The email:
I'm doing well and I am very happy now.I've got my Ps (driver's license), I'm obtaining money and I'm doing well with organising and preparing everything for ******* and myself. I am also gardening. I enjoy my time to myself. My Dad is a lot nicer to me and we're getting along great. My family has calmed down too. We are working well together.
I've got a nice established routine for myself as well.Whether you want me back or not, that's up to you. I'm not throwing myself at you anymore though. And I'll be damned if I let your insults affect me. You are just as guilty.I'm sorry for making you a depressed and anxious mess. I should have been stronger before and not have been worrying about things.
I still have feelings for you and care deeply for you, and I think about you all the time, however, your decision is your decision, and I'll respect it. But if you're going to commit to being a wannabe doubtful bum who thinks he's superior to everyone, I'm not having you around. Your daughter comes first, not you.
Get your act together and commit to being there for your daughter.
Kind regards,
**********.
She was depressed and anxious before the pregnancy. I think she has Borderline Personality Disorder due to the trauma in her past. She used to be so clingy and constantly needed reassurance then treated me like shit when I didn't comply. Now she's acting like she doesn't want me around and can cope without me. I told her I didn't want the baby and I guess I wasn't there for her when she needed it, but she can't accept the fact that I changed my mind and that i'm doubtful of our future. She'd rather drop me.
We also live in different countries.
She's 20F and i'm 25M.
AITAH?

Hi there!
I've had several internal and external HDDs that I used to backup my photos and videos. However, almost all have died the last years. I just can't stand them anymore. For reference, I've bought two Seagate Barracuda 4TB ST4000DM004, and I've sent them 3 times already to be replaced...
At the moment I have 1,3TB of photos and videos in a WD Blue 4TB, and I edit photos and videos with it.
Therefore, I'm thinking of buying a SSD to backup my media, since I haven't had any problems with them (granted, I've only used them as main drives).
Is the Crucial X6 (119 € 2TB) a good choice? It's on sale right now, but I've read that the cache depletes after having had 250GB written. After that, it writes at 40MBps, if I'm not mistaken. It is also QLC, which might affect longevity.
Regarding the X9 (144€ 2TB), I can't find any review...
I have bought the X9 pro (174€ 2TB) for my work, and it's very good, but it might be overkill for backups.
A redditor, u/JohnnieLouHansen said that if I didn't need the speed of an SSD and wanted reliability, to go with Western Digital Enterprise drives, gold. He also said that he has put them in customer PCs. One pair are going on 10 years at 10 hours per day and another set ran 24/7 for 6 years.
I searched for them on Amazon, and used Fakespot; the reviews were graded D, i.e., not reliable any highly deceptive: https://amzn.eu/d/fHMwwAj What conclusion can I take from this?
What do you recommend? Any of these, some other?

Before I explain, I know that I probably sound like a naive idiot. I just still want perspectives, so please read if you have the time. Thank you.
Yesterday my bf and I hung out and I randomly asked if he had the leftover condoms (should have been 2 left out of the 3 pack) that we opened around 2 weeks ago. He said he didn’t have them anymore and took out the empty box. I then calmly asked him where the other 2 were, and he immediately became defensive and said he doesn’t know. I remained calm and asked him again and asked how he doesn’t know, and he seemed to be getting more and more angry while repeating that he doesn’t know. He then tried to tell me that we used 2 of of the 3 condoms and was adamant on that, but I kept saying we only used one. Then, he said that he suddenly remembered he used the condom to jerk off by himself because he wanted to in the car during his break at work and didn’t have a rag, but still doesn’t know where the third condom is.
I have his location and he’s never been somewhere that was suspicious, he doesn’t leave me on delivered for long and will send pictures if I ask (not in a controlling way but like if he’s at work and I want to see him smiling), he usually texts me during his breaks, etc. and most other things in the relationship are fine and I genuinely didn’t ever question him of cheating otherwise. The only factor stopping me from breaking up due to cheating is that I just can’t think of a time where he would have been doing it.
Another thing, one time he had lied about something (non-cheating related) and admitted he lied because I wasn’t buying into what he was telling me. His reaction was the same that time- the frustration, etc. he is usually a calm person otherwise when questioned.
Let me know your thoughts please

Our friend u/Doktorwh10, who has entered multiple contests in the past, suggested the following:

I think a big thing keeping people from doing it is the sense of winning/losing, and not being good enough to compete. But, one of my favorite things about it is just seeing how everyone interprets the same song so differently and seeing what moves they choose for each part of the song.
So what I was thinking was if you've thought about doing like a monthly challenge song instead of a "competition".

And I agree. There's already nothing to win accept bragging rights, so if that's keeping even a single person from entering, that's not the best format for this event. I thought people would see it more as just a fun nothing-competition, but some people might feel intimidated or like they're being judged. It would be better, and dare I say more in the spirit of PLUR, for it to feel like one big collaboration.
Plus, as many of you have probably noticed, I have been struggling to keep up with the current format over the past few months.
So, going forward - including for this month - the "Unofficial Gloving Competition" will be reformatted as

the Monthly Gloving Challenge:

• Every month, any glovers who choose to participate will submit a lightshow to the same song. Same version, same length, everything, no remixes or covers or alternate versions.
  
• Anyone who submits an entry may also submit a song suggestion for the following month (so if you enter in May, you can suggest a song for June). The songs will be voted on in the last week of each month. At the beginning of the submission period, I may sometimes suggest broad themes for the song submissions. Like this month's was "a song that makes you think of late spring / early summer", and I'll definitely be doing "Halloween" for October.
  
• All videos will be compiled into a single edit (assuming any editors have time to do so), which will be used to promote this subreddit and bring more people in. This might include uploading it to Youtube on my channel (which has been un-monetized for over a decade and will remain un-monetized), and/or Youtube Shorts and Tiktok. Please be aware that submitting a video for the challenge will be regarded as consenting to having your video included in these edits - you can opt-out by specifying that in your comments or post title.
  
• Although I will attempt to continue organizing these challenges, if I get busy and disappear again, anyone should feel free to take it upon themselves to organize any of the points explained above. We can all run this challenge together!
  

This month's challenge is "Sunset Jesus" by Avicii. I know the month is 2/3 of the way done, but I figure it's better than skipping this month entirely.

So, I have the dubious honor of having owned both the Luba 2 5000 and the Husqvarna 450X EPOS at the same time for the same yard. I also have the Husqvarna 315X wired version as well. But in this post I want to provide a comprehensive comparison between the Husq 450X EPOS and the Luba 2 5000. There are already tons of vendor marketing materials, YouTubers with their reviews, etc. My goal is to provide a real comprehensive review, with no fanboyism, no hidden agenda, just as a homeowner who wants something that works reliably and that lasts.
In this post my goal is also to provide new information that I was not able to find anywhere when I was comparing these two prior to purchase, if you have any questions that you want answered that I did not cover here just let me know.
MY YARD
My yard is a pretty simple Florida rectangular acre with about 5 big oak trees and plenty more overhanging my yard from my neighbors' yards. I have about 1/2 acre in the back and about 0.30 acres in the front. I use the Husq 315X to mow the front and decided to buy a wireless version to mow the back. I also have a thin strip outside of the front fence that I mow on occasion after opening the gates and fences.
LUBA2 5000 vs HUSQ 450X EPOS
Below I have arranged my findings by categories, with the most surprising being first.

• RTK / Wireless Performance (Winner - Luba) - This was without a doubt the biggest surprise for me. I thought I had a simple yard after setting up the Luba. I put the RTK antenna in the attic, set up the base station, mapped out the yard and was done. The Husq EPOS on the other hand performed 10x worse than the Luba. Same house, same attic, but the EPOS system would not lock onto the satellites. After an hour of fiddling, I moved the RTK antenna out of the attic and mounted it on a pole in my yard. The performance is still terrible, while mapping out my back yard even within 50' of the RTK station, the signal only shows 73%, and I spent hours having to drive the Husq 450X to the middle of the yard to get a signal then rushing back to the last waypoint to try to finish mapping. It took about 4hrs to map 0.5 acres. That was just the beginning of my problems though. It now likes to sit for up to an hour in one spot for some reason even though the app says it has a good EPOS signal. No idea if this is a hardware problem or a software problem but hopefully it can be fixed via software update. If this keeps up, I may have to set more no go areas and mow those areas with my lawn mower.....not a good thing.
• RTK App Feeback (Winner Luba) - The Luba 2 is great about showing you all of the satellite information; co-viewing, RTK satellites, and Luba 2 satellites. The 450X is the opposite, all you get to see is if EPOS is working or not with no way to troubleshoot it except to keep driving the mower around until it is fixed.
• Hardware Build Quality (Winner Luba) - The Luba 2 feels much sturdier and better built than the 450X. Also, the Luba 2 includes an RTK mounting pole whereas the 450X does not. The 450X EPOS is an older design and it does not appear that Husqvarna updated anything other than add an RTK module to their existing product line while doubling the price.
• App Useability (Winner - 450X) - The Husq mower app while not perfect is much better than the Lubas. Mapping is more intuitive; I like the way they used waypoints which is more accurate and more familiar than driving the mower from place to place without clearly defining points. The mowing pattern selection is much more intuitive as well and adding a mowing angle to a work area is perfectly done by simply dragging two dots until the line overlay matches the look you want. I do like Luba's way of showing the amount of work remaining/completed via shaded areas vs the eyesore redlines that Husqvarna uses. As previously mentioned though, the biggest shortcoming is that you can't do any satellite troubleshooting in the Husq app. With the Husq app you can also pause mapping and pick back up where you left off, you can save multiple mowing profiles (i.e. winter vs summer), and you can pause any mowing task, go do something else, then restart the mowing task instead of fiddling with percentages like in the Luba 2's app.
• Lawn Damage - (Winner - 450X) - The Husq 450X EPOS hands down causes less lawn damage than the Luba. No more crop circles, no damage in front of the charging station, it is a real joy to watch it turn on a dime with no endless grinding itself into the dirt. The Luba 2 got stuck all the time at the ends of rows, bases of trees, etc. as it tried to turn around in the soft dirt. It also killed untold numbers of seedlings which I will probably need to overseed.
• Mowing Speed - (Winner - 450X) - The Luba 2 has multiple mowing speeds that you can pick but if you are like me, you have no idea what is too fast or what is slower than necessary. The Husq has no mowing speed options but if you watch it, it automatically slows down on thicker patches of grass and speeds up on recently mowed patches. This not only gets the yard done faster while extending the battery life, it also makes the setup simpler.
• Mowing Height - (Winner - 450X) - The Luba 2 lets you set the height and so does the 450X, the nice thing about the Luba is that it gives you the exact height in inches (or cm) vs the 450X where you have to do you own math to figure out what 1 or 2 or 3 mean in inches or cm. The reason why the 450X still wins for me though is because it is much faster at adjusting the height when it needs to. The Luba 2 bogged down a lot and ground itself into the ground when the blade was too low for the terrain. The 450X seems to adjust its blades in real time and never seems to stop and get stuck on bumps even with the blade set at 1".
• Connectivity - (Winner 450X) - The Husq 450X EPOS includes 10yrs of LTE data and also includes Bluetooth connectivity. The Luba 2 relies on wireless and Bluetooth and if you want LTE you have to buy your own SIM and data plan. Many times the Luba 2 would grind itself into the ground then just turn off. I would then need to go hunt for it in the yard, turn it on, connect via Bluetooth, move it out of the hole it had dug, then wait for it to get a satellite fix before I could get it to do anything. The 450X with LTE is always accessible until the battery dies. With the improvements in connectivity, the anti-theft features are also much better.
• Audible Beeps (Winner 450X) - This was a big problem for me with the Luba 2. It beeps all the time (when its adjusting the cutting height, returning to the charging station, searching for a satellite signal, starting a mowing job, on the charging station, leaving the charging station, etc, etc.). The charging station is right outside of my bedroom window so I had to start running it in the daytime just to keep from being woken up. The 450X EPOS does not do any of that, it shows everything via the app and the status LED on the top, no endless beeps.
• Perimeter Mowing Logic (Winner 450X) - I never understood why the Luba 2 put so much emphasis on perimeter laps, to me it's just the first row to be mowed, apparently the 450X EOPS thinks so too and treats it as such. The perimeter was being badly chewed up by the Luba 2 since it is the least level areas of my yard, the 450X EPOS just mows it without fuss and no digging in and getting stuck at the base of my fences.
• Battery Replacement (Winner 450X) - the 450X EPOS battery can be replaced in about 10min and they are readily available from a dealer, eBay, and others. The Luba 2's battery replacement story is still very murky to me.
• Blade Performance (Winner 450X EPOS) - The Husq automowers spin both clockwise and counterclockwise after every recharge, this means that you do not have to flip the razors over every xx number of hours. The Luba 2 does not have this feature.

OVERALL WINNER (TIE)
Right now both the Luba 2 and the Husq 450X EPOS have a fatal flaw; the Luba 2 badly chews up my yard, and the 450X EPOS can't seem to find its RTK/Satellite Signals. At this point in time I do not know if the Luba's or 450X EPOS's problems are just software or a fundamental hardware problem. Mammotion is addressing their hardware design with the release of the Yuka, I can only hope the RTK problem with the 450X EPOS can be fixed via a firmware update.
I know the 450X EPOS won a lot of categories for me, but if it sits around in my yard all day searching for a signal then none of the rest of its features matter. RTK is so important to the fundamental operation of a wireless RTK robot that it supersedes all else in my book.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Luba 2 - I would recommend the Luba 2 if any of the below are true:

• Hilly yard - obviously the Luba 2 is the better of the two with its AWD
• Mature grass/hard ground - if you have a mature yard with hard clay or dirt that can handle the Luba 2's grinding donut turns then I would recommend the Luba 2
• Cost - If cost is your only concern then obviously the Luba 2 is a no brainer
• Trees / Obstructions - If your yard has even a few big trees or big obstructions, at least for now, the Luba 2 will far outperform the 450X EPOS when it comes to RTK performance

450X EPOS - I would recommend the Husq 450X EPOS if ALL of the below are true:

• You have a perfectly wide open yard with no trees or other obstructions
• You have a yard with new turf or soft dirt/sand
• Your yard is relatively flat

Wired Solutions - My front yard Husq 315X wire guided mower is great, problem free, and still uses a wire. I used a trenching machine, bought heavy duty 14 gauge wire, and buried it around 8" deep. In my opinion, if you can deal with installing the wire, not being able to change things later, and risk the wire breaks, wired is still the most reliable way to go. I think wireless mowers are very close to being mature, but something needs to come along to reduce the problems with satellite reception, RTK placement, and blockage from buildings and trees. We don't all have that perfect wide open yard with no trees or buildings.

A loud blast in gulfs the small life less camp, a bigger explosion hits the barn and a huge rock hits it's roof. Rushing to the scene five fire fighters in one truck, as Soon as they arrive three start to grab the hose and the last two prepare the water by turning the small wheel to run the water.The last turn and the rushing water comes flying out pushing the men back, they lift the hose aiming for the barn.Three hours later the fire has rested, the barn covered in black ash lays lifelessly on the ground in the black charred dirt, the men sift looking for victims. An hour later they hit and find something massive at first one thought it was a burnt up ash of a cow, but then they found a massive rock! The fore men cautiously take a look to find it was still very hot and still smoldering in the ground. The men call the police and anyone who could help them identify this unearthly rock.The police arrive with a few towns people who were professors at the nearby college, looking and studying the rock one professor came to conclude that it wasn't a rock, but a huge meteorite that made its way from space to earth. As soon as the professor told the people they decided to remove it, two hours later a crane arrived to pick up this massive meteorite the tow truck backed up and the man hoped out wrapping the old rusted chains around it giving it a tug to check the chains, he gets in the truck and presses the accelerator gently. Not bearing the meteorite suddenly becomes engulfed in flames once more, the people who were standing there are now apart of the black silted dirt that surrounds the rock, two of the firemen call for backup and drives away giving it room.The meteorite then moves forward towards the small pool of water near the barn, touching the water the meteorite suddenly explodes killing the remaining people surrounding, the helplessly bodies charred and smoldering lay as if they were two the barn.The meteorite then shifts into the earth turning into a smaller lengthy slithering object. Twenty minutes have past and the backup arrives, the firemen hop out looking at a field covered in ash and the charred bodies of their friends, the fire truck still on fire burns away into the deep smoke filled darkness of the night. Holding a small memorial a couple days later the town mourns the loss of it's fellow friends and fire fighters and the sons of the men as they are carried in
there small wooden caskets with a red white and blue flag with fifty stars.The wife's of the men weeped until their eyes were dry. Lowering into the ground the caskets moved slowly into the layered brown dirt, the fire men speak to the town leaving peaceful words. The next day the firemen are called to a small brushfire near the towns edge were the cemetery and the church are located, speeding down the dirt road they arrive to find that the fire has not yet reach any structures, rushing out they grab shovels and pix axes to dig trenches around the main structures, on doing so the fire grows bigger each second.The wind picked up carrying the flames towards the helpless men and the church, the pine trees surrounding the church suddenly catch fire as if they were fuel, the men trapped run into the church hoping for a miracle. Praying and sitting the men wait, wait for their last breath into the fire. The church now on fire starts to collapse with giant beams falling into the middle, one of the men is struck and killed instantly as the other men watch, crying the other men are inflamed and burning with their suit melting. Running the men fall laying on the ground charred and killed. The town now mourns the loss of more men and the loss of their church, standing near the water on the other side of town they let the caskets peacefully float and flow down the river bobbing down and up traveling towards the wooden bridge.The community now devastated does whatever possible to prevent more fires. Couple quiet and peaceful months later the wells dry up, people now only now have one source of water and it's the old shallow river, the river used for transportation has never been consumed of by humans.The townspeople do not like to drink from the river because they have seen the animals that have done so and died because of the contaminated water.Taking the water the towns people boil and make sure the water is crystal clear, floating down the Rivera small boat arrives with a black small tank to store the water for the people. Only having enough to last them for a couple weeks. Two weeks later three people have died of dehydration and worse the river has dried up.The townspeople call for help but no one responds. Curious the sheriff leaves to go out to the other town, reaching the end of the town crossing into the other county the sheriff is suddenly stopped by a gunshot to his tires, rushing from behind a small tree and foliage three camouflaged soldiers in uniform yell and tell the sheriff to stop.The sheriff walking out of the vehicle tells the soldiers
not to shoot and that he is the sheriff, uncaringly the soldiers then shoot him in the knee making flesh and bone fly off and exposing the muscle and bone that is now destroyed by the bullet, crying and laying on the ground the sheriff crawls toward the soldier asking why he shot him, the soldier then answers with his gun firing once more in the sheriffs skull splitting it and exposing the oozing brains that soak into the dry ground. Worried the townspeople wait for the sheriff to return with more water, they wait for three hours before sending a search party with two people, two young men in their early twenties load up into the truck, the men grabbed two guns one .308 lever action rifle and the other a 16 gauge shotgun, following the tire tracks of the sheriffs vehicle they finally come across his vehicle. Getting out of the truck the two men cautiously step out and walk up inspecting the vehicle, stepping into the blood soaked ground the men find two bullet casings marked m.i. USA NATO .223, recognizing the case one man says that this is a military weapon that this case was fired from the other man in disbelief agrees and searches more for more clues. Looking at the car one man sees that one bullet pierced the tires, but looks for the location of were the other one has hit.The blood that they stepped in is now almost soaked into the ground.The men look once more and them crawls back into the truck driving forward toward the car. Inching closely to the vehicle a loud boom and a shriek of a bullet comes piercing through the window into the passengers jaw splitting and tearing the flesh from his mouth.The lower jaw is now gone, teeth now litter the floor and on the dashboard with flesh and blood covering the seat.The passenger shrieking in pain cant speak, he mumbles and makes noises that is unrecognizable, the driver panicking ducks and slams the gas crashing into the vehicle, flying through the windshield the driver slams into the back of the car breaking the glass perching his flesh on his face.The driver then crawls into the vehicle hoping not to get shot, soldiers rush to the truck to find a moaning guy who half of his jaw is gone, they forcefully yank him and throw him to the dirt covered ground, his clothes covered in dust he now knows he is not gonna live very long. The sun is now setting on the small town of the twenty three people that is left, clouds start to build up and it now begins to rain, people rushing out of there homes grab any kind of device to catch the rain in, thirty minutes pass and It is now dark and a light drizzle still falls.The parents of the two sons wait till its eight the expected arrival time of the men. Eight comes very slowly with the parents waiting eagerly to meet there children once more. Eight thirty passes and no
signs of any vehicle or their children come.The parents now worried begin to panic and and wait a little more.While waiting the parents fall into a deep sleep not waking until ten the next morning.The chickens pecking at the ground begin to die slowly due to starvation, the ants slowly eat and surround the dead chickens in swarms.The townspeople now all awake begin to make plans to search for all of the people that are missing, the mayor of the town decides split into four, three people stay in town and five groups of four are made each taking a side of the town. Slowly walking away you can hear the voices of the people calling out the names of the loss. Footsteps cover the ground following the tire tracks, each person inspecting every part of the surroundings as much as possible.Thirty minutes later they get a glimpse of a smoke cloud up ahead, smelling burning rubber the black thick smoke surrounds the group, covering up their noses and mouth they search both vehicles. One person yells out to the others that he found one man on the ground burnt to a crisp smoldering. Dragging the body the flesh melts into the persons hand burning and stinging his flesh, unable to drag the body anymore the group panics and runs toward the town, running through the thick dead grass and bushes a small beeping noise alerts the group, the leader suddenly is instantly vaporized into a cloud of flesh and blood, realizing that they have ran into a minefield.The people seeing the aftermath of the mines begin to freak out and spread. Returning to the small town the four groups meet back up to discuss what they have found.They begin to count to make sure all twenty three are there, but they see four are still gone, waiting they here yelling from afar. Hearing the yelling all of the groups run out too see what the noise is.A dust covered man runs out of the dead dry grass towards the group, once reaching the group the man falls to his knees and cries and mumbles. Curious of why he is crying the people start to question him. Two days later three more people have died of starvation, the town not knowing what to do decides to dig and find water.The mayor calls for a meeting at the center of the town, all of the townspeople gather and listen to the mayor.The mayor speaks about digging and where they should dig, after the long pointless speech the townspeople gather digging supplies such as shovels pix axes and more, traveling to the location the people begin to chomp away at the rock hard sandy dirt.
Five hours later a man in his early thirties hits a hard piece of metal of some sort, curious they begin to dig around it. Reaching one side they decide to leave it a dig around it, but one man curious still wants to dig it out. It was now dark and no water has been found, without the water no one will be able to work any longer, but one man still out working is still trying to dig up the huge metal round rock. Giving up he shoots his anger towards the rock hitting it as hard as he could with the pic axe, as soon as he hit it the third time the rock began to move, freaking out the man began to run but was struck by a piece of limestone going through his abdomen killing him.The rock is now gone a afar where no one will reach it again. The next morning the townspeople awoke to find the body of the man and also the weapon, the limestone was small and rectangular in shape. Inspecting the body one man believes it was one of the townspeople that killed him, another man also agrees and begins to investigate. Rushing towards a small house outside of town the two men slam open the door and barge in, the man laying in his bed is grabbed and beaten, the man questions the men, the men answer by telling him that he is a murderer, puzzled the man tells them that he is not, but sure they take him out to the center of the town. Coming out of their homes the townspeople are surprised and also believe that he is the murderer. Five men and one woman look for anything they can burn, finding sticks and logs they begin to stack them into a bed, the bed now made is the final resting place for the accused murderer. Walking towards the bed the murderer begins to cry and shout out, but no one cares, once laying on the bed the man is bound by his hands by a small rope. Struggling on the bed another man lights a torch and throws it under the bed, catching on fire the wood slowly burns, the man now covered in flames is heard from far away yelling and crying with screams of pain. Smoke covers the town and the smell of burning flesh smothers the noses of the people around.Two hours later the bed is now completely burned down, all that is left is a small pile of ash and a burnt bones of the man. Digging a hole the townspeople push the ash in and bury him to be lost forever. With now fourteen people left in the town the mayor gives up, he waits in his small dirty house alone for any hope.Two days past and no signs until one man is seen digging in the dried up river, the mayor catching a glimpse of him steps outside to get a better view, stepping out side the mayor stands watching from
afar.Twenty minutes pass and the man begins to yell, the mayor hearing and seeing him rushes towards him as fast as possible. Getting closer the mayor can see a small pool of water beneath the mans feet, in joy the mayor calls the townspeople telling them to dig again. Only three people show up by the river telling the mayor that the others are to tired and need water to work, grabbing the shovels the people begin to dig, the mayor runs to his house and grabs buckets to fill. One hour has past and the mayor now has five buckets of water, preparing the fire to boil the water a small woman stands waiting for the fire to spark off, the fire finally catches and is burning furiously, grabbing the water she begins to boil one bucket at a time. People now begin to show up waiting for there chance to finally taste some liquid.

I’m Hispanic, but I never could speak Spanish. I’ve been told multiple times to use Duolingo, but I feel like Duolingo teaches you to learn the English translations of Spanish words. I will be forced to take a Spanish course by my college next semester, but I don't believe I can learn much from the course. Also, I will just be learning from a textbook for that Spanish course, so I want to buy and read it at home. I've already decided to watch Spanish videos after learning a little bit. I saw a comment on another post saying that a book called Madrigal's Magic Key to Spanish, and I'm wondering if it covers beginners-interminate-advanced stages of learning Spanish.

I 38f am looking for something spicy. Social media and tv just doesn’t entertain me like it use to. Life is feeling empty and I’m constantly feeling undervalued and unappreciated. I just need an escape from reality. I don’t want to go to library to find something. I have social anxiety so I don’t get out much. I feel like it would stress me to worry about going, having to search around, then having to bring it back on their time. I know I’m weird 😩 Anyways, I’m hoping you all can help me find a book by my birthday 5/22. I want to treat myself and escape reality so I’m looking for a good first book to start my future collection. Looking for dark fae romance. Main character being a woman. Bonus points but not required if the title and/or cover are discrete. I can buy a cover if I have to. Not trying to have anyone in my business. I don’t want the characters to be under 21 cause I would like there to be a lot of spice. Maybe something where the woman is made to feel desired. Some sub/dom kink is fine. I don’t shame. Any ideas

So I guess in the early modern era several notable folks have signed things like contracts & documents w/ VC (Vi Coactus/Compelled by Force) next to their name, and it seems to mostly be an act of protest rather than having any legal weight.
A US Federal Court apparently shot this down, although in the UK a politician was not allowed into office because she insisted on signing w/ VC next to her name.
I've heard that signing things like this, if you truly are being made to sign it, can possibly be admitted as contextual evidence to establish you never were OK w/ what was going on, if the other party claims you were originally OK w/ it and then changed tune later.
Any datapoints on this topic? Can it be used to provide context around contractual negotiations later on, or is it merely a symbolic act of protest against terms offered w/ absolutely no use in court?
edit: as an aside, if one signs the words "under duress" next to their name... would that be similar in it's effect or lack thereof?

Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/dlMgKwW
Additional photos: https://imgur.com/a/pxnbtKV

1. Tenicor Malus Sol (Glock 17/19 with X300). Essentially unused, carried twice. Love the comfort and quality of this brand but moving into the Floodlight ecosystem. Medium camming bar installed, no other bars available. $85 shipped.
   
2. TxC Beacon (Glock 17/19 with TLR1-HL). Got this in a trade. Don’t have any Streamlights so can’t speak to fit or quality. Priced accordingly. $30 shipped.
   
3. Tier 1 Concealed Axis Elite (Glock 17/19 with X300). OD Green. This holster is a disaster. The retention screw near the light is worthless - too much loctite and now the screw just spins. If you can drill out the screw or have the tools to grip the nut properly to loosen, this could be useful. Comes with a mag carrier (no shock cord to attach to the holster) that has a busted clip and garbage screws that don’t hold well. Priced accordingly. $30 shipped.
   

If you want to add on either of the other holsters to the Tenicor, I’ll package for $100.
Local pickup in Louisville/Fort Knox welcome. Otherwise PPFF or Venmo/Zelle.

🌿 Detailed Overview:
Critically examines how modern society is increasingly dominated by superficiality and illusion, at the expense of literacy and genuine knowledge. Hedges argues that the pervasive influence of spectacle in media, politics, and culture is leading to the erosion of critical thinking, undermining democracy and creating a populace more susceptible to manipulation and control.
🔍 Key Themes and Insights:
Triumph of Spectacle: Hedges explores how contemporary culture prioritizes spectacle over substance. He illustrates this with examples from reality television, celebrity culture, and sensationalist news, showing how these forms of entertainment overshadow meaningful discourse and critical thought.
Decline of Literacy: The book discusses the decline of literacy and intellectual engagement, attributing this to the dominance of visual media. Hedges argues that the ability to read and think critically is being replaced by passive consumption of entertainment, leading to a more ignorant and easily controlled society.
Illusion of Happiness: Hedges critiques the culture of instant gratification and consumerism, suggesting that it creates an illusion of happiness while masking deeper social and personal issues. He discusses how this illusion is perpetuated by advertising and mass media, promoting superficial values over genuine well-being.
Corporate and Political Manipulation: Examines how corporations and political elites use spectacle to manipulate public perception and maintain power. Hedges argues that by focusing on trivial distractions, these entities divert attention from significant social, economic, and political issues.
Impact on Democracy: Warns that the triumph of spectacle undermines democracy by eroding the informed citizenry necessary for its functioning. He discusses how the media's focus on entertainment over substantive reporting weakens public debate and accountability.
Culture of Illusion: Delves into the creation of a culture of illusion, where the distinction between reality and appearance is blurred. Hedges explores how this affects various aspects of life, including education, relationships, and personal identity.
Resistance and Hope: Despite his bleak assessment, Hedges offers insights into how individuals can resist the culture of illusion. He emphasizes the importance of fostering literacy, critical thinking, and authentic human connections as ways to combat the pervasive influence of spectacle.
Philosophical and Historical Context: Hedges situates his critique within a broader philosophical and historical context, drawing on thinkers like Aldous Huxley and Neil Postman to highlight the longstanding concerns about the impact of media and technology on society.
Audience Takeaway:
"Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle" is a powerful and provocative critique of contemporary culture. Chris Hedges' analysis provides a compelling argument for the need to prioritize literacy and critical thinking in an age dominated by spectacle and superficiality. This book is essential for readers interested in media studies, cultural criticism, and the defense of democratic values.
💌 Your Experiences and Reflections:
Have you observed the impact of spectacle on public discourse and personal life? How has Chris Hedges' analysis in "Empire of Illusion" influenced your perspective on the role of media and culture in shaping society? Share your reflections on the challenges and opportunities for fostering literacy and critical thinking in an age of spectacle. Let’s discuss the insights and actions necessary to resist the culture of illusion and promote a more informed and engaged citizenry.
​

• Purchase

Hi everyone,
My son and I have tinkered with WLED, but we are updating his room and he has specifically requested a new LED project that is probably a little of my depth at the moment.
What you would like is LED strips running up the four corners of his room, from floor to ceiling (8'). He would like to be able to control these 4 strips from an ESP board that we've got.
The room is about 12 ft by 14 ft., with baseboard and Crown molding (I'm installing soon), so I can run the power and data behind these as/if needed.
Is the best route here to run all four corners back to a common point where the ESP is located? Can I use CAT5e for this? I want the installation to be as clean as possible, so I was thinking that if I put a cat5e wallplate at each corner, I could power each strip by plugging it into the plate. In this way if in the future, we want to take them out, or change the strip to something else, we can unplug and do it easily.
I don't think the ESP is going to have enough juice to run four 7-ft long strips, can anyone advise on how to power these properly? Pretty green at this but I think I can figure it out with some assistance here. Thanks in advance.

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DAO Auto trading is a type of day trading that enables you to execute your trade on a daily basis Depending on the trade plan you subscribe into And subscription is free. DAO Auto trading is basically designed for new users in the crypto space or people with limited time. This helps you generates and compound profits on a daily basis without losses on your crypto investment and your auto trade plan runs for 5days. You get to earn on each days until your trade plan expires, then you can choose to activate a new trade plan or withdraw your trading profits and capital. All trades on auto trading are being executed by expertise that participate in ICO and IDO, which enables you earn passively through day trading of crypto currency.

CLICK FOR $5 SIGN UP BONUS
Attention, in order to withdraw the bonus, you need to deposit and use the investment offer at least once. Not depositing will result in an amount that won't be withdrawable. (Learned the hard way)
DAO Auto trading is a type of day trading that enables you to execute your trade on a daily basis Depending on the trade plan you subscribe into And subscription is free. DAO Auto trading is basically designed for new users in the crypto space or people with limited time. This helps you generates and compound profits on a daily basis without losses on your crypto investment and your auto trade plan runs for 5days. You get to earn on each days until your trade plan expires, then you can choose to activate a new trade plan or withdraw your trading profits and capital. All trades on auto trading are being executed by expertise that participate in ICO and IDO, which enables you earn passively through day trading of crypto currency.

So, in the past I've mentioned that I use AI to assist in writing code for my personal projects, especially for things I use to automate stuff for myself, and I've gotten pretty mixed responses. Some folks say they do the same, others say AI can never write good code. I ran into a similar mindset among professionals in my field, and it made me realize that maybe folks are simply using AI differently than I am, and that's why our viewpoints are so different on it.
Before I begin, a little about where I'm coming from: I'm a development manager , and I've been in the industry for a while and even went to grad school for it. So when you read this, please keep in mind that this isn't coming from a non-dev, but rather someone who has a pretty solid bit of experience building and supporting large scale systems.
Also, if you read this and think "Why do all this when I can just ask it for code and it works?" This guide is for building large scale systems that are clean, maintainable, and as well written as you can personally muster. Yes, there's redundant work here and yes there's still a lot of work here. But, in my experience, it has not only sped up my personal development but also made it really fun for me and allows me to churn out features for hours on end without getting remotely fatigued.

My AI Development Rules

First: The rules I follow when coding with AI to get the most benefit

• Keep context low, because most AI I've found degrade in quality as the context gets larger. Make new conversations often, and rely on editing existing messages to reuse context. For example, if the AI produces a chunk of code and I have a question about it, I might follow up and ask my question. Then, if I see a second, unrelated, question- I might edit the first question that I asked and replace it with my second question, after which I regenerate the AI's response.
• When asking the LLM to review code, do it in a new chat and tell it ANOTHER AI wrote the code. Not you, not it, but a separate AI. My prompt usually looks something like: "I presented the following requirements to another AI [your reqs here] Please review the code critically and critique it, refactoring as necessary". I've found that LLMs are too nice when I say I write it, and double down when I say that they wrote it.
• This isn't just about time savings, but mental energy savings. This means creating a workflow that saves the developer as much effort as possible by engaging the dev only at specific moments. There may be times reading this where you think "Why do this extra step BEFORE looking it over?" Because the AI can produce a response in 2 minutes or less, while a human can take 5-10 minutes to do the review, and that is energy spent. It will make you tired. I'd rather burn some AI time to get it right before the dev engages
• Do not rely on the AI entirely. Think of the AI as a junior developer- would you task a junior developer with a large scale application and not even review it? Of course not. With AI, you have a junior dev trapped in a little box, writing any code you want. Use that junior dev appropriately, and you'll get a lot of benefit.

Important Note: I always use 2 AI. Always. If you dont have a local AI, then Mistral has le chat for free, and you could use free chatgpt 3.5 If you have high end subscriptions, like Claude Opus and ChatGPT 4 Turbo, even better.
I prefer local AI models for various reasons, and the quality of some like WizardLM-2 8x22b are on par with ChatGPT 4, but use what you have available and feel most comfortable with.
You CAN use just 1, but different models have different training, and may catch things.

Phase 1: Architecture

AI is terrible at architecture, so this is mostly you. You don't have to deep dive down to, say, the innehelper method level, but at a minimum you want to document the following:

1. What is the project about? What are the requirements of the project, in a concise format that you can repeat to the AI over and over again whenever you pose a question to it?
2. What does "Done" look like? This is for your benefit, really. Scope creep is miserable, and you have no one to reign you in as the stakeholder. Trust me; my current project should have been done weeks ago but I won't... quit... adding... features...
3. What classes/modules/packages should exist? Lay the program out in your head. What is each responsible for? How does it flow?
4. At a high level, what kind of methods should each have? If you have a LoggingService, do you want a "Log(message)" method? If you have a FileManagerService, do you have a "ReadFile(fileName)" or "ReadFile(filePath)" or something else?

During this phase, you can present the answers to #1 and #2 to your AI and ask it for an architectural breakdown, but don't just use its answer. This is just to help you get over mental blocks, give you something to think about, etc. Write your own architecture. A big reason is because you, above all, need to know this project's structure inside and out. It will be harder for you to keep track of your project if you didn't write your own architecture.

Phase 2: The Coding

Below is the workflow I use. I understand that for many people this will feel like an unnecessary number of steps, but for me it has resulted in the highest quality that I've found so far, and has sped my development up massively... especially when working in a language I'm not intimately familiar with (like python. I'm a C# dev lol).
Yes, you can get code from AI far faster than what I'm about to say by simply asking for it and moving on, but the goal for me here is quality, developer understanding of the code, and adherence to the developer's style of coding. I want to write code that is clean, maintainable, scalable, and other developers at least won't want to set fire to if they look at it lol
Note: When making my first coding prompt of a conversation to the AI, I almost always include the answer to #1 from Architecture above- the breakdown of requirements for the full project. That context can sometimes help it better understand what you're trying to achieve.

• Step 1: Look over your architecture and pick a feature.
• Step 2: Present the requirements to the first AI (whichever you want to use first; doesn't matter), as well as the high level overview of the classes and primary methods that you want. I generally formulate a prompt similar to this: "Please write python code to read from a file and present the contents to the user. I'd like the code within a module called 'file_utilities', with a class 'FileManager' that has a method called 'read_file' that takes in a file name. I'd then like this called from a module called 'display_utilities', which has a method called 'display_contents_of_file'. This prints to the console the contents of that file. Please consider these requirements, give any critiques or criticism, and write out a solution. If you feel another path would be better, please say so."
• Step 3: Copy the requirements and response. Start a new chat. Paste both, telling it that you asked another AI to write the solution, and that was the response. Ask it to please critique and refactor.
• Step 4: Copy the requirements and the new response. Go to AI #2 (if applicable) and ask it the same question as above.
• Step 5: Take the final response and code review it yourself. How does it look? Do you see any obvious flaws? Anything you want to change? Rename any helper methods as necessary. Consider whether any of it looks unnecessary, convoluted, redundant, or simply has a code smell.
• Final Step: Take the code, the requirements, and all of your feedback, and start over from step 2, doing the whole flow again if necessary.

While this may seem like it would be exceptionally time consuming, I can tell you that this workflow has worked amazingly for me in saving both time and energy. I'm usually dead tired at the end of a workday, and I simply don't have the mental energy to write code for another 4-5 hours straight. Because of this, I put off personal projects for YEARS. But by doing this, it allows me to get roughly similar quality to my own work when I'm fresh, while pawning off the labor portion of the dev to the AI.
I do the thinking, it does the efforting.
I would expect that steps 2, 3 and 4 will take around 5 minutes total. Step 5 will take 10-20 minutes depending on how much code is involved. Another loop will take another 15-25 minutes. So 1 feature will take around 20-60 minutes or so to produce. But the key here is how much mental energy you, as the developer, conserved while still maintaining tight control over the code.
Also note that this workflow won't work for EVERYTHING. Context limits can make it simply infeasible to engage the AI in some tasks. Say you've got 6 classes that are all working together on a function, and you realize there's an odd bug that you can't figure out where it is in that workflow. More than likely, you won't find an AI capable of handing that amount of context without degraded quality. In those cases, you're on your own.
Anyhow, I know this is lengthy, but I wanted to toss this out there. This workflow has worked amazingly for me, and I intend to continue refining it as time goes.

Hello there! I am looking for some new roleplay partners to create amazing stories with. I am 20 years old so all partners and characters MUST be 18+. I am a second-year university student who lives in the UK. I identify as non-binary and use they/them pronouns. I am looking for semi-literate + roleplayers. I am literate myself and can mirror my partner's response length. Absolutely no one liners and a paragraph at the bare minimum. Since I am at university, my life can be rather unpredictable and hectic at times. I do try to send out one reply per day but it will vary depending on what is happening in my life. I aim to communicate if anything happens that will mean that I won't be able to respond for a few days. Please communicate with me as well. I do not enjoy being ghosted. If you cannot reply for a while or no longer want to roleplay then please just explain that in a message.
I am down to play any gender in any pairing. However, I do get quite tired of doing MxF pairings with me as the male. Usually, it takes a good plot for me to be interested in that pairing. The pairing that I want to do most at the moment is FxF. Themes I enjoy are: fantasy, romance, angst, drama, action, historical, and supernatural. Tropes I enjoy include opposites attract, soulmates, forbidden love, and enemies to lovers. I will often create a plot alongside my partner so we can both make something we will love. If you do have a plot in mind that you are eager to try out then please send it my way! If you're interested, please don't hesitate to send me a message. I prefer to roleplay over on discord but feel free to message me on here and we can discuss plot ideas etc. Hope you are having a lovely day x

TLDR Upfront:

• New Player Friendly Completely Fictionalized unit.
• Set in Cold War Era
• Milsim Lite (Trainings and tactics but none of the bs)
• Dynamic campaigns

A gaming group as well as a unit. If you need more info read below
Westra Royal Marines are a completely fictional unit. Not simply set in our world but a completely fictionalized world.We are modeled after the UK Royal Marines with our own twists to it. We are a Lite milsim unit, meaning we do have ranks for Chain of Command and set roles. We also expect people to take ops and training sort of seriously but outside of that we are pretty casual. Our difficulty has been tweaked to be challenging but not to the point where it's frustrating. We also only have the mods we use and nothing super niche that we will use once in a while.

What does your unit do?

We do quite a few things, mainly our bread and butter is general infantry missions. Finding the enemy, eliminating them, securing key points. These are the things we focus on the most. But we do offer other missions depending on the campaign, anything from sabotaging enemy critical assets, Recce, or preparing areas for assaulting forces. This gives us a wide range of operations to do, not focusing too heavily on one and allowing a variety so it's never too boring.

Do you only play in the 1960s?

No, our intent is to progress through time so eventually getting to the 70s 80s and adding more gear and possibly more mission sets for us to do.

Well what roles do you offer?

We offer a lot of the basic roles most do. While we try to make interesting roles a the end of the day without making super niche roles but below are the current roles we have (these are subject to change)

• Rifleman
• Machine Gunner
• Grenadier
• Sharpshooter
• Sapper
• Combat Engineer
• Anti-Tank Specialist
• Medic

What is your training like?

We have 2 trainings for new members. The first is an Orientation to get you on the server with our mods, key binds, a kit etc. This is so when you get on for Operations you are not being a burden to the unit trying to prepare for an op while also trying to get all of this set up for you. After you do this you will be allowed to attend any operation we have.
After this you will wait for us to accrue at least 2 more recruits to conduct a training class. This Class will be used to form the basis of your fireteam. You can get used to working together and then upon your completion of our training phases you will be made a full member and placed as a fireteam within our unit. Completion of your Training is required within a certain amount of time of joining and a class being able to be formed. If no class has been formed for a significant period of time the unit may make an exception and allow you to simply test out of the recruit level.

What's your schedule?

While training will be based upon the recruits ability to attend, the ideal time would be Sundays. Beyond this our ops happen at 8pm CST on Saturdays with fun ops, liberation nights, and other games happening whenever organized.
If any of this interests you or you just want more information feel free to shoot me a message or join our discord: https://discord.gg/rz3EACNWdm
A Recent FTX: https://youtu.be/NAO-xmYmQGg

11/20/2017
Log book of Det. Ryan Snow
Case #2798: The Appalachian Murders
The past couple of days are events I pray no one else ever has to go through what Kate and I had. I had her and Mr. Raines cleared of all charges, having found the proof we all needed to end this case and find the true killer. Kate no longer has to go into witness protection and I had given the police a good enough lie to keep myself from looking insane in the eyes of my co-workers. I know no one will ever know the true story or believe it, but I’m writing it out here. It at least needs to be known written somewhere. Even if my and Kate’s eyes are the only ones that will ever read it written out and forever imprinted in our memories.
The morning Kate had run off to the mountains on her own, I had made my way to the Blackwell home where I was immediately met with Mr. Blackwell charging at me and wrapping his large hands around my neck. He was shaking me and blaming me for getting his daughter killed and not doing more to keep her safe. The police who had been called to examine the scene and read Kate’s letter had to sedate Mr. Blackwell to get him off of me, lying him down on the couch, his head resting on Mrs. Blackwell’s legs. Though the woman was distraught and begging the police to bring her daughter back, she still took the time to shoot that cold, death glare my way. The ice in my chest growing. I couldn’t tell these people that this thing had come after me to get to Kate. I knew it wouldn’t change anything. If anything they’d hate me even more for keeping it to myself.
The sheriff was there and he pulled me away from eye sight of the Blackwells, trying to tell me that this wasn’t my fault. But I couldn’t help but blame myself. I should have done everything I could to keep Kate as far from those mountains as possible.
There were no signs of a struggle in Kate’s room and the letter was definitely written in her hand writing. Her father’s rifle missing from the study, a backpack and some food and supplies gone as well. She had only grabbed one set of clothes from her drawers, showing she did indeed have plans on returning after only one night in the mountains to confront whoever or whatever the killer was.
I told the sheriff to keep any police from going up to the mountains without first allowing me to go up there first to find Kate. He of course argued, telling me that he couldn’t break protocol based on any hunches I may have had. However, I told him that I could get Kate back without her putting up much of a fight, whereas she may struggle with a group of cops who didn’t understand the situation she was in. I was close enough to this case to have built a trust with her after all. I was mentioned in her letter about ending this case for me.
It took a good hour to get the sheriff to eye the Blackwells, Mr. Blackwell beginning to stir from his sleep, and allow me to go to the mountains to find Kate. He didn’t bother to call off the search to the police that had already begun making their way to the mountains, but did radio to tell them to not try getting Kate home without first allowing me to speak to her. He then gave me twenty-four hours to find her to which I told him I’d only need at most ten.
Without telling him about the disturbing scratches on my car, I sped to the mountains, taking the same path Kate had that day she took her friends on their trip. The route, as the sun began to rise was scenic. A drive that may have been a sign of a bright future ahead with a beautiful week in the mountains of nothing but nature, was now a reddening sky of horror. I couldn’t understand how Kate felt, going down the same roads that led to her only friends’ fates to avenge them, but the feeling of guilt did weigh heavy on my chest as I saw the signs of the Appalachian Mountain trails grow bigger on the horizon. Guilt for not doing more to prove Kate was innocent, for allowing Mrs. Mayfield for getting killed right before my very eyes, and for Liam for not being lucky enough to save him.
When I finally arrived to the cabin, there didn’t seem to be any change since the first day I was called to the crime scene, the only thing out of place being Mr. Blackwell’s truck parked precariously near the cabin. The police tape was still up, the cars of Kate and Mr. Woolfe still left where they were, the tires still slashed, the door wide open from when Kate, Ms. Greymoore, and Mr. Woolfe ran out of the cabin upon Mr. Billings was killed by an unknown force. All the bodies had been found and were now being prepared by their families to be buried or cremated. Only one body of the five still roaming around to avenge each and every one of their deaths.
I called out for Kate as I made my way into the cabin. The Ouija board was still on the coffee table, the white line of where Mr. Billings had been found lying face first on the floor with his head bashed open remained on the spot. The planchette was still missing. I kept calling out for Kate as I made my way up to the attic, the door left unlocked, using my flashlight to shine down on the white outline where Mr. Steele had been found completely torn apart. To think Kate had done such a thing, I now realize made me look like a complete dumb ass for believing it.
When I couldn’t find Kate in the cabin, I made my way out the cabin, still calling for her. I called out to her, promising that she just needed to come back home with me and we could solve the murders together. I knew it was a lie and that the sheriff would immediately have her take away to some secluded place where the killer couldn’t find her, but it was all I could think of to try luring her out to meet me. Still, she never appeared.
The sun was soon beginning to set as I tried retracing the very steps Kate and Ms. Greymoore had taken to outrun the killer. I had passed the small shrine of flowers and the pictures of Mr. Woolfe where the boy had been found, his face permanently remaining nineteen forever in the photos of him with Kate and their friends. I kept going, trying my best to follow the same path to the cliff where Ms. Greymoore was found, calling for Kate along the way.
It wasn’t until I found the place Kate had buried her best friend that I found Kate. She was on her knees before the rock where she left her bloody handprint, sniffing as her head was lowered, her dad’s rifle in her hands.
“Ms. Blackwell-“ I began as I took a step toward her. I was immediately cut off as Kate jumped to her feet, raising her father’s rifle at my head. I jolted back, raising my hands up to show her I meant no harm to her. “Ms. Blackwell, it’s me, Det. Snow!”
“Detective…?” She gasped, slightly lowering the rifle, but keeping it on me. “P-Prove it!”
“I’m sorry?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I… I thought I saw Sonja…” Kate breathed between tears, the rifle shaking in her hands, “it… It was wearing her face… It had her voice… How… H-How do I know you’re really Det. Snow?”
“You… Saw Sonja?” I asked as gently as I could with a terrified woman pointing a gun my way. “She spoke to you?”
“Prove you’re Det. Snow!” Kate demanded as she stilled her arms, readying the rifle as she pointed straight between my eyes.
“Alright! Alright!” I kept my hands up, backing up slightly as I tried thinking of how I could prove to her I was really me. “I… I, ah… I have… Had a brother… We went to get ice cream together once and… I dropped a dime and went to grab it… I was five… I followed it out to the road and despite how trafficked it was, I didn’t get hit. I grabbed the dime just as a truck was speeding my way and it swerved just before hitting me… Seeing how close I was to death, I dropped the dime and it rolled into the sewer. My brother called me Lucky Dime since then… Saying the dime was lost to me because it did its job in protecting me… I haven’t seen my brother since I was seven and I haven’t spoken to my parents in…” I looked at my watch. “Five years… No one else calls me Lucky Dime… Not even the people at the station know that was my nickname.”
With this, Kate lowered the rifle, her eyes softening from her furious fear to a more melancholy terror. She looked to Ms. Greymoore’s grave marker, her hand print just barely visible In the approaching darkness.
“It… It looked just… Like her…” She sniffed, “it had her voice… Why did it have her voice… Why did it look like her…?”
“Ms. Blackwell,” I soothed, relaxing now that there was no weapon in my face, “we need to head back, your parents are worried about you and the police are looking for-“
“I can’t go back yet!” She snapped at me as she spun to look at me, tears in her eyes. “That thing is still out there and will kill again unless I end it!” She held up her dad’s rifle as if to show me how she meant to “end it.” “I’m not leaving until I end that… Thing that had the balls to wear Sonja’s face and have her voice!”
“Ms. Blackwell, we will catch the killer, I promise, but right now, we need to get you home before your dad ends up killing a police officer for keeping him from looking for you.”
“I told him in my letter I’d be back tomorrow! I’m twenty-years-old, he can’t force me back home if I don’t want to! I just want to stop this thing before it-“
A howling in the distance cut Kate off. Coyote from what I could hear. If I couldn’t get Kate home, I’d have to get her somewhere safe. I turned to begin talking her down and taking her to one of the other two cabins for shelter. However, when I looked back at her, her face had turned to a bone chilling terror I’d never seen on a person before. She looked like hunted prey that had been found by its predator. She gripped her dad’s rifle to her chest tightly, her hand reaching for the trigger.
“Ms. Blackwell, it’s just a pack of coyote,” I tried telling her calmly, “let’s get to one of the other cabins and-“
“No, no, no,” She stopped me as she stepped back, looking around for where the howling was coming from, “I… Heard that same howling just before I saw Sonja! I thought it was far away, but she… She was right in front of me… She… Something was off, but it looked just like her!”
“Ms. Blackwell, you didn’t see Sonja,” I assured her, “I don’t know what you think you saw, but it wasn’t-“
“Lucky… Dime…”
I froze. My blood turned to ice. The fear on Kate’s face grew as she began backing away, her back hitting the grave marker. I spun around to see a figure in the darkness limp toward us, a scratched and garbled familiar voice coming from it.
“Lucky… Dime…” It wheezed, “You brought her… Back… Give her… To me…”
I whipped out my gun, pointing it at this thing that had his voice. I stepped back to stand directly between this thing and Kate.
“Stay back!” I demanded. “Don’t come any closer!”
“Lucky… Di-“
“Shut up! Stop calling me that! Who are you? Not another step or I’ll shoot!”
The thing stopped limping toward us, its body shuddering in place as it stared us down. I took the safety off of my Glock, ready to blow this thing’s head off if it got any closer or even dared using that voice on me again.
“Kate…” It turned its attention to Kate, a completely different voice coming from it, another male’s voice. “Kate… I’m cold…”
“J-Jasper…” Kate began to sob, “Please, stop using their voices… Please stop!”
“Kate… Kate why did… Did you leave me…?” Another male voice asked. “I… I was in so much… Pain…”
“Shut up!” Kate cried out.
“I thought we… Were friends… Kate…” A female voice. “You said you… Loved me… Why won’t… You let me have… Your warmth…?”
“I said shut up!” Kate screamed as she pointed her rifle and shooting at the creature. She had missed, but the thing still let out an ear piercing shriek as it dodged out of the way of the bullets Kate was shooting. It ran off into the darkness, but Kate kept pulling the trigger of her rifle.
“Stop!” I shouted as I snatched the barrel of her rifle, shoving it to the ground before us. “It’s gone, you scared it off, get to the cabins, I’m right here with you!”
I began shoving Kate back toward where the cabins were, the sounds of that thing screaming out in a symphony of different voices ringing out throughout the woods. I shoved Kate into the first cabin we had arrived to, Cabin #1 I could only assume as I slammed the door shut behind us. It smelled God awful, like the smell of the corpse I found on my first murder case, and it was getting darker as the sun began to sink behind the trees outside.
“Detective, it smell terrible in here!” Kate cried out, covering her mouth and nose, but the tears still falling from her eyes were still visible as they rolled down her cheeks.
I pulled her close and kept her behind me as I took my gun and flashlight out. “Stay close to me,” I ordered, leading the way through the cabin, “do not run off or use that rifle without may say so, understood?”
Kate didn’t answer, but I could feel the heat from her body following after me as I made my toward the smell. It was getting worse as we inched closer to a closet door in a hallway that connected the living room to the kitchen. The door was locked, but after a couple of kicks I was able to get the door to swing open, the smell blasting us in our faces making us gag and nearly throw up on the floor. I fumbled around the sides inside the room to find a light switch that I was able to find to the side of the entryway. A yellow light flickered on, revealing the door led to a staircase. I led the way down the creaking steps, Kate close by as she kept her mouth covered with her shirt.
Once we had made our way to the bottom, Kate dropped her dad’s rifle and let out a scream as we stared at what was waiting for us at the bottom of the steps. In a large pile at the corner of this basement room were nothing but skin and bones of humans and animals covered in maggots and flies. Some of the human bodies being small and child-like in size. The missing people who were never found after vanishing when they came to Cabin #2.
I grabbed Kate’s rifle off the floor and began pushing her back up the stairs, her screaming and sobbing all the way back up to the cabin. I slammed the door shut behind us and pushed Kate to the front door.
“We need to leave,” I had told her, trying to calm her down as we made it outside, “we need to get you home and away from here as soon as possible.”
“N-No… No!” She began fighting me, trying to escape my grasp on her. “No! That… That thing is still out there! You saw it! You can’t say you don’t believe me now! It even called you Lucky Dime! It said you brought me back!”
“I’m not saying I don’t believe you!” I shot back. “I do, I saw exactly what you saw, but it’s way too dangerous for you to be out here while you’re the one it’s after!”
“I escaped it once, I can do it again!” Kate pointed out as she struggled against me while I tried getting her into my car. “I’m not running away this time, I want to kill it!”
“God damn it, Blackwell, we’ll let the police handle it! Just because you have a weapon doesn’t make you safe or ready to handle something like… Like that… That thing!”
“It killed my friends! It wants me! I’m going straight to it so I can blow its head off! It’ll come right for me!”
“I came here to bring you back home, not let you accomplish some stupid ass revenge plot! Get in the fucking car, unless you want to end up like those bodies down that-“
“D… De… Detect… Detective…”
A scratched and moaning voice cut me off. Kate and I both froze at the sound of something approaching. I turned to see a police officer stagger toward us from the tree line. I could barely tell who he was or who he used to be, his head held low and blue uniform covered in blood.
“H… Hel… Hel… Help… Help me…" It croaked as it stumbled closer.
I held up Kate's rifle. "Stay back!" I barked. "Not another step!"
The thing that stood before us wearing the cop like a full-bodied suit stopped in place. It swayed where it stood, blood water falling from its head and down to its chest.
"It… It… It's inside… Inside me…" It breathed painfully. "I… I can't… Help… Me…" Its voice then changed to that familiar voice that made my skin crawl. "Lucky… Dime… I… I'm so… Hungry… Give her… To… Me…"
I pulled the trigger of the rifle, hitting the creature in the head, the rest of it staggering backward from the blow. Still though, it remained on its feet, turning itself to look toward us once again.
"Give… Her… To… Me…" It wheeze, blood and brain pouring from where I had shot it, it beginning to stumble toward us once again. I continued shooting, hitting it in the shoulder, the arm, the leg, the head again, but it just kept coming toward us faster, demanding I give Kate to it.
I was about ready to ram it with the rifle, having run out of bullets, when a voice off in the distance made the creature freeze just an inch before us.
"I'm here! I'm here!" It called out in an almost sing-songy way, using the voice of a little girl. "I'm here! I'm here!"
"I'm… Here…" The creature repeated as it jerked its body to look to where the voice was coming from. "I'm here… I'm here… I'm here! I'm here! I'm here!" It began shrieking in a high pitch wail. It sounded like a mixture of different voices ranging from child, to woman, to man. Keeping flat on its feet, its upper body fell forward onto its hands before speedily crawling off like a spider.
We stood in shaking silence for a moment, Kate digging her fingers into my arm while I was too numb from shock to care about the pain she was unknowingly inflicting. It wasn’t until the radio from my car buzzed to life that jolted us back to whatever reality was at this point. I scrambled to the driver’s side, swinging the door open as I fell inside to grab the intercom to respond to the voice yelling for me over the receiver.
“Det. Snow, what the hell is going on up there?” The sheriff’s scratched voice called out over the receiver when I could barely get my name out of my mouth.
“Sh-Sh-Sheriff…?” Was all I could respond with, still trying to wrap my head around what I had just seen.
“Y-Y-Yeah,” he responded in mock shudder, “what the hell is going on up there? I’ve tried radioing every man I’ve got up there and am constantly being left on red! Do I need to send back-up?”
“No!” Immediately, I returned to full reality, finally understanding the severity of the moment and putting that knowledge into my tone. “Landon, do not send any more men up here, call everyone back immediately! I don’t know what this thing is, but it’s too dangerous! Call everyone back, we’re heading back to the Blackwell house now!”
“We?” The sheriff questioned, skepticism in his voice.
“I found Ms. Blackwell, she’s here with me.”
I was met with statice before the voice of Mr. Blackwell blasted over the intercom.
“Bring my daughter home, right now, you son of a bitch!” Mr. Blackwell demanded. “You bring her home this instant before I decide to kick your teeth in!”
I opened my mouth to respond, but the radio was snatched from my hand from Kate. “I’m not coming home until I kill this thing!” She snapped into the radio. “I don’t know what it is, but I at least know I’m not crazy and that it needs to die before it kills anyone else!”
I grabbed the radio from Kate’s hand, beginning to tell her off when a agonized scream erupted from the intercom. I dropped the radio to cover my ears as Kate did, the scream piercing from my car to throughout the forest around us. The voice screaming and crying for help sounded male and it seemed to echo all around us.
“GIVE HER TO ME, YOU SON OF A BITCH!” A mix of the screaming voice and Mr. Blackwell’s hissed out after a good five minutes of screaming before the radio short-circuited and puffs of smoke flowed out.
After allowing my ears to adjust to the sudden silence, I grabbed the radio once again and tried calling for the sheriff, for the cops with us in the mountains, for anyone. When I was met with more silence, I slammed the radio back down on the holder and cursed loudly, hitting the wheel as if it were the source of all my problems.
After a moment to take some deep breaths, I told Kate to get in the car as I placed her rifle in the back seat.
“Didn’t you hear me?” she shot back. “I’m not-“
“Damn it, Blackwell, we have no idea what we’re dealing with, it can mimic peoples’ voices, and it just ran off like a fucking black widow!” I snapped, stepping out of the driver’s seat to glare down at her. “The last thing I’m doing to leaving you here alone and I’m not staying here another second until I can wrap my head around what the fuck I just saw! So, you either get yourself killed out here while I try talking you down this hero complex high, or you’re going to do what I say and get in the damn car!”
We stood in heated silence, glaring each other down before Kate huffed and stormed over to the passenger side of my car and slamming the door shut as she climbed in. I jumped in after her and began driving away from this nutty nightmare I had found myself in.
We drove down the trail back to civilization in silence, Kate staring out the window and trying to keep her tearful sniffs quiet. I had finally begun calming down and was starting to feel bad for snapping at her. She had only gone there to avenge her friends by killing that thing that had most likely killed a whole bunch of cops to find her. However, I still couldn’t just let her stay to hunt it and I didn’t want to stay out in those mountains with some kind of creature that could take the form and voice of someone I knew. I still couldn’t understand what is was I had even seen.
“Wendigo,” Kate whispered, breaking the silence in the car first. She had said it as if she had just remembered something important.
“What?”
“A Wendigo,” She repeated, turning to look to me with wide scared eyes, “that’s what that thing is! It’s a Wendigo!”
“Slow down, what’s a Wendigo?”
“It’s… Oh, just forget it! You wouldn’t believe me anyway.”
“Ms. Blackwell, I just saw a cop being used as a puppet and then run off at inhuman speed on all fours; I doubt I’m not going to believe a single word that comes out of your mouth now. What’s a Wendigo?”
Kate eyed me for a moment before releasing some of the tension from her face as she took a deep breath and began explaining to me. “They’re a Native American myth; it’s believed they’re the spirits of people who would lose themselves in the woods and would end up eating other people to satiate their hunger. I think that’s what that thing is. They can mimic the voices of people who died and use it to lure people to them, they can take the form of that person too.”
“Why does it want female hearts?” I asked, not realizing I had yet told her what my mysterious caller kept asking for when they called me.
“It… It wants my heart?” she asked shakily.
I cursed to myself before letting out a frustrated sigh. “I think this thing wants hearts, but it only wants female hearts. Why? I don’t know yet. But the only other person to be found after killing someone in those cabins was found with his partner’s heart missing to which he was blamed for taking out of her. Recently, I’ve been getting calls from some… Thing wanting me to bring you back here so it could take something from you. It would have taken Ms. Greymoore’s, but you hid her well enough that only the police could find her in time. Now, I’ve been getting calls asking for you and to get something from you.”
Kate looked to me in shock before a wave of guilt twisted her face in pain. “I… I’m so, so… So sorry, Detective!” She cried out. “I… I had… I had no idea you were being… Harassed by it! Had I known it wanted me back and was demanding you brought me here, I never… I didn’t… That’s why it said you brought me back! Oh, I’m such an idiot!” She pressed her hands to her face, grabbing at her hair between her fingers and tightening them around her eyes.
“No, no, no, stop, stop that!” I ordered, screeching the car to a halt, having to bring it to a crooked stop so I could stop her from hurting herself. I snatched her arms from her head and pinned them to her lap, tears flooding her face. “It’s my fault for not telling you sooner! I was too focused on trying to solve this case with the most efficient evidence I could, but that just kept me looking to you as a suspect. I should have stopped thinking you were the killer the moment I got that first call. There’s no way any of us could have seen… This coming… Except people who probably already believe in that kind of stuff or don’t stop to assume a more rational explanation like a cult… I’m… I’m sorry. But, I won’t let it take anything from you, not anymore. I’m going to get you home and then I’ll deal with this with the rest of the police department. You don’t have to deal with this thing anymore, it’ll be my burden from now on. You need time to finally get some rest and mourn your friends with your and their families. It’s already fucked your life up enough, I won’t let it go on making it worse.”
I stopped her before she could argue with me with a wave of my hand. “Your friends’ deaths shouldn’t be your burden to handle. I know you want to be the one who kills that thing and do right by them, but that’s not what they would want. They’d want you to remember them and continue living. They know you didn’t do it, so stop blaming yourself and stop acting like you’re the one who has to make it up to them. I will put an end to this die trying, but you need to go home and be with people who are happy you still get to live.”
Kate looked down at her hands that I kept down on her lap before nodding weakly and letting out a broken “okay.”
“Good, now let’s get you home before-“
My words were cut off when the honk of a car barreling toward us echoed through the woods. The headlights were fast approaching and I barely had time to grab the gear shift to put us back in drive as the other vehicle hit us, forcing us back and forth in one violent motion. It took me a moment to check myself to be sure I hadn’t hit my head on anything or got whiplash from the crash before I immediately returned my full attention to Kate who was kneeling over holding her head. I gently grabbed her shoulder and pulled her up to examine her head. It didn’t appear to have been busted and bleeding, but she was holding the front side of her forehead.
“Are you okay?” I asked her, prying her hand away from the spot on her forehead, seeing that it was beginning to bruise. “Can you hear me? Blink twice if you can understand me!”
“I… I’m f-fine…” she mumbled as she looked to her hand to check if there was blood on her palm, “I… I think I just… Hit… Hit the w-window…” She then blinked twice in my direction before looking to the car that had rammed us.
I turned my attention as well to the car to see it was a police van, it’s front crushed into the left of my front. I quickly jumped out my vehicle and stormed to the van, yelling at who ever was driving the van to come out and explain what the hell they were doing.
The driver’s side of the van swung open once I was near enough and a man in an orange jumpsuit climbed out, staring familiar daggers at me. The moment realization set in, my mixed emotions of confusion, frustration, and fear turned to fury.
It was Leighton Raines.
“Jesus, you really are a shitty detective.” Was all he said to me before reaching into the can and retrieving a rifle out from the passenger seat.
[END OF PART 1]
Part 6