#Retirement Contributions

[davidl2001]

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[ifindtaxpro]

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[santaclaralocalnews]

Santa Clara’s budget continues to bleed red ink. The City faces deficits between $8 million and $15 million over the next ten years, an annual average of $11 million. Rather than one-time shortfalls, Santa Clara has a chronic mismatch — structural deficit — between general fund revenue where expenses are growing roughly 2 to 4 percent faster than revenues over the next 10 years. Read more at svvoice.com

[bubacorn]

[evanlybuck]

Tommy learns very quickly after their first time that Buck likes having sex. No. Normal people like having sex. Evan loves it and Tommy worries he might be an addict. He wants it all the time, multiple times in the day and in the night which was fine until it started affecting Tommy's ability to do his job. He's a pilot, he needs to be awake and alert to do his job and coffee can only do so much, after he's been up all night having sex.

Eventually Tommy decides, he has to relay his concerns to Buck. He can't go on like this.

"Evan, can we talk?"

He does it on a day where they're both off duty.

Of course this worries Buck. His boyfriend sounds serious and he used his name, not babe, love, sweetheart or any of their many nicknames for each other. Futhermore, any iteration of can we talk or we need to talk is never anything good.

But Buck puts on a brave face, "Yeah babe. What's up?" And listens intently to Tommy's next words.

Tommy takes both of Buck's hands in his and no doubt makes Buck think the worst. The small smile Tommy shoots his way does nothing to appease his fears.

"We've been having alot of sex and it's great - so great." Tommy starts.

Buck thinks about it for a second before agreeing, "Yeah we have."

"And I don't know how well I can keep up."

Buck chuckles. He's in disbelief but relieved that this is all Tommy wants to talk about. Buck then decides to humor his boyfriend.

"I think you've been keeping up pretty well, babe."

Tommy finally laughs. "I try but its starting to affect me at work."

"Oh? Oh!" Realization falls on Buck and he sees how serious Tommy is being. "I'm sorry babe." He gives Tommy' a peck on the lips. "Less sex. Got it."

"Well, at nights at least." Tommy stares at his lips and then places a hand on Buck's thigh, rubbing the area suggestively. "I don't mind making love to you as much as I can during the day and especially on our days off."

Buck similes. "Great. Take of your pants. I've been wanting to fuck you all morning." Ignoring the fact that they had sex less than 3hrs ago.

But it's their off day, so its fine.

[topnotchquark]

I need all of you to look at Vale's Misano 2020 helmet real quick.

Yep. That little blue pill is Viagra. With one pill already missing from the blister pack.

Apparently the "La Doppia" refers to the double header San Marino GP that took place due to the pandemic regulations, and also just a reference to "second rounds" I suppose. Aldo Drudi, Vale's long time collaborator and helmet designer said that the viagra was a reference to how he was an old man at 40 and would need some extra energy for the double race.

Apparently when Vale set the fastest lap during FP3 of the Misano GP, the commentators talked about how he was "riding hard".

Also because he's a cheeky little fuck he posted on his ig about how his Mugello 2021 helmet announcing Francesca's pregnancy with their daughter was a natural progression of the Misano 2020 Viagra helmet. It's stupid but who else would dare to do something like this.

[compacflt]

Would you ever consider writing about a different path Ice and Mav could take, one where they choose to leave the Navy and pursue a more open relationship and civilian life? Thinking it would be easier but maybe the sacrifice to their careers brings its own challenges?

(hi, jan 2024 me here, this was an ask that I answered when it was sent in in May 2023 & didn't post because I felt I actually answered it fictionally in the "icedad" one-shot the week after [and you can obviously see how these thoughts affected the writing of other pieces like "tremors & aftershocks"], but I still mostly agree with this take [though it's a little overgeneralizing] & I think it sums up a lot of my final "meta" modern-military-theory thoughts on ice & mav & their relationship, so im posting it now before I post the compacflt masterpoast)

see,… the thing is, i just… can’t see that happening!! i have no idea how to write that!!! Maybe i really do have a lack of imagination. But i can’t see that happening for a number of reasons. So short answer, no.

Long answer (and it’s long):

1. lame reason to start out, but it, uh, it’s canon that ice ends up at O-10 and mav ends up at O-6. not saying that im beholden to canon obviously (my mav ends up at O-7 and my ice ends up alive) but I do base my characterizations of them on the implications of the political struggles of both their careers so… taking away ice’s fourth star is basically starting from square one wrt my characterization of him. which is a lot of work. i could start from the beginning with a top gun 1986 ice who knows he’s gay—that would be a fun AU (i think other people than me have definitely done that better, though—I’m a one-trick pony). So if that’s what you mean then disregard the rest of this post. but if what you mean is a divergence from my existing work (i.e. homophobic/rank-climbing ice&mav) then… yeah, can’t see that happening, for further reasons below.

2. wrt my characterization of him: it’s based on a broad historical overview of armed service officers and the expectations of their careers. in my view, high-ranking officers aren’t after power—or maybe they started their careers wanting power, but somewhere down the line, it just becomes an expectation. if you do everything right and follow all the rules, you are expected by the institution to lead, whether you want to or not. That’s just the pipeline. at some point you start losing agency. which is what I mean when I keep saying ice doesn’t have a choice in advancing his career (besides the meta fact that this is fanfiction and canon demands that he have 4 stars lol)—high ranking military officers are continually and continually groomed for bigger and better positions; and the longer they spend in the military, the harder it is to leave that lifestyle for something else. And with ice’s canonical (and characteristically INTEGRAL, as I mentioned a week or so ago) refusal to rebel against the wishes of the navy as an institution, plus this historical expectation to lead placed upon the shoulders of excelling officers, I really do think ice is destined for four stars & nothing less, even if it gives him chronic depression. It’s his highest priority not because he wants it to be, but because…it just is. that’s how the institutionalized system of advancement in the military works. it just is. it has to be.

3. I mentioned in this post that I can’t ever see a foot in the door with them talking about their relationship unless maverick dies and is resurrected, and I feel the exact same way about them & their retirement plans. There’s a lot that ice and mav don’t talk about: the biggest one is obviously Goose’s death, the foundation of their relationship; but also their love for each other obv, what they did to rooster, AND their careers, which have to end at some point. Them talking about everything is totally inevitable, it was gonna have to happen eventually before they died, and I think one foot in the door MIGHT have been them eventually talking about retirement (someone sent in a prompt asking for this exactly & i am brainstorming it furiously) but before the Navy FORCES them to retire… i think they would studiously avoid talking about it. For a couple reasons: a) what does retiring with each other mean? living in the same house until they die together? hard to do if you’re just good friends. talking about retirement is tantamount to talking about Them. and b) what are they gonna do outside the navy? Ice has a lot of options, as I mentioned in the slider one-shot—general/flag officers are SUPER sought after in leadership/intelligentsia/management positions post service, so maybe if he were offered a crazy cool civilian position somewhere in San Diego in like the 2000s he would quit the navy for it… but what about maverick? I have no idea what a non-navy mav would do. Civilian airline pilot? Hoo boy. I think he’d hate that. I could maybe see emergency helicopter pilot, lol, or race car driver (i just watched days of thunder can you tell?) but none of the above offers the institutionalized honor the navy does (that, as a reminder, he *killed people* to obtain in the first place). I suggested his test piloting expertise would make him an attractive technical advising candidate to A&D companies like Boeing, LockMart, GD, etc. so that might be one option. But it might have been kind of a touchy subject for him before he racked up the expertise he’d need for those high-level civilian positions… the navy was kinda his only option. So they wouldn’t talk about it because it might hurt his feelings.

4. The biggest reason: again… open rebellion like rocking the boat by quitting the navy to be in an open long-term gay relationship, in upper mil brass ranks, and even retired upper mil brass ranks, just… isn’t done. And REALLY wasn’t done in the 2000s, when i think the scenario in this ask is positioned. And it’s not like “oh but whatever who cares about the navy, ice and mav are in love, they deserve to be happy no matter what, they should do what they want, fuck the navy…” no. Ice and Mav care about the navy. Clearly. Canonically. By necessity. The military requires cohesion and on some level repression of individuality & personal expression to FUNCTION, even when you’re retired. Yes, maverick certainly strains against that repression (which is why you Could spin top gun as an anti-military franchise if you were desperate enough), but he rebels through his ACTIONS (stupid plane maneuvers) not through his personal IDENTITY. his personal identity (headstrong overtly masculine white male pilot, whether gay or straight who cares) is NEVER challenged throughout the franchise (i.e. no one really challenges his masculinity specifically) & his personal identity does not POSE a challenge to the navy. Both he and ice in their outward-facing personal identities really fit in quite neatly to the navy’s overarching identity & contribute to the navy’s cohesion in a way that is favorable to both their careers and the establishment. Lack of imagination or not… i can’t see a universe in which Ice and mav would actively WANT to rock the boat and wreck the navy’s cohesion and their reputations for an open relationship and definitively rebellious personal identities, with the obvious caveat being Maverick’s death recontextualizing both their priorities (yes we’re in love AND we’ve finally proven ourselves to be ultra-capable officers regardless of our sexuality so no one has a license to judge us anymore etc.).

And also, they’re not enlisted seamen. Nor are they mediocre officers who have the luxury of fading into obscurity. Things are different when you’re that high in the ranks, and when your job publicly matters more. sorry, but even post DADT (probably until about biden’s election), an open relationship would end their careers. They might not be fired, but they’d never be promoted again. Too much of a liability getting subordinates to still respect them, from the higher-ups’ perspective, especially if there are other qualified candidates who fit the navy’s core identity better. Like—sorry. This is such a jaded oversimplification. But if you rock the boat like that (i.e. break the service’s united front to be individualistic in a way that does not match the service’s overarching identity), from the perspective of your officer peers, you simply are a bad officer. Being an open individual in a job where you are required to fit in and represent your service is not your job. You are not doing your job well. Straight-up. Even if you’re retired. I met US Army 4-star gen. David Petraeus (retired obv) in February—he led the successful-ish surge in iraq and Afghanistan in the mid-2000s—and he’s STILL a laughingstock for his disastrous affair with his biographer a decade ago, even after he retired from AD service. That’s what people remember him for, not the fact that he was one of our only successful commanders in any of our Middle East campaigns.

Something like that might be one of ice and mav’s worst fears—being known for their affair/scandal instead of the institutionalized honor they’ve fought and killed for. That kind of thing just Isn’t Done. It's bad taste. You have to keep it quiet. If you’re an officer representing the service, you have to represent it well & according to the service’s preconceived identity, even in retirement. (see, for another shitty example of "not fitting in" even in retirement, Lt. gen. Mike Flynn [his whole scandal is actually kinda geopolitically relevant to my fic if you squint lol] whom everyone fucking hates)

To summarize: i hope I’m not mischaracterizing your ask when i reframe it like this—would you ever write ice and mav without the institutionalized pressure to advance in rank and conform to institutional norms?

and yes, I would (and will if you ask—it looks like this: ice & mav meet & fall in love & it’s boring and fine. end of story), but I guarantee you someone else already has. I’m all about interrogation of institutional norms here. And i think until maverick dies & comes back from the dead, there is absolutely no *REALISTIC* incentive for ice & mav to leave the navy and/or have an open relationship. Like it’s just not possible. Idk how else to say it.

[eggtrolls]

[financial “advisor” on tiktok voice] forget who’s gonna match my freak. who’s gonna match my 401k

[adimouze]

*

[feroluce]

Thinking about gepo Valentine's Day shenanigans today and I think it would be hilarious for Gepard to plan to go out on patrol to keep an eye out for Sampo, because the man's been laying low for almost a week now, and that's usually a sign he's about to do something big. ...Of course he knows his habits, he's been tracking him for forever to try and arrest him. ...No it's not because he's gay shut up Serval.

Serval: Pelaaaaaaaaa I have no date, and even Geppie is going out with a guy tonight...

Gepard: I am not!

Pela: There, there...

So Gepard goes out on his patrol and keeps the city safe like the golden boy he is. He walks through the crowds, solves some minor problems, breaks up a few fights...but oddly enough, he doesn't see hide nor hair of Sampo all night? Which. He is absolutely not disappointed by this. It's a good thing. Totally fine. Totally.

And then he finally gets back home, and finds that someone has snuck a rose and even a little package of chocolates in his armor while he wasn't looking ♡

((Serval: Aw, how sweet.

Gepard: MY WALLET WAS IN THAT POCKET.))

[unflying-bee]

when i woke up today, i didnt think THIS is were my day would go. but here we are. isnt life just the most marvelous wonder?

anyway i made world cup mascot yaoi and i know there is at least ONE person out there that will be like 'hell yeah'.

[pinbones]

Thinking about when i studied counselling at uni and they straight up told us that cbt has negative outcomes for many people and shouldn't become a standard for care, all talking therapies seem to have the same efficacy as each other, many psychologists think therapy is ineffective altogether, serotonin and dopamine don't work like that we just act like they do because pills that prevent their reuptake help people*, all diagnoses are a socially created (and enforced) map that shifts and changes with time and culture, and any one person could have been diagnosed and treated differently by myriad different doctors based on luck and social factors

Shame its practitioners don't think so

[chaossmagic]

writing prompt: stucky trying a new recipe together. Something that implies they're going to be around a long time to eat it. Like jam or pickles.

"You sure you got enough there, pal?" Steve asked, leaning in the doorframe of their kitchen, wiping the last flecks of tacky paint residue off his hands. He rolled the paint-stained cuffs of his flannel shirt up to his elbows as he crossed the room to where Bucky stood at the stove, stirring an enormous bubbling pot of blackberry jam. More pans with smaller amounts were littered across the countertops; a row of clean, steaming jars sat on the table, ready to be filled.

"Ha ha," Bucky snorted with sarcasm, giving the jam another stir and sticking in a vibranium finger. He pulled out a purple-jam-covered fingertip and inspected it carefully, tongue poking out as he concentrated in a way Steve thought was utterly sweet and very, very adorable. Clearly, it wasn't the right consistency yet, because he frowned, wiped off his hands, and went back to stirring. "I thought you were out of terrible ideas when you gave up the shield. Guess I was wrong." He turned off the stove and turned to face Steve, arms crossed in front of him. But Steve could see the teasing in his eyes, the faint twinkle at the back of the deep blue, the frown that didn't quite reach his lips, stained faintly purple along with a smear of blackberry jam on his nose and more purple stains on the fingers of his right hand.

"Still can't believe you're practically a farmer's wife now," Steve joked, stepping closer to him, smelling the sweet fruit and sugar on him, layered on top of his cologne and the wax he put in his hair these days, making the soft spikes shine. "James Buchanan Barnes, gone all domestic in his old age."

"Fuck off, punk, you're older than me," Bucky retorted, fake-wriggling away as Steve pressed his face into his neck and kissed him all over the exposed skin of his throat and collarbone. He felt Bucky's hands come up to thread through his hair, now longer and thicker than it had ever been - even more than when he'd been on the run those years, and getting a decent haircut was out of the question - and stroke the soft golden strands fondly. Steve eventually straightened up and wrapped his arms around Bucky's waist, grinning.

"Guess we'll be eating blackberry pie for a while then?" he asked.

"Be eating it longer than that time all we had was cabbage soup twice a day for a month," Bucky replied. "When was it, winter of '37? You know I can't stand the sight of cabbage soup now 'cause a' that. You try to get me to eat it, I'll puke."

Steve grimaced; he definitely remembered that solid month of nothing but increasingly-questionable quality cabbage boiled to death in broth that nothing but a single carrot and a tiny piece of onion in it. He didn't blame Bucky for completely avoiding the stuff now, even though culinary tastes had come along way since those days.

"Well, pie is definitely better than cabbage soup," Steve said, pressing a kiss to Bucky's forehead. "Especially when my beautiful, talented husband spent his day making it because I'm the idiot husband who suggested that planting fruit trees might be a good idea."

"We'll be eating blackberry pie till we both drop dead," Bucky said.

"That's an awfully long time," Steve said. Then he smiled. "I can't wait. We've earned it."

[relto]

tried to help my mom rescue a personal file off her work laptop, and man the lengths her employer goes to stop anyone from doing exactly that. usb devices? get blocked. send as mail attachment? file gets removed. cloud service? is either blocked in the browser or the upload mysteriously fails (not actually sure what that was about, but ive never had that problem before). ssh/scp/curl? not installed or no network connection. in the end i connected my workplaces cloud storage as network drive and well if youre just moving files between folders its fine.. right?

[the-bibrarian]

“The EU average stands at 64.3 years for men and 63.5 years for women. In France, the current retirement age is 64.5 years for both men and women, according to the OECD dataset. This means that France has a slightly higher retirement age than the EU average.”

Source : euronews.com

The absolute fucking irony

[probayern]

have decided i probably need to get my shit together a bit