Tyler9000's Journal

Where are you and where are you going?
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Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

jacob wrote: This stuff used to bother me a lot. I would spend 1-2 days thinking about why each person would attack me and why they said what they said. Eventually, I found a solution in Cippola. IIRC you're not a fan of this model, but it helped me a lot to understand whether something was an intelligent disagreement (like the ones that happen here on the forum all the time) or whether the attacker was a troll or just being stupid. Disagreements aren't always intelligent and neither are all the unintelligent disagreements necessarily evil.
Second look at Cippola! I find myself more agreeable this time. ;)

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

The Green and White Room

I remember the first time my boss mentioned the possibility of inviting me on an overseas business trip. I was helping him put together a presentation for a very big potential client in Europe, and along the way I guess I was articulate enough on the subject matter that he mentioned he might need my help presenting. Before he even asked, I applied that day for my first passport and paid any expedite fees required. There was no way I was going to allow a lack of preparation to nix that potential opportunity.

My initiative paid off, and a few weeks later I found myself in the board room of a major multinational company with a market cap in the billions personally pitching the CEO on a new business relationship. That moment in many ways launched my career in a direction I never would have expected. It went very well, and the owner of my company returned home early because the rest of us had it under control. I thought he was crazy to skip the rest of the European tour but was thrilled to be there myself. From then on regular international travel as a respected company representative was a normal part of my job description.

When recounting my travels to others I naturally focus on the highlights. There was that insanely expensive dinner in an exclusive Stockholm restaurant where the wine bill alone was in the thousands. I’ll always at least partially remember the time I learned the hard way how to not be defeated by drinking games with vendors, and I’m still trying to forget the time I realized my non-English speaking taxi driver was also illiterate and couldn’t read the hotel card but was driving me around anyway. Travel is great for stories.

But the stories just dance around the exciting periphery of the day-to-day reality. In dozens of international trips spanning nearly a cumulative year away from home, the most common experience can be summed up with the following picture.

Image

Apparently every major factory in China has a room that looks exactly like this. This small room with green floors and white walls is where foreign engineers like me are cloistered all day while teams of factory workers take turns filing in and out to ask questions, show samples, and get approvals. Each day in China involved spending about 10 hours sitting in such a room, most often completely alone with your laptop while waiting for the next unscheduled meeting. Wash and repeat for weeks on end.

This didn’t bother me at first, as my tasks seemed very important and I found validation in my contributions. But over time the reward felt more and more hollow. I wasn’t always there because it was truly critical for me to be there. It certainly wasn’t because it made me happier in any way. I was there because it was comfortable for the company to have me there and I was comfortable with them paying me well to do so. It was a situation of convenience.

It was sitting in yet another room like this, tired and weary, many thousands of miles away from home and fantasizing about what I’d prefer to be doing, that I started to realize that the original gift of travel may have seemed like a reward at the time but was actually a handoff. I was reminded of the owner who returned home early years earlier and now I finally understood. I was there so somebody else didn't have to be. My life was offered in exchange for their own, and business continued unimpeded. It took a few years to completely extract myself from that cycle, but now that I have I can’t imagine going back.

So imagine my surprise when I realized recently that I’ve been spending way too much time at work fantasizing about what I’d rather be doing. The surroundings are different than the old green and white room, but the mindset is actually quite similar. I’m not really there because I need to be. I’m there because my employer likes having someone they trust to share work with and we’re both comfortable with the situation. Working part time is certainly way better than before and I really like the company, but the mindless routine is starting to reestablish and I’m not sure how I feel about it.

I also realize it's not automatically a bad thing. I think I’m simply becoming more cognizant of how much of my life is driven passively by routine rather than actively by initiative. Like business travel, the scattered exciting stories can be mere decorative embellishments on an otherwise stale vanilla existence. Maybe I’ll keep doing what I’m doing and find ways to proactively use it to my advantage. Or maybe I’ll reevaluate the part-time situation in a little while and branch out yet again into a new adventure. Whether I ultimately tear down the walls of my personal green and white room and remodel it to my own tastes or walk out the door and move on, it’s nice to see the room for what it is. Or more importantly, what it is not.

It is not my life.

BlueNote
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BlueNote »

There's probably jail cells with more ameneties than that room. Even if they put artwork on the walls, wainscotting , marble floors and nice lights they are still rooms most people have to go to in order to perpetuate their existence.

I know people who have done the international thing and it's usually the same general story. At first it's great because you get to go out to fancy restaurants, take in some culture etc. Eventually it's such a drag dealing with the airports, jet lag, long hours, home sickness etc. A friend of mine who is in sales was working out of China a lot, maybe half the year, and eventually just told the company that he'd not be going back to China, except for a couple weeks a year , because all his customer are in North America. They just wanted him to go to China because they didn't like dealing with the customers coming for factory tours and conventions. He got to eat camel hump and scorpions and all that stuff but eventually it gets old and you realize that green floored rooms in China are the same as Green floored rooms anywhere in the world.

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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by jacob »

@Bluenote/Tyler9000 - Given that the [county] jail was two buildings away from the physics department, we (grad students) used to joke that grad school was about the same as prison except that the convicts probably ate better. I did a lot of academic travel and the picture above reflects a lot of my experience except it was mostly hotel room + conference + 2-3 hour excursion to see architecture/paintings/geographical landmark or whatever... Indeed, I once spent 5 weeks in a small room where the A/C was broken meaning that the the room was about 60F and I spent the entire time coding/researching wearing a coat. Still "fun" though---as in, the local "food/history/culture" probably wouldn't have been more interesting to me than an SSH worthy channel, anyway. FWIW, once upon a time, we also got sent to some Hawaiian wedding resort (Big Island) in which one could take the hotel shuttle to eat "cultural cuisine" or "swim with the dolphins". It didn't take very long (a few years to be precise) before I didn't care much at all for any of this(*). This explains my somewhat "non-enthusiastic" travel blog posts. I'm still of the opinion that---at least when it comes to me---I need to spend enough time and effort to pay taxes in a given place before I truly experience it "my way". While I've been to a dozen+ countries, I feel like I only really experienced three of them.

(*) I'm still not sure whether I'm an outlier of humanity of not caring one iota for standard tourist stuff or whether most people are just faking their appreciation of tourist experiences or whether we're just different #wheatonlevels

bryan
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by bryan »

Just got back from a month long trip myself. During the last two years of van living, I've been very open to business travel as it meant expenses paid and zero bills back home (except the $30/mo gym bill). Extreme savings.

For now, I am trying to take advantage of the free travel by taking holiday to bookend the business trip. Generally I just hang out at local drinking holes, walk around, and try to catch anything interesting. Never made it out of the cities, except a day long bicycle ride from Nice to Italy on the coast and back through the mountains.

I'm hoping I get tired of the travel at the same time as I hit FI. Pity some folks in the company who have to travel much more than me though.
Tyler9000 wrote:I think I’m simply becoming more cognizant of how much of my life is driven passively by routine rather than actively by initiative.
Let us know if you find a solution. Been aware of this myself for a few years but haven't done anything about it. Just lucky that the inertia is comfortable enough.

BRUTE
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BRUTE »

just quit.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

Some rooms are physical or are an artifact of job requirements. Others are mental. The former can be remedied pretty quickly by quitting. The latter are a little more complicated.

I've never been afraid to quit a job when I thought I'd be better off elsewhere, and when I walked away completely about 18 months ago it was the ultimate act of personal empowerment over career constraints. Going back and working a few days a week has been an experiment of sorts, and you can think of the situation as me openly removing the door from its hinges and being free to come and go as I please. But somehow I'm too often just sitting with my nose in the corner out of habit.

You don't always have to quit to leave the room. I think I just need to get out more. Learning to fully utilize your ERE powers requires a little practice.

BRUTE
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BRUTE »

brute doesn't understand why Tyler9000 went back part time. is Tyler9000 just bored without a job? maybe the job is ok, but 3 days a week is still too much? Tyler9000 could try going down to 2 days a week. if that's not feasible, maybe more of a 1 week on/3 weeks off type situation.

or he could try to identify the parts of the job he still enjoys, and the ones that bore him. and maybe move responsibilities into the former direction.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

BRUTE wrote: or he could try to identify the parts of the job he still enjoys, and the ones that bore him. and maybe move responsibilities into the former direction.
Bingo.

Timing is a funny thing. Just a day later, today is a great example of an exciting work day. An old client dropped by and showed off production samples of a product I designed a few years ago -- it should hopefully start showing up in hospitals around the country soon. Also, I was pulled into a new project and I already have a cool idea of how to solve it. I'm working on a prototype now.

At my core I'm a designer/inventor. You can see that in my interests even outside of work like Portfolio Charts and my long-time art hobby. I have over a dozen patents to my name in a variety of different industries, and I enjoy making new things so much that I'd do it for free. That people are willing to pay me quite well to do it is a nice plus in the right situation.

So when the old company (a consultancy that invents new things all the time) called me late last year and asked for help designing a new product and allowed me to name my terms, I figured "why not?" It was a no-lose situation, as I find that kind of thing fun and if it wore on me I could always politely return to my full ERE ways and design my own stuff. I think my angst started when the design work waned and I stuck around anyway.

The contrast is a good lesson. It's an excellent company and they've been quite accommodating with me, so it's important to stay focused and not misplace my frustration. As I said earlier, sometimes quitting really isn't the best solution -- I'm just learning as I go what to ask for.

BRUTE
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BRUTE »

what about becoming a consultant to the consultancy itself. when they have interesting work for Tyler9000 they call, but he won't stick around for the boring stuff? sounds like he doesn't need the money anyway, just in it for the fun.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

Yeah, that's an option. Finding the right balance of flexibility/dependability is the challenge, but it's worth exploring further. Being selective about projects and taking breaks in between could be a good compromise.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

Just a quick follow-up...

Last week work was particularly slow, so I decided to talk to my boss about reaffirming the original plan to be flexible about hours in a way that makes sense for us both. Long story short, we're totally on the same page and I took the week off.

Today I'm reminded of how many obstacles in life seem like mountains but end up being completely self-imposed. You never get what you don't ask for. Be proactive!

BRUTE
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BRUTE »

brute congratulates Tyler9000 :D sounds great.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

Tools, Traps, & Turning the Page

Back when I was just a few years out of school, I was highly proficient in a popular CAD software. It was a major pride point, and my particular skills were extremely desirable in the industry. I remember when a company hired me specifically for those skills and proceeded to work me 80 hours a week as I was too valuable doing that one task to "waste" on anything else, and too advanced for others to keep up with to help. While my expertise absolutely opened doors, it also closed them behind me as I walked through.

Believe it or not, the boss who hired me and pushed me so hard eventually shared that he used to be in my exact same situation and had to literally move out of the country for a few years to escape the CAD expert label and do something new. He hired me to avoid being sucked back in himself, sorta like a horror story where the only way to escape the monster eternally chasing you is to sacrifice someone else.

I eventually learned that the only way to break that cycle permanently was to unlearn that piece of software. Even briefly tinkering can be dangerous, as old routines are far easier to fall into than they are to escape. Today I'm happily mediocre at CAD, and my broad experience is far more valuable than any one piece of software that will eventually be obsolete anyway. I probably wouldn't be where I am today if I hadn't forced my way into a different job role.

-----

Halloween has been a special holiday for me -- not for the parties and the candy, but for the curiosity of timing where it has corresponded to major work-related waypoints the last several years. Whether it’s my last Asia business trip, my last day at the office after pulling the early retirement trigger, or an early marker back as a part time worker, Halloween has been a common day to contemplate the professional costume that I choose to wear on a daily basis. So as I’m relaxing on a Tuesday afternoon eating a bit too much leftover candy, I’m drawn to think about my recent decision to shift gears in my latest career experiment.

This time last year, I took my previous employer up on an offer to work three days a week. I had always wondered if that would be an ideal setup even before I took that full year off, which is perhaps why I ended up staying in the arrangement a lot longer than I initially planned. What started as a 2-3 month project morphed into nearly a one-year experiment of sorts, and I only recently decided to take off the rest of the year to take stock of my interests and options. So looking back at the last two years, I’ve had the unique opportunity to try out two different methods for scaling back from my previous career-centric mindset. The first year I went cold turkey, and the second year I worked part time. With both experiences under my belt, what have I learned?

Professional expertise is kinda like that old piece of CAD software that opens doors while also trapping you. I enjoyed working, but the routine I fell back into definitely started to wear on me and I could see unhealthy old habits reemerging that I thought I had escaped during my time off. Also, not every perceived non-monetary benefit of a job translates to part time work. For example, I now realize how many of my work friendships throughout my career depended on a shared bunker mentality, and when you are free to come and go they are never quite the same. I've been lucky to work with terrific people, but there are some bonding experiences I’m no longer around to share.

But more importantly, I've learned that many of these apparent negatives aren't necessarily an inherent quality of work but of my own expectations. When I pour so much of myself into work that unhealthy habits reemerge, or when when I desire more personal friendships than I passively receive just by walking in the door, whose fault is that? Neither work nor lack thereof is the answer to every life question. That sounds so obvious, but it's amazing how quickly we forget it sometimes.

So two years into ERE, I believe I’m ready to turn a new page. I’ve learned that diversifying my interests is the more sustainable path forward than simply moderating old ones. Like the time I had to unlearn CAD to grow as an engineer, sometimes growing as a person requires tossing your career crutch and expanding your horizons. But I've also learned that work is not the movie monster that needs to be escaped, either. It's just a tool, and life is more than your relationship with a career.

Engineering work will still be one of those tools I’ll choose to wield when it's mutually beneficial to both me and the company, but I no longer idolize it as my best option for accomplishing all of my goals. A carpenter with only a hammer is not truly free to build, and it’s time to expand my tool chest.
Last edited by Tyler9000 on Wed Nov 09, 2016 11:32 am, edited 10 times in total.

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C40
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by C40 »

Wonderful post Tyler. Thanks for sharing. These are extremely valuable lessons

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

Bonding Toxicity

Like many working professionals, I once had a pretty significant caffeine addiction. For years my delivery system of choice was diet soda, although coffee eventually took over as the primary vice. Waiting in line for the morning fix behind scores of similarly caffeinated compatriots was not simply a habit but was actually a coherent culture resulting from a common bond. You can take away our dignity, but don’t touch our caffeine! How else will we avoid headaches and have the energy to continue in our daily rat race? I think in some situations caffeine dependency and the popular social construct around it is less about the immediate energy fix and more about full submission to the stresses of professional life.

I never really kicked that caffeine habit until I also kicked the career habit, and even then it took a minor medical issue to force my hand. But now that my system has been recalibrated, the degree to which I notice the effects of caffeine on my body is pretty jarring. Did I always shake like that? And how the hell did I confuse the resulting rush far more resembling anxiety than clarity with productive rational thought? Today as I sip a homemade decaf on a lazy Friday morning, it all feels like a different world.

The other day I got an invite to a happy hour with a bunch of former coworkers, and I was happy to drop in and see how everyone was doing. It’s a good company with even better people, and I always enjoy staying in touch. But the one thing I didn’t expect from the occasion was how another addiction would be so pervasive among my friends to the point of sucker-punching me in the gut without warning. No it wasn’t caffeine, but an equally toxic combination of careerism and victimhood that serves as the primary bonding agent in so many companies today – work talk.

I know it well as I was deep in its throws for years, but only now can I really appreciate just how irrational and myopic so much work talk sounds to an outsider. From complaints about projects, bosses, and schedules to worries about competition and career growth, the degree that coworkers happily reinforce fears and stresses with a smile and a pat on the back but no real actionable advice is actually kinda remarkable to watch when you are not also part of the loop. I understand that venting against a common enemy can be a bonding activity that doesn’t automatically call for a “fix”, but the experience made me wonder how much stress is actually self-inflicted among well-meaning friends. Like chugging an energy drink after being caffeine-free for months, diving in head-first into work talk after being happily sober for a while was a real system-killer and noticeably drained me afterwards.

I never really knew just how harmful some of my motivators were until I quit them cold-turkey, and with the benefit of clear mind I don’t want to go back. That said, I still enjoy a nice cup of coffee and it’s not like I plan to plug my ears every time there's a work conversation. It’s more about avoiding the quick fix of bonding toxicity and leading an empowered life by example. Share help, not vices.

Tyler9000
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by Tyler9000 »

The Art Of Goal Weaving

I’ve always known that I have an obsessive personality. No, not in the “you’re gonna need a restraining order” sense but more in the way that I will chase down every possible angle to optimize a design solution. The focused chaos in my head is hard to slow down once it gets going.

It’s really difficult to describe how that mental process works, as when in the creative zone my thoughts are never serial and there’s no way I could map even after the fact how I draw connections between dozens of data points at once. Of course that occasionally drives process-oriented people around me a little crazy, but over time they’ve learned to trust my instincts, avoid confusing mental processing time with lack of productivity, and also to not pile more than one design task on me at a time. The space to gather seemingly unrelated information and allow the thousand independent spiders in my head to weave something beautiful is important to how I think. And I suspect that mentality is what made ERE really click for me personally – I’m naturally programmed for a web of goals.

That obsessiveness also occasionally has its downsides, though. As good as I am at building mental models and solving complex systems, I have to be especially careful about focusing too hard on the wrong target. My mantra is to always challenge assumptions, lest I eventually discover that my perfect design solved the wrong problem or simply missed the point entirely. I’m usually pretty good about that, but sometimes you just don’t know what you don’t know. So every incomplete solution is also a learning process.

And I’ve learned a lot.

After optimizing savings to retire nearly three years ago and optimizing spending to maintain the freedom to stay that way, I think I’ve finally figured out that maybe I solved the wrong problem. Or perhaps more accurately, only part of the problem. Now that DW and I have a good feel for a financially independent life we’re starting to better understand the activities which offer the highest personal reward, and while our financial system is extremely robust our overall life ecosystem still feels incomplete. Long story short – retirement in suburbia is easy but is not necessarily the lifestyle we enjoy.

To address that, we have been talking a lot lately about selling the house and renting a place downtown where lots of activities are within walking distance. That would definitely stretch our finances a bit, although I'm confident we can pull it off if we put our minds to it. But life has a way of presenting opportunities at just the right time if you’re paying attention, and recently my old employer called to see if I was available to help again on a project. After thinking about how it might reinforce several personal goals at once, I decided to put a chess piece back on the board and propose a new part time work arrangement that benefits us both. And what do you know – they accepted.

While there’s no rush, we’re considering using that extra income to support our downtown rental goal and even expand the desirable locations we can afford while simultaneously reducing our withdrawal rate to near zero. That puts us in a really great financial position, although it could look a little odd to outsiders. Most people who don’t know our background will probably see us as living beyond our means with a lifestyle not supported by our work income. And I imagine some prospective early retirees reading this journal might see us as splurging on a luxury while taking on unnecessary work without understanding that the decision is about so much more than income and expenses.

This particular work arrangement offers some nice non-financial perks to supplement our existing FIRE-level resources and strengthen the overall system. The projects are mentally stimulating while the part time arrangement naturally prevents me from being loaded with the truly time consuming efforts. And the side perks like full company benefits, group beer-o-clock video game meetings, access to a workshop for personal projects, and genuine friendships all make my web of goals feel all the more interesting and well-designed. What I gain from making myself perpetually available three days a week is on balance a lot more than I’m giving up, and to the extent that it may also reintroduce a few pain points I’ve decided to constructively fix them as I go rather than take the easy way out.

It’s actually kinda strange to see my mindset changing from free time and retirement cash flows to sustainable happiness where work plays a role and money is more of an afterthought, but I think that’s a sign I’m doing something right. I’m sure I’ll adjust again in the future but that’s the entire point – the web of goals is neither linear nor stagnant. All that matters is today, and the spiders in my head seem a lot happier and content to enjoy the new pattern in the afternoon sun.

BRUTE
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by BRUTE »

brute has long wondered what an end game could look like for him. most retirees, early or not, seem to figure out pretty quickly that doing nothing is boring to the point of being impossible to keep up. yet going back to 9-5 seems unfitting, at least in the long term.

some kind of "interesting part of the job only", part-time, flexible location/contracting gig seems like a good fit. brute is curious to hear how Tyler9000 will fare on his new old endeavor.

and suburbia only ever seems to work for humans that are too busy working to actually spend time in suburbia.

[edit]

brute thinks that various life-hacking plans could be put on a scale. on the one end is fat fire, or sucking it up until enough capital is acculumated to drive Lamborghinis and drink margeritas for the rest of the remaining life span, and then doing what humans are passionate about. on the other end is finding a job humans are passionate about, but not necessarily saving any money. ERE is somewhere in between, by aligning the web of goals to enable lean fire while also building up non-work ways to fill up life. the two extremes seem to have the same goal (=maximizing time spent on doing things humans love), but take different paths. the first one takes a very non-linear path (=acquiring capital doing something different until FI, then switching to full-time doing loved things), the second one a very linear path (=finding a (possibly not well-paying) job that enables doing what's loved).

it seems that many creative/professional humans actually quite enjoy parts of their work, and continue even after they wouldn't necessarily have to work for money any longer. brute thinks he's somewhat in that camp. in a way, one of brute's passions became his job, and he will probably enjoy it as a hobby even if/when he has achieved FI.

for these types of individuals, keeping at least one leg in the work/career area seems a pretty good match. it can be hard to find the same level of achievement, mastery, and creativity in a completely different domain after decades of honing and investing in a skill. brute will have to figure out where he will fall on this scale of linearity towards doing loved things.

halfmoon
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by halfmoon »

Tyler9000 wrote:
Sun Jul 30, 2017 1:38 pm
All that matters is today, and the spiders in my head seem a lot happier and content to enjoy the new pattern in the afternoon sun.
Very well expressed.

Also: everything brute said makes sense. Really helps to have it laid out this way.

classical_Liberal
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Re: Tyler9000's Journal

Post by classical_Liberal »

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