Bexar county jobs

Not sure if I'm wording that right but still wanted to ask. Essentially, my roommate wants to move to a more expensive area (in Southern California) because she wants to pursue a career in art and feels that it would be a motivator for me to pursue a career in tech like I've always wanted.
Before COVID, what held us both back was that places that we were applying to told us both that they preferred their candidates to live in the area (we'd be both commuting close to LA everyday). Then COVID hit and everything changed. I haven't tried looking now because I've gotten different opportunities that I'm learning from at my current job, but from what I understand a lot of places in art and tech are still remote. This information could be wrong but the networks that I started to look into pre-COVID have vanished now in order for me to verify this. My roommate's counterargument for this is that we need to just move in the area and live there. But I'm not sure she actually realizes how expensive it is in LA County.
So I'm wondering if the concept of living where you want to work even a thing? If it is, then I may attempt to spend the energy looking for a place. If not, I'd rather stay close to my current job. Ideas, thoughts, advice is welcomed please.

I think I suffer from a really bad case of decision paralysis and that decision will most likely determine my future and personality on the long term, hear me out:
I was 18 y/o, had a high-school sweetheart which I loved and cared for as we were together for a few years at that time. One issue that we had is about our future as she wanted to go abroad for university and I wasn't so keen on that as it meant leaving my friends and family, to whom I was really attached, behind. However after a lot of sleepless nights of arguments and disagreements I caved in and started to plan this. The main reason was the fact that we truly believed that we had a bright future together, however there was a secondary one, it was the better option, as back home things during that time seemed quite bleak.
After even more sleepless nights spent planning out and organizing the actual move, from applying to university to securing accommodation flights and so on, it happened. Two 'kids' in a completely different city, different country, different culture.
Things went quite poorly for the first months as the budget was extremely tight and it did took some time to acquire the necessary documents required to be able to work in the new country, but I was okay, I had my sweetheart, that kept me going. After I started working things started to look good, I took a bunch of overtime during that time as soon we would start to go to university and I had to make sure that we were able to be somewhat financially stable. This didn't quite work-out as we were unable to extend our short-time lease where we were initially staying (not to bore you with details, this was due to most accommodations asking up-front payment for the whole lease). And we had to move again which involved a lot of additional costs (i.e. actual move, agent fees, deposit etc) So I started to do even more overtime although university already started, at that time I was doing 35-40h at work + university, essentially I was almost always away.
Things in the relationship were beginning to slowly crack with me being oblivious to it as I was focused on making sure that we are able to exit this slight hard-ship. (note: we both had the same busy schedule, she was pulling roughly the same hours at work as me) And financially things improved in the following months to the point where we reduced our hours, however what did not improve was the state of the relationship to the point where there wasn't just a slight crack anymore. To keep this part extremely short, we eventually spit-up when I found out that she was already fooling around with someone else for a while now which made me to point blank just move-out from 'our' home.
I considered the option to move back to my home country and drop the uni, I nearly did it when I went back on holiday, but what ultimately made me come back was my commitment to my own self, as in the end it was the 'better option' in the long-term. What came next were 3 years of living on auto-pilot handling work, university, house chores and my own mind as I become quite depressive, but managed to push trough it slow and steady.
Come graduation day, where I had my family and close friends come over and cheer with me, as I got on that stage, pick-up the scroll from the Dean, shook hands, I felt the whole baggage and weight that was pressing down on me being finally picked-up, however, there was nothing left. After those years that I've spent on auto pilot when I switch it off, there was nothing there. I wasn't happy, I wasn't sad, I suddenly felt ... well nothing.
I decided to not pursue a master degree as I was quite tired both mentally and physically. I started to look for a job in my field which took me a while to find but eventually got one and at that time I was expecting that this will be the 'spark' that will get me out of this emotional coma that I was experiencing, but no, there was still nothing.
Which finally bring me to the present, two years later, and the main reason why I wrote all of this tonight to share with you fellow redditors.
While the job that I have and the company/team that I work with are completely and utterly amazing, I truly don't have one bad word to say about them, especially about my manager which was my mentor from day one, the pay is more than good and the career path is already in place for me (i.e. I've already been promoted twice and I am currently in training for the next step which is due later this year which is unfathomable for someone who only had 2 years of experience in the filed).
I sat down with myself and started to introspect what happened with me and why am I not happy? The answer came rather quickly:
"This was not my dream."
Let me elaborate a bit. While the field in which I work in and the job that I have were (and still are) my dream, I never actually wanted to leave my home county, my family, my friends and 'old' lifestyle. After 5 years living abroad I am at this cross-path were I do not feel socially adapted here at all what so ever. I do have my friends and social group here, but I often find myself feeling like an outsider. My core personality is also that I am a family person, my parents and grandparents are getting old and unwell, they are all back in my home country and they are highly unlikely to be able to move here due to various reasons.
I started to look for jobs in my field in my home country as I started to consider moving back, however now I have another part of me telling me that I will not be able to have the same success and career path as I do here, let alone compensation, office culture etc and I am extremely conflicted over this to the point where I started to have sleepless nights over this and not being able to take a proper decision and commit.
Lastly a few notes that I feel I missed out earlier:

• Since the pandemic ended, which was one of the darkest times for me as I wasn't able to visit my home country for an entire year, I am going home every 2 months now.
• I kept a really close friendship with my group of friends back home, to this day (almost 5 years later) we regularly speak via messaging\video calls\gaming together. (Almost daily with some)
• Things are better now (socioeconomically speaking) in my home country than it was when I originally left, but slightly worse in the 'new' country.

Ultimately, I wanted to get this off my chest as writing this did help me acknowledge some things in my mind but I am curious what are other people's objective thoughts on this.
TLDR: My life's crossroad is the decision between having a really good career path and feeling like an outcast or being there for family and old friends but potentially sacrificing that career opportunity. (It's the good old question, money or family)

Hi all, I would really love some advice on my school list, ones to add/subtract. I’m applying very broadly but would prefer to stay on the east coast (specifically the tri state area):

1. cGPA: 3.4x , sGPA: 3.2x, Masters GPA: 3.8
2. Currently pursuing Masters of Biomedical Science in Jersey, one semesters left.
3. MCAT score: 515
4. State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US): NYC, USA
5. Ethnicity and/or race: Arab (African American), URM, not disadvantaged, male
6. Undergraduate institution or category: big purple school in NYC
7. Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer) 2100 dermatology MA (for MD, DO, PA, and NP), 200 hours shadowing (primarily urogyn but many others as it was a multi specialty clinic), 300 hours as volunteer hospital in high school but continued with them in college in a different aspect (helped bring my schools large resources and funding to this local hospital I was a part of).
8. Research: 300 hours at Ivy League lab in high school in which I helped develop a lab protocol and was acknowledged in my mentors PhD thesis (also presented on our work at my high school science conference), 100 hours at a neuromarketing lab in nyc that worked with fortune 500s, 200 hours at a clinical lab at my schools medical center in which one of my responsibilities was translating forms from my second language (Arabic) into English from our large Arab population pool.
9. Shadowing experience and specialties represented: 300 hours , primarily in urogynecology but it was a multi specialty clinic so lots of specialties - gave a presentation at the end of it on obgyn topic.
10. Non-clinical volunteering: 70 hours as a private piano tutor for elementary kids in my city who couldn’t afford private piano lessons (stopped with COVID) , 50 hours volunteer through my Islamic center helping provide meals for the homeless; also went on a service trip with them to Texas after hurricane Harvey to help rebuild homes in Houston (one week). 300 hours as a volunteer coordinator and counselor for a summer camp for kids who’s parents are diagnosed with cancer.
11. Other extracurricular activities: social media coordinator for a an organization here in my city that works to end gender violence against women (I helped manage the male cohort events that worked to make men better Allys), 400 hours as a member of the fresh,soph,jr, and senior class boards on my college student council (this is how I was able to bring my schools resources back to my local hospital)
12. Relevant honors: deans list in my junior year of college, recicved mayoral service award for volunteering at my local hospital in high school (should I even include this? This is the same hospital i counties with through student council, I’m just confused as to how to incorporate this experience at all?)

Please help I’m having such a hard time knowing where to apply even with MSAR. I have money saved up from my job in college so I don’t mind applying to more , I just wish I knew where 😫 Thank you!
MD: SUNY update, SUNY Donwstate, Stonybrook, Einstein, RWJ, NJMS, Albany, Buffalo, NYMC, Rochester, Penn state, Tulane, BU, Hofstra, Hackensack, Drexel, Tufts, Pritzker, Rush, Rosalind Franklin, NOVA
DO: NYIT, Touro (NY) , NOVA, Des Moines

Been working for about 4 months in this globally famous clothing brand as a management trainee, and all I can say is it’s bullshit. If the contract says 9.5 hrs, I’ll only be doing the job in that said amount of time. No more, no less. However, the people there don’t understand that I guess.The culture is fucked up. We’re required to incur a minimum 15 mins after shift to get OT pay but the people there prefer to rush after their supposed shift and tap out 14 mins in. PEOPLE, WE’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO WORK FOR FREE. GET PAID EVERY SINGLE PENNY FOR EVERY SINGLE SECOND. THIS IS A JOB, NOT A CHARITY EVENT. What’s more is the upper management’s push for you to study outside of your working hours. Ask you if you studied on your fucking rest days. I understand that I am in a position that needs to have a fast pace of learning pero at the same time, this is a job. Pay me for every single second that I am doing anything related to it. Kung ganon lang din, sana inindicate niyo sa contract yan. Punyeta. My duty and obligation with my job begins and ends on the agreed upon working hours. No wonder the folks from this company’s county of origin has a declining population. Sobrang consumed nila with the idea of duty and obligation to the company they work for rather than to themselves. With that said, I am out. My time is precious time and it will and shall never be taken for free by damn capitalists.

I live in Sonoma county and recently had a nares surgery to help my Frenchie breathe better.
The vet charged me $1700 and when it was competed including 1 month post healing it appeared as if nothing was improved. The vet stated that they removed tissue inside the nasal but the actual nares did not appear to be opened up in any perceivable way. This is a pretty routine procedure and the results seem far off from what is expected.
My dog still labors to breath and we are scheduled to go back for another consultation.
I have no problem paying for what my dog needs but it’s the principle of “do the job right the first time”. I don’t want to pay for another surgery to attempt to fix what was not properly completed the first and would like some guidance on how to navigate this to hold them accountable or possible legal action if the give pushback.

Wanted to share this has any one else had an experience like this with bexar county? https://youtu.be/SVEoC-gkbOU

We decided to go for a drive in the countryside one Saturday morning. I’m the type of person who usually plans everything, leaving nothing to chance. I’m not spontaneous at all and it gets on my wife’s nerves. This was going to be different. It was all my idea and I assured Tammy we were just going to ‘wing it’. She rolled her eyes. She knows me. She realizes even my ‘spontaneous’ excursions are planned, somehow.
The truth is, it bothers me to not have a game plan. I’m usually the one driving on these rogue adventures and I have to decide to turn left or right if there’s no predetermined path or destination. I hate doing that with a passion but I wanted to prove to her I could drive without advance research or scouting. Inside it was going to kill me, but I had to pretend to be ok with it. You know how couples can get. I had to prove her ‘wrong’.
We loaded up the car with a couple of bottles of water and snacks before steering toward the rural part of the state. In the beginning, I’d been to parts of the area, but the longer we drove, the further I left behind my comfort zone. Tammy was loving it. I’d glance over at her occasionally and she’d have this genuine glow of contentment from the random drive. I sincerely think part of the enjoyment was relishing in my discomfort, but I wasn’t about to let on. Regardless, I wasn’t much of an actor and we both knew I was a bundle of knots inside.
Every few miles we’d see an old farmhouse or weathered barn with cows in the pasture. The scenery was lush and picturesque. The weather itself was beautiful too. All in all, for a random drive in the country being officiated by an obsessive planner, it was pretty darn enjoyable. I didn’t feel the crippling apprehension which usually came over me when I was trying to find a specific location in the dark. It was easier to be ‘lost’ in the daylight, with no set agenda. You might even say I was adjacent to enjoying myself.
The deeper Tammy and I drove into ‘Nowheresville’, the more we started noticing some odd little things. There were weird symbols painted on the side of the houses and barns visible from the old county road. They weren’t anything either of us was familiar with, but clearly they meant something to the locals. The first few didn’t register as anything to take note of, but eventually it became an obvious thing which stood out, in an otherwise idyllic country drive. I found myself anticipating them with each new home we approached. All of the symbols were somewhat different in ‘character’ formation, but they were similar enough to be related.
Neither of us spoke about them at the time but those strange markings troubled us, deeply. It was definitely on our minds when we stopped at a small country store for supplies, and to use the bathroom. As is usually the case with folks in the countryside, the store owners were very friendly. We must’ve stood out like sore thumbs, because they asked where we were from. We bought food and drinks for the road, and yukked it up with them for a couple minutes.
That is, until I summoned the courage to ask what the symbols on the buildings meant. Immediately their whole demeanor changed. It was night and day. Tammy noticed it too. She looked at me with a side-eyed glance as their mood darkened. To their credit, they didn’t try to change the subject. That would’ve been too obvious; but they did look down the aisles first to make sure there were no other customers within earshot, before answering. That definitely raised our hackles. It was creepy as hell. The truth was apparently something ‘outsiders’ like us weren’t supposed to know.
Suddenly it felt like we were about to be sucked into the middle of a rural conspiracy. They leaned over and whispered: “You folks seem real nice. Please don’t ask anyone else about them. It’s for ‘protection’, and for heaven’s sake, don’t be around here once the sun goes down. There’s a full moon tonight and they prefer the dark.”
I looked at Tammy’s mortified face. Her reaction was probably the same as my own. The suspense widened. We kept waiting for them to burst out laughing about winding up the big city folks, but the grins never came. They just handed us our receipt and told us to have a safe trip back home. There was a strong emphasis on us leaving soon. Like a couple of traumatized school kids, we thanked them for their prior hospitality and walked out. It was already dusk, and we were halfway across the state. We’d been seeing those bizarre markers for fifty miles or more.
Was it some secret sect? Tammy dared to take a photo of one of the ‘protection markers’ with her phone as we drove back toward home but the internet service in the boonies was spotty, at best. Since it was some deeply held rural secret, she hoped an image search would tell us what they meant. The country store proprietors acted like it was blood painted on the door of their homes to signal for the Biblical Angel of Death to pass them by.
Night fell quickly, with us still being in the middle of ‘Nowheresville’. We were definitely spooked and needed fuel for the car. Predictably, there were no stations around and the needle was below ‘E’. My OCD nerves were kicking way in. I was tempted to lash-out about why THIS is the reason I didn’t like to be spontaneous, but I held my tongue. It wouldn’t have helped. The image lookup netted very little helpful information. The only thing she could find was that it was somehow tied to ‘a secretive society of occult Freemasons’.
What? There were too many of them for it to be an ‘inside joke on city folks exploring the backroads’. We wouldn’t have thought there would be anything other that devout religious people living in that isolated section of the county. Not only that, but what did the shop owner’s vague statement mean? ‘They prefer the dark’? They made it sound like there were bloodthirsty werewolves roaming the woods. As laughable as it sounded, they weren’t laughing when they said it, and they didn’t appear to be kidding either.
They warned us to be completely out of the area before nightfall, and yet here we were, running on fumes and hoping to find a gas station before we were stranded like sitting ducks. The wind picked up until it blew our little car around like a sailboat in a churning sea. If there was any good from our unplanned misadventure, it was that all the dust we’d picked up from the long drive would hopefully be blown off the car.
It was barely 9pm on a Saturday night but every house we passed was as dark as could be. Not a single light shone in any of their windows. Either they went to bed early in the country, or they didn’t want to invite strangers to their doors after dark. Intellectually I knew rural folk were known to sleep early, but I couldn’t help but hear the shopkeepers conspiratorial words echo again in my ears. I couldn’t see Tammy’s face well but I know her. She was dwelling on it too. Under the circumstances it would’ve been impossible to ignore.
As growing nightmares tend to do, the car began to shudder. It was choking on its last few ounces of fuel left in the line. I wanted to shake the steering wheel in terrified frustration but it’s an inanimate object. I’m the damn fool goaded into ‘proving how unprepared I could be’. This was my ‘reward’. I was going to have to walk in the dark with a gas can until I found the next house. Then I was going to have to beat on their front door and hope they would take mercy on us. It was the perfect checkbox list of ‘NO!’ for me.
Walk alone in the dark. The FULL MOON dark.
Traverse a rural two lane blacktop where I didn’t know a single soul.
Ask for help from total strangers that could have been avoided if I’d just used my damn head in the first place.
And the ‘piece de resistance’:
Be on the lookout for ‘werewolves’ or Moses’ Angel of Death sent to kill the firstborn sons.
My own anger generated a certain level of false bravado which I needed to ‘get it done’. I cursed myself for not having gas already in the fuel can in the trunk but the truth is, I would’ve been afraid it was an explosion risk. It’s hell being an over-thinker. Tammy had the audacity to ask where I was going. I just turned toward her with a disgruntled scowl. She didn’t mean it the way it came out. It was obvious I had to go for help. She just didn’t want to be alone in the car. I think she felt bad for all of her past attempts to ‘loosen me up’ about over-planning things. Perhaps on the eve of our mutual doom, I might’ve won one. Ah, the bittersweet irony.
The two of us held hands. We’d started the journey together and we’d finish it together. Whatever that meant. Like a gentleman, I placed her away from the roadway but it was mostly a symbolic gesture. There were no other cars driving by. She was the first to notice how quiet it was as we walked. There was only the sound of our shoes clacking the pavement. In a place with all manner of wild animals living in nature, it was deathly silent. She gripped my hand tightly. It seemed like we’d walked a long way but the truth is, we were relatively lucky. The nearest farmhouse was less than a mile from our stranded vehicle.
Like the rest, it had one of those arcane symbols painted right on the front door. Also like the others, there wasn’t a single light shining in their windows but the driveway had three cars. They were definitely home but I had my doubts they would answer us. We didn’t want to be shot for startling them so we tried to make some unsubtle noises on the doorstep to announce our benevolent presence. Country folks like their twelve gauge shotguns. I hoped they would realize we were harmless and in need of help.
We both heard sounds of lamentation coming from inside. If anything, they were more frightened than we were. I’d characterize it as terrified. I spoke up in my friendliest voice to reassure them.
“Hello there. We’re terribly sorry to bother you folks so late at night. We’re just passing through from out of town and our car ran out of gas. Do you happen to have some? We’d be happy to reimburse you. I’ve got a hundred dollar bill. I can slide it under your door as compensation.”
A man on the other side spoke up. There was a noticeable tremor in his voice. He appeared to be trying very hard to balance his innate sense of politeness and hospitality, with a crumbling wall of courage. It didn’t bode well to reassure either of us.
“I’m terribly sorry for your trouble mister, but there’s something very evil lurking in these parts you don’t want to encounter. They come out at night time and for that precise reason, we don’t dare open the front door, for anyone. I’d be happy to siphon some of my own gas for you; but I won’t set foot out there until daylight. I have to protect myself and my family. I hope you understand. Now, run back to your car and lock the doors. Quickly! Cover up the windows and take this and put it on the hood of your vehicle in a conspicuous place. It’ll save your lives.”
In the unnatural quietness of the night air, I heard the electronic whirl of an inkjet printer running inside their home. A piece of letter-sized paper slid under the door jamb. It contained one of those strange symbols.
“Leave your fuel can on the porch. I’ll bring some gas, first light. I promise. If they come for you, do not look them in the eye. Go!”
We did exactly as instructed. To the letter. I gotta tell ya, the missus and I would’ve been ‘husband and wife, three-legged race’ winners if we’d entered such a competition. Both of us sprinted at a pace I hardly thought possible. I could barely keep up with her. Then I scrambled to get the keys to open the door. It might’ve been comical if we weren’t racing for our lives. Inside, we located a sun-visor and blankets to block off the windows as best we could. An old paper road map and catalogs from the glove compartment served to complete the job, in record time.
We were almost in the clear when I realized the most important part of the plan wasn’t in place. The protection sign was still in the car with us! I didn’t have any masking tape so there was no way to secure it to the window or hood. Using a rock as a paperweight would’ve blocked it from being visible. In a flash of invention I had an idea. The SUV was so dusty from the county roads that I scrawled the symbol as large as I could into the dirt of the windshield, hood and trunk with my fingers. I hoped that would suffice to spare us from the fury of whatever frightening creatures roamed the hillsides during the full moon.
I jumped back inside just in time. First the smell hit us. It was positively rank and the source of the stench was very, very large. We could feel ‘them’ walking around the car inspecting it. There were tiny voids in our hasty wallpapering of the windows but I didn’t dare look through the cracks. I was too scared I’d make eye contact. We heard them pulling on the door handles to see if they were unlocked. I have absolutely no doubt anything that huge could’ve simply ripped them open but that apparently wasn’t the point. They were checking to see if we’d taken the precaution of locking them.
Tammy had to stifle a scream as the whole vehicle shook back and forth violently. I thought the intent was to flip it upside down. She looked at me in wide-eyed terror. I’d love to suggest she drew strength from my calm masculinity but that would be a bold-faced lie. It was all I could do to keep from squealing like a toddler myself. The things on the other side of the car were definitely not natural. That much was clear to us. Then one of them spoke with a ‘voice’, not of this earth.
“You drew our sacred sigil of mercy on your vehicle, incorrectly. You have parts of the character backwards but we have decided to forgive your ignorance, this time. Leave our home and never return again. Our patience is limited.”
“Thank you!”; We both cried out in unison. Without response, they finally left us, but we dared not leave the impotent ‘safety’ of the car to confirm their departure; even to use the bathroom. Leftover drink cups temporarily served that purpose.
In the morning, the farmer came just as he’d promised. He brought us fuel and something to eat. Not that either of us had an appetite. He saw the evidence of our nocturnal visitors and remarked how fortunate we were, especially with my botched depiction of the ‘sigil’, as they had referred to them. We thanked the man again and we’re on our way. Neither of us breathed a sign of relief until we reached the suburbs.
I drove through an automated car wash to blast off the layers of dirt from our terrifying ordeal, but it didn’t do anything about the savage claw marks and unnatural dents to the sheet metal. I told my coworkers it was from a grizzly bear attack. That would’ve been horrific enough story, but the truth was infinitely worse. These so-called ‘grizzly bears’ could speak, read, and took considerable umbrage to my poorly drawn protection sigils.
My insurance agent demanded to inspect the damage first. He asked me where it occurred. I told him and he adopted the same pale demeanor change as the country store owners. He knew what we faced that night. Obviously there had been other claims like ours over the years. Without acknowledging what we both knew, he said: “You two are lucky to be alive. Don’t go back there again. Your claim will be covered in full. And one more thing, that sigil should look like this.”
He pointed to the clean area of the windshield where I had drawn it. Despite it being washed, you could still see the remnants of my ‘artwork’ on the glass. He took his finger and reversed one of the vertical marks in the middle. Now I know the correct way to draw it. More importantly, Tammy doesn’t try to stop me from planning out all the details of our trips anymore. She finally sees the benefit of NOT being spontaneous. Win-win.

We decided to go for a drive in the countryside one Saturday morning. I’m the type of person who usually plans everything, leaving nothing to chance. I’m not spontaneous at all and it gets on my wife’s nerves. This was going to be different. It was all my idea and I assured Tammy we were just going to ‘wing it’. She rolled her eyes. She knows me. She realizes even my ‘spontaneous’ excursions are planned, somehow.
The truth is, it bothers me to not have a game plan. I’m usually the one driving on these rogue adventures and I have to decide to turn left or right if there’s no predetermined path or destination. I hate doing that with a passion but I wanted to prove to her I could drive without advance research or scouting. Inside it was going to kill me, but I had to pretend to be ok with it. You know how couples can get. I had to prove her ‘wrong’.
We loaded up the car with a couple of bottles of water and snacks before steering toward the rural part of the state. In the beginning, I’d been to parts of the area, but the longer we drove, the further I left behind my comfort zone. Tammy was loving it. I’d glance over at her occasionally and she’d have this genuine glow of contentment from the random drive. I sincerely think part of the enjoyment was relishing in my discomfort, but I wasn’t about to let on. Regardless, I wasn’t much of an actor and we both knew I was a bundle of knots inside.
Every few miles we’d see an old farmhouse or weathered barn with cows in the pasture. The scenery was lush and picturesque. The weather itself was beautiful too. All in all, for a random drive in the country being officiated by an obsessive planner, it was pretty darn enjoyable. I didn’t feel the crippling apprehension which usually came over me when I was trying to find a specific location in the dark. It was easier to be ‘lost’ in the daylight, with no set agenda. You might even say I was adjacent to enjoying myself.
The deeper Tammy and I drove into ‘Nowheresville’, the more we started noticing some odd little things. There were weird symbols painted on the side of the houses and barns visible from the old county road. They weren’t anything either of us was familiar with, but clearly they meant something to the locals. The first few didn’t register as anything to take note of, but eventually it became an obvious thing which stood out, in an otherwise idyllic country drive. I found myself anticipating them with each new home we approached. All of the symbols were somewhat different in ‘character’ formation, but they were similar enough to be related.
Neither of us spoke about them at the time but those strange markings troubled us, deeply. It was definitely on our minds when we stopped at a small country store for supplies, and to use the bathroom. As is usually the case with folks in the countryside, the store owners were very friendly. We must’ve stood out like sore thumbs, because they asked where we were from. We bought food and drinks for the road, and yukked it up with them for a couple minutes.
That is, until I summoned the courage to ask what the symbols on the buildings meant. Immediately their whole demeanor changed. It was night and day. Tammy noticed it too. She looked at me with a side-eyed glance as their mood darkened. To their credit, they didn’t try to change the subject. That would’ve been too obvious; but they did look down the aisles first to make sure there were no other customers within earshot, before answering. That definitely raised our hackles. It was creepy as hell. The truth was apparently something ‘outsiders’ like us weren’t supposed to know.
Suddenly it felt like we were about to be sucked into the middle of a rural conspiracy. They leaned over and whispered: “You folks seem real nice. Please don’t ask anyone else about them. It’s for ‘protection’, and for heaven’s sake, don’t be around here once the sun goes down. There’s a full moon tonight and they prefer the dark.”
I looked at Tammy’s mortified face. Her reaction was probably the same as my own. The suspense widened. We kept waiting for them to burst out laughing about winding up the big city folks, but the grins never came. They just handed us our receipt and told us to have a safe trip back home. There was a strong emphasis on us leaving soon. Like a couple of traumatized school kids, we thanked them for their prior hospitality and walked out. It was already dusk, and we were halfway across the state. We’d been seeing those bizarre markers for fifty miles or more.
Was it some secret sect? Tammy dared to take a photo of one of the ‘protection markers’ with her phone as we drove back toward home but the internet service in the boonies was spotty, at best. Since it was some deeply held rural secret, she hoped an image search would tell us what they meant. The country store proprietors acted like it was blood painted on the door of their homes to signal for the Biblical Angel of Death to pass them by.
Night fell quickly, with us still being in the middle of ‘Nowheresville’. We were definitely spooked and needed fuel for the car. Predictably, there were no stations around and the needle was below ‘E’. My OCD nerves were kicking way in. I was tempted to lash-out about why THIS is the reason I didn’t like to be spontaneous, but I held my tongue. It wouldn’t have helped. The image lookup netted very little helpful information. The only thing she could find was that it was somehow tied to ‘a secretive society of occult Freemasons’.
What? There were too many of them for it to be an ‘inside joke on city folks exploring the backroads’. We wouldn’t have thought there would be anything other that devout religious people living in that isolated section of the county. Not only that, but what did the shop owner’s vague statement mean? ‘They prefer the dark’? They made it sound like there were bloodthirsty werewolves roaming the woods. As laughable as it sounded, they weren’t laughing when they said it, and they didn’t appear to be kidding either.
They warned us to be completely out of the area before nightfall, and yet here we were, running on fumes and hoping to find a gas station before we were stranded like sitting ducks. The wind picked up until it blew our little car around like a sailboat in a churning sea. If there was any good from our unplanned misadventure, it was that all the dust we’d picked up from the long drive would hopefully be blown off the car.
It was barely 9pm on a Saturday night but every house we passed was as dark as could be. Not a single light shone in any of their windows. Either they went to bed early in the country, or they didn’t want to invite strangers to their doors after dark. Intellectually I knew rural folk were known to sleep early, but I couldn’t help but hear the shopkeepers conspiratorial words echo again in my ears. I couldn’t see Tammy’s face well but I know her. She was dwelling on it too. Under the circumstances it would’ve been impossible to ignore.
As growing nightmares tend to do, the car began to shudder. It was choking on its last few ounces of fuel left in the line. I wanted to shake the steering wheel in terrified frustration but it’s an inanimate object. I’m the damn fool goaded into ‘proving how unprepared I could be’. This was my ‘reward’. I was going to have to walk in the dark with a gas can until I found the next house. Then I was going to have to beat on their front door and hope they would take mercy on us. It was the perfect checkbox list of ‘NO!’ for me.
Walk alone in the dark. The FULL MOON dark.
Traverse a rural two lane blacktop where I didn’t know a single soul.
Ask for help from total strangers that could have been avoided if I’d just used my damn head in the first place.
And the ‘piece de resistance’:
Be on the lookout for ‘werewolves’ or Moses’ Angel of Death sent to kill the firstborn sons.
My own anger generated a certain level of false bravado which I needed to ‘get it done’. I cursed myself for not having gas already in the fuel can in the trunk but the truth is, I would’ve been afraid it was an explosion risk. It’s hell being an over-thinker. Tammy had the audacity to ask where I was going. I just turned toward her with a disgruntled scowl. She didn’t mean it the way it came out. It was obvious I had to go for help. She just didn’t want to be alone in the car. I think she felt bad for all of her past attempts to ‘loosen me up’ about over-planning things. Perhaps on the eve of our mutual doom, I might’ve won one. Ah, the bittersweet irony.
The two of us held hands. We’d started the journey together and we’d finish it together. Whatever that meant. Like a gentleman, I placed her away from the roadway but it was mostly a symbolic gesture. There were no other cars driving by. She was the first to notice how quiet it was as we walked. There was only the sound of our shoes clacking the pavement. In a place with all manner of wild animals living in nature, it was deathly silent. She gripped my hand tightly. It seemed like we’d walked a long way but the truth is, we were relatively lucky. The nearest farmhouse was less than a mile from our stranded vehicle.
Like the rest, it had one of those arcane symbols painted right on the front door. Also like the others, there wasn’t a single light shining in their windows but the driveway had three cars. They were definitely home but I had my doubts they would answer us. We didn’t want to be shot for startling them so we tried to make some unsubtle noises on the doorstep to announce our benevolent presence. Country folks like their twelve gauge shotguns. I hoped they would realize we were harmless and in need of help.
We both heard sounds of lamentation coming from inside. If anything, they were more frightened than we were. I’d characterize it as terrified. I spoke up in my friendliest voice to reassure them.
“Hello there. We’re terribly sorry to bother you folks so late at night. We’re just passing through from out of town and our car ran out of gas. Do you happen to have some? We’d be happy to reimburse you. I’ve got a hundred dollar bill. I can slide it under your door as compensation.”
A man on the other side spoke up. There was a noticeable tremor in his voice. He appeared to be trying very hard to balance his innate sense of politeness and hospitality, with a crumbling wall of courage. It didn’t bode well to reassure either of us.
“I’m terribly sorry for your trouble mister, but there’s something very evil lurking in these parts you don’t want to encounter. They come out at night time and for that precise reason, we don’t dare open the front door, for anyone. I’d be happy to siphon some of my own gas for you; but I won’t set foot out there until daylight. I have to protect myself and my family. I hope you understand. Now, run back to your car and lock the doors. Quickly! Cover up the windows and take this and put it on the hood of your vehicle in a conspicuous place. It’ll save your lives.”
In the unnatural quietness of the night air, I heard the electronic whirl of an inkjet printer running inside their home. A piece of letter-sized paper slid under the door jamb. It contained one of those strange symbols.
“Leave your fuel can on the porch. I’ll bring some gas, first light. I promise. If they come for you, do not look them in the eye. Go!”
We did exactly as instructed. To the letter. I gotta tell ya, the missus and I would’ve been ‘husband and wife, three-legged race’ winners if we’d entered such a competition. Both of us sprinted at a pace I hardly thought possible. I could barely keep up with her. Then I scrambled to get the keys to open the door. It might’ve been comical if we weren’t racing for our lives. Inside, we located a sun-visor and blankets to block off the windows as best we could. An old paper road map and catalogs from the glove compartment served to complete the job, in record time.
We were almost in the clear when I realized the most important part of the plan wasn’t in place. The protection sign was still in the car with us! I didn’t have any masking tape so there was no way to secure it to the window or hood. Using a rock as a paperweight would’ve blocked it from being visible. In a flash of invention I had an idea. The SUV was so dusty from the county roads that I scrawled the symbol as large as I could into the dirt of the windshield, hood and trunk with my fingers. I hoped that would suffice to spare us from the fury of whatever frightening creatures roamed the hillsides during the full moon.
I jumped back inside just in time. First the smell hit us. It was positively rank and the source of the stench was very, very large. We could feel ‘them’ walking around the car inspecting it. There were tiny voids in our hasty wallpapering of the windows but I didn’t dare look through the cracks. I was too scared I’d make eye contact. We heard them pulling on the door handles to see if they were unlocked. I have absolutely no doubt anything that huge could’ve simply ripped them open but that apparently wasn’t the point. They were checking to see if we’d taken the precaution of locking them.
Tammy had to stifle a scream as the whole vehicle shook back and forth violently. I thought the intent was to flip it upside down. She looked at me in wide-eyed terror. I’d love to suggest she drew strength from my calm masculinity but that would be a bold-faced lie. It was all I could do to keep from squealing like a toddler myself. The things on the other side of the car were definitely not natural. That much was clear to us. Then one of them spoke with a ‘voice’, not of this earth.
“You drew our sacred sigil of mercy on your vehicle, incorrectly. You have parts of the character backwards but we have decided to forgive your ignorance, this time. Leave our home and never return again. Our patience is limited.”
“Thank you!”; We both cried out in unison. Without response, they finally left us, but we dared not leave the impotent ‘safety’ of the car to confirm their departure; even to use the bathroom. Leftover drink cups temporarily served that purpose.
In the morning, the farmer came just as he’d promised. He brought us fuel and something to eat. Not that either of us had an appetite. He saw the evidence of our nocturnal visitors and remarked how fortunate we were, especially with my botched depiction of the ‘sigil’, as they had referred to them. We thanked the man again and we’re on our way. Neither of us breathed a sign of relief until we reached the suburbs.
I drove through an automated car wash to blast off the layers of dirt from our terrifying ordeal, but it didn’t do anything about the savage claw marks and unnatural dents to the sheet metal. I told my coworkers it was from a grizzly bear attack. That would’ve been horrific enough story, but the truth was infinitely worse. These so-called ‘grizzly bears’ could speak, read, and took considerable umbrage to my poorly drawn protection sigils.
My insurance agent demanded to inspect the damage first. He asked me where it occurred. I told him and he adopted the same pale demeanor change as the country store owners. He knew what we faced that night. Obviously there had been other claims like ours over the years. Without acknowledging what we both knew, he said: “You two are lucky to be alive. Don’t go back there again. Your claim will be covered in full. And one more thing, that sigil should look like this.”
He pointed to the clean area of the windshield where I had drawn it. Despite it being washed, you could still see the remnants of my ‘artwork’ on the glass. He took his finger and reversed one of the vertical marks in the middle. Now I know the correct way to draw it. More importantly, Tammy doesn’t try to stop me from planning out all the details of our trips anymore. She finally sees the benefit of NOT being spontaneous. Win-win.

We decided to go for a drive in the countryside one Saturday morning. I’m the type of person who usually plans everything, leaving nothing to chance. I’m not spontaneous at all and it gets on my wife’s nerves. This was going to be different. It was all my idea and I assured Tammy we were just going to ‘wing it’. She rolled her eyes. She knows me. She realizes even my ‘spontaneous’ excursions are planned, somehow.
The truth is, it bothers me to not have a game plan. I’m usually the one driving on these rogue adventures and I have to decide to turn left or right if there’s no predetermined path or destination. I hate doing that with a passion but I wanted to prove to her I could drive without advance research or scouting. Inside it was going to kill me, but I had to pretend to be ok with it. You know how couples can get. I had to prove her ‘wrong’.
We loaded up the car with a couple of bottles of water and snacks before steering toward the rural part of the state. In the beginning, I’d been to parts of the area, but the longer we drove, the further I left behind my comfort zone. Tammy was loving it. I’d glance over at her occasionally and she’d have this genuine glow of contentment from the random drive. I sincerely think part of the enjoyment was relishing in my discomfort, but I wasn’t about to let on. Regardless, I wasn’t much of an actor and we both knew I was a bundle of knots inside.
Every few miles we’d see an old farmhouse or weathered barn with cows in the pasture. The scenery was lush and picturesque. The weather itself was beautiful too. All in all, for a random drive in the country being officiated by an obsessive planner, it was pretty darn enjoyable. I didn’t feel the crippling apprehension which usually came over me when I was trying to find a specific location in the dark. It was easier to be ‘lost’ in the daylight, with no set agenda. You might even say I was adjacent to enjoying myself.
The deeper Tammy and I drove into ‘Nowheresville’, the more we started noticing some odd little things. There were weird symbols painted on the side of the houses and barns visible from the old county road. They weren’t anything either of us was familiar with, but clearly they meant something to the locals. The first few didn’t register as anything to take note of, but eventually it became an obvious thing which stood out, in an otherwise idyllic country drive. I found myself anticipating them with each new home we approached. All of the symbols were somewhat different in ‘character’ formation, but they were similar enough to be related.
Neither of us spoke about them at the time but those strange markings troubled us, deeply. It was definitely on our minds when we stopped at a small country store for supplies, and to use the bathroom. As is usually the case with folks in the countryside, the store owners were very friendly. We must’ve stood out like sore thumbs, because they asked where we were from. We bought food and drinks for the road, and yukked it up with them for a couple minutes.
That is, until I summoned the courage to ask what the symbols on the buildings meant. Immediately their whole demeanor changed. It was night and day. Tammy noticed it too. She looked at me with a side-eyed glance as their mood darkened. To their credit, they didn’t try to change the subject. That would’ve been too obvious; but they did look down the aisles first to make sure there were no other customers within earshot, before answering. That definitely raised our hackles. It was creepy as hell. The truth was apparently something ‘outsiders’ like us weren’t supposed to know.
Suddenly it felt like we were about to be sucked into the middle of a rural conspiracy. They leaned over and whispered: “You folks seem real nice. Please don’t ask anyone else about them. It’s for ‘protection’, and for heaven’s sake, don’t be around here once the sun goes down. There’s a full moon tonight and they prefer the dark.”
I looked at Tammy’s mortified face. Her reaction was probably the same as my own. The suspense widened. We kept waiting for them to burst out laughing about winding up the big city folks, but the grins never came. They just handed us our receipt and told us to have a safe trip back home. There was a strong emphasis on us leaving soon. Like a couple of traumatized school kids, we thanked them for their prior hospitality and walked out. It was already dusk, and we were halfway across the state. We’d been seeing those bizarre markers for fifty miles or more.
Was it some secret sect? Tammy dared to take a photo of one of the ‘protection markers’ with her phone as we drove back toward home but the internet service in the boonies was spotty, at best. Since it was some deeply held rural secret, she hoped an image search would tell us what they meant. The country store proprietors acted like it was blood painted on the door of their homes to signal for the Biblical Angel of Death to pass them by.
Night fell quickly, with us still being in the middle of ‘Nowheresville’. We were definitely spooked and needed fuel for the car. Predictably, there were no stations around and the needle was below ‘E’. My OCD nerves were kicking way in. I was tempted to lash-out about why THIS is the reason I didn’t like to be spontaneous, but I held my tongue. It wouldn’t have helped. The image lookup netted very little helpful information. The only thing she could find was that it was somehow tied to ‘a secretive society of occult Freemasons’.
What? There were too many of them for it to be an ‘inside joke on city folks exploring the backroads’. We wouldn’t have thought there would be anything other that devout religious people living in that isolated section of the county. Not only that, but what did the shop owner’s vague statement mean? ‘They prefer the dark’? They made it sound like there were bloodthirsty werewolves roaming the woods. As laughable as it sounded, they weren’t laughing when they said it, and they didn’t appear to be kidding either.
They warned us to be completely out of the area before nightfall, and yet here we were, running on fumes and hoping to find a gas station before we were stranded like sitting ducks. The wind picked up until it blew our little car around like a sailboat in a churning sea. If there was any good from our unplanned misadventure, it was that all the dust we’d picked up from the long drive would hopefully be blown off the car.
It was barely 9pm on a Saturday night but every house we passed was as dark as could be. Not a single light shone in any of their windows. Either they went to bed early in the country, or they didn’t want to invite strangers to their doors after dark. Intellectually I knew rural folk were known to sleep early, but I couldn’t help but hear the shopkeepers conspiratorial words echo again in my ears. I couldn’t see Tammy’s face well but I know her. She was dwelling on it too. Under the circumstances it would’ve been impossible to ignore.
As growing nightmares tend to do, the car began to shudder. It was choking on its last few ounces of fuel left in the line. I wanted to shake the steering wheel in terrified frustration but it’s an inanimate object. I’m the damn fool goaded into ‘proving how unprepared I could be’. This was my ‘reward’. I was going to have to walk in the dark with a gas can until I found the next house. Then I was going to have to beat on their front door and hope they would take mercy on us. It was the perfect checkbox list of ‘NO!’ for me.
Walk alone in the dark. The FULL MOON dark.
Traverse a rural two lane blacktop where I didn’t know a single soul.
Ask for help from total strangers that could have been avoided if I’d just used my damn head in the first place.
And the ‘piece de resistance’:
Be on the lookout for ‘werewolves’ or Moses’ Angel of Death sent to kill the firstborn sons.
My own anger generated a certain level of false bravado which I needed to ‘get it done’. I cursed myself for not having gas already in the fuel can in the trunk but the truth is, I would’ve been afraid it was an explosion risk. It’s hell being an over-thinker. Tammy had the audacity to ask where I was going. I just turned toward her with a disgruntled scowl. She didn’t mean it the way it came out. It was obvious I had to go for help. She just didn’t want to be alone in the car. I think she felt bad for all of her past attempts to ‘loosen me up’ about over-planning things. Perhaps on the eve of our mutual doom, I might’ve won one. Ah, the bittersweet irony.
The two of us held hands. We’d started the journey together and we’d finish it together. Whatever that meant. Like a gentleman, I placed her away from the roadway but it was mostly a symbolic gesture. There were no other cars driving by. She was the first to notice how quiet it was as we walked. There was only the sound of our shoes clacking the pavement. In a place with all manner of wild animals living in nature, it was deathly silent. She gripped my hand tightly. It seemed like we’d walked a long way but the truth is, we were relatively lucky. The nearest farmhouse was less than a mile from our stranded vehicle.
Like the rest, it had one of those arcane symbols painted right on the front door. Also like the others, there wasn’t a single light shining in their windows but the driveway had three cars. They were definitely home but I had my doubts they would answer us. We didn’t want to be shot for startling them so we tried to make some unsubtle noises on the doorstep to announce our benevolent presence. Country folks like their twelve gauge shotguns. I hoped they would realize we were harmless and in need of help.
We both heard sounds of lamentation coming from inside. If anything, they were more frightened than we were. I’d characterize it as terrified. I spoke up in my friendliest voice to reassure them.
“Hello there. We’re terribly sorry to bother you folks so late at night. We’re just passing through from out of town and our car ran out of gas. Do you happen to have some? We’d be happy to reimburse you. I’ve got a hundred dollar bill. I can slide it under your door as compensation.”
A man on the other side spoke up. There was a noticeable tremor in his voice. He appeared to be trying very hard to balance his innate sense of politeness and hospitality, with a crumbling wall of courage. It didn’t bode well to reassure either of us.
“I’m terribly sorry for your trouble mister, but there’s something very evil lurking in these parts you don’t want to encounter. They come out at night time and for that precise reason, we don’t dare open the front door, for anyone. I’d be happy to siphon some of my own gas for you; but I won’t set foot out there until daylight. I have to protect myself and my family. I hope you understand. Now, run back to your car and lock the doors. Quickly! Cover up the windows and take this and put it on the hood of your vehicle in a conspicuous place. It’ll save your lives.”
In the unnatural quietness of the night air, I heard the electronic whirl of an inkjet printer running inside their home. A piece of letter-sized paper slid under the door jamb. It contained one of those strange symbols.
“Leave your fuel can on the porch. I’ll bring some gas, first light. I promise. If they come for you, do not look them in the eye. Go!”
We did exactly as instructed. To the letter. I gotta tell ya, the missus and I would’ve been ‘husband and wife, three-legged race’ winners if we’d entered such a competition. Both of us sprinted at a pace I hardly thought possible. I could barely keep up with her. Then I scrambled to get the keys to open the door. It might’ve been comical if we weren’t racing for our lives. Inside, we located a sun-visor and blankets to block off the windows as best we could. An old paper road map and catalogs from the glove compartment served to complete the job, in record time.
We were almost in the clear when I realized the most important part of the plan wasn’t in place. The protection sign was still in the car with us! I didn’t have any masking tape so there was no way to secure it to the window or hood. Using a rock as a paperweight would’ve blocked it from being visible. In a flash of invention I had an idea. The SUV was so dusty from the county roads that I scrawled the symbol as large as I could into the dirt of the windshield, hood and trunk with my fingers. I hoped that would suffice to spare us from the fury of whatever frightening creatures roamed the hillsides during the full moon.
I jumped back inside just in time. First the smell hit us. It was positively rank and the source of the stench was very, very large. We could feel ‘them’ walking around the car inspecting it. There were tiny voids in our hasty wallpapering of the windows but I didn’t dare look through the cracks. I was too scared I’d make eye contact. We heard them pulling on the door handles to see if they were unlocked. I have absolutely no doubt anything that huge could’ve simply ripped them open but that apparently wasn’t the point. They were checking to see if we’d taken the precaution of locking them.
Tammy had to stifle a scream as the whole vehicle shook back and forth violently. I thought the intent was to flip it upside down. She looked at me in wide-eyed terror. I’d love to suggest she drew strength from my calm masculinity but that would be a bold-faced lie. It was all I could do to keep from squealing like a toddler myself. The things on the other side of the car were definitely not natural. That much was clear to us. Then one of them spoke with a ‘voice’, not of this earth.
“You drew our sacred sigil of mercy on your vehicle, incorrectly. You have parts of the character backwards but we have decided to forgive your ignorance, this time. Leave our home and never return again. Our patience is limited.”
“Thank you!”; We both cried out in unison. Without response, they finally left us, but we dared not leave the impotent ‘safety’ of the car to confirm their departure; even to use the bathroom. Leftover drink cups temporarily served that purpose.
In the morning, the farmer came just as he’d promised. He brought us fuel and something to eat. Not that either of us had an appetite. He saw the evidence of our nocturnal visitors and remarked how fortunate we were, especially with my botched depiction of the ‘sigil’, as they had referred to them. We thanked the man again and we’re on our way. Neither of us breathed a sign of relief until we reached the suburbs.
I drove through an automated car wash to blast off the layers of dirt from our terrifying ordeal, but it didn’t do anything about the savage claw marks and unnatural dents to the sheet metal. I told my coworkers it was from a grizzly bear attack. That would’ve been horrific enough story, but the truth was infinitely worse. These so-called ‘grizzly bears’ could speak, read, and took considerable umbrage to my poorly drawn protection sigils.
My insurance agent demanded to inspect the damage first. He asked me where it occurred. I told him and he adopted the same pale demeanor change as the country store owners. He knew what we faced that night. Obviously there had been other claims like ours over the years. Without acknowledging what we both knew, he said: “You two are lucky to be alive. Don’t go back there again. Your claim will be covered in full. And one more thing, that sigil should look like this.”
He pointed to the clean area of the windshield where I had drawn it. Despite it being washed, you could still see the remnants of my ‘artwork’ on the glass. He took his finger and reversed one of the vertical marks in the middle. Now I know the correct way to draw it. More importantly, Tammy doesn’t try to stop me from planning out all the details of our trips anymore. She finally sees the benefit of NOT being spontaneous. Win-win.

Hey so i am currently looking for a second job but with my search i found the usps. I applied because of the benefits and penison i might consider leaving my current primary job for usps. But after taking the test and seeing the pay which was a little over 19$ (cant remember the exact amount) im curious if this is an average pay. Seeing that this is about 7 dollars less then im making right now im not really sure i want to make the jump.
My job rn is a supervisor flex schedule and i work with alot of highschool kids and deal with alot of schedule movements and call outs Im looking for some stability in my work schedule
I strive for full time which i usualy get because someone usualy calls out and the benefits are amazing! I dont know how amazing the usps benefits are in comparison
Im in need of a second job so i dont mind the over time at all! I currently do 7 days a week with the side work (uber eats door dash amazon flex and instcart) .. im trying to get away from using my own vehicle.
So questions How much does a CCA usually make? ( CA LA County) How often do you get raises? Do you work 6 days every week? How many hours would you say you get a week? Is there opportunity for growth/promotion? If so would anyone know the pay gap and how likley that is?
I WOULD BE REPLACING MY CURRENT JOB WITH THIS ONE IF I TOOK IT!!

Opinions on what I should do. So a little background I’m a USMC veteran got out in 2020, I have a 3 yr old child that I just spent almost a year and a half fighting for custody. The custody is, I have month on month off bc mom moved to a different state to be with family. But once my daughter starts pre-k next fall I will have school year and mom gets summers and major holidays.
My dilemma: i accrued 20k in debt fighting for 50/50 custody (which I did get and would do over again). But to my parents not a bank…credit cards. So my goal is to pay them back as soon as possible. I feel my ex will fight to get custody again and school year. This wouldn’t be so bad if she was stable and ik my daughter wouldn’t move a bunch like my ex had to growing up. If my ex would move back it’s week on week of which I think would be more beneficial for my daughter. I applied last year for a university police department and failed on a psych eval, it sounds bad but this was during my ongoing divorce and custody battle and the reason for the failure was the medicine I was placed on. Since I have gotten off the medication and switched to a medication that works for me and would allow me to work for the police department. Meanwhile while waiting on the police job I applied and accepted a job working for the electric union closest to me since working for them I have a great opportunity to be accepted into their Apprenticeship (applied before the police job and didn’t get in for lack of experience, which I have since working for them and becoming a union member) I applied again this year on the last day. The apprenticeships is a five year commitment where I get raises every year and after I’ll be making 34$ (take home) plus benefits which include 7.50 an hour for my retirement for every hour worked, a vacation check I pay into while I work for every 6 full months of 40 hours weeks I will receive 7500$. The issue I worry about is the work is over 13 counties and if I am sending my daughter to school I could see issues with getting her in the bud and such depending on when I worked and where it work. There is also a layoff after each job currently (could change) it can be anywhere from a month to 8 months. But during the apprenticeship I get to use my va benefits which gives me roughly an extra 1000 a month for housing year round if I spread it out or 1200 for 9 months a year.
The cop job should I apply again and get through it and hired would be 23 an hour with somewhat regular raises I don’t know where it caps out but after 5 years my daughter cna go to colleges there for free not to mention they have the best health Care probably in the state. They said all the overtime I could want as well and they are 12 hour shifts.
The big dilemma is the cop job would give me of a steady schedule and dependable income and make it harder if my ex wanted to try and fight me for custody in the future but I feel the union job would better set my daughter and myself up. With me my daughter always comes first and I’m struggling with this. But if I accept the apprenticeship I’m locked in or I burn the bridge forever. And I don’t feel I can’t down union job if I haven’t got confirmation of the cop job but it can take up to a year to find out and I would have to go for three months of training. Any advise will be greatly appreciated!

Ok so I have a warrant because I miss court the last September, I was on drugs last year in Arizona, I was driving by the influence and with 10 fentanyl pills in my wallet. They took me to Maricopa county jail and I spend 5 days there. They give me a release and I was free. 5 months later I got a letter that I have a warrant because I miss court. So, I’m going to Arizona (because now I’m living in Tennessee) and I’m gonna self surrounded. I went to rehab in Mexico and I finished my program, now I’m clean, I got a house, I got a job, I’m 6 months pregnant, I change my life completely and I want to fix that. It there the possibility that they send me to jail?

Hey everyone, so I just moved to SC a week in a half ago and have been staying with a friend. Me and my 2 fam members left California to just get away from a horrible situation and my friend offered a spot til there lease is up. So I was wondering, I’m in Kershaw county at the moment. But wanted to know of any other good county’s or cities nearby that I can get settled in since I seen from my last post that this county is meh lol. I’m still looking for work but have gotten through the hiring process for some jobs but nothing is official yet. (PS, if any place is hiring with good pay let me know) I wanna just get a decent apartment for now but my credit isn’t the best and I’m still looking for work, but I’m just trying to work with what I got at the moment. Any advice or help is appreciated

All my life, I had pledged to follow the rule book. To always have a sense of discipline, never doing anything irrational, and was told I’ll lead a happy life if I do all of that. Well, I did all of that. And guess what, a prescription medication is what finally ruined my life, and is en route to ruining my carrier and everything that’s worth living for. Society underestimates how powerful SSRIs are. An SSRIs sheer force on the nervous system packs a huge punch and your serotonin system is blasted. You’re taking the same drug every single day, and for MONTHS/YEARS - imagine how deeply that will effect the inner workings of your physiology and psyche.
Over time these drugs eroded my personality, my willpower and also my dignity given how the people around me think I’m up to no good anymore. It depleted my courage, my ability to feel deep suffering and pain. So much so that I was left with emptiness. This emptiness would trigger panic because deep down I was dying to FEEL SOMETHING, I knew I had ended up in a place so far from who I once was. I literally yearned to feel the suffering just so I could be enticed to overcome it through determination and willpower. Unlike the hard drugs, there is no inspirational story about coming off of them and getting “clean”, no rehabs to guide us through or anything that would help normalise this process and integrate our pain and suffering into our community and society.
We just have to bear it and stay strong for now. And believe me, we inevitability will find a cure for this condition. And once we do, we would be empowered by the fact that we got through something no one else could even imagine, and we did all that with absolutely no help. There would be nothing in the world that we won’t be able to conquer.
The nurses and doctors reassured me that everything would return to normal. But days, weeks, months and finally years passed by. Nothing has been the same ever since. I was just 24 years old when my life was snatched away from me. Without being asked, without being warned. From one moment to the next, an important part of my personality was stolen from me, which I thought would be impossible to lose. My view of life and society changed dramatically. The "problems" I had before pale in comparison. I would give up anything to get back to my previous self when I had the drive, a purpose, ambitions, and was willing to fight it like a man.
While my friends are getting their dream jobs and getting married, and making half a million a year. The very friends who were in the same school and college as me and equally smart. I on the other hand lost all the beautiful pleasures in life. My goals and dreams seem so far away. I can barely enjoy simple things like video games/movies or a sunset. I became emotionally dull. When I go on long hikes in the cold knowing how happy it used to make me, I feel absolutely numb and empty. When I meet a pretty girl, I feel like I’m looking at a cardboard box and want nothing to do with her, even though deep down I know that isn’t the true me, and I would love to get that Spark back. I miss important deadlines, my brain is mush and I’m running out of time to find a job to avoid getting deported. My mind is so foggy that I can’t hold a conversation or read a sentence and understand it. I used to approach people, network aggressively that led me to getting high paying internship offers in the past. I lost an opportunity that would have paid 200k as a starting salary due to this condition.
I have completely lost the sense of time, the 2 years feel more like 3 months and life is just passing by. I have forgotten what it means to be in love, have a libido or have empathy towards the people you care for. My rude behavior has driven many people away from me, thinking that I’m just horrible and arrogant. And the most alarming part, I seem to be fine with it. Because again, I feel EMPTY INSIDE.
I am now a 27 year old guy who quit SSRIs 2 years ago and still haven’t lost hope. It would take a lot more than this temporary hiccup in my life to lose my ambition, and to completely give up on my dreams. Something that I worked truly hard for, went through a lot of crap and failures only to finally pull it off and end up exactly where I wanted to be, here in America. And I won’t let one stupid pill take that away from me. Not on my watch. I’m willing to resort to anything at this point. When the world doesn’t treat you fairly, you’re under no obligation to follow your morals. It would only hurt you. It’s in your best interest to be ruthless and selfish too. Because when you finally get what you want, the end would justify the means, and the world will once again give you the respect that you deserve.
This experience further strengthens my belief that there is no god. And if god exists, he better not show up in front of me because I’ll shoot him in the fucking head.
I once had a very tight friend circle, have a loving family, and received the best childhood and education anyone can wish for. I know what I’m capable of, and what I have achieved in the past, and the life I have envisioned for myself here in New York. So I believe in myself that I can make it happen if I play my cards right. So I’m not going to let this ruin it all for me. My family has already done way too much for me to make sure I achieve all the dreams I had for myself. I can’t ask for anything more.
I used to be a straight A’s student, and played a sport I was truly passionate about at the county level until the age of 17. Ofcourse, I still faced a lot of failures. I’d sometimes fail to get a good GPA, or get rejected by the girl I really liked. But what kept me going was hope. I oozed optimism because of the hope that everything will turn out fine with time. I took all my failures in a positive stride and lived everyday with a drive to improve myself.
As a birthday present for myself, I decided to seek help in 2019. In a blink of an eye, I lost all my motivation, drive and ambition instantly. I started missing deadlines, my grades dropped due to the brain fog, memory issues and no motivation to study. I stopped going to the gym and never got out of my bed. Last month, I was told that my dog passed away, and I was half way across the globe and couldn’t meet him for one last time. That’s when the world collapsed around me. What followed was months long bout of sense of doom, despair and darkness. But shockingly, given the excruciating pain that I was suffering at that point, I just couldn’t physically cry. I briefly did when I got the news, and then absolutely nothing brought tears in my eyes. I didn’t even know that it’s possible not to cry even when you reach the worst point of your life and the grief is killing you inside. Because you’re truly dead inside. All of this just because I wanted to seek help.
All I can say is, please for the love of god, don’t keep suffering in silence. I know I did. Nobody to this very day knows what kind of hell we have been going through. Nobody thinks there’s anything wrong because on the outside, we all look absolutely healthy. Do not lose hope, PSSD might have snatched away all our feelings but we won’t let it snatch away our optimism.

I have been researching for the past several months and I’d love to start a commune or intentional community in Cali. I was thinking of imperial county because land is relatively cheap but I’m open to other areas of collaborates have access. My vision is a mixed community that is not completely isolated economically from the outside world but everyone doesn’t have to work jobs outside the commune. I’d love to talk with some like minded people and really flesh out the strategy to get this off the floor I want to be in my 30s finishing school with my commune life not far out of reach. If you feel similar message me I’m looking for about 250people so space is available and all support helps

I understand I need to apply to 3 jobs a week(per my county's reqs)and create a log, but what's confusing is do I not have to submit any such logs unless I'm questioned by some authority in the matter? It just seems like a pretty big honor system, lol. And if thats the case, when I do submit a log, do I give them the entire list or will they merely ask for a time window?
And based on some other posts, it's looking like I can use sites like indeed. Just for clarification, is this true?
Thanks in advance. I'm probably just over thinking, but I've been on this for a few weeks now and every bit of info on the official site is just taking me in loops and not answering things clearly.

Company Name	Title	City
HELIX Environmental Planning, Inc	As-Needed Biologist	San Diego
Kaiser	Sp Unit Staff RN - DOU	San Diego
REACH Medical Holdings	Helicopter Pilot (SPIFR) HAA	San Diego
San Diego Imperial Counties Developmental Services, Inc.	Service Coordinator	San Diego
United States Secret Service	Officer (Uniformed Division)	San Diego

Hey guys, here are some recent job openings in san diego. Feel free to comment here or send me a private message if you have any questions, I'm at the community's disposal! If you encounter any problems with any of these job openings please let me know that I will modify the table accordingly. Thanks!

The transit line will connect people to several colleges and high schools, 120,000 jobs, seven medical facilities and things like Bucks games, the county zoo and Summerfest.
https://www.tmj4.com/news/local-news/connect-1-transit-line-helps-to-increase-accessibility-and-connect-milwaukee-county
Credit: Sarah McGrew

Company Name	Title	City
HELIX Environmental Planning, Inc	As-Needed Biologist	San Diego
Kaiser	Sp Unit Staff RN - DOU	San Diego
REACH Medical Holdings	Helicopter Pilot (SPIFR) HAA	San Diego
San Diego Imperial Counties Developmental Services, Inc.	Service Coordinator	San Diego
United States Secret Service	Officer (Uniformed Division)	San Diego

Hey guys, here are some recent job openings in san diego. Feel free to comment here or send me a private message if you have any questions, I'm at the community's disposal! If you encounter any problems with any of these job openings please let me know that I will modify the table accordingly. Thanks!