#i love to study him like a bug. and this post was a fun exercise in trying to make him get better without completely breaking his character

[earnestly-endlessly]

hi! hope you're doing well :) do you have any domestic!cherik fics? or established relationship ones?

Hi anon, thanks for the ask. I'm doing very well, been super busy because I'm currently moving but it's all good. I have plenty of great domestic/established relationship cherik fics for you. I hope you enjoy!!

Domestic/Established Relationship cherik

Daycare ‘Verse’ – orphan_account, pocky_slash

Summary: A modern AU in which Charles runs a mutant daycare and Erik is his long-suffering engineer boyfriend.

Runs in the Family – Anonysquirrel (chibirisuchan)

Summary: Alex knew his own reputation. Hell, he'd started some of his own reputation, because it kept some of the smarter thugs off his back. Everyone knew Alex's reputation. There was no way Hank didn't know his reputation, but he'd brought Alex into a house with some really expensive things and a lot of innocent little kids and his too-friendly, too-harmless dad.

But clearly Hank hadn't told his family anything about Alex, just like he hadn't told Alex anything about his family. At least, not about the brain-breaking parts of his family.

"I didn't know where to start," Hank said, for the dozenth time.

Gift of the Magi, But Screw it Up – librata

Summary: He doesn't know if he's buying too much, too little, or even the right things at all, because he's never entertained a guest as important as Edie Lehnsherr.

Making perfect – aesc

Summary: As is the case with most trials in Erik's life, this one starts with Charles gazing beseechingly at him and asking him for a favor. Not that their going-on-three years relationship is a trial, even though it started with Charles giving Erik the full benefit of sad blue eyes and asking him if he wouldn't mind opening his car door since he'd locked his keys inside, but still.

Continue firm and constant – aesc

Summary: Moira hasn't seen her old partner in saving the world from threats human and intergalactic, Erik Lehnsherr, for a few years. When she finally does see him again, she finds a man different from the one who's been with her down in the dark and the dirt and the blood... or maybe he isn't so different after all.

After School Special – listerinezero

Summary: Charles was barely seventeen and Erik was his social studies teacher. But after almost fifteen years together, does it really matter how they met?

Terrifying Domesticity – ishipitsobad

Summary: Erik is the most dangerous and notorious mafia boss around for miles, and yet the strangest things terrify him.

For example: his children, and his very pregnant mate.

Trying is Half the Battle – Pookaseraph

Summary: Post-Cuba, no divorce, Charles and Erik are in an established relationship and when Charles gets sick with a random flu bug, they discover that Charles can get pregnant. They then try to get pregnant, and try, and try.

We’ll all be gone for the summer – pocky_slash

Summary: Charles and Erik's usual family beach vacation gets a little bigger when they agree to watch Erik's teenaged twins for the summer. Charles is looking forward to a chance to bond with his step-children. Erik is terrified of screwing them up even more.

A Summer Day So Late in Coming – helens78

Summary: Fifty years after they fell in love, Erik comes to Charles with a proposal that rocks Charles's world.

Still Going Strong – JackyJango

Summary: Speaking of forty-eight, Erik hates it. Hates it even more that others are aware of it. While he’s pragmatic enough to know and accept that aging is inexorable, the increase in number gives the people around him the freedom to pounce at him with questions, opinions and advice he'd fought to keep at bay all year.

Besides, Erik believes that youth is a state of mind, not a phase in one’s life.

You have a child’s mind in a man’s body, Charles constantly tells him.

But despite his age, Erik is healthy. He works out daily. His muscles are steel and he can dead-lift four hundred pounds. He can break bones without breaking a sweat. Most importantly, he can still carry Charles to the bedroom and fuck him senseless. And as long as Erik can do that, he’s perfectly happy.

Before You Attempt Me (Fair Warning) – kianspo

Summary: Charles helps Raven get ready for the prom. Surprisingly, that part goes well. The prom itself not so much. Erik cooks a lot of unhealthy comfort foods and is incredibly patient. Charles mostly frets about everything, until Erik does something neither he, nor Raven see coming.

And now you will not be alone any more – pocky_slash

Summary: Erik gives driving, sewing, and cooking lessons, soothes nightmares, bolsters self-esteem, and still can't figure out why Charles keeps smiling at him like that.

Some sense of touch and a melody – pocky_slash

Summary: On a day when Charles, for once, finds himself saying the right thing to everyone he sees, he allows himself to be talked into a field trip to a local orchard.

It’s kind of our whole thing – pearl_o, pocky_slash

Summary: After two years of best friendship, Charles and Erik thought they knew everything there was to know about each other. They're surprised, then, when their first summer as a couple reveals that they have a lot to learn about each other and themselves.

Indulgence – grim_lupine

Summary: “The children are still asleep,” Charles murmurs groggily, flinging an arm out as if searching for Erik beside him. “The house is still standing, this is a ghastly hour, and more importantly, I’m still here. Why do you insist on doing this every morning?”

Your Father’s Daughter – ConsultingWriter

Summary: Wanda proves just how much she takes after Erik.

Pietro reeled back before leaning back in "They didn't tell you what happened? Wanda got in a fist fight and totally wailed on this guy, I mean, on one hand I feel kinda embarrassed for him, but it was so epic."

Erik's eyebrows shot to his hairline. Wanda got in a fight? That was....surprising, to say the least. Wanda tended to take after Charles in temperament and preferred talking to violence.

This Crazy Game Called Life – chiasmus

Summary: Raven declares game night in the mansion. Sean finds an elephant, Erik inherits one hundred unwanted cats, and Charles scars Hank for life with misdirected dirty thinking. This is five thousand-something words of crack with a dose of schmoop. I'm not sorry. Written for this kink meme prompt: Raven is tired of the boys going off to play chess (if they're even playing chess!) and pulls out a load of board games from one of the closets in the mansion. Madness ensues.

To my roomba with love – sareyen

Summary: There are a lot of things that Erik loves about Charles. He loves all of the obvious things; Charles’s kindness, his intelligence, his laughter, his eyes. He also loves the little private things; the way Charles sneaks Erik his unwanted tomatoes, his warbled opera singing in the shower, that sensitive spot on his hip.

And he loves the silly things about Charles, especially the way the man has a habit of talking to inanimate objects when he thinks no one is looking. Charles has conversations with the kettle, the washing machine, and their roomba – and every time Erik eavesdrops on him, he falls in love with the man a little bit more.

Everything About it is a Love Song – pocky_slash

Summary: Erik's spent fifty years being a figurehead and he's ready to leave that behind. Luckily, so is Charles.

(aka Old Retired Dudes in Love)

A Very Xavier-Lehnsherr Christmas – zamwessell

Summary: Erik is discovering new things about Charles Xavier all the time. Charles sometimes talks in his sleep. Often about food. Occasionally in Latin. Charles has a scar on his left thigh from attempting to demonstrate relativity to a girl by sitting on a hot stove. Charles doesn’t mean to be so loud when they make love, but sometimes Charles can’t help himself.

Charles is a voracious reader. Charles has an unspeakably filthy imagination. Charles will try anything in bed twice to make sure he wasn’t wrong the first time.

Charles is unexpectedly fond of Christmas. Perhaps that is not the phrase. “Unhealthily obsessed” might be better.

The fluffiest holiday fluff you ever read in your dang life.

Of Crabs and Castles – flightinflame 

Summary: Charles and Erik take their children to the beach. Wanda builds a sandcastle, Nina makes some friends, and Pietro gets some exercise. Some family fun in the sunshine.

Bring Your Daughter To Work Day – listerinezero

Summary: Charles brings three year old Lorna to class with him.

Glasses – grim_lupine

Summary: Charles blinks at him bemusedly, but Erik barely notices because Charles is wearing glasses— wire-rimmed, and Erik can feel the metal humming, traces without touch the way they follow the curve of Charles’s nose and rest behind his ears.

Genetics Isn’t Sexy – pocky_slash

Summary: Charles lectures. The kids aren't very responsive. Erik, on the other hand....

Peanut Butter and Honey (The Fairytale Remix) – pocky_slash

Summary: Once upon a time there was a Princess named Anya who lived in a house with her Daddy and her wicked stepmother Charles. (A wicked stepmother is the person who comes and lives with princesses and their daddies after their mommies go away.) She had a best friend named Leroy, and one day he was lost.

The Bystander (The Consultant (aka A Westchester Telepath in the Avengers Tower) Remix) – Nanimok

Summary: When it comes to Professor Charles Xavier, telepath, SHIELD consultant and compulsive flirt, no one is safe.

Not even the Big Three.

[supersickies]

Summary: “It went without saying that getting bitten by a radioactive spider had its perks.

But apparently a cure for the common cold wasn’t one of them.”

-

College final exam season leaves Peter sick with a nasty cold, and on his wonderful girlfriend Michelle's first day of her summer internship too. Now it's up to mama Pepper and little sis Morgan to nurse their favorite spiderling back to health.

A/N: This was intended to be a little drabble based on a post I saw (I can’t find it for the life of me but once I do I’ll reblog it asap) but it ended up being a 5k+ fic of sweet sick Peter and his mess of a family. I couldn’t help it I love them all too much. You can read it on Ao3 or under the cut! Whatever what works for you!

Spider-Man can, in fact, catch a cold. This was something that Peter was surprised, yet annoyed to discover. Before the bite, Peter was a sickly, asthmatic, all around fragile kid, and while it wasn’t something that he was exactly confident about he never let it crush his spirit. However, that didn’t mean that as soon as the spider bite rid his body of all his past ailments Peter wasn’t overjoyed. He could finally run a mile without having to stop a quarter of the way through or eat a PB&J without having to instantly call an ambulance. It went without saying that getting bitten by a radioactive spider had its perks.

But apparently a cure for the common cold wasn’t one of them.

He and Mr. Stark discovered this about a year after he was bitten when he had come down with a nasty case of bronchitis that had him hacking all over the compound for four days. Since then Peter was bound to catch a bug here and there, much like he used to before the bite just less severe. It was harder for him to catch things as well, his immune system was usually a force to be reckoned with, unless for any reason Peter was not at “peak Spidey performance” as Mr. Stark would say.

Which leads us to now, a mere 24 hours after the last final exam of his junior year at Columbia, Peter was laid in bed suffering through what he would consider the nastiest cold he’d ever had.

It was barely after sunrise, the clock reading a taunting 5:30, and Peter doing everything he could not to sneeze. With deep, even, wheezy, breaths, the spider-boy was using all his strength to keep the sneeze at bay for one reason. MJ. His lovely, wonderful, amazing Michelle who was starting her first day of her summer internship at nine and would massacre Peter if he woke her up before her alarm. The girl loved her sleep, and Peter would be damned if he deprived her of it.

Think of anything else Peter, literally anything. Remember that big biker guy you helped on patrol the other week? He was pretty nice…oh god it iiihhtches…no, enough Peter, biker guy. Right he had that cool jacket with the patches, I bet I could pull off a leather jacket. Maybe put a spidey patch on the back? Fun…cool…really gotta sneeze. Ugh, FUCK! Okay, okay maybe if you just do that pinch-y sneeze, like Ned and Natasha do…heh imagine Ned knowing he had the same sneeze as Black Widow, he’d flip. Ehh..fuhhhhuck okay thats it, pinch-y sneeze please don’t fail me.

With a shaky hand Peter pinches his nose between his thumb and his forefinger, the motion instantly making his nose tickle more and within seconds Peter was attempting, and failing, to stifle his sneeze.

And it failed hard.

The sneeze was stronger than it seemed and instead of being held back and becoming a noiseless stifle, it came out louder than it should have as it scraped the back of his throat, causing barking coughs to escape as well.

Well everyone, bid him farewell, this will be the day that Peter Parker meets his untimely demise. He instantly feels MJ stir against him with a groan. She was up, oh god sound the alarm she was awake.

“P’ter? That you?” She slurs, sleep lacing her voice.

“Umb, yeah. Sorry embjay I didn’d mbean to sndeeze.” God how he wished his could blow his nose, but he was not going to poke the bear any further.

It was quiet for a moment, Peter knew that he was in danger. MJ was plotting how she was going to murder him and it was only a matter of time before she-

“You feeling okay, baby?” Her angelic voice rings as she turns to face him on the bed. “You sound terrible.”

It was like music to Peter’s ears. He would live to see another day! He was almost shocked, she didn’t even pepper in the classic “loser” nickname. She was concerned. Wait, did he really sound that bad? Should he be concerned?

Peter clears his throat before responding. “I-I thingk I’mb combing down with sombthing. I’mb sorry I’ll try to be quieter.” A wet sniffle concludes his sentence. Damn it he really wants a tissue.

Almost as if MJ could read minds, she places a soft white Kleenex into his hand. “Blow your nose, Pete. I’m gonna go get the humidifier, you’re way too congested.”

“O-Oh, okay. Thangk you Emmby.” He uses her absence to sit up a little and expel the nasty gunk from his sinuses. He still can’t completely breathe, but it’s better than it was before. MJ comes back into the room moments later, carrying the chunky machine. The water inside of it sloshes a bit as she set’s it on Peter’s bedside table but as soon as she plugs it into the wall, a warm soft mist starts flowing from its lid. Peter can’t tell a difference now, but he knows it’ll make a difference the longer it runs.

Satisfied with how the humidifier is working, Michelle sits beside Peter on the bed and looks at him quizzically. “How’d you get so sick?” She questions, her fingertips reaching to brush Peter’s bed head away from his eyes. His forehead moderately warm, but it doesn’t feel like anything that provokes worry.

He hums at her soft touch but shrugs his shoulders at her question. “Don’t kdnow,” He presses the tissue to his nose as it starts running, the humidifier must be working. “I felt fidne yesterday. Mbaybe kinda tired but ndot sick.”

“You know what it probably is?” Michelle says. “All those nights up late studying, not to mention all that trash food you ate-“

“What is this, mbake fun of your poor sick boyfriend day?” He gives a wet coughs for emphasis, and because he really needed to cough.

“Sorry sicky,” She giggled. “what I’m saying is that you had a long hard week and you weren’t exactly taking the best care of yourself. No shame in it, I mean, it happens to everyone but I think your body is so used to you eating well and exercising often that as soon as you stopped your immune system freaked out.

Clearing his throat, Peter nods. “I guess that mbakes sense.” He looks down with a sigh, thinking of all the things he was scheduled to do today. “I better call Todny and tell him I can’t combe in to the lab.” He sighs and reaches for his phone but MJ intercepts.

“First you’re going to go back to sleep until a reasonable hour. It’s almost 6 a.m. Parker, and my alarm goes off at 8, so I’d like a few more hours of rest.” She jabs, pulling the covers up to his chin and kissing him softly on the cheek. “And you definitely need the beauty sleep.”

Peter chuckles at that, which only lead to more hacking coughs. MJ softly pats his back until the coughs subside. With a tsk she tucks him into bed once more before rounding the bed to lay back down on her side. “Rest, I’ll let you know when I’m about to head to work.”

With his eyes closed and his breathing only slightly less congested, thank you humidifier, he smiles contently. “Thank you Emmby, love you.”

“Love you too, snotty.”

Peter wakes again to a kiss on the forehead and the scent of strong perfume making his nose tickle. Before he even opens his eyes, he curls in on himself and muffles three sneezes into his pillow. Ugh, gross. He opens his bleary eyes to see MJ smoothing out her work outfit in their full length mirror. She looks amazing as usual, Peter notes, but her perfume is strong. Or maybe he’s just way too sensitive, a super cold and super senses probably don’t mix well. Without warning, two more sneezes barrel out and he barely has time to cover them. With a groan he sniffles thickly and reaches for the tissue box conveniently placed on his bedside table. He get a warm and fuzzy feeling as he realizes MJ had put them there for him, as they weren't there when he had woken up earlier. It’s the little things. He blows his nose, which get’s MJ’s attention.

She glances over to him with a smile. “Good morning, again.”

“Good mbornding, you look ambazindg.” He rasps, a goofy smile painting his face.

MJ breathes out a laugh at her dopey boyfriend. “Thank you, dork. How’re you feeling?”

He snuggles deeper into the bed, closing his eyes again and coughing weakly. “Call a physiciand,” Peter jokes in a congested and bad British accent. He throws a hand over his forehead for good measure. “I believe it mbay be the plague.”

MJ snorts a laugh at her boy’s dramatics. “Okay, you sickly child king.”

Her heels clack against the hardwood floor of the bedroom as she steps over to where he lies in their bed. As she sits on the bed, her soft hand cups his forehead and then his cheek. “You’re soft.” He mumbles, leaning into her touch.

“And you are running a bit of a fever.” She rubs her thumb sweetly over his cheek before standing back up. She tells him to sit tight and goes to the bathroom to grab a digital thermometer. She returns to find him dozing so she gently brushes his hair back to get his attention. He lifts his eyes to see the thermometer in her hand and opens his mouth just wide enough that she can slip the device under his tongue. “Give that a minute.”

MJ walks out of the room a moment later and Peter hears running water from the kitchen. The thermometer beeps right before she reenters, ice water with a straw in hand. Peter didn’t realize until he saw it just how thirsty he was. He stares at her lovingly as she takes the thermometer from between his lips. “Are you a mbind reader?” He asks, only semi-joking as he sits up slightly to sip the water.

Michelle scoffs lightly. “You bet your ass I am.” She jokes looking down at the medical tool. “Hm, 100.8. Not horrendous but I don’t love it.” Once again she’s gone, this time to the bathroom where Peter hears more water running, making him want to take another sip of his water. He sighs as the cool drink soothes his dry throat. MJ strides back to the bed with a damp face towel folded in half. When she starts to dab Peter’s forehead with the cool cloth he can’t help the shuddering sigh that escapes him. She stops. “You alright?”

Her boyfriend just nods, opening his eyes to look up at her with a small smile. “Feels good. Cold.” He explains. She smiles back at him, taking the cup of water from his hands so he can lay back down. She continues to wipe his brow with the towel and doesn’t stop until a snore leaves his mouth. MJ can’t help the giggle that bubbles up, but to be fair she’s never heard Peter snore before and right now he was quite a sight to see. His hair was sticking up at all angles, even in his reclined position, his nose nearing a shade of bright red, and his mouth open just wide enough that the tiny snores were heard.

She couldn’t help but snap a quick picture to send to Tony.

MJ:

your favorite little mentee won’t be in today…Spidey caught the sniffles : /

Old Man Stark:

Wow he looks rough, you have your internship today?

MJ:

yep first day

dont wanna leave him like this tho

Old Man Stark:

Don’t stress, this is a big day for you. I have meetings all day but Pep would be more than happy to stop by and make sure all is well.

Morgan too

She’s in her “wanting to be a doctor” phase

MJ:

you trying to say she cant be a doctor, stark?

Old Man Stark:

Good lord of course not

The kid is smarter than me and she’s barely 11

I’m just saying wasn’t there a point in your life when you wanted to be a doctor too?

MJ:

yeah of course

Old Man Stark:

And you’re now getting a degree in…?

MJ:

journalism

Old Man Stark:

so…

MJ:

i could be a doctor if i wanted to

Old Man Stark:

I know

And thats why you terrify me

MJ:

>:-)

Old Man Stark:

Go to work!

Let us take care of Peter and we’ll keep you updated as you break into the great big world of being a working adult.

MJ:

:P thanks T-Star

Old Man Stark:

Don’t call me T-Star.

Michelle pockets her phone and grabs her computer bag that’s packed and ready in the living room. Quickly she takes out a stray piece of paper and jots down a quick note for her boy just incase he wakes up alone.

Petey,

Had to get to the office (wish me luck lol) but Pepper and Morgan should be by soon. Please don’t die while I’m gone. I’ll be pissed if you do that. Wash your hands, blow your nose, and don’t leave used tissues on the bed that’s gross. Love you. Feel better.

-M

Satisfied, she leaves the note under the tissue box, gives him one last kiss on the forehead, and makes her way out the door. But not before sending Morgan that goofy picture of Peter.

MJ:

here

use this as blackmail

tell him you’ll post it on insta next time he says he won’t take you to mcdonalds

Mo Mo Stark:

HAHAHAHAHAHA

Peter wakes to his front door closing and whispering coming from the living room. He panics for a moment before realizing that the voices belonged to Pepper and Morgan. As the fan blows above him, he hears a piece of paper flutter next to him. With a shaky hand he grabs it and reads over the note that MJ had left for him. He cant help but blush, just at the thought of his girlfriend. He wonders how her first day is going. He misses her a lot. Then he realizes his fever must of gone up, as he definitely wasn’t this emotionally fragile when he had gone to sleep.

With a yawn, he sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed and grabs the quilt at the end and wraps it around his around his shoulders. With a huff he slides off the bed and makes his way to the living room. He finds Pepper setting grocery bags down on the kitchen island and Morgan already situated in front of the TV, some YouTube vlog video playing over the speakers.

“Morgan Hope, turn that down before you wake your broth-“ Pepper stops when she notices Peter standing in the doorway. “Oh, afternoon sweetheart! Did Morgan wake you? I’m so sorry I told her to quiet down-“

“Pep, it’s okay, I actually woke up whend you guys walked ind.” He rasps, congestion still heavy in his horse voice.

“Oh honey you sound awful, come on now, on the couch. You shouldn’t be up.” Pepper says, guiding him with a hand on his back to the couch. Morgan scoots a bit to make room for her big brother.

“Hi, Dr. Mborgand, you brindg any of the good drugs today?” Peter jokes, making the girl roll her eyes.

“Mom, Peter says he on drugs. He needs to detox stat. Get me an IV with glutathione, vitamin C, and vitamin B.” The youngest Stark states.

Her mother sighs as she returns to the kitchen. “Alright, that’s enough Discovery Life for you. Why can’t you just watch Disney Channel like a normal eleven year old.” Pepper mumbles as she starts taking items out of the grocery bags.

Peter and Morgan just giggle, which leads to a coughing fit from Peter. Morgan’s tiny hand pats his back as he hacks into his elbow, he murmurs an apology as the coughs taper off.

“You need to lay down Petey, and you need tissues.” Morgan articulates as she stands and looks around the apartment.

Clearing his throat, Peter points to the bedroom. “There should be sombe tissues by mby bed…if you could grab those that’d be ndice.”

Morgan nods confidently and makes her way to the bedroom. Seconds later she reemerges with the tissue box in hand and places them in the crook of Peter’s arm.

“Thangk you doctor.” Peter smiles, causing Morgan to smile in return.

“You’re welcome!” The girl returns to her spot on the couch and presses play on the video she was watching. It was vlog about makeup, Peter assumed, as the YouTuber was covered in a very impressive, glossy, look and was showing off makeup pallettes. Peter watches as the video cuts and suddenly the makeup artist is bare faced and begins to work on the look they had previewed in the intro.

Pepper chuckles as she approaches the couch, mug of hot tea with lemon and honey in hand. She hands the cup to Peter, who is drowsily watching the makeup being applied. “You don’t have to watch this you know.” Pepper whispers to him. “This is your apartment and you’re sick, turn on whatever you want.”

Taking a sip of the tea, humming as it soothes his sore-ish throat, Peter shakes his head. “Ndo, this is awesombe, look at how precise he is with the brush. Oh, thangks for the tea…also.” Pepper chuckles more, kissing the boy on the top of the head, and leaving him with Morgan to watch some internet celebrity do a perfect line with their liquid eyeliner.

Pepper had called May in the morning after hearing from Tony that Peter wasn't feeling well, knowing the boys aunt would have all the inside knowledge on how to care for a sick Peter. It wasn’t as if Pepper had never seen Peter sick, though. Since Tony had introduced them to each other way back before Morgan was even a thought, Peter had spent some sick days in the tower, the compound, and even one or two in the lake house. Yes, Pepper had seen a sick Peter Parker in her lifetime, however this was the first time she was his sole caretaker. However, after the quick call to the boy’s aunt, Pepper had a pretty good idea of how to care for the sick Spiderling.

“Oh for a cold?” May had responded. “Simple, grilled cheese and tomato soup for every meal, he’ll probably want to watch Parks and Rec all day, oh and he has Tony’s old MIT hoodie in his closet and he always wears it when he’s not feeling well.”

Pepper smiled at that. When Peter decided to stay in New York for college, for family and spider-y reasons, it was no secret that Tony had been a little disappointed. No, Tony hadn’t done anything special to get Peter into MIT, honestly because he didn’t have too. Peter’s grades and test scores were good enough on their own, but he still would have loved to have seen the kid at his alma mater. When Peter had told him of his college decision, scared out of his mind might he add, Tony just hugged and told him he was proud of him. Tony reassured the kid that where ever he went to school was fine by him and that he’d support him the whole way through. “I am going to need that MIT sweatshirt back” Tony had joked, waiting to be met by a “shut up Tony” or an eye roll, but instead he was met with tears— big fat ones that welled up in Peter’s eyes. Tony was quick to see he had messed up and it took about twenty minutes to reassure the boy that he didn't want the sweatshirt back and that “of course I still love you Peter”. Since then Peter has kept the garment close to him at all times, just incase Tony ever thought about taking it.

Pepper goes to Peter’s closet, instantly spotting the faded maroon hoodie and taking it off of the hanger. Both he and Morgan are still mesmerized by the YouTube video, but they glance up when Pepper walks over again. Peter’s eyes light up at the sight of the hoodie in her hands. He’s close to making grabby hands for it but she hands it to him first. He puts it on and settles back down onto the couch. “Thangk you Pep.”

“Keep it safe, can’t have Tony snatching it.” She jabs as she walks back to the kitchen to start the grilled cheese.

Peter, though thoroughly invested in the new makeup video Morgan put on, can’t help but doze off as the ambient sounds of his apartment lull him to sleep. He hears a shuffling on the couch next to him and opens one of his eyes, seeing Morgan giggling at him. “Can I braid your hair Petey?” She whispers. In true college kid fashion, Peter had let his hair grow out a little bit, and while it wasn’t long enough to braid it all together, Morgan liked to do tiny braids with tufts of his hair for fun.

Turning onto his side away from Morgan, giving her better access to his hair, Peter chuckles at his little sister. “Go for it Mborgie, mbake mbe beautiful.”

With a squeal of delight, the eleven year old Stark pulls tiny hair-ties out of her pocket and gets to work. Peter, who had always loved having his hair played with, lets the braiding put him right to sleep after only a few tiny braids were done.

If Morgan laughed at the snores that came from Peter moments later, she didn't tell him. He did let her braid half his head, anyway.

The rest of the day passes in a sleepy haze for Peter. He remembers waking up a few moments after falling asleep on the couch. Pepper helping him sit up and setting a tray of his favorite sick day meal in his lap. He had to hand it to Pepper, she made a mean grilled cheese soup combo. He finishes the sandwich and about half of the soup before he feels his eyes grow heavy again and the tray is taken from his lap.

“Go back to sleep, hon. Morgan and I are here if you need us.” Pepper reassures the boy, so Peter does.

The next time he wakes was when Morgan and Pepper we’re on their way out. He vaguely remembers sluggishly thanking them for staying with him and Pepper saying something about MJ being home in just a few minutes, but as soon as the apartment door closes Peter was out once more.

The final time he wakes up is to Michelle gently shaking his shoulder, attempting to wake him from his short slumber. His eyes open, but quickly close again as he stretches his whole body, somehow exhausted and sore from his long day of sleeping.

“Emmby, you back?” He asks, not yet opening his eyes again.

He hears her adorable laugh and his heart soars. “Yes, dork, it’s me. Wanna open those pretty eyes for me, Tiger?”

Obviously wanting to see his beautiful girlfriend, he opens his eyes again. MJ looks tired from her first day but extremely happy.

“Was it ambazing? Everythindg you could have hoped for?” He asks, nuzzling closer to her thigh, much like a cat.

She hums an affirmation, bringing her hand up to trace random shapes along his arm. “It was everything and more. Honestly I can see myself working there forever. It was…it was perfect.”

Peter smiles at that. MJ deserved the perfect job and more. “Babe, that fandtastic. I’m so happy for you.” He says horsely but sincerely. He moves closer to her, raising his head a bit to lay it on her lap. With the motion, one of Morgan’s many little braids in his hair make themselves apparent and Michelle can help but burst with laughter.

It causes Peter to jolt up in a sleepy state of panic. “What, what happended?” He asks sitting up slightly, eyes half closed but alert.

She reaches up to ruffle the tiny braids that cover the right side of his head. “What is this? Did Morgan just learn how to fishtail braid because these are honestly kinda good.” She inspects the braids as Peter’s cheeks blush.

He smiles, coughing slightly and gently shaking his head so the braids flop around. That gets another laugh from MJ. “Mby sisters pretty talendted, huh?”

MJ nods, very amused. “An interesting look…but I’ll give it points for creativity.”

As the couple laughs again, Peter brings two fingers up to massage his temple as he feels a dull ache in his head.

“Headache?” Michelle frowns.

“Mhmm,” Peter confirms. “I thingk Mborgan made the braids a little too tight.”

“That’s no good.” MJ sympathizes, lowering her boy’s head back down onto her lap, braid side up so she can work on undoing the little knots. She makes quick work of it and within minutes, Peter’s hair is braid-less and the throbbing in head head dies down. In thanks, Peter snuggles his face closer Michelle’s middle, wrapping his arms around it as well.

“You thingk you can use a vacationd day tomborrow? I mbissed you today.” Peter whines, partly joking but sorta kinda being serious.

“From what I heard, your eyes were open for about thirty minutes today. Too busy sleeping to miss me that much.” MJ giggles at the sniffly boy with his head in her lap. He just shrugs in response, and she can feel his body relaxing and congested breaths evening out. “You going back to sleep on me already, Parker? Not even gonna let me tell you about my day?” She jokes again.

Peter snorts involuntarily as he turns his head to look up at her, eyes glossed with fever and sleepy but apologetic. “I’mb up I’mb up, tell mbe everything.”

She grabs the sides of his face sweetly, slightly squishing his cheeks while she kisses his forehead and then his nose. “I’m kidding, Peter. God your brain must be frying, come on let's go to bed.” She pats his cheek lightly and helps him sit up.

He yawns with his whole body, his hands stretching into the air and his back arching. “But it’s only like six, arend’t you hungry for dinnder?” He coughs into his fists while Michelle takes his other hand, helping him lift off the couch.

“Let me rephrase. You’re going to shower, put new pajamas on, and get in bed while I make us grilled cheeses, your second one today I'm assuming. How does that sound?” MJ asks, leading him to their bathroom.

Peter clears his throat as he sits on the closed toilet. “And…umb…and the tombato soup?”

The shower roars to life as MJ turns the handle. “You think I’d forget the most important part?” She scoffs, feigning hurt. Peter just smiled, the dopey smile he gets when he thinks about how in love he is with this girl. With two more quick forehead kisses she leaves him to shower.

Peter exits the shower feeling refreshed, less stuffy, and hungry once more. Thanks to the shower stream he can faintly smell the toasty cheesy smell from the kitchen and it gives him a nostalgic feeling.

As he grabs pajama pants and the MIT hoodie, Peter thinks of the first time he got sick after going to live with Ben and May. It was the first day of what was considered flu season and the sickly kid had contracted the virus at the drop of a hat. He was miserable the whole day, crying and wallowing in the aches and pains of the illness. The biggest issue, however, was that he refused to eat anything, that is until Ben decided to make himself a grilled cheese for dinner.

The older Parker noticed Peter looking the sandwich with feverish eyes. “Look tasty, bud?” Ben questioned, raising an eyebrow. Little Peter just nodded and Ben smiled, extremely relieved that his nephew was finally going to eat.

Sticking his pointer and middle finger in his mouth, Peter watches as his uncle stands from the couch and starts on another sandwich. “Uncle Ben?” Peter asks in a small voice. Ben looks back over to the kid and nods. “Do you have any of the-the red soup? Mommy always made grilled cheese with red soup.” Peter nearly whispered.

Ben thinks for a minute, not completely sure what the boy meant by red soup, but then it clicks. “Oh! Tomato soup?” He smiles as Peter nods. Ben open the cupboard to him and pulls out a can of tomato soup, flipping it in the air once to see Peter smile. “Tomato soup and grilled cheese coming right up monsieur Parker.” Ben says in a horrible French accent which makes the six year old giggle, as sound that was music to Ben’s ears after all tears. From then on, Peter would only insist on eating that particular meal anytime he had so much as a headache.

The door creaking open as MJ pushes it with her hip brings Peter out of his thoughts. She has the tray of grilled cheeses and soups in her hands and an amused look on her face. “You okay? Need help with something?”

Peter blinks and remembers that he’s sitting in the edge of their bed, in a towel, pajamas in hand. “Oh…no I’mb okay. Just thinking ‘bout stuff.”

MJ sets the tray down on her bedside table. “You already sound less stuffy. Maybe you should sleep in the shower.” She quips, not missing Peter's sweet tiny giggle as she grabs the water tank from the humidifier and takes it to the bathroom with her.

Peter gets dressed and settles into bed. He notices that Pepper has changed the sheets and his heart clinches, nearly overwhelmed by the love he feels from his family. He takes out his phone to text her a thank you but is intercepted by a string of texts from Tony.

Tony Stank:

Morgs is showing me pictures of the wonderful makeover she gave you

Honestly thought you pulled it off really well

…but you need a haircut

Please kiddo let me get you in with my hair guy

You’ll love him

Spider-Tot:

sorry pops but I am fully committing to this college hair thing

mj says she wants me in a man bun by graduation so

cant let my girl down

Tony Stank:

I swear you two are conspiring against me

Oh well

How you feeling bud?

Spider-Tot:

still kinda gross

snotty

but i think my fevers kinda lower

so thats something

tell pep thank you so so much for today

i was barely awake when they left

i feel bad I didn't get to say anything

Tony Stank:

I gotcha Pete don’t worry

If you need more company tomorrow let me know I’m free all day

Spider-Tot:

wdym ill just come in to the lab tomorrow

Tony Stank:

That’s a negative Petey Pie

As your gracious boss i’m giving you the next three days off

I want all this crap out of your system before you’re back in the lab

Spider-Tot:

three days ??

boooo

u stink old man

Tony Stank:

Good lord

You’re the only person I know that complains about getting days off from work

Get a good nights sleep and maybe ill bring you a circuit board to mess with tomorrow

Good enough?

Spider-Tot:

hmmm

fine

Tony Stank:

Good

Now go rest

Don’t bother your girlfriend too much

She complains to me when you do

Spider-Tot:

now I think its you two conspiring against me

:P

night tony

love u

Tony Stank:

Love you too bambino

Michelle returns from the bathroom, makeup off, hair down, and humidifier tank full of water. She sets the tank back in and turns the machine on, steam filling the air. After quickly putting on her own set of pajamas, MJ takes her and Peter’s dinner from the side table and places it on the bed between them. Peter wastes no time digging in, groaning in admiration for the food. He mumbles a thanks with his mouth full and MJ laughs, wiping a bit of soup off of his lip with her thumb.

“You’re welcome, loser.” She teases, beginning to eat her own meal. After a few bites she take the TV remote by her side and flips on Peter’s favorite sick day show.

As the Parks and Recreation theme song begins to play, Peter looks up at his girlfriend with appreciative eyes. “You’re too good to mbe.”

“You remember that next time I make you vacuum and you get pissy about it.” Michelle deadpans, but Peter knew she was messing around.

“I’m not messing around.” She clarifies, turning to look at his with one eyebrow raised.

“You really are a mbind reader.” Peter whispers with feverish wonder.

Throwing a paper towel at him playfully, MJ laughs and Peter joins her. They finish their food as the TV continues to play in the background, Peter yawning and coughing quietly as soon as he swallows his last bite. Without a word, MJ takes the empty plates and tray back to the kitchen. She turns off the bedroom lights as she reenters and tucks herself back under the covers. It's barely after 7 p.m. and the sun it only just starting to set, making the room glow a with dark blues and purples.

Peter is cuddled into her side as soon as she's back in bed, head resting on her chest and arm around her waist. “What am I gonna do with you Peter Parker?” She sighs, twirling her fingers through his already messy hair.

“Love mbe, no matter what? Even if I’mb yucky like this?” He pulls out the puppy dog eyes for this one. MJ may be stoic on the outside but not even she can resist the sweet sparkling glare.

“If I must.” She agrees, holding him tighter and resting her head on top of his.

But she’s happy to do it. Loving Peter Parker is an extremely easy thing, MJ thinks.

[myheartismadeofstars]

Things about my fictional pokemon region (which needs a name):

You are raised by an older sister who trains pokemon for service (both Service Pokemon and Ride Pokemon), and is fairly famous throughout the region for her work. She is also a pseudo-Rival, showing up several times during your adventure to battle you. She’s in the area for work reasons and she takes some time to check out your skills, as well as exercise the pokemon she has on her. Her team changes drastically throughout the game because of this.

The last time you encounter her is as the Champion (she’s not famous just for her service and ride pokemon, but for her battle skills as well)

Two different pokemon professors, a married couple similar to Kukui and Burnet, called Wyatt Buckeye and June Dogwood (btw: the whole region is South-Western USA based, or maybe Western Canada? Think that sort of area. If I go Western Canada, I’d have to include mountains and a temperate Rainforest). I’m not 100% sure what Buckeye studies, because what I think suits him is already taken (because I feel like it would be either Relationships between Humans and Pokemon, which is Oak’s Specialty, or Habitats, which is Birch’s), but his wife Dogwood researches Pokemon Evolution Families (a la Darwinian Evolution). She’s the main professor, the one who gives you your starter and pokedex.

The region is HUGE and has very long distances between cities, but lots of small towns scattered here and there, lots of rest houses, one or two tunnels that act as shortcuts, being straight shots to certain cities. There is also a desert you need to cross.

You have two rivals (like in B/W) Rhett and Acacia. Acacia Buckeye is the professor’s daughter. She doesn’t know what she wants from her life. She has the starter weak to yours and is usually found doing whatever fun side thing is available (Contests, etc)

Your other Rival is Rhett. Rhett is haughty. But it is RHETT who first discovers Team Revive and their plans and decides to take action against them and free the pokemon stored in their lab (he rescues two of them near the beginning of the game, and he gifts one to you, the other is on his team til the end)

The Aether Foundation makes an appearance as a Branch. One that actually does what it claimed. Rescuing abused and injured pokemon and helping them. It’s a location where you can do some odd jobs for money, heal, and battle Aether Employees (some are on break, some have pokemon who are restless, etc. And they heal your pokemon after battle)

Now: Team Revive. Team Revive’s focus is on restoring ancient pokemon and eliminating the rock type contamination that most of the fossil pokemon have, giving them their original type combos (Kabuto: Bug/Water (bug/fighting Kabutops), Omanyte: Water, Aerodactyl: Dragon/Flying, Anorith: Water/Bug (Bug/Steel Armaldo), Lileep: Water/Grass, Shieldon:Ground/Steel, Archen: Dragon/Flying, Tyrunt: pure dragon (Tyrantrum is Dragon/Dark) in their Revive Formes. Almost all of the members use Revive Forme fossil pokemon. Their goal is to obtain Genesect.

PLOT TWIST:

Team Revive isn’t evil. Rhett (who was born in another region, maybe Unova?) jumped to conclusions. Their goals are to restore wild populations of these extinct pokemon, and reintroduce them into their natural habitats. I feel like, post game, you could bring them fossils to receive the Revive Formes.

I also feel like you’d be able to get the true forms of the Galar Fossils, and there would be several regional fossils as well, with two formes. The part Rock regular forme, and the Revive Forme. My choices are: one based off of a Maiasaura (i’d love it if the baby was bipedal and the adult quadrupedal), one based off some sort of prehistoric mammal (I’d choose Direwolf, or maybe a Sabertooth tiger...though this is pokemon, it could be both), and one based off of the spiral shark, and Gorochu. Yes Gorochu, as a fossil pokemon who is the ancestor of all of the Pikaclones.

Some of the scrapped pokemon designs can be reworked for new pokemon or regional variants/evolutions.

I don’t have any designs in mind for other regional variants but I love them, so of course I would include them!

Also you can visit your pokemon in the daycare and play with them like you can play with pokemon in USUM, and you can see how compatible your pokemon are from the road (pokemon who are highly compatible would stand closer and play often, pokemon who are totally incompatible would never go near each other. Maybe toss in some pokedex references too! Like Seviper and Zangoose dislike each other, but after a bit of time start to like each other (because they are breeding compatible). Prey and Predator pokemon would say things like "X seems to be hungry..." or "Y seems nervous..." AND!! If you put a ditto in the daycare with another pokemon it would actually show that you have two of the same pokemon!

[jaybug-jabbers]

All-Glitch Pokemon Blue Run Pt13: Fossils of the Future

June,

I am terribly grateful that you’re still all right after encountering all those glitch trainers. Judging by your notes, it was an extremely trying experience. This does seem to confirm my beliefs, in the very least, that there is something special about you. You seem to possess a certain resiliance and resistance against the effects of glitching, enough that you merely black out and wake up later, typically none the worse for wear. Still, you musn’t start to believe you are invincible. I ask that you still exercise caution in your experiments and exploration. 

I must also thank you for your detailed notes about all of the glitch trainers you encountered. These observations will prove invaluable to my work, I feel. June, I was a little nervous when you first started out as my assistant, but you have proven that you are not only talented with glitches but that you possess the adventuresome spirit and eye for detail that are the marks of a true scientist. I’m very proud.

I hope that you enjoy your day of rest. When you’re finished, we have more work to do. It’s about time you come to meet me in person at my lab. After your return to Fuscia City, you won’t be far. At the moment, my colleagues and I have been working on a new method of researching glitch pokemon. It involves injecting glitch pokemon DNA into fossils and then reviving the fossils. It’s very cutting-edge, and I’d like you to help me in the Cinnabar Island lab. 

Looking forward to finally meeting,

-Professor Gingko

---

Professor,

I’m glad my notes are gonna help you out! And I’m happy I’ve been of help. Honestly, I wasn’t sure about this whole thing either, but . . . it’s been really interesting looking into all this glitch stuff. I dunno what it is, exactly, but it fascinates me. And the glitch pokemon . . . the more I work with them, the more attached I get to them. They’re so strange and alien, but also so familiar, in a way. They kind of remind me of bug pokemon. They’re weird and wild, but they’re also so cool and loveable.

Uh, anyway. I thought I’d let you know how my trip to Saffron went.

One of the top places to go for tourists in Saffron is the Silph Company, that massive corporate building that loves to give tours to trainers. Show off all the pokeball production and latest tech gadgets. I planned on doing that, but unfortunately I ran into a little trouble. The entire building was crawling with those ‘Team Rocket’ creeps.

It was kind of a slog beating all the guys who kept wanting a piece of me-- put a dampener on the fun of looking around. To make matters worse, I then ran into Professor Oak’s freaking grandson once again. He was determined to beat me in a fight. 

Thing is, his levels were pretty high compared to mine, and I was nervous. He started with a Pidgeot, a full level 37 by now. Dusty had been my lead pokemon, but I switched to Fractal. I admit this was just to distract Pidgeot so I could then safely bring in Wobbles, my powerhouse with a great ice move. That’s not a strategy I love using, but we were in a desperate situation. 

Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Pidgeot outsped Wobbles anyway, and took him out in one hit.

I put in Giago to try and have a go with her, but Pidgeot fights dirty and after a little bit was kicking sand in Gia’s face. So I swapped out again and tried Dusty once more. And you know what? I never should have doubted Dusty. She got a lucky freeze and kept pelting away with Ice Beams until the Pidgeot went down. 

Gia was able to handle the Growlithe, and Dusty took out the Exeggcute-- barely, but she did. Charmed got to see her first taste of battle and slashed the Kadabra to death. Finally came Blastoise, which was a whopping level 40. 

I was worried. Giago’s weak to Special attacks, and Wobbles was already fainted. I did as much damage as I could with Charmed, then after going down to Hydro Pumps, I finished it off with Giago.

It was a close battle. Very close. But we pulled through, and I think I learned some things, especially losing Wobbles so early in the match. Wobbles is my ace, my powerhouse, and the one to usually protect us all when we’re outclassed in a battle. But Wobbles goes down to physical attacks in an instant if he happens to be outsped or doesn’t kill right away. When that happened, I thought for sure we were toast. But we weren’t. Giago and Dusty did a lot of work to save us. 

It was a true team effort, too. Giago has immense defense and HP and is the wall of the team, but her Special makes even her frail to powerful Special attackers. Charmed was important to have around to take the Special attackers on. Dusty helped make up for Gia’s weakness as well, somehow taking out a Pidgeot and an Exggecute, despite having some rather low stats. Seperate, they may not have made it, but together they managed to snatch victory. 

After that battle, finishing off the Team Rocket thugs was a breeze. At the top floor I found some dude who claimed to be the leader of the group. He was being obnoxous, so I battled him and forced him to leave. The president of the Silph Company was grateful for that, and he gave me a free pokeball! 

After that, I decided to visit the local gyms during the rest of my free time. I figured I may as well.

After some shopping and relaxing, I finished out my day in Saffron. Overall, not bad. But I’m eager to see your lab at Cinnabar Island. I’m on my way to Fuscia now, to take out Koga at his gym. That’ll give me the clearance I need to Surf around here. Then I can head over to Cinnabar. 

I’ll let you know when I arrive!

-June

---

June,

Excellent. I’m glad you’re bonding so well with your glitchmon, and I’m glad you’re on your way now. Allow me to ellaborate a little on the fossil conversion process we’ve developed here.

The process partly involves something you have already done in the past. Recall when you handled that glitchmon #C6 with the Superglitch move? Yes. You will be repeating those steps, although this time, your C6 should know Double Slap, not Mega Kick. The easiest method is to simply capture another C6 for the task. 

Once you’ve initiated the controlled Superglitch corruption, according to the steps you learned previously, meet me here at my lab. Give me the Helix fossil you collected previously. You will then do some swapping with a pokemon in your expanded party-- the 33rd pokeball, to be exact. I will take this 33rd pokemon and use its DNA to splice with the Helix fossil, and we can revive a glitched pokemon as a result.

Be sure to return the 33rd pokemon to its proper place when finished and then repeat the steps you followed last time for ‘cleaning up’ after controlled Superglitch corruption.

-Professor Gingko

---

Professor,

It was wonderful to finally meet you face-to-face! The lab was nicer then I imagined. A little small, but still fascinating. I enjoy the ocean breeze and the atmopshere of Cinnabar Island, too. It’s the perfect place to study pokemon.

Your lab assistant is a little hard to understand, but I get the feeling he doesn’t get out much. Anyway, I have the glitchmon we revived, #C9, and I’m trying him out in battle now. Sometimes he blends in with the scenary if there’s a lot of rocks around, but he screeches a lot so I usually can find him that way. He’s been an energetic fellow, so I can’t wait to see what he can do!

-Junebug

---

Glitchdex #: C9/201 

Family: Onix Hybrid (95)

Type(s): Rock/Ground

Species Keyword: FRIENDSHIP

It seems to form great friendships with Drowzee. It is best to keep a Drowzee with this POKEMON to allow it to reach its full potential. 

—

End Notes

Glitches mentioned/used in this post:

* English Fossil Conversion Trick

Click for the next part of the series!

This is a repost on a new blog. The original post was on Jan 2, 2020.

[cerastes]

Triple A games being colossal failures is a very rare thing.

Even if critically lampooned and not what the publisher expected in terms of output, Triple A titles don’t really “fail”, they still make a lot of money back, usually more than it was spent in production (albeit this cannot be considered a profit as it is usually not much more, and all that time and those resources could’ve been spent in two or three lesser games in less time that would’ve yielded more capital, but I digress), so a Triple A game being an abject failure is not commonplace at all, and they make very interesting case studies.

The three most relevant Triple A failures nowadays are Mighty No.9, Battleborn, and Fallout 76. It’s interesting because they all failed due to different things. This is all extremely compressed and summarized, as each of those titles merits a lengthy discussion and a long post, but this is how it goes.

Mighty No.9 was the result of Keiji Inafune’s incompetence as a producer. His extremely tone deaf decisions and transparent greed ended up sinking the whole ship. Inafune pushed really hard to make Mighty No.9 a media empire, which was very unwise, as what he had promised was a video game. Before the game had even been released, he was already making more promises than he could realistically fulfill, launching more Kickstarters for several additional things, including but not limited to another video game altogether, Red Ash, as well as an anime for Red Ash. When Mighty No.9 had not, again, yet been released and he had already delayed the release date a couple of times. He kept asking for more and more money even though MN9 was the single most expensive Kickstarter of its time (and surpassed by few nowadays), and the stretch goals got so ridiculous that it lost scope of realism. End of the day, it was supposed to be released on ten different consoles, two of which still haven’t seen a release. MN9 sank with Inafune trapped in the cabin, a reminder to the world that Inafune never directed any game. He mostly was a producer and character designer. Turns out, you need actual directing chops to carry the development of a game, not to mention a media empire.

Battleborn was Gearbox’s own karmic guillotine, and it’s the only entry here I’d consider bittersweet. Randy Pitchford is a morally bankrupt businessman and definitely got what he had coming to him after what he had done to Colonial Marines, but the thing is... Battleborn is actually not a bad game? Despite Pitchford’s lack of a soul and the immensely cringeworthy dialogue, Gearbox does indeed possess real talent in its game-making team, and you can tell they put a lot of love into the game, mechanically speaking. It’s not a masterpiece, but it’s a fun game overall. What killed Battleborn wasn’t it being bad, but rather, it was Gearbox doing exactly everything they needed to kill it. It was an artful demonstration of how to kill a game. If I didn’t know better about Pitchford’s incompetence, I’d be of the mind that this was done deliberately, as no one can possibly beef it this hard. Battleborn, for whatever reason, decided to compete with Overwatch, despite being very different games. Overwatch is property of Blizzard, a fan favorite in the industry who, despite its many failings, no one can deny provides solid games with tight gameplay. Battleborn is closer to a MOBA than a Hero Shooter, and the thing with MOBAs is that they are all free, whereas Battleborn charged you 60 bucks upfront. MOBAs aren’t niche per se, but the competitive, dedicated scene is, and the appeal of games like League of Legends or Heroes of the Storm is that you can try them for free and see if you wanna dedicate to its intricacies or not. Battleborn charged you a 60 dollar fee immediately for a genre of game that a lot of people don’t really stay in until they find the game that they are most comfortable with within the genre. And, all in all? It’s not a bad game, but it’s not stellar, either. It’s very basic gunplay makes it inferior to a dedicated Hero Shooter, but its steep entry fee and overall handling makes it not a MOBA, either. For the kind of experiment that Battleborn was, they really should’ve 1) not have competed with the fan favorite game with tons of momentum behind it and 2) made it free, or at least far cheaper. It doesn’t help that they spent a lot of time not revealing anything about the gameplay proper until it was close to release, whereas Overwatch had released gameplay footage and even a demo. It had no business trying to compete with Overwatch because in terms of both polish and PR, it had no way to beat it.

And Fallout 76... Ah, sweet Bethesda, you’ve really done it now. In the words of Fallout New Vegas: The candle that burns twice as bright, lasts half as long. They really took the good faith of their fans for granted. Nothing new there, really, because Bethesda has always had fans that let themselves be made fools of, what with ”the bugs are part of the charm!” and all that, but F76 is the battle axe that smashed the camel’s back. Todd Howard has charisma, he really does, but charisma isn’t enough for game development because, as it turns out, you need to actually make a game that lives up to the hype you rattled up. Rattling up hype by itself is not enough, and I’d argue it’s ultimately harmful if you cannot deliver on it. Lazily coded, lazily put together, unoptimized, grievously unsafe, and an overall mess, F76 is the logical conclusion of “the bugs are part of the charm!”. You kept celebrating the child’s misbehavior, you kept laughing and clapping as the baby knocked over cups and shat on the couch, so you don’t get to complain now that the baby jabbed a fork into the power outlet and fried its brains. It’s a Triple A title that doesn’t care. Most checks are user-side, not server-side, which, if you know even the bare minimum about game design, is a terrible idea, as players can quite literally modify their game and ‘hack’ it to their liking, and there is nothing you can do against it, because the server sure as hell won’t care. Bethesda isn’t an indie dev or even a newer company like Gearbox is, Bethesda has been in the game for a while now. All of this is simply unforgivable. But the bugs and lack of quality are part of the charm, am I right, guys? We stan Todd “Bethesdad” Howard! Yeah, have fun with that.

Game development is difficult, but these three exercises in failure are examples I like to keep in mind at all times, as they are rare and different case studies of how a game can fail when it absolutely shouldn’t. Be it directorial incompetence or outright laziness, there’s always a way for a video game, something that takes a multitalented team to properly produce, to fall flat on its face.

[blazardragon]

What headcannons do you have about the Asano's

Hello, anon! Oh boy *Cracks knuckles*  I’ve got a few:

Gakushuu:

Ever since reading in Korotan C that he and his friends are oftenbusy practicing as a band for CD releases, I’m convinced that he must likemusic a lot. Since it’s his favorite instrument, he mostly listens to musicwith a lot of electric guitar, like Rock music, but he listens to a variety ofgenres to get ideas. He listens to music in many different languages to try tolearn the language faster, too. For him, finding the balance between havingwide-appeal without being overly generic is an enjoyable challenge.

Since he recommends big cities for Lea to visit while she’sin Japan, I feel that he’s a city person. He likes the activity, energy, and varietycities have to offer. Being able to get to places quickly and conveniently isalso a plus. One of the things he looked for while he was applying to differentuniversities was that it was situated in a city.

His least favorite season is Winter because: 

He hates the cold. He spends most of his time studyingindoors anyway, and their house’s heating system is superb, but he likes studyingnear the window of his room and the cold seeps through the crevices.  

It’s goddamn Karma Akabane’s birthday in December, and everyyear Karma will use that one week to taunt Gakushuu and demand that he respecthis elders. He will die before calling him “senpai”.

It’s his birthday season. This is the time of year whenpeople he barely knows give him things he doesn’t need with the expectationthat he’ll return the favor. He will, of course, since it’s good for buildingconnections, but people pretend extra hard to be sincere around this time ofyear, and he’d rather they lay their intentions bare.

Gakushuu is not a hoarder by any definition of the word. Helikes having clean space without clutter. His room is the cleanest room ateenager could possibly have. That being said, he can’t find it in him to getrid of the (frankly useless) things his virtuoso friends buy him, so he has asmall shelf on his room dedicated to gifts he receives from them. The onlyexception is a porno mag Seo gave him, which he promptly threw away. His fathergenerally gives him useful things, so he doesn’t need to set those items asideanywhere. He simply uses them. Out of caution, he won’t even bring any unopenedgifts from Karma into his house. He opens them outside.

Like Nagisa, he secretly worries about what he’s going to dowith his life in the future. While his future goal is to have an executive job,he hasn’t yet decided what kind of company he wants to lead. He’s a serious kidwho likes having everything planned out in advance (After all, he had plan F’sand other formations setup in advance for the pole toppling tournament), and he’sused to knowing which school he’s going to, so not knowing which college he’llgo to and which major he’ll pursue is extremely worrying for him.

He’s not Ren-level vain, but he’s a little fussy about hisappearance. He keeps a comb on him to keep his hair neat. Unfortunately, thismakes Gakuho’s teasing about the possibility of him going bald in the future extremelyeffective.

Gakuho:

He likes a lot of English music from the early nineties becauseit reminds him of his time in America as a college student, and he honestly hada lot of fun at college. There were a lot of interesting classes to take, a lotof intellectual freedom, and a lot of room to be an oddball. He also likes reallydark music, which certainly doesn’t help his image as “Education Satan”. Consequently,although he genuinely tries to give Gakushuu good, rational pointers regardingthe music he and his friends are working on, Gakushuu simply cannot follow hisadvice. His advice is too tailored to his own tastes, and it would scare toomany people away.

Since his dream school was up on a mountain surrounded byforest, I think he must love nature. His love of nature is also one of thereasons he likes to jog when he exercises. It’s good for the heart, which isimportant because he likes eating western style breakfasts with a lot of meat(assuming what he was eating in chapter 119 is what he normally eats), but healso gets to look at everything as he runs by. As he runs, he tries to identifyevery animal and plant he passes by, and he takes pictures of anythinginteresting he finds with his smartphone. He’s especially fascinated by bugs,so there’s a lot of pictures of bugs on his phone, which grosses other people,including Gakushuu, out.

His favorite season is Spring because:

School starts in Spring in Japan, and he’s a huge nerd wholoves school.

The weather is very nice, which is especially important whenyou’re jogging at 3 AM. All the plants and animals start to come back to lifeafter the cold of winter, so his jogs are more interesting.  

His birthday is in the Spring.  Yay, gifts!

He hoards the gifts he receives from students the same wayhe hoards all the random trophies and certificates he has been awarded over theyears. He’s very proud of the random stuff his students give him, and he’s gladthat returning to being a cram school teacher means more gifts for him. Thankfully,he owns a big house, so he has a room dedicated to storing all his junk. Whileit’s kept well-organized, the fact that there’s a whole room dedicated tostoring useless knickknacks drives Gakushuu crazy.

I usually avoid the headcanon of “X’s parents are pricks”because it seems like a common way to make one’s favorites suffer, but I cannotimagine someone naming their kid “Gakuho”, meaning “the peak of knowledge”,without being a total prick. Talk about high expectations :/

The reason why he’s so good with money and management isthat he was raised and groomed to be a businessman or a stock trader, kind oflike Karma’s parents. In fact, he went to the same high school as them since itwas a high school geared toward preparing mathematically gifted students forthe business life. Gakuho’s parents were very money driven, so they raised himin such a way to maximize his income.

He was never thrilled with the idea, and when he was youngand rebellious, he resented all the time and effort he was forced to put into askill he didn’t really want. However, like what many of the other characters inAssassination Classroom eventually learned, he came to realize that it’s askill that can help him achieve his true dreams. To respect his parents’choice, he went to Harvard and studied Economics and Mathematics, but he alsoworked on getting his teaching license. His transcript is filled with all sortsof random classes he took out of curiosity, though, and he ended up graduatinglate because he was too busy taking random classes outside of his major.  

He winds up being very glad he chose to go to Harvardbecause he meets his wife there. Also, while he feels a strong sense of ironywhen Gakushuu tells him he plans to study at MIT to become a businessman, he’shappy that he studied business since he’s better equipped to advise his son.

Thanks for the ask, anon! If I think longer, I might remember more, but these are themain ones, and I wanted to keep this post somewhat readable by giving them nomore than one page each. I should probably keep a word doc for other headcanonsI come up with.

[abdelodev]

9 Tips To Keep Your Dog Safe & Calm

Who else loves July 4th? I always look forward to the yummy BBQ food, family time, and pretty fireworks. While you may share my excitement for the holiday, our pups certainly don’t!

Many dogs are afraid of fireworks, which makes sense since their ears are so much more sensitive than ours. So when your local fireworks display is set off, it may trigger your dog to freak out. Plus, according to Pet Finder, more dogs get lost on July 4th than any other day of the year. That’s a really scary statistic!

To help keep your pooch safe this Independence Day, check out the following nine tips!

1. Take Your Pup For a Run In The Morning

One of the best things you can do leading up to your July 4th celebration is to make sure your pup burns off any pent-up energy. Going for a run or playing a long game of fetch will help make your dog tired and less likely to act out.  

While physically stimulating your pooch is something you should do before any potentially stressful situation, it’s also an important daily practice.

2. Mentally Stimulate Your Pup With Games

Along with physical exercise, mental stimulation is another great way to tire out your pup. Before your big bash, let them spend some time playing with interactive toys and puzzles. There are a variety of dog puzzles on the market. They each require sightly different problem-solving skills and offer various challenge levels. But they all have one thing in common — you hide treats somewhere in the puzzle and your dog has to figure out how to get them out.

In THIS post, I share my favorite store-bought dog puzzles. In THIS post, I share my favorite DIY enrichment toys.

3. Keep Your Dog Home During July 4th Parties

While it may seem fun to take your dog with you to your holiday party, it’s not really the best idea — especially if the people you’re partying with are planning to set off fireworks.

To help your canine kid feel safe and secure, don’t bring him to a fireworks display. Instead, keep your pooch at home.

4. Set Up a Comfortable Room To Keep Fido Safe & Calm

To help keep your dog calm, leave him in a cozy spot of your home—like the bedroom. Some tips:

Keep the blinds down to help block out the sights of bright fireworks.

If your dog is crate trained then put him in the crate with a blanket around the sides. This will help to block out the sights of bright fireworks, as well as muffle the sound a bit.

Help reduce sounds of loud firework booms and bangs by keeping the television on or playing some soothing music. Music can be extremely effective in calming your anxious dog. While you can simply turn on Pandora, there are playlists designed specifically for calming dog anxiety. For example, the company Through a Dog’s Ear offers a selection of pet-calming tunes. It comes pre-loaded with 4 hours of clinically-tested music.

Use a Dog Appeasing Pheromone Diffuser. DAP is a synthetic chemical that’s based on a hormone produced by lactating female dogs. It’s this hormone that helps keep puppies calm. Scientific studies show DAP works with puppies, but researchers say it’s unclear if DAP works with anxious adult dogs. Still, if you ask me, it’s worth a try! DAP comes as a plug-in diffuser with vials that last for 30, 60, or 90 days. Don’t worry about these synthetic pheromones stinking up your house — humans can’t smell it.

5. CBD Oil

If you’re a regular reader here at Proud Dog Mom then you know I’m a fan of CBD for dogs. It offers many benefits to our dogs and anxiety relief is one of the most commonly talked about! I’ve been giving it to my Chihuahua, Diego, for a couple of years and have noticed three major improvements: He no longer seems bothered by joint pain, it’s soothed his seasonal allergies, and his mood has drastically improved.

I give Diego the Cannanine brand and trust it completely. It’s an organic, full-spectrum oil that’s manufactured in the USA from Colorado-grown hemp. It’s been tested and found to be free of heavy metals, harmful bacteria, yeast, mold, and other toxins. Plus, there’s zero THC. Check it out HERE!

I give Diego a dose every morning with his breakfast. Check the bottle for proper dosing for your pup.

6. Lay Off The BBQ Scraps/Leftovers

While it’s great to feed your pup fresh foods, not all “human foods” are safe for dogs. In fact, some foods that you would consider healthy—like onions and grapes—are actually toxic to canines and can result in death if ingested. Be mindful of seasoned food and meats that are marbled with fats. Additionally, any sudden change to your pet’s diet can cause stomach upset.

*Click here for a list of human foods that are toxic to your dog.

7. Avoid Human Sunscreens and Bug Sprays

Human sunscreens and bug sprays may work for you, but they can be toxic to your dog. They often contain zinc oxide, PABA, and other chemicals that should not be licked or ingested. Instead, use a formula that is designed specifically for dogs. Like this one:

8. Be Sure Your Pup Wears an Up-To-Date ID Tag

As I mentioned in the beginning of this article, according to Pet Finder, more dogs get lost on July 4th than any other day of the year. It’s always best to be proactive than reactive. So make sure your pup wears an up-to-date ID tag that has your contact information on it.

9. Take a Current Photo Of Your Pups

As long as you are careful, your pup should be just fine. However, you should always prepare for the worst. So before heading out to your July 4th celebration, take a current photo of you with your dog. That way, in case he does go missing, you can blast the community with an up to date photo. Plus, having a photo with you in it proves you’re your dog’s momma.  

[smuttyfairy]

Buttercream :1 (M)

1. | 2. | 3. Genre: Smut/Angst/Fluff Summary: (Previously posted under @suganeedsanap) When you fell in love with Kim Taehyung, it was as sweet as cake and bitter as beer. He made your heart swell, but others disapproved. Those days are over, but memories still linger. Maybe this bachelorette party will help ease your mind. Besides, You’ll be Ms. Jimin Park. But why aren’t you happy? Warnings: Alcohol Use Word count: 4,024 Written by: Smutty Jaefairy

A/N: This is a story I’m moving from my main blog to here. I’m having a hard time finding worth in my work so this is an exercise of me looking at my past work and appreciating my writing. I hope you guys enjoy this story. This is one of my babies. 

"Have you ever believed in love?"  

His warm honey brown hair clung to his forehead as you two ran underneath a large building. The rain fell heavily, scattering the ground like large pebbles. He was taking off his coat and wrapping it around your head, a wide smile on his face. His teeth were white, and his breath smelled of something sweet and mouthwash.

“Have you??” He asked, making sure you were dry. His large hands shook the droplets on your hair away. He shook the side of your dress, taking precautions to be very careful. The cover you two had wasn’t much, if you moved a little too much to the right, you’d get drenched. He knew how much you hated getting soaked. It was charming how much he was trying to make sure you averted from it.

You gazed at Taehyung and shook your head no. At that point in your life you never had time for guys or the possibility of something romantic. This day was your first date. He laughed softly and placed his hand on your head.

“ When I look at you Y/n, I feel like what I think love’s supposed to feel like.” Your face gave a confused expression. How could he say something like that so easily? His smile became warmer and for a moment, you could see the image of a man who fell too deep. You always treated Tae as a child, because honestly he acted like one. He would laugh when there was silence, cry when there was no need and just had no direction. But he was pulled to you, and your magnetic pull brought out something different in him. His dark eyes met yours and clinged to your gaze. He hesitated, giving in a deep sigh. With one last look, a look of earnest, leaned forward. On that sunday afternoon, in the pouring rain, he gave you your first kiss.

-

It would be weird to have guys at your bachelorette party, sure. When you told your small group of girlfriends that a couple of your boys were coming over their first question was “Are they cute?”.You shook a finger before laughing along with them.

Namjoon, Yoongi, and Hoseok were coming over to celebrate your last days as an eligible young lady. You were getting married to your boyfriend of three years, Park Jimin. It was to be a moderate sized wedding. Just close friends, family, and a few business acquaintances. It was perfect. Your friends were all so very happy for you. You were dating a successful choreographer,  and you yourself was in line to become the news editor at a rising entertainment magazine. When people talked about you or saw you two, it was perfect. Every time someone said that you two were perfect, you had this internal feeling of chewing on a razor. Jimin wasn’t a terrible person, in fact he was the best boyfriend anyone could have. You were just bugged by the idea of being a perfect couple.

You sat in the living room, the faint glow from the party lights overhead. Your girlfriends were at the door, ushering Namjoon and Yoongi into the house. Namjoon was a friend of yours from university.You both were in the journalism program and had similar tastes. At that time, you were working at a local convenience store when you weren’t at school. Namjoon came in often late night and would chat it up with you about classes and homework. He introduced you to some of his friends from around the neighborhood and before you knew it, you became close with him and his group of colorful buddies. Yoongi went to the same university as you two, but he was in the music program. Hoseok and Jin worked like you, Hoseok going to an art school in the town over. Jin worked on acting from home and took care of his family.

Yoongi gave you a wide smile and a lazy wave. “Congratulations, Y/n!”

“Thank you!” You were trying to get up from the couch, but one of your girlfriends sat you back down, putting a regular cup in your hand.

“What’s in here?” You asked, the room being too dim to see the cup clearly.

“Minae unni made this bowl of what she calls jungle juice. They made it when she was in America for university.” Your friend, Choi, gave you a tipsy smile and handed a cup to Yoongi. He looked at the cup, shrugged, and gave it a swig. He coughed for a moment, asking if there was alcohol in it.

“Yeah, what are you? A lightweight?” She quipped, eyeing him up and down.

He laughed and poked her nose. “ Hey, I’m older than you. Show some respect, beautiful." he said playfully making Choi blushed, hurrying to the other side of the house, slightly flustered. Yoongi was really popular with your friends, so was Namjoon. Minae already had him in a corner, asking him how he was. His pale blonde hair was slicked back and from the look of the smirk on his face, you could tell he was trying to spit some serious game.

You slipped back into the couch and sipped the sweet drink, Yoongi following suit. “How’s everything going on your side?” You asked, watching him take another drink bracing himself.

“Ah, It’s alright. Jimin is so excited about the wedding.” You smiled for a moment, your mouth retracting into a frown.

“I’m guessing you’re not feeling the same?” He said, his mouth going towards the cup again.

“No, no I am. “ you smiled again. For some reason, you couldn’t keep a smile tonight. The wedding so was so close, you couldn’t be getting cold feet. He looked at you seriously for a moment and sat up, turning towards you.

“ Hey, I need to talk to you about something.”  “You looked at him, his expression serious.

“Okay…” you put your cup down and gave him your undivided attention.

“Namjoon was supposed to tell you as soon as he got here, but seeing as Minae has his attention.. I guess I’ll tell you.” You gave him a concerned look, your stomach tying in knots. You felt a sense of hope in your chest, you knew you shouldn’t expect much, but there was something that sat in the back burner of your heart for three long years. He looked away for a moment, then Yoongi’s intense dark eyes met yours. “Taehyung called Namjoon and Hoseok yesterday night.”

-

Namjoon had also introduced you to Jimin, Jungkook and Taehyung. Jimin you knew somewhat already. He worked at the same convenience store as you, but you never properly had a talk with him. One night Namjoon came in with two younger guys. One had short black hair and was roughhousing with the other. His hair a little longer, just ending at his thick eyebrows. His smile seemed to never end, and he seemed a little...odd. It wasn’t that he was ugly. You thought he was attractive, as well as the other boy, but he was off. As soon as they came in, He walked over to the chip aisle and started stacking random things on each other. Namjoon nodded to you, and you nodded back.

“Hey Joonie. Are you babysitting?”  

“Something like that. Jungkook needs some help with a paper so we came to get some food before studying. Taehyung came along because he was bored..he’s gonna be more trouble than help.“

The young male with the black hair walked to the counter with a few sodas, a bag of cookies and a bowl of instant noodles.

“Hello, are you Y/n?” You nodded and smiled softly.

“That is me, are you Jungkook?” He nodded and bowed, you bowing back.

“Jimin oppa and Namjoon oppa have mentioned you before. They were right. You’re very pretty” He said smiling.

You smiled back, grabbing Namjoon’s shirt. “When did this happen?”

“Hey, we weren’t making fun of you, we were being nice.” While you were bickering with Namjoon, Taehyung had somehow had all the chips on the floor and was rearranging them.

At one point you were taking your shoe off and then you saw the aisle. “Oy, what are you doing? Namjoon what is your friend doing? I’m gonna get fired!”

“ Taehyung, put those back. “ Namjoon said with a long groan.

You walked over, he was hurrying to put everything back. You were about to sass him, then you realized what he was doing. He recovered them and somehow made them look more presentable than before. He turned to you, his face blank and his mouth slightly open.

“Thank you for the help. I was actually suppose to do that tonight before I got off. You saved me some time.” You smiled, kind of relieved your least favorite job was already done. He stood there as if he was frozen. Jungkook walked behind him, shoving him a little bit.

“Hyung, you look like a fool.”  He was broken out of his trance and nodded his head.

“Ah, Kim Taehyung. “

“F/n L/n. Thank you for the help.“ You bowed and raised an eyebrow. You recalled your boss saying there was an opening for the overnight shift and you thought it’d be a good idea to suggest it to him.

“Do you have a job? “ He shook his head wildly and you walked to the counter, looking for an application.

“We have an opening. If you’re not busy with school that is.” Jungkook pushed him towards the counter.

“He’s not doing anything, noona. He’ll do it. “ You rang up Jungkook and Namjoon, Taehyung filling the application out, fumbling a few times with the pen. As he finished and gave it to you, you gave him an apprehensive smile.

“I’ll tell the boss about you, okay?” Namjoon gave you a wave as he left the store, Jungkook following with Taehyung last, giving you a goofy grin and walking backwards out of the store and leaving with the other two. You put the application away, happy to have found someone better at doing the detailed jobs, but you didn’t expect him to impact your life. - You instantly grabbed Yoongi’s cup and downed whatever he had left.

“I’m sorry, what?” you felt your words come out in a harsh whisper.

“Taehyung called Namjoon and Hoseok. Hoseok was much more caring than Namjoon. Namjoon scolded him and told him not to come back.”

You frowned and grabbed your cup, drinking it down. Your body felt warm and prickly.

Yoongi’s watched your expression as it changed a few times. “I knew it. “ he said quietly.

You turned to him , eyes wide. “You don’t love Jimin, You’re still in love with Taehyung..” You shook your head, a grimace on your face.

“What? No!” Yoongi sighed and sat back, shrugging.

“If you say so..oh!” He got up and walked over to Choi who had another cup along with hers. “Can I have that cup?” He asked and she nodded.

He took it from her and smiled before going back to you. “Anyways, he says he’s coming back, and if he does what are you gonna do? “  

Your face was focused on the ground and you tried not to think about Taehyung. That was a long time ago, and you didn’t want to think about him. You didn’t want to think about his dorky smile or his peculiar way of handling conversation. You didn’t want to hear his warm deep voice or think about how his hair felt when your hands were tangled in it.

“Y/n?” You looked up and plastered a fake smile on your face. “ He’s too late. Jimin and I will get married. “

Yoongi gave you a face. You couldn’t tell if he was unimpressed or his resting bitch face had kicked in. “You’re not fooling me. I can read you better than Namjoon.” His voice was slightly slurred and his eyes were a little glossy. He was getting drunk.

“You’re drunk, Yoongi.” He shook his blonde hair and paused before laughing out loud. You laughed back, the alcohol in your system kicking in. Namjoon walked over to you two, placing a piece of paper in his pocket.

“ Already getting numbers, can’t even say hi. “ You say, playfully mad.

“ I was going to say hi, but your friends wouldn’t let me alone!”

“You didn’t want to, Namjoon.”  

“That’s not true, I was just being polite. “

You and Yoongi both let out a long “Mhmmmm.” before you got up and gave him a hug, laughing softly.

“Hey, can I talk to - “

“Oh, Yoongi already told me. “ before he brought it up again, you tried your best to advert the conversation. “Where’s Hobi? I don’t want to start til Hoseok is here!”

“He should have been here before us.” Yoongi said, checking his phone.

There was a loud knock, prompting you to run to the door and answer it. Hoseok was at the door, a large delivery truck behind him. “Y/n! Congratulations!” He gave you a huge hug and spun you around.

Your stomach turned for a moment, sloshing alcohol around in the depths. “Hobi! Put me down.” You pouted and he listened.

“Sorry, sorry! Ah, there’s a delivery here for you. They said they need you to sign it before they bring it in. “ You walk out to the driver in the sunset and signed off on the package, telling them to bring it in the living room.  Minae walked out and squealed. “Everyone! It’s here!”  Your face scrunched up at her. You were hoping it was the one thing you asked her not to do. “I said no strippers, Minae..” “Ah, hush. We know he isn’t as impressive as Jimin oppa. Bring it in!” She handled the package while you went back inside, grabbing a bottle of gin from the table of snacks and drinks.

You trudged back to the couch sitting in between Namjoon and Yoongi. Your girlfriends were giving everyone party hats and party horns. You thought it was kind of silly how they were acting so childish, but you gave up a long time ago. Once you told Minae and Choi they could plan it, it left your hands and landed in their capable ones.

Hoseok was helping the delivery man bring in the package. It was a large box and smelled of buttercream and vanilla. You sighed and took a swig of the bottle.

“This feels more like a birthday party.” You said softly.

“It is a bit juvenile.” Namjoon grinned, a drink now in his hand.

You spaced out and words stumbled out of your mouth before you could even process them. “Taehyung would love this…”

Yoongi and Namjoon looked at you, Yoongi leaning close to you. “ Namjoon has his number.”  

Namjoon cut the air and shook his head. “No. He left all of a sudden giving us a half ass goodbye and he left  without a word to Y/n! You think he deserves to come back as if nothing happened?”

Yoongi took a sip and shook his head. “ He doesn’t , but if she doesn’t love Jimin, why is she marrying him?”

“Oi, Y/n! You don’t want to marry Jimin? What is he saying about you not loving him?”

“Yoongi’s drunk!” You said, pouting. “Yoongi stop exposing me with your lies. “

“I’ll expose more if I keep drinking this..” He lips connected to his drink for the umpteenth time that night.

“If things keep going this way, Yoongi will be your stripper.” Namjoon muttered watching them set up.

A large, cake was displayed. It was pale yellow with white frosting along the edges.

“That wouldn’t be a problem.” Yoongi said while licking his lips. You smacked his arm and he set off in a fit of giggles. Even though he told you the worst news you could have heard at this time, you were glad Yoongi was there to keep you from freaking out. Him, Hoseok and Namjoon were like brothers to you. Namjoon was the one who cared and gave wisdom, but constantly ready to bicker with you about anything and everything.  Yoongi was the one who knew how you were feeling and how to make it better.

As they finished, Hoseok slipped in between you and Namjoon, Yoongi reaching over to give him his drink.

“Hobi, drink this.” He muttered.

“Huh?” He looked at it and drank it down. Hoseok was always calling you to make sure you were eating after long hours at the office, bringing you food for lunch or just there when you needed to vent about something stupid at work.

He gave the cup back to Yoongi and winced. “Too strong for me. Ah, Y/n! You excited about the wedding?” You nodded, feeling the alcohol numb any memories of Taehyung or any feelings of doubt you had.

“Yes! I’m ready to be Mrs. Park Jimin.” you smiled, gin laced in your words.

“You mean Mrs. Kim.” Yoongi was getting another cup from Choi, his eyes slightly glossed over.

“Yoongi, you need to stop!”  You gave him a glare, in which he shrugged and took a sip from his cup.

“Once you stop lying to yourself.”

Hoseok shushed you both, and took your hand. He had a sad smile, but you could see the reassurance in his eyes. “Maybe once you’re sober we can talk about everything. You too, Yoongi.”  

Yoongi sighed, snuggling into the couch. Minae walked up to the cake, knocking the stand it stood on.

“Hey, you ready in there?”  Three knocks answered and she grinned wide. As she stood up, she ran to the speaker system and started searching through her massive collection of music. Choi brought in the other girls, them huddling around the couch. Hoseok got comfortable next to you and Namjoon got up, going over to Minae and helping her pick some music.

“Ah, Hobi this is gonna be embarrassing.” You cover your face and sigh deeply. He rubbed your back and smiled.

“Ah, I’m sure you’ll be able to laugh at this fool, right, Yoongi?” Yoongi's drunk giggle came from the other side of the couch and Hoseok waved him off.

Your mind was hazy at this point and Taehyung’s voice was in your head. It was like a faint whisper, but you knew you didn’t want to be there. You wanted to leave the house, and find him. You wanted to ask him why he left you, where he went, why was he back.

You held your head, the room spinning for a moment. Hoseok glanced at you, a worried look washing over his face. “Y/n? Are you alright? “

Before you could answer, the sound system blasted. ”Falling in love “ by 2ne1 started playing and Minae dimmed the lights more. The girls were screaming and cheering. “We got a special gift for the lucky girl tonight~!” Minae said dancing to the music. You looked at the cake, a grimace on your face. The tiers shook slightly, wobbling some. You sat back, knowing a stripper coming out of a cake was going to be messy. Your chin rested in your hand and you sighed. As the cake deteriorated and a body came out of it, you saw jeans and a naked chest. The room was cheering, and you looked up. It was dark and it was hard to see their face, but as they danced in front of you, the smile looked familiar. It was wide and it seemed to make your heart stutter. They grinded in front of you, and you stood up, getting a better look at their face.

You swore you could have died in that moment.

A loud scream came from your mouth, making Namjoon turn off the music and Minae turn the lights up. Buttercream frosting and small pieces of cake stuck to his honey brown hair. It littered his skin, but his smile stayed intact. Kim Taehyung was standing in front of you, stripping at your bachelorette party. You were stone, the party silent. The startling sound of Yoongi blowing a party horn brought everything back to earth. Yoongi laughed, finished his drink and clapped his pale hands. He seemed to be the only one amused.

“Hobi, you put him up to this didn’t you?” He asked, his hoarse laugh filling the room.

“What?!? No!” Hoseok shook his head, disbelief in what he saw. Namjoon walked over to Taehyung, not waiting to scold him.

“What are you doing?!?” The look of disbelief on Namjoon's face made Taehyung laugh.

“Ah! I called Minae to get in touch with Y/n and she said they were having a surprise party for her! She told me her surprise gift and I wanted to help!”  Minae waved, a guilty look on her face.

“Whoops! I thought it’d be okay!”  You stood there, taking everything about him into your memory.

It was Tae. Your Tae, he was back and Namjoon was yelling at him. It was like nothing changed. The alcohol impaired everything for that few minutes. While everyone was trying to understand what was going on, time slowed down. You remembered everything Taehyung and you went through. Your relationship, how your parents didn’t approve. You went through so many hurdles and he was back. Then Jimin’s face flashed in your eyes. Your chest started to pound thinking of the night he proposed. The tears in his eyes, how his smile was so loving. You were Jimin’s now. Tae left you, he didn’t tell you anything. He just left. You couldn’t say anything to him. All of this was so sudden. You felt hot tears spill from your eyes, and Tae stopped arguing with Namjoon and looked into your eyes.

He held your face, his thumbs wiping away every tear. “What’s wrong, Jagi? Are you not happy to see me?”

“T..” you couldn’t say his name, it hurt to think he was back, and he couldn’t even come in a decent way. But you knew Taehyung. He wasn’t as mature as the rest of you, but he always had his heart in the right place.

“I..” you covered your mouth, and suddenly you felt your stomach gripe from the inside out. You ran out of the room and up the stairs, towards Minae’s spare bedroom. You dashed for the bathroom, Taehyung right behind you.

As you saw the toilet your stomach lurched and you fell to your knees, throwing up. You were a mess. You were crying, puking and Taehyun kneeled behind you, holding your hair. He kissed the back of your head and comforted you.

“Why did you come back? You didn’t even say goodbye..”

“What? What are you talking about?” He said, ripping off a strip of toilet paper and helping you clean your face.

“Do you need water? Should I get you medicine?” You heard the music downstairs start up again and you held your knees, groaning. You stomach was pulsing and you just wanted it to stop.

“I’ll drink water from the tap..I just want this night to be over.  “  He looked down for a moment before looking up, his eyes gazing into yours.

“I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye properly.. I had to leave. I thought you would understand..” Your heart felt like a sharp piece of glass rubbed against it. He smoothed the hair out of your face and kissed your forehead. “Jagiya…”

You cried more, your face feeling grimy by this point. Asking to be left alone he stood up and closed the bathroom door. You got up, walked to the shower and turned it on full blast. The hot, steamy water killed off all the bacteria and salt from your face. You began to cry harder in the bathroom and sat in the tub. You heard your phone’s ringtone, muffled by your clothes. A pulsing, throbbing pain invaded one side of your head, making you cry harder. It had been so long since you cried like this. Your body rejected every feeling you had at that moment. You couldn’t help but feel like things would get worse.

[grayembers]

I keep meaning to make a life update post for old friends here, but I wanted to wait until it was all good news instead of mixed, but I’m just gonna accept that won’t happen and update people anyway!

tl;dr I’m graduating with a master’s in computer science soon, job hunting sucks, theses suck don’t do grad school, I play a disgusting amount of Overwatch, and my cat is still super fluffy and great

Still together with Austin, and maybe going to visit him after I graduate. ouo  He’s a constant good presence in my life, and it’s really made me realize what healthy relationships are like lmao. Hindsight is 20/20. But yee he humors all my OT3 plotting and I get to listen to him geek out about musicals recently, it’s very cute. C:

I also have a great set of local friends here, although now I’m worried what’ll happen when I move away for a job. And one of them has been studying abroad this semester so I’ve barely seen her. But they’re all A+ people and we like to play board games and I’ve even dabbled in DnD with them.

We had a stray cat in the house for a few months last semester/into winter, but we finally found a foster group willing to take him in and look for a home even though he had FIV and is kinda old. He was definitely going to die if we hadn’t taken him in, even continued vet care and being indoors only couldn’t really cure his upper respiratory infection. My friend/housemate Michelle was pretty sad to see him go, he was kinda hers even though she knew she couldn’t realistically keep a cat right now. ;o;

I waste a lot of time playing games. Overwatch is my coping mechanism for depression, I hit level 600+ recently it’s pretty pathetic. I do some comp in mid plat, and I’ve actually made a nice set of friends to play with as well. One who happens to go to this same school (I guess we started playing together through friends of friends, but those middle links don’t play anymore) and some elsewhere. So I’m actually on Discord a lot for game reasons! And GrayEmbers#1544, happy to play with friends.

Ooh, I also bought Oxygen Not Included (and convinced Austin to) the other week, which is Klei’s new game - the company that did Don’t Starve. It’s in super early alpha so tons of bugs, but I’m excited to see it grow just like I did with Don’t Starve. So much future content, and I already like it as it is.

I’m trying to shift some of my time-wasting activities to drawing and writing instead of Overwatch. Especially when I find I’m just playing and not having fun. Drew a few things recently, and have had Ryker/Veronica/Christine AU fic in the works since February (and post shit regularly on the side blog), and I’ve really been enjoying renewed character activity with Austin’s newer courier and a friend of Silt’s! Nyl/Red Lucy is the real OTP. Also, I’ve almost convinced two irl friends to play FNV, they’re probly sick of hearing me talk about it lmfao. It’ll always have a special place in my heart.

School happens. Somehow I’m going to be allowed to graduate in a few months without contributing anything useful to the world. I feel like the only thing I really learned in grad school was how academia works, so as far as Computer Science goes, I wouldn’t recommend it unless your endgoal is research or academia. Don’t get me wrong, I took some neat classes and read some really cool research, but I’d already learned most of my hard skills from undergrad so. shrugs. My research I’m being paid to do this academic year involves taking technology into hiking or outdoor settings, and I’m focusing especially on the cultural aspects of it. For example, people react very differently to a person reading a book in nature versus looking at a phone screen in nature when in reality that person could be reading an e-book, they have no idea.

Things are kind of rough again mental health wise, but I dug this hole myself by procrastinating on my thesis which I now have to write in 1.5 months, so. I want to die a lot of the time but I don’t think that’s gonna happen. But if anyone is up for ramming me with their car going 60, hmu literally.

Jobs will probably happen?? I don’t have anything lined up yet and my interests pull me in like 10 directions, but I’m looking pretty seriously into UX design stuff and possibly contracting work in tech. Dream job is still to work with virtual reality and/or gesture interfaces, but that didn’t happen in grad school (partially my own fault partially shitty circumstances) so I don’t know if I have the right qualifications.

Can’t wait to move somewhere and have a job with set hours and get more pets and build a new computer because I can.  ;~;  (No idea where yet, I just know I don’t want to go any farther south because summer is the worst.)

My older brother is getting married in November, which’ll be my third wedding of the year lol. And my Dad and stepmom moved back to the states from China! They’re in Baltimore, I’ve gone to see them once already and probably will again on the tail end of a friend’s wedding. Their dog is super cute holy shit.

Okay now that I’ve lost 90% of readers, I also lowkey wanted to mention I had top surgery over winter break, which you might be able to tell from the two selfies above. If you happen to know me irl but hadn’t heard yet, please keep it to yourself. I still identify as female and use female pronouns, but I’m absolutely loving my new chest and so happy that I saved up for it. ;u; If you’re a mutual and wanna ask particulars or about the process or anything, feel free to message me privately.

Actually, I’ve been meaning to start exercising or something because there’s actually a chance now I can completely like my body shape lmfao. Stress eating is too real though

[whimsically-ominously-auspice]

Watch "EXCLUSIVE: Ex Girlfriend of Paul Pelosi Jr Discusses Abuse, Fraud Allegations" on YouTube

So this guy in the interview is a Ben Clan Human Trafficker

Paul Paleosi Jr is only 20 years old.

The Paul she is talking about WAS Paul then he was killed in 1987 and taken over by aliens.

PPJ hasn't tried to contact her due to his old body being taken over by a Zulu alien.

Because they study intently, the Zulululu would mimic the good and romantic parts of the true person. But the rest of the time be taken down to the evil soul status.

So unfortunately her stories are 100% true and thusly sad

But the person soul is incorrect.

This is why we crested dna4u after 1991 when I blockaded the ability to overtake souls due to my daughters being kidnapped and one being overtaken by Zulululu and the other murdered for refusing.

So dna4u is decades into the making with Galaxies and planets helping as much as possible.

Check out the Google photos of this "51 year old man"

He told me "by the time you find me, I'll only be 20, shes makingbme lie about my age" she being Nancy Pelosi.

She in a long story Tree will post from that I wrote in a private email. With his information included, also abducted me. She's a real bitch

The minute men brought her to the aavuatuin studios and i was supposed to be picked up but I was blocked in traffic, so she was to sit in the lot and wait, she rolled under the plane for shade and was ran over by two planes when they thought they would have that chance to get me in a small window..

Still i haven't been able to be picked up.

Nancy has plenty of clones, tho. So I'm sure some hank ktch will be running her mouth soon.

But she was the worst 'clone' in the baby selling an human marketing trade.

She was mpst often in my Google with a sunk in face... Because she had plates of steel around her skull. Denise does, too as well as Billy and Nathaniel. Nathaniel in the back of his skull, Billy in the front.

She's photographed in my Google as the State Rep but ain't the one that goes to the Chairman Floor.

She's my father's soul mate but not my mother of birth..

In 2003 we banned the ability to get pregnant by anyone but our soul mates.

So Nancy's metal face was her backup. She gave her body to a Saturn good soul, so in thought she would be able to return to it in such times when she is attacked

Not only was and is that not possible but now we have destroyed the shell body. So her Saturn that tricked her to letting a guy her body is now free to work as ghost. And get much more done!.

And Paul and Karina are extra protected by those that waited to kill Nancy and with great and extreme force shoved the Saturn Soul Filled body into a sedan and dropped her to the lot, while invisible

Dino that she killed long ago.

They are extremely violent and more quickly than me with blinders to any other existence to stop them from destroying

So you will immediately die if you mess with my brother or my sister in law and any of my siblings and their children and soulmate.

We have the location of the people who kidnapped my niece and nephew. And so killing them and recapturing my family will continue

They were not reported as stolen. And time is up in order for them to do so.

We have earned experience due to Clayton Millicant, Clay Millican's evil twin.

Thusly we know exactly how to handle this

And I'm quite sure since Donald Trump hates her, that we will earn a monthly stipend instead of a one time payment if he continues to trust in our work

It just takes time

I had Clay and Aubrina murdered yesterday morning and had time to bring them back to life. So these Bastards that kept getting in my way to prevent my appearing at my own property and not being a POW still remain to be tedious. Just so you know, they killed a 12 year old girl last week in order to rape her so they arent made fun of how they can't perform quality sex. Since 2003, sex with a non soulmate is dull, boring and ugh gross. But these idiots don't realize that.

So they killed a 31 year old virgin and a 6 year old crippled child whom could barely walk. Its true she was on the Plane ladder because I taught her due to her disability and crippleness her super skill is to climb ladders because its less pain for her compared to our flat foot selves

She had been locked in a cage and starved and beaten and abused. And her way of sitting in that small space crippled her back and legs and feet and especially ankles.

She had been exercising in my personal bathtub and swimming pool to maximize her strength and ability to move distances greater than 4 feet without pain.

She worked diligently and as much as possible and was able to walk 16 feet on flat foot then walk 24 feet on tip toe and rest then walk 6 to 7 feet flat foot then stop. With minimal pain.

Due to her happiness and flexing her ankles ih the water for 3 to 6 or 8 hours per day.

She worked hard and got ecperiabce to gain health. And she was climbing that ladder of the plane to kill the people up there as they were the same type of people whom abused her. And were friends with them.

And they grabbed her by her neck and threw her 75 feet to the ground.

And so Clay climbed up, not in order to kill but just ask why they were there. He knew i would need to know in order to handle the situation.

And they just threw him down and broke his wrist in a way it was crumbled bones. Then not realizing it was broke. It was unhealed after he was back to life.

And it was extra painful. So don't think they both won't kill now.

He was in 7 to 8 hours of extreme pain and he was of harmless intent, trying to find the solution.

I gave a 6 year old child a revolver in order to protect herself. And she did. We were able to heal her better than the other healing methods we used due to her death.

That doesn't make it fine that they had the nerve to do that shit.

Im just better than they are. I keep warning you ass holes you need to be good in ACTION not by acting.

You don't you'll die.

Again as I said if you're not invited to my personal property including what APPEARS to be a business, you will be a trespasser with violent offence and die.

Im not playing. So Bobby and Edward were murdered for murdering both a pissed off child and a concerned man.

So y'all need to fuck off. Jesse and Alex are presumed to be still looking for Annabelle.

As they kidnapped Annabelle as an infant due ti my having twins. I do have my other daughter, Annabelle's twin safe.

Josie is still in an unknown location and Jesse, Alex and several others are attempting to find her And Annabelle.

Snoop was also a hostile take over but he was my friend. However he was killed by Bobby. And so yes i have friends that are illegal alien. But there is a REAL SNOOP. Out there. That looks like young snoop and less bug eyed.

Smooth, sweet skin and a smooth grace. Still tiny though like his old body. But not old. He was sent to Saturn from TSJ.

We became quality friends before we moved. He went to Venus to help the transition of the rescue pods but they beat him and so i had to go. Because i don't put up with that shit. And so then i took him in as well, not recognizing him due to his swollen facial features from bruising. And he became our Venus representative while sending Data to Saturn from me in order to help Save Saturn. They finished their exponents in 1989, they last was begun and completed in early 1990 due to an experience with Michael Jackson.

Then Jupiter finished.

But also we willingly took the opposite of their good to see the bad in small controlled experiments in order to help. Small traditional studies in the 1960's, and our research allowed them to succeed faster...

Unfortunately this lazy bitch from Uranus kept sending her ass holes here. And so we are in year 81 of trying to fix all supreme galaxies and planets with life.

So we will.

This bitch died by severe torture from the Galaxy Council and Echinecea took over with my life model. And so upon completion we get a ring and a moon. So Uranus has a ring, 4 of them. And i have a tatto of it and irs rings. It is the only planet i have a tattoo of

Its because i fixed it, with my heart and my life experiences, and so with only mine alone its saved 54 galaxies from incompletion.

Now they ain't got that swirl like Jupiter or Saturn because its simply my model and not a combo of theirs and ours. Like Saturn and Jupiter.

Our rings will be a figure 8 around our moon and Earth and then we will gain a moon as i posted yesterday that is being shielded and held by Jupiter inside their ring set and it is the color of my eyes from TSJ.

Mostly i have brown because i just want to kill people and bury them in the dirt, otherwise they're green because id rather bury them in the sea aka good things. Drown them in the spirit of love.

So adding pink is the sunset and sunrise... Truly i do want to live another day.

It hasn't been pink in a long time, so. Sont think I sont think y'all suicidal. If i want to play dumb.

Alright snot heads..

I sent Alex a series of maps. There is new information for them.

Trump get on that monthly stipend..

We need it to keep your people alive.

[laurelkrugerr]

Bringing You The Best Of Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

What’s new at Smashing? When’s the next event? Did you miss out on anything? Don’t worry, you’ll find everything gathered here in one place so you don’t need to have a hundred tabs open. (Yes, it has been that busy!)

Well, I guess we can all agree that this year has been quite something. We’ve all been challenged in one way or the other, and the new normal is not quite the old normal. Still, the overriding emphasis remains on safety and everyone’s wellbeing, as well as the importance on sharing thoughts and feelings on creative wellness within the community.

Unfortunately, the effects of COVID-19 are still so wide-reaching throughout the world, so that the Smashing team has had to make big changes to our plans this year. As Rachel Andrew, editor-of-chief of Smashing Magazine, nicely puts it:

“The pandemic has made life unpredictable and scary for many people. At Smashing, we’ve had to very quickly figure out new ways of delivering great content — in a way that supports the business but also our speakers and workshop leaders. We have been encouraged by the enthusiasm from the community, the messages of support, and the willingness to try these new formats.”

On that note, we have decided to take all 2020 dates online. We hope to see you there!

We’re able to do these all these wonderful things because of your support, and we truly and sincerely appreciate it.

Interactive Workshops To Help You Boost Your Skills

With online workshops, we aim to give you the same experience and access to experts as in an in-person workshop, without needing to leave your desk. So you can learn at your own pace, in your own time, and follow interactive exercises along the way.

We’ve done our best to provide you with a mix of both design- and frontend-related workshops:

Attending a Smashing online event means that you’ll be taking part in live sessions, Q&As, discussion zones, challenges, and so much more! See all schedules and events →

Sit Back, Relax, And Tune In!

The Smashing Podcast is the perfect way to take a little bit of Smashing along with you on your morning commute, when working out at the gym, or just washing the dishes. Every two weeks, Drew McLellan talks to design and development experts about their work on the web. You can subscribe in your favorite app to get new episodes as soon as they’re ready.

Is there a topic that you’d love to hear and learn more about? Or perhaps you or someone you know would like to talk about a web- and design-related topic that is dear to your hearts? We’d love to hear from you! Feel free to reach out to us on Twitter and we’ll do our best to get back to you as soon as possible.

Catching up with what’s new in the web industry doesn’t mean you have to be tied up to a chair and desk! Do as Topple the Cat does it: grab your headphones and stretch those legs! You can subscribe and tune in anytime with any of your favorite apps.

Our Most Recent Addition To The Smashing Bookshelf

We shipped the first copies of Click! How to Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks a few weeks ago, and if you pre-ordered a copy of the book, you must have received a personal note from the author himself, Paul Boag. It was fun to follow the reactions pop up on social media — Ari Stiles shared some tweets in her recent post.

Click! comes along at a time when many of us need a creative “nudge.” The book inspires us to think differently about our routines for building online sites and services—what works, and what doesn’t. You can jump to the table of contents, or if you’d like to take a peek first, you can download a free PDF excerpt right away (17.3 MB). Happy reading!

Print + eBook

$ 39.00 Get Print + eBook

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee.

eBook

$ 19.00

Free! Get the eBook

DRM-free, of course. ePUB, Kindle, PDF. Included with Smashing Membership.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

As you may already know, we aim to publish a new article every single day that is dedicated to various topics current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers enjoyed most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Free Fonts With Personality

Typography is a powerful communication tool, a way to express ideas, and a trigger for creativity. Based on this understanding, the Argentinian-based type foundry Rostype creates fonts that are free to use for anyone, in personal and commercial projects.

There are currently 15 fonts available, and each one of them shines with a unique personality. Some are designed with a special focus on readability, others are the perfect display typefaces, made to stand out, some are retro-inspired, others more futuristic and dynamic. There’s even a typeface inspired by the coronavirus lockdown. A treasure chest if you’re looking for a typeface that is a bit more distinctive.

The Making Of A Typeface

It’s always insightful to sneak a peek behind the scenes of how other design teams work and think. Chris Bettig, Design Director at YouTube, now shares an interesting case study on how he and his team created YouTube Sans, a tailor-made font that doubles as a brand ambassador.

Before the new typeface made its appearance, YouTube used the iconic play button and a modified version of Alternate Gothic for the wordmark. However, as Chris Bettig explains, there was no clear typographical guidance. Designed to work across the entire range of YouTube’s products and reflecting the platform’s worldview as well as the community of creators who use it, YouTube Sans changed that. For more insights into how the font came to life and the challenges the design team faced along the way, be sure to check out the case study.

Dealing With Browser Font Rendering Inconsistencies

We all know those moments when a bug literally bugs us but we can’t seem to figure out how to solve it. Stephanie Stimac recently came across such an issue: When she opened her personal website in Safari, she noticed how drastically different the title of her page was rendering compared to other browsers. It appeared much bolder than expected.

To find the reason for these rendering inconsistencies, Stephanie started to dissect differences between the user agent style sheet and the computed CSS properties and soon found herself far down the rabbit hole, comparing the confusing behavior with Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. There’s no simple answer to the question which browser is actually handling the styling correctly, but after running a number of tests, Stephanie found out how to prevent the browser from deciding how to bold font-weights: you need to explicitly define the font weight with numerical values. A small detail that makes a significant difference.

Continuous Performance Measurements Made Easy

When launching a website, it’s common to run performance tests to ensure the site is fast and follows best practices. But how do we keep it fast as soon as deploys are happening every day? Speedlify is Zach Leatherman’s answer to this question.

Speedlify is a static site published as an open-source repository that uses Lighthouse and Axe to continuously measure performance and publish the performance statistics — at most once an hour and automatically once a day. You can run it manually, locally on your computer and check in the data to your repo, or, if you’re using Netlify, it can run entirely self-contained. A great way to keep performance always in sight.

The Anatomy Of A Push Notification

Push notifications were first introduced on iOS back in 2009, web push followed five years later. Today, they are supported across a lot of platforms and browsers — from iOS and Android to Amazon Echo, Windows, Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, and more. Each one of these platforms is a bit different, though, making it complicated for designers to wrap their heads around what exactly goes into a push notification.

A useful reminder comes from Lee Munroe. He summarized how many lines of text you need on which platform, requirements for images, if there are character restrictions, and other details that can be hard to remember. The overview also comes in handy to assess what your notification will look like on operating systems you don’t have access to. One for the bookmarks.

Editing Keyframe Animations Live

When you’re creating animations, it’s always helpful to see the animation in action as you tweak it. Unfortunately, that also involves a lot of switching back and forth between your text editor and the browser. Mitch Samuels was tired of doing that, so he built a tool to save him time: Keyframes.app.

The tool lets you create a CSS keyframe animation with a visual timeline editor. You can add steps to a timeline, use the simple UI to adjust the CSS properties you want your target element to have at each step, and the animated preview will update live. Once you’re happy with the result, you can copy the CSS and use it in your project right away. Keyframe.app is also available as a Chrome extension. A real timesaver.

Determining The Best Build Tool For Your Project

Build tools aim to make the lives of developers easier by streamlining workflows and codifying best practices. However, picking the right build tool for a project can be a challenge. To help you make a more informed decision, folks from the Google Chrome developer relations team built Tooling.Report.

Based on a suite of tests to assess how well a build tool adheres to best practices, Tooling.Report gives you an overview of various bundlers and the features they support. It’s not only a quick way to determine the best tool for a project but also a reference for incorporating best practices into existing codebases — with the long-term goal of improving all build tools and, thus, the health of the web.

Turning A Flat Image Into A Folded Poster

Some coding experiments leave even the most experienced developers in awe. And even if it’s something you won’t be using every day, it’s always inspiring to see fellow developers think outside the box and explore what’s possible with web technologies. The folded poster effect that Lynn Fisher created with pure CSS is such an experiment.

With a bit of CSS, Lynn makes your average image look like a folded poster. With paper creases running over the image horizontally and vertically and a background shadow that gives the poster a 3D effect. A cool little project that beautifully shows what can be achieved with CSS.

Striking A Balance Between Native And Custom Select Elements

How do you build a styled select element that is not only styled on the outside but on the inside, too? In her article “Striking a Balance Between Native and Custom Select Elements”, Sandrina Pereira shares her attempt to create a good-looking, accessible select that benefits from as many native features as possible.

The idea is to make the select “hybrid”, which means that it’s both a native <select> and a styled alternate select in one design pattern. Users of assistive technology will get a native <select> element, but when a mouse is being used, the approach relies on a styled version that is made to function as a select element. Clever!

Hybrid Positioning With CSS Variables And max()

Some ideas require you to think outside the box and explore new paths to make them happen. Imagine this example: You want to have a page navigation on the side, right under the header when it’s scrolled all the way to the top. It is supposed to scroll with the page when the header is out of view and stay at the top for the rest of the scrolling. That’s exactly what Lea Verou wanted to achieve in a recent project.

You might say, that’s a case of position: sticky, but there’s a more finely-tuned approach to getting the job done, as Lea shows. Without any JavaScript. Her solution relies on CSS variables and the new max() function that lets you apply min/max constraints to CSS properties. A fallback helps in browsers that don’t support max() yet. Clever!

Stories From The Dark Side Of The Web

Hackers, data breaches, shadow government activities, cybercrime, hacktivism — a lot is going on on the dark side of the web. But who are the people behind these activities? And what’s their “mission”? Jack Rhysider dedicated a podcast to the stories that happen on the hidden parts of the network: Darknet Diaries.

No matter if it’s the story of a gambler who finds a bug in a video poker machine that lets him win excessive amounts of money, the story of a penetration tester breaking into buildings, or a nation state hacking into a company within another nation, the Darknet Diaries is full of gripping insights into a secret world. The podcast adheres to journalistic standards by fact-checking and ethical sourcing of information, and while all of this is great entertainment, it also aims at explaining the culture around cybersecurity to make listeners more responsive, informed citizens of their digital lives. Be sure to tune in.

(cm, vf, ra)

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[riichardwilson]

Bringing You The Best Of Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

What’s new at Smashing? When’s the next event? Did you miss out on anything? Don’t worry, you’ll find everything gathered here in one place so you don’t need to have a hundred tabs open. (Yes, it has been that busy!)

Well, I guess we can all agree that this year has been quite something. We’ve all been challenged in one way or the other, and the new normal is not quite the old normal. Still, the overriding emphasis remains on safety and everyone’s wellbeing, as well as the importance on sharing thoughts and feelings on creative wellness within the community.

Unfortunately, the effects of COVID-19 are still so wide-reaching throughout the world, so that the Smashing team has had to make big changes to our plans this year. As Rachel Andrew, editor-of-chief of Smashing Magazine, nicely puts it:

“The pandemic has made life unpredictable and scary for many people. At Smashing, we’ve had to very quickly figure out new ways of delivering great content — in a way that supports the business but also our speakers and workshop leaders. We have been encouraged by the enthusiasm from the community, the messages of support, and the willingness to try these new formats.”

On that note, we have decided to take all 2020 dates online. We hope to see you there!

We’re able to do these all these wonderful things because of your support, and we truly and sincerely appreciate it.

Interactive Workshops To Help You Boost Your Skills

With online workshops, we aim to give you the same experience and access to experts as in an in-person workshop, without needing to leave your desk. So you can learn at your own pace, in your own time, and follow interactive exercises along the way.

We’ve done our best to provide you with a mix of both design- and frontend-related workshops:

Attending a Smashing online event means that you’ll be taking part in live sessions, Q&As, discussion zones, challenges, and so much more! See all schedules and events →

Sit Back, Relax, And Tune In!

The Smashing Podcast is the perfect way to take a little bit of Smashing along with you on your morning commute, when working out at the gym, or just washing the dishes. Every two weeks, Drew McLellan talks to design and development experts about their work on the web. You can subscribe in your favorite app to get new episodes as soon as they’re ready.

Is there a topic that you’d love to hear and learn more about? Or perhaps you or someone you know would like to talk about a web- and design-related topic that is dear to your hearts? We’d love to hear from you! Feel free to reach out to us on Twitter and we’ll do our best to get back to you as soon as possible.

Catching up with what’s new in the web industry doesn’t mean you have to be tied up to a chair and desk! Do as Topple the Cat does it: grab your headphones and stretch those legs! You can subscribe and tune in anytime with any of your favorite apps.

Our Most Recent Addition To The Smashing Bookshelf

We shipped the first copies of Click! How to Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks a few weeks ago, and if you pre-ordered a copy of the book, you must have received a personal note from the author himself, Paul Boag. It was fun to follow the reactions pop up on social media — Ari Stiles shared some tweets in her recent post.

Click! comes along at a time when many of us need a creative “nudge.” The book inspires us to think differently about our routines for building online sites and services—what works, and what doesn’t. You can jump to the table of contents, or if you’d like to take a peek first, you can download a free PDF excerpt right away (17.3 MB). Happy reading!

Print + eBook

$ 39.00 Get Print + eBook

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee.

eBook

$ 19.00

Free! Get the eBook

DRM-free, of course. ePUB, Kindle, PDF. Included with Smashing Membership.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

As you may already know, we aim to publish a new article every single day that is dedicated to various topics current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers enjoyed most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Free Fonts With Personality

Typography is a powerful communication tool, a way to express ideas, and a trigger for creativity. Based on this understanding, the Argentinian-based type foundry Rostype creates fonts that are free to use for anyone, in personal and commercial projects.

There are currently 15 fonts available, and each one of them shines with a unique personality. Some are designed with a special focus on readability, others are the perfect display typefaces, made to stand out, some are retro-inspired, others more futuristic and dynamic. There’s even a typeface inspired by the coronavirus lockdown. A treasure chest if you’re looking for a typeface that is a bit more distinctive.

The Making Of A Typeface

It’s always insightful to sneak a peek behind the scenes of how other design teams work and think. Chris Bettig, Design Director at YouTube, now shares an interesting case study on how he and his team created YouTube Sans, a tailor-made font that doubles as a brand ambassador.

Before the new typeface made its appearance, YouTube used the iconic play button and a modified version of Alternate Gothic for the wordmark. However, as Chris Bettig explains, there was no clear typographical guidance. Designed to work across the entire range of YouTube’s products and reflecting the platform’s worldview as well as the community of creators who use it, YouTube Sans changed that. For more insights into how the font came to life and the challenges the design team faced along the way, be sure to check out the case study.

Dealing With Browser Font Rendering Inconsistencies

We all know those moments when a bug literally bugs us but we can’t seem to figure out how to solve it. Stephanie Stimac recently came across such an issue: When she opened her personal website in Safari, she noticed how drastically different the title of her page was rendering compared to other browsers. It appeared much bolder than expected.

To find the reason for these rendering inconsistencies, Stephanie started to dissect differences between the user agent style sheet and the computed CSS properties and soon found herself far down the rabbit hole, comparing the confusing behavior with Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. There’s no simple answer to the question which browser is actually handling the styling correctly, but after running a number of tests, Stephanie found out how to prevent the browser from deciding how to bold font-weights: you need to explicitly define the font weight with numerical values. A small detail that makes a significant difference.

Continuous Performance Measurements Made Easy

When launching a website, it’s common to run performance tests to ensure the site is fast and follows best practices. But how do we keep it fast as soon as deploys are happening every day? Speedlify is Zach Leatherman’s answer to this question.

Speedlify is a static site published as an open-source repository that uses Lighthouse and Axe to continuously measure performance and publish the performance statistics — at most once an hour and automatically once a day. You can run it manually, locally on your computer and check in the data to your repo, or, if you’re using Netlify, it can run entirely self-contained. A great way to keep performance always in sight.

The Anatomy Of A Push Notification

Push notifications were first introduced on iOS back in 2009, web push followed five years later. Today, they are supported across a lot of platforms and browsers — from iOS and Android to Amazon Echo, Windows, Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, and more. Each one of these platforms is a bit different, though, making it complicated for designers to wrap their heads around what exactly goes into a push notification.

A useful reminder comes from Lee Munroe. He summarized how many lines of text you need on which platform, requirements for images, if there are character restrictions, and other details that can be hard to remember. The overview also comes in handy to assess what your notification will look like on operating systems you don’t have access to. One for the bookmarks.

Editing Keyframe Animations Live

When you’re creating animations, it’s always helpful to see the animation in action as you tweak it. Unfortunately, that also involves a lot of switching back and forth between your text editor and the browser. Mitch Samuels was tired of doing that, so he built a tool to save him time: Keyframes.app.

The tool lets you create a CSS keyframe animation with a visual timeline editor. You can add steps to a timeline, use the simple UI to adjust the CSS properties you want your target element to have at each step, and the animated preview will update live. Once you’re happy with the result, you can copy the CSS and use it in your project right away. Keyframe.app is also available as a Chrome extension. A real timesaver.

Determining The Best Build Tool For Your Project

Build tools aim to make the lives of developers easier by streamlining workflows and codifying best practices. However, picking the right build tool for a project can be a challenge. To help you make a more informed decision, folks from the Google Chrome developer relations team built Tooling.Report.

Based on a suite of tests to assess how well a build tool adheres to best practices, Tooling.Report gives you an overview of various bundlers and the features they support. It’s not only a quick way to determine the best tool for a project but also a reference for incorporating best practices into existing codebases — with the long-term goal of improving all build tools and, thus, the health of the web.

Turning A Flat Image Into A Folded Poster

Some coding experiments leave even the most experienced developers in awe. And even if it’s something you won’t be using every day, it’s always inspiring to see fellow developers think outside the box and explore what’s possible with web technologies. The folded poster effect that Lynn Fisher created with pure CSS is such an experiment.

With a bit of CSS, Lynn makes your average image look like a folded poster. With paper creases running over the image horizontally and vertically and a background shadow that gives the poster a 3D effect. A cool little project that beautifully shows what can be achieved with CSS.

Striking A Balance Between Native And Custom Select Elements

How do you build a styled select element that is not only styled on the outside but on the inside, too? In her article “Striking a Balance Between Native and Custom Select Elements”, Sandrina Pereira shares her attempt to create a good-looking, accessible select that benefits from as many native features as possible.

The idea is to make the select “hybrid”, which means that it’s both a native <select> and a styled alternate select in one design pattern. Users of assistive technology will get a native <select> element, but when a mouse is being used, the approach relies on a styled version that is made to function as a select element. Clever!

Hybrid Positioning With CSS Variables And max()

Some ideas require you to think outside the box and explore new paths to make them happen. Imagine this example: You want to have a page navigation on the side, right under the header when it’s scrolled all the way to the top. It is supposed to scroll with the page when the header is out of view and stay at the top for the rest of the scrolling. That’s exactly what Lea Verou wanted to achieve in a recent project.

You might say, that’s a case of position: sticky, but there’s a more finely-tuned approach to getting the job done, as Lea shows. Without any JavaScript. Her solution relies on CSS variables and the new max() function that lets you apply min/max constraints to CSS properties. A fallback helps in browsers that don’t support max() yet. Clever!

Stories From The Dark Side Of The Web

Hackers, data breaches, shadow government activities, cybercrime, hacktivism — a lot is going on on the dark side of the web. But who are the people behind these activities? And what’s their “mission”? Jack Rhysider dedicated a podcast to the stories that happen on the hidden parts of the network: Darknet Diaries.

No matter if it’s the story of a gambler who finds a bug in a video poker machine that lets him win excessive amounts of money, the story of a penetration tester breaking into buildings, or a nation state hacking into a company within another nation, the Darknet Diaries is full of gripping insights into a secret world. The podcast adheres to journalistic standards by fact-checking and ethical sourcing of information, and while all of this is great entertainment, it also aims at explaining the culture around cybersecurity to make listeners more responsive, informed citizens of their digital lives. Be sure to tune in.

(cm, vf, ra)

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Delray Beach SEO

source http://www.scpie.org/bringing-you-the-best-of-smashing/ source https://scpie.tumblr.com/post/623913047824728064

[scpie]

Bringing You The Best Of Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

What’s new at Smashing? When’s the next event? Did you miss out on anything? Don’t worry, you’ll find everything gathered here in one place so you don’t need to have a hundred tabs open. (Yes, it has been that busy!)

Well, I guess we can all agree that this year has been quite something. We’ve all been challenged in one way or the other, and the new normal is not quite the old normal. Still, the overriding emphasis remains on safety and everyone’s wellbeing, as well as the importance on sharing thoughts and feelings on creative wellness within the community.

Unfortunately, the effects of COVID-19 are still so wide-reaching throughout the world, so that the Smashing team has had to make big changes to our plans this year. As Rachel Andrew, editor-of-chief of Smashing Magazine, nicely puts it:

“The pandemic has made life unpredictable and scary for many people. At Smashing, we’ve had to very quickly figure out new ways of delivering great content — in a way that supports the business but also our speakers and workshop leaders. We have been encouraged by the enthusiasm from the community, the messages of support, and the willingness to try these new formats.”

On that note, we have decided to take all 2020 dates online. We hope to see you there!

We’re able to do these all these wonderful things because of your support, and we truly and sincerely appreciate it.

Interactive Workshops To Help You Boost Your Skills

With online workshops, we aim to give you the same experience and access to experts as in an in-person workshop, without needing to leave your desk. So you can learn at your own pace, in your own time, and follow interactive exercises along the way.

We’ve done our best to provide you with a mix of both design- and frontend-related workshops:

Attending a Smashing online event means that you’ll be taking part in live sessions, Q&As, discussion zones, challenges, and so much more! See all schedules and events →

Sit Back, Relax, And Tune In!

The Smashing Podcast is the perfect way to take a little bit of Smashing along with you on your morning commute, when working out at the gym, or just washing the dishes. Every two weeks, Drew McLellan talks to design and development experts about their work on the web. You can subscribe in your favorite app to get new episodes as soon as they’re ready.

Is there a topic that you’d love to hear and learn more about? Or perhaps you or someone you know would like to talk about a web- and design-related topic that is dear to your hearts? We’d love to hear from you! Feel free to reach out to us on Twitter and we’ll do our best to get back to you as soon as possible.

Catching up with what’s new in the web industry doesn’t mean you have to be tied up to a chair and desk! Do as Topple the Cat does it: grab your headphones and stretch those legs! You can subscribe and tune in anytime with any of your favorite apps.

Our Most Recent Addition To The Smashing Bookshelf

We shipped the first copies of Click! How to Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks a few weeks ago, and if you pre-ordered a copy of the book, you must have received a personal note from the author himself, Paul Boag. It was fun to follow the reactions pop up on social media — Ari Stiles shared some tweets in her recent post.

Click! comes along at a time when many of us need a creative “nudge.” The book inspires us to think differently about our routines for building online sites and services—what works, and what doesn’t. You can jump to the table of contents, or if you’d like to take a peek first, you can download a free PDF excerpt right away (17.3 MB). Happy reading!

Print + eBook

$ 39.00 Get Print + eBook

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee.

eBook

$ 19.00

Free! Get the eBook

DRM-free, of course. ePUB, Kindle, PDF. Included with Smashing Membership.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

As you may already know, we aim to publish a new article every single day that is dedicated to various topics current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers enjoyed most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Free Fonts With Personality

Typography is a powerful communication tool, a way to express ideas, and a trigger for creativity. Based on this understanding, the Argentinian-based type foundry Rostype creates fonts that are free to use for anyone, in personal and commercial projects.

There are currently 15 fonts available, and each one of them shines with a unique personality. Some are designed with a special focus on readability, others are the perfect display typefaces, made to stand out, some are retro-inspired, others more futuristic and dynamic. There’s even a typeface inspired by the coronavirus lockdown. A treasure chest if you’re looking for a typeface that is a bit more distinctive.

The Making Of A Typeface

It’s always insightful to sneak a peek behind the scenes of how other design teams work and think. Chris Bettig, Design Director at YouTube, now shares an interesting case study on how he and his team created YouTube Sans, a tailor-made font that doubles as a brand ambassador.

Before the new typeface made its appearance, YouTube used the iconic play button and a modified version of Alternate Gothic for the wordmark. However, as Chris Bettig explains, there was no clear typographical guidance. Designed to work across the entire range of YouTube’s products and reflecting the platform’s worldview as well as the community of creators who use it, YouTube Sans changed that. For more insights into how the font came to life and the challenges the design team faced along the way, be sure to check out the case study.

Dealing With Browser Font Rendering Inconsistencies

We all know those moments when a bug literally bugs us but we can’t seem to figure out how to solve it. Stephanie Stimac recently came across such an issue: When she opened her personal website in Safari, she noticed how drastically different the title of her page was rendering compared to other browsers. It appeared much bolder than expected.

To find the reason for these rendering inconsistencies, Stephanie started to dissect differences between the user agent style sheet and the computed CSS properties and soon found herself far down the rabbit hole, comparing the confusing behavior with Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. There’s no simple answer to the question which browser is actually handling the styling correctly, but after running a number of tests, Stephanie found out how to prevent the browser from deciding how to bold font-weights: you need to explicitly define the font weight with numerical values. A small detail that makes a significant difference.

Continuous Performance Measurements Made Easy

When launching a website, it’s common to run performance tests to ensure the site is fast and follows best practices. But how do we keep it fast as soon as deploys are happening every day? Speedlify is Zach Leatherman’s answer to this question.

Speedlify is a static site published as an open-source repository that uses Lighthouse and Axe to continuously measure performance and publish the performance statistics — at most once an hour and automatically once a day. You can run it manually, locally on your computer and check in the data to your repo, or, if you’re using Netlify, it can run entirely self-contained. A great way to keep performance always in sight.

The Anatomy Of A Push Notification

Push notifications were first introduced on iOS back in 2009, web push followed five years later. Today, they are supported across a lot of platforms and browsers — from iOS and Android to Amazon Echo, Windows, Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, and more. Each one of these platforms is a bit different, though, making it complicated for designers to wrap their heads around what exactly goes into a push notification.

A useful reminder comes from Lee Munroe. He summarized how many lines of text you need on which platform, requirements for images, if there are character restrictions, and other details that can be hard to remember. The overview also comes in handy to assess what your notification will look like on operating systems you don’t have access to. One for the bookmarks.

Editing Keyframe Animations Live

When you’re creating animations, it’s always helpful to see the animation in action as you tweak it. Unfortunately, that also involves a lot of switching back and forth between your text editor and the browser. Mitch Samuels was tired of doing that, so he built a tool to save him time: Keyframes.app.

The tool lets you create a CSS keyframe animation with a visual timeline editor. You can add steps to a timeline, use the simple UI to adjust the CSS properties you want your target element to have at each step, and the animated preview will update live. Once you’re happy with the result, you can copy the CSS and use it in your project right away. Keyframe.app is also available as a Chrome extension. A real timesaver.

Determining The Best Build Tool For Your Project

Build tools aim to make the lives of developers easier by streamlining workflows and codifying best practices. However, picking the right build tool for a project can be a challenge. To help you make a more informed decision, folks from the Google Chrome developer relations team built Tooling.Report.

Based on a suite of tests to assess how well a build tool adheres to best practices, Tooling.Report gives you an overview of various bundlers and the features they support. It’s not only a quick way to determine the best tool for a project but also a reference for incorporating best practices into existing codebases — with the long-term goal of improving all build tools and, thus, the health of the web.

Turning A Flat Image Into A Folded Poster

Some coding experiments leave even the most experienced developers in awe. And even if it’s something you won’t be using every day, it’s always inspiring to see fellow developers think outside the box and explore what’s possible with web technologies. The folded poster effect that Lynn Fisher created with pure CSS is such an experiment.

With a bit of CSS, Lynn makes your average image look like a folded poster. With paper creases running over the image horizontally and vertically and a background shadow that gives the poster a 3D effect. A cool little project that beautifully shows what can be achieved with CSS.

Striking A Balance Between Native And Custom Select Elements

How do you build a styled select element that is not only styled on the outside but on the inside, too? In her article “Striking a Balance Between Native and Custom Select Elements”, Sandrina Pereira shares her attempt to create a good-looking, accessible select that benefits from as many native features as possible.

The idea is to make the select “hybrid”, which means that it’s both a native <select> and a styled alternate select in one design pattern. Users of assistive technology will get a native <select> element, but when a mouse is being used, the approach relies on a styled version that is made to function as a select element. Clever!

Hybrid Positioning With CSS Variables And max()

Some ideas require you to think outside the box and explore new paths to make them happen. Imagine this example: You want to have a page navigation on the side, right under the header when it’s scrolled all the way to the top. It is supposed to scroll with the page when the header is out of view and stay at the top for the rest of the scrolling. That’s exactly what Lea Verou wanted to achieve in a recent project.

You might say, that’s a case of position: sticky, but there’s a more finely-tuned approach to getting the job done, as Lea shows. Without any JavaScript. Her solution relies on CSS variables and the new max() function that lets you apply min/max constraints to CSS properties. A fallback helps in browsers that don’t support max() yet. Clever!

Stories From The Dark Side Of The Web

Hackers, data breaches, shadow government activities, cybercrime, hacktivism — a lot is going on on the dark side of the web. But who are the people behind these activities? And what’s their “mission”? Jack Rhysider dedicated a podcast to the stories that happen on the hidden parts of the network: Darknet Diaries.

No matter if it’s the story of a gambler who finds a bug in a video poker machine that lets him win excessive amounts of money, the story of a penetration tester breaking into buildings, or a nation state hacking into a company within another nation, the Darknet Diaries is full of gripping insights into a secret world. The podcast adheres to journalistic standards by fact-checking and ethical sourcing of information, and while all of this is great entertainment, it also aims at explaining the culture around cybersecurity to make listeners more responsive, informed citizens of their digital lives. Be sure to tune in.

(cm, vf, ra)

Website Design & SEO Delray Beach by DBL07.co

Delray Beach SEO

source http://www.scpie.org/bringing-you-the-best-of-smashing/

[manuelclapid]

Richard P Christopher N1LT

Richard P. Christopher N1LT

Dick Christopher was a good friend of mine. He was sent back to Heaven on February 23, 2020. I met Dick in the late summer of 2011 when I re-immersed myself into the world of amateur radio. It turns out Dick was the founder of the Central New Hampshire Amateur Radio Club (CNHARC). He welcomed me with open arms to the first meeting I attended in July of 2011.

The morning I discovered Dick  was no longer with us, I was overcome with a feeling of sadness. I found myself wishing I had spent more time with him or had even called to reminisce about great past times.

That sadness only increased several days later when another radio buddy sent me a link to Dick’s online obituary. Here it is: https://www.currentobituary.com/obit/241131

I’ve made my living the past twenty-three years creating those strings of characters. They’re called URLs. I pay attention to them and was aghast to see that Dick was now reduced to a sterile number at the end of a URL. It’s so easy to put his name there in front of the unique number, but alas the webmaster thought otherwise. 

Dick was more than number 241131. My anguish deepened as I read his obituary. It included a brief description of Dick’s work and his interests but it failed to capture who Dick Christopher was. 

I decided that Dick deserved better. You need to know the Dick Christopher who I knew and came to appreciate.

Still Waters

Dick was quiet and reserved, like a remote woodland pond on a wind-free day but his understanding of what was going on and how things worked was as deep as the ocean. 

If you asked Dick a question, he almost always had the answer. When you did stump him, he knew where to send you for the answer. He never made you feel inferior because of your lack of knowledge. He must have been a fantastic mentor when he taught high school physics and math. Dick was smart but he never needed to boast or make anyone feel inferior.

A Tough Negotiator

One of my fondest memories of Dick was early in our relationship. He fostered countless people who wanted to immerse themselves in amateur radio. Within a month of meeting me, he could tell my appetite for all things radio was bigger than the Goodyear Blimp.

Dick knew that the real fun and satisfaction in amateur radio happens on the high-frequency bands. To play radio here, you need a class of license that I didn’t have. My license gave me only the lowest level of radio privileges. A few months after meeting Dick, he called me. The call was extremely brief and to the point, but that was Dick’s personality. He was never a chatterbox on the phone or in person.

“Tim, it’s time for you to upgrade your license.”

“Oh, Dick, yes, I plan to do that soon.”

“I don’t think you understand me. I mean it’s time right now, in the next two weeks, to upgrade your license.” Dick’s voice was monotone but firm.

“Well, I want to understand all that’s involved and I’ve been studying the big book with all the information and questions. I think I’ll be ready to take the test in a few months.”

“No. You’re going to take the test, pass it, and once you have the new privileges you’ll learn much faster than by reading that book. Tell me now if you’re going to be at the test session before the next club meeting in two weeks.”

He was serious. The question pool for that exam has hundreds of questions. Many are quite technical. I was stammering and gulping because I knew he wasn’t going to hang up until I committed to being at the testing session.

“Okay, I’ll be there.”

“Good. Bring $15 and a copy of your current license.” And with that Dick hung up the phone.

I started to use an online study aid. I sat for the exam. You needed to get 27 of 35 questions correct to pass. I got 33 out of 35 and completed the test in about 20 minutes if memory serves me right. As you might imagine, Dick seemed even happier than I was that I had passed and was now a new General-class amateur radio operator.

Dick was right about high-frequency bands. The real fun of amateur radio happens when you can communicate with others thousands of miles away using a tiny box about the size of a paperback book and a thin wire dangling from a tree.

One day Dick and I went with a shared friend, Jim Cluett, to Cannon Mountain to operate outdoors on a late summer day. There are some splendid photos and quotes of Dick’s in this story. I recommend you read it.

Field Day

One event that Dick really loved was the annual Field Day that thousands of radio operators take part in all across the USA. It’s a 24-hour exercise where you’re encouraged to simulate an emergency of sorts and get on the radio outdoors if at all possible. You’re testing your capability to continue to operate using batteries or a portable generator while  dealing with bugs, the sun, wind and storms. It’s more of a challenge than you may think.

Here's a video of Dick talking about Field Day.

 As the founder of the CNHARC, Dick helped organize Field Day for years. He shared stories of past Field Days decades ago when many club members participated and were active the full 24 hours. It’s hard to say whether Dick loved radio or gardening more.

Giant Tomatoes

Dick was a master gardener. He had an amazing array of raised beds where he grew vegetables that could win the blue ribbon at one of the many late summer or fall fairs here in New Hampshire.

When I’d visit Dick in mid-summer, he’d take enormous pride in showing me all of his plants. He was happy to answer all of my questions. I happen to be a horrible gardener and marveled at Dick’s green thumb. He made it look so easy, yet I knew he devoted countless hours of work to cultivate and care for all those wonderful plants.

Sailing

Dick was an avid sailor and loved spending time on the water. He was a member of the prestigious Winnipesaukee Yacht Club and he owned a very nice 25-foot sailboat.

I was fortunate to be invited to sail with Dick at least twice. Both times our mutual friend, Jim Cluett, came along.

One thing that always amused me was Dick’s distaste of spiders. When you rowed out in the dinghy to get to the sailboat, you had to deal with the fabric weather covers that protect the cockpit from the elements.

Dick always asked Jim or me to peel back the covers and whisk any spiders we saw into the water. I did as requested and never said a word because I knew that if there were serpents in the sailboat, I’d never get out of the dingy.

Priceless Interviews

Do you want to come to know and respect the Dick Christopher I knew? I hope so.

I’ll never regret investing the time it took to create these short video interviews with Dick. What a treasure it is to be able to see and hear him! Maybe they’ll inspire you to record a 60-Minutes style video of a person in your life who you want to be able to remember in “real-time”. Dick Christopher was that person for me. 

The post Richard P Christopher N1LT appeared first on Ask the Builder.

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[thegregorybruce]

Richard P Christopher N1LT

Richard P. Christopher N1LT

Dick Christopher was a good friend of mine. He was sent back to Heaven on February 23, 2020. I met Dick in the late summer of 2011 when I re-immersed myself into the world of amateur radio. It turns out Dick was the founder of the Central New Hampshire Amateur Radio Club (CNHARC). He welcomed me with open arms to the first meeting I attended in July of 2011.

The morning I discovered Dick  was no longer with us, I was overcome with a feeling of sadness. I found myself wishing I had spent more time with him or had even called to reminisce about great past times.

That sadness only increased several days later when another radio buddy sent me a link to Dick’s online obituary. Here it is: https://www.currentobituary.com/obit/241131

I’ve made my living the past twenty-three years creating those strings of characters. They’re called URLs. I pay attention to them and was aghast to see that Dick was now reduced to a sterile number at the end of a URL. It’s so easy to put his name there in front of the unique number, but alas the webmaster thought otherwise. 

Dick was more than number 241131. My anguish deepened as I read his obituary. It included a brief description of Dick’s work and his interests but it failed to capture who Dick Christopher was. 

I decided that Dick deserved better. You need to know the Dick Christopher who I knew and came to appreciate.

Still Waters

Dick was quiet and reserved, like a remote woodland pond on a wind-free day but his understanding of what was going on and how things worked was as deep as the ocean. 

If you asked Dick a question, he almost always had the answer. When you did stump him, he knew where to send you for the answer. He never made you feel inferior because of your lack of knowledge. He must have been a fantastic mentor when he taught high school physics and math. Dick was smart but he never needed to boast or make anyone feel inferior.

A Tough Negotiator

One of my fondest memories of Dick was early in our relationship. He fostered countless people who wanted to immerse themselves in amateur radio. Within a month of meeting me, he could tell my appetite for all things radio was bigger than the Goodyear Blimp.

Dick knew that the real fun and satisfaction in amateur radio happens on the high-frequency bands. To play radio here, you need a class of license that I didn’t have. My license gave me only the lowest level of radio privileges. A few months after meeting Dick, he called me. The call was extremely brief and to the point, but that was Dick’s personality. He was never a chatterbox on the phone or in person.

“Tim, it’s time for you to upgrade your license.”

“Oh, Dick, yes, I plan to do that soon.”

“I don’t think you understand me. I mean it’s time right now, in the next two weeks, to upgrade your license.” Dick’s voice was monotone but firm.

“Well, I want to understand all that’s involved and I’ve been studying the big book with all the information and questions. I think I’ll be ready to take the test in a few months.”

“No. You’re going to take the test, pass it, and once you have the new privileges you’ll learn much faster than by reading that book. Tell me now if you’re going to be at the test session before the next club meeting in two weeks.”

He was serious. The question pool for that exam has hundreds of questions. Many are quite technical. I was stammering and gulping because I knew he wasn’t going to hang up until I committed to being at the testing session.

“Okay, I’ll be there.”

“Good. Bring $15 and a copy of your current license.” And with that Dick hung up the phone.

I started to use an online study aid. I sat for the exam. You needed to get 27 of 35 questions correct to pass. I got 33 out of 35 and completed the test in about 20 minutes if memory serves me right. As you might imagine, Dick seemed even happier than I was that I had passed and was now a new General-class amateur radio operator.

Dick was right about high-frequency bands. The real fun of amateur radio happens when you can communicate with others thousands of miles away using a tiny box about the size of a paperback book and a thin wire dangling from a tree.

One day Dick and I went with a shared friend, Jim Cluett, to Cannon Mountain to operate outdoors on a late summer day. There are some splendid photos and quotes of Dick’s in this story. I recommend you read it.

Field Day

One event that Dick really loved was the annual Field Day that thousands of radio operators take part in all across the USA. It’s a 24-hour exercise where you’re encouraged to simulate an emergency of sorts and get on the radio outdoors if at all possible. You’re testing your capability to continue to operate using batteries or a portable generator while  dealing with bugs, the sun, wind and storms. It’s more of a challenge than you may think.

Here's a video of Dick talking about Field Day.

 As the founder of the CNHARC, Dick helped organize Field Day for years. He shared stories of past Field Days decades ago when many club members participated and were active the full 24 hours. It’s hard to say whether Dick loved radio or gardening more.

Giant Tomatoes

Dick was a master gardener. He had an amazing array of raised beds where he grew vegetables that could win the blue ribbon at one of the many late summer or fall fairs here in New Hampshire.

When I’d visit Dick in mid-summer, he’d take enormous pride in showing me all of his plants. He was happy to answer all of my questions. I happen to be a horrible gardener and marveled at Dick’s green thumb. He made it look so easy, yet I knew he devoted countless hours of work to cultivate and care for all those wonderful plants.

Sailing

Dick was an avid sailor and loved spending time on the water. He was a member of the prestigious Winnipesaukee Yacht Club and he owned a very nice 25-foot sailboat.

I was fortunate to be invited to sail with Dick at least twice. Both times our mutual friend, Jim Cluett, came along.

One thing that always amused me was Dick’s distaste of spiders. When you rowed out in the dinghy to get to the sailboat, you had to deal with the fabric weather covers that protect the cockpit from the elements.

Dick always asked Jim or me to peel back the covers and whisk any spiders we saw into the water. I did as requested and never said a word because I knew that if there were serpents in the sailboat, I’d never get out of the dingy.

Priceless Interviews

Do you want to come to know and respect the Dick Christopher I knew? I hope so.

I’ll never regret investing the time it took to create these short video interviews with Dick. What a treasure it is to be able to see and hear him! Maybe they’ll inspire you to record a 60-Minutes style video of a person in your life who you want to be able to remember in “real-time”. Dick Christopher was that person for me. 

The post Richard P Christopher N1LT appeared first on Ask the Builder.

from Home https://www.askthebuilder.com/richard-p-christopher-n1lt/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[andrewmawby]

Richard P Christopher N1LT

Richard P. Christopher N1LT

Dick Christopher was a good friend of mine. He was sent back to Heaven on February 23, 2020. I met Dick in the late summer of 2011 when I re-immersed myself into the world of amateur radio. It turns out Dick was the founder of the Central New Hampshire Amateur Radio Club (CNHARC). He welcomed me with open arms to the first meeting I attended in July of 2011.

Dick is on the left and our mutual friend Jim Cluett is on the right. Location: Flume Gorge State Park, NH RIP Dick!

The morning I discovered Dick was no longer with us, I was overcome with a feeling of sadness. I found myself wishing I had spent more time with him or had even called to reminisce about great past times.

That sadness only increased several days later when another radio buddy sent me a link to Dick’s online obituary. Here it is: https://www.currentobituary.com/obit/241131

I’ve made my living the past twenty-three years creating those strings of characters. They’re called URLs. I pay attention to them and was aghast to see that Dick was now reduced to a sterile number at the end of a URL. It’s so easy to put his name there in front of the unique number, but alas the webmaster thought otherwise. Look now up at the top of your browser to see how easy it is to put his name in the URL.

Dick was more than number 241131. Much much more.

My anguish deepened as I read his obituary. It included a brief description of Dick’s work and his interests, but it failed to capture who Dick Christopher was. 

I decided that Dick deserved better. You need to know the Dick Christopher who I knew and came to appreciate.

Still Waters

Dick was quiet and reserved, like a remote woodland pond on a wind-free day but his understanding of what was going on and how things worked was as deep as the ocean. 

If you asked Dick a question, he almost always had the answer. When you did stump him, he knew where to send you for the answer. He never made you feel inferior because of your lack of knowledge. He must have been a fantastic mentor when he taught high school physics and math. Dick was smart but he never needed to boast or make anyone feel inferior.

A Tough Negotiator

One of my fondest memories of Dick was early in our relationship. He fostered countless people who wanted to immerse themselves in amateur radio. Within a month of meeting me, he could tell my appetite for all things radio was bigger than the Goodyear Blimp.

Dick knew that the real fun and satisfaction in amateur radio happens on the high-frequency bands. To play radio here, you need a class of license that I didn’t have. My license at that time only granted me only the lowest level of radio privileges.

A few months after meeting Dick, he called me. The call was extremely brief and to the point, but that was Dick’s personality. He was never a chatterbox on the phone or in person.

“Tim, it’s time for you to upgrade your license.”

“Oh, Dick, yes, I plan to do that soon.”

“I don’t think you understand me. I mean it’s time right now, in the next two weeks, to upgrade your license.” Dick’s voice was monotone but firm.

“Well, I want to understand all that’s involved and I’ve been studying the big book with all the information and questions. I think I’ll be ready to take the test in a few months.”

“No. You’re going to take the test, pass it, and once you have the new privileges you’ll learn much faster than by reading that book. Tell me now if you’re going to be at the test session before the next club meeting in two weeks.”

He was serious. The question pool for that exam has hundreds of questions. Many are quite technical. I was stammering and gulping because I knew he wasn’t going to hang up until I committed to being at the testing session.

“Okay, I’ll be there.”

“Good. Bring $15 and a copy of your current license.” And with that Dick hung up the phone.

I started to use an online study aid. I sat for the exam. You needed to get 27 of 35 questions correct to pass. I got 33 out of 35 and completed the test in about 20 minutes if memory serves me right. As you might imagine, Dick seemed even happier than I was that I had passed and was now a new General-class amateur radio operator.

Dick was right about high-frequency bands. The real fun of amateur radio happens when you can communicate with others thousands of miles away using a tiny box about the size of a paperback book and a thin wire dangling from a tree.

One day Dick and I went with a shared friend, Jim Cluett, to Cannon Mountain to operate outdoors on a late summer day. There are some splendid photos and quotes of Dick’s in this story. I recommend you read it.

Field Day

One event that Dick really loved was the annual Field Day that thousands of radio operators take part in all across the USA. It’s a 24-hour exercise where you’re encouraged to simulate an emergency of sorts and get on the radio outdoors if at all possible. You’re testing your capability to continue to operate using batteries or a portable generator while ,dealing with bugs, the sun, wind, visitors, and storms. It’s more of a challenge than you may think.

Here's a video of Dick talking about Field Day.

Here's the video Dick was talking about when he was younger with the bushy hair:

As the founder of the CNHARC, Dick helped organize Field Day for years. He shared stories of past Field Days decades ago when many club members participated and were active the full 24 hours. It’s hard to say whether Dick loved radio or gardening more.

Giant Tomatoes

Dick was a master gardener. He had an amazing array of raised beds where he grew vegetables that could win the blue ribbon at one of the many late summer or fall fairs here in New Hampshire.

When I’d visit Dick in mid-summer, he’d take enormous pride in showing me all of his plants. He was happy to answer all of my questions. I happen to be a horrible gardener and marveled at Dick’s green thumb. He made it look so easy, yet I knew he devoted countless hours of work to cultivate and care for all those wonderful plants.

Sailing

Dick was an avid sailor and loved spending time on the water. He was a member of the prestigious Winnipesaukee Yacht Club and he owned a very nice 25-foot sailboat.

I was fortunate to be invited to sail with Dick at least twice. Both times our mutual friend, Jim Cluett, came along.

One thing that always amused me was Dick’s distaste of spiders. When you rowed out in the dinghy to get to the sailboat, you had to deal with the fabric weather covers that protect the cockpit from the elements.

Dick always asked Jim or me to peel back the covers and whisk any spiders we saw into the water. I did as requested and never said a word because I knew that if there were serpents in the sailboat, I’d never get out of the dinghy.

Priceless Interviews

Do you want to come to know and respect the Dick Christopher I knew? I hope so.

I’ll never regret investing the time it took to create these short video interviews with Dick. What a treasure it is to be able to see and hear him! Maybe they’ll inspire you to record a 60-Minutes style video of a person in your life who you want to be able to remember in “real-time”.

Dick Christopher was that person for me. 

The post Richard P Christopher N1LT appeared first on Ask the Builder.

from builders feed https://www.askthebuilder.com/richard-p-christopher-n1lt/ via http://www.rssmix.com/