#Sometimes I feel like it's only sunny title card generator and me

[pansyofthesouth]

I love you Always Sunny title card generator

[unactive-shroom]

I have no idea what to title this tbh <3

Summary. Inumaki Toge brings you out for coffee to make up accidentally spraining your nose during training - but don't worry, you get your revenge

Warnings: like one swear, nose bleed mention, tide pods

The smell of fresh bread and pastries danced in the air as you and Toge took your seats inside the cute café on some Tokyo side street. It was a sunny Saturday morning, and Toge had insisted on dragging you here to make up for accidentally hitting your nose during training the evening before, resulting in a nose bleed that lasted at least 20 minutes. You looked around your surroundings carefully, trying not to disturb the bandage that sat precariously on your nose in a vain attempt to hide the obvious swelling.

It was definitely a cute café - the cosy amber lighting and brick walls welcoming many other couples to the comfortable cushioned seats that lined the walls. Toge tapped your arm, signing a quick I told you it was a nice café. You scoffed at him, shaking your head. “Not nice enough to warrant a broken nose, though.”

He groaned and slumped on his arm, signing a lazy I’m sorry! But at least you get a cute bandage on your nose now.

Sighing at the daggers you shot him, he finally signed exactly what you’ve been hoping he’d say - I promise you can get me back for it, okay?

Grinning, you leaned forward. “In any way?” you questioned excitedly.

With a sigh and a slight look of regret, he answered simply with a dejected “…tuna.”

You hummed happily and handed him one of the menus propped against the wall. “And I’m assuming that you’re paying, right?”

“Tuna, tuna”

You smiled to yourself, still scanning the menu as Toge put his back already. Both of you always got the same thing, generally speaking, but you always thoroughly read the entire menu before ordering. Admittedly, you did feel bad about teasing Toge so much, but hey, he’s usually the one teasing you. And you’re like, 90% sure that he’s using Gojo’s card. But it’s the thought that counts!

The waitress soon came over, giving a warm welcome and asking if you’re ready to order. You recited your usual order, and asked for a pastry too, before looking at Toge. “And an iced matcha as well, right?” He nodded, and leaned over to point at a pastry on your menu. “Oh, and a pistachio croissant, please. Thank you!”

After the waitress had left, you turned to Toge with a thoughtful hum. “So, what do you think of the new first years? Not Megumi, the other two… Nobara? and Itadori? Do you think that they’ll all get along?”

He shrugged in response. Well, they don’t really have any other option, since it’s just the three of them. So hopefully! You nodded in agreement.

Our year definitely lucked out though. I mean, I don’t know what I’d do if I hadn’t met you. Maki probably would’ve killed me by now. He signed casually, his eyes crinkling in a smile behind the scarf covering his mouth.

“Awwww, Toge, you can be so sweet sometimes!”

He clutched his heart dramatically before signing Only sometimes? I’m always sweet and kind and hilarious and-

You grabbed his hands with a laugh to stop him from reciting every positive adjective he knows. He smiled fondly at you before the waitress returned, carrying your drinks.

“Oh, thank you!” you chirped on behalf of the two of you, while Toge simply nodded.

The waitress hesitated before carrying on - suddenly blurting out “Um, do you mind if I ask you guys a question? It’s totally okay if it’s too personal, though!”

“Uhhh, I mean sure, go for it! What’s up?”

“Um..” she fidgeted with her hands before continuing. “Is your boyfriend mute?”

Confused where this is going, your first instinct is to passive-aggressively ask “So what if he is?”, but sensing no ill intent from this girl, and remembering how Toge said you could get him back, you’re struck with a wonderfully devious idea.

“Nah, he did the tide pod challenge a few years back, messed up his throat. He can’t say more than like, two words a day. That’s why we’re talking in sign.”

Silence. Absolute silence stretched between the three of you, but you could see the cogs turning in Toge’s brain, realising that you were getting your revenge. He groaned and covered his head in his hands, which were resting on the table.

“Oh- Oh my god. Okay. Um, I’m really sorry about that- That really sucks. Holy shit.” She regained her composure before continuing. “Uh, I was just wondering because I wanted to learn sign for my friend. Would you be able to tell me where you learned it?”

You handed over the name of the book that you both had used to help learn it, as well as a youtube channel that had helped greatly.

As she left, Toge groaned, looking up at you with one eye open. “Don’t look at me like that! You’re the one who said I could get you back!”

He sat up, shaking his head, and took a long sip from his drink, before bursting out in laughter. I can’t believe you told her that! What the hell, y/n! He signed between fits of giggles.

You giggled alongside him, sipping your own coffee. “well, at least she’ll have a fun story to tell after work.”

You had begun to get weird stares, unsure if they were from the non ceasing laughter from the two of you, or from the fact that you loudly said your boyfriend had eaten tide pods. Regardless, you decided to ask the nearest waitress (not the one who had asked about sign, thankfully) to get your things to go.

Stepping out into the sunshine, you giggled once again, slipping your hand into Toge’s.

“Thank you for bringing me out for coffee. And sorry that I started rumours about you, babe.”

Toge temporarily tried to look mad, letting out half an annoyed “Okaka” before erupting into giggles once more. There’s no way that he’d be able to stay mad at you, not when you were smiling at him like that. He pulled on your arm, clumsily signing arcade? at you, trying to hold the pastries and coffee in one hand. You nodded and grabbed his hand once again, happily making your way toward the arcade, yapping on about the new gacha machines they installed there.

a.n Yapper gf! y/n x listener brainrot bf! Inumaki 4ever idc idc. Alsoo not making fun of the tide pod challenge that was lowkey really insane and dangerous and it goes without saying to not!!! eat!! tide pods!!!

[bevioletskies]

dream a little dream of me

summary: Ryunosuke had never been one for gloomy, rainy weather, had always preferred the comforting warmth of a clear, sunny day. When a particularly heavy rainstorm keeps him and Kazuma in bed for hours on end, he finds himself slowly starting to think otherwise.

word count: 2.4k | read on ao3

a/n: For @asoryuu-week, day four of seven (prompt: "domestic"). This fic takes place post-Resolve; mild spoiler warning for Adventures and Resolve, where events may be alluded to but not described in detail. All names and honorifics are taken from the official localization, with the exception of Sherlock and Iris.

Fic title is from the song Dream A Little Dream Of Me by The Mamas & The Papas.

“Remind me, Ryunosuke, what is it they say about a heavy head? Because yours is certainly making it harder for me to breathe.”

Ryunosuke sighed, lifting his supposedly heavy head from his partner’s chest to level him with a sleepy glare. “Good morning to you, too. Must you demean me before we’ve even gotten out of bed?”

Kazuma’s warm, slightly raspy laughter soothed Ryunosuke somewhat, though he still couldn’t help but feel slightly irritated. “Well, it’s hardly my fault you’re so fun to tease. No one else reacts quite like you do.” Then, Kazuma cupped Ryunosuke’s jaw in one hand, running his thumb across Ryunosuke’s mouth. “And I mean that in all manner of things, if you get my meaning.”

“You’re terrible,” Ryunosuke informed him, though he allowed Kazuma to kiss him anyway, grunting slightly when Kazuma rolled over to straddle him, sinking his entire body into Ryunosuke’s, fingers digging into his sides. “Mm...Kazuma, th-they’re waiting for us downstairs - ”

“Let them wait,” Kazuma murmured, playfully nibbling Ryunosuke’s bottom lip. One of his hands had now moved to Ryunosuke’s thigh, caressing him teasingly. “It’s been too long since we’ve had some time to ourselves.”

“You were only here two nights ago,” Ryunosuke said breathlessly; Kazuma’s mouth had quickly made its way from his neck to his collarbone, leaving a heated trail of kisses down the length of his throat. “Remember? That’s when I finally agreed to - ”

“Ry-u! Kazz-y! Won’t you be joining us for breakfast?”

“Damn,” Kazuma muttered, reluctantly climbing off so he could smooth out the front of his jinbei. Despite Ryunosuke’s continued annoyance at Kazuma’s insatiable nature, if he wanted to put it kindly, he also couldn’t help but admire how flushed Kazuma’s ears, neck, and chest had become in the last few minutes alone. “We’ll be right there, Iris, sorry for keeping you!”

“That’s okay!” Iris called back, her footsteps already beginning to fade away. “Just as long as you’re both properly dressed, alright?”

Ryunosuke groaned, dropping his head into his hands. “This is all your fault, you know that?” Kazuma merely scoffed, rifling through his bag so he could find the fresh set of clothes he’d packed for his overnight stay. “Though I suppose nothing will ever be as bad as the time you pulled me aside in the middle of an investigation and - ”

“I thought we both found that to be a thrilling and memorable experience, but fine,” Kazuma said with a dramatic sigh. “I’ll see to it that we won't try anything that adventurous ever again.”

“We almost got caught!” Ryunosuke exclaimed, agitatedly flapping his shirt in Kazuma’s face. “Don’t you realize how much trouble we would’ve been in?”

Kazuma stared at Ryunosuke in complete and utter disbelief. “...Ryunosuke, you’ve committed treason. You’ve implicated so many government officials, exposed so many government secrets - ”

“...all the more reason not to take a chance?” Ryunosuke offered sheepishly. “Anyway, let’s get dressed before they come looking for us again. I swear I can hear Susato-san’s footsteps coming up the stairs.”

A little over an hour later, Ryunosuke, Kazuma, and Susato returned to the attic, pleasantly sleepy from the generous meal that Iris had prepared for everyone. The rain was still thumping against the windowpane, an erratic tap-tap-tap that filled the entire room, rendering the three of them barely able to hear themselves or each other.

“I know you were planning on returning to your own flat, Kazuma-sama, but I would advise against it in a storm like this,” Susato mused, momentarily brushing the curtains aside so she could look out over the soggy, sorry state of London’s streets. “And I’m sure Naruhodo-san wouldn’t complain if you stayed.”

“I’m sure as well, though Ryunosuke is clearly in no position to answer either way,” Kazuma said dryly, gesturing in Ryunosuke’s direction, where he was currently curled up on the floor by Susato’s tea set, half-asleep and hugging his daruma to his chest. Susato watched, giggling, as Kazuma walked over to gently prod Ryunosuke in the shoulder with his foot. “Come now, Ryu, don’t make me carry you back to bed.”

“We both know you’d like that,” Ryunosuke mumbled. Susato only just managed to refrain from rolling her eyes at them - she’d been privy to far too many of their supposedly private conversations for her liking - instead electing to pat Kazuma on the arm.

“I think this is the perfect weather for a nap, personally,” she said, looking at him meaningfully. “If you plan on returning to bed as well, I can let Iris and Mr Holmes know not to disturb any of us until dinner.”

“That would be great, Susato-san, thank you,” Kazuma said sincerely, though he secretly suspected she just wanted to leave them be. Once she disappeared back down the stairs, he looked down at Ryunosuke with an irrevocably fond sigh. “Ryunosuke…”

“Yeah, yeah, ‘m getting up,” Ryunosuke yawned, reluctantly pulling himself to his feet. “Bed?” Grinning, Kazuma wordlessly took Ryunosuke by the hand and led him towards his bedroom - their bedroom, really, given how often he stayed over these days. Moments later, they clumsily tumbled back into bed, having changed into their sleepclothes once more.

“You’ve still got a bit of egg on your face,” Kazuma observed, wiping Ryunosuke’s cheek. “How does this keep happening to you?”

“Eat too fast,” Ryunosuke murmured, turning to kiss the palm of Kazuma’s hand. “Food...good.”

“Your grasp of both the Japanese and the English language is incredible,” Kazuma drawled, carding his fingers through Ryunosuke’s hair. He then pulled him closer, burying his face into Ryunosuke’s neck. “I thought you went back home to finish school, did you not? Surely you can do better than ‘food good’.”

“You’re so mean to me,” Ryunosuke said, sighing, letting out an exaggerated exhale directly in Kazuma’s face. Still, he turned over so he could wrap his arms around Kazuma’s waist, snuggling contentedly into his chest. “I really should just kick you out and make you go home.” Laughing, Kazuma kissed the top of his head.

“Not in this weather, you wouldn’t,” Kazuma replied. As if to illustrate his point, there was a loud, thunderous crack that practically shook the entire room. “If this storm keeps up, I might have to live here indefinitely.” Ryunosuke merely grunted in response. “Well, you don’t have to sound so pleased about it.”

“Oh - no, it’s not that,” Ryunosuke reassured him, sitting up somewhat so he could look Kazuma in the eye. Despite Kazuma’s typical brusque, yet affectionate nature, he could tell that Kazuma was slightly hurt. “I was just thinking about how much I dislike storms. Rain is fine on occasion, but...it seems as if London is in a permanent state of misery sometimes, you know? And it makes us miserable all the while.”

Kazuma’s clouded expression cleared up instantly. “It’s been ages since we’ve had sunshine,” he agreed, now dropping his head to rest on Ryunosuke’s shoulder. “It would’ve been nice to go for a walk together before I leave...whenever that is.”

“Like we used to do before class,” Ryunosuke said quietly, nodding. “You could never convince me to join you during your morning exercises, though.”

“Forget morning exercise, I had to literally drag you out of bed sometimes,” Kazuma snorted, tangling their fingers together. “I hear Susato-san hasn’t had any luck with getting you to exercise more, either.”

“I exercise enough,” Ryunosuke huffed, pinching Kazuma’s side; much to his dismay, Kazuma merely laughed in response. “I do plenty of pacing up and down during trials, you see.”

“I do see,” Kazuma teased. “I should look for permanent scuff marks behind the defense bench and the witness stand the next time we’re in court. You have a tendency to drag your feet, after all.”

Rolling his eyes, Ryunosuke made a show of yanking his hand out of Kazuma’s grasp and turning over with his back to him, pulling his side of the blankets over his head. “...I’m really starting to think you have nothing nice to say about me at all.”

Even when he wasn’t looking at him, he could tell Kazuma was smirking. “Oh, I think I praise you plenty. But in case you were wanting to hear it…” In one quick motion, Kazuma swept the bundled-up Ryunosuke into his arms, Ryunosuke’s back pressed against his chest, his breath ghosting the shell of Ryunosuke’s ear. “...I love you, Ryunosuke. And I’ll say it as many times as you’d like; all you need to do is ask.”

“Wonderful, now I just sound needy,” Ryunosuke said, sighing yet again, though he craned his neck to kiss Kazuma anyway, tossing the blanket around his shoulders so they were both enveloped in its warmth. Kazuma slowly lowered him onto his back, onto the mattress, knees braced on either side of Ryunosuke’s hips, fingers digging into Ryunosuke’s waist.

“You can insult me back, I don’t mind,” Kazuma murmured, sucking a bruising kiss along the crook of Ryunosuke’s jaw. Though they’d crawled back into bed for a nap, Ryunosuke was starting to feel more and more alert by the second. “Do your worst.”

Ryunosuke hummed, thinking. “...sometimes, you try too hard. You need to relax more, Kazuma. There have been some jurors and witnesses who’ve been intimidated by you, even though you aren’t trying to be malicious.”

“Fair enough.” Kazuma’s voice was low, raspy, sending shivers up Ryunosuke’s spine. “Anything else?”

“You have a bad habit of interrupting people,” Ryunosuke continued, prodding Kazuma in the chest with an accusatory finger. “Even Iris seemed annoyed with you last night, when she was asking us about our latest trial. I know you think you were helping, but I can speak for myself just fine. We’re not in school anymore.”

“...ah.” Kazuma looked humbled, almost remorseful. “I...I’m sorry, Ryu, I didn’t realize. I honestly thought we were just telling them about what happened together.”

“And you need to stop biting me like I’m a piece of meat - ”

“No one can see them!”

“Kazuma, you're doing it again - ”

“Doing wh - oh.” Kazuma burrowed his face into Ryunosuke’s chest, cheeks burning hot with shame. Ryunosuke couldn’t help but laugh; it wasn’t often that he got to embarrass Kazuma and render him speechless. “I...see that I’m not quite the partner I’d thought or, or hoped I was.”

“Last, but definitely not least - ” Ryunosuke abruptly took Kazuma’s face in one hand, squeezing his cheeks until his lips puckered “ - you don’t need to be quite so dramatic, either. I still love you all the same, Kazuma.” He smirked. “And I’ll say it as many times as you’d like; all you need to do is ask.”

Kazuma stared down at him with wide, imploring eyes. Then, he cocked his head to one side, his frown melting into a warm, radiant smile. “...again.”

“I love you.” Ryunosuke kissed Kazuma’s cheek, then the tip of his nose, then finally, his lips. Beaming, Kazuma kissed him back, a little sweeter this time, a little less sensual. “Especially because you’re a little needy, too.”

They fell silent for a few minutes, save for the steady sounds of the rain and thunder and wind whistling past their window, exchanging slow, languorous kisses and simply enjoying one other’s company. Though Kazuma spent more nights at Baker Street than not, in a way, it still felt as if they had months, even years, of lost time to make up for, even though they hadn’t been apart - or a part of each other’s lives, for that matter - for that long. It was times like these that Ryunosuke found himself reminiscing about their university days, the early days of their companionship, when they’d have spirited debates that ended in spirited laughter and meandering conversations about nothing in particular.

“I can hear you thinking, partner,” Kazuma murmured, brushing Ryunosuke’s hair out of his eyes. “Something wrong?”

“No, not at all,” Ryunosuke said, pulling away momentarily to yawn. “Only that we were supposed to be taking a nap, and instead, we spent the last ten minutes poking fun at each other. Though I suppose that’s just an extension of the way we speak to each other in court at times.”

“Susato-san has been scolding you about that as well, has she? Perhaps we do need to - I need to be more careful,” Kazuma corrected hastily when Ryunosuke leveled him with an impressively Kazuma-like glare. “Though we’d be in even more trouble if I were to, say, openly comment on how handsome you looked in court just last week, when your hair was a little bit longer in the back. I thought it suited you.”

“Why do we need to be in trouble at all?” Ryunosuke retorted, elbowing him a little harder than necessary. “I’d rather we do our jobs like the proper lawyers that we are - ”

“Well-behaved schoolboys, you mean,” Kazuma teased.

“ - and come home at the end of the day, where we can do as we please,” Ryunosuke finished.

Kazuma looked at him consideringly, his gaze impossibly soft. “Ryunosuke Naruhodo, are you implying you’d like me to move in someday?”

“What? I - ” Ryunosuke stared at him, momentarily stunned. Then, he relaxed, his head dropping back to his pillow, where Kazuma followed him down, their eyes still locked. “I, er...I thought that was a given. Though I worry that...that people might talk, as they’re wont to do.”

“Professor Mikotoba lived here with Mr Holmes for some time, did he not?” Kazuma pointed out. “Besides, even if people talk, why listen? All that matters is what we think of ourselves, as trite as that might sound.” He leaned in close, pressing a lingering kiss to Ryunosuke’s forehead. “So, just know that whenever you decide to ask, you already have my answer.”

“Then I think I’ll make you wait for just a little bit longer before I do...if only to get back at you for two nights ago,” Ryunosuke added with a smug smile, laughing when Kazuma glared daggers at him in response.

“And you think I’m the cruel one,” Kazuma muttered, pulling Ryunosuke into his arms once more so he could hold him rather possessively, their legs loosely intertwined beneath their mess of blankets. “You told me you enjoyed yourself.”

“I did, believe me,” Ryunosuke grinned, blushing faintly at the sudden vivid memory that had come to mind. “But just this once, I’d like to have the upper hand.” He then leaned in to kiss Kazuma’s exaggerated pout. “Anyway, we really should be getting to sleep now, or it’ll be time for dinner before we know it. I can barely keep my eyes open at this rate.”

“Agreed,” Kazuma said, yawning. He shuffled closer, dropping his forehead down to rest against Ruynosuke’s. “Good...morning, Ryunosuke.”

Ryunosuke shot him one last sleepy, fond smile before letting his eyes drift shut. “Good morning to you, too, Kazuma.”

_____

a/n: Welcome to my fourth entry for Asoryuu Week 2021! We've moved on from sad Kazuma hours to semi-horny Kazuma hours, I guess? Blame it on Kazuma talking about getting Ryunosuke off and holding his hand over a hot plate and finding ways to shut him up; you can't tell me he's not doing this at least a little bit on purpose. Anyway, I always love writing plotless cuddling fics where they basically talk about nothing. I could've made this way, way longer, easy, but we've still got three more days to go!

Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! Likes and reblogs would be much appreciated, and I hope you're all safe and healthy and doing well ❤️

[suncityblues]

Bad Luck and Sunshine

Part 1/5 - SPN - 3k words 

read on AO3

He can fit all his worldly possessions on the passenger seat of his car.

Car keys, red bic lighter, a toothbrush in a ziplock bag. Cellphone, charger, brown faux leather wallet. A maxed out credit card with the name James Ledbetter on it, and a fake ID to match the card. Fourteen American dollars, one Canadian quarter, a Blimpie’s buy-one-get-one coupon.

A pen with the name of a bank on it, a tin of salt. A paperback with a four leaf clover carefully pressed into the pages between the title and the acknowledgments, and that’s it.

Castiel taps the book in the spot where the clover is pressed. He can feel the slight bump of it.  

“They’re supposed to be good luck,” Dean had told him with a shrug when Cas asked why he was rooting around in the grass that day. Dean had handed Cas the book with the clover inside and said, “I used to search for them sometimes when I was a kid. It’s dumb but, hey, I figure we could use all the luck we can get.” Dean had smiled softly then, a bit sheepish. The tips of his ears had gone red.

Back then the world had been ending, so Cas supposed Dean was right, they could use luck.

He remembers trying to be encouraging, saying something about the placebo effect that made Dean roll his eyes and laugh at the same time. He can’t quite recall the specifics of it anymore.

A while later he had reached out to the clover with his grace and found nothing particularly special about it, but kept it and the book anyway. He reaches out again, now, with what little of his power he has left. It’s still just as lucky as any other dead plant.

He takes stock of his possessions again, focusing in particular on the fourteen American dollars and the one Canadian quarter. He checks how much gas he has left in his car and it’s not much. If he keeps going he’ll have to choose between food and gas, just to run out of it again anyway.

He needs to eat sometimes now, and drink water. He needs a shower and a bed if he can get them. Clothes, shoes, soap, toothpaste. All of it costs money, and to get money you have to trade time. Castiel has always found that a little ridiculous but it’s not like he makes the rules anymore.

He’s been pulled over in a dark parking lot in a truck stop town called Laurel for a while now thinking about what to do. Sam and Dean had set him up with the card and the fake ID before he left and Cas doesn’t want to ask them for any more help. He decides Laurel is as good a place as any other to get stuck in.

It’s 9:52 on a Tuesday.

++

A day and a half later Castiel is once again employed at a gas station. He’d tried a diner, a vegetable canning factory, a hardware store, and a rundown CVS but the gas station is the first place that got back to him. They were short staffed after someone named Ricky had walked out, and desperately needed a replacement. Kendra, the manager, had said “it’s like you were sent by an angel!” When she read through his mostly fictional work history. It had made Cas laugh.

This one is called Sunshine Gas and Go. They have to wear ugly yellow polo shirts that say “Let me know how I can help make your day sunny!” On the back. They keep the beer on the left side of the cooler bank instead of the right and the jerky next to the self-serve coffee but aside from that it’s remarkably similar to a Gas-N-Sip.

He wonders bleakly if he should have been the patron of gas stations while he had the ability.

The angel of Thursday, the angel of gas stations, that’s Cas. The guardian of the spaces you have to pass through on your way to better days, better places.

He sometimes wonders how Nora’s doing; if her kid’s okay.

++

It takes Sam and Dean five weeks to cave and check in on him. Cas has been in Laurel for the last three.

They pretend to be on their way back from a hunt, a totally routine salt and burn, and just so happen to be refueling at that particular gas station in this particular truck stop, exactly fifteen minutes after his coworker leaves Cas alone to cover the overnight shift. It’s an obvious and flimsy excuse to make sure he’s okay, but he’s known them long enough to understand that obviousness and flimsy excuses to see one another are gestures of affection in the Winchester family. He finds it somewhat exhausting to witness, and even more so to experience but he doesn’t call them out on it.  

He does, however, make pointed eye contact with Sam who waves his hands in a placating gesture behind Dean’s back and excuses himself to go stare at the overpriced air fresheners on the other side of the store. He had hoped Sam, at least, would have had the sense to text first.

On the counter next to the cash register there’s a plastic bin with a picture of a bald child in a hospital bed taped to it and some loose change inside. Dean picks the can up, looks inside it, shakes it a bit, puts it down. It’s mostly empty.

“You’d think people’d be a little more generous, what with the cancer kid at stake and all,” he says. When Cas doesn’t immediately reply Dean continues, “Or is this one of those, uh, charity scams? You know, where the evil mega corporation asks you to pretty please donate so they can use it as a tax write off?”

Castiel shrugs, he doesn’t know what the Sunshine Gas and Go does with the money. Says: “I’m not sure, Dean.”

He pretends not to see Dean stick some gum from the display under the counter into his coat pocket. He’s watched Dean do this before to other casheers, leaning close to flirt and making off with what he can. Cas supposes old habits die hard. The gum is sugar free cinnamon.

Dean sees him pretending not to see. He smiles big and bright, his nose does a little crinkle that Cas always liked. The term “shit eating grin” comes to mind, Cas must have heard it somewhere, probably about Dean that time too. He rolls his eyes and says, “How was your hunt? Were you or Sam hurt at all?” He can’t do much besides heal minor cuts and bruises these days, but for the Winchesters he’d still offer what he can.

Dean waves him off, “Fine, fine, got shoved around a bit but it’s nothing a cold compress and a good night’s sleep can’t fix.”

“Speaking of,” Dean segues in a breezyl tone Castiel knows is dangerous territory, “Where are you sleeping these days? You gotta sleep now right?”

The ghost of Rexford sits heavy between them, though it’s been years since then. Cas realizes being back at a gas station might have caught Dean off guard, or felt like some kind of dig at him. He doesn’t know how to explain that it’s just bad luck, and he’s not sure Dean would believe him if he did.

This time around he’s not squatting in the back room with the cleaning chemicals but he is sleeping in his car, just until he has enough money for a place to stay or decides to hit the road again. He knows that’s not anything Dean wants to hear.

“Yes, Dean, I need to sleep” he answers, then pauses. He considers lying but it never works out when he does, and this isn’t life or death; just embarrassing.

Besides, Sam and Dean are observant and thorough even during a glorified social visit, so Cas figures they’d put two and two together as soon as they walked in the door. There’s no way they hadn’t clocked his too-big thrift store jeans under the uniform shirt, or the circles under his eyes. The way his beard is a little patchy from shaving in the bathroom mirror in the truck stop visitor center. It’s likely they’d found his car in it’s discreet parking space at the edge of the lot before coming into the Sunshine Gas and Go.

Cas tries tactful honesty: “I’m saving up.”

And it’s true, he is, though he’s not sure what he’s saving up for. But every Friday he gets a paycheck and brings it to the check cashing place in town. After the fee, and groceries, and little necessities he carefully stores what little he has left in the locked glove compartment of his car, under the book with the clover in it.

Dean’s lips press flat together. He stops leaning over the counter and stands at his full height. He makes an aborted head shaking gesture. He speaks like there’s an awful taste in his mouth.

“So,” he says, slightly too loudly to pay it off as cool. Out of the corner of his eye Castiel sees Sam’s head wip towards them, no longer pretending he’s not eavesdropping.

“So, ah—“ Dean repeats, “you’re gonna, what? Drift around? Lay low in some podunk shit hole for the rest of your life?“ he stops, puts his hands on the counter to steady himself, or to keep from reaching over and grabbing him, Cas isn’t sure. A beat.

“You know what?” Dean says, “Nevermind.”

Cas deflates. He knows Dean disagrees with him leaving so soon after becoming human again, and feels guilty about so many things it’s hard for Cas to keep track of them all, but he knows he couldn’t stay either. Just like lying to the Winchesters, it never works out in the end. With almost no power, he’s no help to anyone, not Sam and Dean, not heaven, not even himself. It hurts to think about but maybe that’s just part of being human.

“Dean—“ he starts to say but he’s cut off.

“Don’t worry about it, man” Dean says, he taps the counter twice with his knuckles, “nice place you got here. I’m glad you’re doing alright.”

Dean swallows and abruptly turns to leave, hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket. Cas watches him go until Sam comes to the counter with two bottles of water, a coffee, and an energy bar.

He puts a twenty down, says apologetically, “For this stuff and whatever Dean stole on his way out.”

“Gum,” Cas supplies, and slides the twenty back towards Sam. “Don’t worry about it,” he says.

The cameras don’t work inside the store, and according to Joanna, the only reason they’re still up at all is to deter would-be armed robbers. Castiel watches less deserving people steal from them all the time, so it doesn’t seem worth it to take Sam’s money.

Sam shakes his head and gives him a flat smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. He takes his things but leaves the twenty. Says, “See you around, Cas.” He pauses for a moment, and seems to debate something with himself. Then: “Check in sometimes if you can, okay? You know how Dean can be when he gets worried.”

Castiel knows. He waves to Sam as he walks off into the dark.  

Cas checks the gum display, then manually rings up the items Sam bought. He puts the change into the plastic jar with the kid in the hospital bed on it.

++

A few days later a woman comes in with a ghost behind her. Cas checks the time to keep from gaping. 11:27 AM.

The ghost is a man, perhaps in his mid forties. Too young to be dead, but Cas supposes most people feel that way when they die, no matter how old. When the woman comes to the counter and gives him thirty dollars to put on pump six he sees a wedding ring on a chain around her neck. He puts two and two together.

“That’s a lovely necklace” he says, he looks directly at the ghost when he says it. They make eye contact. The ghost does a sharp inhale for a moment and the lights flicker. The ghost disappears.

Cas frowns, “Sorry about that. It happens all the time,” he lies. He wonders if he could purify the ghost with what powers he has left, that way she wouldn’t have to burn her wedding ring.

The woman seems caught off guard, then smiles politely.

“No worries, it happens all the time at my house too. Must be a faulty power grid in this town or something, my kids swear it’s a ghost or something,” she says.

There’s an apprehensive edge to her voice then, hastily: “have a good one.”

“You too,” Cas says. He thinks about following her out, trying to explain. He thinks about texting Sam and Dean.

The slushie machine makes a mechanical crunching sound and suddenly there’s red goop all over the ground.

Joanna starts yelling and runs for the mop. He goes to unplug the machine and gets sticky pink syrup all over his last clean pair of pants. The ghost slips his mind.

++

Two days later Dean shows up by himself. It’s 6:43 in the morning on a Tuesday.

Cas has been finished with work for fifteen minutes already but there’s a rush at the end of his shift so he says on to help Javier and Kendra out. It’s mostly people stopping for gas on their way to work, or truckers picking up breakfast before heading back on the road. He doesn’t mind sticking around in the mornings, everyone’s usually too tired to be angry and it’s a nice break from the drunks and the sad eyed kids he usually meets on overnights. The extra money doesn’t hurt, either.

Cas doesn’t notice Dean until he’s placing two coffees on the counter in front of them.

His first words are a surprised, “Oh, hello Dean. Where’s Sam?” Which makes Dean huff, and shift from one foot to the other.

“Not here,” he says, then points at the coffee closest to Cas, “That one’s for you. Milk, no sugar still, right?” Cas nods. He knows this is Dean Speak for an apology. He can feel Javier and Kendra look over at them from behind the other register and the cigarette display, respectively.

Dean smiles, all charm but Cas can tell his face looks a little more drawn than usual, like he’d been driving for too long without a break, “You get off work soon?”

Kendra answers for him, “Yes, he does.” She has a maternal look on her face when Cas turns to her. Javier rolls his eyes but doesn’t say anything.

“Shoo,” she says, with a smile. She points at the slogan on his uniform shirt, “Go have a sunny day, James.”

Dean nods, “Yeah, James. Have a sunny day.” There’s that smile again.

Cas closes out his register and gets his coat from the back room. Dean’s waiting for him outside, drinking his coffee and leaning against the Impala. The lighting is the soft grey-blue of the morning, and it feels nice compared to the white fluorescents of the store.

Before Cas can say anything Dean scrubs at the back of his neck, then says, “This coffee tastes like piss. Let’s get breakfast.”

++

There’re a few diners in town but Cas has never been to any of them. Dean picks one on a whim, because the sign has a 1950’s pinup girl in a skimpy waitress uniform.

It’s warm inside and smells nice, like syrup and strong coffee. Dean orders something called The Lumberjack Platter and when Cas tells the waitress, “Just coffee, thanks” Dean overrides it and orders him scrambled eggs with a side of sausage and toast.

“My treat,” Dean says. Cas shakes his head but doesn’t fight him on it.

Dean avoids talking about anything personal. Instead they mostly chat about the case Sam and Dean are currently working on. Apparently they’ve hit a wall with the research and Sam’s been holed up at the bunker for days pouring over blueprints and hacked security footage. There’s a cursed object in a locked bank vault in Little Rock that’s making people have violent outbursts. The questions are: why did it start acting up now, which lock box it’s in, and how to get to it.

Cas wishes he could still fly, then at least he’d be able to solve two of their problems. He runs the idea of trying to find a spell to make the object useless by Dean and Dean types it into his phone to send to Sam. A moment later it lights up with a call but Dean mutes it and sticks the phone back in his pocket.

Dean changes subjects and tells him about the latest Dr. Sexy storyline, about a vampire nest he took out a few years back, about running into Garth in Topeka. Cas talks about the gas station a bit but mostly just listens. He always likes listening to Dean talk.

++

When they leave the diner and get back into the Impala, Cas realizes this is the first time he’s enjoyed himself in a long while. He smiles over at Dean, expecting to be asked where he’d like to be dropped off. He’s thinking about the park by the river on the far side of town, it’s a long walk back to the truck stop but he likes to watch the  trees shift in the wind and the fresh air there is a nice change from diesel fumes. Instead Dean says, “You still don’t got a place to stay right?”

Cas nods cautiously. He puts his hand on Dean’s upper arm and, not willing to let the day go south, says sternly, “I assure you Dean, while I’m not strictly an angel anymore I still don’t need nearly as much rest as you or Sam do…”

Dean nods at the steering wheel, his jaw moving. Cas can tell he’s also trying to not turn this into a fight.

Dean shifts towards him, Cas keeps his hand firmly on Dean’s arm. The energy in the car changes and suddenly Cas realizes where this is going. Dean puts one hand on his waist and the other comes to rest on Cas’ neck behind his ear. Cas breathes in sharply.

“Dean,” he says, then he broaches the subject he’d been painstakingly avoiding all morning: “Why did you come here today?”

Dean blushes and goes still for a moment, he swallows but doesn’t say anything. After a moment tugs him in gently and Cas takes pity on him. Dean tastes like maple syrup.

It’d been a while since they’d done this, but they fall back into it easily. After a few moments of kissing Dean pulls back. Their foreheads and noses are still touching and they’re breathing hard.

“What I was trying to say was, uh,” his ears get red at the tips, “that I got a room at that Budget Motel by the gas station.”

All Cas can think of to reply is, “Oh, I’d like to see it.”

It makes Dean laugh and wiggle his eyebrows.

“Yeah, yeah wanna come up and see my art collection?” He says. Cas doesn’t know what he’s talking about but he likes that Dean keeps his hand on his thigh while they drive.

++

By the time Cas wakes up for his next shift Dean is gone. There’s a text on his phone that says Sam finally had his breakthrough based on something Cas had said. Then a second one that tells Cas the room is paid through till the end of the week. He can stay in it or not, doesn’t matter to Dean one way or the other. A third one that just says: Thanks.

Cas lays in bed for a moment enjoying the soft sheets and suddenly remembers the ghost.

++++++++++

Thanks for reading :)

[svankmajerbaby]

A Personal Review of Netflix’s A Series Of Unfortunate Events

Just as a disclaimer, these are my personal opinions on the show. I know that a lot of people loved it, and that a lot of people did not like it at all.

I’ve here listed what I’ve considered were the good aspects, the bad aspects, and the things I felt confused to see. As to the confusing aspects particularly, if someone has an answer for me -or even a theory- I’d love to read it.

The asoue fandom has evidently waited a very long time; and even though I completely understand the exhilarating feeling of joy we all felt last Friday, I think hype and enthusiasm can also give place to analysis and, while not as pleasant a thing, personal opinions, which are certainly not the same as facts.

THE GOOD

The Baudelaire siblings are my children and they must be protected at all costs.

Louis Hynes and Malina Weissman have good chemistry as siblings and seeing them act together and discuss plans and talk about their interests is a pure delight. Both of them are flawlessly cast. Presley Smith, as it’s expected from a baby, gets distracted very often and it’s somewhat distracting to see her looking around and making faces inappropriate for the situation taking place, but I really liked her nonetheless. Her little smile at Uncle Monty was adorable. Her saying bye at Judge Strauss broke my heart.

Violet’s self confidence. Will it work? “It will now.”

Klaus’ enthusiastic definitions of complex vocabulary.

The short dedications to Beatrice are so beautiful and well done. I love the background music, with the soft humming, and the sound of the typewriter keys.

Patrick Warburton plays a wonderful Lemony Snicket. Almost all of his scenes on screen are great. His deadpan delivery is great, his voice is great, his reactions are great. The little moments he narrates in his room are quite interesting, too. As much as I like watching him slip right into a scene in the Baudelaire’s story, I was very much looking forward to see him in his own timeline, on the run. His sigh before the Baudelaires learn the sad truth is perfectly gentle and bitter.

Neil Patrick Harris is a very convincing Count Olaf. I wholeheartedly loathed him. I like how his interpretation of the character is that of a bratty man-child used to having everything his way, and who is so overdramatic and vain he literally does not seem to care about anything but himself. His makeup was fantastically made and applied. Also, he put a nice physicality to the role, in the way he moved like he was slightly drunk, slightly hungry and like he owned the place at all times. His delivery was also quite spot-on -his Olaf voice is menacing and his other disguised voices are ridiculous but still quite distinct, which was good.

I began hating this Count Olaf so much, so early, when he first held Sunny up high.

Olaf! slapping! Klaus!!!!! Very effective on me. Also, during the second episode, Klaus still had the bruise on his cheek. Good. It kept my anger alive.

When the Bald Man made that remark of Violet being pretty I was immediately thinking, “Oh boy. They kept this.” They also kept the very, very, very unsettling remarks Olaf gives about Violet’s appearance and almost touches her hair once and then he said “I can touch what I want” and I seriously wished he was struck by lightning or that Sunny suddenly bit his ankle or something generally painful happened to him. It’s awful, it’s in character, and as much as I despise it I’m kind of glad they kept it there and didn’t hold back any punches.

Little Moment N° 1: Very near the beginning, when Klaus and Violet discuss the Proust quote: “Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind”. That scene was great. I really like both their pleasant confusion and how it a) displayed their intelligence, b) displayed their innocence, c) displayed their inability to understand grief at that particular moment.

The set design is no Rick Heinrichs, but it’s really good. I especially like the design of all the libraries (even if they were a bit samey), the Murnau cinema hall, the secret passageways, the Reptile Room, the Lucky Smells Lumbermill office and Dr Orwell’s office. The outside of the buildings, I’m not that much of a fan. Still pretty good. What little was seen of Prufrock Preparatory, it looked great.

The secret passageways. I loved these.

It was confusing, but there was something curiously beautiful about the untimely death of Gustav. His saying “the world is quiet here” is definitely a strange choice of last words, but maybe this is a thing in VFD. It served nicely to prove how being a volunteer is definitely a perilous career path.

K. Todd Freeman gave his all to his performance, and it shows. Sometimes he veered into almost too much of a useless, clueless stand-in for neglectful authority figures, but most of the time he was perfect for the role. I know how hard is to fake a convincing cough, so kudos to him also for his very believable sore throat. He is also amazingly good at talking really fast with really long sentences which is difficult to do and sound slightly spontaneous, so yep. A greatly done Mr Poe.

I know Eleanora Poe is an awful person, but I’m kind of happy to see how Mr Poe is so supportive of her, and they seem to love each other very much. I’m always down for that.

Jacquelyn won me over by sheer determination and commitment. Hope to see more of her, even though she proved to be just as deaf to the children’s questions and despair as countless other people.

Little moment N° 2: When Klaus turns the stove on, in the first episode, he stays there, looking at the fire, with wide eyes. He stays there, looking at it, while Violet puts the pan on the stove; and then she puts her hand on his shoulder and pulls him gently to the table. It’s a very small thing (Snicket is talking over it, and it ends in a matter of seconds), but Klaus’ distress and fixation on that stove fire felt strangely deliberate and very, very sad.

Sunny biting something with her face off camera -when she flattens the skipping rock, when she chops the parsley- the effect is so cute and funny? I wish that was more used.

“A home cooked meal is better than nothing. A roof over one’s head is better than nothing. (...)  But being raised in a violent and sinister environment by a man more interested in one’s fortune than comfort and well-being is not better than nothing.“ Yes.

I love Joan Cusack’s performance. Strauss was such an insecure woman, and despite being so gullible and not listening to them when they tried to warn her, she loved the Baudelaires so much and wanted to keep them and help them, and was so kind... She provided a great emotional core to the second episode. I hope Cusack returns in case they film book eleven.

Aasif Mandvi made a wonderful Uncle Monty. He managed the perfect line between eccentric snake fan and caring, loving guardian. My only complaint about his performance was that he had not enough screentime.

Zombies In the Snow, good God. The fake cow. I loved it so much.

Larry, yes. Yes, thanks.

Klaus saying that plenty of boys enjoy playing with dolls... my nerd son.

Violet’s fear for his brother’s safety in the Miserable Mill, and her insistence to clear their parents’ names while being in Paltryville. She can’t afford to think their parents could have possibly been morally dubious. In the end, the parents were still the unquestionable heroes the children wanted them to be, but I like to think this was a bit of foreshadowing of the secrets revealed in the end.

The super extra 200 page letter Beatrice sent Snicket (if one freeze-frames it one can read that it describes how she sent it through carrier pigeons and which also details how they became engaged. I love that the prop makers took the time to write that down).

Cobie Smulders is the best secret spy, ass-kicking mother since Carla Gugino. A+ casting choice.

THE BAD

More of a general thing, but the style of the show felt all over the place.

Sunny is barely in the show. She acts as the distressed victim of Olaf’s plans twice (in the cage and in the luggage) which is one scene too many, especially considering the sensible and understandable erasure of her epic duel with Orwell. Her sole victorious moment was when she bit Captain Sham’s leg. She rarely participated in the other two siblings’ discussions. She was often sat aside, in a chair out of sight, while her siblings talked. Their siblings actively left her alone! She often feels like an extra weight, which is the worst thing a baby can be in a piece of entertainment.

The ugly Sunny speech subtitles. Why that font... why that color.

Some scenes with Olaf were unnecessary -his twirling with the dress, the interview with Mrs Poe, his talking to the troupe while spying on the children at Strauss’ house. I was made very much aware of how much Neil Patrick Harris participated in the creative process.

When the show’s style was being creative it most often succeeded. I hoped they kept it up, but most of it was only about Snicket. I wish they kept using title cards, like they did before Aunt Josephine and Captain Sham’s flashback, and iris shots, like the one used with Violet. If they had continuously using a stylistic choice, these few examples wouldn’t stick out so much. They could also have played around with the ratios, just to give an example, or kept all flashbacks in black and white. It would have been a nice way to incorporate the old-feel style to the show.

I enjoyed their performances, all in all, but the troupe constantly felt like comic relief. They were very seldomly menacing (mostly the Bald Man, who I am genuinely a bit scared of) or useful.

Not enough Reptile Room creatures. I need to see the Church Frog. And the Incredibly Deadly Viper could have been so much better. And it could have had more screentime with Sunny. I find it hard to believe that they became friends so fast.

I really hoped they wouldn’t put the Shirley disguise... Olaf could have perfectly had been a secretary without dressing up as a woman.

70% of the time I felt the costume design was lacking. Not so much that it was bad, but that it was boring and didn’t say anything at all about the character that was wearing it. There was nothing particular about how any of the characters were dressed. I like that each Baudelaire seems to have a certain color palette, but even then it’s not very well determined. Aunt Josephine’s clothes in particular were drab.

The background music can be a bit overbearing. There’s many times when I felt silence would have been better, or maybe something with less choir... And as much as I love the accordion soundtrack -because it is great, and it is fitting- it would have been better with a bit less of it. It made scenes feel “extra quirky”, if that makes sense, and while sometimes it worked, there were moments in which it was overdone.

I really did not care to see the Marvelous Marriage. It wasn’t funny enough to warrant being shown.

The CGI effects were so bad! I understand that they had to use recent pics of the adults to make sure they were easily recognizable, and that Sunny does a great deal of very unusual things that a real life baby can’t possibly do, so one can’t complain too much; but still, some things -like her whistling, or her hanging from the doorknob, or her poker playing, were both unnecessary and a bit unsettling. Also, Violet’s rock retrieving device at the beginning... Surely there had to be a practical way around that. Generally, if they felt the need to add something, one would wish they wouldn’t make an effort to make that addition hard to do without CGI.

The photoshopped picture of the VFD members. It was just bad.

Klaus may have had a bit too many speaking lines compared to Violet... just saying.

Weird continuity goofs... They’re details, but there were so many of them. Most of them around Sunny, which again, understandable, but still, there should have been a way around it.

Let! Klaus! also carry Sunny! Almost all the time, Violet does it!!

So Dr Orwell was Olaf’s girlfriend. I hope they find fresh ways to repeat that trope, because there’s two more characters that exactly follow this concept, and with the already repetitive nature of the Baudelaire’s misadventures this could become quite boring.

Sometimes the adults were so ignorant and blatantly oblivious to what was going on (especially with Mr Poe actively saying what a bad idea it was to act the way he did, like leaving the children with untrustworthy people or abandoning them in the empty dock) that it was not frustrating, it was cumbersome.

Aunt Josephine’s statue. What was up with that? Why couldn’t she just throw a chair through the window?

As effective -and boy was it effective- of a red herring it was, the Mother and Father B-plot felt unnecessary in the end. It could have been cut, and despite suffering from the lack of a Cool Spy Mom and a Tired Spy Dad, the story would have flowed better. Heck, it would have been better with more Jacquelyn.

Statue woman in the middle of the maze? What the heck? What was the purpose of that? Why did she need to talk to the Baudelaires? Why was she the only one who reached out to them? It didn’t contribute anything at all.

Have another actor to be Ike... Sonnenfeld is already visibly seen in the background of Strauss’ library as her father. It was so weird.

Why couldn’t Klaus start the fire with his glasses when he needed to, in the boat during the leeches attack? Mother’s binoculars starting the fire saved the children out of pure luck.

Similarly, the Reptile Room reptiles decided a very particular moment to attack Olaf and his troupe, which also made the ending of the episode seem like a matter of pure luck.

If luck saves the children in the end, then less emphasis is put on their individual talents and resourcefulness. Having them save themselves would have often been the cheaper production decision and the smartest narrative decision.

The Wide Window episodes had sometimes an overreliance on CGI, and it turned it into a bit of a pain to sit through. The house collapsing looked bad. Sunny dangling from the doorknob was bad, Klaus jumping around was bad...

The musical numbers. None of them were truly terrible, by themselves, but they felt out of place and unneeded. The first cringy one was mercifully short and at least served the purpose to show how much of a self-aggrandizing lousy actor Olaf is. The little song with the spoons he sings in the taxi as Captain Sham feels stretched out and annoying. And the last song, “That’s Not How The Story Goes”, which everyone (why Poe? Why Olaf?) sings... It was the most bizarre thing in an already very, very bizarre show. From Snicket in his school uniform, sitting on a cliff, to Sunny’s weirdly CGIed contorted face whistling (including Mr Poe cheerfully singing it, which almost made me think he was truly looking forward to the Baudelaires being even more miserable), it’s a really good song -the best of the musical numbers- but it was a wrong way to finish the first season.

Finally, I know that Neil Patrick Harris is the Star Power, but why must he sing the title song? Why couldn’t it be an instrumental? And as much as I like the way they managed to change each title sequence for each book, it would have been better to have more interesting visuals during the titles. It felt like a missed opportunity.

THE CONFUSING

The grandfather clock toaster? Couldn’t Violet’s talents be shown with a more interesting, useful invention?

What was up with the weird James Brown references? “I’m super bad”, what? A non-sequitur/inside joke between the siblings?

At Justice Strauss’ library, Klaus showed her that he had a small notebook with him, and said he had it with him at all times. He never actually used it. Why show it if you’re not going to use it?

Why are most of the henchpeople unusually and occasionally nice? Why do they act shocked and worried when Olaf kills and hurts (most clearly with the killing of Josephine and when he held Sunny up high)?

Strauss was last seen reading a book on secret organizations. Why does she have that book? Will she become a member? Is her family linked to VFD? How can that book be a thing, if the organization is supposed to be secret? Is VFD something that is well known? Is that book’s author a VFD member, or a Geraldine Julienne/Rita Skeeter kind of badly-informed and dimwitted investigator? Are there other organizations besides VFD that one should be concerned about? Is that book a standard secret VFD reading, or is it sold in average bookstores and available in city libraries? Just how available to the public is that book?

It was suggested Strauss is Jewish (what with greeting Poe and the children with “Shalom” and mentioning how cooking could be a mitzvah), and Olaf too (mostly for the klezmer-style wedding music and his little dance, but I’d find it rather out-of-character for him to be a religious man at all) and Dr Orwell too, though much less clear, for mentioning Olaf ruined a bat mitzvah. But the big question is, are the Baudelaires Jewish?

Who was that elder lady at the cinema and why was the camera so interested in her uninteresting life

Is the Bald Man as unquestionably terrible as he was in the books? “We should use the baby as bait” kind of confirmed it, but the question is more about the future role of the character, considering what happens is following books.

Where did Olaf get that very specific snake-bite-faking device? Is that a standard VFD contraption?

What in the world is Beatrice’s name doing engraved in the remains of Aunt Josephine’s house?

What was up with Snicket buying an orange vest?

Are Sir and Charles actually members of VFD?

Why did Orwell have literal skeletons in her closet? Did she kill people, took away their clothes and hair and skin and muscle and cleaned them and stored them in her closet?

In the little awfully photoshopped picture at the end of the last episode, at Prufrock Prep, Snicket and Olaf seem to be friends; even though Snicket said at the beginning of the first episode that Olaf’s “dreadful villainy haunted [Snicket since he] first met him as a young man.”  Was it a goof by the showrunners, or a proof of the unreliable narrator Snicket can be?

Are the Baudelaire parents really the ones shown in other awfully photoshopped picture of the volunteers at Paltryville? Klaus recognized them, so there’s almost no way they’re not the Baudelaires. Are these actors the confirmed ones for the parents?

Aren’t the Quagmire parents wary of telling their children about their past in VFD? Weren’t they afraid of the known fate of some members of the organization? Do they believe VFD is doing good?

Were the Baudelaire parents active volunteers till the moment of their demise? Did they balance a double life, with the VFD missions and their homelife?

Does Snicket still trust VFD? Does he support the organization that gave him nothing but pain and misery?

Will the series portray VFD as noble? What happened with the aggressive training, the indoctrination, the kidnapping, the indoctrination?

Are the Baudelaire parents morally dubious? Will the show have the guts to put that on screen?

“Call me Ishmael”???????? What the fuck??

Here’s hoping the second season rights the wrongs, emphasises on the good, and answers some questions and creates new ones -hopefully all the right ones.

[raggywaltz1954]

Before politics completely prevents it, here’s another album that was not made in America, but in the land out back, down under, but not in the upside down- Australia!  There’s not much more to add, so to the music we go!

The Music

https://raggywaltz.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/decidedly.wav

The Tune:  “Decidedly”

Recorded: 1960 in Sydney, Australia

Personnel:

Don Burrows-  Clarinet

Dave Rutledge-  Tenor Sax

Terry Wilkinson-  Piano

Freddy Logan-  Bass

Ron Webber-  Drums

https://raggywaltz.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/down-the-mine.wav

The Tune:  “Down The Mine”

Recorded:  Same as above

Personnel:  Same as above

Full disclosure- I admit that I’m not as hip as you may think.  I had no idea who the Australian All Stars were, not to mention what a surf-nik was.  I simply picked this album up at the store because of the album’s cover art.  That proved to be a good move, as my ears would later thank me.  The music is fantastic, swinging jazz like some of the better West Coast music from the mid and late 50’s (I looked it up and discovered that Sydney is in fact on the East Coast, which makes me wonder what the jazz scene over in Perth was/is like).

The Australian All Stars were a group of mostly native Australians, headed by multi-reedman Don Burrows.  Burrows was a famous Australian jazz musician most well-known for his clarinet playing and enjoyed wide success in his home country as well as abroad in America.  He’s still around in Sydney, too.  In the 50’s and 60’s he was in or led numerous combos, including this one, which featured other musicians well-known to hip Australian jazz fans.  The bassist is the sole member who wasn’t born in Australia, instead hailing from Amsterdam.  All the fellas are more than solid jazz players, with Ron Webber’s drumming proving particularly tasty and supportive.  Dave Rutledge sounds like he’s been listening to lots of Lester Young and Bill Perkins.  Pianist Terry Wilkinson plays with punch and restraint, which doesn’t quite make sense until you hear him.  The last track on this album is a trio feature that adequately explains what ‘punchy restraint’ sounds like.  None of the tracks are over four minutes, which is kind of a drag at times only because the one-chorus solos that make up most of the performances are tantalizingly short.  I want to hear them stretch out a bit!

On Gerry Mulligan’s original tune “Decidedly”, everyone gets a chance to solo.  This album made realize how potent the clarinet could be in the right hands.  Maybe it’s because of the big band guys like Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw, or perhaps the Dixieland jazz guys, but I usually think of the clarinet as not a serious jazz instrument.  Don Burrows has caused me to reassess that.  In modern jazz settings, the clarinet’s reedy, breathy and earthy sound meshes well with the more advanced voicings and harmonies.  Burrows and Rutledge don’t limit themselves to just the clarinet and tenor sax respectively.  Not at all.  While Rutledge picks up the flute here and there, Burrows manages to pick up the flute, alto sax, and baritone sax in addition to his clarinet, sometimes on the same track.  Ron Falson’s “Down The Mine” is a catchy little tune and has some tasty playing by Burrows and some pocket brushwork from Webber.  Wilkinson gets a brief spot in the sun before the brief arrangement takes the tune out.  Falson, by the way, is yet another Australian jazz musician who was quite popular during his lifetime.

As usual, jazz records are not as straight-forward as they appear, and this album has a confusing and mysterious background.  For more on this, I turn to Raggy Waltz staff researcher and scholar in residence, Dr. Hiptwostuff, or Dr. H for short.

  Information on this album is rather sparse and hard to come by.  When was it recorded?   It’s not mentioned in the liner notes, and numerous Googles turned up conflicting info.  A Discogs entry only said 1960, while a brief post on a surfing blog said it was released in 1962.  What Discogs did make clear, however, was that there were two versions of this album released in 1960.  It seems that while the record was released in the States by Bethlehem Records as ‘Jazz For Surf-niks’ the album was released in Australia with a different record label, altered title, slightly different cover, and with an added song. In Australia, the album was released on the European label EMI, which was called Columbia.  No relation to CBS and the American Columbia.  This album was called ‘Jazz For Beach-niks’, and the title wasn’t as conspicuously-emblazoned across the cover as the American counterpart, instead placed neatly in the top left portion of the cover.  I guess the American term for a beach-nik is surf-nik? 

And what the hail IS a beach-nik anyhow?  I did some research (for that is what they pay me for) and turned up this definition on Urban Dictionary, which is like Webster’s Dictionary, but for the streets and the hip.  According to the Urban Dictionary, a beach-nik is a “cool turn of the Millennia culture which is a cross between beachbum and beatnik.”  If that sounded negative, that couldn’t be further from the truth.  Continuing with the definition, Urban Dictionary explains that although they think people with real jobs are crazy, “[t]he group is generally educated, and cares about issues effecting this and future generations.”  In other words, it seems that a beachnik is a hipster that’s actually kinda hip and prefers to be at the beach, aka Californians on a global scale.  In the parlance of the cool kids, I can dig it.

As for that song that’s on the Australian (and thus all of the European pressings?) pressing of this album, it’s an original blues performance that clocks in at a whopping eight minutes and 45 seconds entitled “Sky Lounge Blues”.  Why this track was left off the American version, I don’t know.  It’s a shame too, as it has some of the gutsiest playing on the album, with a particularly feisty piano solo by Mr. Wilkinson.  A word about that performance.  It’s eight minutes and 45 seconds on the vinyl album.  On the version that’s online, it fades out around seven and a half minutes in.  Again, the reasoning for this has been lost to the mists of history.  It appears that the only way to hear this record in its entirety is to find a European pressing.  In closing, here’s “Sky Lounge Blues”, minus a minute and fifteen seconds.  Back to Tarik!

The Cover

Raggy Waltz Rating:  A

I truly love the album cover art on this album, although after seeing the Australian/European version of the album, I like that one better than this one.  The titling and font and quantity of both is a bit much here, particularly that “Vivid Sound” proclamation at the bottom.  The photograph itself is kinda hip, delightfully retro.  From an aesthetics perspective, it’s a fun picture, successfully capturing the sunny, carefree, summer vibes of being at the beach.  The two young ladies in the foreground are completely turn-of-the-century, from their hairstyles to their bathing suits.  I wonder what the girl is whispering to her friend?  “Let’s look like we’re saying something.”  “I call dibs on the guy with the white shirt, Marsha.”  “Hey, Jan.  Why is there a saxophone on the beach?”  We’ll never know.  Interestingly, Ron Falson, the same dude who wrote and arranged a couple of tunes on the album, also took the picture.

As for the dudes with the surf boards, they look timeless.  Well, the guy with the blue shorts does, anyhow.  I haven’t seen too many dudes wearing capri pants to the beach.  Now that I think of it, I haven’t seen too many dudes wearing capri pants period…  It’s a good look though here.  And how about those surf boards!  Their prominence on the cover was no accident; it was a clever plug for Gordon Woods, a surf board maker, who gets an additional plug on the back of the album.  The guys holding the boards are members of the South Pacific Surf Riders Club, qualifying them to be card-carrying members of the beach-nik/surf-nik culture.  All in all, this is great cover art for a jazz album with the beach theme.  The only issue, of course, is…

The Back

…what’s the beach theme about, exactly?  There’s no obvious tie to the beach or the ocean mentioned on the album, and the song list doesn’t really have anything to do with the beach, either.  Hmmm.  I feel like there’s a joke I’m not getting, because surely they wouldn’t go all out with the surf-nik/beach-nik schtick and there not be a reason for it…  Maybe it’s culturally-tied joke, something that people in the early 1960’s would have understood that people like myself in 2018 wouldn’t get.  Obviously, it’s a play on the whole ‘beatnik’ term, so maybe this is a playful poke at the beatniks?  From what I know, beatniks were something of a punchline to many people in the 1950’s and early 60’s, with much of the American public being rather infatuated and captivated by them thanks to people like Jack Kerouac.  I’m going to assume that’s what this ‘surf-nik/beach-nik’ business is all about.

Oh, and there’s no liner notes.  Just short bios on all the guys in the group.  Which of course is no good if you wanted to know about the music and the making-of.  To add insult to injury, the anonymous writer of the bios includes a reference to that blues tune “Sky Lounge Blues” that, contrary to what they say, is NOT present in this set.  Hmph.

The Vinyl

The lack of a deep groove makes me wonder if this album was in fact pressed and released in 1962.  These are classic mono Bethlehem labels, pressed on thick and heavy vinyl.  As for high fidelity, “vivid sound”, it’s a big ‘eh’.  The high fidelity comes and goes with different tracks, implying different methods for each recording session.  It doesn’t say who’s behind the sound controls here, but the sound quality differs from track to track, with sound ranging from fine to yikes.  On one or two of the tracks, it sounds like the horn players are standing out in the hallway of the studio.  On others, the piano strings sound like there’s something caught in them, producing a weird, buzzy sound.  It’s a shame, because the music itself is good.

Interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be any stereo pressings of this album.  Indeed, the tracks that have made their way to MP3 are still in mono.  What’s going on with this album?  It appears that this group only made two albums.  Perhaps an Australian reader or anybody more knowledgeable can help fill in some of the gaps or provide more info on this group and these albums?

The Place of Acquisition

This record was one of the first few albums I bought when I discovered my local record shop here in Huntsville.  Flipping through the new jazz arrivals, the cover jumped out at me.  Feeling somewhat homesick for California, I grabbed the sunny album before I realized it was by Australians.  Upon reading that the group was called the Australian All Stars, my curiosity was piqued.  Upon reading that record was under $10, my wallet was opened.  As the record store owner rang me up, he looked at the record and asked me what beach jazz sounded like.  “Is it, like, jazz with ocean sounds and seagulls calling in the background or something?”, he asked.  I almost said no, but I had no idea what the record sounded like, so I told him I don’t really know but I’d let him know.  In retrospect, that’s a great inference, and one that kinda makes sense. Now that I think about it, that would be an interesting jazz album…

In an attempt to appeal to a broader audience, this group made an album not for beatniks, but a neglected demographic. It's Jazz For Surf-niks, Vol.2 // The Australian All-Stars (Bethlehem BCP 6073) Before politics completely prevents it, here's another album that was not made in America, but in the land out back, down under, but not in the upside down- Australia! 

[chinad]

out of curtained chase, covert inflicting adversity.

Jul 1, 2017

dreamt of training of Royal member, ie. noble court and Prince himself. how his attitude toward his servants, esp 3 closest counselors/secretaries, can affect the quality of leadership. saw philosophy in ruled social interactive or code of eloquent. then dreamt with my wife treated in a banquet, with social skill just learned in train. last week's shopping online, a backup router Asus RT-N66u, finally ruined by PRC surveillance. the express, STO.com, totally denied the parcel it serving, just as taobao's logistics. the poor vendor kindly promised me to check why the parcel missing or went wrong, but after 1 day he rebuffed my call and prompt refund me instead, likely unspoken shame of PRC secret cop's hassle intimates him, seals his mouth from disclose iron curtain. with the money returned, I at once ordered another from different vendor now that the market is full of the product. within the day, around 4pm, the vendor sms informed me parcel dispatched. God, dad, how I glad to hear that! yesterday after read news that squareup.com offers in account credit service, I decided to give it a try. but when I trying signup the wonderful website, my internet worsen and inaccessible for 3 hours. I finally gave up and shut down computer. PRC dog likely warns me that even with most powerful network hardware, they still interceptive in my internet traffic, or blocks my financial connection with American service. however, after dinner and a thunderstorm, I smoothly claimed 2 zhone accounts with squareup.com and its affiliate, cash.me . without US SSN number most services out of my reach, esp highly expected in account virtual credit, or deposit in site, but still the wonderful service from the same founder of twitter.com, generously offers us 2 vanity url, http://ift.tt/2sqPfxO and http://ift.tt/2taIwW0 . I can't be more proud of the operation out of distress of surveillance. in the week I also modified 2 online resource of google sites' widgets, both of google photo's, to fit my online brand, and deployed onto my portal. visit them on http://ift.tt/2srmC3H . hope the author grants my reusing his code in xml file that show my google albums' rss source. and I honestly pray google sites, now confronted by google new sites, doesn't elapse into disappear. zhone assets based on the service remarkable hugely sustain. God, dad, this month I merely left ￥100, grant us a happy weekends with my son, woz, Hope of China. bring sooner my crown Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for better management of my vested Empire of China. bring me my second child as namespace billingzhu.com prepares, and his locked facebook account into using. with adequate financial support, dad, God, I live anxious free in this eccentric city for future open and welcoming eastern Asia.

Jun 27, 2017

dreamt near lunar spring festival at my hometown. saw changes in the village: newly built dam control gate and road. the road near dam gate left with deep and steep wheel dents due to insufficient budget for concrete. I saw our village field, flowers and leisure villagers among it. In dream I married my niece, ie. second daughter, the tallest in her sibling of my mom's niece in a village around. but we were divorced soon in dream and our son left me sad for the changing life. last week full of joyes with improved salary. my urgent bills wrote off by it. now with ￥200 loaned by dorm canteen I will visit asylum for medicine today. my backup cellphone, an old moto, hacked and ill behaved, so I deleted critical database on it immediately. it usually disabled both wifi and bluetooth, nor sim card in it. so likely hacker with direct control on it. I wondering if the facing door, a secret cop surveillances me since weeks ago, stealth into my room and injected it malware. my parcel from ordering used router for vpn on taobao.com, delayed a week still it only left one logistic information: dispatched by vendor a week ago, and nothing else happened in other 6 following days so far. another item, a usb card reader, its logistic information also hijacked several days till it reached locally before updated on time. PRC close surveillance sometimes made me sad. the facing door dog, with all its momentum after just settled, half open his door all day and night, unshakable anonymously fixed my door which was tight and sometimes my son in monthly visit even can't push open on his own, likely in weekends when I left to visit my son 3 bus stops away, just under corridor webcams' monitoring evidently and lawlessly. now that my broken door too loose to hold close breeze, I intended directly lock it down after I enter, distant from any spy around in guise superficial sharing privacy any more. the facing cop also in recent days gave up letting its door half open to peek and eavesdrop. my cold shoulders toward his posed free community but just surveillance from which he earns his dog life, likely conveys strong dislike and ruins his fool's joys and presumable fake poise. he also likely partially completed his mission: stolen my password keeper's database, infected my portable devices with trojans and keyloggers, licked my floor with its dripping messy tongue. the long challenge for a clean os out of controlled and poisoned environment in PRC's hooligan nation really drains me, let me feel boring and labored. what's laughable is that, the neighbor tall dog, once pretending cough every day and spitted everywhere in excuse of his illness, these days silently stay unnoticedly astray, quit both domineering and his condemn the tidiness of dorm public space. CCP authority has its power just upon those cheap souls and zombies which label price of manipulation. dad God, save me from fatigue of faith in long run. bring me sooner my Royal China to discipline China and Chinese under holy. remove trifle divided with merciless by forcible authority and in glory of united one. God dad, bring me sooner my crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, for coming age. bring me more offspring to sustain the 1109 years life of my Empire of China under title Zhu's. bring me lighter credit debt in coming months.

Jun 22, 2017

gradually people around me turns better treating me. my gaze when I jog in dusk turns some women and girls friend to me but also gathers hatred. reviewing women in my life so far, I sometimes touched by kindness and grace of QRRS Dorm canteen woman who operating the small business with her diligent husband. his husband is a tall pal, his kindness to his wife is enviable. these days I likely overdo my kindness to them, and easier led to misunderstanding. I always remember first time I met the spouse when their business just open, how the woman confident and contented. I then felt I can help her with her target, wellness & independence. now about 7 years passed I didn't miss it. sometimes love recalls my campus life, esp master degree seeking period when I met Asoh Yukiko. God blesses me with brave heart, whole vision and all those memories so timeless cherished. I don't want to hurt anyone, but the canteen woman's husband likely taking, for his less gifted, for his property appreciated. God, fix my poised with due humility. yesterday I gained a bonus from QRRS, my once and long time employer, just after a day my salary released, which increases near ￥500. the bonus addes another ￥500. with it I renew my godaddy hosting plan for another half year immediately. also renew billingzhu.com a year. with improved salary I ordered backup router from taobao.com, as incredible satisfying and enzymes me in super confident mood. 2 days passed I still felt the content. yesterday I also retouch my homemade gadget on google sites, which now tending to ban such hosting function and my in time usage likely saves me extra cost from google's wonderful and generous free service. see them on most of our zhone portals homepage, in section of blog rss feeds and tweets, youtube, groups, donation links. its nice feeling, for even I never master scripting skill still I probing those scripts and tailored them into my buildups. I gain so much from my education, my ability to self-taught. dad, God, bring me sooner my Crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, and my Empire of China for larger comfort in my life, for fulfilling the proud creator life experience. grant us a happy monthly reunion 2 days later, and monthly cinema and walmart shopping in a pack with dearest son, woz.

Jun 19, 2017

Its a sunny morning, I felt obliged to get up and do something. Recent testing tomato router script put me in a worker’s mindset, absolutely nothing else beyond task memories. I dived so hard that I merely recognize other things than occupied by inch in inch progress I strode outward chaos and no effect. My son last Saturday lost his desktop logon confidential, So I taught him to reinstall windows 10 and roughly customizing before backup to image. He reluctant but worked with me, while his sinful mom, a cheap junior school teacher, close watching my tutorial on computer. She occupied her house every free hours out of work, grasps dirty money from tuitions she ought to offered on job. After 3 years and graduated and then 2 decades, she every more than 12 hours in a day earning from the educational bits even it's shabby in quality in her college. I more and more felt its insane. My son due entertainment ruined for his mom’s house forever a craft hut for his mom and her cheap pupils. In this view, I recently relentlessly equip my son with lounge TV and English programs, on which he enjoys and absorbs when his visits monthly my dorm and on my seat. I hope the moment he enjoys staying with me and my workspace forever prolonged. So last month I equipped him a touchpad k/m combo for convenience of remote input on pc and android TV. The Chinese product works smart even we anxious about keylogger and other spy wares lawless PRC breeds, in favor of dog CCP and state surveillance. My son more or less accepted my arrangement, promoting him from mobile games he excels now and adopting more language and expressive method as his new skill to master. I times and times urged him makes fair use of our borderless web. I hope he enjoys meanings in American culture stocked in amazon prime video and youtube, vimeo sites. My trustworthy video education, defied me in youth decades, pacifies me more than 2 hours daily, broaden my worldview and wishfulness so much that I have to put on forth my son, for his beneficial social experience and nutritional source of moral and spiritual. God, dad, my life so rich that I’m constantly complacent. Bring my son meaningful in his scope of activities. Bring me sooner my Royal China to protect her from poverty grilling the land and souls only left after CCP and PRC. Bring producing capacity our fatherland sustains before the burning out in cheap dealer like communism. Bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for unfinished mission we beset, among a never seen silver proud heaven on eastern Asia. Thx you, dad God.

a newly budding tree in QRRS Dorm where the Son, benzrad, praying and sustains.

source: Regalbum China at zhone family album, Royal moments

via Blogger http://ift.tt/2scDKWL

[be21zh]

Jul 1, 2017

dreamt of training of Royal member, ie. noble court and Prince himself. how his attitude toward his servants, esp 3 closest counselors/secretaries, can affect the quality of leadership. saw philosophy in ruled social interactive or code of eloquent. then dreamt with my wife treated in a banquet, with social skill just learned in train. last week's shopping online, a backup router Asus RT-N66u, finally ruined by PRC surveillance. the express, STO.com, totally denied the parcel it serving, just as taobao's logistics. the poor vendor kindly promised me to check why the parcel missing or went wrong, but after 1 day he rebuffed my call and prompt refund me instead, likely unspoken shame of PRC secret cop's hassle intimates him, seals his mouth from disclose iron curtain. with the money returned, I at once ordered another from different vendor now that the market is full of the product. within the day, around 4pm, the vendor sms informed me parcel dispatched. God, dad, how I glad to hear that! yesterday after read news that squareup.com offers in account credit service, I decided to give it a try. but when I trying signup the wonderful website, my internet worsen and inaccessible for 3 hours. I finally gave up and shut down computer. PRC dog likely warns me that even with most powerful network hardware, they still interceptive in my internet traffic, or blocks my financial connection with American service. however, after dinner and a thunderstorm, I smoothly claimed 2 zhone accounts with squareup.com and its affiliate, cash.me . without US SSN number most services out of my reach, esp highly expected in account virtual credit, or deposit in site, but still the wonderful service from the same founder of twitter.com, generously offers us 2 vanity url, http://ift.tt/2sqPfxO and http://ift.tt/2taIwW0 . I can't be more proud of the operation out of distress of surveillance. in the week I also modified 2 online resource of google sites' widgets, both of google photo's, to fit my online brand, and deployed onto my portal. visit them on http://ift.tt/2srmC3H . hope the author grants my reusing his code in xml file that show my google albums' rss source. and I honestly pray google sites, now confronted by google new sites, doesn't elapse into disappear. zhone assets based on the service remarkable hugely sustain. God, dad, this month I merely left ￥100, grant us a happy weekends with my son, woz, Hope of China. bring sooner my crown Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for better management of my vested Empire of China. bring me my second child as namespace billingzhu.com prepares, and his locked facebook account into using. with adequate financial support, dad, God, I live anxious free in this eccentric city for future open and welcoming eastern Asia.

Jun 27, 2017

dreamt near lunar spring festival at my hometown. saw changes in the village: newly built dam control gate and road. the road near dam gate left with deep and steep wheel dents due to insufficient budget for concrete. I saw our village field, flowers and leisure villagers among it. In dream I married my niece, ie. second daughter, the tallest in her sibling of my mom's niece in a village around. but we were divorced soon in dream and our son left me sad for the changing life. last week full of joyes with improved salary. my urgent bills wrote off by it. now with ￥200 loaned by dorm canteen I will visit asylum for medicine today. my backup cellphone, an old moto, hacked and ill behaved, so I deleted critical database on it immediately. it usually disabled both wifi and bluetooth, nor sim card in it. so likely hacker with direct control on it. I wondering if the facing door, a secret cop surveillances me since weeks ago, stealth into my room and injected it malware. my parcel from ordering used router for vpn on taobao.com, delayed a week still it only left one logistic information: dispatched by vendor a week ago, and nothing else happened in other 6 following days so far. another item, a usb card reader, its logistic information also hijacked several days till it reached locally before updated on time. PRC close surveillance sometimes made me sad. the facing door dog, with all its momentum after just settled, half open his door all day and night, unshakable anonymously fixed my door which was tight and sometimes my son in monthly visit even can't push open on his own, likely in weekends when I left to visit my son 3 bus stops away, just under corridor webcams' monitoring evidently and lawlessly. now that my broken door too loose to hold close breeze, I intended directly lock it down after I enter, distant from any spy around in guise superficial sharing privacy any more. the facing cop also in recent days gave up letting its door half open to peek and eavesdrop. my cold shoulders toward his posed free community but just surveillance from which he earns his dog life, likely conveys strong dislike and ruins his fool's joys and presumable fake poise. he also likely partially completed his mission: stolen my password keeper's database, infected my portable devices with trojans and keyloggers, licked my floor with its dripping messy tongue. the long challenge for a clean os out of controlled and poisoned environment in PRC's hooligan nation really drains me, let me feel boring and labored. what's laughable is that, the neighbor tall dog, once pretending cough every day and spitted everywhere in excuse of his illness, these days silently stay unnoticedly astray, quit both domineering and his condemn the tidiness of dorm public space. CCP authority has its power just upon those cheap souls and zombies which label price of manipulation. dad God, save me from fatigue of faith in long run. bring me sooner my Royal China to discipline China and Chinese under holy. remove trifle divided with merciless by forcible authority and in glory of united one. God dad, bring me sooner my crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, for coming age. bring me more offspring to sustain the 1109 years life of my Empire of China under title Zhu's. bring me lighter credit debt in coming months.

Jun 22, 2017

gradually people around me turns better treating me. my gaze when I jog in dusk turns some women and girls friend to me but also gathers hatred. reviewing women in my life so far, I sometimes touched by kindness and grace of QRRS Dorm canteen woman who operating the small business with her diligent husband. his husband is a tall pal, his kindness to his wife is enviable. these days I likely overdo my kindness to them, and easier led to misunderstanding. I always remember first time I met the spouse when their business just open, how the woman confident and contented. I then felt I can help her with her target, wellness & independence. now about 7 years passed I didn't miss it. sometimes love recalls my campus life, esp master degree seeking period when I met Asoh Yukiko. God blesses me with brave heart, whole vision and all those memories so timeless cherished. I don't want to hurt anyone, but the canteen woman's husband likely taking, for his less gifted, for his property appreciated. God, fix my poised with due humility. yesterday I gained a bonus from QRRS, my once and long time employer, just after a day my salary released, which increases near ￥500. the bonus addes another ￥500. with it I renew my godaddy hosting plan for another half year immediately. also renew billingzhu.com a year. with improved salary I ordered backup router from taobao.com, as incredible satisfying and enzymes me in super confident mood. 2 days passed I still felt the content. yesterday I also retouch my homemade gadget on google sites, which now tending to ban such hosting function and my in time usage likely saves me extra cost from google's wonderful and generous free service. see them on most of our zhone portals homepage, in section of blog rss feeds and tweets, youtube, groups, donation links. its nice feeling, for even I never master scripting skill still I probing those scripts and tailored them into my buildups. I gain so much from my education, my ability to self-taught. dad, God, bring me sooner my Crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, and my Empire of China for larger comfort in my life, for fulfilling the proud creator life experience. grant us a happy monthly reunion 2 days later, and monthly cinema and walmart shopping in a pack with dearest son, woz.

Jun 19, 2017

Its a sunny morning, I felt obliged to get up and do something. Recent testing tomato router script put me in a worker’s mindset, absolutely nothing else beyond task memories. I dived so hard that I merely recognize other things than occupied by inch in inch progress I strode outward chaos and no effect. My son last Saturday lost his desktop logon confidential, So I taught him to reinstall windows 10 and roughly customizing before backup to image. He reluctant but worked with me, while his sinful mom, a cheap junior school teacher, close watching my tutorial on computer. She occupied her house every free hours out of work, grasps dirty money from tuitions she ought to offered on job. After 3 years and graduated and then 2 decades, she every more than 12 hours in a day earning from the educational bits even it's shabby in quality in her college. I more and more felt its insane. My son due entertainment ruined for his mom’s house forever a craft hut for his mom and her cheap pupils. In this view, I recently relentlessly equip my son with lounge TV and English programs, on which he enjoys and absorbs when his visits monthly my dorm and on my seat. I hope the moment he enjoys staying with me and my workspace forever prolonged. So last month I equipped him a touchpad k/m combo for convenience of remote input on pc and android TV. The Chinese product works smart even we anxious about keylogger and other spy wares lawless PRC breeds, in favor of dog CCP and state surveillance. My son more or less accepted my arrangement, promoting him from mobile games he excels now and adopting more language and expressive method as his new skill to master. I times and times urged him makes fair use of our borderless web. I hope he enjoys meanings in American culture stocked in amazon prime video and youtube, vimeo sites. My trustworthy video education, defied me in youth decades, pacifies me more than 2 hours daily, broaden my worldview and wishfulness so much that I have to put on forth my son, for his beneficial social experience and nutritional source of moral and spiritual. God, dad, my life so rich that I’m constantly complacent. Bring my son meaningful in his scope of activities. Bring me sooner my Royal China to protect her from poverty grilling the land and souls only left after CCP and PRC. Bring producing capacity our fatherland sustains before the burning out in cheap dealer like communism. Bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for unfinished mission we beset, among a never seen silver proud heaven on eastern Asia. Thx you, dad God.

a newly budding tree in QRRS Dorm where the Son, benzrad, praying and sustains.

source: Regalbum China at zhone family album, Royal moments

[flauntpage]

Claressa Shields on Conquering The Pros, Hobnobbing With Celebrities, and Drinking Bottled Water in Flint

Claressa Shields, America's most decorated Olympic boxer, is back home in Flint, MI.

The two-time gold medalist and subject of the 2015 documentary, "T-Rex: Her Fight for Gold," is training for her third professional fight, an eight-round bout against bruising super middleweight Mery Rancier scheduled for June 16 at Detroit's Masonic Temple.

Those familiar with the thick file that is Shields's story know that she loves her home town, but being there can be a bit of a mixed bag. Aside from the unemployment, poverty, and contaminated water that has come to define the city, Shields admits that there are "a lot of distractions here."

She insists they're not the kind of distractions that would prevent her from improving to 3-0 as a professional and possibly challenging for a title this summer. But were it not for trainer Jason Crutchfield, who coaches at Flint's legendary F.W.C. Berston Boxing Club, Shields would be working down near her home in sunny Florida.

"I told him, 'Beginning of next year, we're going to start having camp back in Florida, where I live,'" she said.

Shields will always be from Flint. Her family members live in a house she owns there, but she's also a citizen of the world now. Since turning pro with a win over Franchon Crews Dezurn, another decorated American amateur, and following that with a knockout of Hungary's Szilvia Szabados, Shields has only become more popular.

Her Twitter account now chronicles increasingly frequent run-ins with celebrities and Shields is being invited to top fights, like Saul "Canelo" Alvarez's dominating win over Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. on Saturday.

Most importantly, Shields is taking care of business.

Shields standing alongside trainer Jason Crutchfield (center) and promoter Dmitriy Salita (right)

Shields just signed with promoter Dmitriy Salita, the longtime Brooklyn boxer who fought Amir Khan for the WBA world super lightweight title back in 2009. He hasn't stepped inside the ring since 2013, but Salita has been promoting fights in both Brooklyn and Detroit, where he made Shields the first female boxer to headline a fight card on a premium cable network. (Shields' knockout of Svabados was the final fight on Showtime's "ShoBox: The Next Generation" broadcast back on March 10.)

Shields is headlining Salita's card again on June 16, and should she beat the 32-year-old Rancier (7-8-3, 5 KOs), the fighter known as "T-Rex" hopes to put herself in position to face WBC world super middleweight champion Nikki Adler (16-0, 9 KOs) in the near future.

In other words, with another win, Shields could cement herself as a headliner after just three professional fights—something that any aspiring boxer, man or woman, can only dream of.

The following is a Q&A with the charming champion, who was being shuttled back home from another workout:

FIGHTLAND: How did you get connected with Dmitriy Salita, your first promoter? CLARESSA SHIELDS: It all started from the fight that I had on Showtime. He ended up coming down to the gym and watching me train. And then after that, he was just so supportive throughout the whole thing. When we were getting ready before the right, he called me every other day just about. We were able to spend a lot of time together. And it didn't seem like he was a promoter. He wasn't just about business. He was also very social and funny. And I like for everything that I'm doing to be kind of family oriented. We can all make money together, but at the same time, it's all about family, helping each other. So after [my last fight] is when they offered me the deal. My manager asked me, I said "I'm fine with it—I just want him to know, I'm a two-time Olympic gold medalist and I want to fight on TV." And I wanted a certain amount of money and they came with that correct amount, so we made things work.

Is it helpful to have an experienced promoter who is also an experienced boxer? Yeah, someone who actually understands training and when you want to cut off the interviews that you might be tired of doing. It's very important. [A lot of people think] 'Oh, you're a great woman fighter and you can conquer the world,' and all that is true. But at the same time, [he understands], 'She's a fighter, she gets tired, she doesn't want to be bothered sometimes.' He understood all that. It's definitely good that he used to box.

He's also funny too.

What's the best part of being a pro now? I'd have to say the new fans and more exposure. I've been in two Olympics and I'm known worldwide. I've been to certain countries, and stuff like that, but it's just like, you always want to be an American hero to everybody that boxes. I feel like I was an American hero, but I was also an international hero. And I always wanted to be an American hero, like Muhammad Ali was to the U.S. He was a champ. And I want to be the champ here in America and I want everybody to know me more.

What has surprised you about being a professional? In the amateurs, I'm used to getting a schedule at the beginning of the year. It shows all the tournaments that we're gonna fight in, and it shows you the possibilities of how many countries will show up and which countries will show up.

In the pros, it's not like that. There's not no set date. Dates get changed. One minute you're preparing for June 3rd, the next it's June 16th. It's all over the board.

Neither of your first two opponents really connected any major power punches against you, but do you feel differently without the head gear you wore as an amateur? How much of a change is that? The only thing that's different about the no headgear is the head butts. I never dealt with that in my life before. It's very different and some refs don't even call for it.

And those head butts hurt. From my first fight, against Franchon, I think my freaking forehead was stinging for two days. I was like "What the heck?" I never thought that boxing hurt. But after that fight, I was like "ouch."

I'm a good fighter, but I'm a very clean fighter. I'm not head butting people.

I think sometimes a girl wants to get to me so bad, but she don't know how to use her feet or her hands to get in, so she just comes in with her head. Szilvia Szabados head butted me two times.

How significant was it to be the main event on a Showtime broadcast? I think it's significant because you can see who the people are showing up to watch.

It shows that women can sell cards and that the fans want to see us box… I feel like a lot of women have been given a chance, and some have a large fan base, but nobody ever thinks, "Oh, that's a spectacular fighter."

It's always like, "she can fight," but nobody ever talks about her skill or power.

I have never seen a woman box as good as me. And the only one I think was anything close to me is Lucia Rijker… and Katie Taylor.

But they always say that women are tough fighters and they just get in there and brawl, like [retired champion] Christy Martin. Christy Martin would get a bloody nose and just brawl it out.

But that's the thing about women's boxing. A lot of them know how to jab and throw a right hand better than the men, but we don't always get to see that. Some of those women don't get put on TV. And some of those women give up and think, "Oh, we can't actually make any money in the pros."

Me fighting against Franchon was a close match because we're both skilled, fought each other before in the amateurs, and we both have that amateur background and amateur experience. Also, the international experience. We fought in the same tournaments coming up. I'd get the gold and she'd get the silver or the bronze. You put us together and you see the skill set of two really skilled fighters in the ring with each other.

After your amateur career, you started as a professional with more experience than most pro men. I think some fighters get afraid of that when they hear [the crowd] booing them coming out and all that stuff. But I think it's tough to fight me anywhere to be honest. I'm building up my fan base. Obviously, where I'm from people want to come out and support me and we want to pack the house. But I think anywhere I go, I'll get a good crowd reaction. When they come to Michigan to fight against me, they're fighting against me, they're fighting against the crowd. Just knowing that they came, to me I feel like they're coming to my back yard. They have to have that feeling that, "I really have to kill her to win," when they really don't have a chance to win anyway.

I would go anywhere and fight anybody.

I will fight Tori Nelson up in Washington D.C. or wherever Kali Reis is from—I'll fight there too. (Note: Reis is from Providence, RI). And I'll fight them all in their back yard, and I'll win. Period.

It's about building women's boxing. We're not gonna go somewhere we don't have a fan base. We want to fight in front of a crowd of people—thousands of people—so we can become a scene that more people will want to come to. And right now, that place is Detroit, Michigan.

Some have discussed pushing women's rounds from two to three minutes in length. Would you be in favor of that? No. I like two minutes. I think that's what makes women's boxing more exciting than men's boxing.

Some women feel like they want to box three minutes. Me? No, I want to have to GO. I want to have to work for the round. If guys had two-minute rounds, you would see guys get in there and start fighting. There are too many fights where they're jus looking at each other. We got boxers throwing two or three punches in a round.

Then you have all these close fights and all these supposed robberies [on the cards]. If there was just two minutes for the men, they would have to pick up their pace.

I actually like that about women's boxing. We get in there and we got two minutes to win this round. It's chop-down season. You got to keep on chopping down that tree, and you got to do it fast.

With three minutes it's like, "Yeah, whatever."

If I had to fight for three minutes, I would prepare for it. But this is boxing. It's not some sport you can't get hurt in. The less time I got to be in there—24 minutes for a WBC belt or 36 minutes for a WBC belt? Either way it goes, I still have the belt.

You want to get paid more and work less. So I'm in favor of the two-minute rounds.

Is boxing back in 2017? Yeah, definitely. I think they're making the right matchups. There was a lot of [boxers] ducking each other. But now there are a lot of great fights like Shawn Porter and Andre Berto. Who would have thought that fight was gonna get made? I can't believe they fought each other. It's insane.

Then we have Danny Garcia fighting against Keith Thurman. And then we have Errol Spence getting ready to go up against Kell Brook [on May 27]. These are great matchups and great fighters fighting each other in their prime. Some are up-and-coming and some are peaking. You see these guys fighting each other. I think boxing has taken a different turn and there's gonna be some really good fights.

The time of guys ducking each other is over.

I don't think that a woman in boxing that has a belt will be able to duck me. Whoever the top dog is, who I'm supposed to fight, we're gonna fight.

Claressa Shields on Conquering The Pros, Hobnobbing With Celebrities, and Drinking Bottled Water in Flint published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

[be21zh]

Jul 1, 2017

dreamt of training of Royal member, ie. noble court and Prince himself. how his attitude toward his servants, esp 3 closest counselors/secretaries, can affect the quality of leadership. saw philosophy in ruled social interactive or code of eloquent. then dreamt with my wife treated in a banquet, with social skill just learned in train. last week's shopping online, a backup router Asus RT-N66u, finally ruined by PRC surveillance. the express, STO.com, totally denied the parcel it serving, just as taobao's logistics. the poor vendor kindly promised me to check why the parcel missing or went wrong, but after 1 day he rebuffed my call and prompt refund me instead, likely unspoken shame of PRC secret cop's hassle intimates him, seals his mouth from disclose iron curtain. with the money returned, I at once ordered another from different vendor now that the market is full of the product. within the day, around 4pm, the vendor sms informed me parcel dispatched. God, dad, how I glad to hear that! yesterday after read news that squareup.com offers in account credit service, I decided to give it a try. but when I trying signup the wonderful website, my internet worsen and inaccessible for 3 hours. I finally gave up and shut down computer. PRC dog likely warns me that even with most powerful network hardware, they still interceptive in my internet traffic, or blocks my financial connection with American service. however, after dinner and a thunderstorm, I smoothly claimed 2 zhone accounts with squareup.com and its affiliate, cash.me . without US SSN number most services out of my reach, esp highly expected in account virtual credit, or deposit in site, but still the wonderful service from the same founder of twitter.com, generously offers us 2 vanity url, http://ift.tt/2sqPfxO and http://ift.tt/2taIwW0 . I can't be more proud of the operation out of distress of surveillance. in the week I also modified 2 online resource of google sites' widgets, both of google photo's, to fit my online brand, and deployed onto my portal. visit them on http://ift.tt/2srmC3H . hope the author grants my reusing his code in xml file that show my google albums' rss source. and I honestly pray google sites, now confronted by google new sites, doesn't elapse into disappear. zhone assets based on the service remarkable hugely sustain. God, dad, this month I merely left ￥100, grant us a happy weekends with my son, woz, Hope of China. bring sooner my crown Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for better management of my vested Empire of China. bring me my second child as namespace billingzhu.com prepares, and his locked facebook account into using. with adequate financial support, dad, God, I live anxious free in this eccentric city for future open and welcoming eastern Asia.

Jun 27, 2017

dreamt near lunar spring festival at my hometown. saw changes in the village: newly built dam control gate and road. the road near dam gate left with deep and steep wheel dents due to insufficient budget for concrete. I saw our village field, flowers and leisure villagers among it. In dream I married my niece, ie. second daughter, the tallest in her sibling of my mom's niece in a village around. but we were divorced soon in dream and our son left me sad for the changing life. last week full of joyes with improved salary. my urgent bills wrote off by it. now with ￥200 loaned by dorm canteen I will visit asylum for medicine today. my backup cellphone, an old moto, hacked and ill behaved, so I deleted critical database on it immediately. it usually disabled both wifi and bluetooth, nor sim card in it. so likely hacker with direct control on it. I wondering if the facing door, a secret cop surveillances me since weeks ago, stealth into my room and injected it malware. my parcel from ordering used router for vpn on taobao.com, delayed a week still it only left one logistic information: dispatched by vendor a week ago, and nothing else happened in other 6 following days so far. another item, a usb card reader, its logistic information also hijacked several days till it reached locally before updated on time. PRC close surveillance sometimes made me sad. the facing door dog, with all its momentum after just settled, half open his door all day and night, unshakable anonymously fixed my door which was tight and sometimes my son in monthly visit even can't push open on his own, likely in weekends when I left to visit my son 3 bus stops away, just under corridor webcams' monitoring evidently and lawlessly. now that my broken door too loose to hold close breeze, I intended directly lock it down after I enter, distant from any spy around in guise superficial sharing privacy any more. the facing cop also in recent days gave up letting its door half open to peek and eavesdrop. my cold shoulders toward his posed free community but just surveillance from which he earns his dog life, likely conveys strong dislike and ruins his fool's joys and presumable fake poise. he also likely partially completed his mission: stolen my password keeper's database, infected my portable devices with trojans and keyloggers, licked my floor with its dripping messy tongue. the long challenge for a clean os out of controlled and poisoned environment in PRC's hooligan nation really drains me, let me feel boring and labored. what's laughable is that, the neighbor tall dog, once pretending cough every day and spitted everywhere in excuse of his illness, these days silently stay unnoticedly astray, quit both domineering and his condemn the tidiness of dorm public space. CCP authority has its power just upon those cheap souls and zombies which label price of manipulation. dad God, save me from fatigue of faith in long run. bring me sooner my Royal China to discipline China and Chinese under holy. remove trifle divided with merciless by forcible authority and in glory of united one. God dad, bring me sooner my crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, for coming age. bring me more offspring to sustain the 1109 years life of my Empire of China under title Zhu's. bring me lighter credit debt in coming months.

Jun 22, 2017

gradually people around me turns better treating me. my gaze when I jog in dusk turns some women and girls friend to me but also gathers hatred. reviewing women in my life so far, I sometimes touched by kindness and grace of QRRS Dorm canteen woman who operating the small business with her diligent husband. his husband is a tall pal, his kindness to his wife is enviable. these days I likely overdo my kindness to them, and easier led to misunderstanding. I always remember first time I met the spouse when their business just open, how the woman confident and contented. I then felt I can help her with her target, wellness & independence. now about 7 years passed I didn't miss it. sometimes love recalls my campus life, esp master degree seeking period when I met Asoh Yukiko. God blesses me with brave heart, whole vision and all those memories so timeless cherished. I don't want to hurt anyone, but the canteen woman's husband likely taking, for his less gifted, for his property appreciated. God, fix my poised with due humility. yesterday I gained a bonus from QRRS, my once and long time employer, just after a day my salary released, which increases near ￥500. the bonus addes another ￥500. with it I renew my godaddy hosting plan for another half year immediately. also renew billingzhu.com a year. with improved salary I ordered backup router from taobao.com, as incredible satisfying and enzymes me in super confident mood. 2 days passed I still felt the content. yesterday I also retouch my homemade gadget on google sites, which now tending to ban such hosting function and my in time usage likely saves me extra cost from google's wonderful and generous free service. see them on most of our zhone portals homepage, in section of blog rss feeds and tweets, youtube, groups, donation links. its nice feeling, for even I never master scripting skill still I probing those scripts and tailored them into my buildups. I gain so much from my education, my ability to self-taught. dad, God, bring me sooner my Crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, and my Empire of China for larger comfort in my life, for fulfilling the proud creator life experience. grant us a happy monthly reunion 2 days later, and monthly cinema and walmart shopping in a pack with dearest son, woz.

Jun 19, 2017

Its a sunny morning, I felt obliged to get up and do something. Recent testing tomato router script put me in a worker’s mindset, absolutely nothing else beyond task memories. I dived so hard that I merely recognize other things than occupied by inch in inch progress I strode outward chaos and no effect. My son last Saturday lost his desktop logon confidential, So I taught him to reinstall windows 10 and roughly customizing before backup to image. He reluctant but worked with me, while his sinful mom, a cheap junior school teacher, close watching my tutorial on computer. She occupied her house every free hours out of work, grasps dirty money from tuitions she ought to offered on job. After 3 years and graduated and then 2 decades, she every more than 12 hours in a day earning from the educational bits even it's shabby in quality in her college. I more and more felt its insane. My son due entertainment ruined for his mom’s house forever a craft hut for his mom and her cheap pupils. In this view, I recently relentlessly equip my son with lounge TV and English programs, on which he enjoys and absorbs when his visits monthly my dorm and on my seat. I hope the moment he enjoys staying with me and my workspace forever prolonged. So last month I equipped him a touchpad k/m combo for convenience of remote input on pc and android TV. The Chinese product works smart even we anxious about keylogger and other spy wares lawless PRC breeds, in favor of dog CCP and state surveillance. My son more or less accepted my arrangement, promoting him from mobile games he excels now and adopting more language and expressive method as his new skill to master. I times and times urged him makes fair use of our borderless web. I hope he enjoys meanings in American culture stocked in amazon prime video and youtube, vimeo sites. My trustworthy video education, defied me in youth decades, pacifies me more than 2 hours daily, broaden my worldview and wishfulness so much that I have to put on forth my son, for his beneficial social experience and nutritional source of moral and spiritual. God, dad, my life so rich that I’m constantly complacent. Bring my son meaningful in his scope of activities. Bring me sooner my Royal China to protect her from poverty grilling the land and souls only left after CCP and PRC. Bring producing capacity our fatherland sustains before the burning out in cheap dealer like communism. Bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for unfinished mission we beset, among a never seen silver proud heaven on eastern Asia. Thx you, dad God.

a newly budding tree in QRRS Dorm where the Son, benzrad, praying and sustains.

source: Regalbum China at zhone family album, Royal moments

[chinad]

out of curtained chase, covert infusing of adversity.

Jul 1, 2017

dreamt of training of Royal member, ie. noble court and Prince himself. how his attitude toward his servants, esp 3 closest counselors/secretaries, can affect the quality of leadership. saw philosophy in ruled social interactive or code of eloquent. then dreamt with my wife treated in a banquet, with social skill just learned in train. last week's shopping online, a backup router Asus RT-N66u, finally ruined by PRC surveillance. the express, STO.com, totally denied the parcel it serving, just as taobao's logistics. the poor vendor kindly promised me to check why the parcel missing or went wrong, but after 1 day he rebuffed my call and prompt refund me instead, likely unspoken shame of PRC secret cop's hassle intimates him, seals his mouth from disclose iron curtain. with the money returned, I at once ordered another from different vendor now that the market is full of the product. within the day, around 4pm, the vendor sms informed me parcel dispatched. God, dad, how I glad to hear that! yesterday after read news that squareup.com offers in account credit service, I decided to give it a try. but when I trying signup the wonderful website, my internet worsen and inaccessible for 3 hours. I finally gave up and shut down computer. PRC dog likely warns me that even with most powerful network hardware, they still interceptive in my internet traffic, or blocks my financial connection with American service. however, after dinner and a thunderstorm, I smoothly claimed 2 zhone accounts with squareup.com and its affiliate, cash.me . without US SSN number most services out of my reach, esp highly expected in account virtual credit, or deposit in site, but still the wonderful service from the same founder of twitter.com, generously offers us 2 vanity url, http://ift.tt/2sqPfxO and http://ift.tt/2taIwW0 . I can't be more proud of the operation out of distress of surveillance. in the week I also modified 2 online resource of google sites' widgets, both of google photo's, to fit my online brand, and deployed onto my portal. visit them on http://ift.tt/2srmC3H . hope the author grants my reusing his code in xml file that show my google albums' rss source. and I honestly pray google sites, now confronted by google new sites, doesn't elapse into disappear. zhone assets based on the service remarkable hugely sustain. God, dad, this month I merely left ￥100, grant us a happy weekends with my son, woz, Hope of China. bring sooner my crown Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for better management of my vested Empire of China. bring me my second child as namespace billingzhu.com prepares, and his locked facebook account into using. with adequate financial support, dad, God, I live anxious free in this eccentric city for future open and welcoming eastern Asia.

Jun 27, 2017

dreamt near lunar spring festival at my hometown. saw changes in the village: newly built dam control gate and road. the road near dam gate left with deep and steep wheel dents due to insufficient budget for concrete. I saw our village field, flowers and leisure villagers among it. In dream I married my niece, ie. second daughter, the tallest in her sibling of my mom's niece in a village around. but we were divorced soon in dream and our son left me sad for the changing life. last week full of joyes with improved salary. my urgent bills wrote off by it. now with ￥200 loaned by dorm canteen I will visit asylum for medicine today. my backup cellphone, an old moto, hacked and ill behaved, so I deleted critical database on it immediately. it usually disabled both wifi and bluetooth, nor sim card in it. so likely hacker with direct control on it. I wondering if the facing door, a secret cop surveillances me since weeks ago, stealth into my room and injected it malware. my parcel from ordering used router for vpn on taobao.com, delayed a week still it only left one logistic information: dispatched by vendor a week ago, and nothing else happened in other 6 following days so far. another item, a usb card reader, its logistic information also hijacked several days till it reached locally before updated on time. PRC close surveillance sometimes made me sad. the facing door dog, with all its momentum after just settled, half open his door all day and night, unshakable anonymously fixed my door which was tight and sometimes my son in monthly visit even can't push open on his own, likely in weekends when I left to visit my son 3 bus stops away, just under corridor webcams' monitoring evidently and lawlessly. now that my broken door too loose to hold close breeze, I intended directly lock it down after I enter, distant from any spy around in guise superficial sharing privacy any more. the facing cop also in recent days gave up letting its door half open to peek and eavesdrop. my cold shoulders toward his posed free community but just surveillance from which he earns his dog life, likely conveys strong dislike and ruins his fool's joys and presumable fake poise. he also likely partially completed his mission: stolen my password keeper's database, infected my portable devices with trojans and keyloggers, licked my floor with its dripping messy tongue. the long challenge for a clean os out of controlled and poisoned environment in PRC's hooligan nation really drains me, let me feel boring and labored. what's laughable is that, the neighbor tall dog, once pretending cough every day and spitted everywhere in excuse of his illness, these days silently stay unnoticedly astray, quit both domineering and his condemn the tidiness of dorm public space. CCP authority has its power just upon those cheap souls and zombies which label price of manipulation. dad God, save me from fatigue of faith in long run. bring me sooner my Royal China to discipline China and Chinese under holy. remove trifle divided with merciless by forcible authority and in glory of united one. God dad, bring me sooner my crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, for coming age. bring me more offspring to sustain the 1109 years life of my Empire of China under title Zhu's. bring me lighter credit debt in coming months.

Jun 22, 2017

gradually people around me turns better treating me. my gaze when I jog in dusk turns some women and girls friend to me but also gathers hatred. reviewing women in my life so far, I sometimes touched by kindness and grace of QRRS Dorm canteen woman who operating the small business with her diligent husband. his husband is a tall pal, his kindness to his wife is enviable. these days I likely overdo my kindness to them, and easier led to misunderstanding. I always remember first time I met the spouse when their business just open, how the woman confident and contented. I then felt I can help her with her target, wellness & independence. now about 7 years passed I didn't miss it. sometimes love recalls my campus life, esp master degree seeking period when I met Asoh Yukiko. God blesses me with brave heart, whole vision and all those memories so timeless cherished. I don't want to hurt anyone, but the canteen woman's husband likely taking, for his less gifted, for his property appreciated. God, fix my poised with due humility. yesterday I gained a bonus from QRRS, my once and long time employer, just after a day my salary released, which increases near ￥500. the bonus addes another ￥500. with it I renew my godaddy hosting plan for another half year immediately. also renew billingzhu.com a year. with improved salary I ordered backup router from taobao.com, as incredible satisfying and enzymes me in super confident mood. 2 days passed I still felt the content. yesterday I also retouch my homemade gadget on google sites, which now tending to ban such hosting function and my in time usage likely saves me extra cost from google's wonderful and generous free service. see them on most of our zhone portals homepage, in section of blog rss feeds and tweets, youtube, groups, donation links. its nice feeling, for even I never master scripting skill still I probing those scripts and tailored them into my buildups. I gain so much from my education, my ability to self-taught. dad, God, bring me sooner my Crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, and my Empire of China for larger comfort in my life, for fulfilling the proud creator life experience. grant us a happy monthly reunion 2 days later, and monthly cinema and walmart shopping in a pack with dearest son, woz.

Jun 19, 2017

Its a sunny morning, I felt obliged to get up and do something. Recent testing tomato router script put me in a worker’s mindset, absolutely nothing else beyond task memories. I dived so hard that I merely recognize other things than occupied by inch in inch progress I strode outward chaos and no effect. My son last Saturday lost his desktop logon confidential, So I taught him to reinstall windows 10 and roughly customizing before backup to image. He reluctant but worked with me, while his sinful mom, a cheap junior school teacher, close watching my tutorial on computer. She occupied her house every free hours out of work, grasps dirty money from tuitions she ought to offered on job. After 3 years and graduated and then 2 decades, she every more than 12 hours in a day earning from the educational bits even it's shabby in quality in her college. I more and more felt its insane. My son due entertainment ruined for his mom’s house forever a craft hut for his mom and her cheap pupils. In this view, I recently relentlessly equip my son with lounge TV and English programs, on which he enjoys and absorbs when his visits monthly my dorm and on my seat. I hope the moment he enjoys staying with me and my workspace forever prolonged. So last month I equipped him a touchpad k/m combo for convenience of remote input on pc and android TV. The Chinese product works smart even we anxious about keylogger and other spy wares lawless PRC breeds, in favor of dog CCP and state surveillance. My son more or less accepted my arrangement, promoting him from mobile games he excels now and adopting more language and expressive method as his new skill to master. I times and times urged him makes fair use of our borderless web. I hope he enjoys meanings in American culture stocked in amazon prime video and youtube, vimeo sites. My trustworthy video education, defied me in youth decades, pacifies me more than 2 hours daily, broaden my worldview and wishfulness so much that I have to put on forth my son, for his beneficial social experience and nutritional source of moral and spiritual. God, dad, my life so rich that I’m constantly complacent. Bring my son meaningful in his scope of activities. Bring me sooner my Royal China to protect her from poverty grilling the land and souls only left after CCP and PRC. Bring producing capacity our fatherland sustains before the burning out in cheap dealer like communism. Bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for unfinished mission we beset, among a never seen silver proud heaven on eastern Asia. Thx you, dad God.

a newly budding tree in QRRS Dorm where the Son, benzrad, praying and sustains.

source: Regalbum China at zhone family album, Royal moments

via Blogger http://ift.tt/2sqYHBp

[be21zh]

through nothing left in the wasteland.

Jul 1, 2017

dreamt of training of Royal member, ie. noble court and Prince himself. how his attitude toward his servants, esp 3 closest counselors/secretaries, can affect the quality of leadership. saw philosophy in ruled social interactive or code of eloquent. then dreamt with my wife treated in a banquet, with social skill just learned in train. last week's shopping online, a backup router Asus RT-N66u, finally ruined by PRC surveillance. the express, STO.com, totally denied the parcel it serving, just as taobao's logistics. the poor vendor kindly promised me to check why the parcel missing or went wrong, but after 1 day he rebuffed my call and prompt refund me instead, likely unspoken shame of PRC secret cop's hassle intimates him, seals his mouth from disclose iron curtain. with the money returned, I at once ordered another from different vendor now that the market is full of the product. within the day, around 4pm, the vendor sms informed me parcel dispatched. God, dad, how I glad to hear that! yesterday after read news that squareup.com offers in account credit service, I decided to give it a try. but when I trying signup the wonderful website, my internet worsen and inaccessible for 3 hours. I finally gave up and shut down computer. PRC dog likely warns me that even with most powerful network hardware, they still interceptive in my internet traffic, or blocks my financial connection with American service. however, after dinner and a thunderstorm, I smoothly claimed 2 zhone accounts with squareup.com and its affiliate, cash.me . without US SSN number most services out of my reach, esp highly expected in account virtual credit, or deposit in site, but still the wonderful service from the same founder of twitter.com, generously offers us 2 vanity url, http://ift.tt/2sqPfxO and http://ift.tt/2taIwW0 . I can't be more proud of the operation out of distress of surveillance. in the week I also modified 2 online resource of google sites' widgets, both of google photo's, to fit my online brand, and deployed onto my portal. visit them on http://ift.tt/2srmC3H . hope the author grants my reusing his code in xml file that show my google albums' rss source. and I honestly pray google sites, now confronted by google new sites, doesn't elapse into disappear. zhone assets based on the service remarkable hugely sustain. God, dad, this month I merely left ￥100, grant us a happy weekends with my son, woz, Hope of China. bring sooner my crown Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for better management of my vested Empire of China. bring me my second child as namespace billingzhu.com prepares, and his locked facebook account into using. with adequate financial support, dad, God, I live anxious free in this eccentric city for future open and welcoming eastern Asia.

Jun 27, 2017

dreamt near lunar spring festival at my hometown. saw changes in the village: newly built dam control gate and road. the road near dam gate left with deep and steep wheel dents due to insufficient budget for concrete. I saw our village field, flowers and leisure villagers among it. In dream I married my niece, ie. second daughter, the tallest in her sibling of my mom's niece in a village around. but we were divorced soon in dream and our son left me sad for the changing life. last week full of joyes with improved salary. my urgent bills wrote off by it. now with ￥200 loaned by dorm canteen I will visit asylum for medicine today. my backup cellphone, an old moto, hacked and ill behaved, so I deleted critical database on it immediately. it usually disabled both wifi and bluetooth, nor sim card in it. so likely hacker with direct control on it. I wondering if the facing door, a secret cop surveillances me since weeks ago, stealth into my room and injected it malware. my parcel from ordering used router for vpn on taobao.com, delayed a week still it only left one logistic information: dispatched by vendor a week ago, and nothing else happened in other 6 following days so far. another item, a usb card reader, its logistic information also hijacked several days till it reached locally before updated on time. PRC close surveillance sometimes made me sad. the facing door dog, with all its momentum after just settled, half open his door all day and night, unshakable anonymously fixed my door which was tight and sometimes my son in monthly visit even can't push open on his own, likely in weekends when I left to visit my son 3 bus stops away, just under corridor webcams' monitoring evidently and lawlessly. now that my broken door too loose to hold close breeze, I intended directly lock it down after I enter, distant from any spy around in guise superficial sharing privacy any more. the facing cop also in recent days gave up letting its door half open to peek and eavesdrop. my cold shoulders toward his posed free community but just surveillance from which he earns his dog life, likely conveys strong dislike and ruins his fool's joys and presumable fake poise. he also likely partially completed his mission: stolen my password keeper's database, infected my portable devices with trojans and keyloggers, licked my floor with its dripping messy tongue. the long challenge for a clean os out of controlled and poisoned environment in PRC's hooligan nation really drains me, let me feel boring and labored. what's laughable is that, the neighbor tall dog, once pretending cough every day and spitted everywhere in excuse of his illness, these days silently stay unnoticedly astray, quit both domineering and his condemn the tidiness of dorm public space. CCP authority has its power just upon those cheap souls and zombies which label price of manipulation. dad God, save me from fatigue of faith in long run. bring me sooner my Royal China to discipline China and Chinese under holy. remove trifle divided with merciless by forcible authority and in glory of united one. God dad, bring me sooner my crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, from Japan, for coming age. bring me more offspring to sustain the 1109 years life of my Empire of China under title Zhu's. bring me lighter credit debt in coming months.

Jun 22, 2017

gradually people around me turns better treating me. my gaze when I jog in dusk turns some women and girls friend to me but also gathers hatred. reviewing women in my life so far, I sometimes touched by kindness and grace of QRRS Dorm canteen woman who operating the small business with her diligent husband. his husband is a tall pal, his kindness to his wife is enviable. these days I likely overdo my kindness to them, and easier led to misunderstanding. I always remember first time I met the spouse when their business just open, how the woman confident and contented. I then felt I can help her with her target, wellness & independence. now about 7 years passed I didn't miss it. sometimes love recalls my campus life, esp master degree seeking period when I met Asoh Yukiko. God blesses me with brave heart, whole vision and all those memories so timeless cherished. I don't want to hurt anyone, but the canteen woman's husband likely taking, for his less gifted, for his property appreciated. God, fix my poised with due humility. yesterday I gained a bonus from QRRS, my once and long time employer, just after a day my salary released, which increases near ￥500. the bonus addes another ￥500. with it I renew my godaddy hosting plan for another half year immediately. also renew billingzhu.com a year. with improved salary I ordered backup router from taobao.com, as incredible satisfying and enzymes me in super confident mood. 2 days passed I still felt the content. yesterday I also retouch my homemade gadget on google sites, which now tending to ban such hosting function and my in time usage likely saves me extra cost from google's wonderful and generous free service. see them on most of our zhone portals homepage, in section of blog rss feeds and tweets, youtube, groups, donation links. its nice feeling, for even I never master scripting skill still I probing those scripts and tailored them into my buildups. I gain so much from my education, my ability to self-taught. dad, God, bring me sooner my Crown Queen, Asoh Yukiko, and my Empire of China for larger comfort in my life, for fulfilling the proud creator life experience. grant us a happy monthly reunion 2 days later, and monthly cinema and walmart shopping in a pack with dearest son, woz.

Jun 19, 2017

Its a sunny morning, I felt obliged to get up and do something. Recent testing tomato router script put me in a worker’s mindset, absolutely nothing else beyond task memories. I dived so hard that I merely recognize other things than occupied by inch in inch progress I strode outward chaos and no effect. My son last Saturday lost his desktop logon confidential, So I taught him to reinstall windows 10 and roughly customizing before backup to image. He reluctant but worked with me, while his sinful mom, a cheap junior school teacher, close watching my tutorial on computer. She occupied her house every free hours out of work, grasps dirty money from tuitions she ought to offered on job. After 3 years and graduated and then 2 decades, she every more than 12 hours in a day earning from the educational bits even it's shabby in quality in her college. I more and more felt its insane. My son due entertainment ruined for his mom’s house forever a craft hut for his mom and her cheap pupils. In this view, I recently relentlessly equip my son with lounge TV and English programs, on which he enjoys and absorbs when his visits monthly my dorm and on my seat. I hope the moment he enjoys staying with me and my workspace forever prolonged. So last month I equipped him a touchpad k/m combo for convenience of remote input on pc and android TV. The Chinese product works smart even we anxious about keylogger and other spy wares lawless PRC breeds, in favor of dog CCP and state surveillance. My son more or less accepted my arrangement, promoting him from mobile games he excels now and adopting more language and expressive method as his new skill to master. I times and times urged him makes fair use of our borderless web. I hope he enjoys meanings in American culture stocked in amazon prime video and youtube, vimeo sites. My trustworthy video education, defied me in youth decades, pacifies me more than 2 hours daily, broaden my worldview and wishfulness so much that I have to put on forth my son, for his beneficial social experience and nutritional source of moral and spiritual. God, dad, my life so rich that I’m constantly complacent. Bring my son meaningful in his scope of activities. Bring me sooner my Royal China to protect her from poverty grilling the land and souls only left after CCP and PRC. Bring producing capacity our fatherland sustains before the burning out in cheap dealer like communism. Bring me sooner my Crowned Queen from Japan, Asoh Yukiko, for unfinished mission we beset, among a never seen silver proud heaven on eastern Asia. Thx you, dad God. LOFTER：riveryog, 旎宫嘉坊   http://ift.tt/2tA855Z