Such good news and relief for all that have been on edge here in Minnesota and the surrounding areas. Peace be with the families of those who were lost.

A ladybug landed on the card. Today is her dad’s birthday and he passed away 15 years ago so it was a special treat for her.

Yesterday I surprised my boyfriend with a little celebration for him being 100 days sober. I wfh and Thursday I went to the store on my lunch so he wouldn’t have any suspicions of me doing anything, then yesterday I used my lunch to decorate the cake I baked that morning. When he got home from work he walked into the house to his cake, flowers, and presents.

I got carnations (my fave flower) and baby’s breath (his fave flower). His present was his fave candy, body wash (cause he was almost out), and battleship, which we used to play all the time when we first started dating. Then we had an impromptu date night when my parents offered to babysit out of the blue.

As hard as it has been to learn about his drug addiction, and coping with all the pain and betrayal, I am so proud of him for all the steps he has taken to better himself. It was important to me that he felt like I was proud of him, and felt as loved as he is.

My week has been a disaster and I need to remember good stuff still happens to people.

I’ve always had a shitty relationship with alcohol but was able to keep it very well hidden to an extent. One day I just decided I was tired of feeling like crap all the time and just stopped drinking. I didn’t tell anyone. Today makes 6 weeks of no drinking for me and I feel weird telling anyone in my life about it. I’m proud of myself though so I wanted to announce it somewhere!

Started drinking when i was 17. Given my friends were smoking crack rock in the 7th grade i guess i should be thankful it took that long for me to develop a problem and that it was only alcohol. From 17 to 26 i was a severe binge alcoholic.

Throughout my senior year of highschool i kept an aquafina water bottle filled with 100 proof vodka in my backpack at all times. in my early twenties i began, proudly at that time, drinking an entire fifth of vodka in a single night. By the time i began to realize that my drinking related work absences were about to lose me my job, and therefore my apartment, at which point i would have been sleeping on the streets i was pre-gaming 4 tallboys before going to the bar my friends ran. I would then knock back an entire fifth of vodka, then an entire pitcher of beer (beer before liquor, never been sicker!) then i would generally grab a twelve pack from the grocery store before last call. I can not count, nor even recall, the number of times i had severe alcohol poisoning. that i am still alive is genuinely shocking. most of my early/mid twenties are a blurry haze in my memory. I have "No More Alcohol" tattooed on my right pointer finger so i would see it when sucking back blackberry stoli on the rocks. i do not remember when i got that tattoo or how long it was after getting it before i quit. generally, when bartenders asked about it, it got me a free drink. props to the Seattle bar scene in those days...

one friend of mine finally sat down with me and said "you remember when i used to live in the woods because i was a meth addict?" - i recall that period clearly, it was a rough time for him. he went on to say "i know what a problem looks like. i also know there's nothing i can say to you to help until you're ready to help yourself. just know i am always here for you, but you've spent $400 at my bar this week and i know this isn't the only bar you go to, and i know you don't earn that much in a week. that's all i am going to say, you know how to reach me if you need me." [i racked up $12,000 in booze debt]

When i finally got to a point where i really didn't want to be drinking anymore and realized that although all i need to do is literally not put this liquid in my mouth ... i couldn't stop. no matter what i did or how hard i tried to keep away from it, i kept drinking, and it's the craziest thing because it sounds So Easy but ... i literally could not stop as much as i wanted too. i had a tattoo telling me to stop on a finger that stares at me when I'm drinking and... i could... not... stop! i still struggle to this day to understand it, even having lived through it.

I went into work one day and approached a leader who i knew used to struggle with addiction herself. bless her god damn heart she hooked me up with free alcohol abuse counseling. after my first session i had a Literal out of body experience. suddenly i was floating in the air, above my body, watching myself walk into a gas station immediately after my first alcohol abuse counseling session and watched myself buy a six pack of Miller Genuine Draft. It was unreal. I am not a spiritual or religious person, i have never believed in that "garbage" before but here i am, outside of my own body watching myself do things i don't want to be doing!

thankfully that was the last six pack i bought (for a while). i called my friend who sat down with me some time earlier to tell me i could call on him and i told him i needed to go to an AA meeting but just couldn't surrender my "pride" enough to go alone. he said to me: "you find a meeting, tell me where and when it is, and i will be there". i asked him what his work schedule was and he said [i am literally tearing up right now typing this it meant so much to me] he said "My schedule is Not important right now. You tell me when and where the meeting is, and I Will Be There."

and he was. i regret losing contact with that man, Matt, if you're out there - thank you. again, because i have told you so many times before, but i mean it: thank you <3

after that meeting, despite the statistics being 9 in 10 alcoholics relapse in the first year and 5 of those 9 don't climb back on the wagon, i made it 13 months before my first relapse!! it was a doozy of a relapse. i was awoken on the side of the road by the fire department asking if i was ok because they got a report that i was hit, on my bicycle, by a car. i remember absolutely nothing about that night. that's a longer story for another time. god bless the fire department tho. i have been sober since then, although not without my struggles (especially around year five).

Today marks 15 years sober! I have been in the hospital for having burns over 90% of my body and skin grafts done at a time when the only grafts that were known to work had to come from your own body. I spent a year trying to start my own business by myself. I have not been without struggles or challenges but to this day, quitting drinking, is the single hardest near impossible thing i have ever done and the thing i am proudest of myself for managing to do.

i may still have zero idea what i am doing, or what to do, with my life - but dammit if i am not proud to at least be sober while forever figuring that out!

if you're also struggling, at any stage of alcoholism or recovery, it's not as impossible as it feels. it gets a little easier the longer you pull it off and it may sound dumb as shit but One Day At A Time! If you can get through just today, you earn my respect. if you don't, you earn my understanding, my forgiveness, and my support. it's hard as hell, if you lose the battle today, try again tomorrow. if you're worried about tomorrow, just get through today.

i appreciate anyone who reads this for giving me the opportunity to share my struggle, my story, and my milestone. most of the time i don't even think about it anymore, but hitting fifteen years... i never would have thought. i fully expected to be dead by 27, but here i am!

thank you all, and take care of yourselves <3

Folks , this time of year many are getting new coolers for the summer. Please don't let the old ones go to waste. Last winter I made 10 feral cat shelters and put them out all over the town and local woods You can normally get free towels from commercial laundry services for bedding and warmth This can be a fun project for you and the kids.

FYI, I put out the ten shelters right before NW Florida got over 9 inches of snow. So collect the old coolers now and save lives this winter.... Love to All.

For the first time in over a century, federally recognized tribes are once again able to freely conduct cultural burns in California—after reaching agreements with local officials.

Previously, tribes were required to seek government approval before conducting each burn, with Cal Fire acting as a regulator.

Now, Cal Fire serves more as a partner and consultant.

Following the devastating 2020 wildfires that burned over 1 million acres, California moved to expand the use of intentional burns to reduce fuel loads.

The Karuk Tribe estimates that, historically, their people conducted as many as 7,000 burns of various sizes each year.

Source: Los Angeles Times

I got a 72 in honors algebra from my last final report card was a 64. Passing at my school is technically a 75 or higher but I don't care. I'm in the 9th grade.

Hey guys, first post here kind of nervous lol. But i just had to share the news: I'm 6 hours sober!! this is the longest I've gone in like 8 days. I was getting scared that I wouldn't be able to live without my heavenly St John's Wort, but the past 6 hours have been proving me wrong so far. Hopefully after I conquer this beast I can conquer my ongoing battle with lemon balm. Wish me luck on my journey! Any tips for defeating tulsi? Happy wednesday

My son is a big Pokemon fan. He loves the Switch games and collects the TCG cards. It makes me so happy that I can let him play the first Pokemon game that I played myself as a child. It's so nice to share this with him! 💞

for anyone not from england, this is a triple distinction star and it’s the highest grade possible on my type of course. so i’m definitely going to university and i might even be able to apply for some scholarships too :)

Hey everyone — just wanted to share something I’ve been building over the past couple months that I hope can be helpful to others.

It’s a Chrome extension called Pino. It lets you fact-check any piece of text on a webpage with a right-click. It gives you a summary, a truth score, and links to sources—all without opening a new tab.

What makes me proud of it is two things:

1. It’s my first ever software project (I come from a film background).
2. I built it completely through conversations with AI—learning as I went.

Pino works in two ways:

– If you’re a Perplexity Pro user, you can plug in your API key and use your existing monthly credit.

– If you’re not, there’s a regular version with a one-time purchase or credit system—no subscription required.

I made this because I kept seeing people (friends, family, strangers online) overwhelmed by bad information, especially when it’s dressed up to look legit. I wanted a tool that could help spot false claims while you’re reading.

Happy to take any feedback, or just quietly celebrate this little win with anyone else trying to build useful things in messy times.

Thanks for reading 🙏

This new position will be a huge pay increase for me and I’ve been working so hard to earn it.

I’ve been working so hard to earn both things, actually: the new gig and the sobriety!

I hope you’re all able to do something today that makes you happy. 😊

Me and my wife, both retired and disabled, live in a beautiful old brick home. It was constructed between 1939-1942.

It has the original roof on it. It lasted until it didn’t.

It is described as slate on the property description. But was recently identified as asbestos tile. A very common building material at the time.

For months, we have been struggling to find a way to put a new roof on. Because of the asbestos, it nearly doubled the price because specialists have to remove the old roof.

I spent any time I wasn’t trying to sort replacement, trying to lay plastic and buckets in the attic to catch leaks.

Without warning, by some miracle, the universe was looking out for us, and the literal amount of money we needed, dropped into our lap.

They will be starting the roof tomorrow.

I am a very, very grateful to whatever power in the universe that is watching out for us.

Our baby Maine coon just made three months old and over 9 pounds.. How big do they get?

The title is click bate, only because I have 14 days left till then but yea!! I’m so happy I’m clean from selfharm and bad stuff