Lawn mower shop near me

After a post I made here a week and a half ago, plus some interactions with various individuals on and offline, I’ve come to the conclusion that I am autistic with 80-90% certainty. However, one reason it took me so long to realize this is because my ability to mask is very well developed. Good enough in fact that all growing up and through to today I have never had issues making friends. I was always very sociable, in that I was often well liked and nearly always had a good first impression on people.
Before I go on, let me know that this isn’t a brag, this is just to give context.
Some of the reasons I’m good with people is because I happened to be taught good people skills as a kid, I’m very empathetic, I’m highly interested in learning in general so I also like learning about people (which means I’m a good listener), I’ve picked up good habits from watching Charisma on Command and body language imitation of charismatic individuals from movies and in real life, and I let myself laugh anytime I feel remotely like laughing.
But right now, I have almost no friends that I hang out with consistently. The only time I talk to friends is to organize something or when I have a favoquestion for them. I have significant issues getting back to people when they message me, and I never talk to people “just because.” I’m comfortable with the situation I’m in, where there can be many days at a time where I don’t talk to anyone outside of work (I basically live by myself), but sometimes I wonder if something is wrong about it all. Is this just what happens when you’re a significant introvert, or does this sound more like autistic tendencies?

I'm not comfortable sharing much information about myself on this post, but should anyone be able to help me im fine sharing my name and contact number with that person privately.
Im 25f currently living in a hostel in the tuebrook area, specifically near the market/police station.
Im also a type one diabetic meaning I'm insulin dependent. I also have something called a freestyle libre 2, a diabetic piece of equipment that scans my blood sugar levels without having to prick my finger.
My insulin has been more than halved via my Dr these past several weeks due to eating less. I was over 18 stone in November last year so I was certainly morbidly obese and required a higher dose of insulin to manage high sugar . I'm still highly overweight as my last weigh in was 13st 9 in April. But I have lost a lot of weight with no change to my exercise levels.
Weight loss in my case is good obviously, however I'm experiencing hypoglycemia nearly every single day these past couple of months. My Dr prescribes me these 60ml glucose drinks which raise it back up, but hypoglycemia is a very unpleasant and frightening experience and I wish I could more easily prevent it.
I also have autism. Basically a picky eater but it's more severe than that. You know how people suggest that if your child doesn't wanna eat, you should just not give them anything? Yeah that happened to me once and I got to 16 days without food before my mother gave up. It's a food phobia. Before I was diagnosed with diabetes I basically just lived on sugar, hence my weight being so so bad
This is my issue I know. I'm literally living in a hostel I should be grateful to get any food. I wish I was different, but I can't. I went to a food bank and I thanked them, and my hostel for providing me with voucher to go, but I cried myself to sleep because I couldn't eat it. I'm aware my behavior is beyond pathetic. I haven't complained to anyone because I know it's my own fault.
Im used to hunger so until my finances improve I'm aware I'm going to have to deal with not being able to eat every day.
But I am going to end up in hospital again due to how bad the hypos can get. I've just had one of my glucose drinks but I'm sick of treating the symptom.
I asked my mother for £2 and she refused. She abandoned me when I was 15. She found me on the floor unconscious after I visited her at 19 and didn't even call 999. My mother literally doesn't care whether I live or die, and has gone as far as to tell me to end my own life.
If I ask for money I'll just be considered a addict trying to buy drugs.
If anyone could meet me around the tuebrook market or police station area with a loaf of bread and some butter, I would really appreciate it. I love toast and I'm paid Friday so that loaf will definitely get me through till Friday.
Im really sorry to post here

So me (25M) and my girlfriend (24F) have been together for three years now. For a while, everything was great. However, over the past year and a half, she's become increasingly and incredibly jealous and possessive.
She has falsely accused me of cheating numerous times, looks through my phone constantly, and hates when I interact with any girl. Even at coffee shops or people on my sports team. It's worth noting I've never done any of the above to her, even though her roommate is a guy.
I know she's had some relationship trauma in the past, but it's been getting worse and worse, and I've told her many times the effect it's bad on me and how close I am to ending the whole relationship.
Cut forward to today: I was out with an old friend of mine who happened to be a woman, and my girlfriend got into her usual antics again: calling me, accusing me of hiding things from her, and threatening to kill herself. And to be honest, I just snapped. I told her in no uncertain terms to leave me alone and that I have no interest in her weekly drama. And I spoke true. I'm through with her manipulative and toxic tactics.
Now, I'm unsure of where to go. We're on a break, and I kind of want to end it, but three years is a long time and this would be my first major breakup.
Any advice?
Thanks

Hi everyone,
I'm a 31 year old dude who sometime in 2021 noticed a weird lump on my left testicle while taking a shower. I had no idea how long I had it before I noticed it in the shower. It was super scary at first, so I made an appointment with a 3rd party urologist.
When I spoke to the urologist, he scheduled an ultrasound and concluded I have a size 2 varicocele. He said lots of men have it and it isn't an issue, so go on with your life.
Over the next 2ish years, I noticed I felt a bit "off". My energy has been low, I need lots of sleep, I'm not getting stronger at the gym no matter how hard I work. I just felt stagnant and stuck. I tried to improve my sleep schedule, and my life in general, but I just feel like something was working against me.
I started experiencing some issues staying hard when using a condom, and I never really had that issue before. I honestly could barely have sex with a condom. I know I'm getting older, but it still felt like something was wrong.
I got my testosterone checked at my 2 most recent doctor checkups, and they were somewhere in the 350 to 325 range. Not great. It even went down compared to the first test, even tho I've been making positive improvements to my life.
I started thinking what could be causing low T, and I made a few good changes (fluoride free toothpaste, reverse osmosis water filter), but I knew it had to be something else. Eventually, I did some online research and they said that a varicocele could be the cause of lower testosterone!! Why did the doctor tell me it doesn't have any side effects? It made me so mad.
It's been a long road of seeing a new urologist, going to a radiologist, getting another ultrasound, and meeting with the radiologist one last time, but finally I'm scheduled for the embolization in the morning.
I'm really nervous about the embolization. I know it's minor and safe, but going in through the neck creeps me out. But I reallyyy want this solution fixed. I've seen some success stories on this forum, and I hope my story can be one of those in the near future. I just figured I'd share my story while I go through this, since it seems lots of people in my position have done the same.
Thanks for reading <3

Posted on here awhileback consistently about my(22M) 3 yelationship with my heavily depressed partner(22F).
Really bad things were happening to her in her life, and as a result the relationship was tanking. There was absolutely no affection coming from her for months because of how depressed she was, she even forgot Valentines Day until I brought it up the day beforehand. After a bad event caused by me freaking out due to that affection(no argument happened), we sat down and had the talk to end our relationship and just continue as friends. And maybe if things on her end got better, we could get back together down the line.
Honestly, 3 months out, I feel so much better. I can BREATHE LIGHTER. There's still that missing feeling in my heart for her, but genuinely my body just feels so much lighter. There's no more constant worry or dissapointment from a lack of needs or wants. I don't have to make sure she's okay 24/7, and while I care about her, she's not my direct responsibility anymore. My mind can actually relax.
I'm also starting to slowly realize I don't think her love was the best fit for me, and I need someone who can better respond to my energy. After 3 years of handling someone with severe depression, I'm worn out, and I think I'll search for partners who don't suffer from it. I just don't think I can go through such a relationship again...
We're still great friends though, and we talk nearly everyday cause we handled everything responsibly. So I say to those still going through it and are on the fence on ending your own relationship, please just do it. You won't be abandoning them, but putting enough distance between the both of you where you can support comfortably but not be affected by the 24/7 interaction and handling. You'll heal, and it feels good.

I knew that Ray liked to party, but this was a little too much. He was on the dance floor with a spaced out look in his eye, dancing like he’d just stepped out of some 1980s music video. The people around him didn’t seem all that put off, but they were probably almost as high as he was.
​
Almost, being the operative word in that sentence.
​
Look, I get it. I like to party too from time to time. But you gotta be smart about it. You gotta know where your limit is, and I don’t think that Ray knew his limit.
​
***
​
I’d never actually been to this part of town before, but hey, there’s a first time for everything, right? Ray and I had just closed the deal of our careers and figured a little celebration was in order. I’d initially figured we’d just have a few drinks and maybe get laid. But when he broke out the molly, I wasn’t going to say no and the next hour or so after that was fucking killer.
​
Then we’d ran into that dude at the bar.
​
This guy was… well, he looked like he was on drugs, not like he sold them. He had messy hair, a grin that said: ‘I just farted!’ and I’m pretty sure he was covered in glitter. He was wearing a hot pink suit, with a neon blue bowtie, on top of a regular black tie. Yeah. Two ties.
Anyways, he must’ve realized that we were also high off our asses, because as we took a seat at the bar he came right over to us, wearing that ‘I just farted’ grin and chatted us up.
“Hey man! You two having a good time tonight?”
“Fuck yeah we are!” Ray replied, “Fucking love your getup, man!”
“Aww hell yeah, brother!”
​
The Glitter Man went in for a high five and Ray reciprocated.
“You having a party?” He asked.
“Yeah, just closed a fuckin BIG ASS client. Fuck yeah, we’re having a party!”
“Oh man, then I’ve got just the thing for you! Check this shit out.”
​
Glitter Man reached into his suit jacket and took out a gunmetal gray cigarette case. He opened it, showing us a collection of small neon blue pills inside.
“These right here? These are gonna kick your night up a whole other notch,” He promised. “You want in?”
​
Ray stared down at the pills, and I could see his eyes widening like a kid who'd just walked into a candy shop.
“Fuck yeah, I want in!” He said with barely a moment of hesitation, and that is when I stepped in.
“Wait up, the fuck are these?” I asked. “Molly?”
​
“Nah, man. It’s a new thing. Been calling it Blue Lagoon. Trust me, this is the shit! One pill… and you’re never gonna forget tonight. I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds.”
“How much?” Ray asked.
“Tell you what, man. I’ll hook you both up for ten bucks a pop!”
​
Ray started reaching for his wallet, but I stopped him.
“Dude, we don’t even know what this shit is!” I said.
“C’mon, loosen your asshole and live a little, Geoff!” Ray replied, pulling away from me. “Sorry about my friend, man. He just needs a few more drinks.”
“Hey, no worries!”
​
Ray handed over twenty bucks and Glitter Man dropped two pills into his hand, before taking off.
“See you around!” He said, and that was it.
“You in this with me?” Ray asked, offering me one of the pills.
​
I didn’t answer, so he started making a ticking clock noise.
“Times almost up…” He sang, “You gonna get the stick out of your ass and party like a man, or are you gonna pussy out?”
​
I took the pill, sighed and put it in my mouth.
“ATTA FUCKIN’ BOY!” Ray cried and slapped me on the back, before taking his own pill. “Thought for sure you were gonna go all fuckin’ soft on me!” He teased, “Go full Mr. Mackey from South Park. ‘Drugs are bad, M’kay!’” He laughed at his own bad impression of the show.
​
He turned back to the bar, reaching into his pocket for a pack of cigarettes.
“Hey, my buddy and I are gonna have two dry martinis!” He said, “Dirty as you can fuckin’ make them!”
​
He popped one of the cigarettes into his mouth, and that was around the time I noticed that the world around me seemed… off…
​
I blinked slowly, looking around at the people in the bar. I could’ve sworn that I saw flowers blooming on their skin, but it was hard to get a look at them. They only ever seemed to be there when I wasn’t looking directly at them. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something moving behind the dance floor. Some tall, wandering shadow although I couldn’t get a good look at it either. I think that it might have looked at me, with eyes on stalks like some kind of slug. But I couldn’t be sure. It disappeared completely when I tried to look at it head on.
​
I looked over at the bartender, a relatively plain looking brunette. She glanced at me briefly as she shook our martinis, and I swore that I could see flowers growing out of her hair, wreathing her head in vibrant colors that were impossible to really describe.
​
I looked over at Ray, and he was staring at her too. I’m not sure what he was seeing, but whatever it was, it had to be beautiful! The man beside me had roses growing out of his eyes and whenever he laughed, I heard a chorus of angels singing. He was holding a giant chameleon that he kept petting, and it was looking at me.
“Think this is DMT?” It asked.
“Who the hell knows?” Said the man. His head was mostly flowers now.
​
Ray absentmindely handed me my martini, and I took a sip. It tasted like heaven. It tasted like a fresh donut, right out of the oven with the glaze still melty and warm. I wanted to cry from just how beautiful it was!
​
A hazy mist swirled around me, lifting me up to new levels of paradise. As Ray and I went to the dance floor to join the party, I felt at one with the universe.
​
A beautiful girl with flawless dark skin danced with me, as we danced I realized that my place in the cosmos was here! Right here!
​
And then I saw it, really, truly saw it. The grand tapestry of all things. It was right there in her eyes. Right there for me to see. An expanse of events, all seemingly unconnected save for the fact that they contributed to some great, glorious final outcome. A perfect future for all mankind, for all that existed beyond mankind. Hundreds of lives, thousands, millions, billions… perhaps even an infinite amount, all moving parts in an enormous machine, working toward the completion of a single function. Pawns in a grand game whose outcome had been determined outside of time. Every little piece would in it’s own way, fall into place exactly when it needed to, at the moment it needed to, each one carefully guided by a grand design, that operated exclusively through others. An outside force, that pushed them to trigger the events that would lead to the favorable outcome, and arguably, the only outcome, but there really was no big picture to be seen. The end result was something far less finite. It was a state of being. A higher state. A type of perfection that went beyond perfection. Oh, the knowledge of it burned so bright in my skull!
​
I hugged the girl that I was dancing with and we kissed. She told me that she was proud of me before promptly dissolving into a cloud of butterflies, and as I watched them fly away I laughed, knowing that they too were part of the fabric of the universe! I admired the crowd dancing around me, basking in their radiance. They seemed to go on forever and I could see every aspect of their lives in each of them. Their hopes, their dreams, their aspirations. I loved each of them, and looked into each of their souls, looking at what the greatest possible version of them might be.
​
From the corner of my eye, I saw a shadow. The same one from before, possibly? I looked at it, watching as it surveyed the crowd. Despite its darkness, I could see its shiny white teeth and beady eyes. The eyes shifted to me for a moment where they lingered, but the shadow didn’t move.
​
Water flowed around me, distracting me from the shadow again. Fish swam past me, daring me to chase them and I obliged. They promised to take me to a mermaid and teach me how to live in the sea with them. Then I promptly threw up all over some poor girl who was just trying to dance, and after I apologized to her, I tried to explain to the fish that I just needed to sit down for a moment, but by then they’d already turned into seagulls and were just casually shitting on the dude they were sitting on.
​
I stumbled over to one of the booths and collapsed into it, trying to catch my breath.
“Would you like some cheese, sir.” Asked the sentient platter of cheese on the table underneath me.
“My name is Brie!” Said the brie.
​
I stared down at the platter, before picking up a cube of cheddar and trying to eat it. For some reason it tasted like a napkin. This was because it was actually a napkin.
​
My skin felt cold, my hands were shaking a little. The music was way too loud and my mouth was dry.
​
I looked up.
​
There were no fantastical creatures around. No fish, no seagulls, no flowers, no talking cheese. Just a normal nightclub.
​
My head was kind of throbbing.
​
I took out my phone to look at it. It’d been about an hour since Ray and I had gotten our martinis. Had time really passed that quickly?
​
Speaking of which, where was Ray?
​
I looked around for him, before finding him still on the dance floor, dancing like a goddamn maniac. He didn’t seem to be coming down the way that I was. Maybe I’d puked some of the drug up when I’d vomited and it had cut my trip short?
​
Speaking of which, what the hell was that? DMT or something? I was pretty sure that I’d just hallucinated everything that had just happened. Those had to be hallucinations, right?
​
I shook my head, before trying to ground myself in the moment. I still felt dizzy and weak. I ended up going to the bar to just get some water before finding another seat where I could rest for a while while Ray partied his little heart out… and after another hour, I started thinking that maybe something was wrong with him.
​
I noticed that he only seemed to take a break once, and when he did, it was only to head to the bar to get another hard drink. While he was there, I noticed him slipping a familiar gunmetal gray cigarette case out of his pocket. He downed some pills from inside and chased them with a generous sip of whatever he’d gotten. Then, swaying like an idiot he put the cigarette case back in his pocket and lumbered back to the party.
​
That idiot.
​
He must’ve bought the whole fucking case off of that weird guy we’d seen earlier! It was one thing to try some weird new drug like a dumbass, but this? This was insane!
​
I considered going up to him to ask him just what the hell he’d been thinking, but given how out of it he probably was, I knew there wouldn’t be much point to it.
​
So I resolved to just watch him, and make sure he got home safely like a responsible friend/co-worker. I didn’t really want a repeat of the Vancouver Incident where I’d had to drag him crying like a baby out of a convenience store at 4 AM because they were out of gummy bears. (He’d promised me that it would never happen again and up until now I’d held him to that.)
​
I guess if nothing else, Ray didn’t seem to be violent or anything while he was high. The bouncers in this place looked pretty tough, and I really didn’t want to have to watch them beat the crap out of him. And it wasn’t until around 2 AM when the party was dying down that I started to notice Ray acting strange. Well… strange compared to the way he’d been acting for most of the night.
​
He’d seemed more unstable on his feet and seemed less interested in dancing now. He kept looking around frantically, and I saw him take out the cigarette case to look for more pills.
​
I figured that this was probably the time to get up and stop him.
“Hey, hey… relax, man,” I said, coming up to him and stopping him from taking more of those pills. “Take it easy, alright?”
​
He looked over at me with wide, bloodshot eyes as I spoke to him.
“Geoff?” He asked in a small voice.
“Yeah, it’s me. Put the pills down. How many of those have you had?”
​
I took the case from him and looked inside, only to feel my stomach sink a little when I realized that it was empty.
​
It suddenly occurred to me that I probably should have been watching him closer, to make sure he didn’t take all of the goddamn mystery pills, and I quietly kicked myself for not thinking about that sooner!
“Well shit… you feeling okay, bud?” I asked.
“Fraid…” He slurred, “Universe is… wrong…”
​
His eyes suddenly widened, filled with a horror that I’m not sure I could properly describe.
“THERE!”
​
He pointed at something over my shoulder and I looked.
Behind me, sat the unknowable terror that lurks in all places where something ceases to exist and only absence remains… absolutely fucking nothing.
​
“Maybe we need to get you to a hospital…” I murmured.
“No hospital! N-no hospital!” He said, “Please… Geoff… j-just get me somewhere safe! Please!”
​
Yeah, I was definitely getting him to a hospital. I’d already made enough dumb decisions for the night. I didn’t really feel up to making one more.
“Alright, let’s get you someplace safe,” I said with a sigh. I took out my phone to call us a cab. “C’mon, Ray.”
​
He grabbed at me like a scared child as I led him out of the club, jumping at every shadow that we saw on the way out.
​
***
​
“So what exactly did he take?” The nurse asked me. She had a sort of deadpan, matter of fact tone and barely even looked at me, while Ray screamed bloody murder in the next room. I gotta say, I wasn’t exactly beaming with pride as I confessed to the nurse that Ray and I had partied in defiance of every 1980s anti-drug PSA we’d grown up with. But it needed to be done.
​
“I think the guy called it Blue Lagoon,” I said. “I don’t know how many he had, but it was a lot.”
“Blue Lagoon?” The nurse asked, “That’s a new one.”
“Yeah I’ve never heard of it either. I took one of the pills too,” I said. “I was seeing shit for about an hour before I came down. Like, mermaids, talking cheese, flowers… that kinda stuff.”
“So it’s a hallucinogen?” She asked.
“Yeah, I’ve never done DMT but I was thinking it might be similar to that? I don’t know.”
“We’ll take some bloodwork shortly, see if we can’t figure out some more,” She said before leaving me.
​
I quietly went back to Ray’s room, and watched as he fought against the restraints that bound him to the bed.
His face was bright red from all the screaming and he was sobbing like a little kid as he struggled.
“IT’S COMING! IT’S COMING FOR ME!”
​
I didn’t bother trying to talk to him. He was still pretty out of it, and he’d been screaming about something coming for him.
“GEOFF!” He sobbed, looking at me. I saw him trying to reach for my hand, “Don’t… don’t leave.. Don’t let him take me, Geoff… please… you gotta let me out of here, YOU GOTTA LET ME RUN!”
“Relax, you’re gonna be okay,” I promised. “I’m gonna stay right here with you.”
The words didn’t seem to do much for him. He just kept fighting and sobbing.
​
At around 4 in the morning, I finally slept. It was in a chair in one of the waiting rooms, since Ray was still screaming too loud for me to sleep in his room, but I slept. I figured that when I woke up, Ray would have sobered up a bit and we could both go home.
​
I was wrong.
​
When I woke up, there was a police officer standing over me, gently shaking my shoulder. My first thought was that the nurse we’d talked to had reported us for taking drugs (which I thought they weren’t supposed to do!) but no.
​
He just wanted to ask me a few questions about Ray.
​
My memories of talking to the police are hazy. I don’t entirely remember how the conversation went, but I knew that they’d asked me about where we’d been that night. They asked me if Ray had gotten into any fights, or if I knew anyone who might want to kill him. It wasn’t until around halfway through the conversation that I figured out that Ray was dead.
​
I never saw the body. It was covered when they wheeled it out of the room.
​
But I saw the blood.
​
Good God… all that fucking blood… more than I thought could fit in a person.
​
From what I heard, none of the nurses saw what happened. At some point, the screaming had just stopped and when they’d come in to check his vitals again, they were greeted by the gory mess that used to be Ray.
​
After the police talked to me, I didn’t hear a lot about the investigation into Ray’s death. To my knowledge, they never identified any suspects. Hell, I don’t even think they’re entirely sure about what killed him. I heard somebody say it could have been some kind of animal attack, but I think that got shot down pretty quickly, since where the fuck would the animal have come from?
​
The police cleared me as a suspect in the case pretty quickly, since I’d been asleep when it had happened and there were plenty of witnesses who could confirm I was in the waiting room, passed out.
​
I imagine that they talked to some people at the nightclub we’d been at too, but I don’t think anything ever came of that. I’d been watching Ray for most of the night. He’d been dancing and having a good time. The only time I hadn’t been keeping an eye on him was when I was hallucinating, and I highly doubt he picked a fight with someone who’d be willing to break into a hospital to murder him during the hour that I was indisposed! There was literally no logical reason he should have died the way he did! There wasn’t a single person I could possibly think of who could have killed him!
​
Person being the operative word here.
​
Before he died, Ray had been screaming about something coming for him. My memories of the hallucinations I had after I took that pill are a little hazy, but I remember the shadowy thing I glimpsed among the crowd a few times.
​
I remember the pitch that the guy who’d sold us the pills had made:
‘I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds!’
​
Call me crazy… but I’m wondering just how true that pitch was. Maybe not everything we saw after taking those pills was a hallucination. Maybe they let us see something… touch something… and they let that something touch us right back.
​
I don’t know for sure. But that’s the closest thing to an answer that I’ve got. Either way, I’ve been sober ever since that night and I think I’m going to stay that way.

I knew that Ray liked to party, but this was a little too much. He was on the dance floor with a spaced out look in his eye, dancing like he’d just stepped out of some 1980s music video. The people around him didn’t seem all that put off, but they were probably almost as high as he was.
​
Almost, being the operative word in that sentence.
​
Look, I get it. I like to party too from time to time. But you gotta be smart about it. You gotta know where your limit is, and I don’t think that Ray knew his limit.
​
***
​
I’d never actually been to this part of town before, but hey, there’s a first time for everything, right? Ray and I had just closed the deal of our careers and figured a little celebration was in order. I’d initially figured we’d just have a few drinks and maybe get laid. But when he broke out the molly, I wasn’t going to say no and the next hour or so after that was fucking killer.
​
Then we’d ran into that dude at the bar.
​
This guy was… well, he looked like he was on drugs, not like he sold them. He had messy hair, a grin that said: ‘I just farted!’ and I’m pretty sure he was covered in glitter. He was wearing a hot pink suit, with a neon blue bowtie, on top of a regular black tie. Yeah. Two ties.
Anyways, he must’ve realized that we were also high off our asses, because as we took a seat at the bar he came right over to us, wearing that ‘I just farted’ grin and chatted us up.
“Hey man! You two having a good time tonight?”
“Fuck yeah we are!” Ray replied, “Fucking love your getup, man!”
“Aww hell yeah, brother!”
​
The Glitter Man went in for a high five and Ray reciprocated.
“You having a party?” He asked.
“Yeah, just closed a fuckin BIG ASS client. Fuck yeah, we’re having a party!”
“Oh man, then I’ve got just the thing for you! Check this shit out.”
​
Glitter Man reached into his suit jacket and took out a gunmetal gray cigarette case. He opened it, showing us a collection of small neon blue pills inside.
“These right here? These are gonna kick your night up a whole other notch,” He promised. “You want in?”
​
Ray stared down at the pills, and I could see his eyes widening like a kid who'd just walked into a candy shop.
“Fuck yeah, I want in!” He said with barely a moment of hesitation, and that is when I stepped in.
“Wait up, the fuck are these?” I asked. “Molly?”
​
“Nah, man. It’s a new thing. Been calling it Blue Lagoon. Trust me, this is the shit! One pill… and you’re never gonna forget tonight. I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds.”
“How much?” Ray asked.
“Tell you what, man. I’ll hook you both up for ten bucks a pop!”
​
Ray started reaching for his wallet, but I stopped him.
“Dude, we don’t even know what this shit is!” I said.
“C’mon, loosen your asshole and live a little, Geoff!” Ray replied, pulling away from me. “Sorry about my friend, man. He just needs a few more drinks.”
“Hey, no worries!”
​
Ray handed over twenty bucks and Glitter Man dropped two pills into his hand, before taking off.
“See you around!” He said, and that was it.
“You in this with me?” Ray asked, offering me one of the pills.
​
I didn’t answer, so he started making a ticking clock noise.
“Times almost up…” He sang, “You gonna get the stick out of your ass and party like a man, or are you gonna pussy out?”
​
I took the pill, sighed and put it in my mouth.
“ATTA FUCKIN’ BOY!” Ray cried and slapped me on the back, before taking his own pill. “Thought for sure you were gonna go all fuckin’ soft on me!” He teased, “Go full Mr. Mackey from South Park. ‘Drugs are bad, M’kay!’” He laughed at his own bad impression of the show.
​
He turned back to the bar, reaching into his pocket for a pack of cigarettes.
“Hey, my buddy and I are gonna have two dry martinis!” He said, “Dirty as you can fuckin’ make them!”
​
He popped one of the cigarettes into his mouth, and that was around the time I noticed that the world around me seemed… off…
​
I blinked slowly, looking around at the people in the bar. I could’ve sworn that I saw flowers blooming on their skin, but it was hard to get a look at them. They only ever seemed to be there when I wasn’t looking directly at them. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something moving behind the dance floor. Some tall, wandering shadow although I couldn’t get a good look at it either. I think that it might have looked at me, with eyes on stalks like some kind of slug. But I couldn’t be sure. It disappeared completely when I tried to look at it head on.
​
I looked over at the bartender, a relatively plain looking brunette. She glanced at me briefly as she shook our martinis, and I swore that I could see flowers growing out of her hair, wreathing her head in vibrant colors that were impossible to really describe.
​
I looked over at Ray, and he was staring at her too. I’m not sure what he was seeing, but whatever it was, it had to be beautiful! The man beside me had roses growing out of his eyes and whenever he laughed, I heard a chorus of angels singing. He was holding a giant chameleon that he kept petting, and it was looking at me.
“Think this is DMT?” It asked.
“Who the hell knows?” Said the man. His head was mostly flowers now.
​
Ray absentmindely handed me my martini, and I took a sip. It tasted like heaven. It tasted like a fresh donut, right out of the oven with the glaze still melty and warm. I wanted to cry from just how beautiful it was!
​
A hazy mist swirled around me, lifting me up to new levels of paradise. As Ray and I went to the dance floor to join the party, I felt at one with the universe.
​
A beautiful girl with flawless dark skin danced with me, as we danced I realized that my place in the cosmos was here! Right here!
​
And then I saw it, really, truly saw it. The grand tapestry of all things. It was right there in her eyes. Right there for me to see. An expanse of events, all seemingly unconnected save for the fact that they contributed to some great, glorious final outcome. A perfect future for all mankind, for all that existed beyond mankind. Hundreds of lives, thousands, millions, billions… perhaps even an infinite amount, all moving parts in an enormous machine, working toward the completion of a single function. Pawns in a grand game whose outcome had been determined outside of time. Every little piece would in it’s own way, fall into place exactly when it needed to, at the moment it needed to, each one carefully guided by a grand design, that operated exclusively through others. An outside force, that pushed them to trigger the events that would lead to the favorable outcome, and arguably, the only outcome, but there really was no big picture to be seen. The end result was something far less finite. It was a state of being. A higher state. A type of perfection that went beyond perfection. Oh, the knowledge of it burned so bright in my skull!
​
I hugged the girl that I was dancing with and we kissed. She told me that she was proud of me before promptly dissolving into a cloud of butterflies, and as I watched them fly away I laughed, knowing that they too were part of the fabric of the universe! I admired the crowd dancing around me, basking in their radiance. They seemed to go on forever and I could see every aspect of their lives in each of them. Their hopes, their dreams, their aspirations. I loved each of them, and looked into each of their souls, looking at what the greatest possible version of them might be.
​
From the corner of my eye, I saw a shadow. The same one from before, possibly? I looked at it, watching as it surveyed the crowd. Despite its darkness, I could see its shiny white teeth and beady eyes. The eyes shifted to me for a moment where they lingered, but the shadow didn’t move.
​
Water flowed around me, distracting me from the shadow again. Fish swam past me, daring me to chase them and I obliged. They promised to take me to a mermaid and teach me how to live in the sea with them. Then I promptly threw up all over some poor girl who was just trying to dance, and after I apologized to her, I tried to explain to the fish that I just needed to sit down for a moment, but by then they’d already turned into seagulls and were just casually shitting on the dude they were sitting on.
​
I stumbled over to one of the booths and collapsed into it, trying to catch my breath.
“Would you like some cheese, sir.” Asked the sentient platter of cheese on the table underneath me.
“My name is Brie!” Said the brie.
​
I stared down at the platter, before picking up a cube of cheddar and trying to eat it. For some reason it tasted like a napkin. This was because it was actually a napkin.
​
My skin felt cold, my hands were shaking a little. The music was way too loud and my mouth was dry.
​
I looked up.
​
There were no fantastical creatures around. No fish, no seagulls, no flowers, no talking cheese. Just a normal nightclub.
​
My head was kind of throbbing.
​
I took out my phone to look at it. It’d been about an hour since Ray and I had gotten our martinis. Had time really passed that quickly?
​
Speaking of which, where was Ray?
​
I looked around for him, before finding him still on the dance floor, dancing like a goddamn maniac. He didn’t seem to be coming down the way that I was. Maybe I’d puked some of the drug up when I’d vomited and it had cut my trip short?
​
Speaking of which, what the hell was that? DMT or something? I was pretty sure that I’d just hallucinated everything that had just happened. Those had to be hallucinations, right?
​
I shook my head, before trying to ground myself in the moment. I still felt dizzy and weak. I ended up going to the bar to just get some water before finding another seat where I could rest for a while while Ray partied his little heart out… and after another hour, I started thinking that maybe something was wrong with him.
​
I noticed that he only seemed to take a break once, and when he did, it was only to head to the bar to get another hard drink. While he was there, I noticed him slipping a familiar gunmetal gray cigarette case out of his pocket. He downed some pills from inside and chased them with a generous sip of whatever he’d gotten. Then, swaying like an idiot he put the cigarette case back in his pocket and lumbered back to the party.
​
That idiot.
​
He must’ve bought the whole fucking case off of that weird guy we’d seen earlier! It was one thing to try some weird new drug like a dumbass, but this? This was insane!
​
I considered going up to him to ask him just what the hell he’d been thinking, but given how out of it he probably was, I knew there wouldn’t be much point to it.
​
So I resolved to just watch him, and make sure he got home safely like a responsible friend/co-worker. I didn’t really want a repeat of the Vancouver Incident where I’d had to drag him crying like a baby out of a convenience store at 4 AM because they were out of gummy bears. (He’d promised me that it would never happen again and up until now I’d held him to that.)
​
I guess if nothing else, Ray didn’t seem to be violent or anything while he was high. The bouncers in this place looked pretty tough, and I really didn’t want to have to watch them beat the crap out of him. And it wasn’t until around 2 AM when the party was dying down that I started to notice Ray acting strange. Well… strange compared to the way he’d been acting for most of the night.
​
He’d seemed more unstable on his feet and seemed less interested in dancing now. He kept looking around frantically, and I saw him take out the cigarette case to look for more pills.
​
I figured that this was probably the time to get up and stop him.
“Hey, hey… relax, man,” I said, coming up to him and stopping him from taking more of those pills. “Take it easy, alright?”
​
He looked over at me with wide, bloodshot eyes as I spoke to him.
“Geoff?” He asked in a small voice.
“Yeah, it’s me. Put the pills down. How many of those have you had?”
​
I took the case from him and looked inside, only to feel my stomach sink a little when I realized that it was empty.
​
It suddenly occurred to me that I probably should have been watching him closer, to make sure he didn’t take all of the goddamn mystery pills, and I quietly kicked myself for not thinking about that sooner!
“Well shit… you feeling okay, bud?” I asked.
“Fraid…” He slurred, “Universe is… wrong…”
​
His eyes suddenly widened, filled with a horror that I’m not sure I could properly describe.
“THERE!”
​
He pointed at something over my shoulder and I looked.
Behind me, sat the unknowable terror that lurks in all places where something ceases to exist and only absence remains… absolutely fucking nothing.
​
“Maybe we need to get you to a hospital…” I murmured.
“No hospital! N-no hospital!” He said, “Please… Geoff… j-just get me somewhere safe! Please!”
​
Yeah, I was definitely getting him to a hospital. I’d already made enough dumb decisions for the night. I didn’t really feel up to making one more.
“Alright, let’s get you someplace safe,” I said with a sigh. I took out my phone to call us a cab. “C’mon, Ray.”
​
He grabbed at me like a scared child as I led him out of the club, jumping at every shadow that we saw on the way out.
​
***
​
“So what exactly did he take?” The nurse asked me. She had a sort of deadpan, matter of fact tone and barely even looked at me, while Ray screamed bloody murder in the next room. I gotta say, I wasn’t exactly beaming with pride as I confessed to the nurse that Ray and I had partied in defiance of every 1980s anti-drug PSA we’d grown up with. But it needed to be done.
​
“I think the guy called it Blue Lagoon,” I said. “I don’t know how many he had, but it was a lot.”
“Blue Lagoon?” The nurse asked, “That’s a new one.”
“Yeah I’ve never heard of it either. I took one of the pills too,” I said. “I was seeing shit for about an hour before I came down. Like, mermaids, talking cheese, flowers… that kinda stuff.”
“So it’s a hallucinogen?” She asked.
“Yeah, I’ve never done DMT but I was thinking it might be similar to that? I don’t know.”
“We’ll take some bloodwork shortly, see if we can’t figure out some more,” She said before leaving me.
​
I quietly went back to Ray’s room, and watched as he fought against the restraints that bound him to the bed.
His face was bright red from all the screaming and he was sobbing like a little kid as he struggled.
“IT’S COMING! IT’S COMING FOR ME!”
​
I didn’t bother trying to talk to him. He was still pretty out of it, and he’d been screaming about something coming for him.
“GEOFF!” He sobbed, looking at me. I saw him trying to reach for my hand, “Don’t… don’t leave.. Don’t let him take me, Geoff… please… you gotta let me out of here, YOU GOTTA LET ME RUN!”
“Relax, you’re gonna be okay,” I promised. “I’m gonna stay right here with you.”
The words didn’t seem to do much for him. He just kept fighting and sobbing.
​
At around 4 in the morning, I finally slept. It was in a chair in one of the waiting rooms, since Ray was still screaming too loud for me to sleep in his room, but I slept. I figured that when I woke up, Ray would have sobered up a bit and we could both go home.
​
I was wrong.
​
When I woke up, there was a police officer standing over me, gently shaking my shoulder. My first thought was that the nurse we’d talked to had reported us for taking drugs (which I thought they weren’t supposed to do!) but no.
​
He just wanted to ask me a few questions about Ray.
​
My memories of talking to the police are hazy. I don’t entirely remember how the conversation went, but I knew that they’d asked me about where we’d been that night. They asked me if Ray had gotten into any fights, or if I knew anyone who might want to kill him. It wasn’t until around halfway through the conversation that I figured out that Ray was dead.
​
I never saw the body. It was covered when they wheeled it out of the room.
​
But I saw the blood.
​
Good God… all that fucking blood… more than I thought could fit in a person.
​
From what I heard, none of the nurses saw what happened. At some point, the screaming had just stopped and when they’d come in to check his vitals again, they were greeted by the gory mess that used to be Ray.
​
After the police talked to me, I didn’t hear a lot about the investigation into Ray’s death. To my knowledge, they never identified any suspects. Hell, I don’t even think they’re entirely sure about what killed him. I heard somebody say it could have been some kind of animal attack, but I think that got shot down pretty quickly, since where the fuck would the animal have come from?
​
The police cleared me as a suspect in the case pretty quickly, since I’d been asleep when it had happened and there were plenty of witnesses who could confirm I was in the waiting room, passed out.
​
I imagine that they talked to some people at the nightclub we’d been at too, but I don’t think anything ever came of that. I’d been watching Ray for most of the night. He’d been dancing and having a good time. The only time I hadn’t been keeping an eye on him was when I was hallucinating, and I highly doubt he picked a fight with someone who’d be willing to break into a hospital to murder him during the hour that I was indisposed! There was literally no logical reason he should have died the way he did! There wasn’t a single person I could possibly think of who could have killed him!
​
Person being the operative word here.
​
Before he died, Ray had been screaming about something coming for him. My memories of the hallucinations I had after I took that pill are a little hazy, but I remember the shadowy thing I glimpsed among the crowd a few times.
​
I remember the pitch that the guy who’d sold us the pills had made:
‘I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds!’
​
Call me crazy… but I’m wondering just how true that pitch was. Maybe not everything we saw after taking those pills was a hallucination. Maybe they let us see something… touch something… and they let that something touch us right back.
​
I don’t know for sure. But that’s the closest thing to an answer that I’ve got. Either way, I’ve been sober ever since that night and I think I’m going to stay that way.

Ok so after graduating high school I unfortunately didn’t have the option of staying on my parents health care plan when I turned 18 unfortunately. So I got a small deductible plan with a premium of $250. I kept it for one year before I realized that I had another option.
My cousin who didn’t have insurance claimed he was able to negotiate down his hospital bill over 50% when he had his appendix taken out. I don’t remember the total he paid.
After thinking about how much I spent on insurance, copays, etc, I decided to cancel my insurance and instead invest the money into the stock market that I would have paid the premium on(note: I already had set up a Roth IRA and another unrelated investment account when I turned 18 as my father encouraged me to). I figure I’m young and healthy so I’ll take the gamble.
I also thought: What medical expenses could I even incur? Car insurance covers medical in a crash if other driver doesn’t have insurance then sue, I’m at work most of the time so if I get injured there then my employer will have to pay for it. I did play golf a lot so maybe an injury from that could have happened. Still it all just seemed unlikely to me that something would happen. I trusted my body and my judgement.
Long story short I’m currently 29 and the only doctor related things That I’ve done are yearly checkups out of pocket(that I negotiate with the financial office afterward it’s usually very easy to do) and I have more than enough to cover just about any surprise medical expense that could ever happen inside of that investment account. I figure if I get cancer or something with recurring doctor visits then I’ll just end up getting insurance.
If you want to know more about my life: I’ve worked since I was 13 started with cutting lawns then later into the restaurant industry. Out of high school I’ve always worked two restaurant jobs until I moved to nyc last year(big change from the suburbs down south. I mostly moved here to meet chicks). I never went to college because I was scared of debt(maybe not the smartest move idk). I left my parents house at age 19. I don’t really drink alcohol often(despite being a bartender for so long lol) and never done drugs. I’m a real estate agent in Manhattan now and it’s still weird not working physically anymore.

That’s all really. I made it 19 days up until the beginning of last month when I decided to drink on a whim. What a shitty whim.
I’m not at rock bottom per se, but I thoroughly remember how shitty of a habit this is, and yet I can’t stop. I keep going through a handle every weekend and stealing small amounts from the family liquor cabinet just to hold me over till I can make it to the liquor store.
I’m fat. I feel like shit. I don’t feel nearly as clearheaded as I did a month ago, and yet I keep doing this to myself. Sometimes I’m very convinced that this is just practice for when I eventually kill myself because that’s what it really feels like.
I need to stop. I’m sorry for this nonsensical ramble. I’ll probably delete it later. I just had to get it out there.

I knew that Ray liked to party, but this was a little too much. He was on the dance floor with a spaced out look in his eye, dancing like he’d just stepped out of some 1980s music video. The people around him didn’t seem all that put off, but they were probably almost as high as he was.
​
Almost, being the operative word in that sentence.
​
Look, I get it. I like to party too from time to time. But you gotta be smart about it. You gotta know where your limit is, and I don’t think that Ray knew his limit.
​
***
​
I’d never actually been to this part of town before, but hey, there’s a first time for everything, right? Ray and I had just closed the deal of our careers and figured a little celebration was in order. I’d initially figured we’d just have a few drinks and maybe get laid. But when he broke out the molly, I wasn’t going to say no and the next hour or so after that was fucking killer.
​
Then we’d ran into that dude at the bar.
​
This guy was… well, he looked like he was on drugs, not like he sold them. He had messy hair, a grin that said: ‘I just farted!’ and I’m pretty sure he was covered in glitter. He was wearing a hot pink suit, with a neon blue bowtie, on top of a regular black tie. Yeah. Two ties.
Anyways, he must’ve realized that we were also high off our asses, because as we took a seat at the bar he came right over to us, wearing that ‘I just farted’ grin and chatted us up.
“Hey man! You two having a good time tonight?”
“Fuck yeah we are!” Ray replied, “Fucking love your getup, man!”
“Aww hell yeah, brother!”
​
The Glitter Man went in for a high five and Ray reciprocated.
“You having a party?” He asked.
“Yeah, just closed a fuckin BIG ASS client. Fuck yeah, we’re having a party!”
“Oh man, then I’ve got just the thing for you! Check this shit out.”
​
Glitter Man reached into his suit jacket and took out a gunmetal gray cigarette case. He opened it, showing us a collection of small neon blue pills inside.
“These right here? These are gonna kick your night up a whole other notch,” He promised. “You want in?”
​
Ray stared down at the pills, and I could see his eyes widening like a kid who'd just walked into a candy shop.
“Fuck yeah, I want in!” He said with barely a moment of hesitation, and that is when I stepped in.
“Wait up, the fuck are these?” I asked. “Molly?”
​
“Nah, man. It’s a new thing. Been calling it Blue Lagoon. Trust me, this is the shit! One pill… and you’re never gonna forget tonight. I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds.”
“How much?” Ray asked.
“Tell you what, man. I’ll hook you both up for ten bucks a pop!”
​
Ray started reaching for his wallet, but I stopped him.
“Dude, we don’t even know what this shit is!” I said.
“C’mon, loosen your asshole and live a little, Geoff!” Ray replied, pulling away from me. “Sorry about my friend, man. He just needs a few more drinks.”
“Hey, no worries!”
​
Ray handed over twenty bucks and Glitter Man dropped two pills into his hand, before taking off.
“See you around!” He said, and that was it.
“You in this with me?” Ray asked, offering me one of the pills.
​
I didn’t answer, so he started making a ticking clock noise.
“Times almost up…” He sang, “You gonna get the stick out of your ass and party like a man, or are you gonna pussy out?”
​
I took the pill, sighed and put it in my mouth.
“ATTA FUCKIN’ BOY!” Ray cried and slapped me on the back, before taking his own pill. “Thought for sure you were gonna go all fuckin’ soft on me!” He teased, “Go full Mr. Mackey from South Park. ‘Drugs are bad, M’kay!’” He laughed at his own bad impression of the show.
​
He turned back to the bar, reaching into his pocket for a pack of cigarettes.
“Hey, my buddy and I are gonna have two dry martinis!” He said, “Dirty as you can fuckin’ make them!”
​
He popped one of the cigarettes into his mouth, and that was around the time I noticed that the world around me seemed… off…
​
I blinked slowly, looking around at the people in the bar. I could’ve sworn that I saw flowers blooming on their skin, but it was hard to get a look at them. They only ever seemed to be there when I wasn’t looking directly at them. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw something moving behind the dance floor. Some tall, wandering shadow although I couldn’t get a good look at it either. I think that it might have looked at me, with eyes on stalks like some kind of slug. But I couldn’t be sure. It disappeared completely when I tried to look at it head on.
​
I looked over at the bartender, a relatively plain looking brunette. She glanced at me briefly as she shook our martinis, and I swore that I could see flowers growing out of her hair, wreathing her head in vibrant colors that were impossible to really describe.
​
I looked over at Ray, and he was staring at her too. I’m not sure what he was seeing, but whatever it was, it had to be beautiful! The man beside me had roses growing out of his eyes and whenever he laughed, I heard a chorus of angels singing. He was holding a giant chameleon that he kept petting, and it was looking at me.
“Think this is DMT?” It asked.
“Who the hell knows?” Said the man. His head was mostly flowers now.
​
Ray absentmindely handed me my martini, and I took a sip. It tasted like heaven. It tasted like a fresh donut, right out of the oven with the glaze still melty and warm. I wanted to cry from just how beautiful it was!
​
A hazy mist swirled around me, lifting me up to new levels of paradise. As Ray and I went to the dance floor to join the party, I felt at one with the universe.
​
A beautiful girl with flawless dark skin danced with me, as we danced I realized that my place in the cosmos was here! Right here!
​
And then I saw it, really, truly saw it. The grand tapestry of all things. It was right there in her eyes. Right there for me to see. An expanse of events, all seemingly unconnected save for the fact that they contributed to some great, glorious final outcome. A perfect future for all mankind, for all that existed beyond mankind. Hundreds of lives, thousands, millions, billions… perhaps even an infinite amount, all moving parts in an enormous machine, working toward the completion of a single function. Pawns in a grand game whose outcome had been determined outside of time. Every little piece would in it’s own way, fall into place exactly when it needed to, at the moment it needed to, each one carefully guided by a grand design, that operated exclusively through others. An outside force, that pushed them to trigger the events that would lead to the favorable outcome, and arguably, the only outcome, but there really was no big picture to be seen. The end result was something far less finite. It was a state of being. A higher state. A type of perfection that went beyond perfection. Oh, the knowledge of it burned so bright in my skull!
​
I hugged the girl that I was dancing with and we kissed. She told me that she was proud of me before promptly dissolving into a cloud of butterflies, and as I watched them fly away I laughed, knowing that they too were part of the fabric of the universe! I admired the crowd dancing around me, basking in their radiance. They seemed to go on forever and I could see every aspect of their lives in each of them. Their hopes, their dreams, their aspirations. I loved each of them, and looked into each of their souls, looking at what the greatest possible version of them might be.
​
From the corner of my eye, I saw a shadow. The same one from before, possibly? I looked at it, watching as it surveyed the crowd. Despite its darkness, I could see its shiny white teeth and beady eyes. The eyes shifted to me for a moment where they lingered, but the shadow didn’t move.
​
Water flowed around me, distracting me from the shadow again. Fish swam past me, daring me to chase them and I obliged. They promised to take me to a mermaid and teach me how to live in the sea with them. Then I promptly threw up all over some poor girl who was just trying to dance, and after I apologized to her, I tried to explain to the fish that I just needed to sit down for a moment, but by then they’d already turned into seagulls and were just casually shitting on the dude they were sitting on.
​
I stumbled over to one of the booths and collapsed into it, trying to catch my breath.
“Would you like some cheese, sir.” Asked the sentient platter of cheese on the table underneath me.
“My name is Brie!” Said the brie.
​
I stared down at the platter, before picking up a cube of cheddar and trying to eat it. For some reason it tasted like a napkin. This was because it was actually a napkin.
​
My skin felt cold, my hands were shaking a little. The music was way too loud and my mouth was dry.
​
I looked up.
​
There were no fantastical creatures around. No fish, no seagulls, no flowers, no talking cheese. Just a normal nightclub.
​
My head was kind of throbbing.
​
I took out my phone to look at it. It’d been about an hour since Ray and I had gotten our martinis. Had time really passed that quickly?
​
Speaking of which, where was Ray?
​
I looked around for him, before finding him still on the dance floor, dancing like a goddamn maniac. He didn’t seem to be coming down the way that I was. Maybe I’d puked some of the drug up when I’d vomited and it had cut my trip short?
​
Speaking of which, what the hell was that? DMT or something? I was pretty sure that I’d just hallucinated everything that had just happened. Those had to be hallucinations, right?
​
I shook my head, before trying to ground myself in the moment. I still felt dizzy and weak. I ended up going to the bar to just get some water before finding another seat where I could rest for a while while Ray partied his little heart out… and after another hour, I started thinking that maybe something was wrong with him.
​
I noticed that he only seemed to take a break once, and when he did, it was only to head to the bar to get another hard drink. While he was there, I noticed him slipping a familiar gunmetal gray cigarette case out of his pocket. He downed some pills from inside and chased them with a generous sip of whatever he’d gotten. Then, swaying like an idiot he put the cigarette case back in his pocket and lumbered back to the party.
​
That idiot.
​
He must’ve bought the whole fucking case off of that weird guy we’d seen earlier! It was one thing to try some weird new drug like a dumbass, but this? This was insane!
​
I considered going up to him to ask him just what the hell he’d been thinking, but given how out of it he probably was, I knew there wouldn’t be much point to it.
​
So I resolved to just watch him, and make sure he got home safely like a responsible friend/co-worker. I didn’t really want a repeat of the Vancouver Incident where I’d had to drag him crying like a baby out of a convenience store at 4 AM because they were out of gummy bears. (He’d promised me that it would never happen again and up until now I’d held him to that.)
​
I guess if nothing else, Ray didn’t seem to be violent or anything while he was high. The bouncers in this place looked pretty tough, and I really didn’t want to have to watch them beat the crap out of him. And it wasn’t until around 2 AM when the party was dying down that I started to notice Ray acting strange. Well… strange compared to the way he’d been acting for most of the night.
​
He’d seemed more unstable on his feet and seemed less interested in dancing now. He kept looking around frantically, and I saw him take out the cigarette case to look for more pills.
​
I figured that this was probably the time to get up and stop him.
“Hey, hey… relax, man,” I said, coming up to him and stopping him from taking more of those pills. “Take it easy, alright?”
​
He looked over at me with wide, bloodshot eyes as I spoke to him.
“Geoff?” He asked in a small voice.
“Yeah, it’s me. Put the pills down. How many of those have you had?”
​
I took the case from him and looked inside, only to feel my stomach sink a little when I realized that it was empty.
​
It suddenly occurred to me that I probably should have been watching him closer, to make sure he didn’t take all of the goddamn mystery pills, and I quietly kicked myself for not thinking about that sooner!
“Well shit… you feeling okay, bud?” I asked.
“Fraid…” He slurred, “Universe is… wrong…”
​
His eyes suddenly widened, filled with a horror that I’m not sure I could properly describe.
“THERE!”
​
He pointed at something over my shoulder and I looked.
Behind me, sat the unknowable terror that lurks in all places where something ceases to exist and only absence remains… absolutely fucking nothing.
​
“Maybe we need to get you to a hospital…” I murmured.
“No hospital! N-no hospital!” He said, “Please… Geoff… j-just get me somewhere safe! Please!”
​
Yeah, I was definitely getting him to a hospital. I’d already made enough dumb decisions for the night. I didn’t really feel up to making one more.
“Alright, let’s get you someplace safe,” I said with a sigh. I took out my phone to call us a cab. “C’mon, Ray.”
​
He grabbed at me like a scared child as I led him out of the club, jumping at every shadow that we saw on the way out.
​
***
​
“So what exactly did he take?” The nurse asked me. She had a sort of deadpan, matter of fact tone and barely even looked at me, while Ray screamed bloody murder in the next room. I gotta say, I wasn’t exactly beaming with pride as I confessed to the nurse that Ray and I had partied in defiance of every 1980s anti-drug PSA we’d grown up with. But it needed to be done.
​
“I think the guy called it Blue Lagoon,” I said. “I don’t know how many he had, but it was a lot.”
“Blue Lagoon?” The nurse asked, “That’s a new one.”
“Yeah I’ve never heard of it either. I took one of the pills too,” I said. “I was seeing shit for about an hour before I came down. Like, mermaids, talking cheese, flowers… that kinda stuff.”
“So it’s a hallucinogen?” She asked.
“Yeah, I’ve never done DMT but I was thinking it might be similar to that? I don’t know.”
“We’ll take some bloodwork shortly, see if we can’t figure out some more,” She said before leaving me.
​
I quietly went back to Ray’s room, and watched as he fought against the restraints that bound him to the bed.
His face was bright red from all the screaming and he was sobbing like a little kid as he struggled.
“IT’S COMING! IT’S COMING FOR ME!”
​
I didn’t bother trying to talk to him. He was still pretty out of it, and he’d been screaming about something coming for him.
“GEOFF!” He sobbed, looking at me. I saw him trying to reach for my hand, “Don’t… don’t leave.. Don’t let him take me, Geoff… please… you gotta let me out of here, YOU GOTTA LET ME RUN!”
“Relax, you’re gonna be okay,” I promised. “I’m gonna stay right here with you.”
The words didn’t seem to do much for him. He just kept fighting and sobbing.
​
At around 4 in the morning, I finally slept. It was in a chair in one of the waiting rooms, since Ray was still screaming too loud for me to sleep in his room, but I slept. I figured that when I woke up, Ray would have sobered up a bit and we could both go home.
​
I was wrong.
​
When I woke up, there was a police officer standing over me, gently shaking my shoulder. My first thought was that the nurse we’d talked to had reported us for taking drugs (which I thought they weren’t supposed to do!) but no.
​
He just wanted to ask me a few questions about Ray.
​
My memories of talking to the police are hazy. I don’t entirely remember how the conversation went, but I knew that they’d asked me about where we’d been that night. They asked me if Ray had gotten into any fights, or if I knew anyone who might want to kill him. It wasn’t until around halfway through the conversation that I figured out that Ray was dead.
​
I never saw the body. It was covered when they wheeled it out of the room.
​
But I saw the blood.
​
Good God… all that fucking blood… more than I thought could fit in a person.
​
From what I heard, none of the nurses saw what happened. At some point, the screaming had just stopped and when they’d come in to check his vitals again, they were greeted by the gory mess that used to be Ray.
​
After the police talked to me, I didn’t hear a lot about the investigation into Ray’s death. To my knowledge, they never identified any suspects. Hell, I don’t even think they’re entirely sure about what killed him. I heard somebody say it could have been some kind of animal attack, but I think that got shot down pretty quickly, since where the fuck would the animal have come from?
​
The police cleared me as a suspect in the case pretty quickly, since I’d been asleep when it had happened and there were plenty of witnesses who could confirm I was in the waiting room, passed out.
​
I imagine that they talked to some people at the nightclub we’d been at too, but I don’t think anything ever came of that. I’d been watching Ray for most of the night. He’d been dancing and having a good time. The only time I hadn’t been keeping an eye on him was when I was hallucinating, and I highly doubt he picked a fight with someone who’d be willing to break into a hospital to murder him during the hour that I was indisposed! There was literally no logical reason he should have died the way he did! There wasn’t a single person I could possibly think of who could have killed him!
​
Person being the operative word here.
​
Before he died, Ray had been screaming about something coming for him. My memories of the hallucinations I had after I took that pill are a little hazy, but I remember the shadowy thing I glimpsed among the crowd a few times.
​
I remember the pitch that the guy who’d sold us the pills had made:
‘I got a buddy who swears this shit lets him see into other worlds!’
​
Call me crazy… but I’m wondering just how true that pitch was. Maybe not everything we saw after taking those pills was a hallucination. Maybe they let us see something… touch something… and they let that something touch us right back.
​
I don’t know for sure. But that’s the closest thing to an answer that I’ve got. Either way, I’ve been sober ever since that night and I think I’m going to stay that way.

Pictures Show everything that is included with the knife. Every knife has a video.
Yolo takes priority over anything. I'm willing to listen to offers! I am also looking to sell all my knives, not to trade them. I'm hoping to get these all sold!
I'll have these knives shipped out USPS Priority Mail to where they need to go (USA).
Let me know if you have any questions!
Thanks!
Timestamp
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Gavko Thresher

• Specs: S35VN Blade, Titanium Handle (Aqua), 3.6” Blade Length
• Condition: I bought this knife as a collection piece and ended up carrying it once. This knife has never cut, never been sharpened, blade is perfectly centered, 0 blade play. There are a few EXTREMELY small scratches on the scales- I had to use a flashlight to see them and even then I couldn’t tell if it was the finish or a scratch.
• SV: 105

Protech GodFather

• Specs: Maple Burl Inlays, DLC Black Blade, Plain Edge, 154CM Blade Steel, 4” Blade Length
• Condition: This knife has never been used, sharpened, or carried- just collected. The blade snaps out extremely fast. The knife’s DLC has 0 chips or imperfections. On the clip side, the maple burl inlay has a few small marks/scuffs (shown in the video) one is under the clip and two are near the end of the knife. The blade leans a hair towards the show side. There is a VERY small amount of blade play. The knife still feels extremely solid in hand.
• SV:115

Lynch North West Chris Reeve Knives Deep Carry Clip - Model 1

• Specs: This pocket clip is still sealed in the plastic bag it came in. This pocket clip comes with everything- all documents, stickers, pocket clip, etc (see picture). This pocket clip comes with the fade anodization.
• SV: 65

Soque River Knives Lev-R-Lok

• Spec: This knife is from the 80’s made by Soque River Knives (Camillus). Lockback, Stainless Steel Blade.
• Condition: This knife is in great condition for its age. This knife has never been used or carried. There are scratches throughout the blade and on the lock. There is blade play from all directions (still feels pretty solid though). Blade leans towards show side.
• SV:45

CRKT P.E.C.K 10th Anniversary

• Specs: Rainbow Finish, 1.63” Cutting Edge, 2.63” Closed
• Condition: This knife has never been used to cut with, carried, or sharpened. Just a little and not for me. The smallest scratches can be seen on the blade under close inspection with light.
• SV: 20

CRKT Hissatsu Folder

• Specs: Aus-8 Blade Steel
• Condition: Had this knife at about 10 years old. It’s been used and poorly sharpened (didn’t know what I was doing at that time, just loved the knife). There is quite a bit of wear throughout the blade and clip. Action is perfect though.
• SV: 15

CRKT Iraqi Freedom Desert Cruiser

• Specs: 3.75” Hollow Ground Blade, 9” Overall
• Condition: This knife is in perfect condition. Never been used, carried, or sharpened. Very smooth, perfect centering, minimal blade play (I would tighten the pivot but don’t have the bit ATM).
• SV: 30

CRKT Neck P.E.C.K

• Condition: Never used or carried, includes sheath and lanyard. Brand New Condition.
• SV: 15

CRKT Serengeti Hunter

• Condition: This knife is in excellent condition. I’ve never used this knife, carried it, or sharpened it. This knife has been sitting in my collection for a while. There are small scratches throughout the handles (there is a manual in the box that explains how small scratches are normal due to the fact that two small knives are within the knife’s handles. These small knives rub against the handles when taken out and put back in.
• SV: 20

CRKT M16

• Condition: Never used, carried, sharpened. There is lock stick and small blade play (haven’t tightened the pivot). This knife is in brand new condition.
• SV: 30

CRKT M21

• Condition: Brand New In Box- Never sharpened, carried, or used. Extremely smooth, 0 play, well centered. This knife is Brand New In Box.
• SV: 30

Benchmade Bali-Song AFO

• Condition: I’ve had this knife in my collection for a long time. The blade and pouch say Boli-Song, Clip has some small scratches throughout (see video). This knife is in Excellent Condition.
• SV: 110

Benchmade Stryker Auto Police Special 141/250

• Condition: Small amount of blade play, the only sign of wear is a very small white spot towards the pivot of the knife. Blade is centered and action is snappy. Blade steel is 154CMThis knife is Like New In Box.
• SV: 150

Benchmade 7500S Auto Tanto ½ Serrated

• Condition: Blade is centered and I can’t find any signs of wear. The blade has some play in all directions but the blade feels very sturdy in hand. This knife is Brand New In Box.
• SV: 110

Benchmade Tether Pre-Production 814/1000

• Condition:This knife has never been used, carried, or sharpened. This knife is Brand New In Box.
• SV: 75

Benchmade 9700 Auto - Emerson Design

• Condition: This knife is in perfect condition. There are no signs of wear anywhere other than the pocket clip. You can see scratches but nothing has scratched through the black coating. This knife has very very minor up and down play and is well centered for a chisel ground knife. This knife DOES NOT have a box. It does include the plastic pouch as well as the manual. Like New In Box without the Box.
• SV: 80

Microtech Scarab Executive D/E- 09/2012

• Condition: This knife is like new in box. The only sign of wear is on the button. Other than that, this knife has never been used, carried, or sharpened. Just used as a collection piece. The blade steel is S35VN
• SV: 535

Microtech QD Scarab S/E - 07/2004

• Condition: This knife is Brand New In Box. This knife comes with all paperwork and includes goodies, (see picture). This knife has never been used, cut with, or carried. I noticed the button/slide rattles when moved while blade is deployed, but that is how it came to me as I am the first owner (at end of video)
• SV: 535

Microtech Dragonfly 11/2002

• Condition: This knife has only ever been flipped. The only signs of wear are on the bottom where the latch is. This knife is in Like New In Box condition. Blade steel is 14-4CrMo. The outer sliding part of the box is missing (gone while moving). Everything else is included.SV: 275

Microtech Socom Elite Auto Signature Series Bronzed Spear Point - 12/2018

• Condition: This knife is Brand New In Box and has never been used. Perfectly centered as well. M390 Blade Steel.
• SV: 300

Microtech Socom Alpha Fixed Blade - 12/2016

• Condition: Brand New In Box. This knife has an Elmax Blade with Carbon Fiber Handles and Bronzed Hardware. DLC Blade.
• SV: 215

I was diagnosed with a stutter when I was in first grade. I was bullied and humiliated for going to my speech pathologist until I was promoted to middle school. Since then, I said I was never going to go back and if I do then I’m just an embarrassment and shameful.
However, now it has gotten to the point where it’s affecting my social communication, my pronunciation, my thought process, and words get stuck in my throat.
I am reaching out for the first time in nearly 20 years for help again. I am worried that, as an adult, that there’s not much help I can get through speech therapy again. I am looking for some reassurance that my stutter CAN BE improved even at this moment.
Can any SLP provide some insight for me and what to expect?

I posted a video of me playing the piano a couple of days ago. I'm new on reddit and I'm a 22 year old pianist that it's just trying to show my love for classical music. A lot of people complemented me and gave me a lot of good criticism and advices so I could do better and I loved that, however, two users made my life a living hell saying I was shit and I couldn't do anything and that I was an awful teacher if I was teaching kids playing like this.
Before you start insulting a teenager think about your kids if you have any, think about your sister, your mom. I don't understand what people gain from being so rude and horrible to others, why you have to make someone feel so bad about their passion when I'm just trying to show the people what I love? What shocked me the most is that this two individuals were professors and I could just imagine how miserable their students must feel if they talk like this to a teenager. It's horrible for me how someone can hate so much behind a screen, but then I think... they are hating because they aren't happy with themselves, because when they put that screen down, they are nothing. No one to be heard. Im really happy with how I play and what I have achieved as s teacher with only 22 years old. I have recognition by many companies and a lot of people know who I am. Before you hate on someone just know that you have no idea what that person is going through, and you hating just reflects your own insecurities into them. Don't be an asshole, no one is perfect and that is why we are all in this community, it's really sad to see people that will even critic about my house when that is not even near the point. It's disgusting to see so much hate towards a teenager trying to spread the word, calling me a psycho and telling me that I'm a mentally Ill women just because I didn't do a dynamic right, you are disgusting. Playing with mental health is a really low ball and it shouldn't be played around like that. I blocked this person because it was clear that all they wanted was attention. If you want to see their comments go to my interestellar video I'm pretty sure they are still there. I'm a person that is really confident in herself but you never know when they target someone that is not.
Don't be an asshole.

I'm just looking for an active dog to take everywhere with me. I want him to be trainable, chill enough to hang out in a boat, active but also be relaxed when indoors. I want a toller, but I have yet to find a breeder that I can trust. Meanwhile, I've already found a few responsible breeders for the aussie. I'm aware that both require a great amount of exercise and mental simulation. Apart from the size, looks, and purpose, what is the actual difference in raising these breeds? Also, can anyone name any responsible breeders that are near Santa Cruz? Thanks.

My last quit in 2019 was lost because a "friend" of mine, deliberately went out and purchased several boxes of nicotine gum, and then presented the nicotine gum to me at a coffee shop, and offered it to me for free. I foolishly caved in and took it, 4 months of cold turkey down the drain. He was basically waving the nicotine in my face, convincing me to take it and relapse. I then started vaping again shortly after, jerk. I was not expecting such a thing to occur since I've never heard of such a situation happening to others.

​
1) will new seats get added to each round ?
2) what preference actually do ? consider I'm 580 if i apply for a college A as my 1st preference and College B as my 2nd and C as 3rd .if didnt got A or B in 1st round will get allotted on C on 1st round itself
3) Consider i got allotted in a college by MCC and i join in . can i still apply to state quota counselling and see if i get any college near me?
4) and consider i joined in COLLEGE B and i got admitted . If i got college A (which is better ) in next round can i cancel and join ?

Im still traumatized from the way I was beaten in high school. It was horrific and depressing. I’ve been trying to recover but really what I’ve been doing is just pushing it to the side.
The other day at my college grad, I saw the bully that use to give me problems 24/7. He’s basically done anything he wanted to me and got off free. I went to the hospital after one of the beatings he gave me as I almost went blind in my left high from how he punched my eye when I was already on the ground from him body slamming me. I was a skinny little kid when he was bullying me and he basically looked like the hulk at 15/16 (I’m convinced he was on roids he was just too big at that age even when I see old photos at my age now 25 I still get surprised how big he was).
He came up to me with a big smile congratulating me as he was graduating too. I started shaking and nearly vomited from all the PTSD he’s dumped on me. I didn’t really say anything but pretend I didn’t really acknowledge his presence. He addressed he was sorry back when he was 19 but I don’t believe his apology this was one too many apologies and he always used it as away to get back into my life to mess me up.
He looks healthy and looks like he has his life in order. I’m still battling everyday not trying to delete myself off this planet because I’m stuck in 2015. People keep saying karma this karma that but I don’t see now thing I’m angry I want to see him live a miserable life already or at least be abused or experience a tragic event that leaves him permanently damaged.
How can I recover

Im still traumatized from the way I was beaten in high school. It was horrific and depressing. I’ve been trying to recover but really what I’ve been doing is just pushing it to the side.
The other day at my college grad, I saw the bully that use to give me problems 24/7. He’s basically done anything he wanted to me and got off free. I went to the hospital after one of the beatings he gave me as I almost went blind in my left high from how he punched my eye when I was already on the ground from him body slamming me. I was a skinny little kid when he was bullying me and he basically looked like the hulk at 15/16 (I’m convinced he was on roids he was just too big at that age even when I see old photos at my age now 25 I still get surprised how big he was).
He came up to me with a big smile congratulating me as he was graduating too. I started shaking and nearly vomited from all the PTSD he’s dumped on me. I didn’t really say anything but pretend I didn’t really acknowledge his presence. He addressed he was sorry back when he was 19 but I don’t believe his apology this was one too many apologies and he always used it as away to get back into my life to mess me up.
He looks healthy and looks like he has his life in order. I’m still battling everyday not trying to delete myself off this planet because I’m stuck in 2015. People keep saying karma this karma that but I don’t see now thing I’m angry I want to see him live a miserable life already or at least be abused or experience a tragic event that leaves him permanently damaged.
How can I recover

i would say i am an introvert and i get socially anxious pretty easily. i am 19F and have never had much life experiences. i come from a very religious (muslim) household, and i am religious too. as a kid, my parents never trusted other people enough to let me go to their houses, i had only one birthday party and i went to only two birthday parties. as a teenager, my parents still didn't let me hang out with my friends, and at some point my friends gradually just stopped inviting me. when i got around 17 years old, i had probably been out with friends around 4 times, only to go shopping or to go watch a movie. now i go out more often, (maybe 2 times every month) but i have to ask permission first, and i can't stay out late. (after sunset) to cope, i made many internet friends, i play video games with them, text them, and call them on discord. but i still feel terribly alone. i have a best friend, which is an internet friend that lives in the same city as me. we see each other only a few times a year in real life but text everyday. i am grateful to have her. (i feel so bad that i can't be a normal best friend to her, that can be with her when she wants) from always only socializing online and rarely in real life, i think started to hide in my shell. meeting new people in real life and trying to make new friends literally make me panic. but i am okay with seeing my old friends (which don't even talk to me that much anymore since i never hang out with them) sometimes, i just turn off everything and don't talk to no one in real life. i go to school, avoid all my acquaintances the best i can, go home and only socialize online. i feel fucking pathetic, i am literally so lonely. i don't even take care of myself, if i don't have school, i just sleep too much or not enough, i lack on my hygiene in general, and i lock myself up in my room. i had an iron deficiency from not eating enough because of how stressed/depressed i was. and i also at some point gained around 10-15 kilos because of binge eating. in those moments, socializing is so exhausting and i feel like it's just best for me to stay locked up like this, i just feel comfortable in this mess. but sometimes, i just get terribly sad and depressed of how lonely i am, i realize that i do not have a solid friend group, i will have absolutely nothing to tell my kids and grandkids about the 19 years of my life. i start to get out of my bubble. i make enormous efforts to feel better, feel prettier, feel confident. i force myself to try and socialize, rebuild my friendship with old friends, try to approach them and try to plan some fun things to do. but still, my parents absolutely destroy that.
if i try to have a new style and buy new clothes, my parents will tell me how it's too flashy. not modest enough. not pretty at all in their opinion. they never ever compliment it. if i try to have new hobbies, they do not encourage me at all. they show absolutely no interests. they ignore me. if i try to tell them about how lonely i feel and how i do not have friends, and that i want to change it. they ignore my cries. ignore the times i literally cry all night, when i am in clear emotional distress. sometimes, everything is fine, i am still standing, and my mother just rants for hours how i am the worst child she could possible have, and that she doesn't know what she did wrong to god to have me. how can you say this to a child, and think they will be ok. i have heard those rants my entire life, it hurts.
recently, my old friends decided to organize a cookout and invited me. my parents let me because the friend lives a street away. (they never let me go to someone's house before) i was very hyped, those were the friends i wanted to rebuild a friendship with. i decided to prepare brownies and hamburger patties with halal meat for the muslim friends that will be there. my friend cleaned her barbecue, told the muslims they can cook the halal meat first so that it doesn't get mixed up with the pork or the other non halal meat. when my mother learnt that it would be a cookout with meat (no shit..) she immediately refused that i go. even if i explained that i would bring myself the halal meat, that there was absolutely no fucking way i would end up accidentally eating pork or non halal meat. that was just my last straw. all that might seem ridiculous and lame to some of you guys, you might just say wtf go live alone, just go without asking their permission, stuff like that. but i just can't, you can't understand how deep it is, i still love my parents (they are not as bad to me as you might think) and i do not want to sadden them by leaving or disobeying them. i know that there is a whole cultural and temporal barrier between my parents and i, but i want them to understand me, and i want to understand them. has anyone been in that situation? how did you get out?

Shit mate Ive met so many people this weekend it's fucking unreal, you guys are genuinely so amazing and the gizz culture over here in the states is better than it is back home in Australia by 10 fold. You were all such an incredible group of people to meet, but I need to give special shout outs to Echo, Streamus, Mystery Jack and ESPECIALLY my boy Boogieman Sam who I spent nearly my entire weekend with. It was a much more emotional goodbye than I thought it would be but to meet such an amazing and accepting group has absolutely made my entire USA trip. If you guys are ever in Sydney/Australia you fucken give me a text or something and I'll sort youse out, I know you guys did the same for me.
You guys are absolutely unreal, and I love every single one of you. Cheers, Luke