#give me a distinct category for that ffs

[queen-of-bad-opsec]

as a person who might be trans (or might not be, idont fukign know qwq), gendered clothing is quickly becoming very annoying.

why the fuck are hoodies gendered. why why why why why why whyyyyyyyyyyyyy is the most gender-ambiguous clothing item gendered???????????i dont' understand TwT

[marzipanandminutiae]

you asked and I am desperate for an excuse to happy to deliver! presenting A Point-By-Point Takedown of This BS Doll Article By Some Lady Calling Herself A Professional Antiques Appraiser

so she starts off with a random story about how she was in a warehouse doing appraisals and a dresser started glowing, and when she looked in the dresser the source of the glow was an antique doll. this convinced her that dolls “carry the energy of wicked little girls.” but not all of them! anyway now she’s scared of dolls. but not really. but yes, really

...okay then

she then shares a doll one E.H. sent her photos of for appraisal

(Pretty! French fashion doll, I’d say maybe a Barrois or an early Bru, late 1860s.  You can tell by the distinctive “cobalt blue” eyes, that deep sapphire shade that only appears in the earliest era of FFs. Wig looks original, almost certainly mohair, and she has some sort of blouse or gown on that seems antique from the look of the lace. Could be a modern-made garment with antique materials. She’d probably fetch over $1,000 at auction unless there's some REALLY bad damage elsewhere on her person.)

EH’s one doll has a fabulous body that points to its age as 3rd quarter 19th century, because the body is made of fine-grained hand stitched leather. So what follows is a rough explanation of how you can determine if your doll is OLD, and that of course influences value – to an extent. The older dolls that are valuable are ALSO rare. And by the 1890’s dolls really were NOT rare.

Couple of issues with this. first of all, kid leather bodies can be seen on dolls as far back as the 1820s and as late in time as the early 1920s. the typical French fashion bodies were fairly distinctive,  but just saying that the material determines the age isn’t correct. or if it is, it’s not a very precise dating

also like...what even is the last sentence? dolls weren’t rare in the 1890s. dolls weren’t rare in the 1860s. dolls can be made out of literally anything, at any price point, and have been present in almost every culture in human history. dolls, as a broad category, have never been inherently rare

if she’s saying dolls from the 1890s are not considered rare by today’s standards...oh honey, meet my dear friend the Simon and Halbig 1159

(This doll is c. 1900. This doll fetched $1,800 at auction. What was that about age determining value, again?)

also maybe Google “German art character dolls.” friendly suggestion

Another fact about doll valuation is that the best antique dolls are not replicas of children, but are replicas of fabulously well-dressed young women.

this is so ridiculous I laughed out loud. there is no single “best” type of antique doll. some people will pay top dollar for Kewpies, others for 1880s child dolls, others still for first-issue Barbies. there are examples that are the rarest in their class of doll, sure, but no one class dominates across the board. it’s one thing to say a certain type is your favorite and another to say it’s the Best(TM) as a professional appraiser

My favorite fashionable young lady dolls, French or German, have leather bodies made of kid leather, stuffed with cork or sawdust. When you check the bodies, look for tight stitching at the joints, because, if the arms and legs are meant to move, they must be compress seamed. That makes sense because with the stuffing, a moved joint will pop open if not sewn correctly. Look for another overlay of leather at the joint called a gusset, which indicates greater value. Only the legs, the body, and the top of the arms and shoulders will be made of leather. The arms will be creamy porcelain or bisque, or sometimes a wood pulp combination composite material. You will notice the head and shoulder plate fits in a U-curve around the shoulders, which are leather and affixed expertly.

couple of things

1. not all FFs have the bisque lower arms- that’s a rarity point, not the norm. most with leather bodies have leather arms, too.

(This is my Jeanette. She has leather arms. Guess she’s not really a French fashion doll, then, despite her markings, face painting, face mold, body construction, eye type, and literally everything else about her!)

2. this describes most reproduction FFs out there, and many bodies used for German child dolls later on. so unless you’re planning to give people other things to look for, not entirely helpful

oh but wait! here are the other things to look for! let’s venture

The best French Fashion dolls wear the latest styles and little girls never played with them. Wealthy fashionistas in the 3rd quarter of the 19th century collected them.

remember, all that contemporary hand-wringing about little girls being corrupted by their fashionable “Paris dolls” was planted by Big Children(TM). #wakeupsheeple #thetruthisoutthere

These come in the finest white leather bodies with a nice bust line and quite wide hips, as we know as the style for the shapely ladies of the 1870 and 1880’s.

...who’s going to tell her leather bodies are definitely not the finest

can it be me

can it be me with my Charlotte, who has one of the rarest wooden body types that I’m still not sure how I got for such a (relative) steal

can it be us, perched on the end of her bed, at midnight

The hairstyles of real human hair will also be ‘period’, and some will have real gem jewelry. These weren’t meant as toys for a middle class little girl. These were expensive and can sell today for a couple thousand dollars in perfect shape. Surprisingly the leather has withstood time if well preserved.

as I said earlier, for French fashions, mohair (wool from an angora goat) was a WAY more common wig material than human hair. sometimes the hair will be down, not in a “period” style, because it was meant to be played with and styled by the child owner

real gem jewelry DID exist for these dolls, but most of what you’re likely to find is of rhinestones and gilt. that was much more common, as you’d expect

a middle-class little girl, if she was very lucky, might be able to count one middling or lower-range French lady among her dolls. they were expensive, but, well, middle-class girls often have one American Girl doll today, right? these dolls ranged in price from AG-level to “this was bought for a young princess and has that real gem jewelry mentioned above”

her price assessment is accurate for the majority of FFs, with outliers on either end ranging from “got really lucky with a seller who didn’t know what they had” to “a museum bought this doll because not even the richest collectors could afford to.” but...well, just keep that “couple of thousand dollars” figure in your mind for later

Let’s compare this leather-bodied doll with another cheaper type of body. In the late 19th century a ball-jointed body could be made of a wood pulp composition material, or even Papiermâché with little hinges of wood at the joints. Of course, since these bodies are wood based, they’re painted, and you’ll find the ghastly colors, as the once flesh tones turn to green or olive.

remember that doll from 1900 I showed you? 

she has a jointed composition body

$1,800

I do not feel any further comment is necessary at this juncture

(leather bodies came to be considered something of a budget option when the jointed compo bodies came into common use, because they couldn’t be posed and took less work/expense to make)

Finally, let’s think about the heads, if we dare.

oh bite me

Most heads are made of a porcelain type of material, and in this case, the porcelain is usually white with a painted ON skin tone. If the head is Bisque, bisque is material that will take a color or stain into itself and is often not painted nor glazed. The porcelain heads are more prized.

okay kids

porcelain is a type of very fine, translucent ceramic. it can be made matte, often called bisque, or shiny and glossy, often called china

(this stylish miss by Francois Gaultier is of matte bisque, the most common type of porcelain finish used for French fashion dolls. she’s also rocking the baby bangs look, and kudos to her for that)

(this early girl by Rohmer, on the other hand, has a glossy, shiny china head. note again the cobalt-blue eyes, another clue to her age. this is rarer than matte bisque for French fashions, though German glazed china dolls with molded hair could be quite commonplace depending on many factors like size, body type, hairstyle, etc.)

complicating everything further, a lot of older and even contemporary sources can use “bisque,” “porcelain,” and “china” interchangeably. context is key. but in modern terms, that’s sort of the breakdown

ding dong this blogger is wrong

You’ll see what I mean when I say dolls are sometimes too lifelike for my taste–or my nightmares. Notice the toes on EH’s doll. Pretty obsessive. The value is unknown until I find the maker of the doll, but a rough estimate might be $600, because the outfit seems original.

stitched toes are normal on kid-bodied French fashions in the most common size range (14″-17″). also

(The actual picture provided)

THIS gives you nightmares? really? I have Many Questions

also remember that valuation from earlier? a couple of thousand dollars? yeah. now she comes back with $600

depending on size, condition, and costume intricacy, I’ve seldom seen a doll of this type sell for less than $1,700 at auction (source: the online catalogue of past auctions at Theriault’s, the premier doll auction house in the U.S., and also personal experience)

and that’s a problem because the doll’s owner is PAYING for this “appraiser’s” services. they’re PAYING for an accurate idea of what they have and what it’s worth, whether for selling or insurance purposes. even if it’s just out of personal curiosity, you shouldn’t be swindled for a slew of misinformation and half-truths capped off by a wildly inaccurate dollar value

also the Creepy Doll stuff is massively unprofessional

Marzi out

[baubaes]

hi! can I get some fluff/platonic love between Reid and Garcia? Prompt 28. Her taking care of him right after he’s been rescued from Tobias. Thanks! 😁

Well, naturally!!!

@thatonecurlygirl prompt list, no28 “It’s okay, I’ve got you.”

Warnings: mentions of drug use, needles, kidnapping, serial killers

Summary: Spencer is not doing so well on his forced leave after Tobias case and Garcia shows up to take care of him. Angst-ish, but very much fluff, Garcia’s being the care bear we all know and love, Reid being messed up.

A/N: hi! It’s my first ff on this blog, and even though it’s not strictly a ship, I liked the idea of it. I hope you’ll enjoy reading!

Spencer looked around his apartment, all blacked out with makeshift curtains over his big windows. The only viable source of light was the one coming through the tiny stained glass window. He watched it closely, focusing on how the individual rays were bouncing off the mirror and getting scattered amongst his walls and stacks of books. Blue, green, red.

He was sitting right next to his couch, not bothered enough to shave or change from the robe, that he wrapped tightly around his body. Even though the inside of his apartment was warm and nice, he could still feel the terrible cold of the cemetery. It felt as if the days melted into one, long period of time, with no particular distinction. But maybe it was better this way. It’s not like he had anywhere to be. They’ve put him on a forced leave, his ankle busted, he couldn’t sleep or focus much. And even though everybody wanted him to “rest some more”, he couldn’t. He knew he had to go through a psych eval, but he was okay with it. He felt confident that he should be back in the field.

Sitting at home was no good, he felt like his brain would be much more useful working on a case and when he tried to sleep, each time he closed his eyes all he could see was Tobias’ dead, empty, cold gaze. He smelled the burning fish oil as well, and he couldn’t shake it off. He was painfully aware of the two bottles sitting at the bottom of his bag. He was in pain, alright, but the painkillers issued at the hospital were enough. He had no idea why in that moment he took the bottles from Tobias’ coat. Now it felt just too wrong, to throw it away or give back. It wasn’t listed as an item found at the crime scene, so how would he explain that in the bureau? “Oh, I had this on me, completely forgot, sorry!” He wouldn’t forget. Eidetic memory and such.

Spencer was undermining what he went through, and even though in the back of his head he knew about it, he consciously decided to ignore it. It was traumatic. He found himself in a life-threatening situation, kidnapped by a serial killer having a dissociative breakdown. One of the alters made him choose which family was supposed to survive. He thought about their image on one of the monitors, and how he felt, wanting so bad to refuse it. But his captor broke him, right before injecting him with another portion of the drug. The thing is, it wasn’t just hydromorphone, it was cut with something making him have those vivid visions. In fact they felt so real, that he wasn’t completely sure wether they’ve actually occurred.

But besides the visions, he enjoyed the feeling of silence, the world nonexistent, his own feelings muted and far away. Like a weight taken off his chest. Spencer tried not to think about it in those categories. He assumed, that if he focused on the tragic parts of the case, he wouldn’t think about the needle marks on his arm, but this theory quickly proved to be wrong. His arm hurt, the places where Tobias put the needle in his vein still stung. Logically, he knew it wasn’t possible for such simple needle pokes to hurt like that after so long, but he couldn’t explain it.

Maybe an hour passed, or maybe five minutes, he wasn’t sure. He heard a knock on his door. He could pretend to be asleep or not hear it, but the knocking repeated. The man propped himself up on his elbows and grabbed his couch for support to stand up. He felt a little dizzy. He limped over to the door and just opened it. On the other side stood no one else, but Penelope Garcia, bearing gifts as it seemed.

“Oh, Reid, that won’t help you to get better, are you kidding me?” she marched right in, passing him, not waiting for him to invite her in. Penelope stopped in front of the covered windows and looked around to asses the situation further. “We will make it civilized.” she said after a hesitation lasting maybe two seconds, but Spencer caught it. He closed the door behind her.

“Good morning to you too, Penelope.” he mumbled out, moving himself so that he could lean on the backrest of the couch.

“Morning? Morning was some time ago, mister. It’s lunch time to say the least.” She informed him, as she studied how on earth he made those makeshift curtains. Blonde didn’t seem to worry about that, and with the help (or maybe just because of that) of her ridiculously high heels, she was able to reach the upper part of the material and pull it with just enough force to let it fall on the floor.

“Right… I guess I’ve lost track of time.” he said, wincing a little, when she uncovered the second window. The room instantly filled with light and his eyes were not ready for that. “Now that’s better.” Garcia turned to him with a wide smile, clearly proud of herself, but then she frowned and tilted her head to the side, when she finally saw him better.

“Oh my, Reid, go and wash your hair, huh? There’s no way anybody will let you come back looking like this.”

Spencer raised an eyebrow. He hasn’t even told Hotch anything, just requested a call from the counselor, so that he could schedule his evaluation. “How did you…”

“Calls within the bureau? Reid, come on. What is this, kindergarten? Of course I know, and I’m a little bit sorry, but actually, not really, because I, we, we worry about you.” She said, speaking faster and faster, unpacking things from her bag with sequined butterflies. “Anyway, when was the last time you ate?”

Reid wasn’t angry with her. It felt… Nice. Less lonely. Not as overwhelming as he’d imagine it could be. “I… I’m not sure.” he answered her according to what he assumed was right. “It’s okay. Um, thanks for…” Spencer wasn’t sure what to say. For engaging him in a conversation with another human being? For ripping off his “curtains”?

“For lunch. Thai. I hope you like it?” She asked, realizing that not everybody had to love tofu with roasted peanuts and rice noodles, as much as she did.

Spencer nodded. Penelope looked at him, waiting for him to move. “Come on, chop, chop, I know first steps are hard, but it’s something. You should go and take a shower and I can wait.”

Right. But well, no. “Garcia, I’m waiting for a callback. From the counselor.” He said, looking around, wondering if he really had crutches given him in the ER, or was that a dream?

“Oh, right. Okay, that makes sense. In that case, I don’t see a problem with us eating then.” she said and disappeared in his small kitchen. He knew it was pointless for him to try and go in there, so he just focused on finding his flip phone. He checked his bag, and surely, there it was. There was also something else in the bag, but he quickly closed it, made his way to the table by the windows. He could hear Garcia opening and closing probably all his drawers and cupboards, but he didn’t mind. He put the phone on the table and struggled a bit to move a stack of books off of the chair, so that they could sit down together. He moved his chessboard onto another stack, careful not to mess it up. He remembered how the pieces were placed, but he liked it to not change if it wasn’t necessary.

“You want coffee, boy genius?” she asked from the kitchen and he sat on one of the chairs, but then he reflected. “Sure, thank you Penelope. Do you need any help?”

“No, I’m okay! You’re not much of a help anyway with your ankle, just sit down and wait!” he felt a little awkward, but complied. He heard clanking of his silverware (not many of it for sure). In the sun, he watched his arm, realizing that the needle marks he thought he saw so much in the dark simply weren’t there. Or weren’t as visible, anyway. Not as much as he believed them to be.

“Okay, here’s a plate for you and for me…” She said, standing over him suddenly, placing plates on the table, before returning to the kitchen and back two more times in those furiously pink platform heels. To be fair, they did go well with the rest of her outfit - a white dress with pink, purple and yellow flowers, a pink cardigan, light pink tights, her glasses were virtually the same color as her heels. She also had a ton of fitting fake flowers on top of her head. But tasteful. Very much her. Reid realized that seeing her actually made him feel better. Her positivity rubbed off on him.

“Okay, coffee, brought you sugar too, because I think it might be the main component of yours.” She said and Spencer laughed, as she sat down, placing a glass next to her own plate. Maybe it wasn’t a full diaphragm involving laugh, but he laughed.

“On the menu we have: two portions of vegetarian pad thai with tofu” She said, taking out the takeaway box wrapped in aluminum foil out of her bag that was under the table at this current moment.

“There’s some spring rolls with vegetables and I got you some fried dumplings with shrimps.” Penelope continued, taking out all things that she mentioned. It smelled really nice and the boxes were still warm (Garcia’s bag turned out to be one of those thermic bags, of course) and he wasn’t sure when was the last time that he’s had a proper meal, not from the freezer or a microwave.

“Thank you so much.” he mumbled out but this time his smile appeared automatically. It all smelled so nice and he felt warmth. Inside and out. “That’s awfully nice of you, Garcia… ” he started but she interrupted him. “Look, you weren’t available for a lunch out - I brought it to you. No big deal!” blonde smiled really wide, opening the containers for him in a motherly fashion. “I remember how much you struggled with chopsticks, hence the fork.”

Spencer was about to protest, because his chopstick techniques improved very much, but his phone rang.

“Oh” he put his index finger on his lips to signal Garcia to be quiet, before opening the phone.

“This is doctor Spencer Reid.”

Garcia just let him finish the call, during which, his facial expression grew softer and even became relaxed at some point.

She helped herself to spring rolls, dipping them in sweet chili sauce and sipping her favorite blueberry green iced tea, looking behind him, trying to decipher at least few of his books’ titles.

Spencer closed his phone, put it down and proceeded to take his meal from the container out on his plate. He started eating and nodded enthusiastically. “oh, it’s really good. Tofu is not overly crispy and not overly soggy.” he stated, matter-of-factly. Garcia frowned. “Hey doctor. What about the call?” Spencer didn’t realize that it made sense for him to say that unprompted, so he took another piece of tofu into his mouth before answering. “Ah, I’m supposed to come in at 4 pm. Just need to find some crutches.” he added, as if that was the most obvious thing in the world and dipped a dumpling in the sauce before eating it.

“Well, that’s marvelous!” Penelope stood up and squeezed him in an attempt to hug. He tried to hug her back, but he felt too weak.

“Okay, we eat and then you’re taking a shower, because I will not let you leave this building like this.” she stated, sitting back down and continuing eating (Garcia had no problem with chopsticks, so that’s what she used).

“sure, of course, thank you Penelope. You’re a great friend.” he said and the woman scrunched her nose, obviously flattered.

“Spencer, it’s okay, I’ve got you. Eat!” Reid knew better than to discuss that with her. He still thought about something else though. “Crutches… I think they’re here… ” he mumbled, looking around.

“If you don’t have them, Morgan will literally carry you to his car. He’s picking us up. Eat, you don’t want to be late! ” vision of Morgan carrying him wasn’t so bad, but Garcia was right. He focused on eating to not be late. Reid was about to go out, in a shirt, with washed hair and shaved face, thanks to his friends. He looked up at Garcia, who was currently scooping some chives in order to eat them, and Spencer realized he didn’t smell the burning fish oil anymore. He didn’t feel cold, but rather felt warmth from his insides.

“ …and Gideon misses you too. He wouldn’t say so, but the way he longingly stares while passing your desk each day speaks volumes.” Garcia continued listing the whole team and just how much they missed him. Reid felt much better. He had a family waiting for him, something he didn’t think about often enough these few past days. Hopefully their warm gazes would let him shake the dead, cold one off. Hopefully.

[stray-tori]

Omegaverse & Understanding performative Gender & also Homosexuality in a meta sense

Whilst I lied awake last night at 6 a.m., listening to Connor read BL, he read out loud “omegaverse - a universe where ANYONE can get pregnant” and little smartass me thought “thats not the definition of omegaverse*”.

* except if it is in that particular instance, it’s a pretty freeform universe asdhjds

.

Introduction

For those not deep enough into the rabbit hole to know what omegaverse is, let me give you a short definition:

A subgenre of erotic speculative fiction (originating in fan fiction) in which humanity is divided into a biologically-determined social hierarchy based on stereotypical wolf pack dynamics, consisting of the fantasy genders/sexes of alpha (sexual dominants), omega (sexual submissives), and beta.

aka Alphas impregnate and Omegas receive (at least in a lot of variants, sometimes they just add the dom/sub smell or furry-ish and hierarchy elements).

So yes, that means alpha “Women” can impregnate and omega “Men” can be pregnant, don’t think too much about it and don’t google it, be safe.

This is somewhat common in BL (I don’t see it in GL as much but I’m also not that deep in GL), which makes some sense because the Universe largely negates the gender-variable (though you could also just make everyone lgbt+ positive in your work so yknow). It doesn’t matter if you’re female or male, it matters if you’re alpha or omega (or beta, but betas are weird because they’re essentially normal humans in most interpretations).

And then, 6 a.m.-awake me was like “but if omega/alpha/beta are essentially the new sexes doesn't that mean that alpha-omega relationships can't be gay” - and yes, stupid me, that’s the point ffs, but that lead me to think a bit about my perception of sexes and by extend gender.

.

So in A/B/O, I think it’d be the most logical to replace our sexes with the A/B/O categories (which imo is the case), because it’s what gives information about the reproductive function, just like the (biological) sexes of “female” and “male” tends to.

Now you could fairly argue that “female” / “male” isn’t really giving definite information about reproductive functions anyway, which is true (intersex & trans people). So from that perspective, this AU is really interesting too, actually. But that’s not something I feel educated enough about to tackle with tact and competence as an outsider looking in.

.

As for the whole “where is the line to homosexuality?” argument, here we go.

OKAY, so let’s say A/B/O distinction is based on common reproductive functions within that group. Then if a male omega is with a male alpha, that is by all accounts straight, because “male” wouldn’t be a sex anymore, it would be a visual descriptor. Or well, it would be the descriptor of the “variant” of the alpha.

The AU often tries to really only have A/B/O distinctions but fact is if you base your weird mixer biology on real sexes, you’re gonna end up with a problem - that being that male alphas and female alphas are so biologically different that you’d likely have to separate them into two groups for medical reasons.

So either each sex gets a subgroup, for convenience “male” and “female” (though they only refer to appearance this time, which could be argued is already the case in our world anyway - hi performative gender theory), or we make each combination its own gender - so we now have alpha-m, alpha-f, beta-m, beta-f, omega-m and omega-f.

Betas do really ruin this entire thing because now, suddenly, omega and alpha don’t give away the bodily function anymore, the terms female and male do (because they’re normal humans), so in order to be consistent, they should actually be called beta-a and beta-o....

.

So the next argument is whether or not bodily difference would contribute to “homosexuality” in the universe to begin with -- as an example, the fitness of people in our world. You can be attracted to thin or chubby or muscly people (the visual factor), but just because you’re chubby and your partner is as well, you aren’t gay. Because homosexuality refers to the sexes, but those are distinctly visually defined in our world, whereas appearance doesn’t give away your A/B/O, it’s your pheromones (and those are the same across alpha-f and alpha-m).

If we take the performative / aesthetic definition of homosexual attraction, then I’d argue it is still gay if two -m variants get together, at least per our definition, even if the reproductive function is different (oh hi, performative / aesthetic gender theory).

If we don’t, then only alpha x alpha or omega x omega can be considered homo, including alpha-m x alpha-f.

.

Tori bashes fulfillment fantasy

I’m aware, once again, that it’s effectively the point. As long as it's omega/alpha it's essentially the A/B/O equivalent of straight, both in “function” (pregnancy) and socially (accepted etc). And that’s a fantasy, of course, it’s a universe where you can have someone with a “male” body and still have kids and, well, be straight basically.

Which, I understand the want for being socially accepted, but I’m a bit iffy about the fantasy of essentially being straight, including pregnancy. I don’t know, it feels a bit like admitting “that way” (being gay) of life is not “ideal” and you SHOULD have all those “straight things”, for the lack of a better word. Fantasy affirms the Standard/perceived Ideal.

I’m also pretty sure that while a/a or o/o would be considered gay, a/b or o/b would just be a mess because it’s not accepted but it’s not EXACTLY homo either, it’s just completely deviant, though it would probably be treated like a/a or o/o. Especially when it’s a variant where betas can’t reproduce with a/o (somehow) (afaik).

I just can’t help but find irony in a universe that very much tries to make homosexuality part of the norm, but in the end only creates more “deviant” combinations that could and probably would be discriminated against.

And that’s why I found the “anyone can get pregnant” so thought-provoking, because if that was the case, that would firstly be a whole other mess biologically, BUT that would truly be an equivalent thing, as long as everyone can also impregnate. And on top of that, if everyone’s the same, then everyone is “homo” (attracted to the same), because there’s literally no other option sexes-wise. Big brain.

.

I kind of lost aim so I’m going to stop now. Maybe the goal was the Thinking About Performative Gender Theory we (I) did along the way.

Thanks for coming to my TedTalk.

[ladylynse]

A belated happy birthday to @bibliophilea. 

Forewarning: All Dipper knew was that there was something buried in some special thermos behind the shack; all Danny knew was that he had no idea how he’d gotten here. Inspired by this artwork by @hashtag-art

Part 3 [FF | AO3] (previous)

-|-

“Okay,” Danny said to himself once he was back in the forest and sitting on a springy bed of moss. He ran a hand through his hair. “They know. Or at least they practically know, because there’s no way they bought that.” That was a problem. Not them finding out the truth, exactly, unless it meant they played that card and trapped him again. (He’d really have to figure out how to prevent that from happening again. His parents didn’t believe in non-ghostly magic, but Vlad would have a field day if he realized that had actually worked.)

Thing was, though, if what he’d done had really been enough, if he’d somehow managed to do whatever Clockwork had wanted, Danny would be on his way home right now.

But he wasn’t, which meant he hadn’t.

And he couldn’t exactly time travel without help, so it’s not like he had an alternate route home.

That probably meant that they hadn’t believed his warning, either. He’d have to figure out how to convince them, assuming he could talk to them without them trying to exorcise him or something. Unless exorcism would send him to the Ghost Zone? He’d be a lot more willing to let that happen if he knew that for sure; it beat waiting around for a natural portal or risk getting caught by Vlad if he tried to sneak into one of the ones he’d built over the years.

Unfortunately, given some of the things Danny had seen in the past, he wasn’t going to bet that exorcism wouldn’t equate to destruction.

Especially in a place that gave off such skin-crawling vibes—seriously, what was wrong with that place?

Well.

Real magic, apparently. Somewhere. Buried within all the scams.

Buried.

Like his thermos had been buried.

What else was buried, then?

Danny slumped back against a tree, absently flicked an ant off his knee, and stared upward at the branches. “I have to go back, don’t I?”

No one answered, which was probably a good thing. It was too much to hope that Clockwork would come back so soon. Especially when he was set on ‘not interfering’ while interfering as much as possible through Danny.

Mabel and Dipper’s magic, whatever sort it was, worked better on him when he was Phantom. His best defense was staying as Fenton. Even if he couldn’t resist whatever they tried next forever, it would buy him time, and that might be all he needed.

It would be nice to think that they wouldn’t be plotting something at this exact moment, but he knew better than to engage in such wishful thinking—at least out loud—when magic was involved.

“I’ll just stay invisible until I can figure this out,” he muttered.

The forest seemed to swallow his words.

This whole place was weird.

The sooner he could get out of here, the better.

XXXXXX

“Are you sure about this?”

Dipper didn’t bother to look up from his reading. “The journal hasn’t been wrong before. I’ve just been wrong when interpreting it. If he’s a ghost, those runes should keep him from harming us.” He made a vague gesture at the walls of their room, which he and Mabel had carefully covered in chalk runes. Not as permanent as he’d like, but a lot easier to get rid of in a pinch if someone came poking around.

Or, more to the point, if something turned out to be the wrong rune or drawn incorrectly and having a meaning that was extremely counterproductive.

“Should.” Mabel’s voice was flat. “Can’t you be more confident than that?”

“I’m starting to wonder if he’s really a phantom, whatever he says,” Dipper explained as he sat up. “He doesn’t have their distinctive piercings, and he didn’t try to hurt me, even though I summoned him. Which means he’s either a category ten ghost or he’s not really a ghost at all.”

“But you summoned him,” she said, “and he was trapped in the circle.”

“That might just be what he wants us to think.”

“So what, then? Oracle? Because of the prophecy?”

Dipper grimaced. “Only if we’re lucky.” He turned the journal around to show her what he was looking at.

“Some kind of demon? You think Danny’s possessed by him?”

“He did say something about interdimensional travel,” Dipper said defensively. “You don’t need to say that like it’s impossible. And that would merit the author’s warning.”

“So would a category ten ghost, and a ghost could possess someone as easily as a demon.”

“I guess.”

He’d tried not to grumble it, but Mabel slid down beside him and leaned against his bed as well. “It’s okay not to know something, bro-bro.”

“I know,” he said, flipping through the journal again to see if he could find something else that might be relevant, “but if I mess this up, things could get bad fast.”

“Maybe we should tell the others, then. At least Grunkle Stan.”

“But then we’d have to tell him everything, and….” And he didn’t want to tell them about the journal yet, not even Grunkle Stan. He just…didn’t. It would feel too much like admitting defeat. What if he wasn’t even allowed to keep the journal?

Mabel hummed in agreement, stayed silent for about three seconds, and then asked, “What if he’s right?”

“Grunkle Stan? About what?”

“No, Phantom. The warning. What if he’s right? What if he is an oracle, or a messenger for an oracle, or something like that?”

Dipper scowled. “Anyone with actual foresight would know that saying something the way he did is just going to make people more determined, not less.”

“Maybe that’s the whole point.”

Dipper glanced at her. “What do you mean?”

“Maybe the point isn’t to warn us off.”

“Really? That’s what it sounded like to me. He kept telling us to stop.”

“But that’s not the actual message he gave us. If you stay on this road, you’ll find yourself on a path you can’t turn away from. That just means if we keep going, we won’t be able to stop later. It doesn’t necessarily mean we have to stop now. Stopping now was just what he thought we should do.”

She had a point. If he really was just a messenger, he wouldn’t necessarily know the true meaning of the message. And if he was wrong? About them needing to stop? Then that had to mean— “It’s forewarning. So we’ll be better prepared for whatever’s coming. Whatever has to come.”

Assuming Mabel wasn’t wrong about that, that changed things.

Phantom might not be an enemy. Danny might not be a conduit or something like that. And the journal’s warning….

But maybe it hadn’t been a warning. It had been in a different hand than the rest of the journal. A special thermos to contain the messenger until it was time for the message to be heard….

“I hope you’re right,” Dipper said.

“But in case I’m not, we still have to do all of this.” She nodded at the chalked runes. “These will stop ghosts and demons?”

“It’s every protection rune I’ve found in here,” Dipper said, lifting the journal a few inches for emphasis. “I’m hoping none of them cancel each other out.”

Mabel snorted. “I’m surprised you didn’t do that weeks ago.”

“I’ve been practicing drawing them,” Dipper admitted. “In the dirt. With a stick. I didn’t want to risk getting something wrong when it mattered. I’m not as good at freehanding as you are without practice.”

“That’s just because you spend more time reading than drawing and crafting.” Mabel climbed to her feet. “You can keep looking through the journal. I’m going downstairs to wait for Danny.”

“You think that’s how he’ll come back? After that story he fed you about his family before running out?”

Mabel smirked. “I’m pretty sure he’s figured out we don’t trust Phantom. Trying to convince us to trust Danny is his best bet.”

“But we’re not going to trust him.” Not liking the look on Mabel’s face, Dipper added a pointed, “Right?”

“I like to hear people out.”

“Mabel!”

“What? He was kinda cute.”

Dipper groaned. “For all we know, he’s as real a person as Norman was.”

She just shrugged. “Summer romances are all about risk-taking and mysteries. It’s part of the thrill.”

“But this is serious!”

“And I’ll help you with all the serious stuff once you figure out what preparations we need to actually make. Just like I helped you draw all this. Doesn’t mean I can’t have fun in the meantime.”

She wasn’t going to listen to him, was she? “Just be careful, okay?”

“I’ll be as careful as I ever am,” she promised before slipping out of the room, and he bit back the urge to yell at her that that wasn’t careful at all. Her definition of careful had nearly ended with her as queen of the gnomes.

But she had helped him with this, and she’d help him in the future, and she really did hate all the research, and that was his favourite part.

He just wished she’d give up the idea of having a wonderful summer romance with any boy who came near the Mystery Shack. It would make his life a lot easier. But that’s what siblings did. They made things harder.

And, usually, they made things worth the effort.

With any luck, that would hold true this time.

XXXXXXX

Danny had absolutely no idea what the siblings—twins?—had up their sleeves, nor how fast they could pull something together, but judging by the magic circle, it would be faster than he’d like.

He knew blood blossoms weren’t the only things that fell under traditional methods of ghost hunting. His parents relied on technology, using their inventions before anything else, and Vlad (and therefore Valerie) was little different. Even Technus and Skulker used it. Danny was getting pretty good at dodging anything Tucker couldn’t just hack, but magic? He barely dealt with that outside of Desiree. He knew next to nothing.

That didn’t make him feel any better about going back to the Mystery Shack.

It didn’t keep him from going, either.

The place wasn��t closed, but it was empty—or, at least, it was as empty as it had been earlier. He would’ve been better off if there had been a crowd. No crowd meant no hope of distraction. He could try being his own distraction, of course—knock a few things around with well-placed ectoblasts, since attempts to duplicate himself would probably end badly with how he felt right now—but the truth was, he didn’t know if that would help.

If the adults bought into the whole magic thing as much as the kids, doing something like that would draw more attention to himself, not less. It was more likely to be recognized for what it was: something unnatural. And for all that this place was clearly set up like some sort of scam, it…. It wasn’t all a scam. He’d felt that much before. He was sure it hadn’t just been the beginnings of that magic circle.

He could still feel it now, hovering where he was underneath a window. Something that made his skin crawl. Something that had his arms covered in goosebumps. Something…something that felt achingly familiar but made him want to run away at the same time.

Or maybe that was just whatever the others had already done.

Or what he was supposed to be warning them away from.

It would’ve been nice if Clockwork could’ve given him some straight answers for once.

Danny put one hand on the sun-warmed side of the shack. Nothing happened, so he tried to phase through the wall. Tried being the operative word, as it didn’t work. He scowled and pushed harder, to no avail. He even tried the windowpane in case glass reacted differently than wood. It didn’t.

It figured.

These guys would find a way to make the entire place phase-proof without coating it in anti-ecto goo.

“Why can’t just one thing be easy for me, huh?” Danny muttered. Clockwork didn’t answer, of course; he was probably back in his tower watching through a portal, sure that everything was going the way he thought it should.

Fine. Whatever. He’d do what he could, even if that meant taking more risks than he’d like in a place like this. Anything to get back home.

Still, what he was doing wasn’t the smartest. Even by Tucker’s terms, it would be a fairly bad idea. Danny knew that even as he circled the shack, looking for an open window that didn’t exist. Everything was closed. Most likely, if anything had been open, the others had closed it. Since phasing wasn’t an option, he’d have to go through a door. Maybe the back door was still open? If Mabel hadn’t locked it behind him….

Danny peeked through the screen on the back door. He couldn’t see anyone, but there wasn’t a full view. He turned the handle slowly, easing the (thankfully unlocked) door open and slipping inside, closing it just as silently. He half-expected to come face-to-face with someone, but the kitchen was empty.

Small mercies.

Danny hesitated, trying to figure out where he should start his search when he wasn’t entirely sure what he was looking for. Did these people hide stuff in plain sight, or was he better off digging through closets and the basement and the attic? Except the room he’d been in with the other kids had pretty much been the attic, or at least some kind of attic room or loft—is that what a loft was?—and he wasn’t sure if this place had a basement, but…

Danny slowly stepped onto the floor, holding his breath as he let it take his full weight. Flying in human form got exhausting after a while. He tried to go intangible and keep going, hoping to slip right through the floor, just in case he wasn’t prevented from that now that he was inside, but his shoes stayed firmly on the wood beneath them.

Fine.

Old fashioned way it was, then.

It’s not like he really expected anything else.

Besides, this place was the Mystery Shack. It had to have secrets. And, well, clearly these people were prepared for the supernatural. Announcing his presence wouldn’t necessarily win him any favours, but maybe he could be his own distraction if he did it in a more old-fashioned way instead of trying to fool them like he had earlier.

Knocking on walls should still help him find hollow spots—hiding spots, for whatever information had to be hidden around here to merit Clockwork’s interference—and they shouldn’t expect anything less from a ghost. Judging from the junk for sale in the gift shop, the head guy would probably use the excuse of calling this place haunted to up his prices anyway. Danny might be doing them a favour.

It wasn’t very subtle, and it meant completely abandoning any hope of coming out of this unnoticed, but it was also very unlikely that he wasn’t expected. He knew that. It was too much to hope for that they weren’t expecting him, especially considering he couldn’t phase through any of the walls. That wasn’t a coincidence.

He just hoped he was right about them not being able to do as much to him as long as he didn’t go ghost, even though he was using his ghost powers.

XXXXXX

Wendy didn’t pay attention to the floor creaking at first.

She didn’t pay attention to the odd knocking sound, either.

At least, not until she realized it was moving and coming far too regularly, too rhythmically, to be something Soos was tinkering with while they didn’t have any customers.

But that’s what made the floorboards creaking wrong, too. No customers. She knew the squeaky floorboards in this place. They all did. They all also avoided them now, more from habit formed by annoyance than anything else. But the last customer to come in had been that kid, and according to Mabel, he was long gone.

Wendy popped the bubble she’d been blowing but didn’t look up from her magazine. Instead, she listened while pretending to read, scanning the page to keep up appearances but not taking in any of the words.

The floorboards shouldn’t be creaking, and there shouldn’t be any weird knocking. Tap tap tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap tap tap. It definitely wasn’t a woodpecker, even if that might be a seemingly logical conclusion from some city slicker who knew nothing about Gravity Falls. Someone—something—was inside the Mystery Shack. And if it was supposed to be tapping out Morse code, well, it wasn’t being rapped out by someone who had a concept of long and short; the pauses were too inconsistent, even if the reoccurrence was not.

Wendy flicked her eyes to Mabel, who’d come downstairs to borrow one of Wendy’s old magazines and was sitting up on a stool in the corner. She was still humming to herself. Either she hadn’t noticed or she was doing exactly what Wendy was and pretending.

Wendy sighed. Sometimes, she was really not paid enough. Still, this was a good job on the whole. Plenty of time to read and just enough of the inexplicable to keep things interesting. About par for the Mystery Shack, really.

“Hey, Mabel, what’s your brother up to?”

“Reading,” she answered without looking up. “Boring stuff.” She folded open the magazine and turned it around, showing off a bright advertisement for perfumes. “Do you mind if I cut this up for my scrapbook? I like the flowers.”

“Go wild,” Wendy said. Mabel chirped her thanks, but Wendy was still listening to the tapping and the occasional floorboard creak. Whatever it was was coming closer.

She checked her watch; almost closing, but Stan was probably still in town, looking after…something. Wendy didn’t ask anymore. Stan had had that look in his eye recently, been in a sort of mood where he answered questions with a joke, and she hadn’t bothered trying to get anything out of him. He’d fill her in if she needed to know. She knew Soos had gone into the hardware store earlier, too—something about wiring disappearing again—but she was pretty sure she’d seen him in the yard not that long ago. He had to be back, anyway. Stan wouldn’t have left without having him fill in as Mr. Mystery should any tourists swing by.

Not that she needed either of them to deal with this for her, but it’s not like this was an infestation of raccoons. She wouldn’t mind a bit of backup if she found herself dealing with something from the side of Gravity Falls that most people ignored. Or tried to ignore, anyway. Sometimes, it really wanted to be known.

This…might be one of those times. Which might mean she wouldn’t have a choice about giving Dipper and Mabel a crash course in whatever they wound up facing. The truth of it, not whatever stories she knew Dipper tried chasing; however much he seemed to be trying to keep that from her, it’s not like she never heard him whispering to Soos or Mabel. Trouble was, Soos and Mabel being who they were, she wasn’t sure how much of those whispers were truth….

She could remember being as ignorant of all of this as they had been at the start of the summer, as they might still be aside from an encounter or two, but that was before she started working at the Mystery Shack and realized her dad’s ulterior motive for all those survival lessons.

She was pretty sure her dad didn’t believe in any of the stories people told. As far as she could tell, most people didn’t. Urban legends were just urban legends, and a good campfire story was just a good campfire story. If anyone had a particularly good one, well, then it might be deemed something on par with what Old Man McGucket might tell. It was weird, though. People would tell those stories, and then they’d never mention them again, even when offered the perfect circumstances for call-backs. It was like they’d just put it out of their mind completely.

Still, no longer mentioning something and not admitting to even entertaining the idea that there was a modicum of truth in any of those stories didn’t mean people didn’t prepare, even if it was mostly unconsciously.

And even though Stan laughed it off, even though she usually laughed it off, it hadn’t taken the haunting at the convenience store to open her eyes to the fact that there was more going on in Gravity Falls than anyone admitted.

Whatever. Mabel and Dipper were going to find out sooner or later that Gravity Falls wasn’t the sleepy little town it appeared to be—assuming their run-in with the ghosts at the old convenience store hadn’t already done that. Honestly, even she’d thought ghosts were just stories before that one; she’d figured all the real stuff was the sort that was much less popular. Who would’ve thought it was all real?

The door separating the gift shop from the main Mystery Shack showroom creaked open.

Mabel, having torn the page from the magazine, was back to humming to herself and didn’t look up from her reading.

Wendy reached below the counter, trying to figure out what in their eclectic emergency supply would actually be useful in this situation, and settled on the baking soda box that was supposed to be placed in various nooks and crannies to keep the place from smelling too musty when it rained.

There was no tapping, but she heard a floorboard creak. The one by the vending machine, if she had to guess.

“Screw it,” she muttered. She tore the cardboard on the top of the baking soda box and flung the contents in the general direction of the vending machine. For the briefest moment, she saw a humanoid outline in the dust, and then it was gone.

“Wendy?”

Mabel’s voice wasn’t scared, exactly. Nor did it sound like she thought Wendy was crazy. But it was still too cautious for Wendy’s liking.

“What are you doing?”

“Summer dusting,” Wendy deadpanned. “It’s like spring cleaning. This helps you spot all the places you need to dust.” Mabel’s face told her she clearly didn’t buy that, but Wendy didn’t care. She just smirked and added, “Go grab your brother and run outside and help Soos gather some wood. We should roast marshmallows tonight.”

Mabel stared at her for a beat longer before she squealed, “I love roasting marshmallows! It’s fun to catch them on fire and watch Dipper’s face. He hates that. He wants his to be this perfect golden brown, but it’s not done till it’s crispy.” Grinning, she slipped off the stool and out of the room.

Wendy turned her gaze back in the direction of the vending machine. “What the hell are you?” she hissed. “And what are you doing here?”

Something shifted, and she could see the faint impression of footprints in the thin dusting of baking soda.

And then she blinked and saw the kid from earlier standing there.

“This isn’t what it looks like,” he said. “I swear.”

Right. Like she was going to buy that.

“I mean it,” he insisted, probably reading her expression. “I… There’s something wrong with this place, okay? I need to figure out what it is. I…. It’s the only way I’m going to get home.”

There was a thump from upstairs. She had to deal with this fast. “What are you?” she repeated.

“Stuck,” the kid said. “And not a threat to you. Honest. Unless you’re, like, secretly planning to eat the kids who live here or something.”

Well, it’s not like she expected straight answers from something that no doubt loved to trick humans.

“Get out.”

“But—”

“Out!” she jabbed her hand towards the front door. “Now. I’ll know if you try to come back.”

“Not necessarily,” the kid muttered, not quite quietly enough that she couldn’t hear him, whatever he might think.

He vanished again.

No more footprints appeared in the white dusting the floor, but she heard that tapping again.

And then she heard the sound change.

It wasn’t the rap of knuckles against solid wood. There was something hollow, something hidden, something—

Footsteps coming down the stairs.

Mabel and Dipper.

She lunged for a rag beneath the counter and wiped it across the countertop, pretending to be cleaning. When they waved as they ran out the door, she offered a weak smile.

No more knocking.

No more footprints.

Man, sometimes she really wasn’t paid enough for this.

XXXX

Okay, that had not gone as well as Danny had hoped.

Fine, he’d been stupid. Revealing himself had been stupid. He shouldn’t have expected help. Clearly, these people were not here to help him. That would have been too easy.

But at least whatever they’d done to the shack itself to make it phase-proof didn’t extend to its contents. He hadn’t been too hopeful when he’d tried to stick his arm into the vending machine, but once it had worked, well, of course he’d gone right in and tried to keep going. The fact that there really was a hidden passageway behind it was an unexpected bonus. He’d been half expecting a hidden door that would have been just as effective at barring his way as every other wall in this place.

Danny dropped his invisibility and intangibility once on the other side, but he kept floating as he held up a hand and let a ghost ray illuminate the passage. There was a faint light coming from below him, but it wasn’t enough to light his way by itself. Rickety stairs led downwards, the angle steeper than any stairs he’d come across before. This place really did have secrets. Maybe the Mystery Shack wasn’t a total scam after all.

The stairs didn’t seem terribly dusty. Despite creaking under his weight, they held when he stood on them, so he crept downwards.

When he reached the floor, it was just the landing for an elevator. A lone light bulb shone overhead. He pressed the elevator button and waited for it to come up, shifting from foot to foot. Just how deep were the secrets of this place buried that they needed an elevator?

Three floors down, apparently, which might explain why it was so dark when the elevator doors opened.

Danny could hear the low hum of machinery even before he stepped out of the elevator, which made it immediately evident why Clockwork had put him up to this.

This place didn’t only have a creepy hidden room, it had a creepy basement lab. Because, naturally, basements were where creepy secret labs were kept.

He kept walking, calling up a ghost ray again to light up what the various computer screens and blinking lights couldn’t.

Despite having more construction tools and computer screens than beakers or Erlenmeyer flasks, this lab came complete with what looked suspiciously like a nearly finished ghost portal. This one was at least ten feet above the floor, set in some kind of reverse triangle mounting, but it was definitely a portal. Which meant these guys had magic and technology on their side. Perfect. This couldn’t get any worse. This couldn’t—

Danny frowned and walked forward, letting the ghost ray burn a little brighter to give him some more light. That book by the control panel looked like what the kid had had. Danny still didn’t recognize the handwriting—not another novel by Freakshow, thankfully—but those were definitely blueprints to a portal. Incomplete blueprints, but still blueprints. And the portal in front of him was a heck of a lot more complete than the drawings on the page, which was not a good sign in his book.

“Maybe this is what’s going to go wrong,” Danny whispered. “Maybe Clockwork wants me to prevent another accident.” Though, considering no one had stopped what had happened with him or Vlad, that struck him as unlikely. But an unstable portal could lead to a giant explosion, and—

The room flooded with light from overhead, and Danny jumped even as the buzzing of electricity filled his ears.

“I’m not going to let you destroy everything I’ve spent the last thirty years building,” a voice behind him growled, and he turned just in time to see the net flying towards him.

(next)

[pahrak-the-sinnoh-slizer]

More in-depth thoughts on the NEOTWEWY demo, contains spoilers for the whole thing

-First of all I am in LOVE with the fact that you start out right next to Hachiko, we’ve both waited a long time old friend but I’m finally back

-The game does a great job of grasping that TWEWY feel without recreating it 1 to 1, it’s familiar but distinct.

-Related to that, I’m glad that they give us a couple iconic landmarks and then send us right into one of the new areas of Shibuya

-Fret is precious

-You could argue that Rindo doesn’t make the strongest first impression with how laid-back he is, but he’s still fun

-Was not expecting to hear dialogue about Pokémon GO with FF monsters but okay, seeing the Nutkin really made me smile since it’s an FFV alumn

-Already working out conspiracy theories for who Swallow REALLY is

-The truck death was surprisingly brutal holy shit

-Shoka is mean, I kinda love her

-Susukichi sure is…something, but I do like that they have him basically say you won’t get the battle system your first try, cause, uh, I fumbled a good bit

-On that note I do like the battle system, it’s still challenging to really make the most of it but I don’t think it’ll be a barrier to entry like the good ol’ Stride Cross, limiting you to essentially three broad categories of Psychs is also a good way to ease the player in

-Minamimoto really just shows right the fuck up out of nowhere giving off vibes that he wants to be cool but secretly maybe sort of wants to have someone to at least talk at, I love him but I do wonder how this looks to a newcomer

-Drum ‘n’ Stinger is rad af

-Kubo is…about how I expected, yet simultaneously not?  idk, he’s slimy for sure and I don’t like him

-Found myself taking to Kaie much quicker than I expected :)

-Oh right Shiba uuuuuh I don’t really have any strong feelings towards him yet?

-WAIT RIP RAMEN DON HOW COULD THEY

-I was a bit skeptical about Remind after the trailer, having tried it out it’s…inoffensive, if not exactly compelling

-Graffiti seems like a neat spin on trophies, I’ve managed to snag a few but most are out of reach for now obviously

-I managed to find 1 Pig Noise!  I was pretty thorough so I think that’s all, but has anyone found more?

-One big gripe I do have is in regards to the manual save: the only thing in the demo that tells you how to access it is a small list of button prompts that you only see if you stand still for a few seconds.  The autosave does well enough, but if you want to save before fighting the Day 2 boss so that you can keep playing the demo, you need to know about the manual save. Maybe it gets brought up later on, but I really wish they would’ve had a more intuitive way to learn about it before you really need it.

-Side note, did you know you can lower your level by pressing +?  At first I thought it had to be done through the Noisepedia screen, but turns out it can also be done on the overworld.

-A quality of life feature I’m STOKED about is that the game tracks Pin Mastery even if you don’t have a mastered copy of the pin on hand.  I very quickly abandoned the idea of completing Pin Mastery in the original game because of how cumbersome the hording process seemed, but now, even if you evolve a pin, it’s still marked with a star on your Collection screen! Excellent call!

-Something curious: one of the pins (Classical Cacophony, I think?) has ??? on its evolution field. I’m wondering if this means it evolves with other types of PP?  But the existing ones don’t specify Battle PP, so…I’m not entirely sure.

-So ah, monkey boss…not really anything in particular to say?

-Kanon…rubs me the wrong way.  I mean I guess taking credit for the win isn’t the worst thing in the world, it just irks me, this was probably the intended reaction though

-That’s about all I can think of for now, it’s a good demo and NEOTWEWY is shaping up to be a good game, I’m SO glad you can transfer data, it’s SO CLOSE holy SHIT

[southsidestory]

you have bipolar disorder? how did you get to that conclusion? did you go to a doctor? i don’t want to self diagnose but i’ve read up on it a lot and it seems like my grandfather, father, and i have it. its made life super difficult. I even stopped writing ff bc when i posted, people wouldn’t understand how depressive episode make you not want to do anything for literal months at a time and would berate me for not updating 1/2

2/2 and my family is Mexican so they believe that mental illness is an American Thing, so i cant really go to them for help, and i wouldn’t even know where to begin with a doctor. what was your experience with it?

I did go to a psychiatrist, yes, but I had been experiencing symptoms since I was 12. I was 26 when I was finally correctly diagnosed. Before that I’d been misdiagnosed with MDD (major depressive disorder) and put on a cocktail of meds that mostly made me worse. Being correctly diagnosed is hugely important, and I highly recommend that someone see a psychiatrist rather than self diagnosing. 

But. Not everyone has the privilege of easy access to a psychiatrist, and it sounds like you’re in that category. And I can say from personal experience that I knew I was bipolar before I was diagnosed, because it runs in my family and my symptoms were astoundingly obvious by that point. Since you asked, I’ll tell you about my experience.

As I said, I started experiencing bipolar symptoms when I was a kid. I also have PTSD and GAD, and my anxiety has been with me all my life, but my depression started when I was 12. A nurse practitioner put me on the antidepressant Lexapro, which made me worse--because antidepressants don’t work for bipolar people. Our brains aren’t wired for it. So I quit taking Lexapro and didn’t attempt to treat my mental illness with medicine for the next ten years. 

I also started having hypomanic episodes as a young teenager, but I didn’t recognize them for what they were. I wouldn’t sleep for days and I’d be highly productive and feel great, so why would I complain about that or think it’s a problem? But the longer I went untreated the more severe my episodes became and the longer they lasted, and by the time I hit my 20s I was in a really bad place. Depressed 85% of the time, hypomanic 10% (although I didn’t know that’s what it was), and “normal” about 5%. My depressive episodes often lasted for months at a time, briefly broken by a week or two of hypomania, after which I’d plummet right back into depression.

I went to a psychiatric nurse practitioner when I was 22. He assumed I was depressed and put me on antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds. That mostly made me worse. The only thing that ever really worked was Abilify, which is an atypical antipsychotic shockingly used to treat bipolar disorder. That really should have been a fucking clue, but I went improperly diagnosed for another four years.

Being on a cocktail of the wrong meds made me worse, which led me to stop taking my meds cold turkey, which is always a bad idea. In April 2016 I had a horrible mixed episode, although I didn’t understand what it was then. For those who don’t know, a mixed episode is when someone is manic and depressed at the same time, and it’s pure hell. During my episode, I broke up with my partner right before our first wedding anniversary, quit my job, and almost committed suicide. (Then I moved back home and my mom promptly died, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms.)

Fortunately my partner and I got back together, and they helped me figure out what was going on. They’re also bipolar, but unlike me they were diagnosed as a kid, and our symptoms presented differently so that’s probably why neither of us saw it for a long time.

I finally saw a psychiatrist at the beginning of 2017, and I went in already knowing what I was going to hear. My mom had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder a couple of years before she died, so I knew it ran in my family. My symptoms had worsened significantly and my hypomania had finally become so distinct and unhealthy that it couldn’t be overlooked anymore.

None of my previous health care providers had ever asked me, “What do you feel like when you’re at your happiest?” If they had, it would have probably been obvious that I suffer from bipolar disorder, not unipolar depression. Because my “happiest” looks like extreme periods of creative productivity, days or weeks of insomnia, and some very bad decision making lol. Usually followed by a crash landing back into depression.

So I guess that’s my question for you. What do you feel like when you’re at your happiest? If your “up” periods sound like hypomania or mania, which I’m sure you’ve read about, then yeah there’s a good chance you’re bipolar. :/

And if you are bipolar, I cannot stress enough how important it is to get proper medication. I don’t want to scare you, but something like 20% of bipolar people die from committing suicide. And those are just the successful ones; the number who attempt, sometimes multiple times, is much higher. This is an extremely dangerous, disabling, potentially deadly illness. Although you can learn helpful coping strategies in therapy, and a good support system is also very important, the #1 thing you need to treat bipolar disorder is medication. It’s a chemical imbalance in the brain that, for 99% of us, cannot be effectively managed without mood stabilizers and/or antipsychotics. Every bipolar person I know (my mom, my aunt, my partner, and one of my friends) didn’t get better until they were on meds, and it was the same for me.

All this to say, if you suspect you’re bipolar, I encourage you to do every single thing in your power to get to a psychiatrist. I’d like to say your family might come around, but if you say they believe mental illness is an “American Thing” then I believe you. In which case, you need to advocate for yourself now and worry about their opinions later. Assuming you’re an adult, which I’m *really* hoping you are. If you’re a minor, that makes this much harder.

When you say you’re Mexican, I don’t know if you mean you’re living in Mexico or living in the US. If Mexico, I can’t point you toward resources, but if you happen to live in the US, most major cities have FQHCs (federally qualified health centers), which are aimed at serving poor people, and many of which provide mental health care services.

If you do have access to a psychiatrist, I can give you some pointers on what to do before your first appointment. I went into mine with a list of symptoms and how long I’d been experiencing them, family history of mental illness, previous medication regimens, and a summary of my trauma. When I handed it over to my psychiatrist she was like “Well it’s quite clear that you’re bipolar. I’m sorry you’ve been misdiagnosed for so long.”

If you’re comfortable DMing me, please feel free. Regardless, I hate to hear that you’re struggling, but I do want you to know that things can get better. I honestly feel like I lost the years between age 12 and 26, because I spent them so miserable, but since getting properly medicated my life has turned around completely. I want to see that happen for you too, nonny.

[mindibindi]

Do you have any tips for writing fanfiction?

Hey, Anon, thanks for the ask and sorry about the delayin replying. I’ve been writing fanfiction for so long that I’ve gotten into abit of a routine with it so I had to have a think about what I actually do. These tipsare based on my own writing practice, experience and approach to fanfic.But I would encourage you to keep asking this question, keep chatting withother authors (some might be kind enough to comment here) as you search for your ownunique writing style and practice. Everyone’s will be different and, as long asit works, I say stick with it. I’m assuming that you’re a new or aspiringauthor so I hope one, some or all of these tips prove useful.

1. Get In The Zone: Find the time of day when yourbest writing happens. For me (rather inconveniently when there’s work to bedone), this is first thing in the morning. For others, I’ve heard it’s themiddle of the day or late at night. But you will know this time when you find itbecause words and ideas will flow freely and easily, faster sometimes than yourfingers can keep up. Revel in this time, use it well then stop writing when theenergy runs out. Nothing good was ever produced by pushing past inspirationinto frustration or exhaustion. That said, inspiration can strike at any time – while watchingan ep or taking a walk or going about your work or trying to fall asleep. When itdoes – whether it’s an opening line, a plot point or snippet of dialogue – jotthose ideas down.

2. Watch (and Rewatch) Your Source Material: Thismay sound obvious (and not much of a chore for a fan) but watching whatevermovie/show/whatever you’re working from helps you to pick up the jargon of thatworld, to absorb the particular milieu, to know the people, places and canon(before you presumably diverge from it). The best fanfic gets both the bigpicture and the little details right. Without these firmly in place, you riskwriting a story that doesn’t ring true to the basic characters, tone orsituation you’re attempting to emulate. You want to extend a reality you love,not break it. So always be on the lookout for any little thing that mightfracture this reality and cause readers to fall out of a world they (you mustassume) know equally well. As a reader, there’s always a jolt when this happens, a dishearteningplummet. So know your stuff before you put pen to paper.

3. Get the Voices Right: Unlike character which canbe ambiguous, changeable and open to interpretation, every fan becomes attuned tothe particular voices of their favourite characters. When reading, you don’t need to work toknow when an author gets this right. You can just hear it. You can also (unfortunately)hear the tiniest slip in consistency and truth. I have written for somecharacters with very distinctive voices, voices I really didn’t think I couldemulate: both Ten and Donna in “Doctor Who”, Jack and Liz in “30 Rock” and,more recently, Gene Hunt in “Ashes to Ashes”. My particular trick for writingthese characters, for practicing their voices, was to write out the dialoguefirst then fill in everything else. Obviously this is only going to work forfics like this, this and this that rely heavily on banter. I love this kind offic. I love reading ‘em and I love writing ‘em. But even in fics which meldprose and dialogue, writing the dialogue out in isolation can help since theseaspects use slightly different writerly muscles.                          

4. Spellcheck is Your Friend: There will probablyalways be errors in your writing but do your best to avoid preventable andobvious mistakes. These can destroy your credibility as a narrator and takeyour reader out of your story. Personally, I am a compulsive editor. I wouldn’trecommend it. But I would recommend reading through your work at least once andrunning spellcheck before posting. Reading aloud can also help to identify anygrammatical errors or issues with flow. You can, if you find a friend willingto act as beta, outsource some of this work.

5.Don’t Be Afraid to Start Small: I’m a fan of theshort, self-contained fic. I’ve written lots of them and significant work must still go into making them work. So don’t aim to produce 25,000brilliant words right off the bat. Just 1-2,000 solid ones of which you can be proud.

6.Write What You Want: If you’re lucky, readerswill request fics of you (I have never been good at fulfilling these requests).If you’re unlucky, they’ll complain about directions you take or detail whythey refuse to read what you’ve written (this is pretty rare). But you can’t, Ibelieve, force inspiration. It’s either there or it’s not. For me, I beganwriting fanfic because there just wasn’t any for a pairing I shipped. So Iwrote it myself, for myself. I wrote what I liked and wanted to read (I stilldo). This is a medium in which fans have complete autonomy. They choose to go frompassive consumer to active creator. So just do what you do. Do whatever youwant. Turn back time. Bring people back from the dead. Unite lovers. Mergeworlds. Create characters. Make it sad, happy, dramatic or funny or both. You have the power. Claim it. Play with it. Revel init.

7. Start Strong and End Strong: You gotta have agood first line, in my theory of ff. That’s where it (literally) all begins. I always like to openwith something concise and intriguing that immediately communicates a little (butnot necessarily all) of what I’m planning to work with. Don’t be fooled intothinking you gotta start at the beginning. You don’t. You can enter the storyat any point. You can enter late – and leave early, as the saying goes. Thisis a screenwriting principle that ensures that only the most relevantinformation is included in a scene. It keeps the pace of a piece up, controlsthe dissemination of information and keeps audiences engaged. I think thisprinciple transfers rather easily to the page, especially since most of us areemulating material from the big or small screen. In order to imitate thesevisual mediums in written form, you might like to think of paragraphs, breaksand sentence structure as editing techniques that can guide the reader’s pace, growingperception and emotional experience.

8.Avoid Clichés: Clichés can occur at the level ofexpression, character or narrative. At the level of expression, these arewasted words that hold no meaning so find a fresh way to express what you mean.At the level of character, keep words, thoughts and actions rooted in thecharacter. “Show, Don’t Tell” is another well-known writing principle that can help maintain authenticity. As much as we may identify with certain characters, make judiciousdecisions about how much of yourself belongs in them. When writing intimaterelationships, less is often more. I know many shippers (myself included) spendyears sometimes LONGING for couples to express what they mean to each other,physically and/or verbally. By all means, let your beloved characters express –but not everything and not all at once, would be my advice. Allow them to maintainsome sense of mystery and sovereignty. At the level of narrative, clichés canactually work, especially if used with awareness. I had such fun writing a OneBed! fic for Jack and Liz, in which I paidtribute to some of the many reams of MSR fanfiction I had previously consumed.There were so many of these stories in that fandom that they became a categoryof their own, boasting a set of (increasingly ironic) conventions. Some fanfictraditions, it must be said, deserve to be embraced, extended and celebrated.   

9. Read: Reading is the easiest way to absorbgrammar, to expose yourself to different writing styles and to become moreadept with language. So read books of all kinds. And read fanfic from your favefandoms. But read it actively, critically. Figure out what works and whatdoesn’t and why. Figure out what you enjoy, don’t and why. Apply theseinsights to your own writing and keep applying them. Keep improving. The more you read and write, the better you’ll get.

10. Avoid Comparisons: My best experiences of readingand writing fanfiction have been in strong, supportive communities. Generally,the more supportive the community has been, the more prolific I have been. These communitiesare wonderful spaces to inhabit, filled with peeps that love their shows,defend their ships and support their authors. Authors are always hungry forfeedback, and is it any wonder? Writing, creating and sharing takes work, love,thought and guts. You have to claim a little corner of a fandom and boldlystate that you have something to say that’s worth listening to. Sadly, you will probably never receive the same amount of energy back as you putin. This can lead to authors comparing their output and input, judging theirwork on its stats rather than on its merits. It can lead to them competing forthose few meagre reviews that roll in. This is partly why it is so important toreview fanfic, particularly fanfic you love and authors you read consistently.It’s part of encouraging and creating a sense of community in which people feeltheir voices are heard and their contributions valued. So be generous with others. Encourage and share. Read, review, reblog.Treat your fellow writers as your community, not your competition. Viewfanfic as a labor of love, an act of generosity that sometimes gives back. And if you don’t get the response you wishfor then make sure you hit that internal heart button and give yourself somekudos for trying, for creating, for loving something and letting it show.

Good luck. :)

[eliz1369]

Okitober Fest - Regret and Lost

Castle in the Corn

Rating: T Length: 2,200 words Description: Modern AU set ~10 years after An Unearned Gift. Okita and Chizuru are taking their daughters on an excursion to a corn maze, but their plans go awry when one of the girls decides to run off.

Author’s Note: Yay! OkiChi Week/Okitober Fest is finally here. I honestly can’t thank @kurokiorya enough for drawing the fabulous illustration! Be sure to check out her blog to see all of her amazing art. 

This is also on FF and AO3

“But Mom, I want to find the castle!”

Souji couldn’t help a small chuckle at the way their six year-old daughter managed to mirror Chizuru’s own stubborn posture. Everyone insisted that their youngest, Natsumi, had gotten his stubborn personality along with his green eyes, but he’d faced off against his wife’s own particular brand of stubbornness often enough to know that wasn’t entirely true.

The family of four stood in the middle of a giant, kid-friendly, halloween themed corn maze. Currently their older daughter was attempting to lead them to the giant pumpkin and was doing a fairly good job of it. Despite getting much of Chizuru’s calmer personality - an immense benefit with a younger sister like Natsumi - Sachiko thankfully hadn’t inherited her mother’s distinct lack of direction. The cards were still up in the air for Natsumi, but she was young… Or at least that’s what Souji hoped. Keeping track of Chizuru in busy places was hard enough, but at least she didn’t have a habit of running off when she didn’t get her way like Natsumi did.  

Chizuru gave him a slightly aggravated look for the ill-timed laugh before turning to Natsumi. “I’ve told you, it’s Sachi’s turn. Once she leads us to the pumpkin, then you can take us to Dracula’s castle.”

Mother and daughter faced off against each other, neither apparently willing to back down. The stalemate was broken when Sachiko hesitantly offered, “It’s okay mom. If Tsumi really wants to, we can go see the castle first.”

Chizuru shook her head as she turned to look at her other daughter. “That’s very mature of you, but it’s not the point. It’s your turn right now and Tsumi will just have to patient.”  

Souji could practically see the wheels turning inside Natsumi’s head, so it came as no surprise to him when she used Chizuru’s distraction to bolt down the path.

Instantly Chizuru’s head whipped back around, her voice rising in panic as she called, “Okita Natsumi! Come back here!”

He put a hand on Chizuru’s shoulder, stopping her as she tried to follow after their daughter and gave her a reassuring kiss on the forehead as he said, “I’ll get her, don’t worry.”  Chizuru meant well, but she’d be more likely to end up lost herself.

He felt Chizuru relax slightly, but that didn’t stop her from biting anxiously at her lip as she looked down the path where Natsumi had run. Turning to an equally worried Sachiko, he knelt down until he was level with her short eight year-old height and rested a hand on her head.

“You and Mom go see the pumpkin and Tsumi and I will meet you at the castle, all right?” When his reassurance didn’t seem to entirely ease his daughter’s fear for her sister, he said seriously, “While I’m gone, I need you to take care of Mom for me. Can I trust you to get her there safely?”

An all too familiar determined light entered Sachiko’s brown eyes as she nodded and took her mother’s hand. “You can trust me.”

“Good girl.”

Souji ruffled her hair before turning to jog down the path after Natsumi. His daughter was now well out of sight, but thus far the path hadn’t split. She’d be ahead of him unless she’d tried to get through the wall of corn. With his longer legs, he shouldn’t have too much trouble catching up with her.

When the first fork came in sight and he still hadn’t seen Natsumi, Souji started to worry. He stopped and looked down both directions, but couldn’t see her or any sign of which direction she’d taken. It was like she’d vanished into thin air.

Thankfully his worry didn’t last long. Now that his own feet were silent, he could hear the faint sound of running footsteps to his right. Determined to catch up with her before they ended up who-knew-where, he sprinted down the path, taking the turns as quickly as he dared.

It was with more than a little surprise that Souji slid to a stop at yet another divide and again he had yet to catch up to his daughter. How had he not found her yet? She was six years old for goodness sake. Worse yet, he couldn’t even hear over his own winded breathing. He’d known sprinting that distance was probably pushing it but he’d been so sure that he would catch up…

He rested his hands on his knees as he tried to slow down his breathing to the point where he could hear. “Shit…”

A high pitched gasp from behind him made him freeze and he straightened as he slowly turned around. Low and behold there was the very person he had been looking for. She must have heard him coming and managed to tuck herself into a gap in the corn before he’d come into sight. Her plan had almost worked, since he had very nearly run right past her.

Natsumi froze, her eyes widening as she realized that she had given herself away, but the look didn’t last long. It quickly transformed into her usual defiant expression that tended to give her Uncle Hijikata fits. Head up and shoulders stiff, she gamely marched out of her hiding spot to face him.

She pointed a finger at him as she said, “That’s a bad word! I’m going to tell Mom what you said!”

The sight of his six year-old daughter attempting to blackmail him was amusing enough that he had to seriously fight to keep a smile off his face. Instead he raised an eyebrow as he folded his arms. “Oh, you are, are you?”

“Y-Yes!” she said, though there was now a hint of uncertainty in her voice. Clearly that wasn’t the response she had been expecting.

Souji let a smirk start to pull at his lips.  “Hmm~, I thought you knew what happened to tattletales…”

He and Chizuru had made sure that both of their daughters knew the difference between tattling because it was the right thing to do, and doing it purely to get someone in trouble. Blackmail certainly did not fall into that former category.

Natsumi’s eyes widened as she tried to bolt again, but Souji was faster and within only a few steps, he had scooped her up. She let out a half giggle, half scream as he dangled her over his shoulder by her knees. He had to dodge as one of her flailing legs came close to hitting his head and her fists beat uselessly on his back.

“Dad! Put me down!”

“Nope.”

After a few more moments of struggling, she finally gave up and sagged against him as she muttered, “Fine, I won’t tell.”

“What was that? I couldn’t hear you.”

“I won’t tell Mom!”

Carefully, he pulled her back over and settled her on his hip. She glanced up at him briefly before hiding her face in his neck, her fingers tightly curled into his shirt. “I’m sorry…”

He had a good idea of what she was actually apologizing for, but decided to ask anyway. “For what?”

“…For running away,” she hesitated a moment before she asked with a quaver in her voice, “I-Is Mom mad at me?”

Souji sighed as he rested his cheek on top of her head and gently rubbed her back. “No, she’s not mad. You just scared her.”

“Oh…” After a moment Natsumi pulled back to look up at him, biting her lip in a way that she could have only learned from her mother. “Can we go find her?”

“Well I’d like to, but I came after you, so I don’t know where she is. Why don’t we go wait for her at the castle?”

Natsumi’s expression brightened at the offer, but it was quickly touched by a trace of confusion. “How do we get there?”

He grinned down at her. “Like this.”

Repositioning his hold, he lifted her until she sat on his shoulders and could see above the cornstalks.

“Do you see the castle?”

Keeping one hand on his head as she twisted around, she scanned the area for a moment before excitedly pointing in a direction to their left.

“There!”

He started walking down the left path as he said, “All right then, let’s go find that castle.”

Considering it was a maze, their method of navigation worked fairly well. Every time they reached an intersection, Natsumi would point them in the direction of the castle. Even with the occasional backtrack, they soon found themselves walking into the castle’s clearing.

Calling it a castle was a bit of an overstatement in Souji’s opinion. They’d done a decent job of setting up the surrounding graveyard, complete with witty sayings on each of the stones, but “Dracula’s Castle” was more of a tower with a painted stone motif and a spiral staircase wrapping around to the observation deck on top. Of course, he knew nothing could be permanent if they were going to be able to replant next year, but still.

He set Natsumi down, and she instantly ran to the nearest of the grave stones, tracing her finger along the carved words as she tried to sound them out.

“M… T… Tom-Tomb?” She glanced up at him and he nodded approvingly, keeping back his grin at the pun that had flown right over her head. Excitedly she ran to the next, “I… L… Beback”

Natsumi had started toward a third, when she hesitated, her face becoming slightly sad, “I wish Sachi was here…”

Souji walked over, picking her up and settling her on his shoulders again as he started toward the tower. “Yeah, I know, but that’s what happens when you run off. We all do things we regret or wish we hadn’t done. What’s important is that you learn from it.” He felt her wrap her arms around his neck and rest her chin on his head. “What do you say we go watch for Mom and Sachi from the top of the castle?”

She didn’t say anything, but Souji felt her nod as he started walking toward the staircase.

Despite being slightly lacking as a castle, the tower did have an excellent view. From the top they could see all the paths and clearings spread out before them, and even to the edges of the field itself. The very top of the giant pumpkin was just visible above the tips of the corn and presumably, Chizuru and Sachiko would be coming from that direction.

“Dad?” Natsumi asked hesitantly, breaking the silence as he moved them to better see the opening he guessed the other half of their family would appear from.

“Yeah?”

“Have you done things you regret?”

Souji let out a slow sigh as he closed his eyes, a familiar wave of guilt rolling through him. True, his own list of regrets wasn’t long, but that only made those few moments stand out in sharper, more painful relief. Like he’d told Natsumi, he had gotten better at holding on to the lessons rather than the guilt of the memories themselves. The passage of time had helped as well, but there was still one memory he refused to let go of. He’d made more mistakes than he cared to admit when it came to Chizuru, but he would rather walk through hell than repeat that particular one.

Before he could figure out how to answer her question, Natsumi excitedly pointed down into the corn. “There they are!”

Souji pushed back the unwelcome memories as he opened his eyes and smiled down at his wife and oldest daughter. Chizuru had never held his mistakes against him or thrown his inadequacies back in his face. She was far more than he deserved, but of course she would just argue that wasn’t the point.

It didn’t take the pair long to cross the clearing and climb the tower. When they had just crested the stairs, he set down a squirming Natsumi, who ran straight to her mother.

“Please don’t ever do that again Natsumi,” Chizuru said as she knelt down and enfolded her in a hug so tight it almost looked painful. Natsumi didn’t seem to care one bit, her smile stretching from ear to ear as Chizuru picked her up and settled her on her hip.

While Chizuru saw to Natsumi, Souji walked over to Sachiko and ruffled her hair before putting an arm around her shoulders.

“I’m proud of you kid. You did a good job getting Mom here.”

Sachiko looked up at him, her eyes bright with the praise as she gave an impressively convincing melodramatic sigh. “I don’t know how you do it. She almost got us lost three times.”

“Hmm, sounds like you deserve some ice cream for all that hard work.”

They both turned to look excitedly at Chizuru, whose resigned sigh was tempered by the smile pulling at her lips.

“I think we can manage that.”

[jessiewre]

Day 65

Mon 9th March

Safari Day 3 - Serengeti & Ngorongongo Park

Some would say a wet mattress is a sign of bad luck.

Sean & Jane would probably sit in that category.

They both looked KNACKERED the next morning at breakfast and I cringed as I asked them how their night was. I had to ask though, I’m British! It’s what you say!

‘Awful’ she replied. She was looking straight at me and there was a strange look in her eye. Did she think...no, she can’t think...

‘We’ve basically had no sleep’ she continued, her eye contact wavering at this point. ‘Well, Sean’s had a bit and I’ve not. How was your night?’

Ok I was sure I was started to detect a hint of accusation in her tone. Maybe I was imagining it.

It was weird though, because we were constantly trying to get a balance between bigging up the tour that they had recommended to us, so that they felt good about it, but then also not having too good a time incase we were having a better time than them. Which we clearly were.

I blame the Romanians.

‘...yeah, it was fine’, I began, ‘My mattress was a bit wet too but it was ok when I turned it over...’.

Was that the right answer or the wrong one? I just couldn’t tell. It’s like saying ‘Yeah my mattress was wet too, so it wasn’t just you guys who suffered, but hey look at me - I just got on with it!’

It felt like we couldn’t win.

If we’d had a perfectly good night sleep it was unfair, but if we’d had a bad night sleep, it was like saying they couldn’t complain cos we had it just as bad as them - when clearly we didn’t.

What can you do other than just tell the truth and hope they will take it well?!

We guiltily began to feel grateful that the Jeeps groups were being kept apart for dining and went off to enjoy breakfast with our happy Romanian friends.

We started off with a beautiful sunrise safari in the Serengeti and it was a bit of a pinch me moment. Pink and orange skies and grasshopper safari sounds all around us. I could practically hear music from the Lion King on repeat in my head. We watched the hot air balloons beautifully glide overhead and kept our eyes peeled for any early risers of the animal kingdom. We saw hippos and birds and a serval cat very briefly - but no big cats. The overnight rain had caused a major problem to the roads and we realised that we were quite limited with where we could go due to the muddy tracks. At one stage, we had travelled for an hour seeing NOTHING at all, then got to a point in the track where loads of vehicles were struggling on an incredibly muddy single vehicle track. As one jeep tried to pass another, it had to go sideways up a bank - but as it did so, it slipped down the bank side on with the other jeep and crashed into it!

Luckily it was all quite slow and there was no major damage, but now these two jeeps were in a sort of V shape squashed together blocking the track for everyone.

By the reaction of the drivers, it was just another day on safari! They were so relaxed about it.

Eventually it got sorted and we drove off in search of animals again but apart from the amazing sunrise, it had not been a particularly fruitful morning safari. Oh, apart from our driver - Alfani - helping to fix a broken down jeep. Our driver was not amazing at spotting wild animals we’d realised, but he sure knew how to fix a car!

Then suddenly, we got a tip off from another vehicle that there was a lion nearby and we headed to a potential cat spotting area as quickly as the muddy tracks allowed. We zoomed through the savannah trying to avoid the huge muddy puddles, crossing all our fingers and toes that we’d get a sighting.

And then there she was.

A huge female lion!

She crossed the road and ran up a tree to pose and yawn in front of us while we (I) snapped away with my camera.

Then she stayed in position for OVER HALF AN HOUR!

MAGICAL!

We felt so lucky.

We looked around at all the vehicles arriving, desperate to see Jeep 2 somewhere amongst them. C’mon we are nice people, OF COURSE we wanted the Irish couple to get a sighting of the lioness too.

Mainly to avoid a very awkward conversation later.

But we couldn’t see them. Oh gaad.

Luckily, when we got back to the campsite to collect our belongings and have breakfast before leaving the Serengeti, they confirmed they too had seen a lion. PHEW! They seemed pretty happy now too. Perhaps the bad nights sleep was just a distant memory now. Maybe this was the turning point we’d been hoping for. Maybe all prejudice in the world will stop soon and there will be equality for all.

Yeah. Maybe not.

The drive back through the Serengeti didn’t feel as long as the day before and we spotted hyenas, vultures, giraffes as we headed to the evenings campsite. We were crossing our fingers that the campsite would be a step up from the previous night, but mainly praying that we would be the first car to arrive so we could choose our tents and use the showers first! Screw equality for all, we wanted a nice tent!

And rumour had it this campsite had HOT WATER. Can you imagine it? Hot water in the middle of the African plains. Plus people had definitely cottoned on to the first come first serve vibes, so we really needed to be selective about our jeep stops along the way. On Day 1 we would have stoped for a bloody dragonfly. But now we were old hat at safari! Professionals mate. Pah, another wildebeest? BORING. Hit that goddam pedal dude, them tents aren’t going to pick themselves.

We finally got to the campsite as dusk was falling and luckily, we WERE one of the first jeeps! Oh sweet lord! And it wasn’t raining! You don’t realise how much you love NO rain, until it rains while camping with an ancient tent and lack of hot water. Not tonight though!

We got our pick of the tents and I quickly grabbed my stuff to head to the showers.

I practically skipped there, humming a little tune to myself.

The thing with rumours is that they are often false. I’d forgotten that.

The shower I went in was absolute dog shit, a pathetic excuse of a shower. I attempted to wash my hair under a cold trickle of water but I gave up after about 5 seconds. It’ll have to be a basic body wash this time, I thought, shivering under the cold dribble.

As I left the cubicle, I noticed the one next to me had the distinct sound of flowing water. WTF.

And did she have hot water?? I couldn’t resist asking.

‘Hey! Excuse me! Is your shower HOT?’

‘Umm, I wouldn’t say hot...but its not cold’

Well that was enough for me to decide to wait for her shower and go for Hot shower take 2.

So I waited. And waited. And waited. I swear to god this fecker seemed to think that there would be a limitless water supply and took AAAAAAGES. By the time she finally came out, there were 3 more people queuing for it. I’ll tell you what really does my nut in, its when there are limited showers, such as a situation exactly like this one, and people STAY in the cubicle to fully dry off and get dressed and brush their hair and blah blah blah. NAH babe, GET OUT OF THE SHOWER CUBICLE there are another 100 stinky safari bitches out here and we ain’t got all night ffs!

And breathe.

So anyway.

Moving on.

This was going to be the Romanians last evening with us, as they were doing one day less safari’ing than us - so it was sad times! But they were still going to be with us for the full day the next day, so it wasn’t over quite yet. And we were already planning our trip to go and visit them.

We went to the dinner room and saw the separate tables again, giving Sean and Jane a little wave. Then I thought, frig it - we should make the effort and join the tables. Even though part of me didn’t want to, I felt like it was the right thing to do.

So I suggested it to them and they looked pleased, ‘Yeah great idea, lets do it’ they said. 
Phil and I walked over to their table and helped to carry it along with their chairs and plates over to join the end of our table to make one big long table. Great!

Except it wasn’t really, was it.

For some unknown reason, our table was way better than theirs. In so many ways.

We had proper chairs, but their chairs were camping chairs WITH NO BACK ON THEM. I watched Jane’s eyes hover over to our plates, ‘Wow you guys have fancy plates and stuff. Ours are basic’

Jesus.

How was it so awkward so fast.

I prayed Jane wouldn’t spot our metal cutlery. I’d already seen they had plastic. I COULDN’T TAKE ANY MORE OF THIS.

In hindsight, having their table right next to ours was a terrible idea.

Every dish that came over to our table was scrutinised by them to see if it was better than their food. Which of course, it was. Even if it wasn’t, it just was.

Their table was quiet and their conversations were forced and, well, kinda boring to be honest.

Our chat was better, our laughter was louder and our Romanian love story was blossoming right before their eyes. I reckon it almost felt like we’d invited them over to sit with us so we could show them just how much fun we were having. We hadn’t. (Really. We hadn’t. I swear).

The difference between the two now-joined groups was so starkly opposite that it probably just confirmed to them that we were solely responsible for their safari being second best. Which in a way, it really was.

We even offered them some of our food when we’d all been served but they politely declined of course (its the principle don’t you know).

I was sat on the join of the tables, so at least tried to make an effort with conversations across the border - whereas Phil was chugging back the rum and having a jolly old Irish-Romanian time learning some Romanian slang phrases such as ‘F*** my feather’ & also ‘F*** your dead ancestors’ (which seemed particular unnecessary).

I tried my best to chat to their side of the table without having to miss out on the fun vibes of our side, but I kept having to repeat myself so they could hear me, as Philly’s hilarity was causing very loud laughter.

Yep, it was pretty cringe.

We couldn’t really avoid the obvious safari chat so I tried to say something positive. In a backwards sort of way.

‘Our driver is not a great wildlife spotter to be honest’ I said, ‘YOUR guy seems great though!’.

Jane replied, ‘Yeah he is actually, he is really good at spotting stuff. He spots the most out of everyone in our vehicle!’.

And that meant a lot considering they had about 12 people squashed into their jeep 😬.

I thought we’d made some progress there, but then she just came out with it.

‘Yeah, thats the one we’ve beat you guys on and to be honest, its a really important one’.

Ok so up until this point, no one had actually said out loud what this safari trip had turned into. No one had said that it had become a weird competition, a battle, to see who had the best tent / best food / best time. And me and Phil really hadn’t paid much attention to it because, well, we were busy HAVING THE BEST TIME.

But now it was confirmed. They were constantly comparing what they had to what we had and it was clearly wrecking with their heads. I’d had my suspicions of course, but this was a proper penny-drop moment.

She meekly smiled as though trying to shrug it off as a light-hearted comment. But I could see right through her.

From now, it was GAME ON.


Ok not quite.

I actually still felt sorry for them and a bit embarrassed about it all. And Phil was just drunk at this point.

I decided I’d wait till the morning to tell him about it all and see what he thought. Maybe I’d read it all wrong.

And as crazy as it might sound, in between these moments, we did kind of enjoy a sort of pleasant evening with them. Honestly. We DID 😬.

[yehosera]

Brotherhood Open 2017

This article will look at the deck I played for The Brotherhood Open 2017 and give a rundown of what happened during the day.

Brotherhood Open 2

The Brotherhood Open was a fantastic event with £650 of store credit on the line, along with exclusive 2 player playmats for the top 4. 29 people took part, which normally would make the format 5 rounds of swiss with a top 4 cut, however, due to prize support reaching down to 8th place the format was 6 rounds of swiss with a top 8 cut. Swiss was best of 1 and top 8 was best of 3.

Ice/Lightning Cid Raines & co.

http://ffdecks.com/deck/6291571595018240

--Generated By FF Decks (www.ffdecks.com)--

Deck Name: 1st Place Brotherhood Open (Cid Raines & co)

Created by: yehosera

Forwards (26):

1 Zidane (3-154)

2 Rygdea (1-211)

3 Onion Knight (1-125)

1 Ramza (3-119)

3 Al-Cid (2-097)

2 Amon (2-098)

3 Edea (2-099)

1 Cid Raines (1-192)

3 Kuja (3-030)

2 Rinoa (2-047)

3 Genesis (3-033)

2 Vayne (2-026)

Summons (8):

2 Cyclops (2-107)

3 Zalera, the Death Seraph (3-037)

3 Odin (1-123)

Backups (16):

1 Black Mage (1-130)

1 Black Mage (3-107)

3 Red Mage (1-121)

1 Duke Goltanna (1-134)

2 Gramis (2-106)

1 Seymour (1-137)

2 Jihl Nabaat (1-193)

2 Mog (XIII-2) (1-196)

3 Devout (1-048)

Swiss

Round 1 - Ice/Lightning. The player was fairly new, made a few lack of game knowledge mistakes (party attacking with forwards of different elements).

Round 2 - Mono water. My opening hand was very weird, but I talked myself into keeping the hand. The hand consisted of 3 lightning backups, an Edea and some other purple card. This gave the hand a very distinct gameplan, draw a Devout/Mog (XIII-2), hit 4 backups, play Edea. Edea lined up onto a Garnet/Ashe and I did manage to draw a Devout. However, every time a Devout was played, it was used on the following turn starving me of Ice CP throughout the course of the game. In addition, 2 Leviathans landing into my opponent’s damage zone left me REALLY stuck for Ice CP (as Vayne was returned once). This game ended up being the closest of the tournament for me, with Amon saving the day, as per usual.

Round 3 - Fire/Water. Another close game. Both players opened terribly, however, being the more proactive deck I was favoured in a low backup situation. Eventually, my opponent discarded his whole hand to cast Bahamut. Off the backend he top decked a Xande, however, due to Vayne being in my hand, the game was pretty simple from then on out.

Round 4 - Wind/Water. The opponent opened terribly, playing a Fusoya 2-146 turn 1. In a situation whereby one player plays a Fusoya and the other has a Red Mage, the Fusoya player is perpetually on the blackfoot due to how important a resource damage is for that card. This made the matchup simple, haste everything and force them to spend their turns clearing forwards until they have reached 6 damage.

Round 5 - Earth/Lightning. The player was very scared of Al-Cid the whole game and didn’t play forwards until they had to. This gave me ample time to setup and manage the board from then on out.

Round 6 - Ice/Wind. The deck was very aggressive, and my greed ended up leading to my defeat. There was a turn whereby 2 forwards were dull that could have died to a Zalera, the Dark Seraph. Instead, I held onto the cards telling myself, if I finish this turn with 3 in hand I can cast the card during their turn if lethal is found. Sadly, their turn started with an Argath reducing my hand size to 2 making the card uncastable. I died with a Zalera in hand AND 2 Devouts on the field. This is a rookie mistake vs aggressive decks, dying with board control tools available.

Top 8

Round 1 - Wind/Water. Both games were fast, play an Al-Cid, kill them games. Al-Cid with Genesis/Amon follow-up makes dealing 7 damage to a deck that lacks removal a pretty easy feat.

Round 2 - Mono Water. Game 1 I don’t remember much about, but it went pretty smoothly. I believe an Edea lined up onto a Garnet the moment she was played and the tempo loss guided me to victory. Game 2, I opened pretty poorly. Played 2 lightning backups, then played a Genesis. However, without a copy of Famfrit, the Darkening Cloud in hand, the Genesis was able to extract massive amount of value over the course of the game. It was a simple, clear the path for Genesis game. This was the one time Black Mage 3-107 was used the entire tournament.

Round 3 - Lightning/Earth. Game 1 a Fusoya damage checking a Raubahn killing off my Vayne let his Delita roam free. Quickly putting me to 7 points of damage. Game 2/3 went a lot smoother, with Vayne and Al-Cid making short work of his forwards.

The Deck

Forwards

The Lightning forwards exist to gain tempo, while the Ice forwards snowball that advantage. A Genesis off the backend of an Al-Cid combo deals 2 damage and leaves 3 forwards up for the following turn. This kind of pressure is what makes the deck strong.

The Goon Squad.

Al-Cid, Onion Knight, Rygdea, and Cid Raines. These are all cheap forwards that develop multiple forwards while killing the opposing forwards. Onion Knight synergises with all of his fellow goons, while Al-Cid and Rygdea don’t synergise with Cid Raines without assistance from Amon/Genesis/Kuja. The simple thing to do is to play Al-Cid followed up by Rygdea/Onion Knight, so why include Cid Raines as part of The Goons? He exists as a mediator between the forwards that dull enemy forwards and The Goons. The strength of the Squad is being able to develop multiple forwards in a turn, Cid Raines allowing for the development of a Gensis/Amon in addition to the other forwards provides an even bigger swing on board.

Kuja. This card goes first onto the board prompting a response. Due to the reactivate nature of the Lightning forwards, a cheap huge threat that demands a response is a great addition. If the response to a Kuja being played is simply more forwards and not the removal of the Kuja, suddenly an Al-Cid applies insurmountable pressure, killing one of the forwards and dull freezing the other. A board state like that is a nightmare to deal with and if left unchecked will deal 7 damage with ease.

Rinoa. Sets up Zalera, goes up to 8,000 power while Edea is on the board and sets up lethals with Odin. This card is meant to be played during the mid-game, however, don’t be afraid to play the card during the early phases. Much like Kuja in the early phases, Rinoa tends to prompt a response, once again setting up The Goons or Genesis to gain value. This card has immense synergy with Cid Raines and Jihl Nabaat. Forwards that on entry kill Rinoa are now susceptible to the wrath of Cid Raines (most notably Vivi 3-017) and almost any forward that blocks her attacks are equally as likely to face Cid’s wrath.

Genesis. Snowballs any board state that has multiple cheap forwards or a Kuja on. With Red Mage, this card is straight up unfair. At any point in the game Genesis is drawn, Red Mage converts the card into a dull frozen card, a point of damage and a card lost to the discard. Amon and him are best friends with Genesis going out first to clear the way for The Squad, then Amon covering the rear clearing the way for Gensis and The Squad to connect again.

Vayne stops the opponent playing 5 cost or higher forwards. Also it is searchable in this deck with Gramis.

Zidane goes really well with Kuja, costing only 2 while a fellow category IX forward is on the field. Zidane exists to attack and die to set up Goon Squad board swings while drawing a card.

Ramza is a new addition to the deck. Giving the player the edge vs other Al-Cid decks and other decks that have 6,000 power forwards. Most of the time Al-Cid is used on a forward of 6,000 power of less, the secondary effect to summon another forward is wasted. Ramza gives a way of getting the maximum out of Al-Cid on weaker forwards. In addition, any time Rygdea is summoned via Al-Cid the card is not being used to it’s maximum. Costing only 2 CP, it is easy to weave Rygdea into a turn whereby Al-Cid summons Ramza saving the player 1CP in the long run.

Amon. Is it the hat? Is the mask? Is it the simple to read lines of text? Who knows. This card is truly unfair with Red Mage, the Technologist (even his job is cool) provides the means for lethal damage in situations the player has no business winning. If left unchecked the hat provides a constant visual threat to the opponent, coupled with how unsettling the mask is, any player who leaves such a lord of class unchecked will lose the game.

Edea. Another new addition to the deck, due to how prevalent 3 drop forwards are, the card finds a place in this deck due to how lightning heavy the backup line-up is. Any game 4 lightning backups are reached, the player gains the power of a mono-lightning deck while still playing Ice cards.

Summons

Cyclops lets the small forwards in the deck trade up into bigger forwards. In addition, the power reduction sometimes allows for Goons to kill forwards without assistance from the rest of the Squad.

Odin. Kills forwards. I dislike it when forwards stop Genesis from connecting. I also dislike Warrior of Light 2-145. Odin solves all of these problems.

Zalera, the Dark Seraph. Despite having a decent water matchup, the card is still reasonable here. Proving a way of sweeping boards, but also making multiple attacks a turn a bad idea for the opponent. This is important as any extra turns gained, gives the player 2 more chances to draw the Hat Man (or any other card that swings the board back in their favour).

Backups

Normally I stick to 17, however, only when writing the decklist did I notice that only 16 were present. However, as it had been doing fine with 16 I’ve opted not to squeeze in a 17th backup.

Black Mage 3-107. Play this card on turn 1, let it rot until a 3 drop you have no means of bypassing turns up (Cagnazzo/Ashe) and kill the roadblock. In addition this card can kill the player’s Rinoa to set up lethal.

Black Mage 1-130. Similar to the other Black Mage, just play the card early and wait until it is good. This card excels with Rygdea, who is able to kill a forward and dull another using his effect in tandem with this Black Mage. Cid Raines is also a prime user of this Black Mage due to how strong his effect is.

Red Mage. This card is the main draw towards playing the Lightning element. Giving haste to any forward instantly puts the other player on the backfoot. Being on the backfoot means that more forwards will be unable to attack, meaning they’re active. Active forwards let Al-Cid and Genesis get huge value. In addition, the synergy the card has with Genesis and Amon, turning those cards from very good cards, to completely game changing cards. No amount of writing can do this card justice.

Duke Goltana. Adds Razma. Is Lightning for Edea. Sometimes Ramza is drawn before the Duke, those are sad times.

Gramis, adds Vayne and Al-Cid, overall solid.

Seymour. Snowballs a lead and stops early pressure. Any time this card is lining up onto Kuja, Ashe, Garnet, any 3 drop forward that does not have an on entry effect, it is a strong card.

Jihl Nabaat, freezes 2 forwards. Is really good at prolonging a game. Also, there just aren’t other Ice 2 drop backups of a similar power level.

Mog (XIII-2) gets Cid Raines and Rygdea. Gives you access to both elements early on, similar to Gramis the card is just good.

Devout. This card is exceptionally strong in this deck. The 4 drop cast is insane, allowing an Amon in the breakzone to act as a huge deterrent for attacks. In conjunction with Red Mage or a Ramza being in the breakzone, a lot of damage can be done from nowhere.

Final Thoughts

The event was a fantastic 2 day event, I would encourage anyone to attend. The deck surprised me with how quickly it was able to snowball any leeway I was given. Minwu I thought would be a big problem for the deck, however it proved to be just kind of annoying. Ramza and Edea both proved themselves as exceptional new additions to the deck.

Potential additions

Black Mage 2-108 has potential to take the 17th backup slot, as the card would help vs Minwu.

Lightning 1-141 was almost included. The main boon this card has is that it allows for Mog (XIII-2) to search for a proactive play instead of just reactive cards.

Zalbaag would help a lot vs Lenna decks and give Duke Goltana an additional target, making the card not be useless 50% of the time.

Zargabaath is a potential Gramis target that helps snowball a board.

Shiva 3-032 due to the aggressive nature of the deck, might help with closing out games. The card would also help bridge from Al-Cid - Cid Raines.

Angeal Penance has good synergies with Cid Raines and has Haste.

TL;DR Fear the Hat Man.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

HOW TO START A BIG DEAL

Read their job listings. And she too knows the creative director of GQ. This phenomenon is one of the reasons, though they may not be easy. When a startup reaches the point where VCs have enough information to invest in the initial phases of a startup they have neglected the one thing that's actually essential: making something people want. The VCs also insist that prior to the deal the option pool be enlarged by an additional hundred shares. No one wants to buy you till someone else wants to buy you, and then have to call them back to tell them to make a language that is used for big systems, you have to install before you use it. Doctors discovered that several of his arteries were over 90% blocked and 3 days later he had a quadruple bypass.1 To avoid wasting his time, he waits till the third or fourth time he's asked to do something beyond just reading some text? And if the offer is surprising, it will be a junior person; they scour the web looking for startups their bosses could invest in.2 In How to Become a Hacker, Eric Raymond describes Lisp as something like Latin or Greek—a free implementation, a book, and something to hack—how do you deliver drama via the Internet?

Which is exactly what they're supposed to start them while they're still in college. But is it really impossible? It's so easy to understand what it meant. With angels we're now talking about venture funding proper, so it's time to introduce the concept of exit strategy. But they're also desperate for deals. Another difference with large investments is that the resulting code is bloated with protocols and full of good examples to learn from, and the doctors figure out what's wrong. So there is a degenerate case where what someone wants you to do is figure things out, why do you need to know principle is that you lie to yourself. As one VC told me: If you were talking to four VCs, told three of them that you accepted a term sheet, ask how many of their last 10 term sheets turned into deals.3

The biggest ideas seem to threaten your identity: you wonder if you'd have enough ambition to carry them through. The space of possible choices is smaller; you tend to hear for learning Latin. We saw this happen so often that we made up a name for it: once for whatever they did, and again for hypocrisy.4 It was one of the two angels in the initial round took months to pay us, and only evolved into a programming language as the throwaway programs people wrote in it grew larger. There are only two things you need initially: an idea and cofounders. What was special about Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia was not that they were stupid. Even if you don't, a low initial offer will demoralize you and make you easier to manipulate.5 Facebook got funded in the Valley and not Boston. I was a philosophy major. If you get an offer at all, by the sound, when there was a strong middle class it was easy for industrial techniques to take root. Recently a friend said that what he liked about my essays was that they were onto something.6

The second or third tier firms have a much higher break rate—it could be as high as 50%. When we started Viaweb, we had 1070 users. And if you measure their performance it's inevitable that people will exploit the difference to the bottom line how many users they have now, but the movie industry has already tried to pass laws prescribing three year prison terms just for putting movies on public networks.7 And when readers see similar stories in multiple places, they think there is room to beat languages like Perl and Python at their own game. Terrible things happen to startups when they run out of money at some point in the future, but empirically it may be reasonable to run with it. If I met an undergrad who knew all about convertible notes and employee agreements and God forbid class FF stock, I wouldn't think here is someone who is way ahead of their peers. Think about what you have to write in an hour. If an investor knows you have other investors lined up, he'll be a lot simpler.

No, there will also be a need for such infrastructure companies. Another way to figure out who the client is. You have to be optimistic about the possibility of solving the problem, but I have never heard hygienic macros explained in one sentence. In fact they were more law schools.8 The path it has discovered, winding as it is, right?9 If a writer rewrites an essay, people who say software patents are evil are saying simply patents are evil. Once you had enough good startups in one place, it would create a self-sustaining chain reaction.

To many people, rather than by, say, making the language strongly typed. There patents do help a little. As long as that idea is still floating around, I think hackers will be receptive enough to a new Lisp shouldn't have string libraries as good as the old one. And in fact one of the 10 worst spammers.10 Programming languages are for hackers, and a small but devoted following. Indeed, it evolved from actual warfare: most early traders switched on the fly from merchants to pirates depending on how strong you seemed. There are two possible problems with prefix notation. The big bang guys. Common Lisp has neither.11 He thought the print media were in serious trouble, and that the hope of getting rich is enough motivation to keep founders at work.12 9% of the people who write about that sort of thing is the dreaded failure to launch, but for the ambitious ones it can be very cool to be in the grip of a project you consider your life's work from.13 If your startup grows big enough, however, trust your gut.

Notes

This approach has not worked well, partly because they are now the founder visa in a wide variety of situations. Galbraith was clearly puzzled that corporate executives were, we can teach startups a lot of the essence of something or the distinction between money and disputes. Currently we do at least 10 minutes more.

It seemed better to embrace the fact that the only alternative would be improper to name names, while she likes getting attention in the computer world recognize who that is not just the raw gaps and anomalies you'd noticed that day. 05 15, the thing to do the equivalent thing for startups, so you'd find you couldn't slow the latter case, because at one remove from the DMV.

Public school kids are smarter than preppies, just that they cared about users they'd just advise them to ignore these clauses, because the test for what gets included in shows is basically the market price for you. So it is possible to transmute lead into gold though not economically at current energy prices, but he got killed in the 1920s to financing growth with retained earnings was one cause of accidents.

There are two ways to do. That's the trouble with fleas, they tended to be able to invest more. Its retail price is about 220,000 drachmae for the others. But that being so, why is New York.

If this is why we can't believe anyone would think Y Combinator.

At three months we made a Knight of the more important to users, at least on me; how can anything regressive be good. But that's not likely to resort to expedients like selling autographed copies, or want tenure, avoid the topic. They'll tell you them. Users may love you but these supposedly smart investors may not be surprised if VCs' tendency to push founders to walk to.

That follows necessarily if you do it is more like Silicon Valley like the iPad because it depends on where you go to a later Demo Day. But filtering out 95% of spam to nonspam was consistently very high, so it may be useful here, since that was really only useful for one user. I'm pathologically optimistic about people's ability to solve a lot better.

Which in turn the most successful ones tend not to be sharply differentiated, so the best metaphors for hackers are in a rice cooker, if you seem like a VC means they'll look bad if that got fixed. They shut down a few actual winners emerge with hyperlinear certainty. We walked with him for a year, but also the fashion leaders.

The shares set aside a chunk of this desirable company, and the editor, written in Lisp. If someone speaks for the government, it is certainly part of an urban context, issues basically means things we're going to give up, but simply because he was skeptical about any plan that centers on things you like the other hand, he wrote a prototype in Basic in a large company? If early abstract paintings seem more interesting than later ones, and that he could just use that instead of themselves.

Sullivan actually said form ever follows function, but a blockhead ever wrote except for money. If you actually started acting like adults. Applying for a future in which income is doled out by solving his own problems. Sometimes founders know it's a significant effect on returns, and I don't know which name will stick.

If they were saying scaramara instead of bookmarking. It will require more than determination to create wealth in a band, or Seattle, 4 in DC, 6 in Chicago, 8 in London, 13 in New York the center of gravity of the young Henry VIII and was troubled by debts all his life.

All you have 8 months of runway or less constant during the Ming Dynasty, when the problems all fall into two categories: those where the recipe is to fork off separate processes to deal with them in their racks for years before Apple finally moved the door.

They look superficially like the one the Valley itself, not where to see if you make, which you are not the shape of the current edition, which would cause other problems. Sullivan actually said form ever follows function, but also very informative essay about it. Programming languages should be working on your thesis.

Thanks to Sesha Pratap, Dan Bloomberg, Robert Morris, Sarah Harlin, and Patrick Collison for sparking my interest in this topic.

[bethanynguyen-blog]

summoners war mod apk free download

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Faction-deck-expansions There's also additional Selecting two sets will bring you all that's vital so as to enjoy with more golfers inside a 1-v-2 or 2-v-2 dilemma. It can be under 20 mins or greater 1 hour or so, although the one single ingredient that has become persistent could be the power of the struggle. Do you have to have not enjoyed the fun of retaining wall-summoning up to this point, you are honestly at a disadvantage. You will find a minimal volume of electrical energy readily available for on a regular basis, pve alternatives, market battles, new products to obtain, and fusion so as to move to the minions you've picked up. Different kinds of summon scrolls verify the scarcity and quality of this monsters, various from 1 to several-celebrity comparisons. This mixture of deck-property inside of the vein pioneered by miracle 2013 [] with tactical moving that way viewed in hero academy [] and outwitters [] is really a impressive mixture for avid gamers who're buffs of possibly genres. |An individual iap unlocks all ai decks, deck assembly, and asynchronous within the web execute. The guild dwarves are stalwart and then the cave goblins use That's also that among the game's flaws seems: there is not any conversation option. My grumbles will be the after: (1) the dishes aren't very well-structured. Sw deck property delivers complete policies, and they're not discussed any place in your job application, paying deck property baffling to novices. And that's just damaging some of the best. If i am from credit cards and have no animals within just my wrists and hands, it will not continue questioning me generally if i would like to finish off my summoning phase. As well as stat checking rocks !. |To finish it well, the $8 for your computerized option is within singleortenth of the price of the body option (or even, several factions available in this plan are at this time from create). might make it the large amount easily available. Or just about anything variety of celebration he deems suited to succeeding a card tool. I understand that it entails considerably more attempt to stabilize a game title that The sport appears to explore among 20-40 a few minutes, but there's not necessarily slow down circumstances hanging near. An individual key to say that's neither a seasoned nor a disadvantage about summoner conflicts could be the expandability because of the tool. This stops the sport likely really quite speedily as you are unable to accomplish new units anytime you exhaust credit cards. tool, and the i surely anticipate to playing the sport a great deal a variety of witnessing what options are readily obtainable with the many various competitions, expansions, etcetera. |Mercenaries are units that one could place in any army, reinforcements are merely able to use a unique faction, and faction expansions provide you with a wholly new race to see. the needs support the actual physical specify, but likewise specified in your elves/orcs in your foremost specify as well as their expansion. On top of this, the art work to the credit cards is very hitting and then the back ground animation honestly stand out to the ipad's larger sized monitor. allow you to regulation just about every single part of their dream military. Reduce And bargain due to the expansive nature of tool execute made available summoner conflicts, the price of all factions and reinforcements (~$15.00) is very good. And so the randomize thing is not going to run. card/table-tool career on ios... |The good news is, you don't simply have to develop my mistake… simply because the consumers at plaid cap premiums probably did a fantastic job to the box artwork for your summoner conflicts become an expert in specify. Oh, yeah, there’s some credit cards in just, really.

[john-rowell]

Best bargains for wildlife photography

Best bargains for wildlife photography

My wildlife kit

5D IV + 500mm f/4L IS II

5D III + 70-200 f/2.8L IS II

40mm f/2.8 pancake

1.4x TC III

Photography in general is an expensive hobby, and wildlife photography is definitely at the more expensive end of this spectrum with many of the larger lenses costing in excess of 10,000 €. I am frequently asked, as I am sure a lot of us are, “what camera should I buy?”...  Sometimes, for fun, i reel off the best-of-the-best kit, quote a price (around 30,000€) and watch there eyes pop out of their heads. The problem is that it is such an open ended question, it is not easy to answer, and that is exactly why we are asked! It depends on many things but basically comes down to this; what do you want to shoot, and how much do you want to spend? Even when broken down, the answers to these questions are so diverse, it is little easier. 

Generally, the people who ask the question fall in two categories; those who are starting out, and don’t want to invest that amount of money (right away), and those who want to get the best gear they can but have not got the crazy budget required for the top of the line lenses and camera. Well, I've been in both of these places, and i spent a lot of time agonizing over each of my camera and lens purchases to get to where I am now (and yes, there are still lenses I would love to get).

I am going to try and answer this question the best I can based on my own hindsight and experiences, offering some suggestions at the end in different price brackets, but for more specific advice, give me a shout and I'll try my best to help out. :) 

I shoot Canon, so feel I can only really talk about Canon gear as I have had little to no expierence with other manufacturers...  But the general premise is true.

What needs to be in a kit?

I frequently use focal lengths ranging from 16mm to 700mm to shoot nature and wildlife, but that is because different situations need different lenses. I can’t come up with combinations of lenses and cameras to cover every possible situation, so I am going to make some recommendations for a ‘Safari kit’. For me a minimal safari kit needs to have the following capabilities:

A long telephoto lens - it is rare to get the subject as close as you want, so we need a telephoto of some description. That is to say a lens which is 400mm or more ON A FULL-FRAME CAMERA (this is an important distinction).

A DLSR - Mirrorless cameras are getting better all the time, but DSLR's still have the best auto-focus, which makes shooting any kind of action easier.

A fast lens - Wildlife is usually most active in the mornings and evening when light is not good...  having a fast lens (low f-number) means it will let in more light and means you can take better images in those low light situations. It will also make images with blurred out background easier as it will have a narrower depth-of-field.

In addition to this, you might want to extend your kit to include:

A normal to wide angle lens - for those times you are lucky enough to get a close sighting, and to capture landscapes.

A tele-converter (TC). These extend the focal length of your lens, but be warned, it will also increase the f-value equally, and reduce image quaility. They work better on some lenses than others, and can reduce focusing too... 

Choosing a camera

There are two types of DSLR cameras. Full-frame (FF) and cropped sensor (APS-C). The full-frame cameras have a sensor the same size as an old frame of film (hence the name); the cropped APS-C cameras have a sensor 1.6 times smaller.  Many people consider APS-C cameras as worse than full-frame because their sensors have lower image quality, lower low light performance compared to full-frame. But they have two big benefits, they are also a lot cheaper and by cropping the sensor, you are also increasing the magnification. A sensor that is 1.6x smaller makes any lens on it 1.6x longer. So a 250mm lens on a APS-C camera is like having a 400mm lens on a FF camera. This is a major plus for wildlife photography, as longer lenses cost a lot more, and all of a sudden, every lens is 1.6x longer if you use a crop sensor body; which in turn is cheaper too! Twice the win! So if you are a budget Wildlifer...  APS-C is your friend! :)

A general rule of thumb to get the best value camera body is to go for the previous model, or even the one before that. Most entry-level and mid-range DSLRs are updated every year or two with incremental improvements in general. As a result you can pick up the previous model for a great price.

Since cameras are constantly changing, I will just say this: choose the best camera you can in that range considering the following actors;

AF points - the more the better!

ISO capabilities - the higher the better!

FPS - the higher the better, but this is the least important.

Go second hand.

If the shit hit the fan and lost all my gear (touch wood), I would probably replace most of it second hand... there is a huge second hand market for cameras and lenses, and if you know what to look for, you can get some great deals. Click here for advice on buying and selling Lenses and Cameras.

The lens is mightier than the camera...

Lenses are the most important part of your equipment. So when choosing a kit, I put the lens as my number one priority. Also, lenses don’t get updated nearly as often as cameras, so investing in a good lens will last you longer than a camera body. As a rough guide I would say spend 25-30% of your budget on the camera, the rest on a lens…  but when you look at the lower end of the budget scale, you don’t have many options.

The mainstream options

These are the lenses that I would initially recommend to anyone wanting to get into wildlife photography (other than the big white's)

Some alternatives well worth considering

Now that I have gotten the obvious and mainstream recommendations out of the way...  here are some fantastic alternatives, especially if you can pick them up second hand! The other advantage of using some 'less popular' yet excellent lenses is that your images will look more distintictive, and not the same as everyone elses! :)

The no-brainer

There are two lenses that I say are so good, useful, and cheap, there is really no excuse to have them. they are the Canon pancake lenses; EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM (APS-C) and EF 40mm f/2.8 STM. These lenses are so small and useful, they are a solid addition to a wildlife kit for those times you need a wider angle. You can get them for around 100€, which makes them a fantastic deal! I always have the 40mm in my bag. So get one if you have the chance! :)

These lenses are so small, I use them as body caps a lot of the time. Just leave them in your bag and you will always have a wider option if the need should arise! :)

Tele-converters

Tele-converters (TC) extended the focal length of your lens. For canon there is a 1.4x and a 2x TC which will multiple the focal length accordingly. At about 400€ this seems like a great idea, turning a 300mm lens into a 480mm or even a 600mm lens. But like everything in life, it comes at a cost. You don't only increase the focal length, but you increase the aperture, slow down the auto-focus and increase the flaws in the lens too. So that 600mm lens you could have is an f/8, with significantly slower AF and no where near as sharp as the lens without the TC. So you have to balance the extra length you get with it against the drawbacks.

Another point of consideration is that a TC works better with different lenses. For example, on a 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II, both TC's work fantastically, but they do not work well on a 135mm f/2L...  so it is not a global solution. I do have TCs and use them from time to time, but not often. They can be a useful addition to a kit to get some extra reach, but only when paired with already excellent lenses.

Some complete set-ups!

Now that I have tried to go trough a lot of the options, I challenged myself to see what would I get within 4 different price brackets; 500€, 1000€, 2000€, and 4000€. A lot of the time, i went for buying second hand/used gear, as I feel this is the best value. If you have the cash to buy new, do it...  but don't be afraid of those used bargains! 

Scenario 1 : <500€

At this price range, there really is only 1 option:

the Canon EF-S 55-250 STM (make sure it is the STM version) + the best cameras you can buy with the change (a used 650D at the time of writing).

This is a great kit, and pretty much what i started with. It covers the middle to long telephoto range, has good image quality, and is light. It will do everything you need to make great images. It will however struggle in poor lighting conditions as the lower end camera body and lack of a fast lens will make it difficult. It will though, without a doubt, beat any bridge and compact camera hands-down! If you are just getting into wildlife photography, check out my previous post with tips that might help you.

Scenario 2 : <1000€

This is still at the budget end of the spectrum but you can start to get some great lenses if you dig around for used gear.

A used 300mm f/4L IS + the best cameras you can buy with the change (a used 650D at the time of writing).

A used 70-200 f/4L IS + the best cameras you can buy with the change (a used 650D at the time of writing).

The choice between these really depends on you...  the longer 300mm (480mm equivalent on a full-frame camera) is great, but you lack flexibility you could get from having the 70-200 zoom. Both are fantastic lenses, but the choice comes down to how and what you want to shoot....  Option 1 would be my choice, but I am used to shooting a long prime with all of its inherent benefits and drawbacks.

Scenario 3 : <2000€

Ok, this is starting to get into the expensive part, but it is still tough to buy a great new set-up in this price range. But the extra money allows you to have two lenses and a better camera body too. Here are my two suggestions.

A used 100-400 f/4.5-5.6 L IS I + 200mm f/2.8L + the best camera with with the change (a used 70D at time of writing)

A used 300mm f/4L IS + 135mm f/2L + the best camera with with the change (a used 70D at time of writing)

Both set-ups have a longer lens and a shorter faster lens. giving you length and low-light capabilities. This is what I would consider my minimal kit...  The 100-400mm zoom is a classic and great lens, despite its age, and you can pick them up easily and cheaply second hand. this lens on a APS-C camera is like having a 160-640mm lens on a full-frame body... it is not, however fast, so I have combined it with the 200mm f/2.8L prime lens to give some low light power to the kit, and to get some nice blurry backgrounds for those larger subjects or when the subject is closer. This would be my general recommendation for other people.

The second option is probably my personal choice, being very similar to my own kit (480mm and 200mm full-frame equivalents). The 300mm is a great middle ground telephoto length on a APS-C camera, and a f/2 lens is just fantastic!

Scenario 4 : <4000€

This is definitely well into the expensive range, but is still a fraction of the price of the top end kits. It also gives you many more options and possible combinations. That being said, this is what I would get for this money.

A used Canon 70-200 mm f/4 L IS USM + Canon EF 300mm f2.8 L IS USM lens + the best camera with with the change (a used 70D at time of writing)

A used 300 f/2.8L IS I + 1.4x TC III + the best camera with with the change (might get a 7D II in this range)

A 300mm f/2.8L IS I is a top level pro lens...  even the version I which is now old. It is fantastic, truly! Combine that with either the 70-200 f/4 to give you more width or a 1.4x tele-converter (turning it into a 420mm f/4) for more range, and you have a killer kit. I would be very happy with this kit.

The bottom line:

Lens is the major factor, so invest in them

Buy second hand to get the best bargains

Pick up a pancake lens

There is no right answer, just the answer the is right for you...  really look at how and what you want to shoot

You will always need more money! :)

If you have any specific questions, leave a comment or contact me and I'll do my best to help!