#dont send any yet. ill open them a day or two before Christmas

[sparklecarehospital]

It's almost Kissmas drawing requests time :] this is gonna be really fun this year because there's a lot more characters you guys can ask for doodles of since you know about Cometcare now!!!

[shhh-no-ones-home]

december 18 - chris motionless

title: die hard for the holidays

++++

prompt: Person A has secret feelings for person B. person B has secret feelings for person A. one of them suggests having dinner together for the holidays since neither of them will be spending time with their families and all their other friends are busy

request from: @svintsandghosts

tag list: @musicsexandpizza69 @alilpunkrock @cynic-spirit @theoneandonlykymberlee @thisplace-ishaunted @lifeisabitchandsoareyou 

@xyours-eternallyx @joeynihil 

++++

i looked over his newest Instagram post and sighed. god was i that desperate? simping over my best friend? of course i was, but we'd known each other long enough that i knew nothing would ever come of it. when my phone dinged it almost startled me, prompting me to look up at the new text notification. it was my mother. i sighed, opening it and reading it.

"dads sick, doctor says its viral so we wont be able to do Christmas this year. i hope you and your siblings can get together to do something else but if not that's okay. we both hope you have a blessed Christmas anyway and will be mailing gifts out in the next week. love you."

i hummed to myself before answering her.

"hope dad gets better soon and send him my best. i don't see any of them making plans to get together but i guess we'll see. ill mail gifts too if you're okay with that and hopefully ill see you in the new year. love you both."

i closed my phone and set it upside down on my chest, rubbing my hands over my face.

"so much for getting out of the house."

i said to myself. then my phone dinged again, making me roll my eyes in annoyance. to my surprise though it was a text from Chris.

"mom cancelled Christmas this year cause they won a cruise lol. you doing anything?"

i sat up abruptly and typed back.

"my dads sick so mine was cancelled too. when and where do you want me? lol"

i waited patiently for a second before seeing a new message.

"hope he gets better soon. but how about Christmas eve, dinner at my place?"

i nodded quickly to myself.

"ill be there."

---

when the day finally came i wasn't quite sure what to do with myself. we'd hung out millions of times but this was the first time we'd be together for Christmas alone. usually we all had a party with the band and other friends but that was pushed to new years. lets just say i was beyond nervous. plus he told me to dress nice, whatever that meant. no matter what it meant to him, here i was stood in front of my full body mirror, looking over the sparkling blue velvet dress i had on.

"this is too fancy."

i said, moving to my closet. as i started flipping through things i heard my phone buzz. it was Chris.

"you on your way?"

i looked to the time. shit, it was almost six.

"getting my shoes on now. ill be there in fifteen."

i replied. so much for changing. i grabbed a Christmas jumper and pajama pants just in case and shoved them in a bag, pulling my heels on and running out the door. the car ride was fairly quiet, apart from the light Christmas music playing through the radio and my complains about the snow. i wish i would've known it was supposed to snow but it was a little late for that i guess.

as i pulled into his apartment complex parking lot i could see his Christmas tree through the open window. it looked nice, covered in colorful lights and shiny ornaments. i got out of my car and walked quickly across the lot and up the stairs to the second floor, knocking on his door and shivering as the snow flew around me. when he opened the door he offered a wide smile.

"hey! how's it going?"

he asked as he pulled me in for a hug. i breathed in deeply, trying to warm up.

"I'm good, and you?"

i asked as he let me into his apartment. i still felt over dressed, even seeing him in his button down and tie, the two peaking out from under his sweater.

"oh ya know, same old same old. i hope you're hungry, cause dinners about ready."

he said excited and i laughed.

"you know me, never not hungry."

i said and he sent me a knowing look.

"how about you go sit, and ill bring it out."

he said, motioning to the made up table. i nodded.

"you sure you dont want help with anything?"

i asked and he shook his head.

"of course not, you get to be the guest this time, now go relax."

he instructed.

"okay, okay, im going."

i said as he pointed, a demanding look on his face.

---

after dinner we both worked on dishes and things before moving to the couch, the lights all out except the tree as he looked for a movie to watch.

"im glad we could get together for this."

he said, clicking the remote and i smiled.

"you and me both. i think this is the first year i would've been alone since moving out of my parents place."

he laughed a little bit.

"you and me both. even when im not home i still usually have the band to be with."

i nodded solemnly.

"speaking of which, how are they all doing? i feel like i haven't talked to any of them in a while."

i said and he shrugged.

"theyre as good as they always are, keeping busy thats for sure. but youll get to see them for new year."

he mentioned and i nodded.

"yeah i guess so."

it was quiet for a moment, and i looked over him, his focus still on the tv.

"got any suggestions?"

he asked and i hummed.

"uh, no, not really."

i said bashfully, catching his eye when he turned his head with a frown. i guess i wasnt exactly making it subtle that i was staring at him huh? oh well.

"how about die hard?"

he asked and i laughed.

"oh yeah, a christmas classic."

i said sarcastically as he clicked on it.

"you know it."

he said, setting the remote on the coffee table, settling back into the couch. i thought for a second before slipping my arm into his and resting my head on his shoulder.

"you cold?"

he asked and i nodded, looking up as he pulled the blanket off the back of the couch and down over me.

"thanks."

i said, getting comfortable against him again. we sat like that for most of the movie, until i heard him yawn, then he moved to rest his head against mine. i smiled to myself, sliding my hand slowly into his as it rested against my knee. when the movie finally ended neither of us moved.

"ya know, it looks pretty bad out there, maybe you should stay."

he said, never once looking away from the tv. i could feel a small smile making its way to my lips as we sat there cuddled together on the couch.

"you sure? i wouldnt want to be an inconvenience."

i said, feeling his head lift off mine and prompting me to look at him. he squeezed my hand.

"you're never an inconvenience. and besides i wouldnt want you to get stuck in the snow or anything."

i smiled at him.

"i guess i cant argue with that logic, huh."

i confirmed and he nodded his head once.

"great, we can watch another movie then and then go to bed together."

he said, freezing for a second.

"i mean, uh, not together together. but, like, uh-"

he said, flustered, tripping over his words. i pressed a finger to his lips gently.

"its okay chris. i get what you mean."

i said and he sighed.

"fuck it, i did mean together."

he said, slipping his hand out of mine and bring it up to cup my face. he pushed forward and kissed me fervently. a thousand things rushed through my brain at once as i melted into his touch but at the moment none of them mattered. all that mattered was that he felt the same. when he pulled away i didnt open my eyes just yet, sitting there trying to engrave into my memory exactly what he felt and tasted like. when i opened my eyes he was staring down at me, his lips sucked in like he messed something up.

"wow."

i said softly, laughing a little bit.

"im sorry, i shouldn't have done that."

he said, looking down. i shook my head.

"like hell."

i said, making him look to me in shock. i grabbed his face and kissed him again, his hand moving to the back of my head as our mouths moved together. when we both pulled away for air we panted lightly, smiling at each other like idiots.

"it took ya long enough."

i said, making him laugh.

"merry christmas y/n."

he said, stroking my cheek lightly with his thumb and i could feel a blush rising to my face.

"merry christmas chris."

[princessselene126]

Hey yall, emotional abuse, physical pain (not self harm, just illness pain), brief mention of periods, and shitty parents tws coming up.

So i generally try to keep my personal life off here unless I won’t be posting for a while and want to let you know why (like i did with my ear infection.), but I’m having a really bad week and a half and desperately need to vent. Feel free to completely ignore this because I don’t expect anyone to respond, I just need to get everything off my chest--although any suggestions as to what the fuck I should do are more than welcome.

My dad and stepmom have been controlling any emotionally abusive for pretty much my entire life--because you know, abuse doesn’t just start randomly and it’s not something that you can easily fix.

Anyway. When I went home for my ear infection, my stepmom got kinda mad about it. Mad might be the wrong word, controlling is probably better. I didnt tell her or my dad that I was coming home to see the doctor for a few reasons:

I knew if I told them, they’d tell me i should tough it out and go to class

They’d say that i was being over dramatic and that it couldn’t possible hurt that bad

They’d ask why I couldn’t have seen a doctor in Milwaukee (where my college is and 1.5 hours from home), why I needed to come home for something like that.

So I didn’t tell them. While I was home my stepmom texted me asking how I was doing. At the time she didn’t know I had an ear infection or that I was home, so of course like the idiot I am, I was honest and told her I came home sunday night. Seriously I think honesty is my fatal flaw. She, of course, asked why and I told her that “I cant think right now, let alone take a bus somewhere I’ve never been before. I tried to get into the dr at school, but they dont have any openings until wednesday.” I was able to get into my doctor at home on monday, two full days before I would have been able too at school, so it seems logical that id go home right? I couldnt hear out of my right ear anyway, so it’s not like I would have been able to pay attention in class and actually learn anything. 

She drops it or that day.

But my stepmom, being my stepmom, of course texts me back a few days later (fthursday or friday i think) because she thinks that I should have tried harder to find a doctor here. She said, and I fucking quote this entire goddamn text 

Hey so I just want to clarify with you ... you could have gone to a dr there you know? You guys didn’t have to come all the way home and back. good lord. Just find a clinic thats an urgent care or er. you might have had to pay more out of pocket, but so what? And you have 2 insuraces, so that wouldve helped more too. Just saying. So I thought I’d let you know instead of doing all that craziness back and forth. Make it easier on yourself next time kiddo.

And this has me fucking livid because:

I literally explained to her why I didn’t find someone in Milwaukee days before. 

She’s insinuating that it’s too inconvenient for my mom to come get me.

And my stepdad had off on tuesday, so he gladly took me back too school. No questions asked. No complaints. He even bought my antibiotics for me (which I was totally prepared to pay the $10 for myself) before we left.

She’s talking down to me as if I had no idea that I could do this.

I can’t afford to pay more out of pocket right now, even if I might (read: MIGHT) get reimbursed for it later.

Going home literally WAS making it easier on myself.

So I send a screenshot of this text to my mom of course, and she replies almost immediately just going off. My mom and I havent always had the best relationship (she has some emotionally abusive habits too, but she knows about most of them, acknowledges them, and tries her best to fix them), but I know that she will always be there for me. She’s that person who will drive an hour and a half just to come make sure someone is okay, and she has done so 2-3 times in my 2 years at college. She doesn’t care if I’m 45 and living on the other side of the country, she will drive or by a plane ticket to hep me if/when need it. So my mom is beyond pissed off that my stepmom would ever imply that coming to get me, take care of me, is an inconvenience.

I reply a simple “i know” to my stepmom, because I know better than to give her a long winded explanation. She’ll just come back at me with an even longer block of text basically telling me how wrong/stupid i was to not just see a dr in the area.

And of course, of fucking course, she replies with a long block of text anyway basically telling me the same fucking thing. She does this several times and I keep doing the “i know” “yeah” “okay” thing because I just didn’t have the fucking ENERGY you guys. 

But then she says 

my goodness you’re a peach sometimes. Just trying to help and maybe you guys didn’t think of that. 

So by this point in time my patience was completely GONE. I have absolutely none left. I know when my stepmom calls me a peach it’s just her “nice” way of saying “you’re being a fucking bitch.” ((Keep in mind this entire time I was taking screenshots and sending them to my mom so she could be mad with me.)) And so I fucking went off in the nicest way possible. I tell her

no, you’re trying to be in control of the situation that had absolutely nothing to do with you

I was going to just try going to a dr the next morning, but then my mom called and I was crying and she asked if I wanted to come home, so I said yes. It wasn’t an inconvenience to her, though it feels like you’re trying to make it seem that way. And [stepdad] had off so he was easily able to take me back.

I’m not an idiot, im an adult fully capable of doing things myself. But i also recognized that I needed help and accepted it when my mom noticed I did as well

Because yes. I was in so much pain that I was actually crying from it. I usually have a decent pain tolerance (horrific period cramps will do that to a person), but for some reason whenever I say that I’m genuinely in pain my stepmom never seems to think it could be “that bad.” And... that’s exactly how that went. I was soooo prepared to just tough it out and wait until Wednesday if I absolutely had to. But then my mom called and I may be 20 years old but there are those times when you’re an adult and you just need your parent. You need your parent to tell you it’s going to be okay. You need your parent to hold and comfort you. You need your parent to take you to the dr. And for me this was one of those times. I so very rarely ask for help but this time i needed it, and there’s no reason for my stepmom (or anyone) to make me feel like I should be ashamed of that.

So she said something brief to that and I didn’t reply back. Ne next moring she sends me another text starting off with something along the lines of “I’m hurt by how you treated me last night...” and I didn’t read the rest because I knew it would make me mad. I did, however send a screenshot to my mom again.

The next day I call both my mom and my paternal grandma to talk about this entire conversation.

My mom thinks that I should cut off ties with them for at least a few months because this has been overwhelming me so much. I agree with her, but I’m concerned about my younger siblings (not that they’ll get hurt or anything, but that I won’t be able to see them) and also my aunt is getting married in may.

And my grandma was livid too. She’s never liked my stepmom because she’s always thought that she’s treated me like shit. (For a long time i mistakenly believed that my stepmom was a better person than my mom, but I was an impressionable child/teenager then). My grandma and I talked about times when stepmom made me feel bad about myself or treated me as lesser than my half siblings. And my grandma agrees that I should keep my distance, but she asked me to not cut ties, and to keep a decent amount of peace, until after my aunt’s wedding.

Which I understand. I get it. I love my aunt a lot and I truly dont want to cause any problems at her wedding, she deserves the world. But at the same time I don’t know how much longer I can take this you guys. I’m supposed to go to a water park for a night with my dad, stepmom, and siblings during my spring break (it was a christmas present from my dad to the family) and I’m absolutely dreading it. I don’t want to go. My mom says I should just lie and say I have to work, but again, fatal flaw here is honesty, so I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that. I want to see my siblings too, but I really need to start taking care of myself.

I’ve spent far too long worrying about my family even after not living at home for the last two years. I need to take care of myself. I do. But I honestly don’t know how to do that without causing a family feud in the process.

And the reason this was all triggered again today (after not having talked to anyone on my dad’s side since saturday) is because I got a call from a random number while I was in class today. It was a call from my home city and whoever it was left a voicemail. In the back of my mind I started worrying that it was my dad and that he wanted to talk me into not being upset with my stepmom (he’s a terrible person too but that’s a rant for a different day).

I have yet to listen to it because the idea of talking about this with him makes me nauseous. At the same time, not knowing who called is making me overwhelmingly anxious. I don’t know what would be best:

Ignoring the voicemail, or listening to it and potentially having to talk to my dad?

Toughing out being around my family until after the wedding, or risk causing a family feud by cutting ties?

I just... I’m so lost you guys.

[pornowatch]

Valentine

Reyes finally gives in to McCree. 

In Blackwatch they’re called deathgrams.

All operatives are kitted out with the standard GPS beacons, but some take it a step farther. Internal monitoring equipment is not required - it can show up on invasive scans, which can be difficult to explain during undercover work.

But for some soldiers, when their heart stops, they want it to be known. Death triggers a virtual intelligence to initiate any number of protocols, everything from warning brothers-in-arms against rushing into danger to recover a mere corpse to remotely deleting sensitive information from datapads. Sometimes agents with families use it to send goodbye letters to loved ones.

Four days after McCree fails to meet his check-in Gabriel gets an automated message in his personal inbox.

Hey Boss.

Feel weird writing this. Always figured that anyone lucky enough to get me would get you to, but in case your still kicking around then I wanted to say sorry. I aint a fortune teller so I got no way of guessing what does me in, but I know your probably pissed as hell about it. do me a favor and make sure the asshole who got me gets his, alright?

I aint gonna let this get to heavy. It wouldnt be fair to unload all that on you since you cant exactly answer back. Point is, you know how I felt. I never said it outright, but I’m not any more subtle than you are stupid. And since regs don’t much matter now, I just wanted to let you know that I love you. Always did, always will. I could tell you cared about me too, so dont fret about me going to my grave without knowing it.

I never had much religion in me, but if there is an after Ill keep a seat open up at the bar for you. Just dont rush to get here.

-M

Gabriel reads it twice over. He commits the message to memory, complete with McCree’s lack of understanding of basic punctuation principles. The words, he keeps with him. The meaning, he’ll deal with later. Someday.

He purges the message from Overwatch’s server, then gets back to coordinating the recovery mission.

“You’re a son of a bitch,” Reyes grumbles at McCree’s bedside just a couple days later.

The cowboy is unconscious, pallid, and missing an arm. He might lose a leg too, but Zeigler is hoping to save it. But McCree is stable, and though his future with Overwatch is up in the air, he will live.

Oh, he’ll live. He’ll live to pay for putting me through that, a wayward voice in Gabriel’s head huffs. He’s so emotionally exhausted that even the relief of Jesse’s survival hasn’t fully hit him yet. Happiness will come later, after sleep.

The drill sergeant in Gabriel who usually stomps out thoughts like that instead lays off this time.

Less than two months. That’s all the time it takes before McCree is up and walking on his own legs, barely acquainted with the artificial arm prototype but already begging to get back to work. He’s got some healing to do yet and then has to be evaluated, but it’s looking to Reyes like he’ll be fine to return to Blackwatch. Angela really is a miracle worker.

“Say,” McCree starts slowly, and Gabriel has been waiting all day for this. McCree’s been helping out with clerical duties in his office (not without complaint of boredom, but still). Recently the cowboy’s been hung up, trying to talk about something uncomfortable but afraid to spit it out. “While I was MIA, you didn’t happen to, uh, get any weird messages?”

Reyes plays it cool. “Weird messages?”

“Hell, I only ask ‘cause I had one of them chips that kicks on when it don’t detect no life signs. Thing is, chip was in my arm. So, well, I found out that when the arm got taken off, the VI went ahead and sent off some… premature e-mails.”

Reyes sets his datapad down. This conversation has been a long time coming, yet he still doesn’t know how he wants to answer. If McCree wants to stay in Blackwatch then Gabriel has to not have seen the man’s dying declaration. He could lie, say the message never got through, and they can continue maintaining the indefinite holding pattern of “don’t ask, don’t tell”. He’d be saving both their careers from going down thanks to gossip and scandal at best, fraternization charges at worst.

On the other hand, he’d nearly lost Jesse.

“What’s the date?” Gabriel feigns completing some paperwork. McCree will understand. After a short pause the subject is allowed to drop.

“It’s the fourteenth, Boss.”

He feels himself frowning. February fourteenth. Valentine’s Day.

Gabriel Reyes was not a man who put much stock in signs from the universe, but even he had to admit it was one hell of a coincidence. Especially since they’d found McCree, busted up but still breathing, on Christmas Eve.

“Can you believe we’re finally doin’ this?” Jesse asks in a hoarse whisper, eyes drifting blissfully closed while Gabriel kisses down the curve of his shoulder.

The commander chuckles against Jesse’s skin. He’d said finally. Not “actually” or “really”, but finally - like it was inevitable that they end up half-undressed and rubbing cocks like horny teenagers. And shit, maybe it was inevitable. In nine years while everyone else in his life had broken his trust, Jesse was the only one determined to be at Gabriel’s side. He was the only one Gabriel couldn’t afford to lose.

He rolls his hips, pinning Jesse down to the couch. Every repressed fantasy about bending McCree over his desk, all the nights spent with his hand down his sweatpants, thinking of his second’s pouting lips have nothing on the real thing. Gabriel meets Jesse’s upward bucking in time, and they’re both too damn hard to do anything but hang on for dear life.

“Say you’re mine,” Gabriel moans, throat dry and completely, utterly heedless of it.

“Yours, darlin’. You got me. Always did.”

He says it like a promise, and in their clumsy rutting Jesse pulls Gabriel to him. He seals it with a kiss that tastes like bitter cigar smoke.

For the first time in decades, Gabriel gives himself over to it.

[themoneybuff-blog]

Questions About Checking Accounts, Nintendo Switch, iPods, TSP, and More!

Whats inside? Here are the questions answered in todays reader mailbag, boiled down to summaries of five or fewer words. Click on the number to jump straight down to the question. 1. Great advice for job seekers 2. Old hometown checking account 3. Making your own seasoning mixes 4. Inexpensive Nintendo Switch games 5. Partner has extreme debt 6. TSP contribution questions 7. Uses for old iPod? 8. Job search not that simple 9. Value of authenticating sports cards 10. Financial independence and career plans 11. Advice for selling books 12. True hourly discretionary income question I wanted to offer a little update on my switch to a standing desk for professional purposes. About two weeks ago, I moved my main workstation to a standing desk. The purpose for doing this was to significantly reduce the amount of time I spend sitting in a given day, because sitting for your job all the time has some negative long term health consequences. I did recognize that doing this fully cold turkey is a bad idea, and so I planned from the start to do it in stages. My plan was and still is to use the desk until I felt noticeable discomfort, then switch to a laptop in a chair for a while, then maybe alternate back later in the day. My goal was to simply raise my average time at the standing desk a little each week as I strengthen different muscle groups. After a couple of weeks of doing this, Ive found that the big impact has been on my lower back, with a smaller impact on my feet. Im able to work for about four to five hours a day at the standing desk, with other work time spent sitting in a comfortable chair with a laptop. What generally happens is that my lower back starts to get sore, not in a something is broken way but in a this is a muscle thats getting taxed due to exertion and needs a break way. Ill sit down for a while and itll feel much better. However, its constantly experiencing a low-grade soreness, the kind of soreness that happens when you exercise a muscle group. Theres nothing wrong here if I felt something wrong, I would stop using the standing desk for a while. However, it can be a little uncomfortable. Ive had some very minor foot discomfort, mostly on my heels, but nothing significant and it honestly seems to be fading over the last few days. Its hard to tell yet whether or not the standing desk is improving my health in any notable way. I certainly dont think its been bad, but I havent noticed a big health improvement. I do exercise most days, so thats definitely a positive factor, but its hard to extract the benefits of standing with the other benefits of exercise. I think its very likely that there have been some minor benefits, and I likely would have noticed more if I didnt already exercise. Its all about feeling healthy for as long as possible. On with the questions. Q1: Great advice for job seekers I wanted to share some advice from my own experience as an interviewer [in a large corporate HR department]. The big thing is that you shouldnt be hard on yourself if you interview for a job and dont get it. Often, there is already a candidate that is pre-selected and the interview process is a mere formality. Someone thought you were a good candidate and brought you in, but you didnt actually have a real chance at the job no matter how you interviewed. In fact, you should treat all interviews like that. Dont get stressed about them, because theres a good chance that theres already an anointed candidate. I would say that 75-80% of the time, we already have our minds made up regarding which candidate to hire before the interview process begins and interviews virtually never change our minds. Sometimes we will interview someone great and put them on a list of people to call in the future but almost without fail those people already have a job when we call them back. So please dont be hard on yourself if you dont succeed at an interview! And dont get overly stressed about it because theres a good chance that theres already an anointed candidate anyway. Just go in there and answer the questions and learn about the company and let the chips fall where they may. Alison This is great advice, and in line with some of my own hiring experiences in the past. I have been on all sides of this coin at various points. I have been the anointed candidate in a hiring process. I have also been one of the other candidates in a hiring process (where I knew someone else was anointed for an absolute fact). Ive also been involved with several hirings, some of which had strongly preferred candidates and some of which did not. The thing is, you never really know which kind of situation it is when youre interviewing. It may be a more open position where you actually have a good chance, or it may be a situation where you are one of the other candidates in an open process engineered to bring in the vastly preferred candidate with minimal questions. I think the mantra of dont worry about it is the right one here. Just go in there, answer the questions, ask some questions about the company, and move on and keep looking for the next interview or opportunity. If youre the right candidate, theyll call. Often, you wont be, and it wont be due to a fault of your own. Q2: Old hometown checking account I have left a checking account open at my old hometown bank for the last 20 years. It pays a very small interest rate 0.05%. I have a balance of about $1,200 in there. I have always looked at it as a last ditch emergency fund. If anything seriously goes wrong, Ill go there and use that money. But its just sitting there. Isnt there something better I could be doing with it? Dana I dont think theres anything wrong with having a last ditch emergency fund in a bank thats not easy to access. That idea is fine by me. However, its probably just going to sit there for a long time, so you might want to consider doing something with it that earns a better return. The next time youre in your hometown, stop by that bank and see what other options they have. Simply explain that this is an emergency fund for you and you want it in a place where it earns a little more, doesnt lose value, and could be withdrawn in an emergency but isnt likely to be withdrawn. Its very likely that theyll suggest a certificate of deposit, which is akin to a savings account except that it earns a bit higher interest rate and theres a small penalty for withdrawing it early. It wont take very long at all for the CD to earn more than the penalty for early withdrawal and then, after that, its onwards and upwards. Make sure that the bank allows you to automatically roll over the CD when it matures. Right now, with interest rates a bit higher than they were but still fairly low, Id choose a medium term CD, something in the range of one to two years. That will give you a higher interest rate than a short term CD but wont lock you in to these relatively low historical rates forever. Set it to automatically roll over, then forget about it until that last ditch emergency occurs. Q3: Making your own seasoning mixes Have you ever written an article about making your own seasoning mixes instead of buying mixes at the store? You can buy the component spices and mix them yourself and save a lot of money if you use seasonings a lot. I make an Italian seasoning and a chili seasoning and a toast seasoning myself. Margaret Toast seasoning? Youre going to have to send me that one. I have a bagel seasoning mix that I like to use on buttered toast sometimes I wonder if theyre similar. Although Ive mentioned seasoning mixes before and noted how its cheaper to make your own, I dont think Ive ever written a listing of the various spice mixes we have and how we store them. I store most of my spice mixes in large baby food jars that we still have from when our children were babies. I usually make them by mixing other spices by the teaspoon into a bowl and then stirring them thoroughly so theyre mixed, then I fill up the jar with the spice mix. I use masking tape for labeling. Using a mix is a learning experience. Over time, you start figuring out how much to put in stuff. Our chili mix, for example, usually takes a tablespoon and a half per batch, and a batch fills up our slow cooker about halfway. I could write a full post about this if theres interest, including some of my recipes. Just send me a message on Facebook if youd like to see that. Q4: Inexpensive Nintendo Switch games My husband and I bought our son a Nintendo Switch for Christmas. It is his first video game console and he had been asking for it all year so it was really fun to see him open it. Both sets of grandparents got him a game for it so he has had two games to play. His birthday is coming up soon and we asked him what he wanted and of course he wanted a Switch game. We asked him for a list of the ones he wanted and it has 15 or so games on it. The problem is that they are all $50 or more. Why are Switch games so expensive? Our full birthday gift budget for him is $50. Can you help? Anna This is a consistent challenge with Nintendos consoles, and it has been since the 1980s. Nintendo makes very high quality exclusive titles for their consoles those are usually the ones that wind up filling wish lists for console owners but they rarely go down in price until later in the consoles production cycle and the Switch is a pretty young system. Trust me your son isnt being greedy here. Hes probably listing most of the best games for the console, but they all happen to be expensive ones. I would guess that in a year or two, Nintendo will have a line of some of their top titles from a few years prior as Platinum titles for a much lower price point around $20 but were not there yet. So what can you do now? My recommendation is to visit a video game store that sells used games, like Gamestop, and see what they have available for the Switch thats used. Switch games, as you know, come on small cartridges, so its very easy to test a game to make sure it works you can ask them to test it before you buy. Getting a game used in the original packaging will still cost 50% to 75% of the sticker price and the selection may be a bit limited, but this is probably a fairly safe bet for getting one of the games he wants within your price point. A used Switch game is just as good as a new one in terms of someone focused on actually playing the games, so Id look there. Another approach would be to give him a gift card to the Nintendo eShop. There are a lot of very good downloadable titles for the Switch, and you use those gift cards to buy those downloadable titles. While this wouldnt give him any of the games he specifically wants, it would enable him to get a couple of games at least, and there are some very good games for $9.99 or less on the eShop. Q5: Partner has extreme debt I recently discovered that my bride-to-be (June) has about $140K in student loan debt. She had said that she had some student loans in the past but I did not have any idea how much. I am very uncomfortable with being saddled with that much debt. This has caused a great deal of conflict between us over the last few months and I found this out during the holidays. I am not sure what to do. Daniel The biggest factor Id look at is her day to day behavior right now. Is she a frugal person? Does she watch her nickels and dimes? Is she committed not in words but in actions to getting that debt paid off? Is she making extra payments on that debt? If you see that, then I wouldnt fret about it. On the other hand, if she seems to think that such a big debt isnt a big deal, she spends money frivolously all the time, and she isnt making much progress on that debt I would think very, very carefully about this relationship, because thats a value mismatch thats going to chafe for years and years. Beyond that, I would also consider what kind of field that her degree is in. Was the degree she earned in a field with a high income potential, or was it something that will never earn a substantial income? Also, Id look at other factors, like whether or not parental support was promised and then denied. If shes aiming for a high paying career, such as medicine or law or some types of engineering, I wouldnt worry too much about it. If she took out that much debt for a career path that has a very low likelihood of earning a high salary, I would be really concerned. I would also be concerned with that level of debt if there was also significant financial support from her parents where did all of that money go? The challenge with marriage is that you are financially tied to each other in a very deep way and her choices regarding the debt she took out for her education are indicative of the decision making process she will likely employ going forward except now youll be financially liable for them. Having that much debt unless you are both high income earners will significantly affect your life decisions for a very long time, likely for the rest of your life. It will delay your ability to have children that you can support financially, for starters. It will alter both of your career choices and possibilities. It will delay your ability to have a home of your own. I guess, in this situation, what I would really look for are signs of financial maturity beyond that of the student loans. Is she focused on repaying that debt with or without you? Is she making the most of her degree? Does she spend frivolously? I cant answer for you whether this woman is worth it to you. She may be perfect for you in every other way, in which case youll be happier with her. However, having that much student loan debt, and given the alarm bells it sets off in your head, is a sign of likely incompatibility over financial issues, and thats not a recipe for a great marriage. As always, conversation is key, as is paying attention to her actions. What kind of steps is she taking (not just talking about, but taking) in her life knowing that huge debt is sitting there? If youre struggling to answer that and this debt makes you this uncomfortable, this may not be the best situation for you. Q6: TSP contribution questions I am 36 years old, single, no children, no plans to ever marry. I just got a government job that I hope to keep for the rest of my life. Knowing that I am receiving FERS and Social Security already in retirement, how much should I contribute to my TSP to be able to have a comfortable retirement?Want to retire at 65 and have about the same amount of disposable income when I retire. Janine For those unfamiliar, FERS is the pension plan for US federal government employees. TSP is an optional 401(k)-like plan for additional retirement savings. Based on this, FERS should provide about 33% of your final salary when you retire. Social Security, depending on your income level, will provide somewhere around 30% of your income. That means you need to make up about 37% of your income from TSP. If you contribute 5% of your salary to TSP, the federal government matches another 4%. Above that, theres no matching. Given all of that information, I ran some back of the envelope calculations and conclude that given your age and your aim to retire at age 65 with your full salary intact from your various retirement sources and that you want to be able to draw from TSP for the rest of your life, you should contribute 15% of your salary to TSP. This should enable you to withdraw enough from TSP each year to make up your salary shortfall when you retire at age 65 and the TSP balance should last for the rest of your life. Youll want to invest TSP fairly aggressively the target retirement options should work. While I cant guarantee that 15% will get you there, I can certainly say that it is extremely likely that it will either get you there or get you very close to your goal. Q7: Uses for old iPod? Found an old iPod in a desk drawer along with charging cable. Is there any use for this or should I just junk it? I powered it up and it turns on just fine. Adam I dont own an original iPod (I had one way back in the day but I sold it off circa 2007-2008), but a friend of mine keeps one in her car and listens to music with it every day using a cassette tape adapter. You could do the same thing with an auxiliary cable if your car has an AUX port. Just load it up with mp3s of a bunch of music and/or podcasts that you like, keep it in your car, and listen to it during commutes. If you have a charger that hooks into the cigarette lighting receptacle in your car, then you can plug into that and keep it permanently charged. My friend has hundreds of albums that she loved in her teens and twenties. If you like alternative or indie rock from about 1990 to about 2007, theres a good chance youll find a ton to love on her iPod. Just fill yours up to the brim with stuff you like and youll always have something to listen to. You can fill it up with the full archives of a podcast and listen to the entire run of a podcast, too. Old iPods are great for these kinds of things. In other words, use it for what it was intended for. Load it up with audio. Q8: Job search not that simple While I appreciate your regular encouragement to go find a new job if your current one is sapping you, its not always that simple. I have been working as a legacy systems programmer for the same company for 16 years. Most of my day is maintaining old code, migrating it to new machines, and dealing with corporate [nonsense]. I literally hate going into work each day. There arent any available jobs nearby that match my skill set. Trust me, Ive looked. I cant move because my daughter has particular health care needs and needs to be near a top notch medical facility. That also means I need good insurance. I cant just go into work and say, Well, time to find a new job today! Thats just a pipe dream. Terry All right, so what jobs are available in your area that are close to your skill set? Youre obviously in a metro area of some kind. I guarantee there are programming jobs in that area. Whats actually available? What things are most similar to your skillset? Once you know that, start honing your skillset at work so that you can make that leap. Learn how to write tools that will help you with the legacy coding you already do. Start trying to port your legacy code over to a new language for modern systems during your downtime. Use this as an opportunity to learn new languages and paradigms. Get involved with any and all local software development groups. Try to go to their face to face meetings and get heavily involved in any online spaces they have, being as helpful as you possibly can there. Build up some good relationships in your field, then just casually ask about positions that match your refurbished skill set. Also, keep your resume honed on LinkedIn so you can be discovered by people who might be looking for folks in your area. Dont aim for hopelessness. Aim for a light at the end of the tunnel. You can do this at any job. I had a job where I was literally shoveling dirt for hours and hours during the middle of the night by myself and yet I found ways to aim that toward my next step. Q9: Value of authenticating sports cards I have a bunch of sports cards mostly baseball and basketball from the 1960s. I have looked at selling some of them individually but when I look online almost all sales are authenticated cards in a special holder. I looked into this and it looks like you send your cards to an authentication service and pay them a fee and they put them in a special plastic holder with a tag that says its authentic and gives it a grade for its condition. Is this worth it for selling trading cards? Are there ways to sell cards without this kind of service? Marvin You basically described the sports card authentication world pretty well. It exists because there was rampant fraud in older sports cards and other trading cards for a while, so some reputable dealers popped up and started offering authentication and grading services so that people would know exactly what they were buying. Its become the de facto standard for any sports cards of significant value. Basically, if the card is older than about 1975 or so, the player has any name recognition at all, and the card is in reasonably good shape, youre going to make more money selling it after authentication than before, even including the cost of authentication. If its a no-name player or its beat up, youre not going to make a whole lot for it anyway, as people will just want those to help complete sets and they wont sell for more than pennies. What Id do is look for Hall of Fame caliber player cards from your collection (or, as a friend of mine said, Hall of Famers plus Pete Rose) and get those authenticated to sell individually. The rest, Id just divide out by set and sell in bulk. (I have an almost complete 1965 Topps set missing just a few commons that Ive worked on for literally decades, so Im fairly familiar with all of this.) Q10: Financial independence and career plans So how much financial independence would a person need to be able to have full career independence where you still want to have a career but you just feel empowered to make whatever choice seems exciting to you without really worrying about salary but still assuming youre earning a decent salary to live on? I make about $80K and think I can live well on about $40K so my savings rate is about 30% after taxes. How many years would I have to do this before money exits the equation as a career consideration? Barney I think the real question youre asking is how much do I need to save so that retirement is fully covered? This calculator is probably my preferred one. Youll want to play around with different settings to see how long youll need to save to hit your goals. The further you are from retirement, the lower your total savings goal will be. Also, if you assume Social Security benefits will come to you at rates similar to whats available today, the lower your total savings goal will be. You may even be at your target in several years. However, Id still recommend that you save for retirement after you hit your goal number if youre earning a good salary. This allows you to walk away even earlier if you just get tired of the rat race before a typical retirement age. Q11: Advice for selling books I have a collection of hardback books I want to sell. What is the best way to get maximum value for them? Tracy First of all, it depends a lot on what books youre exactly trying to sell. Are they novels? Cookbooks? Old Dungeons and Dragons books? Encyclopedias? Youll want to go to eBay and try to get a sense as to what theyre actually worth. You will probably get the maximum value from them by selling them individually. However, that is exponentially more work for only a fairly modest rate of return. You might be able to sell a lot of ten books for $20 or sell them each individually for $3, for example. Is that extra effort in packaging and shipping and tracking and communication for nine additional packages worth the $10 to you? Another note: if youre selling books, USPS Media Mail is your friend. Its a highly discounted shipping rate that applies to sending books through the mail, and it comes with a tracking number. (Its cheap because its slow and USPS knows a book can sit in a warehouse for a day with zero problems.) You should always use this when shipping books and magazines. Q12: True hourly discretionary income question I understand how this perspective helps to highlight the high cost of non-necessary spending now in terms of lost leisure in the future. But I think it overstates the cost of non-necessities in terms of hours worked. In your example where your annual net wage is $34,000 and your annual work hours is 2,740 (so you net $12.41 per hour worked) and your necessities cost $24,600/year, you should account for 1,982 work hours (= $24,600/$12.41 per hour) as covering necessities, leaving 2,740 1982 = 758 hours for non-necessities. In each of those 758 hours, you net $12.41/hour, and that is the cost of your necessities in terms of hour worked. So a $50 board game costs you $50/$12.41 per hour = 4 hours, not 10.5 hours. The key is to see that you still actually net $12.41/hour, regardless of whether those earnings go to necessities or non-necessities. One way to see this is to realize that the approach in the post can lead to unrealistic implications for the hours of work required to purchase non-necessities. For example, suppose in your example above, necessities are only $10,000 year, and non-necessary spending is then $34,000 $10,000 = $24,000. If your hourly wage for non-necessities is really $4.96/hour like the post says, then it would take $24,000/$4.96 per hour = 4,838 hours to earn that $24,000. But you earned the $34,000 with only 2,740 hours, so something is wrong. Max Max is referring to this article from last week, Using Your True Hourly Discretionary Income to Make Smarter Purchases. Youre just looking at the same issue in a different way. Rather than looking at each hour as being subdivided between essential expenses and non-essential expenses, youre doing the same thing with the total hours over a year. In that example, then, 1,741 of the hours you work essentially earn you nothing in terms of spending money, because all of it goes to essentials. So, frugality in essence just means that youre migrating some of the hours you work from your pool of hours spent on essential expenses to the hours you work for spending money. My angle was different. I divided the income from each hour into essential expenses and spending money. The essential expenses gobble up $7.45 of the $12.41 you earn each hour, while your spending money makes up only $4.96 of the $12.41 you earn each hour. So, then, you judge whether an expense is worth it using just the $4.96, since its the only portion you can actually freely spend. In this case, frugality moves a little bit of money from the $7.45 essential expenses per hour pile to the $4.96 spending money per hour pile. Got any questions? The best way to ask is to follow me on Facebook and ask questions directly there. Ill attempt to answer them in a future mailbag (which, by way of full disclosure, may also get re-posted on other websites that pick up my blog). However, I do receive many, many questions per week, so I may not necessarily be able to answer yours. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/questions-about-checking-accounts-nintendo-switch-ipods-tsp-and-more/

[haeroniel-doliet]

dwhos here for another raaaaaant (vent)? topic is friendships but lets see where thisll go! waheyy let us insert the read more. 

kayokay okay welcome youre gonna regret this; if you havent read through my shitty vents before prepare for ilegibility and thought trains going all over the place and references to things and people youll never know okay great you got off this train? cool gives me more power to crash it see ya. 

okay where do we even begin, oh lets go wild and push out a couple topics first. one is; how shit has improved being uni and how everything seems awful brighter now; why it hasnt actually improved and im lonely as ever; how lonely have i always been; but am i really lonely or just think i should have more bc expectations; why im like this and cannot form relationships

lets start with a bit of a history dive eh eh this is what youre here for, me oversharing my life to nobody thatll read it but come on anyway bc one of the reasons i even fucking do these is because; ironically enough; i have no friends to vent this to!! nobody who actually gives a shit!! and even if they did i have a lot more words and confused thoughts to write out here that would just be really mean to inflict on someone else. 

ok so, classically as a kid ive almost grown as an only child, obviously have a big bro of 7 yrs older that i never formed more of a bond to than the one we share by sharing a family. aka we barely talk. but like i know he doesnt hate me i guess? ok im not gonna go there. its a weird mess. but. all childhood was mostly me playin by myself bc our family friends had kids his age not mine, and we moved around a bunch too and people came in and out, i guess i made ‘best friends’ pretty easily, but none stuck around longer than a year maybe 2-3. bc thats how life was and as a child i guess it wasnt a bother bc hey, let me be friends with everyone! oh but protective parents also mean mostly on my own. thats cool. im totally mature to be sitting at the adults table (there was no kids table) well early at 6-7. mhmmm 

lemme return to finland and start being an early awkward preteen! oh ill be friends with everyone! oh. everyone already has their best friend or best friend group? oh i get left on the playground alone ‘playing the dog at home while they go shopping okay playground games were lame but whaddyou do’ aight cool im okay with this theyre all my friends and im gona draw you all to make friends and nobody like actually bullies me or thinks im weird i guess, anyway school work. oh okay ill make best friends w my neighbour bc were only 7 days apart in age and thats crazy!! i guess we also make friends with lil girls next door bc were 10- 12 and thats what u do. sure. i feel rather criticised by my so called bff bc. we are not on the same wavelength, i feel dumb, im never as funny even if they are hilarious to me, i do gross things w out thinking (imagine having to be told by your friend that you need to buy deodorant when you never thought abt it) and like a bunch of other stuff like not picking up on social cues they dont wanna hang out with me or they dont think looking at funny pictures on the phone is fun... oh okay i mean i guess theyre way better than me but were still friends right? uh yeah. 

okay lets take a gap and go to uk, oh wow, SHIT people actually miss me at home?? im making friends with all these kids in my neighbourhood! oh i can be like the movies where they go down the street and hang out and have movienights awesome! who this is the best! fucking halloween w other 13 yr olds?? having hobbies w them? walking to the bus together and home together?? mad. wild. friends. lets ignore the school consisting of pricks and the only time in my school career ive gotten bullied. like classic bullying. pens thrown at me, butt touched, skirt lifted, name called, teasing my ‘naivety’ (do you work at the dildo factory? haahah. are you frigid? would you have sex with me if i bought you a burger?) oh 13-14 yr olds....  ok no its a wild really good and really shit year combined into an okay year. let me just return home and promise to keep in touch and really very barely keep in touch with any of them. thanks instagram for enabling minimal contact and keeping up w each other. 

(also back then made my first post cryin to tumblr oh why cant i have tumblr besties like everyone else seems to, please someone be my internet buddy! lucky enough actually talked to Amelia a lot, though...... 14 yr old and abt 20 smth. but we played minecraft together and made two shit youtube videos of our competition participation like. you were a good friend to me. never pushed it too far and i really liked having a mature friend. such a shame you seem to have disappeared off the internet (anywehre i know how to reach you) bc hell, i would not have been opposed to meeting you finally irl at fuckin mcm like i always kinda wanted to bc i saw ppl online do, anyway i hope ur life is good and thanks) 

kay so, finally back home weve all moved past the best friend cliques okay okay my class is actually fuckin rad like whaddu you know i dont have to aggressively swear and avoid hugs anymore (self defence from that shitty year) but actually have all these wholesome friends, ofc there were stronger relationships between some people but! i was included. i felt good. it was good. i figured out this being everyones friend thing. im a proper teen now eh. oh but i still had my best friend (briefly moirail) maxx! talking everyday at least for least half an hour if not more, skype calls... watching movies together... sending shit to canada and that one mail i got from you and planning so hard a visit there, even if it felt unrealistic. maybe even spending too much time on you and not making as many connections to my class friends as i could have, u know. stuck on my phone to always be available to you. making you more important. dunno how often id talk thru a crisis in class or however late at night bc, i wanted to be there for you! i loved being needed and being an important piece in moving thru tough times. sure detrimental maybe irl but i was being too much online anyway which i still do but were not there yet. besides, that relationship has had a bit of a roller coaster in the past nearly4 yrs (is it more?) shit that started from an rp and then slowly talking more to being moirails to being the tightest best friends “momma” and all, to your irl friends breaking it up slowly, then a boyfriend really took oyur time and we didnt talk daily lt alone ever get to call bc... shit. okay but i was friends with your boyfriend and though i saw it wouldnt last i was okay with it, like right cool thats teh boyfriend and im the bestfriend. im still involved. yeah man. oh you broke up and now talk more to me! fuck yeah. ill take your side in this regardless. lets get close again even if its not quite the same. i try join your cosplay groups though i cant help feeling me joining killed them, and i followed some you were passionate on! drew all those rad characters of you and your friends to feel adequate and appreciated. then you ad your drama, hated this kid and i wasnt even rly involved. all of a sudden, tight friends, oh i get to be in a chat w you both and a rad other person i had a mild crush on! rad. hell yeah. ive never been in a groupchat like this! this is great i love it. and the vikings came up. and your new friend left bc i was a cis girl and he has problems and could not deal with me not agreeing with his shit argument. (about my countrys history!!)  anyway. they make their groupchat, groupchats die. oh. great i ruined it. okay. i no longer know whats in your life.... oh youre best friends now? i kind of have to bug you to even get added to your ‘friends page’ as dumb as it is. i get knocked right aside as hes the bff and the greatest sweetest person ever even though he still seems like a major dick and even your cool older friend agrees with me..... a load of bullshit and weve drawn apart to barely talking once a week and ive still sent you many gifts bc i think its great! until.  yeah i wasnt gonna send anymore till you promised to set me up with cosplay pieces for christmas and i freak out to send you smth in return (never got more than measurements from me, and due to shit timing i didnt even get to be there for you opening the presents which fuckin ruined it) but whats this? a year on im fucking coming to america and conviced my parents to also go to canada???? fucking insane. still we dont talk much, the plans werent like i expected but i met you and the cool older friend! amazing! it happened! youre real! i brought you more gifts and i got pictures with you and its, it doesnt feel real still. i keep the fucking bus ticket i took from toronto to guelph to remind me. sure i didnt like get much from you back and thats kay different monetary situations and all and yeah. wild. oh but we still barely talk after? no its ok i get it youre not that good with texting people anymore (even if you kept texting you bff while i was there.... like. maybe he was having a crisis i can understand but... please you barely talk to me anymore and now amazingly im there and. you still talk to him a lot. okay...)  ‘ew were not dating were just best friends!” a month later becomes ‘this is my boyfriend and bff i love him more than anything else in the world” ‘oh but hes absolutely a huge mean prick who is super self centered and manipulative,’ and i guess you needed to feel needed like i did and dedicated everything to this shitstorm of a human but. okay... weve drifted apart further, till i demanded thru to your discord (not even active anywhere else) and try damn hard to still talk to you. but its just not genuine. i wanna talk abt important shit to me and worries about myself, but life is difficult on you and i dont feel like you do the same to me so i cant. is it no longer part of our relationship? i guess) 

anyway chapter; who the fuck cares; why i feel i can open up to internet friends more than irl ones;;coming up, the other irl exploits after 9th grade. 

internet friends are based on talking over text and emotions that come up in the moment and contacting them whenever. with irl people, ive always set a sort of boundary that like. our quota of talking is irl. i might message you online but its strictly related to irl things or smth we discussed irl, u feel? even then i mostly never message anyone (thank the two friends in uni ive talked to more than anyone else) but still. theyre people i will unload burdens to IRL when im sitting with them for hours talking about our fucked up relationships with things and life and thats beautiful. but its not consistent through life? like rn all this shit. i cant just go and vent tto you (i guess i could but who knows if youre mad busy and needa be up early tomorrow or are already sleeping or have other shit on your mind, let alone would be offednede by me being so explicit abt me feelings w friendship u being my friend.) anyway, internet friends have broken that and sometimes i talk abt dumb shit ive seen that remind me of them or i wanna get a reaction from someone about and sometimes this bullshit. but more recently, (my discord has fuckin 3 ppl) i cant. i mean. idk if ever could and now theyre just being better w themselves but i cant? Ana tries being a friend and a good online friend but. i cant take it any deeper than like, look how cool this is! yeah that is cool bc theyre exhausted and dont wanna deal w others bullshit and dont want me to deal with theirs bc theyre online to avoid it. all of which i understand but. its kind of hard to deal with. like. youre currently only passionate about your gays in southpark. two things i dont care bout jack shit (actually hate south park idec) and then your response to me just like contemplating quizzes or the way i felt in the mirror at ballet or like smth that comes up to me when im talking abt normal shit, i get an ok, i dk how to respond or, i dont really care. and wildly i love the honesty, and glad to have lines drawn for me when i dont see them, but it always feels like a smack in the face regardless. having stepped out of line and not having realised and stopped before they had to tell me to stop. like it was w that old neighbour bff. i could never tell when she wanted me to leave her alone or smth bc i was having fun! but shed be tired of it and it just. always hurt realising i was too wrapped up in emotion and myself to realise i was annoying or overstepping boundaries and im still terribly self concious about it bc i feel terrible being a bad person like that! i wanna be the perfect friend.ugh. 

the other people on my discord are maxx and the cool older canadian dan, who still is rly cool and admirable. and i feel bad. bc when i first got the dumb thing i talked to him like adults! yea! talked abt maxx and a bit of college and a bit of life and like. it was good! he said good night friend <3 which is like!!! the most wild and exciting thing it fuckin exhilirates me to be called friend in converstion like please fuck validate me being your friend!!!! (god isnt that sad and basically gonna sum up this whole thing) anyway recently im sure things have been sad or busy or hes just that kinda person but my last 4? attempts for convo have gotten no response, even when hes online (supposedly when its ok to message him) and i no longer want to say anything unless its smth im sure id get a response to. bc then im just buggering and annoying the poor guy and become annoying. (even if hes said he doesnt mind and thinks im a great person. i hope) and maxx u know. i can message, and i do, and now more than in a rly long time i- oh my god i get responses!! still they cut short. theres no, hey sorry i dont care or, hey i gotta go, or hey i dont wanna talk abt this, just. no more responses. and i guess my conversational skills are rusty and i havent written anything thatd get an easy response from them! (but stilll, should talking to friends rly require you to formulate conversation starters and talk in a way that doesnt provoke too much but is just easy enough for them to respond briefly and with no investment to make talking to me easy as possible? idk even iguess? maybe im shit at having friends and thats why i have none. shush.)

okay lets head back to irl. high school was shitty weird thing, around 10 ppl in class and i only made friends w 3? got bullied for a good couple days on a trip by 1 and another class person. terrible trying to make friends and keep friendly with everyone in a tiny school but i managed and alls good, and even still, just made friends with the most compatible people, not sure if id have been friends with otherwise. one a nervous wreck of a boy that the teacher tried to like ‘ship us together with’ but while he had a girlfriend and we managed to keep conversation joking and chill (as it should be and i made good sure of it) it was fine, he still like i a very girlfriend oriented person and i guess doesnt chat much online w other girls? im cool with it, a couple snap updates on life here an there its whatever. youre an anxious person anyway and we dont always like. work as friends. another was from japan, who id decieded to make a friend if only to have a friend in japan to visit and to teach me a bit (and teach us to make food! okay im so glad we were friends) and at school it was great enough. helped her get confident in speaking english and correcting work and sitting together at lunch and hanging out outside of school on the rare occasion schedules lined up was fab! i actually am gonna miss her. even if we werent close. and i feel bad bc idk if she wants to keep in contact, and i really suppose i should just aim to write her like a text once a month or so to keep in touch thatd be good, cover that. keep up english and so on. maybe (ps old friends from childhood pop up every now and then on social media and have the rare chat which is quite nice actually! even if im not active or keep them updated, some realtionships i like to leave lukewarm and not hateful but smth thats easy to catch up with if opportunity comes up. i actually can do that quite a lot, make good conversation and feel friendly and make acquaintances. i just. have no idea how to push them to proper active friendships (it just happens sometimes by accident) and no absolute clue how to make htat into a very close “bff we share everything i can message you whenever” kinda relationship classic media like facebook portrays idk. do i need it? i guess not but i kinda wanna know what thats like bc relationships are not a thing for me. lets make that its own paragraph) oh but also on old school friends my frustration of a few days, just. a friend that is the easiest to keep in touch with bc they intitiate and have time and want to do things, but god its annoying and i dont like them. our humours dont align and i feel judged and criticised and like. idk. dont feel great w them. theres moments of like genuine “im glad i met you bc i would have switched schools otherwise” from her and a jar of reminders why were friends and some good memories, but its just. she drains me. and i dont wanna talk deep w her. and though to some other friend it seems like we are heckin dating in secret bc of how comfortable we are and how much we end up communicating to organise things, uhm were not. i wouldnt date her ever im sorry. struggling to stay friends and have it fade to the background amicably before i do or say smth wrong and fuck it up. anyway its just bugging me and i hate it bc i feel bad for her and bad for myself and its just a mess that i dont wanna deal with that mucheven if i talked my parents ear off about it.

ok intermission to parents. in a way no. no fuck they are not my friends. my mom will never be my best friend and i dont think they want that either,being classic parents and allbut i guess, sometimes when i get past the ugh youll never understand youre so god damn annoying!! teenage phase my brain still has, i do talk to them about a lot of things that upset me, bc unlike friends, they cant decide not to care about me or stop talking to me u know. i have vented about shit practices that have really tested my self worth and lack of emotions (remind sobbing like a bitch with a mud covered ass walking home from a terrible skating practice and falling in the rain) and mom comforting thru it. mind telling them all the pent up feelings abt flatmates and analysing them to her like”well shes rly nice and we talk abt this and this but i cant help but feel she doesnt really wanna talk to me and also they didnt wanna hang out and they keep leaving their dishes and told me to clean mine but they did this and that and....” i never talk about internet friends or a lot abt other things bc. not relevant and i dont think id hear what i wanna hear. but im kinda glad i still can do that and vent to them abt like real life things and things that upset me even if its not exhaustive and i cant do everything and they dont fill the gap of this “true best friend” i have emulated. but thats a point of why im not rly lonely. bc i have outlets to a lot of these needs that im not missing it all . just dont have it all in one person or even a small group of ppl.

wht next. oh remind me to come back to group things online. anyway lets give uni a try. so weve talked abt my two impressive friends irl who take the same course as me and kind of have dragged me thru and have gone to hobbies w me and hung out w me for hours and actually come to visist me in london an been cool? yeah theyre pretty rad people and very smart and im glad theyre in my life. even if w al the ranting im not comfortable messaging them all hours of the night to talk abt all my insecuritites and thoughts and problems u know. and one is dating and both have flatmate drama and other groups of friends and tho theyre friends between each other we dont like. make the ultimate trio which is why were not moving in together ( also reminder to being called the 3 musketeers w my high school two gals bc we were seein kinda doing everything together (in school) by me sticking us all together with my “i need to feel validated with friends” glue. that was quite nice.) 

but like in uni, ive said it to a lot of people. its amazing. ive never been happier knowing this many people. i dont make drama, i almost never get included in any drama so all i get are friends!!! and having flatmates, and flatmates friends, and class mates, and people ive just met , and hobby friends i just knew so many people thatd be friendly to me and even smile at me in passing it feels great man. having multiple group hobbies and socials to go to (even if i dont drink much and its not like were partying) it feels good man. i want more of this next term now that i have no”i dont know anyone there” excuses. god i love it. i love waving to people i know, i love getting a ride from someone to go hang out t another friends place and people knowing me by name and caring about my presence! (though not too much, like nobody would miss me i guess, but i still have more of a place to carve and i cant say for sure that they did not notice me missing) anyway archery has been terrbily wholesome and one of the best things ive invested time into and im sad some of the happy faces there are leaving this summer....... and sure none of these friends have gone even to proper hugging levels, let alone talking together without a group of people or god, messaging privately if not strictly club stuff (ok theres like, a couple, one that im delighted about and cant wait to hang w in finland even tho theyre cooler than me)  but u know, same problem w. hm were friends within this hobby group. were not like. actually friends outside of this and wouldnt hang outside of it. uh. yeah. dont rly have that many that kinda friends..... just 2 in fact. ill work on that.... 

side note, i try joining in online groups like mxrp discords, and an odd skype chat for homestuck cosplayers. but its kinda the worst. i dont mind observing and reading in and commenting in my head and rarely actually participating tho nobody knows who i am, but like. nobody knows who i am or cares if im there at all. and its kind of a not great feeling. im not needed or wanted here. they just dont mind me being there u know. idk wht to do with those feelings. i dont really wanna make myself obnoxiously present and make people remember and want to talk to me and actually become immersed in it, bc these dont seem like that great people idk. i guess im too  ‘mature’ to just go omg i love you an all that. 

anyway lets dive into hmmmmmm  why am i still lonely? funny question eh. its because i have no consistent close relationships with anyone. have i ever? maxx was closest but i guess nawh here we are. i can get close to u in a night of just talking for hours but. if it doesnt carry through consistently does it count? i have a couple people to message when im delighted abt smth (heck even post to snapchat to get those lukewarm friendships to be reminded of me) and i have my parents to be sad to about a certain category of things that i share w them (like hobby frustrations and friends theyve met frustrations, and some body upset) i have this hunk of friends in uni i can hang out and chill with and will continue making better friends with gladly. im not an isolated herrmit (all the time) nor do i think im socially despicable. im just. normal. online ive felt more and more as much as i spend my entire day online w all these things im not an internet person??im not always posting on social media, im not always talking to 10 ppl at once, im not writing or creating media, im not consuming other than youtube actually, (like i dont watch shows u knw) , all i do is rp when i muster the strength and hang out lukewarm on tumblr posting rants and reblogging pretty and fun things, not getting involved much. not a fan of anything, not obsessed w anything, not overtly gay ( i dont even know what i am but girls are pretty and sex and relationships get gross as soon as you add me into the picture) and not an exciting personality. hell. i currently fuckin like ballet and archery and like. thats about it. (also hahahhahh catch me going down the abc list of hobbies, aikido, archery, badminton (w archery ppl) ballet. what next. cricket? crochet... cooking? dance (ballet) fencing gaming (hah no), hockey? ice skating ( im already doing it) like look at me anyway shh) im not trans and i dont feel gay enough to fit in (what a rant that is, but im just ignoring it for now) im so boring. too reational, too uninvolved, too unopinionated/have an opinion but prefer to keep quiet and at peace. i guess this is what normal people are like off the internet. and ill just deal with it. but how normal people fill the gap are these ridiculously idealistic bff groups that i clearly dunno how to achieve, and uh. relationships.

so i can foresee a future where an imaginative foggy figure will care about me so much and want to hear all these rants and talk about all my wild thoughts with me and love me and remind me of it and be happy around me and think im funny and make me feel good and loved and better than i am and be someone i love being aorund constantly and wont have to feel self concious with or like i need to be putting on the front that is not gross and is a lovely sociable person. like i doubt they even exist. the kind im specifically thinking off thatll make life a sunset gold and unbelievably happy and good. ill save that sunset gold feeling to my dream future, one in which im happy with my body and personality and have that shadowy figure that makes me all whole and better than im alone and all these pets and animals that i love and love me and plants and color and art and whimsical decorations and yknow. i see it in my head. it feels real good. i kinda wanna see if itll actually happen. it just. it feels so fuzzy and warm and i would love for that actually be real and look back on this and be like. i have it. everythings complete. we can dream. i might get it when im grey and old and all alone but found smth that makes it that good. anyway im not discounting that there might be ‘the one’ in that future, the perfect one. but. i still doubt in the present when or if ill ever meet them let alone if i do htat anything would happen. ive never ever dated anyone or even come close to it. i dont understand how people just, end up in relationships or almost always have one, and i guess im not trying to bc idk if i want it-  idk if im ready for it, but its a weird one ill tell u. i feel with this perfect imaginary figures all these bad feelings would go away and i could talk about them and someone help me fix them and become more and better than my thoughts. but i dont wanna look for one. i dont wanna experiment in relationships so that im ready and wont fuck it up when the one comes bc, its horrendous and stressful and im gross! im not dating material. nah. and obviously nobodys tried to date me so were all on the same page. honestly once i sort out the other things wrong w me, i might just get to therapy for this shit. like. why are relationships such a shit concept to me and like why and how do i deal with it without just saying fuck it relationshipss are not for me. i have no doubt ill keep making connections and friends throughout my life in all different random places, but im actually... kinda afraid none will stick around. if i cant form consistent strong friendships theyre al gonna fade away and ill have nobody when i need someone. having that one solid person would really help bc theyre there thick and thin i guess aparently. i have myself, but considering what a mess i am idk if thats enough at all. i think i should change myself an awful lot though before a relationship could happen. like. nobody wants a barely showering fat chubby in an awkwardway terrible skinned messy sad blabbery person. like. just a gross one. i gotta become so much better before i can even consider letting someone past to get this close i guess. i guess. these feelings are really not settling here and i feel off the rocker. like unsettled and uneasy. also i need to pee which is rly not helping feel less gross. that and my hair is nasty greasy bc rather than take a shower at a reasonable time i did.... nothing. and then i started writing this an hour, two hours ago? more? idk. 

kay then, we have reflected briefly while i was away on how fat and ugly i am and how hopeless considering ive been trying to finish a knitting project for my baby cousin and start drawing again or even just playing my old pokemon game (yknow summer vacay) things in the past few days. nawh. havent. even more productively i should have done actual exercise to build my stamina and make faster improvements in ballet and actually try and tackle the fat and ugly feeling in 8 weeks (but that like... requires diet control... which is hard?) and like o u know. finishing my fucking university course ive lied to everyone abt? ok lets be real i have passed the year and can move into the next w the credits i have and passed all the mandatory classes. but. i want/ need to pass this class. and i already forked out 30 pounds hopefully correctly to apply for a resubmission (more like first submission) of all these projects and its hard. considering in my hirearchy of shit that needs to be done (easiest most necessary first)  i havent even reached the first ladder of like washing my nasty hair. the ladder includes all the above projects and at the end of it is like completing that course (needs to be done by the end of the month u kno bitchh. u dont know how long its gonna take you cannot leave it to the last few days. and this other bulshit course idk if ill even get credit for completing late and dont know if i care but i guess i gotta do it anyway 

basically i just wanna d ie. thatd be nice. id not have to feel fat and stupid and worthless and discomfrot in my own skin and just. nasty and numb but bad all over. okay im really not feeling great bout now. but thanks to all the above weve realised i have nobody to talk to whod talk me out of these feelings and comfort me (let alone if im capable as a person to accept that considering theyd have to be very convicing to get past me going “mhmmm but youre wrong” ) 

anyway this has been terribland i havent achieved anything but feelin kinda bad. we have covered that ive never had proper friendships and that might be detrimental to me ever forming the kind of close companionship i seem to be missing, however at least i can make easy friends briefly and as such know im not a terrible person thru and thru that people hate. i just dont know how to cross that nd not be horribly annoying or how to find those kind of people bc shit and bullshit. do i need it? no i guess ill be fine. would it make my life better and more worth it? probably. id hope so. i mean it seems pretty important in human existence for there to be so damn many songs and movies and aboslutely everything focused around it. 

anyway. i know nobodys gonna finish reading this and i kinda hope i dont read back on this either. my cringey diary moments hidden under a readmore on tumblr. whats sadder.... tsk who wants to figure out how many words this all is? 

mhmmmm mmm 7 pages on word and 6059 words. damn gurl. no FUCKIN WONDer nobody wants to talk to me about my thoughts and feelings when they just erupt. bc even by erupt i mean a mild discomfort that im trying to pin down to a cause and an actual feeling so and so unsuccessfully. 

[shhh-no-ones-home]

December 3 - vinny mauro

title: picture perfect couple

++++

prompt: Person A talks person B into taking family photos with them to get their family off their back this holiday season

request from: n/a

tag list: @musicsexandpizza69 @svintsandghosts @alilpunkrock @cynic-spirit @theoneandonlykymberlee @thisplace-ishaunted @lifeisabitchandsoareyou

++++

"Shit."

I said, looking over my mother's text. She had sent it to all of us. All five of us, me and my 2 brothers and 2 sisters.

"What's wrong?"

Vinny asked, looking down into the funyuns bag and pulling one out.

"My mother wants us kids to send out Christmas cards to her and the family."

He looked confused.

"What's wrong with that?"

I sent him a panicked look, a whine escaping my throat.

"How am I gonna explain to this woman that I am twenty six and single even though I told her I wasn't. And what's worse is she said she is sending us each a check to pay for it."

I clicked my phone off and dropped into the couch, sinking into it and sulking at my new dilemma. I heard him laugh and slowly turned my head to look at what could be so funny.

"What?"

he shrugged, popping another chip in his mouth.

"ill be your fake boyfriend."

he said and i snorted.

"you most certainly will not."

i said and he frowned.

"why not? its not like we dont have pictures together on your socials, it wouldnt be that suspicious. plus i would make a great fake boyfriend."

i sent him a look and he raised his brows expectantly.

"no."

i said and he shifted in his seat on the couch.

"come on y/n! itll be fun!"

i rolled my eyes at him before giving in.

"fine, but you have to take this seriously vin, i mean it."

i pointed in his direction and he crossed his finger over his heart.

"i promise i will take this as seriously as you need me to. and i vow to be the best photo buddy."

i sent him a look before turning my phone back on to text my mother back.

---

the day was finally here, our photoshoot for the Christmas cards.

"vin are you done yet?"

i called down the hall, hearing grunting and drawing my brows.

"you good in here?"

i asked, pushing the door open. in front of me was vin on the floor, his shirt disheveled and his jeans half way up his thighs. i couldnt help laughing at his predicament.

"what the hell are you doing?"

i said amused and he sighed.

"this isnt working."

i shook my head.

"well it would help if you unbuttoned them."

he sent me a dumb look.

"you think i didnt try that first?"

he said and i shook my head, standing over him and leaning down to undo the pants. i frowned when the button popped but the zipper wouldnt budge. i stood up, hands going to my hips.

"alright, take them off."

i said and he sat up, his brows drawn.

"what?"

i moved to the closet.

"we'll try something else."

i heard him struggle to stand.

"but didnt your mom want all matching outfits? thats why she sent them."

i shrugged, pulling a similar pair of his own jeans out and tossing them over to him.

"she shouldve thought about that before buying jeans with a faulty zipper, now get dressed, we're gonna be late."

i said, leaving him standing there in his boxers. i walked quickly down the hallway to the kitchen, finishing breakfast for the two of us so we could take it to go. when he came in he did a spin.

"this look alright?"

he said and i nodded, handing him the muffin and kissing his cheek.

"yes, now lets get a move on it."

---

as we finished the last set of pictures i couldnt help laughing at vin. he had been a light in the darkness the whole two hours we had been out here so far and i was glad he had talked me into this. i was just hoping the pictures turned out as good as i felt they did, even though i had seen anything to suggest good or bad.

"no!"

i yelled as he ran up behind me, tossing leaves my way and making me laugh. i heard the camera click a few times as he hugged me from behind, a wide smile across his lips.

"why not?"

he joked, leaning down and kissing my cheek. i nodded my head, looking into his eyes as he pulled away.

"youll get them in my hair."

i said matter-of-factly and he mocked me.

"oh, youll get them in your hair? is that right?"

he asked and i nodded.

"yes, that is right."

i said and he shook his head, picking me up and slinging me over his shoulder.

"Vincenzo! put me down!"

i screeched, the photographer laughing at us.

"actually thats brilliant."

she said and i sent her a concerned look.

"stay right there."

she said, moving forward to tilt his head so he was looking over his opposite shoulder. she then handed me the 'family christmas' plaque, moving back to her spot.

"youre doing perfect y/n, just one more."

she said, taking a few more snap shots. when she looked at them she smiled back at me.

"i think we've got it."

she said, vinny bouncing up and making me gasp before he dropped me down onto the ground making me laugh. as i was going down though i grabbed him and pulled him into the pile of dead leaves with me.

"aw come on!"

he said as i rolled on top of him, straddling him and dropping leaves on top of his chest. he sent me an annoyed look before sitting up quickly and all the leaves falling to the forest floor around us.

"thats rude."

he said, draping his arms around my waist.

"thats payback baby."

i said, poking his nose. he scrunched it at me, leaning forward.

"its rude."

i shook my head.

"you brought this on yourself."

i said.

"oh!"

the photographer said, taking both our attention.

"i know i said i was done but thats perfect. could i get you two to kiss though?"

she asked and my eyes went wide, my head snapping in the vinnys direction. he had a nervous smile on his face.

"we dont have to if you dont want to."

he said and i thought for a second.

"what the hell."

i said, holding his head lightly and leaning in. when our lips connected i heard the camera shutter a few times. i drew back, resting my forehead against his but keeping my eyes closed.

"i love you."

he said lightly and my eyes snapped open. he had a lazy smile on his lips and i couldnt help melting a little bit.

"i love you too vin."

i said and he pulled me in for another kiss. when i pulled away again he moved his hands back to my waist.

"guess you dont have to worry about having a fake boyfriend any more."

he said and i raised a brow.

"oh?"

i could see the blush creeping its way to his face.

"that is, if you dont mind taking this to another level."

i laughed a little bit and nodded.

"id love that vin."

he sent me a toothy smile, pulling me in for a hug.

"you have no idea how glad i am to hear that."