In the Not Instant (But Pretty Darn Quick) Karma Dep’t, aquatic subdivision
Found while doing some casual research on the pike-perch / zander (Sander lucioperca), a favorite fish that I was lucky enough to run into a lot in Finland:
In July 2009, in a rare occurrence, a zander bit bathers swimming in the Swiss part of Lake Maggiore, sending two people to the emergency room; the worst bite inflicted a wound about 10 centimeters long. The 70-cm 8-kg fish was later caught by the local police who cooked it and offered it to the tourists for the trouble it caused.[21]
(The story was originally reported at Agence France Presse, and though no longer on their website, can still be found in French here and there.)
Since Lysander is a long name, maybe he can have a nickname?
I made a list of possible nicknames!
Lys
Sander
Sandy
Ly
Lander
Andy
Zan
Lyle
Lee
Zander
Bunny: As much as I hate the name “Andy” for personal reasons, it would be kinda adorable to call Lysander that. I also like “Lyle” and “Lee” as nicknames too. I can also see Angel Dust called the baby “Zannie”
"I don't know anyone named sander. If you mean Zander... Well..." *He turns around on the couch to look at where Amari and Lian are fighting over something or other. The scent of burning food wafting through the air, Tonin trying to cook again.* "I think it's honestly Jason".
Books That I Tried Reading And Couldn’t Finish August/September 2022
Here we go again, time to write about the books that I tried to read but couldn’t finish!
For those of you who don’t know: I’ll sometimes write reviews for the “Personally Couldn’t Finish” section of my rating, but I honestly prefer talking about things that I actually liked reading. Exceptions of course being for books that made me viscerally angry. Because those are fun to write about.
Instead, here is a collection of books I tried reading but personally couldn’t for whatever reason. This could be because I got bored (the most likely answer), I really wasn’t into it, or I got really uncomfortable/triggered. Some of these books could actually be really great books (I wouldn’t know, I didn’t finish them), and you might get more enjoyment out of them than I did. So feel free to try them out!
Dustwalker
By: Tiffany Roberts
Good book, I just wasn’t getting into it.
Broken Earth: Argurma Salvager Book 01
By: S.J. Sanders
Good book, I just wasn’t getting into it.
Prison Planet Barbarian (Risdaverse)
By: Ruby Dixon
Not my cup of tea.
SHIFT: Five Complete Novellas (Bear Bites Book 5)
By: Ruby Dixon
Fine but things go kinda crazy and I got lost/confused. Then bored. Most likely just a me thing tbh.
Stolen by the Fae: Paranormal Romance (Fae's Claim)
By: Laxmi Hariharan
Got bored.
Glass Slippers (Dark Spirits Fairytales)
By: S.J. Sanders
Started off interesting, but then it got confusing and I got bored.
King of Flesh and Bone: A Dark Fantasy Romance (The Pale Court Book 1)
By: Liv Zander
Dubious consent, basically rape.
The Minotaur Captain's Mate (Minotaurs of Protheka Book 1)
By: Celeste King
Interesting premise, I just couldn’t get into it.
Zar: A Tortured Hero Alien Warrior Romance (Galaxy Gladiators Alien Abduction Romance Series Book 1)
By: Alana Khan
Dubious consent, but it’s because they’re both prisoners and are forced into it. Can’t get into that.
Sing Me to Sleep: A Series of Sacrilegious Events Novel
By: R.M. Virtues
Not my cup of tea.
Guardian of the Dark Paths (Children of the Ajda Book 1)
By: Susan Trombley
Couldn’t get into romance between the two lead characters.
Girls Weekend: a Monster Bait Romance
By: C.M.Nascosta
I like the plot, the characters, the premise, and I recommend people try this book out. I just was meh about it.
Mandy and the Tentacle Monster (Urf Oomons Book 1)
By: Bebe Harper
Couldn’t really get into it.
Mated to the Monster (Sombra Demons Book 1)
By: Sarah Spade
Good/funny book, but not really my cup of tea.
Tamed by the Troll (The Perished Woods Book 1)
By: Tracy Lauren
Couldn’t get into it.
An Inheritance of Monsters (The Void Book 1)
By: Cate Corvin
Nice smut book, I was just meh about the rest of it.
Ace placed her hand on top of Zander’s, and their eyes met. As Theo and Yarrow continued to laugh, peppering each other with kisses, Ace and Zander simply stared at each other. The world narrowed, for each of them, to one blaringly bright and beautiful point.
Two souls—one hopelessly wandering, the other running for her life—yet they’d somehow met in the middle and become each other’s solid ground in which to grow roots. Their lives until that point had been but a series of fractal paths leading ever inward, toward each other.
“Tomorrow,” Zander echoed, squeezing Ace’s hand in a promise.
“And the next day, and the day after that,” Ace said.
Forever.
Fated Tides: A Metaphysical Love Story by Sarah Faeth Sanders.
Live VALORANT 2023 offseason tracker: Free agents, roster moves, and rumors for 2024 season
The first season of the VALORANT alliance is almost over, and the majority of professional athletes who participated in the VCT or Challengers are finished for the year now that all three Last Chance Qualifiers have concluded across the three international leagues.
Only 16 teams still have something left to play for when Champions 2023 kicks off in August to determine the third VALORANT world champion. But most teams across the top two tiers now have to start thinking about next year.
In this comprehensive tracker, we will detail and list all of the significant confirmed, reported, or rumored roster moves taking place during the 2023 VALORANT offseason, all the way until the start of the 2024 season.
- All confirmed VALORANT roster moves after 2023 VCT season
- M80 Esports
- FaZe Clan
- TSM
- G2 Esports
- Shopify Rebellion
- Disguised
- MAD Lions
- All reported and rumored VALORANT roster moves after 2023 VCT season
- 100 Thieves
- DetonatioN FocusMe
- LOUD
- Sentinels
- All free agents available after 2023 VCT season
All confirmed VALORANT roster moves after 2023 VCT season
M80 Esports
M80 Esports allowed its players to enter unrestricted free agency on July 25. The players are free to pursue any tier-one opportunities during the offseason but have the option of returning to play for M80 in Challengers 2024 if they so choose. The trio of NiSMO, Zander, and koalanoob have all announced their unrestricted free agency.
M80 came just shy of reaching VCT Americas via Ascension, falling in the Americas Ascension grand finals versus The Guard. The squad of former Ghost Gaming, Version1, and NRG players were considered one of the best Challengers teams in North America across the entire season.
FaZe Clan
FaZe Clan released its entire VALORANT roster on July 24. Andrej “babybay” Francisty, Kevin “poised” Ngo, Phat “supamen” Le, Anthony “mummAy” DiPaulo, and Tanner “TiGG” Spanu have all become unrestricted free agents.
FaZe could potentially be exiting VALORANT completely. The org competed in NA VCT across 2021 and 2022 but missed out on partnership. In 2023, they were a middle-of-the-pack team across the NA Challengers season.
TSM
TSM released its entire VALORANT roster on July 8. Corey “corey” Nigra, Eric “Kanpeki” Xu, Anthony “gMd” Guimond, Nicholas “NaturE” Garrison, and Johann “seven” Hernandez are now all unrestricted free agents.
The TSM roster finished fourth during the first NA Challengers split, but finished eighth in the second split before back-to-back losses to Moist Moguls and FaZe Clan eliminated them from the playoffs and ended their season. TSM as an organization plans to “re-enter” VALORANT closer to the start of next season.
G2 Esports
G2 parted ways with its entire VALORANT roster on July 7, except for Shahzeb “ShahZaM” Khan, who is staying with the organization as a content creator. Michael “dapr” Gulino, Erik “penny” Penny, Maxim “wippie” Shepelev, and Francis “OXY” Hoang have entered unrestricted free agency.
The G2 roster entered the season with high expectations and looked poised to meet them halfway through the NA Challengers season. But the team collapsed in the second half, losing seven straight matches to close out their year.
Shopify Rebellion
Shopify Rebellion released Anthony “vanity” Malaspina and Brandon “bdog” Michael Sanders on June 18, making the two unrestricted free agents. The team still has Adam “mada” Pampuch, Kaleb “moose” Jayne, and Victor “v1c” Truong signed to its active roster.
At the end of 2022, Shopify picked up the ex-Luminosity roster and went into 2023 with the same group intact. Between Challenger splits, Shopify picked up vanity to take on the IGL role following his departure from Cloud9. The team improved after a last-place first split but were still quickly eliminated from the playoffs.
Disguised
On June 9, Disguised removed its entire NA Challengers VALORANT roster and staff. Jaccob “yay” Whiteaker, Joseph “clear” Allen, Amgalan “Genghsta” Nemekhbayar, Michael “nerve” Yerrow, Drake “Exalt” Branly, and Joshua “steel” Nissan are all unrestricted free agents.
Disguised Toast signed his VALORANT roster at the start of 2023, and the team successfully qualified for the NA Challengers League. Between splits, Disguised made a prolific acquisition by signing yay, but the team never won a single series after and were relegated at the end of the season. While Toast currently fields a Game Changers roster under the Disguised brand, it’s unclear whether he will bring back a new roster for NA Challengers 2024.
MAD Lions
MAD Lions released its entire VALORANT roster on June 8. Adam “Ange” Milian, Justin “Trick” Sears, Hasan “BlackHeart” Hammad, Marshall “N4RRATE” Massey, Joseph “Bjor” Bjorklund, and William “Will” Cheng are all now unrestricted free agents.
MAD Lions signed the Dark Ratio roster prior to the start of their successful qualifier run, but nothing went well during their NA Challengers season. The team only won three series all year and was eventually relegated, and some of its players were involved in a messy Twitter feud in the middle of the season.
All reported and rumored VALORANT roster moves after 2023 VCT season
100 Thieves
After general manager Daniel “ddk” Kapadia left 100 Thieves on July 31, the community is speculating the organization will make deep roster changes heading to VCT 2024 following the underwhelming results in 2023. Ddk was the one responsible for signing every player in 100 Thieves minus Peter “Asuna” Mazuryk.
DetonatioN FocusMe
DetonatioN FocusMe is hosting open tryouts for 2024 after losing all 11 matches they played throughout the 2023 VCT season. It’s likely that the Japanese organization will change most of the players on its roster, if not all of them.
LOUD
There’s a chance LOUD loses its superstar player aspas after VALORANT Champions 2023, according to esports insider Rod “Slasher” Breslau. The team is reportedly going through internal issues due to everybody having problems with aspas outside of the game. LOUD already had a lackluster performance at VCT Masters Tokyo in June because of this and that could possibly be repeated at Champions.
Slasher followed up this report with another, saying that aspas asked for a raise with a renewed contract, which was reportedly denied by LOUD.
Sentinels
According to Slasher, there is a “90 to 95 percent chance” that TenZ leaves Sentinels’ starting roster via either a team decision to move on from the superstar or a decision by TenZ to move toward full-time content creation or perhaps even a new team. Slasher also claims that Sentinels is very interested in offering aspas a contract if he becomes available.
All free agents available after 2023 VCT season
Here are a list of all players made available during free agency, including their primary agents, contract status, and most recent team.
PlayerPrimary AgentsStatusPrevious TeamyayJett, ChamberUnrestrictedDisguisedsteelKilljoy, ViperUnrestrictedDisguisedclearKilljoy, RazeUnrestrictedDisguisedGenghstaSova, KilljoyUnrestrictedDisguisednerveOmen, BrimstoneUnrestrictedDisguisedExaltSkye, KAY/O, ReynaUnrestrictedDisguisedbabybayJettUnrestrictedFaZepoisedKilljoy, ViperUnrestrictedFaZesupamenAstra, OmenUnrestrictedFaZemummAyBreach, Raze, ViperUnrestrictedFaZeTiGGSkye, SovaUnrestrictedFaZedaprKilljoy, ViperUnrestrictedG2pennyKAY/O, FadeUnrestrictedG2wippieViper, Omen, AstraUnrestrictedG2OXYJett, RazeUnrestrictedG2NiSMOKAY/O, Raze, BreachUnrestrictedM80koalanoobJett, OmenUnrestrictedM80ZanderOmen, Brimstone, ViperUnrestrictedM80johnqtKilljoyUnrestrictedM80AngeOmen, Brimstone, ViperUnrestrictedMAD LionsTrickSkye, KAY/OUnrestrictedMAD LionsBlackHeartBreach, Sova, SkyeUnrestrictedMAD LionsN4RRATEJett, RazeUnrestrictedMAD LionsBjorKilljoy, BrimstoneUnrestrictedMAD LionsWillJett, RazeUnrestrictedMAD LionsFlyuhViper, initiatorsUnrestrictedMoist MogulsvanitySkye, Sova, FadeUnrestrictedShopify RebellionbdogJett, ChamberUnrestrictedShopify RebellionzeekSova, RazeUnrestrictedTeam HereticsCoreySova, RazeUnrestrictedTSMKanpekiSkye, BreachUnrestrictedTSMgMdAstra, Sova, OmenUnrestrictedTSMNaturEViperUnrestrictedTSMsevenKilljoy, JettUnrestrictedTSM
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