If you’re reading this I am begging you to believe me. Especially if you have children. My name is Leon and I have been investigating strange disappearances for four years. I am not an official investigator or a journalist. Before I started this whole thing I did not believe in ghosts or the paranormal. For me to believe in something I had to see it with my own two eyes! Everything had to be factual and everything had an explanation.
At least this is what I used to believe until my wife was murdered four years ago. They found her at work completely skinless. She was drained of blood and was missing all of her nails. They told me the precision required to accomplish this was not heard of yet. I waited months for answers and they never came, so I decided to go get them myself. I had no idea where to start or who to speak to so I went back to the store to try and dig up as much information as I could find.
Her manager eventually told me that she had gotten into a fight with a customer that day and that he assumed she went home on time. When her body was found in the employee break room he was shocked. He had no idea she was still in the building. He said he told me exactly what he told the police. I asked him if there was any footage of the man she was arguing with but he told me the security cameras were not working that day. I vividly remember wanting to punch this guy in his damn face. He was no help and I was determined to solve my wife's murder.
I ended up searching for the guy for months. I asked every one of her coworkers if they saw the argument and a couple of times I even had a run-in with the cops. They insisted that I should let them do their jobs and that they had everything handled. There was no chance I was going to listen to them. I had to take time off from my investigation to attend her funeral and make sure I got all of the preparations right. In hindsight, I was not growing properly and I really should've taken some time to reassess.
So fast forward another month and I finally get a lead. Something I assumed the cops didn't have, this meant I could finally get some answers before being stonewalled again. I ended up finding this guy, Will Brookes at a fucken motel off of the highway about three miles from where my wife worked. I waited for two days before I saw him leave his room to get ice. Once I knew what room to find him in I knocked until he opened the door. He was rightfully pissed but not as pissed as I was. It took every ounce of willpower in my body to not kill him on the spot.
“Why did you kill my wife?!” I snapped as I forced myself into the room and slammed the door behind me. He looked shocked.
“I did not kill her!” He screamed and tried to move around me. So I grabbed him by his shirt and slammed him into the wall next to the tv. This guy was not very heavy and not very strong. At that moment I was wondering how he could kill anyone.
“You were the last person to be seen with her alive!” I barked. I wanted to push his body through the wall. I wanted to crush him.
“I was bringing her the papers she requested for a job offer she accepted in a place called LittleBrooke!” The man said. He was shaking so I put him down and pushed him to the side. “Show me the papers,” I demanded. My wife had told me twice that she had gotten a new job offer. I was extremely excited! I work from home and would be happy to live wherever she wanted. All she had to do was say the word and we could’ve left as soon as possible. But she never made it home to tell me the news.
I watched as the shaking man handed me a stack of papers and even a suitcase. “Here, take it and please leave me alone!” He shouted. “Okay.” I left the motel room and went right to my car. I put everything on the passenger seat and went home. Once I got there I sobbed in the driveway for over an hour before finally getting out and heading inside. I never got to see her body and I never got to say goodbye. Being in this house felt like I was walking into a damn shallow grave of sorts.
I went right to the master bedroom and packed up as many clothes as I could. I even took some of her favorite items, I don’t know why. I took a couple of pillows and two blankets, and after that, I went around to search the rest of the house. Once I had finished in the master bedroom I went and grabbed all my items from the bathroom. After that, I went into the nursery. We were planning on trying to have a baby once she got her new job. I looked around the nursery and took some stuffed animals and blankets, nothing too crazy. I also made sure to grab our family photo album. Finally, I made sure to grab all of the savings from the jar we had plus anything I kept in the safe. I also made sure to grab our wedding video and once I had everything I thought I could need I left the house. On my way out I made sure to tell the building goodbye.
Once I got back into my car I decided to drive a bit. No way in hell was I going to the same motel as that guy so I drove until I hit a hotel far enough away from my house. I did not end up checking in though. Once I got close enough I backed up and just kept driving. I eventually hit a truck stop after a couple of hours and decided to rest my eyes for a while. I was exhausted and there were way too many questions rushing through my head. I knew if I kept driving in that state I would probably crash or something.
After sleeping for four hours I decided it was time to look through the papers and figure out what I was going to do next. I took the first paper from the stack and started to read it. For the sake of time here I will only tell you guys what I found that was interesting.
Paper One: You have been accepted to work as a store manager! Please review your employee packet for more information.
So as I am going over this first paper a couple of things stick out to me. Whoever wrote this was trying not to be specific. The whole paper was one big announcement for a new store opening up in a place called LittleBrooke. There was no state mentioned anywhere on this paper, I would later find out that this place was supposed to be in Washington D.C.
I decided to dig around and eventually found the employee packet. She accepted a job at a mega-store called BrightMarketZ. I thought it was a pretty weird name but what stood out to me was what they were offering to pay her. $22.00 an hour! I couldn't believe it. No wonder she said yes and didn’t bother to ask any questions.
Paper Twenty: To find LittleBrooke please enter [REDACTED] into your GPS device. You will be staying inside apartment 307. All rent for your first month in LittleBrooke is covered by your employer. Please note that all apartments are two-bedroom only. If you have a larger household please speak to Sydney May at Town Hall for bigger accommodations.
After reading this I decided to just go to LittleBrooke and get answers. I was assuming that I would find out what the hell happened if I just went. I wanted to know what my wife died for and I wanted to know why this was some big secret in the first place. I went back to bed and as soon as the sun came up I put the information into my GPS and headed for LittleBrooke.

Year One in LittleBrooke

It took me three weeks to reach LittleBrooke and I could tell that something was wrong the moment I found the town. If I wasn't so damn desperate for answers I would've turned around as soon as I saw the library. The building itself wasn't big but the two huge lions on either side of the staircase gave me the creeps.
After that I passed a mechanic, the whole place looked run down as hell. There wasn't a single car to be seen but the sign said open. The man standing outside of the building waved to me so I gave him a slow wave back. He looked weird. At the time I couldn’t place my finger on why but now I know it’s because he was not human.
The theater was kind of cool to look at in a vintage kind of way. They were not showing anything when I drove by and I made the decision early on to stay out of the theater altogether. After the theater, I saw a small building that said LittleBrooke Press. If anything else I figured I could write for the paper.
As I approached the apartment building a woman was standing outside. Her face was weird as hell. It looked like she had far too much plastic surgery like her face was threatening to pop at any moment. “Hi, can I help you?” she asked me. Her voice was shrill, it was gross to even hear her speak. It sounded like she was putting on a fake voice just to speak to me. “Hi, my wife accepted a job offer. Unfortunately, she has passed away. I would still like to claim the apartment left to us. I can work at any place that currently has an opening.” I offered.
“LittleBrooke Press has space for two more writers!” She smiled and handed me the keys to the apartment. She never asked my name and she knew exactly where I wanted to go. I thought it was weird but I didn’t argue. Instead, I took the keys and thanked her. I spent that whole day getting settled into the new apartment. A couple of things, the front door had four different locks on it. I thought that was pretty weird. I also did not see or hear any other people until my third night in the apartment. I called the LittleBrooke Press about a potential job and they told me to email my submissions. There was no need for me to come in person and honestly, I liked this deal a lot.
For the first few months, I spent my time writing about whatever came to my mind. After that, I would send it in and get my money back. The editor never told me what to do and they never requested anything. It was sweet. As December rolled around I could feel myself slipping into a seasonal depression. At that point, I had made no progress in any of my investigations. I did not know the town well enough and frankly, I felt like I was wasting my time. That night I decided to check out the local bar. It was pretty hidden, you had to drive further into LittleBrooke to find it. Once I got there I was shocked! The place was packed. I sat down at the bar and ordered a drink.
The bartender was hot as hell, too hot. She was so even looking so perfectly symmetrical that it made me extremely uncomfortable. There wasn’t a single hair out of place. “So are you new in town?” She asked me. “Yeah, I just got here a couple of months ago. My now-deceased wife accepted a job offer here.” I said bluntly and dryly. I wanted to finish my drink and go. It was like the bones in my body were screaming at me to leave. The woman looked shocked. “Tell me, does that happen often? Do people accept a job offer in LittleBrooke and turn up dead a couple of days later?” I hissed. It was a genuine question but she did not take it too kindly. She took my drink from my hands and told me to leave.
As I made my way back to my car I could hear someone coming up from behind me. I turned around as fast as possible and had to take three steps back. It was the bartender, but she did not look the same. Half of her face was weighed down like she had no bones at all. Her eyes were bulging out of her head. She gurgled at me. “You need to leave!” She finally snapped and swung her arm in my direction. I moved back before she could hit me. As her hand hit my car window it shattered like it was made of ice. I watched as her arm popped and clicked. I could see it slowly getting longer. Before I knew it her arm was dragging on the pavement! She lunged at me so I punched her in her stomach. She gurgled again and sunk her teeth into my jacket. I screamed for help as we hit the pavement. She was trying fucken eat me! I grabbed her by her hair and threw her backward as hard as I could. As I scrambled to my feet and looked at her I screamed again. Her skin was pulled back. Now hugging the bones on her face. Her eyes were completely exposed! I turned and dove into my car as fast as I could. I slammed the door behind me and sped out of the parking lot like a bat out of hell.
The next morning I received a letter under my door. “Sorry, you had problems last night! Please accept our sincerest apologies.” -Mayor Brookes. There was $300 included with the letter. Now, I thought about leaving but decided I had to stay. Something was going on here and I had to find out what. I removed my jacket to see if the woman had injured me, she didn't but the experience was still terrifying. For the first time in a very long time, I was scared. But I also felt closer to the truth than I have ever been before.

Year Two in LittleBrooke

I spent all of January writing about the women who attacked me. I even contacted the police. I quickly learned that the police were going to be completely useless. My editor never sent the story back so I had assumed it was published.
At the end of the month, I left to shop for some supplies. Let me tell you, the grocery store in LittleBrooke is something else. They don’t have any brands you’ve ever heard of and at first, that drove me nuts. However, I quickly came to fall in love with the food here. It was comforting to have something to enjoy. Like always, I made sure to shop for two to three months at a time. Shopping was easy, I used the self-checkout to make sure I didn’t have to speak to anyone.
Once I got home I put everything away and decided to look around the apartment building. My whole floor started with 301 and went all the way to 310. The first floor was 501 to 509. There was a technical second floor but none of the doors were labeled. It looked like someone was renovating the place.
I got to see some of my neighbors too. An older woman, two men, and I were living next door to a lady the whole time. I had never seen or heard from these people before. It seemed like everyone wanted to keep to themselves too. I wanted to try and talk to someone but every time I approached them they turned and walked away. For what it's worth they looked completely normal.
So I left the apartment building and ventured around the property. There were no other apartments anywhere close to the one I was staying at, or so I thought until I found one about thirty minutes away. It was so out of the way you wouldn't find it unless you were looking. Against my better judgment, I opened the doors to the building and walked right inside. The place smelled like rust and soot.
I went to explore the first floor and was shocked to find blood trails on the floor and the ceiling. I followed the trail and made sure to look at the numbers on each door. This floor was numbered 1-10. Most of the doors were locked and I wasn’t going to try and knock anything down. I opened the door to apartment 10 and walked right inside. There was just enough light from the sun to illuminate the place. It looked like the whole place had been ransacked. I checked the tables and cabinets before heading into the bedroom. I searched the dresser and under the pillows before finally checking under the bed. When I looked under I spotted a black box. I grabbed it and that is when I got the feeling again. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I felt something sharp dig into my shoulders.
I screamed as loudly as I could, my face slammed off of the carpet and I clenched the box with one hand. Before I could figure out what the hell was happening I was tossed backward. I went into the bedroom door and rolled a couple of times until I reached the torn-up couch. I slowly lifted my head and to my horror what I was looking at was way too far from human to be real.
It looked like a dog ape thing. It was mostly skinless aside from some skin on its torso and face. The creature had thick, long claws and was standing on its hind legs. It barked at me. Its fangs were huge! I quickly scrambled to my feet and rushed out of the door as fast as possible. I could feel the blood running down my back. Never once did I consider letting this box go.
“Help!” I screamed as I burst through the apartment complex doors and started to run back to the main road. My heart was pounding, I could feel my chest getting tighter with each step. I could hear the beast behind me, it was screeching. I thought I was going to die for sure, there was no way I could continue to outrun this beast. That’s when I heard a car and before I knew it I could see it! A woman was waving me over, she was just up ahead! I had to push a little harder. I had to be just a little stronger.
When I felt the embrace of the car door I ripped it open and dove inside. She sped away and I looked out of the window. The beast did not follow us any further. “Are you insane!” She snapped at me. That’s the last thing I remember before passing out.
When I woke up I was laying on my stomach on an extremely comfortable couch. I could smell someone making pasta with meat sauce. My stomach was going insane. Everything hurt though, especially my back and my left side. I figured I had hurt my side when I was tossed across the room.
At this point, I did not dive into the box yet. I could barely move. “Hi.” I heard a woman say from the kitchen. “Thank you,” I replied before trying to sit up. I was so concerned that this woman would be another monster. When I saw her though I knew she was normal. She didn't look so damn perfect and that was a breath of fresh air.
“What's your name?” She asked me as I watched her prepare two bowls of food.
“Leon,” I said before closing my eyes. “You heard me screaming?” I asked her seriously.
“I did. I’m pretty sure everyone in our building did. You got hurt pretty badly, I did my best to patch you up.” She paused and laughed. “My name is Ashley.”
So I ended up crashing at her place. During this time I tried to focus on recovering. Sleeping became hell, I was having constant nightmares. I also spent a lot of time working on articles. I ended up giving Ash the keys to my apartment so she could get my laptop. It was a big move to trust anyone here but I am glad I did.
​

Year Three and Four in LittleBrooke

During my recovery, I spent most of my time writing. I wanted to write about everything I have seen and experienced. I had a lot of questions and way too much time with my thoughts. Ash and I got to know each other too.
I told her about how my wife had died mysteriously. I eventually opened up about her being skinned and drained of her blood. Ash told me she had come to LittleBrooke with her older sister. Her sister went to work one day and never came back. She was working at the theater. Ash had told me that she was stuck here, she didn’t feel right leaving with her sister still missing. Every time she would try the cops would meet her at the town line.
It was during this time that we both shared that we had never seen a police station. We talked about the monsters too. Her first run-in with one was at the grocery store. I told her about what happened to me at the bar. She told me that she heard rumors of the beast living beyond the apartments. The first time she saw it was when it was attacking me.
As I started to recover more we discussed a couple of things. First, the neighbors here suck. She could hear me screaming and came to help but no one else did. Second, neither of us has seen any families since we moved here. It was at this point I decided I wanted to leave and I offered to take her with me. We could both get out come hell or high water. She agreed but there was something I had to do first.
I showed her the box I had taken from the apartment.
“You almost died for a box?” Ash asked me. “Yes,” I said seriously.
I opened it and blinked. I found a picture of a girl with black hair and bright green eyes. It read, Stephanie. I found a missing persons report too. This girl had been missing a year before I got here. I decided that my last article would be about her. I had written about a couple of missing people before this. For example, the old lady in our building vanished and her apartment was rented out two days later.
I also found a badge inside the box. It read F.O.P.P. and there was a name! Jack Bridges. We tried to look up the organization's name but we came up empty-handed. I ended up writing the story about Stephanie and the next day Ash and I got packing. We decided to take my car since the cops know what hers looks like. I packed up the essentials all over again and we piled into the car. “We should check the other direction. Before we leave.” I suggested. Ash knew about the bar already but neither of us knew what was beyond that point: This suggested changed the course of our lives forever.
So we started driving in the other direction. We passed the bar where the woman had tried to eat me, we passed a convenience store I didn’t know this town had and we just kept driving. Eventually, I could hear Ash speaking to me, “Holy shit! The police station.” she pointed out. I couldn’t believe it either. I did not stop driving though but I wish I did.
Eventually, we saw a sign that read, LittleBrooke High. Go Bears!
I started to slow down a bit until the school was in view. The place looked run down as hell. There were holes in the walls and leaves growing up the side of the building. The parking lot was massive and full of buses. I pulled the car into the parking lot and told Ash to get into the driver's seat.
“You’re not serious?” She asked me. I could tell she wanted to go but I said, “This is it! This is the last place of note in this fucken town. Just take the wheel and I will be right back.” I said as I jumped out of the car and went to look around.
As I approached one of the buses I grabbed the doors, they were already open a crack. I pulled them open and was hit with a horrible stench. I had to step back and puke and no I am not going to describe what I saw in that fucken bus. At that point, I decided I had seen enough and it was time to fucken go.
“Help!” I heard someone cry from a couple of buses over. “Please!” I heard again. I wanted to slap myself because I knew better. I had already decided it was time to leave but I went to investigate anyway. I went to the bus and pulled the doors open. It smelled like stale piss and blood. “Back here!” A girl screamed out to me. I made my way to the back of the bus, stepping on school jackets and over backpacks. That is where I found them. Two teenagers are tied to the leg of a bus seat. They looked horrible, caking in blood and sweat. They were both injured. “Stephanie?!” I exclaimed as I bent over to free them. I recognized her face the moment I saw it.
“Can you move? I asked the blonde girl.” As I started to let her go. “Everything hurts.” She told me. I opened the emergency exit and called for Ash to pull the car over. It took her a second to hear me but she came as fast as possible. “I am going to get you guys in the car and we are going to get out of here, okay?” I told them. I wanted to tell them everything was going to be okay, but I couldn't. It felt like that would be a huge lie.
Ash stepped out of the car and helped get the girls into the backseat. As I stopped to look around I could feel the bus shift in weight. I turned around and inhaled sharply. Standing before me was a creature wearing a jacket that said COACH on it. He looked sickly, and pale, and his veins were protruding from his face and hands. As he ran at me I jumped out of the emergency exit door just in time to feel something slam off of the back of my head. I looked down to see a barbed football. I could feel blood trickling down my neck, I stumbled forward and felt a hand grab my arm. Ash was shoving me into the car. She slid over me, closed the passenger door, and backed the car up. I thought she was moving like lightning.
At this point, everyone was screaming. My heart was threatening to jump out of my fucken chest. I was so sure we were all going to die here, just like everyone else I had seen on the buses. But no, Ash sped out of the parking lot. The coach chased us to the school limits but for some reason, he did not follow us anymore.
I know we should've stopped to see if the kids could find their parents but we didn't. Instead, Ash just kept driving. Eventually, we could hear the cops behind us but that did not stop her. It took us six hours to finally see the You Are New Leaving LittleBrooke sign! I couldn’t believe it. This place was not that big at all.
So listen, if you’re invited to take a job in LittleBrooke. Don’t take it. It’s not worth your life.

If you’re reading this I am begging you to believe me. Especially if you have children. My name is Leon and I have been investigating strange disappearances for four years. I am not an official investigator or a journalist. Before I started this whole thing I did not believe in ghosts or the paranormal. For me to believe in something I had to see it with my own two eyes! Everything had to be factual and everything had an explanation.
At least this is what I used to believe until my wife was murdered four years ago. They found her at work completely skinless. She was drained of blood and was missing all of her nails. They told me the precision required to accomplish this was not heard of yet. I waited months for answers and they never came, so I decided to go get them myself. I had no idea where to start or who to speak to so I went back to the store to try and dig up as much information as I could find.
Her manager eventually told me that she had gotten into a fight with a customer that day and that he assumed she went home on time. When her body was found in the employee break room he was shocked. He had no idea she was still in the building. He said he told me exactly what he told the police. I asked him if there was any footage of the man she was arguing with but he told me the security cameras were not working that day. I vividly remember wanting to punch this guy in his damn face. He was no help and I was determined to solve my wife's murder.
I ended up searching for the guy for months. I asked every one of her coworkers if they saw the argument and a couple of times I even had a run-in with the cops. They insisted that I should let them do their jobs and that they had everything handled. There was no chance I was going to listen to them. I had to take time off from my investigation to attend her funeral and make sure I got all of the preparations right. In hindsight, I was not growing properly and I really should've taken some time to reassess.
So fast forward another month and I finally get a lead. Something I assumed the cops didn't have, this meant I could finally get some answers before being stonewalled again. I ended up finding this guy, Will Brookes at a fucken motel off of the highway about three miles from where my wife worked. I waited for two days before I saw him leave his room to get ice. Once I knew what room to find him in I knocked until he opened the door. He was rightfully pissed but not as pissed as I was. It took every ounce of willpower in my body to not kill him on the spot.
“Why did you kill my wife?!” I snapped as I forced myself into the room and slammed the door behind me. He looked shocked.
“I did not kill her!” He screamed and tried to move around me. So I grabbed him by his shirt and slammed him into the wall next to the tv. This guy was not very heavy and not very strong. At that moment I was wondering how he could kill anyone.
“You were the last person to be seen with her alive!” I barked. I wanted to push his body through the wall. I wanted to crush him.
“I was bringing her the papers she requested for a job offer she accepted in a place called LittleBrooke!” The man said. He was shaking so I put him down and pushed him to the side. “Show me the papers,” I demanded. My wife had told me twice that she had gotten a new job offer. I was extremely excited! I work from home and would be happy to live wherever she wanted. All she had to do was say the word and we could’ve left as soon as possible. But she never made it home to tell me the news.
I watched as the shaking man handed me a stack of papers and even a suitcase. “Here, take it and please leave me alone!” He shouted. “Okay.” I left the motel room and went right to my car. I put everything on the passenger seat and went home. Once I got there I sobbed in the driveway for over an hour before finally getting out and heading inside. I never got to see her body and I never got to say goodbye. Being in this house felt like I was walking into a damn shallow grave of sorts.
I went right to the master bedroom and packed up as many clothes as I could. I even took some of her favorite items, I don’t know why. I took a couple of pillows and two blankets, and after that, I went around to search the rest of the house. Once I had finished in the master bedroom I went and grabbed all my items from the bathroom. After that, I went into the nursery. We were planning on trying to have a baby once she got her new job. I looked around the nursery and took some stuffed animals and blankets, nothing too crazy. I also made sure to grab our family photo album. Finally, I made sure to grab all of the savings from the jar we had plus anything I kept in the safe. I also made sure to grab our wedding video and once I had everything I thought I could need I left the house. On my way out I made sure to tell the building goodbye.
Once I got back into my car I decided to drive a bit. No way in hell was I going to the same motel as that guy so I drove until I hit a hotel far enough away from my house. I did not end up checking in though. Once I got close enough I backed up and just kept driving. I eventually hit a truck stop after a couple of hours and decided to rest my eyes for a while. I was exhausted and there were way too many questions rushing through my head. I knew if I kept driving in that state I would probably crash or something. After sleeping for four hours I decided it was time to look through the papers and figure out what I was going to do next. I took the first paper from the stack and started to read it. For the sake of time here I will only tell you guys what I found that was interesting.
Paper One: You have been accepted to work as a store manager! Please review your employee packet for more information.
So as I am going over this first paper a couple of things stick out to me. Whoever wrote this was trying not to be specific. The whole paper was one big announcement for a new store opening up in a place called LittleBrooke. There was no state mentioned anywhere on this paper, I would later find out that this place was supposed to be in Washington D.C.
I decided to dig around and eventually found the employee packet. She accepted a job at a mega-store called BrightMarketZ. I thought it was a pretty weird name but what stood out to me was what they were offering to pay her. $22.00 an hour! I couldn't believe it. No wonder she said yes and didn’t bother to ask any questions.
Paper Twenty: To find LittleBrooke please enter [REDACTED] into your GPS device. You will be staying inside apartment 307. All rent for your first month in LittleBrooke is covered by your employer. Please note that all apartments are two-bedroom only. If you have a larger household please speak to Sydney May at Town Hall for bigger accommodations. After reading this I decided to just go to LittleBrooke and get answers. I was assuming that I would find out what the hell happened if I just went. I wanted to know what my wife died for and I wanted to know why this was some big secret in the first place. I went back to bed and as soon as the sun came up I put the information into my GPS and headed for LittleBrooke.

Year One in LittleBrooke

It took me three weeks to reach LittleBrooke and I could tell that something was wrong the moment I found the town. If I wasn't so damn desperate for answers I would've turned around as soon as I saw the library. The building itself wasn't big but the two huge lions on either side of the staircase gave me the creeps.
After that I passed a mechanic, the whole place looked run down as hell. There wasn't a single car to be seen but the sign said open. The man standing outside of the building waved to me so I gave him a slow wave back. He looked weird. At the time I couldn’t place my finger on why but now I know it’s because he was not human.
The theater was kind of cool to look at in a vintage kind of way. They were not showing anything when I drove by and I made the decision early on to stay out of the theater altogether. After the theater, I saw a small building that said LittleBrooke Press. If anything else I figured I could write for the paper.
As I approached the apartment building a woman was standing outside. Her face was weird as hell. It looked like she had far too much plastic surgery like her face was threatening to pop at any moment. “Hi, can I help you?” she asked me. Her voice was shrill, it was gross to even hear her speak. It sounded like she was putting on a fake voice just to speak to me. “Hi, my wife accepted a job offer. Unfortunately, she has passed away. I would still like to claim the apartment left to us. I can work at any place that currently has an opening.” I offered.
“LittleBrooke Press has space for two more writers!” She smiled and handed me the keys to the apartment. She never asked my name and she knew exactly where I wanted to go. I thought it was weird but I didn’t argue. Instead, I took the keys and thanked her. I spent that whole day getting settled into the new apartment. A couple of things, the front door had four different locks on it. I thought that was pretty weird. I also did not see or hear any other people until my third night in the apartment. I called the LittleBrooke Press about a potential job and they told me to email my submissions. There was no need for me to come in person and honestly, I liked this deal a lot.
For the first few months, I spent my time writing about whatever came to my mind. After that, I would send it in and get my money back. The editor never told me what to do and they never requested anything. It was sweet. As December rolled around I could feel myself slipping into a seasonal depression. At that point, I had made no progress in any of my investigations. I did not know the town well enough and frankly, I felt like I was wasting my time. That night I decided to check out the local bar. It was pretty hidden, you had to drive further into LittleBrooke to find it. Once I got there I was shocked! The place was packed. I sat down at the bar and ordered a drink.
The bartender was hot as hell, too hot. She was so even looking so perfectly symmetrical that it made me extremely uncomfortable. There wasn’t a single hair out of place. “So are you new in town?” She asked me. “Yeah, I just got here a couple of months ago. My now-deceased wife accepted a job offer here.” I said bluntly and dryly. I wanted to finish my drink and go. It was like the bones in my body were screaming at me to leave. The woman looked shocked. “Tell me, does that happen often? Do people accept a job offer in LittleBrooke and turn up dead a couple of days later?” I hissed. It was a genuine question but she did not take it too kindly. She took my drink from my hands and told me to leave.
As I made my way back to my car I could hear someone coming up from behind me. I turned around as fast as possible and had to take three steps back. It was the bartender, but she did not look the same. Half of her face was weighed down like she had no bones at all. Her eyes were bulging out of her head. She gurgled at me. “You need to leave!” She finally snapped and swung her arm in my direction. I moved back before she could hit me. As her hand hit my car window it shattered like it was made of ice. I watched as her arm popped and clicked. I could see it slowly getting longer. Before I knew it her arm was dragging on the pavement! She lunged at me so I punched her in her stomach. She gurgled again and sunk her teeth into my jacket. I screamed for help as we hit the pavement. She was trying fucken eat me! I grabbed her by her hair and threw her backward as hard as I could. As I scrambled to my feet and looked at her I screamed again. Her skin was pulled back. Now hugging the bones on her face. Her eyes were completely exposed! I turned and dove into my car as fast as I could. I slammed the door behind me and sped out of the parking lot like a bat out of hell.
The next morning I received a letter under my door. “Sorry, you had problems last night! Please accept our sincerest apologies.” -Mayor Brookes. There was $300 included with the letter. Now, I thought about leaving but decided I had to stay. Something was going on here and I had to find out what. I removed my jacket to see if the woman had injured me, she didn't but the experience was still terrifying. For the first time in a very long time, I was scared. But I also felt closer to the truth than I have ever been before.

Year Two in LittleBrooke

I spent all of January writing about the women who attacked me. I even contacted the police. I quickly learned that the police were going to be completely useless. My editor never sent the story back so I had assumed it was published.
At the end of the month, I left to shop for some supplies. Let me tell you, the grocery store in LittleBrooke is something else. They don’t have any brands you’ve ever heard of and at first, that drove me nuts. However, I quickly came to fall in love with the food here. It was comforting to have something to enjoy. Like always, I made sure to shop for two to three months at a time. Shopping was easy, I used the self-checkout to make sure I didn’t have to speak to anyone.
Once I got home I put everything away and decided to look around the apartment building. My whole floor started with 301 and went all the way to 310. The first floor was 501 to 509. There was a technical second floor but none of the doors were labeled. It looked like someone was renovating the place.
I got to see some of my neighbors too. An older woman, two men, and I were living next door to a lady the whole time. I had never seen or heard from these people before. It seemed like everyone wanted to keep to themselves too. I wanted to try and talk to someone but every time I approached them they turned and walked away. For what it's worth they looked completely normal.
So I left the apartment building and ventured around the property. There were no other apartments anywhere close to the one I was staying at, or so I thought until I found one about thirty minutes away. It was so out of the way you wouldn't find it unless you were looking. Against my better judgment, I opened the doors to the building and walked right inside. The place smelled like rust and soot.
I went to explore the first floor and was shocked to find blood trails on the floor and the ceiling. I followed the trail and made sure to look at the numbers on each door. This floor was numbered 1-10. Most of the doors were locked and I wasn’t going to try and knock anything down. I opened the door to apartment 10 and walked right inside. There was just enough light from the sun to illuminate the place. It looked like the whole place had been ransacked. I checked the tables and cabinets before heading into the bedroom. I searched the dresser and under the pillows before finally checking under the bed. When I looked under I spotted a black box. I grabbed it and that is when I got the feeling again. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I felt something sharp dig into my shoulders.
I screamed as loudly as I could, my face slammed off of the carpet and I clenched the box with one hand. Before I could figure out what the hell was happening I was tossed backward. I went into the bedroom door and rolled a couple of times until I reached the torn-up couch. I slowly lifted my head and to my horror what I was looking at was way too far from human to be real.
It looked like a dog ape thing. It was mostly skinless aside from some skin on its torso and face. The creature had thick, long claws and was standing on its hind legs. It barked at me. Its fangs were huge! I quickly scrambled to my feet and rushed out of the door as fast as possible. I could feel the blood running down my back. Never once did I consider letting this box go.
“Help!” I screamed as I burst through the apartment complex doors and started to run back to the main road. My heart was pounding, I could feel my chest getting tighter with each step. I could hear the beast behind me, it was screeching. I thought I was going to die for sure, there was no way I could continue to outrun this beast. That’s when I heard a car and before I knew it I could see it! A woman was waving me over, she was just up ahead! I had to push a little harder. I had to be just a little stronger.
When I felt the embrace of the car door I ripped it open and dove inside. She sped away and I looked out of the window. The beast did not follow us any further. “Are you insane!” She snapped at me. That’s the last thing I remember before passing out.
When I woke up I was laying on my stomach on an extremely comfortable couch. I could smell someone making pasta with meat sauce. My stomach was going insane. Everything hurt though, especially my back and my left side. I figured I had hurt my side when I was tossed across the room.
At this point, I did not dive into the box yet. I could barely move. “Hi.” I heard a woman say from the kitchen. “Thank you,” I replied before trying to sit up. I was so concerned that this woman would be another monster. When I saw her though I knew she was normal. She didn't look so damn perfect and that was a breath of fresh air.
“What's your name?” She asked me as I watched her prepare two bowls of food.
“Leon,” I said before closing my eyes. “You heard me screaming?” I asked her seriously.
“I did. I’m pretty sure everyone in our building did. You got hurt pretty badly, I did my best to patch you up.” She paused and laughed. “My name is Ashley.”
So I ended up crashing at her place. During this time I tried to focus on recovering. Sleeping became hell, I was having constant nightmares. I also spent a lot of time working on articles. I ended up giving Ash the keys to my apartment so she could get my laptop. It was a big move to trust anyone here but I am glad I did.

Year Three and Four in LittleBrooke

During my recovery, I spent most of my time writing. I wanted to write about everything I have seen and experienced. I had a lot of questions and way too much time with my thoughts. Ash and I got to know each other too.
I told her about how my wife had died mysteriously. I eventually opened up about her being skinned and drained of her blood. Ash told me she had come to LittleBrooke with her older sister. Her sister went to work one day and never came back. She was working at the theater. Ash had told me that she was stuck here, she didn’t feel right leaving with her sister still missing. Every time she would try the cops would meet her at the town line.
It was during this time that we both shared that we had never seen a police station. We talked about the monsters too. Her first run-in with one was at the grocery store. I told her about what happened to me at the bar. She told me that she heard rumors of the beast living beyond the apartments. The first time she saw it was when it was attacking me.
As I started to recover more we discussed a couple of things. First, the neighbors here suck. She could hear me screaming and came to help but no one else did. Second, neither of us has seen any families since we moved here. It was at this point I decided I wanted to leave and I offered to take her with me. We could both get out come hell or high water. She agreed but there was something I had to do first.
I showed her the box I had taken from the apartment.
“You almost died for a box?” Ash asked me. “Yes,” I said seriously.
I opened it and blinked. I found a picture of a girl with black hair and bright green eyes. It read, Stephanie. I found a missing persons report too. This girl had been missing a year before I got here. I decided that my last article would be about her. I had written about a couple of missing people before this. For example, the old lady in our building vanished and her apartment was rented out two days later.
I also found a badge inside the box. It read F.O.P.P. and there was a name! Jack Bridges. We tried to look up the organization's name but we came up empty-handed. I ended up writing the story about Stephanie and the next day Ash and I got packing. We decided to take my car since the cops know what hers looks like. I packed up the essentials all over again and we piled into the car.
“We should check the other direction. Before we leave.” I suggested. Ash knew about the bar already but neither of us knew what was beyond that point: This suggested changed the course of our lives forever.
So we started driving in the other direction. We passed the bar where the woman had tried to eat me, we passed a convenience store I didn’t know this town had and we just kept driving. Eventually, I could hear Ash speaking to me, “Holy shit! The police station.” she pointed out. I couldn’t believe it either. I did not stop driving though but I wish I did.
Eventually, we saw a sign that read, LittleBrooke High. Go Bears!
I started to slow down a bit until the school was in view. The place looked run down as hell. There were holes in the walls and leaves growing up the side of the building. The parking lot was massive and full of buses. I pulled the car into the parking lot and told Ash to get into the driver's seat.
“You’re not serious?” She asked me. I could tell she wanted to go but I said, “This is it! This is the last place of note in this fucken town. Just take the wheel and I will be right back.” I said as I jumped out of the car and went to look around.
As I approached one of the buses I grabbed the doors, they were already open a crack. I pulled them open and was hit with a horrible stench. I had to step back and puke and no I am not going to describe what I saw in that fucken bus. At that point, I decided I had seen enough and it was time to fucken go.
“Help!” I heard someone cry from a couple of buses over. “Please!” I heard again. I wanted to slap myself because I knew better. I had already decided it was time to leave but I went to investigate anyway. I went to the bus and pulled the doors open. It smelled like stale piss and blood. “Back here!” A girl screamed out to me. I made my way to the back of the bus, stepping on school jackets and over backpacks. That is where I found them. Two teenagers are tied to the leg of a bus seat. They looked horrible, caking in blood and sweat. They were both injured. “Stephanie?!” I exclaimed as I bent over to free them. I recognized her face the moment I saw it.
“Can you move? I asked the blonde girl.” As I started to let her go. “Everything hurts.” She told me. I opened the emergency exit and called for Ash to pull the car over. It took her a second to hear me but she came as fast as possible. “I am going to get you guys in the car and we are going to get out of here, okay?” I told them. I wanted to tell them everything was going to be okay, but I couldn't. It felt like that would be a huge lie.
Ash stepped out of the car and helped get the girls into the backseat. As I stopped to look around I could feel the bus shift in weight. I turned around and inhaled sharply. Standing before me was a creature wearing a jacket that said COACH on it. He looked sickly, and pale, and his veins were protruding from his face and hands. As he ran at me I jumped out of the emergency exit door just in time to feel something slam off of the back of my head. I looked down to see a barbed football. I could feel blood trickling down my neck, I stumbled forward and felt a hand grab my arm. Ash was shoving me into the car. She slid over me, closed the passenger door, and backed the car up. I thought she was moving like lightning.
At this point, everyone was screaming. My heart was threatening to jump out of my fucken chest. I was so sure we were all going to die here, just like everyone else I had seen on the buses. But no, Ash sped out of the parking lot. The coach chased us to the school limits but for some reason, he did not follow us anymore.
I know we should've stopped to see if the kids could find their parents but we didn't. Instead, Ash just kept driving. Eventually, we could hear the cops behind us but that did not stop her. It took us six hours to finally see the You Are New Leaving LittleBrooke sign! I couldn’t believe it. This place was not that big at all.
So listen, if you’re invited to take a job in LittleBrooke. Don’t take it. It’s not worth your life.

I posted this as a reply to another thread, but thought (thot?) I would share here, too. Please to enjoy my recap of S3 Episode 3. Spoilers (obviously).

1. Starting off in LA. Kim's body guard/ stylist puts them both in black coats and camo pants so she can go meet Scott for pizza and pre-planned gossip. They're both single, so they have lots to talk about. Like how it's too hard for Kim to go on first dates with guys and also too hard for Kim to break up with guys. She did go out with a guy in NYC, but wasn't smart enough to not go to the same place where she used to hang out with Pete, so everyone thought she was getting back together with Pete. Scott recommends she go for an older Italian businessman, but only if he's hot. Kim's not into it. So they talk about Cher and her much younger boyfriend AE. It's the best. But also probably the worst because Cher must be too old to bang him with the lights on. Kim only bangs with the lights off now. You know, because she's shy.

Two. Kourtney is doing a photo shoot for Lemme "Fall in Love" with Travis. Their love was not the result of a Potion No.9, but for people without their chemistry, who have $30, these supplements containing the essence of flowers will open your heart. Domineco Dolce and his dudes stop by so Kourtney can remind everyone she knew them way before her wedding. Also, Kourtney is shy and didn't speak as a child. Until she was a teenager. The stylist puts Travis in no shirt and they roll around together taking pictures very similar to all the other pictures they've taken before.

1. Kris stops by to see Khloe and Rob. I mean Tate. I mean Tatum. Khloe and Tristan are doing great because they are never ever getting back together ever again. They have very good boundaries and Khloe does not want to fall into old habits. Khloe feels guilty she isn't connecting with her second baby -- that she had in secret via surrogate while her ex-fiancee was having his fourth baby with his side chick -- the same as True. So we have to talk about the difficulties of surrogacy/ miracle of being a mother again. Tatem is now on goat milk formula. He might, but does not puke on Kris.
   
2. In NYC, Kendall is getting ready to attend a Marni show at Fashion Week. This is much more fun and relaxing than when she used to walk the shows because now she is good and healthy and has good boundaries. Kris calls and tells Kendall she's the favorite daughter. But we all know it's really Kylie. Kris said so yesterday while taking a lie detector test on TV.
   
3. Back in LA, it's 6 days before the D&G show and Kim's glam team is getting her ready for a pre-show photo shoot. Her role as Kreative Director of the show has involved creating looks. Well, looks D&G originally created in the 90s. They are so cool and Kim-esque. Crystals from head to toe. Kim is worried about how Kourtney will feel about this whole thing. She probably wouldn't mind at all if it was just a little bit later. (Because time heals all wounds?)
   
4. It's stormy in NYC. Kourtney is in town for fashion shows and Lemme press. She has anxiety and PTSD and needs drugs. Or maybe Lemme matcha. Kourtney wants to show how passionate she is about vitamins. She used to hate press because of the criticism and pressure from the family to earn her keep. But now she's married and confident, so she was able to decide on flavors for her vitamins. Kris watched the Today Show interview and gave it a thumbs up, because Kourtney looked beautiful. Simon thinks that's amazing. The team thinks Kourtney did a great job of organically talking about Lemme during the interview about Lemme.
   
5. Still in NYC, Kourtney is making rounds of the magazines, handing out Lemme pills like Halloween candy. Kourtney loves Lemme Focus, but can't remember why. Travis wore no shirt to perform at a Tommy Hilfiger fashion show. Kris and Kendall show up. Kris tries out a few tag lines for the next campaign like "Lemme get the hell out of here and get a drink." They talk about Khloe's good test results from her melanoma situation. Which Kendall has diagnosed as a result of Khloe being too tired and stressed. Kourtney is a perfectionist and Kendall is a control freak both because of pressure from Kris. Kris thinks thats hilarious. Kendall suggests if they can channel the baggage of their dysfunctional childhoods into productive work, it's all good. Kris will take the blame for any anxiety she has caused, as long as it results in a successful product release.
   
6. Back to LA. Kim is spending quality time with North by allowing her to do her makeup with special effects makeup while she talks to Scott. Scott pitches an idea for an episode where they pretend to be normies. According to Kim, Kris is sad that she has pushed everyone into being so famous they have no sense of actual reality. But Kim can handle it. She's never been depressed. While her daughter continues to work on turning her into an old lady, Kim talks about being fine when her dad died. North farts. It smelled bad. North walks Kim around the house introducing her to the staff as Anika the Art Teacher. The staff helps Kim make her alone time with North fun by playing along. Kim loves making North happy by playing pranks and hanging out with Scott.
   
7. Kourtney and Trav are walking around NYC. Kourtney's outfit choice -- an oversized Blink-182 shirt and over the knee boots -- can't survive the 12 minute walk because the boots are falling down. Trav thinks she should take them off (And walk around barefoot in the rat feces and period blood covered sidewalk? Khloe would never let her set foot in her house ever again!) They make it to the Matcha shop without Travis needing to carry Kourtney like last time. NYC was a whirlwind, but Kourtney will always put family and husband ahead of work.
   
8. Kim arrives in Milan. However, her stylist does not because she forgot her passport. How is Kim supposed to do her job as Fashion Show Kreative Director without a stylist? How is Kim supposed to know what she likes and doesn't like without Danielle there to tell her? Someone needs to fly to Milan with her passport. There are 3 days left and they have no looks. Kim arrives at the D&G studio where 10 people are there ready to get a room full of D&G pieces into looks. Domineco tells Kim, "Your opinion in this case is very great for us." Kim wants people to think this show of rehashed 90s fashions is "Fresh" and "Cool." But it's going to be problematic for Kreative Director Kim to pull this off without her stylist. She always needs someone to confirm that something looks good. Kim doesn't want to do veils (Because Kourtney?). Kim wants more bedazzles, but also needs to check with Danielle. Domineco isn't crazy about bedazzled glasses with a corset dress, but Kim doesn't know without talking to Danielle. There's that fear people won't like it. (Is Danielle supposed to be the scape goat in case this whole show sucks?) A bad show could hurt Kim's brand. People might say Kim doesn't know how to work on the creative side. (Um... they're sure going to say that now, after she is such a floundering mess without her stylist!). She just doesn't know how she's going to do this without Danielle.
   

Scenes: Kim thinks Danielle not being there happened for a reason. Kendall takes Kylie horseback riding and tries to kill her. Kourtney wants to kill Kim for kopying her wedding. Kim is taken completely off guard by Kourtney's reaction. The producers try to pretend there's going to be a "Kendall is pregnant" story line.

If you are queuing a group activity, you're signing up to play as part of a team.

• read chat, and participate in conversations about strategy
• don't flame or mock: for the vast majority of people, that is going to make them play worse
• be willing to go with someone else's plan or adapt around what a teammate is doing
• play it out, don't be a bad sport if things aren't going your way
• pay attention to what is happening to your team and let that influence your gameplay choices

If you want a 100% win rate, think you're better than everyone else, and/or are so socially anxious that the idea of typing in chat overwhelms you, then you should probably switch to a single player game. If you're in a shitty mood, maybe realize a collaborative activity not entirely in your control might not be the best way to spend your time.
No you don't need to be BFFs or a mentor, but there is a lot of room between that and totally self-absorbed asshole. Wherever you think you are on that spectrum, aim two notches higher because people tend to give themselves too much credit.

This is going to be a long one, sorry for that... So with the new game releasing (hopfully) next year, i want to get the platinum trophy for dragon age Inquisition.
To achieve that i need to complete the game on the highes difficulty level. The problem is, i suck at the combat in this game. I dont know why. I am not a bad gamer usually, i can hold my own in some souls like games, i am decent in other rpg's and i am really good in fps games if i can say so my self... But in dragon age Inquisition i just suck ass. Never played anything else than the easyest difficulty level. In my latest play through i tryed to play on normal just to go back down in the middle of my first boss figth.
So my question is, in what ways can you make the game easyer?
What class is in your opinion the easyest to play as the Inquisitor?
What skills shoud you give him?
What are the best companions, and what skills shoud you give them?
What is in your opinion the best tactical lineup for your companions? I usually play mage, with two warrior companions who both have weapon and shield and one rouge companion with bow and arrow.
What is the easyest way to grind enough power to complete the main story? Also maybe influence, to get some Inquisition perks. And while on that topic, what Inquisition perks woud you recommend?
What is the easyest way to grind xp?
What side quests are worth while?
What locations outside the main quest are worth while?
Where do you find the best gear for the playstile you recommend me?
Are there any dialouge options or other actions you can make to make the game easyer? (For example: if you have a over 65 or so Reputation in the winter palace you can skip the bossfigth with the grand dutchess florianne)
Are there any short cuts you can take?
Yeah so i am thankfull for any advice you can give me Also i dont care what ending i get or something like that. I just want to do this as fast and easy as possible.
Also Also, sorry for my bad english. So yeah thanks again in advance!
Edit: Typos

I'm going to try to write my thoughts and feelings down as best as I can. I don't know if it will make any sense. I don't know if I will reread it either. I just need to get my thoughts out somehow. I don't know if I want advice or if I will even respond to any comments but if you have any thoughts please comment if not for me than anyone else who could come across this post.
I'm 22 years old. I struggle with self harm. I am scared to tell my family. I know my mom will blame herself for not seeing it. it's been almost 8 years since I started. I was 14, almost 15 when I first started doing it. The last time I did it was 5 months ago, but I still get the urge sometimes. I think I'm spiraling into depression again. For the last few days I haven't been eating enough, but every time I look at food I just don't know what to eat because nothing sparks hunger. I drink a lot of water, orange juice and other things, so I know I'm not dehydrated. Sometimes I feel happy when I don't eat a lot of food. Because I want to lose weight. And it's nice to have one thing that I can control. I don't have anything else I can control. I don't feel tired when I lay down to sleep, but luckily I'm not struggling too much with falling asleep right now. It was way worse when I was in high school. I hate that it's summer now. It's so hot and the days are longer. I hate the expectation that you have to go out in the nice weather and have fun. It also doesn't help that I struggle with lots of sweating and because of my self harm scars I don't want to wear anything but long-sleeved clothes. It's hard to get out of bed when I wake up in the morning. I have woken up at 6 am almost every day, probably because of the sun and I just hate it. I try to sleep more but when I wake up again I start scrolling on my phone which can be hours.
I hate my life. I don't remember a time where I haven't hated my life. I grew up with an alcoholic dad. He could go long between drinking but when he drank it could last one day or up to a week. He never physically hurt me or anything but it made me feel lonely. Dad was there physically but not there emotionally. Sometimes I blame my mom for not leaving him. They're not married but it's also not easy to just move because of money issues and how expensive everything is. I don't live with them anymore. I don't really have contact with my dad anymore, only mom. I remember them arguing a lot and I am happy I don't have to witness that every day anymore. I also hate my dad for letting one of our dogs run away. I think I was 13 when it happened. He was out hunting with our dog and she did have a gps on her collar but apparently it didn't work and they couldn't find her again. She was just 5 or 6 years old. I still miss her. I also miss the first dog we had who died of cancer when she was 14. I think the cancer could have been avoided if my parents just fed her food she was supposed to have and not leftovers from their food. I'm scared for the current dog we got. I'm scared that she will become obese because she is always fed food she isn't supposed to have. They walk her a lot but that doesn't really help if she is fed too much food. I also remember being a kid and being scared of that one Bratz episode where Burdine force feeds this man until he dies. I remember being scared that my mom would die because she is overweight. She has always tried to lose weight but she has never been successful. I'm scared that my mom will die because I don't know what I will do without her.
When I was about 16 or 17, I sent nudes to a stranger online. Sometimes I'm scared that people will find out about it. I think the reason I did it was because I was so lonely. I had friends in high school at the time but I didn't feel included. I felt like I was the one person in our group that didn't belong. I just didn't feel like any of my friends cared about me. And I'm sure they believed I didn't care about them either. Because I had an argument with one of them about something stupid. She cried but I didn't cry and I have had so many dreams about it. It's been many years but I hate what I did. She was my best friend and I fucked it up. She was the first person I told about my self harm. When I told her, she made sure that I would be safe and she had me sleep over at her house that night. I will always be thankful for her.
I was never bullied in school, only teased a little bit but I didn't feel safe at school either. I was scared to tell teachers that I needed to pee and so I wet myself on multiple occasions. Embarrassing but it happened at least twice. I also did something very stupid when I was about 7 or 8. Someone in my year told me to do something and I did it because I was scared to say no. I got in trouble for doing it and I tried to tell the teachers that they forced me to do it but they didn't understand what I was trying to say and my mom grounded me. That didn't really do anything though. I also remember when I was 14 that I refused to play volleyball when my class was supposed to play. The teacher told all of us that we had to because no one in the class volunteered. I absolutely hated it because some of the boys in my year would always correct me whenever we played it in phys ed. Eventually the teacher told me that I could do something else and I got to help another teacher carry some chairs into a shed. I also remember the first time I hurt myself. I remember the exact date and I remember the following Monday in phys ed and I told the teacher I forgot my gym clothes and couldn't participate. I remember that after the class was done he tried to talk to me because he noticed something was off but he didn't dig deep enough for me to tell him what I had done. Sometimes I wonder if people I went to school with realised that I had hurt myself because I used to wear t shirts to phys ed but then suddenly just started wearing long sleeve shirts. Sometimes I even wonder if my mom secretly knows because I always wear long sleeve shirts.
I never knew I was autistic until I was about 20 years old. I am angry that no one saw it. I was the one that had to figure it out. My mom was told that I would just grow out of my "shy" nature. I wasn't shy, I was fucking anxious about everything. I was clearly struggling but no one helped me. I remember when I was about 13 years old, the school nurse was worried about me because I was alone during recess and got me to talk to this woman. I had friends but I also liked to be alone. I don't know what exactly the woman worked as but I remember the book we used in sessions had the words cognitive behaviour therapy on it. No one told me why I had to see this woman. how can you expect to help a child when the child doesn't even know why they're there to begin with or the child doesn't even know they apparently need help. One day the sessions just stopped and that was that. Nothing came out of it and it didn't help. The only thing I'm grateful for is that she suggested that I participate in an after school activity. I joined a choir and was there until I was 18. I loved singing in the choir, I also got to sing some solo songs too but I never got any friends out of it. I just showed up to all the practices and performances but never felt comfortable enough to make friends.
When I was in first grade, I got diagnosed with dyslexia which I have always thought was wrong. And even one of my teachers in school never even knew I had the diagnosis and she didn't notice anything. Is it possible that they misdiagnosed me with dyslexia instead of autism? It has just never been a diagnosis I identified with. Autism is different though. I got the diagnosis when I was 20 and I know it fits me. I just don't feel like I belong with other autistic people. There are so many things that don't fit me or I just don't experience but is apparently something "all" other autistic people seem to struggle with. I'm tired of not feeling like I belong anywhere. I don't even feel safe in my own apartment. I hate the placement of the living room windows and I hate the tiny space between the counter and stove. I hate that I can hear every fucking time someone uses the bathroom. When I'm in the shower it feels like everyone can hear that I am in the shower. I'm scared to wash my clothes because the washing machine is loud and I'm scared of noise complaints. I hate going out with the trash and getting the mail. I feel like people are staring at me even when there's nobody there. I hate spending my days just looking at my computer. I don't have a job. I don't even know if I'm capable of working. The last time I tried I had to quit because I just couldn't do it even if I was only working part time. It was so exhausting and I'm scared that my life won't get better. I look forward to the future and getting older but I am so scared that things will stay the same. Its been the same for almost 3 years now.
I'm also scared that my mom don't like me anymore. I feel like I am to dependent on her. I always rely on her to go grocery shopping or do simple stuff like clothes shopping or going to the movies. I want to be independent but It's so hard. I remember when I was 18 I wanted to start a completely new life after high school. I tried to study film at the other side of the country. It just caused burnout. I wasted so much money, energy and time on it. I didn't even want to study anything after high school but my mom pressured me to at least study something so I would have a degree in something. The only thing I liked about living there is that no one knew me and I could just be anonymous when walking around. If I could have any super power it would be invisibility because I hate when people stare at me.
The only good things about my life now is my special interests. I love conlanging, austronesian/australian languages, the dutch language, merpeople, h2o just add water, mako mermaids, the bureau of magical things, the elephant princess, summer camp island, gravity falls, rick and morty, the new version of the little mermaid, dodie, siren (show), ghost rockers (tv show), conspiracy theories, world building, cooking, veganism, heartstopper, the owl house, amphibia, icon for hire, bring me the horizon, beabadoobee, pommelien thijs, froukje, tinne oltmans, poppy (singer), cosmic horror, the backrooms, lost in the hyperverse youtube channel, writing stories, filmmaking, singing. Even if I like all these things it's still hard to do participate in it sometimes. I can go months without doing any of it. I don't like it when I'm not writing. I feel the need to be productive but I don't have the energy. I want to be a screenwriter. I got so many ideas for stories but I'm never satisfied with them when I try to write anything down. And I'm scared of asking for advice because I feel like people will just make fun of me for my bad writing or my bad ideas or literally anything.
Sometimes I think I am okay but then I feel bad again. It's a constant cycle. I might feel good one week and the next I feel awful but sometimes the cycle is longer or shorter. I have spoken to both a psychiatrist and psychologist because of my autism diagnosis but I didn't really get the help I needed then. I didn't even feel comfortable enough to talk to them and I had to write a 5 page letter with all my thoughts and feelings but I still don't think they understood the severity of my bad health. Sometimes I wish my problems was seen as just as important as physical health. I wish that I had cancer or something visible that people could easily see. It's hard when it's invisible and some people don't understand that mental health is just as important.
Recently I rewatched Heartstopper and it makes me even more depressed. I love Heartstopper, the show and comic. It reminds me of a life I could never have. I want my life to be as easy as theirs. I want to fall in love. I want to have friends. I want to have people that care about my mental health. I know my mom probably cares about my mental health, but no one else. I don’t feel like I can talk to her about anything deeper than what’s on the surface. I hate how easy everything seems to other people even though it probably isn't. Even heartstopper who is supposed to be a lighthearted story, just makes me envious. Sometimes I don't even know if I am capable of falling in love. I know I'm queer and non binary, but it's just so hard to find anyone who would like me and someone who has similar interests. I did try do go on a date with a guy once but he only wanted sex. When we talked to each other on the dating app, he seemed nice and he liked some of the same things as me. I just wish I could fall in love with anyone at this point.
I haven't told anyone about some of the stuff in this post. I just don't want people to worry about me. I'm worried that if I tell people in my personal life then it will become worse. I have felt suicidal multiple times before. I just don't ever want to feel like that again. I hope this post makes sense. English isn't my first language. I don't know if I have anything more to say. If you read everything then thank you.

As the son of an Asian immigrant that grew up in the US, I used to believe this too.
“Oh no my dad or my mom smacked me! How could they??!! Child abuse!”
Or “they are controlling! They are toxic!”
Different cultures have different way of parenting due to their environment. Perfect example is Asian culture. I’ve seen more and more in the last several years of people in the west criticizing AND influencing even Asians to rebel against their parents due to their parenting.
When you think about Asian society like China, South Korea, and Japan, you need to understand just how competitive their society is. At least in China, kids spend their entire childhood preparing for the “Gao Kao”. That test will determine which college you go to and essentially rest of your entire life. You can see why parents push their kids so hard. They want their kids to succeed and do well in life so they push them.
Only the BEST OF THE BEST can live a great life. Especially when you’re competing with so many people.
Western culture doesn’t have that. So when these western social media show how “abusive” these parents are for making their young kids study, it enrages me.
So when asian parents get that stereotype of “you can only have A. No B”, it’s because of the competitive environment that they came from. And they push their kids to succeed in the west too. There is nothing wrong with them pushing their kids to do better.
This notion of “oh let kids be kids!” They’re fucking kids! They need parental guidance. Not for you to cater to their immature needs. Your job as a parent is to care about the long term effects of your child’s life quality, even if it means it paints you as a the bad person.
You know what I want to do as a kid? I wanted to play with power rangers and video games and make music. I hated school.
In fact my relationship with my parents struggled for years in and after high school even into my grad school years thinking the same thing like how my parents didn’t let me be a kid. I bought into the western belief. As I thought more about it the last few years, I appreciated them for what they did.
Sure, is my life amazing and I’m driving lambos and living in a mansion now? No. But I’m doing fairly well and I’d be doing even better had I listened to them more instead of rebelling.

The first game is one of my favorite games for the majority of my life. The first time I beat it I was so young that my dumbass ran in circles throwing grenades at Malak since spamming flurry level 1 wasn’t cutting it (I just really liked the whoosh noises).
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I give it a playthrough every 2 years or so and always have a blast, and now that I saw it was on switch alongside the sequel, I decided to try KOTOR 2 after doing a force only run with like 8 strength in KOTOR 1.
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For variety’s sake (and a fear of soft locking myself due to the first game’s difficulty at times) I went full meat-head-muscle-guy-hit-stuff guardian with 16 or so strength. The beginning of the game was quite slow and I understand why as a teenager I could never get further than Telos.
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I love world building as much as the next nerd but my lord the amount of log recordings and depth perceptionally challenged mining droids I had to wack while wearing tight fallout cosplay was definitely getting old after a couple hours. The majority of it is spent uncovering a sabotage conspiracy involving evil droids and miners trying to sell a wizard to the mafia, which isn’t particularly relevant aside from a set up of everyone trying to kidnap you and that the red lightsaber fellas are back once again. Too long for what it accomplishes.
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Finally off that space hell and we’re dropped into Telos. I enjoyed the character interactions with everyone trying to bribe you alongside relaxing in a cantina and doing the mini games. Czerka starts off with logic but (as I found most themes in this game) end up being absurdly mustache twirling while spouting about making space walmart great again. So unless you just really hate plants you side with the other boys and eventually get shot onto the actual planet and meet Bao, who’s a great wingman to have around despite me having to crank up my volume when he speaks.
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At this point I’m really loving the combat, it had a good sense of challenge and my team had nice variety once Bao showed up to do more skill monkey actions, since my exile smashed everything they touched. Not much more to say except meeting Atris briefly, who’s main personality trait is attitude. After telling her I don’t really care I was exiled and that my more pressing matter is being shot at, she begrudgingly let me leave while longingly staring at my behind.
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Here the game opens more and I’ll give my thoughts more broadly. Our new thong toting albino handmaiden joins mister manslaughter Atton and myself on Dantooine, a very enjoyable planet with good fights and fun side quests that don’t derail the main goal too much. The politics are simple and brief with both sides being the ol’ good and evil. Unfortunately we’re blessed with the douchebag Jedi who is impressively able to contradict his own values every time he opens his mouth. “You saved me from this cage you damn idiot now they’re going to attack the settlements all because of you. Me being in this cage would have saved the day! You should’ve known!”. Yeah sounds like a needlessly risky plan that involves leaving the defenders completely out of the loop and pretending to know what these murderers are thinking, let’s not do that. He’s the most comical example of “jedi bad I wanna sit and think” and the game isn’t particularly subtle about it.
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Regardless we move on as I’m ambushed by a toothless submissive in my ship that I promptly one shot. She then falls in love with me. As one does.
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With my harem of submissives at the ready I leave the wizard choker Atton in the cockpit for the rest of the game and move on to the planet of crime Nar Shadaar, and begin to become very distracted by how every female can’t stop talking about how hot I am. Even the damn assassins are down bad.
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I find this planet to be the most fun part of the game for me with a good blend of politics, exploration, combat, and overall atmosphere. It felt very “star ears underworld” like I remember from the old EU novels. Mira joins the crew as a bad bitch no nonsense bounty hunter who makes god awful decisions, firmly securing her place in my party for the rest of the game despite her asmr voice forcing my tinnitus ass to read the subtitles.
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It’s of note that I built my lightsaber after Dantooine and essentially one shot everything in the game with force speed and flurry, with Brianna also hitting like a truck while the third member buffs/shoots. I love that the guns are far more valid in this game and Mira felt great to use as the party leader due to her high skills and ignoring mines, while my other two members force jumped into battles. This lasted the entire game and made the combat far less engaging however, as it was a rinse and repeat of extremely fast battles, where I two shotted Sion on Korriban before Kreia told me to piss off.
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I disliked Onderon and it brought the game down quite a bit for me, due to its politics undermining the writing focus of the game, which I’ll get into here to finish off my review.
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This games writing is pretty damn good. The biggest thing that made me sad while playing was that I couldn’t bring all my party members with me at all times as I thought each one was super engaging. Unfortunately in a regular blind playthrough you miss A LOT due to the influence system blue balling some extremely well written dialogue. This hit the hardest with Kreia in my playthrough, which is a shame as I knew she was the one with the best acted/written lines. With the dialogue I did receive however, I can definitely see what they were going for but I don’t find it remotely as thought provoking as the game’s reputation would have you think. Kreia “teaches” you some conceptually interesting ideas, but they end up being hypocritical in their own sense and at the end of the day she really is just spiteful about her failures along with everyone else’s.
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You gave that man 5 dollars, now you’ve effectively made him a target to others where he wouldn’t otherwise be one, making his life considerably worse due to your quick and simple act of kindness. This is certainly thought provoking, but for kind of idiotic reasons. Can an individual even rise up and better their lives without given the chance to do so? Should all be cast into poverty and homelessness without aid as they are too weak to fully pull themselves up in a selfish society? This is some metal gear rising senator armstrong “strong eat the weak” shit and here’s it’s being compared to the force.
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She claims I’m only as strong as I am due to the unfortunate circumstances of being hunted, but I was born with a gift and kidnapped from birth to be a fighter, unlike this beggar in the slums. That lesson is essentially the “challenge breeds excellence” poster that was in your elementary school classroom and it cannot be applied to all situations/people accurately due to several varying circumstances. This is decent stuff honestly when not taken at face value, as it can be interpreted that Kreia is just wrong, so I disagreed with her but also told her that I saw value in what she was trying to teach me then. I suppose the main criticism I have with her writing is she’s VERY blatantly evil, which ended up being a distraction to me instead of being a fresh look at the force.
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Then comes Onderon. Every dispute in this game is insanely obvious who the good/bad guys are, with the latter typically trying to murder babies to achieve their goals. Then I land on this planet and see desperate families begging on the street to be allowed to leave, a man being held in custody with no evidence about to be executed as the authorities are too lazy, and the sworn beast rider enemies of the city casually attempting to murder people inside its own walls due to some dumbass blood truce.
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This queen sucks ass honestly, and this civil unrest and negligence wouldn’t last another 6 months. Then the other side shows up, a bunch of fascists going for a power grab when the republic is recovering from a war effort, claiming its due to war mongering when they’d obviously all be dead if they werent protected from the mandalorians. So they suck ass too. And I decide to not get too involved as the entire game has a “I don’t really care, I’m not a Jedi anymore and I’m trying to learn more about myself and defeat the Sith that hunt me” option for the vast majority of dialogue.
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I decide to take Kreia’s lesson to heart and don’t decline Tobin’s offer in the cantina, as I wanted to see both sides of the conflict in full before making a decision instead of just the “good guy” option as that could have irresponsible consequences, as she said. It’s a shame that once I agreed to help them by saying I really only wanted to speak to the Jedi master, my exile suddenly gained a thirst for genocide and was commited to become a terrorist without giving me the option of informing the queen of the attack this dipshit just briefed me on.
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And thus I spent the next hour or so being called a Sith as I helplessly murdered the entire queen’s army without a single moment that lets me say “I didn’t agree to be the damn general of your terrorist regime”. I’m forced to kill the Jedi master as all the options say “muwhaha my revenge at last”, and all the other Jedi at Dantooine I had pleasant conversations with in the past decide my trial of life has expired. Then Kreia, who called me a failure the entire game for not doing the selfish choices, then calls me a failure for selfishly taking revenge.
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The worst part about this situation? I literally pulled the exact same tactic earlier in the SAME game. When the invaders at Dantooine asked me to help them, I agreed so they’d tell me their plan then immediately snitched to the settlers and set up a defense with this information. Brianne wasn’t happy with this method but tough, it’s called using your brain and saving little baby lives. But here it’s bafflingly not an option and it really hurt my overall experience of this game, changing my ending which all in all seems rushed/unfinished as well, which is truly a real shame once you learn of its forced early release.
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Those of you who know the game very well may find this critique my own fault, and I’ll certainly take a degree of blame for it, but it left a bad taste overall. Despite that, the story in general was such a great time with realistic portrayals of rebuilding in post-war time, and ptsd affecting multiple people differently. I don’t regret playing it and while I do prefer the first game slightly I do look forward to a dark side playthrough one day in the future, as the vast majority of the game really improved on the overall flow that the first had established, despite some pacing issues here and there.

So when you think of cities with high culture and vibrant music scenes on the east coast, what springs to mind? Obviously New York. Thanks to Drake, we all know about the growing music scene in Toronto. You prahbahbly musta tawt a Bawstan tew. Maybe Montreal or Philadelphia or even Baltimore crossed your mind.
Hah. Baltimore.
Time to check your cultural bias, pal. You passed over a quiet little city on the south shore of Lake Ontario, nestled in the Genesee River valley. It has a history as a hotbed of Abolitionism and Women’s Rights. It is the home of Eastman Kodak, Xerox, Bausch & Lomb, Western Union, Ragu and other innovative companies. It has a lively music scene, great nightclubs, world-renowned universities, thriving museums, arts & culture festivals, and live theatre. It is a true cultural gem that many folks overlook.
Yep. You bet your ass I am talking about Rochester, New York.
Since we know that Stoner Rock can come from anywhere, it should be no surprise that Rochester has produced one of the leading bands in this genre. This week we are going to check out a band you are going to want to listen to. If you know them, you love them. If you haven’t heard of them, you are going to thank me.
This week’s band is KING BUFFALO.
About Them
Hold on a sec. King Buffalo? Not King Rochester?
To be fair, King Rochester sounds like the villain in a Disney movie. Kinda hard to imagine that on a T-Shirt. King New York sounds like a particularly obnoxious Yankees fan (and yeah, finding a Yankees fan that isn’t obnoxious is a tough go). King Albany sounds like a car made by Kia.
But King Buffalo? That just works.
Our heroes didn’t start out together. King Buffalo were made up of members of two other Rochester area bands.
Randall Coon and Scott Donaldson were playing together in Velvet Elvis. That five piece band played heavy rock with space-based themes in the early 2010’s. Sean McVay and Dan Reynolds were in another band called Abandoned Buildings Club (side note: kinda neat that their initials were ABC), who had a pure psychedelic rock vibe. When both VE and ABC appeared to be having limited success, the four musicians decided to merge their talents into one band. Coon had handled vocals and guitar in Velvet Elvis and Donaldson had been rock solid on drums. McVay had done vocals and guitar in Abandoned Buildings Club and Reynolds had anchored the sound with his bass. All the pieces were there for a classic Beatles-esque lineup.
So out of the wreckage of ABC and VE, KB arose. The four members gelled so well that they were able to record their first demo - aptly titled Demo - in just two days. Their sound was immediately compared to tourmates and close friends All Them Witches. But where ATW were bluesy and sludgy, King Buffalo had produced songs full of space. Oh, there were heavy riffs for sure - but there were passages of music that were contrastingly lighter and further apart. The best example of these contrasts can be found in the more than 11 minutes of Providence Eye. The first six and a half minutes come at you at a lulling pace, enveloping you in the moment. You get swept up in the rolling riffs. But then the drop happens and you suddenly realize the song has been building to this peak. The tempo picks up and you ride a relentless rollercoaster until you hit the Black Sabbath-inspired outro, which takes you home. It is an emotional experience. The two other tracks - In Dim Light and Pocket Full of Knife are smaller essays on the same theme.
It was clear right from Demo that King Buffalo had some serious talent. But if you have listened to the band you will notice that one thing is starkly different on Demo than from any of their other releases: the vocals. Randall Coon was the lead vocalist on these recordings. If you play them up against anything since by the band they stand out. Our very own QotSA may have successfully had multiple vocalists on multiple tunes, but King Buffalo was destined to have Sean McVay take over the mic. Shortly after 2013’s Demo, Coon left the band to do a solo project called Skunk Hawk.
King Buffalo stood at a crossroads: did they look to replace Coon, or should they carry on as a Power Trio? The choice for them was obvious. McVay, Reynolds and Donaldson knew that they had fantastic potential together. They decided they didn't need anyone else.
Side note: Regular readers of these write ups know that All Them Witches just went through this exact crisis in 2019. What I didn’t share then is that ATW are close friends with KB. I would not be surprised to learn that ATW had some serious conversations about their lineup with the boys from KB before they, too, decided last year to pare down to just three members.
To re-christen their new lineup, in 2015 King Buffalo went in on a split EP with Swedish band Lé Betre (I mean, hooking up with a Swedish partner is a dream of mine, so I see the appeal.) They re-recorded their standout tune Providence Eye with McVay on vocals, as well as two new tracks - Like a Cadillac and New Time. New Time opens their side of the EP with an infectious, descending riff that hooks you immediately. It is clear from the lyrics - No wasting around, it’s a new time - that they had moved on from Coon. Like a Cadillac follows up and is a three and a half minute jam that leaves you wanting more. The re-recorded version of Providence Eye closes out their side of the split EP and leaves no doubt that they are in charge. It is a tighter, heavier version, and the amazing outro is so low down that it will make you want to rob your own house.
With their lineup now set, it was time to put together enough music to tour on. In 2016, King Buffalo released Orion. Here you can witness the melding of their influences into something majestic and fantastic, and it is here that they really develop their signature style.
To explain this style, you need to understand basic song structure.
Most pop songs tend to go verse - chorus - verse - chorus - bridge - chorus - chorus. Sure, you could add in a solo for the bridge, or a detailed intro or outro, or another verse - but this is a tried and true formula. Some variation of this dominates the pop charts to this day.
Not with King Buffalo songs. These guys are the masters of the drop, and you hear it in most of their tunes. QotSA fans are no strangers to that long build and release; it is an integral part of tunes like The Evil Has Landed, God is in the Radio, Song For The Dead, and I Appear Missing. One of the sickest drops ever recorded happens in the middle of the Them Crooked Vultures tune No One Loves Me & Neither Do I. It is where the music turns around, and a new riff takes over, often along with a pace change. It is then that you realize that the song has built to this climactic moment, and you are engulfed by the music.
King Buffalo does this better than anyone else, and you hear it clearly articulated, again and again, on the album Orion.
Take the song Kerosene for example.
A rolling bass riff from Reynolds establishes the song right out of the gate. Donaldson produces punchy drum beats with cymbal crashes at the end of each phrase. McVay’s slide guitar rounds out the intro. McVay’s vocals - very Ozzy like, if Ozzy had any semblance of self-control - frame the first verse, which ends in a fuzzy, heavy riff with crashing cymbals. This same pattern is repeated a second time and the drop is teased at just past three minutes in, but does not happen quite yet. The listener’s anticipation builds as the airy, soaring solo from McVay calls out in contrast to the rolling bass. After the guitar solo bridge, the band goes right back into the chorus. But then it happens: THE DROP. Just past 5 minutes in, the song takes a complete and abrupt turn for a totally different riff that is at the same time heavier and brand new, and yet has been there all the while.
What King Buffalo does brilliantly is subvert your musical expectations.
The standard structure is V-C-V-C-B-C-C.
Kerosene is V-C-V-C-B-C-DROP-OUTRO. Just when you subliminally expect something the same, you get something different.
The entire album is like that. Orion hardly sounds like a debut. It is a mature and deliberate soundscape built by talented musicians who are making significant choices about their art. Songs like Drinking From The River Rising open with an expansive and elastic topography, but drill down to the molten lava of heavy riffs and distorted fuzz. Sleeps On A Vine begins with one of the most zen riffs you’ve ever heard and ends in a tumultuous and heavy sonic assault that is pure controlled chaos. Every song on the album is a study in contrasts that leaves you with auditory whiplash and a burning desire for more.
They are that good.
King Buffalo were able to tour on their new material, and did so extensively. They played clubs and larger venues, often with friends and fellow Stoner Rockers All Them Witches and other bands like The Sword and Elder. In 2017, the released the EP Repeater as a follow up. It is just three songs (The vinyl ad reads, All songs on one side! No need to flip!) but it is a heck of a musical journey. The title track off the EP is 13+ minutes long and is one huge build. When the fuzz finally drops after almost 8 minutes, it is a true cathartic moment. It sneaks up on you, and is so welcome when it hits - especially after McVay’s repetition that “Every Day is the Same* - that you intrinsically understand how great it is when things finally change for the better. Too Little Too Late is an instrumental tune that is both enveloping and expansive. It is a terrific bridge to the final track, Centurion, which is an unbelievable groove. Centurion has three minutes of set up leading to an unreal fuzzy drop that is so dirty it will get you evicted from your apartment.
The influence of their touring with All Them Witches can also be seen on their next full length release, 2018’s Longing To Be The Mountain. Ben McLeod from ATW produced the album. ATW, The Sword and Elder are all thanked in the liner notes. The album picks up right where Repeater leaves off, with KB experimenting with long form songs like Morning Song and the title track, and shorter jams like Sun Shivers, Cosmonaut, and Quickening. Reynolds and McVay pepper the songs with synthesizer sounds that add colour and texture to the overall compositions. Donaldson drums with impeccable precision to provide each song with a safe mooring to return to, driving the guitars forward at the same time as he holds the rhythm in check. This is most clearly evident in Eye Of The Storm. The result is a rich tapestry of expansive and flowing music full of heavy jams and storytelling that will leave the listener wanting more. Their signature build-to-sonic-explosion style does not let fans down.
The success of Longing To Be The Mountain allowed for extensive touring across North America and Europe. It also led to appearances at bigger gigs, like at Rockpalast and the Stoned & Dusted desert rock event in 2019. Anyone that has seen any of their live work knows that King Buffalo are simply hypnotizing on stage. Reynolds’ bass work is reminiscent of Geddy Lee with his complex and flowing style. Donaldson brings controlled power to the drum kit, and is ready to cut loose when the drop comes. And McVay has become a true front man, comfortable with the lead voice on guitar and the microphone.
Their next release, Dead Star, dropped in 2020 and generated all kinds of buzz in the Stoner Rock scene. Of course, the tour planned to support it got axed when the entire world went into lockdown. But the (short album? EP?) is simply fantastic. Red Star Pt. 1 & 2 continues their long form examination and has everything you’d expect from them. Echo of A Waning Star is a lament of just over 3 minutes that is near-perfect. Ecliptic sounds like the soundtrack to a John Carpenter movie and is a complete jam with serious cool 1980’s vibes. Dead Star, the title track, is almost Radiohead-esque in its evocative and regretful take on death and decay.
But the standout track has to be Eta Carinae, which has one of the greatest musical drops and turn-arounds you will ever hear. The entire song pivots just past four minutes in and becomes a 70’s anthem worthy of Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath. If you listen to no other tune here today, you have to check it out. It will absolutely get stuck in your head.
The band dropped their first live record, Live At Freak Valley, in 2020. This is a really nice retrospective/greatest hits album kinda deal. What stands out is just how fucking tight the band is live. With some bands, live versions veer wildly from the recorded ones - and not at all in a good way. This record is the opposite. You can clearly hear on Orion and Kerosene that KB are just that good live.
In the wake of the global pandemic, King Buffalo decided to musically capture the moment in time. They decided to release a trifecta of albums. 2021 saw them drop The Burden of Restlessness and then Acheron. The third record in this trio is 2022’s Regenerator. It is really important to consider all three records in this Triptych at the same time, for they are a sonic cycle.
TBOR is a descent into despondency. Acheron is about hitting rock bottom, and being in Hell. Regenerator is about finding a way to claw yourself back into the light. Each album stands on its own, but together they form a sweeping epic journey that we can all relate to.
TBOR is an album where the protagonist gradually loses the will to exist. There is a cry of deep frustration in Burning, a not-so-subtle reference to a plague in Locusts, a study in being confined indoors in Silverfish, and an outright statement that our hero is sinking in Loam. In fact, the lyrics tell us: “Still I press my face into the ground/I’m waiting for the hammer to fall.”
It is not a happy album.
Just when you think things have to get better, we get the 4-track jam of Acheron. In this record, our hero has fallen to his lowest point. He has descended to Hell. The title track - the first one on the album - makes this clear, when it says: “Waking up under the ground/Silver asleep on my tongue.”
Just in case you didn’t get the classic reference, Acheron is the river one must cross in Greek mythology to get to the underworld. Souls going to Hell had coins placed in their mouth to pay Charon, the ferryman, to take them across the river to Hades. So our hero did sink into the Loam in the last album, and finds himself in Hell. This theme is reinforced in Zephyr, who was the Greek God of the West Wind, and Shadows, which references what the Greeks used to call dead spirits - Shades. And just in case you had any doubt, the final track on the album is Cerberus, named after the three-headed dog that guards the gates of Hades.
What is even cooler about Acheron is how it was recorded. Instead of a studio, they recorded the album underground in a cave.
Now that is commitment.
The final album in this cycle is 2022’s Regenerator. While the first two records were about descent, despondency, and hitting rock bottom, this record is about regaining hope and optimism, and finding a way to come back. We hear this clearly in the lyrics of the record’s final track, Firmament, which says: “Out of the loam I rise, embraced by the etheThe river below relieves my hands of silver” - clearly calling back to the tracks Loam and Acheron. And in case you didn’t know, in Greek mythology the Firmament means the Sky or the Heavens.
Our hero has left Hell behind, and ascended into Heaven.
References to positive mythology are all over this album, from the album art to the tracks Mercury and Avalon. It is a total jam. But the best song on the album might just be Mammoth. If you don’t like the guitar on this song, you and I can’t be friends.
I got a chance to see KB perform last year when they toured with Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats. They are fucking tight. They were the opening act, but were the absolute highlight of the show. I want everyone to hear this band because they really are something special.
Go check them out.
Links to QOTSA
We know that QotSA front man Josh Homme and Kyuss invented Stoner Rock in the 1990’s. They were the genre-defining band. King Buffalo (and other bands like All Them Witches) have picked up this proverbial torch and are now bringing the sound to the next generation of fans. King Buffalo drummer Scott Donaldson is known to be a huge QotSA fan. Perhaps he saw them live when they played in Rochester in 2014 in support of ...Like Clockwork.
It is also sometimes easy to forget that Josh was not the only architect of the low desert sound. Original Kyuss Drummer and co-founder Brant Bjork wrote many Kyuss tunes and continues to be a leader in the music scene today. King Buffalo have played with Bjork at festivals three times: Freak Valley Festival, Black Deer Festival and the aforementioned Stoned & Dusted. There is also a planned collaborative project between Bjork and King Buffalo that may be coming our way soon.
The future is bright, my friends.
Their Music
Providence Eye
In Dim Light
Pocket Full of Knife
King Buffalo songs from the Split EP with Lé Betre
Kerosene -- live in 2016
Drinking From The River Rising
Orion - entire album on Genesee Live
RepeateCenturion -- Recorded Live in the Quarantine Sessions put out by the band
Live at Rockpalast in 2019 - includes songs from LTBTM
Longing To Be The Mountain - Quarantine Sessions
Quickening -- everything is cool until the snake head pops out. Red Star Pt. 2 -- the official video
Ecliptic
Eta Carinae
Dead Star - Full Album
Silverfish
The Knocks
Loam
Hours
Acheron
Shadows
Mammoth
Firmament
Show Them Some Love
/KingBuffalo - C’mon, everyone -- there are just over 500 subscribers. Those are rookie numbers. You gotta pump those numbers up.
Previous Posts
Tool
Alice in Chains
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard
Rage Against The Machine
Soundgarden
Run the Jewels
Royal Blood
Arctic Monkeys
Ty Segall
Eagles of Death Metal
Them Crooked Vultures
Led Zeppelin
Greta Van Fleet
Ten Commandos
Screaming Trees
Sound City Players
Iggy Pop
Mastodon
The Strokes
Radiohead
All Them Witches
ZZ Top

THE BEST WAY TO BECOME A SECURITY MAXIMALIST In the beginning, there was The GuardiaNNN.ai. It was an idea for a simple token listing - a list of projects. And it was the beginning of an idea for our team. At that time, we were still working full-time at an agency and only had time for occasional purchases of low-cap projects. It was then that we first encountered far more scams on the market than genuine efforts to build something. The more scams we encountered on our journey, the clearer it became that we had to do something about it.
So the idea for Smart Check with AI was born - a tool that would detect hidden threats and backdoors. As the bull market transformed and fraudulent practices increased, new features and ideas were packed into it to combat fake projects and to protect users from losing considerable money and trust in crypto.
With this concept, the core team quit their agency jobs and threw themselves 100% into developing the entire NNN ecosystem.
It is now growing into an emerging platform which combines a launchpad for creating new projects, an NFT marketplace free of malicious bots, a DEX hub for shopping on the famous DEXs, and a news centre that collects quality content from projects and crypto bloggers. It’s similar to Medium, but done in a decentralized way.
WE OFFER PROTECTION TO INVESTORS, BUT WE DON'T RESTRICT THEM GuardiaNNN.ai addresses how people make their investment decisions. It offers cold-blooded analysis without emotion. Facts in black and white. We have yet to determine how many people it has already saved. The check alone has been used over 3,000 times. Some users would say this tool has protected them from fraud and made research easier. And that's exactly what GuardiaNNN.ai is all about. It doesn't decide whether a project is a scam or a new gem. Instead, it provides the basis for a good, in-depth analysis of the technical aspects of projects.
Many people are just learning about the crypto world and need help understanding how to buy in. That’s why GuardiaNNN.ai will be followed later on by an academic library which will guide users through the world of cryptocurrencies. We are building a community of people around us - both experts and enthusiasts - who can and want to help newcomers.
MORE THAN 80% OF PROJECTS ARE NOT LEGIT OR TRANSPARENT The world of cryptocurrencies is a world of molten lava. Even the most significant and valuable projects can’t claim to be finished products. Every now and then, a new island surfaces and everyone jumps on it, hoping to make a quick buck. And many speculators exploit this. But it shouldn’t be said that a project has a bad intention coded into it from the get go. Sometimes it may just be an experiment that didn't work out. We can talk endlessly about the whys and hows of failures. Sometimes conspiracies arise, and shocking revelations surface. But no-one can see into the future. And that’s when GuardiaNNN.ai comes into play. It’s there, ready, willing and able to help and respond to what is happening in projects right now – in real-time.
Many people buy into the hype that comes with social trends. A typical example is meme tokens which the crazy crowd don’t do their research on. Things can then not turn out well. There are thousands of examples. Remember the Squidgame token? It was a showcase scam that succeeded precisely because the average user lacked the tools to help them analyze the project and keep their money out of it. Good risk management is essential for any type of investment - even the most seemingly stable ones. You can't rely on luck alone.
GuardiaNNN.ai IS THE SPINE OF THE NNN ECOSYSTEM GuardiaNNN.ai is a pilot project being developed at NNN. Its primary purpose is to eliminate scammers from the crypto world. Everyone can use it for free, but NNN token holders can also access advanced tools to make trading easier. And they also get more detailed analysis and special offers. This living ecosystem is growing and thriving thanks to the community's activity.
NNNNNFT MARKETPLACE IS ONE-OF-A-KIND The market is flooded with NFTs that have no value and no meaning. They are artificially maintained and often full of bots. Our concept is built on the idea of not giving bots a chance to join in and negatively influence projects.
We prioritize the community and our reward system, which we call Karma. 1.5% of all NFT sales on the marketplace flow into our Karma system, which in turn rewards people with incentives, so they’re more active in supporting and helping each other. This further develops the community and benefits the ecosystem so it can grow organically.
LET THERE BE DEX HUB and LAUNCHPAD! All good things come to those who wait, so DEX HUB will be added to the ecosystem. We want to develop GuardiaNNN.ai as a hub, which will let you choose the most suitable decentralized exchange based on your preferences or preferred exchange rates. And the list of exchanges will continue to grow.
We also plan to add Launchpad for new, ambitious projects which meet quality standards. But it all depends on how fast the community develops because we prefer to grow organically and sustainably.
The goal is to build a diverse and robust portfolio of comprehensive products and services on the blockchain. And so, the NNN Community can help the project - by setting up tailor-made contracts and taking care of auditing, promoting and moderating the project.
Another of the ecosystem’s unique elements is the news aggregator. This collects news from the crypto world and enables content creators and members of specific communities to present their aims and intentions and whatever it is that they’re passionate about. Every project can have a profile and create its own content. That means every community can create its own news hub in the ecosystem and spread its content to the world more efficiently than before.
WHAT MAKES US TICK We love exploring and evaluating how projects work. And we love exploring how others engage the community, how they evolve technically, and where their strengths and weaknesses are. The never-ending collection of data and information allows us to raise the bar higher. Our ambition is vast because we see in NNN a way to connect the very best of what works with the most useful things a person preoccupied with the crypto world needs for their comfort and safety.
For many years we have worked in teams that have helped others realize their dreams and visions. Two senior full-stack developers, Zdeno and Pato, are at the forefront of development. Lukáš works as our project and marketing manager. We have worked with corporates and agencies, and that’s why we know what the pitfalls of complex work on projects are. That’s also why we dare to create what no one else so far has done. And that’s why we love our work!
HOW DOES GuardiaNNN.ai AI WORK? This is top secret. Sometimes you shouldn’t blurt out things to the world because competition lurks everywhere. The bottom line is that it works. The main thing that makes us stand out from the competition is that GuardiaNNN.ai is dynamic. It can identify hidden threats with high accuracy.
This helps ordinary users and crypto fans avoid scams, and protect their assets from bad or emotionally-driven decisions. The universal adoption of cryptocurrencies into mainstream life will only happen when people have the tools to help them avoid scams. And it will all only be possible when there’s quality and reliable analysis, sufficient information, transparent communication, and a trusted community.
Only some crypto markets currently offer a comprehensive tool like GuardiaNNN.ai. At the moment, you still have to click through several pages of various checks. And the best quality tools are paid for yet still not sufficient. But we've found a way to give everyone a free security option.
Thanks to GuardiaNNN.ai, project creators can voluntarily arm their potential fans with a tool that strengthens their credibility. By having high traffic on the platform, they can more easily present themselves to new people. Through our innovation hub, they can gain reinforcements for their team and grow their community. And Launchpad will open the way for them to raise new capital for development. The listing has Trending Top Projects embedded in it, secured by an honest vote using a crypto wallet. Polls won't simply be bought. Instead, projects must earn their rightful place in them by being active, approachable, and engaging.

I am a black woman, and I am so sick of other black women coming onto the internet and projecting their insecurities onto everyone else. It is beyond embarrassing. It seems that black women--especially American black women--are engrained to believe that they are so undesirable to men that when a man (no matter the race) gives black women a compliment or labels them as their preference, you all find some way to be offended--labelling everything as performative. Stop it! You are feeding into white supremacy by holding onto this belief. Please stop! No one is gaslighting you. You are gaslighting yourself. If you have low self-esteem and are still dealing with racial insecurities, then get off of the internet and go to therapy.
Trust me--you are desired! The first time a white guy hit on me--I was in my early 20s--and, admittedly, I was taken aback because I was insecure and I didn't realize that I was desirable to white men. There were a couple of other white women around that he could have pursued, but he wasn't interested in them--and this man was fine as hell. After getting involved with him, I allowed my insecurities to affect our relationship and I started projecting. I asked him if I was a fetish, and guess what? He was highly offended, and looking back I completely understand why. I was attacking his character, when in reality he just saw me as a sexy women with an amazing vibe. He didn't care about my race. That experience was an eye-opener for me. I grew up in a predominately white area and I was not attractive when I was younger, so guys (especially white guys) were not into me. But as I got older, I grew into my looks and found a personal style that suits me. Now, I get hit on by men of every race and in every country. I remember being hit on by a white guy on an elevator when I was in Asia. He got on and started chatting with me and then told me that I was really pretty. There was actually an Asian women on the elevator too, but he wasn't paying her any attention at all. Now the internet would have you believing that white men always go for Asian women and that they're really not into black women. No, not the case. I lived in Asia for some time and I can not tell you how many times I was told that I was beautiful by the locals or how many times I was complimented on my skin tone. So many other black women can tell you the same thing.
I am so sick of the online debate about colorism, race preferences--it is all bs. I can give examples as to why:
Myth #1: Most black men are attracted to white women.
This has to be the biggest lie perpetuated by mainstream media and stupid people on the internet. Most black men I know aren't attracted to white women at all. They have told me this. They see them as plain and boring and not having a vibe. Even when I attended predominately white schools--both high school and college (and these schools were very, very white), the small population of black guys were mostly into the other black and brown girls. They were not checking for the white girls AT ALL, unless the white girl had a striking feature--like an enormous ass--which was very rare (I only witnessed that one time).
I know a guy on the west coast who has a friend who only dates white women, but he said that this friend is always sending him pictures of black girls and mixed girls. To me, it all makes sense--white women aren't sexually fetishized like Black and Asian women. They're not seen as sexually enticing in general, and I think a lot of times when a man of color solely pursues white women--8 or 9 times out of 10--it's not about the physical attraction. It's about that man wanting to be closer to whiteness due to self-hate and he's using this white woman as a vessel through which he can obtain some sort of privilege or power by marrying her or having offspring with her. A lot of these men still have an affinity towards black women and would not hesitate to get with a fine ass black woman if she gave him the time of day. Like comedian Godfrey said in a DJ Vlad interview once: "You can't beat a fine ass black woman. You can not beat that sh\*."*
I mean look at the passport bros (even though I think those men are trash). Do you see any of these men flying to Europe in droves? No. They're flying to countries with beautiful black women. Even when they travel to countries with a white demographic--like Brazil--they are still choosing black, biracial, and/or melanated women.
Myth #2: Dark skin black women are less desirable than light-skin black women.
Sighhhhhhhhh
I just can't with this one. Personal anecdote: I have a light caramel skin tone and my sister is dark skin--we're only a year apart, so we've always attended school together. Literally all through school, guys would tell me to my face that my sister looks better than me. All. The. Time. Black guys said this to me and they said it to her too. And when we attended predominately white schools, my sister was constantly told that she was pretty. I, on the other hand, never had anyone tell me that I was pretty at those predominately white schools. Like I said earlier, I grew into my looks at a later age. It's not about skin tone. It's about whether you're pretty or not. I've gone out with friends who are darker than me and they have been told that they are beautiful or pretty while I was sitting right next to them. Pretty dark skin girls literally look like walking barbie dolls. Are you kidding me? I know so many light skin women who are hideous. The number of dark skin women who have traveled to Europe and have been complimented on their skin tone...really? To this day, my sister still gets complimented on her dark skin.
Sure some people have preferences, but a preference doesn't exclude everyone else. I have a preference for dark-skin men and I'm not really into the bald look (it gives grandpa vibes), but I think Common is one of the sexiest men alive. I would probably melt if I met him in person.
This belief that so-and-so isn't as popular as so-and-so because she's dark skin is nonsense. I guess that's why diveludo--a tiktok influencer--has 3 mil followers...because she's.....light-skin? No. It's because she's beautiful and sexy as hell, regardless of her skin tone. If you're having a hard time in the dating world, IT IS NOT because you're dark skin. It's because you're unattractive...like I just can't with this bs colorism debate. Next.
Myth #3: Black men (or any man) publicly professing their love for black women is performative.
How? You think it's performative because you don't see yourself as desirable and you are projecting your insecurities onto others. For example, the whole John Boyega/Breakfast Club situation or the viral TikTok videos of white men showing their admiration for black women--some black women's reaction to that was embarrassing. That preference shouldn't shock you. In the past decade, we saw this huge cultural shift in terms of beauty--it went from tall, blonde, and skinny to melanated and curvy. Terms like basic white girl and melanin queen became popular due to this cultural shift and the expansion of social media. Mainstream media no longer controlled the image of blackness and whiteness and I think a lot of people started to see black women outside of the stereotypical images of us in movies, shows, and tv ads. Look at instagram pages like "brwnart" or tumblr pages like "blackbeauties" and tell me that you can't understand why there's a sudden rise in non-black men's attraction to black women--images like that of black women are are all over social media. Stop it.
Step outside of your insecure bubble for 2 seconds and observe society--the cultural appropriation, the trends in music, the global influence of black culture, the sex symbols over the past decade. I have attended PWI's and HBCU's and hands down those HBCU's have the BADDEST females. I don't even know if it's possible for a white woman to be bad if she isn't appropriating blackness in some way. Is it? Is that possible? I know black men in real life who have only dated white women and in the past decade have completely shifted their preference and no longer find white women attractive at all. Sometimes it's about exposure. I have a white passing friend of Mexican descent who said that when growing up, he was only attracted to white women because he lived in a predominately white environment and that he wasn't attracted to black women during that time. When he was in his 20s, he moved to a predominately black area and realized that black women were pretty hot. Ever since then, he's had an attraction to black women (he's attracted to all races now--but you get my point).
Enough of the inferiority complex. Enough of black women talking down on themselves. You wouldn't be so imitated if people thought you were undesirable.
Do you know how many times I've entered a non-black space and had people (men and women) flocking to me? It's because I stand out as a black woman. I have an aura and a style that attracts people to me, and anytime I enter a predominately non-black space (especially a white space), I know that all eyes will be on me. It happens every time. If you have this belief that you are undesirable and are "bottom of the barrel" or whatever foolish things you tell yourself, then that is exactly how people are going to treat you and that is exactly how you are going to see the world.
Stop perpetuating white supremacy. It is time to break that cycle. Stop speaking negatively about yourself. Stop responding to foolishness on the internet. Stop responding to these self-hating black people and racist non-black people who are using the internet as a source to project their trauma. Stop worrying about which celebrity is dating what race. Stop it! Everything doesn't need a response or a reaction. When some of these self-hating black men spew negativity about us, I literally laugh because 1) I know it's coming from a place of pain and 2) I don't need their validation because I literally get approached by every race of men. I don't feel restricted to one group.
If you're dealing with low self-esteem due to racial trauma, then go to therapy--try EMDR therapy or psychedelic therapy. If you're hair is damaged and you're constantly hiding it under weaves and wigs and your hair is thinning, then go on a hair journey or see a PRP specialist. If you're overweight or out of shape, then go on a diet and make exercising a part of your daily routine. If you're suffering from dark spots and hyperpigmentation, then go to a dermatologist and get a chemical peel. If you need to improve your speech or improve your mannerisms, then take a communications class or an etiquette class. If there's something about your features that you don't like, then get non-surgical surgery (there are so many)--there's nothing wrong with that. Find your niche--everyone has a special skill that they are the best at--whether it's math, art, science, writing, makeup, whatever. Think about your favorite subject in school or what you're doing when you don't notice how much time has gone by--hone in out that, nurture it, and turn it into a lucrative career. Do whatever you need to do to become the best version of you inside and out, and experience the power you can have over people when you captivate them with your black beauty. It is MAGICAL.
Now go be a black queen and stop reacting to the internet.

They have a lot of overlap in their status in rap music. Both hugely influenced the sound of modern rap. They both crank out music and have extensive discographies, with huge leak catalogues. They’re both experimental in their own ways, and both of them were famous culturally but underrated musically.
Latently I keep thinking back to who’s more influential in the game but it’s hard to say because they both influenced the culture. It’s even hard to debate which artist is more experimental or has more flows. For a long time I was money on Young Thug, but as I got deeper in Keef’s discography his flows and music can get really fucking weird too so it’s hard to say.
Thug might have the better discography. I am more of a thug fan but all of his albums are consistent, his least consistent work might be SL1 or I’m Up, and they’re still not bad at all. It might be a little unfair of a comparison though because Keef’s streaming page is flooded with leaks, fake albums, mixtapes and compilations. Even then, his best albums are still good enough to make an argument for his discography. Bang, Finally Rich, Bftd, Nobody, Btfd2, Bang 3, Thot Breaker, 4Nem, Dedication, bftd3, are all great albums to the lengths of B6, BTG, Jeffery, SS1, SS2, SMF. But Keef does have some duds in his discography, unlike thug imo.

What is IPF Classic Worlds?
The International Powerlifting Federation (IPF) is the largest international drug tested fed. “Classic” means the lifters can wear a belt and knee sleeves, but not knee wraps (or bench shirts, deadlift suits, etc). As with all standard powerlifting meets, the lifter with the best total (their best squat + best bench + best deadlift for the day) within each weight class wins.
When is it?
June 11-18
How do I watch? The IPF live stream page.
Find the full schedule here (times listed in Central European Summer Time), and the full roster and nominating totals here (men/women). Note that all the lifters discussed below will be in the “A” group for their weight class.
​
Story lines to watch
Is Karlina Tongotea the new queen of the -76s?
Karlina Tongotea (New Zealand) came roaring into the international spotlight last fall when she totaled 600 kilos at the Commonwealth Games, and won the hyped “battle of the 76s” at Sheffield 2023, despite missing several lifts. Here she faces off again against reigning World Champ Jessica Buettner (Canada) and Equipped Champ (and the brief holder of the -76 total world record, until Karlina broke it) Agata Sitko (Poland). Karlina comes into this as the favorite; winning cements her as the premier -76 kilo raw lifter.
Check out the epic showdown between Agata and Jess at last year’s IFP Worlds here.
​
The -63s, and the return of Carola Garra
Lya Bavoil (France) was the undisputed -63, but failed to make weight for the 2022 IFP Worlds. This opened the door for a fierce competition that ended in a three-way tie for best total, with Meghan Scanlon (USA) winning on bodyweight. With Bavoil moving up to the -69s, the favorite to win is Carola Garra (Italy), with Chiara Bernardi (Italy) and Scanlon likely fighting for silver. Garra last competed in Classic Worlds in 2019, where she won gold. Since then she's mostly competed in equipped, where she has been equally successful.
Bonus: Check out this podcast interview with Scanlon, where she talks about coming back to elite level powerlifting after giving birth to twins.
​
Does Bonica Brown have a real challenger?
Bonica Brown (USA) has been the strongest 84+ for years. At Sheffield in March she broke the squat world record and total world record, and all of her lifts looked easy. However, Belgian lifter Sonita Mulah has been putting up monster gym numbers. She’s also got a big deadlift, so if things are close she has the advantage in that she’ll likely deadlift last. Brittany Schlater (Canada) is also worth keeping an eye on.
​
Evie vs Noemie: The Rematch
Evie Corrigan (New Zealand) shocked everyone by cutting down a weight class to the -52s for Sheffield, where she shocked (almost) everyone and won the whole competition as a wildcard nomination. However, Noemie Allabert (France) was just a few kilos behind her. The battle is going to be intense and could easily come down to the last deadlift.
​
The -93s
The men’s -93 class is absolutely stacked, and paired with the women’s -76s last year was one of the most fun sessions to watch. Even though last year’s champ Chance Mitchell (USA) won’t be competing, Jonathan Cayco (USA), Gustav Hedlund (Sweden), Emil Krastev (Bulgaria) and Gavin Adin (USA) are all legitimate contenders for gold (and would be even if Chance was there). Cayco put on a masterclass at Sheffield, coming in second, while Adin had a monster world record squat attempt that the jury ultimately declared a bad lift on depth (he placed third overall). Expect Adin to nail the squat record this time.
Highlights from last year's showdown here.
​
This event is huge, so there are a ton of great lifters and awesome match ups I didn't have space to talk about. Use this thread to talk about what you're hyped for, discuss the competition, and ask questions.

Cast of Characters:
Kevin Eggs– A bumbling wannabe Hibachi chef fresh out of culinary arts school
Mr. Kritt – Restaurant Manager and owner of Moriyuki’s Grill.
Male restaurant patron
Female restaurant patron
Nick the chef – A drunken hibachi cook who gets himself fired. He eventually carries out an armed robbery to compensate for his lost earnings.
Synopsis:
A clueless and reckless culinary arts attempts hibachi cooking at his first job without much success.
Stage setting:
A kitchen/bar island counter top is positioned at center stage. Three bar stools line the front while a stove/grill top remains partially hidden behind the counter. Above the counter is a dangling Japanese paper lantern.
(Lighting illuminates the main stage area. Male and female patrons are separately seated on their respective barstools with each one positioned opposite the other at the end of each counter corner. They are partially facing the audience with their gazes focused on the main chef behind the counter. Main chef Nick is fully facing the audience and is performing his tasks poorly under a drunken stupor. Both restaurant patrons are grimacing and recoiling nervously due to his recklessness. Kevin enters stage right with a confused expression written on his face.)
(Nick is swaying left and right on his feet while clumsily waving a meat cleaver in one hand and an empty bottle in the other)
NICK
So, you two (hiccup) wanna see me make a chicken hand sandwich? (hiccup)
MALE PATRON
(Grimacing and scared) Please, no. We just wanted a vegetable stir fry and steak. Maybe coming here was a bad idea.
(Kevin tries to grab someone’s attention, but no one listens.)
KEVIN
Um excuse me?
FEMALE PATRON
(Also grimacing) You make a chicken and ham sandwich?
(Nick is aimlessly clattering his cleaver against the grill/stove top.)
NICK
Not chicken and ham, (hiccup) chicken and hand sandwich! Now put your pretty little hand on the cutting board and I’ll show ya.
FEMALE PATRON
(Shrieking) No!
(Mr. Kritt frantically enters stage left and interrupts the chaotic scene. He is shaking his fist in outrage)
MR. KRITT
(Furiously) Nick! You’ve been drinking again! How many times have I warned you that if I catch you intimidating our customers while under the influence, I would throw your drunken ass out of my establishment!
KEVIN
Um, pardon me?
(Kevin is still ignored.)
(Nick points his meat cleaver at Mr. Kritt.)
NICK
Okay dude, you need to chill.
MR. KRITT
Don’t you point that thing at me!
(Mr. Kritt pries the cleaver out of Nick’s hand by the handle and drops it on the countertop. He then points his finger directly towards the right stage exit.)
MR. KRITT
You’re fired! Get out! You’re a menace to the patrons and the establishment.
(After a pause, Mr. Kritt steps towards Nick, seizes him by the back collar of his shirt and pants and proceeds to forcibly eject him from the building. Nick is dragged to the right exit. Kevin side-steps out of their way.)
MR. KRITT
Get the hell out of my restaurant! Out! Out! Out! Out!
(Nick is shoved out the right stage exit. He is still clutching his empty bottle. Mr. Kritt turns his focus to Kevin)
MR. KRITT
What do you want?!
(Kevin stammers through Mr. Kritt’s annoyed gaze. He produces a certification paper.)
KEVIN
I…I’m sorry. My name’s Kevin Eggs and I’m looking for a job. I’m fresh out of culinary arts school and was looking for a hibachi kitchen position…these are my credentials…
(Mr. Kritt swipes the paper out of Kevin’s hand, glances over it for a second, and hands it back to him. He is much calmer at this point, but still retains a firm tone of voice.)
MR. KRITT
Congratulations, Kevin. You’re hired. Welcome to Moriyuki’s Hibachi Bar and Grill. You can start now.
(He leads Kevin back to the Island stove countertop and hands him a togue and apron.)
KEVIN
Wait. No formal interview. No questions asked? Thank you, Mister…
(Both men firmly shake hands)
MR. KRITT
…Kritt. Jay Kritt. Restaurant owner.
(Mr. Kritt shifts his attention to the petrified patrons who are perched at the edge of their barstools.)
MR. KRITT
My sincerest apologies to the both of you for what just happened. The misconduct you just witnessed does not reflect our company policy. I assure you that this will not happen again. Perhaps if you two choose to come here again, I would be most happy to offer you both a complimentary dinner on the house? I understand if you do not wish return here.
(Both patrons relax and lighten up a little. They periodically sip from their water glasses)
MALE PATRON
No, as a matter of fact, I think we’ll stick around and give our order another shot. It is, after all, complimentary.
FEMALE PATRON
And I am curious to see how this new chef will perform.
MR. KRITT
I assure you that you will not be disappointed.
(He shoots Kevin a stern glance and addresses him in a strict tone. Mr. Kritt also points his menacing index finger towards Kevin.)
MR. KRITT
One little foul-up from you, and you’re out of here! Oh, and by the way, take your shoes off. We need to keep a ‘Japanese’ feel to the atmosphere. (Note that Mr. Kritt uses air quotes to emphasize the word ‘Japanese’ in his sentence.)
KEVIN
Oh, sorry about that, sir.
(Keven bends over behind the counter to take his shoes off while Mr. Kritt exits stage left.)
KEVIN
Sooooooo, what did you two order?
FEMALE PATRON
We already placed our orders earlier. The last chef put our orders under the counter.
(Kevin bends over to look beneath the stovetop and remains invisible until he finds two pieces of paper and emerges back into view. He holds up each piece of paper and reads them aloud.)
KEVIN
Ah! One order of soy stir fry, and another order of fried flank steak with scallops. Coming right up!
(Kevin bangs his fist on the countetable surface and shouts out a command. Both patrons appear startled and tense up every time he does this)
KEVIN
Ahem! Tomato!
(An offstage hand from behind the scenes tosses Kevin a tomato. He catches it and places it on the counter, then bangs his fist again.)
KEVIN
Cucumber!
(Offstage hand tosses Kevin a cucumber which he sets down. He bangs his fist and repeats the process)
KEVIN
Onion!
(Kevin catches an onion, places it next to the other vegetables, and bangs his fist again.)
KEVIN
Meat!
(A hand tosses him a piece of steak. Kevin catches it, but almost drops it as it constantly slips and slides in his hand.)
KEVIN
Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Got it! (Chuckling) Heheh! Slippery little piece of steak, ain’t ya? Don’t worry fellow customer, I successfully grabbed your meat and now I’m going to beat it for being naughty little sucker.
MALE PATRON
(Sounding disturbed) Please do not say that ever again.
(Kevin realizes his Freudian slip)
KEVIN
Ooops. That didn’t sound right.
(After setting the fillet on the counter. He pulls two spatulas out of a cupboard beneath the stove counter top. As the patrons gradually ease up from their muscle tension, Kevin begins twirling the spatulas in each hand. As he twirls each one, he loses his coordination and drops them both on the surface.)
KEVIN
(Smiling) Sorry. First day.
(Kevin takes both spatulas and uses them like percussion instruments. He uses synchronized hand movements and coordinated arm crossing gestures to bang out a tune on the hard grill surface using the kitchen utensils. He loses his groove and momentum by accidentally flipping a spatula out of his grasp and onto the ground behind him.)
KEVIN
(Grinning) My bad. Oh well, guess I’ll have to cook with just one utensil.
(Kevin wipes off the stovetop surface with a rag.)
KEVIN
So, how long have you two known each other?
MALE AND FEMALE PATRONS
(Unison) We’re not together.
KEVIN
Oh, sorry. What’s your story, then?
(Kevin looks at the man patron as he begins chopping the onion on a cutting board)
MALE PATRON
I’ve been negotiating this multi-million-dollar contract all day with some of our biggest partners from Japan. It was a tough one alright, but once you get past the language barriers and persuade those electronic geeks to start pushing their signatures on every certified document, It’s a success story. Ironically, I thought to myself, why not celebrate this victory at a Japanese themed eatery to make things a bit more apropos? The guys at the office said -
KEVIN
(In a sing-song voice) Bo-oring! What’s your story, miss?
(Kevin shifts his eyes to the female patron. The male patron shuts up and scowls at Kevin)
FEMALE PATRON
Me? Oh, well…my boyfriend broke up with me and…I loved him so much…
(Female patron starts sniffling and crying. Kevin starts sniffling and tearing up as well due to the onion fumes)
KEVIN
Yeah?
FEMALE PATRON
He told me that he would be my soulmate, forever. And then last night, he dumped me for some French slut! So here I am, eating alone again…
(Female Patron breaks out in tears. Kevin follows suit.)
FEMALE PATRON
(Emotionally Distraught) I mean, what do French girls have to offer over us American women? Looks? Wit? Charm? Non-stop steamy jungle sex? Well fuck you, Sean! Fuck you! Oh, I’m sorry cook Kevin. Did I upset you? You seem so sensitive and empathetic to my feelings right now. That’s so sweet of you.
KEVIN
(Sobbing) (*sniff. Sniff\)* No! It’s just these stupid onions!
(Female Patron drops her head in disappointment.)
FEMALE PATRON
Oh…
KEVIN
I sound like a wuss right now. I’m a badass hibachi chef, not a wuss. I’ll prove it to you guys by karate chopping this onion with my hand!
(Kevin raises his hand in flat, vertical knife motion above his head and brings his hand down hard on the cutting board.)
KEVIN
(Yells) Hiiyah!
(Kevin’s hand chop makes contact with the remaining whole onion. Instead of slicing it in half, the onion slides off of the counter and onto the floor.)
KEVIN
Dammit.
(Kevin pauses, then recomposes himself. He slides some of the freshly chopped onions onto the stove)
KEVIN
Now where were we? Oh, yes! The grill. (Cheerfully) I have an idea! Let’s get rid of these long faces and lighten things up! Nobody here should be unhappy.
MALE PATRON
I was happy until you opened you pissed on my parade.
KEVIN
It’s not stir-fry without eggs in it. They don’t call me Kevin Eggs for nothing.
(Kevin retrieves a carton of eggs from a bottom cupboard beneath the stove)
KEVIN
Since I’m sometimes a scatter brain and mess things up, my family used to call me Kevin scrambled eggs. Get it? Scrambled eggs! Ha! Ha! Ha! (laughing)
(Kevin’s laughter quickly dies down as he notices that his joke was received with cold, dead stares. Female patron utters an annoyed, soft groan.)
KEVIN
(Upbeat chuckle) Okay. Here’s a good one. When I went to Hollywood, I bumped into actor Kevin Bacon. Well, he was nice enough to give me his autograph when I asked him for one. And when I did that, my parents called us the breakfast combo. Why? Because his name’s Kevin and so is mine. Only thing is, our last names complement each other nicely. Bacon and Eggs! Arr! Arr! Arr!
MALE PATRON
(Interrupting) Just shut up and cook the damn food already.
KEVIN
Sorry.
FEMALE PATRON
Yeah, enough. When do we get to eat?
KEVIN
(Ecstatically) Hey. Watch this!
(Kevin selects an egg out of the carton. He picks up his spatula and holds it vertically above his head as if to bring it down in a chopping motion. He underhandedly tosses the egg into mid-air in front of him while attempting to split it in the fraction of a second when it remains directly suspended before his face. He does a karate chop shout during in course of action)
KEVIN
Hiyaa!
(Kevin misses the target and swings into an empty space due to poor timing. The egg plummets to the floor and breaks.)
KEVIN
Shit!
(Kevin tosses another egg into midair and repeats the process a second time.)
KEVIN
Hiyaa!
(He swings/chops at a downward angle and misses again. The egg hits the floor. Both patrons cringe at his efforts.)
KEVIN
Shit!
(Kevin tries tossing up an egg a third time, but misses his target. The egg accidentally lands on the male patron’s head. Kevin is sincerely apologetic at first, but can’t help cracking a bad joke last minute. Female Patron covers her mouth in alarm.)
KEVIN
Whoops! I’m so sorry sir! That was an egg-cident.
MALE PATRON
(Angrily) I’ve had enough bullshit for one night! I’m outa here.
(Male Patron storms off the set: exit stage right)
FEMALE PATRON
(Disdainful tone) You really suck at entertainment, don’t you?
KEVIN
C’mon, give me a little credit for trying. It’s my first day here and-
(He breaks off into a panicked exclamation as fumes rise from the vegetables on the stove.)
Oh my God! The food is burning!
(Kevin frantically drops his spatula)
KEVIN
Oh, not again!
(Kevin hurriedly scoops the few veggies on the stove into his hands and onto a plate. After doing so, he realizes that he just burned his hands. He flails the wildly while looking around the room for relief. Unbeknownst to him, Mr. Kritt furiously enters the scene and stands directly behind Kevin with his hands on his hips.)
KEVIN
Owwwww! Ow! Ow! Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot!
(Kevin submerges his hands into the female patron’s water glass and sighs with relief. She appears to be disgusted)
KEVIN
(sighing) Aaaaaaahhhh…
MR. KRITT
(Loud and agitated) Kevin! You blew it! I turn my back on you for just one second, and bang, I come back to a disaster. Unreliable. You’re fired! Out of here! Gone!
KEVIN
Mr. Kritt, it was just a little mishap. It’s still just my first day here.
MR. KRITT
Out!
(Points to exit)
(At that moment entering from stage right, Nick bursts onto the scene clad in a ski mask and carrying a handgun. Nick points the gun in the direction of Mr. Kritt, female patron, and Kevin. All three appear to be shocked and terrified.)
NICK
(Shouting angrily) Alright all of you! Hands up where I can see them! Get them the fuck up now!
(Everyone raises their hands into the air)
FEMALE PATRON
Oh my God!
MR. KRITT
(Weak and trembling tone) What the hell do you want? I have nothing special to offer.
NICK
Your money, dumbass! Front end register is empty. So I guess I’ll have to try the manager’s office instead.
MR. KRITT
(Moment of Realization) Wait a minute! You’re Nick! I recognize your voice now. I just fired your ass.
NICK
Yeah, that’s right. I’m comin’ back to get what’s mine. No paycheck, remember? So, I guess I gotta take what you owe me by force.
MR. KRITT
I don’t owe you nothin’! You’re a bum who doesn’t deserve a dime even if his life depended on it.
NICK
(More aggressively) Shut the fuck up and get me what I want before I blow your head open!
(Intimidated, Mr. Kritt takes a step back and responds in a shakier tone of voice)
MR. KRITT
Alright. Alright. If it’s money you want, then I’ll lead you back to the office. No hard feelings.
NICK
No, wait. I want something else first. Hey lady, kick your purse over here.
(Nick waves his gun at the female patron. She complies by gradually sliding her purse with her foot towards the direction of Nick)
NICK
Atta girl! Mr. Kritt? Your wallet please.
(Mr. Kritt fishes his wallet out of his pant pocket and nervously tosses it onto the floor)
NICK
(Sneering smile) Ah, last but not least, my replacement. You’re next.
(Kevin gives him a nervous smile)
KEVIN
Actually, I don’t have mine in my pocket. I put it in one of my shoes.
NICK
(Annoyed) Then get it! And no tricks! If I see a knife or a cleaver, you’re dead.
KEVIN
No worries. I won’t do anything.
(Kevin bends over to the point at which he is totally obscured by the entire counter island. Shuffling noises can be heard from behind the surface.)
NICK
What’s taking you so long?
KEVIN
Uh-just a minute! I’ve got it. Nope. That’s not it.
(A spatula is recklessly thrown over the counter top by Kevin, followed by a vegetable.)
NICK
(Uneasily agitated) Hey! Don’t do that! What are you, stupid? Quit it now!
KEVIN
I think I got! No. Not that shoe.
(One of Kevin’s shoes flies out from beneath the countertop and hits Nick in the face, knocking him unconscious. Nick’s eyes crisscross as he slumps to the ground. Mr. Kritt and the female patron exchange relieved facial expressions. Kevin then emerges into view triumphantly holding the other shoe.)
KEVIN
Here it is! Got it! Hey what happened?
MR. KRITT
(Grateful expression) You saved my business and my life. That’s what you did.
FEMALE PATRON
You sure as hell did. Now excuse me while I call the police before I throw up.
(Female Patron pulls out her phone and retrieves her purse before hastily exiting stage right.)
MR. KRITT
What did you have in those shoes?
KEVIN
(In a proud tone) They’re steel toe shoes, Mr. Kritt.
(Mr. Kritt grins while clasping Kevin over the shoulder.)
MR. KRITT
Ya know what, Kevin? Maybe you’re not so bad after all. Sure, you’re a klutz and your jokes stink, but I think I might have a good place for you here. In fact, I’ll give you another chance by training you myself. You’re rehired.
(Kevin returns the grin to his boss)
KEVIN
Really, Mr. Kritt?
MR. KRITT
Sure!
KEVIN
Mr. Kritt I’m never gonna let you down again. We’re gonna have some good times together!
(Kevin violently clasps Mr. Kritt over the shoulder causing him to grunt in pain. In spite of this Mr. Kritt manages to create a half sardonic half sincere grin on his face.)
MR. KRITT
(Grimacing) Yeahhhh...I’m sure we will.
(Lights fade out.)

For context, I was having a conversation with one of my friends about this guy I had an unofficial relationship/friendship with about a year and a half ago. I was also talking to her about how being bullied affected me, but more specifically affected my gpa from sophomore year (we're both currently juniors). At some point during the conversation she said to me; "you were being abused." and I kind of laughed about it, I said something like it really isn't that serious like people do shitty things to each other all the time, but I wouldn't call it abuse. And she said, "No, you were being verbally abused." And I was kind of like that's a little dramatic but okay. In these last few weeks, I did a lot of research about abuse and trauma and honestly I was kind of shocked. I resonated with almost every single article I found and I even took quizzes or screenings about abuse and every single one told that it was emotional abuse. It seems wrong to call the relationship I was in and the way I was treated abusive because than I have to accept that that person didn't genuinely love me and honestly could care less about me or if they did love or care for me at all they wouldn't treat me like that. But it's so complicated because there's always room for discussion. I made mistakes too. The guy was a teenager, so was I. I did things wrong too and I didn't always know how to communicate properly. Who knows maybe deep down he did care but didn't express it properly or was too immature to show it. But truthfully I remember during the course of that friendship/relationship I just remember I was in a lot of emotional pain and under a lot of stress but I never really knew why. No one ever told me that someone telling you no one loves or cares about you is wrong, or being told that you're stupid is wrong, or being blamed for everything is wrong, being told that you're selfish or that you overreact about everything, saying one thing and doing the exact opposite etc, is wrong and someone who loves you shouldn't do those things (romantically, platonically, etc).
I was thinking about it for a long time and I came to realize that the reason I could not accept that maybe this person I loved and cared about so deeply did actually emotionally abuse me was because that would mean accepting that my parents did as well. And it made me realize that I never questioned it or just assumed it was normal or that eventually he would stop or things would work out was because that's what I'd known my entire life. I always assumed that the problems I had with my parents or strained relationships were just normal, and a part of growing up and my parents were just strict and it was something I had to deal with. And yeah, to an extent there were things that were simply normal and parts of growing up, but I only recently remembered a shit ton of things from my childhood that I kind of repressed as well as things that happened recently, and I never once reconsidered the fact that it might've actually been fucked up. It's weird because it's so easy to brush everything under the carpet because they're my parents, and I just have to assume that everything they're doing is well-meaning, even if I don't like all of it. And because they're my parents they're family and it's kind of a loyalty thing that no one should disown or estrange themselves from their parents because they're trying their best unless of course, in extreme cases. Recently for my own processing of things I started writing down in a bullet point kind of format things from my childhood or things that happened that make me upset or uneasy, but I'm not sure still if I overreacted or misremembered these things or it was actually bad. Disclaimer: I understand that I have a lot to be grateful for, both my parents are alive and living in the same household, not addicted to anything, don't physically hurt me. I have friends and I know several people with really unfortunate living situations or family problems and I'm sure that is the case for many people here as well so I truly don't mean to come across as an ungrateful brat but I just need some kind of closure or understanding about my life.

• I have a lot of good memories with my siblings and general/extended family but yet when I try to think of good memories with my mom or dad I honestly blank. I know that they loved me but I never really felt loved and I always doubted whether they genuinely loved me or felt like there was something wrong with me.
• I remember my mom used to take my brother on these adventures around the city on weekends, sometimes just him, sometimes him and his friend, and I'd beg to come along but my mom refused and I just remember feeling so left out all the time and trying so hard to be included with my mom and brother
• I remember my mom would constantly compare me to my brother or unintentionally put me down. for example during an online parent teacher conference for math, in which I had been struggling in, (this was about a year ago) My mom spent so much time talking about how my brother is so smart and strong at math to the point where my math teacher said, "I didn't like being compared to my siblings growing up so I don't comparison is really helping" in which my mom went on to say she wasn't comparing us at all. On other occasions, during family dinnegrace, my mom would say something she's thankful for about my brother and younger sister and a lot of times just simply forget to include me-or she couldn't think of anything to be proud of me for? i'm not sure tbh
• I remember on many occasions I would start crying or asking my parents (but specifically my mom) just genuinely confused and hurt as to why they loved my brother and sister more. They would always tell me I was being crazy or ridiculous and that wasn't true but they treated me much differently than them and honestly I just remember feeling like everything I did even as a child was wrong.
• I remember my mom would constantly accuse me of stuff, sometimes small, sometimes bigger things, but a lot of the times it wouldn't even make sense. One time before a family vacation a few years ago, they were bringing a white wine to my grandparent's house as a gift. They found when they took the wine from the wine cooler to put in the car I guess the seal had broken or some of the wine was gone? I'm not 100% sure. They started screaming at me and accusing me of drinking the wine that was a gift for my grandparents, saying how I ruined the trip and how I always create problems. I was about 13 at the time and never had a drop of alcohol in my life, the thought had never even crossed my mine. I think i was crying in the car during the drive to my grandparent's house because my parents were mad at me, and my dad kept screaming at me to shut up and stop crying, I remember my siblings were upset as well because of this, I think I got punished for it too. My mom would also accuse me of taking her clothes and hiding them, money, etc, which almost 100 percent of the time I didn't do. It wasn't even just the accusing it just felt like my mom would blame me for a lot of obscure things or just pin everything on me. If the counter had a stain-must've been from me. A glass left on the counter? Laundry fell off the rack? My mom's coat fell off the hanger? Just things that seem unimportant my mom would get mad at me for or automatically blame me for things that weren't necessarily my fault or having to do with me at all.
• When my mom would get mad I could always tell. I'm not sure if this is common or not but I became very good at listening to footsteps around the house. I could tell whose footsteps were my moms, dads, brothers, sisters. And I could also tell if someone was mad by listening to their footsteps. When my dad was mad he was more upfront about it, angry yelling and aggressive but he'd calm down and than he'd be fine and pleasant to be around. But with my mom it was more complicated. It was like walking on eggshells because one second I'd feel like okay and even comfortable around my mother but it never lasted because all it took was me saying one wrong thing or doing one wrong thing or something unrelated to me entirely for that to change her entire mood. If I heard my mom's "angry footsteps" I immediately would try to clean up my room, hide my phone, computer, anything that would make her mad, or provoke her in the slightest. If she was in a bad mood she didn't hold back from yelling and insulting everyone, but I probably got the worst of it out of everyone. At times for no reason at all she stomp into my room screaming at me for being lazy, irresponsible, how I ruin the family or I don't contribute or help her at all, how I waste my time, or how I'm selfish or how I'm stupid and I don't work hard or try at anything. Sometimes she'd straight up insult me or other times she would mock me or kind of make fun of me for something random.
• I remember one time my mom got so mad at me and my brother when we shared a room for making a mess in the room (we were probably like 6 and 8) that she threw a chair across the room and it broke my favorite toy horse. I remember crying about it because I loved that horse and when I brought it up days later she’d claim she’d never broken it and I must’ve. I remember the horse was hot pink and plastic. She broke one of it’s legs so it couldn’t stand up on it’s own anymore.
• A few months ago my school had what they called regents week. A week where most students have off in ny high schools, unless, obviously, they have to take regents, in which they would come into the building at a set time during the week for their exam. My school additionally offers office hours during regents week where students can come in for extra help or to make up assignments, or if they're failing a course to do extra credit work. The only thing I was required to go in for that week was an Algebra regents I had never taken in middle school and had to do now. I wasn't failing any courses and most my grades were over 90, with the exception of my math grade which was in the 70s. My mom wanted to know the previous night what my schedule was that week for school. I explained to her (this was a monday night) that I had regents wednesday afternoon so I planned on spending all day studying for it at home tuesday, and after my regents, I had the rest of the week off. She seemed to understand and went to bed. I'm woken up at 6 am to my dad yelling at me saying I have to go to school and my mom as well. I'm so confused and I'm trying to explain to my parents that they're mistaken and I'm not supposed to go to school at all. They're screaming at me how I'm failing math and I'm failing at everything and I'm a joke and I'm so tired and confused and than I'm half asleep arguing with my mom about something we had already discussed the night before. My dad leaves for work, my mom spends the entire morning screaming at me until my head is pounding. She doesn't believe me, she doesn't believe I'm not failing math or I'm not supposed to go to school, she thinks I am trying to skip school and my friend (who has nothing to do with this in the slightest) is influencing me to do so. Meanwhile I just want to study for my exam. At some point I have a breakdown on the floor of my closet and my mom comes in to take my laptop (she already took my phone), and I'm sobbing on my closet floor and I'm exhausted and she starts dumping out my schoolbag and purse and throwing all my stuff around my room. She yanks open the closet door and starts yelling about how I'm a freak and how if I dont go to school I can't live here and she wants me out of her house and essentially kicks me out and says she doesn't want to see me. She storms out o the house, at this point, I can't even reference the study materials without my laptop or prep for my exam the next day. I get dressed and start packing up my stuff to stay at a friends house and while folding clothes on my bed I fall asleep because I'm genuinely so tired. My dad comes home from work at some point trying to negotiate with me and than when starts yelling at me and than leaves again. I finally finish packing up my stuff. My mom comes home, I realize I have to babysit that afternoon. I tell my mom I need my phone to babysit. I tell her to give me my phone when I need to leave, at 3:45. She winds up giving me my phone at 3:51, and I;m late for babysitting. I ask her how I am supposed to study for my regents without my computer, and she throws a book at me. I leave for babysitting, meet up with the friend I was going to stay with,where I'm talking to them about the situation. We get food and i'm planning to pick up my stuff from the hallway of my apartment and head to my friend's house, but my mom is emailing back and forth with my teacher, where he essentially confirms they made an error and I can come into school if I want to but I'm not close to failing the course nor am I required to. I text my mom teling her I'm staying at my friends, and she tells me I "cant run away from my problems," even though she literally kicked me out. My mom texts my friends mom angirly and tells her how I am "running away" and how I'm "not allowed to stay there." Eventually I text my mom and I tell her I will do whatever she wants and attend these office hours for the rest of the week if she lets me stay at my friend's house and leaves me alone. She eventually gets me to come home because I started to feel bad and she says she made chili for me. She never wound up apologizing for that entire situation and continued to do similar things.
• My mom also last night got mad at me for not finishing my dinner, as I'm trying to sleep, storms into my room and takes my gum from my nightstand, accusing me of eating "junk" in my room instead of dinner meanwhile it's literally just gum, gets mad at me for moving my nightstand closer to my bed, leaves my room. Comes back into my room 10 minutes later as I'm about to fall asleep and says "You just hate everyone!" "Why do you hate everyone?" meanwhile I haven't done anything except not finish my dinner because i genuinely wasn't hungry. Than she says "Oh-except your little friends!!" and leaves my room.
• My mom also has a habit of constantly taking my phone and reading all my texts and messages and looking at my recent phone calls and just overrall invading my privacy. She'll also block people or friends of mine (without even telling me) she doesn't like or doesn't want me talking to and downright stop me from hanging out with people unless she likes them. I've lost several friendships with people because of her doing this.
• My mom constantly calls me things like a "drama queen or cry baby" anytime I cry in front of her. Or she'll just roll her eyes at me when I've been upset. She says how I find a problem with everything and how I'm ungrateful or negative or full of hate. She'll tell me things like how I'm not good enough or doing good enough in school, tell me no one likes me because of certain things. When I try to talk to her genuinely she'll ignore me or put her radio on full blast or lock herself in her room. She'll mock me for my interests like theater or make me feel about being excited about a song or a lipstick. She'll tell me how I don't work hard or I'm going to fail or not get into any good colleges.
• At some point I was pretty mad at my mom and I texted my friend why I was upset at her. (I also told almost everything I texted my friend, to my mom directly, and she didn't care) and later that day, my mom takes my phone, reads these texts. Tells me how I'm full of hatred and I'm a bad person and disrespectful to my family. At dinner it comes up and she disowns me saying how "she doesnt have a daughter" and I treat her so badly so she has no respect for me. She gave me the silent treatment for 2 weeks after that point, telling me I'm only allowed to contact my dad but than got annoyed at me at some point for not responding to her text?
• On my 16th birthday her and my dad kind of slut shamed me for the dress I was wearing, it was a black loose mini dress with white lace at the top. However, i was wearing a cardigan over it and tights and boots. I had been really excited to wear the dress and go to dinner for my birthday, and my dad sayts "you can't wear that, show your mother." my mom says my dress is "so inappropriate" for a family restaruant and basically implies I will embarrass the family. The entire birthday dinner I felt really shitty and my parents spent the majority of it talking about my brother
• Whenever I did something wrong as a child my parents would threaten to put me in foster care, tell me I have psychological problems, or that something was wrong with me, that i was ruining the family, or that they were calling the police or having someone come take me away if I didn't stop crying. They would say how they couldn't handle me or how I embarrased them or I needed to stay away from my siblings like I was some kind of monster. I just remember I would be sobbing as a child and like truly feeling like I wanted to die and that's probably the reason I feel so unlovable and worthless and like a burden to this day. I remember I would tell my parents I could live somewhere else or with another family member and maybe they would love me and they would basically tell me that no one would want to have me in their family and that I would get harrassed or abused in foster care. Obviously this terrified me as a child so I would do everything I could to get them to love me or be apart of my family. I remember so many nights I would fall asleep as a child not knowing if one day they might actually get rid of me for good or wondering if I could be loved by anyone in the world at all. (My siblings loved me very much but this was just how I felt)
• My dad was especially mean to me on family vacations for whatever reason, maybe he would feel stressed being at his parents house. One time we all stayed up watching a movie and we were eating candy on the couch. I didn't realize I had dropped a raisinet and it smudged on the side of the couch. Obviously I felt horrible and I immediately got up to fix it when I noticed, unfortunately my dad noticed as well. He was screaming at me for hours while I was hiding behind a table sobbing apologizing. He was saying how I was never going to be allowed to see my grandparents again, how I ruined everything, how I cost thousands of dollars, how the stain was never coming off, how I needed to shut up and be quiet because my grandparents were asleep (meanwhile h ewas the person screaming at me). I kept apologizing over and over again and saying how I don't have thousands of dollars (I was a child) but I would fix it. The stain wound up coming off after a few minutes of scrubbing. my dad never apologized in the slightest and i'm pretty sure he was still mad at me days following that event.
• I remember one time my parents threatened to kick me out of the house, I honestly can't even remember why, and my dad threw my suitcase at my head. I don't think it was aimed to hit me but it did hit me.
• When I was younger and my dad got mad at me he used to drag me around the house if I didn't sit where he wanted me to or do exactly as he wanted. He would drag me around the house by my wrist/arm or sometimes ankles and I would scream that he was hurting me or to let go of me and he didn't stop until I started crying usually. I would scream for my mom to help me or to get my dad to stop and she usually didn't do anything. I feel horrible looking back because I remember a lot of times my little sister would witness this and start crying because of how my dad was acting or because she saw me crying or in pain.
• My dad also used to sometimes squeeze my brother or I's noses or ears when we did something he didn;t like. It became a joke between my brother and I as a child but it was really weird.
• I remember one time a few years ago my dad barged into my room around 10pm yelling at me about how I needed to go to bed. He turned the lights off and slammed the door to my room. I got up to turn the lights back on because I still had to finish my schoolwork and than before I even got back across the room to sit down he stormed back into my room to grab me my wrist and yank me out of my room and tried to drag me out of the apartment by my wrist because I turned the lights back on and wasn't listening to him.
• my mom also made a lot of empty promises to me as a child, like places she would take me or things she'd do. she never fullfilled any of those promises and a lot of times when I brought them up she'd straight up deny she ever said that.
• At some point during the pandemic, I was really struggling with eating as well as some kind of social anxiety.I was sitting on my parent's bed and I was trying to tell my dad how sad I felt seeing all these friends and friendgroups while on vacation, because, truth to be told, I lost a lot of my friends over the pandemic due to the circumstances and just anxiety I guess. While I was talking to my dad I started crying because I realized how truly lonely I felt and like I had no one there for me or no one liked me, a lot of this was self esteem issues as well and I hated a lot of things about my appearance and so struggling with eating was related. My dad started screaming at me calling me stupid and saying how I don't know how friendships work and I expect things without putting the work in.
• When I was 12 I was being bullied and going through a difficult time at school and I cut myself, not because I truly wanted to but honestly I was in a lot of stress and pain and no one ever really taught me how to cope with emotions or who I could turn to and I just wanted to see if I'd feel better. A few weeks after I wound up going to the hospital (a one day trip) because of it. I remember afterwards my mom asking me what are you going to tell people when they ask? What are you going to tell people about your arm? And i remember telling her I’d tell them I’d fell on a grate while running on the sidewalk. And I think she was satisfied with that answer because I couldn’t really think of anything better. I remember the school or guidance counselor? I think) called my mom that monday after school and apparently she needed to take me to the hospital or they’d call the police because I told my friends at the time that I wanted to die, who told my counselor. I remember my mom sister and I taking an uber to the hospital. I remember sitting in the uber in dead silence. I remember my mom telling me at some point that she needed to do her work and that I was wasting her time. I remember asking her why couldn’t we go to a regular doctors because I didn’t want to be taken to a hospital and I didn’t mean to drag everyone into this mess of mine. I remember my mom rolling her eyes when she told me she had to take me to the hospital like I was just some nuisance to her. I remember my mom was referred to a bunch of therapists and specialists I remember weeks had passed with no mention of the incident like nothing had happened at all. I remember asking my mom why she hadn’t gotten me a therapist or if I was going to see a therapist soon and she just told me I didn’t need one and that I was fine. At some point she told me I was just seeking for attention. On the counter someone left out a medical bill for the ambulance from the visit and it was over 5,000 dollars. I remember telling my mom I saw the bill and that I didn’t realize it was so expensive and I felt horrible. I remember her saying yeah. You see how expensive it is now? I think after that it was never brought up again. For a few months after my mom hid all the razors and stuff in the house and I wasn’t allowed to be left home alone for a month or two. But other than that it was never mentioned again.
  
• At some point I started cutting myself again. I was very very careful about hiding this from family and friends especially my mother. I didn't want to be a burden to anyone and I especially didn't want her to view me more as a monster or have more reason to dislike me or look down on me. At some point she saw my shoulder in the bathroom of a hotel as I left the door unlocked and was putting on my jacket. My sister saw as well. I didn't realize in that lighting how noticeable it was but even so i tried to play it off. My sister had a disgusted expression and asked what happened to my arm. I laughed and said it was because I picked at my skin but my mom saw and I could tell she didn't buy it. She said it was really weird and gross and I felt honestly horrendous. In the drive home, she brought it up again out of blue during an argument and said "why is your skin all cut up" and i was like what are you talking about I just pick at my skin-and my dad was driving but he said "you need to rtake her to a doctor." my mom just ignored this and was picking at her nails the entire time, not caring
  

If you read all the way to the bottom just let me know your honest opinions and thoughts or if I'm overreacting about everything. It's strange because while I'm not particulary close with either one of my parents, I feel closer and more loved by my dad than my mom. I kind of accepted that my dad has some anger issues and a bad temper but he does genuinely care about me and love me he just can't always control himself. With my mom I hold much more resentment because I feel like she intentionally manipulates me and makes no efforts to change her behavior. I love my siblings very much and I plan on keeping close contact with them while in college but I don't know if I want to contact my parents after I move out, or how to even go about that. I don't even know what to talk to them about and it feels unnatural because they know so little about me as I don't trust them at all. I just want to know if I am being dramatic about this-like are these normal conflicts in every family or was I truly mistreated? I have a lot of self esteem issues and other issues about my self worth and the way I view myself and I never really considered until it now it might be because of the way I was treated by people my entire life.
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So, I think this is a bit from coming off of the new movie where Peter B. was sidelined and relegated to a bit of the stay-at-home-dad joke that has become kinda popular lately in things like the Mandalorian and the Incredibles 2.
I was telling my friend after we saw the movie that I was kind of disappointed that Peter didn’t have much to do and that he, along with all the other Peters, seemed kind of background to miles especially in how none of them saw the flaws in Miguel’s thinking before miles. My personal gold standard for Spider-Man outside of the comics would be the 90s animated version, because he was the right combination of sarcasm, decisiveness, isolation, and confidence as Spider-Man. I guess what I like the most about that version is that he felt more in command and competent, probably resulting from how he was mostly on his own and even in the crossovers he took on more of a leader role.
Really what bothers me is how bad Peter has been treated in the comics lately and as fun as spider verse was it kind of sucked to see him be made more of a joke of. I know this is Miles’s story, and I am sure we will see more from Peter B. next movie, and obviously the game is coming out later as well, but to me it feels like there hasn’t been a great depiction of Peter in a while. The PS4 version is probably the closest, but what excited me and I assume a lot of other people about the first spiderverse was we got to see an older and weathered version of Peter but that hasn’t really been explored too much whereas the younger PS4 version has been so well trod.
I personally didn’t care for the MCU version as much but it really stems from how they still kept Peter young and removed a lot of the agency he had when interacting with other heroes as seen in other versions. I mean compare the comic civil war Peter to the MCU, I know a lot had to be/was changed but Peter was kind of an emotional center to that story with his role in both sides and how he worked through it. His unmasking and his switching sides on their own were both major wins for the respective sides as a testament to the influence he has even while being kind of a loner and an every day guy. That’s why the first movie did him so much better since you saw the toll it took and I’m all about him being happy in the end, just not as the expense of a joke.
It feels like a lot of people think Peter is this starry eyed goofball when in reality the versions I always knew took being a superhero deathly seriously and the comedy and sarcasm was more of a way to cope with all the pressure he was always under, and a bit of the release that being Spider-Man gave him. But he honestly always had as much to complain about as he did to joke about and I think that balance has really been lost over the years. I think Spider-Man is the one hero who it really feels like it’s a marathon, not a sprint, and all the little things add up.
We’ve gotten a lot of the big, sad, dramatic moments like Aunt Tomei dying but nothing really like Peter using a web umbrella in the rain eating Chinese food on a rooftop and celebrating even the smallest bit of good luck (ASM #578, read it to really get what I mean). I know that’s where the MCU version left off so great if it turns out that way but I’m honestly disinterested because in that regard they wasted 6 movie appearances and now he can’t interact with iron man or captain America in that fashion which was my draw to seeing him in the MCU in the first place. It’s hard to get excited when the MCU seemed like a place to showcase the complete marvel universe to the general public and now it’ll only be half complete if he gets to interact with the X-men and FF (and hopefully they’re done right). I always wanted to see the ultimate alliance or again 90s animated kind of Spider-Man on the big screen and that’s just not what we got.
Maybe the best way to describe it is Peter ought to feel like a guy who came from humble beginnings and appreciates the littlest things because he knows the struggles of Joe Schmoe lower middle class civilian life in a city like New York, and those experiences shape his character even when he has someone like MJ to share the burden with. He has some weariness to him and a sort of low key cynical distrust of new people that doesn’t come across genuinely when he’s this overexcited, kind of immature mouthpiece for the audience. In the comics he might say immature stuff to keep the levity but that doesn’t MAKE him immature and like I said there’s always a bit of subtext that he’s deflecting or closing himself off to a degree.
Maybe what I would like to see from the next movie would be something like the edge of time game, where even if the primary conflict is between Miles and Miguel, Peter steps up a bit and helps change Miguel‘s mind. I guess that seems to be where they’re already headed since Peter and Miguel were the only ones there when Miguel’s universe was destroyed. I just can’t help but compare this Peter to other versions, like the comic spiderverse event, or the original iteration from the cartoon, and it kind of sucks that most people who only watch the movies don’t really get to see that side to it.

CRAWLING
LIBRARY INTERACTION: “That’ll be ten days.” “I’ll try to be a good Samaritan and bring it back.”
The phone rings and I answer it. “Quick”, he says, “What’s the capital of South Dakota?” This is another test from TLN (The Library Network). I hear his stopwatch click and I rush to the computer. I type: WHAT Is THGE COAITOK F SOUTH DOIKAS (caps lock was on). I rewrite my search to simply just “SOUTH DAKOTA”. I knew Google would give me that little box guy off to the side. It did, I read: Pierre, and I say that to the TLN Man on the phone.
He tells me that if I took any longer, I would be fired. The agents would come in and I would find myself in the snow, red hands from the cold and red ears from the embarrassment.
I listen to Apple Music’s “80s Dancehall Essentials” playlist. It has a clear Jamaican influence, every song so far at least. I stand at the front counter when the phone rings. “No grooving!” the TLN Man says. He hangs up before I can apologize I stare outside and if I squint really hard I can see someone hiding behind the middle bar of the doors. A skinny man, or person, maybe a woman, like Maris from the acclaimed sitcom “Frasier”.
We have a fan in the – who is we? – front lobby to reduce harmful particles in the air. I want to stomp on it. I know if I turn it off the TLN Man would call and instruct me to turn it back on. I would too, since I am a slave to authority, or so they tell me.
I’ve stopped listening to 80s Essential Dancehall Essentials so I don’t start grooving again. I get a text from my Dad: We had McDonald’s for dinner. I say: Sounds good. LIBRARY INTERACTION #2: A man whose daughter is hiding check out the Blu-Ray of “Knives Out” and “The Revenant”. I say, “Good variety in movies here.” He says, “There we go. Have a good night.”
TLN Man can see me through every camera. I cannot see him; I never have. The phone rings: “What were you just thinking about?” I hesitate. “Every second is five dollars deducted from your pay!” I say, “I was thinking about how I can’t see you.” He hangs up. My phone beeps I have had thirty dollars deducted from my pay.
I’ve switched to 70s light rock Apple Music Essentials. My co-worker comes up from the back – We aren’t supposed to learn each other’s names. She smiles at me and I feel furry like someone just shoved feathers into my stomach through my belly button. I attempt to smile but I think I look like a monster. She scurries away. I have struck fear in her.
My face feels funny and I call TLN Man. I ask to go to the bathroom and he tells me I’ll get no lunch of I do but my face is squirming and I only get a five minute lunch anyway. I go to the nearest bathroom, the public one, and I look at my face. The feeling is emanating from a mole on the left side of my face, the mole that I have a hair growing out of. Every time that I pluck the dang thing it grows back in days. It’s a thick hair, so it always is a little uncomfortable. I always scratch and itch at it until TLN Man calls and tells me to stop and that I am disgusting and will drive customers away. I want to tell him they are called patrons not customers or at least they used to until now I guess. Everyone is a customer and everything is a business.
TLN Man doesn’t know that I can access the cameras. I managed to get the software by sending myself an email from my boss’ computer. I use the cameras to write this journal. I watch Her as She walks. I am enthralled. My mole throbs. I try to ignore it. MY home is small and sad but the camera feed brings me light and brings my joy. I can be God for a moment too.
I am back at work and sometimes I worry my thoughts are projected above my head and I get scared because I think inappropriate things about Her and TLN Man. Different things but both bad. A patron customer comes up to the desk and asks me if I know anything about some apartment buildings down the street. I say no and she spits at me, claiming I shouldn’t keep information from the public. Another man comes over and asks if he can put real mail in our Santa mailbox. I tell him no and he turns on his heel as quickly as he can and steps outside and he pours his coffee into the letters to Santa mailbox.
The more my mole twitches the more I wish I had the money to pay a dermatologist to remove it entirely. If there even is a dermatologist around here. Maybe if I didn’t talk so much at work or slack off. They money I was docked could’ve been used to drive out to see a dermatologist in the town over. Nobody has cars here since nobody can afford to leave for an extended period of time. I’ve been here for six years now, they only place I’ve lived since my parents died. A man came into our house and shot them along with my siblings. They were nine years old. He came into my room and pointed the gun at me but he didn’t pull the trigger. I’ve always wondered why.
At work She makes a joke to me but I’m too nervous to respond. I just laugh and look down as my hands search for something to do. They find some rubber bands and I try to take a big rubber band and wrap the other ones around up in it but it snaps back at me and hits me in the face. My glasses fly off and she chuckles and hands them to me. In my head she leaps into my arms and saves me from this job. I hope the TLN Man cannot see this.
The last thing I remember about my parents was them fighting while making dinner. Mostaccioli. They didn’t fight often, so it was jarring when they did. I can’t remember what the fight was about either. We ate dinner quietly and when we were done we all went into our separate places. Nobody said goodnight to me that night.
I never know how old people are at work. A woman comes in and I guess she is nineteen but she is forty-three. Married, with kids, two kids, Joey and Marko. She lives at 14432 Cumberland Avenue. Her husband is fifty-four, John. I can find this very quickly at work as long as everything is up to date. I’m not a stalker but I could be.
I left my journal in my work bad on accident. I hope nobody finds it especially Her. Good thing TLN Man is never here, I bet he’d sniff it out. I tried to bury it in my bad, hopefully nobody knocks it over on accident. The page that works knocks the cart into the wall and I jump. The phone rings. TLN Man asks me why I did that and I shrug. He tells me never to shrug, answer with your words, like a man! My fists become tight and I hope he doesn’t notice. I’ve never hit anyone but I would hit him. My mole twitches abnormally, it feels like it’s pulling me in a direction. I let it guide me, I follow it, briefly, and it takes me face to face with Her. She smiles and I blush and walk by Her. The mole stops guiding me and throbs once, hard. Almost feeling like a punishment. I get a drink of water which’ll dock my pay but I don’t care I’ve embarrassed myself and needed and excuse after nearly running Her over. Not that I would ever hurt Her. I barely know Her, what reason would I have to hurt Her?
I believe the man is standing in front of the doors again. I envision him hurling the doors open and lunging at Her over the counter. I save Her, everyone cheers. My boss (not TLN Man) comes in and tell me I have a piece of tape stuck to my jacket. I try to grab it and can’t reach. Double embarrassment. I tried to take the jacket off and she walks by and I worry she can see slash smell my armpits. Every patron customer that has come in has been able to see the tape. They never forget it, I bet, I’ll be the tape guy forever.
Sometimes when I get home from work I daydream about how work should’ve been, how I wanted work to go. I have a dog – Bailee. She barks and barks and I’ve given up trying to stop her. She sees something I don’t, clearly. I sit and I think and I stare at the empty television. I wish TLN wasn’t there, or, I guess he isn’t there but he is present. I am his empty television, waiting for the static, maybe a picture someday. I search dirty things on my computer to take my mind off all this and I feel the one haired mole throbbing.
I am back at work and I see a text from my Dad. Usually I try not to check it at work to avoid TLN Man’s rage, but the phone is quicker than I am and my face opens the phone and I see the text. “Hi. Marla passed away”. She was an old across the street neighbor. TLN Man calls he’s so mad the words sound animalistic, guttural. I tell him my neighbor died and he tells me he can make one phone call and get another neighbor killed the next time I go on my phone at the desk. Phone at desk = lazy = no customers = no $$$. I’m not even sure how we make money but I don’t say that I just hang up. My dad should’ve known better than to text me while I was at work. He’s done this on purpose I bet. Jealous I have a job and he doesn’t. My head throbs, the pain crawling up and around the top of my skull. Fuck him.
I’m home and I go back in the camera feed to see the moment I took my phone out. As TLN Man is yelling at me I see Her behind me laughing at me. How can such an empty television feel so many things at once? I am ashamed and angry, ready to run and ready to gage Her eyes out, rip her tongue out, biblical punishment – thou shalt not laugh at me. I could be better than her, I could be the authority. She’d bow down to me if I had the strength to make her. The headache has moved back into my mole. I storm into my filthy bathroom and rip the cabinet door of the henges; I didn’t know it was broken. The tweezers are in my hand and I’m yanking at the mole hair, mostly missing. My face is bleeding from the poking and prodding and I finally grasp the hair. I yank hard and my face both throbs and tingles. Pins and needles shoot into my face by way of the mole. It feels explosive, volcanic. What’s the lava, I wonder. I feel movement and the hair comes loose, thick, mangey, twitching in the light breeze. I stare hard at the cause of my pain, is this my inhibitor? Is this the reason I am who I am? Maybe now I can be free. I will be the authority. Maybe I can be the TLN Man. My mole throbs – my head whips to the mirror. I watch the hair regrow: longer, thicker than before. I’m on the ground and my mouth is open and I’m wailing. My fists hit the floor and my eyes bleed tears. I remember my childhood exercise. “Weezer, Dolly Parton, Elton John, Dodie, Avett Brothers, Metallica, Disturbed, Bobby Darin.” All musicians whose music has been devoid of all meaning to me. It doesn’t even exist anymore. I sit alone.
TLN Man calls me and tells me my facial injuries are too gruesome for the customers. I notice She is looking at me while I am on the phone. She is stifling a laugh; not obviously, but I just know it. She brought Her friend up to the desk to watch me suffer. The phone has left my hand and has gone flying towards her face. The cord pulls it back and it hits me. She and Her friend laugh. TLN Man is screaming. Suddenly I am home. I do not look at the cameras.
Rejoice! The library is out of power. What a joyous occasion. Alas – I will not see her today, in person or on camera. Or perhaps ever. Tis a shame, although the pain I feel in my face as I think this overcomes the shame. It grips my attention. I turn on my 80s ballads Apple Music station – “Forever Young” plays. Alphabetville? The band name escapes me. I twirl and twirl, attempting to enjoy this lucky day and dismiss my facial pain. My arms were flailing and my brain was quiet. Then, horror! My music changes! I did not request this. MY joy is sucked out of my body; I can feel it leaving, dispensing through my pores. How dare my moment be ruined? I walk over to my phone and to my behest it stands up tall, sprouting two legs! “Ugly mole!” it says to me. I head to my kitchen and I slide one of my dull knives out of the slot and I go walk into my tiny bathroom when I hear a knock at the door. I freeze – who would be here? Must be a vagrant; a burglar; murderer; rapist. I keep the knife behind my back when I answer. Two police officers stand right outside the door, sternly. “Sir, we regret to inform you that there’s been a murder in the building. We have police stationed at all exits and we are doing our best to blah blah blah”. He went on for too long and I managed a weak, “Thanks, officer” and they left. I hope they don’t think I did it. I don’t think they saw the knife. And I was so careful about it all too.
I am back at work. I go home. Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat.
It has been a week since the police came by. They still haven’t found who killed Her.
It has been two weeks since She was killed probably with a knife and my mole the mole on my face (not my mole, I do not own this, I do not condone this) has made me cry every single day. I can barely work, so I have been yelled at by TLN Man every day until he quit.
TLN Man has been reported as a missing person. Work is closed in remembrance. Not that I could forget him – I see him every day.
I cannot move. My mole The Pain on my face has spread, parasitically. I can feel it moving through my brain, down into my arms, all the way to the tips of my fingers. I am rigid with crawling pain. I cannot handle this. I am through. I grab my tweezers – removing the eight hairs might make the mole removal easier. I pull and pull on some of the hairs, then I get them into the grasp of the tweezers. I hear my skin rip apart, I can barely feel it, I’m already in so much pain. I yank and rip the hairs out and I look at the tweezers. In their grasp is a spider. Our eyes meet, the pain is fading, but so is my vision. The pain moves from all over my body back towards my face. Another spider rips its way out, then another, and another, and another. Then a swarm of them. The pain fades, and the pain fades, and the pain fades, and
BREAKING NEWS: The murder of two local people, both employees of the district library, has been found dead in his apartment along with the two bodies. More at six.
The end.

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So I've been thinking for a while if I should document some of the history I had with my ex who I was with for almost 10 years. Partially to shed a light on warning signs that I was too naive to notice and also to ask advice on how others got over their experiences and deal with any problems in new relationships that bring back those feelings.
For record I did go to my GP who referred me to counseling sessions. Unfortunately those were only 12 free sessions on the NHS and the therapist I was assigned just kept referring me books to read and "homework" such as saying out loud 3 things I'm happy about in my life before bed... Often she just talked about the lack of funding from the government and such.
So I finally left my ex in 2016 ish, I was on antidepressants, occasionally beta blockers for the panic attacks and birth control, all of which made my mood go up and down like a rollercoaster. I was absolutely miserable and one day it just kind of hit me that I have to leave, it's me or this forever?
We started dating when I was 20/21 and he was 5 years older than me. We met because of an online game and he worked with my older brother. My brother gave me his in game character name incase I needed help. I started chatting to him in the game and he came to see my character, he showed me around and it started like that. I was going away for a weekend to a youth group camping event and he joked wasn't I going to ask for his number to keep talking and so I did. During the weekend I met someone my age at some of the events and had a lot of fun with, we had similar jokes and I thought he was really attractive. We added eachothers emails to keep in touch and so I texted the game friend to say I was sorry but I met a really nice person I was interested in. He instantly replied some comments about how it was just a crush, did I even know if they liked me back. Was I just going to throw away what we had for a guy I met over 3 days. I thought about it and I felt so guilty. I decided to stick with him and have minimal contact with the other via email. Years later when Facebook became a thing he did add me there and I accepted thinking nothing of it. We still didn't message or anything. One year he wrote "Happy Birthday Hope you are well!" To which my guy wrote a very rude/sarcastic response something like "she's great I'll tell her you said hi", so he deleted his post didn't message again.
When I got back from camp we arranged to meet up in person for the first time ever and we went for food/coffee the usual. I will mention that I was pre warned by my brother and wasn't really supposed to be talking to this guy outside of the game, so for the first few months of our dating we kept it hidden until I was found out resulting at an angry brother waiting at the train station for me and telling off my guy in public saying he should know better and was told to stay away from me.
I told my mum about it later that day and honestly she didn't really care, and said it's normal for my age, and so we began to date properly not hidden. This guy was my first proper boyfriend and my first everything really.
In the beginning it was fine, we had good times. I did have to deal with his ex who was trying to become my best friend and go out shopping/partying with which I thought was too strange so obviously never did. I then found out she was calling him in the middle of the night crying asking him to take her back. So he ended up telling me that they used to be Engaged and how she cheated on him and so he broke everything off. Now the first red flag, he told me for his revenge everytime she would start dating a new guy he would get in contact with her, ask how she is, act really caring and charming. He would convince her to come over and then sleep with her so that she would feel so guilty she would tell/end her relationship. She thought they would get back together but instead he laughed in her face and tell her to get lost. Apparently this happened multiple times before we met.
Over time I came to realise because of this he could be very jealous, paranoid and had a bad temper, he would throw and smash plates, punch walls. Second red flag he "accidentally" locked me in his house while he went to work one day. I didn't really have anything to do or eat. In the past he did joke with me that if it was allowed he would lock me in his house and never let me leave. I never was sure if this was some sort of joke or a genuine accident.
His ex lived in the countryside and enjoyed the thrill of outdoor sex because no one was really around. Because of that he also enjoyed it. And so when we started getting a bit more serious he would force that on me. Once he met me early in the morning before I had work, it was a nice walk but then he got very handsy. It was ok as we were behind a lot of trees, but then he brought me to a bench and got me to sit on his lap with his hands down my trousers/pants, all while people were passing by. I kept my eyes closed the entire time and thought for sure someone would tell us off. A few times he would touch me on busy trains/buses, we went to an abandoned warehouse and a house. Sometimes there were kids hanging around spray painting or breaking things. In the house he told me to give him a blow job, I tried to laugh it off and say no thinking he must be joking. Instantly this made him angry, he didn't talk to me for a few minutes and then started to tell me things like "a good girlfriend would do this for her boyfriend" and so I ended up absolutely sobbing but doing what he wanted. A different time in the warehouse he wanted to do anal, and again I said I didn't want to, and again the guilt tripping and saying he would be really quick and no one would see, and feeling guilted I gave in. He finished inside and we left. I didn't realise till I had a shower later that day that because of being outside and not having access to lube I was very tender and sore in the area. This basically went on, and sometimes I would lie and say that I really needed to pee just to get out of having sex in public. Even at home he would often pressure me to doing things I didn't like, I have a bad gag reflex so honestly didn't enjoy going down on him, plus often I didn't like his smell or taste. If I asked him to wash it he got very angry at me and would say how it loses sensitivity and doesn't feel as good. Over time he withdrew going down on me because I wasn't "being a good girlfriend" and honestly I didn't mind.
Around 4 years or so into the relationship I made a new friend in work and she invited us to her birthday in a room booked in a night club. It was supposed to be couples and masquerade themed. My guy didn't want to go with me because it seemed boring and he had no interest in meeting my friends. He went out of his way to arrange our gay friend to go with me so I wouldn't be alone and would have a guy with me. On the night of the party the friend came over while I was getting ready and we had some drinks, my ex then changed his mind and decided to come. This wouldn't be a problem but he also said it was ok that his scummy brother comes along (that's another story) he had promised me that the brother wouldn't be in the booked room and he would stay downstairs in the main club with him. But in they came. I was annoyed because his brother was being really inappropriate with my friend, saying he would take her in the bathroom and show her a good time. He was taking photo's up girls dresses/skirts and asking for girls numbers everywhere (he had a gf and I was also warned by my ex not to be alone with him) my guy ended up not speaking to me for the night because I was annoyed that he wouldn't remove him. When we got back to his house he wouldn't let me go home and told me to shut up and go to bed. I sat on the bed sobbing that I just wanted to go home and he laughed and laughed in my face pointing at me. When I tried to leave he lifted me by my coat, breaking the buttons and my necklace and threw me against the wall. In anger I lifted a photo frame of us and smashed him over the head, in retaliation he punched the wardrobe right beside my head and broke his little finger, I ran out of the apartment. I sat on the curb outside crying because I didn't know how to get home. After maybe half an hour he came out and took me back inside. He told me to please go to sleep and just leave in the morning. After that event we broke up for maybe 5/6 months. I started to feel lonely and stupidly started talking to him again.
After this we moved in together. We rented a house where he was originally from but was much further for me. It resulted in me having to get a train and bus to work everyday or come home. His reasoning was there were no houses for rent where I lived. At this time I worked a pretty crap sales job, I made minimum wage and only worked 16 hours a week. So giving half of my money to him to cover rent/food etc and buying my train and bus ticket left me with £10 a week to my name. I was further away from my friends (who he didn't like me spending time with, they were bad influences) I had a male friend that I grew up with and I viewed him like a brother. He told me I had to cut contact with him as I wouldn't like it if the role was reversed (even though he had several close female friends) he spent his time trying to get me to be friends with his friends, and I didn't get them, they were all older and we had nothing in common. Once he asked one girl to spend the day with me shopping or just anything because I had no friend's. I was so embarrassed when he told me. The fact I couldn't go see my actual friends when I wanted and was alone already made me feel sensitive. It also didn't help that early in our relationship he told me he had only ever slept with his ex before me, I then found out he had actually slept with a few of these other female friends for various reasons. One had a fight with her bf and got into his bed wanting a hug and crying which apparently escalated. One apparently climbed ontop of him while he was sleeping when his house mate had a house party etc. One was single at the same time as he was and they thought why not see. That's what I was told anyway.
The town where he lived was dying and had very little going for it. Apart from the nice scenery walking my dog I had nothing to do. With this going on I began to fall into a slump. I worked, came home and slept. He began getting irritated if was sitting/sleeping on the sofa after work as his pc was in the living room and he said he felt like I was always watching him. I made the small room upstairs into my own little space with my computer to play games on and sometimes he would sneak really quietly into the room to try and see if/who I was talking to online. I ended up going to my GP to talk to someone and that turned to my first experience of antidepressants and beta blockers for my panic attacks. This cut down my sex drive immensely, and he would often argue that I "just lay there" or wouldn't do anything for him. I was applying for jobs with no luck. I went to speak to an advisor and they actually said "have you ever considered getting pregnant?" I ended up taking 2 weeks holiday in my job so I could adjust to the pills as I was feeling ill. I temporarily moved back home to learn to drive as maybe that would help me. I ended up getting a new job in a kitchen in the city centre, meaning I was getting my first full time job and would only have to get a train now. My ex told me to stop the driving lessons as I no longer needed them, and just move back as I had money now. And I did.
In my previous job all women worked in the store. In this new job it was a lot more mixed, I was the only female chef but I got a long with mostly everyone. I met my best friend here and we were in a small friend group of 4, our manager jokingly named us the breakfast club because we were all so different. My female best friend, our gay friend and a Romanian guy who was still learning English. We became really inseparable and would often plan day trips, cinema, dinner's and nights out. We had a group chat and constantly talked and sent memes. I felt happy having friends again. Over time my guy became extremely paranoid, he didn't want me working or spending time around other guys. He told me men are like hungry wolves and you can't trust them, and how he had worked in McDonald's when he was young and everyone slept with everyone etc. I finally had money and friends and he wanted me to quit. I loved the job and the people and often if anyone had to go home sick/hurt I always offered to stay to close. This also didn't help with the paranoia. It got to a point that I had to send him my new work schedule every week and had to have a "good reason" for doing overtime.
As time went on he started to accuse me of cheating on him. If I went out with my friends or even to visit my parents he would tell me (if you're fucking anyone tonight then don't bother coming home). This got more and more frequent and he began smoking and drinking a lot more. Often I would come home from work late at night and instantly be yelled at. There was another incident where he punched the wall again re breaking the finger, he couldn't play guitar anymore and said it was my fault. At this point he was roughly 31 in our relationship and began a friendship with a work colleague who was 18. I never met her once, and he would often go on nights out with her and her friends. The few times I woke up in the night and he wasn't home I rang him panicked thinking is he ok. He would answer "what?" When he came home that would be another argument that he's a grown ass man and can look after himself and I shouldn't be worried about his safety. This continued and some nights I began sleeping on the sofa because I couldn't stand the smell of the smoke and I was afraid to be yelled at while he was drunk. He came home once with every button on his shirt broken that I bought him for a birthday and said a guy did it for a joke and leave it at that. One night he blew up at me resulting in me having a panic attack and I actually felt like I would die. I couldn't breath and my face started to change colour. When he noticed he finally stopped yelling and started slapping my back and squeezing me. I sat on the floor and sobbed and said I was going back home. We didn't talk again properly for about a month, and then he sent a message saying he needed to talk/apologize. I went back to listen to what he had to say and somehow by the end he was saying he loved me and I need to come home. I didn't get a word in before it turned to him taking off my clothes to have "make up sex" and before I knew it I was back. We planned a holiday away for a week, to reconnect and try and have some dates again. It was mostly really great. We did have a minor argument because he was actively telling me how hot this very young looking Spanish girl was, and during one of the days he made me have sex by the glass doors leading out to the pool at our apartment. But when we returned home it was just as aweful. In our time together I learned he hated having his photo taken and put on social media. So I only took 3/4 photos, a few nice ones of him standing looking out at the beach etc. But that was suddenly an issue that I hadn't plastered his holiday pictures all over my Facebook etc. We went straight back to the old routine, being accused of cheating.
At this point we'd been together a long time. Constantly family members asking when we would marry and all my friends starting families. Maybe it was the fear of missing out but suddenly I wanted the same. I spoke to him about marriage and he was very clear it's something he doesn't ever want (you don't need a piece of paper with permission to be with someone) one night I got home from work and he had hand written and framed his own wedding certificate saying Mr and Mrs such and such and said "there you go!". The talk of a baby was also quickly shut down with the reason being "if you have a kid then you always have to be a part of that person's life if it doesn't work out".
At this point I don't even think it was entirely the antidepressants. I didn't even want to touch him. He made me uncomfortable, always walking on eggshells. He stank of cigarettes and beer. I constantly had to clean the house. Around his desk there would be piles of beer tins and used tissues... We were eating take out everyday apart from my 2 days off work. I started putting on weight and he was wanting more money towards rent and food etc. He was still going out with 18/19 year old girls to parties etc. This went on for another 5 months until one day it hit me that "this is it" and if I don't leave something bad will happen . My friend group at work generally noticed I wasn't ok. My best friend started to tell me that I'm being gas lit among other things. And that I needed out, and finally I was able to tell him it was over. We cried a lot and parted ways. It was hard because I had to go back to gather my stuff in multiple taxis or a van. Sometimes I needed his help as I had given the key back or items were heavy. On one occasion he asked how I was and then touched my belly saying I had lost a lot of weight...His eyes started watering and he went to the garden to smoke. About 20 minutes after this as I was gathering my stuff the younger work colleague came by (apparently they had plans to order pizza and watch a movie) this is also the first time I ever saw her and didn't even get a hello or anything, I guess it was an awkward first meeting.
He didn't tell his family I left him. Some months later his brother saw me at a club with my work friends and text him along the lines of he'd finally caught me cheating. He then told the family and his mother was apparently very disappointed. I doubt they know how everything went though. He did also message me to tell me this and asked me to tell him truthfully had I cheated/had I slept with any of the work guys since breaking up..
He moved to live in another country. Sold all of his items on gumtree etc, including some of mine. I had a large gas BBQ that my mum gifted for our house, when I asked for it back he tried to say I already had it, then said it must have been stolen.
He also messaged me a year afterwards trying to say he had made a huge mistake and would I be willing to move in and try again... Of course I said no. Again in 2020 ish he messaged saying he had a weird request. He wanted to become friends again as apparently no one knew him like I and he stupidly pushed me, his best friend away. He didn't want me to remain angry at how he treated me etc. Again I declined saying I don't know if that would ever be something I would feel comfortable with and also that I'm dating someone and that's not fair on him.
I haven't had any contact since then.
I'll never truly know but I honestly feel like he cheated on me because of how hellbent he was that I was doing so to him. The whole thing has left me with some bad trust issues. I don't want to be the paranoid girlfriend not allowing partners to go out or have female friends etc.
Apologies for the lengthy post and thank you to anyone who takes the time to read. I do feel like I've forgotten some things, or a bit too personal for here and I feel like this is so long already!