#i also still have some good bonuses for this month and the next month

[rvbrestoration]

Tired. Sad. My head hurts. Stressed??? No time to really relax at all. And my country about to be taken over by the literal devil and there is no counting on anything after that.

[clockwayswrites]

Annalise&Tim, Magenta, Solstice, wood fire @roanawayspoons

Annalise is an OC from my fic City Pigeons Bleed Green who showed up briefly. This is an AU where she came to Bruce right away and lived. Uh, sorry that Tim is only dubiously present... but this got in my head.

“Hello, Bruce,” Annalise called from the sitting room that she favored. It was a slightly smaller one than the family room that the would gather in, but she always said that she liked how cozy and warm it was. The Manor, as old as it was, did tend to have a chill to it that would linger in the colder months.

Bruce generally dealt with the permanent cold by wearing warm, turtleneck sweaters and Dick simply never seemed to get cold. Helena liked to steal Bruce’s sweaters, for all that they came pooled around her feet. Annalise, though, seemed to struggle with getting warm with her poor circulation. (Bruce also harbored a fear that the complications around Helena’s birth had caused permanent harm to Annalise, such as the constant fatigue that she seemed to suffer.)

The warm, golden light of the fire spilled out of the half open door to the room and it felt like coming home to step into it. He leaned against the door frame with a smile “Hello, Lise.”

“Alright day at work?” she asked as she stuck her needle in the cross-stitch that she she had been working on.

There was a fifty-fifty chance that it contained a cuss that would make Alfred tsk at her.

“Mm, holiday bonuses went out today, so everyone was in a good mood.”

“Oh, I imagine,” she said with a smile.

The kid—more a pile of blankets and flash of black hair than anything else—who was asleep against her leg shifted. She carded her delicately painted nails through their hair.

“Is one of our sick?”

Annalise hummed in confirmation. “Poor thing was chilled to the bone.”

“That—”

“B! You’re home!” Dick called.

Bruce barely had time to swing around and catch him as he flung himself over the edge of the stare rail and at Bruce’s chest. At sixteen Dick was big enough to make Bruce have to brace himself to catch him. One of these days, Bruce knew he was going to get hurt doing this (but that would hardly stop him, not when his oldest still wanted hugs).

“Hey chum,” Bruce said as he swung Dick around and into the room and set him down. Not Dick who was sick then, which would save the manor a lot of whining. “How was your last day of school?”

“Super boring. We didn’t even do anything! I don’t know why we had to go!” Dick said in a rush.

“He also got, and ate, several candy canes,” Annalise added with a little smile.

“Also that,” Dick agreed.

Bruce tried not to laugh. “Well then it wasn’t all bad, was it. Did you save one for your sister?”

“I did, but she got even more than me! Not that she ate all of them, she’s saving them,” Dick said, like it was the most ridiculous thing that he had ever heard.

“Well, if she’s not feeling we—”

“Daddy!”

Bruce swung just in time to catch his daughter, who of course had also taken to flinging herself at him ever since Dick had started training her in gymnastics this year. The catch was a little fumbled as Bruce spun back to the room and whoever it was that was sleeping on the couch.

“Who—”

“Timothy Drake from next door,” his wife explained softly and with a little smile on her face that Bruce knew spelled trouble for him. Her fingers were still carding through the child’s hair. “Did you know that he’s all alone over in that monstrosity of a house? Poor baby walked over here, in the cold, completely drenched because a pipe had burst in the kitchen. It burst because the heat had gone out and his parents wouldn’t answer his calls about needing their approval for a new furnace. In December. He wanted to know if we had a wrench so that he could shut the water main off.”

Purposefully, Bruce relaxed his hold on Helena so that he didn’t squeeze her too hard at hearing all that. “I see.”

“Yes,” Annalise said. “So I brought him inside, made sure he got warm, and then we had some tea and cookies. I don’t intend to send him back to that house.”

“Of course not, it’s freezing.”

“Ever.”

“…I’ll call our lawyers up then.”

[tussive]

Man, outside of this shit with the one manager lying about me and me getting pissed off and not wanting to work with him, I'm looking pretty good at work right now. I mean, obviously they were already happy with what I've been doing so far, or they wouldn't have given me that raise out of nowhere. But now this week we're having issues with the one overnight crew member. We still don't really have many people who want to or can do overnight, so he was on I think five nights this week as well. Basically he's going to have to enter a 28 day inpatient program in the next couple of days for his mental health. But then I had to send him home early last night and then he called off tonight.

So i texted my manager like, "Hey I think we need to start planning for the very real possibility that he's not going to be back in until he completes this program." Which, going forward next week on, she can probably figure it out with the managers who are willing to help. And there is another crew member who was going to do overnights, but can't now, but said he could do for the 28 days that Cory is gone as a temporary thing. He just can't commit to doing it long term.

But this week is the problem, because anybody who could cover his shifts is already going to be at 40 hours and have other shifts they'd need to drop in order to get these shifts covered, so then she'd have to find coverage for those shifts. I'm going in tonight and I said if I absolutely had to, I could work my other day off as well. I don't really want to do that, and I know the company definitely doesn't want to pay me for 16 hours of overtime, but it's starting to seem like it may go that way.

But even if I do that, there were three more shifts this week that it was me and him, so I was talking to her about options on how we could get those shifts covered. She seems pretty happy that I'm reaching out to her to try and get situations resolved and am helping try to come up with solutions.

I've only been with the company for six months and I do think such a promotion would be a bit premature at the moment, but this kind of shit is really going to help me should the Assistant Manager position become available. Which due to some other stuff going on at the moment, could be happening relatively soon. Like, I know I'm good at my job and that I could probably get promoted eventually regardless, but I really feel like taking on the extra responsibilities that I have and being proactive in trying to resolve these issues is really going to speed that process up. Which is pretty exciting, because from what I understand the current AM's weekly take home pay is roughly double what I currently make. Now she's been with the company for six years, so she's probably gotten some raises. But she also gets like quarterly bonuses on top of that and all this other shit. I mean, that's like, to me, a crazy amount of money to make.

[theuniversitychallengereview]

Not So Smart Meter

On Friday our smart meter told us we had been charged £9 for heating, which spurred me into fiscal action. Well, I say it spurred me into action; I haven’t actually done anything, but it did alarm me. More so for some reason than any of the other do of money I have spent over the past 6 months. £100 at Asda, £37 on the bus to Glasgow. All fine, apparently. But £9 for a day of heating! That’s one step too far.

It turns out that this is because we had put the thermometer display thing in our bedroom, which had the radiators off (it gets too hot at night) so the system was desperately trying to heat up a room over which it had no power. This realisation calmed me down a bit (it was only £4 yesterday), but I’m still going to post my Patreon here for the first time in a while.

Get more from The University Challenge Review on Patreon

creating Irreverent Blogs

www.patreon.com

I write reviews of old episodes over there, and they tend to be a bit more in-depth (read — even longer and more self-indulgent) than the ones here. The latest one is due out tomorrow and is on the quarter-final between Bangor and Imperial from 2012/13. Subscribe for as little as £1/month (that’s 11% of one day of heating if you forget you’ve turned the radiators off in the bedroom.)

Turn the internet off.

I’ve been doing Local Month of Writing a Novel this month (as explained in a previous edition of this��blog), and most days it has taken me upwards of 2 hours to get the 1667 words down.

Today, I turned the wifi off and blasted through 2000 words in one hour. This could just be due to the fact that I struck a rich vein of inspiration, but it’s also definitely at least partly due to the fact I wasn’t periodically on the Fantasy Football Reddit, or Twitter, or Bluesky, or Instagram, or YouTube, or…

Its incredibly simple, but if you cut off access to these timesinks then you cannot access them. Meaning that you get through your work a lot quicker, leaving you plenty of time to write tips on how to get through your work a lot quicker.

Anyway, onto this week’s episode, the second repechage match, between SOAS and Durham.

The University Challenge Review

Subscribe for weekly reviews of University Challenge, an irreverent take on Britain's quirkiest quiz show

www.quizposting.com

Here’s your first starter for ten.

Unfortunately at this point I’m going to have to turn the internet back on because I need to rewatch the episode. Here’s hoping I can avoid clicking on the Youtube shorts tab. Wish me luck.

Brookfield-Pertusini introduces herself by saying she is ‘quite literally reading English literature’, which I personally find to be a bit cringe, but perhaps I am just becoming an old man.

Nash hits back for Durham with pheromones, but he talks himself out of five points on the bonuses because he doesn’t believe that the football team Villarreal could possibly be from a town called Villarreal.

Provinces gives Hasler his first points of the night, then both sides miss the picture starter, on the word turnip in different languages. Roberts hears the word Ra and buzzes with Egypt, winning Durham the picture bonuses, of which they take one.

Rajan calls, and Nash is first to pick up with telephone on the next starter. They are thirty points clear, but Lambert sneaks in with Trojan horse to keep SOAS close.

Another for Hasler gives SOAS the lead going into the music round, but Brookfield-Pertusini is quickest to recognise the Peep Show theme song and steals it back.

Brookfield-Pertusini, who, as we remember, is studying English literature, takes the picture starter by recognising a wordless version of the cover of The Bell Jar. She is good on the bonuses too, but mistakes Normal People for Conversations with Friends. A mistake I made too, because I thought Normal People was red, which it often is, but not in the original printing.

Makaton gives Dorn her third starter, and further ten-pointers from Lambert and Hasler give SOAS a fifty-five-point lead with two minutes to go.

It would have been a sixty-point lead had Dorn been allowed her answer ‘af Klimt’ when the correct answer was ‘af Klint’. I think this demonstrates sufficient knowledge, and presume that it was disallowed because of the artist Gustav Klimt. But she said the ‘af’ so it is clear she knows who she is talking about. Very harsh, in my opinion.

And very important.

Nash keeps Durham in the game with ER, and they do a very good job of answering the bonuses very quickly, passing quickly too when they don’t know. Roberts takes another with Richard II, and a hat-trick put them ten points adrift.

Ten points which disappeared with scattering from the skipper. A single bonus would win them the game, but the gong beats them to it.

Tiebreak.

A question with the answer slipstream was dropped by both teams.

A second question was also dropped by both teams but cut from the show — thanks to Bluesky user trainingmontage for pointing me in the direction of the YouTube comment by one of the SOAS team.

A third question with the answer llama is buzzed on by SOAS’s Lambert, but unfortunately he says alpaca.

A fine guess. I don’t know how much more obvious the rest of the question would have made it that the answer was llama not alpaca, but it was a good tactic to be first on the buzzer here. It’s just a shame that he was wrong. And a shame that ‘af Klimt’ was disallowed.

SOAS 145–150 Durham

Incredible comeback from Durham. As Youtube commenter Ramboost007 says, they remind us that in UC 55 points is just a 3-possession lead.

Tough to take for SOAS, but a very entertaining show for the viewer.

See you next week for the first of the second-round matches.

For now, I’m off to check my smart meter.

[expirisims]

Hello All!

So...I've been on a bit of a hiatus once again! I have been super busy in my personal life as always. I am hoping to get some play time soon, I've been really itching to open my game especially while my manuscript is still with my betas for a few more weeks. Anyway, I have some plans!

For my Sims game, I have been really wanting to make another world, or maybe more...I don't know, I'm too indecisive. I have been toying with the idea of making a roadless village type island, possibly resurrecting my old Pickerling Cove world I started ages ago and did not complete, and a new idea that ties into my real life a little bit. I started a world years ago and it corrupted so it was never completed, however, I found some of the old builds for that world from before the corruption that I have tested in game. I'm thinking of remaking the original concept and using those old builds where I can. Some of them unfortunately will be quite impossible to use because of the terrain, however, I am wanting to incorporate interiors that I am planning to make in 1/6 scale for my little one's doll town. Yes, I have an entire hidden doll city planned in our playroom...and I've been watching too much Youtube in my free time lol! Anyway, I'm thinking that building the various cafe's, apartments ect in Sim World will help me make design choices for the compartments I have planned in the window seat, coffee table and bookshelf in our playroom.

I have also started sewing some clothes for my kiddo's dolls because we have mostly rags left over from my childhood, modern Barbie clothes are simply not the same as they were when I was a kid and let's just say it's a good thing the majority of my kiddo's Ken dolls have molded on underwear! That being said, I would love to share pictures with you all, but I don't want to clutter up Simblr's with non sims stuff so I am planning to open a second page for sharing my crafts! As long as Tubmlr still exists that is.

I know this is already long, but I wanted to at least share my last played day in Redwood Harbor (from months ago) below the cut as I haven't shared pictures in a LOOOONG time! Thanks for sticking around to read this and I hope everyone is doing well! Now on to the pics!

I don't remember exactly what was going on, but I do know that Antonio is still working nights and Joanna is getting VERY pregnant so once I get back into game she may go into labor by the end of this rotation!

Woohoo! Jody has learned to walk! I'm going to be honest, the Sims toddlers wear me out so I have never really tried to get their skills accomplished until my Redwood Harbor save, lol! Quite proud of my little sims!

Looks like it was off to the winter festival the next day! Antonio works nights and Joanna is on maternity leave already...aaand of course, they left Jody to fend for himself while they went ice skating!

Left over salad it is for dinner...Joanna what are those shoes you're wearing with that outfit!!??

OMG!! Really!!?? I'm pretty sure these two are going to break up again so I'm not sure how this is going to work out!

Time for bonuses! Better luck next year Joanna, maybe you won't be on maternity for most of the next year so you can progress in your career, fingers crossed the sims in this save seem to be very fertile.

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE playing this save?

[stayininmylane]

cas it's been all over my dash, please what is up with incredibox i thought it was just a beat maker how does it have lore????

It was the art post that parodied My Immortal wasn't it. Yeah I'd have questions too

I'm so sorry for the invasion my broski.... but I'm glad you're in it with me now! teehee :3

Alright SO

The main game Incredibox (which you can buy for £4.99 on Google Play, Steam, and the Apple Store) is pretty simple. It has its sounds you assemble, and if you assemble them in the right order you can unlock 3 little cutscenes called Bonuses!

Most of the time they're just really cool mini-music videos that have a cute animation playing to an new spin on the sounds. Coolio visual spectacle. But SOME of them have visuals and lyrics that connect to each other! A little bit of worldbuilding! It built up over time until it culminated in the 8th official version, which has very long bonuses that connect together to form a gorgeous-looking 3 minute short film. Which was, insane! at the time. Especially since the film revealed that one of the guys from an earlier version was not only given extreme Story Importance in these bonuses, but also superpowers.

Yeah it was wild man,,, I wish I could've been in the fandom at the time

The 9th official version is much more lowkey with its storytelling, but it has a bunch of visual cameos and lyrical references that connect it back to the 8th. Its 2 (for now!) bonuses are shorter but jam-packed with gorgeous visuals and just,,, such earworms. (All of the bonuses are on YouTube btw, and all are named as well—that's where we get names for concepts.)

Nonetheless, Incredibox's story focuses on building up visually interesting concepts into a world, and picking one or two characters to drive a story if needed. Being a FNAF fan, I love this kind of implicit storytelling.

Some fan-made Mods of the Official Game take a similar, but more explicit approach. The most iconic one is the Evadare series of mods, which have some of the best fan-made bonuses to date. The last mod in the series, The Void, is also musically better than any official version. Each mod goes for the short-film approach, telling an explicit—if a little wild—story. The music was built first and the story built second, like the official game, but because the story is more explicit, we get some wild turns. We're in space. Then we're in Halloween town. Now we're pirates. Now we're in The Void.

There are many good mods that you can download and add to the official version of the game. But for fans who:

a) don't have the official version,

b) don't know how to program with json,

and/or

c) don't know how to animate with an Adobe Animate sprite sheet,

Scratch is the prime way to mod. Stories are all the rage in the fandom, but it's hard to add bonuses on Scratch. So to tell stories, people instead opt to make lore documents, with each sound having its own (sometimes gruesome) backstory...sometimes at the cost of sounding good. Orin Ayo is the most popular example of this, popular enough to form its own little sub-fandom. People love making OCs in the story, though there are better story-based Scratch mods like the Colorbox or Sepbox series.

As much as Incredibox pervades your dash now, it'll probably be gone in a few months when I move onto the next oingly spoingly...but it's still something I recommend you try out!

[authorsadiethatcher]

I wanted to write an update earlier this month, but I was waiting on a piece of news to report. It took most of the month, but now I can talk about it fully below.

April was exciting, May started out great, but little bits of panic and anxiety have set in. Nothing to fear, but damn, have I needed a couple wins recently.

Amazon is where most people find my books, so here’s a link to my catalogue: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Sadie-Thatcher/author/B00B4MINAC

Smashwords is a great place to buy books, especially if you don’t like Amazon’s evil empire. You can find them here: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/sadiethatcher

Plus, you can find them at the Google Play bookstore: https://play.google.com/store/books/author?id=Sadie+Thatcher

I’ve added a new way you can get my books. It’s called Ream and it’s a bit like Patreon, but its author specific, made by authors for authors. I’m still working through a few kinks, but this is an opportunity to get all of my books at each month and a few bonuses. You can see my Ream page here: https://reamstories.com/page/lhssployqw

Additionally, my books are available through Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Scribd. I don’t have links to those stores handy, but if that’s where you like to buy books from, my books will show up there, eventually. I distribute through Smashwords and have to wait until the review team there approves my books for distribution. This can take days or even a week.

Big News Alert

My next fantasy novel is here, written under the name Libby Feron. Rogue Elf is the second book in the Magic’s Most Wanted Series, continuing Tempest Ravifort’s saga. She’s a bounty hunter trying to keep the magical world a secret from the humans, and put her sister through college. Poor, but noble. The book is currently available for preorder and the release date is May 30. That’s next week! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C5ZTQFS3/

Plus, the cover is absolutely gorgeous.

If fantasy is your thing, take a look at all of my novels here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Libby-Feron/author/B09PJ9J5RN

And if you sign up for the Libby Feron newsletter, you get exclusive content and updates like cover reveals before anyone else. I have a bonus prequel scene up for the Magic’s Most Wanted Series that will be exclusive to newsletter subscribers. You can sign up here: https://libbyferon.com/newsletter/

With the fantasy novel plug complete, let me also mention some of the cool stories I have coming out in the next month month.

I’ve got two more books in the Bimbo Records Series to release. Women trying to break into the music industry find success, but only after they bimbofy themselves for their manager.

I also have a series coming up that features women who feel left behind by society’s rising beauty standards and they will do anything to keep up. Even though they know images are airbrushed and altered before going online, they push past that and make their realities as good or better. There might be an addiction to social media likes involved as well. I haven’t decided yet.

And in the second half of June, I will be beginning a Bimbo Academy series. It could be a finishing school or someplace where wayward women are sent to be rehabilitated into happy bimbos. We will see where my muse takes me on that.

Finally, the days of Fake It Until You Make It being available on Amazon Kindle Vella are numbered. I have requested the story come down from Vella so that I may publish it in other forms, including turning it into an audiobook. I don’t expect anything to happen on this until about June 7, but this is your warning to download those episodes now so you can read them at your leisure. Now I just need to get my narrator working on the audio.

[dollycas]

The Sunday Salon is a Facebook group that has become an informal week-in-review gathering place for bloggers. It is also a place to share our thoughts about things of a bookish nature. You can also link up weekly on Readerbuzz. The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Book Reviewer ~ It’s a chance to share news~ A post to recap the past week on your blog, showcase books and things we have received, and share news about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead. HAPPY SUNDAY EVERYONE! I started out the week just being tired and feeling off, no pain at all. I pushed through, but like last week, I went to bed super early because my body needed the rest. Again, I am behind on my reading and reviews, but doing my best. Wednesday was a big day for Son #2. A couple of years ago, we all thought he had a great job that would allow him to provide for his family for years. He was even on company billboards around the area.  Several weeks ago, he saw the writing on the wall. The company was closing plants around the US, and there were more shutdowns than ever before, some lasting a month or more. We also knew the current administration was planning tariffs, and this company brings in parts from Mexico. He said, "I can't raise my family on unemployment and the uncertainty of everything from wages to insurance, and bonuses." They have a union, but the union can only do so much, especially under this administration. So he applied for and got a job with the Department of Corrections and entered their academy. He graduated on Wednesday, and his dad and I were thrilled to attend. He started his job the next day, and we are beyond proud of him. Thursday, we met with a doctor at the infectious disease clinic. I am handling the antibiotics well and have 3 weeks of intravenous meds to go. Then she told us they would like to keep me on oral antibiotics after that for an undetermined length of time due to the recurring infection. I questioned the side effects, and she explained how the meds work and why I have a certain side effect to many of my meds in easy-to-understand language, which I appreciated. My kidneys and liver will have to be monitored closely, and that made me remember that my mother was on dialysis when she passed away, and I don't want to follow her on that path. I am making a list of questions for my next appointment, I am doing some research, and a few friends have reached out who have been on antibiotics long-term. I need to make an educated decision. Friday, we met with people at the hand and upper extremity clinic. They removed my bandages and splint, and said everything looks good. Mr. Dollycas took pictures but will not be sharing because it freaked me out, no need to share that. I was allowed to put some lotion on my dried-out arm as long as I stayed away from the incisions. It felt sooooo goooood. There was still a bit of swelling, so they didn't remove any sutures. I was then handed off to Occupational Therapy, where they made me a new splint. They put large bandages over the incisions, put a cotton sleeve on my arm, attached the splint, and sent us on our way. I return to both clinics in 2 weeks. The first appointment is at 8:15, and it's over an hour to get there, so we will be up early. I just hope for good news and to get rid of this splint. The hand is mostly paralyzed, but you never realized how much you use an arm until you can't. LOL With my appointment, we were unable to attend Kaden's track meet on Friday night, but were thrilled to receive his text telling us he through the discus 96 feet, a personal best. HOW WAS YOUR WEEK? Weekly Rewind - April 1 - 5, 2025 Tuesday - Waters of Destruction (An Orchid Isle Mystery) by Leslie Karst #Spotlight #Giveaway – Great Escapes Book Tour @lesliekarstauthor @severnhouse Wednesday - Cozy Wednesday featuring – One Sharp Stitch (A Nimble Needle Mystery) by Allie Pleiter #Spotlight / #Giveaway Great Escapes Book Tour @alliepleiter @KensingtonBooks Thursday - Murder off U Street (The Academic Mom Mysteries) by Jacque Rosman #Spotlight / #Giveaway – Great Escapes Book Tour @JacquelineCorcoranAuthor Saturday - Murder, She Wrote: Snowy with a Chance of Murder by Jessica Fletcher and Barbara Early #Review @BerkleyMystery @AuthorBarbaraEarly New Arrivals and My Reading Itinerary Monday will return soon! Your Escape Into A Good Book Travel Agent   Read the full article

[foreverisntenough]

reliable sources saying he will earn an average wage at madrid (220k ish) whilst we were offering 300k. ie, he actually just wanted to leave that badly. so all that “who wouldn’t choose 400k” can stop now. they clearly don’t value him like we do.

so, can we stop pretending like the only reason he could leave is because of us fucking him over? let’s call a spade a spade - this is betrayal on his part.

Hope you're ready for a long one...

First, let me be clear, I am hurt and I am angry about this situation especially how it was managed but we're going to get into my opinion on the complexity of it...

Welcome to my TedTalk: Today we will cover the contract chaos & lack of squad depth, the big three and the bigger picture, the betrayal, the optics & the owners’ role, the exploitation of loyalty... all whilst my heart breaks from behind my screen.

Here we go.... 🙄

"Reliable" is such a subjective term. This situation isn't black and white, and I feel too emotionally invested to debate the financial semantics of a football club—especially when it’s something entirely out of my control. We will never see Trent’s bank account when he joins Real Madrid, yet the financial aspect is already being used as bait. The numbers floating around don’t even include the massive sign-on fee (paid weekly, mind you) or the bonuses he’ll receive. Personally, I don’t care about what he’s going to make; I care about what’s being left behind—and right now, that’s nothing. We are losing my favorite player for absolutely nothing to a club I loathe.

Even so, this is about money, but it also isn’t. Because while I believe his decision is a mistake, that opinion comes from a biased, empathetic, sad, and angry Liverpool fan.

A little more from me-

On the contract chaos & lack of squad depth....

This isn’t just about Trent. If you think FSG is conducting good business here, you’re lying to yourself. Aside from Trent, we have two other big, if not the biggest players all but set to leave, with Ali, Robbo, and Ibou potentially following. The contract situation is alarming.

Have you looked at where we’ll be in 2027? It might feel far away, but when you break it down by seasons, it's next season and then into January of the following. By then, we’re looking at Diaz, Jones, Jota, Elliott, Gomez, Bradley, and Tsimikas all out of contract. Maybe they’re not the biggest names, but they’re who we’ll have left.

For months, some fans insisted we didn’t need Trent, preferring Bradley instead. But now that Bradley would be our only right-back, the tone changes. People are mad at Trent (rightfully so in part.) Even if Bradley performs amazingly, who is behind him? He’s injury-prone and doesn’t have Trent’s experience or threat. One viral clip from a tournament we got knocked out of this year isn’t enough to replace years of quality. (I know he's done more but walk with me)

You look at our defense and two of our starting 11 in the back four are over 30, the other CB is injury prone in addition to his contract being up just as soon… Tsimikas has never been good enough, Joey G is injury prone and on the verge of leaving, was last year too, and Quansah really isn’t up to snuff. That's hardly an assurance for someone who is still 26. It just isn’t. 

Our last defensive acquisition was in 2022, Calvin Ramsey. Who played 93 in minutes; one carabao cup game against derby and then 3 minutes in another match... and was never seen again. We’ve survived off Klopp and the willpower of our squad’s long term players that have been good scoutings but nevertheless, sheer talent of those players. 

Many signings have never touched the pitch... But those aren’t the moves we should be making. We’ve made either ineffective signings or none at all, and let players rot on the bench, and then turned around and acted like it’s the players’ fault for wanting more.

You have the likes of Arthur Melo, who never played, you have teams offering 70 M for Nunez but FSG is saying "no that's too low..." so then what's "too low" for the club's local lad? Because right now... it got to 0. They are exploiting the loyalty and hanging him out to take the heat for the fact that they've never paid FOR him.

Paying 43M for Mo Salah isn't normal and yet we as fans take it as some “win.” And it is! But the real "win" came from the player's drive, not FSG's financial tactics. Trent may not be as valuable as say signing Mo was but he has brought every trophy he could back home with him.  He’s won us games. When he's on the field we play better (save an occasional off game, which every player has.)  But playing with Rhys Williams and Nat Phillips as your CB pairing shouldn't happen at a big club. And with that in mind, we shouldn't be paying Luis Diaz less than Nat Phillips who isn't even playing on the 25 man team anymore. We shouldn't be using any of our starting 11 against Accrington Stanley either. These players simply aren't being "valued" accordingly.

So it's not the "only" reason but it's "a" reason this happened.

This contract mess isn’t a future problem—it’s a now problem and it has been past problem happening for a few years. The amount of money and work needed to sort this out in the next three plus years is massive, yet historically, the club has never "spent" properly to fix these situations.

Okay, the big three and the bigger picture...

Three of our starting eleven—three of our biggest players, names, and leaders—are in the final 90-odd days of their contracts. If it were just one holdout, they would have signed already. One of them is the captain of the club. They aren’t "waiting" on Trent. If they were, that would contradict the idea that no player is bigger than the club. And they wouldn't have let the crash out happen the way it has. I digress...

After those three, another five starters will be in the same situation next year. And the cycle continues. By 2027, we’ll have almost reached a point where nearly the entire starting eleven has either left or is out of contract. 

Trent is not Virgil or Mo. Talent aside, he’s at a different point in his career. And that’s a hell of an overdrive to play through in a career with a shelf life and one he still has time left in. 

To be clear, he should have re-signed so we got something—no doubt about that. People love to debate who was easiest to resign but what’s at stake was something you can negotiate, it's factual age. A two-to-three-year deal for Mo and Virgil sees out their careers roughly, keeps their kids in the same schools, and gives them stability, legendary status. Trent has that same option, but then he'd be under 30 and would still be in a rebuild by the time that contract ended. Maybe he could sign for 9 years, 5 years, 1 year, but he has a lot more at stake to “lose” than the other two. 

I agree, he should've signed something so we got some money because he should value himself that worth that but also to respect the club that way. But it is odd that neither he, nor Virg, nor Mo... were able to do that and now we're into 90 days. He isn't isolated, there are two other players with him. Because this was not sorted when any of them had say 2 years left on their current deals, a la what Ibou is in rn. There is no clarity in the club and Trent made a decision that lost him legacy.

People act like Trent has had a "blessed" team, and to a degree it’s true but he’s also been part of Klopp's build and the grind of those players it took to get "back." It took us half a decade to recover from the hole Luis Suárez leaving left. If the roles were reversed and news broke this week that Virgil was leaving, would the reaction be the same? Maybe, likely maybe not. But that’s the problem—this whole thing is based on assumptions and optics. And right now, Trent has completely fucked up the optics because his situation, the eyes on him, the emotional ties to him, and his place of birth make it a bigger spectacle. 

And now, the betrayal, the optics & the owners’ role....

Trent is local. Mo and Virg are not. That’s what makes this different. He is scouse. It's different. Period.

And ahead of the Merseyside Derby, one of the biggest clubs in the world just "let" the media run with the story that the scouser in the squad is leaving—while the league is the only trophy left on the table? Say swear. 

Do you know how insane it even is for the club to let their own player get dragged for days without saying a word? No updates, no statements — but instead decided to post on ig about how a foreign player "really loves the fans and the club" while everything burns. Mental move from the social team.

An interesting side bar I want to bring up here. Maybe this is done by Trent’s advisory, likely not him, but his agency, either way we don’t know – but it’s worth considering whether it be from RM or LFC’s contract with him. I bring up something quite technical… In the prem atm as of 2024 latest (I don’t have the time to find 2025s,) there is a media clause in player contracts that they have to do media. In turn, Trent is either facing some fucking hefty fines RM are paying off, or Liverpool are helping him not do media by filing ‘duty of care to the player.’  Either way, it’s not “Trent” entirety being a dickhead (yes, he is that too) but there is such a bigger web being spun. 

Context: “For the purposes of the promotional community and public relations activities of the Club and/or (at the request of the Club) of any sponsors or commercial partners of the Club and/or of the League and/or of any main sponsors of the League the Player shall attend at and participate in such events as may reasonably be required by the Club including but not limited to appearances and the granting of interviews and photographic opportunities as authorised by the Club”. that players must make themselves available for: “…up to six hours per week of which approximately half shall be devoted to the community and public relations activities of the Club”.

So in regards to media, then to have the likes of ITV reposting the Ballon D’or clip, ESPNuk, Sky Sports all harping on this "downfall" the optics on the situation turn on Trent as per are targeting him villainous, and maybe he is but it’s easily painted villainy. Right or wrong move, the stakes have always been higher with him and he didn’t manage this well. 

If the club can’t tie down even one of these three players, that’s massive. We’ve seen it happen before with Suárez. If two more follow, and then another set the next season with zero backing from FSG, it becomes impossible to ignore. 

Right now, when our starting eleven is forced to fill the gaps, we look at Quansah, Chiesa, and Bradley. Maybe you switch it up with Gomez and Elliott, but are we serious? We’re meant to compete with that? If you take Trent and Bradley out of this, we’re talking about replacing Van Dijk with Quansah. No disrespect to him, but the talent gap between our starters and our bench is alarming. Teams ebb and flow but the way this transpired was avoidable.

We never replaced Fabinho. We still haven’t built a proper midfield. We ran Ryan and Macca to the ground. Elliott makes 40K a week, Jones makes 15K. How are we supposed to believe anything is going to shift when even paying competitive wages is a problem? We've never been the “big spend club” and that's very reflective of who LFC are and I've always liked that but when Marc Guehi (no shade) is being valued at 70-80 million and we're making the type of revenue we do as a club, there comes a point where we need to evolve to stay in the game. Because we're in for a wake up call trying to replace Mo Salah, Virgil Van Djik, and Trent Alexander-Arnold. Those are world class players LFC paid nothing for in terms of what they gave back. And that in turn is why it’s so mental, from Trent and the club that he’s going for free. 

On to the exploitation of loyalty...

And this is what makes me livid—this has turned into survival over passion. Players’ loyalty is being exploited.

This is absolutely not an excuse for Trent's way of leaving, but it is part of the bigger reality. His departure isn’t inexcusable. It is stupid, hurtful, and rude, cowardly, disappointing, upsetting etc… But there are many excuses available. Players stop being seen as people and become nothing more than products with money signs over their heads. When does a player get to make a decision about their life without death threats... And when do fans get reliable information on decisions happening in the club they fund....

I’m mad because "reliable sources" claim Trent’s idea of "success" didn't align with what I personally associate with "loyalty." And he hasn’t given me a reason to believe otherwise. He reportedly views them separately. And that's the thing, they are two separate entities but he made a choice between the two. And I don't like it.

Yes, we are one of the best clubs in the world. Yes, we compete for trophies. But every year, our house of cards begins to crumble in the second half of the season because we don’t invest in depth. 

We’ve had to rely on Klopp’s ability to bring through young players—but that has often been out of necessity rather than design. Winning with 18 year olds was amazing, I loved it, I'm not giving the trophy back it was merited but it shouldn't have to happen that way. Not Trent but the likes of Clark, McConnell, Koumas, Danns. They will maybe have their time, but there hasn't been a starlet in the way Trent came through. And despite all of that, we haven’t bought a player in three windows, aside from Chiesa (for just £12M) and a goalkeeper who hasn’t even arrived yet. And we haven’t renewed any contracts bar someone like Quansah!  

This is a horrendous look for both Trent and the club. I’m fuming at him, but I also acknowledge that we don’t know what has been said behind closed doors. That’s why my anger can’t be directed at just one side. Because FSG is a $13B conglomerate, while Trent is a single human being. It’s unfair to place all the blame on his person (not his agency but his heart)  when the owners clearly don’t value their homegrown talent enough to fight to keep him there. And you can argue how do you know they didn't, he's betraying us. And he is! But, two things can exist at once.

I tend to ask how a 13 billion dollar conglomerate isn't able to retain one of it's holdings three best players, when it comfortably just signed a player to the Red Sox last month to make $833k a week... Liverpool makes more in revenue than that organization and has a higher value than the Boston Red Sox too so it feels unfair for fans to fault Trent for leaving his city when the owners themselves don't seem to care that he's from there. I think there is more than money at play here because clearly there are other players who don’t feel they are being treated with the ‘value’ and ‘respect’ they deserve as well. Why has Ibou not signed? It's because of how the club is being managed... Doesn't make Trent any less of shitty person for doing this but "let’s call a spade a spade" like you said... our club is fucking people over and it's not just players...IT'S THE FANS TOO!!! Raising ticket prices? Still trying to trademark 'liverpool' so small businesses can't sell merch?

Deep breath... some final thoughts....

The same “reliable" sources say Trent wanted assurance that LFC/FSG would invest and compete for trophies. Maybe what "competing" looks like to him is different from what it looks like to us. But it’s not reassuring when we lose to Plymouth Argyle, are knocked out of the Champions League, and lose a Carabao Cup final with three injured defenders and hadn’t signed anyone in the January window for the third time 

That does not in any way excuse Trent’s behavior off the pitch, I’m raging about it but it’s hard to see us do this year after year and not feel discouraged. And something I’ve been waiting for has been someone citing a full season where Trent has been “bad” and it’s not there imo. In fact, it’s only been bad games he’s had (have they been crucial, yes. But has he had crucial contributions, also yes.)  and that’s a reflection of what we’re looking at. Three players who are so talented we can only cite mere individual bad performance errors. Still, I believe in Slot, he’s exceeded expectations but it will be a rebuild nevertheless in the next 2-3 years minimum.

And now Trent, the local lad, will take the heat for it. And it is merited, the situation was handled incorrectly. He has been cowardly. That said, the club is also at fault for their comfortability letting the narrative become "he betrayed us" rather than facing the reality that this is part of a larger failure. LFC and FSG should protect their players until they’re not and personally, letting three of their biggest contracts get down to 90 days is unforgivable. (if they've signed or resined) what they, and in this circumstance also Trent, failed to acknowledge and be aware of was the community and the fans that make up this city. That makes a situation like this such a betrayal because that is how loyalist of a place it is. It’s treason-esque in my opinion

Trent should have handled this differently. No question. I’m beyond angry to the point I’m just sad. It makes me nauseous to even talk about it.

At the end of the day, this came down to career drive. And unfortunately, Trent prioritized accolades over loyalty, and we won’t ever know the reasons he got to the point of making that decision but we have "evidence" it wasn't always a goal to leave. And that fucking hurts. I don’t like that I don’t like my favorite player anymore.

Both parties betrayed the other. But it’s unfair to claim we have that same "evidence" of one side not caring when we’ll never have access to evidence of what happens in the boardroom the way we do of Trent’s on camera.

Trent will have to wear this decision. It’s his face, his name on the line. And so, the saga of Trent Alexander-Arnold’s career—his life—being mismanaged continues...

Thank you for reading lol because if you made it this far 👏👏👏👏 Applause for you, tears from me.

[aspiring-artist-em]

I feel the need to add to this.

my credentials: i'm a swiftie, went to the eras tour, saw 1989 on tour.

taylor swift isn't a feminist. she's a GREAT artist, my god. she's one of my favorite songwriters of all time, and will probably consistently stay in that little box of music i like. i have some of her albums on record, and i know the lyrics to almost all of her songs. i fucking cried when she played all too well, 10 min version live. i screamed to her discography oh the way to and back from her tour.

THAT BEING SAID

she is NOT a feminist. she is NOT an activist. she is a white, female capitalist who sees that she can make money off of feminism. she's blonde, thin, pretty, talented, and doesn't get too involved, which is perfect for being a celebrity in this country and she knows it. because of this, she has fucking nations tweeting at her, she has the fucking fbi using her lyrics in their social media posts, both fox news and cnn go feral for her glitz and glam and it's so hard for them to agree on something, but they both agree that she's cute with travis kelce.

however, she still needs to appeal to the feminists out there. women make up 52% of her fanbase, according to a US survey by the Morning Consult, and i guarantee at least one of the 52% of women are feminists. additionally, it's cool to be a feminist nowadays, it's profitable, and that's what her main priority, after all. Money. did i mention she's a capitalist?

so how does one profit off of feminism without ACTUALLY having to tackle hard topics such as the intersectionality of white supremacy and misogyny? additionally, how does she play the innocent card when she chose to date a known racist? Feminism. at least, her definition of it.

The definition of feminism, occurring to Oxford Dictionary, is as follows: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes". for this purpose, the sexes is referring to male, female, trans men, trans women, non-binary people, people who don't want to be labeled, etc. Essentially, it's equality between genders and also, biological sexes. Taylor swift probably knows this, however, her definition of feminism is more like: "something i can use to make money, or defend myself from getting attacked online."

taylor only uses feminism to further her agenda of making more money.

if she truly cared about feminism, we would have heard more from her. she's so influential, one tweet about gaza could ramp up support for the Palestinian people in a heartbeat. one post saying "i love making my coffee at home, #freePalestine" could put starbucks out of business. one story post, one tweet, out of THOUSANDS can do so much good. essentially, if she puts "i'm not touring until the us government provides adequate healthcare and housing to all of their citizens" on her story, the us government would get it done by the next day.

additionally, she uses the lgbtq community to her advantage. i'm queer, have been for my whole life. and i would like to point out that she didn't say anything about lgbtq rights until AFTER it was completely acceptable to, and now that homophobia is on the rise (so is racism and misogyny (wonder if that's connected (hmmmmm i wonder 🤔🤔🤔 (pls read the sarcasm)))) she says nothing. additionally, she doesn't fight for anything. at all. even if it's related to feminism. unless it's related to her.

she shared a public statement about roe v wade, made with michele obama, stating that she felt terrified about it being overturned. and to her, that's the peak of feminism.

this isn't negating the way she's changed lives. the bonuses she gave to her tour bus drivers are life changing. the donations to homeless shelters and places where people can get food for free are enough to fund MONTHS if not YEARS worth of meals. her charity to women's organizations is amazing. she uses her money for good, more than some of these other celebrities out here.

however, that being said, shes a capitalist, not a god.

i think we should do best to remember that.

ok top 5 least favorite parts of that article lol:

1. taylor sings on her tour even when she’s stressed!! (she did have to reschedule one night after a girl died bc of unsafe conditions. taylor was so sad 💔)

2. girls have been told that our natural feminine interests, like love and glitter, are silly. but if we monetize those things, then more “female art” gets made! #feminism

3. horcruxes, infinity stones, gandalf

4. i thought about bringing up the fact that taylor’s career never actually died or even suffered that greatly, but then i decided not to, because what matters is that she felt canceled

5. “female rage”

[andhumanslovedstories]

Feel free not to answer this but I was wondering if I could ask you about your job. I’m thinking about becoming a nurse but I’m not sure it’s a good fit. Do you have any advice or recommend it? Thank you 💜

Oops! I wrote a wildly long answer! Hope it helps!

Let me know if you have more specific questions, but here are some general thoughts. 

incoming like 1700 words okay

There are so many different ways to use a nursing degreel. Right now I’m a med surg bedside nurse in the hospital float pool, which means I don’t have an assigned floor and I go wherever is currently short staffed. Before that, I was a home health nurse where I could spend up to eight hours a night reading a book while a kid slept peacefully in the bed. I also worked in a different part of home health briefly (hated it, you have to be on the ball with scheduling but some nurses preferred it) where instead of doing full shift bedside care for one patient, I went to a bunch of different patients’ houses in one day, doing tasks like setting up their medication for the next month or doing wound care. All three of those jobs use the same basic skill set but are very different in practice. 

Even within the hospital, a behavioral health nurse has a different night than an inpatient rehab nurse who has a different night than a short stay surgery nurse who has a different night from an ED nurse who has a different night than an ICU nurse who has a different night than a labor and delivery nurse who has a different night than a postpartum nurse. And that’s just night shift, which is what I work and doesn’t have nearly as many specialties working as are there during the day.

This answer--nursing is so broad, you can do anything!!--is true but not necessarily useful, so I’ll get more specific. 

There are a few things that are important to me about nursing. 

It is a job that contributes value to the world. Even if the American healthcare system was perfect, you would need caregivers like nurses. Even if the American healthcare system ceased to exist tomorrow, you would still need caregivers like nurses. Even on my shittiest nights, I can point to something I did that helped someone in some way. Not all jobs can say that. 

I do good work and then I go home. This is more bedside nursing specific, but it’s important to me. I can’t take the work home with me. Emotionally, sure, I can do that, but physically, my patients stay at the hospital when I clock out. I have handed over the responsibility of them to another nurse, then I get to leave, and my free time is my own. I can always opt into more work of the administrative type, but I don’t have to.

It’s a good stable income. This will depend on where you live and your speciality, but in general, yeah. Easy to get hired, especially right now, hiring bonuses, overtime if you’re the type of person to pursue that (this is advice for later in your career if you start it, but I’d strongly strongly strongly advise limiting how many extra shifts you pick up while you’re still learning). Solid reliable income. 

Those all come with some caveats. It’s a stable income, but it often plateaus at a mid level salary range unless you move up into a more administrative role (overgeneralizing this, but true often enough). You can be under a lot of pressure to pick up and stay late (16 hour shifts!) because staffing runs lean. You’ll rarely have all the help you need, especially on night shifts. I get called every single day I’m not working asking if I want to come in. Burnout is so so high right now, and often it seems like admin is like “well new nurses graduate every day so”. Some floors I’ve been on, the senior most nurse has 18 months experience. That’s bad, that’s stressful beyond belief when things are life and death. 

It’s physically demanding work. A lot of bedside nurses leave bedside because they’ve hurt their backs moving patients. I know I’ve seriously tweaked some muscles, and the amount I’m on my feet is not great for my poor weak right ankle. There’s also other physical demands, i.e. helps to have a strong stomach. People will tell you CNAs (certified nursing assistants) or techs do all the incontinence care. They’re correct but also wrong because 1) who the fuck is staffed with CNAs, especially at night, and 2) okay you’ve got a CNA but they’re busy helping change another patient so are you just gonna let this person sit in their shit for 30 minutes? I do incontinence care about every night. There’s the other bodily fluids as well--blood, mucus, pus, Just Ambiguous Goop Hey Where’s That Coming From. Not to mention wound care, which can be gnarly. Like lift up a skin fold, find some maggots in necrotic flesh gnarly. And since so many wounds are on the tailbone and groin, incontinence care and wound care are often the same thing. 

There’s also the emotional stuff. Maybe your patient is dying and just got told today. Maybe they’re dying and they’re comfort care and the whole family is in the room crying every time you go in. Maybe they’re going into withdrawal. Maybe they only speak taishanese and there’s no translators available. Maybe this is their first night in the hospital ever. Maybe this is their 180th night. Maybe they’re terrified of pain and they don’t trust you to help control it. Maybe they’re so mad that they’re in the hospital. Maybe they’re refusing to be discharged because they have nowhere safe to go. Maybe they’re confused and keep trying to stand up on two broken hips. Maybe they had a traumatic brain injury and won’t stop screaming for your entire 12 hour shift. Maybe they really want to tell you about society’s freeloaders. Maybe you walk into their room to answer a call light and they’re sobbing and also you’ve never met this person before. Maybe their husband died five minutes before you got on shift. Maybe they’ve sexually harrassed multiple caregivers and you aren’t allowed to be alone with them. Maybe they’re mean, and sure there might be nuance to that meanness, but goddamn are they an asshole and goddamn they are still your patient. 

Maybe all that sounds bad to you, the physical and the emotional work. I don’t like wound care, so I’m not a wound and ostomy nurse (but I still do wound care). I like talking to my patients, so I’m not an ICU nurse (where the joke is that your patients can’t talk back. heard an ICU nurse darkly refer to their job as “watering crops”. Not work I’m interested in, but thank god some people are) (but I still take on very high acuity patients). I don’t like chaos and triage so I’m not an emergency room nurse (and yet? still chaos!). I like giving patients medications and warm blankets and whatever food they’re allowed to have, I like talking to them how their day went and what’s gonna happen tomorrow, I like checking in on them and finding them soundly asleep, so I’m a med surg night nurse who hates when I hate to wake people up for neuro checks. 

(Med surg, by the way since I didn’t know either before I started nursing school, is medical-surgical nursing. According to the Academy of Medical-Surgical Nurses, med surg nurses “provide care to adults with a variety of medical issues or who are preparing for/recovering from surgery.” Isn’t that the most expansive category you’ve ever heard of? It’s the catch all of the hospital and, as I like to think as a med-surg nurse who actually likes med-surg nursing, the very heart of bedside nursing and should be respected far more than it is sometimes. But that’s a different rant.) (More respect for generalists!!)

Here’s a final thought: If you don’t like sick people, don’t go into nursing. Not everyone is kind and compassionate in the same way, but kindness and compassion should be the foundation of your work. Kindness, compassion, critical thinking, diligence. The role of a nurse is to be a patient advocate. Sometimes that can be advocating for the patient against what you think is the right thing for them to do. How can you protect the patient’s safety and autonomy? How can you help them be an active participant in their care? What do they want? How can you get that for them? This isn’t the same as “dilaudid and ice cream every 3 hours” (sometimes it can be!), but it can be encouraging them to go through with wound care even though it is so painful because otherwise it won’t heal, and it’s thinking about timing their pain meds to take effect in conjunction with the wound care, and it’s practicing the wound care steps with another nurse before you do it on a person so you don’t fuck it up (I. hate wound care yall). It’s being aware that the stakes are life and death, but also dignity and embarrassment, comfort and pain, hope and despair, autonomy and force. It’s an honor to care for people, but you have to be aware of the power you have in those circumstances and the ability you have to be neglectful or cruel. It’s hard to be overworked and underpaid and yelled at and bored and tired and at just another day at the sickness factory and still be thoughtful and kind. Every day at work, I have to push myself to be a version of myself that I like and I respect. Sometimes I don’t manage that, and it’s feels so much worse than when I had a lazy shift as a barista. But I like having a job that pushes me to try, and to have a job that matters if I do it well. Nursing forces me to be a version of myself that others can rely on, and I love that about the job. This is not a career for everyone, but I’ve found it tremendously rewarding, even as I’ve also found it incredibly frustrating. 

If this intrigues you, maybe nursing! If it doesn’t, that’s fine. There’s lots of ways to help the world without burning yourself out.

[dailycharacteroption]

Family Hunter (Slayer Archetype)

(art by shenfeic on DeviantArt)

 A common theme in gothic horror, as well as horror in general, is the idea of a killer that doesn’t just have it out for you, but your entire family. In gothic horror such familiaricide is usually a vaguely-defined curse or hidden monster, or else perhaps a killer that uses supernatural means to track and put down a family, hunting every last member.

The reasons for doing so vary. Perhaps a powerful figure essentially put out a hit on an entire family line (perhaps one of royal lineage), or perhaps the assassin in question has a personal grudge against an entire family. Or perhaps there is a curse, and these murderers are only answering a supernatural call without any real connection to them. Or perhaps in a slightly more heroic turn, the family in question is thoroughly evil and needs to be hunted down.

No matter the case, the so-called “family hunter” slayers specialize in targeting a single family, but are also able to exploit other such bonds on an almost supernatural level, making them deadly not just to the family, but also anyone they are connected with, as well as any sort of beings that are unified by some special bond.

 As one might expect, these slayers focus in on a single family to target with their predations, and thanks to a few occult tricks, they always know if there is anyone left, able to magically discern the next of kin of one of their targets. If in theory they succeed in wiping out a family, they can choose a new one with a month of research.

Eager as they are to slay this family, their weapons and attacks are that much more lethal against blood relatives of that family.

While normally these killers can focus on only one target for study at a time, if multiple nearby targets share a connection, such as being related, creator and creation, summoner and summoned, undead spawn and master, magical domination, or even the bond between master and familiar and the like, they can exploit how the bond makes them similar to study such beings all at once. Such targets don’t have to be part of their target family either.

Further still, they know tactics to isolate their studied target, cutting them off from support of nearby allies.

Interested in a slayer that specializes in very specific targets? Perhaps one that specializes in studying large groups at once in certain conditions? This archetype might be quite useful for a morally dubious character or NPC that evokes fear in those they hunt. You primarily lose slayer talents, so there is a cost for this specialization, of course, but for the flavor and the potential bonuses, it can be quite good in the right circumstances.

 Now obviously this archetype is mostly meant for villain npcs, but players can take it to with the right backstory. However, I’d like to point out the implications of the mechanic where a family hunter that succeeds completely can select a new family to hunt later. Obviously if they are some sort of professional I can see this, or perhaps are devoted to destroying evil lineages. However, if they are motivated by revenge, they might move to new families for a variety of reasons, such as conflating the crimes of another clan with those of their original, or having developed a bloodlust only sated by destroying families. Others, however��� might just not do it anymore, perhaps retiring, turning themselves into the authorities, or even retraining out of the archetype.

  Generations ago, the Akullus clan summoned forth multiple Acrididaemons, the embodiments of death by insect plagues and the starvation such events bring. The fiends brought ruin upon the countryside, such that the deaths continued long after being banished. The survivors of that time swore that the Akullus clan would suffer for their evil forever, training hunters to pursue every last withered stem and branch of that family tree.

 With a hand glowing with the sacred sign of the Four-winged Eagle, a mysterious figure healed the son of the mayor of a remote little town. However, that mark is a sign of the deposed royal family, and with disturbing swiftness the new regime’s assassins descend upon the village chasing the rumor and leaving a trail of bodies unless someone intervenes.

 They say that the Elbors are cursed by the sea, doomed to die if they come to close to the ocean. In truth there is no curse, but they do risk peril by approaching the Valtus Sea, where the locathah that they wronged centuries ago still lurks, an ancient undead being that watches them from afar, snatching them up when they come within reach of the sea.

[shadowfromthestarlight]

oh yeah so here’s what happened

i ended up getting an offer for a position i interviewed for. i was really surprised because they didn’t get back to me right after they talked to my references. maybe i was their second choice, idk. anyway, i was pleased. i made the unfortunate mistake of telling them i’d get back to them right away, within the next day. but the next day my own firm told me that if i stayed, they’d be supportive of me moving next year to work remotely in another state. they approved my august vacation. they matched the salary offer (which is gonna come to like idk $50 a month after tax it’s nothing lol) and they said they understood they had to do more to incentivize people so they were changing the messaging around remote work to be more flexible, planning on bonuses in september, and bringing on new people to help with our workload as soon as possible. of course, the biggest thing to me was agreeing to let me move next year. i hadn’t thought they’d agree, but i gave them a chance anyway, and they did.

so that made my current job very attractive to me... i could stay with the same team and all the same clients and not have to deal with the stress of a transition in the middle of my field’s busy season, and i’d achieve a long-term goal. it was six of one and half a dozen of the other financially. but i was seriously considering the other job because it offered full-time remote work with all the challenges and rewards that brings, and it was exciting - something new, possibly unforeseen opportunities. the two partners are really interesting, too, and i was intrigued by the chance to become friends with them. i couldn’t choose, i wanted to talk it out, so i made the other unfortunate mistake of telling them that i was still considering the pros and cons of accepting their offer or staying with my firm and needed a little more time. they got mad and rescinded their offer. i said i understood (and to a degree i do, they need someone and can’t wait indefinitely for a candidate to make up their mind), apologized for giving them the wrong impression and offending them, and explained that i had truly taken their offer seriously (we work in the same field so i felt really bad about burning a bridge) and they didn’t reply lol. i was relieved the decision had been made for me but also felt like a major coward for not making it myself but was also excited about the fact that i really can move next year and not worry about jobs but i was also terrified that the other people would be so mad that they’d trash my reputation in the community or even hold it against my firm as a whole or the person who’d served as a reference for me. i told the reference what happened (while sobbing the entire time) and she wasn’t mad, she told me i’d made a rookie mistake and made them think i was just playing games when i really wasn’t, that quite frankly i was probably never going to get some nice email back accepting my apology, but that it probably wasn’t going to haunt me forever and i calmed down a great deal.

also yesterday i was talking to a coworker about it and she said that if these people really do hold a grudge and go around talking badly about me or saying that our firm is shady or s/t it says more about them than it does about me and that’s a fair point and i felt way better. i’m now really glad i didn’t take it and feel really excited to move forward. i’m off the job search, at least for the next few months, because i’m too busy and can’t deal with making a transition now. i even, out of politeness, called off another interview i was going to do on thursday because i knew i couldn’t start this summer. if i do move next year and do my job remotely from oregon, my firm is going to ask me to make a one-year commitment and i would be willing to agree. i’m open to finding something in oregon but also think it would be a good idea to have a stable job when i go and to make a slow transition. i spoke to everyone who practices in my field in oregon and they really need more people so i’ll connect with them again and see if i can make a transition by assisting them with a few cases here and there.

the big thing will really be to just figure out where to go, specifically. the portland area is where a lot of the jobs are and it’s easier transportation-wise, but i want to be somewhere quieter and i want to be closer to california so i can vacation there whenever i want. i talked to someone who’s in bend the other day and she said i should really consider going to central oregon and i really will, i’m just concerned about not being able to find a place to live lol. and i don’t want to be too remote, at least not yet, as i need to be able to visit with family. but it’s still a year away so i’ll look into it and keep thinking about it. my family is now totally supportive of me wanting to move and so are my coworkers and that’s really nice. i genuinely feel really lucky. i’ve been through a lot emotionally over the past week (i’ve cried more than i have in the past 12 months lol) but things are really looking up.

i have so much to tell the 5 of you who care lol

[ostrichmonkey-games]

Design Thoughts 🤔

I have this in progress game thing (that will not be finished any time soon so) that tries to synthesize elements of Forged in the Dark, Belonging Outside Belonging/No Dice No Masters, and Apocalypse Keys into one thing.

So I love setting elements as a piece of tech from BoB stuff, but I always find it a little tricky to use them in play. In the sense that they're another level of layer to keep in mind while also keeping in mind everything else about the game! The upcoming game Brinkwood: Refuge handles this in a very cool way (but its also not out yet so I don't want to talk too much about it) and Wanderhome's Natures and Traits also are really good, and feel nice to use (so nice that they hugely inspired the world elements in Extracausal: Monolith). So Step One of this game-design-idea is how can I make something using setting elements that really clicks for me?

Forged in the Dark is one of my favorite "design engines" in general. I love position/effect, actions, rolling a bunch of d6s, consequences/resistance, factions, I could go on and on. There are a lot of very fun levers to pull once you dig into FitD design. I also wildly prefer the Action system compared to a Skill list system. It provides enough structure that players aren't floundering on what to do at a given moment, but not so restrictive or overwhelming that some skill list stuff can turn into. But one thing I always forget to do (both as a player and GM) is utilize Devil's Bargains to their full extent! So Step Two is working on a way to make Devil's Bargains more consistent.

Apocalypse Keys rules (full disclosure, I worked on system development and also contributed a mystery and in progress playbook). One of my favorite part (which is also present in the game Librete!) is how instead of stats, you have a shifting pool of tokens (similar to BoB styles) that you can spend to get bonuses to your 2d6 roll. There are specific triggers that naturally come up in play for each playbook that get you more tokens, and then you can't hoard them because if you get too many tokens at a time, there are Consequences. It creates a very satisfying loop for your characters! So Step Three is how can I emulate this token-loop?

What I've got so far;

To enact a Devil's Bargain you must play a Setting Element. Devil's Bargains are traditionally meant to inject complications into the scene, and often times, so can Setting Elements. Feels appropriate to link them here. This also gives a clear mechanical moment for when a setting element is brought into play (which for me, is really the tricky part in existing games).

You have no stats/attributes that numerically define how many dice you roll at a given time, instead you must spend tokens 1:1 to gain d6. By limiting how many dice you might have access to in a given moment, Devil's Bargains become even more appealing! Rolling dice is good, and so is injecting new complications.

Each playbook has a set of conditions that when met, net you more tokens. This is basically the same format as Apocalypse Keys.

What is still kind of nebulous;

What happens when you gain too many tokens?

Is the loop of "determine if tokens are gained -> spend tokens -> get dice -> roll dice" too clunky? Will probably need to do some actual playtesting to figure this bit out. On paper, its not too distant from the typical FitD "conversation" involving position/effect, but I also want to include position/effect on top of everything else.

Basically everything else about the game lmao.

We'll see how everything starts to shape up in the next few months. This is very much something I'm just poking at here and there, since I have some other projects that take precedence and I would like to get done first.

Anyways, thoughts? Recs for things you think I should look at? What's up?

[surreality51]

Pro tip: if you have the financial means and situation*, look into collecting miles and points for travel through credit card sign ups. It will take an investment of time and energy to learn all the rules, collect the miles/points, and research the best redemption options, but you can go on some amazing trips for mind blowing prices.

Some of my past trips funded by miles, points, and sign-up bonuses: 

First class flight on Japan Airlines from Tokyo to Los Angeles for 70K American Airline miles + $75 cash

5 nights at the Sheraton in Tokyo for $0.

Roundtrip flight from Los Angeles to Maui for 25K British Avios miles and ~$50.

4 nights at the Fairmount Kea Lani in Maui for $0. 

4 nights at the Grand Hyatt Kauai for $0.

2 nights at the Park Hyatt Sydney for $0. 

There’s a whole online community dedicated to this hobby. I started with The Points Guy, but there are tons of blogs and forums out there. (Here’s their beginner’s guide with more details.)

I started collecting miles and points in 2011 and I’m still doing it now. It’s allowed me to see more of the world than I ever thought possible.

*Disclaimer: collecting miles and points is not for everyone and assumes a certain level of financial means, such as having a good credit score, the ability to pay off your credit card bill in full each month, the ability to meet minimum spending requirements to earn sign up bonuses, and no plans for taking out a major loan within the next 6-12 months (i.e. applying for a mortgage). It’s also easier for those in certain countries such as the US where credit card signup bonuses are more common. And it’s easier if you work with a partner to pool/double your miles and points.

[blzzrdstryr]

Like a fairy tale

Yandere!Diluc x maid!fem!reader

Wordcount: 1921

CW: Yandere and slightly suggestive themes.

You loved reading fairy tales as a child - they were magical and hopeful, a needed retreat for a child of destitute parents. They were a promise that if you were good and kind and beautiful enough, eventually some faraway prince would come by and save you from poverty. And you tried to be good - you were obedient and hardworking and you pushed your hardest in the local school, yet hardship and scarcity still trailed your every step - the meager earnings your parents made weren't enough to buy you nice clothes or let you eat until you were sated, which in turn made social interactions harder: some kids sneered and humiliated you, some tried to help you out of pity. You disliked both groups: whether they were friendly or aggressive towards you, they still looked down on you.

Thus you decided to distance yourself from your peers - there was no knight in shining armour galloping towards you on a snow white steed, yet a good education could be your golden ticket to a better rich life. It was hard at first - to work and to study and to help your parents all while ignoring the demeaning and insulting comments the bullies made, but you gritted your teeth and pushed forward, imagining how wealthy you’ll become in the future and in the end our efforts were rewarded - you graduated as the best student, that led you to receiving a scholarship from Sumeru academy. Sparks and shine appeared in your eyes as you read the letter, barely stopping yourself from outright squealing and jumping from joy.

The moment of happiness didn’t last long though, as a reality again reminded you that there’s no place for fairy tales in the real world - scholarship covered the full cost of apprenticeship, but only it - you still had to spend money on the journey from Mondstadt to Sumeru, a place to rent and food, and if you still could find a job after your arrival in the foreign country and pay off the later two, trip required mora that you never had. At first you had a mad idea to traverse Teyvat on your own two feet - it would be a slow and arduous process, but cheap nonetheless. You later gave up on this plan - archons didn’t give you any vision, nor did you have fighting and travelling experience to aid you on the trail that no doubt would be full of slimes, hilichurls and other dangerous monsters.

And that’s how you started job hunting - you took on any work that promised you a hefty pay, be it some boring reports for guild of adventurers or an exciting yet risky endeavor of getting information for an extravagant cavalry captain, which then led you to Dawn Winery. Head housemaid, Adelinde, posted a job opening for a maid, and the prospect of a stable salary, free food and comfortable bed was enough to lure you in there - two or three years ago the previous owner of the winery died in the accident and his successor left Mond for some reason, leaving the maintenance and management of the winery on the shoulders of the said housemaid.

After a quick interview, the head maid demanded you to show her your cleaning skills, which you effortlessly did, having to look after the house by yourself all your childhood. It seems she was satisfied, as she nodded to you and asked to follow her as she led you to your room. Compared to the other two maids here, Hillie and Moco, who preferred to spend their work time in idle chat, you came off as highly professional and diligent worker. This contrast raised both your position and salary in the winery, as Adelinde started to entrust you with tasks more interesting than simple sweeping and cleaning.

You were outside the winery the day you met Diluc - returning from the city and carrying several stacks of milk and wheat you got chased by the hilichurls. Monsters didn’t leave you, no matter how long and how far you ran. You were ready to drop all the goods and have Adelinde to scold you for wastefulness and dereliction when Ragnvindr appeared and stole a breath from you. He looked just like the prince from your childhood tales, impossibly pretty and strong, arriving just when the creatures caught up with you and then defeating all of them with a single slash of great claymore. And just like a fairytale prince he helped you to get up and collect the scattered baggage and asked if you were okay. Then you two headed for the winery, you didn't know that he was it's owner at the time, chatting and thanking him, as he carried purchases. Adelinde almost fainted when she saw the return of the prodigal master in your company. After hastily taking goods from his hands, she made you apologize for rudeness and insubordination, but Diluc interrupted you saying it was fine.

Ragnvindr heir returned back to the winery and life went on its own, except the unreadable glares Diluc started to send you when you both were in the same room. It started off small: the quick glances that soon grew into intense staring. With his impassive stone face it was impossible to tell why he was glaring at you so much, so you acted as polite and professional as you could in his vicinity - after all you didn’t want to get fired and look for a new job. The key to this riddle presented itself during one day.

It was a bleak windy morning when Adelinde sent you to the city again, and as you walked the sky darkened and rain started. You returned absolutely soaked and shivering, teeth chattering and limbs slightly numb from cold and when Diluc saw you he ordered you to change in a low commanding voice. Frightened by the possible dismissal, you hurried putting on the uniform. Because of the haste you pulled it too tightly, hiking up a maid dress a little. It wasn’t up enough to reveal your hips or thighs, showing just a portion of knees that was usually hidden by the wide skirt.

Diluc’s eyes were glued on the uncovered joints, a subtle blush appearing on his pale cheeks. You continued to work, feeling how he consumed your legs with his eyes alone. He is lusting after me. You didn't know what to do with that revelation back then, embarrassed and slightly scared of attracting master Diluc's attention.

Nonetheless, an answer quickly came on the next day as you found a bonus to your salary, so big that it could be considered a payment for the next month. Diluc, despite his usually impassive face, seemed to be ashamed of the thoughts he had yesterday, with the body language telling you of his true feelings.

A plan came to mind. You hated yourself for it at first - it was low and disgraceful, you felt like a stereotypical manipulative gold digger, yet still decided to realize it in life - you needed mora, as fast and as much as possible. Over the time you spent working at the Dawn winery you noticed that Diluc, despite his obviously high intelligence, wasn't really good at judging one’s character, so he fell for your scheme pretty easily. Design you had in mind was pretty simple - to stir him up with small, innocuous gestures and changes that would slip past the outsider’s eyes.

Sometimes you applied a thin layer of healing lip balm on your lips, that so conveniently happened shine and glitter under the light, sometimes you donned your dress a little bit higher, opening the view of two delicate knees and sometimes after cleaning and working all day you felt so hot that you had to unfasten one or two buttons to cool off. Diluc, despite not showing it on his face, was obviously distracted and aroused, hands clenched into fists and a shaky, barely controlled exhale escaping his nose.

He started to pile you with bonuses and prizes; “for a well done job”, he said one time, averting his gaze and masking the shame in his voice under a huff. He also started to request you to specifically clean the rooms he occupied, his eyes sizing up almost every inch of your body. You felt how the lust and desire radiated off him, how his hands itched to trace your skin and have you at his mercy, yet he stopped every time with his steel strong control and self-discipline. You sensed how it dwindled little by little.

Diluc, in some perverted sense, was that fair prince of your childhood daydreams that would save you from poverty.

You almost had saved up the needed amount of money when you noticed the loss of your most cherished possession - an invitation to the Sumeru academy and scholarship certificate. With heart booming in your chest you started to look for it in the whole winery, without giving out that you were searching for something. It seems that you were unsuccessful in your attempts, as master of the winery soon called you into the office.

Here, he was sitting behind the desk with a familiar paper in his hand - your eyes widened as you saw it and you had an urge to run up to him and snatch the invitation from him. You performed a curtsy instead, closing the door behind you and waiting for him to speak, eyes still on the sheet in Diluc’s hold.

“[First], you are a diligent and skillful employee, Adelinde has a very high opinion of you” he started from afar, a slight rosy blush dusting his cheeks at "skillful employee".

"So as your employer I wouldn't want any harm to befall on your person, and" he shaked the invitation a couple of times, "it came to my attention that you were planning on travelling to Sumeru. I advise you against this nonsensical idea".

You gritted teeth, careful not to insult him with the couple of barbed words at the tip of your tongue. Nonsensical idea? This was your goal, a main reason why you worked so much and allowed yourself so little.

“I am sorry, master Diluc, I am afraid I can’t abandon this idea”, you say, response flat and controlled, a thunderstorm of emotions hidden beneath the faux calm, “It is my goal, and the main reason why I work here”. So I can have a bright and secure future, in which I won’t have to worry about the tomorrow ever again.

“I also learned that you were born into a low income family and you had to struggle in your life because of that ” a sudden mention of your less than glorious origin makes your face burn from the shame you thought you buried a long time ago. You are stunned, so he continues: “I believe this little endeavor of yours is also motivated by your desire for a stable future. Drop it, I travelled all across the Teyvat and there are horrors that can easily destroy you both in body and spirit”.

He stands up from the desk, and gets closer to you: “I can look after and provide for you, just stay there and you won’t have to worry about the future again ”. His hold on the paper gets tighter, pyro vision shining with a dangerous glint. A faint smell of smoke spreads through the room - a warning if you remain stubborn and unyielding.

Who could have known that the fair prince was a greedy dragon all along?