Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.
Sun Tzu, Art of War
Everything was for tomorrow, but tomorrow never came. The present was only a bridge and on this bridge they are still groaning, as the world groans, and not one idiot ever thinks of blowing up the bridge.
Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn
I was wrong! Blow the bridge! Blow the fucking bridge!
Tugg Speedman, Tropic Thunder
Hello again GME Gang! It’s been a while since I last ranted at you, but I know we’ve been in some very good hands here at WSB with all the great DD folks have posted over the past few weeks. So no need for CPT Hubbard to go for 11 again on the Thumbscroll Dial (until today, that is). I’ve enjoyed a lot of these posts very much, so thank you on behalf of myself and the attention-deficient Rocket Children for continuing to deliver that 100% Chaff-Free GME-grade Wheat at such a feverish clip.
Now, I am going to get to Hong Kong’s Lamest Outlaw and his disconcertingly vacant eyes here shortly. But first I want to take you on a journey back to Christmas Eve, in the year of our lord 2020—a heady time in all our lives. We were all so young and innocent then, weren’t we? Fresh off the run up to 22. Blissfully oblivious that we were living in the last moments where the question What is The War of 1812? was the only acceptable Jeopardy question for the answer: The Last Time the Goddamn U.S. Capitol Was Stormed. This was also before we all became irresponsibly overleveraged in Cathie Wood’s Ornamental Gourds ETF. It was a wondrous, confusing time.
But before we get too off topic, let’s all hop in my 1985 DeLorean (purchased with proceeds from my Jan 15 calls – thanks RC!), fire up the ol’ Flux Capacitor, and get that shit to 88 because something happened that evening that is Worth Pondering—particularly in light of recent events. And just as a friendly reminder: even though you’re going back in time in a DeLorean, no one here has to deviate funds away from GME shares to Save the Clock Tower and you are under no obligation to fulfill a scenario where you wind up making out with your Mom (unless your Mom is Cathie Wood like mine—in which case maybe just some quick over-the-clothes stuff).
On the Subject of How It Once ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas
So what in the holy fuck happened on the night before Christmas, Captain? Well, while all you Gentiles were sleeping soundly after lying to your children about benign home intruders and before gorging yourself on the teat of late-stage capitalism, me and the rest of the Chosen People were up late eating Chinese food and thinking about tendies (self-hating Jew Joke! Ba-zing!). But then: when out on the electric twitter machine there arose such a clatter, I sprang to my phone to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes did appear, a mysterious tweet from a Rich-Ass Viking who had a lot of fucking interesting things to say about this whole GME situation that’s what.
This tweet, buried as a reply to a tweet sent by Mr. Rod Alzmann (@RodAlzmann or u/Uberkikz11), simply said: “Merry Christmas. Shhh.” But it included this screen shot:
[**Image Deleted Due to the Mods - check the link below where someone transcribed it - I'll try to add later**]
Now, this tweet to Rod, sent late at night and likely after a strong Mead or three, was very promptly deleted. But your intrepid cub reporter saw this here tweet that night with his own two eyes—seeing as I am a degenerate GME addict and devoted follower of Mr. Rod Alzmann (Hi Rod!). And I took screenshots, of course, like any responsible records custodian might. And so did the dude who wrote a somewhat-overlooked WSB post on this, which included the most pertinent text of the message if you are having trouble reading it here:
https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/kk0omp/christmas_miracle_gamergate_2020_gme_shorts/
Now, what are we to make of this? At the time, I thought it was very interesting. But I did not give it too much attention seeing as how the internet is overcrowded with anonymous weirdos claiming to know more than they do about all sorts of subjects (and now I feel your judging eyes…). Also, there was some very good commentary in that WSB post from some sharp folks about the screenshot author’s questionable use of the shorthand PE/IB—given that private equity and investment banks wouldn’t apparently be involved in a behind-the-scenes transaction with the short funds like what was being discussed there (don’t ask me, I just string together silly words here). But maybe you poke around his Twitter a bit and see for yourself.
Still, plausibility assessments based on preferred nomenclature aside, it seemed to me that some version of that conversation had to be taking place behind the scenes in a situation like this—given the batshit insane short interest, the funds supposedly involved, and the rapid rise in SP coinciding with RC’s share accumulation, December 21st amended 13D filing, and new status as a GME Insider and Board member (just love saying all that in a row, don’t you?).
So the Viking’s screenshot tweet, and the very likely possibility that shorts are in so deep that they’re attempting to negotiate peace with large shareholders behind the scenes, stuck in my tiny little baby brain as a pretty plausible set of scenarios. And from the look of it, it seems like some funds were at least willing to discuss offering these shorts a Golden Bridge away from Certain Fucking Destruction on the open market. And if the words on the screenshot are at all aligned with reality, these short funds have no good options.
Yet it seems like they are still playing hardball to negotiate the carat on this generous bridge offer they’re getting. Why? Maybe they’ve been getting high on their own supply for so long and they don’t know how to see this situation for what it is. Who knows? Maybe there is no Ryan Cohen and we’re all living in a simulation. But if the recent low-rent anti-GME articles and market manipulation efforts we’re seeing are any indication, these overleveraged short fuckers seem to think they’re going to be able to spin out of this hold and drive the SP back down to even smaller peanuts than it’s at now by sheer force of will (and some deployment of well-honed tricks of the trade amirite?) to emerge unscathed. Or even victorious? I dunno—it’s their delusional fantasy sequence.
But do you know what this scenario reminds me of? And this is just coming to me so please bear with me as I’m not showing this to my editor before we print (I haven’t seen this movie in ages – don’t know what made me think of this!). Fuck it, I’m just gonna start riffing here. The shorts trying to thread this needle, against all odds and logic and common sense, reminds me of that hilarious scene in Dumb and Dumber where haplessly delusional Jim Carrey thinks he has a chance with Mary Samsonite Swanson. But the scene is funny because he really doesn’t. Have any chance. At all.
Now, I know this is a 1990s movie originally released on VHS that we haven’t seen it or even seen it referenced in ages. But now that you’re thinking of it again after all this time, doesn’t it remind you of this too? I know, I get it: You’d have to have fucking peanuts for brains for it not to.
(https://twitter.com/ryancohen/status/1350877969816956934?s=20)
On the Subject of the Continued Internet Bumbling of Mr. Justin Dopierala
Now that screenshot came to mind this past week when something kind of weird happened while we were all enjoying our quick rocket ship ride. And yes, we are briefly going to talk again about Seeking Alpha’s second finest pro-GME author (always been more of a Dmitriy man myself) and recurring CPT Hubbard character, Justin Dopierala (and no, Angela, I do not want to have like 10,000 of his babies).
Last Thursday, after we were all virtually high-fiving one another and counting our future Lambos, Mr. Justin Dopierala, head of Domo Capital and longstanding uber-bull GME shareholder and author at Seeking Alpha (last seen arguing pithily with our own Rod Alzmann about the conservative nature of Rod’s holiday earnings projections. Hi again Rod!), made it known that he sold all of Domo Capital’s 500,000 shares for around $42.50—at the very top of the run up last Thursday morning.
Now, Domo Capital’s business decisions are none of my goddamn business. And there are plenty of market opportunities right now. Shit, I hear there is even a new Cathie Wood Gourd ETF coming online soon that people are really excited about and that I’m sure Justin’s clients would find intriguing. But Domo’s decision to sell seemed curious given a few things: (1) on Wednesday, when the rocket is mid-flight, he got a twitter follow from Gabe Plotkin, head of Melvin Capital, which he promptly tweeted about with a “get a load of this fuckin’ guy” vibe (oh the sweet, intoxicating arrogance of tendie victory, I too love it so); (2) he had also tweeted that day comparing GME’s rise to Apron’s short squeeze that lasted 4 days—where he also stressed to his followers that Apron had a much lower SI than GME; and (3) he then promptly deleted all of these tweets and almost everything else GME-related on Thursday after apparently introducing 500,000 shares of liquidity into the height of a stressed market up and through the Thursday reversal and down into his own personal tendie town.
Now, after seeing all this, I mouthed off a bit to Justin on the electric twitter machine because that’s kind of my thing. And if you are familiar with my prior ramblings, you know that he and I go way back. In response, Justin talked a bit of shit about your intrepid cub reporter here in a comment on Dimitry Kozin’s October 21, 2020 article about a possible sony revenue share deal or something, the comment section of which has become the preferred SA water cooler over there. (And I can’t link that because Thems The Rulez). And Justin hurt my little feelings a bit with his very sharp denial. And by all means have at it over there to check out his comment about why he sold if you give a shit. That is if Justin hasn’t deleted it yet. Free country and all.
But to summarize, on the subject of treacherous coordination with Melvin Capital, Justin said he would not could not in a boat and he would not could not with a goat. And I for one believe him. And do you know why? Because even though Justin seems like a very smart guy in some ways, he’s also a well-known internet bumbler who blurts out things to his internet friends that a person with better self-control would keep to themselves. And so I do not think he is capable of pulling that off or keeping a secret like that. Also: he said he didn’t so I am more than willing to give someone the benefit of any doubt in that area and you should too. I think we keep Hanlon’s razor firmly in mind here about never attributing to malice that which is explained by stupidity. That is unless, of course, you’re Andrew Left and you’re actually trying to convince people that you didn’t realize there was a US presidential inauguration planned for the same time you announced your Super Important TeeVee Yammerfest ‘21 about GME not being a good candidate for an imminent short squeeze no way no how not if my name isn’t Andrew Left short seller expert extraordinaire and Hong Kong’s Most Misunderstood Ethically-Minded Businessman. You can ascribe the fuck out of malice to that one.
No, even though I really have no idea, I think the most likely thing that happened there was that Gabe Plotkin, Master of the Universe, Head of Melvin Capital, and Acolyte of Perennial Most Ethical Business Man MVP candidate, Steven Cohen—got into Justin’s head when Plotkin followed him on twitter during the 57% (at one point 94%) day last Wednesday and then Justin got a bit chippy about it.
And this is the real reason I’m bringing this up.
Because I honestly care very little about the Nervous Investing Habits of the Wisconsin hedge fund voted most likely to prompt a Mr. Roboto reference. No: I think that Gabe Plotkin sent a message with that follow. Without even ever having to say it directly. And I think that after GME’s huge run and getting a little overexcited while working the twitter machine, Justin maybe had a chance to relax with a warm glass of milk that night and reflect on that message. Which I believe was: I’m watching you, motherfucker. And the only reason I’m paying any attention to some shitstain Wisconsin pseudo-fund on a day like today when I am getting my ass fucking torched is because I want you to know that if this GME shit blows up on me, I’m going to fuck your ass up. I will remember the name Domo Capital forevermore. And when you least expect me, I’ll be there. Now: your move, motherfucker.
And once I realized what might have happened there, that made me feel kinda bad for Justin if he felt that way. Definitely a puss move because fuck you Plotkin I drink your fucking milkshake, right? But bad because that’s a mean message for a business colleague to send, Gabriel. Shame on you if that's how you roll like a big New York bully and scaring our poor Justin like that. And if you just wanted to follow him to shoot the shit or swap listicles and Star Wars Prequel memes with a respected contemporary—even in the very midst of getting fucking annihilated while short GME—well Justin has a totally different account for that and he’s not allowed to access it during work hours.
On The Likelihood That The Most Heavily Shorted Stock in History Is Not Being Subject to Continued Market Manipulation When A Steve Cohen Acolyte Is Losing His Fucking Shirt
Have you heard about Steve Fucking Cohen? The guy who looks like he’s tip top of the list of the premier Hollywood casting agency’s rolodex for Saddest Dipshit Still At the Strip Club After Everyone Else Has Already Gone Home? I’m sorry, that’s mean and my mother told me to always be kind to the truly hideous looking because they’re probably still beautiful on the inside (spoiler alert: he’s not!).
Get a load of this guy:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-01-02/why-sac-capitals-steven-cohen-isnt-in-jail
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2020-09-02/controversial-hedge-fund-billionaire-steven-cohen-takes-on-hollywood
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/steven-a-cohen-among-the-million-dollar-donors-to-trump-inauguration-2017-04-19
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/11/steve-cohen-trump
https://nypost.com/2015/06/17/billionaire-steve-cohen-bros-out-with-guy-fieri/
Are you back? I’ve missed you. That was scary, wasn’t it? But allow me to TL/DR all that for you who decided to avoid all that unpleasantness: the dude just has all this bad luck and keeps finding himself into these really awkward situations where someone could potentially question his commitment to ethical business and life practices as well as adherence to the laws of the United States and it’s just not fair and nothing’s fair and Nice Guy Steve Cohen Is The Victim Here So Just Stop Right There Mister I See What You’re Doing. He's also bros with Guy Fieri. Cool.
But why am I talking about a guy who would so clearly pass Billy Madison’s Final Question about Business Ethics without even breaking a sweat?
Because Steve Cohen once had a young Ace Protegee that he loved very much. With the name of an Archangel, so tender and pure. And one day this young man decided he wanted to Prove Himself and Leave Steve’s Nest. And thus was born Melvin Capital, seeded financially by Steve Cohen but named after famed Crooner Melvin H. Tormé, which Gabe’s esteemed mentor Steve would play in his office, over and over, all those years ago.
Now let’s fast forward a bit because I’m boring myself with all that fucking Cohen reading (the bad Cohen—don’t you dare get anyone confused here). As I was saying: Gabe Plotkin, head of Melvin Capital, has by all accounts gotten himself into a bit of a pickle here being so deeply short GME. Lots of people have analyzed and overanalyzed it, and I’m not going to do it again here; that dead horse is well and truly beaten. But to bottom line it: we’re all just staring down what is essentially an unprecedented math problem that will, at some point, resolve itself. And if it revolves itself in favor of the Good Guys, then the Bad Guys will lose a Fuck-ton of Money. That’s your money block quote, WSJ, so fuck off and stop calling me.
Now: picture yourself as a Steve Cohen acolyte that just bought a $44M Miami Compound and who cannot stop talking about how co-owning the Charlotte Hornets is worth it just for the courtsides alone bro once basketball is a thing again and so what if Michael Jordan keeps calling him Gary it’s close enough. Are you feeling the most financially secure that you have ever felt in your young rich life right about now? Or might you be a wee bit worried that you’ve pursued an investment thesis so reckless, so irrationally and intentionally destructive of equity, that even Melvin H. Tormé himself must be rolling in his fucking grave that you would ever dare put at risk your ability to continue being Michael Jordan’s Gary?
And so here is when I again link my good buddy Jim Cramer’s Great Unveiling of the Tactics Deployed by Short Sellers hoping to change the narrative and construct a “new truth” to suppress the SP in the face of, oh, let’s just say: a very promising turnaround story in a high-growth industry by an e-Commerce Canadian Genius who does not fuck around and who knows what he’s fucking doing and aims to sell more and better video games experiences to crackhead video gamers and there’s a million things he wants to do but just you wait, just you wait.
Is this plot that hard to follow?
And I’ll also say this: I know fuck-all about monitoring order flows or how funds continue to create synthetic shares to short shit into oblivion. But I’m just stepping back and thinking of the broader narrative and tactics on this. Spit-balling here again—bear with me. Now, if you were massively short a security while paying out your ass in borrowing fees for the privilege of entering the most crowded short trade in the market and you’re now opposite a massive business turnaround story, Ryan Cohen, numerous institutions, funds, retail whales, Norwegian HNW Freemason Consortiums, and the energy behind the Finest Rocket Children Ever to Grace Planet Fucking Earth—and you’re taking it in the ass week after week here—Do you then play this straight? Do you set aside all of these illegal and deceptive short tactics Jim Cramer candidly outlines in that video even though they’re impossible to enforce and are in fact not enforced? That Jim basically says you’d be professionally negligent if you were short and didn’t do this shit because fuck it whosgonnastopyou? And now you fucked up and that steamroller is barreling down upon you and there are all these things you could theoretically do try to get yourself out of this jam if you were That Kind of Person? Do you set this all aside and, at least in Jim’s view, tie one hand behind your precious ethical back? On the most heavily shorted stock off all time where you are bleeding Real Life Big-Boy Money? Just buying and selling you know, just a job, honest living, nothing much to it, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, can't get too carried away with it.
Or is it something a little bit fucking different than that?
I don’t know. I’m not in the industry myself. And I would never accuse anyone of doing anything so clearly contrary to the values upon which their professional career as Master of the Universe was built. So Gabe: chill. Don’t follow me or something on twitter man, since for all I know that’s Plotkinese for I Hope You Don’t Mind Sleeping With This Severed Horse Head in Your Bed Motherfucker. It’s just money, dude. You seem pretty well taken care of. But man would I be sweating if I were short right now staring down the barrel of your new neighbor Ryan Cohen’s whims and patience and polite Canadian manners and ambiguous emojis that we all lose our shit for. I mean, fuck man: are you ok? Don’t forget to exercise and eat well during all this. Maybe switch to green tea or something. And remember: you’ll always—always—be Michael Jordan’s Gary.
But here is where we return to our good friend Andrew Left from Citron Research.
Do you remember the excitement you felt this past weekend? I’ve never seen WSB so jacked. People were coming out hot on Tuesday—an uptick day! The new phone book’s here! The new phone book's here! What luck to be free of Gary’s tomfoolery for one fine day. And then GME spiked right away—reaching a high of over $45 that morning.
But then something happened. We all know what it was. But here is where any SEC lookie-loos need to close those Pornhub links and pay closer attention. Because in the moments before the Citron tweet that morning about Andy’s upcoming BuzzFeed Listicle call on Why GME is Scary Investment GRRRR, total short shares available dropped from 1.2M to 0. And a $300K put bet was placed on a weekly with a strike price well over 10% out of the money at the very moment that GME’s price was accelerating rapidly. (H/t u/FatAspirations). That’s some WSB-level shit right there.
And yet they pull it off! GME immediately shoots down nearly 30% intraday, and eventually climbing abck up above 10%, making us all feel a little weird and like ungrateful millennial brats for feeling so shitty about a 10% day. But we all know what fucking happened, now don’t we?
So what can we say about ol’ Andy? Now, many of you know Andy as the dumbshit who shorted TSLA until he was ground into little bits of dumb dumb dust and made to look ever so foolish over and over again until he finally cried drunk uncle and flipped to being long TSLA and now he’s cool to you or whatever. Or you might know him as the guy who puts out really shoddy research that often, by pure happenstance, drives a new narrative to control the orderflow and SP on a WSB-beloved security like PLTR? You know the guy I’m talking about. Once in hot pursuit by Hong Kong fuzz, an International Man of Obviousness with a face that says: why yes, I will have another vodka tonic thankyouverymuch. That’s him.
Well, just like future call-back candidate for the role of Frightened Inmate #2, Mr. Steve Cohen, Andy is also but a Caveman—frightened and confused by your modern concepts of “ethics” and “rules.” No! No!—He’s a straight shooter! Devoted to rooting out obvious frauds, like Lukin Coffee and TSLA (Do not fuck with Elon or my Hot Mom’s ETF, Andy). And like the aspirations of Antoine Bugle Boy when he entered the blue jeans market, Andy saw an overcrowded short trade here based on an overly simplistic and obsolete short thesis about GME and said: “Me Too!” And as this thing is ripping to the stratosphere, Andy starts ringing his dumb dumb twitter bell and saying hear ye, hear ye—Inauguration Day and time it shall be for all my Big Brain thoughts about GME!
Nothing weird about that. No sir.
So Andy Citron or whatever the fuck his name is will be putting out some dumbshit video or something today in what seems to be a pretty clear attempt to scare my poor Rocket Children and get those pesky computers to high frequency this shit to drive the SP down to more acceptable loss levels (cause let’s be honest: they’re still taking a fucking bath here) for Mel Tormé’s namesake hedgefund and all the other cretins that are dug into short position here. And they’re gonna try to scare ya’ with the color red! And they know that no one here likes the color red.
But do see what’s going on here and who we’re dealing with. This really ain’t rocket science, Rocket Children. The dude actually tried to claim he forgot about the Inauguration. In 2021. He has not been in a coma, to the best of my knowledge. But you do look a little bleary eyed, Andy. Must have been all that staying up super late working on those last few bullet points to fill out the powerpoint on that GME listicle of yours, eh sport?
Conclusion: On the Subject of Patience and The Arc of The Universe Bending Toward Ryan Fucking Cohen
In my youth there was a period of time where I went out on boats that would drop crates into the waters of the Arctic. Bundled inside them were raw pieces of meat. In the coming days the boats would head back out to the frigid seas, hook the floats bobbing upon the waters, and pull the crates up. Packed inside would be many crabs. They were so delicious & made a good price at market. The difference between the crate that was empty and the create full of bounty was a mystery even the great physicist Erwin Schrödinger pondered at much length.
But the hearty fishermen of my youth already knew the answer long ago. Why did the trap fill up? Time. In time, all traps fill. In time, all things pondered shall be revealed.
--The Fucking Viking, That’s Who
Now look, you all know I have a soft spot for Ryan Cohen. Hell, we all do. He’s a good dude. And the man has played this flawlessly so far. He really has. The fact that we are all sitting here with Ryan Cohen having successfully negotiated three seats on the Board—a bloodless coup as my man Rod Alzmann says—here in January? It’s amazing. His vision for GME is dialed-the-fuck in and extremely exciting. This misunderstood business is on the threshold of an exciting turnaround with Ryan Cohen at the helm. And though I was very much looking forward to the potential repercussions of a vote being called at the annual meeting and what that might mean for the short-term share price, this result is infinitely better. Whatever their motivations, that Board and George Sherman saw the writing on the wall here and accepted the Golden Bridge that Ryan offered them. And Ryan Cohen has done everything he’s set out to do here. And he’s clearly been having fun while doing it. Read up on the guy at some point if you haven’t–there’s lots of good DD out there on him, obviously. And while you’re reading and thinking about Ryan Cohen, think also about guys like Steve Cohen (no fucking relation) and Gabe Plotkin and Andy Left and how lucky we are that we get to roll with RC against that motley crew of fuckwads.
And do you know what? I’m guessing that RC, and maybe even the funds being discussed in that screenshot, have been very patient with Mr. Plotkin et al in recent weeks. You don’t go around bankrupting hedge funds willy nilly, you know--bad form and all that old chap. People tend to remember that. And guys like Steve Cohen and Gabe Plotkin seem like they play for keeps. So now you try to build them a Golden Bridge to cross—maybe not their preferred route of travel, but could be worse and all that, right guys? But for whatever reason it seems like the natural instinct here on the short side is fight over flight. And these short FUD tactics are getting increasingly ridiculous to help slow down the inevitable march toward the detonator right next to that bridge. So relax everyone! And let’s not fool ourselves: All those Masters of the Universes are well aware of the math problem they’re all facing here and they must have a vague grasp of the odds that this goes off in one direction over the other. And what that could mean for the size of their money pits and how many sports teams they can buy this year. Shit, I assume Steve Cohen is counseling his young acolyte about how many sads he himself felt deep down in his man heart on that fateful day in 2008 when he lost $250M on a short when Volkswagon squeezed to infinity—a sadness that he will continue to draw on when his agent finally finds him a role that calls for it.
But my point is: the longs here can afford to be patient and let this play out. When this thing moves, the Viking’s Schrödinger crabs will only be in one pot. And I’m guessing that pot is the one being held by the guy who is actually in total control here: Ryan Goddamn Cohen.
So enjoy the show today. If you’re anything like me, you’re feeling relaxed after gorging yourself on lucky space peanuts all week.(https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/news/10022/lucky-peanuts/)
And though these silly wabbits with their cumbersome FUD efforts can get a bit tiresome, I’m still very much enjoying this GME show at this point and almost do not want it to end—what with all these Sorkin-esque twists and turns and my Cohen Tweet Decorder Ring getting all this sweet action.
But just remember who Ryan Cohen is, what he cares about, and what, so far, he has told us he intends to do here. And then you might realize, as I have, that Ryan Cohen has had the Gray’s Sports Almanac here all along. This story has already been written. He’s already won. And Melvin Capital’s Schrödinger-ass crabs are dead as fuck. The only question now is: what causes that Golden Bridge to blow? I, for one, am content to wait on RC while counting my good fortune that I can continue to accumulate until whatever happens here happens. So pass the rocket peanuts.
It’s just money after all. Right Gabe?
TL/DR: Psst: a Mysterious Viking once told me about behind-the-scenes Golden Bridge negotiations that are likely taking place that give shorts no chance but the shorts seem to think they’re saying there’s a chance but there really is no chance; Gabe Plotkin, Steve Cohen and Andy Left are misunderstood Straight Shooters who probably answer typical interview questions about their own perceived weaknesses by saying “Sometimes I just care too much about doing the right thing”; and Ryan Cohen is the Goddamn Man so we can all relax and not worry so much about all this dumb short FUD bullshit, ok? OK. 🚀🚀🚀
**If you construe any of the above as investment advice without doing your own DD or at least Googling Ryan Cohen then you are a fucking idiot and may God have mercy on your soul. You too, Andy.

One day early. Buckle up, it's a long one!
Trigger warning: digestive & anxiety issues, medical procedures
Section One: Assets and Debt
Retirement Balance: PERA account $7,389.65
Equity: roughly $45,000 (house and vehicles)
Savings account balance: $523
'Secret' cash stash: about $800 between us which we pretend doesn't exist.
Checking account balance: $2,318
Credit card debt: $6404.47 🤯
Student loan debt: $30,593.72 for my associate's in nursing and one semester of my BSN which I have no plans to finish.
Current clinic bill: $814. I have about $620 left in my flex account from last year that I need to use so I'll probably pay this off this month.
Section Two: Income
Income progression: It's been pretty straightforward for me. I worked at McDonald's in high school (minimum wage) and came back after one semester of college. I was eventually promoted to shift manager in 2007 (I think $9.50/hr). I got my CNA license in 2008 and started working at a nursing home ($10.65/hr). Gradually increased over the years. When I got my LPN license in 2016, I bumped up to around $16.50/hr. Another bump for my RN license at the end of 2017. I started at $26.50 and now make $28.75 base. I work 12 hour nights so I get $.50 differential from 6p-10p and $1 for 10p-6a. This is considered a joke of a differential btw. We get time and a half on holidays. I do truly love my work but I'm so burnt out. I've been in long term care for so long that I'm not sure how to even do anything else at this point.
Main Job Monthly Take Home: ~$2700, more if I work a holiday or pick up a shift
Taxes: ~$700 Health insurance: $303 (family plan with high deductible) Retirement contributions: 6.5% of my pay HSA: $192.30 Flex: $46.16 Clinic bill payment: $100 Life/STD insurance: $54.42 Christmas account: $50
Side Gig Monthly Take Home: generally $0. I do sell some craft items on the side but I don't hustle.
Child support: supposed to be $531 but I get what I get most of the time.
I am married but we do not have a joint account. B's gross is $41,600/year. He recently started a new job and got a $4.50/hr pay increase. He's also a volunteer firefighter and gets paid once a year from that, although last year's check was only $750. He carries dental and vision insurance for us and has a flex set up, about $170/month.
Section Three: Expenses
Rent / Mortgage / HOA fees: $0. 2 bed 1 bath home we share with my daughter (Z, she's 8) full time and B's stepson (E, he's 14) part time. We own outright.
Property tax: $497 this year, B pays.
Car registration: $206 this year for my car, goes down a bit every year.
Home & car (3) insurance: $237, B pays. We just combined everything a few days ago so we might split this. ETA after getting the first bill, I will pay *$265/6 months* for my car and half of the SUV, about $175/6 months.*
Savings contribution: lol, whatever comes from my round up rule
Debt payments: CC bills $400, B's pellet grill $35 (was a Christmas present). B has no debt.
Electric: fluctuates with the climate, last month was $245!!! We are trying to figure out ways to reduce this. B pays.
Gas: $50 now on the yearly plan, B pays.
Watesewegarbage: ~$60, B pays.
Wifi: $59, I pay.
Cellphone: $290, I pay for 5 lines.
Babysitter: $180
Student loans: in deferment, not making payments
Meds: around $50, paid with flex money.
Monthly subscriptions: Hulu, HBO, Pandora, Design Bundles, razors, Netflix, Apple storage, NYT, Cricut Access, Disney+, Amazon subscribe and save items, my entire life, $250. I pay.
Amazon Prime: $124/year, I pay.
Pet expenses: averages around $100 between food, haircuts, shots and insurance for my youngest pup, I pay.
Car payment: $405.27 for my car. We paid cash for our used SUV in December, and B's truck is old and has been paid off for years.
Groceries: around $400, B tends to grab things here and there and I get the big hauls.
School lunch: free this year! Thanks USDA!
Extracurriculars: Z opted out of any extracurriculars this year due to COVID.
Regular therapy: nope
1/16 Saturday
3:30 AM: I'm awake but I refuse to get out of bed. Cruise Indeed and Facebook for jobs. I recently put in my 30 day notice so I need to find something ASAP. I've put in probably 6 online applications already. Print out two applications, three copies of my resume, and create two cover letters. Why do I have to fill out all my info on an application when they can find it on a resume? Get a year of a resume and cover letter making site for $24.99 because I'm terrible at both. Buy some new Brumates that I don't need $67.93 and see that my yearly Prime payment has been pulled. Watch YouTube and fall back to sleep around 5.
8:20 AM: B crawls into bed after work and snowblowing basically the entire yard. Cuddle for a while so he can leech my body heat before I go upstairs. I need to wash my hair. Fall into an internet hole of Facebook and NYT while lounging with the dogs.
Noon: B comes upstairs. I didn't wash my hair. We need some groceries so decide to drive the hour to the nearest town with a Walmart AND a Menards - it's the 15% off bag sale right now. Throw in some dry shampoo, brush my teeth and get dressed. Change the water jug in our machine (our tap water is sketch), let the dogs out and head out.
1:18 PM: Gas is up to $2.34/gallon. Cringe thinking about filling up the SUV. My car is a hybrid but doesn't like Minnesota winters. B and I debate bringing our cat to the vet during the drive. She has FIV and has been losing weight, but we decide against it as there's not much we can do at this point anyways. She's still happy so 🤷‍♀️
2:34: Check out of Menards. $99.15 on a new door lock with keypad, sanding blocks and paper, disposable condiment cups, and Armor All wipes after 15% off and B's $15 return credit that he forgot to use. B gets LED bulbs, grill brushes, motor oil, a door latch for our porch, something for his brother's toilet and a propane tank exchange. Only saw one guy without a mask, so I'd call that a win.
3:05: $15.98 after coupons at Joann's on more tumbler supplies (e-6000 spray, 5 taklon brushes) and one roll of clearance ribbon. Realize I have my Christmas money in my purse and forgot to use it. B goes to Harbor Freight for more tools he doesn't need and a sporting goods store for a gift card for his best friend's birthday.
3:32: We decide to go to Perkin's, hoping they won't be too busy in the off hour. The hostess is wearing her mask under her nose and I'm so annoyed. I have some weird stomach issue going on, so I just get two eggs and toast. B tells me he should be able to get the first COVID shot this week, and I tell him I still haven't changed my mind (we both already had COVID during an outbreak at our workplace). I've been 'not preventing' pregnancy for almost two years. At this point, I'm too anxious to get the vaccine, and there is just not enough data available on pregnant/TTC women to change my mind. My time limit is my birthday, so if I'm not pregnant by then I'll be getting the vaccine in August. $28.87 +$5 tip.
4:47: Check out of Walmart with wet cat food, pop, milk, butter, Mac and cheese, cereal, snacks for the kiddo, chips, ketchup, tator tots, Gatorade, Hawaiian Punch and deli meat. $88.65. Every time I ask B if we need something, he says we have it at home. Also, no grapes? Usually a Walmart trip sends me into an anxiety attack but the store is pretty empty today.
5:09: My favorite stop of the day: the liquor store. The store at home is so crazy expensive so this is a treat. I get Truly Iced Tea and two different kinds of hard coffee to try for $41.91. B picks up three cases of beer.
5:18: B stops for gas ($37 🥴) and we head for home. Buy some vape juice online, $86.59. Yeah yeah, I know. My gut hurts, I'm super bloated and I just want to nap. We talk about our options regarding my medical procedure that is coming up and decide to try and get it done while we're still on my work insurance. I had a positive FIT test so now I have to have a colonoscopy. I'll end up maxing out the deductible but I'll get it half off if we can pay the bill within 30 days. I'll get my PTO paid out at the end of my 30 day notice, so we should be able to swing it. Not really sure we have a great option at this point as B doesn't want me to take on another payment. He is so anti debt, and I have $6500 in CC debt. We are opposites in so many ways.
6:20: Get home and unload the SUV. The dogs are going WILD. I feel like garbage and immediately get into pajamas. Give the cat a can of wet food and she eats a few bites. I still can't find a type she really enjoys. I also hook up the drinking water fountain I bought for her a few days ago. B installs the new door lock and I'm thrilled to have a keypad again. The old one stopped working a few months ago. Pay an invoice for a bulk order of keychain tassels from a wholesale group, $19. Basically do nothing for the rest of the night.
9:45: I'm falling asleep in my recliner. I decide to do my nighttime routine (rinse face, No7 HydraLuminous Gel Cream, Algenist Complete Renewal Eye Balm) and go to bed in hopes of feeling better tomorrow. I skip brushing my teeth because I'm nursing a ginger ale. Watch some YouTube and fall asleep around 10:30.
Daily total: $478.07
1/17 Sunday
2:09 AM: I wake up for the second time tonight with nightmares. I rarely have them so I'm annoyed. B isn't in bed to cuddle with either. I go upstairs to use the bathroom and find him in his recliner. Realize I forgot to take my meds last night (antidepressant, probiotic, omeprazole, hair skin & nail vitamin, Lysine supplements, allergy pill) so grab those along with two Goli gummies and a lorazepam to help me calm down. My gut still hurts, and I'm so over this. Browse the internet and watch YouTube again to fall asleep.
3:55: Wake up to stomach cramps and know my colon is going to empty itself out. Park myself in the bathroom for half an hour and try not to pass out. I'm not sure if it's just IBS or something worse going on, but I'm glad I'm getting it checked out.
7:17: Still awake. I am stressed by the potential of not having a job for a few weeks, my health, and the current state of everything else in the world. Decide to compound this by opening my NYT app. I am so hopeful Joe can start turning things around.
12:17 PM: I must have finally fallen asleep because B comes down to ask if I want to go to South Dakota today. We check out local case rates by county and decide we are probably safe. We are about the only ones who wear our masks in public over there. I must admit that going through this pandemic feels much different out here in the boonies than it does in the city. We had a large surge in cases for about 4 weeks in November-December, and now we are back down to about 2-3 new cases a day. Our local businesses work hard to keep us safe, in part because they don't want to be known as the place so-and-so got COVID. Ah, small town gossip. We do our part try to support them as we really can't afford to lose any businesses in our area. I shoot a text to Z's dad to confirm I'm picking her up in the morning.
1:28: I finally get out of bed and wash my hair, which is my least favorite chore. I brush it out before my shower, use some Head and Shoulders 2 in 1 to combat my winter dry scalp, finish it off with SheaMoisture Purple Rice Water conditioner. I decide to heat style it today, so I use two heat protection sprays. To brush, wash, condition, brush again, dry and curl my hair takes 1.5 hours. Now I remember why I never do this.
3:30: We hide in the corner of the bar for the meat raffle. I really love coming here because the money they raise goes to local charities. We also have drinks and supper. I get a BLT chicken wrap, and we win 3 free drink tickets. We head out around 6. $50 + $10 tip, this comes out of my Christmas money. B goes to the drivethru on our way home and gets me a frozen hot chocolate. Yuuuum.
8:45: For some reason I can't keep all the school calendar changes straight. Z was supposed to be off tomorrow, but I just realized she does have school. I message Z's teacher to let her know Z won't be there, since she has her yearly physical tomorrow after being rescheduled 3 times. Do a quick nighttime routine, take my meds and head downstairs for YouTube and sleep. Hoping for a decent night of it!
Daily total: $60
1/18 Monday
3:05 AM: I'm awake, but for no particular reason this time. Working the night shift really messes with your sleeping schedule. I must have been snoring because B has gone upstairs to sleep in E's room. I clean the litter box and decide to fire up my laptop and Cricut machine to get some projects done I've been procrastinating. I finish a water bottle for B, a stash jar for a friend, create a couple Valentine's mock ups for my business page and seal some glitter signs. I grab a couple SVGs on Etsy $1.38. My mom sees my Snapchat and we message over the woes of insomnia.
6:20: I have come to the realization that buying craft items and actually using them are two separate hobbies. I lay in bed with the cat and doze.
8:40: Leave the house to go pick up Z. Her dad lives about 25 minutes away. On the way home we stop at Casey's for random snacks, $7.64. The clinic calls and we schedule my colonoscopy for Thursday. I have to get some blood drawn later this morning when I bring Z to her appointment. I also have to have a CT with contrast so I'll figure out when I can get that done as well. I take a quick body shower when we get home.
10:55: Bring Z to her well child check-up. I think they asked us about 100 questions, and some of them were super weird for an 8 year old. She finally gets her flu shot and only spills a few tears. No major issues so that's a win! She does miss a few sounds on her hearing test, but we decide to just watch it for now. I get my blood drawn when we're done with her appointment and talk to the radiologist about my CT. He says my prior authorization hasn't gone through yet and he'll call me when we can get it scheduled. We're both hopeful it can get done tomorrow. Then I talk to the surgical nurse to get my pre-op instructions. Finally leave the clinic around 12:45. Pick up my surgical prep from the drugstore, $52.06 (!!!) from my flex account. Z requests cheese pizza for lunch so I oblige.
1:17 PM: I get a call about a job and set up an interview for Wednesday afternoon.
4:10: I bring Z down to the local salon for a haircut. I can't go in (COVID restrictions) but Z loves the feel of a fresh cut so I don't worry. Her hair dresser is her classmate's mom and my old neighbor. $18 + $7 tip.
6:30: B has a fireman's meeting tonight, so Z and I have mac and cheese per our tradition. B hates it so we usually only eat it when he's gone. I make Z have an apple on the side so we can make at least one good food choice today. The Bachelor is on tonight! I usually hit the Reddit stream but I got a late start tonight so I skip it.
9:05: Make sure Z brushes her teeth and hug her goodnight.
10:20: My oldest (and crankiest) dog just cannot be pleased tonight. She keeps wanting to go outside, but it's cold and snowy and she doesn't like either of those things. Sigh. Do my usual nighttime routine, take my meds and go to bed. Fall asleep around 11.
Daily total: $33.99
1/19 Tuesday
6:45 AM: Success! Finally got some sleep. Good thing I woke up though, because I forgot to set an alarm. I wake up a very cranky Z at 7 and make sure she gets ready for school. We are very fortunate that our school district is small, and Z has been going to school in person, full time, all school year. She never complains about wearing her mask either. I drop her off at 8, then B and I bring our SUV to the mechanic. I think B is dropping me off at home but instead we go out for breakfast downtown. I have a pancake, scrambled egg and side of fruit. I hear the regulars (old guys who come in every morning for coffee) talking about signing up for their COVID shots. This is a good sign! B pays, $16.04 + $3.96 tip.
9:01: I get an email that a hospital position I applied for has already been filled. Dang. It's still snowing, so I plan for a lazy day. B goes outside to snowblow.
9:55: The radiologist calls and tells me we can get my CT completed. We decide to do it right away this morning. I run up to the clinic to grab my contrast drink and set a timer so I drink the right amounts during the right time frames. It tastes like flat, flavored water. My stomach doesn't seem to appreciate it much. Hopefully this doesn't become a problem when I'm in the CT machine.
11:00: Get my CT done. I get an IV in my arm and the radiologist pushes Lord knows what into my veins, but it makes me feel like I wet my pants 🤣 He lets me check out the images when we're done. It only takes about 15 minutes and then I head back home. I sit around with B for a while, then I go downstairs to make a few crafty things and fill an order. I put a couple more things on my business page as well. During this time B brings his truck out to the mechanic and brings home the SUV. They put in a 'Minnesota approved' battery, the repair cost was $220. I offer B half but he declines, saying "let's see what the truck costs first."
2:45 PM: I get so distracted crafting that I almost forget to go pick Z up from school. She gets in the car and tells me she had the best day ever! I ask what happened, and she says she didn't get strawberries at lunch. Oh... she was being sarcastic. She picks up her room and puts away her laundry when we get home. We don't do much this afternoon.
7:00: B makes supper tonight, nothing fancy. A chicken patty for me and corn dogs for him and Z. I'm staying away from roughage to make my life easier tomorrow. Z gets ready for bed and I tuck her in at 8:45. Shortly after, B leaves for work. I go downstairs to work on a Valentine's day order.
Daily total: $0
1/20 Wednesday
12:45 AM: I have spent far too long organizing files on my computer. I call it a night. I look up my CT report and it doesn't show anything urgent or explain why there's blood in my stool. Sigh. Normal routine and bedtime.
7:05: I'm up. IT'S INAUGURATION DAY! B is already in bed. He tells me he has the chills, is nauseated, and his arm is killing him. I tell him his COVID shot is working and bring him some ibuprofen. I wake up Z and she gets ready for school. While I'm waiting, I take a body shower, let the dogs out and feed them. Drop Z off at school at 8, deliver a Valentine's Day order (+$20!) and go home to watch the inauguration while eating mini wheats.
10:45: I watch Kamala get sworn in and I get tears in my eyes. Such a historic moment.
11:45: I make myself scrambled eggs and drink a Dr. Pepper. After this, it's only clear liquids until tomorrow afternoon. B helps me give my oldest dog a haircut. You'd think we were killing her the way she cries. She's been getting haircuts every 2-3 months her whole life and still can't sit still.
2:00 PM: I have a virtual interview. The job sounds so interesting but it involves a lot of travel, and I'm not sure that would work with my family. I pick up Z from school when I'm done. She tells me "happy Joe Biden day!" when she gets into the car. We talk about the possible new job and she's not into the idea of me being gone.
5:00: B leaves to go work on his brother's house. He's been there on and off all week. He also got the night off for his floating holiday. I take my meds early so they have time to get into my system. I mix up the colonoscopy prep: two packets of powder into one liter of water. I make dinner for Z while I'm in the kitchen.
6:45: COLONOSCOPY PREP IS NASTY. Like, the taste of the drink is so disgusting and it's making me nauseated. I know it's important to keep it down, but it's also important to drink it within the one hour timeframe. Uuggghhhhh. It ends up being one hour and 45 minutes. B comes home around 8:30 and gets Z into bed.
9:00: The best way to describe how I feel is early labor. The cramps come and go and are so intense I have to take deep breaths. It's so exhausting I end up falling asleep.
Daily total: $0
1/21 Thursday
12:30 AM: IT'S TIME.
6:00: I slept between bathroom trips, but now it's time to mix up my second liter of prep. Yes, I have to do this to myself all over again. This time, I have to make sure to drink it all within the one hour timeframe.
7:30: Everybody is awake and chaos ensues. Did I mention we only have one bathroom? Z is trying to get ready for school, B wants to shower and I'm, well, you know. I get my entire liter of prep down in 65 minutes. B is still not feeling well from his COVID shot.
8:45: I manage a body shower although I had to get out once for the toilet. I am basically a zombie at this point. B drops me off at the hospital at 9:10. When I get there, they are running behind so I have to wait half an hour before I get into my room.
10:05: My nurse blows my vein and I have a panic attack. We are starting this day off great. A second nurse comes in and gets my IV in right away, thank God. Things move pretty quickly from here. By 10:30, I'm in the OR getting the good drugs. By 11:20, I'm awake enough to remember what's going on and drinking water so they'll pull my IV. The surgeon comes in and tells me they didn't see anything abnormal, but they did take some biopsies so hopefully I get some answers. By 12:05, I'm walking out the door.
12:15 PM: I am absolutely starving. B takes me out for lunch. I have a tuna sandwich and a 7Up. Our total is something around $17. I throw him $5 for the tip.
1:00: We're home. We spend the afternoon watching movies and laying around. My stomach is still pretty upset from all the torture. B picks up Z from school since I'm not supposed to drive yet. When she gets home, she regales me with the tale of getting hit in the face with a hulu hoop in gym. She actually has a fat lip!
5:00: I get a jar of my favorite eye cream on a BST board, $20.
6:00: B heads out to work and I make supper. We have tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches tonight. Comfort food for the win.
9:00: Z has a quarter in her tonight. We play a couple games on her iPad before I stick her in the shower and then in bed. I promptly fall asleep in the living room.
Daily total: $25
1/22 Friday
3:30 AM: Move downstairs to our bedroom.
8:00: After work, B picked up E and they come home. The dogs are frantic. I eat a bowl of cereal and hang out with Z, since she doesn't have school today. We make funny drawings of each other and she reads me some knock knock jokes. I also get two more interviews set up for next week. I head back to bed around noon. I have to go back to work tonight. I have a block schedule: 7 off, 3 on, 1 off, 3 on, 4 off, 3 on. Our pay periods are adjusted for the night shift, so if I work the weekend that's my 36 hours for the week.
4:30 PM: I'm up. I take a shower and wash my hair. B makes pizza for the kids, another traditional meal timing in our house. He leaves for work at 5:30. I am dreading work. I have been exhausted after every shift no matter if it was busy or not. I'm not sure if it's my actual job, or just the night shift catching up to me. Either way, I'm looking forward to a new position. Also, getting ready for work is a chore these days. I use Fog Block on my glasses, then put side shields on. I hook my two masks up to my ear savers. Then I find two bottles of hand sanitizer and two pens to put in my pockets because I always lose one somewhere along the way. I pack my bag (water bottle, energy drink, iPad, shoes, snacks and supper) and start my car. I say bye to the kids and head out at 5:45.
6:00: Work is already a shit show and I just clocked in 5 minutes ago. I'm so annoyed and I just don't want to be here. But you better believe I'm going to suck it up and be happy for my residents. They are usually pretty happy to see me after my long stretch off.
11:45: I buckle up for what's going to be a very long shift.
Daily total: $0
Weekly total: $597.09
Food + Drink: $177.07
Fun / Entertainment: $60
Home + Health: $203.44
Clothes + Beauty: $45
Transport: $0
Other: $111.58
Reflection: This was a normal week considering its events. Obviously I don't usually buy a new door lock, and I typically only stock up on vape juice every 6 months or so. I'm heavily into my depression spending, but with everything going on in the world I've cut myself some slack. I'm only going to live once! *ETA our cat passed away this evening, 1/25. We are very sad but are happy we got to give her a good life for the last 3 years.

Sit down, children, and look around you. Our city is wonderful, is it not? The streets are safe. You scarcely need lock your shelters up at night where we live. You are all able to talk with one another without fear of being shot. You can play on your video consoles. You can be sure that you will eat today, and you can be sure that your meals will be of high quality. Isn't it grand?
​
Well, it was not always this way. I am old, my children. Very old. I can remember when I was young - not even your age! - and let me tell you, it was anything but peaceful and grand. I remember what life was like in the War.
​
What's that? I'm sorry. These hearing aids don't fit well with my ear shape. I am not complaining, though - it is awfully nice of our human government to give us these things for free, considering their past with our kind. Ah, you wish to know what the War was. You know, elders are often asked things by their offspring, and I will tell you now, that is the thing I am most asked about by far. But yes, I can tell you. I may be two hundred years old in human years, but those memories are still very much vivid in my mind.
​
Long ago, there were no humans leading us. Strange, is it not? But, yes, that is how things were. Back then, we had to lead and provide for ourselves. For the most part, it was a good life. We traded technology with our neighbors in return for food. We had little need for a military - or so we thought, so secure was our position. Our government, benign as it seemed, was rife with corruption just under the surface. It collaborated with those it should not have for its own gain. It steered us into trouble's way, and it did not prepare us for it even when it became unavoidable.
​
On and on this went, while I was but a little hatchling living with my grandfather, my mother and my many sisters. But those times were not going to last.
​
I cannot find words to describe to you why our people, in our old government, did the things they did. They did not care for you or for me. They cared about how much money they had in their credit accounts, and they would gladly have any of us put to death to get more of it. Well, in the course of their misdealings, they sold out their allies - our allies - to a race that we knew right from the start as our enemy.
​
The public knew nothing, as is par for such a sickening course, but in their pursuit of wealth and power, our old statesmen sold out the secrets of our allies' fleets and armies to this enemy in return for petty scraps of money, believing that their allies could take the fall for their evil, or that they could simply flee from their problems. They were wrong.
​
The Krett, as they are called, were nothing but murderous savages led by a bunch of speciesist dogs. To our old government, they were something to be trifled with. By the time they began arming their militaries against their invasion, it was far too late. The allies they thought would bail them out were blown like dust to the wind, and our worlds would fall to them next.
​
What our old government did not realize was that the Krett had allies of their own. On their own, we could have beaten them back with no small effort. With their allies, we stood no chance. The Krett made it appear that they were attacked first - I forget how, it is something to do with a cargo ship - and their allies came to their aid by way of defense pact. Can you guess who their allies were?
​
The Humans. The very beings that lead us now.
​
Now, before I go any further, let me tell you what Humans are like to face in combat. Aside from their incredible technology, their instincts and mentalities are by far the single most lethal weapons of the entire War. The Krett might have seemed more dangerous from the outside, with their sharp teeth and thick scales and titanic stature and massive numbers and sadistic predatory urges, but I tell you, their wicked grins are but a bluff in the face of the Humans.
​
When the Krett planted their repulsive feet down onto the dirt of our worlds, they were interested in more than simple conquest and resources. They took joy in the chaos and pain they sowed, and went out of their way to sow it. I have seen the Krett capture whole cities just to drag their inhabitants off to be tortured. I have seen Krett soldiers eat our warriors alive - bite by bite through their screams - on the naked street, with our children taken in tow to meet similar fates. The Krett's twisted ideology moved slowly through our space, milking every ounce of it for as much suffering they could wring out of us as possible.
​
The Humans are a different story, though I did not see or hear nearly as much of their conquests against our people as I did from the Krett. The simple reason for this is that the news of Krett conquests were easy to access - they made every agony they inflicted upon us as widely available as possible. But the Humans had a different way of warfare.
​
Where the Humans struck, we scarcely received word of it before nearby colonies were overwhelmed. We heard nothing of their campaigns as they did everything under their power to keep us from learning of their activities, their positions, and their plans. They fought efficiently and practically, with what little we could recover from our engagements with their forces making no mention of the cruelty and terror that the Krett were known for. They took prisoners without harming them. They always accepted surrender. They refused to kill civilians. They did not attack our sick and wounded, nor our doctors. They expended only what was needed to win and shunned needless cruelty, and in so doing, they were mighty.
​
One day, this world - this very world you stand upon right now, your home - was caught in the crossfire, and became the victim of both the Krett and the Humans at the same time. I was merely fifteen years old when I first saw the Krett in the flesh, as our family hid beneath the streets. I could not believe the news of their atrocities before, but when they began ripping us apart with their teeth in our own homes and trading our body parts for consumption, everything was laid clearly out before me. It was all I could do to not cry and give away our hiding spot in the sewers. That was the lowliest point in my entire life - and it took place at the mere beginnings of it.
​
I must stress that, at this point of the War, Human and Krett forces had not linked up with one another. A few months earlier, our news outlets told of our homeworld falling to the Human' onslaught. At that time, the Krett had only just begun their advanced into our deeper territories. After hiding in the sewers for two weeks, me and our family had begin lapsing into starvation, and it fell to me with my small and nimble figure to sneak out to find food. It is during one of these excursions that I saw a Human in person for the first time.
​
I remember, vividly, what impression he made upon my young mind then. I suppose I have gotten used to them now, but back then, they all seemed so spindly and tall. The Humans looked as though they they had no fat upon their bodies whatsoever, even without the bulky power armor they so often bring to battle. That human was, as my luck had it, facing directly towards me when I peeked around the corner of an aisle of an abandoned supermarket.
​
I expected to be shot then and there. I closed my eyes, beginning to utter desperate pleas and spill tears. This went on for what felt like minutes. I remembered what I had seen of the civilians who had been caught, how they were treated like butcherstuff, how their deaths were drawn out for days before the Krett finally moved on before the Humans arrived. in my pleas, I sensed him stepping nearer, his rifle in his hands - and, instead of a bullet, he told me to stay quiet.
​
I opened my eyes through the glassy liquid covering them to see the human's rifle was slung over his back. I could smell something pungent in front of me, in his hands. In place of a gun, and to my amazement, it was a bar of chocolate. As I accepted it, I could see behind the human, and I could see a gathering of other families of my kind holed up in the far corner of that collapsed supermarket. All around them, human soldiers and surgeons tending to them with food and bandages.
​
I was sent to bring the rest of my family over, and for the next few days we lived under the care of human soldiers. I met one who treated me and my secondborn sister of malnourishment - I cannot remember his name, but it started with a 'J' - and when we were not being treated and he was not busy elsewhere, he would play a curious game with me. I still play it to this day with you all. Yes, it was Chess.
​
Over the games of Chess that this human doctor played with me, I got to learn of his species, and I asked him why his race was so effective in the art of warfare and technological advancement. In the midst of being endlessly checkmated and coached on good play, he told me that the world his kind evolved on - the one you hear of in their newsfeeds, this 'Earth', where their capitol is located - was host to some of the harshest conditions in the galaxy, with violent weather, terrible plagues and vicious predators abounding.
​
In the course of growing in such a brutal environment, the Humans had evolved to be incredibly efficient in both body and mind. The reason they appeared so slender and compact was because that was just what they were: compact. Their physiology was efficient. Their background and past made no allowance for flaws. In the same vein, their minds worked quickly and efficiently, as my frustrated young mind learned firsthand in their turn-based game of strategy.
​
As a result of the need for this efficiency, the humans had honed their prowesses into a razor's edge. The tactics, strategies, doctrines and techniques employed by the Krett paled before theirs. The Humans fought themselves regularly on their homeworld, testing themselves against themselves, encountering all the situations one might expect from warfare. And, from this, they refined themselves and their technology into an efficient war machine that none could match. And they did all of this, plainly and simply, as a matter of survival. They have been doing so ever since they learned to craft spears to defeat the large predators of the savannas they evolved in, as the human doctor told me. Sharing such a close past with suffering and cruelty, they had grown to shun it.
​
The Krett, on the other hand, had it easy. They were the apex predators of their home planet. Nothing challenged them. They did not improve, for they did not need to improve. They fell into vanity, believing themselves superior and raping all that which they could find at their whims while remaining ignorant of just how easy they had it. They took joy in their tortures with vast abandon, uncaring of any other than their own species.
​
After the conclusion of one particular game with the human who my memories have named J - by his teachings and insights into his kind's thought processes, the only match to end in something other than a loss against him, as a stalemate - we heard strange shuffling footsteps amassing outside the camp. I snuck behind the human soldiers to see what it was, and it was a group of Krett. It only sunk in what was going on when a plasma bolt went flying my way, very nearly connecting with my skull and killing me. I screamed and ran back to the arms of the Humans that occupied approximately half of this planet at the time, and the Krett gave chase. The humans instinctively reacted, grabbing their rifles and rushing into fighting positions.
​
The Krett were confused when they saw us at first, but they recognized their human allies quickly enough. They approached after the Humans lowered their rifles. I stood near the back of the room with my family, all of whom were silent. Seeing the Humans and the Krett so close together gave me my first comparison between the two.
​
The Humans' hyperoptimized frames were shorter than those of the Krett, but just by the way they moved and slung their rifles around, I could tell that the humans were far more capable than they let on. The differences became most apparent when the human sergeant approached the Krett's leader to greet them. I was overcome by the sickening feeling that the humans would throw us away, to be slaughtered like toys within the jaws of the lizards.
​
But, just as the Krett started acting friendly and flaunting and flexing in the presence of their allies, one human soldier - the one I had run back to, who, incidentally, was the one who had offered me one of their candy bars - whispered into his sergeant's ear and had a brief but scandalous discourse with him. In a moment, the human sergeant became more assertive despite the Krett's taller stature, making repeated gestures towards the rifle of one Krett, which was still smoking from the shot that had almost killed me. His gestures turned into demands to leave, accompanied by demands for an explanation as to why a shot had been fired in my direction.
​
I had seen humans remain calm under pressure and even smile, but to this point, I had never seen them become angry. I had not had much time with their kind, but I could tell that the human sergeant was furious. His voice was loud. When the Krett refused to leave, he began shouting, which was met by roars from the Krett's commander. I do not remember much from their exchange, but they seemed to be arguing over who possessed authority over this section of our planet. At the climax, one Krett drew his weapon on the human sergeant, and then all hell broke loose.
​
The krett was dead before my eyes caught him taking aim. I saw, that day, an entire squad of the very same monstrosities that tore my neighbors and friends and classmates in half be massacred in the space of a few seconds. I saw human soldiers flawlessly orchestrate a precise storm of gunfire into their skulls before their weapons were even drawn. I saw, against every bit of my belief, a Krett engaging a human in hand-to-hand combat, and that very same human proceeding to twist the much larger and heavier lizard into a pile of broken bones on the floor as easily as they would have done so with one of my people. That Krett was the only one out of them all to not be killed in that fight. None of the humans had so much as a scratch on their uniforms.
​
The occupation of our lovely world went on for months afterward, with fighting raging on in systems all around us in a chaotic and untrackable manner. The longer it went on, the less and less I heard mention of the Krett invaders, for which I am infinitely thankful for. I met your grandfather in those months.
​
Our planet, as I'm sure you can guess, ultimately fell under the jurisdiction of the Humans. Shortly after they began encountering the Krett, their focus seemed to shift from winning victory as quickly as possible to securing as much of our space as possible, and I now know why. They were safeguarding us.
​
After the War ended, the alliance between the Krett and the Humans ended immediately. For the two hundred years that this peace has stood, we have prospered. They know how to run a state. They know how to defend a people. As these centuries have worn on, my children, I like to think that the reasons we have not had to worry about the Krett extend to a certain unwillingness on their part to go to war with the Humans that now protect us.
​
My heart aches in its cavity to imagine what has happened on the other side of the Krett border. There, the humans cannot protect anything. What little has been seen is bleak and provides no hope; ships trying to escape, only to all be destroyed and covered up. But now, there is hope. These past two hundred years have seen the Krett become ever bolder against our human leaders. They are instigating against us once again, and I can see that they still think little of the humans. They think their allies will let them win against them. Oh, what a surprise they will have.
​
When the Krett draw their arms against us once again and the humans that you sometimes see walk by you in the streets outside are called to action, and when you are brought to witness their power for yourself, remember, my children: do not be afraid of them. They are powerful. They are cunning. They are indomitable, ruthless, efficient and relentless predators from the worst of nightmare worlds; but, greater than any of those qualities of theirs is one named after their very species: their humanity. They are humane in their brutality; they do not torture or murder or rape or devour their prey like the pathetic cowards who would seek to see us enslaved. They do not desire such things.
​
I have heard you tell of your experiences with some of your human classmates and friends at school. I have heard you say they are faster and stronger and braver than you. Now, you know why. So, when you see a human this day, and I pray for all the days that follow, I bid thee to approach them with trust. Learn from them. Befriend them, and above all, let them know that, for all their terror and power and ruthlessness, they are not feared by their friends.

Lasagna is a classic dish that can tell you a lot about a cook. There are dozens of ways to make the Italian classic... from utilizing different pasta types to adding all sorts of vegetables, or simply opting for a ragu of sorts and cheese. Making lasagna from scratch calls to a cooks ability to make a decent ragu (meat sauce), make homemade pasta sheets, and, if one opts for it, getting creative with the way the "casserole" is layered.
Below is my adaptation on a "classic" lasagna. If you want to have a whack at making it, I've left the technique and measurement list (in both weights and Imperial). I'll also go ahead and link to a video that I created for those of you who prefer something visual. I spent a lot of time on this, so I hope it helps you save some of your own! Let me know if you have any questions. Good luck!
RECIPE (Serves 8...)
For Lasagna…

• 5.5 cups (200g) Parmigiano Reggiano
• 1.5 cups (80g) Low-Moisture, full-fat Mozzarella
• Fresh Basil and/or Parsley TT - garnish

Fresh Pasta Sheets…

• 4 cups (510g) Type “00” Flour
• 4 (230g) Whole Eggs
• 5 (90g) Egg Yolks

Bechamel (“besciamella”)…

• 2 tbsp (30g) Butter
• 3 tbsp (30g) Flour
• 2 cups (474ml) Whole Milk
• 1 cup (25g) Parmigiano Reggiano, grated
• Ground Nutmeg TT
• Salt & Pepper TT

Italian Sausage Ragu “Bolognese”...
(Makes 10-12 servings)

• 4 tbsp (60g) Butter
• 1lb (454g) Italian Pork Sausage
• 1lb (454g) Ground Beef Chuck
• 1 large Onion/ 1.5 cups (320g)
• 3 large Ribs Celery/ 1 cup (100g)
• 2 large Carrots/ 1 cup (125g)
• 5 cloves of garlic, minced (8g)
• 28oz can San Marzano tomatoes (828ml)
• 1.5 cups White Wine (355ml)
• 2 cups Whole Milk (474ml)
• 2 cups Veal or Beef Stock (474ml)
• Herb Sachet - Fresh Thyme, Oregano, Bay leaf
• Chili Flakes TT
• Fish Sauce TT
• (optional) Rinds from Parmigiano Reggiano TT

TT= to taste
*This recipe makes more Ragu than you’re going to need for the lasagna. The ragu freezes well and will stay fresh for 3-5 months in the freezer.
**You could end up with extra pasta sheets, too. It’s better to have some left over, then to be short on sheets. If you have leftover, cut the sheets into any shape you want and chill in an air-tight container. Boom. Fresh pasta for later in the week.
TECHNIQUE:
Fresh Pasta Sheets…

1. Make a mound with the flour and use your fingers to create a well.
2. Drop the whole eggs and egg yolks in the middle, whisk with a fork, and slowly begin collapsing in flour into the beaten egg and egg yolk mixture.
3. Once the eggs have been worked into the flour, drop the fork and begin kneading by hand.
4. Knead for 5-10 minutes, or until the dough is smoothed out.
   
   1. Add in a sprinkle or two of water if the dough is looking a bit dry.
5. Wrap in plastic and set aside. Let rest for 30 minutes.
   
   1. Allowing the dough the time to rest will make it more supple, and easier to work with. If you don’t let it rest, it will remain hard to roll out and pull back on you.
6. Flour a sheet tray heavily and set it aside at the ready.
   
7. After 30 minutes remove the plastic from the pasta and portion out into 4 quarters.
   
8. Grab one quarter from the bunch, and cover the remaining pasta chunks with the plastic wrap so that they don’t dry out.
   
9. Form the pasta chunk into a 5-6 inch circle, dust with flour, then run the dough through the pasta machine starting at width 0.
   
10. After the first pass, fold the two ends over each other, and run it through again. Repeat one or two more times.
    
11. One the sheet is flat and even, increase the pasta machine width to setting 1, flour the dough again, then run the dough through. Repeat this process working your way up to setting 6.
    
12. You should be able to see the silhouette of your hand through the dough.
    
13. Skimping on flouring the pasta dough as you run it through the machine could lead you to torn pasta sheets. Flour is important.
    
14. Place the WELL FLOURED pasta sheets back onto a sheet tray as you work.
    
15. Once the pasta sheet are rolled out, portion the sheets into 13 inch long pieces (big enough to fit in your cooking vessel), flour, and set aside again.
    
16. Cook the sheets in well-seasoned water for 30-45 seconds, or until just cooked but still al dente.
    
17. As the sheets finish cooking, place them on the rack and sprinkle with oil to avoid sticking and overlap.
    
18. Do this step lastly, right before you’re ready to build the lasagne.
    

Ragu Bolognese…

1. Form ground meat into sausage patties, season with salt, and brown in a dutch oven, Once browned, reserve on a plate.
2. Drain a bit of the excess fat from the dutch oven, melt the butter then add in your carrots, celery, onion and garlic. Cook the veg down for 5-10 minutes.
3. Add the reserved browned ground meat back into the dutch oven and crumble using the back of a wooden spoon or something similar.
4. Once the veg and meat mixture is crumbled, deglaze the bottom of the pan with the white wine, scraping all the brown bits off the bottom of the dutch oven. Cook the mixture on high heat until the wine reduces by nearly half. 7-8 minutes.
5. Once the wine is reduced, add the milk. Again, cook over high heat until the milk is near fully reduced, another 10 minutes or so.
6. Once the mixture is almost dry, pour in the San Marzano tomatoes and veal stock and stir until combined.
7. Finally, add in the herb sachet, reduce the heat to low and simmer for 2-4 hours.
   
   1. The longer its simmered, the more flavorful it will be.
8. After time simmering, optionally pulse the bolognese with an immersion blender to get a smooth yet textured consistency.
   
   1. The bolognese will be significantly reduced after simmering for so long. Feel free to add in more stock or water for a looser consistency. I prefer to leave mine reduced for a chunkier sauce.
   2. Control the finally consistency of your ragu by pulsing it as much or as little as you like with an immersion blender.
   3. The immersion blender allows texture control, but also helps emulsify some of the fat in the sauce into the liquid giving a gorgeous light orangish-brown color to the ragu.
9. Once the desired consistency is achieved, season the sauce with fish sauce, salt, and pepper TT, put the lid on the dutch oven, and set aside.
   

Bechamel...

1. Add butter and flour to a medium saucepan and cook for 5 minutes, or until the roux smells like pie crust - Chef John.
2. Slowly whisk in COLD milk (no lumps), then grate in nutmeg, salt and pepper TT. Optionally add a bit of parm to the bechamel (technically making it into a mornay sauce.)
3. Bring the mixture up to a boil, then cut the heat. When the Roux begins to bubble is when it’s at its maximum thickening power. If your roux looks too thin, start over.
4. Let cool for a few minutes, then lay some plastic wrap over the top of the bechamel and cover with a lid so a skin doesn’t form, set it aside.

To assemble Lasagne…

1. Lay down a bit of bolognese and bechamel then the first layer of pasta.
2. Lay down another layer of bolognese, bechamel, AND parmesan cheese. Finish with more pasta sheets to cover. Rinse and repeat.
   
   1. You should still be able to see the bottom pasta sheet once the bolognese is ladeled in, don’t overdo the sauces in each layer.
3. Finish the lasagne by pulling over two of the sheets to form a “bowl” then lay on the remaining bechamel sauce, a dollop of red sauce (mostly for color) and a little more parm.
   
4. Cover with parchment paper, then tin foil and bake at 400F for 35 minutes.
   
5. After 35 minutes, remove the parchment and foil, sprinkle on the mozzarella cheese and broil for 5-10 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and browned.
   
6. Let rest for AT LEAST 30 minutes before slicing and serving.
   
   1. If you cut into the lasagne early, it’ll still taste great… but you might get 3rd degree burns on the roof of your mouth and it could fall apart on you making all the layer work you just did worthless. Butttt it’s your call, I won’t get between a hungry human and a lasagne.
7. Garnish with chopped parsley and basil.
   

A Guide to Homemade Lasagna (from scratch) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKEnChTVelQ&t=34s&ab_channel=OmnivorousAdam

by Paul Connett, PhD
November 28, 2002 from FluorIdealAlert Website
​
Water fluoridation is a peculiarly American phenomenon. It started at a time when Asbestos lined our pipes, lead was added to gasoline, PCBs filled our transformers and DDT was deemed so "safe and effective" that officials felt no qualms spraying kids in school classrooms and seated at picnic tables. One by one all these chemicals have been banned, but fluoridation remains untouched.
For over 50 years US government officials have confidently and enthusiastically claimed that fluoridation is "safe and effective". However, they are seldom prepared to defend the practice in open public debate. Actually, there are so many arguments against fluoridation that it can get overwhelming.
To simplify things it helps to separate the ethical from the scientific arguments.
For those for whom ethical concerns are paramount, the issue of fluoridation is very simple to resolve. It is simply not ethical; we simply shouldn't be forcing medication on people without their "informed consent". The bad news is that ethical arguments are not very influential in Washington, DC unless politicians are very conscious of millions of people watching them. The good news is that the ethical arguments are buttressed by solid common sense arguments and scientific studies which convincingly show that fluoridation is neither "safe and effective" nor necessary.
I have summarized the arguments in several categories:
- Fluoridation is UNETHICAL because:

• It violates the individual's right to informed consent to medication.
• The municipality cannot control the dose of the patient.
• The municipality cannot track each individual's response.
• It ignores the fact that some people are more vulnerable to fluoride's toxic effects than others. Some
• people will suffer while others may benefit.
• It violates the Nuremberg code for human experimentation.

As stated by the recent recipient of the Nobel Prize for Medicine (2000), Dr. Arvid Carlsson:

"I am quite convinced that water fluoridation, in a not-too-distant future, will be consigned to medical history... Water fluoridation goes against leading principles of pharmacotherapy, which is progressing from a stereotyped medication - of the type 1 tablet 3 times a day - to a much more individualized therapy as regards both dosage and selection of drugs. The addition of drugs to the drinking water means exactly the opposite of an individualized therapy."

As stated by Dr. Peter Mansfield, a physician from the UK and advisory board member of the recent government review of fluoridation (McDonagh et al 2000):

"No physician in his right senses would prescribe for a person he has never met, whose medical history he does not know, a substance which is intended to create bodily change, with the advice: 'Take as much as you like, but you will take it for the rest of your life because some children suffer from tooth decay.' It is a preposterous notion."

​
- Fluoridation is UNNECESSARY because:

1. Children can have perfectly good teeth without being exposed to fluoride.
2. The promoters (CDC, 1999, 2001) admit that the benefits are topical not systemic, so fluoridated toothpaste, which is universally available, is a more rational approach to delivering fluoride to the target organ (teeth) while minimizing exposure to the rest of the body.
3. The vast majority of western Europe has rejected water fluoridation, but has been equally successful as the US, if not more so, in tackling tooth decay.
4. If fluoride was necessary for strong teeth one would expect to find it in breast milk, but the level there is 0.01 ppm , which is 100 times LESS than in fluoridated tap water (IOM, 1997).
5. Children in non-fluoridated communities are already getting the so-called "optimal" doses from other sources (Heller et al, 1997). In fact, many are already being over-exposed to fluoride.

​
- Fluoridation is UNSAFE because:

1. It accumulates in our bones and makes them more brittle and prone to fracture. The weight of evidence from animal studies, clinical studies and epidemiological studies on this is overwhelming. Lifetime exposure to fluoride will contribute to higher rates of hip fracture in the elderly.
2. It accumulates in our pineal gland, possibly lowering the production of melatonin a very important regulatory hormone (Luke, 1997, 2001).
3. It damages the enamel (dental fluorosis) of a high percentage of children. Between 30 and 50% of children have dental fluorosis on at least two teeth in optimally fluoridated communities (Heller et al, 1997 and McDonagh et al, 2000).
4. There are serious, but yet unproven, concerns about a connection between fluoridation and osteosarcoma in young men (Cohn, 1992), as well as fluoridation and the current epidemics of both arthritis and hypothyroidism.
5. In animal studies fluoride at 1 ppm in drinking water increases the uptake of aluminum into the brain (Varner et al, 1998).
6. Counties with 3 ppm or more of fluoride in their water have lower fertility rates (Freni, 1994).
7. In human studies the fluoridating agents most commonly used in the US not only increase the uptake of lead into children's blood (Masters and Coplan, 1999, 2000) but are also associated with an increase in violent behavior.
8. The margin of safety between the so-called therapeutic benefit of reducing dental decay and many of these end points is either nonexistent or precariously low.

Fluoridation is INEQUITABLE, because:

1. It will go to all households, and the poor cannot afford to avoid it, if they want to, because they will not be able to purchase bottled water or expensive removal equipment.
2. The poor are more likely to suffer poor nutrition which is known to make children more vulnerable to fluoride's toxic effects (Massler & Schour 1952; Marier & Rose 1977; ATSDR 1993; Teotia et al, 1998).
3. Very rarely, if ever, do governments offer to pay the costs of those who are unfortunate enough to get dental fluorosis severe enough to require expensive treatment.

​
Fluoridation is INEFFICIENT and NOT COST-EFFECTIVE because:

1. Only a small fraction of the water fluoridated actually reaches the target. Most of it ends up being used to wash the dishes, to flush the toilet or to water our lawns and gardens.
2. It would be totally cost-prohibitive to use pharmaceutical grade sodium fluoride (the substance which has been tested) as a fluoridating agent for the public water supply. Water fluoridation is artificially cheap because, unknown to most people, the fluoridating agent is an unpurified hazardous waste product from the phosphate fertilizer industry.
3. If it was deemed appropriate to swallow fluoride (even though its major benefits are topical not systemic) a safer and more cost-effective approach would be to provide fluoridated bottle water in supermarkets free of charge. This approach would allow both the quality and the dose to be controlled. Moreover, it would not force it on people who don't want it.

​
- Fluoridation is UNSCIENTIFICALLY PROMOTED. For example:

1. In 1950, the US Public Health Service enthusiastically endorsed fluoridation before one single trial had been completed.
2. Even though we are getting many more sources of fluoride today than we were in 1945, the so called "optimal concentration" of 1 ppm has remained unchanged.
3. The US Public health Service has never felt obliged to monitor the fluoride levels in our bones even though they have known for years that 50% of the fluoride we swallow each day accumulates there.
4. Officials that promote fluoridation never check to see what the levels of dental fluorosis are in the communities before they fluoridate, even though they know that this level indicates whether children are being overdosed or not.
5. No US agency has yet to respond to Luke's finding that fluoride accumulates in the human pineal gland, even though her finding was published in 1994 (abstract), 1997 (Ph. D. thesis), 1998 (paper presented at conference of the International Society for Fluoride Research), and 2001 (published in Caries Research).
6. The CDC's 1999, 2001 reports advocating fluoridation were both six years out of date in the research they cited on health concerns.

​
Fluoridation is UNDEFENDABLE IN OPEN PUBLIC DEBATE
The proponents of water fluoridation refuse to defend this practice in open debate because they know that they would lose that debate. A vast majority of the health officials around the US and in other countries who promote water fluoridation do so based upon someone else's advice and not based upon a first hand familiarity with the scientific literature. This second hand information produces second rate confidence when they are challenged to defend their position. Their position has more to do with faith than it does with reason.
Those who pull the strings of these public health 'puppets', do know the issues, and are cynically playing for time and hoping that they can continue to fool people with the recitation of a long list of "authorities" which support fluoridation instead of engaging the key issues. As Brian Martin made clear in his book Scientific Knowledge in Controversy: The Social Dynamics of the Fluoridation Debate (1991), the promotion of fluoridation is based upon the exercise of political power not on rational analysis.
The question to answer, therefore, is:

"Why is the US Public Health Service choosing to exercise its power in this way?"

Motivations - especially those which have operated over several generations of decision makers - are always difficult to ascertain. However, whether intended or not, fluoridation has served to distract us from several key issues.
​
It has distracted us from:

1. The failure of one of the richest countries in the world to provide decent dental care for poor people.
2. The failure of 80% of American dentists to treat children on Medicaid.
3. The failure of the public health community to fight the huge over consumption of sugary foods by our nation's children, even to the point of turning a blind eye to the wholesale introduction of soft drink machines into our schools. Their attitude seems to be if fluoride can stop dental decay why bother controlling sugar intake.
4. The failure to adequately address the health and ecological effects of fluoride pollution from large industry. Despite the damage which fluoride pollution has caused, and is still causing, few environmentalists have ever conceived of fluoride as a 'pollutant.'
5. The failure of the US EPA to develop a Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for fluoride in water which can be scientifically defended.
6. The fact that more and more organofluorine compounds are being introduced into commerce in the form of plastics, pharmaceuticals and pesticides.

​
Despite the fact that some of these compounds pose just as much a threat to our health and environment as their chlorinated and brominated counterparts (i.e. they are highly persistent and fat soluble and many accumulate in the food chains and our body fat), those organizations and agencies which have acted to limit the wide-scale dissemination of these other halogenated products, seem to have a blind spot for the dangers posed by organofluorine compounds.
So while fluoridation is neither effective nor safe, it continues to provide a convenient cover for many of the interests which stand to profit from the public being misinformed about fluoride.
Unfortunately, because government officials have put so much of their credibility on the line defending fluoridation, it will be very difficult for them to speak honestly and openly about the issue. As with the case of mercury amalgams, it is difficult for institutions such as the American Dental Association to concede health risks because of the liabilities waiting in the wings if they were to do so.
However, difficult as it may be, it is nonetheless essential - in order to protect millions of people from unnecessary harm - that the US Government begin to move away from its anachronistic, and increasingly absurd, status quo on this issue. There are precedents. They were able to do this with hormone replacement therapy.
But getting any honest action out of the US Government on this is going to be difficult. Effecting change is like driving a nail through wood - science can sharpen the nail but we need the weight of public opinion to drive it home. Thus, it is going to require a sustained effort to educate the American people and then recruiting their help to put sustained pressure on our political representatives. At the very least we need a moratorium on fluoridation (which simply means turning off the tap for a few months) until there has been a full Congressional hearing on the key issues with testimony offered by scientists on both sides. With the issue of education we are in better shape than ever before. Most of the key studies are available on the internet and there are videotaped interviews with many of the scientists and protagonists whose work has been so important to a modern re-evaluation of this issue.
With this new information, more and more communities are rejecting new fluoridation proposals at the local level. On the national level, there have been some hopeful developments as well, such as the EPA Headquarters Union coming out against fluoridation and the Sierra Club seeking to have the issue re-examined. However, there is still a huge need for other national groups to get involved in order to make this the national issue it desperately needs to be.
I hope that if there are RFW readers who disagree with me on this, they will rebut these arguments. If they can't than I hope they will get off the fence and help end one of the silliest policies ever inflicted on the citizens of the US. It is time to end this folly of water fluoridation without further delay. It is not going to be easy.
Fluoridation represents a very powerful "belief system" backed up by special interests and by entrenched governmental power and influence.

Collected in The Road to Woop Woop, and Other Stories (Meerkat Press, 2020):

The Road to Woop Woop

Tumbling down the stretch, a confident glide, the 4WD is a beaut, over nineteen years old.
The argument is brand-new. Maps are convolutions, complicated like relationships. You scrunch the sheet, push it in the glovebox. You feel River’s displeasure, but you hate navigating, and right now you don’t care.
The wiper swishes to and fro, braves unseasonal rain. You and River maintain your silence.
Rain. More rain.
“When’s the next stop?” River tries. Sidewise glance, cautious smile. He is muscled, dark. Dreadlocks fall down high cheekbones to square shoulders. Eyes like black gold give him the rugged look of a mechanic.
“Does it matter?” you say.
“Should it?”
You don’t respond. Turn your head, stare at a thin scratch on your window. The crack runs level with rolling landscape racing away with rain. Up in the sky, a billow of cloud like a white ghoul, dark-eyed and yawning into a scream.
A shoot of spray through River’s window brushes your cheek.
A glide of eye. “Hell’s the matter?” you say.
“You ask me-e. Something bothering you?”
“The window.”
He gives you a look.
Classic, you think. But you know that if you listen long enough, every argument is an empty road that attracts unfinished business. It’s an iceberg full of whimsy about fumaroles and geysers. It’s a corpse that spends eternity reliving apparitions of itself in the throes of death. Your fights are puffed-up trivia, championed to crusades. You fill up teabags with animus that pours into kettles of disarray, scalding as missiles. They leave you ashy and scattered—that’s what’s left of your lovemaking, or the paranoia of it, you wonder about that.
More silence, the cloud of your argument hangs above it. He shrugs. Rolls up his window. Still air swells in the car.
“Air con working?” you say.
He flexes long corduroyed legs that end in moccasins. Flicks on the air button—and the radio. The bars of a soulful number, a remix by some new artist, give way to an even darker track titled ‘Nameless.’ It’s about a high priest who wears skinny black jeans and thrums heavy metal to bring space demons into a church that’s dressed as a concert. And the torments join in evensong, chanting psalms and canticles until daybreak when the demons wisp back into thin air, fading with them thirteen souls of the faithful, an annual pact with the priest.
Rain pelts the roof and windows like a drum.
He hums. Your face is distant. You might well be strangers, tossed into a tight drive from Broome to Kununurra.
The lilt of his voice merges with the somber melody.
You turn your face upward. A drift of darkness, even with full day, is approaching from the skies. Now it’s half-light. You flip the sun visor down. Not for compulsion or vanity, nothing like an urge to peer at yourself in the mirror. Perhaps it’s to busy your hands, to distract yourself, keep from bedevilment—the kind that pulls out a quarrel. You steal a glimpse of yourself in the mirror. Deep, deep eyes. They gleam like a cat’s. The soft curtain of your fringe is softening, despite thickset brows like a man’s. You feel disconnected with yourself, with the trip, with River. You flip the sun visor up.
Now the world is all grim. River turns on the headlights, but visibility is still bad. A bolt of lightning. You both see the arms of a reaching tree that has appeared on the road, right there in your path. You squeal, throw your arms out. River swerves. A slam of brakes. A screech of tires. Boom!
The world stops in a swallowing blackness. Inside the hollow, your ears are ringing. The car, fully intact, is shooting out of the dark cloud in slow motion, picking up speed. It’s soaring along the road washed in a new aurora of lavender, turquoise and silver, then it’s all clear. A gentle sun breaks through fluffs of cloud no more engulfed in blackness. You level yourself with a hand on the dashboard, uncertain what exactly happened.
You look at River. His hands . . . wrist up . . . he has no hands. Nothing bloody as you’d expect from a man with severed wrists. Just empty space where the arms end.
But River’s unperturbed, his arms positioned as if he’s driving, even while nothing is touching the steering that’s moving itself, turning and leveling.
“Brought my shades?” he asks.
“Your hands,” you say.
“What about them?”
“Can’t you see?”
His glance is full of impatience.
You sink back to your seat, unable to understand it, unclear to tell him, as the driverless car races along in silence down the lone road.
If it hadn’t been such a dreary morning, perhaps the mood might be right. But a bleak dawn lifted to cobalt, to brown, slid to gray. One recipe for disaster that simmers you and River in separate pots.
This spring is of a different breed. It traps you, brings with it . . . fights. You gripe like siblings, the inner push to argue too persuasive. Smiles diminish to awkward; words sharpen to icicles.
Kununurra was a break long overdue. A planned trip. Your idea. A dumb-arsed one at that for a romance on the line. As though different soil would mend it.
“Drive?” River had asked.
“Best within the price bracket,” you said.
“Do I look half-convinced?”
“People drive,” you said. “It’s normal.”
“Seems normal to take the plane.”
“If we drive, River, what do you think the concern is? What?”
“If we drive my road rover? I hope for your sake to never ask myself that question.”
“That’s called pessimism.”
“Who’s pessimistic here, Miss Price Bracket?”
You flipped.
Despite his harassed face, he stunned you by agreeing to the trip.
Everything was organized to the last detail. Everything but the climate. A few hours into the day, the weather window opened, torrential rain that left a curtain behind. Despite the planning, you got lost. Twice. Ended up doing a long leg to Kununurra. Gave shoes for another fight.
Irish Clover in “The Road to No Place” chants her soulful lyrics:
You say you’ll climb no mountain with me I’ll go with you anyway Darling I’ll follow you Somewhere we’ve never been. I’ll go with you to the sun and to the night I’ll go with you where the water is wide I’ll go with you anyway No Place is where we’ll be. You say I’m not your rain, your rainbow But you’re my earth, my blanket You’re my canopy, my tree I’ll go with you anywhere we’ve never been.
Not saying a word about River’s uncanny state, one he doesn’t appear to notice, makes you feel complicit with the devil. Like you’ve already sold your soul, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Your dread melts to curiosity. You glance at River and his lost hands and let out a cry. His belly downward is gone. Just an athletic chest and a head, cropped arms driving a car without touching.
“River?”
He doesn’t immediately respond, emotions barricaded within himself. When he looks at you, it’s with a darkened mood. “Have to listen to that stupid song?”
You want to tell him that it’s his car, his radio. That he has no hands and no legs, and what the goddamn fuck is happening? But all you say is, “No,” a whisper in your throat.
“Will you turn it off?”
“No.”
“Be like that.”
No reason has its name, its talent, written on this new grumble. Its seeds sink deeper, water themselves richer, flower more malignant blues.
Though he maintains the same proximity in his hacked body, so close you can almost hear his heart talk, he is drawn away from you, accepting without question the space, its margin creeping further out.
You grip the seatbelt where he can’t see it.
River is . . . my big red lobster. Beautiful, until the fiend.
Two springs ago, you were working at a garden restaurant. He stepped into your life with a guitar across his waist, a rucksack on his back. An avid traveler, you thought. He caught your eye. Rapture, you thought. And then he smiled. Hey presto. Reminded you of the heartthrob muso who won the Boy-up Brook Country Music Awards years back. Your thoughts turned unholy.
We fell in love swatting sandflies . . . in Broome.
Longing swells, you feel empty next to a stranger.
Before the trip, before he became this . . . this . . . your body was willing, the mathematics of your need. But everything around it failed. Night after night, you turned to your pillow, swallowed in thought. One day, you feared, the pillow would mean more than River.
Sometimes you never kissed.
Just a melt of bodies, a tumble of knees, flesh against flesh, almost cruel. Thrusts that summoned a climax that spread from your toes.
“Jesus!”
“Goddamn!”
Your responses are simultaneous as an overtaking truck judders, sways dangerously close, pushes you nearly off the highway.
Silence for a startling second stretches miles out.
You switch driving at dusk. River lightly snores. Just his dreadlocked head and broad shoulders—his chest is gone. The road rover is a power train. You glide with your foreboding. River takes the wheel at dawn. You sleep. Wake on instinct. It’s a strange world in the middle of nowhere. A blue-green carpet with fluid waves. Ears of grass stir, tease, declare interest in everything about you.
Sandy gold stretches a quarter mile deep, some dapples of green with burnt yellows. Beautifully rugged in parts, it reminds you of River’s morning face. You glance at him, what’s left of him: black gold eyes and an ivory-white jaw—skeletal. Clouds dissolve to shimmering threads across the ocean-blue firmament.
The road rover halts at a divide.
“Left or right?” says River.
“Right.”
A whiff of aftershave touches your nostrils. You can almost feel him on your skin.
“Dying for a piddle,” he says.
“Me too. Where do people go in this wilderness?”
“The bush?”
You wipe your forehead with the back of your hands. “River?”
“Yes?” Just eyes—the jaw is gone.
You hug your knees. “I wonder about us—do you?”
“I wonder about it plenty.”
Your stomach folds. You rock on your knees.
“Maybe we should, you know . . .take time off,” you say.
“We are taking time off.”
You pull at your hair, worrying it. Tighten a long strand in a little finger.
“Let’s not fight. Please, River.”
“Okay. What now?”
“Don’t know.”
The road rover rolls into a deserted station.
“Well,” the engine dies, “I’m going for a piddle.”
“Me too.”
You slip on canvas trainers, hug a turquoise sweater.
You depart, perhaps as equals, not as partners.
You step minutes behind into the station, seek the toilet. River is nowhere to ask. You see it, a metal shack, labeled.
You push the door. It swings with ease.
You climb down a stone step, jump sodden paper on the ground. The walls are dripping, the floor swirling with water.
But the need to go is great.
You move tippie-toe toward one of the cubicles, take care not to touch the wetness.
Later, as you wash your hands, a cubicle door opens. River—nothing visible, but you know it’s him—comes out.
“Dripping mess,” you say. “You could have warned me.”
“What—spoil the surprise?” Your heart tugs at the lilt in his voice.
“Can’t find the dryer. What’s this?” You move toward a contraption on the wall.
“Don’t touch—” begins River.
You’ve already pressed it.
“—the green button,” he finishes lamely.
A moan on the roof, roar, and a glorious waterfall of soapy water spits from the ceiling. The deluge plummets, splashes and bounces off walls, floods you.
You screech, try to run. Slip.
Drowning in water, you lift your head and see a silhouette like a shimmering light forming of River. It is bolts of lightning shaping out a man. His translucent body is standing in the waterfall. Now he’s there, now he’s not. He’s shaking clumps of drippy hair, roped, from his face. “Washed itself, did it?”
He’s still wavering in and out like a breaking circuit.
You rise, coughing.
You guide yourself with palms along the wall. Squishy shoes make obscene sounds. Your nipple-struck T-shirt draws your sweater tighter. You stare, horrified. Sobbing denim clings to your legs.
“I just touched it,” you gasp.
Drip! Drip! says the wall.
“Oh, you beaut,” laughs River. Now he’s a silhouette, no longer twinkling in and out. There’s his smoky self, his smoky smile.
The ceiling sighs. The flood gurgles and narrows its cascade to a dribble. Dripping walls, clomps of soggy tissue float in a puddle.
He comes toward you, not the drift of a ghost, but walking, misty leg after misty leg. The blackest, most golden eyes hold your gaze, until you’re enveloped in his steamy form, in the waft of his aftershave: an earthy scent of cedar and orange flower.
“We’d best get these clothes off,” he speaks to your hair. You clutch him, nothing solid, just the emanating heat of his fog. It leaves you with a pining for the touch of him—a longing for his finger tracing the outline of your nose. His mouth teasing the nape of your neck.
You don’t know about tomorrow, whether River will ever be as he was, different from the torment he is now. Present, yet lacking. But he’s your rain, your rainbow. Your earth, your blanket. You’ll go anywhere with him.
Suddenly, you feel more. You feel more deeply.

The Enduring

She remembers landscapes, the history of silence loud in horses wearing blankets in a lush green farm near the Yarra Valley rodeo no longer in use. Vision remembers scent, the car’s “sweet lily of the valley” in a fragrance leisurely releasing from a hung freshener on the indicator stalk of a custom-made dash.
K steered with one hand and fiddled with the radio, his eyes off the road.
“What’s in your head?” she asked.
He didn’t answer.
The color of words was gray in the stereo on full blast as the car whipped into Wandin and its white and yellow flowers near a graffiti-walled toilet named Lost Trains.
Nothing in the mood was changed inside a community park where the car pulled up, or near the parking machine labeled FRAGILE. NOT IN USE and goons had wrapped it in cling wrap so it couldn’t swallow coins.
The camphor-scented bar that was also a restaurant across the road hosted a waiter with the body of Apollo and a face both devils and angels would love.
Vision avoided both, the body and the face, knowing K’s caliber of jealousy. She focused instead on the waiter’s voice when he took their order of a flat white.
“Murderers have killed for less.”
She looked up startled to have spoken her thoughts out loud on the waiter’s constricted vocals, but K refused to notice.
“Are we fighting?”
He still didn’t answer but his silence never left the table or the saucer or her heart—it lurked everywhere it could hurt.
Vision dipped her thoughts in K’s coffee and sought for answers buried in dates and resentments in the muddied froth.
As the waiter busied himself shining glasses, a ruby-haired mermaid winked inside a framed photo of an island and a coal-dusted tower reaching for an otherworld along the wall.
She remembers the locating.
One way is a bell miner’s tink, sweet and musical, just before sunrise and finishing on a hiccupping note just after sunset. One way is the poet’s limerence, verse upon verse in gravity and circles, black-billed gulls in smoking puddles on the burned sand waiting for the whitewash in rhyme. One way is wintering in the northern hemisphere while the patios in the south grow hot and hotter, the flies zang as opposed to zing, beating at heat until they collapse, and Vision, sunstruck in Sailor Falls, said, “I do,” to an excerpt.
One way is albums and camping and everything in between that sirens warn against in songs full of rain. One way is the rumble of wind from his bum in the dead of the night, half a gallon of air condensed into fair dinkum toots. As he turns in his sleep she wonders about forever.
One way is the road to Lost Trains and locating that you’re dead.
She remembers the enduring.
His was the kind of jealousy that vomited a sizzle of green, silent as an ogre but just as mighty. It was no surprise when just days ago he reminded her: “Twenty-five years.”
“What?” She lifted her eyes from the manuscript and its proofreading mark-ups, but his face was a wall.
“All gains make for nothing.”
She raised her palm in exasperation, presenting him with the animation of an oak that wore the portrait of an old woman with cross tattoos on her face, each line of ink shaping a history of stumbles.
If K saw it, the portrait etched in air, he said nothing. Or perhaps he was immune to her gift of the preternatural, or was it simply to the characters in her manuscript?
In the worlds of her stories there were systems and plots to deal with green-eyed monsters, but in the world of K . . . She wondered what he saw as gains in their shared years and why they would make for nothing.
His suspiciousness of her beauty or her literary triumphs or both had the eye of an osprey spotting fish in a lake, the giant bird swooping with talons stretched, shaking water off its wings in slow motion and soaring skyward with the fish secure in its grasp, all the way to a feeding perch where a hungry beak tore into pink flesh.
Only in hindsight did she understand that twenty-five years was a milestone, the landmark of a dying, a dawning of the day he would shape out her beating heart with a kitchen knife to quell his need to possess.
She feels the writing.
She wrote herself into the story and transported her spirit into a quokka. She did consider a selkie but rather liked the furry macropod and its ebony button nose and jolly temperament, despite the selkie’s shiny seal coat and superior gentleness, let alone the advanced swimming. The quokka doggy paddled out of the manuscript, just as K finished the carving.
The critical incident response team, all sirens, arrived in a panel van blinking orange and blue. As K cradled Vision’s disconnected heart somewhere on a blood-bathed floor, the quokka opened the door, shook its head at the bewildered response team and said, “He was not a mouth.”
Men who rage out loud, the talkers, they are harmless. It is the silent ones . . .
But Vision was not a mouth either.
She relives the dying.
She allowed herself to feel each slice of the blade, and was still thinking long after the response team arrived. She wondered what the team might do next, if they understood the precipitous nature of unwisdom that had already sprayed Sailor Falls in the lead-up to the new year. What with gangs raping shops and residents, lotto megadraws going unclaimed and sexual abuse scandals hitting yet more politicians, would one more slaughter make a difference? Such was the world of detachment, the response team arrived and saw and departed, without doing a thing.
She determined that, unable to keep what the team had witnessed—not the blood-soaked floor or a husband holding his wife’s beating heart, but the sight in Sailor Falls of a quokka that spoke human—one siren in the incident response team might write an anonymous op-ed without getting a stint in the psych ward.
The history of silence was loud in horses wearing blankets in the lush green farm near the Yarra Valley rodeo out in the warm rain.
Unpunished and uncuffed, K had wrapped her in a shower curtain, hauled her out the door and lowered her and a spade into the boot of his car where her blood crystallized into gemstones.
Her quokka sat next to him, riding shotgun into a wail of cicadas soaring in circles etched in daylight, bothering the landscape now quiet after the response team chased down a different emergency. Vision was not surprised when the cicadas fell aground as dogs, and they ran away barking at K’s approach to the boot. She considered that they, too, were her animal spirit.
He buried her right there in Wandin and its white and yellow flowers near a graffiti-walled toilet named Lost Trains.
The end?
Not quite.
Turns out one siren in a whole team did write an op-ed.
The quokka watches K’s life in monochrome inside a prison that is an eternity, the husk of him shriveled to a gnome trapped in ancient skin.
If you listen closely, you will hear a faint scratching of nails long as a Komodo dragon’s on somber walls licked by a wash of tide, whispers from ashore in time after time inside a fossil tower on an island so unexpected, you’d be astonished anyone goes there.
And if you work more characters into the story, you’ll find an important writ both fascinating and disturbing in the profundity of prison house faces never too disarming to distract the photographer. The shutter clicks, clicks to stir the silence unwashed in coal dust scattered over a short story with an old woman full of cross tattoos on her face, where a ruby-haired mermaid winks in the shores of what bodes inside a frame.

Dying

It hurt each time he died. The first time it happened, Bluey was on his way to Kinetic, the insurance firm he worked for. That morning he woke up to the alarm at 6 a.m. Showered, cerealed, took the lift to the ground floor. He was crossing the road to catch a No. 78 tram into the city when he went splat, flattened by a truck. A mural on the pavement: flesh, blood, brain and bile.
6 a.m., the alarm woke him. He sat up in bed, scratched his head. He looked at his torso, his feet. Everything was there. Perhaps it was a just bad dream. He showered. Chewed a bowl of cereal soaked in milk. He took the lift—gray floor, blinking mirrors, steel walls as usual. He walked through the sliding door of his apartment building to a whooshing wind. Cobblestones. Trees on the sidewalks. A kid wearing a yellow shirt and green shorts whizzed past on a scooter. To the side of the street: parked cars. In the street: running cars. An Asian woman rode past on a bike, headed opposite.
He reached the main road. He took extra care at the intersection. A tall thin man in a tar-black cloak crossed with him. He was safe on the tram platform when a fire engine all lit, full siren, roared past on the street. It was headed to the city. The tram was six minutes away. Bluey thought for a moment that he should ditch it, leg it all the way to the city. The tram came, he took it. As did the tall thin man. In the city, there was the lollipop woman at the pedestrian crossing with its zebra lines. Bluey got to work carefully, without incident.
At the ground foyer of Kinetic, he walked on a polished floor, all marble. Wall décor: climbing vines snaking to the ceiling. Up on the ivory-white ceiling dappled with baby angels were blinking dots: smoke alarms. There was the receptionist behind her desk, even faced, cobalt haired. Round wide eyes, all lashed up. Potato cream suit. Bluey smiled. She smiled back.
He took the lift to the ninth floor.
“Mornin’ Bluey,” said Geoff Coles the team lead, approving claims at his desk.
“Morning, Joffa,” he said.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothin’. Glad to be alive, I guess.”
“Golly gum. First time I heard a ginger say that,” said Coles. He pointed at Bluey’s carroty curls. “Always so uptight.”
They laughed.
Coles was a gun whore, always yabbering about some weapon or another. Sometimes he brought guns to work, sneaked in a drawer: rifles, shotguns, semis—harmless things really, Bluey was sure. Coles was a brag. A gun-toting brag. Sometimes Bluey called him Indiana Jones.
Bluey sat at his desk. He looked at the yellow phone. It never rang. All day he stamped insurance claims, approved some, rejected some. Day in, day out. That was his job. Stamp, stamp, sign. Today was no different. Or was it? He refused to think he had died. Pushed it out of his mind. Someday he would joke about it with Coles. He and Coles were tight. Coles wasn’t just a gun-flashing brag. He was also a giver. Last Christmas he gave Bluey a nutribullet. Who named a juicer something close to a gun? No wonder Coles fell for it.
Their eyes met.
“Change your mind about being alive, I got a Colt 45 in my drawer.”
“Sure thing, Joffa.”
“It’s got a grip safety and a thumb safety.”
“No shit, Indie.” Stamp, stamp, sign.
They ate sandwiches in the kitchenette. “Nana’s brisket,” said Coles. “Grainy mustard.”
“Wilco that.” Bluey licked his lips.
Coles wife was a grand cook. Bluey had never met her. But he’d met her sandwiches: tomato, basil and mozzarella; super steak; apple and blue cheese. Today Nana’s brisket. Back to work. Stamp, stamp, sign.
The lollipop woman was still at the pedestrian strip. He was on his way home, about to cross the road, when he tripped on a shoelace, fell into traffic. A racing motor bike leaped to avoid him. Its revolving wheel struck and decapitated him. His head rolled seven meters from his body.
6 a.m., the alarm clock. He woke up in bed. He touched his head. It was there. Shower. Cereal. Lift. He thought about cycling to work, decided against it. The bike, a nine-year-old thing that had seen better days, was in the basement of the apartment building. He called up an app on his phone: Uber.
The Uber guy was chatty. “Turks and Dutch at it now.”
“Turks?”
“All over the news. Godamn politics. Hibernating or what?”
“Or what.”
He smiled at the receptionist with her cobalt hair, lashed up eyes and potato cream suit. Baby angels and sunbathed clouds on the ivory-white ceiling. She smiled back. Ninth floor.
“Headache,” he told Bluey. “Yabbering Uber chap. Couldn’t shut him up.”
“Exercising his freedom of speech. Next time just shoot him. Trams not running?”
“Mid-life crisis, I guess, Joffa.”
“Roger that.”
Bluey approved some claims, rejected some. Stamp, stamp, sign. They had lunch in a new joint two blocks from Kinetic. Coles got a plain risotto sprigged with truffles. Bluey went simple: a beef pie. Back to work. Stamp, stamp, sign. A mild cramp in his stomach came and went. A wall clock chimed. He stood up.
“Golly gum. You clock-watcher.”
“A man’s gotta be something, Joffa.”
“Headed out to the horizon?”
“And beyond.”
“Not so far a sniper can’t hit.”
They laughed.
Ground floor. Receptionist. Uber. Out in the street, he saw a woman who looked like the one who rode a bike outside his place. Wilco that.
His stomach was knotting by the time Bluey arrived home. In an hour, he was passing watery stool. In another half, it was bloody stool. By the time he thought to reach for a phone, his body caved, the agony excruciating. This is how he died of diarrhea.
6 a.m., the alarm. He touched his stomach. It hurt no more. He swung his legs off the bed. Pondered a moment. Shower, no cereal—today he was changing it up. He pulled the nutribullet from under his bed. Tore it from its glitz and ribbon wrapping. Rinsed it. Plugged it. Tossed in a few carrots from the fridge. Healthy living, hey? He flicked the switch and the blender hummed, hummed, exploded. Hot sticky sauce leaped toward his face. He dodged. A vomit of carrot spread along the tiled kitchen wall. There was a splatter on the floor. He looked at the mess, the mess looked back at him.
He grabbed a mop and a bucket. Took him an hour to clean it up. Finally he sank to the floor against a wall, wrapped his arms around himself and shivered a whole two hours. This was more than coincidence. Death was actively hunting him. He started laughing, laughing. Rolled on the floor laughing, laughing. This is how he died of loss of oxygen to the brain.
6 a.m., the alarm. He thought about the shower, decided on a bath. He was climbing into the tub when he tripped on a floor mat, hit his head on a shiny faucet, zonked out and drowned in the stagnant water.
6 a.m., the alarm. Outside it was pouring. A bolt of lightning licked the window. Bluey wrapped a nightgown around his pajamas. He went to the basement, unhooked the bike. He rode out into chopping rain. No kid on a scooter. No woman on a bike. He rode against the traffic. Cars swerved.
A flash of lightning lit toward him. He started laughing. “That’s right. Do it. Get over with it now.” A clap of thunder. Cars horned.
“Death wish, you fucker?” someone yelled.
Bluey pedaled faster in the rain, madly laughing as he rode. He aimed for an oncoming car. The driver braked. “You outta your head!” the driver yelled. He pedaled on and on, on and on, away from the city, toward the mountains. No bolt of lightning struck him. It stopped raining. The gray sky turned milky. He rode past a beach. The water was a turquoise blue. He pedaled until his legs hurt.
And then he saw it. A cliff! He huffed and pedaled toward it. The poison in his muscles was killing him. “Just one more pedal,” he whispered. “One more. Just one. Here, baby, cliffie. I know you want me.” The pedals refused to move. He was laughing, crying, his leg muscles stone. The bicycle tipped and he fell to the ground weeping. He was still sobbing when the coppers found him.
Soon as the hospital discharged him, Bluey hired a car. He drove out from the city, toward the mountains, past the beach. He arrived at the cliff. He sat in the car a moment, and then put the foot down. The car coughed, spluttered. He floored the accelerator, again, again. Nothing happened. The car allowed him to turn it away from the crag. It sped him away from danger.
Suddenly he had a purpose. Yeah, purpose: kill himself. Not like there was anything to lose. Nobody special to leave behind, someone to miss him. Maybe Coles, as in miss him, not like he was that special. No, Bluey didn’t have anyone who . . . loved him. He felt a bit sad at this thought.
6 a.m., Bluey towel-bathed, chewed an apple. Didn’t choke on it. Pity, he smiled.
He took the lift with its gray floor and blinking mirrors. The door of the apartment building glided and he was out into cobblestones. There was the kid, whizzed past him on a scooter. He took a tram to the city, a train to the countryside: Glen Ranges.
He walked, walked, walked, he didn’t know how long. Finally he saw a farm with big black bulls chewing hay. He jumped the fence, lay on the ground by a huge bull’s feet, goaded it. “Do it, fuckwit. Do it.” The bull gave a lugubrious sigh and lumbered away. “No!” Bluey grabbed it by the tail but nothing seemed to agitate it much. The bull’s kick was so half-hearted it barely left a scratch on his shin.
Distraught, Bluey returned to the city and hunted manholes. He’d read about them, lids giving way, loose crossbars and all. People plunging and drowning in twenty-one feet of human waste. Where were these goddamn holes with their loose lids? He found a few, lids clamped tight.
He fell into bed exhausted. He did not question his past, or his future. All he knew was now. He was Bluey, a ginger head who worked at Kinetics, an insurance firm. And now more than ever, he wanted to die. To die. To die. Didn’t death want him? A big fat tear rolled down his cheek.
6 a.m., the alarm. Out in the streets, just past Hade Avenue, he saw a milk truck. He ran toward it at full speed, eyes closed, arms spread. Nothing happened. “You got a death wish or something?” the driver barked.
The building that housed Kinetics stood tall, unperturbed by it all. There was the receptionist with her cobalt hair and potato cream suit. Sunbathed ceiling awash with heaven. She smiled back. Lift. Ninth floor.
“What’s going on?” greeted the team lead.
“I’d tell all, Joffa. But you won’t believe me.”
“Shove off. Hospital thing, I heard. Take more time off. Work will wait.”
“I’m good, Joffa. Ask you a question?”
“Shoot.”
“What do you know about me?”
Coles’s laugh was uneasy. “Messin’ with me, boy?”
“I wake up. Every day. Come to work. Go home. Who am I?”
Coles scratched his head. “You do your job. I’m good with that. No questions.”
“Then good for you! Me? I have questions. My life is the same, day in day out. Just the deaths. Now the living. I got questions!”
“Just go home, man.”
“You and your Nana, you’ve got a life. My life’s fucked-up.”
“Man. Get a grip.”
“I die and wake, die and wake. That’s right. When I avoided death, I died and then I woke up. When I chose to die, chased it, nothing happened. What twisted fuck controls my destiny? Who is in charge?”
“You’re talking like some TV guy, mate—”
“Am I? Am I! This ain’t no drama!”
Coles was quiet a long time. “You’re talking all over my head. I don’t understand a word of it. But if dying is what you want—” He pulled a brown bag from his drawer. He put the gun in Bluey’s hand.
“It got bullets?”
“What do you think?”
Bluey pressed the gun to his temple.
“Holy mother. Bluey. Thing’s loaded!”
“Is it?” said Bluey. “I’d like to ask what you’re doing with a loaded gun in the office. See, me, I ask questions.” He waved the gun.
“Point. That thing. Away from me!” Coles’s eyes were that wide.
Bluey dropped his hand. “You gave me the gun.”
“Jesus Christ. I was just messing with you! Pushing common sense!”
A burst of ringing, the phone. Bluey looked at Coles’s desk. “No shit.” The ringing persisted.
Coles answered. “Hello?” He listened. “I didn’t,” he spoke to the receiver. “Some mix up, sweetie. Golly gum. Really sorry.” He hung up. He looked confused.
“Well?” asked Bluey.
“Receptionist downstairs. Asks why I called.”
“Strange.”
“Roger that. What the—”
Bluey aimed at his temple and fired. The gun just clicked.
Coles had leaped, was crouching behind his desk. “Christ!”
The phone started ringing. It rang and rang and rang. No one paid attention.
“Thought you said this thing was loaded.” Bluey fired. Nothing.
He pulled back the top of the gun, slid the chamber. It spat out a bullet that dropped to the ground.
“Shit, Bluey—”
“So it was. Loaded.” Bluey laid the gun on the desk. “Told you. It’s not our script. Ever wondered? About life? What if we’re part of something bigger than us?”
Coles slumped against the leg of his desk. “You could have hurt someone.”
“What if it’s someone else’s show?”
“You could have killed yourself. You, you . . . Larrikin. You.”
“Ever wondered? What if that receptionist downstairs is a bot? And see those?” Bluey pointed at the ceiling. “Those blinkers, smoke alarm shit, what if they were eyes. Watching, always watching.” He yelled at the beacon above his head: “That’s right. You narcissistic fucks!”
Coles was looking at his hands as if they were snakes. “You want to kill yourself,” he said finally.
“Now you get it.”
“Would you? Try that again?”
“I’d try it again tomorrow.”
Again Coles went quiet. “Your life is fucked.”
“Sure thing, Joffa.”
“What now?”
“Imagine scientists in a room full of monitors. Someone speaking to a recording: ‘Computer, register this. Subject zero showing signs of reasoning capability beyond preconditioning.’”
“Ha-ha funny. Not.”
Somewhere in the city, in a dilapidated pub named Crockers, a few people sat round a table with the angel of death. Among them: a kid in a yellow T-shirt; an Asian woman; a lollipop woman.
“Why didn’t you let him blow his brains, boss?” the kid asked.
“To what end?” said the angel, the man in black. “It’s more fun when he doesn’t want to die. Just wish the Jesus chick didn’t keep patching him up.”
“Must have the hots for him.”
“Yes. She loves him.”
“Let’s get another prawn,” someone said.
“Yeah. That Geoff Coles goon.”
“Jesus Christ,” the angel snapped. A pay phone somewhere along a corridor started ringing. They all stared at the direction of the sound. “Coles got family,” the angel said, quieter.
“What, you’ve got a conscience now?”
The phone rang out.
“Call it whatever you want,” said the angel of death. “Everyone has to die some time. I’m just not ready to take Coles right now. That answer work for you?” He looked around. “No more of this shit. We have enough on our arses, like proving that free will is pure gumbo. Death comes knocking, we don’t ask you about voluntary. Any more of you clowns got questions?”
They all looked away.
“And while we’re on the topic of clowns. Stop calling her name in vain. Bitch won’t stop ringing.”
“Um . . . boss,” someone said. “It was you that said Jesus Chr—”
“Sod it, the goddamn phone—”
Ngrrrr-ngrrr! Ngrrrr-ngrrr! Ngrrrr-ngrrr!
At the ground foyer of Kinetic, the receptionist behind her desk, round wide eyes, all lashed up, cradled the receiver.

Mahuika

Available to read for free here

36 yrs old, NW UK, trying to lose weight... and this is my diary.
Location: NW UK
Household: Me, my husband H and our dog
**Reasons for wanting to get fit: I unfortunately need to lose around 30kg. I’m hypothyroid and my weight goes up very easily. I do enjoy exercise though and would like to feel fitter and healthier again.
Fitness Goal: I’d like to get into my size 12 (UK) clothes again. Would like to be a bit less tired too and less out of breath when riding my pony.
Workouts: Walking, horse riding, and Les Mills classes at the moment. When the gym is open I like yoga and swimming.
Diet: I don’t follow anything specific, but am trying to not drink at all during the week (this week not included as we are on holiday) Also trying to stick to 1500 calories on the MyFitnessPal app.
Lifestyle: Currently working at home most days. We have a dog and horses so are outside a lot and I enjoy walking, swimming and group exercise. I also love cooking and wine however.
You get a couple of bonus days as I started this Christmas Day! I obviously didn’t do that well food/wine wise as we were on holiday but we did try to exercise best we could.
Christmas Day
5am- It’s Christmas! I wake up at 5am needing a wee, and decide to turn off my 7am alarm. I then wake up again at 8.45am! Eeek. I go downstairs and return with a cuppa for H and the dogs stocking (yes we are those people). He gets 10 tennis balls, 3 toys, 2 bones and a nice fleece blanket off us and his dog sitter so he is delighted.
9am - We make coffees and open our presents. We have a massive haul and I feel so incredibly spoilt. My highlight was a brand new fancy bridle for the pony I acquired in the summer from H, and I bought him a canvas print from a gallery we often walk past when we visit the coast.
10am - H goes outside to take the dog to the farm to do the horses, and it’s frozen solid. He finally leaves after a few false starts, and I crack on with the cooking. I make cauliflower cheese first, then assemble pigs in blankets, make Yorkshire pudding batter and then peel lots of potatoes, carrots and parsnips.
12pm - H and the dog return just as the chickens are about to go in and I shower, get dressed and pour a glass of champers. I find Turkey dry, and too big for 6 so I always roast 2 chickens. We are having H’s family round for lunch (the 4 live together). Unfortunately we had to cancel seeing mine as it was planned for Boxing Day!
2pm - Our guests turn up, H carves the chickens and I quickly knock together some gravy and boil some broccoli. We sit down and it’s all really good, we have a nice chat, and they head off, they really are easy guests.
4pm - H drives us down to give the nags their Christmas dinner of haylage and a few carrots. I check on a horse that belongs to a friend who had colic the other night and he seems fine, so we head home, it’s freezing!!! A Christmas evening of watching Sherlock, picking at roast chicken and slobbing out. Last dog wee and I’m in bed just after 10.
Boxing Day
9am - Good morning from tier 3! Typical as I take time off to spend with H whose shop is closed for the period everything else closes too. We get up but can’t face breakfast so it’s coffees and a muesli bar then we head down the farm. We arrive to the incredibly sad news that the horse was found colicking again on a later check up (we all staggered our nightly feeding). The vet came out in the night and tried treating it 3 times but then had to call it a day. We are all so incredibly sad as he was a lovely kind boy, and I hide in my stable hugging my pony whilst he is collected.
12pm - I decide against riding but H helps me fit my bridle, and we head home to drop the dog off and heat up a bit of leftover cauliflower cheese. I bought H a months membership to the gym I go to whilst he is off, and I am so glad I did as it’s one of the only things that’s partially open now. We grab our togs and have a swim, followed by a very long soak in the jacuzzi. On our way out MIL rings to say that they have done the horses, so we head straight home.
4pm - I put on the fake oodie I got for Christmas, and we open a bottle of Lanson. We eat our body weight in nuts whilst watching the Hunger games.
6pm - A quick sandwich, and we follow it up with Catching Fire. Such good films. Whilst watching I browse Facebook and see that my favourite yoga instructors from the gym are back offering zoom classes as group classes have been cancelled in tier 3. I got into yoga in lockdown 1 as the gym offered it outside and I found that I didn’t hate it after all. I know the self employed gym instructors are really struggling right now, so I donate £20 to a charity class going ahead, as well as signing up to every class I can currently make.
Ridiculous squabble about the tv volume of all things, followed by bed.
27th December
8am - Wake up and scroll my phone for a bit whilst waiting for H to wake up, he brings coffee to bed and we let the dog up for a cuddle. We don’t bother with breakfast so head down to sort the horses. We feed, muck out and both ride, I have a lovely ride on my pony, whilst H rides his big event horse. Once done we head home before we freeze to death.
12.30pm - I quickly poach some eggs on toast for all of us, H and I eat them and I save the dogs for his tea! Afterwards we head back to the gym for a 30 min swim and a soak in the outdoor jacuzzi. On the way home I stop at Lidl just for some milk, cheese and crisps. We’re off pony duty again tonight so straight home in the warm for us.
4pm - Once home I do 30 mins of yoga; and H watches the end of a film, then it’s pj’s, champagne and nuts/crisps whilst watching the first part of the Mockingjay film. During this my phone pops up with a reminder and it turns out that one of the yoga classes I signed up to is tonight. Funny thing is that H told me it was, but I was adamant it was tomorrow. Apparently it is indeed Sunday today. I’ve had half a bottle of champagne and I’m full of crisps; so I message the instructor to see if there is going to be a link to access. She saves my bacon and laughs at me a lot.
8pm - We don’t bother with a proper dinner again, just get out a cheeseboard we were bought from a friend whilst watching the last of the 4 films. I’m now totally over sitting on the sofa, so the dog gets taken out, and we’re in bed pre 10pm.
28th December
8am - I wake up needing a wee again and it’s snowed! I pinch H’s dressing gown and his crocs and take the dog out for a quick play as he’s barely seen snow before. He’s a bit unsure then jumps around like a loon. When I can’t feel my feet anymore I come in and turn my laptop on to check my emails. It’s a bank holiday today but I have stuck to my resolve of leaving it off so far (I’ve done a lot of hours lately). There is only one email to sort so I sort it, everyone else is clearly managing to take a break too.
9am - I take H a cup of tea and tell him we best go, snow and horses unfortunately do not mix well. We quickly make some toast, knock the snow off the car, drive down very slowly and arrive to the news that the weight of the snow has pulled down an old canopy roof over where the horses are shod, so we secure the area best as we can with barriers and cones, and I feed and muck out whilst H shovels snow in case it freezes again. A quick chat with his parents who have arrived and eat a few too many Haribo that someone has bought down, but it’s too cold for hanging around outside today!
2pm - We get home and make a sandwich each, and just have an hour to warm up, then we’re back down whilst it’s still light with a boot full of rock salt. Even the dog looks aghast at going out again so soon but needs must. H spreads this whilst I feed and water.
4pm - We decide as its still early to head back to the pool AGAIN. It’s really busy inside so even H who is a terrible wuss with a cold pool heads outside. Well it’s absolutely beautiful, I only get 25 mins out of him before he wants the jacuzzi but it’s stunning in the dark in a heated outdoor pool. We poach in the jacuzzi until I feel slightly lightheaded then shower, change at home.
6pm - Home James. I feel vegetable deprived, and also deprived of my favourite hobby - cooking. I have a simply cook pack of Sicilian roast chicken spices so I roast chicken breasts, mash potatoes and roast some leftover carrots and parsnips to have with sweetcorn and the left over Christmas stuffing (for H). We stick on a Sherlock and eat away! It’s lovely. I made enough for leftovers for lunch but H ate them! We watch tv for a bit longer but are really tired so a last quick dog walk and then to bed.
29th December
8am - So i’m not actually on leave today technically, but I’ve agreed I’ll log the hours worked and sort it out later. Check my e-mails but only a few bits to sort so do it right away. Scrambled eggs on toast and coffees and it’s off we go. It luckily hasn’t snowed further, but it’s very cold so very icy and slippy. All the family are down helping this morning so not loads to do. H rides his horse but the rest of us try to stay warm.
12pm - It’s time to do the supermarket shop, thankfully everything is in stock. I buy far too much stuff including tulips, toilet roll, beer for H, loads of chicken and as there are discounts on washing powder and cleaning products those too.
3pm - Once home and unloaded I do an hours work, then download the yoga class I got the link for the other day. When done I heat up some quiche. I did the yoga on our bedroom and the floor is really grotty so I grab H and we dust, hoover, change the bedding and put laundry away, looks so much better afterwards. H fancies a nap and I read my book.
6pm - We scrap the pool today, and I check my work emails again then potter about chopping veg for dinner. I’m making a SimplyCook recipe of linguine with chicken and veg. It tastes far more decadent than it is, as the sauce has reduced fat creme fraiche but tastes like cream!
8pm - We eat and watch Sherlock. I search on line for new lululemon leggings. I love them, and I can do everything in them, but I struggle with the nulux fabric as they slide down, so I have had rubbish luck lately (hence my PayPal balance from reselling). I ask a couple of questions and make a couple of offers on eBay, but I spot what I think could be the perfect pair on the lulu sale, so I pop in an order £64.99. I also book tickets for a local winter light walk that was recommended by a friend. To bed we go!
30th December
8am - Wake up naturally again. Going to struggle to bring this forward by 90 minutes before too long. Dog wee and check e-mails, still quiet. I got a counter offer off a pair of leggings but decide to hold off as I bought a pair yesterday. It’s my charity yoga class this morning so I set up in the bedroom, and H heads down for breakfast with the dog.
10.30am - Was a lovely class and for a great homeless charity. I make a coffee in my to go mug and grab a muesli bar and off we go. It’s snowed again and the yard is frozen solid. It’s the glamorous side of horse ownership when the taps freeze and you have to shovel horse poo all over the concrete to stop people slipping everywhere. Wouldn’t have it any other way but it’s rather cold! Not really safe to get the horses out on the ice so neither of us ride, and we come home for a warm up.
12.30 - I heat up a bit of the leftover chicken and veg from last night and H has cheese. We watch a Sherlock and are intending on doing very little. However, up pops Matt Hancock and we’re in tier 4 from midnight. That means no gym. And whilst it isn’t really swimming outside kinda weather, we are stupid so do it anyway. Half an hour swim then to the jacuzzi.
6pm - Get home and potter about doing jobs. End up accepting the offer on those Lulu leggings as it looks like I’m going to be living in them. £50. Also book onto another special yoga class, £7.50 and see that a Les Mills presenter is doing combat classes on zoom so book onto 3 of those next week £11. I do need to stop doing this now and use my Les Mills app but I do like the classes and know the instructors appreciate the income.
8pm - I heat up some chilli from the freezer, and we rent the new Roald Dahl Witches film on Prime. We really enjoy it (nothing beats the original though). I text my best friend and brother who use my Prime, to see if they want to watch it. Straight to bed, read for a bit and then sleep.
31st December
8am - Hello from Tier 4 (FML). I had a terrible nights sleep last night, just felt really flat. Emails checked. Dog taken out (he has access to our yard 24/7 but does he choose to wee there?! Of course not.) Toast and marmite for me (jam for H) and coffees from the nespresso machine. To the horses we go, bit easier today, we have a working tap. On the way past we see a car gone into someone’s front garden in the village. What a rubbish day they all must have had.
1.30pm - Home and a microwave pizza for me, and a sandwich for H. I do a little bit of work as what I have been waiting for has come through, and then just really feel the need to start cleaning. The dog moults a lot and us being in and out from the farm doesn’t lead to clean floors.
3.30pm - I mop us out of the house as we are on pony duty tonight. We’re done in record time and then it’s back home in the warm. We open a bottle of Laurent Perrier that work got me! Very nice indeed. Watch some more Sherlock.
7pm - We order Pizza Hut £30, and play cards. Make some resolutions including dry January (from Mon 4th) and fitness and weight for me. Make it just until midnight, then straight to bed and sleep. Happy new year!!
1st January
6am - Wake up desperate for a wee and then just can’t really get back to sleep so just toss restlessly. H goes to the shop to buy milk and bread and comes home with crumpets so I have 2 of those and a coffee. Head down to the horses. Lots of people down this morning so we’re able to chat whilst H rides, still very cold though.
12.30pm - Maybe chatting outside wasn’t advisable. We are so cold. We make some lunch, just another microwave pizza for me, then finish off the last episode of Sherlock. We go and huddle in bed for a while shivering.
4pm - Back on pony duty for us so we grab the dog and head down, get it sorted in record time. Come back and plug my car in ready for work next week.
5pm - H does a bit of painting around the house whilst I prepare chicken tacos. We rent the original Roald Dahl witches film this time. I order some second hand yoga equipment off an instructor ready for some classes ahead. £28 for a bolster, strap and mat (she’ll deliver Monday). We have done nothing today but are still tired so bed and reading by 10pm
2nd January
8am - Wake up slightly earlier, again for a wee and come back to bed. H wakes up shortly after and goes downstairs for a wee for him and he takes the dog out and brings coffee to bed! Down to the horses, it’s still cold but I decide to ride. She’s very fresh and it only goes ok.
12.30pm - Back home and put the heating on. Cheese and biscuits for lunch for both of us, and I start the Bridgerton series on Netflix whilst H does some admin.
5pm - We aren’t on horses duty tonight so open a bottle of wine and watch an episode of Bridgerton together (he was sat near so got the gist). I take a break at 6pm to roast a spatchcock chicken with some baby potatoes, roast parsnips and carrots, green beans and red cabbage as I have a fridge full of veg and I hate food waste. We watch Bridgerton all night, then just after 10pm H does the last dog wee and we tidy up and go to bed.
Day 9 - 3rd January
9am- Wake up to an alarm and snooze. I have a Combat class booked for 9.30am. I have mentioned before that I’m very uncomfortable exercising solo in front of H, so I suggest sacking it off but he tells me I should do it, and clears the bedroom floor for me whilst I go get dressed. So glad I did, a cracking 50 minute class.
10.30am - Bundle up and go to get the horses done. H rides his sisters horse for her then she gets on, then I ride my pony and H rides his horse. So we are there ages but it’s dry and sunny even if it is very cold.
2pm - Get home and have some left over chicken from last night, Brie and cranberry sauce in a wrap each. We both then go to the supermarket. I buy a few bits for the house, but we don’t need much. H goes to get his shop ready for next week, I tidy the house, have a bath, and do a few hours of work.
6pm - H gets home and jumps in the bath I ran, whilst I make sausages and mash for dinner. We finish Bridgerton, and chat for a while and then bed. Unfortunately it’s 28 days alcohol and sugar free coming up from tomorrow, plus back at work for us both so we cuddle up and go to sleep!