#did we know Timo has cats

[imperatorrrrr]

Timo Meier, Jacob Markstrom, and Simon Nemec play agree or disagree with popular questions

[ladylooch]

Hey! i have a request :) how about Timo and y/n being neighbors after his move to new jersey? a friend to lovers always makes my heart flutter!

Imagine just wanting to mind your own business and a shirtless Timo appears on the balcony next to yours. This sounds wonderful… how would one sign up for that?? Asking for me, not a friend.

Speaking of friends... here is some quick friends to lovers

I love writing Timo. Thank you so much for the request!

Word Count: 700

It’s finally my day off after working seven straight days. All I want is to sit on my balcony and enjoy the first sprinkle of Spring on the east cost. I grab my book and a can of bub;y, figuring 10:00am is probably a little too early to drink on a Monday morning. I grab the folding chair that’s been propped up for a majority of the winter against the wall of the building. I take a Clorox wipe to it, then allow it to dry before settling into it. I prop my bare feet on the balcony railing, crossing my ankles and enjoying the slight breeze against my face. 

Goodbye Old Man Winter. It’s Spring’s time to shine.

“Um… excuse me?” I hear a voice from my left. I roll my eyes at my bliss being disrupted. Snatching my sunglasses off, I look at the balcony of my new neighbor. I haven’t met him yet, but have heard an occasional noise from the otherwise of the wall. The apartment used to be vacant, so I’m not exactly thrilled to be sharing the wall again. The man is speaking to me from inside his condo. I squint, trying to see through the tinted glass. 

“What?” I respond to him with a slight edge to my voice. I swear to God if this man starts hitting on me…

The most beautiful man I have ever seen steps onto his balcony. He’s shirtless, exposing the rigid muscles on his upper body. My jaw goes slightly slack as the breath leaves my chest. He’s wearing black shorts with the Devil’s logo on one thigh. His hair is wet like he just got out of the shower. He looks like he stepped off the cover of the romance novel in my hand.

Oh my god, I hope he starts hitting on me.

“Sorry. I know you’re trying to read.” He chuckles, gesturing to my book. “But…” He pauses and leans back into his apartment. “Is this your cat?” He holds the questionable orange tabby up by it’s waist. 

“Oh my god!” I exclaim, clasping my hand over my mouth as my cat, Tigger, rubs his head on the underside of the man’s chin. “Yes. Uh, I am so sorry. Tigger! How did you get over there!” I stand, tossing my book onto my chair. “I’ll be right over.” I rush back inside, hustling to the hallway. The door opens when I get there. “I am so sorry. I.. He’s… never done anything like this.” I’m sputtering and flustered.

“It’s all good. We became fast friends this morning.” He chuckles as he scratches Tigger between the ears.

“How long has he been over here?”

“About an hour.”

“Wow. I had no idea he was gone.” I slap my hand on my forehead, embarrassed. “I can’t believe he let you pick him up. He hates men. He’s chased pretty much every boyfriend out of my life.”

“Maybe they all just sucked.” He shrugs at me. 

“Maybe.” I muse as I reach out, gathering Tigger back into my arms. The cat wiggles, trying to reach out for our neighbor again. “I’m (y/n).” I extend his hand out to him. He takes it, securely shaking it. His fingers linger a moment past polite. “Tigger’s mom.” The words are breathless as my eyes dip to his six pack. 

“Timo. Nice to meet you… Tigger’s mom.”

I smile at my fiancé recounting the story of our meet cute to our new neighbor who moved into what was my apartment until two months ago. Tigger is sitting on Timo’s lap, purring and sunbathing as we sit on the balcony this all started on. My feet rest next to our cat as Timo’s fingers work into the arches of my right foot.

“So, all that to say, you’ve got a lucky new place.” Timo gives my ankle a squeeze.

“Yes it is.” I agree, then tilt my face back to the sun. My new engagement ring shines in the Spring sunlight, reflecting speckles of light on Timo's bare chest.

In a year, I went from reading about the love of a lifetime to living it. 

All it took was some luck… and a furry friend named Tigger.

[stereax]

GOT AN IDEA

tell me whos gonna get the cup next year. like who would u say will get it. ik u cant say but who you do think it will be, lets make predictions

Hmmmmm. I did do a bit of an analysis on that a bit ago, but with Free Agency Frenzy almost fully in the rearview mirror, things have changed...

Here are my WAY too early predictions for the playoffs.

Metro -

1. Devils - Conference Leaders

2. Hurricanes

3. Rangers

4(WC2). Penguins

Atlantic -

1. Maple Leafs

2. Panthers

3. Bruins

4(WC1). Senators

Central -

1. Stars

2. Avalanche

3. Predators

4(WC1). Wild

Pacific -

1. Golden Knights - Conference Leaders

2. Oilers

3. Kraken

4(WC2). Kings

This would give us a bracket as follows:

Devils v Penguins

Hurricanes v Rangers

Maple Leafs v Senators

Panthers v Bruins

---

Stars v Wild

Avalanche v Predators

Golden Knights v Kings

Oilers v Kraken

My picks to win?

Devs v Pens - Devs. Even though I give the Pens a playoff berth (which they really could blow) because of some of the good short-term moves Dubas has made to solidify the team, I really doubt they can beat the Devils in a seven-game series. Devs v Pens games always have the aura of "our grandparents threw a party and we were the only ones that came". They're just too old to make a serious Cup run. And Jarry is more often injured than not.

Canes v Rags - Rags. The top three teams in the Metro last year have what could be described as a rock-paper-scissors relationship. Devils overpower Rangers through offense, Canes stifle that offense with good defense, Rangers goaltending blocks Canes volume shooting. Plus, Shesty's mad.

Leafs v Sens - Sens. That's a hot take, but let me justify it. Despite the Leafs breaking the curse this year, they have many glaring issues - most notably, they've gotten way worse over this offseason and are even more cap-strapped than usual. They can't really acquire at the trade deadline even if they want to. On the flipside, the Senators' main issue was goaltending. They got a good goalie in Koorpisalo. I do see this going six or seven, but I honestly believe the Sens can upset the Leafs.

Cats v Bruins - Cats. The Cats already beat the Bruins last year. Arguably better Cats versus clearly worse Bruins? Not even a contest.

Stars v Wild - Stars. The Wild can't seem to crack the first round and they're dealing with $14.7m in dead cap. Contrast with the Stars, who are able to make deep runs for the Cup and don't have $14.7m less to play with. Easy choice here.

Avs v Preds - Preds. The Preds made some really good moves in free agency, adding Ryan O'Reilly and Luke Schenn, among others. The Avs lost their captain for another year and coped by signing Miles Wood to a 6x2.5. Holy overpay. It's almost like they're trying not to contend.

Knights v Kings - Knights. The Kings are an aging husk of a team that managed to lose the PLD trade where Winnipeg was begging for anyone to take him. The Knights just won the Cup. How is this a contest?

Oilers v Kraken - Kraken. The Kraken have depth and have four solid lines of players. The Oilers shipped off Yamamoto and Kostin to the Red Wings for literal table scraps. Darnell Nurse is on one of The contracts in history. Campbell is massively underperforming. C'mon, further the tragedy of the Edmonton Oilers. I know you want to.

Round 2 becomes:

Devils v Rangers

Panthers v Senators

---

Stars v Predators

Knights v Kraken

Predictions:

Devs v Rags - Devs. Shesty probably gets a panic attack when he sees Timo's smiling face. The Devils have learned that the speed game is paramount for them (which is what they use to beat the Penguins as well) and they can track meet the Rangers seven days a week. This really becomes Devils Offense versus Shesterkin. I think the Devils win this one.

Cats v Sens - Cats. This one's gonna set some penalty minute records. The Tkachuks are going to kill each other and their teams' penalty kills. While the Sens upsetting the Cats would be ironic and further a Senators Cinderella Run, I think the Cats win here. I mean, one solid hit on Stützle and half the offense is gone.

Stars v Preds - Stars. The Predators have a Saros, the Stars have an Oettinger. What the Stars have is their top point scorer NOT being a defenseman. That's right - the Preds' top point scorer last year was a defenseman (Roman Josi). I put the Preds above the Avs because the Avs are seemingly trying to be bad now, but I can't put them above the Stars.

Knights v Kraken - Kraken. I just want to see a battle of the expansion teams in the playoffs. Giving the edge to the Kraken only because of Knights playoff fatigue, but it can go either way. Just make it happen, Bettman. That's all I want.

So the Conference Finals become:

Devils v Panthers

Stars v Kraken

My predictions here?

Devs v Cats - Cats. This one could REALLY go either way. I'm giving it to the Panthers because they're a more physical team that the Devils have historically struggled with. Expect this to go to six or seven if nobody's injured.

Stars v Kraken - Stars. I think the Stars beat the Kraken seven days a week. There's no real reason for this (maybe outside of Oetter>Grubi) but just a general vibe that the Stars are just the better team in that matchup.

So your Stanley Cup Final is:

Cats v Stars.

And my winner?

Stars. Anything can happen in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. This one can go either way (damn, I've said that before). I'm calling Stars in six or seven because I think they can be slightly more consistent over the Cats, who can be notorious for being hot and cold. Once again, injuries will play a big role here - if Robertson, for example, is out of commission, the scales tip drastically towards the Cats. If Benn is injured it might be better for the Stars...

[quixotin]

in which adrien is a science teacher and has to pay his karma by babysitting a teenager that has his exact same humor when he was 15.

Chapter 2 of Chat Noir Is My Science Teacher is up, friends :D

Ch. 2. Mr. Deep

In which Matt is baby and Adrien begins to pay his karma for being a lil shit when he was younger, with interest.

When Matthieu braced himself for the day, the last thing he expected to happen was learning that Mr. Dupain-Cheng, his science teacher, was none other than his idol, Chat Noir.

Yes, Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the dorky teacher who laughed at his own bad science puns and had a themed t-shirt for every day of the week. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the man who thought grading with “You Tried” stars and cat stickers was funny. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, who was so gullible he didn’t notice when students wanted to distract him from giving a lesson by asking him about his wife because they knew he could rant about her for hours. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the only teacher that replied with an ‘ok :)’, a meme, and the signature, ‘Sent from my cat-phone,’ when replying to a well-thought email. That Mr. Dupain-Cheng.

How could this be possible? He was so... so uncool .

Read below the cut or on AO3 by clicking the link above.

When Matthieu braced himself for the day, the last thing he expected to happen was learning that Mr. Dupain-Cheng, his science teacher, was none other than his idol, Chat Noir.

Yes, Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the dorky teacher who laughed at his own bad science puns and had a themed t-shirt for every day of the week. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the man who thought grading with “You Tried” stars and cat stickers was funny. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, who was so gullible he didn’t notice when students wanted to distract him from giving a lesson by asking him about his wife because they knew he could rant about her for hours. Mr. Dupain-Cheng, the only teacher that replied with an ‘ok :)’, a meme, and the signature, ‘Sent from my cat-phone,’ when replying to a well-thought email. That Mr. Dupain-Cheng.

How could this be possible? He was so... so uncool .

When Matt thought about who Chat Noir might be under his mask he always pictured someone bold and dashing, maybe one of those cool guys that worked in those crazy science startups. Someone brave, fearless... not a father of two who, Matt was pretty sure, screeched one time a flying cockroach somehow crawled from one of the sinks in the lab. He pictured someone like Barbara Keynes or Peter Parker.

They were witty and mysterious. Mr. Dupain-Cheng was too nice to be a superhero.

“Matt!” Timo tackled him into a hug as Matthieu and Mr. Dupain-Cheng joined the rest of the class. Ladybug had finished handing out autographs to his classmates and had already left. “Are you okay? Did you see the Akuma? It was so sick!”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Matthieu muttered, as Mr. Dupain-Cheng pointedly put as much distance between himself and Matt. He called the class’ attention to continue their museum visit.

“You’re in danger, kid.” His teacher’s words still resounded in Matthieu’s head. “For your own safety, lay low until I decide what to do with this, okay?”

He didn’t give Matt a chance to ask any questions, to say anything. He basically wanted him to ignore this, to act as if he had just found him practicing some obscure hobby outside school.

As they walked, Matt trained his eyes on the back of his teacher’s head, the blond, messy mop of hair towering over the group of teens.

“Hey, Timo?”

“Yeah?”

“Mr. Deep is, like, a nerd, right?”

“Yeah, he’s pretty cool,” Timo said, his attention more invested in his portable video game console than in the conversation. “He knows, like, all the animes.”

“That’s not cool,” said Matt.

“Of course it is,” Timo said, finally peeling his eyes off the screen. “We like that stuff.”

Timo had a point, Matthieu had to admit.

“And remember the time he helped me solder that motherboard we used for the robot competition? That was pretty cool.”

“I... suppose.”

Timo shrugged, blissfully unaware of Matt’s current crisis. “I keep telling you, man,” he said, returning to his videogame. “Mr. Deep is the coolest teacher at school.”

After the field trip, Matt went home stuck in a contemplative trance, wanting to decide what the revelation was that truly bothered him: the fact that Chat Noir’s civilian persona was absolutely nothing like what he had pictured, or that Timo was right and the reason why he disliked Mr. Dupain-Cheng was actually because he looked up to him, and that he embodied the complete opposite of everything Matt was taught to be.

The more he thought about it, the more it made sense, to be honest. As any self-respecting fan, Matthieu knew Chat Noir’s career by heart. He had seen those old clips of him as a teenager, cracking witty jokes and one-liners in the middle of battle. It kind of made sense that he’d grow up to be the kind of man that was unapologetically chaotic. Besides, those memes and punny cat stickers he liked to grade with? Suddenly it seemed all so obvious. It was almost as if Mr. Dupain-Cheng was flaunting the truth in front of everyone, knowing no one would peg him as the kind of man who was a superhero. It was all in the same way no one seemed to understand how on earth such a whacky dude would end up with one of the most successful designers in Paris.

Matt suddenly shot up from the comfort of his bed as he contemplated his thoughts.

Ladybug. Weren’t Ladybug and Chat Noir a couple?

Oh my god, is Mr. Dupain-Cheng cheating on his wife with Ladybug? Or backwards? Wait... Isn’t that famous designer his wife? What’s her name, MDC? No, that’s the brand. Marinette Dupain-Cheng.

Wait.

Does his wife even know? Oh, no... Poor woman! Wait... what if...

Matt gasped. “She’s Ladybug. She has to be.”

He paced around his room, his thoughts going a thousand miles an hour. “I can never let Hawkmoth akumatize me ever again,” he screeched, grabbing handfuls of his hair. “Oh my god!” he shrieked. “Okay, Matt, breathe. Breathe. Just... Think. Okay. This can be good, right? This can be good.”

He kept pacing around.

“Okay, Matt. Okay. You just figured out that Mr. Deep is Chat Noir and his wife is Ladybug... Cool, it’s all cool,” he said to himself in a pitch heightened by the sheer panic that coursed through him. “It’s okay, it’s—.”

He suddenly stopped dead in his tracks as inspiration struck. He gasped excitedly and immediately got on his knees to reach under his bed.

“Of course!” he exclaimed, pulling out a small corkboard he kept hidden under the bed. The board was an indulgent little project if he did say so himself. It wasn’t related to any of his school activities, which is why he had to keep it hidden. Goodness knows what his parents would do if they found out he had been wasting time investigating who Hawkmoth might be.

This wasn’t bad, this was great!

I can help him! Matt thought excitedly. I can help him and Ladybug track Hawkmoth down!

He took a few shots of it with his phone to then ferociously kick it out of view, back under the bed again, when his mother entered his room.

“What are you doing on the floor, Matthieu?” Mrs. Magan, a middle-aged woman with stern eyes, said to him.

“I... lost a coin.”

Mrs. Magan frowned, not making much of the excuse. “Dinner is ready.”

Matthieu let out a silent sigh of relief as his mother turned around, then quickly followed after her, knowing better than to have her remind him a second time.

I can help him, he thought again excitedly. I can be his sidekick!

—-

Matthieu was not one to be late for school, but the day after discovering Mr. Deep’s identity he decided to be extra early, just to make sure he’d be able to talk to him in private. There was always the risk that he’d be late of course, but now that Matthieu knew the reason, he could hardly hold it against him.

Matt was lucky enough to spot him in the Chemistry lab when he arrived. He peeked through the small window on the door. it seemed he was grading papers.

He grinned and immediately went in, hardly being able to contain his excitement.

“Good morning, Mr. Dupain-Cheng!” he exclaimed enthusiastically, causing Adrien to jolt and knock some of the paper sheets to the ground. Matt rushed to pick them up before Adrien had the chance to do so. “So listen, I have thoughts ,” he said as he put the papers back on the desk and fumbled with his backpack to produce his phone. “I was up all night updating my Hawkmoth board, and I was thinking—I was thinking that maybe, you know this philanthropist, Lila Rossi—”

Adrien could only stare dumbfounded at how fast Matt rambled before he even caught the drift of what he was saying. Once he registered it though, he jolted once again.

“Shh!” Adrien hushed at the teen, frantically looking around himself to see if anyone was in the vicinity—even though the door was closed.

“Matthieu, what are you talking about?” he hissed.

“I wanna help you track Hawkmoth!” Matthieu piped with a bright smile, reaching into his backpack again to produce his phone. “Last night, I was thinking, ‘Hey, maybe this happened for a reason.’ I’m pretty good at this whole deduction thing, you know? I’m at the top of the class in almost all subjects and I have like, all the badges possible on the Ladyblog. Also, look, I have this board that I made about all the possible suspects because if you look at the akumatizations there’s a real pattern, and I’m thinking that whoever Hawkmoth might be, has some stuff to work through, because oh my god. Oh, like, this person he—”

“Matthieu, keep your voice down!” Adrien interrupted him. “No! I can’t let you do that. What happened yesterday was an accident, kid. Okay? It’s best if you just... If you just try to pretend like you don’t know anything while Ladybug and I decide what to do. This isn’t a game, Matt. You are in danger. If Hawkmoth ever lays hands on you, there’s no telling what might happen. Stay. Away. From. This.”

Undeterred by the ominous delivery of Mr. Dupain-Cheng’s warning, Matthieu beamed at him. “Don’t worry, Mr. Deep! I’m good at keeping secrets! I—”

“No. It is out of the question, Matthieu. This is dangerous and I—wait, what did you just call me?” Adrien said, suddenly catching the nickname.

Matthieu grew red in the face and smiled sheepishly at his teacher. “Mr. Deep... You know, ‘cause you’re always, like, going off these crazy deep tangents about the physics of akumas and stuff and—Oh my god, that makes so much sense now! Do you study them in your free time? Oh, wow! Do you and Miss Ladybug have a secret layer? Like Majestia and Knight Owl? Wait, actually, don’t answer that. Sensitive information, am I right? Oh! Also, I think Mr. Deep really fits you because you always give us this weirdly specific and deep life advice? And I don’t know how you do it but it’s always on point? Also, your name starts with a D...”

Adrien looked at the boy, shocked, and frankly a little scared that a kid could talk so much, so fast. There’s only one other person he had ever known whose mouth ran like a broken faucet if she was given the chance.

Wait , Adrien thought. Did... did he just pun with my name?

A part of him was flattered, another was surprised, a third one was slightly insulted.

The kid punned with my name. I’m his teacher !

“Matt!” he exclaimed, interrupting Matthieu’s spoken stream of consciousness. “No. This is final. Stay away from this. I don’t want to have to repeat myself. It is final.”

Again, unfazed by Adrien’s effort to act seriously, Matthieu beamed at him. “Don’t worry, Mr. Deep. I’ll prove you can trust me! I would not trust me, too, if I were you. But I’ll prove it! You’ll see.”

The bell rang, and with it came a thankful end to the conversation. At least on Adrien’s side.

“And don’t call me Mr. Deep.”

“Okay, Mr. Deep!” Matthieu said, beaming at him as he made his way out of the classroom. “Oops! I mean, Mr. DC.”

Adrien sighed, glaring at the boy and feeling some sort of karmic entity laughing at him. He knew exactly what Matt’s energetic yet jesterly energy reminded him of: a sixteen-year-old version of himself whose favorite pastime was seeing how much foolery he could get away with before Ladybug decided to murder him in cold blood.

“It’s your karma,” Plagg muttered quietly before his students began pouring into the classroom. “Kid’s your spitting image. Though I gotta say, he blabbers as much as Spots.”

“Oh, shush it!”

“You know you have to tell her soon, right?” Plagg muttered from inside Adrien’s overshirt. “The more you delay, the deeper your grave.”

“I said shush.”

The little god snickered. “Someone’s in trouble.”

Plagg was right, though. Adrien had to tell Marinette about this. It was already bad that he didn’t tell her the moment it happened. She hated it when he did that. But in his defense, he knew she had a tough day at the label and he didn’t want to freak her out. He hoped that excuse would be enough. Plagg had laughed at him when he asked for his opinion about it.

Yeah, he was in trouble.

There was no way but through, he knew this. That didn’t mean his legs could tell the difference between an honest conversation with his life partner and the visceral fear for his survival that was elicited at the image of said conversation. He felt them buckle as he casually leaned against the kitchen island, trying his best to act natural.

The kids had been put to bed and there was thankfully no Akuma in sight. At least not yet.

Marinette sighed with relief as she swiftly undid her hair and reached into the fridge for a bottle of wine. If Adrien hadn’t been so terrified by what he was about to do, he’d allow himself to swoon at her.

Witnessing Marinette shed the tiredness of the day as she swapped into comfortable clothes—usually loose shirts and yoga pants— and poured her drink of choice was one of his favorite things to watch. It didn’t matter that they had been living together for a little over seven years now, he’d never get tired of watching her exist.

“You want some?” Marinette said as she stood on her tiptoes to reach the shelf where they kept the wine glassware.

“Yeah, sure,” Adrien said, then continued speaking after thanking his wife for the wine. “You’ll never guess what happened today.”

“What?” she said, clinking her glass against his before taking the first sip.

“A kid punned with my name.”

Marinette chuckled. “Really? What did he call you?”

“Mr. Deep.”

Marinette snorted as she took another sip from the glass.

“He said it’s because I like to go on deep tangents and because my name starts with a D. Kid can’t pun to save his life.”

Marinette smirked at him. “You’re one to talk.”

He dropped his jaw. “I can’t believe you just asked me for a divorce, m’lady.”

Marinette rolled her eyes and smiled, walking past him on the way to the couch. She placed her wine glass on a small side table and pulled out a sketchbook from one of its drawers. She busied herself reviewing her work while Adrien gathered the courage to nudge the conversation in the direction it needed to go.

“M’lady?” he said from behind her.

“What did you do,” Marinette replied immediately, as she flipped through the pages of the sketchbook.

”I— why do you always assume I did something?”

Marinette turned around and mocked him, then gave him a knowing smirk. “It’s in your tone, Chaton. You can’t lie.”

“I am an excellent liar, I’ll have you know.” He stopped himself from bragging further, seeing as Marinette frowned.

“What is it, Adrien? What happened?”

Adrien’s palms were sweating with anxiety. He gulped. “First of all, I love you and you know that, right?”

“Adrien,” Marinette said, her voice hitching up her tone.

“It’s nothing bad . I mean, it’s a ‘could be worse’ sort of situation.”

“ Adrien !”

“Hypothetically speaking, imagine... what if, er... one of the wielders accidentally revealed himself to someone who, uh, someone who absolutely shouldn’t know? Hypothetically speaking.”

“Adrien, what did you DO ?” Marinette screeched.

[vertigoambrosia]

my internet was out for literally a day let’s see a ~special~ episode of shotgun

OOOO timo vs lucky!!!!

i wasn’t really looking forward to a plotless episode but this matchup!

omg look chris colen is there

wait this is from like, last year!

completely unsurpising lucky would want to play with the4 scarf -  cats love hanging objects

haha lucky points to his foot on the rope

lol tim’s hair is so long in comparison to how hehas it now

haha alan to point out that berlin loves ivan (and pete)

note: he doesn’t mention that this was a brief point in time when jurn wasn’t a jerk

though looking at mack in the entrance this was post-tag league, and probably after that london show afterwards, so he was already beginning to be a jerk again

awww no jurn used ivan as a weapon against his bestie

i forgot about the pink guy

this is one of those matches that’s good but i also feel like goes a bit long

or at least has too many false finishes

like, pete interfering twice?

awww pete took a lot of damage but he still smiles for his friend :3

umm wait i’m pretty sure we saw this match?

wait no it was with mark davis and kelly

but still, this was a superstars match

i guess i can take this space to say i’m really excited about the women they’re bringing in for the next tour

wesna confirmed for being in femme fatales is totally hype

kris wolf is there for apparently the entire tour, which is like, exactly what wxw needs for the womens division

seems like millie mckenzie is also gonna be more regular

hopefully this means we’ll get more than one womens’ storyline at the same time,a nd maybe even deveop kelly’s character past ‘toni’s lil sister’

sadly melanie’s bff in crime lufisto probably isn’t gonna be back; she recently had to abdicate the shine title cause she has to have surgery and take significant time off :(

but kris wolf being on for the whole tour makes me optimistic that we’ll start having more women doing longer stints and really get some character interactions and storylines going

yeah i still have the same complaints about mixed gender matches

lol we know you want intergender so we’ll tease it and get a few shots in but gosh we could never commit to it

it does make me wonder how the intergender street fight ecen happened considering how it’s like, never been mentioned again despite being totally awesome

also the tags don’t ,make sense it doesn’t make sense IT’S JUST TWO MATCHES BEING INTERRUPTED BY EACH OTHER

i’m being cranky, i know

wow they did that exact abdominal stretch cheating/eye poke joke in one of the other matches

i suppose i am just not in the mood for such silliness

[i say, having just watched like ten episodes of freakazoid]

...i wonder if we’ll be allowed to actually see any of the pete dunne matches on the next tour

it’s super annoying how wwe will let people wrestle for other promotions but not fucking let the promotion record it

hell, they don’t even let evolve air william regal’s rando appearances, and he doesn’t even do anything

but i probably shouldn’t open th wwe uk can of worms

HAHAHA ok melanie’s face after kelly did that samoan drop was fantastic

ha andy is giving some top tier Faces while in this hold

see? i do more than complain about intergender!

[desruc]

Get to Know You Thing

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Put your iTunes on shuffle. What are the first 6 songs that popped up?

1) Two Door Cinema Club: Are We Ready (Wreck)

2) Angerfist: Bad Attitude

3) Laura Sheeran: Forever Love

4) Vesala: Muitaki ihmisii

5) Kate Bush: Cloudbusting (DJ Burma Bootleg)

6) Audiotricz: F#cking Wild

Grab the book nearest you and turn to page 23. What’s line 17?

Uhh i have the Finnish edition of Dan Brown's The Origin, and the page 23 has only four lines :D So imma take a line from the 24th page: " -- tilaustyönä tehty univormu vain korosti hänen vaikuttavaa ruumiinrakennettaan."

Ever had a poem or song written about you?

Actually yes, I've had a song written about me :D It was for a skit when I was studying the last year in high school (lukio) - everyone graduating had a short song written about them by younger students (if I remember correctly it was a cover of When Johnny Comes Marching Home :’D)

When was the last time you played air guitar?

Last Thursday. I was listening Franz Ferdinand's Take Me Out

Who is your celebrity crush?

Iiiiii don't think I have one right now

What’s a sound you hate; sound you love?

I   a b s o l u t e l y   hate it when a table knife accidentally scratches a plate a certain way when I'm eating. Uuuurgh just thinking about it sends shivers down my spine

I love the sound of a cat purring

Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens?

I'm sceptical about ghosts, even though I love spooky stories (and get scared easily)

I think it's highly possible that there are alien life forms somewhere in the universe

Do you drive? If so, have you ever crashed?

No I don't. During the resent years I've gotten very afraid of driving, but when I did drive I crashed a car once: I lost the control while driving on a road that had lots of loose gravel (I didn't hurt myself but the strawberries I was taking to the marketplace were ruined). After that I've been in serious car accidents two times (again, by some miracle I only got some small bruises and aches both times)

What was the last book you read?

The last book I read was Timo Leppänen's Merkilliset nimet. It's a book about how brands like Asics, Nokia, Google etc. got their names. It wasn't that interesting actually, the style of writing was pretty boring and repetitive.

Right now I'm reading David Lagercrantz's Tyttö joka etsi varjoaan (The Girl Who Takes An Eye for An Eye), a sequel to the Millennium saga and Stephen King's Kirjoittamisesta (On Writing)

Do you like the smell of gasoline?

Nah

What was the last movie you saw?

Kingsman

What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had?

I burned my hand on a hot stove pretty badly when I was about 4 yrs old, it still is the worst physical pain I remember experiencing

Do you have any obsessions right now?

I'm not sure if this counts but I'm obsessed of my NaNoWriMo wordcount (I'm a bit behind with only 28661 words, todays word goal is around 4000)

Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong?

Yeah, well, I forgive easily and I try to forget as well, sometimes it's easier, sometimes not

In a relationship?

Nope :D

I'll tag @khasuri  @plargh  @pimeydenkantaja and @squidfiction if you feel like doing this :^D

[nemossubmarine]

I finally got around to cleaning the calendar which I’ve used to keep track of our RP since like 10th campaign. It is pretty much as accurate I can get it, so I consider it canon-ish (also bc no one as far as I know, has contested me with their own one :P), but I might tweak it every now and then. I’m putting this out here now, mainly for the ease of accessibility for me and our other GMs, since it seems we have started to run into more questions of “when did this happen?” -kind as of late. I’ll try to update this at least once a campaign.

Last updated: 30/42019 (latest session #100)

A long list of things that have happened at a certain date under the cut.

9:22

Somewhere in Bloomingtide: 

Jelaina and Randy start traveling together.

Boshara flees Kinloch Hold.

Somewhere in Justinian: 

Boshara joins Jelaina and Randy.

14.7. 

Clan Teravest arrives in Vintiver.

15.7.

Harralan Teravest is possessed by a rage demon.

16.7.

The party arrives in Vintiver and meets Cahair Teravest.

18.7.

Harralan Teravest is killed.

29.7.

The party arrives in Denerim.

30.7.

The party meets Kuisma.

2.8.

Dwarf-lord Trugva is killed by an Antivan Crow.

5.8.

Boshara is captured by templars.

14.8.

Boshara and Elspet are rescued from templars.

16.8.

The party visits Fade and meets Mareud the demon.

23.8.

The party meets Humbert Pomdeter in the old, haunted Garriot mansion.

Elspet bonds with Jonathon the spirit.

1.9.

The party arrives in Amaranthine.

3.9.

A massive human trafficking operation is busted in Amaranthine.

5.-6.9.

The party breaks into Vigil’s Keep.

6.9.

Boshara and Kustaa get together.

10.9.

The party is dropped into the Deep Roads.

14.9.

The party meets and kills a Broodmother

16.10.

Ruusu is born.

17.10.

An investigation into Arl Howe’s involvement in Amaranthine’s human trafficking begins.

29.10.

Mandulfr Ashtrak is appointed paragon in Orzammar.

2.11.

First victims of Nightmare die in Kirkwall.

8.11.

Sen Sein dies as a victim of Nightmare.

16.11.

The party arrives in Kirkwall and meets Alf Sein.

17.11.

Nightmare is defeated.

24.11.

Brett Harimann is possessed by a lust demon.

12.12.

Arl Howe goes into voluntary exile to Free Marches.

9:23

26.3.

The party joins the ship crew of the “Foul Magpie”

28.3.

Ship surgeon Nikita dies in the Fade.

Richard is cured of his semi-tranquility.

29.3.

Mutiny on the ship: Harmaakarhu and 5 other sailors are killed.

4.4.

“Foul Magpie” arrives to Estwatch.

6.4.

The ship crew takes on viddasala and her qunari troops and wins.

Alf is made captain of the ship.

Ship is renamed “Ripeä Ropso”.

8.4.

Ship bards Barius and Davos get married.

Richard and Cahair get together.

16.4.

The ship arrives to Antiva City.

Randy leaves for Orzammar.

17.4.

The party finds Sen’s will; Alf now owns the ship.

18.4.

The party finds Konstantine Holzer in the sewers. He joins the ship’s crew.

21.4.

Humbert is reunited with his sister Evenine.

25.4.

Paragon Mandulfr is murdered presumably by carta.

28.4.

Randulfr Mandulfr and Marjaleena Cenas get married.

17.5.

The ship reaches Vesuna, Tevinter.

18.5.

Brett Harimann is killed.

21.5.

Magister Mareud is killed.

29.5.

Carta leader Hedda Karol joins the Legion of the Dead.

17.7.

There’s an attempt at nobleman Harrowmont’s life in Orzammar, carta is suspected.

19.7.

King Aeducan appoints General Saelac as regent in Orzammar.

24.8.

The ship reaches Highever, Ferelden.

2.9.

The party arrives to Steppewolf Keep.

5.9.

The party has an encounter with an ice dragon.

Goddess Rilla is freed.

Kaino is cured of tranquility.

14.9.

The party is attacked by carta; Randy is severely wounded.

Boshara is let into Orzammar.

15.9.

Rest of the party is let into Orzammar.

Boshara attempts a blood magic ritual to cure Harrowmont of Blight. It fails and Harrowmont perishes. 

16.9.

Alf becomes the Master of the Special Fun Round of the Provings.

The party is captured by carta.

Boshara attempts a blood magic ritual to cure Hedda Karol of Blight. It is successful.

18.9.

The party is released from the carta and makes their way back to Orzammar.

19.9.

Boshara attempts a blood magic ritual to cure Cahair of Blight. It is successful, though he loses an eye in the process.

20.9.

Boshara attempts a blood magic ritual to cure Elspet of Blight. It is successful.

22.9.

General Saelac proposes to Boshara.

General Saelac is assassinated by Alf Sein.

6.10.

The party leaves Orzammar.

16.10.

King Aeducan is assassinated in Denerim by Elspet.

18.10.

Cahair, Richard and few other members of the ship crew are dropped off south of Denerim. They’ll visit clan Teravest and Vintiver.

22.10.

Elspet attempts to cure Carmen of the effects of Qamek. it doesn’t work.

25.10.

The ship arrives in Kirkwall.

26.10.

Alf and Boshara hire Arkaitz to locate their mothers.

Randulfr hires Usva-Kilna to teach him to be a boatswain.

The party meets Xenon the Antiquarian, and take up a job he offers.

5.11.

The party disembarks towards Teufelbäder.

12.11.

The party arrive in the town of Meünzebern, near Teufelbäder.

13.11.

The party is transported back in time, shenanigans ensue.

19.11.

The party returns to ship.

26.11. 

The party arrives in Kirkwall.

They return the time-travel necklace to Xenon.

27.11.

The party meets with Arkaitz who shares information on Boshara’s mother.

2.12.

Cahair, Richard & co return to ship.

7.12.

Gilweed picking adventures.

13.12.

Battle with the “Spotted Ladybug”.

16.12.

Estwatch adventures: Ianto and Carmen are cured.

Carmen and Kaino leave the ship to live in Estwatch.

25.12.

Alf learns that his mother is to assassinate Edmund Pentaghast at Empress Celene’s birthday party.

29.12.

Randulfr leaves to Orzammar with Dagrun, Rina, Jasinto, Jasinta, Pitkä-Breck, Carla, Jelaina, Darian, Cahair and Richard.

9:24

2.1.

Randulfr & co reach Orzammar.

5.1.

Alf, Humbert, Boshara and Elspet leave ship near Val Royeaux.

6.1.

Alf sneaks into the Val Royeaux alienage.

Elspet meets Isabella Laroi at Val Royeaux market.

9.1.

Rina, Dagrun and Breck are made members of house Mandulfr.

10.1.

Humbert and Boshara reach the house of Humbert’s sister Hannah. Boshara is taken into the house as Humbert’s illegitimate daughter Rosamunda.

14.1.

Randulfr dines with the current regent of Orzammar Decan Stonefist. They hatch a plan to go into the Empress’ birthday party.

17.1.

Humbert leaves to go back to Val Royeaux.

22.1.

Alf is hired as a servant for the Empress.

Humbert is hired as a guard for the Empress.

1.2.

Alf is transported to Halamshiral alongside other servants to prepare the palace for spring.

1.3.

Humbert is transported to Halamshiral with other guards in preparation of the party.

8.3.

Randulfr and co leave Orzammar to head for the party. Cahair and Richard take Rina and head back to ship.

11.3.

The Empress’ birthday party.

15.3.

King Maric visits Ripeä Ropso.

Nathaniel Howe joins the crew of Ripeä Ropso.

17.3.

The party arrives in Val Royeaux to rescue Kanuuna and Kuolematon Charles. They meet Marvin Mousse and co in a tavern.

18.3. 

The party starts following the templars.

20.3.

The party rescues Kanuuna, Kuolematon Charles and Egaeaeaeae.

20.3. - 27.3.

Hiding in the woods of Orlais.

11.4.

Kuolematon Charles leaves the ship at Estwatch.

17.5.

Konstantine has a near-death experience. He pleads the party to find an old friend, mage named Timo, who has a book that might help.

22.5.

The party finds out Timo’s current traveling destination to be the the destroyed town of Besagnon in Southern Orlais.

23.5.

The party leaves ship in Northern Orlais and start heading towards Besagnon.

28.5

The party meets Timo outside Besagnon. They also meet a Chantry search party led by Brother Genitivi in Besagnon.

29.5.

The party finds the books Timo was looking for, and also a magical skeleton cat by the name of Tau.

Timo agrees to join the ship as a librarian.

13.6.

In the forest near Kolkonkylä, an elf girl Miina meets the spirit of the forest and dubs them Prinssi.

24.6.

The party + Nesta Silvethari leave the ship in Gwaren. Cahair will take Nesta home, while the rest of the party will travel to Takatalvenvara to get Aarli trained.

27.6.

Boshara and Nesta stay behind in a town to spend some moments together while the rest go ahead.

The party, at the recommendation of an elven woman, decide to stay the night at a manor. They get kidnapped and transformed into dolls.

28.6.

The party gets their bodies back.

Cahair’s blight returns.

The party takes Kempers the bard as prisoner.

1.7.

Cahair leaves the party with Nesta Silvethari and Renata, planning to take them home.

3.7.

Miina’s magic manifests

4.7.

The party reaches Takatalvenvara

The citizens of Kolkonkylä and Sture & Harto Gran are turned into werewolves. 

Viljo is killed by Prinssi, because he attempts to kill Miina.

5.7.

The party goes on a search to find the missing people of Takatalvenvara. They discover that there’s something wrong in the forest.

Boshara accidentally explodes a quicksilver vein with her magic.

The party is rescued by Morrigan and Flemeth.

6.7.

The party returns to the forest and find Miina, Prinssi and the surviving werewolves. Miina is healed and Prinssi perishes. The werewolves turn back into villagers.

9.-11.7.

Sture Gran trains Aarli Hauveli.

17.7.

The party returns to ship and start towards Tevinter.

28.8.

The crew reaches Lecentum, Tevinter. 

The party joins the Festival of Hunt.

29.8.

The party comes first place in the Festival of Hunt and receive a ship as a price.

1.9.

Richard asks Cahair’s hand in marriage.

2.9.

Hopeful captain candidates hold a competition, Randy is the winner.

Randy is voted as the captain of the ship.

Cahair asks Elspet to be his first mate in the wedding.

3.9.

Randy appoints Boshara as his first mate.

1.10.

Elspet holds a Ye Olde Stag Night for Cahair.

6.10.

The crew reaches Ferelden and start wedding preparations.

7.10.

Richard and Cahair’s wedding.

30.10.

A huge angler fish attacks the ship. Randy keeps a red crystal at the end of its dangler as a memento.

Also fun additional stuff! Known birthdays: 

Randy  - Between 12th month 8:97 and 3rd month 8:98 - Currently 26

Alf - 5th month 8:96 - Currently 28

Boshara - Somewhere in summer 9:03 (5th, 6th or 7th month) - Currently 20/21

Elspet - 9:01 or 9:02 - Currently 21-23

Humbert - 2nd month 8:76 - Currently 48

Jelaina - 8:96 - Currently 27-28

Konstantine - 2.7. 8:73 - Currently 51

Cahair - 17.12. 8:99 - Currently 25

[umnachtung]

survey stealing prof again this day wow really

When did you meet the last male you texted? on tumblr in ...2014??? idk

Are you currently looking forward to anything? getting my first job and money, going to the Hunchback of Notre-dam musical with my friend, always looking forward to random cat encounters.

Do you have someone of the opposite sex you can tell everything to? most things, i suppose.

This time last year, can you remember who you liked? No one.

Who was the last person you went out to eat with? My family for my sister’s birthday I think.

Whats going on with you and the person you last texted? I don’t know...? I don’t text much on phone.

Were you single on your last birthday? Yes. So what? who gives a fuck?

Did anything brighten up your day today? I went to the museum of communication and used the pneumatic post system there.

How are you feeling at this exact moment? Okay. Hungry.

Do you ever wonder how other people see you? Only people I care about.

Within the next 5 months, what are you looking forward to MOST? hopefully having a healthy arm again by then. maybe a job?

Do you want to cut your hair? Yes. It’s been months. Im dying, squirtle.

Would you rather have roommates or live alone? I would like to have a non-invasive flatmate or two.

Do you have any scars? Several from my cat.

Will you be in a relationship next month? Not that I know of.

Has someone upset you in the past 48 hours? Yes, myself.

Do you get drunk every weekend? No.

What makes you happy? cats, hot tea, rainy quiet days, a good funny conversation with friends, pigeons, crows, getting enough sleep, FOOD

Do you think relationships are ever really worth it? To an extend. You sure gain experience.

Is it possible to be single and happy? Very much so. A relationship shouldn’t define your happiness.

Is your profile private? Not really. They aren’t all too personal anyway (no naked profs or too tmi posts i think??)

What are you doing right now? Browsing tumblr, relaxing, doing this survey lol

Are you taller than 5 foot 7 inches? No. 5,3.

Are you one of those people who just don’t care? I am both extremes.

Do you find piercings and tattoos attractive on the opposite sex? Depends on the piercings and tattoos....

Who was the last person you talked to before you went to bed? online friends i think????

What’s the last important thing that you broke? How? I smashed my new lamp i got for my birthday one day before my actual birthday while cleaning with the vacuum cleaner and i knocked it over. luckily nothing in the internal electrics broke.

Are you planning to go see a movie anytime soon? I wanna watch the “Lego Batman” movie but im broke.

Do you break things when you are mad? No. 

Is it okay to kiss people if you’re single? I don’t really get this question.

What was the first thing you thought about when you woke up? My brain goes into full planning and thoughts flood mode while my body is not up for it usually.

Have you ever intentionally pissed someone off? Yes.

Do you want to be single? -shrugs-

Last three people to text you? Timo, Abelina, Rhoda

Does anyone completely understand you? I don’t even understand myself. I don’t expect anyone else to.

Is this summer gonna be a good one? Maybe? I am not a fan of summer.

How many piercings do you have besides ears? None. I don’t even have my ears pierced.

Do you think you can last in a relationship for 6 months or more? Sure. But it takes two to make it work.

Do you prefer to call or text? Text. Tho I like calls with close buddies more.

Expecting something to change in the next month? Not really. Maybe I will win the notebook that i participated in a raffle for.

You’re thinking about someone, aren’t you ? No. fuck you.

Ever like someone older than you? These questions are getting really dumb.

Can you remember the last time you really liked someone? No.

Where were you at 10:00 pm last night? At home.

When did you last cry? Saturday..???

Have you ever kissed the last person you last texted? No.

ONE OF YOUR SIBLINGS: Mon (there is only one sibling tho)

1. What is the age difference between you two? 

1 year. 

2. Do you know what this person is doing right now? I guess she is back from home after work.

3. How often do you and this person argue? Never???

4. What do you do together? Talk, walk her dog. We don’t really hang that much since she moved out.

5. Is this a step-sibling, half-sibling or full-sibling? a fully fleshed full big sis

THE LAST PERSON YOU TEXTED: Rhoda

1. What was the text about? She asked me how a person was called to google this very weird dumb valentines video.

2. When is the last time you saw this person? On webcam last moth I think?

3. Do you text each other more than you call each other? No. We call more often.

4. How old is this person? turning 25 this year.

5. What is this person’s favorite movie? I don’t know. Maybe a ridiculously funny zombie splatter movie.

YOUR FAVORITE TEACHER FROM LAST YEAR: Does Uni count? Prof. Brandhorst then.

1. Did this teacher give a lot of homework?

No. I was doing my bachelor thesis so we agreed on what to do for deadlines and meetings with her since she was my mentor for it.

2. Did the other students like them too?

I think so?

3. What subject did they teach?

basic design principles, character design, Environment design, prob design for games

4. Have they ever taught you before this year?

Yeah.

5. Does this teacher run any after school programs?

No. just consultation once a week.

ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS: Abelina

1. How long have you been best friends? About 12 years > yes

2. Have you ever fought about something silly then quickly made up? I don’t think so.

3. Where did you meet your friend? In highschool hell having each others backs.

4. Do you live near each other? We live in the same city. But soon she will move to China.

5. Do they have a significant other? Not that I know of.

THE LAST PERSON YOU SPOKE TO: Jane 1. Was this in person, through the telephone or the internet? In person.

2. What was the conversation about? hobby related.

3. How long did it last? 30 minutes?

4. What was the tone/mood of the conversation? Small talk, getting to know each other.

5. What is your relationship with this person? group member of a job integration program.

THE LAST PERSON YOU KISSED: my cat

1. Where did this kiss take place? on the floor.

2. Have you ever kissed this person before? Yes.

3. What were they wearing at the time of the kiss? her fur???

4. How long have you known this person? 14 years.

5. How often do you talk to this person? Not anymore. my cat died in 2015.

YOUR MOTHER: Allex

1. Do you spend a lot of time with her? Kinda. I still live at home.

2. How strong is the relationship between you two? Wasn’t that great. It’s getting better.

3. Do you tell them a lot about your personal life? Not really. 

4. What personality traits did you acquire from her? kicking my own ass when needed, tidiness/cleaness?, high quality standard for food?

5. What is the most frequent topic of argument? the crumbs on the counter in the kitchen.

YOUR FATHER: Andreas

1. What does your father do for a living? organising and restocking for the food used for ferry boats here.

2. Is he considered the head of the household? No. Currently the money  holder tho.

3. What personality traits did you acquire from him? sarcasm, this chill calmness only a true cow can radiate?,  sneezing too loud

4. What do you do together? making tasteless gross jokes to shock my mom.

5. Do you look anything like your father? Not anymore but you can’t really tell us apart on pictures where we both are the same age (3-6 years old??)

[adventuresaroundasia]

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Pin Me!

It’s been quite a while since I’ve done the Freedom Life monthly recaps, but I decided it’s finally time to get back into it! That said, I may or may not have started writing this post with the intent of it just being a July monthly recap and then… got too busy to finish it. Story of my life…

So anyway, here’s what I was up to this summer living in Tbilisi, Georgia!

On the way to Kazbegi!

What I Was Up To This Summer

Over the last two months, I’ve been very busy! Firstly, Chris and I took a quick weekend trip to Kazbegi along the Georgia Military Highway!

In addition to that small trip, I attended a baby shower, prevented my cat from dying via surgery, rescued a NEW kitten, launched a new website with Chris, and more!

**For those of you who are concerned about me traveling during COVID-times, the Republic of Georgia handled the pandemic very well (we only had 17 deaths TOTAL) and things are really starting to open up. We did have a very strict mask protocol at the hotel though, and we specifically went to the countryside where we could explore with almost no people.

Where I Went in July

Tbilisi, Georgia

Mtskheta, Georgia

Pasanauri, Georgia

Kazbegi, Georgia

Sno, Georgia

Gudauri, Georgia

Gergeti Trinity Church is lit up behind me!

Highlights

Here are the best moments from July and August!

A Quick Trip to Kazbegi

After being cooped up in a small apartment for months and months, Chris and I were so excited to finally get out and see a bit more of Georgia. Unfortunately for us, we only had about 2 months to enjoy Georgia before lockdown, so aside from a quick wine tasting day trip, we really hadn’t seen much of the country!

Now that things are (almost) back to normal here, we decided to head to Kazbegi in the mountains near the Russian border. The lack of tourism has been really hard for all of these beautiful mountain towns, so it was nice to be able to provide some business while enjoying the fresh (and chilly) mountain air.

We booked a heavily discounted room at Rooms Hotel Kazbegi, which is one of the nicest local hotel chains in Georgia. It was so nice to take a few days away, and enjoy the beautiful view of the mountains and Gergeti Trinity Church.

Honestly, I think Kazbegi is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been to in my life.

The Russia Georgia Friendship Monument!

Driving the Georgian Military Highway

Driving to and from Kazbegi was an adventure in and of itself! We hired an awesome driver named Timo from GoTrip.ge, who not only stopped at all the major sights along the Georgian Military Highway, he also suggested additional stops and activities for us!

On the way to Kazbegi, we had the opportunity to visit Mtskheta to see the beautiful Svetitskhoveli Cathedral in town and the Jvari Monastery which sits up on a hill giving you an incredible view of the entire town.

We also stopped at the famous Ananuri Fortress, Pasanauri for their amazing khinkali dumplings, Sakuriani to drink mineral water from a natural spring just off the highway, an area just off the highway with “sticky rocks” you could climb up without slipping despite the slight waterfall, and of course, the Russia-Georgia Friendship Monument, which we had completely to ourselves!

On the way back a few days later, we stopped at Sno to see the famous carved head sculptures of Georgian poets, and we even got to take an hour-long cable car through the mountains to Gudauri! We really thought the cable car would be closed considering no one was there, but they let us ride which was such a fun surprise! That said, it was super weird to ride a cable car for an hour and see NO ONE.

Honestly, the trip to and from Kazbegi is amazing, and I’ll have to write a blog post about it soon!

Fruit Baby!

Attending my First Baby Shower

This July was my first experience attending a baby shower! Two of our friends are having a baby literally any day now, so it was very fun to be able to celebrate with them!

We played baby-themed trivia, ate tons of great food, and there was even a gender-reveal with cupcakes! I also loved being able to shop for a few cute baby things as a gift!

Chris and I Launched Multiple Nerdgasms

Over the last two months, Chris and I launched a brand new blog together: Multiple Nerdgasms! This is a site where we can talk about one of our other loves: Dungeons and Dragons. (Yes, we’re both giant nerds).

Chris has been DM’ing D&D games for 24 years (seriously), and I started playing a few years ago. While I used to play once every two weeks, during lockdown, I got involved in three different online D&D games!!

Chris and I thought it would be interesting to write about D&D from the perspective of both the player and the DM, as well as exploring both a male and female perspective. I’ve already written a few posts for the site, and set up social media accounts. I can’t wait to keep writing more!

Surprisingly, the very first post I wrote about gender equality and D&D actually got a lot of traction! People were sharing it on Twitter in women’s D&D groups, and many people reached out to me with their own stories of sexism in D&D. I even inspired a few men I know to create strong female characters.

it’s hard to get a good picture of him

I Rescued a Kitten

So at the end of August (aka last week), I may or may not have rescued ANOTHER cat. After coming home from a nice dinner out, Chris and I stepped out of the taxi and were immediately accosted by a 2-month-old kitten who wouldn’t stop meowing at us.

He looked fairly healthy, so we thought that there was a possibility he belonged to someone in the area, especially considering the fact that he kept running up to people, looking for help/food.

We were originally going to leave him because we didn’t want to take someone’s cat, and even if he was a stray, Georgia has a ton of street cats and kittens that do very well. We even waited for a solid 40-minutes just to see if we could find a mother or owner, but no one came for him.

But on the way home, this little kitten decided to follow us, almost getting hit by two different cars in the process! Worried that he wasn’t going to survive on his own outside, we decided to take him home until we could figure out where he belongs.

After a visit to the vet the next day, we learned that he is definitely a street kitten, but doesn’t have great street-smarts and was relying on people for food and attention. Now he’s happily at home with us and is probably the most loving kitten I’ve ever met in my life. So… welcome to the family?

Yasmina relaxing after her surgery

Challenges

This summer wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Here’s what didn’t go so well…

My Cat Almost Died

If you didn’t already know, I’ve been fostering a cat named Yasmina for a few months now. She’s also a street rescue and has a ton of medical problems. At the beginning of the summer, Yasmina started to go really downhill. She was having a lot of trouble pooping, barely ate, slept constantly, and appeared to be in immense pain.

I kept taking her to the vet, who gave her IV treatments and lots of medicine, but she wasn’t getting any better. We even gave her an enema to try and clear out her bowels! (She hated it).

While my vet seemed great (and refused to take any money for any of these treatments?!!), she also didn’t speak English very well and couldn’t really take the time to fully explain to me what was wrong with Yasmina. I kept offering to pay her (seriously, she’s a saint), hoping she would give me more time, but even the paying clients were extremely rushed in this very busy clinic. I started feeling like it might be worth my time to go to a different vet that comes highly recommended from other expats in Tbilisi.

So after not hearing back from the original vet for a few days, and getting very worried about Yasmina not making it, I had Chris take her into the Veterinary Clinic at Georgia Agriculture University. Apparently, Yasmina is 8-10 years old NOT 2-3 like a vet originally told the girl who rescued her, and her biggest problem is not her kidneys, but the fact that she had a solid kilo of poop stuck in her intestine! She needed to undergo emergency surgery IMMEDIATELY and there was only a 50-50 shot she’d make it due to her age and medical problems.

On hearing this, I contacted the company I work for remotely and asked to have my remaining shift covered while I raced to get to the hospital to be there for her surgery. The entire surgery I was so nervous I felt sick! But thankfully she’s such a strong girl, she came out of surgery just fine, and has completely recovered!

I had to give her a lot of medicine, and take her in for IVs every day (and this vet clinic is NOT nearby my house…). I also have to feed her Royal Canin Gastrointestinal Wet food in 4 small servings a day which is not cheap.. but it’s a small price to pay for my fluffy baby!

As of now, Yasmina is a completely different cat. She’s constantly playing with toys, and went from barely ever making a sound to becoming an extremely talkative little lady. A little too talkative to be honest… 

At least I have khinkali

My Course Launch Didn’t Go As Planned

As many of you know, I have an online course and coaching program called Teach Abroad Squad that helps people to be successful teaching abroad in China!

Understandably, this year has not been great for my business. With the Chinese borders closed and no end to COVID in sight, it’s been a tough year for me.

That said, I did have a very successful launch of my program in April! I had my highest grossing launch yet, and had a bunch of really awesome people join the program. I’ve been working with a business coach who has really helped me through the entire thing (from positioning for the pandemic to dealing with my many mindset issues about selling during this time).

So after that successful launch in April, I decided to do another one in July! I made the free webinar training even longer and better, and had just as many people sign up as I did in April. However, no one joined the program, despite many people seeming interested.

Honestly, this is not really something I wanted to be open about, because I felt really ashamed of the results. I have this fear that if I talk about the struggles I’ve had with my program this year, people will think Teach Abroad Squad isn’t a success and they won’t want to join.

But deep down, I know Teach Abroad Squad is an incredible course, and I have full confidence in it. It’s really just the current situation that’s made things very hard.

Back in April, people still had a lot of hope that the borders would be open by now. So investing in Teach Abroad Squad was a no-brainer! But now with the pandemic raging in many countries like the US with no end in sight, I have the feeling that many people are choosing to hold off until things become more stable.

That said, it doesn’t make my July launch any less disappointing! I put a ton of time and work into promoting Teach Abroad Squad, and sometimes it’s hard not to equate your business to your own self-worth. It’s definitely something I’m working on!

This failed launch has definitely given me the time and perspective to look at potentially creating a second program I’m really proud of, with a different topic that’s more relevant right now.

While I still love and fully support Teach Abroad Squad (I mean, we do live Q&A’s weekly and monthly Zoom Coaching Calls!), it might make the most sense for me to stop pushing it for the moment and focus some energy on a new topic. Now, just to figure out what that topic will be…

For those of you who are interested in Teach Abroad Squad, I’ve decided to put a hold on webinars and big promotions for now. So if you want to join, I’m leaving the cart wide open for you! Feel free to reach out if you have any questions! 

Drinking cocktails with social distancing in Kazbegi

Work Overload: Course Launch, Freelancing, and Interviewing!

Most of July and parts of August were EXTREMELY stressful for me. Earlier in the summer, I started a new part-time job interviewing Chinese students for their college admissions applications, which has been a great source of extra income, but also takes up a lot of the time I used to use to work on my blog and Teach Abroad Squad.

I also have a position working as a social media manager for my business coach Merilyn! Yes, I joined her Lead Your World program, and then she ended up hiring me a few months later to do Social Media! (I help run her Facebook Page and Facebook Group!)

Trying to do these two jobs, and run a launch for Teach Abroad Squad, while also running my cat to the vet 30 minutes outside of town DAILY… is a giant recipe for burnout.

I ended up having major pain in my jaw that’s only just now calming down. But wow, I really overloaded myself these last two months… hence, why this blog post never got published and it’s a 2-month recap!

Georgian bread and cheese on the balcony for brunch!

Major Payment Plan Issues

To make financial matters worse, I had a few people in my program ask me to postpone their payment plan payments by a month due to financial issues. While I wouldn’t normally allow this, I know COVID has been super rough for everyone, so I allowed the payments to be pushed back by a month and followed the instructions from MemberPress to put their payment plans on pause.

IT WAS A DISASTER.

Not only did the system charge them anyway, but it also created a second subscription for them when I turned their access back on, meaning it charged them TWICE the next month. WTF!

Unfortunately for me, MemberPress only does tech support via email (seriously! It’s a paid service!), and my tech support person literally had no idea what I did wrong when I sent them screenshots of my system. They eventually had to get more advanced tech support in the backend of my website to try and fix the problem. It was a complete nightmare and I’m still mad.

Look at them not killing each other!

Trying to Introduce My New Kitten

While I’ve loved having my new kitten Mordie, my older cat Yasmina has NOT been happy. We’ve had to keep Mordie in the bathroom while Yasmina gets accustomed to him, and then we bring him into the bedroom to hang out for large chunks during the day and evening.

I know this is normal, but we have a very small apartment, and keeping them separate has been hard!

Not to mention, Yasmina was pissed at ME for bringing him home. She’d even smell his scent on my hand and growl at me. One day Mordie escaped into the living room and she was so mad she slapped me in the face! She also completely refused to come in the bedroom because it smelled like him, and hissed at me the one time I brought her in there.

Finally, after a week she’s starting to come around. They even napped next to each other on the bed today and she only hissed at him if he tried to come within a foot of her. Baby steps!

Here’s a Georgian tomato and cucumber salad with walnut paste

The USA is a Giant Mess

I could write an entire post on this, but this summer has really showcased that the US has some big problems they need to fix. Firstly the way we’ve handled the pandemic is absolutely ridiculous (and this is coming from someone who lives in a country that locked down hard and only had 17 deaths nationally). Then on top of this, the police brutality and reactions towards the BLM movement is horrifying.

While I’m glad I’m in Georgia right now, there is definitely a part of me that wishes I was in the US so I could participate in the BLM protests to demand racial equality, police accountability, and justice for the many victims of police violence and racism.

I’ve been trying to do my part to help, and have the difficult conversations with the few people in my newsfeed (and on my Adventures Around Asia page!!) who just DON’T get it. While I would typically just block these people for my sanity, I’ve realized that this isn’t productive. But wow, is it EXHAUSTING to talk with people who refuse to recognize their own biases, and will literally never change their minds.

But every time I feel like I just want to walk away, I remember that many people don’t have the privilege to do so. I think many of us have felt exhausted, hurt, and angry these last few months, and I really hope the protests (and upcoming election) create some positive change for our country.

Hello Tbilisi!

Blog Posts I’ve Written Lately

Here are the blog posts I wrote and guest posts I published on Adventures Around Asia since my last major life update/recap!

Fun Fact: I’m a Huge Nerd

What It’s Like to Teach in China as a Black Woman (Guest Post)

Moving to China With Kids: Teaching Abroad With the Whole Family (Guest Post)

I’ve also written two blog posts for Multiple Nerdgasms!

Why I Always Play Female Characters in D&D

Tragic Backstories: 10 Subtle Traumas for Your D&D Backstory

Travel Product of the Month

This month I want to give a shoutout to my amazing Teva W Ysidro Sandals that have gotten me through the summer. Not only are these things super cute and go with pretty much every outfit, but they’re also SO comfortable and supportive. They even have extra cushioning on the ball and heel of the shoe!

I had a pair a few years ago that I literally wore to death, which is why I was so excited to get these for Christmas! Now that the weather is warm I can finally wear them.

This cat tried to eat our food for the entire meal.

What I’m Reading Now: Wisdom of the Enneagram

If you didn’t know, I’m more than a little obsessed with the Enneagram, a personality categorization and self-help tool. The Wisdom of the Enneagram is considered by many to be the “Enneagram Bible” and the book that you really need to read if you want to learn the Enneagram in-depth.

While I’ve owned Wisdom of the Enneagram for quite a while now and had read through most of it, I decided to start reading through from the beginning again now that I have a better understanding of the Enneagram. I’m also taking notes and highlighting important info!

I honestly feel like I’m back in college again and I don’t even mind. It’s always fun to learn something new!

Best Instagram Post

I took this one from the balcony door of my room at Rooms Hotel Kazbegi! Man, the view here is so amazing…

  View this post on Instagram

  A post shared by Richelle (@adventuresaroundasia) on Jul 25, 2020 at 4:24am PDT

What I’m Up to in September

To be honest, I don’t have any big plans for September, but there are a few things that I want you all to keep me accountable on!

Firstly, I plan to start writing a blog post EVERY WEEK on Adventures Around Asia. I know, right? I’ve been so horrible about writing since the pandemic started because I just haven’t felt the passion for travel right now (and neither does anyone else…).

My plan is to write every week about something I’m passionate about, whether or not it has anything to do with travel. To be honest, most of what I’ll say will at least be tangentially related to my life traveling and living abroad (because that’s my life!), but I’m not pressuring myself to write travel articles and teach abroad posts right now when I just really don’t feel inspired.

I hope you all enjoy my passion-led blog posts this autumn and keep me accountable if I haven’t posted anything in over a week!!

The Freedom Life: July + August 2020 This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more info.  It's been quite a while since I've done the…

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Bruins Reinforcements; Updates on Byfuglien and Pavelski; Parayko; Keller – March 28

  The Boston Bruins are getting healthy as they welcomed back Marcus Johansson to the lineup on Wednesday night, along with Torey Krug. Johansson was on the second line with David Krejci and Jake DeBrusk while Krug was back in his usual spot on the top power-play unit. This makes the Bruins an even more fearsome team as they march towards the postseason.

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Samuel Morin made his season debut on the Flyers blue line, having returned from a torn knee ligament. You can read his Dobber Prospects profile here.

My only take is that this is a guy with multi-category potential, but the format of a given league will determine his value. Even if he lives up to his promise right away, he’s behind at least the triumvirate of Gostisbehere-Provorov-Sanheim. Don’t expect a lot of points in his immediate future; he’ll be a guy who relies more on hits and penalty minutes for value, hence why the scoring format matters.

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The Nashville Predators have signed prospect defenceman Dante Fabbro to a three-year entry-level deal and he was practicing with the team on Wednesday. You can read Fabbro’s Dobber Prospect profile here.

It could be tough sledding for fantasy value for the talented first-round pick with all the depth on the Nashville blue line. Everyone of note signed for three more years save for Roman Josi, and I don’t imagine they let him walk. Unless there are trades made, it could be a situation like Morin with the Flyers (even if they are wildly different as players themselves).

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Joe Pavelski was at Sharks practice on Wednesday skating in his usual spot on the top line with Logan Couture and Timo Meier. It looks like he’s ready to return to the lineup on Thursday.

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Dustin Byfuglien was skating in Jets practice in a regular sweater, meaning he’s very close to returning. For those playing head-to-head playoffs in the final week of the season, the Jets have four games (though they’re all on the road), and two of the games are against Chicago and Colorado.

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The 2019 Dobber Hockey Playoff Draft List is available for pre-order now in the Dobber Shop, to be released at the end of next week. Get the edge you need for your playoff pools!

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We had another barn-burner between the Leafs and Flyers as a 2-0 Leafs lead turned into a 3-2 Flyers lead and then a 4-4 overtime session that went to a shootout. The Flyers took the extra point in Toronto’s first shootout of the season.  

Auston Matthews led the way for the Leafs with a goal and assist, totalling six shots on target. That pushes Matthews over 70 points on the year and up to 228 shots, and that’s the scary part about AM34: he’s a wicked volume shooter. This is a guy shooting nearly 16 percent in over 200 career games and he’s up over 3.5 shots per game on the season. If he can consistently play 75 games a season moving forward, 40 goals seems to be a safe bet year after year.

Travis Sanheim had a big fantasy night with two assists, a plus-2 rating, three shots, one block, and two penalty minutes. The young defence core we heard about for years is starting to come to fruition for the Flyers and that bodes very well for this franchise. As for Sanheim, he has been playing many more minutes lately – about 22 minutes a night over his last 10 – and that’s good news for next year. Even if he’s not the top option on the power play, those minutes with his offensive ability on this team will make him a 40-point threat in 2019-20.

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More updates in the morning.

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There is a little over a week left in the NHL regular season and I though it’d be fun to take a look down the road.

If you can think back a year ago, what sticks out to you about the fantasy game, specifically when it comes to player performance? You might think back to Ivan Provorov having double-digit goals and being on the verge of 40 points (which he would eventually surpass), having every bit the look of the future heavy-minute multi-category stud. Maybe it’s Anze Kopitar cracking the 90-point mark for the first time in his career. It could be Jason Zucker reaching 30 goals, seeming like a guy who will threaten 30 goals for the next several seasons. Or it could have been the hope that Carter Hutton’s great half-season with the Blues would translate to a new team for the 2018-19 campaign.

Let’s try to think a year ahead. On March 28th, 2020, what should we expect to see out of certain players with regards to the fantasy game? It’s prediction time.

  Colton Parayko Top-10 Multi-Cat Defenceman

Following three straight 30-point seasons and back-to-back 35-point seasons, things were looking bright for Parayko heading into 2018-19. The team added names like Ryan O’Reilly, Patrick Maroon, David Perron, and Tyler Bozak, giving them loads of scoring depth. With Parayko’s stout peripheral production, a 40-point season would have made him a top-10 multi-category defenceman.

That didn’t come to pass, obviously, as Parayko sits with 26 points in 76 games. His peripherals and plus/minus have meant a solid fantasy season, but he’s still yet to attain anywhere close to his ceiling.

The problem is his assists as he has managed just 16 total thus far, and just two primary assists at five-on-five. Among 114 defencemen with at least 1000 minutes played at five-on-five, he has the fourth-lowest primary assist rate. That would be a concern if Parayko were a rookie or did not have an extensive track record. However, over his previous three seasons, he had 34 total primary assists at five-on-five.

One area of concern would be a drop in shot assists, or passes leading to shots by teammates, this season (from CJ Turtoro’s viz):

  A couple notes on that, though. First, it’s still not a large sample of games tracked this year. Secondly, he had a similar rate a couple years ago when he had 13 primary assists. In other words, that drop in shot assists wouldn’t come close to fully explaining the drop in primary assists.

Parayko will be in tough to reach his ceiling now that he’s apparently third in line for power play minutes. It doesn’t mean he can’t be very valuable in fantasy leagues. With the Blues loaded with both rising and established stars, and Parayko due for a rebound in his assists next year, it seems very possible he’s a top-10 blue liner in multi-category leagues in a year’s time.

  Clayton Keller Rebound

For those who’ve read my work for at least the past year, you know how high I was on Clayton Keller coming into this season. I had him as a top-100 player regardless of format and someone who should at least crack 70 points.

Let’s just say that I was very wrong on this one.

The first problem was that the team didn’t take a step forward offensively as hoped. There were a lot of injuries, sure, but laying everything at the feet of injuries doesn’t do this justice. Like Parayko, we need to look at the assist rates.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Keller was sitting with nine assists at five-on-five this year. Nine. Out of 245 forwards with at least 750 minutes played at five-on-five, Keller comes in tied for 225th, with a lower total assist rate than Johan Larsson, Markus Granlund, and Riley Sheahan. His individual points percentage is under 60 percent, which is abysmal, and the reason for so few assists.

Unlike Parayko, Keller’s issues aren’t with a possible downturn in his micro stats. In a small sample (like Parayko’s this year), things like zone entries, zone exits, and shot assists have all improved from 2017-18. But his play-driving, at least offensively, hasn’t been as good as last season.

Is that all his problem, though? Remember back to 2017-18, Keller played significant minutes with Derek Stepan; over half his time at five-on-five, in fact. He’s played less than 30 percent of his five-on-five time with Stepan this year, having played about as often with Nick Cousins. I do suspect that we see a different Keller next year should he line up with a healthy Nick Schmaltz.

Oh, and for good measure: Keller is shooting 2.3 percent on the power play this year. That’s not a typo, he has one power play goal on 44 power play shots. If he shoots close to his shooting percentage on the PP last year, and has close to the same assist rate, he basically replicates his 2017-18 campaign.

It seems there are a few things that are probably true about the American winger’s 2018-19 season: Keller didn’t take a big step forward in his development, he hasn’t been as bad as his point totals would indicate, and there are brighter days ahead. I’ll be buying a rebound in 2019-20 as Keller establishes himself as a top-100 fantasy player.  

  Brady Tkachuk Top-50 Multi-Cat Player

There’s no sugar-coating it: Sens fans are going to be in for a rough couple of seasons. There are a few nice pieces, though, namely Thomas Chabot and Brady Tkachuk.

I get that people will be worried about the lack of talent on the Sens roster for the 2019-20 season. However, since the trade deadline, Tkachuk has five goals, eight points, 49 shots, and 36 hits in 14 games. Pro-rated over 82 games, that’s 29 goals, 47 points, 287 shots, and 210 hits. If he comes anywhere close to those marks next year, he’ll be a monster in multi-category leagues, even if he’s a minus-20.

Now, expecting a 20-year old sophomore to put up over 250 shots and 200 hits might be asking a lot. But it does outline how Tkachuk can be very relevant in multi-category leagues next year, and that’s by playing big minutes and being the focal point of a low-talent team. I think back to Dustin Brown in 2017-18. Obviously, Tkachuk won’t get a centre near the calibre of Anze Kopitar, which is why I would expect under 50 points instead of over 60. The parallel would be playing 19 minutes a night, with top power play minutes, and those heavy minutes feeding into strong peripherals. Tkachuk hasn’t been 19 minutes a night consistently since the trade deadline, but he has approached 17 minutes a night and he’ll be relied upon even more next season, I’m sure.

Teams without a lot of shine tend to see their top players go undervalued in drafts. Just think of Anders Lee and the prevailing opinion of him once John Tavares decided to relocate. My prediction is that the Ottawa rookie is undervalued by ADP in September, and this time next year, we’re looking at a guy who is a top-50 skater in standard Yahoo! leagues.  

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-bruins-reinforcements-updates-on-byfuglien-and-pavelski-parayko-keller-march-28/

[tanmath3-blog]

Jason Nugent was born in Cleveland, OH in 1974. He moved to rural Southern Illinois in 1992 and lives there today with his wife, son, and mini-zoo of three cats and two dogs.

Jason is the author of three collections of dark fiction short stories: “(Almost) Average Anthology,” “Moments of Darkness,” and “The God’s Eye.”

He’s also the author of the young adult scifi novel “The Selection” for which he won the 2017 Reality Bites Book Awards “Best Author: Scifi.”

Jason has written for Sum’n Unique Magazine and game missions for an independently produced video game titled “Status Quo.”

  Please help me welcome Jason Nugent to Roadie Notes……..

  1. Have you always wanted to be a writer? No, not in fiction anyway. When I was in college I studied history and wanted to teach Medieval history. 2. This question feeds the curiosity of other authors: If writing is a full-time career for you, do you have other streams of income (i.e. editing, cover design, etc.)? I’m not a full-time author (yet!) I work as a sales rep for a screenprinting company. Need ay t-shirts? 3. Why did you choose to write your genre? It’s the genre I’m most comfortable with because I’ve read a lot and watched a lot.

4. What is the strangest subject or topic you’ve ever written? How to cut an eye out. 😉

5. What are you currently working on? I’m working on the sequel to my young adult scifi novel “The Selection.” I’m fairly close to the end of the first draft. 6. What motivated the plot for either WIP or current published book? For my novel “The Selection,” I wanted a story my teenaged son would love. I wanted him to identify with the characters and experience the world I created. The basic premise of the book was an idea I tossed around with him and my wife before I wrote a word of it. 7. What was the hardest story for you to write? Probably the one I’m working on now. I wanted to explore more of the world I created and bring more of the characters to life. It’s been a much larger undertaking than I imagined. 8. What process do you use to plan your novels? I’ll let the idea simmer in my head for a few days before I begin organizing it. I’ll write a loose “outline” just so I have guard rails to keep me on track when I get too far away from where I want to be. 9. Who has been your favorite character? Why? I’d say Timo from “The Selection.” There’s so much to him that readers don’t know yet. But they will! 10. Do any of your character reflect facets of your personality? I think so. I’m a trusting person and believe others have the best intentions. Eron, my protagonist in “The Selection” is kinda like that. Of course, people aren’t always nice and we tend to get hurt. 11. Have you ever experienced writer’s block? If so, how did you overcome it? Not really. I use different techniques to keep the creativity flowing. I’ll use random photos or music to get inspiration and off I go! 12. If you were to choose another genre to write in, what would it be? Why? Maybe Thrillers. The action in some of those is so intense! 13. Which authors inspire you? Stephen King. I love how his writing is accessible and scary! John Scalzi has a similar style, though with a scifi bent. I’m also inspired by some fellow authors like Aaron Hamilton, Thomas Gunther, and Brent Harris to name a few. They are so talented and make me work harder at my craft. 14. What novel would you read multiple times? I’ve read “The Shining” a few times. Love it! 15. If you could meet anyone in the world, alive or deceased, who would it be and why? (Person could be a fictional character) Mr. Snuffleupagus. He’s real!!! Big Bird was right! 16. What is your favorite quote? “Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.” 17. What is your favorite animal, real or imaginary? Gimme a cat any day. 17. What is your favorite color? Blue

    Links: Website: jasonjnugent.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/lailokenri Facebook: facebook.com/jasonjnugentwrites Books: (Almost) Average Anthology: mybook.to/almostaverage Moments of Darkness: mybook.to/momentsofdarkness The Selection: mybook.to/the-selection

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Jason-J.-Nugent/e/B01A2R18UG

    Some of Jason Nugent’s books: 

Getting personal with Jason Nugent Jason Nugent was born in Cleveland, OH in 1974. He moved to rural Southern Illinois in 1992 and lives there today with his wife, son, and mini-zoo of three cats and two dogs.

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Islanders Injuries; Timo Meier Breakout Potential; Oshie; Hartman – January 8

With bye weeks arriving, the NHL loaded up Sunday’s schedule with 10 games. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, be sure to check which teams are taking the week off and adjust lineups accordingly. Maxing out (or close to maxing out) games played is important, even more so when there are fewer games to pick from.

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Both Josh Bailey and Andrew Ladd missed the Islanders game on Sunday with injuries. We didn’t really get much of an update on either:

Weight on Bailey injury: “Wasn’t horrific news but certainly not good news.” Ladd not long term but out today.

— Arthur Staple (@StapeNewsday) January 7, 2018

I guess it’s good news that Ladd shouldn’t be out long, though there isn’t much for clarity on Bailey. As soon as we learn anything we will pass it on but with the team off until Saturday, it’s doubtful we get much from the team until then.

For Sunday’s game, Ladd was replaced by Anthony Beauvillier and Alan Quine took Bailey’s spot on the top line. Jordan Eberle took Bailey’s spot on the top PP unit.

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Sebastian Aho (Islanders defenceman) got his first two career points on Sunday including his first career goal. He was also paired with Nick Leddy at five-on-five for the entire game and even got some power-play minutes on the second unit. He didn’t crack the 20-minute mark but it’s worth tracking his usage once the Islanders come off the bye. They need all the defensive help they can get and with the team fighting for a playoff spot, maybe they rely on Aho more than they had anticipated initially.

He was sent down to the AHL but it’s due to the bye week. I suspect he’ll be back up when the team returns to action this weekend.

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Quick update on the other Sebastian Aho:

Canes GM Ron Francis says Aho is day-to-day with lower body injury.

— Chip Alexander (@ice_chip) January 7, 2018

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As far as rookies go, I don’t think too much was expected of Nolan Patrick. Unlike Nico Hischier, who was given (you could say earned) the top-line role once Adam Henrique was traded, or Clayton Keller, who is probably the best offensive player Arizona has, or Brock Boeser, whose shooting was lauded by some, Patrick seemed destined to not be featured on this particular roster in this particular season. Maybe he could slot in as the second-line centre, but that wasn’t a given.

All that said, it’s hard not to be disappointed with his season. Going into Sunday afternoon’s game, he had just eight points on the year and at times had been a healthy scratch. His shot rate isn’t very good though that should improve over the years. He’s also last among the team’s forwards in adjusted shot share by a pretty wide margin. Again, that’s not too surprising for a rookie, but you’d think with sheltered competition and favourable zone starts that he’d be a little better in this regard. He hasn’t been.

We know that not all young players develop in a straight line. Some guys like Keller come out guns blazing. Some guys like Victor Hedman can take a few years to really hit their stride. There hasn’t been too much good to come out of Patrick’s rookie season, though. I want to ask his dynasty owners: is there any sort of panic setting in, and for those who don’t own him, are you trying to trade for him?

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While on the subject of Flyers centres, Sean Couturier scored goals 22 and 23 of the season for him in the team’s 4-1 win against Buffalo. He’s on pace for more goals this year (45) than his previous career-high in points (39).

It has been a remarkable offensive season from Couturier, but please exercise some caution. He’s now shooting an even 18 percent on the year. His previous career-high was 11.7 percent, and was a career 9.4 percent shooter coming into 2017-18. Yes, he’s shooting nearly double what his career rate was. I am not saying that with better line mates and more ice time (he’s well over 21 minutes a game) that he can’t be a good offensive player. I am definitely saying that I wouldn’t rely on him to push, or break, the 40-goal barrier on a regular basis.

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Don’t forget the Dobber Hockey Mid-Season Guide will be out later this week! Grab the information you need for the home stretch in your fantasy hockey leagues. Just follow this link here.

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Andre Burakovsky was back in the lineup for the Caps after being scratched for a couple games. He was slotted on the fourth line with Jay Beagle and Alex Chiasson where he stayed for the game, playing under 11 minutes.

The Caps have three games this week and then their bye week comes. Maybe Burakovsky can work his way up the lineup, but if it takes him a couple games to do so, he won’t have much use on redraft fantasy hockey rosters for the next couple weeks. I wouldn’t be running to the waiver wire to add him unless you don’t really need production from a roster spot for a few weeks.

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Now that Timo Meier is seemingly sticking around the top line for San Jose, it’s probably time to start taking his value in redraft leagues seriously. Over his past 20 games, before Sunday afternoon’s tilt – which haven’t all been on the top line, mind you – he’s managed 51 shots and is playing about 15:30 per game.

The following chart from Hockeyviz.com should be taken with a little grain of salt. He’s played nearly one-third of his ice time with Joe Thornton and that’s going to skew things a little. All the same, it’s pretty crazy how good this team has been offensively from dangerous areas with Meier on the ice (red is good):

Since being a top-10 pick a few years ago, Sharks fans have been waiting for Meier to be part of the next generation of top-end scorers the team needs. It looks like it’s finally starting to happen. If you were going to try and buy him in deep keepers, or dynasties, then time is running out. It seems a matter of time before a full-blown breakout hits (even without top PP minutes).

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Jack Roslovic suited up for his second career game, first this season, in Sunday’s game against San Jose. He was on the fourth line with Marko Dano and Matt Hendricks.

It’s nice to see Roslovic get in the lineup, and he did take Adam Lowry’s spot on the top PP unit as well, but it’ll be hard to have a lot of value playing in the bottom-six with the minutes he got (under eight). We’ll see if his role changes this week but like Burakovsky, the Jets have three games and then hit their bye, so I wouldn’t pull a hamstring running to the waiver wire to grab him in one-year leagues.

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St. Louis was in Washington on Sunday afternoon and Brayden Schenn was split away from Vladimir Tarasenko. We’ve seen this happen in sporadic spurts this year, but this seemed inevitable. The team hadn’t scored more than three goals in any one contest for 13 straight games.

This kind of sucks for Schenn, but keep in mind that Tarasenko can produced with just about anyone; he scored 40 goals in 2015-16 playing about half his minutes with Jori Lehtera. I wouldn’t be too concerned about Tarasenko’s production outside of the concerns we already had (namely shooting percentage). In fact, both he and Schenn scored in the team’s overtime loss.

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Florida may have lost in the shootout, but we got this goal from Sasha Barkov, so maybe it was worth it?

Barkov shootout goal: pic.twitter.com/FP5ySXif69

— Cats On The Prowl (@Cats0ntheprowl) January 8, 2018

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TJ Oshie was taken off the top line for the Caps early in the second period in their game against St. Louis and replaced by Devante Smith-Pelly. Oshie was moved to the third line with Lars Eller and Brett Connolly.

It has been a rough year for Oshie production-wise. His 82-game pace for goals this year is 26, which isn’t bad out-and-out bad, but there are red flags. His shots per game is down to 1.86, the lowest for him since his rookie year, and that’s despite playing slightly more per game (18:47) than his career average (18:37). It’s not that his shots aren’t just finding the net, either: his 8.99 shot attempts per 60 minutes at five-on-five (before Sunday’s game) is by far the lowest of his career (10.75 last year and 10.78 in 2013-14). In fact, of out 247 forwards with at least 400 minutes played, he’s 232nd in shot rate. He was never a volume shooter, but he was 169th out of 234 forwards last year. Not great, but a lot better than 2017-18. The names at the bottom of the list with Oshie this campaign are basically passers and grinders. Oshie is neither, so this is a problem.

There have been talks of injuries and he did suffer a concussion last month. Maybe there’s something wrong that we don’t know about. All I know is that playing nearly 19 minutes a game, shooting nearly 17 percent, and having an 82-game pace of 26 goals as a goal scorer isn’t great. Shooting percentage regression was inevitable, but his shot rate is becoming a real problem.  

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Ryan Hartman remained on the second line in Chicago’s 4-1 win against Edmonton while also sticking on the top PP unit. He had an assist, three shots on goal, and played a whopping 20:58. His previous single-game high for minutes this year was 18:36 on New Year’s Eve.

He's not shooting as much as he has in prior seasons, but he’s still at a very healthy 15.85 attempts per 60 minutes at five-on-five, in the same neighbourhood has guys like Auston Matthews, Nikita Kucherov, Tyler Seguin, and Mike Hoffman. Remember, he scored 19 goals in 76 games last year playing fewer than 13 minutes a game. If he can play anywhere from 17-18 minutes a game, in the role he’s being given, there is very good offensive upside here. With a top-six spot and top power-play minutes, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be rostered in 12-team leagues by now, especially now that we’re hitting bye weeks.

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There was a scary situation in the Tampa Bay game as Lightning defenceman Dan Girardi went down to a knee to block a one-timer and took it straight off the back of his head:

A better look at Girardi trying to block a Frk shot pic.twitter.com/uvZoay8vve

— Prashanth Iyer (@iyer_prashanth) January 8, 2018

He was down for a few minutes but skated off the ice under his own power. He did not return to the game but the Lightning indicated that he would be ok. Let’s hope it’s nothing serious.

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Boone Jenner had seven shots on goal in Columbus’s 3-2 shootout win over Florida, but failed to hit the scoresheet. He’s now shooting 4.4 percent on the season.

Jenner was a career 11.3 percent shooter before this season so there is clearly a lot of bad luck going on here. He’s still usually getting 18 minutes of ice time so John Tortorella still trusts him. He’s very valuable in multi-cat leagues and he should be able to turn around that shooting percentage in the second half.

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Pavel Buchnevich was a healthy scratch for the Rangers in their game against the Golden Knights. I don’t know how to explain this, honestly, and can’t properly express myself without a string of expletives so I’ll just let it go for now.

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Hey, Karl Alzner had a multi-point game! He scored his first of the year against Vancouver and assisted on Brendan Gallagher’s game-winner in the third. It was Alzner’s first multi-point game in which he scored since March of 2015. His contract is an utter disaster but this was a nice game for him. So, silver linings and all.

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Boston’s top line is seriously rolling right now. David Pastrnak and Brad Marchand both scored for Boston in their 6-5 overtime loss to the Penguins on Sunday night, each their 17th goal of the season. I guess they were tired of being tired with Patrice Bergeron at 16 goals. The three of them have 10 goals combined over the last four games.

A couple games ago they were on the ice for their first goal against at five-on-five this year but it’s incredible how good they are.

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Sidney Crosby had three assists in that win, bringing his season up to 15 goals and 43 points in 44 games. It wasn’t long ago – literally like four days – that people were still freaking out about his season. There’s still half a season left and a lot of regression to go. Buckle up. 

from All About Sports http://www.dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-islanders-injuries-timo-meier-breakout-potential-oshie-hartman-january-8/