of course does not cover all of my living expenses.
I need a break, desperately.
What I have not yet mentioned is that my living situation at home is less than stellar. My father is a narcissist and a drunk, who has more than once hurt me physically and almost daily verbally assaults me and my family. He will drink and drive at 9am, speeding at felony level speeds all while he is also high af. Both me and my brother (20M) are adults now, however he still has us on tracking apps, we have to ask permission to do almost anything (even though we pay for our own activities, transportation, etc.) My mother pretty much does not care about what we do, however she will be the most reluctant to the idea of me dropping out because she has always been the one pushing me and my brother to be academically successful. My brother lives at home and goes to a university very close to our house, but they do not bother or care nearly as much about what he does because he never tried to cultivate a relationship with them like I did.
I am not financially dependent on my parents whatsoever. They bought my brother a car, they have not bought me one. They pay for part of my brother's education, they do not pay for mine (except some application fees in the beginning totaling less than $100). As it is now, none of my clothes, food, bedding, apartment decorations, kitchen appliances, personal care items, ANYTHING has been bought by them excluding maybe some socks I got as Christmas presents.
My parent's background goes a long way to explain why they are so distrustful / think that dropping out of school will ruin my life. My mom moved out when she was 16 years old (mind you, for absolutely no reason because her mother, my mamaw, is an absolutely wonderful lady who was fully willing to financially support her through high school, college, or just being a young person not in school because she did this for my uncle as well) and went straight into work. She never went back to college until she was 29, and she then got pregnant with my brother and dropped out of college and did not go back for 12 years. She then completed her degree and now has a masters and makes pretty decent money. My dad dropped out of high school his junior year (for better reasons than my mother, as my grandfather died when my dad was seven and he had to live through abusive step fathers and had a generally rough upbringing). He then just partied with his friends and my mom, got high, drank, played video games, and worked about 100 different minimum wages jobs that he would work at for 2 weeks and then quit, until he was 27 and my mom got pregnant and he got a job as a delivery driver which he would be for the next 10 years. He then applied for a job in a factory and now makes decent money, but not near as much as my mother.
So essentially, they think my decision to take a break from school will send me down the same hard path they had.
My plan is to move out of my house, take a gap year or a couple from college, and just enjoy being young. I have an extremely close friend group consisting of 10 people between 19 and 23 years old. They all live on their own and I have several different options for who I would move in with, as they have all offered since they are familiar with my living situation.
A few of my friends are attending university. A few online and one still attends a standard brick and mortar university. ALL of them have significantly cheaper tuitions because they are considered an independent, but due to my parents still claiming me as a dependent my scholarships have had to do all of the heavy lifting to get me through.
I say all of this to ask, how the hell do I go about this? I want to just walk up to them and say "this is what I am doing and there is nothing you can do to stop me" but I do not want them to completely cut off all contact with me and write me off as a failure. How do I get my parents to understand that my friends have not convinced me to do this and that this is really the option that is best for me? I know I can afford to live on my own, as I will most likely be living in a 3 bedroom apartment with 4 people that will cost me less that 250 a month to live in. I just want independence and the freedom to finally breath and make my own decisions. What should I do?

My aunt lives across the country. Growing up so far away, I've never been super close to her, but my mom speaks to her sister weekly.
I don't have much family and would like to have more of a relationship with the few relatives I have. Unfortunately, my aunt and I have opposite work schedules and she is very particular about the times she wants to chit chat, so out of respect for her schedule and time I don't speak to her often by phone. A few months ago we did manage to connect and my aunt told me that I was welcome to call at any time, even outside of her preferred hours, and she'd make time for me.
Wonderful! I tried texting and calling a few times, and she never answered or returned my calls. I sent her a Christmas card, I left a birthday voicemail, nothing. I don't like reading into things, and she could very well just be busy, but I started to wonder if her silence was intentional. So I asked my mom if she knew if anything was up. She didn't but said she'd ask next time they talked.
It's been a few weeks. Today my mom told me my aunt was off work this week and to "do what I will with that information." That was an odd thing to say & an ominous tone to set... and when I asked if she'd heard anything back, she said she had gotten into an argument with her sister then and they hadn't spoken again until today, but she didn't want to discuss it.
I am happy to respect if she didn't want to talk about it, but she then proceeded to continue talking circles around it -- that she was disgusted with her sister's attitude, that my aunt had said some upsetting and rude things, that my aunt is being judgemental without knowing what she's talking about. I told her I could listen but if she wanted advice I couldn't weigh in without specifics as I quite literally have no idea what's gone on. My mom then suggested I call my aunt and hear "from the source" what issue she "may or may not have" with me.
Sure, and I would but that's the crux of my issue here -- I can't get in touch with my aunt, only my mother can! And that comment strongly implies to me that my aunt is purposefully ignoring my calls for some reason unknown. I told my mom she didn't have to get into details, but could she confirm whether or not my aunt is actually upset with me or not? My mom dodged the question and that her argument was a "personal tiff" that I "didn't need to worry about." Then she said none of this was a big deal and I was worrying more about it than it was worth.
I find this all confusing and frustrating. If it's not a big deal, then why be so cagey and build up such an ominous tone? If it's nothing, then why would she have trouble telling me, "No, she's not avoiding your calls on purpose," or, "Yes, it sounds like there was a misunderstanding about xyz and you should reach out directly." I don't know... I'm neurodivergant and I don't do very well with indirect, passive-aggressive, or "guess what I'm feeling and fix it" type communication. I really need people to be direct and shoot straight with me. And I kind of feel like I have a right to know at least the basics of a situation that involves and affects me... am I off base here?
And if it is a bigger deal, then how am I supposed to engage with and meaningfully navigate the situation when I am being kept in the dark and given zero information/context about even the degree of the situation, nevermind the details? I feel like I'm flying blind.

Hello! I just purchased my (16F) first car, and to be honest I have zero experience with cars and I’m not sure how to address this issue.
I have not driven it much so far, because there’s been a strange burnt oil smell. It’s not constant, it comes on every few minutes and I suspect it’s oil droplets hitting something hot. I haven’t cracked the hood and poked around yet because I have no idea what I’m looking for.
The people I purchased the car from gave me all of the latest repair papers, and the car appears to be very well maintained. I bought it with a 2023 inspection sticker already on it. A new turbo engine was installed in 2018, and it has about 70k miles on it. The car itself has close to 200k. There was mention in one of the documents of a “hole in the oil feed tube” but I have no idea what that means. It sounds like that could be the issue but l think it might’ve been resolved already? I’m not sure how to really decipher the paperwork. If you DM me I can take pictures of the repair documents and send them to you!
I don’t have much money in the bank at the moment, so I’m scared to take it to a mechanic and get hit with something I can’t pay. I was hoping you guys maybe had any guesses about what it could be and what I should do about it? Thanks a bunch, I appreciate you all!!

I’ve been at my current job for about 2.5 years now. Started as a seasonal temp after getting laid off due to COVID, stayed on after Christmas and moved around a little bit in the company. Last year, I applied for a management position that had opened up (which was kind of a big jump from the job I was working at the time but I had previous management experience) and I’ve been miserable pretty much since then. My new position had me directly under the CEO who is quite frankly one of the most bipolar people I’ve ever met. Working for him and working closely with him is just fucking unpleasant. And to make things worse, around the time I got promoted, one of of the other managers I was working very closely with quit (due to the CEO being a dick) and we did not have a suitable replacement for him from July-November. So I was expected to pick up that slack, help with restaffing and training departments experiencing record turnover, and also settle into my new role somehow. It was very rough for several months. It was too much for one person to balance and I was drowning.
Fast forward to January, a new position opens that I felt I would be better suited for and paid more money, despite being down a tier in the management chain, so I went for it and got it. The last 2 months have been hell. Like I go home and cry in the shower hell. It’s somehow worse than my old role. They’re not hiring someone to fill my old role, they’re splitting it between 2 other people at my company and I’m still expected to carry out certain duties. So I’ve been trying to find time to train 2 people that have other full time roles, dealing with more turnover and us being understaffed and existing staff being inexperienced, while also trying to settle into a new role again. And I’m also so tired and burnt out. Our Christmas busy season doesn’t feel like it ended. We’re still working so much overtime (that I don’t get paid extra for, love being salary.)
I had a performance review on Tuesday. It was awful, both my direct manager and the CEO were in it. I felt ganged up on and didn’t even say a word the whole time. It wouldn’t matter. It’s not worth defending myself to people who don’t care. I’m doing the work of 3 people but it’s still not enough. It will never be enough. I just don’t care anymore. They could fire me tomorrow and I wouldn’t care. I’m on probation for 60 days and I just don’t give a shit. I’m done.
Thank you to anyone who read this far. Everyone around me has said to stay and stick it out, at least until I find something else but I don’t know if I can.

Hoping I can make this clear but it's a little elaborate...
I work for a (very large) food manufacturer in the UK. We have a large processing factory, and a warehouse where the finished goods are palletised and stored/sent out to stores. I've been working in the warehouse for a number of years now, and although it's always kind of casually been regarded as being "separate" from the factory we all have the same contracts. i.e. although I work on the warehouse/distribution side as an "operator", I have the same contract as operators in the factory. Here's where it gets complex...
We have a separate contractor on the warehouse side who drive the deliver wagons, look after the loading bays, manage the stock control or whatever. For years, they've had a small number of employees in the warehouse who work for the main manufacturer, operating the palletising systems and liaising with the factory about product changeovers and any issues etc etc.
Last March, we were put on notice that the contractor was taking on our roles, and we'd be moved back to the factory. There was ten of us, and they let ten people from the factory go on EVR to make way for us coming back. This was via a "consultation period" beginning in March 2022, and we were told we had to train these new contract staff up within 3 months and we'd be out of there at the end of May (2022) for the contractors taking over.
However, the job is much more complex than the factory management thought. It took me about 2yrs to learn this job before I felt comfortable. The guys taking over from us all held really menial jobs like pallet stacking, basic FLT duties etc. Some of them are 60+ with acute medical issues, and it's a really physical job, and they're really struggling with the role. But they've been told it's this or nothing. It's a shitshow.
Whatever. They kept extending the pull-out date for us because the new people couldn't do it. That May pull-out day got extended to August. Then September. Then Christmas. Then January etc. The new company are still struggling to the extent we've recently been told we'll need to support them for at least another year.
They're paying half the pay we earn and have a high turnover of staff, so there's a constant revolving door of new staff that need training from scratch again.
We're constantly being sent back from the factory to sort out their issues when they fuck up again, and I'm just wondering about the legality of it all now. It's an absolute nightmare because I'll get called across when the shit has really hit the fan, and I'll spend the last part of my 12hr shift undoing their mistakes without a break.
Is this legal? Can they sell out my job to a third party contractor and still send me back randomly when they can't manage?
Help! 🤯😂

My BF (24M) and I (22F) have been together for almost two years. We really love each other. We want to get married in the future, kids, house, the whole nine yards.
The only problem is, until recently I thought he and my parents got along decently but I found out that just isn’t true. I live only 45 minutes to an hour from my parents and try to make time once a month to visit their home (my childhood home). It’s important to me that my BF and my parents are not necessarily besties, but can get on well, so I always invite him to come with me. Until now, his accept to decline ratio was 2:5.
Whenever we go see my parents, we’re expected to do all of the social heavy lifting because of their seniority. When we come, I have a key so I let us in, we have to go find my dad usually in the family room or his office and talk to him, and then my mom is usually in a different room cooking, cleaning, or answering emails so we have to talk to her as she’s doing all these things and meander back and forth between them until we’re ready to leave. This is to make sure both parents feel like they’ve been given ample amounts of attention. My parents are happily married by the way this is just how their house is on a given afternoon now that they’re empty nesters. And they know we’re coming because we always pre-discuss a time. I also am embarrassed to admit there have been multiple occasions where we agree to visit them at X:00pm and we arrive to an empty house because they went out to run errands and didn’t make it back in time for our arrival.
Visiting my BF’s parents is so different. When we go, his mom opens the door for us, she already has snacks or food made, and she spends the entire visit giving us her undivided attention either talking to us or playing a board game or even just watching football.
Because of this, my boyfriend doesn’t feel like an invited guest when we go to their house, but more like a burden. He says my parents actions and body language throughout our visits signal to him that they clearly had better things to do than to host him which makes him wonder why he bothered to come and spend time with them. Their behavior had been this way since I moved out (I was single then) so I always kind of took it as normal.
I have tried bringing these things up to my parents and my mom made an effort when we stayed with them for Christmas, but my dad mostly watched TV in a separate room. Now my parents say BF makes them uncomfortable in their own home and they don’t want to have to cater to him every time he comes. They act the exact same way to my brother’s GF, but she’s more extroverted and go with a flow like me and is more likely to just go with it for the sake of keeping the relationship positive. My BF is very reserved and can weather bull crap up to a certain limit like my brother.
The disagreement is mainly about this with other little things, but boyfriend told me he will no longer visit with my parents in their home because there seems to be a clear power play. When we hang out with them outside of the home, they adhere to social cues more and they have a better (but not outrageously great) time together. To be fair to him, I agreed to set this boundary but now I have no idea how to still be able spend time with my parents AND him together especially on holidays like Christmas, New Years, etc. What do I do?
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Tl:dr - BF (24M) is uncomfortable with my parents' (45 M/F) hosting technique so we decided he no longer had to visit with them in their home. How do I ensure they still bond and are not necessarily besties but are cordial or even friendly? How should we navigate holidays?

Kubernetes
I am very new to kubernetes and have just got a stock kubernetes v.1.3.5 cluster up on AWS using kube-up. So far, I have been playing around with kubernetes in understanding it's mechanics (nodes, pods, svc and stuff). Based on my initial (or maybe crude) understanding , I had few questions:
1) How does routing to cluster IP work here (i.e in kube-aws) ? I see that the services have IPs in the range 10.0.0.0/16. I did a deployment with rc=3 of stock nginx and then attached a service to it with Node Port exposed. All works great! I can connect to the service from my dev machine. This nginx service has a cluster IP of 10.0.33.71:1321. Now, if I ssh into one of the minions(or nodes or VMS) and do a "telnet 10.0.33.71 1321", it connects as expected. But I am clueless how this works, I couldn't find any routes related to 10.0.0.0/16 in the VPC setup by kubernetes. What exactly happens under the hood here that results in a successful connection for app like telnet? However, If I ssh into the master node and do "telnet 10.0.33.71 1321", it does not connect. Why does it fail to connect from master?
2) There is a cbr0 interface inside each node. Each minion node has cbr0 configured as 10.244.x.0/24 and master has cbr0 as 10.246.0.0/24.I can ping to any of the 10.244.x.x pods from any of the nodes(including master). But I am not able to ping 10.246.0.1 (cbr0 inside master node) from any of the minion nodes. What could be happening here?
Here's the routes set up by kubernetes in aws. VPC.
Destination Target172.20.0.0/16 local0.0.0.0/0 igw-10.244.0.0/24 eni- / i-10.244.1.0/24 eni- / i-10.244.2.0/24 eni- / i-10.244.3.0/24 eni- / i-10.244.4.0/24 eni- / i-10.246.0.0/24 eni- / i-
Answer link : https://codehunter.cc/a/kubernetes/how-is-cluster-ip-in-kubernetes-aws-configured

We were fine a week before Christmas. I left her place after spending a week and we hugged and wished each other a merry Christmas. I texted her a few days later about something and she never responded. Fast forward a few weeks into the new year and i text her again to check up on her still nothing. Finally 2 months into the year she responded but she wasn’t herself. I asked if I did something to offend her and she said nothing. I called and she didn’t pick up. Nor did she ever acknowledge that she missed my call. It’s now the end of March and im not sure what I did. She had lost her dad beginning of last year so I figured she may need some space. But, am I selfish to expect that she just send me a text like “hey im sorry im not in the mood to talk or i need space” considering ive been there for her the whole of last year ?and I would have definitely respected her wishes. I mean she had made it pretty clear she doesn’t want to speak to me anymore i guess.. now i really don’t have anyone…

My BF (24M) and I (22F) have been together for almost two years. We really love each other. We want to get married in the future, kids, house, the whole nine yards.
The only problem is, until recently I thought he and my parents got along decently but I found out that just isn’t true. I live only 45 minutes to an hour from my parents and try to make time once a month to visit their home (my childhood home). It’s important to me that my BF and my parents are not necessarily besties, but can get on well, so I always invite him to come with me. Until now, his accept to decline ratio was 2:5.
Whenever we go see my parents, we’re expected to do all of the social heavy lifting because of their seniority. When we come, I have a key so I let us in, we have to go find my dad usually in the family room or his office and talk to him, and then my mom is usually in a different room cooking, cleaning, or answering emails so we have to talk to her as she’s doing all these things and meander back and forth between them until we’re ready to leave. This is to make sure both parents feel like they’ve been given ample amounts of attention. My parents are happily married by the way this is just how their house is on a given afternoon now that they’re empty nesters. And they know we’re coming because we always pre-discuss a time. I also am embarrassed to admit there have been multiple occasions where we agree to visit them at X:00pm and we arrive to an empty house because they went out to run errands and didn’t make it back in time for our arrival.
Visiting my BF’s parents is so different. When we go, his mom opens the door for us, she already has snacks or food made, and she spends the entire visit giving us her undivided attention either talking to us or playing a board game or even just watching football.
Because of this, my boyfriend doesn’t feel like an invited guest when we go to their house, but more like a burden. He says my parents actions and body language throughout our visits signal to him that they clearly had better things to do than to host him which makes him wonder why he bothered to come and spend time with them. Their behavior had been this way since I moved out (I was single then) so I always kind of took it as normal.
I have tried bringing these things up to my parents and my mom made an effort when we stayed with them for Christmas, but my dad mostly watched TV in a separate room. Now my parents say BF makes them uncomfortable in their own home and they don’t want to have to cater to him every time he comes. They act the exact same way to my brother’s GF, but she’s more extroverted and go with a flow like me and is more likely to just go with it for the sake of keeping the relationship positive. My BF is very reserved and can weather bull crap up to a certain limit like my brother.
The disagreement is mainly about this with other little things, but boyfriend told me he will no longer visit with my parents in their home because there seems to be a clear power play. When we hang out with them outside of the home, they adhere to social cues more and they have a better (but not outrageously great) time together. To be fair to him, I agreed to set this boundary but now I have no idea how to still be able spend time with my parents AND him together especially on holidays. How can I make sure my BF and my parents have a solid cordial relationship and hang out with all my loved ones despite this boundary? All ideas are welcome.
tl:dr: bf no longer wants to visit my parents at their home because he's uncomfortable with their hosting technique. My parents feel that my boyfriend should be able to go with the flow and that catering to him is not their job and makes them feel uncomfortable in their own home. Need advice on how to still foster a cordial relationship between them and also ideas for getting through the holidays.