#3. Follow the rules set in place for not going to critical areas after bad winters and storms and stir up the loose dirt

[blacknpurplewarpster]

Today is an utter shit show and he wants it to be over with.

[bagopucks]

Q. Hughes - Softly, Sweetly

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Quinn Hughes x Fem!reader

Requested✨

Word Count: 2.8k

Warning(s): Just some making out, proofread once <3

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“And you’re sure they’re not coming home?” I asked softly, slowly stepping out of the car Quinn had picked me up in. The car that his parents didn’t use to take Luke and Jack out.

Quinn and I didn’t have plans to hang out. We’d skipped out on making plans specifically because he was going to go to Jack’s hockey game with his family. I knew things had changed when he texted me two hours after school saying, ‘I’ll pick you up for a movie?’

I knew what that meant. Quinn was a homebody. It meant we were going to lay on the couch, curled up under a million blankets, and watch a cheesy Christmas movie. I was all in.

“Hockey games take like.. three hours with all the breaks and stopping. We have a lot of time.” Quinn assured me, and I knew we had even more time considering the rink Jack was playing at, was an hour away. He rushed over to my place to get me the second he knew his parents hadn’t turned around to come back after forgetting something.

Quinn grabbed his house keys and unlocked the front door, letting me step inside first and shed the winter coat I’d been wearing. I hung it on the coat rack next to the door. When I looked back at Quinn, he was smiling at me. The simple sight of his lips turned upward made me blush. Especially when I knew it was something I did to make him so happy.

“You walk around here like you own the place,” Quinn teased, pushing the door shut and wrapping his arms around my torso to hug me.

“I’m sorry?” I wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing.

“No.. no I love it. I want you to walk around our house like this some day.” His words caught me off guard, but it wasn’t the first time Quinn had mentioned something of the sort. I did at times too.

Being seniors in high school, we both had individual paths we wanted to take. One thing we knew for sure though, was that we wanted to stay together. But Quinn and I were practical people. We were both afraid it might not work out like that. So we counted our blessings while we had them, and decided to cherish the time knew we had together.

“What’s on the agenda tonight, Quintin?” I asked softly, sighing as the dark haired boy pulled away from me. He began to step out of the entryway before I grabbed his wrist. “Shoes.”

My simple reminder had Quinn quickly kicking his wet shoes off before I released his hand and let him go. I kneeled over to untie and take off my own shoes. I set them aside before stepping further into the house.

“I thought.. maybe a blanket fort?” Quinn’s voice grew distant as he wandered down the hall. I heard a door open, then a quiet grunt.

“I’ve been told I’m a professional at those!” I responded loud enough for him to hear, my eyes lit up when Quinn returned with a large folded comforter.

“Really? That’s good..” a nervous laugh fell from his lips. “Jack says I suck at them.” His words made me laugh quietly. Jack always criticized his brothers. Ever the loud and opinionated middle child. “Come help me get the rest of the blankets off my bed.”

It was clear Quinn thought nothing of the offer, but I’d never been in his room before. It was a rule: no girls in the bedrooms. It made me wonder if Quinn simply forgot, or chose to ignore it since we were alone.

I followed behind him, hesitant but excited as I stepped through the door of his room. It was painted a deep blue, decorated with hockey items and knickknacks. I allowed myself time to look everything over before my eyes landed on Quinn. Just in time to see him tossing blankets at me.

“Quinn Hughes!” I chastised through another laugh. I did my best to hold what I could, while Quinn gathered the rest and led me back out of his room.

I almost fell down the steps on the way back to the living room. I didn’t find it funny, but Quinn certainly did.

Once we got to the living area, we dropped our blankets on the floor and stood side by side. Ready to put our heads together and construct the best blanket fort known to man kind.

I’d give Jack credit where credit is due… Quinn really did suck at blanket forts.

I’d get something draped or situated, and a moment later I’d see the blanket completely fall. Only to look up at the guilty culprit.

“Q.. I love you.. I really do,” I began at one point, staring him down. He immediately pulled his hands away from the light blue sheet he was trying to situate over one of the barstools he’d brought up from the basement.

“You’ve gotta stop messing shit up. We’ll never get to the movie.”

After that, Quinn didn’t touch anything unless I told him to. Once I had things somewhat situated, I allowed him to set up the inside. That, he was much better at. When I finished the outer shell, I knelt down in front of the opening and spotted him setting up a few pillows. Blankets covered the floor too, and the throw pillows from the couch were placed around for extra padding on the sides.

Quinn seemed in his own world, so I let him do his thing, watching. He paused at one point, examining his work, biting his lip, before he went in to fluff one of the pillows. When he turned to call me, he practically jumped out of his skin.

“Dude!”

Ah yes, so affectionate.

“It looks good in here.” I sat on my knees, still outside of the fort. We were missing a few things. I didn’t want to get comfy yet.

“Thanks.” Quinn flashed me a brief smile before slipping out from beneath the fort. I stood with him. “Do you want to grab snacks? And I’ll grab the iPad?”

It sounded like a good compromise to me. I nodded.

“Maybe two bottles of water too!” I heard Quinn call as we went our separate was.

We joined up again outside of the fort, my arms full of various chip bags and a box of goldfish. Quinn’s only held his iPad. He helped by taking a few of the snacks from my hands.

Quinn directed me to the side of the fort where the pillow he previously fluffed was. I was the first to get comfortable and lay out snacks, while he had gone to turn off the lights in the living room. When Quinn came back, I was already scrolling through his iPad for movies to watch. He was quick to take up the empty space next to me, leaning on his elbow to see the screen so he could help.

“What are we in the mood for?” I asked quietly, eyeing the comedy section of the streaming service.

“What about The Mighty Ducks?” A different request than usual, but I could cope with that. It was a good movie.

“You got it, Quinny.” I moved one of my hands from the iPad, and subconsciously reached to rest my hand on the back of his head. I carded my fingers gently through his hair.

After I found the movie, Quinn and I got the iPad set up between us. We both laid on our sides, arms tucked beneath our heads for better elevation.

For the good first half of the film, we were pretty occupied. But after a while, I started to notice Quinn stealing occasional glances at me.

I tried to play oblivious. Part of me was really enjoying the movie. But it was impossible to ignore Quinn when he hoisted himself up on all fours and climbed over both the iPad and my body.

“Quinn.” I mumbled, turning my head to watch him settle on his side behind me, wrapping an arm around me. “What are you doing?”

“Wasn’t comfortable.” It was the only response he would offer before his gaze had fallen on the iPad again. My eyes followed shortly after.

Silence fell upon us again. I had to admit I enjoyed being in his arms like this a lot more than across from him.

Quinn’s head eventually dropped to the pillow beside mine. I assumed he’d gotten uncomfortable holding it up, but those assumptions were proven wrong when I felt his warm lips press against the nape of my neck. My heart fluttered.

“Quinn. The movie,” I whispered. I reached back to gently push his head away. I wouldn’t have minded a little fun, but I had to give him some trouble first.

“Come on,” he mumbled, moving his hand to my hip. “We’ve seen it a million times.” His words caused me to chuckle.

I finally rolled over. “Yeah.. I wonder why.” I was quick to shoot back. Quinn deadpanned, then rolled his eyes.

“You’re so mean sometimes.” This time it was my turn to roll my eyes. I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his own, then ended our chaste kiss with a sigh. Quinn didn’t look particularly satisfied. He was in one of those moods.

It wasn’t long before he reconnected our lips, his hand gently rested against my cheek. There’s something so exciting and yet so intimate about kissing Quinn when I wasn’t even supposed to be around him. We were alone together and nobody knew. It’s like we were finally adults in some form or another.

I shifted my body closer to his, our legs tangling together. My hand found the hem of Quinn’s shirt, and slipped beneath it. I giggled into the kiss at the sound of his quiet gasp. My hands must have still been cold.

“You could have warned me,” Quinn whispered quietly as he parted our lips. At first I wasn’t certain what he was talking about.

“My hands?” I smirked and slowly slid them up his chest beneath his shirt. A shiver befell Quinn. “Too cold for Mr. ice hockey?” My taunting earned a sarcastic, ‘ha-ha’ from him.

“I’d ask to take your shirt off, but wouldn’t want you to freeze to death.” Quinn’s eyes never left me. His brow rose as if to ask if I was serious. I gave him a ‘duh’ look in response.

“Have at it.” His words made me snicker. I was careful when I sat up, and tossed one of my legs over his side to straddle him and rest on his hips.

Quinn’s hands found my thighs. He rested them there and smiled up at me as I removed my own hands from beneath his shirt. I leaned forward to reconnect our lips in a much deeper kiss than before. There was a nip at my lip, and I had responded appropriately with one to his own. Still screwing with Quinn even though he was trying to have an intimate moment.

“C’mon,” I parted our lips to whisper. I pushed Quinn’s hands away from my hips, and slipped my own back beneath his shirt to pull it off over his head. A few strands of his beautiful dark hair had been pulled out of place. I tossed his shirt aside, covering the iPad and dimming the only light we had. I could just barely see Quinn, but he looked excited anyway.

My hands ran the expanse of his chest, down to his stomach, up his sides. Quinn’s eyes had fallen at some point to watch my hands. Even as they had travelled up to his shoulders and down his arms, eventually stopping to grab his hands and place them back on my hips. But he had other plans when they slipped to grip my ass.

“You’re the most magnificent person I have ever met.” My words came out as whispers. I leaned forward and reconnected our lips, Quinn‘s hands squeezed in response. It only took a moment before his tongue dragged across my bottom lip, and who was I to deny him access?

I parted my lips for him as one of Quinn’s hands had moved and slipped beneath my shirt to hold onto my hip. He hummed. From what I assumed was pleasure. I carefully dragged my hips against his own, and earned a groan in response. Quinn’s hands ventured further up beneath my shirt, slipping behind my back in hopes of finding my bra clip. His hands halted in their tracks when his phone began to ring. That distinct tone he had set for one person in particular. We stared each other down before I shook my head.

“Answer it.” I knew it was his mom.

He lazily reached for his phone, mumbling something about his mother before answering the call and placing it on speaker.

“Hey, sweetie. I just wanted to let you know we might be back a little later. Traffic was bad on the drive up here. Your father thinks it’ll be worse on the way back.” Ellen’s voice made me smile. The woman was always so kind and personable.

“It’s alright, mom. I think I can keep myself entertained.” I had to cover my mouth to conceal my giggles at his words.

“I know. I know. I just worry leaving you home alone sometimes.” I gently hooked a finger in the waistband of Quinn’s shorts. A surprised gasp left his lips.

“Quinn?”

“I’m okay mom.. sorry- I was just.. I’m okay.” Quinn tried to push my hand away as he spoke, but I gave him a hard time nonetheless, wiggling my hips. His eyes closed tightly, and he drew his bottom lip between his teeth to silence the noise that threatened to escape.

“Sweetie, you promise you’re okay?” Ellen’s concern was endearing, but something neither of us wanted at the moment.

“I’m fine.” His voice was strained, and silence followed his words. Then the screen lit up and Quinn and I both looked down at his phone. Ellen was trying to FaceTime him.

“Holy shit-“ I mumbled out as I climbed off his lap, scrambling to get out of the blanket fort while he grabbed his phone and answered the call.

“Quinn.” His mother sounded suspicious. “Did you hurt yourself? Is everything okay?” Quinn sat up as his mother spoke.

“I’m okay mom. I promise! I just had- it’s nothing.” He adjusted his shorts, glancing up at me before looking back at the phone. I tried to remain as still and quiet as possible.

“Honey..” Ellen sighed, “I swear to god if you have your girlfriend over..” She sounded concerned.

“Mom!” Quinn combated her tone with offense in his own. “You know that’s not me. That’s all Jack.”

My brow rose in a silent, ‘seriously?’ This might have been the first time Quinn had me over without permission, but it certainly wasn’t the first time we’d been together without somebody knowing. Silence followed. Ellen seemed to be deciding whether or not she believed him. Then she sighed.

“Alright.. alright.. I’m sorry honey. I just- after that last incident.. can’t blame me for being a little nervous.” I had to cover my mouth once again not to laugh.

The ‘last’ incident was more like a horror story. Jack had been in trouble for weeks over the whole situation. His mother still got tense about leaving him home alone because of it.

“It’s okay mom. We’re fine.” Quinn spoke, too carefree after assuming he was in the clear.

“We?”

I was sure both of our hearts dropped to our stomachs at the same time.

“You idiot!” I mouthed.

“Quintin.” Ellen spoke sternly. She didn’t have to snap or yell at him to get him to give in. She knew that.

Quinn hung up. My eyes went as wide as they could have possibly gone.

“Quinn! Did you just hang up on her?” I had never seen Ellen when she was furious, nor did I want to.

“I hung up on her.” Quinn confirmed before his phone lit up again.

“You hung up on your mother!” I scolded, and the realization of his actions finally dawned on him.

“Do I answer her again?” Quinn questioned frantically. I gave him a ‘duh’ face before placing my hands on my hips. I would have hated to see Quinn in trouble, but at the same time, it was his mother.. and I didn’t know what else to do aside from encouraging him to turn himself in.

Quinn looked down at his phone and answered the call once again.

It wasn’t on speakerphone.

I still heard Ellen yell his full name at the top of her lungs.

Quinn and I both crossed ourselves when we heard the sound of his mother’s voice.

I knew one thing… I wanted to be home with every door and window locked before Ellen got back to her son. Lest her wrath fall upon me as well.

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[grigori77]

2020 in Movies - My Top 30 Fave Movies (Part 3)

10.  WOLFWALKERS – eleven years ago, Irish director Tomm Moore exploded onto the animated cinema scene with The Secret of Kells, a spellbinding feature debut which captivated audiences the world over and even garnered an Oscar nomination.  Admittedly I didn’t actually even know about it until I discovered his work through his astonishing follow-up, Song of the Sea (another Academy Award nominee), in 2015, so when I finally caught it I was already a fan of Moore’s work.  It’s been a similarly long wait for his third feature, but he’s genuinely pulled off a hat-trick, delivering a third flawless film in a row which OF COURSE means that his latest feature is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, my top animated feature of 2020.  I could even be tempted to say it’s his best work to date … this is an ASTONISHING film, a work of such breath-taking, spell-binding beauty that I spent its entire hour and three-quarters glued to the screen, simple mesmerised by the wonder and majesty of this latest iteration of the characteristically stylised “Cartoon Saloon” look.  It’s also liberally steeped in Moore’s trademark Celtic vibe and atmosphere, once again delving deep into his homeland’s rich and evocative cultural history and mythology while also bringing us something far more original and personal – this time the titular supernatural beings are magical near-human beings whose own subconscious can assume the form of very real wolves.  Set in a particularly dark time in Irish history – namely 1650, when Oliver Cromwell was Lord Protector – the story follows Robyn (Honor Kneafsey, probably best known for the Christmas Prince films), the impetuous and spirited young daughter of English hunter Bill Goodfellowe (Sean Bean), brought in by the Protectorate to rid the city of Kilkenny of the wolves plaguing the area.  One day fate intervenes and Robyn meets Mebh Og MacTire (The Girl at the End of the Garden‘s Eve Whittaker), a wild girl living in the woods, whose accidental bite gives her strange dreams in which she becomes a wolf – turns out Mebh is a wolfwalker, and now so is Robyn … every aspect of this film is an utter triumph for Moore and co, who have crafted a work of living, breathing cinematic art that’s easily the equal to (if not even better than) the best that Disney, Dreamworks or any of the other animation studios could create.  Then there’s the excellent voice cast – Bean brings fatherly warmth and compassion to the role that belies his character’s intimidating size, while Kneafsey and Whittaker make for a sweet and sassy pair as they bond in spite of powerful cultural differences, and the masterful Simon McBurney (Harry Potter, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) brings cool, understated menace to the role of Cromwell himself.  This is a film with plenty of emotional heft to go with its marvels, and once again displays the welcome dark side which added particular spice to Moore’s previous films, but ultimately this is still a gentle and heartfelt work of wonder that makes for equally suitable viewing for children as for those who are still kids at heart – ultimately, then, this is another triumph for one of the most singularly original filmmakers working in animation today, and if Wolfwalkers doesn’t make it third time lucky come Oscars-time then there’s no justice in the world …

9.  WONDER WOMAN 1984 – probably the biggest change for 2020 compared to pretty much all of the past decade is how different the fortunes of superhero cinema turned out to be.  A year earlier the Marvel Cinematic Universe had dominated all, but the DC Extended Universe still got a good hit in with big surprise hit Shazam!  Fast-forward to now and things are VERY different – DC suddenly came out in the lead, but only because Marvel’s intended heavy-hitters (two MCU movies, the first Venom sequel and potential hot-shit new franchise starter Morbius: the Living Vampire) found themselves continuously pushed back thanks to (back then) unforeseen circumstances which continue to shit all over our theatre-going slate for the immediate future.  In the end DC’s only SERIOUS competition turned out to be NETFLIX … never mind, at least we got ONE big established superhero blockbuster into the cinemas before the end of the year that the whole family could enjoy, and who better to headline it than DC’s “newest” big screen megastar, Diana Prince? Back in 2017 Monster’s Ball director Patty Jenkins’ monumental DCEU standalone spectacularly realigned the trajectory of a cinematic franchise that was visibly flagging, redesigning the template for the series’ future which has since led to some (mostly) consistently impressive subsequent offerings.  Needless to say it was a damn tough act to follow, but Jenkins and co-writers Geoff Johns (Arrow and The Flash) and David Callaham (The Expendables, Zombieland: Double Tap, future MCU entry Shang-Chi & the Legend of the Ten Rings) have risen to the challenge in fine style, delivering something which pretty much equals that spectacular franchise debut … as has Gal Gadot, who’s now OFFICIALLY made the role her own thanks to yet another showstopping and definitive performance as the unstoppable Amazonian goddess living amongst us.  She’s older and wiser than in the first film, but still hasn’t lost that forthright honesty and wonderfully pure heart we’ve come to love ever since her introduction in Zack Snyder’s troublesome but ultimately underrated Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (yes, that’s right, I said it!), and Gadot’s clear, overwhelming commitment to the role continues to pay off magnificently as she once again proves that Diana is THE VERY BEST superhero in the DCEU cinematic pantheon.  Although it takes place several decades after its predecessor, WW84 is, obviously, still very much a period piece, Jenkins and co this time perfectly capturing the sheer opulent and over-the-top tastelessness of the 1980s in all its big-haired, bad-suited, oversized shoulder-padded glory while telling a story that encapsulates the greedy excessiveness of the Reagan era, perfectly embodied in the film’s nominal villain, Max Lord (The Mandalorian himself, Pedro Pascal), a wishy-washy wannabe oil tycoon conman who chances upon a supercharged wish-rock and unleashes a devastating supernatural “monkey’s paw” upon the world. To say any more would give away a whole raft of spectacular twists and turns that deserve to be enjoyed good and cold, although they did spoil one major surprise in the trailer when they teased the return of Diana’s first love, Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) … needless to say this is another big blockbuster bursting with big characters, big action and BIG IDEAS, just what we’ve come to expect after Wonder Woman’s first triumphant big screen adventure.  Interestingly, the film starts out feeling like it’s going to be a bubbly, light, frothy affair – after a particularly stunning all-action opening flashback to Diana’s childhood on Themyscira, the film proper kicks off with a bright and breezy atmosphere that feels a bit like the kind of Saturday morning cartoon action the consistently impressive set-pieces take such unfettered joy in parodying, but as the stakes are raised the tone grows darker and more emotionally potent, the storm clouds gathering for a spectacularly epic climax that, for once, doesn’t feel too overblown or weighed down by its visual effects, while the intelligent script has unfathomable hidden depths to it, making us think far more than these kinds of blockbusters usually do.  It’s really great to see Chris Pine return since he was one of the best things about the first movie, and his lovably childlike wide-eyed wonder at this brave new world perfectly echoes Diana’s own last time round; Kristen Wiig, meanwhile, is pretty phenomenal throughout as Dr Barbara Minerva, the initially geeky and timid nerd who discovers an impressive inner strength but ultimately turns into a superpowered apex predator as she becomes one of Wonder Woman’s most infamous foes, the Cheetah; Pascal, of course, is clearly having the time of his life hamming it up to the hilt as Lord, playing gloriously against his effortlessly cool, charismatic action hero image to deliver a compellingly troubling examination of the monstrous corrupting influence of absolute power.  Once again, though, the film truly belongs to Gadot – she looks amazing, acts her socks off magnificently, and totally rules the movie.  After this, a second sequel is a no-brainer, because Wonder Woman remains the one DC superhero who’s truly capable of bearing the weight of this particular cinematic franchise on her powerful shoulders – needless to say, it’s already been greenlit, and with both Jenkins and Gadot onboard, I’m happy to sign up for more too …

8.  LOVE & MONSTERS – with the cinemas continuing their frustrating habit of opening for a little while and then closing while the pandemic ebbed and flowed in the months after the summer season, it was starting to look like there might not have been ANY big budget blockbusters to enjoy before year’s end as heavyweights like Black Widow, No Time To Die and Dune pulled back to potentially more certain release slots into 2021 (with only WW84 remaining stubbornly in place for Christmas).  Then Paramount decided to throw us a bone, opting to release this post-apocalyptic horror comedy on-demand in October instead, thus giving me the perfect little present to tie me over during the darkening days of autumn. The end result was a stone-cold gem that came out of nowhere to completely blow critics away, a spectacular sleeper hit that ultimately proved one of the year’s biggest and most brilliant surprises.  Director Michael Matthews may only have had South African indie thriller Five Fingers for Marseilles under his belt prior to this, but he proves he’s definitely a solid talent to watch in the future, crafting a fun and effective thrill-ride that, like all the best horror comedies, is consistently as funny as it is scary, sharing much of the same DNA as this particular mash-up genre’s classics like Tremors and Zombieland and standing up impressively well to such comparisons.  The story, penned by rising star Brian Duffield (who has TWO other entries on this list, Underwater and Spontaneous) and Matthew Robinson (The Invention of Lying, Dora & the Lost City of Gold), is also pretty ingenious and surprisingly original – a meteorite strike has unleashed weird mutagenic pathogens that warp various creepy crawly critters into gigantic monstrosities that have slaughter most of the world’s human population, leaving only a beleaguered, dwindling few to eke out a precarious living in underground colonies. Living in one such makeshift community is Joel Dawson (The Maze Runner’s Dylan O’Brien), a smart and likeable geek who really isn’t very adventurous, is extremely awkward and uncoordinated, and has a problem with freezing if threatened … which makes it all the more inexplicable when he decides, entirely against the advice of everyone he knows, to venture onto the surface so he can make the incredibly dangerous week-long trek to the neighbouring colony where his girlfriend Aimee (Iron Fist’s Jessica Henwick) has ended up.  Joel is, without a doubt, the best role that O’Brien has EVER had, a total dork who’s completely unsuited to this kind of adventure and, in the real world, sure to be eaten alive in the first five minutes, but he’s also such a fantastically believable, fallible everyman that every one of us desperate, pathetic omega-males and females can instantly put ourselves in his place, making it elementarily easy to root for him.  He’s also hilariously funny, his winningly self-deprecating sass and pitch perfect talent for physical comedy making it all the more rewarding watching each gloriously anarchic life-and-death encounter mould him into the year’s most unlikely action hero.  Henwick, meanwhile, once again impresses in a well-written role where she’s able to make a big impression despite her decidedly short screen time, as do the legendary Michael Rooker and brilliant newcomer Ariana Greenblatt as Clyde and Minnow, the adorably jaded, seen-it-all-before pair of “professional survivors” Joel meets en-route, who teach him to survive on the surface.  The action is fast, frenetic and potently visceral, the impressively realistic digital creature effects bringing a motley crew of bloodthirsty beasties to suitably blood-curdling life for the film’s consistently terrifying set-pieces, while the world-building is intricately thought-out and skilfully executed.  Altogether, this was an absolute joy from start to finish, and a film I enthusiastically endorsed to everyone I knew was looking for something fun to enjoy during the frustrating lockdown nights-in.  One of the cinematic year’s best kept secrets then, and a compelling sign of things to come for its up-and-coming director.

7.  PARASITE – I’ve been a fan of master Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho ever since I stumbled across his deeply weird but also thoroughly brilliant breakthrough feature The Host, and it’s a love that’s deepened since thanks to truly magnificent sci-fi actioner Snowpiercer, so I was looking forward to his latest feature as much as any movie geek, but even I wasn’t prepared for just what a runaway juggernaut of a hit this one turned out to be, from the insane box office to all that award-season glory (especially that undeniable clean-sweep at the Oscars). I’ll just come out and say it, this film deserves it all.  It’s EASILY Bong’s best film to date (which is really saying something), a masterful social satire and jet black comedy that raises some genuinely intriguing questions before delivering deeply troubling answers.  Straddling the ever-widening gulf between a disaffected idle rich upper class and impoverished, struggling lower class in modern-day Seoul, it tells the story of the Kim family – father Ki-taek (Bong’s good luck charm, Song Kang-ho), mother Chung-sook (Jang Hye-jin), son Ki-woo (Train to Busan’s Choi Woo-shik) and daughter Ki-jung (The Silenced’s Park So-dam) – a poor family living in a run-down basement apartment who live hand-to-mouth in minimum wage jobs and can barely rub two pennies together, until they’re presented with an intriguing opportunity.  Through happy chance, Ki-woon is hired as an English tutor for Park Da-hye (Jung Ji-so), the daughter of a wealthy family, which offers him the chance to recommend Ki-jung as an art tutor to the Parks’ troubled young son, Da-song (Jung Hyeon-jun). Soon the rest of the Kims are getting in on the act, the kids contriving opportunities for their father to replace Mr Park’s chauffeur and their mother to oust the family’s long-serving housekeeper, Gook Moon-gwang (Lee Jung-eun), and before long their situation has improved dramatically.  But as they two families become more deeply entwined, cracks begin to show in their supposed blissful harmony as the natural prejudices of their respective classes start to take hold, and as events spiral out of control a terrible confrontation looms on the horizon.  This is social commentary at its most scathing, Bong drawing on personal experiences from his youth to inform the razor-sharp script (co-written by his production assistant Han Jin-won), while he weaves a palpable atmosphere of knife-edged tension throughout to add spice to the perfectly observed dark humour of the situation, all the while throwing intriguing twists and turns at us before suddenly dropping such a massive jaw-dropper of a gear-change that the film completely turns on its head to stunning effect.  The cast are all thoroughly astounding, Song once again dominating the film with a turn at once sloppy and dishevelled but also poignant and heartfelt, while there are particularly noteworthy turns from Lee Sun-kyun as the Parks’ self-absorbed patriarch Dong-ik and Choi Yeo-jeong (The Concubine) as his flighty, easily-led wife Choi Yeon-gyo, as well as a fantastically weird appearance in the latter half from Park Myung-hoon.  This is heady stuff, dangerously seductive even as it becomes increasingly uncomfortable viewing, so that even as the screws tighten and everything goes to hell it’s simply impossible to look away.  Bong Joon-ho really has surpassed himself this time, delivering an existential mind-scrambler that lingers long after the credits have rolled and might even have you questioning your place in society once you’ve thought about it some. It deserves every single award and every ounce of praise it’s been lavished with, and looks set to go down as one of the true cinematic greats of this new decade.  Trust me, if this was a purely critical best-of list it’d be RIGHT AT THE TOP …

6.  THE OLD GUARD – Netflix’ undisputable TOP OFFERING of the summer came damn close to bagging the whole season, and I can’t help thinking that even if some of the stiffer competition had still been present it may well have still finished this high. Gina Prince-Blythewood (Love & Basketball, the Secret Life of Bees) directs comics legend Greg Rucka’s adaptation of his own popular series with uncanny skill and laser-focused visual flair considering there’s nothing on her previous CV to suggest she’d be THIS good at mounting a stomping great ultraviolent action thriller, ushering in a thoroughly engrossing tale of four ancient, invulnerable immortal warriors – Andy AKA Andromache of Scythia (Charlize Theron), Booker AKA Sebastian de Livre (Matthias Schoenaerts), Joe AKA Yusuf Al-Kaysani (Wolf’s Marwan Kenzari) and Nicky AKA Niccolo di Ginova (Trust’s Luca Marinelli) – who’ve been around forever, hiring out their services as mercenaries for righteous causes while jealously guarding their identities for fear of horrific experimentation and exploitation should their true natures ever be discovered.  Their anonymity is threatened, however, when they’re uncovered by former CIA operative James Copley (Chiwetel Ejiofor), who’s working for the decidedly dodgy pharmaceutical conglomerate run by sociopathic billionaire Steven Merrick (Harry Melling, formerly Dudley in the Harry Potter movies), who want to capture these immortals so they can patent whatever it is that makes them keep on ticking … just as a fifth immortal, US Marine Nile Freeman (If Beale Street Could Talk’s KiKi Layne), awakens after being “killed” on deployment in Afghanistan.  The supporting players are excellent, particularly Ejiofor, smart and driven but ultimately principled and deeply conflicted about what he’s doing, even if he does have the best of intentions, and Melling, the kind of loathsome, reptilian scumbag you just love to hate, but the film REALLY DOES belong to the Old Guard themselves – Schoenaerts is a master brooder, spot-on casting as the group’s relative newcomer, only immortal since the Napoleonic Wars but clearly one seriously old soul who’s already VERY tired of the lifestyle, while Joe and Nicky (who met on opposing sides of the Crusades) are simply ADORABLE, an unapologetically matter-of-fact gay couple who are sweet, sassy and incredibly kind, the absolute emotional heart of the film; it’s the ladies, however, that are most memorable here.  Layne is exceptional, investing Nile with a steely intensity that puts her in good stead as her new existence threatens to overwhelm her and MORE THAN qualified to bust heads alongside her elders … but it’s ancient Greek warrior Andy who steals the film, Theron building on the astounding work she did in Atomic Blonde to prove, once and for all, that there’s no woman on Earth who looks better kicking arse than her (as Booker puts it, “that woman has forgotten more ways to kill than entire armies will ever learn”); in her hands, Andy truly is a goddess of death, tough as tungsten alloy and unflappable even in the face of hell itself, but underneath it all she hides a heart as big as any of her friends’.  They’re an impossibly lovable bunch and you feel you could follow them on another TEN adventures like this one, which is just as well, because Prince-Blythewood and Rucka certainly put them through their paces here – the drama is high (but frequently laced with a gentle, knowing sense of humour, particularly whenever Joe and Nicky are onscreen), as are the stakes, and the frequent action sequences are top-notch, executed with rare skill and bone-crunching zest, but also ALWAYS in service to the story.  Altogether this is an astounding film, a genuine victory for its makers and, it seems, for Netflix themselves – it’s become one of the platform’s biggest hits to date, earning well-deserved critical acclaim and great respect and genuine geek love from the fanbase at large.  After this, a sequel is not only inevitable, it’s ESSENTIAL …

5.  MANK – it’s always nice when David Fincher, one of my TOP FIVE ALL TIME FAVOURITE DIRECTORS, drops a new movie, because it can be GUARANTEED to place good and high in my rundown for that year.  The man is a frickin’ GENIUS, a true master of the craft, genuinely one of the auteur’s auteurs.  I’ve NEVER seen him deliver a bad film – even a misfiring Fincher (see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button or Alien 3) is still capable of creating GREAT CINEMA.  How? Why?  It’s because he genuinely LOVES the art form, it’s been his obsession all his life, and he’s spent every day of it becoming the best possible filmmaker he can be.  Who better to tell the story of the creation of one of the ULTIMATE cinematic masterpieces, then?  Benjamin Ross’ acclaimed biopic RKO 281 covered similar ground, presenting a compelling look into the making Citizen Kane, the timeless masterpiece of Hollywood’s ULTIMATE auteur, Orson Welles, but Fincher’s film is more interested in the original inspiration for the story, how it was written and, most importantly, the man who wrote it – Herman J. Mankiewicz, known to his friends as Mank. One of my favourite actors of all time, Gary Oldman, delivers yet another of his career best performances in the lead role, once a man of vision and incredible storytelling skill whose talents have largely been squandered through professional difficulties and personal vices, a burned out one-time great fallen on hard times whom Welles picks up out of the trash, dusts off and offers a chance to create something truly great again.  The only catch?  The subject of their film (albeit dressed up in the guise of fictional newspaper magnate Charles Foster Kane) is to be real-life publisher, politico and tycoon William Randolph Hurst (Charles Dance), once Mank’s friend and patron before they had a very public and messy falling out which partly led to his current circumstances.  As he toils away in seclusion on what is destined to become his true masterwork, flashbacks reveal to us the fascinating, moving and ultimately tragic tale of his rise and fall from grace in the movie business, set against the backdrop of one of the most tumultuous periods in American history.  Shooting a script that his own journalist and screenwriter father, Jack, crafted and then failed to bring to the screen himself before his death in 2003, Fincher has been working for almost a quarter century to make this film, and all that passion and drive is writ large on the screen – this is a glorious film ABOUT film, the art of it, the creation of it, and all the dirty little secrets of what the industry itself has always really been like, especially in that most glamorous and illusory of times.  The fact that Fincher shot in black and white and intentionally made it look like it was made in the early 1940s (the “golden age of the Silver Screen”, if you will) may seem like a gimmick, but instead it’s a very shrewd choice that expertly captures the gloss and moodiness of the age, almost looking like a contemporary companion piece to Kane itself, and it’s the perfect way to frame all the sharp-witted observation, subtly subversive character development and murky behind-the-scenes machinations that tell the story.  Oldman is in every way the star here, holding the screen with all the consummate skill and flair we’ve come to expect from him, but there’s no denying the uniformly excellent supporting cast are equal to the task here – Dance is at his regal, charismatic best as Hearst, while Amanda Seyfried is icily classy on the surface but mischievous and lovably grounded underneath as Hearst’s mistress, Marion Davies, who formed the basis for Kane’s most controversial character, Arliss Howard (Full Metal Jacket, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Moneyball) brings nuance and complexity to the role of MGM founder Louis B. Mayer, Tom Pelphrey (Banshee, Ozark) is understated but compelling as Mank’s younger screenwriter brother Joseph, and Lily Collins and Tuppence Middleton exude class and long-suffering stubbornness as the two main women in Mank’s life (his secretary and platonic muse, Rita Alexander, and his wife, Sara), while The Musketeers’ Tom Burke’s periodic but potent appearances as Orson Welles help to drive the story in the “present”.  Another Netflix release which I was (thankfully) able to catch on the big screen during one of the brief lulls between British lockdowns, this was a decidedly meta cinematic experience that perfectly encapsulated not only what is truly required for the creation of a screen epic, but also the latest pinnacle in the career of one of the greatest filmmakers working in the business today, powerful, stirring, intriguing and surprising in equal measure. Certainly it’s one of the most important films ABOUT so far film this century, but is it as good as Citizen Kane?  Boy, that’s a tough one …

4.  ENOLA HOLMES – ultimately, my top film for the autumn/winter movie season was also the film which finally topped my Netflix Original features list, as well as beating all other streaming offerings for the entire year (which is saying something, as you should know by now).  Had things been different, this would have been one of Warner Bros’ BIGGEST releases for the year in the cinema, of that I have no doubt, a surprise sleeper hit which would have taken the world by storm – as it is it’s STILL become a sensation, albeit in a much more mid-pandemic, lockdown home-viewing kind of way.  Before you start crying oh God no, not another Sherlock Holmes adaptation, this is a very different beast from either the Guy Ritchie take or the modernized BBC show, instead side-lining the great literary sleuth in favour of a delicious new AU version, based on The Case of the Missing Marquess, the first novel in the Enola Holmes Mysteries literary series from American YA author Nancy Springer.  Positing that Sherlock Holmes (Henry Cavill) and his elder brother Mycroft (Sam Claflin) had an equally ingenious and precocious baby sister, the film introduces us to Enola (Stranger Things’ Millie Bobby Brown), who’s been raised at home by their strong-willed mother Eudoria (Helena Bonham Carter) to be just as intelligent, well-read and intellectually skilled as her far more advantageously masculine elder siblings.  Then, on the morning of her sixteenth birthday, Enola awakens to find her mother has vanished, putting her in a pretty pickle since this leaves her a ward of Mycroft, a self-absorbed social peacock who finds her to be wilfully free-spirited and completely ill equipped to face the world, concluding that the only solution is sending her to boarding school where she’ll learn to become a proper lady.  Needless to say she’s horrified by the prospect, deciding to run away and search for her mother instead … this is about as perfect a family adventure film as you could wish for, following a vital, capable and compelling teen detective-in-the-making as she embarks on her very first investigation, as well as winding up tangled in a second to boot involving a young runaway noble, Viscount Tewkesbury, the Marquess of Basilwether (Medici’s Louis Partridge), and the film is a breezy, swift-paced and rewardingly entertaining romp that feels like a welcome breath of fresh air for a literary property which, beloved as it may be, has been adapted to death over the years.  Enola Holmes a brilliant young hero who’s perfectly crafted to carry the franchise forward in fresh new directions, and Brown brings her to life with effervescent charm, boisterous energy and mischievous irreverence that are entirely irresistible; Cavill and Claflin, meanwhile, are perfectly cast as the two very different brothers – this Sherlock is much less louche and world-weary than most previous versions, still razor sharp and intellectually restless but with a comfortable ease and a youthful spring in his step that perfectly suits the actor, while Mycroft is as superior and arrogant as ever, a preening arse we derive huge enjoyment watching Enola consistently get the best of; Bonham Carter doesn’t get a lot of screen-time but as we’d expect she does a lot with what she has to make the practical, eccentric and unapologetically modern Eudoria thoroughly memorable, while Partridge is carefree and likeable as the naïve but irresistible Tewkesbury, and there are strong supporting turns from Frances de la Tour as his stately grandmother, the Dowager, Susie Wokoma (Crazyhead, Truth Seekers) as Emily, a feisty suffragette who runs a jujitsu studio, Burn Gorman as dastardly thug-for-hire Linthorn, and Four Lions’ Adeel Akhtar as a particularly scuzzy Inspector Lestrade.  Seasoned TV director Harry Bradbeer (Fleabag, Killing Eve) makes his feature debut with an impressive splash, unfolding the action at a brisk pace while keeping the narrative firmly focused on an intricate mystery plot that throws in plenty of ingenious twists and turns before a suitably atmospheric climax and pleasing denouement which nonetheless artfully sets up more to come in the future, while screenwriter Jack Thorne (His Dark Materials, The Scouting Book for Boys, Wonder) delivers strong character work and liberally peppers the dialogue with a veritable cavalcade of witty zingers.  Boisterous, compelling, amusing, affecting and exciting in equal measure, this is a spirited and appealing slice of cinematic escapism that flatters its viewers and never talks down to them, a perfect little period adventure for a cosy Sunday afternoon.  Obviously there’s plenty of potential for more, and with further books to adapt there’s more than enough material for a pile of sequels – Neflix would be barmy indeed to turn their nose up at this opportunity …

3.  1917 – it’s a rare thing for a film to leave me truly shell-shocked by its sheer awesomeness, for me to walk out of a cinema in a genuine daze, unable to talk or even really think about much of anything for a few hours because I’m simply marvelling at what I’ve just witnessed.  Needless to say, when I do find a film like that (Fight Club, Inception, Mad Max: Fury Road) it usually earns a place very close to my heart indeed.  The latest tour-de-force from Sam Mendes is one of those films – an epic World War I thriller that plays out ENTIRELY in one shot, which doesn’t simply feel like a glorified gimmick or stunt but instead is a genuine MASTERPIECE of film, a mesmerising journey of emotion and imagination in a shockingly real environment that’s impossible to tear your eyes away from.  Sure, Mendes has impressed us before – his first film, American Beauty, is a GREAT movie, one of the most impressive feature debuts of the 2000s, while Skyfall is, in my opinion, quite simply THE BEST BOND FILM EVER MADE – but this is in a whole other league.  It’s an astounding achievement, made all the more impressive when you realise that there’s very little trickery at play here, no clever digital magic (just some augmentation here and there), it’s all real locations and sets, filmed in long, elaborately choreographed takes blended together with clever edits to make it as seamless as possible – it’s not the first film to try to do this (remember Birdman? Bushwick?), but I’ve never seen it done better, or with greater skill. But it’s not just a clever cinematic exercise, there’s a genuine story here, told with guts and urgency, and populated by real flesh and blood characters – the heart of the film is True History of the Kelly Gang’s George MacKay and Dean Chapman (probably best known as Tommen Baratheon in Game of Thrones) as Lance Corporals Will Schofield and Tom Blake, the two young tommies sent out across enemy territory on a desperate mission to stop a British regiment from rushing headlong into a German trap (Tom himself has a personal stake in this because his brother is an officer in the attack).  They’re a likeable pair, very human and relatable throughout, brave and true but never so overtly heroic that they stretch credibility, so when tragedy strikes along the way it’s particularly devastating; both deliver exceptional performances that effortlessly carry us through the film, and they’re given sterling support from a selection of top-drawer British talent, from Sherlock stars Andrew Scott and Benedict Cumberbatch to Mark Strong and Colin Firth, each delivering magnificently in small but potent cameos.  That said, the cinematography and art department are the BIGGEST stars here, masterful veteran DOP Roger Deakins (The Shawshank Redemption, Blade Runner 2049 and pretty much the Coen Brothers’ entire back catalogue among MANY others) making every frame sing with beauty, horror, tension or tragedy as the need arises, and the environments are SO REAL it feels less like production design than that someone simply sent the cast and crew back in time to film in the real Northern France circa 1917 – from a nightmarish trek across No Man’s Land to a desperate chase through a ruined French village lit only by dancing flare-light in the darkness before dawn, every scene is utterly immersive and simply STUNNING.  I don’t think it’s possible for Mendes to make a film better than this, but I sure hope he gives it a go all the same.  Either way, this was the most incredible, exhausting, truly AWESOME experience I had at the cinema all year – it’s a film that DESERVES to be seen on the big screen, and I feel truly sorry for those who missed the chance …

2.  BIRDS OF PREY & THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN – the only reason 1917 isn’t at number two is because Warner Bros.’ cinematic DC Extended Universe project FINALLY got round to bringing my favourite DC Comics title to the big screen.  It was been the biggest pleasure of my cinematic year getting to see my top DC superheroines brought to life on the big screen, and it was done in high style, in my opinion THE BEST of the DCEU films to date (yup, I loved it EVEN MORE than the Wonder Woman movies).  It was also great seeing Harley Quinn return after her show-stealing turn in David Ayer’s clunky but ultimately still hugely enjoyable Suicide Squad, better still that they got her SPOT ON this time – this is the Harley I’ve always loved in the comics, unpredictable, irreverent and entirely without regard for what anyone else thinks of her, as well as one talented psychiatrist.  Margot Robbie once more excels in the role she was basically BORN to play, clearly relishing the chance to finally do Harley TRUE justice, and she’s a total riot from start to finish, infectiously lovable no matter what crazy, sometimes downright REPRIHENSIBLE antics she gets up to.  Needless to say she’s the nominal star here, her latest ill-advised adventure driving the story – finally done with the Joker and itching to make her emancipation official, Harley publicly announces their breakup by blowing up Ace Chemicals (their love spot, basically), inadvertently painting a target on her back in the process since she’s no longer under the assumed protection of Gotham’s feared Clown Prince of Crime – but that doesn’t mean she eclipses the other main players the movie’s REALLY supposed to be about.  Each member of the Birds of Prey is beautifully written and brought to vivid, arse-kicking life by what had to be 2020’s most exciting cast – Helena Bertinelli, the Huntress, is the perfect character for Mary Elizabeth Winstead to finally pay off on that action hero potential she showed in Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, but this is a MUCH more enjoyable role outside of the fight choreography because while Helena may be a world-class dark avenger, socially she’s a total dork, which just makes her thoroughly adorable; Rosie Perez is similarly perfect casting as Renee Montoya, the uncompromising pint-sized Gotham PD detective who kicks against the corrupt system no matter what kind of trouble it gets her into, and just gets angrier all the time, paradoxically making us like her even more; and then there’s the film’s major controversy, at least as far as the fans are concerned, namely one Cassandra Cain.  Sure, this take is VERY different from the comics’ version (a nearly mute master assassin who went on to become the second woman to wear the mask of Batgirl before assuming her own crime-fighting mantle as Black Bat and now Orphan), but personally I like to think this is simply Cass at THE VERY START of her origin story, leaving plenty of time for her to discover her warrior origins when the DCEU finally gets around to introducing her mum, Lady Shiva (personally I want Michelle Yeoh to play her, but that’s just me) – anyways, here she’s a skilled child pickpocket whose latest theft inadvertently sets off the larger central plot, and newcomer Ella Jay Basco brings a fantastic pre-teen irreverence and spiky charm to the role, beautifully playing against Robbie’s mercurial energy.  My favourite here BY FAR, however, is Dinah Lance, aka the Black Canary (not only my favourite Bird of Prey but my very favourite DC superheroine PERIOD), the choice of up-and-comer Jurnee Smollet-Bell (Friday Night Lights, Underground) proving to be the film’s most inspired casting – a club singer with the metahuman ability to emit piercing supersonic screams, she’s also a ferocious martial artist (in the comics she’s one of the very best fighters IN THE WORLD), as well as a wonderfully pure soul you just can’t help loving, and it made me SO UNBELIEVABLY HAPPY that they got my Canary EXACTLY RIGHT.  Altogether they’re a fantastic bunch of badass ladies, basically my perfect superhero team, and the way they’re all brought together (along with Harley, of course) is beautifully thought out and perfectly executed … they’ve also got one hell of a threat to overcome, namely Gotham crime boss Roman Sionis, the Black Mask, one of the Joker’s chief rivals – Ewan McGregor brings his A-game in a frustratingly rare villainous turn (my number one bad guy for the movie year), a monstrously narcissistic, woman-hating control freak with a penchant for peeling off the faces of those who displease him, sharing some exquisitely creepy chemistry with Chris Messina (The Mindy Project) as Sionis’ nihilistic lieutenant Victor Zsasz.  This is about as good as superhero cinema gets, a perfect example of the sheer brilliance you get when you switch up the formula to create something new, an ultra-violent, unapologetically R-rated middle finger to the classic tropes, a fantastic black comedy thrill ride that’s got to be the most full-on feminist blockbuster ever made – it’s helmed by a woman (Dead Pigs director Cathy Yan), written by a woman (Bumblebee’s Christina Hodson), produced by more women and ABOUT a bunch of badass women magnificently triumphing over toxic masculinity in all its forms.  It’s also simply BRILLIANT – the cast are all clearly having a blast, the action sequences are first rate (the spectacular GCPD evidence room fight in which Harley gets to REALLY cut loose is the undisputable highlight), it has a gleefully anarchic sense of humour and is simply BURSTING with phenomenal homages, references and in-jokes for the fans (Bruce the hyena! Stuffed beaver! Roller derby!).  It’s also got a killer soundtrack, populated almost exclusively by numbers from female artists.  Altogether, then, this is the VERY BEST the DCEU has to offer to date, and VERY NEARLY my absolute FAVOURITE film of 2020.  Give it all the love you can, it sure as hell deserves it.

1.  TENET – granted, the streaming platforms (particularly Netflix and Amazon) certainly saved our cinematic summer, but I’m still IMMEASURABLY glad that my ultimate top-spot winner FOR THE WHOLE YEAR was one I got to experience on THE BIG SCREEN. You gotta hand it to Christopher Nolan, he sure hung in there, stubbornly determined that his latest cinematic masterpiece WOULD be released in cinemas in the summer (albeit ultimately landing JUST inside the line in the final week of August and ultimately taking the bite at the box office because of the still shaky atmosphere), and it was worth all the fuss because, for me, this was THE PERFECT MOVIE for me to get return to cinemas with.  I mean, okay, in the end it WASN’T the FIRST new movie I saw after the first reopening, that honour went to Unhinged, but THIS was my first real Saturday night-out big screen EXPERIENCE since March.  Needless to say, Nolan didn’t disappoint this time any more than he has on any of his consistently spectacular previous releases, delivering another twisted, mind-boggling headfuck of a full-blooded experiential sensory overload that comes perilously close to toppling his long-standing auteur-peak, Inception (itself second only by fractions to The Dark Knight as far as I’m concerned). To say much at all about the plot would give away major spoilers – personally I’d recommend just going in as cold as possible, indeed you really should just stop reading this right now and just GO SEE IT.  Still with us?  Okay … the VERY abridged version is that it’s about a secret war being waged between the present and the future by people capable of “inverting” time in substances, objects, people, whatever, into which the Protagonist (BlacKkKlansman’s John David Washington), an unnamed CIA agent, has been dispatched in order to prevent a potential coming apocalypse. Washington is once again on top form, crafting a robust and compelling morally complex heroic lead who’s just as comfortable negotiating the minefields of black market intrigue as he is breaking into places or dispatching heavies, Kenneth Branagh delivers one of his most interesting and memorable performances in years as brutal Russian oligarch Andrei Sator, a genuinely nasty piece of work who was ALMOST the year’s very best screen villain, Elizabeth Debicki (The Night Manager, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Widows) brings strength, poise and wounded integrity to the role of Sator’s estranged wife, Kat, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson gets to use his own accent for once as tough-as-nails British Intelligence officer Ives, while there are brief but consistently notable supporting turns and cameos from Martin Donovan, Yesterday’s Himesh Patel, Dirk Gently’s Fiona Dourif and, of course, Nolan’s good luck charm, Michael Caine.  The cast’s biggest surprise, however, is Robert Pattinson, truly a revelation in what has to be, HANDS DOWN, his best role to date, Neil, the Protagonist’s mysterious handler – he’s by turns cheeky, slick, duplicitous and thoroughly badass, delivering an enjoyably multi-layered, chameleonic performance which proves what I’ve long maintained, that the former Twilight star is actually a fucking amazing actor, and on the basis of this, even if that amazing new teaser trailer wasn’t making the rounds, I think the debate about whether or not he’s the right choice for the new Batman is now academic.  As we’ve come to expect from Nolan, this is a TRUE tour-de-force experience, a visual triumph and an endlessly engrossing head-scratcher, Nolan’s screenplay bringing in seriously big ideas and throwing us some major narrative knots and loopholes, constantly wrong-footing the viewer while also setting up truly revelatory payoffs from seemingly low-key, unimportant beginnings – this is a film you need to be awake and attentive for or you could miss something pretty vital. The action sequences are, as ever, second to none, some of the year’s very best set-pieces coming thick and fast and executed with some of the most accomplished skill in the business, while Nolan-regular cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema (Interstellar and Dunkirk, as well as the heady likes of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, SPECTRE and Ad Astra) once again shows he’s one of the best camera-wizards in the business today by delivering some absolutely mesmerising visuals.  Notably, Nolan’s other regular collaborator, composer Hans Zimmer, is absent here (although he had good reason, since he was working on his dream project at the time, the fast-approaching screen adaptation of Dune), but Ludwig Göransson (best known for his collaborations with Ryan Coogler Fruitvale Station, Creed and Black Panther, as well as career-best work on The Mandalorian) is a fine replacement, crafting an intriguingly internalised, post-modern musical landscape that thrums and pulses in time with the story and emotions of the characters rather than the action itself. Interestingly it’s on the subject of sound that some of the film’s rare detractions have been levelled, and I can see some of the points – the soundtrack mix is an all-encompassing thing, and there are times when the dialogue can be overwhelmed, but in Nolan’s defence this film is a heady, immersive experience, something you really need to concentrate on, so these potential flaws are easily forgiven.  As a work of filmmaking art, this is another flawless wonder from one of the true masters of the craft working in cinema today, but it’s art with palpable substance, a rewarding whole that proved truly unbeatable in 2020 …

[chessdaze]

Three Wishes Institute: New Locations part 2

I realized I forgot a few locations in my last post about new locations, so I decided to write out the rest here! Under Read more for Length

Crystal Woods:

The crystal woods is a beautiful place, so much so that beautiful seems like a lacking term. The area is full of crystalized trees and nature, yet it’s all entirely organic and the animals who live in the woods have adapted to the environment, eating crystalized foot or grass like it is nothing. Some animals even have crystals growing off of them - it’s an entirely strange and beautiful phenomenon that modern science is still trying to explain.

The woods might be out of the way from a lot of places (the closest city being around two hours away), but it’s not a tourist trap or even a place people visit often. There are people who come to research, people who come to buy land, but they’re all eventually turned away by the residence. The people here are almost all dwarves or descendants of dwarves, and take pride in the land they stand on. There is also a mine, like in the old stories about dwarves serving a princess, and a lot of the residence work there on a normal basis.

It’s a hub of history and tradition, and thanks to modern technology some people have gotten together to properly document all about their land and it’s history - they don’t mind it they simply didn’t want outsiders to do it, not trusting them to really understand or take everything they talk about seriously.

They do however allow new people to move in if they intend to work in the mine or on the fields to pick and sell crystalized crops (this is their major trade item with other cities / countries, and how the town has reminded in good shape for so long). Though it’s rumored that there is an...extensive interview process.

Emil and Otto are from here, and are one of the bigger families within the small town. Not just from the fact that have a lot of younger siblings, but the fact they have a lot of extended family as well. Most of which, are still pure blooded dwarves, while the twins themselves and most of their siblings are only a quarter dwarf, only having pointed ears to show for it.

Thieves Den:

The thieves den is located in a canyon, where ‘houses’ are carved into the side of the canyon wall. If it wasn’t filled with the worst people imaginable, It could be a popular tourist or vacation spot. Sadly, that is not the case. The people who live here are the worst of the worst, stealing from anyone or anything - sometimes even eachother, which starts brawls that could last all night. While they all sort of agree to follow one ‘king’ or ‘queen’ of thieves, there is no honor here, at the end of the day it’s every thief for themselves.

Still, the way they have crafted the homes in the canyon walls is both beautiful and functional. Magic and minor electricity keeps the place let up and functioning with the basics, rooms are filled with gold and other treasures gather Instead of doors there’s normally walls of beads and jewels, or expensive looking fabrics and tapestry that close off areas.

No one from the land of hot sands goes near the Thieves Den, lest they rob you blind and not even leave you with the clothes on your back. Some people from the slums seek refuge here if they have been kicked out for their ‘bad behavior’ and have no where else to go. Sometimes criminals are thrown in here by the guards of the surrounding cities as punishment for their crimes - either those criminals end up joining the den, or they aren’t heard from again.

There are two people who have connections to the den that are correctly At three wishes. One of them is unaware of the other, but the other is all too familiar with the former and occasionally tries to offer advice that only a thief could...

Sand Dune Slums:

A place that is exactly how it is described - a slum area within the Land of Hot Sands. It’s technically in the shadow of the major city (Modern Agrabah, cause idk what else they would call it honestly), so another name for the location is Agrabah’s shadow. People here are sometimes former criminals that can’t get a paying job in the city thanks to their previous record, or just people who had tried to make it big in the city and gave up at some point, or simply those who can’t afford to live in the extravagant city. Their homes are built out of layers of tarp, wood, and stone blocks - and they have to build within a certain area or else the guards from the city get mad at them, saying they’re ‘ruining the scenery’ since the city is a popular tourist spot. This is why the slums are contained to the back side / shadows of the outer city walls.

There’s a bit of a barter system in place of money, as no one really has a decent amount, ad any they’re going to spend would be spent in the city getting better quality things if that could afford it. However there’s still thugs and lowlifes here who try to steal from others without bartering at all - they only get stopped half of the time - the guards tend to turn a blind eye towards crimes that happen in the slums, focusing more on if any of the population of the slums makes trouble within the city, or throwing people out too the slums.

But, overall, the people here are pretty kind and try to welcome everyone with open arms. There’s lots of community events to keep people’s spirits up and they try to share what they get with anyone they can afford to.

Ozan is originally from here, but after stealing one too many things, he was thrown out of both the city and the slums. Left where no where else to go (other than the thieves den, but they wanted to avoid that place at all costs aswell), they wandered until they found a mirror to transport them somewhere else for them to live - which is how he came to steal items from Three Wishes Institute, and later be accepted into the headmaster’s family.

Underland:

(a big thanks to my friend Freya @twstriddle who let me use this idea that they had come up with and make a few tweaks to).

Underland is the organized crime capital of Twisted Wonderland. It is not a place you ever want to be caught in if you don’t know the unspoken rules of the place. Crime happens 24/7 here, you can barely take a look around without catching at least 3 crimes going on around you.

Having mostly been a dumping ground for the Country of Roses in the distant past, the city itself isn’t too modernized but instead has a more steam based system. This is someone’s Steampunk paradise on the surface; clock towers, exposed machinery with  running gears all day and night, Crazy new inventions being made - and thrown out - every single day. Steampunk fashion is also popular and the most sold (legal) items in the city.

Among the crime families, there is one that practically rules over them all, the Pillars. They practically have a monopoly over most of what comes in and out of the city. They maintain a decent, working relationship with the other families, but they are also the most targeted because of their status. (and funfact the leaders of the Pillars are two husbands. I would say I don’t make the rules, but I very much do in this scenario).

Some say that there has been an uproar in Underland ever since someone stole items from the Pillars and disappeared without a trace.

Chronos Gate:

A stretch of land between the Country of Roses and Underland, which is a famous tourist destination. The land has been touched with time magic, now pretty much forbidden over all of Twisted Wonderland, and while efforts were made in the past to try and correct this area’s disrupted time, no success came of it and soon people founded it as a tourist destination instead.

Different areas of the land have different time zones and seasons, as time does not match up over all of the land. One step you’ll be in summer at noon, the next it might be a dark and cold winter night. The biggest attraction is at what is considered the ‘center’ of the land, time is completely stopped. A special walkway had to be made so that people wouldn’t get trapped here as they traveled through.

Each time one enters a different time, it’s considered walking through a ‘gate’ of time, hence the name of the location.

There are also research facilities set up in multiple areas of the land, studying the time magic and how to dispel it. There are people who live here aswell, but they tend to stick to the outer edges of the land - the ‘beginning’ and ‘end’ gates, the ones closest to Underland and the Country of Roses. These are the two gates that are the most accurate as far as time goes, even if they are a few hours ahead or behind the mentioned areas.

Someone in Three Wishes is very familiar how the Gates work.

Rosa Castletown:

A mysterious castle-town that only few have heard of, and even fewer been to. Apparently it used to be an entire country, but has been dwindled down to just the castle and the surrounding city - all enclosed within large stone walls.

Silas Rosamund is from here and often praises the castle town for persevering through the times, but also has slight criticism for the town as they have not all decided to keep up with the latest technology or trends. A lot of senior citizens move to the castle town because of this, wanting a nice and simple place to retire and relax. They have the basics at least, so at the very least they aren’t entirely in the stone age.

The castle town is said to be rolled by a beautiful and powerful queen, who only shows herself on special nights of the year. International holidays being a few but also a few holidays specific to the town, such as the rose viewing festival - as the castle town, if known by anyone, is known for their roses - they even have vines of roses encasing the walls of the town.

Silas actually lived in the castle as a servant, and tended to the Queen personally, so he’s one of the only ones who has ever seen her face up close.

[ask-de-writer]

A QUIET EVENING WITH THE CMC : MLP Fan Fiction

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A QUIET EVENING WITH THE CMC

by

De Writer (Glen Ten-Eyck)

1208 words

© 2019 by Glen Ten-Eyck

Writing begun 10/01/19

All rights reserved.  This document may not be copied or distributed on or to any medium or placed in any mass storage system except by the express written consent of the author.

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Copyright fair use rules for Tumblr users

Users of Tumblr.com are specifically granted the following rights.  They may reblog the story provided that all author and copyright information remains intact.  They may use the characters or original characters in my settings for fan fiction, fan art works, cosplay, or fan musical compositions.

All sorts of fan art, cosplay, music or fiction is actively encouraged.

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Prompt #3 “Now? Now you listen to me?”

Possible triggers:  graveyard with real ghosts and such.  CMC

As they caught sight of Bonnie, poking her head through the door of her family crypt, the three began to back slowly away.  Sweetie Belle whispering to the other two, “Now?  Now you listen to me?  I told you that coming here was a bad idea.”

Scootaloo replied, “It is not like we are even breaking any sort of rule.  It is still daytime.  The cemetery gate isn't locked yet or anything.”

Bonnie, her cloudy white fur and black mane contrasting well with the aged oak of the crypt door actually agreed.  “You don't need to act frightened.  The orange filly is right.  You have not broken any sort of rules by being here in the daytime, even on the eve of Nightmare Night.  I'm afraid that we don't have any sort of treats for you, though.”

Cautiously, Apple Bloom pointed out, “We might not be quite so cautious if you weren't about half out of that door while it's still closed.  Are you some kind of ghost?”

Bonnie looked back in confusion while she stepped free of the crypt.  “No, I'm not a ghost or anything like that.  The ones here are my friends but I'm not one of them.  I am as alive as you are.  Why would anypony need to open a door?  What does that have to do with going through it?”

The CMC looked at each other blankly.  Apple Bloom pointed, “Are you SURE that you are alive?  See those hinges and lock?  Normal ponies need to unfasten the lock and then they can push the door open, swinging it on those hinges to go in or out.”

Comprehension dawning on her face, Bonnie observed, “So that's what those things are for!  I always wondered.  Before I learned to use a door properly, Zom or Junea always let me out.  I was little then and did not really pay attention.”

The CMC looked at each other in mild consternation.  “Who did you say taught you about using doors?”

Bonnie shrugged, “You know, just the ghosts and my other playmates.  Who else would?”

Pausing, she gave the CMC the old steely eye.  “Exactly what are you doing here?”

Scootaloo looked down and scuffed the grass before she replied, “We heard that Morgripe and his buddies were planning to mess up some graves. That's wrong.  We kinda planned to set them up a sort of “haunted graveyard.”  We got springs and sheets to do fake ghosts that could jump out from behind gravestones.  You know, stuff like that.  Don't want to hurt them, just scare them off so that they don't damage anything.”

Bonnie perked right up!  “Oh, that will be so much fun!  I would love to help you!  I have some friends that would like to help too!  The Nightmare Moon is already up, so they can come out to join us!”

Sweetie Bell looked up at the gibbous moon lurking high in the sky and at the nearly set sun.  “Doesn't the sun have to be down before, um, your buddies can come out?”

“No, silly!  They all follow the Night Mare.  As long as she is up, we can play!  They just usually wait until her sister goes down, that's all.”

Bonnie bounced happily over to a big mausoleum, and stuck her head through the door!  The CMC could not hear anything through the heavy stone and solid door.  

Bonnie cheerfully came back and told them, “Wait here!  I am going to see if Flowering Ash or any of the other Ancient Ones want to help!”

She galloped off towards the back of the cemetery, where it faced the Everfree forest.

Apple Bloom watched her go.  She wondered in a soft voice, “Are Ma and Pa here?  Will they be helping us?”

Sweetie Belle was watching critically and replied, “I don't know, Apple Bloom, but Bonnie just jumped past the wall and it is sort of tumbldown and moss grown.  I have been here before and the back wall was not like that.”

In only a few moments Bonnie came floating serenely back, her legs folded neatly under her as if she were resting on something invisible.  She alighted in front of them and exulted, “We are getting two unicorn litches and Flowering Ash to come help!  We are getting some ghosts too!

“When Flowering Ash gets here, show us how to help and where to set your “haunts!”  The whole graveyard thinks that this is hilarious!”

It was only a few moments before they saw the head of a beautiful gray mare across the moss grown wall.  She reared up, forelegs folded and crossed the wall, her forelegs remaining folded as her huge snakelike body slithered across the stones and undulated swiftly to them.

While the CMC, their eyes bugged out, were watching the lamia, two mostly skeletal unicorn litches leaped gracefully over the wall as well.

With all gathered, Flowering Ash wrapped her long body about the CMC, providing them with a comfortable resting place.  Bonnie, with absolute confidence, joined them in her coils.

Flowering Ash, smiled and suggested, “Please tell us what we need to know to help you set up this trap of frights for those vile vandals.”

Eagerly, Scootaloo dug into a big saddlebag and pulled out parts!  As she set a spring mounted to a cross stick, Apple Bloom pulled out a sheet, bound around soft straw with big googly eyes stuck on!  Sweetie Belle attached trigger strings and set stakes to hold them where hooves would trip them!

Giggling, Bonnie stomped one of the demonstration “ghost's” trigger strings!  The false haunt leaped up, driven by the spring!  It fluttered down flat, except for the bulbous head.  Suddenly it lifted up and floated about, flapping a little.

The CMC clapped hooves in delight!  “A real ghost in our fake one! That is so perfect!”  

They guided the whole group to the area where they had overheard Morgripe and his buddies plotting to cross the cemetery wall.  Choosing tombstones and other grave markers with care, the whole group planted the phony ghosts to provide the best scares.

Thoughtfully, they planted some near the graveyard gate, too.  While they were doing that, Sweetie Belle noticed, “I guess that we are stuck here for the night.  They have locked the gate already.”

Apple Bloom felt the softest of hugs and a gentle neck kiss.  Almost like a breeze, her mane got ruffled.  Her eyes misted up.  “That you, Mom? Dad?  Thanks.”

Flowering Ash pointed out, “If you are here when things happen, it will spoil the effect.  Here, let me help.”

One by one, she held the CMC and lifted them over the wall, setting them gently on their hooves and pulling back to her massive coils for the next.

The next morning, all of Ponyville was abuzz with the story!  Morgripe and his friends had done it again!  They came running over their ladder screaming about ghosts and monsters in the graveyard! Constables opening the gate had got a bit of a fright too, as spring trap “ghosts” jumped out at them!

Morgripe and Co. were in trouble again!  And the CMC, giggling behind their hooves could not say anything about their Nightmare Night adventure that actually worked like it was supposed to!

~THE END~

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[icasttourniquet]

Case Study: Operation Eve, Part I

So your character Babak just fell off a (small) cliff into a (shallow) river and hasn’t gotten up. Luckily, Elyssa is on the scene, ready to figure out what’s wrong with him (which is probably a lot) using the Patient Assessment System (PAS). What does she do first?

In the wilderness, the PAS has three stages, and unfortunately, the second stage is called the primary stage, because I guess outdoorsy people index at zero. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. The first stage is…

Scene Safety

Scenario

Elyssa looks up to the top of the cliff to make sure no one else is near the edge and might fall off. Seeing someone, she yells: “There’s a cliff there! Back up!” The figure backs away. She looks around for other people who could possibly help or (more likely) might get themselves injured and require her help. She doesn’t see anyone.

Next, Elyssa throws on her non-Latex gloves and a set of sunglasses. She’s already wearing close-toed shoes. Before approaching, she gets a general impression of the scene, which looks a bit like this: trauma, possible spine injury, patient appears to be breathing, water is cold, night is coming in an hour, we’re two hours away from a trailhead.

Finally, she assesses the cliff for rock fall potential and doesn’t like what she sees. Because it’s cold and her patient is in the water, and because falling rocks tend to do bad things to the human body, she rushes forward, puts her arms under Babak’s armpits, and drags him backwards, out of the water and away from the cliff, as gently as she can, but not worrying too much about injuring him because, while it isn’t ideal, the falling rocks and cold water will kill him faster than a spine injury.

Methods of Assessment

The first thing Elyssa does is assess scene safety. This is her order of priorities: 1) herself, 2) her second, if she has one, 3) any bystanders, and finally, 4) the injured Babak. That means if she needs to put herself or anyone else at risk to help Babak, she should mission abort now.

Here’s a helpful mnemonic for a NOLS-trained Elyssa:

Who’s number one? Me! Or, in this case, Elyssa.

What happened to you? Get a sense for the mechanism of injury (MOI) or nature of illness (NOI). In this case, the MOI is that Babak has fallen ten feet off a cliff onto his leg and back and is now sitting in freezing cold water, both of which can cause injury.

Don’t get it on me! Elyssa should don gloves, close-toed shoes, sunglasses, etc., to prevent any blood from getting on her.

Are there any more? Often, the loudest patient is not the most critical, since at least if you’re screaming, we know you can breathe. Elyssa does a quick check to make sure no one else was injured by Babak’s fall.

Five! What’s the vibe? Elyssa get a general impression of the situation, specifically looking for any immediate, external threats to Babak’s safety and alleviating them.

A Wilderness Medical Associates-trained Elyssa might take a slightly different approach, looking for three things:

Safety: personal, partner, public, patient.

MOI: trauma, medical, or environmental (e.g., hypothermia).

Numbers: how many patients, how many rescuers, how many resources?

They’re both going to help you spot all the big important things; they just use slightly different methods to get you there.

The Three Cs

Having gotten Babak to safety, Elyssa takes a deep breath to calm herself down. Becoming panicked will only put her in more danger. Then, she says, “My name is Elyssa. I’m a wilderness first responder. Can I please help you?” Babak makes a sort of groaning sound and Elyssa assumes consent (for medical treatment) and puts her hands on his head, below the ears so her fingers rest on his neck, to make sure his head doesn’t roll around too much.

The three Cs are: Calm, Consent, and C-spine. Elyssa calms herself by taking a deep breath and reminding herself that whatever happens, she is not injured. Next, she needs to get consent from Babak before touching him, which she tries to get verbally. Elyssa should not under any circumstances waste time trying to figure out if Babak is a child or can give consent because he’s probably bleeding out—this can be handled later. Unconscious patients are assumed to want medical treatment.

(You sometimes hear people joke about getting a DNR tattoo on their chest or wrist as a prank. Unless I physically see the signed DNR order, I assume you want treatment if you’re unconscious).

Elyssa places her hands on Babak’s head and neck to stabilize C-spine (the bit of spine in the neck) because if that severs, it could kill him and this injury was clearly traumatic. On an awake patient, Elyssa could accomplish this by saying, “Hey, please don’t move your neck.” If she had a partner, she could instruct the partner to hold the neck in place to be sure, because she’s going to need to move her hands in the next stages. If Babak had presented with anaphylactic shock from a bee sting, stabilizing C-spine would be less important.

And with that, Elyssa enters the…

Primary Assessment

Scenario

Elyssa places her ear to Babak’s chest and a hand on his neck and discovers he is breathing and has a beating heart. She opens his mouth to check for obstructions and finds a bit of blood but nothing in his airway. She pats him down quickly, checking for blood on her palms each time. She places two fingers in his palm and says “Can you squeeze my fingers?”, which Babak does. She notes that he could have a spine injury.

Methods of Assessment

The goal of the primary assessment is to spot life threats and treat them immediately (untreated life threats tend to become causes of death). Elyssa cares about only two things in this stage: oxygenation and perfusion. Is Babak putting oxygen into his blood, most likely by breathing? And is that oxygenated blood going to where it needs to go, which is, at this stage, the brain and the heart?

To check, Elyssa can go through her ABCs—Airway, Breathing, Circulation—or her BBBs—Blood, Breathing, Breathing. Because Mod E likes the BBBs and he’s writing this, we’re going with the BBB method. Each B has two components:

Blood

First, check for a pulse. If Babak doesn’t have a pulse, Elyssa should start CPR immediately (with one exception, which is if she sees evidence of an arterial bleed, in which case, fix that first or all your excellent CPR is just pumping blood onto the ground instead of Babak’s brain).

Next, do a blood sweep. Elyssa does this by placing her palms against Babak’s bare skin in his ‘shorty wetsuit area,’ or every part of him that would be covered by a shorty swimsuit. For the shorty-wetsuit-uninitiated, that’s the upper arms, chest, stomach, and thighs. Elyssa should check her palms after each pat to see if they are covered in blood.

If she finds blood, Elyssa applies direct pressure to the wound. If that doesn’t help, she can tie a tourniquet. There are two general tourniquet rules in the wilderness: 1) put it three inches above the wound and not on a joint (which would be useless), and 2) never remove a tourniquet. While Elyssa is authorized to apply a tourniquet, under no circumstances should can she ever remove one, even if she thinks she applied it in error. That’s something for E.R. doctors to do. Removing a tourniquet can kill you, even if the wound is no longer bleeding for another reason.

If the bleeding is on the neck, armpits, or groin area, a tourniquet is a bad idea, for obvious reasons (a tourniquet on a neck is also called a noose!). Instead, Elyssa can consider pinching and packing. Pinching means sticking her gloved fingers into the wound and trying to find what feels like a hollow limp noodle or the flacid end of a hose. If Elyssa can find this, that both (1) sucks, becuase, yuck and (2) is amazing because pinching that artery shut stops the bleed right at it’s source, which is great news for people who want to keep their blood. Here is an example of a successful pinch (warning: picture included).

No noodle? No problem. Elyssa can pack the wound, which means exactly what it sounds like: stuff bandages, fabric, loose clothing, maybe specialized wound gauze if she has it into the wound until it stops bleeding. Here is an article about proper wound packing protocol (even bigger warning: lots of pictures that you cannot avoid by not scrolling). Here’s the military’s rubric for assessing how well someone has stuffed a wound (with no pictures! Woo hoo!).

Breathing

First, check that the patient is breathing by placing a hand on his chest, listening for his breathing, or putting something metal in front of his mouth and nose to check for condensation.

If the patient is not breathing and they don’t have a pulse, Elyssa starts CPR immediately. If Babak is not breathing but does have a pulse, she also starts CPR, but if she sees or feels an obstruction in the airway while giving breaths, she’ll continue doing chest compressions.

Next, check that their airway is not obstructed. If it is, use tweezers to take food/teeth/rocks out, or ask the patient to do it himself. Assuming Elyssa has no better options, she can reach in with her fingers and pull obstructions out, remembering, all the while, her instructor who lost two fingers to a startled patient in exactly this way.

Brain

First, Elyssa gives Babak an AVPU score. Awake (A) means he’s awake and talking. A patient who doesn’t know who he is, where he is, or what happened still receives a top mark (A!) in this category, although he may receive lower ratings later on.

V means verbal, or able to follow verbal commands, such as squeeazing a finger when asked. P means responsive to pain. Elyssa can check this by pinching the underside of his upper arms. U means unresponsive to every stimuli. Suffice it to say, U is not an ideal score.

Next, Elyssa mentally notes whether or not she thinks Babak could have a spinal injury. Because he fell off a cliff and Elyssa is smart, she thinks he might have a spinal injury.

Unlike in the previous two categories, Elyssa does not jump into immediate action if her patient fails a brain test. However, both a low AVPU score and a spine injury are considered life threats, so she needs to note them at this stage.

Here’s a video of a full patient assessment.

Scenario

Elyssa is pretty sure Babak isn’t going to die in the next few minutes, but she still isn’t sure what’s wrong with him. Next week, we’ll go over the secondary assessment and see if we can’t nurse Babak back to health.

[thewebcomicsreview]

Ko-Fi Commission: LeaseBound

Leasebound is a “gender-critical” (TERF) webcomic that attained notoriety after releasing a chapter with hateful depictions of trans people, leading to it getting banned from Smack Jeeves. It’s currently self-hosted on a comic press site without a cast page, archive, or even menu, and doesn’t appear to have a patreon (and likely won’t, given its content). It’s a small enough comic that I wouldn’t normally feel comfortable reviewing it, except that the creator explicitly encouraged me to and appears to be getting off on the bad press. 

The story starts with two characters finding out that they both rented the same apartment because the landlord was incompetent and double booked it.

And this particular landlord doesn’t have any other rooms available. There’s a host of logical objections to this set up, such as

Isn’t this fraud on the part of the landlord?

Wouldn’t a major deception like this void the lease?

Why don’t the women move to some other landlord’s apartment and sue the shit out of the woman who sold them a single apartment and surprised them with a roommate?

How does a huge apartment complex with at least 18 rooms have two people booking rooms that don’t talk to each other?

Is the groundskeeper also doing the paperwork and background checks? You don’t buy an apartment at the apartment store, it’s like a whole process.

Isn’t this just the fanfic “but there was only one bed!” trope taken to an even more illogical extreme?

But that road leads to becoming CinemaSins, so let’s just acknowledge that the premise is ludicrous and all the characters are morons so we can move on with our lives. Anyway, the characters introduce themselves as Jaden and Riley, and casually accept sharing a bedroom. They exposit a bit about how Jaden dropped out of college and Riley never went, and

Uh

RILEY: Sorry- I wasn’t trying to pry. JADEN: All good. Earlier you said you had a “few things” in mind RILEY: Right, yeah! I thought it was be good to set some ground rules. JADEN: You can add’ “more organised” to the list then too. Haha. RILEY: Wait, really?  JADEN: Stories for another time

What the fuck? What list? What is Jaden talking about? Why is there an apostrophe hanging out after “add”?

You know how in PS1 JRPGs the translation would be really bad and sometimes people would just say weird shit that didn’t seem to have anything to do with what was just said?

That’s how Leasebound dialogue reads, bizarre punctuation and all. The add’ with an apostrophe is baffling, but I also like how “Haha.” is it’s own sentence with a period at the end.

 Anyway, the rest of the chapter is about how Riley owns a cat but has to keep it a secret because she doesn’t know if the landlord allows pets and I guess didn’t think to ask when she was applying for the lease.

So, the status quo is established. Jaden and Riley wanted to buy a single apartment but got foisted with a roommate, but they’re happy because that means the rent is cheaper. Personally if I wanted a cheaper apartment and was willing to have a roommate I’d get an apartment with a roommate in the first fucking place but we really can’t keep complaining about how stupid the premise is we have to move on. So Jaden is in the living room and, hold on, sorry

This living room is massive. The kitchen has a fridge, and oven, and two matching sofas. In chapter 2 Riley’s going to fit in a four-seat table in here. This is supposed to be a studio apartment in Downtown City

Y’know, City. Not any particular specific real or fictional city with a name, but City.

And Jaden and Riley, neither of whom have college degrees, are so hard up for cheaper rent that they’re comfortable with the surprise revelation of having to share a bedroom with a stranger. But they’re also in a huge apartment in the middle of a metro area? This living room is nearly as big as mine, and I have three roommates and live in Cheaper Suburb. Why are you buying all this space at City square foot prices if money is tight? Get a smaller apartment, or if you really need the space get an apartment that’s not in the middle of City? The author of this comic is 23, has she not looked into getting an apartment? Bigger ones are more expensive.

Okay, okay, the premise is dumb. Let’s move on. Riley and Jaden make sm-

Why are you sharing a tiny bedroom if your Living room is party sized and has multiple sofas? Why not partition off some of the living room with room dividers from IKEA to make a faux bedroom with privacy?

Ahem, Riley and Jaden make small talk and order a pizza and it takes a long time and it’s not super interesting but it’s supposed to be cute and I can’t really fault a slice of life comic for taking its time. Riley’s worried that her girlfriend won’t like that she has a roommate (Riley why don’t you move in with your girlfriend?), and Jaden gets a call from work that they’re shortstaffed.

They’re so short-staffed that they’re going to send an employee out to go pick up Jaden. Can Jaden not get to work on her own? That seems like the kind of thing that would make her not want to move in to this specific apartment. Why would you move to an apartment that you couldn’t get to work from? You’re in the middle of City, and your job is a big nightclub in City, and City has public transit. You previously did not live in City, meaning you used to live further away from work than you now do. How did you get to work before? Isn’t picking up a Jaden a tremendous waste of an employee’s time? Even if the club is aware that Jaden can’t get in on her own and is willing to bend over backwards for her here, why not “Jaden, we need you at work pronto. Take a uber over, we’ll reimburse you”, which is dramatically easier for all involved? Why is everyone in this comic so fucking stupid?

Sigh

Well, Jaden goes to work, and that leads us off into the infamous chapter 3, “The T is for trouble”

We open the chapter with a bad-faith trigger warning that looks like a real content warning but is actually designed to get trans people really mad as Jaden heads to work and-

Hey hey, Rusty started putting links to her tumblr in the comic pages. Someone was expecting pages from this chapter to go viral, wasn’t she? Was the chapter where Riley and Jaden spend a few pages ordering a pizza not giving you enough engagement? But now that you’re the official #2 Terf Webcomic you get lots of angry people in your tags that you can reblog and be snarky at. Bet that makes you feel powerful. I know the feeling. I built my tumblr following by writing reviews and advice columns for five years, but you went from zero to hero in like a week and all you had to do was say mean things about trans people oh my god I figured it out

You’re Mary. Rusty Hearts is Mary Bradford from Dumbing of Age. You want the validation of the “wrong” kind of people giving you shit. That’s why you made sure all your transphobic comics had links to your tumblr and your getting pizza comics didn’t. That’s why you keep reblogging my ads for my comic that I place in your tags. That’s why you see me post the review and make a response like this

And you know what?

Nah.

I’m not going to include chapter 4. I’m not going to read it. I’m not even going to include chapter 3. There’s nothing that I can add to it that hasn’t been said by a ton of other people. I can post your anti-trans stuff and get the vapors about how bigoted you are, but at the end of the day I’m not the Social Justice Report. I’m The Webcomics Review. And your webcomic sucks. It’s boring, it’s stupid, it doesn’t make any sense. Your premise is ludicrous and quickly abandoned to bait and switch people into reading a political polemic (I did skim chapter four, it’s literally people standing around in a circle talking about how trans people are bad like a terfy Ayn Rand novel). Your characters are all morons in order to get to plot points you want to get to, and your first two chapters are a mountain of pointless exposition and characters being vaguely cryptic about their backstories.Your art is bad not just in that you can’t draw well, but in that you don’t bother to include details to give your world a sense of place, and the details you do include like that luxurious living room actively undermine your alleged story (to the extent that there’s a story at all).

But hey, you got your 15 minutes of fame (and zero patreonbux) from the anti-trans stuff. You got people to read your comic. Good hussle. Well done. Tatsuya Ishida does it better.

Leasebound gets zero genders out of a spectrum.

Like this review? Follow me on patreon, or buy me a Ko-Fi! Or even just read my own webcomic, Saffron and Sage!

[dailycharacteroption]

Conversion Corner: Mass Effect Races part 5

Krogan and Turian

 With a history  mired in enduring hardship, the krogan are a fierce race of warriors who have faced setback after setback, from the nuclear war that forced them into tribal, survivalist cultures, to the viral genetic disorder engineered to stop their invading rebellion in it’s tracks.

A race built for a harsh environment, krogan are the only bipedal race in the ME universe to have wide-set eyes, a necessary adaptation given how many species of powerful predators live on their homeworld. They are a tall and swarthy race of reptilian humanoids with thick skin and osteoderms, as well as a large fat-hump above the head behind the shoulders for storing nutrition and water during lean times. Internally, their great fortitude is in part due to the abundance of redundant organs in their body, including a secondary fluid-channel-based nervous system which makes them nearly impossible to paralyze.

In addition to this, krogan are similar to boars and other particularly ferocious beasts In that they can ignore incredible pain when heavily injured, making them incredibly dangerous in combat.

Once, a long time ago, the krogan had made great strides in advancing as a civilization, building walls and cities. However, this ensured a greater survival rate for an already fecund race, leading to a population boom and a lot of bored krogan looking for a real challenge. So they turned on each other, wars and conflicts escalating until weapons of mass destruction plunged their world into a nuclear winter, and forced the krogan back into a tribal lifestyle, that is until they were approached by the salarians to be uplifted to the galactic community as a warrior force against the encroaching rachni.

While this was effective, the krogan proved to be utterly self-serving, using the gifted technology to start their own war to conquer the galaxy, and were only stopped by the turians using a devastating bioweapon developed by the salarians as a deterrent, the Genophage.

This virus dropped the viable birthrate of krogan infants to a mere fraction of what it once was, crippling their previous style of warfare by removing their numbers advantage.

This sudden change had massive repercussions on krogan culture, and now a malaise of fatalism has overtaken them. While they still live in tribes and seek fulfillment in combat, few see any hope, and the already self-focused people  struggle to find meaning in the krogan ways anymore.

Those that do hold out hope still work to restore their people, the females of which live in separate tribes judging applicants worthy to try and mate with, not to mention pouring funds into finding a way to reverse the genophage. Make no mistake though, the females of the species are just as fierce and motivated, and are not just waiting around for someone to fix their problems, but who knows? By the end of the series perhaps a certain protagonist has helped them out?

 +4 Str, +2 Con, -2 Wis

Hp 6

Size and Type: Krogan are medium humanoids of the krogan subtype

Racial Traits:

Krogan Ferocity: Once per day, a krogan brought to 0 Hit Points but not killed can fight on for 1 more round. The krogan drops to 0 HP and is dying (following the normal rules for death and dying) but can continue to act normally until the end of their next turn, when they become unconscious as normal. If they take additional damage before this, they cease to be able to act and falls unconscious.

Natural Armor: The thick hide and plating of a krogan grants them a +1 racial bonus to AC

Shoulder Hump: Krogan double the number of days without food or water they can go without having to make fortitude saves against starvation and thirst. After having done so, a krogan must spend a week eating one and half times their normal meal requirements in order to restock their internal stores and use this ability again.

Redundant Organs: When a krogan fails a fortitude save against an effect and gain a condition or ongoing effect because of this, at the beginning of their next turn, as a swift action they can attempt another fortitude save at the same DC to remove the effect, even if they wouldn’t normally get another save. If the effect already grants later saves to throw off the effect, the krogan gains a +2 to that save. This also applies to poison and disease.

Resilient: Krogan gain a +2 to Fortitude saves against environmental effects like temperature and radiation.

 And finally, let’s focus on one last iconic race of the ME universe, the Turians!

Clad in a flexible metallic carapace, turians are a disciplined race from a world of harsh radiation, their society based on survival through military might.

Standing at about a head’s height over humans, turians are a lean, muscular race of humanoids that resemble a missing link between earth birds and reptiles, with sharp teeth and claws definitely left over from predatory ancestors, and a dull metallic sheen to their plated skin, a thin-layer of thulium that helps block out the worst of the solar radiation that blasts their homeworld. The males also boast a crest of backwards-sweeping horns on their craniums.

Turian society is very much hierarchy-based, with individuals advancing based on their skill and merit. As a heavily militarized society, service in both warfare or peacekeeping capacity is the most common form of advancement, a prospect they approach dutifully and eagerly.

This is because the turian mindset very much focuses on the value of service to others, and while there is still room for individual goals and desires, the turians tend to conflate the needs of others as being their needs as well, which makes them naturally dutiful, if at risk of being loyal to unworthy leaders, which is a hard concept for turians to deal with, especially among their own, since theirs is a society of honesty and duty, where the general expectation is that everyone above and below you in the hierarchy knows what their job is and is doing it competently. After all, if they couldn’t do that, according to turian society, they couldn’t have made it into that position in the first place.

Turian society also teaches it’s people the value of responsibility. A turian must own their actions, for good or bad. This does not mean they find deception impossible, but turian spies typically put themselves in a position where they cannot be asked directly about their loyalties whenever possible, since they have difficulty when directly asked.

Since the military serves as such a pivotal part of their society, entirely colonies can be hired as a private military company, or may serve the interests of their species in colonizing or fighting against threats. Turians don’t believe in half-assing war, either. If they are fighting against a foe, they bring their full military might to the table. No border skirmishes, no small-scale conflicts. This however, has gotten them into trouble in the past, particularly during first contact with humans.

 +2 Dex, +2 Wis, -2 Cha

Hp 4

Size and Type: Turians are medium humanoids of the turian subtype

Racial Traits:

Military Heritage: Turians gain a +2 to Culture and Profession (soldier) skill checks to recall information about military, tactics, and weaponry.

Reflective Hide: Turians treat areas with a radiation level as one step lower than normal to determine if they need to save against it and/or what the save DC is. This does not give them immunity to weapons with the radioactive special property or the irradiate critical hit effect, but it does grant them a +2 bonus to the save against the effect.

Sense of Duty: Turians gain a +1 to attack rolls when using the harrying fire or covering fire action, as well as increasing the bonus they grant when using aid another with an ally to +3.

[aboleth-eye]

Hello! Would you have any advice for new DMs/things you wish you had been told when you started DMing? I'd like to try it myself, but I've only ever been a player, and just figuring out where to start is a bit overwhelming! Thank you in advance!

Great Question!  Here are my Lessons Learned from when I ran a game for the first time!  

There are Four Lessons I wish I’d known when I got started:  Have Your Resources Handy, Start Small (3 Parts), Things Go Awry, and Have Fun Together!   ((This is going to be a very long post, so I’ll cap it a little less than halfway down))

1.)  Have Your Resources Handy!

If this is your first time running a Tabletop RPG system, even if you’ve been playing for years, HAVE THE BOOK(S), WEBSITE(S) AND/OR PDF(S) NEARBY!  I’m serious about this, guys!  Playing a game or watching someone else play is a totally different monster to running it!  

When you first declare to the group that you’d like to host a game, I recommend you read the rules over at least two or three times before hand–start with a deep read first to get it all in your head, and then you can choose to speed read once you’ve had some time to digest the rules.  

But even if reading ttrpgs is your thing, have the resources within easy reach.  Either have your laptop available with open tabs to any pdfs/scans of the game source material and any relevant websites (like standard reference document pages), and/or have a physical copy of the game book with you.  If you are running certain monsters or encounters, I also recommend you copy down any stats and information to a separate text document (on laptop or printed) so you won’t have to page through stuff during the game.

2A.) Start Small: The Setting

If this is your first time or fiftieth time running a tabletop roleplaying game, and you are running a new system for the first time, limit the scope of project to start.  Writing campaign and world settings can be very intense, and it is very easy to write something too specific and railroad people into your lore and world.

For instance, don’t create a massive world with a continent of named cities and landmarks!  Don’t plan out every inch of your world, or else it’ll turn into a “fill-in-the-blank exploration” story instead of an organic world you can change as your group learns and grows!

My first campaign started in a very specifically written city on the edge of a vast magical desert.  I planned out a timetable of events that would catapult the players into the “open-world”.  The players noticed this and didn’t appreciate it. 

Also, do not bog your players down with Lore!  I’ve gone into campaigns where you need to know information “for backstory”!  This is your first campaign, it’s good to know what to introduce and when!  A group of starting adventurers typically doesn’t need to know your world’s entire array of deities, pages and pages of history, and legends “that shaped the world”!  You can introduce these things at character creation IF THE PLAYERS ASK, and then slowly dish things out as the characters live in your world.

It’s also good to not ties yourself down to specific placement of towns, countries, cities, landmarks, etc.  Leave the map blank save for the starting area, and any broadly defined areas such as forests and mountains.  Once characters finish their first missions and adventures, they’ll explore!  With all the “white space” of your world, you can insert places and things as you journey with the group!  

One of my favorite encounters when I was very new to D&D was when we accidentally burned down a forest.  We were fighting a massive tiger with a pixie NPC in a forest, and the pixie just trapped everyone (tiger included) in entangling vines.  Our pyromancer in the party tried to set the beast on fire, and they rolled a critical failure.  

The beast was set on fire and died!  And so did the pixie!  And now there’s a raging forest fire we have to run from!  We get an oxcart running and we take shifts to outrun the magical fire–FOR THREE DAYS!  It was an incredibly tense situation, and it was fun to add “an entire forest” to the pyromancer player’s list of things they set on fire.

You know what would have made all that suck?  If the DM had decided: “Okay, you pass through this location which is a lich’s hideout and have to face that; then the next day you’ll have to ford a river with the tired oxes.  Finally, you’ll be passing through this county’s border…”  

We just burned down a placeholder  forest, and all the consequences that came with it came AFTER we were finally safe!  The DM didn’t bog us down with heavy lore and their maps during a tense situation; they kept the focus on the action at hand.

Prioritize the players’ story before your own!  That’s the lesson I want to make absolutely clear.  You aren’t telling your story with friends as the characters; the Dungeon Master/Game Master/Storyteller is the worldbuilder who tells the character groups’ story as they interact with the world.

2B) Start Small: The First Encounters

Another item I want to bring up is Do Not Start Your Campaign with a “Unique Encounter”!  Start your campaign setting with a simple task for the players to face.  Here are the kinds of challenges I mean: defeat a bunch of zombies in a graveyard for a reward, go into a mine full of bats to retrieve a homing beacon, follow a simple mystery to find a girl’s lost dog, etc.  The Players’ should be introduced to your world with something simple to follow–that way they can make their marks and introduce how they roleplay to the story.  

Do Not try something you’ve “never seen before”!  Don’t have the characters whisked off to another plane or world while they slept!  Don’t have the players face fifteen or so mooks at once during an ambush!  Don’t have your characters struggle to tread water or leap floating platforms while fighting a monster!  These kinds of encounters instantly put players on guard and feel railroaded!  Give them the chance to decide how they integrate themselves into the adventure.

My first campaign violated this rule.  When the players left the city to enter the desert, they were suddenly beset by 12 monstrous scorpions!  And me, in my ambitious tunnel-vision, thought it’d be interesting to have each scorpion have its own turn.  I rolled twelve Initiatives for the scorpions and it was a LONG combat when it clearly didn’t have to be.  

It all looked so good in my head, but when you get players involved you can tell how grueling and boring something like that could be.  I learned a lot that session.

That combat ended the campaign for me.  I decided to go back to the drawing board because that kind of thinking was not going to fly for me and my friends.

Instead, give your players a task that could easily be solved in one or two sessions!  Do not give your players “only one way” to solve this!  For instance, if your first challenge is to get past some guards, let the players come up with the solution themselves.  They might decide to fight the guards, use magic/science to teleport past them, go off on a side quest to become guards so they can infiltrate them, or even walk up and attempt to socialize with them.  You as the storyteller/DM merely narrate the results of whatever the characters do; just bridge the gaps and think of consequences from the players’ actions.

ALSO!  Have a time limit for your first session, or plan breaks for food/drink/stretching.  This activity of DMing can be very stressful, and you might need a break to take stock of what problems and choices occurred during play.  

2C.) Start Small: The Players

Have your players build starting or low-level characters (I typically start with 3rd level for D&D).  The low levels will mean most powergaming and gamebreaking attempts by certain types of players will be nipped in the bud right from the start.  It will also typically limit the powers and abilities of your group (so you won’t have to memorize or look up high-level stuff until much later).  

Another thing I highly recommend is that you are present during character creation!  Do not let people determine/roll character abilities and stats without you.  Either be physically present when dice get rolled and abilities get determined, or be present digitally in a chatroom, discord or roll20 when electronic character sheets get filled in!  

My first campaign I allowed one of the players to bring a character from a friend’s campaign into it.  The original DM ended the campaign; and even though I had played in that campaign alongside this character I had no clue what they could do.  This made things challenging because this character “suddenly” remembered they could fly–so I had to add aerial combat onto my plate during the first fight of the campaign.

It made the situation tense, especially with my bad early encounters (see the 12 Scorpions combat above).

3.) Things Go Awry

If you’ve come this far, there’s one last piece of advice I want to give you.  Your first campaign is gonna suck in one way or another.

I don’t mean that to be disheartening; I want you to think of it as a learning experience.  Whenever a person learns a new skill or engages in a new activity for the first time, it’s always gonna suck.  (Even if someone has a “natural talent”).  You as the DM/Storyteller are going to notice problems crop up left and right; especially if you don’t take the advice I offered above.  For instance, if you start learning to paint with a new medium or start a sport you’ve never tried; you need to practice with the tools and techniques you’ve prepared to see what works for your style of learning.  

Running a roleplaying game is a very unique mashup of activities.  There’s typically a math element you need to consider behind every action the players take.  You need to workout your improvisation skills to bridge connections and gaps your players make.  You need to get in front of a group of people (sometimes more or less experienced than you) and tell a story that keeps their attention.  It’s a stressful mix of being an improv actor, a storyteller and the physical laws of your world.

Hopefully your players will understand when things get crazy and overwhelming.  Gametime might come to a halt because you need to look up a specific rule or wording that you aren’t familiar with.  It’s okay.  Until you get to know how your game world runs with your players in it, it is totally fine to take a breath and think things through.  Oftentimes you can ask your players for help in making a determination or house-ruling.

Last note on this topic: Get Feedback!  At the end of the session, be bold and ask your players if they enjoyed the session, what they liked and what they didn’t like.  Feedback is how DMs get insight on how the game is playing out.  While you’re DMing, your mind is on a million different topics; let the players tell you how they felt during gameplay, so you know what made them feel good or bad on the other side of the curtain.

4.) Have Fun Together!

This is something that needs to be said, if I’m honest.  Running a game can be a stressful activity that “ruins” some things about it now that you are “behind the curtain”.  This is your first session, in what you hope to be a series of games where you and your friends make all sorts of memories.

However, some DMs get incredibly discouraged and no-nonsense when they run a game for their first few times.  That is understandable, especially if being the “mastermind” is a challenge you haven’t prepared for.  A few sessions in and you might find the game isn’t fun for you and/or your players.  That might be a sign that you need to take a break from hosting–use that time to think how you can make the game fun for everyone, or if this campaign just needs to be scrapped!

The priority of the DM is to bring people together.  If a game system, campaign concept or player actions aren’t making the group (you included) happy; it’s better to stop things and take stock before things go too far.  It is never fun to admit your game isn’t viable or enjoyable, but hopefully you’ll have new experience you can take with you the next time you try your game.  

And heck, if you find you prefer playing at this time, that’s fine!  Even if this attempt didn’t have the results you expected, there is nothing to stop you from trying again later if you wanted.  But now that you know how it is behind the curtain, you are naturally more observant to how your own DM/GM runs their games and you can learn from it.

Remember how good the game system/lore/etc made you feel!  It’s why you wanted to DM in the first place; you recognized you had a story you wanted to tell, and this ttrpg had the tools to bring it to life!  No matter what problems arise when you’re behind the curtain, the game should still bring you enjoyment whether you play or manage the game.  Do not give up on the game just because of one bad session or two!  

When I decided to end my campaign, it really was a painful decision.  I loved the world as it was in my mind, but I was not executing it well so that my players enjoyed it.  I got feedback after that terrible 12 Scorpions combat, and decided to take some time to think about everything.  Our group went back to our original DM, with other members trying to DM in that time; and honestly I didn’t DM until I started a small separate group months later.  

During that gap in DMing I digested what I liked and didn’t like about my campaign, and had more time to reflect on the rules.  I decided to take a few steps back and learn from my mistakes.  I still made mistakes the second and third times I DMed, I make mistakes even to this day.  

But at the heart of it all, I love games so much that I want to constantly make my stories and worlds even better, even to this day.

I take the struggles of DMing as learning experiences, rather than let them define me as a writer, storyteller and game master.  I use them as stepping stones so I don’t fall through the gaps again.  I may have started out with a bad first campaign, but I would never take those mistakes away.  

I hope these lessons were helpful!  I love D&D and tabletop roleplaying games so much, and love giving out advice on how to make the experience your own.  I hope this helps a lot of new people bring their stories to life!  Also, I hope I helped everyone’s expectations into the right state of mind.  

Good luck and happy gaming everyone!!  Much love!

– Aboleth-Eye

[sugarinherdixiecup]

Finest Tips on How To Make Money in Real Estate

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Real estate investing can do anything from learning how to fit a quick (in 30 days, or less) EXTRA $5, 000 in your pocket every month, to making all your financial desires come true with an annual after-tax income in Millions of Dollars. You do need to decide upfront, if you are looking for the multi-millionaire status, or just to put some quick cash in your money to pay bills. Regardless of your dreams and desires the way will use real estate investing to get where you want to go in daily life, we believe that there are three critical rules you must go along with, if you are going to be successful. Here they are: RULE NUMBER ONE WILL BE: FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS If you are looking for a long-term commitment to this business, in which case you need to establish up-front that you will need to set-aside some money as a result of each of your transactions/deals to re-invest in your education, And it's probably in your best interest to start with one strategy and stay prepared to switch to a different strategy once these goals will be met. As an example, let's say you ultimately want to be a creator (like Donald Trump, or Sam Zell, or Trammell Crow), but today you have a job and are $50, 000 in debt. Your first step might be to generate quick cash over the then year to pay off the debt, then half way through causeing the happen (say in month six) begin the process regarding implementing a strategy to generate enough income from your real estate shelling out to leave your job, then after you have created a stable platform (enough to pay bills and then some) from your investing pastime, to start a plan to become a developer. All together, this may require two to three different strategies. A "Classic" mistake that many novice buyers would make is to attempt all three strategies ALL AT ONCE - DO NOT DO THIS!!! Better to learn a strategy for swift cash, master it, then move on, then to attempt to find out three strategies at the same time. OLD AFRICAN PROVERB: "He What person Chases Two Tigers Ultimately Gets non-e " Regardless of Strategy to start with, history has shown that people who FOCUS the time, energy and money, are more likely to succeed than folks that do not. Be Patient - Be Focused - Start Smaller, Grow Big. RECAP: Rule Number One is: FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS SECRET NUMBER TWO: YOU LEARN BY DOING! The second important thing to know about real estate investing is that you learn through doing! We know that there are a lot of late-night infomercials which tell you "Come to our FREE seminar, spend $5, 000, and also tomorrow you will wake up a Millionaire - but the condition is we have never found anyone who will admit the really worked. Also, there are people who spend good dollars going to college, or graduate school and study easy methods to "succeed in real estate", and by and large, this can perform, if you then go on to commit to 25-40 years doing the job as an employee of a real estate firm, making someone else high - if you are fortunate enough, you may learn, enough (over time) and then go out on your own. And yes, we all know of people what person buy every book, every tape, and go to each seminar, and become walking real estate investing "Encyclopedia's" - AND YET NEVER DO ANYTHING WITH IT - BAD IDEA! The reason, because if you never put into practice what you read, or hear, you are likely to ultimately convince yourself that "this real estate thing" can not work - UNFORTUNATELY, both history and Forbes Magazine would certainly prove you wrong. Ever since John Jacob Astor has become America's First Millionaire in the 1800's by buying the things would ultimately become Manhattan, more American's have become rich through investing in real estate, than by any other means. And others who have made their fortunes in other areas (like managing businesses) have reinvested their profits into real estate compared with any other asset class. THE BEST WAY TO LEARN TO BE AN REAL ESTATE INVESTOR IS TO BE AN INVESTOR. RECAP: Rule Number Two: YOU WILL LEARN BY DOING! RULE NUMBER THREE: START IN THESE DAYS - RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE. Final Key Thought - a large number of new investors kid themselves by saying thing including "When I get enough money... ", or "When I get enough time... ", or "When I can receive some other things out of the way... " Then I will get started - BALONY!! What they are really saying is "I am Terrified to Death of Failing at this Real Estate Thing", as well as sooner they stop lying to themselves the sooner a thing really great will happen in their lives. The truth is almost every successful realty investor out there (including Donald Trump, and Sam Zell, and Ron LeGrand, and Robyn Thompson, and (Place Millionaire's Name Here), was scared to death while putting their first deal together. What made typically the difference is that they moved forward and did one thing. Sir Isaac Newton said it best in the first Law of Motion: "An object at others tends to stay at rest and an object on motion tends to stay in motion... " In other words - any time you keep on doing what you have been doing, you should expect to purchase the same results. But if you want something different for your life, you need to go "in Motion". You learn the Real Estate Enterprise by DOING, so the sooner you DO, the Sooner you GET. In these days is the day to stop making excuses and to "Go Through Motion". And as you Go In Motion, make a commitment to keep to learn, so you "Stay In Motion" RECAP: Rule Telephone number Three: START TODAY - RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE. So with these three rules in mind, we hope that RealInvestors(TM) will become the key partner in your success and we want to hear about your current success, no matter how small, or how great. Most of all, we want to help you "Go in Motion" and "Stay On Motion"... So , Let's Get Started... Choose ONE strategy to start off. Please Take to Heart Rule Number One: FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS... DO NOT MAKE SURE TO BECOME AN EXPERT ON EVERY STRATEGY BEFORE EVER STARTING! If you do, we can almost guarantee you that will become puzzled from information overload, and you will never begin! Decide on one single strategy that is right for you, learn about it, and get out there and DO IT! Make a commitment (let's say 6 months) where you are completely focused on that strategy. Network through other investor's who are working that particular strategy and do not leave until one of two things has happened: either 6 months moved by with no results, or you get your first put up done using that strategy and decide you want to try out your hand at something else. But do not allow yourself to be taken off course. It was o. k. in elementary plus middle school to try out for every team sport, but once Spring came, you had to make a choice; it was either likely to be track, or baseball/softball, or lacrosse, or producers, or tennis - but you could not play two sports entertainment at the same time. Each sport had its own rules, and various methods targeted required a slightly different mental "game". If you received come to the baseball field with a lacrosse stick as well as shoulder pads, someone would have asked you to "go home" and come back when you were "ready to play the sport" - same is true with investing - ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU ARE JUST GETTING GOING. Now, one day you will be able for you to "Play Like Mike", but as a new investor, let me keep it simple: One strategy, complete focus soon you have proven to yourself that it will work, for you, or you won't, and for most people this will mean at least a 6-month devotion. NEXT STEPS: Once you have familiarized yourself with this Getting Started component to the website, we recommend that you take the following steps: • Read and post regularly in the Real Investors Forums to gain exposure to the issues facing other real estate investors. The chances are, those same issues will face you in the near future. • Real all the Real Investor Articles. This will help to develop your knowledge base about real estate investing in general. • Visit the Real Investor Bookstore and pick out courses who focus on the ONE strategy you have chosen to use to get started. Do not order courses on a myriad of strategies before you ever do the first deal! • Join your local REIA. You will interact with many other investors... some seasoned, some just getting started. You may have an opportunity to network with other professionals that may be able to deliver services you will need as anew investor... a contractor, a real estate agent, a mortgage broker, a hard money lender... etc . You may even have a really great mentor! • Invest in your education! Attend almost any opportunities to learn more about real estate investing, such as The National Realty Investor's Conference. These events are invaluable opportunities to know from, network amongst, and make deals with other further seasoned real estate investors and scholars. Look for online style offerings, such as Real Investor's University (REIU) to occupy the times in between live events • Most importantly... go out right now there and take action - GO IN MOTION!!! • Get your first of all deal done - Your 1st deal will be the undesirable - we promise!!! • Repeat, Repeat, Repeat! • Then, when you're ready, come back and add another strategy to your own portfolio... and continue the process....

[theonyxpath]

This is the last week for the Mummy: The Curse 2e Kickstarter and as that gets “wrapped up” on Thursday we’re going to run right from that to set up our booth at PAX Unplugged in Philadelphia, PA.

Ah, Philly! City of my birth and youth! City of cheesesteaks, soft pretzels, and bad attitudes! I return, anon!

But before that: please check out the Mummy 2e Kickstarter if you haven’t already! We’d love to achieve the next chunk of the Book of Lasting Death and get some more Utterances and Judges in there – but we need your help! If you’ve already pledged – tell your friends! Wander the streets and alert the neighbors! If you haven’t pledged, well here’s the link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/339646881/mummy-the-curse-2nd-edition

Let’s go out strong! (Like the reverse of the Mummys…)

V5 Chicago Folio illustration by Michael Gaydos

We’ll be coming in strong to PAX Unplugged this coming week, with myself and LisaT, Mighty Matt McElroy, Fast Eddy Webb, Dangerous Dixie Cochran, Neall Raemonn Price, Meghan Fitzgerald, Travis Legge, Danielle Lauzon, and Crystal Mazur attending!

Dixie, LisaT, Matt, and myself will be in our booth handing out our new brochure and answering questions – but most of all, we’ll be directing folks to, and signing them up for, demos in both the booth and at our demo table in the gaming area.

Our table is in Area 119a, we’ve been told, in fact! Look right there in this handy map! (Thanks, Ian!)

Right now, the menu for gaming with the rest of our crew is:

Meghan: Changeling: the Lost 2e and Contagion Chronicle

Neall: Scion Hero 2e and Mummy: the Curse 2e

Danielle: Trinity Continuum and Dystopia Rising: Evolution

Eddy: Pugmire and Fetch Quest

Travis: Scarred Lands and Legendlore 

Crystal: Monarchies of Mau and Chicago by Night

Matt: Scarred Lands and Cavaliers of Mars

So come on by if you want to sit in on a game and we’ll get you scheduled! Plus, with the brochure, we’ll be announcing at least one secret project, and we’ll be glad to answer questions about that.

We’ll also be directing anyone who wants to buy our games to right across the aisle from us at Studio2 – which is just darn convenient! Let me underline that: we aren’t selling books at our booth, Studio2 is selling them for us! Here’s another handy map:

Looking forward to seeing a bunch of you folks there – it is a very cool con!

Now, here’s some follow-ups for some things I mentioned last week:

The Pugmire Wolfenoot sale went really well, and both Pugsteady and Onyx Path were able to send nice-sized donations to the Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind! Thanks to all of you who participated in the sale and helped us help them!

Our Reddit AMA went fantastically for about 5 hours and many, many, in-depth questions were asked and answered. Thanks to all of you that participated and if you have any further questions and are at PAX Unplugged, we’ll be glad to continue the conversations! I’ll be there with bells on – well, at least one bell!

They Came From Beneath the Sea! illustration by Eric Lofgren

Last Friday’s Onyx Pathcast started out normally, but then exploded into a frenzy of creative ideas and after the dust settled (or the verbal equivalent) Dixie, Matthew, and Eddy had brain-stormed six new games!

Their titles are:

* Game 1: Envelopes and Urban Legends * Game 2: The Calamari of Crime * Game 3: Super Dragon Dining Crisis Tensai: Apocalypse Ultima EX * Game 4: Universal Faultlines * Game 5: Barn Raising * Game 6: Love in the Time of Androids

You really have to listen to get the actual details of these games, and the wacky yet very typical way that they were conceptualized by the Trio, but even the titles give you some idea of the range of genres and approaches they played around with.

While I was listening – like I do every week, Matthew – it struck me that while the gang were riffing pretty wildly, the process is really very typical for a lot of our creative meetings. For years we’ve tried to use the rules of Improv in our game brainstorming. Like, don’t negate what the last person threw out to the group, try and build upon it.

The old “Yes, and…” rather than “No”.

There’s more than enough time to apply critical or realistic thinking to the ideas, first you need to let the ideas pour out.

(And this is actually not easy to do! A lot of our Onyx Path crew are extremely realistic about the challenges inherent to creating projects, and have very strong opinions and likes and dislikes (hard to believe, I know), so holding those comments back can run against our very natures.)

But as you can tell with this Pathcast, or with my riffing with Matthew half a year ago in the UK GamesExpo edition of the Pathcast where we combined Transformers, Thomas the Tank Engine, and Scion, there’s something innately and deeply fun and satisfying to just letting loose with our imaginations!

Which is, I think, the single greatest part of the TTRPG hobby, and why so many of us love it so much. And, in our case at Onyx Path, why we are so excited to create:

Many Worlds, One Path!

BLURBS!

Kickstarter!

The Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition Kickstarter is now IN ITS LAST WEEK and has passed 200% funding and has over 1000 backers with over a week to go. Backers have already unlocked the Mummy 2e Screen as a Stretch Goal, additional Utterances, and a whole new project: the Mummy 2e Companion!

Please check out this blog from several weeks ago for a description of all the amazing features of this new edition!

Be there to witness the majesty and terror of this new version of Mummy: The Curse! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/339646881/mummy-the-curse-2nd-edition

Next Kickstarter: V5 Cults of the Blood Gods!

Onyx Path Media!

This Friday’s Onyx Pathcast features an interview with fabulous freelancer Lauren Roy! Available on Podbean or on your favorite podcast venue!

It’s another busy week for Onyx Path and our merry band of fantastic streamers on Twitch this week, with games of Vampire: The Masquerade, Pugmire, Scarred Lands, Aberrant, Changeling: The Lost, Hunter: The Vigil, and more random drop-in games taking place all the time! If you’re subscribed to our channel, you can find some of last week’s games, including Scion as run by Neall Raemonn Price, developer of the game!

What’s more, if you’re a fan of Scion, be sure to check out The Gentleman’s Guide to Scion over on Matthew Dawkins’ YouTube channel! It’s only on the second video so far, so there’s plenty of time to catch up. Check out youtube.com/user/clackclickbang

Please find us, follow us, and subscribe to us on twitch.tv/theonyxpath If Twitch isn’t your jam, maybe YouTube is! We’re steadily migrating all our content from Twitch to YouTube, but there’s new videos too! Travis Legge and Matthew Dawkins like to dive bomb the news onto different channels at different times, just to keep everyone on their toes, and this week it’ll be on YouTube again! Subscribe to youtube.com/user/theonyxpath

On redmoonroleplaying.com, Klara Herbol runs Vampire: The Masquerade for Matthew Dawkins and the Red Moon Roleplaying team, while Matthew runs Mummy: The Curse for John Burke, Bianca Savazzi, and Craig Austin from Red Moon! Lots of actual plays of tremendous quality there, for you to check out and enjoy.

Occultists Anonymous are back with more Mage: The Awakening fun right here

Episode 62: Another Round of Darts  The cabal’s plans are interrupted by the arrival of an old acquaintance and have to clean up a mess that isn’t their fault…  https://youtu.be/_JZyq57KNOo

Episode 63: Taking It Offline  The cabal meet with the Phantasm Society in hiding and plan how to stop the Hunters before they become more of a problem.https://youtu.be/zlSrGhu1Eis

The Story Told Podcast interviewed our very own Ian Watson regarding the Trinity Continuum:  http://thestorytold.libsyn.com/episode-41-aeon-interview-with-ian-watson 

And did you miss Mage: The Podcast interviewing Matthew Dawkins about Technocracy Reloaded and other books? Never fear, the interview is right here: https://magethepodcast.com/index.php/2019/11/24/m5-meditations-metanarrative-tools-and-mummy-with-matthew-dawkins/

Drop Matthew a message via the contact button on matthewdawkins.com if you have actual plays, reviews, or game overviews you want us to profile on the blog!

Please check any of these out and let us know if you find or produce any actual plays of our games!

Electronic Gaming!

As we find ways to enable our community to more easily play our games, the Onyx Dice Rolling App is live! Our dev team has been doing updates since we launched based on the excellent use-case comments by our community, and this thing is awesome! (Seriously, you need to roll 100 dice for Exalted? This app has you covered.)

On Amazon and Barnes & Noble!

You can now read our fiction from the comfort and convenience of your Kindle (from Amazon) and Nook (from Barnes & Noble).

If you enjoy these or any other of our books, please help us by writing reviews on the site of the sales venue from which you bought it. Reviews really, really help us get folks interested in our amazing fiction!

Our selection includes these latest fiction books:

Our Sales Partners!

We’re working with Studio2 to get Pugmire and Monarchies of Mau out into stores, as well as to individuals through their online store. You can pick up the traditionally printed main book, the screen, and the official Pugmire dice through our friends there! https://studio2publishing.com/search?q=pugmire

We’ve added Prince’s Gambit to our Studio2 catalog: https://studio2publishing.com/products/prince-s-gambit-card-game

Now, we’ve added Changeling: The Lost 2nd Edition products to Studio2‘s store! See them here: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/all-products/changeling-the-lost

Scarred Lands (Pathfinder) books are also on sale at Studio2, and they have the 5e version, supplements, and dice as well!: https://studio2publishing.com/collections/scarred-lands

Scion 2e books and other products are available now at Studio2: https://studio2publishing.com/blogs/new-releases/scion-second-edition-book-one-origin-now-available-at-your-local-retailer-or-online

Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books? Try this link! http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Onyx-Path-Publishing/

And you can order Pugmire, Monarchies of Mau, Cavaliers of Mars, and Changeling: The Lost 2e at the same link! And NOW Scion Origin and Scion Hero are available to order!

As always, you can find most of Onyx Path’s titles at DriveThruRPG.com!

There’s still time to join DTRPG‘s massive sale for Cyber Monday!

https://www.storytellersvault.com/featured.php?promotion_id=CybeM19STV

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/blackfriday.php?manufacturers_id=4261

On Sale This Week!

This Wednesday, we are proud to announce the PDF and physical book PoD versions of both the Trinity Continuum Core Rulebook and Trinity Continuum: Aeon core book are available on DTRPG!

Conventions!

PAX Unplugged: December 6th – 8th, in Philadelphia, PA. We’re going to have lots and lots of gaming for folks to sign up for, a lot of them featuring our game creators! See maps and things above! 2020: Midwinter: January 9th – 12th, in Milwaukee, WI. Check out David Fuller’s Athens, Ohio Scion actual play tie-in adventure (soon to be coming to the Storypath Nexus community content site) that will be running at Midwinter. The event url is below: https://tabletop.events/conventions/midwinter-gaming-convention-2020/schedule/402

And now, the new project status updates!

DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM EDDY WEBB (projects in bold have changed status since last week):

First Draft (The first phase of a project that is about the work being done by writers, not dev prep)

Exalted Essay Collection (Exalted)

N!ternational Wrestling Entertainment (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Creating in the Realms of Pugmire (Realms of Pugmire)

Contagion Chronicle Ready-Made Characters (Chronicles of Darkness)

Trinity Continuum: Adventure! core (Trinity Continuum: Adventure!)

Duke Rollo fiction (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Redlines

Kith and Kin (Changeling: The Lost 2e)

Crucible of Legends (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Dragon-Blooded Novella #2 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Many-Faced Strangers – Lunars Companion (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Second Draft

Across the Eight Directions (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Contagion Chronicle: Global Outbreaks (Chronicles of Darkness)

Player’s Guide to the Contagion Chronicle (Chronicles of Darkness)

M20 Victorian Mage (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Contagion Chronicle Jumpstart (Chronicles of Darkness)

Exigents (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Development

Heirs to the Shogunate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

TC: Aberrant Reference Screen (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Trinity Continuum Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum Core)

Monsters of the Deep (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

One Foot in the Grave Jumpstart (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2e)

Lunars Novella (Rosenberg) (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Scion: Demigod (Scion 2nd Edition)

Tales of Aquatic Terror (They Came From Beneath the Sea!)

Manuscript Approval

Scion: Dragon (Scion 2nd Edition)

Masks of the Mythos (Scion 2nd Edition)

Titanomachy (Scion 2nd Edition)

Post-Approval Development

Scion LARP Rules (Scion)

Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition core rulebook (Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition)

Editing

Lunars: Fangs at the Gate (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Hunter: The Vigil 2e core (Hunter: The Vigil 2nd Edition)

Let the Streets Run Red (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Geist 2e Fiction Anthology (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition)

Dragon-Blooded Novella #1 (Exalted 3rd Edition)

Cults of the Blood Gods (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

Legendlore core book (Legendlore)

WoD Ghost Hunters (World of Darkness)

Mythical Denizens (Creatures of the World Bestiary) (Scion 2nd Edition)

Pirates of Pugmire KS-Added Adventure (Realms of Pugmire)

M20 The Technocracy Reloaded (Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition)

Yugman’s Guide to Ghelspad (Scarred Lands)

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant core (Trinity Continuum: Aberrant)

Terra Firma (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Wraith20 Fiction Anthology (Wraith: The Oblivion 20th Anniversary Edition)

Deviant: The Renegades (Deviant: The Renegades)

Post-Editing Development

Chicago Folio/Dossier (Vampire: The Masquerade 5th Edition)

TC: Aeon Ready-Made Characters (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed (Mage: the Awakening Second Edition)

City of the Towered Tombs (Cavaliers of Mars)

Oak, Ash, and Thorn: Changeling: The Lost 2nd Companion (Changeling: The Lost 2nd)

W20 Shattered Dreams Gift Cards (Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th)

TC: Aeon Jumpstart (Trinity Continuum: Aeon)

Vigil Watch (Scarred Lands)

Scion Companion: Mysteries of the World (Scion 2nd Edition)

Indexing

ART DIRECTION FROM MIKE CHANEY!

In Art Direction

Contagion Chronicle – Going over sketches.

Trinity Continuum: Aberrant

Hunter: The Vigil 2e – Reviewing art that’s already in.

Ex3 Lunars – Just need two artists’ pieces in.

TCfBtS!: Heroic Land Dwellers

Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed – Contacting two more artists.

Ex3 Monthly Stuff

Cults of the Blood God (KS) – Art all seems ready.

Chicago Folio – Got cover in this morning.

Mummy 2 (KS) – Going.

City of the Towered Tombs

Let the Streets Run Red – Going over artnotes and dividing stuff up.

CtL Oak Ash and Thorn – Awaiting artnotes.

Scion Mythical Denizens – Going over sketches.

Deviant

Yugman’s Guide to Ghelspad – Sending out art notes and contracts.

Vigil Watch – Awaiting artnotes.

In Layout

Chicago Folio

Trinity Continuum Aeon: Distant Worlds – Haven’t forgotten it.

VtR Spilled Blood – Josh is working on it.

Pirates of Pugmire

Proofing

Memento Mori – Awaiting Dev comments.

Dark Eras 2 – Aileen working up the cover.

Trinity Continuum Aeon Jumpstart

M20 Book of the Fallen – Backer PDF errata is with Josh.

They Came from Beneath the Sea!

At Press

Trinity: In Media Res – PoD proofs coming.

V5: Chicago – Shipping to the KS fulfillment shippers. PoD files up and processing.

Aeon Aexpansion – PoD proofs coming.

Geist 2e (Geist: The Sin-Eaters 2nd Edition) – At press, proofs signed off on.

Geist 2e Screen – At press, waiting for proofs.

DR:E – At press, waiting for proofs.

DRE Screen – At press, waiting for proofs.

DR:E Threat Guide – Helnau’s Guide to Wasteland Beasties – PoD proof on the way.

Trinity RMCs

Tales of Good Dogs – Putting up PoD files.

Today’s Reason to Celebrate!

Celebrating Wikipedia-weirdness, in that it’s really easy to see (and construct) all sorts of patterns from the items in it. Like these all here on December 2nd, Cuba’s Armed Forces Day:

1956 – The Granma reaches the shores of Cuba’s Oriente Province. Fidel Castro, Che Guevara and 80 other members of the 26th of July Movement disembark to initiate the Cuban Revolution.

1961 – In a nationally broadcast speech, Cuban leader Fidel Castro declares that he is a Marxist–Leninist and that Cuba is going to adopt Communism.

1976 – Fidel Castro becomes President of Cuba, replacing Osvaldo Dorticós Torrado.

1986 – Death of Desi Arnaz, Cuban-American actor, singer, businessman, and television producer (b. 1917)

Busy date!

[printoncd3-blog]

Five Elements of Good Product or service Brand Design

Five Elements of Good Product or service Brand Design

how to print on a CD

There are generally no strict rules which you can follow so that you can create a well developed product brand. However, many of us recognize a desirable design when we view a single. Why? Because presently there are certain components that will will make a ticket style and design attractive and engaging. This information will guide you by means of the main style factors of a product point and offer tips on just how to use these aspects in your favor.

how to print on a CD

1. Color

To be able to grab the eye of a person who is casually going for walks the aisles of often the food store you need to be able to use color well. Area you choose for your personal label is influenced by some sort of number of things. Just what coloring is your marijuana? If you are applying a specific container, then just what colouring is the item? You need to be sure that the colors you decide on for the tag may clash in a bad way to lessen the actual looks of the complete package. Thankfully there usually are tools to help a person pick out colors that may work well collectively.

a couple of. Graphics

An eye capturing graphical will also support draw awareness of your product or service. With inventory photography and also illustrations thus inexpensive these kinds of days you can locate a new graphic for your own labels with places just like iStockphoto. com or Photographs. com just for a number of dollars. You can subsequently make use of these images with your merchandise labels, just simply be sure to check out the licence agreement. Inside the case of iStockphoto you should use most images intended for up to five-hundred, 000 product labels with no getting an extended license. A photo really can be well worth a single, 000 words upon a solution label while a compelling artwork attracts the eye to your current item.

3. Readability

Shade along with graphics will guide catch a persons vision but except if your style is easily understandable at a glance you will lose people. They point out you will have only 2-3 mere seconds to draw in the attention involving a shopper exploring the particular aisles of a food store which is enough moment to read simply a smattering of words. You need to have your own personal brand or even company name and also a couple of or three words talking about the product or service in large adequate type which it can always be read from half a dozen foot away.

4. Web site

Communicating of type, your selection of font types is the critical decision in addition to ought to get just as much focus seeing that choosing color as well as visuals. Don't choose just one of the common House windows fonts such as Periods New Roman or Arial, and also avoid over-used baptistère such as Écrit or Monotype Corsiva. May be afraid to use anything new and different rapid you can find thousands of exclusive fonts about the - simply go to fonts. com or 1001freefonts. com. The top point to remember is actually that you desire excellent looking type that will be set up.

5. Material

Just before you possibly begin typically the design process you should take into account the label material. Your current design needs to "fit" materials. Common material selections include white-colored, clear, or perhaps a cream uneven document. Clear material permits any "no label look" in which can be very stunning in case you have a colored burial container or product or service. Take some sort of look at Palmolive authentic food soap - this specific is a merchandise this uses a clear brand very well. A very simple design with whitened printer, it really shows down often the striking green water inside of. White material offers you one of the most flexibility using design, since you can make bright into virtually any color an individual like, or you may merely use the light background. For the old planet look, a new textured ointment paper can be extremely effective and also is popular with wineries where you want for you to convey a hand crafted graphic.

6. Label Finish off

No matter if you choose a smooth or matte finish in your labels is a common sense phone depending on the actual kind of image you need to convey. A matte layered can provide a considerably more classic search that is usually very easy to study, whilst gloss will put some influence to the particular colors on the ticket and provide a glistening, refractive look. A great example of the matte look is the Sincere Teas brand of bottled teas. Inside the highly aggressive beverage industry they include a more subdued appear with a simple point functions really well having the matte finish off. In the event that you can't decided involving matte and glossy in that case execute a small order connected with the two and test the idea - find what folks find most attractive.

several. Label Size

If anyone are using the rounded container then you more than likely have a choice instructions do you need one large tag or maybe separate front along with again labels? Front in addition to rear labels allow you actually to elegantly distinct typically the front branding information from your ingredient and regulatory details but they can possibly be more expensive compared to a huge wrap around brand. In the event you go with any wraparound label then the item is important to retain a front "panel" with all the vital branding information due to the fact that is what often the consumers might find as they will are browsing the aisles.

8. Shapes

You can easily actually draw attention to help your ticket by employing an unusual shape. This will likely require the initial purchase of your new die which usually can expense several hundred or so dollars depending on the actual sizing and complexity associated with your design and style. Heinz ketchup is one sort of a unusual shape done well the keystone label condition has become part regarding their company after much more than 130 years. This is one trick that could save the money involving buying a special expire. Use a clear point as well as simulate an abnormal shape by making use of white printer ink to create your personal wanted shape, so it can look that your label provides a one of a kind shape perhaps if it is some sort of easy rectangle label.

on the lookout for. A pattern for Different Flavours

With numerous flavors connected with the same product you will need to keep major design components of your label consistent. If someone is looking on the peach, orange as well as lime flavour they really should be able to understand quickly that it is definitely all the same firm and also brand. A corporation that will an superb job of keeping a frequent yet different look concerning flavors is Nantucket Nectars. Each flavor has a new basic illustration encompassing the particular flavor using a similar field from Nantucket Island inside the background.

10. Info

In the 21st one hundred year every single company should possess contact information particular solution labels. This is clearly not about making your own label design more interesting, but alternatively having your tag be more than the inerte selling and promotion. A great 800 number, a website along with a physical address can certainly become easily included in the brand. You can provide a special site on your label to get customers to join up for the email list, to help you accumulate information and start in order to interact with your very good buyers.

When designing your current label you have to take directly into account what your opposition has been doing. If most organizations in your room have got very colorful in addition to sleek labels, then why not a a lot more plain and more subdued seem will allow you to be able to stand out around the grocery shelf. Take lots of the features mentioned here as well as separate yourself from the level of competition. Providing a new and also exciting look invites shoppers to grab your product.

[burning-up-ao3]

20 Penguins Thoughts: Improvement involves more than a potential trade  January 29, 2019 8:00 AMBy Jason Mackey / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Look at what Jim Rutherford did on Monday, trading Jamie Oleksiak back to Dallas for a 2019 fourth-round draft pick, and it’s fairly easy to conclude that the Penguins general manager has his sights set on doing something.

Fine. Trade away, Jim. Shoot your shot.

But is a swap for a third-line center, or even an impact winger, going to fix this? Highly doubtful.

Not that the Penguins are a dysfunctional group, either. They aren’t. They’re still a very good team. But no matter what move Rutherford makes, if the Penguins play like they did Monday, they’re simply not a trade away from another Stanley Cup run.

“If we’re going to be successful,” Matt Cullen was saying after the Penguins’ 6-3 loss to the New Jersey Devils at PPG Paints Arena on Monday night, “we’re going to have to be a lot harder to play against.”

The 42-year-old has never been more right.

Kevin Hayes, Radek Faksa, Charlie Coyle, Micheal Ferland — all dream acquisitions by Penguins fans, for perfectly understandable reasons — aren’t going to solve the problem by themselves. Neither is shipping out Jack Johnson or calling up Teddy Blueger or whatever other Band-Aid has been applied.

Heck, the Penguins got creamed by the Devils, and Derick Brassard was actually half-decent. What the Penguins will need to fix this — and snap out of a stretch that has included five losses in eight games — is much larger than one or two players.

So, what realistically must happen?

2. Work ethic, urgency and competitive spirit were the terms being thrown around the Penguins dressing room late Monday, and it’s hard to argue with any of them.

The power play also has to be better; those five players need to be a factor, and they can’t keep allowing short-handed goals at this rate. They need to get Evgeni Malkin right, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Penguins coach Mike Sullivan’s move is to pull him off the top unit, as crazy as that might sound. No more bad turnovers. Let him focus on other areas.

The Penguins also must defend better than they did against New Jersey, and there’s simply a lack of urgency that shouldn’t exist at this point in the season, especially not for a team that fancies itself as a Stanley Cup contender.

I do have five questions for the home stretch, but I’ll get to those shortly. First, a couple loose ends.

3. I thought Sidney Crosby had some really strong stuff to say after Monday’s loss. He’s usually fairly positive, never too down, but the captain seemed fairly mad after this one.

What lacked against the Devils: “Everything. Execution. Urgency. Those are probably the biggest two. Pretty important ones.”

The NHL-worst 11 short-handed goals the Penguins have allowed: “I mean, it’s 11. I think it could probably be a couple different things depending on the play. It’s not a stat we’re proud of, that’s for sure.”

On needing to correct things with Tampa coming in: “We can say everything we want to say. We can say all the right things. We have to go out there and do it.”

Good for him. No one has a stronger voice than Crosby. And every word is he said is true.

4. Here’s why I think Rutherford could do something, and soon: Why else let Jamie Oleksiak go for a fourth-round pick?

Perhaps because Rutherford knows he’s going to need the space soon, and this was what he figured was his best available opinion.

That’s what I think, anyway.

“It just puts us in a position when something comes along — which, it will — over the next few weeks here,” Rutherford said when I asked what this means moving forward in our phone conversation early Monday evening. “It’ll put us in a position for other options because of the cap space.”

Which it will. Rutherford knows his phone will be ringing, and you know he’ll answer.

Yes, it was about having too many defensemen and Justin Schultz coming back soon, but that’s not a reason to make the trade now, for that return.

Doing it now, and not when Schultz returns in early February — remember, he has yet to skate with the team — sends a signal that Rutherford is open for business and able to potentially absorb some salary.

5. Switching gears a little bit … why hasn’t Teddy Blueger been gotten a shot? You guys/girls ask this a lot.

With 21 goals and 39 points in 45 games with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the AHL, it’s a totally reasonable question, especially considering Blueger plays in all situations and isn’t defensively deficient.

When I talked to Rutherford before Monday’s game, I asked him exactly that: Why hasn’t Blueger been given a chance?

“It’s a positional thing,” Rutherford said. “He’s played well enough to be here. When it’s been time to recall a player, the players that we’ve recalled can play the wing.

“We haven’t been in a position where we’ve had to call up a center. Teddy doesn’t play the wing. He only plays center. It’s a more-than-fair question. He has done what he’s needed to do to put himself in position to play at this level.”

6. I see Rutherford’s point. Blueger isn’t a wing, and the Penguins would theoretically be doing a disservice to him by playing him out of position, even if I know many of you are going to say, “Well, just shift someone else there.”

I don’t think the Penguins would want a fourth line with two guys playing out of position — probably Riley Sheahan and Matt Cullen — to accommodate a rookie playing his first NHL game.

7. Which led to this follow-up question that I posed to Rutherford: Is there a scenario you see unfolding where Blueger could get a chance this season.

His answer: “I don’t see it with the guys that we have here now.”

I found that answer interesting: “With the guys that we have here now.”

On one hand, that means no; Blueger’s staying in the minors. On the other, I suppose that could change if Rutherford trades Brassard or even Riley Sheahan, although I don’t think using Blueger as a regular is something the Penguins want to force.

8-12. To me, there’s five key questions for the Penguins coming out of the All-Star break. Addressing those will occupy this and the following four spots.

The first involves Malkin. Can he rediscover the form he found during the second half of last season, when he led the NHL in points (62) from Jan. 1 through the end of the regular season?

Taking him off the top power play might be one option. Maybe trying some other people on his left wing. Shoot, maybe even sit Malkin down for a game, just to change something up, although I admittedly don’t love that option.

But I think Malkin is pressing and his confidence is lacking, which is a bad combination.

“Obviously we’d like him to have more of a positive impact on the game,” Sullivan said after Monday’s game. “He’s such a talented player. He’s such an accomplished player. I know how much he cares about this team, this organization and trying to help us win. Part of my responsibility as his coach and our staff is we’re trying to help Geno through this process and try and help him capture his very best game. We’ll continue to work with him.”

9. What happens when Schultz returns?

You know he’s going to slot into the top-four. But more than that, with whom does Schultz play? Olli Maatta? Is he effective? Does he get top power-play reps? The latter part is interesting given that unit’s current situation.

I also look at Schultz like a trade-deadline acquisition. His presence alone could give this group a nice little jolt of life.

10. Where’s Matt Murray at?

It’s hard to criticize Murray after Monday’s game. No, he wasn’t great, but neither was the team in front of him. And this is a guy who was 10-1 since returning from a lower-body injury, with a 1.81 goals-against average and .944 save percentage before the Devils game.

Expecting those numbers might be a bit much, but the Penguins will want and need something close here to make a push over the final 40 percent of the season.

11. What’s the final verdict on Brassard?

Brassard was actually decent Monday, although hardly enough to quash any of the ongoing trade talk.

Given acquisition cost, don’t rule out the Penguins sticking with Brassard, although I would imagine that, if they do, Rutherford would probably like to add another piece to get more from that line.

12. How does this Metro mess sort itself out?

The Metropolitan Division is an interesting place right now.

The Islanders are in first place, have allowed a league-low 118 goals, and Barry Trotz is looking like the Jack Adams Award winner. The Capitals, meanwhile, have lost seven in a row and look lost.

The Blue Jackets are hanging around, and the Penguins are in fourth place, with the Hurricanes just four points behind.

That’s a long-winded way of saying that plenty can still happen, and the margin for error is rather small.

13. Moving on … I loved what Kendall Coyne Schofield, Brianna Decker and others did at the NHL All-Star Game, but I still wish it would have been executed differently.

For one, they should have been paid, especially Decker after winning the premier passer event.

You can treat this like a statement-making sort of event all you want, which I think the NHL did. But when you pay the event winners, pay the winning team of the All-Star Game $1 million and award a car to the MVP … and you don’t see a need to earmark anything for these women — who make nothing close to NHL players — until there’s negative reaction over it, I question how much of a statement you were really trying to make.

14. Also, why not show all of them demonstrating the drills? And why not talk, while Coyne Schofield was flying, about her own career, Northeastern, Team USA women’s hockey, whatever. Anything aside from her husband who plays for the Chargers.

Or, here’s a final thought: Why not promote the upcoming series between Team USA and Hockey Canada in Detroit and London, Ontario?

If you have a platform, use it.

15. One more about Coyne Schofield and Decker …

Being in the building, the buzz created was amazing. It also made me think about something that I’d love to see: a National Women’s Hockey League (NWHL) team in Pittsburgh.

I think it would work, too. There are so many fervent and intelligent female hockey fans here, plus there’s great infrastructure in place for it with UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex and how naturally intertwined it would be with the Penguins.

Have no clue on logistics or anything like that, or whether it’s even remotely possible, but if the team won, I think it could do really well.

16. I find NHL commissioner Gary Bettman’s stance on current labor negotiations … interesting.

He keeps repeating the phrase, “We’re not looking for a fight.”

Great, but your fans don’t care. They just want the product.

And it positions the players, if they ask for anything that’s even remotely reasonable, as the bad guys.

17. Media day must be handled better next year.

You’ll notice that neither Crosby nor Kris Letang was there. They were among the seven of 44 players who did not make it. That’s too many.

But I don’t blame Crosby or Letang. Why should they give up a day of their bye week when the All-Stars who are on theirs from Jan. 27-31 will get five full days?

It’s also not fair to the fans who bought tickets to the event — held inside San Jose’s City National Civic theater — expecting to hear those two or others. I also understand why those who played Wednesday night weren’t there.

My solution: Put a dark day in the schedule, to ensure 100 percent participation. There’s no sense wasting fans’ or media members’ money and ticking off your players … for what?

18. While we’re at it, I also think the Skills Competition needs tweaked.

I think the fastest skater, hardest shot and accuracy shooting events are fine the way they are. Leave those alone. Let’s concentrate on the other ones.

The puck control event was OK, but I don’t see how casual fans might keep the event on their TVs to watch a dude stickhandle around cones. Too boring. Need to spice it up a little.

Secondly, the whole event slowed to a crawl during the save streak-intermission-premier passer part of the evening. Has to be tighter to keep viewers’ attention.

Have goalies stop as many breakaways as they can until they’re done. If it’s two, so be it. They’re done.

Then simplify the passing thing. I don’t need to see poor Mikko Rantanen suffering through 2:17.379, then having to watch seven more heats.

The Skills Competition has some interesting elements. I think it can be watchable, as opposed to the game itself, which is a little too gimmicky for my taste.

But it needs to be tighter, falling somewhere in the 90-minute range start to finish.

19. I was not at all surprised to hear deputy NHL commissioner Bill Daly’s answer when I asked whether the Penguins are being considered for international events.

“Yes,” was what Daly said, with a wide smile.

As they should be.

How does one of the NHL’s marquee U.S. teams, with the league’s most recognizable player and some seriously high-end talent, not get included in this stuff?

The Penguins haven’t played internationally since going to Stockholm, Sweden in 2008. Whether it’s China, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland or the Czech Republic — all destinations on the horizon — the Penguins should get asked to go.

And soon, if you ask me.

20. I liked seeing Toronto’s Auston Matthews rip off his own Maple Leafs sweater to show support for teammate Patrick Marleau, who’s nothing short of a legend out here.

I think it’s part of what should be a push by players, especially the younger ones, to showcase more personality whenever possible.

I know the NHL is a different animal, and it’s never going to rival the NBA or NFL in terms of pure entertainment for casual fans.

But if the league can do something, anything, to become even a little less bland — including players speaking their minds instead of offering milquetoast quotes they fear might upset someone — I think it would be a good thing.

Jason Mackey: jmackey@post-gazette.com and Twitter @JMackeyPG.

[nymandnunez45-blog]

What to Look For in a Divorce Lawyer - How to Select Wisely

With the changes in loved ones law in excess of the final 30 years, such as the adoption of equitable distribution in spot of the previous widespread-legislation principles, the adoption of rules guarding military spouses, and the adoption of support guidelines and various regional principles promulgated inside of the different circuits, the area of separation and divorce has turn into considerably way too difficult and specialized for an individual who does not regularly take care of these kinds of situations. It distresses us when consumers arrive to us with improperly drafted separation agreements, and/or decrees which other inexperienced lawyers have managed. Just as it is greater to win at demo than to have a excellent appeal problem, it is considerably greater to have the appropriate lawyer, a single who will get it right the first time, than to have to pay an individual to correct troubles stemming from problems manufactured in the 1st location. Occasionally the errors are extremely expensive and can not be set as demonstrated in the collection of articles I wrote for The Family members Legislation Information, a peer evaluation publication of the Virginia State Bar, Segment of Loved ones Legislation, entitled "Pricey Mistakes in Multi-Point out Army Divorce Or a Military Wife's Tale of Woe," which are released in the Fall 2007 and Spring 2008 issues of the publication. The series of articles outlines the authorized authorities, approach and procedural factors we employed to effectively protect a armed forces retiree, who was a veteran of the Vietnam War. His ex-wife was trying to get half of his armed forces retired spend and spousal assistance below in Virginia, in spite of obtaining divorced him six many years earlier in Hawaii. Whilst we are always content to accomplish a effective outcome for our consumers, we felt sorry for the ex-spouse, who experienced obtained bad legal suggestions from hr legal professional in the original divorce motion in Hawaii, guidance that direct to bad selections which the Virginia Court docket located to bind her completely. In ruling for us in the scenario, the choose instructed the ex-wife that as an alternative of suing her ex-spouse, show need to go after the lawyer in Hawaii who represented her in the divorce. So, how do you go about discovering a great divorce attorney? Listed here are a few suggestions: Recommendation #one-Inquire a Law firm If you know a lawyer, ask him/her for a referral to a good divorce attorney. He or she will most likely know a person or numerous someones who dedicate a significant portion of the follow of legislation to separation and divorce and associated problems. For example, I have been managing separation and divorce for thirty many years and have an superb track record amid the nearby legal local community. Any divorce legal professional worth his/her salt should have recognized a status between other legal professionals. Legal professionals normally know who is excellent for a certain variety of circumstance they certainly know who they would see, if they had been experiencing separation and divorce. Recommendation #two-Yellow Webpages/Internet While not a excellent resource of info, the Yellow Internet pages and web can be a commencing source of legal professional names. Attorneys who do not point out separation, divorce, military divorce, and relevant places like custody and support or home division, are not in search of cases in people regions and definitely do not commit a substantial part of the follow to people regions. Be leery of adverts that contain a laundry record of almost everything under the solar. Keep in mind the previous saying, "a jack of all trades and master of none"? Wouldn't you fairly have someone who requires the time to emphasis at least a important quantity of time to loved ones regulation, than an individual who maybe devotes 3% of his/her apply to family law issues? Keep in mind not everyone advertises in the Yellow Web pages or haw a site or internet existence.. For instance, there are far more telephone listings than there are legal professional advertisements in the Yellow Webpages. Suggestion # 3-VIRGINIA Lawyer REFERRAL Service The Virginia Law firm Referral Service is operated by the Virginia State Bar. Attorneys need to inquire to get on the record and need to concur to a set price for an original consultation. A lawyer can be listed below any category he/she asks for. The names are on a rotating list and provided to shoppers who speak to the support. Yet again, not all attorneys are outlined. We are not detailed with the referral service. This source can offer the title of an attorney who is in search of family members legislation situations. This does not indicate that the lawyer is an skilled in these kinds of cases or that he/she is skilled. All it indicates is that he or she is searching for divorce instances. Be sure to just take the queries I discuss about here to the lawyer job interview. Suggestion #four-Speak to Far more Than A single Legal professional In truth, interview many lawyers. Request each attorney who else handles separation and divorce in the location. If they will not likely give you names, depart the business office, when you see names displaying up on various lists of recommendations, the odds are most likely excellent that the lawyer is doing these instances on a regular foundation. Recommendation #five - Use a Checklist I have outlined elements that you ought to contemplate when selecting a divorce law firm. A. Expertise. The longer you have been working towards a specific location of the legislation, the far more you know. There is an aged adage that claims a good attorney knows the legislation and a great attorney knows the choose! What is the variation amongst a excellent law firm and a fantastic law firm? Encounter. B. Knowledge Making an attempt Situations. Has he/she reached any demo successes for his/her clients? Can the attorney stage to circumstance outcomes or consumer testimonial reflecting his/her capabilities? C. Are they prepared to settle when suitable to do so? Trial attorneys often experience from a employed gun mentality. They like the thrill of trying situations and may possibly not consider other choices, such as mediation or arbitration to achieve a resolution. Most great divorce lawyers do not adopt this technique, but see demo as a final resort, when other choices have unsuccessful to precipitate a fair resolution of the concerns. As opposed to other places of the law, family law usually entails ongoing interactions and consequently needs a diverse standpoint. I not too long ago read through an article by a private injury legal professional, who was creating on how to pick a private harm lawyer. He explained not to select a lawyer who settles a lot of circumstances. When it arrives to separation and divorce, I think it is critical to try out to get to an settlement, if you can. Likely to courtroom about family members legislation until you have to is like making use of a sledge hammer on a flea dilemma you could get rid of a couple of fleas, but you wreak a good deal of injury to the structure of the house, also. When folks settle their very own situations exterior of courtroom, they can be a great deal much more creative than the courtroom would be in fashioning a remedy that is fair to each parties. Occasionally, arrangement is just not feasible. When that is the circumstance, you want an seasoned able divorce attorney who can advocate for your situation in court and has a established monitor report of success. D. Respect in the authorized local community. What are other legal professionals stating about this law firm? Has the attorney lectured or taught? Has he/she taught other legal professionals? E. Publications. Has he/she created everything that has been recognized for publication in lawful journals? This is an additional sign of respect for the attorney and for his/her skills and expertise. Has he/she prepared or revealed anything created to teach the general public as to their rights duties and tasks under the regulation? F. Affiliations and memberships. What specialist affiliations does the legal professional have? Is he/she a member of the Household Law Part of the Virginia State Bar Association? How to get divorced of the Virginia Trial Lawyers? A fellow of the American Academy of Matrimonial Attorneys? G. Does the lawyer limit the variety of cases he/she undertakes? We don't just take every scenario that phone calls in or walks through the door. We limit the variety of cases that we undertake to take care of at a offered position in time so that we an target on undertaking the best occupation for those consumers. H. Romantic relationship problems. one. How was the phone answered when you referred to as for an appointment? 2. How have been you greeted when you entered the workplace? Were you presented refreshments? 3. Did the legal professional and staff hear to you? Are you positive? Could you explain to they had been listening? 4. Have been you interrupted during your time with the attorney? five. Does the attorney use composed agreements location out the parameters of the representation and the monetary preparations? six. A single of the most important factors of picking a law firm is the partnership factor: you need to have to be capable to operate successfully and easily with your attorney. The romantic relationship demands intimacy and trust. Do you come to feel cozy with the attorney? seven. Have been you launched to personnel? 8. How lengthy does the attorney retain data files on closed instances? What happens to the shut file? How is it disposed of? What steps does the legal professional get to safeguard your confidential info? I. Why does he/she practice divorce regulation? Pals and colleagues think I am nuts to devote so considerably time to separation and divorce legislation. They could be correct, I just may be a tiny mad. But like the tune suggests, "it just may be a lunatic you're looking for." When interviewing a potential divorce law firm be certain to request him/her why they decide on to exercise family regulation. Does the lawyer have a life expertise that makes it possible for him/her to advocate for divorce customers with real passion? Is that enthusiasm something that is mirrored in client testimonies? J. Cost. In contrast to personal harm follow, the very best divorce lawyers do not provide "cost-free" consultations. You will notice that expense is final on the list. In our expertise, the best divorce legal professionals are generally not the most inexpensive. In the prolonged operate, what is it worth to you to keep or purchase your fair share of the property that have been accumulated more than the training course of your married life? What is it really worth to you to insure that you keep your reasonable share of time with your youngsters? Some factors are worth preventing for and well worth the price tag that you have to pay. If your attorney does not commit a significant part of his/her apply to family law issues, has never attempted a contested divorce, has by no means tried out a contested custody circumstance or who has in no way tried an equitable distribution scenario, or drafted a experienced domestic relations get dividing a pension, or who has no expertise in military divorce and has never ever drafted a navy retired pay out order, you may possibly want to choose an additional attorney for your separation and divorce. Legal professional Virginia Dante Perry is actively engaged in the general exercise of law with an emphasis on household regulation and trials for more than thirty many years. More than individuals several years she has attempted to depict herself and her clientele with honesty and integrity. Atty. Perry requires a "no nonsense" strategy. She does not guarantee what she cannot deliver, but tries to supply more than she promises. She says what she will do and she does what she says. Element of her vision is to teach individuals as to their legal rights, duties and responsibilities below the law. Atty. Perry is a people particular person. She enjoys conference and conversing with folks, advising them, informing them and aiding them to solve their difficulties. She has customers who have been with her given that the 1970's. She has a popularity for currently being thorough and methodical in dealing with household regulation matters and for getting a "straight shooter."

[malusvio]

Libertarian Socialist Synthesism

My name is Rose, I am a Libertarian Socialist Synthesist. I fuse ideas from Communalism, Anarcho-Communism, Council Communism, and Marxian critique of capitalism 1) Libertarian Socialist A)  Against all forms of tyrannical and/or centralized authority and replaced instead with de-centralized direct democracy. Opposed to authoritarian socialist tendencies such as Leninism, Marxism-Leninism, Trotskyism, and Maoism. B) Workers should democratically own their workplaces. Rather than having shareholders, a CEO, and board of directors decide what to produce, how to produce it, where to produce it, etc. those will be decided by the workers who work in the workplace C) Elimination of producing things to be treated as commodities. In a world where we are driven under capitalism by profit, resources should rather be distributed according to need 2) Communist A) Abolition of the state, which is a centralized institution ruled by a small elite who govern a bordered area and claim a monopoly on violence inside (and even outside through imperialism) those borders, and replaced with individual de-centralized communes B) Abolition of social classes, where we live in a world where, instead of privilege and status where the few rule over the majority, instead everyone will be equal without privilege. There will no longer be proletariat, lumpenproletariat, landlords, peasantry, bourgeoisie, or petite bourgeoisie, there will only be us, humans. C) Abolition of money in place of Mutual Aid, as proposed by Pyotr Kropotkin, Russian evolutionary scientist who proposed the best of the species survived, not by Darwin’s idea of survival of the fittest, but rather by those who help each other in mutual aid. In a world where we are ruled by profits, we must, as said in the socialist section, distribute resources according to need, not profit

3) Anarchist A) The idea that any hierarchical structure that cannot prove it’s legitimacy must be dismantled and replaced with something else, including the state, capitalism, and landlords, and that hierarchies should be replaced with horizontal organization instead of vertical B) The idea that consent is important in an economical system and social relations

4) Communalist A) Social Ecology, the socio-historical analysis of the development of hierarchy and freedom. It espouses a reconstructive, ecological, communitarian, and ethical approach to society and advocates for a reconstructive and transformative outlook on social and environmental issues, directly democratic confederal politics, and evnisions a moral economy that moves beyond scarcity and hierarchy toward a world that reharmonizes human communities with the natural world while celebrating diversity, creativity, and freedom, and that the roots of current ecological and social problems can be traced to hierarchical modes of social organization, and hierarchy cannot be resisted by individual actions alone such as ethical consumerism but must be addressed by more nuanced ethical thinking and collective activity grounded in radically democratic ideals. The complexity of relationships between people and nature is empasized, along with the importance of establishing more mutualistic social structures that take account of this B) Dialectical Naturalism, the ethics and philosophy of communalism that follows a dialectical pattern through the lense of nature rather than Hegel’s Historical Dialects or Marx’s Dialectical Materialism C) Libertarian Municipalism, the idea that we should have local assemblies within a municipality (town, city, village, tc) where citizens are encouraged to participate in directly democratically making decisions, where those assemblies can unite toward a common goal under confederations, and elected delegates that can be immediately recalled at any point for any reason by those who elected them as well as frequently rotated, and those delegates carry out additional tasks to the ones they already carry out. For more information on Libertarian Municipalism, please read here https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/murray-bookchin-libertarian-municipalism-the-new-municipal-agenda D) Automation should be encouraged to replace menial and rather boring and harmful jobs that no one wants to engage in, giving us more leisure time to enjoy with our friends and family and engage in hobbies we enjoy F) The idea that any hierarchical structure that cannot prove it’s legitimacy must be dismantled and replaced with something else, including the state, capitalism, and landlords, and that hierarchies should be replaced with horizontal organization instead of vertical 5) Council Communism A) The workplace should be directly democratic with worker councils consisting of the workers within a workplace electing delegates that can be immediately recalled for any reason at any time and the position is frequently rotated. For more information on Council Communism please refer here https://malusvio.tumblr.com/post/177301953987/council-communism-councilism and here https://libcom.org/thought/council-communism-an-introduction B) The idea that revolution is a process. As Antonie Pannekoek wrote quote: ”The revolution by which the working class will win mastery and freedom, is not a single event of limited duration. It is a process of organization, of self-education, in which the workers gradually, now in progressing rise, then in steps and leaps, develop the force to vanquish the bourgeoisie, to destroy capitalism, and to build up their new system of collective production.” C) parliamentary debates and propaganda during election campaigns could be used to ‘enlighten the workers about their class situation’. However parliamentary debates and worker unions should not be the main focus in developing class consciousness, as the workers must take action themselves D) Organization and class consciousness are linked through a dialectical relationship. New forms of struggle and organization arise spontaneously, in the sense that they are not planned consciously in advance, and they arise as a practical response to the problems faced by workers in the course of their struggles. Once these new forms have arisen, however, they can be made more widely known, and other groups of workers can begin to act on their example. 6) Marxian (as opposed to Marxist) A) Criticisms of Capitalism including the idea that workers are alienated from their work when the fruits of the worker’s labor ends up in the hands of the employer; The idea that workers are exploited and extracted for their surplus value, the amount of labor that one puts into a product has a portion of the worth of the product they built taken from them and given to the employer, creating further alienation; that Capitalism is a contradiction-laden system with recurring crises coming from tendency of the rate of profit to fall; Capitalism is another stage in the evolution of economic systems; and many other criticisms.

7) Other A) I oppose a violent revolution, as appealing as it sounds, instead I support Democratic Autonomy as a method to achieving a socialist society. I’m not saying I oppose all violence. I support violent resistance to fascism, but a full-blown revolutionary war would kill millions and wreck havoc on the environment. Violent revolutions are a distraction if you have well-developed tech and infastructure. Just build an alt-government on anarchist principles and ignore what the state and capitalists are doing and build good things. I will support the revolution everyone fetishizes if it happens but theres risk of it failing, degrading into fascism or reverting back to capitalism. So what we must do is normalize socialism, organize socialists around mutual aid and charity works to improve our image and accomplish more than LARPing, build power inside and out of the existing power structures, institutions, unions, and organizations, engage in mass strikes and non violent demonstrations. Police attacking non-violent protestors or demonstrators is a bad look, makes us look good. Modern revolutions are won in the arena of public opinion. When 75 million people decide to back something, fighting it with violence isnt possible. The reason for 75 million is that the civilian casualties would run into the tens of millions if bio or nuclear weapons were used. 75 million is ¼ the US population and you arent gonna win revolution without that much support. The state is going to smear us as terrorists when we get violent, and use that as justification to impose all kinds of evil legislation. The United States alone has over 350 million people. Are we really willing to let that many people get slaughtered, and have our hometowns look like what Afrin looks like today? Are we willing to provoke nuclear war and wipe out the entire continent? Dust thrown into the air would block the sun, radiation would contaminate food and water. Instead I support, as I said, setting Democratic Autonomy, in which Libertarian Socialists infiltrate the nation-state’s government alongside Libertarian Municipalities and Worker Councils being set up immediately, ignoring what the nation-state’s government says, setting up counter-power, while simultaneously leeching off of it. This is a non-violent revolution. For more information read here http://daf-sd.org/assets/daf_supporterintroduction.pdf B) Prefigurative politics is important. It is important for us to act in a way in our current capitalist society as we would after it. If we are to have a violent revolution that succeeds, we need there to be no leaders during it, just as we would after it Influences Karl Marx Antonie Pannekoek Joseph Dejacque Pierre Joseph-Proudhon Mikhail Bakunin Pyotr Kropotkin Nestor Makhno Emma Goldman Lucy Parsons Murray Bookchin Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Various Twitter & Discord Users Libertarian Socialist Rants Anarchopac My friends

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Static by Mick Dark - Part 2

...Elijah took himself back in and allowed his heart beat to recover while he slumped into his recliner after having switched on his radio. He drifted off for a few moments, dreaming of his Deborah, as he always did. He was jolted up by sharp static followed by a male voice that had him racing to his seat in front of the wideband radio.

Pressing the transmitting button, Elijah said “hello, Moses? Joe”? Nothing. Light white noise and then silence. Suddenly a shrieking, high pitched sentence “FRENDDDD GAWWWWN! COMM FIND YOOOOO!” Elijah, barely recuperated from his earlier trauma leapt out of his chair, covering his mouth that covered a near scream that ended up producing a forced whimper. “GAHHH ….WE COMMM” then a snapped silence like the radio was unplugged.

“hello! HELLO! WHO IS THIS!!!!??” WHO IS THIS!!!!??” Elijah demanded. He sat back down. This was Joe’s frequency. “How did they know me?? Wait, my god…Joe!” Elijah whispered in a dribbled terrified sentence. “Joe has my location, maps of the entire area but I was miles away from him, even if they had a map. Even if they could read a map.” He continued.

Although….getting around was not their issue. It was the issue of those uninfected. Could they read maps. Could they understand anything? Elijah considered all of this. But they could speak, if that was truly one of them. He was trying to wrap his head around the proposition. Something that he never considered before. They were infamous for their rage and for their senseless malevolence. Nobody knew anything about their level of intelligence or capabilities.” He continued as he dropped into his chair. Looking around the room without any purpose. He knew that he needed a plan. If they were coming for him and knew where to find him – then they were far more intelligent than anyone had suspected and he needed to either fortify or run. Elijah decided to prepare.

Then, another run of static on the radio. “Elijah, my friend, it’s Moses” he said. “Oh thank God, you’re ok. What the fuck happened over there and where have you been”? Elijah pressed. Moses deeply exhaled and started “uhhh.. these things broke into my home while I was out searching for food. Destroyed my apartment. I was afraid they would come back so I took everything I could and while I was collecting my items, I heard them in the building. I hid and then ran as soon as I could hear some silence. In my rush, I left my radio behind and each time I tried to come back, I was afraid”. He continued. “This morning, I decided that I needed to get my radio, if I could. I needed to communicate. That is when I saw this child running across the parking lot, as I was entering the building. I was confused and didn’t know what was happening. Then I saw these two things chasing her. I was terrified for this little girl” “oh my God” Elijah interjected.

“I froze and knew that if I tried to help her, I was in danger but my impulse was to help this poor little girl so I chased after them and raced up the stairs behind them and that’s when I got to an apartment and saw them trying to grab at her, so when I saw a baseball bat hanging on the wall, I grabbed it immediately and acted” he continued. “I’m just glad that neither one of us was hurt”.

“She is safe now and we are back at my old flat but we cannot stay for long, as you know so I am wrapping up my equipment and we have to find another place” he finished. Elijah continued to explain to Moses his recent warning from whatever that was. He conveyed his sorrow at the thought that Joe may, in fact, be gone. He reinforced his concern that he was in danger and was afraid to take this on alone. Nobody ventures out. This is an unwritten rule. Nobody, not at night, not during the day. Only when the circumstance is so absolutely desperate. These abominations travelled in packs and were fast and deadly. They were somewhat intelligent. After the communications received that morning it was clear that they could speak, also. Moses didn’t care. He had already taken once chance and Eli was scared and alone. He would have to keep the little girl in tow, though. She couldn’t be left alone again. She was, most certainly, a liability to take along but it would benefit everyone to stay together. She wouldn’t survive alone.

They had a decision to make, however. If Elijah was in danger, he knew he should move and join Moses. That would be sensible. The concern was that Elijah had set up a fortress. It was reinforced as much as you could fortify a cheap apartment. He had horded enough food to last him months, maybe several weeks, at least, for 3 people. Cans of food. Nothing special but food, nonetheless. He had a water system set up. He had medical supplies and more. He couldn’t leave that behind. So, he decided to stay and fight if necessary. Hell, Moses took one out with a baseball bat, with no issues. Elijah had racked up a half dozen body count in the last two years, himself. Then, Elijah remembered the terrifying voice at the other end of that radio. If he stayed and the warning was valid then it could be a wave that he could have no protection from. He had to go.

Elijah packed up as much crap as he could. Rucksacks full of cans weighing him down. Had forgotten the can opener. Bottles of water, 6 filled up. As much as he could carry. A knife and his bat. Couldn’t take the radio but made one last attempt on it. He tried for just over 20 minutes to reach Moses who finally responded. Moses and Elijah made a plan. Neither one could stay where they were. The block could be teeming with them soon. They both prepared and with the little girl now at Moses’s side where she couldn’t be pried from, they met in the lobby of Elijah’s building, in the security room behind the concierge desk. Quietly. Cautiously. “What now?” whispered Moses. The young girl remained always silent – stared up at Moses and then Elijah anticipating his response.

“We move” replied Elijah. “We get to the boat”. Moses looked confused and froze as they all stopped short of their exchange and braced and listened. Indistinguishable noises in the distance. They rushed the conclusion to the chat. The neurosis was palpable. “what boat?” Moses asked. “Joe has a boat. I know where it is. I know where he hides the key. We gotta go for the boat” Elijah explained. “When?” Moses responded. “Now, brother. We have to go. I have a bad feeling. I mean a bad, bad feeling. This voice. This voice on the radio. I don’t know but I think they know where I am and the voice sounded familiar but hard to tell” Elijah exclaimed, sweat trailing down his face.

“Ok, let me have a look. Let me check the parking lot” Moses replied in a whisper. Moses opened the security room door slowly. He first checked the outer foyer. Nothing but broken glass. The area was clear. They felt that it was now time to make the move. It would be dark in a few hours. They could wait until morning but if Eli was telling the truth and it seemed that this was something that he took quite seriously, they wouldn’t be safe anymore in the apartment block. They had maybe 2 or 3 hours before it was dark. They had to make up time especially with the consideration that they could encounter unexpected delays with routinely keeping out of sight and moving cautiously.

They moved together, they got halfway through the foyer, their feet muting the crackling glass beneath them. Slowly. Then with a heart stopping break in the silence – a sharp static coming from upstairs. Loud enough to have been heard through Elijah’s door as he knew that it was his radio. Elijah was paralyzed from fear. The sharp hiss of the radio was felt as much as heard and it was followed by a ghoulish scream enveloped in white noise……it was difficult to distill the word that followed for a number of reasons – the paralyzing fear felt by the trio numbed their senses but they knew what that word was, when it was repeated.

COMMMMMINGGGGG!!

This was enough to encourage their movement. Elijah wasn’t sure who the message was directed at – the group or his fellow disciples of hell. Either way, those wobbly legs found their forward movement and they were off. The squelching command was repeated again and again until it faded into the distance as they moved out of the parking lot.

“COMMMMINNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG”

The only hope was that they would make it to the boat before the sound alerted the hordes to a collective bounty on the heads of the fleeing team. Holding their weapons tight, albeit gripped with sweaty, shaking hands…they moved slowly between cars, around buildings, avoiding the open and desolate streets on their way to the quay.

Every few minutes, Eli would look up to the sky. The position of the sun was critical to his very existence. They made some distance and they had already gone too far to turn back. To hole up for the evening somewhere would be a terrifying premise as they were all unaware of the spaces that attracted activity and not being familiar with your overnight spot was an incredibly horrifying position to be in. The young girl was unusually strong. She was quiet and silent. Eli and Moses were thankful for this. It could have been their end if she had been hysterical, even emotional to any degree. As the group scurried quietly through an alleyway between two buildings, the echo of the ocean bounced off the passageway.

Above the calming hiss of the ocean’s tides, punctuated by the lack of the usual mob of seagulls, came an echoed series of demonic screams from a multitude of directions running along the stone walls of the passage. The cold grip of horror squeezed their chests and froze them gasping for air which didn’t come. The young girl’s fingernails dug into both hands and broke skin which made Moses and Eli both wince, simultaneously. They knew something was behind or in front of them but it was impossible to distinguish the direction or trajectory they needed to burst into. When they became unstuck, they glanced at each other, down to the young girl who only stared forward, hands shaking and maintained her grip, clawing into the hands of the two men. Moses, a massive mountain of a man, and tough as nails and veteran of damage from the ring let out a small squeal from the young girl’s sharp nails.

They were facing the direction of the ocean and the ocean they will seek. The boat needed to be found and the sky was showing signs of decline. Eli had guessed it to be nearing 6pm and they needed to make some distance. The end of the tunnel was shrouded in ambient light, sun facing them and in the blurriest of silhouettes passed a figure, not 30 feet in front of them. They instinctively gasped and hugged the walls with their backs, the young girl ducking behind a sun-bleached, putrid garbage bag. She felt like retching but moved back from it and covered her nose and mouth.

Every step seemed to bring more threats and far more frequently. Eli suspected that, if they could evacuate the alley and get to the street ahead, they need only cross the park and into the quay. They would scramble to the boat. The key was under the ice box in the rear of the boat. Joe had made that clear a hundred times during their quiet chats. Eli ran through the discussions in his mind that he had with Joe. Those many, many conversations he had, entrenched in white noise most times had him realise that he had no idea what really happened to Joe. Where had he disappeared to?

What if he had taken the boat!?? Eli thought. He had lost touch. Eli had thought the worse but what if he hightailed it!? What if he decided to make a bolt for the boat? Eli hadn’t considered this and it struck him like a dropkick. He could be leading the group to their end. To a useless quay with an empty, watery parking spot where Joe’s boat would be.

“What’s the plan?” Moses said. “We need to make it through the park. Across the baseball field, to the left is the dock….Joe’s boat is the last on the right…..we make it to the boat and we get out of here. I have enough food in this pack to last two weeks, at least and I know Joe has some provisions stocked away in the cabin below, if they haven’t been pilfered yet. We’ll be ok” Eli managed to lay out something positive.

The girl looked up and toward the two of them, slowly, one by one. Then, as they paused at the sidewalk, reaching the end of the passageway….they peered both ways. Even if they saw no movement, they envisioned shapes slinking in various directions within their mind. Eli continuously heard the static from his radio screaming that he was a target and that they were coming for him. It was his imagination but he was terrified. The boat had to be there. It had to be there. Joe couldn’t have known to get away before that threatening unearthly voice occupied his radio broadcast and even if Eli wishes he could have, it was better now if he didn’t.

Moses picked up the young girl who never uttered a name. His giant arms dragged her up to his shoulder and they all tore off towards the park. Eli was moving at half the speed. He was, after all, old. He had nearly no muscle mass left in his body. He had not exercised nor left his apartment for over a year. His legs were burning. Eli gasped for oxygen. Moses stopped to take him by the arm and they walked quickly while Eli recuperated as much as he could in this semi-speed walking gallop. He was ready to give up after a minute. Moses put the girl down and they shared a glance. She knew to stay close. Moses smiled at her.

“let’s go big boy. You can do this” Moses chimed within Eli’s hard laboured breathing. “you got this”…. Eli formed a pained smile and then turned his head slowly to see a torrent of ravenous, shrieking ghouls by the dozens at the edge of the park behind them, nearly 1000 feet away. They were distant but they seemed intent on getting to their newly targeted meals. The girl finally spoke “I’m scared” and started gulping air, fear choking her. Moses had to be their rock at this moment. He grabbed Eli by the underarm and dragged him with the girl close behind. He slung him onto his back like an old, panting rucksack. The girl followed behind and they jogged. The quay was close.

The group was finally in the open and the covert sneaking between cars and buildings was a commodity they no longer enjoyed. They were in the open, exposed and in danger. They were now being hunted. Soon, they were onto the stairs down to the jetty and onto the wooden dock racing towards the boat with Eli’s instructions. “let me down, Moses…I’m ok” Eli muttered with an exasperation of fear and fatigue. Moses dropped him gently onto his feet. Eli led them to the boat. Moses stopped to scan their followers. They had grown. They were seething, spitting, salivating, screaming. Moses turned to follow Eli. The girl was at Eli’s feet moving fast and panting.

“The boat!!!!??” Where is the boat!!?? Eli whispered as loudly and as angrily as one could between clenched teeth.

A space where Joe’s boat typically docked was empty. “He’s…..he’s taken it. It’s gone” Eli sobbed. Suddenly, he noticed their salvation, The Bay Buccaneer. Joe’s boat floating a few yards behind another that had blocked their view. “Run…there it is!! Jump! We have to swim!”…..

They all ran for the dock end and jumped, except Moses. He stood stock still. He looked at the water. No amount of fear can teach you how to swim. Moses couldn’t swim. Moses turned back and saw the horde reaching the end of their dock, ravenous. Eli and the young girl were swimming furiously towards the Bay Buccaneer. Eli turned to see Moses. He was just staring at the horde. Moses knew that he would sink immediately if he jumped. He didn’t expect to have to swim. He then made a choice. In an instant, he weighed the prospects of his slowly dying in the water, panicked or holding back the pack to keep his friend safe with some time, in case any of these bastards could even float to them. His choice was made in a flash and remarkably he chose their preservation over his own.

Moses ran a few feet away to a fishing boat as his eyes spied a barge pole on a set of hooks on the side of a towboat that was docked at the end of the pier. He pulled it off and positioned himself, firm footed, on the edge of the dock. Peering behind him at the other two reaching the boat and Eli pulling the girl up and onto the safety of the boat, they both looked towards Moses. He forced a smile and ran towards the mindless predators with the pole horizontal and with immense power, cross sticked the pole into the group, flinging many onto other boats, some into the water and the rest to the floor of the dock. Moses then swung the pole like a samurai across every head he could connect with and screamed in rage. Despite the lack of hope that he held for himself, two things buoyed him – the knowledge that he was saving his friends and the scream that he had buried in him for years that finally got to come out. It felt good. It was therapeutic, while it lasted. Eventually, though, he fatigued and was tackled by the greasy mob. Now on his back, Moses’s head looked back at the boat and his friends from his upside-down vantage point, ensuring his friends were far from danger while he was ripped apart by dozens of rotten teeth. Eaten alive.

Eli wiped away the moistness of his sweat and navigated to the stern of the boat across a wet and slippery floor and found the large thermal storage bin at the back and hoisted it up. The key was there. It was taped to the floor. He made out the outline within the duct tape and snatched it up. He ran to the ignition and pulled the girl with him. He saw that many of these ghouls had taken to the water and made some effort to swim towards the boat, in their own ridiculous fashion but were making some progress. As he sat down into the pilot’s seat…..a loud static.

Static shifting in different migrating frequencies. It stopped his heart. The young girl looked bewildered. Her eyes squinted, trying to understand where this sound was coming from. It was coming from the cabin below. The cabin that kept the food, the bed, the emergency elements they would need. It was coming from the cabin below where Joe’s radio was kept. His boat emergency broadcast equipment.

Silence took over. Only the ocean. The waves on the hull of the boat. The sounds of gargling demons in the water, mostly sinking to the bottom, having given up their aquatic pursuits. “Fuck this!!” Eli uttered. Then pausing to apologise to the little girl for his language and smiled weakly. Eli turned the ignition with aggression. Instant relief poured over him as the boat started up immediately. He pulled back the throttle and the boat jerked away pulling them both backwards. The girl grabbed his arm for steadiness as she jerked around on her unsteady legs. Eli looked back, teary eyed. He felt that he really wanted Moses with him now. He wished he had Joe with him. He turned to the little girl with a labored but soothing smile to ask her, finally, what her name was, when in his peripheral vision, he saw movement.

The girl finally answered, sheepishly, with eyes welled up from hours of emotional turbulence. Eli wasn’t paying attention anymore and seeing that he was distracted, she looked more confused.

“May. May is my name, Mister. Mister??”

Eli numbly, slowly and distractedly answered “ok, hi May” as shifted his attention to a slow-moving blur behind her. In his foggy peripheral, he saw that they were not alone and he moved her aside to clear her out of the way of his view. Then, Eli was shocked to be staring into the bloodshot, wild eyes of his old friend Joe, lumbering up from the cabin stairs. Salivating mouth, partially missing forehead, slowly widening, hysterical mouth of broken teeth, a wild tangle of hair, stiffened with what looked like dried blood framing a face of bloodthirsty madness.

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