#Afg

[tropical-lycan]

This time I did Renee and Allison!! As well as a secret character that you'll discover in chapter 2 🦊

Part 1: Neil & Andrew

Part 2: Nicky & Kevin

Part 3: Jean & Jeremy

Part 5: Aaron & Wymack

Part 6: Nathan Wesninski

[snowcoming]

IT'S THREE??? THREE BOOKS???????? OMG?

[thefoxesraven]

Also hell's belles BC I already saw some of your cool stuff from that

WIP Wednesday 10/04/23 (CLOSED) | Helles Belles

Before the blinding white light of the entrance hall and emptiness, it was the dim yellow lights of a bar bathroom and panic and terror. Terror as Seth had felt himself loose feeling in his lower legs. Panic as he collapsed and hit his head against one of the sinks. There was guilt that rose when he started to feel himself lose air, and his heart quickened. It wasn't what overdosing felt like — he felt that before. This was worse and it hurt and scared him so much because he knew he wasn't coming back this time. God, his baby brother. Jackson. God. He broke that promise. He broke it. His little brother won’t even know. What was his brother going to do? Please let the treatment work. Mr. and Dr. Wilson please keep him safe. He was so sorry he couldn’t keep his promise. And now he didn’t feel any of that.

He didn’t feel anything. It couldn’t be described as apathy, only emptiness. It was an absence of all feelings and emotions. He took a scan of the area. It was so typical. There were tall strong white marble columns everywhere. They towered over and seemingly went on forever. Seth then found his feet moving towards the front where a long desk stood stretching. Not infinitely so as the columns seemed too. Seth was brought out of his thoughts when a kind voice spoke to him.

“Bryan Seth Gordon Jr.? Welcome to the afterlife, this is the Front Deskth.” Seth’s attention snapped to the man who was wearing a turtleneck and a golden star of David.

[yesdevineruler]

I want more Kai fluff. But fluff that’s also fucked up. Like him killing someone bc they made me sad yk? I JUST WANT HIM TO LOVE ME :(

[kemetic-dreams]

[a2zsportsnews]

ZIM vs AFG, 1st T20I: Zimbabwe secures last-ball win over Afghanistan

Zimbabwe secured victory off the last ball as it beat Afghanistan by four wickets in the first of the three-match T20 series at the Harare Sports Club on Wednesday. Tashinga Musekiwa scored the 11 runs off the last over for home success as Zimbabwe reached its target of 145 after losing six wickets. A 75-run partnership between Brian Bennett, who scored 49, and Dion Myers, who contributed 32,…

[antiques-for-geeks]

Kolchak : The Night Stalker at 50 - They have been, They are, They will be...

This week, Carl runs into something out of this world

And so, just before Christmas 1991, with the end of the Mystery Train nights on BBC2, our brief introduction to the world of Kolchak was over, along with Richard O’Brien’s time as the overlord of the Tube station.

Kolchak signed off for the last time under O’Brien’s care with the series finale, The Sentry; any sneer and snark from our presenter possibly lost to the mists of time.

In some ways, it was all rather sad; here had been an opportunity to have a strand of cheap (for the BBC, at least) horror programming in the run-up to Christmas. The show would have easily taken care of Halloween each year. The timeslot - 23:15 - was nicely inconspicuous too, away from the prying eyes of children and time that some would argue should be given over to more mainstream programming. Plus, the pubs back then closed at 23:30, so no doubt there would have been viewers dribbling in, looking for something to watch until entering the sweet embrace of sleep, their wallets having escaped the loving grasp of the stout yeoman of the bar.

The format, was sound. The BBC had the material in its archives that it could quite happily have used for the serial - shows like The Omega Factor, Doomwatch even a thirst for ITC shows like UFO. There was even the grand-daddy of televised sci-fi horror, Quatermass, although incomplete.

But it was not to be. Instead, a few months later in June 1992, Kolchak returned on Sunday nights for another run. Once again on BBC2, right after Moviedrome (presented at the time by director Alex Cox). Memory plays tricks once more - for years the assumption was that Alex Cox presented the episodes too, but this was the memories of Moviedrome and Mystery Train merging into one. 

A less regimented start time for the series on Sunday nights meant that it wasn’t always possible to watch live; so out of necessity, the episodes were taped. If you were lucky enough to remember or not had your VCR privileges revoked, that is. And that’s how Kolchak came to be stuck in our collective memory. Video tapes that contained a handful of episodes, recorded in the summer and autumn of 1992, watched over and over. Complete with BBC2 continuity intros. Never to be taped over, always to be kept to one side.

Chopper, Horror in the Heights, Legacy of Terror, Mr R.I.N.G., Primal Scream, The Ripper, The Trevi Collection, The Knightly Murders, Demon in Lace.

A repeat airing of the TV Movies in 1993 was added, and they too were committed to their tapes, never to be wiped. But more of that another time.

Then that really was it. Since then, neither the series or the films have darkened the hallways of the BBC again.

There were repeat airings in the UK on Sci-Fi when it wasn’t betrothed to cheap blockbuster knock-offs made by The Asylum, but for that you needed Sky or cable TV. For most people, it was a case that if it didn’t turn up on terrestrial TV, it didn’t happen.

Getting it on home media was also difficult. In a small town asking WH Smith to look it up to see if it was available on VHS resulted in a blank look, ditto the video rental shop.

Sure, it was available on VHS, but only in the states - and only two episodes per tape. You’d need NTSC playback on your video recorder (fortunately mine did) but how would you find it? There was no internet in 1992 for us to look for a supplier in the states and even when there was, finding one prepared to ship to the UK affordably was a different matter again.

But in 1995, things changed. Before social media came along and made everyone mad and shouting at each other, people who could get online started to be able to build websites with companies like Geocities, Tripod or Fortune City. And so people started to put up material about their favourite TV series. Although there would be no video to begin with, here for the first time, we were able to see personal episode guides, and in return share what we thought of the show. Plus, there was more general information about the series itself; behind the scenes stuff, much of it apocryphal but not intended to mislead or cause mischief. Genuine stuff, like confusing Robert Beltran and Erik Estrada and somehow thinking the former was in Legacy of Terror. Which would have been quite something given the age difference between the two actors.

Finally, as it started to become affordable to digitise video, episodes started to appear online and we were able to see the episodes that we’d missed ten or fifteen years before. And then the final piece of the jigsaw arrived - Kolchak on DVD. Here he was in all his glory, and available in Region 2 so that us Europeans could catch up with him properly. The transfer from video was respectable, rather than fantastic, but at last there he was, all 20 episodes available and easy to watch.

And now? None of these shenanigans - £1.89 an episode on iTunes, or possibly free on streaming, although it flits around platforms. No doubt a low quality version to borrow is on the Internet Archive too. All available to watch when you want, how you want.

But for all that convenience, there’s something we’ve lost; having to make an appointment with Richard O’Brien on a Friday night and the serendipity of not quite knowing which episode you were going to get…

The visitor attacks a befuddled cheetah in Chicago Zoo. With all that hay blown at it in the name of special effects, I hope it was on Equity rates.

Plot

Chicago (or Kolchak, at least) is gripped by the Cub’s return to the Baseball World Series. There’s a number of strange events in the background - radio reception across the city is awful, animals are dropping like flies in the city zoo and electronic components are disappearing left, right and centre.

The only thing linking these events seems to be a strange goo appearing where these events take place, and shadowy figures very keen to remove all trace that anything ever happened.

Guests

Darren McGavin and Simon Oakland were joined by :

James Gregory - Captain Quill

Mary Wickes - Dr. Bess Winestock

Maureen Arthur - Woman Speaker

Dick Van Patten - Alfred Brindle

Jack Grinnage - Ron Updyke

Carol Ann Susi - Monique Marmelstein

John Fielder - Gordon Spangler

Rudy Challenger - Stanley Wedemyer

Phil Leeds - Howard Gough

With

Len Lesser - Crowley

Fritz Feld - Waiter

Tony Rizzo - Leon Van Heusen

Dennis McCarthy - Guard

The Scoop

Pop : I had no strong memories of watching this episode before, and on re-watching I can see why. On the plus side, though it still contains a lot of the same familiar elements from the previous two episodes it at least has a different look and feel, with plenty of scenes short during the day. 

There’s also some good interplay with the other members of the INS team, and Darren McGavin is always watchable as Kolchak.

The plot feels more like a typical X-Files episode than usual, and a scene where an invisible force blows out a wall even prompted my wife (who is a big X-Files fan) to wonder if it was caused by the elephant turned invisible by aliens from an extremely silly early episode of that show.

Despite all that, this one felt a little flat to me. The invisible alien was a good idea - anything else would have been almost impossible to pull off without looking ridiculous - but it never felt genuinely threatening.

Mysterious lumps of goo are found at the sites of odd goings-on and Carl is determined to science the heck out of it to get answers.

Tim : I fell asleep during this episode back in 1991 and woke to the end where all I remembered were dancing lights on what seemed to be a washing airer. Such was my befuddled state.

After that however; it gained notoriety. Pop, who managed to wedge his eyelids open for long enough to get to the end, didn't rate the episode at the time. Reading about it in later years, it really didn’t disabuse me of my feeling that I’d not missed out. When I finally did get to watch a copy online over a decade later, I wasn’t taken by it at all. The whole episode seemed pretty poor.

But on watching it back for this review, I finally got it. Maybe it’s just time and experience, but there seem to be strong parallels with The Quatermass Experiment. Envisage Kolchak as the titular Quatermass and you get the idea. A man trying to understand what is going on with something he can’t comprehend because the only frame of reference - the earthly - doesn’t align. Only by stripping back and casting its behaviour in human terms, and mundane ones at that, does he make any kind of sense of the alien’s real motive. 

Part of the link for me to the style of the Quatermass serial is the alien eye-view of the attacks similar to those in the films, the scientist who lets Kolchak know more than she should. Gordo the Ghoul making sure Kolchak isn’t led astray by the superficial willingness of the authorities to cooperate while at the same time, masking shadowy Government agencies’ work to keep proceedings under wraps. A defeated, deflated Vincenzo warned off from his agency pursuing the story.

But the real clincher is the last 15 minutes with Kolchak and the alien in the observatory. Surprisingly, it works. Sure there are compromises - the lack of any physicality of the Alien during the sequence,other than the effects of its actions in the form of knobs that twiddle on their own, may seem something of a let down, but producing a convincing creature would have been nigh on impossible on the budget and risked taking the audience out of the moment. 

You can already see the budget being stretched ultra-thin with the effects they did choose to use. The explosion in the daytime raid on Raydine Electronics is quite the scene and when we lay our eyes on the Alien’s craft, the moment certainly doesn’t underwhelm.

We also see in this episode the world of Kolchak evolving. More than the films, everyone, it seems, hates Carl. With the possible exception of Vincenzo and an unlikely kindred spirit in Monique Marmelstein. Kolchak’s sheer force of will is what’s carrying him through.

Gordo, as always upholding the highest of ethical standards.

Highlight

Pop : The scene where the alien visitor bursts through the wall at Raydine Electronics, sending out a shower of breeze blocks blowing and police officers over their squad cars. Given that this is a cheap old series and it’s shot in the blazing sunlight it looks surprisingly good!

Tim : Carl and Vincenzo discussing the evolving story while Vincenzo has a fine dining chef to serve his every need turns from the comic to the tragic with the intervention of mysterious ‘men in suits’. A small moment in the story, but one that sells the news men's desire for the story meeting the reality of censorship for the greater good. Simon Oakland really sells this moment, his words saying one thing, his physical performance another. It’s at moments like these in the series, you are reminded just how good our leads are.

Carl runs towards the denouement; shots like this add to the Quatermass feel of the story.

Lowlight

Pop : I was disappointed by the standoff with the alien at the observatory near the end. It goes on too long, and the sequence of events is confusing. We also see the same shot of dials being twiddled by invisible hands about five times too many. I felt that the tension generated by the confrontations with the weekly monster in the previous episodes was mostly absent here.

Tim : The alien “attacks”. They just don’t work for me, especially one where a poor cheetah has hay blown at it and then freeze-frames on it looking confused. Doesn’t feel like an alien attack; it feels like someone “messing about and finding out” when the cheetah’s fight or flight instinct kicks in and the cameraman ends up with an arm off.

Updyke vs. Kolchak

‘Uptight’ is back and has been appointed the acting sports editor. He’s still an insufferable weasel as he tries to avoid giving Carl his reward for saving Updyke’s skin. Kolchack runs rings around him in their scene, Easy win for Carl.

Updyke 0 - 2 Kolchak

Score on the doors

Pop : Started off well, and I appreciated the different tone set here, but it failed to stick the landing 4/10

Tim : A strong story, let down by having ideas bigger than its budget. Still good. 7/10

[vibrant-abyss]

Hello, I hope you and your family are well. Can you please help me recycle the post on my account? 🌺 And help rescue my family from the war in Gaza? 🙏 Thank you.

https://gofund.me/37005939

^

[attackcopterblog]

SYLVAN ARMS DEBUTS NEW QD M-LOK ANGLED FORE GRIP

Sylvan Arms has debuted their new QD M-LOK AFG or angled fore grip featuring 3 slot rail mount. Sylvan Arms state “Sylvan Arms Quick Detach Angled Fore Grip 3 slot Rail Mount allows for ease of attaching and detaching without using tools and within a matter of seconds, allowing for a wider range of mounting location options. The Sylvan Arms Fore Grip takes body mechanics into consideration to…

[fmarkets]

American Financial Group Inc. bucks trend with increased earnings per share despite revenue dip https://csimarket.com/stocks/news.php?code=AFG&date=2024-02-24161701&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=tumblr

[jet2travel]

Afghanistan's Cultural Tapestry: Unveiling Authentic Experiences

Delve into the tapestry of Afghanistan's rich culture and embark on a journey like no other. Experience the ancient art of carpet weaving in Mazar-i-Sharif, where skilled artisans create intricate masterpieces. Traverse the breathtaking landscapes of the Band-e Amir National Park, with its azure lakes and towering cliffs. Immerse yourself in the spiritual ambiance of the Blue Mosque in Mazar-i-Sharif, a captivating architectural marvel. Explore the vibrant streets of Balkh, an ancient city steeped in history and myth. Unearth the secrets of Afghan cuisine through a culinary adventure, savoring aromatic dishes bursting with flavors. Discover a world of authentic experiences and create lasting memories amidst the hidden treasures of Afghanistan.

[snowcoming]

the number of times i've thought of exy as neil using fucking iceskates and only realising that it is not on the ice and he's actually running only when it's explicitly stated is kinda sad ngl

[su8ho-blog]

طفل افغان از همان کودکی پشتش بار روزگار است. تا اینکه بیک قلم و کتاب را حمل کند. - 📍 مزارشریف، فغانستان 🗓️ ۳ حمل ۱۴۰۲ 📸 سبحان ©️ SUBHAN Gallery - ‫#کودکی‬ ‫#عکاسی‬ ‫#تصویربرداری‬ ‫#روزگار‬ ‫#عکاسی_جاده‬ ‫#مزارشریف‬ ‫#افعانستان‬ ‫#خراسان‬ ‪#Savethechildren‬ ‪#un‬ ‪#photography‬ ‪#art‬ ‪#subhangallery‬ ‪#Afghanistan‬ #blackandwhitephotography #kids #afg #kabul #everydayeverywhere #asia #un #iphonephotography (at مزار شریف Mazar-e-Sharif) https://www.instagram.com/p/CqHuIGyNYkd/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[feedramc]

دلار هرات نقدی آخرین نرخ معامله شده 46,300 زمان دقیق این قیمت 08:50 TEHRAN 1401/12/28 یکشنبه - 28 اسفند 1401 2023-03-19 Sunday - 2023 19 March برای استعلام دقیق ارزهای موجود در بازار به این پیج مراجعه کنید.👇 @feedramc @feedramc #afghanistan #afghan #afghanwedding #kabul #afghanmusic #afghangirl #afghanculture #afghani #afg #afghandance #afghandress #pakistan #afghanboy #afghanfashion #afghanzoom #afghangirls #afghanstyle #afghanclothes #afghancouple #afghanfood #pashto #afghans #afghanstar #iran #afghanhound #afghansongs #india #love #taliban #afghansong https://www.instagram.com/p/Cp9Wb6doNmZ/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[a2zsportsnews]

AFG vs BAN, 3rd ODI: Gurbaz and Omarzai guide Afghanistan to series win over Bangladesh

Afghanistan batter Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s electrifying century and Azmatullah Omarzai’s all-around performance crushed Bangladesh in Sharjah as the side claimed a thrilling five-wicket win on Monday to secure a 2-1 victory in the one-day series. Chasing 245, Afghanistan opener Gurbaz and Omarzai stitched a 100-run partnership after the top-order failed to sustain Bangladesh’s pace attack led by…

[antiques-for-geeks]

Kolchak : The Night Stalker at 50 - The Zombie

This week, Carl will mostly be dealing with a zombie.

Eight weeks is all the BBC’s introduction to Kolchak amounted to. Although all 20 episodes were available, a decision had been taken to show them out of US broadcast order in their late night Mystery Train strand. Maybe, you’d assume, the BBC went for episodes more in the overall theme when bundled with that evening’s short and film, but it doesn’t seem to be the case.

Maybe the series curator just liked these episodes best.

Maybe the Director General just threw darts at a board and those were the episode numbers they chose to air. 

When the first Mystery Train appeared at a quarter past eleven on Friday October the 11th 1991, it kicked off eleven with the fifth episode of the Kolchak series, The Werewolf. Confusingly we’d have to wait until October the 25th for the series’ second episode, The Zombie, that US audiences had seen on the 20th of September 1974.

Presenter Richard O’Brien hammed up the episode introductions for the camera on a spookily deserted, low lit tube station where the titular train stood at the platform, shrouded in a generous cloak of smoke to aid the ambiance. Memory plays tricks, however. Watching a clip back today however, the station wasn’t quite deserted. It was full of statues of people doing what people do in stations every day of every week of every month of every year. Going about their business.

A welcoming character, wouldn't you agree?

It strikes you that the Mystery Train might have been conceived to exist in a slice of time behind ours. An empty space between seconds or the beat your heart skipped, A personal fiefdom where O’Brien’s character rules supreme, his subjects frozen in time. Viewers assume they are in on the game, that they are somehow apart from it all, but in reality were just as trapped as the statues littering the platform until the programme concluded.

Or perhaps it was just a TV  show and all this is just imagination running wild. Whichever, The Zombie to made its debut on British television, complete with knowing glance and a suitable quip from O’Brien about the improbability of their being a Haitian Community in Chicago in the 1970s.

Less improbable than the episode, mind.

Plot

There’s a series of brutal murders among those in the Chigaco criminal underworld, which all seem to be linked to the gangland killing of a Haitian man. A Haitian man whose corpse keeps turning up in the Police Department morgue despite being buried following his last visit.

Guests

Darren McGavin and Simon Oakland were joined by :

Charles Aidman - Captain Winwood

Joseph Sirola - Benjamin Sposato

Val Bisoglio - Victor Friese

J. Pat O’Malley - Caretaker

John Fielder - Gordon Spangler

Antonio Faragas - Sweetstick Weldon

Scat Man Corthers (sic) - Uncle Filemon

With

Paulene Myers - Mamalois Edmonds

Earl Faison - The Zombie

Carol Ann Susi - Monique Marmelstein

Ben Frommer - The Monk

Roland Bob Harris - Poppy

The Scoop

Pop : A garbled story about revenge enacted by the victim of a gangland slaying, brought back to life by the power of ...voodoo!

This episode does have some plus points. I enjoyed Carl trying to squirm his way out of a hospital trip when he's discovered snooping about by some Italian mobsters. He’s clearly made many enemies on both sides of the law by this point, and it’s a wonder how he hasn’t ended up encased in a concrete piling on a building site.

There’s also the usual selection of stunt-victims being thrown about - this time with a sound like snapping bread sticks as their spines are crushed.

I also think the zombie makeup itself, at least in the final scenes, is as good as could reasonably be expected for a 70's American TV show. 

And since this is a 70's American TV show and also features several prominent black characters we also get small roles for Scatman Crothers and Antonio Fargas (who plays a flash proto Huggy-Bear gang boss).

Despite this it's clearly a step down from the pilot, and seems a much more rushed affair, both in writing and production value.

It’s also worth mentioning that the presentation of the Haitian community (even if just the criminal community) as chicken sacrificing voodoo practitioners sounds like a rambling, semi-coherent bit of 'word weaving' from a Donald Trump rally.

If the story can't really be coherent, make it pretty.

Tim : This is one of the episodes I didn’t catch when it was broadcast, my only memory of the story being a vague outline from a discussion with Pop the Monday after.

The re-telling wasn’t compelling; "there’s a zombie and Kolchak has to fill its mouth with salt. Oh, and it’s really dark so you can’t make out what is going on."

I felt a sense of urgency to watch it from a completist point of view, but not enough to seek it out at all costs. Years later, I found  myself watching a low quality transfer of it online. And frankly I was confused.

Part of that came down to the crime, not being familiar with the concept of the numbers racket. Obviously, it wasn’t a problem for a late-night US audience in the 1970s.

The other part was that we learned a lot from exposition as opposed to seeing the action. Sure, this can work, but when you notice it’s happening, you know it’s not working. Where we do see action, it’s really empty and a massive step down from The Ripper. The Zombie himself barely appears on screen. Even the scenes he’s in, he feels strangely absent.

And this is where the episode falls down in many respects. If we barely see him, why does he need to be a zombie in particular? Replace him with any strongman and the end result would be the same. The whole voodoo thing feels tacked-on in an attempt  to turn a story without a supernatural slant into a Kolchak episode.

Antonio Fargas and Scatman Crothers, while good to see them, aren't used to the extent of the talents, however the inclusion of John Fiedler as morgue attendant Gordo the Ghoul stands out. Sure he’s corrupt, selling information about the bodies in his charge to reporters, but it’s kind of endearingly so. Fiedler Carol Ann Susi’s character of Monique Marmelstein is also a worthwhile addition, the character is played mainly for comic relief, which is a shame.

Yes, there is some decent world-building going on, which suggests better for the future, But this outing feels underdeveloped or even like the script was just in the wrong series. After the strong start with The Ripper, you can’t help but feel disappointed.

Highlight

Pop : Carl climbing into the back of a hearse in a junkyard at night so he can lay the zombie to rest with some salt and a needle and thread is actually one of the more memorable monster encounters from the series, and pretty well executed. The surprisingly decent zombie makeup and the helpless position Carl finds himself in really add to the tension.

Tim : The scenes with the Chicago mob definitely has the hand of David Chase on their shoulder, but it’s the one where Kolchak has to talk his way out of being killed by crime boss Benjamin Sposato and his trusted acolyte Victor Friese that hits best. The punchy, fast dialogue succeeds in being both amusing and menacing at the same time.

That's supposed to be a zombie under the sheet.

Lowlight

Pop : The Zombie returns to his nocturnal den in the junkyard by bus!

Nobody bats an eyelid, and from Carl's vantage point riding on the back bumper he looks like he could pass for a living person... yet when we next see his skin looks like melted cheese and he is clearly very dead. Inconsistencies like this kill any tension the episode was trying to build.

Tim : The criminal underworld’s characters do feel a little too stereotyped, but it’s not as much a deal breaker as the Zombie itself. While we barely see it, when we do it’s.. mixed. During the morgue scene, it’s represented by a healthy arm and feet painted with blue food colouring under a white linen sheet. The way it looks; it might be one of the Blue Man group under there. If they existed in the 1970s. Which they didn’t.

Updyke vs. Kolchak

Updyke doesn’t appear in this episode - so it’s still 1-0 to Kolchak on aggregate.

Score on the doors

Pop : It’s a bit half baked, but still has some Night Stalker magic 4/10.

Tim : An episode that was still working out what it wanted to be pretty much to the end. 3/10.

As the old adage goes; if you need a zombie taking care of, you're best off doing it yourself.