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writing-the-end · 4 years ago

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WS Chapter 40: A Home in Hell

Previous Chapter

Masterpost

A lotta lore coming your way! Thank you X for being the only one with a braincell in this group to explain world mechanics in a way that even I- the author- hardly understands.

And sorry for yet another cliffhanger! I just love them too much! (wonder how many people caught the foreshadowing a few chapters back)

Ecto belongs to @cooler-cactus-block

Red belongs to @theguardiansofredland

Red picks up his head as he hears the sound of fireworks. The late afternoon sun blocks Red’s vision, whiting out the sky and making it impossible to see who is flying by. He feels like a castaway, trapped on this mound of sand with only an ominous nether portal and an unlit campfire. He doesn’t even have the ability to start a fire.

Glimmers of white rain from the sky, forms slowly descending from the heavens. Well, most of them are. One dives straight for Red, wings tucked in like an arrow shot from a bow. The grey elytran wings only open at the last second, just enough to slow the descent and save the flyer from experiencing kinetic energy. Not enough to keep Ecto from barreling into Red, sending them both skidding across the sand.

Red squeaks, gasping for air as Ecto hugs the breath out of her. Red feels something wet on his shoulder, and realizes that Ecto’s crying. She isn’t sure she’s ever seen Ecto cry, even when she was iced out of her own home. “We thought you were gone.”

Red’s lips thin out. She should be gone. Out of everyone’s way. But even death didn’t want something as useless as her. Avon’s wings eclipse the sun a moment later, oscillating to lower her to the sand. She crosses the sandy island in a few strides, lifting off the ground to reach Red as fast as possible. Avon wraps her arms and wings tight around the other two wanderers, cocooning all three in the embrace. A weak chuckle escapes Avon’s lips.“We have got to stop losing each other in this world.”

They only break up when Red has to push them apart. She needs to breathe, and Ecto’s vice grip is definitely not letting her do that. The hermits take slow circles to lower in altitude before landing on the short spit of land. Grian does the best landing, sliding across the sand and using the grains to skid to a stop. Stress’s landing is more of a stumble, coming in too hot for her liking.

Ecto lets go, but stays close to Red. “I...I can’t believe you’re alive. How...how does…”

“Our world has a few different rules than yours appears to have. Differences in the laws of nature, and all that.” Xisuma states, sitting down next to the wanderers. The other hermits crowd close. Even Mumbo, despite nearly being killed by sixty six percent of the trio. “Most deaths here aren’t permanent. You die, but you can come back.”

“Is that what world magic can do?” Red questions. “How does that even work?”

Iskall pulls out a pair of flint and steel, striking it to start the campfire. Keralis and Stress pull up logs for them all to sit on. And Grian reveals pockets full of food. He can’t help but notice Avon’s gaze never faltering from the potatoes in his hand. He starts cooking while Xisuma fills them in. “I don’t know how all it works, but I know my spells work and it eases the tension on all of us.”

“You don’t want to know how many times I’ve died. I’ve kinda gotten used to the tingly feeling of reviving.” Scar chuckles, leaning back and watching as the sun sets on the world. That reminds Scar of something. He picks up a bag from behind the log, tossing it across the fire to Red. “Here you go, little fish. Keep that little guy close in your world, you hear?”

Red looks down, seeing the gilded statue glinting in the sunset colors and fire flames. He notices that it has little wings on it’s back, like an angel with wings outspread. Cute little wings, smaller than his wide nose. He can’t tell if the nose was a mistake or intentional. It’s endearing, but Red isn’t sure why Fred is so important for Scar. Did he make it?

As the cooked meals are being passed around, Avon looks across the fire to Tango. He reminds her so much of Blu, especially the way that the flames frame his face, his blonde hair and eyes the color of heated netherrack. Xisuma said something about Tango spending lots of time in the nether. She bites into her baked potato, swallowing it before she speaks. “You worked in the nether?”

Tango perks up, noticing the quietest camper suddenly speak. He takes a bite of his steak, and leans back. “Yeah, a few worlds back I made this massive nether style base and humongous big farm-ificators in the dimension.”

“Were there other people in the nether? What was it like working there so long?” Red adds, scooting closer to Tango.

“I mean, it was a pretty long time ago. My mind starts to wander and mix things all up into a bunch of gobblty goop. It was really hot, for one. And yeah, there were other people. They didn’t really talk to me much, but they liked to watch my work. They were pretty chill people, the ones I met. Gave me lots of books and told me all sorts of things, like how they would just- pop!- appear in hell. Called themselves hellspawns because of that.”

Xisuma hums, looking at the wanderers and Tango. “I think there’s a reason why hellspawns exist. Every world is a bit different. Different rules of nature, and different ways of keeping those rules. But as every world mage knows, each universe needs to keep its balance. I may have a theory as to why the person who attacked you may exist.”

“Ohhh, if it’s an Xisuma idea it’s got to be all sorts of cool wizardy spells and potion things.” Tango is on the edge of his seat. He doesn’t exactly know why these people appeared and lived in the nether, but his time spent with them made him want to make the best of his own life. Live on his own terms. And he feels he has, here among the hermits.

“There’s three dimensions. All in balance with one another. Too much of one thing can be bad, and too much of another isn’t good either. The nether and the Overworld are equals and opposites. Mirrors, counterweights. Keeping the universe in balance.” Xisuma picks up a handful of sand, watching the grains fall through his fingertips and return to the millions of others among the beach.

“But what about the End? Where is it in all this?” Avon questions, leaning against a propped up knee.

“If the overworld and the nether are the weights, then the End is the scale. Measuring, taking, adding. The liminal space between both, but just as integral as either side.” Xisuma looks around. Most of the people listening seem to be lost, but still listening

“So hellspawns….” Tango whispers.

“Probably appear to give the world balance. To be the counter to the universe. A hellspawn can’t exist without it’s overworld counter being born. And the overworld needs the nether to ease the weight of creation. Both are needed to keep balance.”

“Why would Blu attack us then?” Ecto seems to understand the gist, tossing out all the weird theoretical stuff. “If both need to be balanced, why attack us? Why kill the ender dragon and freeze an entire desert?”

“That...I can’t understand.” Xisuma shrugs, pulling off his helmet to finally dig into the mushroom stew he’s been preparing. Long, fluffy brown hair falls from his helmet, curling around his face.

The wanderers look to Tango, but he shakes his head. “I don’t think any of my books or conversations can help, friends. It’s been ages since my nether base and those massive farms, leaving to join the other hermits in the new world. I really wish I could help more, but this is way out of my league man.”

The wanderers look at each other, before looking back at the fire. It’s not the answer they were looking for, but it’s information they needed. Now they know, hellspawns are from the nether. Some way of their world balancing itself. Stress changes the subject to something lighter, and Scar adds on his own quirky stories until the air is filled with laughter. Calm respite after so long the wanderers struggled. Retreating into the hermit world, wounded and defeated. Quickly becoming lost in the jungle, only to find new friends willing to help them. In more ways than just getting back on course. And now, they can return to their world. Healed and with a new understanding of what they’re facing.

With the dawn light, Scar guides the wanderers back to Larry. The giant snail still eeks over the infinity portal, guarding it with a fierce, lopsided gaze. Scar presses a crystal into each of the wanderer’s hands. “ The heart of the warrior for Avon, Luck for Ecto, and water breathing for Red.”

Red looks at his crystal, then up to Scar. He doesn’t have the heart to tell him that he can already breathe underwater. He just clutches the crystal close, nodding as the rift warps and shifts between them. As much as Red loves being with the hermits, he’s ready to go home. Ready to face whatever is waiting for him.

The wanderers step back through the portal, falling between worlds and back to their own. It’s dazing, and they can’t help but stumble back into their world. The portal disappears, leaving them in the forest. Ecto winces, rubbing her head after nearly cracking it against a tree. “Ugh, what’s that awful scent? It smells like dead fish.”

Red looks around, breath catching in his throat. He recognizes where he is. He remembers the river, flowing through the forest towards the sea. The giant boulders tossed aside and trees growing from the fractures within them. And he smells the horrible scent, making him gag, his nose burning and eyes watering. The tide is turning.

Red scrabbles to his feet, leaving Ecto and Avon behind. Stumbling through the sand of the beach, only to collapse at the interface of the water. The water swirls with a rusted red color, waves brushing dead fish and seaweed against the pristine beaches. It’s already too late.

Red was too late. The tide has turned.

#wandering stars #ecto #avon #red #hermitcraft #hermitblr #minesona #mcsona #tango tek #grianmc #xisumavoid #gtwscar #stressmonster101 #writing

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alliepretends · 6 years ago

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So obviously I’m still crying about Vic in the last episode (my poor darling), but I also want to talk about how valuable I think Vic is as a counterweight to the rest of the Doom Patrol. I talked way back in episode three or four about how interesting I thought the interplay of Vic’s traditional heroism with Rita’s role of the reluctant hero was and I think that has consistently been his role. As the rest of the Doom Patrol goes one way Vic trends the other. In the last few episodes, we’ve seen Larry, Jane, Rita, and Cliff make tons of progress in processing their trauma. And, in doing so, moving towards being better people. Vic, however, who had for the most part processed all his preexisting trauma before the show started (and look, your mom dying in an accident you caused and having huge parts of your body replaced with cybernetics is hugely traumatic, but I think we’re also led to believe that Vic’s trauma hadn’t contained the same existential horror that everyone else’s had). Now, he isn’t just being retraumatized, but he’s having his worst fears come true. I think having these narratives exist as a counterpoint makes both more powerful. We appreciate more just how much the others have had to recover as Vic deteriorates before our eyes and we feel even more viscerally the horror and pain he is suffering as everyone around him is rising up. (Side note: I feel like a major complaint in fandom is that the trauma characters suffer isn’t addressed and I think one of the main reasons for that is kind of the old boiling a frog metaphor. So much trauma happening to all the main characters all the time makes it all feel normal for the writers). I also think Vic’s youth is a huge factor in making this compelling. Vic is what 25? 27 at most? The next youngest (in terms of years lived) is probably Jane. Who appears to be in her late 20s/early 30s when we first see her in the 70s? Vic is surrounded by people with way more life experience than he has that can’t help him. Which, from a personal perspective as someone in her mid-20s, makes it all the more terrifying. I don’t know. It’s all very tragic and compelling and I hope we get to see his recovery as well (I know season two is potentially in jeopardy so fingers crossed).

#victor stone #doom patrol

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gurguliare · 8 years ago

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top 5 counter/weight npcs

JERBOA, JACQUI, ORTH, IBEX, ……….. RIGHTEOUSNESS

#am i forgetting someone?? jim? territory jazz jr? sokrates?#larry.#i'd say maryland september but i hate her as a listening experience #i think there's like ... one more person who you haven't met yet from the september arc but. it's fine it's fine it's fine #friends at the table #ourlightsinvain #no one expects the fannish inquisition #counterweight

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littleladymab · 7 years ago

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what’s up losers I don’t post in god knows how long and now i reappear with some cassmako smut because Joanie was making me sad.

fun fact! I hand wrote this while on vacation and even wrote it while on the plane. Set post-september, in the same canon fic as this bit was, only I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not going to finish this fic because the fandom needs only one canon compliant cassmako and erin can have that title I’m too sad to write it

obviously, nsfw

also, i’m still no good at this so just take it for what it is

Cass pushes open the door to Mako’s quarters, and finds him curled up on his bed -- knees to his chest, face to the wall, trying to make himself as small as possible. Cass breathes a sigh of relief and closes the door behind them.

They shrug off their jacket, toe off their boots, and climb into the bed as well. Their arms curl around Mako, feeling him tense at first, then relax into their chest. “Hey,” they mutter.

Mako makes a sound in the back of his throat, but it’s faint and doesn’t make it that far.

“I’m sorry. About everything.”

This time, Mako manages, “It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not. A lot happened. I don’t need to tell you, because I’m sure you won’t be able to stop thinking about it.” They press their face to the curve of Mako’s neck, tightening their grip. “You’re not going to be okay for awhile. It’s been years since the war, and I’m still haunted by aspects of it. Those were things that didn’t even happen to me -- I saw the results of them in the trauma wing, but I was never directly involved.”

Mako is silent, but still listening.

“This is something that affects you. Your life, your history. Mako -- Aria told me you climbed inside Rigour.” Cass pulls him in closer still, tangling their legs together and trying to reconcile the warmth of Mako’s body against the memory of him cold, pale, trembling on the operating table after they first escaped September. “And I’m not just saying this as a medical expert--” they start, and are rewarded with a dry chuckle. “I’m saying this as someone who cares about you deeply.”

There’s a silence, then Mako completely relaxes into Cass’ embrace. “I saved some of the me’s. Well, Larry did. But I asked him to. I…” He pauses, licks his lips, tries to catch his breath. “After seeing what happened to Maritime, I’m terrified. Why was I the one lucky enough to be let go? What happened to the ones before me -- were there ones before me? I’d like to think that I’m the first, but…”

“It’s a valid fear to have.”

“I don’t want it to be a fear. Because I’m me and that’s what matters. But then I think about… what if they had people that cared about them? What if they had someone they were crazy about, and then one day they just… weren’t? And everyone they loved couldn’t know, or they would find each other again and… they wouldn’t know.”

When Mako starts to curl back up on himself, Cass follows, pressing their lips to the lines of his neck. “The here and now, Mako. That’s what we have. I’m here with you.” They press their hand to his chest, feeling the erratic heartbeat beneath it. “The memories of us, the memories of the Chime--”

“Cass, you saw first hand how easily those could be manipulated.”

“And going forward?”

Mako hesitates, then shifts in the circle of Cass’ arms. His eyes are rimmed with red, but wide with fear. Exhaustion lines every inch of his face, and Cass lifts a hand to brush it away. “Do you remember… back just before we left Counterweight?”

It was barely over a month, but it feels so long ago now.

“What about it?”

“How I took you out dancing. I made you look human.”

Cass’ brow furrows. “Of course. That’s when I kissed you. Those are real memories.”

Something shifts in Mako’s expression, and he surges forward to capture Cass’ lips. There’s a moment when the kiss doesn’t quite line up, but then Cass puts a hand to the base of Mako’s skull and tilts his head for a better position. There’s something frantic and uncertain in the kiss that puts Cass on edge, but they push it to the back of their mind.

Mako draws back, slowly, barely far enough to speak with their lips still brushing. “Can you do something for me?”

“What?” Cass asks, a small laugh tickling the back of their throat. “I don’t think we can find a club in deep space, and I can’t manipulate the Mesh like you can.”

But Mako’s not laughing. He gives Cass a desperate look before dropping his gaze. “No. I want to forget for a moment. I want…” He bites his lip, and Cass presses their thumb to the point, trying to free it. “I feel like I’m losing myself to Rigour, to September. I want to lose myself to you, Cass. I want you to fuck me.”

They immediately sit up, staring down at him with wide eyes. “Mako--”

“Please, Cass.” His hands lift, half-heartedly extending up, then fall to cover his face. “I keep seeing the inside of Rigour every time I close my eyes. That pulsing, the hum. It’s in me. I don’t know how to get rid of it. I just--” His voice hitches and Cass’ heart breaks.

They reach out, carefully pulling Mako’s hands from his face. “Are you sure?”

There’s a flicker of hesitation, and that’s all the answer that Cass needs. They sigh, reaching out to run their fingers through Mako’s hair. “Ask me for anything else.”

Mako looks away, but he doesn’t protest. “Distract me. Take my mind off these memories that I don’t want.”

Cass rolls over and props themselves up over Mako. “You tell me if you need me to stop, okay?” Once they receive a nod, they lean down and press their lips to the hollow beneath his ear. There’s a small constellation of freckles there, and they trace its pattern with the tip of their tongue. Enough to cause Mako’s breath to hitch. With a scrape of teeth, they kiss their way down his neck and jaw.

Their hands move to Mako’s hips and slip under the tshirt. As they kiss lower, hard enough to bruise, their hands ruck the shirt up higher on Mako’s chest until they’re forced to pause long enough to tug it free.

Cass drops the shirt over the edge of the bed and settles back onto their heels, studying the scars on Mako’s chest.

They look until suddenly there’s something blocking their view. It takes a second to realize that Mako’s hands are covering their eyes.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Cass takes Mako’s wrists and pulls them away, pressing a kiss to each swatch of skin.

“You get these wrinkles on the corners of your eyes when you’re sad. Don’t look at me like you’re sad.”

Cass drops their hands and smooths their palm up Mako’s chest, brushing their fingers over the scattering of scars. They receive a shiver and a quickening of breath in response. “I’m upset because I couldn’t help you. Both times. Mako, I was… terrified.” They press the palm of their hand to the new scar, the one that’s angry and red and a few inches above Mako’s heart. “I had her in my sights and I hesitated. And she shot you, and you could have died.”

They don’t dare mention the other scars, the ones that he did die from.

Mako lifts his hands to tangle his fingers in Cass’ hair, guiding them down for a kiss. “Then don’t look.”

“They’re a part of what has shaped you. A part I couldn’t save you from.” They speak in between kisses. The protest dies on their lips as soon as Mako slips his tongue into their mouth.

Cass makes a small sound in the back of their throat, and Mako eagerly swallows it. He cants his hips up, arching his back as Cass’ hands tick down the knobs of his spine.

They fumble with the latch on the belt, not helped in the slightest by Mako’s stupidly intricate buckle in the name of fashion, or the way that he wriggles beneath the touch. Cass palms Mako’s growing erection, applying the slightest pressure and curling their fingers around the shape of it.

Lips pressed to the curve of Mako’s neck, Cass breathes a soft sigh against his skin and pulls the belt free -- dropping it to join the shirt. “Going forward. I don’t know…”

“Shut up,” Mako returns, nails scraping against Cass’ skull and his hips thrusting into their hand. “Shut up. I don’t want to think about it.”

“Tell me what you want, and if it’s within my power, I will give it to you.” Distantly, they’re aware of the Apokine hovering alongside the Kingdom Come.

“You,” Mako says, voice barely a whisper. “I want you.”

Their heart aches, knowing that they don’t know how much longer they can.

Mako must sense the hesitation, because his touch brushes back through their hair, then traces the lines on Cass’ face. “Here and now, right? Fuck tomorrow or whatever, and fuck the past. I have you here and now and I want you so bad, Cass, so please stop talking and put your mouth to something more productive before I lose my shit.”

Cass surprises themselves by bursting into laughter. They kiss the smirk on Mako’s lips until they feel it slip into a smile. “I was trying to be romantic.”

“Save it for a candlelit dinner and rose petals scattered over your bed, not with your hand being a goddamn tease down my pants.” He squirms just so, and Cass’ fingers automatically move to stroke him.

Cass kisses him again, hard and deep, using their free hand to press Mako back into the mattress. When they pull away, it’s only long enough to see the dazed look on his face, content half-smile curling his lips, cheeks flushed.

They kiss his neck, biting into the tender curves and drawing a breathy sound from him. They work their way down his chest, his torso, kissing each of the now-pale scars hard enough to leave a new constellation of bruises in their wake.

Mako’s soft, breathy gasps turn to small moans, and he wriggles beneath the attention.

Cass takes their time, lips and tongue and teeth working to draw any sound, no matter how muffled. They pull his shorts free, and scrap their nails along the clothed shape of his dick, teasing it with gentle strokes and the slightest pressure.

They reach out, mapping the shape of Mako’s hips, his waist, the way his ribs stick out just a little too much. The moan he makes as Cass’ thumb circles his stiff nipple is loud and throaty, so they do it one more time to hear it again.

Their searching fingers find his heartbeat, and they press their palm to the pulse. They can feel the ugly puckered skin from the bullet wound.

With their other hand, they pull Mako’s underwear free. A shudder runs through his body, and Cass feels it where they are pressed together. They trace the line of his hips with their fingers, and their lips follow.

They leave a bite-mark on the joint of his pelvis before placing a kiss to the tender skin just above the soft hairs. They tilt their head, licking the trace of pre-cum from the length of Mako’s dick. They run their tongue across it a second and a third time before finally closing their lips around the swollen tip.

Mako’s voice comes out as a strangled gasp, and his hips buck forward, pushing himself deeper into Cass’ mouth.

They clutch at his hip, holding it still, keeping their slow, teasing pace.

“Cass--” He cuts himself off with a low moan, straining against the grip on his hip.

They respond by scraping their teeth up the shaft and sucking lightly at the tip.

Mako’s hand works back through their hair with a pointed scrape of nails, and Cass groans as they work their way back down, the rumble in their chest and throat echoed by Mako.

They start to move a bit faster, taking him deeper and savoring his taste. Their name is a stumbled litany from Mako, who manages it between breathy moans and sighs of pleasure.

Mako’s second hand, which had been clutching at the bedsheets, lifts. For a moment, Cass thinks that it will also wander to their hair, a small demand from the man beneath them. They never liked people playing with their hair until Mako, who seemed to know all the ways to tease small sounds of encouragement from them as his fingers worked through the curls.

But instead, the hand covers the one they have pressed to his heart, twining their fingers together in a tight grip.

“Cass,” he gasps again, and they love the way their name sounds on his lips. “Cass, please. I’m so close--”

They know. They can taste it, and they dip their head lower, taking him as deep as they can. They work their tongue against every inch of him as they pull back up -- mouth coming free from the tip with a satisfying sound.

They take Mako’s cock in their hand, fingers already working on slick skin as they catch their breath.

Mako’s hand slips from their hair and traces down their jaw, catching beneath their chin.

Cass’ fingers tighten over Mako’s heart, the frantic beat jumping to meet their palm, and Mako’s tightens in return.

They lift their gaze, and everything falls still. Mako’s body, stretched out before them, is flushed and perfect. The bruises have already darkened across his chest, leaving a map of their progress.

Before they can ask if something is wrong, Mako pulls them up to capture their mouth in a sharp, desperate kiss.

Cass’ hand gives a gentle squeeze to his dick before dragging their nails down the length and back up again.

Mako clings to Cass, one hand back in their hand, the other clutching the hand over his heart. His hips stutter and jerk in time with the grip on his cock.

He comes with a sharp thrust, Cass’ name falling from his lips in a muffled cry.

They eagerly lick the sound of their name from his mouth, their hand helping him through the waves of his orgasm.

Mako’s grip finally loosens, and Cass can feel his body tremble slightly.

They press their lips to his forehead, and slide their hand up his neck, cradling the back of his head.

He drapes his arms around Cass’ neck, pulling him in to bury his face in the crook of their neck. “Apparently your slender fingers and pretty mouth aren’t just for serious things like surgeries and making plans.

Cass’ laugh is muffled against the side of his head. “Shut up.”

“I can’t because now I’m wondering why I never asked you for a blowjob before.” His fingers work absently through Cass’ hair in the way they like, and their objection is lost to a hum of pleasure. Mako’s voice is distant when he finally asks, “Should I--”

Cass shakes their head. Yes, they’re very turned on, and if Mako keeps playing with their hair, they might give in. “Not now. This is me taking care of you.”

“I feel like you did a much better job of it than I did. I left you alone to dance with strangers.”

“I still got to kiss you for the first time, so that was worth it.”

Mako makes a sound in response and pulls them in for a slow, deep kiss.

“Still,” he says, when they finally break apart. “It’s very unfair that you’re still completely dressed and I’m as naked as those other me’s in vats.”

The warmth of the moment is pushed away as Cass starts to sit up. “Hey--”

Mako follows, his hair hair completely tousled and lips still swollen from the kiss. The bite marks are darkening by the second, and Cass can’t stop staring at them despite their desire to be concerned.

“Hey,” Mako mimics. “I’m kidding. I didn’t mean it like that. Stay with me a bit longer? Just… get down to my level, alright?”

They huff, and they aren’t sure if it’s in annoyance or amusement. Still, they obey by unbuttoning their shirt.

Mako rolls his eyes as they undress. “Oh my God, this is the most boring strip show I’ve ever been to. It’s a good thing you’re hot.”

Cass pauses, struggling on one foot to pull off their pants. This isn’t the first time Mako has said something like that, but they’ve never pushed it. “Do you really find me attractive?”

“Of course!” Mako looks a little shocked. “I certainly don’t keep you around for the charming conversation.”

Their stomach drops, and they think if maybe they should just move to the Apokine for the rest of the month, to avoid the fact that they think their heart might be breaking a little. “Oh.”

Mako’s expression shifts from a shit eating grin to a look of genuine surprise. “Cass--shit, Cass, I was kidding.” He scrambles up on his knees and catches them by the belt loops. He doesn’t lean in for a kiss, which is good, because they aren’t sure they would give it to him. “I love our chats. I love being with you. You’re so… God, you’re so smart and serious and I know I might not act like it, but I need that from you. I rely on you to keep me focused and steady.”

Cass’ nervousness abates at the earnest tone and Mako’s wide eyes. They relax into his embrace, and he wraps them into his arms for a hug.

And then, with another tug, they tumble back down onto the bed. Cass barely manages to catch themselves -- one hand on the mattress, the other against the wall.

Mako’s grin is back, bright and brilliant, and all Cass can hear is his voice repeating, “I love, I love--”

He gives an impatient tug to the pants. “Now finish stripping for me, fish man, because I need you naked and in my bed a full five minutes ago.”

Dazed, but more certain than they had been in awhile, Cass wriggles out of their pants and underwear (with Mako’s hands a bit more of a hindrance than a help).

The two of them move at the same time, folding into each other’s embrace, and for the first time since leaving Counterweight, Cass feels themselves relax.

#counter/weight #friends at the table #uh #i have no other words #cassmako #a lil miss fic #lil miss writings

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junker-town · 5 years ago

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The Celtics are not quite championship contenders. Yet.

The Boston Celtics are building, but no one is sure to what yet.

The Celtics’ window is cracked open again, that alone should be reason to celebrate their season.

The Celtics have lost four of six including Wednesday night’s abomination against Detroit, during which the exceptionally mediocre Pistons shot 60 percent on Boston’s home floor. The C’s were porous at the point of attack defensively and out of sorts on the offensive end.

Adding injury to insult, Jayson Tatum missed the game with knee soreness and Jaylen Brown sprained the thumb on his shooting hand. All of that comes just in time for a showdown game with the Eastern Conference leading Bucks on Thursday night.

Perhaps this a bad time to take a holistic view of where the Celtics stand vis-a-vis the rest of their competition, but it’s important to remember that they entered the season with little fanfare and muted expectations. Despite replacing Kyrie Irving’s production with his statistical doppelganger and polar opposite in Kemba Walker, they were hamstrung in finding a suitable replacement for Al Horford who left in free agency.

Gone were the days when the Celtics could dream about putting together an ad-hoc superteam. Competence and competitiveness would have to replace championship considerations. The C’s would still be good, sure, but more like, maybe-win-a-playoff-round good, rather than championship timber.

Fittingly, there were more esoteric goals in place. This was a low-pressure opportunity for Brown and Tatum to get their development back on track. And for Gordon Hayward, this season would be a chance to get his own career back on solid footing.

Essentially, the 2019-20 Celtics had one job: to restore confidence in the direction of the franchise. Or, as coach Brad Stevens put it: have a team Boston would root for again. They nailed all of that before Thanksgiving, playing an appealing brand of ball rooted in a swarming defensive style.

Despite their recent funk, the C’s are on pace to win 55 or so games and finish with a top two or three seed in the East. The Bucks are the prohibitive favorites and the Sixers are a matchup nightmare*, but Boston’s unexpected regular season success has changed the postseason calculus ever so slightly.

*Quick aside: Even if Horford doesn’t find his rhythm with the Sixers, his defection to Philly has turned that matchup on its head. That alone is worth the price of his deal.

The question we have before us, then, is this: are the Celtics championship contenders? The easy answer is, Yes, of course. They have the second-best record in the East, a trio of players who could be considered All-Stars, and a leading contender for Defensive Player of the Year, to go along with a top-5ish offense and defense.

Give them a little seeding luck -- placing them somewhere far, far away from Philly -- along with a clean bill of health this spring and there’s certainly a chance they could get to a conference final. That’s a contender, right?

In the NBA, the longer answer is, No, not really. What the Celtics lack is a top-5 player, a superstar who can carry a team through the gut-wrenching pressure of the postseason. There is no Kawhi Leonard, LeBron James, or Kevin Durant here. Throughout NBA history, teams with those kind of players are the ones who win championships.

In the last four decades, there has been only one exception that proves the rule. That team was the 2004 Pistons, who made up for a lack of top-end talent with a bevy of All-Stars and a coaching legend at the top of his game. That’s how that story gets told, but in retrospect those individual Pistons didn’t get the credit they deserve.

Ben Wallace was a second-team All-NBA center and had a strong case for Defensive Player of the Year (he finished second). While limited offensively, Wallace’s contribution to winning basketball games was superstar caliber.

Underrated as he was, Wallace was Detroit’s lone All-Star participant despite strong campaigns from Chauncey Billups and Rip Hamilton. Additionally, the Pistons went 17-3 with Rasheed Wallace down the stretch after acquiring him at the trade deadline. That team wasn’t limited. It was loaded.

The Pistons also caught a handful of breaks including a weak Eastern Conference and a Laker team hellbent on imploding. If that’s the formula for a non-superstar team to win a championship, then it’s an awfully high standard. If you squint hard enough, however, you could see it taking place in Boston. Real hard.

What the Celtics lack in transcendent starpower, they make up for in quantity and quality. Like Billups in his day, Walker is all NBA-caliber guard having another typically excellent campaign. Tatum and Brown are also coming into their own as cornerstone players and making solid arguments for All-Star inclusion.

Additionally, Marcus Smart is the Ben Wallace of this equation. Smart is an All-Defense game-changer who will make an interesting case for DPOY consideration. Finally, Stevens is an exceptional coach working with exactly the right kind of team for his style, a la Larry Brown with the Pistons.

It could happen. It’s just not that likely.

The wild card is Hayward. After flashing huge promise in the first few weeks of the season, Hayward missed 13 games with a broken hand. That time away allowed Brown and Tatum to emerge as lead scorers. The C’s were just fine without Hayward, going 9-4 during that stretch. Still, the premise of this Celtics team was having multiple shot creators on the wing and Hayward’s playmaking is an integral part of the formula.

More concerning was the time Hayward missed recently with a sore foot. Since returning to the lineup, Hayward’s been solid most nights, yet inconsistent on others. If this is the best version of Hayward the Celtics get, it’s still an upgrade over last season’s frustrating campaign when he was coming off his catastrophic leg injury.

Still, if this is the best Hayward they’ll see, and if the long-term health of the franchise depends on maximizing Brown and Tatum’s abilities, then it makes sense to at least entertain the possibility of a trade that swings the pendulum toward title contention. This would be tricky for a number of reasons.

Hayward has another year left at his option on the max contract he signed in free agency during the summer of 2017. Given his injury history, the assumption has long been that he would exercise that $34 million option. That seems less certain considering he has once again established himself as a quality player, putting him in line for one more lengthy contract.

There’s also not a clear target in view. While Andre Drummond appears interesting on paper, the Celtics have done just fine of filling the center spot on the cheap with Daniel Theis and Enes Kanter. It’s also not clear that Drummond would be the defensive upgrade his counting stats suggest.

At one point, Kevin Love would have made a lot of sense, but not with three years left on his deal. Additionally, Tatum has excelled as a small-ball four man. Perhaps Cavs teammate Tristan Thompson would be a better fit, but while the Celtics are flush with draft picks, they don’t have mid-level contracts that would help balance the respective cap sheets without breaking up their core.

If they could somehow pry Steven Adams from Oklahoma City, that might be a different story. The physical Adams would be the ideal counterweight to Joel Embiid in a playoff series. The cost would be prohibitive, if he’s even attainable at all.

The likelier route is an upgrade on the margins, such as adding another wing to bolster a bench unit that lacks scoring punch. The C’s have half a roster of young players on rookie-scale contracts and are likely to have three first round picks, including the legendary Memphis Pick that now figures to be in the middle of the first round. That’s a strong hand to play at the trade deadline.

All of this depends on whether the front office sees this season as a legitimate chance to win now. The other path, the one more likely, is to stay the course and let things play out. They have a bright future in place with Brown and Tatum and they have already accomplished their prime goals for the regular season. Why mess with a good thing?

After all, we went into this season assuming it would take another offseason to finish rebuilding the foundation. The Celtics’ window is cracked open again, that alone should be reason to celebrate their season.

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thisdaynews · 5 years ago

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What Politicos Are Reading This Summer

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/what-politicos-are-reading-this-summer/

What Politicos Are Reading This Summer

From the frenzy of the 2020 presidential field to Robert Mueller’s congressional testimony to the unremitting tweets of @realDonaldTrump, summer 2019 has shown no signs of slowing down. But for those who can pry their eyes away from the news, even briefly,Politico Magazinehere presents our annual summer reading list. We asked some of the most interesting people in politics—writers, activists, lawmakers, scholars and more—to tell us what book is at the top of their reading list and what they’re packing as a guilty pleasure on vacation. (We asked all the Democrats currently running for president for their reading recommendations; those not listed below declined to respond.) Ranging from histories of America’s past, like Rick Atkinson’sThe British Are Coming, to poignant modern memoirs like Tara Westover’sEducated, to bestselling novels like Tomi Adeyemi’sChildren of Blood and Bone, this year’s selections span a variety of genres and forms.If you’re itching to fit in some reading this summer, grab your drink of choice and pair it with one of the following.

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James Comey, former director of the FBI:

Right now, I’m readingThe British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777, by Rick Atkinson. As for a guilty pleasure suggestion, I would recommend that Republicans read the Mueller report, maybe concealing it inside the cover of the latest work by a Fox News broadcaster so they aren’t judged negatively by their colleagues.

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Jay Sekulow, chief counsel at the American Center for Law and Justice, religious liberty advocate, author and member of President Donald Trump’s legal team:

I’ve just finished volume two, and am starting volume three, of Winston Churchill’s six-volumeThe Second World War. My fun read isPhotograph, by Ringo Starr.

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Gretchen Carlson, journalist, author and advocate for sexual harassment survivors:

These are at the top of my reading list:The Moment of Lift, by Melinda Gates, inspiring stories from around the world about women rising up and the greatness that happens when we do;Educated, by Tara Westover, an unbelievable journey of one woman to educate herself that inspires all of us to rekindle that fire in our belly to make the most of our lives (and it happens to be my son’s required reading this summer with parents!);Maid, by Stephanie Land, an empowering story of a woman determined to pull herself up in life through which we all feel stronger; andThe Sun and Her Flowers, by Rupi Kaur, a book of poems, with one of my favorites being:

I stand on the sacrifices of a million women before me thinking what can I do to make this mountain taller so the women after me can see farther.

My beach read isThe Most Fun We Ever Had, by Claire Lombardo, because every family has its issues, and by acknowledging that, we live truer lives and grow as people.

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Beto O’Rourke, former congressman from Texas, currently a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

I’m readingThe Fall of Carthage, by Adrian Goldsworthy, andStorm Lake, by Art Cullen.

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Ben Shapiro, political commentator, author and editor-in-chief of theDaily Wire:

The Adams-Jefferson Letters, edited by Lester Cappon, is great reminder that despite brutal political disagreements, those who share the founders’ vision are not enemies but brothers. AndThe Last Pirate of New Yorkis a wild ride through Civil War-era American history from Rich Cohen, one of my favorite authors.

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Alan Dershowitz, professor emeritus at Harvard Law School:

At the top of my reading list right now isShadow Strike, by Yaakov Katz. My guilty pleasure is reading about David Boies “ethics” inBad Blood, by John Carreyrou.

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Marianne Williamson, 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

At the top of my list isWar on Peace, by Ronan Farrow. Transitioning from a war economy to a peace economy is high on my list of priorities, which is why as president I plan to establish a U.S. Department of Peace. Our national security agenda should not be guided by corporate profits for defense contractors, but solely by our legitimate security needs. I plan to make that happen. For the lighter read, I’m obsessively rereading anything by Jane Austen.

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Alicia Garza, writer, co-founder of Black Lives Matter and special projects director for the National Domestic Workers Alliance:

For nonfiction, at the top of my reading list isHow to Be an Antiracist, by Ibram X. Kendi, a powerful follow-up to his first book,Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. These are two really important books on how race is shaping America and what that means for our future. What’s important to me about these two books is that they not only tell the truth about how racist ideas translate into power, but also provide the counterweight with what we can all do to ensure that everyone gets to live a dignified life.

Unfortunately, my beach read also isn’t light, but it’s excellent nonetheless:A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini. Hosseini is a master storyteller, and each one of his characters is so perfectly imperfect and human.

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Cory Booker, senator from New Jersey and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

At the top of my summer reading list isCan’t Hurt Me, by David Goggins, a fun book. Also on my list are:The Soul of America, by John Meacham, which I just finished, andBecome America, by Eric Liu.

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David Petraeus, retired U.S. Army general and former director of the CIA:

I’ve already begun readingIll Winds, by Larry Diamond, which provides a superb description of the state of democracy in America and around the world—and promises to explain to readers what is needed to shore up democracy at home and abroad. And also at the top of my list isOur Man, by George Packer, which reviewers have praised for its enormous insights not just on Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, with whom I was privileged to partner during his final mission as a diplomat, but also on the three wars in which he played significant roles.

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Lori Lightfoot, mayor of Chicago:

At the top of my list isBluebird, Bluebirdof the Highway 59 series. I like mysteries, especially if they deal with complicated issues around intersections of race and class. My guilty pleasure/fun reading is the magazine theWeek.

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Michael Bennet, senator from Colorado and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

On my list areThere Will Be No Miracles Here, by Casey Gerald,Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, by David W. Blight, andThis America: The Case for the Nation, by Jill Lepore.

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John Delaney, former congressman from Massachusetts, currently a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

The books on my summer reading list areEducated,Songs of America,Make Your Bed,The Second MountainandThe Soul of America.

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Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the House:

Daniel Silva’sThe New Girlis at the top of my reading list. Every Daniel Silva novel is at the top of my reading list, and John Sandford novels are a close second!

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Shaun King, writer and civil rights activist: At the top of my summer reading list are two essential reads:The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Fight Bias, by Dolly Chugh, andHow to Be an Antiracist, by Ibram X. Kendi. Both get to the heart of how we can all actually make this world a much better place.

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Alyssa Mastromonaco, former deputy chief of staff for operations in the Obama White House, author, and senior adviser and spokesperson for NARAL Pro-Choice America:

At the top of my list isLife Will Be the Death of Me, by Chelsea Handler. Chelsea is one of my most supportive friends, and this book is a gift to anyone who is interested in the journey to learn more about yourself, laugh your ass off and cry. Second isHow to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, by Michael Pollan. As someone whose life was changed immeasurably by medical marijuana, I am fascinated by the research and discussion of alternative therapies.

My guilty pleasure read isConfessions of a Prairie Bitch: How I Survived Nellie Oleson And Learned to Love Being Hated, by Alison Arngrim. I love “Little House on the Prairie” and started rewatching it this year. My friend and I did research and found out that Melissa Gilbert and Alison Arngrim were actually inseparable friends. I wanted to know more.

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Ro Khanna, congressman from California:

Trade and rural America are always on my mind, so I’m currently reading Beth Macy’sFactory Man, about how one Virginia town came together to fight for American manufacturing. The book was a gift from that town’s congressional representative, Morgan Griffith. Our political views don’t always align on every subject, but this is a great opportunity to reach across the aisle for a story of American strength. My guilty pleasure for the summer will be following the Phillies. I try to follow the Warriors, but I started my baseball career playing little league in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, so that’s where my loyalties lie.

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Gloria Allred, women’s rights attorney:

At the top of my reading list for the summer is the Mueller report. I feel that this is the most important book published this year and that I have a duty to read it in order to understand Russia’s role in the last election for president and why special counsel Robert Mueller felt that he could not exonerate President Donald Trump on charges that he obstructed justice. My guilty pleasure would be to readI Remember Nothing and Other Reflections, by Nora Ephron. I love her wit and honesty, and I know that this book will make me smile, even as I remember that she left this earth too soon.

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Neal Katyal, former U.S. acting solicitor general and law professor at Georgetown:

At the top of my list is Tara Westover’sEducated. I recently met Tara and was taken by her brilliance and depth, and everyone I know who has read the book raves about it. My guilty pleasure reading is John Grisham’sThe Firm. I’ve got a legal thriller I’ve been dying to write for a dozen years, and I worked out the plot back in 2007. But I want to learn how masters of the genre actually write. Plus, I love books like this.

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Donna Brazile, political analyst, author and former chair of the DNC:

My list includes George Will’sThe Conservative Sensibility, Henry Louis Gates’Stony the Road, Jennifer Eberhardt’sBiasedand Brittney Cooper’sEloquent Rage. I also have David Baldacci’s latest,Redemption.

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Jay Inslee, governor of Washington and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

Right now, I’m currently reading and enjoyingThe Feather Thief, a caper about a young man who steals bird feathers from a museum in the United Kingdom. I just finished and highly recommendWest with the Night, a memoir by Beryl Markham. It is an incredible adventure story, and one that highlights the power of perseverance. Another book I just finished isFreedom’s Forge, a story about the full-scale mobilization of the U.S. economy to defeat fascism during World War II. This story is especially relevant in this moment we’re in, as we will need that same type of mobilization to defeat the climate crisis.

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Colin Powell, retired four-star U.S. Army general and former secretary of State:

I’m currently readingThe Back Channel, by Ambassador William J. Burns, andPresidents of War, by Michael Beschloss.

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Seth Moulton, congressman from Massachusetts and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

I’m looking forward to readingLeadership in Turbulent Times, by my friend Doris Kearns Goodwin. I gave signed copies to my staff for the holiday but haven’t had a chance to read it yet myself.

***

Dambisa Moyo, economist and author:

At the top of my list isTrillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Playbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell, by Alan Eagle, Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg. It’s an insightful book on a man with unique talents and attributes that helped shape one of the most important industries today. My guilty pleasure book isBoom: Mad Money, Mega Dealers, and the Rise of Contemporary Art, by Michael Shnayerson, a fun read on the key players and vagaries of the fascinating contemporary segment of the art market

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Eric Swalwell, congressman from California and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

On my list areAn American Summer, by Alex Kotlowitz, a chronicle of one summer in Chicago’s South Side and the impact of gun violence on a community, andAda Twist, Scientist, by Andrea Beaty, a favorite of my daughter, Cricket. It’s even better when her 2-year-old brother tries reading it to her.

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William Darity, author, professor of public policy, economics and African and African American studies and director of the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University:

My recommended serious read for the summer is Tanya Hernández’s bookMultiracials and Civil Rights: Mixed-Race Stories of Discrimination, a superb critical exploration of the evolution and political consequences of multiracial identities in the United States. My guilty pleasure read is Adrienne Maree Brown and Walidah Imarisha’s edited volumeOctavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, a collection of short stories paying homage to the late Octavia Butler.

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Bill McKibben, author and environmentalist:

I’m reading (rereading, actually, since I got to read a galley a year ago) Richard Powers’The Overstory. Winning the Pulitzer has given it attention, and deservedly. It’s about, in the largest sense, the relationship of people and trees, and it manages the trick of making trees into characters in ways that really expand the boundaries of literature. It’s a book that will be read for generations to come.

I’m almost disinclined to list Kim Stanley Robinson’sNew York 2140as a beach read or guilty pleasure. Usually listed as a science fiction writer, he’s one of the finest writers in any genre at work in America today, and this account of New York once the waters have begun to rise is superb—there are strong notes of Mark Twain, and his usual remarkable insight into how politics could be made to work. It’s also the best book for lovers of our greatest city since, maybe, E.B. White’sHere is New York. A delight.

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Deray McKesson, author and civil rights activist:

On my list areThe Great Believers, by Rebecca Makkai,Children of Blood and Bone, by Tomi Adeyemi, andThe Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo.

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Charlotte Clymer, writer, U.S. Army veteran and press secretary for the Human Rights Campaign:

While we all wait patiently for the last installment of Robert A. Caro’s phenomenal L.B.J. quintet—please, Mr. Caro, do finish soon; it’s terribly impolite to keep a lady waiting—I have two books at the top of my summer reading list: Rick Atkinson’sThe British Are Coming, the first meaty portion of the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian’s announced trilogy on the Revolutionary War, and Dr. Tressie McMillan Cottom’sThick: And Other Essays, a collection of brilliant musings I keep hearing about from friends.

Doesn’t all pleasure reading feel “guilty” on some level for those of us working in this chaotic political era? Despite her anti-pineapple-on-pizza proclivities, I will likely reread Sarah McBride’sTomorrow Will Be Differentfor the umpteenth time because of her powerful, empathetic and nuanced writing on making history as a trans woman. For dessert: Lauren Wilkinson’s debut novelAmerican Spylooks to be a hell of a thriller, and I’ll be partaking.

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Charlie Sykes, political commentator, author and editor-in-chief of theBulwark:

I had a big stack of books to read but just got Tim Alberta’sAmerican Carnagein the mail, and now everything else is shelved. Except for Brad Thor’s latest,Backlash.

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Julian Brave NoiseCat, writer, director of Green New Deal strategy at Data for Progress and narrative change director at the Natural History Museum:

To better understand the troubling times we find ourselves in, I will read my friend and mentor Bill McKibben’s bookFalter. To learn more about policy, politics and history for my ongoing work on the Green New Deal, I have been referring to Ira Katznelson’s tomeFear Itself, about the New Deal and its costs—particularly for people of color. I also just finished my friend Nick Estes’ book,Our History Is the Future, which puts the anti-Dakota Access Pipeline movement at Standing Rock in historical context. The book is, in my view, a significant contribution to environmental justice and the broader left.

On the beach, which, for me, will be more metaphor than physical destination, I’ll turn to some of my favorite journalists in the pages of theNew Yorker. I am particularly excited for Jia Tolentino’s debut,Trick Mirror. The excerpt in a recent issue of the magazine was dazzling. I am also eager to read the pieces collected inShapes of Native Nonfiction, edited by Theresa Warburton and my friend Elissa Washuta. (If I’m honest though, I will likely spend too much time scrolling Twitter, where I gravitate to tastemakers like Cardi B, Lil Nas X, Brother Nature and Hari Nef, to name a few.)

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Anand Giridharadas, author and editor-at-large forTIME:

I’m currently readingCommon Ground: A Turbulent Decade in the Lives of Three American Families, because busing, racism, white resentment and the search for a way for us to live together are as much with us as in the post-1968 era that J. Anthony Lukas covers. I’m in the early stages of reporting a new book, and in these between times I tend to go back to the nonfiction classics for technique. How do you tell the story of an age intimately through people? I’m also eager to dive into Robin DiAngelo’sWhite Fragility, Jill Lepore’sThis Americaand Shoshana Zuboff’sThe Age of Surveillance Capitalism, which for me will follow the tough act of George Packer’s new masterpiece,Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the American Century.

***

Anthony Jack, sociologist, author and professor at Harvard Graduate School of Education:

On the top of my list areThere There,Where the Crawdads Sing,What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You BlackerandHeavy: An American Memoir. This summer is about reuniting with narratives and the experience of getting to know oneself in an increasingly unequal and complex world.

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Helen Zia, journalist, author and activist for LGBTQ and Asian American rights:

Right now, I’m reading three books: an advance copy ofAmerica for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States, by Erika Lee, which is due to be out in a couple of months. It’s an eye-opening look at how today’s demagogues repeat history with their drumbeat of “new immigrants are the scum-of-the earth”—which was employed by Ben Franklin and other “Founding Fathers” against Germans and later to rally hatred toward the Irish, Italians, Mexicans and many others, and also during the ethnic cleansing to rid America of Chinese and Asians, the first legislated “illegal” immigrants. For fun, I’ve been reading Lisa See’s latest novel,The Island of Sea Women, a spellbinding tale of two friends who grow up with Korea’s tumultuous modern history as a backdrop, and Meredith May’s inspirationalThe Honey Bus: A Memoir of Loss, Courage and a Girl Saved by Bees. And I have cued up Min Jin Lee’sPachinko, Viet Thanh Nguyen’sThe Refugeesand Maxine Hong Kingston’s ground-breakingThe Woman Warrior.

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Joe Sestak, former congressman from Pennsylvania and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

At the top of my reading list areThe Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill, Defender of the Realm, 1940-1965, by William Manchester and Paul Reid, andWashington, by Ron Chernow. Just an enjoyable read is Fredrik Backman’sA Man Called Ove.

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Jose Antonio Vargas, journalist, author and filmmaker:

At the top of my list isAmerican Presidents, Deportations, and Human Rights Violations: From Carter to Trump, by Bill Ong Hing. We all must understand the full picture of our country’s modern deportation history. My current guilty pleasure read isOn Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, by Ocean Vuong. It’s like reading the best kind of dessert: It’s so rich you gotta slow down.

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Kim Foxx, state’s attorney for Cook County, Illinois:

At the top of my list isMore Than Enough, by Elaine Welteroth. I strongly relate to Elaine’s notion that when you are identified as a first, you have the responsibility to bring your best self, especially to those who challenge your right to be in the space you deserve to be. Also on my list isCharged, by Emily Bazelon. Emily’s unbiased narrative examines the role of prosecutors in advancing criminal justice reform while keeping communities safe.

InStyle Magazineis my guilty pleasure.

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Wayne Messam, mayor of Miramar, Florida, and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

On my book list areBorn a Crime, by Trevor Noah, andCan’t Hurt Me, by David Goggins. I’m interested in Noah’s improbable success coming from South Africa, and, as a former athlete, I’m impressed with Goggins’ military accomplishments and success as an endurance athlete. He’s a living Superman!

My beach read is the Warchant newsletter. I read these updates multiple times per day to get the latest recruiting news about Florida State University Football.

***

Melina Abdullah, civil rights activist, professor and chair of Pan-African studies at California State University, Los Angeles:

On the top of my list isHomegoing, by Yaa Gyasi. It’s a deep and powerful series of interconnected stories of African people from Ghana and their descendants in the Americas, woven together as a painful, beautiful, hugely important novel. It’s a perfect read for this year’s “Year of Return” to Ghana for black people in the diaspora, as 2019 marks 400 years since the beginning of the transatlantic slave trade.

Also on my list isJust Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson. Written in autobiographical form, Stevenson’s work challenges us to examine what justice should look like. His focus on how we treat youth in the justice system is an important companion text to Ava DuVernay’s Netflix series “When They See Us.”

As for my guilty pleasure read, maybe Roxane Gay’sDifficult Women? I love that it’s a collection that allows me to read a bit and feel satisfied before picking it up again, and I love the characters and the humor interwoven into stories that have meaning and challenge oppression.

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Mike Gravel, former senator from Alaska and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate:

I’ll have to reread Michael Parenti’sAgainst Empire. It’s a classic polemic against the crimes of the U.S. empire, burning with Parenti’s muscular voice and sharp command of the details of infamy. A guilty pleasure is Henry Kissinger, who despite being a moral abomination of a man, writes clearly, coherently and intelligently. ParticularlyDiplomacy.

Produced by Ruairí Arrieta-Kenna and Shawna Chen, art direction by Erin Aulov and Lily Mihalik, and photography by M. Scott Mahaskey.

#Foreign #Politics #Reading #summer

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ciathyzareposts · 6 years ago

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Curse of Enchantia – Ice Rage: The Meltdown

Written by Alfred n the Fettuc

We should really make a list of the seven cardinal sins of adventure game design someday (even if the list would probably be closer to seventy) but I’m pretty sure two sins would make the list pretty easily.

You should never make a puzzle so obscure the only way to solve it is to stumble upon the solution by sheer luck or while trying something completely different.

When you know the solution to a puzzle, you should be able to solve it without having to spend one hour trying to make the game understand what you’re trying to do.

What is interesting is that these two problems are directly related to the interface of the game. While the former is bound to happen again and again with the interface getting simpler with every game (for example I want to climb on a stool but my character ends up pushing it), the latter is bound to disappear for exactly the same reason. In ye olde text adventures you have to discover exactly the way the developer wants you to interact with the game, but with a one-click interface, you don’t have to figure out the logic, you just have to click on the item and see what happens.

What’s really great with Curse of Enchantia is that you have these two sins combined, which is something of a rarity. Add the fact maybe that “having only one music track for a ten-hour long game” might be one of the sins and you’re in for an unforgettable experience.

After a nice long chat with my friend the yeti, it’s time to get back to it…

When we left Brad, he was having some quality time with a yeti in the vast ice wasteland that’s hidden in the costume shop changing room. The first thing you notice is that the yeti swallowed some kind of green frog when you enter the place. I then pick up the snowball on the left of the screen and throw it at the yeti. It becomes enraged and runs towards me… but trips over the edge of the lake and falls face down, spitting the frog in the process.

Brad’s technique for dealing with any danger : let it trip over something.

The frog then jumps away and nothing seems to have been accomplished by this for now… Maybe I’ll encounter the frog-like creature later in the game but considering the randomness of the whole thing, there is a distinct possibility I won’t.

Searching for the vast area around me I find several things:

I pick up a wood board and something that looks like an oxygen-tank or a thermos.

There is a hole in the ice from which a fish jumps out regularly. I seem to be able to interact with the fish at a very precise moment but can’t catch it or do anything with it.

A nice little igloo with an eskimo guy is a bit farther on the east but approaching the eskimo gets him to fall on his face. Maybe he’s scared of me or something.

Some kind of shield seems to be trapped in ice in some place.

There is a huge seal in one place that just waves at me and when I come back there, he’s gone. Maybe he was a friend of the frog and was used as a roadblock.

May I interest you in some fine leather jackets?

I spend some time searching for every nook and cranny of the place but can’t find anything else. This is where I stumble upon a solution by sheer luck. I’ve tried a lot of random things everywhere I could for quite a long time. The fainted/hiding eskimo is notably an area where I try everything on everything: give him money, give him meat, try to use the paperclip or the magnet on the fishing hole, entering the igloo… I realize that the eskimo drops down every time I approach him too much. Entering the screen from different places seem to allow me to get closer before he trips but it doesn’t help me. This is when I try attacking the eskimo, then throwing the wood board at him.

Come on buddy, stop playing dead. I know you can hear me.

And it seems that throwing the plank was the solution, but not for the eskimo. When I do that, I get the thumbs up and Brad goes aaaaaaaaaall the way on the left (I’m talking four or five screens of scrolling) by himself and puts the wood board on the hole from where the fish is jumping.

Hmmmm… yeah, that’s exactly what I wanted to do.

I honestly don’t know what is worse: having a character walk for ten minutes by himself to do something you didn’t plan at all with the command you just gave him or having to be in the exact place where something is supposed to happen (Future Wars or Beneath a Steel Sky style). Well, no use rambling about it… I pick up the fish!

And another example of fine puzzle design happens a few minutes after that. Trying to do something with the oxygen tank/thermos/whatever that might be, I try every command on it and WEARING it works. Turns out the thermos was a deodorant bottle and that the eskimo was not hiding but fainting from the apparently horrible smell that was coming from my armpits.

Once again, I wish I was kidding.

Not trying to make too much sense with this puzzle that would be more in its place with a Leisure Suit Larry game than a fantasy one, I manage to approach the eskimo to talk to him. He asks me for the fish and gives me his fishing pole in exchange.

I mean: the guy lives alone in the middle of nowhere with no bathroom, eating fish and wearing a huge parka in the sun and I’m the smelly one?

I try once again to do several logical things with the fishing pole like attaching my magnet or my paperclip to it or trying to throw it in the different fishing holes that I see but it turns out you have to ATTACK the shield taken in ice with it. Brad then breaks the pole in two and uses it to make a fire.

Again: sheer luck

The fire makes the ice melt and it’s revealed the shield was not a shield at all but some kind of green goblin (that I want to call Bob for some reason) frozen in ice. Maybe it was the frog-like creature that had been swallowed by the yeti but it doesn’t look like it apart from the color green.

I am as surprised as you that it worked, little buddy.

Trying to interact with Bob, I can’t seem to do anything except picking up the ashes from the fire, which I do. Exiting the screen and coming back again, I see that Bob has disappeared. I walk endlessly in the ice wasteland for a moment before realizing that a crevice that was in the northwestern section of the map is now occupied by what seems to be the seal from earlier.

He’s not a very good “hide and seek” player

I cross the crevice and try to yell “Help” for him to react but it does something else entirely. A saw appears in the wall and carves a tunnel. It’s my new friend Bob! He shows himself and tells me to follow him.

Kids, never follow strange frog-like creatures you don’t know.

Okay, I’m sorry but I have to pause here. Nothing I’ve done since the beginning of this play session has been done on purpose. I stumbled upon every solution without really understanding everything. This area is very short when you know what you’re doing but I spent the better part of an hour blindly stumbling from stupid puzzle solution to stupid puzzle solution. And even playing through it a second time doesn’t really make more sense. What is the trigger of the seal for him to help me? Is he a friend of the frog? Why am I supposed to use the ATTACK command on the ice cube with the fishing pole? Was it really Bob inside the yeti’s mouth? Was the whole ordeal only to grab some ashes for later? Is it still worth trying to make some sense out of this game?

Then again, all of this would have been made much easier and much more fulfilling with two very simple things: LESS COMMANDS (just having a “use” command would have made everything better than having to play “guess the verb” like it’s an obtuse parser interface) and MORE DESCRIPTIONS (just have a way of telling me the air tank/thermos is a deodorant can and I will gladly try to wear it).

Anyway, I go through Bob’s tunnel and arrive a beautiful shore.

This costume shop closet is definitely bigger on the inside.

I jump on the boat and start to cross the channel… but something hits it in the middle and the boat explodes, throwing my into the icy waters. Brad doesn’t seem to be sensitive to cold because he just swims back. I then throw my ashes in the water (don’t ask me why. At this point I try just everything on every item I have in my inventory before I try to think) and a huge sea dragon offers me a ride.

Is the sea dragon that eats ashes also an obscure UK reference? Did Nessie eat exclusively roasted fishing poles?

The sea dragon then brings me to the entrance of a huge ice palace. It definitely looks like an endgame location but unfortunately, the completion percentage in the option screen is only at 54…

The penguin family lightens the mood of this place though.

The solution for opening the door is pretty straightforward for once. I pull the stalactites in order from the longer to the shorter (as shown by the penguins, or… you know… the first order I would have tried anyway) and the door opens. I enter the castle and I find a hall with a broom and a table with some dices on it.

Maybe I surprised the janitor while he was having a break playing dices?

I pocket the broom (as any adventure game protagonist with regular-sized pockets would do) but picking up the dices closes the door. I have to throw them again on the table (I see the result of the roll every time) for the door to open again, which makes me think that every throw leads to a different place.

Bim! Craps! Yahtzee! Okay you got me I don’t know any dice game rules.

Entering the door with any combination still leads to the same corridor, though, but with different doors openings on the sides. In the beginning of the corridor I also see a weird jigsaw-like contraption which involves a gun holster as a counterweight.

Spooky

At the very end of the corridor there is a big window. I can look through it to see Bob waving at me. I guess I have to open the window somehow but nothing I try works.

Hey little buddy! Want a shot at sidekick of the year?

Searching in the rooms I opened with my natural 18 on the dices, I find a piece of stalactite I break by ATTACKING with my broom, a magnifying glass and a very accurately drawn gun on a shelf I manage to grab once again by ATTACKING with my broom…

Why don’t you keep the gun for the final battle now, Brad?

Using the gun as a counterweight in the main corridor lowers the dish that was suspended out of my range (which, surprisingly enough, I don’t reach by ATTACKING it with my broom) in which I find a glass piece and some kind of suntan lotion.

But I’m suspicious now. It might also be fire starter or yellow paint.

Despite the fact that the glass piece looks like it would perfectly work to complete the magnifying glass that seems broken, I can’t do anything with it, nor can I wear or drink the suntan lotion. I go back to the dice room and try a few more times to roll the dices, which opens new doors apparently without a lot of coherence or reason. I’m sure there is some logic behind the rolls and the doors opening but I don’t have the patience to try and look into the developers crazed minds.

For example, an 8 closes all the doors… makes perfect sense.

After at least fifteen dice rolls (I’ve never been a lucky dice player), I manage to open enough doors. I put my grubby hands on a megaphone, a big ice cube and a hydraulic jack, keeping the tradition for random items strewn across the game world. Going back in the main corridor, I stumble upon a whistle simply lying on the ground. I take it and I am a bit surprised to see I manage to despite the fact that my inventory was full five seconds ago… Looking through it I realize that my magnet on a string has simply disappeared… Maybe I did use it inadvertently? It seems I didn’t and the game simply decided to get rid of it for no other reason that I won’t need it later on. I can picture the game developers in their office:

-“Hey if we add an item here, the player inventory will be full”. -“Who gives a hoot? Just remove one of the randoms items we make him keep for the last five hours, nobody will mind” -”Yeah, you’re right. If they had the patience to reach this point of the game, their brain is probably already dead anyway. Let’s do some more drugs and create more puzzles!”

At least the inventory is more colorful now than when it was full of rocks.

So I’m guessing now that the magically appearing whistle announces that I found every item I needed because I can’t take the dices anymore to open/close any more doors. I’m pretty sure I’ll have to use the megaphone somehow in order to talk to Bob outside. I try to break the window with the stalactite, the megaphone, try to open it with the jack, blow the whistle, etc… nothing works. The “Trying everything on everything” is much harder now that I have ten distinct inventory items in my pocket. Turns out the solution involves COMBINING the whistle and the megaphone and then ATTACKING the window with this combo.

Seems obvious in retrospect now but remember half a dozen other commands could have worked for the same result.

This here is the example of cardinal sin I was talking about in the beginning of the post. I spent several minutes trying to make Brad understand I wanted to break the window somehow and several more minutes (okay let’s be honest, not so much but it felt like a long time) trying to make him blow the whistle/megaphone thingy. I needed to use the ATTACK command but why couldn’t I use the COMBINE command? The USE command? The UNLOCK command? Even the EAT command could have been considered a way to put the whistle in my mouth. If you have to use a dozen commands for your game, at least consider having two different solutions for a puzzle?

Anyway, jumping through the window unfortunately doesn’t result in Brad plummeting to his death but allows entrance to another ice room. Which makes me ask: where is Bob? He really seemed like he was waving at me from far away, possibly from the exterior of the castle. And why are two rooms connected by a window and not a door? Every little detail like this really work against the coherence of the whole game and make it seem like a dream (or more accurately, a nightmare) to go through. But then again, the whole land is called Enchantia, so everything can be resumed by: you know, it’s magic!

And now a magical raygun I’m guessing I’ll have to absorb using my suntan lotion.

The solution to this room is straightforward enough (which is kind of a relief compared to the rest of the game). You have to put your reflective items in the holes to redirect the laser ray. A bit of trial and error is involved but you have to put in that order: the magnifying glass, the ice cube, the stalactite and the glass shard. The laser ray then goes back to its source and blows it up.

Magical explosion!

I now can go use the jack on the hole in the door in order to open it. That seemed like a lot of work considering the laser didn’t seem very dangerous in the first place (I didn’t even have a nice “electrified Brad” animation going through it) but I won’t complain: I did have something to blow up and that’s always nice in my book.

The most discreet heist ever

In the next room I find myself in front of… the Enchantress herself! Could it be the final battle? The ultimate showdown? The war to end all wars?

What is your throne made of? The whale’s tongue from KQ4?

The enchantress throws blue light balls at me that freeze me on the spot. I have to jump with the right timing in order to avoid them. It’s simple enough and just when I’m in front of the enchantress, possibly with finally a chance to get rid of my nemesis and restore peace in the galaxy… Brad climbs the stairs, sits on the throne and he’s ejected by a big cushion on a spring.

Boing

Well that was anticlimactic… I land in another nondescript room in the ice castle with only one door. I try to go towards the door. Suddenly, a huge hand appears from nowhere and grabs Brad!

Hand of Fate foretelling or Zelda’s Wallmaster reference?

I had a rare moment of fun here because I suddenly understood what I had to do AND managed to make the interface do my bidding without ten tries. It seems like nothing but after a few hours in this piece of crap game, I was overwhelmed by a wave of relief. I WORE the suntan lotion (or cooking oil, or lubricant) and it worked! I became slippery and the hand let me go!

I’m afraid it might be the best puzzle in the whole game

I go through the door and arrive in front of two doors. Then I go through the left door and arrive in front of another door. Then another room with two doors… Oh no… Oh my goodness. Please tell me it’s not true. Not… *shivers*… a MAZE?

Brad is hiding his tearful eyes away from the camera.

Turns out it looks like a maze alright but considering you can retrace your steps, I just went through and spent some time going through doors completely randomly, and it seemed to work. At some point I find a box of matches and finally arrive in a room that’s unlike all the others.

Not the screenshot of the year, but it comes after twelve lookalike rooms so it’s already something.

After this wannabe labyrinth, I find another place that looks more like an ice cave than an ice palace. There is a big rock sitting in a corner next to… a fire extinguisher! One of the items the giant parrot asked me to find (I’m pretty sure that the sentence “I need to find a fire extinguisher because the giant parrot asked me to” has been previously said by at least one serial killer in history).

There is also a pattern in this game regarding orcs wearing tutus.

I try to push the orc (or at least his foot, because it’s the only interactive area I can find), scratch a match on the foot, prick it with my paperclip, give him money, but to no avail. Interestingly enough, when I try to go through the door behind him, the eyes of the orc follow me. I try hiding behind the ice pillar and it works! The orc falls asleep. However, going back near him to try something wakes him up everytime. I try throwing a match at him. I try a lot of other stuff. But the solution is : you have to wait for the orc to fall asleep then ATTACK him with the matchbox. Then Brad walks next to the orc and… I don’t really know… scratch the foot with the scraper part of the matchbox? The result is that the orc yells and jumps through the ceiling.

I have no idea what’s happening here.

My best guess is that Brad scratches a match on the matchbox and uses it to burn the foot. However the fact that you have two inventory items (a match and a matchbox) makes you want to use the match in some way. But no: you have to attack the foot with the matchbox for whatever reason. This is once again another example of the sin of knowing what you want to do but can’t find a way to do it. I knew the solution would involve burning the orc’s foot in one way or another, but I spent way more time than I should have trying to figure out once again the crazy logic in the developers’ minds…

Anyway, I pick up the fire extinguisher and Mr Benn appears out of thin air to bring me back to the town.

If you can teleport like that, why didn’t you send me in this fraking room directly?

And this is it for this play session. I’m back in the town center with a match and a fire extinguisher. At least I feel like I’m making some progress, but it’s far from a smooth ride. The worst thing is that this whole part had a few interesting puzzles but everything is drowned into poor puzzle design and madcap logic. Let’s meet in the same place next time to see if I can find a way to disguise into a pig in order to pass the beetle guard and find an electric fan for my friend the giant parrot!

Session time: 2 hours 30 minutes Total time: 6 hours 30 minutes

Inventory: Paperclip, Bag of money, Match, Fire Extinguisher Score: 306 Percentage complete: 64%

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/curse-of-enchantia-ice-rage-the-meltdown/

#retro games #dos games #retro #crpg #adventure #amiga #oldcomputers #8bit #16bit #blog #repost

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lawfultruth · 6 years ago

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Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles

A group composed of 20 public company CEOs and leaders of institutional investors has released Commonsense Corporate Governance Principles 2.0, an updated set of corporate governance principles that are intended to provide “a basic framework for sound, long-term oriented governance.” The group includes such luminaries as Warren Buffett, the Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Mary Barra, the CEO of General Motors, and Ginni Rometty, the CEO of IBM. The new released document updates the group’s original principles first published in 2016. The principles as updated include some interesting guidelines for publicly traded companies and for their investors, in a number of key areas.

The group’s October 18, 2018 press release can be found here. An Open Letter from the signatories to the updated principles can be found here. The updated principles themselves can be found here.

By their endorsement of the principles, the signatories are indicating their commitment to use the standards in the principles to “inform the corporate governance practices within their own organizations.” The principles themselves are meant “to benefit the millions of Americans who work for and invest in America’s public companies, create economic growth, and sustain the health of America’s corporate markets.”

In their Open Letter, the signatories noted the “precipitous decline” in the number of public companies in the U.S., a development the signatories say that some have suggested is due to “public market participants’ short-term oriented focus” which discourages companies with a longer-term view from going public. The principles are presented as “counterweights” to “unhealthy short-termism.”

The principles address a number of key governance topics, include board composition, leadership, structure, compensation, and responsibilities; shareholder rights (including, for example, proxy access); public reporting; management compensation and succession planning; and investors’ role in corporate governance.

The changes added in the updated version of the principles just released primarily related to three areas: board service and elections; proxy process; and asset manager and asset owner corporate governance responsibilities.

With respect to board service and elections, the new principles adopt a standard stating that “a director ordinarily should refrain from joining a board on which he or she is not committed to serving for at least three years.” The update also incorporates a standard stating that “if a company chooses to hold elections on a staggered basis or otherwise elect directors less frequently than annually, the board should explain clearly (ordinarily in the company’s proxy statement) its rationale for doing so.”

With respect to proxy process, the updated principles state that “public companies should allow for some form of proxy access, subject to reasonable requirements that do not make proxy access burdensome for significant, long-term shareholders.” The principles also emphasize that companies and shareholders are encouraged to engage early on important proxy proposals. Poison pills and other anti-takeover defenses should be put to a shareholder vote and re-evaluated by the board on a periodic basis.

A number of the updates in the revised principles relate to the governance responsibilities of asset managers. The updated principles specify that asset managers should disclose if they rely on proxy advisers to inform their decision making, and that asset managers should disclose their conflict of interest policies in their proxy voting and shareholder engagement activities.

Finally, the updates specify that asset owners (such as pension plans and endowments) should “use their position to advance sound and long-term oriented corporate governance” in their interactions with both companies and asset managers, and that asset managers should use benchmarks and performance reports consistent with their investment time horizon to affect governance outcomes with asset manager and to evaluate the asset managers’ performance on both investment returns and governance.

The updates principles have been endorsed by a number of industry and governance organizations, including The Conference Board and Business Roundtable.

The updated principles contain a number of important (although arguably also common sense) guidelines for the various participants in the corporate governance process, particularly for board members. The guidelines pertaining to board responsibilities address a number of important key board function issues, including in particular that importance of the board to set the agenda, help set strategy and to question management with a goal of “creation of shareholder value” with “a focus on the long-term.”

The principles taken as a whole contain a number of interesting insights and observations, such as, for example: dual class voting “is not a best practice”; poison pills and other anti-takeover measures “can diminish board and management accountability to management”; and, if the board decides to combine the chair and CEO roles, it is “critical that the board has in place a strong designated lead independent director and governance structure.

A recurring theme that weaves throughout the various guidelines is an emphasis on the importance of long-term strategies, goals, and performance. For example, in the section of the principles relating to public reporting, the guidelines state that a company should “frame its required quarterly reporting in the broader context of its articulated strategy and provide an outlook, as appropriate, for trends and metrics that reflect progress (or not) on long-term goals.” The guidelines go on to say that “long-term goals should be disclosed and explained in a specific and measureable way” and that “a company should take a long-term strategic view, as though the company were private.”

The updated principles are relatively short and compact, clearly by design, so in that sense it might be unfair to point out that there are topics the principles do not address. The principles also do not, again clearly by design, address substantive issues. Just the same, I do think it is fair to point out a number of things the guidelines do not address:

The board’s responsibilities for cybersecurity issues;

The board’s role with respect to ESG (environment, social and governance issues) and sustainability;

The board’s responsibilities to constituencies other than shareholders (for example, employees and the communities in which the company is based).

I suspect one response from the signatories on the principles’ omission of these topics is that these topics are really beyond the scope of the relatively bare-bones principles. Another response might be that questions around corporate responsibilities for these kinds of things (particularly on ESG issues and to constituencies beyond the shareholders) are matters of some debate and even controversy in the business world and in academia, and for that reason it was better for the principles to stay away from those topics.

Another response to the omission from the principles of these other topics could be that the principles were intended to address a separate problem which is the “unhealthy short-termism.” With that goal in mind the principles, it could be argued, were specifically designed to encourage long-tong term thinking, not to address other social issues.

I will say that one way that it is interesting that the principles do not address ESG issues is that the signatories to the document include Larry Fink of BlackRock has been an outspoken proponent of the need for companies to address ESG issues. Fink’s January 2018 letter to CEOs on the importance for companies to engage on social issues was something of a shot heard around the world on the topic. Nevertheless, these considerations did not make their way into the principles.

UCLA Law Professor Stephen Bainbridge had an interesting take on the principles as originally issued back in 2016; he said on his blog that the principles are a “mixed bag,” consisting “Some feel good platitudes. Some commonsense. And some pure bunkum.” Bainbridge said last week that the same critique appears to apply to the updated principles, as well.

One final note. There is nothing new about the principles’ concerns about the evils of short-termism. As I have previously noted on this blog, the scourge of short-term thinking has been something of a punching bag for some time now. The more interesting question, as I discussed here, is whether short-term thinking gives rise to D&O liability issues.

Management Liability Webinar: On Wednesday November 14, 2018, Howden Germany and the Mayer Brown law firm will be conducting a free webinar on the topic of “Corporate Compliance, Executive Liability and D&O Insurance in Germany.” The webinar, which will be in English, will take place from 9:00 am Eastern Time to 9:30 am Eastern Time. For the list of speakers and for more information about the webinar, please refer here.

The post Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles appeared first on The D&O Diary.

Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles syndicated from https://ronenkurzfeldweb.wordpress.com/

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golicit · 6 years ago

Text

Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles

The group’s October 18, 2018 press release can be found here. An Open Letter from the signatories to the updated principles can be found here. The updated principles themselves can be found here.

The updates principles have been endorsed by a number of industry and governance organizations, including The Conference Board and Business Roundtable.

The board’s responsibilities for cybersecurity issues;

The board’s role with respect to ESG (environment, social and governance issues) and sustainability;

The board’s responsibilities to constituencies other than shareholders (for example, employees and the communities in which the company is based).

The post Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles appeared first on The D&O Diary.

Business Leaders Release Updated Corporate Governance Principles published first on

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itsworn · 7 years ago

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Super Mean and Nasty 409-Powered 1962 Chevy Bel Air

While the Beach Boys crooned about a “really fine … 409,” how about a totally refined 409? That’s the lyric of this Bel Air bubbletop owned by James and Sandy Eudy. Its fuel-injected mill is thoroughly modernized, boasting 484 cubes and 557 ferocious horses. Not only that, it has an array of other superb upgrades.

Before covering the remarkable craftsmanship that went into the car, here’s some background. In 1961, the Turbo-Fire 409 bubbletop (so named for its abundance of window glass) launched the era of muscle cars. Before there was ever a Chevelle, Mustang, or Charger, before the 454 LS6, 427 FE, or 426 Hemi ever thundered down the streets of America, at the front lines was a new 409 big-block V-8. This engine would instigate a horsepower war among the Big Three auto manufacturers lasting well into the 1970s.

Initially putting out only 360 horses (and fittingly, 409 lb-ft of torque), the 409 offered 19 more cubes than Ford’s then-new 390ci engine. This bigger displacement inspired the Beach Boys tune noted above, but the siren song of horsepower would soon get a whole lot louder.

Originally, the 409 was supposed to be simply a stroked and punched-out 348 Type W truck engine but ended up having a number of differences. The 409’s crank required heavier counterweights, and its shorter connecting rods had more angularity and thus extra side-thrust on the pistons. Due in part to this additional stress loading, the 409 had forged aluminum slugs, allowing it to rev big time, topping out at 6,200 rpm. The higher spin rate required beefier valvesprings for better seating, and the cam was hotter as well.

As for carbs, in 1961, the 409 had a thirsty four-barrel Carter, but in the following year had dual four-barrel Carters. It also received some significant upgrades in the form of a recast block and improved heads with larger valves, plus a better intake and higher compression ratio. The 409 soon blasted out 409 horses, and in 1963 would hit a peak of 425 horsepower.

Which leads us to the Eudy’s bubbletop, built by Neil Lea of Rods and Restos (Centre, Alabama), from a concept drawing penned by Eric Brockmeyer. As noted at the outset, this restomod’s engine offers a quantum leap in both displacement and output, courtesy of Lamar Walden Automotive (LWA).

Fitted to the engine’s custom intake is a batch-fire EFI system from FAST with a 90mm throttle body. Neil likens the system to the Corvette LT1’s. While not as sophisticated as a sequential setup, it gets the job done.

Fittingly, Neil has a “git-r-done” approach to building rods and customs (his Alabama twang sounds remarkably close to Larry the Cable Guy’s). When the engine arrived at his shop he replaced the water neck by fabbing up an aluminum-plate water box at the front, studded with aircraft-style rivets, and he mounted the thermostat to the side. He also installed reservoirs for the water and power steering with “floating” (blind) fasteners.

“It’s amazing what you can figure out when you have to,” he notes.

When Neil came across the car initially, it was partially restored but still in a million pieces, with the doors off and no drivetrain. He disposed of the spindly factory frame, a simple X-member with the doorsills serving as braces. “It’s terrible,” he points out, referring to the chassis flex. While watching another 409 bubbletop twist on the dragstrip, he was surprised that the windows didn’t pop out.

For improved rigidity, he replaced the bendy X-frame with an Art Morrison chassis, lengthened two inches. “Like a Funny Car,” he notes, as he’s always admired that style and used it on a number of project cars.

The suspension pieces are tubular Mustang-style at the front, and a Ford 9-inch in the rear. Baer six-piston disc brakes provide modern stopping power. Another Funny Car inspiration is seen in the 2-inch mini-tubs that allow for deep-dish Forgeline wheels, measuring 20×10 with 4-inch backspacing.

After using fitment rims on hand to determine the look and stance of the car, he then channeled the body, creating a 6-inch lip for the wheelwells. He cut and lightened up the rockers, using new floorpans to hold the body together. He also eliminated the pinch welds. “I hate them,” he gripes. “So I smoothed them out.”

How much did he lower the ride? “As much as it needs,” he quips, based on his years of experience. “The stance is the most important thing,” he adds. “If it doesn’t catch your eye from across the fairgrounds, you won’t go to it,” he wisely points out.

The engine sits higher as well, in order to “get the bay to look full.” The custom hood hinges were made by Ringbrothers.

At the front bumper are wire-mesh “speed grilles” that serve as air inlets, along with a spoiler. The grilles in the rear bumper look like pressure-relief ducts but are really just for looks. The bumper also flows underneath into the custom gas tank.

Inside, the dash was reconfigured by hand with narrower pods, but not so much that it “blasphemed” the GM design. The front seats are from a Lexus, upholstered with distressed orange leather and matched in the rear by Paul Atkins.

Stepping back from the overall project, “I tell you right there that the ’62 bubbletop is a handful,” Neil admits. “It’s such a big car.” Even so, it wasn’t all that bad, since he still was able to git-r-done! CHP

Tech Check Owner: James and Sandy Eudy, Bakersfield, California Vehicle: 1962 Bel Air

Engine Type: 1962 409 Displacement: 484 ci Compression Ratio: 10.5:1 Bore: 4.3725 inches Stroke: 4.000 inches Cylinder Heads: Lamar Walden Automotive (LWA) aluminum Rotating Assembly: Chevrolet 454 crank with Eagle rods, TRW pistons Valvetrain: LWA rockers and pushrods Camshaft: Isky RR-639/260 solid roller Induction: Custom EFI, sheetmetal intake, 90mm billet throttle body Ignition: MSD Exhaust: Custom stainless steel equal-length headers Ancillaries: Philip Boykin wiring harness, FAST ECM Output: 557 hp Machine Work: LWA Built By: LWA

Drivetrain Transmission: TREMEC TKO 600 five-speed Rear Axle: Ford 9-inch, 3.70 gears

Chassis Front Suspension: Art Morrison chassis, tubular control arms, Morrison/Ford spindles, Strange coilover shocks, adjustable antisway bar Rear Suspension: Art Morrison four-link, Strange coilover shocks, adjustable antisway bar Brakes: Baer 14-inch rotors, six-piston calipers

Wheels & Tires Wheels: Forgeline ZX3P 18×8 front, 20×10 rear Tires: Yokohama Advan Sport

Interior Upholstery: Paul Atkins Interiors (Hanceville, AL) Material: Distressed orange leather Seats: Lexus (front); rear custom-built by Paul Atkins Interiors Steering: Art Morrison rack, Billet Specialties wheel Shifter: Rods and Restos in-house custom Dash: Custom dual binnacle Instrumentation: Classic Instruments Audio: Infinity HVAC: Vintage Air

Exterior Bodywork: Rods and Restos in-house custom Paint By: Shane Young at Rods and Restos Paint: PPG 9700 Jet Black Hood: Custom trim and cowl vent filled Grille: Custom air inlet Bumpers: Narrowed and sectioned, all seams welded up Chrome Plating: Jon Wright’s Custom Chrome Plating (Grafton, OH)

The post Super Mean and Nasty 409-Powered 1962 Chevy Bel Air appeared first on Hot Rod Network.

from Hot Rod Network http://www.hotrod.com/articles/super-mean-nasty-409-powered-1962-chevy-bel-air/ via IFTTT

#IFTTT #Hot Rod Network

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