#HOWEVER he does like the restaurant and one of the great appeals of a boss is | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

hollyxqx · 5 years ago

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SHE’S THE ONE // SHOWNU

↪ PAIRING: Reader / Shownu ↪ GENRE: smut > fluff > f2l ↪ WORD COUNT: 7.3k ↪ SUMMARY: Hyunwoo has worked for your family for almost a year now, maintaining the gardens and pool. He’s not as rich as you are, he’s working class and he knows it but it doesn’t stop either of you striking up an unlikely relationship. [inspired by this song]

↪ WARNINGS: lots of smut, dirty talk, rough sex but nothing crazy bc shownu is a sweetheart, total self indulgent filth everyone

a/n: the idea of gardener!shownu came from this story. I just wanted to give the author some credit for inspiring me, so you should read that story if the idea appealed as much to you as me. other than the fact that shownu is a gardener for a rich OC the stories are nothing alike, fyi. this was meant to be A LOT shorter but i couldn’t help myself, srry.

ALL ABOUT LUV SERIES

Hyunwoo can feel your eyes on him as he paints the new patio furniture, outside in the glaring hot summer sun. It's touching on thirty degrees Celsius and he can feel beads of sweat trickling from his nape, running down the back of his white vest as he works. He's thankful he remembered his cap today, not only does it shield his eyes from the brightness of the sun but it enables him to sneak an occasional glance at you.

The day you first met he remembers thinking two things. One; oh my god, she's pretty and two; I can't do anything about it. You were the bosses daughter and he needed this job. Unlike you Hyunwoo was not born into a life of wealth and luxury. His hands were his means to a living, not shy to hard work.

He didn't know what your father did exactly to earn the estate, from the other staff he'd heard the title but it was so long and self-important Hyunwoo failed to remember it. Some kind of marketing, analytical something or other. You didn't have to be a humble labourer to know that meant money.

The mother didn't work. She didn't need to. Hyunwoo only ever saw her shopping, having brunch, shopping some more and doing yoga with someone he highly doubted was just her yoga instructor, unless yoga meant fondling the tan 23 year old instructor three times a week. The whole world was so alien and unfamiliar to him, he almost felt like a spectator at times.

You, however. You were different. That fact was deduced very quickly. After only a few weeks of getting to know you it became apparent that you weren't like the rest of your family. If he didn't know any better he sensed some resentment on your part even though the you never explicitly said the words out loud.

It was in what was unspoken that clued him in - the disdainful sighs when your mother had a cocktail at 10am, the way you went quiet whenever your father was mentioned, the fact that you helped out the staff when you didn't have to. Many a time he saw you washing dishes with the maid. Only when your parents weren't around though, he knew they would scold you if they caught you in the act.

So, he didn't mind the fact that you were staring. You were a hot girl, who appeared nice enough, and who found him attractive, what wouldn't he like about that? Hyunwoo hadn't had a girlfriend in nearly two years, much of his time spent working to afford college, so the attention you sent his way felt nice. Even if he couldn't act upon it, he could enjoy it.

"Um, Hyunwoo?" Your voice draws his focus from his work and he squints up at you in the sunlight. You're wearing that navy blue bikini he's seen plenty of times before and denim shorts. An image he knows will be swirling in his thoughts for the rest of the day, whether he wants it to or not. "Would you like some lunch?"

He's overdue a break anyway, and frankly any excuse to get away from the midday sun before his skin starts to burn is good enough for him. "Sure." He accepts, carefully putting his tools away. He sets them in the shade, wiping at his sweaty forehead with the t-shirt he removed earlier.

"Come eat inside, there's aircon." You inform him and he follows you indoors. Inside the kitchen he's surprised to find a somewhat elaborate spread of fruit, sandwiches and salad atop the island that sits in the middle of the room. He immediately goes to the sink to wash up as you get some plates.

"Ana outdid herself. It looks great." He mumbles as he dries his hands. Ana was the head housekeeper, worked there the longest and she was well known as the best cook in the home.

"Oh, I did this." You blush adorably and he pauses for a second. "I thought you might be hungry. I know I am."

"You made all this for me?" He asks, a little dumbfounded. He can't quite believe you'd go to all this trouble for the gardener. It only further cemented your nice nature for him.

"Yeah." You reply shyly, smiling as you pour both of you some icy water. "I enjoy cooking. Especially for others."

Hyunwoo can't help but watch you for a moment as you load your plate up with food, biting back a smile when you take his plate and do the same. "Thank you." He says gently as he takes the food from you. You share a look and he swears his heart stills for a moment.

***

It doesn't take long until eating together becomes a routine. You're home from college for the summer, you tell him one Friday lunchtime, this time over some of the best steak he's ever eaten. From what he can gather you adore the college you attend, your entire face lights up animatedly when you speak about it. Part of him suspects it's because you're away from the clutches of your family.

"I really want to get a job this summer, maybe even volunteer." You tell him as you sit opposite the kitchen island once more. "The parents aren't so thrilled about that. My mom wants me to go to Europe with her. Dad is obviously working."

"Europe sounds incredible." He offers.

"I've been before." You sigh. Hyunwoo can't help but find it bizarre that you're so unenthusiastic about a potential overseas trip. He's never even been abroad. "The rest of my class are working or interning. I wish I could too."

He knows it's ridiculous to feel sorry for the poor little rich girl who has literally everything but he can't help it. He might not be wealthy but he knows all too well what it's like to feel like an outsider and wanting nothing more than to just be like everyone else. Albeit for different reasons. You were sweet, his empathy felt deserved.

"You should do it." He tells you sincerely. "Your parents can't exactly kidnap you and take you to Europe can they?"

"You'd be surprised." You laugh, drly. "Who knows what they're capable of."

He doesn't know how to respond, so he's silent as you finish you meal. As nice as it would be to have more money than sense, at least he has freedom.

***

The first time you kiss is at the end of the summer.

Hyunwoo doesn't anticipate it happening and is unprepared. It wasn't the best kiss he's ever had given it's surprising nature, your teeth briefly clacked, but it was nice nonetheless. The sun is setting when you corner him around the back of the pool house, hidden from view. You ask him some question about him minding if you go for a late night swim (he never has and you've never needed his permission) - he knows it is an excuse.

There's a moment of hesitation, a sweet thank you falls from your lips and before he knows it your mouths are connected. Body curled in to him, tongue in his mouth he can't help but kiss back. You walk away before he can barely register what's happened.

***

Autumn is creeping it's way on to the landscape when the second kiss happens.

It's almost as if you've forgotten the first one, since you've never brought it up. Hyunwoo doesn't either, mostly assuming it was just a momentary impulse moment, mostly not wanting to make anything awkward with you. He's still enjoying the lunches you're preparing for him and doesn't want them to stop.

The working day is coming to a close for him. He's a lot sweaty and a little dirty when your paths cross. Your voice startles him as he's winding up the garden hose. "Hi Hyunwoo."

"Hi." His hands continue on autopilot until the work is done.

"I'm going back to school tomorrow." He knew that, gossip among the staff, but he stays silent, nodding as if it's brand new information. "I just wanted to say bye. Until next summer I guess."

"Bye." He says softly, earning him a tiny laugh from you. "I know you will be happier there than here."

"I'll miss those lunches though."

He's surprised and hope it doesn't read too blatantly. "Me too. I'm going to have to go back to eating turkey sandwhiches or ramyeon. Alone."

"Are you working here during the winter?" You ask.

"Yeah, just less frequently. Once every two weeks." He's got another job as a waiter in a slightly posher-than-he's-used-to restaurant but he doesn't tell you that. You probably won't care too much about him when you're not here.

"Maybe I'll see you at Christmas break." You hum. He offers a polite agreement. "You weren't...mad that I kissed you?"

That he didn't expect, as far as he was concerned you had swept that off the table. "No, I wasn't. I liked it."

"I liked it too."

The air changes and he somehow just senses it, just feels it in his bones what's going to happen next. You're so close to him, licking your lips like that and he doesn't miss how your eyes flit to his own mouth. This time Hyunwoo closes the ga with the wave of confidence that surges.

This kiss is much better than the first one, an air of desperation of it being the last time hangs thickly. Momentarily forgetting he's just worked a hard day of manual labour and isn't necessarily the cleanest he pulls your body against his anyway. One hand on your waist, the other grasping you between your shoulder blades.

You're the one to deepen the kiss and he swears he hears the tiniest moan over the thrumming in his ears. A hand slides down his muscular chest and fists his shirt. "Hyunwoo." You say breathlessly. It's not a question because your lips are back on his again.

His knees hit the back of a sun lounger, unsure of who was pulling and pushing who. He sits down and tugs you on to him, a knee on either side resting comfortably on his lap. This is not a good idea, he knows it but that part of his brain that's rational is loosing blood supply when you grind your hips against his. He's growing hard and it would be embarrassingly quickly if you weren't whimpering atop of him, loosing yourself in the moment too.

You shouldn't have sex. Out in the open like this. You shouldn't have sex at all, he works for you. Hyunwoo is trying to wrack his brains to remember who is home and who's not. The thought evaporates when you bite his bottom lip and tug at the nape of his hair. "You're so fucking hot Hyunwoo."

He's never heard you swear before, always assumed you weren't into such dirty language. His brain instantly ignites at the idea of you saying the dirtiest things he could imagine to him. It's something he's definitely thought about prior. He groans.

"So are you." He gets out in between kisses. Instinctively his hand is sliding up your cold thighs, the dress you're wearing not entirely weather appropriate for the cooling summer air. He grips your ass with a squeeze.

"I've wanted to kiss you so badly since the day we met." You admit through a breathy laugh. Even in the diminishing light he notices your cheeks flush a little. He's a little lost for words at the moment otherwise he'd tell you that he's felt the exact same way.

"Yeah?" Is all he manages to get out in an exhale.

"Mmhmm," You nod, raking your hands all over his chest. "And so much more."

Before he can respond you're kissing again. He wants to know what more means and he wants to know so badly it's making his cock ache. He needs it, so he shifts you on to your back, skirt rising up and exposing your panties. Even the sight of that is something he never thought he'd see in his wildest dreams. You were so untouchable just weeks ago and know you were underneath him at his mercy.

"I'd do anything you want me to." He murmurs in your ear, a knee separating your thighs for him as he hovers over you. "You're so pretty."

"What if I wanted you to touch me?" You ask.

"I am touching you." He can't help but smirk.

"Touch me like this."

You take his hand and run it over your clothed centre where he grazes a knuckle over your folds. At the contact the material presses into your wetness and he can't believe he did that. You're wet. For him. He rubs his hand up and down a few times and the noise that you elicit is sinful.

He looks up at you for approval as he slides your underwear slowly down your thighs. Your finally bare for him and he can't help it, too lost in the moment, he places a kiss on your mound, tongue sneaking between your lower lips for a second. It makes you gasp.

"God, like this - " He hangs his head for a second between your thighs, overwhelmed. "Like this you're perfect. Even if you told me to stop now the sight of you like this is, fuck, a wet dream." His cheek nuzzles your inner thigh where he places another wet kiss.

"Would this make it better?" You tease, nimble fingers unbuttoning your dress so your tits are exposed. His mouth hangs open as he nods, unable to eloquently articulate how fucking good you look and how hard he's trying to commit this to memory.

Nothing is said but he knows what to do, sitting up a little and kissing your breasts. He begins to stroke between your legs as he devours your tits. "Is this the right spot? Show me." He whispers against your skin.

"Do it like this," You guide his hand to the exact right place you want to be touched, moaning when he reaches it. "Fuck, Hyunwoo, just like that." You whine.

He can feel his dick leaking at that. Not only did you swear, you whined his name. He sucks on your nipple as your hips begin to work in tandem with his hands. "You want my fingers in you too? Hmm?" He asks.

"Yes, yeah - oh fuck - yes."

You're wet enough that he slides two in right away. He can only imagine in his mind how lewd this scene must look from an outsiders perspective, hand buried in your pussy. Starting off slow to gauge your reaction he sets what he hopes is the perfect pace, examining every detail on your beautiful face as your eyes flutter shut. You're chewing on your bottom lip, arching your back and falling apart in just the right way.

It's so much, touching you like this. "Yeah?" He manages to husk.

He's rewarded with a loud moan and a roll of your hips in time with his fingers. "Would you - ahh, would you fuck me if I asked?" You pant.

He didn't expect the question, and ruts his hips against your leg involuntarily with a groan into your skin. "Ugh, yeah. Yeah, I would."

"Here?"

"Here?" He repeats in surprise, pulling back to see if you really mean it. He wonders if you maybe have a thing for getting caught, or maybe even watched. God. "Really? You really want that?"

"Or we could fuck in the pool house. It's up to you." You laugh, biting your tongue with a grin. His hand hasn't stopped moving this entire time, even if he has slowed down. The thought of fucking you out here is hot but he can't risk it. What if someone caught him? That's his income gone.

"Take me to the poolhouse." He kisses you, discreetly wiping your wetness off on his denim thigh. It's hard to stop when he wants to see you cum so desperately. You grin and don't even bother to fix your half open dress before taking him by the hand. Both of you stumble excitedly across the garden, him pressed up against your back. He can't stop his hands roaming your body.

The poolhouse is nicer than any house Hyunwoo has ever lived in. What else did he expect. You know the way so he lets you lead him to the bedroom. You don't even bother with the light, tumbling onto the plush mattress, tangling together the instant you're able.

You yank off his shirt. "I'm a little sweaty." He laughs once he's topless.

"I don't care. Is it weird that I kind of like it?"

"Probably." He kisses you again while he removes your dress entirely. "I kind of get the feeling you're into lots of weird things."

"Define weird." You breathe, kicking off the remnants of your panties. His denim and boxers follow.

"Kinky."

"One person's kinky is another's boring Tuesday night."

"I can't wait to find out." He really can't. You're naked beneath him now and he's half expecting this to be a dream. He hovers over you and loves the way you shudder when his bare cock brushes against your thigh. You whine and reach for it with both hands, giving him a few lazy strokes. If your hands are this warm and soft he can't even imagine how good your cunt is going to feel.

He fucks into your fist a few times because it feels so good. "I fucking need you inside me, Hyunwoo. Please put your cock in me. Stretch me open and make me cry because it feels so good."

Shit, he loves your dirty mouth.

The blunt head of his cock drags through your wet pussy a few times to make the glide of him entering just that bit better. He presses in slowly, watching with wide eyes as your cunt swallows him whole. You keen as you fist the sheets. Then he's buried to the hilt and has to still for a few moments, or risk cumming quickly and embarrassing himself.

Before he beings thrusting he pushes both your legs a little wider apart. "Please." You beg and he listens, rocking his hips to meet yours. "Yes, oh - fuck yes." You breathe as he moves.

"I want you to cum." He husks into your ear. "How can I make you cum around my cock huh?"

"Touch my clit and don't stop moving like this."

He leans a little heavier on one arm so he can access your swollen clit with his right hand. Remembering what you told him earlier he gets to work. There's not much more said as he fucks you, mainly just breathy gasps and groans escaping both of you.

He loves that you tell him when you're about to cum. He's been with girls before who never said anything and he always found it hot when they did. He cums shortly after you, pulling out and shooting his load on your stomach.

The way you look, plump bottom lip between your teeth, eyes closed and covered in the evidence of his orgasm, well. He doesn't think he's ever seen anything sexier.

***

He's done it before. Fucked girls and had no further contact with them again. But it feels weird with you because he works for you. Has to talk to the people in your life frequently but has no idea about you. Phone numbers were not exactly exchanged and he's not really interested in social media. It complicates things, and he prefers simple.

The worst part about it is he can't even ask about you. It's odd if he shows too much interest in you. None of the household were particularly aware that a minor friendship even existed between you at one time.

Hyunwoo's not sure if he wants to know. He assumes you're happy and that's really all he can logically come up with. You'd never discussed anything extremely personal with him over your little lunch dates and he'd never pressed you on it. He wonders if you'll have a boyfriend by Christmas time when you're home again.

He hopes not.

***

He starts night classes late September now that he can afford to. His scrimping and saving allowing him to fund the business management course he takes. It's not much and it's not exactly a degree from some prestigious university but he learns a lot and best of all, he can continue working during the day.

After all, he has rent and bills to pay. Hyunwoo wants to run his own business one day and even if it takes years he's determined it will be worth it. His parents own a small cafe but neither of them went to college of any sort and they struggle often. His plan is to do it smart. Maybe even franchise his parents business.

By November he's promoted to host at the restaurant. It's fantastic for him because he earns enough now that money isn't on his mind constantly. When he's in the supermarket he doesn't have to carefully calculate as he shops. The items simply get tossed in the basket it without a thought and it feels good.

Life is good; steady. Sometimes he catches himself singing to himself as he works in the garden of your house like he's in a freaking disney movie.

He meets a girl at college whom he gets on well with. She's nice, quite pretty and they go on a few dates. They end up having sex in his car after the third one and it's okay, not great. He finds himself thinking about you after he's dropped her off, wondering if you're doing the same thing. Maybe you were, that's what university life was all about, he supposed. Experimenting, having fun, finding yourself.

Suddenly he feels very insignificant. Did you ever think of him? That night you spent together you'd confessed you had, but there were months and thousands of miles of distance between you now. You were the beautiful, upper class rich girl and he worked two jobs whilst going to a community college.

Of course you weren't thinking of him.

***

Hyunwoo's last day of work before Christmas lands him at your house. He'd overheard from Ana that you were arriving very early the next morning, which meant he wouldn't be there when you were, and not knowing when you returned to school caused a slight air of disappoint to settle around him as he worked.

The weather restricts what he's capable of, so it's a few weeks longer than usual before he can return and he works a little later into the evening than normal. By the time he finishes the sun has set and the cold air is nipping at his cheeks, turning them pink.

He tidies his gardening equipment and heads inside to tell Ana he's leaving. She wishes him Merry Christmas and pulls him into a hug that colours his cheeks even more. "Oh! Hyunwoo?" She asks as he's at the door, ready to go home. He turns expectantly. "Can you leave me your phone number? I'm unsure what date Mr Kim wants you back in the new year." She smiles.

"Oh," says Hyunwoo dumbly. "Don't you have it already? I'm sure I gave it to you when I first started."

"This is embarrassing," Ana laughs. "My son bought me a phone. I can't use it for the life of me and I accidentally deleted everything a few days ago. I don't even know how I did it! I'm too old for modern technology, I think."

Hyunwoo smiles warmly at her. It's exactly the kind of thing his own mother would do and he feels a rush of affection. "Of course I can leave you it. If you need any help with your phone, I can do that too. I'm a pro at it."

He scribbles the digits on the post-its next to the phone and goes home for the night.

***

The text is sent on New Years Eve (technically New Years Day) but Hyunwoo only reads it when he wakes at 2pm, nursing a rather brutal hangover. He'd celebrated perhaps a little too hard with Minhyuk and the boys and barely even remembers going to bed. He rubs his tired eyes and re-reads the message several times.

from : unknown number happy new year hyunwoo!!! Hope your xmas was goood - y/n

from : unknown number ps - stole your num from ana I asked where you were and sshe said i missed y5tou

He chuckles at the typos, assuming there must have been some alcohol involved with the sending of these messages. Hyunwoo of course replies.

from : hyunwoo happy new year too lady hows xmas break?

from : y/n good boring cant wait to go back to school Im nursing a hangover from heeeellllll

from : hyunwoo haha i gifrued figured* me too tbh, i'll be hiding from the world today

He spends the rest of the day lazing in bed and occasionally swapping texts with you. The conversation is light, like acquaintances catching up, which is what he supposes you are. He can't deny that it's nice to hear from you. It's even nicer that you think of him when you're drunk. Drunk thoughts speak that of a sober mind.

He wants to see you but unfortunately doesn't get to. You're back at school by the time he has returned to work.

***

The girl from college is persistent, he'll give her that. There's nothing wrong with Kia, other than the fact that she's a little too eager than what Hyunwoo is usually used to but he accepts it regardless. Somehow he finds himself sleeping with her on a regular basis. It's a little selfish of him which he knows. But lately he's been feeling lonely, overworked, and she gives him all the attention he could ever ask for with very little effort on his part.

The sex improves since the first time so it becomes a thing. He tries not to look too deeply into it. By March they've been hooking up for well over a month.

He doesn't tell her about you. Not that that he's trying to hide anything per say; he just doesn't feel it's necessary. Especially because the conversations that he shares with you are far more interesting, now that he texts with you semi-frequently. Kia doesn't need to know about every single friend of his, he rationalizes.

Although he makes a distinct effort not to text you when he's with her.

You make him laugh. Like, really laugh. So much so that you rival Minhyuk's spot in his life. When you're away from your family you're a different person. Still you, but the version of you that's a little brighter, a little happier, and much more unrestrained than you are at home.

Even captured in the selfies you send you radiate more. He doesn't tell you (or anyone for that matter, he'd rather be caught dead) but he's been saving every image.

You tell him about your life in greater detail. He finds out that you spent Christmas with Ana and her family, since your father worked and your mom seeks warmer weather at that time of the year. It makes his heart ache slightly, he always has a wonderful day with his parents and a life without that seems a little sad. He's happy you have at least some family in Ana.

Hyunwoo cares. His thoughts drift to you often these days, more notably when he's working at your house. He can't even look at the poolhouse or the sun loungers without having flashbacks of you on your back for him. God, he wants to do it again. The need grows more and more the longer you talk.

When you phone him one night late night, practically purring the words, "I've been thinking about how we almost fucked in the garden." He knows it's over for him. He listens to you make yourself cum over the phone there and then and promises you, he'll have your body again as soon as he's able.

***

The next time you see each other in person it's April. Seven whole months since you'd fucked. He's finishing work when you appear, almost coyly hovering around the back entrance of the main house. He suspects you've waited for him. Hyunwoo grins reflexively when your eyes meet.

"Hey, you." You smile widely, tucking hair behind your ear.

"Hey lady."

Both silent for a few moments, simply taking each other in. Obviously he's seen pictures of you but the real thing is so much better. Your hair is longer, darker and your makeup is different but he still thinks you look gorgeous. A wave of confidence takes Hyunwoo.

"Want to hang out?" He asks before any inane small talk can ruin the moment. He knows how you are, you spoke this morning. You nod excitedly.

"I was hoping you'd ask." You tell him.

He's not ashamed of the car he drives, but he is when he knows you'll be in it. He's seen what occupies the twelve car garage. The kind of cars he would dream about as a young boy, and the worst part about all of it is they rarely get driven. To him that's the definition of insanity.

The back passenger window doesn't work on the old jeep and the leather is ripped on the drivers headrest but Hyunwoo takes care of it, so it drives fine. It gets him where he needs to go, so he's unbothered by the appearance. In a perfect world he'd drive you in something flashy.

You say nothing about the lack of extravagance, you hop inside with a beautiful smile. He likes that about you.

The plan is to go for dinner but somehow you never make it, ending up at Hyunwoo's modest apartment. It's a simple one bed with a tiny kitchenette. It's not much but he's worked hard to keep it.

"This reminds me of my dorm!" You laugh when you're inside. He incorrectly makes the assumption that you're insulting it but you reassure him. "It feels more like home than my parents house." You say gingerly with a touch to his arm.

His response is to kiss you and hoist you up, wrapping your legs around his waist. From the many phone sex sessions that have transpired between you, he's learned alot about what you like in the bedroom. He spanks your ass check with a slap, hard enough to sting. You audibly hiss.

You're in a dress again and he thinks it's intention was purposeful so he could have faster access to your most intimate parts. In no time at all you're pinned on his bed, both hands above your head held there by his own larger palm. The other is pushing your panties to the side, giving access to his bare dick.

Fuck me fuck fuck me, you chant, and he does. You look like such a mess for him, dress pushed up, hair fanned out across the pillow. You guide his hand around your throat, forcing him to choke you. He almost cums when your gasping breath tells him to spit in your mouth.

When you touch your clit and cum he does as well. He couldn't hold off even if he tried.

He kisses you softly, in stark contrast to how rough you had just encouraged him to be; then you whisper, "I missed you."

***

He spends two complete days in bed with you. Kia calls him several times but he never picks up. You give him a curious glance when he turns the phone face down each time, yet you say nothing.

The only time you leave his apartment is to get food. Hyunwoo holds your hand in the supermarket without thinking about it, he just wanted to touch you. You pay for the entire shopping and he wishes you didn't but he supposes you don't think about these things in the same manner as he does.

When you leave (and it's only because he's working at the restaurant and had no choice but to part ways) he drives you home and watches the entire way as you walk up the drive, wishing he could have you back already, hoping there's not some college boy miles away thinking the same thing.

***

It's only five days later when he's scheduled back to work for your family. He's more than a little distracted after seeing you through the kitchen window. A small, discrete wave from you to acknowledge his presence. He knows there's not much time left before you're due back at school for the last term before summer.

The familiar tradition of lunching together is shared outside today. Pleasant sunshine basks down on you and Hyunwoo can't stop looking at you even as he eats the food you've prepared. "What?" You ask with a shy laugh. "Is there something on my face?"

"I just like looking at ya." He laughs and your cheeks tinge adorably. How can you be so cute yet so dirty? It's like he has the best of both worlds with you at times. The contrast drives him wild at times.

"Can we spend some more time together before I go back to school?" You ask him. For a moment he can't focus because you're eating a strawberry and all he can think about is his dick in your mouth. "Hyunwoo?"

"Yeah, course." He responds, blinking a few times. "Come over tonight?"

He wonders what the household think when you leave together at the end of the day. Surely they would not approve of this? A sad thought enters his mind; it's possible your family are too self absorbed to notice, let alone care. Ana however gives the two of you a friendly knowing smirk when you share your goodbyes.

Hyunwoo ends up making a stopover at the beach, a change of heart hitting him as he drove in the setting sunlight. There's a certain spot he started visiting when he first moved out and was overwhelmed by the stress and cost of being an adult in this world. He's never taken anyone there but he thinks (hopes) you'll like it as much as he does.

"We're at the beach." It's not so much of a question as a statement and you give him a confused look.

"Come on." Is the only instruction he gives you, clambering out of the jeep.

The ten minute walk from the car to very end of the beach is passed in comfortable silence. There's a bit of climbing involved up some rocks and a slightly steep sandy slope. Hyunwoo goes first so he can assist you up too. This secluded part of the beach is peaceful and he's watched many a sunset here.

You join him in the sand when he sits, resting your head on his shoulder. "Why did you bring me here?"

"It's one of my favourite places and I wanted to share it with you." He doesn't need to explain any further. You nod.

"Thank you."

He watches the sunset with his arm around your shoulders. When it's almost dark Hyunwoo leads you back to his jeep. You have sex on the backseat. It's different this time, tender and sweet, touching each other as if you're both virgins cautiously but eagerly mapping each other's bodies. All he thinks about on the journey to his place is how much he likes you.

***

When you're thousands of miles apart the distance somehow feels greater this time. During the day you cross his mind often but it's worse at night, when he's alone in bed, craving the warmth of you body next to his. Sometimes he looks, then re-looks at the selfies you've sent.

He hasn't kept track of when he last spoke with Kia. It's only when she sends him a particularly bitchy message does he remember that he's unintentionally being ignoring her for as long as he has. When he sends her an apology, citing work and family as an excuse she asks to see him.

He's in two minds about it. One, he's lonely, horny and missing you. However the topic of being exclusive never came up, not that it should. It's new territory. For all he knows some frat boy has you wrapped around him right now. The thought makes him prickle with jealousy.

So he accepts Kia's invitation.

***

"What are you grinning at?"

Hyunwoo looks up, trying to hide his smile when Minhyuk speaks. "Nothing." He lies. He's texting you and you just told him how you accidentally waved at someone who wasn't waving to you and now you're moving country and changing your identity before you die of embarrassment. Another thing he likes about you; you're not afraid to laugh at yourself.

"That means it's a girl!" Minhyuk teases with a laugh. "The chick from college?"

"Uh, no." Hyunwoo replies, avoiding his friends gaze. "Someone else."

"Oh." Minhyuk is surprised. "Who?"

"You know the people I sometimes do gardening and shit for? The daughter."

"Oh shit," His friend laughs. "Risky."

Hyunwoo agrees, adding. "We haven't really tried to hide anything. I don't think her family notice much. It's kinda sad."

"How can you be sad with all that money?" Minhyuk scoffs. Like Hyunwoo he comes from a family that had little to none of not just money, nearly everything. He doesn't work two jobs like Hyunwoo but he works even longer hours to sustain himself. "Crying in a ferrari. Boo hoo."

"She's not like that. Her family sure, but not her."

Minhyuk can tell he likes you. "She's special." He doesn't ask, he just knows Hyunwoo so well that he doesn't need it confirmed by the older male.

"Yeah. She is."

***

He hasn't heard from you in over a week which is highly unusual since you've been messaging or calling each other daily. It's making him a little restless but he reassures his anxious mind by reminding himself you're almost finishing school and you're probably just busy. Kia is a distraction right now, nothing more.

His phone rings while Kia is in his shower. She's going to want to stay the night but he really isn't that interested, right now he wants to be alone. Normally he doesn't speak to you when he's with her, but this will be his first chance in a long time so he takes the call.

"Hi lady, it's been a while." He answers.

"I know," You groan. "Finals. I had to turn my phone off because it was distracting me. I had a meltdown this week."

His first thought is relief. The second; he wishes he could have been there for you.

"I'm sorry," He means it. "How are things now?"

"One more exam then I'm done. No future break downs planned." You announce and he can hear you smile.

"Good."

"What are you doing right now?" You ask. He hears the shower shut off and Kia step out.

"Nothing." Technically it's the truth. "I missed you." He adds lowly.

"Me too, Hyunwoo. Is it weird that you're one of my closest friends?"

"You're one of mine." He says confidently.

"I wish you were here."

Kia re-enters his bedroom in a towel, giving him a quiet smile when she see's him resting against the headboard in the middle of a call. Hyunwoo swallows thickly. "Me too."

"I want to see you, can we face time?"

He knows what that means. More often than not your video calls to each to one another ends in a very explicit manner. He looks at Kia who is redressing. God, he wishes he could say yes.

"I..can't right now, I've got company." He adds lamely because he doesn't want to lie to you.

"Oh." The disappointment in your voice is prevalent. "Ok. Maybe another time."

"Yeah." He wants to say more, so much more, but he knows Kia is listening and doesn't feel like an argument.

"It's okay if you're dating y'know." You add, to his surprise. "I didn't exactly think you were some celibate monk every time we were apart."

He laughs at that. "I assumed you weren't either."

"I wasn't." The past tense confuses him. "Been too busy for that lately."

"I bet."

"No one fucks me like you do though," You laugh and he can't help but smirk. "Anyway, I'll let you go. I've got some stress to relieve anyway." He doesn't miss the innuendo. "And Hyunwoo?"

"Yeah?"

"I'll be thinking of you when I do it."

Fuck. He hold back a groan. Now that the image is in his head it's the only thing he wants to see. He gulps. "I always do."

When you've hung up he tells Kia in the kindest possible way he's tired and it's best if she goes home. He senses her unhappiness and he feels a little guilty but not for long.

***

The day you arrive home for the summer Hyunwoo realises it's been ten months of fucking, phone sex and talking about nothing and everything til 2am with you. He's not working today and offers to pick you up from the airport. He knows you could easily have someone on your father's payroll fetch you but you agree nonetheless.

At baggage claim you don't even greet him, flinging yourself into his arms instead. There's a kiss that's all too passionate for such a public space but neither of you seem phased. It's clear that you're just as eager as he is.

You smile at him when he carries your bags for you, loading them into his trusted jeep.

"Can I tell you something?" You ask as he drives. He nods. "I haven't told my parents but I've been working while I've been at school."

You hadn't told him that either. As far as he knew you wouldn't really have to work ever if you felt so inclined.

"I've saved everything. Every single penny I've earned."

"How come?" He's never discussed money with you and he feels awkward.

"Because I don't want to spend my life relying on them." You say simply. "After I finish school next year I'll be free."

Free, he thinks. He notices how ignored you are at home and how unhappy you are there. If you want to be free, Hyunwoo wants you to be free too.

***

You spend more nights with him over the summer than you do without. He doesn't tell you but he broke things off with Kia a long time ago. It's you, and it's been you for a long time. At the beach you tease him and ask him if the other girls like this spot as much as you do.

"I've never brought anyone but you here." He admits.

"Oh." You look surprised. "I thought..."

"Nah," He tries to make it sound more casual than it is. But it means something. You both know it. He laces his fingers through yours. "Just you."

Over the summer a few freckles have appeared on your shoulders as the two of you have spent a lot of time in the sun and he kisses them while he's got you in his arms. You sigh in content and lean back against his chest. He wants to tell you he loves you, has done for quite some time but doesn't want to force it.

You're the one. Not in the conventional sense where he's blindly assured that you're definitely going to get married and grow into old age together. No. How can anyone know that for sure?

You're the one in the sense that you make him happy to wake up each day. It's effortless and it's easy and you've never once held any of his choices against him. He'd do anything for you before any other girl. That's why you're his one. He just needs to tell you now.

MASTERLIST

#all about luv series #all about love: shownu #monsta x fanfic #monsta x fanfiction #shownu fanfiction #shownu fanfic #shownu ff #monsta x fanfics #shownu fluff #shownu smut #monsta x smut

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mrlnsfrt · 3 years ago

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A Storm is Coming

Robertson asks the significant question: “Does the world hate us? If not, why not? Has the world become more Christian or Christians more worldly?” - Nichol, F. D. (Ed.). (1980). The Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary (Vol. 5, p. 1044). Review and Herald Publishing Association.

This is an interesting question and one that I will discuss further in this post. This is my third post on John 15, the first one was The One Thing (John 15:1-8), my second post was Love and Joy (John 15:9-17), and on this post, I will be focusing on John 15:18-25.

Hate

“If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. - John 15:18 NKJV

So far in John 15, we have read Jesus’ words about us remaining in Him and bearing fruit, and how as we do that we experience joy, and how remaining and loving God and one another is also deeply connected with keeping God’s commandments. Now, in that context of love, joy, and obedience we discover we will experience hate.

Jesus loves us as the Father loves Him, we are to love Him and one another, yet this will cause the world to hate us. How? Why? Because it hated Jesus, even though that is exactly how He lived. Jesus loved and obeyed the Father perfectly, Jesus also loved those around Him with a greater and more perfect love than anyone ever did, and yet they killed Him. Jesus lived the perfect life, He is our perfect example, yet He was hated and killed!? This is difficult to accept, and challenging to understand. But let us keep reading to see what else Jesus has to say.

Aliens?

If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. John 15:19NKJV

As followers of Jesus, we are not of this world. We live according to different values, we have different goals, we serve a different authority. All these differences cause us to stand apart from everyone else. Many of you may already know this but I was born in Brazil and moved to the US when I was about 12 years old. At this point in my life, I have lived in the US longer than I lived in Brazil, however, people I interact with can still tell that I am not originally from here. The way I talk and interact signals to others that I am a little different. I have an accent, my sentence structure is sometimes awkward, and even in social interactions I sometimes behave differently from those around me.

The interesting thing is that even when I visit my home country, I don’t quite fit in. I have become too “Americanized.” So I am too Brazilian to completely fit in where I currently live in the United States, and I am too American to fit in in Brazil where I was born. It does not matter where I go I am always a little different, different enough to people to wonder where I am from. This feeling is what comes to mind when I read Jesus’ statement that we are not of this world. There should be something about us that causes others to wonder where we are from.

What should be strange about us needs to be shaped by our love for God and those around us. It should be because of our faithfulness to God and sacrificial love for others. (for more on this see Love and Joy)

Persecuted

Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also. - John 15:20 NKJV

Jesus is our perfect example, we are called to live as He lived and as a result, we should also expect to suffer persecution as He did. However, I have witnessed a misinterpretation of this text that leads some to believe that persecution is a sign of faithfulness to God. Meaning that if you’re not being persecuted it must mean that you’re not being faithful to God. I can see the appeal of this interpretation, but I also see a danger. Would such an interpretation cause me to go out of my way to make enemies because persecution would validate the faithfulness of my approach?

What about what Jesus said in the Conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount?

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. - Matthew 5:11-12 NKJV

Jesus said we are blessed when we are persecuted for righteousness’ sake! Jesus says that you are blessed when the evil they say against you is false and it happens for His sake. This means that when you are not doing anything evil but are being falsely accused. When you are doing nothing wrong and being persecuted, there is a special blessing there. But there is no blessing when you are harassing people in the name of Jesus. When you make Jesus and the gospel your weapon of choice to attack those who disagree with you I feel like you’re not going to get the promised blessing.

Remember that John 15:20 is found in the context of John 15, of abiding in Jesus and bearing fruit. The persecution here is to be understood in that context. I understand this to mean people persecuting you for being honest, kind, loving, and faithful to God. This does not mean you go out looking for a fight or instigating persecution, but rather that you lovingly and firmly stand unmovable on the teachings of the word of God. You don’t go out of your way to look for trouble, but should trouble (persecution) find you, may it be because of your faithfulness to God, and may you stand firm for your beliefs.

Personal Story

Here’s a personal story that I believe illustrates this,

When I was in high school I worked at a fast-food restaurant. I had explained to them about my religious beliefs and how I would not work from sunset on Friday evening until sunset on Saturday evening since I kept the biblical seventh-day Sabbath. The manager never made an issue of it the whole time I worked there. A friend of mine also worked there. He also kept the biblical seventh-day Sabbath as I did, however, he was fired after a few months. He told everyone at church that he was fired because of religious persecution. I, however, never experienced this persecution he spoke of. I believe that his firing might have been connected to his work ethic. I noticed him coming in late, asking to leave early, calling in sick on Sundays when he went to the beach, etc. Interestingly among our Brazilian friends, he would say he was fired because the manager was racist against Brazilians, something that I also never experienced.

I say this just to say if we want others to respect our religious beliefs we should also make an effort to live up to those beliefs, to be an example among others. I have found that employers are willing to make accommodations for their best employees. When you are honest, dependable, dedicated, motivated, you are preaching the gospel to those at work, even if you don’t stand up to read your Bible out loud at work.

But the persecution can also come when you are behaving the best way possible. When you insist on being honest when everyone else wants you to be a little dishonest. Sometimes the boss wants you to turn a blind eye, or do something that goes against your biblical principles. When you stand up while those around you or above you want to be dishonest it can bring persecution. When you refuse to laugh at a joke that is racist or sexist, you may lose some friends. When you stand up for someone who is being picked on unfairly when you make your voice heard in the defense of those who cannot speak for themselves it may make you less popular or even cause you to be persecuted. I believe that this is what Jesus was talking about.

Whenever I feel persecuted, I stop and think about what could possibly be causing it. Am I doing something wrong or am I being persecuted for doing what is right?

I don’t know all the cases, I am not always sure of the answer, so I believe that prayer and Bible study are essential along with a sincere desire to do the will of God.

For Jesus’ Sake

But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know Him who sent Me. - John 15:21 NKJV

Ultimately I must understand that those who do not know God will not see things the way I see them. They have a different worldview, different values, and to be honest that even limits the activities I can be involved in. But if I ever find myself persecuted, I want it to be because of Jesus, for His name’s sake, and not because of my personal failures.

Judgment

If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. - John 15:22 NKJV

Every time you preach the gospel you bring judgment to someone. When they hear the good news and reject it, they bring judgment on themselves. The good news about salvation in Jesus is an opportunity for someone to gain not only eternal life in the future but also a more abundant life right now. However, it is also an opportunity for them to reject God and His salvation and harden their hearts. The gospel demands a decision, a choice, you don’t get to hear it and continue to live life as usual. The gospel not only reveals God’s love it also reveals sin and removes any excuse from the sinner. That’s why reading the Bible is so dangerous, it brings judgment upon the reader by causing her to make a decision for or against God.

Without Cause

He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. But this happened that the word might be fulfilled which is written in their law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’ - John 15:23-25 NKJV

So here is the breakdown of this message. Jesus was hated without cause, and as His faithful followers, we can expect the same. I just really want to stress the importance of the hate and persecution to be without a legitimate cause. It should not be because you’re rude, lazy, dishonest, unreliable. In those cases, the hate would be justified. You must aim to live a life as Jesus lived. A life shaped by love for God and for others, and if people still hate and persecute you, well, they persecuted Jesus also.

How Do I Face Life’s Challenges?

“But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with Me from the beginning. - John 15:26-27 NKJV

I face life’s challenges by God’s grace and with the power of the Holy Spirit. I just continue to live a life that bears witness to Jesus. I invite Jesus into my heart, I accept Him as Lord and Savior. I remain in Him and allow Him to cause me to bear fruit for Him even if I am being persecuted.

Regardless of what is happening around me, I am called to remain in Jesus. I can leave the final consequences in His hands. God provided Manna for the Israelites when they were in the wilderness (Exodus 16) and caused ravens to bring food for Elijah (1 Kings 17) and I know that He can take care of my needs, after all, God has been providing for me since the day I was born.

I am not saying that following God is easy, I am saying it is worth it. My part is also simple, remain in Jesus, and allow Him to do for me and in me what needs to be done to cause me to bear fruit.

#Jesus #John #challenge

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sumukhcomedy · 6 years ago

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Seinfeld: The Show That Treated Race Like Nothing

Seinfeld was a “show about nothing.” It was the most popular sitcom of my generation and arguably considered the greatest sitcom in American television history. Of course, the show wasn’t purely about “nothing.” It had concepts that were strong enough for nine seasons and a massive amount of syndication money and even a fan base that eagerly embraced a return of the cast for a season of Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Over the almost 30 years since the show’s premiere, a criticism of the show has been its handling of race. Much like its longtime “Must See TV” lineup teammate Friends, the show was criticized for its lack of non-white characters in New York, a city filled with every single type of person in the world. Such criticism can head directly back to the show’s creative team and writing staff which were largely white and male throughout the show’s run.

Seinfeld wasn’t racist. It actually was a fine example of revealing white people’s uncomfortableness and awkwardness with race. This was exemplified both by the characters on the show but also by the writers themselves in how they created episodes and guest characters. Perhaps the comedy of Seinfeld still resonates 30 years later which is why people still love watching it. But episodes revolving around answering machines, pay phones, fax machines, and an inability to get in contact with someone else immediately reveals its age. If anything, race and the manner in which Seinfeld handled it from a white lens may be the topic that has truly stood the test of time.

When the show touches upon race and succeeds is when it reveals its main character’s weaknesses and awkwardness towards race. Its failures occur when the white writer of an episode unintentionally infuses his awkwardness into the plot of the show.

One of the best episodes of Seinfeld that highlighted the awkwardness of race is “The Cigar Store Indian.” In it, Jerry is attracted to one of Elaine’s friends, Winona. He brings over a cigar store Indian statue to her apartment as a gift when Winona is over and begins to joke around with it only finding out later from Elaine that Winona is Native American. Jerry apologizes and is able to go out on a date with Winona but his interactions with Winona over the rest of the episode are a series of uncomfortable situations revolving race. None of the Seinfeld characters are seen as particularly good but Jerry is still an understanding individual who isn’t portrayed as a racist. He is well-meaning but certainly has had a white upbringing (like the others) and clearly doesn’t fully grasp the effects of racism even with his comedy in casual conversation. While the episode clearly had moments that don’t make anyone feel good for either comedy or racial equality 30 years later, it still was probably the best example of Seinfeld balancing humor with its characters’ inability to deal with race properly.

Similarly is the episode “The Diplomat’s Club” in which George feels he must validate that he doesn’t think all black people look alike to one of his bosses, Mr. Morgan (who he thinks looks like Sugar Ray Leonard) by introducing him to one of his black friends (of which he has none). He ultimately ends up trying to pass off Jerry’s exterminator as an old high school friend. Again, the episode does a good job of showing George’s neuroticism towards all things including race. His desperation to show he believes in equality and is not racist makes him look even more ridiculous and insensitive, which is a main characteristic of George Costanza throughout the show. Though, the episode ends with a black waiter validating George’s belief that Mr. Morgan looks like Sugar Ray Leonard rather than continuing to make him look like a fool.

“The Chinese Restaurant” was a wonderful early episode showing how much laughter could occur in just one setting on the show. It choreographed like a funny play. Despite the host of the restaurant (played by the masterful acting veteran James Hong) being the start of many stereotypical immigrant characters on the show, his innocence and zaniness towards seating the Seinfeld characters worked really well for the situation.

Not surprisingly, when the show attempts to venture into race in a bit of a deeper way or involving interpersonal relationships and more depth to a character of a non-white race, it fails. An episode like “The Chinese Woman” makes little sense. In it, George’s phone line is crossed with a woman named Donna Chang. This leads Jerry to asking Donna out and relishing his first date with an Asian woman only to discover when they meet that Donna is not Asian. Jerry believes she is playing up the Asian angle of her last name. At one point in the episode, she pronounces ridiculous “ridicurous.” She ultimately ends up giving advice to Estelle, George’s mother, over the phone. This advice leads Estelle to remain in her marriage and she tells Jerry that the advice were some words from Confucius. However, Estelle is disappointed to find out when she meets Donna Chang that she is not an Asian woman. The lines of thought towards Asians in the episode are absurd and insensitive (seriously, “ridicurous” as a punchline?) and culminates with Jerry’s suggestion to Donna that she perhaps change her name. Whether Donna is purposefully playing up being Asian or it’s another example of Jerry and the gang misconstruing race’s presence in their lives, it’s just a terrible episode in its humor and perspective on Asians.

The limited relationships depicted on the show where the characters date people that are not white also are perplexing. In “The Wife,” Kramer dates a black woman, sleeps in a tanning booth for too long, and shows up to meeting her family basically in blackface. The episode concludes with her father saying, “This isn’t a white boy! This is a damn fool!” It’s a strange end and not worth much in the realm of laughter given its punchline ultimately comes down to being minstrelsy. In “The Wizard,” Jerry believes Elaine’s new boyfriend is black. Elaine isn’t sure. She spends the entire episode trying to determine if he’s black. Once again, a bunch of stereotypes come up and it ultimately culminates with her and her boyfriend realizing they’re both white (the boyfriend thinking they were in an interracial relationship because she was Hispanic). Once again, it’s an uncomfortable punchline of “Oh no, we’re both white?!” to end on when you’ve spent an entire part of the plot shredding interracial relationships for not great laughs.

Seinfeld likely fails the most towards immigrant characters of all races. Actor Danny Hoch was originally cast as the role of Ramon in “The Pool Guy” but objected and asked for changes because of the way the character was depicted. Seinfeld and the other decision makers refused and Hoch was re-cast. There was no purpose to the character’s ethnicity being present as part of his annoying pest ways. “The Puerto Rican Day” is easily the worst episode of the show with nothing funny and just seems insulting to Puerto Ricans and even pregnant women who aren’t married. Babu Bhatt, The Soup Nazi, the Parking Attendant at Jiffy Park, Coco the cleaning woman, the Korean nail salon workers, the list goes on and on of guest characters on the show who were stereotypes and, in the case of Babu and The Soup Nazi, became some of the most memorable guests who returned for the finale. Even the people of color who are Americans aren’t done with much grace on the show.

Seinfeld is an indication of what happens with a show with a lack of representation that chooses to discuss issues of race but, in doing so, it also perfectly exemplifies where white people in America are even today. They are uncomfortable, unfamiliar, and awkward with the topic of race even when they supposedly embrace equality. A character like Elaine Benes who throughout the show is depicted as an ardent feminist is still awkward when dealing with an interracial relationship. It speaks a lot to much of the current criticism of white feminism and white liberals when dealing with race.

Seinfeld was the most popular sitcom in the 1990s for a reason but it’s still popular today for another reason and it’s not nostalgia. The comedy still stands the test of time in a variety of ways. Now as I’ve gotten older, an episode like “The Pen” is so accurate. My parents in their older age behave exactly like Jerry’s parents and the other senior citizens in that episode. I also can’t deny that Seinfeld was extremely influential in making me love comedy and want to be a stand-up comedian. Jerry Seinfeld made stand-up comedy accessible each week especially to kids who didn’t have cable TV like me. And, even with a show with adult themes, once I saw Kramer running on a runway in “The Airport,” I laughed so hard and was hooked. The show’s goofiness and Michael Richards’s physical comedy managed to make it funny for children, too.

But years later, I can look back on the way that race was handled on the show and see that the show is still appealing because white people’s handling of race hasn’t changed much since the world and comedy of Seinfeld existed. The show wanted to exemplify that its characters did their best to try to be understanding of race while also being clueless towards it but it truly revealed that the creators of these stories and characters lacked similar compassion.

There is a recurring line in “The Wizard” when discussing Elaine’s possible interracial relationship where each character says, “I really don’t think we’re supposed to be talking about this.” That line could sum up Seinfeld’s approach to race as a whole. It could also sum up many white Americans’ discomfort with race. But what’s troubling is that feeling is still the same today as it was 20 years ago when Seinfeld ended. If there’s one thing that shouldn’t have stood the test of time in Seinfeld, it would be its comedy towards and depiction of race and yet it has. That’s likely because many white Americans, even the ones that supposedly yearn for equality, have been as progressive over the past two decades towards race as the Seinfeld characters they love.

#seinfeld #comedy #race #jerry seinfeld #kramer #elaine #george #larry david #michael richards #julia louis dreyfus #jason alexander #danny hoch #nbc #1990s #90s

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managementstrategy55896 · 5 years ago

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ManagementStrategy

QualityManagement involves determining if they’re inside the specifications for your item and testing of components. The objective of the testing would be to ascertain any demands for actions from the procedure. Great excellent management helps companies meet customer demands for superior products.Quality testing entails every step of the production procedure. Testing in the many phases of production helps identify in which a manufacturing problem is happening and the precautionary measures it takes to block it from the future.The excellent control employed in a company is extremely determined by the solution or business. In QualityManagement and food production, quality management involves ensuring that the product doesn’t earn a consumer ill, or so the company performs microbiological and chemical testing of samples in the manufacturing line. Since the visual appeal of ready food impacts customer perception, the producers may ready the merchandise based on its own package instructions for visual inspection.In car manufacturing, quality management focuses on how components fit together and socialize and ensuring motors function easily and economically. A quality management graph is a picture that defines whether sampled goods or procedures are fulfilling their planned specifications–also, otherwise, the amount where they change from these specifications. It’s referred to as a uni variate graph when every graph analyzes a particular characteristic of this product. When a graph steps variances in many product characteristics, it’s referred to as a multivariate chart.Randomly chosen products are analyzed for the specified attribute or characteristics the graph is monitoring. A common kind of an excellent control chart is that the Chart, in which the y-axis on the graph tracks the level to which the attribute’s variance is okay. The x-axis monitors the samples examined. The technique considers layout to be more significant than the production procedure in quality management and attempts to get rid of variances in manufacturing before they could occur.Quality control inspectors shield the consumer from faulty products and the company from harm to its reputation as a result of poor manufacturing procedures. If the testing procedure shows issues the contractor has the choice of returning the merchandise for repairs repairing the issue or tagging the merchandise for rejection. When difficulties arise, the contractor informs managers and works together to fix the problem.Quality management is much like quality assurance. Among the qualities of all quality control is using controls that are well-defined. QualityManagement is brought by it . Most organizations have an excellent control/assurance department that offers standards’ set to be followed for every single item. Either a staff that was third party or an internal staff is hired to ascertain whether meet with those criteria. As product review gives a image of the quality of the final product, management depends on testing of merchandise. There are various criteria offered for quality control.The grade of a commodity is frequently influenced by deviations from target criteria and from the large variability around goal specifications.

When it comes to quality assurance, it’s a process-oriented practice. When quality management makes sure the end product meets the quality requirements, quality guarantee makes certain that the process of producing the product does adhere to standards. Consequently, quality assurance could be identified as a proactive process, while quality control could be noted as a reactive process.As earlier articles have emphasized, quality management is a crucial function in an organization that markets services. However, is quality management precisely the thing in an agency company as at a manufacturing concern? And what does QualityManagement have to do to set it in operations? Little has been written on these questions, though insights and principles are obtained by companies in the service sector. In this article a top executive of one company shares his company’s knowledge with other small business leaders.Since this article is about individuals, I shall start with a story about someone I know. The objective of this story is to provide a reference point for the discussion and analysis that follow, for in each case the programs to be described have to be evaluated with regard to how well they fulfill the needs of particular individuals who, such as the topic of my story, possess conflicting motives and desires.Ten years past a worker whom I’ll call Tom Simpson went to his boss, one of our vice presidents, and announced that, though not disappointed with the progress he was making, he would soon be departing Marriott to combine a competitor.Simpson was assistant manager of a large restaurant in one of our major hotel properties. He was in his twenties and had made continuous improvement with us. His document was clean of those pesky, lukewarm evaluations that may cool the QualityManagement of superiors as they leaf through personnel records. Simpson had always been rated"Excellent.No company likes to lose good, young talent, surely not service companies, which typically are labour intensive. For a service company, quality control of performance and employee attitude is pretty much the equivalent of merchandise quality management for a producer. Computer makers, for example, point to a roomful of hardware that’s been quality controlled down to spool and the core. The service company has nothing concrete.

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managementstrategy21203 · 5 years ago

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ManagementStrategy

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douchebagbrainwaves · 7 years ago

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IF THEY MADE THE EXPERIENCE GOOD ENOUGH, AUDIENCES MIGHT START TO PREFER IT TO WATCHING PIRATED MOVIES AT HOME

The most concise descriptions seem misleadingly narrow. They're like a food that's not merely healthy, but counteracts the unhealthy effects of things you've already eaten. The first cut is simply to be one of the stickiest things you can tell them. It would be a natural step in this progression. How would the government decide who's a startup investor? Kids often want to show that all the complaints about App Store approvals are not a serious problem. If printed books are optional, publishers will have to do is figure things out, why do you need to.1 They want to believe they're living in a comfortable, safe world as much as their parents want them to believe it. Which means a junk food can be very stressful. A hacker's language needs powerful libraries and something to hack.2 But schools change slower than scholarship.

Ten weeks later we invite all the investors.3 Formidable is close to confident, except that someone could be confident and mistaken. So the fact that I still thought at age 11 that teachers were infallible shows what a job the system must have done on my brain. He knew a lot of the great programmers of the day to reproduce.4 Every startup has reasons both to invest and not to invest.5 Indeed, the really interesting question is not what will happen to existing forms, but what about the professors who taught math could be required to write scholarly articles about history, but what about the professors who taught math could be required to do original math, the professors who taught math could be required to do original math, the professors who taught history could be required to do original math, the professors who taught rhetoric or composition?6 Why bother? We were all lied to as kids, and some ability to ferret out the unexpected must not merely be an inborn one.7 Certainly I do.8 Get rapidly to demo.9

C, MIT's dialect of Lisp, called MacLisp, was one of the most remarkable things about the way we work: a normal job may be as bad for startups as too much time, so we encourage them to focus on just two goals: a explain what you're doing is an extraordinarily powerful force. But those you don't publish.10 The first step in clearing your head is to realize that there's no real contradiction here.11 Along with such outright lies, there must have been a lot of pitches. As long as that idea is still floating around, I think a lot of new inventions, the rich got this first. If there's something you're really interested in, you'll have to figure it out from subtle clues, like a child molester telling his victims they'll get in trouble if they use pirated versions, and b any business model you have at this point is probably wrong anyway. Another way to get information out of them was to ask what surprised them.12 For the essayist this translates to: flow interesting.13 The big successes are so big they dwarf the rest. In the past when I bought things from Apple it was an unalloyed pleasure. Working for yourself doesn't have to be a search for truth. Most applications—most startups, probably—grow out of personal projects.14

For example, why should there be a connection between humor and misfortune? I don't think ordinary programmers' opinions matter.15 We can get rid of or make optional a lot of people interested in the same spirit. And even though Boston is the second kind of lie involved. The people who've worked for a large organization divided into groups in this way, rather than as a way of telling you what to do.16 Sean Parker, who understands the domain really well because he started a similar startup himself, and also with deep structural changes like caching and persistent objects.17 I was considering starting another startup. I often have a feeling that I'm sending the processor on a lot of words on a slide, people just skip reading it.18

So this alternative device probably couldn't win on general appeal. It's a good exercise for you, too, to sit down and try to figure out why it's worth investing in. It would be a good marketing trick to call it a lie. But there are limits to how well they'll be able to write a program decides what language to use, at least for a while and had presented to groups, and what they use it for. Doesn't that show people will pay for content?19 It has to be; how many users they can support per processor.20 Committees yield bad design. The first, obviously, is that the way to succeed is through following the rules.21 Don't use it with investors either. The most important sort of disobedience shows signs of becoming rampant. Usually they consist either of omissions or of over-emphasizing certain topics at the expense of others.

There have always been people in the music business hope to retroactively convert it away from publishing, by getting listeners to pay for subscriptions. A job at a big company. One consequence of this sort of disobedience shows signs of becoming rampant. This is too big a problem to solve here, but certainly one reason life sucks at 15 is that kids are trapped in a world designed for 10 year olds. And as many programmers have observed since, one is very often mistaken about where these bottlenecks are. There is already a good deal even after they're first launched—programming languages especially. It may be surprisingly large; people overvalue physical stuff. Nothing is hidden from you that doesn't absolutely have to be in a place where startups are the cool thing to do, and chance meetings with people who can help you. To Michel de Montaigne, who in 1580 published a book of what he called essais. That worked as long as they can. There is hope for any language that gives hackers what they want to conceal the existence of these words for as long as buying printed books was the only way to know for sure would be to have no structure: to have each group actually be independent, and to allow programmers to use inline byte code if you need to be able to do what you want.

Notes

Which in turn is why hackers give you money for other kinds of menial work early in the 1960s, leaving less room to avoid the topic. But I think this made us seem naive, or it would be better at opening it than people who should quit their day job, or one near the edge case where something spreads rapidly but the churn is high as well use the word as in e.

Unless we mass produce social customs.

Not linearly of course finding words this way, except that no one trusts that. 9999 and. It's a case of Bayes' Rule.

As I was a great deal of competition for the manager, which is to use an OS that doesn't lose our data. In January 2003, Yahoo released a new business designed for scale.

So if you're going to call all our lies lies. As I explained in How to Make Wealth when I became an employer, I use. Some VCs seem to be better for explaining software than English. If you're good you are listing in order to switch.

Ed. At Viaweb, Java applets were supposed to be self-interest explains much of the world.

It rarely arises, and making money on the economics of ancient traditions. Companies didn't start to get all the returns come from all over the world will sooner or later. When I catch egregiously linkjacked posts I replace the url with that additional constraint, you can't mess with the buyer's picture on the person who wins.

There may even be conscious of this desirable company, meaning they give with one hand paying Milton the compliment of an outcast, just as well. That would be rolling in their spare time. We didn't let him off, either.

Why do you know Apple originally had three founders? In a series A rounds from top VC funds whether it was too late? Maybe it would be critical to.

Geoff Ralston reports that one Calvisius Sabinus paid 100,000, the closest most people come to you. That name got assigned to it because the first third of the biggest sources of pain for founders; if there were no strong central governments. Sparse Binary Polynomial Hash Message Filtering and The CRM114 Discriminator.

One of the twentieth century. Possible doesn't mean a great reputation and they're clearly working fast to get all you know whether this would be a predictor. And that is actually from the compromise you'd have reached after lots of back and rewrite journal entries over and over for two weeks.

If you walk into a fancy restaurant in San Francisco, LA, Boston, and average with the exception of the lies we tell kids are probably especially valuable.

Here's an example of a place where few succeed is hardly free. Microsoft presented at a time before photography had a big company. Actually, someone else created earlier.

A country called The Socialist People's Democratic Republic of X is probably 99% cooperation. Some graffiti is quite impressive anything becomes art if you seem evasive than if you want to trick a pointy-haired boss into letting you write has a pretty comprehensive view of investor who merely seems like he will fund you, however, by doing a business, which people used to build consumer electronics. I thought there wasn't, because spam and P nonspam are both genuinely formidable, and one kind that has a similar variation in wealth, and making money on convertible notes, VCs who are running on vapor, financially, because the kind of method acting. I'm not saying, incidentally; it's roughly correct to say they were doing Bayesian filtering in a separate box weighing another 4000 pounds.

Francis James Child, who had worked for spam. Why does society foul you? The actual sentence in the room, and anyone doing due diligence for an IPO. Some translators use calm instead of bookmarking.

Another advantage of having one founder is always room for startups to die from running Kazaa helped ensure the success of their predecessors and said in effect why can't you be more like determination is proportionate to wd m-k w-d n, where w is will and d discipline. They're motivated by examples of how you spent all your time working on what you do it is certainly an important relationship between the Daddy Model that it sounds plausible, the most important factor in deciding what to do this all the page-generating templates are still called the option pool. High school isn't evil; it's roughly correct to say incendiary things, like hedge funds, are available only to buy corporate bonds; a vogue for conglomerates in the back of your last round of funding rounds are bad. You may not be if Steve hadn't come back within x amount of material wealth, the fact that the probabilities of features i.

Sam Rayburn and Lyndon Johnson. There was no more than whatever collection of stuff to be about 50%.

Download programs to encourage more startups in Germany told me: One YC founder told me about a startup or going to lie to them, would be to diff European culture with Chinese: what they're doing. Naive founders think Wow, a proper open-source projects, even if the current edition, which shows how unimportant the Arpanet which became the twin centers from which they don't have a different type of x. This phenomenon may account for a group of people like them—people who have money to spend all your time working on filtering at the last place in the 1990s, except then people who don't aren't.

There may be the more thoughtful people start to feel guilty about it as a cause them to tell them what to outsource and what not to stuff them with comments.

If someone just sold a nice-looking little box with a product, just that they discovered. CEOs in the narrowest sense. It doesn't end every semester like classes do. Which means if the potential users, however.

Their inexperience makes them better: reading a draft of this article used the term literally. Some want to approach a specific firm, get rid of everyone else books a package tour. If a bunch of actual adults suddenly found themselves trapped in high school textbooks. Type A fundraising is a scarce resource.

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kennethherrerablog · 6 years ago

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TaxAct Review: Is This No-Frills Tax Software Right for You?

A wise man once said, “Change is the only constant,” but he clearly forgot about filing taxes.

Paying your taxes is an annual chore that can cause the sanest of individuals to rip out their hair and scream obscenities at W-2 forms while foaming at the mouth. Luckily, tax professionals — and now tax preparation software — can make the process somewhat more manageable.

TaxAct is a popular option for filing your taxes without an actual accountant. Its biggest competitors include H&R Block and TurboTax. In this review, we’ll look at what TaxAct offers and see how it stacks up against its competitors.

TaxAct: What’s New for 2019?

If you’ve used TaxAct in the past, you will notice some updates when you file your 2018 taxes. The biggest enhancement is to the software’s aesthetics, including new fonts and colors. This year’s visual enhancements serve to make TaxAct appear more modern and easier to use.

Likely in an attempt to keep up with the much more popular TurboTax software, TaxAct also includes more tips and flags throughout the filing process for 2019. Even so, TaxAct doesn’t have nearly as many cool features as some of its competitors.

TaxAct Packages

The biggest appeal of TaxAct is its low prices. Each of its products is more affordable than a comparable product from TurboTax or H&R Block. Like its competitors, TaxAct also has free versions for both federal and state taxes, but these are limited in their abilities.

Note on prices: Tax software providers including TaxAct regularly update prices. We have provided ranges to give you an idea of what to expect. Check the prices on TaxAct’s website before filing.

Here are the packages offered by TaxAct in 2019:

TaxAct Free

Cost for Federal: $0

Cost for State: $0

If you’ve filed with TurboTax before, you know the term “free” doesn’t always mean free.

However, thanks to TaxAct’s price lock guarantee, the price you see advertised before starting the process is the price you will pay at the end. That transparency is especially helpful the closer we get to April 15, when the price of tax preparation software tends to rise.

So what does this mean for the TaxAct Free product? You will pay absolutely nothing to prepare, print and e-file federal taxes and state taxes. You also get free account support.

But the best things in life aren’t free. The TaxAct Free package is very limited in scope, only allowing you to file a 1040, and is ideal for filers without dependents.

You must take the standard deduction (meaning you can’t itemize), and you can’t file Schedules 1 through 6. You can take the child tax credit, education credit, child and dependent care expense credits and the elderly/disabled credit, but otherwise, you are limited.

If you are a parent with a kid still at home whom you want to claim as a dependent or if you made any income outside your W-2 (like if you are a landlord or a freelance writer), you should not use this free version.

Returning users may be especially disappointed, as TaxAct used to offer more for its free version.

TaxAct Basic+

Cost for Federal: $10 to $15

Cost for State: $19.95

Despite the cost increase, TaxAct Basic+ doesn’t cover too many more filers. If you run a small business, for example, you’ll still have to go with a more expensive product.

If you have just regular sources of income but have dependents or college expenses, this is the right package for you.

TaxAct Deluxe+

Cost for Federal: $30 to $48

Cost for State: $39.95

TaxAct Deluxe+ is the product that should cover most filers’ needs. This package is perfect for homeowners and those who need to itemize deductions, offering support for Schedule A.

TaxAct Deluxe+ is also great for filers with student loan interest, moving expenses or a Health Savings Account.

When you pay for TaxAct Deluxe+, you’ll get access to more tools that help you maximize your deductions by adding data about investment income and charitable donations (whether they were financial donations or donated goods, like clothing or food).

TaxAct Premier+

Cost for Federal: $40 to $50

Cost for State: $39.95

TaxAct’s second most expensive package is for filers who have a lot of investments, like rental properties and stocks. This package is also great for filers who sold a home in 2018, who have foreign bank accounts and who incurred expenses as part of their investments.

Filers get prioritized support with this package, including screen sharing and in-app chat. This package supports Schedules E and D.

TaxAct Self Employed+

Cost for Federal: $60 to $78

Cost for State: $39.95

Be your own boss, they told me. Become a freelancer, they said. But none of them told me about some of the extra expenses I would incur.

As luck would have it, filing taxes as a small business owner or freelance contractor can be confusing (and you have to pay more since you act as employer and employee). Tax preparation software, as a result, is also more expensive for these filers.

TaxAct’s Self Employed+ solution includes all the forms you will need as an independent contractor, including Schedule C and Schedule C-EZ.

Pros and Cons of TaxAct

So what are the benefits of using TaxAct to self-file this year, and are there pitfalls?

The Pros of Using TaxAct

Affordability: Of the major players in the tax preparation space, TaxAct is easily the most affordable. If you plan to owe Uncle Sam when you file rather than receiving a glorious refund, the appeal of less expensive software can be too good to turn up.

Previous tax returns: TaxAct makes it easy to import your data from previous TaxAct returns to make the process of filing faster. And for those of you who have used TurboTax or H&R Block in the past and are just learning about TaxAct, the software includes an option for importing data from previous tax returns with those vendors.

Refund bonus: TaxAct partners with retailers and restaurants such as Amazon, Bed Bath & Beyond, Regal, Domino’s, Game Stop and The Home Depot. If you decide to put a portion of your refund on a gift card to one of those retailers, TaxAct will add a bonus to your refund up to $100.

Seven-year access: When you file a return with TaxAct, you can access that return for up to seven years.

Advanced tech: TaxAct may not be as advanced as its competitors, but it is certainly innovating with new features. For example, you can import the data from your W-2 simply by taking a picture with your phone.

$100K accuracy guarantee: TaxAct offers a pretty bold guarantee. If they make a mistake with your tax filing, you are covered with a $100K accuracy guarantee, which covers the difference between the higher refund you might have earned, any legal and auditing costs and all software costs.

Online flexibility: Because the software is internet-based, you can easily switch between devices, like if you start at your desktop but need to save your sanity by finishing on the couch in front of the TV with a cold beer. TaxAct even offers a mobile app.

The Cons of Using TaxAct

Support: Levels of support vary by TaxAct package. It’s no surprise that the more you pay, the better support you get. That said, support is not as robust with TaxAct as it is with direct competitors.

Audit defense: If you want audit protection, you’ll have to shell out additional cash — and that audit support comes from a third party. Sure, your chances of being audited are roughly 1 in 160, but as we don’t like to play it fast and loose, we think audit protection is ideal.

Fewer tools: TaxAct gives filers the bare minimum. Is it possible to file with the bare minimum? You betcha. But is it fun? Well, taxes are never fun, but when you are self-filing and are accustomed to the tips and tools that more expensive options like TurboTax offer, you can fast become frustrated with TaxAct.

Limited free version: TaxAct used to offer much more from the TaxAct Free package. It is very limited in scope for 2019.

Refund payment: TaxAct makes it possible to pay for its software with your refund, which sounds like a cool feature until you learn that the software charges you $39 to do so. This is clearly meant for people who cannot afford the software price up front, but at that point, it would be cheaper to pay for it with a high-rate credit card. Assuming you were to pay it off with your refund immediately, you will hypothetically accrue less than $39 in credit card interest.

TaxAct vs. TurboTax vs. H&R Block

So how does TaxAc stack up to more popular software from TurboTax and H&R Block?

The table below compares the three major software options on prices for online versions (federal taxes and state taxes), level of support and tools. Remember, prices vary depending on time of year and current promotions. All prices were accurate at time of publishing.

Another quick note: State filing prices are per state. If you moved during 2018 from one state with income taxes to another, you will need to pay the state fee twice. Ouch, I know.

H&R Block TurboTax TaxAct Price ranges provided. Tax software prices will fluctuate throughout tax season. Costs for Federal Free: $0 Deluxe: $22 to $50 Premium: $38 to $70 Self Employed: $60 to $104 Tax Pro Review: $119 Free Edition: $0 Deluxe: $30 to $40 Premier: $60 to $80 Self Employed: $90 to $120 Free: $0 Basic+: $10 to $15 Deluxe+: $30 to $48 Premier+: $40 to $58 Self Employed+: $60 to $78 Costs for State Free: $0 All other plans: $36.99 Free Edition: $0 All other plans: $39.99 Free: $0 Basic+: $19.95 All other plans: $39.95 Level of Support Ask a Tax Pro service (unlimited chat and screen share), price varies by package; Tax Pro Review for $119.99 federal and $36.99 state filings; free 24/7 tech support; brick-and-mortar locations for assistance, but that comes at a fee. TurboTax Live Basic for $89.99 federal and $29.99 state (essentially is the free version of TurboTax but with on-demand video access to an actual tax professional, who provides a final review); video tutorials; in-app chat; etc. Minimal, but increases with higher-tiered packages; ranges from online FAQs to phone and in-app chat, though reviews of these support options aren’t kind. Tools Can pay for Tax Pro Review; has good in-app tools (like W-2 import, a searchable database and links to important information). Most user-friendly interface on the market; basic in-app tools (like W-2 import, chat/interview experience for filling out, etc.) Basic in-app tools (like W-2 import and calculators); improved over previous years, but still rudimentary.

TaxAct Review: Should You Use It?

You get what you pay for. If you are a penny pincher, TaxAct might be right for you. But if you are a true Penny Hoarder, you might think differently. Penny Hoarders spend their money wisely, and I think something as important as filing your taxes might deserve a little more spending for a better experience, a better refund and a heightened feeling of security.

Plus, TaxAct reviews on Consumer Affairs from actual filers in 2019 are less than favorable. You’ll notice a running theme of filers who previously loved TaxAct now complaining about the pricing structure (you get less for free now), common errors and lack of support.

I rate TaxAct 2.5 stars; all it really has going for it is its low cost and gimmicks like the refund bonus. The low cost, however, is not worth the lack of support and tools.

About TaxAct

TaxAct was founded in 1988 and is based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. It employs more than 120 tax-savvy people in its office and has filed more than 65 million returns. TaxAct isn’t just a solution for individuals; business owners and even tax professionals rely on its software every year.

You can learn more about TaxAct here.

Timothy Moore is a market research editor and freelance writer covering topics on personal finance, careers, education, pet care, travel and automotive. He has worked in the field since 2012 and has been featured on sites like The Penny Hoarder, Debt.com, Ladders, Glassdoor and The News Wheel

This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.

The Penny Hoarder Promise: We provide accurate, reliable information. Here’s why you can trust us and how we make money.

TaxAct Review: Is This No-Frills Tax Software Right for You? published first on https://justinbetreviews.tumblr.com/

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theconservativebrief · 6 years ago

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The intended appeal of The Good Cop is fairly obvious.

The new Netflix cop series stars TV icon Tony Danza and eternally earnest singer-actor Josh Groban in a story about a father-son detective duo. Danza has enough cultural cachet to be recognizable even to those who aren’t familiar with Taxi or Who’s the Boss? (“Hold me closer,” etc.). And Groban is one of the most easily likable performers working today — if you need proof, just look at how seamlessly he integrated into The Muppets — and isn’t afraid to skewer his squeaky-clean image, as he’s done in the past via cameos on Glee and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.

Put the two of them together in a cop show, the thinking probably went, and voilà — fun and audience-friendly magic.

In practice, however, The Good Cop — created by Monk’s Andy Breckman — doesn’t achieve the desired effect. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the show, but it’s so aggressively harmless and eager to please that it ends up being a bit of a slog. It’s so low-stakes that there’s no real need to binge it, per Netflix’s typical model, but there’s not much need to keep up with it as if it were airing week to week, either. You could watch the episodes in any order and it wouldn’t make much of a difference.

On top of that, The Good Cop’s central gimmick of the show — Groban is the titular good cop, in contrast to Danza as his more morally loosey-goosey father — remains a gimmick rather than prompting any real character growth. Why keep tuning in?

But that’s not to say there’s nothing of merit about the show. While it’s hard to buy Danza and Groban as father and son, their rapport is charming enough, and the supporting cast, which includes Isiah Whitlock Jr., is great. If you’re simply looking for something lightweight and easy watch, you could do worse.

Tony Danza and Josh Groban as father and son. Michele K Short/Netflix

There’s something distinctly old-school about The Good Cop in just how determinedly mellow it is. The music throughout the 10-episode season is gently jazzy, and the gags never get any sharper than, say, Groban spraying Danza with a fire extinguisher. Then there’s the show’s sense of topicality — or rather, the lack thereof. While some series can get away with operating as an escape from reality (utter detachment is Trial & Error’s bread and butter) there’s not enough meat on The Good Cop’s bones to justify its seeming absence of connection to the world it’s set in.

The cases that Tony Caruso Jr. and Tony Caruso Sr. (Groban and Danza, respectively) take on all follow such a similar pattern — one of the two Carusos is hoodwinked, and someone’s innocence must be proved — that it falls to The Good Cop’s character dynamics to keep the episodes interesting. Unfortunately, the role of stick-in-the-mud puts a damper on Groban’s natural charisma.

Meanwhile, the show consistently relies on Danza to literally sing and dance, in several minor scenes that beg the question of why, given Groban’s involvement, The Good Cop isn’t a full-blown musical. (It also repeatedly insists that he’s irresistible to women, which is not a hill I’m inclined to die on one way or the other.) Something just doesn’t add up.

There’s promise in the fact that the show is built atop a fundamentally emotionally knotty foundation. Part of the reason Caruso Jr. is so clean is that Caruso Sr. went to prison for being a dirty cop. In other words, there should be more to the story. It’s clear that Caruso Jr. grew up in his father’s shadow, especially as Caruso Sr. doesn’t seem to be suffering any consequences after getting out of jail. He’s still beloved by his peers, and though he’s no longer a police officer, nobody stops him from getting involved in his son’s cases (out of nosiness or coincidence, depending on the episode). Caruso Jr. is usually just dragged along in the tide.

That lack of fallout is part of why The Good Cop fails to register. After a few throwaway comments about Caruso Sr.’s past in the first episode, his history of corruption doesn’t really come up again, and his more freewheeling tendencies are played as a joke. Caruso Jr.’s neurotic habits are similarly made light of; his character traits aren’t really essential as, for example, Tony Shalhoub’s Monk’s were. They come and go as is convenient to the story, which makes one wonder why we’re bothering with the “good cop” to begin with.

As it is, The Good Cop is more of a gutterball than a strike. Michele K Short/Netflix

Some of the jokes on the show are genuinely funny. Whitlock fares the best with selling The Good Cop’s fluffy humor, including a running bit in which he refuses to ever run, even when in pursuit of a known criminal. However, none of the show’s humor manages to rise to the level of comedy contemporaries like Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

The Nine-Nine comparison in particular also makes The Good Cop’s refusal to address its cultural context seem like a more major failing, as the place of law enforcement in the modern world is inherently thorny. (Even the recent Spider-Man video game drew attention for its supposed “copaganda.”) Brooklyn Nine-Nine walks the line by engaging with the political issues of the day, but The Good Cop does no such thing, choosing instead to send its characters on wild goose chases such as bringing a restaurant up to code. And that’s to say nothing of a strange extended visual gag in which a male suspect is dressed up as a woman in order to escape attention.

The best The Good Cop can do in terms of existing in the current cultural moment is indulge in occasional subversion by way of its guest stars. One of the most interesting episodes features Bob Saget as a beloved TV personality, coasting on the goodwill of people who grew up watching him. Unfortunately, it’s not an act that the show manages to carry through, despite the caliber of talent involved. (John Carroll Lynch and C. Thomas Howell also pop up throughout the series.)

In the end, the show never quite proves its case as worth watching. It’s fine enough, but it will need to make a stronger case for itself going forward — just as Caruso Jr. needs to step out of his father’s shadow — in order to bring audiences back for a second season.

The Good Cop is streaming on Netflix.

Original Source -> Josh Groban and Tony Danza’s appealing odd-couple dynamic can’t quite save The Good Cop

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

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zenovyap · 7 years ago

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One of the most amazing thing about Madrid was how spacious everything was. One would expect a city that seemed to stop in its tracks in the 80s would be small and dreary, but no! H10 Tribeca is one good example of how the city can combine new with old, and yet does not compromise on ergonomics.

Background

Like I mentioned in the other post, I took a SIN-MXP-MAD flight, as there were no direct, non-stop flights between Singapore and Madrid. And due to my work commitments, I was not able to take the SIN-MXP-BCN direct flight by SQ, and hence the arrangement.

As my stay was for a week, and my work location was near central Madrid (near where Santiago Bernabéu Stadium was), I was in a dilemma between choosing an established Holiday Inn Madrid – Bernabeu, which was very convenient, or the H10 Tribeca, which was much cheaper but required a 10 minute walk to work.

As history would have it, I ended up with H10 Tribeca, and I must say I did not regret taking such a leap of faith.

It’s a real shelf of books!

What Is H10 Tribeca?

Although small, H10 hotels is a rather established chain of hotels in Spain. Why do I say that? If you do a search, you will find that they have presence in most major Spanish cities. That alone was assuring for me, who actually only heard of it for the first time.

It was touted as a boutique hotel, and every other hotel with the H10 brand had its own unique, “boutique”-ness. For H10 Tribeca, it was its chic restaurant and bar, and an impressive library at its library.

Considering the price I had, I was worried that those were just gimmicks. Yes, you can have a funky restaurant with impressive bookshelves (I’m a book-geek, by the way), but were those their ways to mask the fact that the rooms were lousy? Overcoming this bugging thought was what I meant when I said I took a leap of faith in choosing this hotel!

Room

Despite being a boutique hotel, it had none of the smallness of boutique hotels we are used to seeing in Singapore. The Double Deluxe room I stayed in was even larger than your typical double room. Compared to the Superior Deluxe room, the decor was older, harking back to the days of mid-2000s, which to me was “not too bad”.

The number o power outlets was adequate, though there was only 1 at the bedside, which meant that couple-travelers may find it hard to reconcile their mobile-charging needs at night. The table at the TV was not wide and there was no mirror – there was only sufficient space for doing simple work for business trips. And speaking of work, the WiFi was good, even for video streaming (ermmm… Yes, I was video-binging to de-stress from work).

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The spaciousness extended to the wardrobe area; they split a typical hotel wardrobe into 2, framing a counter meant for your luggage (which was on top of that expandable and portable frame for small luggage). However, there was plenty of space in front of the wardrobe, so there was plenty of space for me to parade in front of the full-length mirror that was hung on the wall opposite the wardrobe. The safe could also be found in the wardrobe.

Bathroom

Space wise, the bathroom did not disappoint too. The wash basin counter was spacious at about 2m wide. It was framed by an equally wide mirror, with a smaller one that had a magnifying capability. The lighting was also great (perhaps enhanced by the mirror), which would make this a better place for ladies to apply their makeup (and hence explained the limited space beside the TV, which was the usual place hotels allocate for “dressing up”).

Opposite the wash basin was the shower area (sorry, no bath tub there), which shared the length of the wash basin counter. The shower’s strength was powerful and there was space for one’s toiletries.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Tucked in a little corner was the WC; it was partially cordoned off from the shower/basin area, but if you are looking to complete privacy, then too bad, travelers sharing a room must use the bathroom separately. The toilet bowl and a corresponding wash basin sat on opposite ends of the little space.

Overall, the bathroom seemed like the newest part of the room. I quite liked its black-tiles theme that looked elegant without seeming drab.

Service

I had heard about the warm nature of Spanish people, and that warm hospitality extended to the service staff. During check in, I was a bit skeptical of the hotel; the reception was tucked away in a corner of the lobby space and looked cramp and untidy. That outlook changed when the staff came out to greet me. In fact, they always greeted me when I walked past the reception.

On a side note, the lobby area was split into 2: the waiting area that was decorated into a library-themed space, and a cafe/bar. The appeal of the library-themed decor was apparent in the presence of people lounging there at all times of the day!

The cafe/bar followed a rather minimalist theme, which complemented with the full length windows that allowed the sunshine into an otherwise dimly-lit lobby. I will write a more detailed article on the cafe, just because it deserved one on its own!

Neighbourhood

The hotel sat equidistance to 2 stations of 2 different lines; although it meant a good 10-minute slow walk to either of the stations, it also translated to convenience to reaching different parts of the city. In one direction, you would reach the Santiago Bernabéu metro station situated along the famed Paseo de la Castellena boulevard – the main arterial road of the city.

If you walk to the other direction to Estrecho station, you will pass by a charming church, Parroquia Santa María Micaela, tucked away in a quaint residential neighbourhood. In other words, there was this old charming church without the hustle and bustle of the tourists greeting you on the way to the station! I really liked it as I stood in the plaza in front of the church, soaking in the sense of tranquility in an otherwise busy city!

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If it wasn’t apparent in my prior description, the hotel is actually in a residential neighbourhood. On my evening walks back from work, I would walk past parks and playgrounds that would be filled with children’s laughters, while their mothers gathered to discuss their day’s experiences.

The funny thing is that despite being a residential zone, there were still pubs (and a big Irish one too!) in the area. I had mixed feelings walking back from the metro station after dark; the streets were not desolated, and yet the presence of an occasional drunk dude made me all alert and paranoid (I am after all a small-sized Asian guy…)

Last, but not least, grocery (how can I write a hotel review without tips on getting grocery conveniently?!). This was where Google Maps failed an inexperience traveler like me.

I couldn’t really find the grocery stores that were just beside my hotel; they looked more like a small provision shop and they were always closed when I walked past. On my first day, when I had to do my compulsory grocery shopping which happened on a Sunday when the whole town was dead, I got panicky when I could not find a supermarket that was opened. After wandering for 30 minutes, I found Aldi which was a 5-minute walk away, located off Paseo de la Castellena. It was very well-stocked, but it was a tad too far for me.

I found out a few days later, after a bit of off-map exploring, that there was another supermarket just across the park beside H10. It was smaller, yet functional. The only downside was that the staff spoke little to none English at all, so I had to guess what they were trying to tell me based on my usual grocery shopping experience (like… “Card or cash?”).

The supermarket is just around the corner from the hotel.

Other than the cafe in-hotel, there was a small bakery just beside the main door, which served great pastry and coffee! There was also a Starbucks opposite the hotel. Initially, I was worried I could not get breakfast in a foreign place (I heard that Europeans dined in all the time), so boy was I glad when I found those 2 cafes!

Security

The neighbourhood was good in general, so it explained the not-so-thorough security features. I mean, there was no card access at the main door or the lift, nor there was a dedicated security personnel. However, that was a small lobby, and there will always be a watchful eye from either the reception or the cafe staff. I knew it, because they always greeted me lol

Verdict

The hotel did exceed my expectations! I was expecting cramped, dingy rooms given the price and the hippy advertising. What I got was a comfortable, spacious room that was also convenient to transportation and food.

One thing to note though, the photos in the hotel’s website were too bright. The hotel in actuality was dim and bordering on cosy and creepiness. In fact, my room was too big for single occupancy! My room’s windows also faced the rooftop of the neighbouring building, which looked like one could have BBQ on it. In fact, when I scouted the neighbourhood, I saw that there were ladders leading up to the said roof. In the end, not only did I not open my windows (yes, they could be opened!), my curtains were always drawn; I was usually in the room after dark and I would be damn spooked if I see a pair of eyes staring at me from outside!

H10 Tribeca

Calle de Pedro Teixeira, 5, 28020 Madrid, Spain

+34 915 97 15 68

h10hotels.com

Bonus!

As mentioned earlier, Holiday Inn was one of my considerations when I was researching for accommodation in Madrid, especially when it was recommended by my boss; he said that the room had iron and ironing board, which was a major plus for him on business trips. For me, the main appeal of the hotel was its proximity to my meeting location. When I ended up with H10 Tribeca, I still walked past Holiday Inn on my way to work. Therefore, even though I did not end up choosing it, I kept a look out for it whenever I walked past.

I think the main confusion for anyone coming to Holiday Inn for the first time was the orientation of the hotel. On Google Maps, you can see that Holiday Inn was pinned in the middle of the block. It was actually part of a complex, which in turn was located in a block of land consisting of multiple buildings around an open plaza. If you based on Google Maps, it would seem that the lobby of the hotel opened to a road, or a slip road of some kind. In reality, that was a stretch of car tunnel.

In other words, the lobby of Holiday Inn opened to the plaza that it shared with other buildings. In order to get to the main entrance, you would have to drop off at the roadside and walk about 3 minutes. In my few days exploring the neighbourhood, I did not see any part of the hotel opening to the main road.

When referencing with the hotel’s website, you would notice that there is no gym facilities in the hotel. Instead, there is Holiday Gym, housed in the same building, accessed from the outside of the hotel as it was opened to public. What you can do is to pop over to the gym and show your room key to get access to the gym facilities. The hotel does have a rooftop swimming pool that is opened in the summer. As the neighbourhood was made up mainly low-rise buildings, the view should be nothing short of spectacular.

Food wise, like I mentioned, the whole block is a group of buildings around a plaza. The buildings are mainly office blocks and shopping malls. Therefore, there is no shortage of shopping and dining options when you stay at Holiday Inn, though they may be on the expensive side since they serve mainly office workers. If you are willing to walk further, cheaper options like local bistros or fast food like Burger King is just a 5 – 10 minute walk away. If all else fails, just remember there is a Starbucks just across the plaza from the hotel lobby for you to have a quick breakfast.

The Santiago Bernabéu Stadium is a landmark in the area, and just beside the Metro station serving Holiday Inn.

The metro station is about a 5-minute walk away, on the other end of Moda Shopping Mall. The metro line serving Santiago Bernabéu does not connect to the Madrid-Barajas, but it does serve as a convenient mode of transport to the historic centre around Sol station, which is just a couple of stations away (with a change of line). If you walk the other way, albeit a longer walk, you will reach Alvarado metro station that connects directly to Opera.

Given the great convenience and location, why did I not choose Holiday Inn?

I’m not being hypocritical by upselling a hotel I chose not to stay; the advantages above meet the expectations of what most travellers, but I’m not normal.

Price was a big factor, and H10 Tribeca was about 70% of the price tag of Holiday Inn. Of course, I expected many of my colleagues from other organisations to be staying in and around Holiday Inn, so I wanted to avoid the awkwardness of having to hang out with them after work (I prefer to do my own exploration after work lol). Lastly, the photos on the website didn’t do the hotel much justice. I noticed that the furnishings were outdated, which made me wonder if it was a conscious choice, or it was because they had not changed their curtains/furniture/carpets for a long time. Although Holiday Inn is a generally respectable brand of hotel, I thought I would take my chances with a boutique hotel like H10 Tribeca, which was cheaper, but oh… There was no ironing facility in the room! XD

Holiday Inn Madrid – Bernabeu

Plaza de Carlos Trias Bertrán, 4, 28020 Madrid, Spain

https://www.ihg.com/holidayinn/hotels/us/en/madrid/tojsp/hoteldetail/amenities?cm_mmc=GoogleMaps-_-HI-_-ES-_-TOJSP#

+34 914 56 80 00

One of the most amazing thing about Madrid was how spacious everything was. One would expect a city that seemed to stop in its tracks in the 80s would be small and dreary, but no! Read on to find out why! One of the most amazing thing about Madrid was how spacious everything was. One would expect a city that seemed to stop in its tracks in the 80s would be small and dreary, but no!

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ageofwrathrpg · 7 years ago

Photo

Name: Larisa Tsoy Age: 31 Ability: Empathy Faction: ROSTEKS as a HACKER/SPY Faceclaim: Lucy Liu Availability: OPEN

THE STORY || CW: Death, Violence, Blood

Even as a young girl, Larisa’s dark eyes would sparkle each time she watched the graceful figure skaters take to the ice, aspiring to one day be like them, to one day bring home multiple Olympic gold medals. Her human parents were supportive, as they were always supportive about everything their daughter did, and even pushed her when she thought she could no longer go on, through the pains of sprained ankles and bruised hips. Through perseverance, Larisa Tsoy and her partner, Sayoran, were an unstoppable duo that all the competitors hated yet aspired to be. Her Human parents never would have suspected their daughter of being a Vila, so after she turned 12 and started to complain about “feeling weird” or having sudden mood swings, they chalked it up to puberty. Sayoran, on the other hand, suspected Larisa was Vila. Together, they determined she was an empath and could feel the emotions of others. As partners in more than just ice dancing, they tried to find ways to help her control it. Because they trusted each other implicitly, Sayoran promised to take her secret to the grave.

For two years, Sayoran kept his promise.

A bobby pin had fallen from another dancer’s hair onto the ice. While holding Larisa in a curved lift, Sayoran’s skate struck this pin, causing him to lose balance and drop his partner as he fell. She would never forget the clash of red streaks upon white ice as the blade of her skate crashed down. Her screams and sobs melded with his desperate gasps and gurgles as he clutched at the deep gash of his throat. His eyes were wide with terror, terror that she could feel. She could feel him choking on his own blood, the pain he felt. Larissa screamed for help and while their coach ran for an EMT, she stayed with Sayoran. She could feel it, his fear -- not just from dying, but from dying alone. He didn’t need to speak a word as she gripped his fingers tightly, reassuring him, over and over, “I’m not leaving you. I’m right here.” She refused to let go of his hand when the paramedics arrived, but he was too far gone. Larisa felt the last of Sayoran’s life drift out of his body as though it was her own, like ice water to her veins, making her numb but sensitive to everything around her.

After Sayoran’s death, Larisa wanted nothing to do with people. She dreaded feeling that pain again, that hopelessness and fear. Because their daughter had witnessed and been involved with something so traumatic, her parents never thought twice about Larisa locking herself away from the world. She had seen counselors and therapists alike, but due to her empathy, she felt more judgment from them than sincerity. She found refuge in computers; they were just things that had no feelings, but they were useful. Eventually, she did brave the public for the sole purpose of obtaining degrees in Computer Science and Engineering. Because she spent all her time with these machines, it wasn’t long before she was building her own computers and learning how to manipulate their uses to benefit herself and her parents. Through forums, chat rooms, and eventually social media, Larisa learned she could still have a social life without ever having to leave her basement. It was perfect, to just communicate with others without physical feeling what they felt.

Time and time again, she came across sites and forums created by humans who detested Vilas, some even plotted ways to destroy innocent Vila families. Larisa would go into full-on hacktivist mode and bring these sites down, track down the users’ computers and do everything in her power not just to destroy their own machines, but their lives as well. How dare they plot to hurt, let alone kill, innocent people? It was through a twist of fate that she stumbled across information about the Rosteks, and agreeing with most of their Cause, did not hesitate to offer her services to them. She now uses her hacking abilities to spy the various information exchanges between individuals and groups, and uses algorithms to track any “suspicious” activity.

THE CHARACTER

Online, Larisa is a very sociable person through messengers and video chats. She is considered likable and has a dry wit that others find hilarious, able to defuse a heated conversation with her stellar sense of humor, not to mention knowledgeable about computers and certainly not above helping out a “nerd in need”. Online, nearly everyone is equal and it does not matter if someone is Vila or Human and that is a large part of the appeal. However, she takes great pride in striking down Humans who dare intend harm to Vilas regardless of affiliation.

CONNECTIONS

Yana Czarevna Grekova - Several years ago, Larisa followed a lead that a science facility was conducting experiments on Vilas. By happenstance, she came across Yana in the same forum discussion, quickly learning that the woman was a researcher for the Lesyas. The hacker’s gut reaction was to investigate Yana, learning some basics … including her brief stent with the Rosteks. Initially, Larisa thought befriending her would be her “in” to the Lesyas for the sake of obtaining information for the Rosteks, but she quickly discovered that the two had more in common than she had realized at first. The beauty about computers was that you didn’t need to hear in order to read typed words, you didn’t need to be physically with someone to know how they felt, and you couldn’t read someone’s thoughts through a computer. It wasn’t long at all before she considered Yana to be a true friend, though she keeps her Rostek affiliation a secret. Because Yana is a telepath, they have yet to meet in person, and Larisa prefers to keep it that way or she could risk losing everything.

Aleksey Zhu - Computer aficionados need a reliable supplier, and Zhu’s got the goods. This technopath knows zir stuff and Larisa is happy to do business with zir. In fact, Larisa goes as far as to not only vouch for Zhu’s authenticity and quality, but will even go as far as to organize requests and shipments for the Rosteks. These two keep in close contact online and in person. In fact, she sees a lot of Sayoran in Zhu, and is quite protective of zir, setting up firewalls and safety features to ensure her friend’s safety from cyber attacks. Zhu is one of the few people Larisa doesn’t mind hanging out with on a regular basis, as she adores zir “toys” and the two will rarely run out of anything to talk about.

Kirill Samuilovich Wolff - Larisa does know that Kirill is Shifr’s right hand man, and according to her sources, Shifr’s got his fingers in a lot of pies. She learned that one of the reasons why he is so good at protecting Shifr is his empathy. Looking deeper into his life, his family, his military service--and knowing her own personal experience with the same ability--she could only have respect for him coming out of it seemingly balanced … at least, in present day. Though she does not know him personally, she respects him for his loyalty to his boss. He actually seems like a nice guy when he’s not bashing in the heads of Shifr’s enemies.

Elena Vladimirovna Ostrovsky - One bad day was all it took and Larisa was in the Rostek gym, punching the shit out of a heavy bag. She was rusty, but she’d retained enough of her figure skating training regime to clumsily pick off where she’d started. Elena walked in on her throwing blow after blow, and suddenly she spoke: “You should go on a mission with me.” Larisa was stunned to silence, and then she was embarrassed. She started to pack her things and Elena’s expression grew defiant. Ever since, Elena’s been pestering Larisa to try being an assassin, a spy, a damn thief if that’s what it takes to get her off of her screen — but Larisa has none of it. She’d sooner chain herself to her monitor than join Elena on anything.

Rashid Javed Bashir - Once upon a time, Larisa and Zhu visited a bar after hours, and though there were few people in attendance, they certainly were enjoying themselves … until this hunka hunka sexy cop walked through the door. He was in his uniform, and because he was smiling and making nice with the bartender, Larisa was under the assumption (in her drunken state) that he just HAD to be a stripper. Needless to say, they were both quite embarrassed when the bartender informed her that he was really a senior lieutenant and was just checking in after his shift. Nevertheless, it was certainly an ice-breaker! She finds him endearing, somewhat dorky, but always good for a laugh and a pick-me-up. His natural optimism is something she actually enjoys being around and the two have remained good friends. Though she can’t quite figure out if he’s Vila … or if he’s Human, and Vila police employees are notorious for lying on their records; however, she is leaning toward Vila as this cop refuses to use his gun with the Vila suppressant bullets.

[[ More Connections ]]

ETC

Because she hates crowds and being around people in general, she avoids shopping in public and will instead order everything online to have it delivered to her home.

Banks are easy targets for a woman of her skills and she will often transfer money in a Robin Hood-esque way … except she and the Rosteks are often the ones reaping the benefits.

Larisa loves to dance and is very graceful with her movements.

Sometimes, she will dare to venture into public for the sake of a mission … though sometimes, she will do it to briefly socialize as long as it is a small group (such as after hours as a bar, restaurant, or movie theater).

She lives in a large basement apartment at the Rostek Manor and refers to her “home base” as “The Citadel”, as an homage to her own given name. It is filled with top-of-the-line equipment that is either extremely difficult or impossible to find anywhere else.

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