#I could talk about so much stuff involving the Foxes and Chicago

[palmettofoxden]

TFC characters as lines from Cell Block Tango

Andrew: It was a murder, but not a crime.

Renee: He ran into my knife. He ran into my knife ten times.

Aaron: If you’d have been there, if you’d have seen it, I bet you you would have done the same.

Neil: They had it coming. They only had themselves to blame.

Allison: I guess you could say we broke up because of artistic differences. He saw himself as alive and I saw him dead.

Kevin: I didn’t do it, but if I’d done it, how could you tell me that I was wrong?

Dan: You know some guys just can’t hold their arsenic.

Nicky: Yeah, but did you do it?

Matt: I am innocent.

Riko: I was in such a state of shock. I completely blacked out, I can’t remember a thing. It wasn’t until later, when I was washing the blood off my hands, I even knew they were dead.

Wymack: If they used us and they abused us, how could you tell us that we were wrong?

Ichirou: I fired two warning shots. Into his head.

[astrodances]

How does Steelbeak fit in your au

Ok ok, finally getting to this one, and I am Excited! 🤩

This is actually going to be a three-part answer, and I'll separate each section, but the part that will be most relevant to the question will be the middle part, fyi.

Here we goooooo! (under the cut!)

______

First section:

So, actually gonna start things off with a tangent that, at the least, will serve as a possible idea for Steelbeak's origins.

So there's the TOS episode, "A Piece of the Action." As far as TOS/Trek goes, this is one of my top favorites. And for those who have been following this AU, you'll know that I was extremely excited when @lettheladylead posted this parody of one of the episode's quotes, featuring the scheme team! (If and when I get around to actually writing this AU, I'm gonna do my best to incorporate that moment. :D)

Between that and watching the episode around then, and posting some Diamond Thieves AU stuff recently, too, I realized that I could totally work the Diamond Thieves AU into my Star Trek AU in a very natural way!

A quick premise for the episode: the Enterprise crew goes to the planet, Sigma Iotia II, home to the Iotians, an imitative species. The Iotians have turned into a society of 1920s gangsters, based on a book about '20s Chicago mobs that the previous Earth ship to visit left behind (the "contamination").

For my AU, I'm thinking that Goldie, at some point before she and Scrooge reunite on Risa (if that reunion is the equivalent of Glomgold's gala, then I imagine the following would parallel the ten-or-so years they didn't interact before then in the show), would have visited the Iotians' planet while traveling through the galaxy on her own little spaceship. She would've left something there - a book, maybe a classic movie, or a musical recording even ;) - along with some other items (probably at least some photographs, and some technology) that would allow these AU Iotians to follow a similar path as their TOS counterparts: they would become 1920s gangsters, but not like those from the Chicago book. No, they'd create a world that is essentially the 1920s era of my Diamond Thieves AU! :D

(I don't know if there'd end up being an Iotian Goldie and/or Scrooge down there on the planet specifically, what with them being imitative, but at the least, the world and other characters and general setting will be there. And Idk yet if/when the real Scrooge and the Klondike will visit the planet, and/or if the real F.O.W.L. will get involved with the planet, or the Iotians will make their own F.O.W.L.-like organization, but hey, now the scene is set for any/all of that. ;))

As for Steelbeak: it could very well be that he's one of the Iotians from this '20s world, and could even fit well into the following section(s). (And even if this isn't his route, the rest of this section still stands.) But I think I'm going to go with the following...

______

Second section:

There is most definitely a trend here when it comes to my personal tastes, but probably my absolute very-favorite episode of Trek (or at least one of the top 5 - making me choose is just not fair XD) is DS9's "Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang". (Quick premise: It's Ocean's Eleven (or "Louie's Eleven"!) in a holosuite on a space station. :D)

Now one thing that I have to state first: Vic Fontaine is very much here and himself in this AU, just as a duck or some other animal (ooh maybe a fox or a wolf? or a cheery kind of dog?) (in DT87 though Duckworth once mentioned a 'Drake Sinatra' - that's something to consider here, although I'm personally more of a Dean Martin fan - we'll find the right pun name XD). I love Vic so much, and this AU can't exist without him.

So anyway, I'm picturing Steelbeak to actually be one of the hologram characters that arise with the jack-in-the-box that takes over Vic's program in this episode. If we're talking DT17 Steelbeak (which is more '60s that his DW91 counterpart, so he might be the better option for this program), then I'm thinking he'd fit in as a Tony Cicci-type of character. If he's more like the DW91 Steelbeak, then he'd be more like Frankie Eyes. (Or maybe he's a mix of his DT17 and DW91 selves?)

Here's where I start to twist things around.

You know the EMH's mobile emitter in Voyager? Well, I'm thinking that either Ludwig (with his own set of EMHs already), Gyro, Fenton, or Gandra, or a combination of them create a mobile emitter for holograms (or already had one made, for Ludwig's purposes). And they either already had it in the works to give to Vic just in general, or specifically plan to give it to him because of the jack-in-the-box that's overtaken his casino. With the mobile emitter, he could get out of the holosuite, at least temporarily until the program's fixed. (I know in the episode, Vic wasn't backing down from the situation and leaving, and maybe that's the case here, but the main point is that the group is ready to present the mobile emitter as a plan to keep Vic safe.)

At some point, however, the emitter falls into Steelbeak's possession, either by accident and he somehow ends up finding his way out of the holosuite on his own and it's a shock to him, or he perhaps overhears of the group's plan and their talks with Vic about the "real world", maybe even some mention of Vic saying something like, "Did you run when F.O.W.L. invaded?" Something. Something to get him curious about the mobile emitter and the real world, and to get him to make a plan to steal the emitter and escape the program. (Maybe besides overhearing things, there's also a glitch in the jack-in-the-box that makes him self-aware and smarter (like, "able to access station files from his matrix" smarter), like Vic and TNG's Moriarty, and he uses that knowledge in his escape plan.)

And you know what? It works.

After they fix the program (and sing their songs), the DS87 crew is all like, "What happened to the emitter?" "Oh, I thought you had it." Or they don't even notice, and assume it's back in some kit of Ludwig's or Fenton's to take back to their quarters later on. (Either way, it's fine, they reason, Ludwig's EMHs will probably each have one by the end of the week, so it's not like they can't get Vic another before the Klondike leaves the station this time.)

Meanwhile, there's a holographic '60s mobster somewhere out there loose on the station, sneaking onto a transport bound for who-knows-where, with a tiny little device tucked up his sleeve, keeping him in the here-and-now.

(And I would just like to say that this idea almost seems meant to be. Why? Because in DWD's "Bearskin Thug," Steelbeak does indeed say, "Badda-boom, badda-bing." I'll take that as a blessing (and probably for the AU name of this episode). :P)

______

Third section:

So this section is especially subject to change, but where does Steelbeak go from DS87? I'm thinking something along the lines of DS9's "Honor Among Thieves" episode.

He won't be sent to Farius Prime to infiltrate anything like O'Brien was, but I think I'll have Steelbeak end up on (AU) Farius Prime and wind up involved with the Orion Syndicate, at first with a smaller sub-group like Bilby's. (And maybe when his Bilby trusts him enough to witness for him, that'll be when Steelbeak first tells him - tells anyone - that he's a hologram? We'll have to see how that plays out, but it's probably something the Syndicate could use in the end. That, or there's a relationship of a very special kind of trust to be had with these two.) (I'd probably change Bilby's name, but...Steelbil? I'm here for it.)

That life suits Steelbeak very well for a while. It's rough work, sure, but he's literally designed to interact with these types of people, and in the end, he thrives with the Syndicate.

And eventually, he'll learn that his Bilby's higher-up, the AU version of Raimus, has formed an alliance between the Syndicate and F.O.W.L., much like that scene where O'Brien finds out about the Syndicate and the Dominion. Only Steelbeak will be for it, and F.O.W.L. will see him as a member to keep a close eye on, and they'll eventually offer him a chance to join the ranks of F.O.W.L., which he accepts.

And thus, Steelbeak ends up with his home team once again. The hologram angle will be fun to play with (especially for Heron - one of her tasks will be to figure out out to make the emitter more permanent for Steelbeak, or on the flip side, how to control it - and thus him - for F.O.W.L.'s purposes (hello Jem'Hadar and the ketracel white). Perhaps it'll be a secret he tries to keep as long as possible, for his own safety. Or maybe he'll use his secret as a way to bribe High Command for something, telling him that, as a holographic matrix, he knew all the ins and outs of DS87, at least for a short time, and could probably get back into the system, if need be, which is info that F.O.W.L. could definitely use.

Whichever way, Steelbeak is gonna be fun.

[nekojitachan]

Okay, so the A/B/O fic won with two votes (LOL, voting counts, people). But I still have time tomorrow, so may do the HtSaM and I’m still plotting out the Spiderman fic.

Anyway, This is like the first scene, just to give you an idea (A LITTLE) of how things will work out in this world.

Uhm... don’t think there’s much to reference for triggers here, other than Neil’s past (very vague).

*******

Neil watched from his seat in the bleachers as the maintenance crew cleaned up after Millport’s graduation ceremony – a graduation ceremony he’d attended despite some misgivings in the end. He’d decided that it would raise less questions if he disappeared after receiving his diploma, one more student who wandered away without any prospects, than be a no show.

His duffel bag was at his side and packed, he merely needed to decide on Reno or Chicago (north or south) as the place to buy his next ID – did he want to return to Canada or try Mexico? The States never had brought him any good luck, it was time for something different.

While he pondered his choices, the bleachers creaked as someone approached – Hernandez. “I didn’t see your parents anywhere,” the counselor said as he sat next to Neil, blue tie askew and grey-shot hair mussed as if he’d run his hands through it a few times.

“No, they’re too busy working. Besides, it’s no big deal, just high school,” Neil murmured as he tapped the folded piece of paper against his knees. “Not like it’ll do me much good.”

“Your grades aren’t too bad, especially for math and Spanish. Mrs. Engles said you’ve a talent for languages, that you speak French better than most of her students.”

Neil winced as he thought about that slip, about responding in the language the one day when he’d been too tired to think straight. “Still not going to do me much good when I can’t afford to pay for university.”

Hernandez grunted as he stood up. “About that, come to my office, would you?”

Neil hesitated for a moment, suspicious of the man, but during his year in Millport (several months too long, really, but he’d been so tired after his mother’s death), Hernandez had done nothing to make him doubt the middle-aged beta. Had asked about his parents, had constantly pressed snacks on him and asked about his health, but hadn’t tried to hit him or appeared to be working for his father.

So Neil followed, figuring that the counselor would press one more college or scholarship application on him (wasn’t it too late for that stuff) and then he’d be on his way, off to another city by the night’s end.

“You’ve got a lot of potential,” Hernandez said while they walked, the start of his usual spiel. “I know it seems that things are easier for the alphas, that they manage to claim whatever they want, and people feel that omegas need special help, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t any support for betas. In fact, there’s groups out there who are doing their best to make things equal for everyone, regardless of their classification.”

“It’s been the same way for centuries, I doubt it’s going to change anytime soon,” Neil murmured as he thought about his father and fought to rub his fingers against the side of his neck, where he’d applied the scent patch earlier in the day; it should still be good for a few more hours.

“No, things are already changing, and they’ll continue to change as more people take a stand.” Hernandez gave Neil a significant look before he opened the door to his office, as the scent (odor) of an unfamiliar alpha washed forth to overcome the familiar one of the friendly beta. “I think you can help, too.”

“Who- no,” Neil denied as he shook his head even while Hernandez all but shoved him into the office; he gripped the straps of his duffel to both hold on to it better and to use it as a potential shield/weapon even though the stranger merely stood still on the other side of the room, muscular arms folded across his chest and wearing an orange jacket bearing a familiar fox head logo. “Fuck, you’re a Fox,” Neil breathed out.

Hernandez winced, probably at him swearing, then motioned at the alpha. “Neil, this is David Wymack, and yes, he’s in charge of the Palmetto Foxes. I asked him to come here to meet you.”

“Pretty mouthy for a beta,” Wymack chuckled; he was taller than Hernandez and had the typical ‘alpha’ build, was broad-shouldered and looked as if he could pick Neil up and snap him in half with ease (looked too much like Neil’s father even if his skin and hair and eyes were darker). Yet his smile was friendly and eyes warm… though Neil knew to never trust someone by their appearance. “Hernandez there sent me your files and I can use someone mouthy who has a talent for languages to help out my crew. What do you say?”

No, this couldn’t be happening, not the Palmetto Foxes; the straps of Neil’s bag burned against his palms as he thought about the binder inside of it, of how the man who ran the Palmetto chapter of the Foxes had invited him, someone who’d once dreamed of attending the Edgar Allan academy, be part of the same ‘crew’ as Kevin Day, who’d run from the prestigious school for alphas to join the Foxes.

Just how much more fucked up could Neil’s life become? What next, would he bump into one of the Malcolms when he went to buy more hair dye or a bus ticket?

“Kid, are you having a panic attack?”

“No,” Neil managed to wheeze out while he shook his head; if Hernandez wasn’t blocking the room’s only exit, he’d make a run for it. “No, I don’t think it would be a good idea, me joining the Foxes.”

“Neil, don’t make a hasty decision here, this is-“

Wymack cut off Hernandez with a slow shake of his head. “Look, can I talk to Neil alone?” he asked, and only the fact that he didn’t back it up with any of the usual alpha posturing kept Neil still when Hernandez agreed after a slight pause.

“I’ll be right outside the door,” he told Neil, which wasn’t as comforting as it sounded. “You’ll be all right, I promise.”

It was quiet in the room for several seconds after the counselor left, then Wymack cleared his throat, which made Neil jump a little. “Seems like a nice guy, he clearly cares about you.” The alpha cleared his throat again and pushed up the sleeves of his garish orange jacket, which revealed tribal flame tattoos on his thick forearms. “Look, you seem a little familiar with the Foxes, so you must know that we take in people around your age from troubled homes regardless of their classification and work with them to earn an education in return for them helping out others. We’re trying to teach a generation that it doesn’t matter if you’re an alpha or beta or omega, that we’re all human.”

Neil stared at the man to make sure if he was finished then sighed. “Am I supposed to slow clap now?” When Wymack glared at him, Neil reminded himself that he was pretending to be a meek beta and shuffled a step back. “I don’t see why you’re interested in me.”

“Because when everyone’s not studying online, they put in some hours at a call center that provides assistance to… well, it’s usually omegas and betas in need,” Wymack admitted. “I could use someone who speaks French and Spanish, and from what Hernandez said, you could use both the degree and someplace safe to live.”

“I already have someplace to live,” Neil lied, indignant over the implication even if it was true.

“Yeah? Then how come Hernandez suspects that you’ve been crashing in the various locker rooms here some nights, hmm? That you seem to avoid your parents as much as possible?” Wymack appeared smug when Neil glanced aside, upset that the counselor had picked up on him sleeping at the school since it at least had running water and heat, unlike the abandoned, partially constructed house which he’d been squatting in for most of the year. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on at home, but this is a chance, kid. Don’t be stubborn and take it.”

It was a risk, is what it was… but Neil was tired of squatting in and breaking into places to bathe and… and he was terrible at living alone, of being on the run without his mother. She might have ‘only’ been an omega, but she’d had the will of an alpha, had been so strong and focused, had kept him focused.

If he left on his own, how long until he just… just ended up rooted somewhere like he had in Millport again? At least if he accepted Wymack’s offer, he’d be one in a group, could blend in and build up some supplies, could properly plan for once. He’d have a stable address to receive his patches and contacts, and could work on a new ID if needed.

There was a risk with Kevin being involved, but he looked nothing like the ten year old kid he’d been the one time they’d met, eight years ago. He smelled nothing like Nathaniel Wesninski anymore, especially when he used the patches.

It should be all right.

It had to be all right, because Neil didn’t have any better ideas.

“When do you need an answer?”

A pleased grin spread across Wymack’s face as if he realized that he’d won. “I��m here for the night and leave tomorrow at 10am. I’d much prefer to take you back with me, unless there’s something holding you here for a few days.” It was as if he feared that Neil would change his mind once he was out of sight.

“I… give me the night to talk to my mother,” Neil lied as he shuffled his feet again. “But there shouldn’t be a reason why I can’t leave with you.” No, that would be plenty of time to grab one or two things that weren’t in his bag, change clothes and apply another patch.

Now Wymack appeared concerned. “Do you need my help when you talk to her?”

“No, it’s better that I do it alone,” Neil said in a rush. “She doesn’t like strangers.” That was an understatement.

Wymack didn’t appear pleased to hear that but was mollified when Neil signed an agreement to work for him in exchange for a scholarship, room and board, and a small stipend. Hernandez almost burst into tears when he was told and would have hugged Neil if he hadn’t stepped out of reach in time.

Wymack also wasn’t pleased when Neil chose to run home that evening instead of accept a ride, but he soon would learn that Neil did things his own way. Neil promised to be at the airport on time then left, mindful to make sure that neither man followed him ‘home’.

Since he was leaving the next day, he stopped by the grocery store for food and a few items, such as wipes so he’d be clean enough the next day without taking a shower. Considering it lucky that he’d just dyed his hair a couple of days ago, he went to the rest room after he paid so he could clean up and change clothes, then went to the laundry mat to wash anything that was dirty and ate his supper while he waited.

He thought about how nice it might be to have a shower every day again, or wash clothes whenever he wanted, or to sleep in a real bed….

It was another night on a plywood floor with the sleeping bag, another night where he slept in snatches, always on the alert for any sound which might indicate someone trying to sneak up on him. As soon as the sun began to rise he was up; he had a breakfast of fruit and granola bars washed down with energy drinks, then used the wipes to clean himself before he applied another scent patch. While it sunk into his skin, he checked that everything he needed was in his duffel bag; anything he was discarding was rolled up in the sleeping bag, which he would throw out in a dumpster on the way to the nearest gas station.

He cleaned up once again when he reached the gas station, just to make sure he was presentable for the flight, and brushed his teeth. Then he bought a couple of snacks and used the pay phone to call a cab to take him the airport, where he waited for Wymack to meet him at the one check-in station.

The alpha was surprised to see that he didn’t have any luggage to check and gave him an odd look as he handed over Neil’s ticket. Neil did his best to act nonchalant when they went through security, to not worry about his fake ID, but the TSA worker barely paid him any attention.

There was a reason his mother always made him present as a beta, even though his build was small enough to pass as an omega as well; people didn’t think much of betas, didn’t expect much trouble from them. Betas were amicable and hard-working and common.

If the TSA agent had known that he’d just dealt with a null? Well, the place would probably be on lockdown by then, with Wymack swarmed by guards and placed under arrest while Neil was (carefully, but all the same) hauled off to a secure location, was sequestered from everyone.

A null was anything but common.

A null didn’t just walk around without an armed escort, oh no.

A null, so rare that there were only a handful known to exist at a time, were cherished and protected (were owned) by the most powerful families. Families which used them for their abilities to remain unaffected by an alpha’s aggressiveness or an omega’s emotional manipulation, who wasn’t triggered by a heat cycle or overwhelmed by pheromones. Everyone around Neil was susceptible to their own nature, could be weakened or enraged by a mere scent or a growl or look… but not him.

It would make him feel powerful if he wasn’t so terrified of the artificial scent which fooled people into thinking he was a beta failing, of them realizing that he didn’t have a scent, and everything his mother had sacrificed for him would then be for nothing.

Ha, nothing, just like him.

However, no one called him out as a fake and he was able to board the plane, even though the scent of cigarettes which clung to Wymack made him want to dig the pack out of his bag and light one up, to hold it near his face so he could inhale the smoke (and let it wash over him, to add its scent to his own as yet another layer to the mask).

Wymack waited until they were in the air to speak. “Look, some of the others… most of them mean well, but a few of them are rather rough. If you have any trouble, come talk to me, Abby or Dan. Abby’s the group’s nurse and unofficial den mother, and Dan’s like my second in command.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, it’s not like I’m going to cause any trouble,” Neil insisted before he opened one of the magazines he’d brought along to keep himself distracted during the flight. After all, he was pretending to be a quiet beta and had every intention of keeping his head low for the next few months before he moved on.

“Sure, you say that now,” Wymack muttered before he opened a notepad and started writing things down.

Neil didn’t know why the man was so worried – it wasn’t like he was the one who had a serial killer father hunting him down because of a weird genetic quirk. However, he decided to keep that fact to himself, since he planned to be long gone from Palmetto before anyone had a chance to figure it out.

*******

I guess if I wrote more, I would have to figure out a name for the damn thing? And it’s more A/B/O/N at this point. Obviously I’m playing with Neil being Demi/on the Ace spectrum here (though it’s not such a rare thing in the real world, I have to have some reason for him to be in the run).

 I think what’s held me back from writing this (well, other than FREE TIME) is what the heck would the Foxes do?

[philosophy-juice]

I was tagged by @breadpunk7 !! again haha

Do you make your bed?: like...... 3 out of every 7 days probably

What’s your favorite number?: 5

What is your job?: I work at a grocery store rn and i was SUPPOSED to be a summer camp counsellor this summer but :(( u kno

If you could go back to school would you?: I’m in school getting my degree in environmental science!!

Can you parallel park?: YES but i avoid it whenever humanly possible

A job you had that would surprise people?: probably the fact that i would have been a camp counsellor?? people who don’t know me well sometimes think i’m shy/quiet but i love kids, the outdoors, camp game type things, and etc, and i think the job really would have suited me!!

Do you think aliens are real?: can’t say whether or not they do exist, but there’s no way it’s not possible and should not be ruled out - there’s too many things we haven’t explored and don’t understand!!

Can you drive a manual car?: Nope

What’s your guilty pleasure?: right now it’s... tik tok.

Tattoos?: 1!! My best friend and i got matching tattoos (i have a paper crane right by my left ankle) but i have ideas for tons more!! some floral and family/friend inspired ones, a mountain range, some other ones too!

Favorite color?: All of them!! But I love yellow and blue, and lately i really love green

Favorite type of music?: Rock, indie stuff, some pop, a mix of a lot of diff genres!

Things people do that drive you crazy?: passive aggression

Do you like doing puzzles?: Jigsaw puzzles yes; other puzzles it depends!! I have to be in the mood. I sometimes like collaborative ones like stuff you’d find in D&D!

Any phobias?: tsunamis. I love the ocean but i am TERRIFIED OF TSUNAMIS. i literally have dreams involving them like, at least once a week. i’m also scared of tornados (thanks to living in chicago for a few years) but they don’t actually scare me that much unless there’s a thunderstorm going on that looks a bit suspect haha!

Favorite childhood sport?: Softball/baseball! I also love playing badminton but not competitively

Do you talk to yourself?: LITERALLY all the time

What movie do you adore?: Jurassic Park, The Princess Bride, Ponyo, Hoodwinked (cinematic fucking masterpiece), Up (I know it’s not the *best* movie but god I love up), Fantastic Mr Fox (just listing some of my favourite movies now), hmmmmm omg. omg Barbie Princess & the Pauper. yes i’m dead serious. also yeah there’s definitely more movies i’m not thinking of rn. i’m so bad at remembering movies whenever someone actually asks me about them. i cannot think of things eek

Coffee or tea?: Both!! I love all manner of teas but especially black and green teas, but I also love coffee (i’m hooked on those whipped dalgona coffee drinks rn..... i’ve been making them with vanilla and almond milk and it’s so yummy)

First thing you wanted to be growing up?: First thing I can remember is either a vet or a musician?? And I still play and love music; next thing was an author and that’s still one of my dreams - my degree’s gonna be in Environmental Science and Geography, but I want to get at least one of my stories published one day :)) I also wanted to be an astronomer (was almost my choice of major in uni) as well as a marine biologist (but I’m shit at biology) but hopefully I can use my major towards the latter of those things!! more so ocean conservation and climate change research!

I’ll tag @thestarninja and anyone else who wants to !!

[justgotham]

We always knew they meant New York," novelist, Lawrence Block, wrote in his intro to the first trade paperback of the DC Comics series, Gotham Central. Block was writing both about the inherent New-Yorkness to Bob Kane's initial vision of Batman's Gotham City and of Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka's incarnation in Gotham Central.

Gotham Central, which debuted in single issues beginning in 2004, is maybe the most quintessentially New York comic book imagining of the city of bats and cats, robins and riddlers. It's a story not about how a boy billionaire with a grudge and an endless arsenal of super-weaponry handles someone like Mister Freeze, but about how the boys in blue of the Gotham City Police Department deal with them. There's something endemically and irrevocably New York about people running around in strange costumes while often-flawed cops do their best to keep a tight hold on a city that never sleeps.  

Ten years after Gotham Central first appeared in comic stores, Gotham, the Fox TV series very loosely based on Brubaker and Rucka's stories, found an even better way to make their Gotham City feel like New York: they filmed there.

And while having the literal New York City skyline to draw inspiration from helped, there was another part of Manhattan specifically that helped give each of Gotham's residents that undeniable New York feel: Broadway.

"I worked on Broadway," says Gotham's current costume designer, John Glaser. "Josh, my assistant, worked on Broadway. ... The painters and the sketch artists have all worked on Broadway. We actually approached each episode like a little Broadway show."

And what advanced techniques were brought from the Great White Way to the Dark Knight?

"Paint and tape," says Glaser. "I hate to say it, but paint and tape make things look the way that they should."

As it turns out, that's a very Broadway approach to costuming. Glaser learned from the best, having assisted under the late, great Patricia Zipprodt, who was the original costume designer for iconic Broadway shows like Fiddler on the Roof, Cabaret, Pippin, and the second longest running show in Broadway history, Chicago.

"Everything was painted, painted, painted, painted. I was a costume painter, so that's instilled in me," says Glaser. "The painting part, some people wouldn't do. Once we actually started to paint things in the first season that we were there and went, 'Oh, this stuff looks much better with the lighting, the dark scenery and the shafts of light.' We always made everything light at the top and dark at the bottom, ombré it down."

There are lots of little fun facts to be learned about the basic costumes and how they echo back to Batman comics, too. It's the little things. "On men's suits, we only used black buttons, no matter what suit it is," he explains. "Black buttons because in the comics all the buttons are black."

For Gotham's fifth and final season, there were creative alterations made to the costumes overall that informed the style of the show, each with specific purpose. "Because they are at war, we got rid of all jewelry," explains Glaser. "It's being melted down to make bullets. Without any jewelry, it kind of changes the look of the show. There are no earrings, there are no necklaces. We didn't want a lot of extraneous costume stuff, just what was really interesting in front of you."

Probably what most separates Gotham from Arrowverse shows or the Marvel Cinematic Universe is how the wardrobe team treats the supervillain costumes and suits. Those, too, get the Broadway treatment. Not at first, though. First, suits for characters like Firefly and Mister Freeze are crafted in Los Angeles. "It's like buying a car," according to Glaser. "They know the body's measured, they make an extra layer of the body for them to give them the right shape, they have the right fabrics, they have the right sculptors, the right fabricators."

But Glaser wasn't a fan of the exactness of these initial designs. "What I didn't like about that was that it looked like a movie costume. We actually took Firefly's costume and Mr. Freeze's costume, after they first wore them, and we started to paint them and age them, just because they didn't look like they were from Gotham. They looked like they were from a different world. We took them back, kept painting them and aging them, putting things on them and making them look more like they were from the city of Gotham."

Sometimes the newness of a costume could even be a problem, especially in Gotham's final season, where everyone is living even more rough than usual. "On Ivy's costume," Glaser uses as an example, "the top of it is flesh and it goes into fabric around her breast and we couldn't figure out how to make that transition without it looking like a skating costume."

So how do you solve that problem beyond paint and tape? "We took it to Izquierdo Studios and I was explaining to Martin Izquierdo what the problem was. He said, 'Alright, just go away for an hour.' We went away for an hour, and then when we came back he had cut, hacked, aged, and torn it, and it looked perfect. It was a dress that melted into her body — so it went from flesh, to fabric, back to skin and flesh, so you couldn't pinpoint whether it was a dress, whether it was her skin, or whether it was vines growing on her. It was vague, misty, and painted with lots of sparkle, so you could never pinpoint what it was. That was a very successful costume."

Beyond the desire to make Gotham feel like New York through the lens of a Broadway show, there was one other consistent challenge: working within the confines of the DC Universe. All live-action TV series that exist within the worlds of DC Comics have to accept that they are second banana in the DC hierarchy. The creators of Arrow had to scrub their Suicide Squad plotline when the film of the same name starring Margot Robbie and Will Smith was greenlit, for example. And so, too, Gotham had to contend with these challenges from a stylistic standpoint.

"There's a thing that Josh and I used to say," admits Glaser. "'If you can't tell what it is, then it's great.' If you can't know where it came from or if you can't pinpoint it, then there was never a problem."

Probably the most infamous struggle Gotham faced in the Batman canon relates to the Joker, in that Gotham simply could not have a character named "the Joker." That is why the twins, Jeremiah and Jerome, were created. And, even then, there was some conflict. "We sent a sketch and he [Jeremiah] had some purple in his suit," Glaser explains. "Warner Bros. said, 'No, you can't use purple.' The producers from Gotham talked with them and they let it pass. I think that was an area or a time when they started to loosen up a little bit, with us. We never got too close to the iconic look of anybody. We always danced around it."

One character from whom there was, surprisingly, no pushback at all was Harley Quinn. "The diamond shapes are painted on so that they kind of fade in and out, kind of ghost-like," reveals Glaser of the initial Harley design. "Every time that we saw her it would get a little more refined. When it started out it was like a dull red and a dull blue. By the time we finished, this is on different clothing, but, still, again, painting, it had become red and white, but because of what she does, we made it look like red blood and white."

You may also have heard that Gotham's final season involves a time jump allowing its audience to see something they've wanted since day one: Batman. And while it's too early yet to reveal everything about the first time we see actor David Mazouz in full Bat-regalia, Glaser did reveal one aspect to the costume that was mandated: "They insisted that the Batman logo be on the belt."

There's so much that goes into costuming a show, there could be a whole series just on the topic. Glaser talked with SYFY WIRE about so much: the muscle suits under the character's clothes, the way each character was built up to be taller and longer, and small details — like the custom made ties for all the men's suits, and how they changed from season to season. Even the background actors got their own story. "For every episode, we would pick a color," says Glaser. "Let's say there's a party scene, we would pick a color and we would pick a vague period and focus on that."

Most of these skills are ones that Glaser and his team learned, not from television, but from their time assisting with, designing, dressing, teching down, and rigging costumes on Broadway, all which helped make the Gotham City of Fox's Gotham the most quintessentially New York incarnation of the DC Universe yet.

[rorykillmore]

i can't remember if you've said, but where do you think your characters will settle post-shift? what are their new living spaces going to be like?

sokay i talked about this a bit in an ask from tony but i’ll just refer back to it and expand on my ideas a bit! especially since i have some revamp stuff more fleshed out now

lucille’s gonna be living in victorian london! i think she’ll kinda miss living by the water though so she might get a place by the river or something. and she’s gonna probably start composing music and finally make a career out of that because that’s something she’s always wanted to do, and every now and again maybe i’ll give her a monster encounter or something since. she does have a shitton of monster hunting experience by now,

her place’ll probably incorporate a lot of the style she’s developed living on her own in her beach house, so it’ll be a touch modernized by london’s standards but still very. elegant in aesthetic. and i like your idea about her and maria rooming together so maybe we can do that!

siobhan’s staying in the southwest. in the same damn saloon, in fact. so there’s not much new to describe about hers or the denny guardians’ living situation; though maybe they’ll like... have an expedition to explore some of the newer towns at some point? road trip!

though i also said i wanted her to get the chance to visit the triassic period location with raptor red and that still stands; i think that could lend to some interesting dynamic development

sara is gonna be staying on the waverider and maybe sometimes visiting port royal if that’s where nyssa’s gonna be hanging out. so not much new to say here either, except that her life might be less... exciting than she’s used to. she might be restless for awhile. ‘cause, y’know, no more time travel, no more timeline that needs protecting. the legends’ll be kinda robbed of their purpose so she’ll need to find a new one. she might revert to more traditional vigilanteism in chicago perhaps or just, maybe they’ll tour around trying to get leads on the organization and that can be their new thing, who knows!

the cats don’t really need much of an update...

dolores and alana are both staying in beacon heights so i’ll just group them together! for alana, it’s probably pretty convenient that it’s closer to metropolis, because she’ll be spending a lot of her time there trying to help the mld get a handle on things anyway. dolores is too content in beacon heights to really want to move around, although i do have vague plans for her to get involved with our Future Location. maybe in some campaign for sentient ai there. it actually might be a good place to continue to make use of host printing stuff

and now for my characters who are ACTUALLY moving around more,

sophie’s gonna be in chicago, of course, running her own club/speak-easy, so she’ll probably live somewhere close to there! i envision her like... moving into an apartment building and renting out a big ol’ penthouse and living it up. that might be where she conducts some of her shady business related to the club and keeping it protected from the organization. oh i actually forgot i added a cool hotel location to chicago; she might rent out the penthouse THERE. and then she can interact with some of the guests and stuff too.

camille’s gonna be living in metropolis still, so technically not much is changing there, but... she might not be home all that often. once the revamp hits i’m really envisioning her traveling a lot, actually. because one of the challenges of the revamp is like... figuring out how to establish mass communication (there aren’t cell phone towers or wifi in a lot of these locations, unless someone icly starts an initiative to install them!) and spread news from place to place and keep everyone connected. i thought it would be cool and make sense if that task sorta fell to the daily planet, so, yeah! camille might be all over the place, staying in different hotel rooms or crashing on people’s couches, that kinda thing. it’ll be interesting to see who she meets along the way

sly, as we’ve already discussed a bit, is gonna be in port royal! he’ll be on the mainland some of the time but i’m also considering... bring in his (canonical) pirate ship and just letting him fuckin’ have at it with whatever crew he assembles. while he’s in town, i think he’d be the type to try to keep things safe and vaguely ordered (i know we discussed him and nyssa being kind of, like, thief-vigilantes) and while at sea he might be doing things like rescuing people from pirates and... maybe even discovering the location of the Plot Thing in that area, so that later he can help guide people to it

cordelia is gonna be in st. denis (or technically just outside of it) since that’s where the academy is being moved! it’s... gonna be a bit of a lifestyle change for her and everyone living there because the people of st. denis. aren’t so culturally appreciative of witchcraft as the people in new orleans are. so i’m interested to play with the conflict of her and the coven kinda... clashing with some of the locals, and what kind of plot stuff that might draw to the area. they might ESPECIALLY get off to a bad start because fate and i are planning on implementing venomplot soon after the revamp, so like. whoops if cordelia bonded with the symbiote gets noticed somewhere in town,

susie and villanelle are both gonna live in paris! fuckin’ naturally.

susie... despite the fact that she could live pretty much anywhere if she wanted to, probably would be happy with somewhere pretty modest. she really isn’t used to anything lavish. although one thing i was definitely considering was having her start some kind of dance academy there, so maybe she’ll live there if that becomes a thing?? what’s really nostalgic for her about paris is that it’s... pretty much stuck in the time period she comes from, too, so there’ll be that to grapple with

and villanelle. honestly i have this whole complicated thing in my head for how villanelle operates on denny, the hoops she jumps through to keep herself under the radar. essentially the situation is going to be: she has a pretty standard apartment in metropolis, which is the address her rifter id is registered to, and the place she’d bring anyone who was like, casually visiting her or whatever. that apartment is... she takes care to make it appear lived in, but it’s pretty standard and impersonal.

her flat in paris is not registered under her name, is much harder to track, and far fewer people get to see it, but it is definitely more resembling of a place she’d actually call home. it’s very... her, very similar to the place she has in canon, probably. expensive and stylish and ~trendy~, very much a 25 year old girl’s apartment if you discount the weapons she keeps in the drawers. i still think it’d be funny if fox had to live with her for a bit as a parallel to him taking in her younger self,

i’m not quite sure where laura will end up yet; i’m considering a few options. one is -- i haven’t set the details of this particular location in stone yet, but she might be an interesting candidate to hang out in whatever fantasy world we develop! because technically, she’s more magical than anything else. i’m also vaguely considering london or future world for her (and she should definitely have an encounter with those fucking. zombie people who live outside of st. denis, FEAR) but yeah we’ll see. might depend on who she falls in with.

[junker-town]

How the pandemic gave Adam Amin a glimpse into the future of broadcasting

A Q&A with Adam Amin on broadcasting in a pandemic, calling games in VR, and where the industry is headed.

Adam Amin had just arrived at dinner with the rest of the crew that would be broadcasting the American Athletic Conference men’s basketball tournament in Fort Worth, Texas when he saw the news that would soon change the world as we know it. Rudy Gobert had tested positive for coronavirus, the fans attending the Jazz-Thunder game were sent home, and one of the busiest months on the sports calendar was about to be postponed or canceled all together.

Amin has been has busy as ever since the pandemic started. He left ESPN to take a job with FOX, landed the play-by-play gig with his hometown Chicago Bulls, called playoff baseball, NFL football, and NBA games in the bubble in VR. We sat down with the 33-year-old to talk about how the pandemic has changed his industry, what the future of broadcasting looks like, and the advice he’d give to young people aspiring to get into the business.

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

SB Nation: What was it like to change jobs in the middle of the pandemic? How has that changed your day-to-day routine?

Adam Amin: It was very odd to transition jobs in the midst of a pandemic. I wasn’t really thinking about it in March. It’s March! You’ve got the NBA going on, I had done the Pac-12 women’s tournament a few days prior, I had done the Warriors game the night before in San Francisco, I was getting ready for the American Conference tournament, and I was going to call the NCAA women’s tournament. So at that time I’m not really thinking about what the transition from one job to another is going to be like. Then the pandemic hits, and we’re all just thrown off by trying to find new routines. A lot of people were struggling, trying to hold onto their jobs or find new ones. There was a lot going on in that 1-2 month span then all of the sudden it was like, “Oh hey your contract is up, we should start talking about this.”

So we ended up at FOX and with the Chicago Bulls gig, and to have to transition out of one job to another during a pandemic was very odd. It almost made it easier to role with the punches, and adjust to anything new we had to do once MLB season rolled around in late July. It didn’t feel like as big of a deal, because everyone was dealing with new circumstances, and mine was certainly a much better circumstance than other people were dealing with. I am very fortunate.

SBN: I remember watching you call a Cubs game this summer where you were working remote in Chicago and your color guy Eric Karros was working in Los Angeles.

AA: The whole crew was in LA, I was in Chicago at the Big Ten Network studios, the game was in Chicago at Wrigley. It was weird. That first baseball game was July 25, a Saturday, then I started doing NBA games for Yahoo! Sports for the seeding rounds in virtual reality with Richard Jefferson, I was doing that while he was in California and I was in Chicago working out of a different studio. We had a producer in Toronto and another producer in Florida. It was a crazy kind of circumstance. That month long stretch of doing a decent amount of baseball games and two weeks of NBA with no one in the room with you, that’s very odd.

SBN: What was that like, and what are the challenges of working remote?

AA: Trying to develop chemistry is the biggest challenge. With Eric, it was a little more difficult because we had never met. At least with Richard Jefferson, I knew him. We had done a number of games together, we’ve hung out, we’re buddies. These are people I hadn’t really met or gotten to know outside of what we’re doing over a headset.

Instead of looking at a field, I’m looking at monitors. Instead of looking at a human being next to me, I’m looking at a projection of them on a television screen. You make do with what you can. You figure out angles. You figure out where your eyes needs to go, and you need to learn that on the fly. You have to adjust. physically and mentally, you got to kind of figure things out, and turn that into muscle memory. You’re fighting something you’ve been doing for almost 15 years. Navigating that is a challenge, but it’s a challenge you need to navigate through.

SBN: How have the protocols around covering sports in a pandemic changed how you do your job? Has it made some things easier or is it mostly an added layer of difficulty?

AA: I miss not being able to walk in and introduce myself to a coach or to a player or to have a conversation with a person in front of you. It has been convenient to be able to do the Zoom calls, and still feel like you’re connecting with someone. I talked to Leonard Fournette recently and being able to talk about how I covered him in high school, talk about his kids, talk about LSU. That’s great. Obviously would I prefer to be in the same room, but at least there’s still some connectivity to feel like you’re speaking with another human being.

The tough thing about television is it’s such a relationships business. Having an understanding of a coach, player, or team through personal relationships is important. I’ve always prided myself on that. I hope we can get to a point eventually where we’re doing things the way we used to do them. The timing of things, the relationships you build, the connectivity of things, to feel like you’re fully immersed in the preparation and connection with people, that’s something we miss right now.

SBN: The idea of using virtual reality in sports is interesting. What was that like, and do you think that could be a viable way for sports fans to consume broadcasts in the future?

AA: Richard Jefferson and I were just calling games from this app called Oculus Venues and it allows fans to basically go to live events from their living room.

I feel like it’s something especially for the NBA that is really solid as a viewing option. The athleticism of the guys, the big time dunks, blocks, when you feel like you’re sitting on the baseline, that’s awesome to be able to see that and feel like you’re there. And you can interact with other people who are in this app with you. The fans seemed like they really enjoyed interacting with Richard Jefferson and I. That made it really fun, and made it seem like it could be a viable option as an alternative for how you want to view these games in the future. I’m not sure about the viability of other demographics, but I thought it was cool.

SBN: One thing that has always stuck out about your broadcasting style is your ability to combine enthusiasm and also professionalism. How do you strike that balance?

AA: It’s a genuine enjoyment of the job. I think you have to enjoy the job of covering sports. I enjoy this very specific structure that we operate in. I really enjoy introducing a team, introducing some storylines, kind of writing the book for that night as you go through the game. You don’t know who the hero is going to be, you don’t know who will struggle. You don’t know who has a fascinating story that no one knows. The result of high level athletic competition is enjoyable for me to watch. For most people, it is. These are athletes who can do things that most of us can’t and that’s enjoy for us to see what other people are physically capable of. That’s the most detailed core answer I can give you.

The emotional aspect of wiring the story that night is appealing. That doesn’t feel like a job. It’s work that doesn’t feel like work. So that combined with really impressive athletes doing cool things in real time, and get to be the first one to document that in real time as a play-by-play announcer, that’s enjoyable to me, and that’s something I feel every time i do the job. That matters to me.

SBN: Where do you think the industry is headed five or 10 years from now?

AA: There’s part of me that hopes — and this is biased and wishful in some ways — that broadcasting is on a similar path that it is now. Not in the pandemic era, but the time before the pandemic. I hope we still have the opportunities to be at games, have access to the players and coaches as we’ve had, and it will be a combination of in person and video, all that stuff. Technology is going to continue to be used for the convenience of athletes and coaches. And obviously that can be for the inconvenience or to the chagrin of people in television, but it is what it is. It’s the cost of doing business. I hope that it stays in a space where announcers are still going to get access, feel involved and immersed, and continued to be the conduit to people at home or in bars, or however they’re consuming the game, on an iPhone, on TV, whatever.

SBN: What advice do you have for people who aspire to get into the broadcasting industry?

AA: I think you need to be a student of a lot of things. You have to be a student of the craft you’re doing. If you’re a journalist, you need to be a student of the craft of writing. If you’re a broadcaster, you have to be a student of the craft of broadcasting, whether that’s elements of language, television, radio, play-by-play, whatever it is. You have to keep learning. Be as all encompassing as possible in terms of your knowledge base. Now more than ever, I think you have to be adaptable and flexible.

You need to know a lot of things so you can be flexible and versatile, and feel like you can contribute in any capacity on short notice. Those are the biggest things in the last six months especially.

Remember that everyone is trying their hardest, and give yourself a break. Don’t beat yourself up over mistakes, don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s hard because sometimes you don’t know what the small stuff is when you’re coming up, finding your footing, every event that happens feels like the biggest thing that’s ever happened. But understanding that you don’t have to beat yourself up over mistakes is big. Like I was obsessed with, well if i’m not doing this job by age 27 like Joe Buck or Ian Eagle or Mike Tirico, I’m not going to have a long career or good career or lucrative career. And that’s just not true.

Set goals set lofty goals, chase lofty goals.

[ahnsael]

Woke up yesterday to a call from my boss, asking me to work graveyard last night/this morning instead of swing yesterday.

I happily agreed -- I stayed up too late last night and was dreading that 1:00pm alarm.

After talking with him, I got to go back to bed and sleep until 6:30pm Now I have two days to get my sleep schedule back on swing shift.

Overall a dead night -- for almost an hour and a half we had no guests. But at around midnight, a lady (probably in her mid-20s -- she was carded, but not by me, so I don’t know) went into the bathroom, came out a few seconds later, grabbed a straw, and went back in. Then she came out a few minutes later, grabbed another straw, and went back in.

One of my security guards thought, “huh, that’s weird.” But this security guard used to do drugs, and after the second time he walked up to the entrance of the womens’ room and took a sniff, and recognized the smell of burning heroin.

He explained to me what was going on, and once she left the restroom we made sure it was empty and went in to see if we could find any evidence. In one of the handicapped stalls, we found two melted straws which she used to suck in the smoke from the burning heroin. I called the sheriff’s department and explained what was going on.

Unfortunately, the lady and the man she was with left while I was on the phone with dispatch. The deputies came and confirmed what the security guard had told me, but said that, since it happened in the restroom (no cameras in there for obvious reasons), even if they found her they wouldn’t have a case, no matter how obvious it was to both the deputies and us what had happened.

All they could do was remove the straws from the premises so we wouldn’t have to handle them (as there may have been residue on them).

A local Native American casino has had a big problem with drug users, and Tribal police have been banning people from that casino left and right. Which...good on them for doing so. But that means they’re now coming here (after midnight, we’re the closest casino to that one, just a couple miles down the road). And I don’t know if county sheriffs have more restrictions on the burden of proof, or whether the Tribal police have been overstepping their bounds as far as assuming guilt without enough evidence, or if the users were more open about it there and got caught.

But, on the plus side, the deputies are making their presence known much more often in our casino. There are a few specific people they’re looking for (apparently one of our regulars, who we’ve long-suspected of dealing, is having a pretty good case built against him with the use of undercover officers, and one of our other regulars has a warrant out, but I have not been able to find out which one so I could call the sheriffs department when I see them), but mostly they just want it known that they are watching. They may catch some people. They may just spook them enough to keep them from frequenting the casino (none of them play much, usually, and even if they did, we don’t need them or their money, as the druggies could turn off our other regulars to where THEY stop coming in).

There have been a LOT of shenanigans lately (unlike about a year ago, when it was a manager and a couple of employees doing the shenanigans, which led to quite the tongue-lashing from our owner, this time it’s not anything WE’RE doing wrong -- in fact, every manager we have is on board with trying to fight this, but understanding that there’s a high burden of proof, but...with this new security guard who has a past, we’re all learning, as he’s filling us in on his old tricks and people he knows are still involved in that world.

Usually it’s tweakers (people on meth). Heroin is even worse. I don’t want either one in my casino, but...wow. I hope we get them out of our hair soon. Let them move to the NEXT casino down the road.

I’m told we scared the druggies away before (they came back after we were off the sheriffs department radar for a while), so hopefully we can do it again.

It’s still weird to me to have a good relationship with (most of) the deputies here. I’ve only ever had bad experience with cops before this (I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating for those of you who are new -- I have no arrest or criminal record, my worst transgression is a speeding ticket that I got in Illinois, and I once got a parking ticket in California because I forgot it was street sweeping day). But most cops I’ve dealt with before I moved here (with ONE exception, a Los Angeles Airport Police officer who helped me out when I ran out of gas literally right next to an LAX runway -- I actually called his superior officer to compliment him, that’s how helpful he was; I actually had an Anaheim police officer, after my roommates locked me out with no notice and not only kept, but then SOLD everything I owned that was in the apartment, ask if I had receipts for the things I’d owned for years, and said “I don’t have a special ‘cop-knock’ that will make them answer the door and give your stuff back”).

But here, with two exceptions that I can think of (out of dozens of deputies with which I’ve interacted), I get along with the force. We’re on the same side. And, yes, sometimes they do talk down to me. The guy tonight kept asking “What do you want me to do about this? You have no video of her actually using.” Which I understood, given the fact we have no video of her using, and told him so, but HE JUST KEPT ASKING as if I hadn’t just fully agreed that there wasn’t enough proof to arrest or prosecute. But while that rubbed me the wrong way, he was overall decent to us (including the security guard who has the past, that this officer is WELL aware of, as my security guard told me that this particular officer had arrested him multiple times, but tonight, he told that security guard “I’m glad to see you’re doing well”).

The casino world is a trip, y’all. I mean, I’ve dealt with SOME (but not all) of this stuff before at other jobs, including Disneyland and the movie theater, but...never this frequently. It’s truly something else. This is, overall, a decent small town where people either look out for each other or just ignore each other. But...there’s DEFINITELY a criminal underbelly here. Not as bad as L.A. or Chicago, probably on par with where I lived in Washington (there it was mostly shoplifting, though, as far as what I dealt with -- here, nobody can steal a slot machine).

The world is often a strange place.

I mean, I saw Fox News last night at work (in between watching Olympic curling, and educating my security guards about the game [I LOVE curling, and I’d never seen a curling controversy before last night, and I saw TWO of them in different matches] -- the opening ceremony is tonight, but some events have already started) praise Donald Trump’s request for a military parade with tanks and marching soldiers and missiles going down Pennsylvania Avenue for his pleasure, and chastise Kim Jon-Un for holding one in North Korea yesterday, calling the actions of a dictator. Wait...what? The cognitave dissonance is strong with them.

[biofunmy]

Facebook News launches with major publishing and journalistic support

CLOSE

Facebook must pay a record-breaking $5 billion fine as part of a settlement with the FTC and also agreed to measures that limit the power of the CEO. USA TODAY

Facebook has begun rolling out its new Facebook News section with support from some of the country’s most prestigious newsrooms, including USA TODAY.

The social network has also enlisted The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, The Dallas Morning News, Chicago Tribune, The Boston Globe, Business Insider and Buzzfeed, among other high-profile news organizations, lending much-needed credibility given Facebook’s previous failures to clamp down on the spread of “fake news.” 

“We’re pleased to partner with Facebook on their efforts to highlight news from trusted, high-quality publishers for their audience,” says Maribel Perez Wadsworth, president of the USA TODAY Network and publisher of USA TODAY. “It’s also a big step forward that Facebook is investing in trust and quality by licensing content from news publishers for the first time.” 

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg arrives to testify before the House Financial Services Committee for a hearing on “An Examination of Facebook and Its Impact on the Financial Services and Housing Sectors” on October 23, 2019 in Washington DC. (Photo: Jack Gruber, USA TODAY )

Facebook is calling this ambitious march into news and journalism a test, for now, made available to a “subset” of people in the nation’s largest cities. The new news tab will appear in the Facebook app on your phone, not on the web.

At a launch event Friday in New York, CEO Mark Zuckerberg suggested that while starting small, Facebook News could reach 20 to 30 million people in a “few years.”

During the initial phase, Facebook plans to showcase original reporting from local properties in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Philadelphia, Houston, Washington, Miami, Atlanta and Boston. 

“The fact that local news is part of this big Facebook rollout goes to the fact of how important trust is, and that local news is where that’s at,” says Steve Chung, chief digital officer for Fox Television Stations.

Adds Patrick Paolini, vice president and general manager at Fox’s WTTG and WDCA stations in Washington D.C.: “From my perspective, shine a light on us.”

The Today’s Stories section of Facebook News (Photo: Facebook)

Readers will be able to access content through four distinct sections:

Today’s Stories: A section with human-curated pieces that will be updated during the day.

Personalization: An algorithmically curated area filled with topics that Facebook believes you will want to read, share and follow.

Topic sections: An area where you can dig deeper into the business, entertainment, health, science and tech and sports categories.

Your subscriptions: Where you’ll find content from paid subscriptions linked to your Facebook account.

You will be able to access controls to hide articles, topics and publishers you choose not to see.

Facebook says it surveyed more than 100,000 people on Facebook in the U.S. earlier in the year and found that it was under-serving many topics people wanted most in their News Feeds, especially around categories like entertainment, health, business, and sports. 

On Facebook News you can control the kinds of stories you’d like to see surfaced. (Photo: Facebook)

Citing unnamed sources, The Wall Street Journal reported that Facebook is offering licensing fees ranging from hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for smaller publishers to a few million dollars annually for bigger ones, with much larger sums reserved for major organizations.

Facebook says it has chosen publishers that are in its News Page Index, which was developed in collaboration with the publishing industry. Publishers must abide by Facebook guidelines that address hate speech, clickbait, and other violations, including inaccuracies determined by certified non-partisan third-party fact-checkers.

Facebook also added that the publishers must serve a sufficiently large audience, with different thresholds set by category.

“We already have a lot of eyeballs on Facebook. This is a nice way to position our brand in a section of Facebook dedicated to reputable journalism,” says Colby Smith, senior vice president and general manager for ABC News Digital and Live Streaming, and another Facebook media partner. Smith hopes for ABC to eventually provide live video through the new news section, just as it already does through the Facebook Watch video platform. At first ABC News will be contributing written stories.

Verizon-Disney bundle: Verizon customers to get a year of Disney+ for free

How to get a free Mini: Spotify giving away free Google Home Minis

In a blog post co-written by Campbell Brown, Facebook’s vice president of global news partnerships, and Mona Sarantakos, a product manager at the company for news, Facebook said it will continue to expand the algorithmic selection of stories driving the majority of Facebook News. 

But journalists will play a prominent role.

“We have progress to make before we can rely on technology alone to provide a quality news destination,” the blog authors wrote. “When we started talking to news organizations about building Facebook News earlier this year, they emphasized that original reporting is more expensive to produce and better recognized by seasoned journalists than by algorithms.” 

Facebook says it has formed a curation team to oversee its Today’s Stories section. “This team is independent, free from editorial intervention by anyone at the company.“  

At the New York launch event, Zuckerberg acknowledged that, “For better or worse, we’re a prominent part of the news cycles. I don’t think it would be reasonable to try and have a news tab that didn’t cover the stuff that Facebook is doing.”  That free rein, he added, extends to stories written about “me.”

Zuckerberg also said that Facebook would not be sharing data about what people read with advertisers.

In the past, Zuckerberg has expressed skepticism about Facebook’s involvement in curating news. “I have a quite contrarian view here because I think the more you start to curate, and to select, and to make choices, the more you automatically, and even involuntarily, transform into a publication house, into a media company. And then, honestly, you’re just too big,” he said during an exchange earlier this year in Berlin with Mathias Döpfner, CEO of Europe’s largest publisher Axel Springer. “Sooner or later, you will be split up by regulators because they will say there cannot be so much dominance in one company that makes the decisions globally who reads what.”

Follow USA TODAY Money & Tech on Facebook. Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Twitter: @edbaig 

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Your Monday Morning Roundup

Last night felt like a punch to the gut.

It was a roller coaster weekend for Sixers fans regarding LeBron James. He officially opted out of his deal with the Cavaliers Friday morning and the courting for the king began. And slowly, it started to begin to feel he might actually come to Philly. And it felt like a Big 3 of James, Kawhi Leonard, and Paul George would not happen with PG staying in OKC.

Fast forward to Sunday, when in the middle of the World Cup, Woj dropped a huge bomb involving a meeting with the Sixers and LeBron’s reps, sans LeBron. The Sixers reportedly pitched that they were very confident the team could get Kawhi from the Spurs and sign him to a long-term deal. Getting him would’ve taken two players and three first round picks. We all wanted to pull the trigger immediately.

And then at 8:05 PM, out of nowhere, Klutch Sports Group, the agency that represents James, dropped a short press release announcing James would go to LA for four years and $154 million. Get his jersey if you want.

To make things worse:

Sources: As trade talks have unfolded, Kawhi Leonard’s focus is unchanged: He wants to be a Laker. https://t.co/0wZGf5MrNt

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) July 2, 2018

Who knows how it may unfold in LA. The Lakers also signed Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, LANCE STEPHENSON, and JAVALE MCGEE to one-year deals. KCP is a good player, but Stephenson, LeBron’s top enemy who will probably play the role of J.R. Smith, and McGee, the big man who’s made numerous appearances on Shaqtin’ A Fool embarrassing himself, is unbelievable. It might turn into a clown show for all we know. They’re also interested in bringing back Brook Lopez and signing Nerlens Noel.

So what will the Sixers do? Ersan Ilyasova and Marco Belinelli left, which means the scoring from our bench took a huge hit. And with Kawhi’s wishes to still be a Laker in any way possible, including sitting out next season, it’d be smart if the Sixers don’t waste Dario and Covington plus three first round picks for a rental.

The big priority right now is to get J.J. Redick back. Losing him would be brutal. Next up would be reloading the bench. James Ennis has reportedly been a target for the team, and Jabari Parker has also been linked to the team. Do you also re-sign Amir Johnson or possibly pursue a guy like Kyle O’Quinn? Guys like Avery Bradley, Tyreke Evans, and Kyle Anderson (RFA) also intrigue me.

They also appear to be talking to Jerryd Bayless about either a complete buyout of his $8.575 million contract or stretching out his contract. The latter of the two options would keep him on the books for three seasons (double the number of years left on his current contract plus one year), but with a lower salary hit of around $2.85 million a year.

So with that, Joel Embiid’s response to all of this was simple:

MOOD #TheProcess pic.twitter.com/uwsCLVCSth

— Joel Embiid (@JoelEmbiid) July 2, 2018

Let’s do it organically. Trust The Process.

Before we continue, a word from our sponsors:

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The Roundup:

We have a new episode of Crossing Broadcast to discuss everything that happened this weekend, including the LeBron stuff.

Continuing with the current Sixers squad, Summer League action begins later this week. Markelle Fultz will not participate as he continues to work on his shot with Drew Hanlen, and Shake Milton suffered a stress fracture in his back and also will not play in Las Vegas.

Here’s a look at the minicamp participants, which also includes former St. Joe’s Hawk Isaiah Miles:

A look at #Sixers minicamp participants (with obvious note that Milton will not be in this group now) pic.twitter.com/tP9FaKOg3K

— Kyle Neubeck (@KyleNeubeck) July 1, 2018

Jonah Bolden will also not participate, and apparently he might not be a part of the team in the future at all:

Source: Philadelphia are entertaining the idea of using stash Jonah Bolden as a trade asset. Lots of interest from other NBA teams, there's a standard NBA buyout to free him of his $400,000 deal with Maccabi Tel Aviv.

— David Pick (@IAmDPick) July 2, 2018

As with the veterans on the team, Justin Anderson had shin surgery and will be re-evaluated in about two weeks.

On Thursday, the Sixers helped opened up a renovated playground in North Philly. They hope it can turn the area around for the better.

The Phillies took three of four games against the Nationals this weekend. After edging the Nats Thursday, the Phils got blown out Friday with a 17-7 loss, thanks to seven home runs by Washington.

Saturday saw Vince Velasquez leave the game early after taking a line drive to his right arm, but the Phils eventually earned a 3-2 win thanks to seven innings of bullpen work. He’s on the 10-day DL.

The series finale was a hot and wild 13 -inning affair, with the Phillies coming out on top with a 4-3 win thanks to an Andrew Knapp walk-off homer. Nick Pivetta came in relief for the final inning and got the win. That capped off a brutal 42-game stretch which saw the team go… 21-21. That’s really damn good.

The team has a well deserved day off before beginning a quick two-game series with the Baltimore Orioles tomorrow night at home. Zach Eflin will take the mound in that one.

During the weekend, we saw Pat Neshek return for a third of an inning, but also saw Hector Neris go back down to Lehigh Valley.

Recently retired Phillie Jayson Werth probably deserves a spot on the team’s Wall of Fame.

While NBA Free Agency was hot, NHL Free Agency also got underway Sunday afternoon. The Flyers made one move, signing James van Riemsdyk to a five-year, $35 million deal ($7 million AAV).

You can thank Claude Giroux and Jake Voracek for persuading JVR to come back:

“I heard from G and I talked to Jake Voracek,” van Riemsdyk said via conference call. “It was good. I did my homework in the situation to talk to guys that were still there, some guys that maybe are not there anymore but that were there recently, just to get a feel of where things are at.

“I talked to both those guys and just picked their brain about some stuff. They were great about being open and available to help me through my process of getting to the point to make a decision. That was really helpful.”

Three former Flyers the team didn’t want signed elsewhere. Brandon Manning went to Chicago (2 years, $2.25 million per year), Petr Mrazek went to Carolina (1 year, $1.5 million), and Valtteri Filppula signed with the New York Islanders (1 year, $2.75 million). Good job by Ron Hextall to not give those guys that much money.

Meanwhile at Development Camp, Isaac Ratcliffe is showing signs of why the team moved up in last year’s draft to get him:

“My goal after last camp was just to get a lot stronger,” he said last week, after finishing drills at the team’s practice facility in Voorhees. “I have the size to actually get heavier, and this year I wanted to come back and really show I developed a lot this year and put on a few pounds. I want to show I can compete with the toughest guys in the league.”

Ratcliffe, 19, said he wants to put on even more weight, continue to add strength, and increase his speed in the next year.

“It’s a fast game, and it’s a game that’s decreasing in size, too,” he said. “And I have to show that I can bring both speed and size to the game, and my skill set as well.”

Some surprising Eagles news: Linebacker Nigel Bradham won’t play in the season opener. He said it stemmed from an incident back in 2016 where he hit a cabana boy.

The Ringer suggests the Eagles trade Brandon Graham to San Francisco:

Let’s say, just for a minute, that the cap-strapped defending champs decide they can’t afford to sign Graham, 30, to a long-term contract extension now or in 2019. In that case, their next two options are to (1) ride out the final year of his contract and maximize their shot at winning a second consecutive title before letting him walk in free agency—thus getting relatively little (a 2020 comp pick, maximum) in return or (2) think big picture, and trade him now for high-value picks and some much-needed cap relief.

I know what I’d do (Super Bowl LIII or bust, baby), but with the 25-year-old Carson Wentz locked in as their franchise quarterback, the Eagles brass should be thinking about the long-term health of their roster and salary cap, too. That’s where the 49ers—cap- and draft-pick rich and not afraid to make a big splash—come in. San Francisco’s got plenty of interior pass-rush talent, but they don’t have a proven elite edge rusher like Graham. If they threw a 2019 second-rounder and more Philly’s way, Howie Roseman may have to consider it.

The Union fell to LAFC 4-1 out west this weekend. They’ll return home on Saturday to take on Atlanta United FC.

In the FIFA World Cup, France, Uruguay, Russia (in penalty kicks), and Croatia (PKs) all moved on to the quarterfinals this weekend with wins.

Today, Brazil takes on Mexico at 10 AM, followed by Belgium and Japan at 2 PM on Fox.

In other sports news, former Islanders captain John Tavares signed a seven-year, $77 million deal ($11 million AAV) with the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Not everyday you can live a childhood dream pic.twitter.com/YUTKdfMALl

— John Tavares (@91Tavares) July 1, 2018

In other NHL Free Agency news, John Tortorella ripped on defenseman Jack Johnson going to Pittsburgh:

John Tortorella sure can’t help himself when it comes to the Penguins https://t.co/vo3l6RH0sF pic.twitter.com/3W8o5DVcpc

— Mike Darnay (@MikeDarnay) July 2, 2018

Seahawks safety Kam Chancellor is probably calling it a career:

Gods Grace

pic.twitter.com/60J2DugpD1

— Kameron Chancellor (@KamChancellor) July 1, 2018

Celtics first round pick Robert Williams missed his flight to Boston and didn’t show up to the first day of Summer League workouts for the team.

Mo Salah signed a new long-term deal with Liverpool. He’ll be there until 2023.

In the news, $1.7 million of fentanyl was seized at the Port of Philadelphia.

Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s personal attorney, said his family and country come first before President Trump

Vermont legalized weed.

The post Your Monday Morning Roundup appeared first on Crossing Broad.

Your Monday Morning Roundup published first on https://footballhighlightseurope.tumblr.com/

[placetobenation]

THAT. JUST. HAPPENED. #WWEBackstage pic.twitter.com/TDd5n0qk25

— WWE on FOX (@WWEonFOX) November 13, 2019

“Just when they think they have all the questions, I change the culture. I’ll see you next week.” – CM Punk on WWE Backstage Tuesday, November 12

In less than one minute of air time on Fox Sports 1 Tuesday night, CM Punk returned and blew up the wrestling industry once more! Not since the pipe bomb incident and his subsequent leave from WWE back in 2014 have we seen the man named Phil dominate the conversation. FOX Sports and WWE confirmed that Punk will now be a contributor to WWE Backstage on a regular, but not every week basis. This is huge news for WWE on two fronts. One, it gives the immediate buzz during Survivor Series build and two, it keeps Punk away from AEW, which reportedly did meet with him and offer a big-money contract. Now, since Punk’s contract is reportedly with FOX and not WWE, it will be interesting to see if the WWE plans to try and use him in a role other than on WWE Backstage, which unfortunately for them, is seen of the least watched platform they are on, as opposed to the USA Network and FOX.  I for one, like many of you, have been waiting for Punk to return as he is one of the generational talents that you will stop what you’re doing to watch or listen to on a weekly basis. I’m hoping they use him well, let him speak his mind and make it an awesome experience for him and us as fans and viewers. Because if they do, hold on to your hats. If they don’t, it will be very short lived!

Now, as for the week that was in the WWE, it continues to be centered around NXT’s involvement in the Survivor Series. After a very disappointing, and yes, taped, RAW from Manchester, England, we got solid shows from NXT and Smackdown. I think what the WWE has to do in the final week leading up to Survivor Series itself on November 24 in Chicago, home of CM Punk of course, is to do more than the run-ins it has been doing the past couple of weeks. Give me more storyline and emotion. Introduce the NXT superstars to those in RAW and Smackdown that may not know them. It may eventually get more eyeballs on to the product on Wednesday night, which is one of the big benefits if done properly.

We’re going to start a new feature to TWITW (This Week In The WWE). It’s the star of the week and this week, it’s an easy one.

Star of the Week – CM PUNK

For obvious reasons stated above. Punk sent shockwaves through the industry not so much for what he did, appear on screen for less than a minute, but what could be in the near and extended future. Count me in! Who knows, maybe a reunion with Colt Cobana could be the next near impossible thing we’ll see.

Now, on to the shows!

RAW

RESULTS

WWE Women’s Tag Team Title Match:: Champions The Kabuki Warriors defeated Becky Lynch and Charlotte

Drew McIntyre defeated Sin Cara

WWE 24/7 Title Match: R-Truth vs. The Singhs went to a no contest

Seth Rollins defeated WALTER @ 4:20 (DQ)

Seth Rollins, Kevin Owens, & The Street Profits defeated Imperium

Andrade defeated Cedric Alexander @ 3:50

Erick Rowan defeated Nigel Kickpads @ 1:00 via pin

Non-Title Match: RAW Tag Team Champions The Viking Raiders defeated Flash Morgan Webster & Mark Andrews

Randy Orton, Ricochet, & Humberto Carrillo defeated The OC

What we loved:

Humberto finally wins – We’ve been harping on this for a few weeks now and it was great to see Humberto Carrillo finally get a win on television. Albeit, it’s in a six-man tag match, but a win is a win.

NXT UK – Great way to introduce the mainstream audience to NXT UK’s most powerful entity, Imperium and its leader, WALTER, especially with the show coming from Manchester, England. Too bad WALTER vs. Seth Rollins fell apart after only four minutes only to lead to the predictable tag team match.

What we didn’t love:

The vibe – Because RAW was taped last Friday after a Smackdown taping in Manchester, you could tell the crowd just wasn’t into it, especially towards the end of the show. It’s almost as if the WWE was treating it as a throwaway show. That’s something they should NEVER do, especially when they treat Monday nights in such high regards.

Where was Natalya – I know they gave the obligatory Natalya couldn’t be there due to family obligations, but why not throw in there that Natalya and Charlotte Flair are getting a tag team title match soon. It seems as if they are defaulting to Becky Lynch and Flair as a team when ever they need a quick fix. I don’t like it especially since we’ve seen them as a team a lot lately. Make your champions special. I liked the team of Flair and Natalya together and it gave them a purpose, a storyline to get behind. Stick to it.

NXT

RESULTS

NXT Cruiserweight Champion Lio Rush defeated Angel Garza

Xli Li defeated Aliyah

Non-Title Match: Keith Lee defeated North American Champion Roderick Strong

Swerve Scott defeated Bronson Reed

Ladder Match for The Advantage in War Games: Io Shirai defeated Mia Yim

#SmackDown Women's Champion @itsBayleyWWE just DROPPED @QoSBaszler on #WWENXT! pic.twitter.com/ONpe5pxjGp

— WWE (@WWE) November 14, 2019

Yeah. We're ready for this.@FinnBalor @SuperKingOfBros #WWENXT #NXTTakeOver pic.twitter.com/Da8aeb15NT

— WWE NXT (@WWENXT) November 14, 2019

What we loved:

Climbing the ladder – Kudos to Io Shirai and Mia Yim for delivering another awesome NXT main event. Every week, these main events have given us quality matches that leave us wanting more. Yim getting busted open with a broken nose and the closing run-in by NXT Women’s Champ Katie Lee Ray, put the WOW in this one. And then to boot, we get what seems to be a thumbs up to KLR for her spot on Shayna Baszler’s Survivor Series team leading to…

Welcome home Bayley – It was short, sweet and effective. Bayley returns to Full Sail as the former NXT Champion takes out the current NXT Champion Baszler on the stage to avenge Baszler’s beatdown of Bayley on Smackdown. Straight to the point and well done.

Balor vs. Riddle – Yes, please. More of this! Talk about your way around not having Balor vs. Johnny Gargano, well here it is. This could be an epic match to come!

Keith Lee – Not only does he continue to get better and better each week, but now his win solidifies his team for WarGames and sets himself up for a future North American Championship title shot down the road. Really good stuff.

What we didn’t love:

Balor’s spotlight – Kill it already. Whoever is following Balor with the spotlight, it ain’t working! It makes it look minor league, especially in a small building like Full Sail.

Got us thinking:

Angel Garza and Lio Rush’s wife – Something watch as we could get more in this cruiserweight battle that saw round one goes to Rush.

SMACKDOWN

RESULTS

For Spots on The Survivor Series Team: Mustafa Ali & Chad Gable defeated Robert Roode & Dolph Ziggler

Smackdown Tag Team Title Match: Champions The New Day defeated The Revival (DQ after interference by Undisputed Era)

Heavy Machinery defeated Jimmy & Johnny Kickpads

Non-Title Match: Bayley vs. Nikki Cross (No contest after NXT interence)

Team Smackdown (Nikki Cross, Sasha Banks, Dana Brooke, Carmella) defeated Team NXT (Dakota Kai, Rhea Ripley, Mia Yim and Tegan Nox) – Nikki Cross wins spot on Team Smackdown for Survivor Series 

What we loved:

The dog mascot – Sure, we thought, probably like most of you, that it was going to be Roman Reigns in the mascot costume. But, pleasantly surprised when it wasn’t as Reigns came straight down to the ring in the middle of the match. Maybe we’ll get a surprise reveal to a returning star later at Survivor Series. That would be a nice payoff. Either way, some unpredictability is good.

#TheNightmare can't scare #TheBoss. #SmackDown @SashaBanksWWE @RheaRipley_WWE pic.twitter.com/nhfc2oSp4G

— WWE (@WWE) November 16, 2019

Highlighting the SS teams – A lot of the time was devoted to building out the Smackdown teams, including forty minutes at the top of the show for the men and then the main event before MizTV for the women. It’s nice to see spots getting earned in the ring for Survivor Series rather than just being thrown together in a promo or graphic reveal.

At #SurvivorSeries, @WWEDanielBryan will willingly step into the darkness when he battles #TheFiend @WWEBrayWyatt for the #UniversalChampionship. https://t.co/d2iqO0jp2E pic.twitter.com/9Fgqb5GNAx

— WWE (@WWE) November 16, 2019

Someone says YES – It wasn’t Daniel Bryan that says YES, but Universal Champ Bray Wyatt that says YES! to a match with Bryan at Survivor Series. We still get Bryan in that clunky not a face, not a heel position, but we’ll get a great match between these two at SS while the fans try to decide who to cheer for as both are well liked at the moment. The possibilities are there and let’s not forget how Sami Zayn and Shinsuke Nakamura could still get involved with all this.

What we hated:

It’s not that we really hated anything this week, it’s more of a wish. With Smackdown moving to FOX, we expected something really different and we just haven’t seen it. Outside of the NXT invasion that was brought about due to “travel issues,” we haven’t really gotten the creative changes we thought were coming. Maybe with the change from Eric Bishoff to Bruce Pritchard, things are delayed. But much like we haven’t really seen too many Paul Heyman changes on RAW, maybe we are expecting too many drastic changes to a company that can’t really deliver that “edge” we may be looking for since it is, after all, sports entertainment, and it’s a public company that delivers to major, national sponsors on major, national networks so a pushing of the envelope has to be pushed softly and not with a Myles Garrett over-the-head helmet shot.

Parting shot:

Aside from Triple H, isn’t it refreshing to see a brand supremacy battle not being waged with a McMahon vs. McMahon vs. McMahon as the theme? While we love Stephanie McMahon as the ultimate heel villain when she really turns it on and not trying to be a brand ambassador, it is nice to see the superstars telling the story. Kudos for not defaulting into a tired storyline WWE. Thank you!

Thanks for letting us share our thoughts! Shoot me an email at jcrowe567@gmail.com. We’d love to hear your comments and suggestions! You can also check out my blog, The Crowe’s Nest as we delve into more pro wrestling, sports entertainment and the World of Sports. My apologies ahead of time – I AM a Patriots and Red Sox fan! If you’re not down with that, I’ve got TWO WORDS for you… NEW ENGLAND!

[lockcup5-blog]

The Linc - NFL evaluators rank Eagles as worst playoff team

Let’s get to the Philadelphia Eagles links ...

Ultimate NFL playoff team rankings: The best on offense, defense and overall - ESPN 12) What could be better for the Eagles than sneaking into the playoffs with Nick Foles behind center (ribs permitting) and a bunch of league insiders ranking them last in the field? Earning a first-round bye with Carson Wentz would be much better, obviously. But, like Pederson was saying, just get into the tournament. The Eagles have done that, and now they’ll face another team known for its offensive trickery. ”You thought Halloween was in October, but this is trick or f---ing treat between Pederson and [Matt] Nagy,” a veteran evaluator said. “It’s two teams with quarterbacks who at times play at backup levels. Which misdirection screen, throwback pass or throw to the quarterback is going to be the difference?” An evaluator thought the Eagles missed their 2017 offensive coordinator [Reich] and quarterbacks coach [John DeFilippo]. But the Eagles are 4-1 with Foles in the lineup this season. That includes a 30-23 road victory over the Rams and a 32-30 home victory over Houston in the past three weeks. ”Their running game is not what it was and the secondary is a little scary, but their defense is good and their front four can be dominant,” an evaluator said.

Winners and losers from Eagles vs. Redskins (and Bears vs. Vikings) - BGN DOUG PEDERSON: The Eagles are 5-1 in their last six games and reasonably could’ve been 6-0 if the worst call of the season didn’t go against them in the Cowboys game. The entire team has really stepped things up ever since they got blown out by the Saints in Week 11. It’s time to put some respeck on Dougie P’s name.

At the Podium #17: We’re On to Chicago - BGN Radio Triple threat of press conferences on At the Podium #17! Double dose of Doug Pederson addressing injury updates, how the Eagles stack up against the Bears, etc etc PLUS Nick Foles talks about his record-tying performance in the Eagles 24-0 win over the Redskins. Powered by SB Nation and Bleeding Green Nation.

Nothing! - Iggles Blitz The Eagles facing Johnson and the Skins had me a little nervous. I remember the Eagles losing to Bruce Gradkowski when he was a rookie. We all remember losing to Joe Webb. There was a costly loss to John Skelton in 2011. You get the point. Just because the other QB is a scrub doesn’t mean he can’t beat the Eagles. Not on Sunday. The Eagles were bullies. They limited the Skins to 89 yards for the whole game. Zero third down conversions. Zero points. That was some beautiful defense. There was plenty of bad offense as well, but the Eagles did their job. When you face an inferior opponent, you want to dominate them. That’s what the Eagles did. They got pressure on Johnson. They shut down the run game. They tackled well in space. Nobody caught a short pass and turned it into a big gain. Didn’t happen.

Young Eagles fan on giving Nate Sudfeld back his football: ‘He’s the player. He earned it more.’ - Philly.com Cohen didn’t have to wait long for a replacement. At Agholor’s urging, a ball boy gave the young Eagles fan a different football almost immediately. Zechman said his phone instantly blew up with text messages after Sudfeld’s negotiation with Cohen for the football was broadcast on Fox and quickly went viral. “My phone is still buzzing,” Zechman said. “People are sending me videos from ESPN. It’s crazy.” Not only was Cohen given another official football from the game, Agholor signed the ball for the young fan, who hopes to have Sudfeld sign the football in the future. Cohen also left the game with one of Agholor’s gloves, which the wide receiver tossed over following his pregame warm-ups.

Playoff Week Opens With Taste Of The New Normal - PE.com Anyway, it’s only Monday. I know we all want Sunday to get here fast, but let’s sit back and think about the ways to beat the Bears. It won’t be easy. This is a good football team the Eagles are playing. Matt Nagy is an aggressive head coach with a young quarterback and the Bears are here to seize the moment. They’re not settling for “just being in the playoffs.” What we’ve got is a week ahead of us that is going to be fun and fascinating. The game plan is being put into place. As you usher in the New Year, 2019, be thankful for where we are, all of us. A season that looked like it was in danger of heading south, really south, turned around and the Eagles are alive. Does it matter that this football team, with so many veterans who have won in the postseason, is going on the road? Not in the least.

Week 17 NFL Team of the Week - PFF Interior Defensive Lineman. Fletcher Cox, Philadelphia Eagles – 93.2 overall grade. Cox was downright unblockable for the Eagles for much of the win over the Redskins, racking up eight total pressures from just 22 pass-rushing snaps. That included three sacks, and he also forced a fumble. The big performance capped a career year in terms of PFF grade for the former first-round draft pick out of Mississippi State.

Remembering the greatest football game Reuben Frank never saw - NBCSP Eagles owner Norman Braman holding a spur-of-the-moment press conference in a shower stall in the basement of Soldier Field was one of the stranger moments of a strange day. It was 30 years ago today, New Year’s Eve 1988 in Chicago, and I was in my first full season as Eagles beat writer for The Burlington County Times newspaper in South Jersey. The Eagles had won their first NFC East title since 1980 on the final day of the regular season, and that earned them the No. 3 seed in the old five-team playoff bracket, a first-round bye and a meeting with the top-seeded Bears at Soldier Field. There was so much drama involved, this being just three years after Buddy Ryan had been carried off the field at the Superdome after his defense helped the Bears win Super Bowl XX over the Patriots, 46-10. Now, he was the Eagles’ head coach, and to say there was no love lost between him and Bears head coach Mike Ditka would be putting it mildly. So this was personal.

Brad Biggs’ 10 thoughts on the Bears’ 24-10 win over the Vikings - Chicago Tribune “If Nick Foles doesn’t play, the game is a joke. Nate Sudfeld? Come on. I expect Foles will play. They’ll get him out there one way or another. They run a bunch of pick stuff and try to attack open windows but the Bears don’t play any real static defense so they will match everything. It will be interesting to see when they do play man if they put (Kyle) Fuller on (Alshon) Jeffery. I think Prince Amukamara might be a better matchup because he’s a little bit more physical. Golden Tate really hasn’t done a whole lot since he came over in the trade from the Lions. You can look at up but I think he’s had only one big game, Monday night (against the Redskins Dec. 3, seven catches, 85 yards, one touchdown), but those were mostly off-schedule plays. He’s still Golden Tate, I think he’s a really good player, but he’s not utilized nearly as much as he was in Detroit. (Nelson) Agholor is a smaller, speed guy. Really good route runner. He’s not physical at all. Foles will throw the ball to Jeffery much more than (Carson) Wentz and then it’s (Zach) Ertz. The Bears haven’t faced a tight end like him this season. If Foles has some magic left in him, maybe Philadelphia does something there. But the Bears have got a better team right now. They’ve got a much healthier team.”

Marino’s Mock Draft 4.0 - The Draft Network 21. Philadelphia Eagles. Yodny Cajuste, OT, West Virginia. Cajuste has exciting potential as a blindside protector in the NFL given his foot speed, anchor, length and power. Philadelphia is so multiple with its offensive scheme that it requires a foundation of mobility to execute, and Cajuste has the physical traits needed to fit. Philly would be well-served to once again tap into the West Virginia talent pipeline.

New York Giants’ quarterback question: What should the plan be? - Big Blue View But with some teams facing decisions around the league, the list of available quarterbacks is soon to grow. We know the Bortles Era is coming to a close in Jacksonville. Ryan Tannehill might soon be out in Miami. It seems that Joe Flacco is going to be available given the rise of Lamar Jackson. Then there’s a decision looming for the Philadelphia Eagles and their current backup quarterback, Nick Foles. Foles and the Eagles have a mutual option for the 2019 season, which would first be triggered by the team extending his contract for the sum of $20 million for the 2019 league year. Then it’s up to the quarterback, who can agree to stay with the team or decline it. If he decides to move on, he owes the organization $2 million, purchasing his rights to walk away. It is ... hard to imagine the Eagles paying $20 million for one year of Foles as a backup, so it’s likely he finds himself on the market, and he might be the most enticing free agent quarterback available. But there would likely be a number of teams inquiring as to his services, including Washington, Jacksonville, Miami and others. So there could be a bidding war for Foles.

Raiders interviewed Marc Ross, Trey Brown for G.M. role - PFT Also, ESPN.com’s Dan Graziano adds that former Eagles personnel man Trey Brown also interviewed for the post. Brown is currently working for the Birmingham team in the Alliance of American Football. Former Giants G.M. Jerry Reese turned down the opportunity to interview for the job.

This Redskins team wasn’t built for today’s NFL. It was built to fall apart. - Washington Post In Washington, a promising 6-3 start devolved into chaos and hopelessness. For the second straight season, injuries overwhelmed the team, with a league-high 24 players being placed on injured reserve. But bad luck wasn’t the only issue. The season exposed several holes on the roster even before the attrition, including a lack of speed on defense and very little explosiveness on offense. And then, in a series of typical but foolish decisions, the organization went into full Daniel Snyder-era dysfunction, starting with the controversial acquisition of troubled and freshly arrested linebacker Reuben Foster in late November and ending with the ouster of Brian Lafemina, the president of business operations and chief operating officer, along with three of his deputies after just eight months on the job. Between those bookend disasters, multiple players took their unhappiness to social media. And safety D.J. Swearinger Sr., the most prolific mouth in the locker room, managed to get kicked off the team last week for taking his criticisms too far and unloading on defensive coordinator Greg Manusky after a loss to Tennessee.

Final 2018 DVOA Ratings - Football Outsiders The Kansas City Chiefs finish the year on top of the Football Outsiders DVOA ratings, and rank among the best offenses we’ve ever tracked. On the flip side are the Arizona Cardinals, in distant last place as one of the worst offenses we’ve ever tracked. But there are also plenty of interesting stories in between.

Frank Reich has molded the Colts into the most dangerous team in the playoffs - Stampede Blue The beat writers have come forward and said specifically that this is a team where there aren’t any jerks. When you see them looking like they’re having a great time as they’re showboating after a turnover or celebrating a touchdown, it is real. They really do have the selfless group of guys in this locker room that actually genuinely like each other and love the game of football. That’s Frank Reich’s gift. That unity, that closeness, that buy-in to an idea that this team could be more than just a team in rebuild mode has taken hold. From day one he has professed belief in this team and in his process. His staff has guided, grown, and held accountable the young men that fill out this roster.

Todd Bowles has been fired by the Jets - Gang Green Nation The Jets got their Black Monday started on Sunday by relieving their coach of his duties just hours after a blowout loss in New England. Bowles is the second coaching casualty since the end of the regular season. Tampa Bay had just announced the dismissal of Dirk Koetter hours earlier. Bowles’ tenure started with a 10 win campaign in 2015, but it ended on a sour note as the Jets fell to the Bills on the final day of the season. The defeat cost the Jets a Playoff spot.

Every NFL playoff team’s fatal flaw - SB Nation Heading into Week 17, your defending Super Bowl champions were maybe the weakest team in the playoff field, ranking just 16th in FPI and 18th in DVOA. Thanks to a surprisingly weak NFC, they still got in, and good for them. Their stay probably won’t last very long. While Philly’s offense has regressed from eighth to 16th in offensive DVOA this year, the defense has been the primary issue, falling from fifth to 21st in defensive DVOA. The Eagles are strong in the red zone (seventh in points allowed per scoring opportunity), and they punish impatient quarterbacks with decent big-play prevention through the air. But that only matters so much when you have the worst defense in the league on standard downs; Philly is 31st in standard downs success rate allowed in open play (which means that strong red zone D is constantly tested) and 32nd in standard downs explosiveness allowed. That puts far too much pressure on a merely decent offense to keep up. “Don’t ever underestimate the heart of a champion” and all that, but unless Nick Foles has a lot more playoff magic to unveil, the Eagles’ title defense won’t last too long.

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                                                            JULY       2018

 PAGE  RIB

***** Pete Davidson has gotten himself engaged to Arianna Grande. He has new tattoos to prove his love.

***** The first wall was raised for the old Conklin’s barn dinner theatre in Goodfield, Illinois. After a struggle to raise money after the old barn was destroyed and a fight with the insurance company, the day has finally come. The new structure which is part of a whole new complex will open in 2019. I can’t wait!!!

***** Vikings QB, Kirk Cousins is still driving his great old van and proud of it.

***** Check out Rotten apples, a website that is a database for consumers to learn if those involved in movies or TV have allegations against them.

***** The Daily show had a good idea. Every time that Scary Clown 45 does his daily dose of fucking everything up, call Fox news.  Calling your congressmen and protesting will have to continue, of course but it seems he mostly listens to Fox. Perhaps if they get tired of listening to us bitch, they will try to get their boss/fan to change a few things. 1-888-369-4762.** How far down will he and his cult drag this country?

***** A personal note: I heard a comedian the other day talking about jerks in all parts of our lives. Whether it be church, work, school, concerts, an AA meeting or whatever there is always an asshole in the mix to ruin stuff. This really resonated with me because I have seen a situation lately that perfectly illustrates this. A local store has a department with 3 managers. Manager #1 keeps hiring in his friends that mostly create their own schedules and do not often break a sweat. Manager #2 has been there a while and things run pretty smooth and fair when they run the day. Manager #3 is new to the position and often seems like they do not know what the fuck is going on and it was recently learned that this one has been backstabbing #2 so much that # 2 was fired. Now, we can’t know, of course, the reason for the firing but it just shows that a perfectly nice place to work and shop with a company one can believe in can go all wrong because of one or two bad apples. Manager #2 who is also battling illness (so does not often have the strength to fight back) has lost a career and many employees who respect them are now stuck working with people they know will run the place into the ground or having to find another job. I have seen a few similar situations thru the years and of course, asshole in chief in D.C. is like the all time perfect example of this but why can’t we weed out the jerks?  

***** Days alert: Is Paul leaving? What? They need to bring in a good mate for him. He is arguably the most honest person in town and he deserves the best. Let Will and Sonny have each other and find a better match for Paul but don’t let him go. I mean Sonny treats Paul like he isn’t even in the room half the time and they were going to marry?!  But, yes.. Chris Sean (Paul) is going and Bryan R. Dattilo (Lucas) may go soon too. Marci Miller (Abby) is out and will be replaced by the old Abby, Kate Mansin. Arianne Zucker (Nicole) will be back. Will she have a baby for Eric? Olivia Rose Keegar (Claire) has released a single titled ‘Just my type.’** Are they really gonna do a Ben and Ciara thing?** Sephen Nichols (Patch) is out as well as Greg Rikkaart (Leo). Farah Fath (Mimi Lockhart) is back. Sheila, Shawn and Belle will show up soon.  Kyle Lowder who used to play Brady will return as another character. There is a rumor that Allison Sweeney (Sami) will swing in for a bit and will she be pregnant with Rafe’s baby? I am betting so since Hope just mentioned something about Raif not having any kids.

***** Antarctic ice loss has tripled in just a decade.

***** The Philadelphia Eagles were cancelled at the White House because most of them would not come. Philly’s mayor countered with:” Trump is not a true patriot but a fragile egomaniac obsessed with crowd size and afraid of the embarrassment of throwing a party to which no one wants to attend.”  The night before, Fox news showed pics of Eagles kneeling when in fact they were praying as they always do. Nobody said there was anything wrong with that before so the players would like to know what is wrong with praying? This particular team never took a knee all season as protest. And what about the 10 players who wanted to go to the White house and worked hard to get there?** Scary Clown says he won’t even invite the NBA champs.

***** Illinois ratified the ERA. Just 1 more state and 36 years after the deadline to adopt legislation we may get there.

***** So, I see Domino’s latest stunt is fixing the roads? Somebody has to work on the infrastructure so it might as well be them.

***** The MtV awards best dressed to me were Alison Brie and Kristen Bell. While the chaos engulfed our country, the young people at the awards (the so called Hollywood elite), spoke out for real super heroes, acceptance for all and an end to bullying.

***** Should we be giving Dennis Rodman airtime to show how stupid he is? I hear the argument  over and over lately that someone was nice to them so they must be ok. This could be said of Trump, Kim Jung Un or a serial killer. How fucking selfish can people be?  The ignorant seem to be incapable of seeing the horror right in front of them as they pick and choose facts.

***** Why have I seen a rash of first cousins as lover’s jokes? Why is it ok to make fun of this?

***** Artifacts were found in Springfield, Il. which came from the 1908 race riots. First found in 2014 when work was being done on an underpass, officials hope to soon have them on display. After working to preserve the items, they are looking to the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress.

***** Is there a new serial killer in Massachusetts?

***** The Koch brothers are apparently waging war all over the country against Mass Transit. They use paid activists to push similar thinking voters to vote it down. It is funny that these big government haters don’t mind that the Koch Brothers have made a well thought out data service to help control their voters.

***** The Tony’s were pretty rockin’ this year. Robert DeNiro got everybody going with a Fuck Trump sentiment. Most awards went to The Band’s Visit, Harry Potter and the cursed child and Angels in America. Once on an Island won best revival and other winners were Glenda Jackson and Nathan Lane (who I love but was really pulling for Michael Cera and Brian Tyree Henry). Tony Shalhoub, Laurie Metcalf and Andrew Garfield also took home awards.  The most beautiful moment was from the students of Stoneman Douglas and their teacher who was honored.** A Trump supporter went to A Bronx tale: The musical after the DeNiro incident which is codirected by Mr. D. The supporter held up a Trump 2020 sign. My son chuckled, “At least he bought a ticket.”

***** IHOP has become IHOB. They think they are Red Robin. More $ in burgers than pancakes, I guess.

***** Stephen Colbert sang the National anthem at a Mets game.** Trump is taking swipes at the late night hosts now. Conan, Colbert and Fallon teamed up to do a funny about that.

***** So some people think that Roseanne’s racist remarks and Samantha Bee’s ‘cunt’ comment are the same? Both should lose their show? NO.. big difference.  Other countries do not get our outrage.. The word ‘cunt’ is not as big a deal in Canada and Great Britain. If there is fall out shouldn’t standards and practices at TBS be in trouble for letting the ‘feckless cunt’ comment go to broadcast? I mean Roseanne did this on her twitter on her own. Trump cult members think they can all go to twitter and spout their racist, hateful rhetoric and get away with it. If one is going to be successful in the mainstream world, they may not get away with that like Scary Clown. Anyway, Go Samantha Bee!!**BTW,  Love the letter that Michael Moore put out about Trump and Roseanne, it is worth a read.** ABC will let the others serve out their contracts after a settlement with Roseanne when they bring us The Conners.

***** Jim Carrey and Showtime will give us ‘Kidding’ on Sept. 9. The dark comedy will cast Carrey as Mr. Pickles, a children’s host who is falling apart. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind’s Michel Gondry will direst and the cast will include Catherine Keener, Judy Greer and Frank Langella.

***** Michael Myers, Jamie Lee Curtis and Halloween are back and wipes out all the sequels.

***** George Clooney received the lifetime achievement award from the American Film Institute.

***** Illinois man, Jay Smith claims he may have coyotes, wild dogs, a mix or hybrid or a unique unknown species in the woods around his home. The U.S. Dept. of agriculture and Chicago’s field museum are now interested in the 40 or so creatures. Smith describes them as bigger than wolves with dark coats. You can see for yourself on youtube : Kanahoe wolves of forgottonia.

***** Atlanta has been renewed for season 3, of course!!

***** Reese Witherspoon will soon be back in the Legally Blonde world for the third time.

***** I truly love to hear Louie Anderson laugh.

***** The President is Missing, a novel by James Patterson and Bill Clinton is #1.

***** Terry Crews talked to the Senate about sexual assault.

***** Secret Service is temporarily keeping an eye on Sarah Sanders and more staff members may get their own agents.

***** The Environmental media association Benefit gala honored Elizabeth Olsen, Ray Halbritter, Mike Sullivan and Jane Fonda who danced on stage with the musical guest Snoop Dogg.

***** Redmond O’Neal was arrested on June 8 for assault with a deadly weapon, criminal threat, brandishing a knife, battery and attempted murder.  Police say he went on a violent spree in Southern California.

***** Watch for Shock and Awe from Rob Reiner in July. People have been floating his name for President and U know the opposition would immediately call him meathead. I say embrace it, Meathead for President!!!!!!!**I Love that Reiner calls out Trump with’ the art of the lie.’

***** The much anticipated Old man and the gun will be out in September. The comedy filmed in Texas stars Robert Redford, sissy Spacek, Casey Affleck, Danny Glover and Tom Waits. I can’t fucking wait!

***** Look for the new film, An Actor Prepares with Jeremy Irons, Mamie Gummer, Larry Pine and Jack Huston.

*****The special council has piled more charges onto Paul Manafort. It was after this that he went back to court for violating the terms of his house arrest and his bail was revoked. The 40 charges now include witness tampering. All charges were about incidents before the Presidential campaign.

***** We have to know that people are not really paying attention when Scary Clown and Gulliani babble on incoherently on national television and their supporters do not seem to care or they really don’t get it. These voters seem to think that it is easier to stay with the devil you know and just refuse to bend. ** Ivanka keeps gathering more new trademarks in China and refuses to answer questions about it as the trade talk rages on.** Why do people keep trying to normalize all this behavior?

***** So.. Supposedly Trump told a friend that porn is not allowed in the White House and it his biggest complaint. Some reporters submitted this as an official question to the White House. It seems the subject has never really come up so no one has thought to ask before. So far there has been no response. ** Word is that Scary Clown rips up papers after he reads or uses them. The problem is that Presidential papers have to be preserved for history so 2 people work just to tape those papers back together.  They were fired this month.

***** Sexual misconduct controversy abounds in Illinois under Mike Madigan with Tim Mapes under the microscope.

***** Justify won the Belmont Stakes and is just the 13th horse in history to win the Triple crown.

***** Senator Jeff Merkley is telling us that immigrants are being held in small cages in Texas. Is this our country? Is this really happening?

***** Recording academy President, Neil Portnow will step down from his post next year.

***** Mystery Science Theatre 3000 will tour in the fall. Joel Hodgson, Jonah Ray, Tom Servo and Crow will begin riffing live on October 9 in Portland, Maine.

***** I wanna be in New Orleans for Voodoo fest on October 26-28. The lineup rocks with Marilyn Manson, Janelle Monae, Zeds dead, Elle King, Mumford and Sons, Arctic Monkeys and Childish Gambino.

***** Next year Brian De Palma is going to start filming ‘Predator’ about the Weinstein scandal.

***** Convicted drug trafficker Alice Johnson was pardoned by Scary Clown.  Who’s next?

***** Trump called Canadian PM Trudeau, meek, mild and weak. ** True to form, Trump showed up late at the G7 for his meeting on women’s empowerment.** Rep. Steve Schmidt said that ‘Trump beclowned himself.”** Trump quote: “Kim Jong Un is a great guy” and “ North Korea is no longer a nuclear threat.” I don’t think he will ever hear the end of it over those statements. Saying it does not make it so. I wrote this and then I heard Chuck Schumer say it. ** Big evidence of wrong doing in the Trump charity organization. He is now being sued by the attorney General for persistent illegal conduct.** Trump now says he wants to withdraw from the World Trade Organization. He is being such a good little boy by helping Putin check things off his list. Destroy NATO, Destroy EU, Destroy the UN, Eliminate U.S. leadership. ** As June ends, there are new reports that North Korea has ramped up its Nuclear production.

***** This whole mess with 2,000 kids being taken from their parents at the border is an outrage. I can’t help but think of our ‘well meaning’ Christian folk trying to convert the Native Americans back in the day. They tried hard to make the natives dress like the white man, pray like the white man and go to our schools. As well as leverage for scary clown’s wall, are they trying to fill these children’s heads with their own propaganda while they are in foster care or residing in the white man’s warehouse? **When will the loyalists realize that a wall cannot be built? Private citizens own some of that land. There are bodies of water on the border. No matter how much the racists wish for it, it just can’t be done.** There is something about the way he grins crazily when he is called out on something. It seems like he is so proud of his lies and the way he conducts himself so unethically. I am reminded of Manson and the way he would light up when asked about his crimes or when he was shown footage from other family members talking about him. This is such a fast moving story that some are equating to the way the Jewish and the Japanese were treated in the past. ** It is obvious that no planning went into any of this new policy. It is wonderful that so many reporters are watching the facilities they know about and staying at the border. It takes time to get the facts and it isn’t easy when the administration is being so secretive. The lawsuits have started. Can we get Sessions, Nielsen, Pence and Trump on child neglect??** People of all nations will not want to be here soon and we will be left with the racists and bullies. Do we leave or do we fight?  If everybody left the Trumpers alone in this country what would they have to complain about? They have no empathy, it is like they thrive on others suffering. ** Multiple on air personalities cried at the stories of the children as their emotions came to the surface. I think many of us feel helpless as that sinking feeling we all had on election night has come to the point we all feared.** The Red Cross has not even been allowed in to these FOR PROFIT facilities. Protesters are staying on the case of Krisjen Nielsen. The administration and their defenders have been so flippant about the whole thing especially Corey (womp, womp) Lewandowski.** It costs the government over twice as much to house the kids without their parents.** Melania visited the kids and wore a jacket which read ‘I really don’t care, Do you?’ This started a whole new mess. I thought of those Turpin monster parents. Why on earth does anyone want to put kids in cages?  Does it make someone powerful to torture children?

***** June ended with about 700 protests for the kids in cages. Family’s Belong Together marches were overflowing in the heat with inspiring messages and a lot of heart. I was so proud to be there.

***** New York has sued the federal government over zero tolerance.**The U.S. has withdrawn from the UN human rights body. Many do agree with this one for they feel there is not equal punishment for nations when it comes to human rights.** A lawsuit was filed on April 23 alleging kids were held down and injected to render them helpless and keep them calm.**It seems that we should leave the immigrants alone and enforce swift, harsh penalties for those who hire undocumented workers. These employees aren’t paying their fair share on these employees.**The Pentagon has been asked to prepare housing for 20,000 immigrants.** I mean, this is not a simple subject but basically if you come in illegally, you go back. If you seek asylum, you should not be separated from your child or be in detention. More judges would help get this backlog caught up and ankle bracelets had seemed to be helping the situation. Take some of this ‘traveling to Mar a Lago $’ and hire more judges. And let’s help stabilize these regimes so folks will feel safer in their own countries. Some are even saying they should abolish I.C.E.. Some of those speaking out with that thought are I.C.E. agents themselves. I.C.E. spokesperson James Schwab has been speaking out. He claims he resigned because although he was asked to spin for both administrations, the current administration asked him to outright lie. Thank you James! ** Immigrants add 63 billion to the economy.** A federal judge has declared the kids must be reunited with their parents in 30 days, for younger kids it is 14 days.** Justin Trudeau tells refugees they are welcome in Canada.

*****  Ok.. Read the next item before this one!!!... So Stuttering John AKA John Melendez has a podcast and he claims he called air force one and he got thru.  He pretended to be Sen Bob Menendez and Trump told him he would have a Supreme Court pick in 2 weeks. While people wondered if this was true, Trump announced he would have his pick on July 9.

***** The Supreme Court upheld the travel ban including Venezuela, North Korea, Syria, Iran, Somalia and Libya. They (5-4) claim it is not a Muslim ban and allows for them to get off the list. This reverses the lower court’s rulings but at least it is the third incarnation as the first two were struck down. Even though the Supreme court said the President has the authority it did put it somewhat in check. Still wrong.  0 people have been killed in our country by a person from one of these countries.** The Supreme Court also tells us you don’t have to pay your union dues. ** Justice Kennedy is set to retire. Trump’s private banker at Deutsche bank for 12 years is Justice Kennedy’s son. JS

***** The country gets more liberal and the power in the country gets more conservative. WTF?** Rod Rosenstein seemed very confident in his questioning this week. This is good news for the country!

***** Sean Spicer is putting together a talk show.

***** The Trump administration is backing insurance companies to eliminate the pre- existing condition protection.

***** The 2019 Hollywood walk of fame will add Robert DeNiro, Anne Hathaway, Michael Buble, Tyler Perry and the trio of Linda Ronstadt, Emmylou Harris and Dolly Parton.

***** Sara Netanyahu has been indicted on fraud charges.

***** Take a listen to the Ear hustle podcast and get the dirt inside prison.

***** Studied show that 97% of rapists never go to jail.

***** Women can drive in Saudi Arabia but arrests are up for women who protest there.

***** Jerry Springer is finally done with his show.

***** The republicans govern without shame. The democrats shame without governing.  –Bill Maher

***** From what I see it seems that America to the Conservatives means guns and Christianity should be included in our governments and our schools.  They seem to like everyone to take care of themselves financially except in extreme cases and outsiders should not be a part of this country. America to the liberals seems like the same rights for all like health care, ruling our own bodies and that love is love. They believe in high taxes and programs to help others.

***** Jeff Sessions of the United Methodist church has been charged under church law with violating paragraph 270.3: child abuse, immorality, racial discrimination and dissemination of doctrines contrary to the standards of doctrine of the United Methodist church. In the 50 years of the church as a denomination, no case can be found that has gotten this far.

***** It seems that there was always a bit of a separation between Fox news and the rest of the company. This latest border mess has crumbled that particular wall. Artists who have at one time or another  worked for Fox Studios are speaking out. Modern Family creator Steve Levitan, director Payl Fieg and Seth Mcfarlane are among them.

***** If we don’t make peace with our wounds, we’ll be tempted to despise the wounded.  – Father Gregory Boyle

***** No one is illegal on stolen land.   Thanks Kim

*****  Trump is not much on tradition. The man cancels the congressional picnic for lack of time but is gung ho for rallies and fund raisers .A scrawl on Fox news dressed down CNN and MSNBC for not airing the latest Trump rally. Who the fuck wants to see that nightmare?

***** Peter Fonda’s emotions got the better of him and he tweeted: WE SHOULD RIP BARRON FROM HIS MOTHERS ARMS AND PUT HIM IN A CAGE WITH A PEDOPHILE AND SEE IF HIS MOTHER WILL STAND UP AGAINST THE GIANT ASSHOLE. He deleted it but the damage was done. He apologized to the family.**Sarah Sanders was asked to leave a restaurant** Maxine Waters is asking people to call out Trump workers when they see them. This is getting ridic but I think the right thinking people of this country are feeling trapped and desperate. Civility is hard keep in check when our country is being taken over by racists, thieves and bullies. We must try to do this right though. We must get this right!

***** Scary Clown 45 claims that crime in Germany is so high, perhaps because of the refugees? In fact, crime is at a 30 year low? Similarly, a report commissioned by Scary’s own administration shows how much immigrants put into our economy but since the numbers were good, they buried that report.** A story claimed that WH staffers show the President only what he wants to see and that John Kelly tells people to just let him keep going as he is and if it leads to impeachment then our country will be through this horrific time.** His rallies and speeches get crazier if that is possible. Does he travel with an audience?** Trump claims that the Dems want immigrants because they see them as potential voters. Genius, years of red tape and possibly letting gang members (his words) in just for a vote! ** He will say anything to divert attention from himself and his cohorts using this country as their personal piggy bank and taking our rights away.** The UN has declared that the policy of separating children from parents at the border, “may amount to torture.”

***** White house.gov has an agenda for a complete reorganizing of the Federal government full of privatization, major cuts and consolidated power.

***** I-95 in Maine has been getting shut down so border patrol can check your citizenship. WTF?

***** OK.. This is a very unimportant note and I try to never watch commercials but I love the new Progressive ad where the dude is turning into his dad. So cute!

***** I wish that there was a little more backbone on the Sunday morn political shows. I mean the weekend of the big outrage at the border, there were big Trump loving infomercials, why are Bannon and Kelly Ann even invited on these shows?  I have no earthly idea how anyone could have an ounce of respect for any of them.

***** A NY Times story finds that Scary clown 45’s prison cutbacks have been so severe that teachers, secretaries and nurses have had to act as prison guards. ** Economists estimate that Iowa soybean farmers alone could lose up to $624,000,000 as a result of the tariffs. **Harley Davidson has moved some of their work to Bangkok because of the trade war.

***** Thank you James Corden for the Carpool Karaoke with Paul McCartney. It is the first time in a while that I let go of all the worry over this country et al and really got engrossed in something sweet and fun.

***** Disabled vets are being docked on their disability checks for an insurance they were forced into that they and their families can’t even redeem.

***** Kevin Vernardo has started his own circus.

***** Vince Vaughn was arrested June 19 for DUI and resisting arrest.

***** The BET awards winners include D J Khaled, Black Panther, Migos and Sza. Best dressed to me were Meek Mill, Remy Ma, Trevor Jackson, Storm Reid and Janelle Monae.

***** Mystery Race day theatre with Michael Waltrip????

***** John Legend tweeted a Fuck You to Paul Ryan!

***** The electoral college must go!

***** March 2019: Tim Burton will bring us Dumbo with Michael Keaton, Colin Farrell, Alan Arkin and Danny Devito.

***** Stan Lee has gotten a restraining order against his business manager claiming elder abuse.

***** A 94 year old Elgin woman put up a large sign in her yard that read ’Impeach Trump now!’ The city told her that it exceeded the size limit for signs in the city ordinance. She put up a smaller sign claiming that she just wants to draw attention to his foreign policy, trade policy and domestic policy. The woman, Myra Becker said that he’s a disaster. “I’m on a walker and there are all the things I can’t do but I can put up a sign.

***** Larry Kudlow had a heart attack.

***** The new season of Comedians in cars getting coffee includes Dave Chapelle, Alec Baldwin, Dana Carvey, Ellen DeGeneres, Zach Galifianakis, Jerry Lewis, Kate McKinnin, Tracy Morgan, Hassan Minaj, John Mulaney and Brian Regan.

***** So John Cena is really a pig! There was a clip of the man telling his girlfriend that he would make the sacrifice of giving her a child. This was a regular clip from a show she does so at least he owns his pig status, I guess. Sure, it is a ‘reality’ show that is supposedly all scripted but I don’t think that would matter to me if I was that kid.  I guess all their money will help. Good luck kid!

***** Boundaries will star Christopher Plummer, Peter Fonda and Vera Farmiga.

***** Mike Pence was invited to the big gay dance party in Ohio that was in the street just outside his hotel.  

*****  Brockmire continues to make me laugh out loud. A great line: Orange juice is a glass of vodka wasted.  How will sobriety play in the next season?

***** Trump staffers seem to have trouble unwinding and having personal lives since most of D.C. wants nothing to do with them. Recently it was revealed that they have found a bar called Rebellion where they feel welcome. Oh what clever clogs.  I imagine that since this has been revealed , it won’t be fun there for long.

***** Better Call Saul season 4 will have a mysterious Breaking Bad character that was never seen named Lalo. A couple more characters will be introduced when the show returns August 6.

***** The Traverse city film fest will honor Jane Fonda with Lifetime achievement.

***** Acura is sure using a lot of vintage Stones in their advertising as of late.** BTW The Stones have a new boxed set of all their original material albums from 1971 on. It is all cleaned up and lookin’ pretty!!

***** The new Whtney doc about Whitney Houston has some honest revelations . In a posthumous Me Too moment, it is revealed that she was molested by her cousin Dee Dee Warwick.

***** Maryland was home to the latest shooting. The AP has declared they will help the Capital Gazette continue to publish until they get back on their feet. Now that is what this country should be about.

***** The table in the Vietnamese noodle shop where Obama and Bourdain dined has been put under glass. Fans have come to the shop to pay tribute.

***** Mia Farrow proposes we move to saying ‘succumbed’ to suicide instead of ‘committed’ suicide because depression is an illness. The legacy of suicide is cruel enough for all involved. The national suicide prevention hotline number is 1-800-273-8255.

***** R.I.P. Glenn Snoddy, Alan Bean, Joe Jackson, Ella Brennan, Dwight Clark, Kate Spade, Alan O’Neill, Danny Kirwan, Eunice Gayson, Murray Frumson, Koko, Jackson Odell, Gena Turgel, Jerry Maren (last of the lollipop guild) , DJ Fontana, Neal Boyd,  Matt ‘guitar’ Murphy, Nick Knox, Jimmy Wopo, Charles Krauthammer, Vinnie Paul, Richard Harrison, Richard Valeriani, victims of the Maryland newspaper shooting,  Anthony Bourdain, Steve Soto, Willie Lee Rose, Richard Allan Greenberg and Eva Kirchgessner.

[rorykillmore]

just out of curiousity (u can answer this whenever) what do u think ur characters would do on denny 2.0 ?

lucille might go settle down in victorian london because ultimately, there’s just some things about that kind of environment she prefers more, although that said i think she’d be a surprisingly... modernized presence there. there are a lot of elements of modern life she’s gotten attached to and won’t feel like abandoning; in fact, i think she’ll even keep her modern style of dress. this also gives her the opportunity to get involved in some more supernatural stuff, which she’s always been more inclined towards. so who knows what might come of that! just when she thought she might be free of all that silent hill-esque bullshit,

siobhan is probably gonna stick to living in the southwest because that’s just become home to her, at this point. she’s not giving up her saloon. but her role as a bounty hunter will probably mean she gets to travel a lot -- and it’d be cool to use this opportunity to give the denny guardians a like, specific cause to tackle maybe?? i’ll talk to fate and giz at some point but maybe we can have them get involved in the situation in the southwest where all the Mounting Outlaw Tension is, because then they have to choose between doing the Right Thing and... using the opportunity to take a shot at the mld, who rocket and siobhan at least have always hated. idk. maybe at some point they can also get stranded in our potential Prehistoric Location because i feel like that would really give raptor red the chance to shine. and maybe have siobhan and rocket have to rely on her a little more?

actually... it depends on my muse level for her but. if i want to do a bigger plot with siobhan she’s a good candidate for “gets captured by the organization and loses her powers”, because lifting the curse is! something she’s been trying to do the whole time she’s been on denny! but having it happen in this way would be really... hard and complicated for her and maybe allow her for some kind of arc where she decides she wants to get her powers back on her own terms, to keep being a guardian and keep doing good.

sara will be interesting because. well i guess it depends on what we decide but as things stands now i don’t really think it makes sense for “time travel” to be a feasible thing on New Denny, at least not outside a set period of time (like seasons? idk). so that’ll be a HUGE adjustment for not just her, but for all the denny legends. compared to what they’re used to, they’re very tied down. i think she at least will still stay on the waverider and travel around because she’s just... not built to settle down anywhere. maybe she and the legends will revert to more traditional (if setting-specific) vigilante work? because they have experience dealing with Historical Threats. and the organization itself definitely seems like something that would be on their radar.

my cats are honestly gonna be a pretty boring answer for this because i don’t think they would like. have much interest or even an entire capacity to understand what’s happening in the outside world, and are content to stay in the southwest and do their thing. so their plot stuff probably won’t change that much, barring like... nightcloud perhaps retreating to the outside world for a little while after tigerclanplot.

dolores will, unless something pretty major changes, probably be staying in beacon heights still. although i think... depending on what we ultimately end up going with for it, there’s a high possibility that she’d be interested in the Futuristic Location and establishing a bit of pull there. god imagine if there are like, any kind of robotic elements in play in whatever setting we choose. dolores stages ANOTHER revolution,

but yeah some of her plot stuff would probably depend on that... she’s also a tentative candidate for like? rifter government stuff if we set that up?? though if she got involved with that she could also be a source of conflict for it because her stances on certain things might be pretty intense, so it’d be interesting to see what happened with that.

sophie-anne is gonna go stay in chicago, i like, instantly decided. she’d LOVE it. it’s the 1920′s!! much less boring than the present >__>,

yeah but she’s probably just gonna move her club over there, although it might take on a slightly more... subtle exterior. in true speakeasy style (but also because like... it’d be a lot less safe in that setting to be so openly ‘yeah nonhumans are great!’). honestly she probably runs the risk of having a very complicated relationship with the local organized crime --

actually if i want to give sophie the opportunity to do something... more actively shady, maybe she could deal vampire blood to them?? and in exchange they don’t fuck with her or her club, but she also turns a blind eye to them going after and abducting other rifters.... hmm....

camille is gonna stay in metropolis. she’s not about this wacky stuff,

but actually giz and i were throwing around ideas and we thought the interesting thing about this plot/settings shift is that... these individual locations are, by their nature, just more isolated from one another than what denny’s used to. they all have their own things going on, their own separate cultures and communities. and that makes information and communication more important than ever. so i’ve already been weighing ideas for the daily planet becoming this more... overarching news station that tries to keep people in touch and connected and informed and just, taking on a more active role in general, which could be really interesting?? maybe they’ll work more closely with the mld, which gives me the opportunity to plot more camille/felix stuff and that’s never a bad thing. 

regardless it like... gives camille cause to travel a lot (which is cool because i think a lot of my characters in this context might be more interested in staying in one or a couple of locations) and just get involved in a lot of potentially unconventional stuff and i’m really here for that! she should get herself, like... a travel buddy.

sly actually might be free roaming it for awhile, although... i really want to get someone involved in the Pirate Stuff if we do that. and he seems like a great candidate for it. he was actually a pirate for a little while in the third game and he was kind of great at it. taking after henriette! it might also give him the opportunity to do some broader plot stuff i’ve been searching for for him, like... he could get involved in combating/stealing from the organization-employed pirates of the era, or maybe if we do the thing where the cure for whatever the experiments do is hidden somewhere around here and sly finds out about it he could be a kind of like... guide for people who are looking for it?? who wants to go sailing with sly

more importantly, who wants to join sly’s pirate crew,

susie... i’ve actually not entirely decided what i’m gonna do with susie yet. mostly because there’s a lot of shady stuff going on that she’d have overt knowledge of, but i... don’t know how much she’d want to get involved? maybe i could do stuff with like. her giving people she’s friendly with more subtle nudges towards The Truth. or maybe if someone wants to do a “my character loses their memories” plot and needs an eventual fix for it, i could offer susie for that. idk.

she might settle in our 70s/80s european location because lbr that’s just home for her. maybe this’ll spur her into opening up a dance academy or something like she’s been thinking of?

cordelia is probably gonna get moved over to st. denis (or a little ways outside of it) if that’s our new orleans standin. which... makes for some interesting conflict becaaause i’m not sure the people around there would be as... you know... accepting of witches as people in modern day new orleans are. it’s gonna put her more on the defensive and potentially create some more conflict between the coven and the public which... could definitely be interesting

and she’d be very agitated by the idea of the organization and them catching and experimenting on people too so, she may be one of my characters who gets more involved in that. she’s also, apart from dolores, another candidate for Potential Government Stuff because she’s already in a position of authority and i just feel like she’d naturally be very good at something like that. makes for more accessible plotting with her, too

alana is still gonna be involved with mld stuff of course which means... well! her schedule might get a lot busier with all the mld is dealing with. but also that she might get to work with a more diverse array of characters if the mld expands their ranks. 

i think she’ll definitely be involved with organization-related stuff to some extent, if... indirectly, at first. because the mld, of course, is going to be dealing with all these emerging threats. actually as a profiler, maybe alana can be one of the people who start connecting the dots re: how a lot of these things are connected?? it really depends on how some of this stuff plays out but...

what else she’ll get involved in, i’m not sure because i still wanna potentially do things like the murder mystery plot with her, so she might be more subplot designated... idk! we’ll see!!

and then villanelle. well. once she starts to accumulate a fair amount of money on denny (which... probably won’t take her too long, given her, well, specific talents), villanelle is probably going to go live it up in 70s/80s europe too. especially if we settle on paris. she’d LOVE that. 

but also... fate and i have been talking about plots for her and fox, and we’ve been tossing around an idea where... they both get picked up by the same employer (she’s an assassin, he’s a mercenary, there’s plenty of overlap) and then things start to get increasingly skeevy and fox starts to question it a lot while! villanelle doesn’t care! because why would she? and that creates a lot of conflict and tension between them and ultimately maybe fox at least gets through to her in the context of “don’t let these people use you”. its an enemies-to-friends(?) plot, basically, but my point being prior to this we were just gonna revert to using some random npcs or something but now... if fate’s game, having fox and villanelle accidentally end up working for the organization that’s targeting all these rifters could be hugely interesting, i think

there’s a lot of potential there

[harrison-fairbanks-blog]

Week 3 - History of Design

I have to say, almost every day, I see some sort of drawing, photo, or other types of designs. There are a few in particular that I shall pinpoint in this project. The first one I’ll show is a photo of a steam locomotive:

This one in particular was built in 1918 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works, classified as a Russian Decapod because it was originally intended to be shipped to Russia as part of an order. However, it is now stuck in the States due to the Bolshevik Revolution. I find that it relates a lot to the industrial revolution part of our reading, considering it is a steam locomotive, a type of machine that was invented during the Revolution, even if it was built around a century later. This photo was taken on September 17, 2017 at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union Illinois, where it is now preserved and operating.

Here is another “Design” (Also preserved at the Illinois Railway Museum) photo example. This is a diesel locomotive, the type of engine that would eventually replace the steam locomotives as previously shown. This one was built by the Electro-Motive Division in 1940, for the Chicago Burlington & Quincy railroad. One thing to note about this one is that it can go up to 110 mph, so in a sense, it kind of solved a problem, much like what designs are meant to do.

This is the third photo design I have to show. This one is, again, at the Illinois Railway Museum, but this time, it’s what is called a Dynamometer car. Built by the Milwaukee Road, these types of cars were designed to record the speed of a moving train. In a sense, they do what all designs are meant to do, solve a problem. These allowed people to calculate the exact speed of any moving vehicle, like a train. Prior to them, it was hard to know exactly how fast the trains were going, people only guessed. Don’t worry, this is the last design example I have to show which is train-related.

(Pardon the cropping being in the wrong angle, please) The last two drawings are, in fact, designs of my own. These were done for a company I had an internship at over the summer, and they both had kind of the same intent, to advertise for the company, known as Ink to the People. Their goal/business is to create custom T-Shirts to fundraise for charities. This is why the first one you see has someone pointing at someone else’s T-Shirt. My idea here was to show how sometimes you can see a really cool shirt and become curious about how the person who owns it, got it. I used this to show why selling T-Shirts is a good idea, for the sake of Ink. The second one is a possible logo I came up with for them. The drawing in the center is actually the MAM Pavilion. This kinda proves that the company is stationed in Milwaukee, considering the MAM’s building is one of the most distinctive features about the city. I think these relate to our history in that there was no shortage of advertising in the Industrial Revolution, they quickly figured out how to convince people to buy their products, and, well, advertising was the way to do it. Always remember that when you see ads on TV or posters on the highway. That’s what they are for.

Here is my seventh design example. Ironically enough, you could say this is a photo in both the way I took the picture, and the fact that this is a camera. Even a camera is a design, and I find that this relates to part of the Industrial Revolution in that photography was invented at the time. Henry Fox Talbot was the inventor as he was doing a horrible job at capturing landscapes with his painting skills, and felt that there had to be some other way to capture them. The invention of photography was his solution. In a sense, this camera wouldn’t have existed without him stepping in.

This my eighth design example. This is my home printer, which, of course, is used to print our stuff (Like in my case, I actually printed the syllabus’ using this). I find that this relates to what we’ve talked about involving printmaking in class, as it exploded during the industrial revolution, which raised demand for posters significantly. By the mid 19th century, most presses could produce up to 25,000 copies of a newspaper per hour. While I certainly don’t think that this printer would be able to print that many (I wouldn’t dare to even try), it is a predecessor of the printers that existed during the Industrial Revolution, which is why I thought it would be good to showcase. Where would design be without printmaking?

     These last three pages are basically design notes, from my dad, in fact. Yes, he is working in the Graphic Design field, which is a big chunk of the reason I’m studying design now. I think that this can go back to when we talked about design thinking last week. All designs require some sort of planning and thinking somewhere, so we should always keep that in mind when working on ours. Just look at the video we watched involving the people designing a new shopping cart. It wasn’t successful, but they did try their best to come up with something new. Even in one of my other classes, I did thought bubbles and wrote down why I wanted to design the object (Which was an electric razor) that I was going to design. Always think ahead before you start designing something. As I learned in another tutorial, process makes perfect, not practice.

[outbananas]

headcanons - i’m so far behind im gonna try to speed through and catch up aka tour, bbmas, birthday, noa visit, miami - 39

as parker has said probably a bunch of times recently, he’s been feeling real good! so he was really pumped for tour and wasn’t even bothered too much by fans taking selfies with him and making fun of him in their ig captions, which definitely happened more than once

though he’d been nervous that it would be weird having noa jump on for a couple days, all the guys agreed it was alright for her to come in for chicago, especially with his birthday coming up and him having the bbmas to attend on that day

the guys sold out three shows in total, which maybe isn’t the hugest of deals in comparison to other artists bc the venues weren’t at all large, but parker was still pretty excited about it, especially since two would be when his girl was coming out to see them aaand it was going to be her first time seeing him/them as the headliner

before the show, they spent some time with the guys, but ultimately ended up parting ways to take noa to see the bean bc it was apparently on her bucket list and parker knows she hasn’t gotten the chance to see a lot of places she was interested in going. which is the reason he’d invited her to the tour coming up in japan, but she was pretty cute getting excited about touristy stuff and playing around

he would maybe deny it to people if they asked, but parker was kind of nervous about how everything was going to go and if she was going to like it and just a bunch of things he ultimately knew better about, but it weighed on him a little bit up until things started and it just kind of fed into the show so it was all good

as one might expect, noa was super into the show and very happy and supportive even if she cringes about his methods of showing how much he loves her. aka giving her a big sweaty hug right after the show and aiming his armpit right for her face, which to be fair he’s given her warnings to expect that so it is not big surprise to her no matter how shocked she may look

the other shows went pretty well. noa seemed to enjoy them and they did fun little touristy things in each area when they had time, just so noa felt like she was really seeing these places and not just passing through, which is how things could get sometimes on tour, though they really did try to see some things going on in the cities they visited as often as possible

on the drive to ohio while most of the guys were sleeping in the van, he and noa sat in the very back to have a little privacy bc parker doesn’t like being super pda, even though will did post a picture of the kinda together on ig but whatever, and she tried to set some boundaries, but ended up caving before the night was over and let him go beyond second base

for rock on the range, parker and noa got a decent amount of time to hang out during the day and just kind of wander together. they fucked around with fidget spinners a bit and ended up having sex in the van, which was less than private considering it was parked out with a bunch of other people bc parker’s allowed to break rules on his birthday weekend

noa let parker wear essentially what he wanted to the bbmas, even though she did ultimately kind of pick it out for him in part, it wasn’t something he felt uncomfortable in, so it worked well. she even let him wear his gucci slides with socks bc she’s great

since parker knew noa was super super nervous about presenting, he offered her some of his xanax to take before the night started and told her he’d take it with her, so that seemed to help her chill out a little bit

prior to the bbmas parker talked a bit about chilling with niykee during since she also wasn’t the biggest of fans of this kind of thing either, so he managed to see her, madison, and obviously noa, tate, and will as well

despite the fact that she was only presenting, parker was really excited about seeing noa up there and got a bit too enthusiastic about things, but thankfully not enough to truly be a disturbance to anyone or anything

the pair made a very quick appearance at the after party only to split and grab a flight home so that they could spend a little bit of his birthday the way parker wanted to, alone together in his apartment

at his apartment parker was greeted with a weed glitter confetti bomb and some other surprises from noa that he was pretty excited about bc not only did it show that she cared and listened to him, but that she supported the other stuff he was interested in even if it was a little odd

numerous times noa brought up him kind of sacrificing his birthday for her, and though he would never deny the fact that the day wouldn’t have been what he would’ve planned, he insisted that he had the best birthday bc he got to spend it with her (aww!! gag! lol) but it was true he had a great time despite it all

the next day, which was essentially the celebration he wanted, was spent at home the entire day just being lazy. both wearing only his sweatpants and eating food, binge watching tv, smoking a bunch, and obviously having a lot of sex like nothing too exciting just real laid back

parker kind of got into all the confetti laying around in the times the were just chilling at he would just sit there and cover noa in it a bit and even enough once that he had to get a picture of it of her that he’s really fucking into

he had been kind of joking king of seriously telling noa that he wanted to be like a teenage boy with those like half naked posters hanging above his bed, but he wanted his to be her. honestly it was something he had been saying on and off for awhile, that thankfully didn’t seem to bug her too much, but she agreed it was cool if he did it with that picture... at some point in the future

also while enjoying his day parker spent a decent amount of time bugging tate trying to figure out exactly what went on between her and will after the bbmas bc in the midst of his high and exhaustion he had encouraged her to get something goin with him and he hoped it’d panned out... which it did, but he didn’t get the confirmation for sure until later

the next day parker and noa went to vegas for the sweet tea tour? i think that’s what it’s called god i’m so lazy i don’t feel like looking, but they went to see his cousin madison and niykee perform. both kind of called him out in one way or another, though thankfully niykee’s was only before the show and not during

after the show and seeing the two for a bit, parker and noa spent some time gambling, which is something he enjoys a fair amount. he tried to encourage her to get involved bc he really wanted to see her win some money and ended up giving her some to play with, not wanting her to risk her own when it was really him wanting her to do it rather than her interest

noa ended up heading home shortly after vegas to spend some time with fox and get ready for the weekend in miami, so they said their goodbyes and parker headed back home alone to essentially just get ready for the weekend and spend some time with the band. before she left, he agreed to help her with fox so she could bring him over the long weekend, which he was a little nervous about, but he knew it would eventually be something he needed to step up on anyway

to make things easier on noa as well as spend tate’s birthday with her, the band flew out of la to get to miami. initially parker sat next to tate in an effort to annoy her on the flight, but changed seats early on to keep noa company, though fox was honestly pretty occupied with the attention from the rest of the band and tate a lot of the flight

the first night was mostly about settling in and also celebrating tate so nothing too eventful really went down, mostly just parker getting used to being in a more enclosed space with fox and figuring out the kind of stuff he was going to need to do to help with him

parker was pretty excited when he learned the band had managed to score a second performance slot for the weekend. he figured that could only mean good things and it would look pretty good for them with their new album and all. he texted noa immediately to tell her about it... which means it probably came before the flight oh well

saturday morning was spent seeing a liger and a tabby tiger and other pretty awesome animals at jungle island. given that fox is only six months old it wasn’t really that exciting to him, just kind of more of experience of being out and being somewhere new, but parker and noa were pretty excited about all the animals and things they saw

for the entire weekend noa had picked out some cool local places for them to eat, which parker enjoyed for the most part even if he was always ordering the most boring thing on the menu and even then sometimes handing stuff over to noa for her to eat. he got to have some badass ice cream though and that was great

the band’s first performance went well and it was fox’s first ever, so that was pretty cool noa wanted him to get in and experience that so young. parker always teases her about how overprotective she’s gonna be and how she wants fox to be a perfect little angel, so he was giving her shit that fox would never believe he experienced that so young... but she was pretty cute and told him that of course he’d know bc it would still be happening later on with parker as he grew older so aw cute couple shit

after the show they had plans to go dancing, which parker is always on the fence about. he loves that she loves it and he loves seeing her have so much fun, but he always ends up looking like an asshole in comparison to everyone around him. still, he always goes and has a good time because noa is a great dancer and she always makes things fun for him

the next day parker took care of fox for a portion of noa’s panel. it was only the second time he’d had responsibility of fox ever and the first time as her boyfriend, so he felt a little pressure even though fox is a really good baby

fox only woke up once while parker had him to himself and he didn’t have too much trouble coaxing him back to sleep by singing to him and attempting to shush him the way noa does

the rest of that day was pretty free to chill and check out other things that were going on, since the next time parker had definitive plans was much later that night for their meet and greet

at some point during this weekend parker also learned that noa was unable to swim and he convinced her it was a good idea to learn for fox’s sake, and he offered to help teach her, though she declined learning in miami, since she didn’t want to be doing it in front of everyone else she knows

the guys had smoked some before their meet and greet and actually ended up with some edibles from noa part of the way through, but it made the experience a little easier on the group since they’re not really the type to do these set meet and greet kind of things normally, but they got some nice stuff from fans/met some good people. noa sat under the table with fox to keep parker company and he only made a couple lewd jokes about it

after they all grabbed a super late meal, parker helped noa prep for her q&a in the morning that she was pretty nervous about. he gave her terrible suggestions for possible answers and joked with her enough to try to lighten her up about it, but ultimately offered her xanax again, which he did the other day as well to help her feel less anxious

on monday parker watched noa’s q&a while someone else watched fox for her. for the most part he kind of enjoyed it, but he wasn’t a huge fan of some of the questions she was asked. one even prompting him to get a good look over at the person asking it, but obviously it wasn’t something worth getting too upset about. he was proud of noa for getting through it and doing a good job

tssf had their q&a later in the day, which seemed to go fairly well. there wasn’t anything too outlandish about it and generally the guys had a pretty good time despite the majority of them not really enjoying interviews all that much

they had their second show, which was pretty early on, which was kind of nice for being out on the beach. something different than the other which was after dark. it was cool to play to a slightly different crowd, since earlier in the day it was more likely that people could just be hanging around vs looking to see them/get a good spot for atl

and omg i think that covers everything i need to write shit down when it happens or closer to when it happens instead of being a motherfucking procrastinator but that’s life