Jersey shore producer ama
r/MTVChallenge
2014.06.30 16:48 Sherlock_House r/MTVChallenge
Welcome to MTVChallenge! The unofficial home for the world's greatest reality TV competition show, The Challenge, and all its spinoffs. We are spoiler free--please take a look at our rules before posting. Join us for live and post-episode discussions, weekly megathreads, and great original content! Threads with the š£š emojis are open to spoilers from yet-to-be aired episodes, including season winners. If you are Unspoiled, avoid those threads and the mods will play defense everywhere else.
2023.06.07 13:41 Adventurous-Team-186 I'm Cori Shepherd Stern, EP of SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE - ASK ME ANYTHING
2023.06.07 13:16 SolidCake who the hell actually watches ācouplesā accounts ? holy god theyre painfully cringy
it can be tiktok, youtube, or any kind of social media really but holy god ācouples contentā is too painful to even hate-watch. and i like watching cringy shit on purpose ! its always the most inane, sappy, unfunny, cringy, just fucking dumb, obviously-staged as fuck, drivel disguised as ācontentā.
btw, i am not some kind of snob. i have watched the entire Jersey Shore
submitted by
SolidCake to
NoStupidQuestions [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 07:52 jennprovine PLEASE can someone tell me wtf this is?!?
| okay so for the past few hours now iāve felt something tickling me and i COULDNT FOR THE LIFE OF ME FIGURE OUT WHAT IT WAS! i thought it was just a piece of stray hair tickling me since that happens to me quite often (i have very long hair). but then i felt it AGAIN on my leg right behind my knee and i was finally able to grab THIS FUCKIN THING off me. it was about the size of a tip of a ballpoint pen and it was the same color as my skin, hence why i probably couldnāt find it prior. iāve never seen anything like this little thing. HOWEVER, weirdly enough, my daughter came home the other day and told me she had a āweird, tiny, skin-colored bugā crawling on her arm. iām now thinking this might have been what it was. DOES ANYONE HAVE ANY IDEA WTF THIS IS?! i live in south new jersey or the ājersey shoreā if that helps at all. thanks in advance for any help! submitted by jennprovine to whatisthisbug [link] [comments] |
2023.06.07 06:31 Flint-Von-Cineac Not that it was worth much anyway but I tore up one of my way-too-commonly-pulled Zach Wilson cards because letās be realā¦.dudeās going nowhere. Got me a sweet LaāMical Perine patch though which is a funny coincidence since heās on my team now (Chiefs).
2023.06.07 05:47 Screaming_Mosquito Does anyone want this thing growing in my backyard? Please say yes.
I've tried selling this thing for weeks now on Facebook Marketplace, eventually at just 1 cent because I just genuinely want it out of my hair. And I cannot find any takers. I want someone to just take it instead of throwing it out because honestly, I'm deeply nervous about what would happen if I did. But if this advertisement proves to be just as fruitless, I will do it despite my nervousness because my mind just can't take this anymore otherwise I'm afraid I'm going to have a psychological break with reality and need to be sedated.
I grew up originally in Northern California near Mt. Shasta, and four years ago I moved to the Big Island of Hawaii after I got a new job working for the university located in Hilo as an adjunct. The search for a place to rent where I could garden in the backyard took a while, but the wait was worth it. Gardening is like comfort food for my soul, and always has been ever since I was a little girl. My mom brought me up doing it, and I took to it immediately when I was just 3 or 4 she always liked to remind me.
I suppose the reason I wanted to leave California was the fact that she wasn't there anymore, that the last piece or vestige of my family was gone and I was all that was left of the life we used to have out there. I remember the day everything was packed up for the movers and ready to go, I walked outside to wait for a friend to pick me up to take me to the airport. As I sat there on my porch, I saw an elderly man walking in front of my front yard. It was an old friend of my mom's from the neighborhood. He had been very kind to me at her funeral as he had just lost his wife himself. We both waved at each other and I got up to chat with him one last time.
As it turned out, he was there to give me a going away present. It was a batch of strange seeds in a small sack. Some were colored burgundy, others indigo, and still others ivory with fascinating patterns on them. In total, there were 19 by my count. He said that before his wife passed away, she had originally intended to give them to my mom. Apparently, during one of their hiking trips around the mountain, the two of them kept stopping to see if someone was following them. Every time they would, some tree would rustle or a bush would make a quick, sharp noise indicating some sort of disturbance. Towards the end of their hike, they stopped one final time only for them to turn around and notice that someone had left this dingy little sack of seeds on a rotted out tree stump they had just passed. In other words, there was no question at that point that they had been followed.
For what reason? He couldn't say, though obviously the implication was that whoever it was wanted them to have these seeds. His wife died soon after that, before she could pass them along to my mother. He said he was hesitant to part with them after she died, but felt extremely guilty having waited too long to give them to my mom. Now that I was heading to Hawaii, he thought he ought to just give them to me instead of continuing to keep them. Other than that, he told me to be very careful with them, to specifically pour them out into the ground from the sack instead of touching them myself. And I wondered why. Like it's such an oddly specific thing to bring up about them.
Regardless.
I took them gratefully and thanked him for the gift and said that my mother would have loved them. Now, I'm not so sure she would have.
It was only a week or so after I had finally unpacked everything in my new place that I decided to garden again. And the first thing I planted, of course, were the seeds once meant for my mom. In memory of her. It was only one I put in the ground because honestly I wasnāt exactly sure how big this thing was going to grow to be. I wasnāt even sure what
exactly this thing was even going to grow to be either. Turns out, itās a vegetable⦠of some kind. I think. Itās almost like a yam? Like with the same texture and everything but with bright orange skin⦠and fur in strange places? Also, another thing, itās
like a yam but at the time of writing this it has most definitely grown beyond the size of a typical yam. Basically itāll increase in size every week or so by a half a foot by my measure. Also, every time it grows by that much, another bulbous root pops out and burrows itself beneath.
And oh yeah there are little blue flowers (or what I guess you could call flowers) growing out of little nooks and crannies and just random spots all over. Iām not sure what to say. I have yet to identify it. If one of you reading this can, then good for you, would you like to take it off my hands in that case? Please? Okay well, I guess I better finally explain why I want this damn thing out of here. Iāve already ostracized myself at work trying to get people to take it, as well as trying to explain what makes me hate the thing, so what harm will come from making a bunch of internet strangers think Iām creepy or crazy?
The black and white of it is that every time this thing grows a half a foot, every time another root plants itself in the ground, every time another one of those little blue flower buds appears on it, something changes. About the world we live in. About our history. About how we live day to day. And no one seems to notice any of the changes except for me. Today in fact, I almost got into a fatal car crash after I woke up and took note of a new flower bud growing on the side of it facing my house. If you put a Bible in front of me and made me swear to God that I was going to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth I would swear on that, my life, and my late motherās grave that I grew up
knowing that Americans in all 50 states drive on the
left side of the road.
I know youāre probably laughing at me. Because thatās what the person I almost ran into did when I told them. They wanted to know if I was British or something, and I said no I was born and raised in Northern California all my life. The closest Iāve ever even been to a foreign country is San Diego. But when I pulled over after that scare and looked it up on my phone, there it was. Americans drive on the right side of the road and pretty much always have. Itās just so⦠jarring. I have vivid memories of me death gripping the wheel to my momās Wrangler for the first time in my life, with her in the passenger seat teaching me the rules of the road for the first time. And I remember very clearly her telling me that no matter where I go in the United States or Canada, if I ever did that is, I would be on the left side of the road the entire time.
And I remember everyone else driving on the left side too. I remember them doing it
yesterday. And now, everyoneās acting like itās actually been this other way the entire time and that Iām somehow just noticing it. But Iām not ājust noticingā it.
It changed without warning me, to my abject frustration. This is what my life has been like since I planted it. I remember when it first sprouted. When I first started noticing the changes. The very first one I encountered were the changes made to the American flag. Again, swearing to God, on my own life, and on my late motherās grave, I can attest that the American flag has
always had 13, red and white,
diagonal stripes. Not horizontal.
Diagonal.
Again, I remember vividly sitting Indian style around our 1st grade teacher as she taught us some of the most basic history of the Revolutionary War. Particularly when it came to the Betsy Ross story. I remember being told that, when Betsy Ross first showed George Washington her initial design for the flag that it did indeed have horizontal stripes just like the one I suppose all of you are familiar with. But at the last second, he had her change them to be diagonal because he wanted to convey that the United States did not intend to be an empire in which some states would be perceived to be dominating the others by being āon topā. Making the stripes diagonal, to him, avoided this undesired symbolism.
I remember it all so clearly, even the little kitschy cartoon drawings in our school books of him with Betsy Ross as she showed him the final design. I remember reading about it in middle and high school. Hell, I even remember writing a 13 page essay for US History I in college that dealt with the subject. The paper of course, along with any historical record or proof of this detailed memory (digital or otherwise), is nowhere I can find it. Itās as if God or something turned the whole world into one big Wikipedia article and began editing reality at random with no one reverting the changes.
If you donāt think Iām crazy yet, then maybe Iām just not trying hard enough. When I noticed the plant had grown its eighth root, I learned for the first time in my life that Richard Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal and
not for having been outed as having had a nearly decade long affair with both Marilyn Monroe and Jackie Kennedy at the same time as I
thought I had been taught. I hadnāt even heard the term Watergate before that. In fact, I learned at the same exact time that apparently for decades since, the affix
-gate had been attached to various other scandals and controversies as though it were a naming convention. Until that eighth root planted itself firmly in the ground, I had never
once seen or heard of something like that before.
The day I noticed the very first flower to bloom on it, was the same day I found out thereās this little place near Long Island and New Jersey you may have heard of called New York City. You see, to me, that place has always been (and always will be in my mind as I cling onto what I know to be the truth) New Ithaca. Frank Sinatraās famous song that is played every year on New Yearās Eve, has always been about the great city of New Ithaca, the Big Apple. The changes are just so weird and particular too. The whole general history of that city and state has remains the same though (at least to me), being that it was founded by the Dutch but was taken by the British and renamed before becoming a part of the United States. Only, instead the place was previously named New North Brabant whereas I suppose you have always known that New York used to be New Amsterdam.
Thereās even a song about that bit of trivia, I learned. Catchy, and also cringe inducing for someone like me going through what Iām going through.
Actually the overwhelming bulk of changes have had to do with place names. Again growing up, I had it beaten into my brain that in
1492 Columbus sailed the Pacific blue. You heard that right. The vast puddle you probably call the Atlantic Ocean has always been the Pacific
to me. And vice versa. Nebraska was a name I had not ever heard of before I measured another half foot in that damn thingās already enormous length. To me that place was called the State of Fillmore. If before I measured it to be at 3 feet, you had asked me to point out Paris on a map, I would have stared at you blankly until I realized you probably meant to say Degaulleville which was built just northeast of the ruins of the ill-fated City of Lights after it was used as a testing ground for Germanyās most devastating weapon of WWII - the nuclear bomb.
Apparently in this new world the plant has created for me, it is our country that has the dubious honor of being the first military in the world to use nuclear weapons in an actual war.
And the list of changes I have just goes on and on like that. Iām not going to waste time spelling them all out for you. Iām sure that should be enough for you to at least hear me out or dismiss me as having had a break with reality. All I want now is this thing in my backyard, and these seeds to boot, out of here. Like I said in the beginning, Iād throw it away, but now that I suspect thereās some sort of link between it and all these changes being made, I worry what it could do to me if I yanked it out of the ground and chucked it into a dumpster. Degaulleville, Fillmore, etc. were erased by this thing. I could be too, if I made it mad enough.
Thereās another part of me, a selfish part, that hopes if someone else takes it they can be the ones to have all these changes happen to instead. They can be the ones to watch desperately as what you once knew to be true, to be there, to be real, is all ground up and thrown away like it was nothing to bend your reality and leave you as the only one aware of it. I want that to happen to someone else instead of me. I want to be the one whoās oblivious to the changes made in the fabric and window dressings of reality. I want to be the one who reads the complaints and desperate cries of someone like me, and calls them crazy. I want want
want that.
Thereās another, tinier part of me, that naively hopes once I can leave this thing with someone else, it will change reality again but this time for the better. For the better, for me. Maybe once it starts affecting someone else adversely, it can change reality one more time to make my mom come back. To come back in a way that would make me forget she was ever gone. And then maybe I can go home, go back to the life I was used to living. But I know at the same time, thereās absolutely no reason it would do something nice like that for me.
Hell, if anything, it could decide to make things in reality, history, etc.
worse for everyone including me. Like let me think⦠Okay for example, remember back in 1999 when everyone was afraid of the Y2K bug, but then it turned out to not be such a catastrophic ordeal as people were predicting? That damn plant could change things to make it so that Y2Kās catastrophic potential was fulfilled. Or wait, hereās a more recent example - remember like three or so years ago when there was that weird disease in China all the schools and governments got freaked out about for two weeks, warning about having to do lockdowns and stuff like that only for the Chinese government to successfully contain it before it could leave its shores?
Iād imagine the plant could change that history as well. And itās not like I
want any of that to happen, itās just that I have little to no control over whether or not it will. And I just want to be free from being the only one to
know itās all happening. To notice it everyday. To have your heart and brain scratched at and tortured by it when you do.
So please, someone, anyone out there who can and is willing to take this thing off my hands knowing full well what it is - just DM me. Iāll give it to you at no charge or expense to you. Iāll even dig it out of the ground and drive to where you are (if youāre on the island that is) so you donāt have to get up and go anywhere. If youāre located somewhere else Iāll happily volunteer to pay
all the associated shipping costs at my own expense as well in order to get it to you.
Youāll be my knight in shining armor if you do.
UPDATE: I am no longer in need of anyone to take this thing and these seeds off my hands. Thank you to the person that DMed me after I posted this. I got your email confirming that it safely arrived at your address as well. Also, glad to hear itās grown another root. By glad, I mean that I am glad to know that it has grown yet again but this time I havenāt noticed anything changing. You have no idea what youāve done to help salvage my sanity. Bless you.
submitted by
Screaming_Mosquito to
LetsReadOfficial [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 05:31 Screaming_Mosquito Does anyone want this thing growing in my backyard? Please say yes.
I've tried selling this thing for weeks now on Facebook Marketplace, eventually at just 1 cent because I just genuinely want it out of my hair. And I cannot find any takers. I want someone to just take it instead of throwing it out because honestly, I'm deeply nervous about what would happen if I did. But if this advertisement proves to be just as fruitless, I will do it despite my nervousness because my mind just can't take this anymore otherwise I'm afraid I'm going to have a psychological break with reality and need to be sedated.
I grew up originally in Northern California near Mt. Shasta, and four years ago I moved to the Big Island of Hawaii after I got a new job working for the university located in Hilo as an adjunct. The search for a place to rent where I could garden in the backyard took a while, but the wait was worth it. Gardening is like comfort food for my soul, and always has been ever since I was a little girl. My mom brought me up doing it, and I took to it immediately when I was just 3 or 4 she always liked to remind me.
I suppose the reason I wanted to leave California was the fact that she wasn't there anymore, that the last piece or vestige of my family was gone and I was all that was left of the life we used to have out there. I remember the day everything was packed up for the movers and ready to go, I walked outside to wait for a friend to pick me up to take me to the airport. As I sat there on my porch, I saw an elderly man walking in front of my front yard. It was an old friend of my mom's from the neighborhood. He had been very kind to me at her funeral as he had just lost his wife himself. We both waved at each other and I got up to chat with him one last time.
As it turned out, he was there to give me a going away present. It was a batch of strange seeds in a small sack. Some were colored burgundy, others indigo, and still others ivory with fascinating patterns on them. In total, there were 19 by my count. He said that before his wife passed away, she had originally intended to give them to my mom. Apparently, during one of their hiking trips around the mountain, the two of them kept stopping to see if someone was following them. Every time they would, some tree would rustle or a bush would make a quick, sharp noise indicating some sort of disturbance. Towards the end of their hike, they stopped one final time only for them to turn around and notice that someone had left this dingy little sack of seeds on a rotted out tree stump they had just passed. In other words, there was no question at that point that they had been followed.
For what reason? He couldn't say, though obviously the implication was that whoever it was wanted them to have these seeds. His wife died soon after that, before she could pass them along to my mother. He said he was hesitant to part with them after she died, but felt extremely guilty having waited too long to give them to my mom. Now that I was heading to Hawaii, he thought he ought to just give them to me instead of continuing to keep them. Other than that, he told me to be very careful with them, to specifically pour them out into the ground from the sack instead of touching them myself. And I wondered why. Like it's such an oddly specific thing to bring up about them.
Regardless.
I took them gratefully and thanked him for the gift and said that my mother would have loved them. Now, I'm not so sure she would have.
It was only a week or so after I had finally unpacked everything in my new place that I decided to garden again. And the first thing I planted, of course, were the seeds once meant for my mom. In memory of her. It was only one I put in the ground because honestly I wasnāt exactly sure how big this thing was going to grow to be. I wasnāt even sure what
exactly this thing was even going to grow to be either. Turns out, itās a vegetable⦠of some kind. I think. Itās almost like a yam? Like with the same texture and everything but with bright orange skin⦠and fur in strange places? Also, another thing, itās
like a yam but at the time of writing this it has most definitely grown beyond the size of a typical yam. Basically itāll increase in size every week or so by a half a foot by my measure. Also, every time it grows by that much, another bulbous root pops out and burrows itself beneath.
And oh yeah there are little blue flowers (or what I guess you could call flowers) growing out of little nooks and crannies and just random spots all over. Iām not sure what to say. I have yet to identify it. If one of you reading this can, then good for you, would you like to take it off my hands in that case? Please? Okay well, I guess I better finally explain why I want this damn thing out of here. Iāve already ostracized myself at work trying to get people to take it, as well as trying to explain what makes me hate the thing, so what harm will come from making a bunch of internet strangers think Iām creepy or crazy?
The black and white of it is that every time this thing grows a half a foot, every time another root plants itself in the ground, every time another one of those little blue flower buds appears on it, something changes. About the world we live in. About our history. About how we live day to day. And no one seems to notice any of the changes except for me. Today in fact, I almost got into a fatal car crash after I woke up and took note of a new flower bud growing on the side of it facing my house. If you put a Bible in front of me and made me swear to God that I was going to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth I would swear on that, my life, and my late motherās grave that I grew up
knowing that Americans in all 50 states drive on the
left side of the road.
I know youāre probably laughing at me. Because thatās what the person I almost ran into did when I told them. They wanted to know if I was British or something, and I said no I was born and raised in Northern California all my life. The closest Iāve ever even been to a foreign country is San Diego. But when I pulled over after that scare and looked it up on my phone, there it was. Americans drive on the right side of the road and pretty much always have. Itās just so⦠jarring. I have vivid memories of me death gripping the wheel to my momās Wrangler for the first time in my life, with her in the passenger seat teaching me the rules of the road for the first time. And I remember very clearly her telling me that no matter where I go in the United States or Canada, if I ever did that is, I would be on the left side of the road the entire time.
And I remember everyone else driving on the left side too. I remember them doing it
yesterday. And now, everyoneās acting like itās actually been this other way the entire time and that Iām somehow just noticing it. But Iām not ājust noticingā it.
It changed without warning me, to my abject frustration. This is what my life has been like since I planted it. I remember when it first sprouted. When I first started noticing the changes. The very first one I encountered were the changes made to the American flag. Again, swearing to God, on my own life, and on my late motherās grave, I can attest that the American flag has
always had 13, red and white,
diagonal stripes. Not horizontal.
Diagonal.
Again, I remember vividly sitting Indian style around our 1st grade teacher as she taught us some of the most basic history of the Revolutionary War. Particularly when it came to the Betsy Ross story. I remember being told that, when Betsy Ross first showed George Washington her initial design for the flag that it did indeed have horizontal stripes just like the one I suppose all of you are familiar with. But at the last second, he had her change them to be diagonal because he wanted to convey that the United States did not intend to be an empire in which some states would be perceived to be dominating the others by being āon topā. Making the stripes diagonal, to him, avoided this undesired symbolism.
I remember it all so clearly, even the little kitschy cartoon drawings in our school books of him with Betsy Ross as she showed him the final design. I remember reading about it in middle and high school. Hell, I even remember writing a 13 page essay for US History I in college that dealt with the subject. The paper of course, along with any historical record or proof of this detailed memory (digital or otherwise), is nowhere I can find it. Itās as if God or something turned the whole world into one big Wikipedia article and began editing reality at random with no one reverting the changes.
If you donāt think Iām crazy yet, then maybe Iām just not trying hard enough. When I noticed the plant had grown its eighth root, I learned for the first time in my life that Richard Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal and
not for having been outed as having had a nearly decade long affair with both Marilyn Monroe and Jackie Kennedy at the same time as I
thought I had been taught. I hadnāt even heard the term Watergate before that. In fact, I learned at the same exact time that apparently for decades since, the affix
-gate had been attached to various other scandals and controversies as though it were a naming convention. Until that eighth root planted itself firmly in the ground, I had never
once seen or heard of something like that before.
The day I noticed the very first flower to bloom on it, was the same day I found out thereās this little place near Long Island and New Jersey you may have heard of called New York City. You see, to me, that place has always been (and always will be in my mind as I cling onto what I know to be the truth) New Ithaca. Frank Sinatraās famous song that is played every year on New Yearās Eve, has always been about the great city of New Ithaca, the Big Apple. The changes are just so weird and particular too. The whole general history of that city and state has remains the same though (at least to me), being that it was founded by the Dutch but was taken by the British and renamed before becoming a part of the United States. Only, instead the place was previously named New North Brabant whereas I suppose you have always known that New York used to be New Amsterdam.
Thereās even a song about that bit of trivia, I learned. Catchy, and also cringe inducing for someone like me going through what Iām going through.
Actually the overwhelming bulk of changes have had to do with place names. Again growing up, I had it beaten into my brain that in
1492 Columbus sailed the Pacific blue. You heard that right. The vast puddle you probably call the Atlantic Ocean has always been the Pacific
to me. And vice versa. Nebraska was a name I had not ever heard of before I measured another half foot in that damn thingās already enormous length. To me that place was called the State of Fillmore. If before I measured it to be at 3 feet, you had asked me to point out Paris on a map, I would have stared at you blankly until I realized you probably meant to say Degaulleville which was built just northeast of the ruins of the ill-fated City of Lights after it was used as a testing ground for Germanyās most devastating weapon of WWII - the nuclear bomb.
Apparently in this new world the plant has created for me, it is our country that has the dubious honor of being the first military in the world to use nuclear weapons in an actual war.
And the list of changes I have just goes on and on like that. Iām not going to waste time spelling them all out for you. Iām sure that should be enough for you to at least hear me out or dismiss me as having had a break with reality. All I want now is this thing in my backyard, and these seeds to boot, out of here. Like I said in the beginning, Iād throw it away, but now that I suspect thereās some sort of link between it and all these changes being made, I worry what it could do to me if I yanked it out of the ground and chucked it into a dumpster. Degaulleville, Fillmore, etc. were erased by this thing. I could be too, if I made it mad enough.
Thereās another part of me, a selfish part, that hopes if someone else takes it they can be the ones to have all these changes happen to instead. They can be the ones to watch desperately as what you once knew to be true, to be there, to be real, is all ground up and thrown away like it was nothing to bend your reality and leave you as the only one aware of it. I want that to happen to someone else instead of me. I want to be the one whoās oblivious to the changes made in the fabric and window dressings of reality. I want to be the one who reads the complaints and desperate cries of someone like me, and calls them crazy. I want want
want that.
Thereās another, tinier part of me, that naively hopes once I can leave this thing with someone else, it will change reality again but this time for the better. For the better, for me. Maybe once it starts affecting someone else adversely, it can change reality one more time to make my mom come back. To come back in a way that would make me forget she was ever gone. And then maybe I can go home, go back to the life I was used to living. But I know at the same time, thereās absolutely no reason it would do something nice like that for me.
Hell, if anything, it could decide to make things in reality, history, etc.
worse for everyone including me. Like let me think⦠Okay for example, remember back in 1999 when everyone was afraid of the Y2K bug, but then it turned out to not be such a catastrophic ordeal as people were predicting? That damn plant could change things to make it so that Y2Kās catastrophic potential was fulfilled. Or wait, hereās a more recent example - remember like three or so years ago when there was that weird disease in China all the schools and governments got freaked out about for two weeks, warning about having to do lockdowns and stuff like that only for the Chinese government to successfully contain it before it could leave its shores?
Iād imagine the plant could change that history as well. And itās not like I
want any of that to happen, itās just that I have little to no control over whether or not it will. And I just want to be free from being the only one to
know itās all happening. To notice it everyday. To have your heart and brain scratched at and tortured by it when you do.
So please, someone, anyone out there who can and is willing to take this thing off my hands knowing full well what it is - just DM me. Iāll give it to you at no charge or expense to you. Iāll even dig it out of the ground and drive to where you are (if youāre on the island that is) so you donāt have to get up and go anywhere. If youāre located somewhere else Iāll happily volunteer to pay
all the associated shipping costs at my own expense as well in order to get it to you.
Youāll be my knight in shining armor if you do.
UPDATE: I am no longer in need of anyone to take this thing and these seeds off my hands. Thank you to the person that DMed me after I posted this. I got your email confirming that it safely arrived at your address as well. Also, glad to hear itās grown another root. By glad, I mean that I am glad to know that it has grown yet again but this time I havenāt noticed anything changing. You have no idea what youāve done to help salvage my sanity. Bless you.
submitted by
Screaming_Mosquito to
nosleep [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 05:00 FbEioe Jersey Shore Italian Whore Shows Her Nice Tits
2023.06.07 04:25 dollcollective I Was a Last-Minute Replacement in an Off-Broadway Play. Something Else Was Backstage With Us.
When I was getting started, an actor I knew gave me some really good advice. While deciding whether or not to take a certain role, consider three factors: the money, the show, and the people. If at least two of those things are good, accept the job. If theyāre paying you well and you love the play, you wonāt mind putting up with shitty people. If itās a great show with a cast full of friends, but youāre not getting paid so well, thatās still alright, itāll be artistically fulfilling. If itās a bad show but you love the cast and youāre making money, youāll probably have the time of your life making fun of the playwright backstage and laughing all the way to the bank.
What my friend failed to mention is that as an aspiring actor, you donāt usually get to be that picky. When I got the call from my agent that a production of The Bacchae was urgently seeking a new chorus member, all I could see were dollar signs. My survival job had just fallen through (the family I nannied for was moving upstate, insisting that Manhattan had just gotten ātoo dangerousā for their toddler), and my savings were only going to cover my rent for another month.
It was raining the day of my audition, and my train got delayed. I showed up panting (I had to run from the subway station) and my hair a disaster. Luckily, in The Bacchae, the chorus is full of⦠well⦠Bacchae. Fervent followers of Dionysus, wild women, drunk and running through the countryside. In the climax of the play, they crowd the protagonist in a frenzy, literally ripping him limb from limb.
Iāll never know if it was my frenetic energy from barely making it to the theater on time, or my actual acting, but I got the part. My costume fitting was the next dayā they werenāt kidding about urgently needing a replacement. Which thrilled me, because I wasnāt kidding about urgently needing the money. At the fitting, I discovered something my agent failed to mention about the production: this wasnāt just any version of The Bacchae, it was a recreationā an attempt to perform the play in the traditional Greek style. In other words, everyone was wearing masks.
Iāve never been fond of masks. We had to do a few assignments with them in my college acting courses; covering your face can enhance the physicality of your body, something like that. But I never liked wearing them, or seeing other people wearing them. It wouldnāt be fair to call it a full-on fear, but the stiffness, the lack of expression, gives me a weird feeling in my stomach. And wearing one, your field of vision limited, your mouth covered, making it harder to breathe, harder to project your voiceā I donāt like it. Itās as simple as that.
But I needed the money. My costume wasnāt ugly, per se, just strange: a long white dress, or maybe toga is a better word, the fabric about the thickness of a burlap sack. My mask, stark white, paper mache, covering my entire face except my eyes, the mouth carved to imitate a grin. No shoes. My hair tucked into a wild black wigā we wore wigs, they explained to me, so the chorus could be identical, indistinguishable. We moved as one, spoke as one, and were meant to look like one. They even made sure to cast women of the same height. In our costumes, it was impossible to tell which of us was which.
It didnāt help that I was an outsider to the rest of the cast, joining the show weeks into rehearsals. Everyone seemed annoyed that they had to teach me the blocking, the inflection of the lines (so my voice didnāt stick out from the other chorus girls), and where to go backstage during scenes with no chorus. A few people tried to be nice to me, but quickly gave up when they realized I knew nothing about Greek theater, or masked theater, or the avant garde. My last show had been a regional production of Cats, for Godās sake. I was totally out of my element.
Things got especially sour when I tried to ask what had happened to the girl I was replacing. Nobody wanted to talk about it. People gasped when I brought it up. The clearest answer I got was a whispered, hesitant, āshe fell,ā but the person wouldnāt elaborate any further. The cast seemed superstitious, uncomfortable, like talking about her would cause them to suffer her fate: removal from the show. And it was clear that, aside from me, everyone else loved this show. The actor playing Dionysus, the couple of times he deigned to talk to me, just kept gushing about how honored he was to play this role, how electrifying it felt to put his history minor to use, to show people a piece of the worldās theatrical beginnings.
I thought the show was fine. Kinda boring, kinda scary. I donāt think I āgetā The Bacchae. In brief, the story is about Dionysus, son of Zeus, disguised as a human. He and his followers (the chorus) show up in a town, but the leader of the town, Pentheus, is upset about it. He doesnāt understand why all these women are acting crazy, and he arrests Dionysus, not believing him to be an actual God. As punishment, Dionysus possesses Pentheusās own mother with the same madness as his followers, and together, with their bare hands, they rip Pentheus apart. His mom walks back into town holding her sonās head, thinking it to be, in her madness, the head of a lion. When she realizes what sheās done, she is overwhelmed by grief, and futilely attempts to put Pentheusās mutilated corpse back together. Dionysus returns, basically saying, āwell, he said I wasnāt a God, and thatās blasphemous, so he got what was coming to him.ā Pentheusās mother is exiled.
Itās incredibly dark. In the reviews, critics called it daring, challenging, a bloody spectacle, a feminist masterpiece. I donāt really get what part of āa man whoās a God possesses womenās minds, driving them to murderā screams āfeminism,ā but hey, Iām the girl who commuted to New Jersey every day for four months to do Cats, what do I know?
Hereās something I do know: the other chorus girls did not like me. And they took their jobs seriously. As we waited to enter for each scene, there was dead quiet in the wings. Usually, thereās some light joking, maybe quickly running lines, maybe physical warmups, shaking out your nervesā I tried to do this once. Before our entrance at the top of the show, we all gathered in the stage right wing, all twelve of us, a perfect and identical dozen. It was a dress rehearsal. No audience. I did a few jumping jacks, trying to hype myself up. Another masked girl grabbed my bicep, hard. When I turned, she just shook her head āno.ā Just a simple, silent, āno.ā We donāt do that here. We stand silently in the wings, focusing on our craft, breathing, waiting for our entrance. I never tried it again.
When you canāt talk to your coworkers, acting becomes a lot less fun. The collaboration element is totally gone. And honestly, the āactingā element was gone for me, too. How am I supposed to find my character or sense of identity in a role when my role is ādonāt let your voice stick out, donāt take a wrong step, blend in perfectly with eleven women who dislike you?ā
So before the shows, instead of chatting, or doing jumping jacks, I wandered the theater. Iāve always loved theaters; the dramatic architecture, the ornate prosceniums, the stark contrast of backstage, so dark, so dusty. The theater was no Broadway house, but it had a fly system (which we didnāt use, because the Greeks wouldnāt have been able to fly anything in), just over three hundred seats (including a mezzanineā fancy!), and lots of backstage space. I could say more about it, because I spent hours during the run of the show wandering, but it wouldnāt be terribly interesting to anyone whoās not me. Just know, it was a beautiful old theaterā and I mean OLD. Built in the 1910s, just before the Great Depression. I used to love imagining how many generations of people had performed on that stage, imagining what theyād think of this show, or what theyād think of me.
About a week into my wandering, on some fifteen-minute break, I was looking at the ladder that led up to the catwalkā a long, thin metal walkway stretching across the stage from above, usually used for hanging lights. I wondered how long it had been since it was used during a show. I wondered if it was even safe. What would the view be like from up there, seeing the entire stage from thirty feet in the air?
I slowly looked up the ladder. I wouldnāt actually climb it. That would be crazy, right? Iām not particularly good with heights. As my eyes lifted, I made eye contactā or rather, mask contactā with someone. A fellow chorus girl, up on the catwalk.
I stopped breathing for a second. What was she doing up there? I started to say something stupid, like, āWhy are you up there?ā when just as quickly as the face appeared, it vanished. I saw her white robed form retreat down the catwalk, heading for a different ladder, probably. It was weird. Why did she run? Embarrassed to be caught somewhere she shouldnāt be?
I allowed myself to entertain a little fantasy: maybe she was just like me. Maybe she also hated the other chorus girls, and didnāt āgetā The Bacchae. Maybe she was exploring the theater for fun on our break, enjoying the old architecture, like I did. I had no idea who she was under the mask, and she had no idea who I was. She probably thought I was one of the normal judgemental girls, and ran off before I could tell on her to the stage manager.
I was filled with unfounded hope. Could I make a friend here? Was it possible? After two and a half weeks of silence from the other girls, it was hard to imagine. How would I find her? How would I let her know it was meā that I had seen her on the catwalk, and we were the same?
After that day, I got much more observant. When the director called for a break, instead of immediately retreating into the depths of backstage, I watched my eleven doppelgangers carefully, tracking who went for water, who went back to the dressing rooms, who ran off towards the vending machines. It was hard to tell everyone apart, but people had to take their masks off to drink water eventually. I memorized faces and tried to keep track of them. I started to get a handle on everyoneās patterns, narrowing down potential adventurers.
It was impossible. Eleven people is too many to observe. But Iām an actor. Memorizing shit is literally my job. By week four, just days from opening, I had three potential girls. I tried to stick close to them during rehearsals, picking one to follow each day, but nobody ever wandered towards the catwalk. Maybe the girl, whoever she was, had been scared away from adventuring when I caught her. I started to lose hope. We were opening soonā I should focus on making my entrances, not making friends.
But then I saw her again.
This time, it was half an hour before the curtain went up for our invited dress rehearsal. The press was there. I was nervous. I knew I had my part down, but when youāre doing a show, no matter how prepared you are, thereās always the lingering fear that youāll freeze up, forget everything, and ruin everyoneās hard work. It just means that you care. I was surprised that I cared so much. I still didnāt even get the play. I couldnāt let the other girls see me weak. I barely show my real feelings to people I care about, much less mean actresses who look down on me. To get away from it all, I wandered down to another unused part of the stage: the orchestra pit. We did have music in the show, but the Greeks didnāt have orchestra pits. So it was closed off, being used as storage.
I loved it down there. I loved looking through the storage bins, finding props from long-forgotten productionsā sometimes I would find something incredible, something I swore was from the day the theater opened, something old and valuableā and usually, I could never find it again. Those bins were a treasure trove. Of all the weird little spaces I found backstage, the pit was my favorite. I felt like a real explorer down there, illuminating my path with my phone flashlight, getting spooked when a mouse ran over my foot (of course the theater had mice, it was more than a hundred years old! And besides, every building has mice in New York City).
That day, I wasnāt there to look around. Just to sit. Just to catch my breath. I tiptoed down the creaky steps, and plopped myself on the ground, surrounded by bins. I inhaled and exhaled, smelling the mildew-y scent of old props on every side of me. And thatās when I heard a noise. Not a mouse noiseā I was used to those. Something bigger. I turned my phone flashlight on immediately, calling, āhello?ā
And the light landed on a mask, just like mine. Mine which was currently off, because I was doing my breathing exercises. I felt exposedā she could see my face, but I couldnāt see hers. I stood up. āYou scared me!ā
She didnāt respond. She looked at me for a second, and started to retreat the other way, towards the stairs at the other side of the pit.
āWait!ā I called. āI wonāt tell anyone I saw you!ā
She stopped for a second. But then she kept walking. I stood and followed. āPlease stop. Can I at least know who you are? I donāt fit in with most of the chorus girlsāā
I reached for her long white toga. I swear, I had it in my hand, but somehow, she slipped away. I staggered a bit, almost tripped, confused that I hadnāt made contact with her costume. And when I looked back up, I only saw a glimpse of her disappearing up the stairs. I tried to follow, again, but I found that side of the pitās stairs reached a dead end. I didnāt understand how sheād gotten out. And when I looked back down at my phone, it was time for places. Disappointed and defeated, I rushed away to the other stairs, making my way to the stage right wing to wait for my entrance.
I counted heads immediately when I arrived. Maybe she hadnāt made it back yet. But, alas: twelve. All accounted for. I nudged a girl next to me, subtly. āWho was the last one here besides me?ā
She just stared at me for a moment, which came off as very creepy through the blank dead stare of her mask. āHow the fuck am I supposed to know? We all look exactly the same.ā
I sighed. āOkay. Thanks.ā For nothing, I thought bitterly.
The invited dress went well. The press liked it, as Iāve already said. I was distracted the entire time. After that day, I made it a habit to count all the girls when the stage manager called for āplaces.ā If I was right about this girl, she, like me, would be one of the last, if not the last one there. She would be wandering, exploring, getting away from the bullies.
I wish I hadnāt done this. I wish Iād given up when she disappeared on a dead-end staircase. I wish Iād never seen her on the catwalk. Because when I started counting heads, I noticed something impossible. Sometimes, before we went on, I counted thirteen identical masked faces.
It was a chorus of twelve. It was supposed to be twelve. Iād recount. Recount again. Thirteen. A chill went down my spine. We all looked the same. Same masks, same togas, same wigs. Who was the imposter? How could anyone be an imposter? It didnāt make sense. How would they get into the theater? How would they get a costume?
I started counting more often. Between scenes, in the dressing rooms, even on stage during dull moments. It fluctuated. Sometimes Iād count twelve for a whole day, an entire show, and sigh in relief, feeling like some curse was broken. But the next day, at least once, Iād count thirteen.
And it seemed as if one masked pair of eyes was always trained on me. I donāt know how she knew it was me. We looked the same. But sheād stare. It felt scary, but also ridiculousā I couldnāt be sure it was the same person looking every time. I couldnāt be sure it was unlucky number thirteen. But I felt like it was.
I felt a lot of things. I felt like I couldnāt tell anyone. The other girls already didnāt like meā I couldnāt have them thinking I was crazy. And admitting the presence of the thirteenth would mean admitting to my adventures into forbidden backstage areas. I couldnāt lose this job. I was living paycheck to paycheck. I wasnāt eating well, or sleeping wellā maybe this was all a hallucination. And somehow, my biggest feeling was that if I told someone about the thirteenth, Iād never see her again.
And I needed to see her again. The obsession had only gotten stronger. I knew, somehow, deep inside, that she was the one I had seen on the catwalk and in the orchestra pit. I no longer wanted to be her friendā I wanted to corner her. To ask who she was, and why she was sneaking in as if she was one of us. I wanted to ask what she wanted from me.
Because she must want something from me, right? Why else would she stare? Why would she appear only to me?
The timing never lined up. The show had opened at this point, and I had a job to do: delighting the audience. I couldnāt skip my entrance to catch number thirteen. The chorus formations would look ridiculous with a missing person. And as much as the other girls hated me, I owed it to them as my costars to make them look good.
Logically, I knew there was only one person the thirteenth could be: Catalina, the actress Iād replaced. She must be jealous of me. Bitter. Maybe she wanted to take my role, like Iād taken hers. It would be insane, but it was all that made sense. She was the only other person who had the costume, who knew the keypad code to get into the theater. She must have recovered from her fall and come to find me.
It was almost like a game. It definitely made the show more interesting for me. Before I realized what was happening, I dreaded performances. I felt stupid, taking on this role in a show I didnāt even understand. But now I had so much to do. I had to plan.
I started showing up early, an hour before my call time. I walked my old spots, thinking I may see her. The other chorus girls were impressed that I was showing up early, thinking it showed some sort of dedication to the show. I think they even started to hate me less. They still detested any attempts at conversation in the wings, but in the dressing room, I started to have a few breakthroughs. In particular, I started a semi-friendship with Erin. Ironically, she had been one of the three women I thought may be the thirteenth, until I realized the thirteenth wasnāt really one of us at all.
She was the only person who I could actually ask about Catalina. āDid she ever say anything about the theater? The building, I mean? Did she have a favorite part of it?ā
Erin would laugh at my seemingly random specificity. āWe werenāt close, Michelle. I have no idea what she thought about the theater.ā
āWhat did she do on her breaks?ā
Erin thought for a second. āI donāt know. I never saw her at the vending machines, or the dressing room. I guess she found some quiet place to run lines.ā
That confirmed it, for me. A quiet place like the catwalk. Or the orchestra pit. We were three weeks into our five week run when I came up with a plan to catch Catalina. It wasnāt a great plan, and I had no idea if it would work, but showing up an hour early every day was making me tired and producing zero results. I needed a new strategy. I realized that after seeing her in the pit, I only ever saw the thirteenth when all twelve of us were together.
So I told a white lie. One night after the show, when everyone was changing in the dressing room, I appealed to my fellow chorus girls. āAre you guys busy before the show tomorrow?ā I innocently asked. āIām feeling a little shaky on some of the entrances. If we could all get here just twenty minutes before our call time tomorrow, Iād love to run some stuff with you guys. Iāve been running it on my own, but without the entire team, I donāt always remember where I fit.ā
To my surprise and intense joy, everyone agreed. They really did seem to respect me more when I looked like I was taking my role seriously. I could barely sleep that night, I was so excited to see if my plan worked. And hey, if it didnāt, I had two more weeks of shows to think up something else.
It was a Sunday night, our last show of the week. Mondays are often ādark daysā in professional theater, meaning there are no shows that day to give the team a rest. I had planned this on purposeā if I failed, I had a dark day to reflect on that failure and try again.
At 5:40, twenty minutes before our call time, all the girls were assembled and in costume. We started running entrances. After ten minutes, I thought my plan had failed. We had run our first three entrances, and I never counted more than twelve heads in the wings. But around 5:55, as we got to our entrances in act two, offstage, I locked eyes with a mask. A thirteenth mask.
I quickly told everyone āI think I got it, you guys, thank you so much for coming early!ā Everyone mumbled that it was no problem, that they were happy to help.
The thirteenth mask broke eye contact with me, looking around in confusionā perhaps distress. The girls started to trickle back towards the dressing room. The thirteenth turned and power-walked away. I shoved through the crowd to catch her, not calling out like I had in the past. I knew she didnāt respond to that. I knew I had to catch her now or never. Once we were out of the crowdās eyeline, I began to run. She ran, too. āYouāre not getting away this time!ā I yelled, like some kind of cartoon superhero. My adrenaline was pumping, and blood rushed to my ears.
After I yelled, I suddenly became aware of another set of running feet behind me. āMichelle? Where are you going?ā It was Erinās voice.
āDonāt follow me!ā I hastily called back, picking up speed. The thirteenth also picked up speed. Though she was running just as fast as I was, she showed no signs of exertion. I couldnāt hear heavy breathing, or heavy feet on the floor. It was like she was gliding. It infuriated me.
Erin didnāt let up. āMichelle, the stage manager is gonna wonder where we are!ā
I ignored her. The thirteenth rounded a corner, and I realized where she was going: the catwalk. The ladder.
She ascended the rungs rapidly, like a spider. I clamored up much less gracefully. Erinās voice had a heavy tinge of concern. āMichelle, what are you doing?! Itās not safe up there!ā
āThen donāt follow me!ā I yelled back, exasperated. āThis is between me and her!ā Despite my vocal warning, I heard Erin climbing behind me.
Once on the metal rail, I looked both ways, terrified sheād escaped me again. But her white toga was just a few feet away, retreating into darkness. I lunged at her. The entire catwalk shook. The thirteenth and I both grabbed the railing to steady ourselves. We met eyes. Or rather, we met masks.
āYou have nowhere to go.ā I stated.
I heard Erin reaching the top of the ladder behind me. āMichelle, come down, please. Youāre scaring me.ā
āI canāt. I finally have her.ā I took a step towards the thirteenth. She took an equal and opposite step back. āTake the mask off.ā I beckoned her. āI know itās you, Catalina.ā
I felt the rail shake slightly as Erin got on it. āWhat are you talking about, Michelle?!ā
āSheās been sneaking in, Erin! Sheās been standing in the wings with us before we enter! For weeks!ā I took another step towards the thirteenth. In my peripheral vision, I could see how high we were above the stage. Thirty feet. You could die, falling from that height.
āItās not Catalina. It canāt be. Stop this.ā Erin called. Finally, frustrated, I turned towards her.
āWho else could it be?!ā
Erin had taken her mask off. Her face was streaked with terror. āCatalina died, Michelle. She fell off this catwalk, directly onto her face, and she died. Please come down with me. I donāt know who youāre talking to, and I donāt know what youāre trying to do, but it isnāt worth it.ā
āWhat are you talking about? Iām talking toāā
I turned back, and she was gone. Vanished like a bad dream. āI swear to God, Erin.ā I started to say. āShe was right in front of me. I chased her hereāā
I turned back to Erin. The thirteenth was behind her.
It made no sense. Nobody can move that fast. Nobody can be in front of me one second and behind me the next. It was inhuman. I stopped speaking. I stopped breathing. It sucks to learn that in a fight-or-flight situation, my answer is to freeze.
Erin mustāve seen how my face changed. āMichelle?ā She asked quietly. āWhatās wrong?ā
Behind her, the thirteenth raised a hand to her mask. Her hands were impossibly pale. How had I never noticed that before? She gripped the mask in her hand. Time stretched. It mustāve only been a second, because Erin didnāt move. But it felt like years of my life passed me by as the thirteenth, inch by inch, raised her mask from her face. Orā raised her mask.
Because there was no face.
Under the mask, pale and gruesome, was a bloody flat edge. Broken, disgusting, it was impossible to make out eyes, or a nose, or a mouth. Inside a somewhat face-shaped frame of stark-white skin, all I could see was flesh, red and raw, squished in on itself. Like someone had fallen from a very high height. And landed on their face.
By the time I finally began to react, it was too late. The thirteenthā or, Catalinaā or, the ghost, orā whatever the fuck that thing was. It moved its hands from the mask to Erinās shoulders. And it pushed. And she screamed, agonizingly loud, as she flew over the side of the railing. And she screamed for the second or so she was in the air. I was screaming, too. And after the crunch of her body hitting the wooden floor of the stage, everyone else screamed, cast and crew alike.
I stared down at her limp form from thirty feet up. Her legs were twisted the wrong way. A pool of blood began to seep out of her. When I looked up again, I expected the thirteenth to be gone, but it wasnāt. With no eyes, it was also looking down at Erin. At what it had done.
And then, slowly, it turned towards me. On all fours, backwards, I scrambled away from it on the catwalk, terrified, not wanting to be next. The thirteenthās shoulders shook rapidly, like a person laughing. But it made no sound. It never made a sound. Not going up the stairs of the orchestra pit. Not when it pushed Erin. And not as it climbed back down the ladder, rung by rung. I found myself alone on the catwalk.
Erin survived, somehow, paralyzed from the waist down. Apparently she fell on her legs, which, when youāre falling from thirty feet up, is a good thing. If sheād gone down head first, there was no chance. The show had to close, of course. When they lost Catalina a few weeks into rehearsal, she was replaceable. But with me refusing to go on, and Erin in the hospital, there was nothing to be done. I havenāt seen Erin since that day. I feel too guilty. But I was never arrested, so I guess she told the authorities that I didnāt push her. I donāt know what she told them. I donāt know what I wouldāve told them, had they asked me.
I donāt do stage plays anymore. The family I used to nanny for gave me a star-studded recommendation, and now I make my living taking care of a five-year-old and a two-year-old for another filthy-rich family. I still act, but I only audition for film work.
I donāt even see plays these days. I wonāt set foot in a theater. If the thirteenth had vanished off that catwalk, maybe things would be different. Maybe I could chalk it up to an extreme hallucination, some terrifying creature my mind brewed up to cope with the stress of the show and paying rent. Maybe I could even forget its bloody mess of viscera in the vague shape of a face.
But I saw it go down that ladder. Rung by fucking rung. And I know itās still out there.
Erin was unlucky. Erin was a victim of being at the wrong place at the wrong time. And if I step inside a theater again, some way, somehow, I know the thirteenth will get me on another catwalk.
This time, Iāll be the one going over the railing.
And Iāve never once landed on my feet.
submitted by
dollcollective to
nosleep [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 04:18 servantoftinyhumans The producer doing an AMA over on FSU discussed Jill!
Apparently the documentary team reached out to precious mamho to be interviewed and she DECLINED!!
submitted by
servantoftinyhumans to
RodriguesFamilySnark [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 03:20 Personal_Hippo1277 Clio Token Size As Text Size By Tier Comparison [Mega Text Wall For Enjoyers of Scrolling]
When I was brand new to NovelAi I had no idea how 2048 tokens really looked as text. So for anyone looking at the tiers, trying to decide how many tokens they want for Clio with the new update, I've tokenized Part of The Great Gatsby by Scott Fitzgerald (public domain since 2021).
That way new users can more easily visualize what the AI's maximum context is for each tier. According to the UI Clio uses the NerdStash Tokenizer, as different tokenizers will convert text to tokens their own way.
------------------------
In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that Iāve been turning over in my mind ever since.
āWhenever you feel like criticizing anyone,ā he told me, ājust remember that all the people in this world havenāt had the advantages that youāve had.ā
He didnāt say any more, but weāve always been unusually communicative in a reserved way, and I understood that he meant a great deal more than that. In consequence, Iām inclined to reserve all judgements, a habit that has opened up many curious natures to me and also made me the victim of not a few veteran bores. The abnormal mind is quick to detect and attach itself to this quality when it appears in a normal person, and so it came about that in college I was unjustly accused of being a politician, because I was privy to the secret griefs of wild, unknown men. Most of the confidences were unsoughtāfrequently I have feigned sleep, preoccupation, or a hostile levity when I realized by some unmistakable sign that an intimate revelation was quivering on the horizon; for the intimate revelations of young men, or at least the terms in which they express them, are usually plagiaristic and marred by obvious suppressions. Reserving judgements is a matter of infinite hope. I am still a little afraid of missing something if I forget that, as my father snobbishly suggested, and I snobbishly repeat, a sense of the fundamental decencies is parcelled out unequally at birth.
And, after boasting this way of my tolerance, I come to the admission that it has a limit. Conduct may be founded on the hard rock or the wet marshes, but after a certain point I donāt care what itās founded on. When I came back from the East last autumn I felt that I wanted the world to be in uniform and at a sort of moral attention forever; I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart. Only Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book, was exempt from my reactionāGatsby, who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn. If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as if he were related to one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away. This responsiveness had nothing to do with that flabby impressionability which is dignified under the name of the ācreative temperamentāāit was an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again. NoāGatsby turned out all right at the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the abortive sorrows and short-winded elations of men.
My family have been prominent, well-to-do people in this Middle Western city for three generations. The Carraways are something of a clan, and we have a tradition that weāre descended from the Dukes of Buccleuch, but the actual founder of my line was my grandfatherās brother, who came here in fifty-one, sent a substitute to the Civil War, and started the wholesale hardware business that my father carries on today.
I never saw this great-uncle, but Iām supposed to look like himāwith special reference to the rather hard-boiled painting that hangs in fatherās office. I graduated from New Haven in 1915, just a quarter of a century after my father, and a little later I participated in that delayed Teutonic migration known as the Great War. I enjoyed the counter-raid so thoroughly that I came back restless. Instead of being the warm centre of the world, the Middle West now seemed like the ragged edge of the universeāso I decided to go East and learn the bond business. Everybody I knew was in the bond business, so I supposed it could support one more single man. All my aunts and uncles talked it over as if they were choosing a prep school for me, and finally said, āWhyāye-es,ā with very grave, hesitant faces. Father agreed to finance me for a year, and after various delays I came East, permanently, I thought, in the spring of twenty-two.
The practical thing was to find rooms in the city, but it was a warm season, and I had just left a country of wide lawns and friendly trees, so when a young man at the office suggested that we take a house together in a commuting town, it sounded like a great idea. He found the house, a weather-beaten cardboard bungalow at eighty a month, but at the last minute the firm ordered him to Washington, and I went out to the country alone. I had a dogāat least I had him for a few days until he ran awayāand an old Dodge and a Finnish woman, who made my bed and cooked breakfast and muttered Finnish wisdom to herself over the electric stove.
It was lonely for a day or so until one morning some man, more recently arrived than I, stopped me on the road.
āHow do you get to West Egg village?ā he asked helplessly.
I told him. And as I walked on I was lonely no longer. I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler. He had casually conferred on me the freedom of the neighbourhood.
And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.
There was so much to read, for one thing, and so much fine health to be pulled down out of the young breath-giving air. I bought a dozen volumes on banking and credit and investment securities, and they stood on my shelf in red and gold like new money from the mint, promising to unfold the shining secrets that only Midas and Morgan and Maecenas knew. And I had the high intention of reading many other books besides. I was rather literary in collegeāone year I wrote a series of very solemn and obvious editorials for the Yale Newsāand now I was going to bring back all such things into my life and become again that most limited of all specialists, the āwell-rounded man.ā This isnāt just an epigramālife is much more successfully looked at from a single window, after all.
It was a matter of chance that I should have rented a house in one of the strangest communities in North America. It was on that slender riotous island which extends itself due east of New Yorkāand where there are, among other natural curiosities, two unusual formations of land. Twenty miles from the city a pair of enormous eggs, identical in contour and separated only by a courtesy bay, jut out into the most domesticated body of salt water in the Western hemisphere, the great wet barnyard of Long Island Sound. They are not perfect ovalsālike the egg in the Columbus story, they are both crushed flat at the contact endābut their physical resemblance must be a source of perpetual wonder to the gulls that fly overhead. To the wingless a more interesting phenomenon is their dissimilarity in every particular except shape and size.
I lived at West Egg, theāwell, the less fashionable of the two, though this is a most superficial tag to express the bizarre and not a little sinister contrast between them. My house was at the very tip of the egg, only fifty yards from the Sound, and squeezed between two huge places that rented for twelve or fifteen thousand a season. The one on my right was a colossal affair by any standardāit was a factual imitation of some HĆ“tel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden. It was Gatsbyās mansion. Or, rather, as I didnāt know Mr. Gatsby, it was a mansion inhabited by a gentleman of that name. My own house was an eyesore, but it was a small eyesore, and it had been overlooked, so I had a view of the water, a partial view of my neighbourās lawn, and the consoling proximity of millionairesāall for eighty dollars a month.
Across the courtesy bay the white palaces of fashionable East Egg glittered along the water, and the history of the summer really begins on the evening I drove over there to have dinner with the Tom Buchanans. Daisy was my second cousin once removed, and Iād known Tom in college. And just after the war I spent two days with them in Chicago.
Her husband, among various physical accomplishments, had been one of the most powerful ends that ever played football at New Havenāa national figure in a way, one of those men who reach such an acute limited excellence at twenty-one that everything afterward savours of anticlimax. His family were enormously wealthyāeven in college his freedom with money was a matter for reproachābut now heād left Chicago and come East in a fashion that rather took your breath away: for instance, heād brought down a string of polo ponies from Lake Forest. It was hard to realize that a man in my own generation was wealthy enough to do that.
Why they came East I donāt know. They had spent a year in France for no particular reason, and then drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and were rich together. This was a permanent move, said Daisy over the telephone, but I didnāt believe itāI had no sight into Daisyās heart, but I felt that Tom would drift on forever seeking, a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence of some irrecoverable football game.
And so it happened that on a warm windy evening I drove over to East Egg to see two old friends whom I scarcely knew at all. Their house was even more elaborate than I expected, a cheerful red-and-white Georgian Colonial mansion, overlooking the bay. The lawn started at the beach and ran towards the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over sundials and brick walks and burning gardensāfinally when it reached the house drifting up the side in bright vines as though from the momentum of its run. The front was broken by a line of French windows, glowing now with reflected gold and wide open to the warm windy afternoon, and Tom Buchanan in riding clothes was standing with his legs apart on the front porch.
He had changed since his New Haven years. Now he was a sturdy straw-haired man of thirty, with a rather hard mouth and a supercilious manner. Two shining arrogant eyes had established dominance over his face and gave him the appearance of always leaning aggressively forward. Not even the effeminate swank of his riding clothes could hide the enormous power of that bodyāhe seemed to fill those glistening boots until he strained the top lacing, and you could see a great pack of muscle shifting when his shoulder moved under his thin coat. It was a body capable of enormous leverageāa cruel body.
His speaking voice, a gruff husky tenor, added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed. There was a touch of paternal contempt in it, even toward people he likedāand there were men at New Haven who had hated his guts.
āNow, donāt think my opinion on these matters is final,ā he seemed to say, ājust because Iām stronger and more of a man than you are.ā We were in the same senior society, and while we were never intimate I always had the impression that he approved of me and wanted me to like him with some harsh, defiant wistfulness of his own.
We talked for a few minutes on the sunny porch.
āIāve got a nice place here,ā he said, his eyes flashing about restlessly.
Turning me around by one arm, he moved a broad flat hand along the front vista, including in its sweep a sunken Italian garden, a half acre of deep, pungent roses, and a snub-nosed motorboat that bumped the tide offshore.
āIt belonged to Demaine, the oil man.ā He turned me around again, politely and abruptly. āWeāll go inside.ā
We walked through a high hallway into a bright rosy-coloured space, fragilely bound into the house by French windows at either end. The windows were ajar and gleaming white against the fresh grass outside that seemed to grow a little way into the house. A breeze blew through the room, blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale flags, twisting them up toward the frosted wedding-cake of the ceiling, and then rippled over the wine-coloured rug, making a shadow on it as wind does on the sea.
The only completely stationary object in the room was an enormous couch on which two young women were buoyed up as though upon an anchored balloon. They were both in white, and their dresses were rippling and fluttering as if they had just been blown back in after a short flight around the house. I must have stood for a few moments listening to the whip and snap of the curtains and the groan of a picture on the wall. Then there was a boom as Tom Buchanan shut the rear windows and the caught wind died out about the room, and the curtains and the rugs and the two young women ballooned slowly to the floor.
The younger of the two was a stranger to me. She was extended full length at her end of the divan, completely motionless, and with her chin raised a little, as if she were balancing something on it which was quite likely to fall. If she saw me out of the corner of her eyes she gave no hint of itāindeed, I was almost surprised into murmuring an apology for having disturbed her by coming in.
The other girl, Daisy, made an attempt to riseāshe leaned slightly forward with a conscientious expressionāthen she laughed, an absurd, charming little laugh, and I laughed too and came forward into the room.
āIām p-paralysed with happiness.ā
She
------------------------
[Tablet: 3072 Tokens ]
------------------------
laughed again, as if she said something very witty, and held my hand for a moment, looking up into my face, promising that there was no one in the world she so much wanted to see. That was a way she had. She hinted in a murmur that the surname of the balancing girl was Baker. (Iāve heard it said that Daisyās murmur was only to make people lean toward her; an irrelevant criticism that made it no less charming.)
At any rate, Miss Bakerās lips fluttered, she nodded at me almost imperceptibly, and then quickly tipped her head back againāthe object she was balancing had obviously tottered a little and given her something of a fright. Again a sort of apology arose to my lips. Almost any exhibition of complete self-sufficiency draws a stunned tribute from me.
I looked back at my cousin, who began to ask me questions in her low, thrilling voice. It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again. Her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes and a bright passionate mouth, but there was an excitement in her voice that men who had cared for her found difficult to forget: a singing compulsion, a whispered āListen,ā a promise that she had done gay, exciting things just a while since and that there were gay, exciting things hovering in the next hour.
I told her how I had stopped off in Chicago for a day on my way East, and how a dozen people had sent their love through me.
āDo they miss me?ā she cried ecstatically.
āThe whole town is desolate. All the cars have the left rear wheel painted black as a mourning wreath, and thereās a persistent wail all night along the north shore.ā
āHow gorgeous! Letās go back, Tom. Tomorrow!ā Then she added irrelevantly: āYou ought to see the baby.ā
āIād like to.ā
āSheās asleep. Sheās three years old. Havenāt you ever seen her?ā
āNever.ā
āWell, you ought to see her. Sheāsāā
Tom Buchanan, who had been hovering restlessly about the room, stopped and rested his hand on my shoulder.
āWhat you doing, Nick?ā
āIām a bond man.ā
āWho with?ā
I told him.
āNever heard of them,ā he remarked decisively.
This annoyed me.
āYou will,ā I answered shortly. āYou will if you stay in the East.ā
āOh, Iāll stay in the East, donāt you worry,ā he said, glancing at Daisy and then back at me, as if he were alert for something more. āIād be a God damned fool to live anywhere else.ā
At this point Miss Baker said: āAbsolutely!ā with such suddenness that I startedāit was the first word she had uttered since I came into the room. Evidently it surprised her as much as it did me, for she yawned and with a series of rapid, deft movements stood up into the room.
āIām stiff,ā she complained, āIāve been lying on that sofa for as long as I can remember.ā
āDonāt look at me,ā Daisy retorted, āIāve been trying to get you to New York all afternoon.ā
āNo, thanks,ā said Miss Baker to the four cocktails just in from the pantry. āIām absolutely in training.ā
Her host looked at her incredulously.
āYou are!ā He took down his drink as if it were a drop in the bottom of a glass. āHow you ever get anything done is beyond me.ā
I looked at Miss Baker, wondering what it was she āgot done.ā I enjoyed looking at her. She was a slender, small-breasted girl, with an erect carriage, which she accentuated by throwing her body backward at the shoulders like a young cadet. Her grey sun-strained eyes looked back at me with polite reciprocal curiosity out of a wan, charming, discontented face. It occurred to me now that I had seen her, or a picture of her, somewhere before.
āYou live in West Egg,ā she remarked contemptuously. āI know somebody there.ā
āI donāt know a singleāā
āYou must know Gatsby.ā
āGatsby?ā demanded Daisy. āWhat Gatsby?ā
Before I could reply that he was my neighbour dinner was announced; wedging his tense arm imperatively under mine, Tom Buchanan compelled me from the room as though he were moving a checker to another square.
Slenderly, languidly, their hands set lightly on their hips, the two young women preceded us out on to a rosy-coloured porch, open toward the sunset, where four candles flickered on the table in the diminished wind.
āWhy candles?ā objected Daisy, frowning. She snapped them out with her fingers. āIn two weeks itāll be the longest day in the year.ā She looked at us all radiantly. āDo you always watch for the longest day of the year and then miss it? I always watch for the longest day in the year and then miss it.ā
āWe ought to plan something,ā yawned Miss Baker, sitting down at the table as if she were getting into bed.
āAll right,ā said Daisy. āWhatāll we plan?ā She turned to me helplessly: āWhat do people plan?ā
Before I could answer her eyes fastened with an awed expression on her little finger.
āLook!ā she complained; āI hurt it.ā
We all lookedāthe knuckle was black and blue.
āYou did it, Tom,ā she said accusingly. āI know you didnāt mean to, but you did do it. Thatās what I get for marrying a brute of a man, a great, big, hulking physical specimen of aāā
āI hate that word āhulking,ā ā objected Tom crossly, āeven in kidding.ā
āHulking,ā insisted Daisy.
Sometimes she and Miss Baker talked at once, unobtrusively and with a bantering inconsequence that was never quite chatter, that was as cool as their white dresses and their impersonal eyes in the absence of all desire. They were here, and they accepted Tom and me, making only a polite pleasant effort to entertain or to be entertained. They knew that presently dinner would be over and a little later the evening too would be over and casually put away. It was sharply different from the West, where an evening was hurried from phase to phase towards its close, in a continually disappointed anticipation or else in sheer nervous dread of the moment itself.
āYou make me feel uncivilized, Daisy,ā I confessed on my second glass of corky but rather impressive claret. āCanāt you talk about crops or something?ā
I meant nothing in particular by this remark, but it was taken up in an unexpected way.
āCivilizationās going to pieces,ā broke out Tom violently. āIāve gotten to be a terrible pessimist about things. Have you read The Rise of the Coloured Empires by this man Goddard?ā
āWhy, no,ā I answered, rather surprised by his tone.
āWell, itās a fine book, and everybody ought to read it. The idea is if we donāt look out the white race will beāwill be utterly submerged. Itās all scientific stuff; itās been proved.ā
āTomās getting very profound,ā said Daisy, with an expression of unthoughtful sadness. āHe reads deep books with long words in them. What was that word weāā
āWell, these books are all scientific,ā insisted Tom, glancing at her impatiently. āThis fellow has worked out the whole thing. Itās up to us, who are the dominant race, to watch out or these other races will have control of things.ā
āWeāve got to beat them down,ā whispered Daisy, winking ferociously toward the fervent sun.
āYou ought to live in Californiaāā began Miss Baker, but Tom interrupted her by shifting heavily in his chair.
āThis idea is that weāre Nordics. I am, and you are, and you are, andāā After an infinitesimal hesitation he included Daisy with a slight nod, and she winked at me again. āāAnd weāve produced all the things that go to make civilizationāoh, science and art, and all that. Do you see?ā
There was something pathetic in his concentration, as if his complacency, more acute than of old, was not enough to him any more. When, almost immediately, the telephone rang inside and the butler left the porch Daisy seized upon the momentary interruption and leaned towards me.
āIāll tell you a family secret,ā she whispered enthusiastically. āItās about the butlerās nose. Do you want to hear about the butlerās nose?ā
āThatās why I came over tonight.ā
āWell, he wasnāt always a butler; he used to be the silver polisher for some people in New York that had a silver service for two hundred people. He had to polish it from morning till night, until finally it began to affect his noseāā
āThings went from bad to worse,ā suggested Miss Baker.
āYes. Things went from bad to worse, until finally he had to give up his position.ā
For a moment the last sunshine fell with romantic affection upon her glowing face; her voice compelled me forward breathlessly as I listenedāthen the glow faded, each light deserting her with lingering regret, like children leaving a pleasant street at dusk.
The butler came back and murmured something close to Tomās ear, whereupon Tom frowned, pushed back his chair, and without a word went inside. As if his absence quickened something within her, Daisy leaned forward again, her voice glowing and singing.
āI love to see you at my table, Nick. You remind me of aāof a rose, an absolute rose. Doesnāt he?ā She turned to Miss Baker for confirmation: āAn absolute rose?ā
This was untrue. I am not even faintly like a rose. She was only extemporizing, but a stirring warmth flowed from her, as if her heart was trying to come out to you concealed in one of those breathless, thrilling words. Then suddenly she threw her napkin on the table and excused herself and went into the house.
Miss Baker and I exchanged a short glance consciously devoid of meaning. I was about to speak when she sat up alertly and said āSh!ā in a warning voice. A subdued impassioned murmur was audible in the room beyond, and Miss Baker leaned forward unashamed, trying to hear. The murmur trembled on the verge of coherence, sank down, mounted excitedly, and then ceased altogether.
āThis Mr. Gatsby you spoke of is my neighbourāā I began.
āDonāt talk. I want to hear what happens.ā
āIs something happening?ā I inquired innocently.
āYou mean to say you donāt know?ā said Miss Baker, honestly surprised. āI thought everybody knew.ā
āI donāt.ā
āWhyāā she said hesitantly. āTomās got some woman in New York.ā
āGot some woman?ā I repeated blankly.
Miss Baker nodded.
āShe might have the decency not to telephone him at dinner time. Donāt you think?ā
Almost before I had grasped her meaning there was the flutter of a dress and the crunch of leather boots, and Tom and Daisy were back at the table.
āIt couldnāt be helped!ā cried Daisy with tense gaiety.
She sat down, glanced searchingly at Miss Baker and then at me, and continued: āI looked outdoors for a minute, and itās very romantic outdoors. Thereās a bird on the lawn that I think must be a nightingale come over on the Cunard or White Star Line. Heās singing awayāā Her voice sang: āItās romantic, isnāt it, Tom?ā
āVery romantic,ā he said, and then miserably to me: āIf itās light enough after dinner, I want to take you down to the stables.ā
The telephone rang inside, startlingly, and as Daisy shook her head decisively at Tom the subject of the stables, in fact all subjects, vanished into air. Among the broken fragments of the last five minutes at table I remember the candles being lit again, pointlessly, and I was conscious of wanting to look squarely at everyone, and yet to avoid all eyes. I couldnāt guess what Daisy and Tom were thinking, but I doubt if even Miss Baker, who seemed to have mastered a certain hardy scepticism, was able utterly to put this fifth guestās shrill metallic urgency out of mind. To a certain temperament the situation might have seemed intriguingāmy own instinct was to telephone immediately for the police.
The horses, needless to say, were not mentioned again. Tom and Miss Baker, with several feet of twilight between them, strolled back into the library, as if to a vigil beside a perfectly tangible body, while, trying to look pleasantly interested and a little deaf, I followed Daisy around a chain of connecting verandas to the porch in front. In its deep gloom we sat down side by side on a wicker settee.
Daisy took her face in her hands as if feeling its lovely shape, and her eyes moved gradually out into the velvet dusk. I saw that turbulent emotions possessed her, so I asked what I thought would be some sedative questions about her little girl.
āWe donāt know each other very well, Nick,ā she said suddenly. āEven if we are cousins. You didnāt come to my wedding.ā
āI wasnāt back from the war.ā
āThatās true.ā She hesitated. āWell, Iāve had a very bad time, Nick, and Iām pretty cynical about everything.ā
Evidently she had reason to be. I waited but she
------------------------
[Scroll: 6144 Tokens ]
------------------------
didnāt say any more, and after a moment I returned rather feebly to the subject of her daughter.
āI suppose she talks, andāeats, and everything.ā
āOh, yes.ā She looked at me absently. āListen, Nick; let me tell you what I said when she was born. Would you like to hear?ā
āVery much.ā
āItāll show you how Iāve gotten to feel aboutāthings. Well, she was less than an hour old and Tom was God knows where. I woke up out of the ether with an utterly abandoned feeling, and asked the nurse right away if it was a boy or a girl. She told me it was a girl, and so I turned my head away and wept. āAll right,ā I said, āIām glad itās a girl. And I hope sheāll be a foolāthatās the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.ā
āYou see I think everythingās terrible anyhow,ā she went on in a convinced way. āEverybody thinks soāthe most advanced people. And I know. Iāve been everywhere and seen everything and done everything.ā Her eyes flashed around her in a defiant way, rather like Tomās, and she laughed with thrilling scorn. āSophisticatedāGod, Iām sophisticated!ā
The instant her voice broke off, ceasing to compel my attention, my belief, I felt the basic insincerity of what she had said. It made me uneasy, as though the whole evening had been a trick of some sort to exact a contributory emotion from me. I waited, and sure enough, in a moment she looked at me with an absolute smirk on her lovely face, as if she had asserted her membership in a rather distinguished secret society to which she and Tom belonged.
Inside, the crimson room bloomed with light. Tom and Miss Baker sat at either end of the long couch and she read aloud to him from the Saturday Evening Postāthe words, murmurous and uninflected, running together in a soothing tune. The lamplight, bright on his boots and dull on the autumn-leaf yellow of her hair, glinted along the paper as she turned a page with a flutter of slender muscles in her arms.
When we came in she held us silent for a moment with a lifted hand.
āTo be continued,ā she said, tossing the magazine on the table, āin our very next issue.ā
Her body asserted itself with a restless movement of her knee, and she stood up.
āTen oāclock,ā she remarked, apparently finding the time on the ceiling. āTime for this good girl to go to bed.ā
āJordanās going to play in the tournament tomorrow,ā explained Daisy, āover at Westchester.ā
āOhāyouāre Jordan Baker.ā
I knew now why her face was familiarāits pleasing contemptuous expression had looked out at me from many rotogravure pictures of the sporting life at Asheville and Hot Springs and Palm Beach. I had heard some story of her too, a critical, unpleasant story, but what it was I had forgotten long ago.
āGood night,ā she said softly. āWake me at eight, wonāt you.ā
āIf youāll get up.ā
āI will. Good night, Mr. Carraway. See you anon.ā
āOf course you will,ā confirmed Daisy. āIn fact I think Iāll arrange a marriage. Come over often, Nick, and Iāll sort ofāohāfling you together. You knowālock you up accidentally in linen closets and push you out to sea in a boat, and all that sort of thingāā
āGood night,ā called Miss Baker from the stairs. āI havenāt heard a word.ā
āSheās a nice girl,ā said Tom after a moment. āThey oughtnāt to let her run around the country this way.ā
āWho oughtnāt to?ā inquired Daisy coldly.
āHer family.ā
āHer family is one aunt about a thousand years old. Besides, Nickās going to look after her, arenāt you, Nick? Sheās going to spend lots of weekends out here this summer. I think the home influence will be very good for her.ā
Daisy and Tom looked at each other for a moment in silence.
āIs she from New York?ā I asked quickly.
āFrom Louisville. Our white girlhood was passed together there. Our beautiful whiteāā
āDid you give Nick a little heart to heart talk on the veranda?ā demanded Tom suddenly.
āDid I?ā She looked at me. āI canāt seem to remember, but I think we talked about the Nordic race. Yes, Iām sure we did. It sort of crept up on us and first thing you knowāā
āDonāt believe everything you hear, Nick,ā he advised me.
I said lightly that I had heard nothing at all, and a few minutes later I got up to go home. They came to the door with me and stood side by side in a cheerful square of light. As I started my motor Daisy peremptorily called: āWait!ā
āI forgot to ask you something, and itās important. We heard you were engaged to a girl out West.ā
āThatās right,ā corroborated Tom kindly. āWe heard that you were engaged.ā
āItās a libel. Iām too poor.ā
āBut we heard it,ā insisted Daisy, surprising me by opening up again in a flower-like way. āWe heard it from three people, so it must be true.ā
Of course I knew what they were referring to, but I wasnāt even vaguely engaged. The fact that gossip had published the banns was one of the reasons I had come East. You canāt stop going with an old friend on account of rumours, and on the other hand I had no intention of being rumoured into marriage.
Their interest rather touched me and made them less remotely richānevertheless, I was confused and a little disgusted as I drove away. It seemed to me that the thing for Daisy to do was to rush out of the house, child in armsābut apparently there were no such intentions in her head. As for Tom, the fact that he āhad some woman in New Yorkā was really less surprising than that he had been depressed by a book. Something was making him nibble at the edge of stale ideas as if his sturdy physical egotism no longer nourished his peremptory heart.
Already it was deep summer on roadhouse roofs and in front of wayside garages, where new red petrol-pumps sat out in pools of light, and when I reached my estate at West Egg I ran the car under its shed and sat for a while on an abandoned grass roller in the yard. The wind had blown off, leaving a loud, bright night, with wings beating in the trees and a persistent organ sound as the full bellows of the earth blew the frogs full of life. The silhouette of a moving cat wavered across the moonlight, and, turning my head to watch it, I saw that I was not aloneāfifty feet away a figure had emerged from the shadow of my neighbourās mansion and was standing with his hands in his pockets regarding the silver pepper of the stars. Something in his leisurely movements and the secure position of his feet upon the lawn suggested that it was Mr. Gatsby himself, come out to determine what share was his of our local heavens.
I decided to call to him. Miss Baker had mentioned him at dinner, and that would do for an introduction. But I didnāt call to him, for he gave a sudden intimation that he was content to be aloneāhe stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily I glanced seawardāand distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock. When I looked once more for Gatsby he had vanished, and I was alone again in the unquiet darkness.
II
About halfway between West Egg and New York the motor road hastily joins the railroad and runs beside it for a quarter of a mile, so as to shrink away from a certain desolate area of land. This is a valley of ashesāa fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of ash-grey men, who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air. Occasionally a line of grey cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak, and comes to rest, and immediately the ash-grey men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud, which screens their obscure operations from your sight.
But above the grey land and the spasms of bleak dust which drift endlessly over it, you perceive, after a moment, the eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg. The eyes of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg are blue and giganticātheir retinas are one yard high. They look out of no face, but, instead, from a pair of enormous yellow spectacles which pass over a nonexistent nose. Evidently some wild wag of an oculist set them there to
------------------------
[Opus: 8192 Tokens ]
------------------------
submitted by
Personal_Hippo1277 to
NovelAi [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 02:20 Septfox Waterproof protector for a latex topper, yay/nay? Opinions on toppers for someone who dislikes most types?
My sleep situation the last couple years has been...non-ideal, but I'm getting around to setting up a bed and sleeping on a mattress like a normal adult. I have an old firm non-pillowtop Simmons Beautyrest mattress that can be charitably described as "supportive", and has never agreed with me very well. Rather than go out and buy a whole new mattress, I'm strongly considering (really, have all but gone ahead and ordered) picking up a soft 3" Sleep On Latex topper to just make it into a pillowtop. The mattress isn't sagging or anything, after all, it's just...y'know...only slightly more comfortable to lay on than a carpeted floor.
The bit of traditional wisdom I know of - that is, based on pillowtops and foam toppers - says to get a waterproof protector because if nothing else sweat/body oils will gum up anything and especially eat memory foam over time. But latex is supposed to be washable to an extent, and reading through some of an AMA by the SoL guys from a while back finds them saying that waterproofing is unneeded and they actually don't recommend anything more than a cotton topper in order to keep the latex feel unmolested.
I don't really eat/drink in bed: the most it has to fear from me is probably just a bit of night sweat and the occasional drips of condensation when I do enjoy a cold bedside drink. I guess there's also the outside possibility that the cat might puke on it before I can toss her off. I also live in Missouri and the AC doesn't always keep up, so the ambient humidity could peak as high as 70%.
So all that in mind...should I even bother with more than a basic cotton jersey fitted sheet+flat sheet?
I'm also open to alternatives: I'm so strongly considering latex because I'm not looking to lay out the cost for a decently thick wool topper, I don't care for the warmth of traditional fiberfill and memory foam, and the last memory foam topper I had just...didn't last very long anyway despite being protected from moisture.
Latex is moderately pricey up front, but the potential longevity and low maintenance appeals to me and my admittedly limited experience with latex pillows found me liking the springy feel of it. And hey, as far as Sleep on Latex goes...free returns. But I can probably be talked into trying most anything in the sub-$300 range as long as returns are an option.
submitted by
Septfox to
Mattress [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 01:58 Ifasogbon Ogunda Ose - Ado Ekiti Odun Agbaye. International Ifa Council
WORLD IFA/ORISA FESTIVAL AND PILGRIMAGE 2023/2024
Preamble The Pilgrimage for this year took a new turn. The Pilgims who attended this year's event was unprecedented. So far, we recorded the highest number of Pilgrims. Also, people came from Rep Du Benin, Rep Du Togo, Cote d'Ivoire, Yoruba people from Gambia were in attendance. Also in attendance were Pilgrims from USA, Venezuela, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, etc. Those who could not attend physically sent their various Ifa messages on Ogunda Ose. Messages came from Brasil, Cuba, Argentina, Spain, Germany, Ecuardo, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbedos, Jamaica etc. It was truly a Pilgrimage and Festival of World dimension. It is completely beyond the shores of Yoruba land!!!
Health Right from the 20th of May when all Pilgrims converged at Ado Ekiti, our Medical teams were busy attending to the medical needs of the people, both Pilgrims and indigenes of the communities that we went to. The health of the people is one of our major priorities.
Transportation and Logistics: Because there were more Pilgrims who attended this year's Festival and Pilgrimage, there were more vehicles which conveyed the Pilgrims to the various Holy Sites. Everything went smoothly, all thanks to the Green Circle International and the Ekiti State Ministry of Arts and Culture. The Director of Arts and Culture deserves our special mention. His diligence made everyting stress free for us throughout the 9-day period.
Our thanks and gratitude go to all the Royal Fathers who stood by us throughout the Pilgrimage period.
Our thanks also go to His Exellency, the Governor of Ekiti State who graciously released Oke Igeti, the home of Orunmila to us. Not only that, the Governor promises to develop Oke Igeti to Holy site of International standard. The International Council For Ifa Religion will forever be grateful to you sir. I enjoin all Ifa devotees throughout the world to please remember the Governor of Ekiti State in your daily prayers. Ase!!! In view of this heartwarming development, i enjoin all devotees throughout the world to come and see the seats of Orunmila-In-Council; the misterious water that Orunmila was using to initiate and heal people; the wonder Opon Ifa that Orunmila was using for consultation at Oke Igeti. This Opon Ifa is made of quartz stone. Come and see the Ope Awonyin that Orunmila was using; come and marvel at the Irosun trees that produce iyerosun powder for Orunmila and his Awo. In short, come and see Ifa wonder at Oke Igeti!!! All these become possible through the grace of the Governor and our Royal Fathers, especially the Ewi of Ado.
E JE KI A FI IBA FUN ORUNMILA NITORI O JE ASIWAJU RERE!!!
WORLD IFA CONSULTATION AT THE FOOT OF OKE IGETI, ADO EKITI ON OJO ABA META, SATURDAY, MAY 27, 2023.
Elders in 17 countries were present for the World Annual Ifa Consultation in Oke Igeti. Eleven countries physically gave messages on Oke Igeti while eight other countries sent their messages via internet and other social media.
The Odu that was revealed during consultation is Ogunda'See, Ogunda Ose. Ifa came with the IRE of cool prosperity for all devotees in the next 12 months and beyond.
For this reason, all Ifa and Orisa Temples need to feed Ifa with one white pigeon each. Each temple also needs to feed each Orisa in the Temple with one eku emo, brown rat. If there are 20 Orisa in a particular Temple, there is the need to procure 20 eku emo and give one to each Orisa in that Temple.
Each member also need to procure six catfish, three to feed Ori and three to feed Ifa.
For those who are born by this Odu during Ikosedaye or Itenifa, there is the need to feed Ifa with one eku emo, apart from the materials mentioned above.
MAIN MESSAGES OF OGUNDA OSE FOR THE YEAR 2023/2024
- Ifa says that all Temples around the world will be blessed with success and prosperity. Ifa says that all Temples shall also be blessed with free gifts that will change our lives for good.
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with 4 hens, 16 pigeons and money. There is also the need to feed Ewiri, the blacksmith's anvil as recommended by Ifa. On this Ifa says:
Ogunda'see ni o m'ese oyun A o m'ese osika l'ona Dia fun Ewiri Ti yoo maa f'enu re fa ifa wo'le Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Ko pe, ko jinna E waa ba'ni ni jebutu ire
Translation Ogunda'see does not know the footprint of a pregnant woman We cannot identify the footprint of a wicked person on the road Ifa's message for Ewiri, the Anvil Who will use his mouth to attract free gifts to his home He was advised to offer ebo He complies Before long, and not too far Join us in the midst of all ire of life
- Ifa says that apart from feeding Ewiri, the Anvil, there is equally the need for all Temples to procure sekere made with cowries. This sekere is to be played regularly in all Temples. Doing so will attract wealth and prosperity into our Temples and all members will benefit from the grace of the Divinities. On this, Ifa says:
Ogunda Sense Babalawo Sekere to dia fun Sekere Ti n s'awo re'lu il'Aje Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Nje Sekere ma rin, maa yan Ara a re l'okun Ara a re l'Aje gbe n so
Translation Ogunda Sense, Ifa cast for Sekere, When going to the land of prosperity, She was advised to offer ebo She complied Sekere walk and match majestically, Your body is filled qith Okun beads, Your body germinates wealth and prosperity
- Ifa says that even though success and prosperity are guaranteed for members of all Temples this year, Ifa however warns all men never to maltreat their spouses for any reason whatsoever. Ifa also advises all women never to provoke their spouses. Ifa says that women in the Temples will be protected and blessed by Orunmila this year. What all women need to do is to support, assist encourage and bless their men to succeed.
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with 4 rats, 4 fish, 4 pigeons, 4 hens, 4 guinea fowls, 4 roosters and money in the multiples of four. There is also the need for each Temple to feed Ifa with a mature she goat. On this, Ifa says;
Ewekewe inu igbe okan soso ni n so Dia fun Ifajinrin Ti n s'omo bibi inu Agbonniregun Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo E ma na 'Fajinrin aya Awo E ma na 'Fajinrin aya Awo Eeyan to ba na 'Fajinrin Yoo ri'ja Ifa E ma na 'Fajinrin aya Awo
Translation All mysterious leaves in the forest germinate only one, Ifa's message for Ifajinrin, The child of Agbonniregun, She was advised to offer ebo, She complied , Do not maltreat 'Fajinrin, the wife of Awo, Do not beat 'Fajinrin, the wife pf Awo , The person who maltreats 'Fajinrin, With face the wrath of Ifa, Do not maltreat 'Fajinrin, the wife of Awo
- Ifa assures all devotees that they will be protected against all forms of violent or untimely death. Iga says that no matter how dire the situation may be, they will be protected and spared. Ifa advises all Temple members to make Orunmila their sanctuary. Each Temple is advised to offer ebo with one mature he goat, lead and money and feed Ifa with one mature she goat.
Orunmila wi o m'oju jo emere Emi naa wi, mo lo m'oju jo emere Orunmila ni omo Ogun to m'oju jo emere To dabi wipe yoo kuu Orunmila ni ko nii ku Orunmila wi o lo m'oju jo emere Emi naa wi, mo lo m'oju jo emere Orunmila ni omo Ija to m'oju jo emere To dabi wipe yoo kuu Orunmila ni ko nii ku Orunmila wi o lo m'oju jo emere Emi naa wi, mo lo m'oju jo emere Orunmila ni omo Osoosi to m'oju jo emere To dabi wipe yoo kuu Orunmila ni ko nii ku Orunmila wii, o lo m'oju jo emere Emi naa wi, mo lo m'oju jo emere Orunmila ni omo oun to m'oju jo emere To dabi wipe yoo kuu Orunmila ni ko nii ku Orunmila ni bo ba se bi ise omo toun ba ni Oje kii ku l'emere Sunmunu, omo oje a d'agba
Translation Orunmila declares that he looks like someone destined to die young, I chorus that he looks like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that the child of Ogun who, appears like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that he will not die young, Orunmila declares that he looks like someone destined to die young, I chorus that he looks like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that the child of Ija who appears like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that he will not die young, Orunmila declares that he looks like someone destined to die young, I chorus that he looks like someone destined to die young, Orunmils says that the child of Osoosi who appears like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that he will not die young, Orunmila declares that he looks like someone destined to die young, I chorus that he looks like someone destined to die young Orunmila says that the child of Agbonniregun who appears like someone destined to die young, Orunmila says that he will not die young, Orunmila declares that the lead does not die young, The child of oje, lead is boung to enjoy long life
- Ifa says that Temple members looking for the blessing of the fruit of the womb shall be blessed according to their hearts desire. Ifa advises those looking for the fruit of the womb to offer ebo with 4 rats, 4 fish, 2 hens one she goat and money. Out of these ebo materials, 2 rats, 2 fish and one hen will be used to feed Ifa. On this, Ifa says:
Orunmila wi o da'see Mi o da'see Bara a mi Agbonniregun Orunmila wi eyi to da'see si'kun omo eku Oyun lo maa fi ni Omo lo maa fi bi Orunmila wi o da'see Mi o da'see Bara a mi Agbonniregun Orunmila ni eyi to da'see si'kun omo eja Oyun lo maa fi ni Omo lo maa fi bi Orunmila wi o da'see Mi o da'see Baraa mi Agbonniregun Orunmila wi eyi to da'see si'kun omo eye Oyun lo maa fi ni Omo lo maa fi bi Orunmila wi o da'see Mi o da'see Bara a mi Agbonniregun Orunmila wi eyi to da'see si'kun omo eran Oyun lo maa fi ni Omo lo maa fi bi Orunmila wi o lo da'see Mi o da'see Bara a mi Agbonniregun Orunmila wi eyi to da'see si'kun Apetebi aya Akapo toun Oyun lo maa fi ni Omo lo maa fi bi
Translation Orunmila declares the menstral fluid is no longer flowing, I chorus that it in no longer flowing, Agbonniregun my father, Orunmila says that the fluid that ceases to flow in the womb of the rat, It will lead to pregnancy, The outcome will be babies, Orunmila declares that the menstrual fluid is no longer flowing, I chorus that it is no longer flowing Agbonniregun my father, Orunmila says that the menstrual fluid that, ceases to flow in the womb of the fish , It will become pregnancy, The outcome will be babies, Orunmila declares that the menstrual fluid is no longer flowing , I chorus that it is no longer flowing Agbonniregun my father, Orunmila says that the menstrual fluid that, ceases to flow in the womb of the bird, It will become pregnancy, The outcome will be babies, Orunmila declares that the menstrual fluid os no longer flowing, I chorus that it is no longer flowing Agbonniregun my father, Orunmila says that the menstrual fluid that ceases to flow, It will become pregnancy , The outcome will be babies , Orunmila declares that the menstrual fluid is no longer flowing , I chorus that it is no longer flowing Agbonniregun my father , Orunmila says that the menstrual fluid that, ceases to flow in the womb of the beast, It will become pregnancy , The outcome will be babies , Orunmila declares that the menstrual fluid is no longer flowing , I chorus that it is no longer flowing Agbonniregun my father , Orunmila says that the menstrual fluid that ceases to flow in the womb of Apetebi the wife of my Akapo It will become pregnancy The outcome will be babies
- Ifa assures all devotees that they will be protected against untimely death, especially the type that affects multitudes. Ifa warns that all devotees needs to avoid the consumption of mushrooms of any kind in the next 12 months.
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with one mature he goat and plenty of different mushrooms. On this, Ifa says:
Gagamaniwa Dia fun orunlojo esun A bu fun Etipatiro Won ni ki won ru'bo Ki won ma baa ku iku ajoku Etipatiro nikan lo nbe leyin to n s'ebo Nje gbo esun lo n ku Etipatiro nikan ni kii ba won ku iku ajoku
Translation Gagamaniwa, He cast ifa for 165 different mushrooms , And also for Etipatiro, They were advised to offer ebo, For them not to experience death in multitudes , Only Etipatiro complied and offered ebo, All myshrooms die, Only Etipatiro was spared ,
- Ifa says that Ifa and Orisa Temples and their devotees will be blessed with success, good luck, prosperity and longevity.
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with one he goat, one she goat and money. There is also the beed to feed Ogun with one rooster, roasted corn, roasted yams and palm oil. On this, Ifa says:
Ewu l'ori arugbo Kasan l'orun aj'ewa Akutapa okete Dia fun Olori-Ire Tii s'omo Ogunda Ose Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Gunnugun kii ku l'ewe Kangere, ma d'agba ma d'arugbo, kangere Akalamagbo won kii ku l'ewe Kangere, ma d'agba ma d'arugbo, kangere
Translation Grey hair fills the head of an aged person, Veins appear round the neck of beans consumer, When big rat dies, its limbs are stretched before it is smoked , Ifa's messages for Olori-Ire, the Lucky One, The offspring of Ogunda Ose , He wasadvised to offer ebo, He complied, The vulture never dies young, I will live to my old age, And Akalamagbo vulture never dies young, I will live to my old age,
- Ifa says that Ifa and Orisa devotees throughout the world will be blessed with all ire of life. Ifa however warns that we need to be contented with the blessings that Olodumare has given to us. We must not be greedy; we must not cheat; we must not tell lies and we must not be diabolic in all our undertakings in life
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with one he goat, one she goat, four pigeons and money. There us also the need to feed Ifa with one she goat.
Apaadi to d'oju de ogiri T'ogiri nii se Dia fun Orunmila Baba n sunkun oun o ri're pe Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Nje ti'nu-t'eyin mi re e o Labalaba kii s'ede Ti'nu-t'eyin mi re e o
Translation Any potshwrd that faces the wall, Belongs to the wall, Ifa's message for Orunmila , When lamenting and complaining his inability to have all ire of life, He wasadvised to offer ebo, He complied, I harbor no secret anywhere, The butterfly harbors no diabolical plan, This is me in and out
- Ifa warns all devotees not to be foing out in the dead of the night. All Temple leaders and administrators need to warn all their members to desist drom going out in the night. It is to protect members from danger.
Ifa advises each Temple to offer ebo with one he goat three guinea fowls and money. On this, Ifa says:
Alapandede nii ko si'le ana a re koro Oko eni nii wo'le to'ni Dia fun Oru Ti n loo gbe Olowo n'iyawo Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O ko'ti ogbonyin s'ebo Nje Oru o ma m'Olowo Ifa k'eni ma rin l'oru
Translation The bat flies into its mother's nest quietly, One's husband is he who has the right to enter one's room, Ifa's message for Oru, the Dead of the Night, When going to marry Olowo as wife, He was advised to offer ebo , He failed to comply, The dead of the night has no respect for any honorable person, Ifa warns all not to go out at night
- Ifa advises all devotees to take very good care of their hygiene. They need to eat healthy meals. This will help chase ailments away from all members. There is the need for Temple leaders to lay emphasis on personal and enviromental hygiene to members of their congregations.
Ebo materials here are one he goat, three guinea fowls and money. Special akose can also be prepared for members suffering from any ailment
Ogunda-see o m'ese oyun Aba o m'ese onde Oosa gbagbe, ko la'se e pepeye A ti nba won rin A o mo'nu u won A o m'eke A n b'eke l'owo Dia fun Olofin Won ni ko ru'bo Ki arun-un kange-kange o ma baa se e O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Ipepe la mu sin'ra Agbon la fi gb'arun danu
Translation Ogunda Ose cannot detected the footprint of a pregnant woman, The chain cannot detect the legs of its captive, Orisa forgot to separate the toes of a duck, We are miving with them, We do not know their mind, We do not know the liar, We are shaking hands with cheats, Ifa's messages for Olofin, When he wasadvised to offer ebo, In order to avoid being inflicted with ailments He complied, We have used strong barks to strengthen our body , And used basket to chase ailments away
- Ifa says that there is the need for all Temples to offer ebo for the protection of the young ones in the Temples against untimely death and calamity.
Ebo materials here are one completely black she goat, one completely black female sheep and one completely black hen. These materials will be used to feed Iroko tree. On this, Ifa says:
Okun ya di'na O mi lengbe sihin-in O mi lengbe sohun-un Dia fun Iya Irenre-Molode To yoo ma f'omo re da'jo Ebo ni won ni ko waa se O gb'ebo, o ru'bo Ewure dudu mo mu bo Iroko Ki'ku o ma pa Irenre-Molode omo o mi o Aguntan dudu mo mu bo Iroko Ki'ku o ma pa Irenre-Molode omo o mi o Adie okoko dudu momu bo Iroko Ki'ku o ma pa Irenre-Molode omo o mi o
Translation The sea overflows its bank, It flows to this side, And flows majestically to the other side, Ifa's message for the mother of Irenre-Molode, Who had been losing herchildren to death, She was advised to offer ebo, She complied, A black she goat i have procured to feed Iroko May death not snatch away Irenre-Molode my child A black ewe i have brought to feed Iroko May death not take away Irenre-Molode my baby I have brought a black hen to propitiate Iroko May death spare the life of Irenre-Molode my child
- Ifa warns all devotees not to inflict pain on those who had once helped them in one way or the other. Members must never pay good deeds with evil. Not heeding this warning may lead to serious repercaution for the culprit
Ebo materials here are three he goats and money. On this, Ifa says:
Oka lo m'ori jo ade Okuuku lo fi fifa jo ere Dia fun Ogun Ti a bi l'ode Ire Ti won o ja a lo wo ni'luu Ibese Ebo ni won ni ko waa se Oore qaa d'ese n'Ibese Oore d'ese Eyin ara Ibese E ma ma s'oore mo o Oore d'ese n'Ibese o
Translation The head of a cobra resembles a crown, The cloth weaver's box drags like a python, Ifa's message for Ogun, Who was born at Ire town, And was trained in Ibese land, He wasadvised to offer ebo, Good deeds has turned to a sin in Ibese town, Benevolence has become a sin, Inhabitants of Ibese, Dont display benevolence anymore, Good deed has become a sin in Ibese town
AFFILIATED IRUNMOLE AND ORISA OF OGUNDA OSE
- Ifa
- Ori
- Esu Odara
- Ogun
- Egungun
- Egbe
- Sango
- Osun
- Orisa Oko
- Iroko
TABOOS OF OGUNDA OSE
- Must never kill or eat a snake
- Must never deny responsibility over pregnancy issue
- Must never pay good deeds with evil
- Must never eat mushrooms
- Must never wear black or red dress
- Must never go out at night
- Must never cheat, lie or be diabolical
- Must never snatch another person's spouse or lover
- Must never give false promises
- Must never fail to take care of personal hygiene
ABORU ABOYE
Solagbade Popoola, ficssmn President, International Council For Ifa Religion
submitted by
Ifasogbon to
Isese [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 01:57 Theythecreator Jersey shore
2023.06.07 01:53 EasyZookeepergame716 I WAS AT THE SHORE STORE
| danny is surprisingly still working there luckily! i also went on a tour in the house which was SUCH a divine experience because the show is my favorite thing ever. if you look on my page youāll be able to see more videos regarding jersey shore so check me out if you can @juicyphobic. if you live in new jersey or new york and love the show you should totally come visit and get a tour for $10 and get a lot of the cute variation in all the clothing and accessories/merchandise in the shore storešš®š¹ submitted by EasyZookeepergame716 to jerseyshore [link] [comments] |
2023.06.07 00:35 Hellstorm5674 Partner retreats?
Partner retreats are basically one big circlejerk where the Partners discuss the firm's operations and status for the new year. Aka Big BrotheJersey Shore type ordeal except for older people. The resorts they go to have enough electric bills to pay off my entire rent lol
submitted by
Hellstorm5674 to
Accounting [link] [comments]
2023.06.07 00:02 garbanzobing One of the producers of Shiny Happy People is doing an AMA on the DuggarSnark subreddit. Letās hope thereās a season 2!!
2023.06.06 23:46 Thoajin Good place in central / Jersey Shore area for Cajun food / fries
Hello! My girlfriend and I moved to Holmdel from North Jersey. We had a spot in Mahwah called chicken and rib crib that sold amazing Cajun fries and Cajun food. We have been craving that around our new location, but are having trouble finding a place. Any suggestions?
Thanks!
submitted by
Thoajin to
newjersey [link] [comments]
2023.06.06 23:02 Rocket_Shep I'm Cori Shepherd Stern, EP of SHINY HAPPY PEOPLE - ASK ME ANYTHING
2023.06.06 21:56 Boorobford Not all "Whites" are enemies of true Asian Masculinity, in fact, only a small portion of them are.
As the topic says, this post does not apply to most whites out there.
I think that Asian Masculinity has convinced all Asian men and Indian men that whites are the enemy. In fact, I'd argue that your fellow brother or sister is a far bigger enemy of yours than whites can ever expect to be. In reality, I don't think that most whites are enemies of Asian and Indian men getting laid, even with white women. From my experience and observations, only certain kinds of whites are.
Anglos and WASPs, especially in big cities like NYC and LA.
Power hungry maniacs descended from old money who have very little to offer the world, often just floating by on generational wealth that their ancestors accumulated by looting the planet. Spoiled rotten by wealthy parents and only have time for drama and screwing around in life. Your typical frat boys at colleges who just go there to party and not learn anything of value. Feel inferior about their masculinity compared to a muscular country boy so they resort to using racism to prop themselves up.
Nerdy white guys, especially those obsessed with anime.
Probably the biggest opponent most of us will face as they can work alongside us if we are in the white collar world. Typical weaboos and dorky high school losers obsessed with anime and even porn. Not masculine at all but slowly start to learn weightlifting in adulthood. Have their delicate egos propped up by Lus that hate the color of their own skin so now they think they are Chad all of a sudden. Arguably the most relevant enemy a lot of us will face but thankfully, far more bark than bite.
Suburban trash.
I like to use this word to describe upper middle class bro culture. The type of guys who could never go pro in a sport but then rush fraternities in college. Often involved in the infamous rape culture that goes on in college campuses. Try to huff and puff their chests out acting alpha but will shit their pants the second someone fights back (as it so happens with black men who go against these losers). Found on all college campuses but California and the northeast produce some of the worst and most overcompensating ones.
Southern Europeans, especially Italians.
The worst are without question the Italians. Sleazy towards women, feel entitled to women of all races, but then cry like babies when Italian women go interracial (which they do quite frequently on vacation). The ones in Italy might be bad but it gets even worse when you look at how they act in countries they have immigrated to in the past, just interact with any Italian American in New York and New Jersey and you will catch my drift.
White incels.
This is self-explanatory.
submitted by
Boorobford to
FarEastAlphas [link] [comments]
2023.06.06 21:50 Falconerelectronics Mina Miller Edison: A Powerful Force
Mina Miller Edison lived an incredibly inspiring life. She thrived in numerous aspects. Especially since she played many roles throughout her impressive lifespan. Highly educated, confident, ambitious and determined represent the characteristics that describe Mina.
She displayed a deep committed to her family. This includes being the loving wife to inventor, entrepreneur and American icon Thomas Edison. She was also a loving and dedicated mother.
In addition, Mina demonstrated a strong passion for her community with the endless organizations that she contributed a tremendous amount of time and energy.
Mina was born into an entrepreneurial family on July 6, 1865. As the Miller family continued to grow, Mina was the
seventh of eleven children born to inventor Lewis Miller and Mary Alexander. Her parents had a love for education. Mina attended and graduated from Akron High School in Ohio. After high school, she went on to study at a home and day school in Boston.
Minaās Father the Inventor and Founder
Mina Miller Edison was born into a family that was used to being in the spotlight. Lewis Miller was a successful inventor. He also became one of the founders of Chautauqua Institution. The Miller family spent summers in their home along Chautauqua Lake. Her families love for Chautauqua was passed down to Mina. Therefore, when she had a family of her own she brought them to her family home at Chautauqua Institition.
Minaās father and husband both had a passion for inventing. However, what they chose to invent was different from one another. While Thomas concentrated on technology and electronics,
Lewis focused on farm equipment. They shared the common goal of making life easier with their inventions.
Chautauqua Institution
Chautauqua Institution sets on the shores of beautiful Chautauqua Lake in southwestern New York State. The Institution was originally called the Chautauqua Lake Sunday School Assembly. It was founded in
1874 as an
educational experiment in out-of-school, vacation learning by industrialist
Lewis Miller and Methodist Bishop John Heyl Vincent. Hence, a place where
spirituality meets continuing education.
āThe original scheme was a Christian educational resort . . . [where] pleasure, science, and all friends of true culture should go side by side with true religion.ā
Chautauqua Institution
We call
Chautauqua County home which is also the birthplace of the
National Historic Landmark, Chautauqua Institution. Chautauqua Institution is a 750-acre community on Chautauqua Lake that attracts 100,000 visitors each summer who explore spirituality, philosophy, cultural vitality and the arts.
President Theodore Roosevelt once called Chautauqua Institution: ā
the most American thing in Americaā.
The mission of Chautauqua Institution (or as locals call it, CHQ):
CHQ is dedicated to the exploration of the best in human values and the enrichment of life through a program that explores the important religious, social and political issues of our times; stimulates provocative, thoughtful involvement of individuals and families in creative response to such issues; and promotes excellence and creativity in the appreciation, performance and teaching of the arts.Each summer season celebrates four program areas: The Arts, Religion, Education and Recreation. A summer at Chautauqua is loaded with lectures, concerts, religious services and as well as amazing displays of literary and performing arts. Chautauqua Institution attracts world-class talent that performs ballet, theater, opera, symphony and dance. Click here to check out this seasonās exciting events.
The Multiple Achievements of Mina Miller
Marriage to Thomas Edison
When Mina Miller met Thomas Edison, she was promised to her gentleman suitor,
George Vincent, the son of Bishop Vincent. Edison learned that Mina would be staying the summer at Chautauqua, he arranged to spend time there to win her and meet her family. Thomas Edisonās hearing was badly compromised by this time from when he was a child so he taught Mina to send and receive Morse code. That summer, he used it to ask her to marry him. He tapped āWill you Marry Me?ā on Minaās hand, and she said āYes.ā
The next step was getting permission from Minaās Father Lewis, to which Thomas wrote this:
āI trust you will not accuse me of egotism when I say that my life and history and standing are so well known as to call for no statement concerning myself. My reputation is so far made that I recognize I must be judged by it for good or ill. I need only add in conclusion that the step I have taken in asking your daughter to entrust her happiness into my keeping has been the result of mature deliberation, and with the full appreciation of the responsibility and the duty I have undertaken to fulfill. I do not deny that your answer will seriously affect my happiness, and I trust my suit will meet with your approval.ā
This
letter won the approval of Mr. Miller. The date for the wedding was set for February 24, 1886, hardly more than a year after they met. She was only 20 years old. Oak Place, the Miller home in Akron, was to be the site of the wedding. Father Miller and his Mary Valinda spared no expense in seeing that the nuptials were an occasion to be remembered.
Managing a Home Full of Staff and Children
When Mina and Thomas Edison got married she was much younger then her husband. She became the stepmother to his three children. Still being young herself she was not fully ready for motherhood. However, Mina Miller Edison took charge of the household. Often times Thomas was not around due to his work. This left Mina in charge of hiring the house staff as well as raising the children. Furthermore, she gave herself the title of āhome executiveā. Mina
also held ownership of Glenmont. The home she shared with Thomas. Owning and managing her own home was the first of many successes for Mina.
Children of Her Own
Two years after their marriage Mina and Thomas added to their family with their first child, Madeleine. This started the same pattern of children Thomas had with his first wife. Their daughter was soon followed by two sons, Charles and Theodore.
Madeleine Edison
Madeleine was born on May 31st, 1888, the first child born to Mina. She was born in Glenmont, the Edison Family home in New Jersey. Madeleine married John Eyre Sloane. She married him in the Drawing Room at Glenmont on June 17, 1914. Madeleine and John had four sons, who happened to be Thomas Edisonās only grandchildren from either marriage.
Madeleine briefly ran for Congress in 1938, she sadly lost. During World War II she gave much of her time to blood drives for the New Jersey Red Cross. She also administered the Edison Birthplace in Milan, Ohio after her motherās death. She died on February 14, 1979.
Charles Edison
Charles Edison was born into the Edison Family at the
Glenmont on August 3, 1890. He married Carolyn Hawkins, whom he had met in 1912 then married on March 27, 1918. Finally, he became president of his fatherās company, Thomas A. Edison, Incorporated, in 1927. He ran the company until it was sold in 1959.
Charles is the best known because of his second career, in public service. In the mid-1930s he served in the cabinet of President Franklin Roosevelt. First as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, then as Acting Secretary. New Jersey voters elected him as their governor in 1940. He also founded a charitable foundation that now bears his name, the Charles Edison Fund. He died on July 31, 1969
Theodore Miller Edison
Theodore Miller Edison was the last to be born at Glenmont on July 10, 1898. He attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, from which he earned his physics degree in 1923. He was the only member of the Edison family to graduate from college.
Theodore did work for his fatherās company after graduation. After starting as an ordinary lab assistant, he worked his way up to technical director of research and engineering for Thomas A. Edison, Inc. He eventually founded his own company, Calibron Industries, Inc. Also, he built his own smaller laboratory in West Orange. Theodore earned over 80 patents in his career. In 1925 he married Anna Maria Osterhout, a graduate of Vassar. He became an ardent environmentalist. Theodore lived in West Orange with his wife Anna until his
death on November 24, 1992.
Minaās Step-Children
With the marriage between
Thomas and Mina, she took on his
three children from the first marriage. Marion, twelve years old, Thomas, Jr. ten years old, and William Leslie eight years old. She continued to struggle with her relationship with her stepdaughter. Minaās stepchildren did not take education as seriously as she did. They believed that Edisonās fame could make their future for them. Finally, due to this belief, Minaās stepchildren went on to live less acclaimed lives as the other Edison children.
Marion Estelle Edison
Marion was the first born of Thomas Edisonās children. She was born on February 18, 1873, and gained the nickname āDotā as a child after Morse Code. In 1895 she married Karl Oscar Oeser, a German army lieutenant. They lived in Germany through the First World War. Unfortunately, her marriage ended in divorce in 1921. Finally, she then returned to the United States, where she died on April 16, 1965.
Thomas Alva Edison Jr
Thomas Alva, Junior, was born on January 10, 1876. He had the nickname āDashā after Morse Code like his sister. He went on to marry stage actress Marie Louise Toohey in 1899. However, the marriage ended within a year. He next married Beatrice Heyzer. Thomas Jr sold the use of his name to advertise āquackā medicines and dubious inventions. His father disapproved of this and eventually asked him to change his name. Thomas Jr. briefly went by the name of Thomas Willard. His efforts at inventing and starting a mushroom farm failed. Finally, he died on August 25, 1935.
William Leslie Edison
William Leslie was born on October 26, 1878. He went to school at St. Paulās School, Concord, New Hampshire. Then also attended J.M.Hawkins School on Staten Island. He later studied at the Sheffield scientific school at Yale. William soon married Blanche Travers. William Edison served in the military during the Spanish-American War in 1898. He also served again in the First World War. Like his brother he turned to farm life, breeding chickens. Finally, he died on August 10, 1937.
Chautauqua Institute and Minaās Influence
Minaās fatherās love for
Chautauqua was passed down to his daughter. Mina dedicated herself to many organizations locally. She supported many land and wildlife conservation. Often times Mina would donate her own funds to projects for Chautauqua. Mina became a trustee of the institute. Others involved in Chautauqua held Mina in high regards. Also much like her father, Mina continued her involvement with her beloved
Institute until her passing in 1947.
Mina was active in many different organizations and clubs including:
The Thomas Alva Edison Foundation
After Thomas Edison passed away, Mina started The Thomas Alva Edison Foundation in his memory. The foundation combined both Thomasās and Minaās passions. Minaās love for education and Thomasās love for science. However, later on, the nature of the foundation changed. It was no longer dedicated to advancements in science and education. Finally, it became a foundation aimed at preserving Thomas Edisonās name and accomplishments
Wrapping It Up
Lastly, Thank you for taking the time to read this post.
In addition, please click these helpful links for more info:
Finally, to learn about
Wire Harness Assemblies, please click below:
Follow us on
Twitter and
LinkedIn.
submitted by
Falconerelectronics to
Ground_Wires [link] [comments]
2023.06.06 20:31 sabercrabs HZD/HFW Full Playthrough Notes (part 1 of ?)
I thought it would be fun to go back and do a full playthrough of both games (and both DLCs), especially since it's been a couple years since I played through HZD. I just finished a speed run of HFW so I could replay Burning Shores, so figured it would be interesting to play it all straight through.
I've gotten through the first few main quest stages in HZD, and thought I'd post some thoughts here in case anyone else was interested. I may post more as I go through, but I can't promise anything because I have ADHD and will likely completely forget about this soon). Obvious spoilers for all parts below.
Beginning of HZD through almost all of Seeker at the Gates:
- First off, Ashley Burch (Aloy/Elisabet/Beta) is incredible. If I didn't know better I would think it was a different voice actor in HZD or that AB was actually a teenager when HZD was being produced. The way she has been able to make Aloy's voice mature is unbelievable
- Dear god I miss my Shieldwing. I haven't jumped off anything I shouldn't have YET, but I have caught myself at the last minute a few times
- There's an interesting difference in how Aloy's motion feels, that both makes it slightly easier and slightly less realistic. It's a little clunkier, but more in the way that it has bigger margins for error. I'm guessing it's a more advanced physics engine thing, but it's very interesting to see the difference.
- I'm both shocked at how good the graphics were (partially because last time I played HZD was on PS4), and shocked at how much better they are now. ESPECIALLY the facial motion capture. Omg, the dialog scenes are so much harder to watch. Oddly, older characters faces are animated much better because they aren't as smooth. Aloy looks shiny as fuck
- Striders feel so much faster than Chargers. Dunno if they actually are, but they certainly feel that way
- Rost and Sylens have a lot in common. Both are very short (with their words) and refuse to answer questions if they don't see the value in it at the time
- Man, Sona raised a couple of great kids for how... severe she is. Both Vala and Varl are incredibly kind and loving. Kind of makes me wonder about their dad
- I miss bandit camps. Rebel camps & outposts just didn't quite hit the same mark for me, don't really know why
- How did I miss that this whole story is a queer allegory before? Maybe this was more obvious to queer people, but I usually pick up on these things since I'm the token straighty in most of my friend groups. Aloy is cast out because she was born different than her tribe. She then spends the entirety of the first two games beginning to learn about found family and that it's ok to have family even if the one you were born into sucks. You also don't owe anything to your biological/legal family; if they suck, you can cut them out of your life. It will never be easy, but it doesn't make you a bad person.
I think that's all for now. Let me know if you have thoughts or questions!
submitted by
sabercrabs to
horizon [link] [comments]
2023.06.06 20:20 igorekk handpicked for Berlin in May (mostly startups/career related)
After skipping April, here are some inspiration snippets from Berlin, Germany and wider. Career and other cool insights.
Here is March.
Week of 1st (May)
- š¤ Do you know any shortcuts/tips/tricks on how to get an appointment at AuslƤnderbehƶrde? If so, please share in the comments or drop me an email. Thank you so much!
- š Lost something on public transport? Here is the website to deal with it. It will be sold at an auction if you do not pick it up in 6 weeks. These are done quarterly, and see you at Auktionshaus Beier in July because I need some AirPods.
- š Germany is extremely dependent on the automotive industry and their exports. Donāt quote me on that, but the big ones make roughly 1/3 of their revenues in China. Now, look at these charts and think: What sets modern cars apart? What does it mean for Germany? Soon, the brand will be the only differentiator.
- š Pragmatic Engineer (Gergely Orosz) gave me a nice shoutout tweet. A must-follow if you are interested in tech/engineering. One of my recent favourites is this interview with Steve Yegge, which is full of interesting insights.
- š¤ If you are like me, you maybe feel worried that your ChatGPT prompt game is weak (especially after reading all those "prompt influencers" milking the trend on the bird app). A while ago, I even linked to a āPrompt Engineerā as a future profession. But according to Ethan Mollick's Guide to Prompting, we do not have much to worry about. In a nutshell: just try things out and then repeat.
- š¦ eBay-Kleinanzeigen, one of the best German websites (š
) with 40M monthly users, will finally rename to Kleinanzeigen on 16.5 after being sold to Norwegian classifieds specialist Adevinta in 2021. Most of it will stay the same; I am delighted my āTop Zufriedenheitā status will also be migrated.
- š Bad news: N26 is laying off 71 (4%), Knister Grill (Munich) insolvent; Flink shrank for 8k (down from 21k!) employees since April 2022.
- berlin choice of the week: activists vandalized a few luxury shops on Kādamm, and of course, the commentariat delivered again on all sides of the spectrum. Also, BVG has a new type of tram that looks like a car. š
- āļø This week I learned that BER Terminals 1 and 2 are connected. You can use any security control to access gates at both terminals.
- š¬ Briefly: SellerX (Berlin) is rumoured to be in a sale process; HelloFresh and Delivery Hero are, unsurprisingly, growing slower: check their Investor Relations pages for details and take it with a pinch of salt; Bosch plans to purchase TSI Semiconductors' assets for $1.5 billion to enhance its semiconductor business with silicon carbide chips; Finn (Munich) CEO Max-Josef Meier resigned after harassing several female colleagues on a company event.
Week of 8th (May)
- š If you have decided to take on ā¬49 ticket, Exberliner prepared a nice list of suggestions for excursions from Berlin. Worth a save!
- š¤ Here is a summary of research on money and happiness. I like Nickās conclusion: Increased income is associated with greater happiness for lower-income individuals. For high-income, unhappy individuals, further income is unlikely to increase happiness. For high-income, happy individuals, while more income could enhance happiness, the effort required may not be worth it.
- š Bad news: CleverShuttle (Berlin) insolvent; Shopify 20% of employees (most of German org).
- berlin choice of the week is an interesting Reddit AMA from an U-Bahn driver from a year ago.
- š¬ Briefly:
- Getir wants to own them all and is reportedly buying Flinkāenjoy it while it lasts;
- Tier reportedly selling itself;
- Vice News, a former alter news source loved by millennials and eventually copied by everyone, is in serious trouble;
- TeamViewer from Ba-Wü posted 13% YoY growth (151M);
- SAP wants to enter LLMs with an investment into Aleph Alphaāit will surely be expensive;
- Lilium (Munich) needs/wants to raise ā¬250M;
- founder of once-hyped Gorillas, Kagan Sümer, is building something new in HealthTech called Mirror (no website yet);
- his other three colleagues founded meal-as-a-service for restaurants, Tasty Urban.
Week of 15th (May)
- āļø Here is another reminder to check out my article with 40+ questions you can ask at the job interview. Disclosure: not written by ChatGPT!
- š» Like all the startups beyond Series B, Bolt also plans to become profitable soon, specifically in the next 12 months, and then IPO in 2025. They might also do payments? More at Reuters. Meantime, Lyft, another Uber competitor, is firing 1100 employees.
- ā”ļø Remember all those predictions on the Russian gas and the collapse of Germany? Here is an interesting article about the concept of substitutes in economics (the fallacy: āWhen the average person thinks about a 40% reduction in natural gas supplies, they implicitly assume that each natural gas-dependent industry must cut its usage by 40%.ā), but it is also worth reading the comments for differing opinions (= free markets are BS.)
- š Besides your burgers and curries, Lieferando started to deliver 100 different MediaMarkt products inside the Berlin ring (useful if you urgently need a phone charger or a phone, lol? and bad for their competitor Arive). Food & high margin product delivery is probably here to stay, but groceries? I think not.
- šBlinkist, a Berlin-based app that always felt like cheating to me, was bought by Go1 from Down Under; nobody asked me for my opinion, but a good time to exit with all the Generative AI knocking on the door! Now I should probably go back to my book.
- š Have you ever heard of Seaflooding? Me neither, but it reads like a great idea. Flooding parts of the Sahara to reduce the ocean levels? Plus, make some energy on the way? Letās do it!
- š Adidas is stuck with ā¬1B worth of Yeezy sneakers since the man lost his mind, but, amongst other batshit crazy stuff, found a purpose in antisemitism. They plan to sell them gradually and partially donate the proceeds. (ā¬, š©šŖ) What a problem to have.
- ā“ļø Exberliner delivers again! Berlin has plenty of ferries; I see myself using some in the summer. This article also made me think I need a āhandpicked Berlin bucket list.ā
- š Bad news: nobody is publishing news about layoffs anymore! There are three options: 1) all layoffs are done; 2) all layoffs are silent; 3) nobody is laying off. I vote for 2). Infarm leaving Berlin & Europe; okƤse (Kƶln) insolvent.
- berlin choice of the week is this DDR map of Berlin from 1988; comments deliver as usual.
- š¬ Briefly:
- swedish Northvolt plans to build a battery gigafactory in Schleswig-Holstein (and employ 3k people) with support from the state and Bund - careers;
- Revolutās CFO is leaving, which is never a good sign, especially after problems with acquiring a banking licence in the UK. On a more positive note: they will start to sell ETFs via Berlinās Upvest;
- Trivago, the troubled aggregator of the aggregators, changed almost their complete board;
- VW will restructure Cariad, its software arm, replacing its CEO with Peter Bosch (ex-Bentley);
- Google did not release Bard in the EU because of GDPregulation worries;
- Unstoppable Finance (Berlin-based crypto play) wants to get a banking license in 2024;
- Mobileye will do automated assistance and navigate-on-pilot functions for Porsche;
- FS Italiane ordered 40 locomotives from Siemens worth ā¬300M;
- Rheinmetall is planning to start production in Ukraine.
Week of 22nd (May)
- š“āāļø If you have ever wondered how many bikes pass a certain checkpoint in Berlin, you have your answers here. (via this post on berlin)
- š I found out about Himmel Unter Berlin, an exclusive invite-only exhibition. I did enter the waitlist, but if I could be your +1, please let me know. š
- šø After eight years of rental price caps, landlords (incl. mine) just seem to love ignoring the rules and ask for too much rent! (š©šŖ) Analysis of 6K cases in 2021 shows that 98% were overcharged. Hah.
- Bitpanda, an Austrian crypto investing platform, jumped on the AI hype train and will invest $10M in an AI chatbot. Ok.
- In Saxony, AfDās Sebastian Wippel brought the topic of chemtrails to the state parliament. Whatās next, Flat Earth?
- Sifted reports that Bolt is close to buying Tier. There are still some micro-mobility companies left, but I am still unsure how such a seasonal business can be profitable long-term. Bolt is betting on many horses, and only time will tell if we will still see so many scooters lying around in 2 years. Related:
- āļøI previously recommended Matt Levine and his Money Stuff, and this week he wrote about blitzscaling of Uber being possibly illegal. The VC-subsidised āwinner takes allā mentality caused partial destruction of competition and could be considered predatory pricing. Worth a read (second chapter)!
- š Bad news: nothing to report. So instead, data from last weekās poll: 26% (41) of voters know 10+ people laid off since April 1st, and 38% do not know anyone. The rest (36%) are in-between. Hard to draw conclusions, but clearly, silent layoffs are happening.
- berlin choice of the week is a flat directory of smaller real estate companies. Good luck if you are on a search now.
- š¬ Briefly: Tesla will start spending on marketing (inevitable with all the competition); ThyssenKrupp wants to IPO its hydrogen unit Nucera (careers) in June for 4B; Cara Care founder Jesaja Brinkmann ALSO behaved inappropriately towards female colleagues at a party in December and is OUT; Intel also wants to invest in LLM developers Aleph Alpha from Heidelberg; after Mercedes also VWis leaving Russia; DB ordered 73 new ICEs (š©šŖ) for ā¬2B and wants to hire thousandsācareers; ATU was hacked (š©šŖ)āI wonder if my car data is LOST or STOLEN.
Week of 29th (May)
- š Germany is, because of a second negative quarter in a row, officially in a mild recession (GDP fell by 0.3% for the last quarter). Well. On the other hand, some startups (esp. renewables) were hiring extensively last year, as the analysis of Sifted shows. To me, Helsing from the Sifted list sounds promising, but ask them if they have a product already. Careers.
- š Most of the Google/Amazon/other reviews are useless. First, a lot of them are fake and second; they can be bought, and third, they are skewed because the majority of people never review.Gergely Oroszdid an extensive analysis of Glassdoor reviews after layoffs and I think the whole thing proves the point that looking at them is useless and a waste of time.
- š© OpenAI founder Sam Altman said they might pull ChatGPT out of the EU because of the regulation shortly after he also told US regulators that AI should be regulated. I guess only his regulation is the correct regulation?
- š Instead of selling itself to Getir, Flink raised ā¬150M from existing investors (they took a haircut to the highest valuation at ā¬2.5B, now at around ā¬1B). In addition, they are letting 100 employees in HQ go and are pulling out of France after their ā¬100M Cajoo investment (š©šŖ, ā¬). On top, Aldi Süd will experiment with delivery around Mülheim (š©šŖ) this July. Are you bullish or bearish?
- āļøBig organisations are often arrogant and inefficient. It recently happened again to Microsoft, as reported in this anecdote where Satya Nadella scolded his R&D team. Another good lesson that the size and throwing money at things often doesnāt work.
- š
One of the weirdest political debates I have seen since in Berlin is around the closing of Friedrichstrasse for traffic. Now it will be open again from the 1st of July. But hey, what is the point of just closing a street without planting trees and making it much more pedestrian-friendly? They did it in many other cities, and it worked. Half-assed attempts make no sense.
- āļø Here is a longer profile in German of Ryanair and its success (š©šŖ) after their annual report. They are profitable, are expanding their fleet and want to hire 10k.
- š§Ø Before joining N26, you might want to read this great analysis from Miriam at Sifted. Bullish or bearish?
- š Here you have an Insta post of some of the best lakes around Berlin, which you should pair with this temperature monitoring when the time comes. From my perspective, the time is not here yet.
- I tried what3words a couple of times, and I remember thinking, āWow, what a great ideaā, before going back to using Google Maps. This week I learned they burned Ā£119M to generate Ā£2.5M in revenue in the last six years. What a time to be alive. This, kids, is what a vitamin looks like instead of a painkiller.
- āļøGreat news. There is probably no imminent danger of getting erased by an asteroid: We still have at least 1000 years left on Earth unless we destroy it ourselves first!
- š Bad news: Circus (Hamburg, 35/25%); Meta 6000 (unknown for Germany); Moss(Berlin, 30), Flink (Berlin, 100).
- š” Speaking of layoffs: I have previously linked to āhow to actā guidance, but it was not as good as this LinkedIn post from Mayuri Reddy. Read it and share it.
- š¹š I have never been to Thailand or Thai Park yet, and this is changing soon; Exberliner has tips on what to eat in Thai Park. I am going with Pad Thai. See you around!
- berlin choice of the week is this discussion about Pfandpiraten and how much they can earn. Fascinating! āThey estimated that about 928,000 people actively collect Pfand in Germany. Of them, 56% make less than 4⬠a day. Of them, 28% collect enough that it is their primary income.ā
- š¬ Briefly: Solaris Bank is raising fresh money (ā¬50M); Klarna moved its goal to reach profitability this summer to āthis yearā and is reportedly āon trackā; Flix is expanding like there is no tomorrow: India will be its 42nd market; Neeva, a Google search ads-free alternative full of ex-Google execs, is no more; Meta was fined a record ā¬1.2B for illegal data transfers from the EU to the US beating the previous record of ā¬746M by Amazon.
-------- You can get
these weekly. Thanks for reading and feedback.
submitted by
igorekk to
berlin [link] [comments]