1. What will you be doing with this PC? Be as specific as possible, and include specific games (ex: resolution, FPS, settings) or programs you will be using.

Right now I mainly play single playecoop/VR games. CSGO, Dota 2, new starship troopers, Total War: Warhammer 3 and mainly beat saber for VR on valve index. I will be buying the next high end Valve VR headset when it comes out. Looking for something that can run 1440p at 165 hz for a few years, and be quiet.

2. What is your maximum PRE-TAX budget before rebates and shipping?

Price isn't a huge issue, ~3-4k but I can allocate more budget for quality of life upgrades.

3. When do you plan on building/buying the PC? Note: beyond a week or two from today means any build you receive will be out of date when you want to buy.

Looking to buy within 2 months or later this year if there is something worth waiting for. Ideally looking to see what is a good build right now and keep an eye on sales.

4. What, exactly, do you need included in the budget? (ex: toweOS/monitokeyboard/mouse/etc)

ToweOS, I MIGHT want to buy a 4k 144+hz monitor but might be a few years away

5. If reusing any parts (including monitor(s)/keyboard/mouse/etc), what parts will you be reusing? How old are they? Brands and models are appreciated.

Using old monitors/mouse/keyboard. Dell S2721DGF is main gaming monitor (1440p, 165hz), have an HP 27' conference monitor from work (75 hz) all less then a year old. 3rd monitor is an old Asus ProArt (6+ years). Might reuse my Samsung Evo 860 1tb as secondary storage. (~2 years)

6. Will you be overclocking (ex: CPU/GPU/RAM)? If yes, are you interested in overclocking right away, or down the line?

Will overlock CPU, however might be down the line if I don't need to do it now

7. Are there any specific features or items you want/need in the build? (ex: SSD, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth, VR, VirtualLink, tensor cores, large amount of storage or a RAID setup, CUDA or OpenCL support, etc)

Bluetooth, SSD, VR

8. Do you have any specific case preferences (ex: mITX/mATX/mid-towefull-tower sizes, styles, colours, window or not, LED lighting, etc.), or a particular color theme preference for the components?

Want a quieter case that has good cooling, mid/full tower, usually prefer black, side panel window and LEDs are nice to have but not a big deal.

9. Do you need a copy of Windows included in the budget? Note: some post-secondary students can get Windows 10 for free.

Yes

10. Will you be upgrading this PC in the future (ie: will you swap out better parts later on or will you build an entirely new tower later)? If so, when?

Might upgrade GPU and storage in the future

11. Do you have a brand preference? (ex: AMD/Intel for CPUs, AMD/NVIDIA for video cards, etc)

Prefer AMD if possible, but looking for the better parts right now

12. What are the specs of your old PC / laptop? Do you want to see if it can be upgraded instead? If so, paste its build from PCPartPicker here.

Not really looking to reuse anything except the Evo 860
PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	Intel Core i7-4930K 3.4 GHz 6-Core Processor	$165.00 @ Amazon
CPU Cooler	Noctua NH-D15 82.5 CFM CPU Cooler	$109.95 @ Amazon
Motherboard	Asus Sabertooth X79 ATX LGA2011 Motherboard	-
Memory	Corsair Dominator Platinum 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR3-1866 CL9 Memory	-
Storage	Samsung 840 Evo 500 GB 2.5" Solid State Drive	$352.99 @ Amazon
Storage	Samsung 860 Evo 1 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive	$118.00 @ Amazon
Storage	Western Digital Caviar Black 2 TB 3.5" 7200 RPM Internal Hard Drive	$119.98 @ Amazon
Video Card	XFX THICC III Pro Radeon RX 5600 XT 6 GB Video Card	-
Power Supply	SeaSonic FOCUS Plus 750 Gold 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	$143.99 @ Amazon
Monitor	Dell S2721DGF 27.0" 2560 x 1440 165 Hz Monitor	$449.99 @ Best Buy
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	$1459.90
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-06-03 14:38 EDT-0400

13. Extra info or particulars:

Want to do air cooling as I don't really want to risk liquid damaging parts. I have really liked Noctua cooling in the past and will likely want to stay with them.
Need a graphics card that can handle 3 monitors +VR. I would also like to put my LG 55 Inch TV as well, but I don't think any gaming cards have 5 ports so not a huge deal for the TV.

Of the six actors to portray MI6 agent James Bond on screen thus far, George Lazenby was the youngest (29 years old at time of filming) and has the least screen time. Appearing in only one film during Sean Connery’s brief hiatus, George battled the sinister Blofeld in the Swiss Alps and worked with both MI6 and an international criminal organization to defeat the madman. He even married the Bond girl, although he was left with a tragic ending when Blofeld’s right hand woman gunned down the happy couple, killing the bride just minutes after the wedding.
All feats come from the 1969 film, On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Theme music
Physicals

• Tosses an attacker into some netting
• After being buried in snow by an avalanche, Bond is up and relatively OK about a minute later
• Chases after Blofeld in the snow
• When a hand grenade detonates under Bond’s bobsled, he’s back up and continuing the chase very quickly
• [Limit] Gets KOed with a blunt weapon

Skill
Combat

• Kicks away a gunman's gun, then beats him up in the ocean
• Flips a man with judo throws twice
• Using an oar, Bond fights off a man with a large hook
• Defeats a strong, tough guy in the hotel
• Disarms an armed woman with one hand
• Briefly fights off three men at once until he escapes
• Beats down a guard with a door, then five strikes
• Uses a ski to knock a man off of a cliff, then kills another man after a struggle
• Beats two men up in a room full of bells

Other

• [Accuracy] Throws a knife into a specific date on a calendar from across a room
• [Accuracy] Tosses a hat onto a hook
• [Climbing] Traverses a ski lift wire with nothing more than a pair of mittens
• [Skiing] Avoids machine gun fire while skiing
• [Skiing] Continues skiing after losing a ski
• [Bobsledding] Chases after Blofeld in a bobsled
• [Deception] Poses as a genealogist under the pseudonym Sir Hillary Bray. After a few days, Blofeld sees through the ruse and has Bond captured.

Gear
Weapons

• A wristwatch that doubles as a garrote wire
• Has a small rifle in the glovebox. Features a scope and suppressor.
• Uses a submachine gun
• Carries a Walther PPK handgun. Used during the bobsled chase.

Gadgets

• Temporarily gifted a safe cracker machine that looks like an unassuming trunk. After a few minutes, a six-digit safe is unlocked.
• Uses metal and a piece of rubber to open a locked automatic door
• Uses his own pockets as impromptu gloves to escape the gear room
• Uses a very small camera

Miscellaneous

• References Sean Connery's portrayal of Bond
• Knows a bit about lepidoptery
• Not the best at curling
• Proposes and eventually marries Tracy despite sleeping with two other women and attempting to sleep with one more

I admire your luck, Mr...?
Bond. James Bond.

Special Agent 007, James Bond is the star agent of MI6. Always cool under pressure and licensed to kill, James is sent to infiltrate enemy organizations and destroy them from the inside. Over the decades, James Bond has gone from serious to campy and back again, but always manages to get the job done through wit, physical ability and superior equipment.
Bond generally wields a sidearm with lethal efficiency, along with a number of incredible gadgets developed by the geniuses at Q Branch. With his remarkable physical ability and ever-changing bag of tools, there isn't an international crime organization that Bond has failed to take down. The only thing that could possible distract Bond are his own vices: women or booze, both of which have gotten one over on him in the past.
James Bond Respect Threads by Actor
Sean Connery- 1962 to 1967, once more in 1971. Physically strong, numerous gadgets disguised as everyday items. Adept in traditional spy skills, like infiltration and observation.
George Lazenby- Once in 1969. Very similar to Connery in his craftiness, skilled specifically in winter sports.
Roger Moore- 1973 to 1985. Downright campy, making use of almost cartoonish skills that actually work in-universe. Skilled driver and pilot with a variety of gadgets.
Timothy Dalton- 1987 to 1989. Colder and more quick to become violent than the others. Usually carries a firearm and a lethal gadget to kill enemies.
Pierce Brosnan- 1995 to 2002. Best variety of gadgets of any Bond. Great feats of endurance and athletic ability.
Daniel Craig- 2006 to 2021. The most realistic Bond, yet has some of the most impressive physical abilities in any of the movies. Low variety of gadgets, but excels in gunfights.
Hover over a feat to see the film it’s from. Additionally, the name of any gif on Gfycat contains the last name of the actor that accomplished it.

Physicals

You have a nasty habit of surviving.
Well, you know what they say about the fittest.

Strength
Striking

• Breaks a wooden board with a downward strike
• Tackles a man through two bathroom stalls
• Barrels through a temporary construction wall
• Punches through drywall and wood to access a hidden room

Lifting/Throwing

• Picks up and throws a chair at a man, knocking him out
• Fights off an attacker with a couch
• Picks up and slides a man across a table
• Tosses a chain onto a low-flying helicopter to cause it to crash
• Holds a man above a ledge by the hair

Grip

• When he’s held underwater by two women, Bond surfaces and holds both of them underwater with one hand each
• Holds onto a small plane while the pilot tries to shake him off
• Catches a rope on a blimp and holds on even after it rises high into the air
• Holds onto the top of a speeding car, even when the driver attempts to shake him off
• Avoids falling out of a plane’s airlock by grabbing onto some netting
• Holds onto the outside of a moving seaplane, even after the pilot attempts to shake him off
• Holds onto the bottom of an elevator car as it rises up a skyscraper

Pushing

• With one other guy, Bond rolls this large concrete column
• Knocks over a large bookshelf

Other

• After being buried in snow by an avalanche, Bond climbs out and is relatively okay about a minute later
• Wrestles with a large constricting snake before killing it with a poison injector

Endurance
Blunt Force

• Keeps fighting after getting a wooden chair broken over his back
• Stays conscious after strikes from Oddjob
  • Oddjob RT
• Fights on through hits with a fireplace poker
• Jumps from a bridge to a passing boat, falling through the roof and onto a wedding cake
• While hanging onto a blimp, he’s smacked into the Golden Gate Bridge and quickly starts climbing up
• He’s knocked down a ladder, but recovers by the time he gets to the bottom rung
• Continues fighting Stamper after a number of blows to the face
• Falls from a low hot air balloon onto a domed structure, and he recovers by grabbing some nearby cables
  • Bond suffered a dislocated collarbone after this fall, however
• When jumping off a low crane, Bond stumbles, falling into a metal air vent. He’s up and running moments later.
• Recieves cock and ball torture by Le Chiffre’s rope, at first barely responding, then laughing in his torturer’s face
• Falls one or two stories onto the top of a bus, but gets up quickly
• Fights on after being hit across the back with a metal pipe four times
• Keeps fighting through repeated strikes from Hinx, like getting thrown into walls or getting thrown through thin walls
  • Mr. Hinx Respect Thread found here
• [Limit] Has a recurring weakness to blunt force trauma to the back of the head

Piercing/Cutting

• Keeps running despite being shot in the calf
  • He’s later seen patching up his calf in the bathroom, so he was definitely hit by a bullet
• Keeps fighting after being cut across the chest and being shot up by a nail gun
• Gets shot in the shoulder by a handgun, but operates mostly unimpeded

Other

• Resists being garroted long enough to grab a knife, stabbing his attacker and turning the garrote wire back on him
• Takes over 12 Gs of force before destroying the machine with an armor-piercing dart
  • Real-life astronauts are typically trained to withstand up to 9 Gs of force.
• Gets electrocuted with a gauntlet that can output 100,000 volts, which leaves him writhing in pain but conscious
  • Scene describing the electrical weapon, where the 100,000 volt figure is from
• Bond is shot by a sniper rifle and falls off a high bridge into water. After three months, Bond is mostly physically able again, although his aim is more noticeably affected.
• Endures having a small surgical drill bore into the back of his skull and into the part of the brain that deals with recognition, seemingly to no negative neurological effect

Agility
Movement

• Chases down an assassin, tackling him
• Takes a running jump up to a rising platform
• Catches up to an aircraft taking off on the runway
• Runs and jumps into a closing metal door
• Catches up to an airplane during takeoff, jumping into the plane through the landing gear
• Catches up to a fleeing truck on a runway, although it obviously hasn’t accelerated to full speed
• Escapes a CIA squad with just a moment's warning
• Runs away from a fireball caused by a house-sized explosion

Reflexes

• While on the ground, he dodges katana swings
• Dodges a thrown knife, then pulls it out of the wood behind him to kill the assassin
• Dodges a dune buggy at close range
• Evades shotgun fire from a pursuer
• Evades rifle fire, then shoots the enemy gunman
• Evades handgun fire with a roll, then avoids some distant machine gun fire
• Dodges a harpoon underwater
• When a man attempts to shoot Bond’s knees from nearly point blank range, Bond moves his legs to avoid the shots
• Uses an enemy to block gunfire
• While sitting in the passenger seat, Bond grabs the driver’s arm before they can shoot him
• Rolls away from an incendiary grenade’s detonation moments after noticing it

Combat Skill

Problem solver?
More of a problem eliminator.

Unarmed Combat
Quick Knock Outs

• Judo flips an attacker, then punches him
• Dispatches a guard with a neck strike
• Silently KOs a man, then steals his equipment to blend in with a scuba crew
• KOs a guard with a judo chop
• Stealthily KOs a guard from behind cover
• Knocks a man out with one kick to the head
• Ends an attempted fistfight with an elbow and then slamming the man on a table
• Knocks out a man by slamming him into the walls of an elevator twice
• Punches a guy out in two strikes
• Consistently one-punches goons
• From a sprint, Bond jumps and kicks a man in the face to knock him out

Against Individuals

• Breaks a hold from behind by a man who wrestles alligators
• Fights evenly with Grant in a train car, with both men getting in hits before Grant begins garroting Bond with a concealed wire
  • Grant is a trained Russian assassin who no-sells strikes to the stomach with brass knuckles
• Sweeps Pussy Galore to the floor, then reverses her judo throw attempt
• Wrestles with Hans before flipping him into a piranha pond
• Flips a man with judo throws twice
• Defeats a strong, tough guy in the hotel
• Has an awesome fistfight with a heavyset henchman, ending with Bond punching him off a rooftop
• Fights an assassin while dangling outside of a moving plane
• Has an extended fistfight with Alec Trevylyn, former agent 006, ending with Alec grabbing a handgun to hold Bond at gunpoint
• During a fight, he breaks a man’s arm, then punches him off a ledge
• Brawls with a martial artist on the outside of a crane

Against Multiple Attackers

• Knocks out six men when fleeing on a rooftop
• Starts thrashing technicians until one pulls a gun
• Defeats four guards in hand-to-hand combat
• Knocks out two attackers who ambushed him
• Drops about four men in a bar fight
• While handcuffed, Bond knocks out four surrounding MI6 agents in an elevator
• Drops two guards with one strike each

Against Armed Attackers

• Kicks away a gunman's gun, then beats him up in the ocean
• Disarms an armed woman with one hand
• While unarmed, Bond fights with a knife-wielding villain, with Bond disarming him and tackling him into water
• Disarms a woman and puts her in a painful armhold
• Disarms a gunman and knocks him down some stairs
• Has an extended fight with a man with a machete while in a confined space. Bond himself was unarmed, although he did ball up his jacket to block some strikes.
• Takes out a CIA riot officer with an elbow to the face
• While completely unarmed, defeats a man wielding an axe, even tricking him into slicing his own foot
• Brawls with an assassin armed with a sniper rifle before dropping him out of a skyscraper
• Intentionally breaks the ice on a frozen lake to bring a gunman down into the water, then Bond chokes him to death with his leg

With Weapons
Blades

• Kills a man with his own knife in one maneuver
• In just a few moves, Bond defeats a henchman in a machete fight, throwing him into a container full of snakes
• Steals a man’s knife, then pins his tie to a nearby counter
• Swordfights with a trained fencer, eventually switching to broadswords, where Bond draws first blood from the torso
• While being held at knifepoint, Bond turns and kills the man with his own knife after a struggle

Blunt Objects

• Breaks a man’s neck with a fireplace poker
• Disarms a diver, then uses the harpoon gun to shatter their goggles
• Using an oar, Bond fights off a man with a large hook
• Uses a ski to knock a man off of a cliff, then kills another man after a struggle
• While unarmed, Bond is attacked by an assassin with a knife, but manages to kill the assassin with a pair of scissors
• Spots an attacker in the reflection of a bronze decoration, then uses the decoration to bludgeon them
• Fights off four men who were beating him with a bat moments before, making heavy use of furniture and blunt items

Unorthodox Items

• Defeats three men in the confined space of a cockpit
• Throws flammable alcohol onto an assassin, igniting him
• Beats down a guard with a door, then five strikes
• Takes out two motorcycle-riding assassins with a long plank of wood
• Uses a ski pole to set a trap for a motorbike-riding assassin
• Knocks out a prison guard while handcuffed, at one point using the cuffs on the man's face
• Defeats two men in a crumbling building, using exposed wiring and a nail gun to dispatch them

Environment Focused

• Brawls with an assassin in a hotel room before throwing him into a bathtub and knocking a fan into the water, electrocuting him
• Kills Oddjob by using exposed electrical wiring on a metal cage that Oddjob was touching
• Tricks Jaws into hitting a wood column, knocking a wooden structure over himself
• Brawls with Jaws atop a cable car
• Fights off three hockey player assassins in a hockey rink, taking one out with the zamboni
• Judo throws a goon onto a bed of spikes
• While pinned to a wooden door by knives, he opens the door and kills an assassin with one of the knives
• Smacks a henchman with a plane’s antenna, throwing him off the plane
• Tosses maggots at a gunman, then knocks him out and judo throws him into the maggots
• Bond drags a guard into water and drowns him
• Bond ties a rope around Mr. Hinx’s neck and attaches it to a weight, then kicks that weight off the train to pull Hinx away

Accuracy

You wouldn’t kill me. You’d miss me.
I never miss.

Pistols

• Grabs Goldfinger’s gun and fires on an airplane window, sucking the villain out of the plane
• Shoots a gunman despite their being behind a column for cover
• Right after waking up, he shoots a ninja in the dark
• Poses as a wax figure and shoots Scaramanga
• Shoots three soldiers with his Walther P5, two of them being headshots
• Accurately hits a gunman from a moving speedboat
• Shoots a gunman through a wooden floor
• Uses a human shield to block bullets, then returns fire, killing a gunman
• Turns and fires on a man before he can fire
• Shoots a man while hanging upside-down by the leg
• Disarms and shoots two policemen
• Disarms the man holding him at gunpoint, then kills four other armed men in seconds
• Shoots two fire extinguishers to obscure the room and allow hostages to safely escape
• While handcuffed and at gunpoint, Bond steals the gun to shoot his captors

Against Vehicles

• Uses the Walther PPK to shoot out a dune buggy’s front tire
• Fires a Taurus PT92 into the engine of an oncoming Jeep, disabling it
• From a speedboat, Bond accurately hits a helicopter’s engine enough with a handgun to cause it to crash

Rifles/Submachine Guns

• Using a sniper rifle, Bond shoots a man in a helicopter, causing him to drop his grenade inside
• Fires a rifle, killing three goons, while sliding down a bannister
• Kills at least 8 men with a submachine gun in a short timeframe
• Turns around and shoots a gunman before he can kill his hostage. Note that Bond turns and fires right after the gunman receives orders to kill the hostage.
• Spots a sneaking soldier dressed in black and kills him with a rifle
• Fires on a guard before the guard can fire his weapon
• From a speeding hovercraft, Bond hits small land mines to detonate them on his pursuers
• Uses a Sa vz. 58 Compact to escape Blofeld’s facility, killing nearly a dozen guards, even at extreme range

Other Firearms

• Turns and immediately shoots a harpoon gun, killing a stealthy assassin
• Takes out a distant sniper by firing a shotgun
• Accurately shoots a sniper’s rifle with his own, rather than kill her
• Escapes a crowd of divers by stealing a harpoon gun and firing it into a nearby seaplane, pulling himself away

Non-Firearm Accuracy

• Throws three scalpels into a man’s arm and chest
• Throws a knife into a specific date on a calendar from across a room
• When the auto-targeting system fails, Bond manually shoots down a capsule full of viruses with a laser cannon
• Kills a man with a climbing spike

Other Skills

I always enjoyed learning a new tongue.
You always were a cunning linguist, James.

Athletics

• Dives off an oil rig into the ocean below
• Avoids machine gun fire while skiing
• Continues skiing after losing a ski
• While skiing, Bond jumps and twists to smack two gunmen with his skis
• Goes rock climbing on a nearly vertical rock wall
• Temporarily outswims the pull of an industrial fan before destroying it with his air tank
• Performs a HALO jump into water, then immediately begins scuba diving
• Swims outside of a submarine, scaling the surface until he can re-enter the vessel on the other side. He had to hold his breath for almost two minutes while scaling the outside of the submarine.
• Infiltrates North Korea by simply surfing onto the coast of the country
• Parasurfs off a collapsing iceberg
• Leaps from a crashing plane, catching up to his partner and using her parachute to save them both

Driving/Piloting
Driving

• Weaves around a parking lot, causing a dozen cop cars to crash into themselves, walls or parked cars
• Briefly drives on two wheels to slip through a narrow alley
• Drifts a double decker bus, causing a couple cops to crash their motorcycles
• Jumps over a river in a car using a broken bridge as a ramp
• While driving, he knocks over barrels onto enemies, then drives on two wheels to block bullets
• Drives a car over a ramp, onto a bus, then back to ground level

Piloting Aircraft

• Picks up a villain's wheelchair with a helicopter, then drops him into a smokestack
• Avoids a heat-seeking missile while piloting a small plane, redirecting it into an enemy hangar
• Dodges a stinger missile by driving a semi-truck on only the left hand wheels
• Starts a helicopter in midair and lands safely
• While flying a much less maneuverable plane, Bond tricks a fighter jet into crashing into a mountainside by producing smoke from a damaged engine
• Ejects a pilot from a helicopter, then pulls the helicopter out of freefall

Other

• Jumps a speedboat over a small patch of land
• Drifts a tank, then drives through a building to cause untold property damage

Traversal

• Performs a front flip off a ledge
• Traverses a ski lift wire with nothing more than a pair of mittens
• Traverses the underside of an oil rig by swinging on a rope, then walking a tightrope
• Jumps on the back of a couple alligators to escape a swamp
• Swings on vines like Tarzan to escape pursuers
• Traverses the side of a moving train
• Uses a long pole to safely travel down a building, then releases the pole to smack a pursuing officer
• Performs a combat roll down stairs to avoid handgun fire
• Runs up a crane to reach the top of a building under construction
• Climbs up a vertical I-beam
• From the top of a moving truck, Bond runs and flips through the open windshield
• Jumps down a story onto stone, rolling to avoid impact damage

Stealth

• Uses a hollow reed to hide underwater from guards and dogs
• Hides in plain sight by pretending to be making out, but it’s actually just his own arms wrapped around himself
• Evades a crowd of police
• Lowers his heart rate to trick medical staff and an EKG, then dispatches the staff and escapes the hospital
• Broke into M’s house to use her computer

Other

• [Observation] Notices an attacker in the reflection of a woman’s eye, then uses her as a human shield to block a strike
• [Foreign Language] Learned several Asian languages at Cambridge
• [Alcoholism] Can tell the temperature of alcohol after one sip
• [Deception] Poses as a genealogist under the pseudonym Sir Hillary Bray. After a few days, Blofeld sees through the ruse and has Bond captured.
• [Underwater] Ties a boat to a large rock with the rope he’s bound in, causing the boat to break the rope, freeing Bond
• [Sleight of Hand] Switches out a priceless Faberge egg for a fake copy
• [Animal Commanding] Commands a wild tiger to sit, and it actually listens
• [Gambling] Wins a quarter of a million dollars at a high stakes gambling table
• [Invention] Descends a tall building with some rope and an unconscious body
• [Seduction] Seduces a married woman to learn more about her husband’s criminal activity
• [Preparation] Puts shotgun shells under the floorboards in order to fire on intruders when they step on them
• [Observation] Identifies a hidden door based on a tiny sliver of light through the crack

Equipment

Right, now pay attention 007. I want you to take great care of this equipment. There are one or two rather special accessories.
Q, have I ever let you down?
Frequently.

Weapons
Firearms

• Carries a Walther PPK, a discreet pistol with excellent stopping power
• A collapsible Armalite AR-7 sniper rifle with an infrared sight, allowing for use in the dark
• Bond carries a S&W model 29 revolver in early Moore films, then later switches to his iconic Walther PPK, then, finally, uses the Walther P5
• Carries a very small firearm, the Beretta 950 Jetfire
• Has a firearm disguised as a camera. Additionally, the device is programmed to Bond’s own palm signature, meaning only he can fire the weapon.
  • The camera gun can be outfitted with a scope and tripod for long range fire
• A suppressed UMP-9, used to fire on Mr. White’s leg at range
• A Walther PPK with a palm-print sensor coded to Bond’s hand, meaning only he can fire it
  • Sure enough, when someone else tries to use it, it just doesn’t fire
• A heavily modified Glock 17, with laser sight and microphone attachment

Other

• A combat knife
• A projectile launcher disguised as a cigarette, gifted to Bond by a ninja master
• A grenade disguised as a ballpoint pen
  • By tossing the grenade pen into a pool of fuel, an explosion and destructive fire is formed
• A grenade disguised as a lighter
• A flashbang explosive disguised as a handgun, used to stun three gunmen, allowing Bond to dispatch them

Gadgets
Mobility

• A grappling gun and cord that attaches to his pants, allowing him to scale the outside of a skyscraper
  • Can be outfitted with metal projectiles and used as a firearm instead
• Briefly wore a ninja outfit with suction cups on the palms and knees, used to scale down metal walls
• Flies away from a fight with a jetpack
• A belt with a hidden high-tensile cord, enough to support Bond’s own weight
  • Using the belt cord, Bond swings Spider-Man-style across a room and out a window

Reconnaissance/Infiltration

• A small explosive, used to blow a lock off a cell door
• Has a small safe-cracking device disguised as a cigarette case
• Special glasses to see through tinted glass
• Photocopier disguised as a checkbook
• A digital skeleton key disguised as a gift card
• Binoculars built into a pair of glasses
• Sunglasses with built in X-ray vision, allowing Bond to detect concealed weapons and see through women’s clothing
• A powerful camera, used to identify the faces of high profile criminals with just a few pixels
• A cell phone that acts as a fingerprint scanner, a powerful taser and as a remote control for a BMW

Continued in Comments

TARDIS

The TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimensions in Space) is a Type 40 time capsule the Doctor nicked many years and regenerations ago. It travels throughout space and time by passing through a space-time vortex and is dimensionally-transcendental (bigger on the inside than the outside).
Space Travel

• Lands underground.
• Smashes Graham's wooden chair when she lands in his living room.
• Crosses the Judoon's enforcement field surrounding Gloucester by syncing the TARDIS within its refresh rate and slipping in unnoticed.
• Lands inside a plastic trash structure that's located deep in the Indian Ocean .
• Rescues a man trapped in a deteriorating space shuttle by materializing around him the moment before its total destruction then dematerializing away.
• Lands inside the Passenger-form, a pocket universe concealed in a humanoid which the TARDIS doesn't like being inside.
• Dematerializes away in time to avoid the pull of a magnetically-charged implosion.
• Lands safely inside a volcano.
• Saves Ace from falling to her death by materializing side-up to catch her.
• Travel is not always instantaneous as it takes 4 minutes to get to Japan from the UK.
• Cannot access the alternate dimensions.
• The temporal residue covering Karvanista's ship makes it difficult but not impossible for the TARDIS to materialize inside it.
• The strength of the Flux's pull prevents the TARDIS from landing inside a Sontaran spaceship about to be consumed by it.
• The CyberMasters use a blocking field to keep the TARDIS from materializing inside the space train their hijacking.

Time Travel & Manipulation

• After separating from the Doctor, TARDIS starts phasing in and out of time in the exact same location which made it a legend to the settlers of Desolation because it only appears every thousand rotations in a ghostly form.
• Returns her companions to Sheffield only half an hour after they left Earth.
• Takes her companions to 19 News Years Eve displays in a row, across different centuries and planets.
• Not all points in history are fixed. After visiting an undesirable future for Earth and the human race, the Doctor assures her companions that it's just one of several possible futures that can be averted.
• Inadvertently creates a time loop at a storage facility when put into reset-mode.
• Travels two centuries in the future in the exact same spot.
• Brings Dan from the future back in time for his date.
• Has a tendency to land earlier or farther than the intended time, ranging from a matter of minutes, hours, months, decades and even centuries
• The Doctor cannot prevent a man's death in the past because it led to Yaz's birth who brought them there in the first place. On the other hand, it's imperative to keep a historical figure from prematurely dying as it would have great ramifications for the human race.
• The Doctor warns her companions not to interfere with the fabric of history before doing exactly that.
• Can't get too close to a past version of itself because it might cause a temporal feedback loop.
• A geo-magnetic disturbance pulls the TARDIS off course by several centuries.

Security & Defenses

• The cloister bells signal events of an extreme nature, such as the the Flux's approach and the Doctor's upcoming regeneration.
• A protective air bubble surrounds the TARDIS so the Doctor and her companions can safely peer outside with the doors open into space or underwater. The Doctor and Yaz could even safely sit on top of the TARDIS while eating ice cream. The Doctor once opened a "vacuum corridor" small enough that only a Kaled mutant would be affected by a supernova without harming anyone else onboard (that is until the corridor started expanding so they had to hurry things up).
• The Doctor implies the TARDIS has an intruder alert that sounds similar to a doorbell.
• All TARDISes can blend in with their surroundings through a Chameleon Circuit. The Doctor's TARDIS is permanently stuck as a 1960's police box after its circuit malfunctioned long ago.
• Has a net and mattress catch the Doctor and Yaz when they fall inside.
• The Doctor reboots the TARDIS to expel a Weeping Angel from it.
• UNIT are unable to open it.
• Several entities have managed to breach the TARDIS in different ways:
  • A Kerblam! teleport pulse enters the TARDIS without the Doctor's approval.
  • A Kasaavin nearly breaches the TARDIS before the Doctor sends it into flight.
  • The Eternal Zellin teleports inside the TARDIS.
  • The Judoon not only transport themselves into the TARDIS but also transport her into a prison cell.
  • A Weeping Angel enters the TARDIS and seizes control of it.
  • A Dalek traitor managed to bypass the TARDIS firewall to communicate with the Doctor via hologram.
• The instability of time due to the Mouri's weakened condition causes adverse effects on the TARDIS such as navigational issues, leakage, webbing, and structural irregularities in its interior and on its exterior. All these issues were cleared up when the Doctor set the TARDIS to self-reset.
• The Ravagers psychically hijack the TARDIS and force it to land in the Temple of Atropos.

Navigation

• The TARDIS' telepathic circuits can locate destinations of psychic and psychological relevance.
  • Connects with an old wristwatch to pinpoint the time and place it broke.
  • Gets the coordinates of several displaced planets from the Ux, reading their minds as well as harnessing their psychic abilities.
  • Finds the source of psychic power that's been communicating with Graham in his dreams.
  • The Doctor intends on using it to check her mind.
• Answers the call of the Doctor's sonic.
• Links Yaz's phone to the TARDIS to locate a woman whose number is on it.
• After the Recon Scout Dalek blocks her navigation system, the Doctor establishes a biofix on it using its DNA sample and forces it to communicate with her through a hologram (though the Dalek ends up blocking that too).
• Accesses CCTV, GPS and number plate tracking to keep up with the Recon Scout Dalek. When those methods fail, she switches to satellite monitoring which brings her to its eventual destination.
• Tracks the Recon Scout Dalek from the huge heat signature resulting from its massacre of an army.
• Locks onto Yaz's commdot signal to land at her location.
• Traces Dalek DNA to a facility in Japan.
• Locates Karvanista's spaceship.
• Locates Vinder through his phone signal.
• Locates the planet where a "child" was teleported to.
• Finds where the Master is keeping the Doctor through his transmission signal.
• Can't track the Sea Devils' vessel because they masked their route.

Durability

• Has a forcefield capable of blocking a shot from a temporal displacer. and a Dalek's blast. This shield can also be extended to protect a larger structure, like Wardenclyffe tower.
• Stands beside a supernova long enough for it to disintegrate a Dalek mutant.
• Gets pulled into the heart of the Flux - a massive space hurricane that can disintegrate entire planets in its path - which merely displaces the TARDIS to the past. The collision also disrupted the Flux and impeded its path of destruction.
• Withstands the destruction of a multi-story building without any visible damage.
• Ends up inbetween the jaws of a giant sea monster.
• The Master threatens to trap the TARDIS in a blackhole for eternity, implying it would not be destroyed by one.
• The Twelfth Doctor's explosive regeneration energy causes significant damage to the TARDIS interior, which forcibly ejects the Thirteenth Doctor in response.

Communication

• Contains a microphone that has connected with a Dalek out of its casing, Captain Jack's vortex manipulator and Vinder's emergency communicator.
• A holographic interface receives calls from other spaceships and places like Madagascar and UNIT HQ.

Observation

• Can view outside activity through a wall screen.
• Views Earth's outer atmosphere through a sort of periscope.

Scanning

• Reveals that a sample of alien residue is from a Kaled mutant.
• Scans a sewer for non-terrestrial life.
• Deciphers an image containing Agent O's location and sets the coordinates.
• Scans a building for life signals to make sure its safe, but didn't register a hostile hazmat alien.
• Claims that a strand of hair doesn't exist, because it belongs to a creature brought to life from a woman's nightmares.

Detection

• Senses traces of altron energy in 1955 Alabama.
• Receives multiple distress signals and senses psychotrophic waves from the planet Ranskoor Av Kolos.
• Keeps an alarm ready for incidents happening on Earth.
• Detects the heat of an explosion caused by the Recon Scout Dalek and the alien itself flying away from it.
• Reports a Dalek absorbing the UK's power and shutting off everyone's internet connection.
• Receives alerts across three continents on Earth.
• Senses the Flux approaching which it signals with the Cloister Bell.

Interfering with Technology

• Blocks the phone lines to prevent Robertson from calling security.
• Jams Karvanista's radio.

Remote Transportation

• Sends a group of displaced planets back to their original position by extending and splitting the TARDIS' dematerialization field.
• Teleports the Passenger-form in front of the TARDIS to absorb the rest of the Flux.

Addtional Console Functions

• Provides a visual aid for the Doctor's presentation on Rosa Parks.
• Has a custard cream dispenser.
• Synthesizes an antidote to Praxeus without the Doctor's supervision.
• Contains a recess where the Doctor stores her biomodule deep in the TARDIS.
• Rolls out a high-tech ladder that straightens itself so they can climb down onto a high speed space train.

Intelligence & Sentience

• Argues with the Doctor.
• Decodes a Quantum Flux Lock that goes through a hundred billion combinations per millisecond.
• Tends to bring the Doctor not where she wants but where she's needed.
• Deciphers a psychic transmission of data.
• Contains a databank with historical records which the Doctor can get a destination from based on an input of citeria.
• Protests when the Master tries to fly it.

Other

• The TARDIS exploding could mean the end of the world.
• Changes its outer and inner appearance after the Doctor's regeneration damaged it.
• Translates local languages for TARDIS inhabitants wherever or whenever they land.
• Has clap-activated lights.
• Houses a wardrobe hall in case Team TARDIS need to blend in.
• In a last ditch effort to stop the Flux, the Doctor sics a beam of Time Vortex energy at it to no avail.
• Uses her TARDIS's power to jump start the Master's TARDIS.

Sonic Screwdriver

The Doctor's version of a Swiss Army knife but without the knives or Swiss Army. The trusty Sonic Screwdriver functions as a scanner, door opener, machine operator and whatever ridiculous need arises.
Scanning
Temporal-Spatial

• Scans the recall circuit of Tzim-Sha's transport device to map the distance it traveled the universe.
• Determines the year.
• Tells the Doctor that they have not entered another world, which is correct because they're in the zone between worlds.
• Reveals that an ornate box is not from Earth.
• Finds a worrying lack of spacial-temporal readings at the Temple of Atropos.
• Detects retro-temporal manifestations in a tunnel system caused by the Flux and determines that a particular door is a safe passage out.
• Tells the city, year and time of the place the TARDIS wasn't meant to land on.
• Confirms that an empty seafloor is the exact coordinates of a pirate ship they intended to land on.

Classifying

• Reveals the function and biomechanic nature of the Gathering Coil.
• Confirms the Doctor's suspicion that Ilin is just a hologram being projected from far away.
• Reveals that armed guards are robots instead of organic lifeforms and what kind of robot they are.
• Shows the components of an alien dust as a combination of various, densely-compacted chemicals and billions of DNA fragments.
• Shows that an alien in human form is, in fact, not human.
• Explains the meaning of a Judoon alarm.
• Shows that Commander Gatt is Gallifreyan.
• Determines that an underwater structure of plastic trash is an alien construct, but not an alien colony.
• Shows the composition of bone powder.
• Reveals that a mist cloud is not natural mist.

Technology

• Shows the number of seconds before a mine detonates.
• Scans a decapitated Kerb!am man head then a computer to learn that the company's system directed all its control into that one robot.
• Scans a room to find teleportation hardware that's been building up huge amounts of power for one big transmat.
• Confirms that the Recon Scout Dalek's transmission didn't send.
• Discovers that an Orb of Thassor has been repurposed but can't determine what for.
• Learns that a spaceship is powered by organic fuel cells.
• Reveals the type of malfunction affecting an unstable spaceship.
• Finds the power source of a spaceship and that it's secured by a quantum fluctuation lock.
• Gets contradictory information from a super-dense container.

Microscopic

• Discovers flesh-eating microbes living in the waters of Desolation.
• Reveals Krasko's neural restrictor in his brain.
• Reveals microscopic bombs within sheets of bubble wraps.
• Scans the Lone Cyberman's compressed corpse to find the Death Particle still active within it.

Life Forms

• Can detect for life forms in an area.
• Shows the exact number of living humans in an area.

Energy

• Finds traces of altron energy on Rosa Parks.
• Finds a psychic signal being emanated from a bunch of detached fingers towards an orb.
• Scans the Flux from a distance to find that it disobeys every law of time and space.
• Finds alien pulse fields in 17th century China.

Other

• Gets nothing unusual from scanning the residue of hostile alien mud.
• Scans a girl suspected of witchcraft to find nothing unusual.
• Can reveal how somebody was killed and the type of weapon used.

Limits

• Gets a disorganized series of readings from scanning a ruin on Desolation.
• A dense compound overloads the sonic with too many inputs when she tries to scan it.
• Doesn't get a reading from a Thasaavin.
• Fails to decrypt the bioshield the Fugitive Doctor used to appear human.
• The cloaking technology used to hide Percy Shelley is so large it interferes with the sonic's readings while at Villa Diodati.
• The Cybermen use a jamming signal to prevent her from getting intel on them.

Manipulating Technology
Activation

• Opens up a holographic projection of Tzim-Sha's next victim through his Gathering Coil.
• Activates her homemade transporter.
• Unlocks the Thijarian's infobank.
• Activates the Thijarians' transmat technology to leave their base and to send them away.
• Takes Twirly the Robot off sleep mode.
• Readies grenades to explode if she's threatened.
• Turns her neck communicator on and off.
• Turns on the Ux prisoners' neural balancers.
• Inadvertently beams herself and her team up into an alien temple.
• Triggers the Silver Lady to draw the Kasaavin's attention.
• Activates her Braxium Bouncer.
• Inadvertently reveals the power source of Zellin's ship.
• Unintentionally triggers Karvanista's trap.
• Turns on the Mouri's pedestal.
• Switches on her makeshift CCTV with an added slap.
• Plays a Sontaran transmission recorded on Bel's baby monitor.
• Turns on the Sea Devil's base to set sail.
• Activates her companions' nano-implants.

Manipulation

• Removes the DNA bombs from her friends and herself then puts them back in the Gathering Coil that implanted them in the first place, causing Tzim-Sha to detonate them on his own body when he absorbs the Coil's data.
• Stabilizes the TARDIS when it's stuck phasing in and out of time and space.
• Syncs the digital map on a handheld device to a building's computer.
• Accesses the Tsuranga's computer systems that patients are restricted from.
• Sets the timer of a bomb.
• Edits an electronic clipboard so her arrival to Kerblam appears scheduled.
• Swaps the settings on her and Graham's ankle braces designating their jobs.
• Hijacks a delivery bot's teleportation circuit and later does the same with the company's prototype robot.
• Modifies a piece of the Morax's tree so she can reactivate their prison.
• Summons the TARDIS using power from Tzim-Sha's technology.
• Accelerates the decoding process on the Vor website.
• Accesses the databanks on the Master's TARDIS.
• Accelerates the charge time of a teleporter from 1 minute to 10 seconds.
• Turns the Orb of Thassor into a communicator between her and the Skithra Queen.
• Transfers the readings from a blood sample onto a laptop.
• Merges three different phone calls into one so she can address all her companions at once.
• Projects a laptop's display onto a TV and controls it.
• Accesses the data from Dan's phone not only threw computer screens but also across a different century.
• Keeps a flashlight shining on Weeping Angel when they start draining its power.
• Reverses the polarity of the neutron flower of a brain scan device to stun some Weeping Angels.
• Disengages Karvanista's ship from the rest of the Lupari fleet.
• Sonics a Sea Devil's high-tech sword out of his hand.
• Steadies a space train.

Deactivation

• Removes the perception filter cloaking Krasko's gear.
• Temporarily jams a Dalek's gunstick. She attempted this a second time, but it failed because the Daleks adapted.
• Deactivates the TARDIS' shield.
• Turns off the alarm sensors on Barton's plane.
• Removes the Master's perception filter making him appear Aryan to the Nazis.
• Partially shuts down Karvinsta's ship and deactivates his weapon then reactivates the former.
• Remotely damages a building's circuit box to kill the lights.
• Removes the consciousness shield disguising the Qurunx as a human child.
• Fails to prevent a sonic mine from detonating.
• Seemingly unable to stop the Kerblam man from assaulting Charlie.
• Fails to stop a hostile Sat Nav.
• The Master sonic-proofed his bomb to keep her from disabling it.

Detection & Tracking

• Tracks the source of altron energy over miles.
• Tracks the Thijarians after they teleported away and where their base is.
• Follows an unusual energy reading that leads her to Nikola Tesla.
• Points to the Fugitive Doctor's buried TARDIS when scanned cover a large area.
• Detects two nearby Cybershuttles landing in the area.
• Finds traces of non-terrestrial weapon dispersals at Dan's flat.
• Senses the Lupari fleet approaching.
• Reacts to nearby psychic readings and leads her to them.
• Detects a temporal disturbance on another floor.
• Detects a second Dalek in the building.

Locks

• Manipulates doors from the past, present and future.
• Opens a "big lock door".
• Turns the wheel of a hatch.
• Opens and closes electronic sliding doors.
• Unlocks a row of padlocks.
• Fries an electronic keypad to access a restricted section.
• Unlocks a filing cabinet.
• Releases Twirly from his exhibit.
• Unbolts a door.
• Opens the doors of an airplane hangar.
• Opens and closes an airplane's cargo hatch.
• Forces an auto-locked door open.
• Unlocks an electronic cage and locks it when the Alpha Dreg is contained.
• Locks a hatch door.
• Frees herself from futuristic cuffs.
• Opens up a Cyberfighter from a distance.
• Opens an unmanned TARDIS.
• Unshackles a Sontaran.
• Opens the hatch on a train.

Physical Manipulation

• Unties a piece of rope.
• Freezes the mirror gateway to the Anti-zone during a movement, seals it to stop its inhabitants from pursuing them further, opens it up again by reversing the polarity of the neutron flow and finally blocks it for good by smashing the mirror.
• Lowers a glass cage on a Kasaavin.
• Drops a grate on a Skithra.
• Puppeteers Zellin's fingers to use them against him and Rakaya.
• Removes a circuit panel.
• Incapacitates the Grand Serpent.
• Stabilizes her earring when its pulled by a strong geomagnetic force.
• Doesn't affect the Remnants.

Unveiling

• Hides the notes she wrote in marker pen and reveals it when the coast is clear.
• Reveals the mechanical inner workings of an alien tree.
• Reveals an invisible forcefield.

Other

• Capable of automatic self-repair, a feature which surprised even the Doctor.
• Audio records the Master's planned double-crossing of the Thasaavins.
• Sounds an alarm that can be heard over great distances.
• Doubles as a flashlight.
• Messes with her and some humans' life signals the Daleks use to track them in order to mislead them.

Finally finished my next Holiday Script. But you can fill it whenever you want, if you're interested. No rush.
Word Processor file available upon request. Any SFX included are just suggestions for reference. If you want to use the script, then you can change whatever you want, and post it wherever you want. Monetization OK. Please just let me see the finished product. Credit me by putting「Script by The Mousou Koujou https://www.youtube.com/@TheMousouKoujou 」in your description, and if possible, placing this image at some point in the video, like an outro: Business Card
My commissions are open! If you like my style and want a specific script, don't hesitate to ask! https://ko-fi.com/themousoukoujou/commissions
START
[Excited] Hey dad~, I'm home! I had the craziest day at work. I can't wait to tell you all about it, and…
[Calming down] …Whoa, what's with you, dad? Why are you all dressed up?
(Pause)
Special night? What are you talking about? You didn't tell me anything.
(Pause)
[Annoyed] Well you know how much I hate surprises, so that was a dumb idea. Just explain it already. What kind of "special night" is this supposed to be?
[Confused] Are you…going to a party or something?
(Pause)
[Annoyed] …huh? Is that some kind of joke? Your Girlfriend is coming over? The very same girlfriend who you conveniently forgot to mention before this very moment? This isn't even a surprise anymore. It's an ambush! Why didn't you say anything!?
(Pause)
No no no, don't try to blame me. I'm reacting this way Because you kept quiet. You’re the one who messed up here.
(Pause) Yeah, you told me you would start dating again. And I supported you, ‘cause I didn't think Mom would want you to stay alone forever. But that was a while ago, and you haven't said anything since. Now all of a sudden you’re close enough with some random woman to bring her home? (Pause) Well she’s random to me. You haven't even told me her name. (Pause)
Alice, huh. Makes sense, since she's clearly driven you insane! (Sigh)
Fine, whatever. What time is she supposed to get here anyway? (Door bell rings) …You have got to be kidding me.
(Pause)
"My best behavior?" You think I can promise something like that in this situation?
(Pause)
Ugh, fine. I promise. Let's just get this over with.
(Front Door opens)
[Polite] Hello, pleasure to finally meet you~. I've heard so~ much about you. All good things, of course. (Giggle)
Oh, can I take your coat?
(pause)
It's not a hassle at all. Please let me…oh.
[Nervous] Oh wow. Wh-what a lovely dress. Wh-where did you, um, buy it.
(Pause)
A gift from my father, hmm? And did he happen to mention where he got it?
(Pause)
Well it actually belonged to my mother. It's been collecting dust ever since she…
Well the point is, no one has worn it in a while. So he must have decided to give it a fresh start with you.
[Whisper to yourself] it's like he's trying to replace her…
[Normal volume] Hmm? Oh I was just thinking…"This is the place for her". (Giggle)
You belong here with us, and it's nice to finally have you over for dinner. Come on, let's go to the dining room and enjoy whatever dad tried to cook.
(Glasses clang, and various cutlery sounds as they ear together)
(Heavy sigh)
[exhausted] She's finally~ gone. I used up all of my energy for the month. I never want to put on a show like that ever again.
(Pause)
What do you mean? You told me to be on my best behavior. So what else was I supposed to do?
(Pause)
Well if I didn't put on a show, then I wouldn't have been able to hide how much I wanted her to leave.
(Pause)
No, I did not like her. For the record, I tried. I really did. But everything she talked about was so stupid and pointless. And did you really not mind how much she talked about her exes? Would it have killed her to focus more on you?
(Pause)
[Annoyed] Of course I'm upset!
I told you. I'm like this because you kept it a secret. We're supposed to tell each other everything, but you kept this from me. I'm sorry dad, but I don't think I can trust you.
(Pause)
No, I mean it. You went about this all wrong, and I don't know how to deal with this.
[Curious] …Hmm? Can you…say that again?
(Pause)
You mean that? You'll really do anything I say?
(Pause)
Hmmmm~
Well a new car, or some jewelry would definitely help me forgive you~ (giggle)
But really, I don't need anything fancy. If you're that serious about making things work out with her, then I also have to try my best. I mean Look at me, being all selfish after telling you to put yourself out there. it doesn't get any more childish than that. So all I really want from you, is her contact info.
(Pause)
Yes, I need to go meet with her, and be honest. Like I said, I definitely can't put on this act again. So I need her to see the real me, and hear all of my real concerns. After that, I think the 3 of us will he able to move on. What do you say?
(Pause)
Aww, thanks dad. You won't regret this. I love you! Good night~
(Long pause)
(Front door opes)
Dad, I'm home~. Da~d? Where are…oh. There you are. What are you doing all curled up on the couch like that. Are you…are you watching the news again? You hate watching the news. You always say it's too much negativity.
(Pause)
Huh? What do you mean you "want to be negative"?
Wait…is this still about Alice? Ugh, dad I told you; you have to get over her. I mean, clearly she's over you. Otherwise she wouldn't have ghosted you for the past week. Please look at me, dad.
(Pause)
Dad, come on. Just forget about her. And if losing her makes you feel this bad, then maybe we were wrong.
(Pause)
I'm saying…maybe you don't need to get back out there. I mean, between me, and mom's spirit, don't you have enough overbearing women to deal with? (Giggle)
You don't really need to add Alice to the list. Maybe one day you'll find someone new. But you don't have to rush it. For now, the 3 of us…we're still a family. Isn't that why we keep her pictures around? So come on. Show your real family some appreciation. Get off the couch and give me a hug.
(Pause)
(Couch squeak sfx)
Finally ~, thanks dad, it's nice to…hey, what's wrong? Why are you giving me that look?
(Pause)
What do you mean? What's wrong with what I'm wearing? I think it looks very nice. And it fits me perfectly.
(Pause)
Hmm? Oh yeah~ I remember now. I guess you did give this fancy dress to Alice. Well she, um, decided to return it when I went to visit her.
(Pause)
Yeah, Alice uh, remembered what I said about the dress belonging to mom. She practically begged me to take it back. In retrospect, maybe that was her way of saying she was done with us.
I'm sorry, I, uh, really thought I mentioned this when I got back from her place. It must have slipped my mind somehow.
(Pause)
"Not that kind of woman", huh…
And that's why you'll believe her over your own daughter?
She put you through hell this past week, and you'll still side with her? I can't believe you.
(Pause)
Wh-what do you mean? Of course she's the one who put you through hell. That's why you need to stop focusing on her.
(Pause)
N-no that's not what I meant. You don't need to interrogate me. What do I have to do with any of this?
(Pause)
I have not been acting weird!
Dad, please stop with all these questions!
Dad! You're wrong!
(pause)
[Yelling] No! I didn't do anything to her! She did it to herself!
(Deep breath and long exhale)
[Eerily calm] …Fine, dad. Since you can't let sleeping whores lie, I'll spell it out for you.
Alice won't be returning your calls.
She won't be speaking to any one anymore. I made sure of that.
I swear, I really did go over there just to talk. To make an effort, for your sake. You were so head over heels in love. What kind of daughter would I be if I didn't support that. But when I got there, all of that crumbled away. I rang the bell, and the door opened. But she wasn't on the other side. No, it was her other boyfriend. I don't want to go into the messy details, but let's just say that by the look and smell of the place, there was no other explanation for what was going on in there. And believe me, I looked for one. I tried so~ hard to give her the benefit of the doubt. But it was all true. She was sleeping with another guy, the day after you brought her to your home. That's the kind of woman she was.
(Pause)
Yes, that's right. Was.
(Pause)
"What did I do? "
I did what I had to do. To protect you from her and her lies.
I told the boyfriend that I had the wrong apartment, and left. I hid, and waited for him to leave. Even got a clear picture of him leaving, since you wouldn't believe me otherwise. Here, see for yourself.
(Pause)
Anyway, after that, I went back and rang the bell again. When she opened the door for me like an idiot, I pushed her back inside to…confront her.
I remember wanting to convince her to break things off with you. She said something about having needs. After that, I got a little…upset.
It's weird. People usually justify it by saying they "lost control".
But in that moment, I had Never. Felt. More in control. It's like I knew exactly what to do, and how to do it.
And when it was all over, I felt a peace, something unlike anything I had ever felt before. Then it was just a matter of cleaning up. By the time I left, it was like I was never there in the first place. The remaining evidence only pointed to the last guy who was in her apartment. I'm sure the detectives enjoyed such an open-shut case. I'm surprised you didn't see the story since you've been obsessively watching the news all week.
And you know what the best part is? I got away with it! (Laugh)
It's been a week since then, and all they've done is arrest the other guy. Makes sense of course. Her social media presence was mysteriously erased, so there was no way to connect her to you. And this dress, which never should have been in her apartment in the first place, is finally back home where it belongs.
Everything worked out perfectly!
That's why I'm sure of it. I'm sure this had to have been a blessing from mom. She's still looking after us, keeping us safe. Even after all this time, she hasn't abandoned us. She showed me what to do, and protected me from the consequences because it was the right thing to do. And that's why I'm certain that we'll be okay. Just the 3 of us. Forever.
(Pause)
Oh dad, I know you don't feel it now. But you will. I'll make sure of it.
(Pause)
You'll what? Turn me in? You would have your own daughter arrested for helping you out? Does that really make sense?
(Pause)
Of course I helped you. Now that woman won't cheat on you ever again. And she can't distract you from your real family. This is a good thing. Why can't you focus on that?
I don't think calling me names is going to change anything. But it's okay, I know you're stressed. We can talk more about this in the morning. Lemme give you a hug.
Hey, don't flinch away from me. Just let your daughter hug you.
[Whispering in ear slowly until the end] Oh wow. Your pulse is racing. You really are stressed. Or could it be…you're scared? I wonder what you could be scared of. (Giggle)
But it doesn't really matter.
I promise, from now on, mom and I will be sure to protect you, so you don't need to be afraid.
Not now.
Not ever.
I love you dad. We~ love you.
Good night.
END

I work in a gay bar in midtown. We’re open until 4, and usually have a drink together afterward.
I worked tonight. We had one cocktail. I went to Taco Bell for some easy food, and went to the train station. I’m sitting all happy, eating my taco, when this stranger sits next to me and asks me for a piece of a taco. It seems weird to give just a piece, so I hand him the full taco. Fine, I have others, lemme be generous.
The guy takes one bite and throws the rest away. Uhh, not cool. I say “that’s messed up” and he stands up to get in my face. “What are you gonna do about it, n-word? Stand up and fight me”
No, I’m going to finish my food. This motherfucker hit me in the face. Open-hand, not super strong. But he hit me. A stranger.
Thankfully, the guy on my other side saw this all happening and started talking to the guy enough to let me walk away. But. In my 9 years, I’ve never been smacked by a stranger.
Be safe out there, all.

Hi modding experts, I need your help organizing and figuring out the best set up of my current load order and which of my mods are obsolete, useless/broken(and why) or in a wrong position or lack of a required file.
The game keeps crashing every 20-30 mins (also with new saves I do for testing) even though I partially copied this LO from orders labeled as stable online.
Here's my LO as I read it on the console

1. USSEP
2. Unofficial CC content patch
3. RW2 resources
4. EOSI
5. Patron carriages/innkeepers (I like the expensive travels & inns but I still don't know if this conflicts with EOSI, need testing)
6. Debug menu
7. Realistic ragdolls and force
8. Immersive Leveling
9. Character Creation Overhaul AIO
10. Craftable Telvanni robes
11. Craftable Hold guard armor
12. Ars Metallica
13. Undiscovered Skyrim
14. Open Civil War
15. Paarthurnax Dilemma
16. Become a whiterun guard
17. Destroy thieves guild
18. Thugs Not assassins
19. Jenassa fix - bosmer armor
20. Bosmer armor pack
21. Realistic AI detection - LITE
22. Dangerous Skooma
23. Summermyst
24. Narrative loot
25. Smithed equipment in loot
26. Face masks of skyrim
27. Morrowind imports
28. 360 walk & run - standalone
29. Fire HD
30. Enhanced Blood texture
31. Unique uniques
32. Frost white glass armor
33. Black and gold ebony armor
34. Black and gold ebony weapons
35. Royal armory - New artifacts (don't know if this conflicts with CRF or other, it's the version that only replaces a few vanilla weapons of the important characters)
36. Beyond skyrim Morrowind- Bonemold weapons
37. Bones for a crow fix (don't know if this is obsolete with the Unofficial CC patch or the USSEP but last lime I checked I still needed this because the corpse of the npc didn't appear, a common bug)
38. Special edition followers (this one only alters some followers AI and combat styles)
39. More tavern idles
40. CRF (I can't figure out where to put this, I fear it overwrites something I move it higher)
41. RDO
42. Serana expanded dialogue add-on (do not confuse with the most famous meme-like serana dialogue add on, this is the one that uses most vanilla features of serana)
43. More to say 9.0.2
44. Civil War lines expansion
45. RDO + CRF + USSEP patch
46. Bosmers have antlers
47. Vanilla hair remake NPCs
48. Vanilla hair remake replacer
49. Brighter torches
50. Spells light dynamic shadows (i saw it can be used with other lighting mods I just don't know if is better above or below elfx)
51. Updated ELFX (...and here comes the mess)
52. ELFX fixes
53. ELFX enhancer
54. ELFX exterior fixes
55. JKs interiors AIO (...where do I put this?)
56. Simply Darker Nights (by the same author of "brighter torches" above, these two work well together)
57. Enhanced skyrim nights
58. Lush aspen fall trees 2k - gamerpauly
59. HD birch bark (for the above, simply retexture the bark of rift trees)
60. Lush Vanilla trees 1K - gamerpauly
61. Improved terrain LOD meshes (...where do I put this?)
62. Capital of winterhold
63. Solitude docks (need testing if it conflicts with JKs or something else)
64. Arthmoor Practice dummies
65. Arthmoor Provincial Courier service
66. Arthmoor Oakwood (and all the Artmoor villages in a non particular order EXCEPT Keld-Nar and Telengard)
67. Arthmoor Storefront
68. Environs - Whiterun watchtower
69. Environs - shrines of talos (maybe it conflicts somewhere with JKs skyrim but I don't know yet)
70. Quaint raven rock
71. Quaint raven rock - ELFX exterior fix
72. Better Tel Mithrtyn
73. Books of skyrim (...where do I put this? It seems not conflicting with anything at the moment)
74. JKs skyrim AIO (...where do I put this?)
75. JKs windhelm outskirts (I can't understand if the windhelm exterior that look super cool in this mod is already present in the Jks skyrim AIO, is this repetitive? it seems not but I need to know where to put this in LO because it crashes sometimes in this area)
76. Bells of skyrim
77. Bells of skyrim - JKs skyrim patch
78. Bells of skyrim - Immersive citizens patch
79. ( ...and here comes the other mess below)
80. JKs skyrim CRF + Arthmoor's mods patch
81. JKs skyrim Storefront patch
82. JKs skyrim ELFX exterior patch
83. Jks INTERIORS ELFX patch
84. JKs INTERIORS- JKs skyrim AIO patch
85. JKs INTERIORS ELFX fixes patch
86. Jks INTERIORS USSEP patch
87. Jks INTERIORS ELFX Enhancer patch
88. JKs skyrim - Immersive citizens patch
89. JKs INTERIORS- Immersive citizens patch
90. JKs windhelm outskirts- USSEP patch
91. JKs windhelm outskirts- CC ebony plate armor patch
92. JKs windhelm outskirts- NO snow under roof patch
93. JKs windhelm outskirts- Immersive citizens
94. NO snow under the Roof
95. The Marshlands by Tesfiend
96. Wildcat injuries animations DAR
97. Immersive movement
98. Wildcat
99. Wildcat patch Immersive movement
100. Mortal Enemies patch Immersive movement (the mod M.E. is included in a mod below, so I don't need to re-download it but still need this to converge between ME effects and Immersive movement right? I'm confused about this)
101. Hardcore Dragons difficulty
102. Better Auriel Bow
103. Vanilla Plus v5.1.1 (this is the mod that contains Mortal Enemies which compatibility is needed between it's changes and Immersive movement, right?)
104. Vokrii
105. EOSI - vokrii patch
106. Immersive citizens- AI overhaul (...where do I put this?)
107. Immersive patrols (large battles)
108. Populated land roads path
109. Lightly populated settlements
110. Lucien (...where do i put this guy in my LO?)
111. Lucien Anniversary
112. Taliesin elf follower
113. Dominion's more high elves
114. Immersive Winterhold NPCs (there are two of this exact same mod which one is the most up to date? I have the one with the argonian mage in the thumbnail)
115. Erandil thalmor follower
116. Notice board - better solstheim
117. Notice board
118. RW2 (with it's resources file up at the top)
119. JKs skyrim - RW2 patch
120. Imperial rewards
121. Immersive hunting
122. Mammoth pelts (don't know yet if it conflicts with Immersive hunting)
123. Heliomancy Spells
124. Bound Shield
125. Caves of morrowind (...a dungeon, where do I put this?)
126. Depths of Skyrim (...where? Above or below RW2?)
127. Hold border banners
128. Elemental fury offhand fix
129. RJ tweaks - followers (... where do I put this? Does it conflicts with Immersive citizens?)
130. RJ tweaks - hearthfire (above or below Immersive hunting? Or where?)
131. D13 faster get up
132. Alternate Start
133. JKs INTERIORS - Alternate start patch
134. Color patches remover

Introduction

I've been a part of this community for long enough that maybe 3 people recognize the color of my shave towels when I post on /wicked_edge (they're purple). In /wetshaving, I occasionally make dick jokes with mammothben.
As a result, I've spent about an hour ruminating on this post and how to make the Maggard Meetup as awkward as possible. These are my memes and mine alone. I have rejected several cash offers to not post these findings, and I will not be stopped.

Grievance #1: Ending the Base Race

Background

In the before-fore times, the meta for soapmaking that every soapmaker followed was to get a handful of main scents that they keep the same, and release small tweaks to their soap base every 6 months to render the community's collection obsolete and generate a buying spree where people now had to get their favorite scents in the "latest and greatest" soap base.
Many consider this era the golden age of wetshaving, and Barrister and Mann was an active contributor to the base race. White Label/Black Label base, Glissant base, Latha base, Reserve base, Soft Heart base, and Excelsior base all helped encourage wetshavers across the world buy Seville multiple times in the hopes for better slickness, improved cushion (which is totally a thing), and the ultimate post-shave feel.
Then everything changed when the Omniberries attacked.

Omnibus

On September 29, 2021, a nuclear salvo was unleashed from the halls of barristerandmann.com. Leviathan was released in the Omnibus base, and soapmakers around the world waved the white flag on the base race.
Declaration Grooming's Milksteak, Sus Artisan Accoutrement's CK-6, Boob-label & Evans' Kaizen K2. These mainstays of American soap bases have remained stagnant ever since. Omnibus effectively ended the base race across the entire market, and led to the community consensus becoming "chase scents, not bases."

Why This Matters

This alone isn't problematic, having a stable set of great bases to choose from and allowing premiere soapmakers to focus on releasing more interesting scents in smaller batches is good for the community, for the industry, and the world.
The problem arises when old, established brands like Tabac take the end of the base race as a signal from the market that they can cut costs by moving their soaps onto to inferior bases. I'm not saying that it's Will's fault that tallow Tabac is now unobtanium, but you could make the argument that it's Will's fault that tallow Tabac is now unobtanium.

The Solution

The best way the community can address this issue is to write daily letters to Maurer & Wirtz that they need to bring back the tallow base for Tabac, and buy out Maggad Razors' stock of 4.1/4.2 base Saponificio Varesino soaps so they can restock everything in the 4.3 base.

Grievance #2: Financial Abuse

Background

Every few years, the copyright expiration date on Mickey Mouse looms near and Disney lobbies the US government to extend the copyright expiration date so that Disney can maintain their stranglehold on The Mouse, despite their eager use of public domain IP like Sherlock Holmes and King Arthur. Is Will literally Big Soap? I'm not saying he is, I'm just asking questions.

Mousse de Saxe

Will has a whole blog post on how he came about his formulation of Mousse de Saxe, and while it's a very interesting story and his formulation of MdS has become catnip for wetshavers, it's also become something of a crutch in his soapmaking. MdS features in Beadelaire, Full Measure of Man, Lavanille, Le Grand Chypre, and most recently in Vespers.

Why This Matters

Although many of us in the community have no thrill anymore, MdS remains the inimitable constant source of thrill at all of /wetshaving cannot resist. L'appel du mousse is the compelling urge one feels to buy at least a sample (I just need a taste!) of Will's latest release featuring Mousse de Saxe. Will knows this fact about us. He knows it well. My sources tell me Will has bought several jetskis with the money he's earned from abusing this fact about us. And he can't keep getting away with it.

The Solution

Since the turn of the new millennium, sex strikes have proven effective in Colombia, The Phillippines, South Sudan, Togo, and elsewhere. By withholding that which their oppressors desire until behavior is changed, peace can be achieved. So to everyone at the Maggard Meetup, I call upon you to refrain from complimenting Will's scent-making until he releases Mousse de Saxe as a standalone dropper that can be added to soaps and aftershaves a la Declaration Grooming's menthol dropper. Si se puede!

Grievance #3: Olfactory Abuse

Background

It is at this point in the post that I must concede, Will is the superior meme-meister. This absolute madlad is at the gigabrain Dr. Manhattan level of the soapmaking world, except instead of moving to Mars he's decided to dead-ass fuck with us. Seville prints more money than the Nintendo Switch, he's got MdS for whenever he wants the cash to buy another jetski, and Omnibus ensures no other soapmaker will encroach on his soap base superiority. How do I know he's decided to stunt on our noses? Because of 2 scent notes.

Cilantro and Cum

Let's start with Cilantro. When the Four Horsemen series was announced, the wetshaving community was awash with curiosity and speculation about what each of the four horsemen would smell like. Would it be like how Noble Otter tackled the "Firefighter" theme without actually making a soap that smelled like a fire?
No. War would smell like an actual war crime. How does one scent a war crime? Apparently with Cilantro. I have it on good authority that Will devised the scent profile for War when eating tacos for taco tuesday and the topic of how cilantro tastes like soap to some people with a specific gene. "Well what would happen if I added an ingredient that tastes like soap to my actual soap?" and off he went. His friends and family didn't see him for days. The Cleveland Browns found a post-it note that had "Cilantro No Matter What" scribbled on it. And some time later, a scent that could curdle Wholly Kaw's Creme Fraiche base was brought to market. Will knew that we'd buy all 4 scents, get all matchy-matchy, and even dickhole the aftershaves. And then the SOTD's began. "My wife hates this," "my cat peed on the tub when I left it open to dry," "why has god forsaken me?" Guess who was laughing his ass off from Mars? Our very own Dr. Manhattan.
For those of us familiar with Pear Tree blossoms, they have a very particular scent. The kind of scent that makes guys inspect their pant leg and say "I'm fairly certain I didn't miss." The kind of scent that makes women think "Oh gross, honey I told you to change your underwear after last night." That's right, Pear Tree blossoms smell like cum. So when Will was considering what scent to re-release for Spring 2023, did he select fan favorite Paganini's Violin or the fruity fougere Passiflora? (Both of which he relased bath soaps for in February). No, he chose the cum soap. The soap that's supposed to remind you of the time you took a walk through Central Park and rounded a corner only to be accosted by a masturbating homeless man.
I tried to give Will the benefit of the doubt, and asked point blank "Is the pear blossom accord in Rhapsody going to be as, well... pear blossom-y as the original Rhapsody formulation?" to which he responded "Why would I change it?" He knew. He knew what he was doing when he originally released the soap, and he knew why I was asking if he had changed it in the re-release. Dr. Manhattan was laughing on Mars again.

Why This Matters

This matters because Will still hasn't re-released Roam and I need the matching aftershave in my life. There are only so many fresh tubs of Roam out there that j33pguy13 can source for me. Instead, Will chooses to re-release Rhapsody and put together what may go down in history as the most infamous multi-scent meme soap release in history with the Four Horsemen. This is a personal attack on my love for Roam and I will not stand for it.

The Solution

Will, re-release Roam and all is forgiven.

Grievance #4: Feet

Preface

I'm a heterosexual male, but that shouldn't matter when it comes to shaving products or labels. Yes, we drank beer. My friends and I. Boys and girls. Yes, we drank beer. I liked beer. Still like beer. We drank beer.

The Problem

Lavender, Interrupted has been to Will as At the Mountains of Madness has been to Guillermo Del Toro. Everyone wants to see it. Will wants to make it. But the creative ambition of the project makes the promised project almost un-makeable. Lavender, Interrupted had been long promised as an evolution of the lauded Lavanille scent, but faced delays and reformulations, and further delays.
And now, today, many of you will go to the Maggard Meetup anticipating getting a full bottle or sample of the long awaited fragrance. And I can't say I'm not jealous.
I'm really jealous.
But lets wind the clock back to Tuesday March 21, 2023 and remember the Deals/New Products thread from that day.
"Happy Tuesday!
Just wanted to drop in quickly to let you all know that the Q2 2023 Release Schedule is now posted on our blog and that it features a sneak peek at a mockup for Lavender, Interrupted packaging."
Will wanted us to see the packaging. Not a new blog post on how he put the final touches on the fragrance. Not a picture of the bottle it would be sold in. He wanted us to see the picture of sexy feet he put on the box. He postponed Lavender, Interrupted and strung us along just so that his feet pics could get maximum exposure with minimum heat. Are those Will's feet on the box of Lavender, Interrupted? Why does will want us to see pictures of his feet in thigh-high stockings? I'm not saying they are Will's feet on the packaging of Lavender, Interrupted. I'm just asking questions.

The Solution

Nothing really to be done about this other than be mad about discovering new about ourselves. Just accept that we're all going to love this fragrance and that the box with sexy feet on it will be in many wetshavers' dens, delighting Will that his feet pics are going to be all over the sub's mail call threads for years to come.

Conclusion

I'm not sure why you read this far. It's lot to take in, I know. I'm intentionally avoiding a few smaller topics of less import, like... Night Music having poo notes. I'm not going to critique Will/Barrister and Mann beyond that, because it's already been established that he's straight up fucking with us with some of these scents and I am 100% here for it.
I've been wracked with guilt holding onto this knowledge while wetshavers around the world continue to buy Will's wonderful products, but I realized the potential hilarity of pointing out Will's sexy feet pics the morning of the Maggard Meetup was too much to pass up. My intention is just to meme on everyone tangentially related to what I've posted here, and to get Roam a proper re-release. I will not source any of my claims, and I expect you to do your own research. Take my word for it.
After all of this though, I am convinced that Will is an absolute gigachad in the wetshaving world. Please join me in encouraging Will to re-release Roam.
TL;DR Does this sub even have mods anymore? Why is this post still up?

Best Times of Day to Buy or Sell Stocks

First thing in the morning, market volumes and prices can go wild. The opening hours are when the market factors in all of the events and news releases since the previous closing bell, which contributes to price volatility. A skilled trader may be able to recognize the appropriate patterns and make a quick profit, but a less skilled trader could suffer serious losses as a result. So if you’re a novice, you may want to avoid trading during these volatile hours, or at least within the first hour.
However, for seasoned day traders, the first 15 minutes following the opening bell is prime time, usually offering some of the biggest trades of the day on the initial trends. The opening is 9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Eastern Time (ET) period is often one of the best hours of the day for day trading, offering the biggest moves in the shortest amount of time. A lot of professional day traders stop trading around 11:30 a.m. because that is when volatility and volume tend to taper off.

Best Day of the Week to Buy Stocks

People believe that the first day of the workweek is best. It’s called the Monday effect or the weekend effect. Anecdotally, traders say the stock market has had a tendency to drop on Mondays.

Best Day of the Week to Sell Stocks

If Monday may be the best day of the week to buy stocks, then Friday may be the best day to sell stock—before prices dip on Monday. If you’re interested in short selling, then Friday may be the best day to take a short position (if stocks are priced higher on Friday), and Monday would be the best day to cover your short.

Best Month to Buy Stocks

So, in terms of seasonality, the end of December has shown to be a good time to buy small caps or value stocks, to be poised for the rise early in the next month. There’s another advantage: Many investors start to sell stocks en masse at year’s end, especially those that have declined in value, to claim capital losses on their tax returns

Best Month to Sell Stocks

September is traditionally thought to be a down month. October, too, has seen record drops of 19.7% and 21.5% in 1907, 1929, and 1987.3 These mark the onset of the Panic of 1907, the Great Depression, and Black Monday. As a result, some traders believe that September and October are the best months to sell stocks.

Best Date of the Month

There is no single day of every month that’s always ideal for buying or selling. However, there is a tendency for stocks to rise at the turn of a month. This tendency is mostly related to periodic new money flows directed toward mutual funds at the beginning of every month.
In addition, fund managers attempt to make their balance sheets look pretty at the end of each quarter by buying stocks that have done well during that particular quarter. Stock prices tend to fall in the middle of the month.
So a trader might benefit from timing stock buys near a month’s midpoint—the 10th to the 15th, for example. The best day to sell stocks would probably be within the five days around the turn of the month.

The Bottom Line

These suggestions for the best time of day to trade stocks, the best day of the week to buy or sell stocks, and the best month to buy or sell stocks are generalizations, of course. Exceptions and anomalies abound, depending on news events and changing market conditions.

Chapter 4: The Dew
We have a new cast member for this chapter! Her name is Molly, and let’s just say she’s the MVP.
It was almost noon when I woke up. Faaaaack! I scrambled to get dressed, slap on a little makeup, put my hair in purple pigtails, ask myself whether I was dolling myself up for FPB or for Axton... Yeah, that was a no-brainer. I engaged in basic some humaning (brushing teeth, applying deodorant, etc.), spritzed on some men’s cologne called Spicebomb (FPB really was kind of right about that), put on my new shoes, and dashed out the door. I looked at my phone to see if I had a missed call or an angry text from FPB. Nope. Good! He must have still been passed out.
I Ubered to FPB’s place to get my car, then I drove back to Sage’s house and parked on the side of the street. There were four Molly Maid vehicles in the driveway. I checked the door. It was unlocked. Was it possible that my absence might have gone unnoticed? As I entered the house, I could hear one of the professional cleaners yelling at Sage. I’ll call her Molly.
Molly: I’m charging you TRIPLE! I had to call in SIX extra girls. We clean up vomit, pee pee, poo poo, and your house smells like a distillery! You are nasty, nasty people!
I was damn near pissing myself laughing. One of the professional cleaners swooped past me, and I felt embarrassed to even be associated with these nasty, nasty people (even though all of them except for FPB had been super nice to me).
I found my way into the kitchen and accidentally interrupted Sage and Athena arguing over who was going to pay the cleaning bill. Sage was in favor of splitting it between the chummers, and Athena was in favor of sticking Mori with the bill since his nasty, nasty rules caused the nasty, nasty mess.
I cleared my throat so it didn’t seem like I was eavesdropping.
Athena: OP! Hey! Where have you been all morning?
Me: I ran home to get some sleep. The snoring was pretty loud...
Athena: I hear ya. We sleep in Sage’s bedroom, but Mori makes all the others sleep in the War Room or on the porch. You might be able to convince him to let you sleep in the guest room tonight?
Me: Isn’t it your house, Sage? I’ll play by your rules.
Sage: Yeah, but Mori’s in charge during Shadowrun weekends.
Damn, this really was starting to feel like a fucking cult. But I still found Mori hella amusing despite all his absurdities.
Me: Hey, guys? How much hell am I about to catch from FPB?
Sage: That would be... none. He’s still passed out in the backyard.
I made my way to the porch. I guess the cleaning crew hadn’t gotten there yet. There were toppled cups, empty liquor bottles, and several piles of puke on the porch; and the distinct scent of boozy pee clashed in an act of olfactory violence with the scent of stale vomit. I didn’t even want to take a single step outside. I was wearing my brand new shoes, after all! But the rest of my outfit was blissfully casual.
FPB’s absurdly formal clothes were draped over the hammock, and he was sprawled across a lawn chair in nothing but his black boxer briefs, snoring like a freight train.
Axton was sitting on a dry patch of the steps that led down to the yard, smoking a cigarette, and drinking what I hoped was coffee. Snorlax was passed out in the inflatable kiddie pool. And Mori was nowhere to be seen. Axton turned around and noticed me. Surely he didn’t remember trying to kiss me the night before. I mean, I kind of hoped that he did... but it would make my life a whole lot easier if he didn’t.
Axton: OP! Where did you run off to after you put us to bed?
Me: I went to sleep.
Axton: Where?
Me: Ummmm...
Axton: I won’t say anything to FPB, don’t worry.
I wanted to believe him. “I went home. I wanted to sleep in my own bed, and I wanted to have my car in case I get tired again. I seriously can’t keep up with you guys.”
Axton: That’s probably not anything to be ashamed of. Wanna come sit? Have a smoke?
I scanned the porch. “I’m not sure where it’s safe to step.”
Axton put his cig in the ashtray and stood up. “Combat boots to the rescue.”
He crossed the porch, picked me up, and carried me to the puke/pee/booze-free step. As he was putting me down his hand very deliberately grazed the length of my spine. Guess he remembered... I couldn’t seem to pull my hand off his shoulder, nor could I seem to take my eyes off his lips. But just then, FPB stirred. And he roared, “UNHAND MY GIRLFRIEND, YOU PIECE OF SHIT!”
He tried to stand, but his tall, hungover ass just withered to the ground.
Me: Good morning! Don’t worry. He was just helping me protect my new shoes.
FPB: So help me, Pretty Boy. If you touch my girlfriend again, I WILL END YOU.
Axton: Just trying to be gentlemanly, buddy. You want some coffee?
FPB grunted.
Axton turned to me. “You want some, too?”
FPB: DO NOT SPEAK TO HER, YOU FUCKING SKIDMARK.
Me: I’m good. I’ll hit Mori up for some coke later on.
Axton laughed and headed to the kitchen.
FPB: YOU WILL NOT GET COKE FROM MORI. I WILL LITERALLY KILL HIS (expletive slur deleted) ASS IF HE GIVES YOU COKE.
Snorlax was stirring in the kiddie pool.
Snorlax: FPB... Chill, bro. Seriously. God damn. You’re gonna pop a vein in your forehead.
Okay, it’s finally time to pause and give you guys some background on my relationship with FPB. It might be mildly triggering for some, so apologies in advance.
He repulsed me at first. I thought he was a snob, I hated his beard, and his circus freak height intimidated me a little. But he managed to humanize himself. He feigned vulnerability. He was attentive and affectionate (at first). And when we finally went on a proper date, it was actually pretty romantic. Plus, he had cool Bioshock tattoos! I wouldn’t find out about his Shadowrun tramp stamp until a bit later.
And I felt like I was gaining some maturity by looking past the unsightly beard, the constantly furrowed brow, and the shocking amount of time he spent standing on the most random soapboxes one could possibly imagine. I’ll also shoehorn in the fact that he had been “dating” a possessive, obsessive legbeard and I found myself feeling like a white knight for helping him out of that annoying situationship.
FPB’s triumphant, and probably fabricated, stories of his past facilitated empathy. He had dropped out of college to join the Peace Corps. He once pulled over to save a child from a burning vehicle. He had been bullied in middle school for being the only boy in the Color Guard. Blah, blah, blah. It was mostly a load of bollocks, and I’ll save the ridiculous details for another story. But his displays of affection in the early stages of our cursed courtship seemed sincere, and I believed him when he said that my “being there for him” was helping him grow as a person. What a rube I was.
The emotional connection gradually ran deeper as a result of FPB’s exceptionally well-rehearsed vulnerability act, but it was hardly a romance novel. After several relatively normal “getting to know each other” months, I discovered that FPB had been notoriously promiscuous in the past. A lothario, through and through. Many women apparently knew all about the “ladies’ man maître D” in midtown Wellsprings who would go home with absolutely ANYONE.
And I soon figured out that he had not left his promiscuous past behind him... at all. But even if I hadn’t become aware of his reputation, I could often smell his sexual escapades once he felt confident enough to interact with me immediately after he’d gone muff diving. His beard stank like a turtle tank, with heavy top notes of body odor and microwaved fish, and undertones of stale urine, dingleberries, and sometimes a gentle waft of rotting tampon.
He’d also had to treat his foul flavor-saver for pubic lice on a few occasions. I know I mentioned his beard crabs earlier, but it bears repeating (if only for the cringe). I can’t even begin to explain how humiliating the state of his beard was for me. I take care of all manner of personal hygiene, and I’ve certainly never had CRABS. To be known as the girlfriend of such a nasty beardo must have caused at least a few people to reasonably assume that I had a crab-infested crotch and a serious case of junk funk. #notmyjunk
Hindsight tells me that I didn’t care about his philandering because I wasn’t in love with him. His company wasn’t particularly enjoyable since he spent most of our time together complaining about “losers” on the internet and lambasting the insufferable management at the restaurant where he worked. But he could carry on lengthy conversations about luxury fragrance, which was... harmless. Plus, I enjoyed the idea of having a “boyfriend” since I was approaching 30.
And FPB could convincing behave like the *perfect gentleman* on the rare occasions when we attended respectable social events together. So all of my friends thought I’d won the dating lottery by landing myself a quirky, intelligent, polite, and visually striking boyfriend. This dreadful dating experience tempts me to spout some unsolicited advice along the lines of, “Wait for the right *connection* with a person who makes your life more enjoyable, and don’t get hung up on your relationship status... YOU are enough.” But perhaps that’s something we all have to realize for ourselves.
Aside from the philandering, things ran pretty smoothly back when FPB was still keeping “the crazy” under wraps. His goblinization unfolded in tiny, almost imperceptible increments. And by the time he had become a full-blown possessive lunatic, every attempt to end things with him resulted in death threats, slander, vandalism, bomb threats, or false police reports. I could easily write an entire lengthy story about every disastrous breakup attempt. But they wouldn’t be amusing stories. At least this current story has moments that I can try to frame as humorous, largely thanks to the Shadowrun crew.
I suppose the most honest answer as to why I had given FPB chance after chance is that I had absolutely NO prior experience being emotionally close to severely mentally unstable people. I’m one of the lucky ones who has never suffered from mental illness aside from occasional situational depression and some mild body images issues when I was a teenage girl on the high school drill team. I grew up in a loving family. And the only other serious romantic relationship I’d had prior to FPB fell apart because we were just in different stages of life (he was quite a bit older), and we eventually found ourselves unable to relate to one another. Nothing horrifying.
FPB was much closer to my age, we had common interests, and he was a (seemingly) genuine gentleman at first. Our relationship was like Beauty and the Beast... in reverse. I’m not so much comparing myself to Belle as I’m comparing FPB to a kind-hearted prince who gradually transformed into a stomping, snarling, tantrum-throwing BEAST.
Any desire that I’d ever felt for him died from poon fume inhalation. And FPB was pitifully butt-hurt when I closed the cookie to him. And despite displaying no interest in showing affection towards me, despite having countless randos at whom he could wiggle his whisky wang, despite griping incessantly about my terrible personality, my wretched taste in music, and my annoying sense of humor, he refused to end the relationship.
But if I so much as spoke to another man, FPB would call the police and report him as a TCAP Story, vandalize his property (usually with poop and/or semen), stalk him relentlessly, or make a slanderous website, crudely photoshopping the poor guy’s face onto obscene images that he got off the deepest, dingiest, most dumpster-fiery recesses of the dark web. This “retaliation technique” would eventually get his ass incarcerated, but not until many, many unfortunate girlfriends later.
Everyone had always told me that, “Relationships are HARD.” Guys, gals, non-binary pals... if you ever feel the need to cough out this fetid tonsil stone of “wisdom,” please operationally define the word “HARD.” If a relationship feels like a prison sentence and you find yourself fearing for your safety or for the safety of your loved ones, that isn’t “hard.” That is coercive control. RUN. But never forget that running is often much, mucheasier said than done. There’s no shame in getting help from friends, family, and law enforcement.
​
So, where were we? Snorlax was telling FPB to chill out, Axton was going to get some coffee for the lanky, bearded ball of rage, and I was standing on the one clean step, hoping the cleaning crew would come outside and save us all.
FPB was flailing about, trying to achieve a sitting position. Snorlax seemed to have gone back to sleep. And Axton returned to the porch with a cup of coffee and a bottle of water. He made his way down to FPB.
FPB: You’d better stay far, FAR away from her for the remainder of the weekend.
Me: Funky, he’s helping your hungover ass. And he hasn’t been inappropriate towards me in any way.
(That was kind of a lie. But I suppose it all depends on what you consider “inappropriate.”)
FPB harumphed.
Me: I promise you that I’ll punch him in the face if he makes me uncomfortable. Otherwise, please let me get to know your friends. You said that was an important part of the weekend.
Axton sat down the hangover remedies next to FPB’s lawn chair.
Axton: You want some Advil?
FPB nodded, and Axton took the pills out of his pocket and handed them over. FPB washed the pills down, took a few sips of lukewarm coffee, and leaned back in the chair, groaning miserably.
I sat down on the clean step and lit up a cigarette. Axton left FPB to his own devices and approached me cautiously. I gestured for him to come sit next to me. Axton grinned sheepishly, took his cig out of the ashtray, and sat down on the step. I wanted to keep FPB under control, so I said under my breath, “We’d better sit about two feet apart.”
Axton and I both scooched away from one another, the ashtray serving as a buffer, and we continued to speak quietly so that FPB’s hungover groans would drown out our conversation.
Axton: Are you really gonna punch me?
Me: Are you gonna make me uncomfortable?
His grin faded a bit, “Have I made you uncomfortable? If I did, I’m so sorr...”
I made eye contact with him and held it for about 3 seconds longer than I would have held friendly eye contact and replied with my own sheepish grin, “Not at all.”
​
Snorlax was sitting up by that time and he seemed to be in a world of hurt as well.
Axton: Yo, Snor! You need some hangover helper, too?
Snorlax (groaning): Pleeeeeeease.
Axton got up to fetch Snorlax some coffee, water, and pills. Those combat boots were going to need to get hosed down before he went back inside. Especially with Molly and her pissed off crew still at the house.
In fact, I could hear Molly screeching at Sage again.
Molly: There’s more mess on the porch? What sort of mess? More poo poo? A lake of liquor? You people are ANIMALS. I’m never cleaning your house again!!!
Sage: Ummm... I think it’s just booze and pee. You should be able to just power wash it.
Axton: There’s a ton of puke out there, too.
Molly: Jesus, save us all.
Axton ran to Snorlax and delivered the hangover helper.
Axton: Dude! The maids are on their way, and they’re pissed off. We gotta disappear.
I put my cigarette out, stood up, and dashed over to FPB, who was still reclining in the lawn chair with a pained expression on his face.
Me: Funky? The maids are coming. We need to get out of here.
FPB: And go where?
Me: I don’t know! I’ve never done this before. I think Axton knows, but I’m afraid to talk to him.
FPB: HEY, FUCK-FACE. Where are we running off to?
Axton: Garage! Go around the side of the house.
Axton helped Snorlax stagger around to the garage, and FPB managed to wobble to his feet. As he was standing up, I noticed a whisky wee aroma and an extra dark patch of fabric near the crotch of his black underpants. While I guided him to the garage, I tried my darndest to keep his wet boxer briefs away from my clean shirt. His crotch was level with my mid-section, so I curved my body away from him and let him basically use my shoulders and arms as a walker. In the end, we all managed to enter the garage though the side door. It was dusty, musty and stuffy, but it was blissfully devoid of puke and pee. Well, aside from FPB’s underpants.
Sage must have anticipated that we’d take shelter from the angry maids in the garage because he came out from the house and opened the garage doors for us, letting in a nice breeze.
Sage: You guys good?
We all indicated the affirmative.
Sage: Excellent. Mori should be back from the liquor store pretty soon. And he’s picking up hangover food, too.
Snorlax: What’s he getting?
Sage: Taco Bell.
Seriously? Not only were they having to restock the booze, but they were also planning to chow down on Taco Bell to help with the hangovers? There was no way in hell that was going to help.
At any rate, FPB and Snorlax were chugging the remainder of their hangover helper and seemed to be gradually getting their sea legs back. Axton had apparently been awake a little longer than they had, so his hangover seemed to have passed. I’m just assuming this since I was forbidden to speak to him. And with the only two non-hungover people there forbidden to speak to one another, the garage was eerily silent.
We were all sitting on the dusty floor and FPB, still wearing nothing but wet boxer briefs, tried to pull me into his lap.
Me (getting up and crossing the room): HELL NO. You peed yourself. I’m not sitting in your lap until you go wash up and put on some clean underpants.
FPB: It’s not pee. It’s dew.
Axton: It’s piss, bro. I can smell it.
FPB (snarling): You shut your fuck-nugget mouth, Asshat.
Wow, Axton’s ability to exhibit no reaction at all to FPB’s venom was impressive. I might have to try that and see if it would work for me.
Snorlax: He’s right. It’s definitely pee. No shame, though. I wet my pants, too. I had to get up and change at like... 6 in the morning. It sucked.
FPB: OP, please get over yourself and come sit by me.
Me: No lap sitting.
FPB: Fine.
Me: Do you want me to go get your backpack so you can change?
“Chill out, Miss Uptight! We all wet our pants every weekend. It’s tradition,” he said as he wound his long arms around me from the side.
I felt like I was in a cage. I rolled my eyes, and I think Axton noticed my exasperated expression because I could see him snickering.
FPB: What’s funny, you DICK?
Axton composed himself, and Snorlax gallantly stepped up to save us.
Snorlax: He’s laughing cause I farted. Sorry.
Always a sucker for bathroom humor, I burst out laughing. Axton started laughing again, Snorlax started laughing, lifted a cheek and really did rip one this time. The butt wind even kicked up a little dust from the garage floor. That made all the reasonable people in the garage laugh even harder. But not FPB. No, he was fuming.
FPB: What the hell is really so fucking FUNNY? Someone fess up to me or I’m gonna start flaying you bitches.
Axton: Dude. For real. We’re laughing at a fart. (more laughter)
Snorlax (also laughing): Yeah, just the thought of Taco Bell gave me gas.
FPB’s fury just made it even funnier, and all of us were in stitches.
FPB: I know you’re all laughing at ME.
Yeah, I guess it did kind of start off that way. But by the time his rage was hitting the boiling point, we really were just behaving like overgrown children and laughing hysterically at a fart. And everything was ten times funnier because we had this “stick in the mud” sitting there getting outrageously offended by the laughter. You know the feeling, right? When you’re not supposed to laugh at something, it becomes even harder not to laugh? Or is that just me?
FPB: I’m getting dressed now. OP, come help me. You two jabronis can stay in here and laugh at each other’s farts.
Instead of heading to the hammock in the back yard where FPB’s clothes presumably remained, he entered the house through the garage door and headed straight for the guest room to retrieve his backpack. Good. Maybe he was at least going to put on some clean underpants.
But, no. He wasn’t. That would have taken away from the repulsive debauchery that his whizzy boxer briefs allowed him to revel in. He really needed to settle on a story. Was he such a wild, crazy party boy that he was too cool to care that he’d wet his pants? Or was he a pathetic drunk who’d passed out and managed to collect afternoon dew in the crotch of his boxer briefs (and nowhere else on his body)? We’ll never know. His Shadowrun tramp stamp was in full view as he bent down and grabbed his wallet from his black leather backpack. He then marched into the kitchen and told Sage, “Bring me a maid.”
Sage: Ummm... they’ve got their hands pretty full at the moment.
FPB produced a hundred-dollar bill from his wallet. “I want my clothes steam cleaned. And I’ll need them spritzed with perfume. Athena’s got some here, doesn’t she?”
Sage: Yeah... But you’re gonna have to ask HER if you want to use her perfume. And you’re gonna have to ask the cleaning crew to steam your clothes. They’re all pretty annoyed with me over the condition of the house. There’s a new head maid. I’m having to pay TRIPLE the normal cleaning fee, dude.
In my mind, the considerate action would have been to forego the steaming and offer the cash to Sage, since FPB’s sparkle vomit and spilled liquor definitely contributed to the mess. Instead, FPB exited through the front door, made his way around to the backyard, and began removing his clothes from the hammock. The maids shrieked. FPB ignored the shrieks, gathered his clothes, and sauntered back into the house. Once we were back indoors, we could hear Molly going over the bill with Sage.
FPB: AHEM. Madam, I need these clothes steam cleaned.
He thrust his suit and the hundred-dollar bill in her direction.
Molly: Excuse me??? We were hired to clean this disgusting house. You want your clothes steamed, go to the drycleaners.
She sniffed the air.
Molly: And go take a shower. You smell like a diaper.
I stepped in. “Hey. Sage? Do you mind if I steam FPB’s clothes in the guest bathroom?”
Sage: Fine by me.
I pulled FPB aside. “Give me your clothes. You peed in your sleep after you took you suit off right?”
FPB: IT’S DEW.
Me: It doesn’t matter. Your underwear’s wet and you need to put on a dry pair. In the meantime, I’ll go in the bathroom, hang your clothes up, get the room steamy from the shower, and then they’ll at least be a little less wrinkled. We used to do it all the time in college.
FPB: But those bitches have professional equipment. If they can steam carpet, they can steam a suit.
Me: I think it’s a different type of steamer.
FPB: Oh, you’re an expert on steamers?
Me: Not the Cleveland kind.
Damn it, Mori would have appreciated my attempt at an obvious dirty joke.
FPB harumphed, and I put the plan into action. I turned the shower on as hot as it would go, sifted through FPB’s suit components carefully to make sure his pants were dry. Fortunately, they were. I hung the clothes as close to the shower curtain as I could without getting them wet and sat down to try and enjoy the steam room and the solitude. Maybe it would make me feel refreshed? But the sweetness of the solitude wouldn’t last, as I could hear a conversation taking place just outside the door.
Sage: What the hell, man? Why are you guarding the bathroom door?
FPB: I don’t want any of you pervs trying to walk in on my girlfriend while she showers.
Sage: Okay... I think she’s just in there steaming your fancy clothes.
FPB: She might be taking a shower, too. NAKED. I have to protect her from the male gaze.
Sage: Well... I’ve got a girlfriend. Mori’s not here, and Snorlax and Axton are both stand-up dudes.
FPB: I don’t trust Axton. I caught him picking her up on the porch, and then he tried to TALK TO HER.
Sage: “Picking her up” as in the crap you pull at work all the time? Or literally “picking her up” so she didn’t step in puke?
FPB: Uh... he made some lame excuse.
Sage: So... Picking her up so she didn’t step in puke. What a jerk.
FPB: Right?!
Sage: Listen, man. The door locks. And she’s a grown woman. Leave her alone for five minutes, for fuck’s sake. And put on some clean underwear.
FPB: IT’S DEW.
When I couldn’t take the steam anymore, I turned off the shower, retrieved FPB clothes, which did look spiffier, and opened the door to inhale the fresh, cool air. Ahhh! And the lovely cleaning crew had managed to get rid of the “poopy-pee-puke-pizza” pungency.
Apparently, being lightly mocked by the “vice principal” had embarrassed FPB enough to make him go find something better to do. No one was outside the door at that moment. I gathered FPB’s clothes, carried them to the guest room, and laid them out on the bed.
Now to find my seething anger ball of a boyfriend. Best guess? He was back in the garage, yelling at Axton and Snorlax. So that’s where I checked first.
I entered the garage from the house, and found Sage, Athena, Axton, Snorlax, and Mori all sitting around enjoying some Taco Bell and drinking beer. No FPB.
Me: Hey, guys! Have any of you seen a tall, angry guy in wet boxer briefs?
Mori: He’s on the back porch. Said he had to call his work.
Ah, yes. “Work.” That meant he was texting one of his randos. Probably the one who showed up at Sage’s house late last night.
Me: Beer me?
They all answered with a validating chorus of “Hell yeah,” and, “Go girl!”
I grabbed a beer from the cooler and scanned the room for a place to sit. Axton stood up and led me over to his spot.
Axton: Hey, guys! Who am I?
And then he pulled me onto his lap, wrapped his arms around me and started shouting in a caveman voice, “MY GIRLFRIEND. MINE. NO TALKING TO HER. DON’T EVEN LOOK OR I’LL STAB YOU IN THE EYEBALL.”
Everyone, including me, found this incredibly funny. And I was pleased to see that the whole team was acknowledging FPB’s absurdly possessive behavior. Maybe if the people he respected most in this world called him out on his insane possessiveness, he would reflect? Yeah, let’s see how that goes...
I stayed in this far too comfortable position for a minute or so. Axton was more muscular than FPB and he wasn’t “circus-freak tall,” so his lap was a much better fit. But I knew that if FPB rounded the corner and caught me sitting in another guy’s lap, he’d flip. Especially since my position in Axton’s lap had happened purely to make a mockery out of FPB. I leaned into him for a few more seconds, then slid over into my own cold, hard, lonely space.
Guess I needed to do some reflecting, too... Not because I was finding myself attracted to a guy who wasn’t my boyfriend. My boyfriend was a psycho and I needed to reflect on why I hadn’t been able to find an exit strategy that didn’t lead to terroristic threats or stalking.
Mori: I think I’ll add a new punishment tonight. But only for FPB. If he glitches, he has to sit in my lap and let me paw all over him. See how he likes it.
Me: Be sure to get a raging boner and jab him in the hip with it.
I couldn’t tell if the laughing that ensued was because I’d made a crude joke to the perfect audience or because I had unintentionally “called” the inevitable.
Mori (in a deliberately creepy tone): Oh, that won’t be a problem.
We laughed again.
And then, all the fun was sucked from the garage. FPB entered from the driveway and demanded to know what was funny.
Sage: Mori’s cooking up new punishments.
FPB: That’s... terrifying.
Me: Hey, I put your clothes in the guest room if you want to get dressed.
FPB: M’kay. I’m getting a beer first.
He cracked open a beer and headed inside. As he towered in the doorway, he turned to me.
FPB: You coming?
Mori: You need your girlfriend to help you put your clothes on? Are you in kindergarten?
FPB: Eat a dick, Mori.
Mori: Sounds delicious.
FPB shuddered and trudged inside. He hadn’t made any more demands that I accompany him, so I let him go put on his big boy pants all by himself.
*end of Chapter 4
As always, thank you so, so much for reading!
Hope to see you back for The Lap of Luxury!

Hey, I met this guy on the Friends Amino a few years back. It feels so long ago that I can't even pin a year especially since I have trouble remembering dates. I want to say it was between 2018-2019.
I know this post is pretty redundant. I don't expect to find him especially since it was several years ago when we met on the app but I can't help but wonder if he's okay. He got himself banned so he wouldn't be tempted to come back so it's not like I could do that blocking trick I see people recommending and I can't remember his name anymore since his ghosting me sort of left me emotionally messed up (I was in a difficult position back then) so I did my best to try and not think about it.
It sounded like he wasn't in a good spot and his other friend (I think their name was Taco Bell?) deleted their g-mail to keep themselves from getting back on the app. I'm hoping he's at least okay and hopefully doing better than he was back then. Goodbye wall-rape-gang...
Edit: fixed a sentence. I have memory issues when it comes to remembering dates and other moments.

I (31m) just broke up with my (26f) girlfriend today.
You guys I don't really know where to start and I don't really want to ramble but I guess I'm going to anyways.
We've been together about 1.25 years, live 5 hours apart and have seen eachother almost every weekend except maybe 6-8.
I'll never forget the first time we met, she had never done a LDR before, was recovering from being sick so I offered to drive down to see her. We got a hotel (not classy I know) in a location that she works and loves, I remembered hugging her, putting a face to a name so to speak. We had met on Boo (app, highly recommend it) and we had these engaging long conversations about everything... The first message I sent her was about history, something I am very interested in and my god, the conversation flowed and continued to flow. The level of connection we had almost instantly was like no other I have ever felt.
I remember us getting out of the car and being weak in the knees with taking it all in. It was real now. She was even more beautiful than in her pictures. I hugged her and felt so alive and happy. We checked into the hotel, we both had to pee really bad and joked about peeing on the rug in the lobby as we were standing in line.
I came directly from a 10 hour day at work (carpenter) was so filthy and went directly into the shower. I get out of the shower and we held eachother and talked for hours laughing and having a good time. We both didn't even realize how hungry we were. We went out and got waffle house which was a first time for me. Our relationship was full of many firsts for us.
Right away I knew I had to have her, I asked her if she would want to continue and be my gf and she said she'd be a fool not to. A month or so in we told eachother we loved eachother at a very special location in my life, we had both been fighting the urge to say it sooner.
This woman changed me. She made me better. I cried more in front of her than I have in my entire life, something I have always been uncomfortable with. I am so grateful for her for being supportive to me in that way.
I remember us meeting eachother's families and it felt so good. I felt like I had a place in hers and I know she did in mine. My grandma's health is going downhill and has been for a while now, this Christmas my gma handmade my gf this really cool and cute old school apron with my gf's and gma's name on it. Added to that, my gf's profession is baking, something she is very passionate about. That's never happened in my entire dating life and my gf and I were so honored.
A couple months back her GPA developed cancer and has been going downhill, I have a motorcycle, turns out same exact one he had. He gave me his bells. I was so honored, I was speechless and stammering looking at them.
The plan has been for 6 months or more that I move to her to close the distance. Initially I was scared, I had never wanted to move away from my family before and had never taken that big of a risk before. We discussed at length who moves where and both agreed it would be best if I moved there due to a variety of factors.
Life got in the way, I had a couple old junky vehicles that needed attention and money and spent a couple months like crazy after work working on them with my brother. The amount of frustration and guilt I had for not moving in with her tomorrow was insane. We talked about it several times and agreed that it was for the best that I get all my ducks in a row before I move, as coming back home every weekend for however long it takes to square up my life would make both of our lives harder when it would already be challenging initially living together and have me acclimate to her area.
I had several job offers in her area soon after dating. Most of them not a good idea. As an example I could work for a family friend who gets drunk on every job and can't pay his bills... so we agreed that I needed to figure out what I wanted to do for work for myself in a way that benefitted me.
About a month ago my mom and her friend came down to visit, all four of us stayed at airBnB close to gf's work and in the area in which we would move. It was a lot of fun. I felt something was off in gf. The morning before mom, friend, and I were to leave I looked at gf's phone and had found she posted on reddit about us but the post was deleted so I didn't see much. I felt betrayed. She had become distant and wasn't talking to me much and she'd rather talk to strangers instead of me? I confronted her about it and a fight ensued.
So I decided to stay another couple days with her to work on ourselves, I helped her at work for a half a day (something I've done several times that everyone enjoys), we went back to her place and she got super drunk. Told me she felt like her life is falling apart and she's not happy. I held her while she cried, listened, and told her I'd be there for her rain or shine always. At one point she stood up... barely and she got a look in her eyes combined with her body language where I was near certain she was going to hit me (been here before in the past with others). It scared the shit out of me.
I left in the afternoon the next day after she told me I was her person, and she was laying in bed crying uncontrollably. It was so hard to leave but I had thought it would be better for her if I did.
For a couple weeks all communication on her end dropped. We used to talk all the time, and I was lucky to get an "I love you" once a day. I begged her to talk to me and not give up on us. The only times we talked she had clearly been drinking and said some truly horrible things about me. Character assassination repeatedly, I told her in confidence previously about some deep dark secrets I have and insecurities and she used then against me to tear my soul apart. I was devastated, I thought of leaving her then, but I didn't because I still loved her and she had been a great partner up until this point. She had stopped going to work, did not work for two weeks. From what I gather she spent most of that time at her mom's probably drinking and not doing much else.
One weekend we were supposed to go to a family wedding on my side, lots of people coming from out of town who are huge in my life I don't get to see often at all. A day or two before she told me she wasn't coming, and the thought of being with me and talking to me riddled her with anxiety. I spent that weekend surrounded by beautiful strangers and happy times and it was hard for me to quell the thoughts about "the grass is always greener". At one point an attractive woman was talking to me briefly at a bar after the wedding, playing with her hair etc. It was clear she was into me. It felt good to have someone give me the time of day but I felt terrible for putting on an impression that I was available and happy.
Then this weekend (memorial day weekend)... oh God. Gf and I had plans to go to a concert, stay at a hotel. I told her I said I don't want to go to a concert with you and your sister and spend money and pretend everything is fine when it most definitely isn't. She told me that was selfish because her sister was looking forward to it. So I begrudgingly agreed to continue with the concert.
We saw eachother for the first time in three weeks and right away I sensed the guilt from her for being cruel to me. I tried to point it out and she denied it, she was a lot more physically attentive with me and giving me compliments. The first night we were alone and it was hard but I think we undid some of the damage and reconnected a lot. I think we were both happy about the progress but sad at what we had become.
Concert was the next day, it was great, again she's attentive and amazing like the woman I fell in love with. My hopes had reactivated for us a little and my smile was genuine instead of forced.
Her mom had texted us Sunday (the next day, clarification gf lives with mom so I stay there when I visit) and had said to try to not be at the house all day since the house had many people in it already. Okay, makes sense. We occupied our time doing other things, and drove back to her mom's around 8 or 9p.
On the way there, one of my brother's (E) calls me and asked if I had heard what had happened to my other brother (B). I had said no, I hadn't heard I had assumed he had got the job he was looking at. E tells me B's apartment building collapsed. B was safe, but lucky to be alive realistically. B had lost everything he's ever had, he escaped with the clothes he had on and his phone, he didn't even have his wallet.
I'm dissasociating as I'm hearing all of this, driving gf and me back to gf's mom's house. Our relationship is dying, and I get the feeling that her mom isn't happy with me. We get to her mom's house and her mom and aunt (who is currently living there, I've seen her only twice) are drinking on the porch and want gf and me to come out and talk to them. Was a demand not a request. I don't know how long this went on, best guess is 1-1.5 hours but they berated me, were drawing wild ass conclusions about me, you name it, really weird, scary and hurtful things. I didn't bother to try to defend myself because there was no point. Gf sat there quietly and agreed with them partially. I felt so betrayed, hurt and alone, she didn't stand up for me. I asked her if she would speak to her mother or my behalf and she said she wouldn't. I found out I'm no longer welcome at the house, complicating our relationship further.
Memorial day the next day, I hadn't even really slept, no shower, I left gf's mom's house at 5a when I knew no one would be there and waited at a truck stop for hours for my gf to wake up and come talk to me. Eventually she did, and I told her my respect and trust for her mom was in the sewer and I was afraid her crazy ass alcoholic mother was twisting my gf's opinion of me over the last month. I told her I don't know how you can do it but please get out of that house soon. Between B losing everything he owns and the verbal assault I had last night I was in a very dark place. Later that day, completely dead inside with no sleep we made it to her dad's side of the family where everyone appreciates me and loves me. We had fun in the backyard, I did my best to try to forget about B and last night but I couldn't. I went inside at some point to pee and I snapped. I found my gf in the backyard and announced in front of her family that I had to go home immediately.
As she was driving me back to her car I reminded her about how I had been to the hospital for her brother several times and how I would like the same respect for myself. This frustrated her. I said I think now is the time we agree to go to therapy and she did agree, however I felt she didn't want to.
I've been working like a dog this week sweating my ass off, hadn't heard much from gf at all, last night I asked when can we talk again? She said today after work. I woke up this morning and I knew I couldn't take it anymore. I knew in my heart I have always supported her and loved her deeply. I knew all the sacrifices I already made and all the sacrifices I would continue to make in the future with my moving to her, and how she still would refuse to give me the proper recognition and reciprocation I deserve.
I broke up with her this morning. I'm hoping to meet halfway this weekend to exchange our stuff. I'm also hoping she'll do some self work and come back to me before I move on for good, I told her my door will be open to her for a while but I don't know how long.
Moral of the story- changing for people is good if it's good, sacrificing for people is good if it's good, loving people is good if it's good. If the person you are with refuses to communicate and reciprocate, it's not your fault. We make our own choices. Please be smarter than me and take care of yourselves.

16th of August, 2025
WARSAW, Poland (AP) - In June, Poland sparked controversy when the leadership of the two main opposition coalitions were arrested on charges of supporting terrorism and later on charges were added on for taking bribes from a defense manufacturer. Afterwards investigations were also opened into the ruling PiS party, the defense firm Mesko, and the Armament Agency.
​
The headquarters of the KO and The Left coalition were raided in mid-June by Warsaw police leading to the arrest of 71 individuals belonging to both political alliances. The raids were under a pretext of anti-terrorism, after it had come to light that a member of The Left, Jakub Klimek, had financed a 2023 extremist attack against an office of the ruling Law and Justice party. Jakub Klimek was in a standoff with the police at the time after he took his family hostage and refused to turn himself in. The police siege ended after two hours with Klimek’s suicide.
The police have released an official timeline of events, where they claim that four hours before the raids, they got access to evidence in an ongoing trial concering one of the 2023 attack’s perpetrators, which saw additional funds sent to the ’’Fists of Freedom’’ (FOF) far-left terror organization from both KO and The Left after FOF had raided the PiS office. After getting this information, they immediately started communicating with a judge in Warsaw for a warrant, which they received 2 hours later.
In the raids they found evidence of over $754k sent by both coalitions to the members of the FOF and their families, presumably in exchange for them not revealing their parties’ hands in the attack. Documents were also uncovered which confirmed the initial attack was also funded by the parties, but was meant to take place without anyone getting harmed, instead to retrieve documents with proof of the alliances taking a $2.3 mn bribe from the defense firm Mesko in 2023 for purchasing additional Piorun air defense missiles. These documents were being used by PiS as blackmail in exchange for political concessions and support for their legislation.
The documents proving KO and Left relation to the $852 mn purchase of air defense missiles in 2024 were destroyed, but separate documents remained, alluding to a deal made between Mesko and the coalitions for expressing parliamentary and political support for increased arms purchases from the company in exchange for a hefty monetary payment, remained in tact and were analyzed by the police.
22 of the 71 arrested individuals from KO and The Left were charged, either with supporting extremism or taking bribes, or both. The charged individuals are some of the highest-ranking politicians in the coalitions, including Krzysztof Gawkowski, the parliamentary club leader of The Left, and Rafał Kazimierz Trzaskowski, the current mayor of Warsaw and member of KO.
Investigations were also launched into Mesko, the Armament Agency, and PiS for their supposed blackmail. The investigation into PiS is ongoing, but a Warsaw police department spokesperson stated: “It is very unlikely that we see any arrests here…the most we can expect is a fine no more than three million Zloty (note: around $715k).”
The investigation into Mesko uncovered documents which proved that KO and Left took a bribe from them in 2023 for an additional purchase of Piorun air defense systems. 3 employees of Mesko were charged with bribery.
The third investigation launched in June was into the Armament Agency, which is the main body for military procurement in Poland. This investigation was closed two weeks ago with the police reporting that definitive evidence was gained that showed the employees of the Armament Agency were pressured into the purchase by KO and Left politicians with threats including losing their job.
The Armament Agency reopened the order case with Mesko for revisiting. The deal was originally for 800 Piorun launchers and 2500 missiles costing $842 mn in total between 2024 and 2029, but to date 280 launchers have been delivered along with 900 missiles. The Polish government has already paid $311 mn of the total cost to Mesko and the Armament Agency announced the rest of the deal will be cancelled and Mesko will be fined for $10 mn.
All of this comes as Polish presidential elections are slated to take place in October, and now, as KO and The Left have seen catastrophic collapse in support, both polling at around 10%, PiS has a much greater chance of victory even as they were expected to win even before the entire fiasco. The latest AP poll puts a potential PiS candidate astronomically high at 70%.
The events have been watched closely by Western analysts who are scared of a democratic dictatorship, where one party gains such a large majority that there is not effective opposition to them in the government.

Top 5 Updates of last Week:

• Tiktok is testing a AI chatbot to improve user interactions with content.
• Pinterest introduced new platform change to improve their algorithm, the linked post is complex, I will be breaking it all down next week & share a post.
• Youtube is retiring Youtube Stories next month.
• Google added 3 new AI features to Search for all users to access.
• Twitter is asking researchers to pay $42k or delete data it gave them.
• Microsoft published new 41 page report on How to govern AI usage, promoting safe AI usages.

Google:

• Google expands its Digital marketing coaching program for SMBs.
• Google announced new AI marketing tools for SMBs and marketers.
• Google top story badge replaced with Trusted store badges.
• Google search bug caused a huge drop in video traffic.
• Google sitename now support subdomains on mobile.
• Google Bard gains images with more coming soon.
• Google Marketing Live 2023 Event recap for you.

Tiktok:

• TikTok sues Montana to prevent the app ban in the US State.
• Adweek’s new research in how tiktok creators are not getting the same reach as before.

Instagram

• Instagram Search Ads API is now available via Instagram marketing API.
• Instagram will soon allow you to add music to your profile.
• Instagram was down this week and caused people rushing to twitter.

Meta :

• Meta sells Giphy to Shutterstock.
• Meta slashes business teams in final round of layoffs.
• 1.2 Billion euro fine is now issued for Facebook as a result of EUPB binding decision.
• Meta introduces promotional ads for Ecommerce deals.
• Meta is about to limit how it uses Ad data in UK after UK antitrust forces them.
• Meta’s open-source speech AI recognises 4,000 global languages.

Twitter:

• Twitter bot situation is getting out of hands.
• Twitter is likely to opt out of EU code against disinformation.
• Twitter is working on a “video for you” section to promote video content.
• Twitter announced a new API pricing to help startups use Twitter at a reasonable flat rate.
• Twitter Adds new Playback speed control features for Video.

YouTube:

• Youtube shares their insights on Youtube algorithm for creators.
• Youtube launched Quiz posts on iOS and web.
• Youtube starts a weekly series on Intro to Live shopping.
• Youtube community posts feature is now available to all channels.

LinkedIn:

• LinkedIn Added 5 new Insights-backed features to Sales navigator.
• LinkedIn launched new security features: verified job posting & message alerts.

Snapchat:

• Snapchat reaches 200M Active users in India.
• Snapchat enhanced AR try-on tools as it continues to grow its AR capabilities.

Reddit:

• Reddit shared new insights about how new apps are discovered through daily App discussions.
• Reddit users are getting spam followers due to an ongoing spam campaign.

Advertising:

• Walmart working on providing Ad creative services to advertisers of all sizes.
• Lebron james joins Taco bell for “Taco Tuesday” trademark campaign.
• Disney & booking (com) making a huge spark with their new campaign.

Sales:

• Amazon’s Generative AI sales playbook got leaked.

Microsoft & AI

• Bing integrates itself with ChatGPT.
• Bing chat doubles chat character limit.

Pinterest:

• Many Platforms say they have Gen-Z using their app. But Pinterest shuffle is getting the real love.

Marketing:

• Discord gets custom streaming deck hardware and a big plug-in upgrade.
• Monday .com announces new integration with Microsoft teams.
• Neeva search engine, acquired by Snowflake after going private last week.
• MrBeast’s feastables brand is now available in every 7/11 in US.
• Peloton working on their new identity of more than a bike company.

What are your thoughts on all these recent updates and changes?
PS: You can ask for links and subscribe to the weekly newsletter (link in my bio) for next week’s recap.

Top 5 Updates of last Week:

• Tiktok is testing a AI chatbot to improve user interactions with content.
• Pinterest introduced new platform change to improve their algorithm, the linked post is complex, I will be breaking it all down next week & share a post.
• Youtube is retiring Youtube Stories next month.
• Google added 3 new AI features to Search for all users to access.
• Twitter is asking researchers to pay $42k or delete data it gave them.
• Microsoft published new 41 page report on How to govern AI usage, promoting safe AI usages.

Google:

• Google expands its Digital marketing coaching program for SMBs.
• Google announced new AI marketing tools for SMBs and marketers.
• Google top story badge replaced with Trusted store badges.
• Google search bug caused a huge drop in video traffic.
• Google sitename now support subdomains on mobile.
• Google Bard gains images with more coming soon.
• Google Marketing Live 2023 Event recap for you.

Tiktok:

• TikTok sues Montana to prevent the app ban in the US State.
• Adweek’s new research in how tiktok creators are not getting the same reach as before.

Instagram

• Instagram Search Ads API is now available via Instagram marketing API.
• Instagram will soon allow you to add music to your profile.
• Instagram was down this week and caused people rushing to twitter.

Meta :

• Meta sells Giphy to Shutterstock.
• Meta slashes business teams in final round of layoffs.
• 1.2 Billion euro fine is now issued for Facebook as a result of EUPB binding decision.
• Meta introduces promotional ads for Ecommerce deals.
• Meta is about to limit how it uses Ad data in UK after UK antitrust forces them.
• Meta’s open-source speech AI recognises 4,000 global languages.

Twitter:

• Twitter bot situation is getting out of hands.
• Twitter is likely to opt out of EU code against disinformation.
• Twitter is working on a “video for you” section to promote video content.
• Twitter announced a new API pricing to help startups use Twitter at a reasonable flat rate.
• Twitter Adds new Playback speed control features for Video.

YouTube:

• Youtube shares their insights on Youtube algorithm for creators.
• Youtube launched Quiz posts on iOS and web.
• Youtube starts a weekly series on Intro to Live shopping.
• Youtube community posts feature is now available to all channels.

LinkedIn:

• LinkedIn Added 5 new Insights-backed features to Sales navigator.
• LinkedIn launched new security features: verified job posting & message alerts.

Snapchat:

• Snapchat reaches 200M Active users in India.
• Snapchat enhanced AR try-on tools as it continues to grow its AR capabilities.

Reddit:

• Reddit shared new insights about how new apps are discovered through daily App discussions.
• Reddit users are getting spam followers due to an ongoing spam campaign.

Advertising:

• Walmart working on providing Ad creative services to advertisers of all sizes.
• Lebron james joins Taco bell for “Taco Tuesday” trademark campaign.
• Disney & booking (com) making a huge spark with their new campaign.

Sales:

• Amazon’s Generative AI sales playbook got leaked.

Microsoft & AI

• Bing integrates itself with ChatGPT.
• Bing chat doubles chat character limit.

Pinterest:

• Many Platforms say they have Gen-Z using their app. But Pinterest shuffle is getting the real love.

Marketing:

• Discord gets custom streaming deck hardware and a big plug-in upgrade.
• Monday .com announces new integration with Microsoft teams.
• Neeva search engine, acquired by Snowflake after going private last week.
• MrBeast’s feastables brand is now available in every 7/11 in US.
• Peloton working on their new identity of more than a bike company.

What are your thoughts on all these recent updates and changes?
PS: You can ask for links and subscribe to the weekly newsletter (link in my bio) for next week’s recap.

Top 5 Updates of last Week:

• Tiktok is testing a AI chatbot to improve user interactions with content.
• Pinterest introduced new platform change to improve their algorithm, the linked post is complex, I will be breaking it all down next week & share a post.
• Youtube is retiring Youtube Stories next month.
• Google added 3 new AI features to Search for all users to access.
• Twitter is asking researchers to pay $42k or delete data it gave them.
• Microsoft published new 41 page report on How to govern AI usage, promoting safe AI usages.

Google:

• Google expands its Digital marketing coaching program for SMBs.
• Google announced new AI marketing tools for SMBs and marketers.
• Google top story badge replaced with Trusted store badges.
• Google search bug caused a huge drop in video traffic.
• Google sitename now support subdomains on mobile.
• Google Bard gains images with more coming soon.
• Google Marketing Live 2023 Event recap for you.

Tiktok:

• TikTok sues Montana to prevent the app ban in the US State.
• Adweek’s new research in how tiktok creators are not getting the same reach as before.

Instagram

• Instagram Search Ads API is now available via Instagram marketing API.
• Instagram will soon allow you to add music to your profile.
• Instagram was down this week and caused people rushing to twitter.

Meta :

• Meta sells Giphy to Shutterstock.
• Meta slashes business teams in final round of layoffs.
• 1.2 Billion euro fine is now issued for Facebook as a result of EUPB binding decision.
• Meta introduces promotional ads for Ecommerce deals.
• Meta is about to limit how it uses Ad data in UK after UK antitrust forces them.
• Meta’s open-source speech AI recognises 4,000 global languages.

Twitter:

• Twitter bot situation is getting out of hands.
• Twitter is likely to opt out of EU code against disinformation.
• Twitter is working on a “video for you” section to promote video content.
• Twitter announced a new API pricing to help startups use Twitter at a reasonable flat rate.
• Twitter Adds new Playback speed control features for Video.

YouTube:

• Youtube shares their insights on Youtube algorithm for creators.
• Youtube launched Quiz posts on iOS and web.
• Youtube starts a weekly series on Intro to Live shopping.
• Youtube community posts feature is now available to all channels.

LinkedIn:

• LinkedIn Added 5 new Insights-backed features to Sales navigator.
• LinkedIn launched new security features: verified job posting & message alerts.

Snapchat:

• Snapchat reaches 200M Active users in India.
• Snapchat enhanced AR try-on tools as it continues to grow its AR capabilities.

Reddit:

• Reddit shared new insights about how new apps are discovered through daily App discussions.
• Reddit users are getting spam followers due to an ongoing spam campaign.

Advertising:

• Walmart working on providing Ad creative services to advertisers of all sizes.
• Lebron james joins Taco bell for “Taco Tuesday” trademark campaign.
• Disney & booking (com) making a huge spark with their new campaign.

Sales:

• Amazon’s Generative AI sales playbook got leaked.

Microsoft & AI

• Bing integrates itself with ChatGPT.
• Bing chat doubles chat character limit.

Pinterest:

• Many Platforms say they have Gen-Z using their app. But Pinterest shuffle is getting the real love.

Marketing:

• Discord gets custom streaming deck hardware and a big plug-in upgrade.
• Monday .com announces new integration with Microsoft teams.
• Neeva search engine, acquired by Snowflake after going private last week.
• MrBeast’s feastables brand is now available in every 7/11 in US.
• Peloton working on their new identity of more than a bike company.

What are your thoughts on all these recent updates and changes?
PS: You can ask for links and subscribe to the weekly newsletter (link in my bio) for next week’s recap.

1. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I’ve met Harry Styles several times, and he is so nice and considerate. He actually put off going out with his team just to sit and talk to my 15-year-old daughter and me. I’m sure he was exhausted, but he seemed to enjoy relaxing and chatting with us. My daughter will most likely live on that memory for years to come!"
2. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Jennifer Aniston is a sweetheart. She seemed very genuine and kind. I met her in a restaurant bathroom of all places. We talked for so long, her friend had to come and find her."
3. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Lorne Michaels when I worked at a 5-star restaurant. Everyone who worked with me knew I’d been a fan of SNL since I came out of the womb, so when I picked up the phone to make the reservation and spoke with his assistant, I told them I was Lorne's biggest fan. When he arrived with his wife and son (who went to a local boarding school), they were so kind, and he said, 'Oh, I heard you’re my biggest fan, and that’s amazing because I don’t have fans — the cast always has fans!' I almost died. I gave them my favorite table, which they were thrilled with, and when he got up to leave, he left me an envelope with a pretty sweet bonus tip inside. I wasn’t usually tipped doing my work, so it wasn’t necessary, but it was so thoughtful and appreciated. All three were true gems. You’d never know he was famous or rich at all."
4. TOTAL NIGHTMARE: "I met Roseanne Barr for work once. I went to shake her hand, and she looked me up and down and said, 'I don't shake hands,' then walked away."
5. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Matthew Gray Gubler after he did a talk years ago at my college! Only the first 100 people who got tickets were supposed to be able to do a meet and greet. He said 'rules were made to be broken' and that he would stay and meet with everyone until they kicked him out. Not only was he incredibly sweet to me (literally introduced himself...so humble and posed for a goofy pic), but he seemed so genuinely kind to everyone there. Just amazing energy all around."
6. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "A friend and I visited my boyfriend while he was doing security at a jazz festival in Malibu. He told us Adam Sandler and his family had been there all day and tons of people took pictures with him. We ran back to the car to grab the digital camera, looked up, and saw Adam, his pregnant wife Jackie, and their toddler leaving. We went up to them. Adam was clearly done for the day, but his wife said, 'Honey, let me hold [toddler's name] and you can take a picture.' We handed him the camera and he took a selfie with us. Still have that picture on my fridge. Love the Sandman!"
7. TOTAL NIGHTMARE: "My little cousin played one of Rob Schneider's kids in 50 First Dates. Rob was stuck-up, never got to know the children or their parents, and always went straight to his dressing room. I'm an introvert, so I like my alone time to recharge, but apparently the vibes he was giving off were that he couldn't be bothered to care about anyone else there. Also, the little girl in the movie was apparently a spoiled brat who threw tantrums and made them have to redo so many takes. I can see why Rob maybe didn't want to play with her, but the other kids were great!"
8. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "My husband met Rihanna years ago and said she was super nice. He was working as a ground handler at an airport and was setting up something on the ramp for her private plane. She came out, approached him, asked him about his job, and they chatted for a few minutes. Not sure if she was killing time until the gate opened, or if she went out of her way to talk to him for the heck of it, but he had nothing but nice things to say about her."
9. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Jerry Springer while bartending almost 20 years ago. He was thinking of getting back into politics and had a meeting in our private dining room on the second floor. It was happy hour and the bar was packed. Someone spotted him and started chanting, 'JERRY, JERRY,' while he was about to walk up the stairs. He then came to the bar, ordered a $2 beer, walked through the entire bar, shook hands, and took pictures. When he finished the loop, he set the full beer on the bar and handed me $40. Regardless of his show, I will always think of him as a class act."
10. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "My story is that I was actually horrible to a celebrity. In the '70s, I was obsessed with Donny and Marie. They were playing at our state fair that year. My dad tried to get tickets, but it was sold out. He took us to the fair anyway. A few times we could hear the music, which infuriated me at 7 years old. When we were leaving, my dad had to stop the car because there was a big crowd of people. As they cleared to let us through, two people popped their heads in the car window to apologize. It was Donny and Marie. I refused to believe it was really them, and I told Marie, 'You're not Marie. She's a lot prettier than you.' My family was horrified."
11. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Hands down nicest celebrity I've ever met was Taylor Swift. I met her at a concert as part of her security at the Houston shows. She was polite and introduced herself to everyone. She was obviously very busy, but she seemed interested in what I had to say and signed an album cover for my son."
12. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I have been lucky enough to meet Sir Ian McKellen twice: once after a performance where I also met Simon Callow and Patrick Stewart, and once during his tour of 80 shows for turning 80. Absolutely lovely man. He is my #1 dream dinner guest. I wish I was his friend."
13. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I did a photo-op last year at my local con with Ewan McGregor and, even though it was so quick, he was super sweet. We shook hands, and he asked how my day was. He’s gorgeous in person!"
14. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Matthew Lewis at a local con at his booth and he was lovely (and gorgeous in person). I told him how jealous my Harry Potter-obsessed sister (who was working that day) was going to be, and he told me to tell her he sent his regards! It totally made her day at work when I texted her about it after!"
15. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Pink around 2000. She performed at a teen club I was at, and she was a sweetheart. After her performance, she even danced with us for a little bit."
16. TOTAL NIGHTMARE: "I’ve heard nothing but bad things from people who've met Bill Nye. One friend said he was at some children’s art show and made fun of the artwork in front of the youngsters. What a jerk."
17. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "When I was in college in Boston, I was making a late-night Taco Bell run. As I was walking in, this white limo pulled up in front. I went inside and placed my order, and a guy in a white jumpsuit with a white bandana tied around his head came in. There weren't that many people in the restaurant, but he stopped and signed autographs and was chatting everyone up when I left. It wasn't until a few years later that I realized that person was Steven Tyler. This was in the late '80s before Aerosmith had that string of hits."
18. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "The most genuine interaction I've ever had with a celeb was with Bert Kreischer. I saw a show (during which he mentioned his grandma was in the hospital). Then, he told the audience he would be going to the bar next door after the show if anyone wanted a picture. When he arrived at the bar, he waded through CROWDS of people and made sure everyone who wanted to was able to get a pic or a moment with him. I stayed at the bar for a drink until he was on his way out (by this time the crowd had dispersed). I called out as he passed, 'Hey, I didn't get a chance to say it before, but I hope your grandma does well.' He stopped, turned around, and had a very genuine conversation with me."
19. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Jason Momoa was really fun to meet in person when I saw him at a Nine Inch Nails show. Really fun guy!"
20. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Jennifer Lopez. I went to where they were filming Air last year (I live in LA) because I wanted to meet Ben Affleck. I met Matt Damon as he wrapped before he left. He was a SUPER nice guy. I waited for Ben as his Escalade pulled up, but I DID NOT expect JLO to get out. She got out right next to me. She was only with her driver and he didn’t tell me to move or anything, so when she got out, I was like ‘Jen! Can I get a picture?' and she said sure. We talked about Selena because I’m Latina and she’s super important to me, and the movie means so much to me. She was SOO nice and sweet. She didn’t give any vibes that I was annoying her or that she had to Go. We also spoke in Spanish. We took our picture and then she went inside to get Ben. When they got out, Ben was NOT HAPPY (I don’t blame him. He was acting and directing), so I just stepped aside."
21. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "In 2004, I met Tony Curtis. He exuded 'old Hollywood.' He made his way around the room, speaking to each person, and when he approached me, he extended his hand and held my hand through the entire conversation. He focused on our conversation as if there was no one else in the room. As we said goodbye (he was still holding my hand), he raised my hand to his lips and kissed it. He was dressed impeccably and was in fine form. I have had many celebrity encounters, but nothing rises to the level of Tony Curtis. Absolutely the best celebrity encounter I've ever had."
22. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Sir Patrick Stewart at the Peabody Hotel in Orlando. We were both hanging out with friends in the lobby. He told stories, made lots of jokes with his friends, and included us in the conversation."
23. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I went to college with Muhammad Ali's twin daughters. He came with them for move-in day, and they arrived in a chauffeured Rolls Royce. He was gracious and took as many pictures and signed as many autographs as people wanted. I even have a picture where he is pretending to punch me. I told him that I grew up down the street from the house he had in Chicago before he donated it to the Nation of Islam. He asked me if they were good neighbors and laughed when I told him not really."
24. TOTAL NIGHTMARE: "My sister met Katy Perry at a restaurant, but she was being rude to the bartender and all the employees who came over to help, so now my niece and nephew aren't allowed to listen to her music."
25. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Tori Amos, and she was an absolute sweetie pie. She hugged me and told me she liked my shirt. We spoke briefly. I was starstruck, but it made a lasting impression on me."
26. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I grew up in a tiny town (pop. 3,000), and every year for his twins' birthday dinner, Michael J. Fox would bring his whole family to the restaurant my mom worked at. She almost always ended up being their server and she said he (and his family) were the nicest people. They were unobtrusive, friendly, and excellent tippers."
27. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "James Earl Jones was super sweet. My father and I met him when I was young. His voice is deep, but sweet!"
28. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I met Dennis Quaid, and he was the nicest guy ever. We chatted about dogs for a while, and he was more than happy to take a few pictures!"
29. TOTAL NIGHTMARE: "I helped host a book signing for Bobby Flay, and he's a jerk."
30. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Every time Dave Matthews plays at the venue across the street from our bookstore, people want to be working in the cafe because he randomly shows up for coffee the morning of his concert and gives the people waiting on him free tickets."
31. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Nicest celebrity I've ever met was Cole Sprouse. This was way before when he probably got sick of being on Riverdale and decided to just show his true colors. He took the photo of us together because I was shaking from nerves and excitement."
32. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "I was a bartender at the Troubadour for five years and have so many stories! Jeff Bridges was the first celeb I met. His band was playing. Before we opened, after his sound check, he made a point of coming down to us bartenders to introduce himself and thank us for helping out that night. SUCH A GEM!"
33. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "Jason Schwartzman came into the bar I worked in on a night that had a bunch of teenage bands playing and was super sweet to any of the kids who came up to him."
34. ABSOLUTE DREAM: "When I was young, I went to an Olivia Newton-John concert. I grew up watching Grease on repeat and had always loved her. At the concert, me and another young girl were invited on stage to give her flowers and introduce ourselves. On stage, l asked to get her autograph and she told me she would after the show. Post-concert, I waited with my family to get an autograph and she invited me and my dad into her fitting room and no one else. Once back there, I was so starstruck and amazed that she remembered my name! She was so kind and took pictures with me and my dad, signed a photo, gave me the set list, and wrapped it up by giving me a hug and kiss on the cheek. She spent probably an hour with us just hanging out in her room and chatting. To this day, it's one of my most cherished memories."

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There has been some talk in other circles about how boring this finals matchup is. I couldn’t disagree more and so I’ve come to list several things that make me appreciate how unique, exciting, and interesting this playoffs run has been for the Nuggets (some of are obvious but still should be included).

1. Only the second time ever that a 8 seed has made the playoffs and faced a 1 seed. The fact that they lost a play-in game and were one game away from being out yet went on to beat the 1 and 2 seeds in the east is crazy.
   
2. The Nuggets will have not faced a single 50 win team this playoff run which to my knowledge is the only occurrence in the past 20 years. (Although there still have been good teams with lots of star power like Ant, Gobert, KAT, Booker, KD, LBJ, AD, Jimmy).
   
3. This is the first year with a WCF and Finals appearance in Nuggets history.
   
4. This finals series only features 2 all-star players for the season and I think the Nuggets would be the first team in 20 years that I’m aware of with no other previous all-stars in the starting line up with Jokic being the one by himself. Additionally, although Deandre Jordan is a 3 time all-star he is one of the last on the bench so you could argue to expand for just participants in the series as well. Also, Bam is the sole all-star on his team.
   
5. I am open to debate on this but IMO Jokic is the only top 10 player at his position during the REGULAR season on the team and I’m fairly certain that is extremely rare for a finals team let alone a finals winner if we can. You could argue Murray but his regular season wasn’t spectacular as he was getting back into it so here’s my list: Curry, Lillard, SGA, Kyrie, T. Young, Ja, Fox, Brunson, Halliburton, Jrue, and technically Harden and Doncic play point too.
   
6. Jokic with most playoff triple doubles ever in a single playoff run.
   
7. Three of the all-time greatest playoff risers Jamal Murray, Butler, and Jokic.
   
8. The Heat are routinely playing 4 undrafted players in the FINALS. That’s so cool and respect to them.
   
9. More crazy underdog stories: Spoelstra starting out as a video coordinator in 1995 and now is a 3x champion with a 6th (or 7th?) finals appearance. Jokic drafted 41st during a Taco Bell commercial (bet you never heard that one).
   

Did I miss any or get any wrong? Lmk because I’d love to add to the list Anyways you get the point, it’s a really cool finals I think and I’m excited to see how it plays out!