#technique changes panel to panel and is kinda really noticeable

[goldenstorm0]

Quick little look at a tiny project. Should have everything done either tomorrow or the next, just one more panel/drawing and text. Buuut this came out fluffy and cute. Anya definitely didn't say something lowkey fucked up or weird. just 100% wholesome. yep

please don't notice that I forgot that Loid has two legs. something something Loid eye leg club

[judgeanon]

Plastic Skies - Model 4.5: Wishy-Washy

I’ve mentioned before in previous parts of this journal how one of the top three most satisfying things about getting into model kits was learning a new skill and/or buying a new tool that helped improve not just the model I was working on, but also could be used retroactively on every other one. And so far, the most powerful of these moments has to be when I learned to use washes. Or at least, started to learn.

For those who’ve made models before, I’m sure you’ve noticed that, among the thousand other small mistakes and shortcomings of the kits I’ve posted so far, I don’t do panel lines or weathering. The simple explanation was that I thought they were absolutely beyond me. Weathering sounded like the kind of stuff absolute maniacs with eighty volumes of wartime photographs and fifty different kinds of paints do, and panel lines... this is gonna sound very dumb, but for some reason, I held the belief that doing panel lines involved grabbing a very fine tip marker and just manually painting them one by one. I think some GunPla models do that, and it’s possible that’s where I first heard it, but what matters is that to me, the whole thing sounded absolutely nutso. Especially at the 1/144 scale I’d been working lately.

But then I stumbled into a couple of videos about panel lines made easy, which led me to discover the “Sludge Wash” technique. For those who haven’t made models before, this means making or buying a paint wash (a severely thinned, watered-down paint), painting it all over the model, waiting until it dries and then using some thinner on a napkin to clean the surface excess. Idea being that the wash goes inside the panel lines, and when the thinner wipes away the surface excess, only the lines remain. It turned out to be a slightly more delicate procedure than I thought, but when I saw it, all I could think of was that this wasn’t so hard. I could do this. I could totally do this.

The next time I went to the shop, I didn’t buy any models. What I got was a bottle of black wash, a matte varnish, paint thinner and a few more brushes. And then I got to work. As I mentioned, sludge washing wasn’t as easy as I figured. There was much more sludge than wash, if that makes any sense. And yet, while none of my attempts were close to perfect, I was still deeply impressed by the sheer immediacy of the change. Call me a hopped-up impatient little kid, but few things are as satisfying as making a decision and seeing it blossom into an instant improvement.

My first pick for experimentation purposes was the Tomcat, because out of all the planes I’d built so far, it had the most visible panel lines by far. And the results were as impressive as they were swift.

Kinda wish Tumblr would let folks zoom in on these pictures in text posts, but even like this, the change should be pretty obvious. Instantly, the wash added like two whole dimensions to this model, not to mention making it look like I’ve owned it for twenty years instead of half a month. It wasn’t actually my intention to weather it like this, but I couldn’t really argue with the results. So naturally, I did it again.

The wash’s effect on the Flanker wasn’t quite as extreme as with the F-14, but it still helped endear me to what I still saw as a botched job. It does make the edges of where I tried using masking tape for paint stand out a fair bit more, but the accidental weathering added a lot to it. And I also took the opportunity to try out different kinds of varnishes, giving the Flanker a coat of matte and the Tomcat a glossy one. As with the wash, the results were instant.

The odd man out was the Mirage. As an older, cheaper mold, it didn’t have as many panel lines to grab the paint, so it ended up looking more sludge than anything. And I didn’t even try doing the MiG-21, mostly because the wash I bought was black, so it sounded a little pointless. Still, I do know that there are washes in other colors and that there are far more precise ways to apply them. Haven’t gone and bought them yet, but they’ll be the first thing I get as soon as my next paycheck arrives.

Tomorrow, you’ll see exactly why.

[jingusflorpus]

One Piece's Subtle but Fantastic Touches

There are a lot of minor touches Oda puts into his artwork in One Piece that kinda go unnoticed by a lot of people, but I think really help sell the atmosphere and genuine nature of the story that he's trying to tell.

1: Oda Never Draws a Character's Mouth Closed when they're Speaking.

No matter what the context or who the character is, if a character is speaking out loud, their mouth is open. As I said, it's a minor touch, but it makes the characters feel much more emotive in the way they speak and act, which is extremely important in a series like this, where expressions are so commonly exaggerated to sell as much emotion as possible.

Oda even subverts this fact to better sell certain instances across the series as well.

Here, we can see Nami yelling her threats at Ulti, but something feels... off. Nami seems to be yelling here, but her mouth isn't open? How strange. For a series like One Piece where people are ALWAYS expressive, why would Oda make this scene feel so awkward? What gives?

Zounds, it was Usopp! Nami wasn't speaking at all!

This joke lands so well because of Oda's constant and ubiquitous use of open mouths for speech. The fact that Nami's mouth isn't open serves to make that scene feel a bit stilted, to let the reader know something is off. That way, when the joke lands here it feels like a natural progression from one panel to the next. Neutral >> Confusion >> Comedy.

2: Oda Always Redraws Panels // Oda's Use of Character POV in Flashbacks

One thing I don't think a lot of people realize when reading this series is that Oda always redraws any panel that he wishes to reuse.

While other comic authors might just copy paste old panels that they wish to remind the reader of, as far as I am aware there is not a single instance in this series of Oda ever doing such a thing. He always redraws them.

While part of it is simply because Oda has stated that he feels reusing panels like that would be lazy, I also really appreciate that it helps to keep the reader engaged in the story due to the slight changes in the art that redrawing panels would require. There have been many times where I personally was taken out of a story a bit because I noticed a reused panel that caused me to be reminded that I'm reading a book, not being immersed in a story. Especially when an author's art style has changed between the current part of the story, and the part of the story they're pulling the old panels from. It can be quite jarring to suddenly be in a completely different art style for a panel or two in the middle of the comic.

Listen, I love Jujutsu Kaisen, it's my second favourite shonen series behind One Piece, but going from Akutami's current artstyle all the way back to his signifinicantly less clean and refined JJK 0 artstyle for this copy-paste flashback is so jarring that I can hardly take it seriously.

But that's not all!! It's not enough that Oda always redraws flashback panels, he makes sure to redraw them from the perspective of the person who is having the flashback. Take a look at the example up there. In the original panel, Tashigi is looking off to the side. But in the second panel, as Zoro is recalling the scene, Tashigi is staring forwards. Because in the original scene, she's talking to Zoro himself. Oda sets the flashback from Zoro's point of view for the sake of immersion, like we're really recalling the scene through his eyes.

Another, less subtle example:

Y'know I didn't really need to include those last three panels for the purposes of this but they're adorable and I love them

In that first page, Luffy has dropped Tama behind him. She's staring at Luffy's back as he decks Holdem in the face. A chapter later, as Tama is recalling the scene, we once again see the scene repeated, but this time the the perspective has shifted to Luffy's back. To Tama's perspective. That was how she saw Luffy in that moment, so that's how we see it too. It's such a good technique to help you stay immersed and feel like you're really experiencing what these characters are experiencing, as they experience it. There are several more examples of this throughout the series, and it's definitely something to watch out for! It's one of my favourite little details.

There are a lot of other little things that I could gush over and make this post like 3 times as long, like how Luffy has 0 thought bubbles in the entire series in order to showcase his personality, but these are just some of my favourites. They're barely even noticeable when you're just reading through the series, but they make the experience so much more enjoyable and immersive.

[cuteoni]

I was talking with a friend who I consider like my brother (it was very important to mention it >.>) about a certain pair of twins named Aspros and Deuteros (oh sweetie, you thought I only drew them? No no, I talk about them all day, all night >.>).

I like to translate some TLC panels because it’s interesting to see the differences between the original and the translated version, and sometimes there are things that can surprise you and tell you more about the characters.

In this post I will mostly talk about the French translation because it’s the only translation I know (oh yes I’m French, that’s why my English is very bad ‧⁺◟( ಥ ·̫ ಥ )

So, there was one thing that surprised me when I translated some panels:

Deuteros calls Aspros Brother/Elder Brother (兄, ani) in the original. Well, it isn’t really “surprising” but in the French translation, Deuteros never calls Aspros “Brother” “Elder Brother”, so I didn’t expect this. I’m wondering why they choose to go with “Aspros” when there is a certain logic behind these names/nicknames: Deuteros calls Aspros “Brother/Elder Brother” before they see each other again after Aspros’s death, then he calls him only “Aspros”; and for Aspros, he calls Deuteros “Deuteros”, then “Second/Shadow” and after “Little Brother/Deuteros”. Sometimes, nicknames reflect the relationship we have with somebody, the lesser you are close to someone, the lesser you’ll tend to give them a nickname (most of the time, I think). My dear brother from another mother completed this conclusion with a very interesting point of view which makes very good sense thinking about it: he said “It also shows the fact that Deuteros noticed Aspros’s change of behaviors, whereas Aspros shows us that the darkness is consuming him, and he doesn't try to hide it. Also, Deuteros shows us that for him when he had to kill Aspros it wasn't his brother, but somebody else.”

In summary, I mainly want to say that it’s kinda a shame that they “erase” little details like this because these details add something to the scenario, and shows us that Deuteros doesn't “blindly trust” Aspros, he sees that his brother changes, and so, he changes slowly his behavior with him: trust -> distrust.

Oh! And in the French translation, Deuteros responds to Aspros who said that he only copies him “For me... This technique is the last pure thing my brother has developed as a Saint!” (which we can maybe link to the original where he no longer calls Aspros “Brother/Elder Brother”).

It was kinda long to write but it’s done (ง˙∇˙)ว

I first want to say that it’s my interpretation of the twins, so I’m very very sorry if it’s not like your interpretation (˃̵͈᷄⌓˂̵͈᷅)

And I’m sorry if it’s not really organized, most of the time, I talk about my little discoveries in private messages so it was my first time I talk about it in public.

(I hope my English wasn’t too bad (°□°;)

[sweetescapeartist]

DBS COLORING BOOK CHAPTER 74 REVIEW

*spoilers* I liked this chapter in isolation.

*spoilery spoilers* I dislike this chapter when comparing it to other chapters.

Here's the battle Vegeta fans have been waiting for...! (Glad I lowered my greatly expectations)

First, let's talk about use of panels real quick. When there is action, Toyo has done better and uses about 6 panels max to convey the fight. But when there is dialogue, he uses too many panels. Like 7 to 9 panels on one page. That is too much for dialogue. And he has pointless reaction shots often.

It begins with the axolotl inspired Sugarians leaving their fishbowl homes through cleaning-tube roadways. I like their aquarium-like city and their buildings.

And here we are on page 2 with the Toyotaro dialogue. 😒 How can I tell? Compare it to Dragon Ball and you can easily tell the difference between Toriyama's dialogue & Toyotaro's dialogue. (Toriyama has been more focused with working on the DBS movies. I highly doubt he contributes as much to the manga as some fans believe.)

Vegeta sounds like Mr. Satan when calling fusion and cloning "tricks" lol. And no, I doubt Vegeta's Forced Spirit Fission would work on Granolah. Granolah split himself in 2 with a technique. It is still all Granolah & he hasn't absorbed anyone. Forced Spirit Fission is useless here.

Granolah sure is chatty again after he kept saying how he really really wants to kill these Saiyans. Vegeta tells him he parted ways with Freeza and he is an enemy now, as to which Granolah laughs. Granolah thinks Vegeta is betraying Freeza to spare his own life. This just let's us know what kind of person Granolah is...

Granolah is a nonsensical idiot who doesn't know how to reason well & doesn't listen to truth because he assumes he is already right. I don't like ppl like him who refuse to grow mentally. I went from liking Granolah, to not caring about his bland personality, to disliking him. 😑

Oatmeel's input is pointless because he doesn't sway Granolah into believing the Saiyans may not be lying. He quickly gives up and becomes quiet. Vegeta informs Granolah that he was a child when Planet Cereal's ppl were killed and wasn't part of the attack. But he doesn't care and Paragus wants revenge against the royal family... I mean, Baby wants revenge on all Saiya... Granolah wants to kill all Saiyans.

Then we get Vegeta saying he will kill Granolah after barely talking to the guy who was willing to talk. I guess Vegeta just wants to fight and test his power instead of trying to redeem himself like earlier chapters implied and fans theorized. Throw that out the window.

He turns SSB Evolution & Hakai's large rocks around Granolah. But Granolah appears behind him and shows Vegeta true hakai. He elevates a big chunk of the ground & blows it up then the force pushes Vegeta to him and Granolah strikes him. Cool way to use the environment in battle.

Also, Granolah knows Hakai. He shows it off by using his own more powerful Hakai & suggests Vegeta's training with Beerus is lacking.

There is some cool looking art. Their fight moves from forest to river to lake. Interesting environment s for DB. Reminds me of the Cooler movie and the fights on Namek a bit.

This entire time, Vegeta is on the defensive and has to run. But, I find pages 16-21 silly.

Why is Vegeta swimming when he can fly through the water?! Swimming is slower & Granolah is firing fast ki blasts at him!

YOU: "But, Vegeta is swimming so Granolah can't detect his ki."

Granolah can see him! His right eye is supposed to see blood flow and stuff. He nearly hits him multiple times. And lets not forget he was sniping them long distance and his Goku in the neck and almost took him out. Why does Granolah need aim assist now? I'll tell ya why. To make Vegeta look more impressive than Goku by making Goku look like a poor fighter. And this was a Goku who was using Ultra Instinct and still got messed up by Granolah while Vegeta is just using SSB Evolution. Character sabotage... 😒

Back to my complaints about Vegeta swimming. The swimmin' would work in OG Dragon Ball but not here. It would work on Namek with Freeza who can't sense ki, but not here with Granolah who can sense ki (& maybe even god ki) & his eye can percieve all kinds of movements of the body.

And why does Vegeta momentarily pop up out the water then go hide back into it? Don't say its 'cause he needs to catch his breath. He aparently did training holding his breath while on the Heeter's ship, so he should be fine holding his breath. It was for a short period of time anyways. It just doesn't fit and is unnecessary in multiple ways.

Vegeta Hakai's Granolah's big blast to escape it and it blows him out of the water. Interesting kinda... Until you realize that Vegeta's training that we were shown was lame. He just Hakai'd logs & rocks! It should've shown him trying to Hakai ki blasts from Beerus. Make his training look cool darn it!

Chapter 70 Established that Hakai has changed. It no longer is just erasing things from existence in different ways. It has to have a *boom* explosion to it. So when Beerus Hakai'd Zamasu in chapter 19, there should've been an explosion instead of turning him into sand? So, now whenever the Hakai is used, there will always be an explosion...? I don't like how Toyo is quick to change what he set up just for his convenience...

Granolah brags about himself then Vegeta brags about himself-...! That's why I dislike Granolah! He's just like Vegeta! Maybe if I stop thinking of Granolah as a "good guy" then he will be cooler? I did like evil Vegeta as an evil character. We were supposed to hate him. So, if I imagine Granolah as an evil Vegeta... It worked! Granolah's unappealing attitude works perfectly if you view him as an evil enemy! (Still kinda preachy tho)

VEGETA: "But I'm still going to win."

Vegeta fans rejoice! Your prayers have been answered by the great Zalama! Vegeta announced victory...! Wait... I've seen this before... Yo... Vegeta fans, prepare for Vegeta to be defeated just in case. He has a record of announcing victory then ultimately losing. Don't get your hopes up too high.

Lol Granolah disses Vegeta's ego 👌. But Granolah is unknowingly talking about himself too XD. Dummies. Vegeta mocks him by calling him "Mr. Strongest" & Granolah has nothing to day. Granolah can dish it out but can't take it.

Goku wakes up and sees Vegeta fighting Granolah. Who cares? How are you gonna be caught off gaurd in a form that reacts on its own? Go back to sleep. I'm not mad at you, Goku. I'm just disappointed.

Vegeta fires a barrage of ki at Granolah and Granolah Hakai's them. Then Vegeta fools Ganolah into destroying an ancient city of the Cerelians.

VEGETA: "I can tell, you know... That you only recently acquired this absurd strength."

GRANOLAH: "How? How can you tell?"

VEGETA: "Thank you for confirming."

There's the Granolah we know. Quick to give out valuable info. Also, this is to make Vegeta appear "smarter" & a "better fighter" than Goku. Realistically, a master martial artist like Goku would be first to notice that Granolah recently acquired this kind of power. But, Goku is being dumbed down for Vegeta's sake.

VEGETA: "Need I repeat myself...? You may be stronger but... there's no gaurantee that I'll lose to you!" *attempts to break Granolah's leg*

So says the guy who always loses unless the opponent is weaker than him. But, he even lost to weaker opponents on Earth before, so....

Vegeta fans calm down, calm down. This is basic Vegeta dribble. Let's be real. When has Vegeta ever defeated an opponent that was stronger than himself? Never. When has Vegeta become stronger than his opponent and defeat them because they're weaker than him now? Always. Does Vegeta ever win when he is too cocky? Nope. This is to hype y'all up. Don't be mad if he loses. Y'all know this routine. The arc ain't even over so the chances of him winning are low.

Now let's examine Vegeta's fight in comparison to Goku's fight.

Goku goes through all his forms & uses Ultra Instinct in base, SSJ, SSG, SSB, & then goes silver haired UI when fighting Granolah. Then, he loses in every form. Vegeta goes straight to Blue Evolution and only seriously gets hurt once.

Goku keeps getting hit despite having a technique that is all about evasion. Vegeta gets hit far less & doesn't have Ultra Instinct.

Goku was struggling to fight a clone that was half the power of Granolah. Vegeta fights Granolah at his full power and struggles less.

Goku complains about his training and how he is struggling using his technique. Vegeta who had less time with Hakai training isn't complaining about struggling with Hakai.

Goku far surpassed Vegeta in the Moro arc, yet they are crippling Goku to let Vegeta catch up & make him look better. Vegeta has literally gotten a handout that he didnt have to work hard for in order to catch up with Goku... This chapter is fine when isolated and you aren't thinking about any other previous chapter. But, it is a convoluted mess when you look back at the previous chapters, the piss poor storytelling, & Vegeta's poor Hakai training that leads up to this chapter.

Where'd that "heroic" Vegeta and that "redemption" stuff go? Its as if Toyotaro decided he should stop tying to make Vegeta the hero & main character instead of Goku being the main. (Thank God.)

But... Vegeta says that he loves fights that are unpredictable?? That I disagree completely with. Vegeta wants fights to go in his favor through all of DBZ and will throw a fit when it doesn't.

In RoF: it was going in his favor so he loved it.

Destroyer Tournament arc: he didn't like that things didn't go his way in the end.

Future Trunks arc: he was upset when losing to Black, but loved it when he thought he was going to win.

ToP: angry when everyone else surpassed him, happy when he gained an upperhand, upset when he lost the upperhand.

Moro arc: Vegeta is upset that Moro is stronger but even more upset that Goku is stronger than him. When he is stronger than Moro he is loving it. Then when he loses the advantage, he is upset.

Vegeta doesn't love unpredictable fights, Goku does! Vegeta loves predictable fights in his favor.

Granolah asks how many lives were sacrificed for Vegeta's carnage. Vegeta doesn't answer. Why? Because its best to ignore the fact that he has killed billions of ppl so that Vegeta fans can ignore his bad actions (Yet many say that Vegeta has developed so much without acknowledging his terrible past). Can't have Vegeta looking like a bad guy in this chapter, right?

Oh boy! Page 37 is more "Vegeta hype!" He doesn't care about strongest or second strongest ('cause he has never been 1st place) & he basically explains Dragon Ball to us.

Roshi already taught Goku & Krillin that there will always be somebody stronger, so they need to keep reaching higher and higher.

If Vegeta is stronger than he was a few minutes ago, would that mean the same for Goku when he was fighting? Why did he perform so poorly? I wonder... 🤔

Granolah jabs Vegeta in the stomach, but Vegeta manages to slow it down (how come Goku using Ultra Instinct couldn't do that?). And cool. Blood. Anime has better writing and cool character development/moments. The manga has blood... Well, I guess blood is cooler to some ppl.

Vegeta is looking like Goku in the ToP before he attained UI. He has his head down & all. Vegeta just isn't talking about hownl much he sucks. Why does Goku keep insulting himself? N-nevermind. This is about Vegeta who keeps complimenting himself.

Why did Granolah become scared of Vegeta suddenly? Wouldn't he just see him as a mad dog and use his amazing power to put Vegeta down before he can do anything? He hates them so much, but keeps letting them live.

Uh oh... Vegeta doesn't like protecting and saving? BuT I tHoUgHt hE wAs a hErO! Where is his development going?? Ya mean the real development he had in the anime or the pseudo development in the manga?

But even after saying all that... I prefer manga Vegeta to be like this instead of a wannabe hero. Wannabe hero doesn't fit. This feels like Vegeta is in character again. I like this. I was just criticizing how Vegeta was written in past chapters in comparison to this one. A more chill Vegeta who loves battles? This is what I've wanted from DBS manga Vegeta for a long time!

Oh snap! Vegeta's transforming? I wonder what it will look like (thanks for the warning from the leaks 👍). Oil... Why are you even in this chapter? We don't care about you right now & you're boring without Maki. Goku says it ain't "any old god ki."

I wonder how Goku never knew about this new form if he and Vegeta trained on Beerus Planet together. Ya think he would've sensed and saw it & even wanted to fight against it.

So is this new form a spur of the moment thing? So Vegeta has a new form that he never trained... And he asks if Granolah has been training his new power on page 34... Sounds hypocritical of Vegeta, or he is being thrown a bone to make him look capable. Is Vegeta gonna pull a Golden Freeza by not training this new form? Or maybe a UI Goku at the ToP and lose the form?

Page 43, Granolah shoots tiny ki blasts at Vegeta's tower of flaming ki and he is surprised it did nothing. Why not try again but this time use that one big blast instead. No? Gonna let the guy of the race you hate finish transforming? Just gonna be scared and shocked to make Vegeta look impressive? Ok.

Pages 41, 44, & 45

Oh! Here it is! The new form...! Aaaand I still don't like it. Also, he healed up like Goku did last chapter too. Odd. Why does transforming heal them now? Didn't before.

No build up to make the form more cool, it's just

"Here, Vegeta. Goku has one more form than you do & he has mastered UI, so we can't let you fall too far behind. So I just pulled this crap transformation fresh outa my butt and gave it to you."

Another undeserved handout. Can you please make Vegeta earn a new form in the manga? PLEASE?!

Vegeta looks like he is in his own UI Omen form (like how Vegeta fans begged for Vegeta to get for the longest time). Dark hair with sone lighter coloured higlights, light coloured pupils, new aura. But this is what I see...

SSJ3ROSÉ of DESTRUCTION INSTINCT OMEN (or just "SSJ-ChexMix" for short)

Looks like in the end, Vegeta needed to resort to his own Ultra Instinct equivalent!

Oh no... I criticized Vegeta's bad writing too much! I bet some Vegeta fans are gonna automatically assume that I hate him because I want him to be written better without plotholes! 😱

IN CONCLUSION:

This chapter is good when isolated on its own. But, this chapter is filled with inconsistencies when you look back at previous chapters. Overall, it's... a mixed bag that I barely like. It's just so retarded that Goku had to be dragged through the mud just for Vegeta to look better. That is insulting to Vegeta and it either shows how much he sucks or or how weak the writing for Vegeta is. But we got what we got...

Wanna know how to make Vegeta look good without making Goku look pathetic? Goku never uses MUI! Goku defeats Granolah's clone with SSB. Then, Granolah merges back with his clone & catches SSB Goku by surprise and knocks him out.

Then, the reason why Vegeta seems to be doing better is because Vegeta is using SSBE, unlike SSB Goku who was caught off guard. Why make the MUI form & Goku both look like trash just to give Vegeta his own Ultra (Destructive) Intinct? Is Vegeta really that trash?! 😓😴

I don't wanna see the Heeters anymore. My hype for them died, but maybe a later chapter can make me like them more. Idk.

Where is my homie, Moniato?! 🐌 (BEST CHARACTER OF THE ARC SO FAR!)

Oh yeah...I was supposed to complain about not seeing Freeza again like I do every chapter... Who cares at this point? If Granolah is stronger than Goku & Vegeta, what can Freeza do? Hide for 3 yrs and let Granolah die?

What are my predictions for next chapter? More Vegeta wanking of course. More gloating & looking down on Granolah too. A battle of overinflated egos. Bad dialogue and decent to good art. I'll probably find it mostly boring but I may be surprised (that could be a good or bad thing). Vegeta will appear to be winning before...

Vegeta gets defeated & certain Vegeta fans will rage & be annoying. Those ones will complain about how Vegeta always gets the short end of the deal (that's what he gets for being shorter than Bulma & 12 cm taller than Krillin). This one should happen imo based off of Goku's performance.

Vegeta's fight will get interrupted before the battle ends so that Vegeta fans don't get angry. Make Vegeta fans feel that Vegeta could've won and keep them grasping on to hope. (How manipulative.) This one is most likely to happen to "satisfy" all fans.

Vegeta will win and Vegeta fans will rejoice & some will be very annoying. Despite the fact that he had terrible training, was handed a new form just to stay relevant, and Goku had to underperform & UI had to be nerfed just to make Vegeta look good. This one may happen just to appease Vegeta fans. (That is the worst outcome imo.) If Vegeta gets "a win/a W" against a main villain, make sure his training looks impressive and he has some sort of connection to the main bad guy. That way the victory feels well deserved.

If the final enemy is Freeza, then Vegeta defeating Granolah isn't "a win" against a major villain. Granolah will just be a bump in the road. He's already set up to not be a "bad guy." In the end, the main bad guy will be either Freeza, Gas, 7-3, or someone. Vegeta fans shouldn't care if Vegeta wins or loses against Granolah. He isn't the "final boss."

[notebook-13]

Hi!! I liked your Hawks thing and I was wondering if you would say more about his visor?

Sure! I’m not sure if you mean say more about the times when his visor is removed, say more about patterns in how he wears his visor, or talk about his visor as a symbol of something. So, since I’m most interested in fanfic, I’m going to talk more about the first two things and only briefly about thematic stuff.

Like I said in my other post, the thing I pay the most attention to is when it’s removed from his eyes. (The various times I say “remove” or “take off,” what I mean is removed or taken off from his eyes, not necessarily his head.)

This happens when…

Endeavor confronts him post-ceremony about his shenanigans, and Hawks strategically pulls down his visor to persuade Endeavor he sincerely admires him, wants to thank him, and wants to help him.

When the nomu shatters it, and Hawks thinks about how he admires Endeavor, and he thinks the line about how his back isn’t reassuring.

When Hawks watches Endeavor leave Fukuoka, he pushes up the visor and remembers his promise to get his hands dirty if it’ll save people, and then he repeats his line about wanting a world where heroes have time to spare.

And, ofc, when Dabi stomps on him while shouting that sentiment tripped Hawks up after all.

Besides the automatic potential meaningfulness of removing the visor, Horikoshi also gives these moments meaningfulness through his art style: Hawks earnestly looking up at Endeavor while he thanks Endeavor for being reassuring, and Hawks grimly thinking that he’ll make a better world happen at his trademark speed, are both large, detailed panels without backgrounds, putting all the focus on his newly-bared face and eyes. The panel where the nomu shatters his visor is smaller, but it’s given meaningfulness through the slow-motion effect of the nomu’s tentacle approaching Hawks’s face.

So: there’s something important about these moments, and given how dishonest Hawks is, I’m inclined to think that they’re important because they’re honest.

The only transition moment I’m iffy about is this one:

So far, this is the only time Hawks removes his visor by lowering it around his neck instead of raising it to his forehead, and the effect is that he covers his mouth. This post is actually what inspired me to think about Hawks’s visor in the first place, and it points out that Hawks is often drawn with his mouth covered—and even something like his gesture where he zips up his mouth resonates with his position as a spy and secret-keeper for the Commission.

So, I think Hawks may not be all that honest about his feelings for All Might—it could be more complicated than he’s letting on here.

I’m ambivalent about whether the visor has meaning when it’s already in place…I don’t really see a pattern of him being more honest when the visor is off versus on. But I’ve puzzled over it enough that my brain feels like mush when I think about it, so here’s an info dump.

I think I got this all accurate, but hey, I might’ve made a few mistakes.

Times when he wears the visor:

185 - Hero ceremony

185 - Talking with Endeavor post-ceremony

186 - Lunch with Endeavor

187-189 - Nomu fight (until it shatters) (involves flying)

191 - Receiving the spy mission from the HPSC

192 - In off-duty clothing, saying goodbye to Endeavor

199 - Training Tokoyami (involves flying)

231 - Hauling Jeanist around (involves flying)

240 - Applauding the PLF rally (while remembering delivering Jeanist to Dabi)

243-5 Delivering the MLA book to Endeavor (involves flying)

246 - Interacting with the PLF (including Hawks’s internal monologue about being glad that Class 1-A is faster than him)

258 - Every interaction with Twice (“I wanna fly free”)

263-264 - Attacking Twice

Times he doesn’t, by choice:

199 - Post-patrol, when he invites/kidnaps Tokoyami to take him on a night flight (but he wears it while they talk and fly)

231 - When Dabi phone-calls him to assign him the assassination mission (involves leisurely flying)

231 - In off-duty clothing, when he pays Jeanist a visit

240 - He removes it off-screen while greeting people at the PLF rally, sometime between the end of Shigaraki’s speech and before Dabi comes over.

255 - Teaching Twice (when he receives the hint about the hospital and goes “the pieces are in place!”)

Times he doesn’t, by obligation:

190-192 - because it’s broken. He helps Endeavor defeat the nomu, prepares to fight Dabi to save Endeavor, later confronts Dabi about their mutual sabotage, and then visits Endeavor in the hospital.

191 - childhood, didn’t own it yet.

Unclear:

While delivering Jeanist’s body to Dabi, Hawks is strangely faceless, we never get a proper look at him. I think there’s a blurry visor on there, but idk.

So?

My brain is mush again and I don’t have much insight into how Hawks decides whether or not to wear his visor at a particular moment. He wears it where it’s sort of pointless (i.e., indoors) and he wears it when it’s kinda rude (one-on-one meal with Endeavor). Bidding farewell to Endeavor is the closest Hawks comes to being off-duty, but he’s wearing it then, so I don’t think the visor is purely part of his hero costume. He has it off during ch255 while he tutors Twice, but he has it on in ch258 while he tutors Twice—did something change?

I think there could be a weak correlation between the visor and Hawks feeling guilty or nervous. Hawks wears it as much as he can around Endeavor, and once he grows attached to Twice, maybe he starts to wear it around Twice, too. He wears it during the PLF rally while he’s shaken over how formidable the PLF is, but once he acclimates and gets down to work chatting people up for info, he takes it off (off-screen).

It’s also possible that not wearing the visor is a sign that he’s excited. He’s not wearing the visor when he nabs Tokoyami and takes off, he’s excited that Dabi has folded and contacted him again, he gives Jeanist a very special smile, and he could’ve been excited when he was first befriending Twice.

Or there could be a connection with how hard he’s trying to seem sincere. In ch185, he takes off the visor to try to persuade Endeavor that he is sincere (and in this case, is sincere), and maybe after that he’s not so concerned with appearing earnest, so he puts it back on. Wanting to appear truthful could explain why he’s not wearing it while he’s chatting with people at the PLF rally or when he’s initially charming Twice, but it wouldn’t explain why he wears it around the PLF so much in general (other than battle-readiness), or why he wouldn’t wear it while he’s on the phone with Dabi.

…I know it’s not much, sorry. Maybe someone who reads this can come up with a better idea?

I think the most suspicious—and therefore, most potentially meaningful—incidences of him not wearing the visor are when he’s on the phone with Dabi (Hawks is flying, but he has it off) and when he visits Jeanist, which is the only time Hawks voluntarily doesn’t have a visor with him at all. (Did he take public transit to and from Jeanist’s apartment? Or did someone from the HPSC drop him off/pick him up?)

Anyways, my favorite of my three ideas is that he doesn’t wear the visor while he’s excited, so that’s what I’d go for if I were writing him in fanfic. It meshes well with the honesty-gesture of removing the visor.

Misc interesting notes:

When Hawks is flying, he is obliged to wear his visor as protection against high winds. Flying=freedom is generally common, and it’s especially poignant in Hawks’s case since his ability to fly diminishes the more feathers he sends out to save people. So if the visor itself symbolizes something, then I think that “something” is important to his freedom as well as his honesty. He can fly without his visor…but he won’t see where he’s going. (Unless he has a third eyelid.)

Both of his iconic lines about flying, “Those who can fly, should!” and “I wanna fly free,” are spoken while wearing his visor.

Both Twice and Shigaraki wear things on their faces (or in Shigaraki’s case, previously wore). There could be a foiling between the visor and the mask or hand.

It’s also worth considering, who is Hawks’s honesty for when his visor is removed? For the audience? For himself? For whoever he’s in the scene with?

I don’t think Horikoshi has ever drawn Hawks putting his visor on; he’s only shown Hawks taking it off. In the first scene with Endeavor, Hawks replaces his visor off-screen, potentially while Endeavor’s back is turned. He also replaces it off-screen before flying with Tokoyami.

Horikoshi avoids the cliché of “light flashes off the visor to obscure Hawks’s eyes while he’s being deceptive.” because then we would never see hawks’s eyes Instead, when Hawks’s visor obscures his eyes, it’s usually either during comedy or to make him seem menacing. It is interesting that the same technique is used for both amusement and fear.

The only time I’ve noticed Horikoshi use the cliché is in ch245, when Hawks remarks he recommends everyone to read this book because it’s going to be very important going forward.

Edit: Whoops, I forgot to mention! I read an interesting post yesterday that talks about how vision and telling the truth are such integral parts of Hawks’s character that they’re included in his name. Definitely worth considering in relation to his visor.

[fauzhee10069]

JoJolion: What actually happened in Mamezuku Rai's past? (with some villains’ theory & motivation)

The X-Files theme is playing... (& TL;DR at the bottom post)

Back in chapter 75 during Ozon Baby arc, we got a glimpse of of how Mamezuku Rai's past happened.

JJL chapter 75: Ozone’s Baby Pressure – part 3

When he was a child, his parents grew prized high-class pears which would sell for millions of yens. However, because their techniques were leaked, a competitor tied to money-lenders ravaged Rai's parents' orchard, ruining their crop and forcing them to sell the land. Unable to forgive his parents' incompetence, Rai secluded himself on a mountain slope and managed to cultivate fruits in spite of the harsher climate. He was found by Norisuke IV and then he was appointed in secret as his personal fruit grower and appraiser.

However, in recent chapter (99) of JoJolion, we’ve been told that Rai’s father just passed away.

In the flashback, Rai told that he found his parent's orchard infested with insects. After informing them, his father rushed out of the house to deal with it, but was killed by a landslide caused by a typhoon. He then attended his father's funeral. However, there was also Akefu as one of the guests in the funeral, though it seemed that no one know him (including Rai).

Back to the present time, Head Doctor Akefu as Tooru’s Stand revealed his name as “Wonder of U”. He also revealed that he was the real cause of the death of Rai's father.

JJL chapter 99: Endless Calamity – part 5

He told Rai that his father had accidentally triggered the pursuing when he rushed out to deal with the insects, causing him caught in the flow of calamity.

Therefore, in these two chapters (75 & 99), it seems that Araki retcons Rai’s backstory. In the Ozon Baby’s arc, it was told that what damaged Rai’s pear orchard was the act of sabotage by the usurpers who were connected with local money lenders to cut the pear branches. The chapter also said that it was because Mamezuku’s cultivation techniques had leaked to other people in the industry. However in this chapter 99, we’ve been told that it was the work of rock insects and “Wonder of U”.

It is as if the story has changed, but the JoJo fandom page (wiki) actually considers it as if the two events took place at different times in a row. But does this mean that Rai's pear orchard had been destroyed twice?

Rai and The Rock-Humans

Wise Anon in 4chan also suggested that the usurpers who destroyed Rai’s pear orchard could be the rock-humans as well.

Then what was the motivation of those rock-humans to destroy Rai's pear orchard, twice?

JJL chapter 99: Endless Calamity – part 5

I think it's still quite difficult to be able to really tell the motivation of Akefu/”Wonder of U”/Tooru as major antagonist lately. But what Akefu said here sounds like a declaration of war between silicon-based & carbon-based humans.

We have just been shown that Tooru is indeed a rock-human. Urban Guerrilla had also implied that the goal of the rock-humans is to be superior being and reach the peak of society (compared to those ordinary carbon-based humans).

Then in this chapter 99, we’ve been told about the reason the rock-humans are created, it is as the backup for those carbon-based being in case their existence fails. But if so, why were they created together and living together at the same period?

There is also an interesting idea by u/Mamezuku from reddit:

What if rock-women no longer exist anymore? We have never seen any rock-woman (besides the flashback), only groups of men so far. What if the Doctors are trying to use the Locacaca in order to create a legacy, a rock-baby? That's why the perfect New Locacaca is very important to the Head Doctor’s gang. Notice how the narrator specified in this very chapter how normal men can make babies with rock-women, but not vice versa. The growth process that a rock-human has to go through is extremely harsh and difficult, hence why there's not many rock-human alive. What if no rock-women survive in this generation and only rock-men are left now? This would be an awesome motive for the rock-humans (Tooru) and so far it looks like it's heading this way.

Rai and Higashikata

Another interesting thing that I saw in Rai's flashback was the Higashikata family as funeral guests.

We see that Norisuke IV along with Jobin and Hato came to the funeral, we did not see Joshu and Daiya, probably because they were too small at the time. But clearly we don't see Caato here, even in panels when Norisuke IV and Rai were having conversation. I mean, she did not appear in this flashback at all.

This implied that Caato might have been in prison by then, which means that the equivalent exchange in her infamous flashback with Jobin already happened. Jobin and Hato also seemed not much different compared to them in the moment just before Caato got arrested.

Then according to Rai’s old backstory in Ozon Baby arc, he got hired by Norisuke IV as his plant appraiser when he was around 17 years old. Let’s do a little math, JoJolion took place in 2011, Mamezuku Rai is 31 (as his name & age were written in the chapter of his first debut). 31-17 = 14 years ago, 2011-14 = 1997, it was the year Norisuke IV have recruited Rai.

Then the time when Caato got arrested, in present time, she just finished her prison term and was released from prison. She was sentenced for 15 years of incarceration. 2011-15 = 1996, it was the year Caato was caught by the police.

Therefore, the time of Rai's father's death and the destruction of his pear orchard occurred around a year after Caato was jailed. At the funeral, Norisuke IV consoled and gave him his support, he also expressed his concern regarding Rai's pear orchard and the fate of his family. It seemed that Mamezuku family was in a real trouble at that time.

Norisuke IV is the man who is able to see someone's talents precisely. Seeing Rai's talent and the trouble faced by his family at that time, he also helped Rai by inviting him to work together as a plant appraiser in his family business.

The relationship between them turns into mutualism, Norisuke IV saved Rai from poverty due to his family's bankruptcy, while Rai helps Norisuke IV advancing his business further until Higashikata family becomes more successful and prosperous.

So what did Caato have to do with all this? This brought me back to her confusing and mysterious statement during her family reunion:

JJL chapter 58: Dawn at The Higashikata House

This out-of-nowhere claim have been causing those Caatofags to speculate and support the theory regarding her involvement with the cooperation between Higashikata and Damokan Group to the extent that they set aside Jobin’s role as an active player in this shady business. Of course, I believe that Jobin was the only one who initiated the cooperation with Damokan Group secretly (outside his mommy’s influence).

But what if instead of working with Damokan Group, Caato has actually cooperated with Head Doctor’s gang? I think HD gang might have made contact with Caato. It is possible that a contact was made when Caato was in prison (given the interval from her arrest to the destruction of the Rai’s pear orchard) or maybe even prior to that.

What motivated Caato?

Perhaps to prosper Higashikata family business and get rid of their potential business rivals, including Mamezuku family. With Rai's expertise, it is very likely that one day his family will be able to rival or even surpass the success of the Higashikata family. However, by (indirectly) bringing Rai to work for Higashikata family, their business will increasingly prosper. Basically, two birds in one stone.

I always love to see Caato as a foil for Holy: if Holy is a woman who is into scientific matters, Caato could be a woman who is more into business matters. Even her design gives a little hint about that:

Caato is already considered an outsider for Higashikata family, but it is quite interesting to see her wearing one of the attributes of the family on her clothes. However she prefers to use the fruit seller mark rather than the family crest symbol, kinda implying that she no longer cared about the family but still cares about their business.

What motivated The Head Doctor’s gang?

Answering this one is quiet trickier, maybe because it’s still hard to really read their motives. I want to return to the theory of procreation above, but what is already clear is that “the rock-humans really need New Locacaca” and we already knew that the formula of New Locacaca is to plant regular Locacaca on Higashikata’s land that has the property of “equivalent exchange”. However, this formula has just discovered after the birth of Josuke as a fusion-human.

Even so, according to Makorin, the issue regarding the ability of Higashikata’s land to do equivalent exchange has long been known by the citizen and most likely the rock-humans also already knew about it. Besides, by blending with society, it is highly likely that rock-humans (particularly the HD gang) have found out about Rai's talent in horticulture. Perhaps those HD gang (Tooru) have intended to direct Rai to the Higashikata’s land and make him cultivate a whole new type of Locacaca there.

Just like Holy, the HD gang is into scientific matters too. So HD gang has devised a plan to bring Rai to the Higashikata family, namely by eliminating Rai's family’s business and making him work under the Higashikata. HD gang may have used Caato to make this happen.

How did Caato (Higashikata) and Head Doctor’s gang work together?

Seeing the contrast of their motives and the relationship between those Higashikata and the rock-humans all this time, I can’t see their relationship as in a boss/the head and subordinates. They might have worked mutually just as how we have seen Jobin and Damokan Group working together. On the rock-humans’ side, both HD gang and Damokan Group already have their respective bosses (Tooru/HD & Damo), whereas I think Caato had worked independently like Jobin.

You are right, I cannot accept the concept that is often believed by other readers, that there is a single top leader among them (especially the Caatofags). What is most appealing in JoJolion is that each individual has their own situations, motives, and needs, they also have different characters and backgrounds that shape them. However, all of that leads them to one objective: the Locacaca fruit, leading to the race of the New Locacacaca that involving various factions.

How did they meet and who initiated it first?

Because this is still purely a theory, I cannot really answer who started this cooperation. So I will answer how this could be most likely played:

Caato

If Caato was really the one who initiated it, assuming that she made contact with HD gang before she went to prison. She could simply make a call or go to wherever the HD gang was at the time.

But what if it started after she was already in prison? At this point, this will be mere speculation and hype (as a result of the limited information we have about her). The big question is how can she interact with the outside world? Caatofags often hold the idea of how OP her Stand is, mostly by comparing her Stand to D4C. The assumption that she was able to make contact with the outside world happened at the moment when Caato was able to take out her newly released cellphone despite her 15 year-long incarceration.

But since when did she have that phone? Has it been several years before (time travel)? Or did Caato always hide her cellphones in prison and replace them with the latest model every year? Assuming that in the first year of her incarceration, she was able to smuggle her phone. Of course the possibility that he could communicate with HD gang was simply by calling them.

Another bigger question is how Caato knew about Head Doctor’s gang? Could it be just a flashback that hasn't been told to us? Another speculation and hype by Caatofags is that Caato herself is a rock-human, particularly a rock-woman. This theory is also being widely discussed again after the most recent chapter 99 gives brief information about the rock-women. For me, this theory is too far-fetched (and almost bullshit).

Moreover, while this theory is still unconfirmed, those Caatofags have already made up a further theory that Caato is the top leader above all existing rock-humans (including Tooru/HD). I really wonder why Caatofags are so delusional… (and this one really sounds bullshit).

Head Doctor/Tooru

I also don't really know how Tooru got to know Caato or the other Higashikatas (or even Rai), we also need to look further into his background and backstory about it. However, being a rock-human he is, this is more possible for him. We all know that rock-humans (which are silicon-based) generally have longer lifespan than carbon-based humans. Rock-humans can live for up to 240 years. Rock-humans also grows by transformation, which causes them to be much older than what they look (example is Wu Tomoki who looks 33 despite his actual age being 70).

Therefore, Tooru himself might be much older than we think. We have seen the birth of Tooru in chapter 99, but we don't know exactly when he was born. But judging from the flow of panels, during the explanation of how a rock-woman gave birth to her baby until the baby grew up as Tooru. We can say that Tooru was born around Meiji era (1868-1912) or even 1901, the year in which Johnny died. The same year Rina was stricken with the rock-disease.

Whatever it is, this makes it even more likely that Tooru knows the history of the Higashikata family, especially if he knows the ability of equivalent exchange on their land. As a long-lived rock-human, he has many opportunities to learn many things and get as much information as possible. Also keep in mind that Tooru knows about “the saint”.

Then how did he make contact with Caato? With his Stand 「Wonder of U」, I am sure that he is able to do it, even if Caato was already in prison at the time. WOU can move through reflective surfaces while manipulating objects around it, it can also move in 2D and 3D alternately. In chapter 96, we’ve also seen that WOU is indeed capable to enter a prison as it was shown when Rai was in jail. 

With the possibility of Caato's ability to hide a phone with her Stand and WOU which is capable to move through cellphone, of course it's very possible they can communicate. Caato didn't even need to have a phone at the time, because WOU is able to move through any reflective objects not limited to cellphones. And as we have seen in the latest chapters (98 & 99) that WOU/Akefu is able to converse with Josuke and Rai.

Though I'm more convinced that Tooru is more likely the initiator, I don't really see him as the boss who's ordering Caato... or vice versa.

This is the difference that I felt when talking about Caato and Tooru (the two main villain candidates): talking about Caato is like composing a fiction where we only get a couple of sentences to develop into a few paragraphs, or even a story. Whereas talking about Tooru really feels like I'm doing an actual analysis based on some factual data, using the pictures, dialogues and information, comparing and linking several related events.

Then, what had HD gang/Tooru and Caato done to Rai and his family?

The key players who had ruined Rai's family (according to both chapters: 75 & 99) were the money lenders, the unknown usurpers/competitors, the insects (which is likely rock-animals) and The HD/WOU itself.

The insects and WOU were nothing but the work of HD/Tooru, therefore the money lenders & competitors could be the work of Caato.

However, the problem is...

It still feels strange if Rai's pear orchard have to be destroyed twice. Also, according to the chronology on his wiki page, the sabotage by money lenders happened first (because in that chapter 75, Rai's parents were mentioned as "father and mother"). After that, Rai's father died by calamity when he went to deal with the pest insects.

This chronology does not support the idea that Caato and HD gang had worked together, as if they had worked independently in ruining Rai's life.

If so, is that really what actually happened?

There is still hope, considering that Caato was in prison, which means that she had limited mobility. Therefore, the first incident of the damage to the Rai's pear orchard could have been done by Caato with the help of HD gang.

Then seeing that Rai's family was able to recover again, HD/Tooru took second action which eventually caused the death of Rai's father.

But the other last problem is why did Caato still care about helping her family business when she had been jailed (and abandoned by them)? As I said before, there are two possibilities: the cooperation happened either “before” or “after” she was jailed. Perhaps Caato already planned it before she was jailed. Whatever it is, it means that Caato had committed two sins and hid them from Norisuke IV: “murder & sabotage”, all for the sake of her family.

Perhaps the first event with money lenders happened before she went to prison whereas the second event with insects & WOU happened after that. Surely, they ruined Rai’s life twice because their main objective was "to get Rai into the Higashikata family."

Another interesting trivia is that Rai's age had actually been retconed from UJ release to the tankobon release. Originally, he was meant to be 32 years old, but Araki changed it into 31. If he was initially to be 32 years old, then he would be 17 around 15 years ago! The same year as Caato's prison sentence and what she claimed that she has role in the 15 years success of Higashikata business. No wonder she thinks that she deserve her compensation.

Also, take a note that the Caato said her controversial claim in chapter 58 whereas Rai was first mentioned in chapter 59 and debuted in chapter 64. Perhaps Araki had originally intended to involve Caato in Rai's past (although I wonder why he changed it for some reason).

I dislike the hype Caato as the main villain, therefore I often try to debunk any far-fetched theory from her supporters. But that does not mean that I shall disregard Caato’s potential role as long as the theory that support it makes sense.

TL;DR Caato might have been involved in Rai's past, she could have worked with Akefu or did it personally. This could be the answer for the "15 years" claim she said about helping Higashikata business back during the family reunion in chapter 58.

That's all I can think about Rai's past and Caato's claim, which are both confusing af.  Though it's also quite odd, if Caato is the person behind the goal of making Rai work under Norisuke IV, why didn't Jobin know Rai's identity as their family plant appraiser? Why didn't Caato tell him?

Read further:

Mamezuku Rai's past and Caato’s missing potential (invalid)

Caato’s potential role in Rai’s past

[fireproofkings]

The making of a sweater series

Part 1 || Part 2

Two things before we start: First, this is a long one and it has a few photos so buckle up if you’re reading. And second, I apologize in advance for the state of my nails in any of the pics, I know they are incredibly awful, but I promise I’ll do them tomorrow.

If you know me, you know I am the worst at keeping up with things, and if not, the fact that I have 7k drafts can give you a pretty good idea.

Last Saturday (July 11th) I went out and bought everything just as I expected, but while I was out shopping, Louis decided to attack us.

That’s one of those things you will always remember what you were doing the moment the news hit. I was buying all the supplies to make Harry’s sweater when Louis announced he was finally free.

My phone was blowing up, and when I went to check why, all of my group chats were screaming, and the lovely Ed (@literlarryreal) was sending me long voice notes telling me all the thoughts she has and let me tell you, it was a ride.

Yes, I cried in public and no, I am not ashamed to say it was not the first time I have done so with something Louis related.

Anyways, getting back on track, I spent way more than I was expecting to, but it’s alright lol. I am confident it’s all going to be worth it.

Under the cut you can find a summary on everything that happened this week with the process, and more pictures of Jack, my dog.

Here’s everything I bought that day. The quantities are exactly what is in the pattern in JW Anderson’s website (plus an extra colour I bought but then found a better match for, which I might use if I run out of any colour). I did end up finding everything, but I had to go to a few different stores to do it. There’s kind of a shortage due to the current situation and the fact that these aren’t essential goods.

I wanted to start that same Saturday, but I decided to finish that scarf I was making before, just so I wouldn’t have to go through all the trouble of changing needles and storing it away where it would probably get messed up, so I finished it and here’s a photo of it:

I ended up doing an infinity scarf, and have some yarn leftover, maybe I’ll do a hat or something like that in the future. Yes, those are my PJ’s don’t judge me.

Then I procrastinated starting the actual sweater for all of Sunday and Monday (12th and 13th). That’s something I tend to do, if you haven’t noticed.

One thing I hadn’t thought of as particularly hard, ended up being something out of my nightmares (I also tend to over exaggerate, if you’re reading this, you’re really getting to know me lol).

That green square is incredibly awful.

The pattern itself isn’t that difficult, but if you have to undo some lines it completely falls apart and you have to start over. This happened to me like three times the first time I attempted it.

Usually it takes me half an hour to 45 minutes to do one square, this one took literally two hours and a half. But it was so much easier and quicker the second time around. Putting in a lifeline and doing tallies in a notepad every time I finished a line helped a lot.

Jack did end up making it better. Even if him laying directly on top of it made it difficult to work.

On the other hand, the black and red jacquard squares were something that had me slightly worried. The technique is kinda confusing and is very easy to mess up if you are not paying attention.

The first few lines I did wrong, but then I learned how to do it properly and while the handling of the multiple strands of yarn is difficult, you get the hang of it pretty quickly.

But then, horror struck.

I realised that for some reason I was doing the squares 12cm long and not 14cm like they are supposed to be. So that panel was going to end up being 6cm shorter than the others in total, which doesn’t seem like much but was definitely going to show.

Here you can see the mess. I had to undo basically two whole squares, since the first one was 14cm (I really don’t know what was going on in my brain) and the second one, which was a jacquard pattern one, could be continued, but those two squares cost me about a whole day of work.

I was so frustrated I decided to stop for the day and take a long hot shower.

I came back to it the next day and Jack made it all better (can you sense a pattern -no pun intended- here?).

So, to wrap it up:

They are lined up in the way they go in the completed sweater. The little notes on top help me keep track of which one is each of them. The numbers in blue show the order in which they were done.

The first one was pretty easy except for the green square I talked about before, I started that one on Tuesday (14th) and finished on Wednesday (15th). That same day I started the second one which I finished early on Thursday (16th), it was really uneventful which I appreciated a lot, apart from my pointer finger hurting from pushing the needle, so I decided to invent some kind of protection with tape and silicone, which failed extremely, because it rides up and falls off.

Here you can see my failed attempt at some kind of protection for my pointer finger. I basically need a thimble, but I can’t find one online.

Maybe the uneventfulness of panel number two was to make up for the absolute nightmare that was the third panel that I had started that same day, the one I talked about being 6cm too short. It threw me off the loop for the rest of the day, which meant I only finished it late on Friday (17th) and by then I was too tired to do anything else.

Yesterday, on Saturday (18th) I started the fourth one, but I didn’t have the energy to work that much, and today, Sunday (19th), I haven’t done much more than a couple of rows.

By this point I have 3 completed back centre panels and another one 3/4 of the way done. I just have that 1/4 and the two side panels (that include shoulder shaping) left to finish the back, and then I have the front, sleeves, cuffs, collar, ribs, and button band to finish the knitting. Then it’s all ready to sew together.

Just as I did with last post, I want to close this off with some pointers for what is coming, just to keep myself on track and look back to later:

This week I want to finish the back and leave it all ready for sewing when I’m done with the rest of the knitting.

I have to write for a fic exchange I wish I had started earlier but I’m still confident on the time I have left, so that will be my priority, and not knitting.

I start classes again on August 3rd and I hope to be finished by then (with both the sweater and the fic lol), I am kinda confident I will be able to do it since I’m kind of 1/3 of the way through, so if I keep the same pace, or an even better one, I’ll be able to make it.

Something I’m not looking forward to is doing the shoulder shaping, I have no idea how to.

I have been worried the yarn I bought isn’t going to be enough (it might be just my anxiety talking), but I think it’s going to be okay since I am nearly 1/3 of the way through on the squares with one of the colours, but I haven’t gone through that amount of yarn yet.

I have made the executive decision to not do the tassels with the left over yarn and to sew the panels and ribbing together right sides together (so the seams will be on the inside) to give it a more polished look, but this might change in the future.

I’m starting to see it take shape, even if only the back, and I’m really excited!!!

If you want to see the other posts in these series go to the top where the other parts are linked or go to the tag here.

[ty-talks-comics]

Best of DC: Week of January 29th, 2020

Best of this Week: Justice League #39 - Scott Snyder, Jorge Jimenez, Daniel Sampere, Juan Albarran, Alejandro Sanchez, Hi-Fi and Tom Napolitano

Talk about a Cosmic Sandbag.

Shayne, the alt-future son of Hawkgirl and Martian Manhunter, gave his life and essence so that his father could return from the darkness. This book opens with the amazing return of Martian Manhunter as drawn by Jorge Jimenez with colors by Alejandro Sanchez. Manhuner hasn’t been seen since Justice League #28 when Lex Luthor absorbed him to become Apex Lex, so this return had a monumental feel, especially as the rest of the League looks upon him with awe. Jimenez makes this moment feel powerful as J’onn stands tall against Perpetua with his reds glowing vibrantly thanks to Sanchez.

As soon as Perpetua takes notice that J’onn has returned, she lunges after him. This is likely due to the fact that Martian Manhunter is legitimately one of the most powerful telepaths in the DC Universe and in the subsequent pages, he makes the choice to connect the minds of the people of Earth with his and the rest of the Justice League to try and swing them all toward the side of hope. 

This results in a wonderful double page spread where Jimenez poses Martian Manhunter like he’s about to use the Solar Flare from Dragon Ball and speaks to the people. Jimenez and Sanchez show the people on the streets and various members of the League looking towards the sky with smiles on their faces. Snyder scripts this amazingly by having Manhunter give the rousing speech of goodness and rising above that Superman would normally give. What makes this even better is that Manhunter, who usually suffers disillusionment from living amongst humanity, does an amazing job.

J’onn’s speech manages to rouse enough people that the Totality, the macguffin that could imprison Perpetua once again, begins to glow and surge with energy. Perpetua, starting to feel the fear of loss orders an onslaught of the League. Jimenez emphasizes the anger on her face, the fear on Lex’s and the intensity of the battle happening on the steps of the Hall of Justice.. Sanchez makes sure that the colors almost surge off of the page with flashes of red and blue.

As the hope of the people of Earth continues to grow, the tendrils of the Totality wrap themselves around Perpetua’s spindly body as she screams in anger and hatred. Tom Napolitano places Martian Manhunter’s thought balloons perfectly throughout these pages as Snyder ends J’onn’s speech with the people of Earth joining together in the feeling of heroism and hope. The Sigil of Doom begins to fade away and Perpetua has failed…

And then “KRA-KOOM,” Napolitano’s powerful lettering cracks across the page as Jimenez draws the Sigil of Doom firmly seared into the sky and made even stronger by the overbearing hum of Sanchez’s vibrant green. This is the kinda trope that Scott Snyder does well, but also kinda overuses in his grand scale stories: The Cosmic Sandbag. The heroes were on the very cusp of victory and it seemed like the people of Earth were actually believing in the hope that Martian Manhunter was talking about, but instead they gave into their fear, hatred and base instincts just like Perpetua thought they would.

Snyder utilizes this bait and switch technique to show just how influential Perpetua’s evil is and how at the end of the day it will take more than just a flowery speech to turn people, especially since they watched the Justice Leagues battle the forces of Doom and lose massively. Snyder used this in Dark Nights: Metal anytime Batman thought he had a chance in defeating The Batman Who Laughs and Barbatos. They would just pull nonsense out of nowhere and further plunge our hero into despair because he couldn’t anticipate the villain’s very next five moves. I love it and hate it because it helps to show hopelessness, which I am a fan of, but Snyder does do it a bit too much for my tastes (See The Batman Who Laughs mini-series).

The next thing we see is a Rita Repulsa-esque cackle from Perpetua and honesty this might be my favorite of Jimenez’s panels because he just makes Perpetua look so petty. She’s basically saying, “Bitch, you really thought!” before explaining how everything was by her design. She wanted to give humanity a choice to hear both sides and they still chose Doom. Manhunter tried to hide his mind from her, but he failed to realize that as the creator of the Multiverse, he could never think fast enough to avoid her. Perpetua is far more powerful than these heroes could ever have anticipated.

Jimenez and Sanchez absolutely kill the next few panels as Perpetua casts away the shackles of the Totality, breaking out of the tendrils as her black cape...hair(?) causes a gust of wind to shake our heroes while the background shows varying tones of blue, almost a mockery of their ideals of hope. She stands over the Earth while the void of space appears vast around it and with a flick of her wrist and a flash of yellow she wipes the Justice League from existence. Doom truly has won and she vows to create a new story from the ashes of Hope.

Though, the universe itself has other ideas. In the black of Space, green matter begins to coalesce into a form, then that form takes shape and appears to be Martian Manhunter. Daniel Sampere, Hi-Fi and Juan Albarran take over the art from this point and pose Manhunter as if he’s in a womb, reborn after being supposedly killed by Perpetua and saved by something else. I love that Snyder places such importance on Manhunter and his humanity. Despite the insurmountable odds that the League has faced up to this point, he still does everything in his power to call back to the Earth, to try to win the people back.

He is unable to, however, and it seems as though he’s not the only one unable to use his powers as the rest of the League shows up behind him. In an awesome splash page Sampere and Albarran show everyone as wearing black bodysuits, potentially symbolizing a loss of identity or power as none of them seem to be able to use their abilities. Hawkgirl seems to be the only exception because her wings are a part of her. Superman tries to rationalize that as long as they’re not actually dead then there’s still hope, but then he fails to fly, landing back on the moon.

Another awesome thing about this issue is how it calls back to the very first issue of the run with the Quintessence showing up. The Quinessence are a group consisting of Highfather, The Phantom Stranger, Hera, The Wizard Shazam, The Spectre and Ganthet of the Guardians of Oa. They are some of the most powerful beings in the universe and even they knew that this was how things were meant to be. They saw the same vision of Doom that Martian Manunter did and saved the League in the nick of time to prepare them for what’s to come, not just a war of Justice or Doom, but for Everything.

With everything that’s been hinted at as far as the next incoming Crisis, this is a really good inciting incident as far as things go. Perpetua wins and sets up the next true war for the Multiverse. Given there’s still things to sort out with The Batman Who Laughs, the conflict is set and the Justice League has to give their all to ensure that they can protect the Universe. Superboy Prime is coming back in the pages of Shazam, Wally West has found his kids and Dark Multiverse world of his own creation and this issue even references Doomsday Clock and kinda cements its place as an alt-Universe story, but acknowledges the importance of it.

Scott Snyder has set the stage for everything to come and thanks to his fantastic art team telling the story, he drums up the feeling that there’s still a way to see Geoff Johns original vision for Rebirth through. The hope is there, the League just needs to fight for it. I can’t wait to see what Robert Venditti can do as the writer for Justice League given the amazing work he’s done with Green Lantern and The Freedom Fighters series. Doug Mahnke also taking over as main artist is also a welcome change as he’s one of my favorite of DC’s regulars as well.

This was a high recommend and I can’t wait for the future!

[my-hero-aaron]

Summer Camp

Time for another long journey through the adventurous life of Aaron and K! This time they’re training their quirks to the max! 

We’d been hearing rumors about it for weeks, but it was proved to be true just yesterday: we really were going on a field trip! I was excited to actually get to spend some time with K, I’d been cooped up cramming for finals for a good while there. My room had morphed into even more of a disaster area in the process, with a clear nest of loose paper, hurriedly scrawled notes, and a large assortment of meal replacement bars having built up around my desk. I drew in a deep breath and sighed heavily at the arduous task that lay before me in sorting all that out. The wrappers in particular fluttered a bit at my exhalation, and I raised an eyebrow. Why in the world would I pick this up by hand, I’ve got a perfectly good quirk to help me out! I smirked slightly and flicked my eyes shut, breathing in the cold in the room around me to push out into the detritus that had piled at my feet, then paused mid-breath. If I blast frost onto all this paper, it’ll wreck my notes. I grumbled slightly at my realization, and begrudgingly started to pack things away normally.

Before I knew it, the short few days between our last final and the day of the trip had flew by, and as I stepped out of the bus that UA had chartered for our travels, I smiled back at my two best pals. However, my kodak moment didn’t last long, as when I looked around a bit closer at my surroundings, the true purpose of the trip hit me like a ton of bricks. This was no pleasure cruise, but instead a training camp to whip us into shape. Unfortunately, the teachers made clear that my deduction just happened to hit the nail straight on the head. “This trip is focused on you all developing your quirks. Just like any other muscle your body can use, your quirks get stronger and more efficient through repeated application of stressors. This would be the perfect time to work on any weaknesses you’ve spotted in your capabilities, or perhaps develop a new technique you’ve been curious about. As you can see, we’re rather isolated, so letting yourself really let loose won’t be any kind of issue, as it may have been for some of you who have a more... forceful limits to your abilities.”

“Weaknesses to my quirk, huh? I mean, there’s the obvious one I could work on, I have such dreadful trouble working in high-heat environments.” I mumbled to myself, my brain already whirring at any techniques that I had been waiting to put into use. Beside me, Oliver was practically beaming at the colossal expanse of trees that filled the area around the clearing we were in.

“Golly gosh, look at all these pals! I bet some of these cuties have been here for a long while!”

“You’d be surprised, Oliver, some of these trees are younger than they look!” Kailey prattled off in response as she restrained herself from continuing, something our green-minded pal had said clearly setting off a little ping of historical knowledge from her stores.

I smiled slightly at K’s restraint. It seemed like she was already working on improving her quirk. However, she clearly wasn’t the only one, as a hot gust of humid air blasted me in the face. Across the way from us, there was quite a chaotic display occurring, with quite a few of 1-A’s students pushing their quirks to a new high. After a moment’s observation, it became clear to me just where that blast of air had come from: a large pot that was situated over a roaring fire. Huh, I wonder why they’re preparing a stew right in the middle of what’s clearly the training field- My thoughts ground to a halt as I saw just what-or rather, who- was in the pot, and they had my mouth watering for an entirely different reason. It was that kid who had half my quirk and twice my power, and it looked like he had been at his training for a while, the sweat of his exertion mixing with the steam of the water and tracing lines along his gritted jawline. The next thing I knew, Kailey was elbowing me in the ribs (I must have been staring again) and gesturing with her head to follow her.

“Uh... Kailey? What did I miss while I was... uh... zoning out there?”

“We’re on our way to another clearing where they’ll give us space to work on our own quirk training like 1-A are right now. They said if we didn’t have ideas, that the teachers would have something set up to just push our quirks to be just that much more strong.”

“Oh JEEZ, I already do enough of that, I better come up with something quick!” I could practically hear the gears grinding in my head, but I smiled as I could practically feel the pieces clicking into place behind my eyes. That heat wave had reminded me of how thermals worked, huge columns of hot air wavering high into the air beneath the wings of birds as they floated without effort over the ocean. Then that lead me to my fascination with flight. Even in the pre-quirk world, one of the most common superhero powers that someone would say they’d like best. After all, soaring through the air without a care in the world did look like a great time. I’d been looking for an elegant way of flight without the obvious dusting of frost that’d leave me moist and underwhelmed after my jaunt into the skies, and I think Todoroki’s heat had provided me with an option, finally. Thankfully, Kailey had kept me from slamming face first into the ground in front of me as I walked, practically on autopilot, letting the tetrominoes of my thought process slam into the perfect tetris of an idea.

“You look like you’re onto something, Aaron. Care to share with the class?”

“So y’know how hot air rises, right?”

“...Yeah, but you’re going to have to give me more than that, dude. I know everything, doesn’t mean I can find everything.”

“Well, if hot air rises, why can’t I?”

“Aaron, normally when I say you’re dense it’s because you’re not getting my hints, but this time I mean it’s because you’re literally too dense.”

“Nonono, trust me, I’ve got a plan and everything!”

“Okay birdman, let me know what Vlad thinks of your idea.”

“Hey Oliver, have you got any ideas for your training?”

“W-well I do have all these trees, I’m sure there’s something I can do there!”

“DUDE WHAT IF YOU MADE LIKE A GIANT TREE MECH?”

It wasn’t clear if Oliver’s wince was at my sudden loudness or at the sheer cheesiness of my idea, but I never got to find out, because we’d reached our portion of the training grounds. I was going over the way I’d have to look at the air around me, and it didn’t help that the idea I had in mind focused on the way heat moved to cause the phenomena I had in mind, so inverting things to actually work in a way that I could actually produce the impetus of my desired current was, in a word, mind-bending. I’d clearly zoned off deep into my own mind for a bit tinkering with the fluid dynamics problems, as I nearly jumped out of my skin when Kailey’s elbow once again found itself buried in my side. Our teacher, rather begrudgingly, called my name off the list, asking me to come forward for my assignment of initial exercises. I felt my face flush a deep red as I walked up to our teacher, as usual mumbling an apology for my absent mindedness.

“Vlad, before you let me know what you have in mind, I think I’ve got a particular technique I’d like to learn. Granted, it’s fairly theoretical at the moment, but I’m pretty sure it’s at least somewhat possible.”

“Go ahead, Frigius, just know that the whole design of this camp is about strengthening your raw power.”

“Well you know how some heroes can fly even though their quirks kinda have nothing to do with flight? I think I’ve got an idea so I can do something like that, y’see-”

“We don’t have all day, get to the point!” Apparently my carrying on had gotten loud, since one of my classmates cut me off midsentence with a shout.

“To make a long story short I think I can fly if I make the air change temperature in just the right way.”

“Interesting concept. I’ve got a set of drills to help you work on your current limitations, but you can work on your idea for the second half of the day, might help your perception issues.”

“Drills? But Vlad, I already do drills practically every da-”

“Frigius, I’m already humoring you with this flight idea. You’ll do your drills, just like your classmates.”

I (rather begrudgingly) gave a slight bow to my instructor, and hurried back to my friends, my mind already spinning once again on the problem I’d handed myself.

“Hoshihime, you’re up next.”

By the time I managed to come out of my calculatory fog, everyone in the class had gotten their training setups assigned, and Kailey had managed to lead my half-conscious self to the dinner table.

“Earth to Aaron! Have you come down yet?” Kailey’s smirk made it clear that the look on my face alone clued her in to just how busy I’d been considering the angles of my new problem.

“How long was I out? What’d I miss?”

“Well, they assigned everyone what amounts to sets of drills to either make us able to use our quirks more forcefully, or use them more precisely. Apparently the teachers think that since I can control space, I could change what things are made out of, so that’s what my drills are focusing on. You wanna tell him what you got, Oliver?”

“Oh, well, I, y’see, I get to spend time with all these trees!”

“Okay, but do they have anything in mind for you to do with the trees, or...” I raised an eyebrow as I trailed off, hoping to get a bit more information from my green pal.

“My quirk doesn’t work as well without sunlight, s-so the teachers suggested I go deep into the forest and train there!”

“Woah, really? I mean, that’s not what I would have gone with, but I suppose the teachers know what they’re on about... Speaking of, how do ya think they choose stuff like this? Is it like, something they hold a panel on, or maybe they ask our parents? Any ideas, Kails?”

“I’d assume they notice little holes in our technique just from the virtue of our training at school, and build our training regimens around that, in order to keep us from simply exercising our bad habits into huge exploitable weaknesses. Then again, in my case, they simply had a piece of conjecture about my ability guide their decision, so that’s clearly not a hard and fast rule. Considering this camp is mostly about building our quirks stamina wise, though, maybe they just simply take into account what makes it harder to actually use our quirks and expose us to that? Kinda like exposure therapy I suppose? I’m surprised they didn’t flat out hand you something to do with fire, Aaron, given your difficulties with-”

Thankfully, someone announcing that our allotted time to eat was almost over cut off K before she blithered out my major weakness to just about anyone who could hear. A little while later, and we got rushed off to bed.

[lexpistachio]

Aren't there scenes/panels in omgcp that we shouldn't even see since the comic is meant to be from Bitty's POV/perspective? Like the Jack flashbacks, the time we see Kent will Jack is doing an interview, and there's some other bits and pieces that technically readers shouldn't actually be able to see, unless at some point the POV/perspective was changed or at least expanded so that readers also saw things from a narrator POV/perspective? Sorry this is kinda random, I only recently took notice

Oh but haven’t you heard, Jack and Bitty are one person now. They do errrything togetherrr

Kidding aside, you’re right, wow thanks for pointing that out! The Kent interview bit was really jarring to me (because Jack’s flashback was, i suppose, a shared POV when he was “revealing” what happened that night at the epikegster), although I thought the comic’s use of visual techniques to conceal/reveal parts of the story it wants to be told was awesome. But the story it wants to tell is that Kenny is a lil bitch who cried when his buddy didn’t want him back, and if you think about it, wow, the comic actually went out of its way from its established POV just to show that apparently Kent is a crybaby with a vendetta. I laughed

[bewarecreepercomics]

Beware the Creeper #1

First issue in the original six issue miniseries written in 1968. Creeper’s had about three of these over the years, none of them exceeding twelve issues. Well, better a short, comprehensive story than, well...the Clone Saga.

Behind you. The Menace lurks behind you. If you’d just turn around-he blends in only slightly better than you do-he’s got orange on him for godssakes, is he Naruto’s grandfather or something? He is behind you!

Again, not a bad cover at all. No wasted space, an actual background, stuff happening. My only criticisms are that the rain looks like melting icicles instead of rain, and that the colors clash a bit, but hey, Silver Age. Riotous colors were not unusual.

We start out on a dark and stormy night, in which no one sees a green and bright orange ninja scaling a building. Well, it is raining, perhaps there are fewer people on the streets. Sure, I can suspend my belief for that.

This guy is The Terror, and he is going to these great lengths to sneak up on an unfortunate fellow he believes is going to betray him. We get the immediate establishment of this guy as a bad guy. No mysteries here.

I’ve got some bad news for you, sir...

Exactly what you think is about to happen, happens.

Actually, it kind of doesn’t. Yes, The Terror bust right through that window, but how this guy dies is a mystery. Mr. Terror doesn’t shoot him. Doesn’t stab him. It’s implied that he maybe hits him, but just then...

Jack Ryder, you have the worst timing of any man alive.

The Terror kicks his butt. How embarrassing. And then leaves without even bothering to kill him. The insolence!

His poor victim dies of...plot-convenience-itis, but not before giving Jack a list of names to check out. Now that’s spite.

Jack, of course, wants to follow up on this as soon as he can, but is stymied by his boss, who has assigned him to watch over the stations weather girl, Vera Sweet.

Yes, that is seriously her name.

I told you so. Vera is a publicity hound who smokes like a chimney, and has zero respect for our hero. She is also listed on almost every Creeper bio description as his love interest.

There is literally not a single comic in which this is true.

Really. We never, ever see this. The best we ever get on this subject is several mentions in more recent years that they used to go out, but it went bad and now they barely get along. In these original comics, they are practically antagonists.

Meanwhile, the Terror bursts in on a gangster, still dressed like that. Instead of busting into laughter, he gets busted in the face, and the Terror demands half of his rackets profits. And it looks like he’s not the only unlucky mobster to be victimized by the Terror.

Aw, the double-crossers might have been double crossed. I don’t feel sorry for any of them.

Jack ditches Vera at the very first opportunity to check up on those names victim #1 provided. First up, Gerk Kreg.

Try saying that name five times fast. Anyway, for a supposedly successful gangster, it sure is easy for Jack to just walk right into his house. More like succ-sessful, amirite?

Anyway.

It’s so easy for him to get in there that he has to switch to Creeper and bring attention to himself just to get noticed. He also makes the first mention of what is in later iterations referenced as an addiction to Professor Yatz’s serum.

Hey, if throwing up the horns is supposed to be demonic, does throwing down the horns invoke angels?

Of course, a Goon Battle follows. You know the kind. Where these supposed tough guys can barely lay a finger on our hero, and are sometimes so bad at fighting that he can have an entire internal monologue about how awesome he is without even getting interrupted?

Yes, yes, you are the very picture of idealized manliness. And so are your underoos. (Nice buttcheek we got there, thanks Ditko.)

Well, he battles his way through the mob penthouse, stopping only to question a goon, but doing so gets him ambushed and restrained. Let this be a lesson to you; punch first, ask questions later does not work. Punch only, and ask no questions is the way to go!

Gerk Kreg(ugh, why) decides that, before he shoots Creeper, he wants to know who he really is. No, you fool! Didn’t you learn? Punch only! No questions!

In attempting to rip his wig off, we learn something interesting.

That’s right, the molecular rearrangement device doesn’t just change his clothing and administer a dose of serum, it actually fuses that stuff to him. The wig, the rug, the makeup, the suit, none of it can be removed when he is Creeper.

Oh, the implications! The horrible, horrible implications.

Everyone’s startlemant at this revelation gives Creeper a chance to punch his way free and escape. You see! He got the lesson!

Jack thought that Kreg might be the Terror, but didn’t manage to get any proof in that punch-fest, so he moves on to the next name he had been given, that of Hack Axeley, a...private detective? With that name? Could’ve sworn he’d be either a hitman or a lumberjack.

Hack wants nothing to do with any of this, clearly being too busy working out of a closet with a gorgeous window view. Seriously, it is crowded in there.

Jack decides to do as Axeley suggests-go ask Cleary the lawyer. Who promptly runs him out. Not a big surprise there, Jack is no longer a reporter, nor is he a detective. He is small-time TV network security. Buuuut, Cleary’s defensiveness has made Jack suspicious, so he decides to go back in, in costume.

Up the side of the building.

In broad daylight.

Where everyone can see him.

Still wanted by the police.

BrainTrust.jpg

To get away, he hops a few buildings, drops into an alley, and switches back to Jack.

I wasn’t kidding in the previous review, he seriously does this all the damn time. Oh, and now he remembers Vera, and that he has an actual job.

Love interest, everybody!

She wants to punish him for ditching her by making him walk her dog in the rain. Is that all? What the heck is he got to gripe about, nowadays they’d have his job. Again!

Well, he caves, and they head back to his place to grab an umbrella. She might be a shameless fame-seeker, but Vera is no monster! However, the Terror is! And he is waiting in Jacks apartment to get the drop on him, fully armed with the Punch Only philosophy!

He was not, however, expecting Vera’s Shriek Like a Banshee Technique!

The name of the game in this issue is Jack Gets Ambushed. But the Terror makes a run for it, figuring Vera’s screaming will have attracted too much attention. Jack immediately ditches Vera yet again, to chase after him.

Nice working with you Jack.

Forth comes the Creeper, and so commences The Chase! Which takes up the rest of the comic, with one small break.

Here’s a bonus: My favorite panel in this issue. Get a look at those hands. It might be worth mentioning here that Ditko also helped create Spiderman. I wonder if there’s a way we could tell?

No time to contemplate now, time for another ambush!

Gosh darnit Jack, just look behind you every now and again! 

We get a dazzling rooftop fight out of this. There’s fisticuffs! Close calls! And of course...

Ass shots!

The Terror makes his escape. Again. Jack puts two and two together and gets a high value of three. In other words, the Terror waiting at Jacks apartment means that Gerk Kreg can’t be the Terror, because Jack didn’t question him as Jack-only as the Creeper. Only two fellows know that Jack Ryder was researching the Terror, and he decides to drop in on one of them, the misleadingly named Hack Axeley.

Who is just so dead, you guys.

Worried for the safety of the lawyer Cleary, he phones to warn him to stay low, then goes forth to question the late Axeleys secretary, Ida Horn.

Fear his swayed hip! Become powerless before the provocative pose! The distractionary merit of the skimpy outfit is proven yet again!

While she is sufficiently terrified-partially by Creepers questions and vague threats, but mostly by his sexy, sexy photoshoot vogueing- He notices something cleverly hiding behind her drapes.

The Terror is truly a master of stealth. Especially since there isn’t even a window back there.

More brawling for our champion and his nemesis! Oh, but this time, there is a maverick contender!

Kick his ass, baby! No, wait...

Uh...I don’t think that phrase means what you think it means...But whatever, Creeper has recognized the Terror’s voice, and the jig is up! Almost.

Aw, I kinda liked her. It’s too bad her legs have detached from her body. But enough of that! Resume the chase!

Just swinging about in empty space, in a storm, in the darkened city. Badass. But they have been spotted by those who are out for their blood. So now that he’s got him, what does Creeper do?

Freaking publicly unmasks the Terror, revealing him to be Hack Axeleys assistant! Remember? This guy?

He said two words while Jack was there. He was clearly super important and involved, oh yeah. And now his face is uncovered and visible...In front of everybody who wants a chance to murder him. Great job, Jack. This guy is sure to survive until his court date.

No, nevermind, Creeper drops every single one of the gangsters by himself because he’s the title character. How could I forget. The police reap a bumper crop of crooks, and Jack escapes, but not without surveying his work.

He’s not addicted, he can quit any time he wants.

And so our comic comes to an end with Jack and Vera bickering. How romantic.

While this is the first issue of the miniseries proper, it is completely removed from the story as a whole, presenting us only with a mediocre mystery, and a lot of awesome fight scenes. The real story starts next time, in Beware the Creeper #2, coming soon!

[theplateescape]

L.A.

Los Angeles: City of fallen angels

After much too long dragging ourselves out of the quicksand of our modern lives, we touched down in the city of angels with no sleep and, by then, uncomfortable shoes. We at once found ourselves being spoken to like slow children by a large, surly black woman who had apparently seen fit to apply thick, white house paint as nail polish and eye shadow, as we negotiated passage through the broken down houses, and barred windows of Inglewood to our accom in Koreatown. After a brief glimpse of the famous Hollywood sign through the green/grey haze of the thick LA air, we arrived at our temporary home. Our driver of course, was not shy to ask me for a tip (we come from a non-tipping culture in Australia and New Zealand) an awkward exchange which consisted of him giving me change for the ride fare, and then me giving it straight back. We then stashed the bags, as we were much too early to check in and, with a much needed change into my trusty jandels/ thongs/ flip flops, set out into the 40 Celsius morning to kill some time.

Following a lot of cursing and sweating, we managed to get a tuna melt in the belly, and board one of the mobile looney bins they call buses, to the Downtown area for a quick reconnaissance mission. We stumbled into “The Last Bookstore”, and the “Grand Central Market” which was more of an immense extended food court, with great local beers, and a mind boggling array of local delicacies. With the jagged teeth of jet lag digging deeply into our ability to remain conscious, we just managed to get back to Koreatown before surrendering to sleep. Waking sticky, but refreshed, it was back to the Grand Central market for great local beers, tongue tacos and the spiciest raw prawns I’ve had since Bangkok. Marinated in lime juice and coriander and swimming in pure evil, this refreshing bowl of prawn aguachile was the perfect catalyst for a big night out.

First stop, “Varnish.” The worst kept secret bar in LA. With a great cocktail list and super authentic prohibition era speakeasy vibe, this gem is hidden behind a sandwich shop. You enter through a door that from a distance just looks like a wooden panel wall. A few cocktails down, the best mint julep I’ve ever had, and free shots from the vibrant and knowledgeable bar staff, we did what all self respecting traveling alcoholics should do, and asked the bar keep where they go to drink. Seems simple enough right? It’s like asking chefs where they go to eat. We’ve employed this technique many times in foreign lands and have yet to be disappointed. Next to “Bar Clacson” for a beer and to watch people play pétanque on their full sized indoor pitch until I notice a lot of people emerging from the back of the bar. Another hidden space is revealed as we head through to a dark, dingier space playing punk music at high volumes and finished with arcade games. Needles to say this is much more our scene and we hold up here until we can barely stand.

As we leave, we employ the old ‘ask the bar tender where to go’ trick one last time and end up in the middle of nowhere eating tostadas and tacos from a truck with a bunch of LA natives. These taco trucks are an institution here and people are pretty faithful to their favourites. I’ll admit on our way to the “Flamin Tacos” truck, it seemed like the mother of all bad ideas; heading into the unknown with no trusty internet service or cell phone coverage to get our drunk asses back home. But as soon as I tasted the “Cubano,” a two pound sandwich filled with every kind of dead animal you could think of I realised, I am home!

As a child I can vividly remember one of my friends going to Disneyland over the school break. I can also remember being intensely jealous and vowing to get myself there some day. Well folks some 25 years later this overgrown kid got his wish, and then some. We hit three theme parks in 4 days, a deceptively exhausting exercise. I’ll spare the details in favour of a brief overview of each as we experienced them.

Universal studios. This was our first one so we were naturally pretty excited despite getting in from our taco excursion at 2.30am. In short this place is like the Gold Coast’s “Movie World” on crack! Not so many actual roller coasters, but 3D motion master type rides are the go here. The highlight was definitely Harry Potter’s Wizarding World. All the lengthy queues for rides were well shaded with big misting fans everywhere, which were a godsend in the crippling heat. Longest wait time was 45 mins for the Harry Potter ride, but it was the best!

S

6 Flags, Magic Mountain. Our roller coaster lust was fully sated at this park. There so many that we couldn’t possibly ride them all in one day, though we did try. This one is a long way out of town and involved us having to hire a car and drive ourselves out there. We’d had another big night the day before. This coupled with learning to drive on the right side of the road made for a pretty exhilarating experience before we even got to the park. The highlight was probably the “Tatsu” in which you are strapped in then turned to face the ground, and hurtled head first through the most terrifying series of twists and turns ever dreamed up by some sick genius engineers. It was the first ride of the day and we foolishly thought we had picked a gentle ride to warm up with, not the most intense ride in the whole park! Parts of this park where a bit run down and shabby to be fair. Also in a week of bad theme park food, the styrofoam biscuit they were marketing as a burger here was the fucking pits. Longest wait time was an hour I think, and lines were unshaded and the park overall felt poorly thought out compared to the other two. The “Superman Escape” is worth an honourable mention as I have never screamed with such honest and complete terror as I did while being shot 35 meters in the air backwards at 100miles per hour.

Disneyland. We really did save the best for last. As soon as you set foot in the magical kingdom you can’t help but revert back to an awe stricken 10 year old kid. The obsessive attention to detail was impressive to say the least. Some of these rides are at least 40 years old now, but you’d never know. Everything was so beautifully maintained, you’d swear it was built yesterday. Beautiful design and flawless staff execution, (the other parks probably had more thrilling rides) overall immersion, professionalism, and a sense of true childhood wonder made this place on point. Highlight was the “Indiana Jones “ ride which also had the longest wait, not that that mattered as the queue lead you through an ancient temple complete with booby traps and ancient relics. Also “New Orleans Town” was fucken mint! Unfortunately the “Haunted Mansion “ and “Space Mountain” where both closed which kinda sucks but this place was still the happiest place on earth. They also had the best food with the “Dole Whip”, a pineapple soft serve that actually tasted like a real pineapple, and a Moa sized turkey leg that tasted like ham and left me greasy and defeated.

We did all the other LA staples, the Hollywood walk of fame, the Chinese theatre. We saw an orchestra performance of some of John Williams finest film scores at the Hollywood Bowl which was $20, BYO, and so epic it still brought a smile to this jaded old travellers face. I was delightfully and constantly surprised at how, despite the reputation for rudeness, the people of LA were so polite, kind, and helpful. The traffic gets a bum rap here too but to be honest, Auckland traffic is much, much worse (sort your shit out Auckland!), besides once you have mastered the “hook turn” on the mean streets of the Melbourne CBD, you can basically drive anywhere it seems (except Saigon, Saigon is fucked up!). We’re told that no trip to this town is complete without a trip to “In-n-Out Burger” and to be fair it was an experience. If you’ve never seen a drive through queue spill out onto the road, around the block and hold up traffic a road over, then you ain’t seen shit son! The burgers were good, but not that good. We went to “Five Guys” burger parlour a couple of days later which was far superior in every way, and we didn’t have to wait 45 mins for burgers and battle overweight, heavy breathing burger whores for a scrap of table space to actually eat. In a town built on hype and little substance I felt like In-n-Out’s popularity is symptomatic of an age when you can be famous for simply being famous. Sure the secret menu items are kind of a cool touch, but is a secret menu really that cool if everyone, their dog and the internet knows about it?

After cramming in as much as possible in our short time, in this very large city, we decided to hit “Little Tokyo” for drinks and nibbles. Starting with “Mumford Brewing “ we demolished their range of very delicious IPA’s before striding through what was hands down the biggest homeless tent city I have come across. The stark contrast between the “haves” and the “have-nots” in this town was never so brutally apparent as while watching my back we made our way to the next port, in this sea of misery and decrepitude. We’ve seen real poverty in places like Cambodia before, but it was a cold hard slap in the face to see this happening on such a large scale in the “Greatest Nation On Earth”; for shame America. 

Our night then took us to “Wolf & Crane”, where the barkeep directed us to a great sushi bar down the road (always ask the bartenders where to go), where we gorged ourselves on very well priced raw delicacies prepared right in front of us, and sipped giant Sopporo’s and tried our best to order what we could in poorly spoken Japanese. Back to Wolf & Crane for more beers, whiskey tasting flights, and eventually being held captive by the head bartender who knocked off, sat down with us, and proceeded to get us completely shit faced until the wee hours, and refused to let us pay for anything.

Suffering the most brutal hangover, in a week of foggy starts, we pulled our shit together, cleaned up the now unrecognisable food mess we had presumably purchased before retiring only a few hours before, and prepared to leave Los Angeles. We rented a car, packed up all our shit and hit the road for the California coast. The fresh sea breeze and coastal hillsides did much to mend the self inflicted mental wounds we sustained in the concrete jungle. Mile after mile of pristine coast line gobbled up by big business and wanky resorts the size of small towns, made me long for untouched New Zealand just a little, as we made our way down to the border to cross into Mexico.

Los Angeles, city of angels, home of the dodgers and of course Mickey Mouse. Where the air is thick, the water dehydrates you, and the sun is always shining. Looking back however, the angels are dodgy at best, with soiled, scabbed wings, and yellowed nubs for teeth that chatter incessantly to drug induced apparitions, while constantly scratching at the imaginary worms crawling under their skin. I’m no stranger to colourful characters coming from one of the rougher parts of Auckland, and now living in a once notoriously sketchy area of Melbourne, but as we catch the bus to downtown LA to rustle up something to eat, it strikes me that there are an extraordinary amount of damaged individuals roaming the streets in the broad, unforgiving daylight. It takes more than the far off gaze of a few broken souls to deter my appetite, but as I stare into the vast void pooling behind those dead eyes, I have to ask myself, “who is to blame for all this misery?” And then it clicks, who else could it be? The only logical conclusion is as obvious as the track marks on the arms of its victims, we must of course blame the mouse! That’s not to say that I believe a 5 foot rodent wearing gloves and pants is responsible for all the hurt on the streets here, rather it is an effective symbol for the dream, or rather, lies that lead so many hopefuls to over extend and wind up facedown in the gutter. We are all told that if we work hard we can do anything. But this is not necessarily the truth. Do you really think a man (or women) wakes up one day with the burning desire to clear away other people’s trash. Most of us have to play with the hands we were dealt. But that’s a necessary evil in our world. Simply put, if we all got what we wanted out of life by following our dreams our filth would ultimately pile up in the streets and choke society to death. Some ones gotta pick up the trash. Hollywood makes its living packaging up the lie, the dream, and selling it off piece by piece for the price of an admission ticket. So like moths flying too close to the light bulb, the hopefuls come to ‘make it’ in tinsel town, but instead crash and burn, and wind up chatting to themselves on the 720 to downtown. Possibly also the apparent lack of an effective welfare and public mental health systems could be a large contributing factor, but it’s not as fun as taking a swipe at everyone’s favourite bipedal magic vermin.

[iguana012]

Russian Nats: The Aftermath

Ho Ho Ho and Happy New Year to everyone reading this! I’m back with a (very) late recap of one of the most important national competitions and possibly that one competition where the judging panel either gets batshit crazy or they are, in fact, Santa’s reindeer in disguise and they give free PCS candy to everyone.

Because although the Russians celebrate Christmas on January 7, the Christmas tree is already lit and the atmosphere is festive. Why wouldn’t it be since Mrs Santa herself is there supporting the children with her... well... shouting, hitting the microphone, tears and so on. 

After making the Grand Prix Final in some way, Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Soloviev continued to dominate at Nationals winning their event by a comfortable margin. In the men’s event Maxim Kovtun’s trolling wasn’t on his side; he eventually came back in the FS and made Mrs Santa cry but Mikhail Kolyada ended up taking the crown. In the ladies event Evgenia Medvedeva felt comfortable enough to throw #yolo 3-3-3 combination even though she knew her third triple would be invalidated while in pairs Ksenia Stolbova showed who’s the boss (and their butler) while Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander Smirnov ended their season here. DETAILS UNDER THE CUT! 

I’m mostly gonna talk about the ladies because the level of holy shitness in this event overshadows all the others. 

Former World Champion (can you believe that) Elizaveta Tuktamysheva still can’t seem to find her mojo. Not only that, but her mojo has been MIA for so long, she didn’t finish anywhere near the podium (she was 8th). Two seasons ago Liza was winning every single competition (except Skate America and Russian Nationals) with a pair of muumuus and a pair of programs that fit her like a glove. Some kind of cabaret Bolero as her SP - that inevitably made me imagine just how it would look next to a live orchestra led by an old white haired conductor - and some kind of strip club Scheherazade (without actual stripping going on in her FS) which required joint wiggling, a sport she might just be better at than figure skating. This season she came up with a Mozart remix so tacky it would probably make the creators of Moulin Rouge! jealous except she decided to switch back to last season’s SP at Nats. And uh, a bat program? Bat queen of caverns? That would explain the falls... since there are, like, hollows in there. ANYWAY Liza is at this point in her career where she became famous with an Ice Ice Baby hit a few years ago and there’s nobody left to write another hit for her. 

Former World Bronze Medalist Elena Radionova (also known as Kate Winslet) brought an interesting SP which she’s able to sell the crap out of BUT somebody had to skate to Turandot this season. SOMEBODY had to do it, okay. She became a top skater right at the same time Liza had her breakout season, except she remained relevant for another season... and a half. Because this season also ends here for her. Her body hasn’t been nice to her at all, she became much taller while her jumps became much smaller but the determination and grit never changed and no matter the quality of her jumps (or lack thereof), she managed to pull through. She made it to the GPF but in a field this deep there’s only so far she can go with her current technique. And when her technique gets worse, you notice several flaws that have been there since the beginning: the posture, the so-so skating skills. 

Current World Bronze Medalist Anna Pogorilaya has pogoturned this season around and taken 180 degrees turn from pogosplats on pogosticks to pogonsistency, pogoconfidence all the while giving pogoboners to everyone. Her Por Una Cabeza SP gives her the opportunity to show her new acquired #sass and although she seems to be wearing a dead animal on her shoulder and the music breaks into a (unnecessary) remix, you just can’t take your eyes off her. She is blessed with a lot of beauty. Blue eyes, full lips, long limbs - truly blessed. The only critique I’d have is her telegraphing her jumps in the FS (so much that she often ends her program after the music), lack of finesse like she isn’t finishing her movements and she’s also very focused to get the job done which makes her performance fall flat in the FS. Other than that, she did get the job done, she had a magnificent Grand Prix season but politics the judges pushed her off the podium either due to not being impressed or due to having Maria Sotskova’s carrots up their butts. 

Speaking of Maria Sotskova... uhm. Well the judges clearly like her! I mean she made the GPF... and her cheer thread on FSU is called “poetry on ice” while I struggle to recall her programs so she must be good. From a powerful club I hear. That would make some sense. She’s a nice kid but it’s like she got her 5 minutes of fame here and will be a filler until Alina Zagitova and Polina Tsurskaya turn seniors... I mean this is her first senior season and yeah she can improve but for now she’s kind of average. And plain. 

And now we’re left with the girls from Eteri’s factory who are basically running the world now and at the Olympics most likely. Eteri’s newest invention is called Alina Zagitova, a 14 year old prodigy who milks the system better than her senior Medvedeva: she doesn’t raise one arm but two, she doesn’t split her jumps into first half and second half, she just skates through the first half and jumps the crap out of the second half, gets all those bonus points and ends up with a higher TES than Medvedeva. But she’s wearing one of Medvedeva’s old costumes. So she’s like. Medvedeva 2.0? Like the Windows 10 to Windows 8? The Snow Leopard 10.6.8 to the Snow Leopard 10.6.x I don’t know I don’t even use Mac but you get the gist. 

And finally the OBVIOUS winner and reigning World Champion Evgenia Medvedeva. I really admire this girl you know? No bullshit. I’m kinda envious. She brings a couple of “what the fuck is going on” programs, she gets her picture taken and she says спасибо, is able to express the horrific consequences of terrorism like “she’s only 16 and her expression is SO mature she is the best skater ever” lalala. No matter how much bitching there will be regarding her programs, her choreographer (also inventor, visionary, arteest) Ilia Averbukh knows how to milk the system as well as Eteri. Evgenia is SO self-confident she goes “well what the fuck I know I’m gonna win I might as well throw a 3-3-3 in the second half of the program just to troll my coach lolz”. I wonder if she was thinking what present to buy for Yuzuru in the middle of her tano jumps? Girl is not afraid to go after the gold. Or her crush for that matter. By the way, the third triple of the 3-3-3 was underrotated, So 0-1 for Eteri. 

And this is a rare picture of choreo genius Ilia Averbukh

AS FOR THE REST OF THE COMPETITION I’M GONNA PUT IT SHORTLY 

[ariellblogus]

TL;DR: Read logs, delete useless shit, maintain the DB clear.

* Warning: An extended learn! *

Oh properly, I feel like a n00b while typing this but that’s how things roll. I’m not positive if I’ve any regular readers left, as to have regular readers one must be a daily writer, which I am clearly not. (Yes, I wish to change.)

Still, when you go back and stalk this blog, you’ll notice that submit frequency for 2018 has been abysmal at it’s greatest. But yes, there’s a cause an fascinating story behind the same. A narrative which might train you a thing or two about hosting WordPress by yourself internet hosting. It has definitely taught me a lot.

So, it began back in January once I began noticing poor loading performance of the location. Being a self-shared hosted occasion, I chalked it up to poor bandwidth or dangerous optimisation by Staff GoDaddy (not a lot constructive about them). Soon I started getting 503 error randomly on the home page, so it was time to research stuff…

Preliminary findings

I logged into GoDaddy account and went into my hosting status page. Immediately I used to be greeted with an orange banner(hyperlink right here) stating I’m reaching the resource limit and I have to improve my internet hosting plan soon to maintain up the graceful operations. I scoffed mildly to their advertising techniques and opened the boot to look underneath the hood.

I opened the CPanel and took a look over on the system panel on the left. To my amazement, virtually all of the parameters have been either terminal pink or warning orange. I appeared up the labels to know the which means of these indicators.

Pink is often my favorite color

Nicely, clearly, I used to be a bit stunned as I have an expertise of operating WordPress since 2006-ish and I have had run pretty complexly themed blogs on my potato local pc (2006 PC, yeah!) utilizing XAMMP on Home windows.

In case you are a backend guy and skim this line above now (in 2018), you will in all probability cringe more durable than you do on Nicki Minaz songs. Every little thing about that line is WRONG (2006, PC, XAMMP).

Anyway, I had a fond memory of WordPress stack being tremendous environment friendly and respectable at dealing with a mere 100+ blog posts with ~15 plugins. Especially once I was not even posting posts commonly and visitors was on a decline.

Something was improper right here.

I referred to as up GoDaddy tech gross sales help and patiently explained my drawback to him only to get his sales pitch – “Sar, I can see the upgrade banner in your account, so can you. Please give cash, we offer you moar resourcez. Oaky?“. Hmm, in all probability not that brash however you get the gist. I (mildly irritated) requested him to escalate my name to his supervisor or someone from *real* tech help.

Properly, they kinda did. A woman (I am NOT a sexist) picked up the decision and I swear to the odin that she was not capable of perceive something about wp-config and the 503 error and requested me if I have cleared my browser cache. I politely requested her to switch the decision to her supervisor.

…

This time a moderately mature sounding guy picked up the decision and ask my drawback. People, I used to be already 3 ranges deep and 20 minutes on the call. I still defined to him my drawback. He opened his admin console, obtained to my box and disabled all plugins (essential) and my custom theme.

The location seemed to breathe for some time and we have been capable of access the same. He informed me plainly that this can be a basic case of resource overutilization and I have to upgrade my hosting from the essential starter plan to at the least their Delux combo something plan. I made the rookie’s mistake of asking the fee for the same as he immediately stated he will simply transfer my name to his gross sales representative. *facepalm* I held up the connection earlier than they might plug me one other degree deep.

I deep down knew that I want to research this myself earlier than throwing moolah on the desk.

Lazy boi excuses; Half – I

This was February 2018. I stored my weekend free and planned to drill down into my GoDaddy shared internet hosting server to seek out the resource drawback. I used to be positive about some bug leaking memory or some infinite loop sucking out my CPU burst cycles. I deliberate to duplicate the setup on AWS t2.micro free occasion and made an account on the same. It does require a credit card on the file before letting to fireside up ec2 situations. My AMEX CC had some drawback because it debits the verification money however nonetheless stated pending for 48 hours. Truthful enough, I assumed I’ll begin in 2 days…

But all of a sudden (a software program engineer approach of shedding joyful tears!), I acquired a huge venture to work on from scratch at my last job @ Shuttl. (Yeah, I have switched career, yet once more). The venture identify rhymed with XMS. I was pretty excited to build a Python Django venture from scratch along with my 2 gifted senior teammates. I used to be completely satisfied that I will get to study a ton and can deploy an entire challenge reside AND……both of my 2 gifted senior teammates left earlier than even the completion of the primary milestone of the undertaking. Yep, just left. And I used to be struck with lots of legacy code to work on, with a little or no concept concerning the framework. I had a great experience with Flask framework but Django had some things carried out in another way.

I slogged at work and the great half was that I was capable of understand most of the code and received fairly good at Django,  carried out a ton of APIs and built a primary dashboard UI.  Anyway, that sucked subsequent 2 months of my life and I utterly forgot about this blog, the 503 challenge and meanwhile it stored getting worse as it began opening sometimes and stored throwing 503 errors for probably the most part.

Lazy boi excuses; Part – II

Nah, let’s transfer forward. I’ve shared too much personal stuff anyway. 😛

Let’s start recent? Scrap all shit.

It was around Might 2018  and I obtained some interns and a junior to assist me with new tasks that our product group was pumping out PRDs out at a tremendous price. I used to be working continuous on similar however still a window of private time opened up. Meanwhile, we migrated our code repositories to Github from Gitlab and I obtained to know concerning the idea of gh-pages.

Github pages – A neat nifty venture by Github which allows you to host stuff from your repo as easy websites or blogs. Free of charge!

This appeared like a candy chime to my ears as I used to be drained of the non-existent help from GoDaddy and their incompetent tech staff (free-tier a minimum of). I began formulating a plan to nuke bitsnapper altogether and start from scratch and make a easy Martin Fowler-esque blog.

Clear, simple and nerdy.

So, I created a simple website blog on jatinkrmalik.github.io and even posted some posts (perhaps 1). However because of lack of a lot formatting options and skill to customize stuff, was a bummer.

I lost curiosity in Github pages quicker than America did in Trump.

AND soon I resigned from Shuttl and left in July as a result of [redacted] causes.

A new beginning, AWS method?!

In late July, I joined a really early stage startup referred to as Synaptic.io after what felt like a swyamwar of supply letters. (okay, no bragging). I used to be impressed by the product and measurement of the staff which you possibly can rely on one hand. It felt profitable to get into core group, build one thing great and have an opportunity to witness progress from the within.

Anyway, Synaptic being a data-heavy company, we use lots of third social gathering providers and instruments for automated deployment to staging, prod and so on. Naturally, AWS is the spine of our deployment infra. I acquired a brand new AWS account each for staging and prod, so I started reading about the identical and obtained to find out about Bitnami WordPress AMI which comes preloaded with the WordPress stack goodies and one can deploy with a click on. It was time to reactivate my AWS account and hearth this up.

A couple of weeks in the past.

Initially of August 2018, I was lastly capable of authenticate my AWS account by punching a new credit card. I fired up a bitnami WordPress occasion and did a setup for the standard WordPress installation. Now all I had to do was simply again up stuff from GoDaddy servers and restore right here.

Sounds straightforward proper?

EXCEPT.

IT.

WAS.

NOT.

I logged into my good previous CPanel, received the FTP creds, loaded FileZilla and began the switch. The ETA was in the north of double-digit hours as the website’s public_html folder was somewhere round 1.5 GB which is comprehensible as I’ve lots of media information and videos. Truthful enough. However this once more was going to take rather a lot of time as the problem with transferring a folder is that every micro-size file (<100 kb) takes mere milliseconds to obtain however takes it’s personal sweet time to write down on the local disk when downloading from the web. The apparent means was to pack the public_html folder into a zip file and then switch.

I did an SSH into the box and ran the command zip -rv public_html.zip public_html/ to zip the listing, but one factor which I forgot was that even whereas zipping a listing, I’ll hit the identical drawback of the zip program manually iterating over all of the information (together with microsized one) and can take quite a bit of time to attempt to compress every one. I left it for 20 minutes only to seek out it solely 10% via my all information. Enchancment? Positive but I am not a very patient man.

Why is that this so slow? Oh, wait.

I appeared into the log (because of -v…verbose), and came upon that I had quite a bit of information in my public_html folder in my xcloner plugin directory resulting from some failed attempts to take website backup from a plugin. I found more such folders of some plugins which haven’t any lively position in powering up this blog.

Checking the dimensions of information within the plugins directory.

So, I deleted these folders in public_html/wp-content/plugins and tried operating the zip command once more. It was still slow and I gave up in a couple of minutes.

Clear up.Zip them em!

I google about wrapping information in a zipper with out compressing a lot and obtained to study ranges of compression in zip utility which fits from 1-9 with 1 being least compression and 9 being the very best degree of compression whereas it defaults to 6. So, I attempted again this time with butzip -1rv public_html.zip public_html/ quickly realized the iteration over gazzilion information take extra time than compression logic for the CPU.

Simply wrapping.

I learn more and came upon that making a tarball w/o compression is quicker than zip utility, so it was time to attempt that and perhaps let it complete in its own sweet time. So, I fired up the command: tar -caf public.tar public_html and left it operating.

Unsure if it ever completed…

Then I logged into phpMyAdmin (an internet app to handle MySQL occasion) to take a backup of my bitsnapper WordPress DB. I simply clicked on export and the downloaded file was of measurement 48 MBs which was odd as in UI it was displaying a DB measurement of 1.2 GB. I knew SQL backup can compress some knowledge but of this magnitude? WTF. I opened the SQL file in VS code and clearly, the file was incomplete and had some HTML gibberish at the end which on inspection was the HTML for phpMyAdmin. Bizarre?

I attempted exporting the DB as soon as again from the UI and this time the dimensions of the backup.sql file was 256 MBs. I felt this was applicable but my instinct did a proper click on and opened in my editor as soon as again. Certainly enough the file was nonetheless incomplete with that gibberish. Truthful to say, the backup from phpMyAdmin was corrupted.

prime

I did an ssh into my internet hosting box using the creds in my GoDaddy account and tried every little thing from checking the output of system instructions like:prime, ps -ef, free but the box is properly sandboxed by GoDaddy to avoid any unauthorised access. I even tried to do a privilege escalation with intention of gaining extra management over my hosting account and perhaps restart mysqld however all in useless.

pssudo?

I knew about taking direct DB backups from the shell utilizing mysqldump -h -u -p > db_backup.sql so it was time to attempt that. I ran the command and tailed the backup SQL file with tail -f db_backup.sql to look into its content material because it populated. It began exporting DB nicely and as I started feeling badass and went to seize a cup of espresso, the terminal introduced me with the error message:

man mysqldumpFirst try.

I googled about the problem and it had something to do with the max_alllowed_packet variable of MySQL. The one two methods to vary that was either my modifying /and so forth/my.cnf file (which I used to be positive I didn’t have sudo entry to) or run SET GLOBAL max_allowed_packet=1073741824; query within the MySQL console.

Admin? No? Sorry.

Yeah, both of them didn’t work. Obviously. You want respective system admin consumer access for both.

The roadblock was getting stupidly irritating, and I had to get the backup.  I googled more and somebody prompt to cross the max_allowed_packet variable with the mysqldump command as.–max-allowed-packet=1073741824 Tried that too, didn’t work.

With –max_allowed_packet

I was tired and needed to sleep, so I terminated my ec2 occasion and slept.

TODAY.

At present I used to be feeling motivated and deliberate to look into the problem from another angle.

As an alternative of utilizing the WordPress AMI, I made a decision to create the whole setup from scratch. I launched an occasion of ec2 with Amazon Linux AMI. The goal was to know if that is actually GoDaddy messing with me or is it some fault in my database which is leading to the entire shebang.

I used this submit as steerage to arrange every little thing from grounds up.

I logged in once more to my GoDaddy account to be greeted by the orange banner urging me to upgrade. I felt weak and was nearly to click improve and throw some dough to get the straightforward means out. But no, that’s towards the hacker mentality I work with.

So, I opened the CPanel, phpMyAdmin and tried taking a backup again. It again downloaded a 250-something MB file with gibberish at the end. I manually eliminated the last half of the file and uploaded it to my ec2 instance by way of scp and imported it into my distant MySQL occasion.

After importing the public_html information, importing SQL backup and configuring wp-config.php file with DB host and creds, I restarted each httpd (Apache server) and MySQL (DB server) and opened http://ec2-instance-url:80 and to my partial euphoria, it did load up my header and footer for bitsnapper however no posts have been seen.

Hmm… something was missing.

I seemed into the tables on phpMyAdmin and my MySQL server on the ec2 occasion and duh, my wp_xxx_posts table and wp_xxx_postsmeta was lacking. Yeah! So, the problem was that my DB measurement has such giant that Godaddy shared hosting limited bandwidth was not allowing me to take a backup of the whole DB. Clearly, I had to repair this.

I wrote a custom python script to take a backup of the bitsnapper DB table-by-table to avoid hitting the max_allowed_packet limit as observed last week however the identical error mysqldump: Error 2013: Misplaced connection to MySQL server throughout question when dumping table wp_xxx_postmeta  stored popping up.

I started my intense googling session as soon as again and queried alongside the line of  ‘how you can backup DB from GoDaddy shared internet hosting‘ and ‘GoDaddy + shared hosting + mysqldump + error 2013‘ and by some means by a fluke, I landed on the Backup part of my ….drumroll?….. CPanel! *facepalm*

Facepalm second!

It had every thing I was making an attempt to do above with a flick of a click. I ended all my previous efforts and download the complete web site backup which had each public_html folder and DB backup SQL. The whole archive was nonetheless 2.5 GB which was big for a small blog like this.

Anyway, I did a scp to my ec2 instance and tried to exchange the information in /var/www/html with public_html/ and restored mysql backup by way of mysql -u -p < db_backup.sql and this time it labored with out an error. I restarted my mysql and apache http server by service mysql restart; serivce httpd restart; and tried to load http://:80 and presto! the entire website loads up.

The euphoria this time also lasted for a brief burst as within 2-3 reloads the replicated website again began throwing up the same 503 error and my shell session chocked up.

503! Not again.

I fired up a brand new terminal and tried SSHing into the box however the box just turned unresponsive. I went to the AWS admin console to examine my ec2 instance monitoring for the machine parameters and observed an identical sample as with the CPanel (left panel) parameter console.  It was all purple and orange as soon as again.

Clearly, GoDaddy’s internet hosting wasn’t the only wrongdoer.

Real IT help == Self-troubleshooting!

It was then once I decided to shed my worry of peeping into the DB tables because it was a gone trigger anyway and I nonetheless had a partial backup from last yr once I migrated the blog from WordPress managed internet hosting to standard shared internet hosting box.

Boys, it was time to run some queries. The first thing I did was to login to the phpMyAdmin and lookup the tables, schema and properties. I used to be assured that the issue is with the DB measurement and that’s the rationale for slow queries which is chocking up the CPU burst time.

I seemed into tables and located table wp_xxx_postmeta to be around 950 MB in measurement with simply 11000 data. This immediately fired up alarms in my head as I have labored with multi-million row DBs during my stint in Adobe & Shuttl and the table measurement was principally in the vary of few MBs solely. A tough again of the notice calculation said a median measurement of 100 kb per report on this table which was weird because once I seemed up the schema for a similar, it simply was storing 4 data i.e. meta_id, post_id, meta_key, meta_value.

Hey DB, you cray?

It was time to prod this table and understand the info inside it. I fired up a simple query:

SELECT meta_key, rely”text” FROM ‘wp_s4w671g0kp_postmeta’ GROUP by meta_key order by rely”text” desc;

Lo behold, the end result was a bit shocking as till now I used to be considering that this desk may include submit revisions or metadata solely but the query outcome was something like this:

meta_key rely”text” _total_views

1895

_view_ip_list

1892

_jetpack_related_posts_cache

1206

_wp_attached_file

1144

_wp_attachment_metadata

1101

wp-smpro-smush-data

1069

_wp_attachment_image_alt

903

_edit_lock

155

_edit_last

140

_yoast_wpseo_focuskw

118

_yoast_wpseo_linkdex

118

_thumbnail_id

116

_yoast_wpseo_metadesc

114

_publicize_twitter_user

107

_wpas_done_all

103

_total_likes

77

_like_ip_list

77

_wpas_skip_3914702

75

_wpas_skip_11104850

72

_yoast_wpseo_title

56

_wp_attachment_backup_sizes

40

_yoast_wpseo_focuskw_text_input

38

_wp_old_slug

35

essb_hideplusone

29

essb_hidevk

29

Do you see it? There are some 1800+ data for _view_ip_list, _total_views,  _jetpack_related_posts_cache which is principally nothing however data originated from WordPress personal homegrown fashionable plugin – Jetpack. I googled a bit about security delete for these data, didn’t find anything,  took a leap of religion and executed:

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_view_ip_list’;

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_total_views’;

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_jetpack_related_posts_cache’;

It deleted some 4,000 data out of 11,000 data it had and look what happened once I refreshed phpMyAdmin?

All cleaned up!

Yus! My wp_xxx_postmeta table measurement dropped from 900-something MBs to 6.Three MBs by just deleting ~4,000 data. What sick joke is that? My complete DB measurement dropped to 25 MBs from ~1.2 GBs, in all probability because of the cascade effect of overseas key constraints of the data I deleted.

Outcome?

My web site was a breeze once once more. The load time went down considerably, in all probability as a result of of quicker DB queries and even the system monitoring parameters on the CPanel went down from Purple/Orange to Inexperienced. I did some load testing by executing a number of curl requests to my house page by way of terminal, and the server was not breaking any sweat.

Take a look at that RAM usage!  WHAT? Keep in mind once I talked about operating WordPress stack on my 2006 PC with some 128 MB of memory? Yeah!

So fast much wow!

Classes?

Troubleshooting Godaddy is a long-term thing. You’ll be able to either get into the shit and fix it yourself or you can begin throwing money on the display until you escalate to their core tech workforce which I assume might be by no means for shared internet hosting plans. They could have a terrific help for devoted servers though.

AWS is a f##king superb piece of tech. If you understand how to harden servers, by all means, simply drop these legacy internet hosting providers and go on your personal setup. It’s in all probability cheaper, quicker and extra VFM. A easy t2.micro instance will value < ₹700/month. (Perhaps extra, sigh world financial system!).

Typically, being a smartass isn’t good. Most of the occasions, nevertheless, it retains you protected.

All the time examine logs. -_-

The post Back from Dead

[moonlifesims4ccfinds]

TL;DR: Read logs, delete useless shit, maintain the DB clear.

* Warning: An extended learn! *

Oh properly, I feel like a n00b while typing this but that’s how things roll. I’m not positive if I’ve any regular readers left, as to have regular readers one must be a daily writer, which I am clearly not. (Yes, I wish to change.)

Still, when you go back and stalk this blog, you’ll notice that submit frequency for 2018 has been abysmal at it’s greatest. But yes, there’s a cause an fascinating story behind the same. A narrative which might train you a thing or two about hosting WordPress by yourself internet hosting. It has definitely taught me a lot.

So, it began back in January once I began noticing poor loading performance of the location. Being a self-shared hosted occasion, I chalked it up to poor bandwidth or dangerous optimisation by Staff GoDaddy (not a lot constructive about them). Soon I started getting 503 error randomly on the home page, so it was time to research stuff…

Preliminary findings

I logged into GoDaddy account and went into my hosting status page. Immediately I used to be greeted with an orange banner(hyperlink right here) stating I’m reaching the resource limit and I have to improve my internet hosting plan soon to maintain up the graceful operations. I scoffed mildly to their advertising techniques and opened the boot to look underneath the hood.

I opened the CPanel and took a look over on the system panel on the left. To my amazement, virtually all of the parameters have been either terminal pink or warning orange. I appeared up the labels to know the which means of these indicators.

Pink is often my favorite color

Nicely, clearly, I used to be a bit stunned as I have an expertise of operating WordPress since 2006-ish and I have had run pretty complexly themed blogs on my potato local pc (2006 PC, yeah!) utilizing XAMMP on Home windows.

In case you are a backend guy and skim this line above now (in 2018), you will in all probability cringe more durable than you do on Nicki Minaz songs. Every little thing about that line is WRONG (2006, PC, XAMMP).

Anyway, I had a fond memory of WordPress stack being tremendous environment friendly and respectable at dealing with a mere 100+ blog posts with ~15 plugins. Especially once I was not even posting posts commonly and visitors was on a decline.

Something was improper right here.

I referred to as up GoDaddy tech gross sales help and patiently explained my drawback to him only to get his sales pitch – “Sar, I can see the upgrade banner in your account, so can you. Please give cash, we offer you moar resourcez. Oaky?“. Hmm, in all probability not that brash however you get the gist. I (mildly irritated) requested him to escalate my name to his supervisor or someone from *real* tech help.

Properly, they kinda did. A woman (I am NOT a sexist) picked up the decision and I swear to the odin that she was not capable of perceive something about wp-config and the 503 error and requested me if I have cleared my browser cache. I politely requested her to switch the decision to her supervisor.

…

This time a moderately mature sounding guy picked up the decision and ask my drawback. People, I used to be already 3 ranges deep and 20 minutes on the call. I still defined to him my drawback. He opened his admin console, obtained to my box and disabled all plugins (essential) and my custom theme.

The location seemed to breathe for some time and we have been capable of access the same. He informed me plainly that this can be a basic case of resource overutilization and I have to upgrade my hosting from the essential starter plan to at the least their Delux combo something plan. I made the rookie’s mistake of asking the fee for the same as he immediately stated he will simply transfer my name to his gross sales representative. *facepalm* I held up the connection earlier than they might plug me one other degree deep.

I deep down knew that I want to research this myself earlier than throwing moolah on the desk.

Lazy boi excuses; Half – I

This was February 2018. I stored my weekend free and planned to drill down into my GoDaddy shared internet hosting server to seek out the resource drawback. I used to be positive about some bug leaking memory or some infinite loop sucking out my CPU burst cycles. I deliberate to duplicate the setup on AWS t2.micro free occasion and made an account on the same. It does require a credit card on the file before letting to fireside up ec2 situations. My AMEX CC had some drawback because it debits the verification money however nonetheless stated pending for 48 hours. Truthful enough, I assumed I’ll begin in 2 days…

But all of a sudden (a software program engineer approach of shedding joyful tears!), I acquired a huge venture to work on from scratch at my last job @ Shuttl. (Yeah, I have switched career, yet once more). The venture identify rhymed with XMS. I was pretty excited to build a Python Django venture from scratch along with my 2 gifted senior teammates. I used to be completely satisfied that I will get to study a ton and can deploy an entire challenge reside AND……both of my 2 gifted senior teammates left earlier than even the completion of the primary milestone of the undertaking. Yep, just left. And I used to be struck with lots of legacy code to work on, with a little or no concept concerning the framework. I had a great experience with Flask framework but Django had some things carried out in another way.

I slogged at work and the great half was that I was capable of understand most of the code and received fairly good at Django,  carried out a ton of APIs and built a primary dashboard UI.  Anyway, that sucked subsequent 2 months of my life and I utterly forgot about this blog, the 503 challenge and meanwhile it stored getting worse as it began opening sometimes and stored throwing 503 errors for probably the most part.

Lazy boi excuses; Part – II

Nah, let’s transfer forward. I’ve shared too much personal stuff anyway. 😛

Let’s start recent? Scrap all shit.

It was around Might 2018  and I obtained some interns and a junior to assist me with new tasks that our product group was pumping out PRDs out at a tremendous price. I used to be working continuous on similar however still a window of private time opened up. Meanwhile, we migrated our code repositories to Github from Gitlab and I obtained to know concerning the idea of gh-pages.

Github pages – A neat nifty venture by Github which allows you to host stuff from your repo as easy websites or blogs. Free of charge!

This appeared like a candy chime to my ears as I used to be drained of the non-existent help from GoDaddy and their incompetent tech staff (free-tier a minimum of). I began formulating a plan to nuke bitsnapper altogether and start from scratch and make a easy Martin Fowler-esque blog.

Clear, simple and nerdy.

So, I created a simple website blog on jatinkrmalik.github.io and even posted some posts (perhaps 1). However because of lack of a lot formatting options and skill to customize stuff, was a bummer.

I lost curiosity in Github pages quicker than America did in Trump.

AND soon I resigned from Shuttl and left in July as a result of [redacted] causes.

A new beginning, AWS method?!

In late July, I joined a really early stage startup referred to as Synaptic.io after what felt like a swyamwar of supply letters. (okay, no bragging). I used to be impressed by the product and measurement of the staff which you possibly can rely on one hand. It felt profitable to get into core group, build one thing great and have an opportunity to witness progress from the within.

Anyway, Synaptic being a data-heavy company, we use lots of third social gathering providers and instruments for automated deployment to staging, prod and so on. Naturally, AWS is the spine of our deployment infra. I acquired a brand new AWS account each for staging and prod, so I started reading about the identical and obtained to find out about Bitnami WordPress AMI which comes preloaded with the WordPress stack goodies and one can deploy with a click on. It was time to reactivate my AWS account and hearth this up.

A couple of weeks in the past.

Initially of August 2018, I was lastly capable of authenticate my AWS account by punching a new credit card. I fired up a bitnami WordPress occasion and did a setup for the standard WordPress installation. Now all I had to do was simply again up stuff from GoDaddy servers and restore right here.

Sounds straightforward proper?

EXCEPT.

IT.

WAS.

NOT.

I logged into my good previous CPanel, received the FTP creds, loaded FileZilla and began the switch. The ETA was in the north of double-digit hours as the website’s public_html folder was somewhere round 1.5 GB which is comprehensible as I’ve lots of media information and videos. Truthful enough. However this once more was going to take rather a lot of time as the problem with transferring a folder is that every micro-size file (<100 kb) takes mere milliseconds to obtain however takes it’s personal sweet time to write down on the local disk when downloading from the web. The apparent means was to pack the public_html folder into a zip file and then switch.

I did an SSH into the box and ran the command zip -rv public_html.zip public_html/ to zip the listing, but one factor which I forgot was that even whereas zipping a listing, I’ll hit the identical drawback of the zip program manually iterating over all of the information (together with microsized one) and can take quite a bit of time to attempt to compress every one. I left it for 20 minutes only to seek out it solely 10% via my all information. Enchancment? Positive but I am not a very patient man.

Why is that this so slow? Oh, wait.

I appeared into the log (because of -v…verbose), and came upon that I had quite a bit of information in my public_html folder in my xcloner plugin directory resulting from some failed attempts to take website backup from a plugin. I found more such folders of some plugins which haven’t any lively position in powering up this blog.

Checking the dimensions of information within the plugins directory.

So, I deleted these folders in public_html/wp-content/plugins and tried operating the zip command once more. It was still slow and I gave up in a couple of minutes.

Clear up.Zip them em!

I google about wrapping information in a zipper with out compressing a lot and obtained to study ranges of compression in zip utility which fits from 1-9 with 1 being least compression and 9 being the very best degree of compression whereas it defaults to 6. So, I attempted again this time with butzip -1rv public_html.zip public_html/ quickly realized the iteration over gazzilion information take extra time than compression logic for the CPU.

Simply wrapping.

I learn more and came upon that making a tarball w/o compression is quicker than zip utility, so it was time to attempt that and perhaps let it complete in its own sweet time. So, I fired up the command: tar -caf public.tar public_html and left it operating.

Unsure if it ever completed…

Then I logged into phpMyAdmin (an internet app to handle MySQL occasion) to take a backup of my bitsnapper WordPress DB. I simply clicked on export and the downloaded file was of measurement 48 MBs which was odd as in UI it was displaying a DB measurement of 1.2 GB. I knew SQL backup can compress some knowledge but of this magnitude? WTF. I opened the SQL file in VS code and clearly, the file was incomplete and had some HTML gibberish at the end which on inspection was the HTML for phpMyAdmin. Bizarre?

I attempted exporting the DB as soon as again from the UI and this time the dimensions of the backup.sql file was 256 MBs. I felt this was applicable but my instinct did a proper click on and opened in my editor as soon as again. Certainly enough the file was nonetheless incomplete with that gibberish. Truthful to say, the backup from phpMyAdmin was corrupted.

prime

I did an ssh into my internet hosting box using the creds in my GoDaddy account and tried every little thing from checking the output of system instructions like:prime, ps -ef, free but the box is properly sandboxed by GoDaddy to avoid any unauthorised access. I even tried to do a privilege escalation with intention of gaining extra management over my hosting account and perhaps restart mysqld however all in useless.

pssudo?

I knew about taking direct DB backups from the shell utilizing mysqldump -h -u -p > db_backup.sql so it was time to attempt that. I ran the command and tailed the backup SQL file with tail -f db_backup.sql to look into its content material because it populated. It began exporting DB nicely and as I started feeling badass and went to seize a cup of espresso, the terminal introduced me with the error message:

man mysqldumpFirst try.

I googled about the problem and it had something to do with the max_alllowed_packet variable of MySQL. The one two methods to vary that was either my modifying /and so forth/my.cnf file (which I used to be positive I didn’t have sudo entry to) or run SET GLOBAL max_allowed_packet=1073741824; query within the MySQL console.

Admin? No? Sorry.

Yeah, both of them didn’t work. Obviously. You want respective system admin consumer access for both.

The roadblock was getting stupidly irritating, and I had to get the backup.  I googled more and somebody prompt to cross the max_allowed_packet variable with the mysqldump command as.–max-allowed-packet=1073741824 Tried that too, didn’t work.

With –max_allowed_packet

I was tired and needed to sleep, so I terminated my ec2 occasion and slept.

TODAY.

At present I used to be feeling motivated and deliberate to look into the problem from another angle.

As an alternative of utilizing the WordPress AMI, I made a decision to create the whole setup from scratch. I launched an occasion of ec2 with Amazon Linux AMI. The goal was to know if that is actually GoDaddy messing with me or is it some fault in my database which is leading to the entire shebang.

I used this submit as steerage to arrange every little thing from grounds up.

I logged in once more to my GoDaddy account to be greeted by the orange banner urging me to upgrade. I felt weak and was nearly to click improve and throw some dough to get the straightforward means out. But no, that’s towards the hacker mentality I work with.

So, I opened the CPanel, phpMyAdmin and tried taking a backup again. It again downloaded a 250-something MB file with gibberish at the end. I manually eliminated the last half of the file and uploaded it to my ec2 instance by way of scp and imported it into my distant MySQL occasion.

After importing the public_html information, importing SQL backup and configuring wp-config.php file with DB host and creds, I restarted each httpd (Apache server) and MySQL (DB server) and opened http://ec2-instance-url:80 and to my partial euphoria, it did load up my header and footer for bitsnapper however no posts have been seen.

Hmm… something was missing.

I seemed into the tables on phpMyAdmin and my MySQL server on the ec2 occasion and duh, my wp_xxx_posts table and wp_xxx_postsmeta was lacking. Yeah! So, the problem was that my DB measurement has such giant that Godaddy shared hosting limited bandwidth was not allowing me to take a backup of the whole DB. Clearly, I had to repair this.

I wrote a custom python script to take a backup of the bitsnapper DB table-by-table to avoid hitting the max_allowed_packet limit as observed last week however the identical error mysqldump: Error 2013: Misplaced connection to MySQL server throughout question when dumping table wp_xxx_postmeta  stored popping up.

I started my intense googling session as soon as again and queried alongside the line of  ‘how you can backup DB from GoDaddy shared internet hosting‘ and ‘GoDaddy + shared hosting + mysqldump + error 2013‘ and by some means by a fluke, I landed on the Backup part of my ….drumroll?….. CPanel! *facepalm*

Facepalm second!

It had every thing I was making an attempt to do above with a flick of a click. I ended all my previous efforts and download the complete web site backup which had each public_html folder and DB backup SQL. The whole archive was nonetheless 2.5 GB which was big for a small blog like this.

Anyway, I did a scp to my ec2 instance and tried to exchange the information in /var/www/html with public_html/ and restored mysql backup by way of mysql -u -p < db_backup.sql and this time it labored with out an error. I restarted my mysql and apache http server by service mysql restart; serivce httpd restart; and tried to load http://:80 and presto! the entire website loads up.

The euphoria this time also lasted for a brief burst as within 2-3 reloads the replicated website again began throwing up the same 503 error and my shell session chocked up.

503! Not again.

I fired up a brand new terminal and tried SSHing into the box however the box just turned unresponsive. I went to the AWS admin console to examine my ec2 instance monitoring for the machine parameters and observed an identical sample as with the CPanel (left panel) parameter console.  It was all purple and orange as soon as again.

Clearly, GoDaddy’s internet hosting wasn’t the only wrongdoer.

Real IT help == Self-troubleshooting!

It was then once I decided to shed my worry of peeping into the DB tables because it was a gone trigger anyway and I nonetheless had a partial backup from last yr once I migrated the blog from WordPress managed internet hosting to standard shared internet hosting box.

Boys, it was time to run some queries. The first thing I did was to login to the phpMyAdmin and lookup the tables, schema and properties. I used to be assured that the issue is with the DB measurement and that’s the rationale for slow queries which is chocking up the CPU burst time.

I seemed into tables and located table wp_xxx_postmeta to be around 950 MB in measurement with simply 11000 data. This immediately fired up alarms in my head as I have labored with multi-million row DBs during my stint in Adobe & Shuttl and the table measurement was principally in the vary of few MBs solely. A tough again of the notice calculation said a median measurement of 100 kb per report on this table which was weird because once I seemed up the schema for a similar, it simply was storing 4 data i.e. meta_id, post_id, meta_key, meta_value.

Hey DB, you cray?

It was time to prod this table and understand the info inside it. I fired up a simple query:

SELECT meta_key, rely”text” FROM ‘wp_s4w671g0kp_postmeta’ GROUP by meta_key order by rely”text” desc;

Lo behold, the end result was a bit shocking as till now I used to be considering that this desk may include submit revisions or metadata solely but the query outcome was something like this:

meta_key rely”text” _total_views

1895

_view_ip_list

1892

_jetpack_related_posts_cache

1206

_wp_attached_file

1144

_wp_attachment_metadata

1101

wp-smpro-smush-data

1069

_wp_attachment_image_alt

903

_edit_lock

155

_edit_last

140

_yoast_wpseo_focuskw

118

_yoast_wpseo_linkdex

118

_thumbnail_id

116

_yoast_wpseo_metadesc

114

_publicize_twitter_user

107

_wpas_done_all

103

_total_likes

77

_like_ip_list

77

_wpas_skip_3914702

75

_wpas_skip_11104850

72

_yoast_wpseo_title

56

_wp_attachment_backup_sizes

40

_yoast_wpseo_focuskw_text_input

38

_wp_old_slug

35

essb_hideplusone

29

essb_hidevk

29

Do you see it? There are some 1800+ data for _view_ip_list, _total_views,  _jetpack_related_posts_cache which is principally nothing however data originated from WordPress personal homegrown fashionable plugin – Jetpack. I googled a bit about security delete for these data, didn’t find anything,  took a leap of religion and executed:

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_view_ip_list’;

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_total_views’;

Delete from FROM ‘wp_xxx_postmeta’ WHERE meta_key = ‘_jetpack_related_posts_cache’;

It deleted some 4,000 data out of 11,000 data it had and look what happened once I refreshed phpMyAdmin?

All cleaned up!

Yus! My wp_xxx_postmeta table measurement dropped from 900-something MBs to 6.Three MBs by just deleting ~4,000 data. What sick joke is that? My complete DB measurement dropped to 25 MBs from ~1.2 GBs, in all probability because of the cascade effect of overseas key constraints of the data I deleted.

Outcome?

My web site was a breeze once once more. The load time went down considerably, in all probability as a result of of quicker DB queries and even the system monitoring parameters on the CPanel went down from Purple/Orange to Inexperienced. I did some load testing by executing a number of curl requests to my house page by way of terminal, and the server was not breaking any sweat.

Take a look at that RAM usage!  WHAT? Keep in mind once I talked about operating WordPress stack on my 2006 PC with some 128 MB of memory? Yeah!

So fast much wow!

Classes?

Troubleshooting Godaddy is a long-term thing. You’ll be able to either get into the shit and fix it yourself or you can begin throwing money on the display until you escalate to their core tech workforce which I assume might be by no means for shared internet hosting plans. They could have a terrific help for devoted servers though.

AWS is a f##king superb piece of tech. If you understand how to harden servers, by all means, simply drop these legacy internet hosting providers and go on your personal setup. It’s in all probability cheaper, quicker and extra VFM. A easy t2.micro instance will value < ₹700/month. (Perhaps extra, sigh world financial system!).

Typically, being a smartass isn’t good. Most of the occasions, nevertheless, it retains you protected.

All the time examine logs. -_-

The post Back from Dead