Never bought a car before so I'm new to the whole process.
I'm a 22 year old graduate student moving to Miami. I need something small that'll allow me to do errands and go about the city. I won't have a daily commute as Ill be living and working on my university campus.
My parents and grandparents want to buy me a new car when I graduate from my program in 2 years. This is their gift to me. Unfortunately, I cannot wait that long and there's no possibility of them buying me a car now. It is what it is.
I've been saving up money for some time now and can comfortably put down 5k. I could do more but I do not want to wipe out my savings. I'll be making around 25k every year for the next two years while in school. I won't be paying for rent, utilities, internet, and will have unlimited access to the dining halls. I got lucky that my graduate assistantship included this as part of my package on top of the 25k especially in a hcol area.
I've been browsing the market for a couple of months now and it's been stressful. I have a hard time justifying spending almost 15k sticker price on a 7 year old Honda with 80k miles.
Recently, I've been considering cars like the sparks or versas. They aren't known to be built like corollas or fit, but if I only need it for a couple of years, I thought this could be an option.
My main concerns are reliability and high maintenance costs. I like the idea of having a warranty to fall back on esp with it being my first car. I saw used car places like carmax have decent warranties like maxcare.
If you were in my shoes, what would you do?

I drive a 2016 Honda Fit. Friday, going to work at roughly 65 mph, my pass. Rear tire kept making a thumping noise every few rotations on smooth asphalt. When I would drop below 55 it wasn't noticeable. No low tires. Driving home it was fine. Now today I notice it thumping at 30 mph. Any ideas?

I have had my Fitbit Sense since the year it came out, I think Dec 2019. It has sustained being smacked around and I've gone thru a LOT of chargers!! But it NEVER gave me this error before!
My watch is dead now, so I can't take a screenshot, but it basically said it could NOT CHARGE because the temperature was "too low" and it wouldn't charge u til it was warm enough to do so.... Which makes NO SENSE. For a Sense watch
For one, I live where it's very hot during the day and the house isn't too cold during the days or nights either. So it hasn't ever told me it was "too cold" to charge it before.
But last night I tried multiple chargers, multiple outlets and rooms, and I even used a dry warm compress to "warm up" any sensors... But it does not charge and now is dead.
I talked to fit it customer service on their Fitbit community and they told me they'd escalate the issue to the next level tier, but it may take some time and I'd hear back via email, so this it may not even be today I get this issue resolved.
I am not sure if the temperature sensor got damaged somehow after I went swimming yesterday -- although I've gone swimming many times wearing the watch and never had any problems charging it afterwards. My only issue has been the charger pins on the charger will not always pop out and stay out and I've gone thru a bunch to keep it charging. But now none of my chargers will work on it no matter what, so it's NOT the charger or the location or temperature at all.
I assume it's broken... But has anyone else had this issue? How was it resolved?
All I've seen online in other communities has been it has been replaced.
Thanks everyone... This error has totally affected me! I need my watch and am in a Wellness Study using its data, but I guess not anymore! 😅

Another disconnecting topic
So I got a Boss Be9acp and did my first radio installation. Installed into a 2015 Honda Fit. Got everything to work fine (handsfree phone buttons don't work on the steering wheel but that's par for the course)
I know Boss bad yada yada.
Got my unit and adapters from crutchfield and used their wire instructions.
Android auto is my only problem. Seems to work fine for a little bit then disconnect and go to the radio home screen. It almost seems like the disconnect happens (intermittently) when I receive a notification while navigating. I could be wrong. I've got a new cable and tried a 3rd cable and it continues to happen.
I've got the grounds running to the harness ground, would having chassis ground change anything? Is the dash subframe okay for chassis ground?
Curious on everyone's thoughts. I'm thinking of doing chassis ground as a final fix and sending the radio back if that doesn't fix it

Hi everyone, I (23M) just graduated college and looking for a new car now. Take home will be around $5200 per month, and the major expense will be of rent (probably between $1500 to $1700). I don’t have much student loans thankfully so that’s why looking to lease. I have set around $350 to $500 for the car payment
How are people liking the new accord? I honestly loved the previous generation 2.0t Is Civic also a good option? I like the sport and touring trim
My brother and I had a 2010 civic hybrid and a 2010 corolla le during the last 5 years, he’s probably gonna sell both and get a new car as well and I also don’t want to keep a used car now. Both have their own little problems that we don’t want to fix.
I haven’t had any experience with lease/finance yet, but most people have told me lease is a better option and if I like the car I can purchase it after the lease period. My credit score is 770.
I want to stick to the honda family. I like the TLX too but then again the payments are too much for a single guy like me at the moment. Let me know if there are other options/brands.
I’ll be living in Arizona if weather conditions impact your comment

Moving to Florida? This is your thread.
Ask questions, answer questions, or tell us your best advice on moving to Florida.

FAQ Section in the works

Feel free to contribute below!

Hurricanes

Hurricanes are part of living in Florida. Some years nothing happens, some years it's a wild ride.
If you're going to live beach side, then you need to take hurricanes seriously. Wind conditions leading up to them can and will cause the bridges to the mainland to close, meaning you can be cut off for extended periods from everything, including emergency services. Flooding/Storm Surge are real dangers to life and property. Make sure you have a plan way in advance for the high likelihood that you will lose both electricity and running water.
The further you get away from the coast and intracoastal zone, the lower the risks you have from severe damage from hurricanes, even major ones. But still have a plan, because anything can happen. Look for houses that have hurricane shutters or look into getting your home fit with them. Consider areas with buried power lines, as they're less likely to lose power. You can have a storm like Faye sit off the coast for days and flood almost everything. You can have tornadoes spawn from them. Fences are regular casualties of almost any named storm. Trees should be trimmed well in advance, paying close attention to when final collections occur before the storm hits so you don't have piles of potential wind debris laying in your yard.
That said: hurricanes are typically overblown by the media and should not be a major deterrent. As long as you have a plan and make sure that you're ready for the worst that could happen, you should almost always come out of the other side of hurricanes fine. Our local government knows how to handle them and a lot of infrastructure is built to withstand them. Most of us who have been through many of them don't consider anything Cat 3 or less to be anything more than a couple hour inconvenience. But always have a plan, no matter what.

Car & Home Owners Insurance

Yes, Florida has one of the highest rates of Car & Home Owners insurance in the US. It is recommended you find an insurance broker who can shop around (at no cost to you) for the best rates for your needs.
Car Insurance is required by law per vehicle per driver.

Toll Roads and You

Welcome to Florida, home of what seems like every toll road on the planet. You can certainly get around them, but it's significantly more efficient to use tolls.
E-pass Vs Sunpass: one or the other for all the tolls around Florida. Both are accepted across Florida, Georgia and North Carolina. E-PASS has less issues. Plus the advantage of their Uni, which is accepted across 18 states. Both gives you discounts on most tolls Florida.
Keep Discussion on topic. Comments such as the below will be removed:

• "Don't Move here"/ "Leave" or any variation of goes against Rule #1.
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Hello everybody,
I have been reading your posts for the last one and a half years and first of all I wanted to say THANK YOU. For helping me not feel alone with all this and for exchanging options.
I am in an emotional state right now so I decided to create this account and kindly ask you for your experience and support.
I was diagnosed with acquired neuroproliferative Vestibulodynia by an experienced doctor. I didn't have a biopsy but I fit in the criteria. Everything started with a badly treated yeast infection, which caused inflammation. That undertreated inflammation turned into nerve pain in my vestibule. Tissue looked fine, but touching was painful. After 2 years I finally got Lyrica which helped improve my life a lot. But summer heat (hello uthoff syndrome), swimming pools, tampons and sex was still bad/not possible. After trying a lot of treatments to rule out muscle problems and hormonal issues (never used hormonal birth control by the way) I did the Anesthesia test and was a good candidate for complete Vestibulectomy. My Vestibulectomy was 8 weeks ago and the first 3 weeks were very painful. Finally got my stitches removed after 5 and a half weeks because they wouldn't dissolve and where pulling on my skin.
After that I made a big jump in recovery. Of course sitting was/is still problematic and the scar is very tight. But touching myself was not burning, orgasms worked and I was so happy. At nearly 7 weeks I went on with my life like before. I was still not completely recovered but I had to get back home (took a long journey for the surgery and stayed at friends house for the whole time <3) and go back to work. I also had my period right after returning home and could use mini tampons. I felt like I was on the road to recovery until last Thursday. I had just started massaging my scar daily and using dilators without problem. I then noticed that with getting turned on or touching myself I felt some burning. It comes with my vulva swelling with arousal. The new ""vestibule"" is not hurting, I put pressure there without problem and it's not the scar on the outside, that feels different. I can't say what it is. It feels deeper inside, on the left and right side. I tried taking Lyrica again and it didn't help - which I take as a good sign. Waiting and ice helps. I talked to a medical professional and they suggested it might be cysts forming and/or muscle tightening from too much activity. But today the whole situation made me cry because I was feeling so much better and now feeling burning triggered all the fear and hopelessness I have felt over the past 4 years that I had to deal with my Vestibuloldynia. I am scared that my nerves have grown back or that after 8 weeks without nerve pain my body decided to start with the nerve pain again. I was so happy last week because I was painfree with only the tight scar pulling and needing some work up. Rationally, I know that such a sudden "failing" after the great start is unlikely but I am in desperate need for support.
Thank you and I wish everyone of us that some day we all get the cure we deserve. English is not my first language and I am very emotional right now so I am sorry for any language errors.

I'm going to build a new, small HA cluster with kubeadm (no microk8s/k3s). It will be 3-4 nodes, bare metal running on-perm. For more specific specs, the machines will be dual 64 core and epic 9004's, 3/4TB ram each, 24 SSD's each, dual 100G fiber AIOIMs, going to one local switch. Obviously the control plane and nodes will be tainted together since the machines are limited in number. The cluster will firewall'd and only be accessible on the local building subnet, so there are no routers involved here. I was planning to use static pods with keepalived/HAProxy for the control since that seems the simplest and most straightforward. Was thinking rook/ceph for the storage.
Where I'm struggling the most is with the CNI. Which one do I go with, and then do I use metalLB and nginx ingress? I've heard that cilium can do all of these things, replace metal LB, act as an ingress, and the CNI. One of my major goals for this new cluster is to have as much observability, metrics, tracing, etc that I can get out of every component. I also want to make the cluster more secure and enforce policies etc, which is something lacking on my current microk8s clusters.
A very important note is that I have ONE ip for the load balancer, and all the services need to share this single public IP and load balancer. All the services are subdomains with CNAME records that point to this one IP. mydomain.example.edu = load balancer ip A record, service1.mydomain.example.edu, service2.mydomain.example.edu -> CNAMES that point to mydomain, etc.
From what I can tell in cilium's documentation, their load balancing implementation requires BGP, but I don't have that because of having no router? Or is the BGP internal to the cluster? This part isn't really clear to me.
It's for an academic research cluster in a lab, so I'm not looking for a commercial/enterprise support solution, I'm looking for an open source one. The CNI landscape has changed a lot in the past couple years it seems, so I'm not really sure what is the best solution for me here, or why something might be the best fit. So again, looking to simplify the number of components for a small on prem cluster, while also getting the most observability possible. If keeping all the components separate makes the most sense then I'm totally fine with that too.
Any thoughts or advice would be appreciated.

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So, I just graduated and I am hoping to be a product or project manager. My training aligns more with product, but project management fits my experiences too and I'd probably have an easier time switching over with some PM expeience / my education bg. So I'm trying to move to a city with good public transport, mainly looknig at Chicago but am flexible for anywhere else that fits the transport bill.
I have 2 interviews lined up this week. One is for an Office Administrator role for a veterinary related business. Job desc was taken down but it's mostly like doing administrative things to help their business run. The other interview is with HomeDepot as someone who schedules installation appointments and deals with customer service stuff for those customers. My question is, do either of these positions really give me skills I can use to help me down my path to being a PM or should I keep looking even if I get either of these roles? I had a busines analyst interview but I struggled to get Teams to cooperate for the interview so it was over the phone and I don't know if that hurt me despite being well. I know being a BA is a more traditional path towards PMing but I want to hear from others if the admin or installation coordinator roles would be good places to gain exp from on my path to being a PM or if I should focus on getting a BA or some other role. Any help is much appreciated!

Timestamp: https://imgur.com/a/T3Dhiv6
Logistics:

• all prices listed are shipped anywhere CONUS with USPS with tracking and insurance
• say dibs to reserve your item **then pm me**; you have 30 mins to send payment before your dibs expires
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• Your order will ship within 24 hours of your payment

Special Deals:

• buy 2 or more items, [get this cable lock absolutely free](https://imgur.com/a/SCSRa4f) (I only have one; first come first served)
• buy 3 or more items, get 10% off your entire order (plus [the free cable lock](https://imgur.com/a/SCSRa4f) if it's still available)

Still Available (7):

• MGW Model 309S sight pusher for straight style sights https://imgur.com/a/VnEaBQP
  • Price: $80
  • Details: No salt/never used. Compatible with straight-style sights (compare with model 309 below)
• MGW Model 309 (non-S model) sight pusher for angled style sights https://imgur.com/a/OLP1Ad2
  • Price: $80
  • Details: No salt. Compatible with angled-style sights (compare with model 309**S** above
• Benelli Shotgun Magazine Cap https://imgur.com/a/0mHhtWf
  • Price: $25
  • Details: No salt. This model has no eyelet (the top surface is smooth). According to Benelli, this cap will fit the Legacy and Montefeltro shotguns in 12 GA and 20 GA.
• Benelli 12 GA Choke Wrench https://imgur.com/a/5vFmA79
  • Price: $25
  • Details: No salt/never used. This black T wrench has an adjustable handle and thread chasers on one end. For 12 GA shotgun chokes
• Benelli 12 GA Crio Choke M (Modified) https://imgur.com/a/gyFNXs7
  • Price: $20
  • Details: No salt/never used. The constriction level for this choke is M for Modified. This is a stainless steel, flush fit choke by Benelli. Steel shot is acceptable with this choke. Useful for hunting doves, duck, and geese.
• Langdon Tactical Technology Striker Control Device for Glock Gen 1-4 https://imgur.com/a/JE7aysQ
  • Price: $50
  • Details: No salt/never fired. Replace the existing slide cover plate on your Gen 1-4 Glock with this device to instantly give your striker-fired pistol additional protection against negligent discharges. Read more here: [https://langdontactical.com/glock-striker-control-device-scd/](https://langdontactical.com/glock-striker-control-device-scd/))
• Vedder LightDraw Kydex OWB holster for Glock 20 Gen 3 & 4 https://imgur.com/a/3qE30iA
  • Price: $55
  • Details: This holster is made by Vedder for the Glock 20 Gen 3 and 4. It's compatible with threaded barrels (but not super large muzzle devices), suppressor-height sights, and most slide-mounted optics. On the body-surface of the holster, I have "G20" faintly etched into the kydex for model identification, and that's the only salt if you can really call it that. Great condition other than that. This holster has the premium pancake belt loops to accomodate belts up to 1.75" in size.

I'm on a break from college right now so I decided that it was the perfect time to binge watch this show again. I love this show so much, as do most people here. Here are some opinions I have.
Season 1 to season 4/5 are superior. Sometimes I think the show ending after Rory graduated high school could've been better.
I used to love Rory when I first watched the show but with every watch I like her less and less. She never grows/learns from her mistakes. Her affair with Dean for me is so cringe because she just does it again. She was 19, I feel like it was a pretty reasonable mistake to make at that age. But at 32? After already doing it once?
Season 6 is way worse than 7 because 7 had to clean up the mess ASP left behind....with more and more time I'm losing respect for ASP.
Rory should've ended up with Jess.
As for AYITL, I barely made it 15 minutes in before I turned it off. It was trying way to hard. I mean, I know it was 2016 but what was with the "are you bodyshaming me? Trigger warnings!" Thing lorelai said to Luke? It felt so forced.
I actually like Lane's storyline. Yeah I wish she did more but from the snippets we got, she seems happy. Same with Paris, she doesnt seem happy but it fits well. I wish her and Doyle stayed together but it makes sense.
I skip over the musical...what a waste of time. I also can't bear to watch Richards funeral, so I skip over that too or I'll be an emotional wreck.
I do like Emily's progression. In wintespring it feels like the Emily we knew. But her quitting the DAR, moving to Nantucket with her maid and her family...ugh I love it.
I don't remember there being such blatantly rude (?) Humour in the OS series....what was with the bodyshaming in the summer episode?
Rory should've done literally anything other than what she was doing...teaching at Chilton? Honestly that makes sense! Or even getting her PhD and teaching at Yale. Again...it just felt so weird...
And lastly, what was with the therapist??? I'm sorry but I'm a psychology major and my goal is to be a therapist. I can't believe how they wrote her...it was so off putting. She never really engages with Emily and lorelai to get them to talk, she takes up smoking because, what, they are soooo difficult???? Are you kidding? And then her loudly acknowledging lorelai in public breaks one of the biggest therapy rules - CONFIDENTIALITY. This whole therapy thing was just a clear sign to me that ASP and her husband have no idea what therapy or a therapist is actually like despite the fact that they need it....
This show with forever hold a special place in my heart, but I'm happy to pretend that season 6 to AYITL didn't happen..... I want to hear your thoughts!!!

Hello! This is just one write-up in a series of write-ups I will be doing making the case for the best survivor. For each write-up, I will look at one legendary player, and explain why they have an argument for being the best player survivor has seen. If you don't feel like reading, you can watch the YouTube video version of it on my channel.
Of all of the candidates, I can go over for the Best Survivor, Sandra might be the most difficult, and at the same time, the most simple one to make the case for. On paper she had a resume that stood for 39 seasons as an unbeatable, one-of-one achievement. Sandra came onto the show in Season 7 Pearl Islands and finished as the sole survivor of the season, which for many viewers already puts you in contention as one of the greatest survivors to ever play. 13 seasons later, on heroes vs villains, Sandra comes back, and wins her second million. In one of the most beloved and hyped of seasons, on one of the most star-studded casts, this little potty-mouthed lady found a way to get all the way to the end and be the sole survivor yet again. In a game where returning winners are immediately targeted as massive threats, this is an incredible achievement. Her title as the only two-time winner stood until a season of all returning winners was introduced, effectively ending the record no matter what happened. Even then, the player who won that season, Tony, needed a second season between his two winning ones to fumble the game and reduce his target for Winners at War. Every other returning player who you can think of, any great you can put a name on that returned for a second time, failed to do what Sandra did. It is a fact that Sandra’s two back-to-back wins immediately put her into the GOAT conversation for survivor. On the other hand, this is in fact Sandra we’re talking about. Now I love Sandra, and I know it sounds pretty rude, but at first glance, she seems to have zero of the qualities the best survivor player holds. So far in my series, my two other candidates for best ever have been domineering, physically fit alpha males, and you would be hard-pressed to find any other player as opposed to them as Sandra. She’s at worst a challenge liability who warms the sit-out bench, and in her two postmergers has not once won individual immunity. She isn’t some all-controlling godfather, and she isn’t exactly the master of the idol play. She speaks her mind and gets into fights with her tribemates. Winners are supposed to be threats to the game, but looking at all of this, maybe you can see the perspective of some - is she really ever an actual threat, or did she just luck out? What I have just outlined is the polarizing debate about Sandra that seems to follow her around. Because if you’re invested in Survivor like I am, there’s a huge chance you either think Sandra is one of, if not the best to ever play, or flat-out one of the worst winners who had the amazing fate of winning twice. Clearly, since this video is arguing for Sandra being the Best, I’ll stick with the former position in this video, but I’ll even let you know I have gone back and forth continuously about ranking Sandra as legendary or middling. I’ve thought about this a lot, and I will try my hardest in this video to convince you Sandra is the best, but I will not pretend she’s your standard fantastic player. What Sandra really is, is maybe the most unorthodox, unique player the game has ever seen.
Season 7 of survivor is probably the most engaging and chaotic of the early seasons. Sandra famously begins the season helping her tribe out by bargaining with the local villagers in spanish. She becomes a key part of Rupert’s Drake Tribe alliance, which gets her all the way to the merge. But that alliance is shattered by the third vote of the merge. This is due to some major shenanigans; for one, the unprecedented twist occurs of having two people who were previously voted out re-enter the game. Additional mischief ensues to the scheming of one Jonny Fairplay, in my eyes one of the most underrated strategists of the early game, and one of the great Sandra bickering partners. In large part due to the outcasts and Fairplay, Rupert is blindsided, and the Drake alliance crumbles, as Jon and the Outcasts slowly take over. Oh, but Sandra still wins. What? Yeah; even with her alliance crumbling and placed in arguably the most chaotic postmerge the game had seen up to that point, Sandra still makes it to the end and wins handily, 6-1. Oh, well, clearly she can’t repeat a run like that again. 6 years later, Sandra returned to the Villains tribe of the universally lauded season 20 of the show, Heroes vs Villains, where once more she is met with some unprecedented and chaotic 39 days, a game-changing strategist, and Rupert. This time, she ingrains herself in Boston Rob’s villain alliance in the early pre merge, before once more disorder ensues. Russell Hantz happens, using hidden immunity idols like no one ever has before to destroy Rob’s alliance, and eventually take out the Robfather himself all before the merge. Sandra appears to be down for the count, relegated to the perimeter of the villain's tribe along with the fellow challenge beast Courtney Yates, where she once more bickers with another squat little man for her remaining time in the game. The merge ensues, and just like at the villains' beach, through some all-time great idol play, the heroes roll over, one by one, to Russell. It seems like Hantz and Parvati are all but unstoppable… oh, and then Sandra wins again. 6-3. How does this keep happening? Is it really luck that Sandra, in some of the most chaotic seasons we’ve seen, beginning already in poor circumstances due to her poor challenge abilities and emphasized by her alliances continuously collapsing, wins not once but two times? Lightning does not strike twice, but Sandra does.
Yes, the haters will say, she really is that lucky. Like pearl island's final immunity challenge. For those that don’t know, in the final challenge of pearl islands, Jonny Fairplay has to win one more challenge against Lil and Sandra, to guarantee himself immunity and kick Sandra out. Jon is not a challenge threat but against them, he’s an Olympic athlete. Of course, the final challenge is all about squatting, the one thing Lil is good at. Wishy-washy Lil wins and very much in character, stabs fair play in the back and essentially hands Sandra the million, the contest being so one-sided due to said compulsive backstabbing. If the challenge was based around anything else except squatting, Sandra doesn’t win. Oh, and look at Heroes vs Villains, in the very last moments of that final immunity challenge. Jerri is less than half a second away from winning this immunity. If that happens, Sandra is out instead of Jerri in the final four. Maybe if you’re a real survivor nerd, you know that even with her translation help, Sandra was still probably the first to go out on the drake tribe if they lose the first challenge. Which by the way, the drake tribe win by no more than a couple yards. If the morgan team never hits a bit of muddy sand, Sandra Diaz-twine, potential best survivor ever candidate, is the first player voted out of her very first season.
You know, a wise man once said “ if ifs and buts were candies and nuts we'd all have a merry christmas", and that’s what I’m hearing here. These are all hypothetical situations that never happened. Who's to say they know if x, y, and z didn’t happen, sandra would have no chance of winning? Even without squats, women usually win the balance and focus-heavy final challenges of the first 7 seasons. In season 20, no matter who gets immunity Sandra is pretty safe considering russell and jerri saw her as a goat to bring to the end. In fact, jerri winning probably means Parvati goes in her place, and from what we know Jerri does not beat Sandra in a final tribal council scenario. And with the possibility of her getting out first… seriously, can you really call yourself a great survivor if you weren’t close to getting out first in your winning season? Also, why Sandra would just roll over and die? She has the ability to scramble and get the vote off of her, so why wouldn’t she in this scenario? Hypotheticals and calling out Sandra’s challenge luck only take you so far, let’s talk about all of the most obvious moments where she lacked luck. Season 7 episode 13, Jon and Burton seem to be wrapping the season up. One of the three women is going home next. While Jon and Burton are off for a reward, Sandra guides Darrah and Lil to begin flipping on the boys, once more preying on Lil and Darrah’s wishy-washy behavior. As the men get back to camp, she pretends to have given up on the game as they had predicted, setting up the spectacular blindside of Burton. Fast forward to Season 20 Episode 8. The villains' tribe loses in a disappointing fashion to the heroes, with Sandra’s close ally Courtney being the main target due to her poor challenge performance. Courtney seems like the obvious choice, except for the fact Sandra has been convincing Russell that Coach Wade is out to get him, as an act of vengeance for voting out his ally Rob. Russell in his paranoia believes Sandra for the most part, and even though Coach is completely fine with voting out Courtney to keep the tribe strong, he is instead blindsided, and Sandra’s ally is saved.
And never mind the unfortunate circumstances of having her alliances crumble around her and being forced to play from the bottom, one of the hardest situations a player can get themselves into. But no, doubters will tell you that actually, being at the bottom helped Sandra. She just got to sit on the sidelines while the bigger threats were taken out. In fact, if Russell had gone out just like Sandra wanted, she surely would have lost. That bitter jury hated Russell and his allies so much they would’ve voted for anyone instead of them, so no Russell equals no Sandra win. The first thing to address here is this; why are you bringing out the hypotheticals again man? Why are we automatically assuming that taking a far easier road would’ve meant absolute death for Sandra? We’ve seen this woman adapt to every crappy situation the game threw at her, why would it be so hard for her to once walk to the straightforward path to victory. Secondly, let’s talk about this “bitter jury” which purportedly handed Sandra the win unfairly. No matter what video you watch from me, I will never admit that a bitter jury is a thing, mainly because it isn’t. The jury is the end all be all of the game of Survivor. Being judged by your peers, and taking care of the way they see you are baked into the very essence of the game. Saying a jury can be bitter or wrong is like saying a basketball is wrong when you miss a shot. Ball don’t lie, and neither does a jury. Finally, sitting on the sidelines is a very diminishing term for the skill that might be the most important to the entire game: threat-level management. There are arguments for who is the best challenge beast or mastermind in Survivor History, but Sandra is without a doubt the greatest threat manager the game has ever seen. In her entire season, Sandra, who had all but one person write her name down on day 39, logged exactly 0 votes against her the previous 38 days. In her second season, now with the revered distinction as a returning winner, she logged a whopping… 3 votes against her. Now’s a good time to bring up Sandra’s other appearances. Sandra returned for two more appearances as a player, and once as a giant stone head. But for those player appearances, you would think, a two-time winner would be dead in the water immediately. Her target would just be too big to bare, and an appearance after the first vote of her tribe would be a miracle. But this is Sandra, so are you even surprised when I tell you she survived until day 16 both times, outlasting multiple players from her own tribes along the way? Yeah sure, day 16 is not exactly a long run, especially pre-shortened seasons, but anything past day 3 for a two-time winner should be looked at with bafflement. As well, both times Sandra got out on some pretty iffy terms. For those latter 2 seasons, she was relatively safe until the Jeff probst special, a lopsided tribe swap, which completely obliterated her chances of surviving in season 35 game changers. In 40 after a more fair swap occurred, but Sandra was the target of a pretty controversial idol play, that lots of people argued was a dumb move on the idol player’s part that Sandra couldn’t have predicted. To me, I think it still stands that Sandra’s threat-level management is of a caliber of its own. Her unmatched ability to sneak under the radar, allowing anyone but her to be the target of the episode, and the episode after that, and so on until it’s only her, does wonders, and it’s why she won twice. It also very much contrasts with the other great players of survivor history, who command groups of people or pull ingenious idol tricks to stay afloat. The contrast between these greats and Sandra is what makes her unique, but also, uniquely unappreciated by some fans.
For me, I feel the Survivor community at large uses completely conceptual ideas and phrases to judge a player’s abilities, phrases that unintentionally undervalue Sandra. You can look at her game, and say a thousand things; What are her physical, social, and strategic skills, does she have agency in the game, does she control a voting bloc, does she really have jury management… Look, I use a lot of these terms as well, but, do you really think this is the kind of stuff they were talking about during that first season in Borneo. Just for once, throw away these buzzwords about how a proper winner should play, and look at the pure, primordial essence of becoming sole survivor: getting to the end and winning over the jury. That’s it. And whose game better fit’s these simple parameters than Sandra. Let’s look at an example of how using survivor vocab overlooks Sandra’s unique winning abilities. In heroes vs villains a lot of people critique her for having little voting power and never being able to vote out Russell Hantz even though she attempted to orchestrate a plan throughout the post-merge. Let’s give more context to this situation, however: Yes, Sandra could not gather the remaining heroes to vote against Russell. What she did do however is use her open scheming against him to her advantage at the very end. She survived to the final tribal council where she proved she was the only remaining villain who had actively stood against Russell, something all the heroes, who were now out and hated the way Russell treated them respected dearly. Sandra showed she had separated herself from Russell’s alliance, something not even the great Parvati could do. All of this; leveraging your failed strategy as a way to win, does not fall under any one word or skill survivor nerds use, but it still works. I think Sandra is actually filled with a lot of these intangibles. She is very aware of others, is able to spot problem players early on, a master of picking at social cracks between people to stir the pot, etc, etc
Sandra’s playstyle is so simple it’s stupid. Call it under the radar or effective jury management or whatever, but simply put, in a game called Survivor, Sandra it the best at surviving. Until she held the biggest target on her back the game has ever seen, Sandra could survive to the end, and get the jury to like her over the remaining survivors. That’s all you need to win. And really winning is all that matters, especially in Survivor. Think about it; we are seeing the smallest slice of a season - about a whole month of contestants playing boiled down to 13-40 minute episodes. We as fans really know nothing about the success of a player. The only real evidence we have of a truly successful player, something the editors can’t cut out or warp, is that winning tally. So who are we to say Sandra isn’t the best player? Why question if she really is great, when the only concrete evidence we have points to a resounding yes. Not to sound like a broken record, but she has won twice, back to back, across multiple eras of the show. And looking at the modern seasons, which seem to heavily favor under-the-radar and non-domineering winners, do you think a newbie Sandra plopped in these contemporary games would do anything else but completely dominate? Her game style could work in any era of the show, under the worst conditions; Sandra would still find a way to win in her own, unique way. So when asking who is the best survivor, the survivor who has the greatest odds of winning it all, give me a player who can back that claim up with real results. Give me the queen, give me Sandra Diaz-Twine.

I’m looking for an ECU unit for a Honda civic ek3 new or used..

Just wanted to say thanks to @eieio2021 and @Pretty-Curve-707. I bought two of these acrylic craft organizers at Michael’s yesterday. They worked well in the cubbies of the IKEA bookcase I have in my room to organize my craft stuff. They almost stacked/fit one on top of the other - but the little feet…so I have to organize things a little. I ordered 2 more. They hold about 13 per drawer. I managed to fit 8 in their boxes in one drawer. I have Swatches I’m selling too, and extra bands, from when I change up the bands for a new look, etc. Now all can be in one spot. I will use one of these organizers for the selling ones to keep them separate. These worked great for me. Much better than my Swatch hanging trees 😂 or shadow boxes.

I have a "newer" 2450 Commercial treadmill. The one with the larger, 22" screen. From the factory, it is running Android 11.
When I initially attempted to get various apps running on this device, I sort of ham-fistedly ran through some of the commands in the unchained script. I never actually ran the script itself. I had a very uneven experience with the iFit app itself including:

1. Being unable to login.
2. Content not loading at all.
3. No treadmill-specific content seeming to be available.
4. Repeated prompts to allow permissions to a USB Device (later versions of iFit ask for permission to Generic HID).
5. Later versions of iFit not allowing any Treadmill control, regardless of permissions being granted.

Following another helpful discussion here with xkelly999 and brentl99 (I didn't get the "99" in your username memo, sorry), I decided to factory reset and try to be a little more methodical about testing what does and doesn't work for my specific treadmill.
A factory reset left me with the following apks:

• com.ifit.eru-2.1.0.1225.apk
• com.ifit.launcher-1.0.17.22
• com.ifit.standalone-2.6.81.4118.apk
• MemfaultBort.apk (probably a red herring, but it came up in the list as com.ifit.bort, so I pulled it just in case).

These versions required me to use the getresponsecode.com generator, it is not pinless, even after a factory reset. I then disabled the admin app's ability to change system settings.
I blocked updates at a DNS level, as well as via the iFit Secret Menu. Interestingly, I noticed that going to Settings -> Maintenance in iFit showed an update available, despite the DNS blocks. Clicking this "Update Available" link pushed me into iFit Admin, where I was presented with a progress bar and an "Updating" screen. That progress bar never moved (likely due to the DNS block). Further, in iFit Amin - Secret Options -> Preview Updates, It showed me the pending updates to both iFit (com.ifit.standalone), and iFit Admin (com.ifit.eru).
At this point, with access to Priveleged Mode, I went ahead and enabled Developer Options, USB Debugging, and connected the treadmill to Wifi. I pulled the "stock" APKs via ADB, and created the .wolfDev directory. I then set about to update the iFit apps to see if I'd lose access or anything.
After unblocking DNS and updating, I have the following APKs (changed):

• com.ifit.eru-2.1.1.1227.apk
• com.ifit.standalone-2.6.85.4363.apk

Without rebooting, I can still toggle Privileged Mode via the standard 10-7-10 tap sequence. The iFit app connects to their web interface. I see treadmill related exercises (to be clear I do not have an iFit subscription), and the treadmill itself works WITHOUT any sort of permissions prompting.
Following a reboot, I had the same permissions. Privileged Mode was still enabled. I could swipe up and get myself to the Android desktop. Treadmill worked without USB/Generic HID prompts.
I'll stop here, for now. I haven't installed nova/alternative launcher. I haven't installed any other streaming apps. Reading through the unchained script, I'm assuming the only commands that could have ultimately caused my previous problems lie in first three commands:

echo Disabling iFit system apps adb shell pm disable-user --user 0 com.ifit.eru echo One of three disabled adb shell pm disable-user --user 0 com.ifit.launcher echo Two of three disabled adb shell pm disable-user --user 0 com.ifit.standalone 

I'm not sure what differences are created when you disable the "native" com.ifit.standalone, and then install (what you would think is) the same apk linked from the wiki, via ADB or whatever other method. I would think there is no difference, but for some reason, in my case, there appeared to be.
I hope this helps somebody else in the future, but if nothing else, I've at least got my own sequence sort of worked out here. brentl99 I want to thank you, again, for all your efforts here. It's a lot of work to keep this information updated. Even typing this single post was a hassle.

Greetings Redditors, Simply put: it bothers me that my girlfriend has a relationship with her ex. My hope is that I can gather some outside insight about the situation. We have been dating for half a year now and things are going, for the most part, remarkably well. I could list all the things I love about her, but that's beside the point. My concern about their relationship is this: the guy is an alcoholic who cheated on her repeatedly and who clearly still loves her. When we first started dating, for example, he would call her drunk at 3am on week nights and once texted her to know "who was fucking her." I appreciate her being transparent and letting me know about these incidents and, in principle, I have no issue with someone being on friendly terms with their ex. After all, they loved each other once. However, I don't exactly feel comfortable with it and I have said as much to my girlfriend when she planned to visit him for "lunch" a few weeks ago. I put this in quotations because when it was first said to me it was framed as such, but after talking to her she said that she was simply going over to her old house (where he still lives) to sort through some things she has stored there. The shift in her description of her plans bothered me, but it's perfectly fair if that's what she was going over there for. What bothered me beyond this shift, too, was that it was the second time she had seen him in two weeks. Previously, she had only seen him maybe twice during the entire relationship to drop off her dog so he could spend time with her ex's dog (they owned the two together). This first time she simply dropped them off. No big deal. The second time she brought her dog over and did laundry and watched tv while the cycle was on. The tv bit made me uncomfortable, but I chalked that up to my insecurity. Again, fair, and I thought nothing of it past this very temporary feeling. When she went to see him (now under the pretense that she could sort through things and the dogs could see each other) two weeks later, however, I felt uncomfortable. It would be different if she was social, but she's not at all (she's seen friends a grand total of one time since we've been together). While she's a perfectly friendly and socially competent person, she simply works hard and is very tired often (she teaches at an urban school). But the frequency didn't sit well with me. To sort out my feelings I smoked some weed (which I do very infrequently) and started feeling anxious/neurotic, so I texted a good friend to assess my feelings before I spoke to my girlfriend about it. My friend's perspective was that seeing him was "enabling" and that she was "using the dogs to stay close to her." Essentially: my gf wants his time and he's getting it. My friend is pretty jaded from her previous marriage so I took that with a grain of salt, but it still seemed like a fair point. She said that if I brought it up with my girlfriend, her response was going to be a "fit of rage" if she was clueless about how it might be enabling or caginess if she was aware. Her prediction was remarkably accurate: she became upset and essentially tried to portray everything as a "me" issue. I didn't like it all being pinned on some psychological defect of mine, but the response was vaguely reassuring. I genuinely think she was clueless and, after the conversation, I felt better about the situation. I trust her (and maybe this is ultimately the bottom line). I just think her attitude is somewhat naive. If she wanted to get back in that relationship, why wouldn't she simply do that? The last thing I want is to be viewed as is insecure/dependent/needy/clingy/controlling/etc. That's not a good dynamic in a relationship. Knowing that I'm even remotely seen like that makes me feel pathetic. Not a good look. I'm still bothered by the situation (though to a lesser extent) and I was hoping to hear some responses to it. Additionally, any insight into how to navigate being seen as insecure, etc. would be appreciated.

Greetings Redditors, Simply put: it bothers me that my girlfriend has a relationship with her ex. My hope is that I can gather some outside insight about the situation. We have been dating for half a year now and things are going, for the most part, remarkably well. I could list all the things I love about her, but that's beside the point. My concern about their relationship is this: the guy is an alcoholic who cheated on her repeatedly and who clearly still loves her. When we first started dating, for example, he would call her drunk at 3am on week nights and once texted her to know "who was fucking her." I appreciate her being transparent and letting me know about these incidents and, in principle, I have no issue with someone being on friendly terms with their ex. After all, they loved each other once. However, I don't exactly feel comfortable with it and I have said as much to my girlfriend when she planned to visit him for "lunch" a few weeks ago. I put this in quotations because when it was first said to me it was framed as such, but after talking to her she said that she was simply going over to her old house (where he still lives) to sort through some things she has stored there. The shift in her description of her plans bothered me, but it's perfectly fair if that's what she was going over there for. What bothered me beyond this shift, too, was that it was the second time she had seen him in two weeks. Previously, she had only seen him maybe twice during the entire relationship to drop off her dog so he could spend time with her ex's dog (they owned the two together). This first time she simply dropped them off. No big deal. The second time she brought her dog over and did laundry and watched tv while the cycle was on. The tv bit made me uncomfortable, but I chalked that up to my insecurity. Again, fair, and I thought nothing of it past this very temporary feeling. When she went to see him (now under the pretense that she could sort through things and the dogs could see each other) two weeks later, however, I felt uncomfortable. It would be different if she was social, but she's not at all (she's seen friends a grand total of one time since we've been together). While she's a perfectly friendly and socially competent person, she simply works hard and is very tired often (she teaches at an urban school). But the frequency didn't sit well with me. To sort out my feelings I smoked some weed (which I do very infrequently) and started feeling anxious/neurotic, so I texted a good friend to assess my feelings before I spoke to my girlfriend about it. My friend's perspective was that seeing him was "enabling" and that she was "using the dogs to stay close to her." Essentially: my gf wants his time and he's getting it. My friend is pretty jaded from her previous marriage so I took that with a grain of salt, but it still seemed like a fair point. She said that if I brought it up with my girlfriend, her response was going to be a "fit of rage" if she was clueless about how it might be enabling or caginess if she was aware. Her prediction was remarkably accurate: she became upset and essentially tried to portray everything as a "me" issue. I didn't like it all being pinned on some psychological defect of mine, but the response was vaguely reassuring. I genuinely think she was clueless and, after the conversation, I felt better about the situation. I trust her (and maybe this is ultimately the bottom line). I just think her attitude is somewhat naive. If she wanted to get back in that relationship, why wouldn't she simply do that? The last thing I want is to be viewed as is insecure/dependent/needy/clingy/controlling/etc. That's not a good dynamic in a relationship. Knowing that I'm even remotely seen like that makes me feel pathetic. Not a good look. I'm still bothered by the situation (though to a lesser extent) and I was hoping to hear some responses to it. Additionally, any insight into how to navigate being seen as insecure, etc. would be appreciated.

If I’d only followed my instincts, I’d never have boarded that doomed ship. When the Azure Seastar left port, its passengers were all alive, each with smart phones and watches and tablets, as well as the cruise ship’s own communications… yet not a single message was sent before it went missing! No distress call.
The fates of over a thousand passengers and crew remain unknown, with only a handful recovered from a lifeboat, days after the Seastar herself vanished. But the coast guard’s only statement on the lifeboat’s recovery was that “the passengers did not survive.” Rumors circulated about a “thermos full of eyeballs” and a “passenger whose mouth was stuffed full of severed fingers”—but these details have been denounced as lies, sensationalizing and capitalizing on a tragedy.
The official cause of the Seastar’s disappearance is a rogue wave. No survivors. No witnesses.
Well… one witness…
… but perhaps I shouldn’t tell. Better for the world if that ship stay lost forever!
The families of the missing, however, deserve the truth… which is why I am posting.
But first, a warning—the gruesome snippets I recounted above barely scratch the surface of the horror I am about to share, some of which I took part in. I wake screaming every night. I sleep with the lights on. I never enter darkened hallways or stairwells. And I do not ever shake hands. Although I’ve always had some quirks (the handshake one is an old habit), most of these are fresh, a consequence of my time aboard that doomed cruise ship. I do not intend to gloss over any details, but rather to give a complete accounting, including of my own involvement… so be forewarned.
And understand that my story is one of unimaginable horror.
***
To explain what really happened aboard the Seastar, I need to first tell a little about myself. Sorry, I know I’m like a bit of decorative wallpaper—just sort of there. But I see things.
It all started when I was very young (I do promise this is relevant). I didn’t want to swim in the community pool with my brother because the water was cloudy, hiding a shadowy figure in the deep end. I distinctly remember standing at the pool’s edge, crying inconsolably while my father urged, “Go on, jump in!”
My brother set the example, diving down to the bottom of the foggy water. When he came up, a silver dollar glinted in his fingers, which he dropped back into the pool before I could snatch it. “Oops! Guess you gotta dive for it!” He laughed, the sun shimmering off his sunburned shoulders. “Come on, there’s quarters down here, too!”
Diving for coins was a game we often played, so I plunged in after him, kicking my way down with my eyes squeezed shut. When my hands grazed the rough cement bottom, I patted around.
Silky hair tangled around my fingers like seaweed.
I forced my eyes open against the stinging chlorine—and shrieked.
Wide, empty eyes stared back at me from a bloated face.
When I shot to the surface, wailing about a dead woman in the water, other swimmers looked on, perplexed. My older brother tried to console me and swore there were nothing but coins.
He was correct—not until a week later would a woman drown in that pool, and sink to the bottom of the foggy water while swimmers unwittingly raced laps above her.
***
The next time I saw was when I threw a tantrum over my grandmother’s armchair. It smelled so bad I grabbed my nose and exclaimed, “Ewwww!”
My parents scolded me for my rudeness. Grandma occasionally struggled with incontinence, so for her chair to stink was, they assumed, the result of an accident. They thought I was exaggerating to make fun of her, but in the sweltering summer, the smell was truly unbearable—like rotting meat and diarrhea and cheap perfume all churned together. I threw such a fit we left, though Grandma insisted on hugging me despite my being an “awful brat.” Her skin was wrinkled, papery-thin and soft as silk, but despite the uncomfortable warmth of her apartment, her embrace was ice cold.
Less than a week later the call came. My grandmother had been found after a neighbor’s complaint about the smell…
She’d died in her chair.
***
But when the seeing really clicked was in my tween years, two separate incidents. The first was after a classmate of my brother’s pulled up in a car reeking of burnt meat, the interior charred and black. He stepped out of the car seeming not to notice that behind him, another version of him remained belted into the front seat, unrecognizable through the char beyond the glint of a gold chain melted into his neck. I burst into hysterical tears and screamed at my brother not to let him drive. The classmate laughed and called me a weirdo.
He crashed later that week.
The second incident began at a school function, where my brother chaperoned me. A man pulled up in the school drop-off zone—he was one of the more popular teachers, famous for his yearly pizza parties. In the car with him were two young kids. I can’t remember their names, just that the littlest boy was giggling and clinging to a toy T-rex when he hopped out. My brother and I were asked to help carry the party supplies and drinks from the teacher’s car. But the moment I opened the passenger door to grab a box, the reek of fetid pond water made my stomach lurch. I staggered back, clapping a hand to my nose and mouth.
“Hey! Everything all right?” the teacher asked.
My brother, no doubt remembering what happened to his classmate weeks earlier, took me aside.
“C-c-c-c-cold!” I burst to him. “D-dark! The smell! Like the rot in the bottom of a lake…”
While I wrung my hands and sniffled, my brother watched the two young kids follow the teacher into the school. He shook my shoulder and said, “Hey—hey, we’re going to save them.”
“How? No one ever believes me!”
“I believe you, Hope. Hey…” He gave me a squeeze and looked in my eyes. “‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers…”
What a dork. That line was from Emily Dickinson—my brother’s favorite quote for me for when I was upset. It was corny, but encouraged me.
A few minutes later, we were careening along backwoods roads in the teacher’s car. To this day, I don’t know how my brother got the keys. His plan was we’d stow the car in a garage for a couple weeks, long enough to outlast the vision, since my predictions always came true within about six days. But it hadn’t occurred to either of us how being inside the car would affect me. The damp and rot washed over my skin. COLD. Every hair on my body stood erect, floating as if underwater. I couldn’t breathe… gagging on the fetid water, I rolled down my window. Raindrops from outside pelted my face, and something… something clicked. A sudden terrible question. When I’d peered into the darkened interior, I hadn’t been able to see… who was inside the car?
“Hey,” my brother said, apparently struck by the same thought. “You’re not foreseeing our deaths, are you?”
I don’t know if it was fate that caused us to fishtail just as he spoke. But also he might have hit something, because there was a bump. All I know is suddenly we were flying, off the road and over the side toward a lake, and then plunging, and I snatched for his hand as the impact slammed us forward into the dashboard. Then the water wasn’t just in my mind. It was real. It was pouring in through the car window.
I fought, flailing. Unbuckled. Floundered through the half-open window. Luckily I was still small enough to get through, swimming up and breaking the surface.
“Cory!” I screamed. “CORY!!!”
But I knew already that my brother wasn’t coming up—his hand had been cold when I’d touched it.
***
Naturally, his death feels like my fault. Oh, in kinder moments I remember that I was a child, and try to forgive myself for letting him get behind that wheel. But for a time, I was driven by the fierce need to atone. I sought desperately to save even one life… ANY life. I’d see a body swaying from a beam in a construction site. Legs dangling from a trunk in the car on the highway ahead of me. A suitcase on sale in a luggage store, dripping blood. Every time I tried to prevent the death… only to fail or worse, cause it. Each loss drove home more deeply my shame, my failure… until eventually…
I gave up.
I don’t try to prevent the deaths anymore. These days I catch a whiff of that familiar sickly putrid scent, and I leave. I avoid human touch, especially handshakes.
I’ve truly become wallpaper. Able to see. Powerless to prevent.
My name, incidentally, is Cassandra… I changed it because I could no longer bear my birth name. If “Hope” is the thing with feathers, I was an angel of death, harbinger of doom to my brother and others. So instead I call myself after the Greek priestess doomed to foresee the future but never to be believed… unable to prevent even one single tragedy.
***
But let’s get back to the cruise. The missing passengers. The eyeballs in the thermos—oh, those grisly details! Mind you, once you know you can’t un-know, no matter how much you drink, or smoke, or however you drown your despair. Speaking of drowning, a month ago today, I hit the big 4-O. I celebrated my four decades of life by doing the one thing I’ve done consistently since I was old enough—drinking away my failures. Every icy grip. Every unheeded warning. And especially the times I’ve well and truly fucked up. Oh yes. Those are the ones that call for some hard forgetting.
I was on my second or seventh drink at my favorite bar when a voice exclaimed, “’Evening, friend!”
A woman with shimmering purple eyeliner and matching purple hair approached. It was the musician who often played there, Lily Tsuki. To be honest, she was the primary reason I frequented that bar, though we’d hardly spoken beyond my occasional compliments about her playing. She slid into the seat next to mine and clinked my glass.
“Roy at the bar told me it’s your fortieth. I see you in here once a week, always tipping well and drinking like you’re trying to drown yourself. Someone did something kind for me recently, so I’m trying to pass it on…” She fished a hand into her pocket, and to my surprise produced a gift card for a cruise. I didn’t catch all of her story in the noisy bar, but apparently, one of her admirers was very rich, always offering her gifts verging on inappropriate. After finding out she’d be playing on the Azure Seastar, said admirer sent her the card so she could spoil herself on the cruise. She didn’t feel comfortable accepting, so she gifted it to me. “… There’s enough on there to cover your fare. Don’t thank me—thank you, I needed to get rid of it. Enjoy your fortieth, friend!”
As she handed me the card, her fingers brushed mine.
Warm. Alive.
I mumbled my thanks, cheeks warm. Why? Because she chose me? Blushes! I’m an idiot.
Still, I was glowing, and not just because I was tipsy. Why not? I thought. Why not treat myself, this once? The Azure Seastar… it sounded like a dream. I’d go see Lily Tsuki play at the piano bar against the backdrop of a glimmering ocean. I’d drink under the stars. Get a tan. Get my sea legs! And every hand would be warm and every breath would taste of the summer breeze!
***
Nine decks (eleven including the crew-only levels). Over a thousand people. Pool, bars, restaurants, lounges, cafés, spa, cabaret—the Seastar truly was the Ritz Carlton on the water! I was absolutely giddy! Of course before the luxury came the wait—just like the airport, parking, luggage, ticketing, security. It was as I neared the entrance for ticketing, enjoying the summer breeze, that I caught traces of a sour odor… a whiff of decay… so faint beneath the car exhaust and the smell of the saltwater that I might have missed it, were I not so attuned to death. At port, it was likely some unfortunate animal packed into a shipping crate and decomposing. I’d even read horror stories of people, trafficked in sealed shipping containers and asphyxiating. That faint whiff made my insides curdle.
Then I was inside the air conditioned terminal, packed with passengers—and inhaling nothing but the blessed AC.
The check in was surprisingly quick. I followed the embarkation signs up the escalator to the terminal’s upper level, through the double glass doors, greeted on my right by printed images of pool decks and steaks and wine glasses. On my left, through the enormous paned wall of glass, the Seastar herself loomed. My God, she was enormous!
So many decks! So many balconies!
Then I squinted a little closer. What was that speck? A tiny figure, draped on a railing?
My heart dropped to my toes.
Something was horribly wrong.
The figure, small against the massive width of the ship… had no face. Only a torso and most of its arms. It had been decapitated, and dried blood spattered the rail.
My footsteps slowed. I pressed against the glass, eyes rapidly roving the rest of the ship. Was it just one…? One incidence of violence, or…
Perhaps I wasn’t seeing correctly. It was a stunt. A practical joke. A mannequin. I needed to get closer. I hurried along the terminal, joining the line out to the gangplank.
The bowl of the sky had turned deep purple, the sun lowering toward the horizon, and in the Seastar’s deep shadow, the temperature dropped. A sudden chill gripped me as I trotted out onto the gangplank. I sniffed. Sniffed again, more deeply.
Rot.
The same putrid odor I’d caught outside. A passenger ahead of me noticed me grabbing my nose, and remarked, “Not used to that ocean smell?” I did not respond, because now that I was close enough to see the ship more clearly, I noticed… cracked glass… broken panes in the sliding glass doors of the cabins… no! I gasped, sinking to my knees, and the passenger kindly leaned to help me up. As her hand seized mine—it was cold.
I jerked back so fast I actually collapsed into the passengers behind us—a mother and her daughter.
“Oh!” exclaimed the mother.
My hand brushed the daughter’s bare arm. Cold.
“Are you okay?” asked the daughter, a child of about twelve.
I crawled back from her, and another person, an elderly gentleman, leaned down to help me up, his hand on my elbow. Cold!
“Miss?” he asked. “Miss—” But I bolted, barely hearing their cries as I launched myself back toward the terminal. No no no no no no no no—my eyes watered and my belly bunched into knots and my heart lurched into my throat and oh God oh God—the ship! The whole. Entire. Ship. It was… dark… windows broken… Not a single light shining in the interior, and spatters of blood here and there visible on its decks and balconies… But worst of all was the smell. I hadn’t even entered the ship yet and already I knew, knew, in the way only I can know, that the smell wasn’t just one body or two. Not if I could detect it all the way out on the gangplank. All the way at the entrance to the terminal. For the whiff of putrefaction to have spread so far, the source was something massive. A colossal pile of decomposing bodies like a herd of dead elephants.
That ship… no one on that ship was going to make it back…
As I entered the terminal with its blessed filtered air and the windows between me and the ship, I turned and looked at the line stretching behind me. Passengers laughing. Chatting. Dressed in their finest. Flirting. Teasing. Buzzing with excitement. Old and young couples. Children.
Everyone on this ship is going to die…
... and I’m the only one who knows…