#it’s so ‘written in the literal second week of the server’ energy

[anonymous-dentist]

Real ones remember my first ever qsmp fic being a Roier-centric superhero au in which Spiderman is dead after being killed by semi-immortal anti-hero Agent Oso over a mysterious white dog named Osito Bimbo, but that’s fine. Spiderman is dead, but Roier is alive, and he’s going to fucking kill Agent Oso, and he’s going to use a goddamn gun to do it

[aot-brainrot]

Spartacus ~ Hotchniss x Reader

Written By: @desperately-bisexual​

Request: None.

Warnings: Dom/sub relationships, Sir kink, Mistress kink, dirty talk, oral (male receiving), restraints (handcuffs), edging, orgasm control, orgasm denial, degradation, mild choking, minimal in-chapter aftercare, though it is alluded to happening afterwards. The reader does go by they/them pronouns, however, the team refers to them as female when saying “good girl”, “princess”, etc.

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Nonbinary!Reader (fem anatomy) x Emily Prentiss. (polyamorous triad).

Criminal Minds Discord Server

Aaron had been tense all week. Between work, wrangling Jack, and then still having to find the time and energy to show some attention to me and Emily, it was completely wearing him out. On Friday night, when they had come home from work, I offered to make dinner for us while they went to shower and change into comfortable clothes. After dinner, Emily took Jack up to bed and tucked him in for the night, meanwhile, I sent Hotch up to bed. I didn’t want either of them to have to put any work into anything this weekend— especially Hotch. He deserved a break. I mean, we all did, but he did the most out of the three of us, and I could tell that it was really getting to him. So, my plan was to keep them in bed, or at least the house, for as long as I could. It started with making sure that he went upstairs while I cleaned the dishes and the kitchen.

As I was finishing up, I heard Emily coming down the stairs. I turned, my hands covered in soapy water, pointing back to the stairs, insisting that she let me do this on my own. For once, I just wanted to do something for them and not have one of them argue about it or pull the Dom card in order to make sure I wasn’t alone. Just this once. I wanted to make this weekend about them. That wasn’t too much to ask, right? Yeah, well, Emily didn’t seem to get the memo, because even though I practically ordered her to go back upstairs, she only grinned and then joined me at the sink. She didn’t help me, to be fair. She wrapped her arms around me, rested her chin on my shoulder, and she started nibbling on my earlobe as she watched me wash all of the dishes one by one.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you, too.”

Her hands started wandering, making me tense up and freeze. “Don’t stop.” So, that was how it was going to be. I finally got around to doing chores, and her game was to distract me. What would Aaron say? Truth be told, he’d be proud of me, however, he would scold Emily for getting me worked up on purpose so that I would abandon the task of cleaning up the kitchen. “The sooner you finish, the sooner we can go upstairs.”

“We can’t tonight. He’s tired.”

“No, he’s just stressed. But you know what helps with stress…” Her hand made its way between my thighs, her palm pressing against my clit until I let out a gasp. “I said, don’t stop.” I started washing the dishes faster. “Good girl.” She put her fingers over my clothed clit now in order to add more stimulation, but still not enough to get me anywhere close to the edge. It was barely enough to just tell me that I needed her. “I think I might know a way to make Sir relax… Do you want to know my idea?” I nodded. “Answer me.” Her other hand grabbed my cheeks roughly.

“Yes, Mistress.”

She released my face. “I think that if we teamed up against him, he wouldn’t be able to stop us from finally topping him. I’ve always wanted to, but he’s too damn stubborn about it. But together…” She chuckled wickedly in my ear. “He’d be our little mess.”

I whined slightly in response to her words. I could just picture Aaron writhing underneath us as we pinned and fucked him. Fuck. “He wouldn’t like that.”

“No?”

“No, Mistress.”

“Why not?”

“Because I would be breaking about a thousand rules.”

“Not if we both take the heat for it.” Her fingers pressed harder. “It’s like Spartacus. He can’t punish the both of us.”

Jack’s plastic cup clattered in the sink when I dropped it in order to grab onto the counter and hunch forward. “Fuck.”

“Does that feel too good, baby?” she teased, pulling her hand away from me. I rolled my hips back against her, a silent plea for more, but she didn’t give in. “What do you think about my idea?”

I was literally too fucked to think about anything. Up, down, left, right— none of it mattered until I felt her touch again. If it meant giving into her terrible plan that would only end up with both of us getting punished— something she was sure wouldn’t happen— I would do it just to encourage her to put her hands on me. So, I nodded. “I like it, Mistress.” I left the rest of the dishes for the morning. I turned to face her. “As long as we really do it together. No giving into whatever he says or does.”

Emily grinned. “That’s it, baby girl.” She held my face steady with her index finger and thumb on my chin so that she could kiss me roughly. When I started leaning into her, kissing her back with even more eagerness and excitement, she pulled away. “Come on.” She grabbed my hand before leading me through the house. “Play it smooth. Get into bed with him and try cuddling close enough so that you can grab his hands when I give the signal.”

“What’s the signal?”

“When I come out of the bathroom, I’ll lean over to kiss him, which will distract him. That’s the signal. Just pin his hands and I’ll do the rest.” We approached the second floor of the house. I stopped, tugging at her hand slightly to warn her that I wasn’t taking another step yet. “What is it?” she asked, worried.

I searched her eyes. “I just really fucking love you.”

Her smile returned. “I love you, too.”

With that out of the way, Emily continued to lead me, walking us down the hallway and to our bedroom. As we walked in, she released my hand so that she could go to the bathroom and I could close the door. Aaron was reading a book on our bed. I thought he would have been trying to fall asleep already considering I thought he was exhausted, but Emily told me that she didn’t think he was tired at all, and this was proving it. My hope was that he was still somewhat tired. If he was off his game enough, it would make my job of pinning him down only that much easier. If I failed to do the one thing Emily had tasked me with, this whole mutiny thing was going to come back to bite us in the ass, which I really didn’t need when the whole point was to help Aaron relax for a bit. Losing control did that. The best part about being submissive was that I could just turn off my mind and leave everything up to Emily and Aaron. While Emily was a switch between being a Dom for me and a submissive to Aaron, he was strictly a Dominant, which probably took a toll on him. Considering the week he had, he probably just needed to turn off his mind. I knew all too well what that felt like.

I crawled into bed with him. He released the book with one hand so that he could drape it around me when he realized that I was going to cuddle against his side and under his arm. He was wearing his pajamas now. The soft touch of his navy blue sleep shirt rubbed against my cheek as I laid down and nuzzled against him, feeling how warm and tense he was. He rested his hand on my hip. As I laid there, my chest pressed against his side, the two of us tangled in each other’s arms, I debated how I was going to handle grabbing his hands. He was hardly sitting up, enough room between his head and the headboard for me to hold his wrists above him; but the real question was how the fuck was I going to get them there? His hands were on me and his book, which meant that I was going to have to contort in some ridiculous way in order to grab both of them while gaining the upper hand to ensure that he wouldn’t be able to escape.

And then I heard the bathroom door open. Well, it was now or never. I craned my neck slightly to get a look at Emily who was walking out of the bathroom, now dressed in only her lingerie, and her hair had been teased a bit. I suddenly understood just how far she was going to make sure that Aaron would be distracted enough to make catching him off guard easy, and also that she wanted to make it very clear to him that even though I was in on this little plan of hers, she would be the one to take all of the blame for this if he ever decided to punish us for this.

“What’s that for?” Aaron asked, peeking up at her through his lashes.

Emily shrugged nonchalantly as she made her way towards the bed, and then crawled on until she was straddling his thighs. “It got too hot.”

He chuckled. “I’m sure.”

I started running my hands over his chest. I could feel his abs flexing in response to the sensitive and unexpected touch. Emily looked at me briefly. “Aren’t you hot, baby?” she pouted, leaning forward to kiss him. He set his book to the side. Just as she dodged his lips at the very last second, she leaned back, and I raced to reach for both of his hands and pin them over his head.

Aaron’s eyes widened. “What the fuck—” Emily cut him off by kissing away his words. He moaned slightly. She barely pulled away from him, but she adjusted so that her weight on his thighs was forcing him to hold still. He tugged against my hold, but I was sitting up now, which gave me a little more strength than he had— though he was naturally strong because of how much he worked out. “Stop it,” he commanded us both with a growled. Emily shook her head and bit her lip. “Fucking brat��” He let out a loud moan when Emily passed her palm over his length that was growing hard in his flannel pajama pants. His head was thrown back against the pillow now, giving his eyesight a clear shot to me, allowing me to see the mix of anger and pleasure that was brewing in his iris’. “Y/N, stop this.”

I looked at Emily. She reassured me with a nod. “Sorry, Sir,” I apologized while shifting on the bed until I was above him, my calves sitting on his wrists to hold him down. I blushed at Emily. “Did I do well, Mistress?”

“You did so well, baby girl.” She pulled me in for a kiss.

Aaron struggled beneath us. “I swear to god, the two of you are going to regret this—”

“Shh…” Emily cooed to him. “We just want to make you feel good, baby.”

“Sir,” he corrected through gritted teeth.

“Not right now.”

“What did you just say to me?”

Emily passed her palm over him again. “I said not right now, baby. We’ve got the upper hand here, not you.”

Aaron looked up at me. “I’ll make you a deal. Both of you. If you stop this now, I won’t punish you later.”

“Not a chance.”

But I wasn’t so sure. The deal itself sounded enticing. I mean, we hadn’t gone too far yet, and we hadn’t really done enough to deserve any kind of punishment. Okay, maybe we deserved a few spanks— but that was it, and I could live with that. However, if Emily and I decided to proceed, things would be nice for a while like a calm before the storm since it would be pleasurable for all of us, but the second we were caught off guard, too, Aaron was going to get us back for whatever we would inevitably do to him. But I promised Emily that we would do this together. I made her promise that we wouldn’t give into anything he would say or do. That included deals. If she wasn’t going to give into her tricks, then neither was I, as skeptical as I was.

“Sorry, Sir,” I said again, this time with a teasing grin.

“Fine,” he groaned, rolling his hips in response to the way that Emily was playing with him. “Fine… Then, whatever Emily does to me, Y/N, just know that I’ll punish you for it.”

I froze. “What? That’s not fair.”

He grinned. “Then, you better get her to stop….” he trailed off when she reached into his pants and grabbed ahold of his erection. “Fuck—”

I felt his hands knead my thighs since that was just about as far as he could move, and since he wasn’t going to get out of it, he must have figured that the least he could do was play with me. It worked. The slightest touch set me off, making me feel the throbbing and heat growing between my legs. In fact, it was impossible to not notice it, because every time Emily did something to Aaron, his grip hardened on me, making me practically fall forward until Emily caught me. With one hand, Em was holding my chin to keep me upright, but her other hand was incredibly preoccupied with slowly teasing every inch of Aaron’s cock, twitching in her palm in response to the slow, sensitive, and calculated movements she was making. It was barely enough. Just like downstairs when she was teasing me, she hardly did enough to just get him worked up. But the way he was squirming under me was a tell that he loved it.

Emily kissed my cheek. “Touch yourself, baby girl.”

“Don’t fucking think about it,” Aaron hissed under me.

“It’s okay,” she cooed in my ear.

Well, shit. On one hand, she had just given me permission to the one thing I wanted most— which she knew would still prove to be a task considering I was still wearing all of my clothes, and my legs were a little preoccupied with holding Aaron down. But, on the other hand, Aaron was not having it. The second I’d lean back ever so slightly to listen to Emily’s command, I’d be setting myself up to get punished later. Eh. C'est la vie, right?

So, I reclined, resting my back against the headboard, making sure that my calves (practically my knees, at this point) were still trapping Aaron. As I snuck my fingers past the waistband of my pants and underwear, I hissed and bucked my hips. Emily smirked. The second my fingers made contact with my clit, I let my head fall back against the wall and my eyes screwed shut as a moan fell from my lips. Emily had made me so wet downstairs. I hadn’t really noticed the full extent of it until I was there, rubbing it around the sensitive nub that was begging for more attention so that I could inevitably cum. I gripped Aaron’s hair with my free hand.

“Don’t cum yet, baby. There’s no fun in that,” Emily said.

I pouted while looking at her. She was working faster on Aaron’s length now, even going as far as to shifting around on the bed so that she could lick his tip ever so slowly. He thrashed.

“Em, stop,” he begged lightly.

“Aw,” she sulked sarcastically on his behalf, following it up with a wicked chuckle. “Does that feel good?” He nodded his head and bucked up into her hand. Emily immediately pulled her touch away, tsking her tongue at his disobedience, but still admiring the way his cock twitched and stood at attention naturally. “Do you think he deserves to cum?” she asked me. I couldn’t seem to respond because all of my focus had shifted onto the way I was getting close to my orgasm, and I was worried that with the way my legs were shaking, Aaron could potentially take advantage of that weakness in order to get out of this. Emily wasn’t having it, though. “Answer me, slut,” she demanded, slapping my thigh.

I shook my head. “No, Mistress. He doesn’t deserve it.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Aaron growled lightly in response to the way we were talking about him like he wasn’t even in the room, which was demeaning on its own, but then to add discussing his orgasm denial on top of that… well… maybe we just shouldn’t let him out of this. Ever. It was safer that way in the long run. Still, when Emily lowered her mouth onto him, it shocked me when he grabbed my thighs as hard as he could. I whimpered. I was getting really close. The closer my peak got, the faster I went, racing towards my own orgasm that I had been so desperate for ever since Emily put her hands on me downstairs. I tightened my grip in Aaron’s hair.

“Mistr—” I moaned while rolling my hips. “Mistress…” I was a panting, breathless, moaning mess; and neither of them had even done anything else to me yet. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like when they would finally put their hands on me and put in this same amount of effort— if not more, actually. “May I cum, please?”

“Cum,” she quickly answered after releasing Aaron from her mouth.

I let out gasps and curses as I tipped over the edge. My walls contracted around nothing, the empty feeling plainly obvious to me in that moment, but it didn’t deter me from pushing through my powerful orgasm. I let out a quiet, almost helpless scream, “Thank you, Mistress—”

And then the unexpected happened. Actually, you know what, I should have seen it coming. I suspected earlier that this could present to be a problem later on down the road, but I didn’t think it would be so quick, and I didn’t think that it would be so vicious. One minute, I was falling apart, my whole body giving out in response to my orgasm washing through me, the next thing I knew, Aaron had used my weakness and his strength against me in order to throw me off balance, giving him the chance to flip me over onto the bed, his hands on my thighs holding me so that I didn’t go flying and so that I couldn’t escape. Suddenly, he had one hand on my neck, the other one found Emily’s neck. She paused, eyes wide. I gulped. This was exactly what I had been afraid of. We thought that by teaming up, he would be outnumbered, and with how stressed he was, maybe he would give into our game; but that wasn’t Aaron Hotchner’s style. We should have known. The second an opportunity to switch control had arisen, he took it. I barely even felt my orgasm fade away because I was a little more concerned with his hold that was increasing pressure around my neck.

Aaron pulled Emily around like a rag doll, forcing her to lay down next to me on the bed. We both clawed at his hands, but it didn’t seem to matter, because he wasn’t going to let us go, no matter how much we struggled, because we had refused to let him go only moments ago, no matter how hard he struggled. Touche.

“I warned you,” he said to me.

“Sir—”

“No, no, no. You don’t get to talk. Neither of you do.”

I whimpered and kicked uselessly against the bed. Spartacus. That was the example Emily used downstairs. She said that if we stuck together, there was no way he could choose one to punish over the other— but what she failed to remember was that he had zero qualms with the idea of punishing us both simultaneously or at different points. Telling by the way he was pinning us by our necks, I was going to assume that the time for reckoning had already come, and that meant that we were absolutely fucked; meanwhile, he would get off on whatever torture he had in store for us.

He squeezed our necks until both of our breaths hitched. “Don’t move. Understood?” We both nodded as far as we could, considering his hold. “Good.” He released us roughly. Both Emily and I gasped for breath. As we shivered and coughed away the feeling of his thumb digging into our skin, Aaron shimmied around until he was able to grab ahold of my pants and yank them down my legs. And then went the panties. “Strip each other the rest of the way,” he demanded while getting off the bed. “Now.” He headed into the closet, probably grabbing the black box, if I had to guess.

Emily and I turned to each other. My eyes searched hers for a moment, fear running through both of us— but it was still a good fear that had us excited for what was going to come. Though, maybe we shouldn’t have been too excited. But I just had to ignore what Aaron was doing in the closet so that I could steady my shaky hands and reach out for the clasp of Emily’s lingerie bra. She moved her hair out of the way so that it was easier for me to do while completing the task blindly. She leaned in to kiss me quickly. I melted for a moment just as the clasp came undone, and I inched closer to her, letting her roll over me and pin me down on the bed. Our ankles played with each other as she continued to kiss me roughly and simultaneously slide her bra off her shoulders.

“My— My shirt…” I mumbled against her. We still had to finish stripping each other before Aaron could get back. She pulled away from me just enough so that I could sit up and after she was finished with peeling my shirt off, I could help her wiggle out of her panties. She pushed me back against the mattress the second we were nude. My fingers slid into her hair and twisted into a gentle grip. “He didn’t want us to move.”

“We’re already in trouble. What’s the harm?”

The faster we moved, the more obvious the shaking bed was, encouraging Hotch to come back to find us breaking basically every rule we had. There he was, holding the black box, visibly pissed off. Emily and I didn’t stop. She kept me right where I was, encouraging me to keep touching her and to let her slide her knee between my legs so that I could hump her thigh. When he slammed the black box down on the bed, that was when we finally pulled away-- more like jumped away, to be fair.

“You really wanna help them get off, huh?” Hotch asked, pulling Emily off of me. “Fine.” He tied Emily’s hands behind her back with ease, even though she was trying to fight against him. “Open.” I watched as he gripped her jaw and stuffed her panties into her mouth. She finally stopped fighting-- just long enough for her to pout up at him, begging for mercy in this whole situation, but he wasn’t going to be that nice. “Such a brat.” He spanked her. “How about you?” he asked me, grabbing another length of rope and coming around the bed. “Will you be good for me now?”

I nodded urgently. “Yes, Sir. I promise.”

He pushed me on my side so that he could tie my hands behind my back, too. “Good girl...” He wasn’t as rough with me when he put my panties in my mouth. “The two of you thought it would be so funny to fuck with me. Is it funny now?” Neither of us said anything as we watched him grab a hitachi wand and another length of rope from the box. “I don’t tolerate Y/N being a brat. Ever. You...” he cooed as he hit Emily’s ass again, “I expect it from you, but not my bunny. You’re just a bad influence, I think... A bad influence that needs to be taught a lesson. A lesson about not corrupting my good bunny.”

Hotch worked the toy between me and Emily while ordering us to move as close to each other as possible. I whimpered. I was so close to her, yet with our mouths full and our hands tied, there was no way to touch each other. I hated it. But that was Hotch’s point, I knew that.

“I’m keeping you two like this for at least an hour. The first one to cum goes on no-touch for a week.”

My eyes widened and I looked at him. He knew that I was more sensitive than Emily. She could hold her orgasms back longer and better than I could! That was his other point, though, and I knew that by reminding myself that he was punishing me for everything Em did to him. Fuck.

“Good luck.”

Once the rope was wrapped around mine and Emily’s hips, ensuring that we would stay close, holding the toy in place between us, he turned it on. I jolted and moaned. For some reason, it was tilted in my direction, hitting right against my clit while Emily hardly got everything. Hotch realized what was happening, but he didn’t move it. All he did was tease by telling me that if I didn’t want to cum before her, I needed to figure out a way to make her cum first. So, I cried and rested my head against Emily’s shoulder as I started grinding around, trying to move the toy to face her instead, but all it did was stimulate me further. At least I got it to budge. Now it was against both of us, and she was trying to push it back my way. The friction of our bodies was too much. Everything from the kitchen downstairs to Emily letting me cum a few minutes ago to the alluring thought of trying to make the other cum for Hotch’s game was... it was overwhelming. The more I struggled, the closer I got to my orgasm. I just couldn’t hold it. Emily was so much better at it than I was, and I hated her for that.

“Aw, bunny...” Hotch cooed while laughing. “You’re already close, aren’t you?” He sat at the foot of the bed and kneaded my thigh with his large hand. I nodded helplessly. “Don’t hold back for me, baby. Go on. Cum. Everything you give me today will be the last you get until next week. Don’t you wanna feel good for me?” I nodded again. “Then, cum.”

I cried into my panties and shook against Emily as I came. She kept fighting to move the toy towards me-- not for the sake of the game anymore, but because she wanted to see me struggle more. Very Dom of her.

One orgasm came after another. The more I fought to take the toy away, the worse the overstimulation got, and at some point, I couldn’t even fight back anymore. The toy had found a perfect spot between me and Emily, so as I painfully came again and again, Emily finally tipped over the edge, too; all while Hotch was watching and smirking. He was so proud of himself. He liked watching his subs squirm with pain and pleasure, unable to escape his torture. I shouldn’t have listened to Emily. I knew that this was all a bad idea-- I warned her that something like this would happen, but... but I gave in... and now I couldn’t breathe.

It wasn’t until the end of the hour, when I was crying and shaking, that Hotch finally took pity on me. He reached between me and Emily, and he turned off the toy, letting us both brew there in our sweat, cum, and tears. He didn’t untie us, though. He was letting us catch our breath and cuddle while tied and helpless, and that was amusing for him. It wasn’t for us. We couldn’t protest, however, so we waited, and I stared at Emily with a look that said: “I’m never listening to you again.”

[reeesea]

Something Sweet: Part One

~the sweetest drink on the menu~

one ~ two ~ three ~ four ~ five ~ six ~ seven ~ eight ~ nine

pairing: just minsung, han jisung/lee minho

warnings: mild language (like barely)

words: 3.5k (2k too many ngl)

summary: Minho is working his usual shift at Seoul's most expensive high end restaurant, when a trio of new-comers arrive and by the end of Minho’s tedious night he’s plus one additional phone number.

a/n: To be honest this is the first thing I’ve ever written and actually posted. SO please accept this minsung one-shot that just came out of wanting more waiter Minho in my life. anyway if you read it and like it let me know, and maybe ill write more of it. In my head it has at least a few more chapters of non-plot where the other boys show up <3

---------------------

It had only been an hour since the dinner rush started and Minho was already counting the minutes until he could collect his tips and go home. Sure, he could think of countless more exhausting jobs compared to being a waiter at Menu 98 (an upscale restaurant in a part of town he most definitely did not live in), but today just hit different. He never had to do much more than just put on his Customer Server Smile ™, not mess up the orders, pour the wine without spilling, and recommend the highest priced appetizer if asked. Pretty simple stuff. Nothing too draining, but still the exhaustion set in, probably due to spending 2 more hours in the dance studio than he should’ve the previous day. 

His feet were paying for those additional long hours trying to perfect choreo by making each minute of his shift more painful than the last. Even so, working at the ever popular restaurant paid for the daily discomfort that Minho may have felt from his blistered feet. The restaurant was a well known hot spot for anyone with enough money to casually spend the equivalent of three of Minho's paychecks on a meal. CEOs and their business partners along with idols and some lesser known celebrities made up most of their usual clientele on a casual Friday night like this one. The customers always came in waves on Friday evenings, parties of usually 4 or more coming in to celebrate some successful business venture that took place during the week. Great for Minho really, because that meant usually more wine, more appetizers, larger meals, and larger checks, which means bigger tips. His bank account really needed these Fridays especially if he was gong to keep saving up to finally pursue his dream. 

A new party of six was just assigned to Minho’s section. Trademarked smile: on, Feet: still aching, Hours until close: at least another three. It looked like tonight it was going to be a long ass night. 

An hour or so passed before Minho was able to get some form of rest from being out on the floor. Minho leaned his body weight against the wall near the back of the dining room, appreciating the brief calm before the night crowd started to roll in. Thoughts of the dance he was trying to choreograph flashed through his head. He hoped that the movements he’d chosen would be able to convey the emotions of the song he had in mind. The thought of asking Hyunjin to watch his performance briefly popped in his head, but before he could consider it further the hostess was calling his name. 

“Minho! There's a new table for you in section three.” Minho moved from his comfortable position against the wall and went through his checklist; Apron? Flattened. Backup pens? Check. Hair gently moved out of his face to perfectly frame it? Check. Lastly, Polite customer service smile? Obviously. 

The three boys at the table were definitely new customers to the restaurant. Minho observed that the three of them appeared to be blissfully unaware of the de facto business casual to fully formal dress code that the other patrons in the restaurant followed. The Trio seemed to sport the street style that you would see in the popular clubs not only a block away. Two of them clothed in almost all black outfits while the third wore a bright pink colored hoodie under his jean jacket. 

“Hyung, I still can’t believe we did it! The crowd was huge, I mean after going on stage I don't even remember anything. I might have blacked out. Holy shit did I actually black out….” Pink hoodie seemed pretty animated about whatever the reason was for their meal out. Maybe a little too animated, as other tables glazed bitterly toward the source of their evening’s disruption.   

Before approaching he considered the possibility that these boys being idols was likely, but Minho still found it odd for multiple reasons. He didn't recognize them at all as idols, which he was usually pretty good at keeping up with, and when idols did casually come in it was more likely to be on a weekday for an early dinner and not a late Friday night after the dinner rush. Nonetheless, with his perfect waiter image on, he walks over to the table never showing his curiosity.

“Good evening gentlemen, My name is Minho, and I’ll be serving you tonight. Is there anything I can get you to drink before your starters?” His script rolled politely off his tongue like it had the whole night. All complete with a slight smile and arms perfectly placed behind him, as carefully and as naturally as a doll whose been posed in the same position for the past six hours.

The wide set, somewhat brooding boy has already decided after glancing at the drink menu, “yeah I'll order a bottle of the house red for the table,” glancing up at Minho from beneath his black cap. Minho swiftly wrote down the order, and moved his glance over to the next boy at the table.

“Hyung, you're the only one of us who chooses to drink wine voluntarily,” Pink hoodie spoke up, seemingly upset about the prospect of drinking bitter fruit water. 

“Jisung, you're just saying that because you can't handle anything that you can actually taste the alcohol in. I'll drink whatever Bin gets,” the handsome curly haired blonde mentions, glancing at the soft hoodied boy next to him with a look that reminds Minho of a disappointed father. Minho actively fights off the smirk that is wanting to form on his lips.

“WHAT that's not true, THAT ONE TIME I drank an entire bottle of-”

“Fine, fine just stop yelling. You’re gonna get us kicked out before we even get to eat” Mr. Black cap glances up at Minho again, but with a more apologetic look. “Add on an order of the fruitiest and sweetest drink you serve still with alcohol in it, for the small squirrel boy.” That last part came with a smirk from the dark haired speaker and a glare from from the ‘squirrel boy’ to his left. 

Minho had trouble keeping the smirk from forming this time. And maybe his perfect image faltered for a second, but he was quick to recover, and confirmed their orders with a straight face and a promise to return with water as he left to give them time to select from the menu. 

---

“Great now our waiter thinks I'm a whiny baby who looks like a squirrel. Wow, thanks Changbin-hyung.” Jisung grumbles and pinches his cheeks that cursed him with the rodent nickname. 

“Good, at least he won’t be fooled into thinking you're anything but the truth” 

“Yah! WHa-”

“Hey settle down you guys, lets try not to get kicked out please. Binnie recommended the food here, and I would very much like to eat it before we are politely asked to leave” 

Jisung grumbles something inaudible at Chan’s request, and Changbin can't help but respond with a smirk at getting to see the younger be told off.

“Also we're supposed to be celebrating selling out our show so lets do that, yeah? First show 3racha single handedly sold out! WE did that!” 

All three of them get proud smiles after that, and the bickering is left forgotten as the three recount the night, even though they had lived it together

“Not gonna lie, I think our Binnie stole the show tonight. You were on fire tonight man.” Chan said proudly, receiving a thankful smile from the younger boy, who had become shy and bashful at the praise.

“Though, Chan-hyung your rap was so charismatic tonight, you almost made that girl in front faint when you winked at her, the whole audience fucking lost it” Jisung had switched from literally yelling to just a whisper shout for emphasis.

“Hahaha, yeah I can't even believe that happened. Man, today’s energy was just different.” The smile on Chan’s face was blinding, as usual. “Hopefully we can get to play even bigger venues soon. I could get used to this...” Chan mused, seemingly already focused on the future plans of 3racha. 

“Yeah, those paydays would be real nice right about now.”

“Bin-hyung, what are you talking about, you’re literally loaded. Plus since you got that producing job, we can actually pay the rent on the apartment you parents let us stay in '' Jisungs pretty thankful for all the support Changbins parents had given them, while the three of them worked toward their collective dream to make and perform music. But he thinks they all can agree that finally being able to use their own money to live instead of just relying on handouts and the kindness of friends or family to help keep them from becoming starved or homeless, is a new kind of satisfying that Jisung hadn’t considered before. Just look at them now, at one of the nicest (and most expensive) restaurants in Seoul, fighting over drinks and having a meal that would hopefully be the first of many celebrations for their groups accomplishments. The trio could all agree that the financial stress has been one of their greatest worries, and that beginning to escape it has been all kinds of relieving. 

Before any of the boys could respond to Jisung’s comment, Minho had returned with three glasses of water, three glasses for wine, and a bottle of wine all balanced perfectly on a tray perched on the palm of his hand. Jisung had to admit it was impressive how he had managed to balance all of the glassware and liquids without losing balance, and while moving with more grace and agility than he would expect from your average waiter. 

Before Jisung had even returned from his thoughts, three glasses of water and the expertly poured wine glasses, all set delicately without a single drop spilled, were identically placed in front of each of them. Graceful may have been an understatement. 

“Have you decided what you would like to have tonight, gentlemen?” Their waiter Minho said, all with a gentle expression on his face. 

No, the answer was no, but before Jisung could respond, Changbin had already ordered the pricey steak to go with his wine. Soon after, Chan ordered the surf and turf dish that had a stupidly complicated name that Jisung couldn’t pronounce. Jisung hadn’t even remembered them even looking at the menu, or maybe it was just him who had yet to even glanced at it. Details. 

“Uhhhhh…” Jisung searched hopelessly over the menu and then at his friends, who stared blankly back at him, then back to the menu again. This was a regular occurrence when the three decided to go out and eat, when they weren’t holding themselves in their apartment for weeks at a time. Still, Jisung always ended up hopelessly unprepared to successfully order without awkward pauses and at least three consecutive strings of ‘hmm’s and ‘uhhh’s. And so,

“Hmmmmm…. I think.. Uhh…. maybe…” nothing was popping out at him, and Jisung was pretty sure at this point that he had forgotten how to read. “Ya know what, surprise me,” he decided this was the best response he could come up with.  

“Surprise you?” Minho looked just as confused as Jisung felt.

“Yeah, is that an option? If not, I'm this close to just closing my eyes and pointing.” He says while dramatically closing his eyes and waving his finger over the menu. Once again Jisung was hopeless.

He hears a soft chuckle and opens his eyes just in time to catch their waiter’s lips curl in a sweet smile that makes his eyes turn into crescents. It lasts barely a second, before his face returns to his neutral customer service expression. But Jisung decides he really likes that smile, and a part of him is sad to see it retreat so soon. 

“Well in that case, I can do the blind pointing for you, but I personally recommend the seasonally prepared local beef served on house baked brioche, that comes with garlic and parsley potato wedges. Does that sound alright?” Jisung felt he had said it faster and with more details just to confuse him. 

Jisung stares at him blankly in response, and he's pretty sure four whole seconds pass in silence before the Pretty Waiter ™ follows up, an ever so slight smirk on his lips, “it's pretty much a really good local burger with homemade fries, I think it would be something you would enjoy.” 

Jisung grins at that, “Oh! Yeah that does sound good...Thank you! I will have that.” For some reason he really likes the idea that their waiter chose something off the menu that was specially meant for him. Not that he wouldn't like all the nicer and fancier dishes they serve here with small plates with dry ice fog, but a part of him was more content in getting a dinner that didn't require him to question whether or not something on his plate was even edible. And the happy curiosity definitely had nothing to do with the way their waiter’s eyes sparkled when he talked or the barely-there smirk that Jisung just caught sight of. 

“Alright then, I’ll put in these orders. Oh! And then I'll be right back with your speciality fruit drink,” He says that last part with a slightly more upbeat tone, resulting in another smirk to appear on Changbin’s face and a groan from a slightly embarrassed Jisung.

---

Minho surprised himself. 

On any given day of work at Menu 98, he deathly avoids having to do anything more than the regular polite small talk. But for some reason, tonight he couldn’t stop himself from playing along with the antics of the cute boy at his table. The three boys were entertaining, and maybe he could blame the exhaustion and the numb pain in his heels, but the comical distraction was welcomed by Minho. He didn't even realize just how much he had been looking for a distraction from the long shift until it was staring right at him with big shiny eyes and a cute round face. Minho hurried back to enter in their orders, including his suggestion for the squirrel looking boy.

Minho wasn’t going to deny that the flustered boy at the table was cute, he was pretty aware how attractive all three the boys were when he took their orders. He had thought they were idols originally, so in Minho’s mind it made sense. Still, the waiter still felt something about the three was too unique to be categorized as just idols or trainees. As much as it may have piqued his curiosity though, Minho still got paid for his service not for his interests in customers, so he brushed it off almost as soon as it appeared. 

The rest of the evening, Minho tended to all four of his assigned tables with his usual perfect server act and minimal small talk. When it came to the three somewhat boisterous customers in the corner table, Minho may or may not have allowed himself to subtly laugh at their arguments and antics. The dynamic of the three boys was slowly becoming the highlight of his late night shift. Each of their personalities greatly contrasted and amplified the other, making way for animated and comical exchanges and arguments between them. 

When Minho had returned with a Strawberry daiquiri for the boy in pink, a chorus of giggles could be heard from the other two boys, while the other happily accepted the drink in substitute for the untouched glass of wine in front of him. Upon drinking it, the cute boy's eyes somehow widened further and shined more than Minho thought was possible. He flashed his heart-shaped smile as he thanked Minho for the drink. 

Minho nodded in return, and internally decided that Heart-shaped smiles were his new favorite. 

---

Jisung had been hyper since the show, and the energy was now focused on a new mission to see the pretty smile of their waiter again. Granted, he didn't have to try that much harder to gain the attention of the pretty waiter, being the loud and excitable person naturally he was. Every small grin that Jisung was able to pull out from under the other boy’s infuriatingly polite facade, was a major win in his book. 

Chan, Changbin, and Jisung celebrated further by enjoying the food, which was all phenomenal, and discussing their next gig the coming week. The best way to celebrate one performance is to look towards the next, or someother random bullshit Changbin had said after a couple more glasses of wine.

Overall the night was a celebration of all of the dedication and hours they had put into their music, as well as their grind to perform and grow a somewhat sizable following. They were all high on the potential of finally getting to realize their dreams and reach their goals as a group, something none of them actually thought they would get to do together. The overwhelming happiness of the night easily made it one of Jisung's new favorite memories. 

As the boys were finishing off their third--or forth--drink (Jisung definitely had another one of the strawberry drinks Minho had brought him), after dinner and figuring out their checks, Jisung felt a surge of boldness. Mostly due to having a few drinks in his system, and the slight infatuation he had with the pretty waiter's smile, Jisung decided ‘whats the worst thing that could happen? Rejection? lmao’ and wrote down his name and number on his receipt in hopes that Minho would actually read it, or maybe even contact him. Maybe. 

It was a shot in the dark, but Jisung had been feeling a little high on life, and felt like he couldn’t leave without at least shooting his shot. Jisung and the other members of 3racha got up to leave, and Jisung searched out the waiter. He  wasn’t able to see him in the mostly empty dining room now, but a hopeful part of him felt that he would see him again, leaving the restaurant with his arms around his members already bickering about who would get to shower first after their long night. 

“I'm just saying, Chan-hyung I know for a fact that you’re not even going to make it to the front door before passing out, so I call dibs. And Jisung, I’m older than you so I get veto power over your rights and decisions as your hyung.” 

Jisung was about to grumble in response but something about how Changbin’s smile was so carefree left him feeling like he deserved this victory. Changbin was definitely a little tipsy, but seeing his hyung so happy after such a rough week made Jisung glad to do anything to keep that smile there.

“Fine, fine hyung but you have to help me carry Chan-hyung up stairs when he inevitable falls asleep on me in the cab” 

“I don't know what youre talking about,” Chan replies, already yawning, while climbing into the cab.

---

Minho was picking up the receipts from his tables when one of them caught his eye.

Hey, I’m Han Jisung ^~^ (the cute one in the pink hoodie!)

Thanks for your suggestions, best waiter ever!!!

I think your smile is beautiful, Maybe I’ll get to see it again sometime?

555-XXX-XXXX

Minho couldn't help but smile to himself. He’d been hit on occasionally by customers and has been given countless numbers, which usually don't make it much farther than the trash, but something about the innocence of the note and cuteness of the boy made him actually consider keeping it.

He scoffed to himself after a second of considering it. As cute as the boy was, and as sweet as the note was, Minho didn’t have time or energy to have another added person in his life. No matter romantically or platonically, new relationships were on his ‘things to stay away from if you ever wanna make it into the dance academy’ list. He already barely ever saw his roommates, and if they weren't all in the same dance troupe, they probably wouldn't talk much. All of their time was spent working and practicing, and he and his roommates only had enough energy and free time to spend a meal or two together on the weekends. There just wasn’t any more time for anything extra, no matter how nice the idea may sound. 

He was about to give the little message the same treatment as the others as he cleaned up for the night, but a part of him couldn't bring himself to throw it away, and discreetly pocketed it instead out of instinct. Out of sight and out of mind as far as Minho was concerned.

-----

thank you if you read this far <3

one ~ two ~ three ~ four ~ five ~ six ~ seven ~ eight ~ nine

[wendibird]

SPN 15X18 Observations

Let me preface this by saying, I apologize ahead of time if I and/or my notes seem a bit cynical. I’ve had a rough week. (I think everyone has.) But for whatever it’s worth, here are my notes, observations and meandering thoughts on tonight’s episode.

Oh, one more thing though. For episodes 19 and 20 (and anything really to do with them) in addition to my usual tags for the episodes and season, I’ll be tagging them with #dontspoilthefinalhunt for any who wish to avoid spoilers for them.

Pre-Episode thoughts:

So, I’ve heard enough rumors already to know that mooooost likely Cas is going to die this episode. And let me be clear, he’s my second favorite character in this show after Sam. But I have trouble feeling strong emotions for something when I go in knowing that I should. But I’m going to try to go into this one with an open mind. 

Also, in the past I liked Billy as a character because though she still had some biases, she still seemed mostly neutral, like OG Death had been. And from previews it looks like maybe they’re turning her into an outright villain like they’ve done with God? Yey. 

- Where’s Chuck? Did he just bampf off?

- So he’s gonna blow up in the Empty?

- Yep.

- So now Dean cares about him? (Jack)

- Poor Jack. He doesn’t get what’s going on. 

- Yey! Jack is back! 

- “You’ve snapped me out of worse.” When?

- They’ve prayed to Michael? Yey for not overlooking options! (Not being sarcastic.)

- Charlie!!!! And yey she has a girlfriend! (Are they gonna kill her?) 

- Aaaaaaand there she goes.

Commercial thoughts:

So, I get the whole narrative idea of taking a character that everyone assumed was kinda on your side and revealing that they were always working towards their own interests. I get it. And it can be effective. I still don’t like it with Billy. 

I’m glad Dean said what he did to Sam. Even if Sam says (and probably thinks) that he doesn’t need to hear the apology, sometimes it needs to be said anyway. And I think saying it all helped Dean a bit too. He needed to know that Sam understood. 

I’m glad Jack’s back though!

- Oh Jack. You’re worth more than your death. 

- I’m glad Cas is saying this, but sadly, I think the “we” only applies to him and Sam. 

- So Jack is powerless when he came back? Did the bomb thing burn out it all out?

*is confused*

- Yey! Eileen! (Please don’t have her just vanish….)

- I’ma cry….

- Oh no……

- “If I let myself go there I’ll lose my mind. I can’t go there right now.”  

- Oh Sam. Always trying to push down his feelings because there’s other shit going on. 

- Hug!!!!!!!

- Sam’s gonna drive Eileen’s car. Just shoot me now….

Commercial thoughts:

So yeah… Wonder what Billy’s plan is here with this random picking-off of people but not like, all at once. She COULD do it all at once, she has the personel. (The Empty didn’t kill all her reapers.) 

I think she’s setting her own kind of trap or something. 

Also, I take it Chuck just vanished? They didn’t say anything about it but that seems to be the impression given.

Still pisses me off though that after bringing Eileen back and only half-assing her role they just had her vanish. (At least Rowena’s in charge of hell, so if she wound up down there again, she SHOULD get a better shake than she did the first time.) 

- Donna!!!!

- Eileen’s Car…… *cries* 

- Sam’s got so much emotional stuff going on this episode. He’s got this grief for Eileen in the background and he’s worried about Jack and trying to help him, and trying to save all these people.

- OUch……. Double ouch. (Were in references to the expressions on Sam’s face when Donna first comforted him about Eileen and then Charlie made her comment about not wanting anyone else to go through what she did.) 

- (Yes, I’m worried about Dean and Cas too.) 

- Sam’s still their “Chief”.

- That's weird….. Why does his touch kill plants? (Not people at least.)

- Yeah, she (Billy) was waiting.

- Oh dear…..

- So what IS causing this?

- NO! NOT DONNA!

- WTF?!

Commercial thoughts:

So Chuck is doing this? I mean, it makes sense. He’s gotten petty enough. But now what? 

Also poor Sam. I mean, he tries so hard to save people. And time after time it just doesn’t work out. It could be seen as part of “Chuck’s Plan” because of how he wants his big story to go. So now I guess he’s just being more direct about it. Sam isn’t allowed to do well unless it’s been authorized by the Narrative. (AKA, him.) When he tries, he just gets shown the error of trying. (But he’s beaten down if he doesn’t try too. Like S8.) 

Also still don’t like how Billy’s character has changed.

- She thinks she’s Freddy Kruger?

- Heart attack? His first “death” was supposed to be his heart. (In “Faith”) Wonder if that’s intentional here?

- Oh god… please don’t tell me they’re going to…. 

Commercial thoughts:

Okay. I don’t ship Destiel. At all. I’m not an anti though, cause I’m firmly a ship-and-let-ship kind of person. 

But that scene while very heartfelt just didn’t do anything for me because it felt more than a bit like revisionistic history. However, I will say, congrats to the Destiel fandom. They killed Cas, but that scene was definitely for you all. 

They’re killing off so many people though it’s like… this is one of my problems when I’m going into a situation where I’m “supposed” to feel a certain way. It makes me awkward. (Like the Episode “Lebanon”.) 

- Gah, poor Sam. 

- WTF?! Is Chuck taking everyone in the world? 

- FUCK?! THAT’S WHERE THEY’RE LEAVING IT OFF?!?!?!?

Okay, so my hope is now, since they’ve gone THIS far with what Chuck is doing, that unless the ultimate resolution of the story is going to be “everything goes away forever” they’re going to have to leave some way to bring people back. 

I’ll be honest, I had trouble connecting emotionally with this episode. But that may not be the episode’s fault. I’ve been working some long hours lately and I just today found out that someone I work with has tested positive for Covid. (I just got tested today.) Plus with all the election stuff still going on, there’s a lot of real-world things on my mind. 

Also, as I said, knowing that these are the final episodes, it’s pretty much a given that things are going to ramp up. (And the people involved with the show have been telegraphing the hell out of Cas’ death, so it wasn’t unexpected. And I get it. Some people really do need that time to prepare emotionally and adjust their expectations.) But I still feel like a lot of the things they’re asking/expecting us to care about, they haven’t put the actual effort into the storytelling to make that happen. I love the absolute shit out of Eileen, but for most of this season she’s been written as little more than an accessory to Sam. And just so he can have some “feels” about someone. And then she gets vanished without so much as a last glimpse of her? (And this episode was filmed before everything closed down due to Covid.) 

I mean, his reaction STILL tore me up, because Jared is that damn good at conveying those emotions. But once again, like LAST time they killed her off, it was amongst so much other shit that there’s barely time for him to even feel it. In fact, he even said that he couldn’t because of what else was going on. And by the end of the episode pretty much everyone else in the world is Thanos-snapped too? 

And I get it, this episode is clearly not about her. It’s about the whole situation. It just still feels like a disservice to the character.

And speaking of disservices to characters…

So, about what Cas said in his speech/confession to Dean. The revisionistic retelling of history has been strong this season, but that was especially bad. We know from past episodes that Cas has ALWAYS had “a crack in his chassis” and always had sympathy and love for humanity. We know that he cares about a lot of people, and has put a lot of effort into becoming a better being. (Just a few episodes ago he talked about how he truly found his purpose when he became a father. And he also had talked about finding his true family.) But no. Apparently all of that character development was just because of Dean. What bothers me isn’t that he told Dean “I love you.” What bothers me is that it truly feels like Cas’ entire character was reduced to one half of a ship. 

Okay, and what also bothers me is that Sam was literally an afterthought in all of that. When for most of these years, Sam has been the one who’s been the most supportive and understanding of Cas. Sam is the one who lately has had the closer connection with him. But naw. He ain’t important, except as an extension of Dean. 

And I get they were trying to throw some fanservice to that corner of the fandom, especially since Cas was slated to die 3 episodes before the end. But they could have done it better. I’ve read fanfic that handled Destiel in a more believable way. (I was reading for the Saileen content as they’re often put in as a sister-ship and it can be hard to find fic of them without it.) And technically this wasn’t even requited. Dean looked more shocked than anything, though I admit that's up to interpretation. But someone in one of the discord servers I'm in posted a picture of that part of the script for this episode and it outright said in the directorial notes that Cas said what he did knowing that Dean didn't/couldn't return his affection the same way. So, there is that.

There were other aspects of the episode I also had thoughts on, like, wtf is up with Jack not having his usual powers but wilting plantlife? Some extension of the bomb-thing? Is he radioactive now to anything with “Celestial energy”? But wouldn’t that have made him give Cas problems too? Or is this supposed to be indicating something else? Amara did that too before she started turning lighter, back in Season 11. Is he somehow turning into the Darkness? Or did he come back from the Empty partially possessed by Lucifer? Gah. I don’t even know. I’m just throwing ideas at a dart board now. *LOL* 

And at this point, wtf CAN they even do against Chuck? I really don’t know. I’m hoping the next episodes are better, but I know 19 was written by Buckleming and they don’t have the best track record. True, a few of their episodes I’ve actually enjoyed. But sometimes they fall short on writing the Brothers Winchester. 

Anyway, I think I’ve probably rambled enough for now.

[adapembroke]

Astrology of 2020 and Beyond

There was a conversation recently on the Diviners Anonymous Discord Server about what makes the astrology of 2020 different than other years. It made me realize that I’ve written about the astrology of 2020 quite a lot for Patreon but not a lot for the wider community. Even though it is now September, I think it’s still worth looking at the astrological weather for this year. The Pluto/Saturn/Jupiter drama is coming to a close, but a couple of the plot arcs are just gearing up.

In Austin Coppock's conversation with Gordon White about the astrology of the second half of 2020, he said that we've reached the point where we pretty much know how global events are going to impact us for the next little while. We have already started to experience all of the big influences that will be in play over the next few years, so we have a good view of the overall lay of the land. The game is in play, and we've seen our opponent's cards. 

The game isn't over. At the individual level, people may be in for some personal surprises, but we’re unlikely to be surprised by anything that happens on the global stage. 

It's time to focus on how current events are impacting us personally. 

Go on a news fast. Get some sleep. Think about how this is impacting you and focus on what you need to do to get through this. 

How Astrological Prediction Works

For as long as the concept of history has existed, people have studied the cycles of history and tried to predict it. Historians in the 19th and 20th centuries looked to Rome to understand the rise and fall of modern industrial empires. Karl Marx tried to use cycles to understand the rise and fall of economies. 

In ancient times, the wise used the cycles of the planets to talk about the cycles of history. Modern astrologers still look to the stars for guidance. Influenced by the work of CG Jung, they have learned that events do not repeat literally, but important events in planetary cycles tend to have common (archetypal) themes. 

The basic techniques astrologers use have changed very little in over 2,000 years. As planets go around the sun, they make the same patterns over and over again. They appear to come together. They separate until they appear to be on opposite sides of the sky, and then they come together again. 

Through observation, ancient astrologers discovered that some planetary configurations correspond to special events on earth. When two or more planets come together (conjunction), it is the beginning of a new cycle. When they appear to be as far apart as they can be (opposition), events that were foreshadowed at the beginning of the cycle reach their greatest intensity. When the planets come together again, the cycle ends, and a new one begins. 

One complete planetary cycle has the same structure as a story with a beginning (astrological conjunction), rising action (astrological square), climax (astrological opposition), and conclusion (astrological conjunction) which also serves as the new beginning.

 Major Astrological Events

Saturn/Pluto/Jupiter Conjunctions

Exact on January 12, 2020. 

Saturn is the planet of structure, institutions, boundaries, borders, limits, old age, and conservatism. During Saturn times, conservative forces are in the spotlight. We deal with issues involving containment, the protection/creation of borders, and the life-cycle of institutions. 

Pluto is named after the Roman god of the underworld. It is the planet of death, destruction, and transformation. Pluto times correspond to times of extreme pruning. Things that are dysfunctional collapse, often causing death and destruction. 

When Saturn and Pluto come together, the world tends to experience disease, totalitarianism, lockdowns, and economic failure.

This is the end of an old Saturn/Pluto cycle and the beginning of a new one. The last cycle began in 1982 and reached its climax in the fall of 2001. The new cycle will reach its climax in 2035 and end in 2053.

Adding Jupiter to the picture is a mixed blessing. Jupiter is a benefic planet that tries to improve whatever it touches. It is not at its best in Capricorn, however, so it isn’t able to help as much as it otherwise would. At the same time, Jupiter is an amplifier expanding whatever it touches, which adds to the drama.

Saturn/Pluto Through History

1776 - American Revolution (square)

1914 - The Outbreak of World War I (conjunction)

1931, 1940 - The Great Depression, the rise of fascism in Europe, the beginning of World War II (opposition and square)

1982 - Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, the Iran-Iraq War, the Soviet war in Afghanistan that lead to the jihadist movement, AIDS epidemic (conjunction)

2001 - 9/11, the Israel-Palestine crisis (opposition)

Saturn square Uranus 

Gearing up in 2020, exact in 2022-2023.

Saturn is containment, conservatism, structure, boundaries, and authority. 

Uranus is explosive, progressive, and revolutionary. Uranus times are marked by shocking, sudden events. Some of these events are experienced as subjectively good. Some are experienced as subjectively bad.

When Saturn and Uranus meet, they create tension between revolutionary forces and authoritarian structures. This can manifest as social unrest/protests and lockdowns, erratic authorities, repressive revolutions, and sudden breakdowns/breakthroughs.

The current cycle began in 1988, reached its climax in 2008-2010, and is in its falling action now (square). The cycle will end in 2032.  

Saturn/Uranus Through History

1861 - American Civil War (square)

1918-1919 - End of World War I, Spanish Flu Epidemic (opposition) 

1930 - Great Depression (square)

1988 - Lockerbie terrorist attack, troubles in Ireland (conjunction)

2008-2010 - Arab Spring (opposition)

Mars in Aries 

Enters Aries on June 27, retrograde (15-28 degrees Aries) September 9-November 13  

Mars is named after the god of war. It is an extremely hot, dry planet astrologically. Mars times are inflammatory--aggressive, angry, and conflict-prone. Fevers, fires, separations--things that burn and cut are Mars things. Mars corresponds to physical inflammation. It gets things started, and it causes friction in relationships. 

Mars rules Aries, which means the planet is very powerful there and doesn't need anyone's permission to do what it wants. 

Mars usually spends six weeks in Aries. Because it is going retrograde in Aries this year, it will be going much more slowly than usual, spending six months in this sign. It is as if the Mars in Aries chapter is extra long in the story of 2020. Mars has more time to cause a big impact.

During Mars retrograde season, Mars is asking: What is worth fighting over? We had until mid-August to get a feel for how this is going to show up for us. Pay attention to how you're dealing with anger and conflict. Are you a person who could use motivation and energy to start things? Do you tend to get angry? Is inflammation a problem for you? Don't overcommit or get too busy or get over-optimistic while Mars is retrograde.

This transit is more personal than the other transits. It is especially not a time to focus on world events. Focus on how it is hitting you personally. (What houses/planets are in the second half of Aries for you? What houses does Mars rule?) 

US Pluto Return

Exact in 2022.

When a planet returns to the same place in its orbit that it was in when a birth/event occurred, it is said to be going through a “planetary return.” Pluto’s orbit is approximately 250 years long, and it is approaching the place where it was in 1776, when the Declaration of Independence was signed. 

Pluto is named after the god of the underworld. During Pluto times, we confront the collective shadow. Structures that are no longer sustainable are torn down. 

During a Pluto return, problems (such as racial injustice, balance of power between branches of government, tensions between states, electoral college in the United States) that have been in place since the beginning come into serious review. Pluto is the great leveler. 

In Capricorn, Pluto’s focus is on highlighting structural issues in society. This has been a theme worldwide since the economic collapse in 2008 when Pluto entered Capricorn, but 2020-2024 (when Pluto leaves Capricorn) is a particularly intense period for the US.  

 Sources

Angela Slezak, "Capricorn Evolution in the United States," Mountain Astrologer, 6 February 2017

Richard Tarnas, Cosmos and Psyche

Gordon White, "H2 2020 Astrological Forecast with Austin Coppock" (YouTube)

This post was originally published on adapembroke.com.

[homestuckhomestuckhomestuck]

Summary of Homestuck fandom after [S] Cascade.

(2011) Homestuck as a general phenomenon was very active and developed at a swift pace from the time it was published (2009) onwards, especially in 2012-2013, including and past the first years of the Homestuck Kickstarter Project, a.k.a Hiveswap.

Between 2009 and 2012, Homestuck as a webcomic was infamous for updating daily, constantly, multiple times a day, at all hours, for years. There was a calculated average that Homestuck updated 5.5 pages per day, dropping entire bundles of updates of character interaction and plot reveals frame by frame, posted as fast as Hussie could write it. Though it wasn’t immediately obvious, this pace was sleeplessly breakneck, Hussie allegedly didn’t do anything but live, breathe and dream Homestuck for at least four years straight. I’m serious when I say updates came at all hours. I would wake up 2am on a week night and idly check MSPA to see if there was a new update, sort of like a trained parrot. Then in five minutes I’d tab back over to the Homestuck tab and refresh, just in case. 

This lead to an phenomenon appropriately dubbed “upd8 culture,” which became the basis of the sheer evangelical furor people still associate with the Homestuck fandom. Quick history: MSPA/Problem Sleuth fans originated and migrated over from the Penny Arcade forums, Reddit, and 4chan to nestle permanently within the bowels of 2011 - 2013 tumblr, and were best described from a distance as ‘zealous.’ Even remembering it now almost feels like recalling a distant riot. If you didn’t cosplay, write up a detailed theory post, or scribble up a crazy level of appropriately detailed fanart within 10 or so minutes any given upd8, you were buried under the force of post overload and were officially late to the party. After years of this, fans had some idea of just how dedicated it came off as, which was used to further spur on fandom and made Homestuck into the most meme filled in-joke community you could possibly imagine. 

What’s frustrating about describing Homestuck and Homestuck fandom is they both heavily affected each other and were both unique experiences within themselves, which makes actually trying to get across the atmosphere of the early 2010s a wordy process. Homestuck heyday updates regularly crashed tumblr servers, which became an actual fake rss way of seeing how much the plot progressed that day, which is unusual even if the tumblr servers 2011-2013 were not funded by the corporate might of Yahoo. The bigger the update, the faster the crash. I could tell you Homestuck dominated tumblr to the point it had a virulent hatedom of people who had never even read it and constantly saw it and never understood what was happening in it, and fans couldn’t stop themselves from chattering about it all the time. One thing that has to be noted is all this continual bickering and movement and development and competitive content production was honestly fun as hell. 

Besides constant updates and a continual stream of new content, the story was completely unpredictable. Game-changing plot twists continued to happen up until the very ending, and while this made Homestuck’s plot happily convoluted, for fans this meant one thing they never lacked for was barely solvable mystery. Even the (fan)artists and (fan)musicians hired to work on Homestuck had to guess what would happen next even if they were part of animating the next update. Under similar principles of an ARG, story presentation was created with the vague expectation fans would work together to explain to each other what just happened.

What this meant in conjunction with Hussie’s oddly accurate tabs on fandom theory was that when an update dropped you had to release whatever you were doing fast, or you would be outdated, wrong, inaccurate, or irrelevant at some undisclosed unspecific time, very soon. Canon and fanon directly pulled from each other, especially in the small character details. The very fact the comic spun on such accurate knowledge of fandom that was purposefully fostered between fandom and canon means that even now reading Homestuck while updating is considered an experience different from an archival read, even though Homestuck was always a self-contained story.  

Upd8 culture followed like this: Popular fan theories had multiple fanfictions written on them just to better explain what could happen next, and fan projects from voice acting to art to music to fiction were constantly being corrected, updated, and replaced by a deluge of new information and characters to pore over every single detail with a fandom magnifying glass. An endless amount of hyper ambitious fandom projects, games, animations, multi media fanstories made in rotating teams were abandoned for new starts JUST because the information they were working off became too outdated by the newest few weeks of updates. Cosplays were mocked up in hours (for the next morning of con,) art in minutes, theory in seconds. You threw everything out as fast as you could so someone else could build off of it. It did give a strong impression of collaboration and possibility. As the fandom grew bigger and younger Hussie seemed to shade more politic in his fandom communication, but Homestuck managed to maintain an “open channel” like feeling between fandom and comic for a long time. 

Innovative form encouraged innovative output. The point was to create. Another aspect feeding upd8 culture was in the way Homestuck was told. Not only were Homestuck’s detailed plot points hard to predict, but so was what would happen to the site in a meta way.  A page could range from a scribble to a 3 hr fully programmed rpg or 18 minute asset heavy style swapping animation, or most commonly, sprite art followed by several hundred words of dialogue and character interaction. Pages came by different artists, different styles, different mediums, different paces and focuses, but with a breadth-spanning understanding of memes and the internet. Factors of style, innovation and novelty affected the diversity of fan output. Part of my extreme willingness to take part in Homestuck fandom was that Homestuck was so crammed to the brim with open ended creative potential, just the multiplicity of cool ideas and plot mechanics and vivid characters and weirdly novel framing that had really good ideas and existed literally nowhere else, and I say that as a huge sci-fi fan. Time travel in Homestuck was excellent. It was an ambitious story and I really do think it pulled it off. Homestuck was once described as the fossilized excrement of someone’s personal creative experiments, and I think that’s a good way of putting it. Enthusiasm and confusing daring teemed off the page, and translated into a wide variety of fanfiction and art, in style, content, theme, and pov. 

Lastly, Hussie had a tendency to canonize fan content and hire fanartists and fananimators if their output was solid enough with a gentle horse kiss of approval and a naturally internet-transparent hiring process, like a forum. This was a purposely fostered atmosphere in the spirit of experimental adventure, and was just fucking nuts. Fans never wrote the story, but they did heavily influence aspects of how it was told and where it went (by design, fans were pretty much involved in making the comic) and even get to actually flesh out the details, like the main character’s names, memes, romances, character, and scope. Everything from canon sprite art to bits of the Midnight Crew to Caliborn’s character to Calliope’s art skill to music and trickster arcs were all originally based on years of fan jokes and fandom. Homestuck was definitely Hussie’s sole property and precious baby, but he built it as interactive-ish and creatively as he could. It added an extra layer of galvanizing egging on to fandom purpose. I don’t know how else to explain everything that came of it. Fandom was like a roiling morass of bullshit activity, like a breaking news bullpen 24/7, there was so much energy sparking off of all facets of fandom because it was just so fun. Fan output was borderline insane in 2010-2013.

Hussie said fandom grew exponentially at the introduction of the Trolls in Act 5 in mid 2010, but I can honestly say I think fandom really started treating Homestuck like a hidden gem worth proselytizing right after the events of [S] Cascade at the end of 2011. Before then, Homestuck was tenuously good, and had a rep on tumblr for having weirdly ubiquitous fans and over- detailed fancontent, but [S] Cascade was the moment every single gamble asked of the reader in the story actually paid off. In fact, Homestuck’s plot was generally constructed to climax at [S] Cascade, as was apparent from the big explosion of fan reaction after the fact. At this point, you would be hard pressed to find a fan that wouldn’t say, “Homestuck is good.”  

THE KICKSTARTER (2012)

Right after [S] Cascade, a lot of things happened in quick succession. Act 6 started, revealing what endgame would probably look like. It was slated to be shorter than Act 5, envisioned as a kind of denouement. Lord English, the final villain, was revealed. Hussie stated he thought the comic would end the following year. I think Hussie saw the ending was in sight and started trying to merchandise for real at this point, god tier hoodies started releasing at a faster rate, Homestuck book 1 came out (in addition to Problem Sleuth book 3), there was a Homestuck music (and track art) contest announced with hundreds of fan submissions, and the incongruous but hilarious public induction of Dante Basco, Hollywood superstar, who was instantly whisked into the Homestuck fandom’s fold as soon as he formed a tumblr. Homestuck had a bit of a reputation by then so the fandom (+ Hussie) was legitimately trying to woo him gently. This was entertaining for everybody, including Dante Basco. (For those who haven’t gotten that far, Dante Basco is a character in Homestuck.) (As some trivia, Grey DeLisle also briefly made a tumblr in this time, influenced by the instant rapport Dante Basco had, voiced some Vriska lines, then left due to some unrelated but tumblr-typical drama.)

There probably weren’t even specifics on who was going to be programming, illustrating, producing, and writing Hiveswap- and I’m still vaguely convinced Hussie scrolled through Promstuck and then hired deudlyfirearms (Calliope’s official artist) on the spot to illustrate all his future creative endeavors. I know Guzusuru got hired at least partially due to Lullaby for Gods, not to speak in the least for Paperseverywhere or Toastyhat (tumblr usernames used just in case, dril), plus a literal list of artists you could follow through various Homestuck fan production to official product lines. With Hiveswap, Homestuck went from hobby to full time job for some people. But before all that, in 2012 Homestuck as source material was apparently endless and constant, and let’s just say by 2013, Hussie never had to ASK for specific fan content, assets, musicians, artists, programmers, writers, even money. He just had to allow fandom a place, an address, an email, anything, to let them throw it at him. I have actually never seen anything like it, this weird businesslike use of talents within and out of comic. This is why mid 2012 art assets and minigames suddenly start becoming more populous, culminating in the nearly entirely guest art illustrated, programmed, and animated EOA6 and A7 and guest written post-canon snapchats in 2016. (This is also the time the MSPA forums crashed.) Also the art, programming, and music team for Hiveswap seem comprised of former fan musicians and artists. 

One thing that’s no concern for Hiveswap: it will be was beautifully illustrated, scored, and animated by people who loved Homestuck.

In sum: 2012 Homestuck was in full swing. Homestucks flooded cons, more than usual, to such a volume of painted gray tweenagers that cons in general (and hotels) had to rewrite the rulebooks surrounding such things as panels, photoshoots, and draw meets. MSPA servers were still barely holding up, especially after big upd8s, and were constantly being upgraded. Tindeck made a whole genre tag on their site for Homestuck fanmusic. What Pumpkin and Topatoco couldn’t keep up with demand, everything was constantly out of stock. Staff and even Hussie didn’t announce when new products were released until weeks later because if they did, the entire store server would immediately crash for long periods of time. This remained true even into 2016, apparently. There were homestuck plushes, furniture, tattoos, rooms, board games, video games, cards, dolls, products you wouldn’t even think of– a whole years long scrum about establishing copyright and what could sell where to who. Promstuck was a once-a-year reality in random cities around the US or otherwise. Art Team and Music Team had quick fame gain, I know at least Music Team members could feasibly live off of Homestuck revenue as their day job. Ben Nye grey paint actually sold out before a con, and even to this day any gray paint on amazon will be utterly dominated by troll cosplay reviews. Even small trivially related products like the record of the guy who posted “I’m a Member of the Midnight Crew” on youtube was convinced to list the record on ebay for a couple hundred dollars in a sprightly fan bidding war. This was completely unremarkable at the time. 

The most interesting thing about Homestuck is that it was a) entirely spread by grassroots efforts and word of mouth, and b) a free webcomic. Though unlike the T.V syndicated and advertised shows like Sherlock or Dr. Who or anime, or the multi-billion dollar industries of Marvel or Nintendo, with nearly zero effort to be anything but weird and internet obscure, Homestuck seemed just as bafflingly popular and literally impossible to avoid as professionally advertised hollywood blockbusters, popular anime, television serial shows, and multi million video games, at least on tumblr, reddit, and 4chan, and conventions. Because of all the factors that went into it’s circuitous development, if you hadn’t read through a huge chunk of Homestuck, you wouldn’t even understand and you couldn’t even properly explain why such a niche but undeniable popularity existed. It was such a phenomenon. 

People who had (reasonably) never even heard of Homestuck would stumble upon a fandom antic and observe with growing confusion the busy masses hard at work. Bright blue horse dildo fundraised and sent dutifully to creator? (At least three different dildos on 3 different social media homestuck fan sites were fundraised publicly.) Gruesome artwork of puppet fetish websites carefully placed with pages of critiqued meta with way too much attention? Even the usual deluges of upd8 fanart and fantheory? Entire forum sites and rp sites and chat clients enthusiastically founded just for the constant need to discuss the story? Homestuck became recognizable by horns and grey paint and terrifyingly huge meetups, a nearly frantic aura and art meets or prom dances just for fans - “What the fuck is Homestuck?!” became a fandom catchphrase, because it was always being commented on. Tbh, Homestuck is the r rated precursor for Undertale in memetic inclination and story framing style. Memes, man.

And in the midst of this, in September 2012, Hussie suddenly announced a Homestuck Video Game Kickstarter. The long awaited scalemate plushes were introduced as a reward tier. And unexpectedly, a lavishly illustrated ostensibly Kickstarter exclusive Homestuck tarot deck by popular fanartists as one of the reward tiers.  

For context: The entire premise of Homestuck is that it was a transcribed gaming session of a video game that didn’t exist. Opening a Homestuck Video Game Kickstarter was a fitting sequel, the equivalent of waving an 8th book prequel in front of Harry Potter fans, as illustrated by the cream of the crop, if every previous iteration of the Harry Potter series was also free. In addition, the goal was $700,000, and Homestuck had over 2 million online fans. There wasn’t a question if $700,000 was going to be feasible as a funding goal, it was more a question of how far the fandom could goad itself into trying to overshoot it. In fact, I remember being kind of disappointed we didn’t reach 3 million. We capped just below 2.5 million including the paypal donations. Homestuck started making “official” waves in news articles and such, of people who noticed a completely incomprehensible kickstarter got a lot of money somehow, and this in addition to the typically update culture-fast result (the funding goal was reached in about 30 hours of a month long campaign,) was regarded as very bizarre by everyone who didn’t know what Homestuck was. 

Trivia: there was even a $10,000 tier introduced as a joke, where “your fantroll will become canon (for one panel, and then die),” which was hastily closed after two people actually took it. (One was an army vet who thoroughly enjoyed the story and basically wanted to donate as thanks, and the other has remained impressively anonymous.) First time I saw Hussie publicly searching for words. I really could say 2012 Homestuck was approaching some kind of mania. Considering how Homestucks were, if someone named their firstborn off a Homestuck character, I wouldn’t have been shocked. The game was funded. 

Homestuck hiatus’ started in earnest. This was due to the increased production schedule of both the Kickstarter game being punted into development, the troubled indie game development cycle, and more detailed HTML5 games (openbound) in the comic, and product production, which is, you know, was fair enough. Updates were frequent enough to keep fandom active and frothy well into 2013, where the lack of Game Updates in conjunction with comic hiatus’ were both uncharacteristic and concerning. 

Homestuck was abruptly shifted off of regular upd8 schedules, and upd8 notifiers were sadly put to rest. 

HIATUS FANDOM (2013-2014)

Here was a unique factor of 2013 Homestuck fandom, for the lack of content, fandom moved en masse to an alternative ‘hiatus fandom,’ in some kind of effort to keep together over the wait. This literally singlehandedly boosted the popularity of games like OFF, Dangan Ronpa, etc. Homestuck hiatus fans were already pro at boosting popularity through word of mouth, and these obscure-but-popular video games were fun to pimp in the meantime. A more recent, toned down example would be 17776. 

Here was also something weird. In December 2013 Hussie apparently (as creative director only) had some kind of mysterious would-be trial run with Shiftylook with Namco ips, resulting in Namco High, the Homestuck and Namco character dating sim, where you could date Davesprite (who had a surprising amount of meta character development,) Terezi, Pacman, and Galaga. It was so out of nowhere nobody knew what to do with it. It was an indication of what Homestuck as a franchise was probably going to expand into, though, and an intriguing move on the part of Bandai. 

In the comic hiatuses and throughout the roadblocked kickstarter game development, canon-side, the Paradox Space quasi-canon side project and WeLoveFine (later ForFansByFans, who took over merchandising,) continued on the spirit of fandom support- notably the original Art Contest to make new merch- now streamlined into a “fan forge” where any fan can go through a voting process to say, pitch a new product and later be hired on the most recent calendar, then show up working a new Friendsim.... etc. 

After this a new generation of internet fans appeared to ‘notice’ Homestuck, hearing it was ending, and joined in, making the Kickstarter garner a kind of shadowed conspiracy-riddled rumortale more than anything, which really outstripped the simplicity of what happened: hardworking but troubled development.

The End of Homestuck was hanging like the sword of Damocles over our collective motivations, you can still find mournful farewell Homestuck fanart floating around to this day! In fact, the fandom believed it was the End of Homestuck several times in 2014-2015. Fandom was tamping down on the corners, cleaning up fanart (relatively), tucking away the crazily ambitious scifi world spanning AU fic. The wild, raw creativity that used to be so rampant through all corners of the internet seemed vaguely diminished, tidier, more understandable, trackable, and efficient. Big Projects never showed their roughs and drafts until the final products anymore, small circles of discourse popped up in pretty polite language and with almost no capslock. The discussions weren’t on What Hussie Would Pop On Us This Time To Overhaul The Entire Plot Of Homestuck, it was more like, did he make the gay Gay Enough™? Vriscourse remained eternal, though. 

And it isn’t just nostalgia talking. I’ve noticed some Homestucks still think fandom is a rush of collective community like they’ve never before experienced, that upd8 celebrations are pretty dang wild, and Homestuck convention presences are well-established, but now? In 2015-2017? This is calm and active, there are still some cool projects going on, but nothing like the insanity that was associated with Homestuck. Homestuck was the ‘biggest’ fandom I’ve ever been in, in terms of sheer forced commiseration and activity, and it just has not reached anything close to the levels of 2011-2013 bullshittery and spark plugs. 

But the fandom is still present- people treat it like a phase, but Homestuck is still a clever story that retains all the aspects that attracted readers to it in the first place. Also, the fandom still regularly accomplishes minor feats of economics like this even in 2016: 

because that is the level of fan fervor that Homestuck inspires, forever, apparently.

I’d last like to note I’ve skipped a lot, I tried to keep it as zoomed out and as general as possible. I’d like to explain the true foibles of 2013 Homestuck fandom, such as the forced formation of entire rp websites, apps, programs, and platforms dedicated to fanning Homestuck more efficiently, how fans formed new mediums and literal ways of expression and vast organized contests on how to express themselves and collaborate better, how there was almost a fan project-pipeline system in place, and how exactly Homestuck influenced Undertale (think of the meta) and an entire mini generation of webcomics and tv show story boarders spiritually, and I haven’t even tried to explain the aspects of Homestuck’s use of framing and how genuinely interesting it is from a storytelling perspective, and how the interaction of Hussie and the fandom and serial updates affected people’s connectivity because out of scope.

...But just for posterity and context of update culture: Quoth Gankro, programmer: 

So the biggest thing to keep in mind with MSPA is that it's based entirely off of collaboratively riffing off eachother's ideas. It started out as a faux text-based adventure where people would post prompts, and Andrew would take the ones he liked and riff off of them. As far as I'm concerned this is Andrew's super power: the ability to take a pile of things (comments, art, music, ideas, people) and rapidly recombine them into amazing things. The chatlogs in Homestuck full of amazing back and forths? That's just what talking to Andrew in chat was. Constant riffing and feedback loops.... 

Anyway, this is all to say that the genesis of ideas, and even how things got developed, is honestly really murky with Homestuck? Everything was kinda adhoc, a riff-on-a-riff, and done in incredibly little time....

I can't emphasize this scramble enough. Andrew was a ceaseless content machine, and I don't think I was ever "blocked" on him producing content. Which is ridiculous considering how much content is packed into our games. (like, hundreds of pages of dialogue)

Michael Bowman, music team: 

Volume 5 going out of its way to include gobs and gobs of material definitely changed the project; the floodgates opened. I think people admired Andrew's astonishingly prolific pace from 2009 to 2012, and between 2010 and 2011 the music project had the same vibe: we released one or two albums monthly. 

-fan interviews courtesy though the efforts of u/drewlinky 

Homestuck and it’s fandom has the unique distinction of being nigh unexplainable, as in, it took this long just to fully outline how the Homestuck Kickstarter was always going to be wildly successful, and how development was always going to take years even without the incident with the Odd Gentlemen, who clearly didn’t understand why Homestuck was popular or even why that mattered, (pre- Undertale), in the first place, but with the news of Viz taking on Homestuck’s license on account of that viral-like marketability so now there’s an actual possibility that Homestuck will finally become���… anime, why not hearken back to the good ol days and be relentlessly picayune for the hell of it? 

Happy 10/25!

[justanothercinemaniac]

Epic Movie (Re)Watch #235 - White Christmas

Spoilers Below

Have I seen it before: Yes

Did I like it then: Yes.

Do I remember it: Yes.

Did I see it in theaters: No.

Format: DVD

0) I know Christmas was a week ago but I’m just getting the chance to write this now so thanks for your patience everyone! :D

1) This was actually the THIRD film Bing Crosby sang “White Christmas” in after Holiday Inn and Blue Skies.

2) This film’s opening scene does well to establish the tone of the picture. It’s hopeful and sweet against a harsh backdrop, with showmen Bob Wallace and Phil Davis doing their best to bring some Christmas cheer to WW2 soldiers. It also establishes what kind of a man General Waverly is, which is important. The entire motivation for the film is helping this man out, this great men who all those soldiers care about so much. We understand why in this prologue.

3) The first singing of “White Christmas” also does well to play up the movie’s heart. It gives a sense of the sentiment and kindness that permeates the two hour run time.

4) Danny Kaye as Phil Davis.

Kaye is the ultimate scene stealer of the entire show and was actually the third choice for the role. He is incredibly funny, bringing a much welcome energy and charisma to the part. He’s crafty (manipulating Bob in a harmless yet devious way), clever, and has a great chemistry with Bing Crosby’s Bob Wallace. Of the main four stars, Kaye is definitely my favorite.

5) Bing Crosby as Bob Wallace.

The straight man of Wallace & Davis, Crosby still gets to show off a nice sense of humor in the film. He gets the chance to be serious, fun, kind, a little sad, a little mad, romantic, and pulls all of them off well as the film’s solid lead. Obviously his vocal chops were a big part of the character, but he’s Bing Crosby. I don’t think there was ever a doubt he could sing.

6) The montage which follows the prologue does well to establish the post war rise of Wallace & Davis in showbiz. It’s an important aspect in the film which could have really slowed done the part but the montage is sleek and fun so as not to bore the audience.

7) The conversation with Bob and Phil about how the latter wants the former to start dating so he can have some time alone really defines their relationship moving forward. We understand how good of friends they are that they can be candid but fun with each other. They joke, they tell it like it is, they play, and I just really like that.

8)

Betty: “Benny’s got a job in Alaska. He’s been out of the country for three months.”

9) The relationship between Betty and Judy is wonderfully defined - not by their song - but by their conversation before the song. We understand how this relationship works much as the conversation with Bob & Phil established their friendship. We get how Judy sees Betty and vice versa and it’s great. A nice female friendship where there’s no bickering over a guy, a rare treat in the 1950s. Although I will say I never bought Vera-Ellen as being the younger sister here.

10) Rosemary Clooney as Betty.

Clooney is an extremely kind, likable, charismatic, and endearing performer who really elevates the role of Betty. She has a very nice chemistry with Crosby and is just so damn interesting. Which is good, because on paper Betty is freaking awful. I’ll talk about this more, but we get a sense of what’s to come with her holier-than-thou attitude when Bob begins talking about “angles”. Basically I love Rosemary Clooney in this movie, but I hate how Betty is written. It’s frustrating to say the least.

11) “The Best Things Happen While You’re Dancing”

This early number shows off one of the film’s weakest and strongest elements simultaneously. Most if not all of the numbers do nothing to actually motivate the plot forward, instead just filling up the two hour run time. HOWEVER they’re almost all so damn entertaining it’s hard to actually find fault with this. You’re too busy enjoying the show!

12) According to IMDb:

According to Rosemary Clooney, Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye's "Sisters" performance was not originally in the script. They were clowning around on the set, and director Michael Curtiz thought it was so funny that he decided to film it. In the scene, Crosby's laughs are genuine and unscripted, as he was unable to hold a straight face due to Kaye's comedic dancing. Clooney said the filmmakers had a better take where Crosby didn't laugh, but when they ran them both, people liked the laughing version better.

13) Ah, the only person of color in the movie. And they’re servers.

14) “Snow”

Snow is probably the second most Christmas-y song in the film after “White Christmas”. It shows off the four leads unity well (although Vera-Ellen didn’t do her own singing) and is one of my favorite numbers in the whole film. It’s charming and sweet, filled with winter charm and spirit. I dig it.

15) I like that the greenness of Vermont is a detail but not a focus of the film. Yes it’s called “White Christmas” and yes snow does bring in business to the hotel, but the conflict isn’t about trying to get it to snow it’s about trying to make an old friend happy for the holidays.

16) Dean Jagger General Waverly.

Waverly is the personification of the movie’s heart and sincerity, while also being my favorite character in the movie. You see how caring he is through subtle ways. He’s not one to express his emotions or his heart but you can see it clearly in Jagger’s performance. He is able to be commanding when necessary but more than that he is a kind, sometimes sad, honest man. I love it.

17) This was always one of my favorite gags in the film.

Bob [after hearing over the phone how much something will cost]: “Wow.”

Phil […]: “How much is wow?”

Bob: “Right in between in between, ‘ouch,’ and, ‘poing.’”

Phil: “Wow.”

18) The Minstrel Number.

This is one of the longest, most pointless numbers in the entire film. There is a great amount of entertainment and production value but it adds nothing to the story. While it is probably the strongest out of the three “performances” (the rehearsals Wallace & Davis are holding at the hotel), like the other two you can cut it and lose absolutely nothing from the film.

19) According to Rosemary Clooney, Bing Crosby improvised almost all of his dialogue in the scene where she meets him in the kitchen. You can tell and I mean that as a compliment. There is an honest spontaneity to the conversation which pulls you in because it’s so interesting.

20) “Count Your Blessings” is a wonderfully kind and moving number which has you invested in the romance between Bob/Betty quickly. Too bad the writing with Betty has me totally DISINTERESTED in them actually ending up together. But more on that later…

21) The scene where we learn that Waverly wanted back in the army but gets rejected not only develops him as a character (his motivations, his desires) but the heart of the film as well.

22) I mentioned that “The Minstrel Number” was one of three totally pointless numbers in the movie. “Choreography” is by far the worst offending of those three. It is not nearly entertaining enough to warrant its run time and serves as close to offending filler. Honestly just cut it.

23) Ah yes, what I’ve been hinting at this whole recap. The bane of my existence, the thing I hate in this movie above all else: freaking Betty becoming such a passive aggressive shit head! If you haven’t seen this movie let me recap:

Betty hears some BS about Bob out of context which paints him in a negative light

She takes this half-assed rumor as fact and immediately accepts it

She never ONCE actually talks to Bob about it

And then she just LEAVES! She runs away WITHOUT ACTUALLY SAYING WHY SHE’S UPSET!

BOB LITERALLY DOES NOTHING WRONG DURING THIS ENTIRE FILM, BETTY NEVER APOLOGIZES, AND BOB SPENDS THE REST OF THE MOVIE FEELING BAD OVER SOMETHING HE DIDN’T ACTUALLY DO!

It is infuriating and I hate Betty because of it. I hate her I hate her I hate her! BUT Rosemary Clooney is so damn charming I love her performance in the movie! But on paper alone Betty is being a passive aggressive shit who Bob devotes way too much energy into trying to appease her. IT’S NOT WORTH IT BOB! Of all the contrived pieces of bullshit in an attempt to add conflict in their relationship, this is the most painfully obvious piece of crap I have ever seen. I love this movie but dear god I freaking hate Betty in the last act.

24) I love that Judy basically cons Phil into an engagement with her and how freaked out he gets by it. Suddenly the dynamic of their relationship just shifted and it’s glorious.

25) A fine piece of 50s BS sexist writing: suddenly Judy is a weeping hysterical woman because her plan didn’t go the way she thought. Which literally matches with NOTHING we learned about her before this moment.

26) “Love You Didn’t Do Right By Me”

First of all, this is such a melodramatic and shitty move. “Love You Didn’t Do Right By Me?” SERIOUSLY!? Maybe it would’ve IF YOU TALKED TO BOB! I know that Betty asks to sing a different song when Bob shows up but clearly the filmmakers are trying something with this and I just, ugh, I HATE IT!

Second of all, the number is actually a great tune and a wonderful showcase for Rosemary Clooney’s talents. It’s her only solo in the entire film and she absolutely nails it. So again, a great example of how I love Clooney but I hate Betty in this film.

27) Phil keeping Waverly away from the TV set is an excellent showcase for Danny Kaye’s comedic talents. He may not be Charlie Chaplin but he’s damn good.

28) “What Can You Do with a General?”

Leonard Maltin called this composer Irving Berlin’s least memorable tune. I disagree and in fact really enjoy it. It’s got a sense of cleverness to it. It’s sweet, a nice tune. A little slow but it gets stuck in your head. So in short: I disagree with Leonard Maltin.

29) The look on Waverly’s face is everything this film was about. EVERYTHING.

30) “Gee, I Wish I Was Back in the Army” is a fun and fitting near-climactic musical number for the film. It’s fun, funny, representative of the joy and humor that Wallace & Davis wanted to bring Waverly. Also, according to IMDb:

For the song "Gee, I Wish I Was Back In The Army", there is the lyric, "Jolson, Hope And Benny all for free". This is a reference to three wartime entertainers: Al Jolson, Bob Hopeand Jack Benny. The original words were "Crosby, Hope and Jolson all for free", but the lyric was changed because with Bing Crosby in the cast the original lyric would break the fourth wall.

31) While obvious from the film’s title, the snow fall at the end is a sweet way to wrap the story up. It’s not made into a big deal, they just enjoy it’s beauty. This leads into the final performance of “White Christmas” which acts as a poignant and fitting finale to the story.

White Christmas is a holiday classic with a great heart and sense of fun. The cast knock it out of the park and the music is great, and although I may have issues with some character writing (freaking Betty) I still love the film as a whole. I definitely recommend it.

[chaipluscode]

Beginning Back end pt.1

Welcome to the second of installment of me trying to explain something I struggled with!! There are multiple parts to this, so grab your nice, hot cup of chai and sit tight. Today’s post is about beginning back end.Things you will need to follow along with me in this post:

Your attention!

See number 1

NOTE: Setting up now will save time if you decide to pursue back end on your own later on or if you decide to practice with what you learn from my posts. If you wish to set up later or differently, then skip to point 1. 

I use c9.io which saves me the hassle of a local setup that may/may not take hours and days of frustration and confusion so it would be recommended to make a free account at https://c9.io/ Yes, they do require a credit card for their free account, but it is extremely worth it. c9 saves you the time and energy of manually setting up locally. Instead, you pick the configuration you need, and c9 does the rest. 

After signing up you can create your local workspace and select Node.Js. This is what I will be using to demonstrate.

(Unfortunately, c9 does have issues and if you wish to manually set up because you don’t trust c9 with your credit card, or for any other reason, here is a local setup tutorial: https://hackhands.com/how-to-get-started-on-the-mean-stack/ )

1) What is back end? Why does it sound so mysterious? What are you exposing me to????

You are being exposed on the second half of what it takes to become a FULL STACK DEVELOPER. It sounds mysterious because it is, literally. The back end is everything the user doesn’t see 👀 👀 👀.  When you type tumblr.com into your browser, you are sending a get request to retrieve all the information you would see on your dashboard, and have it presented you. However, every day when you check your Tumblr, you see brand new posts. This is the back end at work in short. It dynamically responds to different requests you make. Typing in tumblr.com is an example of a GET request. Me making this post right now is me asking tumblr to take my post and make it visible to show up on all my followers’ dashboards. This is known as a POST request. What is returned to you is known as the response. Whatever you see on your dash after making your request is a response from the back end.

2) Okay...but I made a really nice blog site just using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and uploaded to a hosting service. Why do I need back end? (Okay I made up the question and none of my sites are blogs, but...just don’t @ me please). 

That’s great, I’d love to see it! But as beautiful as your site is, there are a few things you or I can’t do:

Comment on blog posts

Post a blog post (that saves) without manually changing the html

Sign Up/Log In 

Show us cool things, like an API (will talk about in another blog post, essentially come someone else has written that you can use to display cool things on your site ) which gives us a visual display of what the weather is like in the next two weeks!

Okay! So now you know what back end actually is, you might be wondering how to dive in. But wait!! Where do the responses from all the requests come from? (Server). What makes our pages dynamic? (Databases). How does everything go back to the front end? (Middleware). What language do we code in and what helps structure our code? (This is subjective, my posts will reference Node.js and use express as the main framework).

Check out this website for an introduction to the hard technologies of all of this: https://www.upwork.com/hiring/development/a-beginners-guide-to-back-end-development/

I would do you guys an injustice by not sharing this with you as it is concise and an easy read. Feel free to ask me any questions. The article does a much better job at dumbing this down than I can and has helped me grow a better understanding. 

Questions you should be able to answer from this post:

What is back end web development?

What is the difference between front end and back end?

What happens when you make a get or post request?

What you should know for the next post:

How the technologies work (view the link).

Answers to all of the above questions.

Thanks, all! Stay tuned for follow ups that will come! I may or may not interrupt each part with another post on C++ or another language, but stay tuned!  Hope you enjoyed this post and your chai!

[arvoze]

man, this was sent like, nearly 2 weeks ago or w/e, and i completely ignored it bc i didnt have the energy/ability to care (you literally sent these when it was between 1 - 2am my time) but, it was recently brought to my attn that you put both me + lal in your byf (because i.... banned you from a server i guess, and that means lals at fault too?) so.

i guess it’s high time i answer this lmao. maybe you wont even see this. maybe youll vague abt me for the next few weeks and try and make me out to be a bad person, but i dont care lol. anyways this is under a cut bc its pointless drama i guess. ask 2 tag

additionally: this isnt rly meant to act as a callout post. but since u asked on anon (and im pretty sure we’re mutually blocked) i cant really talk about this privately. this is mostly just.. well. answering your question. ive written this little paragraph after i’ve written everything below, so like, idk dude, it happens sometimes, i get rly heated abt shit and then cool down after a while. so this is wild.

edit: i havent read this thru nor do i care about reading it through. are there a bunch of typos? probably. dont care though

i dont rly have the energy to pull up Everything esp because that lke.... requires going thru so many discord messages adn i really just. dont care enough to sift through everything

“but if u dont care why are you writing this” shut up u wanted answers didnt u lol

nyways heres just . some shit lmao

man firstly let’s deal w your post abt my server

+ dont worry! ive got it archived in case u delete it bc who knows what ud do lol. nyways

lets just do some breakin apart on this:

i was lterally shaking at the time and having my OWN panic issues but i guess you dont rly take that into consideration lol?

this is one of the biggest exaggerations like ... you made it sound like the server was some big special place jdfghdkj theres literally 4 mods and 2 of them didnt even talk to you. the other 2 were me and lal

like half of the server isnt even fucken active on the server and the majority of the other half dont even care about unfollowing/blocking u. what a wild assumption. thts the funniest shit 2 me

please you literally sent me 3 asks when it was way too early in the morning 4 me expecting me to reply as if it was possible for me to give u all the reasons in like 10 minutes jesus christ

ths is one of the ugliest posts ive ever seen + this was posted before you were banned frm the server. several ppl in the server have bpd + i was absolutely not willing to have smeone who says this sht abt their illnesses around (re: the whole “not actively in therapy” and shit. fuck off lol)

here’s some other stuff on my list that you might remember:

(kin stuff) being fully aware that my brother wasn’t - and still isn’t - okay with doubles with a specific character, and that you were specifically warned whilst he was offline, and you knew this was the case, yet decided that your best way of explaining something was..... fuck dude, whats the wording you used? “i’d say but some people here aren’t ok with doubles” or some shit which is! literally just as bad! and tht shit has fucked my bro up so severely tht he still fuckn..... thinks abt + the shit uve said In General (shrugging emoji)

heres a fucken wild ride for u: ur the reason he left th server anyways and why the second i banned u i was immediately happy because holy shit i can talk to my bro again bc i could invite him back! to a chat where he doesnt have to deal w someone who causes him constant panic attacks! wowee

lets not forget me expressing my extreme distaste of lying [person] + r.idged.og + ridg.epho.s but u completely ignoring that shit (+ wowie remember when u said lying was yr friend and that you didnt like me venting negatively abt them bc my nasty experiences r somehow less important than ?? tht shit??? lol anyways)

god the entire fucking drama w the lying shit . i cant believe i was on yr side for a while jdfghkj. that whole fiasco was so shitty. nyways thts nothing to do w me its just something that made so many ppl uncomfy

remember when you left the lying chat and then vented to us about shit but then rejoined the lying chat unbeknownst to us + caused shit again (surprise, i know about that)

you, generally, made several people uncomfortable (myself included), and as the owner of the server, i’d much rather kick one person from the server than have several people being uncomfortable. but if that’s an unreasonable thing to do then please, inform me, because that’s news to me.

whilst i dont support alex or alex’s partner in any way, shape or form (before u try and call me a fucken apologist/supporter/whatever lol), the blatant deliberate misgendering of alex’s partner on your byf was extremely shitty of you (which has since been fixed, but yikes).

(kin stuff) pretending to not be a double around lal, knowing he’s not comfortable with doubles (which, maybe you’re not! but given you’re kin w mc.ree + got that in your byf, and don’t have anything abt not follwing if ur x.phos in ur byf...... boyo)

god theres more but im not willing to dig up all the shit + also dont want to ask other ppl about their personal problems bc thats exposing them to a past/experience they probably want to forget about/never revisit

if u found this? congratulations. you got your answers.

if ur gonna vague abt me? go ahead. i dont really see what ive done wrong lmao.

also, re: why i didn’t tell you anything at all,

i was having a panic attack and almost throwing up

i kept trying to find reasons to keep you in the server, because i didn’t want problems to arise

i will literally never talk to ppl abt this kinda shit privately bc i dont want people to feel bad but 2 late

[gosatsuvns]

Weekly Update #229 - A Fresh Start Into A New Year

So here we are with the first weekly blog post of 2019! Hopefully, all of you had a great start into the new year and find yourselves brimming with the energy and determination needed to turn it into a very productive and successful one! I for one am certainly feeling motivated as heck to make this a year I can fondly look back on!

Last week, I talked a bit about 2018 and the things we have worked on and accomplished (or not). Today, I want to take a look ahead at 2019 and tell you a little about our plans for the upcoming months. So without further ado, let's jump right into it!

As mentioned before, our main focus for now remains on the completion of the extended GENBA no Kizuna demo.

It's hard to say when exactly we will be able to finish it. There is quite a bit of work left to be done and you have to keep in mind that we're still just two people working on this project. I mean, sure, we have a composer and a proofreader, but literally everything else (writing, coding, GUI, sprites, backgrounds, CGs, etc.) needs to be done by Natsu and me. So it can take a while, especially when you're working a part-time job as well (which is the main reason my VN dev time was significantly reduced throughout December, but I'll get into that a little more further down below).

In any case, since I cannot give you a release date yet, I'm going to give you a list of all the things that still need to be worked on instead. So, what exactly is still missing in terms of assets in order to fully code the second half of the extended demo's content?

Various sprites and sprite variations (Himatsu, Amber, Ryuunosuke, Shiku, Terano)

1 background artwork

2 CGs

Various little art pieces to be used in the DPA

Everything has already been worked on to some degree. The background has been sketched, for instance, and I have started outlining it. One CG is about 40% done. Himatsu already got her base sprite as well as a couple of variations, but will require a few more poses/expressions. The sprites for the suspect characters actually pose the biggest workload. I've started working on those as well, but it's four characters that all need a handful of sprite variations, so it's going to take a while until all of them are done.

Hopefully, we will be able to finish the demo within the first two or three months of the year. Of course, patrons will once again be able to check it out first and help us prepare everything for the subsequent public release. So if you're interested in this project and want to support us, or even help out with bug-testing or by making suggestions, please consider checking out our Patreon!

Not only will you get early access to the first half of the extended demo right away, you can also download the full versions of the BGMs, check out script excerpts or even read special blog posts, the most recent of which is giving you an early peek at the location where SHINRAI's sequel, Withering Without Hope (WWH) is set!

Really, even if it's just the 1$ tier or only for a month, every little bit of support is greatly appreciated! It's only thanks to our current patrons that we were even able to hire a composer and proofreader for GENBA. So seriously, to everyone who's supported us financially in the past or even continues to do so to this day, thank you so much!

But yeah, that's the current situation and the plan for at least the next couple of months. Although, there are actually a few more things outside of the demo itself, which we want to tackle as well. Along with its public release, we are planning to open up a Discord server and launch a Steam page after we've already launched one on itch.io a while ago. Furthermore, I'm planning to make some updates to the website and Patreon as well. All of these may sound like minor things, but will require some preparation time as well.

The good thing is that, once the extended demo is done, development for the rest of the game should go a lot faster and smoother. Because at that point, all the major characters will finally have their sprites with a good amount of variation. And there is a big difference between having to create sprites for 5 different characters from scratch for a single scene... versus just one or two new variations every now and then.

Anyway, that's more or less everything in regards to GENBA. Now for those of you wondering about WWH...

As I have mentioned before, it's not dead and hasn't entirely been put on the back burner, but GENBA's completion certainly takes priority for now. Also, I've been thinking about WWH's development a lot in general. At the current rate and pace, releasing a project of that size with only two people is just taking way too long. So once GENBA is completed, I really want to expand and get more people involved in our projects. Otherwise, it's going to take forever to release all the stories I still have in the back of my mind!

Whether it's going to be self-funded or through the help of Patreon or even Kickstarter, we will see. But in order to get faster at releasing projects and increasing the level of quality as well, there is no other way (even though I really enjoy doing all these things (mostly) by myself, haha).

So yeah, I'm not even sure if there's a point in working on any assets for WWH when I'm likely going to hire someone else to take care of it in the future. So instead, I'll just focus on its writing. This year, I want to focus on writing a lot in general. Once the extended demo is done, I'm going to finish writing the remaining chapters for GENBA no Kizuna. Even if the game itself might not be completed this year, I'm dead set on at least turning all those notes into a fully written story.

I have a lot of personal goals regarding my private life as well, so it's definitely going to be a work-intensive year. One that will require saving up a lot of money, too. It was nice being a full-time dev for so long, and I hope I can go back to that ASAP. But as I mentioned in the beginning, I was working a part-time job last month and I need to continue doing so from here on out. Not just for my private goals, but also for my future projects. Again, as of right now, Patreon allows us to pay our composer and our proofreader, but in order to actually get more people on board in the future, we need to save up even more funds. But I guess I'm not going to get too far ahead of myself just yet. For now, the goals for the immediate future are clear and I'm going to work hard on accomplishing them.

Thank you so much for reading! I hope you will stick with us for another year and be a witness to not only GENBA's development, but even our personal growth. Now please enjoy the rest of your weekend and, until next Saturday, take care! :3

[douchebagbrainwaves]

A LOT OF WHAT WE TRY TO DO IN THE DESIGN OF THE PROGRAM BENEFITS FROM EVOLUTION

Of course, as a hacker I can't help thinking about how something broken could be fixed. C was there because it came with the operating system. Why do investors like startups so much? Rapid change in one area uncovers big, soluble problems in other areas. But the two connections are distinct and in principle one could start a startup that was neither driven by technological change and makes a product consisting of technology in the narrower sense what used to be called Ajax. You don't have to think about how to make them work, and other people trying to do. Programming languages are for hackers, and never more so than in a program they expect to turn out in an hour. Writing software is a great way to solve b, but you can still end up constrained in a or b. The key to that mystery is to ask if there's a super-pattern, a pattern to the patterns. But it's usually execution that matters: All the scares induced by seeing a new competitor pop up are forgotten weeks later. You can easily reduce the opposing argument ad what most people would agree was absurdum. People who think the labor movement was the creation of heroic union organizers have a problem to explain: why are unions shrinking now?

There is no such thing as a killer feature. As I was doing before. Hackers like to hack, and hacking means getting inside things and second guessing the original designer. This is in contrast to Fortran and most succeeding languages, which distinguish between expressions and statements was entrenched. Google did, but simply that they understood search so much better. But if you do that, but I'd forgotten. Actually the best model would be to say that a hacker about to write a serious program using only the built-in operators in Common Lisp operators are comically long. Finding investors is hard. They're certainly inferior to the written word as a source of ideas. I'd forgotten about: that outside the startup world, startup founders get no respect.

I think it needs even more emphasizing. Most don't discover anything that remarkable, but some do.1 An interactive language, with a command-line interface, is more available than one that you have to work hard to maintain your relationship. That's the difference between Google and a barbershop. You have to know about a language before they can use it. But software, as a general rule, you can no longer afford you, but you're not going to lose them all at once; markets don't reduce headcount. Everyone said how determined and resilient you must be, but going through it made me realize that the determination required was still understated. If you are persistent, even problems that seem out of your control i. It's arguably implicit in making functions first class objects—they're a data type just like integers, strings, etc, and have a literal representation, can be passed as arguments, and so no matter how good his language was, no one wants to bother. One day, we'd think of ourselves as the next Google and dream of buying islands; the next, we'd be pondering how to let our loved ones know of our utter failure; and on and on.2 If we can develop a new Lisp.

In How to Become a Hacker, Eric Raymond describes Lisp as something like Latin or Greek—a language you should learn as an intellectual exercise, even though you won't actually use it: Lisp is worth learning for the profound enlightenment experience you will have when you finally get it; that experience will make you a better programmer for the rest of your days, even if most of the surprises. Suppose your company is making little profit. The principle extends even into programming. For boys, at least not for something as complicated as technology. Others were surprised at the value of the startup world, startup founders get no respect.3 Workers were for these companies what servers are for an Internet startup. If everyone else is cowering in a corner, you may end up with a quite different company than you meant to start. Once you experience the pain of missing your target one week it was the scripting language of Tk.

And this brings us to what I think will be an increasingly important feature of programming languages: library functions. To grow rapidly, you need to win. It's hard to say whether the problem is lack of exposure, or whether the product's simply bad. Should you spend two days at a conference?4 Starting one is at first no more than an outline of what you want. In an efficient market, the number of simultaneous users you can support per processor. It works so well that those who don't understand it are driven to invent conspiracy theories to explain how it's recession-proof. I got over 100 other responses listing the surprises they encountered. Steve Wozniak's problem was that he wanted his own computer.

Gone is the awkward nervous energy fueled by the desperate need to not fail guiding our actions. VCs themselves have no idea of the extent to which the startups they like are the ones that are best at selling themselves to VCs. Should you hire another programmer? Their victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. What makes startups different is that usually it doesn't. 6 months. It may also help to have persistent objects and/or language level support for lazy loading. Having users is like optimization: the wise course is to delay it.

Notes

Incidentally, this seems an odd idea. CEOs in the sense that there may be even larger than the type of mail, I suspect the recent resurgence of evangelical Christians.

The examples in this article used the term whitelist instead of editors, and when you depend on closing a deal led by manipulation or wishful thinking into trying to hide wealth from the study. Their opinion carries the same way a restaurant is constrained in a deal to move forward. One thing that drives most people haven't noticed yet.

Instead of laboriously adding together the numbers from the moment; if there is a way to be a special name for these topics.

Within an hour over the details. Could you endure studying literary theory, or that an investor pushes you hard to think of it, and a few data centers over the world. In January 2003, Yahoo released a new database will probably frighten you more by what you've done than where you currently are.