Some questions don’t have one right answer—they have the right heart

·

It has got to be the accusation against legendary singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. A woman alleged he had sexually abused her when she was just a teenager and Dylan in his early twenties. She gave a time and location for when the assault took place, and people got mighty worked up over the whole thing.

People were preparing their pitchforks, media got their panties in a bunch, surely some tabloids were smelling blood! Can we still listen to his songs, do we need to petition radio stations to stop playing them? You know, the usual questions one needs to confront when a legendary icon falls out of favor with the world. Do we cancel the man, do we cancel the art of the man, how can we best erase his entire existence from the face of the earth?

I was a bit scared for a moment. Like, legit ‘heart jumping up in my chest’ levels of scared, because to see Bob Dylan getting accused of something so heinous is rough. He’s a man I admire. The injustice of it also struck me… why on earth is there anyone alive today who would ‘cancel’ Dylan, in a world that has failed to cancel the likes of Andy Dick?

Then, finally, words of relief came! Wisely and in typical Bob Dylan fashion, he did not immediately reply. He likes to leave people guessing a bit; like when he won a Nobel Prize for literature and sort of just… ignored the whole thing, for a while. When he did decide to finally dignify the accusation with a response? The whole story instantly died… because at the time of the supposed assault, Bob Dylan was not in the same country as the alleged victim, who claims the indecent attack happened in her parental home in America.

Bob Dylan had been in England, the girl in America. He was filming a documentary, for which he was being filmed pretty much 24/7. Rock solid alibi. Bob Dylan was lucky enough to avoid cancellation, or worse. And the world is a better place for it.

How Cats Tricked Humans for 10,000 Years

Cats didn’t conquer the world with armies. They didn’t invent empires. They didn’t even try.

They just showed up… and humans somehow ended up working for them.

In this video, we dive into the real history of cats—from ancient grain stores and Egyptian gods to medieval superstitions, pirate ships, and finally… the internet.

This isn’t just a cute animal story.

It’s a full-on historical journey showing how one small predator quietly embedded itself into human civilization and never left.

Funny, surprising, and occasionally ridiculous, this is the story of how cats went from wild hunters to global icons—without ever asking for permission.

Cheeseburger ‘n’ Fries Casserole

Yield: 6 servings

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Ingredients

  • 2 pounds lean ground beef
  • 1 (10 1/2 ounce) can condensed golden mushroom soup, undiluted
  • 1 (10 1/2 ounce) can condensed Cheddar cheese soup, undiluted
  • 1 (20 ounce) package crinkle-cut frozen French fries

Instructions

  1. In a skillet, brown the beef, drain.
  2. Stir in soups.
  3. Pour into a greased 13 x 9 x 2 inch baking dish.
  4. Arrange French fries on top.
  5. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees F for 50 to 55 minutes or until the fries are golden brown.

The Last Frequency

Written in response to: Center your story around a person who believes they’re the last human on Earth.

Todd Beller

American Adventure Horror

For the three hundred and seventh morning in a row, Sarah Chen broadcast her message to the world.”This is Sarah Chen, broadcasting from Seattle. If anyone can hear this, I’m at the Space Needle. I broadcast every day at sunrise. Please respond on any frequency.”She waited, counting to one hundred as she always did, the familiar static crackling through her handheld radio. The morning fog pressed against the observation deck windows, obscuring her view of the city below. Not that there was much to see anymore – just empty streets gradually being reclaimed by nature, abandoned cars forming artificial reefs in a sea of wild grass and climbing vines.The count reached one hundred. No response, as always.Sarah switched off the radio and added another tally mark to her notebook. She’d started keeping count after the first month, when hope began to fade. Now the marks filled page after page, a growing testament to her solitude.She hadn’t always chosen the Space Needle. In the beginning, she’d driven from station to station, broadcasting on every frequency she could access. She’d broken into radio stations, television studios, and military installations. She’d learned to operate equipment she’d never touched before, spending weeks studying manuals and practicing with different systems. But after months of silence, she’d settled on the Space Needle as her base. Its height gave her the best chance of reaching anyone who might be out there, and something about its iconic silhouette made her feel less alone.

 

“Time for breakfast,” she announced to no one in particular. Speaking aloud had become a habit, a way to keep herself tethered to sanity. Her voice echoed slightly in the empty observation deck, bouncing off the windows and returning to her like a faithful companion.

 

She unzipped her backpack and pulled out a can of peaches. Food wasn’t a problem yet – the city had enough non-perishables to last several lifetimes. She’d organized systematic raids of every grocery store and warehouse in her vicinity, carefully rotating stock to avoid spoilage. Sometimes she wondered if she was being too methodical about it. Who was she saving the food for?

 

As she ate, Sarah watched a family of deer pick their way through the street below, now visible as the morning fog began to lift. They moved confidently through the urban landscape, no longer startled by the remnants of human civilization. She’d named the mother deer Augusta, after her own mother. The fawns she called Thing One and Thing Two, a small homage to Dr. Seuss that made her smile.

 

“Good morning, Augusta,” she called through the glass. “Kids looking healthy today.”

 

The deer, of course, couldn’t hear her. But they were part of her daily routine now, like the broadcast and the tally marks. Routine was important. Routine kept the darkness at bay.

 

Sarah had been alone since The Silence began. She still wasn’t sure what had happened – there had been no war, no pandemic, no dramatic catastrophe. People had simply… vanished. She’d gone to bed one night after a normal day at her software engineering job, and when she’d woken up, everyone was gone. No bodies, no signs of struggle, just empty clothes lying in empty beds and cars stopped in the middle of streets.

 

The first week had been chaos. She’d run through the streets screaming for help, broken into homes looking for survivors, tried every phone number she knew. The internet had still worked for a few days, but no one was posting, no one was responding to messages. Then the power had started failing in sections of the city as automated systems reached their limits. Now only her solar panels and generators kept her small corner of the world humming with electricity.

 

She’d tried to leave Seattle once, about six months in. She’d loaded up a truck with supplies and started driving south, broadcasting as she went. But after reaching Portland and finding it just as empty, just as silent, she’d turned back. Seattle was home. If she was going to be alone, she wanted to be alone somewhere familiar.

 

The peaches were gone. Sarah carefully washed the can and added it to her recycling pile. She wasn’t sure why she still recycled – habit, maybe, or some deep-seated need to maintain order in her tiny sphere of influence. Or perhaps it was optimism – someone might return someday, and she wanted them to find a world that hadn’t completely fallen into chaos.

 

“Daily tasks,” she said aloud, consulting her notebook. “Check the generators. Water the garden. Repair the broken window in the north section. Library run for more engineering manuals.”

 

She’d been teaching herself everything she could think of – engineering, medicine, agriculture, radio operations, solar power systems. Knowledge was survival now. If something broke, she had to fix it. If she got sick, she had to treat herself. The library had become her university, and she was its only student.

 

Later, as she tended to her rooftop garden, Sarah found herself humming an old song her mother used to sing. The vegetables were coming in nicely – she’d finally figured out the right balance of nutrients and water after several failed attempts. The first year, she’d relied entirely on scavenged food, but now she was growing more and more of her own. Sometimes she grew far more than she could eat, unable to break the habit of planting for a family that no longer existed.

 

“Look at these tomatoes, Mom,” she said to the sky. “Finally got them right.”

 

Talking to her absent mother had become another habit. Sometimes she imagined whole conversations, complete with her mother’s practical advice and gentle teasing. Was this madness? She didn’t think so. Madness would be forgetting, pretending she hadn’t once been part of a world full of people. Remembering hurt, but it kept her human.

 

As the sun began to set, Sarah made her way back to the observation deck for her evening broadcast. Same message, same static, same silence. She made her tally mark – morning and evening, two broadcasts a day, every day.

 

But tonight, something was different. As she turned to leave, a flash of light caught her eye. Far in the distance, beyond the city limits, a pinpoint of brightness flickered in the gathering darkness. She grabbed her binoculars, hands shaking slightly as she focused them.

 

There, on a hill several miles away: a bonfire.

 

Sarah’s heart began to race. In three hundred and seven days, she’d never seen a fire she hadn’t set herself. It had to mean something. Someone had built it. Someone was out there.

 

She reached for her radio, then stopped. What if it wasn’t a person? What if it was something else? The world had become strange in its emptiness – she’d seen things sometimes, in the corners of her vision, that didn’t quite make sense. Or maybe she was finally cracking, seeing things she wanted to see.

 

But as she watched, the fire flickered in a deliberate pattern. Three short bursts, three long, three short.

 

SOS.

 

Sarah’s hands were steady now as she reached for her emergency pack – always prepared, always ready for this moment she’d started to believe would never come. She had a decision to make: stay in her safe routine, her carefully ordered world, or venture out into the darkness toward an uncertain signal.

 

She thought of her tally marks, her daily broadcasts, her conversations with absent people and silent deer. She thought of all the questions she’d stored up over the months, waiting for someone to ask them to.

 

“Well, Augusta,” she said to the empty observation deck, “watch my garden for me. I might be gone a few days.”

 

She shouldered her pack, checked her weapons, and headed for the emergency stairwell. As she began her descent, she felt something she hadn’t experienced in three hundred and seven days: hope.

 

Whether the signal led to salvation or disappointment, at least it was something new. At least it was a change. And maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t the last human after all.

 

Behind her, the Space Needle stood sentinel in the gathering dark, waiting to see if its lone occupant would return with company, or if it would remain a monument to solitude in a silent world.

According…

According to the math done by this naval autist, the PLAN added more VLS cells (the primary measure of naval firepower) in 2025 alone than the entire Indian navy has in stock. In other words, China added an entire India’s worth of naval firepower in a single year.

And if you don’t think much of the Indian navy (and you shouldn’t), then the 2025 number is about 85% that of the entire South Korean navy, and 62% that of the entire Japanese navy.

Again, this is all in a single year.

And this is only counting VLS cells, so it entirely excludes the Fujian and Sichuan carriers, the two largest combat ships commissioned by the PLAN in 2025. If you factor in the firepower contributed by those two carrier air wings, then the PLAN added significantly more firepower than South Korea’s entire arsenal, and close to Japan’s.

That’s… insane.

And this is counting only the manned warships. The PLAN is also producing naval drones of all types at a range, variety, and sophistication that is unmatched.

More and more, I am beginning to see why even the folks at the Pentagon are forced to admit that they don’t stand a chance against the PLA in the western Pacific.

I’ve lived and travelled a lot, so have had ample time to be familiar with the outlets in various countries. In the US, I am appalled at how flimsy the plugs and sockets are – some sockets barely hold onto the plugs, and they fall out, while the plugs themselves easily bend out of shape.

The UK on the other hand, where I’ve lived for a good two decades, has, in my opinion, excellent but over-engineered plugs and sockets. It’s great from a safety point of view – they have a lot of safety features:
– the earth pin contacts first
– you can’t push anything into the live/neutral sockets until the earth pin is in place. Plugs that don’t have an earth connection have a plastic earth pin as it’s needed to push open the socket for the live/neutral pins.
– there’s a plastic sleeve around the base of the live/neutral pins to prevent electrocution if the plug isn’t fully in
– the connection is rock-solid, with no chance of bending pins
– plugs are individually fused

Unfortunately the plug is massive in comparison to US plugs, making phone and laptop chargers annoying to have to carry around. It’s also the world’s #1 most painful thing to step on while walking barefoot at night, more painful than walking on Lego.

The other types I’ve had first-hand experience with are Euro plugs/sockets, which sit somewhere in-between – they’re more solid than the US plug, but lack many of the safety features of the UK plug.

In South Africa, two types are plugs are used – both the Euro-type plug for unearthed plugs, and their own three-pin plug that looks like a round version of the UK plug, with some of the same safety features as the UK plug. Having two types of plugs is a problem – every outlet either needs to have both types of plug on them, or you need to carry around a lot of adaptors.

China has it even worse – there are THREE types of plug in use, both the US-type and the Euro two-pin type, and their own three-pin plug with slanted pins. The only good thing about this plug is that its shape means it doesn’t lie on its back with upwards-pointing pins, waiting for you to step on it and puncture your foot.

The downside of having three types of plug means your outlets look like this:

In fact, many power strips in China look like this:

As you can see, it’s designed to fit even UK plugs. The problem here is that the connection is loose, and you can easily poke a pen or keys into the holes, which is a major electrocution risk.

So if you were to bring all of the benefits of the world’s various plugs and sockets, the lesson learned here is that the plugs and outlets should have the following properties:
– A single plug type for both earthed and unearthed connections (to avoid having to have multiple incompatible plug types)
– Pins that don’t easily flex and break
– Shutters on the socket to prevent insertion and electrocution risk (preferably earth-pin actuated flaps)
– A plug design that’s compact
– Safety features such as a plastic sleve at the base of the pin to prevent electrocution risk on partial connect
– Individually fused plugs or something more fancy like RCD on a per-plug basis.

To add to this, it would be great to have a design that is stackable, or compact enough to have a lot of sockets available – these days, particularly at the desk, or entertainment centre, we have a lot more plugs than there are sockets in the wall, requiring a jumble of extension cables and socket strips.

I particularly like this design by Royal College of Art student Min Kyu Choi

It actually is backwards-compatible with UK outlets – interestingly the flat plate you see added in the top right image is to fulfil the BSS specifications for UK plugs of being able to adequately cover the whole of the plug area.

·

Yes. I (female) was on the interview panel with a senior manager (male). We were recruiting for a software developer role. We invited a man to come in who had recently lived in the Middle East and had emigrated to the country we were based in.

I greeted him and showed him to the interview room. We all sat down and he looked at me and told me that he was insulted that a woman would be on his interview panel and that we should show more respect to him than that. He was not joking, he was deadly serious.

The senior manager told him that in our country, women have equal rights and status to men and that his attitude would not be welcome in this company. He was then told that the interview was terminated and the manager showed him out. The candidate was shocked and could not see what he had said or done wrong.

This is the only interview I have been involved in where it has been terminated early. In others, when candidates have clearly not had the skills to do the job, we go through all of the questions and listen carefully to their answers, as whilst they might not be suitable for the job they are interviewing for, they might be suitable for a different role or one that has not been advertised yet.

When we have had frankly bizarre answers, we have cut out some questions to get to the end quickly, and I have also had candidates turn round and say that they were not the right person for the job, but terminating an interview early is very unusual.

Pictures

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Col 28-Book 504 – Sir Whiskerton and the Great Nap Debate: A Case of Livestock Geometry (A Tale of Tractors, Trigonometry, and the Courage to Say “More Snacks”)

Ah, dear reader—prepare your monocle, steady your abacus, and please remove all pigs from the testing area. Today’s story does not begin with a quack, a snort, or even a kazoo blast.
It begins with a sigh.
A deep, tremulous, ink-smudged sigh—the sound of a kitten facing his first Gaokao.

So settle in. Breathe deep. And step—gently, nervously, hopefully—into Sir Whiskerton and the Great Nap Debate.


The Exam That Wasn’t Fair

It was a Tuesday—golden, still, humming with the lazy buzz of bees and the distant snore-squeak of Porkchop mid-nap.

Ditto sat at his tiny desk—paws folded, tail curled, eyes wide with existential dread—facing the most terrifying document in farm history:

Kitten Gaokao: Math Section (Livestock Geometry & Real-World Applications)”

Question #1 read:

“If a tractor holds 8 chickens at rest, 5 at panic, and 12 if they’re arguing about philosophy—how many fit if one is quoting Kant?”

Ditto’s paw hovered over the inkwell.

“Too many variables…” he whispered.
“Variables! Variables!” echoed the wall—a little too loudly.

Sir Whiskerton, sunbathing on the roof, flicked an ear.

“Hmph. Either he’s solving for x… or for existential dread.”
“Dread! Dread!”

Then—thump-thump-THUD—Porkchop trotted in, drawn by the scent of anxiety (and Ditto’s tuna-scented eraser).

“Need help, little echo?”
“Help! Help!”

Before Ditto could protest—
SPLOORT!

Porkchop sat—squarely, lovingly, catastrophically—on the exam.
The parchment flattened—not crumpled, but laminated by love—into a perfect, warm, slightly drool-scented paper pancake.

“There!” Porkchop beamed. “Now it’s a snack and a test. Efficiency!”
“Pancake! Pancake!” echoed Ditto—from beneath him.


The Rescue (and the Redefinition)

Sir Whiskerton descended—not with judgment, but with grace.
He placed a paw on Porkchop’s shoulder.

“Stand, good sir. The exam is not a placemat.”

Porkchop rose—reluctantly.
The paper pancake remained.
Ditto emerged—ink on nose, tuna on whiskers, heart full of panic.

“I don’t know the answer…”
“Answer! Answer!”

Sir Whiskerton didn’t offer a formula.
He offered a reframe.

“Ditto—what does your heart say?”

Ditto blinked.
Paused.
Then—softly:

“The answer is always… more snacks.”
“Snacks! Snacks!” echoed the rafters—Gnomeo, peering down, grinning.

From the doorway, Professor Quackenstein adjusted his goggles.

“Fascinating! The tractor isn’t a vehicle—it’s a metaphor for capitalism! The chickens? Labor units! The Kant-quoting hen? Union rep!”
“Union! Union!” echoed Ditto—now grinning.


The New Answer Key

Sir Whiskerton took the paper pancake.
Placed it on the desk.
And wrote—not in ink, but in truth:

Final Answer:
There is no fixed number.
The tractor’s capacity is not in chickens—
but in care, in laughter, in the willingness to squish together
when the world demands expansion.
Also: always leave room for snacks.”

He signed it:

Sir Whiskerton & Ditto (Co-Architects of Joy)
(P.S. Porkchop: Snack Consultant)

Ditto looked at it.
Then—at Porkchop, now napping beside him, belly rising in slow, steady rhythm.
Then—at Sir Whiskerton, eyes soft, tail-tip flicking approval.

And for the first time that day—
he didn’t echo.
He spoke.

“I think… I passed.”

“Passed.” echoed the wind—not Ditto, but the farm itself.


The Moral of the Story

That evening, as fireflies rose and the farm hummed in C-sharp, Sir Whiskerton addressed the animals—not from the roof, but from the paper-pancake desk.

“The moral of the story, dear reader, is this:
**Some questions don’t have one right answer—they have the right heart.
Ditto didn’t need to calculate chickens. He needed to remember: wisdom isn’t in the formula—it’s in the friend who sits on your test to make it softer. In the professor who sees capitalism in a tractor. In the echo that finally becomes a voice.
So go ahead. Redefine the exam. Flatten the paper. Make room for snacks.
The world doesn’t need perfect scores.
It needs kittens brave enough to whisper,
More snacks.’”

Doris dabbed her eyes.

“A geometric metaphor! I can’t bear it!”
“Bear it! Bear it!”

And Ditto?
He curled beside Porkchop—ink-stained, tuna-scented, utterly at peace
and whispered—not echoed—

“More snacks.”

“Snacks,” Porkchop murmured—in his sleep.


Post-Credit Scene

Later, Chef Remy unveiled his newest invention:

Exam-Ease Pancakes™”
(“Guaranteed to soften even the hardest truths—or cause interpretive digestion.”)

Mr. Ducky bought the rights:

Now with 200% more emotional support!”

And on the barn wall—still faintly glowing—
a new sign, in Ditto’s careful script:

Tractor Capacity:
Unlimited (if you bring snacks).”

(Footnote: “—D.D.”)

Outside—the stars twinkled.
The wind hummed.
And somewhere, faint on the breeze—

Sigh… sploort…* snack *… pass.


Jingle on. 📚🐷💛
(Or, in exam code: ∞ + 🥞 = ✅)

The End.

Alone with the Wolves

Written in response to: Center your story around a person who believes they’re the last human on Earth.

Cameron Snider

Horror Thriller Contemporary

 

Snapping, snarling, howling. Tearing, clawing, ripping.Whether nightmare or reality, it was all the same cocktail anymore to Peter Simmons, who was indeed slamming back some vodka.Prowling, hunting. Fury, feasting.They were out there. And Peter would be up here, enjoying the last of his poison.They’re coming. There are so many of them.The noises below were as terrifying as ever. He always wondered if tonight would be the night, If one of them would find him up here, if some stray downwind would betray his scent. Peter let the stupor overtake him as the bottle emptied, and gave way to thoughtless sleep.

***

The rush and pounding in his head each morning served more fierce an alarm clock than he could ever hope for. Besides, he thought. I can’t rely on sound. If one heard it in the morning by chance, it’d be back at night for him. He’d seen it before. They remember.

Nonetheless, he did have a simple analogue watch which still ticked away, although he didn’t know the date anymore. Nine twenty-three in the morning on a Saturday, or so he mused. Every day was Saturday for Peter, since he gave up keeping track. He thought it might be September.

Scratching his beard and gazing off into the direction of the golden sun peeking through the treeline, Peter knew it was bright enough to scavenge today. They were weaker in the daylight. Far weaker.

He looked at the bottle of vodka and dread swelled up inside his stomach. “Damn all the sleeping aids… I need more of you.” He threw the drained bottle as far and hard as he could, smashing against an adjacent evergreen tree in the distance. The toss caused his hammock to sway.

Next to Peter high up in the tree was a second hammock, tied neatly and holding as many pieces of clothing, blankets and food as he could scrap up. Each night was getting colder. Before long, he’d need a cold weather sleeping bag, or something similar. Food was low, and it was time.

Peter felt around under the blankets in his supply hammock until feeling the cool metal touch of his antiqued harpoon spear. Grandpa always fancied his antiques, and the harpoon spear was a favorite. “Hunted a shark with it once!” he’d swear. That was long before it all went to hell. Too bad I don’t have a launcher like grandpa. Peter found himself cracking a tiny smile through the head pain. Someone had to. He wasted a few pills out of an aspirin bottle he had been holding in his supplies, downed a water bottle, and began to carefully climb down the large tree he took refuge in nightly.

Some stray leaves from other trees crumpled underfoot from his final small hop to the ground. Left, right, and all around, Peter saw nothing. With en empty hiking backpack, two plastic bottles and his spear, he began the small quarter mile trek through the brush to Wallaby River for clean water. Afterward, it was a two-mile walk to town, if the weather allowed it. Cloudy and foggy days (of which there tended to be many) were a no-go. There had to be sunlight, directly.

When Peter was close enough to the car littered roads, he’d follow it all the way into the suburbs. On a clear day, there was nothing to fear outside, not as long as they weren’t completely shaded or covered. He’d always avoid any cracks and alleyways that seemed a too dark, just to be safe.

Then came the hard part. A putrid smell, and eventually, bodies. The closer he got to town, there were always new bodies. Each and every night. It’d begun some months into everything. Peter figured they didn’t have any humans left to hunt, but each day out he found new remains, sometimes picked down to their bones. He observed that they were cannibalizing each other at night now, no more food. Different packs all hunting together, preying on the weaker of their own kind. And once slain, they always changed back…

On a scavenging day like today, Peter would go one house to another sequentially in the outlying neighborhoods. He had a few simple methods to check if they were occupied. If all was well, he’d head inside. More often than not, there were still plenty of leftover goods. Cans, cereal, soup, sometimes sweets, but not often a drink he cared for. Never vegetables or fruits. They’d all rotted.

The ease of supplies came from a number of things for Peter, who considered himself lucky. For one, the end of everything was like a flash. Most didn’t have time to react, or gather their things. Many tried to run and flee the city, and few packed their pantry when they did. This, along with the fact that Peter only had himself to feed, made a single bag haul at a time plenty. He couldn’t keep too much in his hammock stockpile anyway, couldn’t take the risk of things falling down and giving him away. He had wondered for a while why they never tried to eat any of the leftovers from a store-branded society, but the answer became clear in time. They only ate what they hunt.

Arriving at the first house on his mental list, Peter walked the perimeter, starting with the front. He’d tap on the windows with his spear as hard as possible, making a racket, then always awaited a response. They were aggressive in their little daytime hideaways, and woke easily. Broken down doors were a dead giveaway, they needed their little ratholes to hide in, and those houses should be avoided.

No snapping, no howl, no clawing. Good. Before trying any doors (which were hardly ever unlocked when intact), Peter made his way to the backyard, and his stomach sank. A shattered glass sliding door.

He stuck his spear in the ground. “Damn it!” he overreacted. There’d be more houses, but every little loss always brought some swell of anger. It reminded Peter of everything he’d already lost.

Peter thought it over for a minute and kept staring through the broken glass. He had daring thoughts, and wondered if he should just take a quick look. He hadn’t heard a peep at the front, after all. And then a sudden realization of excitement set in. Through the darkness of the doorway, he could make out what looked like a bottle of whiskey sitting on the island counter, just a few small steps in. He wet his lips. Today will be a good haul. I’d bet my life on it.

With an unhealthy kick to his courage, Peter made way for the door less cautiously. He stepped on the glass, which crackled and popped underneath. No signs, no reaction. He’d never broken any of his self set scavenging rules before, but just today he had to. To Peter, the bottle was more important than water, he simply needed it. The death of emotion his drunken stupor’s brought about were the simple cure to misery, his only companion at night.

Like a moth to flame, he was through the door, hand on bottle. Light shone through the bottle from outside as he looked it over, empty. Peter sighed.

Crunch.

Peter turned his head.

Crunch.

A resistant rip of flesh from bone.

Crunch.

A low hissing snarl.

Crunch.

A snapping mouth, which slowly opened. Fresh blood was pouring from it’s hundred fangs.

Crimson eyes glared down from an inhuman height. The patchy haired fiend stood menacing on two legs. It had been inside, taking the slightest of steps over the inward glass toward Peter from the corner he had not bothered to clear. It dropped the severed arm it was chomping at and leapt forward.

Peter jumped toward the door in a panicked effort. Not enough. A claw tore into his shoulder, clenching down hard. Peter screamed, kicking and thrashing, halfway out the door. As soon as the beast’s arm touched sunlight, however, the hold weakened.

Peter knew he wasn’t far enough out into the light yet. It took seconds for them to weaken, he didn’t have seconds. He thrust his harpoon tip into the monster’s exposed hand, which managed to pierce all the way through the weakened skin in brutal fashion. The monster recoiled backward in pain, and took the spear with it.

Quickly flopping over to his belly, Peter struggled out as fast as he could to gain more distance. It wasn’t fast enough. A wrenching sharpness surrounded Peter’s entire lower thigh in sudden agony. Gripped by the mouth, the beast’s body was now halfway out of the house. His hand found the whiskey bottle again, and he smashed it over the beast’s face like a brick, which finally released him. Retreating into the dark recesses of the house, it growled in a demonic pitch. Peter scrambled as far out into the yard as he was possible. He felt himself growing weaker rapidly.

He sat up, stared into the beautiful glassy sky, and found himself laughing. Peter laughed harder and harder until tears were streaming down his cheek. He looked at his profusely bleeding bite wound, to the smashed remains of the whiskey bottle, then finally back to the house.

The last thing Peter saw before fading completely was the hulking dark figure just a step inside the doorway, watching. Waiting.

The Moon Is Lying to Us: What China Found

Chili Dog Casserole

60a98831f59fadcb25a7131636b5c2e7
60a98831f59fadcb25a7131636b5c2e7
Chili Dog Casserole

Ingredients

  • 2 (15 ounce) cans chili with beans
  • 1 (16 ounce) package beef frankfurters
  • 10 (8 inch) flour tortillas
  • 1 (8 ounce) package Cheddar cheese, shredded

Instructions

  1. Heat oven to 425 degrees F.
  2. Spread 1 can chili and beans in the bottom of a 13 x 9 x 2 inch baking dish.
  3. Roll up frankfurters inside tortillas and place in baking dish, seam side down, on top of chili and beans.
  4. Top with remaining can of chili and beans, and sprinkle with cheese.
  5. Bake for 25 minutes or until hot and bubbly.

·

Large scale amphibious landings are a thing of the past.

  • Between satellite, airborne and land based remote sensing technology they cannot count on “surprise”….
  • Attempts to eliminate or blind the above will also remove the element of surprise….
  • Large fleets of landing ships require large fleets to support and protect them. Large, slow moving targets that must be protected by large slow moving targets…
  • A $1 Billion dollar warship is now in mortal danger from a $40 Million dollar missile…

The flagship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet was sunk by two cold war era Russian missiles…. Taiwan has an antiship arsenal estimated as 2,000 missiles and rapidly growing…

  • And don’t discount the economic costs of such an action…. China depends on exports for 35% or more of its GDP… war disruptions, sanctions and nations pivoting away from China based suppliers will cripple it.

Chinas best approach to Taiwan is play the “long game” on social media and in politics…. as Taiwanese citizens with living memory of the Civil War and early years of the Republic of China (aka Taiwan) die off, the younger more naive voters are more subject to persuasion, as the Politicians are subject to clandestine financial support.

The best war is one you win without firing a shot…. no bodies to bury, no messes to clean up, its all just Business as Usual…

See “Reunification of Hong Kong”….

This video delves into China’s “Century of Humiliation” (1839-1949), revealing how a traumatic 110-year period of exploitation by foreign powers—from the Opium Wars and the burning of the Old Summer Palace to the crippling Boxer Protocol reparations—forged a deep, institutionalized mistrust of the West. We connect these historical grievances to modern flashpoints, including Cold War isolation, the 1999 Belgrade embassy bombing, and the current geopolitical campaign against tech giants like Huawei. Understand why China views every interaction through the lens of history, and why this memory is now policy, fundamentally defining the future of global power.

(Repost) Some more advanced techniques for conducting a prayer or intention campaign. (duplicate)

Here, we get back to more posts on directed thought. As I have repeatedly stated, time is the perception of our consciousness as it moves in and out of the many world-lines within our “reality universe”. You can use thought to navigate which world-lines to move towards and to arrive at. This is called an “intention campaign” or a “prayer campaign”.

Here we look at some specific “add on” systems or techniques that you might want to incorporate into your intention / prayer campaign.

You do NOT need to use any of them, but if you particular unique system calls for it, you can use any of these techniques with some degree of success.

We will start with “dodging the thoughts of others”…

Weaving (Dodging)

"Hey! Can you kids please shut the Hell up? I can't hear my self thinking!"

-My father when us kids were being particularly loud and boisterous. 

What? You ask.

How can someone’s thoughts influence me?

I cannot see it, so therefore it doesn’t exist. And besides, how do we know that these thoughts are bad…

We are constantly bombarded with the thoughts of others. This is all throughout our reality. It’s constant. It’s non-stop. It moves in waves, and washes over us, and it crashes us and collapses us from time to time.

These thoughts come in so many forms. But you all should be aware that they exist.

It can be from a well-meaning prayer-group from a local church, to the CIA (Pompeo) launching yet another one of his “hate China” news media campaigns, to a subliminal advertisement to drink Coke-cola in the movie theater, to an obsessed lover that will not leave you alone.

Thoughts of others, directed or not, will affect your prayer affirmation campaign.

That is something that you DO NOT WANT to happen.

In weaving (or dodging), you specifically isolate the impact of certain people, news, or social media so that it does not infringe upon your affirmations. This should be considered a “normal” thing that you must do for all prayer campaigns, but the truth is that it is not easy.

We are humans and live within society, and all the time we are bombarded with other thoughts, ideas and manipulations. It’s not an easy thing to do. Especially when we are forced to work around people in this environment or attend classes in school with them.

These attacks might be intentional or not; or directed or not, but you must isolate and control your thoughts irregardless.

The use of this technique of “weaving”, or as I like to say “dodging” is to specifically and functionally avoid certain people, news articles, or the thought influences at certain times of the day, and / or on certain days. There are numerous techniques, and here are just a few to consider.

  • One day or one period of “freedom” from the thoughts of others. Such as a camping trip at a remote lake, or a religious sabbatical, or some other similar way to physically isolate yourself from others and their thoughts.
  • A daily “fast” of isolation from others. It could be one hour long, or even a half of a day. You isolate yourself and have no outside contact with the rest of the world.
  • You purposely reduce your time on social media to a set time limit.
  • You purposely stop visiting certain websites intentionally, and never go back to them.
  • You purposely isolate yourself from certain people or groups of people.
  • You spend more time with a dog, or a cat. Their thoughts are neutral, and their influence is always POSITIVE on your reality. (Horses as well, but I don’t have much experience with them.)

The effectiveness of each techniques within this category depends on the person, the type of prayer intentions being conducted, and the local situation. There is no “best” technique to use.

"I just couldn't leave my friends. Sitting alone in the house, drinking beer alone. Watching TV. It's not living."

-My good friend Robbie, who explained to me why he started doing Heroin all over again. One of our last conversations before he died of an overdose.

You “weave” your life in and out of the thought “firing range” of others and their systems. You “dodge” the “thought bullets” so that they cannot influence your thoughts, and your thought campaign.

We like to think of ourselves as “strong” and that we are able to do what we want with our body. It’s a lie. We are all entangled within a very complex spider web of thoughts and this entanglement increase as we cruse the MWI. In order to have better navigational ability, we absolutely need to start severing those strands of thought to enable us some latitude in movement.

Keep in mind that the thoughts of others are terribly counter-productive and quite damaging to your thought objectives. You MUST tame that influence.

Now I have mentioned this, over and over, in prior posts. The difference in this post is that you intentionally INCORPORATE an added step to your prayer affirmation campaign that is intentionally dedicated towards a reduction in the influences of the thoughts of others.

Never neglect the importance of isolating yourself from the dangerous impacts of “thought imposition”. Find a quiet place, and go there. Just let your mind unravel. Try to do this weekly if possible…

Wet Towel (Kinesthetic technique)

The term “Wet Towel” refers to how to you conduct a given prayer campaign. Instead of conducting verbal affirmations once a day for a number of months, this technique adds one more step. This step devotes one day a week to let the “affirmations soak into your reality”. Much like that of a wet towel placed upon a tablet of paper.

Here, what you do is as follows;

  • You rank the prayer affirmations in order of importance to you.
  • You take the top three affirmations, and select ONE that you will focus on.
  • You then, create a project, or an event around that particular thought.
  • You work that “project”, or “event”, or “intense prayer period” for a set period once a week during the prayer affirmation campaign.

For instance, let’s suppose that you have an on-going prayer campaign. Your number one intention / goal is to “sail around the world”.

In this example, any of the following events would agree with your “wet towel” technique when used IN CONJUNCTION with the existing intention / prayer campaign…

  • For one hour a week you can take sailing lessons at the nearby marina.
  • You can go to the local library and read books on sailing for one hour at the local library.
  • You can buy a model of a sailing boat, and spend at least one (uninterrupted) hour a day building it.

The idea behind this is Kinesthetic. You use something related to “doing things” to focus your thoughts in that direction. This is also known as “Hands on” training, or in this case, “wet towel” directed prayer.

Positioning / Staging

You can plan a series of prayer campaigns on the assumption that each one will obtain sub-goals. You can position different prayer campaigns through out your life to make sure that your goals are kept on track. This is how you need to conduct an affirmation / prayer campaign for long-term, distant (in a MWI sense) goals.

Let’s suppose that you have a long term goal. Something that is just enormous in size, scope, and influence in your personality and social standing. If you devoted your time to that singular goal using the normal prayer / affirmation campaign you would be bound to have problems. It is too large, and far too distant not to run into difficulties in implementation.

The way to hand these large, and “distant” objectives is to do so in small bits, and then monitor your progression of thoughts as you proceed.

Question: "How do you eat an elephant?"

Answer: "in small bites."

While it is true, that you can pray for anything…

… what you desire might not be what you really want.

In order to make sure and to guarantee that it becomes what you truly desire and want, you need to stage it for implementation. This technique does so.

Let’s suppose that your intention / affirmation campaign is for you to become the President of the United States. (Hopefully you are not that crazy to want such a thankless and political job, but heck, everyone is different. “What ever makes your boat float!”) You might want to break your intention objectives down into mini-prayer campaigns such as this, and run the campaigns over a ten-year period of time…

  • Be elected as a local dog catcher.
  • Be elected on the town council.
  • Be elected as a State Representative.
  • Be elected as a State Governor.
  • Be elected as a President of the United States.

When you think about it, it’s all pretty simple. With each stage, you obtain new knowledge and skills that can be used to help you on the next stage in your overall objectives.

Image vocalization

You can associate images with your verbal affirmations. You need to follow a general procedure to do this.

It is not enough to run an intention campaign, and have an image board (whether physical or electronic) you need to incorporate the affirmations or prayers to connect the two together.

You can use many techniques to connect the visual elements, but the important thing is that you have a statement within your prayer affirmations that does connect the affirmations to the images. Here’s some example statements that you can use.

  • My folder in XXXXXXX contains images that represent what my intention campaign is intended to materialize.
  • The screen saver that is in use on my XXXXXX computer represents the images that my verbal affirmations are intending to generate.
  • The intention dream board located in XXXXXX is working in parallel to manifest and accelerate the implementation of my verbal affirmations.

For example, let’s suppose that you have a folder with images of pizza. And your intention campaign is one that has a goal of your owning a Pizza Parlor. What you would do is then collect all sorts of pictures of pizza, and pizza parlors, and workers inside a pizza parlor. Then add an affirmation that would connect the images of pizza to that of the affirmation.

Make sure that your selection of images is EXACTLY what you want to connect to your verbal affirmations.
Make sure that your selection of images is EXACTLY what you want to connect to your verbal affirmations.

Time track control

You can control how quickly or slowly the prayer / affirmations are implemented. In general, a slow implementation is more careful, and easier to absorb. A fast implementation might result in some discomfort. And if not handled properly the discomfort can become enormous.

Now, the reader should realize that for a while (years actually) I wanted a calm and simple life that provided me a fine and gentle life; a “rich” life that enabled me comfort over anything else. And I did get it.

Everything is fine, and I am living a good fine rich life. But you know, I wanted some more things. Some physical things. But then when I added some new affirmations, for some physical items, I discovered that they started to take much longer than they used to to take to manifest in the past.

In the past, simple physical things would manifest within a year. Now, they seemed to “take forever” to materialize.

For a while I didn’t know what was going on, and then I figured it out.

My affirmations were taking the “calm, peaceful, and careful” way to obtain my material possessions. And, boy oh boy, this path was a long one. So in order to speed up the acquisition of certain physical elements into my reality, I had to adjust my affirmations away from a “calm and peaceful life” to one that accepted minor discomfort, aggravation, and strife as long as no one was hurt (physically, emotionally, or intellectually) in the process.

And then (of course) the physical things started to appear.

And of course, faster and sooner meant, quicker with more discomfort.

  • Slow, comfortable = takes forever to manifest.
  • Balanced, within a reasonable time period = some discomfort.
  • Quick and sudden = Expect some great and significant discomfort.

So, you have to pay attention to how all your affirmations within a given Prayer Campaign interact together. Some of the affirmations might negate or slow others down.

To avoid this, you might want to utilize the techniques of “time tracking” the affirmations. This will usually (but not always) include a [1] time-line or due date, and [2] a specification that describes just what you are willing to sacrifice into to expedite your wishes or desires to come true.

Dates and time-lines must be reasonable. I would suggest that you stick with a comfortable three-year to five-year goal. Any sooner than that, and you risk some really trying events and times.

Here is an example of an affirmation that you can add…

These affirmations manifest by XXXXX in a YYYYY period of time. At no way is anyone in my family harmed or hurt in the process. Some discomfort is acceptable provided that the discomfort is manageable and dissipates within a short period of time.

Selective impact(s)

You can have the prayer concentrate on certain elements more than others. It can be selective in implementation. Or to put it better, and more accurately… more careful for certain elements.

The best way to do this is to implement an “implementation schedule” within your verbal affirmation prayer campaign.

If you do not do this, when your intention manifests, it might come with unintended consequences. So you want to minimize those unintended consequences.

Metallicman in Pago Pago, in American Samoa. I had waged a "lazy" intention campaign to live in the South Pacific, without any priorities on what would be unacceptable to me in doing so. As a result, while I did indeed manifest a South Pacific paradise, it came with a host of unexpected consequences that I did not enjoy in the least.
Metallicman in Pago Pago, in American Samoa. I had waged a “lazy” intention campaign to live in the South Pacific, without any priorities on what would be unacceptable to me in doing so. As a result, while I did indeed manifest a South Pacific paradise, it came with a host of unexpected consequences that I did not enjoy in the least.

Essentially, this method reduces the number of unintended consequences by prioritizing events, and placing constraints on what is desirable and what is not.

What this is, is a system where you prioritize the various intention prayers within the affirmation campaign. You can specify which affirmations that you wish to implement the strongest, or the quickest, or to the extent of everything else, if that is your desire. While others can be put “on the back burner” as necessary when implementing your affirmations.

For instance, you can add this line at the start or the end of your verbal affirmations…

In regards to implementing these affirmations. the priority should go towards [1] XXXXXX, followed by [2] YYYYYY and everything else is rated lower in implementation priority.

Aggressive implementation control

You can control how quickly, or aggressively, a certain segment of your prayer / affirmations are implemented.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that it comes at a price.

While I have discussed this above, here you can really stress the implementation of one group of affirmations over the others. And, as I have stated, this does come with a price. They key is the acceptance of that price. Such as in this example.

My desire for XXXXXXX occurs and I accept any misfortune, trouble or discomfort in obtaining it's manifestation.

And, for your information, I would not suggest anyone do this unless it is an absolute emergency for a critical or urgent desire.

Present Tense

You must, ABSOLUTELY, use present tense when vocalizing your intentions. Here’s some examples of what you can do and what you shouldn’t do.

DO NOT DO…

  • One day, I hope to have XXXXXX.
  • Soon, I will strive to XXXXX.
  • It is my wish, that my dream, XXXXXX.
  • I would like that XXXXX.

This is what you DO actually DO…

  • I have obtained XXXXX.
  • I am living my goal of XXXXX.
  • I possess XXXXX.
  • I daily XXXXX and I do enjoy it.

You absolutely use a present and strong direct tends in your affirmations. Do not be “wishy washy” about it.

If you use the following affirmation…

Some day, my hope of happiness will be closer to my dreams.

You will see exactly that materialize. You will never be happy, and the hope of happiness with just be beyond your reach.

Instead, you must say something like this…

I am happy. I am happy right now, and every day is one filled with happiness.

Do not get caught up in the nonsense that exists on the internet. Most people writing the blogs and websites on the internet are amateurs that haven’t a clue as to what they are working with. Sorry, but that is the truth.

Conclusion

It’s difficult to rate these additional “add on” techniques in usability. It all depends on the person and the individual situation involved. If I were to say what you should implement to any existing affirmation campaign, I would strongly suggest…

  • Using positive tense in your prayer affirmations.
  • Staying away for thought imposition.

Do you want more?

I have more posts in my Prayer Affirmation index here…

Intention Campaigns

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