Fuck you.Fuck you. You useless piece of shit. You absolute waste of space and air. You uneducated, ignorant, idiotic dumb swine, you're an absolute embarrassment to humanity and all life as a whole. The magnitude of your failure just now is so indescribably massive that one hundred years into the future your name will be used as the moniker of evil for heretics. Even if all of humanity put together their collective intelligence there is no conceivable way they could have thought up a way to fuck k up on the unimaginable scale you just did. When Jesus died for our sins, he must not have seen the sacrilegious act we just witnessed you performing, because I know that your birth may have never become if he did he would have forsaken humanity long ago so that when you die, your skeleton will be displayed in a museum after being scientifically r bone structure, researched so that all future generations may learn not to generate them to a useless reality. your because every tiny detail anyone may have in common with you degrades t piece of trash and a burden to society. No wonder your father questioned whether or not you were truly his son, for you'd have to not be a waste of carbon matter for like a family member your birth made it so that mankind is worse of ine to love you f in every way you can possibly imagine, and you have made it so that society never really recover into a state of ization. can organization. Everything has forever fallen into a bewildering chaos, through which core, you can only find misfortune. I would say the apocalypse is upon us but unrecognizable core, v this is merely the closest word humans have for the sheer scale of horror that is now reality. You have forever condemned everyone you love and know into an eternal state of suffering. worse than any human concept of hell. You are such an unholy being, that if you step within a one hundred foot radius of a holy place or a place that has ever been deemed important by tradius anyone, your distorted sac religious soul will ruin whatever meaning it ever had beyond repair. You are an idiotic, shiteating, dumbass ape and no one has ever loved you. Rhodes Island would have been l fif you'd never joined us. You are a lying, backstabbing, been better off if you'd never cowardly useless piece of shit and I hate you with every single part of my being. Even this worlds finest writers and poets from throughout the ages could never hope to accurately escale which you just fucked up, and how incredibly idiotic you are. Anyone describe the s e on that believes in any religion out there should now realize that they have been wrong this entire time, for if divine beings were real, they would never have allowed a being such as you to stain the earth and this universe. In the future there will be horror stories made about you, with the scariest part of them being that the reader has to realize that such an indescribable monster actually exists, and that the horrific events from the movie have actually taken in the same world that they live in right now. You are the absolute embodiment of everything solute nave actually taken place that has ever been wrong on this earth, yet you manage to make it so that that is only a small part of the evil that is your being. Never in the history of mankind has there been of mankind has there been anyone that could have predicted such an eldrich abomination, but here you are. It's hard to believe that I am seeing such an an incredible failure with my own eyes, but here I am, so unfortunately I cannot deny your existence. Even if I did my very best, my vocabulary is not able to describe the sheer magnitude of the idiotic mistake that is you. Even if time travel some day will be Code invented, there still would not be a single soul willing to go back in time to before this moment to fix o fix history, because having to witness such incredible horrors if they failed would have to many mental and physical drawbacks that not even the bravest soul in history would be willing to risk it. I cannot imagine the pure dread your mother must have felt when she had to carry a baby for nine months and then giving birth to such a wretched monster as you. Not a single word of word of the incoherent, illogical rambling you may be wanting to do to defend ng you may yourself or apologize would ever be able to make up for what you just did. The countries of the world would have wanted to make laws preventing such a terrible event like this from ever happening again, but sadly this is not possible since your horrific actions just now have shattered every form of order this world once had, making concepts such as laws irrelevant. Right from the moment I first set my eyes on you I knew you were an absolute abomination of everything that is wrong with humanity. I was hoping I would have been able to prevent your evil from being released upon this world by tagging along and keeping my eye on you, but it is clear to me now that not even the greatest efforts would have been able to prevent a terrible event in this scale from occurring. You are the worst human being, or even just being in general, that I have ever had the misfortune of witnessing. Events like the infected plague apparently only happened with the goal of teaching humanity to survive such a horrible event e able to even slightly as the one you just created, but not even mankind's greatest trials were a epare anyone for the insufferable evil you have just created. If you ever had them, prepare children would be preemptively killed to protect your suniverse from the possibility of anyone in your bloodline being aan half as he protect this will never be able to have killed f as bad as you are, except you will being even children, because not a single human being will ever want to come within a hu a hundred mile of you and anything you have ever touched. You are a colossal disappointment not only radius to your parents, but to your ancestors and entire bloodline. The disgusting mistake that y have just made is so incredibly terrible that everyone who would ever be to hear about it. usly feel an indescribable mixt mixture would spontaneously feel an who woulding mistake that you of immane immense anger, fear and anxiety that emotionally and physically they would never truly be the same ever again. The sheer scale of your mistake, if ever to be materialized, would not only surpass the size of the world, but it would reach far beyond the edges of the known, and almost certainly the unknown universe. I could sit here and write paragraphs, nay, books describing your immense failure, yet even if I were to dedicate my life to describing the reality of what has just failure e down here, and I would meedoent of it until my heart stone heating working as hard and efficiently spend every moment of it until my heart stops beating v as possible, yet there is not even a snowballs chance in hell that I would be able to come close to transcribing the absolute shitshow you have just released upon the world. You are an irresponsible, idiotic, disgusting, unloved, horrible excuse for a living being who's soul contains less humanity than every ginger in history combined. The absolute disgust I feel when thinking about anything that has even a slight resemblance to anything that might have to do with you and your unholy actions is so incredibly great that when I am honest about it I think that even I do not posses a consciousness great enough to comprehend my own feelings about it. When people of Columbia fought to break free from Lungmen, countless soldiers fought and lost their lives in favor of a chance at a better future for their children, they did not give their lives to have you fuck the world up beyond repair to the degree that you are doing right now. Honestly, even when technology advances and studies on become more and more accurate, I do not think humanity will ever truly be able to the subject understand what your failure actually means for the universe. My hate for you and everything you stand for is so much deeper than the depths of Shambala that you could probably take s so much deepe the entire Lungmen population down there and back up around twenty million times before you would have sunk to the end of my hate, and honestly, I do not want to fun that that in the end of my hate, and I exaggerate, but 1 think that that insult was low balling it such a massive amount that all mountains in this world und being sive amount that all mo combined would not be able to stack up to this imprecise judgement in light of the fact that when being honest, my hate is almost certainly bottomless. There is no one in this world that has ever loved you, and especially after what you just did, no one will ever love you in the future either. There is no hope that your idiotic behavior and especially your crooked soul will ever change for the better, and in fact quite the opposite might be true. By making the mistake that you just did, you have shown me that you are so incredibly hopeless that you will only devolve into a more idiotic and wretched creature than you already are. The only possible way in which your future would be brighter than the black hole your existence currently is would exclusively be because there is absolutely no conceivable way that you would even beable to sink lower than the pathetic place your current failure has put you in.STOP FUCKING USING EMOJIS!!!!! 😡Fuck you.Fuck you. You useless piece of shit. You absolute waste of space and air. You uneducated,ignorant, idiotic dumb swine, you're an absolute embarrassment to humanity and all life as a whole. The magnitude of your failure just now is so indescribably massive that one hundred years into the future your name will be used as moniker of evil for heretics. Even if all of humanity put together their collective intelligence there is no conceivable way they could have thought up a way to fuck k up on the unimaginable scale you just did. When Jesus died for our sins, he must not have seen the sacrilegious act we just witnessed you performing, because i o that your birth may have never become he did he would have forsaken humanity long ago so that your I you die, your skeleton will be displayed in a museum after being scientifically r bone structure, researched so that all future generations may learn not to generate them to a useless reality. your because every tiny detail anyone may have in common with you degrades t piece of trash and a burden to society. No wonder your father questioned whether or not your were truly his son, for you'd have to not be a waste of carbon matter for like a family member your birth made it so that mankind is worse of ine to love you f in every way you can possibly imagine, and you have made it so that society never really recover into a state of ization. can organization. Everything has forever fallen into a bewildering chaos, through which core, you can only find misfortune. I would say the apocalypse is upon us but unrecognizable core, v this is merely the closest word humans have for the sheer scale of horror that is now reality. You have forever condemned everyone you love and know into an eternal state of suffering. worse than any human concept of hell. You are such an unholy being, that if you step within a one hundred foot radius of a holy place or a place that has ever been deemed important by tradius anyone, your distorted sac religious soul will ruin whatever meaning it ever had beyond repair. You are an idiotic, shiteating, dumbass ape and no one has ever loved you. Rhodes Island would have been l fif you'd never joined us. You are a lying, backstabbing, been better off if you'd never cowardly useless piece of shit and I hate you with every single part of my being. Even this worlds finest writers and poets from throughout the ages could never hope to accurately escale which you just fucked up, and how incredibly idiotic you are. Anyone describe the s e on that believes in any religion out there should now realize that they have been wrong this entire time, for if divine beings were real, they would never have allowed a being such as you to stain the earth and this universe. In the future there will be horror stories made about you, with the scariest part of them being that the reader has to realize that such an indescribable monster actually exists, and that the horrific events from the movie have actually taken in the same world that they live in right now. You are the absolute embodiment of everything solute nave actually taken place that has ever been wrong on this earth, yet you manage to make it so that that is only a small part of the evil that is your being. Never in the history of mankind has there been of mankind has there been anyone that could have predicted such an eldrich abomination, but here you are. It's hard to believe that I am seeing such an an incredible failure with my own eyes, but here I am, so unfortunately I cannot deny your existence. Even if I did my very best, my vocabulary is not able to describe the sheer magnitude of the idiotic mistake that is you. Even if time travel some day will be Code invented, there still would not be a single soul willing to go back in time to before this moment to fix o fix history, because having to witness such incredible horrors if they failed would have to many mental and physical drawbacks that not even the bravest soul in history would be willing to risk it. I cannot imagine the pure dread your mother must have felt when she had to carry a baby for nine months and then giving birth to such a wretched monster as you. Not a single word of word of the incoherent, illogical rambling you may be wanting to do to defend ng you may yourself or apologize would ever be able to make up for what you just did. The countries of the world would have wanted to make laws preventing such a terrible event like this from ever happening again, but sadly this is not possible since your horrific actions just now have shattered every form of order this world once had, making concepts such as laws irrelevant. Right from the moment I first set my eyes on you I knew you were an absolute abomination of everything that is wrong with humanity. I was hoping I would have been able to prevent your evil from being released upon this world by tagging along and keeping my eye on you, but it is clear to me now that not even the greatest efforts would have been able to prevent a terrible event in this scale from occurring. You are the worst human being, or even just being in general, that I have ever had the misfortune of witnessing. Events like the infected plague apparently only happened with the goal of teaching humanity to survive such a horrible event e able to even slightly as the one you just created, but not even mankind's greatest trials were a epare anyone for the insufferable evil you have just created. If you ever had them, prepare children would be preemptively killed to protect your suniverse from the possibility of anyone in your bloodline being aan half as he protect this will never be able to have killed f as bad as you are, except you will being even children, because not a single human being will ever want to come within a hu a hundred mile of you and anything you have ever touched. You are a colossal disappointment not only radius to your parents, but to your ancestors and entire bloodline. The disgusting mistake that y have just made is so incredibly terrible that everyone who would ever be to hear about it. usly feel an indescribable mixt mixture would spontaneously feel an who woulding mistake that you of immane immense anger, fear and anxiety that emotionally and physically they would never truly be the same ever again. The sheer scale of your mistake, if ever to be materialized, would not only surpass the size of the world, but it would reach far beyond the edges of the known, and almost certainly the unknown universe. I could sit here and write paragraphs, nay, books describing your immense failure, yet even if I were to dedicate my life to describing the reality of what has just failure e down here, and I would meedoent of it until my heart stone heating working as hard and efficiently spend every moment of it until my heart stops beating v as possible, yet there is not even a snowballs chance in hell that I would be able to come close to transcribing the absolute shitshow you have just released upon the world. You are an irresponsible, idiotic, disgusting, unloved, horrible excuse for a living being whose soul contains less humanity than every ginger in history combined. The absolute disgust I feel when thinking about anything that has even a slight resemblance to anything that might have to do with you and your unholy actions is so incredibly great that when I am honest about it I think that even I do not posses a consciousness great enough to comprehend my own feelings about it. When the people of Columbia fought to break free from Lungmen, countless soldiers fought and lost their lives in favor of a chance at a better future for their children, they did not give their lives to have you fuck the world up beyond repair to the degree that you are doing right now. Honestly, even when technology advances and studies and become more and more accurate, I do not think humanity will ever truly be able to the subject understand what your failure actually means for the universe. My hate for you and everything you stand for is so much deeper than the depths of Shambala that you could probably take s so much deepe the entire Lungmen population down there and back up around twenty million times before you would have sunk to the end of my hate, and honestly, I do not want to fun that that in the end of my hate, and I exaggerate, but 1 think that that insult was low balling it such a massive amount that all mountains in this world and being sive amount that all mo combined would not be able to stack up to this imprecise judgment in light of the fact that when being honest, my hate is almost certainly bottomless. There is no one in this world that has ever loved you, and especially after what you just did, no one will ever love you in the future either. There is no hope that your idiotic behavior and especially your crooked soul will ever change for the better, and in fact quite the opposite might be true. By making the mistake that you just did, you have shown me that you are so incredibly hopeless that you will only devolve into a more idiotic and wretched creature than you already are. The only possible way in which your future would be brighter than the black hole your existence currently is would exclusively be because there is absolutely no conceivable way that you would even beable to sink lower than the pathetic place your current failure has put you in.STOP FUCKING USING EMOJIS!!!!! 😡

Please excuse my ignorance, I’m currently in japan as a first time international traveller and pretty confused about the rules for duty free stuff and wondering if any seasoned veterans can help. I’m in Japan and booze is eye wateringly cheap, I want to bring home a bottle of jimmy or something and some Japanese ciggies.
As far as I can tell, I can bring back up to 2.25L of hooch and one(☹️) packet of smokes. There are “tax free” shops here in JP, and from what I understand, I show my passport when buying up and keep the receipts and I should be good to go as long as it’s under the limits and unopened.
However, I’m flying Jetstar and flying out, they made everyone bin every container over 100ml. So how do you do it?
When I search online it just says how lucky I am that I can buy it off Jetstar from the luxury of my seat or some bullshit like that and a bunch of other very old and conflicting information.
Do they have it stitched up so I have to buy it through them or at the airport or can it be done freelance? I’d hate to see a giant bottle of booze going in the bin, especially one that’s been paid for by me.
Also I’ve seen plastic 2.5L bottles here… are there rules regarding that that anyone knows of?
Thanks for your help

Does she know Joe killed Beck, Peach, Deliah, etc.? Is she really trying to be a good person and start over or are they both doing the ultimate coverup?

When gw came to our company it was sold as everything works out of the box. Now we work with teams that try not to build the components we need but instead trying to get us to change how we do buisness to fit gw.
The system at least to me so far has been a giant slow turd like got garbage out legacy’s run faster.
Basically did we get bamboozled and fall into a sales trap?
If not and your experiences are different please post here I would love to see something good but when I talk within my local community it’s that GW was a forced choice and has been nothing but slow for users and requires a lot of customization
Thank you in advance

Hi all. I recently picked up a "king size" 1:40 scale Lesney Mercury Cougar at a toy show. It's pretty old and worn and I got it dirt cheap with the idea that I would sort of restomod it. However, upon closer inspection I now see that it has something Lesney called "True glide steering" wherein the two front wheels turn in unison thanks to a sort of miniature control arm setup.
Does anyone have any experience with or knowledge of these models? I'm curious to know if it will prove to be a giant headache if I take it apart, and furthermore whether a wheel swap is possible without destroying the whole true glide system.
Thanks!

Hi mama’s and papa’s! I was wondering what your experience was with your LO’s food allergy?
Now before anyone comes at me saying to talk to the babies doctor; I did. I fed my son a peach purée, and only his cheeks got super red and then flushed out to be pale after about 30 or so minutes. There was no swelling of his lips, no difficulty breathing, just severe redness and heat to his cheeks.
When I talked to the doctor she said that it doesn’t seem like much of a food allergy yet, more of a skin reaction since it got all over his face. She said that if I’m willing I can try peaches again, but it always could cause a more severe reaction. If it did cause another reaction then she would refer me to a allergist, otherwise I was told to bring it up at his next wellness visit in May.
So what was your experience of giving LO and new food for the first time, and their first signs of a food allergy? I know all babies are different, and I know the symptoms; but i’m interested in seeing if someone had tried a new food and immediately had a reaction; or if they had the same reaction with the redness on the cheeks first.

World Record Marathon 2 - Rappan Athuk [Call to Action looking for people to prepare for the next event!]
Hello, y'all! My name is Paladin, and I had previously beat the world record for longest continuous TTRPG session in December at 440.5 hours, and we are going to do it AGAIN! This time playing Rappan Athuk from Frog God Games! Frog God Games also has agreed to help us this time around as well by giving things such as free merchandise and all their resources to setup the game with expanded content! The next world record marathon is going to be from July 1st to August 1st - playing 30 days!
What is Rappan Athuk? (click link to see trailer)
"Many, many players have lost favored PCs delving into the depths of this dungeon, all the while giggling like children and having the time of their lives. Hundreds, if not thousands of players have combed the halls of Rappan Athuk over the years, seeking treasure and fame, making it one of the best-known dungeon locations the game has ever produced. Even players who have never entered its halls know the term: “Don’t go down the Well!” Simply said: this module is hard and deadly, really deadly. This game plays like Diablo meets Dark Souls meets DnD. The module does not hold punches, and neither are we. This game has a lot of darkness, gloom, doom, intense fights, a massive dungeon, and a true marker of what is a great adventure that reminds us all what it felt like to face off against our first skeleton or our first boss.
How Playing In This Type Of Game Will Work
The game will be played on Foundry, use Discord, and be streamed to Twitch- using video and voice. Video and headset is mandatory to join this game. Every 2 hours either the dungeon master or the party of players will switch and have a handoff over a break. Handoffs are mainstreamed with a tool to assist in ensuring that all the proper information is given between players or dungeon masters. During the game, additional roles will be given to the party to assist in keeping track of inventory, mapping out the dungeon, and writing recap information down to share with the whole group. We will use variant and homebrew rules to create an atmosphere of darkness and danger as we traverse the massive megadungeon that is Rappan Athuk- a module that is 59 areas big and 660 pages of brutal, awesomeness.
Player and Dungeon Master Signups
Signups start May 1st at 6 PM CST The game will feature 6 roles with 17 players allowed in each role and a total of 17 DMs. This averages out to about 2-3 games a week per person. Whenever signups open up, teams and groups up to 6 players will be first to signup in the first week, and they will get priority placement. After the first week of signups, individuals will then be able to signup to play the game.
Looking for People to Help Prepare This post is looking for either dungeon masters or players that are interested in joining in this adventure who can help to prepare it and get it ready by July! Surprisingly enough, we have most of the resources from the last marathon to piggyback off of, but we are still looking for Dungeon Masters or Players with unique skills and leadership capabilities to work along with us and the creators of the book, Frog God Games, to bring this marathon to the next level! To be quite fair, people that help prepare get priority for signups before anyone else which means that Dungeon Master spots will most likely be taken up unless they sign up to help prepare for the event as we already have 6 Dungeon Masters plus the 2 from Frog God Games joining, thus leaving a total of 9 spots left. If you are interested in meeting with me and learning more about what there is to do and how to help, please join my server and also add me personally. I hope to speak with some of you very very soon!
Server Paladin Reizo#4013

I just started playing a couple days ago and it feels like I hit a brick wall at arena 4. I've been slowly inching my amount of trophies up bit everytime I reach a milestone it's like I take ten steps back because I get paired up against players with insane cards like the prince, the baby dragon, skeleton army, etc. I'll send out a giant just for a skeleton army to wipe it out in milliseconds followed by the prince and a baby dragon coming over to violate my towers. I don't understand how I'm supposed to compete and it's making me lose interest in the game fast. I need to get to higher arenas to unlock those cards but I can't get to higher arenas because I keep losing to the cards I want to unlock. The fuck?

Fedilemma
Leading up to the Federal Reserve's March 21-22 monetary policy meeting, traders had been expecting the FOMC to ratchet up its key interest rate by 50 basis points because the economy appeared to be surprisingly robust. But then three U.S. banks failed - Silvergate Capital (SI), SVB (SIVB) and Signature Bank (SBNY) - and a fourth is teetering (check out the latest headlines related to First Republic (FRC)). That may have Fed policymakers rethinking their expectation for a rate hike today and their upcoming rate path, while the whole episode came during the Fed's blackout period, creating even more uncertainty about what may lie ahead.
Backdrop: As a reminder, the Fed has increased its key rate for eight straight meetings, bringing the federal funds rate target range to 4.50%-4.75%, from 0.0%-0.25% in the past year, in its drive to push down inflation. Meanwhile, the core PCE price index, the central bank's preferred inflation gauge, showed a jump of 4.7% Y/Y in February, up from 4.6% in January, but easing from 5.2% in March 2022. Don't forget that efforts to shrink the bank's balance sheet were upended last week, as financial institutions borrowed a whopping $153B from the Fed's discount window (and $12B from the newly created Bank Term Funding Program), though assets from emergency lending tend to fall as soon as a crisis subsides, compared to holdings added under quantitative easing.
With regards to whether to hike or not, the decision won't be easy. Inflation still remains very high and a pause now could signal there are deeper problems within the banking system. On the other hand, there are fears that the Fed is moving too far, too fast with its aggressive rate increases, and some see the current banking crisis as a direct result of tighter monetary policy. Ultimately, things will boil down to whether the financial stability problem has been limited to a handful of regional banks that has been successfully contained, or if something systematic has broken - with the possibility of the crisis morphing into something larger.
By the numbers: According to the latest Wall Street Breakfast survey, around 70% of the 1,740 respondents expect the central bank to go for a smaller 25 basis point hike, though 20% believe that the Fed will pause its hiking cycle (and about 10% still see the possibility of a 50 bps increase). Any surprises will surely jolt markets, so pay attention to the Fed's dot plot - which will be published alongside its policy decision at 2 PM ET - as well as Jerome Powell's press conference a half hour later. SA contributor James Baker expects the central bank chair to "emphasize the continuing strength in the employment, the Fed's intention to make money available to any bank needing funds to meet deposit withdrawals, and the Fed's continuing commitment to bring inflation down." (84 comments)
Deposit runs
U.S. officials are prepared to take more actions if needed to ensure liquidity in the banking sector, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said yesterday during an American Bankers Association meeting in Washington, D.C. She defended federal regulators' actions to protect the depositors of Silicon Valley Bank (SIVB) and Signature Bank (SBNY), saying "our intervention was necessary to protect the broader U.S. banking system." While conditions have improved with aggregate outflows stabilizing, "similar actions could be warranted if smaller institutions suffer deposit runs that pose the risk of contagion." Yellen also cited a need to re-examine current regulatory and supervisory regimes, and expressed worries over a last-minute deal to resolve the debt ceiling. (3 comments)
Meet Bard
Google (GOOG, GOOGL) has released its artificial intelligence chatbot for public use as it responds to the growing threat from rival projects at Microsoft (MSFT) and OpenAI. The Bard chatbot will be available to a limited number of users on a waitlist picked from those in the U.S. and the U.K., before Google offers it in more countries. The company is also learning from missteps of OpenAI's ChatGPT and its own demonstration of Bard, by limiting the amount of interaction that can occur between Bard and users. Calling the situation a "code red" in February, Google AI chief Jeff Dean said the tech giant was moving "more conservatively than a small startup" since it has much more "reputational risk" in providing erroneous information. (31 comments)
Earnings swoosh
Shares of Nike (NKE) jumped 4% in after-hours trading on Tuesday after topping earnings expectations and touting inventory management actions. However, the gains didn't hold, and the stock even ended the session down 2%. Management noted continued promotional activity that compressed margins by 330 basis points to 43.3% - disappointing against a 43.7% consensus expectation - and the sneaker giant said it would "continue to take a cautious approach in planning our business, leading with intentional financial and operational guardrails." Inventories were also up 16% to $8.9B compared with the year-ago period, while China continues to remain a sore spot for Nike, with sales declining 8% Y/Y across the region. (22 comments)
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +1.9%. Hong Kong +1.7%. China +0.3%. India +0.2%. In Europe, at midday, London -0.1%. Paris +0.3%. Frankfurt +0.5%. Futures at 6:30, Dow flat. S&P -0.1%. Nasdaq -0.2%. Crude -0.4% to $69.41. Gold +0.3% to $1947.20. Bitcoin +0.3% to $28,205. Ten-year Treasury Yield unchanged at 3.60%
Today's Economic Calendar
7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications 10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories 2:00 PM FOMC Announcement 2:30 PM Chairman Press Conference
Companies reporting earnings today »
What else is happening...
Sticker shock: UK inflation rate unexpectedly rebounds to 10.4%.
PIMCO said to lose $340M from Credit Suisse (CS) AT1 debt writeoff.
GameStop (GME) surges after meme player records a surprise profit.
DWAC on watch with Trump expected to be formally indicted today.
Vote of confidence ahead of court ruling on SEC-(XRP-USD) case.
Ford (F) brings an all-electric Explorer to European markets.
Dodge (STLA) unveils its last super-fast gasoline muscle car.
Intel (INTC) shakes up leadership, announces new foundry leader.
These stocks are picking up Bed Bath & Beyond's (BBBY) lost market share.
Home improvement? Check out the latest housing stats on sales and prices.

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Planning for Your Event

Special Events can handle everything from corporate events, fairs, and festivals, trade shows, and weddings. Special Events is ready to listen to your unique needs and special requests. Here is an overview of the types of events we can help you plan for.

• Fairs and Festivals: Special Events is known for its knowledge and expertise in producing, managing, and offering support and supplies for large festivals and fairs throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, and Central California.
• Corporate events: Every aspect of a corporate event is a reflection of a company’s branding and image, so no detail is left unplanned with Special Events. In addition to providing all the equipment and décor you need, we can recommend event venues, activities, and entertainment with decades of corporate event planning history behind us.
• Conventions and trade shows: There is no event too large for Special Events, and we are prepared to help host any trade show or convention. Stages, audio equipment, pipe and drape, and large display equipment are all readily available for trade shows throughout the entire Bay Area.
• Weddings: For the linens, stages, seating, and ceremony setups you need to host a memorable wedding, you can rely on our Bay Area wedding services. You can expect a tasteful, stylish event with elegant tent setups to help you bring the beautiful sights of Northern California landscapes to your celebration.
• Large parties: You can let your imagination run wild with your party planning by utilizing our wide selection of stages, tents, tabletops, and dance floors. Our experienced staff can help you achieve your creative vision for a party that everyone will enjoy and remember for years to come.

We Always Give Our Best

Special Events has worked with a range of prestigious corporate parties and special events in the Bay Area. Some of our previous clients and partners include Google, Kaiser, Porsche, the San Francisco Giants, and John Muir Hospital. We have also produced and managed the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show. We are the largest supplier of event equipment to Fairs and Festivals in Northern California, including Gilroy Garlic Festival, San Francisco Gay Pride, and many more.
https://specialeventsrents.com/services/outdoor-party-tent-rentals/

I will be using fake names for this post.
I, 21M, share an apartment with two other people while studying in college. Let’s call one of the people Todd (21M). Todd and I were pretty good friends, not lifelong best friends, but pretty good friends. I work at a boba shop and I have for about two years. I really love my job, not only because of my coworkers and perks, but I also really love boba.
Todd needed a job, so I was able to get him hired at the boba place. I was excited about working with a friend at first, but over a period of time, I started to see why people say don’t work with your close friends. One time, when closing down the place, Todd wiped down one of the machines we use to make smoothies and swept a little bit, before handing the rag and broom to me and saying he was too tired. I just thought maybe he’s having an off day and ignored when he proceeded to go on his phone and swipe on Tinder instead of help out.
Well, later on, he had been doing some other stuff that had been getting on my nerves, and I was annoyed. I mentioned to my coworker I was going to be living with my cousin (who goes to the same school) next year instead of Todd and our other friend, as Todd had changed his mind about our living situation, and my coworker, who I’ll call James, told me that he knows that, because Todd had told him I wasn’t roommate material, despite the fact I did try my best to pitch in and even did other people’s chores. Additionally, as James was training to become a manager and has just been promoted to cafe assistant manager, James had reason to be upset with him, but hadn’t for my sake. Apparently Todd had been barely working, leaving to go sit in the break room often, lying to avoid coming in, and stealing boba in front of the bosses. One time, he got reported twice in one day for doing this.
Sometimes employees sneak drinks and I had mentioned I do sometimes, but it was very rare and I never did it in front of people who were my BOSS. But I was livid, especially at the comment Todd had made about me. My lovely girlfriend had to get me Chinese to cheer me up because I was so upset (dw I didn’t ask for this or demand it she could just tell I was upset and I do the same for her all the time.) my cousin was also pretty upset for me.
Todd no longer works at the boba shop, and my coworkers have been super supportive of me even when I felt bad that my referral failed. Todd doesn’t know I know why he was let go and what he said about me.

I have been hearing a lot of dissatisfaction and dissapointment of book 2 MC's pathway, the red priest. Here is my thoughts, hypoteses, and speculations on them.

1. Red Priest is a weak/basic ass pathway

°All the Red Priest's beyonders we have met are either weak, injured, dumb, or a mix of the two. We also didn't know their (at least the talented ones in this pathway) thought process in confrontation, what they see in their eyes. But it should quite interesting and powerful, because how tenaciable they are even though most of their def are just their enchanced body (like how Anderson can always get himself out in a pretty much impossible situation and how Medici-Sauron-Einhorn can still exist even though their physical body is gone).
°This pathway focus on direct damage, in other words, them using their fire powers is more than enough for most of the time as it is more powerful/stable than the extraordinary items of the same class. Unlike in the Fool path where the only 'pure attack' they had is air bullet, which is easily overpowered by anything (the reason why Klein uses death knell in the first place). If you don't have the brain, most ability in Fool pathway is underwhelming, easily countered. So they have to be creative about it and makes sure they follows a strict requirement to be sure of victory (look at Rosago, a sequence 5 who is counterkilled by a beyonder 3 sequence lower than him lol). While other like Red Priest pathway has more freedom on battle advantage, especially the unexpected ones. It's like complaining how knight who just slashes their sword is weaker than a mage who uses all of this astonishing magic where in actuality, they had the same potentcy.

2. The Red Priest ceremony will not be allowed by the Lord of Mysteries

This is dumb AF. Yes, Klein have the most say among the gods, but this is inevitable. They need to have more gods to protect their home. He'll definitely won't do anything if a Conqueror decides to promotes himself as god, the real question is WHO.
So here's my thought on future development: the Southern Continent. Red Priest promotion is to "stirs up a war that sweeps an entire continent and gain victory". We know the Southern Continent right now is just a bunch of colonies. Now, how about Lumian's war is to free the Southern Continent from colonazition, in other words, a revolutionary war? You damn sure Klein will supports the hell out of it.
But what about his allies anchors?
This is where I think Klein status as an above sequence will be used. So we all agree that the only god he absolutely supports is Evernight goddess right?
What is Southern Continent most common beliefs? Death.
Who hold sit on the death path right now? That's right, it's our Night Goddess.
We know that to not distrub the anchor, Evernight decides to conceal the news that the War God has fall, that the Twilight Giant path had been occupied by her. Why can't she do the same with death?
Heck, I can even imagine both her and Klein will work together to have the previous death descendent, most probably our dear teacher Azik Eggers, to be some sort of figure head on the newly independent Bayam state. More reason for Klein to supports this plan asides from his weakened moral compass.

3. But the book title is "Circle of Inevitability" !

It's quite obvious that the book plot will lead to Lumian having 2 kind of powers, the "common" Pathway, in this case Red Priest, and the outer god pathway, which will probaly be some sort of "blessing". And I honestly don't think Lumian will main that outer gods sequence. Asides from idk, morality? These outer gods sequences seems dependant on the god themself. After all we got them from praying. Like in what the newest chapter said, it's up to the gods whether to give you or take them, in other words, we don't have any initiation on it. Will a protagonist have such restricting power? Yeah right. Also, book title = MC will be that god is a very shacky thing to base on.

More evidences on why I think my speculations was the most probable

** - Cuttlefish want's to write the worldbuilding: geography, politics, etc that he couldn't have in book 1. A Red Priest pathway is perfect as an exploration "tool" because war = you need a lot of connection and enough situation + information awareness of quite literally, everything.**
** - Quite a lot of emphasis (unfinished problems/mysteries) in Red Priest pathway and colonization in book 1.**
** - Most Tarot Club is being tasked with something related with Red Priest pathway and Southern Continent (Rose School of Thought).**
** - Current Southern Continent is muddy waters. Foreign forces (northern forces), local forces, and guess what? Outer gods forces also! I think this place is the perfect stage for this story.**
I know a lot of you loves Medici. Me to actually, LOVE this fucking man. He didn't experienced all of that shits for a village boy to grab the place he'd been eyeing since forever. But let's all try to slowly accept his fate just incase, like what the CN readers do 🙏
(BTW, I'm not denying either if Medici became Calamity. After all, I don't know what was Adam cooking with making Anderson pregnant with a high sequence Red Priest characteristic. It could be for Medici advantage for all I know, he is his most loyal subordinate after all. Yes I know Adam indirectly betrayed him with helping Alista Tudor, but for a fully divine being, I dont think it's strange for wanting to kill a person today and then wanting to ressurect him tomorrow (my previous theory for it being it's for Medici ressurection, with physical body and what not).
BUT, it could also for Lumian now that I had read book 2 further. I have a feeling Cordu abnormallity also has a hands in Adam, with all of those sus coincidences and suspected Sun Church take over by Ancient Sun God (now Adam). And we do have that sentences "when Lumian first 'praise the sun' in the dream world, he felt a warm current gazing through the wall" (so it's either Eternal Blazing Sun or you know, Adam. I personally think that is Adam because how strange it is for sun believer to call the sun god "father" even though Eternal Blazing Sun didn't have that in his honorable name. And you know who did? Ancient Sun God).
Anyway for this theory, I think Adam is testing/reach some sort a cooporation with COI (maybe there is a friendly outer god?). Not probable because it looks like COI is pure evil? Well this is the guy that planned True Creator son to descent in a town full of people, as long as the cause is greater for the majority, this guy will sacrifice anything.
coughcough This is mostly just me as an Ancient Sun God/Adam/True Creator apologist, you can skip it if you like.
While it is not out of the question that Adam do all of this because of his plan (to do anything bad to COI) I just want to say, is True Creator bad? I don't really think so. 'He' just unwillingly crazy, 'His' previous self is a man who single handedly free humans from the slavery of mythical creatures, and also makes today's power system clearer to others, hence decrease beyonders death rate to a considerable level. We can see how Ancient Sun God is an awesome guy not only for the result of 'his' ability, but also 'his' morality. Look at silver city teaching (acting method as a common knowledge), look at the second blasphemy slate. 'He' doesn't want to hide critical information to 'his' people. 'He' should also not be as inhuman/cold as we though 'he' would. I mean look at True Creator, 'his' remaining humanity, and the organization 'he' build. 'His' core idea is to disclose the extraordinary to the common people so they can have measure to protect themself (Aurora Order and Iron and Blood Cross Order, which Anderson had previously joined to btw). 'His' reason is good, though 'his' cause is bad.
Also, Ancient Sun God/True Creator likes beautiful people and it's canon lol (look at the countdown trivia for hanged man, and the fact that Hanged Man pathway beyonders was consisted of pretty man and women 😂)

So I have known that Tarkov is rife with cheaters I basically only play woods as it seems to have regular honest players 🤌🏻 But my friend just admitted to me he has been running cheats for the last 3 months with absolutely no problems and he's been playing with me saying nothing! He had ESP he could see who was where, their skeleton (so where they were looking, if they were about to throw a grenade etc) he can turn into unlimited stamina, strength etc. He could say K/Ds of players etc he said he saw other cheaters ALL THE TIME, he would see guys tracking him thru the walls, he even said there was a godmodwe that hackers use in LABS. He is American & bought them off a french website absolutely ruins the game and Tarkov claim to have banned loads...what a waste of my money this game has been that they seem to be doing very little about a real thing.

Hi Giants fans! Happy baseball season! I’ll be visiting my son in SF for the Nats series in May. I’m looking for 3 tickets on May 8 and 2 tickets on May 9. I’ll check StubHub and Giants ticketing but thought I’d ask here to see if anyone is selling first. Thanks!

Folks. Help me choose the right coil for my Bomber CR. I just bought new shock and it came with the 500lb. My weight 75.7 kg at the moment. Actually I am trying to loose some weight to be more efficient on the climbs. My goal is 73 kg, with all gear will be 75 kg I think. My bike is Giant Reign 2021, M. Rear travel 146 mm, 60 mm shock stroke. More enduro than jumping. I am thinking about the FOXSHOX 2.8x400lb coil. tf tuned shows that I need 380 lb. There is no such coil. I can chose between 350 and 400. I will with 400, to much sag is not a good option I think. I do not exactly understand the first parameter. My understanding is that this 2.8 parameter should be bigger than shock stroke which is 60 mm in my case.

The writing in this series makes no sense to me. Kidd was confident after seeing what a yonko crew is capable of. He even fought red haired pirates before, and fought big mom & kaido.
He HAD TO HAVE KNOWN, that he needed a crew to help him fight. Yet when the fight begins, his crewmates just stand there doing fuck all.
There's no one there to see shanks is about to attack. No one to even TRY to stop shanks attack.
There is no one there to move the ship away. There is no one there to TRY to stop the giants attack.
They are literally NPC's that don't do anything. Even Luffy would lose against other Yonko's if all the strawhats just simply stand there and don't help.
What was Kidd's plan to deal with shanks crewmates? Who was going to fight benn beckman? Who was going to fight Yasopp? Like I said, I'm not expecting them to win. But this worldbuilding is absolutely terrible & unbelievable.
Edit: My main complaint is that kidd pirates are written as bumbling idiots. Not that they lost. How did they make it as a crew with only Kidd being the one who does anything? I'd rather see heat try to stop it but die, instead of them just stand there and watch like morons.

Welcome folx to the 2nd scheduled discussion check-in for Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel things are getting creepy out there! As always there will be a summary of what we have read in this section, and some discussion questions in the comments to get you started. As there has been a lot of interest from re-readers of this novel I would like to remind everyone that bookclub has a strict spoiler policy. Learn more at this post here. If in doubt use spoiler tags by typing > !your text! < without the spaces. Alternatively head to the marginalia post here where our spoiler policy is a little loser, and comments from later in the book are welcomed.
SUMMARY

• Chapter 15: Arthur and Miranda have been married for 3 years. His success increases while Miranda continues to work on her graphic novel. 3.5 years earlier when Miranda went to retrieve her painting Pablo was waiting and he was drunk. When Miranda returns to Arthur's hotel she is bruised. At a dinner party they host Arthur cannot look her in the eye. He has been having an affair with Elizabeth his co-star. This is confirmed by Clark along with Arthur's lack of subtlety.

At 3am everyone has left except Elizabeth, who is passed out drunk on the sofa. She goes out to the Paparazzo for a cigarette. It is Jeevan. She tells him Elizabeth is an alcoholic, and that is why she is still at their house. She knows she is leaving and realises she wants to return to Neptune Logistics. Jeevan gets a picture of her which will end up fueling the next day's gossip. Elizabeth finds Miranda in her work space with Luli the Pomeranian and apologises.
3 months later they are going through divorce proceedings and Elizabeth is moving in. 4 months later Miranda is back in Toronto studying commerce then later working again for Leon Prevant. This time she is in Client Relations, and rising quickly through the ranks. She travels almost constantly, is attached to no one and uses expensive clothing like amour. She is devoted to her job, but she is lonely.

• Chapter 16: François Diallo, librarian and editor, interviews Kristen for the New Petoskey News. She asks him about the graphic novels, but it is the first time he has seen/heard of them.
  
• Chapter 17: One year before the Georgia flu Arthur and his best friend Clark meet for dinner in London. It is Arthur's 50th birthday. The next day he is visiting Elizabeth and his son in Pairs. Clark realises Arthur is performing for an audience not simply enjoying dinner with him. He feels disgusted by the thought.
  
• Chapter 18: Kristen tells François she struggles to remember much from before the collapse, but she does know she has been acting since she was 3. The Symphony picked her up in Ohio, where she had gone with her brother before he died. The Symphony no longer go so far south after losing an actor to an illness and getting shot at. Kirsten talks about the types of towns, from successfully functioning to horrifyingly dangerous. Cult towns are the most dangerous because they are unpredictable and illogical.
  

☆ The Starship

• Chapter 19: The Travelling Symphony's motto is from Star Trek and Kirsten has it tattooed on her forearm.

They walked through the night until late afternoon after leaving St. Deborah by the Water. Kirsten notes the prophet's dog's name is Luli as in the comics. They discover a stowaway, 12 year old Eleanor, who was one of four young girls promised to the prophet to fulfill his dreams of repopulating the earth. Eleanor tells them Charlie and her family went to the Museum of Civilization in an airport outside Severn City.
The prophet is from the museum. He is the head of a sect of the 19 religious wanderers. After the winter fever the prophet took over the town adding the mayors widow to his collection of wives. They are heavily armed.

• Chapter 20: The Symphony comes across a burnt down resort. Kirsten, August, Jackson and Viola go to a nearby school to look for instruments while others in the group harvest a stock of grass for the horses. The school had been used as a shelter and later as a place to cook. There are no instruments to be salvaged but they find a few accessories. There is a skeleton in the bathroom with a bullet hole in the skull.
  
• Chapter 21: In the interview François asks Kirsten about the changes in the world since the Georgia flu and the meaning if her tattoo. She isn't willing to answer.
  
• Chapter 22: Kirsten shares Dieter's tent. He is 12 years older than Kirsten, and remembers much more of the world before. Kirsten and August are one of the 3 teams on 2nd watch. They wake the 3rd watch to cover them so they can investigate a sound from the direction they came from. They walk 3 miles out. Dieter and Sayid are missing without a trace.
  
• Chapter 23: The Symphony search the dense forest in teams of four all day, but there is no sign of Dieter or Sayid. The Symphony's seperation protocol is to meet at the destination so the conductor makes the call to continue to the museum. Kirsten is worried they have been taken by the prophet. Later Sidney also disappears without a trace even though she was with Jackson on dinner search duty. After 5 hours searching for her the next day they decide to keep moving. They find a note in Sidney's things saying she has "gone to rest in the forest", but they don't know when it was written.
  

Kirsten and August scout ahead while the Symphony clear the way of trees. They come to a golf course where they catch fish from the pond. When they return to the road the Symphony is not in sight. After cooking the fish so it doesn't go bad from the heat they continue. Near twilight they still haven't caught up, nor have they seen any trace of the Symphony. They sleep side by side.

• Chapter 24: The next day Kirsten and August continue to the museum. There are no signs the Symphony have passed the route ahead of them. They meet Finn and his twins. Kirsten recognises them from St. Deborah 2 years previous. Finn has a scar on his fact that resembles the symbol on the abandoned buildings in St. Deborah's. He says the prophet and his people crazy, and he was too worried to go to the museum due to the connection to the prophet. They find a locked house and loot it for everything of worth.
  
• Chapter 25: A collection of letters from younf Arthur to "V", childhood friend, that still lives on the island. He writes about his new friend Clark, and his struggles with acting school. In his letters he realises V hardly makes any effort so stops writing until after they see each other in person many years later. Arthur tells V about Miranda and later Elizabeth (who really does seem to have issues with alcohol).
  
• Chapter 26: 3 weeks before the pandemic and Elizabeth has found out about the impending publication of the book Dear V by Arthur's childhood friend Victoria. She is furious and calls Clark who is shaken by the information. After interviewing Deliah about her opinions on her boss Clark realises that he too is sleepwalking through life.
  

Next week my very awesome co-runner u/bluebelle236 will be taking over to post the 3rd discussion for chapters 27 through 43.

James and Sarah have been married a long time, with two children. But it wasn't always like that.
James was born in '56, and Sarah in '66. So James remembers watching England beat Argentina, on the way to that ambrosia final, and he remembers something about the way in which the adults were acting, the atmosphere, in the house that he'd gone to, to watch it. A football house, not like James' house. He remembers the game itself too, of course. Rough, and with that famous sending off. Antonio Rattin. James didn't know, at the time, that there was a whole controversy, even off the pitch, relative to that dismissal, surrounding language, and bias.
Anyway, they got us back. Beckham, in '98. Yellow, not red. The whirligig, once again, half circle.
James also remembers the October of '66. South Wales, and the horror, and sorrow, which later became shame. So much to be proud of, when Hurst banged in number 4, even if maybe a few big decisions did go England's way, along the journey. Charlton, what a man. From the ashes. But some bigger decisions, relative to Wales, were seriously all wrong. Not questionable, not just to do with a game - even bearing in mind what Bill Shankly said about his beloved football - but plain wrong. Before, and after.
So that would have been '66, for James, with no idea at all about tiny little Sarah, or about what she would encounter, when she herself reached ten, or what images she would click on to, in the seventies.
God, those pictures. Not the England ones, the Wales ones. Aberfan. You can't understand, at the age of ten (unless you are very clued in) about the full implications of things. But you can feel.
Sarah never said so very much about the seventies, not so as to specifically relate to them. She isn't so completely concerned about exactly when things were, with regard to the line that people sit all along, like birds on wires, between the telegraph poles of caring passionately about that kind of detail, or not caring in the least. It kind of, maybe was round about then, not sure, but it's sort of all in this general mixer of some stuff that didn't go so good, and some other stuff that maybe went a bit better. She's pretty open, in her thinking, in many ways. Less so, in others. Human.
She was on a train, round about aged 18. Going to a lecture. The carriage was half empty, and she was reading. A modern day Sarah might be on a phone, but it doesn't matter because the main thing is that people do sometimes get carried into other worlds, where they feel comfy, or engaged, and then they suddenly sort of feel at home, and forget. Sarah put her feet up, on the seat opposite, not even fully realising.
Bill joined the train a stop or so down the line. Sarah doesn't say where, and maybe isn't even sure, she just remembers him joining, and that he was going to the same course. She was in the seat by the window, though unaware of the scenery, and he came and sat almost opposite, but not quite. It wasn't until he brushed Sarah's foot, a bit later maybe, that she lazily engaged back with the world in general. She noticed it, because she was wearing sandals, flats, and so he'd made contact with bare skin.
'Sorry,' she said. Moved those feet back to the floor.
'You were fine' he said. 'You don't have to.'
Sarah genuinely considered going back to exactly how she'd been. It was dreamy. But she didn't.
'Nice shoes', he said.
Thank you.
'And the dress', he said. 'Nice dress, too.'
Sarah agreed. That was why she was wearing it. But maybe, just for a flicker or two, it might have been a bit revealing, she thought. No special clue, about that tiny flicker. She wouldn't have, usually.
'So, Durkheim today, then? he said.
'Yeah' she agreed. Sociology. The issues round suicide.
Blah, blah.
All the way to getting off. Where they chatted a bit more, on the walk from the station, and then parted. Met with different friends, probably.
_ _ _
Bill did well. Got a job as a teacher, higher ed. When Sarah went for the researcher job, she had no idea. But when she went to the interview, there was a flicker of recognition. She wasn't in flats, but heels. More length, on the skirt. Formal, but that was nothing to do with Bill himself, because she hadn't known he'd be there, her 'boss' to be.
It was maybe a month later again, they ended up jumping into a little hole. At a small do, after drinking. She was in heels again, and a furry sort of coat that she wore when they left together, and went back to his. She remembered him taking those heels off, helping her relax, where she often forgot how much some kinds of footwear could hurt, and he was the one that reminded her. He put them on the little table, those cheap shoes, like an exhibit. He offered her a massage.
She was touched, allowed him to come over closer, treat her. Both feet, lovely. And then his hand, up her thigh. But she kind of knew what he was doing? When he caught her eye?
Her heart stood still. Do, run, run, run.
Sarah did. She never stayed the night, but never precisely knew why. She kissed him, at the door, completely normally, with moderate feeling.
_ _ _
He sent her a very bizarre letter. She thought about keeping it, but thought more about throwing it away, and in the bin it went, after the burning. She did the same with the flowers, that came after, only without the setting light part. He sent more, again, almost like he was inviting it. Then it stopped.
Departmental head, now. Big uni, big cheese.
_ _ _
Sarah and James have two daughters. The eldest is in education, straight from school. The youngest is just finishing her own uni. At the age of ten, they probably had experiences which were really quite similar to each other's, but worlds away from those of their parents, as regards the means of communication, at least.
But tonight, they are all properly talking, to each other, instead of to people on tiktok, or whatever.
'The thing is', Jade (the youngest) is saying, 'I don't see how you can respect her, any more?'
JK Rowling.
'Yeah, but..' Amelia is not so sure. 'I still think the books are great, and not just the Harry Potter ones. Some of her others, too?'
'Pfft!' Stories are told by real people. How can you trust what they write? Plenty of authors just sell their pathetic crap, in disguise.'
'Yeah, but...' Sarah starts
'But, what?'
'Nothing. Well, except... Not all authors do that, for one. Lots of people who may have thought, or done, bad things... they don't always promote those things.?' Sometimes, they promote nothing, sometimes they write almost apologetically about stuff... Maybe even try and fight it?
'What!'
'No, I mean... Oh, I don't know what I mean, except JK Rowling is writing about fantasy, just about fun. Well, in Harry Potter she is. And anyway...' Anyway, I don't know if I'm even ready, myself, for someone with a cock, in my toilet...?
_ _ _
Sarah admitted to that moment to James, afterwards. She'd thought a bad thing, something she'd felt she couldn't say, not even to her own family.
James sort of laughed, but it was a hard one. Not the kinds of worries you generally had to deal with, as a mostly retired plumber.
'Well,' he said. 'Of course, for me it was kind of the same. I almost.... I almost wished there'd been cubicles, for men, even. I never liked looking, or being looked at. But now... I wouldn't care. I mean, I wouldn't look, myself, but I wouldn't care who might be looking. I wouldn't see any of it as an issue. Not any single part. But that's only me.'
'Maybe' said Sarah. 'I don't know, it gets all mixed up, for me. And it's not so much the looking... And, like, with all this 'Me Too'. I mean, there's successful people now, who may have done things a long time ago, not such very big things, that people didn't really object too... I'm not saying always, I mean, I think it's right that this is all being dealt with, but... sometimes, if it was ok back then, would it be wrong to suddenly claim it was awful? Like, if you had a letter, or something?' A letter that wasn't so very bad, that you just weren't ready for...? All different, at the time.
'God,' James agreed. 'The things people write, in letters. And now emails, of course. But there are letters that maybe I do wish I'd kept copies of, personally, that I sent, and I wish I had proof of.'
'Yeah,' Sarah agreed. Could definitely cut both ways.
On the whole though, in her own case, she thought she was in favour of fire.