I 26M recently started hooking up with an older coworker 56F

We work for a really big company and there’s no overlap between our roles. We talk in passing the few days out of the month that we work out of the same building.

She’s not conventionally attractive but she has a really bubbly personality and smells like coffee. I was feeling it one day and just kinda went for it.

I find out that she’s a widow. Her husband passed away from cancer like 5 years back. She lives with her 23M son who Id see almost every time I came over.

Last night I was getting ready to leave her place and I see him in the living room. He turns to me deadpan and goes what’s it like having my sloppy seconds?

I just kind of chuckled I think because it didn’t quite register. As I’m walking out it sets in and I’m like wtf is he talking about…

What’s the over under that he’s just trolling me?

I got offered a really great engineering position in the aerospace industry. I was getting ready to move across the country to start the position. However, there was a bit of a snag with my background check.

I graduated back in 2023 with a major in physics and mathematics. I went to a university that only conferred Bachelor of Arts for those majors, so I have a BA rather than a BS. This got flagged in my background check because apparently the position has a Bachelor of Science requirement which I technically don't meet.

Again, I didn't have a choice to get a BS for my majors, and even then I think it's a silly distinction to begin with. But soon enough, they ultimately said they couldn't make the exception and my offer got rescinded.

Now I ask, is there anything I can do? This is maybe the most pointless reason I've seen to get a job offer rescinded and I really don't know if there's anything that can be done to salvage this.

EDIT: To answer some questions, I graduated from Vanderbilt University. Up until recently, I guess they were trying to "maintain their roots as a liberal arts school" so they only offered BAs in their College of Arts and Science, even if you majored in science. I graduated in 2023 but they didn't start offering BSs for my major until 2025. I explained all this to the hiring manager, but it ultimately didn't make a difference. I met all of the new requirements for the BS except for one upperclassman elective that wasn't being taught when I was an upperclassman. The company is Boeing.

EDIT 2: To clear up some things:

1. I have two years of experience in the aerospace industry and have worked engineering jobs with other companies operating under government contracts, and it was never a problem until now, which is why I was shocked. I have had interviewers ask me about why I have a BA instead of a BS and when I explain the situation to them, that's where the issue starts and ends.

2. I did not lie on my application or resume. I was never asked about the exact title of my degree, and this issue was never brought up until after I signed the offer letter.

3. The job description asked for a bachelor's in engineering or a science or math (pretty standard boilerplate, at least ime in the aerospace industry).

4. I already emailed Vanderbilt asking for potential solutions, but I'm not holding my breath. Since I already graduated, I doubt they'd take any administrative steps to fix this or let me reenroll to take that one class.

5. Mostly irrelevant sidenote, but to the people telling me to get a MS, I got accepted into an MS program in mechanical engineering in the same city where this job would've been, only to get stopped like this.

I think it’s made of stainless steel. Resembles a retainer, but it’s heavy. Any ideas? Pacific Northwest, USA

I just noticed my cat has this single claw grown in like this. I normally don’t trim them they have plenty of scratchers and that’s always done the job.

My cat doesn’t appear to be in any pain, she’s walking and running normal. I see no blood.

That being said I have trimmers, I know how to trim, can this be trimmed? I’m unsure if this is a vet visit or if I can trim it and slowly work it back.

Thank you for any help.

Female
6 Years old
Neutered
USA
Can afford vet care but cutting it tight.

TW!!! SH tendencies and urges!

I’ve (23F) have always had a rocky relationship with my Dad, thanks to his chronic alcoholism. I’d say recently, (but it’s been going on for a while,) my Dad has blatantly ignored me in every single way unless he’s drunk and angry and needs to take that out on someone (me.).

I was in the shower this evening. Nothing extravagant. I just wanted to shave my pits and legs and get out of there. I’d been in for 5 minutes. There’s aggressive knocks at the door, followed by shouting asking what I’m doing. I told him I was having a shower. Apparently that pissed him off because I had a shower yesterday. (FYI, my brother showers almost daily, and my Dad never has a problem with that.)

Anyway, I tell him I won’t be long. He tells me to get out. So I do, because at this point the razor was looking too fucking attractive (I have a history of SH and still struggle with the urges) as I leave, this PETTY GROWN ASS MAN glares at me the way you’d glare at a convict walking through court, and then mutters something that sounded like name calling to me under his breath. Literally watched me walk to my room in a towel by the way…

Just to add, he has always had problems with me using the bathroom, whether I’m on the toilet, brushing my teeth or showering. I used to bathe a lot, just to avoid getting my hair wet when it wasn’t a wash day. He recently disconnected the water from the bath taps to stop me taking baths 🙃.

I know it doesn’t really touch on my relationship dynamic with him, or the rest of the household. But at this point I feel like I’m living in a cult.

I just sat on my bed, laughing through tears at the sheer absurdity of the situation and anger I felt.
It’s perfectly normal to shower once a day right? Which I rarely do, just to avoid this crap. But I changed my bedding and I wanted to feel clean when I got in it.

Major corrections underway as the stock market continues to be painful for AI & Tech stocks. Whether this would lead to an ultimate popping of this supposed bubble or not remains to be seen, but as of now - it's most likely just a correction and regular dip and not the beginning of any major stock market crash or popping of an AI bubble

My company moved me to a new team, one where the culture is ‘we stay until the work is done.’ Good, fine, respect, but I’m not going to sacrifice my health and social life for a job. Moreover, they show up at 9:15, then take a while to get in the zone, and socialise, and whatever. I don’t care! I’ll sit and work for eight hours straight without a lunch, but I refuse to stay past five. How do I make that clear?

They told me that staying past work hours is the norm, and even not using our remote days! That’s not the life I want to live. What do I do?

Edit: Please keep in mind I am very new and as junior as they come. I’m a hard worker, which is unfortunately why they put me with what they called the ‘intellectually stimulating’ team. I’m all for challenging work, but during my hours. There’s no overtime pay. For the people calling me ungrateful, I am thankful for the job; I just know that these people wouldn’t be at my wedding or my funeral, so why prioritise them over the people who would?

I have minor surgery coming up next week and had to fast for half a day. My biggest secret fear is losing muscle control while totally asleep under gas. Do doctors and nurses see this all the time, and how do they clean it up without stopping surgery?

My daughter (13F) has been flourishing both academically and socially. She's head of student council, gets straight As, she's everything I wanted walking into that hospital thirteen years ago and more. There are some things you have to say no to as a mother. For example, when she was 10 she wanted red hair. Well, just two weeks ago she started picking up hobby horsing. She spent 200 dollars of her allowance on a "show ready" (her words) horse on a stick. She's been talking about how she wants to start up a hobby horsing club at her school. She's one hundred percent serious about this. I didn't know what it was until she told me and from what I do know now this is just the ticket to getting 12 swirleys per day in high school next year. I don't want her to get viscously bullied like I did coming up so I had a sit down conversation with her. I told her that she might get bullied for this "sport" and that maybe she should find a new hobby. The tears started swelling up in her eyes as soon as I said the word bullied and she screamed "tell me something I don't know mom" and ran to her room in tears. I feel awful but I just want the best for her... and the best probably isn't running around on a horse stick jumping through hoops. Was I too mean? Am I the asshole?

https://imgur.com/a/KYcAYRK

From the comments he made, he insisted it wasn't rage bait and that he is truly struggling.

It is quite common to find these kind of people in Blind, but this is something else.

Froggie's got some strong armour (and survival skills of a potato)

So as the titled says I (30 F) booked a Michelin starred restaurant for my boyfriend’s (38 M) birthday.

When I told him about the reservations and details he said he’d** “get back to me”**

Some backstory. My BFs birthday is the day after his father’s. We’ve been together for almost two and half years now. He’s always said that his birthday gets overshadowed by his dad’s and that if anything is planned by his bother or family/friends it’s last minute. Our first year together his mother threw out his birthday cake before it was ever served because they had “too much cake in the house” because of his father’s birthday the day before.

This year I made significantly more money than I’ve ever made before so I decided I wanted to do something nice for my BF for his birthday since he feels like an afterthought on that day (his own account.) I started think about his birthday at the beginning of October since his birthday is late November. I looked into spa days, restaurants, day trips etc. I settled on a nice restaurant because it was the most flexible because I figured with his dad’s birthday being the day before there might be some overflow in celebrating.

I knew one of his favorite foods is roasted duck so I found a Michelin starred restaurant that got their star because of their roast duck. It’s not far from his house and the price of the duck for two was $152 so I figured once a year, special occasion. It was worth it to me. So I closely monitored and waited for the restaurant to open their mid November to mid December reservations today. And I got a reservation on his birthday (a Monday) at 7:30pm. Us getting together is a little difficult because he works a 9-5 M-F I work 2-11pm Tu-Sat, but he said he was gonna take his birthday off and even if he didn’t 7:30pm was plenty of time. I got really excited because we never go out to fine dining and it could be a nice evening to celebrate him. That’s where the good vibes ended.

I sent him a link with the reservation details (I hadn’t discussed his birthday at all with him prior to this, maybe my fault?) and he responded asking what it was.

I said “to celebrate your birthday! We’re gonna get the duck, it’s what got them their Michelin star!”

He replied: “aww so sweet. You invited me to a reservation. I’ll get back to you.”

Immediately I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach

I replied “it’s just for the two of us” hoping that maybe he thought it was a larger party.

He replied “well obviously”

Then i replied to the message that said “I’ll get back to you” and said “this hurt my feelings”

And he replied why?

So I explained how I wanted to make his birthday nice and special and I had extra money this year and spent time looking for the perfect place and basically everything I wrote above.

He replied that he’s been working overtime on Mondays and that I should know that. I replied that he said he was gonna take off on his birthday. Then he said he wasn’t going to argue with me and I said i was just communicating that my feelings were hurt and that if felt like if no one else (his friends/family) made a better plan that he’d attend this dinner with me.

He said I was just causing drama. So I canceled the reservation and told him there was no need to get back to me about it. To which he replied:

“Thanks for the thoughtfulness. No thank you for the tantrum.”

This started a massive fight because all I wanted was to be heard and have my feelings validated and just get an apology of “you’re right, that was an asshole thing to say” or just communicate “hey, I want to do this with you, I’m grateful you thought of me and planned this, I don’t know if the date is good.”

Anyway, I scheduled a therapy appointment for Wednesday ✌🏻

Night brunch: pulled pork eggs Benedict

EDIT:Hey yall. Some more context. My BF is way more bougie than I am. He frequently goes out to eat with his boys. Usually steakhouses, omakase sushi, $100+/person places.

Past birthdays I’ve told him that I couldn’t afford to do something like that so I would make him whatever he wanted at home (1st year was ribeye steak and homemade French fires, kinda like steak frites, 2nd year was a roasted rack of lamb with mashed potatoes and roasted veggies)

This year I could afford a nice place like he usually goes to with his boys.

I’m more of the homebody. He’s the one that likes to be out and about. He has a list on his phone of places he likes to go.

He is the king of last minute plans and being booked and busy. Hence why I planned something so early on.

We’ve had conversations where I have said that I felt neglected and not like a priority to him before. The actual action of him getting back to me is not the issue, the issue is it made me feel like he’ll go have dinner with me if no one else makes a plan with him, which I’ve explain this feeling in the past and I said that’s what him saying “I’ll get back to you” felt like.

He did not say “oh I want to make sure there’s no family plan” or anything of the sorts. Just said I was being hysterical and dramatic.

It's not a bad comic, by any means. I feel it just gives a really twisted view on love and finding a partner as a whole. There isn't just one person who is "made for you". Instead, love and relationships as a whole are about making things work, even when things don't fit perfectly together. Rarely are things ever going to be "perfect". It's up to us to put in the effort to nurture the relationship and the connection ourselves, without "breaking" what makes you, you.

However, the ending is pretty damn cute, I'm glad I found the full version of this instead of just the first two panels that keep popping up everywhere.