#this is 100% true go check charles account

[80181880]

Charlie, you forgot to switch your account😭

[anthonysstupiddailyblog]

Anthony’s Stupid Daily Blog (471): Sat 1st Jul 2023

Up at half five this morning to catch my train down to Londern Engerland to see Iggy Pop live in concert. There were four lasses in the booth of chairs on the opposite side of the aisle from me and one of them popped open a bottle of champagne that went all over her. Luckily none of it went on me because it would be bad enough having to travel on a train for four hours all wet but champagne is what I was drinking when I blacked out on that cruise ship to Amsterdam 15 years ago and ended up falling out of my bunk bed and getting a black eye. Being drenched in the stuff would mean I’d be getting constant flashbacks for the whole trip. I arrived in London four hours ahead of check in time but luckily I was allowed to leave my bag there so I wasnt dragging it around for the rest of the day. I checked the gigs website said that Iggy wouldn’t be going on until half 8 so I decided I would get the chance to relax and enjoy a walk around London (for the first of three times this year) and wouldn’t need to set off for the gig until about five o’clock. I wanted to buy a new jacket and some new shirts but despite walking from Kings Cross to Leicester Square I didn’t see a single fucking mens clothing store. For the second time in my life a trip to London has happened to coincide with London Pride Day (if I still hung around with my college friends this is the moment they would say “yeah right”). Five years ago I came here to see Richard Herrings podcast recorded and it happened to be the pride festival and new the same thing has happened with the Iggy Pop festival. I walked through the pride festivities to get to Leicester Square and I could sense all the gay people were thinking that I was bringing the mood down with my miserable face but were too polite to ask me to leave. I needed a loss when I got to Leicester Square. The nearest place with a toilet was McDonald’s but I suspected that like in Edinburgh they would require you to buy something and the code to get into the toilet would be printed on your receipt. I went in and paid for an orange juice and once I got my receipt went downstairs to use the toilets only to discover there is no code and any cunt can come in and use it for free. Fucks sake. I was so angry that I took my orange juice and threw it at a trash can outside. However it bounced off the can and splashed all over a drag Queen in the front of a gay pride float and the whole crowd thought I was some sort of anti gay protestor and an angry mob minced after me. Luckily I saw that the Prince Charles Cinema was showing The Wizard of Oz so I ran inside knowing that this was the last place a group of angry homosexuals would expect a homophobe to hide. Needless to say this entire story was completely 100% true. Anywho after a few hours shopping in the sunshine I headed off to catch my train to Crystal Palace. Some fat smelly dude initially sat next to me on the packed train but thankfully he got straight back up and moved a few seats forward. Presumably he must have spotted that someone left a half eaten Mars Bar on one of the seats. I thought that I was going to struggle to get from Crystal Palace station to the park without Google Maps but luckily as soon as I existed the station there was a lass with a sign instructing people where to go to get to the concert. Man I wish the trip to WrestleMania had been this fucking straightforward. The park wasn’t as full as I expected but then again this was five hours in to a nine hour concert in he baking heat so a sizeable amount of people just have fucked off. I missed Generation Sex but that’s no big thing since the only Billy Idol song I like is Super Overdrive and by all accounts they didn’t play it. The next act was Blondie and for 78 Debbie Harry is still really good. She has a naturally charm and charisma and even though her voice is obviously a lot more gruff and less melodic than when she first started she nevertheless still has a great singing voice. I enjoyed hearing Heart of Glass live but they left without playing One Way Or Another which is my favourite song of theirs so I’m guessing g they muse have played it shortly before I arrived but that’s no big deal. One of the food carts was selling veggie noodles and while I expected them to be shit they ware some of the nicest I have ever had. Easily better than any and all of the shit I had while I was in America. It was so good I went back about four times for some more. I wish I’d thought to get this bitches number and asked about employing her to live in my house to cook me noodles every day. For the hour in between Debbie Harry leaving the stage and Iggy arriving I walked around the venue listening to an episode of Eric Bischoff’s podcast in my headphones. Even though I vowed I would resist it at all costs ok realized I was going to have to use the toilet and fuck me what a disgusting sight / smell it was. They basically have dozens of makeshift urinals erected around an area of the field which are essentially walls which shield the sight of you pissing into a giant barrel. Even if you agreed to supply me with free noodles for the remainder of my life I don’t think it would be enough to get me to to accept a job where I would have to empty these fucking urinals. At long last Iggy finally took to the stage and the crowd started dancing along with him. I know Iggy isn’t everyone’s plate of noodles but his ability to entrance and command an audience is undeniable. It was like myself and the rest of the crowd were hypnoses and felt compelled to dance along with him (for someone who hates dancing as much as me getting me to join in was quite an achievement). Over the next hour we were treated to The Passenger and the iconic Lust For Life which were amazing but sadly this will not be what kind remember most from this gig. What I will remember most is some drunk bloke who climbed up on a wall at the top of a hill and began drunkenly dancing until a security guard ushered him back. The drunk man did start to carefully inch himself back along the wall but then, weary of the fact he would probably be thrown out of the gig, jumped from the wall to the grass near the top of the hill but then lost his footing and rolled down the hill like a drunken Boulder from Indiana Jones. Another security guard at the bottom of the hill apprehended him and attempted to thrown him out. However his friends sprinted down the hill and asked the guards to give him another chance and their he was sorry for making a drunken fool of himself. At this point the drunkard broke the security guards grip and ran laughing into the crowd while the security chased after him like a fucking Charlie Chaplin film. This is by quite some margin the funniest thing I have seen in a long time. After Iggy performed his penultimate song “I Wanna Be Your Dog” I felt a slight trickle of rain on my arm and decided to call it a day and made my way back to the station. Iggy must hate having to perform at festivals in the UK because there’s a good chance he’ll get soaking wet. In fact I’m surprised that after fifty years of performing without a shirt that he hasn’t contracted pneumonia. I bet in the early seventies performing with one’s shirt off was probably a good idea for a gimmick that set you apart from the other acts at the time but I bet that Iggy couldn’t have foreseen that he would still be doing it fifty years later on a cloudy day in a park in England while looking like something you’d see hanging in a butcher shop window. I bet he would just love to put a shirt on but he’s being doing it for so long now that it would look out of place. People would go “but what about all the times you didn’t have a shirt on?”. I missed out on my chance to see Iggy at the Royal Albert Hall in 2018 because I was in New York in the date of the gig. It sounds horrible to say but due to his advanced age I worried that I might have missed my last chance to see him (especially when covid hit). I was delighted therefore when he announced this gig because it meant I would be able to see an all time legend in one of my favourite cities in the world no less. Iggy is a true innovator and one of those artists who you can tell doesn’t give a fuck what people think of him which endears me to anyone (unless it’s a politician obviously). I left the gig happy that I finally got to cross this legend of rock off my band bucket list and now the only true must see artist I have left in there are Devo who I will be seeing in a month and a half. I was one of the first concert goers to arrive at the station and saw that the train wouldn’t arrive for another half hour. I waited patiently but when there was five minutes left to wait some bloke from the station came out and loudly told us that the next train back to kings cross was actually going to be at a different platform and ushered us up the stairs. I was furious because now I was unlikely to get a seat and I was even more furious when we got to the other station and was told by another station representative that the bloke who told us to come here had ducked up and we needed to go back where we came from. I got back to the platform just as the train arrived and had to cram myself in and got squashed to the very front of the carriage. Even though the train was full more people still squeezed on when we arrived at the next platform. Someone actually shouted at me to move down to let more people on. I just made a motion illustrating to him that I couldn’t move any further but what I want to do was scream “IF I MOVE ANY FURTHER DOWN I’LL BE DRIVING THE TRAIN YOU STUPID CUNT!”. Anywho i finally arrived back at Kings Cross at about midnight and my hostel was only a short walk up the road. I still had a biting a buzz on from the gig and worried I wouldn’t be able to get to sleep but thankfully after 30 minutes or so I felt my eyelids getting heavier and I stood drifted off. I haven’t had many good days over the last 34 years but today was definitely one of them.

[trippin-over-my-fandoms]

I’ve seen this done before but here are my modern!rdr2 social media headcanons for the Van der Linde gang.

some of these are LONG and then some are shorter. doesn’t mean I love any of them any less however. I just did my best with all of them. 

* I treat the gang as family especially for my modern au 

Dutch

frequently uses Facebook and has dozens of friends he doesn’t even know. like if he gets a friend request he’ll accept it. John tells him he might as well just make his page public and Arthur pleads with him to make a facebook PAGE so that his random friends will stop liking posts that Arthur tags Dutch in. 

Dutch has no idea how to make a facebook page. 

he also has a Twitter and a massive following at that. He’s VERIFIED. 

all of his twitter posts are vague though

are they a joke? are they political? is it what he’s eating for lunch that day? literally no one knows.

Hosea

also has facebook but doesn’t use it because why does he need to look at pictures of events he was at. he only uses it to see things he didn’t partake in

also has snapchat but just to keep up with the kids 

because life360 was too much to deal with for everyone

and snapchat is cool

also he can and will spam you with bitmojis 

Arthur

used to use facebook a lot but stopped because he was tired of his posts getting likes from people he didn’t know and friend requests from people Dutch was friends with. 

plEASE

he has a private facebook for a reason, he doesn’t want other people to know his business. 

he also has an instagram but anything he posts on facebook also goes on there. it’s not aesthetic or pretty or anything and he doesn’t even caption over half his pictures. 

he literally only uses social media so that his friends and family know he’s alive

has snapchat because of Hosea but barely knows how to use it 

doesn’t get why everyone wants to use snapchat when teXTING AND CALLING ARE RIGHT THERE

John

the question is what doesn’t he have.

john has been trying to make it big on social media since youtube came out.

his youtube used to have videos on it but he deleted them because they were cringy and arthur liked to send them to the group text. 

plays twitch games on the weekends and sometimes with Jack but he thinks most of the subscribers are there for his kid since most of his solo streams don’t do as well

has a twitter, doesn’t follow Dutch, literally envies that he’s verified. 

he’s tried everything but no matter what he does nothing pans out

uses tiktok to promote twitch streams

instagram feed is mostly selfies of him but 99.9% of the time he’s wearing sunglasses and the caption is some random quote 

also has facebook but only to appease Arthur and Dutch, he doesn’t even have a profile picture. Claims only boomers use it. 

an avid reddit user. if he’s got problems he’ll go to reddit. claims reddit saved his life. everyone’s tired of the story so they stopped asking. 

also uses snapchat more than he should and the only social platform he has more than 100 followers on. 

Charles

same as arthur and has both facebook and instagram and posts the same on both except his are pleasing to look at. 

they’re unintentionally aesthetic 

he uses a psd on all his pictures and won’t share what it is

has monthly life updates that start with some inspirational or deep quote and then text that pushes the instagram word limit

also has a deviantart , has shared psds there before , constantly tries to convince Arthur to get it. 

used to use tumblr but he forgot about it

Abigail

the definition of a facebook mom. 80% of her facebook posts are about Jack or parenting. 

Instagram is similar but also different, she’s actually a relatively successful influencer with over 1,000 followers. 

all of her friends and family (who have instagram) follow her

has snapchat solely for the cute bitmojis and to send John adorable snaps of Jack playing with all the fun filters. 

she also won’t take a selfie unless it’s with snapchat because she no longer trusts her own camera. 

also uses pinterest and has a collaborative board with all the ladies. 

but in general, on her own, she has too many boards. she uses pinterest for EVERYTHING 

Sadie

bold of you to assume she uses social media. 

she does just not a whole lot. 

checks it once in the morning and once at night. 

except pinterest because how dare Abigail get her into it. but even pinterest she only uses in downtime. 

has facebook and instagram but there’s maybe only five posts.

if anything she’ll post on her story

will only snap Abigail and Arthur otherwise she doesn’t use snapchat

all of the social apps are mostly offloaded on her phone anyways

if she needs to know anything she just checks the group text which she has on do not disturb because they text way too much. 

Molly

she’s verified on instagram 

it’s also the only social platform she’ll use, which frustrates Dutch because he wants to be friends with her on facebook

but she’s happy with just instagram 

she keeps it simple 

and the main theme to her posts are fun outfits in her ever expanding closet

the other posts are usually of plants that she’s managed to grow. she’s not the best at being a plant mom but she’s still a good one to the ones she’s managed to keep alive. 

the only thing she contributes to the pinterest board are her own pictures of her plants which are overly aesthetic. 

Karen

started out with a normal instagram account then made a spam account which she ended up using way more often.

all of her posts are extremely chaotic

and usually reposts from her snapchat

has a reddit just to troll John

reposted his cringy youtube videos to reddit and got hundreds of upvotes

if you wanna see the most raw and chaotic videos of Arthur and John then she’s the one to follow. 

also if you wanna see Abigail when she’s not all put together. 

is the reason there’s so many memes in the collaborative pinterest board

Mary-Beth

has a instagram but also has a second instagram for art and book reviews

or basically anything she’d post on her tumblr

which is her second most used social

also uses facebook but only because she is an admin for one of those multifandom blogs. 

also begs Arthur to get a deviantart. 

uses pinterest most but only second to Abigail

literally the queen of pinterest DIYs

Micah

has twitter

as far as anyone else knows that’s all he has

maybe he has snapchat?

maybe they saw him on snapmaps once? 

all he ever does with twitter though is retweet anything Dutch posts.

yet somehow he has so many followers. 

Lenny

anyone who has snapchat has streaks with Lenny

even Hosea who doesn’t understand why it’s a thing

he also posts a lot on facebook but it’s mostly travel or vacation photos everyone is just a tad jealous of. 

Lenny always seems to be busy but still has time for streaks with his friends. 

he’s also an up and coming youtube vlogger

Sean

also has reddit to troll john

but he also legitimately uses it too. 

he’s also really popular in the minecraft subreddit , don’t ask

also has twitch and also has way more subsribers than John

and a youtube which he’ll upload (overly edited) twitch streams to

everyone subscribes to him but they don’t tell John that.

also has a tiktok and is up to date on all the trends because of course he is

Kieran

got facebook when he was 10 and just never left.

literally doesn’t use any other social media

he’s not in the group text either so he has to facebook message Arthur to know what’s going on. 

but he shares a lot of memes and cute pictures of animals

he used to follow Dutch but unfriended him when he was the only thing he ever had on his activity feed. 

Susan

has facebook but claims she doesn’t have time to use it

Arthur knows this to not be true because she will like a lot of his posts. 

she’s also guilty of liking every single picture in one post or album. 

Arthur has also caught her looking at memes and using recipes she finds on there. 

also part of the pinterest board but never contributes. 

Trelawny

he has an account for everything

like

litereally

everything. 

even whatsapp and linked in and kik

even tinder

the only one anyone knows about are his facebook, twitter, and instagam

but there’s no posts on any of them except twitter

he’s also verified

but for unknown reasons

any posts on his facebook are ones he’s tagged in

he’s also in a lot of facebook groups

Strauss

runs a subreddit

a paid facebook admin of several pages

the only person who actually knows this is Dutch because Strauss has told him about it

he has no online presence whatsoever out side of those.

Javier

spotify king

has over 500,000 subscribers on youtube

uses instagram but as another platform for his music

edits his own album covers

top tier playlists too

Tilly

aesthetic queen

the most put together and pleasing to look at instagram feed next to Charles. 

uses pinterest a lot as inspiration and for making moodboards.

also uses tumblr to share moodboards

part of the sims global community facebook group

she keeps saying she’s going to start a youtube vlog but hasn’t yet

keeps trying to convince John to let her help him with his youtube.

she also uses twitch to play minecraft and sims

oh and she set up a minecraft server for everyone

Bill

facebook boomer

that’s it

I don’t know how else to put it

probably shares heavily republican posts

Swanson

didn’t use social media until tiktok.

he doesn’t do dances or anything but he does post weirdly obscure and chaotic videos that end up trending on more than one occasion

it’s usually drunk ramblings in his car that end up being hilarious

or videos of the others almost dying or ending up in the ER

Pearson

facebook boomer but make it cool.

also shares conservative posts but less offensive ones compared to Bill’s

likes almost every post any of his friends share

also comments on them too

Uncle

does he have social media? no one knows for sure. 

yet somehow he knows what’s going on

even if nobody can find any of his social accounts or have ever seen him using one before let alone doing anything on his phone other than playing cheesy mobile games.

[shmegmilton]

Hey! Just been looking through your blog and saw some of your posts re: Jumel, Burr and Alex Jr. While it’s true Chernow told the story in his biography and that’s where the popular idea that he was her lawyer came from, the story has apparently been repeated by Burr biographers long before Chernow wrote his Hamilton. There’s a book called ‘Aaron Burr and the Literary Imagination’ by Charles J Nolan (1980) who mentions the story in Chapter 1: ‘The Man who Killed Hamilton’, he gives his source as ‘Aaron Burr: Portrait of an Ambitous Man’ by Herbert S Parmet, published in 1967. I don’t own the latter book so I have no idea who he gives as his source but it seems that this story has been in currency for a long time regardless of whether it’s true or not.

     Yeah, I’m aware it’s been around for a while. My first intro to the myth was in Vidal’s book on Burr in the 1973, which implies Vidal got it from the 1968 book, I imagine. As for the 1980 book (which I haven’t read), from whatever instantly accessible info about Charles J. Nolan I can find on Google, his Staff Page on the USNA website says that he was more-or-less exclusively an English & Creative Writing professor. Granted, you don’t NEED a degree is history to enjoy it, study it independently or even write a book about it, but none of his credits imply anything about him having a background with history and/or historical research.

   Also, judging by the title (Aaron Burr & the American Literary Imagination) I assume that it’s less of a Burr biography and more of an essay on all of the different Burr interpretations in fiction books, plays, etc. Nancy Isenberg has a whole section covering the topic in her Burr biography, as well. If that’s the case, if Ron Chernow got his information from this 1980′s book, he’s either grossly irresponsible with his research, or an idiot. Which means that it was probably the 1968 book, or a book printed before that.

-

    But the thing about those historians in particular (ie. pre-1960s historians) is they have a “pass” for lack of a better word; they did what they could with the info that they had, which was mostly unvetted newspapers & washed biographies written either by direct descendants/family members that had an agenda (“make them look as great as possible”), or by third parties with their own agenda. There wasn’t “standards” for research, no one was under any obligation to be truthful--not to mention, it’s hard to be truthful in the first place if your only sources aren’t truthful themselves.

As much as a hate the Hamilton play, the way Lin Manuel Miranda writes his obsession over “legacies” makes a good point; the Founding Fathers cared MORE about their legacies than historical accuracy. Case and point, this is why we didn’t know about Thomas Jefferson & Sally Hemings, or the fact that Alexander Hamilton most likely DID own slaves until relatively recently--because over the last few decades, historians have finally been getting unrestricted access to historical archives that were hidden to “protect” these people’s images. ‘History is written by the victors’, or however that saying goes.

-

This poses a problem for Chernow because, if he DID get his info from one of these books... that kind of diminishes his credibility, doesn’t it? Because any professional in any sort of field SHOULD know, as a general rule: the older your sources are, unless it’s a first-hand account or written documents, the less likely they are to be accurate.

This is why peer-review is an important step in a lot of fields; academics every few decades will double-check these older books or studies alongside the new information we know & realize that they’re incorrect, or that the conclusion is different than what we thought it was.

This is why we don’t think recognize outdated information like ‘humans only use 20% of their brain’, or ‘homosexuality is a choice’ as fact anymore. Because we double-checked and now we KNOW it’s wrong. Ergo, no academic who wants to be taken seriously is going to cite 3rd party books that are 30, 40, 50 years old/clearly outdated. Unless you’re Chernow, I guess.

-

    But the BIG issue I have with the “Alexander Hamilton Jr. was Jumel’s divorce lawyer” myth (you mentioned seeing my other posts before, so you probably know that Jumel’s biographer discovered that Alexander Jr. was a real-estate broker who temporarily took ownership of her property during the divorce so Burr couldn’t get to it, which means this myth is most likely a misinterpretation), is that even though he may have sourced this from a book (not that we’ll ever know because HE never sourced it).... I have yet to see it repeated in any Burr biography before & since. Which should be a red flag, but Chernow’s confirmation bias was too great, I guess.

The two OLDEST biographies on Aaron Burr that we have, Memoirs of Aaron Burr (1837) and The Life & Times of Aaron Burr (1858) don’t even mention Alexander Jr. or much about the divorce proceedings at all. Aaron Burr: A Biography (1938) also doesn’t mention it at any point when discussing the divorce.

Some Burr biographies that I’ve read before & since Chernow’s book was written (May 2005) that ALSO don’t mention it are:

Aaron Burr (Milton Lomask, 1980)

Burr, Hamilton & Jefferson (Roger G. Kennedy, 1999)

Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr (Nancy Isenberg, 2007)

The Heartbreak of Aaron Burr (H.W. Brands, 2012)

The Secret Wife of Aaron Burr (Susan Holloway Scott, 2019)

American Emperor (David O. Stewart, 2011)

War of Two (John Sedgewick, 2015)

I haven’t read many biographies on Alexander Hamilton, but my current theory is that this myth originally started in one of his biographies because:

Judging about how Chernow wrote Burr, he didn’t care enough about him to read more than two pages, let alone an entire biography about him.

Like I said, no other Burr biography that I’ve seen verifies this information, so unless he’s an idiot it’s virtually impossible for him to have sourced this from a Burr book.

-

So, yes, while you’re 100% correct that Chernow isn’t the originator of this myth, he still perpetuated something that a majority of SERIOUS historians seem to be in agreement is unverifiable/false, to an audience of thousands of people & now that’s all you see when you type in Eliza Jumel or Alexander Hamilton Jr. into Google. It’s obnoxious, and he’s obnoxious.

[greenwaymoney]

Stock marketing investing for beginners

Your first step into the realm of markets. 

You’ve seen all the hype around stocks, GameStop, Tesla, etc. You hear all this talk about call options and swing trading and complex analytical systems. There seems to be so much noise that it can turn you off from actually getting started in the first place.

Here’s the truth: investing does not need to be complicated. 

In fact, we can make it incredibly easy. This post is for those that have never invested in the stock market before. If you’ve already dabbled in the market or are a seasoned investor, stick around for a refresher.

There are a few things you should do before you invest your hard earned cash in the financial markets:

Determine your risk tolerance.

Decide how committed you are to research.

Going in without a plan pretty much ensures you won’t get what you want (how do you know what you want if you don’t decide that upfront?)

Risk Tolerance

You must decide if you want to be risk averse or risk tolerant. Averse means you want safer, more secure investments. Tolerant means you are willing to trade risk for a chance at greater reward. Remember, risk does not always equal reward. A lot of stock market research is focused on finding what are called “Asymmetric returns” where you can leverage your returns to far exceed your upfront risk. That is for another time.

If you are younger, you will probably be more risk tolerant. The older you are, the closer you get to “retirement”, the more you are likely to safeguard your investments. However, that is certainly not true in every situation. 

Commitment 

Do you want to be reading financial statements and browsing the news all day? Probably not. How committed you are to researching investments and stocks will determine how actively you manage your portfolio. Also remember, just because you spend hours on Discord looking at stock signals doesn’t necessarily mean you will outperform the market. Risk ≠ Reward (not always at least).

For the beginning investor I still recommend you do some basic research (like reading this post) but don’t worry about getting too deep into it. The important thing is to just start. That doesn’t mean you throw your money at random tickers though. Let’s get into how to actually invest in the stock market. 

How to get started

Disclaimer: this is not financial advice, this is just the opinion of a guy on the internet. Make sure to do your own research before making moves with your money. Cheers!

Once you’ve asked yourself some basic questions and conducted a little upfront research, you need to take these steps to start investing:

Open a brokerage account.

Contribute money you are willing to lose.

Plan your portfolio.

Make your investments.

Behold, the road to investing lies before you.

Step One: Open a brokerage account

A brokerage account is like a bank account for stocks (oversimplified). It gives you access to the securities (stock) market and allows you to make trades. You will hear about margin privileges, options trading, futures, and a lot of other terms. Don’t worry about those words too much right now; we’ll get to them. 

You can go with a simple, mobile-friendly brokerage like Webull, Robinhood, or Public. I’ve linked to Robinhood that will give us both a free stock when you download the app and make an initial deposit. 

You can also go with a more traditional company like Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade, or Fidelity. It is really up to you.

Most of these brokerages offer commission-free trading which means you won’t be charged fees to place a trade. In addition, some offer fractional investing which means if a stock costs $100 you can buy 1/10th of the stock if you only have $10 in your account.

Ultimately, what brokerage you use doesn’t matter. It’s a matter of personal preference. Just make sure you like the user interface and that it isn’t too confusing. Wouldn’t want you to accidentally YOLO your entire portfolio into OTM call options, net yet at least :)

Step Two: Contribute money that you are willing to lose

Willing to lose? What do I mean by that? What I mean is that investing is least effective when it’s emotional. If your entire net worth is invested in the stock market, and the market takes a 10% dip, how is that going to affect your mental health?

Only contribute money that you aren’t going to need to pay for basic living expenses. Check out this article where we talk about how to reduce your spending so you can have more money for investing.

Step Three: Plan out your portfolio

You’ve opened an account and made your initial deposit. Now for the fun part, right? 

Here you need to decide what exactly to invest in. There are thousands of companies out there so how do you decide which ones to place your cash into? What I would do in this instance is invest in index funds which are like baskets of stocks. Index funds like Vanguard’s $VTI covers a large amount of stocks and will basically follow the movements of the broad market.

This is a more risk-averse strategy. The market usually returns around 10% annually and that’s probably what you’ll be looking at with index fund investing.

Starting with index funds is a great way to get yourself introduced into the stock market without exposing yourself to a ton of market volatility. 

Step Four: Make your initial investments

Now that you’ve decided upon your investment strategy. It is time to make those investments. The biggest thing here is to buy and hold. Don’t try to time the market, nobody can do that. 

Putting it together

Congratulations! You’ve successfully completed a major milestone in your financial freedom journey. Investing in the stock market for the first time is no easy task. I’m so proud of you.

Once you’ve gotten started in investing, you can begin to experiment with more sophisticated and complex trading strategies, but only if you want to. You definitely don’t need to do anything crazy in order to make good returns in the market. It all depends on your time horizon and investing goals. We’ll have more content coming out soon regarding investing so make sure to drop a comment and let us know what you think!

[gevejsbvdj]

Pt. 2

the continuation of what inspired my leave beneath the cut

I have a friend, who I got along with really well because we are both Afro Latinas (only she can speak Spanish. I don’t, not really) and we are black kids who had an interest in unconventional topics. I messaged her before disappearing about the ending of the server. I was keeping her updated all throughout, but after telling her the ending, I left her on read

I won’t disclose what I got up to during my absence. But again, don’t think that I had a breakdown because of the server ONLY. It was the final straw. I had so much going on in my life and I couldn’t take it anymore. 

Anyways, she took it upon herself to send hateful messages to Ley’s account and thought it was something to be proud of and told me. I...wasn’t impressed. But I still didn’t respond to our chats. Then she (her name is Rex. I’m gonna call her that) dmed Ley and was actually pretty aggressive towards her in an attempt to get answers. Again, not impressed but it was enough for me to actually come online. I feel like that’s why she acted out, to get me online. I don’t think she cared about me and used my pain to hurt others.

I had extremely brief, passing conversations with people who weren’t involved with the situation at all right before I messaged Rex. 

Ley was special to me before her message. I was always very defensive and protective of her like I was everyone else, but her especially because I thought she was nice. And I remembered when people were being mean to me, she reached out. And I still appreciate her for doing that. 

Which was why it was so confusing when Rex told me that they were all mad at me because I ACCUSED JOANE OF GROOMING PEOPLE. They wanted a reason to make me the villain so badly that they made shit up.

Notice how here, she says that I called Joane a FUCKING PEDO. Not even just a groomer but an outright PEDOPHILE. 

I’ve been raped. I’ve been sexually assaulted, groomed, all of that. I don’t say shit. I never say anything. I’ve even been accused- yes, ACTUALLY ACCUSED unlike Joane- to being a paedophile. I’m 19. Not even just that but I’m freshly 19. I got accused when I was 17. But I would never just- ughhhh moving on I don’t wanna get into it. 

When Rex asked for proof, this is way Ley sent her:

In this screenshot, I’m literally discussing how Joane’s childish behaviour could get her killed. I was concerned. Again, where’s the bullying?

Rex told me that Ley said she was wrong for not having proof, and I understand. Ley wasn’t present when it all went down

But really Ley? 

I heard a quote from someone that said something like “if someone believed a lie about you without checking up on you first to see if there was proof, then they were already looking for something to destroy you with to begin with” or SOMETHING like that. So I thought back to that quote and felt awful. I always suspected that they didn’t really like me, but always marked it up to my depression talking nonsense. But after all of this...maybe it was true. Why did I come out the most damage? Why were they making up lies about me? Me, out of all of them. Why was I consistently being seen as the bad guy overall? No really tell me. 

Anyways, this was Ley’s justification to believe that I would say such an awful thing:

Okay. Let’s just say that- Joane WAS a groomer. That she actually is a paedophile and I commented on it. She’s obviously not but I’m pulling a Ben Shapiro here. Everything else is the same only Joane is a paedophile. 

That motherfucking “it’s weird that he only spoke up when they were arguing” argument, and other arguments like that are so fucking toxic. As well as “well it wasn’t a problem that never came up before” so??? That’s what the fucking #metoo movement was all about. Timing means NOTHING when it comes to that. It doesn’t matter if it’s Joane or fucking Bill Cosby. The fact that thought came to Ley’s head is so fucking upsetting and DISGUSTING.THAT mentality is why people never want to believe victims of assault. Same goes for “they could have said that privately” guys she’s talking about that user who said they were uncomfortable with Joane coming onto him. Privately? It was private to him. In that server, we’ve made it known that it’s a very homey and comfortable environment. And who the fuck are you to tell someone where and when they can speak up about something like that???

Also, she accused me of calling her a pedo again. Good for me right? I’m a bully and I’m someone who just blindly calls people paedophiles. Good for me, damn. 

No, you shouldn’t believe someone right away when they call someone a groomer. God don’t I know that. But you definitely don’t say THAT what the fucking fuck. 

Jesus. Okay, moving on. 

Rex aggressively messaged Mel who had something similar to say:

uggh, you WERE the toxic environment i wanted to flee from,.

It hurts. It hurts a lot to see another friend you looked up to call you a bully. And that they just say that you called someone a groomer when you didn’t. 

Mel couldn’t provide proof either. 

Mel also tagged her post with someone kinda ignorant. 

Imagine if (thinking of someone I and others don’t always agree with) someone like James Charles made a post broadcasting all the homophobia he dealt with during his career, and I or some other asshole said something “while I don’t always agree with James…” like now isn’t the time. Now isn’t the time to let people you know you disagree with me ESPECIALLY on a post where you agree with me 100%??? What is the point then? You agreed with me, so agree with me. There. No one is saying that you have to agree with everything I say lord fucking knows I don’t always agree with you guys. fucking DUH. It makes me think you just wanted to put that in to lesson me and my words, even only slightly. Why? That hurts a lot, Mel. It really fucking does bruh.

When Rex called her out on it, she deleted the reblog. Not just the meagre little tag but the whole post. If she couldn’t be slick with me, then she wasn’t going to support me at all. It isn’t worth it if she can’t be shady. That’s the message I got from that. Tells me a lot. 

I am not friends with Rex anymore. She’s always been really aggressive and drama craving and I can’t take it. It’s impacting me negatively as well. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t somewhat happy with the screenshots she gave me. Told me a lot about these people I was still willing to talk to. 

Now? I won’t even waste their time.

After all of that. I made the post. The big announcement post. It was too much. I can’t escape the racism in my hometown or in the country in general, but I can leave and distance myself from the fandom. 

I was talking to someone today, and she, as a white woman, admitted that white people act so shitty when it’s implied that they’re racist. Which is so true. 

As I said, people make mistakes. No white person EVER is 0% racist or biased. I’m sorry but it’s not true unless you’re a baby or something. Same goes for other races, but mainly white people who have always had the upper hand, the privilege, the money, the chances, the power, all of that. 

Listen to me. 

When a person of color tells you that you are being microaggressive, biased, ignorant, or prejudice, or straight up RACIST, YOU FUCKING LISTEN TO THEM. Why do you guys get so AGGRESSIVE AND MAD?? That is so fucking WEIRD. 

And yes. I’m talking to you Vulture. 

I really had no ill feelings towards you prior to your comments.

Or your posts. 

peep that clumsily used aave. never fucking talked like that to anyone but me. either way, you sound dumb.

Why?

Why so...mad?

You felt guilty? Why did you feel guilty? 

...I’m gonna let you answer that. 

Moving on. I know that not everything has to be about race. I hate making things about my race. I do, even when I should! But you can be racist unintentionally. Does that mean you’re racist? No! I have yet to receive a genuine apology from any of you, meanwhile, I’ve been over here grovelling and hoping that you like me again. God. Why is it so hard for you to apologize and move on??

No, in that same fucking server, someone sent a racist meme after joking about slavery all day:

And yes, the people in the chat at the time laughed at it... 

I told them that WASNT funny and they freaked out all “WHY CANT I TALK TO PEOPLE IM SO FUCKING STUPID I SUCK” like oh...my god. You guys make it so awkward being black oh my GOD. I- like it makes me never want to say ANYTHING but I know I have to but god what the hell guys???

I wouldn’t really think that the members of the server chat were racially biased if they just accepted the fact that they were micro aggressive and didn’t flip out about it. Not really, at least. That reaction is so- well it’s sus as fuck. People who aren’t prejudiced will apologize, correct themselves and move on. Not dismiss me constantly and DEFINITELY not freak the fuck out. 

I also wouldn’t assume they were racially biased if this SAME EXACT SITUATION DIDNT HAPPEN TO ME BEFORE. 

Yep! On the Beatles Amino, I was called a bully and was reported by the LEADERS. Why? Because I told a curator she was inconsistent with her rules… that’s it. And that was back when I was sugary sweet all the time and was deemed to be a cinnamon roll. Nah. They knew I was black and I got told that people were scared of me and that I was bullying people. Yeah okay. Messaging ONE curator about her rules is the same thing as bullying people. Chile I can’t. And it only happens in the Beatles fandom. But no when someone calls John Lennon a racist it’s all “Zach! Zach! Tell them they’re wrong.” Ugh...

So that’s that on that. I have nothing else to say. Don’t message me about this post if you didn’t read all of this. I’m an idiot and I’m honestly still willing you hear you all out but don’t expect me to ever want to have anything to do with you. Out of the what- 50 people from that server, only two stood up for me? And two separate people APOLOGIZED TO ME. AND THEY HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYTHING. That’s a shame. Thank you Johnny, Lenny, Laurie, and Remy. All of your names rhyme and you didn’t make me feel like I was CRAZY, unlike those I mentioned. There’s so much shit going on in the world rn, especially to do with racism. I know that you guys know. But some posts really....really tried me. oh well. I’m black. I like The Beatles. And I’m a victim of microaggressions, false accusations, gas lighting. I’m also out. bye.

black lives matter resources

[newstfionline]

Friday, January 8, 2021

Spending the pandemic talking to yourself? If you live alone, you’re not alone (Washington Post) One bleak pandemic day in November, Aisha Tyler caught herself vacuuming the inside of her freezer. Then she scolded herself. Yes, out loud. Sometimes the Los Angeles-based actress will tell herself to “snap out of it.” On brighter days, she’ll congratulate herself on what a good job she’s doing and call for a celebration. Humans leave little unspoken, and this past year, as many of us have avoided social events and worked from home alone, we’ve been forced to talk out loud to the only person still around to listen: ourselves. Sure, it may take the form of bantering with our pets, scolding the politicians on TV or cajoling our malfunctioning printers, but that’s really just another way of hearing our own voice, helping us discern what exactly is going on inside that head of ours.      What’s going on here? Charles Fernyhough, a psychology professor at Durham University and author of “The Voices Within: The History and Science of How We Talk to Ourselves,” says research shows people talk out loud more when under stress or facing cognitive challenges. It was praying aloud that kept 44-year-old April Harris going during her 32 days in quarantine with a deep cough at the California Institution for Women in Chino, Calif.—not just self-encouragements like “I can do this” and “You got this, April,” but repeated declarations like “by His stripes, I am healed.” “I would pray for our country and for a cure to this virus,” she says in an email from the prison, where she has spent 24 years but had never previously talked out loud to herself. “Now I pray that I am covered by His blood, not wanting to endure that again. I pray for the women who are in isolation now.”

Here’s Why Car Thefts Are Soaring (Hint: Check Your Cup Holder) (NYT) After years of declines, car thefts appear to be surging in cities and suburbs all over the country. The spree, which has been exacerbated by the pandemic, does not appear to be the work of sophisticated crime rings, the police say. Instead, this new wave of car thefts seems to stem from a combination of simple carelessness and the same technological advancement that once made stealing cars nearly impossible: the key fob. The broad adoption of keyless ignitions that began in the late 1990s ushered in a dark era for car thieves. New cars had engine immobilizers that only a microchip in the key fob could unlock, and vehicle thefts quickly plummeted. Technology, it seemed, had largely solved the problem of stolen vehicles. Until people started leaving their fobs sitting in their cup holders. Now, the police say forgotten fobs and keyless technology have contributed to soaring stolen car cases. In Hartford, the police have traced the surge to teenagers joyriding in from the suburbs. In Los Angeles, stolen cars reappear so frequently that the police believe thieves are using them like Ubers. And in New York City, a related but different problem has emerged as more drivers leave their cars running to make pit stops and deliveries during the pandemic, making their cars easy targets for thieves who can simply drive away, even without a fob.

Canadian compensation (CBC) Based on companies that trade on the TSX, in 2019 the average total compensation for the 100 best-paid CEOs of Canadian corporations was $10.8 million, while the average annual salary for a worker in Canada was $53,482 the same year. That means top CEO pay is about 202 times that of the average Canadian worker, which is actually down from the 227 observed the previous year. It also means that at 11:17 a.m. on Monday, the average CEO had already made the annual salary of a typical worker.

An unimaginable moment in America (AP) To see it unspool—to watch the jumbled images ricochet, live, across the world’s endless screens—was, as an American, a struggle to believe your eyes. But there it was, in the capital city of the United States in early January 2021: a real-time breaking and entering the likes of which the republic has never seen. The U.S. Capitol was overrun by violent supporters of Donald Trump, who exhorted them to march on the domed building as lawmakers inside carried out their constitutional duty by certifying his electoral defeat. The proceedings were quickly abandoned as the selfie-snapping mob smashed windows, marched through hallways and rummaged through lawmakers’ desks. Fourteen days before Joe Biden is set to be inaugurated on the very same site, elected officials sheltered in place in their own building. Agents barricaded themselves inside congressional chambers, guns drawn. The stars and stripes—soaring over public property—was lowered, then replaced as a blue Trump flag ascended. In one of the day’s most indelible images, a hoodie-clad trespasser sat in a chair overlooking the Senate floor—minutes after it had been vacated by Trump’s own vice president, Mike Pence—waving his fist in front of a thick, ornate curtain designed to summon the trappings of democracy. The United States on Wednesday seemed at risk of becoming the very kind of country it has so often insisted it was helping: a fragile democracy.

World reacts to US mob (AP) Amid the global outrage at the storming of the U.S. Capitol building by angry supporters of President Donald Trump was a persistent strain of glee from those who have long resented the perceived American tendency to chastise other countries for less-than-perfect adherence to democratic ideals. In China, which has had constant friction with the Trump administration over trade, military and political issues, people were scathing in their criticism of Trump and his supporters, citing both his failure to control the coronavirus pandemic and the mob action in Washington. The Communist Youth League ran a photo montage of the violence at the Capitol on its Twitter-like Weibo microblog with the caption: “On the sixth, the U.S. Congress, a most beautiful site to behold.” That appeared to mock House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for her June 2019 comments in praise of sometimes violent antigovernment protests in Hong Kong. Iran, another country that faces routine U.S. criticism over violations of human rights and democratic values, jumped on the insurrection as proof of American hypocrisy. The semiofficial Fars news agency called the United States a “fragmented democracy,” while Iran’s pro-government Twitter accounts gloated, circulating photos of the mobs with hashtags that included #DownfalloftheUS. “The beauty of democracy?” with a shrug emoji was the reaction tweeted by Bashir Ahmad, a personal assistant to the president of Nigeria, which has seen several coups since independence—including one led decades ago by President Muhammadu Buhari, who most recently entered the office via a vote. Venezuela, which is under U.S. sanctions, said the events in Washington show that the U.S. “is suffering what it has generated in other countries with its politics of aggression.” Several countries, both allies and antagonists of America, issued travel warnings to their citizens.

America the exceptional? (Foreign Policy) It’s not easy to say how much the storming of the Capitol will contribute to the decline in the reputation of the United States abroad. That’s because that decline has already been so steep: A Gallup poll of 29 countries in 2020 found that 20 already had approval ratings of U.S. leadership that are at new lows or that tie the previous record lows.

‘The power of life and death is in the tongue,’ Senate chaplain says (NYT) “We deplore the desecration of the United States Capitol building, the shedding of innocent blood, the loss of life, and the quagmire of dysfunction that threaten our democracy.” Those words, spoken by Barry C. Black, the Senate chaplain, resounded through the government chamber in the early hours of Thursday, as he declaratively closed a joint session of Congress marred by violence with a prayer. A Seventh-day Adventist minister and former Navy rear admiral known for his penchant for brightly colored bow ties, Mr. Black has been the Senate’s official clergyman for nearly two decades. His prayers in the chambers have long been laced with rebukes for the infighting of the lawmakers surrounding him, and his words have often served as a conscience check for those on both sides of the aisle. That was never more true than on Thursday morning, as he warned lawmakers that their words could have great consequences. “These tragedies have reminded us that words matter, and that the power of life and death is in the tongue,” he said. “We have been warned that eternal vigilance continues to be freedom’s price.” His prayer also urged new unity in the face of the deep divisions among lawmakers and within the country, driving home a need to “see in each other a common humanity.”

Twitter, Facebook muzzle Trump amid Capitol violence (AP) In an unprecedented step, Facebook and Twitter suspended President Donald Trump from posting to their platforms Wednesday following the storming of the U.S. Capitol by his supporters. Twitter locked Trump out of his account for 12 hours and said that future violations by Trump could result in a permanent suspension. The company required the removal of three of Trump’s tweets. Facebook and Instagram, which Facebook owns, followed up in the evening, announcing that Trump wouldn’t be able to post for 24 hours following two violations of its policies. Facebook later said that Trump would be banned indefinitely.

Indian farmers take to their tractors (Quartz)  On the other side of the world, a protest of a different kind is taking place in Delhi, as farmers who oppose India’s newly passed agricultural laws plan to march into the city with 2,500 tractor trolleys today. It’s the latest action in nearly two months of demonstrations that have grabbed headlines globally for their scale, but also for their inventiveness—some of the tractors have previously doubled as screens for movie viewing as protesters dug in for the long haul. The latest round of talks between the government and farmers is scheduled for tomorrow. If the two sides can’t agree on a path forward, farmers’ union leaders say a tractor rally and nationwide protests will start on Jan. 26, when the country celebrates Republic Day.

With Mass Arrests, Beijing Exerts an Increasingly Heavy Hand in Hong Kong (NYT) They descended before dawn, 1,000 police officers fanning out across Hong Kong to the homes and offices of opposition lawmakers, activists and lawyers. They whisked many off in police cars, often without telling relatives or friends where they were being taken. Within a few hours on Wednesday, the Hong Kong police had arrested 53 people, searched 76 places and frozen $200,000 of assets in connection with an informal primary for the pro-democracy camp—all under the auspices of Beijing’s new national security law. In one swoop, the authorities rounded up not only some of the most aggressive critics of the Hong Kong government but also little-known figures who had campaigned on far less political issues, in one of the most forceful shows of power in the Chinese Communist Party’s continuing crackdown on the city. The message was clear: Beijing is in charge. The mass arrests signaled that the central Chinese government, which once wielded its power over Hong Kong with a degree of discretion, is increasingly determined to openly impose its will on the city. In the months since the law took effect, Beijing and the Beijing-backed Hong Kong leadership have moved quickly to stamp out even the smallest hint of opposition in the Chinese territory, where the streets once surged with huge anti-government protests. And they have shattered any pretense of democracy in Hong Kong’s political system.

Japan declares emergency for Tokyo area as cases spike (AP) Japan declared a state of emergency in Tokyo and three nearby areas on Thursday as coronavirus cases continue to surge, hitting a daily record of 2,447 in the capital. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga issued the declaration at the government task force for the coronavirus. It lasts from Friday until Feb. 7, and centers around asking restaurants and bars to close at 8 p.m. and people to stay home and not mingle in crowds.

The next catastrophe has already been predicted (Les Echos via Worldcrunch) The epidemic surprised us, but it was predictable. In the risk report regularly published by the World Economic Forum (WEF) for its annual Davos summit, infectious diseases were listed every year as one of the 10 biggest threats. The report’s description of a virus spreading uncontrolled around the world was exactly what played out in 2020. There were frequent discussions at Davos about this type of danger. For example, in 2016, after the damage caused by Ebola, the general director of the World Health Organization, Margaret Chan, sounded the alarm about the next pandemic. Jim Yong Kim, president of the World Bank, drew a parallel with the Spanish Flu, evoking the risk of an illness that killed 30 million people. Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft-cum-health philanthropist, insisted on the necessity of training teams in public health management and logistics. If this health crisis is causing so much suffering, it’s because we refused to seriously prepare for it. We didn’t follow the advice of the philosopher and engineer Jean-Pierre Dupuy, who pushes us to think about catastrophe to prevent it from happening. The time has therefore come to think about the next global catastrophes—the less predictable ones.

[jkarma]

First = Last

Once there was a boy named Jeff, he was a smart kid who was really into learning and is fascinated by both the genres of math and science. In his elementary life, he was not a bad student, usually in the top 10 of the class if not in the top 5.  But there was a slight problem. He wasn’t having the best time since he was always being bullied verbally. This never got into him much and he thought that elementary was going to be the hardest thing ever, but this all changed when high school came along.

6-8-2016 

On the first day of class, Jeff felt excited because he knew that elementary was over and this is going to be a new step in life. And so it is. It’s like he was in a new school or something, and everything seemed new. Half of his classmates were either from the other sections or were from other schools, his teachers were all new and even the lessons are new! So the day went on, the English class was over and the Chinese class was coming. He wasn’t really a big fan of Chinese since he isn’t as good at it compared to English, but nonetheless he usually still gets to the top 10 of the class which is decent for him. But the one thing that really changed his life forever was the moment when he met a girl in Chinese class. He thought it was cool at first but eventually learned how “infatuation” works. Her name was Melanie. He found out that two to three other boys liked her too but this wasn’t a big issue for him at that point since he thought that education was still more important than “infatuation”.  A few months passed by, and he’s starting to like this girl even more! But they don’t talk much because they have totally different lives and he couldn’t tell anyone about it since he was scared and because his best friend likes her too. So he kept it for himself.  But not until it came to a point where he told Melanie exactly what he felt about her and nothing much really changed after that. He tried to talk to her a little more and even wrote letters to her, but then again, “We’re still too young, and education must be focused first.” He said. So he started to forget about her and focused on his studies like before.

3-10-2017

The 4th grading periodical examination is just around the corner and one evening, Jeff was studying Filipino. One of his hatest subjects. “Why don’t I check my Facebook for a moment, I’m sure it's not gonna take long,” he said. While scrolling on Facebook, Jeff saw a girl named Sarah who has more than 100 mutual friends. He then asked one of his friends about who this girl was, and his friend said that Sarah is one of their batchmates and had just transferred to their school this year. I sent her a friend request in the hopes of meeting a new friend, and with no surprise, she accepted it. They started talking in messenger and slowly became friends. Summer went on and they talked all day every day and they started to know way more about each other and started to become close friends. 

4-15-2017

It’s the middle of summer and things started to become boring. Fortunately for Jeff, Sarah was there to keep him company. Day and night they would chat and on this exact day, Jeff fell for her. But again, he was too shy to tell anybody so he initially kept it for himself. They kept talking and even became best friends at one point even though they have not met each other in person yet. Could this be it?

6-10-2017 

School is just 3 days away and Jeff is excited to meet his new teachers and maybe even new classmates and friends, but one thing he really was up about was to finally talk and meet Sarah for the first time. He even asked Sarah if they could like to talk sometime or hangout or something. I mean, he does like Sarah so why not become close to her personally? So he kept on encouraging himself to not miss out on this opportunity but...

6-13-2017

It’s the first day of class. Oh man was he excited for this day. “Time to be who I really am!” said Jeff. The first few subjects were great for Jeff, lunch was coming and he wanted to somehow talk and meet Sarah in person but it came to a point where he was too shy to even approach her. So this rendezvous of theirs didn’t push through and remained like that until around the third grading. But this didn’t affect him as much because school was still pretty busy. So when he started to gain some confidence, he asked Sarah if they could meet up somewhere and he thought that the library was the best place since they both liked books, and so they did meet the following day. It was kind of awkward as expected but it wasn’t the end of the world for Jeff, in fact, it was just the beginning.

12-10-2017

At this point, Jeff and Sarah were best friends but still don't really talk much in person. And a great opportunity was up ahead! It’s gonna be Christmas soon and of course, there was an upcoming Christmas party in school. Jeff wanted to give something to Sarah as an appreciation gift for always being there for him. He asked her what gift she would want, and she obviously denied that she wanted something and said that anything would be fine. At first, Jeff had no idea what to give to Sarah. He asked for help from friends and all, but he had no luck. After a few days, he thought of something that she might like and use, a watch.

12-15-2017 

The Christmas party went on, and Jeff had so much fun. Afterward, Sarah and her friends went out to hang out with one another. Jeff thought of this as another opportunity to get closer to Sarah in person, and so he went with them. Jeff’s best friend was also there so it wasn’t really a problem for Jeff to fit in. They went to a mall and did all these crazy things such as karaoke singing in Timezone. Before the day ended, Jeff noticed that Sarah wasn’t going with the others and instead will be going home with her family, Jeff then took that opportunity to at least try to get a picture with Sarah whilst it’s still possible. So they did take a picture and Jeff was as happy as he can be, but he almost forgot one thing.

1-4-2018

Christmas break was done and a lot of things happened the past 2 weeks. Well, in messenger, Jeff and Sarah still talked pretty much every day and all that stuff but they were starting to lose touch. “But why tho?”, asked Jeff and he did some investigation. After a while, he found out about this dude named Charles who likes Sarah too! Charles and Jeff were decent friends because they went to the same tutor the year before. “What a coincidence?” said Jeff. So he decided to give this Charles a chance to prove himself to Sarah because she promised Jeff that she would never like Charles back and that they would not end up being together. Days passed by and both of them became closer and closer, which scared Jeff a little bit. He had very supportive friends who stood by his side when he needed it, and this helped him a lot especially when he feels like a loser because of what is happening around him.

1-15-18

It’s Sarah’s birthday, and Jeff wouldn’t want to miss the chance of proving to her that he cares about her. He not only planned to make her a video, and give her a gift, but he also planned on giving her letters from the entire batch. As he was about to give the gift to Sarah, something tragic happened. He lost the P1,000 gift card from H&M that he was supposed to give Sarah, and it was nowhere to be found. He explained everything to Sarah and she said that it was okay.

1-31-18

At this point, Jeff and Sarah were still friends. But one day, Charles had authority over Sarah’s Facebook account and used it to keep her away from Jeff. How? By blocking Jeff in her account. Pretty smart, but it definitely was not good news for Jeff. Even though he knew that Sarah would never want him to be her boyfriend, he still wanted her to be his friend, his best friend.  Because of this, he was devastated. But after a while, he thought that maybe she might still unblock him sooner or later. Day after day, week after week, month after month, and still nothing. He started to forget about her because of this, and so blocking Jeff from her life might not actually be that bad after all.

5-14-18

Remember Melanie? Well, she was one of the main people who helped Jeff forget about Sarah and move on. Even though she knew that he once liked him, he still treated him as one of her best friends. At this point, Jeff has fully moved on from Sarah and just went on with life, but there was something missing. Jeff and Melanie continued to talk in messenger and got closer and closer. Eventually, he thought “This was the girl whom I liked before, why don’t I pursue this and maybe, just maybe, even get her heart?” He then thought “But Melanie isn’t allowed to have a boyfriend yet. Oh gosh, what am I thinking?! This will just hurt me, and I’ll be the one who’s going to be disappointed again.” He then stopped thinking about this and focused on his studies once again.

3-8-22

It’s their Senior High School graduation and all the effort that he had done all paid off. Jeff was the valedictorian of their batch and received numerous medals and awards all throughout. “If there was one award that I had missed, it would definitely be the award for love. But I guess it’s one of the reasons why I’m here right now so I might as well miss it and try again next time. This is just the first few steps in life, and there’s a lot more to go.” He said. After graduation, he approached Melanie and said something to her. This is how their conversation went.

Jeff: “Hey, Melanie. I can’t believe it’s graduation already ahhhhh!”

Melanie: “Yep, haha. Time really passes by so quickly.”

Jeff: “What are your plans after this graduation?”

Melanie: “Hmm, I dunno... Probably go to college? Hahaha.”

Jeff: “True. Haha. Remember the time when you said that because of a promise, you weren’t allowed to have a boyfriend until you graduate Senior High School?”

Melanie: “Yeah why?”

Jeff: “Well uhm, since we have already graduated, would you like to go out with me?”

Melanie: “Wait, what?”

Jeff: “Yeah ‘cause why not? Haha. You’re a very special girl and I just want you to be the girl whom I spend the rest of my life with.”

Melanie: “Thanks, but I don’t know.”

Jeff: “Come on Mel, we have known each other for probably 6 plus years now, haha, and I wouldn’t want to miss this chance because I don’t know if I’ll have the chance to ever meet you again. I like you.”

Melanie: “Uhm... I’m sorry Jeff, but I don’t think this is going to work out because I don’t really want to mess with your already “great” life. I’m just an ordinary girl, and I believe you deserve someone better than me. I’m not saying no but I’m doing this for you.”

Jeff: “Mel, don’t say that. You’re a wonderful and amazing girl. I don’t care what others think about you. All I know is that I like you because you’re you and nothing can change that.”

Jeff hugged Melanie for the first time and Melanie quietly said: “You’re the coolest person I’ve ever met and I would be more than willing to be with you.”

- Conrad

[officialunitedstates]

Twenty Years Ago, When We Lost to Them

One of the most debilitating consequences when this all went down was the financial aspect. People invested for almost their entire lives into their IRA’s, 401k’s, 403b’s, checking accounts, savings accounts, CDs, money markets, Vanguard, Charles Schawb, TD Ameritrade, Edward Jones, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley, Chase ... and then it all came crashing down in the span of a hour. All it took was for Them to say the command -- not even say it but think it -- and it was gone. The US dollar was no more, virtual or otherwise.

As a kid growing up in Milwaukee -- Middle America, as we liked to call it -- I thought I was safe from all this. We were never going to be nuked, we were never going to have a terrorist attack, we were never going to have to worry. We were safe, insulated, protected from disaster. But no one was after the crash. You couldn’t be immunized.

Yeah, of course a little black market had sprung up after this. People still thought the good ol’ USD had value for a while. Trading $50 for a gallon of water the local prepper had stored in his bunker was an all-too-real reality. But soon it was $100, then $300. And eventually the only people who could afford that were the mattress-stuffers who were allergic to banks before all this. It doesn’t take long before inflation drives a market economy into a barter economy.

At the same time, the alternative seemed more and more appealing. They had replaced our beloved USD with their “New United Dollar” and other than the lack of Illuminati images on the back, it was roughly the same. The paper still felt and smelt the same and the Presidents still adorned the fronts. It didn’t take long before everyone had gathered themselves up at the Payment Centers to pick up their Paychecks in the NUD so they could go to the Approved Grocery Stores, which only accepted NUD for payment.

The poor and anarchists among us thought this whole thing was great at first. Wiping the slate clean was a genius move by Them, they thought. It swept away all the old men and rich snobs who had generated and stored their wealth, profiting off of no work of their own. It set everyone equal. It was a true fresh start. I am ashamed to say I originally sympathized with that line of thinking.

It was said that the New United States of America was the first true command economy. It was the first that was capable of being so. The pure processing power combined with the military power that They had had enabled Them to put this whole thing into action. Communism had risen from the dead, true communism, and it had wiped us out more thoroughly than any other type of attack ever could.

[whatdoesshedotothem]

Saturday 30 April 1836: SH:7/ML/E/19/0034

8 55

2 am

- fine frosty morning - downstairs in ½ hour - Mawson had been waiting ½ hour - gave him check for £100 (Messrs. Illingworth and his partner Spencer) - mentioned having seen Mrs. Sutherland’s letter of June 1833 - thought Captain S- would therefore make no claim of acreage of A-‘s name being included (she not knowing enough about it) should advise not to claim anything for the coal already got but A- had written down and I myself thought £20 per acre a fair thing for what remained to be got of Charnock’s coal - I- said about 6 acres in the whole and about 2 or more got - he talked of expense - I said well! then I would ask if A- would take £15 - with respect to the 2nd pit I had advised A- only to claim for the 5 years = £250 since she and her sister came into possession - let the administra lux of the late Mr. Walker claim the rest if she liked - smiled and said Illingworth might tell her if he liked - a good deal of talk - J. and S- much pleased - said I might send for I- myself only hoped he would do his best for me if I did send for him - ‘yes! that I will promise you that’ said he - then had Husband and Barstow - the latter came to say Mr. Wainhouse objected to the Foundry - I thought he would object - said Mr. Husband had best ask him quietly - if W- would not consent there was only one way for it - (meaning a notice to quit) - but the engine might be put up - B- had heard of a 2nd hand one -he

  SH:7/ML/E/19/0035

 had best bestir himself and inquire and if it was worth anything take Mr. Husband and view it the 1st thing on Monday let me have an answer before I went away - had Charles Howarth and paid him (under Mr. Husband) for store-room and larder - then had Joseph Mann who brought his notes =£68.6.6 ½ - to get the money at the bank and pay him in the afternoon - then had Ingham about the upper Hagstocks walling - all these people kept me till 11 50 - breakfast at 12 and Marian came and sat with me the whole time - read me the prospectus of the Messrs. Briggs etc from the Halifax Guardian - fair straightforward prospectus - well done - appearing to great advantage after the humbug of the Messrs. Rawson - saw a carriage at the door (did not know till evening it was Mrs. Henry Priestleys’) - Marian said I was gone to H-x - off down the old bank at 1 ½ - long while at the office of Messrs. P- and A- they had heard I had turned them off and got a new attorney had heard of the letter from Messrs. Gray to Mr. Rawson - explained - did A-‘s business as well as my own - explained about Illingworth (they approved) but Adam said A- had a right to the whole £250; for the additional £50 a year for the 2nd pit went in part of payment of the sum total for the coal SW- had valued the coal after this price fixed upon it - A- had bought at this price and was therefore entitled to the £250 as a part and parcel of the whole - very true - said I would explain this to her - they seemed amused and pleased at the proposed letter reminding Capitan S- A- had taken a colliery for better and worse, and if he shared the bet, he ought to risk the worst - explained about Wainhouse’s objections to the Foundry - said I thought Mr. Parker had better see him on the subject - Gave A-‘s order on Messrs. Briggs for £400, and said I would on Monday morning give an order on the Yorkshire District Bank for the remainder of the £925 for the purchase from Patchett - for Bland and c° ready to pay the £90 deposit on the Bouldshaw coal, and this money if paid had best go towards A-‘s purchase - then explained my own business - appoint Mr. P- steward to receive and pay all indoors and out and call to see my aunt about once a month – Mr. Wainhouse’s £4000 ready anytine but at 4 ¼ p.c. on bond - 4p.c. landed security - asked P- and A-‘s advice - to go on to the end at the bank or take the money of W- P- advised the latter - very well, said I, then I will take the £4000 or £5,000 let it be - and I will come over for a few hours next week (probably Thursday or Friday thought to leave A- at Tadcaster or Leeds) and sign the bond and put the money into the bank - signed a notice to quit to George Robinson as usual - Desired Messrs. P- and A- to consult the magistrates and about the Northgate hotel - whether they would wait patiently till it was finished, or oblige me to open the [tavern] and sell ale in the meantime - said with respect to going abroad A- wished it I had told her the expense and said if we did go she must pay - had I not best advise her to order SW- to pay a certain sum to Messrs. P- and A- and then instruct them to pay the same to Hammersleys to be placed to my account - yes! this the most regular and best plan - from P- and A-‘s to the bank - got £200 of which fifty in Bank of England the rest in their notes - asked for letter of credit for £2000 to remain in force one year and be renewed if necessary - not a word against it - said I would send them a regular order to honour Mr. Parker’s checks on my account to the amount of £2000 - then to Whitley’s - paid my bill from 1 January up to today inclusive - then to Greenwood’s - mentioned about the garden and damage whatever was reasonable for Walker pit stead etc Mr. P- to pay G- for the licence and settle whether any ale to be sold or not at present - would be best to avoid it if possible - then to the Northgate hotel, looking about - gets on very well - then had Husband - he shew his plan for the new Dispensary - very fair indeed - Mr. Harper had told him he had just as good a chance of getting the job as Harper himself had - in which I agreed - returned up the new bank and by the Lodge - saw Booth - with fine weather he will nearly complete his job in a fortnight - Mark Hepworth in the stable - come to bid for Ruthin - offered £10 - no! could see the horse for £12 but would give him 10/. back and for the scare crow of a new gin horse he brought this morning price 6 guineas would give him 10/. for his trouble of buying - at last agreed but said if he did not take the horse home with him tonight I would be off the bargain in the morning - (our hay is all but done - shall have to buy in a few days) - then had Joseph Mann - paid him - kept his bills to enter tomorrow in his book and mine - it seems he has already received £3.17.0 for coal at 8d a load or corve - this to be regularly placed to my credit by Mr. Parker - then wrote 3 pp. and ends (hurried) to A- York in answer to her 2 ½ pp. I got at the post office this afternoon together with Briggs’s prospectus directed to A- sent my letter to A- and a note to ‘A. Jubb Esquire Lord Street’ saying I should be glad to see him before I went and should if he could come in the course of tomorrow - dinner at 8 and coffee and Marian sat with me the whole time and till 9 ¾ when went to my aunt for ½ hour -had John Booth in the drawing room - settled with him and gave him orders - and read the newspaper (my aunt went at 10 ¼) till 11 55 then came upstairs and till 11 55 wrote all the above of today - Had William Green yesterday just before dinner and Joseph Smith’s wife about 7 this evening - mentioned about the possibility of William G-‘s wanting the cottage she lived in, but said if he left his daughter, the daughter should not stay where she is - Smiths’ wife very quietly told the tale of her husband’s being still poorly and not well off - had sold something (a bobbin frame or something of no great use to them) to help to pay ½ year’s rent due she laid next Sunday week - so I gave it her and said she would hear from Mr. Parker when to pay it the next time - several showers morning and afternoon but I escaped them all - F35 ½° and dampish now at midnight - had Mrs. Hutchinson the schoolmistress between 6 and 7 this evening - she wants more flannel - told her always to advise with Mrs. Ann Lee about these matters, and said I would tell A- of her wanting 11 yards more - hoped all would go on well - they have 10 boys and 6 girls (2 of the latter ill) - particularly charged to bring forward Ann Booth and her brother John to go to them by and by.

  SH:7/ML/E/19/0036

 then wrote as follows to ‘Mrs. Walker Cliff Hill’ to go by little John Booth in the morning - ‘Shibden Hall - Saturday evening 30 April 1836 - my dear madam - I arrived very early on Thursday morning and promised myself the pleasure of seeing you before my return to York on Monday morning - I begin to fear this will not be in my power, I have been, and am likely to be so incessantly engaged - I do assure you, I regret seeing you - we hope to get off from York before the end of next week, and shall reach Paris as soon as we can, from which place Miss Walker will write immediately on our arrival - we shall make some little excursions from there but where is quite unfixed - our absence must depend entirely upon circumstances, but we shall be glad to be able to amuse ourselves during the summer months - my aunt is surprisingly well, and my having Mrs. James Briggs to keep house for her, will, I feel assured, make her very comfortable - we all unite in kind regards to yourself - Believe me, my dear madam, very truly yours A. Lister’ - wrote note to ‘Mr. S. Washington, Crownest’ with the plan of yew trees quarry to have the last measurement added to it, and be sent back by early on Monday morning and with the account of what I may be indebted to Mr. SW- and what he has paid Ingham in a/c of Hagstocks walling and if has thought it right to pay the last ½ years Water Lane rate for the poor - and send him copy of A-‘s directions about the stockings to be knitted - 12 ½ when I had written all the above.

[dollsome-does-tumblr]

here is my list of things that are, to me, 100% true about reign in a post-series world, even if the show itself never knew that, just to make the ending a little less brutal on my heart:

greer and castleroy eventually reconciled; castleroy’s rebound affair thingie fell through and so did greer’s flirtation with james (on account of him being IN LOVE with HIS SISTER, thx laurie mccarthy), and, like, let’s say they wound up in the same place at some point because greer had to go to their old home to get some things she left there or somethin’ and they drank too much wine whilst commiserating over their romantic failures and then accidentally hooked up. they kind of are all ‘we TRIED and it DIDN’T WORK!’ for awhile about their accidental romantic relapse, but eventually just fall back together and rebuild castleroy’s pepper empire, much aided by greer’s fierce business acumen. they raise rose and live a life that is, granted, very fraught with angst because of mary’s whole predicament, but are happy together. sometimes martin the pirate comes to visit for holidays, and makes fun of greer for having such an obvious weakness for men with magnificent curly heads of hair.

it’s revealed that leith did not, in fact, randomly get married right away to some stranger (even though, let’s be real, it fits in with his frequently terrible and disappointing personality as a romantic partner) -- that letter was part of a plot by narcisse to try to get claude to give up on leith and settle down with luc! leith and claude met up in tuscany as they agreed to and are happily reconciled, and it’s possible that leith + claude + luc become a delightful throuple. WHY NOT. they probably like to spend most of their time relaxing in a remote villa and living a life of pastoral luxury and peace. leith teaches claude and luc how to cook.

bash goes on to be the most amazing wizard druid in all the world, and maybe finds hogwarts. kenna (who is maybe the queen of a small european nation? who knows??) travels back to scotland to check in on mary and she and bash wind up crossing paths again and they get back together. kenna is totally 100% weirded out by bash’s magic powers, but also thinks it’s kind of fun when he takes her out on woodsy adventures and such. bash and kenna’s daughter are really wary of each other at first but then form an adorable bond.

catherine becomes best frickin’ friends with that witch from the end of season four. catherine and narcisse and the witch are french court’s hippest throuple. (like mother, like daughter!) narcisse possibly fathered the antichrist for the witch, but they’ve all got it under control. henri and charles die or whatever and no one cares over-much. the witch teaches catherine how to transform into a hawk. catherine flies over to scotland to visit her dear mary on the regular.

[architectnews]

Palace of Westminster London Building Restoration

Houses of Parliament London Building Restoration, Renewal Contracts News, BDP Refurb

Palace of Westminster London Restoration

Palace of Westminster Refurbishment: Neo-Gothic Building Restoration, UK – Winning Architects

post updated 26 Mar 2021

Houses of Parliament Restoration Programme

Palace of Westminster Detailed Record

Parliament restoration programme launches nationwide invitation for specialist surveyors to help develop most detailed record of the Palace of Westminster ever created.

• Intrusive surveys on Victorian building services, archaeology, stonework and more • Restoration programme will support thousands of jobs and apprenticeships across UK, including through apprentice loan scheme to support small and medium businesses

Specialists from across the UK are being invited to play a part in the first stage of the vital and complex restoration of the Palace of Westminster.

The Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Programme has today launched a procurement drive to invite expressions of interest from specialist surveyors, including small and medium sized businesses across the UK, to carry out dozens of on-site surveys in the Palace of Westminster.

The Palace of Westminster building viewed across the River Thames from the south: photograph © UK Parliament

More than 100 surveys are being carried out during the first stage of the restoration project to develop the most detailed record of the Palace of Westminster ever created.

The survey analysis will map out the condition of all the complex mechanical and engineering systems including the Victorian heating and cooling system.

Expert surveyors will also look at the miles of gas and electric pipes that often run directly alongside one another in the basement, and in thousands of spaces in floors, walls and risers that were originally designed as part of the Victorian ventilation system. Many of the systems reached the end of their expected life decades ago and urgently need replacing.

Other surveys will focus on archaeology and the structure of the building and investigators will also look at fire safety, the condition of windows, walls, floors and stonework, and heat loss from the building.

Restoring the building will create thousands of jobs across the UK, including through an industry-leading apprentice loan scheme that will see around 160 apprentices, including engineers, designers, stonemasons, and carpenters, employed by the organisations overseeing and delivering the restoration of the Palace of Westminster and loaned to UK businesses working on the restoration.

photograph © Nick Weall

David Goldstone, CEO of the Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Delivery Authority said:

“Our experts are carrying out more than 100 surveys to develop the most detailed record of Parliament ever created, as we get on with the job of preparing the detailed and costed plan that will for the first time give a true sense of the costs and timescales of restoring the Palace of Westminster.”

The survey analysis will map out the condition of all the complex mechanical and engineering systems including the Victorian heating and cooling system.

The in-depth surveys are a key part of developing a detailed and costed restoration plan that will for the first time give an accurate sense of the costs and timescales for restoring the Palace, as well as designs for a restored Parliament. Most of these surveys will be procured through the intrusive surveys framework contracts.

The surveys involve specialists spending thousands of hours studying and analysing the building to better understand the full scale of work that needs to be done. The Palace of Westminster is falling apart faster than it can be fixed and urgently needs extensive work to protect it for future generations.

Surveys are expected to begin later this year and every supplier will go through the same rigorous security checks as existing Parliamentary contractors and suppliers.

In total, there are eight categories where suppliers are being invited to apply to be part of an Intrusive Surveys Supplier Framework, making the final procurement of dozens of individual surveys much quicker.

picture © Nick Weall

Palace of Westminster Intrusive Surveys Supplier Framework

The categories are:

• Civil Engineering / Structural • Ground Investigations & Geotechnical • Instrumentation & Monitoring • Environmental • Mechanical, Electrical & Public Health • Archaeology • Asbestos Removal • Conservation Contractor

The framework is for up to £80m of survey contracts over the next four years, with around £10m of contracts expected to be procured in the first year. A range of other surveys are already being carried out through existing frameworks. Findings from surveys will be used as the restoration team develops a detailed and costed plan for restoration and renewal of the Palace of Westminster.

In line with best practice and guidance from the National Audit Office and Infrastructure Projects Authority, this detailed and costed restoration and renewal plan will explore options based on extensive investigations, surveys and analysis with a strong focus on a ‘do essential’ option.

As the programme develops the detailed and costed restoration and renewal plan, it will also continue working closely with Parliament to determine all the functions that the building needs to have in future, as well as what needs to be done to improve the building. With 3000 people working in and visiting the 150-year-old building every day, there are a huge number of requirements to take into account as the programme plans the restoration of one of the most recognised buildings in the world.

The detailed and costed restoration plan will be considered by Parliament, and work on the Palace itself is due to start in the mid-2020s, as previously expected.

Westminster Hall Steps: photograph © UK Parliament

Background

The contract framework notice is published here: https://ift.tt/3rpxAA8?

Governance

The organisations which will lead the UK’s biggest heritage renovation project, the restoration and renewal of the Palace of Westminster, were launched in April 2020 as independent bodies, separate from, but accountable to, Parliament. The Houses of Parliament Restoration and Renewal Sponsor Body has been set up to tackle the work needed to protect the Palace, ensuring it can continue to serve as the home of the UK Parliament in the 21st century and beyond.

The Sponsor Body will set the scope, budget and timescale for the project in response to the requirements of Parliament. It oversees the Delivery Authority, which will be responsible for developing and delivering the work to the Sponsor Body’s specifications, and which is responsible for this surveys procurement.

6 Dec 2017

Houses of Parliament Renewal Debate

Discussion about Palace of Westminster

Discussion about how to ensure safe and secure future of Palace of Westminster

The exclusion of historians and archaeologists from the Westminster Hall repair project does not bode well for the rest of the Palace of Westminster, reports The Guardian.

Charlotte Higgins has nailed the dilemma of the Palace of Westminster (The Houses of Parliament are falling down, 2 December). Politicians are the last people who should be managing such a complex and precious estate on their own, says Mike Pitts, Editor, British Archaeology. Those who oversaw Augustus Pugin and Charles Barry, as they struggled to build the thing in the 19th century, have been described as “probably the worst clients in Britain”, and their successors have ever since strived to live up to that dictum.

But the palace is nonetheless valuable, as a work of art, a symbol and a location with a richer, and more enriching, history than any other in the UK. We should encourage parliament to know that making the building safe, accessible and sustainable, while restoring and respecting its architectural heritage, is a project of international significance that, done well, would display courage and vision and earn the nation’s respect.

The Westminster Hall roof is being fixed, but historians and archaeologists have been excluded from the project, with a baseless argument about cost. Without archaeologists on board, one of the great wonders of the medieval world – and the greatest treasure in this world heritage site – is at risk of compromise.

photo courtesy of architects Foster + Partners

Website: Houses of Parliament Renewal Debate

14 Jan 2021

Westminster Hall Restoration

Renovations: Perfect Circle and SCAPE image courtesy of architects practice Westminster Hall Restoration

22 Jul 2017

Houses of Parliament Renewal Contracts

UK Parliament Renewal Contracts awarded to help ensure safe and secure future of Palace of Westminster

British architectural firm BDP win the architectural contract for the Palace of Westminster London Restoration.

In December 2015 the following four major international architects firms were shortlisted:

Allies and Morrison BDP Foster + Partners HOK

CH2M win for Lot 2.

The shortlist:

• Aecom & Mace (Joint Venture) • Capita Property Infrastructure & Gleeds Cost Management (Joint Venture) • CH2M Hill • EC Harris (ARCADIS) • Turner & Townsend

BDP and CH2M have been selected to take forward vital work that needs to be done to protect the heritage of the Palace of Westminster from the substantial and growing risk of failure of its essential services. This follows a procurement process run by Parliament, and will help ensure the continued running of a safe, secure and viable home for the UK Parliament.

The Palace of Westminster is a Grade I listed building, and, with Westminster Abbey and St Margaret’s Church, is part of the UNESCO Westminster World Heritage site.

Since its construction in the mid-1800s, many features and systems in the Palace have never undergone a major renovation, and the heating, ventilation, water, drainage and electrical systems are extremely antiquated. In awarding these contracts, Parliament can take forward the crucial work required to safeguard the Palace and keep Parliament running.

An urgent programme of mechanical and electrical (M&E) repair work which began in 2009 only protects the Palace until 2020 and only addresses those systems at highest risk of failure. These contracts will provide for a new round of medium-term M&E work, to ensure that the Palace remains safe and habitable beyond 2020.

The work will also include detailed exploration of the condition of the building, a building-wide security strategy, planning for a major programme of asbestos removal, and fire safety improvements. Parliament expects to spend around £12 million under these two contracts over the rest of this financial year.

The successful bidders, both of which submitted the best value for money bids, with highest overall score combining quality and price, are:

BDP for Lot 1 – Architectural and building design services.

CH2M for Lot 2 – Programme, project and cost management services.

Photos © UK Parliament unless stated otherwise

This preliminary work does not affect decisions on which option the two Houses may want to consider in any future debates on a way forward for a Restoration and Renewal Programme for the Palace of Westminster, but will lay the groundwork for a longer-term strategy that will protect the heritage of the building and ensure it can continue to serve as home to the UK Parliament in the 21st century. Work that companies may be asked to carry out at this early stage will be option neutral, that is, will be required whichever delivery option Members of both Houses may choose.

photo from architects

This next, detailed preparatory stage will ensure Parliament is ready to commission design work once Members of both Houses have made a decision in principle and will ensure that taxpayers, as well as Government and Parliament, can be confident that the final proposal is the most cost-effective, and ensures value for money for taxpayers. Before the final go-ahead for the chosen option is given, a detailed design brief, business case and budget will be developed for Parliament’s approval.

photo from architects

Brian Finnimore, Managing Director of Parliament’s Strategic Estates team, said: “We are delighted to be making these contract announcements today, as an important step towards our goal of preserving the Palace of Westminster for future generations. We look forward to working with BDP and CH2M to ensure the Palace remains safe and secure for the more than a million people, including 100,000 schoolchildren, who visit Parliament each year.”

Westminster Hall London building interior, oldest part of the Parliamentary Estate:

“We welcome BDP and CH2M on board, and the expertise they will bring in architectural and engineering design and in delivering projects. We have seen from other major public projects that effort put into early planning is rewarded later with financial savings, so this appointment now will help put value for money for the taxpayer at the heart of this essential work.”

photo © Nick Weall

Tim Leach, Architect Director at BDP, said: “It’s an enormous privilege for the practice to be entrusted with helping to safeguard the Palace of Westminster, this international symbol of democracy and our society’s shared values. This new programme of work presents the unique and very special challenge of responding to the needs of Parliament and its visitors, and conserving its historic fabric for this and all future generations.”

Jonathan Baker, Managing Director of the National Governments client sector at CH2M said: “We are delighted to have been named as the provider of programme, project and cost services for this important work. CH2M has a strong record of delivering solutions for complex and challenging programmes and we are honoured to be working in collaboration with the Restoration and Renewal Team to help preserve and enhance the use of the Palace for future generations.”

The building is both a symbol for the United Kingdom and of democracy throughout the world.

Transforming the magnificent 19th century architecture into a functioning 21st century parliament building within a UNESCO heritage site will be a major challenge. Architects BDP, formerly known as Building Design Partnership, started in Preston, Lancashire, and retains a large office in the area, in Manchester. It is a major British architecture firm with work across the world.

Previously on e-architect:

9 Sep 2016

Houses of Parliament Renewal

Palace of Westminster Building Restoration Update

Prime Minister Theresa May backs moving MPs out of the Houses of Parliament for at least 6 years. It will be the first time MPs have moved out since the Blitz.

MPs would relocate to the Department of Health while the House of Lords would decamp to the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre in Westminster.

Palace of Westminster London Restoration

Palace of Westminster Building Renewal Details

The Joint Committee on the Palace of Westminster concluded in a report that the Palace of Westminster ‘faces an impending crisis which we cannot responsibly ignore’.

source: Houses of Parliament Restoration

Temporary UK Parliament on the River Thames picture © Project Posiedon Houses of Parliament on the River Thames in London – 3 Oct 2016

17 Dec 2013

Houses of Parliament Restoration & Renewal

Deloitte Real Estate and AECOM with HOK to support the Palace of Westminster’s Restoration and Renewal programme

St Stephen’s Tower – aka ‘Big Ben‘: photo © Keepclicking

The House of Commons and House of Lords announced Deloitte Real Estate, AECOM and HOK as the team appointed to undertake an Independent Options Appraisal as part of the ‘Palace of Westminster Restoration and Renewal Programme’.

Aerial Photograph looking southeast: photo © webbaviation

Built: 1840-68 Architects: Barry + Pugin

photographs © Nick Weall

Large Victorian Gothic Building

Houses of Parliament and Burghers of Calais by A. Rodin photographs © Nick Weall

Palace of Westminster London

Houses of Parliament Building Restoration

Location: Parliament Square, London, SW1, England, UK

Architecture in London

London Architecture Links – chronological list

Westminster Abbey photograph © Nick Weall

Whitehall Buildings

Another building by one of the Houses of Parliament Architects – Pugin : Hub Edinburgh

Big Ben Photographs [2007] taken with Panasonic DMC-FX01 lumix camera; Leica lense: 2816×2112 pixels – original photos available upon request: info(at)e-architect.com

Houses of Parliament London : image © Isabelle Lomholt

Houses of Parliament London joint architect : Charles Barry

Scottish Parliament Building

Government Buildings

Danish House of Parliament

Houses of Parliament : New Zealand

London Architecture

Architecture Walking Tours London

London Architect

HOK Architects

Comments / photos for the Palace of Westminster Renewal – Houses of Parliament London Architecture page welcome

The post Palace of Westminster London Building Restoration appeared first on e-architect.

[perfectirishgifts]

Where Has All The Money Gone?

New Post has been published on https://perfectirishgifts.com/where-has-all-the-money-gone/

Where Has All The Money Gone?

The use of cash is going down but the amount of cash out there is going up. Where is it all?

In the UK, a committee of MPs has said that the Bank of England should be trying to track down £50bn of “missing” UK currency. This is about three-quarters of all UK banknotes in existence! So where is all of this missing cash? Is it all being used by money launderers or people bribing government officials to obtain COVID-related contracts or are there more benign explanations?

I am very curious to know where the missing banknotes are, because it’s not only the UK that has lost track of its cash. In a many countries, for many years, the use of cash for purposes such as shopping has been steadily decreasing while the amount of cash “in circulation” has been steadily increasing. This is true in, for example, America and Australia as well as in the UK and Europe.

Down Plunder

Look at Australia as an example. The governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), Philip Lowe, pointed out that “there are fourteen $100 notes in issue for every Australian, thirty $50s and seven $20s” before going on to ask where exactly the $3,000 per Aussie is, saying that “I, for one, don’t have anywhere near that amount“. Me neither, although I just checked and I do have A$25 in my travel wallet, so perhaps one explanation is that lots of visitors get some Aussie dollars out at the airport and then discover that they never need them because it’s an advanced nation where everywhere takes contactless and then forget to spend them before they leave. But that can’t account for anything but a tiny fraction of the billions “in circulation”.

The main explanation given by the RBA is that some people choose to hold a share of their wealth in Australian banknotes. The RBA Research Discussion Paper 2018-12 “Where’s the Money‽” says that of the outstanding banknotes some 15-35 per cent are used to facilitate legitimate transactions (I’d actually be surprised if it was ten per cent by now) with the rest hoarded as a store of wealth or for other purposes. These other purposes are:

10-20 percentage points to domestic hoarding (this now seems small to me, given the lack of transactional usage and the ban on cash transactions over $10,000) and up to 15 percentage points to international hoarding (which includes the A$25 in the draw in my study);

4-8 per cent are used in the shadow economy. This seems low, given that more recent figures show that up to A$1 billion is held by drug dealers alone at any one time, and

and 5-10 per cent are lost.

By the way, some good news for the RBA is that some of the missing banknotes turned up. A Mr. Simon Cross was pulled over in Queensland and when the police looked in his car they found $4.35 million in cash ($1.75 million in a suitcase and $2.61 million in a cardboard box). I don’t doubt that Mr. Cross’ preference for cardboard boxes full of cash is legitimate and a wholly reasonable response to the low interest rates currently available on Australian savings accounts.

Cash Categorised

Whether in the America or the United Kingdom or Australia, the use of cash for legitimate activities has been falling while the use of cash for drug dealing, money laundering, tax evasion, payments to corrupt officials and so on has been rising. Banknotes are, statistically, not being used to buy things. Cash is no longer primarily a means of exchange. The latest figures from the Bundesbank show that nine out of every ten euro banknotes issued in Germany are never used in payments but hoarded at home and abroad as a store of value. Not “rarely used”. Not “infrequently used”. Never used. The notes are not in circulation at all but are stuffed under mattresses where they are not even part of the shadow economy.

A few years ago I wrote about the Bank of England’s categorisation of the demand for cash. I found their breakdown help, so I thought it might be helpful to revisit these categories to help with our discussion:

Transactions. Here the trends are clear. Technology is a driver for change but that the impact is weak. In other words, new technology does reduce the amount of cash in circulation, but actually quite slowly. However, as the Bank of England’s quarterly bulletin for November 2020 points out that during the COVID crisis the way people use cash changed. People are spending less cash, but the total value of banknotes in circulation has increased so that the “cash gap” between transactional usage and aggregate demand for banks has widened.

Hoards. These are stores of money legally acquired but held outside of the banking system. If the amount of cash that is being hoarded has been growing then that would tend to indicate that people have lost confidence in formal financial services or are happy to have loss, theft and inflation eat away their store of value while forgoing the safety and security of bank deposits irrespective of the value of the interest paid.

Stashes. These are stores of money illegally acquired or held outside the banking system to facilitate criminal behaviour. Prof. Charles Goodhart (London School of Economics) and Jonathan Ashworth (UK economist at Morgan Stanley MS ), note that the ratio of currency to GDP in the UK has been rising and argue that the rapid growth in the shadow economy has been a key cause. Two rather obvious factors they highlight are the increase in VAT to 20% and the continuing rise in self-employment, both of which serve to reinforce the contribution of cash to the shadow economy.

Exports. The amount of cash that is being exported is hard to calculate, although the Bank itself does comment that the £50 note is “primarily demanded by foreign exchange wholesalers abroad”. I suppose some of this may be transactional use for tourists and business people coming to the UK, and I suppose some of it may be hoarded, but surely the strong suspicion must be that at lot of these notes are going into stashes.

As you see, there is an important distinction between hoards and stashes. I have a strong suspicion that banknotes (in particular those $100 bills that the governor refers to) are increasingly to be found stashes. In which case, I can tell the parliamentarians that the fate of the UK’s missing billions in £50 notes is not particularly mysterious. A couple of years ago, the UK Treasury said that these notes are “rarely used” for routine transactions and that there is a “perception” that they are used for money laundering, hidden economy activity, and tax evasion. This perception is pretty widespread, by the way, and not only amongst itinerant bloggers and crypto commentators . I remember when Peter Sands, the former head of Standard Chartered, said that the main use of the £50 was illicit and he’s about as much of a mainstream banker as you can get. In summary, therefore, I think that central banks’ estimates of hoarding are generous and that it is the shadow economy fuelling the growth in cash “in circulation”.

Cash gaps and tax gaps

If the amount of cash being stashed has indeed been growing then central banks are facilitating an increasing tax gap that the rest of us are having to pay for. This why, given that no-one is using them for legitimate purposes, I thought it was odd when the Bank of England decided bring the £50 up to date and make it out of plastic. Robert Jenrick, then exchequer secretary to the Treasury, explained the decision at the time by saying that “people should have as much choice as possible when it comes to their money and we’re making sure that cash is here to stay”.

16 May 2018, Germany, Munich: Ammunition, firearms, packages containing cocaine, and cash lying on a … [] table during a press conference at the criminal investigation office of the Federal Land of Bavaria. In the press conference, Bavaria’s Interior Minister and the police will reveal details and background information of the investigation proceedings against twelve suspects, who were arrested in the course of the cocaine bust. Photo: Peter Kneffel/dpa (Photo by Peter Kneffel/picture alliance via Getty Images)

Drug dealers certainly want to exercise the choice to operate in cash, but how much weight should be attach to their requirements? What about other groups who favour cash? According to British tax authority estimates almost half of the tax gap is down to small businesses and they account for nearly three times as much of the missing tax as “criminals”. I’m not sure if both of these groups are voters, but these numbers must in some measure account for the government’s reluctance to inconvenience those responsible for the lion’s share of missing taxes.

Why do I keep going on about this? It’s because the people who benefit from the convenience of £50 notes (eg, tradesmen avoiding sales tax, crystal meth manufacturers avoiding social security taxes and so on) are benefitting at the expense of law-abiding tax-paying citizens (eg, me) and I have to fill in my tax form soon.

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Galapagos Travel Guide: Evolution at the Equator

Research. That’s the first thing I would advise when planning a trip to the Galapagos. It’s a pricey trip and you want to make sure that you are getting the adventure you envisioned.  A few months of planning and it will ‘evolve’ into the trip of a lifetime! The biggest decision is whether you want to explore on a boat or via a land tour. My personal bias is to explore the Galapagos by boat…you have the possibility to explore more remote islands and see more animals and landscapes. With a land tour, you are somewhat limited as you are bound by how far your day trip boat can take you.  That’s only the first of your many decisions! Next up will be the wildlife. This is certainly a large factor and will dictate your other decisions.  There are distinct mating periods for certain animals, times when the water will have more wildlife, and periods to witness babies hatching. The Galapagos has 2 distinct seasons, a dry cool season and a warm wet season, which will heavily influence this…and influence if you can actually tolerate snorkeling or diving in cold water necessary for some animals. I would consider the final big decision your itinerary. Many are divided into an Eastern and a Western itinerary and one is not better than the other. It just depends on what you want to see. For us, we had our heart set on those adorable Galapagos Penguins so we made sure we chose an itinerary that included Isabela and Fernandina (Western). 

Much has been written about the possibility of booking a ‘last minute’ trip. While I think theoretically this is possible, it requires a great deal of flexibility. You’d have to roll up to Quito with cash in hand and be ready for any leftover berths on ships. Not only does this require some luck, but it also potentially means you’d have to forego an island you really wanted to see. Heavily researching exactly what you want and planning can still allow you to get quite a bargain. I would also advise communicating with many tour companies so they can alert you if there is a deal. One of the ships that had the itinerary I wanted was consistently $5000 USD…until one night it suddenly dropped to half off as no one had booked a single cabin. So…keep checking as pricing does change esp as the departure date nears. Noticing exactly when this change happened allowed us to score the prime cabin on the boat…at the same rate as the other cabins. Some of our shipmates tried a last minute deal in Quito and found the same price we paid booking months ahead. We booked with Happy Gringo who were excellent and had scores of amazing online reviews on Tripadvisor. They also sent a flower arrangement to our hotel in Quito for our anniversary…exceptional service and email responses were incredibly prompt. Ultimately, we booked on the Reina Silvia for the first week in December. We packed some wetsuits, snorkels, water shoes and were off! Given my ‘love’ of air travel on South American airlines (see my other posts regarding dear Latam), we have gotten a bit more savvy and now book a mandatory extra day to account for plane delays. This trip on Copa airlines was no different…partially under their airlines control and partially weather. A strong storm in Panama had us divert to a smaller local airport and after a ‘brief’ 3 hour wait on the tarmac, we were cleared to return to the main Panama airport. This, I fully concede, was not under their control. However when our 3:30 flight evolved into 5 PM on the board due to the weather, then 6, we boarded…what Copa really meant was we were leaving close to 9 PM which meant another 2 or so hours sitting on the tarmac. This was especially frustrating as we had taken quite a sprint to make the 5 PM and didn’t have time to get dinner…when in reality, the 3 hours spent on the tarmac would have been much better spent grabbing a leisurely dinner. 

Cotopaxi

Arriving at the JW Marriot hotel in downtown Quito close to midnight left little time to sleep before our planned hiking/biking day tour of Cotopaxi. Side note…i book nearly everything through Orbitz to get my Orbucks but we did find a much better price for our day tour booking direct ($30 less per person). We booked through Rebecca Adventure Travel and had a very smooth pickup. Our day included a local lunch and dinner, a hike from the parking lot up to the refuge on Cotopaxi, and a bike ride down. While I am very glad we did this tour…make no mistake, it was a challenging hike. We live at sea level and hiking to 16,000 feet with zero acclimatization was a heart pumping endeavor. We’ve never experienced any challenges with altitude but we truly felt a bit lightheaded and out of breath on a fairly steep hike up to the refuge. If you go, bring plenty to hydrate and dress warmly. Our views of Cotopaxi were somewhat obscured by clouds but we still had a great view of the glacier. Biking down was quite a rush. I’m not sure how safe I felt hurtling down the gravel road on a loaner bike, but we survived! and there was always the option to bail out and hop on the van following us. With only one day before the Galapagos, we preferred this to a city tour, but the trade off was not really experiencing much of Quito. Some travelers we met did have some issues with petty crime in Quito. A backpack was slashed open, a credit card skimmer was used, so be alert. Instead of either Quito or Cotopaxi, I would even consider flying to the Galapagos before your cruise and staying in Puerto Ayora but more on that later. 

Hiking and biking Cotopaxi Ecuador Early the next morning, we were off on a flight to the Galapagos! There are 2 additional costs to travel to the Galapagos 1) a $20 tourist transit card that allows the Ecuadorian government to keep track of who travels to the Galapagos and 2) a $100 Galapagos entry fee that you will pay on arrival to the Galapagos. You need cash to pay for these items and I would advise that prior to travel to the Galapagos, you obtain your cash. You’ll need it for these entry requirements, tips for cruise staff, and extra charges on the boat and I believe there are only 2 ATMs on the islands that are rumored to run out of money often. To note, there are no international flights that arrive to the Galapagos. Also note…Ecuador uses the USD as their currency. There are no plastic bags or bottles allowed in the Galapagos so bring a reusable bottle (or most ships will provide one) but you can bring in alcohol and other liquids on this domestic flight. 

Our arrival to the Galapagos was smooth and we were immediately met by our tour guide after claiming our bags. It was nice to know our next 8 days were planned to perfection by our guide and we would’t have to do much rather than photograph and relax! The airport is located on the tiny Baltra Island. Thus, to travel to San Cristobal, where most ships depart, or to find a hotel from which to explore, you’ll need to catch a ferry over the Itabaca Channel. Our tour guide seamlessly arranged this (as would all of the cruises), but it’s easy to navigate on your own if you were not doing a cruise. I assumed we would hop right on the boat, but we instead enjoyed a leisurely first day before boarding the boat around 5 pm.  Read the full article here: http://champagnetraveling.com/galapagos-travel-guide-evolution-at-the-equator/ #Galapagos #galapagosislands #galapagosisland #galapagosjogos #galapagostortoise #galapagosEvolution #galapagosshark #GalapagosOnly #galapagosnationalpark #galapagoslife #GalapagosPenguin #galapagosgianttortoise #galapagosreptiles #galapagoscruise #galapagostravel #galapagossealions #galapagosunbound #galapagosiguana #galapagosflamingo #galapagosdiving #galapagosdeals #galapagosday #galapagoscamping #galapagosbirds Immediately after arrival to the main island of San Cristobal, we boarded a shuttle and began our true Galapagos adventure. First stop: El Chato 2 Ranch, a private ecological tortoise reserve. Within minutes of exiting the bus, we had our first Galapagos animal encounter! We saw close to a hundred of these giant tortoises gradually working their way through this very large reserve snacking on grass and calmly observing us. Our next stop was a delicious outdoor lunch at Rancho El Manzanillo. To complete our day of giant tortoise amazement, we stopped at the Charles Darwin Research Station where they are working on tortoise rehabilitation, monitoring animal migration, and much more. Our guide allowed us to stroll from the research station through the town of Puerto Ayora before boarding our ship. Our 15 minute walk took us through the main street in Puerto Ayora filled with countless trendy appearing restaurants, shops, and boutique hotels. We regret not being able to spend more time here. If we were to recreate our trip, we’d maybe try to fly into town a bit before our ship departed to explore the research station and Puerto Ayora further. We booked our flights through Happy Gringo but you can book flights to the Galapagos independently (which possibly would be cheaper). This is a great (and maybe the only stop) for souvenirs as the other islands are not really inhabited (except by the wildlife!). I grabbed a t-shirt from the aptly named Darwin + Wolf Clothing Store. 

Reina Silvia

Next up, embarking on the Reina Silvia. This is a somewhat older ship with excellent upkeep with 6 cabins for 12 passengers, a crew of 7 plus our guide. Our cabin was the cabin located on the top floor which was great for avoiding noise from the engines though it could get a bit more listing with any rough seas. Each cabin had a private bathroom and plenty of storage. There was also a main dining area where you shared 3 tables with your shipmates and a communal lounging area on the towp deck. Finally, the zodiac boat to travel to each island was located at the stern. Any shoes worn exploring were left on the back of the boat to keep the boat free of dirt and debris. Many opted to go barefoot on the ship, but I wore either flip-flops or deck shoes as my feet are always chilly. A few other words about daily life on the ship…each day our guide would post a detailed itinerary of the next day's activities including meal times, excursions and what equipment might be needed. For example, landings from the zodiac are either “dry” (they’ll bring you up to the rocks where your feet will stay dry) or “wet” (you’ll hop off the zodiac at the beach directly into the water). Snorkeling gear (free) and wetsuits (paid) are available though we chose to bring our own. Water temps vary based on the time of year. In December, I snorkeled with a 1 mm wetsuit and was quite comfortable…some without wetsuits appeared pretty cold though my husband just wore a rashguard and was fine. Finally, the cuisine was surprisingly delicious for a 2 person operation in the middle of nowhere. We had 3 meals and 2 snacks daily and there was free beer in the communal area and soft drinks. Food was incredibly plentiful…we hardly used any of the snacks we packed. Water is filtered and tastes fine. We typically bring a few crystal light packets just to have some variety in flavor.

Floreana

Day 2: Floreana was the next island and was a very busy day. Most days were incredibly full with a daily snorkel and one or two short hikes. The wildlife on this adventure was the most abundant of any of our travels. Flamingos, marine iguanas, sea lions, blue footed boobies, sally light-footed crabs, more tortoises, and the galapagos penguins all greeted us on Floreana. There is also the famous Post Office Bay where an 18th century tradition continues to this day. Postcards are placed in a wooden barrel and travelers find a postcard located near their home and hand deliver on their return. Each night we’d hop back on the ship for a delicious dinner and the ship would set sail for the next island. Most passengers were asleep very early…there is definitely no nightlife on the ship! We stayed up later than most which allowed us to edit some photos and enjoy the sea air as we cruised under hundreds of stars. 

Isabela and Fernandina

Day 3-5: Isabela and Fernandina were our next days. Isabela and the island of Fernandina are located far west in the Galapagos and are really only accessible by cruise ship. Marine iguanas and the penguins are most abundant here. A highlight was pulling up on the zodiac to an island teeming with hundreds of blue footed boobies mingling with marine iguanas, penguins, and pelicans. We also had the opportunity to snorkel with penguins and marine iguanas. It’s a crazy experience to see these tiny dinosaur like creatures swimming toward you. Our favorite moment of Isabela though was a playful sea lion who followed us along the shore chasing our boat until he lifted his flipper in a goodbye wave. Sea lions have quite the personality! We also fell in love with a baby sea lion who entertained himself by tossing a piece of seaweed in the air and falling over trying to repeatedly catch it. My personal favorite Galapagos animal though is still the waddling 20 inch tall Galapagos penguin. It’s a trial of persistence trying to capture a photo of a penguin swimming underwater. They are stealthy and streak through the water much faster than a lumbering human in flippers! On day 5, we gathered with the captain as we watched the GPS flash zero as we crossed the equator from the south to the north. The crew had a generous serving of appetizers and snacks and we sipped champagne to celebrate the occasion.

Isla Santiago

Day 6: Isla Santiago: In Isla Santiago our weather was very windy and we got a great kayak workout in battling the currents and wind. Sea lions were abundant here as well and many baby sea lions were nestled in and nursing with their mothers. 

Santa Cruz & North Seymour

Day 7: Most of our Galapagos days were filled with volcanic rock and craggy landscapes, but our final day included a stop on the northern shore of Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz has a beautiful white sand beach and we got to walk along the soft sand to a lagoon filled with flamingos and get to partake in a bit of swimming. Our final snorkel of the trip was in the rougher waters off North Seymour to try to see sharks. We saw many resting along the sandy ocean floor but failed to see the elusive hammerhead shark. North Seymour itself has a plethora of birds…painting every rock surface of the island with a white bird poop. We witnessed the magnificent frigate bird whose male will puff out its red chest to a balloon size to attract females. Our final day was just a trip to the airport to depart. This day involved a lot of waiting. We were at the airport hours before our flight left. As we were unsure what time we would return to Quito, we booked a final night at the Quito Airport, before our international flight left the next morning. Downtown Quito is somewhat of a distance from UIO (Mariscal Sucre International Airport), so we elected to stay at the Wyndham Airport Hotel. This hotel was beautifully modern and when we experienced our first mini earthquake at 3 am, it was also structurally very solid! 

The Galapagos is truly a must visit destination. The wildlife is otherworldly and it is a privilege to be in their presence. In our opinion, a small ship cruise is the best way to experience the islands. It allowed our group of 12 to easily embark and disembark each zodiac excursion onto the islands and our ship could explore the more remote locations. You’ll take too many photos but it’s hard not too with so many perfect moments. 

Champagne Splurge

The cruise itself is a bit of a splurge as there aren’t really any inexpensive Galapagos travel options. However, our main splurge was our hotel in Quito. As we arrived on Thanksgiving, we wanted a little nicer accommodation so we could celebrate. The JW Marriott was beautiful and covered in roses. Who knew that Ecudaor was one of the world’s largest flower exporters? 

Insider Tips

After our share of South American airline travel, I think we’ve learned it’s best to budget in an extra day of air travel in case of delays. We’ve yet to seamlessly arrive to a South American destination without a hiccup.On our ship, all cabins were the same price even thought they were of varying size. Definitely ask your tour operator for advice on which cabin to book so you can nab the best one.Most Ecuador travel agencies will ask you to pay in cash or bank transfer. You could pay with a credit card for a supplemental fee (2-3%). I was a bit leery of forking over thousands to an unknown tour agency so chose to pay the additional fee so I had some recourse in case of trouble. Happy Gringo, with whom we ultimately booked, were fantastic however and that probably wasn’t necessary. You’ll need cash in the Galapagos and ATMs are not plentiful, so make sure you have cash for the Galapagos entry fee and tourist card (totaling $120 together) and tips for the cruise crew. If you do hike Cotopaxi, you may want to acclimatize a bit first. Otherwise, you’ll be huffing and puffing the whole way up as we did! This is definitely a trip for a waterproof camera or GoPro equivalent. There is as much to see on land as underwater! Read the full article