Hotel with smoking rooms near me

I am at a loss. I have only posted once prior, but minor background is that I have quasi-guardianship of my partner’s niece preteen.
So about a month ago I found weed in our niece’s room. So we did more digging and found out more. They’re smoking with their mom, their friends, etc. They had been having some pretty major mood swings and withdrawing from our family dynamic so we knew something was up.
Then we confronted them about it and were told that THEIR MOM is giving it to them.
I don’t have an issue with weed - I want to make that clear. I do have an issue with giving an underage child this and allowing them to distribute it to their friends and encouraging it. I don’t know how else to describe this feeling but it 100% comes off to me as grooming from this grown woman pushing drugs on to her kid and her kids friends.
We did not punish our niece for smoking because we understand the curiosity and the need to just be a kid. We did however make it be known that if this continues we will no longer allow them to live with us - as them living with us is their choice as much as ours. After confronting their mom we had a long verbal altercation where she berated us (and mostly me) because we aren’t perfect and we never ever have strived to be perfect. But it was just assault after assault of well you have done this before how about that. She is pushing so HARD to think that her own brother is trying to have some incestual relationship with her kid because her kid DOESNT WANT TO LIVE WITH HER.
I want to call the cops, I want to call CPS. But I have no solid proof that her mom is pushing drugs on her other than word vs word. But it’s not right and I’m stuck in a state of distrust with my niece because I cannot trust them to tell the truth.
I am very suspicious that my niece has bpd, however due to no legal guardianship we can’t take them to therapy or a doctor or anything like that because mom wants control over what is said or what the topics are. In the past my niece has used unhealthy methods to cope with their anger. Be it sneaking alcohol, cutting, or now weed. My worry is that knowing that they are ALREADY using weed as a release at such a young age they will move on to bigger and better drugs. When we were cleaning tonight they mentioned how sad they were that we found the weed and that they should have thought of better hiding spots but swears that they won’t smoke until they are older. But these words mean nothing to me knowing that they will lie so easily and willingly based on what they think I want to hear.
I’m tired of walking on eggshells around their mom who despises us for calling her out and my own issues with my own child and my family and I just don’t know what to do at this point. I just need to get this off my chest because I’m road blocked at this point in time.

Okay, I have a main job at a grocery store. Sometime near the end of last week, I got a little side job at a car wash that wasn't too far from my main job and I was able to walk to both.
Well I worked a total of 3 days and I was working alongside with the night manager, and two other guys. Well today, I'm working the night shift which is 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. I was super focused on doing the test at the night manager gave me, that I did not realize that coworker number 2 went behind my back on the job site and pestered the night manager to make my position more permanent.
I didn't know any of this was going on, like I've stated. But apparently he hoped that I beat out another temporary worker for the job to get on the official payroll because she stole a bicycle from him. I didn't know any of this and the night manager brings it up to me at the last few minutes we will do to leave for the night from the car wash. Apparently coworker number two gotten a hissy fit at something she said about the situation and left on his bicycle in a huff.
She basically complaints to me, like I had anything to do with the whole situation. And now as a result of him pestering her the entire time we were working last night from 6:00 to 7:00, now me neither me or the other temporary chick will get permanent position at the car wash now.
I was actually really liking working there than 3 days I have already and I was actually going to use that kind of money to help out a little bit with the food situation at my house, so wasn't just for kids through the novelty of working two jobs at once. And now because the co-worker number two, that's been taken from me now.
I was super almost low-keyed depressed because I had to walk home and tell my own mother tonight about me pretty much not getting the job in a more permanent role.
I have to show up tonight at 6:00 p.m. so the night manager can pay me. I know I work those 3 hours, an hour each night, but I'm really don't feel like up to it because it was such a shit show today. I'm frankly embarrassed to show my face around that car wash again, even though at the end of the day, I had nothing to do was what happened between co-worker number two and her.

tldr: my dad's a bastard and we have money problems
my mom's mental and physical health has been deteriorating. she has severe scoliosis and a bulging disk that causes chronic pain. she has ptsd from a previous abusive relationship, depression, and severe anxiety. my dad joined some cult a few years ago and threw my already struggling family to shit. he's always either at work or in his room on his computer attending "church" but half of the time he's just watching porn. i have to take care of my siblings who all have autism or some type of learning disability. it's draining having to do school from 6:30 am to 7:00pm and have to use my free time to help my mom teach them and take care of them when my mom is not home or not available. i only get from when everyone is a sleep to when everyone wakes up to myself but i have to share a room with 2 other people, my sister and my grandma. i grew up in poverty and it's always got to be rubbed in my face when i'm with people my age. one of them just spent $300 dollars on plushies. PLUSHIES GOD DAMNIT!!! we need $300 for my moms laser therapy but they are out there getting two custom plushies with it. they make fun of my clothes. my shoes in particular always raise a few eyebrows. they have holes in the, they buckle in wards, and are separating from the sole. whenever one of them is going through a "rough time" they get to join in a yearly vacation. their definition of rough is they got into a few arguments with their family, they feel guilty for some stupid reason like raising their voice at someone yada yada. it's just so unbearable to see these coddled kids struggle with the simplest things. they think it's the end of the world when they get into an argument with their parents. well you get to get away with yelling at each other every once in a blue moon over something stupid like being told " no Johnny you have to eat your veggies" but they woke up on the wrong side of the bed. well when i get in an argument with my dad i can't show my temper without it getting physically violent. honestly i'm lucky to even be able to get into an argument with my dad some people around here just get a beating at the slightest hint of talking back. normally it's over me standing up for my siblings or my mom, or when he's being careless with his porn, or when i have to get him to do something that i can't do myself. recently my mom has been comparing me to my bio mom (her sister) it hurts because i know she holds her in such little regard. recently my dad and i got into another fight. he was going on and on about how stupid and lazy i am while i was trying to clean the entire house from head to toe for mothers day. well i was trying to get my siblings to help he called a bossy bitch and i lost my cool. i didn't yell at him but i called him an angsty teen who doesn't do shit and is always on his phone or computer and needs me to do everything for him, and the i called his religion pathetic and he lost it. he tried punching me so kicked him in the balls and ran to my room and locked the door. i found out my dad raped my nana when he was a teenager but he's so immature he blames his parents for never being there when he was kid. like damn neither were mine but i turned out ok. i can't go stay with someone else because my mom would be hurt and i would have to leave my sibling with that sorry excuse of a man. now my mom is even more stressed out and triggered. my dad has even more control over my siblings and i can't tell anyone because i don't want to end up in foster care because one of those coddled middle class kids heard about it and reported me.

Looking for an upgrade in the gpu department. I'd prefer something with 12gb+ of vram, so a 3080 12gb, or a 3080ti most likely. If the price is decent I may consider a 3090. Let me know what you've got. Can do local, but most posts aren't near me so I assume shipping will be required.

For context I 22 F and in a long distance relationship with my boyfriend 23 M for over three years now. We visit each other and discuss getting married.
Today I asked my boyfriend if he would ever move to my state temporarily to be with me so I can spend time with my dad who needs me as he is not doing well. This was something I was asking him to do in two years time. We got in a fight because he says I asked for too much and he could never be one hour away from his sister who needs him. She is healthy and is around the age where she would be going to college so for that reason I said it was not the same.
I was just asking to stay closer with my dad for a couple years and so my boyfriend could meet my family properly but he won't consider it. I never ever want to keep him from his family, and I actually love his family. Is what I'm asking for normal and fair? I guess my real question is does someone who refuses to move temporarily to be with them really love the person asking them to move?
The situation is a bit nuanced. I live in a southern state that could make his family feel unsafe because my state's governor passes laws against lgbt. In that case I said that we would visit his family once a month where they are. But even then he said no. In fact he told me that he could visit me...which to me is weird because if you want to build a life with someone wouldn't you at least temporarily move near them in our long distance situation to get to know their family? I would do the same for him and offered to move to New York after a couple years of living in Florida together when I will be done with law school. Is this all just a waste of time? Would love an outside opinion.
Tldr: my boyfriend won't move temporarily to my state because he refuses to be more than an hour away from his sister.

I don't get the impression that anything is haram anymore. Muslim community on reddit and in the US say premarital relations, partying, smoking are not a issue or little things and to just repent later. Tbh it's making me think these aren't serious or major sins as they were made out to be when we were kids and not to take life too seriously, and instead go out and enjoy as long as you pray or repent, you'll be good.
Especially when comments here get downvoted if you speak out against these type of lifestyle, they say you are getting involved in others lives or to mind yourself. Do not feel like there is a standard of principles/values in our society anymore, at least for Muslim community. And I don't see why anyone should be strict with theirselves if all of this is okay. May as well just go out and enjoy life. Actually people will doubledown and say we are supposed to live this lifestyle and what makes us Muslim is repenting. And that prevention is not central to Islam. Or enforcing societal standards.
I'm seriously wondering if I'm misguided or misknowledgeable on Islam and taking it too seriously. Because my community seems to suggest so. And I'm seriously thinking I may be wrong and these things aren't too serious to God as long as we don't associate partners with him.

Hi! I'm Dylan (they/them). I turned 24 a few months ago and am primarily looking to meet new friends and something that could develop into a long-term relationship. I currently live in Georgia, but am actively looking to move out of the south. I'm demi, like taking things slow, and am primarily aesthetically attracted to femininity or androgyny regardless of gender.
A little bit more about me:

• Physically, I'm 6'1", shaved head, pale skin, blue eyes, and a fairly slim build (albeit I gained and am currently losing some fall/winter weight). Presentation-wise I'd say I'm more "soft-masculine" I guess? My fashion is minimalist with lots of natural colors but I like to throw in more feminine accessories/earrings or painting my nails. I've tried more feminine fashion and I like it, but not all the time and not enough to wear regularly. I love colder weather since I get to wear all my favorite sweaters and scarves! I used to be a gym rat in college and I'm getting back to my old gym habits, which is really exciting.
• I'm looking into developing a more androgynous style since I think that'd be cool as fuck.
• I work as software engineer and I love programming and messing with computers. From the moment I was exposed to programming I knew I wanted to do it for the rest of my life. I use Arch btw.
• I love cats and sharing pictures of my sweet furry friend.
• I've been described by others as sensitive, empathetic, and thoughtful. I'm pretty introverted and shy in group situations but love having thoughtful conversations and learning about people and what they are passionate about and why. I'm very affectionate and cuddly towards people I'm close to, while being cognizant of their boundaries of course.
• My greatest passion is competitive fighting games, mainly the Guilty Gear series. Playing and studying the game, going to tournaments both local and afar, and interacting with the community bring me immense joy. Starting in late 2022 I've been traveling and taking weekend trips to bigger tournaments, and I'm always training for the next event!
• I deeply love music and play a few instruments, but I've mainly been focusing on classical guitar. Neutral Milk Hotel is my favorite band of all time, but I'm constantly exploring lots of music across pretty much every genre. I have soft spots for jazz, folk, prog/math rock, some alt rock, and psych rock though. In the classical world I tend to be drawn to the Romantic period composers. I also collect vinyl!
• Running, longboarding, or skateboarding through local parks is one of my favorite ways to spend time outdoors. I also enjoy hiking, but never really go unless it's with others.
• Huge coffee nerd and night owl. Those are probably related. Figuring out people's coffee tastes and brewing them a cup they love is really fulfilling.
• I'm vegan for the animals and I'll gladly cook badass vegan meals for people.
• I read a little bit every day. Right now I'm reading Thinking, Fast and Slow and the Dune series (really excited for the new movie!). My favorite novel is definitely The Catcher in the Rye, and I'm also a massive Tolkien nerd and read lots of philosophy and psychology, although I'm definitely a novice in the latter two fields. I'm attempting to learn Japanese as of a few days ago, too!
• Some of the non-fighting games I'm playing right now include Tears of the Kingdom, Dwarf Fortress, and Pokemon. My favorite singleplayer game is Morrowind!
• I hate cars and one of my big goals is to move out of the south and to a city where I can be car-independent.
• My favorite movie is The Big Lebowski and watching it never fails to make me smile. My favorite anime is a toss-up between Cowboy Bebop and Ping Pong the Animation. Naruto gets on the honorable mention list for how many times it's made me cry.

What I'm looking for in a romantic partner:

• Someone in roughly my age range (20-30-ish) who is passionate and caring and enjoys absurdist/dry/goofy humor interspersed with deep conversations. I tend towards identifying as sapiosexual.
• Someone who is also affectionate!
• Someone okay with monogamy. Polyamory is really cool, but not for me personally. I'm kink-friendly and a sub-leaning switch. Don't really like discussing sexual tastes in public forums otherwise.
• Someone who would be fine with long-distance if circumstances dictate that.
• Someone who is a child-free leftist.
• Someone who is alright with me being an introvert who can get overstimulated easily.
• Tobacco use is a deal-breaker for me in romantic contexts. I don't drink alcohol for physical health reasons but I have nothing against alcohol use in non-addiction contexts.

If you're interested in reaching out then I'd love to hear more about you in a message or chat!

First, I don't know what drove the big price bump this year - inflation, venue costs, whatever - so this isn't necessarily a criticism of the price bump. Second, this is purely anecdotal - I am not trying to make any sweeping generalizations about this is the doom of DefCon or anything like that. I am just interested if anyone else is seeing the same thing.
To the meat of the matter now, so we are like 9 weeks out and I am starting to try and track down which of my friends are going to be attending this year and arranging get togethers and such. In the process I have had a few friends (like 4 at this point) who have been fairly regular attendees tell me they aren't going this year, citing cost as a major reason. Ancillary reasons have included they don't like the new venue, aren't happy with some of the village changes, and skytalks cancellation, but those have all been partnered with cost. (Also one was really unhappy with room block costs, they apparently compared costs the week after and thought the hotels were gouging, but that seems to really be outside DefCon control (I personally have not compared costs)).
I am still planning on going, and a good portion of my friends are also still planning on going despite these defections but I am curious if anyone else has encountered this.

I currently live near Phoenix, Arizona. My lease ends in early November. I may go month to month for a few months after my lease ends, but I'm wanting to move to Richmond, VA, ASAP after my lease ends. I've already started looking at and applying for fully remote jobs, as my current job, while still wfh, requires me to be in the Phoenix area. For those of you who have moved to a different state, what's the best way to apply for jobs, and when should I start applying to on-site jobs as well? I've heard 3-4 months in advance, but I don't know how accurate that is.
Also, I don't think I'll have a vehicle at the time I plan to move. In case I don't, for those with experience with movers, which company would be the best? I have enough saved up so I can spend a few thousand and still have a few months rent just in case, so it doesn't necessarily have to be the cheapest option, but also not looking for the most expensive either.

My friend wants to know if someone tips off the police or an apartment complex that john smith is running a drug operation in room 123, is that enough for the police to get a warrant to raid room 123?
unrelated: my friend also wants to know how to go about lawyering-up and finding a good defense attorney that is familiar with drug-related crimes in his area.
edit: also just fuck me and throw in any information you think may be useful to know

Okay so, I’m (f) in love with my friend. We have been friends for 2ish years and I would say that we are decently close.
We each have a separate best friend and we don’t talk everyday or anything but recently we’ve gotten closer and eat lunch together more regularly and are hanging out outside of school more and more. (Always in a group setting but still more than we have in the past)
I think I started to grow a crush on her last spring but I didn’t realize that I liked her like that until September 2022. And it just progressively got worse from there and hit the point that I think I’m inlove with her in April. (This is the only woman I’ve ever felt romantic feelings for as well, so I’m very confused)
Recently she has lost a large portion of her friends so I’m considered 1 of the 3 outside of school friends she has right now. And I’m scared of that because if she sees me as one of her closest friends it will be harder for me to get out of the friend zone.
In the past I was able to hide my feelings for her pretty well and live with just being friends with her, but recently within the past 2 weeks I am struggling to even be near her and I can hardly talk to her without wanting to just spill her how I feel.
However, I also don’t want to change or destroy our friendship by telling her. Plus I live in an area and house where being gay is not very normalized so if we were more than friends it would have to be a secret.
I also think the main thing holding me back from telling her is that I have no idea how she feels about me.
Sometimes I think that she might have feelings for me too but other times it seems like she doesn’t at all.
I don’t want to get too into detail with why I think that she might like me back because I don’t think it’s that relevant in how I feel about her. But we have kissed once and it was not very platonic imo.
So essentially I feel the deep need to tell her how I feel and have been getting pressure from the few outside sources that I have told about her saying to tell her too.
I also feel like I have to tell her because this guy I was talking to that I ended things with because of my feelings for her said that if I don’t tell her he will be very disappointed in me and I feel like since I ended things with someone else bc of my feelings for her I owe it to that other person to tell.
Basically should I tell her? If I should how should I? And what should I do if I get rejected?

Hello, recently I had an encounter with a man off grindr, he came to my hotel room and we immediately began swapping oral on each other. Occasionally after brushing my bottom gums will bleed but nothing too drastic, so this night in particular I’m not sure if there were any bleeding gums. Anyways, we exchange oral(he did not finish in my mouth but unsure of pre-cum) , then I finish masturbating him and he finished over himself and my hand, i then start to masturbate myself until I finish with the same hand… (mutual masturbating/frotting)
Is there any reason to test in these scenarios? Or am I just being a hypochondriac and paranoid about possible being infected?
Side note, he had no unusual things on his penis smell was a tad different but nothing unbearable, I asked him if he was “clean” (very ignorant comparison I know) and he said he was “a single father with full custody of his kid” not sure what that really is supposed to mean. Maybe just to make it seems he’s just another “normal” gay man.
Anyways please give me honest opinions if I’m at any type of risk I was just recently tested and tested negative on ALL STDS.

First. - Previous
“Shit! Doctor Ngai, did you see that?” Lieutenant Gastaud’s yell broke me from my absent minded reverie.
“See what?” I asked.
“That hyper footprint. Drive signatures are Confederation. Probe twenty-nine is nearest. Cameras show what looks like two battleships, two battlecruisers, four cruisers, three frigates and twelve destroyers, plus ten large ships hanging, likely freighters or troop ships.”
“That is not good,” Lieutenant Smolyaninov said. The navigator had the conn for third shift while the captain and XO slept. “Silent running, engage full stealth systems.”
“Full stealth systems active,” Gastaud confirmed. “We are now a hole in space.”
“Time to wake the boss.” Smolyaninov said.
I thought Smolyaninov should have done that first. But it was not my place to correct him.
“Lucky you,” the helmsman Lieutenant Joanna Stojanov chirped. “XO is cranky when you wake him up.”
“Get the stewards to throw on some fresh coffee,” I advised. “That stuff they got on now is like tar. No matter what Chief Bishop says, you shouldn’t have to chew your coffee.”
“Talk to me,” I heard the captain’s voice over the intercom.
“A Connie battlegroup just dropped out of hyper, and they are closer to us than any other ships, at about twenty-five million miles. But they are stationary.”
“Set condition one. Wake up the ship. I want all hands on deck,” Nugraha ordered. “Any orders from the Flag?”
“Nothing yet. We’ve been running silent. Wait, orders just came in. ‘All personnel to return to ships. Prepare to leave orbit and retreat outside Confederation space at the first sign of aggression.’ Well, I guess that’s it for us.”
“Hyper footprint!” Gastaud’s voice raised a few octaves, and I did not blame him. “At least sixty-three point signatures and at least five battleship size. Getting a fighter launch. Lord, that’s over seven hundred of them.”
His voice calmed down and he added, “I’m getting an IFF on them. They’re ours. It’s Marine Expeditionary Force Twelve.”
“I don’t know if that is a good thing or not,” the captain said as she entered the bridge, still sealing her uniform. “It was always possible the Connies would pitch a fit over our presence. I didn’t expect a battlegroup, maybe a division of destroyers coming to frown at us and pushing us along.”
“But dropping an entire MEF on them? That’s ballsy,” Stojanov added. “Even for Marines.”
“It was MEF-12’s shuttles that got sent here,” the XO used the phonetic abbreviation. I had not heard him enter. “So, it makes sense that the CO would keep an eye on his people.”
“There go the Connies,” Gastaud’s comment was completely unnecessary, as we all could see the plot. “That was a lot of excitement I could have done without.”
“I agree,” Captain Nugraha frowned at the plot as the carriers recovered their freshly launched fighters. “But it was probably the best outcome, at least from our perspective. I wonder how long it lasts? The Connies came at us with a big stick and that is unusual.”
“Their admiral was unprepared for a bigger stick,” I observed. “It makes me think that this was not quite what they planned.”
When they all looked at me blankly, I continued, “Come on, the Connies are many things, but stupid isn’t one of them. They just brought a knife to a gun fight. A few ships coming here and shaking fingers at us and politely telling us to leave is one thing. And that is what should have happened.
“A small battlegroup like that is fine if they want to push around pirates or the Ku'kor'ae. But us? You’d better come at us with a full fleet in your pocket if you want to push humans around.”
“I am uncomfortable with the implications of this,” Nugraha mused.
The XO started to say something but was cut off by shrill alarms sounding.
“What now? Gastaud griped. “Oh, shit.”
The threw the data from his computer into the main holotank. “Every probe we have in the inner system just went haywire!”
Dal’tari is larger than Sol and considerably more active. It left the inner planets radiation scrubbed wastelands. Only Umsurrat’s distance and powerful magnetic field had allowed life to evolve. Mass coronal ejections had happened irregularly since records were kept. They’d caused many droughts and famines.
But the recent ones were unusual in their ferocity and frequency. One would be bad, but not something that would cause an extinction level event.
But with ejections at least twice as powerful than the any during the previous millennia? And over a dozen a week? Lasting several weeks? How could any planet survive that?
Since the Angel Fleet arrived, there had been no sign of them.
That just changed.
“That is an understatement,” I said softly. “I’ve not seen anything like that… ever.”
“Look at the magnetic and gravitational fields,” Keoki instructed. “They are completely unstable. The poles have flipped at least fifteen times… and there it went again. What the hell?”
I ran a quick analytics program on the data, something I created on the fly. It mapped the gravitational and magnetic fields for the entire system. It had every planet, every moon… everything in system, including all the ships.
“Check this out,” I said. “There is some kind of gravitational finger from the sun to where MEF-12 dropped out of hyper. It looks almost like the gravitational distortion we see on an event horizon.”
“They dropped out of hyper deep inside the gravity well, but I’ve seen ships drop this deep, or deeper, in a gravity well at least a hundred times before. What is different about this?” Doctor Keoki Nurhayati puzzled.
“I’ve never seen this many ships at once, Keoki,” I replied.
“Me neither,” Nugraha added. “But we’ve also never seen it with an unstable sun like this.”
“The storm will hit Umsurrat in,” I did the calculations, “thirty-nine hours, seventeen minutes. The hard radiation in fifteen minutes.”
“Who’s in command of MEF-12?” Nugraha demanded. “Get him on the horn.”
“Lieutenant General Ichiro Tokuda is in command,” Laz answered. “He’s a hard charger but capable.”
The holotank lit up with Tokuda’s visage. He had the hard, square jawed, buzzed haircut look of a marine lifer.
“Tokuda speaking.”
“General, I am Captain Nugraha of the science and survey ship, Rudy Horne. I cannot be a hundred percent certain, but it seems your arrival has triggered another massive coronal ejection event. One that is larger than any of the others that have been measured. Our probes have detected one heading to the planet as we speak. The hard radiation front is… thirteen minutes away.”
“How bad is it, Captain?”
“Very bad, sir. But I think we, rather you and the cargo ships can do something about it. If you were to create a barrier with your ships’ radiation and particle shields extended to their max distance from your hulls on the sunward side of the planet, you could deflect or absorb most of it.”
I sent him a diagram of a ships’ formation, a double layered grid with the largest ships at the core. “You have a total of a hundred forty-three ships in orbit. Your military shields are better than the civilian ships. I recommend putting your fifty-nine ships in the center with the deflectors at max distance from the hull. The civvies can hold the perimeter.”
“We won’t make it in time. It will take us over fourteen minutes to get there,” Tokuda said.
“Not if you let the heavies hold you back. But your smaller ships can it in time if you send them now. They can take the brunt of the first waves. It’s not perfect, but better than nothing.”
“We’ll cut our compensator safeties to the bone,” Tokuda promised. “I will shave as much time off the transit as I can. Tokuda out.”
We are much too far outsystem to be of any assistance other than monitoring the probes and reporting. Which meant we wouldn’t not much more than spectators for the next half hour.
The radiation wave moved at light speed and there was no room for error. The cargo ships had moved immediately. Admiral Pierre was obviously on the ball to herd that group so effectively. The destroyers made it first, mere minutes ahead of the escort carriers, assault frigates and troopships. The battlecruisers and fleet carriers arrived a minute later.
The carriers belched fighters. Seven hundred and seventy five fighters crash launched for the second time in almost ten minutes. I didn’t expect that.
Fighters and other light craft could not survive in hyperspace. The titanic forces surging in hyperspace required massive shielding and inertial dampeners that only capital ships could mount. Fighters just did not have the tonnage to mount this equipment. Fighter shields were less powerful. Designed against normal amounts of radiation, but even with their technological limitations the pilots still intended to contribute with sheer numbers.
I updated the plot, assigning ships to their individual positions. Most of the ships were in their assigned orbits by the thime the first waves of radiation hit. It is impossible to accurately describe it. The sensors showed visible light as well as down shifting the high ultraviolets and upshifting the low infrareds. The computer laced together all the imagery into something we mere humans could appreciate.
“As impressive as this is, I imagine what they are seeing dirtside is much more spectacular,” Nugraha said softly. “The light show down there has to put the most active aurora borealis back on Terra to shame.”
“The battlewagons are almost there,” Gastaud announced. He spoke into the silence absently, as if he needed to say something, to fill the silence with words worthy of the moment. “The planteside sensors show a minimal uptick on hard radiation counts. You’d get almost as much from a microwave. Looks like your plan worked, Captain.”
“I wouldn’t call it a plan,” Nugraha replied with a nervous laugh. “More like a desperate attempt to plug a hole in a dam with our fingers and lots of prayers. My god, that amount of radiation would sterilize most worlds and you stopped it.”
“It made sense, though. Our particle shields can handle the nasty shit hyper throws at us, and this is about equal to that,” Laz observed. “The fighters were a nice touch. Never thought of adding them to the mix.”
“Next radiation wave is in five minutes,” I added. “The battleships are on station. Their added shielding should keep most of the radiation from reaching the surface.”
“The sun’s calming down,” Keoki observed. “We’re still getting that odd tic every seventeen and a half seconds, but at least it’s stopped spitting corona at us.”
“Incoming transmission, Captain,” Stojanov announced as she activated the holotank. “It’s the general.”
“That was a good idea, Captain,” Tokuda said. “It worked like a charm.”
“I thought it had a good chance of blocking some of the radiation, sir. It was just a matter of how effective it would be. Now, the question is how quickly can we engineer and build a permanent orbital deflector array to protect the planet until we can figure out what is causing the sun to belch?”
“Even if we can figure out what is causing it, how realistic is it that we can stop it? I am just an old jarhead. I can figure out how to invade a planet, but I leave all the science stuff to people who are much smarter than me.”
“Have you had a chance to read our reports?”
“Not really. Can you give me the short and sweet version? Remember to use small words.”
My bridge staff chuckled at that. “We have found, actually someone on the planet found it and alerted us to it, anyway there is an odd gravitic and magnetic field spike in the planet’s gravitational and magnetic fields. It is exactly every seventeen point five seconds with not a femtosecond difference.
“An engineer found it when she was calibrating a fusion plant’s magnetic bottle. We took that data and looked deeper. The sun’s magnetic and gravitational fields are also showing that same tic, just on a grander scale. I intend to look at all the planets and see if they are seeing the same thing.
“Then the question is what is causing it? Nothing natural is that exact.”
“And if it is nothing natural, that means it is something manufactured,” Tokuda mused. “And if it is manufactured, we can find it if we start looking.”
“Exactly. The problem is, we are operating solo. We need the other three survey ships… to be honest, we need their survey probes. We carried only fifty. The Tombaugh and Leonard are our sisterships and have a hundred probes. The Edgeworth is a lot bigger. She carries one-fifty by herself, and I expect a cargo ship full of drones within a day or two. If we can flood this system with a thousand survey probes, we can narrow down where to look.”
“A thousand probes?” He asked. “That’s bound to be expensive. But if we want results fast then we spend the money, right?”
“Trust me General, it is not something I say lightly. Even if we can recover ninety-five percent of the probes to refurbish, that’s still near a billion dollars, plus the five hundred million for the five percent we lost. So, roughly one point five billion dollars.”
“Captain, that is just a drop in the bucket for what the Federation has spent to this point just in supplies, not to mention the costs of getting the supplies here. If you can find that needle in this cosmic haystack for just one point five billion dollars, then that is a huge savings against the costs of maintaining these relief convoys.”
“You are right. I hadn’t looked at it that way. But I can assure you that we’ll be working non-stop until we find it.”
“I will let you get to it,” the general replied.
“I will keep you updated.” I’d no sooner said that and noticed general looking uncomfortable.
“Not to put too fine a point on this, but I am not in your chain of command. You were ordered to report to Senior Rear Admiral Pierre. Admiral Pierre is the senior officer on station, and that makes him the system CO. He is in command, and that includes my forces until we leave. Hell, he can order me to leave right now.”
“I understand, general. I intend to keep you in the loop because we get more flares and need your ships to move, but as it stands, stay between the planet and the sun and you will block most of the radiation.”
“Roger that.”

This was a crazy time that I’m almost positive I’ll never forget. Me and my cousins (Jay, Jerret, and Anthony) were celebrating Jarret’s birthday at a hotel. My nieces birthday was also around the same day so they did two birthdays in one hotel. Me and my cousins which were all boys stayed in one room and my niece and her friends stayed in another room. The rooms were very separated and were basically from one end of the hall to the other. Everything was going good for the first 2 hours until stuff started getting a little weird. We got a phone call from in our room and you could obviously tell it was my niece and her friends because they have similar voices and it’s easy to tell if it’s them or not. They would also ding dong ditch our door but you could still tell it was then because they would loudly run away and laugh. But things started getting different to where when they would knock on the door they wouldn’t one away laughing. It was very silent, they used to bang on the door when they would ding dong ditch but the knocks started getting quieter and their was only 2-3 knocks instead of 500. It started creeping all of us out and Jay look through the peep hole but no one was there. When we heard the quiet knocks again u could also see the shadow of feet at the bottom crack of the door. While the shadow was there Jay sprung up and looked through the peep hole. But still he saw no one. Then Jay told us a thought that creeped all of us out. He wondered if the person that was still outside the door was ducking or it was a ghost. It creeped all of us out and we tried to ignore it. We also called my niece to see if it was them outside the door. But they said they had stopped knocking on our door like an hour ago. Once my niece said that all of our eyes widened. We all still tried to get our minds off of it by watching TV. We kept getting calls from different rooms that were completely random, and all you heard was silence if you picked up. The tiny knocks still happened about every 10 minutes. Finally we were done with all of this and we packed up all of our stuff and called my niece and told them that we were gonna stay in their room for a bit and she said okay. She told us that once we got there to knock so she could let us in. So we started heading to her room. You could hear people talking about stuff while walking past all the doors but once we got to my nieces door everything went silent. We all looked at each other but not a word came out of anybody. Anthony knocked on the door and no one answered. We all looked at each other but still not another word. Jay called my niece but it went straight to voicemail. We all looked at each other again but with much more shock and not another word but it felt like our mouthes were frozen. Then the thing that scared us the most was when all of the lights in the halls way flickered 3 times. That’s when we ran back to our room.
Should I make a Pt.2?

Please can I just be fucking done I’ve done so much harder assignments in the past but the idea that I have to pass this single paper to get my degree is making it so much bigger of a deal for me than it needs to be. I can’t talk myself out of pure panic and it’s preventing me from sticking to a topic and really starting the research. It’s due in 2 weeks and I’m so terrified that despite getting through 5 years of undergrad without failing anything that this single paper will be my downfall.
School anxiety is so horrible. I thought it’d get better the closer I get to graduation, but it feels like until I have every single assignment turned in and graded I’m going to still be convinced there’s some chance I won’t graduate.
I can’t shut up about this damn paper to people around me because of the amount of anxiety it’s causing me. It’s unreasonable. I’ve done 20 page undergrad research papers with not nearly half this anxiety. I’ve made it through so fucking much to get this far yet I am still so convinced that I will fuck it all up.
SOooo ANGRYYY AND TIRED AND FUCKING OVER UNDERGRAD PLEASE JUST GIVe me my fucking DEGREEE

For context our toddler like most is getting harder to get to bed at night. She's getting older and learning more about the world around her and she just wants to stay up. Some nights are worse than others but lately we have to fight to get her to bed most nights.
Today (or yesterday at this point) for Memorial day my parents had invited us over. I was asked when we would come and I said after our daughters nap. My father seemed disappointed because he wants to see us longer. So we decided to try and make it work.
They only live 20-30 min away from us so that means a much shorter car nap for her. Usually after a short nap it's near impossible to get her back to nap for the rest of her normal nap amount. We got there around 11am and she had a ton of stimulation with my parents, my sister and her 4 kids, and some other guests.
At the end of it all our strategy was to do the before bed routine at my parents house and then she would fall asleep on mthe car ride home and we'd take her right to bed. And this initially was working. She slept for like 3 hours in the car and then in her crib.
And then at 10:30pm or so she just woke up and started screaming. This went on for a bit until my wife managed to calm her down. This involved the TV unfortunately and a eggo waffle. I was told I should go to bed as one of us needs to be able to take over. I did and then eventually they came up and the screaming happened again. It has mostly been going on till like 10 min ago.
Anyways I guess I will not be giving in to my parents demands and go visit around her nap time. Her schedule cannot be messed up because we are exhausted and she is a handful. If we go visit them it will be after her nap or well before it so she can nap there.
TLDR: parents guilted me and my family into coming before daughter nap and it threw off her schedule and that made me and wife more exhausted.

Last year my husbands ex-friend 26 male moved out of his parents house after he got caught messing with a 17 year old. That’s a whole other drama. I didn’t know the full story until after I suggested he move in until he got his own place. Anyway during our stay he was horrible, never washed his clothes, never cleaned his cats litter, etc didn’t help with bills or groceries and was sending that 17 year old money. and sometimes I pay him to clean the litter but he’d still leave the bag of cat poop in the room. So the room started to stink. One day, I told him to clean the room and no buts and in the end he told me to F off and get out of the room. So I kicked him out. He asked if his cat can stay with us until he found a place. I said yes. His cat stayed with us for over 6 months ( sept 2022- present) and he never checked in on the cat. We never asked for any money in return as he loved having his cat tommy with us. Well 2 months ago he tells me he’s taking tommy back cause he moved back in with his parents and they got a new house. I told him okay cause we were at a point where I told him he needs to make a choice, give us the cat or take him.
Well last week I noticed his cat is limping now. And he’s struggling to walk to get food, water and go to the bathroom, not cause he can’t do it, cause it can’t walk over there and do it. He doesn’t play with the other cats anymore, and he doesn’t come sit with me while im working. It’s our little bonding thing. His mood has completely changed.
So I told them and they said they’ll get him in a week. But I’m really worried and we can pay for the vet visit but the issue is they never took him to see a vet ever and where we live, shots must be given or done before they can be helped. Tommy has never had a shot so his visit will be $500. Check up, test, medicine and shots.
I was talking to my dad and he was like if that cat dies or gets worse they’ll blame you even if y’all did everything for him. You can’t be put in that position financially and morally for their actions. he was like you guys are pushovers and letting these people take advantage of your kindness. So I texted them and told them to get their cat tomorrow or he’s ours and we will take him to the vet.
And now I feel horrible to do this to them. I feel like they’ll think I’m only pushing him back to them cause he’s sick but really I just want the help for him. And I’m scared something may be really wrong

I know the endgame event isn't finished, and I'll probably keep paying attention to what happens with it, but I think my involvement is mostly wrapped up. I had some ideas for new plotlines to write, but I think my characters have largely reached a good conclusion to their various arcs, and I don't really have the time to give new ones justice. Plus, I'm interested in greener pastures. I might post a broad epilogue post or two, once the endgame event is wrapped up, but for now, this chapter in the history of the Blackwood Vale draws to a close.
The Blackwood forces currently raised can be commanded by Lansdale, or if they're inactive, Tully or Daeron. All my PCs who were with the force are now dead. Lansdale has full mechanical control over Raventree Hall, due to Tristifer's position as Lord, Osmund Butterwell's position as castellan, and Bethany's withdrawal. If Estermont and Mooton wish it, they can assume that Bethany introduces Warren to Zhoe once their mission is over. As for Bethany's mission in King's Landing, Warren can take over completely.
It's been an absolute blast writing with you all this game, and I've loved my time as Blackwood, for all its unexpected twists and turns. I've enjoyed conversing about lore and history, and I've enjoyed watching all of these little plot threads play out - and trust me, I've been paying attention to nearly every plotline in the game. I'd especially like to shout out ingan, Norlium, Vierwood, TT, Tellural, Mads, Art, Mia, Plasma, Goch, Stank, Pitchy, Bob, Prester, Rangi, and Razor, all of whom were wonderful writing partners. I know I can be abrasive at times, especially as this iteration got older, but I really do appreciate all of you who have taken the time to write in this community.
I'll see you all in 9PK, and I hope to see you all there to, along with whatever unexpected twists and villainy we come up with.

I saw an ex of mine today at work. I am currently traveling to other centers in our company to help out until they can get new staff hired and trained. Plus I get to learn a system/machine that we don't use in our center and I like learning new/different equipment.
The ex that I saw raped and beat me on my 18th birthday, nearly 20 years ago. I reported it to our local police then and they did nothing. I had to see him every day for the rest of the year and after graduation I moved away, joined the Marines and did the work to put him out of my mind and move forward with my life. I have not thought of him in years except for around my birthday because I have nightmares and flashbacks.
Now to the issue at hand. I recognized his name as soon as I saw it and instantly knew who he was on sight. Him confirming his date of birth gave way to any doubts that were hanging in the air. He still has the same haircut, facial hair and a scar on his face from where I scratched him while I was trying to fight him off. He still wears/uses the same Axe products he did in high school and the smell made me want to vomit. I managed to hold it together, maintain composure and professionalism and I did my job but was on edge until he left the building.
I am unsure if he realized who I am even with my name tag on. Should I report him to my boss or let it go and try to avoid him if he comes in again? Can I have him banned from the building? I know it is way to late to have him prosecuted due to the statute of limitations on rape cases but seeing him again (even by coincidence) threw me off and put my other clients in danger because I was not at the top of my game.