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crystalized-dreams · 5 years

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As tempting as it was to try and write this slightly in character, I’ve been sick these last several days so I’ll try and lessen it, especially for those of you who read this blog and aren’t particularly into Star Wars (That said, if anyone is here from my old SWTOR blog, a Rising Moons/Bright Suns to you depending on where you may be in the universe!). I’m also probably going to bring up a bit other facets of my trip to Disney World, but the focus is absolutely going to be in the brand new area– Galaxy’s Edge where you can visit Batuu and get a feeling of full immersion in the Star Wars Universe.

I wouldn’t really call myself the biggest Star Wars fan, but I like it enough to still enjoy several aspects of it. What I found myself most excited for was using the new Datapad mode through the Play Disney app once we arrived in Batuu. I absolutely adored collecting things in SWTOR so being in this immersive world where we can scan things and do jobs and quests and collect things? Completely up my alley.

While I wouldn’t mind my face not just being a black silhouette, there’s still some fun outfits. As hard as I tried though, I wasn’t able to do everything. I will say as much fun as I had with the Datapad, there were a few… issues I ran into with it. Less about the app itself, but oversights with having this type of connectivity and immersion.

For one, there isn’t a lot of seating. This isn’t really too surprising– besides for immersion reasons, it helps keep people moving and to be honest, it never felt incredibly crowded outside the shops a bit. Because of this though, people essentially make their own seats, whether it be the sides of plants or most commonly, the various crates lingering around. Which wouldn’t be so much of an issue if most of the crates weren’t used for the Datapad game. Various crates of all sizes have a QR code like this, either vertically like below or horizontally: There were many times I ended up passing by areas missing them because people were covering them– whether leaning on it or with their legs while they sat down on it. While some people knew about the app (or recognized it after seeing multiple people playing and having them ask people to move), most had no idea and didn’t realize they were blocking anything. And sometimes people need to sit and nobody really wants to interrupt someone who just wants to take some photos, but there were times I ended up just waiting around for 5-10 minutes for someone to be done to finally scan something for two seconds. Some can even be facing inward which, at least for me, weren’t always easy to reach.

In the end, I managed to get 9/15 Outfits, 3/8 Weapons, 7/11 pieces of Cargo, 12/20 Parts & Scraps, 2/4 The Interior Star Maps, 3/3 New Territories Star Maps, 1/4 The Slice Star Map, 0/2 Trailing Sectors Star Maps, 1/3 Western Reaches Star Map, 2/4 Unknown Regions Star Maps, 8/8 Vehicle Schematics, 0/1 Schematics Data (though, I swear I had this?*), 4/8 Droid Data Memories, 4/5 Dok’s Den Dealings Transmissions, 0/3 Kase Double-Cross Transmissions, 0/2 A Strange Feeling Transmissions, 0/3 A Lifelong Companion Transmissions, 1/3 Debts to Oga Transmissions, 0/3 Life in the Outpost Transmissions, 1/3 Dhoran’s Mistake Transmissions, 1/3 DJ R-3X Transmissions, 1/2 Droid Problems, 1/2 Resistance Operatives Transmissions, 2/4 First Order Comms Transmissions, 0/1 OTS Recruitment Transmission, and 0/1 Monkey Lizard Sighting Transmission. As for titles, I have 23/40 unlocked. I probably won’t unlock all the First Order ones, but I have 2/5 of them thus far. I really want to get the Galactic Explorer title. I also don’t see myself earning Bankrupt or a few others unless something with the requirements change.

*I believe this is the Credits Skimmer. I never really figured out how to utilize it properly. But maybe it just doesn’t show up properly while out of the park.

While you have full control over the crates (barring… anyone sitting on and/or blocking them), the transmissions I had a lot of trouble with. I found my phone just did not seem to pick them up often and they would be gone fairly quickly (like it’d be there and gone within the next refresh even if I didn’t move). Hacking seemed to work the best, but some just… worked in awkward ways (For example, I found I had nothing to hack in the Cantina despite a few things requiring DJ R-3X to be). It felt like I had to walk in circles to really get it to work. Speaking of the Cantina though, we actually went in for breakfast as I just… had to try the Moogan Tea: It was amazing. I actually got a second one to go. We also had some Batuu Bits which were really tasty. I’d love to go again for dinner, though, hopefully we can actually sit next time… Fingers crossed they will have the new dishes that their other location has too.

Moving on, the thing I had the most trouble with was actually the translating. The automatic rarely actually picked up anything I was near (and I needed to hold my phone up in front of it when it was) while it was also near impossible to really do so manually without holding up traffic. I don’t really know a better way to do it, but I ended up making no progress on it because of that. It would translate fine when it actually worked– the problem was just getting it to pick up what I needed.

The jobs were definitely the most fun and for the most part, worked the smoothest. I did almost every job with the exception of some of the First Order jobs– I only did the ones that would get me an item over just credits. I never received more jobs on a different day (though, I could repeat the ones I did), but I’m hoping more may be added in the future.

The exception to “working smoothly” though is “Flight Crew Wanted”, a big multi-step job that requires you accomplishing certain things while in the queue (normal queue– not fast pass and not single rider’s) for Smuggler’s Run. As much as I enjoyed the right (well, sort of– we’ll get to that), this is where I found some of the biggest oversights are for the Datapad mini-game. The job involves helping out Hondo Ohnaka and starts off wanting you to scan crates you will see along the line. There are a lot of crates and occasionally, you’ll be asked questions about where they go. How many crates you scan and how many questions you answer correctly determines what the characters will say about you and how well your performance was.

The biggest issue is that this is a moving line. If the line is moving incredibly slow and it’s a huge line, well, maybe it’ll work out, but unfortunately for health-related reasons, I actually can’t stand for long periods of time. If the line is moving that slowly, I wouldn’t even be able to stand in it. If the line is moving at a fair pace, you can’t scan fast enough and you end up blocking the line so I can either get separated from my party or end up just letting people pass me. It’s incredibly hard to balance and even when we tried to, it just became too much as we kept seeing more and more crates and even ones we missed due to not looking around enough.

Next, you’ll be memorizing various different IDs and then answer questions asked about it. I’m not sure how many you have to do in order to have “done enough”– but one surely was too little. You have a good amount of time to do this at least and this is probably the step you can work on the most as it really doesn’t require a specific area to be in to take care of something. You just need to be after the crates and before the look-out deck… which is where the next problematic step comes. You’ll be going past four large windows above the Millenium Falcon and again, depending on the line queue, this isn’t exactly the easiest to do. You will be asked questions about the ship and need to answer accurately in order to pass.

Once that is done, it’s time for the actual ride part and your performance matters. Whatever credits you earn from the ride will get you those credits in your datapad and even an achievement based off how much you can earn. At most, if you do everything perfectly, you can earn 13,000 credits, the amount going down based on your performance and how much damage the ship takes. And that is what brings us to our biggest oversight– each “party” for the game consists of six people. And not everyone is likely to want to do the ride just like you. There’s two pilots, two engineers, and two gunners. While you can see if someone may want a different pass than you (Someone is our group had been engineer before so I traded them my gunner pass as I didn’t want to be engineer), you can’t really do anything about having different ideas in mind for what you want to do. In general, there’s essentially these groups of people:

People who want to do everything perfectly

People who want to fail completely

People who just want to enjoy the ride for the heck of it

People who are just there for someone else

The other half of our party mentioned having an issue as one of the pilots was a little kid. A similar situation happened with a friend. There will be kids on this ride. That is absolutely expected. And while I absolutely believe some kids can do a great job, there are also plenty of kids who do not care in the slightest or are only there because their parent/guardian wants to be on the ride. And I genuinely worry slightly on the kids part because someone will absolutely get annoyed and take it out on their party members and that’s kind of the problem with these group teamwork things, especially if you do not know enough people to make a full party.

When we go to Disney, we have anywhere from 2-5 people usually. Not enough for a full group and one of those people would absolutely not go on it due to motion sickness. It ended up being three of us going on the ride with three people we didn’t know. My husband and our friend ended up being in the pilot seats with me as an engineer while our newly met crew members would be the two gunners and the other engineer.

In the end, while I managed to keep my side of the ship at 100%, the other engineer didn’t do as well with 15% damage done halfway through and even more by the end of it. My husband also messed up with the breaks at one point.

The ride is incredibly reflex intensive and the thing is, and unfortunately this is the other big oversight with it, the best chance you have at doing your best is not actually watching the ride at all. Maybe I could’ve done it regardless, but in the end, I had rarely watched any of the ride screen as I was too busy focusing on my buttons. You mainly just have to hit the buttons lit up and switch the appropriate switches as indicated. It’s very easy to read (likely due to the range of ages), but it’s also easy to get caught up in the screen or forget exactly where a button is if you’re not looking at it. And if you’re looking at the buttons, you’re missing what’s going on around you as you’re no longer looking out the window, but at your control panel.

I saw so little of the ride itself because I was so focused on doing well and not letting my crew down which I suppose our other Engineer didn’t care as much about. We had earned about 11,800 Credits, but due to damages, ended up losing over 3,000 in repairs. I actually hadn’t even known we would get them in the Datapad at the time of going on the ride– I just am a perfectionist, but this made me even more disappointed we failed. Especially considering how well we did.

And does this encourage people to go on the ride again? Yes, absolutely, but heck, it’s encouraged by being one of the best ways to earn credits too and when you have a full schedule or not a lot of time, while going on Smuggler’s Run over and over again for an entire day/week sounds fun, it’s not always plausible– not to mention the team situation again. And honestly, I wouldn’t even mind trying a “failure” run where I just… don’t do anything the entire time, but I’d want to actually do a perfect run first. Since the ride varies based off when you “fail” or succeed, I really want to see both paths definitely, but it feels like it’ll be a while before doing either.

Smuggler’s Run was actually one of the last things we found time to do because of a very busy schedule and just trying to find a good time where the line wasn’t too crazy. There is no fast pass for it (and I’m not sure if there is one planned) and to be honest, as it currently stands, I would assume that would take me away from my crate checking and everything involved in the Datapad job so I’m not sure I’d get a fast pass even if I could.

As for the ride just… on its own merits, it was fun and reminded me of essentially a smaller party version of Star Tours– it moves very similar, but obviously, it’s much more interactive.

I had hoped to go on the ride again, if only for another chance at scanning things and a perfect score, but we just didn’t manage to make it back unfortunately. I’m still bummed about it.

Moving onto things I did BESIDES the Datapad minigame, for one, my husband and I both made Droids! Mine is this cute BB Unit who I still have yet to think of a name of. We even got the bag for it too: I also got a personality chip for it and some stickers so I hope to style it up a bit at some point (mostly using the pink to cover up the black maybe…). My husband made an R6-Unit: I kind of wish more could’ve mixed and matched, but I’m not really surprised they couldn’t. I hope we’ll see more ways to customize our droid in the future.

We also stopped by Savi’s Workshop for some very important business.

I had gone the Elemental Nature route which also gave me this lovely pin: There were some pieces I liked from the Protection & Defense type, but in the end, Elemental Nature just kind of fit me more. Though, I wish they still kept the original coloring over the silver for the whale bone:

We also made sure to stop by the markets and I picked up these lovely handmade plushies:

This adorable Mouse Droid (plus a lovely droid group photo): (The top opens and the wheels move so it’s fun to just… move it about and have it old some things 🙂 Plus the lanyard to wear it around your next)

And a Holocron, currently with the purple crystal I had gotten with my lightsaber: 🙂 I also got white and green Kyber crystals. I sure hope they add pink ones.

As for food, I already spoke about the Cantina earlier, but we did our best to try everything at least once. Kat Saka’s Kettle was worth it for the Mouse Droid, but honestly, the popcorn just… wasn’t that great. It was kind of chewy in an almost stale-like way and I don’t know if we just got a bad batch or what, but it just… was not enjoyable.

We, of course, had to try the Blue Milk and Green Milk over at the Milk Stand. Both were enjoyable, but my husband and I both preferred the Blue Milk. I think my only complaint is I would’ve loved a less “smoothie-like” version– just actual milk or even a milkshake. Something more creamy, essentially. We wanted to get the special Milk container, but due to lack of time, we didn’t get the chance.

For breakfast, we had Ronto Roasters and got the Ronto Morning Wrap and Ronto Wrap (which seemed to be a combination of it and the Endorian Chicken Wrap at the time we went, but now seem to be more different things). Despite generally not being much of an egg person, I loved the Ronto Morning Wrap. It was perfect and the Grilled Pork Sausage was amazing. I’d absolutely get it again.

We got Docking Bay 7 Food for lunch (though, my mother had the breakfast and said it was great so I definitely want to try the Bright Suns Breakfast Platter next time we go). I had gotten the Endorian Tip Yip with mashed potatoes while my husband got the Felucian Garden Spread. I really enjoyed mine, though, if I picked, I’d say I liked my Ronto Morning Wrap more. While my husband liked his and I enjoyed my taste of it, it was a lot spicier than expected which took away from the flavor.

To go with our lunch, we also tried the [non-alcoholic] drinks and desserts! The drinks seemed to have been changed a bit since we last went, but both we had were great. As for the desserts, I got the Batuu-bon and my husband got the Oi-Oi Puff. We shared a bit though and both were really great. My husband can’t decide which he liked more, but I preferred my Batuu-bon.

Next time we go, I’d love to try the Batuuan Roast and/or the Smoked Kaadu Ribs. I’ve heard the macaroni and cheese is good too.

And of course, we’re not here to just talk about what we did, I have some pictures of the sights too 🙂 #gallery-0-37 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-37 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-37 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-37 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

The entire area has such high rocks and is set up in such a way that it genuinely does feel like its own planet/city. Even if it’s a bit awkward walking through Toy Story Land to get to it. And all kinds of familiar and new characters will just be walking around. And who knows, maybe you’ll run into a cool spy and have cool spy conversations like the person writing this did 😛

Moving on to the rest of Disney, it was honestly a bit of a mixed trip. In a way, it was less crowded than we expected despite some areas still being rather packed and I ended up being sick two days before we left and the day of. We normally go around this time for the cooler weather, but this year, it was about 90 the entire time, which sure I guess is to be expected when on a planet with three suns and also in Florida but usually it’s closer to 70-80 or so when we go. In the end, I quickly got hit with heat stroke which just kind of murdered me ahead of time for our trip. I’m not going to go into my health issues, but for several reasons, I do very very poorly with heat and with all the construction and things being moved back for the new gondolas, I was not doing well.

Because of that, a lot of our plans got cut a bit. We did our usual Afternoon Tea at the Grand Floridian where we had been hoping to stay before things ended up not working out: #gallery-0-38 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-38 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-38 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-38 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

I had gotten Zanzibar Chai as my tea and absolutely loved it. While I love all the courses, I will admit the scones and sandwiches are my favorite courses. We had planned to do the tea tasting they now have in Epcot at the England Pavilion, but due to me getting sick that day, we ended up having to cancel. I’m really hoping we’ll be able to go next year.

Due to the issues with our hotel stay, what we ended up doing was staying in a Polynesian Bungalow for a night (which was really nice, honestly): #gallery-0-39 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-39 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-39 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-39 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

The view was so pretty and we even got our own little private pool. While the Polynesian isn’t necessarily my favorite hotel, it at least has nice room service and I still love passing this every time we enter the hotel: #gallery-0-40 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-40 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-40 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-40 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

And then switching to a room at Saratoga Springs for the rest of our stay (in which I finally got to accomplish my dream of a two floor hotel room like in Home Alone 2…): Despite the size of it, the beds were not as comfy unfortunately and the pillows were… incredibly flat 😦 Which made sleeping a bit difficult. The room also wasn’t particularly close to a bus stop which meant a decent trek in the morning (and the room was one of the last due to the size) to not be late and an exhausting trek back after already walking all through the park.

While we hoped to do our usual “taste” around the world part of the Food Festival, due to lack of time, it just… did not fully work out. Because of this, we tried to focus on just our absolute favorites (and even then, still tried to narrow it down) for things we’ve had before and prioritized new things we hadn’t tried. I didn’t get many pictures because, again, time was just hard and honestly, I never want to plan a trip with so much overlapping again, but we did get a few pictures of some desserts plus the lovely Boba Milk Tea from China. #gallery-0-41 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-41 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-41 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-41 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Lion King Panna Cotta

Cheesecake Sampler

The Cheese Crawl Victory Cheesecake

Panna Cotta isn’t usually my thing, but that one was pretty interesting. I liked the left-most cheesecake of the sampler best. And of course I had to do the cheese crawl– the cheesecake for finishing was really good too. And China always has an amazing Bubble Tea lately to be honest.

The only things I didn’t get to try were the Cheese Plate and Popcorn at the new Apple Orchard booth Someone ordered the last just before me and I’m still pretty bummed about it. It was our last day so not much I could do about it.

On the bright side, we FINALLY got to do one of the “special events” at the Food Festival. Because my husband and I don’t drink alcohol, it’s really hard to justify the prices of most of the events as alcohol is always included, but the Parisian Breakfast was one of the more reasonably priced events despite also giving alcohol. To be honest, I was worried we would miss it– there was a hurricane passing through and it was pouring like crazy. We ended up being completely soaked (and being super wet on the freezing cold bus was not fun) and then essentially had to book it from the entrance to Epcot all the way to the World Showcase and to Paris. Maybe if I was less out of breath and stressed out I could’ve tried explaining in French, but thankfully I eventually managed to get out that we had reservations (There has been people who had tried to come in for food and to be out of the rain who had not) and thankfully, they still sat us despite being about an hour late.

They were so nice and it was really good. Also lots of cheese which is always great. I absolutely loved the Hot Chocolate especially– I prefer my hot chocolate more light and creamy than really rich so this was literally perfect and I wish I had the recipe for it. I drank so many cups. And while part of it was so we wouldn’t get pneumonia, it was also because it was genuinely super tasty. #gallery-0-42 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-42 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-42 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-42 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

One other new thing we finally got to do was check out the Na’vi River Journey ride and Pandora in general over at Animal Kingdom. We rarely go to Animal Kingdom as it doesn’t have a lot of indoor areas and I kind of need that with my heat issues, but a lot has been added since we’d last been there. I had managed to get fast passes for the ride as I kept hearing good things about it and I have to admit, while the land wasn’t as amazing as Batuu, Pandora was still pretty cool: #gallery-0-43 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-43 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 50%; } #gallery-0-43 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-43 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Unfortunately, I can’t really say the same for the ride. It was pretty and sure, the Animatronic was impressive and very fluid, but it was just very… boring. Even most dark boat rides I’ve been on, there’s usually at least some… speeding up or amusing things to look at or some nice song or even a tiny drop, but this was literally just meandering around in a river in the dark and seeing some of the sights which, like I said, isn’t necessarily bad– I don’t regret going on it, but I don’t understand the hype and I would never go out of my way to do it again (and honestly, I’m not sure I would do it again even if I didn’t have to go out of my way).

On the bright side, we ended up eating at really lovely place– Tiffins. I loved the decor of it and while it was expensive, all the food was amazing. The drinks were really creative too. And that place alone may finally get my family to give Animal Kingdom another shot. And who doesn’t like seeing cute animals? #gallery-0-44 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-44 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-44 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-44 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

We also finally tried out the Frozen Ride which wasn’t too bad, but I do miss the old Norway boat ride. I really liked how the area for the line was decorated though.

In the end, we only went on about four rides total– besides the three mentioned above, we also went on Test Track again with our friend as it was his first time in Disney. I hope Disney will one day add an option to like… 3D-Print these over just getting it on a card. #gallery-0-45 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-45 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-0-45 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-45 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Regardless, we at least got a lot of the big important things done. I just really hope our next trip goes much smoother. And with that, I just have one last thing to say: Til the Spires 😛

Incoming Transmission from Batuu (and the World of Disney) As tempting as it was to try and write this slightly in character, I've been sick these last several days so I'll try and lessen it, especially for those of you who read this blog and aren't particularly into Star Wars (That said, if anyone is here from…

#Batuu #Disney Land #Disney World #Disneyland #Droid Depot #Epcot Food Festival #Galaxy&039;s Edge #Lightsabers #Parisian Breakfast #Smuggler&039;s Run #Star Wars #Star Wars: Galaxy&039;s Edge

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monokuroo · 6 years

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Happy Valentine’s Day!

Or at least post-Valentine in my part of the world. I hoped you have a wonderful date with your significant other.

But if you’re like me who’d rather hang out with my 2D husbandos (yes I have a sad layf lol), then let the eligible dads of Dream Daddy be your date!

If you tell me 2 years ago that I’m going to play and love Dream Daddy, I would probably laugh my ass off.

Released in 2017 by Game Grumps, Dream Daddy is a dating sim where you can customize your ‘dadsona’ and as the name suggests, you can date different kinds of dads. There are 7 dads in total but let’s start by making the dadsona who will date these dads.

At the start of the game, you’d be prompted to customize a dad to your liking. Think of it as the simplified version of the Create-A-Sim menu in The Sims.

So here’s my dadsona, Bae Summers.

Isn’t he good-looking? I loved that egg nipz shirt! hehe

Once you meet all the dads, it’s time to date! You have to message them on the game’s version of Facebook, the Dadbook. Each dad has 3 dates that need to be passed. Aim for S or A rank to ensure a good ending.

Or, if you’re like me, you can turn to guides such as these https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1085165969 and https://allgamers.com/article/2932/dream-daddy—guide-to-unlocking-all-dad-endings.

You’ve done all the things above and now you’re ready to push that message button. So the next question would be…

Who is your Dream Daddy?

You’ll see mine at the end. 😉

Craig Cahn

The main reason I got this game! After watching Kelsey from this video I had the urge to get his end!

MC’s college buddy and partner-in-crime. But when they meet again, Craig is already a responsible father of three.

Wait, there’s more.

He’s also a businessman, running a sports business. Also, he’s a health junkie. He trains every day, jogging around the neighborhood with his baby strapped on his body. To top it all, he coaches his twins’ softball team. Such a busybody.

Bae: My ultimate sexual fantasy is you. 😏😏😏

Craig’s ending, his route, heck even his kids did not disappoint! I would play his route again and again just to see his daughter River. She’s, like, the cutest kid in this game!

Seriously, though, I’m shipping MC with Craig because their bond is something. I love the whole bromance to more-than-bros going on. The confession scene at the end is sweet and cute. Too bad the game’s pretty short. I would have liked to see more of these two.

That third date, though. 🤩

Another reason to love Craig’s route is that, unlike the other dads, he has none of those minigames. So you can just safely play through this route without worries of a failed date.

(There’s a mini-game where Craig invites you to do the treadmill. But in my game, it didn’t appear on his route. Rather, he invites you when you are in another dad’s route.)

Mat Sella

Mat is the owner of the coffee shop in the neighborhood. He loves music, coffee, and his daughter Carmensita.

After ogling at Craig, I’m not sure I’d like Mat. But there’s a certain charm to his awkward personality. Like how he looks flustered when meeting people, which, at first glance, is totally unlike him.

Bae is so thirsty I kennot. 😂

But Matt’s really sweet and thoughtful to everyone. Contrary to his belief that he doesn’t like crowds, he’s rather good at taking care of people. It’s nice to see him complimenting MC’s personality. Together, they look like cute awkward teens and that’s…adorable.

The last date and the scenes leading up to the ending are so sweet. I loved how they get so flirty with each other. Mat is just giggling and flirting with the MC. That’s the happiest I’ve seen him in the game.

Brian Harding

Brian is MC’s rival dad. From the first time Brian and MC meet, this dad keeps on one-upping our MC. So for the rest of the route, they work through their rivalry thing.

Hence, this route contains the most nerve-wracking minigames! Brian invites the MC in different activities such as playing golf and fishing. And since, MC is competitive as ever, you as the player have to win them all!

So if you’re planning to get all of Steam’s achievements, I can only wish you luck. I admire you for having the patience I can never have. Because you’ll need a lot of it to finish Brian’s minigames, especially the golf part.

As for Brian and MC as a couple, I find it hard to see any chemistry between them because of their constant rivalry. But once I realized what Brian is doing, I found it cute. It’s nice to see them sort out their differences in the end.

Also, his daughter, Daisy, is a bit of an uptight at first. She keeps on correcting Amanda’s jokes which had me rolling my eyes a lot of times. But Amanda’s really chill so she teaches Daisy to be a bit more laid-back. Then, the two of them makes an adorable pair of siblings.

Robert Small

Robert looks wild and gruff, someone giving off a dangerous vibe.

MC’s first encounter with him is when he and Amanda visit Mat’s coffee shop. There, Robert checks out MC, staring darkly from the corners of the shop. I admit, he gives off a creepy vibe on that scene.

If MC decides to go out at night, he’ll go to a pub where he’ll be properly introduced to Robert.

Anyway, the other characters call Robert as an enigma. He’s such a mystery to everyone due to the cryptic way he speaks. You can never EVER get a straight answer from him. I can’t help but roll my eyes every time he speaks like that…

One of those rare moments that get him to speak what he really thinks.

…I guess I really am no good with people like him because it feels like he’s belittling other people with the way he speaks.

Surprisingly, I loved the ending. Robert did have some baggage. But I think he has the most realistic ending. I appreciated his no kiss-and-tell personality because at least he’s really clear with what he wanted in his relationship with MC.

Another surprising part of this route is Mary. It is already weird to have her hitting on MC on his first night in the neighborhood. Being friends with Robert, she is not someone to be messed with.

But Mary’s actually a really good friend. She doesn’t look like it, but she cares for Robert. And I appreciate her for that.

Damien Bloodmarch

When I watch Let’s Plays of the game, whenever players meet Damien, they’ll all have the same reaction — “Vampire Dad? No way!” But whenever I scrolled through the comments, everyone says that Damien is just misunderstood.

Those mixed reactions are really intriguing.

Damien dresses and acts like a Goth and has a love for the Victorian Era. Because of this, he gives off a standoff-ish vibe.

Damien is a sweet and romantic guy. Underneath his classy look lies a cute cinnamon roll. He proves that you can’t judge a book by its cover. His route is like watching a slow and old-school romance unfold. Like, how he prefers handwritten letters (with seals!) over Dadbook messaging.

And I loved how everyone could tell that they’re sooo in love with each other to the point of teasing them. I even love the part where Amanda saw them kissing in front of their door because that’s like a reversal of their position as dad and daughter.

Also, he’s a fudanshi. 😏

He has a collection of SasuNaru fic? 😏

Hugo Vega

Hugo is Amanda’s teacher. Being a person of authority, he’s pretty uptight.

Hugo is, well, nerdy. Other than teaching middle and high schoolers, he writes scholarly stuff and he’s very knowledgable with high brow lit.

He’s knowledgable. Period.

But he has another hobby: wrestling. He’s got a room of wrestling things. And it goes without saying that he knows a lot about it, a huge fanboy. That and those teach-me-wrestling-moves had me 😏.

Thing is, I enjoyed Hugo and his son, Ernest moments more in Damien’s route. Unlike Damien’s son, Ernest didn’t really show his appreciation for Hugo in his dad’s route. Meanwhile, in Damien’s, due to certain events, the relationship between Hugo and Ernest have a big leap. They have a more familial atmosphere around them in the end.

Or maybe, Ernest is busy on other things…

Joseph Christiansen

I have mixed feelings about this dad.

Joseph freaking Christiansen is a youth minister at the church. He’s the husband of Mary and father to the freakishly looking kids, Chris, Christian, Christie, and Chrish.

My initial reaction when I meet him and his family: YOU’RE TELLING ME YOU CAN DATE HIM!?

Just look at their names. I feel like I’m committing a sin.

Also, he spends most of his route being extra sticky to MC, like being sweet and clingy. I could definitely picture him staring longingly to MC, giving off mixed signals.

It’s uncomfortable knowing Joseph is married to Mary. She’s not the nicest neighbor. But after playing Robert and Damien’s routes where she is a good friend, she’s grown on me.

AND NOW I’M SNATCHING HER HUSBAND.

You’re being such a good friend MC. 🙄

So other than the names and his wife’s existence, Joseph intrigues me in the previous routes. During Amanda’s graduation party where MC talks to each character, Joseph asks MC to hang out with him anytime he’s free. He’s not telling MC that in a casual way. It’s more of like this:

… which is like silently pleading MC to notice him.

When MC did, he so brilliantly dumped him.

Which brings me to another reason why this route brings me discomfort.

Joseph’s best end is in the opposite direction with the other dads. After flirting around, he’d tell you that he’ll go back to his wife. And that’s perfectly okay. That’s a good thing, mending a broken family.

But it feels like MC is subjected to a needless embarrassment and rejection for someone who’s only stringing him along. He’s just a rebound, a one-night stand.

I couldn’t help but compare Joseph with Robert, because of their internal issues and how they treat MC. Thanks to this, I ended up liking Robert more, mainly because he’s very clear with what he wants and puts a distance from MC as he fixes his life.

Now I kind of regretting leaving Joseph for last since it taints a charming game. It’s like Joseph lives in a different world, far from the sweet worlds of the other dads.

===

So to answer my question above:

Craig is the love of my life in this game. Though I loved everyone, in all fairness. I just especially loved him. Even MC agrees,

For my favorite in the game – Craig > Damien = Mat > Robert = Hugo > Brian > Joseph. Or it can actually be Craig = Damien = Mat = Robert = Hugo >Brian >>> Joseph.

Everyone is farrrr better than Joseph. lol

So who’s likely to be your date among the dads of Dream Daddy?

As of this writing, Steam is having its Daily Deals and Dream Daddy is included. Snag this game over there and have a fun post-Vday celebration!

Next post will be my one and only reason to play Dream Daddy.

The Eligible Dads of Dream Daddy #dreamdaddy Happy Valentine's Day! Or at least post-Valentine in my part of the world. I hoped you have a wonderful date with your significant other.

#Dream Daddy #Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator #Dream Daddy: Dadrector&039;s Cut #English VN #Game Grumps #visual novel game

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thetygre · 6 years

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30 Day Monster Challenge 2 - Day #14: Favorite Invisible Monster

Some of the monsters on this list are so good at being invisible that I couldn’t even find a good picture of them.

1. Killer Brain (Fiend Without A Face)

The charm of any invisible monster is proportionate to how bizarre it is when it is inevitably revealed, and there are few monster that can compete with the killer brains from Fiend Without a Face. Even their explanation is unique; killer telekinetic thoughts that possess human brains and feed off nuclear radiation. These things are simultaneously adorable and grotesque; they’re slimy and have the eye tendrils of a slug, and even the way they move is creepy. They use their spinal cord tails to move around and strangle people, making more of their kind. These guys made it into Pathfinder where, frankly, I wish they had replaced Intellect Devourers in terms of being the game’s designated brain monsters (since the Mind Flayer is copyrighted). The killer brains just nail that perfect kind of creeping horror where I don’t want to touch one but I also kind of want to keep it in a tank as a pet. They do not disappoint once you finally get a look at them.

2. Monsters from the Id (Forbidden Planet)

The artist Francisco de Goya once stated, “The sleep of reason produces monsters.” The Monster from the Id from Forbidden Planet is the living embodiment of that phrase. On the alien planet of Altair IV, advanced aliens used incredible technology to make their very thoughts manifest into beings. But in a single night, the entire race was driven to extinction when their own subconscious thoughts manifested and killed them. Years later, a scientist by the name Dr. Morbius finds the aliens’ technology and uses it for his own, and the cycle begins to repeat itself. The monster is only briefly seen, and even then it’s only by the light of laser-blasts and electricity in what is frankly a perfect embodiment of raygun gothic.

Design wise, the monster isn’t particularly innovative, but I really think that’s to its credit. The id is the primal, brutish part of our minds; it would make sense for a monster based on the id’s subconscious desires to be a bulky, angry brute. And of course there’s also the classical element to the Monster as well; Forbidden Planet can be interpreted as a retelling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, with Morbius as Prospero. If Robby the Robot, as a product of high intellectual science, is the spirit Ariel, then the Monster is Caliban. Caliban of course represented the elements of water and earth in Prospero’s miniature cosmos, and just as Caliban represented the primitive state of the world, the Monster from the Id is representative of the primitive state of the mind. Both monsters play to humanity’s earlier states. The Monster from the Id is, put frankly, a spectacular monster. Its invisibility reminds us that no matter how much we try to suppress our darker feelings and desires, there is always a monstrous part of us just underneath the surface.

3. Ghost Wolf (Fables)

Realistically speaking, all air elementals should be invisible, but so far Ghost from Fables is the only one to step up to bat. Ghost is of course the lost seventh son(?) of Bigby and Snow. He’s essentially an air elemental by virtue of Bigby’s father being the North Wind; it’s complicated. At first nobody even knows Ghost is around until he starts asphyxiating people to death. As an air elemental, air is his food, and the air in the inner city is polluted while the air in certain peoples’ lungs is nice and clean, which I think is a neat urban fantasy detail. After his mom sends him off so he doesn’t get killed, he joins up with his dad for some guerilla terrorism. It’s fine, trust me. I like Ghost first and foremost because we just don’t get a lot of air elemental characters, and when we do they tend to stick to the stock elemental character archetypes. But Ghost is an innocent kid, just a child trying to navigate around the mother of all handicaps. He doesn’t mean to be a monster, he’s just trying to survive. All Ghost wants his to be with his family; like all invisible monsters, Ghost’s is confronted with an issue of presence and acknowledgment. Ghost can’t be seen, but he can be felt, and his character makes us question how much that is worth is terms of bonding.

4. Griffin (The Invisible Man)

There have been a lot of invisible men through the years, but Griffin is still my favorite for his blend of insanity and sadism with a bit of underlying tragedy. Griffin achieved invisibility by use of a special chemical that also drives him insane with its prolonged usage. With that said, it’s hard to know whether Griffin is cruel because of the drug, or if that was always some part of him; both prospects ultimately play in Griffin’s invisibility.

First, while Griffin’s insanity is attributed to the chemicals he uses, it really derives more from his lack of recognition from other people. As an invisible being, people don’t attribute to Griffin all the dozens of minor cues a person receives every day that reassures them that they exist; glancing at them, saying hello, moving out of the way, etc. An invisible man would have to cope with the fact that outside of their own ability to sense the world around them, they don’t really exist. They are a total non-person, dehumanized in the most profound way possible.

This leads to the second point; a person treated inhumanly will begin to act inhuman. A lack of recognition is also a lack of responsibility, a state where you don’t have to be held accountable for your actions. That kind of freedom gives a person the chance to show who they really are. That is the tragedy of the invisible man; Griffin already felt inadequate before he was invisible, and was a complete non-entity with his power, so he used that power to hurt people and lash out, further alienating himself from humanity.

5. Prisoners (Silent Hill 2)

There’s a prison cell in Silent Hill 2. It’s not unusual to go to prison in Silent Hill; at this point it’s practically standard. And it’s also not unusual for the cells in that prison to have horrible monsters waiting inside. What is unusual is when you can’t actually see the monsters, and they don’t really do anything. They’re just… there. Existing. If you listen closely they seem to be chanting the word ‘ritual’, or maybe ‘are you sure’ backwards; it’s unclear. Like most monsters in Silent Hill, especially 2, all sorts of meanings and symbolism can be attributed to the prisoners. But more than anything, they’re there just to be creepy and add ambiance, and they’re disturbingly effective at it.

6. The Dunwich Horror (H.P. Lovecraft)

We don’t get enough abominable half monsters anymore. Not enough deformed masses of flesh that were simply never meant to be. The Dunwich Horror is where you can really see Lovecraft drawing from The Great God Pan in terms of influence. Growing up in rural country, I was always fascinated by the concept of the family monster in the cellar or the barn. The Dunwich Horror is too great, too terrible to be in our world. Its invisibility stems from the fact that it simply isn’t meant for our meager reality. Like Lovecraft says, it has more of its father than its mother in it. The Dunwich Horror reminds me of a storm or some other kind of natural disaster, the kind of thing the ancients would say a god was behind. But it also brings to mind the original definition of monster; ‘monstrum’ were omens in the form of deformities in childbirth, given by the gods. The unnamed Whateley brother is just such an omen; a portent of forces beyond mankind.

7. The Blair Witch (The Blair Witch Project)

Frankly, the Blair Witch could have gone on the witch list, and probably would have if I was doing a solely pop culture list. But I don’t think that should discredit the Blair Witch as an invisible monster, and there are angles to her absence that would be lost if she suddenly just showed up at the end of a movie. Most obviously, of course, is that the witch is supposed to be an ambiguous entity. Her existence could be entirely fictitious, and she might be nothing more than insanity. The Witch being invisible makes her manifest as a kind of madness, an insanity that appears solely through environmental cues. I would suggest that the Witch is invisible because she is a historic figure; specifically, she is a historic evil. She is something terrible that happened in the past, and even if that evil isn’t seen anymore, it’s still there, a part of the landscape. It’s a very basic horror reading, but I still think it applies to the Blair Witch as a monster.

8. Stealth Sneak (Kingdom Hearts)

I have a lot of good memories of beating up this guy in the Olympus Colosseum. I mean it’s utterly pointless for it to be invisible; the monster’s so huge you can even jump on top of it. But I just love this chameleon monster design! Chameleons don’t get enough play as monsters; they’re always getting upstaged by komodo dragons and iguanas. And obviously the superior color palette is green. I know that shouldn’t matter for a monster that can change color at will, but a line has to be drawn somewhere.

9. Death Sword (The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess)

This guy almost looks like he belongs on the evil weapons list until you actually get to see him. Then when you finally get a look at him, he’s one of the coolest designs in the game! Just look at this horrible thing. What was he? Why is he locked up in this musty old desert tomb? And what did he do that he had to be bound with all these amulets? There’s a lot of mysteries for this mini-boss, and we’re probably better off not knowing. Just appreciate his design and respect the cleaver.

10. Intangir (Final Fantasy VI)

This is just sheer nostalgia. When I was a kid, my cousin let me play her copy of Final Fantasy VI briefly, and I kept running into an invisible monster. Whenever I would attack it enough, it would appear and reveal this giant cat-dragon thing. For years, it became my default to assume that any invisible monster was a buff cat-dragon-man. Blair Witch? Cat-man. Cattle mutilators? Cat-man. Forbidden planet monster? Cat-man. This is Schrodinger’s Cat-Man, where every invisible monster is potentially a cat-man until proven otherwise. Years later, I can see now that this thing is a Behemoth palette-swap, but I like to think of it is a lesser subspecies.

#30 Day Monster Challenge #30 Day Monster Challenge 2 #the invisible man #silent hill #kingdom hearts #final fantasy #h.p. lovecraft #the legend of zelda #long post

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thatyorkshireguy-blog · 6 years

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It’s About To Get Chile

My apologies for the graphic photo that i’ve chosen to lead with here, but it just about sums up the emotions of the last 12 months and what i’ve put my body and mind through just to achieve what was required! To keep on going!

For my first blog post I’m going to have to hang my ‘Yorkshire plums’ out a little and bear my soul to you. So apologies, but it’s going to one of some length (giggedy) for me to be able to give you a full idea of my story and who this blog is aimed at.

My name is Liam Grady and i’m a 35 year old marketing and communications specialist.

I am a born and bred Yorkshire man.... Doncaster in South Yorkshire to be precise.

Here’s the big one........ in less that 3 weeks time, I will be moving my entire life to Chile, South America.

Why? But of course people....I move for love... for a beautiful chilean woman called, Fran Díaz Abeleida.

(Here’s the night we first met in London)

I met Fran in September 2017 when I was working down in London for just three days. Turns out Fran was on the last two days of her trip around Europe and making her way back home to Chile. What were the chances we would be stopping just one street away from each other in England’s capital during that time? Crazy to think about!

Well after two incredible evenings with this lady, I headed 170 miles via car back up north (The land of Yorkshire Puddings and more friendly folk) and Fran headed 7500 miles via a plane back to South America, not knowing if we were ever going to see each other again.

The face that you actually see in the one above with Fran was taken at a time when my life may have been at my weakest, from a mental health point of view. During this stage of my life I wasn’t happy with who I was as a person and I’d hidden that fact through the bottle and party lifestyle for many years. I always loved the people in my life and loved the ‘job’ that I did as a communicator......I was just missing something in my life. I didn’t respect myself - I will elude to what contributed to this downfall further down the story.

As dramatic as this sounds, just a few days after meeting Fran, I could have killed myself or someone else as not for the first time id stupidly drink drove my vehicle. The ‘straw that broke the camels back’ as they say, was when I nearly crashed my car into my house mates car, and my own house. I felt so lost and I didn’t know what the problem was to be able to fix it.

After some very harsh but ‘said with love’ words from a few friends, I decided to take an even more dramatic step and actually fight to survive....and this very much ended up being in the literal sense. I’d been training in martial arts over the years, on and off, very much off... more than on!

However i found emotional and physical comfort whilst I was training at a place called Charles Martin Martial Arts for a charity fight in 2016. It helped me very much, and it was a team mate that turned to me and said I should fight properly this time.

I thought this person was crazy, as anyone will tell you who is in the fight game, that preparing....even for an amateur fight in K1, Muay Thai, Boxing or MMA is one of the hardest things you will do in your life. You have to change everything.

In November 2017 my life changed.....

For two months I started to train three times a week and i’d told my coaches of my issues and where I wanted to be and how much I wanted to change. I knew this was going to be difficult but I had no choice. I needed this.

At the same time I’d been talking to Fran over text and voice calls for a few weeks but i’d started to feel like it could be a bad focus of my attention or that there maybe no point in this communication, because how could we ever see each other.

I remember ‘THE PHONE CALL’ with Fran. I told her that I was concerned nothing would happen, or how could it even happen for a while given the circumstances. It was Fran’s turn to motivate and inspire me, as she was absolutely gutted that I didn’t think ‘the relationship’ would go anywhere and she proceeded to at first be very upset... but then the next 15 mins turned into one of the most beautiful talks i’d ever had.

I couldn’t believe this beautiful South American was willing to take a risk on me and at least try to make something work between us.

At this moment I stopped being a ‘wimp’ (not the best word but one I described myself as at that point) and I really started to fight.

Fran then took a huge step and booked a flight to see me in February for a two week break. I couldn’t believe it. But I still didn’t feel like I was anywhere near good enough or right for this woman. I also needed to dedicate my energy to this person as she lived so far away and to stop me from being tempted with other life distractions that made me hate myself in the first place.

So the training went from 3 days to training between 5-8 times a week. I was dedicated and so focussed and proceeded to change much in my life. My energy levels towards work improved and my whole outlook and positivity started to raise to places id never even been. I was actually starting to like to the person I was turning into.

February 2018 was approaching fast and both myself and Fran were very anxious, scared and excited about seeing each other. Although we had spoken pretty much every single day since we met each other, we hadn’t seen each other for over 6 months and we had only met each other twice in person! Yet again, this seems a little crazy doesn’t it.

That day came when Fran took another 7000 mile trip. I will never ever forget she arrived on that train and looked at me. Our eyes both welled up and I knew at that moment I was already dreading the point of her leaving. We had the most incredible two weeks together.

Doncaster isn’t the most beautiful of locations in the U.K (according to most) but during Fran’s trip we had some of the worst snowfall in recent times and it added something so magical to the two weeks.

Awesome hey?

Fran left during the first week in March and although devastated I just knew I wanted to be with her so badly but I also.... I knew realistically I might not be able to see her for some months to allow me to save up enough money to make the trip happen.

April 2018 had arrived and so had my first fight. Everything I had worked hard for was here...my moment ... everything was set up beautifully. My opponent was over 15 years younger and was coming fresh from a victory. What happened next I wasn’t expecting....

During that 1st round of my first fight I was absolutely rubbish and my opponent battered my for the first 2 minutes. I wondered what the hell I’d done. But one thing in life I had discovered is that I always had a big heart and it would take a lot for me to actually give up. I might not have had the skills my opponent possessed but my mind and heart had become that of a warrior.

Although physically shattered just after the first round, I came out the second like a totally different guy. I ended up winning that second round landing a good sweep and a good right hand which had my opponent rocked back. It was however too little too late and over the fight my opponent won a well deserved decision. That first fight taught me so much.

After the fight was over I felt an emptiness inside and over the course of the next few weeks I could feel myself slipping back into my weak points because I didn’t have training or my beautiful Chilean with me. It wasn’t long before I quickly realised that I needed to be with Fran ASAP!...but in her country and not in mine. I needed a change of everything. I just had no money to get there.

My job that I was in at the time only paid me enough to cover my bills, just get by each month and it didn’t give me the mental or physical freedom to use my skill set to its full potential.

In order to get me to Fran I know I needed to do two things, change something with my work life and go back to training straight away with the view to fight again.

During June and July I did everything I could to improve my life. Work hard during the day in my normal office role (Communications Director), train hard for two hours every day straight after work and then any spare time I had would be dedicated to helping others with their social media/marketing - FOR FREE!!!! I wanted to pay my time forward with the hope that deep down something would come back to me.

This is exactly what happen...

At the start of July, i’d produced a document on social media for one of the business members at a co-working studio called ‘Helm’. From that one document caused a ripple of actions.

I’d received a call from the founder of Helm, a good friend and contact, Liam Swift. He asked whether i’d like to do a presentation on social media at the next ‘Doncaster Digital’ event, which takes place at the Helm studio every month.

I agreed and put together a presentation that was true to myself and something that could help many businesses understand more about their social media channels. This event turned out to be one of the best attended Doncaster Digital events with over 40 different businesses attending my talk.

(Here’s me giving the talk on that night at the studio and one quite happy straight after - I am the one jumping higher than the rest as you can see!)

So I was told it went very well indeed.

Actually....my phone would not stop with texts and calls of support that night. At around 11.00pm, Liam Swift dropped me a text message to say that there was a couple of people in the room who were watching very closely and that I may get a text in the morning from a business regarding help they required.

The following morning I received a text message from the founder of football coaching brand, Mini Kicks. He wanted to meet me to discuss a potential opportunity about working with them and them helping me on my mission to get to Chile. This had me very intrigued.

I received that text message at 9.30am and by 12.00pm I was having lunch with the Mini Kicks founder.

By 12.45pm I had received a job offer that again was a turning point in my life and by 2.30pm ....i’d handed in my notice and effectively quit my other job that day.

The offer at that time was just too good to refuse. It was only a short term solution but it allowed me to achieve what I needed to straight away and give me the freedom to build up a personal brand before I left for Chile.

It is the first time, hand on heart that I have ever......ever shed tears of pure joy and emotion. I phoned up Fran, burst out crying and just said....”I can come to Chile”. I just couldn’t believe this opportunity had happened!

If truth be told I wanted to just fly there and then but I couldn’t leave the country until I had done a few things. The first was fight again and that came last month in October, and the second was to be a best man at one of my closest friends weddings. This happened last weekend.

My life was finally coming together but I was still having to manage money and effectively start my own business and go solo again.

Fran even came to see me again in September for a few days which although she became very unwell during her time here - literally as she landed, it was a chance to show her what a person I could be in times of illness. It was just great to be with her!

How much can one person try and achieve in just a short space of time?

Ok, so now it was fight time once again! I’d trained so hard for this next fight, physically and mentally took me to places I hadn’t been, but due to a bad injury suffered in August I wasn’t able to do any sparring. Which was bad news for me because in October I fought an absolute beast of a guy. I also had to come down to 70kg which I was 77kg when I started this journey the November before.

Again fight day came, and with my closest friends and family there to watch, it once again seemed that everything was set up to go out with a bang and leave as a hero.

We were ready...and I had unfinished business.

From the first bell I wanted to show that i’d improved...and I had. I was calmer, better on my fight...just better all round. However i’d been matched up once again with a very powerful and skilled guy. He caught me with an uppercut that badly broke my nose and for 10 seconds he knocked the sh*t out of me....and he went for the KO. On shakey legs, I managed to quickly back off and then out of nowhere I landed a right of my own which then rocked my opponent. The commentators were going mad. Another moment i’ll not forget.

In fairness my opponent took the first round just on the better shots landed but we both exchanged some great punches and kicks which made it a great fight.

Then came a defining moment which I believe my friend and one of my corner men, James Hartley, put better on Facebook - which i’ll share with you now (Again another read, but it’s hard for yourself to put into emotions).

James’s (gent in the lovely shirt haha) word’s really capture what I went through on this journey of self discovery, on a journey of doing what I had to do to be a better person not just for Fran, but mostly for myself. I’ve had a crazy 12-18 months!

If I didn’t love myself, how could I ever allow myself to fully love someone else or allow them to fully love me.

To just bring it back to why I was in the mental state I was at the start of this story.....

Over 8 years ago, I ended up losing my best friend in a car crash and my dad through cancer, within 6 months of each other and all I did was pack all that pain up and pretend like it didn’t matter. Hiding tough times through drink and a party lifestyle, which was absolutely bullshit and I allowed that to start destroying myself from the inside out. Up until I met Fran and my love for martial arts, I just never knew how to love properly....and thanks to both of those things, I now can. I am so excited about life and in less than three weeks I will be flying to Santiago, Chile, to be with my lady.

My mission is to make her happy, save lots of street dogs and help other people, whether that be in business or just in life.

I wanted to share this story because it gives you an idea of if you truly want something, if you’re truly willing to improve yourself and get to where you need to be in life, it becomes fight or flight and you have to fight for what you want.....you have to! And I did and will continue to do so. Don’t hide grief and pain, and do lean on people for support, they give you the strength when you least expect it.

Although this is quite a personal post, I want the people and brands that I will be working with moving forward to know the type of person that they are working with and I truly hope it helps people discover that they can achieve anything they want.

Oh, I ticked of the best man duties as well....that was last weekend and it was one of the best days of my life, and a memory that will stay with me forever.

So cheers to you U.K. Leaving my country, my life and especially my friends will be the hardest thing i have ever had to do, maybe even harder than my fight journey. But it is easiest the most exciting thing I’ve ever done.

Thank you so much to my friends and family who have supported me along the way. A huge thank you to the people at Helm and at Mini Kicks.

One of the biggest thank you’s has to go to my coaches and team mates at Charles Martin Martial Arts, I don’t think they truly realise what an impact they have had on my life and how much it truly as changed.

Of course the biggest one goes to my girlfriend, my partner and the reason I am moving country...... Fran. You inspire me to be better for both you and for myself. I can’t wait to see you in three weeks time.

And Chile....I am coming for you!

Thank you for taking the time to read this. I know it was long (giggedy) but I am grateful for your time.

Forever humble...

Liam Grady

That Yorkshire Guy.

Please share this with anyone who might find this helpful and please follow me on Facebook and Instagram - just follow ‘THAT YORKSHIRE GUY’ - I will be sharing my entire journey via Instagram and I am hoping to collaborate with some amazing brands on this journey. Please get in touch on my IG page or [email protected]. I will get onto this more on my next post.

#socialmedia #marketing #inspiration #depression #thatyorkshireguy #mentalhealth #branding #communication #helpingothers #Muaythai #fighting #love #story

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ainmunaqadh · 7 years

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memory log 0.5

Ain’s P.O.V (point of view)

Ishtar Academy. The research facility thats well known throughout the solar system. Here today, me and my batch of students from my school will be going to a trip there. Only the 12th grade year of students of my school had the privilege to go there due to some odd...reasons we students don’t know. Probably because they knew we were all training to become Guardians. Whatever reasons, we certainly didnt want to miss out this chance. Though some parents didn’t really approve of this trip, but after some explanation they seemed pretty okay with it soon after including my strict father. The trip was just a few days trip and just a day at the Ishtar Academy to not make the protective parents worry as it will be our first time into space. It felt like a dream to head to Ishtar Academy. They discovered plenty of things over there. I really liked researching and this could a chance to sharpen my skills for my dream job. A researcher. This was just a day trip and literally everyone was feeling anxious including myself. My father fortunately had a few days off before he go back to his work with Mr. Bray. My father did some lecturers about life choices. Those parent-child talks. You know the thing. He’s a protective dad after all.

Soon enough, the day came and all of us went into the space ship that looked like sci-fi space trains from Mass Effect. Almost like the Normandy but bigger. Once on board, we all took ourselves to our rooms and shared rooms with some friends of the same gender for safety reasons.

“Hehe, I’d be glad if I managed to catch an attention of a fellow researcher. It’d be awesome to do their work!” My friend Lidwina exclaimed as she rises from her bed.”To think to become a guardian and research at the same time, oh wait that’s a Warlock thing.”

Charmaine, one of my friends, looked toward me as she was sitting on her bed with her legs crossed,”Ain you want to be a Hunter actually right?”

I was on my bed, sketching on my sketchbook. I was sketching out myself as a guardian with my own Ghost(which I’ll soon have). Thinking, saving lives and doing good deeds to achieve great sense of honor and nobility.”Yeah, my mentor is a Hunter so I’ll be a Hunter. But being a Warlock doesn’t seem bad either it is?” I chuckle to myself, thinking myself as a Warlock instead of a Hunter.

“Boo. Warlocks are space wizards and nerds. Look Goh, Hakimi, Wong and the others. Nerds and they fit the Warlock stereotype.” Lidwina crossed her arms and did a pouty face hearing my last sentence. All three of us are going to be official Hunters some day. When that day arrives, we’ll all make it worth for us , our mentors and everyone else in our lives.

“Oh please, not all Warlocks are like that. Same goes for Titans and Hunters. Like what if a Warlock can do well with knifes? What if a Hunter wants to float like a Warlock? What if a Titan fights more like a Hunter?” I finished up the final touch ups in my sketch as I indeed looked awesome in my cloak with my mentor Brendan by my side.”In fact, let’s make a bet. If one of us attains both classes, be it Hunter-Warlock or so on combination, the other two losses. ”Don’t jinx it if it happens to me especially. Chances are high if you’re keen on it. Up to the Traveller really.”

Lidwina and Charmaine looked at each other with slight hesitation. I rarely make bets but when I do, I would win no doubt as the probabilities of my winning were like...99.9%. Even so, they nodded and agreed.”Fine.”

Days passed, we finally reach to Venus and there stood the famous Ishtar Academy. I could’ve swear some of us would like to go continue our studies there once we graduated out of high school. We were greeted by some of the professors there and were much welcomed. We were taken around the place and it was huge. Bigger than any university we’ve been to. The professors even asked what job we’d like be to part of aside from being Guardians. They were happy to hear some of us like to continue their higher education here at Ishtar Academy.

“Alright students, I’m sure you all got your piece of papers we just handed out to you. Listen, those lucky enough will have a name written on their paper. If you get a name, you will be spending time with that person who is a fellow researcher here.”

Everyone looked at their folded piece of paper in their hands. Some crossed their fingers and hoped they get a name.

“Alright kids open your paper!”

Everyone then unfolded their papers before a lot of groans and cheering was heard all around. The groans were probably from those who got a blank page and the cheering was from those who got a name. I just stood there in silent. I got a name. Dr Maya Sundaresh. She sounds like a prestigious person from the sound of her name. Her name even sounds pretty.

“Ain you got a name? Wah lucky you!” Lidwina showed her blank paper as she looked quite upset but calmed herself anyway.

“You lucked out Ain. I didn’t get a name either. I heard Goh did. As expected from the top student of our batch.”Charmaine shrugs as she held out her blank page before putting it back into her pocket,”Those who didn’t get a name will go around the Academy with the staff members to the projection room. We’re going on in a 3D simulation project to test our skills as guardians.”

“Ah that sounds grand. Wish I could join but of course I’m going to be with Dr Maya. A real experience.I ‘ll see you both later.” I walked off according to the directions showed on the map to Dr Maya’s lab office.

Once arriving there, I knocked on the door to let her know I was coming in.”Hello? Dr Maya?”

Exoâ€™s P.O.V or Cayde

Still an average day for a fixture like me. Like usual day. I just stood there close by the door way while watching over Dr Maya who was as usual focusing on her research. I still haven’t felt anything. Just this ache in my cold husk that gave up to the ice long ago. Maya will never see me other than a fixture. Nothing else. Because I’m not a living being in the flesh. I was just metal. With not much memories from when I was human, that doesn’t matter. I’ll just remain like this anyway. Unless someone with a good and pure heart came into my life. Chances are pretty grim.

But then I heard a knock and voice outside the door.

”Hello? Dr Maya?”

The door slowly opened as apparently I was the first thing that greeted her. She just looks at me for a moment before she smiled. Smiled. The first time...someone actually saw me as an actual being and not some kind of nutcracker statue or anything that’s usual ignored. Her hair was a soft ebony black and slightly wavy. Her skin a fair colour and her eyes a dark brown like the soil from Earth. She reminded me of Snow White somehow. Her smile...bright as a star that I felt something in me. Maybe my wish was heard.

Dr Maya immediately looked back from her work once the girl entered the room. The girl wore a school uniform. White blouse and a long sky blue skirt. Simple but it definitely looked cute on her. Her wavy hair was long as it was tied up into a ponytail. It definitely added something to her appearance.

“You’re a student from that school are you not? You got my name?” As always, Maya sounded serious but this time she sounded friendly to not scare the girl.”Dr Maya Sundaresh but you probably know my name already.â€”

“Yep!â€ She held out the paper with Maya’s name on it,”I’m Ain! Honoured to meet a researcher like you!”

Ain....that was quite a name. Pretty in fact. Short but pretty. Like herself. Her voice was something else too. Feminine but had a leadership sense to it. This Ain girl seemed like something grand in the near future perhaps.

Dr Maya and Ain immediately got back to what Maya was doing but starting with the basics. Maya told Ain about their research on the Vex and Ain had pointed out a few facts. She was a real smart kiddo. Brilliant like Maya but more...brilliant than Maya. Sure she was nervous and stuttered a few times but it actually made Maya chuckled. Have I never saw her chuckle or even smile before. Ain had that cheerful and happy go lucky aura. Ain even told Maya about her becoming a Guardian soon. A Hunter in fact. Nice choice. Her skills will be fantastic to say from her description of results in her training. It was harsh but important. Maya prepared a lab coat her size. She looked like a mini professor to be honest. Her giggles were really something too. All I could do was just watch even during Maya taking a picture of Ain in her lab coat. I was just a fixture. In the background. Nothing important than metal. At least just to Maya anyway. Ain smiled at me. Maybe she thinks of me differently.

Hours passed and apparently it was time for Ain to gather up with the other students to head back to Earth. I was feeling sad to see her leave. Sad? I actually feel an emotion? That’s a progress. To think a girl like her made me feel this way, may be she’s the actual person I need to see myself better. To put up myself as an individual and not a fixture.

“Thank you Dr Maya. For the tips and everything. Hope that I’ll pass the final exam!” She turns around to walk back to the door way with her own ID card in her pocket. The ID card will give her access to any part of the place, if she plans to return to which I hope so. She then stops for a moment before looking over to me. Her dark brown eyes meeting my aqua blue optics. She smiled at me once more.”It was nice meeting you too.”She then resumed to walk out of the room and Maya just straight went back to her work without gazing at me or whatsoever. Ain was the only that noticed me as an actual person.

Ain is....quite an interesting person to say. Interesting I mean....I could’ve swore...I could have a crush on her. Probably. It was hopeless anyway. I won’t see her again.

Or maybe I will. When I do, I won’t take her for granted.

Ain’s P.O.V

As much as it was interesting to be with Dr Maya, that blue Exo looked intriguing as well. Despite not speaking or all, he just made sure we would be both safe from harm. He was the security officer after all. I see in his optics. Widening whenever I smiled or look at him for a moment. I could’t tell if he felt anything. Dad didn’t specifically say if Exos could feel anything or not. Still, Iâ€™d just smiled just in case so he would’t feel left out. He was quite tail. Normal for a male exo to be that tall. I only reached up to his shoulders. Yes I am indeed small.’

Receiving the ID card from Maya, I put it in my pocket before heading out to the others at the entrance as it was time to head back home. Just then, I stopped to look to the Exo once more.

I smiled,”It was nice meeting you too.” Of course, his optics widen slightly to which I chuckled softly while walking out of the room. He surely was quite of an Exo. Almost good looking. Okay I will admit that. He is rather a good looking Exo but that doesn’t mean I like him...maybe.

Back at the entrance, we took a lot of group photos and even with the professors that were gonna say their goodbyes to us. Everyone else also got an ID card. Just in case we plan to return. Once we got onto the ship, we all got the windows and waved to the professors.

That night, all of us were back in our rooms. Talking about what we did at the Academy. Of course, Lidwina and Charmaine asked me plenty of questions

.“Anything else”

I sigh to Lidwina’s question,”well there was this Exo who is the security officer. He was quite interesting too. He didnt speak but he was always surprised whenever I smiled at him.” I chuckled once more, remembering those moments.

“Ohhhh....an Exo hmm? Never practically saw one myself.” Charmaine crossed her arms and smirked,”Surprised to see you smile at him? That sounds obvious.”

I then punched Charmaine’s, but not too rough,”Oh no no. It‘s not like that. Honestly. I felt his pain of just being in the background. I wanted to make him to feel like an individual. Exos have a mind of their own after all." But I never told them that Exos were actually once humans.”So I did. By smiling at him and actually paying attention to him.”

Lidwina snickered quietly,”awww how sweet of you. Caring for a robot” To which she earned a pillow hit right in her face.

“Anyhow, we should head to sleep. It’s getting practically late.” I was right somehow. It was almost midnight and we were supposed to wake up early tomorrow. And yes I used this as an excuse to get away from more questions.

Lidwina did the pouty face once more before crossing her arms,”Uh fine. But you better tell us more tomorrow. The whole class.”

Charmaine giggled softly hearing this,”presentation. Goh and those who got names will tell their stories as well.” She lies down on her bed before yawning softly with Lidwina yawning as well.

I lied down on my bed with my head on my pillow and my blanket covering myself. We were all indeed exhausted from going here and there.” Will do. Good night you two.”

“Good night..”

I snapped my fingers as the lights automatically switched off with all of us going into dreamland or just a deep sleep.

To be honest, that Exo was more interesting than I thought. I sure hope I can spend more time with him. Or maybe talk to him to hear his voice.

I’ll definitely won’t miss chance.

#destiny the game #destiny 2 #V: Student and Trainee( Pre-Collapse Ain)#Maya Sundaresh #Cayde-6 #OC #my writing #mun rp #THIS TOOK ME A WHILE BUT IVE DONE IT #now I'm sleepy and stressed #need sleep

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thepopularnobody413 · 6 years

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1.2.19

It is a new year, im not really sure how im feeling cause im kind of drunk right now, but im just chilling, waiting, i feel this year is going tp be very special, this year isn’t even about me ive come to realize and accept that i have to do everything in my power to make sure that my guys make it. they are my mission i dont care exactly what happens to me but i just want my team, my guys to do everything they want, everything they dreamed of. i feel like ive been trusted and they put their future in my hands and ill do everything in my power to make sure they can do what they want, they are too talented too good, they honestly are too good to have to settle for any of this shit, id hate myself if they didn’t achieve everything they dreamed of. i love them with all of my friends, they parents even trust and love me, at least to an extent so i have to make sure they win, i have too. thats my goal this year to make sure my team is winning and is content with their lives and what they want. i really loe them got damn theses niggas are talented like honestly. they gotta make it, even if its before i do. ill do whatever i can for these guys i just hope they trust me but ill prove myself i hope they see it. but anyways as for mw. this is the year i know it, i feel it, ive been waiting for this, nothing will come in between us or my mindset for this year, FGod has built me up and made me so strong, even mentally. i love these guys honestly. damn i cant stop thinking about them. i care for these dudes too much Jaylen you got this i believe in you the most out of everyone you know? you are the key to greatness. you will play a huge impact in all of our lives. remember when we were at theBig E and this random girl asked who you were? and she swore on everything you were famous? ill never forget that day bro, thats how i knew you were everything. you are me bro, just a mini version and i love you bro please never stop. we can do this together, separate, it doesn’t matter YOU can do it. YOU can really do it, youre mindset is beautiful you will be the greatest to ever do this shit no joke. Dayvi, i love you bro. you are the chosen one, Hod chose you bro, why you playing with your gifts? if i could just get you to take me serious bro, younger special why are you playing around with this music shit. i know you know how good you are soooo please bro just let me help you its all i care about. i want to protect you from all these distractions and fuck shit you got going on, but i cant. i know that. but im here for you through all this shit bro. just trust me please we can really do this shit, we just have to do it together. i need you on board you play such a huge part come on bro, help me out here. i love you tho. CURRENCY WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU BRO, WE NEED YOU TO BE GREAT THIS SHIT ISNT GOING TO HAPPEN WITHOUT YOU WE NEED YOUR IDEAS YOUR MIND YOUR GENIUS, COME BACK PLEASE. this is the year we follow God i need all of us to be on the same page. i want this year to be about us, we got this y’all just trust me. please. i cant beg enough. X i love you, youre on my mind everyday. i never met you, never knew you but its crazy how connected ive felt to you since you left us but i know you gave me your energy. i love you born love you, idk what you did to me or put in my spirit but i will carry on and live out your legacy. this year is our year i promise i know it. theres so much to reflect on and consider and think about. failure is not an option. what am i going to do if i cant everyone on the same page? this is our future, i see why God put me ahead shit is wild. but i accept this responsibility im not tripping about it anymore. i know a lot of lives are put into my hands but it depends on how i am personally. and im okay i swear i just need people to help keep me on track. where are my core supporters the people that actually love me and want to see me succeed. My success is your success. so please people help me. whoever is down for me? anybody? Brb.

#forgot to post this #also i never came back #im sorry #hopefully im entertaining someone out there

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nerdybookahs · 4 years

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Good old Black & White… I loved the game and I hated it. To be honest, I never got far. There was this one quest where you had to follow a non-believer without him noticing you. I tried over and over again, on several days, and I never managed to get past him. But it was still a special game! A few days ago, I opened my inbox to find the subject line: “The God Game Genre is Back!” – It was from 42 Bits Entertainment telling me about their Kickstarter game and offering me to give the early alpha a try. It took me all about five minutes to skim over the Kickstarter project to realize that yes, this may actually be a kind of God Game I would love to play.

I’m jumping ahead a bit here when I say that it has also, after Project Gorgon and Chinatown Detective Agency, become the third PC game I backed on Kickstarter! The main reason wasn’t being able to play the early alpha build, though. It was rather the game’s description and the fact that they got funding from the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW (some kind of local German funding). Having such an official kind of funding makes me trust the project more, to be honest. But even though I had decided I wanted to back it, I still waited until after I tried out that build. I may easily get excited, but there’s at least some tiny little bit of rationality left. Their roadmap also seems to be rather rational and it shows just how early in the development process we are. Alpha will likely start in June this year. Beta won’t be before December. Steam Early Access is scheduled for April 2021. And release will probably happen in Q3 2021. Something that I find a bit weird is that the more money you back them with, the more votes you will get in their feature queries. I am not sure that’s a good idea. At least not when you want to have the game appealing to a lot of players as opposed to fewer people with more money to spend on games.

But let me now finally tell you about my impressions! First, a very important note: I got an early alpha build to look at! I am not going to write about bugs, weird behaviour that doesn’t seem intentional, missing features and so on. I am, however, going to tell you what’s already there, and my impressions of the game so far.

It’s a single-player game and you play as a God against up to four other Gods. There’ll be a campaign as well as individual skirmishes. The enemy Gods can focus on violence, deceit, pleasure or fertility. And of course, you want to be the mightiest God with the most followers. So you need to make the people in the different villages believe in you and your might, but you can decide how you want to achieve that. You can be nice to them, spread love, keep them happy with fireworks or you instill fear in them and make them follow you because they’re scared you may kill them off if they don’t! Choose your strategy wisely. The game features two different phases: During the day, you spread love and/or fear – basically, this is when you act. During the night, you plan. You choose if villagers should erect certain buildings, or you manipulate their dreams. As an example, you can tell a village to send off food to another village that way. All actions cost mana and it is more expensive the further away it is from your “base”, a huge orb. I was told that this orb is the representation of my godly self in the world!

The early alpha lets me play a match at the early stage (so basically the regular beginning of a match) and a later stage. The later stage still had me start with just a handful of followers, but the maximum amount was at 2000. At the beginning of a match, it’s 5. I started with a regular new game and got a mini tutorial which explained to me how to do wonders (spreading love or instilling fear), create fireworks and so on. I shouldn’t forget the imp: It let me give it a name, after all, and led me through the tutorial! After the tutorial, it’s basically a swirling light where my mouse cursor is and follows my mouse’s movements on the screen. I am not sure it serves any other purpose, but it was a nice touch in the tutorial.

There is also a little bit of music in the game already. It seems to have a good quality, but at the moment, you hear one song over and over again which is a bit repetitive and you can only change the volume of the sounds, but not turn off the music specifically at the moment. If the rest of the soundtrack is going to be like that, though, then it’ll be very nice to listen to while playing the game.

I am not sure if the villagers’ faces will stay like that. It’s creepy, to be honest. It looks like dead dolls and I don’t much care for the villagers that way. They all have individual names, at least, which makes it easier to identify them. Maybe at some point you even have your favourites that you spoil here and there with a bit of extra love and healing.

The developers decided to keep the user interface to a minimum and I like that. I think it’ll work very well with this kind of game, although I did wish to see more information. You can see how many followers you have at the top of the screen. For each village, you can get more information as well when hovering over them. I’d just like to have one screen of information, at least. A list of all villages and the percentages of followers I have in each of them and so on. Other than that, having the minimal UI is fine. It makes you focus on the screen and the villages themselves. Villages that mainly follow me have a certain kind of roof colour, by the way. Blue in this case – not sure it’ll always be blue for the player or if we will be able to choose the colour we want.

I also started a late game with a maximum of 2000 followers, but I quickly fell behind the AI. They had something like 190 followers while I dropped from 58 to 56. I was spreading wonders and inspired villagers to make them more productive, but there was no strategy behind my actions. I quit the game at that point. Quite obviously, I didn’t really know what I was doing. But I also figured that I don’t have to: There’ll be plenty of time to learn the game once it has all the features in – in about a year. At least, I already have one game to look forward to in 2021!

And since I only write about my experiences and I’m sure that there’ll be people here that would want to see a video of the game instead now, I’ll leave you with two recommendactions, an English and a German video. You can also hear the music there! It’s really atmospheric and calm.

youtube

Please note: I did receive the early alpha version for free. I was not asked to write about the game! In other words: All opinions are my own. But as you may know, if I’ve got nothing nice to say, I usually prefer not to say anything at all. So if I didn’t like the game, you probably wouldn’t see a blog post about it.

Also: This is a Kickstarter project. As with any Kickstarter project, there is no guarantee to a) receive a finished product and b) that the finished product will be as described now because the game is still in development. Do not back any Kickstarter unless you’re certain that you still want to support the project even with these risks!

Remember Black & White? How about Fata Deum then? #Blapril2020 #Kickstarter @42BitsEntertain Good old Black & White... I loved the game and I hated it. To be honest, I never got far.

#42 Bits Entertainment #Blapril2020 #Fata Deum #Indie Developer #indie games #kickstarter

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marcos008-blog · 5 years

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Citroen DS 19 – 1956 – 1bb

The Citroën DS (French pronunciation: [si.tʁɔ.ˈɛn de ɛs]) is a front-engine, front-wheel-drive executive car manufactured and marketed by the French company Citroën from 1955 to 1975 in sedan, wagon/estate and convertible body configurations. Italian sculptor and industrial designer Flaminio Bertoni and the French aeronautical engineer André Lefèbvre styled and engineered the car. Paul Magès developed the hydropneumatic self-levelling suspension.

Noted for its aerodynamic, futuristic body design and innovative technology, the DS set new standards in ride quality, handling, and braking—and was the first production car equipped with disc brakes.

Citroën sold 1,455,746 examples, including 1,330,755 built at the manufacturer’s Paris Quai André-Citroën production plant.

The DS came third in the 1999 Car of the Century poll recognizing the world’s most influential auto designs and was named the most beautiful car of all time by Classic & Sports Car magazine

MODEL HISTORY After 18 years of secret development as the successor to the Traction Avant, the DS 19 was introduced on 5 October 1955 at the Paris Motor Show. In the first 15 minutes of the show, 743 orders were taken, and orders for the first day totalled 12,000. During the 10 days of the show, the DS took in 80,000 deposits; a record that has stood for over 60 years.

Contemporary journalists said the DS pushed the envelope in the ride vs. handling compromise possible in a motor vehicle.

To a France still deep in reconstruction after the devastation of World War II, and also building its identity in the post-colonial world, the DS was a symbol of French ingenuity. The DS was distributed to many territories throughout the world.

It also posited the nation’s relevance in the Space Age, during the global race for technology of the Cold War. Structuralist philosopher Roland Barthes, in an essay about the car, said that it looked as if it had "fallen from the sky". An American advertisement summarised this selling point: "It takes a special person to drive a special car".

Because they were owned by the technologically aggressive tire manufacturer Michelin, Citroën had designed their cars around the technically superior radial tire since 1948, and the DS was no exception.

The car featured a novel hydropneumatic suspension including an automatic leveling system and variable ground clearance, developed in-house by Paul Magès. This suspension allowed the DS to travel quickly on the poor road surfaces common in France.

In addition, the vehicle had power steering and a semi-automatic transmission (the transmission required no clutch pedal, but gears still had to be shifted by hand), though the shift lever controlled a powered hydraulic shift mechanism in place of a mechanical linkage, and a fibreglass roof which lowered the centre of gravity and so reduced weight transfer. Inboard front brakes (as well as independent suspension) reduced unsprung weight. Different front and rear track widths and tyre sizes reduced the unequal tyre loading, which is well known to promote understeer, typical of front-engined and front-wheel drive cars.

As with all French cars, the DS design was affected by the tax horsepower system, which effectively mandated very small engines. Unlike the Traction Avant predecessor, there was no top-of-range model with a powerful six-cylinder engine. Citroën had planned an air-cooled flat-6 engine for the car, but did not have the funds to put the prototype engine into production.

The DS placed third in the 1999 Car of the Century competition, and fifth on Automobile Magazine’s "100 Coolest Cars" listing in 2005. It was also named the most beautiful car of all time by Classic & Sports Car magazine after a poll of 20 world-renowned car designers, including Giorgetto Giugiaro, Ian Callum, Roy Axe, Paul Bracq, and Leonardo Fioravanti.

NAME Both the DS and its simpler sibling, the ID, used a punning name. "DS" is pronounced in French as "Déesse" (goddess); "ID" is pronounced as "Idée" (idea). An intermediate model was called the DW.

MOTORSPORT The DS was successful in motorsports like rallying, where sustained speeds on poor surfaces are paramount, and won the Monte Carlo Rally in 1959. In the 1000 Lakes Rally, Pauli Toivonen drove a DS19 to victory in 1962.

In 1966, the DS won the Monte Carlo Rally again, with some controversy as the competitive BMC Mini-Cooper team was disqualified due to rule infractions. Ironically, Mini was involved with DS competition again two years later, when a drunk driver in a Mini in Sydney Australia crashed into the DS that was leading the 1968 London–Sydney Marathon, 98 miles from the finish line. The DS was still competitive in the grueling 1974 London-Sahara-Munich World Cup Rally, where it won over 70 other cars, only 5 of which even completed the entire event.

TECHNICAL INNOVATION – HYDRAULIC SYSTEMS In conventional cars, hydraulics are only used in brakes and power steering. In the DS they were also used for the suspension, clutch and transmission. The cheaper 1957 ID19 did have manual steering and a simplified power-braking system. An engine driven pump pressurizes the closed system to 2,400 pounds per square inch.

At a time when few passenger vehicles had independent suspension on all wheels, the application of the hydraulic system to the car’s suspension system to provide a self-levelling system was an innovative move. This suspension allowed the car to achieve sharp handling combined with very high ride quality, frequently compared to a "magic carpet".

The hydropneumatic suspension used was pioneered the year before, on the rear of another car from Citroën, the top of range Traction Avant 15CV-H.

IMPACT ON CITROEN BRAND DEVELOPMENT The 1955 DS cemented the Citroën brand name as an automotive innovator, building on the success of the Traction Avant, which had been the world’s first mass-produced unitary body front-wheel-drive car in 1934. In fact, the DS caused such a huge sensation that Citroën was apprehensive that future models would not be of the same bold standard. No clean sheet new models were introduced from 1955 to 1970.

The DS was a large, expensive executive car and a downward brand extension was attempted, but without result. Throughout the late 1950s and 1960s Citroën developed many new vehicles for the very large, profitable market segments between the 2CV and the DS, occupied by vehicles like the Peugeot 403, Renault 16 and Ford Cortina, but none made it into production. Either they had uneconomic build costs, or were ordinary "me too" cars, not up to the company’s high standard of innovation. As Citroën was owned by Michelin from 1934 to 1974 as a sort of research laboratory, such broad experimentation was possible. Michelin after all was getting a powerful advertisement for the capabilities of the radial tire Michelin had invented, when such experimentation was successful.

New models based on the small, utilitarian 2CV economy car were introduced, notably the 1961 Ami. It was also designed by Flaminio Bertoni and aimed to combine Three-box styling with the chassis of the 2CV. The Ami was very successful in France, but less so on export markets. Many found the styling controversial, and the car noisy and underpowered. The Dyane, was a modernised 2CV with a hatchback, competed with the 2CV inspired Renault 4 Hatchback. All these 2 cylinder models were very small, so there remained a wide market gap to the DS range all through the 1960s.

In 1970, Citroën finally introduced a car to target the mid-range – the Citroën GS, which won the "European car of the Year" for 1971 and sold 2.5 million units. It combined a small 55 horsepower flat-4 air-cooled engine with Hydropneumatic suspension. The intended 106 horsepower Wankel rotary-engined version with more power did not reach full production.

REPLACING THE DS The DS remained popular and competitive throughout its production run. Its peak production year was 1970. Certain design elements like the somewhat narrow cabin, column-mounted gearstick, and separate fenders began to seem a little old-fashioned in the 1970s.

Citroën invested enormous resources to design and launch an entirely new vehicle in 1970, the SM, which was in effect a thoroughly modernized DS, with similar length, but greater width. The manual gearbox was a modified DS unit. The front disc brakes were the same design. Axles, wheel bearings, steering knuckles, and hydraulic components were either DS parts or modified DS parts.

The SM had a different purpose than replacing the 15-year-old DS design however – it was meant to launch Citroën into a completely new luxury grand touring market segment. Only fitted with a costly, exotic Maserati engine, the SM was faster and much more expensive than the DS. The SM was not designed to be a practical 4-door saloon suitable as a large family car, the key market for vehicles of this type in Europe. Typically, manufacturers would introduce low-volume coupés based on parts shared with an existing saloon, not as unique models, a contemporary example being the Mercedes-Benz SLC-Class.

The SM’s high price and limited utility of the 2+2 seating configuration, meant the SM as actually produced could not seize the mantle from the DS.

So, while the design funds invested would allow the DS to be replaced by two cars – a ‘modern DS’ and the smaller CX, it was left to the CX alone to provide Citroën’s large family or executive car in the model range.

The last DS came off the production line on 24 April 1975 – the manufacturer had taken the elementary precaution of building up approximately eight-month’s of inventory of the "break" (estate/station wagon) version of the DS, to cover the period till Autumn 1975 when the estate/station wagon version of the CX would be introduced.

DEVELOPMENT The DS always maintained its size and shape, with easily removable, unstressed body panels, but certain design changes did occur. During the 20-year production life improvements were made on an ongoing basis. ID 19 submodel to extend brand downwards (1957–69)

The 1955 DS19 was 65% more expensive than the car it replaced, the Citroën Traction Avant. This affected potential sales in a country still recovering economically from World War II, so a cheaper submodel, the Citroën ID, was introduced in 1957.

The ID shared the DS’s body but was less powerful and luxurious. Although it shared the engine capacity of the DS engine (at this stage 1,911 cc), the ID provided a maximum power output of only 69 hp compared to the 75 hp claimed for the DS19. Power outputs were further differentiated in 1961 when the DS19 acquired a Weber-32 twin bodied carburettor, and the increasing availability of higher octane fuel enabled the manufacturer to increase the compression ratio from 7.5:1 to 8.5:1. A new DS19 now came with a promised 83 hp of power. The ID19 was also more traditional mechanically: it had no power steering and had conventional transmission and clutch instead of the DS’s hydraulically controlled set-up. Initially the basic ID19 was sold on the French market with a price saving of more than 25% against the DS, although the differential was reduced at the end of 1961 when the manufacturer quietly withdrew the entry level ID19 "Normale" from sale. A station wagon variant, the ID Break, was introduced in 1958.

D SPECIAL AND D SUPER (1970–75) The ID was replaced by the D Spécial and D Super in 1970, but these retained the lower specification position in the range. The D Super was available with the DS21 2175ccm engine and a 5 speed gearbox, and named the D Super 5.

SERIE 2 – NOSE REDESIGN IN 1962 In September 1962, the DS was restyled with a more aerodynamically efficient nose, better ventilation and other improvements. It retained the open two headlamp appearance, but was available with an optional set of driving lights mounted on the front fenders. All models in the range changed nose design at the same time, including the ID and station wagon models. Series 3 – Nose redesign in 1967 with Directional headlights

In late 1967, for the 1968 model year, the DS and ID was again restyled, by Robert Opron, who also styled the 1970 SM and 1974 CX. This version had a more streamlined headlamp design, giving the car a notably shark-like appearance. This design had four headlights under a smooth glass canopy, and the inner set swivelled with the steering wheel. This allowed the driver to see "around" turns, especially valuable on twisting roads driven at high speed at night.

Behind each glass cover lens, the inboard high-beam headlamp swivels by up to 80° as the driver steers, throwing the beam along the driver’s intended path rather than uselessly across the curved road. The outboard low-beam headlamps are self-leveling in response to pitching caused by acceleration and braking.

However, this feature was not allowed in the US at the time (see World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations), so a version with four exposed headlights that did not swivel was made for the US market.

This ‘turning headlight’ feature was new to the market – it had only been seen before on the very rare three headlight 1935 Tatra 77A. The Tucker, which never was mass-produced, had a central headlight that turned with the steering. 45 years later, it is now a commonly available feature, even in the United States.

NEW GREEN HYDRAULIC FLUID The original hydropneumatic system used a vegetable oil liquide hydraulique végétal (LHV), similar to that used in other cars at the time, but later switched to a synthetic fluid liquide hydraulique synthétique (LHS). Both of these had the disadvantage that they are hygroscopic, as is the case with most brake fluids. Disuse allows water to enter the hydraulic components causing deterioration and expensive maintenance work. The difficulty with hygroscopic hydraulic fluid was exacerbated in the DS/ID due to the extreme rise and fall in the fluid level in the reservoir, which went from nearly full to nearly empty when the suspension extended to maximum height and the six accumulators in the system filled with fluid. With every "inhalation" of fresh moisture- (and dust-) laden air, the fluid absorbed more water.

For the 1967 model year, Citroën introduced a new mineral oil-based fluid LHM (Liquide Hydraulique Minéral). This fluid was much less harsh on the system. LHM remained in use within Citroën until the Xantia was discontinued in 2001.

LHM required completely different materials for the seals. Using either fluid in the incorrect system would completely destroy the hydraulic seals very quickly. To help avoid this problem, Citroën added a bright green dye to the LHM fluid and also painted all hydraulic elements bright green. The former LHS parts were painted black.

All models, including the station wagon and ID, were upgraded at the same time. The hydraulic fluid changed to the technically superior LHM in all markets except the US and Canada, where the change did not take place until January 1969, due to local regulations.

INTERNATIONAL SALES AND PRODUCTION The DS was primarily manufactured at the Quai André-Citroën in the Javel neighborhood of Paris, with other manufacturing facilities in the United Kingdom, South Africa, the former Yugoslavia (mostly Break Ambulances), and Australia.

Australia constructed their own D variant in the 1960s at Heidelberg, Victoria, identified as the ID 19 "Parisienne." Australian market cars were fitted with options as standard equipment such as the "DSpecial DeLuxe" that were not available on domestic European models.

Until 1965, cars were assembled at the manufacturer’s Slough premises, to the west of London, using a combination of French made knock down kits and locally sourced components, some of them machined on site. A French electrical system superseded the British one on the Slough cars in 1962, giving rise to a switch to "continental style" negative earthing. After 1965 cars for the British market were imported fully assembled from the company’s French plant. The British-built cars are distinguished by their leather seats, wooden (early ID19 models) one piece plastic (early DS19 models) dashboards, chromed number plate mount let into the front bumper, and (on pre-1962 cars) Lucas-made electrics. These were all right hand drive cars.

The DS was built and sold in South Africa from 1959 to 1975.

The DS was sold in Japan, but the models were built in France and left hand drive.

DS IN NORTH AMERICA The DS was sold in North America from 1956 to 1972. Despite its popularity in Europe, it didn’t sell well in the United States, and little better in Canada. While promoted as a luxury car, it did not have the basic features that American buyers expected to find on such a vehicle, such as an automatic transmission, air conditioning, power windows, or a powerful engine. The DS was designed specifically to address the French market, with punitive tax horsepower taxation of large engines, as well as very poor roads – it’s no great mystery that it was a fish out of water when those constraints were removed.

Jay Leno described the sporadic supply of spare parts as a problem for 1970s era customers, based on his early experiences working at a Citroën dealer in Boston.

The DS was expensive, with a 115 hp (86 kW) vehicle costing $4,170 in 1969, when the price was $4,500 for a 360 hp (268 kW) Buick Electra 225 4 door sedan. For all years, 38,000 units were sold.

US regulations at the time also banned one of the car’s more advanced features: its composite headlamps with aerodynamic covered lenses. Based on legislation that dated from 1940, all automobiles sold in the U.S. were required to have round, sealed beam headlamps that produced a meager 75,000 candlepower. The powerful quartz iodine swiveling headlamps designed for the 1968 model DS represented so many performance improvements at once that they were far beyond what the regulations could allow.[50] Even the aerodynamic headlight covers were illegal – as seen on the 1968 Jaguar E-Type. It took the lobbying muscle of Ford to point out that the government was requiring two contradictory things – safety, by ensuring that all headlights were best-of-breed circa 1940, and fuel economy through the CAFE standard – by definition, cars with poor aerodynamics are sacrificing fuel economy. Composite bulb lamps and aerodynamic covered headlights were not permitted until 1983.

The European lamps were legal in Canada, including the directional headlamps.

The hydraulic fluid change in 1967 was another brain teaser for U.S. automotive regulators at the Department of Transportation. NHTSA follows the precautionary principle, also used by the Food and Drug Administration, where new innovations are prohibited until their developers can prove them to the regulators; this stifles the experimentation that automakers need to advance their products. NHTSA had already approved a brake fluid they considered safe – DOT 3 brake fluid, which is red and hygroscopic to promote internal rust. This completely different fluid, used in aircraft applications – the technically superior green LHM (Liquide Hydraulique Mineral) – took NHTSA two years to analyze for automotive use. Approval finally came in January 1969, so half the U.S. cars of the 1969 model year use red fluid and half use green fluid.

DESIGN VARIATIONS PALLAS In 1965 a luxury upgrade, the DS Pallas (after Greek goddess Pallas), was introduced. This included comfort features such as better noise insulation, a more luxurious (and optional leather) upholstery and external trim embellishments. From 1966 the Pallas model received a driver’s seat with height adjustment.

STATION WAGON, FAMILIALE AND AMBULANCE A station wagon version was introduced in 1958. It was known by various names in different markets (Break in France, Safari and Estate in the UK, Wagon in the US, and Citroën Australia used the terms Safari and Station-Wagon). It had a steel roof to support the standard roof rack. ‘Familiales’ had a rear seat mounted further back in the cabin, with three folding seats between the front and rear squabs. The standard Break had two side-facing seats in the main load area at the back.

The Ambulance configuration was similar to that of the Break, but with a 60/30 split in the rear folding seat to accommodate a stretcher. A ‘Commerciale’ version was also available for a time.

The Safari saw use as a camera car, notably by the BBC. The hydropneumatic suspension produces an unusually steady platform for filming while driving.

CONVERTIBLE Rarest and most collectable of all DS variants, a convertible was offered from 1958 until 1973. The Cabriolet d’Usine (factory convertible) were built by French carrossier Henri Chapron, for the Citroën dealer network. It was an expensive car, so only 1,365 were sold. These DS convertibles used a special frame which was reinforced on the sidemembers and rear suspension swingarm bearing box, similar to, but not identical to the Break (Station Wagon) frame.

CHAPRON VARIATIONS In addition, Chapron also produced a few coupés, non-works convertibles and special sedans (including the "Prestige", same wheelbase but with a central divider, and the "Lorraine" notchback).

BOSSAERT COUPE Between 1959 and 1964, Hector Bossaert produced a coupé on a DS chassis shortened by 470 mm. While the front end remained unchanged, the rear end featured notchback styling.

THE REACTOR In 1965, noted American auto customizer Gene Winfield created The Reactor, a Citroën DS chassis, with a turbocharged 180 hp (130 kW) flat-six engine from the Corvair driving the front wheels. Since the DS already had the engine behind the front wheels, the longer engine meant only one row of seats. This was draped in a streamlined, low slung, aluminum body.

The Reactor was seen in American Television programs of the era, such as Star Trek: The Original Series episode 2.25 ("Bread and Circuses)," Batman episodes 110 ("Funny Feline Felonies") and 111 (driven by Catwoman Eartha Kitt), and Bewitched, which devoted its episode 3.19 ("Super Car") to The Reactor.

MICHELIN PLR The Michelin PLR is a mobile tire evaluation machine, based on the DS Break, built in 1972, later used for promotion. Technical details

SUSPENSION In a hydropneumatic suspension system, each wheel is connected, not to a spring, but to a hydraulic suspension unit consisting of a hydraulic accumulator sphere of about 12 cm in diameter containing pressurised nitrogen, a cylinder containing hydraulic fluid screwed to the suspension sphere, a piston inside the cylinder connected by levers to the suspension itself, and a damper valve between the piston and the sphere. A membrane in the sphere prevented the nitrogen from escaping. The motion of the wheels translated to a motion of the piston, which acted on the oil in the nitrogen cushion and provided the spring effect. The damper valve took place of the shock absorber in conventional suspensions. The hydraulic cylinder was fed with hydraulic fluid from the main pressure reservoir via a height corrector, a valve controlled by the mid-position of the anti-roll bar connected to the axle. If the suspension was too low, the height corrector introduced high-pressure fluid; if it was too high, it released fluid back to the fluid reservoir. In this manner, a constant ride height was maintained. A control in the cabin allowed the driver to select one of five heights: normal riding height, two slightly higher riding heights for poor terrain, and two extreme positions for changing wheels. (The correct term, oleopneumatic (oil-air), has never gained widespread use. Hydropneumatic (water-air) continues to be preferred overwhelmingly.)

The DS did not have a jack for lifting the car off the ground. Instead, the hydraulic system enabled wheel changes with the aid of a simple adjustable stand. To change a flat tyre, one would adjust the suspension to its topmost setting, insert the stand into a special peg near the flat tyre, then readjust the suspension to its lowermost setting. The flat tyre would then retract upwards and hover above ground, ready to be changed. This system, used on the SM also, was superseded on the CX by a screw jack that, after the suspension was raised to the high position, lifted the tire clear of the ground. The DS system, while impressive to use, sometimes dropped the car quite suddenly, especially if the stand was not placed precisely or the ground was soft or unlevel.

SOURCE AND RESERVE OF PRESSURE The central part of the hydraulic system was the high pressure pump, which maintained a pressure of between 130 and 150 bar in two accumulators. These accumulators were very similar in construction to the suspension spheres. One was dedicated to the front brakes, and the other ran the other hydraulic systems. (On the simpler ID models, the front brakes operated from the main accumulator.) Thus in case of a hydraulic failure, the first indication would be that the steering became heavy, followed by the gearbox not working; only later would the brakes fail.

Two different hydraulic pumps were used. The DS used a seven-cylinder axial piston pump driven off two belts and delivering 175 bar (2,540 psi) of pressure. The ID19, with its simpler hydraulic system, had a single-cylinder pump driven by an eccentric on the camshaft.

GEARBOX AND CLUTCH HYDRAULIQUE OR CITROMATIC The DS was initially offered only with the "hydraulique" four-speed semi-automatic (bvh—"boîte de vitesses hydraulique") gearbox.

This was a four-speed gearbox and clutch, operated by a hydraulic controller. To change gears, the driver flicked a lever behind the steering wheel to the next position and eased-up on the accelerator pedal. The hydraulic controller disengaged the clutch, engaged the nominated gear, and re-engaged the clutch. The speed of engagement of the clutch was controlled by a centrifugal regulator sensing engine rpm and driven off the camshaft by a belt, the position of the butterfly valve in the carburettor (i.e., the position of the accelerator), and the brake circuit. When the brake was pressed, the engine idle speed dropped to an rpm below the clutch engagement speed, thus preventing friction while stopped in gear at traffic lights. When the brake was released, the idle speed increased to the clutch dragging speed. The car would then creep forward much like automatic transmission cars. This drop in idle throttle position also caused the car to have more engine drag when the brakes were applied even before the car slowed to the idle speed in gear, preventing the engine from pulling against the brakes. In the event of loss of hydraulic pressure (following loss of system fluid), the clutch would disengage, to prevent driving, while brake pressure reserves would allow safe braking to standstill.

MANUAL – FOUR SPEED AND FIVE-SPEED The later and simpler ID19 had the same gearbox and clutch, manually operated. This configuration was offered as a cheaper option for the DS in 1963. The mechanical aspects of the gearbox and clutch were completely conventional and the same elements were used in the ID 19. In September 1970, Citroën introduced a five-speed manual gearbox, in addition to the original four-speed unit.

FULLY AUTOMATIC In September 1971 Citroën introduced a 3-speed fully automatic Borg-Warner 35 transmission gearbox, on the DS 21 and later DS 23 models. It is ironic that the fully automatic transmission DS was never sold in the US market, where this type of transmission had gained market share so quickly that it became the majority of the market by this time. Many automatic DSs, fuel-injected DS 23 sedans with air conditioning, were sold in Australia.

ENGINES The DS was originally designed around an air-cooled flat-six based on the design of the 2-cylinder engine of the 2CV, similar to the motor in the Porsche 911. Technical and monetary problems forced this idea to be scrapped.

Thus, for such a modern car, the engine of the original DS 19 was also old-fashioned. It was derived from the engine of the 11CV Traction Avant (models 11B and 11C). It was an OHV four-cylinder engine with three main bearings and wet liners, and a bore of 78 mm and a stroke of 100 mm, giving a volumetric displacement of 1911 cc. The cylinder head had been reworked; the 11C had a reverse-flow cast iron cylinder head and generated 60 hp (45 kW) at 3800 rpm; by contrast, the DS 19 had an aluminium cross-flow head with hemispherical combustion chambers and generated 75 hp (56 kW) at 4500 rpm.

Like the Traction Avant, the DS had the gearbox mounted in front of the engine, with the differential in between. Thus some consider the DS to be a mid engine front-wheel drive car.

The DS and ID powerplants evolved throughout its 20-year production life. The car was underpowered and faced constant mechanical changes to boost the performance of the four-cylinder engine. The initial 1911 cc three main bearing engine (carried forward from the Traction Avant) of the DS 19 was replaced in 1965 with the 1985 cc five-bearing wet-cylinder motor, becoming the DS 19a (called DS 20 from September 1969).

The DS 21 was also introduced for model year 1965. This was a 2175 cc, five main bearing engine; power was 109 hp This engine received a substantial increase in power with the introduction of Bosch electronic fuel injection for 1970, making the DS one of the first mass-market cars to use electronic fuel injection. Power of the carbureted version also increased slightly at the same time, owing to the employment of larger inlet valves.

Lastly, 1973 saw the introduction of the 2347 cc engine of the DS 23 in both carbureted and fuel-injected forms. The DS 23 with electronic fuel injection was the most powerful production model, producing 141 hp (105 kW).

IDs and their variants went through a similar evolution, generally lagging the DS by about one year. ID saloon models never received the DS 23 engine or fuel injection, although the Break/Familiale versions received the carburetted version of the DS 23 engine when it was introduced, supplemented the DS20 Break/Familiale.

The top of the range ID model, The DSuper5 (DP) gained the DS21 engine (the only model that this engine was retained in) for the 1973 model year and it was mated to a five-speed gearbox. This should not be confused with the 1985 cc DSuper fitted with an optional "low ratio" five-speed gearbox, or with the previous DS21M (DJ) five-speed.

IN POPULAR CULTURE President Charles de Gaulle survived an assassination attempt at Le Petit-Clamart near Paris on August 22, 1962, planned by Algerian War veteran Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry. The plan was to ambush the motorcade with machine guns, disable the vehicles, and then close in for the kill. De Gaulle praised the unusual abilities of his unarmoured DS with saving his life – the car was peppered with bullets, and the shots had punctured the tyres, but the car could still escape at full speed. This event was accurately recreated in the 1973 film The Day of the Jackal.

Beyond de Gaulle and the French aristocracy, the roomy DS also appealed to French taxi drivers.

Outside France, the car drew an eclectic customer mix, such as Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, Pope John XXIII, painter Marc Chagall, and actors Ken Berry, Jeff Bridges, and Rosamund Pike.

The DS appeared in several episodes of contemporary television series Mission: Impossible, including substantial appearances in ‘The Slave’ (ep. 2.06) and ‘Robot’ (ep. 4.09).

An ode to Jane Child’s DS21 appears on her 1989 self-titled album.

In 1989, the film Back to the Future Part II featured a modified Citroen DS as a flying taxicab, when the main characters travel 30 years into the future (2015). Scarface (1983 film) with Al Pacino and the 2009 television series The Mentalist both feature the DS in key roles. According to Internet Movie Cars Database, the DS/ID has made over 2,000 film and television appearances so far.

Two films focus on the DS, including The Goddess of 1967 about a Japanese man purchasing a DS (goddess or déesse in French) in Australia, and 1995’s Icelandic-Japanese road movie Cold Fever.

LEGACY Citroën DS values have been rising – a 1973 DS 23 Injection Electronique "Decapotable" (Chapron Convertible) sold for EUR €176,250 (USD $209,738) at Christie’s Rétromobile in February 2006. and a similar car sold by Bonhams in February 2009 brought EUR €343,497 (USD $440,436). On 18 September 2009 a 1966 DS21 Decapotable Usine was sold by Bonhams for a hammer price of UK£131,300. Bonhams sold another DS21 Decapotable (1973) on 23 January 2010 for EUR €189,000.

The DS’s beloved place in French society was demonstrated in Paris on 9 October 2005 with a celebration of the 50th anniversary of its launch. 1,600 DS cars drove in procession past the Arc de Triomphe.

From 2005 to 2008, a young Frenchman named Manuel Boileau travelled around the world in a 1971 DS ambulance. It was an 80,000 kilometer journey across 38 countries called Lunaya World Tour. While traveling through Laos, he located the forlorn 1974 DS Prestige belonging to Sisavang Vatthana, the last King of the Kingdom of Laos, which is now preserved and restored by specialists in Bangkok.

In 2009, Groupe PSA created a new brand – DS Automobiles, intended as high quality, high specification variations on existing models, with differing mechanics and bodywork. This brand ranges across four models, the DS3, DS4, DS5, and the China-only SUV DS 6. The DS3, launched in March 2010, is based on Citroen’s new C3, but is more customisable and unique, bearing some resemblance to the original DS, with its "Shark Fin" side pillar. These have created their own niches, with the DS4 being a mix of a crossover and a coupe and the DS5 mixing a coupe and an estate. Many feature hybrid-diesel engines to maximise efficiency.

WIKIPEDIA

Posted by asienman on 2016-11-06 19:33:59

Tagged: , Citroen DS 19 – 1956 , asienman-photography , asienman-photoart , Auto Museum Volkswagen – Germany – Wolfsburg

The post Citroen DS 19 – 1956 – 1bb appeared first on Good Info.

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lauriecgarcia · 6 years

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This Is How I Finally Got The Bathroom Makeover Of My Dreams

Master bath

Many of the tips that I share on my blog started out as discoveries I made while navigating an unfamiliar situation in my own life. It feels very rewarding when I can turn my trial-and-error experiences into information or advice that someone else can benefit from. And that’s exactly what I’m hoping to achieve with today’s post about my recent bathroom renovations! It was my first major home renovation project, and I really had no idea what to expect when I got started. My hope is that by sharing the whole story, I can help make the process a little easier or less scary for someone else! :-)

The Full Story Behind Our Bathroom Renovation Project

Master and Hall bath after staining cabinets

A Brief History Of Our Home Renovations

I have been bemoaning the state of my bathrooms for several years now. And during that time, I’ve spoken to quite a few other fifty-somethings that have similar feelings about their own homes! Many of us have lived in our current houses for around 20 years now, and our houses could really use a little TLC at this point. And after all the kid-raising and “making ends meet” we’ve done over the years, I think we deserve to finally get serious about the home renovation projects we’ve been dreaming about!

Kitchen – before and after staining cabinets and refinishing countertops

Around five years ago now, I took my first baby step toward updating my own house. We completed a mini-makeover of the kitchen by staining the cabinets and refinishing the countertops. (And even though I’m content with those updates for now, a much more extensive kitchen remodel is still on my wish list for the future!)

Great Room – before and after taking down wall and replacing floors

A couple of years after that, we took down a wall in our living area and replaced most of the flooring on the main level with tile and wood. Since doing those two projects, I’ve been content with almost everything in the house—EXCEPT for our two dated bathrooms!

OGT Kitchen – before and after remodel

Getting Started

This year, I decided to (finally) take a step towards getting my bathroom project started by getting a few bids. The first call I made was to a reputable kitchen and bath remodeling company. The bid I received from them took my breath away, and unfortunately not in a good way. I considered biting the bullet and accepting the bid anyway, but then I thought about the Lowe’s-sponsored kitchen renovation we did at the OGT Studio a few years ago.

Master bath

That project turned out great, so I figured it was worth a call to Lowe’s to see what they could do for my bathroom project. And I’m very glad I did! Not only was their bid a whole $10K(!) less than the first bid I’d received, but the whole process went about as smoothly as a home renovation project can possibly go!

Hall bath

Designing My Dream Bathrooms

After accepting the bid from Lowe’s, we set up a time for a design consultation. I met with a talented designer named Melissa, who was extremely helpful in helping me choose materials for the project. I already had an idea of the look I wanted for my bathrooms (thanks to Pinterest, of course), and Melissa was able to walk me through the pro’s and con’s of various options. She also suggested products that I never would have thought of on my own, and those ended up being some of my favorite parts of the finished design!

Master bath

I was initially a little worried that Lowe’s might not have materials and products that fit the style I wanted, but those worries evaporated quickly! They had a wide variety of products that represented all the current home design trends. A lot of the “Pin-spiration” I had gathered from Pinterest for our bathroom renovation featured oil-rubbed bronze hardware and white subway tiles. And luckily for me, Lowe’s had lots of options to choose from for both!

Master bath – Photo by Allison Niccum

Demolition, Construction, & Installation

The demand for contractors is currently surpassing the supply in our growing town. It’s hard enough to get someone to replace a few light fixtures, let alone sign on for a whole renovation project. But going through Lowe’s gave me access to an array of qualified and proven independent contractors. And since Lowe’s expects their contractors to prioritize those jobs, I didn’t have to worry about being put on their back-burner.

Master bath

Another bright spot in the construction and installation part of the project was our project manager Scott. One of the most common complaints people tend to have about renovations is that they weren’t kept in the loop during the process. But Scott always made an effort to send us a text or stop by to keep us updated. On the few occasions that there was a holdup for some reason, he would reach out to let us know about it. Both me and my worrywart husband appreciated this immensely!

*Note: The contractor we ended up working with was Ideal Kitchen and Bath out of Orem, Utah. I just had to give them a shoutout here because they were so great to work with! :-)

Hall bath

A Job Well Done!

Of course none of the above would matter if I wasn’t happy with the finished product (which I definitely am!) I honestly get a little thrill every time I walk into either one of our bathrooms. My husband summed it up nicely when he said it felt like “walking into a bathroom at a really nice hotel.” Our bathroom renovations actually exceeded my expectations in a lot of ways. I had no idea that a taller vanity, higher shower head, and deeper bathtub would make such a huge difference!

Master bath – Photo by Allison Niccum

If you have the itch to update your tired bathrooms (or kitchen, or any room really), I hope this post gives you the confidence to make it happen. Believe me, if I can spearhead a project like this, you can too! :-)

Have you recently renovated a room in your home, or are you dreaming about a renovation project?

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8302119 https://www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com/my-bathroom-renovation-story from The Top Cleaner https://thetopcleaner.tumblr.com/post/181779163812

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squaretaxis-blog · 6 years

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A few tips for stress free travel and why it is important for every person

The trick of successful and stress-free travel is to plan ahead. While it may seem challenging, your goal is to consider every possible contingency that may arise and take action before it happens. What would you do if your luggage was lost? If you are sick? If you forgot your blue pump? Proactiveness will reduce the likelihood of a serious crisis during travel.

Travel does not have to destroy the bank - if you are willing to plan your holiday spending in advance. First determine how much AFFORD you can get and then develop your travel plan. Start searching for travel deals as early as possible - talk to your travel social, find internet specials, and check out discounts with travel clubs. You can enjoy a package discount at a special price combined with hotels and airline tickets.

If vacations tend to cause problems with your credit card, consider opening a savings account for your trip - you will be charged a small fee each month for your next trip. You should also plan to use traveler’s checks instead of credit cards to stay within your budget. Surprisingly, how easy it is to overfire when starting to distribute plastic! Throughout the trip, be sure to record the amount you actually spent - compared to your budget. You can carry a small piece of paper with you to record the cost and calculate the total cost per day.

If you can’t seem to achieve this in your budget, consider compressing lower-priority charges in exchange for higher-priority charges. When my husband travels with me, we are always willing to stay in a budget hotel so that we can eat and participate in cultural activities. We think that expensive hotels are wasting on us because we spend very little time in the room and we would rather spend the money elsewhere. Where are you willing to trade?

Have you ever left home and suddenly realized that you forgot your toothbrush, shoes or swimsuit? Had to rush to replace the items you left is not only a waste of time and money, but also reduces your travel pleasure. Sometimes you may forget a project that is not easily replaced - such as your checkbook or a report that you should submit at tomorrow's meeting. But you can save a lot of heartache by guessing in the package.

Start with a list of short-term trips (from one to three days) and long-distance travel. You can even create different lists for different types of trips - camping, business, foreign travel, beach trips, cold weather trips, etc. Try to include any and all common items you might need - clothes, toiletries, alarm clocks, night lights, whatever you like. Then use these lists as memory joggers because you are packing for each trip. You can also reduce the amount of time you are prepared to travel by keeping a “pre-packaged” cosmetic bag that contains a copy of the items you use at home. Fill your kit with shampoo, soap, lotion, cosmetics, toothpaste and shaving cream samples - even miniature toothbrushes and razors. These travel-sized items take up less space in your suitcase and you are less likely to leave important things.

Don't forget your important documents - especially if you are traveling overseas. You should plan to bring a citizenship certificate, an official government photo ID (a driver's license or a military ID card is a fine), a national birth certificate with a raised seal and a passport. Remember that children and babies must also hold a travel birth certificate issued by the state.

If you can escape it, try not to check your luggage. I bought a very spacious lever-type carry-on that can hold up to a week of clothes - so I don't have to worry about losing my luggage. If you pack a "mashup" garment and plan to do some washing in the process, you don't need 15 different outfits for a one-week trip. If you have to check one, be sure to keep items that you can't carry with you - toiletries, changing clothes, cleaning underwear, drugs, maps, travel confirmations, and any upcoming business meetings you may need. But everyone can only get a medium and a carry-on bag at most. Remember, you can remedy the underlying packaging at any time, but not overpack! No matter how heavy your trip starts, it will weigh twice as much when you go home.

If you plan to make any purchases on the go, you can decide to bring an extra bag to carry your shopping home. Put your full suitcase in a slightly larger empty box - or take a foldable handbag that takes up a small amount of space in your bag. But the easiest option (although perhaps not the cheapest) is to have each store ship your treasure directly to your home. This is a particularly good policy if you take home any large or bulky aircraft.

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lightandmatter · 6 years

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BenQ SW2700PT: AdobeRGB You Can Afford

For the past two months I’ve been testing the 27″ BenQ SW2700PT QHD (2560 x 1440 pixels) monitor. Viewing my images on its screen, I am continually amazed that so many photographers out there are willing to spend thousands of dollars on cameras that eek out slightly more dynamic range and color depth than previous generations, and then view their images on narrow-gamut sRGB monitors with mediocre color accuracy (that includes you, Mac users). Part of the problem is that wide-gamut AdobeRGB monitors used to be quite expensive, but that’s no longer true: the 27″ BenQ SW2700PT monitor offers 99% of the AdobeRGB gamut with excellent accuracy and costs about $550.

Is it worth it for the non-professional, though? If you’re a serious, passionate photographer, then the answer is yes, though you’ll need to care enough about your images to add a little extra complexity to your workflow[3. The details are beyond the scope of what I can include in a monitor review, but there are plenty of good books and videos out there on color management. At the very least, you’ll need to get familiar with Photoshop/Lightroom/Affinity Photo’s color settings, and be comfortable switching between AdobeRGB and sRGB when you’re outputting for the web or narrow-gamut print. This monitor makes the switching of your hardware easy with the quick control pad.].

In the Box

Like most professional photography monitors, the BenQ ships with a screen hood to protect the screen from glare and color shifts caused by stray light. Additionally, it comes with a puck-shaped quick control pad that allows you to easily change color modes (AdobeRGB, sRGB, monochrome) and make changes to the monitor’s settings.

[/media-credit] The control-puck, seen here in its recessed dock, connects to the bottom of the monitor with a wire, which is not show here. You can put it wherever is most convenient on your desktop.

You’ll also find the expected assortment of cables: power, USB, and DisplayPort. As was the case with the SW271, unfortunately, the monitor only ships with a DisplayPort to mini-DisplayPort cable, which is useless if your graphics card has full-size DisplayPort sockets, since the monitor only has a full-size Display port socket, too. I hope that in the future they decide to include a standard DisplayPort to Displayport cable.

Display Performance

[media-credit id=1 align=”alignright” width=”264″][/media-credit]

The Colors

For about a month, I had the SW2700 set up next to the more expensive SW271 (the major difference being 4K resolution), and straight out of the box, the color reproduction from these monitors was almost identical. Like the SW271, the SW2700PT gave me gorgeous, accurate colors, particularly noticeable in blues and greens, but there were also significant improvements in the skin tones.

[/media-credit] While calibrating the monitor with my Spider5Pro, the display registered 99% of the AdobeRGB gamut.

[media-credit id=1 align=”alignright” width=”300″][/media-credit]

It’s was no surprise that the two monitors matched so nicely straight out of the box; both ship pre-calibrated and a calibration report greets you as soon as you open the packaging. The ΔE[2. Delta-E is a measurement of color accuracy, where 0.0 is perfectly matching, and 2.0 is the smallest difference that is indistinguishable to the human eye.] numbers were not quite as small as those of the SW271, but I couldn’t see a difference visually. The average ΔEs were 1.69. I achieved this result by using the quickest of the calibration procedures; using a longer one may have provided better results, but this was good enough for my purposes. You can see the complete chart, below:

General Results

Report summary

Passed

Fri Mar 30 13:20:48 2018

Manufacturer

BENQ

Model

SW2700

Serial Number

ECH01958SL0

Profile

SW2700 1_D65_AdobeRGB_L160_G22_2018-03-30T19.53.26Z.icm

Target

D65

Test

Measured

Status

Average ΔE

1.69

Passed

Maximum ΔE

2.52

Passed

Target

Measured

Color

Index

RGB

L*a*b*

xyY

ΔE

255 255 255

100.00 0.00 0.00

100.00 -0.39 2.48

0.3164 0.3336 157.10

2.41

241 241 241

95.63 0.00 0.00

95.93 0.51 -2.00

0.3099 0.3250 141.14

2.05

228 228 228

91.20 0.00 0.00

91.51 0.93 -2.27

0.3099 0.3241 125.07

2.52

216 216 216

86.71 0.00 0.00

87.23 0.99 -2.18

0.3100 0.3240 110.73

2.51

203 203 203

82.14 0.00 0.00

82.90 0.48 -2.07

0.3093 0.3244 97.35

2.15

190 190 190

77.49 0.00 0.00

78.15 0.76 -1.96

0.3098 0.3242 84.01

2.21

171 171 171

70.54 0.00 0.00

71.16 0.49 -1.72

0.3097 0.3246 66.64

1.86

149 149 149

62.60 0.00 0.00

62.83 0.46 -1.72

0.3093 0.3241 49.31

1.79

128 128 128

53.98 0.00 0.00

54.64 0.37 -1.41

0.3096 0.3245 35.48

1.60

96 96 96

40.67 0.00 0.00

41.57 0.61 -1.42

0.3095 0.3232 19.20

1.82

64 64 64

26.09 0.00 0.00

27.13 -0.14 -1.21

0.3067 0.3235 8.08

1.43

42 42 42

15.44 0.00 0.00

15.99 -0.51 -0.56

0.3069 0.3266 3.30

1.00

255 0 0

61.42 89.56 75.15

61.26 89.83 74.64

0.6389 0.3308 46.83

0.29

0 255 0

83.30 -137.97 90.83

83.41 -128.00 91.25

0.2105 0.7112 99.75

1.68

0 0 255

32.98 80.31 -109.38

32.94 80.29 -109.46

0.1502 0.0605 11.90

0.05

It’s also worth mentioning that the SW2700PT uses 14-bit 3D look-up tables for processing color. The screen panel itself is, according to BenQ, a 10-bit, non-flickering panel (many consumer monitors are 8-bit, or 7-bit with FRC).

The Backlight & Screen Surface

I was very impressed by the smooth, even backlight of the SW2700. There were no apparent bright spots or bleeding around the edge, though a photograph in low light did turn up a very slight amount of bleed in the bottom center of the screen. Again, it was not visible during real-world use. Similarly, I photographed a white screen and didn’t detect any dark regions, color shifts, or ripples.

The surface of the screen has a nice, light matte finish to reduce reflections and glare. I didn’t encounter any problems with it: no color shifts at odd viewing angles, and the finish was not so heavy as to reduce the depth of blacks. Contrast was good.

Hardware Design

The BenQ SW2700 is a monitor designed for working professionals, and it shows. It’s not flashy looking like a Mac: the finish is simply flat black, with a very thin bezel and a nicely dim power-button. Also unlike Mac monitors, the monitor stand is very flexible, allowing you to adjust the height of the monitor from just a few inches above your desktop to about ten inches, and you can turn the screen from horizontal to vertical orientation for editing portraits or other vertical images. Because there’s so much movement possible with the screen, BenQ very cleverly built a carrying handle into the top of the base’s tower, making it relatively easy to move the monitor around on your desktop. There’s also a VESA mount if you want to use dual monitors or a wall-mount.

Although it looks like dark, brushed aluminum, the base of the monitor is actually covered with a textured plastic shell. It looks nice, but basic. Where the stand’s vertical column attaches to the base place, there’s a round recess that fits the puck-shaped quick control pad. The pad itself has a chrome band around the top, but is otherwise identical to the one that ships with the SW271.

The included (but optional) monitor shade is also black. The interior surfaces of the hood are lined in black velvet, keeping all light reflections to a minimum. If you work in an excessively bright area (I did for my first month of testing), a monitor hood makes a big difference.

[media-credit id=1 align=”aligncenter” width=”740″][/media-credit]

On the left side of the bezel, an SD card reader and two USB ports can be easily reached (especially if you’re not using the monitor hood), which is a significant improvement over the more expensive SW271.

Working With the Monitor : General Opinions

Side by side, the biggest difference between this monitor and the SW271 is that the pixels are actually visible on the SW2700. The experience is very similar to using a 23″ 1080p monitor: the pixels are not prominent, but they’re visible. If we do the math, the QHD screen of the SW2700 has slightly better pixel density than a 23″ 1080p monitor (109 ppi vs 96 ppi), but it’s not a huge difference, whereas a 27″ 4K monitor has a pixel pitch of about 163 ppi.

If you are passionate about photography, and the colors that you capture matter to you, do yourself a favor and get an accurate, AdobeRGB monitor like the BenQ sw2700PT.

This also means that programs designed for 23-24″ 1080p monitors will still look good on a QHD 27″ screen. The text should be legible, icons should not be too small to click on, etc.

Of course, if you’re working with 4K video, you’ll want to get a 4K monitor, but if you’re a photographer simply looking for a little more screen real-estate, a QHD is a good choice, and a clear steup up from a 27″ 1080p monitor.

Unfortunately, since I don’t work with video or play movies on my workstation, I didn’t test out the HDR capabilities of the monitor.

Price

The BenQ SW2700 currently costs $550 on Amazon, but it can also be purchased at places like B&H Photo for the same price. If this doesn’t sound like a great deal, you’re probably not comparing it to other AdobeRGB monitors. Eizo’s 27 inch wide-gamut monitors run around $2500 for QHD panels. The Asus PG278QR is sRGB only and costs $100 more than the BenQ, and while monitors like the Dell Ultrasharp U2717D ($379) look good at first, it only covers 99% of the sRGB gamut, and many other features are lower spec to match (8-bit color rather than 10-bit, no HDR, etc).

Conclusion

Over the years, I’ve used quite a few different monitors, including Eizo and NEC professional monitors, and the BenQ SW2700PT matches or exceeds the performance that I’d have expected from those more expensive brands.

And I’ll say this again: many people will tell you that you shouldn’t get a wide-gamut (AdobeRGB) monitor like SW271 unless you print with an inkjet, because most online printing companies (Shutterfly, Miller’s, etc) only accept photos as sRGB files, and everything posted to the internet will have to be sRGB, too. While this is true and practical advise, there is a certain amount of joy as a photographer in seeing your photographs displayed in beautiful, wide-gamut color. I love looking through my images in Lightroom and working on them in Photoshop (or equivalent programs) and seeing them with all of the greens and blues that get clipped out when using sRGB monitors. At least half of the photos that I shoot are not professional; they’re for myself. And if I’m shooting for my own enjoyment, I want to really enjoy my images with the best color possible. If you are passionate about photography, and the colors that you capture matter to you, do yourself a favor and get an accurate, AdobeRGB monitor like the BenQ sw2700PT.

Unless a 4K monitor is necessary for their workflow, I recommend the SW2700PT even to people who don’t think they need it. If you’re a professional and you know what you need, then rest assured: the BenQ SW2700PT will give it to you. If you need a 4K monitor, the BenQ SW271 is a great choice, too (see my review of that model).

[media-credit id=1 align=”aligncenter” width=”740″][/media-credit]

BenQ SW2700PT Monitor Review: Wide Gamut, Accurate AdobeRGB Color BenQ SW2700PT: AdobeRGB You Can Afford For the past two months I've been testing the 27" BenQ SW2700PT QHD (2560 x 1440 pixels) monitor.

#BenQ #best monitor #monitor

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master-duke-of-dollars · 7 years

Text

“The Name’s Bond.”

“James Bond”

These classic words from the debonair 00 British Secret Service agent are known around the world. Based on Ian Fleming’s 12 novels, the legendary James Bond first appeared on theatre screens in 1963, when the first movie – Dr. No – was released. The franchise has been the longest-running film series in history!

For more than 50 years, this suit wearing MI 6 division commander saved the world ~24 times.

His manners are top notch; coinciding a luxurious lifestyle that’s attributed to his knowledge of top-shelf alcoholic drinks, love of fast European manufactured cars, confident demeanor, and cultured characteristics that have stood the test of time as the standard for being a true gentleman.

Times have changed since Sean Connery took on the now famous James Bond role, so we must ask ourselves the following question: Is James Bond’s lifestyle still the epitome of an elegant gentleman??

James Bond History and Numbers from the Legacy

Ian Fleming was irked by the inability to live the life he dreamed of. Motivated by his brother being in the military, he authored the ultimate spy stories! Personally, I find the books to be more enjoyable than the action-packed films; but, I feel that both are time well spent!

There is no mistaking that the movies have filled the Eon Production’s money coffers to the brim!!! Let’s look at few stats taken from 007james.com

The numbers are adjusted for inflation and in accordance with the CPI

[table id=12 /]

The James Bond character has been played by 6 different actors; each one making bank!

[table id=13 /]

Now the debate begins – who was the best Bond?

I thoroughly enjoyed Sean Connery’s performances, and the movies back in the early days had a better feel to them in my humble opinion. It felt much less based on action and much more on the plot, let us really see the character of Bond — demonstrating the characteristics so well known today. Pierce Brosnan came in a close second, but the action based movies to me didn’t give enough time to enjoy more punch lines (an example coming later in the post). [Note from Jack: Brosnan is the quintessential Bond.]

Unfortunately, in the bond series, there are various scenes between him and the lovely bond ladies that are a bit too aggressive to us. Maybe this is why I feel pretty strongly that Dukes are the better gentlemen these days.

Who’s your favorite bond? Let us know in the comments!

What Makes James Bond a Gentleman?

Top Shelf Indulgences

“Vodka Martini…….shaken not stirred”

Throughout the movies, 007 orders various top-shelf liquors, sometimes stating preferences for limited edition bottles.

Here are a few examples:

Champagne Bollinger R.D. 2002: ~$300 / 750ml bottle

Belvedere Vodka: $80 /1.75L bottle

2005 Château Angélus Premier Grand Cru Classé Saint-Émilion: $430 / 750ml bottle

Macallan 18-Year: $240 / bottle

Drinks from the movie Spectre, written up by www.eater.com

Groomed, Tailored, & Irresistible

Tom Ford or Brioni Suits

Even as 007 loses suitcases, changes countries, and continuously escapes imminent danger – he always finds a way to look dapper. His tailored suits from Tom Ford are quite the quality….and price tag: ~$5,500 each!!!

Image from: http://www.jbsuits.com

Manners and Confidence That Always Get the Girl

In each movie, Bond is able to use great manners, confidence, and mysteriousness to woo any girl he encounters. It’s as made up as the Axe Effect. He’s calm and composed. Always the man with the plan, knowing what to do even when the situation looks dire. James Bond never gives up and always, always goes back to save the girl!

M (his manager) gives him the opportunity to take leave on the government’s dime after saving the world, and the movies never show him doing so without a companion along for the adventure.

As stated above, we don’t condone the aggressiveness in some of the interactions he has. We treat our other halves with respect and love at the Duke of Dollars Kingdom.

5-star Only World Traveller

Not only does Mr. Bond stay in beautiful hotels in fabulous places, he does so in the best rooms such as the presidential or VIP suite. Here are a few places he stayed in the different films:

The Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas: ~$500 / night

Hôtel du Cap – Eden Roc in France: unknown

Hotel Danieli in Venice, Italy: ~$500 / night

The Langham in London: ~$700 / night

Drives fast expensive cars

Here are just three of the many cars throughout the bond movies. The prices below are the current price, not the prices from the past. In the books, James Bond actually drove a pre-war Bentley, but Goldfinger made one of the cars below famous: any idea which?

1. Aston Martin DB10

2. Aston Martin DB5

3. Toyota 2000 GT

Aston Martin DB10 – ~$500,000

Aston Martin DB5 – $1,000,000+

Toyota 2000 GT – $560,000

The answer is the DB5 – the most famous car in the world thanks to the Bond movies.

Always Completes the Mission

In our culture, the commitment and consistency bias mental model is a staple of being successful. We want to be friends with and trust people who are consistent and do what they commit to.

How many missions has James Bond failed out of the 24 we’ve had the opportunity to watch? 0.

This important trait is very gentleman-like because of how valuable that is with a future partner.

Technologically Sound

One of my favorite scenes that show the relationship between 007 and the quartermaster. It is a challenge to stop laughing after the punch line @~1:20 :

“Just took a few seconds Q…”

The New Age Gentleman – A Master Duke!

In this essay, we’re stating that standards for being a gentleman have changed. It’s time we define a new class of gentlemen; we’ve stated our reasons below.

It Costs too Much to live like Mr. Bond!!

According to CNBC, it would cost $1,500,000 to live like James Bond in the movie Spectre – an $800,000 apartment, $250,000 car, $6,000 watch, $4,000 suit, $2,100 hotel, $850 phone, and that doesn’t even include the plane tickets!

The movie is only 2 hours long! To achieve FIRE using the 4% withdrawal rate, Bond would need more than 5 MILLION dollars invested.

SN – the movies fail to mention that Bond was only able to spend like this while on missions. His focus for most of the year is on paperwork and intelligence. When duty calls for an out of state assignment (once or twice a year), he uses the unlimited bankroll of the British Government to fund his lifestyle.

On the other side of this lavish spectrum comes the Dukes of the Duke of Dollar Kingdom. Although the opportunity to take on some Extreme Dating does happen within the budget, our life choices are not even close to the luxurious Mr. Bond.

Because Dukes live frugally and live with end goals in mind, we are able to spend much less – reducing the FIRE number we require. Why does this matter? Because instead of fancy vacations, expensive cars and watches, we indulge in our newfound time by building relationships in our lives – increasing our overall happiness!

We want to also note that once we have achieved our kingdoms, saving up and going to extravagant places can be on the bucket list! Tell us in the comments some of the ideas you have for FIRE. What will you do with your new time?

Do Cars and Clothes Matter? Stability is better!

The Financial Independence lifestyle might not create the most extravagant dates or the designer clothes and suits, but it allows for the most important things in your life.

Have you always wanted a classic car or fancy suit but don’t think you can afford it?

Once your kingdom is built, we say go for the gusto! Financial Independence isn’t about withholding from the dreams you have; it’s quite the opposite, leading you to better control your life to get the things you truly want. All it takes is a commitment, some creativity, and lots of hard work!

[Jack: sometimes my wife and I will dress to the 9’s and “play fancy” for a date. This doesn’t always involve a huge dinner bill or ritzy hotel, but we make a point to adopt overly debonair mannerisms for the night. Netflix in PJ’s is just as fun

The best part of being a Duke? You don’t NEED the fancy life. You can hold the door of a Camry for any lucky lady and she will love you just the same!!

In Millionaire Next Door, the fancy clothes and cars that the U.A.W.s (Under Achievers of Wealth) have are not quite so fancy to the bank account.

Late on a car payment? How about struggling to pay off the car? How about the mortgage? These are things of the past…Dukes use their wealth to rid themselves of the gremlin armies of debt!

By doing so, we open up our lifestyles to focus on passions instead of stressing out to pay those we owe. We budget, we invest, and we prepare for curve-balls. This financial stability leads to knocking out one of the biggest stresses in relationships – finances.

Like the great Bobby McFerrin wrote for us…don’t worry, be happy.

Happy Families Require Commitment

Time with family is an imperative part of your life. You can’t help one of your family’s mini-dukes as they learn the basic multiplication tables if you’re not there when they begin studying them. Dinner at home with the family leads to healthier and happier family members.

Working overtime and long hours once you’re out of the “grind years,” does nothing but take time away from those you care about the most. Our journey to a financial kingdom contests this!

Once you have that F-You money, overtime is a thing of the past – allowing you to focus on priority numero uno – your family!

Dukes Build Homes Not Bachelor Pads

There is a huge difference between real, unwavering, and trust-filled love relationships compared to quick, passionate, fly-bys. Builders of a financial kingdom understand the importance a spouse in their life, so they choose carefully. They add to their happiness for years vs minutes or hours.

You may not get every girl you want or have them automatically at the drop of your name. Ladies may not unrealistically fall in love with you after hours stuck on a train, but you will have that very special person in your life who gives you gifts money just can’t buy!

By being a Duke, instead of a 00 womanizer such as Bond, the only thing you chase after are brave, intelligent spouses with longevity as the motivation to build a wonderful life. One of the most important decisions you make in your life is who you marry, not who you hook up with!

Dukes build homes, not bachelor pads.

It’s like the old question to any gentleman goes: “If you had a daughter or son, how would you want them to be treated?” I’d prefer an answer from those who have financial kingdoms and respect in mind.

Are Fancy Dates a thing of the Past?

We’d never suggest such a thing!

Going on a date with your loved one doesn’t require a fancy car or even a fancy dinner. A fancy date with suits and a beautiful dress, make-up, and candles can be an extravagant experience every once in awhile – plus it’s super romantic. We, of course, are fans of the Extreme Dating policy.

Dukes can afford this without having to suffer the consequences due to their overall financial stability mentioned above.

Just as fun, heading to the grocery store in your sweats and buying your favorite foods (and dessert of course!). Getting back home, you turn the Bluetooth speaker volume up, preheat the oven, and let the cooking collaboration begin…adding in some dances to your favorite song with your other half as you wait!

Disclaimer – I can’t do this LOL [Jack: me neither, but I try]

Once the meal has finished and you both have sung too much and danced until your feet hurt, light the candles on your dinner table, dim the lights, and enjoy the fruits of your labor!

Concluding Thoughts

Our responsibility, motive, and passion has been and will continue to be passing on the values to live that successful life so many dream of. Being a gentleman doesn’t require unlimited funds from the British government.

We hope to have convinced you that the new age of being a gentleman has begun, join us as we change the culture to appreciate the truly finer things in life: time, communication, trust, respect, and fun.

Lastly, although the idea of being a gentleman feels like it mostly relates to the behavior of men, in actuality women have the choice of accepting the different traits that men strive for. In other words, it is just as important for women to decide what the definition of a gentleman is because men are incentivized (as in, they want to find a spouse) to acquire the behaviors associated with that definition. If women ever fawn over men in high heels, you won’t be able to hear yourself think over the click-clack of 5″ manpumps. Likewise, a dating culture that frowns upon objectification and womanizing will help to encourage young bucks to max out their respect games. We are hopeful that the cultural winds are blowing in that right direction.

What gentleman traits do you think are most important to exhibit or require? Do you agree or disagree with our case study?

Tell us what you think by leaving a comment – we’d love to discuss it with you!

Image resources:

Header: Deviant Art

DB10: Top Speed

DB 5: Wikipedia

Toyota 200 GT: https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1967-toyota-2000-gt/

Case Study: Who’s the Real Epitome of a Gentleman – James Bond or Master Duke?? "The Name's Bond." "James Bond" These classic words from the debonair 00 British Secret Service agent are known around the world.

#Celebrity

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