#(because i mostly measure the strength based on the aftermath)

[pastafossa]

I’ve just started reading trt like just started on the kidnapping arc just started and I’m loving it, but do you think you could lay out a list of all the arcs that have happened up until now and which ones hurst the most? Just cause I’m a little squirmy when it comes to angst and I wanna know when to expect it :D

I can! Absolutely! I keep meaning to make an index one day I'll do that. I'll be a little vague for spoilers but still open about the angsty parts. I'll also put it behind a spoiler wall for anyone who doesn't want to see it!

Matt, seen here identifying the spoilers below that Keep Reading bar...

Kidnapping arc: right now you're on the kidnapping arc! Lots of cuddling and softness after that arc (ch12-13).

Devil-Hunt: fun chapters with their version of hide and seek (affectionately called Devil-Hunt) for ch14-15! No angst, only joy.

Old Friend Visit🌧️: Next bit of drama pops back up around ch16-19 with a visit from an old friend. Bit of angst, maybe 1-2 sad rainy clouds out of 5.

Matt Gets Slashed By Nobu And Then Argues With Foggy🌧️🌧️🌧️: general sadness as we touch on Matt getting shredded by Nobu canonically and his and Foggy's fight starting at ch20. That's always depressing (canonically 5 of 5 sad rainy clouds) but no worries, we comfort him through it. There's a little bit of him being, understandably, sad and miserable, so a bit of angst, but there's a lot of comfort and cuddling and such there too to balance it - and that weekend of caretaking ends around ch26.

Various Non-Angst Arcs: Basically comfort comfort, growing relationship, some plot stuff with SHIELD, dealing with canonical events, no major bad vibes. (Ch27-31)

Away Chapters🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️: Next bit of angst has been, up until now, one of the rougher points to go through. You'll get your first hint of it starting at the end of Ch32. Buildup to Ch34 in which Reader/Jane... has to leave town for a very specific reason, and thus say goodbye for a bit. That leads us into the Away Chapters arc - what they're both up to, how they're both dealing with the separation, important plot events, etc. Fairly angsty and sad, but it's with the understanding (on both their parts) that the separation is temporary. Separation ends in Ch42 in a way that deserves fireworks!

Various Non-Angst Arcs: Lots of cuddling after that, dealing with the separation, and with any injuries that might have been gained, some plot stuff. Slight bit of angst having to do with our Mortal Enemy White Coat Asshole, but nothing major. Ch43-48.

Hypothermia arc: from ch49-52! Maybe 1 rainy cloudy? Not really though. Mostly just good god, matt, what the fuck.

Fuck-ton of Romance Arcs: Lots of romance-y things after this! Romance romance romance. Ch53-62!

Woops it looked like you almost died arc🌧️🌧️: Ch63-65 involves a short angsty, very close call and an argument about it arc, so some angst because Almost Died. Maybe 2-3 clouds. Def not 5 clouds though.

Devil-Hunt arc: More Devil-Hunt because it's fun. Zero clouds, only fun.

Buildup bits and pieces of angst 🌧️ to 🌧️🌧️🌧️: OK so this next arc's a little trickier since it's leading to a big reveal and I've set it up way ahead of time. This one involves pieces of angst slowly woven in and building up in between other more chill events - Starting around 68... what happened in Los Angeles with the fire, aaaaall of that is going to start creeping in and making itself known. You'll get, say, an angsty scene about it in Ch70 but only for the first section, while the rest of the chapter is not all that angsty. At first it's mostly woven in between other arcs - a Big Visit from a friend (Ch68-73)🌧️🌧️, dealing with some bounty hunters (ch76-78), some smut (ch78-79), and lots of Matt being very loving and soft and supportive in between. Short angsty moments range between 1 cloud and 3 clouds out of five.

You'll know you're getting close to the Angst Dive when Frank canonically shoots Matt between the eyes (Ch83🌧️🌧️) and he loses his hearing temporarily. We're gonna obviously have some comfort and caretaking and soft discussions (ch84-90) though before we get into the fire stuff, because Matt deserves it.

Los Angeles Fire Comes Out🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️🌧️: Once you hit Ch91... We're gonna slowly begin our descent into true Five Cloud Angst territory. This is the arc we're in now so I can't say how many chapters it will take, although I'm estimating another 2-3 update cycles depending on how much time I have with moving. This will likely be our darkest, angsty-est section yet - there will be misunderstandings, miscommunication, a lot of Matt's insecurity and self-loathing unintentionally crashing together with Reader/Jane's guilt and insecurity. There will be tears, hurt, and some brokenness. I will promise, though, that the storm of it will be over by morning in the fic - so our lovely couple just has to get through one night and then things will get easier (there will be comfort, cuddling, emotional comfort smut, all the good stuff). A lot of readers are waiting until this section is done to read through it, so if you're looking to do the same, I'm tagging each of these angsty updates with raincloud emojis in the tumblr updates and in the chapter summaries! There will be a little sunshine symbol when we come out of it. <3 After that, you can expect softer things for a bit because I always try to give ya'll a bunch of happy breathing room between the heavy stuff. No perma-gloom here!

As for what's in the future... I know the angsty points that are coming, just not what chapters precisely! I try to add an angst warning but if you ever need to know if the current arc will be depressing or sad, feel free to ask and I'll let you know!

#ask response #the red thread #angst #the red thread spoilers #like not if you've read up until current obvs #but if you have *not* read and want to go in blind then yeah there's mildddd spoilers although I did my best #up until the 90s (I can't believe I can say that) the saddest section you're gonna have #is the Away Chapters #that arc is quite sad although I try to weave some less angsty stuff in #there are various exciting plot things and stuff with shield #AND A CAR CHASE #but yeah the sad is there #that would be on and off 4 clouds of sadness #The area we're in now is 5 clouds #although I guess even that's not as bad as it could be since I'm not killing anyone #(death is like idk 8 clouds and we will never see 8 clouds) #(breakup is idk 7 clouds maybe?) #(i need to create a cloud scale) #(except I am like the fujita scale of angst clouds) #(because i mostly measure the strength based on the aftermath) #(did I cry a little? Did I get a few comments saying they cried? 3 clouds!) #(i could call it the enhanced pasta scale like the enhanced fujita scale) #(where am i what am i doing) #(this got off track and now i'm in tag nebraska wtf)

[ren-c-leyn]

The Forest of No Return

Another story based on a prompt by @thependragonwritersguild . Problem is, their blog wouldn’t let me search it, so I can’t link it. Instead, here is the prompt in question:  “Her crown was fashioned from a deer’s skull and her heart beat with all of the forest’s fury.” (#1000)  And then I forget to post the warnings, so sorry. It has some swearing, character deaths, a little more description on the wounds but not gorey gorey, and over all is a pretty angsty piece.

 We should have known better. It was not a land for men, not even a land for elves, I doubt even the nymphs and dryads even dared to enter the heart of her domain. At the time, the tales were meaningless to us. The warnings and fearful whispers didn’t even reach our deafened ears. One thing and one thing alone held any sway over us, the promise for more power.

 The very edge of the forest was about as welcoming as a gallows. Crows watched us hungrily, like we were dead men about to sway. None of them made so much as a peep as their dead eyes followed our trek through the knotted mess of brambles, ivy, knotted shrubs, and gnarled trees. We hacked at the plants, and they hacked right back at us. We traded blows like it was a war. hatchet and sword blows countered with sharp thorns and parried with thick branches.

 I don’t know how long it took us just to breach the outer ring of the forest, but those who could not afford full suits of armor found themselves in sorry shape. One would think we had just fought off a werewolf pack, not a sorry bunch of stationary plants. Or were they? It may have been a trick of my eyes, the fatigue getting to me, but I swore I saw the paths we had just cut for ourselves shrinking behind us.

 The Forest of No Return, the old wives’ tales called it. The Bramble Wood maps called it. Both seemed equally fitting from where we were standing. Still, we had come this far, why stop now? The foolish thought running through most of our minds as he trudged forward, wading through thick thorns and more bushes.

 The roots took their turn in this onslaught, ambushing us from below. We cursed and spat, stumbling through the overgrowth. I remembered one fellow screaming that we should have just set fire to this damnable place to clear the path for us. I don’t think it would have done any good. Mushrooms and ferns mostly grew in damp places, and the musty scent in the air, and the sweat pouring from my face, only served to reinforce how humid this place was. It was a small wonder we weren’t running into vines and bright flowers, like the southern tropics.

 Exhaustion sat in, and I couldn’t be sure if we were actually making progress or not. It still looked like a sea of ferns and brush, and felt like wooden snared were set every other step in a vain effort to break our ankles. Most of us were sitting for our rest, panting like dogs with only the tops of their heads and helms visible over the greenery. I stood, scanning what little I could see through the trees for some sort of landmark. Of course, there were none. It was just trees, trees, more trees, and then the layer of dense greenery below them. I couldn’t even tell what time it was because the branches were so thick.

 After a time, our leader roused us, pushing us further in the direction we had been headed, praying it was the right way to get into the heart of the forest. It sounded so simple in the tales, but then, it always does. Get into the heart of the wood, defeat the guardian, and claim it’s power and riches for ourselves. So simple. At this rate, though, I wondered if we would have strength enough left to battle a simple foe, little alone a mystical being.

 Still, we pressed forward. The shadows gradually grew deeper, the light dimmed, and before long, we were marching by torchlight. There was something ominous about that forest at night, or perhaps it was just the part of the forest we had wandered into. Nothing looked like it had changed, it was still trees and plants, but now there was this warm breeze at our necks, like a beast breathing on us. It brought a faint odor of decay and damp earth. Graveyard was the first word to come to my mind, but I pushed the thought away. No point in thinking that way.

 The feeling of eyes boring through our very souls was next, and that was worse. There was no direction it came from, and no sounds or shifts of air to accompany it. The urge to run was strong, but where would we run too? The silence and darkness gave nothing away, and not even the breeze was strong enough to stir anything more than a few trembling leaves here and there.

 The fatigue weighed my legs down far more than armor ever had. My eyelids threatened to close at any moment, but that scent and those eyes kept pushing me forward. They herded us like cattle, never relenting until daylight came and the last of our torches had blown out. We set watched and buried ourselves into the undergrowth. The word graveyard came to me again as I tried to peer at the sky from beneath layers of rich greens and earthy browns, and it haunted me all the way into my restless dreams.

 I shot up to the sounds of screams, as did most of us. Swords, shields, axes, and spears were in our hands before our minds could comprehend drawing them. We rushed towards our comrades, prepared to slay whatever had been tormenting us for so long, only, there was nothing. It was their dreams, not a foe. We shook them until they woke, blabbering incoherently about the queen or something. 

 Most of us shook it off as this place getting to them. I, however, felt the breeze on my neck get very cold at the word queen. I gritted my teeth and looked back, weighing my options. Did I dare try to wade back through all of that alone? Or did I take my chances with the rest? The decision was made for me when the leader began to push us forward. The crowd washed over me, pushing me down the same non-existent trail as the rest. Whatever our fate was, it would be one we shared for better, or as I figured, for worse.

 We finally found different scenery, and it was beautiful. Crystal clear ponds on both sides of a large, round grassy area. Flowers bloomed everywhere, filling the air with a rich perfume. In the center of it all was a white tree. It’s branches fanned out around it, leaving a small section in the center bare. While many of the others rushed to the center, happy to be free of the accused undergrowth, I continued staring at that tree. It reminded me very much of something... a chair? No, a throne.

 I felt my stomach sink and my heart stop. I opened my mouth to shout, to call them back, but it was too late. My voice died in the back of my throat as she dropped down from ancient branches above them. I couldn’t even see exactly what she did, only the bloody aftermath of it. I had seen battle, I had seen war, but I had never witnessed anything nearly as brutal as what laid on that green, flowery field. The forerunners laid motionless on the ground, great gashes in their armor and their bodies. Blood was everywhere. I couldn’t imagine what it would take to get it to splatter that far.

 The ones that had been right on their heels didn’t even come to a full stop before a blinding green light lashed out at them from her hands. They too laid crumpled on the ground. The few of us with caution stood on the edge of the field, staring at the carnage. The stillness was deceptive, making time seem to pass slower than it really had. By the time any of us had regained our senses, that feral beauty was walking towards us.

  Her crown was fashioned from a deer’s skull and I was sure her heart beat with all of the forest’s fury. The earthy tones of her skin and hair contrasted with the rich greens of her clothes, and even more so with the bright, angry amber of her angry eyes. She strode with an elegant, intimidating gait, and I knew who she was. The guardian, the queen, the reason none ever returned, and the being that turned this place into a graveyard.

 Some of the braver changed her in fury, weapons poised to strike down the tall, willowy woman. They never got within five paces of her before sharing our comrades’ fates. The wiser ran, but they didn’t get five paces into the forest before being impaled on the roots. Only I was left standing, rooted in place by fear and wonder.

 She stopped, practically nose to nose with me, staring down into my eyes. I tried to meet her challenge, wanting to die with at least some measure of dignity left, but I was beginning to feel tired, vision blurring ever so slightly as I struggled to focus. This wasn’t right, I should have been sharper with the adrenaline coursing through my veins. It was like I was poisoned. Then it hit me, the flowers. We never would have survived even if we had killed her.

 A mirthless chuckled escaped me as I sunk to my knees, unintentionally kneeling before the queen of this cursed forest. My sword arm rested across my knee, hand barely holding the sinking blade. I fought to keep my head up, but it was growing heavier by the second. The crows knew, the tales had known, and now we too, knew. I closed my eyes, prepared to join my comrades, but I was not granted even that small blessing. I had bowed, surrendered, and there was not enough mercy in her heart to let me escape her wood, even through death.

#My writing #fiction #fantasy #angst #short story #a story by Ren

[armeniaitn]

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s congratulatory message on New Year and Christmas

New Post has been published on https://armenia.in-the.news/politics/prime-minister-nikol-pashinyans-congratulatory-message-on-new-year-and-christmas-67399-31-12-2020/

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s congratulatory message on New Year and Christmas

Dear people, dear compatriots in Armenia, Artsakh and the Diaspora,

It is even hard to believe that there are only a few minutes left until the end of 2020, a year of which we will keep bitter memories for a long time ahead. A war with severe consequences, the COVID-19 pandemic: 2020 will be remembered with these milestones in our people’s history.

On New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with the families of our martyrs, our brothers and sisters who fell in the war, as well as with their children, mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, brothers and sisters.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with the families of our missing soldiers – their children, mothers, fathers, wives, brothers and sisters.

[embedded content]

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with the families of our captive compatriots, their children, mothers, fathers, wives, brothers and sisters. During this time I had the opportunity to meet and communicate with many of them, and I must say that this is just the case when grief brings people closer to each other. Unfortunately, by the end of 2020 we have not yet managed to identify and find out our missing compatriots; we have not been able to repatriate all our captives, and I want to apologize to the families for this situation, without talking about the reasons.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with our soldiers, officers, generals, our army, our border guards on combat duty who are making heroic efforts to stabilize the post-war situation and reinstate the nationwide feeling of security.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and thoughts are with the police and security officers who are enforcing security and public order in the Republic of Armenia.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with our doctors and paramedics who have for a while now been fighting the coronavirus. The war opened up a second front for them, and our doctors saved thousands of lives of wounded servicemen with the same heroic drive.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and thoughts are with those servicemen and civilians who became disabled during the war, and I especially want to tell them that life is not over and you will still make your personal contribution to Homeland’s strengthening.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with our brothers and sisters who are back from the battlefields, but keep reliving every minute and second that they spend on the front lines.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and thoughts are with those who lost their homes due to the war. For the same reason, I will refrain from stating the measures that the government has already implemented, is taking and will take to solve their problems. Everything necessary will be done indeed.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and minds are with our compatriots in Artsakh. Our beloved Artsakh is experiencing extremely difficult days. Of course, the presence of Russian peacekeepers provides strong security guarantees for our compatriots in Artsakh. The status of Artsakh continues to be an absolute priority for us, and political and diplomatic efforts must be made in this direction.

On this New Year’s Eve, our hearts and thoughts are with our compatriots in the Diaspora. Your continued love and daily affection matters even thousands of kilometers away from Artsakh and Armenia, and our unity cannot be disrupted in any way. We all know that.

On New Year’s Eve, however, our hearts and minds are mostly with our children, who were deprived of Christmas carols and fairy tales this year. Children and their future are the most important motivators in our national mentality, and I wonder after all what we should do for our children in such a difficult situation.

The November 9 statement called for an end to hostilities, but we still feel the aftermath of the war. These aftershocks may have a military bias; they sometimes have a moral-psychological aspect, sometimes – political, and our biggest task is to defy them if we are to ensure stability in Armenia and Artsakh and make decisions conducive to stability. Our greatest duty before our children and before the nation is to address the problems we are facing today; we should embark upon the cause of building the future as soon as possible.

What future do we see for our country, our children and our people? These issues are important not only for tomorrow but also for today’s developments. We have to build Armenia in a new way; we have to build Artsakh in a new way, we have to build our optimism in a new way, and I want to start 2021 with that very mood. The environment has changed around Artsakh and around Armenia. We did everything to prevent such a change in the environment.

But today there are specific realities, and we must face those realities, because this is a necessary precondition for managing the situation. The logic of chaos, panic, fear should be overcome minute by minute; we must rule out any such factor as may lead to such realities. The very first minutes of 2021 should be the “zero point” for us to usher in the outset of our new national rise.

What do we need for this? First of all, we must build up a new security environment, the most important component of which is the launch of army reforms. We should further strengthen the relations with our primary security partner – Russia, and create new security guarantees in this context.

The next key point is the establishment of a credible judiciary system. This is a priority issue and an increasing challenge for the country, including in terms of security.

The introduction of modern education concepts and bringing each individual’s competitiveness up to international standards is our next major task, which will ultimately lead to a significant increase in the competitiveness of our society.

And finally, the people’s power, that is, the people’ power to form a government must become ever stronger with each passing day, as this is an indisputable reality for all time.

Dear compatriots, dear people in Armenia, Artsakh and the Diaspora,

2021 should come as a year of labor for us, not a year of ordinary work, but a year of striving, where working hard and creating added value should be a primary task for each of us. Our national revival should be based on the Work-Education-Work formula; our optimism should be reinstated through labor and learning; national happiness should be built against the background of work and education.

In this difficult time of sorrow and anxiety we must not forget about happiness, about the happiness of our children, of our generations, because no other goal gives us as much strength to live as the goal of our children’s happiness. And in order to be stronger, we must have more and more children, a large family with 4-5 children must become a rule in us. We must implement new state programs to promote maternity in 2021, because birth and motherhood are the undeniable symbol of our vitality and strength.

This day next year all the lights will be brighter in Armenia and Artsakh; there will be Christmas trees shining everywhere, which will be the greatest tribute of respect to our martyrs, which will be our greatest service to our commitment to building a bright future for our children.

Welcome to 2021! On the eve of Christmas, I would like to greet you with the following words of the New Testament, the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the mourners, for they shall be comforted… Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Blessed are those persecuted for the sake of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven!

Welcome to 2021, the year which should usher in a new era for us, the year of our national revival.

Happy New Year and Merry Christmas!

Read original article here.

#Armenia #Artsakh #Covid-19 #Politics

[dgarski]

​This Journey (Part LXXXIII)

The long road and finding peace in living again. How did I get here? The entire point of this blog "This Journey", has been for me to catalog a sort of diary/archive of memorable and significant events that have happened since my life changed nearly a year ago. Maintaining this blog, has been about my own mental therapy. I've never needed for validation in the words I say. Sharing it was simply a chosen part of it, to actually get it out there for others to perhaps, learn something from my experiences as a stroke and heart attack survivor; and just how difficult it can be to get ones life back together after such a dramatic change. I think that the one thing that is forefront in everything I've been through, has been trying to understand why I didn't die. By all medical accounts, I should have. Why didn't I? Where did that "will to live" come from? How much of my unconscious determination to not die verses pure dumb luck, actually kept me alive? There is so much that I still don't know about those first hours when and after I collapsed. That part frightens me the most. I mean, try to imagine not being able to clearly account for several days of your life. Imagine waking up in a hospital bed, and not knowing why you are there. I think that I was mostly angry for what had happened to me, as it meant that I had lost almost all control of my life. Other people were making decisions about what was or wasn't going to happen to me; and I had no choice but to relinquish that control. I remained helpless and vulnerable for many days, even after I was released from the hospital. I wish I could remember what I was thinking during that time frame. Something way down deep inside me, knew that I had a very long road ahead of me. If I were going to ever figure out a way to get back to Florida and pick up my life where I left off, it was going to take a long time, a lot of hard work and determination, and a whole lot of unconditional support and understanding from those who were going to have to deal with me for the duration.

In the period of me trying to figure out what I was going to do, what I needed to do to get my life back, I kept getting signs. It felt almost like I was being guided...and I mean, guided by energies. I have always understood that nature has a way of balancing everything. Time determines the duration of these balances. I really like that quote about being able to see signs when they appear: "What the eye doesn't see and the mind doesn't know, doesn't exist", even if it does!" ~ D.H. Lawrence

I have always felt like I have been guided by things and energies I know exist, but cannot prove. I listen to, I pay attention to and I see what most cannot. Maybe it's a level of understanding that comes with being a musician/instrumentalist for most of my life. Some call it empathic knowing. I feel energies very strongly. I think that the most challenging and most difficult part of the process, was trying to deal with those who simply refused to understand me. I received a great deal amount of negative energy from people I never would have thought would burden me with their combined judgments and insecurities. Once I realized that these people simply could not understand me because of their own limitations, I was able to begin to let them go. I am nothing if not a very strong individual when it comes to knowing immediately, who and what is right for me and who and what is not.

I could not waste time explaining myself or my reasoning for the decisions I made. In my mind, it was never a requirement for my well-being. Nobody else was living my life. Why should I ever follow or accept the advise of someone who will never have to live with the outcome? I've lived too long to have such a lack of confidence. Some call it stubbornness. Well, that stubbornness is what got me through some of the worst days of my life. I had no choice but to use that power of stubbornness to get me through this journey. Patience was the key. If I was going to make things happen, if I was going to see my goals come to fruition, it was going to require a great deal amount of patience. There will always be those who read these words and wonder why I don't continue to mention all of those individuals who helped me, and gave me a chance to get my life back together. It's very simple, really. Thanking someone for helping, should be a one-time occurrence, just like the event that required the help. There is a certain loss of dignity and value when you continue to thank someone, over and over again for the same thing, solely based on some sort of outside source of guilt or obligation. I have never fallen for such weaknesses. Thank someone when gratitude is required and apologize only when you have done something wrong.  Yes, I am very grateful to everyone who helped me. There are numerous individuals who made sure that I didn't die that night. I have no idea who most of them are. Yeah, try living with that fact. I will never know why those who helped me during my recovery, were available to do so. Family was there immediately. Why? I don't know. I mean, I honestly don't know how it was possible for them to get there and be there for me while I laid in that bed, helpless to the world. All I know is what I was told. I do not know everything that went on in conversations between them. I do not know the thoughts they had as individuals. Did they think that I was actually going to die? Yes, desperation requires desperate measures. I get that. We can never really know what we are truly capable of achieving under such extreme situations. Regardless, They were there. They helped me. I guess that I just forgot that it is possible for family to come to ones rescue. It is said that when chaos and loss of control happens in your life, when everything is falling apart, and one thing happens after another, it can feel like the end of the world. Somehow, some way, with enough time, we manage to come out of it, hopefully, a little less for wear, but we do come out of it. Years later, when we reflect on those events, they somehow read like a finely crafted novel. That old saying, "What doesn't kill us only makes us stronger", bares a great deal of merit. There is an idle truth to these simple perspectives. It seems that life and the balances of nature and energies, have ways of simplifying the chaos and calming the proverbial waters after the storm.

I guess, that's part of the learning of patience. To had to trust that everything would eventually be okay. I had to learn that. It gave me the courage and the strength to push forward. Before I could do that, I also had to learn to let go of what was, so I could make room for what was to be. I truly do understand that my new life is going to cost me my old one. How much gut instinct gets us through and guides us when we experience such traumatic/dramatic life changes? How much of that deep-seeded need for a sense of well-being and normalcy, comes from within? Why do some have so much more than others? Where does that fight come from? Why do some survive and most don't? Why does someone go through the same thing I did, and end up in a grave, and I didn't? What is that? What is that thing inside of us that keeps us alive in the worst possible scenarios? What does it mean that I wasn't meant to die? Who said so? Honestly, I am hopelessly sick of constantly hearing that it "wasn't my time" or that some body's religious "gawd or a band of angels somehow intervened" and made sure that I didn't die, because he/she has other plans for me. I don't believe in any of that, and yet, it seems to be the most popular social explanation. Is this simply because, why I was allowed to live, just can't be explained logically or scientifically? I think it goes far, far deeper than the simple, elementary acknowledgment of alleged "higher powers". I can prove that medical staff can save a life. I saw it first hand, many times, when I worked at the hospital. I saw some of the worst situations, come through those emergency doors, and those people were taken care of by highly-trained individuals who know how to fix a broken body. I cannot prove however, that it was was anything more than that, and neither can anyone else. Ironically, many of the people in the medical field, will vehemently be some of the first ones to admit that they cannot explain why someone under their care lived or died. They will also be the first to attest to a greater power bringing someone through when every medical understanding should have seen that person die. That's fine. If that's what works for them, then it is a good thing. I feel and think that it is so much more than that. As human beings, we are capable of surviving some of the absolute worst things that can happen to us. You hear or read about a vehicle accident where your first inclination is to conclude that there was no possible way that the person(s) in that car, could have survived...but somehow, they did. How many times have you seen the aftermath of an airplane crash where survivors actually made it through? The list of unexplained scenarios that defy logic, goes on forever. Perhaps, this is my quest for understanding. Perhaps this will go on for a very long time. I hope to find some answers as I walk this path. I hope that "this journey" will lead me to better understandings of why life is so incredibly precious and short, and how we need to do everything we can, each day to appreciate the time we have to breath and live each day as if it truly was our last.

[sandytree1]

Radioactive hazards

Just a jumbled mess of notes. I’m still thinking about that Project 7 where we were supposed to design a live-work research pod for Chernobyl that I didn’t finish. So began googling stuff and looking up and working out details I’m wondering about. 

How to visit and live in radioactive areas? How to dress? How to prepare (local) food? What are the most radioactive places on earth? (contrast and compare) How to walk around radioactive sites? How to stay safe? How dangerous is radiation? How long should and could you stay in a radioactive area? How is it for people who moved back - what are their lives like? How to resettle the site? 

What do people do here? What can you research on here? What kind of data from site would be interesting? What tools, equipment and facilities do you need to do this research? How would their day by day routine look like - throughout a month - throughout the four season? 

What’s the geography like? Where do I find reliable maps of the area? How to I access these maps? geography, typology, contour relief map, political boundaries, rivers and seas, mountains, flora, fauna, exclusion zone. travel paths, roads, infrastructure, landmarks, world map location, prevailing winds, climate, habitat type. 

What are the dimensions of a wolf? What does a wolf need to survive and thrive-ish? What does the day to day life of a wolf look like? 

Nuclear power is a reliable source of energy, but comes with the risk of meltdown. 

Be careful of what you touch and where you step, because there’s all this radioactive dust and particles floating everywhere. 

When it blew, it spewed radiation across dozens of towns. Triggering a 12 mile evacuation zone that’s still partially in effect today. The plant itself is the hazardous site. 

Yet Japan is encouraging people to move back. How has conditions improved in the years since the disaster? Radiation researcher Azby Brown. You need to get permission to enter. Play it safe and stay in my protective gear. 

Fukushima Daiichi -- actually a massive cleanup in there, 5000 people working there. They can get into parts of the buildings, but they send robots there to take video etc. People can’t even go in there, since the radiation is so high. How long could people survive in there? A couple of minutes. There’s so much radiation damaging and killing your cells, that your organs would simply shut down. There might be some way of cleaning up to make it livable in 20 years, but it’s an incredibly daunting task. 

They’re removing the top inches of soil where the dust has settled. Dropped into plastic bags and stored in a temporary site. 9 million bags and counting. “Watch your speed, careful.”

Town has become overrun with wild boars. They’re ravaging homes and everything in their path. They eat and destroy crops, making it hard for farmers. They’re not only aggressive and known to attack, they’re radioactive. 

for everyone who returns, they build a new school and house from scratch. In the school yard there’s a radiation monitor so parents can check if its safe when they drop off their kids. “We teach our students about the volume and strength of the radiation, as well as how to avoid it.” 

Children are actually the most vulnerable to radiation. 

Everyday Ouji-san prepares food for the students and has to test the local ingredients that they use for radiation. Has there been times when the radiation levels were too high? Yes, there has. Test once per ingredient, which takes 30 min per ingredient to measure. 

For some living elsewhere is simply not an option. “We have our ancestors with a long history in this town as family. This is the most comfortable place for me, and I wish to continue to live here. I wasn’t worried that much to return, really.” Kids play outside on the ground, and we were concerned about soil contamination. After the accident, we carried a radiation detector with us, although the radiation level in the town of Naraha is low and safe. We’ve gotten used to this. I truly hope more families return and the town will be more active again.” People really trying and working to rebuild. 

A Geiger counter only measures ionizing radiation -- aka radiation with enough energy to rip electrons off atoms. Measured in units called sieverts. If above 2 sieverts, then you’ll probably die shortly after. 

Nautral background radiation coming from earth itself. The soil, rocks, air, space. Average .1 - .2 microsieverts per hour. The radiation in Hiroshima today is only 0.3 microsieverts per hour, 70 years later. Uranium ore is fluorescent under UV light. Marie Curie discovered uranium in Chech republic. In her office her doorknob is 0.10 and then the back of her chair when she pulled it out leaving traces of radium. New Mexico, Trinity test site where the world’s first nuclear bomb was set off. The whole area was vaporated. There was so much heat coming off the bomb that it fused all the desert sand into this green glass which you can still find it here. They’ve named these pellets Trinitite. 0.8 per hour in average, while the pellets are 2-3 microsieverts per hour. 

Which place has higher radiation than any place we’ve seen so far? Answer: airplanes. As you gain altitude, there’s less atmosphere above you to shield you from the cosmic rays: 0.5 microsieverts - 3 microsieverts per hour. 

Chernobyl Nuclear Reactor 4, Ukraine. Just walking close (100 m) gives off 5-6 microsieverts. So much heat was generated that it blew the top off and spead radioactive isotopes throughout this whole surrounding area and over into Europe. If I stayed here for 1 hour, my body will receive as mcuh when you’d receive a dental x-ray. So not a huge amount of radiation. Reason why it’s not that high is because they removed a couple of meters worth of topsoil from this whole area, then dumped it somewhere. Which is why we can stand here. 

Fukushima, Japan. Geiger counter goes up: 3. Mask is overkill, it’s just to stop the dust from getting into my lungs. 10% lesser radiaction material spread than Chernobyl. But because it’s not as long ago, much less of the radiation has decayed. Getting readings up to 5-10 microsieverts. Don’t stay too long because of that. 

Pripyat hospital was where the firemen were brought. The ones who fought the fires at the reactor, and in the basement they left their clothes once they realized it was so contaminated - they chucked it down there. 200-500 microsieverts by the door of them. 2000 microsieverts is a years worth of natural background radiation. CT scan is 3 years worth of microsieverts. Fukushima residents will receive an additional 10 000 worth of microsieverts in their lifetime. US radiation workers limited to 50 000 microsieverts. Astronauts receive 80 000 microsieverts. Smokers lungs receive on average 160 000 microsieverts every year. 

Uranium is not limitless supply (230 years). The largest problem is not meltdown or anything, but nuclear waste. Many different designs. 

Nowadays Chernobyl has become a site for dark tourism. 30 years later more than 10 000 tourists explore the disaster site every year. They snap photos of the stricken power plant and wanders the empty streets of Pripyat. Visitors are screened before they enter the zone. 19 miles surrounding blast area. Told not to sit down nor touch items within this cordon. Checked for radioactive particles when they leave again. Tour operators mainly based in Kiev. They insist the site is safe to see. Even offers overnight stays at a hotel which has been freshly built. 

Chernobyl power plant blew up 26 april 1986, Soviet Union. Nowadays Pripyat, Ukraine. Secret didn’t break until 50 hours later when radioactive particles were detected in Forsmark power plant in Sweden near Stockholm. Accompanied by a toxic cloud sweeping the continent. Belarus suffered the worst effects: poisonous rain, damage to plants and crops, birth of mutated animals. Impact also felt in Scandinavia, Switzerland, Greece, Italy, France, UK. Only 31 people were killed directly - mostly staff and brave souls that battled to encase the bleeding reactor in concrete. But for all its notoriety and its pan-European aftermath, it was largely a localised affair. 400 x more radiocactive material realised into atmosphere than by the Hiroshima bomb. Pripyat was evacuated 27. april - far too late in terms of citizen’s health. 

Exclusion zone is on border between Belarus and Ukraine: Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (Ukraine) and Polesian Exclusion Zone (Belarus). 19 miles surrounding blast area.

Ukraine is at war with Russia over Krim peninsula, although Putin won’t acknowledge their involvement in the civil conflict. But the capital Kiev is 450 miles north-west of troubled Donetsk. The current Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) advice says “the situation in Kiev and western cities is generally calm.” 

Tour operators insists that site is safe to visit. Ukrainian officials have suggested that Pripyat won’t be habitable for another 20 000 years though. Crew maintaining concrete sarcophagus work strictly monitored 5 hour days over the course of a month then take 15 days off. 

Place has become a time capsule of Cold War era beyond scope of what a museum can recreate. It IS 1986 with all its suspicion, frission and atomic fear. 

Rusted swimming pools, dusty gymnasium, giant ferris wheel. Amusement park was due to open 4 days after explosion. They’ve all become a symbol of the disaster. 

East European forest has reclaimed the city. Unchecked by man’s hand in 30 years. ABANDONED site. Trees begun to creep in. Wildlife skitters and darts in the shelter they provide. Wolves, lynx, brown bears have returned. Blissfully free of human footprints. 

Chornobyl tour (chernobyl-tour.com) offers 1 day foray to both power plant and Pripyat from £62 a head. Or a detailed 5 day itinerary from £361 per person. 

Welcome to Chernobyl (chernobylwel.com) specialises in 2 day trips which stay overnight from £240. 

Ukrainian National Chornobyl Museum (chornobylmuseum.kiev.ua) is a safer compromise. Charts the event with an exhibit of gas masks, images of deformed animals. Moving through a corridor of name signs for villages that were deleted from the map when the reactor burst. How many people were displaced? 

It was without comparison until Fukushima 2011. 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/ukraine/articles/how-can-i-visit-chernobyl-and-is-it-safe/

25 things you didn’t know about Ukraine, the heart of Europe 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/ukraine/articles/amazing-fact-you-probably-didnt-know-about-ukraine/

How to travel to radioactive places (GOOGLE)

Watch Derek Muller travel to the world’s most radioactive places

Ten most radioactive places on earth - Brainz

About radiation danger/safety of short-term trips to the Chernobyl Zone (chernobyl-tour.com)

The most radioactive places in Chernobyl - ChernobylWEL.com

Nuclear tourism - Wikivoyage

Is Chernobyl safe? what you need to know - World Nomads

What’s it like to visit Chernobyl exclusion zone (The Independent)

Fukushima Travel Guide (Japan-Guide.com)

Netflix’s Dark Tourist: Japan investigating Fukushima tour episode (news.com)

travel the most radioactive places in the world (youniversitytv.com)

How to decontaminate a radioactive environment (MPH online)

Fukushima travel guide (GOOGLE)

Nuclear Waste problem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uU3kLBo_ruo

[theonyxpath]

This week we look at Lest Monsters We Become by Jess Hartley, from Of Predators and Prey: The Hunters Hunted II Anthology.

The Campfire was blazing by the time we drove past. Whoever named the place couldn’t have anticipated how ironic it would sound, when the country bar burned to the ground.

“Keep driving,” I ordered. “Don’t slow down, don’t look at the fire, and for the love of God, no matter what happens, do not stop this car.”

I swapped out the shotgun I’d been clenching in my fists for the camera I kept tucked in the glove box, and took a series of photos as we sped past the inferno. Most wouldn’t come out — I didn’t dare use flash, lest I tip us off as something other than disinterested passersby — but hopefully the flames themselves would provide enough illumination to glean something useful later on. Information is power. That was something Antoine had taught me, a long time ago. No weapons can protect you if you don’t know what’s coming.

And those folks at The Campfire? My guess was none of them had any idea what was coming for them.

Mercifully, from what I could see, the parking lot, and thus the bar, had been lightly populated. Only a few cars — some of them burning as brightly as the building — paid testament to the now dead (or worse) victims of this pack’s latest raid.

A graffti-covered van confrmed my suspicions as to the group’s identity. They changed out vehicles like some folks changed socks, but always customized their current choice with the markings of their pack. Sometimes it was done in red spray paint, other times, in blood — The Unbroken were flexible like that. Self-centered, violent, inhuman monsters — but flexible.

“Where are we going?” Jake had followed my orders, piloting us past the fire, but now that the ruined bar was in the rear-view, and a four-way stop crossroad up ahead of us, he didn’t know what to do. We’d only been partners for a month or so, but I’d seen this over and over. Jake was great at carrying through a plan, but when life threw him a curve ball, as it often did in the field, he tended to freeze up.

It was going to get him killed one of these days. I didn’t intend to die beside him because of it.

That was one of the drawbacks of working with a partner: You were limited by their weaknesses, hobbled by their handicaps. Chinks in their armor became holes in yours. And when dealing with vampires, any flaw can be a fatal one.

I much preferred working alone. But desperate times require desperate measures, and I hadn’t been this desperate in a long, long while. When my path crossed with Jake’s, we recognized something in each other — a look, perhaps, or a bit of vocal inflection. Hunting left scars on the soul as well as the skin, and sometimes you can just tell when someone bears the same burden you do. So, in hopes that a change in process would change my luck, I took him under my proverbial wing.

On a good night, he was a decent driver, and an extra set of eyes. On a bad night? Well, it hadn’t come to that, but in a pinch, the old adage about not having to outrun the bear, only your buddy? That applied just as well to vampires. And Jake wasn’t that fast.

I thought for a moment before answering him. “Left. There’s an old water tower down that direction. It should be tall enough to see which way they head out when they leave the fire, and let us figure out where they’re going from here.” Without argument, Jake took the left turn.

I didn’t wait for him to stop the car before I leapt out at the base of the tower. Time was running short for me, and if we didn’t get them tonight — well, I wasn’t sure I’d get another chance. I didn’t like those odds. Not in the slightest.

I was halfway up the ladder before Jake could turn off the engine. The nightcold rungs were barely above freezing, but I climbed fast. My fingers didn’t have a chance to go numb before I reached the top of the ladder and hauled myself out onto the maintenance walkway that circled the tank.

Although the sirens were too far away to hear, I could see the whole thing playing out from my perch. In the farthest distance, the lights of town sparkled innocent white. Nearer to me, beyond the city limit, the light faded, houses grew few and far between, and street lights quickly disappeared. The Campfire, far enough from town to avoid city liquor taxes and urban noise complaints, blazed orange-red against a backdrop of rural darkness.

Panting and shaking, Jake finally hauled himself up the ladder to the walkway, clutching the railing as he made his way over to my side.

“Jeezus, ya could’ve waited for me.” He wrapped his arms around his chest, sticking his hands into his armpits to warm them.

I shrugged in answer. If Jake was going to survive, he was going to have to get faster and stronger. But no amount of me telling him that would bring about the change. I’d gotten it from Antoine, but I couldn’t give it to Jake. He’d find his own way to catch up… or die trying.

As we watched, emergency lights approached from town, blinking blue and red as they sped toward the burning building. A single set of white headlights showed the leech pack fleeing the scene in the opposite direction. They turned off before the crossroad, heading for a dark place that moonlight showed to be a largish copse of trees in the middle of otherwise flat farmland.

I pointed, just in case he hadn’t followed the pack’s progression. “There.”

Jake squinted, and shook his head, unable to pick the lights out from that distance.

“Trust me. They turned off on that secondary road.” I checked my watch. “Sunrise isn’t that far away. They’ll stop there to sleep away the day.”

“Will the cops follow them?”

I shook my head. “They got out before the cops got a bead on them, and they don’t leave behind witnesses. They’ll have killed almost everyone.”

“Almost?”

“Yeah.” I answered while watching the van’s red tail lights make for the forest. “If they follow their normal modus operandi, they’ve got some of the folks from the bar in the van. Five probably. One for each of them.”

“Hostages?”

I shook my head. Sometimes I forgot that not everyone had the experience with vampires that I had. It takes time, and that’s one thing that new hunters rarely get enough of.

“Food… And troops to cover their trail. They’ll feed on them, then turn them and bury them somewhere along the way. If the cops do happen to follow up on anything more than a cursory investigation, they’ll find the pit, and possibly a bloodsucker or two. Either the police will put them down, thinking they’re high on bath salts, or they’ll tear the cops to bits. Either way, it’s usually enough to delay any further follow up, at least long enough for them to get away.”

Jake nodded, as if he understood, but he really didn’t. He’d come into this life almost by accident, when the restaurant he worked at got taken over by one of the snooty vamps. One night he saw something he shouldn’t — the new owner taking a dinner break on one of the staff members. When the boss went after him to make sure he didn’t break the Masquerade, Jake defended himself with a bottle of cooking sherry. Luckily for him (if not for the vamp), the boss jumped him in the kitchen — discreet, but also home to the grill. And, while the glass didn’t hurt the leech, the fire sure did. Instead of a dead body and murder charge, Jake ended up staring at a pile of ash, and a new hunter was born.

Well, he thought of himself as a hunter, at least. So far he’d mostly just been lucky. He’d taken out a couple of weak leeches, catching them during the day, or by using some mail-order anarchy recipes to sabotage their cars with do-it-yourself bombs. Good tactics for a fledgling or a loner. One-on-one, most folks don’t stand a chance against a vamp with their blood-borne speed, strength, and resilience. Add in the broad range of mind- and emotion-controlling powers, shape-shifting, and God only knows what else they’re capable of, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster if you try to fight fair. Guerilla tactics were pretty much a hunter’s best bet, and he’d taken to them like a duck to water.

But, he didn’t really know what it was like at the heart of the situation — not yet, at least. He’d been dealing with stuff from a distance, and it wasn’t something you really got until you’d been through the worst of the aftermath yourself.

Like everything else they touched, the carnage and destruction vampires left behind was worse than anything living people inflicted on each other. Mortal minds just don’t want to imagine the depths of depravity that leeches were capable of.

That’s what made their “Masquerade” — hiding behind a thin mask of humanity, while carrying out their monstrous acts in the shadows — even possible. Even when directly confronted with them, we still didn’t want to believe. That’s why the bar fire would be labeled arson, or a horrible accident, by the media. People want to believe there was nothing out there hunting them. They insist on believing it.

They are wrong.

Read more about Jake and his partner in Of Predators and Prey: The Hunters Hunted II Anthology, now available in ebook and print from DriveThruFiction!

#Onyx Path Publishing #White Wolf Publishing #Vampire: The Masquerade #Vampire The Masquerade #Classic World of Darkness

[mikemortgage]

Three scenarios: How the U.S. midterms are likely to affect investors

In the aftermath of the most devastating month for stock markets in seven years, U.S. voters are heading to the polls Tuesday for the midterm elections that may play a significant role in deciding where equities go next.

Historically, voters have had little interest in midterm elections. In 2014, less than one-third turned out to boost the Republican Party’s majority in the House of Representatives and see them win back the Senate for the first time since 2006.

The added interest in this year’s election, CITI Research North America economist Dana Peterson said, is due to how much is riding on them for U.S. President Donald Trump, whose fellow Republicans currently control both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Stocks have stumbled, but here's how the bull market could get back on track: Joe Chidley

Uphill battle to get USMCA through Congress could become ‘mountain’ after midterms

Why Trump blames that wacky ol' Fed for markets going crazy: Joe Chidley

“Usually, no one pays attention to them but they are this year because it’s going to act as a referendum on President Trump’s policies,” Peterson said.

Despite the low turnout, midterm elections tend to have a direct impact on Wall Street, with the uncertainty depressing markets in the runup and then, a post-election rally regardless of which side emerges victorious.

According to Kevin McCreadie, president and chief investment officer of AGF Investments Inc., the market has not declined in the 12 months following a midterm election since 1946. The average boost, post midterm, he said, was 15.3 per cent.

But with more at stake this year, especially when it comes to economic policy, that all could change.

Scenario 1: Democrats win the House; Republicans keep the Senate

Multiple polls point to the most likely outcome being a split of Congress. The Democrats are widely expected to gain control of the House while the Republicans are the clear favourites to maintain their majority in the Senate — and perhaps even increase their strength there.

The split is so expected that Wall Street has already priced it in as the most likely result, said Hugh Johnson, chief investment officer at Hugh Johnson Advisors, a New York-based firm. If it happens, he said, it will most likely be met with a yawn.

In this scenario, the markets may undergo their usual post-election rally, but the divide in Congress may lead to policy “gridlock” in the coming months — not necessarily a bad thing for investors.

“For Wall Street, less is more and if you’re talking about virtually nothing coming out of Washington, that’s less and might be pretty good news,” he said.

Seeing the two parties work together through the next two years of Trump’s term would be rare, but there are a few policy issues that could offer the rivals a chance to do so. Trump is widely expected to work with the Democrats in the House on a new infrastructure bill projected to be in the range of US$1 trillion to US$1.5 trillion. Former White House economic advisor Gary Cohn told Reuters in September that he expects it to be the first thing the two sides work on post-election. CITI, Peterson said, already has the deal “baked in” to GDP growth projections — she expects the deal will add 0.2 per cent in 2020, allowing growth to reach 1.8 per cent.

McCreadie expects the markets to bounce in November and December, but uncertainty can creep back into investors’ minds as soon as January when the new House sits for the first time.

That’s when the whispers about Democrats potentially moving to impeach Trump could begin. Party leaders have been silent on the possibility on the campaign trail, focusing instead on investigating the president in connection with Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Under a split Congress scenario, it’s unlikely impeachment would result in a conviction in the Senate because it would require two-thirds of the Republican-dominated chamber to vote in favour. Even if the process goes nowhere, McCreadie said the markets will become volatile due to headline risk.

“(The market) will be noisy but not corrective — unless something shows up in that stuff that says they’ve got him,” he said.

Scenario 2: Democrats sweep Congress

Polling website FiveThirtyEight was projecting on Friday afternoon that the Democrats have a 15 per cent chance of winning a majority in the Senate. In fact, they’re widely expected to lose a seat and inflate the Republican advantage in the chamber to 52-48. But if the Democrats pull off the unexpected, they could have a clear path to impeaching Trump.

While going down that road would set off all kinds of market fireworks, it comes with all kinds of political risks for the Democrats as well.

Assuming they don’t move to impeach, gridlock may once again be the order of the day, Johnson suggested, because Trump will be able to wield his veto power on Democratic legislation.

“Nothing is going to happen because it’ll hit a wall when it gets to the White House,” Johnson said.

A few exceptions would be an infrastructure bill and perhaps some kind of co-operation with Trump to resolve the China trade war. The Democrats would also be able to successfully put an end to any hopes the Republicans may have had about repealing Obamacare.

Attempts to challenge or repeal any of Trump’s economic initiatives — such as the US$1.5 trillion in tax cuts announced last year or new measures to tackle the debt — could be worrisome for investors, McCreadie said.

“The fear in the market is that the tax reform and pro-business agenda is stopped — and not only stops but gets rolled back.”

A sell-off in equities would soon follow. McCreadie said bonds would then become positive as investors make a move to fixed income instead.

Scenario 3:  Republicans sweep Congress

Should the Republicans maintain complete control of Congress, “whatever Trump wants, Trump will get,” Johnson said.

Under this scenario, there will be no impeachment and Obamacare is once again at risk.

Trump has also flirted with additional cuts and strangely suggested two weeks ago that he was looking into a 10 per cent tax cut for the middle class. The GOP has since walked back that suggestion.

The tax cuts that Trump made in 2017 will not be rolled back and Congress will instead look for a way to make individual cuts permanent as they’re set to expire in 2025, Peterson said.

“If you do that, there’s no benefit to the economy in the short run,” Peterson said. “You’re not going to see it until 2026 and in the meanwhile you’d signal that you’re going to run up budget deficits even more than we’re anticipating.”

The tax cuts were mostly responsible for the ballooning budget deficit in 2018, which increased 17 per cent to a six-year high of US$779 billion. Further debt increases, Peterson said, could lead to the U.S. running a risk of a downgrade of sovereign debt.

In the long term, continued stimulus will lead to the Fed continuing to increase interest rates so that Trump does not overheat the economy. “They’ll have to go it alone under these conditions and you bet they will,” said Johnson, who added that rising rates could eventually derail the bull market.

The short term offers more intriguing possibilities for investors. With Trump’s pro-business agenda unimpeded, the equities markets may heat up in the next two years, Johnson said.

“As hard as it is for me to say, from the point of view of markets and the economy, you probably have to say we have our best chance — I hate to say this — that the Republicans retain the House and the Senate,” Johnson said. “That’s the best outcome.”

from Financial Post https://ift.tt/2ALDwMX via IFTTT Blogger Mortgage Tumblr Mortgage Evernote Mortgage Wordpress Mortgage href="https://www.diigo.com/user/gelsi11">Diigo Mortgage

#IFTTT #Financial Post

[aliciacouri-blog]

7 Tools To Overcome The Dreaded Impostor Syndrome

As someone who had challenges with my own self-confidence, I have been looking into this particular subject for some time now. I can say with certainty that I have definitely suffered from the dreaded IMPOSTOR SYNDROME throughout my life. The more I read about the debilitating symptoms, the more I saw myself and kept saying, “Yes! Yes, yes that was me, 100%!”

An irrational fear of mine had always been disappointing someone with my work. The way that manifested for me was that I would rather work my butt off for free than charge for my services. When writing my first and second book I would tell myself, ‘There is no way anyone will want to read anything I have to say, especially in a book, I mean… Come on.’ So I stalled in writing my second book for two years.

In life and business, I constantly second guessed myself and wouldn’t speak up for fear of sounding completely ignorant. Yes, I have accomplished some things, but in my mind they were nothing noteworthy, and any day I would be found as a fraud. In my mind, I was never good enough, never pretty enough, never smart enough.

However, I was comforted to discover as I dove deeper into this subject that I am NOT alone, and to all my sisters out there that are suffering from this fake false attack, you are definitely not alone!

I mean, when you are in the company of such greats as Maya Angelou, Meryl Streep, Tina Fey, and Sheryl Sanberg, who have all felt this way, it ain’t all that bad. The biggest myth about this syndrome is that it only affects women, or at least affects us more than men. In my opinion, the difference is that men have a particular gene, (I think it’s the macho gene), that overrides their feelings of being an impostor and empowers them to muscle through and just do it. For women, I believe we have so much pressure, (mostly self-imposed), to do it ALL right: be the perfect wife, the best mother, totally kick butt at business, in addition to volunteer like Mother Teresa! We don’t cut ourselves any slack!

If you are unclear about what the Impostor Syndrome is, it’s that feeling that you don’t belong, that any day they will figure out you are a fraud and will find someone much better to replace you. This is something that you have to conquer over and over again, so below I have seven tools to help you overcome the IMPOSTOR SYNDROME, so you are able to work your way past it and build confidence in yourself.

BEAUTY. Yes, I said beauty. Author Thomas Troward says, “Beauty represents the most supreme living quality of thought, it is the glorious overflowing of the fullness of love, which indicates the presence of infinite reserves of power behind it.” In short… Beauty = Power. All the great philosophers, thinkers, inventors, artists, and creators in history, including Aristotle, da Vinci, and Michael Angelo, all regarded beauty as the main source from which everything else flowed. I see beauty as the essence, the very nature of an infinite, all powerful, omnipotent God poured out in you. But, if you cannot connect your beauty to the inexhaustible well of power resident on the inside of you, then you will always doubt and devalue yourself, and success will be a struggle.

NEGATIVE SELF TALK. We all know we should NOT engage in this particular vice, but it is there with us all the time. The key is to recognize it the minute those doubts and fears of not being qualified enough, or good enough, or talented enough start creeping in.  The point is you are there, and because you are there, you are enough, and you are exactly who is needed to get that job done!

TAGS. Your TAGS are your Talents, Assets, Gifts and Skills. Too many times we do not take inventory of our TAGS, or we devalue exactly what those TAGS are. I am sure if you took a survey of people around you and asked them what they think your talents and skills are, you would be surprised at some of the things they came up with. I had that happen to me when I was asked to speak to a women’s group about time management. I laughed hysterically when they asked me to present that topic because in my mind I was horrible at time management; yet, the leader of the organization saw me as someone who gets things done very efficiently and effectively. Suddenly “Time Management” became a part of my list of skills, whether I felt like I did a good job with it or not.

ASSESSMENTS. Assessments are a great way to evaluate yourself objectively. I gained so much confidence in who I was and what my strengths were when I started taking different types of assessments. The one that I believed was the biggest eye opener for me was the Kolbe A assessment, which measures your Conative strengths. It is how you are naturally wired to operate and act instinctively to any given situation. Your Conative strength will never change. When I had a better understanding of that, and I began to trust my instincts more based on how I am naturally wired to act and react, I had so much more fun in what I did and did it with so much more confidence because I was no longer trying to fit into what I thought others wanted from me. Rather, I did it in the way that was natural for me and saw tremendous success.

OVERCOMING FAILURES. The greatest response to failures is bouncing back from them quickly and using them to springboard you to the next level of success. The most successful people in history have suffered catastrophic failures early in their careers but have been able use the failure as a catalyst too much greater success. There is not a single successful person that has not tasted the agony of defeat. So why are you any different? Ok, this seems like a no brainer, but we sometimes get bogged down with our own high expectations for ourselves that nothing but perfection will do, and when we cannot achieve it we are deflated. I have learned to take the lessons learned from the “failure” and really apply them to my next attempt. Yes, there will be a next time for sure because I am not quitting. When you look at professional athletes, they have such short memories when it comes to failure because they get right back up and go for it with even more gusto. Yes, I said gusto!

REFRAME. Reframing negative experiences goes hand in hand with overcoming failures. Reframing is a little different because in order to reframe, you first have to invite the idea that this experience was meant to be. You have to accept that what happened was exactly what needed to happen, and then find the lesson within that negative experience. Let’s say you didn’t get the promotion you wanted. Suddenly you start to believe, “see I knew I wasn’t qualified enough for that job” or, “they always promote the guys before they would put a woman in that role.” Reframing would first assume you weren’t meant to have that job, then look at all the ways you grew in the process preceding, and then in the aftermath what it forced you to have to learn or do. Find the growth in it and the lessons learned and you will be so much stronger and ready for the next promotion.

ALTER EGO. I saved this one for last because it really is my favorite tool. This is a technique professional athletes and performers use to get in the “zone.” It will allow you to immediately change your state and level up in a way you normally would not consider for your everyday mode of action. What is an alter ego? Think of it as your best and most trusted friend that is actually living inside of you. This is the persona you get to create thinking without limits who or how you would be if you were totally awesome! This is a tool you pull out when you need to be fierce, strong, and confident like Beyoncé does when she is on stage and her alter ego Sasha Fierce steals the show. You have full control pulling together all the elements of your alter ego, and when that impostor syndrome feeling starts to creep in, pull your most awesome self who has no doubts or insecurities out and let her take the wheel!

No matter what stage of your business or life you are in, whether COO of a major company with thousands of employees or a new hire that just wants to do a good job, the effect of the Impostor Syndrome can sneak in at any moment rocking you back on your heels and putting you on the defensive and before you know it, you are entertaining thoughts of self-doubt. At those moments, it is critical to pull out one or all of these tools to immediately pull you through and restore confidence and allow you to go kick butt!!!

https://www.redcarpetceo.com/single-post/2016/05/03/Cutting-costs-maximizing-results-1

[mozgoderina]

Lifelong learning is becoming an economic imperative

THE RECEPTION AREA contains a segment of a decommissioned Underground train carriage, where visitors wait to be collected. The surfaces are wood and glass. In each room the talk is of code, web development and data science. At first sight the London office of General Assembly looks like that of any other tech startup. But there is one big difference: whereas most firms use technology to sell their products online, General Assembly uses the physical world to teach technology. Its office is also a campus. The rooms are full of students learning and practising code, many of whom have quit their jobs to come here. Full-time participants have paid between £8,000 and £10,000 ($9,900-12,400) to learn the lingua franca of the digital economy in a programme lasting 10-12 weeks.

General Assembly, with campuses in 20 cities from Seattle to Sydney, has an alumni body of around 35,000 graduates. Most of those who enroll for full-time courses expect them to lead to new careers. The company’s curriculum is based on conversations with employers about the skills they are critically short of. It holds “meet and hire” events where firms can see the coding work done by its students. Career advisers help students with their presentation and interview techniques. General Assembly measures its success by how many of its graduates get a paid, permanent, full-time job in their desired field. Of its 2014-15 crop, three-quarters used the firm’s career-advisory services, and 99% of those were hired within 180 days of beginning their job hunt.

The company’s founder, Jake Schwartz, was inspired to start the company by two personal experiences: a spell of drifting after he realised that his degree from Yale conferred no practical skills, and a two-year MBA that he felt had cost too much time and money: “I wanted to change the return-on-investment equation in education by bringing down the costs and providing the skills that employers were desperate for.”

In rich countries the link between learning and earning has tended to follow a simple rule: get as much formal education as you can early in life, and reap corresponding rewards for the rest of your career. The literature suggests that each additional year of schooling is associated with an 8-13% rise in hourly earnings. In the period since the financial crisis, the costs of leaving school early have become even clearer. In America, the unemployment rate steadily drops as you go up the educational ladder.

Many believe that technological change only strengthens the case for more formal education. Jobs made up of routine tasks that are easy to automate or offshore have been in decline. The usual flipside of that observation is that the number of jobs requiring greater cognitive skill has been growing. The labour market is forking, and those with college degrees will naturally shift into the lane that leads to higher-paying jobs.

The reality seems to be more complex. The returns to education, even for the high-skilled, have become less clear-cut. Between 1982 and 2001 the average wages earned by American workers with a bachelor’s degree rose by 31%, whereas those of high-school graduates did not budge, according to the New York Federal Reserve. But in the following 12 years the wages of college graduates fell by more than those of their less educated peers. Meanwhile, tuition costs at universities have been rising.

A question of degree, and then some

The decision to go to college still makes sense for most, but the idea of a mechanistic relationship between education and wages has taken a knock. A recent survey conducted by the Pew Research Centre showed that a mere 16% of Americans think that a four-year degree course prepares students very well for a high-paying job in the modern economy. Some of this may be a cyclical effect of the financial crisis and its economic aftermath. Some of it may be simply a matter of supply: as more people hold college degrees, the associated premium goes down. But technology also seems to be complicating the picture.

A paper published in 2013 by a trio of Canadian economists, Paul Beaudry, David Green and Benjamin Sand, questions optimistic assumptions about demand for non-routine work. In the two decades prior to 2000, demand for cognitive skills soared as the basic infrastructure of the IT age (computers, servers, base stations and fibre-optic cables) was being built; now that the technology is largely in place, this demand has waned, say the authors. They show that since 2000 the share of employment accounted for by high-skilled jobs in America has been falling. As a result, college-educated workers are taking on jobs that are cognitively less demanding (see chart), displacing less educated workers.

This analysis buttresses the view that technology is already playing havoc with employment. Skilled and unskilled workers alike are in trouble. Those with a better education are still more likely to find work, but there is now a fair chance that it will be unenjoyable. Those who never made it to college face being squeezed out of the workforce altogether. This is the argument of the techno-pessimists, exemplified by the projections of Carl-Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne, of Oxford University, who in 2013 famously calculated that 47% of existing jobs in America are susceptible to automation.

There is another, less apocalyptic possibility. James Bessen, an economist at Boston University, has worked out the effects of automation on specific professions and finds that since 1980 employment has been growing faster in occupations that use computers than in those that do not. That is because automation tends to affect tasks within an occupation rather than wiping out jobs in their entirety. Partial automation can actually increase demand by reducing costs: despite the introduction of the barcode scanner in supermarkets and the ATM in banks, for example, the number of cashiers and bank tellers has grown.

But even though technology may not destroy jobs in aggregate, it does force change upon many people. Between 1996 and 2015 the share of the American workforce employed in routine office jobs declined from 25.5% to 21%, eliminating 7m jobs. According to research by Pascual Restrepo of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the 2007-08 financial crisis made things worse: between 2007 and 2015 job openings for unskilled routine work suffered a 55% decline relative to other jobs.

In many occupations it has become essential to acquire new skills as established ones become obsolete. Burning Glass Technologies, a Boston-based startup that analyses labour markets by scraping data from online job advertisements, finds that the biggest demand is for new combinations of skills—what its boss, Matt Sigelman, calls “hybrid jobs”. Coding skills, for example, are now being required well beyond the technology sector. In America, 49% of postings in the quartile of occupations with the highest pay are for jobs that frequently ask for coding skills (see chart). The composition of new jobs is also changing rapidly. Over the past five years, demand for data analysts has grown by 372%; within that segment, demand for data-visualisation skills has shot up by 2,574%.

A college degree at the start of a working career does not answer the need for the continuous acquisition of new skills, especially as career spans are lengthening. Vocational training is good at giving people job-specific skills, but those, too, will need to be updated over and over again during a career lasting decades. “Germany is often lauded for its apprenticeships, but the economy has failed to adapt to the knowledge economy,” says Andreas Schleicher, head of the education directorate of the OECD, a club of mostly rich countries. “Vocational training has a role, but training someone early to do one thing all their lives is not the answer to lifelong learning.”

Such specific expertise is meant to be acquired on the job, but employers seem to have become less willing to invest in training their workforces. In its 2015 Economic Report of the President, America’s Council of Economic Advisers found that the share of the country’s workers receiving either paid-for or on-the-job training had fallen steadily between 1996 and 2008. In Britain the average amount of training received by workers almost halved between 1997 and 2009, to just 0.69 hours a week.

Perhaps employers themselves are not sure what kind of expertise they need. But it could also be that training budgets are particularly vulnerable to cuts when the pressure is on. Changes in labour-market patterns may play a part too: companies now have a broader range of options for getting the job done, from automation and offshoring to using self-employed workers and crowdsourcing. “Organisations have moved from creating talent to consuming work,” says Jonas Prising, the boss of Manpower, an employment consultancy.

Add all of this up, and it becomes clear that times have got tougher for workers of all kinds. A college degree is still a prerequisite for many jobs, but employers often do not trust it enough to hire workers just on the strength of that, without experience. In many occupations workers on company payrolls face the prospect that their existing skills will become obsolete, yet it is often not obvious how they can gain new ones. “It is now reasonable to ask a marketing professional to be able to develop algorithms,” says Mr Sigelman, “but a linear career in marketing doesn’t offer an opportunity to acquire those skills.” And a growing number of people are self-employed. In America the share of temporary workers, contractors and freelancers in the workforce rose from 10.1% in 2005 to 15.8% in 2015.

Reboot camp

The answer seems obvious. To remain competitive, and to give low- and high-skilled workers alike the best chance of success, economies need to offer training and career-focused education throughout people’s working lives. This special report will chart some of the efforts being made to connect education and employment in new ways, both by smoothing entry into the labour force and by enabling people to learn new skills throughout their careers. Many of these initiatives are still embryonic, but they offer a glimpse into the future and a guide to the problems raised by lifelong reskilling.

Quite a lot is already happening on the ground. General Assembly, for example, is just one of a number of coding-bootcamp providers. Massive open online courses (MOOCs) offered by companies such as Coursera and Udacity, feted at the start of this decade and then dismissed as hype within a couple of years, have embraced new employment-focused business models. LinkedIn, a professional-networking site, bought an online training business, Lynda, in 2015 and is now offering courses through a service called LinkedIn Learning. Pluralsight has a library of on-demand training videos and a valuation in unicorn territory. Amazon’s cloud-computing division also has an education arm.

Universities are embracing online and modular learning more vigorously. Places like Singapore are investing heavily in providing their citizens with learning credits that they can draw on throughout their working lives. Individuals, too, increasingly seem to accept the need for continuous rebooting. According to the Pew survey, 54% of all working Americans think it will be essential to develop new skills throughout their working lives; among adults under 30 the number goes up to 61%. Another survey, conducted by Manpower in 2016, found that 93% of millennials were willing to spend their own money on further training. Meanwhile, employers are putting increasing emphasis on learning as a skill in its own right.

  Source: The Economist / Special report. Link: Lifelong learning is becoming an economic imperative Illustration: Paul Rumsey. Moderator: ART HuNTER.

#propaganda #neoliberal capitalism #postmodern thinking #contemporary world #economy #education #knowledge #brainslide bedrock education talk #paul rumsey #the economist #technology #free your mind