#they say there's a 120% of inflation only in this first month

[lucianinsanity]

I'm actually about to cry because 1 lemon is going to cost me $100 when I go back home when last year 6 lemons costed me less than $200

I feel so stupid for being this sad

[reasoningdaily]

Farmers of color plan to appeal a recent federal court judge’s ruling, which they say is a continuation of Jim Crow and erases their commitment to right the historical wrongs against them.

Six months ago, John Boyd Jr., Kara Boyd, Lester Bonner, and Princess Williams filed a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. government, including the United States Department of Agriculture. The farmers alleged the government broke its promise when it failed to pay the eligible debt for farmers of color because Congress repealed a $4 billion debt relief program for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers — which includes Black, Native American, Hispanic, and Asian communities. 

Instead, they created a race neutral program to replace it, which the plaintiffs say was a “blatant attempt to skirt its contractual commitments” to them and other farmers. As a result, farmers can’t pay off their debts, according to the lawsuit. 

“They have to know that this is a continuation of Jim Crow, and a continuation of what free Black men and women went through in this country. This is a continuation of that because we see it as another broken promise,” Boyd Jr., president of the National Black Farmers Association, said last week. “Just like my forefathers, I ain’t giving up the fight.”

The U.S. Justice Department argued in a March 10 filing that the legislation established the financial assistance program, “not contractual undertakings.” The department asked for the complaint to be dismissed for “failure to state a plausible claim for relief.”

Senior Judge Edward J. Damich for the United States Court of Federal Claims agreed in an April 27 opinion, saying there wasn’t an expressed or implied-in-fact contractual agreement between the farmers and the federal agency.

“Instead, the program reflects Congress’ intent only to “declare a policy to be pursued until the legislature shall ordain otherwise,” not an intent “to create private contractual or vested rights,” Damich wrote.

The original loan forgiveness program at the center of the complaint passed in March 2021 as part of the American Rescue Plan Act, offering up to 120% of the outstanding indebtedness to address historical inequities and funding disparities by the USDA. 

Black farmers saw this as the first step to repair the broken relationship with the federal government, especially after the landmark Pigford v. Glickman, a class-action lawsuit alleging the USDA discriminated against Black farmers from 1983 to 1997 when they applied for federal financial assistance, and failed to respond to complaints of discrimination. The court approved a settlement in 1999. While some Black farmers received payments, thousands did not because of confusing paperwork, filing deadlines, denials of claims, processing issues and attorney malpractice, NPR reported.

In June 2021, the same month the USDA planned to start loan payments to eligible borrowers, a judge issued a restraining order on the program in response to a lawsuit brought by a group of white farmers alleging that debt relief racially discriminated against them. 

“The discrimination is just not with the USDA. It also goes deep into the court system,” farmer Corey Lea told Capital B in December. “It’s crazy how the white farmers got it done within 30 days and Black farmers, if they get any justice at all — most of the time, no — they’re in [the courtroom] for years. It’s a systemic problem.”

Rather than implement the existing loan forgiveness program, the Inflation Reduction Act, which was signed into law last year, replaced it with assistance for a broader group of “distressed borrowers.” 

The act provides $125 million for technical assistance regarding food, agriculture, and agricultural credit to underserved farmers, ranchers, or forest landowners, including those living in high poverty areas. Another program provides $2.2 billion for farmers who have experienced discrimination prior to January 2021 by the Agriculture Department’s farm lending programs. Recipients can receive up to $500,000 each. 

In September, all parties agreed to dismiss the lawsuit in response to the Inflation Reduction Act. A month later, Boyd Jr. filed suit. He said the relief from the original program in the American Rescue Plan Act would’ve made a big difference in helping farmers to wipe their slate clean — especially for Bonner and Williams, who have struggled to make ends meet or pay off mounting bills.

“This administration … just abandoned us, left us out there high and dry. That’s why I turned to the courts,” Boyd Jr. said.

[ailtrahq]

Costco, the retail giant renowned for offering a wide range of products at discounted prices, has recently added an unexpected item to its inventory: 1-ounce gold bars. While the exact price is available only to Costco members, online discussions suggest that the bars were priced at just under $1,900. As of 1:30 p.m. UTC on 28 September 2023, the spot gold price stood at $1,874.50 per ounce. On 26 September 2023, during Costco’s Q4 2023 Earnings Call, Richard Galanti, who is Costco’s Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, had this to say: “I’ve gotten a couple of calls that people have seen online that we’ve been selling one-ounce gold bars, yes, but when we load them on the site, they’re typically gone within a few hours and we limit two per member.“ The gold bars are exclusively available online and can be purchased only by Costco members. Membership fees for the retail giant range from $60 to $120 per year, depending on the chosen program. According to a report by CNBC published yesterday, Jonathan Rose, co-founder of Genesis Gold Group, sees this move as a strategic promotion that could attract a specific segment of Costco’s customer base. According to Rose, Costco has recently expanded its range of survivalist goods, including a 150-serving emergency food preparedness kit and he addition of gold bars aligns well with these products, especially at a time when concerns about economic stability are high: “They’ve done their market research. I think it’s a very clever way to get their name in the news and have some great publicity. There is definitely a crossover of people living off the land, being self-sufficient, believing in your own currency. That’s the appeal to gold as a safe haven as people lose faith in the U.S. dollar.“ Earlier this month, during a recent discussion with Michelle Makori, the Editor-in-Chief at Kitco News, Michael Lee, founder of Michael Lee Strategy, forecasted that gold prices could escalate to $5,000 per ounce within the next three years. Lee attributes this prediction to the current recessionary state of the U.S. economy and the impending wave of defaults. He pointed out that the yield curve has inverted, a historically reliable sign of an upcoming recession, and noted that both businesses and consumers are already overleveraged, making defaults likely. Lee also questioned the current gold price, which remains under the significant psychological threshold of $2,000 per ounce. He suspects market manipulation by banks and financial institutions, citing the buying activities of BRICS nations and past manipulations in the silver market. Lee further speculated that China and Europe would be the first regions to seek safety in gold, driving its price up. He views gold as a long-term investment, serving as a hedge against inflation and economic instability. Additionally, Lee expressed skepticism about the accuracy of labor market data, noting that reports have consistently been revised downward. He questioned whether this pattern is due to government bureaucracy, flawed models, or intentional manipulation. Finally, Lee criticized the Federal Reserve’s decision to raise interest rates, arguing that it would exacerbate the recession and that other methods, like quantitative easing, should be employed to control inflation. [embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ic70nqCqpI[/embed] Featured Image via Unsplash Source

[xxx-cat-xxx]

Shot to Hell

Writing finally worked again! I thought of using this for Whumptober but then I was like, screw it, who’s gonna wait a month? So here have the Spider-Man content you’ve been asking me for, plus Tony and Bruce father-henning Peter.

Major thanks to @whumphoarder for beta-reading.

*

Peter fades back into consciousness right in the middle of a heated debate between Tony and Nat over the best method of peeling hard boiled eggs. 

“Wha’ happ’nd?” he croaks, prompting Tony to stop mid-sentence (“No, you don’t crack them on a flat surface, you gotta hit em with a–”) and both of them to turn their heads in his direction.

“Oh, look who decided to wander back to the land of the living,” Tony teases, but even in his still-dazed state, Peter can see relief blooming on his mentor’s face. 

“I passed out, didn’t I?” he asks. 

“Bingo. 10 points.” Tony raises a mocking eyebrow before asking in a more sober tone, “How are you feeling?”

“...Shot,” Peter deadpans, eliciting an eye roll from Tony and a grin from Nat.

“Do you remember what happened?” she chips in.

“Uhm… kind of?” Peter tries to think through the fog in his pounding head. He recalls the impact of the bullet with his body, and then someone―Dr. Banner?―plucking said bullet out again in an increasingly painful procedure that must have led to him blacking out. It’s the in-between that he’s kind of fuzzy about. For example, how he moved from the intersection of 77th and 164th to a room with the most hideous, peeling lilac-coloured wallpaper he’s ever seen and three venus fly trap plants on the windowsill. 

“Where am I?” 

“Bruce’s humble abode,” Tony explains, gesturing around to the sparsely adorned room. “Very humble, actually. Not even sure he has indoor plumbing.”

Nat rolls her eyes and hits his arm with a playful backhand.

Peter frowns. “Why are we at Dr. Banner’s?”

Tony shrugs. “It was closest, and we had to get that bullet out of you before your freaky spider DNA started knitting itself back together.”

“Bruce has all kinds of medical equipment here,” Nat explains. “He sometimes treats undocumented citizens.” 

Tony raises an eyebrow. “How do you know that? I didn’t even know that.” 

Nat shrugs mysteriously, then pushes herself away from the edge of the desk she was sitting on top of. “I’m gonna tell him that your disaster kid woke up.” 

“I’m not–” Peter starts at the same moment Tony asserts, “He’s not–” 

“Yeah, yeah, save your breath.” Nat’s smile is amused and a little bit fond. 

Once she’s left the room, Peter pulls the blanket off his bare chest to try and get a look at the bandaged wound in his abdomen, but even lifting his head a little sends jolts of pain through his body and a groan escapes before he can stop it. 

“Easy, easy,” Tony says, pushing him back down. “No moving just yet for anyone with holes in them.”

“Is it really bad?” Peter asks, trying hard to mask the worry in his voice. He’s been injured in countless other ways since getting his powers, but it’s his first time getting shot. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wonders whether there will be any lasting damage. 

Tony’s expression goes soft as he seems to read his thoughts. “Bruce says you’re already healing. The bullet missed all the vital organs. With your healing factor, you should be back on the streets in a couple days.” 

At Peter’s relieved sigh, Tony then launches into an explanation of the very painful things Clint and Steve did to the Hydra agent who fired the gun after the other left to get Peter to safety. Peter nods along, feeling his eyes growing heavy. He doesn’t even realise that they’ve slipped shut until he feels Tony lightly rest a hand on his shoulder, but opening them again seems like way too much work. The wound is pulsing in time with his heartbeat, and he’s suddenly exhausted.

“...Peter? I thought you said he was awake.” 

“Yeah, he was until five minutes ago. Come on, kid, the doctor’s in.”

“Ngph,” Peter grunts, blinking his eyes open again to see Bruce swim into focus, the doctor’s brows knitting in concern. “‘M awake.”

“That’s good.” Bruce gives a small, encouraging smile. “I just want to check your vitals and see if there’s anything we can do for pain management. I know that normal painkillers don’t work on you, but there are some alternatives we could try.”

“No, no it’s fine. It’s not hurting that much,” Peter lies. 

“Uh-huh,” Bruce says, obviously not buying it. He fixes a blood pressure cuff to Peter’s upper arm and inflates it.  

"Yeah, that's still pretty low, but moving in the right direction. You probably shouldn't try to get up just yet."

"Probably?” Tony interrupts. "If he tries to leave this bed any time before tomorrow morning, I'll confiscate the suit for a month."

"Alright, Tony. Calm down." That's Nat, seated in a chair at the foot of the bed.

Tony flashes Peter a warning look before sticking his tongue out at Nat.

"I'm gonna take your pulse.” Bruce puts two fingers onto Peter's wrist and looks at his watch for a while. "120―Your heart's racing. Not much pain, you said?"

"I've had worse," Peter mumbles. That's not a lie, at least. The two-day migraine he had after getting bitten still ranks on top of that list, closely followed by the time he ruptured his Achilles tendon during a triple backflip in the Spider-Man suit from the roof of the gym. 

(The video Ned took of this particular incident still circulates on TikTok).

Tony huffs out a breath and mutters something that sounds a lot like god, this kid.

"Alright." Bruce lifts the blanket to check the bandages and seems to be content with what he's seeing. "Just try to rest like this, but if you can't sleep, we can think of trying some cannabis drops."

“Thanks, Dr. Banner,” Peter says.

"Oh, and you should eat and drink something if you feel up to it. You lost quite a bit of blood back there."

"Uhm." He definitely doesn’t feel up to that―he’s been lightheaded and slightly queasy since the time he woke up, and the mere thought of food turns Peter's stomach. "Maybe drink something?"

“We can start with that.” Bruce removes the blood pressure cuff and starts to put it back into its bag. “I’ll bring you some juice.”

“I’ll get it,” Nat offers and leaves the room. She returns a minute later with a small bottle of orange juice and a pink straw that she passes to Bruce.

“Oh, organic and fairtrade,” Tony comments, eyeing at the label. “You’re in for a treat today, kid.” 

Peter chuckles, but cuts himself off abruptly when he makes to sit up and the pain in his abdomen flares to the point that his vision greys out. “Ow,” he mumbles. 

Tony shoots out a hand when Peter lists towards him and carefully lowers him back down onto the mattress. “What did we say about not getting up yet?” the engineer pronounces through gritted teeth. “There’s a straw in that.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Peter awkwardly takes a few sips from the bottle while lying back, and then stops to draw in a breath. 

His unsuccessful attempt at sitting left him even more dizzy than before. The juice settles uneasily in his stomach and he puts the bottle down after finishing half of it before turning onto his uninjured side with Tony’s help. Nat and Tony restart their quibble about egg-boiling behind Peter while Bruce, sitting right next to him, starts to scroll through something on his phone. 

Peter closes his eyes and attempts to fall asleep, but the longer he tries, the more the pain radiating from the bullet wound seems to increase. On top of that, there’s a growing sick feeling in his gut that’s impossible to ignore. He slowly draws his legs up to his stomach, but it doesn’t help, so he stretches them back out and surreptitiously rests a hand on his belly. Adjusting his head on the pillow, he tries to carefully breathe through his nose.

“You doing okay?” Bruce asks quietly, looking up from his phone after another few attempts by Peter at finding a comfortable position. Peter nods, then lifts his hand to stifle a sick burp that carries the taste of orange juice. Cold sweat has broken out all over his body and he can feel himself starting to tremble minutely. 

Bruce regards him with a frown, then addresses Tony and Nat, who are still caught up in their banter. “Why don’t you two take this outside?” 

Tony starts to protest, but Bruce gives him a pointed look that the other man seems to understand, because he closes his mouth again and gets up from the far side of the bed. "See you later, buddy," he says, giving Peter’s shoulder a squeeze.

Once the two of them have left the room, Bruce turns back to Peter. “What’s going on?” he asks. 

“I, uhm, I kind of feel like throwing up,” Peter admits in a whisper.

“It’s alright, that happens,” Bruce assures him calmly. “I’ll get you a bowl, okay?” 

“I don’t want anyone to see–” 

“I get it,” Bruce reassures. “Don’t worry.” 

He disappears out of the door and Peter keeps swallowing thickly against the nausea rising up in his throat. The only thing worse than throwing up in front of the Avengers would probably be throwing up onto an Avenger’s bed. Luckily, Bruce reappears quickly with a basin in his hands that he sets down within Peter’s reach. “Try to breathe through it,” he advises. “But if you need to get sick, it’s okay.” 

Peter nods miserably. He tries to follow the scientist’s advice of breathing calmly, but it doesn’t do much to quell the nausea. A few minutes later, he has to reach for the basin, saliva already pooling in his mouth. 

"Here." Bruce helps him prop himself on his elbow. Peter shakily spits a few strings of saliva into the basin until a gag rises in his throat and he brings up a gush of orange juice. He barely manages to draw a breath before a second wave forces its way up. Peter can’t stop a whimper from escaping his lips between retches when his wound protests the sudden movement.  

“Hey.” Bruce pats his shoulder awkwardly. “You’ll be alright. Just get it all up.”

Peter is panting and shaking all over when he finishes. Bruce passes him some water to rinse his mouth. 

“That sucked,” Peter croaks after swirling and spitting it back out. He more crashes than lies back down on the pillow, pain radiating in waves through the lower half of his body, making his head spin. 

Bruce gives him a slightly sad, sympathetic look. “I’m sorry it’s hurting.” He gestures at the basin. “Are you okay if I take this away?” 

Peter nods, closing his eyes. A part of him is absolutely mortified at the idea of one of the world’s best scientists cleaning out his puke bowl, but the pain has taken most of the embarrassment away, and if there is anyone of the team he feels least uncomfortable seeing him like this, it’s probably Bruce with his slight shyness and calm down-to-earth attitude.

The man returns a few minutes later, bringing along a cold cloth for Peter to wipe his face, a small box of mints, and Tony.

“Day just keeps getting better, huh?” Tony remarks.

“Ugh.” Peter buries his head in his pillow. “This is such a disaster. And I was looking forward to the mission. And the team.”

“Hey.” Tony’s tone softens. He strokes some of Peter’s sweaty hair away from his forehead and then brushes his eyes shut. “We’re still here. Go to sleep now, kid. You’ll feel better when you wake up.”

So Peter does.

_________

All my fics

Taglist: @toomuchtoread33  @yepokokfine

[alwaysmarilynmonroe]

Today is a very special day, it’s Marilyn’s Birthday! Can you believe that if she were still alive,  Marilyn would have been turning 94 years old today – just two months younger than the Queen herself! With each year I always try and write a special post about this amazing woman, who has helped me so much and achieved more than anyone could have imagined in her 36 years. Therefore, I decided to write 94 facts about the Birthday Girl – some you may know, some you may not, all in the hope that genuine things will be learnt and the real Marilyn will be more understood and appreciated.

Gladys and baby Norma Jeane spend some quality time together on the beach in 1929.

Little Norma Jeane, aged seven, in 1933.

Norma Jeane photographed by David Conover whilst working at the Radio Plane Munitions Factory in either the Fall of 1944 or Spring of 1945.

Norma Jeane by Andre de Dienes in late 1945.

Marilyn by Richard Miller in 1946.

Marilyn on Tobey Beach by Andre de Dienes on July 23rd 1949.

Marilyn by Ed Clark in Griffith Park in August 1950.

Marilyn attends a Party in Ray Anthony’s home, organized by 20th Century Fox on August 3rd 1952.

Marilyn filming The Seven Year Itch on location in New York City by Sam Shaw on September 13th 1954.

Marilyn by Milton Greene on January 28th 1955.

Marilyn by Cecil Beaton on February 22nd 1956. This was her favourite photo of herself.

Marilyn attending the Premiere of The Prince In The Showgirl at the Radio City Music Hall on June 13th 1957.

Marilyn by Carl Perutz on June 16th 1958.

Marilyn by Philippe Halsman for LIFE Magazine in October 1959.

Marilyn attends a Benefit for The Actors Studio at the Roseland Dance City on March 13th 1961.

Marilyn on Santa Monica Beach for Cosmopolitan Magazine by George Barris on July 1st 1962.

______________________________________________________________________________

1.  Stood at a height of 5’5½”

2.  Born in the charity ward of the Los Angeles County Hospital at 9:30 AM on June 1st 1926.

3.  Married three times;

– Jim Dougherty: (June 19th 1942 – September 13th 1946) – Joe Dimaggio: (January 14th 1954 – 31st October 1955) (Temporary divorce granted on October 27th 1954) – Arthur Miller: (June 29th 1956 – January 20th 1961).

4. Suffered two confirmed miscarriages; an ectopic pregnancy on August 1st 1957 and miscarriage in December 16th 1958.

5. Suffered with endometriosis very badly, so much so that she had a clause in her contract which stated she would be unable to work whilst menstruating.

6. Starred in 30 films – her last being uncompleted.

7. Favourite of her own performances was as Angela Phinlay in The Asphalt Jungle (1950)

8. Winner of three Golden Globes; two for World Film Favourite – Female in 1954 and 1962 and one for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical for her performance as Sugar Kane in Some Like It Hot (1959) in 1960.

9. Her idol was the first Platinum Blonde Bombshell, Jean Harlow.

10. Amassed a collection of over 400 books in her library, ranging from Russian Literature to Psychology.

11. Favourite perfume was Chanel No.5

12. Had two half siblings; Robert “Jackie” Baker (1918 – 1933) and Bernice Miracle (1919) – the former she would never have the chance to meet and Bernice was not informed about Marilyn until she was 19 years old.

13. Former Actor and 20th Century Fox Studio Executive, Ben Lyon created the name Marilyn Monroe in December 1946 – Marilyn after fellow Actress, Marilyn Miller and Monroe after Marilyn’s mother’s maiden name. Ironically enough, Ben starred with Jean Harlow, in her breakout movie, Hell’s Angels (1930).

14. Legally changed her name to Marilyn Monroe ten years later, on February 23rd 1956.

15. Attended The Actors Studio.

16. Third woman to start her own Film Production Company – the first being Lois Weber in 1917 and the second being Mary Pickford in 1919.

17. First had her hair bleached in January 1946 at the Frank & Joseph Salon by Beautician Sylvia Barnhart, originally intended for a Shampoo Advert.

18. Contrary to popular belief, she was technically a natural blonde, not a redhead or brunette. She was born with platinum hair and was very fair until just before her teen years. Her sister described her with having dark blonde hair upon their first meeting in 1944.

19. Another myth debunked – she had blue eyes, not brown.

20. Was one of the few women in the 1950s to use weights when exercising.

21. Wore jeans before it was considered acceptable for women.

22. Her famous mole was real – albeit skin coloured, so she emphasized it using a brown eye pencil.

23. Was a Step-Mother in two of her three marriages to three children – Joe Dimaggio Jr. and Bobby and Jane Miller.

24. Found out she landed the lead role in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) on her 26th Birthday.

25. Another huge myth dispelled – only actually met President Kennedy four times from 1961 – 1962. Three of them were at public events, with the last being her performance at Madison Square Garden. One of them was at Bing Crosby’s Palm Spring house with various people, so at most (which again, is very unlikely) they had a one night stand – nothing more and nothing less.

26. Was the first Playboy Cover Girl, although she did not actually pose for them, nor give permission for them to be used. Hugh Hefner bought the photograph from a Chicago Calendar Company for $500 and the two never met.

27. Speaking of Playboy, the photo was taken by Photographer Tom Kelley on May 27th 1951 and Marilyn made a total of $50 for the photo shoot. The most famous photo then went on to cause a national sensation after being sold to the Calendar Baumgarth Company and became known as, “Golden Dreams“.

28. In 1955 it was estimated that over four million copies of the Calendar had been sold.

29. Favourite singers were Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald. 

30. Attended the Academy Awards Ceremony only once on March 29th 1951 and presented the award for “Best Sound Recording” to Thomas Moulton for All About Eve (1951) which she also starred in.

31. Performed ten shows over four days to over 100,000 soldiers and marines in Korea in February 1954 – she actually ended up catching pneumonia because it was so cold.

32. Was one of the few Stars who had Director Approval in their Contracts. Some of the names included were, John Huston, Elia Kazan, Alfred Hitchcock, George Stevens, William Wyler, Joshua Logan and Sir Carol Reed.

33. Was pregnant during the filming of Some Like It Hot (1959) – filming finished on November 7th 1958 and she miscarried the following month on December 16th.

34. Featured on the cover of LIFE Magazine seven times during her lifetime;

– April 7th 1952 – May 25th 1953 – July 8th 1957 (International Edition) – April 20th 1959 – November 9th 1959 – August 15th 1960 – June 22nd 1962

35. Favourite bevarage was Dom Perignon 1953 Champagne.

36. By the time of her death, her films had grossed over $200 million, when adjusted for inflation that is the equivalent of $2 billion in 2019.

37. Designer, William Travilla dressed Marilyn for seven of her films, two (*) of them received Oscar Nominations in, “Best Costume/Design, Color“;

– Monkey Business (1952) – Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) – How To Marry A Millionaire (1953) * – River Of No Return (1954) – There’s No Business Like Show Business (1954) * – The Seven Year Itch (1955) – Bus Stop (1956)

38. Spent 21 months of her childhood at the Los Angeles Orphanage, from September 13th 1935 until June 7th 1937.

39. Was one of the first Stars to speak out about child abuse, with her story appearing in movie magazines as early as 1954.

40. Fostered by her grandmother’s neighbours, Ida and Albert Bolender, for the first seven years of her life.

41. Lived in England for four months, during the period of filming for The Prince and The Showgirl (1957) from July 14th 1956 – November 20th 1956.

42. Her Production Company, Marilyn Monroe Productions produced only one film, The Prince and The Showgirl (1957) based on Terrance Rattigan’s play, The Sleeping Prince.

43. Was photographed by Earl Theisen in October 1952 wearing a potato sack dress after being criticized by the press for her outfit choice at The Henrietta Awards in January 1952. A journalist wrote that Marilyn was “insignificant and vulgar“and “even in a potato bag, it would have been more elegant.“

44. Was a huge supporter of LGBT+ rights, saying the following quote about fellow actor and friend, Montgomery Clift to journalist W.J. Weatherby in 1960,

“I was remembering Monty Clift. People who aren’t fit to open the door for him sneer at his homosexuality. What do they know about it? Labels–people love putting labels on each other. Then they feel safe. People tried to make me into a lesbian. I laughed. No sex is wrong if there’s love in it.”

45. Her measurements were listed as the following by her Dressmakers; 35-22-35 and 36-24-24 by The Blue Book  Modelling Agency. For the majority of her life she weighed between 117-120 pounds, with her weight fluctuating around 15 pounds, during and after her pregnancies (1957-1960), although her waist never ventured past 28.5 inches and her dress size today would be a UK Size 6-8 and a US Size 2-4 as she was a vintage Size 12.

46. Her famous white halter dress from The Seven Year Itch (1955) sold for $4.6 million ($5.6 million including auction fees) on June 18th 2011, which was owned by Debbie Reynolds. The “Happy Birthday Mr. President Dress” originally held the record for the most expensive dress, when it was sold on October 27th 1999 for $1.26 million. It then went on to be resold for $4.8 million on November 17th 2016, thus regaining it’s original achievement.

47. Was discovered by Photographer, David Conover, whilst working in The Radio Plane Munitions Factory in the Fall of 1944 or Spring of 1945, depending on sources.

48. Now known as the, “Me Too” movement, Marilyn was one of the first Stars to speak out on the, “Hollywood Wolves” in a 1953 article for Motion Picture Magazine entitled, “Wolves I Have Known”. The most famous incident being with the Head of Columbia Studios, Harry Cohn, who requested Marilyn join him on his yacht for a weekend away in Catalina Island. Marilyn asked if his wife would be joining them, which, as you can imagine – did not go down well and her contract was not renewed with the Studio. Marilyn made only one film with Columbia during her six month contract, this being Ladies Of The Chorus (1948) which was shot in just ten days!

49. Loved animals dearly and adopted a variety of pets over the years. These included a basset hound called Hugo and parakeets, Clyde, Bobo and Butch with Husband Arthur Miller.  A number of cats including a persian breed called Mitsou in 1955 and Sugar Finney in 1959. Her most famous pet was gifted to her in March or April of 1961 by friend, Frank Sinatra, a little white maltese named Maf. His full name was Mafia Honey, as a humorous reference to Sinatra’s alleged connections to the Mob. After Marilyn’s death, Maf went to live with Frank Sinatra’s secretary, Gloria Lovell.

50. The book she was reading at the time of her death was Harper Lee’s, To Kill A Mocking Bird.

51. One of the movies she starred in was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture and won, this being All About Eve (1950) at The 23rd Academy Awards on March 29th 1951. It ended up being nominated for 14 Oscars, a record at the time and has only been matched by Titanic (1997) and La La Land (2016).

52. Her first magazine cover was photographed by Andre de Dienes in December 1945 for Family Circle, released on April 26th 1946.

53. Joined The William Morris Agency on December 7th 1948.

54. Was right handed, not left as often believed.

55. Third Husband Arthur Miller wrote the screenplay for Marilyn’s last completed film, The Misfits (1961) which was originally written as a short story for Esquire Magazine in 1957. After the tragic ectopic pregnancy Marilyn endured in August of 1957, friend and Photographer, Sam Shaw suggested to Miller he alter his short story specifically for her. Ironically the making of this film culminated in their divorce and Marilyn stating,

“He could have written me anything and he comes up with this. If that’s what he thinks of me then I’m not for him and he’s not for me.” 56. Was Author, Truman Capote’s original choice for the role of Holly Golightly in Breakfast At Tiffany’s (1961) however, she was advised to turn it down by her Acting Coach, Paula Strasberg, who did not think the role of a prostitute would be good for her image. Writer George Axelrod, who wrote the Screenplay for Bus Stop (1956) and the play, The Seven Year Itch, ironically ended up being the Screenwriter for this movie.

Capote said this regarding Marilyn,

“I had seen her in a film and thought she would be perfect for the part. Holly had to have something touching about her . . . unfinished. Marilyn had that.”

57. Second Husband Joe Dimaggio had The Parisian Florists deliver red roses on Marilyn’s grave twice a week, for twenty years, from August 1962 until September 1982. Marilyn had told him how William Powell used to do this for Jean Harlow after her death and he reportedly vowed to do the same after their Wedding Ceremony. After the 20 years he then donated to a children’s charity, as he thought it would be a nice way to honour her memory. They also created the flower arrangements for her casket at her funeral.

58. The following five Directors directed Marilyn in more than one movie;

– John Huston; The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and The Misfits (1961) – Richard Sale;  A Ticket To Tomahawk (1950) and Let’s Make It Legal (1951) – Howard Hawks; Monkey Business (1952) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) – Billy Wilder; The Seven Year Itch (1955) and Some Like It Hot (1959) – George Cukor; Let’s Make Love (1960) and Something’s Got To Give (1962)

59. Was an illegitimate child, which unfortunately was attached with a lot of stigma in the 1920s. Her mother, Gladys, listed her then husband Edward Mortenson on the Birth Certificate, although it is commonly accepted that her real father was Charles Stanley Gifford, as Gladys left Edward on May 26th 1925. Gladys had an affair with him, which ended when she announced her pregnancy and he never acknowledged or met Marilyn, although she tried multiple times over the years to speak with him. 

60. Stayed in a number of foster homes during her childhood,

– George and Emma Atkinson; February 1934 – September 1934 – Enid and Sam Knebelcamp; Fall of 1934 – Harvey and Elsie Giffen; January 1935 – March 1935 – Grace and “Doc” Goddard; April 1935 – September 1935 and June 1937 – November 1937 and end of 1940 – February 1942 – Ida Martin; November 1937 – August 1938 – “Aunt Ana” Lower; August 1938  – End of 1940 and February 1942 

61. Had her hand and footprints immortalized in cement at Graumans Chinese Theatre on June 26th 1953, with Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) co-star, Jane Russell. Marilyn would place a rhinestone in the dot of the letter “i” as a reference to her character, “Lorelei Lee” but it was sadly stolen. This was an incredibly special moment for her, as she often talked about placing her hands and feet in the many prints there, when she spent her weekends at the Theatre as a child, especially in 1933 and 1934.

“When I was younger, I used to go to Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and try to fit my foot in the prints in the cement there. And I’d say “Oh, oh, my foots too big. I guess that’s out.” I did have a funny feeling later when I finally put my foot down into that wet cement, I sure knew what it really meant to me, anything’s possible, almost.”

62. The famous gold lamé dress worn in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) and designed by William Travilla, was deemed too risqué by the censors. Unfortunately for fans, this meant that the musical number, “Down Boy” was cut from the film and we only glimpse a few seconds of the dress from behind, on screen.

63. Due to the censors, the original, “Diamond’s Are A Girl’s Best Friend” costume was changed to the now iconic pink dress with black bow. Originally it was to be a diamond encrusted two piece, which was extremely daring for the then Motion Picture Hays Code.

64. Loved Erno Lazlo Skin Cream, Vaseline and Nivea Moisturizer.

65. Had she completed Something’s Got To Give (1962), Marilyn would have been the first Star in a major Motion Picture to appear nude on film. As she passed before it was completed the achievement went to fellow Blonde Bombshell, Jayne Mansfield in, Promises! Promises (1963).

66. Met Queen Elizabeth II in England at the Empire Theater in Leicester Square whilst attending the Premiere of, “The Battle Of The River Plate“ on October 29th 1956.

67. The Misfits (1961) was both Marilyn and Clark Gable’s last completed films. Clark died 12 days after filming finished, on November 16th 1960. The film was released on Clark’s would be 60th Birthday, February 1st 1961 and Marilyn passed 18 months later.

68. As Marilyn died before the completion of Something’s Got To Give (1962) it ended up being remade with Doris Day and James Garner, entitled, Move Over Darling! (1963). The film was originally intended to be a remake of, My Favourite Wife (1940) which starred Cary Grant.

69. Signed a recording contract with RCA Records on September 1st 1953. One of her songs from River of No Return (1954) entitled, “File My Claim” sold 75,000 copies in its first three weeks of release.

70. Was admitted to the Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic on February 10th 1961 by her then Psychiatrist, Marianne Kris. Originally thought to be for rest and rehabilitation, following her divorce from Arthur Miller and the strain of filming The Misfits. However, Marilyn was placed on the security ring and held against her will. Thankfully, she was able to contact ex Husband, Joe Dimaggio, who stated he would, “Take the hospital apart brick by brick” if she was not released and after three days of emotional trauma, she left.

71. Visited the following Countries;

– Canada – (July – August 1953) – Japan (February 1954) – Korea (Feburary 1954) – England (July – November 1956) – Jamaica (January 1957) – Mexico (February 1962)

72. Purchased her only home, 12305 Fifth Helena Drive on February 8th 1962, where she would tragically pass just under 6 months later.

73. The home had the following tile located on the front paving entrance saying, “cursum perficio” meaning, “my journey ends here.” The title is still there to this day.

74. Her final interview was published in LIFE Magazine on August 3rd 1962 and was written by Richard Meryman.

75. Aside from her millions of fans, had a staunch group of supporters affectionately known as, “The Monroe Six” who followed Marilyn around New York during her time there. Their nickname for Marilyn was, “Mazzie” and they became so acquainted that Marilyn actually once invited them for a picnic at her home.

76. First married at just sixteen years old, this was to avoid returning to the Orphanage she had spent almost two years in as a child.

77. Supported numerous charity events, most famously riding a pink elephant in Madison Square Garden, to support the Arthritis and Rheumatic Affections Association on March 30th 1955.

78. Left 25% of her Estate to her then Psychiatrist, Marianne Kris and 75% to mentor and friend, Lee Strasberg. For reference, her Will was last updated on January 1961 – a month before she entered the Payne Whitney Hospital on the advice of Marianne Kris.

79. At the time of it’s release, The Misfits (1961) turned out to be the most expensive black and white movie ever made, costing a budget of $4 million dollars.

80. The Premiere of The Seven Year Itch was held on her 29th Birthday, on June 1st 1955, she attended with ex Husband, Joe Dimaggio.

81. Laid to rest at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery on August 8th 1962 at 1:00 PM, with friend and mentor Lee Strasberg delivering the Eulogy. 

82. Although so often associated with diamonds, actually wasn’t that fond of jewellery stating, “People always ask me if I believe diamonds are a girl’s best friend. Frankly, I don’t.” 

83. Spent her 36th Birthday filming Something’s Got To Give (1962) and then attending a Charity Event for muscular dystrophy at the Chavez Ravin Dodger Stadium, which also happened to be her last public appearance.

84. Whilst recovering in hospital from an appendectomy in April 1952, Marilyn asked long time Makeup Artist and friend, Allan “Whitey” Snyder to do her makeup, should she pass before him. She gave him a gold money clip with the inscription, “Whitey Dear, while I’m still warm, Marilyn” and he did fulfill this promise to her.

85. Converted to Judaism for third husband, Arthur Miller on July 1st 1956.

86. Despite appearing in 30 films, she only actually dies in one, that being her breakout movie, Niagara (1953) where her character Rose Loomis, is strangled by her Husband George, played by Joseph Cotten.

87. Moved to New York City in 1955 and attended The Actors Studio, after breaking her Film Contract with 20th Century Fox. This was for a number of reasons, mainly years of low pay, unsatisfactory scripts and lack of creative control. A new contract would finally be reinstated on December 31st.

88. Repurchased a white Baby Grand Piano that her mother, Gladys, owned during their time living together in 1933. After Marilyn passed it would then be sold at the Christies Auction of her Estate in 1999 to none other than, Mariah Carey for $632,500.

89. Wore long hair pieces in River of No Return (1954) and a medium length wig in The Misfits (1961). The first I can only assume was due to the time period and setting of a Western and the second was due to the bleach damage her hair had suffered. After the filming in 1960, she wore the wig a couple of times in public events and then reverted back to her normal hair.

90. Like all students, it was tradition to perform in front of each other in The Actors Studio and on February 17th 1955, Marilyn acted out a scene from “Anna Christie” with Maureen Stapleton. Although it was an unwritten rule that students were not meant to applaud one another, an eruption of cheers and clapping happened after Marilyn had finished.

“Everybody who saw that says that it was not only the best work Marilyn ever did, it was some of the best work ever seen at Studio, and certainly the best interpretation of Anna Christie anybody ever saw. She achieved real greatness in that scene.”

– Actor Ellen Burstyn, on recalling Marilyn’s performance.

91. Used the pseudonym, “Zelda Zonk“, when trying to remain incognito.

92. Marilyn’s mother, Gladys Baker, suffered from Paranoid Schizophrenia and after various stays in institutions, was declared insane on January 15th 1935, when Marilyn was just 8 years old. After 10 years she was released and managed to retain various cleaning jobs and had developed an intense interest in Christian Science. However, by 1951 she was back in various institutions and would stay in the Rockhaven Sanitarium until 1967. Even after death, Marilyn continued to cover her mother’s care payments and Gladys would go on to outlive her for 22 years.

93. Favourite photograph of herself was taken by Cecil Beaton on February 22nd 1956.

94. Last professional photos were taken by Bert Stern, famously known as “The Last Sitting” for Vogue Magazine on June 23rd, July 10th and 12th 1962. Allan Grant took the LIFE Magazine interview pictures in her home, on July 4th and 9th 1962. Whilst George Barris took his photos for Cosmopolitan Magazine, the previous weekend on the 29th and 30th of June, until July 1st 1962. ______________________________________________________________________________

To those of you who took the time to read through all 3000+ words, thank you! It truly means more to me than you know and I really hope it’s shed some light on the truly special person Marilyn was and made you hold a good thought for her on her big day.

Follow me at;

BLOGLOVIN

INSTAGRAM

TUMBLR

TWITTER

YOUTUBE

For inquiries or collaborations contact me at;

meganmonroes@icloud.com

Happy 94th Birthday Marilyn! Today is a very special day, it's Marilyn's Birthday! Can you believe that if she were still alive,  Marilyn would have been turning 94 years old today - just two months younger than the Queen herself!

[lunarr-rrose]

Finance Options & Strategies

https://u109893.h.reiblackbook.com/generic11/the-storage-stud/finance-options-strategies/

In this video, Fernando would like to talk about finance options and strategies when it comes to self-storage.

Starting from the end then move his way to the beginning.

The last on the list for Fernando’s finance options is to have stabilized senior debt that is non-recourse.

A non-recourse loan means that even though you are signing for it, if anything happens, for instance, if the market goes down you are not liable for that loan.

This is one of the best types of loans to get to limit your liability.

Usually, to get these seniors loans or “the stabilized debt”, the property has to be at its maximum potential. It has to be fully occupied, it’s bringing a high revenue and net operating income as much as possible.

A non-recourse type of loan is one of the most favorable because it has longer terms and has lower interest rates.

Your next finance option for your property can be a bank loan. This is a recourse loan meaning that you are fully liable regardless of what happens in the market.

If you want to learn more about the other types of financing options and strategies that Fernando is willing to share just continue watching this video.

Fernando O. Angelucci is Founder and President of Titan Wealth Group. He also leads the firm’s finance and acquisitions departments. Fernando Angelucci and Steven Wear founded Titan Wealth Group in 2015, and under his leadership, the firm’s revenue has grown over 100% year over year. Today,

Find out more at

https://www.TheStorageStud.com

https://titanwealthgroup.com/

Listen to our Podcast:

https://thestoragestud.podbean.com/e/finance-options-strategies/

------------------------------------------

Hi! This is Fernando Angelucci, I'm The Storage Stud. Today, I'd like to talk about some finance options and strategies when it comes to self storage. So, I guess we should start from the end and move our way to the beginning. You know, the end of be all is, to have stabilized senior debt. That is non-recourse. So, when a loan is non-recourse, that means that even though you're signing for it, if anything happens, you know, let's say the market turns or there's some type of Black Swan event. You're not on the hook for that loan. If there is a loss to the property, or if, say for example, you have to fire sale it and you can't get more than, what the loan amount is for. So, that's a non-recourse loan. Now, there are what they call carve-outs, primarily bad boy carve-outs. So, you're not, you know, purposely defrauding anybody, you know, you're not engage in illegal activity.

If that were the case, then it would become recourse. But, if it's just something that has to do with, you know, factors that are out of your control that's where you'd have a non-recourse loan. So, those are always, you know, the best types of loans to get, just to limit your liability. But usually to get these senior loans or these stabilized debt, the property has to be at it's maximum potential. It's already stabilized. It's fully occupied. It's bringing in as much revenue as possible. The net operating income is as high as it's going to be, you know, aside from maybe growth in inflation. But those types of loans are usually the most favorable because of how long they are and how low the interest rates are. For example, a senior loan on a stabilized property might come from a life insurance company, or it might come from the Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities market or CMBS as some call it.

It may even come from some of the big lenders such as you know, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley and Barclays. So, these types of loans are typically up to a 10 year balloon. So, you have up to 10 years to either sell or refinance. And they're usually amortized over a longer schedule, usually 25 to 30 year amortization. Recently, in the last few months, I've been seeing quotes as low as 3.3% interest with some options going, you know, allowing for interest only, through either a portion or the entire balloon periods all the way up to 10 years paying only the interest with no principal pay down. These loans are typically, they're a little bit more difficult to get. You need to know, kind of people in the space. We typically go through brokers that have these relationships in the CMBS markets with the life insurance companies that will lend on these types of assets.

So, those are kind of the goal that you're trying to get to always is, you know, stabilize the property, get some senior debt on it, take it off your balance sheet. So, it's no longer, you know, it's no longer recourse. Now, one step ahead of that is, let's say a like a bank loan, a local bank may finance a property. These are typically recourse, which means you're on the hook for that loan amount, regardless of what happens in the market. And they typically have shorter, not only balloon schedules, but also amortization schedule. So, a typical bank loan that we see and we use, are you know five-year balloon with a 20 or a 25 year amortization. Typically these loans are going to require about 20 to 25% down. Now, there's a caveat because self storage is a business that also qualifies for SBA financing, which we'll get to in a little bit here.

And these are good loans for property that already shows income. It already shows that it's producing positive cashflow. It has a solid debt service coverage ratio or debt covers. Some people say your debt service coverage ratio is the amount of payments that you have to make, or the dollar figure per year, your debt service divided by your net operating income. And that will, I'm sorry, it's the other way around your net operating income divided by your debt service. And then that will come out as a ratio. It's usually, you know, banks want to see a 1.2 or 1.25, that covers. So, that means that your net operating income is 120 to 125% of what the debt service is. Again, so that's really good loan. If you can show financials from the seller, now let's go even one step ahead of that.

Say you are working with a seller that, decided that instead of paying taxes on his property, he was going to hide the income by taking cash and not reporting that income. So, his tax returns do not reflect what the property's actually bringing in. This is very typical, especially with smaller operators. These mom and pop owners, we find that, you know, one in three chance that the income that they're showing is not the true income potential, but here's the problem. These sellers, they want to get the value based off of all the income that it's producing, even the income that they can't prove on their tax returns. So, they basically chose, you know, Hey, do I want to make my money now, by not paying the, my proper fair share of taxes on these returns? Or do we want to make my money later by actually showing the income so that when the bank appraises it, or when a seller comes and looks at my last two to three years of tax returns, that the true value is represented.

The true net operating income is represented in those tax returns, and then you get a higher purchase price, but most of the time people want to have their cake and eat it too. So, they'll hide income, but they still want to get the value at where it was if all of the income was actually shown. So, there's two ways or three ways that you can handle those types of situations. The first is, to ask the seller to finance the property for you. Saying, hey, Mr. Seller, you know I understand you want a million bucks for your property, but based on what your tax returns are showing, I can only pay you 500,000 and that's what the bank will allow me to buy it at. So, we're at an impasse here, unless you are willing to be the bank for two to three years, for me, as the seller financer.

And that way I can properly, you know, show the income that this property is producing on a couple of tax returns. And once I'm at two to three years worth of showing the proper income, then I could refinance you out with the bank. So, that's option number one. Typically, it goes 50 50, you know, it's, if the seller needs the cash immediately. They usually won't go for that type of strategy. But if, you know, they, they still like to receive passive income and residual income by getting those interest payments. And they don't need all the cash right now, then we'll structure something like, you know, 15% down or 20, 25% down, you carry the mortgage for us for, you know, three years. And we'll have an amortization schedule over 25 or 30 years. And I like seller finance deals because you can dictate all the terms.

Usually when you go with a bank there's very little, you can really negotiate on because of the golden rule. The golden rule is he who has the gold makes the rules. So, I do like seller financing. Now, if the seller is unwilling to do that, another option you can do is go with an asset based lender or a hard money lenders as they're called colloquially the hard money lenders. They're going to look at asset value and they're going to lend up to a certain amount of that value. These lenders are typically experienced with real estate investors. They understand that we buy things at a discount, and we do a value add to raise the value of the property over two to three years, and then either refinance or sell. So, these hard money lenders are a good option when you have tight timelines.

And maybe you don't have as much down payment money as you need, but you do pay for it on rate. So, as opposed to say, you know, CMBS or senior debt life co companies, or you know, Morgan Stanley or some of these big firms where they're, you know, you're paying 3.3 to 3.5% interest, a bank might give you a loan anywhere between four to 5.2% interest in today's world, but a hard money lender. You're going to be paying anywhere between 10 to 14% after all the points and fees are included in this, because it truly is one of those situations where, you know, they're taking a risk and they want to be compensated for that risk. Typically these loans are short-term and they're not amortized or they're interest only loans. They will be one, two years, maybe three years interest only with the whole point of you taking them out as soon as possible, because those interest rates that they charge are pretty high. Now, suddenly between the bank and the hard money lenders or the asset-based lenders are the bridge lenders.

So, the bridge lenders are there specifically to be a bridge, bridge you from where you are now to the debt. That's going to be a little bit longer term. These are also typically interest only. I have seen them amortize as well. They're a little bit cheaper than the hard money loans, but a little bit more expensive than the bank loan. So, we have seen bridged at anywhere from, six and a half to 9% interest storage. So, the last couple of months these are typically they come from private equity firms or hedge funds. There are some banks that do bridge lending, but it's not very common. So, those are some of the options that we use as far as like traditional real estate financing. But as I alluded to before, there's also a caveat that self storage is also considered a business.

So, you can qualify for SBA loans, which are the Small Business Administration. These loans are pretty favorable, but they just come with a ton of extra documentation and rules. The two that we typically look at are the SBA 7 A and then the other one is the SBA 504 loans with these types of loans, you can get into a property with 15% down. And the amortization schedule is usually very favorable. 25 to 30 years, the rates are also decent. You know, they're going to be comparable to bank debt, maybe even a little bit cheaper than bank debt. And I won't get into it now because it's a whole other conversation, but the way they structure it is by having participation from other banks on one of the loans. And the other one is direct, a direct loan from the SBA.

So these, types of loans are great. If you have a lot of time on your hands, you know, if typically SBA lenders say they can get deals done in about 60 days. I have not seen that in my experience with storage, especially on the types of properties you're purchasing with these SBA loans. Typically, the documentation is not real good, let's say from the seller side. So, I usually will tell the seller, Hey, I'm going to need 90 to 120 days to close if I'm going to be using an SBA loan. So, those are some of the options that we use when it comes to financing self storage properties, and each loan has kind of its own little bucket. And they kind of blur a little bit at the very edges. So, when you're going from bank that a senior debt stabilized that there's a little bit of blurb on the edge of each same thing from bridge debt to bank debt, same thing from, you know bridge to hard money.

And then, you know, our favorite of course, is the seller financing. And one of the main reasons we really like it is cause it's a win-win not only do we get to set a terms, the underwriting is almost non-existent. The seller also takes advantage because now they're making interest on their purchase price and they're able to spread their capital gains and depreciation recapture taxes across multiple years, instead of just taking it in a, you know, a one-off transaction where you may have to pay two, $300,000 in capital gains in depreciation recapture. So, if you can spread that over time, that really helps with the sellers. So, let me know if you guys have any questions on, you know, financing options and strategies, when it comes to self storage, feel free to leave a comment below or reach out to us on our website or social media. And until next time, you know, it's good to see you.

[steve-rogers-new-york]

Pre-WWII Television  Mid-1930s to 1945

In the last month, I’ve read no-less-then THREE separate fics referencing Steve and/or Bucky having more than a passing knowledge or experience of television pre-21st century — and I really wanted to clear that misinformation up. 

Television, like most new technologies, existed for some time before being adopted by the wider public, and early models were prohibitively expensive for the everyday person. While yes, I think the boys would have seen a television demonstration at least once, they would not have owned one, nor would anyone they knew have owned one (except Howards, but when would they have seen it?).

First Commercial Televisions

The first ‘electro-mechanical’ televisions of the mid-to-late-1930s were grand, expensive affairs. The two of the main producers in the US were RCA with their TRK-12, TRK-9, TRK-5 and TT-5 models, and DuMont with their Model 180, and Model 181. These set would be handcrafted, with polished wooden cabinets modelled in the popular Art Deco “streamline” style of the times. Rather than an accessory, televisions of the 1930s and 1940s were large pieces of furniture and had little resemblance to today’s sets. Despite the large bodies, the screens themselves were only some 10-15″ wide diagonally.

These sets were sold in large, high-end New York department stores like Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, and Wanamaker’s. They went for anything from $199.50 to $600 per unit, which when calculated for inflation, is about $3,500 to $11,000 in today’s money. 

Around 7,000 sets were made in the US before WWII, and with such a massive price-tag, only around 2,000 sets were actually sold and in use across America. Most of the unsold units went into storage until after the end fo the war.

The first practical demonstration of television sets outside of those high-end department stores was the 1939-40 New York World’s Fair. There, visitors could visit the RCA Pavillion to see the “Hall of Television” with its thirteen TRK-12′s in action; as well as the “Radio Living Room of Tomorrow” and “Radio Living Room of Today,” which showed the technology at home in domestic settings. There were also live NBC broadcasts and opportunities for guests to be televised and see themselves on television — a unique novelty that came with an “I was televised” souvenir care to go with the experience. Other manufacturers at the World’s Fair also had their own television demonstrations, including General Electric, Westinghouse, General Motors, and Crosley.

So, what could those lucky 2,000 Americans watch? Well, televisions of this period could receive channels 1 through 5, and New York City had the only broadcast station. NBC began broadcasting regularly scheduled programming in 1939, along with CBS and Don Lee. Broadcasts ran for around 2-hours of content in the afternoon and 1-hour in the evenings. Programming during this time included all manner of content: sports, plays, operas, cartoons, cooking demonstrations, travelogues, fashions shows, skaters at Rockefeller Centre, and numerous live telecasts. The rest of the time viewers would only see the station’s test pattern.

WWII

All this slow progress came to a grinding halt when the US joined WWII. While some broadcasts continued, they were on a limited basis and included civil defence programming. All production of televisions was ceased, with engineers instead using their expertise for the production of radar and communications equipment for the military instead.

Post-WWII Growth

It wasn’t until after the end of WWII that television really got its explosion in popularity and became a household item for any aspiring middle-class family. At the end of the war, most people still didn’t know what a television even was, but only four years later, the majority had not only heard of them but wanted one. By 1949, the price of television sets had dropped and people were buying then at a rate of 100,000 a week! In addition to the drop in cost due to mass-production, families also benefited from suddenly having disposable income thanks to the post-war economic boom. By 1954 55.7% of households owned a television.

 Steve, Bucky, and Pre-21st Century Television

So, realistically, how familiar would our boys have been with television before post-thaw/deprogramming? Well, going on my own favourite headcanon than the 1939-40 New York World’s Fair can be used as an almost direct analogue to the 1942 Stark Expo, I think there were two scenarios in which the boy would have even come across a television in the US: 

Manhattan Department Store — Now I say Manhattan specifically, as despite Brooklyn having its own high-end department stores in Abraham & Straus and Frederick Loeser & Co., however, it doesn’t mean that they stocked televisions. My research seems to indicate that they were pretty exclusive products and only specific department stores stocked them — kind of the same way only certain car dealerships will sell you a Ferrari. Thus, I think if you were to go with the idea they say one in a department store display, you would have to assume they were inside one of the those gig-name Manhattan stores to even catch a glimpse. Seriously, they would not be catching a glace walking past a storefront, these would be deep inside for the distinguished partons.

Stark Expo — Again, assuming a degree of similarity between the real World’s Fair and the fictional Stark Expo, I think it’s fair to assume there would have been some sort of television demonstration. Now, whether the boys would have seen it is another thing. Bear in mind that these World Fair style attractions were MASSIVE, covering hundreds of acres of land, requiring internal transportation and remaining open for at least a year. Now, even if the Stark Expo was on a smaller scale, I doubt they saw even close to everything in just the evening they were there. So really I’d say its a 50/50 chance they saw a television there or not.

The only other place I think they would have possibly come in contact with television might be during the war, either:

While in Britain — Both Steve and Bucky would have (at least briefly) been in Britain during the war. Bucky, prior to deployment on the continent, and Steve with the Howlies during meetings with higher-ups. Television was actually more widely adopted in the UK, than in the US. Around 19,000 sets (compared to the US’s 7,000) were made in the UK, which assuming the rates of sale were similar would mean more than twice the number of sales. Broadcasting also started some years before those in the US. So, which all broadcasts were suspended the moment the war started, there is a chance that they would have come across a set sitting dormant somewhere or another.

Steve while on the USO tour in the home of a rich/famous donor — So one thing to consider is that Steve would have spent a while before Azzano hob-nobbing with the rich and famous as part of attempts to raid money for the war effort. And it’s not too outrageous to think that at least one of them would have owned a television and shown it off.

Other Points of Note

The first colour televisions did not come onto the scene until 1954.

There were, of course, no remote controls — not until 1950.

Image Sources

TRK-12 Promotional Photo, two women and one man | Source RCA TRK-12/120 (1939-40) | Source RCA TRK-9 (1939) | Source DuMont 180 (1939) | Source Working 1939 Art Deco Television Set | Source World’s Fair “Hall of Television” from the back w/o guests, 1939-40 | Source World’s Fair “Hall of Television” from the front w/ guests, 1939-40 | Source “I was Televised” Souvenir card (Front and Back), 1939-40 | Source

The full research document for this topic is available on the Discord’s “Patreon Clubhouse” channel ($3+ donors)

This post has been sponsored by my much loved and long-time Patreon supporter Joanna Daniels. She and I would like to dedicate the post to the loving memory of her mother Joan Daniels. She will be sorely missed.

[ Support SRNY through Patreon and Ko-Fi ] And join us on Discord for fun conversation! I also have an Etsy with upcycled nerdy crafts

[traumatized-motherfuckers]

Stress-based sickness, psychosomatic disorders, and the F word. Fibromyalgia.

Read up or listen up @t-mfrs.com (podcast available wherever you stream.)

Waking up, like I didn’t sleep for weeks. Falling asleep after five minutes on my feet. A pounding head. That sense of dread. Sticky sharp pains through in my shoulders and neck. Brain short on energy, missing a few cards from the deck. Waves of nausea and stomach cramps. Chills and sweats, depending on the body amps. Swollen lymph nodes. Muscle weakness poorly bodes. Insatiable hunger but nothing sounds edible - shit, now desire to throw up is incredible. Eyes shriveling, dry, back into my skull. The aches in my legs, pulsing and dull. Foggy thoughts. Racing heart. When will this end, why did this start?

Did I finally catch the ‘rona? Or am I just past my limit for being stressed out again? Well, I just moved, so this time I know that the answer is very likely… stressed.

So who wants to talk about getting sick? Yeah, among this group, the answer might be surprising. A lot of us do.

Why? Not because we love bitching and complaining when we feel less than ideal - spoilers, that’s every day, there’s really nothing left to say about the raging shit storms inside of us after a few years of it. We’re tired of hearing about it, too… just like we’re tired of living it, feeling it, and fearing it.

No, for us, it’s because it feels like there’s always a surprising ailment right around the corner when we least expect it. One that seemingly has no logical basis or reasonable solution. One that no one else understands. One that feels like it’s born of mental illness, somehow, while being very physically present. One that we don’t even bother bringing to doctors anymore, because no one needs to be shamed and shoved out the door again by their flippant disinterest in anything we say after the words, “Yes, I have anxiety.”

Yep. If you haven’t tried to mingle mental health with western medicine before, let me give you a quick disclaimer: unless you’re missing an arm, don’t bother. In my experience, the only thing you’ll get is an eye roll, possibly a prescription bandaid that somehow makes you feel worse, and a bored recommendation to see a psychiatrist - even if you already do.

All of this, of course, has the effect of only making you feel more upset. First, mentally, as you ruminate over the disrespect of essentially being called a liar just because the doctor doesn’t have enough training. Then, physically, as your increased stress and systemic arousal pushes your body into a new level of overdrive.

Oh, was it a mindfuck just to make the doctor appointment, get yourself there, and deal with the social anxiety of a waiting room for 30-120 minutes? I bet it felt great for someone to then invalidate your health concerns, recommend you calm down, and send you out the door without even looking you in the eye. Feeling more upset, now on a highly emotional basis? Enjoy the shame, hypertension, and lost sleep, as if you needed any more of that.

Today, I want to talk about the stress-central area of my health that hasn’t been completely figured out… and the label that I - embarrassingly - just recently learned is highly applicable to my physical condition.

But also, the outrage that I feel over said label, because, well, it explains nothing. In fact, if anything, it probably does all of us a huge disservice after we’re granted this diagnosis by pushing us into the express lane for being written off. It also separates two issues that are poorly explained, rather than combining them into one full picture that might actually yield answers. Oh, and should I mention that I think this is a larger problem of gender bias in the healthcare system? Yeah, why the fuck not. Might as well air all my grievances as a nice lead-in to another upcoming episode; is mental illness diagnosis skewed by gender?

I don’t want to let my pounding head and aching shoulders deter me too much, so let’s just get started.

History of ailments

I’ve talked about this before, but to briefly cover how fucked up this body is… let’s take a trip back to 2013 when my system failed me out of the blue. And by “out of the blue,” I mean that I had chronically overworked myself running on anxiety, obligation, and starvation for 2 years, leading to physiological revolt.

So, looking back, “duh.”

But at the time? This was all-new. It was crisis-inducing and beyond comprehension that I went from a perfectly healthy, physically resilient, surprisingly strong and low maintenance specimen to a chronically pained, systemically ill, digestively impaired, and constantly exhausted sack of wallowing self-hated.

After a lifetime of zero health concerns, I found myself bedridden and obsessed with every weird thing my body was doing to me. Which, as you’ve probably guessed, came hand in hand with the new weird things my brain was doing to me.

After a lifetime of zero health concerns, I found myself bedridden and obsessed with every weird thing my body was doing to me. Which, as you’ve probably guessed, came hand in hand with the new weird things my brain was doing to me.

You’ve probably heard the “What IS CPTSD?” episode by now, so I’m guessing you’re not a stranger to the details about the common emergence of complex trauma symptoms. Yes, that’s based on a lot of research, but it’s also a throwback to my own experience. I was a long time depression and anxiety lurker, first time complex trauma contributor around age 23, when my brain was suddenly uprooted by a series of new social and therapy-based traumas.

My depression became debilitating negative self-regard and stronger suicidal ideation. Suddenly, my social anxiety became agoraphobia. My new health issues became topics of obsessive and intrusive thoughts… you know, when I wasn’t ruminating about my role in every trauma, my worthlessness as a human, and my recently-unsettled childhood memories. My early twenties were a great time.

And with all the mental strain, came the unresolvable insomnia. Which fed right into the health problems. Which circled back to spark more mental duress. Health anxiety is not a fun way to live.

So, to call my illnesses psychosomatic is completely appropriate. But, also, completely insulting when a western medicine practitioner utters the phrase as if it was a turd slowly coming out the wrong end. And that’s exactly what happened every time I tried to seek help.

So, to call my illnesses psychosomatic is completely appropriate. But, also, completely insulting when a western medicine practitioner utters the phrase as if it was a turd slowly coming out the wrong end. And that’s exactly what happened every time I tried to seek help.

To be clear - back in the day I had some very easily detectable physical problems. I understand that doctors have a difficult job when it comes to interpreting the immeasurable inner experiences that their patients detail, but that wasn’t entirely the case here. When your body stops digesting food, well, there’s some evidence to prove that it’s a fact. When a 96oz medical grade laxative used for colonoscopy prep results in zero percent colon cleanse… uh… somebody isn’t doing their duty (pun intended). And boy, did my digestive system just decide that it was DONE doing its only job.

Everything I ate seemed to spark unpleasant physical responses, but moving materials through my guts and extracting nutrients wasn’t one of them. After months of garbage disposal failure, I was basically a walking sewer mixed with a compost pile. I found myself chronically starving, exhausted, puffy, distended, intestinally inflamed, and generally sickly. Your body doesn’t fare so well when it has no sustenance, it turns out.

At the same time, or maybe slightly predating my digestive protests, I started getting ill in weird ways. Things I had never experienced before started popping up, like chronic respiratory tract infections, sinus infections, and gum infections. I was having what seemed like allergic responses to something in my inner or outer environment. I was often covered in hives or my face and stomach were inflating like balloons for no apparent reason. I had near-constant pain in my continually-locked shoulders and neck. My actual skin, itself, hurt, as if I was being stretched to the brink of bursting. My lifelong migraines transformed into something new - disorienting tension migraines that came with horrifying loss-of-vision auras and feverish shakes.

Generally speaking, I was so tired all the time that I could barely get out of bed for more than a few moments before retreating back to my safe place to feel like garbage. My limbs felt like someone had tied weights to them and extracted several major muscle groups. I struggled even showering or washing my face, because both required holding my arms up higher than I was capable of enacting. I was so deliriously tired that I couldn’t see straight, think, or complete basic tasks.

Generally speaking, I was so tired all the time that I could barely get out of bed for more than a few moments before retreating back to my safe place to feel like garbage. My limbs felt like someone had tied weights to them and extracted several major muscle groups. I struggled even showering or washing my face, because both required holding my arms up higher than I was capable of enacting. I was so deliriously tired that I couldn’t see straight, think, or complete basic tasks.

On top of giving up my impressive life trajectory in the aftermath of the physical breakdown - because I was too fucking exhausted to consider the next steps I needed to take for grad school - this is also where I’ve previously mentioned my drive-aphobia coming into play. When you can’t count on your own faculties, you definitely don’t want to be behind the wheel. And suddenly, life gets very restricted.

I gave up my… anything life trajectory at that point. I went from a wildly social and focused student with a fantastic sense of humor about life and stronghold of self-determination to… Hiding indoors. Keeping isolated. Obsessing over my health. Googling the most embarrassing things late at night. Having no answers. Feeling like a crazy person. Hating myself. Fearing that this was the end. Assuming that my future was over. Guilting myself for fucking up my past. Replaying my tragic story of a rapid flight and a crash, after everything I had fought so hard to accomplish. Giving up.

This is riiiiight about where I pull most of my inspiration for talking about living in perpetual “trauma states” from. Being consistently triggered, out of control, and terrified. Having no answers and no one to even ask. Watching mental illness take over my world without the slightest clue of what was happening. And, oh, the perpetual torment of unpredictable physical breakdowns.

Everyday a new surprise. Every moment the opportunity for a shocking change in vitality. Every night a battle of my brain versus my chronic pains versus sleep.

And so it persisted, throughout 2013 and into several later years… despite the fact that I actually came up with an answer for myself that vastly improved a good part of the sickness struggle... but definitely didn’t fix it all.

Finding AN answer

I’m sure I’ve already mentioned this, too… but eventually I found some respite in my health struggles through no help from modern medicine. In fact, I helped myself thanks to familial clues when I decided to exclusion-diet my way into an answer. My grandpa had celiac’s disease long before it was trendy and I decided gluten was a logical place to start. And what do you know? That helped about 60% of my ailments.

So began years of obsessing over figuring out the gluten free life. Which, contrary to popular opinion, fucking sucks. I get that it became a trendy idea at exactly the wrong point in my life, but goddamnit, I hate the question, "Are you ACTUALLY gluten free, or is it by choice?" It is not a dietary walk in the park when essentially every item is contaminated with some form or another of secret sauce and your body is going to flip out at the slightest dusting.

I remember being so distraught over having these drastic dietary considerations to figure out on my own that I would spontaneously break down into tears in all sorts of places - the fridge, the grocery store, restaurants, social contexts when people kindly asked, “how about you choose where to eat this time.” I can’t choose! I can’t eat anything! I would privately bawl to myself. What a fun time that was.

But that was not nearly the end of it.

It turned out, yes, entirely cutting the glutens helped immensely. I also realized that sugar was not my friend. In fact, processed anything was not going to have a great outcome. But then… there was this other weird pattern that I started noticing in my life… sometimes I was pretty healthy and (relatively speaking) happy with the way things were going off-wheat. But sometimes I was just as sickly and digestively screwed when I definitely hadn’t consumed anything questionable. As if other tried and true components of my diet randomly became gluten analogs that upset me just as much.

Plus, there were some ailments that just never seemed to go away. The insomnia was a persistent problem that stretched back to being about 5 years old, but got more severe with time. The aches and pains in my neck and shoulders only worsened, no matter how many tennis balls I rolled on, yoga classes I attended, or muscle relaxers I popped. The exhaustion came and went with connections to my mental health and diet, but not directly related to bready food items. The brain fog didn’t clear up when I had a strictly regimented diet. The tension migraines never fully returned from where they came.

Plus, there were some ailments that just never seemed to go away. The insomnia was a persistent problem that stretched back to being about 5 years old, but got more severe with time. The aches and pains in my neck and shoulders only worsened, no matter how many tennis balls I rolled on, yoga classes I attended, or muscle relaxers I popped. The exhaustion came and went with connections to my mental health and diet, but not directly related to bready food items. The brain fog didn’t clear up when I had a strictly regimented diet. The tension migraines never fully returned from where they came.

I was still finding myself bedridden and ready to give up on the whole idea of living on a semi-regular basis. Sometimes it was every two weeks, sometimes once a month, sometimes a few months apart. But I never knew why, how long it would last, or how to control the system-wide failures.

And if you want to know how western medicine helped me with any of these continued challenges… it didn’t. I tried to get answers for years before I finally gave up. Every doctor turned me away. Every specialist was critically uninterested. Even the Mayo Clinic neglected to listen to what I said or utilize applicable resources, after I was so sure they could solve the medical mystery of my life.

So. I stopped trying at a certain point. I resolved myself to being health anxious and perpetually confused by myself. I realized that I would never know what any day was going to bring, because my discomforts and continued sicknesses seemed to come and go with the tides.

Eventually, after years of this bullshit, it got a bit better. I buckled down with - you guessed it - strict routines designed to circumvent some of the challenges.

Eventually, after years of this bullshit, it got a bit better. I buckled down with - you guessed it - strict routines designed to circumvent some of the challenges.

I realized that my diet needed to be incredibly tight, and by that, I mean “boring.” Beyond gluten, I cut out basically everything sugary, carby, and processed. I noticed that without a certain variety of physical exercise on a regimented basis, everything started slipping. I prioritized finding ways to get to sleep at night, even if it meant being rigid and assessed as “dramatic” by less slumber-impaired humans. I gave up any activities that caused neck and shoulder strain, and tried to be better about things like stretching. I also noticed that dealing with my emotions was a gateway to pain and discomfort relief, which was an uphill battle all it’s own. And, you know, eventually I learned about this Complex Trauma thing that explained a HUGE part of early to mid twenties, including a majority of the physical ailments.

But, although I began to live like an above-averagely healthy human again… I’ve still always had a few mysteries about my health.

Sure, over the course of many years I’ve figured out how to live with a semi-predictable body after long periods of never knowing what tomorrow would bring. But, unfortunately, there are still times when my system throws me a curveball. During those unanticipated spans of health failure, I’m left ruminating on a question or three that haven’t ever been answered consistently.

One of the most common inquiries is coming at you next.

Stress or sick?

So, even after all my life changes and careful modifications. All my sacrifices and seemingly over-the-top regimes. I’ve still had an ongoing health obsession that pops up from time to time when my shit starts to go downhill.

The incrementally-observed question that runs through my head on repeat… “Wait, am I communicably sick, or am I just fucking stressed out again?”

The incrementally-observed question that runs through my head on repeat… “Wait, am I communicably sick, or am I just fucking stressed out again?”

I realized a while back - maybe in my mid-late twenties - that holy hell, I sure felt like I was coming down with the flu more often than it was logical. The thing was, my symptoms only ever progressed to the point of feeling like I was still actively fighting off the sickness as it took hold. I would get the temperature dysregulation, the headache, the muscle pain, the foggy feeling, and oh boy, the exhaustion - that generally serve as your first signs of contagious trouble.

I would be too deliriously tired to get up and do anything. If I made myself go to work, it felt like wading through a dream. Half present, half falling asleep at my desk. My body felt like it weighed a thousand pounds. Even my head was too heavy for my neck to manage the task.

Beyond the energy void, I would genuinely start to experience pre-illness complaints, like swollen lymph nodes, congestion, and the aforementioned shivers and shakes. I would find myself incredibly hungry, as though my immune system was ramping up for a fight. I would get weak, like all my electrolytes were purged from my body. I would characterize the experience as feeling “generally under the weather” in preparation for something much larger slamming into town.

Beyond the energy void, I would genuinely start to experience pre-illness complaints, like swollen lymph nodes, congestion, and the aforementioned shivers and shakes. I would find myself incredibly hungry, as though my immune system was ramping up for a fight. I would get incredibly weak, like all my electrolytes were purged from my body. I would characterize the experience as feeling “generally under the weather” in preparation for something much larger slamming into town.

And I would respond in kind. I would retreat to bed, Nyquil and vitamin C showering over me on frequent intervals, gearing up for the systemic war of a lifetime. I would drift in and out of sleep for a day or two, fending off the weird muscle aches and sweat sessions that come with an emerging fever. Interestingly, many of my old food reactivities would rear up during this period. I would get my neti pot and vomit-bags ready for action.

And then… nothing else would happen. Assuming I chilled out and retreated to a state of forfeit when I actually treated myself with kindness and care, everything would work out. After 1-5 days of being back in my bedridden state, determined that significant contagious sickness was headed my way, it would seem to just disappear overnight. Or, clear up by about 70% overnight, to be more realistic.

It took several rounds of this pattern - I couldn’t tell you how many - before I finally realized… heyyo, my body shuts the fuck down when I’m stressed out. Every time I experienced one of these sudden falls from health, it followed (or ran in tandem with) a period of significant stress, anxiety, and/or depression. And if I let myself relax for a week, it would all be okay. If I tried to push through it because ObLiGaTiOnS, I was signing myself up for a prolonged and far more serious health failure. It happened too many times; I knew it wasn’t a coincidence. Like I had postulated earlier in my adulthood - my health seemed to be drastically affected by my mental state. Particularly, my interpretations of stress, obligations, and fears.

And I can tell you, my health anxiety quieted down for a while in the aftermath of the acceptance. Call it immersion therapy. When you’ve experienced the same event over and over again, but A never leads to B, and C-alming your shit makes condition A disappear  back into the ethers... well, eventually you take it for what it is and just stop panicking so much. I think I got tired of preoccupying myself with the whole dumpster fire at some point and preferred to extinguish the flames by letting them run their course.

This is where I’ve lived for the past many years now. Realizing that if I push myself too hard mentally or physically, or if I let too many stress signals infiltrate my brain… I’m about to get fucked up. My health will slip quickly. I will be reactive to essentially every food on this planet. My body will be puffy, inflamed, and painful. Not to mention, so goddamn tired all the time. But that’s it. It won’t last forever. I’m not going to die. Telling myself the opposite makes it all last a lot longer. Don’t pile stress about your stress-induced sickness onto your existing stress, and you'll be better soon.

This is where I’ve lived for the past many years now. Realizing that if I push myself too hard mentally or physically, or if I let too many stress signals infiltrate my brain… I’m about to get fucked up. My health will slip quickly. I will be reactive to essentially every food on this planet. My body will be puffy, inflamed, and painful. Not to mention, so goddamn tired all the time. But that’s it. It won’t last forever. I’m not going to die. Telling myself the opposite makes it all last a lot longer. Don’t pile stress about your stress-induced sickness onto your existing stress, and you'll be better soon.

And yet, when it’s happening, I also never know for a fact that my stress-based illness is definitely what’s going on. The result is getting trapped in a “will I or won’t I” obsessive spiral of anticipating the worst while reassuring myself that it might be nothing at all. There’s a lot of internal and external conversation about it, as people want to know if you’re sick and you want to be able to warn them that you feel like death… but also have to throw in the caveat, “Iunno, you have to realize that this happens to me all the time and it’s usually nothing, though.”

Of course, this creates the opportunity for my brain to 1) tell me I’m probably fine, quit complaining, pussy, and 2) compare myself to everyone else on the planet, who doesn’t crumble when their brain interprets times are hard. Because, of course, I have to make myself feel mentally ridiculous for feeling physically horrible. Other people are always happy to help in this regard, too. "You sure get sick a lot. I thought you had the flu last month. Wow, it always seems like something is wrong with you." Mhm, I feel the same on all accounts.

And, Fuckers, that’s why I stopped talking about it or looking for answers a long time ago. Instead, I've just relied on the most logical answer and quit worrying. I’ve done enough research on my own, not to mention all my Animal Science schooling, to know how stress responses work. They’re significant. They have the potential to disrupt your entire body through hormonal dysregulation. And they work differently - as far as we can tell - depending on the organism.

So that’s what I’ve leaned on. Acknowledgement that stress really screws with me. It zaps my energy. It fogs up my brain. It makes me overstimulated. It causes weird pains and immune system responses. It churns up my digestive problems. It also makes me feel like I’m starving but nauseous all at once. Over long periods of time, it can lead to infections. It, obviously, ruins my sleep, which reaaaaally doesn’t help with any of it.

So that’s what I’ve leaned on. Acknowledgement that stress really screws with me. It zaps my energy. It fogs up my brain. It makes me overstimulated. It causes weird pains and immune system responses. It churns up my digestive problems. It also makes me feel like I’m starving but nauseous all at once. Over long periods of time, it can lead to infections. It, obviously, ruins my sleep, which reaaaaally doesn’t help with any of it.

That’s that. Pretty complicated but simple. Try not to stress yourself out and god help you, if you do. Chill for a few days and you’ll be alright, probably. No one knows why it happens. Doctors don’t care. Just watch out for yourself, because no one else deals with this shit.

Unless… they totally do.

So, that’s fibromyalgia

I guess this is where I tell you something that a lot of folks have probably already figured out. Sorry if you’ve been yelling at me through your headphones this whole time - chill, I’m getting to it.

There definitely is a term for everything I’ve described. There are millions of other people who experience it. And, yeah, doctors often still don’t believe it’s real… but the numbers and anecdotal evidence don’t lie.

Ever heard of fibromyalgia?

Of course you have. But have you ever really looked into what it meant? Because… I hadn’t.

Annnnd then a listener and I were chatting on Instagram a few weeks ago. And she mentioned... everything I just mentioned. And her diagnosis had been? Fibromyalgia.

Annnnd then a listener and I were chatting on Instagram a few weeks ago. And she mentioned... everything I just mentioned. And her diagnosis had been? Fibromyalgia.

Via DM, your fellow Fucker started telling me about being tired all the time, mysterious aches and pains that worsen with stress, IBS symptoms, improper temperature regulation, and over-exertion that leads to required days of recovery. My jaw hit the floor.

You know I hopped online and started doing more research of my own. And all of the information was confirmed and expanded upon in a way that drove my mandible straight into the basement.

Hey, you know how fibromyalgia is synonymous with “widespread pain?” Oh shit, if you dig into it, there is a lot more to learn. Here’s a (maybe, complete?) list of the currently known associated symptoms. Keep in mind, I couldn’t find a single comprehensive resource for this information. This list is compiled of information from the the peer-reviewed article I'm going to read from later, the American College of Rheumatology, the CDC, Healthline, and Medical News Today. And if it sounds like a bit of a "catch all" pile, I think you're right.

Pain and stiffness all over the body

Fatigue and tiredness

Depression and anxiety

Sleep problems

Problems with thinking, memory, and concentration, known as “fibro-fog”

Headaches, including migraines

Tingling or numbness in hands and feet

Pain in the face or jaw

Digestive problems, such as abdominal pain, bloating, constipation, and irritable bowel syndrome

Tenderness to touch or pressure affecting muscles, sometimes joints or even the skin

Irritable or overactive bladder

Pelvic pain

Trouble focusing or paying attention

Pain or a dull ache in the lower belly

Dry eyes

Sleeping for long periods of time without feeling rested (nonrestorative sleep)

Acid reflux

Restless leg syndrome

Sensitivity to cold or heat

Problems with vision

Nausea

Weight gain

Dizziness

Cold or flu-like symptoms

Skin problems

Chest symptoms

Breathing problems

Insulin resistance

Wait, wait, wait. THAT’S what fibro is? Because, I’m sorry, I have literally never heard any of that detail before… and although it gets so ambiguous that I suspect these ailments are all the conditions that just haven't been explained before by medical science... this list just described my life. All the way down to the tiniest detail of dry eyes, as I now recall chronically dumping drops into mine for those same years in my 20s. What. The. Shit.

Prior to this research, my symptomatic knowledge of fibro was essentially - pain, of the unexplained and incurable variety. No one ever once has mentioned anything else about the condition to me, or allll the ways that it correlated with my years of health trauma. Not my peers, not my doctors, and not even my amazing, well-informed therapist.    

So, maybe I’m really late to the game here, but long story short, my mind was blown when I heard that there’s actually a term for this experience which I had forfeited to processing as a “unique way that my body individually destroys me” for all these years. I thought I was just uniquely uncomfortable all the time and stopped burdening others with my experiences.

So, maybe I’m really late to the game here, but long story short, my mind was blown when I heard that there’s actually a term for this experience which I had forfeited to processing as a “unique way that my body individually destroys me” for all these years. I thought I was just uniquely uncomfortable all the time and stopped burdening others with my experiences.

Maybe that’s why I never had anyone clue me in to the diagnosis - I honestly stopped talking about the cyclical sickness a while back, after recognizing that people didn’t respond favorably to the narrative, “I just get too stressed out to function.” Shutting my mouth and writing off my experiences may have halted my potential for hearing a realistic account of living with fibromyalgia. Oh, how the trauma shame shenanigans never stop royally fucking you.

Of course, based on my own recent education, now I’m wondering if fibromyalgia applies to far more of us in the trauma community. Because if I hadn’t found reliable information on it in all my trauma and inflammatory illness research over the years… how many other people are in the same boat?

And this brings me to my next point. I really hate the term fibromyalgia.

Why I hate the term

There’s actually another explanation for why I never heard about everything that fibromyalgia describes. Uh, you’re going to hate me for this, but I didn’t think it was a “real” diagnosis.

Yep. I’m telling you with moderate guilt that for the longest time, I appraised fibro in the same way that western medicine considers all psychosomatic illnesses - not valid. And I’m unhappy with myself, too. Believe me, I feel like my least favorite kind of person... a hypocrite. But this also points to the systemic issue that undermines so many of our attempts to get help, and that makes me far more unhappy.

Yep. I’m telling you with moderate guilt that for the longest time, I appraised fibro in the same way that western medicine considers all psychosomatic illnesses - not valid. And I’m unhappy with myself, too. Believe me, I feel like my least favorite kind of person... a hypocrite. But this also points to the systemic issue that undermines so many of our attempts to get help, and that makes me far more unhappy.

You see, a number of years ago, as a budding counselor with a few years of experience, my therapist friend mentioned something about fibro. Specifically, that it was a common label granted to more seriously mentally affected patients… and it wasn’t believed to be a real thing. I wish I could remember more detail on the context, but the basis of the story is, someone that I trusted - someone with many trauma patients - told me that in her experience, no one took fibromyalgia seriously. People with intense mental illnesses regularly presented with unfounded complaints of pain, and this is the term they were assigned as a result.

There was no proof of their physical discomfort. The patients tended to have myriad mental and physical health issues. They tended to be more difficult clients. Professionals had doubts about how serious the complaints were. No evidence, no respect. It was just about that simple.

To give more weight to the story, here’s one quick excerpt that is actually validating to read, from an article titled, The management of fibromyalgia from a psychosomatic perspective: an overview.

“People with FM often reported dismissive attitudes from others, such as disbelief, stigmatization, lack of acceptance by their relatives, friends, coworkers, and the healthcare system, that consider them as ‘lazy’ or ‘attention seeking’ people, with their symptoms ‘all in their head’. Such dismissiveness can have a substantial negative impact on patients, who are already distressed, and also on the degree of their pain.”

So… similar to the asshole social associates described above… for years after that, I paid no attention to fibromyalgia. When people brought it up, I nodded and moved on. I didn’t disbelieve that there would be a connection between mental illness and the onset of bodily pains after my own experiences, but the term had also been shuttled to a file in my head that sidled up next to, “seeking prescription pain meds.” This was an incorrect judgement based on incorrect, oversimplified information. But unfortunately, it left an impression.

So… similar to the assholes described above… for years after that, I paid no attention to fibromyalgia. When people brought it up, I nodded and moved on. I didn’t disbelieve that there would be a connection between mental illness and the onset of bodily pains after my own experiences, but the term had also been shuttled to a file in my head that sidled up next to, “seeking prescription pain meds.” This was an incorrect judgement based on incorrect, oversimplified information. But unfortunately, it left an impression.

It took the real life account of someone with the diagnosis to show me all the ways that my previous perception was completely incorrect. I suddenly realized how reductive and insulting the false information had been. Annnd all the ways that I could have really helped myself and a few others a lot sooner if I had just investigated the term on my own, rather than lazily falling back on someone else’s casually-expressed opinion.

So, I’m saying… fuck me. 100%. That makes me really upset with myself. But it makes me even more frustrated with the medical field.

And this is why I hate the term fibromyalgia.

It doesn’t actually explain a fucking thing… and it doesn’t seem like anyone is actually trying to.

At this point, there is no known cause for the development or persistence of the disorder. Fibromyalgia has essentially become more of a label for a grouping of symptoms that we “allow” people to assume when we don’t know what the hell might be wrong with them. I say “allow” very purposely, because it feels like our medical overlords have granted us this word as a way to pacify the uncomfortable masses - not treat them.

At this point, there is no known cause or organic mechanism for the development or persistence of the disorder. Fibromyalgia has essentially become more of a label for a grouping of symptoms that we “allow” people to assume when we don’t know what the hell might be wrong with them. I say “allow” very purposely, because it feels like our medical overlords have granted us this word as a way to pacify the uncomfortable masses - not treat them.

Millions of humans have detailed the same experiences, but science hasn’t yet come up with a way to explain them, so let’s go ahead and give them a new diagnosis that boils down to “Not sure what’s going on, but they say it’s unpleasant and it sounds a little something like widespread pain. Cool, let’s call it a day. Nah, we don’t need to educate the medical community or the public - we don’t need a single list of all the known comorbidities - because we don’t get it, ourselves. Let’s make sure we put that disclaimer right in the definition, so everyone knows it’s a controversial topic."

And implicit in saying that doctors and scientists don’t understand the term, comes a negative connotation of assumed delusion or attention-seeking complaints.

Essentially, what I’m bitching about is the tendency of researchers and practitioners to shuttle things they can’t directly measure to the back of the relevancy line. Despite all of the anecdotal evidence from fibro sufferers that corroborate the same causes, symptoms, and outcomes… we can’t see what they’re talking about and we don’t have an easy explanation, so we put this in the “fake news” stack of information - AKA psychosomatic illness.

Now, it’s also worth mentioning that fibromyalgia is deeply intertwined with trauma. Something like 2/3rds of fibro patients also have confirmed PTSD symptoms, if not higher. Exact numbers depend on which study you trust. Just know, it is a prevalent, accepted, correlation between trauma and the development of fibromyalgia. And of course, no one has determined the causative or affective relationship between the two at this point in time.

Hell, we all know that a lot of mental and physical health professionals don’t even want to acknowledge trauma at this point - or, do so with a smirk and an eyebrow raise, at best. So tethering the two poorly-comprehended disorders together? Oh boy, it’s a sure-fire way to ensure that no one listens to a word you say after honestly answering their background information questions. Might as well throw down your wallet and walk yourself right out of the office at that point.

Hell, we all know that a lot of mental and physical health professionals don’t even want to acknowledge trauma at this point - or, do so with a smirk and an eyebrow raise, at best. So tethering the two poorly-comprehended disorders together? Oh boy, it’s a sure-fire way to ensure that no one listens to a word you say after honestly answering their background information questions. Might as well throw down your wallet and walk yourself right out of the office at that point.

The medical field’s lack of trauma education is a big problem. Making “psychosomatic” a dirty word isn’t helping millions of folks out there. Being invalidated by the people who could possibly help you is another mental health crisis waiting to happen. And all of this is infuriating to me, following my own experiences and thinking about other people’s.

Should we take this one outrage step further? Sure.

You know that a vast majority of fibromyalgia sufferers are… women. Sorry, about to get a tad feminist. Is anyone here surprised that primarily female voices tend to be written off by medical professionals? Ha, ha, ha. No, probably not.

For all of human history, the ladies have been getting the shit end of the stick when it comes to medical care. We all know that women were given amazing explanations for their ailments, such as having “hysterics” or "the vapors" not so long ago.

Furthermore, there is research showing that doctors do not take women’s accounts of pain severity seriously, in particular. Even fellow female doctors and nurses are given different treatment by staff when they go to the ER, versus male counterparts. And if you’re a minority or socioeconomically challenged woman? The data says you might as well take two aspirin and see what happens the next morning, because the medical attention research is even worse for those demographics. Huge surprise.

So, pulling this all together: Considering that the majority of us who receive complex trauma diagnoses are women… considering that implicit in this label, comes the increased likelihood that we’re not economically well-to-do and belong to minority groups one way or another… how do you figure we’ve ever had a chance of receiving real help for our unmeasurable physical conditions?  

So, pulling this all together: Considering that the majority of us who receive complex trauma diagnoses are women… considering that implicit in this label, comes the increased likelihood that we’re not economically well-to-do and belong to minority groups… how do you figure we’ve ever had a chance of receiving real help for our unmeasurable physical conditions?  

Yeah, we haven’t.

We’ve been given a term - complete with a wink and a nudge - that no one wants to meaningfully research or prioritize understanding. We’ve received a new phrase that doctors will “generously grant us” when we’re drowning in unexplained symptoms and pain. We’re then labeled with a word that essentially amounts to “disregard and humor” for all our future appointments. On top of it all, we’re carrying the burden of traumatic histories, which immediately qualify us for misunderstood diagnoses that more or less equate “ghosts in their blood” - because, hell, we can’t quantify mental illness, either.

The whole ordeal makes me really upset. The fact that I was inadvertently pulled into this biased disbelief makes me more upset. It also serves as quite a demonstration of how powerful or deleterious knowledge can be after it worms its way into your head involuntarily and becomes your only “go-to” piece of data, true or false.

One seemingly-trustworthy person mentioning a negative opinion of fibromyalgia one time in my past somehow infiltrated my thoughts to the extent that I didn’t have a second thought for 5 years? And we're talking about a goddamn trauma researcher - with, what I consider - an otherwise open and connection-happy mind?

The power of assumed authority and truth in opinion is significant. If I can be swayed in this way, how could less mental health informed medical professionals stand a chance in responding differently? That’s frightening and clarifying… though immensely upsetting.

So, since biomedicine hasn’t bothered to find any great information for us, despite the rapidly increasing rate of fibromyalgia diagnoses in the past two decades - how can we make sense of the information to actually help ourselves?

Let’s talk about that next.

What we can conclude

So it kindof blows finding out that you probably qualify for a new medical term… only to find out that we don’t actually know anything about said term. I say this, because if you’re waiting for me to pop off with some sweet research on fibromyalgia… uh… I haven’t found it yet. But not for lack of trying. So far every article I’ve seen has been pretty basic and uninspired.

Does fibromyalgia correspond with trauma? It does. Does stress mediate and moderate fibromyalgia, PTSD symptoms, GI problems, and depression? It does. Does it take a long time and numerous appointments to receive medical help for fibromyalgia complaints? It does. Does the comorbidity of post-traumatic symptoms make fibro more uncomfortable and challenging to overcome? What do you know - it fucking does.

(Wow. So enlightening. Having two debilitating disorders is less fun than having one. Who’s funding these research studies, anyways?)

The first thing I can conclude is, there’s not that much to conclude. This is to say, no one - that I’ve seen, so far - has revealed anything super shocking or thought-provoking about fibromyalgia.

The first thing I can conclude is, there’s not that much to conclude. This is to say, no one - that I’ve seen, so far - has revealed anything super shocking or thought-provoking about fibromyalgia.

Really, the  most interesting things I learned from my reading are that

1) insulin resistance is another associated disorder, which explains even more of my baffling life

2) sex hormones are leached from your system under stress, which, refer to point number one... explains another huge chunk of my existence, and

3) the recommendations for treating fibro long term are the same recommendations I’ve given for getting your trauma life re-ordered.

You know how I always push for people to find out what’s manageable on their own through trial and error, rather than approaching trauma recovery with preventable fires burning in every area? Hey - someone agrees.

Namely, it's recommended that in order to manage fibromyalgia you establish routines including strictly nutrition-based eating habits, non-threatening forms of consistent exercising, prioritizing tons of sleep, and controlling your environment as much as possible for stressful stimuli. Doctors can also supplement your rehab with antidepressants, because, again, fibromyalgia is related to the same underlying hormonal imbalances as depression - but the larger health issues are managed best by changing your behaviors. Just like I’ve said.

I suppose this is no surprise, since this entire time I’ve unknowingly been talking, in large part, about how I’ve controlled my own fibromyalgia symptoms. I just thought it was mandatory trauma pains I was dampening. But the word is out! There's a separate phrase for it. The doctors and I agree; stop treating yourself like a turd, and maybe you’ll stop feeling like one. Whatdoyouknow. Sometimes there are reasons for the things I notice experientially, even if they aren’t originally informed by medical lingo.

Secondly, looking at what we can conclude at this point about fibro… Well, it justifies my previous hypothesis that stress is the root of my body’s evil. There’s not much to definitively say about fibromyalgia at this point, but we know for a fact that it is agitated and potentially caused by stress.

Secondly, looking at what we can conclude at this point about fibro… Well, it justifies my previous hypothesis that stress is the root of my body’s evil. There’s not much to definitively say about fibromyalgia at this point, but we know for a fact that it is agitated and potentially caused by stress.

This perfectly aligns with my observations that a terrible work week mixed with a personally challenging month on top of a physically exhausting cleaning marathon will lead to a systemic breakdown every time. And, conversely, those times when life has actually been pretty chill correspond to periods of bodily health and limited upset - the times when I wonder “was I ever really sick at all?” and start to health gaslight my damn self.

Realizing the link between stress and sickness, of course, also begins to explain the correlation to trauma, and particularly, complex trauma.

Now, let me start by saying that there’s some debate over the downstream effects of PTSD - some researchers swear that it decreases system arousal in the face of later stress, others have collected data reflecting that a nervous system hyper-sensitization takes place. From my own trauma involvement, I’ve seen and heard more cases of the latter; we’re quick to upset and easily pushed into stressed territory. I don’t know many, if any, trauma folks who are non-responsive to disturbing life events... but that sounds more like a deep, dangerous, clinical depression symptom to me.

Personally, once I’ve been chronically stressed for a few weeks or months, then I notice the loss of stress response take over. My limbic system gives up, the HPA axis stops responding, and therefore nothing can rattle me. Perhaps you’ve also had the experience of laughing when your car breaks down, because it’s already been 3 months of disaster around every turn and there’s nothing else you can do for yourself. So, sure, people can reach a point where they legitimately don’t respond to the chaos anymore, but I’m not so sure that’s a consistent norm. I think it’s more likely that you turn off your stress reactions if you’ve been adequately prepped to dissociate for the sake of sanity or your chemical balance is so wack that your danger center has powered down.

I can tell you without a doubt that before the point when my stress threshold has been raised sky-high thanks to repeat exposures and wiring disconnections... I’m a rapid-responder when anxiety comes calling. Stimulus - rapid survival reaction - no space in between being startled and shaking from head to toe. And this is the case for basically every Motherfucker I know. I’m no expert, but I think we tend to fall more into the hypervigilant camp surrounding this podcast, rather than the laxadonical one. Always on the lookout, always ready, often bowled over by our own responses.

I’m a rapid-responder when anxiety comes calling. Stimulus - rapid survival reaction - no space in between being startled and shaking from head to toe. And this is the case for every Motherfucker I know. I’m no expert, but I think we tend to fall more into the hypervigilant camp surrounding this podcast, rather than the laxadonical one. Always on the lookout, always ready, often bowled over by our own responses

This nervous system sensitization, as they call it, explains a lot of trauma symptoms. I’ve regularly discussed the hypersensitivity problem it creates, when your brain doesn’t adequately filter out or assess neutral stimuli because it considers basically everything to be a threat. This can also contribute to the ADD and ADHD diagnoses that we receive, when our heads are too busy trying to sort all that data streaming in to direct our thoughts in a steady way. Or, the ways that we’re uniquely thrown immediately into panic mode when we sense a risk. Plus, we’ve probably all had the experience of tiny, secret triggers sneakily upsetting our bodies when the stimulation wasn’t even significant enough to pass through our cognitive recognition centers. These are all caused by the same systemic over-sensitization problem.

In general: yes, we trauma folk are sensitive to our environments - inner and outer. We are easily pushed down survival pathways to fight/flight/freeze/fawn responses. We rapidly catastrophize ambiguous information, which can convince our brains and bodies that the worst has already happened. We’re hyperaware and easily overstimulated, often agitated, and regularly on edge.

I maintain, in the face of controversial evidence, that we get stressed out easily. And our bodies react dramatically.

I feel like I should also state that this is especially true, as most of us have read, when we have unresolved emotional strain floating around in our meat jackets. We can be overstimulated and aroused (in a bad way) from the inside, out. Since the majority of us are not skilled in emotional recognition or resolution, we’re often walking around with a lifetime of hard feelings stored in our guts. And there’s been roughly zero doubt in my head about emotional and environmental stress contributing to dissociation, contributing to a vagal nerve shutdown as a big part of the digestive failure that characterizes fibromyalgia, IBS, Crohns, and so many autoimmune disorders.

On top of the unresolved emotional root of stress, this pings another episode that I've previously released. The one about being overly restrictive in your diet and exercise for the sake of appearance perfectionism. If you physically exert yourself too strongly through caloric deprivation or extreme work outs, you can easily stress your body into a survival response. It can't tell the difference between starvation for bikini season and starvation for lack of food. Running your ass off for your upcoming wedding or running your ass off for your upcoming bear attack. Your danger sensing center is sensitive and it overreacts, much like myself.

Now, considering that all these examples of central nervous system sensitization and physiological survival states that go hand in hand with Complex Trauma and Fibromyalgia, so many weird health mysteries are potentially resolved. But, not exactly the pain component. Or, is it.

Now, considering that all these examples of central nervous system sensitization and physiological survival states that go hand in hand with Complex Trauma and Fibromyalgia, so many weird health mysteries are potentially resolved. But, not exactly the pain component. Or, is it.  

Again, the authors out of Italy and Brazil who penned, The management of fibromyalgia from a psychosomatic perspective: an overview, have a potential way to think about that. They state:

“Even if the causes and pathophysiology of FM are not completely known, widespread chronic pain could be explained by a vulnerability due to a perturbation in the central processing of sensory information, named ‘central sensitivity’ or ‘central sensitization’, that amplifies the response of the central nervous system to a peripheral input. Hence, people with FM and/or other central sensitivity syndromes have a lower threshold for interpreting sensory information as noxious. Several factors, such as genetic predisposition, deficiencies in neurotransmitter levels, biochemical changes in the body, endocrine dysfunction, mood states, anxiety, sociocultural environment, psychological trauma and past experiences in general, expectancy beliefs, and catastrophization have been proposed as explanatory mechanisms of patients’ subjective experience of central sensitivity. Current research indicates that abnormal sensory and pain processing is a key factor in the pathophysiology of FM. There is robust evidence that  abnormalities in central pain processing, rather than damage or inflammation of peripheral structures, play an important role in the development and maintenance of chronic pain in patients with FM.”

Interesting, huh? I still think inflammatory responses are a big part of the 1000 piece stress puzzle, but I don’t disagree with the idea that our finely-tuned danger detection systems amplify pain and discomfort signals to deafening levels. Putting all the system data together, you can deduce a fairly complete picture of how strain, physical degradation, and pain are all related.

Finally, I have confirmation that being overly stimulated causes everything from my energy drain to my dietary responses, migraines, and autoimmune attacks... all the way down to my temperature sensitivity, random presentation of allergic reactions, and even that occasional sharp pain in my jaw… not to mention all my life-altering functional problems, like being unable to sleep at night, existing with debilitating pain, and living while feeling sedated?

Finally, I have confirmation that being overly stimulated causes everything from my energy drain to my dietary responses, migraines, and autoimmune attacks... all the way down to my temperature sensitivity, random presentation of allergic reactions, and even that occasional sharp pain in my jaw… not to mention all my life-altering functional problems, like being unable to sleep at night, existing with debilitating pain, and living while feeling sedated?

All of my strange health complaints from the past decade have aligned with this new label. And that label corresponds perfectly with my inkling that running on cortisol and overzealous guardsmen have been the major source of my health anxiety sauce. Welp, it’s been validating research for all of my educated guesses, to say the least.

Long story short, there’s not a ton of helpful information about the reasons for developing fibromyalgia or what makes it get worse. But there’s one thing we do know for a fact; stress is the enemy. At least I think it’s comforting to conclude that stress is the root of many of our C-PTSD complaints, as well as depression, anxiety, insomnia, obsessive thoughts, and now… a whole list of common maladies, labeled fibromyalgia.

Whether or not it’s really understood, at least there is a connection between everything. At least there’s something that ties ALL the random, disjointed pieces of torture together. I’m guessing that for many of us, fibromyalgia is similar to complex trauma, again, in that regard.

And, lastly, I can conclude that… I have more questions

More questions than answers

Here’s one last excerpt from the aforementioned article, which is the only one I found that’s worth hearing from.

They state: “FM is labelled, often with a negative connotation, as a ‘functional somatic syndrome’, part of a ‘somatization disorder’, ‘fashionable diagnosis’, ‘idiopathic pain disorder’, ‘non-disease’, ‘psychosomatic syndrome’, dismissing the true suffering of the patients. In the absence of a univocal identified biological cause, subjective reports of symptoms by the patients are often viewed derogatorily and discredited as ‘psychogenic.’”

Like I said, there isn’t a lot of helpful information out there if you’re looking to learn more about this controversial condition. Unfortunately, it has been categorized as a “functional somatic disorder” which essentially means that we don’t have an explanation for the organic basis of the disorder.

Like I said, there isn’t a lot of helpful information out there if you’re looking to learn more about this controversial condition. Unfortunately, it has been categorized as a “functional somatic disorder” which essentially means that we don’t have an explanation for the organic basis of the disorder.

Uh, I don’t know what could be more organic than the endogenous hormones in our own bodies creating downstream health effects, but hey, I’m not a biologist anymore, what do I know?

The fact remains - there’s a lot more to understand about the assorted mechanisms that lead from trauma into depression, generalized stress disorder, and physical manifestations of a biochemical system that’s running off-balance. And this is where I have the biggest questions.

First, I have to get this out of the way. I’m wondering about the known gender split in fibro. The numbers are horrendously skewed towards women as the primary sufferers, and that’s not helping the medical legitimacy case. So, what are the chances that men just don’t have fibromyalgia at the same rate as women? Either they don’t get stressed to the same magnitude or their bodies respond completely differently? It’s possible. OR. Is it something else?

It seems to me like this follows another similar mystery - what are the chances that men just don’t suffer from Complex Trauma at the same rate as women? Pretty poor? Probably more of a diagnostic or seeking-help issue? Yeah, I think so, too. Yet, if you look strictly at the numbers, it sure seems like there are more women hearing about C-PTSD than men.

This analogous labeling issue between the genders makes me think of a few explanations…

1) Men don’t seek help for their physical ailments the way that women do, either because they’re less in tune with their bodies or because they’re shamed for not being tough enough if they complain. Just like C-PTSD.

2) Men don’t hear about fibromyalgia, because it is an engendered diagnosis reserved for dramatic women at this point. Just like C-PTSD. They receive other partial diagnoses, like IBS, that are less controversial. This leads me into a whole spiraling rant about several genital-dependent psychological diagnoses that I feel similarly about, but one of them is…

3) Men don’t receive the same level of fibromyalgia labels as women because men don’t often receive Complex-PTSD labels, which would serve as a hint to their doctors, since trauma is a well-known predisposing factor…

This brings me to the next set of questions.

It’s unpopular opinion time, but, frankly, I don’t know that any of these trauma and fibro issues are really that separate.

It seems to me like we’re talking a lot about one particular problem that splinters off into a thousand different outcomes, depending on the circumstances, the biology, and the human in question. Not separate conditions.

It seems to me like we’re talking a lot about one particular problem that splinters off into a thousand different outcomes, depending on the circumstances, the biology, and the human in question. Not separate conditions.

First comes the trauma, then comes the presentation of downstream physical and mental symptoms. Presentation, magnitude, and personal recognition of these symptoms varies, just like severity of Complex Trauma does. But under both conditions, our experiences are often so similar - the hard part is that we struggle to describe them and often lean on abstract language which can be used in such diverse ways. We focus on different problems, depending on our own life impacts.

So, maybe we notice and report internal events differently, but it’s hard for me to believe that the two disorders aren’t more than corresponding diagnoses - and are, in fact, one and the same.

I could be very wrong, but I’d sure like to find out.

So, to the small percentage of fibromyalgia sufferers who don’t have trauma… you sure? To the depressed and anxious folks who can’t seem to get a grip on their physical health, but never saw their life as traumatic… want to take another look? To all the traumatized folks with Raynauds, food allergies, hypertension, ADD, aches, and migraines… have you really looked into the full definition of fibromyalgia?

ARE these conditions of trauma and fibromyalgia different? Or is this another complication in identifying unseeable symptoms in a population of folks who never learned to name their mental and physical experiences? Is this an artifact from a group who tends to underestimate and under-report their own experiences in light of unhealthy others’ core beliefs? How prevalent is fibromyalgia, really? Especially in the context of Trauma?

ARE these conditions of trauma and fibromyalgia different? Or is this another complication in identifying unseeable symptoms in a population of folks who never learned to name their mental and physical experiences? Is this an artifact from a group who tends to underestimate and under-report their own experiences in light of unhealthy others’ core beliefs? How prevalent is fibromyalgia, really? Especially in the context of Trauma?

Is it possible that everything boils down to one underlying event - trauma - that produces a whole host of other biological adaptations down the line? Did we create a separate term for it, simply based on a lack of standardization?

Or is this an exclusionary problem?

Have all the various ways we’ve learned to categorize and describe our experiences actually separated one full disorder into two half-disorders; one that encompasses the brain and another that covers the body? Is it our societal misunderstanding of the connection between our perceptions and our meaty husks, forcing us to separate the issues of mental and physical health that would be better understood together, as one?

I’m not sure! But I’m definitely thinking a lot about it.

Partially, from personal bias. I always considered my physical issues to be part of my trauma life, not separate from it - and that explanation made perfect sense to me. Where do these disorders really split? Maybe it’s possible to have Complex PTSD without the physical symptoms, but that's really not what I hear from people. The most of us have at least some periods of physical ailments, even if they're not persistent. To me, it seems like a distinction that should be made within the trauma diagnosis - with or without physical wellness degradation - rather than piling a separate, largely-ineffective diagnosis on the vast majority of us who have some variety of said bodily ailments.

I feel like the real issue isn’t “what is fibromyalgia?” The actual problem is a lack of biological understanding in the Psychology field. And a mirrored failure to understand Psychology in the medical field. Then, throw in a reluctance to study the conglomerate of bio-physiology and mental health issues in the scientific research literature because both experiences are difficult to measure or confirm and the studies would be less elegant.

I feel like the real issue isn’t “what is fibromyalgia?” The actual problem is a lack of biological understanding in the Psychology field. And a mirrored failure to understand Psychology in the medical field. Then, throw in a reluctance to study the conglomerate of bio-physiology and mental health issues in the scientific research literature because both experiences are difficult to measure or confirm and the studies would be less elegant.

If more psychologists actually learned system biology and more medical practitioners actually studied abnormal psychology, maybe we wouldn’t have disparate diagnoses that each come with a half-recognition. Maybe we could have one term that encompassed the full experience of trauma. Maybe these professionals could confirm all the details that we don’t understand by working with a more comprehensive approach to how humans work as a whole, rather than organ by organ. Just a fucking thought.  

Because, I can tell you, if my therapist friend had the same biological education that I did at the time, I guarantee that she wouldn’t have told me fibromyalgia was a “pseudo diagnosis.” If she had knowledge of the connection between stress hormones and bodily breakdown, plus the trauma physiology that determines our sensitivity to stress - there’s no way she would have been so flippant or insensitive with her words. But under the influence of her counseling peers, the diagnosis became a fallacy.

I think this highlights the danger of the problem at hand. It only took one industry-determined void of knowledge to pass along an unfair opinion that skewed at least my perception for years down the line. And, think about it, how many times has one innocently-baseless comment in the psychology or medical fields probably created a lifetime of bias in an up-and-coming professional?

Maybe this is why we have the self-perpetuating negative connotation of psychosomatic illness in our society that seems to crawl its way towards improvement, while every other disorder makes significant strides. A lack of personal understanding of the biology-psychology connection is easily turned into a respected opinion, and readily transmitted to unknowing people who are eager to learn from their wise mentors. And so, the next generation inherits the same set of half-baked progress-stunting ideas. Over and over and over.

Maybe this is why we have the self-perpetuating negative connotation of psychosomatic illness in our society that seems to crawl its way towards improvement, while every other disorder makes significant strides. A lack of personal understanding of the biology-psychology connection is easily turned into a respected opinion, and readily transmitted to unknowing people who are eager to learn from their wise mentors. And so, the next generation inherits the same set of half-baked progress-stunting ideas. Over and over and over.

Depressing! And enlightening.

And that’s roughly where I stand today, after days of fibromyalgia research and very few satisfactory answers. Depressed and enlightened.

More or less, asking myself more questions about the legitimacy of our entire mental and physical healthcare system and all the lines we draw in the sand. Confident that trauma leads to increased stress leads to increased brain and body trauma. Somewhat happy to know that I’m actually not the only one who consistently apologizes for feeling like shit and questions if it’s “valid” or not because it seems connected to my brain. But also, pretty pissed off that we’ve been given a word that comes with no explanations and a hellofalot of medical field judgement, as if we needed more of that.

Oh, one more factoid to throw into the end of this conversation. There’s a link between low socioeconomic status and fibromyalgia.

Oh, one more factoid to throw into the end of this conversation. There’s a link between low socioeconomic status and fibromyalgia.

Hey, the same link exists between socioeconomic status and complex trauma. Hey, it’s another predisposing factor for post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms’ emergence. Hey, big surprise, if you have a stable and predictable physical and financial environment, you’re less likely to develop the terror-based conditions brought on by earlier trauma.

If you have financial resources, you’re also less likely to be chronically stressed by the demands of life. You’re probably also more likely to receive respectable medical care. Therefore, meaning that you’re both less likely to have enough perturbation to develop over-sensitive nervous system responses and less likely to be dismissed by doctors with a label they don’t believe exists. Plus, probably more likely to have access to mental health care that could prevent the onset of Complex Trauma presentation, and likely fibromyalgia, altogether.

Oh, look, logic explains so many things. Or, fuckit, let’s just choose to believe that poor people are lazy and always want to complain about something, whether it’s in their heads or their bodies. Whatever the rich white men say.

Big issues to think about.

Like I state way too often on this show, it’s the small things in this trauma life that bring you comfort. And monumental societal failures that make you scream. (Okay, I just added that last part today.)

Wrap it

Okay, let me get out of here before I question more beliefs that are way out of my paygrade. Sorry, medical and psychological practitioners. I know that I’m just a critical observer who, like that kid everyone hates in class, perpetually asks too many questions.

At the bottom of all my complaints, I just wish that we could come up with a way to characterize these disorders that actually helped people understand what was happening. If you know how your body is reacting to what stimuli and how the symptoms are all related, that's a lot more powerful than throwing assorted barely-defined titles at them.

If we can't definitively say that fibromyalgia and trauma symptoms are one and the same, fine. Let there be a distinction. But I think it would be preferable to call fibro something more telling and true to the accepted cause. Call it semantics, but something like Stress Affective Syndrome would be more useful than the made-up word of fibromyalgia. Please, anyone feel free to come up with a better phrase, because I just made "Stress Affective Syndrome" up so I could say "I've got SAS." It already fits the bill.

I guess I’m just up in arms that I’ve tried to find answers for my brain and body health all these years, and turned up completely empty handed until random connections have eventually given me the information I’ve needed after a decade of effort. Maybe if I had my complex trauma diagnosis before I had my health complaints, someone would have mentioned fibromyalgia. Maybe, they would have knowingly smirked and sent me to a psychiatrist. Hard to say.

I guess I’m just up in arms that I’ve tried to find answers for my brain and body health all these years, and turned up completely empty handed until random connections have eventually given me the information I’ve needed after a decade of effort. Maybe if I had my complex trauma diagnosis before I had my health complaints, someone would have mentioned fibromyalgia. Maybe, they would have knowingly smirked and sent me to a psychiatrist. Hard to say.

Even if I had gotten that information about fibro, would it have helped separate from the C-PTSD diagnosis? Honestly, probably not. I would have just been harder on myself for suddenly being too weak in the face of stress. And after reading that medical professionals doubt the validity of fibromyalgia, in the first place? Well that would have been a whole other source of disbelief, anger, and negative self-regard. Maybe a whole new crisis, once my inner critic got a chance to hammer away at my head.

I suppose that figuring out the patterns of my strange bodily conditions actually needed to happen organically for this Fucker, because any semi-questioned diagnosis would have just been more fuel for my trauma fire at that point when I so thoroughly despised myself. Confirming to myself, for a fact, that stress fucks me up may have been a prerequisite for accepting that I might be “one of those fibro people.” You know, the ones who lie about their symptoms. Ha.

And, again, this says a lot about the potential damage that poorly-described labels can do to people… just as much as it says about my own reluctance to be considered a weak-minded over-reactor by outsiders.

All of this being said, I’m so grateful for finally finding out exactly what all fibromyalgia actually entails. It took too long, but honestly, the information came at the perfect time. Two days after I got it, I was stress-sick. Ahhh, it's fibro time. How’s that for irony?

As always, I do think there is some empowerment in the basic root understanding that you aren’t the only one who’s dealt with any of this. The mysterious illnesses, the pain, or the lack of care from modern medicine aren’t individual experiences. Hey, you might even be relieved to know that someone else on this planet routinely asks herself, “Do I have cancer for real this time, or am I just overworked again?”

As always, I do think there is some empowerment in the basic root understanding that you aren’t the only one who’s dealt with any of this. The mysterious illnesses, the pain, or the lack of care from modern medicine aren’t individual experiences. Hey, you might even be relieved to know that someone else on this planet routinely asks herself, “Do I have cancer for real this time, or am I just overworked again?”

After years of nobody I spoke to having a tale that even mildly resembled my autoimmune breakdown, finding anybody who related to my issues was extremely relieving. Not only was it a common experience, but it meant that I hadn’t somehow brought the discomfort on myself - through mental illness, physical shenanigans, or plain old weakness - the ways that I feared.

Furthermore, it proved that I hadn’t imagined it all. Because believe it or not, you’re surprisingly willing to throw yourself under the bus after all the pain has passed. I’ve spent the past decade telling people, “I think I have the glutens, as I call it... but I don’t really know though, it’s never been explained, sometimes other things bother me, and sometimes it’s really not a big deal, I don't know what it is” as an almost-apology. A disclaimer that I, too, doubt my own memories and conclusions because they weren’t properly validated by who I considered authority figures.

Hearing that other people had digestive disorders and autoimmune disasters in the wake of Complex Trauma, via the book The Body Keeps The Score, shocked me into self-acceptance of my prior experiences. Hearing that all of it can be encapsulated by this term fibromyalgia a few days ago - well, shit. This is a more mainstream occurrence than I ever previously thought.

And you know what? It does matter to me that I’m not the only one who falls apart when my brain gets overwhelmed. Even if it doesn’t fix anything. Even if my own postulations for how fibromyalgia is born from trauma feel more applicable than the scientifically proven ones. Even if I don’t believe the term deserves to stand alone as a medical label without further delineation - especially of the connection to and overlap with trauma. Even if I think… it might be inseparable.

And you know what? It does matter to me that I’m not the only one who falls apart when my brain gets overwhelmed. Even if it doesn’t fix anything. Even if my own postulations for how fibromyalgia is born from trauma are more enlightening than the scientifically proven ones. Even if I don’t believe the term deserves to stand alone as a medical label without further delineation - especially of the connection to and overlap with trauma. Even if I think… it might be inseparable.

Now I know. When I feel a physical breakdown coming on, with the suspected cause being stress… I don’t have to apologize for it. I don’t need to tell people that I just can’t handle the pressure with unfettered shame for my own biochemistry. I can rest assured that what I’m going through is common - far more common than we know - and completely valid. Even if there are people ready to tell you that it's not.

But, to be honest, I still probably won’t tell anyone that it’s called fibromyalgia. I’m not proud to say, I wouldn’t want them to think I’m just being dramatic.

UGH.

[child-of-sunshine]

Just gotta rant for a minute so this is going under a cut

I can’t stand the way tumblr in general talks about “rich people” (which they can’t define to save their fucking lives) and particularly when they mention “millionaires” as though it actually means something significant in terms of wealth. 

First, no one seems to understand that by today’s inflated standards, a million dollars really isn’t that much. A quick google search will tell me that the average “middle-income” parent in America will spend over 250k to raise a child from birth to 18 years old. If a couple has 4 kids, they’re already spending over a million dollars on those kids. Yes, that’s over 18 years, but it’s still meaningful.

If a person makes 100k, which is supposedly the 85th percentile of income, it only takes them 10 years to make a million dollars. And yes, obviously they’re spending money too, and it’s not like their savings or their net worth are going to be a million in that time, but people don’t even seem to comprehend that their earnings over that time would literally be a million. Someone earning the average American income, let’s say 50k because I get conflicting information from various sources, would only take 20 years to earn a million dollars.

And calling “millionaires” (putting that in quotes because people (a) do NOT understand the difference between net worth and actual liquid assets or even income) rich, particularly in the context of the “eat the rich” rhetoric, is ridiculous. I know this site has a serious problem with black-and-white thinking, but for fuck’s sake.

Let’s take a look at my parents.

My dad grew up in a relatively low-income household. His mother’s grandparents came straight from Italy with a few dollars in their pockets and nothing else. Her family struggled to get food on the table at times. She worked very hard as a seamstress and married a man who had a good job at Ford back when that meant actual benefits including into retirement, and so they managed to raise two boys without having to worry too much about being able to afford food or housing. They saved like crazy and spent the minimum that they possibly could on themselves, so that when they reached retirement, they had a pretty decent amount of savings for the rest of their lives and could finally enjoy some luxury vacations and get a small but nice house in Florida.

My mom grew up in a truly low-income household. She was the youngest of five siblings living in a tiny, shitty town in Nowhere, Michigan, with two parents who smoked constantly, in a house that sat next to some kind of horrifying mystery waste pond (she and both of her sisters had cancer, my mom at just 36, and one of her brothers died from some kind of unknown neurological deterioration). Her father got TB and spent time in a sanitarium, after which he became a withdrawn alcoholic and then died relatively young. Her mother became depressed, stopped working, and died of cancer. My mom lost both of her parents in her early 20s, before she even met my father.

Both of my parents were gifted with the great privileges of great brains and being white. Even in their crappy hick town in the middle of nowhere, my mom managed to be in the top of her class (of 56 whole people) in high school and earned a scholarship to a state university, literally the only way she could have afforded to attend. My dad worked to pay for his college as far as I know (because back then you could actually do that). They both got bachelor’s degrees. My dad became an engineer, a good career, and quickly found a job with a relatively new, small local company. He worked extremely hard, long hours for years and moved up to being a manager, and the company has grown a lot over the 25+ years he’s now worked there, with the result that he now makes a low six-figure salary. My mom took a computer programming course after realizing her journalism degree wouldn’t get her much paid work, and has worked as a programmer for 25+ years now, switching jobs sometimes, usually making somewhere in the 60-70k range in the last decade or so.

My mother got pregnant with my sister around the time she and my dad got engaged. She was working a crappy programming job and he’d barely started as an engineer, making nowhere near six figures. They lived in a trailer park, in a trailer with a hole in the floor and steps that were a safety hazard. She’d spent some time living with her sister, who’s 13 years older than her and never had children (thus had a house and some savings). My dad’s mother, the seamstress, made my mom’s wedding dress for free as long as my mom bought the material for it, which was just about all they could afford. They had a nice, small wedding when my sister was about 2 (she was afraid of my mom’s dress lmao) and one of my cousins took the pictures.

Four years after my sister was born, my parents had saved up enough to put a down payment on our house, a moderate-sized family home in a suburban neighborhood that was just being built. The house was a little over 200k. She got pregnant with me and the house was finished just after I was born.

My mom got cancer when I was 2 years old. They haven’t talked to me much about it. Her sister spent a lot of money to buy her a really nice wig made of animal hair (which, unfortunately, she could rarely wear because it made her very itchy). She went through surgery, chemo, and radiation. She spent months sick as hell and miserable, while trying to raise two young daughters. Thankfully, they’d saved enough to be able to handle the medical bills, particularly with my dad’s good job that had good benefits and, by then, was paying him a pretty decent salary. My mom recovered, thankfully (over 20 years in remission now!).

In 2008, when the recession hit, my mom lost her job quickly. She tried finding new ones but couldn’t. No one was hiring programmers, they were getting rid of them. Her depression got a lot worse. I was in high school and depressed myself (in large part because of the situation at home, though my parents don’t know it, that became suicidal depression a while afterward), and they had to start paying for therapy for me. My sister was in college and had to try to pay for it herself because my parents’ college fund for her hadn’t gone as far as they’d hoped. My dad’s company supplies machines to auto manufacturers. They were worried. They laid off some people, thankfully not my dad, and others had to take pay cuts. My parents started sitting down and seriously going over finances. My mom and I had to completely quit figure skating, my only physical stress outlet (like I said, that contributed a LOT to the severe depression). We had to cut down the grocery bills and think about not buying gifts for family members’ birthdays and such. My grandparents, happily retired by then with good savings, paid off the rest of our mortgage and told my dad to pay them back without interest whenever he could, so that no matter what happened with the jobs, we at least wouldn’t have to worry about losing our house. I listened to my parents scream at each other over money and I cried myself to sleep a lot of nights.

Guess what? My dad is a millionaire. Definitely not in liquid assets, but in net worth he probably just barely hits 1 million. He now makes a low six-figure salary and when the economy is doing okay, he invests some of it in the stock market, mostly in low-risk stocks that are guaranteed to have payouts (I don’t know a lot about this, so that’s all I’ll say). He inherited/learned his dad’s extreme money-saving ways and saves as much as possible. He’s an engineer and very handy, so whenever possible he does home and car repairs himself to save a lot of money. I managed to get a scholarship that covered almost all of my undergrad tuition, I lived at home for half of undergrad and all of med school to save money, I worked in retail in undergrad and as an EMT in med school to pay for some of my own stuff, and they didn’t pay for any of my med school tuition, so that’s it for their educational expenses for me. My mom’s had a good, stable job for the last few years that pays in the low 80k range, I think. We live in a house worth ~250k that we now fully own thanks to my grandparents. 

A few years ago, my dad’s brother bought a crappy, tiny, nearly-condemned cabin in the woods up north for about 20k (seriously, it was shit). He and my dad put in a few hundred dollars and a TON of time and manual labor to fix it up, and now we pay half the bills on it and both of our families use it for vacations. We have a small (19ft) boat that my dad bought as a gift for my mom when she had cancer--he got it extremely cheap from a guy who’d bought it, barely used it, and just wanted rid of it. It’s a 1994 and full of problems now, but we’ve managed to keep it going (barely, at times) and my dad has taken really good care of it over the years. A friend of my dad’s got him into snowmobiling about a decade ago and once his brother bought the cabin and they fixed it up, my dad got a cheap, crappy used snowmobile, which he used for a few years before reselling it and upgrading to an actually nice, new one, because yeah, he could afford it. He’s upgraded a couple times, good for him. When I actually have the time off, I go up with him in the winter and ride one of his old ones that he kept and fixed after it had an engine problem. It doesn’t cost much to renew the trail permits each year and I borrow my uncle’s gear for riding, so other than the initial cost of the sleds, it really costs us nothing to go riding (gas is extremely negligible in snowmobiles, they can go 120+ miles on a single 8 gallon tank, and we store them ourselves at the cabin so we don’t pay for that). We store the boat in our garage at home (like I said, it’s small) so other than the permit and gas for that when we take it out, again, really no continuous expense.

My parents pay all of their taxes without trying to do any bullshit work-arounds. They don’t have a lawyer or a tax accountant or a financial advisor, my dad does it all himself. He keeps track of all of our finances himself. We don’t pay a landscaping service or a cleaning service or any of that crap, we do it all ourselves like any other middle-class family. My mom donates regularly to charities for cancer, animal rescues, and injured veterans. 

But to tumblr, incapable of seeing nuance, we’re “one-percenters (absolutely nowhere near true) who own a house and have a ‘vacation home’ and a boat and recreational vehicles” so we’re pretty much just as bad as Bezos, because anyone who isn’t actively struggling to put food on the table or in horrible medical debt because of our disaster of a system is apparently “rich” and there’s no such thing as shades of gray.

[billehrman]

From Rags to Riches

It is hard to believe that we went from the worst fourth quarter performance last year since 1931 to the best gain for the year in 2019 since 2013. We believe that there are more gains to be made in 2020 as the global economies recover after a sluggish performance this year bolstered by continued monetary stimulus, some fiscal stimulus and less trade tensions. The pundits/experts have remained one step behind, looking in the rear-view mirror as traders, rather than over the valley as investors, which is our strength. Did you notice how all of them were bullish last week? A little late, don’t you think?!

Let’s go back in time and look at what we were saying just one year ago around this time of year during the worst December that any of us can remember. On December 16th our blog was entitled “Christmas Sales Have Begun”. We mentioned that adversity creates opportunities for investors with more than a one-second time frame. We commented on all that was bothering the markets including: “record flow outflows (huge tax selling), a global synchronous economic downturn; trade problems, consumer and business confidence falling, rising fears of deflation, and monetary authorities had it wrong (they were tightening)”. Systematic trading was dominating the marketplace putting undue pressure on the averages.” Fortunately, we had raised a lot of cash in October, so we started to nibble away at defensive, high yielding stocks.

The following blog dated December 23rd was titled “It’s Always Darkest Before the Dawn” where we discussed that “a perfect storm hit the financial markets as the Fed raised rates, signaled two more rates hikes in 2019; maintained their $50 billion per month runoff of their balance sheet; the ECB ended its bond purchases; the trade war with China over stolen IP escalated; there was a partial shutdown in our government; Trump’s administration was in disarray; and investors were liquidating stocks at a record pace.” We predicted that the global economy would slow without any inflationary pressures in 2019 and that the next move by all monetary authorities would be to ease big time.” We believed that the stock market was still undervalued, so we continued buying only defensive stocks like healthcare, consumer non-durables, cable with content, utilities and the like with above average dividend yields.

The last blog of year was entitled “Wake-up Call” where we sat back, looked over the valley and discussed what was needed to be done to right the ship to avoid a global recession with rising deflationary forces in 2019. We felt that clearer heads would prevail as the alternative had such negative connotations for the global economy and rising deflationary pressures.  We began commenting in this blog that the stock market multiple would trend up to 20 times earnings, higher than the historical range, as interest rates were 300-500 basis points lower than the historic norm while bank capital/liquidity ratios were moving to all time highs. We added that the Philips curve was dead, and the Fed had no reason to fear inflationary pressures as unemployment fell. We recommended adding to defensive stocks, U.S based, with above average yields as our economy would outperform all others as the consumer was 75% of GNP.

Now let’s fast forward to December 2019 and, once again, look at the key issues first and foremost in the minds of investors throughout the year which have all done a 180 degree turn since a year ago: trade, monetary policy, Brexit and Trump:

Trade: Presidents Trump and Xi had a phone conversation Friday confirming that the signing of Phase 1 of a trade deal would happen the beginning of 2020. China confirmed that it was also postponing any additional tariffs on U.S goods just like we did on the proposed December tariffs. It was confirmed that China will buy at least $40 billion of agricultural products and over $200 billion of other U.S goods over the next two years. Finally, it became clear that President Xi has concluded that it was better to deal with Trump than run the risk of dealing with a left-wing Democrat.

The House finally passed the North American trade pact with bipartisan support. This deal to us was far more important to conclude than Phase 1 of a trade deal with China. We are confident that this deal will boost U.S. GDP over the next two years.

Finally, Trump decided yesterday not to impose tariffs on Brazilian steel and aluminum. The bottom line is that trade will most likely not be an issue in 2020 which should lead to less uncertainty in the business community and a turnaround in global trade.

Monetary policy: Could it get any more accommodative than now? Several key voting members of the Fed came out last week and mentioned that there will be no change in rates in 2020;  the Fed injected nearly $58 billion into the financial system; Sweden ended negative rates which has been the wrong policy choice; the BOJ kept policy steady leaning on Abe’s $120 billion stimulus plan to boost Japan’s economy; and finally China added the most cash into the open market since January.

Brexit: Prime Minister Johnson, with his newfound majority in Parliament, forced through a bill which puts the country on course to leave the EU by January 31, period. His intent is to force the EU to conclude a deal now. We agree with him as the EU is acting like a bully even though their economies are at far more risk if a hard Brexit occurs than the U.K.

Trump: Trump clearly has a winning hand going into 2020 to win the Presidential elections. Even his impeachment may turn in his favor as Pelosi delays moving it to the Senate who will clearly exonerate him. We are confident that Trump will propose the following next year: major tax cuts for the middle/lower classes; a new Healthcare bill; and propose a major infrastructure program painting the Democrats into a corner as obstructionists.  

Here’s how we are ending the year: investors are adding to equities as they are underweighted the asset class and there is minimal tax selling as all asset classes are up; the global economy is bottoming out and 2020 looks like a much better year; trade deals are being concluded lowering tensions and boosting business/consumer confidence; monetary authorities everywhere are easing providing more liquidity than is needed by the real economy thus pushing investors out on the risk curve;  the stock market multiple is moving up as investors final acknowledge, like the monetary authorities,  that low inflation is not transitory; and Trump looks like a winner.

Clearly, we went from rags in 2018 to riches at the end of 2019.

Paix et Prospérité became fully invested while shifting its portfolio months ago to more economically sensitive companies with superior managements and  strong cash flow selling at recession valuations while reducing the defensive holding selling at record high valuations as we became more confident that the global economy had reached an inflection point and 2020 would be a far better year economically. Technology was and remains the largest portion of our portfolios.  Our overriding core belief was that the monetary authorities would remain overly accommodative through 2020 providing wind to our backs while reducing risk. We also felt that Trump would do everything in his power to get re-elected which is quite a lot,  as we have seen.

Our objective for the S & P next year remains 3400+ based on S&P earnings of $170+/share with a stock market multiple of 20-ish. We are riding the trend in place, as Soros would do, as long as all the key issues that we factored into our analysis remain intact. So far, so good!

Let’s take a brief look at the most recent global economic data points as we look over the valley rather than in the rear-view mirror

United States: All of the most recent data points keep turning up positive such that we have raised our fourth quarter GNP estimate to over 2%: personal income increased 0.5% in November; real DPI rose 0.4% while real PCE increased 0.4%; the PCE price index rose only 0.1% excluding food and energy; third quarter GNP was unrevised increasing 2.1% with higher consumer spending offset by a decline in inventories; consumer sentiment rose to 99.3 in December from 96.8 in November (great for holiday sales); existing home sales picked up increasing 2.7% in November; leading indicators were unchanged; coincident indicators rose 0.4% and lagging indicators increased 0.5%; Fannie Mae increased its 2020 forecast significantly; industrial production rose 1.1% in November and 0.5% excluding autos (GM strike); home builder confidence increased to a 20 year high to 76 in December; and job openings edged up to an amazing 7.3 million jobs.

Pretty great set of numbers for sure.

Finally, President Trump signed yesterday an astonishing $1.4 trillion-dollar spending bill.  

The bottom line is that we believe that 2020 real GNP will be above the consensus  exceeding 2.2% with inflation holding beneath 2%.

China: While the government is currently forecasting 6% growth next year, we actually believe that it could be higher based on the huge amount of monetary and fiscal stimulus now being plowed into their economy. The trade deal, too, will remove a huge uncertainty boosting business/consumer confidence such that we expect a rebuilding in inventories which have been reduced during the fourth quarter.

Finally, November stats came in stronger than anticipated with production jumping 6.2% from a year ago; fixed asset spending accelerating to a 5.2% gain over the first 11 months and retail sales climbing 8%. China’s large purchase of U.S. agricultural products will go a long way to taming their high inflation rate.

The Eurozone/U.K.: While we remain pessimistic on the long-term prospects of the Eurozone without fiscal, trade and regulatory reforms, next year could clearly be better than 2019 as global trade tensions are reduced and a deal with the U.K. on Brexit is finally reached. Recent data points have come off the bottom like the composite Purchasing Manufacturers and Services Indices but none of them are worth bragging about. Maybe Merkel has to leave office before any real change can occur in Germany and then the rest of the Eurozone.

Japan: The government recently came out with small upgrade in its 2020 economic forecast now projected 1.4% for the year. We do expect that the fiscal stimulus package along with trade deals may make these numbers conservative for the first time in our memory.

Investment Conclusions

We see no reason to alter our current view that 2020 global economic growth will accelerate from disappointing 2019 results. It is clear that all the monetary authorities will stay on hold with their aggressive easing policies until inflation stays above 2% for a sustained period which is not likely anytime soon.

Our investment conclusion is to continue to move to more economically sensitive companies like global industrials, capital goods and machinery companies. Also, we are maintaining very large financial holdings as we expect yield curves to steepen as short rates are not increased by the monetary authorities as global growth improves. We continue to add to well financed, low cost industrial commodity companies with strong cash flows as we expect prices to rise from increased demand and a lower dollar. Technology remains the largest sector of our portfolios for obvious reasons as buyers get a quick, high return on these investments in addition to their need to remain competitive. Special situations remain the second largest sector in our holdings as long as managements are intent on closing the gap between their current price and intrinsic value.

Clearly, we are not long bonds nor the dollar anymore.  

We want to wish all of you a sensational holiday season. We hope that our weekly blogs have made a difference and have helped you in some manner. Feel free to email or call us if we can do more to help you out.

Our initial tag line was “the creation of wealth to help mankind.” We are all so blessed and need to give back whatever and wherever we can.

Our weekly Investment webinar will be held on Monday, December 23rd at 8:30 am EST. You can join by typing https://zoom.us/j/9179217852 into your browser.

Remember to review all the facts; pause, reflect and consider mindset shifts; turn off the pundits/so called experts; look at your asset mix with risk controls; do independent research and…

Invest Accordingly!

Bill Ehrman

Paix et Prospérité LLC

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, January 11, 2022

Inflation up, virus down as priorities in US: AP-NORC poll (AP) Heading into a critical midterm election year, the top political concerns of Americans are shifting in ways that suggest Democrats face considerable challenges to maintaining their control of Congress. A poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that management of the pandemic, once an issue that strongly favored President Joe Biden and his fellow Democrats, is beginning to recede in the minds of Americans. COVID-19 is increasingly overshadowed by concerns about the economy and personal finances—particularly inflation—which are topics that could lift Republicans. Just 37% of Americans name the virus as one of their top five priorities for the government to work on in 2022, compared with 53% who said it was a leading priority at the same time a year ago.

Stay home or work sick? Omicron poses a conundrum (AP) As the raging omicron variant of COVID-19 infects workers across the nation, millions of those whose jobs don’t provide paid sick days are having to choose between their health and their paycheck. The current labor shortage is adding to the pressure of workers having to decide whether to show up to their job sick if they can’t afford to stay home. “It’s a vicious cycle,” said Daniel Schneider, professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. “As staffing gets depleted because people are out sick, that means that those that are on the job have more to do and are even more reluctant to call in sick when they in turn get sick.” A survey this past fall of roughly 6,600 hourly low-wage workers conducted by Harvard’s Shift Project, which focuses on inequality, found that 65% of those workers who reported being sick in the last month said they went to work anyway.

Natural disasters cost insurers $120 billion in 2021, Munich Re says (Reuters) Marked by devastating hurricanes and cold snaps in the United States, 2021 proved the second-most costly year on record for the world's insurers, Munich Re said on Monday, warning that extreme weather was more likely with climate change. Insured losses from natural catastrophes totalled around $120 billion last year, second only to the $146 billion in damages during the hurricane-ridden year of 2017. The U.S.—ravaged by dozens of tornadoes in December, and by Hurricane Ida and freezes in Texas earlier in the year—accounted for an unusually large portion of the losses, Munich Re said.

US details possible sanctions against Russia (NYT) The Biden administration and its allies are assembling a punishing set of financial, technology and military sanctions against Russia that they say would go into effect within hours of an invasion of Ukraine, hoping to make clear to President Vladimir V. Putin the high cost he would pay if he sends troops across the border. In interviews, officials described details of those plans for the first time, just ahead of a series of diplomatic negotiations to defuse the crisis with Moscow, one of the most perilous moments in Europe since the end of the Cold War. The plans the United States has discussed with allies in recent days include cutting off Russia’s largest financial institutions from global transactions, imposing an embargo on American-made or American-designed technology needed for defense-related and consumer industries, and arming insurgents in Ukraine who would conduct what would amount to a guerrilla war against a Russian military occupation, if it comes to that.

Kazakhstan ‘stabilized’ (Washington Post) Kazakhstan officials said that the country has “stabilized” after days of violence and bloodshed amid sweeping anti-government protests. The government said that 164 people died and 8,000 were detained during the demonstrations. A presidential aide slammed foreign media for creating what he called a “false impression that the Kazakhstan government has been targeting peaceful protesters.”

Sri Lanka seeks Chinese debt restructuring amid crisis (AP) The president of debt-ridden Sri Lanka on Sunday asked China for the restructuring of its loans and access to preferential credit for imports of essential goods, as the island nation struggles in the throes of its worst economic crisis, partly due to Beijing-financed projects that don’t generate revenue. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa told visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi that it would be “a great relief to the country if attention could be paid on restructuring the debt repayments as a solution to the economic crisis that has arisen in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic,” according to a statement from his office. Sri Lanka faces one of its worst economic crises, with foreign reserves down to around $1.6 billion, barely enough for a few weeks of imports. It also has foreign debt obligations exceeding $7 billion in 2022, including repayment of bonds worth $500 million in January and $1 billion in July. The declining foreign reserves are partly blamed on infrastructure projects built with Chinese loans that don’t make money. China loaned money to build a seaport and airport in the southern Hambantota district, in addition to a wide network of roads.

Myanmar’s Suu Kyi sentenced to 4 more years in prison (AP) A court in Myanmar sentenced ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi to four more years in prison on Monday after finding her guilty of illegally importing and possessing walkie-talkies and violating coronavirus restrictions, a legal official said. Suu Kyi was convicted last month on two other charges and given a four-year prison sentence, which was then halved by the head of the military-installed government. The cases are among about a dozen brought against the 76-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate since the army seized power last February, ousting her elected government and arresting top members of her National League for Democracy party. If found guilty of all the charges, she could be sentenced to more than 100 years in prison.

Threat of omicron keeps China walled off (Washington Post) A year ago, Chinese health experts had hoped the country could safely reopen to the world by now, as it attained herd immunity against the coronavirus. China achieved last month the herculean goal of vaccinating more than 80 percent of its 1.4 billion people with two doses. But far from reopening, the country has returned to its harshest controls in two years, as it seeks to contain the highly contagious omicron variant. China has returned to harsh and inflexible controls, including the lockdown of 13 million people in their homes in Xian, the city with the most severe outbreak. The measures have plunged Xian into logistical dysfunction, with some residents reporting they were struggling to obtain shipments of food. Several hospital officials in the city were fired after reports of a pregnant woman who lost her baby outside a hospital as she waited for a coronavirus test result to clear her entry. The number of officially reported cases remains minuscule, compared with that of many countries. But with top leaders touting a “covid zero” approach, local officials are under intense pressure to halt the spread before the Winter Olympics begin in Beijing next month.

Jerusalem church leader says Israeli extremists threaten Christian presence in city (Reuters) The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem has accused radical Israeli groups of threatening the presence of Christians in the holy city, in remarks that Israeli officials rejected as baseless. In a column in the Times of London on Saturday, His Beatitude, Theophilos III, said he believed the aim was to drive the Christian community from Jerusalem’s Old City, which has sites sacred to Judaism, Christianity and Islam. “Our presence in Jerusalem is under threat,” the patriarch wrote. “Our churches are threatened by Israeli radical fringe groups. At the hands of these Zionist extremists the Christian community in Jerusalem is suffering greatly, he said. “Our brothers and sisters are the victims of hate crimes. Our churches are regularly desecrated and vandalised. Our clergy are subject to frequent intimidation.” A U.S. State Department report published last year on religious freedom around the world said Christian clergy and pilgrims continued to report instances of ultra-Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem harassing or spitting on them. Church groups have for some time reported attacks of vandalism at religious sites in the city.

Shocked parents watch train speed off with baby on board (AP) A baby in Germany has been reunited with its parents after they watched in horror as it speed off on a train without them on board, police said Monday. Federal police said the father had put a stroller with his 11-month-old child inside onto the train but was waiting on the platform for his wife to join them when the doors closed and it pulled out of Duesseldorf station early Sunday. The panicked parents rushed to a taxi in hopes of catching the train at its next stop in the nearby city of Duisburg. But passengers who spotted the unaccompanied baby alerted the conductor, who ordered the train to return to Duesseldorf. The parents eventually returned too and “the baby was handed back into the care of its grateful parents,” police said in a statement.

[sabrinasu1998]

Oil settles near 3-year high, Dow climbs up 480 factors, Gold rates finish greater

 Gold prices finish higher to notch a small once a week gain

Gold rate end higher on Friday, tallying a little gain for the week, with costs finding some support from weak point in the dollar and government bond yields even after a reading on the cost of U.S. items as well as services disclosed an increase for August.

 Spot gold price rose $1.40, or nearly 0.1%, to clear up at $1,758.40 an ounce. Spot silver rose 49 cents, or 2.2%, to work out at $22.536 an ounce.

 " Three inflation numbers today ... recommend that gold needs to rise," Chintan Karnani, supervisor of study at Insignia Consultants, told MarketWatch. He referred to German import rates, which rose at the fastest in 40 years last month, Euro zone inflation, which struck a 13-year high last month and an increase in U.S. rising cost of living in August, which left the inflation price at a 30-year high.

 " Gold is the best hedge versus multi year high rising cost of living," claimed Karnani.

 For the short term, he suggests "mindful positive outlook in gold," as investor sentiment is "neutral to bearish."

 Bullish investors made the instance that unpredictability around the financial rebound and Federal Reserve's policy because of inflation problems cultivate an excellent setting for bullion and also various other precious metals. That is even as the Fed is readied to taper month-to-month acquisitions of $120 billion in Treasurys and also other bonds that aided to supply liquidity to struggling markets throughout the most awful of the COVID pandemic.

 " First of all, the beginning of tapering the Fed's bond purchases is imminent and already appears to be partly priced by the markets," composed Carlo Alberto De Casa, market analyst at Kinesis Money, in a research study note.

 " Secondly, the basic basis for spot gold demand appears relatively strong, suggesting that there will not be a significant decline," he wrote. He makes the situation, pointing partially to Thursday's profession, that gold capitalists have been deal searching the possession, acquiring following significant dips.

 " This sudden rebound might reveal that sellers are losing power and for that reason, customers are attempting to invest throughout a dip, now seeing gold as an extra eye-catching choice after the current decline," De Casa composed.

 Looking ahead for the spot gold market, U.S. economic information launches will certainly remain in focus next week, said Karnani, with consumer goods, ISM non-manufacturing as well as ADP and also nonfarm payrolls jobs numbers set for release.

 Stronger numbers will "create another huge sell off in gold as well as vice-versa," he said. "These numbers will inform us the growth outlook for the 4th quarter," as well as the economy will be the essential motorist for rare-earth elements and also money markets in October."

 Oil clears up near 3-year high ahead of OPEC+ conference

Oil cleared up over $78 a barrel on Friday, simply reluctant of a three-year high reached previously this week, on expectations that OPEC priests will maintain a consistent rate in raising supply.

 The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries as well as allies, called OPEC+, fulfills on Monday. The team is slowly loosening up record outcome cuts made in 2015, although sources say it is taking into consideration doing even more to boost production.

 Brent crude oil climbed 97 cents, or 1.2%, to work out at $79.28 in its fourth once a week rise. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) climbed 85 cents to work out at $75.88 in a sixth week of gains.

 Brent has increased over 50% this year and also reached a three-year high of $80.75 on Tuesday.

 OPEC+ is encountering stress from consumers such as the United States and also India to produce even more to help in reducing costs as demand has recouped faster than anticipated in some parts of the globe.

 " If OPEC+ stays with the script as well as only delivers the planned 400,000 bpd boost in November, energy markets will soon be seeing $90 oil rates," stated Edward Moya, senior market analyst at OANDA, adding that any boost smaller than 600,000 barrels need to enhance costs.

 Oil is likewise locating support as a rise in natural gas costs around the world motivates power manufacturers to move away from gas. Generators in Pakistan, Bangladesh and also the Middle East have actually started switching fuels.

 " The most likely factor for stable crude oil prices is that capitalists believe the supply-demand space will widen as the power crisis worsens," said Naeem Aslam, expert at Avatrade.

 U.S. buck slides for 2nd day, but outlook remains upbeat

 The buck succumbed to a second straight session on Friday, tracking decreases in U.S. Treasury yields, as investors scheduled profits after recent sharp gains, though the decline was viewed as temporary.

 United state 10-year Treasury yields were last at 1.484%, down nearly 6 basis factors.

 For the week, the US dollar index uploaded its largest percent gain considering that late August, as investors aimed to the Federal Reserve's decrease of possession purchases in November as well as a possible rate trek late following year.

 Cautious market sentiment as a result of COVID-19 concerns, wobbles in China's growth as well as a Washington gridlock ahead of an impending due date to lift the U.S. federal government's borrowing limit has backed up to the buck, viewed as a safe-haven possession.

 In afternoon trading, the dollar index slid 0.3% to 94.046, having actually acquired 0.8% today, the biggest regular surge since late August. Friday's set of U.S. data was blended, adding to buck weak point ahead of the weekend break.

 U.S. consumer costs enhanced greater than anticipated in August, posting a 0.8% rise, however consumption was weak than initially assumed in July, dipping 0.1% rather than acquiring 0.3%.

 Rising cost of living stayed elevated, however not by much. Core inflation as gauged by the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, omitting the unstable food as well as energy elements, was up 0.3% in August, unchanged from previous month.

 In manufacturing, data was more positive. The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) claimed its index of nationwide manufacturing facility activity increased to a reading of 61.1 last month from 59.9 in August.

 In various other currencies, the euro climbed 0.1% to $1.1595, dropping concerning 1.1% for the week, its greatest percentage loss since mid-June.

 The yen to dollar got better from a 19-month reduced over night, with the dollar last down 0.2% at 111.105 yen. Product currencies rallied versus the U.S. dollar on Friday also.

 The Australian buck gained 0.6% to US$ 0.7270 and plunged 3.6% in the third quarter - the most awful efficiency of any G10 money against the dollar - as rates for Australia's top export, iron ore, dropped dramatically.

 Sterling was likewise an underperformer last quarter, going down 2.5%, as well as publishing its worst week in more than a month, amidst growing supply chain issues.

 Sterling was last up 0.6% though at $1.3552, just above a 9-month low at $1.3516.

 U.S. stocks end up greatly higher Friday

 United state stocks pushed greater on Friday as capitalists got rid of a harsh September as well as news of a new dental treatment for Covid-19 improved shares of firms linked to the economic recuperation.

 The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 482.54 points, or 1.43%, to close at 34,326.46. The S&P 500 climbed almost 1.2% to 4,357.04, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 0.8% to 14,566.70 as well as broke a five-day losing streak.

 Shares of Dow member Merck jumped close to 8.4% after the medicine maker and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics claimed their oral antiviral therapy for Covid-19 decreased the risk of a hospital stay or fatality by 50% for individuals with moderate or light cases. The business plan to look for emergency consent for the treatment.

 The new medicine from Merck appeared to improve travel supplies. Shares of Royal Caribbean and Las Vegas Sands included 3.8% as well as 4.3%, respectively. Southwest Airlines increased 5.6% after JPMorgan updated the supply and also stated a lot of the team deserved purchasing for a trade. Bank stocks increased as well, assisting the Dow outperform.

[weekinethereum]

September 7, 2018

News and Links

Protocol

[Eth2.0] shasper implementer call notes. Also some good VDF evaluator discussion on r/ethereum

[Eth 2.0] Prysmatic dev update

[Eth 2.0] Who is building what in Ethereum 2.0?

[sharding] Batched cross-shard transaction fee payment

[Casper] Latest Casper standup call

[Casper] Parallelizing Lamport’s 99% fault tolerant consensus

[State channels] Unavailability griefing with Pisa explainer

[State channels] Forward Timelocked Contracts

[Plasma] Plasma chains with enforced consistency between multiple parent chains

[wasm] Wasabi: A Framework for Dynamically Analyzing WebAssembly

[wasm] Raul Jordan: WebAssembly and the future of blockchain

[starks] Cheap hash functions for zkSNARK merkle-tree proofs, which can be calculated on-chain

[starks] Roll up: scale Eth with starks from Barry WhiteHat

Stuff for developers

Toward frictionless upgradeability from Zeppelin’s Fran Giordano

Contract upgrade anti-patterns from Trail of Bits

Trail of Bits explains its binary static analysis tool, Rattle

Superblocks releases its new IDE

DateTime library v1.00 from Bokky

Another web3swift with ENS support

Loredana’s latest video demo of Pipeline visual IDE

Tutorial on writing private transactions with Parity’s Secret Store

Boilerplate for Truffle5 + Solium + Zeppelin + Coveralls

Code for Delegated Execution Subscriptions[EIP1337/EIP948]

Strengthening the weakest link in smart contract security -  “onlyOwner”

Exploring the Ethereum chain with Quickblocks. and part 2

OpenZeppelin 2.0 release candidate

Releases

Parity v2.0.3 beta

Trinity v0.1.0-alpha.15

web3.js 1.0.0-beta.36

Live on mainnet

Connext’s first payment channel hub (Spankchain) is live on mainnet

Spankchain also began the process of releasing its stablecoin BOOTY, which is heavily collateralized by its native token. You stake SPANK to get BOOTY. (links should be safe for work)

Zinc launches ERC725 identities on mainnet

Bounties Network exploreris live (and get your BRLN coinat ETHBerlin)

0x v2 deployed to mainnet

Dether is live, so you can trade ETH locally in 120 countries

DDA goes live with 1 week long & short tokens available on ETH/USD (5X multiplier) and BTC/USD (1X multiplier

BZx margin trading protocol launches on mainnet, Bamboo Relay should have margin trading live on Monday

Ecosystem

.xyz names are now supported by ENS on mainnet

Alethio’s visualization of opcodes over blocktime

Rinkeby consensus failure port-mortem

Dogethereum bridge is live with Doge mainnet and Rinkeby

Sina Habibian: identity and reputation in web3

Enterprise

Scaling for enterprise: explaining the IBFT algorithm

Governance and Standards

ERC809/1201: Tokenizing Non-fungible Access

Dean Eigenmann: Blockchains are not companies

Last call for ERC1167 minimal proxy contract

ERC1376: service friendly token

ERC1384: equity agreement standard

Project Updates

FunFair to launch this month after it got a Curaçao gambling license

Aragon Core as decentralized OS

Raiden v.0.8.0 update

Digix’s two votes: rewards pool 4.2%, 97% voted to give them 20m USD, 34% participation

Maecenas raised 1.7m for 31.5% of an Andy Warhol painting

omiseGO ewallet update

Maker monthly update

Golem’s call for potential use cases

Dmunity has a beta release of their Reddit-like app on Ethereum

An early Brave 1.0 beta release. Current Brave stats: >4m mau

Peepeth cancelled the Kickstarter and is doing a crypto-only fundraiser

Interviews, Podcasts, Videos, Talks

Phillip Angele talks Livepeer at Berlin meetup

Arthur Falls returns with an interview of Zilliqa’s Amrit Kumar and Xinshu Dong

Open Source Block Explorers community call

Kleros on Epicenter

Bernhard Müller on Hashing It Out

Nadav Hollander with Laura Shin

Gnosis CTO Stefan George on Inchained

Tokens / Business

TechCrunch published a sloppy anti-ETH op-ed this week (no link). Check out Ameen Soleimani’s response and Vitalik Buterin’s.

A false report may have tumbled cryptoasset prices this week, but Nathaniel Popper says Goldman is still moving forward with cryptoasset futures/forwards.

Brayton Williams on using and investing in dapps

ERC998 and the future of blockchain game assets

Introducing the equilibrium bonding market

Dynamic token bonding curves

General

A comparison of interoperability protocols - Polkadot, Cosmos, Wanchain, Icon and Aion

Gavin Wood: why we need web3

Cosmos August update

Zilliqa’s thinking on dev and user challenges of sharded chains

Grin testnet <> Ropsten testnet atomic swap

Aurora: Transparent Succinct Arguments for R1CS

Liberal Radicalism: Formal Rules for a Society Neutral Among Communities by Buterin, Hitzig and Weyl

Shapeshift is moving to an account-based approach

Coursera and ConsenSys intro to blockchains course

With issuance reduction to 2 ETH per block, Bitcoin and Ethereum now have similar inflation rates

Always good for a laugh: Ethereum obituaries

Dates of Note

Upcoming dates of note:

September 7-9 - ETHBerlin hackathon

September 7-9 - WyoHackathon (Wyoming)

September 8 - Ethereum Industry Summit (Hong Kong)

Sept 10 - Devcon4 final wave of tickets go on sale at 4pm PDT

September 12 - Maker DAO ‘Foundation Proposal’ vote

September 13-14 - EEA Tech Spec working group (NYC)

September 21-23 - EthAtlanta

Sept 29 - Oct 1 - Ethfinex’s governance summit (Lugano)

Oct 5-7 - TruffleCon in Portland - ROGUETIM discount code this weekend only

Oct 5-7 - ETHSanFrancisco hackathon

Oct 11 - Crypto Economics Security Conf (Berkeley)

Oct 22-24 - Web3Summit (Berlin)

Oct 24-25 - Winding Tree hackathon (Prague)

Oct 26-28 - Status hackathon (Prague)

Oct 28-30 - Ethereum Magicians Council of Prague

Oct 29 - Decentralized Insurance D1Conf (Prague)

Oct 30 - Nov 2 - Devcon4 (Prague)

Nov 2 - MetaMask to stop injecting web3

Nov 3-4 - Enterprise Ethereum hackathon (Prague)

Dec 7-9 - dGov distributed governance conf (Athens)

Dec 7-9 - ETHSingapore hackathon

If you appreciate this newsletter, thank ConsenSys

This newsletter is made possible by ConsenSys, which is perpetually hiring if you’re interested.

I own Week In Ethereum. As such, editorial control has always been 100% me.  If you're unhappy with editorial decisions, feel free to tweet at me.

Shameless self-promotion

Link: http://www.weekinethereum.com/post/177858137803/september-7-2018

Most of what I link to I tweet first: @evan_van_ness

Did someone forward this email to you?  Sign up to receive the weekly email (box in the top blue header)

[livingcorner]

Secrets of In the Night Garden

His hand slaps down on the sketchpad. “Don’t read that,” says Andrew Davenport, refusing to move his fingers, despite my cajoling. “It’s terrible.” His hand is covering a short rhyme, written in pencil, that was his very first attempt to devise a song for a shapely piece of blue fluff called Iggle Piggle, who first came to life on these sketchpads three years ago, and who has since all but taken over the world.

I’m astonished to find Davenport so unwilling to let me see the rhyme. It’s not as if his reputation as the king of kids’ TV isn’t assured. As well as being the co-creator of Teletubbies, which in its 13 years has travelled to 120 countries and generated £2bn, Davenport is the man behind In the Night Garden, the gently surreal bedtime show for pre-schoolers of which Iggle Piggle is the star. In the Night Garden – which first aired on the BBC in 2007 and features engagingly colourful characters who meet, play, sing, wander about, then tuck up for bed – may even eclipse Teletubbies: it has already conquered 35 countries and territories, from Norway to China, where book sales have reached 1.5m. More importantly, for at least a year, the show was pivotal in getting my own daughter, now three, off to bed. As far as I’m concerned, Davenport is bigger than Santa.

You're reading: Secrets of In the Night Garden

We turn the page. “This is the first ever drawing of Iggle Piggle,” says Davenport, who is opening up his prized sketchbooks to an outsider for the very first time. The Guardian’s photographer, also the father of a toddler, and I both gasp. Davenport points to the figure’s floppy, bean-like head. “That head shape was the main feature. It became characteristic. With a drawing, you can create reality immediately. Character almost forms itself: you can switch off your editorial mind. In the Night Garden all started from this sketch. He’s a sort of a lost toy, a floppy character who has made his way through the world somehow.”

The first ever Iggle Piggle drawing. Photograph: David Levene

Iggle Piggle is now making his way through the world all the way to the stage: the In the Night Garden Live show opened in Liverpool last month and has just arrived in London, before heading for Glasgow and Birmingham. “For a long time, I didn’t want to do a stage show,” says Davenport. “It’s difficult to create something that works for a theatre audience in the way that a TV show works for one. And conventional theatres are simply not designed for two-year-olds, with those seats they can’t see over.”

Read more: History of Gnomes | LoveToKnow

The solution takes the form of a travelling inflatable theatre fitted with baby-friendly touches, such as microwaves for the warming of milk (promising a whole new kind of interval drinks bedlam). Audiences are offered a choice of two stories. “One features Iggle Piggle losing his blanket,” says Davenport. “The other features Makka Pakka washing everyone’s faces.” Neither story, it’s safe to say, will come as a great surprise to regular viewers of the show, many of whom are parents who find its soothing antics easier on the eye and the ear, not to mention the imagination, than Teletubbies.

We flip to the first ever sketch of Makka Pakka, outside his cave, dripping sponge in hand. Where did the idea for this bear-like, pint-sized wiper of faces come from? “Often, children don’t like having their faces washed,” says Davenport. “If you can make a playful version of that, it will defuse the situation, if you like. I thought it was quite funny to have him just come on with a trumpet and interrupt the whole narrative – to make everyone stop and have their faces washed. It seemed quite truthful for a child.”

The first Makka Pakka sketch. Photograph: David Levene

Davenport, 45, has no children of his own, but a godson, he says proudly, “has lived through In the Night Garden”. Tall and slim, with cropped hair and a quick laugh, he wears a dark blue shirt and looks as smart and spotless as his studio in London’s East End. At his desk sits a keyboard and a phone – he sings into its answering machine if he thinks of a tune while he’s out; a piece of software turns it into music.

Shelves bear the sort of books you might expect: A History of Toys by Antonia Fraser, and Seeing Things by Oliver Postgate, Davenport’s hero and the creator of his own favourite kids’ TV show The Clangers. “Who wouldn’t want to live underground on a separate planet?” he says with relish. “It’s a totally alien world that’s just fantastic.” Some titles are, however, a little more cerebral: The Developing Child by Bee Boyd, The Language and Thought of the Child by Jean Piaget.

The original Upsy Daisy design. Photograph: David Levene

He quotes Piaget when I ask him to explain the phenomenal success of In the Night Garden, and how it manages to be both soporific and entertaining. “I’m not sure soporific is the right word,” he says, pointing out that the show finds very young children just as their play is expanding out of the mere physical (bang it, chuck it, break it) and into the world of ideas. “Piaget had this notion of operational play and symbolic play. Up to a certain age, a child will take hold of a doll and bang it to see what it sounds like. Then, at a certain point, that doll becomes symbolic. It starts to stand for a person. It’s that kind of play In the Night Garden is accessing. And it’s that, I think, that is so calming.”

Read more: Yellow Garden Spider | National Wildlife Federation

Before setting off to meet Davenport, I’d asked my daughter if she had a question for Iggle Piggle’s daddy. “Why does Iggle Piggle have to go to bed?” she said. “That’s a really interesting question,” says Davenport. “He’s the connection for the child, the one who goes to sleep at the beginning and enters the Night Garden. But he’s also, crucially, the only character not in bed at the end. ‘Somebody’s not in bed – Iggle Piggle’s not in bed.’

“Bedtime really commands a child’s entire day. Very often children don’t have a proper sense of time. They live with the idea that, at any moment, someone could just take them from what they are doing and send them to bed. It can be a difficult moment: being suddenly alone. So In the Night Garden makes a metaphorical explanation for sleep, which is one of the only things in a child’s life it can’t be accompanied on. That’s why you have the image of Iggle Piggle alone on a boat at the start, floating on a dark swelling ocean that’s a metaphor for sleep.”

Source: https://livingcorner.com.au Category: Garden

source https://livingcorner.com.au/secrets-of-in-the-night-garden/

[ericvick]

Home prices could cool when the Fed tapers its bond-buying program. But a crisis? Unlikely.

U.S. home prices have been rising at a record annual pace in recent months, fueled in part by historically cheap credit, the absence of properties for sale, and the scramble by households for more space as families have fled to the suburbs during the pandemic.

Can the good times last when the Federal Reserve finally cuts back on buying mortgage and Treasury bonds? Here’s how mortgage rates and a less gargantuan central bank footprint could impact the heated U.S. housing market.

“The Fed is certainly talking and thinking about it,” said Kathy Jones, chief fixed income strategist at the Schwab Center for Financial Research, on the subject of how the Federal Reserve could scale back the central bank’s $120 billion a month bond-buying program.

But Jones also thinks tighter credit conditions, likely via higher borrowing rates as the Fed tapers its bond buying program, might end up being a saving grace for today’s housing market.

“Housing prices could certainly pull back, after accelerating so fast,” she said, pointing to households fighting over the few properties available to buy, while navigating work from home. “At some point,” she said, mortgage payments on high-priced homes “become unsustainable with people’s incomes.”

“But I don’t see a big housing debacle.”

How to pump the brakes on housing

The central bank has maintained a large footprint in the mortgage market for more than a decade, but the worsening affordability crisis in the U.S. housing market led Fed officials to walk a tightrope recently when trying to explain its ongoing large-scale asset purchases during the pandemic recovery.

Fed officials in recent weeks have expressed a fair bit of disagreement around the timing and pace of any scaling back of its large-scale asset purchases.

St. Louis Fed President James Bullard said Friday the central bank should start to slow down its bond purchases this fall and finish by March, saying he thought financial markets “are very well prepared” for the reduction in purchases.

During a midweek press briefing, Chairman Jerome Powell said tapering likely would start with agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and Treasury bonds at the same time, but also “the idea of reducing” mortgage exposure “at a somewhat faster pace does have some traction with some people”.

The blue line in the chart below traces the central bank’s balance sheet and abrupt path to a $8.2 trillion balance sheet since 2020 when its efforts to support markets during the pandemic began, with the red line representing its Treasury TMUBMUSD10Y, 1.232% holdings and green line its MBS. MBB, +0.02%

Fed holds major cards in MBS and Treasury markets

St. Louis Fed data

As of July 29, the Fed was holding about 31% of the roughly $7.8 trillion agency MBS market, or housing bonds with government backing.

“You could make the case that the Fed owns almost one-third of the agency mortgage bond market, and that it might make sense to loosen its grip,” Jones said, particularly as Powell has played down a direct link between its MBS purchases and climbing home prices.

It may now seem like a distant memory, but before the pandemic upheaval, that was precisely what the Fed was trying to do.

“Who would have thought,” said Paul Jablansky, head of fixed income at Guardian Life Insurance, that the U.S. would be in the midst of “one of the frothiest housing markets in history,” following last year’s extreme pandemic shutdowns that closed businesses, workplaces and national borders.

“Occasionally people ask, are we at the peak?” said Jablansky, a 30-year veteran of the mortgage, and asset-backed and broader bond market. “We are outside the balance of our experience, so it’s very difficult to say we are at the peak,” he told MarketWatch.

“I do think house price inflation will have to slow down dramatically. But maybe the biggest question is, can we see housing prices go negative? I think the Fed will work very, very hard to create a soft landing in house prices.”

Schwab’s forecast has been for the Fed to kick things off by reducing its monthly asset purchases by $15 billion to $105 billion. That would mean cutting $10 billion from its current $80 billion monthly pace of Treasury purchases and $5 billion from its $40 billion monthly pace of MBS.

“So far, we haven’t changed that,” Jones told MarketWatch.

While the Fed doesn’t set long-term interest rates, its mass buying of Treasurys aims to keep a lid on borrowing costs. Treasury yields also inform the interest rate component of 30-year fixed-rate mortgages. So perhaps, scaling back both at once makes sense, Jones said.

Misremembering the 2013 taper

Fed Chair Powell said on Wednesday that the central bank’s “substantial further progress” standard for unemployment and inflation in particular hasn’t been met yet, while stressing that he’d like to see more progress in the jobs market before easing its monetary policy support for the economy.

Powell also frequently has talked of lessons learned from the market upheaval of 2013, the “taper tantrum” that rattled markets after the central bank began talking about taking away the punch bowl, as the economy healed from the Great Recession of 2008.

“What we need to remember,” Jablansky said, is that markets sold off in anticipation of tapering, not the actual pull back in asset purchases. “Later in the year, the period [former Fed Chair Ben] Bernanke was talking about, the Fed actually continued to buy assets, and the amount of accommodation it provided to the economy actually went up.”

Historically, the only stretch where the Fed has actively withdrawn its support occurred between 2017 and 2019, following its controversial, first foray into large-scale asset purchases to unfreeze credit markets post 2008.

“It’s very difficult to draw a lot of conclusions from that real short period,” Jablansky said. “For us, the conclusion is that 2013 may be instructive, but the circumstances are really different.”

See: Why the Fed’s balance sheet is expected to top $9 trillion after it starts reducing its monthly asset purchases

The message from Powell consistently has been about preserving “maximum flexibility, but to go very slowly,” said George Catrambone, head of Americas trading at asset manager DWS Group.

Catrambone thinks that may be the right strategy, given the uncertain outlook on inflation, evidenced by, the recent spike in the cost of living, but also because of how significantly many of our lives have changed because of the pandemic.

“We know that a used car won’t cost more than a new car forever,” Catrambone said. “Do I think the housing market slows down? It could. But you really need the supply, demand imbalance to abate. That could take a while.”

Extreme wildfires, drought and other shocks of climate change have been tied to $30 billion in property losses in the first half of 2021, while putting more patches of land and U.S. homes in the path of danger. While these were less frequent housing market topics in 2013, the pandemic also changed the whole notion of “what is safe” for many families.

“Migratory patterns tend to be sticky,” Catrambone said, of the flight out of urban centers to suburbia.

What’s more, the delta variant fueling a new wave of COVID-19 cases has led to stricter masking and vaccination policies, including at Alphabet Inc., GOOG, -0.97% Facebook Inc. FB, -0.56% and others, but also delayed plans by many big companies to return staff to offices buildings.

“This probably doesn’t help occupancy rates for commercial real estate, with more people likely staying closer to home,” Catrambone said, but it likely adds to the already high “psychological value placed on housing.”

After touching record highs, the S&P 500 index SPX, -0.54%, Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.42% and Nasdaq Composite Index COMP, -0.71% closed Friday and the week lower, but booked monthly gains.

On the U.S. economic data front, August kicks off with manufacturing and construction spending data, followed by motor vehicles sales, ADP employment and jobless claims, but the main focus of the week will be the monthly nonfarm payrolls report on Friday.

Read: Climate risk is hitting home for state and local governments

[orbemnews]

Analysis: Fix the climate crisis, or get out of the way The Anglo-Dutch company was ordered to slash its CO2 emissions by 45% by 2030 from 2019 levels. Crucially, the target includes emissions created when consumers use the oil, gasoline and natural gas that Shell produces. Big implications: Shell said it would appeal the ruling. But the decision is remarkable, setting numerous precedents that could eventually force other oil and mining companies to change their business models. For the first time, a court took the goals set out in the Paris Climate agreement and applied them to a company. Shell had been targeting a 20% reduction in carbon intensity by 2030, and 45% by 2035. Now it must move faster. “The court understands that the consequences could be big for Shell,” said Jeannette Honée, a spokeswoman for the court. “But the court believes that the consequences of severe climate change are more important than Shell’s interests,” she added. Hours later, attention shifted to Exxon Mobil’s annual shareholder meeting, where a plucky hedge fund called Engine No.1 was seeking to unseat four board members in a corporate version of David vs. Goliath. Balance of power: Engine No. 1 holds just 0.02% of Exxon’s shares and has only existed for six months. Exxon was the world’s most valuable company as recently as 2013, generated sales of $179 billion in 2020 (a down year) and once wielded enough influence to be described as having its own foreign policy. Engine No. 1 argued the climate crisis poses an existential threat to Exxon (XOM) — one the company hasn’t taken seriously enough — and Wall Street’s biggest guns agreed. “A refusal to accept that fossil fuel demand may decline in decades to come has led to a failure to take even initial steps towards evolution, and to obfuscating rather than addressing long-term business risk,” the hedge fund wrote in its investor presentation. Scoreboard: Despite the long odds, Engine No. 1 won at least two board seats in the shareholder vote. It could add to that total when counting resumes. Engine No. 1 triumphed in the proxy fight by recruiting powerful allies that share its concerns about Exxon’s direction. Institutional Shareholder Services advised shareholders to vote for three of Engine No. 1’s candidates. Advisory firm Glass Lewis urged shareholders to back two Engine No. 1 candidates. The California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), another powerful pension fund, also backed the campaign. “Investors are no longer standing on the sidelines. This is a day of reckoning,” Anne Simpson, managing investment director at CalPERS, said in a statement. BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, backed three of the candidates put forward by Engine No. 1. Exxon has traditionally recruited board members who lack “specific energy industry experience,” BlackRock explained in a statement, while the Engine No. 1 nominees have significant expertise in renewable energy, technology and infrastructure. “We continue to be concerned about Exxon’s strategic direction and the anticipated impact on its long-term financial performance and competitiveness. In our view, the board would benefit from the addition of diverse energy experience to augment existing skillsets,” said BlackRock. The third blow: Chevron (CVX) investors added to the pressure on the industry, voting in favor of a shareholder proposal on Wednesday asking the company to cut emissions generated by the use of its energy products. Taken together, the defeats send a loud message to other fossil fuel companies as the International Energy Agency warns the world it needs to immediately stop drilling for oil and gas to prevent a climate catastrophe. What’s next: Climate activists will continue to apply pressure to energy companies and investors, pushing for change by using their new battle-tested strategies of attacking via the courts and shareholder resolutions. Urgent update: There is about a 40% chance of the annual average global temperature temporarily reaching the critical 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels in at least one of the next five years, according to a report published Thursday by the World Meteorological Organization. Under the Paris climate accord, countries committed to reduce their carbon output and halt global warming below 2 degrees Celsius — and if possible, below 1.5 degrees Celsius — by the end of the century to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. Larry Summers sends stark inflation warning to Joe Biden Larry Summers is urging Washington to tap the brakes on stimulus — or risk unleashing a serious burst of inflation. “I think policy is rather overdoing it,” Summers said in recorded comments at a conference that were released Wednesday. “The sense of serenity and complacency being projected by the economic policymakers, that this is all something that can easily be managed, is misplaced.” The argument: The former Clinton and Obama official took issue with how the Federal Reserve and government spending continue to turbo-charge the economy even though the risk of a catastrophic deflationary spiral has faded. “We’re taking very substantial risks on the inflation side,” Summers said in remarks originally made May 18, adding to a series of warnings the former Harvard president has issued in recent weeks. Inflation watch: Prices have risen sharply on everything from used cars and lumber to steel. The return of inflation is especially costly to low-income families, who are most likely to have been hit hardest by the pandemic. Once viewed as a candidate to run the Fed, Summers pointed to how the Central Bank is signaling that interest rates will remain very low for the foreseeable future and continues to buy $120 billion of bonds each month. “The Fed’s idea used to be that it removed the punchbowl before the party got good,” Summer said. “Now, the Fed’s doctrine is that it will only remove the punchbowl after it sees some people staggering around drunk.” A new era at Amazon Amazon founder Jeff Bezos will officially step down from his role as chief executive on July 5, he announced during the company’s annual shareholder meeting Wednesday. What’s next: Bezos will hand the reins to Andy Jassy, who currently runs Amazon Web Services, after nearly three decades running the internet giant that made him one of the richest people in the world. Bezos will become Amazon’s executive chair. The company first announced the leadership change as part of its February earnings report, saying Jassy would take over during the fiscal third quarter. The timing is “sentimental,” Bezos said — July 5 is the date Amazon was incorporated in 1994. “I’m very excited to move into the [executive] chair role, where I’ll focus my energies and attention on new products and early initiatives,” Bezos said Wednesday. Passion projects: In February, Bezos said he was looking forward to having more time to work on his ventures outside the company, such as the Bezos Earth Fund and Blue Origin. Bezos said he expects that Jassy — who has been at the company for 24 years and risen through its ranks to run its most profitable division — will be “an outstanding leader.” Up next Best Buy (BBY), Dollar General (DG), Dollar Tree (DLTR) and Medtronic (MDT) report results before US markets open. Costco (COST), Dell (DELL), Gap (GPS) and Salesforce (CRM) report after the close. Also today: US jobless claims at 8:30 a.m. ET Coming tomorrow: US personal spending and income data. Source link Orbem News #Analysis #Climate #crisis #Fix #investing #orgetoutoftheway-CNN #Premarketstocks:Fixtheclimatecrisis