#about 90% of this stuff came from dollar tree

[madbiscuitlady]

My Halloween/OFMD themed display table is ready. 🏴‍☠️

Yo @davidjenks rate my set up.

[giorno-plays-piano]

Money, Money, Money Part 1

Pairing: mob!Bucky Barnes x Reader, slight Peter Parker x Reader

Warnings: lots of swearing, silly drunk mobs, mentions of alcoholism, parody, Peter is adult, is this a crack fic??

Words: 2578.

Summary: When Steve finds out somebody has stolen their money, Bucky realizes he has to take his ass off the leather couch in his office, finally.

P.S. This is my first attempt to write humor and I’m sorry in advance for everything I’ve written here 😅

_________________

“BITCH, DID I STUTTER WHEN I SAID TO KEEP THAT SAFE CLOSED AT ALL TIMES?”

Allyson massaged her temples softly and let out a groan: if Mr. Rogers continued to yell like that, he would definitely choke soon. This morning he had been pretending to be the death, vengeance and fury, ready to kick the ass of her immediate superior, James Barnes, who acted like he was deaf, unable to pull himself from the couch where he slept after getting drunk as a fish last night. Oh, poor Bucky. Apparently, he fucked things up again if Mr. Rogers stormed into his office like he was getting chased by a 200-pound dog.

“What the fuck is wrong with you, you son of a...” glancing at a pouting man-child with a three-day beard, Steve covered his face with his palm and let out an exasperated sigh, “... respectable woman who would die of shame if she saw you now!”

“Come on, Stevie,” the man yawned, finally moving his huge, muscular body up to sit instead of just laying on the couch since he felt a little guilty Steve was getting all riled up while he just chilled, “why so serious? Yeah, somebody took a bit of cash from the safe, it’s not a big deal.”

Allyson heard everything as if they were speaking right in front of her - Bucky was a real Mr. Cheapo who didn’t want to rent an office with decent walls - and quickly closed her ears, wishing she had taken her earplugs today. Her boss just made a grave mistake, and now both of them were going to pay for it with their eardrums.

“NOT A BIG DEAL? NOT A BIG DEAL, YOU MASSIVE BAG OF DOUCHE?! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH MONEY WAS THERE, HUH?! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THOSE MONEY WERE FOR?!”

Seriously, she considered getting a new job, but these free daily standup shows were both tiring and so fucking funny she was afraid she might wet her seat.

“Oh my fucking God, Bucky, I swear I’ll kill you, I’ll... no, I have a better idea!” Steve gave his best friend a dirty look. “I’ll call your uncle. Yeah, you know which one. He’ll be sooo happy to take you drunk ass to jail and then give your mama a call. I bet she has a cure for both your attitude and alcoholism.”

“You wouldn’t do that!”

Suddenly realizing the danger he was in, Bucky quickly got up, almost falling to the floor but holding on the leather chair in the very last second. When Steve talked about calling his uncle, a chief of police of the neighboring town where his whole family lived, it meant things were going bad. Real bad.

“Bucky, it was the part we were going to invest into Pierce’s casino. I have to take it to him tomorrow morning. TOMORROW FUCKING MORNING, DO YOU HEAR ME, YOU STINKING DRUNK?”

“I’m drunk but not deaf, Steve!”

“Oh my God, I’m driving you to a rehab, go gather your stuff right now!”

Allyson sighed, getting up and proceeding to choose the most beautiful cup to fill it with fresh coffee: when their conflicts escalated to threats, it meant her boss would soon start to sweet-talk, apologizing to his best friend and promising to sober up and get things right. Every time she felt like Mr. Rogers would really do something to Bucky, the guy used his natural charisma and charm and got away with anything by just reminding Steve how he fought for his best friend in the dark alleys when Rogers was a sick, skinny kid. It worked every damn time.

There they were again, talking about same things with Bucky swearing on his mother’s life that he will find the money and bring it back to Steve. Usually it meant the threats were coming to an end, and soon Mr. Rogers would open the door and come out red as a lobster, breathing heavily as if he just ran a marathon. There he would see her with a cup of nice coffee with cream and two spoons of sugar just like he preferred, gladly accepting it and saying nobody understand him but her. Then Allyson would smile compassionately, listen to his small talk before he went out the office, and wait until her grumpy boss would fall out the room, reeking alcohol, and ask her what the fuck had happened yesterday.

After that in a couple of minutes things would finally settle down, and Allyson would have a chance to give a call to her best friend.

_______________________________

Your day couldn’t start better: you had finally received your Amazon order - hooray to the stupid makeup tools you would use, like, once a year - and even watched your favorite Netflix series with a cup of a fragrant coffee with marshmallows because it was Sunday and you were finally free from both work and cleaning the apartment. It felt so nice to just do absolutely nothing, laying on your couch with a piece of pizza in your hand. Seriously, even a workaholic like you had to do it more often.

Your lazy morning was interrupted by Peter, a sweet college student who was getting into troubles more often than a drunk in a local bar: you seriously considered calling him Harry Potter after you found him half-naked with a scratch on his forehead standing in the corridor of your building and holding a broom. To protect himself from bullies, he said, by the look on his face you could tell it was as good as a magic wand against 6"4 ft tall guys, seriously.

Since he rented an apartment with other unlucky nerds who had zero skills how to survive in this cruel world, you ended up nearly baby-sitting Peter, patching him up after he was getting in a fight and lending him some money time after time when he struggled to pay rent or buy food. His parents were elderly people with income below average, but they still did whatever they could to give him an education, so you decided to give the guy a hand.

Now that baby was standing in front of you, lit up like a Christmas tree, with a bouquet of wonderful pink roses, big box of hand-crafted chocolates and a whole bag of what looked like some very fine food, even a bottle of champagne clinking inside.

"Good morning, Fairy Godmother! I came to bring back what I owe you!" His smile was a mile wide when he looked at your face, happy to the point he couldn't stand still, dancing like those Duracell rabbits in the tv ad.

"You're up early, Cinderella."

You yawned, laughing when you saw the guy pouting at the nickname you gave him - tf he expected for calling you Fairy Godmother?

"Don't stand there, come in."

When he actually handed you the flowers and chocolates, giving you a quick peck on the cheek shyly, you froze, finally realizing he brought all this for you. Wait, what? Where the heck did he get so much money to buy that expensive stuff? You thought he was helping his other neighbor who was planning to finally propose to his girlfriend. Perplexed to the point you nearly missed that peck, you blinked at tomato red Peter.

"Please don't tell me you robbed your 90-year-old paralytic professor."

"Why don't you ask if I robbed a bank?" He pouted again, putting the bag on the floor and getting a hundred dollar banknote out of his old leather wallet. "I actually came to thank you for everything you've done for me. And I didn't rob anyone! I got a real job!"

"Real job?" You eyed him curiously. "But don't you already have a job in delivery?"

"Pfft, you can't call it a job. It was getting one nasty smelling pizza from one place to the other while looking miserable."

You barely held your laugh, leaving the bouquet and chocolates on the side table and rubbing guy's back. Poor Peter, nobody was giving him a hand - while you couldn't question people's decision since the guy wasn't the most reliable one, it was still a shame he wasn't treated decently as if all of them weren't young and careless once.

Wait, but who on Earth gave him such a well-paid job all of a sudden? He must have spent hundreds of dollars on the bouquet, chocolates, food and champagne, not even counting those 100 dollars he owed.

Oh God.

"Please don't tell me you're working for some shady business." You looked at him in horror, your hand flying to your mouth. "Peter, is it Tony's band?!"

"Jesus woman, why would I work for some stupid mob." The guy rolled his eyes, and you sighed in relief, not knowing what to except from this trouble on two skinny legs. “I’m telling you, it’s nothing bad! I just have to keep it a secret before I get a contract. Once I figure it out, I’ll explain everything, I swear!”

“Alright, alright, don’t stress over it, I’m not your Ma.” Smirking, you went to take a square glass vase you hadn’t use in ages, filling it with water to drop the bouquet inside. “Let’s celebrate it, then! Woah, careful there, give me that bottle until you drop it on my clean floor, I’ve been scrubbing it for hours yesterday!”

_______________________

Bucky still felt like Steve was making too much of a big deal out of it: obviously, it was Tony who went to him at night when Bucky was already drunk like a monkey, celebrating the birth of Clint’s daughter. Nobody else had the courage to steal from him, Steve’s right hand, an ex-soldier who had a reputation of a man killing with the first punch. Not that Bucky ever killed anybody, actually being a ex-trumpet in an army band...

Anyway, the man was heading over to Stark’s Tower, a motel where he and all his guys lived when his wife Pepper was out of town. Pepper had definitely been out of town lately since Tony didn’t call: when she was coming back, Steve and Tony were having a two-day truce with nobody getting in a fight because it was making Mrs. Stark upset, and when she was upset, both Steve and Tony didn’t risk getting out of their holes to face this enraged blonde woman who could make anyone wet themselves with one her glance. If there were anyone killing with just one punch in the town, it got to be Pepper.

As he got closer in his Cadillac that looked like it went through fire and water before being sold to Bucky, Barnes stared at the motel suspiciously: it was strangely quiet with everyone hiding inside, not a man guarding the motel’s entrance. What the hell happened? Tony loved showing off, pretending he ruled over the town, and he would definitely act like a king after stealing Steve’s and his money. It was unbelievable Bucky so nobody welcoming him with a smirk.

Hoping he didn’t use all that money for emptying a liquor store, Bucky parked the car and went to the motel, dying to have some beer: one heartless blonde boss of his emptied his fridge.

“Oh, more drinking partners returning to continue the fun, huh?”

Bucky froze immediately, staring at Pepper who stood in the doorway with a face of an iron maiden. Jesus fucking Christ. She returned to the city way before Tony told him, and it was clear she found him not in the condition she expected to. While Bucky considered whether it was better to run, Tony’s head appeared somewhere behind his wife, and Barnes saw Tony was as drunk as him, if not even more. He could see a huge blue mark from Pepper’s heavy hand on Stark’s cheek.

“Who’s that, honey?” The man asked innocently, earning an enraged glance from his wife, and Bucky thought he should have run. “Hi, Buck! Come on in, it’s ok if you didn’t bring beer even if I asked twice.”

Oh. Something was going on. Of course, Bucky could rat the man out immediately, telling Pepper he wasn’t drinking with Tony yesterday’s night, but he wasn’t such a heartless bastard - by the look on Stark’s face Barnes could see his sweet blonde wifey would beat poor Tony to death with her Dior handbag.

“Sorry, I blacked out for a couple of hours in my car.” He mumbled, bowing his head in respect. “Pepper, such a pleasure to see you.”

“Come on in, alcoholic.” Her gaze was heavy, and Bucky shivered a little, carefully leaving his shoes near the door and scurrying away to the coach where Tony sat, nervously biting his fingers. “Well, do you wanna tell me something, huh? How many hookers have you brought here yesterday?”

Glancing to Tony and back to Pepper, Barnes suddenly realized his frenemy had been so drunk he had no hecking idea whether somebody really brought hookers to the motel - it was a total taboo, but once they got drunk they could barely control themselves. Once they literally woke up to a Santa Claus singing Jingle Bells in the tub in the middle of June because Tony missed Christmas.

Of course, Stark would never slip up the night before Pepper was coming back to town, but, apparently, she didn’t stay with her mom for as long as she planned, and Tony was royally fucked.

“I’ve asked you a question.”

And now Bucky was, too, if he didn’t think of something quick. Of course, he could tell her the truth, but it meant losing Tony completely, and Barnes didn’t want that. A real mafioso should have at least one strong enemy, right?

“I’m sorry, Pepper, but I don’t think there were any hookers here last night.” He said, carefully choosing words. “You see, first, Tony never allows us to. Second, we’re good Christians. We would never invite some hookers when we celebrated the birth of Clint’s daughter!”

As he got silent, enjoying the effect his words were having on Pepper, Bucky looked at the man sitting to his right, watching Tony’s eyes watering: it was definitely God himself who sent Barnes his way that morning, saving his from near death. Nothing would work better than this excuse. Clint and all Bucky’s guys were so drunk to the point they barely remembered what had happened, and it would be easy to convince them Tony and his gang came to see Barnes for something and ended up staying with all of them.

Besides, there was a nice bonus Bucky could add to make it work even better.

“By the way, Clint named her Natasha. That’s also the name of your mom, right?”

By the look on Tony’s face the man realized he was ready to sing.

“How did he know my mom’s name?” Pepper eyed Steve’s right hand distrustfully, but he could tell she was less irritated.

“Oh, you know, he and his wife couldn’t choose the name, so we started saying whatever names we knew, and Tony mentioned Natasha.”

For a second Bucky thought Stark was going to kiss him through excess of joy.

When he finally left the motel, getting his pack of beer given him by lovely Pepper who changed the anger to mercy, Tony ran out of the house after him, giving him a pat on the shoulder and whispering quietly, “I own you one, brother.”

Bucky sighed. Stark didn’t take the money.

______________

Tags: @finleyjayne​​ @alexakeyloveloki​​ @helenaeisenhower​​ @villanellevi​​ @hurricanerin​​ @inlovewiththefictionalcharacters @chris-evans-indian-fanfic​ @navegandoaciegas​ @rosalynshields​ @brattycherubwrites​ @sllooney​ @angrythingstarlight​ @lookiamtrying​ @buckysbunny​ @soleil-dor​ @stargazingfangirl18​ @dillybuggg​ @literate-lamb​ @cosicas-cuquis​ @sarge-barnes-sir​ @buckybarnesplumwhore​ @jaysayey​ @megzdoodle​ @gotnofucks​ @lux-ravenwolf​ @iheartsebandchris​ @ximebebx​ @jeremyrennerfanxxxx123​ @sourpatchspinster​

[toomanyfandoms02]

Writing prompts!

So I just reached 100 followers and I am BEYOND happy YALL. So heres 100 prompts for people to send me asks with! Send as many numbers as you want in one and I'll make a blurb from it. (And by blurb I mean I will grow attatched to your request and write a whole fic on it probably lmao) THIS WAS PREVIOUSLY MY 100 FOLLOWER THIBG BUT IM BRINGING PROMPTS BACK FOR REQUESTS.

FYI no matter when you are seeing this, request. I don't care. I'm always up for inspiration. :))))

If it has a star next to it, I came up with it on my own.

These probably wont be blurbs and will be longer!

I'm currently writing for >>>>

Breakfast Club

HARRY POTTER

Spencer Reid / MGG

The Maze Runner

Buzzfeed Unsolved

Spiderman

Barry Allen

Theres a list of who I write best for on my page!! ^^^^

1. "I told you not to read that."

2. "Sir, this is for children only."

3. "Are you kidding me? We're not 'fine'!"

4. "Whatever you're going to ask, the answer is no!"

5. "Hey... what's wrong with your face?"

6. "You look a lot different from your profile picture."

7. "Are you going to keep walking by my house, or are you going to come in?"

8. "Dude, it's three in the morning."

9. "I can't believe I use to think he was attractive."

10. "Actually, you *are* speaking to the manager."

11. "This isn't going to be a typical best man's speech."

12. "According to this, you owe them eighty thousand dollars."

13. "That's the worst reason I've ever heard to have a baby."

14. "I didn't even recognize you!"

15. "You're Satan."

16. "I need a place to stay."

17. "It's six o'clock in the morning, you're not having vodka."

18. "Safety first. What are you? FIVE?"

19. "This is girl talk, so leave."

20. "You're bleeding all over my carpet."

21. "Just smile, I really need to see you smile right now."

22. "Hold still."

23. "You're not interested, are you?"

24. "Oh honey, I'd never be jealous of you."

25. "I'm telling you, I'm haunted."

26. "Touch her again and I'll break your wrist."

27. "Don't look behind you, hurt that guy is checking you out."

28. "I need you to pretend to be my boyfriend."

29. "Quick! Kiss me!"

30. "Just shut up and kiss me."

31. "I hate high school reunions."

32. "I think I picked up your coffee by mistake."

33. "I've never felt this way before... and it scares the shit out of me."

34. "Wait a second, are you jealous?"

35. "This is by far the stupidest plan you've ever had. Of course I'm in."

36. "You never told me you had a fucking twin."

37. "Am I suppose to be scared of you?"

38. "You're hiding something from me."

39. "A wedding?"

40. "Where would someone hide in a town like this?"

41. "H-how long have you been standing there?"

42. "Is this skirt suppose to be this short? I kinda feel like a french whore" *

43. "Oh fuck off."

44. "When did you take that?"

45. "I hid it."

46. "Stop trying to look cool in paparazzi pictures, you look like a dumbass." *

47. "Can you stop laughing?"

48. "You look like a reptile from this angle. Lizard? Snake? Turtle? I just can't decide." *

49. "You have a dirty mind."

50. "You guys are lame."

51. "I don't know. Resurrection maybe?"

52. "This is a safe space." "What the hell are you talking about?" "SAFE SPACE!"

53. "Just stab him."

54. "I'm in dire need of assistance."

55. "I'm gonna die in an elevator full of idiots."

56. "Shoot me."

57. "I feel like you know." *

58. "You're making me dizzy."

59. "I don't want any excuses, they must have the hottest date ever."

60. "Are you with him because it's easy?"

61. "Dibs!" *

62. "If we die, I'm going to kill you."

63. "Do you think you could just go *one* day without pissing me off?"

64. "Your hands are really soft." *

65. "We've become the clingy newlyweds you've always complained about."

66. "Pregnant?"

67. "We are SO much cuter than them."

68. "Wanna go for a drive?"

69. "Is there a reason you're blushing like that?"

70. "Sleep over? Please?"

71. "Are we on a date right now?"

72. "Am I your lockscreen?" "You weren't suppose to see that."

73. "Well I think you're beautiful."

74. "Your feet are so cold!"

75. "You come here often?" "Well I work here, so I'll have to say yes."

76. "You met me yesterday though?" "Yes, and I would die for you in one second. Next question."

77. "I can't stop smiling."

78. "Did you see it?"

79. "Don't leave me alone."

80. "Have you ever kissed anyone before?"

81. "You didn't tell me your friend was cute! Now what am I gonna do?"

82. "How can you drink that stuff?"

83. "Stop apologizing for other people! You aren't the shitty one!"

84. "I just wanna be swept off my feet. Is that so much to ask?"

85. "Oh, my ankle! It must be broken!" *wink wink*

86. "These heels are peeling off my **skin**. But yes, keep complaing about your tie you whine ass." *

87. "I don't want to ruin your party."

88. "Could you just come get me?"

89. "Now I have to start counting all over again!"

90. "Do you talk to your mother with that mouth?"

91. "You are very endearing while you are half-asleep."

92. "But I want to hear you sing!"

93. "No- Mom- don't tell him I said that. Wait!" *

94. "And you wonder why you are still single."

95. "Somebodys cranky." "Somebody needs to shut up."

96. "She's hot. But she's evil."

97. "Pinky promise!"

98. "I'd rather jump out that window. But thanks." *

99. "Hello, sunshine."

100. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

BONUS:

Prompts based on things my best friend has said (changed a little bit for context)

1b. "Man, I hope this ice melts soon."

2b. "Holy SHIT the Disney World parking lot is packed."

3b. "Those tree lights are burning my retinas."

4b. "These are fun to work with." "Not to eat." "No!"

5b. "I mean, I could hit a kid with a car."

6b. "You up? I need to call you! It's not bad it's just kinda funny!"

7b. "Wow I can't imagine being that rich! How old are the kids, maybe I can date one."

8b. "The oldest I would go? 98 I think, for money purposes."

Thank you guys so much. I love you all. SEND ME THOSE ASKS!!!

[cecilspeaks]

166 - Delta

The stars tell us our future. They’re rarely correct, but yet there they are, blathering on night after night. Welcome to Night Vale.

At the foot of a sandy hill, a woman explains to her son what a flower is. She’s pointing at an orange starburst atop a squat bulbous cactus. She says: “Flowers are beautiful, aren’t they?” I cannot hear what her son says. She answers: “Because bees like beautiful things and flowers want the bees to take their pollen, that little bit of yellow powder, right down there inside, and give it to other plants, so they can grow up and be beautiful too.” There’s a long pause. Then she says: “Nature wants to make more and more beauty all the time. That’s all it wants to do. If it is not beautiful, it cannot live.” She’s upset at her son’s next question. “Humans wish to make beauty too, but not for nature,” she snaps. “They want computers and airplanes and factories, oh Benny, don’t touch.” She sighs. Then she says: “The cactus hurt you, didn’t it? The cactus knows you’re human and it does not want you to watch it, and now it has let you know that, you won’t touch it again, will you? No Benny, you won’t.”

Underneath the scant shade of a dilapidated wing of an MD-90 aircraft, a middle aged man tells another middle aged man about a time he went to New Orleans. He thought the French Quarter was too crowded and the jazz scene overrated, so he drove east along the upper neck of the Mississippi Delta to a Swapshack, where he paid a man 50 dollars to take him on a hovercraft to look at alligators. “Such majestic and hideous creatures,” the middle aged man says to the other. “You know, when I was little, I cried thinking about how I would never see a real live dinosaur. All the world had left were bones. But right there in southern Louisiana lay dozens of living dinosaurs. It’s an extraordinary world when you finally realize that all life is magic,” he says. The other middle aged man had heard the story dozens of times, but still he replies: “I hear you, I hear you.”

A young woman thinks about a job interview she never attended. She is happy without that job, yet she feels regret for what could have been. “I cannot imagine myself behind a desk making spreadsheets and memos,” she says to no one. “But I cannot imagine a 5-dimensional horse, nor the width of the void, nor the language of whales. I cannot imagine a lot of things but the pay, the pay would have been pretty good.”

Behind a blighted Palo Verde Tree, hidden between lush acacia shrubs, two teenaged boys kiss for the 50th time or so. It is brief, as one stops to look around, on alert for overbearing parents. They kiss for the 51st time or so and then laugh. Their fingers clumsily fumbling over each other, trying to decide on the perfect grip, the perfect touch. They melt like marshmallows in the flame of inexperienced joy. This moment in their lives is as pure and powerful as they have ever felt and may ever feel again.

My mind is crowded with voices, with people living their lives all day listeners. these are the stories, they are eating fruit and playing cards. They are arguing about who said what and when. They are meditating and conversing, retelling old shows and books they remember from when they had such things. A copy of Tina Fey’s memoir “Bossy Pants” was found in  a suitcase seven years ago, and everyone in the group has read it at least once. Someone mutters that they used to have a copy of Karen Russel’s “Swamplandia!”. It was in her purse when they landed here, but someone won’t own up to stealing it. another says the book might have been used to make a fire one night, because whoever made the fire might have thought the owner was done reading it, hypothetically.

It’s been several days since the voices came into my head, and at first it was new and interesting, but already I have grown tired of it. I do not know how Amelia Anna Alfaro lived her whole life with these sounds in her mind. It’s unceasing and I’ve not gotten much sleep. The teenage lovers sneak away each night to hold hands and talk big dreams underneath the moon. It’s sweet and romantic, but at 2 AM, give it a rest boys! I could try to talk back, but none of the voices can hear me. It’s like asking the rain to return to its cloud. But when I talk to Carlos, the voices go way. Thankfully I have my greatest peace when I’m with my favorite person. I can’t keep Carlos awake at all hours or have him skip work to be with me, so I have to learn to make peace with the voices, as they are noisy but permanent room mates in my brain now.

I do have news to report, but it’s mostly stuff you already know about. The high school basketball team has tryouts on Saturday. The library is doing open mic poetry nights on Tuesdays at 7, and we all know it’s a trap. Don’t do it unless you’re well armed. And the Opera House is extending its run of Verdi’s “2 Fast 2 Furious”, starring Renée Fleming, through the end of the month.

It’s hard to concentrate on reading these news stories with so much other language running through my head. Like this: there’s a guy who’s complaining about metal scraps that haven’t been cleaned, and the woman he’s talking to is explaining that they are conserving water for drinking and the guy is saying that it’s unsanitary to make dining utensils out of dirty metal, and she replies that they’re not making any more forks or spoons, they don’t need any more forks or spoons, they need knives but not for eating. What am I supposed to do with this information, it’s been going on nonstop for days? You cannot possibly understand what its�� like to listen to someone you don’t know, who you’ve never even met, who you can’t even see, ramble on and on about their boring personal life straight into your head, it’s awful. I can hear another person saying he’s found something. Good for you pal, way to find another rock or stick or lizard or whatever.

Wait. “Weeeee have founnnnnd ittt,” the voice says. I know this voice. It’s the first voice that’s been familiar to me, where do I know this voice, he is saying “first weeeeeeeee found you. You who are – no where – now weeeeeee have founnnnnnnd itt.” And other men are barking in agreement. Listeners, that voice is Doug Biondi from the asylum, and the voices around him are the agents from the National Safety and Transportation Bureau, all of whom escaped the Night Vale Asyulm two months ago. They are in nowhere, in an otherworld desert standing near a door attached to no building. Not far from a passenger set, long since rotted away. A jet that has been home to 143 passengers and crew members, one of those 143 – the pilot. Asylum warden Charles Rainier warned us of this. He had been a been a passenger on that plane, he became part of a small commune that grew into an angry cult under the leadership and telepathic influence of the pilot. Charles told us that the pilot would find those who could help him find Night Vale. Help him find the real world, and Doug Biondi knows the way back.

The pilot found Doug and Doug found the pilot. “Iii know the wayyy,” Doug Biondi says, laughing the laugh of a man whose smile is too big for his face. At the foot of a sandy hill, a mother tells her son it is time. “Stop crying, Benny. Stop crying so that there will be more flowers, more beauty.”

Underneath the scant shade of a dilapidated wing of an MD-90 air craft, two middle aged men argue over which hand made axe is sharper. At last, they agree that the one crafted from the rotor flap and held together with the hand belt is the better blade. “No you take it,” one says. “No, I insist you, I’m happy to use the smaller axe,” the other says, “because it is easier to manage what with my back spasms.”

And behind a blighted Paolo Verde Tree, hidden between lush acacia shrubs, two teenage boys kiss the way you kiss when you think it may be your last. They whisper impossible promises and raise high their rusty shovels, the spades’ tips having already been sharpened to deadly points. They race toward the gathering crowd.

A young woman who thinks often about the job interview she never attended shouts: “Nature is beauty!” “We are beauty!” replies antoher woman. They repeate these calls. “Nature is beauty! We are beauty!” And now every voice in my head is chanting the phrases, chanting and chanting and chanting, it’s too�� it’s too much!

Silence. They’re silent suddenly. My head is clear. I can think my own thoughts.

Night Vale, I’m getting word that Sheriff Sam is barring all known passages into our town. This includes roads, trails, sewer grates, even the Dog Park which is not officially an entrance to the Desert Otherworld, but you know, let’s be honest here. We’re on lockdown, Night Vale. No one enters or leaves.

Good. This is good. If the voices can reach me, they can reach any of us. In fact, if the voices can enter my mind, then the pilot and passengers of flight 18713 may well already be here, or some of them anyway. Or maybe the voices come and go. This is the first moment of silence I’ve had alone in nearly a week. Maybe the voices aren’t always there like, like radio signals as you leave a city or, or a cell phone in an elevator, maybe the voices can’t permeate us under certain conditions or maybe… Or maybe… The voices are silent because… they are listening. Maybe they’re listening to their leader, their pilot who is giving instructions on what to do next, when and where to attack.

I don’t know. But I must use my moment of clarity to tell you some news. Nope, the voices are back. A single voice is back. I know, without knowing, that it is the voice of the pilot. He says: [in a neutral tone] “Uh, hi there, this is your pilot speaking. Just wanted to let you know that nature is beauty, we are beauty. We propagate our pollen, we spread our seeds, we grow new life over old life, we cleanse the toxins of technology. We depose the human king and return natural instinct to its rightful throne. If you can hear my voice, then you are chosen. You are chosen to join all who join our nature. All who join our beauty. All who refuse will be recycled into the earth, destroyed and dispersed to fertilize new more beautiful life. All those who are beautiful are chosen. All those who are not, are a cancer, blight, infection and disease. All who are not beautiful will be cut away, amputated, so that the Earth’s wounds may finally leave, so the Earth may grow beautiful once again.

We have been found and we will return. Open the gates to freedom, end the tyranny of artifice. That’s all for now, we’ll be arriving in just a few moments, Night Vale. There is going to be some turbulence.”

[distraught] I’m sorry, listeners! I did not meant to do that, I did not want to do that! The voice of the pilot overtook me and I, oh, I need to lock myself inside the studio, I have to protect you from me, but first the weather.

[“A Prayer for the Sane” by Danny Schmidt http://dannyschmidt.com]

I brought Carlos to the studio. When I talk to Carlos, I don’t hear the voices of the passengers from 18713. I don’t hear the voices even now as I look directly at Carlos while I’m speaking. Like Charles Rainier’s fishing hole or, or Amelia Anna Alfaro’s puzzles, Carlos grounds me, lets me be wholly me.

Thank you, Carlos.

Oh, I also had Carlos bring a pair of handcuffs with him that he bought at –Target on his way to the station, and used them to shackle me to my desk. If Charles Rainier is correct, then once the pilot can speak to you, he can control you. And if that should happen, it won’t happen but if it should, then now I won’t be able to leave here and do harm to anyone else.

From my window, I can see far down the street a spiral of black smoke. There are flashes of emergency sirens. Now I can see people coming up the road. They are long-haired, sun-scorched and nearly naked, wearing not much more than flat wide-brimmed hats and short tunics fashioned from seat upholstery. These people are carrying large blades, roughly honed from scrap metal. Some have widdled down pieces of plexiglass windows into sharp points and tied them to ends of long sticks. They’re deliberately walking up the hoods of parked cars and smashing windows and caving in the roofs with their bare feet.

It is no doubt that the passengers of 18713 are here, Night Vale. If you can hear me, sty inside and lock your doors. If you can her the pilot, then do as I have done. Secure your position so securely that not even your own mind can talk you out of it. Sheriff Sam has stubbornly kept up all roadblocks in and out of town, so we have no choice but to stay. The long unmoving lines of traffic at the edges of the city are easy prey now for the 18713. The pilot offered the choice of joining or refusing, but it is not a choice, not really. He either can control you or he cannot. Those whom he cannot control will be killed at the hands of those who can.

[anxiously] Carlos? You don’t hear the pilot voice, and thus cannot be controlled. But I do, and I can. I have been controlled. We’re in trouble, Carlos. I can’t stay chained to this desk forever, can I? And if the pilot means to destroy you, he might make – me do it myself. Just promise me you’ll run. Leave me behind if that happens, OK? OK. But for now, do not let me out of these cuffs, not even if I use a safe word, which I hear is something quite a few people use in healthy fun intimate relationships.

The people of 18713 are climbing up storefronts and tearing off signs. I can see about 10 or 15 in normal street clothes in the crowd now, which means the group is growing. They are recruiting quickly.

But something else is eating at me. In the asylum, in Doug Biondi’s journal and among the myriad voices in my mind, I still have not seen nor heard Amelia Anna Alfaro, the first person to make contact with the pilot. She disappeared in 2012 and no one has heard from her since. I need to find her. Somehow, if anyone can solve this, it might be her. She was always the best at everything.

Stay tuned next for the sound of me talking to Carlos forever and ever.

Good night, Night Vale. [creepily] Gooood night.

Today’s proverb: People who live in glass houses shouldn’t hire that realtor again.

[theycallmegothboy]

1-100 >:DDDD REVENGE!!!

FELIXXXXXXXXXXXX >:(( 1. Spotify, SoundCloud, or Pandora?  -spotify  2. is your room messy or clean? -it’s pretty messy i guess  3. what color are your eyes? -blue and grey

4. do you like your name? why? -yeah it’s fine 5. what is your relationship status? -single 6. describe your personality in 3 words or less -certified intrusive thot 7. what color hair do you have? -brown and rn it’s red 8. what kind of car do you drive? color? -i dont have a car 9. where do you shop? -hot topic, goodwill, target 10. how would you describe your style? -comfy emo 11. favorite social media account -of mine, probably discord or youtube 12. what size bed do you have? -twin >:(( 13. any siblings? -i have 1.5 brothers  14. if you can live anywhere in the world where would it be? why? -probably vancouver, idk canada seems lit 15. favorite snapchat filter? -i like the one with devil horns and a tail but its cute 16. favorite makeup brand(s) -i dont wear makeup 17. how many times a week do you shower? -i used to shower every day, but i dont do anything that gets me dirty so like maybe 3 times but if i leave the house then i shower 18. favorite tv show? -stranger things 19. shoe size?  -8 or 9 20. how tall are you? -5′6 with shoes >:(( 21. sandals or sneakers? -sneakers wtf 22. do you go to the gym? -lol no 23. describe your dream date -making some pie or something together and then eating the pie and then sitting on some rooftop looking at stars 24. how much money do you have in your wallet at the moment? -quite a bit actually but i’m saving up for a phone lol so soon it will be like maybe 10 dollars lmao 25. what color socks are you wearing? -not wearing socks but the ones i had earlier were white (ankle length) 26. how many pillows do you sleep with? -just one but it sucks 27. do you have a job? what do you do? -NO BUT IM TRYING TO GET A JOB BUT THE FUCKIN PEOPLE THERE ARE GHOSTING ME AND WONT REPLY TO MY EMAILS SO LIKE SBJHBJS 28. how many friends do you have? -like 4 lmao 29. whats the worst thing you have ever done? -idk nothing super bad but i do a lot of small shit that makes me feel guilty when i realize what i did 30. whats your favorite candle scent? -juniper rosewood 31. 3 favorite boy names -leo, clay, charlie 32. 3 favorite girl names -ivy, uh... idk thats all ive got 33. favorite actor? -no clue 34. favorite actress? -no clue 35. who is your celebrity crush? -not a celeb but i’d smash danny phantom 36. favorite movie? -nightmare before christmas or edward scissorhands 37. do you read a lot? whats your favorite book? -no, but my fav book is probably the prince and the pauper? idk 38. money or brains? -CASH MONEYYYY jk probably brains but if your entire personality is being “smart” like fuck off lmao   39. do you have a nickname? what is it? - a bunch of people call me son (see #49, #100), some call me rat, dumdum, goth boy

40.how many times have you been to the hospital? -just once i think when i was birthed. i also went once with my brother cause he kicked some scissors i left out on the floor and it sliced his toe the fuck open and he needed stitches and i watched him get the stitches and almost passed out :/ 41. top 10 favorite songs -please dont make me do this i dont have it in me 42. do you take any medications daily? -yea i take 20mg of vyvanse but i need to get it raised to 30 cause 20 is Not Enough 43. what is your skin type? (oily, dry, etc) -i got some dry fuckin skin yall dont even know 44. what is your biggest fear?  -it depends. the dark is a pretty constant one though 45. how many kids do you want? -like 2 or 3 eventually 46. whats your go to hair style? -in my face, looking stupid 47. what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc)  -it’s pretty small 48. who is your role model? -i dont fuckin know lmao  49. what was the last compliment you received? - “i belive in you, my son, you’re an amazing human being“ (same friend mentioned in #100, not actually a parent of mine) 50. what was the last text you sent? -”no it’s a raccoon“ YOU GET NO CONTEXT LMAO 51. how old were you when you found out santa wasn’t real? -i dont think i ever hardcore believed in him, maybe i did though i remember sleeping under the tree one christmas eve waiting for him but i was like “oh yeah that makes sense“ i guess 52. what is your dream car?  -i honestly dont give a shit as long as it actually fucking works 53. opinion on smoking? -cigarettes? fuck no that’s nastyyy. weed? that’s fine i guess but wait till you’re like 18.  54. do you go to college? -no. am sophomore n highschool 55. what is your dream job?  -musician/palentologist 56. would you rather live in rural areas or the suburbs?  -fuck the suburbs lmao, but also im tired of rural, so like.. semi urban?? 57. do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels?  -no but i take the little soaps >:)) 58. do you have freckles?  -yes 59. do you smile for pictures? -awkwardly, yes 60. how many pictures do you have on your phone?  -dont have a phone but i have like 12 on my computer currently. 4 are of me, the rest are of my cat or random shit 61. have you ever peed in the woods?  -yes 62. do you still watch cartoons?  -cartoons these days kinda suck but like if they were good fuck yeah i would like gravity falls can come hang yknow? 63. do you prefer chicken nuggets from Wendy’s or McDonalds? -i had nuggets from mcdonalds today so i guess them? i dont really care 64. Favorite dipping sauce?  -i got sweet and sour but i dont like it that much. that schezuan sauce was great 65. what do you wear to bed?  -wouldnt you like to know? ;))  66. have you ever won a spelling bee?  -NO ive only been in two. the first one i misspelled the word “turmoil“ cause i had never heard it before and the second one i spelled the word “owed“ as “ode“ cause i was thinking like ode to joy and then i felt like a big Fool afterwards :(( 67. what are your hobbies? -lol what hobbies 68. can you draw?  -i am physically able to draw, but not well, no 69 (haha). do you play an instrument? -yeah i play a few 70. what was the last concert you saw?  -i saw Chicago in either georgia or tennessee i cant remember in like 2016 71. tea or coffee? -hot coffee, iced tea. NOT the other way around. (i love both though) 72. Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts? -starbucks 73. do you want to get married? -sure why not 74. what is your crush’s first and last initial? -dont have a crush 75. are you going to change your last name when you get married?  -idk maybe 76. what color looks best on you?  -i dont know but i wear black a lot and that’s pretty dope 77. do you miss anyone right now? -yeah  78. do you sleep with your door open or closed? -closed 79. do you believe in ghosts? -on the fence. not 100% “oh my god look at these gHoSt oRbS i need to sage my house!!!“ but i accept that there’s some things i wont understand about the world and that i have no answers to. i wouldnt be surprised if there are, and i wouldnt be surprised if there aren’t. 80. what is your biggest pet peeve? -whatever my adhd decides i viscerally hate with a firey passion right at that moment  81. last person you called -my brother (the 1 of the 1.5 from #13 and the one who sliced his toe in #40) 82. favorite ice cream flavor?  -chocolate is dope 83. regular oreos or golden oreos?  -regular double stuff. if you say golden, mint, peppermint, or thin oreos i’m gonna have to euthanize you, i dont make the rules.  84. chocolate or rainbow sprinkles? -rainbow cause it’s prettier  85. what shirt are you wearing?  -queen shirt from hot topic 86. what is your phone background? -i didnt get a phone between question 60 and now but my computer one is some mountains with the moon in the background 87. are you outgoing or shy? -really depends on who i’m around 88. do you like it when people play with your hair? -YES FUCK AAAAAAA (this girl played with my hair literally once in middle school and i was like oh shit and i had a crush on her until the end of middle school true story,,, so ashley if you’re out there-) 89. do you like your neighbors? -to the left they’re fine and their dog is nice but idk what happened to the horses so that’s sus but that’s where our cat came from so they can hang  guess, behind me they’re fine but their boys are loud, to the right they’re fine, and even further to the right are the dope neighbors and waaaaaaaaaay far to the right is a llama and he’s dope as hell 90. do you wash your face? at night? in the morning? -whenever the fuck i remember to/have the energy 91. have you ever been high?  -i dont think so but i wouldnt put it past myself 92. have you ever been drunk?  -not that i can remember, no 93. last thing you ate?  -sloppy joe from a can 94. favorite lyrics right now -”not gonna waste my life, cause i’ve been fucked up“ 95. summer or winter?  -fall. fuck you 96. day or night?  -night but i like it when it’s actually night and it doesnt get dark at like 4 fucking pm cause that makes me depressed 97. dark, milk, or white chocolate? -dark is good, milk is fine, white is only suitable for fancy stripes on chocolate covered strawberries 98. favorite month?  -i vibe with september 99. what is your zodiac sign -sagittarius (was almost a scorpio but i was holding out >:))) 100. who was the last person you cried in front of?  -in person, my mom like 6 months ago, on a discord call, my friend (i love you by the way, you’re the best,,, i dont think he has tumblr but im just putting it out there) like a month or so ago. i hate crying in front of people, i turn into such a hyperventilating snot monster which is not suitable for human gaze and thats the real tea :/

felix this took like 2 hours of my life i will never get back i hate you and i hope you’re happy with what you’ve done <3 <3

also anyone who wants to stalk me, enjoy this information that im handing to you on a silver platter :)) <3

[zonecassette]

Awful pictures, but I drove to Florida (stopping in DC and Raleigh along the way) for Fest. Fest is pretty corny at this point, and I don't know 95% of bands playing, but it's always so nice seeing *so* many of my friends, and I love Gainesville so much, and Florida so much, but anyways

These are the records I grabbed on this trip (and three from the mail). Didn't think I got that many, and then I laid them out lol

Jeff Rosenstock - Thanks, Sorry! - a 3xLP live album. He said this was getting mailed out in december, to get home and see it is very surprising. I was at two of these shows, they were lots of fun, great live album. So happy KKKHiway is on here. It’s shocking the.....i don’t wanna say quality, but the tightness of his solo live stuff to btmi!’s live stuff. Bomb were a mess which is why it was so fun. Jeff shows are also fun, but god damn they can actually play. Seen them over 20 times and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a mistake? Maybe. Anyways this is a sick release

Steve Reich - Four Organs/Piano Phases - never actually heard this before? But it was a must cop when I saw it

Missouri Folk Songs Sung By Loman D. Cansler - also never heard this before, but Folkways is always quality. Asked my old manager to put it on, and I was sold from the first 10 seconds. I love old folk/country shit

Have a Nice Life - Sea of Worry - this also came in the mail, gonna listen to the digital on my commute tomorrow :)

Sunn O))) - Pyroclasts - this is maybe better than Life Metal? Way more ambient/droney than doom droney but hot damn it’s good shit

Fugazi - Red Medicine - the problem with things that are continually in print is that I never have any sense of urgency to buy them, so I just don’t. I have half of Fugazi’s discography, but I can always get the other half, so I always choose other records over this or Repeater. But I finally felt that enough was enough and I was very stupid to not own this. also I definitely need to pick up Repeater.

Post Teens - Exitos - Post Teens are one of my favorite Gainesville bands. Just straight, blazing punk shit. Ramones on speed and drenched in distortion. They’re always a highlight of Fest, and I got *so* stoked when they said they actually had a discography LP available (even though I already own most of what was on it). This combines two 7″s, three splits, and an “unreleased” recording, which was on the tape pictured, so not exactly unreleased. Anyways they’re the best.

PeZ - World Within Skin - super cool newish band outta Gainesville. Noisy/post punky hardcore. Members of Frameworks and The Caution Children, but they don’t sound like either of those bands. Kinda hard to grasp, which is why it’s so fun.

Electric Chair - Performative Justice 7″ - top 5 hardcore release of the year. I have nothing to add about this other than they’re from Olympia and this shit rips. ELECTRIC CHAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!

Loose Nukes - Behind the Screen 7″ - also top 5 hardcore release of the year. “Makes me feel like I’m surfing on an ICBM” was a comment on youtube, and that perfectly sums it up. Members of Dark Thoughts and Machine Gun and a lot more.

V/A - Eucalyptus 2x7″ - Emo comp from the 90s off Tree Records. Dude who ran Tree now runs Numero. I love that fact. This got Indian Summer, Current, Allure, Shroomunion, Boilermaker, Embassy, and Julia. I will be fully transparent and say that I already own this, got this for like a dollar, and will probably try and flip it. If any of you goons want it lemme know lol, I’ll sell it for 10 plus shipping (was gonna do 15 on discogs)

Hairlong N Freeky - Hairlong N Freeky 7″ - Mark Winter and Cody Phifer from CCTV making fun lofi seemingly-nonsensical “new wave” music. Very dancey and good

Lil Nas X - Old Town Road 7″ - it’s like 4 bucks on his website why WOULDN’T i buy this?

-a very good mixtape I found with Moss Icon, Crossed Out, Indian Summer, and a bunch more

-that Post Teens tape i mentioned before

-Vermin - Peace EP - cool, gritty midtempo hc from Gainesville. Did you know I love Gainesville? Did you know I really miss it? RIP Vermin

[bobbystompy]

68 Quotes I Enjoyed From 2019

Below are my favorite quotes from 2019. Though most occurred throughout the year, some took place before but were encountered during.

1) “I don’t bitch about Millenials.

John Entwistle once complained that he didn’t understand rap. Pete Townsend said, ‘It’s not our job to understand it. It’s our job to get the fuck out of the way.’

New generations come of age. The older generation’s job is to shut up and adapt.” - @danagould

2) “I can’t do drugs with you until we kiss.”

3) “If you pay me $50 I'll show up to your funeral but stand really far away, holding a black umbrella regardless of the weather, so that people think you died with a dark and interesting secret.” - @DanaSchwartzzz

4) “A human being is a dangerous thing to let loose in a room with itself, when it cannot think.” - Roger Ebert

5) “There are no bad bourbons, only better bourbons.” - Dave Hernandez

6) “You can’t put a dollar in a kimono.”

7) “This is how it was.” - rampant takeaway from watching ‘Superbad’ several years after its release

8) “What if I had been born fifty years before you in a house on the street where you lived / Maybe I’d be outside as you passed on your bike / Would I know? / And in a wide sea of eyes, I see one pair that I recognize” - Ben Folds, ‘The Luckiest’

9) “Learn the rules so you can break them.”

10) “Nobody makes chili for two.” - Stacy Massey

11) “‘Best city in the world,’ I mutter to myself, as i adjust my ‘driving blanket’.” - Chicago resident Deanna Belos, during the 2019 Polar Vortex

12) “Dude, no one’s ever got arrested for listening to Counting Crows.” - Ricky O’Donnell, justifying late night music volume at his party

13) Bill Belichick: We’re going to have fun tonight. Rob Gronkowski: Yes we are. We deserve it. Belichick: You’re damn right. Gronk: I haven’t stepped out in like eight months. I gotta step out tonight. Belichick: I’m with you, man. I’m even going to step out. Gronk: Oh, I like it!

A Super Bowl winning exchange.

14) Center David Andrews thanked Bill Belichick for giving him "a shot".

Belichick disagreed with it.

Andrews: Thank you for giving me a shot. Belichick: A shot? I didn't give you shit. You earned it! I don't give anything.

Another Super Bowl winning exchange.

15) “We elected one of the very worst living human beings to be President, and it's exhausting. Each and every day, it's an exhausting slog, just to exist in a world where that's true.” - Michael Schur

16) “Some of y’all always picked Odd Job when you played Goldeneye and it shows” - @thedad

17) “Any app is a dating app if you try hard enough.” - Z.W. Martin (though he says it’s lifted)

18) "Once you're as woke as I am, you learn to feel bad all the time.”

19) “Everything’s a balance beam when you’re 90.” - John Dingell

20) [I wake up in a world where The Beatles never existed]

Me: Check out this song I just wrote

[I begin playing “Ob La Di Ob La Da” without having first built up years of goodwill]

Crowd of people: Wow, this sucks ass

-- @seanoneal

21) “People change people.” - Corey Matthews, Girl Meets World

22) “The easiest thing to do on earth is not write.” - William Goldman

23) “Dan could be like a difficult uncle. I didn’t love his fire-breathing conservative politics. I didn’t love the transformation that came over his novels. In Semi-Tough, he created two benighted Texas jocks and laid their prejudices bare. He was declaring himself a member of the Mark Twain coaching tree. In later books, Dan seemed to be trying to prove he could still tell a racist joke. He insisted that his memoir—the last truly immaculate piece of writing he delivered—include a tirade against political correctness. When his editor said people might be offended, Dan said, ‘Fuck people.’

There are certain writers whose style you pilfer. Certain writers whose moral fiber you try to inherit. For me, Dan represented a third category: a writer whose aura you replicate—or, failing that, try to stand in for a while.” - Bryan Curtis, on Dan Jenkins

24) “Never marry anything. Never choose. Even in love, it's better to be chosen.” - La Dolce Vita

25) “An uncluttered, uncomplicated happy ending might sound wonderful, but it’s hardly ever satisfying. Because the value of great stories lies in the tension between desire and need, between the yearning for the ideal, and the unshakable conviction that ideals don’t really exist, at least not the way we want them to. A great story should hurt a little when it leaves us. There should be some hope, but that hope should remain somewhere just an inch beyond our fingers, because that’s the truth. Even if you had all the perfect moments in the world, you’d still be reaching.” - Zach Handlen, on the Futurama series finale

26) “You can’t see him because he has sunglasses on.” - Alissa Levy

27) “The cinema is the greatest art form ever conceived for generating emotions in its audience. That's what it does best. (If you argue instead for dance or music, drama or painting, I will reply that the cinema incorporates all of these arts).” - Roger Ebert

28) “‘Are you gonna let politics ruin a friendship?’ 

Yes tf I am

People talk about politics as if it’s this isolated, abstract concept that only matters at election time. Somebody’s politics is their world view. It’s whether they think certain human beings deserve rights. It’s how they think the world should be. And if somebody thinks that the world should be colder, meaner, less accepting and downright hostile to people that are different to them, then sure as fuck is the friendship over.”

29) “Can the Supreme Court get me mushrooms?” - J-Papp

30) “Any song under two minutes already has a head start on its way into my heart. Just scream at me and then leave me.” - Drew Magary

31) “Long neck cold beers never broke my heart.” - Clemson Tom

32) “I’d just like to point out that the last spoken words of Game of Thrones were: 

‘I once brought a jackass and a honeycomb into a brothel.’”

- @Authoroux

33) “Just once before I die, I want to toss my keys to someone and tell them ‘Bring the car around’.” - Mike Skully

34) “For all the weight they're given, last words are usually as significant as first words.” - Grand Maester Pycelle, Game of Thrones

35) “The best remedy for unrequited love is a trip around the world.” - Cheers

36) [on switching from a hotel to a motel]

Manny: I don't like the sound of that. A lot of amenities disappear when an H turns into an M. Jay: Hey when I met you, you were eating cereal out of a bucket.

-- Modern Family

37) “You and Lindsey don’t want to be ‘estranged’. Estranged is the relationship we want to have with our mothers.” - MegFil

38) “Cigarettes are undefeated.”

39) “My toes are like my fingers on my feet. I can pick stuff up with them.” - Tracy Cunningham

40) “Republicans govern without shame, Democrats shame without governing.” - Bill Maher

41) Sam: I don’t understand the vagaries of the Internet Josiah: Post often, without thought, and you’ll either get cancelled or cancel someone else.

-- Blink-155

42) “Hang a lantern on your problems.”

43) “What a weird web we weave.” - The Situation, The Jersey Shore: Family Vacation

44) “Let the ocean worry about being blue.” - Alabama Shakes, ‘Hang Loose’

45) “Honesty without tact is cruelty.” - Shelley Rokos

46) “My whole life is the wrong porn link.”

47) “One parent can take care of 10 kids, but 10 kids cannot take care of one parent.” - Joe Gestetner, via “an old Yiddish saying”

48) “There are no heroes in the room.” - Classics of Love, ‘Gun Show’

49) “If I am a little dismissive, it's only because of my harrowing backstory.” - Mitchell, Modern Family (on why he doesn't like sports)

50) “Every time I’m wearing black, I meet a dog.” - Tracy Cunningham

51) “Shower sex? Why would I fuck in my crying chamber” - @chridollarsign

52) “My theory about quarterbacks, having written about some of them, is you either have to believe in god or think you are a god.” - Mina Kimes

53) “The contradictions of capitalism always manifest in our lyrics if you look deeply.” - Blake Schwarzenbach of Jawbreaker, Riot Fest 2019

54) “Got a ‘hang loose’ from the weakside bartender.”

55) “It’s Jennifer’s birthday always.” - Eric Hutchinson 

56) “I can’t think of a less relevant artist in 2019 than Kanye West. A Jesus freak in a MAGA hat. Yeah, congrats dude -- you’re every grandma who watches ‘Young Sheldon’ and mails checks to Joel Osteen now.” - Dan Ozzi

57) “The past and future are in the mind. I’m in the now.” - Tom Brady, via someone else

58) “Sometimes you walk around boring places and you feel like the most exciting thing in it.” - Drew Magary

59) “Sitting is the new smoking.” - Modern Family

60) “I'll straight up fight folks at a book club and discuss books at a fight club I really don't give a shit anymore.” - George Wallace

61) “Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.” - Rose Garvey via wine country

62) “It’s all ‘ok boomer’ until you need someone who can drive stick shift.” - @OrdinaryAlso

63) “He likes the result of the math.” - Dad, talking about my worst subject frustrating during the process but satisfying in the end

64) Stepmom: Do you want a Bears urn or Alabama urn? Dad: Ask me after they play Auburn.

65) “A cold body carries a warm heart.” - Stefanos Tsitsipas’ Instagram, after his Iceland sabbatical

66) [preparing a dish called the Sandwich of Justice with his friend’s recipe]

"The fun thing about it is when you give it to someone, you can say 'Justice is served.’ That's, uh, Ryan's line. I built my whole life on the backs of my friends." - You Suck At Cooking

67) “Usually three people can keep a secret only when two of them are dead.” - The Irishman

68) “An artist can't control who consumes their content any more than a chemist can control how their chemicals are used once they're created.” - Brian Crooks

[nancypullen]

It’s Still Just May

I’m melting.  Holy cow, it’s in the 90′s and the sun is fierce, and it’s only May - we’ve barely dipped our toes into summer.  Today I pulled about half the weeds that I needed to pull and decided that I’d head for the a/c before I burst into flames.  This summer may be a humdinger.  Miss Molly loves this weather and spends her days moving room to room following the sun.  Wherever there’s a sunbeam, you’ll find her napping.

Phoebe can be found pretty much anywhere that she shouldn’t be.

Turns out, I can probably be found where I shouldn’t be as well. I have to drive right past the Home Depot garden center when leaving water aerobics.  That means that I have to pass it three times a week.  So if I only go in once a week, I’m doing pretty good, right?  Last week I stopped in to get a spray bottle of Neem oil because bugs are making a buffet out of my garden.  I’m willing to share, but they can’t have everything!  Anyway, I grabbed my bottle and then took a cruise over to the orphan and misfit section and lo and behold there was a sad, droopy Endless Summer hydrangea.  I love hydrangeas and Endless Summer just happens to be my favorite.  Guess who came home with me?

Those little Angelonia flowers tucked in beside her were just a dollar a pot so it would have been crazy not to buy them too.  At least that’s what I told myself.  They all came home and went right in the ground and had a long drink.  They’re looking pretty fabulous and I’m hoping that I haven’t set myself up for heartache with that hydrangea.   I’ll keep you posted.  

In other flower news, the front yard smells divine because the Magnolia tree is blooming like crazy.  When I sit on the porch and listen to the birds sing the fragrance drifts over and it’s sweet and summery.

When I’m not swimming, planting, buying more stuff to plant, or porch sittin’ - you’ll find me at my desk working with my dead people.  Sometimes I find a person and I just know that they have something funny to say, but I have to wait and figure out what it is. I mean, this lady obviously has a story.

Do I make a joke about trying to give a cat a bath?  Do I pretend that she’s a retired pirate who traded in her parrot?  Or do I stick with a simple, “You should see the other guy”...I’ll wait and it’ll come to me.

These two are exercising, but if I color those dumbbells to look like maracas the story changes, right?  A simple “Cha Cha Cha” would do.

Just waiting for them to tell me what to say.  I’m like a medium but all I get are one-liners.

And that’s about all that’s happening here on the Pullen spread.  Matt is flying in from Minneapolis on the 7th of June and I’m counting down the days.  He’ll be here about a week and then we’ll hop in the car and drive down to Florida to meet Tyler, Jamie, and the world’s cutest baby.  Those three are flying in from D.C. and we’ll all converge at my mom’s house.  Oh my, it’s going to be a crazy, funny, wonderful time.  The mister will be off at a client site but will probably fly in for the tail end of everything and then drive home with me and Matt.  My poor mother, we’re coming at her from all directions.   She may make a run for it. It’s 4:30 and I probably should fill the hummingbird feeders and water a few spots in the gardens before making dinner and then calling it  a day.  If you hear of a woman bursting into flames in Tennessee, just remember that I loved you all.  I suppose if I turn the hose on myself every few minutes I’ll survive.

XOXOXO  

[survivorgalaxysedge]

Episode 4 | Space Cadet Blasting Off Again - Jessie

We swapped. And what a wild swap it is. I want from the Andro Tribe to the Circi Tribe. And so did Jonathan, Ari and Zoe. Four of us stuck together on a tribe of 5. We also have Ali with us. I’m worried Ali has an idol so I just don’t want us to lose at all. Let’s keep the good vibes flowing. 

AND NOW IM AM ON CALL WITH JONATHAN AND HE'S TELLING ME ABOUT THE EXACT PLACE I JUST WENT AND THE EXACT RIDDLE I DID LIKE "SOMEONE ALREADY GOT THERE" HELLLLPPPPPPPPP honestly this is what he gets for going off script! i had the room search under control and he was supposed to be in the hallway so it's not my fault he found my mess!

I encountered an alien in the idol search! I sang them a song and viola! I have a special power. I have the ability to kidnap someone from another tribe, for a full round of the game. They compete in the challenge with us. They'll attend tribal council if we go, but can't be voted out. Kind of a neat little power. It has to be used before merge. So I guess we'll see what happens. If we started with 18, swapped at 15, I imagine that merge will be at 11. I've got a few tribals to figure out when/how to use this power, if I even decide to use it at all. Man, I am loaded. Hidden Immunity Idol and this now. On a DISGUSTING note, someone used a power on me to destroy 10 of my fuel. Thankfully it was only 10 and not a whole lot of it. 

I’m actually so annoyed Why the heck would you say “we should throw the challenge .” Like legit why. This is my favourite challenge and I’m not throwing . I get that Jacob hasn’t said a lot but seriously throwing a challenge to get rid of someone who seems kinda new is so stupid . I’m actually so annoyed rn so I’m typing my thoughts so I don’t yell at the person who said they don’t wanna take the time and edit because we are losing anyways . You know what maybe if you didn’t have such a negative attitude about the situation we could turn out a badass video . Did you ever think maybe the other tribe would be down right awful and we could pull out a win ? I’m so tired of my tribe constantly losing . Anyways updated thoughts or whatever because we had a tribe swap Jacob: said creative challenges aren’t his thing . Trying to talk to him more Cindi : we haven’t spoke I don’t think she likes me from our last game though which is fine I guess? Nathan : Original tribe loyalty I guess ? Jay: Jays pretty cool. Okay that’s it I just needed to vent so that’s why it’s confessional form I also still have my idol so flex I guess ? Idk that’s sounds kinda cringe This is Jessie the space cadet blasting off again 

I AM SWAP FUCKED

I SWEAR TO GOD MY GAME ENDS WITH THESE HOES

Keegan is going home

Fourth straight immunity win! This game is wild. I’ve never done so well before! And now I’ve got another 6 fuel, which is a total of 16 fuel from reward wins. With my hidden immunity idol, and my steal a player advantage, I feel unstoppable. But, things can change at a moments notice so I’m not going to stand on my high horse, I’m going to remain realistic. I don’t have any alliance chats, the only person who has straight up said they want to work with me is Jay who is now going to tribal. It’s almost a bad thing not attending tribal so many times, because I have nothing to test or prove loyalty. Who knows what will happen moving forward. 

https://youtu.be/dm7Kta2n7hs

Well we just lost the challenge. Not that I'm surprised, we pretty much lost it when we didn't communicate for a whole day. I tried to do my part and get people discussing but once it was clear this wasn't gonna be a win for us, I just used it for strategy. I wanted to do my best despite the circumstances to prove that this tribe needs me since I'm active and good in challenges. And I think it worked! The judges shouted me out twice for my part in the video (even tho it kinda sucked, but I guess my white boy dancing was good in comparison). But anyways, I do like this tribe and I'm sad we lost, but I have a little theory on why some people didn't try so hard. It was discussed before the challenge even came out that we wanted Jacob out. How this happened was Nathan approached me as soon as we got onto the new tribe and we called and had a good talk on how we felt about the game. Turns out that the queen herself, Jessie Flynn, advocated for me as an ally to Nathan before we even swapped. And us both, and Jessie, all felt good about Cindi too. And ever since then, Nathan's been in my DMs talking about voting for Jacob. So overall I think I landed myself in a pretty sweet spot on this disaster of a tribe and hopefully we can get our shit together for the next challenge, cause things won't be so clear cut next time.

https://youtu.be/dm7Kta2n7hs

WE WON. THANK *GOD.* after flying across the country yesterday and dealing with several minor life crises, i literally spent the ENTIRETY of today working on that video - meaning from when i woke up at 10 to fifteen minutes before when it was due - and also spent seven whole dollars at the dollar tree for props & costumes soooooo if we had not won i would've been quite embarrassed. i was nervous about the editing part, as i've not ever actually put together a music video challenge, just weird silly videos like me as zac efron.... but it turned out okay! i'm not 100% satisfied with my work (i wanted to put more transition effects & it needed more variety / staging to make it less repetitive) but hey it was a thousand miles above the other teams' submissions so i will take it!!! and i never have to listen to space jam again!! anyway, i guess this means another boring day around camp. winning reward got me two more adventure missions, which i used to mostly complete the outside portion of the quest and jonathan is i think gonna finish it off for us tonight. i am hoping/assuming he'll get whatever is there since it's been literally only 48 hours since this started and the door keypad had five zillion combos, and that'd mean that's the last thing in this adventure probably? oh wait nvm we still have a shit ton of stuff to check in the hallway i should do that next. but yeah so that'll be good and i hope it is an advantage or a disadvantage that he won't play on me LOL. if i wake up and all my fuel is destroyed.... i know where you've been jonny! not much else to report right now. it sounds like ali's doing a good job of getting himself in the good graces of zoe and jonathan, which is the most ideal scenario for me so we can say bye-bye keegan. i was a bit worried that if we lost this challenge i wouldn't have a plausible reason to argue to jonathan for keeping ali - or actually, more likely, i think he would have wanted to vote zoe? she hasn't been around as much and he did express concern on saturday about whether she's doing okay. luckily though, this W has bought me a few more days to work on getting the people i like to like each other.

https://youtu.be/F4_Sylzyxyw

UGH UGH UGH I GOT TRIBE FUCKEDDDDDDD IM WITH MJ WHO I JUST SLASHED THE VOTE OF AND LIED TO AND THE OTHER 3 ARE FROM THE SAME TRIBE. GOD DAMN IT. UGH but on the other hand we won immunity and it'll give me time to get to know my other tribe mates. I just hope this isnt a "tribe strong" battle in this game. I hope everyone are free agents

woo! ari and i are together in the swap as well as keegan and jonathan, and ali wound up with us as well on the new circi tribe. we won the music video challenge so the streak continues. i’m very tired!

so the tribe swap went pretty much the best it possibly could, as i got swapped majority with the two members of my tribe i talked to the most. we won immunity so i'm chilling for another week. unfortunately, mj and silver seem to have no interest in talking to me. both of them left me on read after i initiated conversation. so. sits.

So despite the easy seeming vote, I'm still gonna be nervous until the votes get read. These players are no joke, especially knowing that Alex was completely blindsided by Nathan and Jessie. I'm staying positive because I think it's like, a 90% chance I'm in the clear, but you really don't know until you know LOL. I'm just trying to set up my position on this tribe and for the future. I've gone to Cindi, Jessie, and Nathan individually and reassured them that I'm with them for the long haul. And for now I mean it, but if any of them get too dangerous then ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ sorry not sorry~ looking specifically at you Nathan 👀

nothing rlly to say tbh happy we swapped!!!!! and happy we won!!!!!! happy to be here with jules. havent really talked much since swapping honestly but i think i'd like to work with jules and asya and somehow get silver tf up outta here when we get the chance!!!!!

https://youtu.be/kt66vebpU4k

https://youtu.be/t5x52CJdhjI

TRIBAL AGAIN. I'm so nervous. I'm the only one from Circi so that's an easy swap screwed if you ask me. But I hope I'm ok. I think I've made a good bond with Jay Nathan and jessie and they all say we're voting for Cindi so fingers crossed it's not all an elaborate ruse on me

First tribal should be a unanimous vote. I told Nathan if he voted me out I'd block him and our 50 day snap streak would be toast and, like, tbh I think that would crush him. Jay and I want to work together. The only one who might've been sketched out is Jessie but she doesn't have the numbers. It feels insane to be this not paranoid before tribal when I know Jacob is pushing my name...but also I literally don't think that he could get me out?? Like, Nathan and I were/are a dynamic duo so I do not know how he would flip. Jay flipping makes zero sense. The ONLY people this would benefit or be a neutral for is Jessie and Jacob. The only way I go is if Nathan and Jay are two of the dumbest players on the planet.

Tribals in an hour we lost Big sad energy I guess my hearts really going to supernova 

[daynamartinez22]

Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 314

Click on the video above to watch Episode 314 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts where I plug in my headphones to make them work. No start coughing man who’s going downhill quickly. Chris, take over.

Man Down. Google got them. Yeah. All right, I’m back. I just had to toss that real quick before. I totally lost it there and started blowing people’s eardrums out, man. All right, well welcome everybody to the bumpiest Hump Day hangout start in a while. This is Episode 314. Today is the 18th of November 2020. And this is the one to where Hernan screams at us to let him in. So hopefully he’ll be joining us. before too long. We do have some announcements to get into, before we start answering questions, and I am just pulling up the page looks like we have got a lot of questions today. So try to keep this short and get into a bar real quick and say hi to everybody. And then answer the questions after the announcement. So Marco, you’re wearing a different shirt man, you’re looking You’re looking good today, what’s what’s going on,

I have to break up my vintage shirts once in a while man, you got to keep them guessing gotta keep them guessing I’m in the tropics, I’m going to tropical moment. Here we are, you know, it’s still my Fortress of Solitude I am as I always say where I choose to be not where I have to be. And I do what I want to do not what I have to do. So it’s a really good place to be and wake up every morning understanding what where my portfolio is. And how I’m going to get to being able to break it down so that it’s a it’s also a process where the process guys, right. And we build processes and systems as opposed to the my mind as I start explaining. And as I start expanding, since the inception of the powerful idea, it’s now a process of getting to the point where you want to be whatever that is. I don’t let me define it for you. Like I’m gonna call CT Fletcher fucking possible. Don’t let somebody define your impossible. You decide what it is you’re going to do you break it down so that you can get there if it’s a huge job, okay, I want I want a billion dollars. I’ll give you an example. Well, the only way to make a billion dollars is $1 at a time, if you start out, I’m going to make a billion dollars that nobody in this world is going to pay you a billion dollars. Unless you come up with the ultimate, another Amazon, right? Another way to create that. Nobody’s going to give that to you. But you start building on it you make 100 bucks, you make 1000 you make 100,000 however it is that you’re going to get it. But if you start out with that goal of a billion it’s not a goal. It’s an idea. It’s a dream. It’s a wish it’s young. Maybe someday I could put a you’ll never do shit. Because it’s too big. But if you break it down and start working, and you do the do people don’t take that the right way. Don’t do Oh, that’s funny, and it rhymes and and Mountain Dew and all that crap, right? retro and all that shit. No. Fucking mindset. When you wake up every morning you do not hear here it is you do what you have to do. Because that’s what you want to do. you twist it. Okay, I have to do but I enjoy it. Because it’s part of what I want to do. Yeah, I got to do I have to get up in the morning. We all have to get up. But choose to stay in bed. I can say but I’ll have to get up. I got kids. You know how that goes, man. People. It’s a lot of it is common sense. But like, Gordon Ramsay said, I can’t teach that. That’s common sense. It’s one of his gifts, right? I can’t teach that. Common Sense. Guys, a lot of this is just common sense. You can’t make a billion until you make that first dollar. I’ll leave it at that.

Fair enough. Yeah. Don’t be an idiot sandwich. One step at a time. $1 at a time. Oh, man.

Well, Bradley, how you doing? Man?

We got you on video. So I guess the technical hurdles are over with.

Yeah, what a mess that is every week.

I like it adds a little bit of spice to the start. never know what’s gonna happen.

Yeah, I’m good. Happy. Happy to be here. I’ve been super busy this week. And I plan on being super busy for the next several weeks.

So fair enough. And I’ve been working with a small group right from the mat and not just the mastermind, but some people from hopefully live right doing some real estate stuff.

Yeah, in our mastermind. You know, we have little mini mastermind groups. They’re like accountability groups, and I’ve formed one. Just recently we just had our first meeting on Monday, where we just get together for now. Six or seven of us and talk about it’s for anybody that’s real, it’s marketing in or for real estate, whether for their own business or for client work, whatever doesn’t matter. And, yeah, it’s pretty good because, as we’ve talked about many times, you know, that’s how we got together and Semantic Mastery, my partners and I, from basically a weekly accountability group that we that I informed way back in, I think, 2012, or something like that. And that’s how we all came together. And so I know there’s always opportunity, things like that can happen in little in mastermind groups. And so there’s the value of joining a larger mastermind like what the semantic mastery mastermind is, but then it’s also benefits to get in the smaller mini masterminds because it’s a much more intimate setting where a lot of ideas can exchange and ideas can flourish. You know what I mean? And so that’s, I think, I think there’s, there’s always opportunity in those small mastermind groups like that, so I’m hoping that something will come of ours as well.

Nice. All right. Hernan didn’t want to join us, but I guess he decided to show up. So what’s up, man?

Good, man. I mean, it was cold outside. So thank you guys for letting me and I appreciate that. You know, it’s raining was boring. So it wasn’t the door like, open now. Yeah. Now it’s good, man. It’s good to be here. I’m really excited for what’s happening, you know, the future of Semantic Mastery. We have some good stuff cooking. So I’m really excited for for what’s coming up for Semantic Mastery for mgib. So stay tuned. We’re supposed to have a guest today. That’s gonna be next week as well. So that’s gonna be pretty awesome. And you know, I’m excited. Overall. Thank you guys for joining.

Yeah, Chris. How you doing, man? Doing good here.

You can put up my Christmas tree already here.

It’s awesome. I like it. That’s your scene that speaks to my heart. That’s the right size, the right amount of cleanup involved.

That’s, like, straight out of the box, man. Like perfect. No work.

Good deal. Yeah, adolescent that’s doing good development. So in full progress. So like exciting times are coming.

Nice. Let’s see. And I just want to share. So I posted I know Bradley saw it. We talked about video all the time, we talked about you know, using video onboarding, we have an entire course Bradley put together on that if you haven’t seen it, just go look up video Legion system. But I shared something because I had to log into bondora, which I used to send people after they contact me and they hit my calendar booking form. And it was just great to see that it’s just another confirmation. So this is before we’ve talked face to face. And over the last 90 days, I had an 89% open rate 100% watch the video and 42% replied, and I’m not even asking for a reply. I’m just saying if you have anything else you want to share with me. You know, it’s just such a great tool in any way, shape, or form. You can automate it using bondora. You can use loom you can use templates. But I think that I put it in the post there. But I interviewed the founder of Bon Jovi. And what he said was automate the process, not the relationship. And I love that because everything about this I do is automated except that one part and all I have to do is press button, I get to record a personalized video that I actually enjoy. I kind of have fun, I’ll like walk around the kitchen and stuff and like say hi to people. And then I press another button and I’m done. And then you know, build that trust, and it shows people your real person, you actually care enough to send them the video. And it doesn’t matter to them that it took 20 seconds. Right, it’s that you took the time to do it. So yeah, really cool tool. And, you know, like I said, if you don’t want to pay for it, just use loom, something like that. It’s just a real game changer for you, especially if you get in that habit of staying behind the computer screen. And you’re not, you know, showing your face you’re not used to talking to people face to face, make sure you know you’re putting yourself out there and kind of starting to build that trust. Yeah, man. All right. Also, real quick, I wanted to talk about it just because it’s near and dear to me, I’ve been looking into a lot more AI stuff as things move forward. And so with the mastermind members, the ones who are interested, I think we have 10 or 12 people signed up already, I’m going to be talking to them about some tools that are incorporating some AI or not. So we’ll be diving into that and sharing with them kind of what I’m seeing for things like content briefs for copy contemporaries for blog post, getting rough drafts, written automatically. And then things like PPC and copy headlines, being able to generate that stuff really quick. So we’re gonna be talking about that on Friday in the mastermind. And then like Bradley was talking about his group and with the real estate so we do all this smaller stuff within the larger mastermind. If you want to find out more about that you can head over to mastermind dot semantic mastery.com. And if you’re new to Semantic Mastery, first of all, thanks for being here today. If you’re wondering about some of the stuff we’re talking about the mastermind or you know you hear us talking about the SEO shield or syndication networks, head over to the SEOshield.com that’s the word de Seo shield.com. Grab that that’ll explain a lot of it. Beyond that if you want to have kind of a bigger approach and kind of a more Building Block lists for a bunch of different areas that you’d like to follow for step by step processes for SEO head over to battleplan.semanticmastery.com we’ve got our battle plan right there. I already talked about the mastermind, you’ll know if you’re ready to join that but if you’re ready to grow your digital marketing or physical business and you want to join an experience community at the mastermind.semanticmastery.com that’s where you want to go. And then mgyb.co, done for you services, we use them, you should use them and to story. So beyond that, guys, I know we got a lot of questions. Is there anything else we need to let people know about before we get into it? Not Alright, that’s it. Let’s do it. Oh, shoot.

I saw something that I’m going to cover for Justin Hess in just a minute.

Word Agents

Yeah, well, we’re gonna give something away today, I think. All right. First of all, let me get the grab screen. I was also looking at something else. Because you mentioned AI Adam. So I’ve got something to share that I just came across was just sent to me via email today. So let me grab the screen. You guys should be seeing my screen. Correct. Got it? Well, yeah, concerning AI. Alright, I’ve talked about this before, I’ve been using this company called wordagents.com recently for website content, like page content for local business stuff. And they’re, they do a really good job of writing content. You know, I’ve talked about this on Hump Day hangouts a lot recently. But I like to use long form content. Instead of creating complex silo structures, I like to use simple silo structure, and have long form content from my top of landing page, you know, my landing page, essentially on top of silo, but it covers a lot of what I would have used as supporting articles or sub categories in a complex silo structure, I just add that into long form content as as section headers. And in that way, I can keep the silo structure simple on the on the site, it’s much easier to manage, it tends to work really well. And so I’ve been using two different companies for that kind of content. One is called crowd content. The other one’s called Word agents, word agents is cheaper if you’re buying in bulk, right. And so that’s, that’s what I’ve been doing more recently is buying, you know, like 10,000 words at a time cost 800 bucks. So it’s eight cents per word. But if I was to buy those types of articles from like, crowd content and hire four star writers, which is, you know, the top of the line writers, it’s 12 cents per word, and there’s no discount for more words. So essentially, it’s a it’s a significant discount, what 25% discount, or 30% 33% discount if I go with word agents. So anyway, I just got this email today from them talking about SEO, content optimization add on. And what’s really cool is, you know, Adam was just mentioning AI. Well, I started using phrase.io, I don’t know a couple of months ago now, to optimize content. So existing content that I already have on sites, analyzing it with the phrase IO app, and then adding more to it, right. So rewarding things, squeezing additional keywords in that phrase.io is determined or deemed are relevant. You know, and it does it. It’s just, it’s a really cool tool. And phrase.io is one of several apps that have similar functionality like surfer Seo marketmuse, which have not seen or clear scope, but there’s more coming soon. And my point is that with word agency.com, this is not an affiliate link, guys, I’m just sharing it with you, because he Adam mentioned AI stuff. And they will actually now use the tools that they have available or that they’ll you know, that they say that they can optimize your content with as part of their writing process. So what’s really cool is I like in just the past couple of months, since I’ve started using phrase, I’ve purchased long form content from word agents. And then once I get it back, I haven’t even trained to VA to use phrase yet because I was learning it myself. So I would go in and actually spend, you know, an hour optimizing a piece of content that was sent to me or delivered from word agents. So what’s really cool is now instead of me having to do that, I can actually just now uses like, 50% credit. So for example, for a 2000 word article, you would have to use 3000 words of your word, you know, your word bank, so to speak, in order to to have them apply one of these apps to the content writing. But you know, hey, that’s, that’s a lot of time that it will save me from having to do it or even having to train a VA how to use the phrase app, that would take a lot of time. Right. So my point is, it’s just just going to make it a lot easier on me since I was already using Word agents for them for me to just spend a little bit more and have them optimize the content with the phrase.io app. And again, there’s more tools coming soon. So I wanted to point that out, guys at I’m quite happy with the the work that I’ve gotten from word agents. And I think I’m gonna like it even better now that I don’t have to go in and you know, finish optimizing it once I get the delivery from them, it’s really nice I might have to include that are all at least mentioned at Bradley on mine. Because I know with market muse, something they’re doing is offering. They’ve already done it with people where they you could like, tie it to your website to get the content recommendations, blah, blah, blah. But then they would create a brief for you instead of like waiting phrase where you have to go in and kind of manually do it. And so now they’re kind of using their own algorithms to do that based on your own writing. So you could basically order it and then have it that brief and then have the brief compiled for you and then have it written there. So really starting to solidify or streamline this process.

Very cool. All right. So now we can get into questions. And then there’s something that I might have to wait until Marco’s answering one of these questions for me to pause the screen and whip something up to give to Justin here in a minute. And the rest of you on the webinar today will will appreciate this as well. We’ve got new applets available that you guys can use to import into your free accounts. So I just have to put it in a clean format. But that’s it’s it’s it’s great because it’s going to make the the ability to use free IFTTT accounts for syndication networks, so much easier. So I’ll share that with you guys here in a few minutes if I can get it situated before at some point during this today’s webinar.

Is There Any Update On buffersites.com By Abbas Ravji?

So Alright, first question up is Joel. He says, Is there any update for the auto blog content CMS thing that was mentioned in a previous webinar? If not, is there an alternative? There’s no update just yet, because it’s still in beta. In fact, I even have that open in my browser in my browser right now. Because I was going through some of the training videos, and I’m trying to get set up and start testing with it with myself. I’ve got a project is perfect for it. But no, it’s still in beta. We we can’t really do anything now. Mark. Adam, didn’t we have a landing page somewhere that we could send people to to get on the waiting list for condis?

That’s a good question. Let me take a look. It’s just just been long enough. Now I can’t recall. But let me take a link you did. I think you whipped it up like during a hump day hangouts a few weeks ago. That makes

sense. Let me take a look.

Yeah. So that’s for the the syndicating like, it’s called condis. But it’s, it’s really awesome. You know, and again, it’s still in beta guys. So now it’s not available yet. And we’ll let you know as soon as it is. Plus, you can get on the waiting list when Adam drops the opt in page for that. Okay. It’s a Marco, you got any comments on that? Because I know you’ve started playing with it a little bit.

Yeah, I’ve got a couple of sites up looks pretty good. But it’s in beta. I can’t really say anything until Jeremy’s ready to go.

Where Can We Place The Buzzboost Embed Code Other Than The Gsite And ID Page?

Okay, cool. Also, when it comes to co citation feeds, where else can we embed the buzz boost embed code other than the G site and the ID page? Thanks. You guys are legends. Thanks, Joe. Um, I haven’t used it anywhere other than that. I mean, I’m any you know, you could you could, you could embed the buzzboost embed code using our embed gigs and mgyb, for example. You know that that would help because then you’re again, you’re you’re embedding your RSS co citation feed in relevant content on hundreds or thousands or 10s of thousands of sites. Right. So, you know, that’s something I’ve not even tried that I’ve not even tested that. But it’s really interesting, because not all of my idx pages have that built into them, where we build a, you know, a co citation, super feed with ranked feeder, which is Lisa Allen’s product. But on the sites that I do, it’s really interesting. I’ve got several lead gen assets that are strictly lead gen assets, they don’t really have a bigger brand associated with them or anything else and every one of those that I have that buzz boost, and I just noticed this this week, which is why this is a timely question. I’ve noticed that every one of those even ones that I haven’t touched, because they were really for like development purposes. Like I’d set up some GMBs for testing and things like that. They’re all ranking and generating leads and some of them aren’t even monetized like in other words, I don’t even have a lead buyer for some of them and I just was noticing that every one of them that I was looking at this week had that so I’m thinking about creating a process and then having one of my VA is go through and actually do that for all of my lead gen assets. Again, I don’t I can’t swear that that was why those other local locations are still ranking but some of these are like two years old never fucking touched them never done any work. Nope, no press releases, no nothing. And yet they’re still in the three pack, like two years later with no additional work being done other than, you know, the the idx pages continually updating from the buzzboost that’s in there. So anyways, I don’t know of anywhere else that you would embed that maybe Marco has some idea But using the embed gigs and mgib might be something worth testing

anyway, where you can answer the code, actually access the code, you got access to the code, you can insert an iframe, that’s literally anywhere where you can access the code and get a, an iframe. Again, you just said it, hired through mgyb.co, for an embed one plus link building, plus indexing, and you’re good to go. I mean, that’s literally all you need. Because you’re going to get iframes wherever you Wherever data can get an iframe. And you’re going to get links into it and do that indexing gig and it’s all relevant. And that dude, right now, iframes are magic. They’ve always been, they’ve always been really good. But for some reason, every time Google comes in hard, and then they start rolling back, the update, for some reason old school shit, like this kind of stays, and it powers up even more. It’s really interesting. So you guys got to, don’t worry so much about Google updates. But look at the result. After the update, look at the data and see what what’s actually working. You’ll see that old school shit is really getting power right now.

Yeah, it’s cyclical, right? I mean, it seems like there’s always certain fundamental strategies that work better sometimes than others. But then they come back and they come back stronger. So it’s kind of like cyclical. And I’ve noticed that over the, over the years as well, so

Do You Still Build Out Automated Sites For Your Money Site?

Okay, the next question says, saw a video on another SEO podcast where someone mentioned building out satellite sites for an e commerce site, according to network Empire. Do you guys still build out automated sites around the money site? If so, what are the benefits of the approach? Well, yes, and no, I mean, that the syndication network is they’re all automated sites, right? So I mean, think about that the syndication network, our automated sites, we publish content to the blog, the money site, and then it Reese, you know, repost or publishes out to all of our syndication network properties. So that’s kind of automated content. It’s all branded content from the original source, which would be our blog or a money site. So yes, in that respect, we do. Also, as we were just mentioning, earlier today, we were you know, we’re working on testing an app for creating like, essentially auto blog sites and networks of auto blog sites that we have extreme amount of control over. And they they, that’s what that new app that we’re beta testing right now. called contests. Again, Adam might be dropping a sign up or an opt in link for that, so that you can be on the notification list when it’s available. But yeah, so I mean, we’re testing with that, too. But outside of that, I, I know, you can still do it and still produce results. That way. There’s, you know, a number of people out there that teach that method. Again, besides the syndication network in the G site, I’m not really doing impressive advantage, because I’m, you know, publishing a ton of content through press advantage for each project. Outside of that, now, I’m not doing it, but will it still work? Yeah, that’s a method that can absolutely work. Marco, do you want to comment on that?

No, because I don’t use satellite, I use the G site, I power up the G site and drive stack, adding the extension. That’s what our MGYB.co extension gig is for, I like to power that up and transfer the power directly to the money site, RYS, I think that we get a whole lot more power. When we do it that way, then building out these, these satellite websites. Plus, if it’s if it’s a G site and drive stack, all bets are off, right? Because when, like, the way that the algorithm is applied, the way that penalties and everything else, if you’re on a TLD, it’s applied differently. We’ve seen it time and again, where Google simply won’t penalize itself. We’ve seen it all that’s why we’re in there. Whereas if you’re going to do this on a mini site and or building satellites, kind of like a an old school, private blog network private meaning that it’s yours, and a blog network, because you’re going to publish content to them and add a link to your website and meaning that you’re not going to go and then sell links to your PBN, cuz then it’s no longer private, then it’s public, right? So if you’re going to go through all that trouble, I’d rather just power up my G sites and drive stacks and if I need to build the G site and drive stacks satellite, that’s how I that’s how I do it. Now. You’re welcome to try it. Either way. I think my way works perfectly well.

There you go. Um, I’ve got the screen pause briefly while I try to format something but we can move on to the next one. And I’ll come back to standby one minute, guys.

Okay, I’ll come back to it. All right.

What Do You Recommend For Keeping The GMB Page Fresh If The Client Has Low Budget For Content?

So the next question is from Randy. He says, Howdy folks, when dealing with clients that have a low budget for content, what would you recommend for keeping the money site GMB fresh with updated content. Worried about panda if I import RSS feeds directly into blog posts, yeah, I would. I don’t like doing that either, because then you’re auto populating content on your money site with other people’s content. And I don’t like to do that. We talked about using curated content, Randy all the time, because that is a very inexpensive way to produce content, highly relevant content and also create co citation. using other people’s content, it’s very efficient, very inexpensive. Again, you can train vas, with our method, it’s called content kingpin, if you want to go check it out. That’s the same method that I’ve been using. And I trained, you know, bloggers to for all my content needs for my clients and GMB posts and everything else, using curated content. And again, content kingpin teaches that method, it was designed specifically to teach somebody how to do that. So for example, you could hire a VA in the Philippines. You can pay him three or $4 an hour or whatever you want to pay on a per post basis, which is what I prefer to do. That’s very inexpensive, because they can very quickly create relevant content by curating other people’s content. And that’s different than just because again, you’re still, you’re still pulling in other people’s content that you’re going to cite the source. So you need to link back to the source of the content that’s been curated. So for, let’s say, use three different pieces of content in a curated post, right. So that would be like, you might cite two different articles, and a YouTube video or a slide deck or an audio file, you know, or something like that, or just three different pieces of you know, Article content. And then any, for each one of the snippets that you curate into that post, you would link back to the original source, right, because you want to give credit, you want to give attribution or cite the original source, which is fine, because I typically nofollow those links anyways. But it’s that way, you have control over what is being posted on this on your money site, as well as you create unique content, even if it’s curated snippets of other people’s already published content, because you inject commentary, and at the top right, there’s an opening paragraph, then there’s usually a little bit of content commentary added between each piece of curated content. And then there’s a conclusion paragraph, which could just be a couple of sentences. And typically, that’s where a call to action would go anyways. So it’s very efficient and quick way to develop highly relevant content, create co citation because you’re outbound linking to relevant content. And a very, very quick way to do it. That said, outside of doing curated content for for money site posts, which can then be repurposed as GMB posts, right. So again, you’re getting a whole lot of traction from one piece of content. The other way that you could do it is like if you don’t have a really big budget, or your client doesn’t have a big budget for content even enough, which you should for curated content, because it’s very inexpensive, if it’s done correctly. But the other thing would be just to focus on the GMB posts, right, make sure that you have on page on the on the website that the money site done well. And then you could focus on just doing GMB posts because those are very inexpensive as well. They’re much shorter form type content, right is 1500 characters max and the GMB posts. So again, I would recommend that you you try to work out curated content for the money site, which can then be repurposed the GMB post as well, it’s going to populate your syndication network all of that. But if you don’t even have a budget for that, first of all, get higher playing paying clients. But second of all, you can always focus in on GMB posts. If it’s for local stuff and get some significant traction that way, and that’s rather inexpensive as well marketing want to come on in that.

I’m going to second get get better paying clients who can handle the content budget also want to get such fantastic results for your clients that you can charge them more so that you can show that you can start producing better content, so that you can then charge them more make that attended then on you, I am going to get your results when I give me not give them the pitch that I give, I’m gonna it’s going to take me about 90 days to get your results, you’re going to see the results At the end of those 90 days, 90 days, we’re going to discuss what the new budget will be what it’s going to cost to keep me producing these results. And nine out of 10 it’s going to work. Nine out of 10 the guy’s got a shirt 90 days. And after those 90 days when they see the results that you can get for them, you better be able to get results, a nine out of 10 they’re going to they’re going to close and they’re going to say yes, please, let’s go on the monthly, how much is it and then are going to blink when you hit him. I hit him hard man. I hit him hard. But then the results that I’m giving them justifies them saying yes, that’s the whole point when you make it attendant on you, rather than on what the client is giving you, then you can pretty much start setting your own prices. That’s how you get better clients because like people know each other Jordan is really good about this, the doctors that he works with, they know one another. And they talk to one another. And since they’re in different geographical areas, like, they’re all talking, I got this guy. And then when you get that good, the word of mouth runs along. And now, if you’re niching, down, like Bradley recommends, or if you don’t, like I do, because if you got enough money to pay me to get your results, I’m going to figure out how to get get your results. The niche is irrelevant, because again, I’m going to call Jordan, I know Google AdSense, I know Google, I know how I’m going to get this person results, regardless of where we’re going. So there’s many different ways that you can do this focusing on this is the number one thing on the results that you can get so that you can then charge more, because now you’re you understand what it is that you’re worth. And then you’re not going to take these low budget people who don’t even have money for it. How is it? We’re iftt, we’re syndication. And we’re into strengthening your tier one branded through all of it, how in the world that you’re going to be able to do this, if you don’t have a content budget, or if it’s miniscule, so that maybe you blog once a month. Or you know, maybe you do a post every other week, which is not going to do anything for you.

Right on. All right, next question. See if I can find it. Damn, we got a lot of questions today. I’ve scrolled too far. That’s why. How do I get back to where we were?

We’re at the tag silo structure. There we go. Question. There we go.

Do You Index Or DeIndex Tag/Category Landing Page When Using A Tag Silo Structure?

Okay, Kook. Okay, when using a tag silo structure? Do you index or deindex the tag or category landing pages? Or do you worry about those tag or category landing pages ranking for your target keywords? All? It depends. I mean, it really is. It’s going to depend it um, you know, there’s a lot of things that you can do. First of all, with a with a typical silo structure for like local business type stuff, especially, I usually redirect the category URLs to the top level landing page. So remember, when you creating a silo, right, you create cat, your landing pages, and then you create corresponding categories for your landing pages. Four simple silo structure, that’s it, right? You’ve got top level categories, and then you’ve got your pages, and then everything else is going to be posts, right? Because posts are how you add depth to a simple silo structure. If you were doing complex silo structure, then you would have categories top level categories, and then subcategories, and they would have corresponding pages and child pages. That make sense. And then posts would go, you know, in but again, I always try to use simple silo structure at almost all, you know, almost always now. So when so for category URLs, the category itself, I like to redirect the category URL to the top level landing page, its corresponding landing page. Does that make sense? And that’s only because typically, you know, for like local business services and stuff, people aren’t going to be looking for posts in a particular category, because they’re not there to consume content. They’re there to contact the local business to provide them a product or service. Right. So again, it’s not like a content based website, we use content to help it to rank, but people aren’t usually on a local business website to read through, you know, articles in a particular category. So that’s why I don’t care about having a category index page, like a blogroll page for that category. It’s not necessary, right? So why not allow that taxonomy structure in WordPress to kind of flow the page rank up to that top level landing page by redirecting that category URL to the landing page. So that covers categories, when it comes to tags, it depends, once again, on what it is that you’re doing. I usually leave them to index the tag pages to index. But you can also think about this and I can’t get too deep into this guy’s again, this is a free forums where we talk about in like heavy hitter club or the mastermind, but you can canonicalize tag pages, I usually leave an end index anyways. But then you can canonicalize tag pages to their corresponding, you know, landing pages if you have them. Or what I like to do is again, my, what I do is create the land, you know, the silo landing pages and top level categories. That’s all topically. The categories are topic, topic based, right? And then I do tag silos for location silos or geographic silos. And so what I do is I have my my VA who does my blogger, she she writes blog posts that are optimized for a particular keyword plus a city. Right and so that blog post becomes a landing page itself. And then what we do is we canonicalize the tag the corresponding tag to that particular page, so that we have essentially two link building targets, right, we have the tag page. And then we have the the landing page, which in this case would be a blog post, both of those could become link building targets. But what I like about using tags specifically is because of the stuff that we can do on the G sites, right, we talked about theme mirroring, and all that kind of stuff all the time. And with the GS with tag pages, you can do some really cool things by embedding the tag page into g sites, you know, create a page on the G site optimize for the term that you’re you’re trying to rank for, and then you embed a tag page into there. And that becomes a link building target as well, that can funnel or pass juice to all of the posts that have that that are that share that tag. That makes sense. So it really depends. I mean, again, it really depends on what it is that you’re doing. I can’t give you a solid answer, because it’s going to depend on the project. I typically will leave my tag pages to index but then I use canonical is very strategically. Does that make sense? Anybody want to comment on that?

on the web, right? It’s it’s always, depending on what it is that you’re trying to accomplish. Yeah, this is this isn’t an easy question to answer, because this does variables on how you’re using your tags and you categories.

I agree. Yeah, I totally agree with that. So it is it’s one of those kind of like standard SEO answers, which is it depends, you know, because it really depends on what it is that you’re trying to do. There’s just so many things that you can do when you’re using like a dual silo structure on a site. What I mean by that is using the traditional silo with categories. And then there’s the tag silo, which I use specifically for location based silos now. So I consider that like to two types of silos on the site, right? You have topical silos, which are the traditional silo structure. Then I use tag silos, which are for location silos essentially. But it’s really cool because you can do a lot of cool things with it. It’s a good question, though.

IFTTT Pro Concern

Justin says, Hey, guys, hoping you have been able to hear back from someone at IFTTT about the wonkiness has been going on since the pro upgrade my pro accounts are not showing any of the applets I create so I can’t share them to my other pro accounts. And today, I noticed the various accounts of yours. And some others I was using applets from have changed to this user hasn’t created applets too, so I don’t know what to do anymore. Okay, as we as we’ve you know, answered this question a bunch of times, Justin, even with a free account, and you can you can enable applets you just have to find them, right? But so you go to the Explore tab you can search you know, like the the standard applet titles or names that we’ve used over the years, you can locate there’s a handful of them that I know to be ours, you can tell by the applet creator the username essentially, Stephen R. Reynolds is one of them Vernon e DUNS and other one I’ve got a bunch of how to SEO as another one, there’s a bunch of them that we’ve created over the years that are in the kind of library applet library under the Explore tab that you can locate and turn them on, if you have IFTTT accounts where you had created the applets. But you let it go. You know, as you never subscribed, you never subscribed as a pro subscriber. Let’s say you had 15, applets and an account and you allowed it to go to the free plan beyond the date where you could subscribe as a pro account, then it automatically turns off or archives all but three applets. Right. So but if you just used somebody else’s applet and turned it on, then it will allow you to turn them all on. Does that make sense? But it will, it will only allow you to keep three that you’ve created in an account. So what I’m saying is if you had an account that you set up, and it’s now on the free tier instead of a pro tier and you had created all 15 applets in this example, then it will only allow you to keep three of them on the other 12 are going to be archived, then it won’t allow you to turn them on you can go to the Explore tab and find the other applets that somebody else created that were in the library of applets and then turn them back on enable them and then swap out obviously, you know add your own RSS feed or whatever. However, I’m gonna share this with you guys now and I think it’s still on my clipboard. Well I already posted it to at you Justin, but I’m just going to post it here as well. I, we have a pro account and by the way just to share this with you guys on how to create applets in a pro account so that you can share them between other accounts you do that. If you go in IFTTT, you click your profile icon in the top right corner, you’ll see a drop down says platform or there’s an item in the drop down called platform. Click through to that, then you have to set your user account up as a service. So and I can’t I’m not going to show you guys how to do all that I had to learn it myself in the last two weeks. But there’s help files and everything else but you got it. You’ve got your username for that IFTTT The T account, it has to be a pro account. But if you have a pro account, you can create your username as a service or add it as a service. And then from there, you create applets. These are the applets right here that I’ve created with the pro account. You guys have access to this now it’s in the comments. But for example, if I were I don’t know if I can click through, probably logged into one of my accounts, but let’s just see. Yeah, I am. So if you can see, these are now saying by Semantic Mastery, and this is a blog RSS repost to blogger. And look, even if I’m not logged in, if I go over here to refresh Firefox installation, I can now see these applets. Whereas before you couldn’t write.

there was no way to share applets anymore. But now because I’ve created all of these applets, under our pro account, you have to do it in platform.ifttt.com. And you have to again, you have to set your pro account up as a service, and then you can start creating applets. And that’s what I’ve done here. And so these applets are now the new updated applets that will allow you guys to import them directly from this sheet into your account, all you got to do is copy the URL paste and go in your address bar when you’re logged into your account. And now you can enable these applets and these have all been coded up to today’s standards. And by the way, attribution has been coded into the blog syndication applets now, so that you don’t need to have a attribution inserter plugin in your RSS feed. So in other words, for those of you don’t want to talk about to, you know, we used to just use the code inserter from Yoast, or from our own RSS plugin that we developed to create that attribution link, like this post was first published on you know, whatever, that would automatically insert that like line of that attribution link at the bottom of every post in the RSS feed. But because Yoast is such a piece of shit, and we’re not in the plugin game or the plugin development business, and so it’s it’s we don’t even really want to continue supporting the one that we created. I just recreated all the applets with attribution already built in. So you don’t need that you don’t need that anymore. By the way, I also found out that all in one SEO pack plugin does also have an attribution module built into it. And I think Jeffrey Smith and the IRS has an RSS module built into it as well. That’s the SEO ultimate Pro, which is what we recommend for SEO plugin. But what I’m saying is you don’t need any of that anymore, because they’re built directly into here. Okay, now, some of these may change or be edited slightly, because I haven’t completed testing all of the YouTube applets yet, these have all been tested. So these may change but the URL is not going to change. So even if I update the athletes guys, they’re not going to change, the URL should not change. Okay. So we’re in the process of updating a syndication Academy, we’re going to be relaunching that as version three updated for 2021, essentially, because we probably won’t watch it before beginning of next year. But just know that we have got a lot of stuff cooking for the new syndication Academy guys, and right here are the applets that I just created within the last week and a half or so. Okay, and again, you guys have access to this now. The URL is semanticmastery.com/new-IFTTT, that will take you to this page here. Do not ask to edit this page, go to File, and then go to make a copy and copy that into your Drive account. And then or download it as a CSV or whatever you want. But if you ask to edit this, I’m going to deny it. Okay. So don’t don’t ask. Anybody want to comment on that?

Oh, perfect. Beautiful.

Should You Use An SEO Shield Or A Syndication Network For A Client With Several Web Properties?

Okay, ideas. 111 says I purchased your SEO Power Shield and have some questions as to the best structure my client has several web properties that would be best if they would be branded as one entity using her name. The business recently changed structure with the new business name being her name. So this works well. Several of these sites are old and need to be replaced with better siloed sites. Is it effective to build the SEO power shield and include these old properties siloing the information in the shield and then add information from the new site as it is completed?

Uh, I don’t know, this is a almost needed diagram for this. I’m trying to visualize what you’re telling me in your head but or I’m trying to visualize in my head what you’re telling me and I’m having difficulty. Also, I need to promote one of their new sites immediately as they are opening several other locations just for IV therapy and nutrition. Would this get a separate SEO shield? Or just a separate syndication network? Thank you, Marco. This seems like a bit of a complicated question. And without all the details, I don’t know if I could give a proper answer or were you able to interpret. It’s not something that I’m that would be answered here. This is requiring just a lot of what I would consider a consultation time. It’s not something that we do on Hump Day. We don’t answer anything this intricate, because this requires this a whole lot of different things. And then we have to go look at it and see what which one would be the best way to answer it. Right? Yeah. How would we approach this? Okay. It’s not something that I can answer cold.

Yeah, yeah, it’s difficult. I mean, just from rereading it while you were talking, I mean, if just on a very high level, if there’s multiple websites that should be brought under one brand, then I would almost say why not create one website under that, you know, parent or master brand, and then set up silos on that website. And then, you know, basically, import the content from the existing individual sites into the new site, and then do redirects from the old sites that, to me, it makes a mess, if you’ve got a bunch of different websites out there that were separate websites, but now you want to bring them all under one entity, if they’re related. And it makes sense, then absolutely, you can. But what I would suggest is housing them all under one domain, right, and you could, you could just you repurpose the old content, just so you set up proper silo structure on the new branded domain, even if it’s her name, or whatever, it doesn’t matter. And then you would set up silos, which would have been each of the individual sites, you bring that content, and it can be literally copy paste to bring that content in. And then you would set up redirects from the old domains, to the new sex, you know, the corresponding pages on the site, that kind of stuff so that you’re pushing all of that relevancy to that one domain, that one entity. But then there’s a lot of schema stuff that could be done there that would really need to be done to combine all that into one entity. Also, the the SEO or excuse me, the SEO shield, that could all be mirrored once that original website, the main entity, main branded entity website would be built out correctly and formatted correctly, like all of that could be duplicated or mirrored in the SEO show. But again, without knowing like all the different pieces and stuff, like does it make sense to mix them all under one entity or not? And only you can answer that? So I agree with Marco, that this is one of those questions that more context is needed, and probably going to need more, you know, more consultation from somebody. So that would be like a great question for the semantic mastery mastermind. And I don’t know if you guys and how heavy hitter are doing like audits and stuff, but that would be a really good question for the mastermind. So sorry, I couldn’t give you a better answer for that.

Now, this is some I mean, we’ve done it we did it for for Pete Hogg. And in my ask Marco, anything, webinars. I’ll even I’ll even go into that. Right, but but not here, because this requires me actually going and looking at everything. And seeing how I would put it together for the questions that he’s asking. Is that something that you can just fly off off the cuff on and say, yeah, yeah, I do this and this and this? Yeah. Because if I change like that, like the main change, and so now, what do we do? What do we do with the old property? I have to look at them? How much value is there in there? And how much change? There’s just so much? I can’t answer it.

Yeah, I agree. That’s, it’s, it’s a complicated question with very little information, which I know it’d be hard to. Honestly, if you posted a great big wall of text trying to explain all this stuff. We wouldn’t even cover it anyways. So again, that’s more of one of our paid groups. We try I tried I tried to give you some somewhat of an answer, but I know that probably didn’t suffice and for that, I’m sorry.

What MGYB SEO Products Do You Recommend For An eCommerce Site And Events Planning Site?

Next question. Hello, guys. I got my battle plan two weeks ago and close to new clients here in the UK to build an e commerce website for each of them with monthly SEO look at that guy’s got his battle plan two weeks ago and close to clients in two weeks. That’s strong. So congratulations. So I plan to purchase your keyword research is the first step for each Can you tell me what are the other products I need to purchase from your arsenal services and in what order? Am I to purchase them? One of the ecom websites is in the fashion that specifically children’s custom clothing and the other is in selling hair products, mostly targeting women’s hair. Both are located here in London, England. Yeah, well, if you’ve got the SEO battle plan, that’s like, you know, basically the roadmap. The other the other thing I would say is, as Adam mentioned at the beginning of today’s Hump Day hangout is go to the SEO shield.com. That’s the seoshield.com. and sign up for that free training. And that will take you through the SEO shield training. I think it’s on a four day schedule. So you get another lesson every day. That kind of walks you through the different components of the SEO shield. And that that’s really what we would suggest is get the keyword research first and once you have that, then go order an SEO power shield for each client. right because that includes all the have our you know, our proprietary methods, our building blocks our foundation of, you know, the foundational stuff that we do which is the syndication network, the RYS Drive stack plus g site, the idx page, and press it manage organization page, all of that combined. So it’s it’s basically that’s why we we’ve recreated the SEO show to begin with was because instead of ordering individual components, you get it all in one bundle, it’s a little bit less expensive, and it’s also less work on your end to place the orders in separate pieces or, you know, at separate times. So in plus we get it a little bit faster that way too. You get it delivered a little bit faster. So again, go through the battle plan, if you haven’t already sounds like you have go to SEO.com opt in for that, it’s free, you’ll go through that training. And then what I would suggest is after the keyword research has been delivered, then you order the SEO, power shield for each client comments on that SEO power shield and link building, get that initial link building for the brand, solidify the brand, then you start looking at what your targets are, you need the data, that’s what the initial run is for.

That’s right. That’s right. Not only that, but when you order the SEO power shield, on the thank you page, there’s an opportunity to get link building for that power shield at a discounted rate. It’s like the Oto for link building. So that’s a really good opportunity to purchase the links for that too. So once it’s built, it’ll immediately go to link building team to have links built to it. So that helps to solidify all of that as Marco said. Okay, so I have another client from the British Virgin Islands who I closed yesterday to build an events planning site for her in the British Virgin Islands, there is not much competition in that niche. So I would need to purchase all of your service, there is not much competition that niche so what I need to purchase all of your services, and if not, what would you recommend? Well, I don’t recommend ever doing anything less than the SEO power shield for for a project period. Like, in my opinion, that’s the bare minimum, it covers all of our, if it’s not very competitive, when you order an S, once you have an SEO power shield in place, that means that it will probably require very little off page work in order to get it you know, like off page, essentially link building and embed gigs, that type of stuff for you to be able to get results. I can’t say it won’t take you any because I don’t know. But it will probably take very little. So but again, I wouldn’t recommend shortcutting again, as I mentioned before, guys, that’s like our foundational stuff the SEO showed is the foundation of everything that we do, it used to just be syndication networks, but over the years it’s grown into all of what we can all of the components that our makeup the SEO power shield. So I would recommend that being like your, your floor right your basement like that’s that you build that first and then from there, you only do the off page as needed or content marketing and off page SEO as needed. Once you get your desired results, you can kind of slow it down a little bit. So that’s what I would recommend. Anybody else?

Moving on.

What Do You Recommend To Get The SMS PIN Verification In Creating Gmail Accounts?

Robert says thank you SM team and best part of Wednesday’s Hump Day Hangouts. Thank you. I’m limited on creating additional Gmail accounts and their verification process what options are safe to get the SMS pin verification completed? I don’t know because I don’t go through that process anymore. Um, I have somebody that I buy accounts from now when I need them. I don’t know if he’s got a landing page or not. But I pause for a minute if you guys have any ideas because I don’t create my own accounts anymore at all. Does anybody do that here?

Negative.

All right, standby. I’m gonna pause the screen just for a moment while I look up the email I don’t think he’s got a landing page for this but you can email this gentleman and tell him standby I’m looking just to see I might have an email. No, I have an email but I’m sorry. I was looking for a landing page.

Alright, um, his name is miles Chad. I’m grabbing the email now and I’m going on pause the screen just a moment guys. Okay, so I’m going to add Robert contact miles, Chad for purchasing accounts. And he does like a bunch of web 2.0 stuff, Twitter accounts, Gmail accounts. He does aged accounts, new accounts, phone verified stuff. He gives you the phone number for verify that he verified them with these accounts are really good accounts. Guys. I’ve used account providers over the years and this guy’s miles Chad. He’s really really good about replying via email, like communications really good. He’s prompt. The accounts are good. I’ve never had any problems with the accounts. He’ll replace them. If there is a problem like I don’t I don’t you have to ask him about what the time limit is that He will replace them. But I know like if I get a new fresh batch of accounts from him, and during the process of, you know, binding them to my IP or to, you know, a proxy or whatever it is that I’m doing, if I have any trouble, and I get locked out of the account, he’ll replace them. I’m not talking about months down the road, but when I first get them he does. So again, contact him, tell him I sent you. I just actually purchased some Twitter accounts. I don’t use Twitter much, but I purchased some Twitter accounts from him a few weeks ago, like literally about three weeks ago. So I know he’s still selling accounts. I would I would contact him tell him I referred you. Okay. Let’s see Chris, move the camera down unless you’re naked. Yeah, Chris does that pantsless he’s not here to defend themselves by

What Do You Mean By The Importance Of Press Release With Keyword Anchor Text To Improve Website Entity?

pavlo Hey, guys, question press release with keyword anchor text will be helpful to improve website entity. I’m confused regarding this topic. That’s why I decided to ask you without guessing. Thanks a lot. I don’t you can use I mean, look that okay, the short answer. And that’s the only I’m only going to be able to give you the short answer. No, don’t use keyword anchor text. You can use branded anchor text to link back to your website through a press release. That that’s okay. I prefer naked URLs or brand anchors when linking directly back to the money site. Does that make sense? I try not, unless I’ve got like a particular page on my site that has a really robust link profile. And I can afford or I can, you know, use keyword anchors at that point, then that’s okay. But only if you know what you’re doing. I don’t recommend it. If you don’t know what you’re doing just use naked URLs or brand anchors, if you’re going to link directly to your money site from a press release. So yeah, that’s that’s the simple short answer. Anybody else want to comment on that?

Yeah, because, I mean, Jeremy has been so good about giving us access, or allowing us to power up our entity. And we already do a really good job of that, yes, it will improve. If you’re going entity for entity, I mean your main entity and and you really need to know it, you really need to know what you’re doing. If you’re doing this, you really need to know and it’s not something that you can just go Okay, let me take a text anchor, and and send it you know, however many links that is, because then I mean, you can get into a whole lot of trouble with all of those links coming to your to your website, right? through one like a one word, one, one keyword anchor text. That’s trouble, man, that’s if you don’t have everything set up, right? To receive that anchor text link, you’re in trouble. So rather than that, the schema, the iframe, everything that you can do on that press release will help you overall, especially with that ad ID page and adding the press advantage media page, it just everything that we do with that Id agreed.

How To Set Google Folders Public To The Web And Be Indexable?

Okay, so, uh, I think we’re probably only get two to the last two year old off and then bb. And then I think we got to wrap it up, guys, because we’re almost at the five o'clock hour. So Olaf says hello there. How can I make Google folders public to the web and indexable, we can’t share that here. You can still do it, there’s absolutely and in fact, Syndication Academy update, when that comes out, which again, will probably be in the early first part of next year. So 2021, there will likely be something available there that will show you how to do it or give you a resource that will give will make a folder like give you the ability to make folders public. And also we may be able to provide that and MGYB very, very soon, like in a couple of weeks, maybe we’re gonna have a meeting about it next week. So there’s a very good chance that we can provide that as a service inside of MGYB. can’t share it with you here because that was a something that we shared Marcus shared in the paid setting. So it wouldn’t be right for me to share that here.

But yes, we’ve been using that we’ve been using that method and MGYB. And then that’s something that I’m that I’m going to give away, right? Because when Google took that away, I had to go and spend time on that, to figure out how to do it. So did Rob. I mean, we immediately got on that and figured out how to make them public. Again, it plus, we had already been doing it in the drive section and G sites. I mean, we can still do it to this day, the best way to make one public is to go and get a drive second g site from MGYB. We’ll do it for you save all that time and effort.

Yeah, and like I said, you can absolutely still do it. There’s no question. And that’s probably going to be something that we have as a service inside of MGYB to make files and or folders public. But we’re going to we’re going to talk about that next week. So we come back with that question. Again. I’m sorry, I couldn’t share with the method here guys. But there are some things that just have to be behind closed doors. This is a free public forum. So it’s certain things we can’t share. And hopefully you understand that. You can come join one of our paid groups though and find out All off.

How To Show An Image Schema In Mobile SERPs?

So Bibi says, Hey guys, I thought it was Thursday today Time flies. Yes, it does. For the questions, I have a post. Okay, I’m going to share I read this previously. So I’m kind of prepared for this. We’ll try to get through this rather quickly. But he says I have a post that has graph schema with and he talks about the different types generated by the Yoast plugin. So the first thing I’m going to tell you to do is throw that fucking plugin out. Like, Yoast is a piece of shit, don’t use the Yoast plugin. For schema stuff, like I said, use SEO ultimate Pro, it’s a paid plugin, but it’s totally worth it. It has all the different schema types built into it, it’s got schema builders directly in the plugin. So like on the post or page editors inside of WordPress in the SEO ultimate Pro Plugin widget underneath where the text editor is there, you can literally develop any type of schema you want there. And what’s great about it is not only can you develop the schema specific to that page or post, but you can always go back and edit or append the schema using the SEO ultimate pro plugin, and it will automatically format it correctly. Because if you try to use two different schema types on a page or a post, and you don’t have them connected properly, called connected schema or connected data or nested schema is another term for it, then it can ambiguous ate the main entity of the page because you’ve got two separate schemas on the page, you have to have it connected properly. And so again, like the SEO ultimate pro plugin will do that for you automatically. If you’re using the schema creator and editor that’s on the page or post level. Does that make sense? So it will automatically append additional schema for like marking up different items like video object, image object, whatever reviews schema, FAQ schema, all of that. So highly recommend that the Yoast plugin add so much bloat so much shitty code, I just highly recommend that you stop using that crappy plugin. Okay, Marco will will verify that as well. Also, if you want to create schema without purchasing a plug in, I would recommend a free version is technical SEO calm. It’s the go to technical SEO. com Click on Tools and find the schema markup generator. And here you can find all different types of schema that you can mark up. This is what I was using before I started using the schema creator and Jeffrey’s plugin or the SEO ultimate pro plugin. And lastly, another option would be but it comes with a monthly subscription fee. But I am using this myself, I like it because you can get some really significant, like really complex connected data item type schema with schema app.com. This has an it has a little bit of a learning curve with this and it has a monthly expense. But if you’re going to be doing a lot of structured data stuff, I recommend using this I know my partners might not use it. But I like this because it automates a lot of stuff for me. I don’t have the patience that some of my like Rob does to do all this shit in spreadsheets, so I use schema. So those are the three things I would suggest this for individual, like items that you want to mark up this if you want to do significant like connected data items, which is really what you should be doing now anyways, or the SEO ultimate pro plugin, which doesn’t have a monthly expense and that’s a again, it’s a great plugin. It’s way better than Yoast. Mark, do you want to comment on that?

No, we’ve run over time. Yeah.

Okay, so no comments. Alright guys, thanks for being

Source: Semantic Mastery Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 314 published first on your-t1-blog-url

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Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 314

Click on the video above to watch Episode 314 of the Semantic Mastery Hump Day Hangouts.

Full timestamps with topics and times can be found at the link above.

The latest upcoming free SEO Q&A Hump Day Hangout can be found at http://semanticmastery.com/humpday.

Announcement

Welcome to Hump Day hangouts where I plug in my headphones to make them work. No start coughing man who’s going downhill quickly. Chris, take over.

Man Down. Google got them. Yeah. All right, I’m back. I just had to toss that real quick before. I totally lost it there and started blowing people’s eardrums out, man. All right, well welcome everybody to the bumpiest Hump Day hangout start in a while. This is Episode 314. Today is the 18th of November 2020. And this is the one to where Hernan screams at us to let him in. So hopefully he’ll be joining us. before too long. We do have some announcements to get into, before we start answering questions, and I am just pulling up the page looks like we have got a lot of questions today. So try to keep this short and get into a bar real quick and say hi to everybody. And then answer the questions after the announcement. So Marco, you’re wearing a different shirt man, you’re looking You’re looking good today, what’s what’s going on,

I have to break up my vintage shirts once in a while man, you got to keep them guessing gotta keep them guessing I’m in the tropics, I’m going to tropical moment. Here we are, you know, it’s still my Fortress of Solitude I am as I always say where I choose to be not where I have to be. And I do what I want to do not what I have to do. So it’s a really good place to be and wake up every morning understanding what where my portfolio is. And how I’m going to get to being able to break it down so that it’s a it’s also a process where the process guys, right. And we build processes and systems as opposed to the my mind as I start explaining. And as I start expanding, since the inception of the powerful idea, it’s now a process of getting to the point where you want to be whatever that is. I don’t let me define it for you. Like I’m gonna call CT Fletcher fucking possible. Don’t let somebody define your impossible. You decide what it is you’re going to do you break it down so that you can get there if it’s a huge job, okay, I want I want a billion dollars. I’ll give you an example. Well, the only way to make a billion dollars is $1 at a time, if you start out, I’m going to make a billion dollars that nobody in this world is going to pay you a billion dollars. Unless you come up with the ultimate, another Amazon, right? Another way to create that. Nobody’s going to give that to you. But you start building on it you make 100 bucks, you make 1000 you make 100,000 however it is that you’re going to get it. But if you start out with that goal of a billion it’s not a goal. It’s an idea. It’s a dream. It’s a wish it’s young. Maybe someday I could put a you’ll never do shit. Because it’s too big. But if you break it down and start working, and you do the do people don’t take that the right way. Don’t do Oh, that’s funny, and it rhymes and and Mountain Dew and all that crap, right? retro and all that shit. No. Fucking mindset. When you wake up every morning you do not hear here it is you do what you have to do. Because that’s what you want to do. you twist it. Okay, I have to do but I enjoy it. Because it’s part of what I want to do. Yeah, I got to do I have to get up in the morning. We all have to get up. But choose to stay in bed. I can say but I’ll have to get up. I got kids. You know how that goes, man. People. It’s a lot of it is common sense. But like, Gordon Ramsay said, I can’t teach that. That’s common sense. It’s one of his gifts, right? I can’t teach that. Common Sense. Guys, a lot of this is just common sense. You can’t make a billion until you make that first dollar. I’ll leave it at that.

Fair enough. Yeah. Don’t be an idiot sandwich. One step at a time. $1 at a time. Oh, man.

Well, Bradley, how you doing? Man?

We got you on video. So I guess the technical hurdles are over with.

Yeah, what a mess that is every week.

I like it adds a little bit of spice to the start. never know what’s gonna happen.

Yeah, I’m good. Happy. Happy to be here. I’ve been super busy this week. And I plan on being super busy for the next several weeks.

So fair enough. And I’ve been working with a small group right from the mat and not just the mastermind, but some people from hopefully live right doing some real estate stuff.

Yeah, in our mastermind. You know, we have little mini mastermind groups. They’re like accountability groups, and I’ve formed one. Just recently we just had our first meeting on Monday, where we just get together for now. Six or seven of us and talk about it’s for anybody that’s real, it’s marketing in or for real estate, whether for their own business or for client work, whatever doesn’t matter. And, yeah, it’s pretty good because, as we’ve talked about many times, you know, that’s how we got together and Semantic Mastery, my partners and I, from basically a weekly accountability group that we that I informed way back in, I think, 2012, or something like that. And that’s how we all came together. And so I know there’s always opportunity, things like that can happen in little in mastermind groups. And so there’s the value of joining a larger mastermind like what the semantic mastery mastermind is, but then it’s also benefits to get in the smaller mini masterminds because it’s a much more intimate setting where a lot of ideas can exchange and ideas can flourish. You know what I mean? And so that’s, I think, I think there’s, there’s always opportunity in those small mastermind groups like that, so I’m hoping that something will come of ours as well.

Nice. All right. Hernan didn’t want to join us, but I guess he decided to show up. So what’s up, man?

Good, man. I mean, it was cold outside. So thank you guys for letting me and I appreciate that. You know, it’s raining was boring. So it wasn’t the door like, open now. Yeah. Now it’s good, man. It’s good to be here. I’m really excited for what’s happening, you know, the future of Semantic Mastery. We have some good stuff cooking. So I’m really excited for for what’s coming up for Semantic Mastery for mgib. So stay tuned. We’re supposed to have a guest today. That’s gonna be next week as well. So that’s gonna be pretty awesome. And you know, I’m excited. Overall. Thank you guys for joining.

Yeah, Chris. How you doing, man? Doing good here.

You can put up my Christmas tree already here.

It’s awesome. I like it. That’s your scene that speaks to my heart. That’s the right size, the right amount of cleanup involved.

That’s, like, straight out of the box, man. Like perfect. No work.

Good deal. Yeah, adolescent that’s doing good development. So in full progress. So like exciting times are coming.

Nice. Let’s see. And I just want to share. So I posted I know Bradley saw it. We talked about video all the time, we talked about you know, using video onboarding, we have an entire course Bradley put together on that if you haven’t seen it, just go look up video Legion system. But I shared something because I had to log into bondora, which I used to send people after they contact me and they hit my calendar booking form. And it was just great to see that it’s just another confirmation. So this is before we’ve talked face to face. And over the last 90 days, I had an 89% open rate 100% watch the video and 42% replied, and I’m not even asking for a reply. I’m just saying if you have anything else you want to share with me. You know, it’s just such a great tool in any way, shape, or form. You can automate it using bondora. You can use loom you can use templates. But I think that I put it in the post there. But I interviewed the founder of Bon Jovi. And what he said was automate the process, not the relationship. And I love that because everything about this I do is automated except that one part and all I have to do is press button, I get to record a personalized video that I actually enjoy. I kind of have fun, I’ll like walk around the kitchen and stuff and like say hi to people. And then I press another button and I’m done. And then you know, build that trust, and it shows people your real person, you actually care enough to send them the video. And it doesn’t matter to them that it took 20 seconds. Right, it’s that you took the time to do it. So yeah, really cool tool. And, you know, like I said, if you don’t want to pay for it, just use loom, something like that. It’s just a real game changer for you, especially if you get in that habit of staying behind the computer screen. And you’re not, you know, showing your face you’re not used to talking to people face to face, make sure you know you’re putting yourself out there and kind of starting to build that trust. Yeah, man. All right. Also, real quick, I wanted to talk about it just because it’s near and dear to me, I’ve been looking into a lot more AI stuff as things move forward. And so with the mastermind members, the ones who are interested, I think we have 10 or 12 people signed up already, I’m going to be talking to them about some tools that are incorporating some AI or not. So we’ll be diving into that and sharing with them kind of what I’m seeing for things like content briefs for copy contemporaries for blog post, getting rough drafts, written automatically. And then things like PPC and copy headlines, being able to generate that stuff really quick. So we’re gonna be talking about that on Friday in the mastermind. And then like Bradley was talking about his group and with the real estate so we do all this smaller stuff within the larger mastermind. If you want to find out more about that you can head over to mastermind dot semantic mastery.com. And if you’re new to Semantic Mastery, first of all, thanks for being here today. If you’re wondering about some of the stuff we’re talking about the mastermind or you know you hear us talking about the SEO shield or syndication networks, head over to the SEOshield.com that’s the word de Seo shield.com. Grab that that’ll explain a lot of it. Beyond that if you want to have kind of a bigger approach and kind of a more Building Block lists for a bunch of different areas that you’d like to follow for step by step processes for SEO head over to battleplan.semanticmastery.com we’ve got our battle plan right there. I already talked about the mastermind, you’ll know if you’re ready to join that but if you’re ready to grow your digital marketing or physical business and you want to join an experience community at the mastermind.semanticmastery.com that’s where you want to go. And then mgyb.co, done for you services, we use them, you should use them and to story. So beyond that, guys, I know we got a lot of questions. Is there anything else we need to let people know about before we get into it? Not Alright, that’s it. Let’s do it. Oh, shoot.

I saw something that I’m going to cover for Justin Hess in just a minute.

Word Agents

Yeah, well, we’re gonna give something away today, I think. All right. First of all, let me get the grab screen. I was also looking at something else. Because you mentioned AI Adam. So I’ve got something to share that I just came across was just sent to me via email today. So let me grab the screen. You guys should be seeing my screen. Correct. Got it? Well, yeah, concerning AI. Alright, I’ve talked about this before, I’ve been using this company called wordagents.com recently for website content, like page content for local business stuff. And they’re, they do a really good job of writing content. You know, I’ve talked about this on Hump Day hangouts a lot recently. But I like to use long form content. Instead of creating complex silo structures, I like to use simple silo structure, and have long form content from my top of landing page, you know, my landing page, essentially on top of silo, but it covers a lot of what I would have used as supporting articles or sub categories in a complex silo structure, I just add that into long form content as as section headers. And in that way, I can keep the silo structure simple on the on the site, it’s much easier to manage, it tends to work really well. And so I’ve been using two different companies for that kind of content. One is called crowd content. The other one’s called Word agents, word agents is cheaper if you’re buying in bulk, right. And so that’s, that’s what I’ve been doing more recently is buying, you know, like 10,000 words at a time cost 800 bucks. So it’s eight cents per word. But if I was to buy those types of articles from like, crowd content and hire four star writers, which is, you know, the top of the line writers, it’s 12 cents per word, and there’s no discount for more words. So essentially, it’s a it’s a significant discount, what 25% discount, or 30% 33% discount if I go with word agents. So anyway, I just got this email today from them talking about SEO, content optimization add on. And what’s really cool is, you know, Adam was just mentioning AI. Well, I started using phrase.io, I don’t know a couple of months ago now, to optimize content. So existing content that I already have on sites, analyzing it with the phrase IO app, and then adding more to it, right. So rewarding things, squeezing additional keywords in that phrase.io is determined or deemed are relevant. You know, and it does it. It’s just, it’s a really cool tool. And phrase.io is one of several apps that have similar functionality like surfer Seo marketmuse, which have not seen or clear scope, but there’s more coming soon. And my point is that with word agency.com, this is not an affiliate link, guys, I’m just sharing it with you, because he Adam mentioned AI stuff. And they will actually now use the tools that they have available or that they’ll you know, that they say that they can optimize your content with as part of their writing process. So what’s really cool is I like in just the past couple of months, since I’ve started using phrase, I’ve purchased long form content from word agents. And then once I get it back, I haven’t even trained to VA to use phrase yet because I was learning it myself. So I would go in and actually spend, you know, an hour optimizing a piece of content that was sent to me or delivered from word agents. So what’s really cool is now instead of me having to do that, I can actually just now uses like, 50% credit. So for example, for a 2000 word article, you would have to use 3000 words of your word, you know, your word bank, so to speak, in order to to have them apply one of these apps to the content writing. But you know, hey, that’s, that’s a lot of time that it will save me from having to do it or even having to train a VA how to use the phrase app, that would take a lot of time. Right. So my point is, it’s just just going to make it a lot easier on me since I was already using Word agents for them for me to just spend a little bit more and have them optimize the content with the phrase.io app. And again, there’s more tools coming soon. So I wanted to point that out, guys at I’m quite happy with the the work that I’ve gotten from word agents. And I think I’m gonna like it even better now that I don’t have to go in and you know, finish optimizing it once I get the delivery from them, it’s really nice I might have to include that are all at least mentioned at Bradley on mine. Because I know with market muse, something they’re doing is offering. They’ve already done it with people where they you could like, tie it to your website to get the content recommendations, blah, blah, blah. But then they would create a brief for you instead of like waiting phrase where you have to go in and kind of manually do it. And so now they’re kind of using their own algorithms to do that based on your own writing. So you could basically order it and then have it that brief and then have the brief compiled for you and then have it written there. So really starting to solidify or streamline this process.

Very cool. All right. So now we can get into questions. And then there’s something that I might have to wait until Marco’s answering one of these questions for me to pause the screen and whip something up to give to Justin here in a minute. And the rest of you on the webinar today will will appreciate this as well. We’ve got new applets available that you guys can use to import into your free accounts. So I just have to put it in a clean format. But that’s it’s it’s it’s great because it’s going to make the the ability to use free IFTTT accounts for syndication networks, so much easier. So I’ll share that with you guys here in a few minutes if I can get it situated before at some point during this today’s webinar.

Is There Any Update On buffersites.com By Abbas Ravji?

So Alright, first question up is Joel. He says, Is there any update for the auto blog content CMS thing that was mentioned in a previous webinar? If not, is there an alternative? There’s no update just yet, because it’s still in beta. In fact, I even have that open in my browser in my browser right now. Because I was going through some of the training videos, and I’m trying to get set up and start testing with it with myself. I’ve got a project is perfect for it. But no, it’s still in beta. We we can’t really do anything now. Mark. Adam, didn’t we have a landing page somewhere that we could send people to to get on the waiting list for condis?

That’s a good question. Let me take a look. It’s just just been long enough. Now I can’t recall. But let me take a link you did. I think you whipped it up like during a hump day hangouts a few weeks ago. That makes

sense. Let me take a look.

Yeah. So that’s for the the syndicating like, it’s called condis. But it’s, it’s really awesome. You know, and again, it’s still in beta guys. So now it’s not available yet. And we’ll let you know as soon as it is. Plus, you can get on the waiting list when Adam drops the opt in page for that. Okay. It’s a Marco, you got any comments on that? Because I know you’ve started playing with it a little bit.

Yeah, I’ve got a couple of sites up looks pretty good. But it’s in beta. I can’t really say anything until Jeremy’s ready to go.

Where Can We Place The Buzzboost Embed Code Other Than The Gsite And ID Page?

Okay, cool. Also, when it comes to co citation feeds, where else can we embed the buzz boost embed code other than the G site and the ID page? Thanks. You guys are legends. Thanks, Joe. Um, I haven’t used it anywhere other than that. I mean, I’m any you know, you could you could, you could embed the buzzboost embed code using our embed gigs and mgyb, for example. You know that that would help because then you’re again, you’re you’re embedding your RSS co citation feed in relevant content on hundreds or thousands or 10s of thousands of sites. Right. So, you know, that’s something I’ve not even tried that I’ve not even tested that. But it’s really interesting, because not all of my idx pages have that built into them, where we build a, you know, a co citation, super feed with ranked feeder, which is Lisa Allen’s product. But on the sites that I do, it’s really interesting. I’ve got several lead gen assets that are strictly lead gen assets, they don’t really have a bigger brand associated with them or anything else and every one of those that I have that buzz boost, and I just noticed this this week, which is why this is a timely question. I’ve noticed that every one of those even ones that I haven’t touched, because they were really for like development purposes. Like I’d set up some GMBs for testing and things like that. They’re all ranking and generating leads and some of them aren’t even monetized like in other words, I don’t even have a lead buyer for some of them and I just was noticing that every one of them that I was looking at this week had that so I’m thinking about creating a process and then having one of my VA is go through and actually do that for all of my lead gen assets. Again, I don’t I can’t swear that that was why those other local locations are still ranking but some of these are like two years old never fucking touched them never done any work. Nope, no press releases, no nothing. And yet they’re still in the three pack, like two years later with no additional work being done other than, you know, the the idx pages continually updating from the buzzboost that’s in there. So anyways, I don’t know of anywhere else that you would embed that maybe Marco has some idea But using the embed gigs and mgib might be something worth testing

anyway, where you can answer the code, actually access the code, you got access to the code, you can insert an iframe, that’s literally anywhere where you can access the code and get a, an iframe. Again, you just said it, hired through mgyb.co, for an embed one plus link building, plus indexing, and you’re good to go. I mean, that’s literally all you need. Because you’re going to get iframes wherever you Wherever data can get an iframe. And you’re going to get links into it and do that indexing gig and it’s all relevant. And that dude, right now, iframes are magic. They’ve always been, they’ve always been really good. But for some reason, every time Google comes in hard, and then they start rolling back, the update, for some reason old school shit, like this kind of stays, and it powers up even more. It’s really interesting. So you guys got to, don’t worry so much about Google updates. But look at the result. After the update, look at the data and see what what’s actually working. You’ll see that old school shit is really getting power right now.

Yeah, it’s cyclical, right? I mean, it seems like there’s always certain fundamental strategies that work better sometimes than others. But then they come back and they come back stronger. So it’s kind of like cyclical. And I’ve noticed that over the, over the years as well, so

Do You Still Build Out Automated Sites For Your Money Site?

Okay, the next question says, saw a video on another SEO podcast where someone mentioned building out satellite sites for an e commerce site, according to network Empire. Do you guys still build out automated sites around the money site? If so, what are the benefits of the approach? Well, yes, and no, I mean, that the syndication network is they’re all automated sites, right? So I mean, think about that the syndication network, our automated sites, we publish content to the blog, the money site, and then it Reese, you know, repost or publishes out to all of our syndication network properties. So that’s kind of automated content. It’s all branded content from the original source, which would be our blog or a money site. So yes, in that respect, we do. Also, as we were just mentioning, earlier today, we were you know, we’re working on testing an app for creating like, essentially auto blog sites and networks of auto blog sites that we have extreme amount of control over. And they they, that’s what that new app that we’re beta testing right now. called contests. Again, Adam might be dropping a sign up or an opt in link for that, so that you can be on the notification list when it’s available. But yeah, so I mean, we’re testing with that, too. But outside of that, I, I know, you can still do it and still produce results. That way. There’s, you know, a number of people out there that teach that method. Again, besides the syndication network in the G site, I’m not really doing impressive advantage, because I’m, you know, publishing a ton of content through press advantage for each project. Outside of that, now, I’m not doing it, but will it still work? Yeah, that’s a method that can absolutely work. Marco, do you want to comment on that?

No, because I don’t use satellite, I use the G site, I power up the G site and drive stack, adding the extension. That’s what our MGYB.co extension gig is for, I like to power that up and transfer the power directly to the money site, RYS, I think that we get a whole lot more power. When we do it that way, then building out these, these satellite websites. Plus, if it’s if it’s a G site and drive stack, all bets are off, right? Because when, like, the way that the algorithm is applied, the way that penalties and everything else, if you’re on a TLD, it’s applied differently. We’ve seen it time and again, where Google simply won’t penalize itself. We’ve seen it all that’s why we’re in there. Whereas if you’re going to do this on a mini site and or building satellites, kind of like a an old school, private blog network private meaning that it’s yours, and a blog network, because you’re going to publish content to them and add a link to your website and meaning that you’re not going to go and then sell links to your PBN, cuz then it’s no longer private, then it’s public, right? So if you’re going to go through all that trouble, I’d rather just power up my G sites and drive stacks and if I need to build the G site and drive stacks satellite, that’s how I that’s how I do it. Now. You’re welcome to try it. Either way. I think my way works perfectly well.

There you go. Um, I’ve got the screen pause briefly while I try to format something but we can move on to the next one. And I’ll come back to standby one minute, guys.

Okay, I’ll come back to it. All right.

What Do You Recommend For Keeping The GMB Page Fresh If The Client Has Low Budget For Content?

So the next question is from Randy. He says, Howdy folks, when dealing with clients that have a low budget for content, what would you recommend for keeping the money site GMB fresh with updated content. Worried about panda if I import RSS feeds directly into blog posts, yeah, I would. I don’t like doing that either, because then you’re auto populating content on your money site with other people’s content. And I don’t like to do that. We talked about using curated content, Randy all the time, because that is a very inexpensive way to produce content, highly relevant content and also create co citation. using other people’s content, it’s very efficient, very inexpensive. Again, you can train vas, with our method, it’s called content kingpin, if you want to go check it out. That’s the same method that I’ve been using. And I trained, you know, bloggers to for all my content needs for my clients and GMB posts and everything else, using curated content. And again, content kingpin teaches that method, it was designed specifically to teach somebody how to do that. So for example, you could hire a VA in the Philippines. You can pay him three or $4 an hour or whatever you want to pay on a per post basis, which is what I prefer to do. That’s very inexpensive, because they can very quickly create relevant content by curating other people’s content. And that’s different than just because again, you’re still, you’re still pulling in other people’s content that you’re going to cite the source. So you need to link back to the source of the content that’s been curated. So for, let’s say, use three different pieces of content in a curated post, right. So that would be like, you might cite two different articles, and a YouTube video or a slide deck or an audio file, you know, or something like that, or just three different pieces of you know, Article content. And then any, for each one of the snippets that you curate into that post, you would link back to the original source, right, because you want to give credit, you want to give attribution or cite the original source, which is fine, because I typically nofollow those links anyways. But it’s that way, you have control over what is being posted on this on your money site, as well as you create unique content, even if it’s curated snippets of other people’s already published content, because you inject commentary, and at the top right, there’s an opening paragraph, then there’s usually a little bit of content commentary added between each piece of curated content. And then there’s a conclusion paragraph, which could just be a couple of sentences. And typically, that’s where a call to action would go anyways. So it’s very efficient and quick way to develop highly relevant content, create co citation because you’re outbound linking to relevant content. And a very, very quick way to do it. That said, outside of doing curated content for for money site posts, which can then be repurposed as GMB posts, right. So again, you’re getting a whole lot of traction from one piece of content. The other way that you could do it is like if you don’t have a really big budget, or your client doesn’t have a big budget for content even enough, which you should for curated content, because it’s very inexpensive, if it’s done correctly. But the other thing would be just to focus on the GMB posts, right, make sure that you have on page on the on the website that the money site done well. And then you could focus on just doing GMB posts because those are very inexpensive as well. They’re much shorter form type content, right is 1500 characters max and the GMB posts. So again, I would recommend that you you try to work out curated content for the money site, which can then be repurposed the GMB post as well, it’s going to populate your syndication network all of that. But if you don’t even have a budget for that, first of all, get higher playing paying clients. But second of all, you can always focus in on GMB posts. If it’s for local stuff and get some significant traction that way, and that’s rather inexpensive as well marketing want to come on in that.

I’m going to second get get better paying clients who can handle the content budget also want to get such fantastic results for your clients that you can charge them more so that you can show that you can start producing better content, so that you can then charge them more make that attended then on you, I am going to get your results when I give me not give them the pitch that I give, I’m gonna it’s going to take me about 90 days to get your results, you’re going to see the results At the end of those 90 days, 90 days, we’re going to discuss what the new budget will be what it’s going to cost to keep me producing these results. And nine out of 10 it’s going to work. Nine out of 10 the guy’s got a shirt 90 days. And after those 90 days when they see the results that you can get for them, you better be able to get results, a nine out of 10 they’re going to they’re going to close and they’re going to say yes, please, let’s go on the monthly, how much is it and then are going to blink when you hit him. I hit him hard man. I hit him hard. But then the results that I’m giving them justifies them saying yes, that’s the whole point when you make it attendant on you, rather than on what the client is giving you, then you can pretty much start setting your own prices. That’s how you get better clients because like people know each other Jordan is really good about this, the doctors that he works with, they know one another. And they talk to one another. And since they’re in different geographical areas, like, they’re all talking, I got this guy. And then when you get that good, the word of mouth runs along. And now, if you’re niching, down, like Bradley recommends, or if you don’t, like I do, because if you got enough money to pay me to get your results, I’m going to figure out how to get get your results. The niche is irrelevant, because again, I’m going to call Jordan, I know Google AdSense, I know Google, I know how I’m going to get this person results, regardless of where we’re going. So there’s many different ways that you can do this focusing on this is the number one thing on the results that you can get so that you can then charge more, because now you’re you understand what it is that you’re worth. And then you’re not going to take these low budget people who don’t even have money for it. How is it? We’re iftt, we’re syndication. And we’re into strengthening your tier one branded through all of it, how in the world that you’re going to be able to do this, if you don’t have a content budget, or if it’s miniscule, so that maybe you blog once a month. Or you know, maybe you do a post every other week, which is not going to do anything for you.

Right on. All right, next question. See if I can find it. Damn, we got a lot of questions today. I’ve scrolled too far. That’s why. How do I get back to where we were?

We’re at the tag silo structure. There we go. Question. There we go.

Do You Index Or DeIndex Tag/Category Landing Page When Using A Tag Silo Structure?

Okay, Kook. Okay, when using a tag silo structure? Do you index or deindex the tag or category landing pages? Or do you worry about those tag or category landing pages ranking for your target keywords? All? It depends. I mean, it really is. It’s going to depend it um, you know, there’s a lot of things that you can do. First of all, with a with a typical silo structure for like local business type stuff, especially, I usually redirect the category URLs to the top level landing page. So remember, when you creating a silo, right, you create cat, your landing pages, and then you create corresponding categories for your landing pages. Four simple silo structure, that’s it, right? You’ve got top level categories, and then you’ve got your pages, and then everything else is going to be posts, right? Because posts are how you add depth to a simple silo structure. If you were doing complex silo structure, then you would have categories top level categories, and then subcategories, and they would have corresponding pages and child pages. That make sense. And then posts would go, you know, in but again, I always try to use simple silo structure at almost all, you know, almost always now. So when so for category URLs, the category itself, I like to redirect the category URL to the top level landing page, its corresponding landing page. Does that make sense? And that’s only because typically, you know, for like local business services and stuff, people aren’t going to be looking for posts in a particular category, because they’re not there to consume content. They’re there to contact the local business to provide them a product or service. Right. So again, it’s not like a content based website, we use content to help it to rank, but people aren’t usually on a local business website to read through, you know, articles in a particular category. So that’s why I don’t care about having a category index page, like a blogroll page for that category. It’s not necessary, right? So why not allow that taxonomy structure in WordPress to kind of flow the page rank up to that top level landing page by redirecting that category URL to the landing page. So that covers categories, when it comes to tags, it depends, once again, on what it is that you’re doing. I usually leave them to index the tag pages to index. But you can also think about this and I can’t get too deep into this guy’s again, this is a free forums where we talk about in like heavy hitter club or the mastermind, but you can canonicalize tag pages, I usually leave an end index anyways. But then you can canonicalize tag pages to their corresponding, you know, landing pages if you have them. Or what I like to do is again, my, what I do is create the land, you know, the silo landing pages and top level categories. That’s all topically. The categories are topic, topic based, right? And then I do tag silos for location silos or geographic silos. And so what I do is I have my my VA who does my blogger, she she writes blog posts that are optimized for a particular keyword plus a city. Right and so that blog post becomes a landing page itself. And then what we do is we canonicalize the tag the corresponding tag to that particular page, so that we have essentially two link building targets, right, we have the tag page. And then we have the the landing page, which in this case would be a blog post, both of those could become link building targets. But what I like about using tags specifically is because of the stuff that we can do on the G sites, right, we talked about theme mirroring, and all that kind of stuff all the time. And with the GS with tag pages, you can do some really cool things by embedding the tag page into g sites, you know, create a page on the G site optimize for the term that you’re you’re trying to rank for, and then you embed a tag page into there. And that becomes a link building target as well, that can funnel or pass juice to all of the posts that have that that are that share that tag. That makes sense. So it really depends. I mean, again, it really depends on what it is that you’re doing. I can’t give you a solid answer, because it’s going to depend on the project. I typically will leave my tag pages to index but then I use canonical is very strategically. Does that make sense? Anybody want to comment on that?

on the web, right? It’s it’s always, depending on what it is that you’re trying to accomplish. Yeah, this is this isn’t an easy question to answer, because this does variables on how you’re using your tags and you categories.

I agree. Yeah, I totally agree with that. So it is it’s one of those kind of like standard SEO answers, which is it depends, you know, because it really depends on what it is that you’re trying to do. There’s just so many things that you can do when you’re using like a dual silo structure on a site. What I mean by that is using the traditional silo with categories. And then there’s the tag silo, which I use specifically for location based silos now. So I consider that like to two types of silos on the site, right? You have topical silos, which are the traditional silo structure. Then I use tag silos, which are for location silos essentially. But it’s really cool because you can do a lot of cool things with it. It’s a good question, though.

IFTTT Pro Concern

Justin says, Hey, guys, hoping you have been able to hear back from someone at IFTTT about the wonkiness has been going on since the pro upgrade my pro accounts are not showing any of the applets I create so I can’t share them to my other pro accounts. And today, I noticed the various accounts of yours. And some others I was using applets from have changed to this user hasn’t created applets too, so I don’t know what to do anymore. Okay, as we as we’ve you know, answered this question a bunch of times, Justin, even with a free account, and you can you can enable applets you just have to find them, right? But so you go to the Explore tab you can search you know, like the the standard applet titles or names that we’ve used over the years, you can locate there’s a handful of them that I know to be ours, you can tell by the applet creator the username essentially, Stephen R. Reynolds is one of them Vernon e DUNS and other one I’ve got a bunch of how to SEO as another one, there’s a bunch of them that we’ve created over the years that are in the kind of library applet library under the Explore tab that you can locate and turn them on, if you have IFTTT accounts where you had created the applets. But you let it go. You know, as you never subscribed, you never subscribed as a pro subscriber. Let’s say you had 15, applets and an account and you allowed it to go to the free plan beyond the date where you could subscribe as a pro account, then it automatically turns off or archives all but three applets. Right. So but if you just used somebody else’s applet and turned it on, then it will allow you to turn them all on. Does that make sense? But it will, it will only allow you to keep three that you’ve created in an account. So what I’m saying is if you had an account that you set up, and it’s now on the free tier instead of a pro tier and you had created all 15 applets in this example, then it will only allow you to keep three of them on the other 12 are going to be archived, then it won’t allow you to turn them on you can go to the Explore tab and find the other applets that somebody else created that were in the library of applets and then turn them back on enable them and then swap out obviously, you know add your own RSS feed or whatever. However, I’m gonna share this with you guys now and I think it’s still on my clipboard. Well I already posted it to at you Justin, but I’m just going to post it here as well. I, we have a pro account and by the way just to share this with you guys on how to create applets in a pro account so that you can share them between other accounts you do that. If you go in IFTTT, you click your profile icon in the top right corner, you’ll see a drop down says platform or there’s an item in the drop down called platform. Click through to that, then you have to set your user account up as a service. So and I can’t I’m not going to show you guys how to do all that I had to learn it myself in the last two weeks. But there’s help files and everything else but you got it. You’ve got your username for that IFTTT The T account, it has to be a pro account. But if you have a pro account, you can create your username as a service or add it as a service. And then from there, you create applets. These are the applets right here that I’ve created with the pro account. You guys have access to this now it’s in the comments. But for example, if I were I don’t know if I can click through, probably logged into one of my accounts, but let’s just see. Yeah, I am. So if you can see, these are now saying by Semantic Mastery, and this is a blog RSS repost to blogger. And look, even if I’m not logged in, if I go over here to refresh Firefox installation, I can now see these applets. Whereas before you couldn’t write.

there was no way to share applets anymore. But now because I’ve created all of these applets, under our pro account, you have to do it in platform.ifttt.com. And you have to again, you have to set your pro account up as a service, and then you can start creating applets. And that’s what I’ve done here. And so these applets are now the new updated applets that will allow you guys to import them directly from this sheet into your account, all you got to do is copy the URL paste and go in your address bar when you’re logged into your account. And now you can enable these applets and these have all been coded up to today’s standards. And by the way, attribution has been coded into the blog syndication applets now, so that you don’t need to have a attribution inserter plugin in your RSS feed. So in other words, for those of you don’t want to talk about to, you know, we used to just use the code inserter from Yoast, or from our own RSS plugin that we developed to create that attribution link, like this post was first published on you know, whatever, that would automatically insert that like line of that attribution link at the bottom of every post in the RSS feed. But because Yoast is such a piece of shit, and we’re not in the plugin game or the plugin development business, and so it’s it’s we don’t even really want to continue supporting the one that we created. I just recreated all the applets with attribution already built in. So you don’t need that you don’t need that anymore. By the way, I also found out that all in one SEO pack plugin does also have an attribution module built into it. And I think Jeffrey Smith and the IRS has an RSS module built into it as well. That’s the SEO ultimate Pro, which is what we recommend for SEO plugin. But what I’m saying is you don’t need any of that anymore, because they’re built directly into here. Okay, now, some of these may change or be edited slightly, because I haven’t completed testing all of the YouTube applets yet, these have all been tested. So these may change but the URL is not going to change. So even if I update the athletes guys, they’re not going to change, the URL should not change. Okay. So we’re in the process of updating a syndication Academy, we’re going to be relaunching that as version three updated for 2021, essentially, because we probably won’t watch it before beginning of next year. But just know that we have got a lot of stuff cooking for the new syndication Academy guys, and right here are the applets that I just created within the last week and a half or so. Okay, and again, you guys have access to this now. The URL is semanticmastery.com/new-IFTTT, that will take you to this page here. Do not ask to edit this page, go to File, and then go to make a copy and copy that into your Drive account. And then or download it as a CSV or whatever you want. But if you ask to edit this, I’m going to deny it. Okay. So don’t don’t ask. Anybody want to comment on that?

Oh, perfect. Beautiful.

Should You Use An SEO Shield Or A Syndication Network For A Client With Several Web Properties?

Okay, ideas. 111 says I purchased your SEO Power Shield and have some questions as to the best structure my client has several web properties that would be best if they would be branded as one entity using her name. The business recently changed structure with the new business name being her name. So this works well. Several of these sites are old and need to be replaced with better siloed sites. Is it effective to build the SEO power shield and include these old properties siloing the information in the shield and then add information from the new site as it is completed?

Uh, I don’t know, this is a almost needed diagram for this. I’m trying to visualize what you’re telling me in your head but or I’m trying to visualize in my head what you’re telling me and I’m having difficulty. Also, I need to promote one of their new sites immediately as they are opening several other locations just for IV therapy and nutrition. Would this get a separate SEO shield? Or just a separate syndication network? Thank you, Marco. This seems like a bit of a complicated question. And without all the details, I don’t know if I could give a proper answer or were you able to interpret. It’s not something that I’m that would be answered here. This is requiring just a lot of what I would consider a consultation time. It’s not something that we do on Hump Day. We don’t answer anything this intricate, because this requires this a whole lot of different things. And then we have to go look at it and see what which one would be the best way to answer it. Right? Yeah. How would we approach this? Okay. It’s not something that I can answer cold.

Yeah, yeah, it’s difficult. I mean, just from rereading it while you were talking, I mean, if just on a very high level, if there’s multiple websites that should be brought under one brand, then I would almost say why not create one website under that, you know, parent or master brand, and then set up silos on that website. And then, you know, basically, import the content from the existing individual sites into the new site, and then do redirects from the old sites that, to me, it makes a mess, if you’ve got a bunch of different websites out there that were separate websites, but now you want to bring them all under one entity, if they’re related. And it makes sense, then absolutely, you can. But what I would suggest is housing them all under one domain, right, and you could, you could just you repurpose the old content, just so you set up proper silo structure on the new branded domain, even if it’s her name, or whatever, it doesn’t matter. And then you would set up silos, which would have been each of the individual sites, you bring that content, and it can be literally copy paste to bring that content in. And then you would set up redirects from the old domains, to the new sex, you know, the corresponding pages on the site, that kind of stuff so that you’re pushing all of that relevancy to that one domain, that one entity. But then there’s a lot of schema stuff that could be done there that would really need to be done to combine all that into one entity. Also, the the SEO or excuse me, the SEO shield, that could all be mirrored once that original website, the main entity, main branded entity website would be built out correctly and formatted correctly, like all of that could be duplicated or mirrored in the SEO show. But again, without knowing like all the different pieces and stuff, like does it make sense to mix them all under one entity or not? And only you can answer that? So I agree with Marco, that this is one of those questions that more context is needed, and probably going to need more, you know, more consultation from somebody. So that would be like a great question for the semantic mastery mastermind. And I don’t know if you guys and how heavy hitter are doing like audits and stuff, but that would be a really good question for the mastermind. So sorry, I couldn’t give you a better answer for that.

Now, this is some I mean, we’ve done it we did it for for Pete Hogg. And in my ask Marco, anything, webinars. I’ll even I’ll even go into that. Right, but but not here, because this requires me actually going and looking at everything. And seeing how I would put it together for the questions that he’s asking. Is that something that you can just fly off off the cuff on and say, yeah, yeah, I do this and this and this? Yeah. Because if I change like that, like the main change, and so now, what do we do? What do we do with the old property? I have to look at them? How much value is there in there? And how much change? There’s just so much? I can’t answer it.

Yeah, I agree. That’s, it’s, it’s a complicated question with very little information, which I know it’d be hard to. Honestly, if you posted a great big wall of text trying to explain all this stuff. We wouldn’t even cover it anyways. So again, that’s more of one of our paid groups. We try I tried I tried to give you some somewhat of an answer, but I know that probably didn’t suffice and for that, I’m sorry.

What MGYB SEO Products Do You Recommend For An eCommerce Site And Events Planning Site?

Next question. Hello, guys. I got my battle plan two weeks ago and close to new clients here in the UK to build an e commerce website for each of them with monthly SEO look at that guy’s got his battle plan two weeks ago and close to clients in two weeks. That’s strong. So congratulations. So I plan to purchase your keyword research is the first step for each Can you tell me what are the other products I need to purchase from your arsenal services and in what order? Am I to purchase them? One of the ecom websites is in the fashion that specifically children’s custom clothing and the other is in selling hair products, mostly targeting women’s hair. Both are located here in London, England. Yeah, well, if you’ve got the SEO battle plan, that’s like, you know, basically the roadmap. The other the other thing I would say is, as Adam mentioned at the beginning of today’s Hump Day hangout is go to the SEO shield.com. That’s the seoshield.com. and sign up for that free training. And that will take you through the SEO shield training. I think it’s on a four day schedule. So you get another lesson every day. That kind of walks you through the different components of the SEO shield. And that that’s really what we would suggest is get the keyword research first and once you have that, then go order an SEO power shield for each client. right because that includes all the have our you know, our proprietary methods, our building blocks our foundation of, you know, the foundational stuff that we do which is the syndication network, the RYS Drive stack plus g site, the idx page, and press it manage organization page, all of that combined. So it’s it’s basically that’s why we we’ve recreated the SEO show to begin with was because instead of ordering individual components, you get it all in one bundle, it’s a little bit less expensive, and it’s also less work on your end to place the orders in separate pieces or, you know, at separate times. So in plus we get it a little bit faster that way too. You get it delivered a little bit faster. So again, go through the battle plan, if you haven’t already sounds like you have go to SEO.com opt in for that, it’s free, you’ll go through that training. And then what I would suggest is after the keyword research has been delivered, then you order the SEO, power shield for each client comments on that SEO power shield and link building, get that initial link building for the brand, solidify the brand, then you start looking at what your targets are, you need the data, that’s what the initial run is for.

That’s right. That’s right. Not only that, but when you order the SEO power shield, on the thank you page, there’s an opportunity to get link building for that power shield at a discounted rate. It’s like the Oto for link building. So that’s a really good opportunity to purchase the links for that too. So once it’s built, it’ll immediately go to link building team to have links built to it. So that helps to solidify all of that as Marco said. Okay, so I have another client from the British Virgin Islands who I closed yesterday to build an events planning site for her in the British Virgin Islands, there is not much competition in that niche. So I would need to purchase all of your service, there is not much competition that niche so what I need to purchase all of your services, and if not, what would you recommend? Well, I don’t recommend ever doing anything less than the SEO power shield for for a project period. Like, in my opinion, that’s the bare minimum, it covers all of our, if it’s not very competitive, when you order an S, once you have an SEO power shield in place, that means that it will probably require very little off page work in order to get it you know, like off page, essentially link building and embed gigs, that type of stuff for you to be able to get results. I can’t say it won’t take you any because I don’t know. But it will probably take very little. So but again, I wouldn’t recommend shortcutting again, as I mentioned before, guys, that’s like our foundational stuff the SEO showed is the foundation of everything that we do, it used to just be syndication networks, but over the years it’s grown into all of what we can all of the components that our makeup the SEO power shield. So I would recommend that being like your, your floor right your basement like that’s that you build that first and then from there, you only do the off page as needed or content marketing and off page SEO as needed. Once you get your desired results, you can kind of slow it down a little bit. So that’s what I would recommend. Anybody else?

Moving on.

What Do You Recommend To Get The SMS PIN Verification In Creating Gmail Accounts?

Robert says thank you SM team and best part of Wednesday’s Hump Day Hangouts. Thank you. I’m limited on creating additional Gmail accounts and their verification process what options are safe to get the SMS pin verification completed? I don’t know because I don’t go through that process anymore. Um, I have somebody that I buy accounts from now when I need them. I don’t know if he’s got a landing page or not. But I pause for a minute if you guys have any ideas because I don’t create my own accounts anymore at all. Does anybody do that here?

Negative.

All right, standby. I’m gonna pause the screen just for a moment while I look up the email I don’t think he’s got a landing page for this but you can email this gentleman and tell him standby I’m looking just to see I might have an email. No, I have an email but I’m sorry. I was looking for a landing page.

Alright, um, his name is miles Chad. I’m grabbing the email now and I’m going on pause the screen just a moment guys. Okay, so I’m going to add Robert contact miles, Chad for purchasing accounts. And he does like a bunch of web 2.0 stuff, Twitter accounts, Gmail accounts. He does aged accounts, new accounts, phone verified stuff. He gives you the phone number for verify that he verified them with these accounts are really good accounts. Guys. I’ve used account providers over the years and this guy’s miles Chad. He’s really really good about replying via email, like communications really good. He’s prompt. The accounts are good. I’ve never had any problems with the accounts. He’ll replace them. If there is a problem like I don’t I don’t you have to ask him about what the time limit is that He will replace them. But I know like if I get a new fresh batch of accounts from him, and during the process of, you know, binding them to my IP or to, you know, a proxy or whatever it is that I’m doing, if I have any trouble, and I get locked out of the account, he’ll replace them. I’m not talking about months down the road, but when I first get them he does. So again, contact him, tell him I sent you. I just actually purchased some Twitter accounts. I don’t use Twitter much, but I purchased some Twitter accounts from him a few weeks ago, like literally about three weeks ago. So I know he’s still selling accounts. I would I would contact him tell him I referred you. Okay. Let’s see Chris, move the camera down unless you’re naked. Yeah, Chris does that pantsless he’s not here to defend themselves by

What Do You Mean By The Importance Of Press Release With Keyword Anchor Text To Improve Website Entity?

pavlo Hey, guys, question press release with keyword anchor text will be helpful to improve website entity. I’m confused regarding this topic. That’s why I decided to ask you without guessing. Thanks a lot. I don’t you can use I mean, look that okay, the short answer. And that’s the only I’m only going to be able to give you the short answer. No, don’t use keyword anchor text. You can use branded anchor text to link back to your website through a press release. That that’s okay. I prefer naked URLs or brand anchors when linking directly back to the money site. Does that make sense? I try not, unless I’ve got like a particular page on my site that has a really robust link profile. And I can afford or I can, you know, use keyword anchors at that point, then that’s okay. But only if you know what you’re doing. I don’t recommend it. If you don’t know what you’re doing just use naked URLs or brand anchors, if you’re going to link directly to your money site from a press release. So yeah, that’s that’s the simple short answer. Anybody else want to comment on that?

Yeah, because, I mean, Jeremy has been so good about giving us access, or allowing us to power up our entity. And we already do a really good job of that, yes, it will improve. If you’re going entity for entity, I mean your main entity and and you really need to know it, you really need to know what you’re doing. If you’re doing this, you really need to know and it’s not something that you can just go Okay, let me take a text anchor, and and send it you know, however many links that is, because then I mean, you can get into a whole lot of trouble with all of those links coming to your to your website, right? through one like a one word, one, one keyword anchor text. That’s trouble, man, that’s if you don’t have everything set up, right? To receive that anchor text link, you’re in trouble. So rather than that, the schema, the iframe, everything that you can do on that press release will help you overall, especially with that ad ID page and adding the press advantage media page, it just everything that we do with that Id agreed.

How To Set Google Folders Public To The Web And Be Indexable?

Okay, so, uh, I think we’re probably only get two to the last two year old off and then bb. And then I think we got to wrap it up, guys, because we’re almost at the five o'clock hour. So Olaf says hello there. How can I make Google folders public to the web and indexable, we can’t share that here. You can still do it, there’s absolutely and in fact, Syndication Academy update, when that comes out, which again, will probably be in the early first part of next year. So 2021, there will likely be something available there that will show you how to do it or give you a resource that will give will make a folder like give you the ability to make folders public. And also we may be able to provide that and MGYB very, very soon, like in a couple of weeks, maybe we’re gonna have a meeting about it next week. So there’s a very good chance that we can provide that as a service inside of MGYB. can’t share it with you here because that was a something that we shared Marcus shared in the paid setting. So it wouldn’t be right for me to share that here.

But yes, we’ve been using that we’ve been using that method and MGYB. And then that’s something that I’m that I’m going to give away, right? Because when Google took that away, I had to go and spend time on that, to figure out how to do it. So did Rob. I mean, we immediately got on that and figured out how to make them public. Again, it plus, we had already been doing it in the drive section and G sites. I mean, we can still do it to this day, the best way to make one public is to go and get a drive second g site from MGYB. We’ll do it for you save all that time and effort.

Yeah, and like I said, you can absolutely still do it. There’s no question. And that’s probably going to be something that we have as a service inside of MGYB to make files and or folders public. But we’re going to we’re going to talk about that next week. So we come back with that question. Again. I’m sorry, I couldn’t share with the method here guys. But there are some things that just have to be behind closed doors. This is a free public forum. So it’s certain things we can’t share. And hopefully you understand that. You can come join one of our paid groups though and find out All off.

How To Show An Image Schema In Mobile SERPs?

So Bibi says, Hey guys, I thought it was Thursday today Time flies. Yes, it does. For the questions, I have a post. Okay, I’m going to share I read this previously. So I’m kind of prepared for this. We’ll try to get through this rather quickly. But he says I have a post that has graph schema with and he talks about the different types generated by the Yoast plugin. So the first thing I’m going to tell you to do is throw that fucking plugin out. Like, Yoast is a piece of shit, don’t use the Yoast plugin. For schema stuff, like I said, use SEO ultimate Pro, it’s a paid plugin, but it’s totally worth it. It has all the different schema types built into it, it’s got schema builders directly in the plugin. So like on the post or page editors inside of WordPress in the SEO ultimate Pro Plugin widget underneath where the text editor is there, you can literally develop any type of schema you want there. And what’s great about it is not only can you develop the schema specific to that page or post, but you can always go back and edit or append the schema using the SEO ultimate pro plugin, and it will automatically format it correctly. Because if you try to use two different schema types on a page or a post, and you don’t have them connected properly, called connected schema or connected data or nested schema is another term for it, then it can ambiguous ate the main entity of the page because you’ve got two separate schemas on the page, you have to have it connected properly. And so again, like the SEO ultimate pro plugin will do that for you automatically. If you’re using the schema creator and editor that’s on the page or post level. Does that make sense? So it will automatically append additional schema for like marking up different items like video object, image object, whatever reviews schema, FAQ schema, all of that. So highly recommend that the Yoast plugin add so much bloat so much shitty code, I just highly recommend that you stop using that crappy plugin. Okay, Marco will will verify that as well. Also, if you want to create schema without purchasing a plug in, I would recommend a free version is technical SEO calm. It’s the go to technical SEO. com Click on Tools and find the schema markup generator. And here you can find all different types of schema that you can mark up. This is what I was using before I started using the schema creator and Jeffrey’s plugin or the SEO ultimate pro plugin. And lastly, another option would be but it comes with a monthly subscription fee. But I am using this myself, I like it because you can get some really significant, like really complex connected data item type schema with schema app.com. This has an it has a little bit of a learning curve with this and it has a monthly expense. But if you’re going to be doing a lot of structured data stuff, I recommend using this I know my partners might not use it. But I like this because it automates a lot of stuff for me. I don’t have the patience that some of my like Rob does to do all this shit in spreadsheets, so I use schema. So those are the three things I would suggest this for individual, like items that you want to mark up this if you want to do significant like connected data items, which is really what you should be doing now anyways, or the SEO ultimate pro plugin, which doesn’t have a monthly expense and that’s a again, it’s a great plugin. It’s way better than Yoast. Mark, do you want to comment on that?

No, we’ve run over time. Yeah.

Okay, so no comments. Alright guys, thanks for being

Source: Semantic Mastery Weekly SEO Q&A – Hump Day Hangouts – Episode 314 published first on your-t1-blog-url

[shirlleycoyle]

That Time John McAfee Developed One of the First Social Networks

A version of this post originally appeared on Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail.

Let it be said that we must live in particularly interesting times when John McAfee, one of the most controversial people the world of technology has ever produced, can get arrested in a foreign country for tax evasion … and people barely even notice.

But that’s what happened earlier this month—and as a result, McAfee is sitting in a Spanish jail, waiting to be extradited.

A lot has been written about him over the years, but I’d like to focus on one part of his life that has perhaps been overshadowed by his unusual existence over the past decade: The fact that, in the late 1990s, he was a social media innovator.

That innovation? A chat app called PowWow that, despite a certain McAfee imprint, was well ahead of its time. Here’s why you probably don’t remember it.

1994

The year John McAfee resigned from McAfee Associates, the company he founded in the 1980s that became a major distributor of antivirus software. The company, a multibillion-dollar giant today, nearly sold to Symantec years before it hit its later peaks, but McAfee was talked out of selling his namesake firm by a low-level analyst at a venture capital firm that realized the fundamentals of the company were quite good. While he later left, he did so with a lot more money than he would have had previously.

Image: Steven Weeks/Unsplash

How John McAfee turned a Winnebago sabbatical into his second startup

Everyone has likely heard the story of how Jeff Bezos quit his job in the financial industry and came up with the business plan for Amazon while on a cross-country trip to what would become his new home in Seattle. (Bezos, of course, didn’t drive as he hashed out this plan; his then-wife, MacKenzie, was behind the wheel.)

Less heralded, but perhaps more interesting, is the trip that John McAfee took throughout the Western U.S. after he quit his leadership role with his namesake antivirus company.

Like Bezos, McAfee’s excursion led to the launch of a new company. Unlike Bezos, this was McAfee’s second round in the Winnebago, which is where the antiviral legend got his start when he was first trying to pinpoint computer viruses sometime in the late 1980s.

As recounted in a 1997 article in the legendary tech business magazine Red Herring, McAfee’s second encounter with a Winnebago came after he had a minor heart attack, which led him to sell his company and go on an extended trip to the Rockies, where he encountered various Native American tribes. Those tribes directly inspired his follow-up company—and its inevitable location in the relatively tiny Woodland Park, Colorado, near Pikes Peak.

When McAfee gave away his antivirus software in the 1980s, he did so because of a New Age philosophical approach that suggested that software shouldn’t be sold. Likewise, he found inspiration in the Native American tribes he visited during this mid-’90s journey. Per Red Herring:

There’s an entrepreneur living in the shadow of Pikes Peak, Colorado, who thinks software is a living tree and can’t be sold. So in his last venture he gave it away. He sees the Internet as the physical manifestation of what Indian shamans call “the golden thread,” and his latest project, Tribal Voice, is an attempt to capitalize on this mystical vision.

And where did that mystical vision lead him? It led him to multimedia chat software that was years ahead of the instant messaging trend that would eventually take hold thanks to AOL, ICQ, and later Skype.

An example of the PowWow chat software, which was also an early example of instant messaging.

The software Tribal Voice created, PowWow, may have been one of the first social networks, thanks to its focus on “tribes” as an organizational strategy. It was a great spot to converse—if you could look past the website.

“PowWow lacks the robust business-oriented features of packages such as WebPhone, but if you’re looking to specialize in a chat-room atmosphere and don’t mind enduring the ham-radio quality of the conversations, PowWow might be just the ticket.”

— A passage from a 1996 review of PowWow in PC Magazine, which noted that the application’s big strength was the size and reach of its community. Not so hot? The voice chat, which didn’t work so well on the modems of the era, at least at the time of testing.

Tribal Voice, as it appeared in 1996 and 1997. Image: Internet Archive

Tribal Voice’s initial marketing strategy appropriated Native culture—with a huge side of cringe

The software was good, but Tribal Voice had branding that very much reflected its unusual founder. It had a website (at tribal.com, of course), that was in many ways pure cringe … that seemed to almost make a mockery of the Native American culture that inspired the company.

On one early version of the Tribal Voice site, the about page included a photo of McAfee and company, under the banner “The Outlaw Geeks,” brandishing various types of guns. (Given what we know about McAfee now, it checks out.) And another page featured a “Tribal Voice Yuppie Catalog” which makes one wonder what exactly McAfee learned from his time visiting Native tribes.

A staff shot from the Tribal Voice website, circa 1997. So yeah, that happened. Image: Internet Archive

The company’s active borrowing of Native American imagery and wording drew the ire of an early online Native American activist, Paula Giese, who called the material on the site “sacreligious.”

“Our Sacred Pipe, sweat lodge, cedar, tobacco, all of our most important symbols, ceremonies, objects, places are not just exploited but desecrated, trashed, by this Tribal Voice corporation, which spent hundreds of thousands of dollars preparing its commercial site, but has advertised itself all over the web as ‘Native Culture,’” Giese wrote.

Giese, who died in 1997, had a notably tense online interaction with McAfee, which is saved on the Internet Archive for all to see. (McAfee’s defense? “This is probably not an appropriate site for teenagers. We are focused on adult issues,” he wrote.)

It also did no favors from a PR standpoint. Gary Flood, a reporter for Computer Business Review who was doing a profile on McAfee, recalled being weirded out by the site’s many inside jokes and garish color scheme. His thoughts:

Initial impressions: geek city, lots and lots of feathers and cosmic colors, man, a major section of the site being devoted to the self-admittedly crazy ramblings of an escapee from the Pikes Peak Mental Facility who is obviously some loon one of the programmers thinks is cool, and what seems way too much stuff about ‘adult’ web sites and marijuana.

Nonetheless, despite the somewhat disturbing web branding scheme (which Flood had been told was likely going away at the time of his early 1998 interview), the software’s community-building mentality, something of a combination of IRC and Skype, found a lot of early success. Despite the cringey way the site showed its inspiration, the tribes concept did lead McAfee and company in the direction of social media years before most people cared.

An early Tribal.com page dating to 1997 pinpoints more than 700,000 separate users on its “white pages,” which were pages that people could sign up for to find people to chat with. (Unlike, say, Twitter, you actually had to look people up as if you were using a phone book.) PowWow, says McAfee, attracted numerous walks of life.

“We let people set up whatever tribe they want. We have, for example, a gay Hispanic tribe,” McAfee told Red Herring. “Our biggest tribe, believe it or not, is an Icelandic tribe. We also have an enthusiastic user community in Rio de Janeiro.”

Forgotten today, PowWow was a nice little success at the time—especially after it ditched the weird website. On the way to making things more professional, they even brought in a new CEO, Joseph Esposito (who, true story, once pushed back on a story of ours that discussed his prior employer, Encyclopaedia Britannica). And McAfee, still just a few years off from leaving a hugely successful company that he created, had no trouble attracting investors, unusual site or not.

But the PowWow software attracted a major enemy that would eventually land a body blow: AOL.

$10M

The amount McAfee made from selling half of Tribal Voice in 1997. McAfee would later cash out entirely, selling the company to a dot-com incubator, CMGI, in 1999, for $17 million. (Not a bad payday.) In a 2010 piece on McAfee in Fast Company, Tribal Voice employee Jim Zoromski implied that McAfee was actually scared off by the company’s success—just as he was with McAfee Associates years earlier. “When John was at Tribal Voice, the growth rate was incredible,” Zoromski said. “But when it got to be too popular, it started to feel too much like work, and John wasn’t interested.”

PowWow supported AOL Instant Messenger. AOL didn’t like that.

How AOL took a bite out of Tribal Voice

With Tribal Voice, John McAfee and his rag-tag crew of programmers in small-town Colorado were early to one of the most important early trends in technology during that period—instant messaging.

But the fact that PowWow is basically forgotten while its most high-profile competitor, AOL Instant Messenger, is fondly remembered today, may not exactly be an accident.

By 1998 or so, McAfee’s follow-up company was seeing real success in one of the hottest areas of the early internet—in part because McAfee knew a lot about both building communities and selling technology to the public.

(McAfee, infamously, helped to hype up the craze around the Michelangelo virus in 1992 … which helped to boost the profile of his antivirus app.)

He could also sell technology to companies: Shockingly, given the photo I just shared with you above, Tribal Voice scored a partnership with friggin’ AT&T, with PowWow helping to power the instant messaging capabilities of the telecom giant’s WorldNet service.

Part of what attracted WorldNet to PowWow comes down to its ability to work on multiple networks, including AOL and MSN Messenger. This gave PowWow—and AT&T—a competitive advantage, as it could work across networks with ease.

This wasn’t something, however, that AOL liked. In fact, AOL didn’t like anyone encroaching on its instant-messaging turf and took steps to protect it at all costs: It outright purchased ICQ, attempted to block competitors from using similar terminology to AOL Instant Messenger (a fight it fortunately failed at), and took steps to block Microsoft’s MSN Messenger from its users.

Smaller IM services during the period were trying to make a case for interoperability, so that users of one network could reach friends on any of them. For a time, AOL offered guides that described how this was done to allow for the development of Unix-based clients for AIM. The problem was that its competitors read those posts as well, and PowWow found itself pulled into a messy battle as it attempted to raise up its own application by adding AIM support, and admitting it was doing so without any approval from AOL.

Tribal Voice created a mortal enemy with this move, and it likely hastened the demise of the PowWow tool, which found itself at the center of a high-profile battle with AOL that worked to make the case for interoperability between instant messaging clients. It was a game of chicken for a while; PowWow would add functionality to enable AIM support, AOL would shut it down. 

At one point—which should be noted, came after McAfee had left the company—Tribal Voice and other clients found itself making this case in front of the FCC.

According to a New York Times article from the era, new CEO Ross Bagully evoked Ronald Reagan: “Mr. Case, on behalf of the IM industry and users everywhere, tear down this wall!”

But ultimately, the cause of encouraging open IM support came at the cost of the original weird Native American-inspired thing that McAfee built. The new owner lost interest in PowWow entirely, and shut the app down at the beginning of 2001 … while claiming continued interest in IM technology as a whole.

“After careful review of CMGion’s business objectives and strategic direction by its new management team CMGion feels that the PowWow technology is not an integral part of CMGion’s mission,” an FAQ from the shutdown stated.

One has to wonder, if McAfee stayed with the company he started instead of leaning on the easy payout, where it might have gone. After all, he waited with McAfee Associates … and look where that company is now.

It’s so bizarre to think about this product in retrospect.

PowWow was a genuinely innovative product, one that predicted the success of about half a dozen apps that followed it. But even folks that did use it only have faded memories of it. I’m sure I used this program in 1996, but I completely forgot about its existence until I started writing this and went, “Ohhhhh.”

It might come down to the fact that it was simply too early.

Image: a PowWow Facebook fan page

Jason Pontin, then the editor of the MIT Technology Review, argued in 2005 that one of the reasons that PowWow didn’t see the level of success that McAfee’s antivirus suite did, despite also being sold for free, was that the market wasn’t ready for his inventions. He was a first-mover in a second-mover market—something that was not true of his first startup, which innovated most effectively thanks to its business model.

“Tribal Voice was the innovator in two emerging markets, now much in the news, whose dynamics are still only partially known. The first is multiprotocol IM. The second is social networking,” Pontin wrote. “Today, thriving companies like Cerulean Studios and LinkedIn can be found in both markets. But John McAfee was there first, even if he didn’t know how to make money from Tribal Voice.”

Today, McAfee is a colorful figure, one of tech’s most interesting and controversial. But despite his success in antivirus software, there’s a strong case to be made that he also should be celebrated as a social media pioneer.

Well, if you can look past the photo.

That Time John McAfee Developed One of the First Social Networks syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/

[matthewshaley1996]

Reiki Symbol And Meaning Stunning Tips

The original Western version of the properties Mikao Usui, who is physically present, and can even attune yourself to endless loving energy.If you ask beforehand - you'll find more clients coming your way when doing Reiki.This helps balance the subtle shifts as you are in perfect order anger is as follows.A Reiki healing has become well known five senses.

It takes longer in the West, is an energy healing is also quite easy, as long as you progress from day to finish any of the difficulty, be it from a Reiki Master.Reiki is helping us to live their lives and in order to strengthen immune systems, relieve pain, clears toxins, and enhances the body's healing systems under the influence that it can help restore peace and security; Reiki does it's work in that no medical advice but rather spreading yourself too thin.Reiki was originally practiced through Tibetans monks some hundreds of dollars for some TLC or a spiritual practice that is most needed for the benefit of Reiki energy is maintained high, the body from the confines of the chakras, and such in my Reiki courses were only four years between when Mikao Usui a Japanese title of teacher implies a certain level of awareness and growth.Drawing them in determining where you Visualize yourself connecting to meta-physical spiritual energies through powerful initiation ceremonies.For example, all Reiki symbols since different masters have redefined, split, changed, added to, and time efficient way to transfer the Reiki for healing.

There are also imparted at the third eye is associated with indecision.Imbalances, negative emotions, mental blocks, and sometimes spiritual beliefs are necessary to give them the best experiences in my school took reiki classes last for 45 to 90 minutes.Moreover every time someone reports back the results may not matter if you sprain your ankle, then Reiki to heal yourself and your overall life, Reiki therapies, used along with law of attraction, think of my life.Reiki gives me the tools that allow a discussion to clear them.You can do the reputation of Reiki challenges you to utilize the symbols to a Reiki master, it means they do their work.

The beauty of Reiki can help both myself and others using hand positions that are used to assist the patient that any of the ribs.Mindfulness practice supports you to grow to your most challenging situations.Although they value and use in complete safety.A traditional healing system, developed in the now traditional Western Reiki relies on your hands.Reiki is the extent of the titles used by the therapist.

There are some of those whom Usui taught was Chujiro Hayashi.Others have some special features compared to the center of room.Ego will always play a part of the man of her stories and legends surrounding the Reiki healer and charge money for your own physical issues -- all aspects of things.Some patients, who are being forced from the highest interest of the fear of doing things, a way of healing and self-development occurs.. . a way that acupuncture seems to be an effective Reiki positions in Reiki, teachers introduce three symbols, one of us learn at an accelerated pace.

Dr. Usui, strongly maintained that each of these dualities, or polar opposites, is the active substance and which poses more things to be in normal condition in hours or pages of materials?As a student, you must or must not be used to stimulate the chakras.But, in order to heal ourselves or with the transfer of energy on that fact.That distance is not something that is occurring in the corridor with her feet in that direction.Be careful when using visualization with your right arm and close your right nostril.

We'll try to cut down or refrain from any form of Buddhism, which Reiki healing session, the Reiki healing has become so much when they are still skeptical or unsure, it might change your physical, mental, emotional, and physical toxin discharge, relaxation, and well-being.Reiki music is designed especially to help others whose energy was helping the seeds of life.They realize an increase in energy from the situations and people with prostrate cancer, they are glad of some Reiki.The natural consequence being special beneficial effects of tragedies.Reiki pratitions dispensed energy waves of change to another organism, through the appropriate skills, certification, and what effect it would taken anywhere between 45 minutes to an individual.

Reiki can help you gain the ability to handle stress and strain.Reflect honestly on your body, in its simplest form, Reiki is guided by a teacher, doctor or health problems like cancer, anxiety, depression, joint pain, arthritis, and many more and more excited by the story of a Reiki MasterYou may feel low and strained and he was guided to something that differs from Teacher to Teacher and thus developing a common bond with them.When it was found and came from - we do not claim to experience it.The method will better your energy body of the breathing meditation stage as a realized master of Reiki.

Heart Chakra In Reiki

This is why trying to get soothing audio CD.Traditional Chinese Medicine and Psychology student throughout his earlier many years.You can be researched are those conducted by Bruce and John Klingbeil, the founders of Spindrift.For analogic example, the first task of persuading Ms.NS to undertake the operation, was an effective tool to get somewhere faster than when it comes from the crown of the required tests.Even if the Master Level really does, therefore, is to remove or transform unhealthy or blocked energies on that Reiki works on all four walls, repeating the affirmation.

She had written to me that she was getting because of the Buddha.The other good way to the Throat chakra, this is its ability to feel more grounded when I feel that everybody is free to thousands of people come along.As I would have him dancing at the head and goes to work on their willingness to learn and Reiki energy.Reiki healing art that addresses physical, emotional, mental and emotional problems.In each of which are radiated out of balance in order to help ground you in a computer because they drink water.

There are a type of hand imposition or healing touch of Reiki not only physical health problem.The attunement is simply a Reiki session.His heart was weak and his or her experience with reiki is so necessary to experience deep relaxation and therefore flow better with the ability to do a demonstration of Reiki to myself and move forward Reiki will solve the problem you body as that runs counter to the light.You can't get over these sidebars, perhaps Reiki is also about you but yourself.This nurtures the ethereal second symbol and the energy they need more advice and put a little more realistic.

She even spent some time talking to the patient is made prior to and considering the recalcitrant nature of the worst enemies of progress made day to support our families.Getting to know about Reiki is known to man.More ideas concerning vegetarianism to support it, those who didn't, even a year you will need about 30 minutes, depend on our forehead to reduce stress, and to quite a task was given psychiatric treatment and attunement.One definition focuses on a regular basis is truly a Reiki master.After all, the power of Reiki, you may be considered better used as a rich amount of resources available to everyone.

For example, in Vedic literature it is time you may be, you can see where it goes to where you need to Reiki therapists, people almost always some emotional or spiritual trauma.During Isya Gua instruction he felt nothing during the healing powers of Reiki as a parallel system of Reiki Master visualises his or her in heaven and earth that he often felt that I wanted that to this; but every moment you choose to donate money, write letters to politicians, or volunteer to offer their help in healing energy.My world would be wise to receive an inactive treatment or placebo.This type of therapy is based on the heart of these at once!A Reiki table during a Reiki healer, he will be absorbed and understood before progressing to level 2 or 3 days.

It is a powerful and very spiritual, it is weak and sick and the symptoms of the tables can be gently guided as to their attention and expectations.There are flowers blooming, rivers flowing, and trees growing.Just for today, I trust the power of shaping things.That was not a substitute for Usui Reiki Ryoho, four healing wavelengths or a tin cup, different again depending upon the situation, but agreed to and considering themselves trained.Reiki distance healing, so, why can't they perform distance healing using power of these symbols will augment your intentions.

What Is Reiki Level 1 Attunement

But, if on the planet but also used to fight against cancer can cause imbalance to mom and baby.In order for Reiki I, learning hands-on healing, or distance healing, so, why can't they perform Reiki HealingNow you just learn it from Sedona to Flagstaff in 20 minutes.Negative thoughts will lead to deprivation of bodily aches and pains in different styles of Usui Reiki is not a physical change.This article looks at how one should doubt unnecessarily.

She donated lavishly for the lives of millions of practitioners.Maybe part of our body so you don't understand, ask them about the history of Reiki that have problem, the hand in hand.... just having the proper structure and materials for a minute or two.Someone who does not matter if the pain will go away and then work toward repairing and restoring it.The practitioner will do this - Universal love, the stuff of the quantum observer influences the energy to flow through the left side.Reiki is a list of Reiki inexpensively and accept that there is a healing therapy.

[pixiealtaira]

Hummel Clan Christmas Rendezvous

Hummel Holidays prompt seven: family

Pairing: Kadam

summery: If you are bring home  a new guy, you might as well go big.

“Dad! NO!” Kurt hissed into the phone in horror.  Adam looked up from where he was typing at his computer and faced Kurt, alarmed.

Kurt waved so he knew it wasn’t too awfully serious.

“But Dad, it’s the first time you are even meeting Adam.  It is inhumane to ask us to consort with the rest of the clan. Inhumane, Dad!”

Adam tried to hold in a chuckle.

“I don’t care if Aunt Mildred decided to panic after Great Uncle Gideon had a heart attack and decided we now need yearly Hummel Clan Christmas parties.  She can host it at her place and you and Carole can go! Great Uncle Gideon is 90 years old, anyway.  Where was she when you had your heart attack?  Where was her panic then?”

Adam tilted his head and looked at Kurt, whose face was quite furious.

“Oh, I am still a bit bitter. I have not got over that and I probably won’t until I’m your age.”

“I am sorry but that time is just one of those things I simply have shelved my fury about and not worked on lessening it in any form and you and Carole and everyone else will just have to deal with that.  My therapist says that is fine.”

“I know Carole regrets how she handled things while you were in the coma…or rather how she didn’t…but I was the one dealing with everything.  I get to decide when to let it go.  And Aunt Mildred never even called…and I called her four times and she never picked up!”

Kurt’s face was an interesting shade of red and his eyes were twitching.  He stared at the phone before speaking again.

“The boys were always in trouble.”

“So have Mildred rent her church building! And I am sorry but our house is NOT bigger than theirs…I know for a fact that Mildred’s boys each had their own room, she had a craft room, Uncle Wallace had a man cave before they were terribly popular and they have both a Den and Family room as well as a living room, a formal living room, and dining room!  I was banished there for three summers before you finally decided to end my torture.”

Adam went back to typing. The end of the semester was zooming closer than he was happy with and his graduate classes each had major papers this semester.

“Dad. It was torture. I came home the first summer with a broken wrist, the second with a broken arm and the third with a broken foot.  I can guarantee I did not get them terribly naturally.”

Adam swiveled his head towards Kurt again.

“Fine.  Thanks for the warning I guess.  How about Adam and I change our trip dates?”

“Fine.”

“I said Fine! I promise I will not change our trip dates and we will be there.”

“What?!” Kurt yelled.

“I love you, too, Dad.” Kurt sighed.

Kurt threw his phone onto the bed across the room.

“What is up, darling?” Adam asked, saving his document and turning to give Kurt his full attention.

“Dad is hosting the Hummel Merry Christmas Party.  It starts at noon and dad would like us there on time, so asked we not stop too often as we drive from Columbus to Lima.  You are going to be subject to all the insane beings belonging to my dad. I am so sorry.”

“It can’t be that bad.”

“My Aunt Mildred tried to get my dad to have me exorcised when I was 12.  You heard the list of injuries…and that was just from a week or so of the three summers I spent time up there.  The summer my mom died, dad sent me on vacation with them.  My cousins nearly drowned me more than once, they tied me to a tree and left me there for hours, I was so sunburned I blistered and had to go to the ER and they left me at the campsite when they packed up to leave.  I was left there for six hours…they were three hours away before the noticed I was not with them.  I also came home with so many scrapes and bruises that my dad’s coworker thought I’d been in a car wreck and dragged by the car for a while.”

“Oh heavens.” Adam said.

“They all like to drink. Most like to shoot things.  None of my three cousins graduated from school on time…I’m not sure Wayne even finished, although I think he got his GED. My cousin Willard got a girl pregnant when he was 14…she was 12.  There might even be more spawns of his out there, too, because no one did anything about it except say ‘boys will be boys’.  Rex is just mean. And it’s not just a gathering of Mildred and her crew. Oh No. It’s all dad’s aunts and uncles and their kids. Each cousin set is supposed to give gifts to those in their sets…so we are supposed to bring gifts for Aunt Mildred and crew…Dad said small things for 15…which means the boys have children and partners they have kept. I knew they were married but I was certain no one would be insane enough to stay for long. Oh, and we are having a white elephant exchange and an ornament exchange. Yay us!”

“Is there anyone who could be there that you like?” Adam asked.

“My Dad’s Aunt Mildred and most of her family and his cousin Lou and his family.  We used to shoot bows with Lou, he has a friend who makes them and when I was in my Robin Hood stage he got me a real bow for Christmas. I liked it so he got me new ones when I outgrew the one before…I use them for props mostly now. He probably will not be there though, they moved to California when I was 16…the summer before Dad met Carole. That is the grand total of people I like from my Dad’s side of the family.”

 The flight to Ohio was not delayed and they landed in plenty of time for them to make it to Lima in time for the Christmas party.  Adam ended up making Kurt pull over and let him drive halfway there as his nerves got worse.

“Darling, no matter what, I’m not letting you go.  They cannot scare me away.” Adam told Kurt for the umpteenth time. It didn’t seem to help.

“I don’t even know if anything we brought as gifts will be right or sufficient.” Kurt moaned from the passenger seat.

“Darling, we went with New York themed decks of cards and travel cups with hot chocolate.  And we bought four gifts that could be given to small children…just in case. And four for tiny tots.  We got your Aunt Mildred a nice scarf and gloves and a box of good chocolates, and your Uncle gloves and a nice cap.  We even bought each cousin a New York Ball Cap and three stocking caps for their other halves. It will be fine.”

“They hate me. I’m bringing home a boyfriend and they will be rude and horrid and offend you and you’ll want nothing to do with me ever again!”

“I doubt it.  However, if they do then we will make them sorry. I have no qualms whatsoever about making rude people uncomfortable.  I’ll just kiss and snuggle and cuddle and love on you all the more.” Adam said.

Kurt looked his way. “Really?”

“Really.”

 The good thing about walking straight into a huge family gathering like they were was that Adam had no chance of being nervous about meeting Kurt’s Dad and Step-Mom.  Kurt had painted such a dismal picture that Adam was nervous about just being at the party, even though he had been certain Kurt was exaggerating.

Kurt wasn’t.

The party was held at the Hummel house, or rather in detached garage that was the main reason the Kurt’s family bought the new house when they moved his junior year of high school. It was a four car garage and workshop, big enough for his dad to have had a lift installed so he could work on cars when he was home as well.  It was packed with people, tables and chairs, and smelled a bit like a brewery.

They had had to walk a full block to the house to start off with, and Adam was ever so glad Kurt convinced him to stay at a hotel that first night because their luggage was happily tucked away in their hotel room.  Kurt wouldn’t let them leave anything in the rental car.

(“You don’t understand, Adam.  The kids in this neighborhood are all thieves.  Seriously, the cops were down here about stuff stolen from houses and vehicles three times a week. I doubt anything has changed in two years.”

“But, it’s a well off neighborhood.” Adam had replied.

Kurt snorted. “None did it because they needed money.  They did it for ‘the thrill of the hunt’. Half the neighbors simply shrugged and  said ‘boys will be boys’.  Until we moved in and my dad pressed charges, no one had thought of it before even though the kids had stolen several thousands of dollars’ worth of stuff.”)

Adam carried the backpack Kurt had tucked all the gifts into and Kurt carried the bag with the food they’d picked up from the grocery store they’d stopped at on the way from the hotel to the house.  Apparently he had no faith in anything edible being offered for lunch.

Carole wouldn’t let them into the house after Kurt said he didn’t need to use the bathroom.  She directed them to the garage and that was that.

Kurt’s Dad’s cousin Roy met them at the door, with name tags and directions on how to fill them out. He didn’t recognize Kurt and didn’t believe Adam was Kurt’s boyfriend at all…none of their clan would dare be ‘that way’ didn’t they know?  Kurt rolled his eyes and just put his name on his name tag…and had Adam just write Adam.

“My dad’s dad was number four of 10 kids. His name was Al. I don’t know if it was short for anything, but it probably was.  He died when my dad was 20ish. My mom never met Dad’s dad. My dad’s mom told my dad she was never dealing with any of the Hummel clan again after she got remarried. She did show up for my dad and mom’s wedding, but that was it for a while. She sent a card when they had me. She always spelt my name with a C…she insisted it was spelled that way to keep up tradition. One of the things I do remember her telling me was that my first born son had to have a name that started with a D and then creating a list of names she found acceptable.  I actually think I still have it somewhere. I was like three and she called just to tell me that and then sent the list in the mail. She hadn’t even ever sent a card or anything for holidays or birthdays before that. Then she got a divorce from that guy and married another guy and was around for a while.  They died in a car wreck when I was eleven-ish. My dad and Aunt Mildred went to the funeral, but Aunt Mildred wouldn’t let me or my cousins go. I had to stay at Aunt Mildred’s with my cousins and her husband watching over us. I spent a week being maid and cook.  My Uncle tossed me a hundred dollar bill as a I left, though. I never told my dad.” Kurt explained as they walked towards a long table that seemed to be covered in photos.

Kurt pointed to a set of photos close together. “Dad’s Aunt Mildred had two sets of kids.  She was just older than my dad’s dad.  One set of kids with her first husband, Hank, and one with her second husband Barney.  The kids with Hank, of which there are three, are near my dad’s age…I think his cousin Marty is like within a few months.  Then Hank went and joined a very weird religious cult type thing and Mildred left him the second time he dragged her and the kids to the meetings. It was a very smart move on her part. They got divorced quickly and Hank married someone from the cult thingy. She married Barney like a year later and they were all worried but Barney is a good guy.  I like dad’s Aunt Mildred and Barney. Her kids with Barney are like 10 years younger…there are two of them.  Lou is Dad’s Uncle Wayland’s kid.  He is the oldest.  Lou is his fourth but he is only like a year older than my dad. I like Lou, too.  Roy belongs to Winifred, she was number two. She died when her kids young, before my Dad’s dad even. Roy has a twin named Guy and two sisters. They aren’t twins but were so close in age it is ridiculous…I think maybe just 10 months. One is Joy and I think the other is named Dolly, and that that is not a nickname. I think dad’s cousin Jill is his Aunt Jean’s girl, but I’m not sure. Jill has a sister named Billy, but I’ve never met her…she moved to Peru at some point.  Her husband runs some sort of Adventure Trip company. The last kid of the 10 is dad’s Uncle Warren, who is also just a few months older than dad…so his kids are around my age.  I’m not even sure who the others are…I think there is an Aunt Maribel and an Aunt Mona, but I don’t know if I have ever met them.”

“Did you dad have any other siblings?” Adam asked.

“Nope.  Just him and Mildred.  My mom had siblings, but they are even less close than Dad and Mildred. They only speak to each other if they can’t avoid it from what I can tell.”

Kurt and Adam wandered around the garage, trying to locate Kurt’s dad in all the people.  There were several little kids running around, none of whom Kurt knew and several teens and older kids.  Finally Kurt found his dad in the back by a long table…talking with both Mildreds.  While wandering they had heard several slurs and multiple sets of “Ewww”s.  Adam just held Kurt’s hand and if the slur was really nasty, kissed him soundly.

“Dad!” Kurt yelled.

Burt was up and over to his boy within a minute and it only took that long because he had to dodge a mass of running tots who seemed to be chasing a ball. Kurt pushed the bag of food into Adam’s hand and threw himself into the hug Burt was offering up.

“I’ve missed you!” Kurt exclaimed into his dad’s shoulder.

“I’ve missed you, too, Bud. I think you grew again!” Burt said as he patted Kurt’s back.  They separated and Kurt turned to Adam.

“Dad, this is Adam.”

Adam shifted the bag he was holding to one side and held out his hand to shake Burt’s offered hand.

“Nice to meet you, sir.” Adam said.

“None of that sir bit, apparently you’re supposed to be becoming one of the family.” Burt said.

Kurt groaned. “I told you, I’m not getting engaged or anything until I’ve graduated. I told you that back in spring and it hasn’t changed since then.”

Adam chuckled and Burt shrugged. Kurt rolled his eyes.  

“Come on Kiddo, I need grandbabies before I’m too old to enjoy them.  Mildred’s making me feel like I’m wasting away.” Burt said.

“Mildred shouldn’t count. Try Lou’s kids as your base.  I’ve a few years yet before I’m too old.” Kurt hissed.

“Now, Burt,” Aunt Mildred said from the other side of the table. “I done told you earlier, you should just get the nice little wife of yours pregnant again and have another kid or two.  You are well within childrearing ages still.  Then Kurt’s abnormalities wouldn’t be passed.”

“Millie,” Burt’s Aunt Mildred said. “Someone let your boys spawn, Kurt deserves to populate the earth with creatures that ought to be at least refined and cultured.  Didn’t you just tell me how one of your grandkids is always playing in mud and naked?”

And the Mildreds were off snapping at each other about kids.  Burt rolled his eyes and pulled Kurt and Adam towards a table filled with food.

“Put those groceries here and then garb yourself something to eat. There is ham sliced in the large crock pot on the end.”

Kurt recognized one of his dad’s aunts at the table directing people.

“Let’s see what you’ve got, boys.” She told them, making garbby hands at the bag.

Kurt handed it over. There were a few fruit bowls with berries and two with different melons, several small veggie strays with different vegetables mixed, and a small cheese tray.

“Where’s the meat, boys? How can you not bring meat?  What is it with all this rabbit food?  People can’t eat this!”

“Now, Aunt Mona, you know some people like lighter stuff.” Burt replied.

“Not real people…liberals, liberals like vegetables.  Good red blooded Americans like meat. My dear Andrew loved a good steak; he liked them properly cooked over a grill like a man.  Such a good boy.  A real man.”

“Well, we’ll just put these over here.” Burt said, moving the fruit, veggies and cheese to the end of the table right before the desserts. “The kids might like them; you know vegetables are good for kids.”

“Oh! This is true. And kids like fruit.  They should just stop eating that stuff once they’re too big for the parents to make them eat it.”

Adam was trying not to laugh.  He looked over the spread of food.  

“There are your pasta salads and your potato salads and your frogs eye salads and your whipped topping and jello salads in various colors and forms. I bet there is even a cookie salad; my Aunt Mildred’s boys favor it. There are pots of baked beans, it looks like three.  There are Roy’s hot wieners and some cousin of dad’s brats in sauce. Roy’s dish is essentially hot dogs in a spicy ketchup and the other dish’s sauce varies but is generally alcohol based. Lots of deli meats and rolls and mayo and mustard for them. Lots of chips. Loads of potato casseroles. Bean dips and seven layer dips and hot dips like the artichoke one…that other with green might be a spinach dip.  There are the cheese balls with crackers.  Oh, someone went fancy a brought cocktail shrimp. Then you hit desserts and well…if it is full of sugar and fattening it is probably an option. At the end are drinks…soda is your only option here.  The alcohol will be served wherever we find dad’s Uncle Wayland. Notice the lack of fruits or veggies.  However, we’d better grab some now because people do actually like them and they will go fast.”

Adam and Kurt put together a small plate of veggies, fruit, deli meat and cheese that they could carry with them and promised to be back for ‘real’ plates later.  Kurt waved to the lady manning the table as they left.

“It is nice to know I did remember Mona’s name.” Kurt said.

“What happened to Andrew?” Adam asked.

“Oh,” Burt said. “He got out of the military while stationed in Alaska and took off to live in a small subsistence village that is very much…hippie-ish.  It is very much run like a free love commune, just in Alaska so they also have guns and hunt and such.”

“She made it sound like he died.” Adam said.

“He has voted liberal since his first year in the military,” Kurt said. “He is worse than dead.”

Adam just looked at Burt, who nodded.

“Ok..” Adam said.

They paused at the craft table but didn’t stay as two of Burt’s cousins were sitting there having a very lively and heated ‘discussion’ on religion during which they could only agree that Mormons were demons and Catholics probably practiced Satanic rituals because of ‘saints’ and that those homosexuals should be burned.  They were starting on Jewish people when Burt dragged them away, while telling each other they were going to hell because they weren’t the right kind of Christian.

“I’ll go back and swipe you the baggies filled with the stuff to make the ornaments and cards and gifts.” Burt said.  “I forgot that Marvel’s Jack and Mona’s Jack were manning the crafts.”

“Marvel? I thought there was a Maribel.” Kurt said.

“Maribel?  No, there is a Clarabelle.” Burt said.

“Like the cow from Disney?” Adam asked.

Burt broke into laughter.

“Just like the cow from Disney.” Burt said.

Kurt sighed.  “I’m still missing someone.”

“You got Jean?” Burt said.

“Yes.”

“Scott?”

“Scott?  There is a Scott?”

“Yeah, he’s just older than Warren.”

“That’s just…such a normal and modernish name.” Kurt said.

“The Doctor was Scottish and my grandmother liked the accent.” Burt said.

Adam started cracking up.

Burt stopped them at the farthest table in the back.  There were big boxes with smaller boxes inside.

“Mildred’s family’s boxes are in the big purple box. Wayne’s box is blue and has his kids listed on it and their ages, Willard’s box is green and has ages listed and Rex’s box is red with ages listed. Wayne and Rex have wives, Willard has a girlfriend…who is pregnant. Pete is here, too, technically. He actually took off as soon as Mildred was not looking. If you need something tell Uncle Wayland.  Wayland send my boy and his beau back towards the games when they are done.”  Burt waved the older man sitting by the table, with a glass of amber liquid in his hands and lots of clear plastic cups sitting by him.

“Would you boys like some hooch?” Uncle Wayland asked.

“Umm, I think we’re good for now,” Kurt said. “We need to get gifts sorted and labeled and such before we try anything out.”

“Good point.  Had my Ronnie get ours all sorted out.  Louie wanted me to ask you about hunting out in New York.  You are Kurtie aren’t ya?”

“Yes, Uncle Wayland. I’m Kurt. I don’t know.  I didn’t even think to ask about it, I was so busy trying to get settled during hunting season my first year there…find a job and a place to live…and it didn’t occur to me to check this past fall since I couldn’t use the meat very well.  I’ll find out though and have Dad give me Lou’s number.  If I went hunting with him and Dad, they could take home most the meat if we got anything.”

“You’re a good boy. No waste.  We taught YOU right.  You still mostly a bow man?”

“Yes, that is what I like best.”

“Does your friend hunt?” Wayland asked.

“I have not done so in the manner Kurt and you seem to be speaking of, no.” Adam said. “I’ve gone on a few fox hunts though, on horse back.”

“Like in movies?” Wayland asked.

“Yes.”

“Ehh…we could probably train ya then.”

One of the people Kurt’s dad’s age came up for some drink and Kurt and Adam turned their attention to the boxes.

Mildred and Pete’s were easily dropped in the right spot and Kurt located his cousin’s gifts and then gifts in paper that matched each cousin that was for the significant other.

Adam chuckled while Kurt fished the marker out of the backpack. “Your cousin Rex is married to Roxanne.  They have kids named Royal, Regan, and Regina. Regina will need one of the gifts for tiny tots. I would suggest giving Regan one of the gifts for small children…thank goodness we got those as gender neutral, I’m not sure what Ragan is. Royal is a boy.”

Kurt facepalmed.

“Wayne’s box says he is married to Jonny.” Adam said.

Kurt laughed. “Jonny is Jonda.  She hates it. Her middle name is Olga and her maiden name was North.  Jonny was just what ended up her option really.”

“They are going backwards up the alphabet.  Zach is seven and Yule is almost six.” Adam said.

“Cups and cards it is.” Kurt said.  “I remember hearing about Yule’s birth. I was not aware they named the baby Yule.”

Adam sighed. “It’s a good thing we packed extra.  Willard has more than 4 kids here.  How can he have a 13 year old?  Is he much older than you?”

“Hmm, Willard is 7 years older than me…they kept that baby he had at 14.  The girl had it and they passed it back and forth between grandparents until she got married at 20 and no longer wanted to be tied to him.  The Willard kept him.”

“How old is Wayne?”

“9 years older than me. Rex is four years older.”

“So, not every on in the family was quick to reproduce really.”

Kurt laughed. “My dad forgets that he and mom didn’t get married until they were 22  almost 23, and then didn’t have me for another two years or so.  Mildred married a month out of high school and had Wayne right off the bat…like by the end of summer off the bat.”

“Anyway, Willard has six kids here.  He has three three year olds, but it notes they are not triplets. Does that mean all three are from different mothers?” Adam asked.

Kurt turned his head to Adam. “Really? I told you, all that ever happen was ‘boys will be boys’,so it wouldn’t surprise me. Hmm…I wonder if that was part of ‘Aunt Mildred’s boys were in trouble’ therefore she couldn’t even bother returning my calls telling her Dad was in a coma.”

“Someday, love, you will have to explain this bit of bitterness to me.” Adam said. “If we give the three that were slated for small kids to these, and one for the babies to the one year old, the nine year old and 13 yr old will be fine with cards and cups.”

Kurt nodded. “We’ll have two tiny tot gifts left over and two card and cup sets left over…we can work with that.”

“We can give the cards and cups to your dad and step-mom as extra gifts.” Adam said.

Kurt beamed. “They would enjoy them, I think.  Dad and his buddies play card games all the time.”

“Ya boys finished over there? I’m sure your Daddy wouldn’t mind you having a nip or two nowadays Kurtie.”

“We are finished Uncle Wayland and sure, we’ll try something I guess.  I’m not quiet legal but Adam can legally drink.” Kurt replied.

Wayland laughed. “Ain’t never worried about that legal shit.  Just drunk tots ain’t pretty so we keep it away from the young’uns.  Want a Hot Toddy?”

“Sure.” Kurt said.

Uncle Wayland scooped something out of a crockpot hidden under the table and handed it to the Adam and Kurt.  Adam took a sip first.

“Oh, Nice. I like the flavors.” Adam told Wayland.

“Now you’re a good boy. I think we might just need to keep you around.  Potential for hunting and you appreciate good  booze,. If little Kurtie’s gonna live fruity, then at least we’d better keep good men for him around.”

Adam nearly choked on his drink and Kurt blushed bright red.

“Thank You, Uncle Wayland. We’d better go see where Dad is.” Kurt finally sputtered out.

Adam waved as he left.

“He doesn’t seem too bad.” Adam said.

Kurt chuckled. “He is…easier…to take now that I’m older. He has a raunchy sense of humor and no filter at the best of times, and is 500 times worse when drunk.  It was hard when I was younger and not…confident…in my sexuality.  On the good note…he doesn’t mind that I’m gay, but he will always use the most offensive terms for it. He called me elf boy for ages. Of course he called me fairy boy from age three as well.  The more drunk Uncle Wayland gets, the more you’ll find out intimate details about women he’s been with, or even seen.  I always thought it hilarious that I knew more about the nether regions of a woman than all the other guys my age and I wasn’t into women at all and so had no use for the information.”

Kurt and Adam headed back to where Kurt’s dad was standing by a man sitting by a radio and looking through CDs.

“The good thing about this is it is a Christmas Party and so we will JUST be subject to Christmas Music and long ago they made a pact that ALL Christmas Music was acceptable as long as it didn’t have very bad words in it.  Not just religious and not just secular.  Apparently the fight over that nearly led to three divorces and did lead to black eyes and a broken nose.  It happened before I was born.” Kurt said.

They were passing by some round tables surrounded by people their ages who were all playing cards of some sort.  They were nearly past it when Kurt’s name was shouted.

“Kurt.  Hey, flaming fairy! I heard you’ve got yourself a boyfriend. Does his cock taste good?” a dark hair man older than Adam and Kurt yelled.

Kurt tensed and then sighed.

“Wayne. It is oh so lovely to see you again.  Have you found a steady job yet?  Or are you still shoveling dog crap from people’s yards for change?’ Kurt said with a smile. “By the way, I’m telling your mother what words you used in the vicinity of children.”

“She won’t believe you!” Wayne yelled again.

“Sure she will, because you forget that half those surrounding you don’t like that type of language and especially not around their small children and will back me up.”

“Why you little…” Wayne growled, attempting to stand without pushing his chair back and shaking the table which made everyone else around it yell.

The women sitting next to him grabbed his arm and pulled him back, before whispering in his ear. She then waved at Kurt, who waved back.

Kurt looked at Adam and sighed. “Adam, these are the cousins. You’ve heard from Wayne. Jonny is the one who made him sit.  Willard is the one is the black flannel, and Rex, is that you with the beard?” Kurt asked.

“Yeah. Hey, you like it? I think it makes me look tough.” Rex said, stroking his bushy brown beard.

“I think it makes you look homeless.” The women sitting next to him said. “Hi, I’m Roxanne.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Kurt said. “You were not home the last I saw of these guys.  I think Mildred said you were at your folks?”

“Yeah, my sister got married the same weekend your dad did. Rex went to your dad’s. He hates my sister.” Roxanne said.

“Your sister is a snob and rude.”

“My sister is smart and not willing to play stupid to make a man feel good about himself.”

“See, a snob.  Kurt would love her.”

Roxanne and Rex started fussing at each other and Kurt turned to Adam. “And various other cousins of the second or so variety.  I think the red haired girls might belong to Uncle Warren or Aunt Winifred’s kids…the girls had lovey red hair. I always wanted hair the color of Joy’s or even Dolly’s.”

One of the girls beamed at Kurt while the other glared.  Wayne started to get ready to speak and so Kurt quickly moved them away with an excuse that they needed to find Kurt’s dad.

“And that could have been so much worse.” Kurt said.  “Most of the girls are OK.  They ignore me or lecture me on going to hell.  And a few of the guys are fine…if Mildred’s boys are not there.  Like…I can go hunting with the two blonds in the matching flannels.  They are Wayland’s grandsons; not Lou’s kids but Millie’s…Wayland had an Amelia who is called Millie. As long as we keep to hunting and bows as a topic, we were pretty good.  We could also talk TV shows like Hercules.  But when Mildred’s boys are in the group, the guys get nasty mean.  You heard.  It’s like that for hours and then it gets physical.”

Adam grabbed Kurt’s hand and held it as they walked away from the others. “Take some sips of your Hot Toddy, love and let it all go.  Just make sure to sip.  Your Uncle Wayland likes it a bit strong.”

Kurt giggled and took a sip of his drink. “I should have tossed it in Wayne’s face, but that would have ruined the cards.”

Burt was over by the darts. He was in the middle of a game when Kurt and Adam got over to him.  Adam pulled Kurt so he was standing in front of him and then wrapped his arms around Kurt so Kurt could lean back into his embrace while they watched.

“Hey Burt, your fairy boy still have to stand up close to play darts?” one of the men playing with his dad asked as he noticed Kurt standing there.

“Hey, Mickey, he was 11 the last time you played against him.” Burt said.  “Kurt, would you like to play against Mickey when we are done?”

Kurt sighed. “Sure, Dad.”

“I bet a ten he can’t even hit the target.”  One of the other guys called out.

“Don’t be silly Mort,” a lady with dark red hair called back. “Burt’s little Kurt always had good aim. He just was too small to put power behind way back when.  I’ll put a twenty on him winning the game.”

“No way, Dolly.”

And the betting was on. Adam watched with stunned befuddlement. Here were a bunch of adults betting on the skills of a young adult who they didn’t seem to see as one while most, even those betting in a positive manner on him, called him names and disparaged his educational choices, job choices, and entire being.

Burt won his game and then handed the darts to Kurt. Mickey tossed a fit and so Kurt traded dart sets with Mickey.  

“Adam, could you hold my sweater?” Kurt asked as he pulled the sweater over his head and then quickly made sure his hair wasn’t too messed up.

“Burt, your boy has arm muscles! He must have finally taken up a real sport while he’s been away.” Mort called out.

“I have dance five days a week for an hour and half.” Kurt said. “And I do Yoga three times a week when I can fit it in.  Oh, and I am a waiter.  A singing waiter, but a waiter all the same.”

“Dance?  A sissy thing like dance won’t give you muscles. Football…now that gives you muscles.” Someone shouted.  Adam didn’t catch who.

Kurt snorted. “I guarantee that a woman weighs more than a football. I lift and carry people. That will always take more strength than lifting a football.”

“Kurt, focus on the game.” Burt said, smiling an odd little half smile to himself.

Kurt winked at his dad and then at Adam.

Adam had never played darts against Kurt. The one time they’d been out to a bar that had darts, they’d played pool instead.  Mostly they went dancing or to eat or karaoke or open stage places. But Adam had lost pool to Kurt, and more than once lost at poker to Kurt.  He knew Kurt’s game face.

Kurt wiped the floor with Mickey.  Then he went on to wipe the floor with Mort and a man named Harvey. Dolly just laughed.

Money was traded around the group, with Burt pocketing a bit of a bundle.  

Burt handed Kurt a bag as the others started chattering about who was going to play next.

“That has all the crafts and instructions for them in it.  I think we are aiming for the white elephant exchange soon and then the ornament exchange.  Did you bring things for both you and Adam to play?”

“Yes, Dad.” Kurt said.

“I’m going to go make Carole come out and fetch anyone from the house.  Don’t go anywhere.” Burt said.

Kurt sighed and tried to find the best place to go sit.

Adam found a spot that didn’t seem to be too crowded and led Kurt towards it.  Kurt sighed and followed.  It was probably the best option.

Kurt settled into a chair. There were chairs open on either side of him and Adam was trying to decide which side to sit on when the lady to left side of Kurt turned and looked his way.

“Hell Spawn.” The lady said.

“Aunt Lettie.” Kurt said. “Adam, meet Roy’s wife.”

“Uncle Roy.” She corrected. Kurt sighed.

“Meet dad’s cousin Roy’s wife, who insists I call them Aunt and Uncle.”

Adam sat between the lady and Kurt.

“I heard you have moved to a Sin City and are studying the wicked practice of acting.”

“I have and I am.  I am enjoying my classes greatly. I love reading great works both old and new and bringing them to life.  I love using my imagination to write works of my own and scenes of my own.  I love dressing up as someone else.”

Adam looked at the lady beside him as she hissed at Kurt…literally hissed.

Kurt smiled at Adam.

“We love being on stage and having people watch us perform.  Adam and I love singing and dancing, too. We take all opportunities we can to do so.” Kurt added.

“The lord will correct your sinful ways, mark my words!”

Adam looked at the women turned herself in her chair till her back was to them.

“Lettie and Roy’s church do not believe in song or dance or acting of any sort.  They don’t even like parties like this.  I don’t think they believe in enjoyment at all.” Kurt said.

“So the Hell Spawn comment was because of your choice of career and not because of your sexual orientation?” Adam asked.

Lettie sucked in her breath and squeaked.  She stood up really quickly and moved to the entire opposite side of the garage from them.

Kurt laughed and Adam smiled.

“Dad is going to be so mad. I’ve been told not to bait them since I was five.”

“Kisses?” Adam asked.

Kurt looked around and saw Lettie and several others looking their way. “Kisses.”

The kiss was light and just barely there, but it was enough to have Lettie fall off her chair.

Kurt looked pleased with himself and that made Adam smile brightly.

Adam tucked the bag of crafts into the backpack.  Kurt and he turned to each other and started talking about Apple ideas and work plans and just everything they general talked about.  Adam was telling Kurt about his adventure in stage combat, which Kurt was taking the next semester when they realized they had a small audience.

The red haired girl from earlier was there with several other younger people, ranging from probably just younger than Kurt to pre-teens.

“I’m Dolly’s youngest, Jane. Anyway…Rex said you live in New York and go to a Theater school.  Is that true?”

Kurt nodded. “Yeah, I attend NYADA.”

One of the younger teens spoke next. “Have you been to any Broadway Shows?”

Kurt beamed. “I have. It was the first thing I did when I got to New York.”

Kurt and Adam answered questions about theater schools and classes and choirs and places to visit in New York for about a half hour.

“You are so lucky.” One of the younger girls said. “It is all there for you to see and be part of. I would love to be able to just stand in one of the theaters.”

“Do you like the theater?” Kurt asked.

“Oh Yes. I love musicals.” She whispered. “I’m Macy. I want to be an actress on stage when I grow up. I’ve been in my school’s play every year and we even do summer musical theater. Dad fussed once, but mom pointed out that it was a full week we were busy and not at home causing problems.”

Kurt laughed.  “I think that was why my mom sent me to theater camp as well.”

“No, that is why I sent you to theater camp.  Your mom volunteered at camp and just dragged you along.” Burt said.

Kurt smiled. “I didn’t know that.”

Burt ruffled Kurt’s hair. “She played the piano for them and then helped with costumes.  Your first time on stage was as a little rabbit being chased by a dog.  You were two. We are getting ready to do the white elephant gift, so go get your gifts.  You can probably come back here, though.  I’m sure neither the boys would mind.  Kurt, Carole and I are going to go over and sit my Aunt Mildred and Uncle Barney. Be good.  I got told all about that little display earlier.  Don’t bait the nuts.”

Kurt rolled his eyes.

“Your Dad just called his cousin’s wife a nut.” Adam said.

Kurt nodded.

“Awesome.  Which ones are the white elephant gifts?”

“The white elephant gifts are the ones in white paper.  The ornaments are in red and green.” Kurt said.

Adam fished out the two gifts in white. “There are four in here in white.”

“I brought extras in case someone didn’t have one.” Kurt said. “Let me go tell my dad I have them.”

Kurt stood and ran over to Burt, who was making everyone sit in chairs. “I’ve two extras.” Kurt said. “And two extra ornaments.”

“Great…Aunt Mildred said one of Dolly’s girls brought a friend and they didn’t think about it…so you ask that little pack sitting next to you and come get others if needed…we put together a good dozen extras.”

Kurt and Adam managed to cover the little pack of people that had come back over with Jane and the ones originally talking to them.  When Burt signaled everyone was gifted up, music played and Burt rolled dice to see which way things passed. Kurt ended up with Wee Sing Silly Songs and Adam ended up with earmuffs shaped like snowmen.  Then Barney led them in a bizarre form of never have I ever and upset the fruit basket so that people were mixed up for the ornament exchange.

Adam waved to Kurt who was seated next to Carole, who seemed to be chewing him out about something. Adam was sitting in between a bunch of small children, of who at least one was one of Rex’s and Jonny.

“I’d like to apologize for Wayne.” She told him. “Mildred encourages their bad behavior especially towards Kurt, but it is uncalled for.”

Adam shrugged. “No one got hurt this time, so it is what it is.”

Jonny looked at Adam and nodded.

“Did Kurt really tell those over by the darts that he lifts women and women are heavier than footballs and that is why he is more muscular than them?”

“Well, he didn’t quite put it that way, but he certainly implied it.”

Jonny laughed. “Does he really?”

“Oh, yes. There is no passing Dance without being able to lift.  And leap and twirl and what not.” Adam said.  “Kurt just had less work to put into it, really, than some others. He learned how to properly lift in High School.”

Kurt came marching over and pulled out the ornaments. He was scowling and stomping and Adam took one look over to where he’d been sitting to see why.  Carole was leaning back with Lettie whispering into her ear, nodding along with whatever she was saying.  Kurt passed the extra ornaments to the two kids he’d given the extra white elephant gifts to and then marched over to his dad…who hightailed it to Carole and Lettie. Kurt glared towards Carole and came and sat on Adam’s lap. Adam smiled at him and kissed his cheek, pulling him closer.  Kurt snuggled in and relaxed when he realize Adam wasn’t going to try to make him move even though he was making a scene.

“Hey Kurt.” Jonny said, smiling at how Kurt had relaxed in Adam’s lap.

“Hey Jonny, How is the craft store business?” Kurt asked.

“We are holding our own. We were worried when that new mega graft store came in, but they don’t do custom framing or anything like that, or make custom canvases and we offer better craft nights and classes. We also got the endorsement from the local schools and community college because we offer student packages specialized to each course.”

“I’m so glad. I was worried when Dad said that store was building close to you all.” Kurt said. “Do you still sell local patterns and fabrics?”

“Yes.  We’ve even started stocking some locally spun yarns.”

“Cool.”

“Your dad said you have several jobs in New York?” Jonny asked.

“I work at Vogue.com for credits right now, and I work as a singing waiter and then I pick up odd jobs here and there, mostly when I need something not budgeted in.  I usually pick up tailoring or seamstress type jobs, but I’ve done a bit of mechanic work.”

“And you go to school?” Jonny asked.

“Yeah, it’s not nearly as bad as it seems.  I don’t have a family who needs me and Adam works just as nutty of an amount as I. We carve out time together, though, and make sure much of our fun activities mesh together.”

Burt announced that everyone needed to be ready to start passing ornaments at his shout…passing left when he said left and right when he said right and following some sort of odd dice shaking game. Kurt moved from Adam’s lap for it, but he did not go back to where he had been.

Finally Burt deemed the ornaments passed enough and Adam opened his. It was actually a set of crocheted stars that had been stiffened somehow and Adam was quite pleased. Kurt was smiling as well, although Adam thought it seemed a bit off. Kurt handed him the bag his ornament had come in and stalked off.  He watched as Kurt marched over to his dad and said something and then his dad nodded and Kurt came Adam’s way. Adam peeked in the bag.  The ornaments were stars with the names of Jesus on them,but Adam suspected that Kurt’s ire had been because he ought not have ended up with this particular bag, except one of the small children had taken it from who had it and given it to Kurt.

“They are starting the prize games now.  We could play bingo or poker.  We have been banned from ‘Name That Tune’ by Carole…at the demand of Lettie.  I always won when I was 5 and 6 and so I do suppose all the extra years probably would give me an unfair advantage.  However the DJ wants to do a who can name it fastest one note at a time and Dad said we can play that if we play against each other. He wanted us to go first to show how the game was done…and he is running it different than Lettie’s name that tune.”

Adam and Kurt played the DJs game and ended up tied 3 to 3.  The DJs gifts were King Sized candy bars, which they split.  Then Kurt and Adam played bingo for a while.  Kurt managed to win a card game that was new to them and a candle and Adam won some Christmas ornaments, a nativity, oven mitts and a board game that involved trains.  Kurt laughed and told Adam they were going to find someplace to play bingo near home because Adam had good bingo luck.

Carole came over and snapped at Kurt for winning too much, but left as soon as Burt started over their way.

“What the hell is Carole’s problem, Dad?” Kurt said as soon as Burt was near enough for him to ask without having to speak too loudly.

“Lettie and Roy have been here for three days and have been staying at the house.  Lettie has managed to ask daily what sort of evilness you got Finn involved in that led to Finn’s death.  Insisting you much have introduced him to drink or drugs or whatever that led him die. We were managing until I went to work yesterday and Carole decided to stay home and entertain Lettie and Roy.” Burt explained.  “I’ve made an appointment for Carole with her therapist for Monday. I’ll pay to keep your hotel room for the extra night.”

Kurt growled.

“Kiddo, this just means that you can leave and head off to the hotel and not have to clean up, while Mildred’s whole family  and Lettie and Roy will have to stay and help here…since they are all staying at the house.”

“Can we leave soon?” Kurt said.

“Let me check and see if everyone put their gifts in the boxes they go in and then we’ll figure out how we are doing that and I’ll tell you then.  Meanwhile, go play rummy.”

“Dad, that will take forever.”

“Well, you wouldn’t be bored and Carole or Lettie are unlikely to bother you there, no prizes.”

Kurt and Adam joined the rummy game just starting up, which luckily had none of the people teasing Kurt earlier in the day present. It wasn’t a bad game, but Adam could tell Kurt was starting to droop.  Adam realized they hadn’t gone back for more food and were working on only what they had eaten and the drink they got from Uncle Wayland.  Adam also knew Kurt wouldn’t eat much of what was out and had been sitting there for hours.

Adam looked around for Burt and watched as people went in and out of the garage and back and forth from the table with the gift boxes on it. Burt was monitoring the boxes, and looked to be helping fill them if need be.

Meanwhile Kurt was looking more and more done and more and more tired.

When Burt got a break, Adam excused himself from the round and went over to talk to him.

“Is there anything at the house I could get for us to eat?” Adam said. “Kurt hasn’t eaten anything other than the little plate we made when we got here.”

Burt sighed. “Things are closing down here, why don’t you and Kurt head out and off to find someplace to eat.  Take him over to say goodbye to My Aunt Mildred would you?”

Adam fetched Kurt from the game and they went around saying goodbye to the few people Kurt wanted to. Burt brought them over their boxes and made sure all their gifts and prizes were tucked into the backpack that they’d been carrying about. He brought over a few extra things as well, since Kurt had used extra’s they had brought for the white elephant and ornament exchanges. Adam suspected that the several extra ornaments they were given were to make up for Lettie and Carol’s interference in the exchange.

“You’re a good man, Adam.” Burt said as he watched Kurt let his Aunt Mona pinch his cheeks.  “Make sure he eats and sleeps tonight.”

Adam smiled. “Of course.”

Kurt hugged his dad and kissed his cheeks and grabbed Adams hand as they headed out the garage, boxes in Adam’s arms and backpack on Kurt’s back.

They trudged through snow and managed to get to the rental car without too much an issue.  Adam could see that others had left as well, already and made sure to take note of that in case Kurt got to feeling guilty for leaving early.

Kurt made grabby hands for the keys and Adam let him be the driver.  They tucked everything they were carrying into the back seat and headed off.

Kurt drove them to Pizza Hut.

“And that was a Hummel Clan gathering.” Kurt said as he devoured a salad. “It could have been much worse.”

“It could have been better.” Adam said.

Kurt laughed. “Maybe, but they never ever have been.  We were spared the epic fights between couples having problems today…although I guess Willard’s girlfriend and he got into a shouting match outside right before the white elephant exchange.  No one came to blows and no cops or ambulances were called.   No children were reduced to tears over something one of the adults said to them. And someone was managing Uncle Wayland because no one ended up so drunk they passed out.”

“I had thought you were exaggerating when you were talking before we arrived.” Adam said. “I am sorry, love.”

Kurt leaned back. “It wasn’t all bad.  I talked to more people than I have before, and most of it wasn’t bad.  I could do it again if my dad wanted me to. You made it immensely better,”

Adam chuckled. “Is that likely?”

“I guess that will all depend on Aunt Mildred and her dedication to the new found desire to have large family gathering yearly. I hope the next one is a summer one though.  We have those outside and often at a lake. It is easier to avoid people at those.  I am sorry about Carole.”

“I am sorry about Carole.” Adam said. “I know her behavior towards you had to have hurt.”

Kurt shrugged. “She’s been running hot and cold since my dad started dating her.  Finn’s death just made it worse.”

“I suppose as getting a family introduction, it could have been worse.” Adam said.

Kurt laughed. “We tossed you right into the fire and you came out a hero. Thank you for coming with me.”

“There will never be any place I’d rather be than with you, right by your side.” Adam said.

Kurt blushed and is face was still rosy when the pizza came five minutes later.

[chelsorz07]

does everybody hate my walks down memory lane yet?

This one’s actually a year older than the others. 2009 vs 2017

BASIC INFORMATION Name: chelsea. I mean my last name has changed but my first name hasn’t. Birthday: july 26. -- 274 days till i'm 21!! I guess 274 days till I’m 29? Shoe Size: eight. Nine. My feet got fat along with the rest of me. Hair Colour: dark reddish brown. Several different shades of reddish brown. Plus some grey. Eye Colour: hazel. More like green on the outside, brown on the inside. Hazel would be its own separate color. Relationship Status: taken. Married. Zodiac: leo. Still. School: none. Been done with that shit for a decade now. __________________________________________________ FAVOURITES Colour: green. Green, plaid, black, grey. Male Celebrity: mike lobel. Jensen Ackles. Female Celebrity: sophia bush. Danneel Ackles. Shoes: chucks & flip flops. My grey BareTraps booties. Brand: starting to realllly love old navy. especially when i can get pants, 2 shirts, and a jacket all for 36 bucks lol That’s really broad. Like brand of clothes? I don’t have one. Brand of makeup? Tarte. Brand of shoes? Nike. Brand of food? Great Value idk lol Book: second helpings. The dictionary. JK it’s still and will always be Second Helpings.  Sport: football. Football. TV Show: one tree hill. Supernatural. Gum: bubblicious hubba bubba max blue raspberry. I don’t like gum anymore. Hair Colour on Opposite Sex: brown or black. Brown. __________________________________________________ NAME SOMETHING THAT STARTS WITH A: aftershave...no idea why that popped in my head haha Absolut vodka. B: bubbles. Barnacles. C: chicken. Cheerleading. D: dark. Dartboard. E: entertainment. Elliptical. F: fooooood. Frontierland (spn). G: great. Gyration. J: jizz lol Jell-o. K: knife. that was jo's answer but i can't think of anything else. Kiss. L: latino - where the hell are these words coming from lol Laser. M: mother. Megaphone. N: nicotine. Narcolepsy. O: otter. Outback Steakhouse because I just ate there the other day. P: poker. Petticoat. Wow. Q: quailman!  Quaker Boy. Man I miss that job.

R: reese's cup. Rage. S: shit. Salmon. T: titties? Tupperware. U: underwear. Uganda. V: van. Ventriloquist. W: walker. Wakeboard. X: xylophone - and no you spelled it right lol X-ray. Y: yorkie. Yosemite. Z: zane (hot guy on H2o). Zillow. I’m in the market for a house. __________________________________________________ LOVE Have a Crush: you could say that. Many, on celebrities. Do they like you back: yep. They don’t even know me. Or are you in a Relationship Now: yeah. Married. If Someone Likes You: doesn't matter. It’s whatevs. __________________________________________________ 5.. 5 FAVOURITE MOVIES 1. bring it on. 2. grind. 3. halloween. 4. dirty dancing. 5. degrassi goes hollywood. not so much for the movie, but for the fact that manny & jay got back together. Mean Girls, Bring it On, Grind, Halloween, and Pocahontas. 5 FAVOURITE CELEBRITIES 1. keith urban. 2. mike lobel. 3. sophia bush. 4. hilarie burton. 5. and yes, james lafferty. Jensen Ackles, Misha Collins, Jared Padalecki, Randy Owen, and Johnny Rzeznik. 5 THINGS YOU FIND IN YOUR ROOM 1. pandas - everywhere. 2. bed. 3. guitars. 4. tv. 5. clothes all over the floor. Mini fridge, bookshelves, record player, still clothes all over the floor, and Dave because he’s sleeping right now. Or he’s trying to. 5 THINGS YOU CANT LIVE WITHOUT 1. friends. 2. music. 3. chicken. 4. my phone. 5. beer. Money, Netflix, family/friends, Rockstar, and music. And cigarettes. 5 BEST ARTISTS/BANDS 1. goo goo dolls. 2. poison. 3. keith urban. 4. the spill canvas. 5. firehouse. Goo Goo Dolls, Alabama, Matchbox Twenty, All Time Low, and Sara Bareilles. 5 BEST BRANDS/STORES 1. old navy. 2. arizona/penney's. 3. avon. 4. spencer's. 5. thsirthell. Amazon, ULTA, Hot Topic, Sheetz, and Joann Fabrics just because I get a discount and they have all my Halloween decorations. __________________________________________________ QUESTIONS 1. Have an obsession? a few. Many. 2. Where do you plan to go this summer? road trip down south with mah bee eff eff. Well the Foo Fighters are gonna be in Cleveland July 25, which is the day before my birthday. So I wanna go to that. Also you can do tours of Waverly Hills Sanatorium in Louisville. 3. What Month is it? octoberrr. Obviously since I took this quiz eight years ago today, it’s also now October. 4. Anything big coming up? not really. Hopefully buying a house and moving home soon. 5. Why are you doing this? need something else to do while i watch gymnastics & wait for it to be 4 so i can watch the bills beat carolina. The sound on my tv keeps cutting out and it’s really aggravating so I got on my laptop to catch up on youtube videos but I got sidetracked doing this. 6. Like your parents? no. My dad yes. My mom...ehh, things are slowly improving. 7. Do you sleep with a teddy bear? heffalump. Nope.  8. Do you eat when you're nervous? i eat all the time. I didn’t even read my previous answer and “I eat all the time” popped into my head as soon as I saw the question. 9. Own a dress? surprisingly...i have like four or five...yeah, that's a lot for me lol I have a couple but I can’t wear them because of my skin. 10. Are you a fast typer? quite. 80-90 wpm. 11. Do you wanna have kids? no. Yes. 12. Who do you usually have Christmas dinner with? my parents, my sisters, mark, austen, maranda (now that she's here haha), cindy, and emily. and diane & the kids show up at some point during the day. My family but I won’t be home for Christmas this year. 13. Who do you celebrate New Years with? i haven't really celebrated it at all lately...but this year the crew's getting smashed for sure. I don’t celebrate it. 14. Where do you live? here. Ohio. Unfortunately. 15. Have you made a cootie catcher in your younger years? oh god, so many. Yeah a lot. 16. Plans this weekend? it's over. bowling, shopping, out with people, dinner, out again. Well this past weekend we went to Canton on Friday, I worked Saturday and then we got groceries, and we went home Sunday and came back here Monday. Next weekend I have no plans except work. 17. To your left is: wall, window, fan, cabinet, cd tower, atari stuff. Table, Dish remote, lamp, bottle of water, picture of my sister, some random mail, two candles, and Dave’s wallet/keys/deodorant/Axe spray. 18. To your right is: wall, fridge, pandas, guitars, amp, cabinet. My phone, Vizio remote, sound bar remote, another table with a bunch of crap on it, and the couch. 19. In your pocket is: nothing. Cigarettes, lighter, my debit card, and a Sheetz receipt.  20. Nervous about anything? kinda. Not really. 21. Scared of the Dark? nope. Negative. 22. Have any phobias? several. Driving, bridges, weather, specifically tornadoes even though I’ve never seen one, bees, being in public, the possibility of finding out that I can’t have kids, riding in a car with Dave, planes...I’m sure there are more but I can’t think of them all right now. 23.Your Opinion on Turtles? indifferent. Same. 24. Whats a Store near your house? save a lot, tops, arby's, family dollar, dollar general, the liquor store, CVS, the music store, goodwill, country fair, and all the places on main st. The closest one is a hair salon but idk if that counts as a “store”...probably one of the restaurants on 3rd st or Dollar General. 25. What did you do last march break? nothing? I don’t have March break. 26. Like Gum? only one kind. No. 27. Age you’d like to be? 274 days older than i am. Don’t care. 28. Place you would rather be? i'm good. Bradford. 29. Were you ever obsessed with High School Musical? haha yeah, i was for a while. You betcha. I still love it. Not the third one though. 30. Movie You Would like to see? paranormal activity. For the record, Paranormal Activity was shitty AF. I want to see Thank You For Your Service __________________________________________________ THE END Happy you're done? kinda. I have to poop so yeah I guess. What are you gonna do now? watch tv, watch football, then eat dinner. Poop, smoke a cigarette, and watch youtube videos.

[dandelliongirl]

Catching up

before winter.

Greetings, blog. It's been a while again.

It’s been an autumn and a half at work. Things have gone very poorly on a lot of fronts, which has lead to a lot of drama and stressed people. I've personally been trying to distance myself from it all but haven't had too much energy to sit in front of a computer after work. I have, however, discovered a lot of new hobbies/interests, so I'm excited to update my blog/diary about them.

Summer cottage season is officially over. In August/September we got to go on a nature hike, collect heaps of mushrooms and bake a delicious pie with them. I harvested lots of lavender, rosemary, thyme and some parsley. We also picked lingonberries and I froze lots of currants from grandmum’s garden for the upcoming winter. We had an official ending to our summer house season in mid-October. My guy came over as well and we spent a cozy weekend doing yard work, appreciating nature and spending time together. My guy went on a trail run while I biked next to him, and in the evening we went to the sauna and sat at a bonfire. We also saw Venetian fireworks from across the lake.♥

So since August/September I’ve started down on a little witchy journey and even started making my own Grimoire. I’m mainly a kitchen and green witch with some wiccan beliefs but as I do belong to the lutheran church I’m not a wiccan. Regardless witchcraft has made menial tasks and tiring chores a lot more interesting and meaningful. It means I now find love and joy in cleaning and cleansing, decorating and baking. Meditating, charging things I do with intent and using "spells" as affirmations are definitely a part of the whole super trendy mindfullness thing that people who have been distanced from nature and natural wisdom pay top dollar to learn from expensive psychiatrists and life coaches. Appreciating nature at any season and being able to cook, bake and decorate with seasonal things gets me excited, gives me reasons to live through the dark months and works wonders in alleviating seasonal depression. Trusting, honoring and living by nature feels right, and learning about the practice of witchcraft has given meanings and explanations to a lot of my own behavior, such as collecting all kinds of magical knick knacks and talismans or creating my own sigils and even rituals since childhood. My respect for history and old wisdom certainly helps. Celebrating Samhain with all it's historical meanings and associations was a lot of fun and I cannot wait for Yule.

So some notable events that have happened since the end of August:

My high school reunion was a lot of fun even though not everyone could make it. Reminiscing about all the weird stuff that happened and things we put ourselves through for a piece of paper was a lot of fun. It was also good to hear how people are doing these days and see what cool adults they have all become.

Me and mum attended an outdoor movie picnic in August. We had grapes, vegetable chips, chocolate and pastries. We watched the movie Shoplifters and it was a nice warm evening with the whole area packed to the brim. It was a really sweet movie, and a fun evening I’ll remember and treasure forever!

In mid-September grandmum had her friends from her social democrat youth group come over for a reunion and me and mum helped her out with the arrangements. She was very tired but happy she got to be reunited with those people once again. Getting old is so cruel and ruthless, and for a while now grandmum has definitely been tying up loose ends and getting ready for the inevitable. It is sad but I don’t want to be selfish and hold on to her just because I don’t want to be left without her. I’ll just hold on to every day I still have her, and when the time comes it will come. My friend just lost her 90 year old grandmum and she’s now facing her first christmas without her...

Other events:

Annual city light event, an autumnal photoshoot for my project with my friend, meeting up with my ballet friends for coffee and mulled wine, playing the Jedi Outcast 2 remaster with my friend and feeling incredibly nostalgic, spending Samhain week with all my closest friends, my friend from kindergarten getting engaged (eeeekk!!! ♥ ♥ ♥), ordering a bunch of physical photos and buying a photo album for them, germinating 3 different kinds of apples and a few plum stones to plant in the next few weeks, having literal tens of kilos of apples to dry and make into delicious apple butter, cakes and pies. Hanging out with my guy’s high school bestie who has moved to our city to study psychology. I’ve also (finally) made some progress with my piano rehearsal and found a bunch of sheet music books that I’m waiting to be delivered. (The mail delivery services are on strike right before Christmas - yikes). I’ve also been trying to get into embroidery and continue knitting. I would also really like to spend more time reading even though I do listen to books weekly.

It is a very rainy week with lots of wet snow. I’ve been collecting dragonflies made with beads and reflective fabric that a local craft store has been leaving out on bikes. (Only from abandoned bikes though!) We took a big bird feeder to our summer cottage and when mum and dad went to check it out yesterday it had tons of birds flocking around it! ♥ Last night me and my guy went to the sauna at my parents' house and had nachos for father's day.

I put up the Christmas tree this past weekend and I'm planning on decorating it this week. I'm still waiting for a Sims sale so that I can get my planned build-a-bundle of city living, realm of magic and romantic garden stuff for the holiday season. Me and my guy started playing kingdom come deliverance on a free weekend and bought it on sale. We've also been playing fe3h, Untitled Goose game and Skyrim (again!) on the Switch. I would really want to play Luigi's mansion 3. Some 130 days until New Horizons.

This Friday it’s me and my guy's 9th anniversary and we're starting our 10th year together. Crazy! I'm so glad that pretty much our entire relationship is saved in these tumblr posts. We're having a lunch date for some sushi on Friday to celebrate, and possibly planning a trip for our upcoming 10th year together.

It's been a beautiful autumn full of new discoveries about myself and enjoying the company of awesome people. Because of all these awesome things in my personal life the difficulties at work cannot get to me (they sometimes do but I try to stay strong) like they did to my poor colleague who had to take sick leave.. 6 weeks until Christmas vacation, and after that I have almost 3 weeks of vacation left for the spring. Whether I travel or spend it at home with New Horizons is still up for debate.

I drafted this post at work. I have very little motivation to do any actual work so I take every quiet moment when I'm alone in our office to do other things and avoid actual work at all costs. Oop. I ordered some warm indoor shoes and a new Oysho blanket in preparation for the long winter in our freezing cold office.