#then he went on a whole lecture about ‘on Easter or real Easter?’ and talking about the Passover

[allofuswantgwinam]

i haven’t even posted a single thought today so it’s safe to say I’m feeling better today 🤣💀 but i have THOUCHTS AND FEELINGS

there’s this guy i work with and it is a battle bc he gets on my nerves so much *it is not jsut me also wanna throw that out there😭* he only works Saturday’s and I usually don’t have to close with him but I do tn and I just wanna pat myself on the back bc I have been doing really good with all my annoyance with him. bc sometimes it is me asf, like he gets in my nerves sm but I do not need to be an asshole but he is so arrogant and never stops talking and acts like he is the smartest person in the world and it DRIVES ME INSANE BUT IVE BEEN DOIN SO GOOD IM SO PORUD but I also am still me and real at the same time. I just try really hard to be a distance or to just remind myself “he is who he is, deep breaths and do not choose this battle” oh my god. Cause he’s not even an awful person he just is exactly what I said lol he is very nice but I just do not enjoy working with him at all but im mfing doing it and I’ve conditioned myself to just not even fucking care bc it’s just one day. only one. 1 more hour. that’s all 😭🤣

[shipuu]

So i find tratie adorable so this how i think they got together

We are gonna make this realistic not that “fell in love when we were 16 and somehow managed to stay together through everything”. Nothing wrong with that trope. But like i said ~~realistic

Katherine gardner - originally from washington dc. She went to gerogetown uni.

She has always been passionate about the plants and first decided to major in Agricultural Studies, but then she didnt really like it.

So she switched to environmental studies. Not exactly about plants per se. But still related to the environment.

She sees the way humans are destroying the world and genuinely wants to help

Shes got good friends in college, sleeps around a little bit. Has a good relationship with her father.

Extremely hard working. Work ethic 1000000. Graduated with honors. Got a job at an enviromental consultancy firm in new york.

Travis off to college. I believe he went to a college in ny to be close to CHB and connor. Probably a community college seeing as he couldnt afford other unis

Nothing wrong with that. His relationship with his mom is rocky. So she wouldn’t be able to help out.

Majored in business administration. He takes it lightly his first year, seeing as how he isn’t used to the education system because he lived at CHB his whole life.

He genuinely wants to be successful. To have a life for himself and connor. So after first year kicks his butt, he works hard and raised his GPA the following years.

Extremely good at math and numbers. He steal messes around, playing pranks on people but nothing harmful. Also sleeps around a lot. (Nothing wrong with that)

Malcolm pace made an offhanded comment about how travis should start a new club at uni called “how to steal” and he considers it before shoving the idea away.

During the summer, he helps chiron with any business related things (tax forms, buying shirts, selling strawberries). Connor and him still play a lottttt of pranks

Graduated with honors. Lives in brooklyn With connor who is currently attending college. They still visit CHB from time to time.

So this one time, he steals something but then gets caught. Nothing expensive. A petty offence really. He calls chiron up to save his ass but chirons like NOPE.

So he gets charged. And the court gives him community service since it really was a petty offence.

He has to work with those “plant a tree” volunteer services during the weekend.

Katie is also volunteering there for fun and mostly because during the weekend, she has time to spare.

Travis goes there and is genuinely surprised to see her since he hasnt seen her in 4 years. ( she doesnt visit CHB as often. And even when she does she doesnt see the stolls)

Katie is genuinely surprised too.

First day, they dont talk the whole morning- just planting trees. Katie is still curious as to why he is here. So by the afternoon she asks him.

Shes isnt one bit surprised about the stealing thing. She also forgave them about the Easter Bunny cabin incident as it was 8 years ago??¿¿

Hes kinda nervous and blushing when he tells her the truth. Tbh he had a tiny crush on her back when they were teens. But it sorta went away, as they didnt interact much.

They catch up and its mostly just small talk. The next day, they talk more and katie realises travis has changed. He isn’t as annoying anymore. Travis also realises that katie has changed as she doesnt lecture and scold people anymore. Shes become more chill

The volunteering thing is over so they exchange numbers, promising to keep in touch. However over text, their convo is dry seeing as they arent THAT close and with their busy adult lifes. They slowly drift apart.

Fast forward another year. Katie works at her environmental firm and they start a new project. The firms brings in business consultants because the project has to be a success. One of the consultants is obvio TRAVISSSSSS.

Again both of them are surprised to see each other. Like always they dont really talk in the beginning. Mostly small talk. But then they get paired together for a part of the project.

So then it begins, late nights, coffee runs, laughter at 11pm in the office. Trying to work on numbers and investors and getting the most out reach on this project.

They get to know each other on a much higher level. They start to like each other but wont say anything.

Travis admits katie is gorgeous. And katie admits travis is handsome (not to each other. They just think about it)

2 months later, katie invites travis over to work on the project, trying to come up with an action plan. He brings over beer. And they settle in. Its 2 am. And they both are tipsy.

The project is long forgotten, and start talking about weird things like is cereal soup? Is gucci even worth it?

Its 2 am. Katies apartment is dim because of the lighting. They are both drunk. Sitting on the floor, extremely close to each other. Travis find hers absolutely gorgeous. Her cheeks are flushed coz of the alcohol. And shes wheezing so hard coz of what he said.

Katie thinks he looks hot as hell. And with his knowledge on business she finds him 1000 times more attractive.

Travis kisses her first, he pulls back about to apologise, before katie grabs him by the shirt and kisses him back. They have drunk sex on the carpet.

When travis wakes up the next morning, he realises he fucked up. Sleeping with a coworker. What was he thinking? You dont mix business and pleasure.

So he leaves her apartment. And when katie wakes up to see him not there she is kinda hurt.

They see each other in the office next day. And travis cant make eye contact with her. Katie is super confused because she thought he had a good time.

When everyone goes to lunch. She grabs travis and pushed him into a broom closet. And practically interrogates him.

Travis admits he likes her and she says the same. They’re super close to each other(coz of the tiny closet). The electricity in the air is charged. And they kiss again.

Travis doesnt wanna have sex in a closet so he picks her up, slams her on a table in the closet, bunches her tight skirt around her hips, and goes down her.

And katies just trying not to moan loudly. But failing miserably. Travis stoll knows how to eat pussy.

The rest of the day is filled with luscious glances, slight touches, her putting her hand on his thigh under the table and slowly inching upwards.

They meet up that evening at her apartment. And they agree to start dating. They keep it lowkey not yet telling connor.

After 1 month, they tell connor who btw called it from day one. He’s extremely happy for them.

Travis gets a bit jealous when guys flirt with katie and vice versa. But the two them only have eyes for each other.

Katie gets paired with another guy from the office for some work. Travis also notices that the guy checks katie out a lot, even though she is oblivious.

because of their conflicting work schedules, and how they never get to see each other. Katie working on the project with “that guy”travis is busy with his work, and helping connor out in his senior year. Late nights where they miss each other so much

And thats when their first real fight happens. Hes yelling. Shes yelling. Travis gets insecure that katie doesnt want him anymore. Katies positive they are gonna break up.

In a last ditch effort, she goes to his place. And have a painfully truthful conversation on how they both messed up. They promise to do better and communicate more

That night they make ~~love~~ to each other. Not sex, LOVEEEEE.

After that its smooth sailing. They have fights now and then, but nothing they cant handle.

Their first “I love you’s” is a week after they made love to each other. She was making dinner ( shes a fucking amazing cook) and travis is standing behind her arms around her waist, chin on her shoulders.

And they’re talking and he says “well thats one of things i love about u” and after a second he realises what he said and practically freezes. Katie stops stirring the pasta and turns to look at him.

They both just kinda stare at each other and travis is so fucking nervous and then katie breaks out into the most breathtaking smile he has ever seen. she tells him i love u back.

Their kissing turns to making out and he picks her up, slams her on the kitchen counter and they have sex. (They also turned off the stove dw)

2 orgasms later. They finally eat dinner. And things between them are fucking amazing

After dinner they retreat back to the bedroom where katie is screaming his name and travis’ grunting heavily.

And it’s complete bliss.....

Also side note. Hermes and demeter 100% approve

[fycarmensandiego]

1995 Animation Magazine article

After months of trying to find a library to supply this over interlibrary loan, I’ve finally managed to get a copy of the cover story from February 1995′s Animation Magazine, about Where on Earth. Aside from the truly cringetastic headline on the cover, the article itself is poorly written and just as poorly researched (for example, saying that Carmine appears on the cartoon), but it does have snippets from interviews with several execs at both Brøderbund and Dic.

A scanned copy of the article (featuring some concept art of Carmen, Ivy, Zack, and a nameless goon in regrettably low quality) is available in my online archive, or read the text (with some spelling and punctuation corrections) below the cut.

Lady in Red by Morrie Gelman, special to Animation Magazine

The commercial television version of Carmen Sandiego, the lady in the stylish red hat and shoes who steals national treasures such as all of the sushi in Japan is, surprisingly, the most successful program ever produced by DIC Entertainment. Maybe not so surprising, since with more than 4 million units sold since 1985, Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?, currently out in a junior version on CD-ROM, is computer software’s best-selling history and geography title ever.

Carmen is the first software character ever to make the leap to television. In addition to the DIC-produced Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? educational/entertainment series for Fox, Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?, a game show, is in its fourth season on PBS.

It was four years from the time Andy Heyward, president and C.E.O. of DIC, spotted Carmen as a computer game designed by Brøderbund Software to provide young people with exposure to world geography and cultures before it ever got on commercial television.

Heyward read a story about Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? in the business section of the Los Angeles Times. He went to the Northern California community of Novato, where Brøderbund Software is based, and met with company officials. He said at the time, “I would like to option the property,” and then took it over to CBS.

DIC had the property in development at CBS for three consecutive years. It was still in the running when Heyward had lunch with Margaret Loesch, president of Fox Children’s Network at the Big Boy restaurant in Burbank.

“CBS developed it and at the final bell decided that educational programming was too risky,” Heyward recalls.

At a NATPE in the early ’90s, Barbara Kriesman, the FCC attorney in charge of the Video Services Division, was the main speaker at a children’s seminar. The seminar was focused on compliance with the recently enacted Children’s Television Act requiring broadcasters to air programming that meets the educational and informational needs of children. Stations were told, in effect, they would lose their licenses if they did not comply.

It was clear that Fox had to protect itself. Margaret Loesch is a very competitive person. She was ready to take a chance.

Heyward told her of DIC’s developing Carmen Sandiego with CBS. She asked if it was picked up yet and he said, “No, it wasn’t.”

Loesch said Fox would pick up the series if it could have an exclusive.

According to Heyward, Loesch made “a big pitch” on why Fox would be a more competitive environment for Carmen Sandiego. Heyward listened and agreed, finally saying, “OK, let’s go.” The show made its debut on Fox’s Saturday morning line-up from 11:30 to noon last February as Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego?

By Heyward’s evaluation, Carmen has been more successful than any “educational” show, ever, especially because “kids don’t think of it as an educational show.”

That it be highly entertaining was DIC’s hope and aspiration from the start.

“We work very hard to get a lot of stuff in there that kids learn from,” Heyward says. “The production has not only cel animation but computer graphics, source footage and live action.”

Heyward confirms that “Carmen Sandiego is far and away the most successful program we’ve ever produced.”

For Robby London, senior vice president, creative affairs at DIC, Carmen Sandiego is the company’s “flagship” program and one of his “favorite, favorite topics to talk about.”

While London admits that everybody always says that some show or another is “unique,” that label is totally valid for Carmen.

Some of the things that make Carmen unique are the many disparate production elements not often seen on Saturday morning television.

Carmen includes regular cel animation to carry the narrative forward. Silicon Graphics Inc.’s computer animation takes characters from place to place throughout the world, allowing viewers to learn about the places. Within the SGI platform, still photos are used, such as source footage of Franklin Delano Roosevelt making a speech, along all sorts of other visuals, including graphs.

Another component is “limited animation,” which is quick, little, perhaps 5-second, images of a rather silly animation that is in a completely different style from the regular cel animation. Live action appears throughout the episodes in terms of the players playing at home on the computer against Carmen Sandiego. This is the whole basis by which DIC tells the story.

Michael Maliani was executive producer and producer of Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? the first season of the show. With DIC currently working on the third season, Joe Barruso, who previously directed the show, is now producer.

Maliani, who was in at the earliest stages of development, remembers that “What we were trying to do was make something entertaining and educational. We wanted to be different. We really wanted to make it interesting to watch. That’s why we wanted to have so many elements.”

Kids like variety, Maliani contends. With that in mind, DIC decided to produce Carmen with different media, including standard cel animation, other computer graphics and some live-action added in. “We thought we could show the educational stuff without being boring,” Maliani explains. “We didn’t want to make the show a lecture. We wanted to weave the education into the plot.”

Like the computer game, the DIC series is full of visual and spoken clues about the mysteries Carmen Sandiego, her cunning cat Carmine and her gang of goofball thieves stealing such ambitious treasures as the roof off the Taj Mahal and statues from Easter Island. Viewers (players in the computer game) get help in trying to stop Carmen and her henchmen form the ACME Detective Agency. The DIC series (and now Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? Junior Detective Edition on CD-ROM as well) features the young characters Zack and Ivy who report to The Chief. The plot of each episode (and the objective of the computer game) is to follow geography-based clues and “bag the bad guys, recover the stolen loot and put Carmen Sandiego and Carmine in the clink.”

Along the way, viewers learn such facts as the height and location of Mt. Everest, and that the Sphinx in Egypt has the body of a lion with the head and breast of a man.

“We knew we were going to fit right in the 6 to 11 age demographic,” explains Maliani, “but we wanted to make Carmen a little more sophisticated so we could get the older kids.”

A major difference between Carmen the computer game and the commercial TV series is in visualizing the capers. The computer game offers as a premise that the Eiffel Tower or the Taj Mahal is stolen. DIC’s production team had to estimate the weight of the Taj Mahal and then figure out what it would take to lift it.

DIC’s researchers established that four Russian helicopters could hoist the estimated weight of the Taj Mahal roof.

The next problem was how to accomplish the feat. DIC’s solution? Use a laser to cut off the roof. Add hooks to it and lift it off.

“We had to figure this stuff out,” Maliani notes. “It’s kind of fake but almost real.”

London explains that many shows on Saturday morning have had a degree of pro-social values. One of the things that is different about Carmen from all these other shows, according to London, is that Fox and DIC took the “conservative high road” that pro-social is not sufficient to fulfill the mandate of the Children’s Television Act.

“Carmen can’t just show good moral values and teach little lessons in living,” he points out. “It must have a measurable curriculum that actually teaches information, not just lessons in living.”

Among the consultants on Carmen is Dr. Peter Kovaric, a professor at UCLA in the Graduate School of Education, who is also director of the school’s educational technology unit. Kovaric is an acknowledged expert on using technology, such as television, to teach kids.

He reviews all Carmen scripts and helps DIC’s production team conceptualize shows. “It’s an exemplary relationship,” affirms Kovaric.

“One of the very good things about Carmen is that it is a commercial venture and is reasonably successful. That may help lower the reluctance of broadcasters to try something new and different,” he observes.

DIC also employs Barbara Wong, a teacher and principal of Baldwin Middle School in the Alhambra (Calif.) school district. Wong credits the DIC production team with being “very concerned” about having quality programming for kids. “They’re very in tune with people like myself and very open.”

Carmen, she points out, “has a lot of elements in it that readily apply to a teaching situation.”

Wong explains that while Carmen is not a “surrogate teacher,” the show does quality as “a nice addendum – a nice resource to have.”

Wong gets screen credit as Curriculum Consultant. Kovaric is Educational Consultant.

According to London, Carmen, in addition to gaining an educational seal of approval, invariably wins its time period. In the Sept. 1993 to July 1994 Nielsen data, Fox’s Saturday morning line-up, which includes Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers, X-Men, Bobby’s World, Tiny Toons, Taz-Mania, Eek the Cat and Carmen demonstrates the last is one of the top shows not only with kids 2 to 11 but with persons 6 to 17.

It averaged a 6.0 rating with kids 2 to 11 and 5.1 with the older demo, suggesting that as an educational program it’s holding its own handily against traditional animated entertainment, including action/adventure.

Another measure of Carmen’s appeal is that in the same Nielsen measured time-span, “the lady in the red hat” has more viewers than Beekman’s World and Bill Nye combined – not only with kids 2 to 11 but with persons 2 and over.

“It’s by no means a loss leader,” emphasizes London. “It’s not even number one by default. It really holds up Fox’s ratings.”

Maliani, who is senior vice president in charge of development, knows he risks sounding hokey but points out that in his 10 years with DIC he has wanted to try “to make a difference.” In Carmen Sandiego, he says, “we have a property where you could actually learn.”

In large measure, Maliani speaks for everyone connected with the Carmen Sandiego property when he comments: “This is the one show that really meant a lot to me and I gave it my all. I gave it everything I had and everything I could think of creatively. I wanted it to be special.”

————————————

Carmen Sandiego began life as a computer game – a history, geography, educational title – by way of Brøderbund Software Inc., Novato, Calif., a diversified consumer software company. Founded by Douglas Carlston, Brøderbund is one of the hottest names in educational software publishing.

For the recent holiday season Brøderbund published Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? Junior Detective Edition, an icon- and dialog-based CD-ROM product designated for 5- to 8-year-olds.

But Carmen Sandiego isn’t just a game. The software series inspired two TV shows for kids: DIC Entertainment’s animated adventure Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? On the Fox Kids Network, and the PBS game show, Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego? produced by WGBH Boston and WQED Pittsburgh.

Brøderbund constantly works at new ways to update the original product. Software titles include Where in the USA Is Carmen Sandiego?, Where in Space Is Carmen Sandiego?, Where in Time Is Carmen Sandiego? and Where in America’s Past Is Carmen Sandiego? in addition to the signature Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?

Brøderbund has creative input on every Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? script, but not necessarily every storyboard.

Ken Goldstein, publisher of Brøderbund’s Education and Entertainment Products Group, describes his company relationship with DIC Entertainment as “very healthy.”

He was deeply involved in the first season of the DIC/Fox series, establishing the working relationship and the new ground rules. Since then he’s passed on regular contact to his staff, yet still signs off on every set of script notes (drafts of every script are read by Brøderbund staff and every storyboard reviewed).

For the most part, the DIC series scripts are different from those used by Brøderbund, but there’s some synergy. Brøderbund has introduced a new character into its most recent software, Stretch the Crime Dog, described as “a lovable, clue-sniffing, crime-busting canine” who works for the ACME Detective Agency.

Reciprocally, the software is now using agents Zack and Ivy and The Chief from the DIC animated TV series.

“Carmen is a perennial for us,” notes Goldstein. “It really is an evergreen product, a premier intellectual property. I’m delighted to manage its existence.” According to Goldstein, Carmen Jr. will probably go Gold in the software business, which is 100,000 pieces, within a couple of months.

Brøderbund, Goldstein also reports, does a lot of licensing, including T-shirts, mouse pads and backpacks, among other items. Carmen is also very much an international product. Goldstein says Carmen software is “very big” in Spain and Mexico, and also especially popular in Israel.

There’s a Japanese version of Carmen, plus a cartridge version on Nintendo and Sega, which has not done as well as Brøderbund would like. “I don’t think it’s the right venue for that product,” Goldstein remarks.

Brøderbund is stepping up to a new level of international distribution on March 1, opening its own Brøderbund Europe office and publishing localized versions of new Carmen products from that time forward.

By Brøderbund’s design and demand, there are no guns or other weapons in the Carmen Sandiego TV show or software. The Carmen character does have henchmen, but, points out Goldstein, “it’s very much ‘Three Stooges.’ They botch things and they use such things as big suction cups, funny gadgets and outlandish vehicles, but there are never any guns, no bombs, no grenades, no violence. They never threaten the detectives. It’s all a game of wits.”

Brøderbund also has been very careful not to portray stereotypes, to make sure with the software that all different types of international cultures are reflected positively. DIC is equally sensitive about portraying stereotypes and respecting different cultures.

“Computers have revolutionized the teaching world, and now classrooms will never be the same,” suggests one reviewer of Carmen software.

“Programs like Carmen let students explore their own paths of learning,” points out another.

Morrie Gelman is the president of Ventures in Media, a market research, information packaging and television development firm.

[adultswim2021]

Ephemera Week (2002)

I really wonder how effectively I’ll be able to do this in 2003. In 2003, Adult Swim started doing the black and white text bumps, where they give max sass and NO EFFS (fucks), so every week had unique content. I definitely don’t have the resources to catalogue every bumper or even come up with a decent “best of”. Ephemera Corner 2003 may look very different. To quote my good friend Zorak, “Brak, do you ever think about the future?”. To this I say, yes. Yes, Zorak, I do.

BROADCAST ANOMALIES AND SPECIAL NIGHTS!

Adult Swim Action (and other stuff) | February 23, 2002

February 23rd was the first installment of Adult Swim Action. Up to this point, Adult Swim aired a block of mostly comedy capped off with Cowyboy Bebop. This was the first formal separation of Action and Comedy. I remember the bitter rivalry between the two fandoms on various message boards I posted on. It really did seem like a venn diagram with almost no overlap; action fans hated the comedy shows (maybe they liked one or two but hated the rest) and the same went for the comedy fans, except most of the comedy fans I knew were devout anime haters.

At the height of my anime animosity an internet ex-friend of mine started a message board called ANIME SUCKS. It was an experience I’ll always remember fondly. At it’s peak it had over 1000 members. All but about a dozen of those members were actually ANGRY anime fans who just stumbled on the board and were FURIOUS at us for being anti-anime, and we’d just act like obtuse dickheads about it. Like, we’d act stupider than they were and just wind them up.

We developed a few tricks to really set somebody off. For example: they’d write an impassioned defense of anime as an art form, and say something like “it’s not all like Pokemon or Dragonball Z”, to which we’d reply “actually those are the only two animes I like”. This really got them. There was a special thrill to just replying “miyazaki is an idiot” to a guy’s 6-paragraph essay about why anime was “good, actually”, prompting an even longer response. It was really fun! We didn’t have to harass people online, they’d just come to us to get abused. I’ve never seen bait get taken so effortlessly. One day that guy just closed the message board, locked everyone out, and disappeared forever.

That was some aside, huh? Anyway, the arrival of Adult Swim Action meant that Adult Swim stopped airing the Thursday night repeats of Adult Swim Comedy, which was a shame. It Also meant Adult Swim’s Sunday night had an extra hour to fill, which they did with Rocky & Bullwinkle and the Popeye Show. People complained. I didn’t. Vintage animation is just a different take on the “adult” label. Besides, I was used to tuning out by 12AM anyway, so even if I didn’t like those shows (I did!) I wasn’t missing anything, really. But yes, if it were a full hour of Space Ghost repeats I guess that would’ve been better.

The Lewis Lectures | May 19, 2002 - 12:45 AM

A repeat of Lewis Lectures? IT HAPPENED! But what was so different about this broadcast of Lewis Lectures? Well, they accidentally scrambled the SAP audio with the default English audio, causing the Spanish soundtrack to play in tandem with the English one. It was bloody well fucked mate. This is simply no longer England.

I remember becoming an Adult Swim completist and taping this, considering it some kind of void in my collection. Part of me wishes I saved the recording, so I could combine it with the inferior YouTube rip currently up and have a closer-to-pristine copy than the one that’s available. But also, JESUS FUCKING CHRIST THIS IS LEWIS LECTURES WE ARE TALKING ABOUT. How much pain can I inflict on myself?

Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law Mini-Marathon | September 15, 2002 - 11:00 PM

On this night they aired a little Harvey Birdman marathon of the 4 episodes. This was kinda baffling, as Birdman had 6 episodes to its name and they’d been repeated into the ground by this point. I guess it goes to show that Adult Swim kinda considered Birdman to be their prestige program. I’m hard-pressed to call any one Adult Swim show “smart” in a way that’s apparent on a shallow level. Birdman is set in a courtroom, animated the most competently out of all their other shows, and involved cultural references in a showy way. Like, Space Ghost having Dave Willis absurdly shout “UP THE CHAIN” in the background of a Space Ghost episode is almost just a weird easter egg. But Birdman? Birdman was name-dropping Hanna Barbera characters the same way Frasier would talk about whatever gay shit Frasier talked about.

They aired The Dabba Don, Shaggy Busted, Shoyu Weenie, Very Personal Injury in that order. I would’ve swapped Shaggy and Shoyu and for Bannon Custody Battle and Death by Chocolate, but that’s just me, I guess.

Adult Swim New Years Bash hosted by Carl and Brak | December 31, 2002 - 11:00 PM

Adult Swim officially ended 2002 with this: a night hosted by Carl and Brak in Times Square, watching the ball drop (which was FREAKING MEATWAD!!!!). I remember this night fondly. Unfortunately I can’t find the whole thing, but here’s a single segment I found on vimeo to give you some idea. I think I had it up at one point and Turner very annoyingly had it taken down.

I used to have this massive physical media collection; stuff on VHS and DVD and DVD-R that was meticulously catalogued. I ditched a lot of it in favor of digitizing stuff like this, eternally keeping it on hard drives that I meant to back up but never did. It seems more convenient, but it isn’t. If this were 2003 and I needed to show you this, I would be able to retrieve it from one of my many shelves. I might still have this, but would have no idea where to look for it and it would probably involve me getting in my car and going out to my storage unit and pulling every single box out. I turned it into ones an zeros and stuck it on a nondescript black box that could very well be dead. And now it’s not even on YouTube. Sad? Sure, it’s sad.

PEAK EPHEMERA

(phrase stolen from Grifthorse podcast)

Hey, here are some videos I found on YouTube in case you wanna go down a wormhole of watching old Adult Swim commercial breaks. May the gods of posterity keep them online forever:

February 4, 2002

Spring 2002

June 16, 2002

June 30, 2002

July 27, 2002

August 2002

November 17, 2002

November/December 2002

MAIL BAG:

This ends EPHEMERA WEEK. We’ll do actual episodes soon!

What's the scariest thing you seen on adult swim?

I don’t know if I have a real answer for this. I don’t think I actually get scared by stuff in movies or TV shows. I can’t even come up with a funny answer. Remember the end of that Metalocalypse episode where the little sick girl is dead and her eyes turn into maggots and you hear that screechy voice was like I’M DEAD BECAUSE OF YOU!!! I’ll just go with that even though it made me laugh really hard

Ever watch Limmy's Show

I am content just being vaguely aware of Limmy (no, I never watched his show. Seems good).

Please don't do such a big mailbag. I couldn't believe how many r-words wrote inane bullshit to you. Let keep this blog about the real stars: Master Shake, Space Ghost, Brak, Zorak, Meatwad, Frylock, Debbie, Black Debbie, Carl, Sparks, Stormy, Hesh, Moltar, Harvery Birdman Captain Murphy, Dr. Quinn, Paula, Marco,  Brendon, Jason, Melissa, The Mooninites, the Plutonians, Peanut, Coach Mc Gurk, Mentok the Mindtaker, Virjay, Antoin, Colby, Trotter, Adair WE ARE THE UPRIGHT CITIZENS BRIGADE :)

I can’t believe this IDIOT doesn’t get that by typing such a long message he very IDIOTICALLY contributed to the length of the Maili Bag... LMFAO, what a IDIOT

This is maybe the funniest blog on tumblr. You really think these nasty little cartoons are special, huh?

Hey than-- oh :( Yeah, I guess so :(

would you like master shake if he did the whole thing

I’m sorry what

[vios-rockland-corner]

Dollmaker Talk PT 2

*snaps fingers*  Guess what?  I got the “okay” sign to talk a little bit more about Runawayoutlaw’s unfinished Dollmaker build.

That means yes I will be going into my thoughts about the characters and setting this time.  I focused on Dollmaker being outside the Rockland canon and the game mechanics last time.

(MAJOR spoilers below for the unfinished Dollmaker build)

First of all, what is the plot of Dollmaker?  Well the MC this time around is a medical student attending a seminar that day on improving relations between demons and humans for the greater good.  One of the very speakers at the lecture is none other than Dr. Sano Kojima.  The MC apparently catches his eye and you two seem to get along fairly well considering you admire him for his position (he’s a demon ambassador) and he appreciates that you seem to be specializing in demons for your medical degree.  All seems to be going well and you look forward to discussing the profession with him more...only to get caught off guard when he knocks you out and brings you to his home.  The atmosphere quickly changes when you wake up and he cuts straight to point that his main goal is turn you into a human doll!  He puts a binding spell on you so you can’t escape the house, but he gives you the freedom to walk about as you please.

That’s pretty much the gist of the game.  From there it’s about exploration and getting to know the inhabitants of the house, and on rare occasions, seeing some visitors.

Sano Kojima

As I stated in my previous post, both Sano and Akira have been introduced beforehand in BTD.  This game was meant to revamp the characters and stories.  For the most part, I’d say personality wise that Sano stays very similar to his BTD counterpart.  He’s very calm and professional.  He’s very much into his research and appreciates compliance from the MC.  He can still kill you in this, but the only such ending I found is if you fight back repeatedly right away.  Like I said, he prefers compliance.  He is probably one of the more sane of the three main house inhabitants and possibly the nicest?  It’s hard to say when I feel like both Sano and Annabelle’s routes weren’t quite finished yet.  That or I haven’t found everything yet.  

I will say compared to the BTD game, Sano here doesn’t show nearly as much sadism or malice.  He DOES still want to turn you into a doll though, but again I don’t think his route was fully finished (or I haven’t found the right paths yet).  I didn’t get a full ending with him completing the doll transformation, so other than the beginning, we don’t get to delve into that obsession as much as I would have liked.  I remember playing BTD and getting that one ending and thinking, “Oh!  I love that concept, I wish I could have seem more of the character focused on that.”  Dollmaker is obviously supposed to do that, but the creator didn’t get around to the finishing touches.  I kept getting stuck in the same loops with “Sano’s route,” so I can’t say much else.

Annabelle Winter

Annabelle is a brand new character.  There’s a bio for her luckily in the game to explain some of who she is (a former lead singer), but otherwise I probably was able to get the least information about her in the game.  I remember some notes about her one tumblr way back when Dollmaker was being developed.  Basically, she’s supposed to be Sano’s “first doll.”  You, the MC, would then end up being the second doll.  You can tell this really doesn’t sit well with Annabelle, even if I couldn’t get much more information about her feelings in the game.  There’s a conversation between Akira and her you can spy on, but you really aren’t quite sure what’s happening.  Her room was also always locked for me.  I don’t know if the programming for it all hadn’t been completed like Sano’s wasn’t, or I just wasn’t performing the correct actions.

The existence of Annabelle is interesting though because then it does make you ask questions like: What’s her relationship with Sano?  Are they lovers or something else?  Is she jealous that he’s making a new doll? Does Sano plan to throw Annabelle out after he has you? Does this mean the MC could also get tossed out later? What’s her relationship with Akira?  Stuff like that adds more tension to the atmosphere.  On the plus side, at least you know Sano’s successfully turned someone into a doll before, so you know the procedure should go fine (yay?).  Personality wise, I didn’t have enough to go off of to get a real good idea of what she’s like.  She can be a little bitter and creepy, that’s for sure, but also talks sensibly with someone like Akira.  It’s hard to say.

Akira Kojima

Ah Akira!  Probably the character that was the closest to completion in my opinion.  That doesn’t mean his whole path WAS complete, but compared to Sano (one death ending vs. couldn’t progress) and Annabelle (hardly any progression and no ending found), Akira actually had decent introductions, quality time with the MC and an ending.  Granted, it was mostly the ONE ending...but I kind of loved it and it wasn’t a death ending at least.  Before I get into that, what’s he like in Dollmaker?  Well he definitely has more of a domineering and feisty personality I’d say, contrasting nicely with Sano.  He also can be both naughty and tender I’d say when it comes to romance.  He can be pretty sensitive at times.  You also learn he’s a contract killer in this game, but he doesn’t seem to really enjoy the work.  That’s the only major hint I’d say of the guy being unhappy.  I remember during the development process it was hinted that Akira has a LOT of baggage in this universe.  Baggage unfortunately that seems to make unstable enough that he will completely flip his lid if he thinks someone is turning on him.  What I’m saying is...the dude actually has a yandere ending XD  I’m not joking.  For those who know of my main blog and are probably thinking, “Did YOU enjoy that?” the answer is obviously HECK YES!  See what happens is if you get too cozy with Akira, apparently that makes him latch onto you.  

I swear to god when I played my first run, I was NOT trying to make him jealous.  I thought there was more to do so I didn’t think it was a big deal if I didn’t wake him in bed (it seemed rude to me), go to the kitchen and compliment Sano’s eye.  But those Telltale mechanics from the last post I talked about?  This is where I realized too late they were hinting that Akira gets VERY aware of what you do in the house once he starts to like you.  He doesn’t like it AT ALL if you either seem like you’re trying to leave or get friendly with anyone else then.  He goes full “snap.”  What he does is try to “train you” so that you agree the MC belongs to him and him alone then.  I love how he does it actually because I find it pretty realistic.  Yeah he gets really rough with you initially once he’s snapped, but the big thing is he throws you into a large closet.  He just leaves you with a bucket and nothing else.  And then he makes NO CONTACT with you.  You go through...who knows how many days with occasional bottles of water or food placed on the floor without Akira talking to you or even you seeing him.  Depending on your actions, sometimes he’ll pop in to check on you, but if you show that your spirit isn’t broken yet, he goes back to the no contact.  He’s essentially driving the MC insane through isolation.  It’s very simple but incredibly effective.  Imagine literally being given nothing to do for days on end with limited food and water and just a bucket to relieve yourself in.  It can start to wear on you.  Humans are social creatures too (we NEED other people).  I love MC’s with stronger spirits actually that don’t bend to a yandere’s whims all that easily.  So yeah, I kept the MC yelling and tried to just hold out as long as I could.  This puts you in a loop though and Outlaw did a nice little touch where there’s this static effect over the screen when you continue to make decisions.  This helps to emphasize how monotonous this routine is becoming for the MC and you really feel less of the urge to fight back anymore.  I can see why the MC broke in the end.  Once they are broken, Akira comes to collect you and that’s pretty much the end.

Obviously I loved playing through Akira’s path the most.  I will do one small critique here since...I’m kind of a nut about yanderes.  I think it would have been nice to have a FEW more hints before Akira’s “snap” that he suffers from something like anxiety or separation over losing people.  There might have been some and I just got lost in the build maze finding this information XD  Like I said, I knew he had baggage (and even lost a lover) from the creator’s tumblr page during development, but I think it would have been nice to have some hints like that in the game.  Just food for thought in case they want to try another yandere character in the future.  Some people don’t like if you pull a “yandere snap” out of nowhere without at least dropping some kind of hint of instability with the character prior.  I mean I’ll always enjoy yandere endings regardless honestly XD  It depends on how serious you want to take it though.  This situation was different than say Marcus from Till Death Do Us Part only because....that game basically is ALL about the “snap” there (no real progression to it like in Dollmaker).  You had just enough backstory (The MC and Marcus are divorced and Marcus gives you nightmares) that him coming back as the ex from hell isn’t surprising.  People can fill in the blanks and fantasize all they want there about what went wrong with the relationship beforehand.  With Akira, you’re seeing the relationship progression play out, so there’s a little more pressure to make the “snap” a little more believable.

I don’t know how fair it is to critique an] game that’s clearly not finished though 0.o

There’s was other stuff in the game I enjoyed like all the little Easter eggs with the plants and paintings, and Cain even popped up briefly in a bad end :P  There was other stuff I also didn’t learn about though like Mio (sorry I scared you lol), but it is what it is.

Still a nice treat.

[prorevenge]

EK tries get me arrested? Enjoy your own criminal record :D

[Background info]

This happened back when I was in sophomore year, and was a bit of a nerd but in a weird phase where I was actually starting to get some confidence. I spent the last 2 years thinking about launching an online business (back when Shopify wasn't as popular and prominent) and finally started to keep on track.

So I spend several weeks going to whole-sale websites, gathering products, designing the websites, etc. Once it launches, I decide to start small and only use my school district as the target market; of course there is mistrust with this system because no one takes a high school kid with an Amazon-esque website seriously. But after a while and some small purchases, I had a decent customer base with around 10-25 orders per week.

This was first when the school found out about it and the AP (Assistant Principal, person designated to watch our specific graduation class for all 4 years we are there) calls me down to his office and basically lectures me on the importance of the legality and on how I need to change the name of the website. Basically I named it after the school which was named after a well-known politician's family, and they didn't want legal issues. I did a lot of homework involving this and legally checked everything, especially since I was a minor and I didn't wanna cause any issues for my own fam.

I didn't care that much, I had been meaning to reboot the site and make it more lighter and modern anyways. I changed the name and moved on.

[Issues begins]

Now EK was a highly manipulative kid; he was one of those unlikable and bratty people who made up stories to attract girls and popularity. He always bragged he was gonna be rich because of how rich his parents were, girls would be obsessed with him, he was gonna be in movies; basically all sorts of delusional claims. I started out being uneasy "friends" with him meaning I just talked to him in class but I slowly drifted away from him because he would constantly flirt and harass these two girls, even though they told him not to and I tried to stop him.

Most of our entire grade didn't like this kid, but then he claims he owned the websites and ran it, and if anyone knows marketing, an unsavory person with ownership is bad for business. So I confront him and he apologizes saying that he'll retract his claims and say the truth.

The next day he did the exact opposite and spread rumors of how the situation happened in the opposite manner. This angered me and he forced my hand, I went straight to the site and made a notification post and email to all my customers saying that [Due to several circulating rumors about our business, we would like to remind out customers that EK does not own the website nor is he connected with us in any shape or form. Thank you for your service! Please be sure to check out our Easter Sale!]

Embarrassed, EK makes the most insane claim that I have ever heard...that I'm using the website to launder and sell drugs & weapons through school. Post-Columbine, this was taken very seriously and I was called down to the office where I found my AP and 3 police officers waiting for me. They questioned me, the website, etc while patting me down and searching my backpack, jacket, and belongings. They freaked out when they saw a condom and credit card knife (yeah it's my own damn fault for having a blade at school but I was an EDC guy who never did anything wrong). Honestly I wasn't as embarrassed as I was worried for the optics on this.

The considered this plausible intent and cause and I was handcuffed and put into police cruiser (a pretty comfy Dodge Charger to be honest) as they headed over to my house and called my mom telling them the situation. They asked to let them search my room (and only my room) and my mom obliges; with us being immigrants, she didn't want any trouble and she probably couldn't think straight from seeing her son in handcuffs. It angered me for a cop to hold me against the wall while I'm restrained, while two more turned my room upside down looking for something that didn't exist while my mother cried her eyes our at all this happening.

They didn't find anything of interest except this out of school project I was working on (JLaservideo's fire gloves, search it up). I had three of them and parts for at least 3 more. The officers asked me what it was and how it worked, I told them the basics and it was for science fair. They took them in as evidence and questioned the legality of the gloves while taking pictures along with the single canister of butane fuel.

I get suspension for 3.5 days (the rest of my school day was In-School-Suspension AKA isolation) but no criminal charges since there was no evidence. WELL NO SHIT!

I checked the office's sign in sheet (whenever we talk to an AP, they keep a record of the time, name, and date of when someone comes in. As I signed out to, I see one name before my own...EKP's. My anger doubles as all I can think of is ways to kill him but I calm myself, saying that his time will come.

The next 3 days allow me to plan for my revenge...

[Revenge time]

One of my friends had a recording of how EK said he wanted to PUSH A GIRL OFF A BALCONY at a party they both were at BECAUSE SHE REJECTED HIM! Maybe somehow that recording was emailed to the police department, teachers, and several students through a throwaway email....

I recorded him stalking this girl from school and all the way to her house and peeking in through her window. This didn't happen once, twice but four times! This was edited almost like a montage and emailed as well.

Once every 5 weeks, the school brought in drug dogs. I saw a K9 police car in the parking lot and quickly texted my friend that was a pothead. I told him to bring a weed brownie and put it in EK's bag when during 2nd period (which was at the other side of the school so he wouldn't get caught). This went swimmingly as hallway banter was filled with EK being caught with drugs in school.

[End Result]

EK was expelled, had a restraining order filed on him by the girl along with two others who came forward, and had a court case the next month. The second girl had a boyfriend who was a classmate of mine and I let him know what he was doing. Somehow the guy found out where he lived and him and his friend's keyed his car, slashed his tires, stole his shoes, and jumped him. He was found guilty for possession of marijuana (idk the real charge but the state I live in is very strict with weed; this resulted in several moths of juvenile detention where he was beat up even more. Where he is now, I don't know but I doubt he succeeded like how he bragged he would.

I spent the rest of the year in a very peaceful mindset :D

(source) story by (/u/Spade3k)

[bitletsanddrabbles]

Downton Court Hotel pt.3

I seriously wrote part three ages ago....and hated it. So I’ve been waiting for something better to come along. I’ll post it to Ao3 after I’ve chewed on it a bit, tweaked the phrasing, etc. For now, though, here it be.

(Also, I know bachlorette parties normally take place the night before the wedding. This one was done several days before to allow for everyone’s work schedules. Haven’t figured out how to work that information into the actual story yet...)

Fandom: Downton Abbey

Relationship: Baxter/Molsley, canon pairings

Characters: Thomas Barrow, Phyllis Baxter

Warnings: Sop, mentions of past bad relations of multiple sorts, cranky Thomas.

https://bitletsanddrabbles.tumblr.com/post/165776433184/downton-court-hotel-pt-2

There was still eyeliner clinging around his lashes. No matter what he tried, Thomas couldn't seem to get it all off. The rest of the makeup had come off well enough with soap and water and he'd finally been convinced the eyeliner was diminished enough to go to tea, but tea was over. The rest of the bridal party, sans bride, had already left for work. Soon he'd have to join them. Eyeliner was just the sort of thing Carson would notice if he showed up in it, and bachlorette party or no, he would not approve.

Damn Anna and Gwen for talking him into this. He was going to take his full weekend off and spend the whole time so smashed that the hangover lasted for two days. Assuming, of course, he wasn't sacked for wearing eyeliner to work.  "Phyllis?" he finally called, trying not to sound panicked. "Is there some trick to getting this crap off?"

For a moment he wasn't certain if she'd heard him. Then there were footsteps on the other side of the door and her voice, muffled slightly, saying, "I have some makeup remover in the medicine cabinet. Try that."

Dutifully he pulled open the cabinet, but was at a complete loss as to what he was looking at. Phyllis Baxter was not the sort he expected to have a medicine cabinet full of beauty products, and yet there were creams and conditioners of every sort on the shelves. "What does it look like?"

"May I come in?"

He wasn't quite certain why she'd asked. It wasn't as if he was using the loo, and it was her bathroom, after all. Still, he appreciated the thought. Without a word, he opened the door. He expected her to just come in and fetch the bottle for him, but instead she also got some cotton swabs and had him sit on the closed lid of the loo.

"Here, let me." With a somewhat strained smile, she popped open the cap on the little bottle and applied some thick cream to the swab. "Close your eyes."

"Thanks," he muttered, following her instructions. He flinched a little when the swab touched him, simply because he couldn't see and wasn't used to things that close to his eyes.

"You're welcome," Phyllis replied. "Although there's so little left, I don't know that it's necessary."

Thomas snorted at that. "If I come in wearing anything that might be considered makeup, Carson'll spot it straight away, I promise you. Then that will be that."

"Mr. Carson doesn't care that much." Her voice took on the gentle, chiding tone she used when she thought he was being silly, but didn't want to upset him.

As usual, it only served to irritate him. "Yes, actually, he does. He's almost as bad as Dad used to be, only he doesn't yell as much and..." He didn't finish the thought. "Anyway, I don't feel comfortable is all. I think about it and all I can hear is Dad yelling at Margaret for putting me in her Easter dress and Mum's heels."

"Well I think it did a lovely job of bringing out your eyes, but it's gone now. Hold still a bit more and I'll make sure there's no left over remover." The cotton swab was replaced with a warm, wet washcloth. "There."

Thomas opened his eyes, blinking a little as the wet lashes stuck together. He then immediately checked the mirror to be certain that, yes, it was all gone. "Thanks," he muttered again, then gave her a sideways glance. "I'll be sure to remember all of that if I ever want to bring out my eyes."

"The waiter at lunch seemed to agree with me." That was said in her teasing voice, the one she used when she wanted to make him smile, but wasn't certain he was ready to.

At least eight times out of ten, he wasn't ready to. This was not one of the lucky times. "The waiter was flirting with at least three different girls," he retorted with an eye roll. "At best he was bi curious and would figure out after one night that men weren't his cup of tea. At worst, he just thought I was tipping and hoped he'd get more from flirting."

"Thomas!"

"No, I've given up on romance," he insisted, leaving the bathroom for the comfort of the living room, his hostess trailing behind him. The one good thing about the other bride's people being maids (well, except for Daisy) was that they'd tidied up the debris from the gifts before they'd left. There was one chair occupied by boxes waiting to go out for pick up, but beyond that, Thomas could sit where he liked. He chose the recliner and, once seated, looked up at Phyllis with his best 'devil may care' expression. "It never goes well for me, so I'll leave it to other people and you can turn your attention to hooking Gwen up with someone."

Phyllis gave him one of those worried frowns she wore so often. Really, she fussed more about him than his own sister ever had. "Is this still about Jimmy?"

"What?" he scoffed. "Of course not. That was years ago and I'm over it. Better a best mate than a failed boyfriend any day." He paused and gave her a hard look. "And don't bring up Andy. That was never even a possibility, no matter what everyone else decided, thank you." "I wasn't going to mention it." Phyllis took a seat in the arm chair across from him, her hands folded neatly in her lap. "Really, I didn't ask you to stay so I could lecture you about your love life, I promise."

"Then why did you ask?"

"I had a question for you." She straightened and met his eye, smiling. She didn't say anything further. She didn't ask anything. The silence stretched long enough that Thomas was about to prompt her when she finally asked, "Would you like more tea?"

It was not the question Thomas had been anticipating. It was, in fact, so far from that he couldn't help a short, bewildered laugh. "What, another? I've already had six cups."

Phyllis's eyes dropped immediately to her lap. "Right. Of course."

"Is something wrong?" Thomas asked, eyebrows drawing slightly together. While he might complain about Phyllis fussing over him more than his real sister, the fact remained that he returned the favor and nothing was calculated to make him set aside his own troubles quite so quickly as signs that she was unhappy. If called out on the fact he would, of course, deny it or make some excuse, but there it was. "You're not having second thoughts, are you?"

The question seemed almost startling. "Oh, no!" Phyllis quickly assured him, her face lighting up with a very genuine smile. "No, I am very certain that I want to marry Joseph. It's only that the wedding is in three days and, well, I've not officially named my Maid of Honour."

Thomas frowned at that. "I thought that was going to be Anna. Or, well, I suppose she wouldn't be a maid. Not at a wedding."

"No, that would be Matron of Honour, and I think everyone's assuming it will be her. I haven't asked her, though. I've been thinking about it and..." She paused, then looked him dead in the eye. "I've realized what I truly want is a Man of Honour. Thomas, would you please stand next to me at the wedding?"

Someone else might have asked if she was joking. Thomas knew better. She wouldn't joke about something like that, not in that earnest manner. She wasn't the sort. He suddenly wished he'd paid more attention to what actually went into weddings, since the question was clearly an important one, but he had no idea why. "Well," he mulled the request over, "Would I have to wear a dress?"

This time it was Phyllis's turn to be startled into laughter. "No, no, I would never ask that of you. I promise. It's really no different than any of the other bride's maids, except you'd stand directly next to me and..."

"Catch you if you pass out from nerves?" Thomas guessed. It earned him another laugh.

"I suppose there's that although really, if I didn't pass out the first time around, I'm not going to pass out now." She paused, then shook her head with another smile. "No, the only real concern I had was that the...Person of Honour, I suppose, walks in with the Best Man."

That bit of information hit Thomas like a wet towel. "I'd have to walk in arm in arm with Bates?"

"I wouldn't insist on arm in arm."

"Good," Thomas huffed, settling back in the chair, his posture leaving no question as to his feelings on this development. "I don't need him hitting me in the shins with his cane."

"Thomas! I am certain Mr. Bates is capable of not accidentally hitting you."

"Who said it would be an accident?" Thomas protested. "Really, you all act like he loves me and if I'd just stop being stubborn, we'd be best pals!"

Phyllis gave him a disapproving look. "You do start things, most of the time."

"Most of the time isn't all of the time." Under his breath he added, "Although try telling Carson that." He picked absently at a loose thread. "Are you really certain you want me to do this?"

The disapproval softened a little. "I trust you and Mr. Bates both to behave. How's that?"

"Wasn't Margaret your Maid of Honour last time? Another Barrow might be inviting bad luck." He watched her carefully from the corner of his eye.

With a sigh, Phyllis closed her eyes for moment. "It's not Margaret's fault that Peter was a con artist and a thief. It's not her fault that I didn't get to know him very well before marrying him." She opened her eyes again and looked straight at him. "You're not bad luck, Thomas.

" "Well then," Thomas shrugged. "I suppose I'll do it then. I just hope you don't wind up regretting it, is all."

Phyllis stood and walked over to press a kiss to the top of his head. "I won't. No matter what happens, I won't."

[bewareofchris]

32-42: + 10,000 points for casting James Spader and using the Pinocchio song.

+ IT WOULDN'T BE VERY HARD TO KNOW MORE ABOUT YOU THAN YOU KNOW ABOUT EACH OTHER, NATASHA.  Since ya'll can't even pretend to be friendly if your life depended on it.  It's like: "I have a secret that would help.  I should go to a secluded cave in another country and skinny dip for answers without talking about it."

+ it was important that Thor went and put on his kick ass outfit so he could show up and pick Tony up by the throat.  I just want to point out that Thor has fully developed Kink for Throat-Grabbing and he should possibly be shamed for it.

+ NONE OF YOU ARE GOING TO BE LIKE "THOR DROP THE TONY."  Not even Steve who is the leader is like, "we don't pick up our Tony by the throat, Thor.  That's bad for the team dynamics" and that's because Steve is a secret serial killer who wants to drag Tony behind his motorcyle at present and feel perfectly morally right about it because TONY IS ALWAYS CAUSING SHIT.  Oh My God.

+ I'm just saying.  Maybe you should elect a leader who does actual work leading?  Like, shows up when one of you dies to offer assistance?  Stays in the loop?  Supports his team members?  Doesn't create an environment wherein two super geniuses take it upon themselves to go ahead and accidentally create a super monster without talking it out because They'll Get Lectured.  

+ if your super genius pals are creating super monsters behind your back because you’re a lecturing self-righteous fuck, you may not be the right pick for leader of the team.

+ Fuck you, Marvel.  I buy into this set up you've made because it's a bunch of fucking dudes and one assumes none of them were ever taught the significance of compromise or using their words but fuck you.  This is a conflict that could have been resolved if ANY of these motherfuckers had matured past the elementary school playground level of communication abilities.

+ It's been like 2 minutes

+ Tony is stress laughing.  Just so he could be less sympathetic.

+ THOR.  YOU SHOWED UP IN JOUTENHIEM TO START SHIT, SUCCEEDED IN ALMOST STARTING A WAR AND ALSO KICKING OFF LOKI'S LIKE THREE MOVIE CRISIS ABOUT HOW HE NEVER KNEW HIS REAL FATHER BUT SECRETLY HE WANTS TO MURDER ODIN WHILE ALSO GETTING HIS APPROVAL, and you're going to mouth off about Tony messing with something he doesn't understand?  Oh right, you can, because Marvel didn’t recycle your one single plot line for the 7th time.

+ I'm going to be honest here.  It's 100% easy to blame Tony.  It shouldn't be this easy to blame Tony.  There shouldn't be this many people in the team that are completely in agreement that its Tony's fault.  This isn't a team.  

+ Also, yes.  Bruce is going to roll over and show his belly.  You got him to create Ultron against his better judgement.  You should have convinced Cap to do it.  Then the whole team would be apologizing to you for not supporting you because you were clearly Correct and Morally Righteous.

+ Fuck you, Steve.  You have like 0 interest in keeping the team together.  

+ It's only been 4 minutes.

+ "Self-destruct" but he didn't.  So really, lets blame Wanda because Ultron is LITERALLY her fault.  She was like: "oh he'll just kill himself."  But oops.

+  .......I have 0 patience for yet another person showing up to tell me how Stark The Arms Dealer was responsible for their Personal Trauma.  This is the Plot Equivalent of the Grinch stealing Christmas, being redeemed and then showing up at Easter to take all the kids' fucking eggs and bunnies.  And then you think he's really learned his lesson but oops he's back at Halloween stealing all your pumpkins and shit.  

+ I like how they try to make Clint have personality.  "Girlfriend."

+ STEVE.  STOP GIVING HIM THE STINK EYE.  STOP.  Staring at Tony like he's a child murderer.  I stg.  

[dreamersusan]

Bula To Aloha (Part 2)

It was weird to officially begin our program on a Monday, which was supposedly a public holiday, Easter Monday… well, where I come from anyway.

We were to meet 9am and the day before, I had already searched for the location. It’s good to know where you have to be (also where to run when you’re running late!)

It was the day where I got to meet the other members of the cohort. The 15 of us travelled from 9 different countries, and now here we were… ready to embark on a 6-week journey together.

I sat at the table in the middle of the room, also known as our classroom. We had speeches by the important people of the organisation and we then introduced ourselves to everyone (This was something we had to do so many times with the various people we met. Usually it’s our name, country and job)

After having our photos taken for ID and signing documents, we broke for lunch before heading out on our first field trip. We took the bus to famous Waikiki for a historic trail walking tour with our guide.

It was quite a walk as we made our way down the path, past the crowds, past the nice and expensive shops, and the hotels. When we finished for the day, we had the chance to explore the area.

An interesting fact I noted was that food is not served on glass plates. Rather, it’s served in styrofoam containers. I guess this makes it easier to take your food away if need be. The only place you’d get proper plates is in an actual restaurant.     

A colleague and I walked on that world-renown beach and through the hotels looking for an exit (we even went in a circle and came back to the same spot!) As we were going about, something caught my eye. There were many people holding out their phones in one direction. I looked to see what they were trying to capture. When I realized what it was, I too joined in on the ‘madness’. It was a beautiful sunset! However, a mere picture cannot truly compare to seeing it with your very own eyes.

Standing on the beach and taking in everything around me, it was surreal. Who would have thought that one day I was able to be in Hawaii, with my feet sinking into the sand on Waikiki?

On our second day, we had a speaker from the Hawaii Tourism Authority share with us about tourism in Hawaii. I fell asleep during parts of her presentation as she mostly talked about numbers (which is so not my thing!), and because I slept late… unfortunately sleeping past 1am was something I did almost every night, and throughout my entire trip. It’s a really bad habit, which I struggle to overcome, even back home. A few years ago, I made a resolution to sleep at 9pm, that obviously didn’t go as planned!

We were then introduced to the Leading Change Course, although we were already told about this before arrival into Hawaii. We had to finish the necessary materials before leaving for Washington DC to attend congress. So me being the night owl, stayed up to complete it and passed the final assessment on the first try (Even though I hardly went through the readings! But I did watch the lecture videos by the course instructor) Don’t judge!

After lunch, we had a video conference with a representative of SPTO (South Pacific Tourism Organisation) about tourism in the South Pacific. This reminded me of home as the speaker was in Fiji. The room where we had the session was pretty cool. A long table with several microphones around it with huge monitors on all sides of the wall.

Then in the afternoon, we had a group discussion outdoors on mats. We were given a predicament and had to decide from a group of characters, the best one to be saved from an incoming disaster. It was interesting as we all had differing opinions on the matter… and lots of laughs along the way.

Wednesday was a pretty great day in the classroom. It was because we had great speakers who kept us from falling off to sleep ahaha. The first speaker was an academic of the university who spoke on conservation and eco tourism.

It’s sad that these natural environments are being damaged by overly excessive access to these areas. So much so that they are either closed off for a day to recover or even closed for years to fully regain what was lost due to human ignorance and selfishness.

Speaker two was from the Hawaii Film Office who shared how film/TV is a tourism promotion strategy and stories of film crews and stars who shot in Hawaii. The third speaker was from The Outrigger talking about Hawaiian culture and mass tourism. He shared that parts of the Hawaiian culture was losing its meaning and value.   

They say ‘the best is saved for last’ and this was certainly the case as our final speaker brought with her so much intensity and passion. She was from the Hyatt Regency Waikiki Beach Resort & Spa, who also shared on the same topic as the one before her.

Speaking of how the Hawaiian culture was being degraded for commercialism, she reminded and encouraged us that we should protect our cultures from being lost to a world that doesn’t appreciate its uniqueness. Her presentation really fired us all up!   

We were provided lunch in the classroom and then we set off to visit The Battleship Missouri Memorial. We were part of a tour group as our guide explained the history of the ship and WW2. We then had time to freely explore on our own. I can’t imagine what it’s like to live out on the open sea for months and even years on end.

On Thursday, we had someone from the organization speak about turning project ideas into reality. In the afternoon, we visited the Manoa Heritage Center where we toured gardens and the surroundings of a large house.

We got back to the classroom for our homestay orientation from someone of the International Hospitality Center.

Friday was our final day of orientation and classroom activities. We started with a trip to the King Kamehameha Judiciary History Center. Here, we took part in a mock trial of a real case that occurred many years ago.

Then we walked to Iolani Palace, the only palace on US soil. We had to wear a protective cover over our shoes before entering. It was heartbreaking to learn of the stories that had taken place inside. The Hawaiian monarchy was sadly overthrown in 1893 by a group of Americans. The Queen was then imprisoned in a room with no contact beyond palace walls.

Later, we had a group photo outside and a reception to mark the end of our first week.

On Saturday, I did my first washing. Why am I writing about something mundane as this? Well, I found it pretty cool to pop coins into a machine to buy a small packet of washing powder (which lasted me the 5-weeks in Hawaii!) I also found it cool to start up a washing machine with quarters and the same goes for the clothes dryer. Yeah, I’m weird, right? Hahaha! The best feeling was collecting your laundry and it feels nice and warm. Yes, I don’t have a dryer back home. 

In the evening, I attended the spam jam with colleagues. We eventually split up due to the huge crowds. It was much easier to walk around without having to keep track of others. I found it pretty cool how there’s an event dedicated to a beloved food product. All around, there was spam infused food, merchandise and even a costumed spam can. It was a great atmosphere although at times it felt suffocating.

Back home, I don’t usually go out at night, and there I was… eating a burger on the grass by Waikiki beach.

On Sunday, my colleague and I went to look for our placement location, The Kahala Hotel & Resort… and it was a bit far. Waited for a bus which seemed like forever. We had to get off at a bus stop and walk 10-minutes into the property. Once we confirmed where it was and how to get there, we made our way back as it started to rain.     

Back in the dorm, I was nervous about starting our 4-week placement. I didn’t mind if the whole program was just like our orientation week: classroom sessions and then field trips hahaha!

 NEXT: Hello, Kahala!

[5hineesback]

i originally took a short hiatus for reasons completely unrelated to what i’m about to talk about. but during my few days away from tumblr i found out that one of my friends had passed away. i hadn’t seen her in almost a year, i transferred universities last year and she was on my course in my first university. i just want to say a few words for her here, because i’m not really comfortable posting it on her facebook wall or anything like that.

caitlin, we were never one of each other’s closest friends, not by a long shot, but we were friends, and we shared some really great times together. when we first bonded over being fans of it’s always sunny in philadelphia and the office. the time in class when we changed aras’ laptop background to a picture of danny devito when he wasn’t looking. hearing you shout “boom, roasted”, “get rekt”, or “thats what she said” during lectures at any available opportunity. your loud hiccups during lectures throughout the year that started off seeming weird but within a few days became downright hilarious to everyone in the room, including you. you calling everyone “duck”, saying “you do you, boo”, people impersonating just how northern you were when you said “rate” instead of “right”. the time you came into lecture dressed in a yellow shirt and blue dungarees and kept denying that you looked like a minion. how you’d order tap water when we all went out for the night because you didn’t drink. how people started joking that we’d go on a “caitlin pub crawl” and just order a tap water each. the day the whole course went down to the beach, when you, myself and some others travelled in jordan’s car and we stopped off to get mcdonalds. how after the beach we drove to the nearby castle and walked around, where we sat and chatted on the wall while the others were down on the rocks doing god knows what. one of the best nights out i ever had, when you, claire and i kept doing impressions of nessa from gavin and stacey, shouting “oh” like she does when we were on the bus and in the queue for the club. the time a bunch of us hung out on campus and watched you, jordan, toff and chris skateboard, when you tried to skate with two boards and tried to jump from one board to the other, which didn’t end completely in disaster, but could have. the couple of times we had a late class or a night of drinking in someone’s flat and you’d come in with sunglasses on because you were high. towards the end of the year where the course sat in the library doing all-nighters and you’d be handing out caffeine tablets to all of us. how hilarious your snapchat was over this past year, with you teasing and joking around with your dad and your friends, the best tribute to its always sunny ever - your rum ham tattoo, which you only got a couple of weeks ago that i would have loved to see in real life. 

and i know that isn’t everything. it’d take me weeks to list everything because you were one of the friendliest, most bubbly and positive people i’ve ever met in my life. i heard that this year you made a christmas dinner for everyone still on the course. i’m sorry i missed that. i’m sorry i waited so long to visit you all, when i’ve been meaning to for months. 

i don’t know how it happened yet. you were at home for easter, not at uni, so i don’t think many people on the course know how it happened, except for maybe your closest friends. maybe i’ll find out over the next few days, or the next couple of weeks, or maybe not. but i hope that however it happened, it was painless and you didn’t suffer.

you truly were the heart of the course, as everyone keeps saying, and when i thought about visiting you were one of the first people i thought of. i will be visiting the others soon, so i can remember you with them. i think they’re going to plant a tree for you on campus. that’ll be nice. you will be remembered well, you touched so many hearts and impacted so many lives. danny devito would be proud. 

[gracewithducks]

She Who Believed (Luke 1:30-31, 38-45)

Faith. It’s a word we throw around all the time, especially in the church: have faith, hold onto your faith, share your faith. But what does it really mean?

 On the simplest level, of course, when we talk about faith, what we’re talking about is what you believe; when I ask about your faith, what I’m asking is who or what you trust, in your heart and soul, on the deepest level. And we all know, of course, that the “right” answer is: I put my faith in God; in my heart and soul, on the deepest level, I trust in the grace and love of Jesus Christ.

 But when push comes to shove – what does that faith look like? What does it really mean?

 And this feels like dangerous territory for me, as a preacher, because I start to think back about all the “faith” sermons I’ve heard over the years. There were, of course, the ones that I heard which were not so much sermons as lectures and angry rants about why our faith, the Christian faith, the insert specific branch of Christian faith is the best faith, the only faith, the only true way to heaven, and why everyone else of any other faith is fooling themselves all the way to hell.

 This, by the way, is not one of those sermons.

 But most of the sermons I’ve heard on faith over the years have a whole lot more to do with miracles: they’re sermons built on stories of people who had faith and who found their prayers answered at just the right moment in just the right way. There’s the man on the boat stranded in the ocean, who tells the captain to open the sails, and who prays for wind to come – and so much wind rises that the captain has to tell him, you can stop praying; we have enough already. Or there’s the story of a community stuck in miserable drought, so terrible that all the people set aside a day to pray for rain – but of course, the only one with true faith is the one who carries her umbrella. There’s the money that wondrously shows up just in time to pay the bills or feed the hungry orphans; there’s the missionary’s daughter who prays for a doll only to find one tucked into the food and clothing shipment that soon arrives, even though it had been packed and shipped long before her prayer went up… There are stories of job offers and scholarships and loud noises that save the family from a fire, stories of missing glasses miraculously appearing, stories of people facing deadly diseases who pray for healing and suddenly the disease is gone.

 They’re great stories. They’d even be great stories for today, when we talk about faith in the context of Mary’s life: Mary, who found her life turned upside down when God showed up in an impossible way… Mary, who heard the angel tell her, “Nothing is impossible for God,” and who must have carried those words in her heart through all the impossible days in her life.

 All those stories of faith, they’re great stories, and they make great sermons, because obviously, we remember them – at least, I do. And we remember them in our own most desperate moments, and those stories give up hope and keep us going: we proclaim with faith, “With God, all things are possible.”

 Have faith, we remind ourselves. Have faith, because miracles are real. Have faith, because God answers prayer; God works in wondrous ways. If God brings you to it, God will bring you through it. Have faith, and don’t give up, and don’t doubt. After all, James said “the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind; that person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord… but when you ask, you must believe and not doubt” (James 1:6-7).

 Just have faith. Ask, and it will be given to you (e.g. Luke 11:9). You do not have because you do not ask (James 4:2). Ask, have faith, don’t doubt, and God will shower you with blessings. Have faith, and you can live your best life now. Have faith, and don’t doubt, and your miracle will come, too.

 I don’t doubt that there are miracles. I don’t doubt that things happen in life that we can’t explain, that we cannot help but recognize as God moving in an unexpected and impossible way. I know some of us in this room have experienced those moments first-hand.

 The thing is, sometimes we don’t get the miracle we’re praying for. And this is where this understanding of faith – this idea of, just keep praying and trusting God and God will give you what you want – it starts to fall apart. If you don’t get your miracle, does it mean you don’t have enough faith? That you don’t really trust God? If your prayers go unanswered, is it because God failed you, or it because you failed God?

 What does it really mean, what does it look like, to “have faith”?

 Let’s go back to our scripture for today. We’ve heard how Mary, after she’s finished talking with the angel, leaves to go visit her cousin Elizabeth, who’s also expecting. And when Elizabeth hears Mary’s greeting, the baby inside her leaps for joy, and Elizabeth says, “Mary, you’re blessed, and your unborn baby is blessed, too.” Remember, nobody knows that Mary is pregnant yet – but still Elizabeth blesses her. And she goes on to say, “Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

 Elizabeth blesses Mary for her faith. And it’s helpful to remember Elizabeth’s own story here. Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah were what we’d call people of faith: he was a priest, and they both “were righteous before God,” according to Luke, “living blamelessly according to the Lord’s commandments.” They were good people who did their best to follow God, but to their grief, they were childless, and they were both old enough that they’d given up hope of children.

 And then one day, Zechariah met an angel. And the angel says, “Don’t be afraid, Zechariah; your wife Elizabeth is going to have a son, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, and have a powerful ministry.” And Zechariah says, “How will I know that this is so? Because I’m old, and my wife is old, too.”

 And this is very familiar, isn’t it? It sounds just like Mary’s story: an angel appears, the angel says don’t be afraid, a miracle baby is coming, and the person hearing the words says, “How can it be? It can’t, and here’s the reason why.”

 But to Zechariah, the angel says, “Look, I’m Gabriel, and God sent me to give you this message. But now, because you didn’t believe me, you won’t be able to talk until your son has been born.” Which seems a bit harsh to me: Zechariah asked a question, he asked for confirmation of this impossible thing, and he is punished with silence. Nevertheless, Elizabeth does conceive, and she is amazed that her prayers for a child have been answered at last.

 So when the angel shows up to Mary, and Mary says, “How can it be? It’s impossible,” she isn’t met with a sentence of silence. But instead, Gabriel says, “Look, go see your cousin Elizabeth, who could never have a child, but now, even though it’s not possible, is carrying a son. That should show you that nothing is impossible with God.” And Mary says, “Here I am, God’s slave; let your word be fulfilled.” And then the angel left, and Mary got up and hurried to go see Elizabeth. She wanted to see the evidence for herself; she wanted some confirmation that she hadn’t dreamed it all, it wasn’t a delusion – it was real, and her life really had been changed forever.

 And Elizabeth blesses Mary for her faith, for believing that God’s promises would be fulfilled. I’m still not sure why exactly Zechariah is silenced for doubting, when Mary does exactly the same thing – she asks questions, and raises concerns, and looks for confirmation that God’s word is true – Mary does the same, and she is praised for her faith. It doesn’t make sense to me.

 And maybe that’s because faith doesn’t make sense. Maybe that’s the point: that it’s not as simple as we want to make it; it’s not just, ask you will receive – faith is much bigger, and much more complicated, that that.

 Instead of one those neat and tidy preachers’ stories, let me share with you this preacher’s story today.

 I could tell you about a lot of wondrously answered prayers in my life: I could tell you about how, exactly when I finally surrendered control and decided to stop worrying about my future and searching for my future spouse, to trust that if marriage was in the cards for me, then God would just drop the right person right in front of my face – and how that’s exactly what happened. Or I could tell you about how desperately I prayed for my first child to wait until my maternity leave started before being born, but not any longer, because I didn’t want to “waste” any of my time off… and how she obliged, and was in my arms by noon on that very first day.

 And I could tell you about plenty of other prayers: the times I almost slid off the road but didn’t, the times my kids fell down and none of their bones were broken when they came up. I pray, and prayers are answered, all the time.

 But I could tell you other stories, too: I could tell how I prayed, maybe even more fervently, that my second child would wait until maternity leave to be born – only to have him choose to come the week before Easter instead. Of course, I did have back-up plans in place for Holy Week, so maybe it was my own fault for doubting.

But I had back-up plans the first time around, too, and I’m pretty sure God isn’t glorified when I’m a fool… so I’m not really sure my faith or doubt is to blame.

 I could tell you about all the bones that were broken, in the most unlikely and inconvenient ways.

 And of course, the most personal and difficult example in our lives: when we had to come to terms with the reality that our son wasn’t going to be healed, and he wasn’t coming home.

 When Carl was diagnosed with leukemia, we soon realized we were lucky: he had one of the most curable kinds of cancer, and he responded perfectly to his treatments. I actually felt guilty when I’d run into other parents in the hallways or the lounge, because our kid was doing so well, and not suffering all the side effects and complications that their kids had.

 Carl’s test results were always better than we could have hoped for, and when we got the word he was in remission, it was the answer to prayer. We started planning a party, and I remember the joy of standing in my churches that next Sunday and sharing the good news: it’s over. And I remember how many people shook my hand and hugged me and said, “Of course he’s okay. How couldn’t he be, with all those people praying for him?”

 Just a couple of days later, we found out that the cancer wasn’t really gone. As we went back down the rabbit hole, things just kept getting worse and worse. The answers were never what we wanted. And I remember, when we were coming to terms with saying good-bye, my husband admitting he’d been in denial: he said, “I just keep thinking maybe God wants to make Carl’s miracle even more impressive, when it finally comes. But I don’t think that miracle is coming at all.”

 Even as we were trying to treasure those last few days, we were inundated with messages from people who meant well: people who encouraged us to claim our miracle, to pray even harder, to have faith and not doubt… and at one point, we had to tell them: Stop. It’s not helping. You’re not helping. That kind of “good news” isn’t what we need right now.

 People would ask me, later, after losing a child like that, how did you keep your faith? And rightly so, because there were days and nights – long, long nights – when I wondered myself whether we would hold onto our faith. But the thing is, faith – believing that God is with us, and God’s promises will be fulfilled – faith is so much bigger than any one person or miracle or healing. Faith is bigger than that.

 This is what we had faith in, then: we had faith that God hadn’t failed Carl, and Carl hadn’t failed, either. We had faith that in real life there are no guarantees. And we also had faith that this is not where the story ends.

 I still believe that death is not the end. And I still believe that my life matters, and that Carl’s life matters. And I still believe that God is good, and God is faithful, and even if I don’t understand, and even if there are no promises in life, I still believe that, in the end, love will get the last word; I believe that, “in the end, all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well” (Julian of Norwich). We’re not there yet. But by God’s grace, we will be.

 Mary had a faith that was bigger than herself. Did you notice, when Gabriel spoke with her, she didn’t get any answers or any guarantees? There was no, “Do this one thing for God, and God will set you up with a comfortable pension so you can spend the rest of your life in ease.” There was no, “Do this, and everyone will call you the Queen of Heaven for all generations.” There was no, “Bear God’s Son, and he’ll make sure your prayers go to the front of the line.”

 Mary gets no guarantees in exchange for her faith. As a young woman, she’s heard the stories, and she knows she isn’t even guaranteed to survive the birth of this son. God doesn’t give her any promises for her own life: but what she hears from the angel is a vision of something much bigger than herself: the Son of the Most High coming to earth, reigning over an eternal kingdom. Even that, she has no idea what exactly it looks like or what it all means. But it’s enough: God is coming to work in the world, and she has enough faith to agree to be a part of it.

 Mary says yes. “Here I am, God’s servant; let God’s promises be fulfilled in me.” And we can debate whether or not she really had a choice in that moment, but I’m not sure that’s the point, either, because we all face so many things in life we never got to choose. But what we can choose is whether we believe that God is at work, in that unexpected and impossible moment, no matter what. That’s what Mary has faith in; that’s what, in this moment, makes her say: yes. That yes – it brought her joy and blessing, and it brought her pain and grief and unanswered questions along the way… but still she kept going. And maybe that’s what faith really is: not the big miracles, but the strength that keeps us going each day.

Faith is refusing to give up, refusing to give into despair and confusion; it’s believing that God is still working, and there is something bigger than what we can see – and though it isn’t all right now, someday, by God’s grace, it will be. So we choose to keep going, to hold on to that vision and keep working towards it. We choose still to believe.

 God’s promises will be fulfilled. God’s love is around us now, and God’s love will have the last word. May we have the faith to keep going until that day.

  God of the unexpected moments, God of all our hopes and fears, God of our joys and of our sorrows, God who is always faithful to us, help us to be faithful to you. Give us the faith to keep going, even when it’s hard, even when we don’t understand. Help us to believe that you are still with us, and you always will be; help us to believe that, in the end, love wins. In Christ’s name we pray; amen.

[maximumexpertdream-blog]

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GREAT DOG BREEDERS are NOT TOO PROUD to GET INFORMATION! Beautiful, rustic, as well as serene, it is a stress-free hideaway in the gorgeous Tatra mountains of Poland. Galleries, video, enjoyable, and also audio interactions like animation make stories spring to life. Area readies, bus terminal is really close so you could easyli traveling Zakopane or where ever you desire, likewise Nowy Targ facility is strolling distance away. We'll allow the contributions to speak for themselves, and we will not be the court of fact. Examine out Opera's assistance page You could likewise look near an address, city, or area rather if you're still having difficulty. The very first susceptability in the Android os reveals beneficial information which assists the assailant utilize among the remote code execution vulnerabilities described below. Sadly discount rate codes typically aren't legitimate on this route. In these situations, public notice and competitors are not required for the participant to continue in the company's Internship program. . Four individuals were jailed in a Tuesday mid-day capturing in Orange Area, according to an apprehension record. Health and safety authorities at Bristol Common council say floor coverings outside doors can interfere with escape paths and so they have actually sent each one of their 32,000 tenants a letter demanding that they eliminate any type of outdoors mats. If you're worried about identification theft, but haven't yet come to be a sufferer, this fraudulence alert will shield your credit score from unproven accessibility for at least 90 days. The court settlement came after area code enforcement police officers released greater than 200 infractions at the Granada Apartment building. This uses no matter if the Trainee position is a position with a job ladder, with a different job series, with a various series with a profession ladder, or whether the Trainee placement coincides collection as well as quality level as the Intern NTE position. Each paint will certainly be accompanied by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer's verses - a poetic matching of the repainted landscape as well as its environment. As a lamb just absorbs 50% of what it consumes, Welshmen are now running around the mountains with pooper scoopers accumulating the pets' waste matter. Podhale, which means under the hill fields, is Poland's southernmost area. With BlueBorne, assailants could acquire complete control right from the beginning. A Westfield, New York, brewery is now entering the fish production service. Un car parking sans service de voiturier est proposé moyennant un supplément. Repertuar (B): śpiewki i nuty Sabałowe, wierchowe, ozwodne, krzesane, baciarska. 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The IANA time area identifier for Nowy Targ is Europe/Warsaw. Viewing the sun slowly get engulfed by the moon might have been fun, yet it appears to have had a negative effect on our sleep. We're thrilled to be working with AHA making on-demand drone distribution a truth in Reykjavik, as well as soon around the globe." ML. Resto Illuminati is of global persuasion coupled with a delightful ambience, while Shuck Baranem Restauracja as well as Chata also supply great neighborhood food. You could likewise wish to search for Nowy Targ, Poland in The JewishGen FamilyFinder (JGFF) You will need to produce as well as login with a JewishGen customer account in order to see their information, however their site is cost-free to use and also incredibly valuable. Appuyez sur l'icone put l'envoyer instantanément. Enter your e-mail address and also we'll send you our ideal deals. BlueBorne could serve any kind of harmful objective, such as cyber espionage, data theft, ransomware, and even developing huge botnets from IoT devices like the Mirai Botnet or smart phones similar to the r e c e n t WireX Botnet The BlueBorne assault vector exceeds the capacities of most assault vectors by passing through secure air-gapped" networks which are separated from any other network, including the internet.

[rahvenboys]

update on the crush situation + my date w a different guy for the anon

oh god you make it sound like my life is a romantic soap or something. Nothing really exciting happened but I’ll give you an update anyway.

WARNING: THIS IS SUPER SUPER LONG

I’ll give you an update on my crush first!! I still like him veeeery much! I actually managed to talk to him again! Have I not told you?

 (all of this happened the week before easter break)

 So I skipped half a lecture to finish an assignment I had to hand in on thursday (it was tuesday). I first went to the library of our department. At like 4pm I went downstairs to the general section of the library. I needed to look things up in encycopledias. I was in the isle where the encyclopedias were held. I was sitting on my knees on the floor. I was looking at the encyclopedias while texting a friend when I suddenly noticed someone had come in the isle. And guess who it was?? IT WAS HIM OF COURSE. And I didn’t even notice at first. I was suddenly very happy I was wearing a dress (with bare legs) and very sad I wasn’t wearing any make-up!

 I was actually just taking pictures of the books bc I didn’t feel like staying in the library any longer. But he changed things. Suddenly I had a burst of motivation. I went to search for a free desk I could work at. Preferably close to him. One of the only empty spots was right opposite of him. Sooo I sat down in front of him and god I was kinda shaky!

 Then we both still had to go back to the encyclopedia isle a few times. So he went there first and after like a minute I had to be there too. So I went there and saw him kneeling in front of the book I needed. So I kinda awkwardly knealt down too. He made a bit of room for me and we were sitting like 10cm apart and ahhhh. That was nice. I took out the book I knew covered my subject. And quietly told him thank you as I got up. And I went back to my spot. When I said that he seemed kinda surprised??

 After a while we were both in the same Isle again, (we weren’t following each other or anything, we were just answering the same questions, tho we had different subjects we had to look up) and I saw him with an open book in his hand. Before I could think things through I had already asked: ‘can you find it,’. He looked up and said yeah I think I finally have now. So I answered after picking up a book myself ‘That’s good,’ I said that with like a half smile. And you know what that asshole does?? He gives me this radiating smile. I’m not even kidding his whole face just lit up and it was so beautiful??? I went back to my spot kinda dazed lol.

 After another few minutes I went to return my book and get a new one. And as I’m browsing the bookshelves he comes into the isle, and goes looking for another book too. And he asks so how’s your assignment doing? and I went uhm kinda? I’m trying with weva (abbreviation for the course) you never know. And I don’t really remember what he answered. I remember asking him what library he had to go to for assignment 4. He answered and I said oh I had to go to... which is a pretty chill place to work but the fact that it has big windows, so everyone who walks by, just looks at you. And he said ‘I can believe that’. I also asked about who he had to research for the task we were doing. And he was just really really nice and it felt kinda comfortable. Usually I’m so nervous I just can’t act normal but I feel like I was quite normal and nice.

 A while later I was browsing again and he comes in and says hey sorry do you have your syllabus with you, I forgot mine in my dorm. Can I borrow it please? And I was kinda surprised and bewildered but I still managed to say yeah sure so I went back to my spot and handed it to him.

 When he gave it back, he made sure to look me in the eyes when he said thank you. Like there are these lights right on your eyelevel so you don’t really see much of the person sitting opposite of you. So he leaned down and made sure we made eyecontact when he gave it back and it was just so sweet??? I feel like he’s the nicest person?? We didn’t really flirt and I don’t think I made a real romantic impression on him. But I at least hope he thought I was nice and looked good in my dress (it had an open back kinda so I hope he looked at that lol). God I just really want to get to know him more. I want to make him smile again!! I still don’t have the nerve to add him on fb tho as we didn’t tell each other our names. As soon as he mentions his name I will.

 Then my date, which happened the day after the library thing. But I’ll give you some more info on the guy. So this guy I knew from middle school (in the American system/ we call it high school too) randomly sent me a message while I was in class. I didn’t think much of it so I answered and the conversation went flirty pretty fast. Bear in mind that since we were in the same class a few years ago I had seen him only a handful of times. Besides, I knew he had a girlfriend. And according to fb they were still dating so I was very suspicious. Basically he was saying that I could stay over after a night out. He mentioned his dorm a lot! So we were talking about meeting up and I was under the impression it was just as friends (bc he has a girlfriend or so I thought). My friend already thought it was a bad idea but I was like what could the harm be? So we met up on Wednesday to go for a drink. We were talking and it wasn’t very datelike ya know until we kinda gazed into each other’s eyes?? The moment was ruined by another table who were talking about sperm loudly. He also told me he did have a girlfriend for a while but they had broken up two weeks prior our date. Bc she cheated on him and lied about it. And I of course told him that he deserved better.

He mentioned that we could go to his dorm a few times and I was like noo I still have to finish my assignment at the library. (which was kinda true I still had to finish the damn thing). So he walked me back to the library and he just came closer and put his arm around my waist and idk how I felt about it. I didn’t expect anything like that okay. So we were walking through this alley and we kinda stopped and he started giving me kisses on the cheek and he was like ‘I wanna kiss you’ and I was kinda like idk dude this doesn’t seem smart. I kinda felt like I could have been anyone. I mean he was very insistent on us meeting that week even tho I told him that I had lots of work. I kinda felt he was doing it just to get back at his ex in a way?? I was just confused at that point dude. Besides he’s kinda one of my friend’s exes. (Tho she doesn’t mind when I told her I went on a date with him and said I rejected him she was like why didn’t you just kiss him??)  I was sooo confused and I kept telling him that this wasn’t smart and he was frustrated but I just didn’t know what I wanted bc at one point it was cute and kinda romantic and if it had been with my crush it would have been a perfect date! But I feel like he just wants me in his bed to have someone in his bed ya know? I felt like he wanted to use me kinda?

So I didn’t kiss and went to the library. Afterwards I went home (still a little tipsy) and he sent me a message saying he’s sorry but he just thought I looked pretty and he really wanted to kiss me. And I told him that he didn’t really do anything wrong. And maybe next time.

I literally don’t know how I feel about this guy. He’s nice and all and not unattractive but I don’t entirely trust his motives. Besides I don’t really have that much experience so that makes me nervous lol. However, I have been thinking about him a bit lately and I think I’m going to give him an another chance? So I messaged him and we’re probably going out again next week + we’re probably going to kiss and idk how I feel about it all. What has my life turned into?

Boys are confusing.