First edit:
Fuck this thing blew up. in all my years of redditing I have never been overwhelmed with wholesomeness like today. Thank you moderators for pinning this post - I will keep updating this on the regular! Before I go, if anyone wants further information going back before 25th January, here's a chronology of events from pre-squeeze till 4th February written by yours truly.
Valentines Day 14/02 edit:
Thank you all for your positive feedback and for literally all the awards. In all my life I never got platinum, let alone Argentium, and then Ternion!!!
I had a few celebratory drinks last night and I woke up totally shitfaced. It's valentine's day and I will be spending the day with the gf (who as some of you noticed from my page-article, we are expecting by the end of the month and she is right about to pop so she needs extra care and attention). I will be reading all the comments during the day, every time the gf turns her head a bit from me. I'm saving the comments with links to DDs so that I can add them later on.
I urge each and every one of you to read the new section 'HOW CAN YOU HELP ME WITH THIS THREAD'
Again thank you for everything and stay positive! Make sure to let the ones who care about you know that you care about them too today! Happy Valentines Day!
______________________________________________
It took me a very long time to collect and create abstracts, but I finally finished. I'm totally exhausted but quite proud of myself for bringing you everything you need to know so far in one thread.
I would love for this thread to be stickied, and if it does I plan to continue to update the same thread every day. If it does not I will continue posting updated versions every day. I also have my own website where I will keep updating this list.

Please help spread this around - knowledge is power. If you have a link to more DD leave a comment!

Please note that all Dates and Times posted are Central European Times (CET)
Obligatory: This is not financial advice. I am a smooth-brained holder of GME 🚀💎🤲 We like the stock!
______________________________________________

Doing your part

The Congress hearing will be streamed online on the 18th of February. Please email your representatives before this day.
What else can I do?
Make sure that you are not allowing shorts to borrow your shares to short-sell them!

How Can You Help Me and This Thread

First of all, THANK YOU. If you really want to help me and our brothers, here's what you can do:

Read and provide criticism, help me make better summaries and one-liners for the links to make it as readable as possible (think: ELI5)
Share this post to everyone you know - link this thread in WSB threads as comments so that we can educate the ignorant. We can link it in a way such as this: " Here’s a link to the motherload of DD for our favorite stonk " Empower others with knowledge
Look for any DD I have missed, old and new, especially in OG WSB from before the coup - send them to me as links in comments AND AS CHAT MESSAGES. I am going through all messages and I will update later today
We need to find a way to archive all the DD links from WSB so that if the mods of WSB catch on, we can have a backup of the threads before they delete them!
Collect more information on the coup, such as the info that was present from wallstreetbetstest and u/zjz posts. The retaliation messages, proof of removals of threads, bans for no reason ...etc.
Collect fake media articles that we can disprove so that I can compile a full list of bullshit media providers and articles
Let me know how I can better organize this thread.
and finally, don't forget to REPORT SHILLS. I would love to become a moderator and be able to investigate and ban shills myself. I applied but I don't think it will happen for now.

______________________________________________
Backdated posts added later in edits:

11-02 03:00
Added the Chronology of events from pre-squeeze to 4th February.
09-02 12:45
22-01 13:55

______________________________________________

The List of DD Begins Here:

13-02 18:10 Shills on reddit being paid up to $650/week.

13-02 17:45 Level 2 data shows that at certain moments during trading days we may be just a few thousand shares away from hitting the high asks.
13-02 15:51 Citadel may have a long position in TSLA and will probably have to sell if it comes to liquidity when having to cover shorts (or bail out HFs again).
13-02 15:50 Intensive thesis on the Congress hearing this Thursday 18th Feb, investigating DTCC and Brokers for their complicity in enabling naked shorting, and likely collusion to shut down trading on the 28th Jan. You can help out by contacting representatives with the points mentioned in the thread.

On Thursday you can watch the live stream here.

13-02 07:50 IV changes in options indicate that a $50 support level is established with a possible $50-72 channel. Analysing option prices shows that another run-up is coming.
13-02 06:30 At this point, if manipulators pushed the price down too hard it would have taken more shares off the market through puts, reducing the liquidity further, making it harder for the HFs.

Price target prediction end of next week 19th Feb @ $58-59, with peaks above $60 to issue further Calls (to get paid the premium) then hold it below this line.
The following week 26th Feb will end below $70 as there is a large off-set of calls vs Puts at this strike price, and a gain from 50-70 in two weeks will bring in more retail investors again.

13-02 05:15 We are currently in a liquidity crisis and shorts cannot cover in such an environment. Manipulators fought hard to keep it below $55, which was the strike price that would have hurt them the most.

Tool to analyse the max pain price.

13-02 04:50 Prediction that during the Congress hearing this Thursday 18th Feb, GME trading may get halted until the hearing is over. DFV will hopefully explain all the fuckery that has happened so far, and the web of lies will begin to unravel. This would bring back retail investor interest and push the price back up.
13-02 04:00 A ranting reminder that any time someone is being an aggressive bully, they are operating from a place of vulnerability. Once you know this it’s easy to spot the chink in their armour that they’re trying to compensate for. We have the power.
13-02 03:00 GME is only where it is now because of manipulation. More importantly, if you think that HFs and the manipulators are planning to give up and ‘settle’ to cover at $50 you are wrong. They’re continually doubling down and won’t rest until they bring GME down to $0.

12-02 22:50 WSB Warzone - Since the most discussed ticker was GME, the post was deleted.
12-02 17:10 Compilation of Due Diligence

The surge up to $480 was likely not short-squeezing, but reducing liquidity along with massive retail investment along with Gamma squeeze covering naked options.
HFs liquidated significant positions of major holdings causing red days to have cash for covering positions.
Shills, bots and crooked mods have infested WSB to spread FUD and delete posts and users fighting the good fight.
Massive amount of $800 Calls expiring March 19th, along with massive amount of Puts for TSLA - as GME spiked TSLA tanks
We will likely not see a massive squeeze, but a slow cover similar to TSLA short squeeze.

12-02 08:20 Shorting halted by most Brokers

In fact iBorrowDesk only saw a 100k share movement from the 1.4M shares available to borrow all through the trading day.

12-02 07:00 FTDs: HFs naked short positions opened after 1st Feb (after the FINRA report data) and not before so that they do not get accounted for in the latest FINRA report. These new positions will have to be covered by 24th Feb if they do not want them to be shown in the next report.
12-02 02:00 Data assimilation (extractions from FINRA and Yahoo Finance) showing December 2020’s short positions that are in the red, and probably are not covered by now at significant losses (the real bagholders).

Shorts were betting that GME wouldn’t pass $20.

11-02 16:40 GameStop Executives held the line and did not sell any shares at peak, even though they had the option to.
11-02 16:00 Why we don’t need a squeeze to win, Ryan Cohen’s changes to the company operation will blow up the company’s value.
11-02 15:00 Implied Volatility surges, particularly for $800 Calls expiring Feb 26th, indicating higher volatility in the days to come.
11-02 14:45 Calculations showing that:

~40M shares held by retail investors (~80%)
~54M shares held by institutions (~113%)
~48M shares as float (this is probably incorrect as Morningstar reports a float of 27M)
GME detained at 193% total
Real short interest at 138% (if Morningstar is correct, the SI would actually be 248%)

11-02 12:30 ETFs went on a buying spree, reducing float, and diamond handing.

Link contains breakdowns of institutional shares held and changes

11-02 05:10 A list of potential upcoming changes to company operations that will make the stock much more interesting for retail investors.
11-03 03:50 A reminder from an older investor to always stick to your original plan and not get distracted by some shiny object. If you find something and ten people tell you that it’s worthless, then it isn’t.
11-02 03:00 The state of WSB since the moderator coup
11-02 01:35 Shorts could have covered on the upswing on the 10th Feb, then released fake news on Fidelity selling their shares then started short-selling and short-laddering to drop the price again.

11-02 01:10 A comparison of Short Interest data from providers.

10-02 08:30 Shorts have most probably been buying $800 Calls to make it seem like they ‘cancel out’ their short positions.
10-02 08:20 Figures, calculations and logic showing that the Short Interest is higher than anything reported.
10-02 07:50 An overview of what happened so far, with psychology and reasoning of HFs along the way.
10-02 06:15 DD on possibilities of covering and outlook of potential outcomes.
10-02 06:10 Crunching Finra’s SI report shows that SI is over 117%, and that there were 112% more shares shorted than were actually available to purchase on 27th January. It’s possible that between 1/13-17 about 7M shorts were covered, but they had to have continued to short like crazy since then to push the price down.
10-02 05:20 Naked shorting was probably aided by DTCC who probably shut down buying to stop the squeeze to avoid a scandal. Shorts likely hid their open positions via a loophole which generated synthetic longs. If this is correct there is a large amount of counterfeit shares floating in the market.
10-02 04:22 Finra reports 78% SI, while institutions own 206% (144M shares) of all outstanding shares. This could mean that actual SI is around 150%.
10-02 03:00 Finra releases SI data: 78.5%

09-02 20:00 A compilation of manipulative tactics and logical fallacies to help you identify when they are being attempted against you.
09-02 12:45 Biden administration cannot allow itself to lose trust at the beginning at the term, and HFs Brokers WS and the media may be in a worse position than we thought.
09-02 08:45 Cramer exposed - video from 2006 shows how himself (when he managed an HF) and other HFs manipulate markets.
09-02 08:20 Shares being bought around $270 after hours.
09-02 02:00 Proof that FINTEL are altering short data, with replies from CEO.

08-02 17:00 Shorts may provide fake data to FINRA for a relatively small fine which could help save them millions-billions.
08-02 14:15 Compilation of DD showing that nothing has changed no matter what the media is saying.
08-02 09:50 They are losing $2B ever 2.5 days
08-02 01:45 Why to buy GME regardless of a squeeze. The future of GameStop is bright.

07-02 16:45 Hypothesis that Melvin is just a tool for larger hedge fund to take over Citadel and take trillions from them.
07-02 16:40 Evidence shows the HFs likely use a loophole trick to appear as if they covered their shorts using synthetic longs generated from options.
07-02 13:30 A very useful spreadsheet to track and analyse stocks
07-02 03:45 There is no mathematical way shorts covered for Jan 13, 22, or 25 as is being reported by SI data providers - they are lying.

06-02 22:00 The interstellar yo-yo theory: every 13 days (settlement days) stock price increases and pushes back by selling more synthetic long positions (fake shares into the market), FTDs increase
06-02 18:20 Institutions hold 177% of float, proving the existence of a huge amount of synthetic longs.

05-02 23:40 HFs want you to think that they repositioned and covered their shorts, but calculations show that this was impossible and the conditions were not ideal to do this without incurring massive losses.
05-02 19:30 GME and AMC graph comparison, showing the exact same movement.

02-02 23:30 Analysis of 265,000 rows of SEC data shows massive amount of FTDs compared to the rest of the market - likely that it is a result of massive illegal share counterfeiting by shorts.
02-02 05:30 The market may collapse due to the creation of a massive number of preexisting synthetic longs that were bought and held. To fix it, market makers decided to make more, but their cure is also a poison they can't stop taking.
02-02 04:00 Melvin claims to have closed out their positions, but used an illegal loophole to make it seem like they have.

01-02 23:20 Short Interest appears to have fallen but in truth is being shoved under the rug of option traders.
01-02 20:45 A list of misinformation articles inducing FUD
01-02 20:30 Following the crumbs: How GME is exposing illegal activity
01-02 17:15 Psychological warfare - FUD and manipulated dips along with further short-selling to make you believe that you’ve missed the peak.
01-02 10:20 Evidence of massive naked short selling fraud.
01-02 02:30 Public data suggest massive securities fraud creating more shares than exist, and that retail investors may hold more than 100% of all outstanding shares.

31-01 09:10 Wall Street is freaking out because they are about to get caught doing extremely illegal shit that may implode the whole system - fake shares in the float.
25-01 23:30 Today’s co-ordinated attack: let the price run up only to jack up margin requirements, then dumped.
22-01 13:55 Make sure that you are not helping shorts borrow your shares and short sell by opting out with your broker! Some brokers settings are by default, so you have to change it yourself.

A chronology of events pre-squeeze till 4th February written by yours truly.

I was a long time lurker and occasional commenter on wsb. I’ve always been a rather pragmatic investor who likes to mitigate risk. I suppose I just enjoyed living vicariously through others by seeing posts on the sub in its former state. Sometimes they’d lose big, sometimes they’d win big, and either way the memes were always funny. It always felt harmless because my impression was that people never wagered more than they were willing/able to lose.
I did decide to throw my hat in the ring these last 2 weeks during all the short squeeze craziness though. I bought a bunch of shares in both Blackberry and Nokia when they were low, and then sold at their (near) peaks and made about 5 grand in total. Pretty cool. At that point I was playing with house money so I figured hey, I’ll buy a couple GameStop shares and see if this thing can rocket higher. And it did! If I’d sold at 400-500 I would’ve made a few more bucks. But I kept holding, and obviously I lost most of my original investment. But overall I am far and away in the green on these short squeeze stocks so I’m not bothered at all.
And that brings me to the topic of my post. Yesterday afternoon I created and posted a meme/gif on wsb using a scene from goodfellas. The one from early in the movie where Henry gets pinched but “keeps his mouth shut”. Click on my profile if you want to see it.
This, along with a couple other gifs I made, were just me trying to post funny content in the sub that I felt was in the spirit of what wsb used to be. Self deprecating, a little chaotic, and fun. I guess I hoped this type of content would help course correct away from the hive-mind it was becoming.
But the comments and private messages I received in response to the goodfellas post in particular genuinely concern and sadden me.
“I‘ve never felt that I belong anywhere but I finally have a home here with you degenerates”
“My parents think I’m insane but I’m going to keep buying shares. Glad you guys understand me”
“I bet my tuition money on this stock but this gif made me feel better about everything I’ve lost”
“Guys, is the short squeeze over? I put in 5k today. How high will the price get”
Wsb feels like a cult now. And I’m not being hyperbolic. These are some deeply lonely, and VERY financially illiterate people who have jumped on a sinking ship and think it’s a rocket.
A couple months from now, we’re going to be reading about the billions that people collectively lost investing in GameStop and amc after the squeeze peaked. We’re going to hear about suicides, divorces, bankruptcies, and lives just generally derailed.
Between that and the info about the mods that continues to come out, the cult-like nature of wsb is only going to grow and expand. I honestly hope it gets shut down.
Edit: I deleted the gifs. They were funny, but doing more harm than good.
Edit: If anyone is interested in seeing my latest gif for the wsb folks - https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/lctim7/time_to_wake_up/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

Please help spread this around - knowledge is power. If you have a link to more DD leave a comment!

Doing your part

How Can You Help Me and This Thread

First of all, THANK YOU. If you really want to help me and our brothers, here's what you can do:

Read and provide criticism, help me make better summaries and one-liners for the links to make it as readable as possible (think: ELI5)
Share this post to everyone you know - link this thread in WSB threads as comments so that we can educate the ignorant. We can link it in a way such as this: " Here’s a link to the motherload of DD for our favorite stonk " Empower others with knowledge
Look for any DD I have missed, old and new, especially in OG WSB from before the coup - send them to me as links in comments AND AS CHAT MESSAGES. I am going through all messages and I will update later today
We need to find a way to archive all the DD links from WSB so that if the mods of WSB catch on, we can have a backup of the threads before they delete them!
Collect more information on the coup, such as the info that was present from wallstreetbetstest and u/zjz posts. The retaliation messages, proof of removals of threads, bans for no reason ...etc.
Collect fake media articles that we can disprove so that I can compile a full list of bullshit media providers and articles
Let me know how I can better organize this thread.
and finally, don't forget to REPORT SHILLS. I would love to become a moderator and be able to investigate and ban shills myself. I applied but I don't think it will happen for now.

______________________________________________
Backdated posts added later in edits:

11-02 03:00
Added the Chronology of events from pre-squeeze to 4th February.
09-02 12:45
22-01 13:55

______________________________________________

The List of DD Begins Here:

13-02 18:10 Shills on reddit being paid up to $650/week.

On Thursday you can watch the live stream here.

Price target prediction end of next week 19th Feb @ $58-59, with peaks above $60 to issue further Calls (to get paid the premium) then hold it below this line.
The following week 26th Feb will end below $70 as there is a large off-set of calls vs Puts at this strike price, and a gain from 50-70 in two weeks will bring in more retail investors again.

Tool to analyse the max pain price.

The surge up to $480 was likely not short-squeezing, but reducing liquidity along with massive retail investment along with Gamma squeeze covering naked options.
HFs liquidated significant positions of major holdings causing red days to have cash for covering positions.
Shills, bots and crooked mods have infested WSB to spread FUD and delete posts and users fighting the good fight.
Massive amount of $800 Calls expiring March 19th, along with massive amount of Puts for TSLA - as GME spiked TSLA tanks
We will likely not see a massive squeeze, but a slow cover similar to TSLA short squeeze.

12-02 08:20 Shorting halted by most Brokers

In fact iBorrowDesk only saw a 100k share movement from the 1.4M shares available to borrow all through the trading day.

Shorts were betting that GME wouldn’t pass $20.

~40M shares held by retail investors (~80%)
~54M shares held by institutions (~113%)
~48M shares as float (this is probably incorrect as Morningstar reports a float of 27M)
GME detained at 193% total
Real short interest at 138% (if Morningstar is correct, the SI would actually be 248%)

11-02 12:30 ETFs went on a buying spree, reducing float, and diamond handing.

Link contains breakdowns of institutional shares held and changes

Obligatory:
LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
Just passed my Sec+ exam with a score of 833 out of 900.
Originally wanted to get this done years ago when I was in college but never got around to it. The kick in the butt was when a friend of mine got his for a new job and told me that I should get it before they retire 501.
Personal Prep experience:
My background has always been the general home tech/gadget enthusiast, doing small projects with arduinos and raspberry Pi's and have a B.S. in EE. I did some examcompass tests prior to studying and got scores of 15-30%. None of that background was much help or applicable besides just being used to CLI commands.
Watched professor messer while doing dishes or chores around the house. I work an 8-5 in office job(No telework/Youtube banned network wide) so I couldn't listen to Lessons in the background. Then got Udemy practice tests and got like 55-70%, kept retaking them until I got 85+%.
Then started doing practice tests using some iOS apps( while watching tv but ultimately decided like I was just memorizing answers so would try to read the Dion's cheat sheet on sections I missed, and googling diagrams of things such as RADIUS.
Crammed GCGA and practice tests for 5-7 days.
On the pre assessment in the book I got an 80%, 78-100% on reading the chapters and doing the post chapter quizzes, and wound up with an 86% on the end of book review.
Felt pretty confident but after reading horror stories I got served a fat slice of humble pie and confidence drained so I shelled out the extra Cash on Messer's practice exams the day before my exam. The pdf is 3 exams with 5 PBQs per exam and 90 questions total each. I believe this is probably the best practice test with extensive explanations for each correct and incorrect answers. I think picking it up is worth it for the PBQ formats in combination with Dion's practice tests. I got 86%-85%-91% on the three practice exams and was still scared I wasn't ready.
On the exam itself:
My first hiccup was while waiting for the exam to start, I tried to open up chrome to do some last minute review. This was a big oopsies as my computer glitched out and I had to restart my system and go through the whole process of checking in again.
3 of the PBQs were a cake walk, 1 was a bit of a challenge but I think I might have picked up most of the points of it, the remaining PBQ was completely out of left field, didn't know how to even guess on it. It went really deep into a topic on the exam list that I haven't seen any prep material cover that much in depth(I'd bet my money it wasn't worth many points).
I'd say about:

35% of the MC questions were freebies
30% required careful rereading
25% were tough but felt could narrow down the responses and go with my gut.
10% were again just out of left field for how in depth they were

Really buying into the theory that certain questions are weighed less heavily than others or flat out don't count at all. Hearing about people feeling like they bombed the test but passing gave me confidence, it must really suck if your test is generated to put all the tough/left-field questions in the beginning. Felt like mine was lucky enough to sprinkle the freebies through out to build confidence back up.
To describe how this studying compared to school/other courses. I’d compare it to studying for maybe a history test vs studying for comp sci or math courses. Understand why, what, and lessons learned from deprecated methods.
TL;DR: LET'SSSSSSSS GOOOOOOOOO I PASSED!!!

Привет идиоты,
I have returned to inflict more psychic damage upon you about the sick fucks that make up the worldwide disease that is Big Capital. Today, I would like to talk to you about Kenneth Cordele Griffin, the founder and CEO of a little company called Citadel LLC.
Now unless you have been living under a fucking rock for the past week or have drank yourself to the point of amnesia for one reason or another (forgivable), you are probably by now at least vaguely aware of what Citadel does and how it relates to current events surrounding GameStop and WSB's new favorite hedge fund, Melvin Capital.
Seeing as how there's a few million more of you here now than there were last month when I was emptying the contents of the bowl of oatmeal that is my brain on these pages about present day financial crimes perpetrated by Citadel and their ilk and the ouroboros of Western intelligence agencies and Big Capital, let's do a quick recap. I do hope you take the time to read the full posts, because you may learn something interesting. ^{^{^PSTH}} ^{^⁼} ^{^{^Stripe}} ^{^{^🚀🚀🚀}}

The markets and the flow of capital around the world are rife with financial crime.
The vast majority of this crime is perpetrated by large institutions like Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Deutsche Bank. Some of this crime takes the form of laundering money for drug cartels, terrorists, pedophiles, and sex traffickers. Some of it involves manipulation of the markets.
The regulators in charge of dealing with these fucks are utterly spineless, to the point that any honest person must wonder out loud if they're in on it and getting a take. This phenomenon is known as regulatory capture and is a particularly insidious form of political corruption.
The CIA, since its inception in 1947, has acted as a sort of parallel government within the broader United States government, and has been the primary ideological engine of its foreign policy through its ties to Big Capital. That foreign policy has always kept the interests of business as its top priority. One might even call this the Deep State.

Who is Ken Griffin?

Ken Griffin is the absolute epitome of the archetypal scumfuck egomaniac asshole that embodies everything that is wrong with the ultra-rich class of Big Capital. Ahem, sorry. Let's try that again.
Ken Griffin started his career out as a 🌈🐻 at the age of 19 while an undergraduate at Harvard, shorting the convertible bonds market and making a bunch of money off of the October 19th, 1987 crash, more commonly known as Black Monday. He graduated in 1989, supposedly returned 70% in his first year as a professional fund manager, and went on to found Citadel in 1990. Citadel has swelled to gargantuan size in the last 30 years. It apparently almost went under in 2008 during the financial crisis, but they were fine after the empty suit known as Barack Obama reneged on his campaign promises and fully sealed the transfer of the United States to Wall Street and the rest of the 1%. The hedge fund managed $35 billion as of October 2020 (probably less now LOLOLOL) and a little more than a quarter of all equity volume flows through Citadel Securities in their capacity as a market maker.
He lives in Chicago, but that's not very important. I will note that Chicago has been a historically CIA rat-infested city, as evidenced by the group of University of Chicago-trained economists that helped carry out the regime change ops and aggressive neoliberalization of South America in the 20th century. He's not a complete political partisan, but he does tend to favor Republicans. He has donated to Democratic Party luminaries like Rod Blagojevich and Rahm Emanuel, libertarian psychopaths like the Koch Brothers, and neocon war hawk freaks like Karl "Turd Blossom" Rove. His most recent political contributions were to Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, the two imbecilic former Senators from Georgia who were both busted for dumping stocks on insider information shortly before the Great Beer Virus Crash of 2020. The thread tying these fine folks together is that what most people in the United States think of as politics is more akin to a game show than a real system of governance, and the ultra-rich value their class allegiance much higher than their allegiance to any one political party. As a slight aside, Loeffler's husband is the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange. How in the fuck is the spouse of a (formerly) sitting Senator allowed to hold that position? Yuck.

The Ken Griffin Real Estate Portfolio

(Disclaimer: Griffin may not still own every property in this section and I don't care to find out which, if any, he has divested himself from, because frankly, the levels of opulence make me feel fucking sick. Also, if this is considered d0xxing or something because some of these may be personal residences, I will remove them upon request. This is all publicly available information, though.)

132 East Delaware Place in Chicago, Illinois -- luxury high rise with residential units, office space, and retail stores
800 North Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Illinois -- penthouse unit
820 Fifth Avenue, New York City, New York -- overlooking Central Park in Manhattan
Big Ass Mansion in Aspen, Colorado
Two properties at the Hualalai Resort in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
Multiple mansions at 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70 Blossom Way in Palm Beach, Florida. Further links here and here.
12,500 square feet of penthouses at Faena House in Miami, Florida
1290 South Ocean Boulevard in Palm Beach, Florida
3 Carlton Gardens in London, England -- former home of Charles de Gaulle, former President of France
Numerous units at 220 Central Park South in New York City, New York -- a four-floor penthouse and two adjacent apartments on the 20th floor
650 Meadow Lane in Southampton, New York -- purchased from Calvin Klein
Vacant double lot costing $37 million Star Island, Miami Beach, Florida

The Ken Griffin Art Portfolio

Many of the pieces listed here are not held personally by Griffin, but are loaned out to institutions like the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Art Institute of Chicago. For the extreme smoothbrains among you, the reason Griffin blows giant bags on horrible pieces of art and puts them on public display is so that he can use them as tax writeoffs.
Herein lies the part where you may call me a conspiracy theorist if you please, but I think Griffin's art portfolio is indicative of some type of covert relationship with the intelligence agencies. I sincerely do not believe that any person can reach these strata of society without at least brushing elbows with some glowies. The most expensive pieces in his collection come from the school of art known as abstract expressionism, which was quite literally a CIA-sponsored project meant to counter the influence of Soviet realism during the Cold War. The idea was that the Soviets would see the wacky vomitus that people like Jackson Pollock would spew all over a canvas as an expression of the ideals of freedom and individuality and break free of the bonds of Communism.

False Start by Jasper Johns. Housed at the MoMA, purchased by Griffin for $80 million.
Curtain, Jug and Fruit Bowl by Paul Cézanne. Housed at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Purchased by the previous buyer at auction for $60.5 million -- Griffin's purchase price is not known.
Self Portrait by Paul Cézanne. I think this is the correct one. He did a whole bunch of these over the course of his life. Price unknown.
Water Lilies by Claude Monet. He did like 250 of these, this is the one that comes up when searching it with the year of the one Griffin is known to own, 1905. Price unknown.
The Green Dancer by Edgar Degas. On display at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid, Spain
Little Dancer Aged Fourteen by Edgar Degas. An extraordinarily ugly wax sculpture on display at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
Interchange by Willem de Kooning. Abstract expressionist trash purchased for $300 million from noted Jeffrey Epstein associate and suspected pedophile David Geffen. Recall that Epstein is highly suspected of being some type of intelligence asset tasked with blackmailing rich scumbags by anyone who has studied his story closely.
Number 17A by Jackson Pollock. More abstract expression trash, also purchased from David Geffen for $200 million.

How does Citadel spend its money?

Good question! They buy politicians. Remember regulatory capture? Here's Citadel doing just that: current Secretary of the Treasury, former Chair of the Federal Reserve, and sentient potato woman Janet Yellen took more than $800,000 in speaking fees from Citadel. In fact, Yellen "earned" over $7 million in speaking fees from various other financial institutions including Goldman Sachs and Citigroup between her stints at the Fed and at Treasury. What do we think? Is she just such an enrapturing speaker that she's worth every penny? Or is she getting a kickback for helping to deregulate financial markets and a bribe to look the other way when short sellers and market makers collude to shut retail traders out of the market en masse, like they did yesterday with GME?
They also buy stakes in distressed hedge funds, apparently. Remember the $2.75 billion bailout that Citadel and Point72 gave to Melvin Capital on Monday, which they promptly pissed away doubling down on their GME short? Isn't it weird that Robinhood shut down trading on the very stocks that the hedge funds were bleeding out from and then forced people to liquidate their long positions at the very bottom of a coordinated short seller attack? Doesn't it seem a little strange that the hedge fund branch of Citadel is allowed to own part of another hedge fund that's being bled dry, as Citadel Securities buys order flow from Robinhood to illegally front-run retail orders?
There's also this, on the topic of Melvin Capital and pedophiles and sex traffickers: Melvin Capital's 5th largest long holding is a company called L Brands, which is the parent of Victoria's Secret and Bath & Body Works. Victoria's Secret, as seasoned Jeffrey Epstein gumshoes will know, was founded by one Leslie Wexner, who had a very troubling relationship with Epstein. Epstein was Wexner's personal money manager and Wexner was Epstein's only known client. Wexner and Epstein were so close that Wexner gave Epstein a mansion on the Upper East Side in Manhattan in 2011, years after it was already known that he was a pedophile creep. Epstein would tell the girls he was sexually assaulting that he was a modeling scout for Victoria's Secret. Jean-Luc Brunel, another Epstein-associated "modeling scout" and sex criminal who was recently arrested in France, would supply models to Victoria's Secret through his agency MC2 Model Management. Basically, what I'm saying is that Melvin Capital, and now Citadel by extension, are long sex trafficking pedophiles.

How can I poke this asshole in the eye?

It seems like there's two big things you can do to do your part.
The first is to 💎👐 GME. The institutions are clearly scared shitless at how much blowback is coming their way or they wouldn't be taking such drastic measures to try to tip the scales in the favor of the shorts at the expense of everyone else. Turn off share lending in your brokerage if you can and still haven't.
The second is to transfer your assets out of Robinhood yesterday and graduate to a big boy brokerage. Citadel Securities (remember, this is the market maker, not the hedge fund) banked a record $6.7 billion in profit last year. You can bet that this has at least a little to do with the influx of Robinhooders pressing the market order button on their phones and letting Citadel front run their orders while Robinhood gives them a garbage fill.

TLDR: Ken Griffin final boss. Citadel bad. Robinhood bad. GME go up. Stop FOMOing into other dumb shit and stick to the plan.

I know that last week was a bit on the turbulent side for BB. I decided to double-check my original BB DD, as a way to remind myself of why I invested in the first place. From my point of view, nothing has changed in the fundamentals, and I am still very well satisfied with my investment.
Currently, I have 410 stocks, with an average buy-in of $17,62 per stock.
Before getting down to the good stuff, I just want to point out that this is in no way financal advice, neither do I take any responsibility for your financial choices based on my text. I'm just your average happy amateur.
THE PHONE COMPANY THAT SWITCHED TO IoT AND CYBER SECURITY
For starters, you can't really exclusively call Blackberry a phone company anymore. They've switched their main focus to Cyber Security and IoT. Today, BB provides solutions for Unified Endpoint Security, Penetration Testing, Ransomware Protection and Blackberry QNX (remember that last one, because it's important).
In December of 2020, a massive attack occured against SolarWinds, a major IT firm that provides software for entities ranging from Fortune 500 companies to the US government. The US agencies in question that got attacked were: parts of the Pentagon, the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, the Department of Energy, the National Nuclear Security Administration, and the Treasury.
However, not a single of BlackBerry's customers were affected by the hack.
BLACKBERRY QNX
Blackberry owns and develops the closed source QNX operating system, which is a real-time operating system (meaning that it can process data without buffer delays). If you have a smartphone or a car, chances are that in one way or another, it runs with QNX embedded.
Read more about QNX here.
PARTNERSHIP WITH BAIDU, XPENG and GAC GROUP: EV-INDUSTRY IN CHINA
Just like in other developed parts of the world, it's springtime for the electrical vehicle-market in China. You might have heard about some of their most successful brands: NIO, BAIDU, XPENG and GAC group.
NIO has a market cap of $61.6 bn, XPENG has a market cap of $31.5 bn, Baidu has a market cap of $80,16, and GAC group has a market cap of a whooping $114,7 bn.
Why is this good for Blackberry?

In August 2020, BB announced that they will be "powering the Level 3 driving domain controller of Xpeng" using... you guessed it! QNX!
A couple of weeks ago, BB announced that they would deepen their partnership with Chinese GAC Group, who amongst other things make electric cars. I read an article from a couple of days ago claiming that "Future GAC electric cars will get BlackBerry driving assistance technology" using... you guessed it! QNX!
Since April 2019, GAC group and NIO (the other EV maker) has had a joint venture in the form of the brand "Hycan", an electric car manufacturer. It's not farfetched to believe that there is a good chance of the Hycans to have QNX embedded as well.

Read more here.
PARTNERSHIP WITH AMAZON
As you all probably already know, Amazon is the world's largest e-commerce and cloud platform company. BlackBerry recently partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to launch a new connected vehicle platform that merges BlackBerry's QNX operating system with AWS's IoT services.
AWS launched its IoT platform in 2015. At the time, Amazon stated that it would make it easier for developers to create apps that link to myriad IoT gadgets, including smart speakers, home appliances, wearables, and connected cars. AWS is already the world's top cloud platform, so it makes perfect sense to integrate its IoT service into the most widely used embedded operating system for connected cars.
By linking QNX to the cloud, automakers can instantly monitor a vehicle's EV battery levels and vehicle subsystems, provide over-the-air software updates, and personalize vehicle cockpits, advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), and machine learning models for autonomous driving through cloud-based apps.
This reinforces BlackBerry's market-dominating position in embedded operating systems for connected cars, which also circles back to BB's endevours on the Chinese EV-market.
PROJECT KUIPER
I want to warn you all that this next part is purely speculation on my part.
From Wikipedia: Kuiper Systems LLC is a subsidiary of Amazon that was set up in 2019 to deploy a large broadband satellite internet constellation to provide broadband internet connectivity. The deployment is also referred to by its project name "Project Kuiper". Amazon announced that it would be investing $10 billion in this project to deploy the satellite internet constellation.
How could BB fit into this thing?
Well, here's my hypothesis:
Why would Amazon start a long-term partnership with BlackBerry? Well, because BlackBerry has competency that Amazon lacks in-house of course. If Amazon wants to send satellites to space, why wouldn't they use Blackberry, when QNX has already been used in rockets by NASA and SpaceX?
Although there isn't any concrete evidence for my claims about BB and Project Kuiper, I personally don't believe that my thougts are way "out there". I guess time will tell if I'm right, but it's what I'm betting on!
_______________________
TL;DR:

BB's QNX operating system could become huge during 2021 due to BB's involvement with Amazon and Chinese EV-manufacturers.
BB could play an important part in Project Kuiper

I made my first post here a while ago about my schizophrenic, childish and attention seeking MIL. Generally, things have been better since they last visited and I honestly don’t want them to visit at all or at least for a long time because she makes me feel weird in my own house. Plus, my husband absolutely hates her and said she is dead to him.
Old post: https://www.reddit.com/JUSTNOMIL/comments/k902x8/mil_is_bipolar_and_schizofrenic/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Just to recap: my MIL was diagnosed with schizophrenia and my FIL and SIL shelter her, never call her out on her bullshit and everyone is expected to always treat her with kindness. But she’s insufferable. She will twist everything and make it awkward even when you had the best intentions. She makes it weird for us and also any third party she will consider “an agent”. She’s also all knowing and just plain annoying so I try to remain as nice as possible while staying away. We moved to another state so it helps a lot but she will still try to reach out because she always feels left out.
Anyway, on Saturday she texted me out of the blue asking about my new couch and she also asked if I could take a picture of the manufacturer’s label. Weird but whatever I thought maybe she wants to buy the same one. But then she came back with a bunch of nonsense that everything is made outside of America (she’s a Trump supporter while also a naturalized Asian immigrant lol) and was getting all worked up, putting a lot of exclamation marks etc. So I said something along the lines of: I can’t afford us made products and we like our couch so it is what it is /shrug. She felt weird/bad for her weird texts (as always, she will try to say that was not her intent or I misunderstood it because I’m not a native English speaker) and came back with the regular fluffed up bs such us “we miss you!” + plus sent me our old picture because I guess she felt bad and wanted to be sweet again (sometimes she can be, but I don’t care). Whatever her intentions were, I just wish she left me alone because I really don’t want to talk to her. Ever. I wish she never fucking contacted me because she wastes my time and steals my energy.
I work from home and I’m the main breadwinner in our household because my salary is much higher. Needless to say i am pretty busy and under a lot of stress. And she suddenly calls me. I just ignored her and got a text: “No rush... just call back if and when you can. Bet it is busy Monday!”
All I want is to be left alone. I don’t need to keep in touch. She is not entitled to my time only because she is bored and needs to talk to someone. She is not my mother and not my friend and during the early onset of her disease, she was horrible to me (she thought I was an agent with a motif to spy on her or some shit like that) and now I don’t trust her and I don’t want to let her in. I hate the fact that everyone is scared of triggering her and babies her so much. I just find it unfair she is never held accountable, refuses to take meds and will never understand she’s sick, plain and simple. Occasionally she will just text me and it’s not anything bad, just pointless to me. I don’t want to call her back but I wish there was a way for me to make her understand I’m not her daughter and she shouldn’t bother me. How do I do it and am I an asshole to think this way? My husband hates her more than I do so when I ask him what to do, he tells me to block her. It’s not that simple. I don’t really have a solid reason to block her. She is not that bad, but she is definitely a fucking pain in the ass.
Sorry for the angry post. Since i have no one to talk about it to, you’re the only people I can share it with and maybe find some understanding/advice, since my husband can’t deal with it.

Hey, hi, hello. As always, it’s me, Eli. And Mr. Bailey.
Let’s start off with some good news: I’m finally back to normal (well, as normal as possible these days) after the concert hall incident. That is, I’ve recovered from my injuries. My arm is fully functional again – if still a little stiff – and my headaches have stopped. The only noticeable remnant is, of course, the scars, but there’s nothing to be done about those.
And with that, I want to find out more about Zoe. I also want to find out more about whoever or whatever is listening and watching to us. I figured I just might be able to combine the two. See, I’ve been thinking about the concert hall, and piecing together what I remember has gotten easier as my head clears.
Here’s what I think: Zoe was telling the truth. She seemed as surprised as I was when the monster hordes showed up, and someone helped me fight the monsters. It must have been her. She also, supposedly, patched me up as best she could, and there’s no reason she’d do that if she wanted me dead. I was basically unconscious for a week; she could have killed me any time.
Now, don’t get pissed at me for trusting her or something. To be clear: I don’t trust her. After all, it’s still suspicious that she found out where I live, and that she wants me to come to her. Makes me a little uneasy. She may have a perfectly legitimate reason, and that would be great, but I don’t know yet.
All that being said, as I’ve been thinking about the concert hall, it occurred to me that maybe we really were both ambushed. Maybe the entity observing us heard that we were planning to meet up and wanted to prevent that from happening. So to ensure we didn’t get a chance to talk, he or she or it sent a bunch of monsters. I mean, the monsters are essentially both walking cameras and killing machines – pretty good plan. I would be impressed, if I wasn’t so pissed that this whole thing was purposefully orchestrated. What kind of asshole intentionally sets up the brutal murders of an entire city population?
Caleb, that’s who. He’s the only person I’ve met awful enough to do this. Thank God he was brutally murdered alongside everyone else, so it couldn’t be him. I’m relieved every day that even if someone is watching me, whoever it is can’t be quite as bad as Caleb. Fuck Caleb.
Anyway, after talking with Mr. Bailey and learning about the surveillance, it seems kind of likely that something bigger than either me or Zoe made sure our meeting went south. I wouldn’t, like, bet money on it or anything, but it sure seems like a strong possibility.
So what do you do with such a theory? Use the scientific method, of course. (Thanks, high school science classes). You test it. And that’s what I decided to do. In the few days leading up to my planned attempt to visit the bookstore, I talked about it out loud all the time. Talking to myself is nothing new; this was just the first time it was for someone else’s benefit. I discussed to myself and to Mr. Bailey about my plans to go meet Zoe; I didn’t mention exactly where she was, because if she turns out to be a victim as much as I am, I don’t want to fuck her over and make it obvious where she’s staying. But I talked about the day and time I’d be going, my general route, all that shit.
And then it was time to see if the bait had worked.
On my first attempt (yes, first – there’s more where this came from), I headed out in the afternoon and took the most direct route along major city streets. I had made probably two turns when I heard a call for help from an alley. The voice sounded all too familiar even if it was one I hadn’t heard in months, and my heart sank. I kept walking, but almost of their own accord, my steps slowed.
Seconds later, someone stumbled out into the street and fell to his knees only a few feet away from me. He looked up, and his face made me want to cry; it looked similar to mine, but a couple years younger and more freckled. There were also no pupils in his eyes, which confirmed exactly what I’d feared upon hearing the voice: 1) it was an MJ, and 2) it was imitating my brother, Justin.
“Please help me, Eli,” it begged in its twisted version of my brother’s voice. “I’ve been alive this whole time, looking for you.”
“No, you haven’t,” I answered, but my voice cracked. Mr. B chirped nervously on my shoulder.
“Yes, I have,” MJ-Justin said. “Don’t you remember, I was still breathing when you left the house? I was still breathing, and you just left me there in our parents’ blood to die. Don’t you remember that, Eli? It’s your fault I almost died. You could have saved me, but you left me.”
It was crying softly now, tears trailing down its face. “No, I didn’t,” I insisted, but it was a weak protest. My voice was quiet, hoarse with emotion. Because who was to say Justin hadn’t still been breathing? I was pretty sure he hadn’t; I’d seen him torn apart as brutally as my parents had been. There was no way he could have survived that. Hell, his organs had painted the walls. But I’d had to flee; I hadn’t actually checked to see if any of them had still been breathing. And they couldn’t have been, I knew that…but what if they had? There was a tiny, tiny chance one of them had still been alive…and if that was the case, I’d left them there to die.
“I know you didn’t mean to,” MJ-Justin said. “You can make up for it now. Please. Just take my hand, and we can start all over.”
It reached out its hand, showing off the dark holes where its fingers should be. I stared at it, spiraling, thinking back to the day I’d seen him killed, how there was no way he could have survived, I’d seen the blood, I’d seen his intestines on the floor – I was closing my eyes now, remembering much more than I wanted to – and then my eyes snapped open and I pulled out my knife, smacking its hand away with the blade.
“You’re not him,” I snarled. “His heart was ripped out. Now fuck off before I find something to destroy that useless head of yours with.”
Its face twisted in anger – an expression I had never once seen on Justin’s face (he was always the nice, laidback one of the two of us) and didn’t like seeing on this cheap imitation. Then, similar to the last time I’d encountered an MJ, it morphed into me, its skin bubbling like hot wax and reforming into my likeness.
Luckily, as I did a quick scan of the area, it seemed the MJ was alone this time. Thank God, because I really was not in the mood to watch myself assault Justin.
Before MJ-Me could get a word off, Mr. Bailey yowled and flung himself onto the MJ, scratching the shit out of its face. It yelled – in my voice, which was seriously unnerving – and stumbled around, trying to pry him off, but it turns out, getting a furious cat off your body isn’t very easy without fingers.
This was great for me, because it gave me time to find a trash can lid in the alley. I brought it out, Mr. B leapt off, and I smashed the MJ’s head in. Great teamwork.
After that I sat down on the sidewalk for a few minutes and shared some cuddles with Mr. B to calm down and clear my head. I was going to continue on my way, but as soon as I felt stable enough and stood up, I shit you not, I turned to my left to see three – yes, three – MJs coming towards me. They looked like me and my parents. Now, you remember the addition to Rule #11 (If you see yourself, just fucking leave. It’s not worth the pain). So at that point I realized I wasn’t getting any closer to the bookstore without a lot more emotional trauma than I was prepared for, and I went home.
Yes, I gave up. Berate me for it, see if I care. You can’t understand until you’ve experienced the MJs fuck with your head and heart all at once.
Besides, I only gave up for the day. I made my second attempt the next afternoon.
I’m sure you can guess how that went.
I won’t bore you with the details of Attempt #2, but here’s the summary.
I talked a lot about it beforehand too. That evening, I made a big deal of the first failure and described my new plan. Then the next day, I took a route that was more off the beaten path; I used smaller side streets and planned to double back several times. I passed an apartment building with a small, overgrown garden out front. Now, you’d think this wouldn’t be big enough to attract a Sandra, and maybe that would be the case normally; but one had been stationed there, it seemed. I saw the two purple flowers growing in the weeds just in time to get my earplugs in (Rule #8). It wasn’t a fun encounter – my ears still bled and my head still ached. I managed to burn it to a crisp eventually.
Shortly after that, my path was blocked by a crowd of Calebs. I had to run into the closest building, which turned out to be a ten-floor office building, and let me tell you, what a crazy time. Never thought I’d be using cubicles to my advantage, but hey, whatever works. I also ran up and down a lot of stairs, because the elevator had been destroyed by monsters some time ago and was laying broken in the basement, its cables severed.
By the time Mr. Bailey and I had killed all the Calebs, it was starting to get dark, and my legs were killing me. So I went home again. No fucking way am I going to that bookstore for the first time at night.
Now, the third attempt is when things got really interesting. First of all, because I tried a third route: the scenic route, if you will. A long path near the outskirts of the city that took me right along the dome for part of the walk.
And when I got to the dome, I saw something new: on the ground at the base of the dome, about every ten feet or so apart, were spray-painted red X marks. You know, like “X marks the spot.” Only it didn’t seem like this was for buried treasure, because 1) I’m pretty sure there’s no random buried treasure in this city, and 2) there were sixteen of them. I counted. That’s not “X marks the spot,” it’s “X marks 160 feet worth of something.” They definitely weren’t there last time I walked this way a few months ago, which means someone or something has drawn them since this all began.
Mr. Bailey just gave me a little meow and shake of his head, so I guess he didn’t know either. It occurred to me that Zoe could have made them, and if that was the case, I wondered what she was marking. If I ever got through the monsters clearly being sent to stop me from getting to her, I’d have to ask her.
Because, I mean, come on. Based on the last two days, my hypothesis certainly seemed to be correct. It’s common to run into monsters, obviously, but the way I’d been running into them on every route I’d tried, as if on cue? It felt like they’d been placed in my path intentionally.
The third attempt only made that theory seem more likely. After finding the X marks at the dome, I turned in towards the city, my back to the dome, intending to head deeper into the city now that I’d gone as far on the outskirts as I could.
I didn’t make it very far before – shocker – I heard the thundering of footsteps, and around a corner came a herd of Brents. By that I mean, like, ten of them. Which is a lot for one guy to handle, especially since I only ever carry two or three Molotov cocktails at a time.
Mr. B arched his back and hissed at them from his place on my shoulder; unfortunately, this did not seem to deter them. They were all staring right at me, and they just kept coming. “Fuck,” I cursed under my breath.
And then I ran. Because what else was I gonna do? It gave me concert hall vibes, as I ran away and simultaneously reached into my pockets, fumbling for a cocktail and my lighter. The kind of déjà vu I never wanted to have: here I was, running for my life, frantically trying to light something on fire to throw back at them…again.
Thankfully my lighting-stuff-on-fire while sprinting skills have gotten better with experience. I managed to set the rag alight and toss it over my shoulder. I heard the screech as at least one Brent went up in flames, and a second later I smelled burning Brent flesh. I gagged and almost vomited, but that would have slowed me down, so I just covered my mouth and tried not to focus on the grossness factor.
I did the same thing again with my second cocktail, and this time I remembered to breathe through my mouth, avoiding the worst of the awful burning-monster-flesh smell. I hoped I’d gotten them all; they are pretty stupid and will flock together, even if something on fire comes their way. I chanced a glance backwards and my heart sank: not only were there still several left of the original pack, but as I watched, another several came careening out of side streets and joined them. The herd was basically back to its original size, and I had no more ready-made Molotov cocktails on me. Fuck.
I had also been sprinting for quite a while at this point, and I’m not ashamed to say that despite the occasional running for my life I do, I’m not in the best shape in the world. It’s been a long time since high school basketball. So I was winded as all hell and developing some major cramps. Without meaning to, I began to slow down, and the Brents – who hadn’t been far behind to begin with – gained even more ground.
I tried ducking quickly into an alley or two, hoping that would confuse them, but it didn’t. They just kept coming. Finally I found myself in front of a bank; it seemed as good a bet as any. I raced up to the doors and tried to pull them open, only to find that the suckers were locked. And I mean, like, really locked. I could see through a window in the heavy door that they were deadbolted. I mean, come on, who was so worried about money when all this started that they locked up the bank so well? Did someone really think the monsters were here for armed robbery? Or maybe people had hidden out here early on. (If that was the case, it definitely hadn’t worked, because I could see massive holes in the roof even from here. If only I could have gotten in through those!)
With enough time, maybe I could have found a way in. But I didn’t have time. Mr. B meowed sadly. Resigning myself to my bad luck and my fate because of it, I turned around, my back against the bank doors, and faced the Brents.
“Sorry, bud. I love you,” I whispered to Mr. Bailey. And I closed my eyes, waiting to feel claws tearing into me and ripping out my organs.
Only I didn’t. You probably guessed that, since I’m writing this now. But I stood there, heart beating a mile a minute, convinced these would be its last beats…and instead of getting torn to shreds, I heard roars, ripping, thuds, yelping. I had no idea what was going on, but I was too scared to open my eyes, because I didn’t want it to somehow be a trick (who knows, maybe the Brents had gotten smarter and were trying to lull me into a false sense of security. Stranger things have happened here).
That is, until Mr. B chirped and flicked the back of my head with his tail. I trust his judgement, so I slowly opened my eyes.
What I saw was…weird. It looked like the Brents were fighting each other. Several of them already laid dead on the ground, their throats brutally torn out. So I guess if you have ten-inch claws and are big enough to fight a Brent man-to-man, you can kill them the good, old-fashioned way. I think I’ll stick to fire and explosives, though.
There were four left, and it appeared to be one versus three. There must have been one who decided it wasn’t a team player and wanted me for itself. And unfortunately, that one was apparently pretty terrifying, because as I watched them snarl and lunge for each other, two of the opponents yipped in fear before turning tail and fleeing.
Now it was one-on-one; I didn’t have to watch long before it was all over. There was a lot of slashing and biting, but ultimately the rebel won. It smashed the other Brent’s head to its knee, clawed the shit out of its chest, and tore its throat out, same as the ones who were dead already. That other Brent dropped to the ground, lifeless, leaving just the rebel. And the rebel looked up at me, blood dripping from its claws, and began to walk slowly towards me.
God, I wished I had something else flammable! Maybe I could pull off my jacket and set that on fire. It still had all my other supplies in its pockets, though, and the Brent wasn’t very far away; I didn’t think I could empty my pockets, get the jacket off, and light it on fire in time. Well, at least I’d only be torn apart by one Brent, and not a whole heard fighting over me. That seemed like it might be a little less gruesome.
I kept my hand on my lighter and was about to light it and throw it at the Brent – a last effort at saving myself – when it suddenly stopped walking. It was on the bank steps now, a few feet away from me but not close enough to tear out my heart, and it just…stopped.
It made a noise that sounded like a dog whining. It was almost cute. I’d never heard a Brent make that noise before. And then came the real shocking part: Mr. Bailey responded with a chirp. I looked at him in shock as the Brent whined again, and Mr. B meowed, and it continued back and forth. They were having a conversation!
After thirty seconds or so, the Brent held out a paw and opened it, palm up, to me. Sitting there was a note, and before I even read it, I recognized the handwriting.
I glanced at Mr. B, who chirped and tilted his head, as if encouraging me to take it. He seemed to be pretty sure, so I gingerly lifted the note from the Brent’s paw. It stood there patiently as I read it.
This is Waffles. He’s a little smarter than most of his kind and a hell of a lot nicer. You can trust him. Maybe you remember being carried by something big and hairy after the...incident at the concert hall. If you do, well, that was him. He’s my friend. I can explain in person.
Speaking of that, I sent him to help you. I saw you yesterday; you got close to the bookstore. After the concert hall, I knew they were trying to keep us apart. I figured he could make sure you get here today.
He knows where to go. See you soon, I hope. Zoe.
I looked at Mr. Bailey in disbelief (he was reading the note over my shoulder) and said, “You seeing this shit?”
Well, he apparently didn’t think it was quite as ridiculous as I did, because he stared me down and gave a soft little chirp. I could see in his eyes that he trusted the Brent – excuse me, Waffles – and I trusted Mr. Bailey. He had talked with it, after all. So I guess I was totally giving in to insanity and would now follow a Brent to find Zoe.
I sighed and said, “Lead the way.”
And that’s how I ended up walking alongside a Brent named Waffles, heading to a bookstore, to go talk to a girl I barely knew, while it held a conversation with my cat. Just when you think your life can’t get any crazier, huh?

“Daniel, can you run through the case for me one more time please?”
I looked across the desk at my new assistant. He was exhausted, I could tell. His brain was frazzled from repeating every tiny detail so many times.
He took a sip of water and prepared to do it again, just once more.
“The target is Liam, he was twenty three years old at the time of his disappearance six years ago. He lived with his parents, Brenda and Steve and was a single father to Macy, four years old at the time. He was a responsible young guy and an outdoorsy person who often took his daughter to the local woods.”
“Good.” I replied. “What happened to him on March 6th?”
“He’d spent a day in the woods whilst Macy was having a rare overnight visit with her mother. He didn’t get to hike alone often and took whatever opportunities he could.
“He returned to the home that evening, agitated. His parents said he wouldn’t calm down and kept repeating that something was following him. His behaviour was erratic and paranoid.”
Daniel took another sip of his water and rifled through the mounds of paperwork on the desk to jog his memory of the timeline before continuing. He was doing well, but I enjoyed watching him sweat.
“His parents managed to calm him enough to get him to sit and eat dinner. There was no one surrounding the house or in their garden, despite searching.
“Still unsettled, he told Brenda at 9pm that he was going for a walk to clear his head. She thought it may help and didn’t stop him. When Liam didn’t return by 11pm Brenda began to panic.
“She tried to call her son but his phone was switched off, which was very unusual. She didn’t know what to do. Her and Steve drove around the local area but couldn’t find Liam anywhere. He didn’t return home and was reported missing the next morning.”
“Has there been any evidence since?”
“Nothing. Not a single sighting either, which is odd for a case like this. But there are numerous theories, most relating to a photograph that Liam took and posted online only hours before he returned to the home.”
I picked up a photograph that stuck out amongst the local news clippings and documents I’d managed to acquire from police, rescue forces and PI’s.
It was one I’d spent hours looking at.
It showed Liam, a handsome young guy beaming at the camera, trees around him and his face reflecting the happiness he felt within nature. I’d started to feel like I knew the missing boys face better than even his mother did, having studied it so intensely.
It would’ve been fairly innocuous, if it weren’t for the shadowed figure just visible in the background.
Humanoid in shape, the figure appeared to be standing behind a tree, watching Liam as he walked through the forest. It’s features were clear; eyes, a nose and a smile, all engulfed by darkness. Every time I looked at it I felt a chill of fear and excitement.
The case had gained very little traction; police had mostly written Liam off as a runaway. They kept up a cursory investigation but explained away his erratic behaviour with drugs, despite everyone close to him insisting that it was completely out of character.
Most professionals involved had disregarded the photograph as an optical illusion.
Not all were so eager to declare the mystery solved. Difficult to find Internet forums discussed the photograph regularly, coming up with a colourful array of theories.
Did Liam run away and stage the picture? Was he kidnapped by some sort of Bigfoot? Did he stumble on something he shouldn’t have in the woods and paid for it on his later walk?
Some even speculated that his ex, Janie, killed him to gain custody of their daughter. This was a theory that was fiercely denied by both Janie and Liam’s family. The couple maintained a good co-parenting relationship and the arrangements for Macy were agreed.
His mother contacted me when police officially closed the case after seven years of following useless leads and tips from conspiracy theorists. Macy had started to ask about her dad, to question what happened. Brenda couldn’t bear the not knowing.
“I got your number from a friend at a support group I attend. She said you’re the best.”
That’s all Brenda said to me when she called.
She couldn’t pay. Usually my services are very expensive but Liam’s case intrigued me, so I took her on pro Bono.
It was Daniels first case, and my first working alongside someone else. It was unusual, to have someone in the office who wasn’t crying, or lamenting me for not being able to resurrect the dead.
It was going to take a while to adjust but after the incident in the bar with Olive I was grateful not to be alone. I hoped I’d made the right decision, Daniel’s online credentials were shining as he reeled off the case in perfect detail.
If it worked out I would have so much more time to work out who was trying to stop me getting to the truth.
I thought of Valerie. The hour that I waited for her in the park to turn up and how cold the bars were on that swing. We were sixteen, confused and in love, her disappearance broke my heart.
I couldn’t be more desperate to follow the lead but I had to be smart. I needed Daniel to acclimate before I trusted him to help me with something so important.
I had to see how he’d cope when faced with a monster.
In Liam’s case, everything pointed to him having been taken against his will by the entity in the trees. I’d had the photograph studied by experts in editing, all of them said it was untouched.
That was rare. I’d never before had a piece of evidence so compelling. I ran the risk every time of unearthing another human monster and another human tragedy. Or finding someone like Kai, who didn’t want to be found.
Not this time.
“Tomorrow we’re travelling to the woods and we’re going to retrace Liam’s steps. Are you ok with that Daniel?”
He looked nervous. Daniel was young, inexperienced and sceptical of almost everything I’d told him, regardless, he showed promise.
I’d tried to be upfront and whilst I was grateful that he hadn’t left immediately exclaiming my insanity, I was concerned that he was woefully underprepared.
I’d met him online two years ago, where he’d obsessively categorised missing persons cases, sparing no detail. His reservations were natural.
It’s a hard pill to swallow, finding out that monsters are responsible for a huge number of unresolved disappearances.
Daniel thought that I was making some kind of sick joke, that it was an initiation.
He nodded and we parted ways, him carting a huge folder out of the office to study the case overnight. I’d tasked him with mapping the route and helping us find the spot that Liam took the photo. I wanted to really test him.
I pulled up an hour or so before sunrise outside his small flat, just above a shop.
He’d dressed ridiculously, in a shirt and blazer. I held my tongue, making a conscious effort to come across nicer.
“Morning Amelia!” He beamed, feigning a cool exterior. He couldn’t hide the sweat on his brow or the small tremor in his hands. Not from me.
“Are you ready?”
“I am. Last night I did some research into the local area and the woods Liam went missing in. Did you know there are eight people who disappeared in those woods in the last decade alone?”
“I didn’t know that. Good work. I think we could be dealing with something very dangerous... I have to ask, Daniel... Why the suit?”
I just couldn’t stop myself.
“I’m working. These are my work clothes.”
I laughed a little and touched the accelerator with my woodland walking boots, feeling a little smug as Daniel whimpered a meek protest.
“You’ve not done any field work in your research have you.” I smiled to myself, revelling a little in his fear.
“I find my skills are on a computer. I can dig up dirt, hunt anyone down via their digital footprint and put together a comprehensive file. But no... I’ve never taken it out of my bedroom.”
“Do you know why I offered you this job Daniel?”
“Because I’m thorough. I’m useful.”
“No. That’s not it.”
I smiled again as I took a hand off the wheel and reached across him to the glove compartment, pulling out a pack of cigarettes and lighting one as I wound my window down slightly.
Online sleuths were ten a penny but there weren’t many with the skills that Daniel had, I’d chosen him for a reason.
“I hired you because I traced you back to the email address I received the anonymous files from. I haven’t come across many internet detectives with the balls to hack a secure police system.”
Daniel grinned, it was a victory he needed to help subside his nerves.
“Like I said Amelia, my skills are online. I saw some old posts of yours about this case on the forums and I thought I’d give you a hand. We’d been talking for some time and I really wanted this job.”
I felt my whole body cringe. I did need a hand. The files he sent we’re regarding the case that kept me awake every night for over a decade. The only one I’d been unable to solve.
Valerie.
I didn’t want to burst Daniels bubble by telling him I’d already seen those files and that they were of no use to my investigation. It was his drive and ability that I was interested in. I let him have his victory.
“Tell me if I’m overstepping but I didn’t realise that you... knew her.” Daniel continued, plugging the silence that had followed his admission.
“You are overstepping.” I hissed back. “We aren’t discussing Valerie today. Who is the target?”
“The target is Liam-“
“The target is Liam.” I asserted with finality, tossing the end of my cigarette out of the window. I wasn’t ready to let him in, not yet.
We continued towards a small village silently, an antiquated sign marking our turning off the busy stretch of road and into meandering hills and valleys.
Abelfort
I stopped the car abruptly in a small, deserted car park on the edge of the woods.
“Where did he enter?” I asked.
The woods weren’t especially large, not in comparison to the vast national parks of America. For England, however, it was more than just a small smattering of trees. Certainly enough to be classified a forest.
Choosing the correct entrance point was vital to covering similar ground to Liam.
“He lived over that way.” Daniel clutched a piece of paper and pointed to his left, dawn just breaking in full over the tree line. “So he will have gone in through something the locals call the cross tree.”
He pulled another scrunched piece of paper from his pocket and I despaired a little as I noticed his formal shoes. They looked expensive. He unscrewed a photo of two trees that had intertwined about two metres up, creating a perfect natural archway.
It wasn’t hard to find.
There was something about the way the trees danced with each other in the morning light that made it look more eerie than peaceful. Like two lovers in a violent, passionate embrace.
“There’s no need for work clothes in this job, you know?” I joked, trying to make conversation and squash the earlier tension as I held my copy of Liam’s selfie up to various different trees.
“I’m learning that now. There was no induction pack.”
I scoffed. I supposed I wasn’t such a traditional employer. When should I have broken it to him that we were extra busy during holidays?
The forest terrain was treacherous. Even through my boots I could feel the protruding tree roots and uneven surfaces. Daniel was struggling, shivering a little under the canopy that blocked out the freshly risen sun. We walked for hours.
I wasn’t sure what exactly to look for, I couldn’t liken the monster in the photograph to anything else I’d dealt with, leaving us in unfamiliar territory.
Finally, after starting to feel hopeless, I noticed something.
I faced Daniel and held my finger to my lips, stopping him in the clearing we’d reached.
The sounds that accompanied the trees had stopped, there was no birdsong, no tree branches moving in the wind, not even the sound insects rustling in the leaf litter. Instead there was a feint hum, surrounding the area and vibrating from every direction. It was low pitched and hypnotic.
Daniel started to shake as he noticed the low, rhythmic tones. I felt my own heart start to pound a little.
Whatever was near was doing a great job of trying to insight panic. I wondered if that hum was what Liam heard, alone, following him through the trees as he made his way home.
That would fuck with anybody.
“Come on! You didn’t hide very well the first time, why are you hiding now? We’re here for Liam!” I shouted into the open space.
I was angry. Angry that something would be so blatant and yet so cowardly. It was trying to use us as playthings.
“Who said that was the first time.”
The hum came to a grinding halt as the creature spoke and its words echoed directly through me.
“Come out. Face me.”
I noticed that Daniel had dropped his map and his whole screwed up pile of printed documents. The internet wasn’t going to help him now and he knew it. I was confident I could keep him safe... for the most part.
The leg came first. The burnt looking, shadowed leg that lengthened and contracted as it moved, like a slinky making its way down a steep set of stairs. The body followed. Unlike anything I’d seen before the monster moved like the laws of physics didn’t apply.
It wasn’t typical of the monsters I was used to facing. Many of them resembled humans, or at least things that humans might recognise. This, however, was something entirely new.
For a moment, I felt exactly what Liam must have felt. The panic, the terror, the desperation to flee and go home. It wasn’t a good feeling.
As it stabilised, fully in our view it morphed into the human-like shape I’d grown so familiar with when studying the photograph.
It’s extremities resembled the branches and roots of the trees around it. It’s eyes formed in the space between the shadows, glowing a yellow that just stood out amongst the winding branches.
And that grotesque, sinister smile.
Not all monsters were so unpalatable, but I could feel the hatred coming from inside this one. Like it’s sole purpose was misery.
“What happened to Liam.” I quivered desperately.
“Which one was he.”
Without the forest to obscure it the monster voice echoed with each word, like a second, and third, and fourth voice all lived inside it. A mocking laugh following every letter.
“The one you couldn’t resist so bad that you let him take a picture of you.” I held up the photograph, inching slightly closer.
”mmmmmm.... hahahahahah.”
I took my eyes off the monster long enough to recover from the profound effect that his evil smile was having on me. I turned to Daniel, scanning his torn and muddied clothing as I noticed a damp, dark patch on his posh suit trousers.
I hadn’t intended to scare him so badly. I hadn’t expected to be scared so badly myself.
“Is he alive?” I shouted.
”Of course not. He tasted so good. How do you think you taste... Amelia?”
I felt my face sink. I tried to control it but I couldn’t.
“How do you know my name?” I demanded, shaken.
”Your reputation precedes you. There are so many out there who would consider me a hero for removing you from this world.”
I took a step back, piecing together the parts that didn’t make sense. A monster like this wouldn’t reveal itself. It just wouldn’t.
This was a trap. Just like Olive.
“Who hired you?” I screamed, my hands clammy and sweat forming on my neck. I tried to hold my composure.
”There’s plenty of candidates aren’t there. Your work, your life, your involvement with that pretty, young girl... What was her name? How did she taste Amelia?”
I swallowed a lump in my throat. The sickening voice spoke with such knowing of my intimate personal tragedies.
He knew way too much. And we’d found him far too easily.
“Who are you working with? How do you have these details?”
*”I bet you’d love to know the answer to that. You still didn’t answer my question though. What do you think you taste like?”
I snarled. I wasn’t going to get anything from him and I knew it. Distressed, it took me a few moments to notice the creature extending a long, branch-like arm towards my new assistant.
“Daniel move!” I screamed, watching in horror as he leapt backwards, stumbling in his muddied shoes and tripping to the ground.
I ran towards the monster, fumbling in my pocket for the knife I’d used to sever my connection with the sirens. One that had got me out of many scrapes. The creature noticed the small blade in my hand and it’s smile extended, past the perimeter of its face.
”They said you had weapons... Your weapons won’t be effective against them. You have no idea what’s coming.”
I plunged the knife, deep into the shadowed mass as it stood and waited, laughing, accepting its fate. It was apparent the entity was nothing more than another message, a living warning on a suicide mission.
That terrified me even more.
As the knife made contact the creature started to disappear, fading into blackened particles. I didn’t like to kill anything, that was never my aim, but no one deserved to die like Liam did either.
One by one the particles faded into nothingness, leaving behind a lighter atmosphere. As the last of the creature was obliterated the colours in the forest grew brighter and the sharp tweet of a bird broke the silence.
“What the fuck was that!” Daniel’s voice bought clarity to the area as he hoisted himself up from the floor. The creature was gone. I clung hard to my blade.
Clarence, a good contact working closely with monsters, hadn’t explained to me how it worked or what it was made of when he’d given it to me. He said it was a secret of the organisation he worked for and if they found out I had one he’d lose his job.
I’d tried to turn him down at first, insisting I’d rather die than kill, but I’ll be damned if it hadn’t come in good use more than a few times.
“I meant...” Daniel continued, breaking my stream of thought.
“I know what you meant and I told you when I hired you, open mind. You need to adjust to the things you’re going to see. Now get us back to the car, please.”
We stumbled through the trees and out of the woods. Daniel was embarrassed, he tried to hide the wet patch in his trousers but he knew I’d seen.
“It’s ok to be scared you know.”
“You weren’t. I don’t want to be scared anymore Amelia, this was awful... and the most exciting thing I’ve ever done. I’m ready for our next target.”
“Me too... But first we have to inform Brenda that her son won’t be coming home and that her granddaughter no longer has a daddy.”
I shed a tear for Liam as we loaded the car and got back on the road. I had nothing to give his mother, no evidence of life or death and not a single real answer.
Daniel was wrong too. I was scared.
Monsters and the people that work with them are responsible for so much damage. And I know all about it. There was a chance that these warnings lead to Valerie, and an even bigger chance that I was being trapped.
Whoever was after me already knew the answers to my cases and they’d reached the monster first. They were able to make such a terrifying creature willing to die for their cause.
This wasn’t just about stopping me finding Valerie. Someone wanted me dead.
TCC
case 3

What with the current fascination with sea shanties and sea songs, I figured that some folks might be interested in trying out the musical instruments of Western sailors of the 1800s and early 1900s. While a classic shanty tended to be sung just with vocals, sailors played a variety of musical instruments popular in their eras, and in the Folk Revivals of the mid 1900s, lots of musicians did fine work adding instrumentation to the old tunes.
Maybe you’re an experienced musician looking to try a new sound after discovering sea songs, or maybe you’ve never played a note and hearing these great old tunes has inspired you to learn. In whatever case, in this little write-up I’m going to lay out some of the traditional instruments of the era which were favored by sailors, and explain for each how affordable and easy to learn they can be, and link you in some examples to listen to and places to learn more about each instrument.
I’m not a PhD musicologist, but I do have a lot of research background, been playing traditional music for over 30 years, and have a general handle on the scene and the era. And I have for over a decade done little projects online to encourage people to push their boundaries and break away from the mainstream by trying musical instruments beyond the most common ones. Being entranced by a new genre of music is a fine time to further expand your horizons by taking up an instrument and making music yourself.

WINDS * Tinwhistle * Flute (and piccolo and fife) * Trumpet
STRINGS * Guitar * Banjo (and banjo ukulele) * Fiddle * Mandolin * Ukulele
FREE REEDS * Harmonica * Concertina * Melodeon/Button Accordion * (Toy Accordion/Melodeon)
PERCUSSION * Drums * (Bodhrán)
NOT TRADITIONAL SAILOR INSTRUMENTS, BUT WOULD SOUND AWESOME WITH SHANTIES * Appalachian/Mountain dulcimer * Udu or Ibo drum * Bagpipe * Electronic Instruments
I will note before we begin, especially in the budget category, there are some real bargains but plenty of junk, so please use this article as a starting point, but read up a little on best buys. Don’t just say “oh, I dig Irish flute, and I see a new one on eBay for $50, sounds like a bargain!” and buy it without doing a little research, or you’ll get stuck wasting time and money on unplayable junk. All the more so for used instruments, which can offer great savings, but you really want to buy from a reputable dealer or a musician, or have an ironclad strategy for DIY repair, lest you get something too out of whack to learn on and too pricey to repair. Plenty of bargains, just don’t get impulsive, do just a little research before each purchase and you’ll be glad you did. There are online communities full of geeks like me for each of these instruments, who'd be happy to chat with you about choosing a good one for your money, and how you can best learn to play.
We’re looking largely at the instruments of seafaring European (and diaspora) folk of the 1800s and early 1900s, which you can note largely resembled the instruments of the working class on land, farmers and city laborers, just with an eye towards durability and portability at sea. Fortunately, many of these instruments are relatively affordable, intuitive to learn (they had to be, to catch on with a largely illiterate population that just wanted to get to playing music without fuss), and often rugged and compact for travel. I realized after I finished this article that all these instruments can be learned by ear and video without formal written study, and (with the exception of fiddle) beginner tutorials for them are written in “tablature” (numbers that say where your fingers go) rather than sheet music, making them even easier to learn for total novices.
WINDS
Wind instruments had the huge advantage of being relatively compact, simple, and affordable, and some of them had a dual purpose for signaling or for military music, or just being heard above the noise of work and waves to keep a rhythm for work or dancing.
Tinwhistle
A tinwhistle is a small metal pipe with six finger-holes, and a whistle-like mouthpiece that directs the breath onto a sharp edge that produces the note. Like a referee’s whistle but with control of the notes.
The great thing about tinwhistle is you can get a totally serviceable instrument for literally $9 or so; they’re just that cheap to make. There are professional Irish musicians who spend decades playing $9 whistles (often doing a little fine-tuning on their own to smooth them out), so they’re by no means just toys. Even if you aren’t in a hurry to learn, honestly at that price you might as well pick one up next time you’re shopping online, and give it a whirl. An instrument you could own for life for the price of a decent 6-pack. The subreddit tinwhistle can provide advice and resources, and off-Reddit there’s the specialized Chiff and Fipple Forum.
If you buy a tinwhistle as a beginner, absolutely get one in the Key of D (the most common key), because 99% of teaching materials are for D, the common key for Irish music. (You'll notice an Irish crossover trend in much of this advice). There are some tutorials for shanties online, but honestly best bet would be to use some of the tutorials for Irish tunes just to learn the basics, and then you’ll swiftly be able to transition to learning other genres by ear.
"Drunken Sailor" tinwhistle duet with concertina
Flute (including piccolo and fife)
The flute is of course a tube where you blow across a hole to make a note. Most of us have seen the classical flute in videos, silver with all those fancy mechanical keys, but the flutes of the 1800s were largely wooden and had few or no keys, just open finger-holes like the tinwhistle. In the modern day, such “simple flutes” are largely associated with folk music, especially Irish, so there are plenty on the market, including affordable ones made of synthetic materials or metals. Just don't be seduced by import "rosewood" cheapies, they're junk, one made of PVC pipe by an actual musician would be a better buy than those wall-hangers.
I made a post on Chiff and Fipple asking about affordable flutes and fifes, and got some good options under $50 for some really simple plastic tube instruments of decent make, and some finer Irish flutes turned from synthetics around $250. Flutes come in a variety of sizes, but like tinwhistles the easiest way to learn is using Irish music tutorials and then adding nautical repertoire once you have the basics down, so again probably get Key of D.
You can get a Low D flute about 2 feet long, or a High D flute (known as a fife or piccolo, or band flute) an octave above, the same rough size and pitch as a tinwhistle, just different method of blowing. The Low D instruments are pretty similar to each other, but for High D ("fife/piccolo/band flute") note some are "true fifes" made to play best at very high pitches for fife and drum music, others are meant to play smoothly at their lowest register, identical in range to a tinwhistle. So mind that distinction and ask the experts if you aren't sure which model suits your vision.
Dixon Irish flute duet with cittern (large mandolin cousin)
Modern high-quality Irish keyless piccolo
Trumpet
In my poring over old engravings and photographs, I was struck by how many showed sailors playing various trumpet-type instruments in the late 1800s, which kind of makes sense given the cultural crossover with military Naval traditions, and the volume of a trumpet which helps cut through wind and noise for signaling or dance music. I’m sure there are a zillion good write-ups on buying a basic trumpet (from $100-300), so I’ll leave you go google those or visit Trumpet.
But personally reading up for this article got even me thinking about trying my hand at a little brass. I'm honestly torn between getting one of the novel plastic "brass" instruments made for learners like pTrumpet or jHorn (around $100) because I like innovative design, or carefully buying an okay-quality used brass instrument (after consulting experts) for similar price. But I bet a whaler would've loved a plastic one if they'd been available in 1863.
"Wellerman" on trumpet
STRINGS
Guitar
In my survey of period imagery, I did indeed find some images of men at sea playing guitar, but do bear in mind that guitar in the 1800s and early 1900s was nowhere near as omnipresent as it is today, and in different forms. Plenty of other instruments were far more popular, up until the mid-1900s where guitar really became a go-to choice in the West. Note too that steel strings on guitars, as well as larger body sizes, didn’t show up much until the early 1900s, so for much of this period those who played guitar played smaller body instruments, with gut strings (nowadays nylon strings sound almost like gut but are massively more durable and affordable).
That said, tons of musicians in the Folk Revivals of the 1900s played a modern large guitar with steel strings and sounded great, so it really depends what tradition and sound you want to imitate. Again there are thousands of write-ups on taking up guitar, and plethora of new and used models, steel strings or nylon, all sizes, so I’ll leave that to you to Google or hit up LearnGuitar.
But I would encourage you to keep an open mind to guitar types to get a little more unusual flair in your musical stylings, break away from the crowd a bit. If you’re an experienced strings player, if you want to get that droning and modal sound you hear in shanties, try tuning your current guitar to the Drop D or DADGAD tunings (see DADGAD), also popular in Irish music, and I think you’ll like your results.
And if you’re a novice considering starting on guitar, I’m one of those people who believes that 2 months on a $50 ukulele and then four months on a guitar gets you further ahead than 6 months on a guitar alone, because uke is just so much more accessible for the total beginner. (Plus you’ll end up having a spare uke to carry where your guitar is inconvenient and left at home.) So if you’re considering guitar, check ukulele and ponder whether a uke of some sort could be an affordable and easy initial stage to launch your studies.
Irish jig on guitar in DADGAD tuning
"Drunken Sailor" on nylon-strung guitar
Banjo
The banjo is an instrument developed by American enslaved people, inspired by related instruments they’d known in Africa. By the mid 1800s, the banjo had crossed demographic lines and become hugely popular with European-Americans and spread to other countries, far more popular than the guitar was at the time. It was the go-to plucked string instrument for much of the 1800s.
If you’re looking to take up banjo, know that the banjos of this period had a different sound and playing style than the modern bluegrass instrument, so set aside your stereotypes and listen to some recordings of “Old Time” banjo rather than the bluegrass and country licks you’re used to hearing in soundtracks. These banjos were less piercing, mellower, and a more languid style. And much like on guitars, steel strings were less common, gut being typical and having a much softer sound (today we have nylon options). So when you go reading up “how to choose a banjo” articles or visiting Banjo (or BanjoHangout.com), look for an “open back” banjo rather than one with the heavy metal ring around the head (“resonator”) which makes it louder and sharper for bluegrass.
If you want to get really traditional, and sound softer and be easier on your fingers, spend $9 to get nylon (imitating gut) strings for a much less cliché and smoother sound. (Just note nylon strings stretch like crazy for a few days until they break in and stabilize, be patient.) Speaking of sound, absolutely don’t fall into trying to learn the modern “three-finger” or “Scruggs” style of play, which is a post-WWII styling, but read up on the old “clawhammer” or “frailing” style of play, which sounds entirely different and may pleasantly surprise you if you thought you don’t like banjo.
"Wellerman" on 5-string banjo, played clawhammer style
Nylon strings on a fretless banjo, just to show a very different sound
I will briefly mention some banjo variants other than the 5-string type we’re mostly familiar with. There is also the “tenor banjo” which has four strings, lacking that shortened fifth string off to the side on the currently popular banjos. A tenor banjo is tuned differently: depending on what strings you’re using (and you can swap the strings out for about $10) it’s tuned either like a violin/mandolin, or like a guitaukulele, so those skills cross over well, and is slightly shorter than the common 5-string.
Three Irish reels on a tenor banjo
And if you want a banjo that to one degree isn’t as historically associated with sailors, but to the other is actually surprisingly similar to the smaller and mellower banjos of the early 1800s, there’s the “banjo ukulele” hybrid which is quite affordable and easy to learn.
Frankly, if this is your first instrument and you want banjo, I’d get a banjo ukulele first rather than a 5-string, because they’re just so affordable (decent ones start around $100 new) and handy and easy to learn, and very mellow, not like the cliché sound you’d expect. And though they lack the fifth string, in the last decade or so a ton of YouTube uke experts have been developing the “clawhammer ukulele” style of play. It works impressively well on ukulele or banjo ukulele (which are played the exact same way, same online tutorials apply, they just have a different body and thus sound).
"Leave Her Johnny, Leave Her" on banjo ukulele, clawhammer style
Fiddle
The “fiddle” is physically basically the same as a violin, just played in a folk rather than classical style. There are probably millions of violins bouncing around the world, including plenty of used deals, but you really want to read up on how to find a good deal on a new or used one, because violins are a little finicky. I would also say that unless you’re extremely motivated or getting a Zoom teacher, I wouldn’t advise fiddle as your very first instrument. Because they lack frets and learning to use a bow is its own distinct skill, they have a bit of a steep initial learning curve. So you maybe want to learn a little ukulele or mandolin (which has the same fingering as fiddle) before jumping in. But that said, if you just love fiddle and are ambitious, or already have a little strings background, by all means dive on in. Learn it in standard tuning, but once you get the basics down, try "open tunings" for shanties and the like. Hit up Fiddle for advice.
The fiddle was a hugely popular instrument from the 1700s up to the mid-1900s before falling off sharply heading into the rock ‘n’ roll era. With fiddle you can cover a huge variety of historical musical traditions.
"Blow Boys Blow" on fiddle, while singing (something you don’t see classical violinists do)
Mandolin
This originally Italian instrument took on a wider popularity in the Western world around the late 1800s and early 1900s, again being more popular than guitar in many areas during that period. A mandolin has the chording ability of the guitar but the melodic dexterity of a fiddle, is nice and compact especially compared to a large modern guitar, and can be bought in a passable starter model as low as ~$99. Though if you can stretch to a budget of more like $300, you’ll really appreciate the improvement.
Plenty of used ones floating around, though buy those from a musician or reputable dealer, not from randos on eBay with something they pulled out of a closet from ages ago. Mandolins are under very high tension, and older ones that are low quality or mistreated can be warped or cracked in ways a novice can’t easily notice, but that make them unsuitable to be played. Don't jump on the first "bargain" you see, mando is common enough that you'll see bargains every other day, don't get impulsive, get advice from mandolin players online.
I will note that although mandolin had a narrower time and place of popularity than banjo or especially fiddle, it closely resembles even earlier instruments like the “English guitar”, “cittern” and “Portuguese guitar” that were more widespread, so can serve as a partial stand-in for a number of centuries and locales. Plenty of good information at mandolin awaits you if you want to take up mando.
Beginner mandolins are pretty affordable, and it's not too hard to learn, but it will take time for your hands to adjust and toughen up your finger pads. If you want to try mandolin tuning on an even more affordable instrument and with less string tension, you can get a basic starter ukulele and get Aquila's "Fifths" strings for ukulele (make sure to get the size that corresponds to the size of your uke) for $5-10 and string it in GDAE or CGDA, and then the fingerings would cross directly over to mandolin or mandola.
"Salt Water Shanty" tune on the mandolin
An example of the related "Portuguese guitar", shared between England and Portugal by the sea trade, played on the docks of Lisbon for "fado" music
"Bach 1st Cello Suite" on a ukulele re-strung to CGDA
Ukulele
The ukulele is based on traditional Portuguese small guitar-like instruments, and was introduced to the Hawaiian Islands in 1879 when the SS Ravenscrag brought over Portuguese immigrants in 1879. The instrument caught the imaginations of the local Hawaiians, and some Portuguse woodworkers who'd just arrived capitalized on that trend and began producing a local version. So certainly sailors coming and going from Hawaiian ports had a chance to become familiar with the instrument.
The ukulele is one of the easiest string instruments to play, and the skills cross directly over to guitar and other instruments. If you're new to strings I would highly suggest getting a $50-99 ukulele first to get used to strings, and then decide your best move. As noted above, a uke can be an excellent stand-in for guitar, banjo, or mandolin (especially if restrung in fifths).
"Wellerman" on a regular $40 ukulele, conventional strumming and sounding awesome
"5 Sea Shanties on Ukulele", a really great and crystal-clear tutorial for noobs by Destiny Guerra
Ukulele has a shanty contest recently, might want to check out the submissions by other Redditors of shanties on ukulele
FREE REEDS
The name “free reeds” might sound confusing, but it basically just means things like the accordion and harmonica (which despite looking so different, are close cousins). On common reed instruments like saxophone or oboe, the air tube has one reed (a flexible tongue that produces a note as it vibrates when air flows over it) that makes the core pitch, and by opening holes to change the functional length of the tube you change the note. In contrast, with free reeds, you have an array of individual reeds that always make the same note, and you choose which note(s) to play by directing air over them with a button (accordion) or by moving it against your mouth (harmonica)
Harmonica
I think most folks are familiar with the basic concept of a harmonica, so I’ll just note there are a harmonicas at every price range, all kinds of keys (and ones in minor scales and such), and a lot of harmonica players own a whole stack of them to have a variety. While there are playable ones for like $10, aim for about $25-35 or more for your first one, if able, rather than going totally cheap, just so you aren’t held back as you’re trying to learn. There are a ton of free harmonica tutorials online, and books you can buy, and harmonica to advise, so you can’t go too wrong.
The modern harmonica was invented in the 1800s (based in concept on centuries-old instruments of Southeast Asia encountered by travelers). Hohner started mass-producing barge-fulls of them in Germany shortly after the American Civil War, and exporting them to the US. While maybe we don’t think of harmonicas as a sailor thing, they were an omnipresent affordable and pocket-sized instruments, surely familiar to sailors of the period.
"Drunken Sailor" on a less-common minor-key harmonica
"Wellerman" tutorial on standard harmonica
Concertina
The association between sailors and concertina is so strong as to be almost cliché, due in large part to Hollywood portrayal, like sea shanty concertinist Alf Edwards cameoing in 1965’s “Moby Dick". The concertina is basically like a small hexagonal accordion, but a simpler and less raucous sound due to (usually) only one reed per note, and every button is an individual note rather than some buttons being chords.
Concertina is pretty intuitive to play, and there are some good free tutorials online. For a novice interested in sea shanties you probably want the “Anglo” style (different notes on push and pull, like a harmonica or melodeon). Commonly people buy the 30-button Anglo, because most concertina buyers play Irish music and you want 30 for that. But for shanties and other simple folk, you can do well with a 20-button (which can also play most Irish), which tend to be a little cheaper. I would really give a pass to the $150-200 China-made ones on Amazon and eBay, and go for at least $299 or so for a new 20b or used 30b. (Or hit up Cnet's sales subforum to ask if anyone has a bargain 20b for a noob).
While Anglo is hands-down the traditional choice of sailors, in the Folk Revivals, for whatever reason (lots of them cheap in pawnshops?) a lot of folk musicians took up the English-system concertina. The English externally looks similar but has the same note on push and pull of the bellows, so totally different playing style. Some of the most famous shanty players of the 1960s-1970s (like the fantastic Alf Edwards mentioned above) played English, which in the actual sailing days was the instrument of the wealthy, not laborers.
But y’all are in luck, because I’m a mod at Concertina and have written a pretty comprehensive Concertina FAQ and Buying Guide for novices, the sub itself can help advise with any questions, and for serious experts or to shop an active buy/sell forum for bargains, visit Concertina.net Forums.
Note for both concertina and melodeon (button accordion), “Appcordions” produces free or cheap apps for your phone or tablet which emulate concertina (Anglo, English, or Duet fingering systems) or button accordion. The apps take a little getting used to, but are fun to try out the concept before committing. Read the instructions or watch a tutorial for each to understand how to emulate bellows direction changes on an app, and they're better on tablet than phone, but passable on phone.
Modern shanty "Grogg Mayles" played on Anglo concertina (note the constant back-forth to change notes)
A. L. Lloyd singing “Off to Sea Once More” backed up by Alf Edwards on English concertina (Lloyd is my favorite shantyman of all time, and Edwards so gorgeous on English that I forgive him the heresy of passing up Anglo)
Melodeon (Button Accordion)
When modern people think “accordion” they tend to think the huge ones with a piano keyboard, such as played by Weird Al. But for much of the 1800s and early 1900s, the dominant accordion was the “melodeon” (Americans tend to call them a “button accordion”) which is generally smaller, and has one, two, or three rows of buttons instead of a piano keyboard. Like the Anglo concertina or the harmonica, a given melodeon button produces a different note when you change air direction, which means that notes that make a chord line up together, making it very intuitive to play.
There are hordes of melodeons on the used market, but ones hauled out of a closet after 40 years of no play can need hundreds of dollars of refurbishment by a skilled technician. So again don’t go buying from randos on eBay, but buy from an actual player, or reputable dealer (many of whom buy the tore-up rando ones cheap on eBay, fix them up and flip them at reasonable prices). Figuring out the good deals can be daunting to a novice, so I went to Melodeon.net and got a detailed discussion going resulting in somewhat of a novice buyer’s guide for sea shanties that you might find easier to digest.
With some hunting around the various reputable dealers, and Melodeon.net’s sales section, you can find a decent melodeon as low as $250-350 (easier still in the UK or EU where melodeon is more common). Also check out the small sub Melodeon (we may add a sticky or wicki to link dealers of affordable refurbished button accordions). Fortunately shanty players are less picky about specific keys and models, so can get some good deals on less-fashionable variants other musicians are slow to buy.
High Barbary on 2.5-row melodeon, voice and fiddle
"Bully in the Alley" tutorial on 2-row D/G melodeon
Addendum: “Toy” Accordions (Melodeons)
I will address one kind of intriguing and highly affordable option for learning the basics on melodeon. There’s a little 7-button job called a “toy accordion” made in China (the button kind, not piano kind), sold on all the major online retailers. It isn’t so much really a "toy" as it is a small functional instrument but of kinda middling materials and iffy quality control, but it is a genuine musical instrument. Funnily enough, a small and shoddy mass-produced melodeon was exactly what laborers and sailors of the mid to late 1800s played, churned out of factories in Germany at prices so low they were practically disposable. Ironically the “toy” is arguably the historically authentic option, in spirit.
I don’t want to sound like I’m shilling for Amazon, I don’t even have affiliate links to them on my YouTube channel (maybe someday), but I’m telling you now that Amazon or equivalent is a good place to get a toy accordion. That way you can buy a model and from a seller with the best reviews, and (this is vital) one with “free returns”. The QC on these is iffy, so if you get a lemon it’s great to be able to put it right back in the box, click “return” on the app, and it gets picked up off your porch or you drop it off at a local business that processes Amazon returns. And if you like you can even just re-order it with your refund until they get it right.
These “toys” run about $20-40 (I just bought an EastaMugig, and it seems pretty decent and ready to tweak), so just pick one with good reviews, ensure it has free returns, and give it a whirl. Or if you really want to cut to the chase, there are accordion “fettlers” (repairers) who will just gut a toy for you and put quality reeds in it. Currently Smythe’s Accordions is the main shop I know of doing this in the US, and will put in quality reeds in the key of your choice, into a Russian toy accordion (better quality), if you want to spend $200.
Now, if you get one into your paws that plays okay and you want to keep it, I suggest immediately opening it up and making some minor tweaks. This is one of those things all the melodeon folks casually mention and afaik nobody has bothered to make a proper tutorial on (I hope to shortly for my YouTube channel), but you can make these substantially better with very little skill. Basically put, you got seven buttons, with two notes per button, and two reeds per note to give it a tremolo/echo effect. The issue is those doubled reeds use up a lot of air, and your bellows are small, and one reed will always be more in-tune than the other. So you get some really basic tools and masking tape, pour a beer or soda, carefully open it (they’re pretty sturdy if you get a good one) and identify the two reeds for each note, lay down masking tape along one to silence it. While you’re in there, if you can identify any reeds that aren’t sounding properly, they’re probably clogged with dust, and you can google up how to carefully slide something thin like a dollar bill under the tongue to knock the dust loose and allow it to sound. Tape off one of each pair, assemble it and try it, and if a given note (now one reed per note) sounds off, make a note of which, disassemble and switch the tape from the other reed and see if the other one sounds better.
It’ll take some futzing, but no major skill and no permanent changes (do it carefully so you can still return it if it just won’t shape up). If you get it right, now it’ll be using half as much air so way easier to play, and if you like there are many other little tweaks to adjust button play, fix bellows leaks, and all that, all pretty low-skill. But fundamentally for $20-40 you can have a kinda shoddy yet effective little melodeon, much like the sailors of old, on which you can accompany sea songs.
Drunken Sailor on a decent yet stock toy accordion
Irish polkas on a toy accordion that’s been fitted with quality reeds
PERCUSSION
Looking at old sailor imagery, you generally see small snare drums and bass drums, and there seems to be a large crossover between those on civilian ships and similar ones played in the British and American navies of the era. If you’re a real stickler you can get “rope-tuned” old-school wooden snare and small bass drums (sold for fife and drum reenactors), or make do with modern used marching-band instruments.
I do want to note there is one kind of drum that’s relatively recent in tradition and wouldn’t really have been played by shanty-era sailors, but sounds absolutely amazing with shanties if you aren’t a stickler: the Irish bodhrán. It’s a relatively shallow circular shell with one drum head, held in one hand and the other hands holds a double-headed stick (like a little kayak paddle) and virtuosically skips it off the drum head in rhythmic patterns. It's pretty cool, but if you get one, learn it proper because eager noobs not bothering to learn skill and just whacking on it are a cliche in the Irish trad scene. Bodhran is tiny but has some good links, and you can always ask and see who answers.
Daniel Payne of Newfoundland sings “Wind Through the Window” while backing himself on bodhrán
NOT TRADITIONAL SAILOR INSTRUMENTS, BUT WOULD SOUND AWESOME WITH SHANTIES
I want to briefly discuss one instrument from each category that aren’t strictly historical to seafarers, but really fit in with the spirit of shanties. These would be great retcons, and one very modern wildcard at the end.
Appalachian/Mountain dulcimer
The dulcimer was likely a French or German instrument acquired by the rural folks in the Appalachian mountains of the US, and worked into the local tradition due to its simplicity. It’s a long wooden box played in the lap, tuned to open tunings, with only partial fretting, which makes it ridiculously easy to learn and accompany yourself on. I like to joke that it's the "Celtic sitar."
I taught quite a few workshops on the dulcimer for groups, and it’s about one of the easiest fretted string instruments to learn. They’re pretty affordable (you can get cardboard-bodied [seriously, they work] ones around $50, basic wooden ones around $100, ask around at dulcimer) and they have that droning and dark sound that would go great with shanties.
"Skye Boat Song" on dulcimer
Udu or Ibo drum
This percussion instrument, originating in West Africa, is a clay pot (some modern makers use synthetics) that is drummed upon, and capable of some really cool percussive sounds. Can produce a surprising number of tonal effects, I think of it as the "African tabla." Runs about $100+ for the basic synthetic models by Meinl, which are lighter and more durable than ceramic. LP makes durable ceramic ones from about $75. See the very tiny sub Udu for more info, or ask the larger community at drums.
Udu/Ibo drum solo
Bagpipe
Check your stereotypes, the Great Highland bagpipe associated with marching around in kilts (which is awesome in its own way) is only one of about 100 kinds of bagpipes, from Ireland to India and Sweden down to Libya. The Highland Pipe is loud and piercing, so not really great vocal accompaniment, but among the many other pipes are several which play at an indoor volume and lower pitch.
Among the ones I’d most recommend to someone starting pipes, in terms of affordability (roughly around $400-$500 for basic ones of these three, some bargains come in lower), availability, volume, compactness, versatility, etc. would be the Scottish Smallpipes (quieter and a full octave deeper in pitch than Highland), the Swedish bagpipes, and the German hümmelchen.
More than any other instrument on this list, for bagpipes I urge you to beware "too good to be true" deals. The reason is there is one specific outfit in Pakistan that has been turning out virtually unplayable bagpipes for export for decades, and they're all over Amazon and eBay for $100-200. They are not "well, I'll try a cheapie first and see if I want to get a nice one", they are total garbage, and the company is run by jerks because they could make a serviceable pipe in Pakistan by paying their workers 10% more and instead opt to turn hopeful noobies off piping forever with a "maybe it's a good starter" that's just trash. There are definitely good deals in piping (mainly some innovators working in synthetics, and some craftsmen in Eastern Europe with low costs of living), but the specific Pakistan pipes exported by a certain cynical company are omnipresent and a total waste. But the good news is with the slightest research you can avoid them and get some good starter pipes at reasonable price.
Give those three types of bagpipes (or others too) a listen, see what jumps out at you, drop by Bagpipes to discuss.
"Mingulay Boat Song" on Scottish smallpipes (bellows blown so the piper has breath to sing)
"Polska efter Nedergårds Lars" on Swedish bagpipes
"A Cascarexa" (Galician waltz) on hümmelchen
Electronic Instruments (maybe on your tablet or even phone to be cheap)
I’m sure many of you have seen techno remixes of "Wellerman" and whatnot, so though clearly in history those far post-date the shanty era, they do sound awfully cool (in some cases). So don’t be too shy to lay down some drum and bass lines and sing over them. There are various electronic boxes and knobs you can buy to do so, but these days a lot of what used to be $500 of fancy electronics are now emulated on your phone or tablet. Go mess with the free music apps, or read reviews and pay $10 for a good one, and get some beats going.
If you want to try out a free iOS app that's pretty intuitive for making beats, as a total novice in electronic music I've enjoyed the free phone app Figure.
Korg iKaossilator laying down drum and bass lines

I’ve been a cop for a little over 15 years now... damn, time really flies. I grew up in this town knowing my mailmen by name, going to the farmers market on Saturdays for my vegetables, and actually attending our monthly town halls- it’s quite the small town life. My rookie year on the job for the most part involved DUI arrests of the same five guys and traffic control for local parades. However, one night I was driving down the road and noticed a red reflector in the bushes on the side of the road. I eased my foot off my gas and coasted towards the light before realizing it was a laid down motorcycle. A second later, I saw the lifeless body around the guardrail.
My heart sunk to my floorboards as I slammed on my brake and came to a screeching halt. I jumped on my radio as I leapt out from the car, “112 Alpha to Base. I’m out on Route 76 with a motorcyclist who is unresponsive. Send medics and backup.”
I didn’t need to check his vitals to see he was unresponsive. His body was ripped to shreds. The guard rail did less guarding, but rather acted like a cheese grater against his fragile skin. His jeans were ripped apart as easily as paper. The image is still ingrained in my mind when I close my eyes.
It was quickly apparent there was nothing I could do to help him. In a matter of minutes two additional officers and medics arrived on scene. I was surprised the medics didn’t announce time of death on scene but instead hauled the body on to their gurney and hurriedly drove away.
Since I was first on scene, I took the report. We got notification that our John Doe didn’t survive and we treated it as a death scene. By the end of an extremely long shift, I still had to identify this guy. I searched his motorcycle and found a wallet in the stow away compartment. Jason Dunes. He was only 22 years old and came from a nice part of town.
My Sergeant tasked me with notifying next of kin so after tracking down this guy’s parents, I started the drive to their house. Ugh, notifications are one of the worst parts of this job. His parents were heart broken and assured me that he would never drink and drive and absolutely did not use any drugs. They were so persistent that he was so cautious and safe on his bike, they pushed and pushed to make sure we did our jobs correctly.
I couldn’t get their persistence out of my head and my instincts told me I was missing something. I went back to the scene and drove a few miles down Route 76. I proceeded through a green light, past the accident scene, and slowed down around the appearing neighborhood. I skimmed the houses and noticed one with a huge spotlight and... could it be? A camera!
I knocked on the door and an older man in his robe answered. “Now, what’s with the ruckus, officer?”
I explained to him that there was an accident and I noticed he had a camera outside of his home. “Does your camera reach the street?”
“You bet it does! I’ve had my mailbox hit three times now and I wanna make sure the damn city pays for it when it’s their dump trucks!”
I was able to get a copy of the tape and as I drove back to the station, I approached the traffic light again. Despite the green light, I slowed down. Again, I looked around and saw there was a camera.
With much legal effort that I won’t bore you with, I got that footage too. I watched as Jason drove his motorcycle through the intersection, followed by an older blue pickup truck. Then, a few minutes later, I watch the older man’s footage and see the blue pick up truck- no motorcycle. I rewind it and slow it down. The truck had a broken headlight. I jumped back to the traffic light footage and saw the truck had not one, but TWO headlights.
This was a hit and run. I immediately took the evidence to my Sergeant, who subsequently took it to our Chief. They thanked me for my police work but said they would take it from there. Again, I was a rookie cop at the time and wasn’t surprised they didn’t want me to take lead on a death investigation.
I tried to follow up and all they said was that it was untraceable and they never found the blue truck, so it just wasn’t going to be solved.
This is where things get weird.
I’ve been working our front desk for the past few weeks while I heal from some minor shoulder surgery. A woman came into the station today and asked for the police report for Jason Dunes’ accident in 2005.
“His accident was November 14th, 2005,” she clarified.
“Wow, I was actually on that call. Was that your son?”
The woman gently closed her eyes and nodded her head. “Hard to believe it’s been 15 years.”
She looked much different than I remembered. To be fair, she didn’t seem to recognize me either as being the one who notified her of her son’s death. Perhaps it was my shaggy beard I’ve been growing since working the desk, or perhaps my receding hairline.
“I’m sorry to say, but since it’s still technically an open case, we can’t release the details to the public.”
“I’m not the public, I’m his mother!” She attested.
I sympathized for the woman, truly. I suggested, “You should have access to the official Coroner’s report if that could be of help to you.”
She huffed. “I already tried that first. They had no record of my son and told me to obtain the police report to see if that would help them with locating his autopsy report.”
“Let me see what I can do. I’ll have to talk to my Chief, but maybe we can try to help you sort this out.”
She appreciated my efforts and I handed her my business card. After she left, I logged in to our report system and searched for Dunes, Jason.
No Results.
I tried searching by report date next- 11/14/2005.
No Results.
“What the hell,” I muttered to myself.
I tried nearly ten other search options before finally searching by reporting officer and typed out my name- Gullifty.
9, 872 Results.
I went to the last page and slowly worked my way backwards towards November 14, 2005.
It wasn’t there. I stared at my screen, in shock that the report seemingly went missing.
I stopped in my Chief’s office and told him the entire situation and asked him where the report could have gone.
“Hm. Maybe there was some system glitch or you didn’t enter it right.”
I entered the report right. It was signed off by my Sergeant at the time, who has since retired. I sensed distance and a lack of care from Chief Hawkins. His phone rang and he was quick to shoo me out of his office and closed the door behind me.
I was at a lost of words. I had to call Mrs. Dunes back but I didn’t know what to say.
She answered, “Hello?”
“Hi Mrs. Dunes. This is Officer Gullifty. I’m sorry to say I didn’t get much information on my end either that would help you. I really wish I could help more. I remember the case quite clearly.”
“It’s very frustrating,” she responded. “I’m honestly relieved to hear you at least say you remember him. Everyone else treats me like I’m crazy and like there was never an accident.”
“I’m sorry, that must be so frustrating. I am curious though, If you don’t mind me asking, what makes you reach out for the reports now, 15 years later?”
I heard her take a deep breath through the phone. “Oh, you’ll think I’m just crazy.”
“Try me.”
“I recently saw a local psychic. I’ve been having a bizarre dream where Jason yells for help and hands me a lottery ticket with letters and numbers on it. I told the psychic all about my dream and she asked me if Jason died in a car accident. I told her yes. She said Jason was trying to solve his murder through my dreams.”
I didn’t want to insult the woman, but I also don’t believe in that bullshit. I just said, “Mhm.”
“Well, I wrote down the numbers and letters that show up in my dreams and asked her what they mean. She stared at the paper and then looked me right in the eyes and said I had written down the license plate of my son’s murderer.”
My natural investigative mind blurted, “Tell me the license plate number.”
Part 2

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