#March Size Capacity

[evonydavidguo]

How to increase your March Size in Evony?

How to increase your March Size in Evony? With the development of your castle and troops in Evony, you will realize that even though you have a lot of troops, there is a limit to how many troops you can send out. In order to send out troops as much as possible, we have to increase our March Size. So, how to do this? There are a lot of methods to increase March Size in Evony. If you are interested…

[reasonsforhope]

"A 1-megawatt sand battery that can store up to 100 megawatt hours of thermal energy will be 10 times larger than a prototype already in use.

The new sand battery will eliminate the need for oil-based energy consumption for the entire town of town of Pornainen, Finland.

Sand gets charged with clean electricity and stored for use within a local grid.

Finland is doing sand batteries big. Polar Night Energy already showed off an early commercialized version of a sand battery in Kankaanpää in 2022, but a new sand battery 10 times that size is about to fully rid the town of Pornainen, Finland of its need for oil-based energy.

In cooperation with the local Finnish district heating company Loviisan Lämpö, Polar Night Energy will develop a 1-megawatt sand battery capable of storing up to 100 megawatt hours of thermal energy.

“With the sand battery,” Mikko Paajanen, CEO of Loviisan Lämpö, said in a statement, “we can significantly reduce energy produced by combustion and completely eliminate the use of oil.”

Polar Night Energy introduced the first commercial sand battery in 2022, with local energy utility Vatajankoski. “Its main purpose is to work as a high-power and high-capacity reservoir for excess wind and solar energy,” Markku Ylönen, Polar Nigh Energy’s co-founder and CTO, said in a statement at the time. “The energy is stored as heat, which can be used to heat homes, or to provide hot steam and high temperature process heat to industries that are often fossil-fuel dependent.” ...

Sand—a high-density, low-cost material that the construction industry discards [Note: 6/13/24: Turns out that's not true! See note at the bottom for more info.] —is a solid material that can heat to well above the boiling point of water and can store several times the amount of energy of a water tank. While sand doesn’t store electricity, it stores energy in the form of heat. To mine the heat, cool air blows through pipes, heating up as it passes through the unit. It can then be used to convert water into steam or heat water in an air-to-water heat exchanger. The heat can also be converted back to electricity, albeit with electricity losses, through the use of a turbine.

In Pornainen, Paajanen believes that—just by switching to a sand battery—the town can achieve a nearly 70 percent reduction in emissions from the district heating network and keep about 160 tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere annually. In addition to eliminating the usage of oil, they expect to decrease woodchip combustion by about 60 percent.

The sand battery will arrive ready for use, about 42 feet tall and 49 feet wide. The new project’s thermal storage medium is largely comprised of soapstone, a byproduct of Tulikivi’s production of heat-retaining fireplaces. It should take about 13 months to get the new project online, but once it’s up and running, the Pornainen battery will provide thermal energy storage capacity capable of meeting almost one month of summer heat demand and one week of winter heat demand without recharging.

“We want to enable the growth of renewable energy,” Paajanen said. “The sand battery is designed to participate in all Fingrid’s reserve and balancing power markets. It helps to keep the electricity grid balanced as the share of wind and solar energy in the grid increases.”"

-via Popular Mechanics, March 13, 2024

--

Note: I've been keeping an eye on sand batteries for a while, and this is really exciting to see. We need alternatives to lithium batteries ASAP, due to the grave human rights abuses and environmental damage caused by lithium mining, and sand batteries look like a really good solution for grid-scale energy storage.

--

Note 6/13/24: Unfortunately, turns out there are substantial issues with sand batteries as well, due to sand scarcity. More details from a lovely asker here, sources on sand scarcity being a thing at the links: x, x, x, x, x

[paddlescuddlesbubblesgurgles]

so around the start of the summer I ate literally as much as my body could possibly handle every day, every meal. I got in the habit of gorging myself until I could hardly breathe, could not stand or sit or even lay down comfortably, and my belly was aching. I couldn’t even sleep, nor could I really do much of anything but sit there helplessly and gasp or groan at how big I’d gotten, and how full I’d become. This was exactly what I wanted.

I was consuming between 7000-12000 calories a day during this time. This lasted about 2 months or so, maybe 10 weeks. I rarely took a break, and this had…intense consequences on my capacity. I routinely ate things like: entire family sized dinner portions for each component(vegetables, starches, meats). Family sized fast food meal deals(usually about 5 combos worth). 7-8 combos from various fast food places(usually their entire menu). Party sized or tailgater tray offerings from restaurants(usually enough for 10-15 people).

I cannot become full now. No matter what I do, if I’m not eating literally family sized portions, I’m not filled. I can become comfortably satiated after 3-4 meals at once, but my belly constantly yearns for more.

I finally have started experiencing some of the crazy ‘feedism fantasy’ tropes I thought weren’t real (or at least greatly exaggerated due to ya know…writing lol). Things like

I literally can get hunger pangs WHILE MY STOMACH HAS A REASONABLE AMOUNT OF FOOD INSIDE. I’m talking I’ve already eaten a heavy plate that is literally 3-4lbs of food. Gone. Inside me. But my belly has the NERVE to growl around it and demand more food.

Sometimes I become anxious when the only amount of food available to me is a normal serving size (this is honestly the hottest. I’m talking whiny, worried, needy feelings because I only got enough food for 1 person.)

i crave eating 24/7, or for long periods. I catch myself daydreaming about sitting down with enough food for a large gathering, and stuffing it all inside myself for literal hours. I’m not kidding, I want to eat for 6-8 hours straight of almost nonstop consumption. I just want to sit down, lean back with my gut supported by my lap or my couch, and stuff it so completely full. I would prefer if my primary activity for the day was eating.

hunger and arousal are now so completely linked I almost cannot experience one without the other…which means I’m hungry and horny pretty much unceasingly. Constantly my mind goes back to sex and eating. I’m literally just daydreaming in the background about when I will get to open my mouth next.

I’ve now eaten many of the feeding fantasy portions. Family meals, party trays, entire cakes, multiple entire pizzas, entire trays of baked goods, entire boxes of cakes, a box of donuts, entire pies, and generally levels of excess that I can only describe as obscene.

This has caused me to really fatten up. I gained 40 or so lbs from the end of March to the middle of July. I also happened to do this without an encouraging, physical, coercive or forceful feeder, which means if I were to have these (what I desperately crave), I imagine I would reach new capacity heights. I primarily eat for fullness. I love that food drunk fullness feeling where my entire body stops functioning properly. I love feeling like all I can literally do is let my belly do its thing and process all the food I gave it. I’m desperate for it. I constantly crave it. The weight gain is an unintentional but welcomed side effect of my incessant gorging.

I cannot wait for my next opportunity. I have so many ideas. Will I finally try 3 pizzas? Will I try to eat more foot longs than I am tall? Will I make myself an entire family banquet and then greedily try and eat it myself? I need to do it soon. I can’t keep eating enough for 6-7 people each day…I need more, and I need it all at once.

[sweetbutpsychobutsweet]

Care To Make A Wager?

Chapter 5

Thorin Oakenshield x AFAB!Reader

Summary: There's only one bathing pool and all of the pent up tension between you and Thorin finally starts to come to a head in the form of a bet

Warnings: smut, 18+, NSFW, Minors do not interact, angst, fingering, spanking, light choking, biting

author's note: Ahhhh! I'm so excited to finally share this chapter with you guys!!!!!! There will be plenty more spiciness to come between these two, and that is a promise, dear reader😉

Word count: 3686

To say you were in need of a bath would be a massive understatement. After spending so long on the road you felt as though you were covered in a permanent layer of dirt and dust. Your boots were caked with mud and your hair seemed to be harboring an entire forest of leaves and twigs. 

When Lord Elrond offered you rooms to wash up before dinner, you were all too happy to accept. You had spent so much time in Rivendell over the years that you knew exactly how to get to your regular guest suite. 

The wardrobe was still full of fine gowns and shoes in your exact size. The well-worn books you had failed to return to the great library still sat undisturbed in a pile next to the bed. It took a great amount of restraint to keep yourself from running your fingers along all of the familiar elven luxurious. Not until you had scrubbed all of the dirt and grime from your skin. 

There is a large bathing pool right outside your room that you are all too eager to step foot in. It is always filled with warm, flowing water, and the ceiling above remains open to reveal the sky overhead. You grab yourself a clean towel and practically skip through the adjoining door.

Only to stop short when you see someone else has already beaten you to it. 

“No!” you shout in frustration and Thorin turns to see you pouting angrily at him from the doorway. 

He chuckles at your frustration from where he already stands in the warm waters up to his chest. You take extra care to direct your glare right at his face, refusing to let your gaze wander down to all the exposed skin.

“Sorry lass, not fast enough this time,” 

“Thorin,” you growl, “do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting to visit this pool again?” he just shrugs at you. “There's another one down the hall I’ve been told, if you hurry you might still be able to beat the others to it.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” you snap before letting out a sigh.

“I can’t use that one,” you mumble, “it’s too…deep.”

Thorin stares at you in confusion for only a moment before barking out a laugh.

“Are you saying,” he chuckles, “that after all these years you still haven’t learned how to swim?”

You growl at him before turning around to march back to your room. 

“Wait!” he calls after you, still laughing. “I’m sorry, lass. We can share if you’d like? There’s plenty of room.”

You turn back to look at him suspiciously. He’s right, it’s a very large pool you could easily fit several people at once. The problem is that sharing it would mean taking your clothes off in his presence. It’s one thing for him to be naked, while you stand there fully clothed. But the depth of the water prevents you from seeing anything below his chest and you have a lot more…parts, that require coverage. 

It’s not that you feel insecure about your body, especially with all of the low-coverage outfits you’ve worn while performing. It's just that the idea of Thorin seeing you in that capacity feels… different. 

“I won’t look,” Thorin promises, seeing your internal debate.

The water looks so refreshing and warm,  you can’t help but think it would be worth the risk.

“Fine,” you relent, tossing your towel nearby and toeing off your boots. “But if I catch you peeking you’re walking out of that pool with fewer parts than you had going in.” He turns around slowly to face the wall when you reach up to undo the laces of your trousers, shimmying them down your legs before letting them fall into a muddy pile with your blouse not far behind.

You cautiously dip one foot into the water, slowly lowering your body all the way in and  a contented sigh escapes past your lips before you can stop it. 

The water comes up to your shoulders, and you try to rearrange your hair as best as you can so it covers your breasts.

“Alright,” you tell him, and he cautiously turns to face you again. 

His gaze slowly trails down every inch of exposed skin, lingering just a moment longer on the ends of your carefully placed hair.

Thorin takes a cautious step closer towards you and your breath catches in your chest. He slowly moves closer and closer to you until he’s standing right before you. If you were to drop your gaze, it would be safe to assume that you could see all the way down his torso, perhaps even further… which is exactly why you keep your chin held high and your eyes locked on his. 

He lifts one hand up out of the water and lifts it up reaching towards your chest ever so slowly. Your eyes widen and you temporarily forget how to breathe in anticipation as his hand finally makes contact… with the bar of soap beside you.

He takes a few steps back with that self-righteous smirk on his face as he starts to run the soap between his hands.

“Is something the matter?” he asks you tauntingly, “one might say you look… disappointed.”

You let out a growl and angrily splash water in his direction but he just laughs at your irritation.

You turn around to dunk your head underwater, wetting your hair enough to start lathering in one of the fragrant shampoos sitting by the side of the pool. 

With the product now in your hair, all of the dirt and debris finally starts to untangle itself from your head. All except for one particularly stubborn twig that seems to have knotted itself around several strands of your hair in one of the most inconvenient and unreachable places on your head. You yank and pull at it blindly but no matter how hard you try it only seems to make it worse. You could try adding more products but it would be pointless.

“Could you help me please?” you ask with a frustrated sigh. Thorin hums in confirmation behind you and you feel the heat radiating off him as he wordlessly approaches you from behind. 

You let your arms fall back to your sides in the water as his strong hands come up behind you to take their place. He delicately starts untangling it one strand at a time. Moving gently to try and avoid causing you any pain. You can’t remember the last time someone’s played with your hair like this, and the sensation causes your eyelids to flutter closed and your shoulders to droop in relaxation as you sink slightly deeper into the water.

“I could teach you if you’d like,” he says quietly, “to swim I mean. It’s an important skill it just might save your life one day.”

“Sure it is,” you reply sarcastically, “you just want an excuse to grope me underwater,”

His fingers still for a moment, “It doesn’t have to be underwater, but if you’re offering…”

You tip your head back to look at him with your eyes narrowed, pretending to give it some thought.

“Hmm, I’m afraid I’ll have to decline your generous offer my king.” you reply formally, “I have very high standards for all my lovers, I only share my bed with those who can give pleasure just as well as they receive it.”

You’re only half joking to get under his skin, but Thorin doesn’t seem to take it that way. 

His grip on your hair gently tightens, and he leans down to bring his lips beside your ear.

“Are you implying that I’m incapable of bringing a woman to climax?” he whispers darkly.

Shivers run up your spine and a hot clenching sensation forms in your belly. You shrug your shoulders nonchalantly.

“Care to make a wager on that?” he challenges.

“Very funny,” you smirk nervously, trying to dig yourself out of the hole you’ve quickly gotten yourself in.

“I’m not laughing,” he replies darkly, one of his hands leaves your hair to trace a slow, agonizing path down the side of your neck, before landing on your shoulder.

“I bet I could make you come, right here, right now, using only my fingers.”

You gasp at the filthy images that start to fill your mind and you’re forced to squeeze your thighs together to help relieve some of the ache.

“How about we make a deal,” he drags his other hand along your spine causing your back to arch in ecstasy. “If I can make you come, you have to let me teach you how to swim.”

You laugh at his request, before thinking of a condition of your own.

“And when you can't, you have to let Lord Elrond look at the map.” his hand stills on your back and you half expect him to refuse.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he brings both hands down to your hips and roughly pulls your back up against his chest. “Deal,” he whispers before playfully nipping at your earlobe.

One arm snakes around your belly to anchor you closer to him, while the other reaches up to grab one of your breasts. You moan as his hand squeezes and massages the soft flesh. 

He growls into your ear and thrusts his hips deeper into your backside, making it all too clear to you just how his body is reacting to yours.

“Do you have any idea what you do to me?’ he asks, his hand on your breast starting to trace slow circles around your now hardened nipple. You bite your bottom lip trying your hardest to suppress the sounds of pleasure his ministrations threaten to pull from you. 

“Do you know how many times, I’ve had to find some excuse to slip away, just so I could touch myself to thoughts of you in those damn trousers? It’s all I can think about.”

A wicked grin crosses your face. It brings you great satisfaction to know just how much of an effect you have on him. 

“Tell me,” he whispers from behind you, his free arm moving down the curve of your ass to give it a rough squeeze. “When you touch yourself, what do you think of?”

His hand slides around your hip to slowly inch closer and closer down toward your core. You arch your back to encourage him to keep moving his hand closer, but he stops right above the spot where he knows you need him the most. 

You let out a whine as he stubbornly keeps his hand frozen in place.

“I asked you a question,” he reminds you, “who do you think of?”

You tip your head back to rest against his chest, your eyes meeting his. You smirk at the dark lust you see in his eyes, swimming with desire for you. You think about lying to him, giving an answer that you know will make him angry, unhinged. But you don’t want to risk him moving that hand any farther away from your core.

“You, Thorin,” you whisper to him, “always you.”

He roughly brings his lips down to yours in a fierce kiss, and at the same time, he slides his fingers down the rest of the way to trace large circles around your core.  His hand at your breast reaches up to wrap around your throat, applying gentle pressure to keep you in place as he gives his tongue the freedom to explore your mouth.

You let out a moan before you can stop yourself, and you can feel the smirk on his face without even having to open your eyes. His teeth scrape against your bottom lip as his fingers start to tease circles around your entrance, one finger tracing the outside before pulling further away again.

You whine at his teasing and thrust your hips up to try and bring the entrance closer to his fingers. 

He abruptly pulls his hand away when he realizes what you’re doing to roughly grab you by the hip, the hand around your throat tightening the smallest amount in warning.

“Uh, uh, uh,” he chides in your ear. “Behave yourself.”

He removes his hand from your throat and presses it between your shoulder blades, gently bending you over in front of him. He keeps a gentle hand on your hip and brushes all of your hair to one side of your neck, exposing your entire back to him. 

Your hands reach up to grip the edge of the pool with a gasp as he starts to kiss his way down your spine slowly. 

“Can you do that for me?” Thorin asks, “Can you be good?”

You nod eagerly as his lips hover over the curve of your backside that remains above the water.

You jolt in surprise as a hand comes down to your ass with a sharp smack. 

“Use your words,” he demands, gently rubbing the now tender skin of your cheeks.

“I’ll be good,” you whisper hoarsely, “I promise.”

Thorin hums in approval as one hand slides down your bottom to tease the entrance to your core once again. His other reaches up to grab a fistful of your hair. With a gentle tug, he is pulling your head back to look at him.

The hand at your core leaves you briefly empty and wanting. He keeps his eyes locked on yours as two of his thick fingers push into your mouth. You can already taste the sweetness of yourself on him as he presses them deeper into your mouth. Your tongue licking and sucking every drop of yourself from them. 

You let yourself put on a little show for him, imagining it wasn’t just his fingers in your mouth. Your eyes flutter closed at the idea of what it would taste like, what it would feel like to have that beast currently pressing against your thighs deep inside of you.

“Eyes open,” Thorin warns with a sharp tug of your hair.

He pulls his fingers out of your mouth, leaving you such a disoriented drooling mess that you don’t even notice where he’s relocated those fingers until they’re plunging deep inside you.

Thorin releases the hand in your hair to cover your mouth just barely fast enough to muffle the scream of pleasure you can no longer contain. 

You push your hips back onto his fingers, signaling for him to start moving and he is oh so happy to oblige. He does not start slow, his brutal pace has you arching your back and crying into his hand at how quickly you can already feel your climax approaching. 

That fire in your body is growing hotter and hotter and yet you still need more.

You desperately reach back behind you, blindly searching for his cock in an attempt to give yourself some kind of anchor in the storm of pleasure. As if sensing your intentions already he growls your name in a low warning, giving his fingers an extra deep thrust to catch you off guard. 

You gasp into his hand, your fingertips just barely grazing the tip.

“That wasn’t part of the deal,” Thorin reminds you.

Shit. you think to yourself. The deal.

You were so confident that all of his talk would not be able to translate to the bedroom, that the only reason his fingers were deep inside your throbbing pussy right now was as part of a childish bet.

A deal to finally find the answers hidden in that map, to help you enter Erebor, and most importantly to knock his ego down more than a few notches.

If you let yourself come on his fingers like this he wins. You’ll have lost the wager, and he’ll be able to lord this victory over you for years to come.

You can’t let him win, you just can’t.

You bite down hard on the rough hand covering your mouth to try and distract both of you from your current task but it still isn’t enough to slow his pace. His eyes narrow at you from above, a wicked grin spreading across his face, seeming to relish the pain.

You growl in frustration, desperate to think of some way, any way to put a stop to the rising flame in your core.

You try thinking of the most unsexy things imaginable: Orcs, rotten fruit, trolls, too-tight corsets, chamber pots. 

But no matter what you try the only thought you seem to be able to hold on to is Thorin.

Thorin who has his fingers inside you.

Thorin whose enormous cock is still pressed up against you.

Thorin whose beard keeps tickling your bare back.

Thorin whose blue eyes look like the hottest part of a burning flame.

Thorin whose deep voice sends shivers down your spine.

Thorin who left you.

Who abandoned you, lied to you, broke your heart.

A hot angry tear slides down your cheek and you bite harder into his palm, enough to feel droplets of blood start to roll down your chin and mix with the salt of your tears. 

You hate him. He betrayed you, broke your trust, and left you all alone. And he has the audacity to still make you feel things for him? After everything?

Perhaps after everything, he owes you this much. A mind-blowing orgasm, deal be damned. You’ll convince him to share the map some other way.

You’re feeling a pleasure so intense, so intoxicating, that when his fingers finally hit that one perfect spot inside you, you let yourself come undone on him. You’re too high on your own bliss to even care that you’ve lost the bet.

You wait for Thorin to start gloating, to rub it in your face that you were wrong. But he doesn’t.

He just slowly removes his fingers from your core and his bloody palm from your face and quietly disappears behind you in the water. Your head suddenly feels impossibly heavy and you let yourself slump over the edge of the pool, exhausted and trembling.

Thorin reappears behind you with a gentle hand on your back, while the other brings a warm cloth against your skin. 

He gently turns you to face him and you’re too tired to put up a fight. A strong arm wraps around your back to hold you upright against him. He brings the warm cloth to your face, gently wiping the mess off your chin and your lips, before trailing it farther and farther down washing every inch of exposed skin with an intense focus. 

It’s getting harder and harder to keep your eyes open. Sensing your fatigue he drops the cloth as soon as he’s done and starts to slowly lead you out of the pool. 

“Wait here,” he whispers as soon as you’re out of the warm water’s embrace, cold and shivering. You cross your arms over your chest to try and warm yourself before a soft towel is gently wrapped around your body. You attempt to take one, shaky step back towards your room and are immediately swept off of your fawn like legs into Thorin’s arms. 

He carries you back into your suite, the both of you undoubtedly dripping water across the marble floor as he gently places you on the bed.

You’re almost disappointed to see that he now has a towel covering his bare waist.

You expect him to leave you now if he has no interest in gloating, but instead, he crawls onto the bed with you. His body heat is such a welcome feeling that you don’t protest when he settles in right behind you wrapping a strong arm across your wet skin and pulling you in closer towards him by your waist. 

“You were trying to fight it weren’t you?” 

You shiver at the sensation of his breath tickling the back of your neck.

“How could you tell?” you ask him.

He chuckles against your ear before giving it a playful bite. 

“You always have this look on your face, whenever you’re trying to restrain yourself. I’ll admit it’s not a look I see often as you tend to say or do the first thing that pops into your head without thinking it through,” he grunts as your elbow reaches back to jab him in the ribs.

“What made you change your mind?” he asks in a serious tone. “You could have easily fought me off if you wanted to.”

“I know,” you reply with a sigh. “As much as I hated the idea of letting you win, I figured after everything you put me through, betraying and abandoning me, at the very least you owed me a mind-blowing orgasm.”

You can feel Thorin tense up behind you. You crane your neck to look back at him and he’s staring back at you with an intense look on his face that you can’t quite place.

“I would have thought you’d be flattered to hear me refer to it as ‘mind blowing’” you laugh nervously. He blinks at you and gives a weak smile before slowly untangling his arms from your waist so he can rise to a seat on the bed.

“The others are waiting,” he says, “we should head to dinner before someone comes looking for us.”

You nod silently, not having enough strength to call him out on the convenient change of subject.

“You go ahead,” you tell him, knowing you’ll need some time to process everything that’s just happened. “It might take me a while longer to finish getting ready,” you lie.

He rises from the bed, still clearly deep in thought as he crosses the room to head back to his own suite. He pauses for a moment with his hand on the doorknob, like he has something else he wants to say to you. But instead, he just disappears through the door without another word.

You let out a deep exhale and press the heels of your hands into your eyes.

“I can’t believe I just let Thorin Oakenshield finger fuck me,” you groan.

Next Chapter

Taglist:

@mrsdurin @thetaekwondofeline

[jokeroutsubs]

[ENG translation] Jamming sessions, the 'Jure Maček Curve', and new music - A Joker Out interview

An interview with Bojan Cvjetićanin and Kris Guštin, published on the Gedankengroove website on 12.04.2024. Original article written by Elie Mück, photos by Elie Mück. English translation by olenalinasarah and @nyx-aira, proofread by IG GBoleyn123.

Note: As the interview was originally conducted in English, author Elie Mück collaborated with us to give us the original wording wherever it was necessary for the right meaning to come across. Thank you, Elie!

"What would I do in this black night without you?" That's what Joker Out ask themselves in their (as-yet) unreleased song Šta bih ja. I was able to visit the five men from Slovenia in Cologne at the end of March and talk with Bojan and Kris about the song and the 'See You Soon' tour, which was almost over at that time.

The indie rock band was able to reach a wide audience across Europe with their participation in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023. Their song Carpe Diem is their most successful release to date with over 20 million streams on Spotify. After several concerts across Europe and an arena show in their home country, Bojan, Kris, Nace, Jan, and Jure travelled to London at the beginning of the year. The two-month stay in London, which didn't only consist of playing Jenga and cooking (as their Instagram stories made it seem), served as preparation for a studio session in April. Before that, the group went on a European tour at the beginning of March, playing 22 concerts in 14 countries - including five shows in Germany. Kris and Bojan tell me what's behind the changing setlists and how the band comes together in jamming sessions.

Elie: To start with, how are you doing? Did you get to Cologne safely?

Bojan: We're doing well. We arrived this morning and slept until 1pm, so we're well rested. Cologne has treated us very well. The venue is perfect, very cosy, and the staff are great.

Elie: The tour is almost over, what are your impressions so far?

Bojan: To be honest, the tour has been fantastic so far! The time has gone by super fast. We've seen so many more cities than last time. When you start touring, you usually just visit the capital cities and imagine that those are the only places you can play. But this tour consists of mostly the second or third biggest cities in each country and the shows have been great so far. We are thrilled with how many people have come and how their reactions have been. So, we're having a lot of fun.

Elie: It's interesting to see that you're playing very different sized shows on this tour. The hall in Helsinki, for example, has a capacity of about 1,500 people, whereas in Munich only about 400 people fit in. What do you prefer? The bigger gigs or the smaller ones?

Kris: It depends a lot on the audience and our mood. We have to go on stage in a good mood. I don't think the number of people makes a difference. At least not at these sizes. An arena show with 10,000 people is comparatively very impersonal and you focus more on the show and what you're doing. I definitely prefer the smaller gigs, but a concert in front of 500 or 1,500 people feels about the same.

Elie: I've heard from other artists that they prefer the bigger concerts because they have more space on stage, is that similar for you?

Bojan: For me personally, the concerts with an audience of 1,500 people are the ones where I feel most comfortable. The stage is big enough for me to move around freely without a fear of tripping over something and it still feels like I can interact with every person in the room.

Elie: Compared to the tour in autumn, you are now playing a varying set. I looked at your setlists from the last few shows and it seems like you have two or three setlists that you alternate between. Who came up with that and why did you want to vary the set?

Bojan: I think we collectively came up with that. When you play 22 shows in a month, you can get stuck in routine. It can feel like things are just repeating themselves and the mood of the shows is, in a way, predetermined by the songs you play. That's why we decided to break it up and make it a bit more fun. It's very cool because we have three setlists and I have no idea which song is coming next. That's good for me because it's always a bit of a surprise. It makes the whole thing more exciting. The fans like it too. There have been some who came to several concerts and heard different songs each time.

Elie: How did you find out which songs work together?

Bojan: It was a long process.

Kris: We sit down together and try to find out what works best. It can take several days but sometimes it works straight away. Our drummer Jure has his own technique.

Bojan: We call it "The Curve".

Kris: The "Jure Maček Curve" which determines how our concerts should go in terms of mood. We decide, for example, that we should start with something energetic-

Bojan: Shh, we should keep that a secret (laughs).

Kris: So, if you have calculated everything with the "Jure Maček Curve", you have a very good set.

Elie: You also play three unreleased songs. Were these the songs that were most ready to be played live or did you have other songs in mind that you wanted to put on the setlist?

Bojan: We had a few more songs that we wanted to try out on the tour. Our idea was that we would have time during the soundchecks and in between to turn the songs into something playable. However, we have less time than we thought, which is why we decided to leave it at these three songs. I really like that because it turned out that one of the songs will definitely be the next single. The fans went totally crazy. Shortly after we had left the stage at the first concert in Helsinki, the lyrics to Šta bih ja were already online. Afterwards we were told that a TikTok of the performance had over 400,000 views, which is crazy. People are even singing along already. It was nice to see that. We've also found things we want to change about the songs. A few things that work and a few that don't work.

Elie: Have these things changed over the course of the tour?

Bojan: Not yet, we have decided to leave them as they are. But we definitely know what we want to change.

Elie: I heard that after the tour you will go to Hamburg to record your next album. What is your plan for the time in the studio?

Kris: What I think will happen in Hamburg is that we will take the first couple of days to record Šta bih ja. I think that song is the most unchangeable in its structure. We have to be quick if we want to release it as a single before the album in autumn. After that we have the rest of the time to work on the things that were created during our time in London, most of which aren't nearly as studio ready. We also recorded our biggest hit Carpe Diem in the studio in Hamburg. That one wasn't nearly as finished either when we got there, so I don't think we have anything to worry about.

Elie: In London you worked on new music in the form of jamming sessions. Did you ever get to a point where you had something like a "creative burnout"? If so, how did you manage to get back into a creative mindset?

Bojan: Definitely. I wouldn't say burnout, more like frustration. Jamming always needs all five of us and of course five different minds can't always work towards the same story. Sometimes things don’t go the way all of us would like it to go for a longer period of time. When that happens, our biggest help is our producer. He always finds the cause of the problem and works with us to find a solution. I think it's important to have someone as a kind of filter. We are all emotionally connected to our music and of course he is too, but in a different way. Our producer is like the sixth pair of eyes and therefore a very important part of the writing process.

Elie: In your latest single Everybody's Waiting you used a keyboard, which is new for you. Do you have any other things you'd like to try out for the new songs?

Kris: Jan bought a mandolin in Berlin. I'm sure that will come up in the studio.

Bojan: I'm sure we want to use more synthesiser. One song we're playing live at the moment originally had a riff that was played with the synthesiser but is now played with the guitar. This change takes away the whole point of the riff. There are many things we want to try out. I think we will also work with choirs or similar vocals. We want to be as free as possible with our creativity for this album.

Elie: We are definitely looking forward to what will happen. I really like the new songs. To finish, a question that I ask often: Which song or album do you think everyone should have listened to at least once in their life?

Kris: I listen to a lot of old music, so I can't recommend anything new. But I would say (They Long To Be) Close To You by Carpenters.

Bojan: Right now, I would definitely recommend a song that I'm listening to a lot at the moment. My song is older too, I'll go with Il mio canto libero by Lucio Battisti. The whole album is very good, we listened to it a lot while Everybody's Waiting was being made.

—

After our chat, it's not long before the band starts their show. They enchant the whole audience with their incredible energy. Like Bojan said, the fans in the first rows are very confident with the lyrics. As soon as Šta bih ja starts, everyone sings along. "What would I do in this black night without you?" The song begins and ends with this line. A song about longing and missing.

The setlist takes us through every emotion and ends with a call to the current generation:

"We've gathered the courage to rebel and make a change," says Novi Val, the last song of the evening. Bojan invites everyone to become part of the "new wave". He says he wishes Joker Out concerts to be and remain a safe space for everyone.

Everyone, including the band, stands arm in arm and slowly sways to the music. A feeling of community accompanies us as we leave the hall of the Kantine and make our way home. Joker Out show that you don't have to stick to one style of music as a group and how diverse the result can be if you don't allow yourself to be restricted creatively. All five of them seem to have an incredible amount of fun with their work and I can only hope that it stays that way for a very long time.

Check out more photos by photographer and interviewer Elie Mück on Gedankengroove!

Do not repost! If you post quotes from this translation, please link back to this post!

[comicarc]

𝐇𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐬 𝐄𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐃𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐥 𝐢𝐬 𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞

A chance meeting with a stranger leads down the road of an inevitable devotion. Breeding a childish love into an obsessive attachment. The devil's temptation is all-consuming, only producing pain disguised as pleasure.

wc: 2906

The grace of his footsteps, despite his enormous figure, had seemed to incite an absurd curiosity within me. His attitude ranged from a spectrum even vaster than that of light, as he got along with almost everyone he met, yet peculiarly, seemed to never lose his morals or beliefs in the face of so many opinions and conversations. 

I had paid no mind to him when he first marched through the halls of Gotham high, the whole school was abuzz with chatter, gossiping about this bizarre new character. He never dressed the part of being Bruce Wayne’s ward, often rocking hoodies large enough to drown in, colored a deep blood red that seemed to fuel the fury of the teachers. He was a delinquent in every right, yet he was also as intelligent in the same capacity.

Paid for by the one-percenters of Gotham, the library the size of a Manhattan penthouse was often eerily empty, met occasionally with the presence of a student trying to pay another for answers to an assignment. I was an exception in all such aspects, for neither was I rich nor conceited enough to believe in the fantasy that I would be handed everything in life. I would relish the silence of the library, a place I had made a home of by the second week of high school. Gotham was not a city for me, and the cheap apartment that I called ‘home’ was anything but its namesake, lacking everything that the library could provide. 

I had heard the whispers of others, of how the girls were intrigued by the new kid to instantly desire him, and of how the boys spoke nonsense, fueled by a jealous rage. Though these polarized opinions had left me curious, I never thought it my place to ever participate in such an activity of imagining. That was a right reserved for the rich, for those who had time enough to do as they pleased. 

Jason Todd sat in front of me, one fine day, in the library, so enamored in The Great Gatsby that he ignored my existence. Although caught off guard, I enjoyed the silent company, feeling as though I was not alone in my fated destiny toward deterioration as I spent more and more time in the library each passing day. Life had only begun to worsen with time, yet his presence had seemed to soothe me with silent comfort.

At first, I brushed him off just as I thought he had done of me, yet the more I saw him, I began to imagine as well. He had made me a rich woman, not materialistically, but rather metaphysically. My mind spent hours trying to reason why he stayed. Was the library his abode as well? Was he trying to read every book he’d laid eyes on in there? Why? Questions only left a hole, a desire to fulfill my curiosity. 

“Hey.” Jason's soft voice, like the serpent tempting Eve, left me craving conversation. It was the third month of our silent routine when he finally spoke, soothing months of contemplation with a single word. Oh, how desperate I had been.

The days that followed after that interaction were like a daydream. Unbeknownst to most, Jason had a poetic soul paired with the heart of a hopeless romantic. He would bring my favorite coffee with a pastry to the library and set it beside me inconspicuously. He’d brush off every thank you, pleased by the apparent delight in my expression when I would realize what he had brought. These little gestures enabled us to evolve beyond the library setting, meeting instead at coffee shops near the school simply to study as we normally had done.  

Our interactions were intimate, yet physical exchange was always kept to a minimum, with either party fearful of crossing the line and losing the other. But observing the way his massive body could maneuver through the crowds of people on the street, watching him eat with a linger of an animalistic instinct through his gentle facade, and catching his radiant smile whenever he laid eyes on me was fulfilling enough. Until it left me longing for more.

It had taken me a while to muster the courage to make a move to him. I had developed feelings for him that grew deeper with each passing day, and I couldn’t hold in my desire any longer. So, on a sweltering summer day, as me and Jason sat at the coffee shop we would always hang out at, I decided that I would do something. Jason, in his tank top and jeans, sweat shining in the glare of the sunlight, had left me a blushing mess, too embarrassed to think through what I should do to further our relationship. In my state, I had barely recognized how he seemed timider than usual, keeping to himself. 

After an awkward afternoon in the quaint shop, I decided my endeavor was a lost cause. I got out of my seat, and walked to the entrance, motioning to Jason that I was about to leave. Together we walked out through the door, yet before we could part ways, he grabbed my wrist with a gentle grip. The sudden action caused me to swing around, crashing into his chest as I did. Before I could apologize, he used his free hand to take hold of my chin and tilt my face upward just enough to meet his lips. 

The world seemed to fade away, leaving only the two of us suspended in time. It was a moment of pure magic. In that fleeting instant, I knew with certainty that Jason was the perfect man for me, the one I had been searching for without even knowing it. As we pulled away, breathless and exhilarated, I felt a sense of clarity wash over me like a cleansing tide. In Jason's arms, I had found my sanctuary, my safe haven in a world full of chaos. 

And to tie the not on such a precious moment, he had whispered, “Will you be my girlfriend.”

Since that day, Jason established a routine. He’d keep his distance until the night, when he’d knock on my door, littered with bruises, crying for help. The late nights were reserved for peeling away every layer of Jason’s being his traumatizing past and his blissful present. Then, there came days that I wouldn’t hear from him for days, never seeing him at school or at the cafe. He was like a ghost disappearing and reappearing as he wished, toying with my heart every time. Yet, he always managed to make up for his absence, knowing just the right things to reel me back in when I started to slip away. But despite the distance, despite the pain, I stayed because I loved him. I had fallen in love with his fucked up ways, his twisted dreams, a secret life he kept from me.

He wasn’t a bad lover, just an absent one. His appearance had become the highlight of my days, the way he’d caress me when we hugged, the way he’d hold me in his arms while we rested in my bed. Everything he did was able to erect a lustful emotion I never knew I had. He was by all means, perfectly imperfect. Human in all rights. 

After we graduated, he became more and more distant. He’d never told me what he was up to, convinced that I would stay by his side no matter what. I felt as though I was more of a token anchor than a person to him. Existing just for him, as if I did not have passions and ambitions of my own. But he was right. His love was intoxicating, leaving me an obedient puppet who’d always wait for him. Yet the summer after graduation, when he left me for months, I finally began to become skeptical of our situation.

It was bittersweet to know that this time, he hadn’t stood me up due to his own volition. Fate was a heartbreaker, leaving love a longed-for feeling buried six feet in a grave that I could never see, even if I wanted to. Jason had a simple ceremony, with his blue roses placed upon the coffin as he was buried. A speech was given, tears were shed, and people departed more disturbed than they arrived. Or at least that was what I was told in a letter. The sender was one who shared the same address, the same life, the same ambitions as Jason, yet hadn’t the heart to allow his girlfriend the privilege of knowing about the late son’s departure from this world. 

Bruce Wayne had known loss to a degree incomprehensible to the common man, and no amount of money would ever fix the wounds that bled him dry. Yet, this experience should have encouraged communication. If he was as heartful as the news portrayed him to be, sympathizing with those less fortunate enough to form a family full of grieving children, then how had he glanced over me? The same pain had haunted me, from the moment I felt Jason slipping from my grasp, becoming more and more distant until he left me forever. Bruce Wayne, through Jason, was depicted as a madman driven by an insane drive as persistent as the Joker’s scheming. Jason worshipped the man more than god himself, and yet he often came to me with pained sobs, unfulfilled dreams, and an unbridled rage that his ‘father’ failed to provide for. 

Having never met the man before, I had formed a loose persona in my mind that I had assumed the billionaire was. Yet, my assumptions were solidified after receiving the curt letter, rather, note, written with such passive care that anyone would have thought it was merely as insignificant as a to-do list. 

To whom it may concern:  We gathered to remember Jason at Wayne Manor. It's regrettable you couldn't join us. The Wayne family extends their condolences and offers assistance during this difficult time.

Pretentious, arrogant liars. Gotham’s elite were all the same. I sat in the restaurant for two hours, danced in the street on my way home imagining what I would do for Jason's birthday, and attempted to reason another one of his absences from the date before knowing. The sealed envelope sat on the doorstep, accompanied by nothing but a red seal that indicated its correspondent. It was a strange item to receive out of the blue. 

With no notice, no knowledge of the life that Jason led among the elite, I was baffled by the harshness of facing a sudden reality. It felt surreal to imagine Jason of people dead. He was a killer, with killer looks, a killer smile, and a killer attitude. A body built to fight, and an aura as dangerous as a drug. He couldn’t have died, not my Jason. 

I couldn’t comprehend losing Jason, enough that in such denial I had ventured to Wayne Manor, forcing my way through the ebony gates onto the gothic grounds of the mansion. At the front door, after incessantly pounding on the grandiose doors, I was finally met with the face of the butler, Alfred. Before speaking I stared at him for a few moments as I cleared my blurry vision from the uncontrollable tears that rolled down my cheeks. He seemed to recognize me, as he let me inside, placing a hand on my back for support as he looked toward me with an empathetic expression. 

“Jason can’t be dead. I never saw a body, never heard a lick of what happened to him. You’re liars.” The words left like venom, hurting the old man enough to display his aching heart in his eyes. 

“We all have lost someone very special, but we must accept it.” He spoke, attempting to keep a calm demeanor. 

“Accept it? What the hell are you on about? A funeral I was never invited to and a body I have yet to see. How am I supposed to accept something that seems too imaginative?” I retorted, my anger laced with sorrow.

Silence hung heavy between us, but I pressed on, seeking the truth I feared. “He didn’t care, did he? He loved something more than he loved me, right?”

Alfred nodded, giving into his grief as his eyebrows softened, and his gaze moved to the floor, tears threatening to spill from the corners of his eyes. 

“Can you tell me what it was that he adored enough to give his life for?”

“Justice.”

I laughed. Of course, he chased independence from his family, yet revered the so-called philanthropist guardian he had. Though he might have begun with the pursuit of true moral justice, Bruce skewed into a dangerous endeavor. 

Bruce Wayne was a killer, not Jason, no he had a handsome impression, a soft smile, and a hopeful attitude. It wasn’t justice that Jason pursued, it was Bruce’s image of it. He was an imperfect man, his only weakness was the longing for a familial love he was denied by his own parents. One that I could never compensate for. He wasn’t my Jason, never had he been. I didn’t know Jason at all, I was the puppet, toyed with by the father and the son. 

After six months of sleepless nights and living nightmares, I finally found a haphazard peace to settle in. I watched the sky every night, wishing that the hope that blessed Metropolis would make its way into Gotham and give me the will to move on with my life. But, as the general populace is fated to remain in the same cycle, trapped in the chains of modern capitalism, all I was able to do was make do with my shitty job, in my shitty apartment, living a lonely life, as devoid of color as the Gotham sky was of the sun. My visit to Wayne Manor had not changed anything, for I was still left in the dark regarding every manner in which Jason’s name was exploited, whether it be a fundraiser in his honor or a gala, I was always the last to know. 

But without hearing his name, seeing his face, or feeling his touch for so long, I had begun to forget him. Out of sight, out of mind as the saying goes, and though I had forgotten everything, his soft voice still haunted me whenever I slept. I had fallen into insanity fueled by my imagination, one that left me feeling rich in broken pieces of a heart. 

Tonight I sat at the edge of my windowsill, one leg resting on a loose brick outside the apartment, while the other remained crossed beneath me. With my head leaned back against the metal of the frame, I watched the stars twinkle in the night sky, like diamonds. It was a rare night, to hear the sirens go off occasionally. There were no screams, no gunshots no cries for help, only the ambience of the city. I took it as a sign, that change had arrived, that peace was mine to finally be in. 

Closing my eyes, I decided that tonight was safe enough to let my guard down. To enjoy Gotham’s raw essence as a mother to the unfortunate. Her touch let my hair dance in the breeze, cooling my body from the heat of the day. Her sounds were a harmonic symphony lulling me into a deep sleep. But her motherly affection was short-lived, as the sound of boots hitting the fire escape had woken me from my lucid state. 

 The footsteps felt heavy yet sounded as soft as the movements of a ballerina. There was a familiar feeling about the situation, but I couldn’t quite place it, not until his breath hit the back of my neck. Even with the faint light from the neon sign, the man remained a silhouette in the darkness, bigger than what the steps had led me to believe. I didn’t move, waiting for the man to make the first move.

“Hey.” In the same husky voice in which he introduced himself to me all those years ago, Jason had come back, yet again tempting me to be consumed by him. At first, I thought I had finally broken, gone insane from the grief. I was done fighting my end when the weight of Jason's touch settled upon me. It was as though a dark cloud descended, shrouding me in a familiar embrace that I couldn't resist. His fingers traced the contours of my hand, each touch sending shivers down my spine, igniting a flame that I thought had long been extinguished.

I felt the pull of his presence, magnetic and intoxicating, drawing me closer with each passing moment. His breath, hot against my neck, tempted me to abandon reason and lose myself in his embrace. Despite the past, despite the pain, despite everything urging me to resist, I found myself unable to pull away. His hold tightened and his lips brushed against my ear, I knew that I had crossed a line from which there was no return. Swallowed by the shadows of Gotham's embrace, I had sealed my fate the moment I met him. I was fated to die a poor woman, yet the devil enticed me with a taste, and I will die a rich woman consumed by the unending pain of unreal love. 

[peaches2217]

▼ for the bros!

🔻- childhood headcanon

One I’ve touched upon in the past, but it’s been a while, so I’m bringing it back: in their teens, Luigi always wanted to experiment with wearing feminine clothes, things like dresses and blouses and skirts, but never had the nerve to for fear of being ridiculed. He would get as far as trying things on in the dressing room, but he could never work up the courage to actually buy anything, much less wear it publicly.

Enter Mario, who has not only been intensely protective of Luigi and his happiness from day one, but had a fraction of his capacity for shame in their youth. He would accompany his brother to the mall or to boutiques and let him browse, glaring down anyone who dared throw even the most subtle of questioning glances their way. And when Luigi inevitably found something he liked but was too afraid to commit to buying, then Mario would take it up front and buy it himself.

The first time that happened, Luigi, while grateful, admitted that he had no idea how he would find the nerve to wear it anywhere but at home. “Do you wanna wear it in public?” Mario asked him. “Well… yeah,” Luigi said, “but everyone’s gonna stare.” And the solution was simple to Mario: if people wanted to stare, he’d give them something to stare at. So he marched right back into the store and bought that same outfit in his own size.

Luigi wore his first dress at age fourteen, a breezy pale green sundress with flowers on the hem, and Mario wore the same dress right alongside him, cranking his boisterous mannerisms even further to ensure everyone was staring at him and not his timid brother. It would not be the last time they left the house in matching dresses, not by a long shot.

[corallapis]

The Time Lords entered, moving clockwise around the colonnade that marked the perimeter of the room until they found their place and shuffled out onto the floor of the Camber. […] Everyone already knew precisely which part of the amphitheatre they should be standing in. They clustered in the usual groups determined by elaborate equations of seniority, office, family ties, college allegiance and personal acquaintance.

She knew the names of everyone standing around the President: the Magistrate and the other Ministers, the Castellan, the Co-ordinator of the Maxtrix, half a dozen Cardinals and a couple of cowled representatives from the religious orders. Larna found it difficult to believe that now she was a cog in the same intricate clockwork as these people, that she was beginning to acquire titles and duties of her own.

Each generation felt this way, each thought that they would usher in an age of revolution and a better way of doing things. Somehow, somewhere along the way, the dust and cobwebs and routines got into the blood, the desire always cooled. What had been energetic had always become ossified. Worse still, those who retained their fervour into adult life had become tyrants, intent on power whatever the cost.

A phalanx of the Chancellery Watch was practising the drill for the morning. They were in full ceremonial uniform, crimson, striped fur, breastplates and cloaks. They’d formed a neat square, and were marching up and down, boots clacking against the marble floor as regular as the tick of a clock. They’d done these drills for thousands of years — literally in the case of many of the soldiers. Long ago they must have exhausted every creative possibility there. That was the point, wasn’t it? They weren’t thinking, they were doing something that came as naturally and easily to them as breathing.

Gallifrey’s nameless sun rose over the Capitol Dome, as it had done since the first days of the universe. No sunlight penetrated the Dome itself, but the Oldharbour Clock that stood in the Eastern parts of the Capitol marked the occasion by chiming Nine Bells. On the ledge beneath the vast clock face, an intricate mechanical ballet began, as life-sized animated figures emerged from their positions and set about their daily routine. They were gaily painted and beautifully dressed, certainly symbolic of something, although even the few Gallifreyans that had noticed them couldn’t agree what it might be. One of the problems was that the clock had never been built. Not in this timeline, anyway. It was a paradoxical survivor from the Time Wars, probably the only vestige of its parallel Gallifrey still in existence. It had just appeared one day, no one remembered when. The analogue Time Lords that had built the Tower had imbued the clockwork figurines with a degree of sentience and the capacity for self-development. Now, unknown to anyone, the clock people were the most intelligent beings on Gallifrey. Their social interactions were complex, if perfectly regulated, and they had developed a complex framework of philosophy and etiquette to explain their world and their actions. It would be some time yet before they realised that they were just characters on a long forgotten clock face, but the discovery would come. When it did there would be dissension, schism and war. But still they would circle each other in perfect orbits, moving their limbs in perfect arcs.

Life in the Citadel normally ran like clockwork, everything in harmony, the same every day.

The chimes of the Clock Tower rang out over the hexangles of the Eastern side of the Citadel. The Time Lords and Technicians began to emerge from their quarters and glide smoothly to their work and their leisure. Lord Henspring and Lady Genhammer passed each other by the living fountain, three members of the Watch marched past, on their way to lay a wreath at the Monument to Lost Explorers. A small group of students stood around discussing the cultivation of roses and chess endgames. Deep within the Citadel, the TARDISes sat in their cradles, surrounded by humming machinery, as they had done for hundreds of thousands of years.

Nothing had changed, because nothing ever changed on Gallifrey except over geological timescales. Nothing was better, nothing was worse.

— The Infinity Doctors

[mariacallous]

It’s been one of the wettest years in California since records began. From October 2022 to March 2023, the state was blasted by 31 atmospheric rivers—colossal bands of water vapor that form above the Pacific and become firehoses when they reach the West Coast. What surprised climate scientists wasn’t the number of storms, but their strength and rat-a-tat frequency. The downpours shocked a water system that had just experienced the driest three years in recorded state history, causing floods, mass evacuations, and at least 22 deaths.

Swinging between wet and dry extremes is typical for California, but last winter’s rain, potentially intensified by climate change, was almost unmanageable. Add to that the arrival of El Niño, and more extreme weather looks likely for the state. This is going to make life very difficult for the dam operators tasked with capturing and controlling much of the state’s water.

Like most of the world’s 58,700 large dams, those in California were built for yesterday’s more stable climate patterns. But as climate change taxes the world’s water systems—affecting rainfall, snowmelt, and evaporation—it’s getting tough to predict how much water gets to a dam, and when. Dams are increasingly either water-starved, unable to maintain supplies of power and water for their communities, or overwhelmed and forced to release more water than desired—risking flooding downstream.

But at one major dam in Northern California, operators have been demonstrating how to not just weather these erratic and intense storms, but capitalize on them. Management crews at New Bullards Bar, built in 1970, entered last winter armed with new forecasting tools that gave unprecedented insight into the size and strength of the coming storms—allowing them to strategize how to handle the rain.

First, they let the rains refill their reservoir, a typical move after a long drought. Then, as more storms formed at sea, they made the tough choice to release some of this precious hoard through their hydropower turbines, confident that more rain was coming. “I felt a little nervous at first,” says John James, director of resource planning at Yuba Water Agency in northern California. Fresh showers soon validated the move. New Bullards Bar ended winter with plumped water supplies, a 150 percent boost in power generation, and a clean safety record. The strategy offers a glimpse of how better forecasting can allow hydropower to adapt to the climate age.

Modeling studies have long suggested that better weather forecasts would be invaluable for dam managers. Now this is being confirmed in real life. New Bullards Bar is one of a half-dozen pilot sites teaming up with the US Army Corps of Engineers to test how cutting-edge forecasting can be used to optimize operations in the real world. Early tests of the methods, called forecast-informed reservoir operations, have given operators the confidence to hold 5-20 percent reserve margins beyond their reservoirs’ typical capacity, says Cary Talbot, who heads the initiative for the Army Corps.

To Talbot, FIRO could mean a paradigm shift in how the Corps and others run dams. Historically, dam operators under the Army Corps umbrella had to ignore weather forecasts and respond only to rain and snow that was already on the ground. This rule traces back to the notorious capriciousness of traditional forecasts: If an operator takes a bad gamble on a forecasted weather event, the results can be dangerous. But in practice, this forces operators to react later than their gut tells them to, says Riley Post, a University of Iowa researcher who spent over a decade as a hydraulic engineer for the Corps. They might, for example, be expected to hold water in a nearly full reservoir even as heavy rains approach.

Recent developments, however, have sharpened the trustworthiness of forecasts, particularly for atmospheric rivers on the West Coast. Leaps in computing power have enabled ever-more-muscular climate and weather modeling. To pump these models with data, scientists led by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography have since 2016 launched reconnaissance flights over atmospheric rivers of interest, where they release dozens of dropsondes, sensor packs shaped like Pringles cans. The result is a detailed profile of a storm’s strength, size, and intentions, which can then feed into FIRO.

These reports aren’t clairvoyant; all weather forecasts involve a measure of uncertainty. But a dam operator with increased confidence in when, where, and how much water will strike their watershed can take a more “surgical” approach to holding or releasing water, Post says.

And if they know how much time they have, they can also make the most of their existing water. Take Prado Dam, a vintage 1941 facility that was built to shield Orange County from flooding but can also distribute water to 25 groundwater-recharge stations. This past winter, forecasts showed a well-spaced parade of storms tracking its way. So operators pulsed water from the dam into storage at an optimal cadence, giving it time to soak into the landscape. Adam Hutchinson of the Orange County Water District, which manages the groundwater-recharge system, said publicly in July that these actions delivered an “exceptional” boost to water supplies for “those dry years we know are coming.”

Jinsun Lim is an analyst with the International Energy Agency think tank who studies climate resilience in the energy sector. Lim says that this sort of specificity is exactly what hydro officials in many countries wish for: tools that can translate climate impacts at a local level for their unique watersheds and infrastructure. Talbot hasn’t seen anything quite like FIRO deployed abroad, but he says that curious parties from the UK, Chile, Southeast Asia, Australia, and other regions have contacted him. Meanwhile, other corners of the hydro world are applying similar logic to their own climate challenges.

For BC Hydro, which serves 95 percent of British Columbia’s population, heat waves have proven a bigger problem than drought. Rivers and rains remain strong, but the province’s historically mellow springs and summers have warmed up, prompting many people to switch on air conditioners, which jacks up power demand. To keep the ACs humming, BC Hydro keeps a close eye on its fuel supply, that is, its watershed. About 150 monitoring stations, equipped with snow, climate, and surface-water sensors, enable a near-real-time picture of water flows. This helps operators store up water for demand spikes in summer and winter alike.

Tajikistan, which gets fully 98 percent of its power from hydroelectricity, is adapting its fleet with a mix of hard and soft measures. Renovations at the 126-megawatt Quairokkum power plant, built in 1956, were screened against a range of climate scenarios—such as the diminution of its source glaciers. Just replacing its six Soviet-era turbines will hike output to 170 megawatts; the dam will also be reinforced for a 10,000-year flood whose intensity could exceed the previous design standard by anywhere from 15 to 70 percent. Meanwhile, investments by international funders in HydroMet, the country’s long-dysfunctional meteorology service, are paying off: The agency recently gave power generators early notice of a dry year, enabling forward planning.

Recent trends have underlined the need for such changes. Earlier this year, the International Energy Agency said today’s hydropower facilities are on average 2 percent less productive than dams were from 1990 to 2016. Droughts have weakened flows at many plants, the agency said, leaving fossil-based energy to fill a gap the size of Spain’s annual power use. Other dams have been exposed to extreme events for which they weren’t strictly engineered, as in north India in 2021, when a crumbling glacier sent forth a wall of water that wrecked dams and towns downstream. Last month’s disaster in Libya, due to the failure of two flood-control dams hit by a supersized Mediterranean storm, further underlines the risks of maladapted facilities.

Even hydropower’s harshest critics take no issue with nip-and-tuck improvements at today’s dams. But amid a massive expansion planned in the Global South, they warn against overconfidence that hydropower can adapt its way out of climate change. In July, an environmental group in Namibia urged the government to rethink a large dam proposed for the Kunene River, saying it’s prone to the same climate extremes that have sapped the energy of Namibia’s other dams.

As climate disruption sets in, solar and wind can provide equivalent power with less risk, says Josh Klemm, co-executive director of International Rivers, a human rights organization focused on river communities. “We need to really reexamine plans to develop new hydropower,” he says. “We’re only going to deepen our reliance on a climate-vulnerable energy source.”

The Army Corps, meanwhile, is in the early stages of studying whether FIRO can be attempted at 419 other dams under its umbrella. Scaling up FIRO isn’t entirely straightforward; other parts of the US have different kinds of precipitation events than California does, and some of these are currently a lot harder to predict than atmospheric rivers. But Talbot is optimistic that the ever-improving forecast science can find efficiency gains there for the taking. “It’s making your existing infrastructure work harder for you,” he said. “In the face of climate change, this sounds like a great way to position ourselves for buffering that.”

[lonestarflight]

Cancelled Missions: NASA's October 1977 Space Shuttle Flight Itinerary

"Soon after President Richard Nixon gave his blessing to the Space Shuttle Program on January 5, 1972, NASA scheduled its first orbital flight for 1977, then for March 1978. By early 1975, the date had slipped to March 1979. Funding shortfalls were to blame, as were the daunting engineering challenges of developing the world's first reusable orbital spaceship based on 1970s technology. The schedule slip was actually worse than NASA let on: as early as January 32, 1975, an internal NASA document (marked 'sensitive') gave a '90% probability date' for the first Shuttle launch of December 1979.

In October 1977, Chester Lee, director of Space Transportation System (STS) Operations at NASA Headquarters, distributed the first edition of the STS Flight Assignment Baseline, a launch schedule and payload manifest for the first 16 operational Shuttle missions. The document was in keeping with NASA's stated philosophy that reusable Shuttle Orbiters would fly on-time and often, like a fleet of cargo airplanes. The STS Utilization and Operations Office at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston had prepared the document, which was meant to be revised quarterly as new customers chose the Space Shuttle as their cheap and reliable ride to space.

The JSC planners assumed that six Orbital Flight Test (OFT) missions would precede the first operational Shuttle flight. The OFT flights would see two-man crews (Commander and Pilot) put Orbiter Vehicle 102 (OV-102) through its paces in low-Earth orbit. The planners did not include the OFT schedule in their document, but the May 30, 1980 launch date for their first operational Shuttle mission suggests that they based their flight schedule on the March 1979 first OFT launch date.

Thirteen of the 16 operational flights would use OV-102 and three would use OV-101. NASA would christen OV-102 Columbia in February 1979, shortly before it rolled out of the Rockwell International plant in Palmdale, California.

As for OV-101, its name was changed from Constitution to Enterprise in mid-1976 at the insistence of Star Trek fans. Enterprise flew in Approach and Landing Test (ALT) flights at Edwards Air Force Base in California beginning on February 15, 1977. ALT flights, which saw the Orbiter carried by and dropped from a modified 747, ended soon after the NASA JSC planners released their document.

The first operational Space Shuttle mission, Flight 7 (May 30 - June 3, 1980), would see Columbia climb to a 225-nautical-mile (n-mi) orbit inclined 28.5° relative to Earth's equator (unless otherwise stated, all orbits are inclined at 28.5°, the latitude of Kennedy Space Center in Florida). The delta-winged Orbiter would carry a three-person crew in its two-deck crew compartment and the bus-sized Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) in its 15-foot-wide, 60-foot-long payload bay.

Columbia would also carry a 'payload of opportunity' - that is, an unspecified payload. The presence of a payload of opportunity meant that the flight had available excess payload weight capacity. Payload mass up would total 27,925 pounds. Payload mass down after the Remote Manipulator System (RMS) arm hoisted LDEF out of Columbia's payload bay and released it into orbit would total 9080 pounds.

A page from the STS Flight Assignment Baseline document of October 1977 shows payloads and other features of the first five operational Space Shuttle missions plus Flight 12/Flight 12 Alternate

During Flight 8 (July 1-3, 1980), Columbia would orbit 160 n mi above the Earth. Three astronauts would release two satellites and their solid-propellant rocket stages: Tracking and Data Relay Satellite-A (TDRS-A) with a two-stage Interim Upper Stage (IUS) and the Satellite Business Systems-A (SBS-A) commercial communications satellite on a Spinning Solid Upper Stage-Delta-class (SSUS-D).

Prior to release, the crew would spin the SBS-A satellite about its long axis on a turntable to create gyroscopic stability and raise TDRS-A on a tilt-table. After release, their respective solid-propellant stages would propel them to their assigned slots in geostationary orbit (GEO), 19,323 n mi above the equator. Payload mass up would total 51,243 pounds; mass down, 8912 pounds, most of which would comprise reusable restraint and deployment hardware for the satellites.

The TDRS system, which would include three operational satellites and an orbiting spare, was meant to trim costs and improve communications coverage by replacing most of the ground-based Manned Space Flight Network (MSFN). Previous U.S. piloted missions had relied on MSFN ground stations to relay communications to and from the Mission Control Center (MCC) in Houston. Because spacecraft in low-Earth orbit could remain in range of a given ground station for only a few minutes at a time, astronauts were frequently out of contact with the MCC.

On Flight 9 (August 1-6, 1980), Columbia would climb to a 160-n-mi orbit. Three astronauts would deploy GOES-D, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather satellite, and Anik-C/1, a Canadian communications satellite. Before release, the crew would raise the NOAA satellite and its SSUS-Atlas-class (SSUS-A) rocket stage on the tilt-table and spin up the Anik-C/1-SSUS-D combination on the turntable. In addition to the two named satellites, NASA JSC planners reckoned that Columbia could carry a 14,000-pound payload of opportunity. Payload mass up would total 36,017 pounds; mass down, 21,116 pounds.

Following Flight 9, NASA would withdraw Columbia from service for 12 weeks to permit conversion from OFT configuration to operational configuration. The JSC planners explained that the conversion would be deferred until after Flight 9 to ensure an on-time first operational flight and to save time by combining it with Columbia's preparations for the first Spacelab mission on Flight 11. The switch from OFT to operational configuration would entail removal of Development Flight Instrumentation (sensors for monitoring Orbiter systems and performance); replacement of Commander and Pilot ejection seats on the crew compartment upper deck (the flight deck) with fixed seats; power system upgrades; and installation of an airlock on the crew compartment lower deck (the mid-deck).

Flight 10 (November 14-16, 1980) would be a near-copy of Flight 8. A three-person Columbia crew would deploy TDRS-B/IUS and SBS-B/SSUS-D into a 160-n-mi-high orbit. The rocket stages would then boost the satellites to GEO. Cargo mass up would total 53,744 pounds; mass down, 11,443 pounds.

Flight 11 (December 18-25, 1980) would see the orbital debut of Spacelab. Columbia would orbit Earth 160 n mi high at 57° of inclination. NASA and the multinational European Space Research Organization (ESRO) agreed in August 1973 that Europe should develop and manufacture Spacelab pressurized modules and unpressurized pallets for use in the Space Shuttle Program. Initially dubbed the 'sortie lab,' Spacelab would operate only in the Orbiter payload bay; it was not intended as an independent space station, though many hoped that it would help to demonstrate that an Earth-orbiting station could be useful.

ESRO merged with the European Launcher Development Organization in 1975 to form the European Space Agency (ESA). Columbia's five-person crew for Flight 11 would probably include scientists and at least one astronaut from an ESA member country.

Flight 12 (January 30 - February 1, 1981), a near-copy of Flights 8 and 10, would see Columbia's three-person crew deploy TDRS-C/IUS and Anik-C/2/SSUS-D into 160-n-mi-high orbit. Payload mass up would total 53,744 pounds; mass down, 11,443 pounds.

JSC planners inserted an optional 'Flight 12 Alternate' (January 30 - February 4, 1981) into their schedule which, if flown, would replace Flight 12. Columbia would orbit 160 n mi above the Earth. Its three-person crew would deploy Anik-C/2 on a SSUS-D stage. The mission's main purpose, however, would be to create a backup launch opportunity for an Intelsat V-class satellite already scheduled for launch on a U.S. Atlas-Centaur or European Ariane I rocket. An SSUS-A stage would boost the Intelsat V from Shuttle orbit to GEO.

NASA JSC assumed that, besides the satellites, stages, and their support hardware, Columbia would for Flight 12 Alternate tote an attached payload of opportunity that would need to operate in space for five days to provide useful data (hence the mission's planned duration). Payload mass up would total 37,067 pounds; mass down, 17,347 pounds.

Space Shuttle Flights 13 through 18 would include the first orbital mission of the OV-101 Enterprise (Flight 17), during which astronauts would retrieve the LDEF payload deployed during Flight 7.

Flight 13 (March 3-8, 1981) would see three astronauts on board Columbia release NOAA's GOES-E satellite attached to an SSUS-D stage into a 160-n-mi-high orbit. OV-102 would have room for two payloads of opportunity: one attached at the front of the payload bay and one deployed from a turntable aft of the GOES-E/SSUS-D combination. Payload mass up would total 38,549 pounds; mass down, 23,647 pounds.

Flight 14 would last 12 days, making it the longest described in the STS Flight Assignment Baseline document. Scheduled for launch on April 7, 1981, it would carry a 'train' of four unpressurized Spacelab experiment pallets and an 'Igloo,' a small pressurized compartment for pallet support equipment. The Igloo, though pressurized, would not be accessible to the five-person crew. OV-102 would orbit 225 n mi high at an inclination of 57°. Mass up would total 31,833 pounds; mass down, 28,450 pounds.

Flight 15 (May 13-15, 1981) would be a near-copy of Flights 8, 10, and 12. OV-102 would transport to orbit a payload totaling 53,744 pounds; payload mass down would total 11,443 pounds. The JSC planners noted the possibility that none of the potential payloads for Flight 15 — TDRS-D and SBS-C or Anik-C/3 — would need to be launched as early as May 1981. TDRS-D was meant as an orbiting spare; if the first three TDRS operated as planned, its launch could be postponed. Likewise, SBS-C and Anik-C/3 were each a backup for the previously launched satellites in their series.

Flight 16 (June 16-23, 1981) would be a five-person Spacelab pressurized module flight aboard OV-102 in 160-n-mi-high orbit. Payloads of opportunity totaling about 18,000 pounds might accompany the Spacelab module; for planning purposes, a satellite and SSUS-D on a turntable behind the module was assumed. Payload mass up would total 35,676 pounds; mass down, 27,995 pounds.

Flight 17, scheduled for July 16-20, 1981, would see the space debut of Enterprise and the retrieval of the LDEF released during Flight 7. OV-101 would climb to a roughly 200-n-mi-high orbit (LDEF's altitude after 13.5 months of orbital decay would determine the mission's precise altitude).

Before rendezvous with LDEF, Flight 17's three-man crew would release an Intelsat V/SSUS-A and a satellite payload of opportunity. After the satellites were sent on their way, the astronauts would pilot Enterprise to a rendezvous with LDEF, snare it with the RMS, and secure it in the payload bay. Mass up would total 26,564 pounds; mass down, 26,369 pounds.

For Flight 18 (July 29-August 5, 1981), Columbia would carry to a 160-n-mi-high orbit a Spacelab pallet dedicated to materials processing in the vacuum and microgravity of space. The three-person flight might also include the first acknowledged Department of Defense (DOD) payload of the Space Shuttle Program, a U.S. Air Force pallet designated STP-P80-1. JSC called the payload 'Planned' rather than 'Firm' and noted somewhat cryptically that it was the Teal Ruby experiment 'accommodated from OFT [Orbital Flight Test].'

The presence of the Earth-directed Teal Ruby sensor payload would account for Flight 18's planned 57° orbital inclination, which would take it over most of Earth's densely populated areas. Payload mass up might total 32,548 pounds; mass down, 23,827 pounds.

Space Shuttle Flights 20 through 23 would include the first mission to make use of an OMS kit to increase its orbital altitude (Flight 21), the first European Space Agency-sponsored Spacelab mission (Flight 22), and the launch of the Jupiter Orbiter and Probe spacecraft (Flight 23)

Flight 19 (September 2-9, 1981) would see five Spacelab experiment pallets fill Columbia's payload bay. Five astronauts would operate the experiments, which would emphasize physics and astronomy. The Orbiter would circle Earth in a 216-n-mi-high orbit. Payload mass up would total 29,214 pounds; mass down, 27,522 pounds.

Flight 20 (September 30-October 6, 1981), the second Enterprise mission, would see five astronauts conduct life science and astronomy experiments in a 216-n-mi-high orbit using a Spacelab pressurized module and an unpressurized pallet. JSC planners acknowledged that the mission's down payload mass (34,248 pounds) might be 'excessive,' but noted that their estimate was 'based on preliminary payload data.' Mass up would total 37,065 pounds.

On Flight 21, scheduled for launch on October 14, 1981, Columbia would carry the first Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) Kit at the aft end of its payload bay. The OMS Kit would carry enough supplemental propellants for the Orbiter's twin rear-mounted OMS engines to perform a velocity change of 500 feet per second. This would enable OV-102 to rendezvous with and retrieve the Solar Maximum Mission (SMM) satellite in a 300-n-mi-high orbit.

Three astronauts would fly the five-day mission, which would attain the highest orbital altitude of any flight in the STS Flight Assignment Baseline document. JSC planners noted that the Multi-mission Modular Spacecraft (MMS) support hardware meant to carry SMM back to Earth could also transport an MMS-type satellite into orbit. Payload mass up would total 37,145 pounds; mass down, 23,433 pounds.

On Flight 22 (November 25 - December 2, 1981), Enterprise might carry an ESA-sponsored Spacelab mission with a five-person crew, a pressurized lab module, and a pallet to a 155-to-177-n-mi orbit inclined at 57°. Payload mass up might total 34,031 pounds; mass down, 32,339 pounds.

During Flight 23 (January 5-6, 1982), the last described in the STS Flight Assignment Baseline document, three astronauts would deploy into a 150-to-160-n-mi-high orbit the Jupiter Orbiter and Probe (JOP) spacecraft on a stack of three IUSs. President Jimmy Carter had requested new-start funds for JOP in his Fiscal Year 1978 NASA budget, which had taken effect on October 1, 1977. Because JOP was so new when they prepared their document, JSC planners declined to estimate up/down payload masses.

Flight 23 formed an anchor point for the Shuttle schedule because JOP had a launch window dictated by the movements of the planets. If the automated explorer did not leave for Jupiter between January 2 and 12, 1982, it would mean a 13-month delay while Earth and Jupiter moved into position for another launch attempt.

Almost nothing in the October 1977 STS Flight Assignment Baseline document occurred as planned. It was not even updated quarterly; no update had been issued as of mid-November 1978, by which time the target launch dates for the first Space Shuttle orbital mission and the first operational Shuttle flight had slipped officially to September 28, 1979 and February 27, 1981, respectively.

The Space Shuttle Orbiter Columbia lifts off at the start of STS-1.

The first Shuttle flight, designated STS-1, did not in fact lift off until April 12, 1981. As in the STS Flight Assignment Baseline document, OV-102 Columbia performed the OFT missions; OFT concluded, however, after only four flights. After the seven-day STS-4 mission (June 27 - July 4, 1982), President Ronald Reagan declared the Shuttle operational.

The first operational flight, also using Columbia, was STS-5 (November 11-16, 1982). The mission launched SBS-3 and Anik-C/3; because of Shuttle delays, the other SBS and Anik-C satellites planned for Shuttle launch had already reached space atop expendable rockets.

To the chagrin of many Star Trek fans, Enterprise never reached space. NASA decided that it would be less costly to convert Structural Test Article-099 into a flight-worthy Orbiter than to refit Enterprise for spaceflight after the ALT series. OV-099, christened Challenger, first reached space on mission STS-6 (April 4-9, 1983), which saw deployment of the first TDRS satellite.

NASA put OV-101 Enterprise to work in a variety of tests and rehearsals (such as the 'fit check' shown in the image above), but did not convert it into a spaceflight-worthy Orbiter.

The voluminous Spacelab pressurized module first reached orbit on board Columbia on mission STS-9 (November 28- December 8,1983). The 10-day Spacelab 1 mission included ESA researcher Ulf Merbold and NASA scientist-astronauts Owen Garriott and Robert Parker. Garriott, selected to be an astronaut in 1965, had flown for 59 days on board the Skylab space station in 1973. Parker had been selected in 1967, but STS-9 was his first spaceflight.

The 21,500-pound LDEF reached Earth orbit on board Challenger on STS-41C, the 11th Space Shuttle mission (April 6-13, 1984). During the same mission, astronauts captured, repaired, and released the SMM satellite, which had reached orbit on 14 February 1980 and malfunctioned in January 1981. Challenger reached SMM without an OMS kit; in fact, no OMS kit ever reached space.

STS Flight Assignment Baseline document assumed that 22 Shuttle flights (six OFT and 16 operational) would occur before January 1982. In fact, the 22nd Shuttle flight did not begin until October 1985, when Challenger carried eight astronauts and the West German Spacelab D1 into space (STS-61A, October 30 - November 6, 1985). Three months later (28 January 1986), Challenger was destroyed at the start of STS-51L, the Shuttle Program's 25th mission.

In addition to seven astronauts — NASA's first in-flight fatalities — Challenger took with it TDRS-B, NASA's second TDRS satellite. The Shuttle would not fly again until September 1988 (STS-26, September 29 - October 3, 1988). On that mission, OV-103 Discovery deployed TDRS-C. The TDRS system would not include the three satellites necessary for global coverage until TDRS-D reached orbit on board Discovery on mission STS-29 (13-18 March 1989).

Following the Challenger accident, NASA abandoned — though not without some resistance — the pretense that it operated a fleet of cargo planes. The space agency had at one time aimed for 60 Shuttle flights per year; between 1988 and 2003, the Shuttle Program managed about six per year. The most flights the Shuttle fleet accomplished in a year was nine in 1985.

Shuttle delays meant that JOP, renamed Galileo, missed its early January 1982 launch window. It was eventually rescheduled for May 1986, but the Challenger accident intervened. Galileo finally left Earth orbit on 18 October 1989 following deployment from OV-104 Atlantis during STS-34 (October 18-23, 1989).

Between the time JOP/Galileo received its first funding and the Challenger explosion, NASA, the White House, and Congress had sparred over how the Jupiter spacecraft would depart Earth orbit. Eventually, they settled on the powerful liquid-propellant Centaur-G' rocket stage.

Citing new concern for safety following Challenger, NASA canceled Centaur G'. Galileo had to rely on the less-powerful IUS, which meant that it could not travel directly to Jupiter; it had instead to perform gravity-assist flybys of Venus and Earth to reach its exploration target. Galileo did not reach the Jupiter system until December 1995.

LDEF had been scheduled for retrieval in March 1985, less than a year after deployment, but flight delays and the Challenger accident postponed its return to Earth by nearly six years. On mission STS-32 (January 9-20, 1990), astronauts on board Columbia retrieved LDEF, the orbit of which had decayed to 178 n mi. LDEF remains the largest object ever retrieved in space and returned to Earth.

During reentry at the end of mission STS-107 (16 January-1 February 2003), Columbia broke apart over northeast Texas, killing its international crew of seven astronauts. This precipitated cancellation of the Space Shuttle Program by President George W. Bush, who announced his decision on 14 January 2004.

The end of the Space Shuttle Program was originally scheduled for 2010, immediately following the planned completion of the International Space Station. In the event, STS-135, the final Space Shuttle mission, took place four years ago (July 2011), three months after the 30th anniversary of STS-1. The Orbiter Atlantis lifted off on 8 July with a four-person crew — the smallest since STS-6. It docked with the International Space Station to deliver supplies and spares and landed in Florida 13 days later."

Article by David S. F. Portree: link

source, source

NASA ID: S77-5784, S77-5785, S77-5758

[dreamsofminnie]

“False Confidence”

Kazuha | Childe —x gn!Reader Smau

01- Dare myself🍁🐳 | Word count: 975

Rushing from your college campus towards the cafe which your best friends worked at was a real strain on your legs. The workout would be worth it for a free drink.

Lucky that the cafe manager is nice to the twins and even more so when she met you. The twins could tell so hard that the manager has a slight crush on you. Reason why you get drinks on the house when your at the cafe anytime of the day.

Just you sitting by the windowsill also attracts passerby’s and brings in customers. Your stunning looks do attract many eyes.

Unwanted eyes? Not necessarily since it does wonders to ego boosts. Just when you're back at your shared apartment with the twins, do you deflate your swelled ego, it’s terrifying when it’s inflated.

Attention is better sweet and quick so it can be ignored just as bitter.

The opposing reason you wanted to get away, it’s the last week of classes till summer break and the swarms of invites to hang out over the summer from many people interested in making a lover out of you.

You frown deeply at that thought. Just adding to the lover count I see, never happening.

Running around the corner of the block your thoughts come to a stop as you see the name of the cafe appear etched onto the window. ‘Cafe Dense’

A strange name but dense is better than being aware. Whatever that meant.

The tinkling of the bell on the door signaled your arrival. Two blondes look up from their workstation just in time to see you enter and wave you over.

The cafe at noon was packed at half capacity. No wonder since Lumine and Aether were well known, being extroverts that is. At one time people thought you three were triplets since you suck to each other like glue. None of you minded that thought, it was wholly true.

“Here. Your ‘on the house’ drink.” Lumine rolled her eyes playfully and passed the large sized cup.

“Thank youu Lumie, did you spit in it tho?” You smile while peering into the cup.

“I did think you would want that… She didn’t though. Or else manager would see and hang Lumi’s paycheck over her head.” Aether laughed while the other blonde grumbled, “manager is such a simp.”

You take a sip and hum. The line for ordering only consisted of three boys, which the other workers were diligently tending to.

Letting Aether and Lumine continue with their work, you needed something else to occupy your time. . . Giving yourself a little dare won’t hurt.

Kazuha (3rd person)PoV—

“Finallyyy Albedo’s here. Quick Quick, get your drink and we are outta here.” Tighnari shooed Albedo towards the cashier area who had only just shown up and barely got a chance to sit down.

“Ah. I wanted to buy another drink as well, let me come with you Bedo.” Kazuha gets up and follows the blondie with his wallet. Albedo asks if this was Kazuha’s third drink and the suspect merely shifts his eyes away.

Tighnari glances at Cyno’s empty seat, he went to the bathroom not long ago. Did he get stuck with no toilet paper? Again? Tighnari let out a long frustrated sigh and marched toward the men’s bathroom to find his lost partner.

“One green tea latte please.” Kazuha gently smiles as the golden-eyed blonde girl across the cashier counter, inputs the drink and tells him to tap his card. The mumbling of the guy behind him nearly makes Kazu turn around but the cashier thanked him and called for next. Kazuha just followed Albedo–who went before him, standing at the waiting area on his phone. “Kazu did you get the text about the class group chat? It’s so fucking dumb.” Albedo shut his phone off and glance at his friend.

“Hm?” Kazuha dug through his pockets and struggled to find his block of technology. “Did you forget your phone on the table you were at before?” Albedo’s suggestion made Kazuha nod and return to the table which, Bedo’s hypothesis was correct.

“Ah. I thought I lost you. Uh? Who is this on my lock screen??. . .”

Childe (3rd person)PoV—

Repeating the order over and over again, Childe checked the group chat once more to get the coffee order right.

He mumbled out the orders, “Scara wanted a hot Matcha latte; which we made fun of for him wanting steamed milk.” He chuckled and scrolled down.

“Arlei demanded a red eye coffee. Not surprising for that coffee addict. Then Dain requested…an Irish coffee… just because he saw Arlei drink it once. Does he know that there is alcohol AND sugar in that??”

Childe was just about to type his question in the chat but the cashier snapped his attention away when she called out next. He walked up to the counter and placed his phone down, wanting to memorize honestly.

“Heya girlie, I’ll get a Hot matcha latte, a red eye, and an Irish coffee.” He grinned smugly, practicing how he would show up with correct drink orders for them time around.

He tapped his card and sauntered off with his idiotic confidence clouding his head.

After waiting for about 10 minutes of absolutely nothing in his head but his proud grin, his drinks were ready and bagged up, he checked his pockets to text them that he got it.

“Huh?! Where is my phone?!??? Where’d I leave it??” Light tapping on the counter alerted childe as he looked up and see the cashier from before handing him, his phone. “You left this at the cash register, dumbass.” She walked off towards the break room before he could thank her.

Still slightly stunned he decided to continue with his text to his friends.

“WUah?! Who is this?!? They’re so pretty… WAIT, THIS MUST BE FATE!”

Previous | Masterlist | Next

Synopsis-> You were bored so you took the cute guy’s phone which lay open on the coffee table at your friend’s work place. And took a selfie of your face and pinned it as their lock screen. And now you are being hunted by the phone’s owner who's now curious about you from your flirt and run. Through your flirtatious ways, you have never been able to maintain relationships; you always keep an arms length away. You don’t believe you deserve love at all, so why not flirt with strangers?

Summer season-> Name has been filling back on their flirts since the responses to their flirts were getting too dizzying to them. Though the twins can see the attempts of two boys vying for your affection. Twins detective agency activated while you took some time to yourself with failure.

So many hidden secrets eehehhe

The name of the cafe cOUgh CoUgh hint: top of the page😁 punfect

Yes, Lumine was the Cashier; i needed Childe to say his iconic “Hey girlie”

Only Childe would be dumb enough to leave his phone on the counter smh

Taglist->

@pokidot @scarletttcroww @noirinnn @melodiesoffadedroses @x4ndr @liilactears @ilovekazuha271 @ghostlysyntaxed @ferumie @cryastre @whipped-for-fictionals @crucnhice @tamikahoshiko @soleillunne

[wedreamedlove]

Early on in the game, we learned that Osborn’s three sizes were 102-76-96 but now look at how the man has grown thicker after 1.5 years, haha. There’s also the secret size of 3L too...

Translations under the read more!

SHOULDERS (46cm)

Just like its invincible owner, this tidy and unstained white shirt brings an unblemished victory for him and all the people he protects.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “You want to hear my heartbeat? You have to come a bit closer then.” BAD MEASUREMENT = “This length isn’t very correct, is it? Do you want to measure it again?” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “Mm, you’ve measured it very accurately. I’m already looking forward to the finished product.”

HANDS (16cm)

A pair of fitted soft leather gloves for punching enemies efficiently and for interlocking fingers with one’s partner, gently and solidly.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “You want to start with measuring someplace else? Sure thing.” BAD MEASUREMENT = “The measurements are a bit off… but it seems like it can be made into couples gloves.” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “Is the size of my hands the same as how you remember them to be?”

WAIST (77cm)

Tactical combat requires a nimble mind and extremely quick spontaneous reactions. This nylon belt can protect flexible waist muscles and, in extreme circumstances, it’s also suitable for binding people.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “You said you were going to measure my waist. If you keep messing around, I’m going to counterattack.” BAD MEASUREMENT = “What are you turning red for? Haven't you known my measurements for a long time now?” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “Your serious expression when you're measuring my waist is lovely.”

CHEST (103cm)

Field combat conditions change greatly but with tactical straps personally put on by one’s partner not only are one’s clothes tidy, but it also provides support for various combat like daggers, firearms, and thrown weapons.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “My physique isn’t bad? Looks like my recent exercise has been pretty effective.” BAD MEASUREMENT = “Made a mistake? Don’t be nervous, you can measure me however many times you want.” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “Your technique is so clean, the tactical straps you make should be well-fitting.”

THIGHS (58cm)

A strong and durable utility bag with plenty of capacity. The inner material has been carefully improved by the tailor to lessen the burden on the thigh, and even if one marched for an entire day with a full load there will only be a slight mark on the surface of the skin.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “Hold on, wait until the measurements are taken, then whatever you want to do, I'll do it with you.” BAD MEASUREMENT = “Relax, do it again. You can definitely measure the accurate size.” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “So professional? Looks like I can entrust my thigh to you without worry.”

FEET (27cm)

Formal leather shoes that can flexibly pair with various settings. Its owner can hide their deadly footsteps when carrying out missions, or they can dance to their heart's content with their partner at a celebratory banquet.

FAIL MEASUREMENT = “Tickles a little… Where are you touching?” BAD MEASUREMENT = “It’s different from my usual shoe size, did your hands shake?” PERFECT MEASUREMENT = “As expected, you’re extremely professional even when measuring shoe size.”

[jelloduckie]

I aggressively read and looked over The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde just so I could draw them so hello!!! Here's my take + notes Jekyll ~

Here's all my notes from the book (thank you Mr. Utterson): - a large, well-made, smooth-faced man of fifty - something of a stylish cast - every mark of capacity and kindness - large handsome face His hands brought to you by the man himself: - professional in shape and size - large, firm, white and comely Misc notes: - elderly and discontented doctor - imperfect and divided countenance And that's all we got... we have Hyde's differences that kind of display what he at least isn't. But anyways my dears! With this info I decided his clothes would be well fitted and move with him. Dignified air to him with a soft smile. He's larger in size but fit/tall, lovely big hands too :3c I took the liberty to make his eyes green since the potion he took to turn back into Jekyll was a "watery green." I also thought a dimple would suit him (completely indulgent). He is aged but I assume not many wrinkles, kind of baby faced for his age, whitening hair and wrinkles by the eyes will do (I don't want him to look young). I actually couldn't help myself but have a similar hairstyle to Fredric March (no description of hair in book). Brownish hair since it seems popular with his character but a lighter shade from the "younger" Hyde. Speaking of! Hyde ~

I actually drew him before Jekyll. He is quite easier to envision with so much description in the book. I perceive I'll draw him more accurately to my notes the more I draw the fellows (I couldn't bear to fix this already good sketch).

Physical appearance: - smaller, slighter, younger - lost in stature / shrunken limbs - pale and dwarfish - evil written broadly and plainly on the face - livelier image, more express and single - imprint of deformity and decay - deformity without any nameable malformation - displeasing smile - ugly idol His clothes: - rich and sober fabric - enormysly too large for him in every measurement - trousers hanging off his legs, rolled up to keep them from the ground - waist of the coat below his haunches - collar sprawling wide upon his shoulders - clothes hung formlessly - very plainly dressed His hands: - lean, corded, knuckly - of a dusky pallor - thickly shaded with a swart growth of hair - corded and hairy (again, seems like a hyde trademark) Misc notes: - husky, whispering and somewhat broken voice - comparative youth, the light step - murderous mixture of timidity and boldness - troglodytic

So, Mr. Hyde is definitely not deformed physically, it's more of a personality deformation that people can just "sense." His smile is striking, so the best way to portray his evil would be with how his face contorts when making expressions. His timidness is important, he'd most likely be hunched over, reclusive yet have an air of boldness, which is equally as important. His hair unkempt and wild in comparison to Jekyll for his "livelier" image and darker in color for a youngness. I didn't portray his clothes correctly in my sketch but it's alike. To add a pinch of difference in character I made his pant stripes green, to contrast Jekyll's red. To hammer this in I made Hyde's eyes red instead of green to tie them together completely. His boots have a red shine, Jekyll's would have a green if I had drawn them. Why red? "The mixture, which at first of a reddish hue-", "compound changed to a dark purple, which faded again more slowly to a watery green." To me this clearly demonstrates the change from Hyde to Jekyll (which the potion was for).

I was originally going to draw them side by side for a better comparison, but Hyde is supposed to be considerably short while still being very thin (not lanky). I also would say his boots would be too big for Hyde (which I didn't draw here).

Thank you for reading my observations *bows gayly*

[writingtheother]

Webinar: Write Lore Your Readers Won't Forget with Stant Litore

Our mythologies shape and define us. Our myths and legends—our heroes and exempla, our tricksters, our gods, our ghosts, our monsters, our understanding of our past and of the world around us—inform our choices and perspectives, what we value, and what pressures we feel as we chart our course between our strongest fears and our deepest desires. This is true for our fictional characters, too! (Regardless of your genre or topic.)

In this webinar, discover the exciting things you can do in a story when you know the lore of your fictional world and its implications. Whether your fictional world is big as a galaxy or the size of a single family. Whether its heroes are interstellar entities or goddesses of thunder and storm or wise grandmothers or cowboys lassoing a tornado. Even better: something we've never encountered in a story before.

Author Stant Litore will explore techniques for designing the stories behind the story you're telling–the stories that your characters either carry in their hearts or resist with all their capacity.

How deep does your lore go? And how fiercely does it press on your characters' lives and actions? Let's find out!

When: April 6 & 7 @ 9AM – 4PM Pacific Can't make the live webinar? Register to get the recording after Price: $100 – $150 Scholarships Available! Application Deadline: March 17

Please visit our website more details on registration options, required texts (if any), technical requirements, our accessibility statement, class audience, and the scholarship application.

👉🏾👉🏾 Details and Registration 👈🏾👈🏾

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Just before 7 am on March 3, Danny Lemoi posted an update in his hugely popular pro-ivermectin Telegram group, Dirt Road Discussions: “HAPPY FRIDAY ALL YOU POISONOUS HORSE PASTE EATING SURVIVORS !!!”

Hours later, Lemoi was dead.

For the last decade, Lemoi had taken a daily dose of veterinary ivermectin, a dewormer designed to be used on large animals like horses and cows. In 2021, as ivermectin became a popular alternative COVID-19 treatment among anti-vaxxers, he launched what became one of the largest Telegram channels dedicated to promoting the use of it, including instructions on how to administer ivermectin to children.

But despite Lemoi’s death, the administrators of his channel are pushing his misinformation—even as his followers share their own worrying possible side effects from taking ivermectin and some question the safety of the drug.

Lemoi, a heavy equipment operator who lived in Foster, Rhode Island, “passed away unexpectedly” on March 3, according to an online obituary post by his family last week. He was survived by his parents and brother. The obituary gave no details about the cause of his death.

In the Telegram channel, administrators broke the news of his death to his followers. “Though it was obvious that Danny had the biggest heart, it was unbeknownst to him that his heart was quite literally overworking and overgrowing beyond its capacity, nearly doubled in size from what it should have been,” the admins wrote, adding: “We understand that this is going to raise questions for those who were following him.”

The admins added that Lemoi had undergone testing on his heart last year, but the results had shown no cause for concern.

Lemoi began taking the version of ivermectin designed for animals on a daily basis in 2012, after he was diagnosed with Lyme disease, according to a detailed account of his medical history he gave on a podcast last November. He said then that five months after first taking the drug, he quit all other treatments and believed ivermectin had “regenerated” his heart muscle.

During the pandemic, Ivermectin became hugely popular among anti-vaxxers, many of whom were taking and recommending the veterinary formulation of the drug, rather than the one designed for human use. While ivermectin for humans is used to treat serious illnesses like river blindness, it has repeatedly been shown to be an ineffective treatment for COVID-19.

And according to the Missouri Poison Center, ingesting large doses of ivermectin formulated for animals has a long list of side effects, including seizures, coma, lung issues, and heart problems. Veterinary ivermectin is not a cure or effective treatment for COVID, the FDA has repeatedly warned, and is highly concentrated because it is designed for large animals like horses and cows. “Such high doses can be highly toxic in humans,” the FDA cautions.

“Danny was fully convinced that his heart had regenerated after his incident with Lyme disease that almost ended in congestive heart failure,” the admins wrote, before claiming that “a family history of heart disease and chronic stress” were why his heart had ultimately become engorged. “All of his other organs were unremarkable,” the admins wrote. “And this was determined to be a death by unfortunate natural causes.”

The admins of Lemoi’s channel did not respond to VICE News’ questions about where they got their information about his death. Lemoi’s surviving family did not respond to VICE News' request for comment on the cause of his death.

But a review of Lemoi’s Telegram channels shows that many of his followers who are taking his dosage recommendations, or “protocols,” for veterinary ivermectin are experiencing numerous known side effects of taking the drug.

“I’m 4 months now and all hell’s breaking loose, all pain has hit my waist down with sciatic, shin splints, restless leg syndrome, tight sore calves & it feels like some pain in the bones,” a member wrote on Friday.

Lemoi explained away the negative side effects of taking veterinary ivermectin by describing them as “herxing,” a real term to describe an adverse response that occurs in people who take antibiotics as a treatment for Lyme disease.

“My wife has been taking ivermectin for 3 months,” a member wrote Friday. “She is being treated for autoimmune hepatitis, thyroid, and vertebrae issues. She has had some serious HERXING. Today she has a migraine, vomiting and severe stomach pain. Does anyone have any ideas how to help, and are these HERXING symptoms?”

Some members of the group are taking ivermectin not only as a treatment against COVID, but as a cure-all for almost every disease—from cancer and depression, to autism and ovarian cysts—believing that every disease is caused by a parasite that is removed from the body by ivermectin, just as animals are given the drug to treat parasitic worms like tapeworm.

Lemoi also formulated an ivermectin regimen for children, and numerous members of the group reported that they were using it. This week alone one member wrote that she had established another group for “parents of children on the spectrum, cerebral palsy, pans/panda, downs etc.,” who are using the Lemoi’s recommended children’s dosage.

When some members of the group blamed Lemoi’s death on ivermectin, they were criticized in the Telegram channel; their fellow group members claimed they were spreading misinformation.

​​“No one can convince me that he died because of ivermectin,” one member wrote this week. “He ultimately died because of our failed western medicine which only cares about profits and not the cure.”

Despite Lemoi’s death, administrators said this week the Telegram channel would live on, and the group is attracting new members who continue to take ivermectin despite suffering serious side effects.

“I am very new to this... I’ve been on Bimectin paste for 20 days,” one new member wrote on Friday morning, explaining that he too was suffering from Lyme disease. “I have severe chest pain. Costochondritis symptoms. Air hunger, internal tremors, brain fog, headaches on the back of my head, anxiety, depression, doom and gloominess.”

Oh...just remembering all the MAGA freaks on here that were foaming at the mouth over ivermectin and wondering why @staff never gave us a "report medical misinformation" option...

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"BELIEF IN "HAIRY GIANTS" NOT CONFINED TO INDIANS," Toronto Star. March 8, 1934. Page 5. ---- White Men Familiar With B.C. Natives Belief In "Sasquatch" ---- ONE SAW FAMILY ---- By A. D. KEAN That "Sasquatch," the legendary hairy giants of West Coast Indian fame are believed in by white men borne borne to-day when J. A. Hewat, came into The Star office to see me. Mr. Hewat is the son of Ronald Hewat one of the best known of the older police constables of British Columbia, and has been an acquaintance of mine since Childhood, having been born in the Similkameen valley near my own home.

"Sure I believe in Sasqusttch," stated the known stalwart J. A. "for I've known a great many Indians who must have seen the hairy giants. Not only among the tribes who live on the mainland but among those of the north end of Vancouver island as well. For three years I was with the Dominion geological survey, in the capacity of packer, with from 10 to 20 horses and three to five helpers in charge, and at various times I came I came in contact with Indians who told in detail of meeting the Sasquatch. The giants are thought to live in caves mostly, and have been known for ages in the districts adjacent to the Fraser delta, the western mountain passes of the coast range in and around Coquohalla - where the boundary railroad comes through from the Okanagan valley to Vancouver, and upon the high table-lands about Victoria peak on the northermost tip of Vancouver island.

More Than Legend "Sasquatch is considerably more than a legend with all those Indians," said Mr. Hewat convincingly. "I've even heard the giants described being the last living descendants of the once powerful Aztecs of Mexico and the country to the immediate south. I knew a prospector, Cariboo George by name, who told me he had seen huge barefoot tracks of the Sasquatch in the shore of William's lake (North Central B.C.) and had followed the giant's trail up into the hills nearby.

"Cariboo George related how he had hidden himself in some bushes while the Sasquatch went by. They were a monster 8-foot man and his wife and child. All were completely naked except for a thick coat of pale, brownish-colored short fur or matted hair. The giants spoke with deep rumbling, guttural voices and seemed act very happy toward one an other. Old George seemed so wholly convinced by what he described that I found myself believing likewise in the reality of the Sasquatch," admitted Hewat seriously.

"Cariboo George also claimed that a good-sized family of the giants lived in the William's lake district somewhere and that they paid visits intervals to the local waters at nightime for fishing.

Several Near Fort Langley "Near old Fort Langley, on the upper Fraser delta," went on J. A., "there are known to be several of the giants. Many Indians there whom I met and knew told me they had seen the Sasquatch. These Indians, like those farther inland, declared the giants to be rather blonde than otherwise, but that the Indians feared the Sasquatch greatly considering them in the light of evil spirits. All the Indians agree, however, that the Sasquatch are of immense stature and tremendously powerful, and that they possess the faculty of seeing clearly through the darkest night.

"No can hide from Sasquatch, one of the stock phrases of an Indian, when relating some legend of giants," said the dark-eyed Hewat.

"About the best story I heard told of the experience of an Indian trapper who lived on the northern extremity of the Mt. Victoria plateau on Vancouver island. went on J. A This Indian looked on out of his split log cabin in early one morning to find a Sasquatch stalking about dooryard.

"The giant spied the Indian just in time to prevent being shot at. According to the trapper the Sasquatch leaped behind the corner of the shack and tore the whole roof-corner off at a single sharp pull.

"This act so terrified the Indian inside that he fell into a swoon, from which he did not awaken for several hours. When that frightened trapper regained consciousness the place seemed deserted so the redman crept cautiously outside to look around.

"While following the huge footprints left by the Sasquatch the trapper came suddenly upon the giant seated calmly at the foot of a widespreading 12-font cedar tree. With horrified gaze the Indian froze In his tracks. the while the Sasquatch eyed him silently. Presently the giant spoke. He used the native dialect of the Indian though hardly used to it.

"Why Do You Follow Met" "Why do you follow me? asked the Sasquatch in a rumbling voice. I could have killed you but you were too frightened. So I came away. Now go back and tell your tribesmen what you have seen and I have done and remember, Sasquatch cautioned, ominously. 'If you so much has tell the least falsehood about me I shall bring more of my people and we will destroy you all. At which the trapper turned away and fled.

"I asked the trapper what that Sasquatch looked like and he described the giant as being of a red-brown color with a cost of thick all over the body. He said the Sasquatch showed great shiny white teeth and around the loins of the monster was a short skirt made from the pounded inner bark of cedar plaited into a strong-looking cloth.

"The Sasquatch wore no shoes or moccasins, but the bottoms of his feet appeared tough and calloused, like the pads on the feet of big bear. The giant's hands were of immense size, nearly twice as large as of a man. And the height of Sasquatch was at least eight feet. He must have weighed 400 pounds, declared the trapper.

"ONe day at home in the Similkameen valley I met an Indian who claimed to have visited the cave of Sasquatch," continued Hewat. "The place was near the head of the Tulameen river, up near the old pass used to drive cattle over to the coast when you and I were boys."

"Yes I know where you mean," I answered, but go on with the Sasquatch story."

Found Great Stools "Well this Tulameen redskin told me he walked right to the mouth of the strange cave before he realized it was there at all. Inside the darkened dwelling were great stools made of gnarled fir tree roots. There were six of these, the Indian said. In the centre of the big cave was a strong wide table. It, too, was made as though to carry several tons of weight.

"There were long logs piled at the side of the cave, near a sort of rough-looking fireplace. Farther back hung the unskinned carcass of a blacktail buck deer and there were several set chunks chunks of meat hung upon the cave, sharp racks protruding. The Indian took one fearsome look around, then darted from the cave mouth at a swift run. He never stopped, he said, until he reached the safety of his own family wig-wam.

"So you see," explained Hewat, "it's pretty hard to disbelieve the presence of the Sasquatch, in face of all the realistic stories passed on by the various tribes of Indians who live near the mountains, and who are so convinced of the existence of the giants that they scarcely dare to speak of them in more than the whispers.

"How about yourself?" I questioned J. A. "Do you believe in the Sasquatch?"

"Sure-I can't help but believe in them, after hearing almost every tribe along the lower mainland of the B.C. coast tell about the wonders of the Saskquatch," concluded Hewat.