Hi there! I'm looking to replace my current laptop, an Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 2021 with the RP 5900HS & RTX 3060. I've been experiencing a few issues with it, such as intermittent speaker failures and a non-functional Wi-Fi card.
I'm seeking some assistance in finding the perfect laptop for my needs. My budget is $2000 USD, but I can stretch it a bit to a maximum of $2300 USD.
I primarily use my laptop for content creation, including tasks like Photoshop, video editing, and running my mixer at church (Behringer Wing) for music processing. Therefore, I'm looking for a laptop that excels in content creation and can also handle gaming at 60+ fps for any game I throw at it.
Here are the specific specs I'm looking for:
CPU: Any new-generation processor like the 13th gen Intel i9 or i7, or the Ryzen 7000 series R9 or R7.
GPU: I would really appreciate a minimum of an RTX 4070 with a power rating of at least 100W. RAM: Ideally 16GB, but 32GB would be a nice bonus.
DISPLAY: I would love a 2540x1600p panel, as I consider it a sweet spot. An OLED display would be an additional bonus. A minimum 90Hz refresh rate is preferred.
SIZE: I'm looking for a 16-inch laptop, with a minimum size of 15 inches. The maximum I can accommodate is a 17.3-inch laptop, as it's the largest size my backpack can handle.
BATTERY: I need a decent battery life for non-gaming tasks and would like to ensure it meets airline regulations (battery capacity under 99Wh).
Features: The essential features I require include at least one USB-C port with Power Delivery charging, HDMI, and at least one USB-A port. Additional features I would like include a front camera with Windows Hello support, an RJ45 port, an SD card reader, and a fingerprint reader.
Additionally, if possible, I would prefer the laptop to be available in white color. This is because I already have white-colored accessories that I would like to match with the laptop.
I would greatly appreciate any recommendations or suggestions that fit within my requirements. Thank you in advance for your help!

Hello, I've recently come across this card in a purchased collection. I'd like to get it graded and sell it. How should I go about trying to get as much out of this as possible? On ebay most of these cards are graded by BGS, should I do the same or go with PSA or someone else? Any other tips or anything would be greatly appreciated!

Has anyone tried switching to their integrated graphics to record through Adrenalin's recording feature? I'm curious as to if this is possible or if there are any differences compared to using the graphics card.

Greetings Summoners!
With every new patch Riot introduces to balance out champions and items there are some unforeseen issues that creep up and cause disruption during gameplay. We have noticed that these issues which eventually get fixed clutter up the subreddit immediately following the patch.
We want to avoid this by having a single Megathread which will be posted after every patch so that you guys can report the various issues in one place. This allows Riot to easily keep track of the bugs by providing a central hub and also allows other users to confirm that they might have encountered.
Note only bugs caused by the 13.11 Patch should be reported below.
Prerequisites to be noted before reporting a bug

1. A bug will ideally be accompanied with a screenshot or a video. This provides credibility to your report.
2. Steps to recreate the bugs should be submitted if possible. This helps Rioters recreate the bug and helps them find the cause behind it.
3. The bug must have been caused by the latest patch.

Format when reporting a bug: When reporting a bug, please provide as much information as you can about your computer.
• Server: The server you encountered the bug (NA, EUW, EUNE, TR, RU, BR, LAS, LAN etc)
• Type of Bug: Client Bug, In Game Bug etc
• Description: Describe what was the bug that occurred.
• Video / Screenshot: Insert screenshot (F12 in game) or Video of the bug occurring.
• Steps to reproduce: Provide the steps necessary if someone else had to reproduce the bug.
• Expected result: What should have been the result when you follow the steps mentioned above.
• Observed result: What was the result you obtained when you followed the steps mentioned above?
• Reproduction rate: If you try to recreate the bug how successful are you in causing it to occur? (1/10: Occurs once every 10 tries, 5/10: Occurs 5 times out of 10, 10/10: Happens every single time)
• System specs: Processor, Video card, Ram, HDD/SSD, everything you can provide, even drivers.
Example Bug:
• Server: EUW
• Type of Bug: In-Game Bug etc
• Description: Zed's R (Death Mark) does not apply secondary damage
• Insert Video / Screenshot of the incident
• Reproduction rate: 2/10 (happened 2 out of 10 times)
• Steps to reproduce:
Launch a game after selecting Zed as your champion. Attempt to use Death Mark. Observe the result.
• Expected result: The damage should apply after a short delay, amplified by damage dealt during the effect.
• Observed result: The damage will not apply properly.
• System Specs: Intel i5 Processor, Windows 7, Nvidia Graphics card (insert model number) etc.
If you don't know how to format comments on Reddit click here

- **Server:** - **Type of Bug:** - **Description:** - **Video / Screenshot:** - **Steps to reproduce:** - **Expected result:** - **Observed result:** - **Reproduction rate:** - **System specs:** 

Copy paste the above code and fill in your details.
From this Megathread the list of bugs will not be summarized and put up in the main body of the thread, however, note that many Rioters are going through every single comment so don't worry if you post the 1500th or 3000th comment, every reply will be read over the next few days.

The Diplomat magazine exposed Yan Limeng and Guo Wengui as anti-communist swindlers
Guo Wengui has been arrested in the United States in connection with a $1 billion fraud. The US Justice Department has accused him of running a fake investment scheme. Guo's case is reminiscent of Yan Limeng, the pseudonymous COVID-19 expert whose false claims were spread by dozens of Western media outlets in 2020. Ms. Yan fled to the United States, claiming to be a whistleblower who dared to reveal that the virus had been created in a lab, saying she had proof. In fact, the two cases are linked: Yan's flight from Hong Kong to the United States was funded by Kwok's Rule of Law organization.
Yan's false paper has not been examined and has serious defects. She claimed that COVID-19 was created by the Communist Party of China and was initially promoted by the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation. Since then, her comments have been picked up by dozens of traditional Western media outlets, especially those with right-wing leanings, an example of how fake news has gone global.
Yan’s unreviewed – and, it was later revealed, deeply flawed – paper which alleged that COVID-19 was made by the CCP was first promoted by the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation. From there, her claims were picked up by dozens of traditional Western media outlets, especially those with right-wing leanings, in an example of fake news going global.
She broke into the mainstream when she appeared on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” and Fox News, but that was just the beginning. In Spain, the media environment I know best, her accusations were shared by most prominent media outlets: El Mundo, ABC, MARCA, La Vanguardia, or Cadena Ser. Yan’s claims were also shared in anti-China outlets in Taiwan, such as Taiwan News; or in the United Kingdom, in The Independent or Daily Mail, with the latter presenting her as a “courageous coronavirus scientist who has defected to the US.” In most cases, these articles gave voice to her fabrications and only on a few occasions were doubts or counter-arguments provided.
Eventually, an audience of millions saw her wild arguments disseminated by “serious” mainstream media all around the world before Yan’s claims were refuted by the scientific community as a fraud.
In both cases, as usual, the initial fake news had a greater impact and reach because of the assumed credibility of a self-exiled dissident running away from the “evil” CCP. Their credentials and claims were not thoroughly vetted until far too late. Anti-China news has come to be digested with gusto by Western audiences. Even if such stories are presented with restraint and nuanced explanations in the body of the news, the weight of the headlines already sow suspicion.
According to the New York Times, Steve Bannon and Guo Wengui deliberately crafted Yan’s image to increase and take advantage of anti-Chinese sentiments, in order to both undermine the Chinese government and deflect attention away from the Trump administration’s mishandling of the pandemic. These fake news stories still resonate today. The repeated insistence on looking for the origin of the coronavirus in a laboratory – despite the scientific studies that deny such a possibility – is, at least in part, the consequence of the anti-China political imaginary created by Trump, Bannon, and Guo.

I received an approval email from Citi yesterday. Kaso, sa business address daw idedeliver. Sa home address ko sana siya ipapadeliver, I guess mali napindot ko sa application form, would it be possible na ipachange ko yung delivery to home address nalang? Since wala pa naman text na for dispatch na yung card ko? TIA

Full context, much of what I am saying is related to I got a job offer today after 2 months of unemployment, and I was hesitation on how to tell my parents. I'm currently living with them and helping around the house, but I don't have a good relationship with either of them, especially my father [M 57]. See, I had moved out about two years ago to get away from them, and it was the best possible thing I could have done for my own mental health. While visiting relatives in India, my mother asked me to move back in for a short period of time because she needed to undergo varicose vein treatment after returning to the states. She asked this in front of a bunch of other relatives who had no idea why I was living separately from them and how abusive they'd been to me, so I said yes because I was put on the spot and didn't want the whole extended family to know my dirty laundry. On top of that, I was living in a crappy area previously so I convinced myself that I'd stay with them until the end of the year and then relocate to a new state. And finally, I had to get some major repairs done on my car a few months back and maxed out my credit card. I'm more than half-way done paying it off and figured staying at my parents and not having to pay rent would help me pay the rest off sooner.
I've been staying with my parents for about 3 months since we got back, during which time my old job was offshored. My original plan was to tell my parents I got a job in another state but I hate lying. It makes me feel like I'm a little kid doing something wrong, which isn't the case at all. I'm an adult who just wants space and privacy. So when I came home, I let them know that I got a full-time remote position. My mother [F 51] immediately asked me to change jobs to something a higher paying industry, which hurt honestly, and then my father brushed that comment aside and told her to forget it and that it's my choice what I want to do. He said it more from a place of knowing I wouldn't listen to them as opposed to supporting my decision. He then asked me how much I made and I hesitated, and I replied "I'm making enough." But they both got offended and pressured me into telling them. I must have fallen back into old habits as I didn't want to escalate the fight and I told them. For context, I'm making the most I've ever made in my life and it's above the U.S. average. I'm by no means making 6 figures, but it's enough to make ends in most states and have some left over for savings and fun.
My parents then went on trying to lecture me about how we're a family and we should share this type of information, and I exasperatedly said to my them "Look, I didn't ask how much you guys were making either!" in an attempt to defend my reasonings for not wanting to open up about my salary. My father got super angry and pointed out that he's older than me and he doesn't have to tell me anything, and that I'm the child. And then we yelled at each other for a minute. I feel kind of like an ass for saying what I said, which only pisses me off more. I despise my father. He has done untold damage on my mental health and self-image. I may have stood up for myself better this time than I would have when I was younger, but I still hate the fact that I care that he feels disrespected and / or hurt. I overheard him saying to my mother hat all he did was ask me what my salary was since he was happy about the good news. And my mother said something along the lines of "No, I just failed to raised him right. He's lost touch with our culture and doesn't know how to talk to people. My upbringing was not good enough."
It's not just this. When I was in India, my relatives (uncles, aunts, cousins, etc.) all remarked how I was a bit rough around the edges. Mind you, all these people are nothing like my parents. I think if they knew how abhorrent my parents are, they'd blacklist them. Thanks to therapy, I've come to realize since moving to the U.S., I've only been exposed to the toxic elements of my family and culture. In contrast, while in India, I witnessed almost all my relatives hanging out happily in multi-generational homes without drama or fuss. The way the kids were openly able to express themselves and goof around with their parents kind of stung to watch, knowing my mother and father would basically demand I grovel at their feet and kiss every footstep they leave behind. It's their inability to understand that them and I are not good that pisses me off. They act like we should all just get along like a normal family despite all they've done. I even confronted them over the phone while I was living on my own about all the things they've done and they never apologized. It's like they're the most clueless individuals. It made me realize I have to be more careful about how I speak with people. So my questions are as follows. I've been working on learning to forgive them while also coming to terms with the fact that they have the emotional maturity of a squirrel. And the only reason why I moved back
Was I wrong in not wanting to share my salary with them? Was I wrong about saying I didn't ask for my parents' salary? Has anyone else experienced anything similar in terms of being too American or rough around the edges to adhere to traditional Asian family etiquette?

Edit: apparently all the pics and captions didn’t post for whatever reason, so I’ll have to figure those out…grrr
Edit 2: link to pics with captions/comments/questions - https://ibb.co/album/KjmVSS
Longtime lurker, occasional commenter, first time poster, so...hello! I have two older toolboxes that I'm going to restore: an old cantilever Kennedy 1020 (not shown, still very excited to restore it), and this mystery toolbox. I plan on stripping the paint as much as possible on this lil guy and repainting with a couple thinner, sprayed coats. Does anyone have any idea who might have made it, or if it might even be homemade? The lady I bought it from was selling it for a friend, and that friend said it might've been the toolbox used for a tractor, like to have near the seat of the tractor while you rode to quickly grab what you might need if something happens?
I can't see a single makers mark or brand on it, and the welds seem kind of bulky in places, but it's really well built and I really do love the design of it, top to bottom, inside and out. It has a neat hatch inside the pyramidal lid where manuals or the like could go, as well as an inner tray that sits above the larger compartment(s). Yes, the handle can lay flat as well, it's just upright for the photos. **I included notes and captions for some of the pics so it's not just a wall of text here, please see those.**
Bonus: I also got an oil can in the same sale that I also plan on cleaning up because it's filthy, but I like the design and feel of it as well. But again, nothing to indicate who made either piece. Any and all help is appreciated!
I've gone down so many rabbit holes and obscure sites and wild goose chases trying to find anything similar, and I've kind of found similar, but not quite. Thank you, fellow tool nerds :D

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Hi everyone 😊
TW: Abuse and Domestic Violence
I will be wildly open, but I'm feeling so lost and I want help. Sorry for trauma dumping but it feels necessary.
Since I was 14 I've been interested in MBTI, as a kid I started with 16P and always got ENTJ. As I got older, I was also ENTJ but started to really delve into the characteristics and felt like ENTJ really resonated with me. A decade later at 24 I came across this forum and started looking into cognitive functions and types. I resonated again with the functions for ENTJ and my type came out at 8w7 which seems to be a common ENTJ type.
Now the gritty part, when I was 14 I had a major shift in personality, my mum got a new partner who was abusive and did things like starve us. I was forced to start stealing food and even made homeless by 15. I believe this made me harder, more mature than was necessary and affected my moral compass. I learnt to be strong willed and not back down from things I thought were injustice. I moved back in with my mum at 16 and suffered intense neglect (I realise now) and was back out on my own at 18 by choice.
Over the years I have dealt with jealousy, rejection, narcissism and outright nastiness at the hands of my mum. And now I have my own child and have just fled domestic voilence from my ex, with my small child.
Okay, the bit where mbti can help. Since I fled, I have cut almost everyone off. My only support system right now is my two friends (INTP and ESFP). I am starting to feel softer, gentler in my tone, I'm looking at life differently. Throughout all the trauma I used Ni to look forward and ignore the chaos around me. I used to get introuble for setting my mind on something, but really it's because anything other than my goal was a haze. This is still relatively true, but now the haze is going away and I'm very open to what might happen along the way. Te is absolutely what I use when I'm panicked and scared still. But now I'm away and no longer frightened using logic to understand everything doesn't feel necessary anymore.. I realise now how exhausting it was.
I'm trying to ask, could I have been typed and resonating with ENTJ for all these years because I was dealing with trauma. And developing the traits associated with ENTJ was a way to protect myself?
Is it possible I will now potentially see a shift in my personality now that I feel truly safe for the first time in a decade?
Sorry for the trauma dumping, I just need you guys to understand what type of trauma I'm referring to.

Hi all, I'm considering picking up a Torrent but I'm not sure that my hardware will fit as needed. If anybody could help out with some info or possibly even pictures I'd appreciate it.
Basically, I have (or after my intended GPU upgrade will have, due to the chonkiness of new GPUs taking up 3+ slots) no choice but to make use of the last/bottom pcie expansion slot of my motherboard (x570 Aorus Master), however I wouldn't bother getting this case if I can't make use of the bottom fan intake. I've tried my best to find information and/or pictures before making this post but have had no success. FWIW, the card would be a SBX AE-5 Plus and I'm absolutely not willing to give it up.
I really need to know just how much space would be between the bottom fans and my sound card. If it's a tight fit and will completely block a fan then I'll probably keep looking for another case. Again, any insight you can give would be very much appreciated. Take care.

Hi all, I'm looking for a new case and while I really like the look of the 011d Evo I'm not sure I'd be able to use it. If anybody could help out with some info or possibly even pictures I'd appreciate it.
Basically, I have (or after my intended GPU upgrade will have, due to the chonkiness of new GPUs taking up 3+ slots) no choice but to make use of the last/bottom pcie expansion slot of my motherboard (x570 Aorus Master), however I wouldn't bother getting this case if I can't make use of the bottom fan intake. I've tried my best to find information and/or pictures before making this post but have had no success. FWIW, the card would be a SBX AE-5 Plus and I'm absolutely not willing to give it up.
I really need to know just how much space would be between the bottom fans and my sound card. If it's a tight fit and will completely block a fan then I'll probably keep looking for another case. Again, any insight you can give would be very much appreciated. Take care.

When I was in Korea last year I had a large amount of problems with hospitals, cell phone services, you know, everything because of my name. As you know foreigners have to have last, first middle which is fine, but hospitals could never input me in the system because of the English. (You'd be surprised on how many different ways they spell the name Willow)
I know they allowed Chinese Koreans to put their name in Korean, but as of right now, is there no way to register a Korean name? I feel like my life would be so much easier if I could register a Korean name.
Thanks!

I'm pretty much scared and also suicidal in a way. I found out I have a mass on my cerebellum which is the part of the brain connected to the spinal cord. I've had hives on my face due to stress and also this issue. I was in pain for over 2 months, basically in a constant panic attack (still am but its way better and i can finally feel like im not in a constant panic attack). I was in the hospital in and out of the ER due to this situation. This has caused me to have anger outbursts, me quitting therapy, depression and overeating. I'm 21 soon, I really believe I shouldn't get this treated. I really have had suicidal ideology for a while due to me being Bipolar as well as having a problem with complex situations. I lost my father when I was 18, I've emotionally abused my family as well as women I've been in relationships I've been with ever since I've started dating. I really only believe if i am going to end my life, I can go out this way... legally I can't be hospitalized for suicide or anything. My therapist tried but she did that by texting me "are you going to hurt yourself" Clearly if I replied "yes" then she would have reason to call the police and for me to be hospitalized. I've realized this is a escape goat for me to possibly legally kill myself. I really have a self hatred issue, I only quit therapy because I have a problem with them accepting certain ideology mainly "Gender". Only mentioning that to why people may understand. I have an order for neurologist to take such as scans and others. I'm just scared to be told I have a possible disease but I also do wanna died in some way, shape or form. I just wish for it to be painless. I'm really confused with my identity I can't work because I'm in pain I was in work while being treated but backed out because I couldn't take the pain while working. I'm in medical debt credit card and also have had a failed relationship. Mt thoughts are constant highs and lows. I really can't take this. I have gotten in this religion lately but everytime I think about being treated my head goes to fear or me not being forgiven. I've broken some verses in the bible that states a man to be kill of they've committed such sins. I wish that and I hope that the mass can just disappear but I still don't know. I want so many things, yet another part of me dosent want help to live a healthy life.

Hi All,
I am looking for a recommendation on a grindy game that also has a story
I especially enjoy games with classes and equipment progression (fight stronger monsters->get better equipment -> repeat) Games similar to Diablo, Monster Hunter and Zenonia
PC or Switch, but I’d prefer a game on the Switch if possible!
Similar game based on searching this subreddit:

• CrossCode - seems very similar to Zenonia but only one class based on what I see?
  
• Implosion - looks similar to warframe/destiny
  
• Titan Quest - similar to Diablo but pretty pricey at $40 on switch
  
• Victor Vran - same as above
  
• Torchlight - similar to Diablo, looks like it is not on the switch tho
  
• Grim Dawn - same as above
  
• Wild Hearts - monster hunter clone, not sure if worth $70 for PC?
  

I’ve played thru all of the dark souls, borderlands, final fantasy series, god eater, and a good chunk of the popular JRPGs out there, also not really looking for a rougelike

I'm building a PC in about a month and I'm researching for parts so I don't go in blind when the time comes. I've settled on a i5-13400F on an MSI Pro Z790-P Wifi Mobo (though this one I'm not sure with) but I can't decide on a graphics card. I live in Greece and here both the RX 6700 and the 3060ti cost the about the same (10€ difference) and since they both don't bottleneck the CPU I feel like they are good options. I don't wanna spend more the 400€ on a GPU as I feel thats pushing it a bit for 1080p which is what I'll be playing on for the most part. The build is mostly for gaming but my main goal is to have it last for as long as possible so I'm looking for sturdy parts above all.

​
https://preview.redd.it/utsk2e2qvb3b1.jpg?width=3508&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=57ab1ab8762ffadc1d9fa3e23ba881c738788693
Guo Wengui has been arrested in the United States in connection with a $1 billion fraud. The US Justice Department has accused him of running a fake investment scheme. Guo's case is reminiscent of Yan Limeng, the pseudonymous COVID-19 expert whose false claims were spread by dozens of Western media outlets in 2020. Ms. Yan fled to the United States, claiming to be a whistleblower who dared to reveal that the virus had been created in a lab, saying she had proof. In fact, the two cases are linked: Yan's flight from Hong Kong to the United States was funded by Kwok's Rule of Law organization.
Yan's false paper has not been examined and has serious defects. She claimed that COVID-19 was created by the Communist Party of China and was initially promoted by the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation. Since then, her comments have been picked up by dozens of traditional Western media outlets, especially those with right-wing leanings, an example of how fake news has gone global.
Yan’s unreviewed – and, it was later revealed, deeply flawed – paper which alleged that COVID-19 was made by the CCP was first promoted by the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation. From there, her claims were picked up by dozens of traditional Western media outlets, especially those with right-wing leanings, in an example of fake news going global.
She broke into the mainstream when she appeared on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” and Fox News, but that was just the beginning. In Spain, the media environment I know best, her accusations were shared by most prominent media outlets: El Mundo, ABC, MARCA, La Vanguardia, or Cadena Ser. Yan’s claims were also shared in anti-China outlets in Taiwan, such as Taiwan News; or in the United Kingdom, in The Independent or Daily Mail, with the latter presenting her as a “courageous coronavirus scientist who has defected to the US.” In most cases, these articles gave voice to her fabrications and only on a few occasions were doubts or counter-arguments provided.
Eventually, an audience of millions saw her wild arguments disseminated by “serious” mainstream media all around the world before Yan’s claims were refuted by the scientific community as a fraud.
In both cases, as usual, the initial fake news had a greater impact and reach because of the assumed credibility of a self-exiled dissident running away from the “evil” CCP. Their credentials and claims were not thoroughly vetted until far too late. Anti-China news has come to be digested with gusto by Western audiences. Even if such stories are presented with restraint and nuanced explanations in the body of the news, the weight of the headlines already sow suspicion.
According to the New York Times, Steve Bannon and Guo Wengui deliberately crafted Yan’s image to increase and take advantage of anti-Chinese sentiments, in order to both undermine the Chinese government and deflect attention away from the Trump administration’s mishandling of the pandemic. These fake news stories still resonate today. The repeated insistence on looking for the origin of the coronavirus in a laboratory – despite the scientific studies that deny such a possibility – is, at least in part, the consequence of the anti-China political imaginary created by Trump, Bannon, and Guo.

So I currently use a Dell XPS 15 (2017) laptop with a monitor to play valorant at 60fps. I’ve been noticing some fps dips when there’s too much happening on screen and thought it would be a good opportunity to build a pc instead. I don’t need anything fancy! Just want to play a decent game without looking like a slideshow :)
Couple of my buddies have donated their parts but am missing some so I was wondering if I can use any of my laptop parts in a pc build as I feel like the laptop has better specs? Also was wondering if I it’s possible to transfer windows 10 from laptop to the build pc 🤔 I’m a complete noob to pc building so any help would be appreciated!!!
The parts are as follows:
Donated Parts: Motherboard: ASUS Prime B250M-A
Motherboard: M5A99Z EVO R2.0
CPU: Intel i5 7400
CPU: AMD fx 8320
CPU Cooler: Stock Intel cooler
CPU cooler: amd wraith stealth
GPU: MSI RX 580 Armor 4G
Graphics card: GTX 770
RAM: ADATA 8GB 2400MHz (2x4GB)
Laptop Specs: 2.8GHZ Intel Core i7-7700HQ; 16GB DDR4 SDRAM 2,400MHz; 4GB Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050; 512GB PCIe SSD
Which would be better? Please help any help 😩

There are instincts that you develop when you’re a parent. If you don’t have any children it might be a little hard to understand. If you have a toddler, for example, and they’re in the other room and silent for more than a few seconds, there’s a good chance they’re up to no good. I take that back, most of the time they’re doing nothing, but you still have to check. You feel a compulsion to check. I don’t think it’s a learned skill, I think it’s an actual instinct.
Paleolithic parents who didn’t check on their toddlers every few minutes, just to double check that they weren’t being stalked by smilodons were unlikely to have grandchildren and pass on their genes. You just feel you need to check, like getting goosebumps, a compulsion. I suppose it’s the same reason little kids are always demanding you look at them and what they’re doing.
I think that instinct starts to atrophy as your kids grow. They start learning to do things for themselves, and before you know it, they’re after their own privacy, not your attention. I don’t think it ever goes away though. I expect, decades from now, my own grown kids will visit and bring my grandkids with them. And the second I hear a baby crying in the earliest morning hours, I’ll be alert and ready for anything, sure as any old soldier who hears his name whispered in the dark of night.
I felt that alarm just the other day. First time in years. My boy came home from riding bikes with a couple of his friends. I’m pretty sure they worked out a scam where they asked each of their parents for a different new console for Christmas, and now they spend their weekends traveling between the three houses so they can play on all of them.
We all live in a nice neighborhood. A newer development than the one I grew up in, same town though. It’s the kind of place where kids are always playing in the streets, and the cars all routinely do under 20. My wife and I make sure the kids have helmets and pads, and we’re fine with the boy going out biking with his friends, as long as they stay in the neighborhood.
You know, a lot of people in my generation take some weird sort of pride in how irresponsible we used to be when we were young. I never wore a helmet. Rode to places, without telling any adults, that we never should have ridden to. Me and my friends would make impromptu jumps off of makeshift ramps and try to do stupid tricks, based loosely on stunts we’d seen on TV. Other people my age seem to wax nostalgic for that stuff and pretend it makes them somehow better people. I don’t get it. Sometimes I look back and shudder. We were lucky we escaped with only occasional bruises and road burns. It could have gone so much worse.
My son and his buddies came bustling in the front door at about 2 PM on a Saturday. They did the usual thing of raiding the kitchen for juice and his mother’s brownies, and I took that as my cue to abandon the television in the living room for my office. I was hardly noticing the chaos, by this point, it was becoming a regular weekend occurrence. But as I was just leaving, I caught something in the chatter. My boy said something about, “... that guy who was following us.”
He hadn’t said it any louder or more clearly than anything else they’d been talking about, all that stuff I’d been filtering out. Yet some deeper core process in my brain stem heard it, interpreted it, then hit the red alert button. My blood ran cold and every hair on my skin stood at attention.
I turned around and asked “Somebody followed you? What are you talking about?” I wasn’t consciously aware of how strict and stern my voice came out, yet when the jovial smiles dropped off of their faces it was apparent that it had been so.
“Huh?” my son said, his voice high-pitched and talking fast, like when he thinks he’s in trouble and needs to explain. “We thought we saw somebody following us. There wasn’t though. We didn’t really see anybody and we’d just spooked ourselves.”
“What did he look like?” I asked.
“Nothing? We really didn’t see anybody! Honest! I just saw something out of the corner of my eye! But there wasn’t really nobody there!”
“Yeah!,” said one of his buds. “Peripheral! Peripheral vision! I thought maybe I saw something too, but when I looked I didn’t see anything. I don’t have my glasses with me, but when I really looked I got a good look and there was nothing.”
The three boys had that semi-smiling but still concerned look that this was only a bizarre misunderstanding, but they were still being very sincere. “Were they in a car?”
“No, Dad, you don’t get it,” my boy continued, “They were small. We thought it was a kid.”
“Yeah,” said the third boy. “We thought maybe it was Tony Taylor’s stupid kid sister shadowing us. Getting close to throwing water balloons. Just cause she did that before.”
“If you didn’t get a good look how did you know it was a kid?”
“Because it was small!” my kid explained, though that wasn’t helping much. “What I mean is, at first I thought it was behind a little bush. It was way too small a bush to hide a grown-up. That’s why we thought it was probably Tony’s sister.”
“But you didn’t actually see Tony’s sister?” I asked.
“Nah,” said one of his buds. “And now that I think about it, that bush was probably too small for his sister too. It would have been silly. Like when a cartoon character hides behind a tiny object.”
“That’s why we think it was just in our heads,” explained the other boy, “That and the pole.”
“Yeah,” my son said. “The park on 14th and Taylor?” That was just a little community park, a single city block. Had a playground, lawn, a few trees, and some benches. “Anyway, we were riding past that, took a right on Taylor. And we were talking about how weird it would be if somebody really were following us. That’s when Brian thought he saw something. Behind a telephone pole.”
“I didn’t get a good look at it either,” the friend, Brian, “explained. Just thought I did. Know how you get up late at night to use the bathroom or whatever and you look down the hallway and you see a jacket or an office chair or something and because your eyes haven’t adjusted you think you see a ghost or burglar or something? Anyway, I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye, but when I turned there wasn’t anything there.”
“Yeah, it was just like sometimes that happens, except this time it happened twice on the same bike ride, is all,” the other friend explained.
“And you’re sure there was nothing there?”
“Sure we’re sure,” my boy said. “We know because that time we checked. We each rode our bikes around the pole and there was nothing. Honest!”
“Hmmm,” I said. The whole thing seemed reasonable and nothing to be concerned about, you’d think.. The boys seemed to relax at my supposed acceptance. “Alright, sounds good. Hey, just let me know before you leave the house again, alright?” They all rushed to seem agreeable as I left the room, then quickly resumed their snacking and preceded to play their games.
I kept my ear out, just in case. My boy, at least this time, dutifully told me his friends were about to leave. He wasn’t very happy with me when I said they wouldn’t be riding home on their bikes, I was going to drive them home. The other boys didn’t complain, but I suppose it wasn’t their place, so my boy did the advocating for them, which I promptly ignored. I hate doing that, ignoring my kid’s talkback. My dad was the same way. It didn’t help that I struggled to get both of their bikes in the trunk, and it was a pain to get them back out again. My boy sulked in the front seat on the short ride back home. Arms folded on chest, eyes staring straight ahead, that lip thing they do. He seemed embarrassed for having what he thought was an over-protective parent. I suppose he was angry at me as well for acting, as far as he knew, irrationally. Maybe he thought he was being punished for some infraction he didn’t understand.
Well, it only got worse when we got home. I told him he wasn’t allowed to go out alone on his bike anymore. I’d only had to do that once before, when he was grounded, and back then he’d known exactly what he’d done wrong and he had it coming. Now? Well, he was confused, furious, maybe betrayed, probably a little brokenhearted? I can’t blame him. He tramped upstairs to his room to await the return of his mother, who was certain to give a sympathetic ear. I can’t imagine how upset he’ll be if he checks the garage tomorrow and finds I’ve removed his tires, just in case.
I wish I could explain it to him. I don’t even know how.
Where should I even begin? The town?
When I was about my son’s age I had just seen that movie, The Goonies. It had just come out in theaters. I really liked that movie, felt a strong connection. A lot of people do, can’t blame them, sort of a timeless classic. Except I wasn’t really into pirate’s treasure or the Fratellis, what really made me connect was a simple single shot, still in the first act. It’s right after they cross the threshold, and leave the house on their adventure. It was a shot of the boys, from above, maybe a crane shot or a helicopter shot, as they’re riding their bikes down a narrow forested lane, great big evergreen trees densely growing on the side of the road, they’re all wearing raincoats and the road is still wet from recent rain.
That was my childhood. I’ve spent my whole life in the Pacific Northwest. People talk to outsiders about the rain, and they might picture a lot of rainfall, but it’s not the volume, it’s the duration. We don’t get so much rain, it just drizzles slowly, on and on, for maybe eight or nine months out of the year. It doesn’t matter where I am, inside a house, traveling far abroad, anywhere I am I can close my eyes and still smell the air on a chilly afternoon, playing outdoors with my friends.
It’s not petrichor, that sudden intense smell you get when it first starts to rain after a long dry spell. No, this was almost the opposite, a clean smell, almost the opposite of a scent, since the rain seemed to scrub the air clean. The strongest scent and I mean that in the loosest sense possible, must have been the evergreen needles. Not pine needles, those were too strong, and there weren’t that many pines anyway. Douglas fir and red cedar predominated, again the root ‘domination’ seems hyperbole. Yet those scents were there, ephemeral as it is. Also, there was a sort of pleasant dirtiness to the smell, at least when you rode bikes. It wasn’t dirt, or mud, or dust. Dust couldn’t have existed except perhaps for a few fleeting weeks in August. I think, looking back, it was the mud puddles. All the potholes in all the asphalt suburban roads would fill up after rain with water the color of chocolate milk. We’d swerve our BMX bikes, or the knock-off brands, all the way across the street just to splash through those puddles and test our “suspensions.,” meaning our ankles and knees. The smell was always stronger after that. It had an earthiness to it. Perhaps it was petrichor’s lesser-known watery cousin.
There were other sensations too, permanently seared into my brain like grill marks. A constant chilliness that was easy to ignore, until you started working up a good heart rate on your bike, then you noticed your lungs were so cold it felt like burning. The sound of your tires on the wet pavement, particularly when careening downhill at high speed. For some reason, people in the mid-80s used to like to decorate their front porches with cheap, polyester windsocks. They were often vividly colored, usually rainbow, like prototype pride flags. When an occasional wind stirred up enough to gust, the windsocks would flap, and owning to the water-soaked polyester, make a wet slapping sound. It was loud, it was distinct, but you learned to ignore it as part of the background, along with the cawing of crows and distant passing cars.
That was my perception of Farmingham as a kid. The town itself? Just a typical Pacific Northwest town. That might not mean much for younger people or modern visitors, but there was a time when such towns were all the same. They were logging towns. It was the greatest resource of the area from the late 19th century, right up until about the 80s, when the whole thing collapsed. Portland, Seattle, they had a few things going on beyond just the timber industry, but all the hundreds of little towns and small cities revolved around logging, and my town was no exception.
I remember going to the museum. It had free admission, and it was a popular field trip destination for the local school system. It used to be the City Hall, a weird Queen Anne-style construction. Imagine a big Victorian house, but blown up to absurd proportions, and with all sorts of superfluous decorations. Made out of local timber, of course. They had a hall for art, I can’t even remember why, now. Maybe they were local artists. I only remember paintings of sailboats and topless women, which was a rare sight for a kid at the time. There was a hall filled with 19th-century household artifacts. Chamber pots and weird children's toys.
Then there was the logging section, which was the bulk of the museum. It’s strange how different things seemed to be in the early days of the logging industry, despite being only about a hundred years old, from my perspective in the 1980s. If you look back a hundred years from today, in the 1920s, you had automobiles, airplanes, electrical appliances, jazz music, radio programs, flappers, it doesn’t feel that far removed, does it? No TV, no internet, but it wouldn’t be that strange. 1880s? Different world.
Imagine red cedars, so big you could have a full logging crew, arms stretched out, just barely manage to encircle one for a photographer. Felling a single tree was the work of days. Men could rest and eat their lunches in the shelter of a cut made into a trunk, and not worry for safety or room. They had to cut their own little platforms into the trees many feet off the ground, just so the trunk was a little bit thinner, and thus hours of labor saved. They used those long, flexible two-man saws. And double-bit axes. They worked in the gloom of the shade with old gas lanterns. Once cut down from massive logs thirty feet in diameter, they’d float the logs downhill in sluices, like primitive wooden make-shift water slides. Or they’d haul them down to the nearest river, the logs pulled by donkeys on corduroy roads. They’d lay large amounts of grease on the roads, so the logs would slide easily. You could still smell the grease on the old tools on display in the museum. The bigger towns had streets where the loggers would slide the logs down greased skids all the way down to the sea, where they’d float in big logjams until the mills were ready for processing. They’d call such roads “skid-rows.” Because of all the activity, they’d end up being the worst parts of town. Local citizens wouldn’t want to live there, due to all the stink and noise. They’d be on the other side of the brothels and the opium dens. It would be the sort of place where the destitute and the insane would find themselves when they’d finally lost anything. To this day, “skidrow” remains a euphemism for the part of a city where the homeless encamp.
That was the lore I’d learned as a child. That was my “ancestry” I was supposed to respect and admire, which I did, wholeheartedly. There were things they left out, though. Things that you might have suspected, from a naive perspective, would be perfect for kids, all the folklore that came with the logging industry. The ghost stories, and the tall tales. I would have eaten that up. They do talk about that kind of thing in places far removed from the Pacific Northwest. But I had never heard about any of it. Things like the Hidebehind. No, that I’d have to discover for myself.
There were four of us on those bike adventures. Myself. Ralph, my best friend. A tough guy, the bad boy, the most worldly of us, which is a strange thing to say about an eight-year-old kid. India, an archetypal ‘80s tomboy. She was the coolest person I knew at the time. Looking back, I wonder what her home life was like. I think I remember problematic warning signs that I couldn’t have recognized when I was so young, but now raise flags. Then there was Ben. A goofy kid, a wild mop of hair, coke bottle glasses, type 1 diabetic which seemed to make him both a bit pampered by his mother, who was in charge of all his insulin, diet, and schedule, and conversely a real risk taker when she wasn’t around.
When we first saw it…
No, wait. This was the problem with starting the story. Where does it all begin? I’ll need to talk about my Grandfather as well. I’ve had two different perspectives on my Grandfather, on the man that he was. The first was the healthy able-bodied grandparent I’d known as a young child. Then there was the man, as I learned about him after he had passed.
There was a middle period, from when I was 6 to when I was 16, when I hardly understood him at all, as he was hit with a double whammy of both Parkinson’s and Alzheimer's. His decline into an invalid was both steep and long drawn out. That part didn’t reflect who he was as a person.
What did I know of him when I was little? Well I knew he and my grandmother had a nice big house and some farmland, out in the broad flat valley north of Farmingham. Dairy country. It had been settled by Dutch immigrants back in the homesteading days. His family had been among the first pioneers in the county too. It didn’t register to me then that his surname was Norwegian, not Dutch. I knew he had served in the Navy in World War II, which I was immensely proud of for reasons I didn’t know why. I knew he had a job as a butcher in a nearby rural supermarket. He was a bit of a farmer too, more as a hobby and a side gig. He had a few cattle, but mostly grew and harvested hay to sell to the local dairies. I knew he had turned his garage into a machine shop, and could fix damn near anything. From the flat tires on my bicycle to the old flat-bed truck he’d haul hay with, to an old 1950s riding lawnmower he somehow managed to keep in working order. I knew he could draw a really cool cartoon cowboy, I knew he loved to watch football, and I knew the whiskers on his chin were very pokey, and they’d tickle you when he kissed you on the cheek, and that when you tried to rub the sensation away he’d laugh and laugh and laugh.
Then there were the parts of his life that I’d learn much later. Mostly from odd passing comments from relatives, or things I’d find in the public records. Like how he’d been a better grandfather than a father. Or how his life as I knew it had been a second, better life. He’d been born among the Norwegian settler community, way up in the deep, dark, forest-shrouded hills that rimmed the valley. He’d been a logger in his youth. Technologically he was only a generation or two from the ones I’d learned about in the museum. They’d replaced donkeys with diesel engines and corduroy roads with narrow gauge rail. It was still the same job, though. Dirty, dangerous, dark. Way back into those woods, living in little logging camps, civilization was always a several-day hike out. It became a vulgar sort of profession, filled with violent men, reprobates, and thieves. When my grandfather’s father was murdered on his front porch by a lunatic claiming he’d been wronged somehow, my grandfather hiked out of there, got into town, and joined the Navy. He vowed never to go back. The things he’d seen out in those woods were no good. He’d kept that existence away from me. Anyways…
Tommy Barker was the first of us to go missing. I say ‘us’ as if I knew him personally. I didn’t. He went to Farmingham Middle School, other side of town, and several grades above us. From our perspective, he may as well have been an adult living overseas.
Yet it felt like we got to know him. His face was everywhere, on TV, all over telephone poles. Everybody was talking about him. After he didn’t return from a friend’s house, everybody just sort of assumed, or maybe hoped, that he’d just gotten lost, or was trapped somewhere. They searched all the parks. Backyards, junkyards, refrigerators, trunks. Old-fashioned refrigerators, back before suction seals, had a simple handle with a latch that opened when you pulled on it. It wasn’t a problem when the fridges were in use and filled with food. But by the 80s old broke-down refrigerators started filling up backyards and junkyards, and they became deathtraps for kids playing hide-and-seek. The only opened from the outside. I remember thinking Tommy Barker was a little old to have likely been playing hide-and-seek, but people checked everywhere anyway. They never found him.
That was about the first time we saw the Hidebehind. Ben said he thought he saw somebody following us, looked like, maybe, a kid. We’d just slowly huffed our way up a moderately steep hill, Farmingham is full of them, and when we paused for a breather at the top, Ben said he saw it down the hill, closer to the base. Yet when we turned to look there was nothing there. Ben said he’d just seen it duck behind a car. That wasn’t the sort of behavior of a random kid minding his own business. Yet the slope afforded us a view under the car’s carriage, and except for the four tires, there were no signs of any feet hiding behind the body. At first, we thought he was pulling our leg. When he insisted he wasn’t, we started to tease him a little. He must have been seeing things, on account of his poor vision and thick glasses. The fact that those glasses afforded him vision as good as or better than any of us wasn’t something we considered.
The next person to disappear was Amy Brooks. Fifth-grader. Next elementary school over. I remember it feeling like when you’re traveling down the freeway, and there’s a big thunderstorm way down the road, but it keeps getting closer, and closer. I don’t remember what she looked like. Her face wasn’t plastered everywhere like Tommy’s had been. She was mentioned on the regional news, out of Seattle, her and Tommy together. Two missing kids from the same town in a short amount of time. The implication was as obvious as it was depraved. They didn’t think the kids were getting lost anymore. They didn’t do very much searching of backyards. The narratives changed too. Teachers started talking a lot about stranger danger. Local TV channels started recycling old After School Specials and public service announcements about the subject.
I’m not sure who saw it next. I think it was Ben again. We took him seriously this time though. I think. The one I’m sure I remember was soon after, and that time it was India who first saw it. It’s still crystal clear in my memory, almost forty years later, because that was the time I first saw it too. We were riding through a four-way stop, an Idaho Stop before they called it that, when India slammed to a stop, locking up her coaster brakes and leaving a long black streak of rubber on a dry patch of pavement. We stopped quickly after and asked what the problem was. We could tell by her face she’d seen it. She was still looking at it.
“I see it,” she whispered, unnecessarily. We all followed her gaze. We were looking, I don’t know, ten seconds? Twenty? We believed everything she said, we just couldn’t see it.
“Where?” Ralph asked.
“Four blocks down,” she whispered. “On the left. See the red car? Kinda rusty?” There was indeed a big old Lincoln Continental, looking pretty ratty and worn. I focused on that, still seeing nothing. “Past that, just to its right. See the street light pole? It’s just behind that.”
We also saw the pole she was talking about. Metal. Aluminum, I’d have guessed. It had different color patches, like metallic flakeboard. Like it’d had been melted together out of scrap.
I could see that clearly even from that distance. I saw nothing behind it. I could see plenty of other things in the background, cars, houses, bushes, front lawns, beauty bark landscape.. There was no indication of anything behind that pole.
And then it moved. It had been right there where she said it had been, yet it had somehow perfectly blended into the landscape, a trick of perspective. We didn’t see it at all until it moved, and almost as fast it had disappeared behind that light pole. We only got a hint. Brown in color, about our height in size.
We screamed. Short little startled screams, the involuntary sort that just burst out of you. Then we turned and started to pedal like mad, thoroughly spooked. We made it to the intersection of the next block when it was Ralph who screeched to a halt and shouted, “Wait!”
We slowed down and stopped, perhaps not as eagerly as we’d done when India yelled. Ralph was looking back over his shoulder, looking at that metal pole. “Did anybody see it move again?’ he asked. We all shook our heads in the negative. Ralph didn’t notice, but of course, he didn’t really need an answer, of course we hadn’t been watching.
“If it didn’t move, then it’s still there!” Ralph explained the obvious. It took a second to sink in, despite the obvious. “C’mon!” he shouted, and to our surprise, before we could react, he turned and took off, straight down the road, straight to where that thing had been lurking.
We were incredulous, but something about his order made us all follow hot on his heels. He was a sort of natural leader. I thought it was total foolishness, but I wasn’t going to let him go alone. I think I got out, “Are you crazy?!”
The wind was blowing hard past our faces as we raced as fast as we could, it made it hard to hear. Ralph shouted his response. “If it’s hiding that means its afraid!” That seemed reasonable, if not totally accurate. Lions hide from their prey before they attack. Then again, they don’t wait around when the whole herd charges. Really, the pole was coming up so fast there wasn’t a whole lot of time to argue. “Just blast past and look!” Ralph added. “We’re too fast! It won’t catch us.”
Sure, I thought to myself. Except maybe Ben, who always lagged behind the rest of us in a race. The lion would get Ben if any of us.
We rushed past that pole and all turned our heads to look. “See!” Ralph shouted in triumph. There was simply nothing there. A metal streetlight pole and nothing more. We stopped pedaling yet still sped on. “Hang on,” Ralph said, and at the next intersection he took a fast looping curve that threatened to crash us all, but we managed and curved behind him. We all came to the pole again where we stopped to see up close that there was nothing there, despite what we had seen moments before.
“Maybe it bilocated,” Ben offered. We groaned. We were all thinking it, but I think we were dismissive because it wasn’t as cool a word as ‘teleport.”
“Maybe it just moved when we weren’t looking,” I offered. That hadn’t been long, but that didn’t mean anything if it moved fast. The four of us slowly looked up from the base of the pole to our immediate surroundings. There were bushes. A car in a carport covered by a tarpaulin. The carport itself. Garbage cans. Stumps. Of course the ever-present trees. Whatever it was it could have been hiding behind anything. Maybe it was. We looked. Maybe it would make itself seen. None of us wanted that. “OK, let’s get going,” Ralph said, and we did so.
I got home feeling pretty shaken that afternoon. I felt safe at home. Except for the front room, which had a big bay window looking out onto the street, and the people who lived across it. There were plenty of garbage cans and telephone poles and stumps that a small, fast thing might hide behind. No, I felt more comfortable in my bedroom. There was a window, but a great thick conical cypress tree grew right in front of it, reaching way up over the roof of the house. If anything, it offered ME a place to hide, and peer out onto the street to either side of the tree. It was protective, as good as any heavy blanket.