#so I only won the knowledge that I won 2nd

[ninelivesart]

I’m having a bit of an artist dilemma and I’m hoping someone might be able to help.

Every year my work does a pumpkin decorating contest (painted, not carved). And the prompt is always “Favorite book character.”

This year I thought it would be fun to do all the main SJM girls. I also bought a pack of acrylic paint pens just for my pumpkin.

However, I usually work digitally and wanted to draw up my designs digitally just to play it safe. Since you can’t really sketch on a pumpkin.

Now I’m stuck trying to figure out how to get the designs onto the pumpkin. Nothing I’ve tried so far has worked. I tried to decoupage the images but they just peeled right off. I then downloaded a paid app that’s supposed to superimpose your images over the camera. Great in theory. Didn’t work out for this particular project.

And now I’m back at square one. I considered the old pencil tracing technique but the designs are just too detailed and I know it won’t come out visible enough to be worth the effort.

The only other thing I’ve thought of is a projector. But since I have no plans to use it for tv, I don’t know what to look for. I still want something relatively affordable. But I’m not looking for something to project big images. The pumpkin is fairly small even for a pumpkin. I know I’ll probably use it for canvases. But I still don’t want to shell out the money for something unless I’m sure it’ll do what I want it to do. And we don’t really have a store here that I can go browse and talk to people.

Also I did consider a home made projector but to get it to do what I need, I’d have to buy so many supplies that I may as well just buy a real one.

So that’s where I’m at. I had this issue last year too and i ended up giving up just because nothing worked out. I’m hoping I can get at least one of these ladies on my pumpkin this year.

If you have any ideas or know of a good projector I can buy, I’d be really grateful.

[david-goldrock]

hi!! this isn't a hate ask, just a genuine question.

i have a quite a few jewish mutuals and my personal knowledge of a typical holiday season for jews is very limited.

i know i could go to google and stuff but i thought i would also ask a few blogs who are jewish.

i'm a minor and i go to a catholic school, so my lack of knowledge about judaism has a bit of a reason ^^"

tldr; the question here is how do jewish people celebrate around the typical holiday time? (november/december, sterotypical xmas season for people who celebrate)

So around the christian holiday time there's a single Jewish holiday- Chanuka.

The Jewish calendar is not consistent with the Gregorian one every year, but this year chanukah will be between 25th of December and January the 2nd

Chanuka is a Hebrew word that means "the celebration of the establishment of a new house, factory or other building"

In the case of the holiday, that building is the second temple

The story of Chanukah is beautiful, but if you want the TLDR:

After the conquest of Alexander the Great (refered to as Alexander from macadonia), the Selucid empire controlled Israel. At first they were tolerant of the Jews in the area, but when Antiochus the fourth came around, he imposed a much worse rule, including disallowing Jewish customs and Jewish bible learning, and making the temple Ta'meh (not kosher for sacrifice)

In the city of Modi'in, a resistance grew, and after many battles, they won the fight against the Selucid empire, even though their forces were much fewer and less trained, And established the second Jewish state

The legend says that when they got to the temple and tried to relight the Menorah there, there wasn't any oil good enough for the task anywhere there - only a single beaker of oil with enough oil to light the Menorah for a single day. Regardless, when they tried to light the Menorah with it, G-d made a miracle happen and the beaker lasted for 8 days, enough for new oil to get to Jerusalem

There are various customs of hannukah. Most refer to the oil beaker part for... Ancient political reasons we won't get into right now, but they include eating fried foods and lighting up the Chanukiya (which is a replica which is legally distinct from the Menorah so that it won't be a sin to make it)

There is an ambivalent custom - playing with a dreidel, which is a gambling game with rules I don't remember. On the dreidel 4 letters appear. In the diaspora - נ ג ה ש which is an acronym for נס גדול היה שם. - a great miracle happened there. In Israel the acronym is נ ג ה פ which is an acronym for נס גדול היה פה - a great miracle happened here. In some places, that miracle is the establishment of the state, in others it's the oil beaker

There was a custom inspired by Christmas which is to share chocolate coins with the children on Chanukah. In the diaspora this becomes more and more like Christmas with gifts given on the holiday, while in Israel that custom is, as far as I can tell, slowly disappearing

There is one custom which is definitely war related and not oil related, which is children making re-enactments of the story of Chanukah. It's not very common, but I remember it fondly from my youth

Chanukah has many songs also, which I will translate in the coming weeks so stay tuned XD

If you have any more questions, ask away!

[laura1633]

I've made my piece that this year is probably the year Max' run is going to end. He's had such a good run and I'm grateful that RBR provided him a good car for most of the time.

However, I'm still of the opinion that it's time to jump ship. RBR is sinking quite fast. Horner's head got way too big. Waché and his team clearly lost key figures and they are not able to compensate and actually build a decent car that can take the fight to McLaren and Ferrari. Max should not fulfill his contract and what I've heard he thankfully has performance clauses in his contract which could mean he could leave.

I'd love to see Max in a different car. I'd love to see him in red. I'd love to see him beside Charles. Eternal rivals finally united in one team, terrorizing the other drivers.

(I could also imagine Max taking revenge and joining Mercedes just so George loses his seat, because let's be honest: if Toto got the chance, George would be out of this seat faster than he could say yabadabadoo).

I think going into this season I have just assumed that Red Bull will not be competitive and so if they do end up being so then it's a bonus. I know Max can do amazing things in a car and will get the absolute maximum out of it but there comes a point where the car performance doesn’t allow you to compete for the championship and this may or may not be the year. 

It’s been amazing that he has won four in a row and if this run did stop at four I truly think that if he wanted to stick around long enough then he could easily go on another run and get another four. Overall though he has already proven that he is one of the greatest of all time. That’s not to say he won’t be in the fight, I am just setting my expectations low and then I can only be pleasantly surprised, unlike last year when I set my expectations high and the RB20 happened! 

I think a big test of whether Max will want to stay long term at RBR will be whether they can identify and fix the issues and develop in the right direction.  If they can’t then surely you start losing faith in the longer term. I also Max will have knowledge of how their engine development is going so it will be interesting to see what he does. 

I would love to see Max at Ferrari, even knowing the history of world champions who go there haha! I think him and Charles would be a really exciting team and Ferrari don’t seem to have any issues with having two ‘No1’ drivers. (Also on a non racing related note I think the PR videos of the two of them would be insanely embarrassing in the best possible way) It would be interesting if Charles wins the world championship to see if Ferrari then want to revert to getting a ‘2nd driver’ in to support their champion or if they continue with the two lead drivers.

I know a lot of people hate the idea of Max going to Mercedes and I completely understand why because I remember the things said about Max during 2021 but I do feel like if Max believed Mercedes could delver him a more competitive car then there is a chance of him going there. Kimi and Max in a team would be great too! It will be interesting to see what happens with George's contract negotiations and if he does re-sign then how long for.

I suppose Aston Martin is also an option. Honda have said they would like to work with Max again and I believe Newey would welcome Max going there. 

It’s going to be an interesting 1 or 2 seasons… I hope that if it is the case that Red Bull are not strong at the start of the season they can at least get on top of their development.  

[fangirlylady]

What is your headcanons on shangblade?

Sorry for the late reply, but OML, my first question & it's about my 2nd fav MK crackship! These'll cover 5 of my general HCs, then ones I think of in the different eras of MK!

My ShangBlade Headcanons

General:

Shang Tsung first spotted Sonya during one of her missions in Earthrealm. He was simply doing his shady sorcerer business for Shao Kahn before he spotted her fighting an enemy. He was not only attracted to her beauty, but her strength and will.

Sonya wouldn't be attracted to Shang's looks - not because she thinks he's ugly! But she would be attracted to his stubbornness, wit, and resilience (kinda like how I imagine she'd be attracted to Johnny). She'd also really like how knowledgable he is about battle & war tactics.

They'd have a lot in common than either of them realize (similarities will depend on the timeline). Whether it's the fact that they both serve their realms with pride, they're both constantly underestimated by friends & foes alike, or that they're craftier than they appear, they'll both be surprised at how similar they actually are.

Shang Tsung is possessive of Sonya. That's been shown well-enough in the '95 film. If they were to be together, he'd be a lot more yandere-like. He'd treat her like the world, but if anyone so much as look her a certain way (in his eyes), they'll be a part of his experiments without hesitation.

The two wouldn't have a very long relationship with one another...not without one changing their allegiance. Therefore, if Sonya turns into a villain due to Shang Tsung's influence, they would be a happy villain couple. On the flip side, if Shang Tsung becomes a good guy due to Sonya's influence, they would be a happy heroic couple!

1995 Movie

Sonya didn't let Shang Tsung kidnap her, as the film showed. Instead, I like to think that he tried to catch her by surprise when she was trying to reach Johnny during his fight against Goro. But, because she's an experienced soldier, she managed to surprise him instead & put up a good fight.

Speaking of said fight, it's very one-sided, with Shang Tsung at the defense while Sonya kept throwing punches & kicks. Though she was good, he was better (unfortunately).

Then he gives her an ultimatum while he's got her in a hold (nothing spicy, I swear). If she admits defeat & lets him take her to Outworld, he won't call the tournament & have Shao Kahn invade Earthrealm. If she doesn't, then he'll have to defeat her & take her "strong, sweet, beautiful" soul into his collection (and also win the tournament & let Shao Kahn invade).

As confident as this Special Forces soldier was about her kombat, she's not stupid. She knew that unfortunately, she's been outmatched by this conniving sorcerer. Thinking about her friends & their kombat though...she agrees.

And that's how she was kidnapped near the end of the film.

Also, I'd like to think that despite Shang Tsung saying that Sonya was going to be offered to Shao as a bride...

The First Timeline (MK1 - Armageddon)

Shang Tsung was smitten with Sonya when he saw her beat up his guards. When he forced her to participate in the tournament, he fully intended to kidnap her & keep her for himself (after ridding of Shao Kahn before he could touch her), no matter if she won or lost the tournament.

Sonya was treated with surprising grace from the sorcerer at first, as opposed to Kano. They've even had talks (see my third general HC), but even with his revitalized appearance & good manners, she never fell for his charms. That's why she's seen chained up in Shao Kahn's kolosseum, though Shang never wanted to put her in that position.

After she escaped, it was on sight whenever she saw him ever since. But instead of feeling bad, he always appreciates seeing & fighting her every time they've met. He's still in love with her as he was before, not matter how she felt about him.

The Second Timeline (MK9 - MK11)

Like the first timeline, Shang fell for Sonya when she & Jax came to his island battling his guards. BUT, he's a lot more subtle about his attraction towards her, because like her, he was focused on his job.

Even so, this attraction did play a role on how lenient he is when it came to her during the first tournament. "You allowed them to escape," Raiden said. 🤭

But, of course, after Liu Kang's win & the invasion afterwards, Shang Tsung kidnaps Sonya anyway and tries to make her see the dark side. He saw how relentless she was as a fighter, so-

She has no time for his bullshit...and that just makes him more attracted to her.

He still tries to hang out with her, despite her being a prisoner, and she hates it every time. Though with their talks, she did come to secretly appreciate his cunning and intelligence...as a foe!

After Sonya's freed, she now has knowledge she could use to help her friends gain an advantage over Shang Tsung...as well as a few other kombatants.

Even after the events of MK9, the sorcerer still lingers in the soldier's mind. Not particularly in a romantic way, but in a way to never underestimate her enemies and what they're capable of when interested in her.

After killing Fire God Liu Kang in his ending, Shang Tsung would create his own timeline & have Sonya be his strong, loyal wife (akin to retcon-Sindel). She was his muscle with weapons enchanted by his magic, he was her sorcery in case her strength & weapons weren't enough.

Now, I COULD also bring forth my new era HCs concerning ShangBlade, but I'll withhold them...until the time is right!

[which-qsmp-egg-would]

Time for the March Summary!

First of, the egg that haunts my dreams,

Richarlyson

For the 3rd month in a row, with 13/62 polls won last month, Richas has been voted most likely to:

Eat a random nut/berry/bug he found outside

Aim for the head during dodgeball

Intentionally cough/sneeze on someone while sick

Pick up something gross and chase his siblings around with it

Play computer games in class instead of doing his school work

Play football indoors and accidentally break a family relic

Play Julius Ceasar in a recreation of the Ides of March

Love a cursed food combination

Hunt down islanders that aren't wearing green on St. Patrick's Day

Pretend to be possessed to scare a sibling/parent

Refuse to wear shoes, even in the woods

Be the Rico (Penguins of Madagascar) of the island

Be covered in band-aids all the time

I do not know how he managed to win this many without me noticing. I think he's stealing trophies from me when I'm not looking.

Dapper

Wait, what? Even I wasn't expecting our favorite literal-demon child to win 2nd! With 11/62 polls won, Dapper has been voted most likely to:

Read Wikipedia articles for fun

Berate adults for coughing into their hand

Be a "Home Alone" protagonist

Love "Doctor Who"

Read Homestuck

Make a recreation of the Ides of March

Actually catch a leprechaun on Saint Patrick's Day

NOT have to sing the alphabet song to remember what order the letters are in

Love the Sherlock Holmes books

Know everything about demon folklore and scare everyone with their knowledge of it

Be determined to find every single easter egg at the island-wide easter egg hunt

She's a nerd, what else is there to say?

Chayanne & Pepito

Tied for 3rd, with 6/62 polls won each! Chayanne has been voted most likely to:

Love Hockey

Hyperfixate on the Percy Jackson series

Be a try-hard in P.E. class

Start a game of King Of The Hill everytime the school replaces the woodchips at recess

Fight with a teacher over a test grade

Sleep through fasting all day

Only look for the difficult to find eggs so their younger siblings can have fun at the Easter egg hunt

And Pepito has been voted most likely to:

Lose every round of Hide N' Seek because Pepito can't stop giggling

Believe in the Tooth Fairy

Chase Pepito's own tail

Still not know how to swim

Actually break a leg during a school play on accident

Eat paper because Pepito thinks it tastes good

One of the oldest eggs tying with one of the youngest. It's perfect.

Sunny

With 5/62 polls won, I'm sure Sunny is a little miffed that she's ended up in 4th. But it's okay, you all are sure to put her in 1st place one of these months. Sunny has been voted most likely to:

Secretly paint their closet an obnoxious color

Have a fashion show using her parents' clothes

Sleep with all of their stuffed animals so they don't get lonely

Treat the masjid shoe racks as their own personal shoe store

Have an imaginary friend

Tallulah, Ramón, & Pomme

Tying for 5th, with 4/62 polls won each, I'm very happy to see Pomme winning her first ever polls! And a total of 4 of them, no less! Tallulah has been voted most likely to:

Try and dye her own hair (making a huge mess)

Fit the main character role in "Coraline"

Perform Tarot card readings

Catch bees to pet them

Ramón has been voted most likely to:

Be obsessed with cowboys and the Wild West

Race to recalibrate the SmartBoard at school

Set up an elaborate rube goldberg machine to suprise a parent for their birthday

Have a space hyperfixation and want to be an astronaut

And Pomme has been voted most likely to:

Be a monster at PaintBall

Hyperfixate on Splatoon

Be very meticulous while coloring in a coloring book

Write a book

I think there's a pattern with that last one.

Leonarda

With 3/62 polls won, Leonarda has been voted most likely to:

Be obsessed with Power Rangers

Be into ice skating

Read every single Warrior cats books

I don't have anything funny to say here, It's hard to pay attention while listening to Ze Frank talk about coral kkkkkkkk

Empanada

With 2/62 polls won, Empanada has been voted most likely to:

Spend recess burying herself in woodchips and sleeping

Have Batik as a hobby

Oh hey, it's the first time Empanada's gone a full month without winning a poll about sweets!

Chunsik

Finally, our youngest has won a poll! With 1/62 polls won, Chunsik has been voted most likely to:

Be exempt from a Federation experiment because he politely declines it

What a polite kid!

...

...

That's it, right? That's all the eggs. All 11 eggs, all 62 polls for the month of March

...

Why does my clipboard say I'm missing two polls.....

...

Oh! Yes!

Juanaflippa & Bobby

In an absolutely unprecedented event, Juanaflippa AND Bobby have become our first ever dead eggs to win a canonical poll, with 1/62 win each! Juanaflippa has been voted most likely to:

Have a million allergies during the spring

And Bobby has been voted most likely to:

Get BANNED from playing Bulldog

It's still insane to me that you all managed to get these two a win. Bobby was going up against RICHARLYSON for void's sake. You all were fighting against the current on that one.

See you all soon!

[becauseimanicequeen]

4 Minutes Theories (Ep. 1-8) Results

The finale was last night, so I thought I would do one last theories post where I gather all the theories I've had since the trailer and the teaser (which were kind of sweeping since the trailer and teaser didn't give me much to get super detailed about), including the theories from episode 1, episode 2, episode 3, episode 4, episode 5, episode 6, episode 7, and some wild-ass theories I posted in between these posts and episodes. Let's see how wrong I was throughout the show.

Pre-premiere theory: The moments Great sees ahead of time are moments that might help him redeem himself from a past mistake/transgression. (Confirmed)

I could argue that Great's do-overs were based on an obstinate need to "prove" to Tyme that he's not a coward, but I won't (lol).

Pre-premiere theory: The car accident is the trigger for Great’s visions. (Confirmed)

Pre-premiere theory: Title is involved with Korn. (Half-Confirmed)

I half-confirmed this since Title has a semi-connection to Korn through Great, Fasai, and Warit.

Pre-premiere theory: Win is battling some contrasting, opposing forces (internal and/or external). (Confirmed)

This theory was based on the background of the poster for JJay/Win. I solely based it on the red and green contrasting colors.

Ever since it was revealed in the 2nd episode that Win works for the police, I've had the feeling that the contrasting forces he's battling are his attachment/feelings for Tonkla and his duty to uphold the law.

Considering he went rogue to find out who killed Dome, practically gave Tonkla the knowledge of whom killed Dome, and yet tried to arrest him (not to mention shooting him when he got in the line of fire), just to name a few things, I would say that this idiot has been struggling the whole time.

Pre-premiere theory: Den is a neurologist and friends with Tyme. (Half-Confirmed)

I half-confirmed this because I don't think it was ever confirmed that Den was a neurologist, right? I mean, all the brain scans in his office might be evidence that he is. But I half-confirmed it anyway.

Pre-premiere theory: Den has a situationship with Korn. (Wrong)

I kept this theory only because I wanted to see Bas and Job together. It was a delulu wish, and I will keep being delulu about this.

(I'm still on my "Non is alive" agenda, so I can keep this wish alive forever, lmao.)

Pre-premiere theory: Dome is a mystery person operating under the radar without showing his true alliance until the end. (Scrapped)

I scrapped this theory a long time ago.

Pre-premiere theory: Great and Win are brothers who will butt heads from time to time. (Wrong)

Pre-premiere theory: Fasai is the other character with a condition similar to Great’s. (Wrong)

I knew quite quickly that this wouldn't happen, but I kept it unconfirmed all the way to the end because you never know...

Also, it gave me an excuse to add some Fasai/Natty to my post, which is a win in itself!

Pre-premiere theory: Great’s (Bible’s) tattoos have something to do with the story. (Wrong)

I was sure this wouldn't come true ever since someone told me before the premier that those were Bible's real tattoos. But I kept this theory anyway because that meant I could use this image in all my posts:

So, even though I didn't "win" this theory, I still won.

Pre-premiere theory: Great becomes Korn’s target because he can see ahead of time. (Scrapped)

I scrapped this weeks ago.

Pre-premiere theory: Great hit the person with his car at 11:01 (or they died at 11:01) and that’s why he sees clocks stopping at that time. (Wrong)

Pre-premiere theory: 11:01 is when Great can see 4 minutes into the future. (Wrong)

Pre-premiere theory: Someone will die/fake their death. (Confirmed)

As I've written in the previous posts in this series on my 4 Minutes theories, this theory was pretty obvious from the start. Sammon kills characters all the time, lol.

But, I also mentioned in one of the previous posts that I won't confirm this theory until one of the more important characters dies (excluding Great and Tyme). The ones I thought would die were Dome, Title, and perhaps Korn.

I was right about all three of them, so I'm marking this one as confirmed.

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Great is having an out-of-body experience. (Confirmed)

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Korn will do some shady shit to prove to his dad that he can take over the family business. (Confirmed)

Korn definitely did some shady shit. Especially in the real past timeline we saw in the 6th episode. You can't convince me he didn't beat up Nan in that warehouse when he came out a wiped the blood off his hands. So, I will confirm this even though I really wanted to see more of what shady shit he got involved in to please his dad.

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Tonkla is at the center of it all. (Half-Confirmed)

This theory was based on the background of the poster for Fuaiz/Tonkla. At first, I thought he had a target on his back (which became true as soon as he became the prime suspect in Title's murder), but at one point, it felt like it developed more into Tonkla being at the center of this whole thing (like he was the spider in the web).

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote that I would only confirm this if Tonkla's timeline was the real timeline (which it seemed to be, even though there were some anomalies in his timeline as well) and if he became the prime suspect in both Great's shooting and Title's death. Since he only became the prime suspect in Title's death, so I will only mark this as half-confirmed.

Revised/developed pre-premiere theory: Fasai has a connection with Korn. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Tonkla will betray Korn. (Confirmed)

I mentioned last week that I would only half-confirm this if shooting Great was the only betrayal we got. And I was totally fine with that. But then Tonkla said that he'd cheated on Korn when Korn was gone, which means that Tonkla himself thought of it as a betrayal. So I will confirm this.

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Great's visions of himself and Tyme are his present self's memories of their time together. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 2 theory: Great had a cardiac arrest/near-death experience at 11:00. (Confirmed)

Wild-ass pre-ep. 2 theory: Great will get Tyme's heart (after Tyme is shot). (Wrong)

I knew this wouldn't happen. (Besides, this wasn't the Transplant I wanted.)

Revised/developed wild-ass pre-ep. 2 theory: Tyme is having his own out-of-body experience. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 3 theory: Dome is Tonkla's brother. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 3 theory: Tyme has a precognitive ability similar to Great’s (or might develop one). (Wrong)

I was right that Tyme would also have an OOBE, and I was right that his heart also stopped at 11:00. But we never got to see any precognitive abilities from Tyme. So... Wrong.

Pre-ep. 3 theory: Fasai (and/or her father) is in league with someone within the police force. (Confirmed)

Well, Police Colonel Warit (who they called a general in the subs more than once, btw, but it said Pol.Col. Warit on him on MDL a couple of weeks ago when I needed to double-check on another character's name, so I'm going with Police Colonel) is one corrupt asshole. He's also a corrupt asshole that confirmed this theory for me. So, thank you? I guess?

Pre-ep. 3 theory: There are different timelines at play. (Confirmed)

Well, this one is pretty obvious, right? I've written a long ass post about my thoughts on the timelines and a post with the scenes in the first 6 episodes in chronological-ish order (including both the real past and the different timelines) and then one about Tonkla's timeline (ep. 1-7).

My theory included:

The real past/Tonkla's timeline

Great's OOBE

Tyme's OOBE

The present

A couple of weeks ago, I also wrote that I would only confirm this if I got the majority of these timelines confirmed, which I did.

Pre-ep. 3 theory: Great has 4 minutes to wake up/get his heart to start beating again. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 3 theory: Tyme is getting close to Great because of Great's family and their connection to the illegal gambling sites. (Confirmed)

Wild-ass pre-ep. 3 theory: The number 4 marks a character with death. (Confirmed)

The number 4 (which in Cantonese is pronounced very similarly to the word "death") marks characters with death.

The characters that came in contact with number 4:

Great, who was shot and flatlined at the hospital.

Tyme who was also shot.

Manee, who Great hit with his car and left to die.

Dome, who was killed by Title.

Title, who was murdered by Tonkla.

And the elderly lady in bed number 4 who, most likely, died because of her illness.

I previously wrote that I would confirm this if I got the majority correct. Also, I said that NDEs didn't count.

If I don't count Great and Tyme, I've got half right. But since I believe Great and Tyme didn't come back to life again, I have the majority correct. So, I'll confirm this theory.

Revised/developed pre-ep. 3 theory: Tyme is looking into the illegal gambling sites because his family fell victim to either them or Great's dad. (Confirmed)

Pre-ep. 4 theory: Great's actions during his OOBE won't change anything in the present. (Half-Confirmed)

I will half-confirm this because I'm still not sure whether Great's actions did help Tonkla hear his brother (or if Tonkla was in some weird ass timeline too). And I'm too tired of this show to keep thinking about it, lol.

Pre-ep. 4 theory: Tyme's choices in the real past are the reason Great is in the hospital having a cardiac arrest. (Scrapped)

I scrapped this weeks ago.

Pre-ep. 4 theory: The note saying "Can you forgive me, Great?" is written by the mystery woman in the gallery (Lukwa). (Wrong)

Too bad I didn't use my initial theory in these posts though, especially the part where I thought that particular note came from someone who talked to Great at the hospital in the present. It's just that the words were filtered through Great's mind, which is probably why the handwriting was different.

Anyway...

Pre-ep. 5 theory: The bodies the police find are the people who died in the real past. (Half-Confirmed)

I will only half-confirm this because I initially included the shareholder with the red umbrella in this theory as well (and that Nan's body would show up somewhere at some point). But I did get Dome and Title, so I'll half-confirm it.

Pre-ep. 7 theory: Tyme and Great met as kids (Confirmed)

I based this theory on how Tyme said "You're still afraid of dogs?" in ep. 6.

That was it. Now, let's look at the final results.

Final Results:

Total theories since the trailer: 36

Confirmed theories: 19

Half-Confirmed theories: 5

Wrong/scrapped theories: 12

(Btw, my stats should've included 37 theories, but I couldn't find the 37th in any of my posts, so I chose to omit it from this one.)

Well, that went a lot better than I expected from such an intricate story like this (with different timelines, questions, mysteries, etc.). I was not expecting to have more confirmed than wrong theories. Either way, I'm glad this is over because I need something else to fill my brainspace. (At least until the next Sammon show comes out in November, if I remember correctly.)

That's it for Ice Queen Holmes, at least for now. Over and out.

[alianoralacanta]

Paddock Magazine Analysis (13-12-2007)

Context: Following the McLaren/Ferrari spying controversy of 2007, where McLaren eventually lost its 2nd place in the World Constructor's Championship and got a $100 m fine, Max Mosley in his capacity as FIA President did two interviews. The first was for BBC Hardtalk. His performance there was very poor, making it look suspiciously like the FIA's case was weak. More telling was the second interview, with Paddock Magazine. Given that Paddock Magazine was a FIA publication, it was not exactly going to be the height of intentional journalism. However, it provided an excellent demonstration of the FIA's beliefs about the case. When combined with what had been learned in 2007 (from the Hardtalk interview and earlier proceedings of the case), it was incredibly destructive to the FIA's case against McLaren. In combination, it went to the degree of indicating the FIA had a case to answer itself… My understanding of legal issues has evolved since then but I do not believe the FIA's position has correspondingly improved. (The first parts of quotes are bolded, to help put structure to this essay. I've also had to delete the artificial double-spacing that ended up in there for some reason. For the record, if I wanted to double-space an entry, I'd use the double-space function).

Warning! Long entry alert! An annotated guide to the Paddock Magazine interview with Max Mosley. It is the December 2007 edition, and the FIA has given us a handy link.

It is, as the FIA probably hoped, a good guide to the state of Max Mosley's thinking. Let's probe into this resource to find out exactly what the implications are of the interaction between Max's thought processes and what can be ascertained from other sources.

"I think, in the end, the championship went to the right person"

Max has a good point here. Kimi did in fact do the best performance out of the challengers, so it was perfectly sensible for him to have won the prize. It's refreshing to see some sensible opinions from Max.

"Well, I don't think it [the off-track drama] has done any damage - in fact, it has raised public awareness".

Yes, Max - raised it and turned them right off again. Unfortunately, the good initial note didn't last long.

"The only harm would come if people started to believe it [the spying] was endemic and we couldn't stamp it out."

Most people that weren't deeply knowledgeable about F1 before the Ferrari/McLaren mess were not aware that F1 even had spying. Their impression would not have been that stopping spying was good, it would have been "What do you mean, F1 has spying?!?" The people who've been following F1 for a time know that spying at some level is both endemic and, to a certain extent, inevitable. Admittedly, it is not inevitable to the point alleged against either McLaren or Renault, but information transfer between teams is inherant in any industry whose primary value is in the contents of talented people's heads. Formula 1 is demonstrably such an industry.

"I found myself defending McLaren, rather than trying to explain why we'd done what we had to do!"

If the HardTalk interview constituted a defence of McLaren's behaviour, I'm glad the interviewer did not ask Max to attack McLaren, because it looked to me and a number of other people as if Mosley was launching a McLaren attack at the time.

"The whole thing [the Ferrari/McLaren mess] should have been stopped before it started".

Correct. One would have thought that Nigel Stepney and Mike Coughlan would have known their information-swapping behaviour was slightly dodgy before engaging in it. Apparently not (at least in Coughlan's case).

"Ron [Dennis] could have gone to Jean [Todt] immediately after Australia and said: "Look, we asked the FIA about your floor because there's somebody at Ferrari giving us information".

Two problems. One, this was not the FIA's line at the time. For example, Spyker submitted a protest at that very race concerning Super Aguri and Squadra Toro Rosso using a Toro Rosso drawing, which arrived at Spyker by an unknown route (or at least, unknown to people outside the paddock such as me). Nobody from the FIA openly asked Spyker to tell Franz Tost about the drawing (this may have happened quietly, or Colin Kolles may have done the courtesy call on his own initiative, but we don't know either way). The impression that this sort of thing gives is that if the FIA is contacted in such a way that it receives the offending document(s), the opposing team manager need not be (perhaps because the FIA contacts the opposing team manager as a matter of routine in these cases). So what Max is effectively saying is that the FIA's policy was wrong at the time, for if McLaren had known that the FIA policy wouldn't hold six months down the line, it is highly unlikely he would have taken the path of relying on the known FIA procedures to do the appeal. Instead, he would have either informed Jean Todt (if he had known about the Stepney/Coughlan flow and intended to get it stopped) or he would have simply said nothing, and probably not appealed the Ferrari car in Australia at all (if he thought there was only the one document and/or he wanted to attempt to evade notice).

Secondly, there is no particular reason to believe that Jean would have stopped the information flow on Dennis' say-so, especially as it has yet to be proved whether Dennis knew who in the team had received the drawings, let alone whether this person had received the drawing in a legal fashion. For that matter, it isn't even clear that Dennis knew there was a drawing involved - it is entirely conceivable that Coughlan would only have told people verbally about what he knew about the Ferrari floor, and not given away sources. Certainly if I was in Coughlan's position and intended to use this Ferrari information illegally, this is what I would have done. Simply because the drawing was eventually discovered due to Trudy Coughlan stupidly taking some Ferrari CDs to a photocopy shop does not mean that her husband was stupid in his dealings with the material. With hindsight, the truly smart thing to have done would be to take the moral high ground and denounce Stepney as openly and as immediately as possible, but none of us have foresight as good as our hindsight.

"You get the odd person saying that this has always gone on in F1, but that's nonsense".

Er... ...Shadow/Arrows in 1977, anyone? That was the entire (successful) theft of a team's entire intellectual property (IP), back before the term was even invented. Then there's the whole Ferrari/Toyota mess, involving a copious amount of data theft by more than one ex-Ferrari (and now ex-Toyota and presumably ex-F1) employee.

Admittedly, the general backdrop of espionage is on nowhere near as large a scale (the McLaren/Renault mess is probably a run-of-the-mill example among instances of dishonest information transfer). However, the alleged extent of the Ferrari/McLaren mess has precedents.

"There was a constant stream of information for months"

Interestingly enough, this wasn't proven at the WMSC court, though Max would like to pretend it was proven. Having reviewed the relevant portion of the Ferrari/McLaren September case transcript, I have spotted in the preliminaries that the documents that supposedly prove this statement were considered by the McLaren lawyer to be illegally obtained and illegally revealed to the WMSC court. The response from the WMSC was that it was not concerned about whether the documents were legal. Since it was illegal to use them in court, it was also illegal to base any part of the judgement on these documents. As a result, these documents cannot constitute evidence, let alone proof, of the exchange between Stepney and Coughlan - unless the Italian courts deem that the documents do in fact constitute such evidence.

This hasn't happened yet. Therefore, there is no actual proof that the "live" part occurred, since the WMSC Court appeared to have no other sources for this in its transcript. It thought the illegally-used and unproven documents were "impressive" enough.

"The second major mistake that McLaren made was when they held an inquiry... ...they didn't do it thoroughly enough"

Well, all it would have taken is for two people to have lied in a way that was undetected and McLaren wouldn't have been able to detect that connection. Even if Coughlan and de la Rosa had been somewhat truthful (by admitting that they talked to each other), how much would have been considered normal for two employees, and would it be possible to prove in the relatively short timeframe (the inquiry occurred in the run-up to the July meeting, giving McLaren about three weeks to get the inquiry completed) to go through 1000 people's e-mails to find a handful of dodgy e-mails? Even if only e-mails sent by Coughlan were considered (it is known that McLaren suspected him of something, as he got suspended pretty sharpish when the exchange was initially discovered), that would still have been dozens, and likely hundreds, of e-mails to check. In a company that size, it is fairly easy for a dodgy e-mail connection to go undetected. Usually, discovery occurs when one of the parties accidentally copies their e-mail to someone who has the power to stop or inform on the perpetrators, or else someone in power sees such an e-mail on the screen. For all the advances in e-mail monitoring software, breaches outside a limited range (porn, unnecessary attachments, swearing and personal e-mailing) remain very difficult to detect, especially if the intention is to do so without unduly impeding the free flow of legitimate information. It would take a very time-consuming and thorough, or a very lucky inquiry, to have found out that a rogue employee was transferring illegally-obtained information to another employee unless one of them confessed. That didn't happen until early September (and then it was not to McLaren but to the FIA) - rather late for the initial July trial!

"I think everyone felt that there was more to this than we'd heard [in the July case]".

No, most of us didn't; at least, not in the English-speaking sources I've seen. The Europeans generally write in languages other than English, which makes assessing the rest of Max's answer difficult (the only other language I know is Spanish, and the Spaniards would presumably be pro-Alonso...) The time of which Max speaks was before the time that the FIA started chucking out transcripts to the general public at the slightest opportunity. We, the general public, were not expecting anything else to come out of the case. If the WMSC was, why didn't they take the trouble to advise us in the decision? Oh, wait a minute, that would have made their decision to try the case so early look premature...

In case you're wondering, not every Spanish source was pro-FIA about the second trial. El Pais was concerned that the FIA decision was pro-Ferrari - but maybe its being in Spanish precluded Max from reading it. So the generalisation that the continentals were all pro-FIA in the end is false.

"I'd already been told that some e-mails existed, by Bernie [Ecclestone] [when Ron Dennis informed Max of the e-mails]"

Clive at F1 Insight has already tackled this matter; suffice to say that Max's pretence that he was hearing about the e-mails from Ron for the first time is unimpressive at best. More transparency is expected from people enforcing rules.

"I wasn't sure enough to write to the drivers, until the Italian police came up with the list of all the contacts"

Excuse me, but isn't this the same inadmissible list that has already supposedly proven a "live" link between Nigel Stepney and Mike Coughlan despite its inadmissibility? If this is so, then Max was not entitled to use it as a tool to compel anyone to comply with its wishes, particularly with the threat implied with it being an FIA instruction. Such behaviour demeans the validity of FIA instructions.

That said, the FIA could and perhaps should have asked every employee in McLaren to turn over all relevant evidence as soon as it opened the investigation of the case on a reasonably-scaled amnesty scheme. It had the power to analyse the e-mails (including Spanish translation!) that McLaren could not reasonably be capable of doing in such a short time-frame, and it would also have led to a considerably swifter route to the conclusion of this matter.

"they [the e-mails] either came from Alonso or de la Rosa. But presumably the Alonso camp"

That's a mighty big leap, given that Max does not give evidence that differentiates the two. This sort of thinking can be seen elsewhere in this interview, to sometimes dangerous effect to his own case.

By the way, reading personal e-mails is normally illegal under the Computer Misuse Act. However, the sense of Max's elaboration of this question indicates that Fernando chose to reveal these e-mails to Bernie (why remains a mystery, when it would have been simpler to forward the lot to Max), on this occasion the initial Alonso e-mail can be said to have been acquired legally. There is no question over whether the subsequent driver e-mails were obtained legally, only whether Max's justification for requesting them was based on legally-obtained documentation.

"I still think, from a legal point of view, we should have excluded everybody [relating to McLaren over the Ferrari/McLaren mess]."

I'll give him that - he has never deviated once from this point of view. He is consistent in at least some of his opinions. If you assume the conclusion that the WMSC wanted us to believe, then this also follows. The conclusion is therefore valid.

The trouble is that the conclusion is not sound, for the evidence has turned out to be some illegally-obtained Italian documents and a bunch of e-mails that only prove that three employees knew rather than one (and also suggesting that only those three knew - otherwise the e-mails would have been in English and had a wider circulation). This means that there were three rogue employees. The two discovered by the September trial had been granted full amnesty, so technically the FIA was not empowered to issue any punishment to the rest of the team following the evidence, due to its inadequete nature.

"In the end, arguably justice was done [in the McLaren/Ferrari mess]."

Try making that quote compatible with the previous quote. Note that they are spoken by the same person, in the same paragraph in relation, to the same question. Can you get "justice was done" to fit with "we should have excluded everyone"? Me neither.

"For a lot of it [the evidence], you had to draw the inference."

This is the most self-destructive sentence I have ever seen in a court case. Only a fool admits to having little hard evidence for a guilty judgement, let alone one involving such a large penalty and with a larger one threatened. If this were a real court under discussion, the police would be immediately pressing for a re-trial without the interested parties even having to ask first. It pretty much invalidates Max Mosley as a judge of fact in these sorts of cases.

The temptation for me to skip the assumptions that follow this sentence are therefore too strong to resist.

"If we'd done nothing, there would be the temptation to set out to acquire information from another team in any number of ways."

This probably seemed like a logical thing to say at the time (this interview appears to have taken place in late October or early November). However, since the McLaren/Renault mess has shown that only the impression of co-operation is necessary in order to evade a spying charge, then this statement suddenly looks a bit strange. If anything, events will encourage employees to spy, not discourage them. Just not necessarily as individuals.

"I think, and hope, they're paranoid about not doing anything"

How's that for a "Go back to being blobs. Blobs are easy" (Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett) mentality?

"If there are things of that kind... ...they've been quietly got rid of"

Proof that this interview was done before mid-November, when the McLaren/Renault case re-appeared (after a brief mention in the September court case).

"Just suppose the 2008 McLaren incorporates everything from the 2007 Ferrari... ...we've got to make sure... ...the 2008 McLaren doesn't incorporate and Ferrari intellectual property"

If (and after everything above, it's a big if) you still believe that McLaren's guilty judgement was legitimate, then this is a perfectly sensible inference. Max is completely right about the need to check that cars are not contaminated with other teams' IP. In fact, why don't they do this with every team at the appropriate moment in the season, to proactively check that this sort of stuff doesn't happen?

Would be a neat idea...

[grogumaximus]

do u feel like its realistic for max to win the dutch gp? im nervous😖 the thing giving me hope is that he could’ve won spa if it wasnt for the grid penalty right I don’t wanna be delusional but I need it

redbull usually r good is spa n they only did good in the wet quali bc they opted for a more loaded wing for one lap pace (quali setup) . n based on my lvl1 wheel knowledge zandvoort is a high downforce track so the track suits mclaren n not to be pessimistic but I think the merc will be the 2nd best. also it seems like it's another wet quali so lool if max qualifies in the 3rd row/p4 or lower I don't see him winning bc so far it looks like its a dry race n the drs train/dirty air will be back there n it will be sooo difficult to overtake.

but if he does well in quali n hannah does her magic in the race n ofc max will be motivated so yeah there's hope he will fight for the win. but also there's the brake system rule change which could change some things idk

[audiobook-mike]

HG who have the best chance of winning BB25 if they made F2: (IMO)

Matt > Jag = Corey > Felicia > America = Cirie > Blue = Mecole = Bowie

Matt - IMO he has the cleanest game, well liked, won comps, has been in multiple alliance, people are reluctant to target him. I have a hard time seeing him get evicted in the near future. He also has the most comp wins of the house (who haven't been evicted).

Jag - Although he has been evicted (which every opponent should say in a F2 speech), he has endured a lot - he's been blamed and scapegoated for a lot and he (along with Corey, Matt, America) were instrumental in flipping the house and changing the power structure of the house.

Corey - He was actually the most important player in flipping the house and taking out Izzy and putting the target on Jared and changing the power structure of the house. He's well liked by the remaining HG's and although he may be targeted alongside America - IMO he has enough of a support structure to survive being on the block next to her (assumed support Matt, Jag, Bowie).

Felicia - She is the only woman in the house with a comp win and she made a big move taking out Hisam (was it a good move though? He was loyal to them) but nonetheless she isn't afraid to make moves. IMO she deserves a bump up ahead of all the other women left solely for having the only win so far.

America - Similar to Jag, she has had a tough road - she has been scapegoated and blamed/targeted by so many people in the early game and survived it. She was also important in helping Cam take out Izzy by swaying Cory despite Cory having good relations to Izzy side and Izzy in particular. But she need some wins and big moves to justify a win over those ahead of her.

Cirie - Started the game with a huge advantage (secret son), used him and his knowledge of the other side to dismantle a week 1 huge alliance. But IMO that wasn't an earned play, that was BB giving her an advantage and playing it correctly. I do give her credit for being a big name and never being on the block. She has a good social game early but for her to win I need her to win an HoH/veto and make some big moves herself.

Blue / Mecole / Bowie - All 3 of these are IMO goat tier (dragged to the final because they are very easy to beat both comp-wise and F2-wise). I would need to see significant game moves being made in the 2nd half of the game for any of these women to even be considered a winner for BB25.

[deke-rivers-1957]

Josh Morgan And Jodie Tatum's Rank

Disclaimer: For my tier list I’m basing this off of a one on one fight with no weapons and no outside interference. If a character has to rely on a weapon they’re ranked lower. If a character has to fight more than one person at a time, I’d look at it on a case by case basis. Age, size and general background are factors that will be taken into consideration. Since a lot of those details are going to be up to interpretation as these are characters and not real people, feel free to share your own thoughts.

Kissin Cousins takes place during the height of the Cold War in the 1960s. Based on the military wanting to build a missile base in the movie, we can assume this is a result of the recent Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. Given how the US launched attacks against possible Cuban airfields throughout 1963-1964, it makes sense to assume that the plan described in the beginning is part of it. No one at the time knew if there would be a nuclear war so the 1960s was spent with the military significantly upgrading their defense systems.

Since Josh and Jodie only fought each other I have to combine their backgrounds and put their sole fight in one post. Neither Josh nor Jodie have a given age but we can assume they're the same age given how "identical" they are. We can get a general idea of age based on Josh being a 2nd LT. pilot in the Air Force. That's the lowest commissioned officer rank you can get. Anyone with knowledge on Air Force ranking can correct me but I would guess that Josh is anywhere between 25-30 years old. Therefore Jodie would also be in that age range. Jodie of course is the "champion wrestler" and still does a lot of physical labor as a mountaineer.

This is a wrestling match if you can call it that. It's mostly pushing, shoving and pawing. Neither one threw an actual punch and no one won. Azalea and Selena broke the two apart before an there was official winner. Therefore this fight ends in a draw.

At face value neither guy shown enough to even deserve a rank. However based on their general backgrounds I would put Jodie above Josh. While they were evenly matched Jodie is in a WAY more athletic condition than Josh. Jodie has to hunt and do a lot of manual labor just so him and his family can live up in the mountains. Without including his "champion wrestler" status, there's little to no room for Jodie to get fat and lazy. With Josh, being an Air Force pilot leaves a lot more room for him to be slightly out of shape. Since he's in the military physical fitness is still a requirement, but he doesn't have the same rigorous fitness routine that Jodie would have on a day to day basis.

Therefore I would put Josh in upper B tier and Jodie in low A tier. I think if we saw more altercations between the two, we would get a better idea. As it stands I would give Jodie the slight edge given that Josh is almost never in a position where he would have to fight someone without a weapon. If Jodie is a champion wrestler, then he would absolutely have an edge as he would in general have more experience.

Tagging: Thank you @xanatenshi, @grizelda71-blog, and @arrolyn1114 for your input.

[kylekozmikdeluxo]

Diary/political post:

A lot happened tonight.

Susan Crawford beat the Elon Musk-backed candidate in the Wisconsin Supreme Court election today, very red/MAGA sections of Florida didn't quite turn out for their candidates (they still won, but - tellingly - not by much), and Cory Booker concluded his record-breaking 25hr filibuster speech, flattening the record held by Strom Thurmond and his anti-civil rights rant... Like, h'wow!

The Wisconsin win is especially important, given what Elon tried to do to get the Republican candidate in this gerrymandered state to win. That fucker basically did what Republicans regularly accuse George Soros of...

I don't know about you, but I'm beginning to think there's some stuff happening (often where you can't see it), and that most Americans actually don't like Trump's policies, Elon's tryhard bullshit, and all this cut-rate shitty-ass fascism.

No more than two months into that orange buffoon's second term, no less.

I feel it's already falling apart, faster than Bush's 2nd term it seems. Even more so, when you factor in the Tesla Takedown protests (and Republicans retaliating w/ violence and arrests, showing just how fragile and scared they are), and much more public dissent... Like, I feel most Americans actually don't like this shit. Even some of the median voter who chose Trump last fall, voters whom I am very critical of.

I feel it proves my theory that Kamala Harris would've won last year if it weren't for the dingus median voters who only ever show up during presidential elections, and always vote based on "vibes" and not any political knowledge whatsoever. Trump only won by about a million and a half votes or so, and Kamala's 75m votes? She's in third place for highest amount of votes for any presidential candidate, only below Trump last year (77m) and Biden (81m).

She would've won, I think, if a lot of those particular fools just stayed home. The fools that look at Trump and his Hitlerian aspirations, and say "Yeah! I like that guy!" Like that fool from Pennsylvania that they interviewed who was all like "Yeah, Trump is like Hitler and that's bad and all, BUT THE ECONOMY." If those people didn't vote, we'd probably win more presidential elections. Just like we do w/ special elections, midterms, and other assorted races.

Trump and all of these assholes try to assert that Americans are fed up with "woke" and "DEI" and "blue-haired transgender women", that the American people overwhelmingly love Trump and Musk and all these losers... Outside of MAGA and racists, they really don't. Trump only won by a small margin, and he was helped by uninformed idiots and young men lost in the Tate/Rogan/MAGA misinfo-sphere. This doesn't let Dems off the hook for various failures and the things they could've done better over the last few years, but to me it was largely another case of the median voter just showing up like doofuses and fucking everything up for the rest of us... And they're sure to attempt to do the same in 2028. (Go away if your schtick is "Heh, if we even HAVE elections in 2028.")

But I'm totally gonna take these wins where I can get 'em, I'm gonna revel in Musky's latest tantrum (he's already going through some shit right now), I'm gonna get a kick out of the buyer's remorse...

I couldn't imagine any bigger fools on a day like today, lol.

[1cai-fleakz1]

Update: Nov 25th - Dec 1st, 2024

Hello! It has been over a week since I last made an update on here. About ten days I would say. I just finished Thanksgiving break I guess, so here's all that happened:

[Monday, November 25th]

First thing in the morning during geometry, I had to take 5 of those a stupid clear sight tests...It was not fun to say the least. It took up all of class time, was tedious, and I knew absolutely nothing on there, yet, I still wanted to do my best (up until the last two tests, which were very rushed). After that, we had WINN time, and I played cards with 2 of my friends plus my love. So that was pretty fun. Then it was band class, and we talked about Thanksgiving and what not. Then in Business class, we played The Price is Right Thanksgiving Edition, and I unfortunately came in 2nd...but I still won a pity mint..Yay! Then I watched all of season 1 of Arcane after school...Lol.

[Tuesday, November 26th]

First in the morning I went to give my Spanish teacher my extra credit project, and he was lowkey being an opp about it, saying that i did it wrong...but like bro, it's not that deep, just take the freaking poster. Then in fiber arts, i worked on my project, but my table mate wasn't here, so i didn't talk the whole class, which was fine. Then at lunch I talked to my best friend, of course. We discussed our friend's current actions, and we were just a little annoyed at by how he has been acting lately. Then in English class, we did a vocab assignment, where the whole class had to create a cohesive story about Macbeth while using up all the vocabulary words from our unit. It was actually harder than it sounds. Then finally, Biology. It felty so miserable at first, but then I talked to my friend, and it got better. I actually cannot stand that class on some days. But once school was finally over, I was just excited to head out of school, so I could hang out with my love at my house. My dad said he would be able to pick us up, so I thought this meant he got the truck fixed, but little to my knowledge, he actually had a surprise. When my love and I walked out of the school, and up to the car, we were a little confused, because my dad was in the passenger seat, and we couldn't see who was riving in the front seat. But then it hit. IT WAS MY SISTER!! I yelled, "OMG it's my sister!" And my love didn't believe me at first, but then she saw her too. We both immediately ran up to the car to hug her. It all felt so insane. I was so surprised, and happy. Then we went to surprise our mom at work. After that, we called up our two besties to go to mall with us, but only one could go, because the other was at work. So we went to the mall, and then we surprised one of our friends at work, and the other at his house. It was so fun. I ended up getting a few things at the mall too. I got a shadow the hedgehog shirt, a new scent from bath and body works, a pin, a matching necklace set I got for me and my love, and then some cards. We also stopped at the photo booth too of course. I got some loaded steak fries and a banana and strawberry smoothie too. Then we went home, and my love and I cuddled till she had to go. That was the last time I saw here until when I go to school again, because they went to Vegas for break.

[Wednesday, November 27th]

All day my brother, sister, and I just played Roblox. It was so fun. We played two tycoons, some monkey raft, and we also played some board and card games. We just had a lot of fun catching up on our gamer grind.

[Thursday, November 28th]

This day was my birthday!! And Thanksgiving of course. I just turned 16. Which is just so crazy to me. I can't even comprehend that. It is just so crazy how old I'm getting. And I know I'm not necessarily "old", but I feel like I just landed on this earth, but I'm actually 16??? Anyways, my parents greeted me with a gift when I came downstairs, which was really nice. They gave me an $100 gift card too a piercer shop, to get my eyebrow piercing done. Which I have been wanting for over a year now. I'm just so happy they're letting me do this!! I also got a present mailed to me from my aunt. She sent me a whole paint set, with canvases, paint, and brushes. She also got me a keychain with a cute and clever quote on it saying, "The Earth without art is just eh." Get it? cause if you remove...Yeah, you get it. Hehe. I put it on my backpack though! Then We later had the best feast ever at our home with just us, which was actually pretty nice. Then I wanted to put the tree up, but everyone was so tired. And I just wanted my sister, but she was being mean, and she made me flipping cry on my birthday bruh. It was so mean, but I felt better after a bit. Then we put the tree up super late, and I ended up going to ed at 1:30am.

[Friday, November 29th]

BLACK FRIDAYAYAAYA!!! My sister and I were out shopping ALL day! My dad gave me $100 dollars to spend, and my grandpa ended up giving my another 4100 later, which was CRAZYZ. I've never gotten that much money on my Birthday before. Well it wasn't my birthday anymore, but it was because of it, you know. But we went to target, Walmart and 5 below. I spend the most money at five below coming in at $140.....Yeah. I spent it all on gifts though. And I would say it's worth it, cause I got something for all my friends. Then we got Jamba juice, but for some reason that made me feel really sick, which has never happened before, so that was strange.

[Saturday, November 30th]

I hung out with my two besties on this day!! We spent the day at my house talking and being silly with us and my sister. It was a very fun day I would say. Then we ate dinner, and they left. Not much to it. Well besides the fact that our insider at the "Boys' night party" forgot everything because his ass got wasted...idiot. Also we didn't get to prank them, because they had their little party the day before we got together. So no pranks this time...but watch out, cause they're comin'.

[Sunday. December 1st]

FINALLY! DECEMBER! It feels like it'd taken so long to get to December. I literally did nothing on this day. I just sat in bed mostly, and watched Instagram reels. Even though I told myself I would get ahead on my school work for A days. (This did not happen) I also forgot to do my weekly band assignment...oops. It's okay though, because I have a 98%. So I think I'll be fine. Then I jus drew for the rest on the ight, up until now. Well now it's December 2ndf technically, right? But it's time for bed, so goodnight world!

[roman-catholic-mass-readings]

2nd September >> Mass Readings (Except USA)

Monday, Twenty Second Week in Ordinary Time 

(Liturgical Colour: Green. Year: B(II))

First Reading 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 The only knowledge I claimed was of the crucified Christ.

When I came to you, brothers, it was not with any show of oratory or philosophy, but simply to tell you what God had guaranteed. During my stay with you, the only knowledge I claimed to have was about Jesus, and only about him as the crucified Christ. Far from relying on any power of my own, I came among you in great ‘fear and trembling’ and in my speeches and the sermons that I gave, there were none of the arguments that belong to philosophy; only a demonstration of the power of the Spirit. And I did this so that your faith should not depend on human philosophy but on the power of God.

The Word of the Lord

R/ Thanks be to God.

Responsorial Psalm Psalm 118(119):97-102

R/ Lord, how I love your law!

Lord, how I love your law! It is ever in my mind. Your command makes me wiser than my foes; for it is mine for ever.

R/ Lord, how I love your law!

I have more insight than all who teach me for I ponder your will. I have more understanding than the old for I keep your precepts.

R/ Lord, how I love your law!

I turn my feet from evil paths to obey your word. I have not turned from your decrees; you yourself have taught me.

R/ Lord, how I love your law!

Gospel Acclamation John 8:12

Alleluia, alleluia! I am the light of the world, says the Lord; anyone who follows me will have the light of life. Alleluia!

Or: Luke 4:18

Alleluia, alleluia! The Lord has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives. Alleluia!

Gospel Luke 4:16-30 'This text is being fulfilled today, even as you listen'.

Jesus came to Nazara, where he had been brought up, and went into the synagogue on the sabbath day as he usually did. He stood up to read and they handed him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll he found the place where it is written:

The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight, to set the downtrodden free, to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour.

He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the assistant and sat down. And all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to speak to them, ‘This text is being fulfilled today even as you listen.’ And he won the approval of all, and they were astonished by the gracious words that came from his lips. They said, ‘This is Joseph’s son, surely?’ But he replied, ‘No doubt you will quote me the saying, “Physician, heal yourself” and tell me, “We have heard all that happened in Capernaum, do the same here in your own countryside.”’ And he went on, ‘I tell you solemnly, no prophet is ever accepted in his own country. ‘There were many widows in Israel, I can assure you, in Elijah’s day, when heaven remained shut for three years and six months and a great famine raged throughout the land, but Elijah was not sent to any one of these: he was sent to a widow at Zarephath, a Sidonian town. And in the prophet Elisha’s time there were many lepers in Israel, but none of these was cured, except the Syrian, Naaman.’ When they heard this everyone in the synagogue was enraged. They sprang to their feet and hustled him out of the town; and they took him up to the brow of the hill their town was built on, intending to throw him down the cliff, but he slipped through the crowd and walked away.

The Gospel of the Lord

R/ Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

[partyhatjigglypuff]

i do think it's worth elaborating on how much of Yu-Gi-Oh! was related to the "Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG" (referred to in the manga as "Duel Monsters") because it's kind of funny from a broad perspective when you consider all 38 volumes of the Yu-Gi-Oh! manga and compare it to the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime, which is the benchmark for most people.

Duel Monsters is introduced as a one-off idea in the 2nd volume over two chapters and makes a comeback in volume 5 as the culmination of a longer arc (the battle in volume 5 is the 3x blue eyes white dragon vs Exodia that became the pilot of the anime*). these battles look nothing like the card game you remember - it was mostly drawing cards and whichever monster had the bigger number won. there were some spells and traps but it was very basic and didn't have much strategy.

here's the thing: there were only three Duel Monsters battles in the first seven volumes - Takahashi spent just as much time on other games he made up, like "Capsule Monster Chess" played by Mokuba and a TTRPG ran by evil Bakura, as well as a bunch of messed up one-offs where Yami Yugi would challenge bullies and thugs to games of death for their greed, and there was an underlying air of mystery with the egyptian artifacts.

however, Duel Monsters was by far the most popular part of the manga and it was insanely marketable. so. the next 24 volumes of manga were allllll about Duel Monsters** and include the arcs most people are probably familiar with (Pegasus Island and Battle City) and while there's some other action, most of it is centered around this card game, and there's a little bit more overarching plot about the egyptian stuff but it's kind of an afterthought.

the story then abruptly jumps back to the egyptian mythos, with yugi and co transported back in time to ancient egypt to learn the truth about Duel Monsters and help Yami Yugi prevail over evil. Yugi then has to defeat Yami Yugi in one last game of Duel Monsters to send him to the afterlife, and they all live happily ever after.

now, because so much of the content outside of Duel Monsters was kinda dark (especially for american audiences), the adaptation and localization focused heavily on the card game and removed a lot of the darker and grislier concepts. remember the Shadow Realm? in the comic, there was no shadow realm. people just fucking died from explosions or being sawed in half. the last few volumes in particular were kinda gory and my parents were NOT happy when they found out what the card game comic was doing. there are 5 seasons of the original anime, and seasons 3 and 4 are almost entirely new material focused on Duel Monsters.

as a result, the vast majority of americans who are familiar with Yu-Gi-Oh! know very little outside of the context of the card game and the anime adaptation of the card game, and that's largely the cultural impact that remains. no knowledge of the eerie, cruel shadow games, the life and death D&D game, or the bloody egyptian history. just the heart of the cards.

anyway. you should read the yu-gi-oh manga.

(disclaimer: i have not interfaced with yugioh outside of the original manga run and the relevant anime episodes, and haven't done so in a long time aside from the occasional re-read. there's probably some incorrect info, and some info made incorrect by the many subsequent spin-offs and adaptations that didn't catch my interest. i just wanted to go off about the funny dichotomy of USAmerican perceptions of Silly Card Game Cartoon vs the macabre content of the manga, because that was eye-opening for me at age eleven)

* the first seven volumes were adapted into an anime referred to as "season 0" by fans, but i'm not sure if it ever officially made it to the US

** yes, there was also Dungeon Dice Monsters.

I love yu-gi-oh (the manga) because it's both basic enough to be broadly appealing and has an absolutely buckwild plot festering under a relatively straightforward premise, which means there's all these normal casual readers of stuff running around discussing what seems like a relatively straightforward fun kid's comic with their friends (who haven't read it) only to have themselves having to suddenly explain the ancient Egyptian soul games being played a trapped spirit pharoah who keeps murdering high schoolers for crimes like "being a bully" and "taking the best table at the school fair", and the rich kid's giant death theme park, and how this all ties in to the complex magical politics of reincarnated Egyptian priests. There are stories with more broad appeal and stories with weirder plots, but very few stories straddle the line to so perfectly contaminate one with the other.

Yu-gi-oh was Homestuck before we had Homestuck is what I'm saying.

[unhingedhousehold]

count the sheep

summary: you can't sleep and bradley passed his sweet mom's genius method to help you.

lol. omg. was scrolling through tumblr when i found this post and one of the reblogs said they used to go through alphabet and name a person they love whose name starts with each letter and... that's how i gave birth to my 2nd story lol who would've thought I'll have 2 babies!

this story is so funny in my head sffdgfgr i had so much fun writing this sfagafwfsgsgsgsgdg okay enough with the giggles

pairing: bradley bradshaw x reader (reader has hair)

warnings: mentions of bradley's parents, mentions of pineapples on pizza (lol), mentions of mint choco flavor (lol again), implied smut, a bit of marriage proposal thought (bradley is a simp), bradley saying fuck!!, my knowledge about natops and navy based on my 5 mins google research so apologize for any mistakes, english isnt my 1st language so you know the sorry for any inaccurate words and bad grammar drill!!

words: around 2k i think

i don't consent my work being translated or copied, please be respectful of someone's work!

Bradley felt like it's been hours since you've been turning and tossing on your side of bed when in fact, it's only been around 30 minutes. He already turned off the lamp, a playlist created to help both of you to sleep soundly still playing, yet you're still wide awake squirming trying to sleep. You were in his embrace earlier, but escaped because you simply just can't stop moving and shift your body a bit from Bradley's. He heard you grunt, and that's his cue to get you back to his embrace, his arms wrapped around your body and chin on your hair.

“I say this with so much love, please stop squirming or I'll have to tie you on the headboard.” He heard you chuckling and even though he can't see you but somehow, he's able to detect there would be a witty answer from your upcoming reply.

“Oh kinky, wouldn't be the first time though.”

See?! You and your smart mouth will be the death of him!

“Pervert. Seriously, what's up? You're usually the first one to go to the dreamland. Try to relax and stop thinking, okay? We had a long day; let's rest our tired body, yeah?”

You sighed, feeling guilty and trying to escape again from his embrace so he'll be able to have his sleep, “That's what I've been trying. Sorry. Maybe I should be sleeping on the cou–” he stops you with a kiss on your lips, “Nah, don't apologize,” and tightens his grip to prevent you from getting away again, "and not a chance."

You relented and hugged him back, with muffled voice, you reason, “This is why you shouldn't let Bob chose a movie. I don't do well with horror.”

“He won today's quiz from Cyclone. Phoenix would've killed me if I interfered with Bob's choice of movie. Besides, you have your eyes closed the entire time the movie is on! And you know it yourself you will never be able to say no to Bob.”

You smiled fondly at his statement, recalling the time when Bob offered you to try his mint choco flavored ice cream and you ended up liking it to normal amount (up to this day, Fanboy still convincing you you're basically having toothpaste as a dessert. Hangman as the Vice President of Mint Choco Ice Cream Lovers kicked his ass for that). “Bob is really the worst enabler in my life.”

You can feel Bradley's laughter from the way his chest grumbled. He then hummed along the song that's currently playing, usually his humming would help you sleep faster, yet it's not working.

You're tracing something on his back, from your initial to his, and mixed both of your initials when he started talking again, “You know, maybe I know a way. This is something my mom came up with when she was dealing with her insomnia.” He said it with so much ease, so different from years ago when he didn't even wanna talk about his mom. You started writing his Mom's name on his back.

“How?”

As he felt you writing the O letter, he answered, “Count the sheep.”

You stopped your movement from writing the I letter, “So I should literally counting them to thousands? I've made it past 300 only back then.”

(You remembered it because you had 3 coffees in one day thanks to back to back studying session you had to do during exam period.)

“No, you're not literally counting the sheep. It's more like you try to think of things that fit the topic you chose and count them, but don't google the answers. Just lay in bed and think of them.”

“Does it work for you?”

He answered when you just finished his Mom's name, and now you're going to write his Dad's, “Most of the times, yes.”

Bradley felt it when you're done writing NICHO, index finger about to start writing L when you quietly asked, “What kind of topic did you chose then?”

“Inactive United States Navy aircraft squadrons between 1980 to 2009. What's on NATOPS Pocket Checklist. NATOPS Emergency Procedure Basics–” before he can continue with more Navy related that you have no idea about, you looked up and kiss his lips tenderly to shut him up, “You're such a nerd.”

He laughed, kissing the top of your hair and defends himself. “Not always like that. Sometimes I think of ways to please you. My favorite topic to think about, honestly.”

You rolled your eyes, your hands that previously on his back smacked his ass lightly.

“Or you can use my mom's way, she told me to go through the alphabet and name a person I love whose name starts with each letter.” Bradley started writing something on your back, like you did earlier to his.

When you felt him writing your last name, that's when you found your voice back. “Hmm. Interesting.”

“Yeah, I used to do that a lot when I was a kid but I don't think I can do it now.”

“Why?”

“Because your letter is the only letter I can think of. I don't need to through from A to Z to think of someone I love.”

With your fist, you hit his chest lightly, “You're such a sap.”

“Only with you, sweets.”

His index finger started to write M, followed by R, S, continues with B, R, and then A. You had an idea what he was about to write, so you decide to try his Mom's method.

“Okay, I'll try.”

He just finished writing W with heart emoji in the end when he replied, “Go on. I'm listening.”

You wrote A on his chest, rocking your brain to come up with someone whose name starts with A.

“A.. I can't think of any A... Aaron?”

Bradley tensed up, the movement of his index finger trying to write the V letter suddenly stopped and shifted his body a bit to get a look at your face, “Who the hell is Aaron?”

“What? Urgh, I don't think this method will work. It's just one male name and you're already this worked up. How am I supposed to go through until Z?”

“The Aaron I know in your life was your ex-fling! You could've mentioned Ally!” Your brows furrowed, looking at him with confusion clouded your face, “She makes omelet you claimed is to die for at the diner we frequent to?”

You laughed at his goofy but correct answer, “You're unbelievable.”

You're back to his chest, writing B as the next letter. “Okay. B.. hmm...”

You both knew damn well who is the person going to be, but riling him up is your favorite thing to do so you made your voice to be the sweetest and full of hope voice that you'll certainly say one precise name.

“Oh I know, this is the easiest,” You practically can feel Bradley's anticipated eyes, smile at the ready and kisses that awaits you after you said one name, his fingers ready to write so much after he finished i love you on your back earlier.

(He's just that good with his timing, huh? You can't let him have his victory, though.)

“It's Bob! Next for C...”

Bradley released you from his embrace, fingers stilled in the air, and giving you that look when you told him you like your pizza with pineapples on it, “What the fuck?”

You showed him your innocent eyes, a kind of eyes that will let you get away with anything and everything, blinking them, “What? I'm doing it right! Bob starts with B!”

He huffed, hands covering his face dramatically, “You know there's someone else whose name starts with B.”

You taunt him, “Yeah? Who?”

Oh, he loves you so much for that.

He pouts, voice like a little kid whose mom rejected his idea to go biking with friends, “Oh come on, big elephant in the room?”

Your eyes lit up when he said that, as if you got what he meant by the elephant in the room.. because you should! How could you forget his name? A name that you're screaming to when he went down on you! A name you fervently vocalize when he's ball deep insi –

“Hmm.. Benjamin Penny?”

Shocked at your answer, his mouth goes wide open, formed a big O, “Are you kidding me?”

And what happened next was your laughter filled the room with Bradley hovering over you as he tickled you with so much force; from your waist to your sole, your stomach isn't lost on him as he blew so much raspberry on it. Not only that, he attacks you with kisses on your neck, biting the juncture between your shoulder and neck, the back of your ear tickles at how much force he puts to make you laugh that you can't say anything but laughing. When you got lost in the feeling, he's back on tickling your waist.

He's really good at memorizing your body, thanks to the amount of times he spent to explore on it. You decided you couldn't take another tease from him when you felt his right hand trying to make its way on between your closed legs, and as you tried to get away from his teasing by hitting his shoulder, an idea came up, “Stop it, Cradleeeey!” But it seems like he didn't hear you, looking at how his hands busy kneading the flesh of your thighs.

“Hey Dradley, stop it! Okay, I surrender!” He's now looking at you, confusion over his pretty face because he just registered what you just called him.

“What did you just call me?”

“Cradley. Dradley. Eradley? Bradley starts with E sounds so weird.” Both of his hands are now on your side, face inches away from yours, “Fradley is funny though. Oooh, Gradley?” You kissed his nose, and his cheeks as you said each name.

“Did you just change the first letter of my name?”

“Yeah. Now I know what you meant by elephant in the room! You said to go through the alphabet and name a person I love whose name started with each letter, right? Hradley sounds weirder than Eardley, don't you think?”

He laughed so hard at your expression and to muffle his chuckles, he hid his face on your neck. You can't help but to join him as you wrap your hands around his neck.

“Wait until we get to T.” He said after so much effort to stop his giggles.

“Oh my god! You're right. Hey, Tradley,” you giggled, amused by it and he kissed your forehead because he didn't want to interrupt your laughter and looked at you like you hung the moon (you did, according to him), “I don't think I'll be able to pronounce Xradley and Zradley well though.” You said the X and Z with struggles, and for your attempt to pronounce Yradley and Wradley next, he rewards you with a kiss to your lips, deepening it when he felt you opening your sweet lips to welcome him.

–––

And the next few weeks when Bradley was deployed and had a hard time sleeping, he chose his topic about ways on how to propose you. He woke up smiling as he vividly remembers what he came up with. He thanked his genius Mom for her count the sheep method; that's how he knows his Mom has always been, is always, and will always be with him, just like she promised.

the ending is a bit weird but whew 🥹🥲🫣 if you make it to the end, thank you for reading!

[nellas-art]

A line up of my favourite followers and some headcanons. There were more favs but this drawing would never be finished if I tried to include them all.

The text under the readmore:

Lambert

They/Them

Cares for their spouses and followers deeply

Takes their spouses concerns very seriously

Bothers them that their followers view themselves as below them

Peaceful but won’t hesitate

Gremermer

They/Them

The first and eldest follower

Lambert’s 3rd spouse

Soft-spoken but firm

Keeps the peace at the camp and is in charge when Lambert’s away

Usually found farming or lumbering

Barbatos

She/Her

Quite opinionated and hot-headed

Isn’t afraid to but heads with other followers

Only listens to/can be calmed down by Lambert, Gremermer, and Fear to a degree

Lambert’s 4th spouse

Only soft around her spouse/friends

Fond of Fear

Works the stone mill

Fear

She/Her/They/Them

Lambert’s loyalest follower; willing to do anything

Very enthusiastic, eager, outgoing, affectionate, flirty, and mischievous; pushes their luck

Lambert’s 5th spouse

BFFs with Witness Agares and is in a competition with them to smooch/woo the most people

Fond of Barbatos

Saleos

He/Him

Lambert’s 1st and longest spouse

Very sweet and doting on Lambert

Worrywart; tries to hide what bothers him, fails

First to insist to tag along crusades as a demon

Likes cooking

Paar

She/Her

Lambert’s 2nd spouse

Selectively mute: speaks in whispers, sign language, gestures, or a pinch if needed

Was initially courted by Trena but fell in love with Lambert

Very sweet but a little shy

Close to Saleos

Works the refinery

Narinder

He/Him

Lambert’s 6th and last spouse

Grouchy, cold, irritable. cold, and snarky

Butts heads with Barbatos often

Gets along with Gremermer, Paar, the Witnesses, and Fear somewhat

Farms alongside Gremermer

Flusters easily despite trying to have an air of formality and superiority

Witness Agares

She/Her/They/Them

The most amicable of the Witnesses

BFFs with Fear and is tied with her in their smooching competition due to evening out the score by smooching each other

They and Fear are tooth-rottingly inseparable; partners in crime

Happy they’re not a Witness to Leshy

Honest, caring, smart, and flirty

Humer

He/Him/They/Them

A nervous soul

Afraid of Narinder

Hangs around Gremermer or Barbatos

A great farmer

Trena

She/Her

Initially was courting Paar until she fell in love with Lambert

Still cares for Paar but won’t pursue despite the open relationship Lambert has with their spouses

Baalzebub

He/Him

The most chill follower; keeps it real

Friends with Saleos when they worshiped Kallamar

Spars with and trains followers

Putymer

They/Them

Everyone loves Putymer

Likes a clean camp, so they’re often found cleaning

Helps with whatever tasks need to be done

Hangs with Baalzebub

Witness Astaroth

She/Her/They/Them

The most serious of the Witnesses

Knowledgeable about the Old Faith, the Bishops, history, etc

Keeper of the library within the Temple

Loves sharing the knowledge

Quiet, usually reading or deep in thought

Witness Bathin

He/Him/They/Them

Skeptical of new followers but is easily won over with food

Very skilled cook

Goes along with whatever Agares or Astaroth say/do

Witness Allocer

They/Them

A little spacey and clumsy but well meaning

Wasn’t a Witness as long as the other three, so they’re not as strong

Is great as and enjoys decorating

Hangs around Witness Astaroth

Amdusias

He/Him

Chatty, curious, and friendly

Helps new followers settle in alongside Gremermer

Works the healing bay

Likes music and is often heard humming (his theme)