#wine and spirits website

[sktthemes1]

Why Is the Wine Brewery WordPress Theme the Ideal Choice for Your Winery or Vineyard Website?

In the competitive world of wine production, presentation is just as vital as product quality. Whether you’re a boutique winemaker, run a wine bar, or manage a scenic vineyard estate, your online presence must reflect the sophistication, craftsmanship, and heritage that your brand represents. This is where the Wine Brewery WordPress Theme proves to be an exceptional asset.

Purpose-built for wineries, wine shops, breweries, and tasting rooms, this theme delivers an elegant design, powerful customization features, and sales-ready functionality—all crucial for attracting customers and growing your brand online.

Let’s explore how this theme can elevate your wine business and help you pour success into your online journey.

Crafted with the Wine Industry in Mind

Unlike generic templates, this WordPress theme is specifically tailored for the wine and beverage niche. From its color scheme to its typography and layout blocks, every design element echoes elegance and craftsmanship. Wine is about the experience—taste, aroma, setting—and your website must evoke that ambiance from the moment a visitor lands on your homepage.

The Wine Brewery WordPress Theme supports full-width imagery, animated transitions, and parallax backgrounds that let you tell your winery’s story visually, enticing users to scroll, explore, and engage.

Showcasing Your Products Beautifully

Selling wine online isn’t just about listing bottles with prices. Customers want to know tasting notes, origin stories, pairings, and vintage details. This theme comes equipped with product sections that let you highlight:

Grape variety and vineyard origin

Year of production and aging method

Tasting notes (aroma, flavor, finish)

Food pairing suggestions

Bottle sizes, packaging, and awards

The theme’s clean layout and focus on imagery help your products shine, allowing customers to connect with the wine experience even before they take a sip.

Seamless eCommerce Functionality

With WooCommerce compatibility built in, the theme lets you turn your winery website into a thriving eCommerce platform. Visitors can explore collections, place orders, redeem discount codes, or join your wine subscription service directly through your site.

You can offer shipping by region, provide multiple payment methods, and highlight promotional items like tasting kits or limited-edition blends. Inventory management, tax settings, and order tracking are also streamlined—so you can focus on growing your winery, not just managing a website.

Promote Events and Wine Tastings

Wineries are not just about products—they’re destinations. If you host vineyard tours, tastings, or wine-and-dine events, the theme provides dedicated event sections where you can list dates, descriptions, pricing, and online booking options.

These sections are visually attractive and functionally smooth, making it easy for visitors to book private events, reserve tasting spots, or RSVP to seasonal festivals and wine launches.

Additionally, if you cater to wedding venues or corporate gatherings, you can create specialized landing pages within the theme that target those audiences.

Build a Visual Connection Through Galleries

Photos speak volumes when it comes to setting the tone of your brand. This theme includes portfolio-style galleries and image sliders that help you showcase:

Your vineyard’s landscape and winery interiors

Behind-the-scenes winemaking processes

Customer moments and tasting experiences

Awards and special features in magazines

Galleries are mobile-responsive and optimized for fast loading—key for keeping users engaged, especially when browsing on mobile devices.

Engage Your Audience with Educational Content

Today’s wine lovers are curious and informed—they want to understand your winemaking techniques, varietal selection, and sustainability efforts. The built-in blog functionality allows you to share:

Wine guides and pairing advice

Seasonal harvest stories

Behind-the-scenes vineyard updates

Articles about wine storage, serving, and aging

Regular blogging not only positions you as a trusted expert but also boosts your visibility on search engines. With thoughtful SEO strategies, your posts can attract organic traffic and encourage newsletter signups, purchases, and bookings.

Performance-Optimized and SEO-Friendly

Your website is only as good as its speed and search performance. This theme is built for performance—it loads fast, uses clean code, and supports schema markup. That means better user experiences and higher rankings in Google.

From breadcrumbs to mobile responsiveness to alt-text support for images, the theme includes all the essential elements to improve visibility, crawlability, and user retention.

Designed for Easy Customization

Your winery has a unique identity—and your website should reflect that. Powered by Elementor, this theme makes it easy to customize pages without writing a single line of code. Change fonts, tweak layouts, update colors, and add new content with intuitive drag-and-drop features.

Whether you’re highlighting a new vintage release or adjusting the homepage for the holiday season, updates can be done in minutes, not hours.

Social Integration and Newsletter Support

Modern winery marketing relies heavily on social proof and audience engagement. This theme supports seamless integration with your social media accounts, allowing you to showcase Instagram feeds, TikTok tasting sessions, or Facebook event invites right on your homepage.

It also supports email marketing tools like Mailchimp, helping you grow your subscriber base and keep wine lovers informed about new releases and exclusive offers.

Final Thoughts

If you're in the wine business, your website should feel like an extension of your vineyard—rich in character, beautifully designed, and built to foster trust and connection. The Wine Brewery WordPress Theme gives you all the tools to create a professional digital storefront that mirrors the elegance and charm of your winery.

Whether your goal is to sell wine online, promote tastings, or attract more foot traffic to your vineyard, this theme makes it easy, intuitive, and visually stunning. It’s more than just a website—it's a full-bodied digital experience.

[sparklyinnards]

insane how substances delete mental illness temporarily. but watch out

[twilightsumu]

release date | t. fushiguro

pairing: toji fushiguro x afab!reader

synopsis: one drunken (lonely) night leads you down a rabbit hole of a prison pal website — where you come across none other than toji fushiguro. after a flirty email exchange, you find out his release date and decide to pick him up. turns out, he wasn’t the only thing getting released.

warnings/genre: modern au, smut (mdni), very little plot, prison system, unprotected p in v penetration, fingering, dry (?) humping, gets a little rough, dirty talk, spitting, cursing, car sex, pet names, cream pie , reader and toji are essentially strangers, no aftercare.

a/n: last month i was obsessed with love after lockup and been sitting on this since. this was suppose to be a gojo fic but toji’s wicked spirit took over. and i know i have other fics to work on, the freak just wanted to come out. lmao, enjoy!

wc: 5.3K

your burning hot laptop is balancing on your lap as you lean into your couch. one of your hands is aimlessly on the mousepad looking up god knows what. the glass in your other hand is all empty. the wine rushing into you and making you think about the stupidest things that you know you would not give second thought to sober. 

but... you’re in your mid twenties, all of your friends have found their partners. your ex cancelled, again (as if you should really be seeing him). it’s a saturday night and the only thing your eyes are burrowing into is the bottom of the wine glass and this website that keeps making you giggle. 

writeaprisoner.com

you’re not sure how you even got here or if you’re fully aware of what you’re looking at. 

it’s just a joke you tell yourself. you’re just going to swipe and see what it’s all about. maybe find some true crime cases that you heard about from the podcast you listen to on your way to work. 

you straighten yourself up. bringing the laptop a little closer so that you could really see and make out all of the crimes these people committed. and maybe, you��ll get some eye candy to giggle over before shuffling off to bed and making you forget about your stupid ass ex, or the fact that you ran out of wine. 

you swipe up on your mousepad, passing by names, pictures of buff men in prison orange and blues. some of the taglines scaring you more than inviting you to send an email.

not a ‘killer’ but i’ll kill for the taste of you. 

(this person is serving three life sentences for killing three people.)

here for twenty more years and would like someone to keep me company. 

(how the fuck would you be able to keep him company…. in prison?) 

you sigh and start to regret your life choices. maybe even more than these prisoners are regretting their crimes. but, your fingers are swiping at the perfect pace, walking to your bed seems like too much work right now, and you just need to see at least ONE good looking prisoner. 

god, what will your mother think of you now? 

you ignore that and continue on your aimless quest.

and after what seemed like half the night. your eyes become blurry and the voice in your brain calling for you to close up shop, go to sleep, and maybe never drink a bottle of red wine alone again — your mouse clicks on to the next page and you’re sure this is where your night is going to end. 

with the page buffering, and the color orange burning in the back of your eyelids — the first account that loaded up dragged a breath out of you that was so strong you almost scared yourself. 

toji fushiguro

dob: 12/31/19xx

gender: male

sexual orientation: straight 

height: 6’2

“out soon. might need a ride. and a reason to behave.”

staring back at you (not in prison orange) is a man in a black compression shirt. as if he was granted the access to have a miniature photo shoot in the prison. 

toji fushiguro is built like a man who can ruin you — broad chest, thick arms, and a body carved from grit, not glamour. he doesn’t look like the instagram model boys you meet out at bars on friday nights. not sculpted by ab workouts at equinox. he’s dense, functional — the kind of strength you don’t just see, you feel when he’s on top of you. if you ever meet him, of course.

you would’ve thought you’ll be distracted by his body alone, but his face is another story. all sharp edges and shadows. a strong jaw that’s clenched, a scar on the right corner of his mouth, shaggy black hair littering in front of his narrowed eyes. 

eyes which even in this picture are unreadable. like their assessing anyone who looks at him. regardless if you’re in front of him physically or clenching your thighs as you look at his profile off a website in your one bedroom apartment. 

you shift closer to the laptop, placing your wine glass down so that you could use both hands to bring him, you mean the laptop closer to you. your cheeks burning along with the top of your thigh because of this laptop working as hard as it could to show him to you. 

you’re so convinced it’s the wine talking and making you act. or maybe also the fact that your best friends have told you you need to just find a good looking man and fuck him or have him fuck you, whichever floats the boat — but your fingers are flying over to the message portion of his profile. 

you skip the crime section. regret it a little. but how bad could it be, really? 

also he needs a ride and you’re all for helping fellow human beings — ones who look like they’ll fuck you so good you could possible give him the pin to your debit card directly afterwards. 

you stop. your cursor blinking over the message icon. toji fushiguro’s picture still assessing you, like he’s making a mental bet to see when you, or whoever else comes across his profile, breaks. 

you close your eyes, wondering how crazy this is. 

also, you start to make a checklist of things you need to do directly after this message: 

never bring this up to your mother. she will disown you faster than you could believe toji could make you cum. 

never bring this up to your friends either. as their view on instagram beach blonde boys will not see the vision of this man you’re hoping to get. 

make a wax appointment with your wax girl.

add this red wine to your grocery list every week. 

maybe book a boxing class at your ex’s gym just in case you do meet this toji. 

you open your eyes, meeting toji’s again. and you’re pretty sure that is the wine playing tricks on you — his lips look like they ticked up into a slight grin. inviting you to take the jump. 

and because you care about people getting home safely, you did not plunge down this website for nothing (actually exceeding what you wanted), your thighs haven’t unclenched themselves since he’s been blinking on your laptop — the cursor clicks the message icon. 

to: tojifushiguro@writeaprisoner.com

from: ynln@gmail.com

subject: i may have a ride for you 

message: 

i probably shouldn’t be the one helping you behave. but if you’re lucky, we’ll figure that out in person.

(attachment: picture of yourself)

you press send and immediately shutting your laptop. all you could do is laugh, at your boldness, the website, at how much you are expecting an email from him whenever you get back to your laptop. 

to: ynln@gmail.com

from: tojifushiguro@writeaprisoner.com

subject: what type of ride are we talking? 

message: 

it must be my lucky month then. im getting out soon, and you’re cute.. so we should find out just how well i behave. 

you got more pictures or do i have to earn them in person? 

to: tojifushiguro@writeaprisoner.com

from: ynln@gmail.com

subject: any ride that gets you where you need to be

message: 

how soon? and i think you could earn a lot more than pictures in person. 

(attachment: another picture of yourself) 

to: ynln@gmail.com

from: tojifushiguro@writeaprisoner.com

subject: how big is your car?

message:

next week — (address to prison). 

they let me out at 7 am. 

wear whatever you wore in that last picture. 

the clock on your dashboard reads 6:49 am. you should be exhausted and downing three cups of coffee right now — but you’re nervous and extremely horny. two emotions you never had the pleasure to feel at the same time and definitely not before the sun was completely up. 

you’re in the outfit you had on in the picture you sent toji last. a black mini skirt and plain cropped tee. easy access, you thought to yourself when you threw it on this morning. 

you’ve been watching the gate like it owes you something. getting here a whole hour earlier than you had to be to make sure you were exactly where toji was going to be released from. you’re the only car in the lot — which somehow makes it feel more dangerous. or more intimate. you are not sure which.

6:53 am. 

you reach for your cellphone to make sure, for the sixteenth time, that your location is off. the last thing you need are your friends or god forbid your mother to interrupt your little rendezvous with a criminal you met from a prison pen pal website. 

6:56 am. 

you’re gripping your steering wheel as you notice some commotion happening at the gate ahead of you. a couple of men in uniform and a man behind them. one man — even from here, you know it’s toji fushiguro. you have studied his photo enough times to recognize the tilt of his head.

you actually want to laugh at yourself, already out of the car before you even realize it. checking over yourself in the reflection of your car windows. 

“they let you out early,” you say loud enough for him to hear. 

and walking towards you is… him. 

toji looks taller than you imagined he would be from his photos. his arms hugged by the tight compression shirt he had on his profile picture. his lips curved in a grin, not welcoming whatsoever, but inviting if you’re into someone luring you somewhere where you shouldn’t be. 

his eyes look you over, like you’re prey. you ignore how much you want to squeeze your thighs together because you want some control over this. 

“you have a problem with me coming early?” 

you huff out a quiet laugh. toji’s slight smirk makes you feel a little dizzy. 

“i’m sure they had their reasons,” you smile, though your eyes stay on his feet — worn shoes, heavy steps, like he’s still getting used to the ground again.

he’s finally close enough that you smell that faint, clean scent of whatever soap they offer to them in prison. you didn’t expect his scent alone to make your stomach tighten, but it does and you’re trying your hardest to not pounce on him like a dog in heat. 

you tilt your head up to finally meet his eyes and you didn’t expect the stillness that comes with you both just looking at each other. 

his gaze drags over your face and then drops — slow and deliberate, over your chest — pausing on the goosebumps rising on your bare stomach at the hem of the crop top. that grin on his lips growing more as his eyes rake down your body and on the outfit he asked for you to wear. 

your gaze starts at his face. your eyes linger a beat too long on the scar just above the right side of his lip — lips you’re aching to know the feel of. his solid frame draped in sweats and that damn compression shirt. every ridge of his body calling out to you.

you don’t say anything. you don’t know what to say. your mouth is a little dry. you don’t trust your voice, not with how hard your pulse is thumping. 

“fuck,” he mutters, mostly to himself. “i think they let me out at the right time.” 

you ignore the moan stuck in your chest at the rough edge of his voice saying that curse.

“you earned it,” you shrug, proud of yourself for not letting it slip. not yet. 

“like i earned this ride?” toji grins, wider this time — sharp enough that it makes your skin prickle. “where should i sit? back or front, baby?”

you shiver under his stare and the pet name. you’re not sure how you’re going to wait to get to wherever it’s private to have him touch you. 

“mhm, where would you like to sit?” your tone playing casual. 

“back,” he says, stepping past you. his hand on the door handle of the car you’ve been standing in front of for what felt like thirty minutes. “unless you want me fucking you with the gearshift knocking into my spine.” 

you blink at his back as he opens the car door. you want to pretend you didn’t hear that sentence. like your knees didn’t buckle a little. like you’re not thinking about getting fucked in a prison parking lot.  

toji’s big figure shuffles into your back seat and you look over your shoulder. the parking lot is still empty and you hear the birds chirping in the still morning air. it feels almost surreal. 

“i thought you were offering me a ride sweetheart,” you hear from the open door. he’s patting the space next to him. 

you told yourself you’d wait — let him touch you when you got home. but your panties are damp, and the way he’s looking at you makes the seat feel too tight, too hot, too hard to ignore. 

you swallow the lump in your throat, and shuffle in behind him. your hand grazing his thigh as you settle in, closing the door behind you. 

“here?” you ask lowly. your knee is grazing his firm thigh. 

he takes a moment to stare at you, smugly. like he knows just how wet you are and he is just excited to know he got you there. and with how much space he’s taking up — your bodies are slowly entangling with each other. 

his hand reaching for your bare thigh. your hand grabbing his forearm to ground yourself. 

“did you really think i was going to wait?” 

you open your mouth to respond — something sarcastic, a joke to land to make this moment feel less desperate than you feel. but, all that comes out is a shaken breath when his big hand starts to slide up your thigh.

slow. hot. demanding. 

his fingertips stop just beneath your skirt, dragging up the soft, goosebump littered skin of your thigh like he’s got all the time in the world. as if you two aren’t in the parking lot of the prison he just got released from. 

“c’mere,” he roughly mutters. he shifts his legs wider, one of his thighs now pressing so hard into yours, you’re sure it’ll leave an indent. with one of his hands still on your thigh, his fingers so terribly close to where you really want him — he guides you to move. having you straddle him, your knees press into the seat on either side of him. 

“fuck,” he mutters again, eyes dropping between your bodies.

your skirt is bunched up high on your hips now, barely covering anything. and your soaked panties — god — they’re pressed against the thick stretch of his sweatpants, leaving a dark, obvious mark.

his hands slide down to cup your ass, fingers digging in with a firm squeeze. 

you roll your hips, desperate for more friction — the drag of his sweats reches your clit, and your breath stutters, sharp and humiliatingly loud in the quiet car.  “you’ve been this wet since you saw me?” his voice is low, like he’s fighting to stay calm — like your body is testing his patience.

you nod, because your throat’s too tight to speak.

he chuckles, slow and dangerous, tilting his head back to look up at you. his eyes flick down, lingering on the wet spot staining his pants, and then back up to your face — smug and greedy all at once.

he leans in, lips grazing your jaw, your cheek, your ear.

“then be a good girl,” he murmurs, “and let me taste it.”

before you could react — his fingers are already slipping beneath your panties. two thick fingers dragging through the wetness between yours folds like he owns it. 

you let go of the gasp that’s been lodged in your chest since he first touched you. your hips stutter forward, and his other hand grips your waist to hold you steady on the growing tent between your legs. 

“shit,” he breathes out. his eyes locked on your face. his narrowed eyes watching the way your face scrunches at the slow pump of his fingers. he curls a finger in your heat and you forget about the soreness in your outstretched thighs. 

“i knew you’d be tight,” he whispers. his nose touching yours as he breathes in the whimpers you’re letting out. 

he keeps you spread open over him with nothing but the strength in his hand that’s firmly holding your hip. the pads of his fingers pressing in tightly, your thighs trembling where they cage him in. 

your hands, not knowing what to do in the moment, run along the curves and edges of his solid abs beneath you. you feel him heave in a breath as you let one out.

his fingers start a slow rhythm, dragging through your folds again before pressing up into you. your breath catches, a low moan slipping from your lips.

he hums low and deep in his chest. pleased with himself, or at how soaked his fingers are. as if he expected nothing less from the girl he sent a few emails too before this. 

your nails dig into his shoulders — not just for balance, but to ground yourself, too. because the stretch of his fingers, the pressure in the pit of your stomach, the sounds that aren’t only spilling from your mouth but so from the wetness of your pussy — it’s growing unbearable. 

and before you could let go, toji’s fingers slipped out of you with a pop. you let an airy whine out before you could stop yourself. 

he chuckles. his thick fingers glistening with your juices between your faces. and without breaking eye contact, he lifts them to his mouth — sucking them clean off like the starving man he is. 

you watch him watch you. the pool in between your legs getting wetter by the second. 

your eyes drift from his to his fingers slick with your juices, then to the scar on his lip. every single thing making you want him even more.

there’s a beat of silence. the only thing being heard is your heavy breathing as you slowly start to slide your hips forward for some friction. 

“just wait,” he says as his finger falls from his mouth. he’s eyeing you like he has every intention to ruin you. 

the hand steadying you on your hip reaches for your hair as he tugs your head slightly back. his other hand reaching for your jaw.

“open your mouth,” he says lowly, thumb dragging over your bottom lip. “wide.”

his fingers on your jaw are firm and demanding. 

you do — almost too quickly. 

he spits right on your waiting tongue. keeping eye contact as the juices he just lapped up from you runs down your tongue. 

and before you could completely close your mouth to swallow, the hand in your hair pushes you towards him. his mouth is roughly on yours. 

you moan into the kiss, rocking your hips instinctively. the drag of your soaked panties over the thick bulge in his sweats makes your thighs twitch.

“how am i meant to behave when all you want me to do is fuck you?” he mutters against your mouth. 

your hands that were on his shoulders are now wrapped around his neck and you lean forward. chest to chest. 

“i think you’re behaving just fine,” you whisper back as you start to plant small kisses along his jawline. 

he groans, just slightly. his firm hands on your hips gripping a little tighter. pulling you a little closer… as if that’s possible. 

you trail your kisses a little lower, brushing down the column of his neck — stopping right at the pulse point that’s thumping just as hard as yours. you lap your tongue over the spot, sucking there lazily. 

you hide the smug smile threatening to stretch across your lips when you catch the thick swallow he barely manages to choke down. his hands twitching at your sides, hard enough that it sends you forward a bit. allowing you to fully feel his sweat-covered cock along your aching cunt. 

“should i start the ride now?” you murmur as you start to shift your hips to be right on top of his cock. in perfect position for him to slip in if you both were unclothed. your pussy stretching over him the thick shape of him, dampening his sweats under you even more. 

as you back up, using your hands to push off his chest — the top of your head brushing against the ceiling of the car. 

you watch as his jaw clenches. his eyes shifting from your face to the heat coming between your legs. you almost think he may want this more than you do. 

you roll your hips.

the friction sends a jolt right through your core. you weren’t even trying to make a sound but a soft gasp slips out anyway. your fingers find his shoulders again, nails curling into the solid bulk of him as you do it again. slower this time.

his breath hitches. his hands squeeze, forcing you down harder.

“again,” he says. voice tight. like it’s costing him.

so, you roll your hips down on him again. and again. 

each grind is obscene — the slick sounds of your wet pussy, your panties so wet that they’re sticking to your clit, barely moving when you drag another pass along his hard cock. but with the added pressure of your panties clinging to you, your clit catches every ridge his dick had to offer beneath his sweats. 

he’s so hard you wonder if it hurts. 

your thighs are starting to tremble from soreness. you want to say it’s too much, but in reality it’s not enough. not even close with how badly you actually want him in you. 

the windows around you are so foggy, that when you move one of your hands off his chest to the window next to you to get some balance, your hand is met with pure condensation. 

you start to find a pace that’s so achingly slow, the tick in toji’s jaw telling you so. 

soft rolls. soft grinds. you can’t help the tiny gasps that are escaping your swollen lips. 

toji’s hands start to roam, leaving from your hips. one trailing up the side of your ribs, lifting your shirt up in the process, you’re so grateful you didn’t wear a bra today. his demanding hand palming your tit, using his index finger and thumb to flick your nipple a little too roughly.

“fuck toji,” you gasp and he grins at you. pinching your nipple just a little harder causing you to arch your back. 

he lifts his hips slightly to meet yours — a subtle thrust that makes your breath catch. 

he leans his face closer to yours, his pupils blown out and you could just imagine how you look. 

“the first time hearing my name from your lips,” he gruffly mutters. the hand at the base of your back quickly making its way to the back of your neck pushing your face closer to his. 

“and look at you,” your noses are brushing against each other. “what a short ride this is going to be,” he mumbles. his eyes blinking down to your moving hips. 

you whimper. your hips twitch like they’re moving on instinct now, guided by the burn in your gut and the wet sounds between your legs.

“i need you to fuc-“

you don't even get the words out before toji’s hands are under your thighs, flipping you fast and rough. your back pressed into the car seat, the seat buckle burrowing into your hip. 

one knee pressed into your chest, your other leg extended over toji’s broad shoulders. your panties stretched miserably over your leaking cunt. 

the way he manhandled you like nothing, excites you more than it scares you. 

“what did you think i was going to do?” he whispers as he leans forward. his chest pressing into the back of your thigh, the burn matching the heat twisting low in your stomach. 

you let out a quick breath as he quickly leans back. one if his hands delicately skimming over your wet panties one second. the next, forcefully ripping it from your hips. 

your gasp is as loud as the rip of your (favorite) underwear. 

now, without anything in between your cunt and the humid air in the car — toji gives it a long look. his tongue licking over his lower lip. 

“look at her,” he muffles. the hand on your hip tightening. “dripping all over yourself and we haven’t even fucked.” 

all you could do is watch him. your chest heaving out quiet breaths. your hands clinging onto the seats on either side of you. the coldness of the buckle bringing you back down whenever you got too caught up in his stare. 

he leans closer before spitting down between your bodies. the wad of spit hitting your clit as it drops down between you.

you buck your hips, causing toji to get the hint and shimmy his sweats as low as they could go. his hard dick springing up as soon as it’s free from its confinement. 

and god, what a dick this man was blessed with. you sat and stared at his pictures more often than you’d like to admit. and even then, your mind could never quite conjure how his cock would look.

and here it is, pressing at the entrance of your leaking cunt. it’s big — curved just slightly near the tip, a vein standing out along its side. all you want is to feel it deep inside you.

with your leg still high on his shoulder, toes curled, and the other one pushed into your chest by his weight. you’re completely folded — and you almost want to laugh because no way does this stranger have you folded up like this in your own car. 

your breath is caught right in your chest when you feel the head of his cock drag through your soaked folds. so deliberately, slow on purpose. like he’s trying to savor this. or punish you. you're not sure what his motive is at the moment. 

you look up at him and his eyes are intently watching his own cock play in your folds. his upper lip snarled into his mouth. 

“so fuckin’ wet,” he shivers as he drags along the wetness again. you huff a breath out of your nose, your nails clawing into your back seat.

his dick throbs right at the head of your entrance. you suck in a breath, preparing yourself. he pushes in, just barely. 

and then one look at your face, he pushes in fully. a rough thrust follows, one hand steadying your thigh, the other reaching for the head of the seat behind you as leverage.

your mouth falls open, no sound following. your eyes squeezed shut. the stretch, the burn of having him fully inside is overwhelming. it’s so him. 

“you were grinding like a little bitch in heat,” he groans, hips snapping hard into yours. the sound of skin slapping against skin sharp in the foggy silence of the car.

“and now look at you.” you keep your eyes shut. your hands scrambling for anything to hold on too. the seat belt, toji’s thick arms, your own legs. 

he fucks you fast, deep, almost cruel. your leg on his shoulder slipping off and quickly being placed where toji believes it belongs. not letting you miss anything. making you take it. 

the sound of his heavy balls smacking your ass competing with his groans and your high pitched gasps. 

“toji-“ you moan. that growing burn in your stomach reaching out and taking over your body. you were so close. “i’m going to cum,” 

with this position, your clit is catching every movement he makes. every grind, every moment his hips meet yours. the angle allowing him to stuff you so deeply he almost feels like he’s a part of your body naturally. 

one of his hands finds its way to your jaw. grabbing you a little too roughly, with enough pressure to keep your face turned up towards his. 

you open your eyes to meet his that are filled with so much hunger, you shiver. 

“open.” 

knowing — you don’t hesitate, tongue already out. he spits down into your mouth again. and he watches you as his hips still drill into yours. you seductively swallow it down before he’s pressing into you. his mouth hungrily overtaking yours. a nip at your bottom lip as you buck your hips to meet his bruising pace. 

“i want you to cum just like this,” he demands. his lips still brushing yours as he speeds up his thrusts. 

you arch your back as much as you can, letting out a string of moans. 

“folded and drooling just for me? what more could a free man ask for?” 

your thighs start to shake with the pressure of his body still pressing into the back of your leg. 

the sounds of your slick wetness and your hips hitting each other over and over again are so loud, you think those officers who let him out must be hearing this. 

you feel that spasm coiling deep in your belly. all you could do is reach for his arms to ground you. and pray to god that the tears pooling at your lash line stay in. 

you feel him lean back, letting you see what’s happening. your body curled, pussy split open on his cock, slick dripping from where you’re stuffed so full.

his thumb presses to your clit. tight little circles that make you cry out — loud and sharp.

“yeah, let’s hear you baby,” he mutters, pressing on your clit cruelly. “lets hear you cream on my fuckin’ cock.” 

and that’s all it takes for you to finally be pushed over the edge. 

your hips bucking, thighs trembling, every curse you could mutter falling from your lips in loud moans. 

your orgasm ripping through you so forcefully, your vision gets all hazy and you’re thrown back to the night you went on this prison pen pal website and oranges burned behind your eyelids. 

“don’t stop,” you groan out. toji’s hips still slapping into yours. his thrusts getting sloppier. a little rougher. 

and he doesn’t stop. keeps fucking the mess you’ve made on his cock back into you. chasing his own high. 

your nails scratch down his arms as he leans forward again. his face lodging itself in the crook of your neck. his hair tickling you chin. his sweat mingling with yours. 

his hold on your thigh is so tight, you’re sure you’re going to have toji imprinted on your body for weeks to come. 

“fuck,” he stutters. his hips fucking into you erratically now. 

his grip on your outstretched leg is bruising and that’s how you know he’s about to cum.

jaw locked, his tongue marking your neck and you feel him pulse in you. a low groan weaving out of his mouth as you feel the warmth of his cum pumping into you. 

he stays buried inside you for a moment, your heavy breaths mingling with his. everything is still besides his heaving chest and the slick slipping down your thighs and on to his. 

he lifts his head up, his eyes meeting yours. his hand sliding up to your jaw, cupping the side of your face. thumb dragging on your bottom lip, inviting himself to more of you.

you blink up at him. dazed and extremely satisfied.

“… why were you in prison?” you whisper. your tongue lapping over your bottom lip and catching his thumb accidentally. 

he watches the movement, his eyes tracing your tongue. that grin on his face. 

he lets out a low laugh and you feel it in your stomach and you try to ignore the need to clench your thighs with him still in you. 

“we could talk about it after i eat,” he murmurs.  

you pull back slightly to get a better look of his face. your eyebrows are rising in question. 

“what will you like to eat mister free man?” you joke. 

his grin spreads. slow, sinful, and convincing. 

“your pussy.” 

and because all you want is to bury his head in between your legs as if you’re serving him his death row meal — you don’t miss a beat, surprising yourself in the process. 

“let’s get out of here.” 

he growls, his free hand dropping from your outstretched leg and gripping your thigh. the sound running straight to your dripping pussy. the one he’s slowly pulling out of you. 

“your car is too small,” he mutters. “need to get you somewhere i can really take my time.”

dividers: @bernardsbendystraws

[museenkuss]

Marie Museenkuss Advent Calendar

For this advent season, I've prepared a selection of little treats - recipes, things to read or things to watch that I enjoy (or wrote) and am excited to share with you over the next few days. Each day, I'll 'open' another door to reveal the treat. I hope we can celebrate and have fun together!

[💎] To start, a cosy Christmas crime classic: Hercule Poirot's Christmas

[🦊] One of my all-time favourite fairy tales, Allerleirauh, can be read on this website! If you'd like to turn pages and see an illustration or two, you can also read it in the Green Fairy Book via archive.org, but beware - that version is censored!

[🪞] An all-time classic of a different kind, maybe just in time now that the New Year is slowly seeping in: Joan Didion's Essay "On Self Respect"

[💌] Feelings inspired to write? I’ve got some shimmering, cool, delicate december prompts ready for you!

[🗝️] In the spirit of the censored Allerleirauh: Read my thoughts on death, mutilation and the gruesome in fairy tales

[👢] On the morning of the sixth, German children will find little treats in their boots that Nikolaus left for them the night before. Let's use some of them (apples, marzipan(optional), nuts) to make a traditional German christmas treat - the Bratapfel. Rezept. Authentic English recipe.

[🏮] Let's take a virtual trip to the Tate and look at Sargent's Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose in two short videos that focus on description and technique!

[✨] The nostalgic excitement of entering a theatre and watching the other guests before the show - Chanel's A/W 2024/25 Haute Couture Show blends Opera and High Fashion.

[☕️] Today (very appropriate for the temperature drop), we're learning how to make French hot chocolate: [written recipe] [video]

[🦢] Do you have an hour to spare? Enjoy this charming little volume on perfume from 1928, a love letter to fragrance filled with anecdotes from all over the world and illustrated by the wonderful George Barbier: The romance of perfume by Richard Le Gallienne

[🌹] A Renaissance princess and her baroque prince... Here's a magical performance of Sleeping Beauty by the Bolshoi Ballet

[12] 🎪

[🍰 ] With eleven days left, there's still more than enough time to make the Fortnum&Mason Christmas Cake in time for Christmas! [the official F&M christmas cookbook has a very similar recipe for a fruit cake, but without the soaking and with a layer of fondant on top. let me know if you'd be interested in that, I'll post a pic]

[💋] today, let’s read one of my favourite sensual poems for winter: Francis Jammes — Tu Seras Nu (You will be nude), translated by Kenneth Rexroth

[🖋] This sunday, let's write! Or, alternatively: Let's daydream! Here are some brand new prompts for inspiration.

[🎞️] In the spirit of daydreaming: You and I by Papooz, Weak for your Love by Thee Sacred Souls, Mystery by Raveena are three extremely different but visually stunning music videos to songs I absolutely adore. To start this week, take a little moment to watch and listen, dream and dance.

[🍷] Easy poached pears in red wine with vanilla - a gorgeous, ruby-coloured dessert. I've made (regular) poached pears before and they are just as easy as this title suggests. But I'm SO eager to try (and share <3) this variant!

[18] 🎠

[🐻] After a long, tiring day of Christmas shopping (or Christmas stress), let's relax with a whimsical film! Panna a netvor (Beauty And The Beast) from 1978 <3

[💫] Imagine a zine, except more whimsical and more complicated - today, we're learning how to make a Victorian Puzzle Purse! They're so pretty, perfect add-ons for a christmas gift - or adorable presents in their own right.

[🩰] I feel like Christmas is the time where we can truly reconnect to the magic of childhood. So today, let's put on our (imaginary) ballet slippers and do a little 5-min Nutcracker ballet choreo in our living room! Whether we're dancers or not honestly doesn't matter - nobody is watching us, this is all about enjoying the fantasy of a snow-sparkling night. We're playing pretend! And if you'd rather improvise to something more dramatic, I used to whirl around to Borodin's Polovtsian Dances.

[🕰️] During this cold, dark evening, I present to you one of my favourite poems, caught between romanticism and irony: Heine's Old Chimney Piece (in translation).

[🎟️] About a year ago, Joel Haver made a video looking back on 4 years of uploading weekly short films. It's one of my favourite videos, visually, in its tone and regarding its message, and I feel now that the year is coming to a close, it might be a really inspiring watch: it's been fun.

[🎄] I wish I could invite you all over to show you the illustrated edition of E.T.A. Hoffmann's Nutcracker that my parents gifted me in 2001. Instead, I offer you a very nice translation: Nutcracker and the King of Mice - and, if you're the audiobook type, I found a good translation with Tchaikovsky's music here. The story is haunting, delicate, glittering, unheimlich. It starts on Christmas Day and infuses the following days and nights with magic. It was such a joy to share this Advent Calendar with you and I hope that with this, I can share some of my Christmas festivities with you, too, since they're so entwined with this story (and since the first chapters also somewhat accurately depict how I celebrate Christmas, too - on the evening of the 24th, after decorating the tree). Lots and lots of Love, darlings! I hope you have a magical day, a magical evening, and a very Merry Christmas!

[anniebeckcalla]

───aphrodisiac.

non-idol au. wc:1.0k. cw: fluff, deceit, lying

calla's note: Sorry that I have not been consistent! I've been having a bit of a brain fart (this story took me THREE DAYS to complete. Imagine that. THREE DAYS!) Anyway, I hope that you enjoy it. Don't be shy, use the replies to tell me what you thought.

23.02.25- I just noticed an error at the end of the story, I've now fixed it!

Your hands trembled as you opened the glossy vial of scarlet liquid that had been concealed within your sleeve, your back turned to Haechan so that he couldn't see what you were doing. Carefully, you tilted the vial and let a few drops fall into the wine below, the dark liquid absorbing the clouds as they hit the surface. It was wrong. You knew it was wrong. Everyone knew that you couldn't influence someone to fall in love with you; their love had to be true, from deep within the gloomiest chambers of their heart. However, you had waited for far too long.

Nobody could compare to Haechan- he was ravishing, smart, and funny. Most people with those qualities are mean-spirited, taking away all their flairs, but Haechan was the kindest soul that you'd ever known. He took his time to listen to you; gazed deeply into your eyes as you talked about your worries, wiped your tears away gently with his thumb. NOBODY could have him apart from you. So desperate were you, you were willing to die before you let another woman or man have him for themselves.

When you had stumbled across the ‘Flame of Love’ aphrodisiac on a shady website, promising to have your chosen one begging at your feet within minutes, you'd sent for it immediately, heart beating faster than it ever had in your boring little life. While it was on its way, you'd spent sleepless nights questioning your morals. Did you really want Haechan to be overcome with undying love for you because of a spiked drink? Weren't you betraying his trust and good heart by using magic to intoxicate him? What about afterwards? Would he suddenly hate you within every inch of his being, leaving you an empty shell of the wreck that you already were? Or would he perish and wither away from the strength of the potion, making you his destroyer?

It was too late to turn back now. The potion was here, and Haechan had arrived for supper.

You took a deep breath and carried the wine glasses to the table where Haechan sat with the rest of the food. Placing the drinks on the table, you sat down opposite him, picking up your fork. “I hope you like this beef wellington,” you smiled. “It took me a while to prepare it.” Haechan nodded in reply. “I just know it's going to taste amazing, y/n. You always make the best food.” Just then, he took a large sip of the wine, and you looked down at your pasta, unable to watch him ingesting your poison.

You both finished the meal in unusual silence. It was a horrible silence, thick and stodgy, seeping its’ way into every nook and cranny of the kitchen. It settled itself around your ears, nose and mouth, made stickier by your guilty conscience that only grew as Haechan took more sips of the glass of wine. You didn't want to arouse suspicion, so you drank wine in unison with him, trying to ignore how bitter and disgusting it tasted. As the food disappeared, your ears rang and your head spun, the texture of the food clinging to your teeth and the roof of your mouth. At last, you couldn't bear it anymore. “I'm going to get the dessert out of the fridge,” you gabbled, trying to stand up.

Haechan's eyes were sparkling, dimples in his cheeks as he smiled at you. He picked up the glass, swirling the last dregs of liquid. “I know what you've done, y/n,” he said. Your ears burned as your heart thudded against your ribs, chest heaving visibly. “I don't know what you mean by that,” you whispered. Haechan laughed, the sound reverberating around the kitchen. “This must be your first time,” he said. “For the future, remember to give the aphrodisiac to your victim, and not to yourself.” He walked around the table and picked up your empty glass, holding it up to your face. You were mortified to notice the sticky potion lining the bottom of the glass. “You see this, baby? Poison. Every last bit of it. You've only gone ahead and intoxicated yourself.” Tears ran down your cheeks as you stared into your lap. “I'm sorry,” you mumbled. “I just wanted you to be in love with me.”

Haechan knelt down until he was at eye level with you. “Why didn't you ask me how i felt about you?” he asked. You dared to look at him. It would have been bad enough if he was angry, but your heart sank when you saw how disappointed he was. “I don't know,” you replied. “I wish you had,” Haechan continued, “because we could have saved a lot of time waiting around for the other person to admit their feelings. I'm in love with you, y/n. I always have been, from the day we met.” You couldn't look at him anymore. You stared back down at your lap. “It's okay. You don't have to say those things.” “Fine.” Haechan took your face in his hands, lifting your head up gently to meet his eyes. “If I can't say it, I'll describe it instead.”

Before you could reply, he pressed his lips to yours in a dulcetous kiss. You didn't know if it was the effects of the aphrodisiac, but it as if you had finally found your home in Haechan's embrace; like everything had been worth it in the lead up to this moment. Euphoria flowed through your veins as you leaned into the kiss, a gasp escaping your throat as Haechan bit your lower lip gently. [calla's note: sorry, I'm not good with writing freaky things]. At last, you pulled away, chests heaving, eyes blazing with a newfound hunger. “I think we should continue this somewhere else,” Haechan breathed. “So do I,” You wrapped your arms around Haechan's neck and allowed him to carry you out of the kitchen with surprising strength.

Maybe, being evil did help you to get your way.

[allwaswell16]

All the One Direction fics I read and enjoyed in Sept 2024. You can listen to my podcast to hear me talk about each of these fics as well as an overview of what was posted on ao3 including the fics on this month’s fic roundup [ @1dmonthlyficroundup ] which you can find here! Please let the writers know if you liked the fics by leaving kudos and comments! Happy reading!

Fanfictional Podcast #66 |  ko-fi | fic recs

- Louis / Harry -

🩵 Better is the End by LadyLondonderry / @londonfoginacup

(M, 26k, Greek mythology) Louis stands at the entrance to the labyrinth, and knows that this is the end. No one escapes from the labyrinth. No one can defeat the monster inside and make it back out alive.

🩵 Sugar, Sugar by @parmahamlarrie

(E, 25k, sugar daddy Louis) Meeting your soulmate was the most joyous event of one’s life… or at least, it’s supposed to be. Harry, in all of his 25 year old wisdom, was suspicious of the role fate plays in everyone's lives. He'd rather focus his time dating older men he meets off of a sugar baby website.

🩵 Break (Up)? Coming Right Up! by The_Halcyonic_Lachesist / @chai-hat-tea

(M, 14k, breakup) Louis promised Harry that they would always be together, but when Harry's dreams get in the way, will Louis be able to keep his word?

🩵 Like A Miracle by crimsontheory / @ireallysawanangel

(M, 12k, established relationship) Louis thinks he finally knows what it feels like to be truly nervous now that he has one very important question to ask his boyfriend. Part 4 of Marcel series

🩵 touch me baby, put your lips on mine by @insightfulinsomniac

(E, 12k, pwp) the soft and sweet sex party fic with a dash of dom/sub dynamics and a LOT of public sex.

🩵 Smells Like TEAM Spirit by @persephoneflouwers

(NR, 10k, high school) Punk Louis and quarterback Harry have been secretly dating for years. Feeling overwhelmed by his commitments, Harry suggests a short break, fearing he can't give Louis enough time. As Louis reflects on his vulnerabilities, Harry struggles on the field without him.

🩵 This Ain't Red Wine by LetTheMusicMoveYou / @letthemusicmoveyou28

(E, 9k, supernatural) the one where Human Louis accidentally finds himself at a Vampire only party which actually turns out to maybe not be the worst thing

🩵 Haunting Beauty by 4ureyesonly28 / @evilovesyou

(G, 6k, ghost Louis) It’s 1988. Harry has just finished his first year of teaching English and looks forward to a relaxed break. Louis is a poltergeist and has different plans for Harry’s summer.

🩵 Good-Old Fashioned Lover Boy by not_fitzwilliam / @not-fitzwilliam-darcy

(NR, 5k, omegaverse) When a miscalculated decision leads to an accidental courtship with the sweetest, most gentle alpha, Harry is torn between breaking the alpha's heart and telling the truth. 

🩵 we could be enough by @hellolovers13

(M, 5k, omegaverse) Louis never imagined anyone could love him for who he truly is. Then he meets Harry.

🩵 Only Angel by starryhaze / @starryhaze28

(E, 5k, pwp) the one where Louis is in Japan and stumbles upon a boy wearing angel wings

🩵 this cage was once just fine by amomentoflove / @daggerandrose

(T, 3k, uni) the one where Harry pines for Louis

🩵 A Tight Space by @haztobegood

(T, 2k, shapeshifter curse) Louis startles with a hand to his chest. “What the fuck was that?” “Oh, that’s the cat. I told you Liam found a stray a few days ago. That’s him.” “Are you sure that’s a cat?”

🩵 The Wilds - Timestamps by @jaerie

(E, 2k, omegaverse) The fact of the matter was that they were still bonded. And since they were just like any other bonded pair, Louis really wanted his knot. Part 3 of The Wilds

🩵 we could be the greatest team by 5sexualhomos / @hogwartzlou

(G, 1k, friends to lovers) Imagine your OTP accidentally and unofficially moving in together. Bonus points if they aren't dating at the beginning.

🩵 Singing Like a Bird 'Bout It Now by QuickedWeen / @becomeawendybird

(G, 1k, meet cute) Dr. Louis Tomlinson is worn to the bone, but only has a few patients left before the end of the day. One of those appointments takes quite a few twists and turns.

🩵 The Ball Guy by @homosociallyyours

(T, 1k, humor) Harry is an unpaid intern on his first film set, and he's pretty excited to see that his number one celebrity crush, Louis Tomlinson, will be a part of the movie. He's on the call sheet for the day, followed by a very odd addition: a ball guy?

🩵 Wordplay 2024 (series) by @kingsofeverything

Nest (G, 100 words) Harry wakes up first. Tight (NR, 100 words) Louis comes home early. Carry (NR, 100 words) Baby bump. Press (E, 100 words) Louis asks for it. Interference (G, 100 words) Bottom of the ninth.

- Rare Pairs -

🩵 circling the truth by we_are_the_same / @so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed

(T, 3k, Liam/Louis) Liam Payne has met his soulmate. He knows he has, because he woke up with his power this morning.

🩵 'Cause What I Want Came True by @lululawrence

(NR, 1k, Louis/Diego Luna) He’d known Diego was attractive, the few photos he had shared on the dating app had made that clear, but there was something about seeing him in person that made him feel… more.

[kemeticdevotee]

Het-Heru, Goddess of love, beauty, music, and art!

Het Heru, better known by her Greek name Hathor, is a Goddess whose worship extended from the predynastic era of Egyptian history to the end of the Greaco Roman Period. Being such an ancient Goddess, she is associated with many things. She is the Goddess of love, sex, passion, wine and beer, fertility, joy, music, art, dance, healing, childbirth, foreign lands and mining.

She is the daughter of Ra, and there is a myth where, as a lioness, she slaughters humanity under her father's will. These humans were rebels against Ra, and Hathor, bast or Sekhmet, punished them.

She is the patron Goddess of women, children, artists, miners, mothers, and foreigners.

The seven Het-Herus

The seven Het-Herus are usually thought to be either daughters or aspects of the Goddess. They could tell the future, and decide fate. Usually involked in divination (especially for telling the fate of a newborn infant), they were divine musicians and scared away evil spirits, and they also helped with matters of love. The seven Het-Herus go by these names:

Lady of the Universe, or Lady of Juvenation

Sky storm, or Mistress of the West

You from the Land of Silence, or Mistress of the West

You from Khemmis, or Mistress of the east

Red-Haired one, or Mistress of the East

Bright Red, or Lady of the Sacred Land

Your name Flourishes, or Lady of the Sacred Land

Her festivals + Celebrations

The month of Hathor in the Kemetic calendar (ronpet.app is a good kemetic calendar website for keeping track. If you do not use the Kemetic calendar in your practice, November makes a good substitute for this month.)

The Hathor festival, celebrating the birth of the Goddess by getting dressed up and playing music

The Beautiful Reunion, celebrates the union of Horus of Edfu and Hathor of Dendera.

Symbols

Cows, Lionesses, frogs, falcons

milk

The Eye of Ra

The number 7

Sycamores and date palms

The colors red, turquoise, gold and pink

Papyrus plants, and wildflowers

Musical instruments, especially the sistrum

Jewelry, especially the sacred Menit necklace.

Cosmetics

Mirrors

The sky and the Sun

Gold, malachite and turquoise

Offering Items

Malachite, gold, turquoise, citrine, rose quartz

Images of the sky, sun and milky way

images of cows

musical instruments

any art dedicated to her

Cosmetics

Art/writing supplies

Mirrors

Red, pink or gold fabrics

Bread, apples, grapes, dairy, chocolate (modern), pastries

Milk, water, beer, wine, liquor, flavored water (especially grape or lemon flavored)

Jewelry

Epithets

Gracious Lady

She of Beautiful Appearance

She who saves souls

Lady of drunkenness

Eye of Ra

Lovely Het-Heru

Golden One

Lady of Dance

She who hears prayers

Devotional Acts

Sing

Play instruments

Sunbathe or stargaze

Make art/poetry

Listen to music in Her honor

Help wildlife

Help people in need

Practice gratitude

Read poetry

Consume art

Do anything cosmetic related

Dress up nicely

[antiochianorthodoxcumberlandmd]

Daily Scripture Readings and Lives of the Saints for Friday, May 09, 2025

Fast Day (Wine and Oil Allowed)

Feasts and Saints celebrated today:

3rd Friday after Pascha

The Holy Prophet Esaias (Isaiah)

Christopher the Martyr of Lycea

Elder Hieronymos of Simonopetra

Monk-martyr Nicholas who lived in Vuneni, of Larissa in Thessaly

Epimachos the New Martyr of Alexandria

The New Martyrs of Novo Selo, Bulgaria

Readings for today:

Acts of the Apostles 8:40; 9:1-19

John 6:48-54

3rd Friday after Pascha

Apolytikion of 3rd Fri. after Pascha in the Second Tone

When You descended to death, O Immortal Life, then, the light of Your divinity destroyed Hades. When You raised the dead from the depths of darkness, all the heavenly powers cried out, "Glory to You our Christ, the Giver of Life."

The content on this page is under copyright and is used by permission. All rights reserved. These works may not be further reproduced, in print or on other websites or in any other form, without the prior written authorization of the copyright holder:

Apolytikion of 3rd Fri. after Pascha (c) Narthex Press

The Holy Prophet Esaias (Isaiah)

Reading from the Synaxarion:

The Prophet Esaias, the son of Amos, was descended from a royal tribe. He prophesied in the days of Ozias (who is also called Azarias), Joatham, Ahaz, and Hezekias, Kings of Judah. About 681 B.C, in the reign of Manasses, the son and successor of the most pious Hezekias, when this Prophet was censuring Manasses' impiety and lawlessness, he was sawn asunder with a wooden saw, and thus received a martyr's end.

Of all the Prophets, he is called the most eloquent because of the beauty and loftiness of his words. His book of prophecy, divided into sixty-six chapters, is ranked first among the greater Prophets. The Fifth Ode of the Psalter, "Out of the night my spirit waketh at dawn unto Thee, O God . . ." is taken from his book. It was this holy Prophet who foretold that a Virgin would conceive in the womb (7:14); that not an ambassador, nor an angel, but the Lord Himself would save fallen man (63:9); that the Messiah would suffer, bearing our sins (ch. 53). His name means "Yah is helper."

Apolytikion of Prophet Isaiah in the Second Tone

As we celebrate the memory of Thy Prophet Isaiah, O Lord, through him we beseech Thee to save our souls.

Kontakion of Prophet Isaiah in the Second Tone

Having received the gift of prophecy, O Prophet-martyr Esaias, herald of God, thou didst make clear to all under the sun the Incarnation of God by crying with a great voice: Behold the Virgin shall conceive in her womb.

The content on this page is under copyright and is used by permission. All rights reserved. These works may not be further reproduced, in print or on other websites or in any other form, without the prior written authorization of the copyright holder:

Reading (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery - Brookline, MA

Apolytikion of Prophet Isaiah (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA

Kontakion of Prophet Isaiah (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA

Christopher the Martyr of Lycea

Reading from the Synaxarion:

Saint Christopher was at first named Reprobus. Seeing the Christians persecuted, he rebuked the tyrants for their cruelty. Soldiers were sent to bring him to appear before the ruler; but he converted them to Christ, and with them was baptized, receiving the name Christopher. After he appeared before the ruler, he was imprisoned and two harlots were sent to seduce him, but he converted them also, and encouraged them in their martyrdom. He was subjected to torments and finally beheaded in the days of Decius. Many marvellous and mythical things are said about him out of ignorance and superstition, one of which is that it is impossible for one to die suddenly from some unexpected cause on the day on which one looks at the Saint's icon. This is the origin of that proverb that is quoted in various quarters: "If on Christopher thou shouldst gaze, thou shalt safely wend life's ways." The etymology of his name, which means "Christ-bearer," has undoubtedly moved iconographers to depict him carrying the infant Jesus on his shoulders; it is completely erro-neous, however, to depict him, as some uninformed iconographers do, having the head of a dog, because of a statement in his life that he was dog-faced, by which is meant only that his countenance was exceedingly frightful to look upon.

Apolytikion of Martyr Christopher in the Fourth Tone

Thy Martyr, O Lord, in his courageous contest for Thee received as the prize the crowns of incorruption and life from Thee, our immortal God. For since he possessed Thy strength, he cast down the tyrants and wholly destroyed the demons' strengthless presumption. O Christ God, by his prayers, save our souls, since Thou art merciful.

Kontakion of Martyr Christopher in the Fourth Tone

Thou who wast terrifying both in strength and in countenance, for thy Creator's sake thou didst surrender thyself willingly to them that sought thee; for thou didst persuade both them and the women that sought to arouse in thee the fire of lust, and they followed thee in the path of martyrdom. And in torments thou didst prove to be courageous. Wherefore, we have gained thee as our great protector, O great Christopher.

The content on this page is under copyright and is used by permission. All rights reserved. These works may not be further reproduced, in print or on other websites or in any other form, without the prior written authorization of the copyright holder:

Reading (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery - Brookline, MA

Apolytikion of Martyr Christopher (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA

Kontakion of Martyr Christopher (c) Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA

Prayer Before Reading Scripture

Shine within our hearts, loving Master, the pure light of Your divine knowledge and open the eyes of our minds that we may comprehend the message of Your Gospel. Instill in us also reverence for Your blessed commandments, so that having conquered all sinful desires, we may pursue a spiritual life, thinking and doing all those things that are pleasing to You. For You, Christ our God, are the light of our souls and bodies, and to You we give glory together with Your Father who is without beginning and Your all holy, good, and life giving Spirit, now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Epistle Reading

The Reading is from Acts of the Apostles 8:40; 9:1-19

In those days, Philip was found at Azotos, and passing on he preached the gospel to all the towns till he came to Caesarea. But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now as he journeyed he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed about him. And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, " I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting; but rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do." The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. Saul arose from the ground; and when his eyes were opened, he could see nothing; so they led him by the hand and brought him into Damascus. And for three days he was w ithout sight, and neither ate nor drank.

Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, "Ananias." And he said, "Here I am, Lord." And the Lord said to him, "Rise and go to the street called Straight, and inquire in the house of Judas for a man of Tarsus named Saul; for behold, he is praying, and he has seen a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight." But Ananias answered, "Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to thy saints at Jerusalem; and here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call upon thy name." But the Lord said to him, "Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name." So Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying his hands on him he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came, has sent me that yo u may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit." And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized, and took food and was strengthened.

Gospel Reading

The Reading is from the Gospel According to John 6:48-54

The Lord said to the Jews who believed in him: "I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that a man may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh."

The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" So Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day."

[sgiandubh]

When clueless, silence is golden

I was just browsing around while looking for something completely different and stumbled upon this quintessential Mordorian POV:

Disclosing a username is crass and I usually never do this, unless really necessary and relevant. So spare me the ad hominem argument you usually fumble around with, Disgruntled Tumblrettes. Yet, for all its intellectual paucity, this is interesting dissection material, since clearly this person hasn't got the slightest idea of what she is so confidently talking about.

First scenario at play: The Tasting Alliance, 'a company no one has ever heard of', booked and paid for the suite.

Not necessarily booked, nor necessarily paid, madam. In the real business world you are so clueless about, these arrangements are seldom - if ever - monetized. It's rather all about barter.

That company no one ever heard about - except, perhaps, #silly and totally irrelevant Forbes (https://www.forbes.com/sites/joemicallef/2023/04/13/the-tasting-alliance-and-reserve-bar-are-set-to-launch-top-shelf/?sh=b45f7085f6f1) - is the parent company of the San Francisco World Spirits Competition (SFWSC), largely acknowledged as at least one of, if not the world's leading spirits award contest. Google is your friend, you should try it some time:

The operative info here is that this evaluation comes from the Beverage Trade Network, a professional portal for spirit dealers. Having determined this, Tasting Alliance's IG number of followers is completely irrelevant, since we are talking about two very different targets, here. Its real leverage and weight on the global market does not really need the boost of an aggressive social media presence and the kind of events it hosts are not your favorite junior hockey league or elementary school cake and bake sale.

Let's look a bit further. It takes one click to get on the Tasting Alliance's website (https://thetastingalliance.com/). Granted, not all the information you need to understand its business model is right there and I had to go dig a bit (not without some help - merci encore!) to even get a grip on how these wheels are really turning.

The way they sell themselves is sober and confident. And completely disinterested in social media impact, to be honest:

So, in lieu of glitz and sequined bras, we have a success story in its own right, which started in Frisco in 1980, then continued in 2000, with the addition of the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. Further expansion followed in 2018, with the New York World Wine & Spirits Competition and 2019, when Dias Blue set a firm foot on the emerging Asian market, with the Singapore World Spirits Competition.

I doubt an explanatory drawing is needed as to the why of this expansion choice: it's all about baijiu, the old/new Chinese sorghum spirit and the everlasting love of the Far East for anything fermented. Lao-lao, the unspeakable Laotian homemade rice whisky, comes immediately to the mind of this blogger: the last bottle I saw, somewhere along the unexploded ordnance ridden Route 13, had a plump snake inside, as a naïve Viagra of sorts. Took a mouthful and thought I was going to die - but when spending the night in a longhouse with the Tai Lü people, you can't afford a faux-pas, can you? /end of travel memories intermezzo

By all my estimations, The Tasting Alliance is very profitable business. Let's unpack ( for current fees, see source: https://callingallcontestants.com/contest/2023-san-francisco-world-spirits-competition/):

Considering the 500 USD fee /entry (550, in 2023) in the competition and the fact that in 2022 there were approximately 5000 entries in the Frisco spirits' competition, we have a very rough turnover estimation of 500x5000= 2.5 million USD. That figure is just for one of the spirits competitions, mind you, and does not take into account what the winners probably pay for the right to mention their medals on their bottles (I am yet to see them on the SS gin bottles, btw), nor the multiple sidekick profit (e-shop sales, consulting and/or other distribution deals, etc). So, at the end of the day, I would comfortably multiply that base by 4, assuming a similar scale for all the other events they organize, which takes the yearly turnover at around 10 million USD and keeping in mind this is very probably a conservative estimation. I also assume costs are negligible, taking into account the discretion with which major players traditionally operate on that particular niche. Real expenses are probably limited to the activity of a handful of offices, sparingly and intelligently staffed. Advertisement is probably bartered and social media, well... you just saw the effort, haven't you?

But then there's the brand's real power on that market and this is the right time to talk about influence and impact. Perhaps this recent (2021) Men's Journal article will help us see better: https://www.mensjournal.com/food-drink/inside-the-san-francisco-world-spirits-competition

With a bit of luck, this could happen:

Sounds familiar? Of course and I bet that was S's strategy. If you imagined him doing the same exhausting booze tour every year (groping on top and seriously cringe on the sides), I think you might want to reconsider. I told you Sassenach Summer was a sandbox for more serious things to come and until now I have no reasons to change my mind. He did it for a reason and, mind you, that reason is not that the booze did or does not sell. It does. Restaurants start to feature it. Podcasts are being produced. The press starts to mention it (that recent New York Times article is evidence enough). This is not Lucky Luciano dealing in bootleg alcohol during the Prohibition and making obscene money over a fortnight. This is a serious business project that was delayed by COVID. That's all. And it takes time and patience and consistence. We know he has all those aplenty.

We also have the totally inane take on production costs for that podcast. It suddenly made me remember again my media expert past. It is with complete and educated confidence that I tell you: a potential 5K USD extra cost for renting that damn suite for the day is peanuts, even for a two-minute clip (let alone, in reality, a podcast interview, and I stand corrected if wrong), if such costs are covered by The Tasting Alliance. But my money is on a barter with The Shutters on the Beach, which would be, again, common business practice.

Second scenario: 'Shutters comped the room for free promo (...) for an actor most people haven't heard of.' You can throw timelines down my throat as many times as you wish and tell me he already stayed there several times and yell and screech, but here is what I think. Shutters didn't comp that suite for S, an actor most people haven't heard of, a decent, hard working start-up entrepreneur. If so (I doubt it), it would be logical to think Shutters comped that suite for The Tasting Alliance, which has a long documented history of partnerships with hotels that host their competitions:

So Shutters might have comped that room for a major player of the alcohol lobby world, happy that S, a returning client, picked them out of several possible options, because it was convenient. I don't believe for a second he stayed there.

This guy knows what he's doing and C's gin success completely depends and I bet will rely on that relentless networking effort. If anything, the Keepers of the Quaich recent development is only confirmation of all the above. But that's another story - very soon on this page.

IYKYK. The rest is uneducated cackle. But Mordor people were never the brightest bulbs in the fandom's chandelier, were they?

[maboroshi-no]

Hamefura LN Release SS

This seems to be a commemorative special story posted when LN1 and LN2 came out.

Series: My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! Source: Ichijinsha Bunko Iris website Synopsis: Katarina gets drunk during the ball held for Geordo and Alan's 15th birthday. Translation: maboroshi-no

Anne: My Lady, are you alright?

Katarina: I'm okay, Anne. I'm feeling well!

After saying this, when I swiftly got up from the sofa I was sitting on, the scenery around me spun dizzily, and I inadvertently staggered. 

Anne: And how is this okay…? Please patiently stay here until the ball is over.

After I, Katarina Claes, had staggered, my maid-in-waiting Anne sighed a little while helping me. As I was looking at her tired face, I dazedly wondered how things turned out like this.

Today was the birthday of the twin princes of this country. Since it was the year of their 15th birthday and debut in high society, a magnificent ball was held at the castle.

Since I was engaged to one of the twin princes, Geordo Stuart, I was naturally invited to this party and attended it with Geordo as my escort.

However, with the guest of honor Geordo surrounded by many people and very busy engaging with them, I, his plus-one moved to a corner. 

When I did, there were many very delicious-looking dishes and delicious-looking juices remaining untouched in the corner. It instantly raised my spirits and I relished the dishes laid out on the table.

Especially, the grape juice completely refreshed my dry throat. It was so delicious that I emptied three glasses.

Then, as I was reaching out for my fourth glass, my friends, who were also attending the ball, noticed me and came to me. I took a step towards them, and… at that moment… the scenery around me spun dizzily. 

When I came to, I was lying on a sofa in the waiting room of the party, and Anne, who had accompanied me from the manor, was peering worriedly at me.

According to Anne, I got drunk from drinking too much wine and fainted. 

I see, so this grape juice was wine~. I had only attended children's tea parties until now, so they had all been juices… But in adults' balls, there would also be alcohol. 

After I had heard the circumstances from Anne and grasped the situation, Anne sternly told me, "Since it happened at a corner of the venue, it didn't seem to have reached public eyes, but please be very careful."

The ones who carried me here were my friends coming to me at that time. They also seemed to have tended to me for a while. I had to properly thank them afterward.

Still, for the scenery to spin so much just from standing for a bit… The effects of alcohol were so powerful.

What's more, when I swiftly stood up, the alcohol might have hit even harder because my head became even fuzzier.

Maybe it was the effect of alcohol, but I felt so good~ As I was sitting on the sofa thinking this, a visitor came to the waiting room.

Geordo: Katarina, I heard that you fell sick. Are you okay?

The one who, after saying this, showed up with a worried face was Geordo. With the other nobles hardly letting him go, it became late when he came to see me. "I am sorry for coming late", Geordo apologetically said as I dazedly gazed at his face.

Geordo: Katarina? Are you really okay?

As I was dazed and didn't answer him, Geordo knelt and peered at my face.

As he did, Anne told him, "My Lady got drunk with alcohol", and explained things in my place. 

While she did, I dazedly gazed at Geordo's face. Geordo's face felt different from usual. Like… how should I put it? He looked somewhat tired.

Katarina: Prince Geordo, are you tired?

Geordo: …Ah, yes. There were especially many people approaching me today, so I am indeed a little tired.

While a little surprised by my sudden question, Geordo replied this.

It seemed like even Geordo got worn out from people coming to him one after the other.

On my birthday, Geordo escorted me and greatly helped me. It would be great if I could also help him in any way… Wasn't there something even I could do? I dazedly pondered this…...... That's it! I just came up with a great idea. As he was peering at me, I pulled Geordo's body close and hugged him tightly. Then…

Katarina: Good job! You've worked hard!

After saying this, I stroked Geordo's head. When I was little, Father would often do this to me after I had worked hard on my hated subjects. When he did, I would somewhat feel at ease and greatly cheered up.

I intended to cheer up the tired Geordo like this, but… When I pulled my head back and looked at Geordo, he was frozen with a straight face.

Huh? How come? And why was his face bright red? What happened? Maybe I was reeking of alcohol?

As I was thinking that I should probably apologize for the alcohol smell, for some reason my head became even fuzzier… The scenery started spinning again… and I fainted.

When I woke up again, I didn't remember anything after I had drunk the grape juice. It seemed Geordo came to see me and we talked, but I had no recollection of it.

When I talked about it to Anne tending to me, for some reason, she looked at me with eyes like she had seen something sad.

[mariacallous]

Like a lot of us, Carlo Acutis spent an ungodly amount of his life staring at screens. Born in London in 1991, he grew up an only child in a newly connected world. He wore sweatshirts and Nike trainers. He played Halo and taught himself to code. But that’s where the similarities end—because next year, Acutis will officially be named a saint.

As well as the internet, Acutis revered another institution: the Catholic Church. From a young age, he was acutely interested in Eucharistic miracles—extraordinary events which, according to Catholics, see consecrated bread or wine suddenly become the actual body or blood of Christ. “To always be united to Jesus: This is my life plan,” he told his mother after his First Communion.

In 2004, Acutis started to research Eucharistic miracles from around the world, developing a website to document them. His aim was to connect with other young Catholics. “He was personally convinced that the scientific evidence would help people … come back to Mass,” says Courtney Mares, author of Blessed Carlo Acutis: A Saint in Sneakers and Rome correspondent for the Catholic News Agency.

The online archive was unveiled in October 2006, a simple build with cursive text and religious imagery. But just a few days after it launched, Acutis fell ill. He was diagnosed with leukemia, with little chance of recovery. “Death has become the passage towards life,” he told his mother, before falling into a coma, suffering a brain hemorrhage, and passing away. He was just 15.

His spirit lived on. The website he’d built helped introduce Eucharistic miracles to a mass audience across the globe and was translated into 17 languages. A physical exhibition linked to Acutis’ work has toured internationally, being shown in thousands of parishes worldwide. It’s still touring now. Acutis is revered not just for his use of technology, but also his dedication to living virtuously. “I think that prayer was truly the great secret of his saintly life,” Mares says. But the website was key to creating a halo effect, heightening his reputation as a blessed figure.

In 2012, the Archdiocese of Milan—where Acutis’ family had moved when he was a child—started a cause for canonization, paving the way for sainthood. Unbeknown to most secular folk, saints are still made regularly; Pope Francis has recognized a record 912 since 2013. But becoming one, as the cliché goes, requires patience. The original petitioner appoints a postulator to collect evidence of the candidate’s sacred work (the “devil’s advocate” used to be a real antithesis to this occupation, arguing against sainthood).

“The process of identifying someone as a saint is long and careful and quite bureaucratic,” says Tim Hutchings, associate professor of religious ethics at the University of Nottingham. “It starts when some Catholics decide that they really think someone should be a saint. They start a campaign to prove to their local bishop that this person lived an incredibly holy life, or died for their faith.”

After being named a "Servant of God" in 2013, Acutis reached the second rung on the ladder to sainthood when he was venerated by Pope Francis in 2018. His body was exhumed and brought to a tomb in Assisi where he still lies today, dressed in his trademark '90s teenager garb. “It’s a beautiful thing that for the first time in history you can see a saint dressed in jeans, sneakers, and a sweatshirt. That’s a great message,” Father Carlos Acácio Gonçalves Ferreira, the shrine’s rector, said at the time. A Franciscan monk based at the tomb, noted that “many young people” were visiting.

Next, Acutis and his followers needed a literal miracle—one he had performed himself. “It has to be something which can't be scientifically explained, so proving this is difficult. For example, this might require doctors to confirm that they can't explain how a healing has occurred,” Hutchings says. In 2013 a woman in Brazil claimed that praying to Acutis had helped heal her son’s pancreatic defect. In 2020 Pope Francis authenticated the miracle and Acutis was beatified, culminating in a ceremony celebrating his virtuous life. “According to Google Trends, more people were searching for information about Carlo Acutis than about the Pope,” Mares notes.

Then, in May 2024, a second miracle was recognized, involving the healing of a 21-year-old girl from Costa Rica injured in a bike accident. In 2022, her mother had knelt at Acutis' grave and prayed for his help. Her daughter then miraculously resumed breathing without support and made a full recovery. The Pope approved Acutis’ canonization in July—with an official ceremony set for 2025.

It’s rare for a saint to be so young and unheard of, and still reach this lofty status so soon after their death. “It is remarkable that Carlo Acutis will be canonized so close to the date that he was born. For context, of the 912 saints canonized by Pope Francis, the next most recent birth date was in 1926,” Mares says. It makes him the first ever millennial saint and, as some Catholics have put it, “God’s influencer” and the “patron saint of the internet.”

Meanwhile, the cult of Carlos Acutis is continuing to spread across the world. Relics, including a piece of the sheet that shrouded his corpse, a fragment of one of his sweatshirts, and his actual heart, have toured internationally, recently coming to the UK for the New Dawn Catholic Pilgrimage. Online, you can buy Carlo Acutis figurines, rosary beads, posters, and commemorative keychains. In North Lanarkshire, Scotland, a life-size statue of Acutis has been erected at Carfin Grotto, and there’s a stained-glass window in Wiltshire to attract young churchgoers.

There's even a comic book telling his story, and a VR experience offering players a chance to step into Acutis’ sneakers. And, for Catholics who are unable to pay their respects in person, his tomb can be visited (and donated to) virtually through an always-on livestream.

The Church doesn’t pick saints—campaigns start with the Catholic community—but Acutis’ popularity meshes with its desire for a young role model. It also highlights the Church’s embrace of tech. “The Pope has been making an annual lecture about communications technology for 58 years,” says Hutchings. “It absolutely makes sense for Catholics to look for a saint of the internet who represents the godly and faithful use of technology.”

There is, of course, still a stigma surrounding the internet’s potential for blasphemous behavior. “The Pope has warned that today’s digital age constantly tempts young people to ‘self-absorption, isolation, and empty pleasure,’” Mares says. And some devout Catholics are still struggling with temptation. “With technology changing at such a rapid pace today, many Christians are still grappling with how best to live out their faith in the world of laptops, cell phones, and social media,” Mares says.

But the Pope also called the internet a “gift from God” in 2014, and he recognizes its potential for spreading the word of Christ—it just depends on how it is applied. And in the case of Acutis, tech was used in a pious way. “Acutis used the new technology in exactly the way that the Church wants to see it used: to promote commitment to Catholic teaching, virtuous living, and devotion to the rituals of the local church,” Hutchings explains. The Church will hope that the relatable “saint in sneakers” who watched cartoons and surfed the web will resonate with a community looking for an idol.

[quidell-fics]

Black Myth: Wukong Patch 1.0.12.16581 Notes

Source click here

Version: 1.0.12.16581

**Update Time: December 10, 2024 16:00 (UTC+8)**

**NOTE: Epic Games Store Version will receive the patch first, but it will also be rolled out gradually on other platforms.**

**What to Know Before Patch Installation**

* Due to the platform's update mechanism, your computer will need to reserve a larger amount of free disk space for temporary storage of the update files.

* If you have installed any mods in the game, installing the patch may cause compatibility issues. This could prevent you from launching the game or triggering error pop-ups during gameplay. We recommend uninstalling the installed mods and verifying the integrity of the game files before restarting the game

* If you encounter unusually large update sizes during patch installation, or if the game gets stuck, crashes, or fails to start after installation, please refer to the [Installation/Patch] on our official website.

* **All new items introduced in this patch will not be required for any game achievements.**

# Major Updates

**New Gameplay: Challenge**

*"It's tough to confront the old rivals anew, but the Great Sage will always prevail!"*

* After completing the game at least once, the Destined One can find "Challenge" at any Keeper's Shrine.

* There are two types of challenges available: "**Return of Rivals**" and "**Gauntlet of Legends**".

* "**Return of Rivals**"

* The Destined One can challenge a former opponent to a duel, choosing from three levels of difficulty.

* If any opponents remain undefeated in the main game, the corresponding rematch will be unavailable.

* "**Gauntlet of Legends**"

* The Destined One can battle against multiple opponents in succession, using customized curses to tailor the difficulty.

* This mode can be difficult, as some old opponents may surprise with new moves. Proceed with caution!

* If any opponents remain undefeated in the main game, the related gauntlet will be unavailable.

* Completing any gauntlet rewards players with new rare treasures.

* Medicine: "Glimmering Scale Pellets" and its formula;

* Drink and Soaks: "Sour Wine", "Frost-Enduring Chrysanthemum", and "Robust Antler";

* Curios: "Stone Tiger Tally", "Ever-Burning Palace Lantern", and "Fragment of the Ocean-Settling Pillar";

* Equipment: "Three Hill Crown";

* Weapons: "Qing Mallet", "Fanged Cyan Staff", and "Leeching Centipede Staff".

**New Game Feature: Journeyer's Chart (Map Function)**

*"Let the chart chart the journeyer's journey."*

* A remarkable one has captured these landscapes, organizing them into charts for guidance and marking.

* A Journeyer's Chart can be unlocked when the Destined One first enters Black Wind Mountain and meets the Keeper.

* Afterwards, for each new territory reached, a "Journeyer's Chart" can be purchased at the Keeper's Shrine.

**New Equipment: Armor Set of Opulence**

*As the year comes to a close, we wish all Destined Ones an early Happy Chinese New Year! May you have joy and prosperity all year round.*

* Four special armor pieces have been crafted to celebrate the upcoming Chinese New Year.

* After installation, all Destined Ones can claim these directly through "Trailblazer's Gift" at any Keeper's Shrine.

**New Music Library Functions**

* "Black Myth: Wukong Soundtrack Selection" has been added as a new soundtrack application (some tracks are not available for export due to copyright restrictions).

Please note: Due to configuration issues on EPIC, purchasers of "Black Myth: Wukong Deluxe Edition Upgrade" may experience delays in receiving the soundtrack selection. Your patience is much appreciated.

# Bug Fixes

# Bosses

* Fixed an issue where yaoguai chiefs "The King of the Kingdom of Flowing Sands and His Son" might not drop the spirit of "Second Rat Prince" upon defeat.

* Fixed an issue where "Kang-Jin Star" would die unexpectedly under certain conditions.

* Fixed an issue where "Zhu Bajie" could not be defeated during a certain phase.

* Fixed an issue where yaoguai king "Yellow Loong" would get stuck underground in certain situations.

* Fixed an issue where some skills of yaoguai king "Yellow Loong" could not be interrupted even after being seen-through.

* Fixed an issue where yaoguai chiefs "Cloudy Mist, Misty Cloud" would continue attacking players while in invisible state under certain conditions.

* Fixed an issue where yaoguai chief Lang-Baw-Baw could not engage in combat under certain conditions.

* Fixed an issue where some skills of "Erlang, the Sacred Divinity" would deal abnormal damage to the Destined One.

* Fixed an issue where the Destined One could engage in the battle with "The Four Heavenly Kings" in forms other than "Stone Monkey" under specific operations.

* Fixed an issue where the Destined One could be blocked by an invisible wall, preventing him from entering combat in certain situations.

* Improved the grappling performance of yaoguai king "Yellow Wind Sage".

* Reduced the invulnerability duration of "Green-Capped Martialist".

* Enhanced the effectiveness of the vessel "Wind Tamer" against yaoguai chief "Non-Void".

* Improved the combat experience with yaoguai chiefs "Cloudy Mist, Misty Cloud".

* Improved the combat experience with yaoguai chief "Emerald-Armed Mantis".

* Improved the combat experience with "The Great Sage's Broken Shell".

**Levels**

* Fixed an issue where Zhu Bajie did not appear in Mount Huaguo under certain conditions.

**Protagonist**

* Improved the experience when the Destined One consumes multiple medicines consecutively.

* Enhanced the experience of Varied Combos and Charged Heavy Attacks.

* Optimized the description of Transformations-related Talents.

* Fixed an issue where the damage detection of Spirit Skills persisted indefinitely under certain operations.

* Fixed an issue where the animation of Life-Saving Strand could not be triggered when the Talent had taken effect under specific operations.

* Fixed an issue where "Bull King's Mask" could gain Focus even when attacked during invincible states (Doging, Perfect Dodging, or Seeing-Through).

**Interactions**

* The Music Library progress bar now supports dragging.

* Control customization for Keyboard & Mouse now supports mouse side buttons.

* Fixed an issue where the Sprint button icon would not display in Controller Type B's layout.

* Fixed an issue where the Inventory interface might not display content under certain operations.

* Fixed an issue where the UI could become misaligned under specific operations.

**Sound and Subtitles**

* Fixed errors in some sound effects.

* Fixed abnormal voice playback for certain yaoguai kings.

* Optimized the volume of certain sound effects.

**Performance**

* Fixed occasional crashes for some users after enabling DLSS frame generation.

* Fixed screen flickering issues for some users after enabling XeSS.

* Fixed a memory leak issue under certain conditions.

* Fixed crashes caused by outdated drivers.

* Optimized performance for numerous scenes and boss fights on medium and low-end configurations.

* Enhanced the performance of Full Ray Tracing on GeForce RTX.

**Localization and Other**

* Added language support for Turkish.

* Added and improved translations for Portraits in several languages.

* Corrected translation errors and fixed issues with spelling, capitalization, and terminology consistency in several languages.

* Improved the translation of lyrics in several languages.

* Enhanced the quality of some English voiceovers and their synchronization with subtitles.

* Improved text display in several languages.

[beardedmrbean]

A restaurant partially owned by California Governor Gavin Newsom is recruiting for a $16-per-hour role, despite a new state law guaranteeing a minimum wage of $20 per hour for fast-food workers. The restaurant appears not to meet the threshold for the new minimum wage, a law that Newsom himself signed to much fanfare in September.

The Context

On April 1, the new law guaranteeing a minimum wage of $20 per hour for fast-food workers employed in large chains took effect across California, up from the previous minimum of $16.

The law was passed by Democrats in the state legislature last year but has come under fire from some Republicans who claim it will cost jobs. A wage of $20 per hour for a full-time worker results in an annual salary of $41,600.

The new law applies to those restaurants that are part of a chain of 60 or more venues nationwide and which offer limited or no table service.

What We Know

PlumpJack Café in Olympic Valley, California, is seeking a part-time busser to "assist the food server in the restaurant to ensure guest satisfaction during all aspects of the dining experience."

The advert, placed on job posting website ZipRecruiter, says that the employee will be paid $16 per hour and their duties will include clearing dishes from tables, the preparation of caffeinated drinks and decorating tables prior to customer arrival.

The café is owned by the PlumpJack Group, a company founded by Newsom which specializes in wine and high-end dining. Its website says that PlumpJack Group operates four bars or restaurants, placing it well below the threshold for the $20 per hour minimum wage to take effect.

Newsom placed his ownership interests in the PlumpJack Group into a blind trust in 2018, and has had no day-to-day involvement in the running of the company since assuming office in January 2019.

Newsweek has contacted Newsom and the PlumpJack Group for comment outside of normal working hours.

The official PlumpJack Group website states: "In 1992, Gavin Newsom opened his first business, PlumpJack Wines, combining his passion for wine and his driving entrepreneurial spirit.

"Over the next decade, the PlumpJack Group began to grow under his leadership to include many of the restaurants, wineries, and retail establishments in the current portfolio."

Views

Republican State Assembly member Joe Patterson shared screenshots of the PlumpJack Café, PlumpJack Group website referring to Newsom as its founder and the rental cost of two properties in the area on X, formerly Twitter.

He added: "I wonder why @CAgovernor @GavinNewson's food businesses don't pay $20/hour? Live job posting at $16/hr in Olympic Valley. It's very, very expensive to live there... but he doesn't do as he tells others and doesn't pay a living wage."

The increased minimum wage for fast-food workers more generally has been criticized by some Republicans who warn it will reduce the number of jobs.

Speaking to DailyMail.com, Rep. Doug LaMalfa from California said: "As if prices in California aren't high enough. Fast food prices are already rising, and employees are being replaced by self-checkout kiosks and soon robot cooks.

"Nearly everyone will be worse off: higher prices, fewer jobs, fewer eating options as places close, and fewer small businesses. Ultimately this new $20 minimum wage will affect nearly every job, with similar results."

In an earnings call at the end of October, McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski said that "there is going to be a wage impact for our California franchisees," which he added would have to be partially "worked through with higher pricing."

In February, Newsom denied a report by Bloomberg News that he pushed for a separate exception to the new minimum wage law that benefits a campaign donor. The law exempts restaurants that have on-site bakeries and sell bread as a standalone menu item.

As a result, Greg Flynn, a billionaire and Newsom donor, could save hundreds of thousands of dollars at his Panera Bread outlets in California, according to Bloomberg.

A spokesman denied any connection, saying: "This story is absurd."

In January, a baseline minimum wage of $16 came into effect across California.

[blueiscoool]

'Magical' Roman Wind Chime with Phallus Found in Serbia

Phallic objects like this were common in the Roman world to ward off evil.

Archaeologists have unearthed a Roman wind chime called a tintinnabulum — featuring a prominent phallus — at an archaeological site in eastern Serbia.

Such objects, which were hung near the doorways of houses and shops, were believed to serve as magical protection for the premises. This one was discovered on the porch of a large home on a main street in Viminacium, an ancient Roman city, the extensive ruins of which now lie near the Serbian town of Kostolac, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) east of Belgrade.

"The building was destroyed in a fire, during which the porch collapsed and fell to the ground," Ilija Danković, an archaeologist at the Institute of Archaeology in Belgrade, told the Serbian-language website Sve o arheologiji.

Tintinnabulums were designed to catch the wind, supposedly so their noise and unusual appearance would frighten off evil spirits and ward off the curse of the evil eye, which was greatly feared in antiquity.

Viminacium was the civil and military capital of Rome's Upper Moesia province from the first to fifth centuries, until it was sacked by the Huns under Attila in 441. The city was rebuilt under the Byzantine emperor Justinian, but it was finally destroyed by invading Slavs in about 535.

Magical phallus

This is the second tintinnabulum found in the ruins. The first is now in a private collection in Austria; nothing is known about its discovery, he said.

However, the newly discovered tintinnabulum was discovered in its full archaeological context. "As soon as we started uncovering it, we knew immediately what we had discovered," he said.

The latest tintinnabulum from Viminacium is made of bronze, but it is being kept surrounded by soil until it can be properly restored. As a result, its exact configuration isn't known. But it is centered on a "fascinum" — a portrayal of a magical phallus — with two legs, wings and a tail, he said.

"Judging by what can be seen … it had four bells and the chain from which it hung," Danković said, adding that there also seemed to be other elements to the design not seen on other tintinnabulums.

Roman beliefs

The symbol of a phallus wasn't always erotic or obscene for the ancient Romans, Danković said. "It was a bringer of good fortune and happiness, and an efficient weapon to combat the evil eye," he said. "For this reason, phalluses can be seen everywhere in the Roman world, from wine cups to the amulets worn by children."

He added that the symbol was often publicly displayed to summon prosperity and deter thieves.

The discovery of the tintinnabulum is evidence that Viminacium was "in every sense a part of the Roman world," Danković said.

Not only did its people share many Roman beliefs, he said, but it's likely that the tintinnabulum was imported from elsewhere in the empire, showing that there were social elites at Viminacium who were willing to pay a significant amount of money for such an object.

Ken Dark, an archaeologist and historian at King's College London who wasn't involved in the discovery, said the Viminacium tintinnabulum was a type of "apotropaic" amulet that was designed to ward off evil influences and give protection to people or their property.

Such amulets "were common in the Roman world, and these sometimes took forms which would seem very strange — or even comical — to us today," he told in an email.

By Tom Metcalfe.

[heartfullofleeches]

answer me these questions 5 and you shall pass the bridge ( I'm a goblin )

Where did Saffron grow up?

(Weird one but ) what's his fav website?

What brings him in a good mood?

does he sing in the shower and if so would he get embarrassed if his s/o walked in? And what song(s) would he sing?

whats one realllllyyy embarrassing moment in his life?

Like majority of his siblings C.C grew up with his auntie. Her section of hell could be considered purgatory and if he wasn't royal blood his ass would get bullied hard for living there

Monsterhigh.com

Aside from the obvious being time with his darling C.C enjoys dancing/singing/d.jing as his main hobby. When he's trying to relax he'll kick back with a bottle of wine, his pet snake(s), and those classic 2000's kid movies catered towards girls. He also enjoys shopping and sitting in eBay bids for doubles of dolls he already has so he can have them out of box and brush their hair. He has the money to win most right out the door, but he loves waiting til the last second to crush his opponents spirits.

Yes he does and no he wouldn't as he'd probably just invite them in. I don't know many popular songs that could fit his personality as we don't have the exact same music tastes. I will say he sings that one song Shower by Becky G

Lost a bet with Baron and had to go with him and their aunt/uncle Gemini to an anime convention and enter in the cosplay competition. He won first place and burns any pictures of it. It was that or wear Crocs for a week

[reasoningdaily]

16 Black Innovators Who Changed Food Forever

Macaroni and cheese. Ice cream. French fries. Jack Daniel's whisky. Frozen foods in general.

We wouldn't have any of the above foods, plus many others, were it not for Black food innovators and figureheads that have made significant contributions and altered the way we eat and make food today.

Below are just some of the stories of these incredibly talented and inspiring individuals. Some of these names came from research via the New York Times and Food and Wine, but we've also included historical sourcing and context for each person as well. You can click on their names to view those original pieces.

Nathan "Nearest" Green

Known as "Uncle Nearest," Nathan Green was a skilled distiller who mastered the "Lincoln County" process. This method of distilling is thought by food historians and whiskey experts alike to have been brought in by slaves, and uses charcoal to filter and purify foods. The "Lincoln County" process, in particular, uses sugar maple charcoal to filter bourbon.

Green trained hired hand Jasper Newton Daniel (known to the world as "Jack Daniel") while working on a priest's distillery in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Daniel eventually made him the first master distiller of Jack Daniel's, the famous Tennessee whisky many people drink today.

While Jack Daniel's shares the story of Green on their website, an all minority-led whisky brand named "Uncle Nearest" continues to build upon his legacy with spirits that use the same distilling technique, but feature Green's name on the bottle.

While Thomas Jefferson is sometimes credited with bringing foods like mac & cheese and ice cream to the United States, Hemings was the one who actually learned to make them. A slave in the ownership of Jefferson prior to his presidency, Hemings traveled with him to France in 1784 specifically to learn the art of French cuisine.

Hemings became the first American trained as a French chef in history as a result, bringing back several dishes to the United States. French fries, ice cream, macaroni and cheese, creme brulee, French meringues, and French whipped cream are just a few examples. These dishes and others would be incorporated in Hemings' signature half-French, half-Virginian style of cooking he became renowned for.

Hemings would later also cook one of the most famous dinners in American history: the one between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton that settled who would pay for the Revolutionary War and established Washington, D.C. as the United States' capital. He eventually was freed by Jefferson in 1796.

Zephyr Wright

Zephyr Wright was the personal chef for President Lyndon B. Johnson and his family for over twenty years. It was her cooking that made the Johnson household a popular one for D.C. dinner parties.

Wright would follow Johnson to the White House during his tenure, and was in charge of the home cooking in the White House kitchen. She would also temporarily cook all meals, including VIP ones, in between the tenures of two White House Executive Chefs.

Wright is thought to have heavily influenced Johnson's support for the Civil Rights Act of 1964,. Wright was known to have spoken up to the President during his time in Congress about the injustices she faced road tripping between Texas and D.C. during congressional recesses, saying that she was not allowed to use the bathroom in areas she was driving through, and couldn't stop off and eat at restaurants. President Johnson reportedly used some of her stories to convince Congress to sign the bill. He would also give her a White House pen when the act was signed into law.

Leah Chase

The Queen of Creole Cuisine, Leah Chase was the heart and soul of Dooky Chase's restaurant in New Orleans across seven decades. Known for her fried chicken, red beans and rice, gumbo, and other classics, Chase started out in the 1940s when she got a job as a server at a restaurant. She eventually took over the helm and made it a safe haven for anyone to come and eat at.

Dooky Chase's was known as one of the few places that it was publicly okay for races to mix at, since the cops wouldn't bother activists inside the restaurant. Thus, leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, including local leaders and national ones like Martin Luther King Jr., would often strategize while eating there.

Chase would go on to serve presidents like Barack Obama and George W. Bush, along with Associate Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and other influential figures. Disney has even made a movie with a character inspired by her: Princess Tiana of Princess and the Frog.

Abby Fisher

Around the early 1880s, Abby Fisher was known for her award-winning pickles and the Mrs. Abby Fisher Pickle Company in San Francisco. She had at least 35 years of cooking experience, some estimates had it, and the awards she won for her food reflected that.

However, Fisher is probably best known for publishing one of the first cookbooks ever authored by an African-American woman. The book, called What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking, contains over 160 recipes and uses the dictated words of Fisher herself.

The cookbook surged in popularity in the late 20th century when a publisher began reprinting it in 1995. Today, it offers a window into these early recipes that places like museums try to recreate for guests to sample.

Edna Lewis

Edna Lewis became a legend while she cooked at Cafe Nicholson in Midtown Manhattan starting in 1949. Her fame and Southern recipes led to guests like Marlon Brando, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Salvador Dali showing up for dinner. After stepping away from the chef's role (as an active partner) in 1952, she would lecture at the American Museum of Natural History while working as a chef and private caterer.

Lewis would later become inspired to write her first cookbook as demand for them grew in 1972. She was one of the first African-American women from the South that would publish a cookbook that did not hide her name, gender, or race. She would go on to publish more in the future, eventually becoming known as the Grand Dame and Grand Doyenne of Southern cooking.

Larry James and Jereline Bethune

The Bethune family, to this day, runs Brenda's Bar-Be-Que Pit in Montgomery, Alabama. Open since 1942, the restaurant would become an important hub for those in the Civil Rights Movement.

After Rosa Parks infamously refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus, Larry James and Jereline Bethune were instrumental in using their restaurant to organize bus boycott efforts around the city. As the movement continued and literacy test laws (meant to curtail the Black vote) were introduced, Jereline would also quietly hold lessons teaching other African-Americans how to read. They were then able to pass these literacy tests and go out and vote.

Alfred L. Cralle

Ice cream today would not be the same without the work of Alfred Cralle. Born just after the Civil War, he had an affinity for mechanics as a young age, and would go study at Wayland Seminary, a school set up after the Civil War to educate newly freed African-Americans.

Cralle would go on to work as a porter at a drugstore and a hotel in Philadelphia, and developed the idea of the ice cream scoop while watching people struggle using two different spoons to get the ice cream into cones. Cralle's mechanical inventional, which is the basis of how ice cream scoops work to this day, was invented in 1897.

Cralle would also become a successful promoter of businesses in Philly, and was the assistant manager of the Afro-American Financial, Accumulating, Merchandise, and Business Association in Pittsburgh.

Ever heard the story of how potato chips were invented to spite a customer at a restaurant? George Crum was the chef at said restaurant, the Moon Lake Lodge resort in Saratoga Springs. A customer came in around the summer of 1853 wanting extra-thin French Fries, frustrating Crum to the point he sliced them as thin as possible, fried them in grease, and sent them out.

The chips became a big hit, eventually becoming known as "Saratoga Chips." While Crum never patented the dish, he did open his own restaurant, "Crumbs House," that served a basket of them at every table.

Chips wouldn't become a grocery product until 1895, and the concept of bagged chips didn't show up until 1926.

Joseph Lee was one of the most influential people when it came to industrializing the way we make bread.

Having worked in a bakery from a young age, Lee eventually became the owner of two restaurants in Boston, as well as a hotel and a catering company. Looking to find a way to minimize bread waste, he eventually invented a machine that would convert day-old bread into breadcrumbs. Patented in 1895, he later sold the rights and the breadcrumb maker would spread across the world.

That wasn't Lee's only invention, however. He would later patent the idea for an automatic bread maker that mixed and kneaded the dough, the basis to the same devices (think, stand mixers) that we still use in our kitchens today.

Lloyd Hall is considered to be one of the pioneers in the world of food chemistry. A pharmaceutical chemist for Griffith Laboratories in Chicago who completed graduate school, Hall would be awarded over 100 patents and received multiple honorary doctorate degrees for his work.

Hall's main area of work came around the development of techniques to preserve food. Some of his most revolutionary patents included using  "flash-dried" salt crystals that revolutionized meatpacking. He also introduced the use of antioxidants to prevent the spoilage of fats and oils in baked goods, and developed a process known as "Ethylene Oxide Vacugas," which could control the growth of bacteria and molds in food.

John Standard was an inventor instrumental in modernizing two pieces of kitchen equipment that virtually every household has today: stoves and refrigerators.

Refrigeration was a concept that was being researched as early as the 1830s, but mainly focused on using some sort of power. Standard's improvement to the fridge, patented in 1891, was an unpowered design that used a manually filled ice chamber as the central cooling unit.

Standard also made significant upgrades to the oil-powered stove, patenting one with a space-saving design in 1889 that could be used in applications like buffet-style meals on trains.

If you've worked in the food industry or any commercial transportation that required keeping stuff cold, you've likely seen the Thermo King brand somewhere in your lifetime. Frederick McKinley Jones was the founder of that company, and inventor of the first automated refrigerated system for trucks.

A skilled and gifted electrician and mechanic, Jones had patents for sixty different inventions across a wide variety of fields, including the portable X-ray machine, motion picture devices, and even medical storage units.

He's most known for the Thermo King, the refrigerated system he invented, because it allowed for fresh goods from around the world to be transported and sold in stores. Jones is essentially responsible for not just all refrigerated transport globally, but also the entire frozen food industry.

Known as the "Oyster King of New York," Downing was most known for his 19th-century restaurant, Thomas Downing's Oyster House. His oyster hall was legendary, with prominent figures like Queen Victoria and Charles Dickens having dined there.

Downing was born a free man, as his parents were freed by plantation owner John Downing. He grew up and was educated on Chincoteague Island in Virginia, and eventually made his way up to New York following the war of 1812. Like many other African-Americans in New York, Downing eventually went into the oyster business, opening his own oyster cellar in the 1820s.

Oyster cellars were the universal food of New York at the time (similar to hot dogs today), but many establishments weren't as trusted as Downing's. That's because he specifically catering it towards the fine dining clientele, with a large dining area, carpet, and chandeliers gracing the hall. Elaborate dishes like oyster-stuffed turkeys and a pan roast made with wine and chili graced the menu.

This, at the time, meant that African-Americans couldn't eat Downing's restaurant, but few were aware of the double life he led. Downing's basement was a key stop in the Underground Railroad, and as an abolitionist, he helped many that were escaping the South in search of freedom. He also led political efforts, funding schools for African-American children and leading the fight in desegregating New York's trolley system.

Downing was so regarded in New York that when he passed away in 1866, the New York City Chamber of Commerce closed so that its members could attend his funeral.

The sugar industry in the United States has Norbert Rillieux to thank for allowing them to become so powerful. Were it not for his inventions, making sugar would still be a time-consuming and dangerous process.

Originally, the sugar refinement process, known as "The Jamaica Train," was dangerous and expensive. Laborers (usually slaves) would transfer ladles of scalding hot sugar case juice between open boiling kettles, often resulting in scalding and terrible burns (anyone who's worked with sugar knows how painful it can be). The result was a dark syrup that was molded into cones and dried before being sold.

From  1834-1843, Rillieux developed a system for refining and crystallizing sugar using a much safer and controlled method, allowing the United States to eventually dominate the sugar market. His process is still used today for freeze-drying food, pigments, and other food products.

Many people know George Washington Carver for the myriad of products he invented that utilized peanuts or sweet potatoes. As an agricultural scientist working in the South, he was also a man responsible for helping revitalize much of the economy in that region.

Working out of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, Carver was a teacher and a researcher from the late 1890s until his passing in 1943. An early pioneer of crop rotation, he encouraged farmers to plant peanuts in the soil after harvest to replenish lost nutrients, helping farmers improve not just their livelihoods, but their diets as well.

Carver's research and work focused on revitalizing soil and maximizing plant production while keeping costs to a minimum. Outside of agriculture, he was a massive promoter of racial equality, and massive advocate of peanut oil as a potential treatment for polio. While never proven, the claim was widely circulated in media, and eventually turned into a "Peanuts for Polio" fundraising effort that helped raise money for medical care and benefits for children affected with the disease.

Following Carver's passing, then-Senator Harry S. Truman sponsored legislation that would lead to the construction of the George Washington Carver National Monument. It was the first-ever national memorial to an African-American.